#too busy trying keep the motives up to be a photographer too

[jaegeraether]

Sunsets and footballers (Part 34)

Lucy Bronze x Reader (32)

Masterlist (other parts here)

That was not what she’d expected at all. YFN had done her research and put her own puzzle pieces together, though her theory had missed the mark by a significant amount.

“I know what you’re thinking.”

YFN couldn’t even close her mouth.

She walked closer, lightly treading with elegance as if to not scare her away. When she was close, her eyes lingered on the scar cutting her eyebrow with empathy.

YFN managed to find herself and cleared her throat. “Your misdirection was very believable.”

“I was worried the voice would give it away.” She said almost shyly. Her voice was more regal now, less…common? Clever.

YFN’s relief must have been clear, and she didn’t realise herself just how worried she’d been. “And my misdirection was not entirely untrue…” She gestured around her. “This is her house.”

They were standing in the house of JK Rowling. The woman she’d assumed she was meeting. It all made sense, didn’t it? Joe. Lumos. When she’d originally started researching the company, she’d come across the other Lumos, the charity founded by Joe. Though, she made sure to not hold any assumptions going into their meeting.

“Why her?” She asked, knowing it was a little rude to do so. “Why hide behind someone the public hates so vehemently?”

“I needed someone with power, someone rich, someone people could believe had the capabilities of doing so.”

“So Lumos is a branch of her company?”

“No…it’s my company, my money. I spoke to Joe about the idea of using her as a bit of an alias, as well as using the same name as her charity.”

“But…why hide at all?” She really didn’t understand. She was wealthy, powerful and beyond all else… “People adore you.”

“I thought about it, trust me. But how would that look, having me try to lift the women’s game? It would look like a publicity stunt, like they needed me when they don’t. I need them to show that they can do it themselves. They have the motivation, the will, the support and now they have you. At least, I still hope they do?”

YFN was fully aware now that up until this point, she’d been disillusioned as to the identity of ‘Joe’, right down to the reason that she’d chosen her. She was a writer. Exactly what Joe herself would have done. This was a better scenario, though the fact that her guise was the infamous author would not be well received. She didn’t try to understand the complexities of it all. Looking beyond all of that, she knew that the person she’d spoken to on the phone was genuinely passionate. Caring. Hard-working. She understood that she had been a victim of her title and knew deep down that they could accomplish incredible things together.

“They still do...”

“Tea is prepared in the estate room, ma’am.” Benjamin interrupted politely.

“There’s hot chocolate too, YFN.” She promised with a lovely smile that begged to be photographed.

How did she know?

“Thanks, Kate.”

“Cath, please. Only the media calls me Kate.”

“Did you ever have any intention of meeting me?”

To her credit, Catherine was very similar the person she was presented as in public, however the more time they spent together, the more liberated she became with her thoughts. YFN realised how much of a burden it must have been, stuck under the thumb of royal obligation and public expectation, though in this room, there were just the two of them.

“No,” she allowed herself a little smirk as she took a sip of tea. “No, my intention was most definitely to stay invisible in this. And besides you, I plan to keep it that way.”

“You’re not worried about Mark?”

“I knew that hiding behind Joe would mean the possibility of people assuming she was directing this, and furthermore that she would have enemies try to pull her down. She did warn me about Mark. He’s…persistent.”

“A business rival I’m assuming?”

“I believe Joe managed to ruffle his feathers a little with a business deal a few years back. She said he’s forever since been adamant to undermine her achievements, and to make matters worse, he doesn’t care that Lumos is a charity. See, I originally assumed we’d be safe if I created a company with the same name, because who would attack a charity? As it turns out, Mark would.”

“And I’m guessing the idea of you having a personal conversation with him to quietly nip this in the bud is out of the question?”

“Indubitably.”

YFN bit her lip as she thought about the situation she found herself in. She wanted to ask if her husband knew, but knew it was the wrong question for the conversation. What Catherine was doing was separate from that. Separate from her life as a royal, as a mother, as a leader.

“No, William doesn’t know.”

YFN’s eyes shot up to find Catherine’s. David wasn’t wrong, she was intelligent. She had those rare gifts of intrapersonal and interpersonal intelligence, the types that YFN felt she also had; the ability to truly understand herself and other people. It was perfect for Catherine’s main role, really.

“A personal project then?”

“Of sorts.”

“With…very high ambitions?”

“Yes.”

The conversation was quick witted and much more was being said in the words they didn’t vocalise.

“I’m Australian, so forgive my lack of knowledge…but I wasn’t aware you were so passionate about football?”

“It does tend to be William’s passion more than mine, however I do love sport. And while football may not be my favourite, it is England’s favourite, and it’s where the change needs to happen first.”

First? Her eyebrows raised. “You plan on expanding Lumos to other sports?”

“Gradually, yes. The focus begins on all things football and will grow to encapsulate all female sport.”

“Not male sports?”

“Potentially in the future, if we ever reach equivalence, however that is not my intention. My main goal is to focus on the female perspective. I find sport to be one of the largest places of gender inequality and male dominance. It’s going to be a tough field to make change.”

YFN couldn't help but feel that her choice of JK Rowling as a hidden alias was detrimental to her success. Catherine read her thoughts again, she seemed to be good at that.

“Joe…is a friend. I’m unsure of your opinion in the matter but I don’t agree with her opinions and I did think that using her would only be of benefit to her if people had dug deep enough to assume she was behind it. “

She wanted the best for Joe, even at the sacrifice of a little face. Even after her controversial opinions. The admiration must have been written on her face from Catherine’s returning look.

“And Joe did also help me choose you.”

“That explains a query of mine. I’m a writer, first and foremost.”

“Please don’t think that I only chose you because it’s what Joe would have done. It’s not. I looked into you and your work meticulously. It took me a long time to find you, and it wasn’t just for your work as a writer. It was the way you interviewed people, the way you approach questioning, your ability to be both affable and determined. You know exactly what you want, and how to get it without sacrificing the comfortability of the people you speak to.”

It was the nicest compliment she’d ever received, and she felt herself blushing a little. Catherine put down her tea.

“Also, I found some of your photography. I understand you moved away from it and over to the publication side of your previous workplace. Photography happens to be a passion of mine. I believe it to be an important artform, and it did motivate me towards pursuing this project. Without it, I wouldn’t be here with you. I’d be off with the other duties that are required of me.”

Catherine had studied Art History, if YFN remembered correctly. It began making even more sense.

“What…is the timeline you had in mind?”

“The only timeline I’ve considered so far is that of football. I want us to have coverage of all of it by the end of next year. I hope that it’s a fully run operation by then, and we can expand into tennis and cricket.”

The hot chocolate did its job then and YFN yawned so hard, she worried she was being rude.

Catherine gave a polite chuckle.

“It’s getting late. We have a few days to talk this over more, Joe is in the US for another week, and I’ve managed to wriggle out of some royal engagements for the next few days. Shall we pick it up tomorrow?”

Things had begun to come even more into focus the next day after they’d spoken a little more. It was her passion project, and one that YFN felt honoured to be a part of. The only people who were aware of it were her Lumos management, Joe, several staff, and now YFN. Catherine’s management team for Lumos was kept small and tight, and their main jobs were not limited to networking throughout the sports, optimising their business and even planning for the future of the company.

In the early morning, they’d all taken a meeting together in the conference room on Zoom. As the meeting began, YFN was surprised to see a few of the individuals had been people she’d met at the charity event. Catherine really did have people everywhere.

“It’s a good thing that it became a necessity to meet.” Catherine admitted. “I think now that we know each other better and you can fully see our goals, we’re going to benefit from it.”

YFN agreed with that. And now that she realised just how much influence, wealth and power were behind the company, her confidence grew as well as her appetite for more.

The meeting went for hours with so many points of business that YFN didn’t really understand. Luckily, they hadn’t expected her to, as her focus was primarily on the actual product they were providing. She hadn’t realised just how much effort went into the secrecy of a company, or the background decisions, compromises, and discussions that she’d previously thought of as trivialities.

The money of course would be noticed by William who knew his wife had a passion project, but didn’t know what. It was her baby. The way she led her group made that very, very clear, and although she wasn’t used to running a company, she was so well-read and had educated herself so well that she wasn’t just a figurehead, she was leading them and not afraid to ask questions to the more experienced businesspeople.

The meeting became interesting when the team unanimously agreed on the expansion of the employees after their successful first round and had already had many candidates lined up which they filtered through together. Catherine encouraged YFN to get involved in that as she actually worked on the ground with them and managed them.

Following that, management went back onto other business details and Catherine used the opportunity to give YFN a phone very similar to her own, and it was purely set up to work with her and the management team. No wonder why she’d always been so quick at replying and holding that boundary between Lumos and her other duties, she’d had an entirely separate phone for it.

With the need for more people, came the eventual agreement for an office space. London made sense as it was central, and most games would be there. They’d already acquired the space and were just waiting for the final go-ahead which Catherine gave that approval for. YFN was grateful that the discussions moved onto design and architecture, furniture and parking which gave her the perfect opportunity to decide how to use the multiple sets of cutlery with her different lunch dishes.

Catherine had laughed at that, and it was warming to see her so relaxed outside of the public eye.

Listening to them talk about the office, she was pleased to see that it wasn’t too far from Lucy’s apartment, knowing it would be convenient, though she knew it would be best for her to stay central in Birmingham for the meantime, just until they became a lot busier. She could deal with the drive until then. Besides, she wondered if Leah and Jordan would be back together anyways. Thinking of that, she messaged Jordan.

YFN: Where's my update??

She was at training so didn’t expect a response until that night, however.

“…background checks.”

YFN’s head shot up. They were talking about background checks for the employees they were deciding on. She wondered how in depth they would be and didn’t have to wonder for long as they began to discuss them in depth. Her eyes widened knowing that they must have done the exact same for her. Catherine noticed that.

“It’s standard procedure, I’m sure you can understand.”

She nodded. Of course, she could understand. They wouldn’t let anyone sit next to or run a business with the future Queen of England.

The day dragged on, though Catherine had made sure they all had several breaks and took the time to show YFN around Joe’s property. It truly was beautiful, yet she couldn’t miss the amount of security who were wandering around the estate, a few with their eyes on the pair.

“Can you…understand why I’m wanting to stay a silent figure in all of this?” She asked gently as they wandered through the garden. It was actually a day of decent weather, the sun poking through the clouds.

“I can, and I respect it. I’m also glad we’ve met. Everything makes much more sense now.”

“Fantastic. Now I know we’ve already agreed to keep this between just us, however there’s Lucy, correct?”

YFN nodded. She didn’t like the idea of keeping anything from her.

Catherine stopped and turned to her, taking her hands gently. She was taller than the little Australian of course, even more so with heels. “YFN…I know what it’s like to have to keep secrets. It’s not fun. I’ve seen it tear relationships and families apart…”

They way she held her eyes and spoke was so… motherly. So royal-like. Beyond that, she could see the pain in her eyes and she wondered just how much this woman had been through.

“I’m okay with you telling Lucy. I don't want your relationship to be affected, and I trust your judgement, but please stress to her to importance of secrecy. One leak and all that we’re trying to accomplish disappears.”

YFN relaxed a little. She could tell Lucy.

“Thank you, Cath. I really appreciate that.”

They were just settling down to dinner when Catherine was pulled aside for a phone call. Their meeting had ended shortly before that, YFN full up on information and motivation for the upcoming work she had to do. She worried a little about Barcelona.

Dory: We may have had sex. Then I cried and kicked her out at 10pm.

YFN choked on mashed potato. How had she managed to choke on the least chokeable form of potato?

YFN: What?!

Dory: When are you home?

Catherine walked back in then looking a little stressed and apologetic.

“I’m so sorry, duty calls back in London. I’m afraid we’ll have to cut this trip short. You’re more than welcome to stay here another day...”

“That’s okay, I can leave tomorrow if that works.”

It did work. Catherine finished her dinner and left apologetically and this time, with a gentle, motherly hug and promises of a bright future working together. It was strange being left in the large house alone with just Benjamin and a few staff wandering around. Her phone buzzed and it was her flight change being emailed, a change to tomorrow morning. YFN checked in and then replied to Jordan.

YFN: I’ll be home midday tomorrow.

She pocketed her phone. Another buzz. She pulled it back out.

Lucy: Hi, little one. Can I call?

#woso #womens football #woso community #woso fanfics #woso imagine #woso soccer #jordan nobbs #lucy bronze #lucy bronze x reader #engwnt #lionesses #lucy bronze imagine #woso x reader #leah williamson

[the-boy-meets-evil]

tell me how it got this way | chapter 3

pairing: jungkook x f.reader (also hoseok x f. reader elsewhere in the fic) genre: angst, fluff, smut (other chapters) | non-idol!au rating: 18+, minors DNI warnings: swearing, mentions of drinking, reader is going through it with her found family, jimin is jimining, jungkook is actually super chill word count: 4.2k summary: jungkook runs into someone he wasn't expecting and yoongi is clear about how you should handle hoseok showing back up.

a/n: this fic has taken a bit of a turn from how i originally intended to write it. but hey, that's what happens sometimes. sometimes the characters are the ones to tell you where they want to go. with that in mind, the back half of the chapters are going to look different but i'm also way more motivated to finish them. thank you to @hot-soop & @ugh-yoongi for reminding me that characters can change. prev | masterlist | next

Jungkook likes when his jobs finish early so that he doesn’t have to hang around all day. He’s good at posing, not so much at sitting or standing still when the photographer can’t quite get the angle they’re looking for. It’s fine, though. Each job puts him one step closer to ditching all the odd jobs he picks up. The reality is that he’s usually too easily distracted to stick with one thing. But he likes modeling and they keep telling him he’s good at it, so he thinks this career choice might stick.

He’s waiting at the counter for both of his coffees to be ready when he feels a set of eyes on him. It feels like someone is trying to get his attention and he looks over to the other end of the counter. He recognizes the guy immediately. It’s the same guy that had made your body go all rigid and tense in a way he had never experienced before. Jungkook’s face gives nothing away as he smiles and looks back down at his phone. He’s waiting for a response from you confirming you’re not actually in the middle of something, which he realizes he should have checked before ordering the second coffee but, oh well. It’s much harder to say no when he comes bearing coffee. And in the time he’s known you, you’ve never said no to coffee.

“Hey,” the guy says and Jungkook looks up at the sudden closeness of the voice. Was his name Hoseok? Jungkook thinks that’s what you called him.

“Uh, hey,” Jungkook responds. 

“I think we almost met the other night?” The guy is pushing and it makes Jungkook uncomfortable, not for himself, he doesn’t care, but for you.

“I don’t know, man, I meet a lot of people,” Jungkook says noncommittally. It wasn’t a lie, not really. He does meet a lot of people in his line of work.

“But how many do you rush away from at a gala?” The other man raises an eyebrow like he has Jungkook, who just shrugs.

“The gala was busy,” Jungkook says, still not really committing to anything.

“Would you stop acting like you don’t know exactly who I’m talking about?” the man asks. He looks annoyed but Jungkook doesn’t really care. 

“I don’t remember rushing away from anyone. I remember my date and I were both tired and we decided it was time to leave,” Jungkook answers evenly.

“So you do remember me,” the man concludes and Jungkook just shrugs. “I’m Hoseok, by the way.” 

The man says and extends his hand. Jungkook looks at it for a moment before deciding he can shake it without turning it into a big deal.

“Jungkook,” he responds.

“Listen, this is awkward, but since you’re clearly close to her, I wondered if she had mentioned me after you two left,” Hoseok asks and it’s clearly taking a lot for him to get the question out. Jungkook doesn’t say anything and Hoseok sighs. “Can you just get her to return my messages?”

Jungkook hesitates and surveys the other man. Truthfully, he’s a bit curious about this stranger that appears and causes that kind of reaction. Not that curious, though, that he wants to give him anything else. “I don’t know what to tell you. Whether or not she answers you is her business and I’m not about to try and tell her to do something for some random guy that cornered me in a coffee shop. And if you knew her like you said, you’d know she never does anything if she doesn’t want to.”

Hoseok opens his mouth to say something as a barista places two coffees in front of Jungkook. The sight of the two coffee cups momentarily stops the other man from saying anything. Jungkook takes advantage of this and raises one of the cups as if to say cheers and heads off without another word.

You haven’t been paying much attention to your phone, a habit that drives Namjoon up the wall when it’s during what he calls normal working hours. Truthfully, that’s partly why you do it. Sometimes he’s too tightly wound for his own good. He needs to get laid, and badly, but you know better than to suggest that again. One time was enough. Somewhere else in your apartment, the buzzer sounds, indicating that someone wants to come up. Since you haven’t ordered anything, you assume it’s probably someone you actually want to see and buzz them in without checking, unlocking your door on the way back to your desk. 

Even though you know someone is coming upstairs, you return to your desktop (a sign that you’re stuck when it’s too much for just the laptop), and re-read the offensive paragraph for the hundredth time, trying to figure out why it bothers you as much as it does. Something about it feels wrong, off, just completely terrible work. Are the words repetitive in a bad way? Is there not enough variety in the sentences? All you know is you hate it. And you can’t scrap it like you originally wanted to because then you would have to write something else in its place, which is equally offensive. Your brain has picked this exact moment to lose any original thought you once had. So here you sit, staring at the paragraph as if willing it to re-write itself.

You hear the front door open and close and a second later, tattooed fingers are placing a cup of coffee down on the table next to you. The hand is instantly familiar and you crane your neck around to smile up at Jungkook. He’s giving you that bunny smile you love, the one that makes him look far more innocent than he is. 

“I’m giving up writing,” you say as he moves to sit on the couch.

“Well the coffee shop was hiring, they had a sign up when I was just there,” Jungkook says, sitting down and sipping his coffee.

You turn fully around to glare at him, his smirk only further annoys you. “I’m serious, Jungkook, I’m quitting. It’s too much and I can’t do it.”

He answers the way he does because he’s heard you say this probably a few dozen times before and always for some variation of the same reason. You’ve got writer’s block or hate what’s on the page in front you or you’re stressed or nothing sounds right. And every time, what’s on the page is better than anything the majority of people in the world could write. He sighs and asks the question he already knows the answer to. “Can I read the part that’s convinced you that you need to quit?”

“No.” The answer is immediate, like always. He keeps asking anyway and you kind of like that about him.

“Come here,” he says and it’s not really a request. At least, it’s not really a request you can, or even want to, ignore.

So, you get up and walk over to settle down next to him. Your body sinks into the couch and he puts an arm around you. It’s easy to feel calm around him. Even though he’s all energy and a million projects, there’s also a sense of serenity that rolls off him. Not for the first time, you wonder if you like having him around so much because he’s never put pressure on you, never forces anything like a label or a conversation about what’s happening. You’re both content to just keep going the way you’re going.

It’s easy to just settle into him, something you’ve done countless times before. Jungkook seems to go into a sort of autopilot. He’s opening Netflix and flipping through your saved list for something, probably something that you started one of the other times he was over. And it’s nice to have someone else make the decisions. You spend your life making your decisions and making decisions for every character you write, which takes a lot. Since there’s this pressure to always make the right decisions for them.

As if sensing that he was losing you, Jungkook squeezes your shoulder and presses a kiss to the side of your head. It’s a gesture that’s sweet and affectionate, but also a way for him to pull your attention back to him. Hell, maybe all you need to get around this block is to let Jungkook distract you. There are much worse ways to lose yourself, honestly.

When you first met Yoongi, he wasn’t much for feelings and you weren’t even sure if he liked you. Honestly, sometimes you’re still not sure how he puts up with you the way he does. But you’ve long since picked up on his small ways of showing you that he cares. Min Yoongi isn’t one for words of affirmation and he’s not usually big on physical touch (unless he’s very drunk or your name is Park Jimin, then all bets are off). He does, however, really like to do small acts of service. Once you had mentioned while you were over that there was this one type of chip that you really loved and could almost never find. Somehow, the next time you were over, and every time since, a bag has been tucked away in the small pantry. It’s never out, never where you can see it, but it’s there. 

Yoongi also really enjoys quality time, which usually doesn’t involve much talking. Most times, you sit in silence while he paints and you either work on something you’re writing or, more often, read something yourself. Or play games on your phone. The first few times, it felt weird. Like why were you sitting in silence? You quickly got used to it and it only came up again briefly when Jimin started coming around. He couldn’t understand the two of you at first. Now, he accepts it without question.

This is not one of those times. This time, Yoongi is thoughtful and introspective. The people closest to you now are all annoyingly observant. Maybe it’s come with age or maybe you’re actually getting better at letting people in. Best not to dwell too much on it, you think.

“I think you have to talk to him,” Yoongi says, not for the first time. Jimin hasn’t come home yet and you find it easier this way, without Jimin’s interjections, even if they are incredibly well-intentioned.

“I don’t owe him that,” you respond.

“No, you don’t,” Yoongi agrees easily and you feel hopeful. For all of a second. “But you owe yourself that.”

“What does that mean?” You set down your book, realizing that if Yoongi has things to say, reading is a lost cause. 

“You can’t focus on anything else and you’re not going to be able to until you get whatever it is off your chest,” Yoongi says.

“I’m always like this when I’m speeding towards a deadline,” you say with a dismissive wave of your hand, and Yoongi rolls his eyes.

“You’re always looking for distractions, sure. Not like this, though,” Yoongi says.

“I think it’s just that passage I was talking to you about,” you say and frown. 

“That passage definitely isn’t your best,” Yoongi says and you pick up the nearest pillow to throw at him.

“Rude,” you say.

“Would you let me finish?” Yoongi asks, easily dodging the pillow. “It isn’t your best, but we both know you’re not going to submit that. We also both know, if you’re honest with yourself, that is, that you can’t fix it until you clear your mind.”

“I’m scared,” you admit and Yoongi softens.

“That’s the first time you’ve admitted that since you told me he showed up at the Gala,” Yoongi says. 

“I finally got my shit together, you know? I’ve got you and Jimin, things with Jungkook are easy, Namjoon has mellowed. Things are good. It’s taken me years to get here, but I’m finally here,” you say.

“And they still will be after you talk to him. You can still control the whole thing, get whatever you need to out of it. And then you can go back to writing in peace, mind clear,” Yoongi says.

“Maybe you’re right,” you admit, conceding just a bit. 

But it’s more than enough for Yoongi. He knows you’re going to go through with it. “I’ll be here every step of the way, promise.”

And you know he means it. Yoongi is careful with his words, uses them like each one means something real. They carry weight and you appreciate how they gather around you. It’s something so small, but you know that you can do it with him. Somehow, despite all your instincts otherwise, you know that you can trust Yoongi to always pick you up when you need him to. 

You’re about to say something else when Jimin bursts into the apartment and he’s not alone. He’s got a couple of bags in his hands and he’s beaming that smile that makes you nervous.

“I thought I’d pick up some dinner,” Jimin says and looks over at you with a smirk.

“And by dinner, did you mean Jungkook?” 

You’re surprised to see him and also kind of relieved. If you’re going to have to build up the strength for a conversation that you don’t really want to have, at least your second most comforting person is there too. 

“Jimin, we talked about bringing home strays,” Yoongi chides half-heartedly.

“Hey, I’m not a stray!” Jungkook protests. “Besides, I brought drinks.”

“And I thought since you were here already, we might as well have dinner and a couple of drinks,” Jimin says to you.

“Just a couple though, right, Jiminie? I have to actually be a human tomorrow,” you say.

“Of course, nothing crazy,” Jimin says dismissively while not meeting your eyes.

It is not a few drinks and honestly, that’s on you. In the over 2 years you’ve known Jimin, it’s never been just a few drinks when he’s been looking like that. It’s never been just a few drinks when he’s made a point of saying that nobody had to go into any sort of office or work setting early the next morning.

Maybe it would have been just a few drinks if Jungkook hadn’t let Hoseok’s name slip and if Jimin hadn’t then insisted on role-playing what you were going to say. Because he absolutely agreed with his incredibly smart boyfriend and wanted to be part of it. Which was how you ended up acting out the conversation with Jimin playing Hoseok, a disaster from the beginning. Not only had Jimin never actually met this man, but his response to everything was over-the-top. Again, you should’ve known better.

So you did what any rational, well-adjusted adult would do. You drank your feelings and used that as a way to push you forward. One more drink and it’s easier to think of what to say. One more drink and you find the courage to do what you need to do to clear your head. One more drink and you can take on anyone or anything. One more drink…

One more drink leads to your head feeling like it’s going to split open the next morning. You miss the days in college, where you could drink until the whole world was fuzzy, then get up the next morning for an 8 am class. Every part of your body hurts this morning and it’s a stark reminder that you’re getting older. As if the morning couldn’t get any worse, your phone starts emitting an ear-splitting ring that you’re convinced is different than normal. Maybe Jimin changed it. That’s absolutely something he would do. Demon.

You see that it’s Namjoon calling and you know that you should answer right away. But you’ve got a headache from drinking too much the night before and you know you’re actually ahead on something for once. You’re still deciding whether or not to answer it when it stops ringing and you’re thankful. Namjoon’s voice is not what you want to hear. Not that it’s unpleasant, just unwelcome in your current state. You’re not hungover, per se, you just don’t want to hear some rambling thoughts about something that he thinks is serious and actually doesn’t matter. Since you don’t have anything book related to talk about, you’re wondering if he’s called to talk about some sort of appearance or maybe the next project that you haven’t even started yet. Your phone beeps, indicating a voicemail and you audibly sigh, though there isn’t anyone else there to hear.

Namjoon’s voice comes through the second you hit play. “Hey, I hate to bother you but I really think this is important. It’s not work-related either. Just...call me back, okay?” 

There’s something about his voice that’s almost worrying to you. He doesn’t usually sound so soft or careful. Sure, he’s great at managing you. A big part of that comes from the fact that he doesn’t baby you. So the fact that he’s using such a cautious voice is enough to get you sitting up and hitting the redial.

“That was fast,” Namjoon answers, still an almost undetectable hint of nerves in his voice.

“I was debating answering when it stopped ringing,” you say. 

“Good to know you screen my calls even when you aren’t behind,” Namjoon says. He’s stalling.

“I wasn’t screening, I have a raging headache.” It’s true and this conversation is not doing anything to help it.

“I’m sorry about that.”

There’s an awkward pause and you wonder if you’re going to have to pull the information out of Namjoon when he seems so eager to share it. “What’s going on, Joon?”

“I’m not really sure how to say this...but I think your boyfriend is having an affair with my assistant.”

Silence. Confusion. Boyfriend? What boyfriend? You’d mentally agreed to at least hear Hoseok out and see if there was anything approaching friendship to even bother salvaging. Did Namjoon somehow think you were dating Hoseok? Like everyone had thought when you were in college?

You shook your head to clear the thoughts away. No, that was ridiculous. Namjoon doesn’t even know Hoseok. Why is your brain going there right away? And then, for some reason, your mind sticks to the fact that Namjoon said affair. Affair. How old is he?

“Affair?” you ask, repeating the word because it’s all you can focus on.

“Yes, I...well I’m sorry, but my assistant mentioned…” Namjoon trails off, seemingly unsure what to say.

“Joon, I don’t have a boyfriend. Who are you talking about?” you ask. This is how you should have started but you were you. Making fun of Namjoon over word choices is a favorite pastime. 

“Well, I don’t want to pry, but you did insist on taking him to that gala with you. I don’t know all the labels and…” Namjoon is rambling and it’s only made worse when you start laughing at the realization. “Oh, I’m glad you think this is funny.”

“Jungkook and I aren’t in a relationship, not like that at least,” you said when you’ve controlled your giggles enough. “We’re friends, I guess? We, uh, hang out a lot.”

You had kind of slipped over the last sentence because as funny as it was that Namjoon thought you were dating Jungkook, you also did not want to be talking about your sex life with him.

“I guess I just figured. Because of the gala.”

“No, I just knew Yoongi would be worried about Jimin and didn’t want to be alone,” you say. It’s the truth. You do like hanging out with Jungkook and you definitely like fucking him, but a relationship? No.

“That’s...good then,” Namjoon says, somewhat awkwardly.

You can’t help yourself. “Isn’t your assistant that new guy with the boxy smile and the kind of messy, fluffy hair?”

“I hadn’t really noticed…”

“He’s hot, good for Jungkook if they did sleep together,” you say, before Namjoon can even finish awkwardly fumbling over a response.

“I know writers are unpredictable, but you take it to a new level,” he says after a moment and you can picture him pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers.

This is one of your favorite things about Namjoon. He whines and pretends that your antics are too much for him, pretends he’s annoyed when you miss a deadline by only a day or two, pretends working with you is exhausting. Well, that last one may be true. You can be a lot to handle. He definitely likes you, though, no matter what he says and you appreciate it.

You can’t resist, it’s too good. As soon as you hang up with Namjoon, you’re opening up a text conversation with Jungkook.

You: okay how hungover are you? Jungkook: not at all? Are you hungover?

Fuck Jungkook and his inability to get hangovers, honestly.

You: tabling that I hate you until later because Joon just said the funniest thing Jungkook: only taken him…how long have you been working together? 5 years? You: right? About fucking time You: so he calls me, I miss it because I *am* hungover, I call him back You: and do you know what he had to interrupt my day for? To tell me my boyfriend is having an affair with his assistant Jungkook: WHAT Jungkook: how fucking old is he? Affair? You: you’ve met him, he’s not that old Jungkook: wait, who’s your boyfriend? You: that’s the same thing I asked! He thinks you and me are in a relationship Jungkook: since he used the word affair that actually tracks Jungkook: who’s this assistant I’m sleeping with though? You: Kim Taehyung? About your height, shaggy dark hair, kind of dresses like a grandpa but make it *fashion* Jungkook: oh I know him, yeah he’s pretty hot. Not sleeping with him though Jungkook: I think I’ve talked to him all of 2 times You: I wouldn’t care if you were tbh I just thought it was so funny and had to share Jungkook: great start to the day You: thanks, I’m definitely feeling better Jungkook: want some breakfast for your hangover? Something greasy? You: I’ll leave the door unlocked It’s a struggle to get out of bed, honestly, and you have a moment of being mad at Jungkook all over again for not being hungover. Even though he’s bringing you greasy hangover food, which you know will be amazing, you still hope he might’ve been exaggerating about how he was feeling.

He’s not. Fuck Jungkook.

At least he has the decency to look apologetic as he’s making you a plate of food, all your favorites together asking for a heart attack and you don’t care. He makes himself a plate and comes to sit next to you on the couch. You already have a show playing in the background and start to feel more human with each bite. 

You’re wondering if he’s going to bring up the text that started it in the first place. He doesn’t, just lets you eat mostly in peace and then cleans up the plates when you’re done. By the time he’s coming back, you’re already laid out on the couch. He just laughs and picks your legs up to settle underneath them. Softly, his fingers trace patterns you can’t identify into your calves. There’s something really relaxing about it. You don’t even realize it when you drift off back to sleep.

It’s a little disorienting when you wake up an hour later, not really sure why you’re sleeping on the couch or why the TV is on. You’re still half asleep when you register that your feet are on someone and you remember Jungkook bringing breakfast over.

“Sorry Jungkookie,” you say, sleep still coloring your voice. “Didn’t mean to fall asleep on you.”

“It’s fine,” he says and he’s smiling so he must mean it. “How do you feel now?”

You stretch to get the rest of the sleep out of your limbs, catching Jungook tracking the movement out of the corner of your eye. “Good actually. Breakfast was perfect.”

“Good, I’m glad,” he says and hesitates. “How are you feeling about everything last night?”

You frown. “I don’t know.”

“Wanna talk about it?” Jungkook picks up tracing patterns into your skin.

“Not really,” you sigh. “Not because I don’t wanna talk to you. You all just made good points and you’re all right. There’s not much else to say about it.”

“That’s fair,” Jungkook nods.

“How are you feeling?” You watch him for any sign that he’s uncomfortable. 

He doesn’t seem bothered. His eyes are soft when they land on yours. “Should I feel any particular way?”

“No,” you say, almost a question.

“You had a whole life before me,” Jungkook says with a chuckle. “It’s easy to tell there have been some really difficult things there.”

“Easy for you,” you mumble, partly hoping he doesn’t hear you.

“Maybe,” Jungkook answers anyway. “It’s never bothered me though.”

“Thank you,” you say.

He only smiles. Doesn’t ask you for what or for you to explain things you’re not sure you can. There’s just acceptance of you being exactly the way you are.

please let me know your thoughts ❤️

#btscarnivalnet #kvanity #btswritersclub #bts imagines #bts scenarios #bts x reader #bts x you #jungkook imagines #jungkook x reader #jungkook x you #jungkook fluff

[catcake24]

"Let's do this thing! My name is Hollie Connors, I was bitten by a radioactive spider, and for the last six months I've been the one and only Spider-Girl!"

"You probably can guess the rest - beat up some bad guys, get beat up by those badguys, hang out with my best friends MJ and Eugene, and take some pictures for the paper as my main gig."

"New York in my dimension is pretty flooded, some historic global warming left the ground under six feet of oceanwater and constantly raining, so things like Sunshine are pretty memorable! Along with the supervillains, and me fighting those villains of course. Making the front page isn't exactly new for me anymore."

"But I keep going at it, despite how much I might fall from all that rain or breaking an arm, because I know what I do is worthwhile for my city. And I'd say I'm pretty good at it!"

"At least... in my world. Heh. I mean, have you SEEN those other guys-"

Meet my Spidersona/ Spiderverse Oc, Hollie also known as Spider-Girl(by her city) or Rain (by other spider people when they eventually visit).

I have lots of ideas for her lol

Her New York is flooded, so people get around on jet skis and other somewhat futuristic aquatic transportation. There are also some floating sidewalks and platforms for businesses and homes, and the city has built upwards even more.

It constantly rains in her dimension, and she made non-slip shoes specifically for traversing in the rain. That's also why she wears a poncho, also it's a cute costume I find.

I actually looked up who spider-girl is, which helped me inform her backstory a bit, though it's also mashed with Spider-Man's. - She's adopted by a couple who raised her (now divorced), and she works as a photographer as she attends high school.

She went to get some pictures while a reporter interviewed a CEO who was trying to find a way to control the weather - make it so sunny days weren't so rare - and accidentally stumbled into a secret lab. She soon was stumbling around, getting bit by a radioactive spider, and got flushed out by the sewer.

Hollie's motivating event was not the death but the severe injury of her friend Eugene who was paralyzed from the waist down. She saw some criminals mugging people but stayed out of it, but then later Eugene was paralyzed after an attack gone extremely wrong. She realized that the pain she felt was likely also felt by the loved ones of those she saw being mugged in the past. Queue the "Great Power, Great Responsibility" lesson and her starting out as Spider-Girl.

That company she stumbled into was evil too, I don't know enough about Spider-Man to give it a specific name, but it was experimenting with animal DNA to try and make super humans and use it for crimes. Also just general evil plans like monopolize sunshine

Her world isn't very serious most of the time, even with the city being flooded life just kinda carries on like it's normal. Not super cartoony, but it has a levity and pretty good status quo compared to other spider-people.

I based Hollie off myself in many ways, but I wanted to have fun with this character lol

((I have many thoughts on how she would interact with other spider-people, and some other extra ideas for Hollie and the World, might reblog this with those later))

#my art #fanart #spidersona #atsv spidersona #my oc #oc art #oc brainrot #original character #accidentally made her conventionally attractive #was not my intention I just am bad at drawing skinny people #also not everything is shaded completely because I don’t like doing it and I wanted to just get this done lol

[pesterloglog]

Autoresponder, Jane Crocker

Act 6, page 4961

TT: Hmm.

GG: Welp, let me have it!

TT: Have what?

GG: A hard time for botching up the pooch!

GG: I think I just locked the door with that muttonheaded stunt. And now that mirrored obelisk is good as gone.

TT: I wasn't going to say nothin'.

TT: Hell, I was asleep at the wheel too while you were busy fucking up, and I have an IQ of, hold on, robo-calculating...

TT: Robo-calculating...

TT: Robo-calculating...

TT: Robo-calculating...

GG: Oh brother.

TT: Robo-calculating...

TT: About 500 billion.

GG: That is really, really robo-smart.

TT: Don't get human-fresh with me, Crocker. I'm about to bring all five hundo-billy points of my stringent cyborg IQ to bear on your dumb problem. Check it out.

TT: I took note of the captcha code to the thing, and recorded a digital flashsnap of its appearance through my photographic silicone memory canals.

TT: Which is to say I looked at eight alphanumeric digits a couple minutes ago, and remembered them.

GG: Ok?

TT: So give the bunny the wallet. I'll have him run back to the house and make you a new obelisk with the same grist you just collected from it.

TT: He can stash it in the wallet and run it back to you, and then you can open the door. You shouldn't be waiting around too long, cause he's real spry.

TT: Which is exactly why you should wait here. You'll just slow him down.

GG: Alright, I think I can do that.

GG: What should I do in the meantime?

TT: Let me think about that.

TT: Robo-calculating...

GG: Oh stop it!

TT: K.

GG: None of our friends will answer me. What could they be up to?

GG: You must at least know what Dirk is doing.

TT: He's slicing up some drones.

GG: Some what?

TT: Big red robots. He'll be busy for a while.

TT: Roxy I'm not sure about, but there is a pretty high probability as governed by the immutable laws of mathematics that she is preoccupied similarly.

GG: She's fighting robots too, you mean?

TT: I don't know. Maybe.

TT: Dealing with them, in some way, perhaps.

TT: If so, it wouldn't be a coincidence.

GG: Why?

TT: I think the Condesce is attempting to force the issue now.

GG: What? What issue!

TT: It's likely that it's a coordinated assault. Sending drones both to here and Roxy's place.

TT: She's probably trying to get everyone else to stop dicking around and join the game already.

GG: Are you sure she's not just trying to kill them?

GG: It wouldn't be her first assassination attempt.

TT: Yeah, but come on. Dirk has been a sitting duck here for years. Roxy too.

TT: She could have wiped them out any time with a swarm much bigger than this one. Or just nuked them.

TT: Her "assassination attempt" on you was pretty weak too.

GG: But it nearly worked!

GG: I would be dead right now if not for the whims of GCat.

TT: Right.

TT: Like I trust the motives of that fucking thing.

GG: So, you're saying she's only pretending to hunt us?

TT: I believe she probably would genuinely like to kill us. She is a psycho after all.

TT: But it's also obvious to me she needs us to begin playing this game, for whatever fucked up purpose she has.

TT: She might even need us to win it too, for all I know.

TT: Her antagonism is all part of the dance.

GG: Then you're saying Dirk and Roxy aren't really in danger from the robots?

TT: Oh, I wouldn't say that. They're still pretty deadly and they shoot missiles and stuff.

GG: Augh! I just want to talk to my friends and see if they're ok.

GG: What about Jake?

TT: No idea what's going on with him right now.

TT: I'm sure when the time is right, the witch will keep pushing him along to join the game as well.

GG: Then I guess I'll just sit here and worry about everyone quietly until Seb gets back.

TT: What about your troll friend?

GG: What?

TT: The alien whose name you don't know.

TT: You could talk to her.

GG: Oh yeah!

GG: I forgot about her.

GG: But I suppose that's because she's always the one to contact me. I never get a response when I message her.

TT: Well, you could give her a try. Maybe things are different now.

TT: I could hack into her system to get her attention, if you think that would help.

GG: You can do that??

TT: Nah, just messin' with you.

TT: Later.

timaeusTestified [TT] ceased pestering gutsyGumshoe [GG]

#homestuck #autoresponder #jane crocker #homestuck act 6 #page 4961 #homestuck act 6 act 3

[funkymbtifiction]

EFJ superego things, low intuition, and so on ;)

How do I tell my superego to be quiet? I know I’m a 2, a 6 or a 9 and I keep on beating myself up for not helping people enough even though I’ve been told I’m thoughtful/helpful. I always feel like I could be doing a better job and be more composed/perfect and I keep on working on my presentation and avoiding mistakes but to no avail. I am worried that I’m letting everyone down — I have such a crazy volunteer schedule and I keep on getting asked to do things and I can’t say no. Is this typical 269 stuff?

Sounds like a core 2w1.

Something to take to heart: when you are always picking up the slack, there's no room for anyone else to take the initiative to help -- and sometimes that's what other people need to do. One way to help them reach their full potential is to leave the space for them to know they are needed, by not saying yes to everything.

One way to dismantle your super-ego is to notice when you find it hard to tell anyone no, slow down, and ask, "Do I really want to do this, or am I just guilt-tripping myself into it?" If the answer is the latter, there is no shame in saying no, nicely. "I wish I could, but I am just too busy to take on another thing. I'm sure you will find someone capable of handling this or that you can get it done, because you are amazing!"

You also have to learn to factor your own needs into things, and self-care, something 2s struggle with -- but the bottom line is this: you can't help anybody else if you are too exhausted, burned out, or busy, because you are not taking sufficient down time and resting. You do not need to do everything, be everything, and get everything done, for everybody.

And yes, 269s tend to be pushovers in a way -- there's no fix in there that isn't somewhat attached to people, and 9s loathe any kind of conflict, so they will go along with it to avoid disappointing others.

Do you experience these things as a fellow superego type?

To some extent, yes. I guilt-trip myself regularly for not being nicer, more generous, more accommodating, or for slacking off instead of getting things done; I feel guilty just sitting around doing nothing or watching television when there's a lot of stuff to do. I had to learn to give myself permission to delete asks I don't want to answer, rather than feeling obligated to respond to them. (Sorry, people! But that's how it's gonna be.) But it's somewhat helpful for me, being a Fi and not a dominant 2, in that I prioritize what I want to do above all else, so I can manage a degree of separation from people. (For example: I care more about writing than answering asks, so writing comes first; any leftover energy goes to answering the asks I care about.)

I also am wondering how to become more intuitive — I think I am probably a sensor because I have difficulty with blind idealism and I have a photographic memory yet I still put a rose colored lens on things instead of seeing them how they are.

This is pretty typical for a 9-2 stem. They hate negativity, and 269s are the type most inclined to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, forgive endlessly, and assume their motives are purer than they are. Whichever one is leading will direct this more -- the 692 is a bit more negative and skeptical, but the 296 or the 926 are positive.

My mom, in contrast, is an ENP who intuits things immediately and goes tangent to tangent and is SUCH a good and funny conversationalist. She clearly leads with Ne and it comes so naturally to her. Ideas are her life. She also reads people’s intentions much more & is right about her various hunches. (“I knew it would end like that,” etc.) How can I make my Ne this way?

Why do you want that? Just to be an interesting conversationalist? I am sure as an ESFJ that you are fine as you are, that you are interesting as you are, and that you have enough Ne to be quite funny if you were to lighten up a little and give yourself more credit. You will never have as strong or as accurate a Ne as your intuitive mother, so don't try to achieve those levels. Lower Ne is very good at being creative, seeing things in new ways, and optimistic, but it's not going to be right all the time. Just let it be true to itself, and use it for stories, whimsy, and coming up with alternative possibilities. :)

#question #mbti #enneagram #enneagram 2

[audie02mia]

Is Fb Advertising and marketing Planning To Improve Your Company?

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Help make your information webpage specialist. Since you are longing for individuals to find you on Facebook, your profile page may be the very first impression that people have of your company. If you make it specialist, audiences will spot your enterprise as a specialist one. Be sure you use suitable sentence structure and spelling.

How Companies Use Instagram For Marketing

Provide unique articles which is readily available only to guests who "Like" your Page. Online audiences usually believe that distinctive articles is superior to other content material merely since it is exclusive. Because a "Like" fees the audience absolutely nothing, they will probably provide it of curiosity, along with your company benefits from the promoting. When utilizing Facebook or twitter for marketing and advertising purposes, constantly have a substantial standard of professionalism. Irrespective of how significantly you'd prefer to respond with an psychological viewpoint to customers, it's usually best to help keep your private opinion from it. Work the same way you would in case the customer were actually right there with your business office.

How To Become A Social Media Marketing Expert

By no means get a Facebook or twitter page from another person. Many individuals do this to enable them to have a lot of likes right away, but this is never ever a good idea. As soon as people learn to recognize they may be an element of something different, they will likely almost certainly in contrast to the site and provide their buddies a warning. Stay lively on your own Facebook or myspace site. Employing Facebook or myspace to showcase your company is over just starting a profile and hoping people discover it randomly. You have to continue to be productive on the page and article status changes, photographs and respond to remarks and concerns regularly.

What Are Typical Agency Fees For Social Media Advertising

A company that only communicates using a buyer infrequently, like a car car dealership or even a Realtor, does not demand a enterprise web page on Facebook. Unique customers have no motivation to keep up with your posts. Use particular ads on Fb instead. Make the backlinks much more obvious by having a picture. Facebook or myspace will display a review of the weblink but discussing a picture linked to the link you happen to be expressing should get this upgrade much more obvious. Opt for your photos carefully to be certain your viewers will observe the up-date you discuss. Facebook or twitter is becoming virtually a second website for a lot of organizations. Soon after getting of Facebook for many years and comparing visitors results from Facebook and also to the state business web site, many organizations have found they already have a lot more Facebook or twitter targeted traffic compared to they do on the house internet site. This can be a wonderful way to broaden your appearance online. Tend not to expect the advertising report to reflect process quickly. You should wait around approximately 48 hrs to view the final results. Occasionally that could consider to a few days to get this intel. You can split your reports into month to month, every week or even every day studies to understand all the about how precisely your advert does as you possibly can. In the event you operate a Facebook or myspace shop, make use of the helpful examine-in function. Give your users a chance to upgrade their position on Facebook or myspace by checking out in when they see your retailer. This can be a terrific way to achieve family and friends of your client, as his or her buddies are able to realize that they frequented your shop. Be ideal about whenever you article. Every target market is distinct regarding the time they should browse social websites websites through the day. Should you be publishing at 9am, but your viewers tends to surf during the night, then you are missing out on glowing possibilities to develop interaction and neighborhood with these individuals. Article as soon as your viewers tends to be around. While much of your articles should be content material which adds importance and supplies info your enthusiasts would enjoy, some of your site content also need to be interactive. Question your customers for comments, whether it be what you should brand the next taste of tea or what you must hand out in the competition. They'll love to inform you what they believe! Get your market to talk about content with you on Fb. For instance, run your opinions by the market before employing them. simply click the up coming document by any means, you will possess plenty of ideas direct through the supply. While you phrase your posts on Facebook, don't grab the AP style guide. Alternatively, create them like you were writing to your best friend. Use cliches, slang and contractions, should you so wish. The greater natural the verbiage, the much more likely your reader would be to determine what you're declaring and think it. Now that you comprehend the how, what, why, when and where, or at least the way to figure them out for your self, you simply need to supply the creative thinking to produce an excellent Facebook or myspace marketing strategy. Take some time necessary to complete the job appropriate the very first time. Once https://www.searchenginejournal.com/advanced-seo-skills/434274/ do, your campaign should certainly take off.

#Social Media Marketing #Social Media Marketing Agency #Facebook Marketing #Social Media Marketing Company #Digital Marketing #Digital Advertising #Search Engine Marketing #Facebook Advertising #Paid Social Medial Apps #Facebook Advertising Agency #Generate Leads #Facebook Ad Agency Services

[jafarnajaf]

Are you looking for ways to make some extra money as a freelancer? If so, then you should join Fiverr. Fiverr is a great site that connects freelancers with people who need help with all sorts of things. The secret to landing a lucrative freelancing job is focusing on the abilities and experiences you currently possess and considering the parts of your resume you want to strengthen. We've compiled a list of the best Fiverr gig ideas that can work with your schedule to aid you in getting started with your online business. Fiverr Freelance Gig Ideas Try these ten best Fiverr gig ideas to start making money online as a freelancer on Fiverr: 1. Freelance Web Research:  It's important to consider how you, as a freelancer, may relieve businesses of some of their workload to help them save time. One such time-saving job that might pay you for your patience is web research. Useful Skills: Better attention to detail is a useful skill.Abilities in study and investigation.Ability to compile the information into reports that are not too long.Endurance. Work examples include: Finding emails, photographs, brand references, or even keeping tabs on competitors is all part of typical web research. The digital marketing job can be rather flexible, though. You may take on more specialized internet research projects, including compiling data on top songs, summarising book and movie plots, or gathering background information for authors and journalists. It may be worthwhile to market your work as a "virtual assistant" position if you're willing to take on other digital admin responsibilities like data entry and web research. On Fiverr, this is a typical way to earn money. 2. Sell Your Social Media Skills: Businesses could benefit greatly from your abilities if you're naturally generating viral postings on social media and growing online followers. It can be the ideal strategy for you to succeed on Fiverr as a business. Developing your digital skills can benefit you as well. Many job routes would benefit greatly from having demonstrable expertise with customer involvement, SEO, or marketing efforts. And this is one of the best fiver gigs that do not require any business planning launching. Useful skills: Knowing how to increase social media engagement.The capacity to modify content and tone for various social media sites.Invest in management solutions like Hootsuite to ramp up performance if you want to grow your social media following. Work examples include: For a premium cost, you might offer pre-written tweets and Instagram posts, as well as unique content customized to the brand. You might even offer to create brand-new social media profiles. You could also perform picture sourcing and editing duties. By charging companies a charge to distribute their material on your social media sites, you may earn money in another fantastic method. If you already have a sizable social media following, this will work best for you. However, if you share sponsored content, kindly keep in mind to adhere to the ASA's recommendations for indicating whether a post is sponsored or an advertisement. 3. User Testing: User testing is worthwhile if obtaining early access to upcoming trends appeals to you. This example might not be as persuasive as a work experience sample on your resume. But if you select projects that are enjoyable, fascinating, or quirky in addition to other, more career-focused ones, it can help you stay motivated as a freelancer. Additionally, you can frequently get paid to test products you would otherwise be eager to buy. Ideal. Useful skills: Voicing your ideas with assurance.Of willingness to test new goods that you normally wouldn't purchase.Writing abilities to express your ideas clearly and simply. Depending on the gig, you might additionally need a camera phone, transportation to pick up or return the products, or the ability to let your screen and audio be recorded while you test the device.

Work examples include: You might be asked to provide feedback when performing independent user testing on anything from websites, games, and apps to customer support and grievances. However, if you focus on a particular industry (such as electronics or stationery) as a user tester, you may have a better chance of receiving products before they go on sale. Additionally, you would get an opportunity to influence how they evolve. 4. Write On A Freelance Basis: Interested in article writing for a living? Fiverr makes doing exactly that simple. Based on your strongest areas of expertise, consider providing writing services. If you're a blogger, for instance, you could get paid to write blog entries for other people. Alternatively, if you are proficient in another language, you might freelance translate documents. Mentioning your area of expertise in your Fiverr gig description might help you stand out from the competition. Writing is the most popular fiver gig if you want to start as a content writer. Useful skills: Ability to change your writing style to fit the assignment.Strong command of grammar, punctuation, and spelling.A focus on the details. Work examples include: You could be hired to write an e-book on a particular topic, help with a student's essay, or even pen a company's new mission statement. The possibilities are endless– as long as you're a strong writer, Fiverr is a great platform on which to freelance your skills. 5. Design Ebook Covers: When it comes to earning money as a freelancer, the ability to identify and seize trends is quite helpful. As an illustration, the self-publishing industry has boomed in the previous ten years, with thousands of authors choosing eBook formats to monetize their material. And as a result, there is currently a big need for digital book cover designs. Useful skills: Design aptitudes.Management of time.Strong ability to create images.Skills in visual analysis.Current awareness of publishing's graphic trends. Work examples include: You can be asked to create specialized covers or templates, handle technical issues, or provide feedback on draught covers as a freelancer responsible for creating eBook covers. In addition to being excellent sources of work on Fiverr, commissioned artworks, graphics, and original photography can fetch much higher prices as premium services. 6. Teach Your Hobbies: Still uncertain about your ideal freelance position? It's that easy: do what you love! Someone out there will pay you to teach them something, whether you learned how to speak Spanish fluently on your own or your parents forced you to take piano lessons every Saturday for five years. Useful skills: Interpersonal and instructional abilities.The knowledge that is specific to a field.Ability to produce written or visual teaching tools that you can sell in addition to providing in-person instruction. Work examples include: Consider your areas of greatest interest if you're thinking of teaching on a freelance basis. Any topic could serve as your niche. Do you know how to mend a bike, create Van Gogh-esque paintings, or craft the ideal dating app profile? Start there, gain experience as a freelance teacher, and see where it leads. 7.WordPress Services: The best and most straightforward Fiverr gig ideas to earn money without having any expertise are WordPress services. If you are familiar with WordPress, there are a tonne of services you can provide. Also, since WordPress is the most popular content management system, the demand for these services is always high. This is not different than social media platforms and web design. Useful skills: Services for building websites.Services for website migration or cloning.Service for fixing WordPress errors.A maximum throughput service for WordPress websites.Services for WordPress SEO. Work examples include: You could be asked to install WordPress, choose and set up a theme, or add plugins.

You might also be asked to help people with their WordPress website in other ways. Once you've got some experience, you can start offering more services, such as creating custom themes or plugins, website migrations, and so on. 8. SEO Services: If you know how to improve a website's ranking in search engine results pages (SERPs), you can offer your services on Fiverr. This gig on five is one of the most popular gigs on the platform, as firms of all sizes are always searching for methods to improve their visibility online. Useful skills: On-page SEO.Off-page SEO.Keyword research.Link building.Local SEO. Work examples include: As an SEO freelancer on Fiverr, you could be asked to do keyword research, link building, on-page optimization, or local SEO. You can also offer other services, such as social media marketing, PPC campaign management, etc. By doing this, you can save money more as a mobile app developer or a visual assistant. 9. Canva Templates: Canva is a great way for businesses to create professional-looking designs without hiring graphic designers. You can create templates in Canva that businesses can then purchase and use for their own branding. This is a great gig idea for someone with an eye for design and a little bit of marketing know-how. You can also create images for social media management, and these gigs on Fiverr are in high demand. If you are not an expert, then hire infographic designers to do this job because of its marketing strategy. If you are looking for in-demand gigs, then this one is perfect for you. Useful Skills: Design skills.Canva template creation.Marketing knowledge. Work examples include: As a Canva template creator, you'll be responsible for creating templates that businesses can purchase and use for their own branding. This could include social media posts, headers, logos, etc. To be successful, you'll need to have a good understanding of design and marketing. 10. Proofreading: Reading an article and identifying or fixing any errors is known as proofreading. The mistake could be a grammatical one, a spelling one, etc. So, before you accept this employment, make sure that you are proficient in any language. This is available for sale for $5 for 1000 words. Useful Skills: Thoroughly reading and editing text.Grammatical and spelling knowledge. Work examples include: As a proofreader, you'll be responsible for reading and editing text for errors. This could include grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc. To be successful, you'll need to have a good eye for detail and excellent language skills. The suggestions listed above are effective strategies to launch a freelancing career. However, the secret is to personalize them and differentiate yourself in a crowded market. Google Trends, a fantastic free tool, is a great place to keep track of what people are searching for to remain ahead of the curve on Fiverr. You'll be successful if you put in the work and use your expertise. Look for More online business ideas. Here it is: 1. Realistic ways how to make money online 2. Top 10 Online jobs for college students 3. Best Small Business Ideas Of 2022 How To Look For Yourself Simple Fiverr Gigs: We'll now look at a few methods you can use to find simple Fiverr gigs on your own. Here, we're constantly adding new and intriguing gig suggestions. Therefore, you can always look for other jobs that you'll enjoy, or you can find selling gig ideas on the official fiver website. Any Fiverr Gig Concept Is Simple To Outsource: Okay, given that Fiverr is currently the most affordable marketplace available, this might sound a little difficult. However, you could pay some locals to complete the task. You can either work together with a small group and ask them to complete your work in exchange for you sending them to repeat customers. They might consent to finish the assignment in a little less time. Even if you only get paid $1 for every $10 in sales, you can still survive on passive income.

By selling Fiverr gig ideas, you can make a good amount. Additionally, you are using this to create a great Fiverr profile. You can expand your services in the future, as well as learn something new and start offering it as a service. Additionally, you can use the money from Fiverr to launch ventures if you want to. Trending Services On Fiverr: It's a blessing to know what the on-demand simple Fiverr gigs are by looking at the trending page on the website. You will have the chance to find employment, as the majority of them are just getting started. Now, it occasionally changes. Therefore, you shouldn't take the screenshot at face value. You can instead visit Fiverr and evaluate the services there. You will eventually reach the most popular services on Fiverr. To locate simple Fiverr gigs that pay well and need few talents, you may always look into more of the popular Fiverr services. Finding Gigs On Fiverr With Little Competition: Seek the "NEW" bubble on Fiverr if you want to locate gigs with little competition. Service is relatively new and has little competition when it has a new blob next to its name. Several of these Fiverr jobs are simple, whilst others can call for special skills. You can certainly test them out if you want to develop gigs for students on Fiverr. Future growth for these services is enormous. Said it will continue to be on-demand for the ensuing five to ten years. Therefore, you can try them out if you're seeking Fiverr gigs that are simple for students. Keep In Mind The Following: Before you post any of the simplest Fiverr gig ideas to start earning money on Fiverr without any expertise, be sure to keep a few things in mind. First, be aware that you will never be paid for having no abilities. The headline wasn't clickbait, though. Instead, mastering a talent that can be picked up in a few days or sometimes even less can allow you to earn money on Fiverr without having any prior training. To post these types of simple Fiverr gig ideas and get good Fiverr money, we will do so. Please remember to practice your expertise or your Fiverr work ideas before going live. It is essential to have talent. Before posting that gig on Fiverr, it is advised that you practice the talent first. You cannot successfully operate a Fiverr gig just by learning new stuff. Because customers will ask for refunds, you will lose money. Additionally, if a customer doesn't request a refund, they will write a bad review that could ruin your profile. Therefore, practicing the tasks first and having several samples prepared before going live on Fiverr is always the best idea. Creating a featured image for Fiverr should be your next step. You must also upload a Featured image if you post a gig. Therefore, be sure to have one. Additionally, some of these jobs demand investment. Only use the software or service if you have the ability to learn it. And lastly, make sure that the client's target audience is a must before creating the best Fiverr gigs.

[headshotphots]

Exactly How to Take Great Headshots Photogaphy

Taking top quality headshots can generate a lot of service if you grasp this method. To obtain your customer's suitable portrait, collect information concerning them as well as sketch an approximation of what they want. Brian Ackin will certainly help the professional photographer make them comfy and prepare them for the picture session. Listed below are some ideas to aid you take the perfect headshots. After that, adhere to these tips to guarantee that your customers will enjoy their new pictures. Position. One of the most vital idea for taking great headshots is to kick back as well as be on your own. Pose as normally as feasible, as well as don't try to present also difficult. Keep your chin and also jawline as natural as feasible. Attempt various angles and also postures to find the right one. You might want to fire from eye level, however it's not constantly lovely.

Try to make your subject comfy, and also be motivating. Background. Choose a neutral background. An empty workshop or a level, brick wall can help develop an all-natural backdrop. Similarly, a workplace with natural light is a great choice for specialist headshots. In addition to a neutral history, the video camera must be placed in between the subject and also the light source. Ensure to have the history neutral in color as well as devoid of distractions.

Listed here are some ideas to assist you obtain the perfect family portraits headshot . Apparel. Keep in mind to use garments that flatter your number. Attempt to prevent insane hairstyles. Your hair will certainly stand apart better when it's down. Similarly, try wearing something that matches your skin tone. Make-up needs to match your skin tone and also the surrounding setting. It's additionally a good suggestion to stick with one attire and also stay clear of changing it for every photo session. The more all-natural you are, the more probable you will certainly be to be comfy and also certain.

A welcome overview layout. A welcome guide is an excellent print security to promote your headshot digital photography. It's a custom portfolio, ideal for handing out as gifts or perhaps taking with you when you meet prospective customers. The welcome guide theme is an excellent option for your marketing collateral because it showcases your entire series of headshots. Headshots differ commonly depending upon the type of organization you remain in. Make sure to customize your welcome guide to the particular type of business you're targeting.

The style of headshots varies by career. As an example, a corporate attorney could favor a clean white background, while a yoga trainer may select a vibrant and also colorful setting image. Avoid exaggerating it with accessories or too much makeup. A customer ought to additionally prevent dressing up especially for a headshot session. If a client is not comfy with their clothing, they might decide to go for a different clothing.

To get one of the most out of your headshot digital photography session, it is crucial to prepare a couple of days in advance. Consume alcohol plenty of water as well as consume a healthy diet regimen. Prior to the shoot, you can likewise plan out your clothing. It's a good idea to obtain a good friend to take the photo of you for you when possible. Otherwise, you can make use of the selfie technique. Using a tripod, prop your cam against a consistent surface area, as well as establishing a timer can assist make your headshot photography session go much more efficiently. To learn more , click here:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photo_shoot.

[tonghoptintucseo24h]

Real estate services effective usa photo editing company 2022

1 / Overview of real estate services USA photo editing company A perfectly captured photo can convey thousands of messages smoothly, especially in real estate. But to create a flawless image, an ideal retouching process is essential. All real estate companies require attractive internal and external images of the property, to motivate buyers to buy or transact with particular real estate. The real estate upgrade process consumes a lot of time and therefore it is better to outsource the service so that you can focus on the core operation. In such cases, you can contact us at Retouching Company, as we provide the best globally recognized real estate image enhancement services. Most of the photographers face various problems like light defects, wrong background, focus blur, distortion, and many more. When hiring us to upgrade real estate photos, we will save you nearly 30-40% of the cost per photo.

2 / Advantages of Real Estate Image Enhancement Service a/ Advantages of enterprise scalability and flexibility As a real estate agent, while outsourcing your image enhancement services, you are free to add or gradually reduce the number of professionals working on your project based on your requirements. The basis of enhancing and enriching your real estate image is thanks to an outsourced service provider. So, if the broker wants more animation, the provider will ask their experts to work on retouching the raw images. b / Improve company image Let's face it, everyone is attracted to anything and everything at face value. Anything hidden on subsequent layers is discovered. This is why photos from real estate photo retouching services should be in the best shape and form they can make sure they also need to keep their business running. c/ Closer interaction between broker and potential client When you take your real estate business to another level by promoting yourself on social media platforms, you show up there too. With the help of beautiful and dynamic photos of your property, potential customers will try to contact you through direct messages on social media platforms. Here, if the uploaded image is not attractive enough, you may never keep the buyer. Immediate feedback will increase their level of interest in purchasing the property. d/ Less expensive replacement Outsourcing real estate photo editing services will bring lower costs for real estate agents. This is partly due to their ability to acquire more customers, which leads to higher profits, making their operating costs much smaller. The concept of economies of scale applies largely to their real estate image enhancement services. When there is a lot of work to do, the potential cost of the situation can be spread out per unit of output, bringing it closer to zero as output increases.

e/ Better performance on social media and websites Outsourcing real estate image enhancement services also helps you showcase your fine work on social media. Real estate social media marketing works exactly like any other advertising campaign. Posting too many random pictures on social media is not worth it. A series of real estate photos can confuse customers and make them uncomfortable. When photo editing is handled by dedicated professionals, you'll have more time to focus on your planned activities. Activities, customized for potential customers and aware of their buying habits. Real estate photo editing service is important for your project or business if customers are interested in our services at website: https://www.elitephotoedit.com >> See also: real estate photo editing companies usa 2022.

[zenruption]

How To Create An Impressive Professional Bio

Pixabay. CCO Licensed.

A professional bio is a bit like a public resume. They typically take the form of a website page - this could be a page on a company website or a dedicated professional bio website. The purpose of a professional bio is to provide a background as to who you are and win over the trust of clients, suppliers or investors. They can be used by jobseekers trying to win over employers, but are more commonly used by those who are self employed.

When it comes to creating an impressive professional bio, there are a few key ingredients that you’ll want to include. This post lists those ingredients.

Choose a warm and professional photo

Adding a picture of yourself to your bio is essential for building trust by showing that you’re a real person. Of course, you need to look both professional and approachable in your photo. This typically involves a smiling portrait of you dressed in your workwear and looking ready for business. A ‘headshot’ is typically viewed as the most professional option - this should contain your head and shoulders with minimal distractions in the background. It’s worth hiring a professional photographer to take a headshot. This photo should be displayed at the top of your bio. You can learn more about taking a professional bio photo in this guide from Jennifer Dell. 

Write in the third person (but include some first person quotes)

You can write a professional bio in first person, however third person bios typically come across more formal and professional. This is because they feel like they were written from someone else’s perspective, which can make you come across more renowned and important. Of course, first person quotes can still be great for sprinkling throughout a bio to give people a better idea of your personal beliefs - a prime example being this bio from Raj Kalyandurg. Just make sure to isolate these quotes in quotation marks. 

Use your full name – but only at the beginning

It’s important to include your full name in a bio for SEO purposes. This should be included towards the beginning of your bio, however you may want to switch to referencing yourself by your first name later on in the bio. Using your full name throughout could come across as too formal - as the reader learns about you, switching to a first name can provide a more friendly and relaxed tone. Of course, there may be cases where you prefer to refer to your surname such as if you’re a doctor or a politician. 

List your certificates and awards

You should use your bio to gain credibility by listing some of your professional achievements. Certificates and awards are particularly strong credentials that you don’t want to leave off your bio. This could include degrees, licences, professional body memberships, previous high ranking job titles and professional awards. Make people aware of these credentials at a glance by highlighting them in bold, putting them in bullet points or adding trust badges.

Tell an inspiring story

A professional bio that inspires people is great for generating business. One way to do this is to tell a story throughout your bio in which you overcome obstacles to obtain success. Obviously, avoid mentioning any obstacles that could damage your professional reputation (such as scandals, professional mistakes, addictions or criminal charges). Instead focus on things like economic challenges growing up, previous wrong career choices or ability to overcome things like disabilities or discrimination. 

Share your future goals

To show that you’re still motivated to succeed further, consider ending your bio by sharing some of your future goals. These don’t have to be concrete goals and could be something as simple as ‘wanting to help more people’. The most important thing is to show that you’re still blossoming and that you haven’t passed your peak - especially if many of your achievements listed are from years ago.

Keep it snappy

A professional bio doesn’t need to be lengthy. If it’s a small section of an ‘about us’ page, then you want to keep it no longer than three to four pages. If you’re dedicating an entire page to a bio, then it is worth making it slightly longer so that the page feels more fleshed out. Try to write in relatively simple sentences that highlight the key facts and use plenty of paragraph breaks so that it doesn’t feel like a wall of text - this will encourage people to actually read your bio

[sugar-petals]

♡ måneskin scenario: getting to know ethan 

↳ NOTE. by popular demand and because i’m entirely enthralled by the phenomenon that is ethan torchio myself, here we go givin’ the gorgeous drummer some love.

word count. 5.5k

TAGS. no warnings all fluff, fem!oc, slice of life, photographer!reader, first date-ish, shy flirting, ot4 is part of the plot, ethan being sexy in heels

Jacob had enough of that twilight bullshit and joined a glam rock band. At least that’s what you thought seeing Ethan around for the first time. Setting up the kit, carrying his whiny band members around, fixing his ruffle shirt, chugging some water: Big gig tonight, extra long setlist. Five minutes later, complaining about his brocade shoes being hard to kick the bass drum with. Even later, silently nodding along to an impassioned Damiano speech crafted to boost the morale, and posing for your camera in his silver jumpsuit. Friendly to approach all the way, but without initiating stable eye contact even once.

One thing’s for sure. As your favorite professor said back at university: Someone may be photogenic and unearthly as hell in terms of looks, and even be intimidating — but also so damn shy, you won’t see their eyes a single time. „Gotta work with it and not against. Then it gets interesting“. In essence, the takeaway from that course. Which does come in handy now. Ethan seems like the kind of guy you really have to get into for a more intimate-feeling picture.

Sure, many people in front of your camera have all kinds of introverted personalities anyway, wearing sunglasses in particular. So much about eye contact in the first place. And the aesthetic is priority, not studying character. Although you really are a fan of that, it’s a huge part of photography if anything. Alas, you’re here to „capture nothing more but the spirit of italo-rock, the attitude, the hedonism!“ (the exact words of your boss) for a music magazine after all. Really, nothing more? You paid attention to how he worded it. Fair enough. Rock spirit, that’s all, the exciting parts.

Ethan surely has it. Drumming on everything he can find during rehearsal breaks („music is everywhere“) with his sticks, even Thomas’ amplifier. He’s actually dorkier than you thought, less composed when he’s in his element. First impressions do deceive. The hair’s hard to miss, too. It’s the central motif that attracts you. You may or may not have taken over 50 shots of it just because. Ethan is a bad bitch and he better know. You climb around the venue to get any salient angle of Måneskin you can think of. Even from all the way back, last row. You don’t want to annoy them being all up in their face constantly. You’re hired to get all the good shots, they’ve been a band for seven years already, professionals in the making. Doesn’t mean you have to stand below the edge of the stage and never change position.

Even from back there, the silver reflects beautifully at the back of the stage. The fashion’s all designer and it shows, but Ethan couldn’t look bad in any of the shots even if he tried or wore the plainest black suit (hell, that would be just as beautiful in fact). Just how long is that hair anyway. All the way down to the solar plexus, must be 24 inches or more. 25, even. Many rockers would wear it that way, but Ethan seems particularly interesting with how he touches it, how he behaves with it. There we go again with the character study, you can’t help wondering.

But really. It’s any photographer’s dream when someone moves their hair around so damn naturally. Gives a great variety to how it frames and shades the face. You like to play with light all the time. And hey, why ask for eye contact when he does even better posing in other ways. The body, too, Ethan’s posture is great. Victoria and Thomas often bend to really get into their power chords, Damiano frequently hunches forward for a belt. But Ethan’s throned at his kit like some royals taught him to be a good boy. Back straighter than a pole, how the hell.

No glance in your direction still, even if you return from your last row spot to move around on stage with the camera. Which gives the band a motivation boost and chances to try out gestures up close, too, so even better. Hey, maybe it doesn’t annoy them. You can actually get used to it, this way of photographing them is all dynamic. Nearing the end of the first rehearsal, you’re all busy maneuvering between Thomas and Damiano to get a nice semi-profile from Ethan’s left side. Gotta work with it not against, you chant to yourself as a mantra, and it seems easier to stick to than you thought.

How glossy all that hair is commands all the attention of your shutter release in and of itself. That he takes good care of it and has been growing it since forever shows a dedicated guy. It’s actually quite wavy. The band arrived in the pouring rain and Ethan’s curly strands at the crown and nape of the head were definitely showing — super cute. An army of stylists took on the resulting humidity frizz. They whipped out the straightening iron and protective spray, and even now before the big performance, Ethan brushes his hair out in front of you, and sweeps it around with his fingers anyway. You take pictures of the bits you find most candid, and decide to rather perfect single shots instead of making several in a row. The more you photograph him, the more you want to discover his essence in one picture. His sheer presence almost begs for it, it’s ridiculous.

Victoria on the other hand has no problems with rapid-fire releases and comes close to your lens to pull funny faces. She’s got some of the coolest poses you’ve ever seen with her bass, and hops around the stage like a bunny to the beat. Thomas is a virtuoso and pro who keeps on doing what he does when you make him pose, and Damiano can flirt with any camera ever. He even lowers his red leather jacket off his collar bones for you to have a great shot. He’s promising and most definitely a born divo, your boss will be happy with those pictures most definitely.

Then again. Behind that supposed hedonism is so much hard work and thought. Damiano even gives you ideas for angles during the second rehearsal. „Hm, maybe stand on the amplifier?“ Eagle perspective, not a bad idea at all. After trying out said suggestions with the help of triggered stage security making sure you don’t fall off the construction („eh, Damiano always suggests the most reckless things to staff, don’t mind him“), you find yourself concentrating on what goes on at the back of the stage all over again.

Ethan is busy practicing a new solo which has you curious about whether it’s for an upcoming album. Though again — the shoes cause trouble. Ethan complains again, the music stops. That could very well be the reason why he seems so preoccupied today, or is it? The manager tells the stylist, and the stylist hurries, voilà, Ethan has a new pair of shoes brought in. Ones with a thicker sole, bit of a chunky heel, and laced up rather than being slippers, a drummer’s worst nightmare as you have learned today.

You wait until he changed. Then snap some more pictures how he continues practicing calmly, and the sound did improve since he can kick the bass drum better now. Now you position yourself across the stage all over, in the empty audience ranks. Ethan is the most radiant and confident when you just take a step back. But well, he still sweeps his hair around a whole lot and looks even more tense-looking than Damiano who’s doing vocal warmups and jumping jacks, „Come on guys, come on, we’re starting in 30 minutes!“.

You can tell he does it more often when he’s nervous. And that means he does it very often. People would probably assume it’s vanity, or the fact that the hair gets in the way. You can see that for him it’s a place of distraction, maybe safety. A gesture like an anchor. He’s used to it being long just like his eye shadow being dark and smoky all day. He knows the drums by heart, if it falls in his face no need to shake it away. And besides. The strands reach below his shoulder blades, it stays down his back if he doesn’t move around too much. He could easily tie it up as well. All those things go through your mind without you even knowing why.

To switch things up a little, you photograph Thomas fooling around with Victoria at the snack bar, stuffing fries up their noses, and already see the lighting technicians do their final check. Some of them you know briefly, you made shots at this venue before, last year for a Shakespeare theatre play. You did some freelance work in the scene, but now you’re put to the test for more involved jobs. Hard to complain though, Måneskin are amazing in front of the camera. If Damiano is not the ideal Hamlet, you don’t know anymore.

Something new happens all the time, the expressions are priceless. Ethan’s in particular, when he does his wide-eyed surprise faces learning that there’s actually healthy food at the snack bar. „Vitamins, how nice.“ — Thomas, pokerfaced, reacts with eating a mayonnaise-dripping sandwich. Ethan, unfazed. Headed straight to the fruits. You’ve never seen a tall silver glitter tower like him walking around biting a bright red apple. Well, you can take Jacob out of twilight, but not the twilight out of Jacob. Snap, another picture. Clash of words, that’s a nice theme.

The concert of this evening seems particularly energetic and leaves your camera roll with some brilliant, tweet-worthy material. Damiano covered in confetti, eyeliner running. Victoria on the shoulders of Ethan while he’s playing her bass.  Thomas, stagediving. Fans waving banners and chanting along to Seven Nation Army. Your ears are ringing when the light technicians close down the stage two hours later. Thomas really played his soul out with the solos, and your feet seem to vibrate. That’s your body thinking Victoria’s bass is still playing, but the magazine is very happy with how the pictures turned out after you send the whole batch to them as soon as you can.

Little to no retouching, zooming, or cropping necessary. Ethan is just perfect as he is, you feel like you captured him well. After swiping through the gallery on your tablet, you think Victoria has some great ant’s eye perspective shots as well. Those go right on your own blog, she’s just amazing. The magazine has an enthusiastic article typed out already. Damiano’s mid-air split on beat for the final song makes the cover story on Monday, and Måneskin’s manager comes back to you a week later. „What would you think about doing some behind the scenes stuff for us? We’re planning a music video!“

And that’s how you end up in a Sicilian restaurant with Måneskin and crew a week later, stuffed with Calzone and mind filled with Damiano’s inspiring words (and the occasional catchy freestyle rap). The MV is as good as finished. Thomas had shown you around the mansion they were shooting at, and you could convince a taciturn  Ethan to walk between the marble statues and boxwood trees in the garden. With his black cape on, a rhinestone choker, and the low-cut lacey blouse that the MV director was obsessed with as well, asking you to focus on it. Your best shot even ends up in the thumbnail of the Youtube video without you even expecting it would.

All the garden pictures turned out mindblowing. If not iconic, the best project you had so far. Gets to show you the best things are often improvised. Ethan, stoic as always, sat at the base of armor-clad Emperor Augustus twisting into the blue sky in a large gesture. The marble was a perfect contrast. Ethan ate a ripe pear from a tree, even that was aesthetically pleasing, then leaned against a hunting Apollo, and you also framed him from the back next to Aphrodite and Cesar. He put on his sunglasses underneath Achilles, and knelt at the feet of a Pietà replica. Marvelous panorama shots, with him the shining center. Well, we know since Queen that the drummer is the unrealistically pretty one.

The whole picture series is blowing up on your blog for the whole afternoon. „Count Dracula on a stroll in Versailles — eugh, begone sunlight!“ is what a comment neatly sums it up as. People seem to especially like the shot where Ethan playfully put his cape over Pallas Athena’s spear with a blurry Thomas having a laughing fit in the background. Well, even Count Drac gets photobombed sometimes. Your phone buzzes with notifications every other minute, you do notice it against your thigh. But the insalata of the restaurant is good and the night is young. Victoria and the manager tell old stories of Thomas snapping a guitar string while he was trying to serenade a highschool crush. Ethan scolds them for making fun of it.

Damiano gets drunk and dances on the table, the MV director discusses new ideas, some walk-in fans take pictures. The temperature is still unbearable. You order a dessert to share with Victoria and Ethan. A large tiramisu that the waiter cuts in three pieces, and it’s truly delectable. The chocolate, so crunchy, melty. The cream, fluffy and cool, making for a funny white beard that makes Ethan look like an arctic scientist returning from an expedition.

Of course, you take pictures, all the food is documented. As are late night restaurant shots with Damiano’s heels peaking into the frame when you photograph the band’s friendship bracelets, hand-made by Victoria on a tour bus last year. Damiano’s back down on the table soon, singing, while Ethan creates a beat with two forks. Thomas also agrees to take your camera for a while so you’d be in the frame for a change, too.

You pose for a group picture, or rather a group hug, and being in the middle …Ethan’s arm wraps around your shoulder loosely, hair dangling into his face, but also brushing yours. He focuses on the camera, facing away from you. The schooled eye could catch you breaking a sweat in the resulting photo. Ironically, the tiramisu doesn’t cool you down the way you thought. Thomas is too busy trying to figure out your camera dials and yelling „hey eyebrow king, smile!“ at Ethan.

A round of even more gelato goes down in spoons and spoons. The band members eat like they ran a marathon. Ethan clinches a third round because he can, unhealthy be damned, he needs some sugar and refreshment. And it’s true the MV shooting was strenuous in the heat, and had lots of intense performing parts. Even an invisible rope suspension were Thomas would descend from a ceiling during the chorus with little cherub wings attached to his back because why not. If the manager agreed to recreate this on tour some day, the pictures would be amazing.

You can’t help but think what kind of special effect would suit Ethan the most, and you come to the conclusion that a bridge lift would be the coolest thing ever. A rising part of the stage letting him emerge like an elevator from the underground.  Maybe using smoke machines, too. The idea twirls around in your mind so intensely, Damiano asks if you’re wasted. You’re always getting carried away with all kinds of fantasies like that for over a week now. A dreamy photographer? Not unusual, but it’s seriously distracting you from the present moment.

The crew slowly heads home, and the band decides (translation: Victoria’s mood is) to head to the movies. Just when the waiter arrives with the bill, Damiano spills panna cotta all over Ethan by accident. So bad he’s all sticky from the shoulders down, making Ethan opt for the hotel instead. Besides, he’s been drumming his soul out, sleep is so needed now. Since the group is already gone and there’s still a forgotten cymbal left to carry back to the equipment bus by the hotel, you help Ethan maneuver it around. The heat is making either of you sweat, even with the full dark of the night coming up.

The gaffer lady you’re sharing a hotel room with is already fast asleep. Damn it. You want to cut a video and make screenshots with the laptop being decently bright. And with some volume if possible, you don’t find headphones in the darkness of the room. Ethan clears the desk in his own room for you after removing his make-up. He looks so young and beautiful and tired.

You type and drag and double click yourself through the video and do some last blog updates to deal with all the notifications. Ethan lends you some headphones, but you only keep them on one ear. The humming is too nice to ignore. Nor do you know what to even expect. The bathroom door is open, Ethan is topless washing the lace blouse by hand. Only wearing bellbottom pants and his lace choker — nothing else. He’s fully immersed in his task. He even adds some other shirts and silk scarves into the soap water along the way while he’s at it.

You’ve never seen someone do their own laundry so systematically. Ethan looks like Prince Caspian at the sink, wielding the almond soap bar like his weapon of choice against the enemies of Narnia (the devious panna cotta that’s still sticking to everything). He might be all mysterious, but he’s well able to curse all kinds of things. You tease Ethan for dropping his gentlemanly behavior for a stain of dessert. Ethan insists you sound like Thomas trying to test him with his slick comebacks, which makes you laugh. The blog has calmed down a little and your eyes hurt from editing, so you call it a day and send one last e-mail.

Ethan is drowning in bubbles at this point. The whole room smells like fabric softener. He thanks you for helping him carry around the equipment earlier. In return, you say grazie for him being your perfect muse in the garden today. Philosopher he is, Ethan remarks how Måneskin is usually the one searching for muses, now he ended up one himself — „Maybe not a bad thing, eh. Become the thing you want or something.“ That’s way too deep for a summer night in Sicily, and both of you need a huge portion of sleep. Tomorrow, lots of schedule. You do find yourself wanting to help lick that dessert off his chest. No way you’d tell him.

Ethan waddles off to shower after a crooked, reserved smile for a good night departure. When you close the door to your room and start brushing your teeth, the other members’ voices emerge in the hotel corridor — they’ve returned from the movies. Damiano is even more wasted than before and audibly sings. „You’ve looked at the photographer lady in a certain way earlier, huh. I saw, I saw!“ Victoria does a loud ‚shh‘ noise, and the stoic reply is a simple „Sleep, Damiano, you’ve had too much.“ Thomas giggles, and four doors click shut. Damiano’s singing is now muffled for two minutes until it’s silent. How the fuck can you even sleep after hearing that.

You assumed that Ethan would treat you differently the next morning, in whatever shape or form. But he doesn’t. The greeting is short as it would always be, and he informs you that he did manage to wash out the sugary clay from his clothes as he puts it. Damiano says nothing, adjusts his rings. Thomas randomly pulls zippers at his packed-up equipment. Victoria headed to the car already. Downtown to a studio it goes. The group gets styled to perfection, twenty minutes later they make a reaction video to the newly released MV teaser. Ethan talks about enjoying the sculptures in the garden.

Three hours down the line, you shoot some promotional pictures of them at a pool. Thomas has the time of his life perfecting his diving board skills, and Damiano creates the musical background, singing and prancing. The aerials would make literal perfect editorial-in-VOGUE material. In the meantime, Victoria dozes in the sun. Ethan dives. Sometimes just sitting at the bottom of the pool, othertimes swimming back and forth. The art director suggests you to go into the water, too. He’s right, the perspective works out well this way.

You’re basically standing in there with your flowy pantalon pants and camisole, using a waterproof camera. Your bikini is back at the hotel. It doesn’t matter, everything will dry quickly, the others went in the pool with clothes as well. And you’re all too wrapped up in your passion in the first place. You marvel at how fun the whole scenery looks through your lens. Their outfits are cropped and luminous, today’s color is bright red. You order the lighting assistant back and forth, get some more great Thomas frames where he tosses around a volleyball that the manager brought along. Less rock than usual, but it works. Måneskin at a pool in Sicily.

Damiano splashes water around like crazy. Victoria joins the fun as well, splashing right back. It’s infernal. Well, those are going to be dynamic pictures, you think, and the cameraman never dies, so. Ethan resurfaces every other minute, wiping the chlorine from his eyes. He slicks his hair back with both hands, looking down his body learning how his shirt has become completely transparent. He covers his chest with his hair, quickly, then submerges again. It’s strange. Being topless is usually no big deal in Måneskin.

Almost 12 o’clock. Thomas and Damiano wander off to work on some lyrics, probably the title that the drum solo is part of. All top secret. Victoria returns to her sun lounger, checking her phone. The crew heads for lunch, but you stay in the water, gladly you put sunscreen on earlier. You ask Ethan to try some seated or floating poses at the bottom of the pool that you saw him practice earlier. „No worries, keep your eyes closed.“

What unfolds before you is the most beautiful thing. Ethan’s shirt fans out like a red jellyfish underwater, playing around his body. His figure is just enviable. He gets the hang of it and knows quite how to move. Or rather, to remain stable when the pose is perfect. Hands above his head, horizontal, or seated, only one foot  lightly sweeping over the pool floor, or on one knee, as if he proposed.

Raising his arms helps him sink down and settle, as if he immersed himself in deep meditation. Although the purpose of meditating is to be present, isn’t it. And that’s what he feels like. Ethan would normally switch on autopilot for most of his public interactions, now he’s alive and fully in the concentrated movements of the photoshoot. So much about improvising all over again. The hair creates the most incredible shapes like a black, wide brushstroke, clearly outlined. Thank god you have the waterproof camera. These are moments you’ll never forget.

Your blog notifications keep on bleeping throughout the afternoon. The promotional pictures are a hit. Måneskin’s manager is basically waving five new contracts in front of your face at dinner, but you’re kind of spaced out again. The cozy, rose-ranked atmosphere of the street café you went to is inspiring, and the members dressed up in the most fancy suitwear. Men in Black? Måneskin in Black. It’s almost as if fate read your mind. Ethan is looking at you very intently from across the table when the minestrone is served.

Pasta shells, parsley, vegetables and basil leaves. The scent surrounds the entire table. Damiano, in serious mode tonight, is too busy finding new rhymes and an alternative chorus with Thomas who wildly brainstorms. Victoria drinks, loudly chats with the gaffer lady that you share a room with, and they use a leaf of a palm tree pot plant to tickle Damiano. Thomas plays the acoustic guitar. Ethan and you end up smiling briefly at another. „Bon apetit,“ you say. It’s almost 34° celsius. That’s going to be an entire pile of cheesecake gelato tonight.

Five signed contracts later and halfway through a hefty caprese cake, the title song is finished. An ode to Marlena, fierce like the Mediterranean sea. The piece certainly sounds exactly like this place. Strangers listen to Damiano performing bits and pieces, but you decide to disperse when too many cellphones come out. Damiano wants to go to a bar, Thomas and Victoria carry home their guitars, or to the hotel to be exact, and bags of newly shopped vintage clothes. You ask Ethan if there are any cinemas around the area. „We missed out last time, remember.“

The Palazzo Theater is a small and hidden insider tip far from the main street with its busy beach tourists. Under bulbous metal balconies and peach-colored facades, a small entrance with lanterns on each side guides you inward. Ethan almost hits his head, it’s so low. He’s wearing glossy red bottoms under his suit pants, you’re out and about with a 6’2 giant after all — a statue by himself. A small man with a pipe sells you cheap tickets for a Mads Mikkelsen movie and lemonade, Ethan picks up an XXXL caramel popcorn bucket. You think he’s flexing, but you get a sudden heureka by looking at it twice.

Unlike the S, M, and L bags, it’s thick cardboard and drum-shaped. Oh my god, obviously. Which fine percussionist could ever resist such temptation striped in red and white, the sound deep and dull? It makes you smile how Ethan pursues his instrument even when he seemingly doesn’t, it really has to be a hobby at heart. That’s how a job becomes a profession, and a profession a vocation, your uni professor’s other favorite words all over again. The latter’s words have gotten you far so you again trust the insight that came to you through that quote.

Seeing Ethan standing there, you can almost see the childlike joy at imagining it being empty and ready to get turned around. A tuxedo Italian with Louboutin heels and a ginormous popcorn drum, half past eleven somewhere in Palermo: Ingenious combination, you snap a picture. Ethan makes a cute face, posing like a pinup of the 50s. Who knows how many vintage store posters he’s seen during tours, he must have picked it up there. And— Is he blushing? Must be the dim lights in here.

Off you go to the auditorium. Ethan, who balance the popcorn with all care in the world like it’s his baby, walks the aisle slower than you. The slim steps don’t have any floor lighting. Not very heel-friendly, but since it’s not a huge budget theater and few people dare spike heels on those cobblestones outside anyway, the stairs shall be forgiven. You take out your phone and offer your arm. For every gentleman it takes a gentlewoman, duh. Like rock’n’roll and the camera staff, chivalry (or shevalry as Damiano calls it when Vic holds the door open) never dies. He mumbles a thanks, you climb upward to the fourth-last row, Ethan holds on tight.

No ankles twisted and not one popcorn spilled, you get seated on red velvet. The chairs are dated, but nevertheless ultra comfortable. Nobody else is here. The adverts roll, Ethan cracks open the lemonade bottle caps with his chunky golden lighter because he can. You toast to Mads Mikkelsen’s bone structure and good minestrone, Måneskin’s finished title track, the promo pics, and the discovery of Ethan’s favorite new drum. A whopping five things to toast about? The night’s going to be great.

Damiano catwalking across the screen, wearing a Versace skirt in the middle of otherwise-boring commercials does shake you up. He was picked as a testimonial recently. Though, your pulse is high enough. Ethan’s hair is brushing against your shoulders, not to mention his goddamn massive arms. He can’t get out a single word either for the entirety of the ads, avoiding eye contact all over again. Just how much suspense can starting to eat the first popcorn have. Well, you pick two  from the very top and start munching.

Mads does a great job opening the movie as one would expect, but you just can’t concentrate. Instead, you stress-eat popcorn. Which makes Ethan do the same thing, at least he’s somewhat fixated on the screen. After the first ten minutes, he shakes his head. „That makes no sense at all,“ he clears his throat. „Yeah, yeah it  clearly doesn’t,“ you agree, basically on Torchio-autopilot yourself for the lack of a better reply. You were too busy figuring out the components of his aftershave rather than the thin plot. Shifting in your seat, chugging lemonade…

The air conditioning is scarce, but at least the screen is quite large and proper. You try to focus on the cinematography and do small talk about it. If there’s something you can comment on without having followed the string of action, it’s at least this.  You might be nervous, but you’re still a photographer. „Um, isn’t this chainmail nice in the closeup?“ — „Hm, I guess it works. We should ask Damiano to request something like this from Versace.“ — „Medieval Måneskin Rockers?“ — „Something like that.“ — „Hilarious.“

By the twenty-minute mark, the popcorn drum is almost empty. Gladly, that stuff just shrinks to bits in the stomach. The lemonade just has to galvanize it. You might be able to distract yourself with the camera shots and the last caramel chunks, but that doesn’t change Ethan’s long legs and Acqua di Parma perfume next to you. Yep, you finally figured out what it was, it wasn’t the aftershave. And well. Ethan smells like hotel soap from Milano to Napoli and back.

That scent basically dominates all the others besides a hint of cigar and basil and citrus-y deodorant mixed with runny sweat. God fuck, you can barely stand it. And the almond scent. You take a chance to at least jokingly point it out to him. The random movie flashback sequence is boring — and just as nonsensical as before, no offense to Mads though, he’s just walking around in chain mail — enough to deviate from whatever choppy convo you had going on before.

„I actually washed it twice,“ Ethan pulls off the silky scarf that functions as his current tie, and you recognize it. „The strawberry sauce was hard, but the cranberries… God no, I’ll never go near pana cotta again. Nothing against cream desserts.“ You take the scarf, smell it. Did he literally just hand it to you? Figures, he’s sweating bullets, too. And oh shit, he hasn’t talked that much all evening.

You slowly shift from bodies turned to the screen to facing each other. So up close, so up front, only God can help you know. His eyes are dark and reflective of the film’s flickering lights and changing scenes. You wish you could photograph them on sight. It would be as glimmering as your view from the hotel room, overwatching the unobstructed stars of the Mediterranean bay down the boulevard.

But it’s like you’re stuck in your position this way, feverishly thinking about a reply. What to pick up on, what to pick up on. You think about today, the evening where you edited things in his room. „Uh well, drop your laundry in the pool next time,“ you laugh, more than tentative, with your fingers randomly curling around the scarf. „The chlorine stuff will do the job for you. It’s so aggressive, it bleached by pants one shade lighter.“

Saved. Smooth transaction. Phew. „Oh, the pool was horrible. Not the photos, I mean… I don’t know how you can poison water that way.“ — „I know right? It’s still in my nose. But yeah, was a good idea with the underwater thing. The photos turned out really well.“ — „I really haven’t done something like that before but I guess it turned out hm, nice?“ — „Come on! Nice is understated. Are you fishing for compliments?“ — „No no, by all means!“ — „The one kneeling. It’s my favorite. I don’t even know what to do with all these pictures.“

„I don’t know. Maybe keep them?“ — „Keep… for what?“ — „It’s a separate series, right. The art director didn’t request it. Maybe they can be used for something later on during promotions.“ — „Yeah. We’re always a little extracurricular,“ you laugh again, tense in your voice, and empty your lemonade completely. „This, too,“ Ethan points at the theatre in general. „You’re good to talk to. The better version of alone time.“ — „Thank you. You’re great to go out with. I… really like it.“ Beautiful nature scenes show on screen, but they’re nothing but a blur. You take Ethan’s hands in the dark and smile. „Maybe we should do it more often.“

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© submissive-bangtan 2017-2021. all rights reserved. do not repost or translate. all depictions fictional.

#maneskin #ethan torchio #ethan torchio x reader #maneskin fanfic #maneskin scenario #måneskin #maneskin fluff #maneskin x reader #maneskin fanfiction #ethan x reader #ethan torchio fluff #ethan torchio fanfic

[pallastrology]

similarities between neighbouring signs

Aries shares determination and a need to be in charge with Taurus. They both like to feel in control of the situation, but this manifests differently for the two signs. With Aries, the emphasis is less on being the rule maker and more on feeling they are ahead of the game, while Taurus, who fears change, likes to feel nothing unexpected will happen. They are also both self-oriented, in slightly different ways; while Aries is focused on self-actualisation, the question of identity, and realising their goals, Taurus often connects more with self worth, personal values and self-love. A quick note: self-oriented doesn’t mean selfish, it means the concept of self is especially important.

Taurus shares the need for mental stimulation and social bonds with Gemini. Both signs can be prone to rumination without enough external stimuli to focus on; for Taurus, this often manifests through work, hobbies and home projects, while Gemini can be found taking in new information and socialising. On that note, both Taurus and Gemini have a deep need to connect with other people to feel whole. Taurus loves to love, and can have a relatively small “inner circle” of trusted people, while Gemini reaches out like a neural network, flitting between lots of people. These relationships can sometimes appear shallow, but are vital for Gemini.

Gemini shares a shrewd memory and the need for understanding with Cancer. Gemini is known for having a sharp memory, Cancer? Not so much, but those who don’t know this have never been close to a Cancer. They have an almost photographic memory, especially for emotional experiences, while Gemini is more of an information retainer, especially for things that can pique their interest. Both signs are often quite misunderstood – Gemini for being shallow and two-faced, Cancer for being a fragile child or a loving mother with no in-between. However, Gemini is really someone who is malleable and able to shift between lots of interests and types of people. And Cancer has a business acumen that can rival Capricorn, however they often aren’t quite as motivated towards this side of themselves. Gemini and Cancer both ned people who can see and accept how multifaceted they are.

Cancer shares compassion and a strong inner-child with Leo. Cancer is so often seen as the archetype of the mother, and yet they have a child-self hidden within. When we think of cancer as being moody, this is often the cause; they can try to keep their inner child pacified and suppressed for too long, and so it bursts out. Leo is a little more outwardly childlike in a sense – they have this sense of creativity, pride, a need for praise and admiration that can be endearing to some and irritating to others. Both signs are very compassionate in their own way. Cancer is known for being motherly and nurturing, but Leo can be so incredibly caring too – after all, think of lions; they aren’t loners, they live in a pride. And pride is what Leo can fill their loved ones with, if given half a chance. These are two signs who give a lot of love, but need a lot back too.

Leo shares insecurity and creativity with Virgo. While Leo tends to find themselves being their own biggest cheerleader, and even ignoring their faults to avoid the feelings of shame and doubt, Virgo may instead turn to criticising others, projecting their worries and guilt over not being “enough” onto their loved ones. The key to managing both of these issues, is awareness. Leo and Virgo are both creative signs, though it shows up very differently. Leo is classically creative, presenting themselves and their art loud and proud for the world to see. Virgo, on the other hand, uses their creativity less for dramatic display, and more for everyday life; they are natural problem solvers and often very good with their hands. The life they build is their creation.

Virgo shares attention to detail and fragmentation with Libra. Virgo is known for being attentive and detail-oriented, but Libra is too; however, for Libra, this trait shows up more through their social intelligence and eye for the arts. Both signs can be hypercritical of themselves and others, and both signs have high standards and are perfectionists at times. Another trait that they share, is the propensity for feelings of fragmentation to bubble up. Both signs can mould themselves into what they think they want to be – their idea of perfect, whatever that is for them. However, when it comes to perfectionism we all know that almost nothing is ever actually good enough, and so Virgo and Libra continue to snip pieces off and stitch new pieces on until they no longer resemble themselves. This is something that self-love can mend, as they need to learn that they are whole and perfect as they are.

Libra shares the needs for truth and intimacy with Scorpio. Both signs value the truth very highly, but while for Libra this is often underpinned by a need for things to be just, to be able to balance out all sides of the story, for Scorpio the desire for truth is underpinned with fear of being deceived. They need to rip off any potential blindfolds that may be obscuring the truth from them. Both signs also need – and can be afraid of – intimacy. Libra loves contracts and to love others, while Scorpio desires a partner in crime, someone to become one with, both physically and spiritually.

Scorpio shares depth and avoidance with Sagittarius. Scorpio is deep in almost every sense of the word – they are emotional wells, hold dark secrets, keep their more personal thoughts to themselves and like to stay a little enigmatic. Sagittarius isn’t outwardly deep, as they are more jovial, humorous, light-hearted. But their quest for knowledge and expansion leads them to reflect inwardly too, and they take in more than just information during their journey. Both signs also share a certain avoidance – Scorpio avoids betrayal by never trusting, avoids heartbreak by never letting others in. Sagittarius can find commitment too much to deal with, and runs. They are afraid of being trapped or tied down. Both signs could do with learning to embrace their fears, and accepting that they will survive if it doesn’t work out.

Sagittarius shares drive and expansive dreams with Capricorn. Both Sagittarius and Capricorn are highly driven signs, but it manifests very differently in them. Sagittarius, the lifelong student, and Capricorn, who was born to master their craft. This drive helps them to etch away at their dreams; Sagittarius is driven to consume everything they can find, travel as far as they are able, and chase the horizon for their next chapter. Capricorn is driven to polish and perfect themselves, and build themselves a life and legacy they will be proud of. As different as these two dreams are, the tenacity with which they work at them is really just the same.

Capricorn shares passion and stubbornness with Aquarius. Both signs are passionate and motivated, as we often see in Capricorn's work ethic and Aquarius’ desire to make a change. While Aquarius is usually associated with social and digital upheaval, Capricorn prefers more traditionally tangible results. Capricorn and Aquarius are both stubborn and can be short-sighted at times too, but this stubbornness is something that can be channelled into their projects. These are two signs who have the power to change things for the better, and to set themselves apart form the rest, but they must master their self doubt – which may manifest as stubborn refusal to dream.

Aquarius shares intuitiveness and humanity with Pisces. These two both see and feel the plight of humanity in their souls, though they act on it very differently; while Aquarius will be marching, Pisces will be nursing the wounds of the people they meet. Aquarius brings about change, and Pisces picks up and stitches together the pieces. Both Aquarius and Pisces also share a keen sense of intuition, and can put this to good use with some practice. This is where we see the archetype of Aquarius as the inventor, they have these flashes of ingenuity that allow them to break things down and build them back up, better than before. Pisces, on the other hand, is intuitive in a gentler way; their brilliance is more emotional and social, and needs a little more work to harness properly.

Pisces shares vision and impulsivity with Aries. Neither sign is a natural planner like their sister signs; Pisces gets swept away in the big picture, while Aries has to work hard to channel their energy in the right directions. Both Pisces and Aries, however, are blessed with inspiring vision. They can conjure up grand ideas as easily as dreaming for Pisces, who steps into this potential world like stepping into the ocean. For Aries, their vision is like a supernova, growing ever larger and brighter. With time and practice, these gifts can be harnessed beautifully.

#pallastrology #mine #astrology #astrology blog #astrology post #neighbouring signs #aries and taurus #taurus and gemini #gemini and cancer #cancer and leo #leo and virgo #virgo and libra #libra and scorpio #scorpio and sagittarius #sagittarius and capricorn #capricorn and aquarius #aquarius and pisces #pisces and aries

[blu-joons]

CHRISTMAS A⇴Z HEADCANON ⇴ Song Minho

A ⇴ ACTIVITIES

Minho loved to take photographs during the holidays whenever the two of you went out anywhere so that he could remember the adventures that the two of you went on, scrapbooking many of the photos in his albums to keep.

B ⇴ BAKING

Watching you bake often fascinated Minho, although he was far from a baker himself. Just as he loved his arts, you loved baking over Christmas, and so usually whilst you’d be busy making gingerbread in your kitchen, Minho would join you with his drawing pad and pens so that the two of you could still spend time together and listen to some Christmas songs whilst also each doing the things that you loved too.

C ⇴ CHRISTMAS EVE

You loved trying to get Minho in the festive mood on Christmas Eve, leaving him with little choice but to get involved. You’d get him matching pyjamas with you, give him plenty of hot chocolate and mulled wine too, and of course, you would mess with him and make sure that he followed the traditions for Santa to visit too.

D ⇴ DECORATING

The decorating of your home was where Minho truly came into his own at Christmas. Each year he would come up with a different them for your home, making sure that each room was filled with decorations. As much as he loved going out and buying decorations for your home, Minho also loved creating some decorations himself too that the two of you could keep hold of and bring out year after year to celebrate with.

E ⇴ EVENTS

Getting Minho to a Christmas event would sometimes be a challenge for you as he loved being at home, and so to get him feeling festive and comfortable you would organise several little events at home so that you both got what you wanted. On the way home from work you’d make sure that you bought everything that you needed to setup the perfect Christmas for you both without the hassle of being around others.

F ⇴ FOOD

One of his favourite things about Christmas was the food, although Minho didn’t tend to eat too much throughout the rest of the year, he would never hold himself back over the holidays. As soon as he heard you arriving home with a bag of food in your hands, he would start rummaging through it straight away to see if you had bought any Christmas specific foods home and sneak them into his studio when you weren’t paying attention.

G ⇴ GIFT GIVING

Minho preferred to give presents at Christmas, as he often added his own personalised touch to many of them, there was something even more sentimental for him about giving presents to all of his loved ones.

H ⇴ HOLIDAY HOME

He loved being with you at Christmas, wherever that was, either with his family or with yours. Minho wasn’t massive on going too far away from home at Christmas, all he wanted was to be nice and comfortable in a place that he was familiar with, surrounded by you and all of the people that meant the most to you too.

I ⇴ ICE

Minho would protest throughout most of the winter that he didn’t want to go ice skating with you, but usually as Christmas came around you would manage to convince him. Each year he would hover around the barrier, never truly trusting himself to let go as he was slightly fearful of falling over and injuring himself.

J ⇴ JOY

Although he was never massive on Christmas himself, Minho loved seeing the enthusiasm that you put into Christmas each year, not just for your own sake but for your family’s too, helping out wherever you were needed and making sure that they all received presents that they would fall in love with too.

K ⇴ KIDS

In the back of his mind, Minho would certainly begin to think about the future with you at Christmas, in awe of how joyous you were during the holidays and how that happiness would create the perfect Christmas for your children in the future whenever the two of you decided to settle down and start your family.

L ⇴ LOVE

Minho loved how you always tried your hardest to make him enjoy Christmas, it would always take a bit of hard work to get him motivated for Christmas, but usually in the final few days before Christmas Day came around, he would find himself undeniably feeling festive thanks to the efforts that you went to.

M ⇴ MOVIES

He loved watching Christmas films with you, often putting one on in the background whilst the two of you busied yourselves. When the two of you were wrapping your presents was when Minho would usually love to watch Christmas movies the most, glancing up and watching a couple of scenes in between each wrapped gift.

N ⇴ NAUGHTY OR NICE

Throughout most of the year Minho would be on your nice list, the only time he only found himself on the naughty list was when he became a bit of a Scrooge, refusing to get excited for Christmas no matter how hard you tried to get him to.

O ⇴ OBSESSION

Minho was obsessed with getting creative at Christmas, although it wasn’t his favourite time of year, he loved putting a lot of effort into various different things because of how much you loved Christmas and his artwork too.

P ⇴ PRESENTS

Quite often Minho would surprise you with the gifts that he bought you, always managing to find the perfect thing. You never really thought that he was paying too much attention to what you were saying, however he would prove you wrong every Christmas morning by buying you exactly what it was that you wanted.

Q ⇴ QUESTIONS

If the two of you were in a room together, you would usually ask Minho if he minded if you put your Christmas playlist on, you never wanted to overwhelm him with too much festiveness, but he could never say no to you anyway.

R ⇴ RANDOM FACTS

The main reason that Minho always agreed to let you play your music was because most years he came up with the playlist himself. He was very particular about what Christmas songs he would listen to, and so after adding all of your favourites, he would browse through and pick out the songs that he loved too.

S ⇴ SNOW

You would often have to drag Minho out when it snowed, not wanting him to miss out by staying indoors. For a while, he would be a little moody that you had made him go out in the cold, but after watching you run around with an excitable smile on your face, he would usually end up thankful that you had encouraged him to head out.

T ⇴ TRADITION

Although the two of you always bought for everyone, each year Minho would throw in an extra present for everyone, making it a tradition of his to make everyone a handmade present each year as well.

U ⇴ UNDERNEATH THE MISTLETOE

You loved to get Minho underneath the mistletoe as he couldn’t run away. Whenever he found that you had got him under the mistletoe, a laugh would come from him before succumbing and letting you give him a kiss.

V ⇴ VACATION

He hated going away at Christmas, in his opinion, Christmas was a time to be at home and with family, and so after you had suggested once about going on holiday at Christmas, you learnt not to do it again.

W ⇴ WRAPPING

Minho loved being very detailed when wrapping presents, adding a sentimental touch to each one so everyone knew it was from the two of you.

X ⇴ XXXX

Whenever you got excited around him, Minho would find himself pressing a kiss against your cheek to try and calm you down as you struggled to keep yourself composed in amongst all of the festivities around you.

Y ⇴ YOU

You were the present he was always most thankful for, nothing else ever compared.

Z ⇴ ZZZ

Although he could be considered a bit of a Scrooge, every Christmas Minho would always remind himself how lucky he was to have you still, falling asleep and promising to make the most of the holidays with you.

---

Masterlist

#winner #winner imagine #mino #mino imagine #minho #minho imagine #winner scenario #winner reaction #winner headcanon #winner mino #song minho #song minho imagine #mino scenario #mino reaction #mino drabble #mino one shot #mino fluff #kpop #kpop imagine

[whosscruffylooking]

The Purest Things-Something There

Warnings: Mentions of murder. Canon-typical violence.

Word Count: 2.5k

a/n: i am so beyond sorry that it has taken this long to get another chapter out. this doesn’t follow my post schedule that i had previously given, but hopefully this can be a good place holder till later this week. 

The Purest Things Masterlist

May 2008

Bookend: "It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it, I am not going to be silent." -Madeleine Albright

"There's no way I'm doing that," you rebuttal, "Hotch? Tell them it's a ridiculous idea." He stays silent, but his mouth twitches slightly.

Oh, you son of a-

"Richards is a classic narcissist. The challenge of facing a tough, fearless, and intelligent woman will give him his high. Narcissists are drawn to goal-oriented women, women who are resilient, adaptable, yet decisive. Show him that you are a good listener, but don't praise him."

"Think of him like a wild animal," Spencer adds, "You don't feed zoo animals because they are unpredictable. Remember, narcissists have an extraordinary sense of self, and when you praise his ego, you enable his unstable and feeble mind. He doesn't hear praise; he hears how much better he is than you. If you don't feed the beast, he won't have the stamina to combat your confidence later."

"Once you disarm him, I'll come in and challenge his confidence," Hotch concludes. 

Could you have said that less attractively? That would have been more helpful.

Aaron cheekily smirks as if reading your mind but quickly looks away. You wish you didn't blush so fast-that you had some sense to keep your emotions to yourself. In a second, your cheeks are rosy, and you are convinced that everyone in the room can perceive your feelings as if you wrote them on little notes and passed them around.

You grunt and roll your eyes, "I hate all of you."

Derek snaps his fingers at you, "Lose the jacket."

"All men are pigs," you spit while removing your blazer, leaving you in a fitted tank top and your tight-legged jeans that hug your curves in all of the right places.

Derek wolf whistles at you, and you hurl your jacket at him.  Aaron lets his eyes slide up and down your body, his gaze lasting longer than it should. He swears that as you stride into the interrogation room, your hips swing a bit farther side to side than usual. It is the very action that radiates courage, a mind coupled perfectly with itself and the world around it, concentrated and solemn.

Typically, Hotch would divert the task of adulating a narcissist to Prentiss, but he knows if anyone can take command of someone's attention, it's you. How does he know? Because you captivate him far more often than he cares to admit, defying his very being with every interaction. You are a secret weapon that he wants to keep concealed until you can allow your talents to shine genuinely. Aaron knows that now is your moment. ++++ "What is it that I am being accused of? Fraud? Embezzling?" The sharp-dressed businessman questions; his gaze is straying further below your eyes than you care for.

Pig.

You throw a file down on the medal table, and it slides across, stopping right in front of the man, successfully redirecting his stare somewhere other than your chest.

"Try murder."

His eyes widen, "You're joking. Come on, where are the hidden cameras? I'm ready for you to yell candid camera now! I am Milton Richards, for god's sake!"

"I don't know!" You shrug your shoulders. "Why don't you explain this to me, Mr. Richards. I'm just as confused as you are. What reason could a successful, charming, handsome, wealthy business mogul like yourself possibly have to kill someone?"

"Oh please," Richards scoffs, "This isn't an interrogation. You've already pegged me as guilty."

"I don't agree, but you have the right to feel how you feel."

He purses his lips, leaning as far away from you as physically possible while handcuffed to the table.

"Milton, why did you try to escape a moving vehicle when my team apprehended you?"

"Just felt like it, I guess," he shrugs mockingly.

"So, something just randomly compelled you to flee the custody of a federal agent?"

Richards leers at you. You stand up and walk around the table, leaning down next to him, "I get it. I do. You're a suave, wealthy, and ruthless business tyrant. You have to cover your tracks-do what it takes to survive."

He raises his eyebrow, turning to face you, your faces mere inches from each other. I got you now.

"Trust me. I know probably better than anyone what it takes to maintain a position you fought your entire life for. I'm a woman; I had to claw my way into the F.B.I. Do you think it's easy being surrounded by a team filled with uncontrolled testosterone? Womanhood requires balls; I see you keep your balls in your pants, cool, cool. Mine are on my chest, up top. As you've so duly noticed."

His eyes flicker to the aforementioned area, and you restrain yourself from gagging.

"And you know what, Richards? I use them every day of my life. Because in my line of business, sometimes I have to take the backdoor to get things done. Why do I get the sense that you were the same way before you became Mr. Wolf of Wall Street? How else does a kid who grew up in the projects become a multi-millionaire mogul by 27?"

"We both know what the other is capable of. C'mon, let's show each other a bit of respect here. No games, let's be upfront with each other," you appeal. ++++ Aaron watches as you work the room like it is your stage. You play the part perfectly.  He admires your ability to absorb things and then responded rather than immediately react to douse firey circumstances rather than add to the flames.

Derek finds himself next to Aaron, smugly observing Aaron's visible fascination with you.

"She's fantastic, Hotch," Derek beams with pride. Hotch holds his breath behind pursed lips in an attempt to barricade himself from the feelings of foolish jealousy he feels creeping up.

I know she is. I think I recognize it a little too well.

Aaron knows that Derek will be scrutinizing his reaction to the commendation and refrains from responding.

Of course, Derek reads this lack of a reaction as a response itself. And he finds it strangely amusing. ++++ "Here's what I think happened," you twirl your finger around the manilla file, "I think you were having some money troubles and your top investors caught onto your little games. When you sat down, you volunteered the crimes fraud and embezzlement as reasons you assumed we brought you into custody. You listed them like they are apparent reasons for us to charge you. Those are two areas you are clearly willing to take the fall for and have cause to oblige by."

Opening the file, a photograph is revealed within of a murder victim. Richards shifts uncomfortably in his seat, stifling a cough.

"Do you know this man?"

"N-no," he claims as his eyes flutter from the photo to his hands.

Surprised by his blatant tell, you glance back at the two-way mirror.

Turning back to the suspect with a newfound spark in your eyes, you press harder, "Strike one. Try again."

"Excuse me?"

"The man in the image is Walter Barone, the C.E.O. of Jameson Whitely Associates...your accounting firm. Your company was going bankrupt, Milton. There was nowhere left for you to turn. So, do you want to try that again? This time, answer my questions directly and honestly."

"Walt had a reserve saved for me worth $5 million. Last week when I approached him about dipping into the fund to keep the company afloat, he withheld it. I wouldn't kill him for it, though."

"Well, see, that's the problem here, Milton. When he was found, that little reserve of yours was nowhere to be found. Naturally, you can assume where my mind goes when I try and put two and two together, right?"

"I told you," he says, clearly provoked by your accusation, "I wouldn't...didn't kill him."

"Wasn't it you, in your book, right? Who said, 'It's surprising what a man will do when properly motivated?' I don't know about you, but losing everything you'd ever worked for and having your one saving grace held from you seems like pretty good motivation."

Silence. "Oh, come on, Milton, now is not the time to act so arrogant!"

He slams his fists on the table; you abstain from being startled in an attempt to show him no fear.

Wild animals can smell fear. 

"Arrogant, huh? Why don't you step up and prove me wrong? Prove you're better than me. You despise me for being successful; I despise you for your assumption that you could waltz in here like a tramp and seduce me into giving myself up. What? Too harsh? I'm not sure you and I are even the same species."

Hotch bursts into the room, and you quickly signal for him to stand down. I've got this.

He gives you a prideful wink. I know you do.

Somehow Aaron being in the room gives you that last little push to conclude this grand performance of yours. Slowly, you begin clapping dramatically for his little one-person comedy act. He certainly knows how to play the fool.

"Is that a dare? Challenge accepted. Your entire life, you have suffered from a disease... a fragile ego. You have built these walls of detachment so that you can conveniently solicit status to hide your true, weak self. You lash out because you feel it compensates for your insecurities."  

"The truth is, despite being at the top of the corporate chain, every day you lead the life of a loser. You are willing to destroy people psychically, emotionally, and mentally. And you view that as a cause for celebration. You are the embodiment of a loser and abject failure."

Hotch touches the small of your back; you shiver at the sudden warmth that fills your body in reaction to it. He hands you a piece of paper, one that seals Richards' conviction.

"Milton Richards, you are under arrest for the murder of Walter Barone, Hank Simmons, Frankie Lisbon, and Jillian Ryder."

Hotch motions for you to do the honors.

"By all means, lead the way."

Holding yourself proud and tall, you waltz over to Milton and hoist him out of his chair. Inclining your lips to his ear, you tell him contemptuously, "You lose."   ++++ "Way to go, superstar! You had us all on the edge of our seats," Derek says, wrapping his muscular arms around you. You breathe in his cologne and savor the sensation of being in his arms.

Since the day you met Morgan, you've felt a draw to him. Not in a romantic way, though you proudly admit he is hands-down one of the most gorgeous men to set foot on earth. He gives you the feeling of safety, warmth, and brotherly love. His hugs rejuvenate you after a long day of work, and you see to it that neither of you leaves the office without receiving your signature embraces.

Aaron observes you and Derek's shared embrace from the shelter of his office. Before he can comprehend his movements, his legs carry him to the terrace overlooking the bullpen.

What do you think you're doing, Hotch? Pull yourself together. They’re friends. Just like you and her are.

Dismissing his inner voice of reason, he calls out to you, "Y/L/N. See me in my office."

You grimace at his tone of voice but abide by his request.

Derek chuckles, "Green is not that man's color."

"What?" You turn to him, confused.

"Goodnight, superstar."

"Night, handsome," you blow him a kiss, trying to brush his comment out of your mind.  ++++ "You summoned?"

Aaron's whiskey-colored eyes meet yours. The tempo of your heart quickens like a metronome.

"You did a phenomenal job in there."

"I've learned from the best." You. I've learned from you.

He clears his throat, "Those things you said...a-about the men on this team. Is that how you truly feel?"

Shocked by his willingness to believe such a misleading statement, you gasp and close the distance between the two of you.

You must have some nerve to believe that I would ever view you as anything other than the most upstanding man I've ever met.

"Aaron, what I said in there is further than the truth than I would have liked to have strayed. In fact, it was with you that I finally felt equal as a human being-like someone recognized me for my intellect and self-worth. A woman can't acquire that regardless of how 'equal' this world claims to be."

Aaron finds himself lost in your eyes, absorbing every meaning behind your words.

"It was a freeing feeling having someone I respect so highly show me similar respect."

No. Don't stop talking. Please. Hotch blushes at his inner monologue, incapable of comprehending precisely what kind of influence you hold on him.  

"Anyway," you laugh, brushing away a strand of hair that had fallen in your face, "Sorry for my little tangent."

"No," Hotch interjects firmly, "Never apologize for expressing your feelings. I assured you last year that I'll always be available as a sounding board for you. That offer still stands."

Your gaze softens as you study him, his intentions, his mannerisms. He notices your pupils dilate, and it commences a chain reaction within his veins. To him, it's not the fact that you radiate beauty on the outside. Sure, you are physically fit and put in the effort to maintain your appearance. Naturally, that would be why someone like Derek Morgan would have you on his radar.

But, Aaron has gradually grown accustomed to the kindness that you seem to reserve just for him. He sees the differences between how you act around the team versus when you step inside his office or are alone in the car with him, even the way your confidence elevates when he walks into the interrogation room.

These differences aren't unique to just you, though. Aaron notices the same changes in himself when he is around you. Never did he expect to go home from work and lie in bed thinking about the way your eyes strayed on his for a moment too long, or how as he completed paperwork at his desk, he'd replay in his mind a cheesy joke you told the team. He knows how you like your coffee from observing you in the break room one too many times.

One cream, two sugars.

Your laughter warms his body from the inside out. When you talk about your favorite comic book with Prentiss and Morgan, the twinkle in your eye never fails to bring a smile to his face. He knows that you hate getting out of the car when it rains because your perfectly straightened hair that you spent god knows how long on will undoubtedly curl.

His changes were less evident on the outside. But, he knew that deep down, there is something there that wasn't there before.

Tag List:

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[starshiningsirius]

Dr. Jerkyll and Mr. Hyde (Yandere Leech twins x reader)

An au idea I had came to mind based off @yandere-wishes Victorian twst story and @yandere-romanticaa 's Extraterrestrial story.

I love these two eels and I'm late on their birthday but it's still their birthday for me.

The clear moonlit sky shown brightly over the waters of the ocean. As yet another scream echoed within the streets of a supposedly vacant city.

The detective woke up with a start but not from the scream, but from the ringing of her phone. A report she had been writing stuck to her face from the humid atmosphere. She picked it up getting a few details from Idia, who was panicking on the other side of the line. Considering he worked in the criminal department at the desk and didn't have to see any bodies whatsoever you would think he'd be calm when trying to say what happened.

"Calm down Idia. Tell me what happened?" Her voice was gentle since yelling wouldn't help his nerves.

"Therewasanothermurder! Theyclaimedanothervictim!" He spoke so fast that his words wouldn't be understood by most but she was used to this with him and every word was caught by the detective's ears.

"Where's the crime scene?"

"In front of Sam's shop on Crystal Road, Ms. Y/n L/n." The voice of Idia's younger sibling popped up a contrasting his older brother's cowardly behavior.

He wanted to be just like his older brother so he spent his days in the office with him. Though there were times when Idia tapped out and his brother had to step in.

"Thank you both. I'll head their now." She hung up after hearing a farewell from both brothers.

The candle was long out and she grabbed her gun, notebook, and pen within the darkness, before venturing out the confines of her home.

When she got there a crowd had surrounded one spot in particular.

Cater was already there taking photos of the scene as it was his job being a forensic photographer.

"Hey, hey! Y/n's here, make way!" The crowd parted for her as soon as he announced her presence.

Whispers were muttered as she passed through into the middle of the crime scene. Mostly about how she hadn't caught this killer yet. She ignored them though and went on to meet with her coworker.

"It never ceases to amaze me how your always here first Cater, if anything you should be a suspect." She started off saying to her compatriot.

"Can't help it if I want to stay informed dectective, I just want to stay informed before anyone else." His smile on his face was out of place as he took another photo of the corpse.

"Who was it this time?"

"Such a poor fate to befall dear Monsieur Heart." A new voice joined in the conversation.

"Rook, I see you've arrived but can I get their name please?" The detective said sighing at the theatrics of her friend.

"His name was Ace Trappola, I can't imagine how Monsieur Spade must be feeling about this tragedy." Rook feigned a sorrowful look.

"Oh yeah A-Deuce kun were inseparable, I feel sorry for him. Think he knows already?"

"If there as inseparable as you say Cater then I suppose not, he isn't here yet otherwise I'm sure he'd cause a scene." She noted.

"That doesn't make him a suspect though right? I mean sure he's been a suspect in many crimes before, but Deuce kun far too soft!" Cater was a bit frantic at the thought alone.

"No, I doubt it was him he wouldn't want to disappoint his mother with something as vulgar as murder, he cares for her far too much to do that." That calmed his worries.

"You know I've heard Monsieur Heart have many laments on how his delivery to Roi d' Rose-" Cater didn't let Rook finish.

"RIDDLE?! No way he did this! Have you seen how strict his mother is? Just waltzing in their office and so much as suspecting her son is a one way ticket to hearing her screams! Besides I doubt his mother would even let him out this late anyway, he's always about following the rules set in place for him." Cater says with an imaginary sweat that could have formed to express his fear and anxiety.

"True, and I can't afford another headache from that lady, but we could get some valuable intel from him about Trappola's demeanor the past few days seeing as it may be a pattern in the serial killers motives."

"What about Sam? He's gotta know something considering the murder occurred in front of his shop." Cater's gaze went toward the shop to the right of them.

"Ah the shop keep, a wonderfully eccentric man with many secrets." Rook stated his opinion of him from what he gathered on his own free time.

"Says the French man whose got info on everyone from stalking them on the street." The detective says shaking her head at the strange man next to her who happily smiled at her statement.

"I wouldn't call it that more so getting to know my prey more personally." She sighed hearing his reply.

"A crime analyst such as yourself is such a good cover up!" Cater's response made her sigh once again.

She shook her head toward her coworkers. They took their job in a mild manner but beyond that they did do well to get it done. Even though the means of how they did it were very much questionable in her eyes.

She looked toward the ground seeing the body of the former male right on the cusp of adulthood. His orange hair was a bit disheveled and the looks of shock on his face petrified in time.

"Ah, the dectective is already using those perceptive eyes of hers." Cater's words fell on deaf ears as she was examining the crime scene closely.

"As expected of Reine de la déduction, such dedication in her work. Très bien!"

Their bones were disfigured, just like the last person. No one has this type of strength it didn't make any sense. The only lead that was given but she noticed a glowing substance in his mouth.

"Cater, Rook, I need some confirmation. Out of all the other times these cases have been appearing there weren't any liquid substances to be found beside the occasional blood right?"

"You are correct."

"Yeah, nothing else to be found from what I could see." They both confirmed her suspicion.

She had to go talk to Jade again, but first thing tomorrow she had to interrogate Sam, as well as Riddle Rosenhearts which was sure to be headache on her part.

* * *

His mother was an agitation to say the least. During her entry into his mother's office and upon stating the reason for her entry, Riddle's mother had already hated her the moment she finished speaking. Yelling and hollering about how her son would never commit such a crime even though the dectective never stated he was a suspect in the slightest.

She only asked to question the behavior of Mr.Trappola as of late before he met his end. He was under no suspicion whatsoever but she wasn't having that and kept screeching until her son had to calm her down.

It was much more pleasant afterwards but the headache Y/n had in the early morning just listening to her screeching didn't disappear throughout the whole endeavour.

Just before she bid him farewell he apologized deeply for his mother's behavior with a red face of complete embarrassment. To which she replied it was alright and thanked him for his time. Unfortunately though she had to bear that burden on her own as Rook and Cater had their own jobs to partake in analyzing the other crimes and investigating the trend within the series of murders. It was unfair but that was life. By the time she exited their establishment it was already in the afternoon a little after lunch.

Next was to venture to Sam's shop which was right where the crime had taken place. The body was already removed and taken to forensics, so the only thing left was a broken street lamp.

"Ah, well if isn't the dectective, I believe I already know the pleasure of seeing you here on this fine day," He tipped his hat to her with a smile on his face.

"Afternoon to you too Sam. I would like to acquire any information you have on the murder of Ace Trappola that occurred last night, in front of your establishment."

"Such a shame the little demon, was too young to have bite the dust. But you know as well as I my information comes with a price."

"A thousand madols should suffice a description of what you saw right?" She questioned handing a stack of the paper currency to which he smiled at.

"All I know is that last night was certainly something else. I heard a smash of a lamppost outside my window, up on the second floor. Shop was already closed though. When I looked down I saw what looked to be two silhouettes outside the window. One way taller than the other though, I recognized of Trappola on the ground and something glowed within the hands of the killer, a vial of sorts. He poured it down the throat of the little demon, but Trappola put up a good fight before it was over."

"Over? Can you specify?"

"As in he was left on the ground for dead, it looked like he was choking on whatever was consumed. The killer held him tightly after he realized he was choking. It was similar to a hug but one that was more deadly than a normal one. After he dropped him to the ground and walked away laughing hysterically at who he squeezed."

"And you weren't going to go to the police to inform that you had witnessed the murderer of a serial killer!" Her voice had raised a bit in volume as her agrevated state didn't alleviate since earlier in the day.

"I'm not one to get involved in others private life, Dectective. I've got a business to run." She understood his point though exhaling a sigh through her nose.

"Right. If you want to keep your life you keep your mouth shut. Alright I thank you for the intel." The dectective closed her notebook after writing down many notes on the case.

"Pleasure doing business with ya, Dectective! Best of luck to you as well! You'll be needing it more than anyone." She was only able to hear the first part of it not when his cheery demeanor went away.

She walked out to her final destination of the day, a close friend of hers. His name was Jade Leech, a smart man that excelled in pharmaceuticals just as did Riddle's mother but in a more different sense. His potions were revolutionary with in the subject of alchemy and his botany skills and knowledge made his fame and fortune.

He's helped her on countless cases before, with his expertise in potions it aided in knowing key components to solving head bangers such as this.

As she reached the door of his manor she knocked before waiting a moment or two to see his smile.

"Dectective, how pleasant it is to see you today." He flashed his signature smile toward me, with pearly teeth straight and white.

"It's nice to see you too Jade. May I come in?"

"Your always welcome here, though I must say you do look exhausted how about I put on some tea?" He made way for me to step in.

"You don't have to Jade."

"I insist, naturally I should show good hospitality to all my visitors. Your free to take a seat wherever you like."

"So how are your mushrooms doing?" She said starting up conversation on a favorable topic for him. He was in the kitchen that connected to the empty dining room, that opened the way to the living room where she sat.

"I imagine you didn't come here just to speak on how my mushrooms are doing alone?" He spoke it in the form of a question but he already knew the answer with a knowing smile on his face that she couldn't see but knew he had.

"You are right, my apologies, I actually require your aid with a substance that could be the key in solving the recent serial killings." She watched as he walked in with two plates in hand.

"It's fine, I'm glad you can come to me for help." He served the two plates, one in front of her and the other in front of himself.

They had pasta on both of them with the mushrooms I mentioned. It smelled heavenly. Her stomach growled loudly which caused Jade to laugh lightly.

"I'm assuming you haven't eaten much of anything have you?"

"No I had too much work to do today." She blushed looking away from him.

He sighed making a small 'tsk' noise.

"You have got to take better care of yourself, that dedication of yours is admirable but otherwise you'll drive yourself into an early grave with that sort of work ethic." He chastised.

"Ah, I just don't have the time these days, I'm sorry for all the trouble you have to go through for me." Her eyes traveled toward the food with a slight guilty feeling.

"You speak as if your some sort of burden on me, quite the contrary I worry for your safety and yours alone. You may be a skilled dectective but, I care for your well being first."

Her face grew to an intolerable temperature that would make people think she was sick. She was very much surprised by his words. The first time anyone has ever said anything that endearing to her in a while.

So to ignore the feeling of her heart racing she picked up her plate kept her eyes trained on it. Her expression looked to resemble pouting.

"L -let's just eat then shall we?" She stumbled on her first word internally cursing as she heard Jade's laughter.

. . .

After they had eaten Y/n had spent some time explaining to Jade the situation with Trappola's murder and handed him the vile of the substance found at the crime scene.

He listened attentively and chimed in few times for clarity. He said he would have the analysis of the substance done within two days. Soon enough she was on her way out the door even though he had offered her to stay the night she had declined politely. It wasn't weird since they were close friends with one another anyway. Not to mention there were times where she would fall asleep while waiting for Jade to finish his analysis and he would be nice enough to place her in a room.

"Thank you Jade, I would have loved to spend more time with you, but I've been really busy as of late with all these murders." She thought for a moment and then looked up at him. He was a bit tall, scratch that he was tall, of course so she got on the tips of her toes and placed a kiss on his cheek to show him her gratitude.

Jade's face lit a flame, cheeks flushed as he touched where her lips made contact.

"I'll see you later." Was all she said before walking away briskly passed the gates of his house not looking back.

She would've heard the glass breaking inside the male's house in which indicated another presense inside.

. . .

Two days had passed and the dectective was trying to piece together what was the link between these series of murders.

She had to go check with Lilia who is the pathologist that had completed an autopsy on all the bodies of the victims. As eccentric as he was he was more tolerable than the combo of intricacies that are her co workers. Then again everyone in this office was weird in their own way.

"Ah, dectective what great weather we're having today, is it not?" He said with a smile on his face.

Unlike Jade he was significantly shorter than him so she had to look down a little to see him or stand a few feet away.

"It is indeed, Lilia. You seem to be in a good mood today."

"That is because I have made a breakthrough on today, while working through the night." His smile grew and the magenta eyes affirmed his happiness toward the news he had to share.

"On Mr. Trappola's body, I have found something strange but interesting nevertheless! A scale and not only that, but there is something you should see for yourself!" He brought her over to said man's corpse luckily the bottom half of his body is covered and the top half as well up to his shoulders.

Lilia grabbed one of his tools for dissection and beckoned her to come closer as she showed her what he had found. That's when she saw it.

Lilia had a small knife and maneuvered it to a small spot itself, lifting up a small piece of skin that was already slit and based on the size of the knife and similarity to another a butter knife it wouldn't have been able to cut the skin.

"There are two more like this on this side of his neck and three on the other side. So it seems like they're gills.

"What about the other bodies?"

"I spent the night examining those as well and they all have the same gills but Trappola here is the only one who had a few scales."

"So maybe the substance has something to do with these oddities on him. Trappola probably ingested some."

"It's quite possible that whoever this murderer is trying to test the substance on the person instead of themselves but based on Trappola's few scales being the latest attempt it seems they are making improvement for whatever the elixir's use is. These strange characteristics it reminds me of some fairytale I heard some time ago." He drifted off sounding like an old man reminiscing.

"Enlgihten me then Lilia." Knowing just how Lilia liked to ramble on about myths and legends like he'd seen them and lived through their stories.

"Well if you insist but this one involves merfolk certainly you've heard of mermaids and such right these scales on legs don't they remind you of those types of things. Gills on their necks so that half people half fish would gain the ability to breath underwater."

"Ah right but this is reality. Seeing is believing though right? Who knows though maybe they could help with the case." She was skeptic hearing about a bunch of lore that could just be coincidental but she knew better than that. Coincidents were more than just preordained.

. . .

Now back at Jade's manor the dectective was contemplating what in the world such a myth could play a factor in a murder scene. It just didn't make any sense as to why the person would need such a potion. What type of person would you have to be to go that f-

She couldn't finish that thought since Jade had opened the door.

"Ah, Jade good day to you-" the dectective looked up toward him to see the tall man staring at her for a bit longer than a few seconds. She did notice the strand of black hair usually on his right was on the left.

Unconsciously she reached up and was about to grab it before her hand was grabbed.

"Just what are you doing little dectective?" His voice got a bit darker towards the end sending shivers down her spine for a second before she saw his eyes in front of her and thought to herself for a second.

'Was his gold eye always on the right?'

A slight tighter squeeze on her hand woke her up form her head. She was reminded of the situation again. She could feel his breath closer to her face, she was internally malfunctioning and was losing her train of focus.

"Ah, I was, I was just trying to flip your black strand of hair." She stuttered and didn't internally curse herself this time since the proximity was still a factor in her brain turning to mush.

Jade suddenly smiled a wide one at that. Usually it'd be small and polite even when teasing he'd have a signature closed eyed smile keeping the adorable image of his flustered dectective in his head. But that wasn't the case this time. This smile was more menacing and sent bad news toward all who saw it.

Jade towered over her a bit more leaning to the right a bit toward her ear.

"Dectective do you know what you remind me of?" He questioned with a wide smile on his face.

He leaned in too close for comfort his breath could be felt on her right ear, while his hand on her shoulder kept her still.

"An adorable little shrimp! I could just eat you up!" He said it slow to build up suspense but it sounded serious and at the same time.

She pushed him away feeling her face heat up tremendously like an oven.

"J -Jade!" She couldn't find the words to describe what she just heard feeling beyond embarrassed and having her heart pound loudly that she swore he could hear.

"I -I have to go, thank you for your time!" She frantically stated about to run off but before she could Jade had grabbed her wrist and pulled her back.

"Aww can't I get a kiss too, little shrimp? Besides aren't you forgetting something?" She was too put off by the request to understand the sentence, but her mind did process part of the sentence and she remembered why she came here.

He held up a folded up sheet of paper in his hands toying with her holding it out of her reach.

How could he say that in such a cool voice? Her nerves couldn't handle so much teasing, it wasn't unlike him but it seemed he had gone over his usual gentlemanly behavior.

She hurriedly kissed him on the cheek in which he hadn't expected such a quick response to his question with a blush on his face becoming apparent and his frozen stature. She took the opportunity to jump up for the paper and ran from near the doorstep bidding farewell with the sheet of paper she had took in hand leaving a blushing male to watch her run out. His smile grew as he saw her frantic behavior, excitement bubbling within him.

He ran outside to the backyard of the mansion to go share his newfound happiness.

. . .

"Jade! Shrimpy is really cute!" The one male spoke to Jade in a tone of voice that was different than that of a few minutes, one that would have made him believe he was Jade himself.

There appearances were so similar, cept for the eyes and voice they were twins after all. With a little makeup and easy voice tone change one could hardly tell the difference anyway.

"I'd thought you'd understand if you saw her up close, Floyd." Jade was actually outside tending to his mushrooms in the garden while his look alike was entertaining the female detective that had left in a hurry. Though knowing his brother he could already assume how it must have went. Thinking of his little dectective being so flustered indefinitely brought out his sadistic side a bit.

"Can we keep her?" Floyd was so fond of her seeing her turn red, hearing her heart beating loudly, when she stuttered and that kiss on the cheek pretty much sealed the deal for him. She was so full of life and it brought excitement for him since he had to stay within the manor and avoid everyone. His behavior would be brash and scare many in the public eye not only that but his strength was inhuman which could cause problems for the person on the receiving end. Especially if you were trying to blend in.

They only came from the sea to see the lives of humans and unlike one of their friends who started a business in this day and age. Jade could survive on land with the ability to easily fool others with a facade whereas Floyd couldn't do that all the time and would probably squeeze someone for no reason other than boredom.

He didn't like being confined but after seeing the dectective sleeping on the couch once, he became curious as to who she was and why Jade spent so much time helping her. He knew for a fact his brother was not at all kind or generous. He was beginning to finally understand.

"We are but you have to be patient, you did give her both sheets of paper before she ran off correct?" His brother inquired finally seeing the hunger in his brother's eyes.

"Yup, she gave me a kiss just so she could distract me and take it. Shrimpy is so cunning she makes me want to squeeze her and pay her back for catching me off guard like that." The thought alone sounded enticing to Floyd, he couldn't wait to wrap his tail around her.

"I need you to go on another 'outing' tonight we have to perfect this first if we want to have any shot at having her to ourselves." Jade's words did nothing to damper his mood as his excitement reached a new level at the thought of showing his little Shrimpy off to everyone.

They were trying to get make a potion in which a human could become a sea creature, though it was easy for Jade to make one for himself and Floyd to come on land. The same can't be said for a person that's been human and has not a single gene that ties them to the ocean. Altering genetics is difficult and delicate and one mistake and their dear little detective could end up just like those poor unfortunate souls that were test subjects. Jade would never risk bringing her with them under the sea if he wasn't sure she'd make it.

"Okay~ Jade!" He said eagerly!

Now that Floyd was on board as well he would be more motivated and inclined to help, making it more easier for Jade as he wouldn't bother and complain so much about being on land longer.

. . .

She barely slept a wink after what had occurred. Every time she thought about her encounter with Jade she'd blush and bury her face into a pillow with frustration.

She tried before to get some of her work done before that, but that didn't work out too well as her mind drifted back to the same situation.

How close he was, the warmth of his breath against her ear, it was enough to make her brain stop functioning as if he were there again.

He seemed far more clingy than usual and she didn't know how to describe it other than strange. The notes from the alchemist were neat and precise and confirmed what Lilia and her examined on the bodies earlier in the day. But that wasn't the only thing that fell from the folded piece of paper. It was another small piece with neat cursive that matched the analytics on the other page.

'Would you like to spend your day off with me?'

Yet another reason she wouldn't be getting much sleep tonight.

. . .

After getting off from work she mentioned to her coworkers how Jade had offered her to spend her day off with him. Well they asked what she was gonna do with her day off since it was a rarity. First Cater asked her if she said yes to him yet. She said no and he understood from the get go that she was way too flustered to even respond to him. So he offered to go respond to him on her phone.

Rook congratulated her and went on a rant about love even though she tried to get through his head it wasn't a date. He asked what she would wear and she had no actual clue, in which Rook took that as an invitation to lend his aid and expertise.

He brought her to one of his friend's businesses. Cater said this place was highly recommended and that anyone whose anyone came to the place for a makeover. Specifically called Vil's beauty salon and boutique. She didn't understand how a person could have both but he seemed to be managing it fine. The said shop owner gave her one look and shook his head at her appearance.

His words were, "What a poor excuse for a girl to go on date with such a potato face such as that, it's shameful for not only you but the guy as well."

He had her try on clothes and by the end of it all, she felt different. Her head hurt from all the pulling around of her hair. She had put on enough clothes that she believed she was playing dress up. The outfit settled upon was different from her usual style and she had on makeup for the first time in her life.

Rook and Cater applauded Vil's work new appearance. The dectective had to admit that when she looked in the mirror she understood why Vil had such a reputation that Cater reccomended him highly.

She had to buy all of it of course and thanked Vil immensely for his efforts. There was actually a discount considering Rook brought her and she looked so 'pathetic'. He had a victoriously smug smile on his face and complimented his own efforts before waving the trio off. She thanked her two coworkers and bid them farewell, looking forward to the her first day off in a millennia.

When she met Jade the next day at his door he was plenty surprised by her appearance. He blushed with his eyes widened in astonishment at the change. Not to mention on the side of the manor Floyd could see just how beautiful she had dressed. It was going to be a long day especially with the heels she was wearing and trying her hardest to walk in.

. . .

The two friends went to Clover's bakery where Jade offered to pay for any sweets she wanted but it seemed they were terribly busy today and the line was a bit long not mention the place was packed inside so there weren't any tables to sit in.

Trey said it was nice to see her out and about for once not on dectective business for once. He said hello to Jade as they were all friends though she only knew Trey from Jade who introduced me. On rare occasions she would go to his bakery for something sweet. He handed them two cupcakes for free but also asked for a favor for him.

"Can you give deliever Riddle this tart please? His mother isn't home and he rarely ever gets anything sweet. I usually have Ace do it but-" He looks away for a moment.

"It's fine, Jade do you-"

"It's no trouble at all, we'd be happy to." He says with an enchanting smile on his face.

Trey handed over the box containing the tart to them and they made their way over to the clinic where Riddle resided.

On the way Jade and her conversed. She asked him why he agreed so quickly and he responded with his own unique answer.

"I know it's in your nature to help others. Yet another fond trait of yours."

It's more embarrassing hearing it for the first time and out loud no less. She could feel her face heat up again.

"Then there's when you turn into a cherry, one of my favorite traits." He said in a teasing tone with a smile toward her making the dectective flush even more and look away biting into her cupcake. To ignore the laughter emitting from her friend alongside her. Now this is the Jade she knows.

. . .

To be completely honest both of them enjoyed their time today with one another. They had delivered Riddle's tart which was almost a complete disaster.

Considering she asked Jade to be lookout in case his mother came back. Long story short she did arrive earlier than expected. After she and Riddle heard her voice outside the walls right near the entrance gate, the dectective told Riddle to go before she found him with the tart. Riddle was far more worried about her but the dectective told him she'd be fine.

By fine she meant ducking in the rose bushes for cover, there weren't any thorns surprisingly all been cut off. She waited for Riddle's mother to enter the house and had to scale the wall that was located next to an alleyway. Climbing up was the easy part but getting down was the hard part. She was wearing heels and that drop looked like she would possibly break a bone if she landed the wrong way.

She came to a decision to take a leap of fate and let her heels drop to the ground. One thought passed about Vil being pissed about her ruining them. She shook her head though and pushed herself off.

Before she could land someone else caught her. Looking up at her savior she saw the two colored eyes of Jade. Who smiled happily at making it on time.

"Ah look at that, my assumption was right. I thought you'd take this route out their place. It would've been such a shame if you were to get injured."

"Thank you Jade, can you put me down now please?"

"I don't think so I'd rather hold you like this until we get to the resturant for everyone to see." He playfully said watching her face heat up.

"Wha-? N -no I can walk on my own!"

"But you might have hurt something besides someone who can't get their words out is akin to a child so they must be coddled correct?" His teasing was endless today.

. . .

After leaving the Monstro Lounge a business run by one of Jade's friends, Azul Ashengrotto, the sun had already long set.

"Let me accompany you to your apartment, Y/n it's supposedly dangerous to be out after dark correct? Or you can just spend the night again?" He offered.

"I have to decline besides I've already used enough of your generosity I don't want to take it for granted. It's been such a great day thanks to you Jade, wish we could do these more often cept for the fact I have work tomorrow." She said in a relaxed tone.

Despite all the teasing she really did enjoy herself with the man. Having her heart beating loudly all day and having her brain short circuit was all too amusing to the man beside her, but out of everyone else even his own brother she made him feel strangely different. He couldn't explain the feeling itself, but he knew for a fact he'd never do all of this for someone he would use.

"You wish to spend more time with me? I can grant that you know." Jade had said that so simply and out of the blue but in a calm tone as well.

"There's no way you can do something like that but I appreciate the thought. It's fine though you've done enough already. I'd rather not burden you with a simple wish." She said with content.

Before he could respond to that statement fast footsteps hurried over to them both and made the pair turn around.

"I saw the killer it was Mr.Leech! He ran away from the scene!" His hair was a light green, eyes full of life and the loud tone of his voice was distinct.

"Sebek what do you mean you saw Jade kill someone he was with me the entire time!We just left the Monstro Lounge Azul saw us leave!" The dectective was defensive pertaining to justice being served, not to mention her friend was being accused and she had been with him the entirely of the day.

"No it was him I saw him Felmier was killed by him!"

"Felmier was killed?! You should've started with that! Take me to the body did you make sure he was dead?!"

. . .

Sebek had spread all about the town that Jade was the murderer even though the people who had seen us together throughout the day vouched. Trey, Riddle, Azul, Rook, and Cater even Vil had seen them together. Some actually took Sebek's words in and started to distrust Jade even so.

Vil and Rook two friends of Felmier had paid for the funeral costs as Epel's family was struggling. It was admirable to see the young man take on the vicious job as Vil's protégé. It really was a shame. Vil actually kept up a face and Rook though he looked upon the casket with blank like expression it was easy to tell he was out for blood. Jade did show up to pay his respects even though some glared at him and were suspicious.

Vil came up to dectecrive during the repass and told her to make that fool pay dearly. She would of course no argument there. Epel had been a good kid and may have been a bit brash but still good nonetheless. So was Ace.

And thus a good day ended on a sour note.

The dectective would have more sleepless nights. Lilia performed an autopsy on Epel's body with Vil standing by his side to make sure he didn't damage it. Even he was shocked to see more and more scales near his legs and gills that were more prominent.

These people were getting even more closer to there goal it seemed and she couldn't do a thing. She was so frustrated at that fact alone. Jade's analysis did help some though. Looking through shops though that sold what would be the components of the elixir nothing suspicious could be found in any of the people who had brought those items. Not to mention those who did didn't have all the items brought from another store, there was no reoccurring name in sales.

Speaking of Jade though she had begun to think back to Sebek. He wasn't the type to lie not on the name of the mysterious nobleman Malleus Draconia that he served would he ever embarrass himself to stain his name even slightly. That's what Lilia told her at least.

He said Jade had did the deed. But he was with her the entire time. Come to think Sam's description had also matched Jade's strange behavior before he gave her the analysis, but it didn't make sense. Jade was one person he couldn't be in two places at once!

Maybe someone was trying to frame him and to that extent she went to go question if he had any enemies of the sort. His response was that he didn't have any as far as he knew. That could have been a good lead.

With no others she sighed looking extremely worn out and Jade had a frown seeing her state. He insisted she stay the night and she denied saying she had to finish this case even more so now. He at least offered her a meal in which he put slipped some sleeping pills that made her fall asleep after eating.

Both pairs of two colored eyes gazed at her peaceful state not liking how she'd exhaust herself with so much work. Only for the sake of others and waste time and effort for people that isn't them. It was annoying to Floyd and agitated Jade more than he liked to admit. She did say she wanted to spend more time with them right?? If only she didn't have that stupid job. Even more a reason to push the date up to the next few days.

. . .

About a week and a half had passed and the dectective had no other leads still. It was killing her to say the least. All those unfortunate victims and those families and friends that mourned definitely weighed on her shoulders, guilt eating at her insides. Such a shame too within the end of the day she was at home taking an evening nap on her day off in which she didn't even go out today. Her phone buzzed waking her up from her slumber.

A text from Jade. It had been awhile since they last talked seeing as she fell asleep at his manor again even though she didn't intend to.

Rubbing her eyes she read the text from her bright phone screen.

'Meet me at the dock at 10 today.'

She wasn't as flustered as last time in fact she considered not going as this case took top priority. But this was Jade, her closest friend, and she hadn't taken much of a break as her nap was only 30 mintues probably the only amount of sleep she would get today if she was being honest with herself.

She reluctantly sighed and decided to get ready an hour before meeting him and walk there a bit early to have some time to her own thoughts. She thought about going to Vil's shop to buy another outfit but it would have been a waste if they were only meeting for a short time. Not to mention she didn't want Vil to come to the conclusion she was slacking off with Jade even though the bags around her eyes were very much proof.

As she sat at the edge of the dock admiring the stars the waves hitting the edge of the pier calmed her head. It was nice to say the least.

She wondered what Jade would have to talk about. She looked at her phone and saw it was 10:05, Jade being late was a surprise, hopefully if she waited a bit longer her worry would ease. That atmosphere could not have lasted any longer.

A slight wind blew and during that exact moment something pulled her under by her feet into the cold ocean waters below. She managed to hold her breath and open her eyes to see nothing but darkness even with the moon behind the clouds right about now only endless shadows were there.

She could barely hear but she could have sworn something swam by her. Arms touched her waist which almost made her scream for a moment though that was something suicidal. It touch the sides of her stomach and stayed there for a moment.

Even though she tried to struggle it was fruitless when the thing that held her tickled her sides making her open her mouth and succumb to breathing in water then choking soon after. That wasn't the only thing to occur since the next second lips were on hers and a fluid trickled down her throat along with the water that she was trying to swallow. The tongue of said thing dipped inside her mouth and would have made her gag if they hadn't pulled away.

She regretted it the moment they did cause she still could breath and with her mouth open she thought she would take her final breath. Both or what she assumes were two people backed off letting her go to meet her demise with her slowly closing her eyes. She didn't notice the glow of what transpired around her lower half of her body. She could finally take in some much needed breaths except her neck for some reason felt sore and she could no longer move her legs separately to try and swim up for air.

Looking down she saw the horrid image of a long tail with a fin on the end where her legs were supposed to be. The pain form her neck was from three newly formed slits on either side of her neck. Her fingers traced over them finding this whole situation unbelievable. When she finally came to her senses she found herself hearing voices as well.

"Shrimpy's still here! It worked, Jade!" A cheerful voice could be heard in the cold waters that surrounded her.

Something slimy wrapped about her new found lower half. Pulling her closer to be within someone's arms. They held her a bit too tight like all the air, water in her lungs could have been? Did she still even have those anymore she wondered? Even still the amount of pressure put on her by the creature hugging her was able to be felt.

He was laughing happily spinning around in circles with the former human female getting dizzy by the second.

"I can see that Floyd. How wonderful, but do take it down a notch she only was just turned after all." That voice was all too familiar. She couldn't help but say it aloud, but that couldn't be true.

"Jade?" Her voice was a whisper but of course he still heard it.

"Yes, my dear angelfish what is it?" He responded in an endearing tone that was calm despite the situation she was just put through.

She glanced toward the voice to see what appeared to be a creature similar to that of an eel by the tail. Her eyes trailed up to the sight of his face. It was him no doubt about it. The eyes were exact and so was the hair the only difference was the body and skin.

"Aw Shrimpy why'd you acknowledge him first? I'm here too." A voice whined in a more child like tone directly in her ear. It brought a shiver down her spine.

'Shrimpy?' That was unmistakably the nickname Jade gave her when he acted weird.

She turned toward his way and saw a sharp toothed grin on his face when she looked at him.

"Floyd you haven't even introduced yourself." Jade sounded like his normal self and this Floyd person was just the complete opposite of him.

"Oh right Shrimpy I'm Floyd, Jade's brother and your going to be with us in the sea from now on! Isn't that great? I can't wait to show you all my favorite places you'll love it!" He sounded so excited while dread built up in the mermaid.

"What do you mean stay here?! What have you done to me? Who, what even are you two?!" She said those words with malice laced into them having them both chuckle in response.

Jade had also wrapped his tail about her upper half restraining her further. He brought himself closer to her face, a smirk etched on to it.

"My, my, Y/n you did say you wanted to spend more time with me, isn't this what you wanted?" He tilted her chin up showing a sadistic smile on his face that only built up even more dread than what his brother had already.

"I didn't realize or expected anything like this and you know that! Why would you do this?! You! You-" She thought for a second processing all that had occurred the past couple of weeks.

"You killed them you gave them that exlixir that ended their lives. Every single one of them." This time it was the other brother's turn to speak.

"There's our little dectective she's so smart!~" Floyd just made her completely uncomfortable with how he would call her that nickname and whisper words in her ear.

"Why? Why would you do this?" She became defeated knowing turf like this was theirs and she stood no chance against them in the first place.

"Eh why? Is Shrimpy really that blind Jade?" Floyd mocked her with no remorse as tears streamed down the dectective's eyes at the thought of letting so many people down.

"Why? My dear angelfish haven't you noticed? We've become quite enamored with you. Hm no better word to put it is obsessed, at first it was just me but with Floyd's impatience I just had to get him in on understanding why we didn't go back home already. As for those people they were necessary for testing the elixir for this very moment. We couldn't have you dying on us afterall." He said with absolute calmness evoking rage within the mermaid.

She clenched her fists.

"So many were sacrificed, I should've died, instead." She murmured the last half but both the twin eels heard it.

There expressions turned dark and their tails gripped the female tighter startling her from her state of guilt.

"Eh, why would you say that Shrimpy, we can't have you leaving us. We finally got you all to ourselves and I haven't had much time with you, and yet you say you want to leave." Floyd's arms contracted her more than Jade's tail already, now she understood what it must have felt like for Trappola.

"He is right Y/n dear, we only want what's best for you and having you say that only makes our blood boil so please understand." Jade gripped her chin with a scary amount of strength. This was the first time he ever seemed so much more intimidating to her.

"Don't ever say something like that again am I clear?"

From that point on she was stuck between the twin eels who loved her so. She only wished she could have been able to listen to Sebek when he said the truth. Mr. Leech did do it just not the one she thought.

#twisted wonderland #disney twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland x reader #yandere twisted wonderland #floyd leech #jade leech #yandere floyd leech #yandere jade leech #yandere twst #yandere tweels

[once-upon-an-imagine]

I Bet My Life - Severus Snape

A/N: ahh xD so here it is! I have no idea how this happened but I really liked it! hope you guys too :) I have been in a very Snape mood lately so feel free to request him xD Professor!reader

Warnings: use of Sectusempra and mm mentions of sex? I guess, idk better safe than sorry

Disclaimer: I don’t own Harry Potter :) gif isn't mine :)

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

I Bet My Life

I've told a million lies but now I tell a single truth There's you in everything I do

"Professor Black, what can I do for you?" Severus Snape said, looking up from the assignments he was grading, but only for a minute before he went back to his task.

"Don't 'Professor Black' me, Severus Snape!" you said, annoyed, making him look back up again. "Why did I have to hear from some third-year students that you are dueling Gilderoy Lockhart tomorrow at noon?"

"Because I am" he simply said.

"Why?"

"Because he wanted me to help him demonstrate different spells against the Dark Arts... obviously."

"Severus!"

"Don't raise your voice at me!" he said, getting up, towering over you.

To anybody else in this school, with the exception of a few of his colleagues, that would have been enough to intimidate them and make them drop the subject. But not you.You had known him for way too long. Plus, you grew up with Sirius and Regulus. And your parents were Walburga and Orion Black. You were their only daughter and had been placed in Ravenclaw. Needless to say, in their eyes, you were no better than Sirius. So, there were very few things that could intimidate this woman. Let alone, Severus Snape who had been your friend since you were in school and who had been your partner (officially) for the past year.

"Why are you doing this, really?"

"Why would you think I have an ulterior motive?"

"Oh, so you're helping him out of the kindness of your heart?" you said with a small chuckle. "Don't make me laugh, Sev. You even make me do something in return whenever I ask for a favor" you told him with a smirk.

"Who says I didn't ask Lockhart for something in return?"

"What did you ask him for?" you asked with an arched eyebrow.

"Excuse me?" he said in his same, usual tone, but you noticed him tensing up.

"What did you ask him in return for your help?"

"I asked him to stay away from you" he mumbled, but you heard him.

"You did what?"

"You heard me, Black" he glared at you and you glared back at him. He only used your last name when he was mad at you, no matter how many times you had told him you hated it.

"So you would rather duel Lockhart than admit to him that we are a couple?"

It was exhausting. Ever since he started teaching DADA this year, he had tried to get you to go out with him. He was becoming increasingly insisting with each passing day. He sometimes even did it in front of Severus, but he was astoundingly good at pretending he didn't care. Or maybe he didn't. Maybe he wasn't pretending. You had wanted to let Lockhart know so many times, but you had agreed with Severus to keep your relationship private from the very beginning. Although you were positive that Albus and Minerva had a bet going on about when you were going to get together with the other professors.

"What goes on between you and I is nobody else's concern. We have talked about this" he said in his same monotone voice.

"It does if it helps me get rid of him!" you snapped back. "Do you have any idea how frustrating is to enter my class each time with a stupid note that has his photograph signed by him, every day? Have you not noticed how much I try to not sit next to him during every meal or appear to be busy so he won't come talk to me? Or do you simply not care-?"

"OF COURSE I CARE!" he yelled back, making you jump a little. "Do you think I don't notice how he looks at you? How he talks to you? How he talks about you?" he said, furious. "I do and it drives me insane!"

"Then why won't you just tell him instead of staging this whole duel-?" you stopped mid-sentence when you realized something. "Wait a minute" you said looking back at him. "What happens if Lockhart wins?"

"How dare you? You don't think I'll win?"

"Of course you'll win, Severus" you said, rolling your eyes. "But what if for some weird twist of fate he beats you? I doubt he'll agree to stay away from him if he won, would he?" you said, walking towards him and making him walk backwards.

If any student were to walk in, they would not believe that their sweet, kind, Charms professor, head of Ravenclaw, had such power over the dark, scary Potions master. He was terrified of you. Not that he'd ever show it, even to you, but you knew.

"It does not matter. I will defeat him" he said, calmly.

"Severus" you glared at him. "I am not going to ask you again" you threatened.

"The same thing" he muttered looking away.

"Excuse me?" you said even angrier than before, making him walk back until he hit his potions cabinet.

"I can explain-"

"No!" you snapped, raising your finger at him. "Are you meaning to tell me that you and Lockhart are dueling for me?"

"I didn't say that-"

"You said that if you win, he will stay away from me and you just said that if he wins... you have to stay away from me?"

"He is not going to win-"

"That is NOT the point, Severus!" you yelled at him. He had to admit, he had never seen you this furious. "How could you agree to this?" you whispered, your eyes filling up with angry tears. Severus felt his heart breaking. You never cried. He had seen you cry twice in his life. Once, when Regulus died. And the second time, when Sirius was sent to Azkaban. "Does our relationship really means so little to you?"

"No!" he said, quickly. "How could you think that-?" he said, trying to walk closer to you, but this time, you walked backwards.

"How could I not?" you said, your voice breaking and one tear falling down your cheek. "You chose to gamble me away like some disposable thing to you!"

"No! It is not like that! Love, listen to me-" he tried again but you placed your arms around yourself like a protective shield against him as more tears fell down.

"No" you said, stepping away. "Don't call me that" you said, knowing he rarely used pet names and he was doing it to wear you down. "You don't get to call me that" you glared at him before wiping off your tears. You then started hearing the ruckus outside and you knew it was time for his next lesson.

"Love-"

"Your next class is here" you said, composing yourself as some sixth-year students started walking inside and sitting at their desks. "I won't keep you any longer, Professor Snape" you said, making Severus' heart break.

You never called him that. Not even before you started dating. You had been friends for over a lifetime (sometimes more) and you loved teasing him since he said you were in a professional environment but you never cared. He watched you walk out the door and composed himself, before turning his wrath towards his students.

You walked out of his class and composed yourself before you made your way to your next lesson. You were too occupied with every thought floating in your mind, you accidentally bumped into two identical redheads.

"Professor Black" they said at the same time before they both hid whatever they were holding behind their backs. "Sorry, we didn't see you there" George said with a warm smile.

You could tell them apart. Not so much by their physical appearance but more by their personalities. If you were careful, you would be able to notice it.

"We were just on our way to Transfiguration" Fred said quickly. "Lovely seeing you, Professor" they both finished at the same time as they walked around and past you.

"Stop" you instructed and, even if you had your back to them, you knew they listened to your command. You slowly turned around and smiled when you saw you were right. "What are you two hiding?" you asked with an arched eyebrow.

"Us? Nothing, of course" they said at the same time with smiles so innocent, anyone that didn't know them, would think they were just as well behaved as their older brothers.

"Are you two placing bets about Snape and Lockhart's duel for tomorrow?"

Both of them sighed, looking at each other, impressed. "How do you always do that?"

"Let's just say, I have seen my fair share of... mischievous boys" you said, with a smirk. They had always reminded you of James and Sirius, especially the many times you had caught them in your times while being a Prefect.

"Are you going to tell on us?" George asked as they both pouted their big brown eyes at you.

"Not if you give me 5% of your winnings" you said, shrugging your shoulders.

"5%?" Fred asked outraged.

"Well, is either that or I would have to report you boys to Professor McGonagall and then... no winnings" you explained with a sweet smile.

"Fine" they both said defeated. "Would you like to place your bet?"

You let out a small sigh. You might as well have some fun with this. "Fine" you said taking out your money. "Put me down with fifteen galleons" you said, handing them to George, who had the jar of money.

"Fifteen galleons?" they said at the same time. Most likely nobody had bet as much. "On Lockhart?" Fred asked.

"Lockhart? No, on Snape, obviously" you said, rolling your eyes a little and they looked even more shocked. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing. It's just... well, you're the only girl that has bet on Snape" George informed you.

"Yes, well my judgment is not clouded by Lockhart's ridiculous charms" you said, crossing your arms over your chest. "Now... I believe you two were on your way to Transfiguration?"

"Of course" they said at the same time. "You look lovely today, Professor" Fred continued.

"As usual" George added.

"See you in class!"

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

You were pacing around back and forth in front of the Great Hall. It was almost time. You saw the second-year of all houses walking inside, talking about the duel that was about to take place as if it was the best thing that happened in this school. You could feel your heart beating so heavy, you were almost certain everyone could hear it.

"Professor Black?" you were snapped out of your thoughts by the voice of one of your students.

"Hermione, hello" you replied kindly.

"You came to see the duel?" Ron asked, excitedly.

"Well, I just want to make sure nobody's getting murdered" you muttered, but apparently the trio of friends heard you. "Oh, I'm only joking. I am certain Professors Snape and Lockhart are merely dueling for educational purposes" you said, smiling nervously at them.

"Who do you think it's going to win?" Harry asked you, curiously.

"Why don't we... move along?" you said, pushing them inside the Great Hall. "You should go take your places" you instructed them as they discussed which professor was going to win. "What are you two doing here?" you asked when you saw the Weasley twins close to the entrance. "This isn't your class! You know what? I don't even want to know" you said, before walking into the Great Hall.

It was set up to have a fair dueling match with all the tables lined up as one long stage. You spotted Severus at the end of the tables that were going to be used for said match. He caught a glimpse of you and made the man he was talking to turn to you as well.

"Darling, how wonderful!" Lockhart said, happily as he stepped onto the table. "You received my invitation to come and see what I do best" he said flirty, making you roll your eyes.

"It's Professor Black, as I have told you many times, Professor Lockhart" you said, firmly. "And I have come to make sure that neither of you two buffoons hurt yourselves, or a student for that matter" you said, walking between the crowd of students, taking your place.

"Why we would never" he assured you with his famous charming smile. "Now gather round!" he yelled, making all the students take their places. "Gather round. Can everybody see me?" he asked, walking up and down the tables. "Can you all hear me?" he asked, having everyone's attention on him. "Excellent" he said, smiling. "In light of the dark events of recent weeks, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little dueling club to train you all up in case you ever need to defend yourselves" he explained, stopping in front of you. "Or a damsel in distress" he said winking at you as you rolled your eyes once more. "As I myself have done on countless occasions" he said as he kept on walking. "For full details, see my published works" he said arrogantly before taking off his cape and throwing it at you, but you stepped out of the way, and a couple of girls behind you started fighting over it.

"That Lockhart's is really something, isn't he Professor?" Justin Finch-Fletchley said smiling up at you. "Awfully brave chap" he added.

"I think he fancies you" you heard on your other side, Susan Bones, Hannah Abbot, and Hermione Granger all grinning at you.

"You are so lucky" Hannah added.

You decided to remain quiet and then looked back at the other fighter in the duel. He hadn't been able to take his eyes off you. He had tried ever since the day before to get you to talk to him but you had managed to avoid him every single time.

"Pay attention, kids" you told them.

"Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape" Lockhart continued. Snape slowly walked up the tables and closer to Lockhart. Arms in front of his chest, unfazed by this whole situation. You couldn't help but feel your heart clenching as he got closer. Merlin, how you hated him. And how you loved him. "He has sportingly agreed to help me with a short demonstration" he said, before winking at you. "Now, I don't want any of you, youngsters, to worry. You'll still have your Potions master when I'm through with him. Never fear" he said, smiling at the room.

Without meaning to, you let out a laugh, followed by a loud snort. You widened your eyes and felt your cheeks burning when you noticed everyone had turned to look at you. You cleared your throat and composed yourself, missing how the corner of Severus' lip lifted only slightly.

"Oh, I am terribly sorry" you apologized, faking a cough. "I think I am coming down with something. As you were" you motioned for the two men to continue.

The two men walked into the middle of the tables, facing one another, raising their wands, before swinging them to their sides. They bowed to each other before they turned around and started walking in opposite directions. Nobody dared to take their eyes off the two men on stage. Your eyes followed Severus until he turned around and stood in his pose as Lockhart counted.

"One... two... three!"

"Expelliarmus!" a blast had come out of Severus' wand, before Lockhart could process it, sending the DADA teacher flying backwards. Most of the male students seemed amused, but the majority of the female students looked worried as Lockhart tried to sit up straight.

"Do you think he's alright?" Hermione asked.

"Who cares?"

You froze for a moment. Did you say that out loud? But it was Ron Weasley next to you. Thank Merlin.

"Mr. Weasley" you scowled him. You were still a Professor. You at least had to pretend to be concerned so you tried your best to hide your smile.

"An excellent idea to show them that, Professor Snape" Lockhart said, composing himself once he stood back up. "But if you don't mind me saying, it was pretty obvious what you were about to do. And if I had wanted to stop you, it would have been only too easy" he said cockily.

"Perhaps it would be prudent to first teach the students to block unfriendly spells, Professor" Snape said in his classic condescending tone with his classic condescending smirk. You forced yourself to stop grinning at the scene in front of you.

"An excellent suggestion, Professor Snape" Lockhart said, forcing a smile. "Let's go again" he said as they resumed their positions.

The two of them kept on going a few rounds, Severus easily beating Lockhart for most of the rounds, except one or two where he had gotten distracted. You started noticing that Lockhart's frustration made him escalate each round with a new spell. Snape managing to block it each time, however, you knew it would only be a matter of time until he started escalating his spells as well.

"I believe that should be enough of a demonstration for the students to-"

"Nonsense!" Lockhart interrupted you as he stood up once again. "We are settling this once and for all" he defied Snape as he stood in front of him.

"My pleasure" Snape said from his place.

"No!" you said, stepping on the table as well. "This has gone on long enough! You two are turning this into an egotistical battle instead of an educational activity for students to learn charms and spells that can help them protect themselves!"

"Pardon me, my dear, but this is my class" he said, slowly shoving you out of the way. "And we're going to finish this like men" he said, making you let out an offended scoff.

"Excuse me?" you said with an arched eyebrow and then you turned to look back at Snape. "Are you just going to stand there and let this continue?"

"If Professor Lockhart would like to do one last attempt of demonstration" he said in his monotone voice. "I don't see what the problem is" he finished.

"Fine!" you let out a sarcastic laugh before you climbed down the tables. "Go ahead and finish yourselves then, see if I care" you muttered.

"Oh I will finish you alright" Lockhart said to Snape. "And when I do, you will finally have to stay away from her and I'll have her all to myself-"

"You talk a lot for somebody who has lost the last few rounds, Lockhart" Snape said calmly.

The two of them remained in their places and were talking only within each other's earshot, but you had a pretty good idea of what was going on. And you knew it wasn't going to end well.

"I already have planned our first date" he taunted him. "I'm going to take her to the Three Broomsticks, then Madam Poodifoot's perhaps, you know how women love that place" he kept on rambling on. Snape made his best to show that he was not getting to him but you knew that whatever the DADA teacher was saying, was upsetting the Potions master. You knew by the way he was gripping his wand. And you also knew he was close to losing it as Lockhart went on. "And then back to my chambers with a bottle of Firewhisky-"

Lockhart was sent backwards, much as he did earlier in the duel. The students gasped shocked. Snape hadn't even said a spell out loud.

"Oh no" you muttered to yourself. It was happening.

"Right, students. Professor Snape has just demonstrated how a non-verbal spell can also be helpful-" Lockhart didn't get to finish because another spell was sent his way, Snape pointing his wand directly at him.

"That is enough!" you yelled, as you tried to get the students to back off the tables, but the two dueling men barely acknowledged you; it was useless.

The dark-haired wizard kept on throwing spells and cursed at the blonde one, who was trying with all his might to avoid them, as he got his wand back in his hand. He walked over to Snape, managing to dodge the spells coming out of his wand.

"Did I touch a nerve, Professor Snape?" Lockhart mocked him, once he was in front of his face again. "I have noticed the way you look at her, you know?"

"I advise you, Lockhart to walk away right now" he said in a low voice. He knew he could not lose his temper in front of all the students, and in front of you.

"The only way I am walking away out of here is Professor Black in my arm" he said with a smirk. "Maybe I'll have a little celebration with her afterwards-"

"I am warning you" Snape said feeling his hand start to shake.

"I bet you she'd love it. To be with someone like me. I bet you I can have her scream my name in no time-"

Lockhart flew backwards once more, but he was getting quicker at recovering and he was back on his feet before Snape thought he could, so he quickly threw another spell at him. You knew that face too well. You had only seen it once in your fifth year when he used it against James Potter. You knew what it was. You were genuinely surprised when Lockhart managed to block it, deviating its way. You saw it making its way through the students and towards Neville Longbottom. Why did it always have to be Neville Longbottom? Everyone quickly dispersed, avoiding getting hit and before you could think of anything else, you pushed Neville out of the way, making the curse hit you instead.

"LOVE!" Snape yelled, feeling his blood run cold. He saw you fly across the room and hit the stone-cold wall before you landed on the floor, screaming in pain, blood spurting from your face and your body as if you had been slashed with an invisible sword. He instantly ran to your side and he could barely register the noise of scared students around him. He heard Lockhart saying something about that's how you block a spell. "My love, look at me" he said, holding your hand, and cupping your cheek with his other hand, not even caring about who could hear or see him. "It's okay, love. I'm here" he said, stroking your trembling hand with his.

"S-Sev?" you said, breathing heavily and looking him into his dark onyx eyes with your frightened ones.

"GET EVERYONE OUT!" Snape yelled directly at Lockhart, who was now at your side too. "And go get Madam Pomfrey!"

"Right, I should-"

"NOW LOCKHART!" he snapped again. You started feeling lightheaded as you saw the Great Hall clear in less than two minutes. You felt him move and tightened the grip on his hand.

"Don't leave me, please" you begged, crying as you tried to normal your breathing.

"I'm not leaving you, love" he said, kissing your forehead. "Ever" he assured you. "I am so sorry, angel" he whispered before he grabbed his wand. "This is going to sting a little" he warned you and you nodded gripping his hand harder.

Severus drew his wand and traced it over the deep wounds on your body, muttering an incantation that sounded almost like a song. The flow of blood seemed to ease. He then wiped the residue from your face and repeated his spell. Now the wounds seemed to be knitting. His heart breaking with every pained whine and tear that came out of you. Never in a million years would he ever want you to experience such pain. Pain that he created nonetheless and pain that came from his wand. From his mind. He did this to you.

"D-don't cry, l-love" you said, cupping his cheek with your free hand. He hadn't even noticed he was until you wiped the tear away with your thumb. He was about to reply but you started closing your eyes.

"No, no. Stay with me, love" he begged. "Love, please" he said with his voice breaking. "I love you" you heard him say before everything went black.

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

You woke up a couple of hours later and saw that you were in the Hospital Wing. As your eyes adjusted to the light, you noticed you were at the furthest bed and there was some kind of curtains, separating you from the rest of the beds. You sat up, regretting it the second you felt every small cut on your body making you let out a pained sound.

"What do you think you're doing?" you heard the familiar voice you loved so much, walking inside your little room and placing the tray of food on your nightstand. "You should be resting" he said, sitting down next to you.

"Sorry" you said with a small smile. "Is that for me?" you asked pointing at the tray.

"Of course it is, love" he said in an incredibly soft tone. One you were sure you had never heard him use before. "But you have to drink this first" he said, handing you a small bottle with a potion in it. You grabbed it and did as you were told before you spat it back out. "Hey!"

"That is bloody disgusting" you said, cleaning yourself up.

"Excuse me? I brewed that potion myself" he complained. "And you have to drink it to heal faster" he instructed.

"I'm sorry, love but it tastes horrible" you argued.

"I don't care. Drink it" he said with a firm tone, grabbing it and giving it to you again. You hesitated and tried pouting your way out of it, but finally gave in since Severus wasn't budging, and you drank it down. Severus tried not to laugh at the face you made but you managed to finish it.

"There, are you happy?" you pouted. "Hey, what's wrong?" you asked when she saw him frowning. "I'm fine, Sev-"

"I'm sorry" he said, taking a sit on your bed and holding your hand to his lips before kissing it. "I am so sorry about everything" he whispered. "You were right" he said, cupping your cheek with his free hand. "I am so sorry, my love-"

"Sev, it's okay-"

"No. Is not okay" he said, with his voice breaking. "I did this to you. I have never wanted anything to hurt you and I-" he stopped, looking away. "And it could have been a student. This is all my fault" he said, taking a deep breath. "I should have never agreed to duel that imbecile" he kept going. "I should not have let him get to me, making me lose my temper" he added. "But most importantly, I should have told him that we are a couple" he said, making you smile slightly. "I should have told anybody who would listen that we are a couple. I don't want you to think that our relationship means little to nothing to me. Our relationship means the world to me" he assured you, kissing your hand again. "It always has. You have no idea how proud it makes me feel to call you mine. The only reason why I said I wanted to keep our relationship private is because... because of my past, love" he said. "I don't want anything in this world to harm you. And being connected to me will-"

Severus was cut off when you pulled his face and crashed his lips against yours. He tried to stop you but gave in since he knew how stubborn you were and knew better than to stop you from doing something you wanted to do.

"I don't care about that, love" you said, with a smile once you broke apart. "Whatever happened in the past, is over. And whatever comes..." you sighed. "We'll figure it out, together. There is nobody else that I would want by my side" you whispered before giving him a peck on the lips.

"But I am-"

"I know what you are" you said, smiling. "And I am a Black, Sev. You know what Regulus did and Sirius..." you stopped. Sirius was still a touchy subject for you and he knew that. "Nobody is really safe for what's to come, love" you assured him. "I just know that I want to spend as much time with you as I possibly can... if you want to" you said, looking at him with hopeful eyes.

"You deserve better-"

"I deserve someone who took care of me when I wasn't able to take care of myself after I lost my two brothers" you told him with a serious expression on your face. "I deserve somebody who helped me throughout my first year at teaching here so I wouldn't make a fool out of myself" you continued. "I deserve somebody who makes potions for me whenever I get sick, no matter how horrible they may taste" you said with a small giggle. "I deserve someone that cares about me the way you do, Sev" you assured him.

"I just don't want you to get hurt-"

"I won't" you assured him. "You won't let that happen" you said smiling. "I know you won't" you said, kissing him once more.

"You really trust me that much?"

"Are you joking? I even bet fifteen galleons that you would beat Lockhart today" you said giggling. Severus widened his eyes in surprise and arched his eyebrows at you. "What? I believe I won" you smirked. "Tell Fred and George they owe me my money" you told him, making him laugh a little. "I'd bet my life on you, Severus Snape."

"You really are something else, Professor Black" he said, rolling his eyes before he kissed your forehead.

"Thank you, Professor Snape-"

"No" he cut you off. "Don't call me that, please. Ever again" he begged, making your smile grow wider.

"So..." you said looking innocently at him. "Does this mean that everyone knows we're a couple?" Severus let out a small laugh and nodded.

"I imagine that if they didn't hear me on the Great Hall when you fell, they did when I yelled it at Lockhart in the Hospital Wing" he told you. "Minerva and Albus were there so..."

"Oh, so by now the entire school probably knows" you said laughing a little.

"Most likely, yes" he nodded. "Did you know Albus and Minerva had a bet going on with the other professors about when we would get together?"

"I knew it!"

"You did?"

"Well, I suspected it, really. Minerva and Pomona kept on asking me if we were already together every month" you admitted.

"Apparently, it started when we were students" he informed you.

"Really?" you said with an arched eyebrow. "Who won?"

"I think Hagrid" he admitted, making you laugh a little as he took his seat back next to your bed. "You should eat something, love" he said, pointing at the tray and you did as you were told.

"Sev?"

"Yes, my darling?" you blushed a little. You weren't used to him calling you lovely pet names but you were not complaining.

"I don't know if I was delirious because I hit my head or if I imagined it but... I think I heard you say something to me before I blacked out?" you said with a small smirk.

Severus cleared his throat before he looked at his Daily Prophet. "You did."

"Hmm... and what was it?"

"You’re pushing it..."

"Please?" you pouted. "I just hit my head and almost bled out-"

"I love you" he quickly said, not wanting to remember just hours ago, when he had never felt more frightened in his entire life. "I love you, Miss Black. I always have" he admitted.

You bit your lip, trying to prevent your smile from getting bigger but it was basically impossible. You sat up, ignoring every pain in your body, and brought him closer to you.

"I love you too, Severus Snape" you said kissing him again.

The End

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

A/N: aahh xD I hope you like it! I don’t get much Snape requests but I love them so... please ask away ;)

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