ohhhh ok i get my problem now. i don't cry often at anything because I'm so emotional i can't talk honestly how i really feel around people i trust and what they deserve like my siblings and that's why I don't talk back to my parents when they treat them like shit because they never listen to me and tell me how I'd like if i took care of the house myself. and if i speak this out loud i get the overwhelming urge to cry

fuck it im feeling funky break time from the armor lets write (tw for eating disorders and struggles with body issues [both fat and skinny])

I'm sitting here on the floor listening to you. I hear how your talking to her, punishing her for how little she's been eating. I once agreed with you that she needs to eat more, that the amount she's eating now is so little and so unimaginable as to why anyone would put themselves through it.

Then I remember the conversation of the morning. I showed you an outfit, and you told me I needed to lose a couple pounds. I don't normally show you my outfits, and when I felt good in this one you didn't see my joy in the skirt, you focused in on how it took on my hips. Where I was admiring the skirt detail, you clocked in to the detail it gave my stomach. Lose 10 pounds, you said, that's how my outfit was judged. Maybe you thought it pretty, but you didn't see it that pretty when the fat of my stomach got in the way.

I flash through years of my life, looking for where my concerns of my stomach had stemmed from: you. You compared me to anything you could think of. You told me what to wear so your fat fucking disgrace wouldn't be so horrid at school where nobody made a comment on it, only one person ever on my second to last day of middle school.

The one thing you always compared me to? Your light and joy, the one who'd be your greatest creation, the best, a prodigy of her siblings. The very same girl now who's diet seems to be just water. The girl you'd compliment before for her fitness from working out now you yell at to eat anything because she's in her room all day basically. You call her sick, and I'm certain that's what you once thought of me.

I feel sick, cause you wanted me to be like her.

I wonder if she's up in her room, wondering if surgery will make you stop nagging her. I wonder if she can't seem to feel happy in her skin without being judged by the adults like you. I wonder if she thinks she's the problem and is so mad at herself for not being able to fix it.

I wonder if I would be the one she wants to be like now.

To my little sister and mortal enemy, you do not want my pity, nor my respect, because you want nothing to do with me and most times I want nothing to do with you. However, for even the worst person, sometimes you give them such things, no matter how badly they don't deserve it, because they don't deserve such things either. That's how I feel. I thought you'd be so good and happy because you got all her praise, you never thought of cutting your stomach off or anything like that cause you were always told how perfect your body is. In truth, you are their perfection, and now that they see it, they blame it on you that it's not what they wanted. You are perfect, even if I hate you, you have been perfect always.

With all that said and done, I hope you come downstairs and eat.

November Baby - Ushijima x Reader

Summary: Wakatoshi offers you a little more than just chocolate and flowers on Valentine’s Day. (~2.7k words)

Warnings: breeding kink, pregnancy talk, cisfem!reader, nsfw

A/N: Breeding kink and big one-track minded boy just go hand in hand. This is for @prettysetterbaby’s Valentine’s Day collab!

---

Wakatoshi never told you directly that he wanted children, but he signaled so in every possible way. 

It was initially subtle - of course, he’d always loved your hips, but his eyes and hands started to rest on them more often, and soon your belly became his favorite place to plant soft kisses, and his fingers started to favor the dip in your waist and the smoothness of your hips.

In the evenings when you washed up for the night, his eyes seemed to hone in on your facial features more than usual, and while he stood beside you at the bathroom sink to get ready of his own accord as you brushed your teeth and swiped toner on your face and neck, you could see him perform a sort of math in his head, adding and subtracting from the elements that comprised the two of you. 

You took note of all these behaviors, but you declined to pick his brain because your Toshi was always direct, and you knew that if he was quiet now, it was only because he was still coming up with the proper words to express what he was feeling.

But he let you know all right, in the middle of a crowded department store in the heart of Warsaw that looked like it had been ransacked by Cupid’s battalion many times over.

“Is Poland just really into Valentines’ Day or is it this store?” You joked, as you followed your husband leisurely pushing a shopping cart you’d overloaded with essentially useless trinkets and decorative items. You’d moved into your new home just a couple of weeks ago, and still were engrossed with the task of filling the empty spaces between comfy furniture and elegant fixtures. 

You were now trekking through the realm of cribs and diapers and couldn’t help but stifle a laugh at the frankly quite excessive marketing. Red and pink hearts were everywhere, as were flowers, huge balloons, chubby angels and red crossbows, you name it.

“Oh my God, even the baby section is Valentine’s Day themed??? No wonder everyone I know is born in November!”

You were busy laughing at your own joke, but instead, he looked at you with the slightest bit of caution in his hazel eyes, leaning over the cart as it rolled to a stop and gripping the handles carefully.

“Let’s have a November baby, too,” he said, abruptly enough to stun you for a split second.

Your eyes grew slightly wide, your face growing hot at his clear and concise statement, and you quickly looked around to see if anyone else had picked up his distinct baritone. You knew in your heart of hearts he was completely serious, and flustered, you bumped him slightly on the hip.

“Why would you say it right now?” You hissed.

“Does it matter where I say it?” He asked, with a slight raise of his eyebrows. You pouted, fingers tightening on the handles of the shopping cart as well. His eyes were still on you, again, gauging your reaction, worried if he was too forward and if he had somehow made you upset with his suggestion.

“Only if you want to of course, my love,” he reassured again, his hand now covering yours. His smile was understanding, even if there was a hint of lingering hope.

The warmth was fading from your face, your heartbeat that had sped up due to embarrassment now settling with the stroke of his thumb over the back of your hand.

It didn’t take you long to think because the thought had already crossed your mind. Being heavy with his child, then eventually coming to this very store with a small little one that looked like the two of you…

It was a delightful thought, actually.

“Wine and dine me first,” you teased, kissing him quickly on the nose, “and then we can consider having a Valentine’s Day baby.”

He grinned, the slightest bit of mischief in his glance.

“I’ll have you pregnant by the end of the night.”

---

Dumping your pill pack into the trash was a surprisingly simple ordeal and you were very thankful it was mainly used for birth control over anything else. But out of an abundance of caution, you’d decided to shoot a message to your primary care doctor earlier that morning anyway and gotten the green light to start immediately, which was reassuring if not embarrassing. While you knew she didn’t take it this way, part of you felt like you’d essentially disrupted her life to say by the way, my husband’s gonna fuck me into oblivion until i pee positive on a stick, any objections?

Ushijima seemed to be taking this ordeal very seriously as he was prone to do, his diet even more regimented than usual despite being off-season and adding an extra ten minutes to his morning jog, a protein-heavy green smoothie in hand. While that was cute, what wasn’t cute was the fact that he hadn’t touched you in the past week.

When you rolled over to him in the middle of the night, slipping your hand down his boxers to try to get him to give you what he wanted, he responded with a kiss on the lips before gently removing your hand off of him and intertwining his fingers with that hand instead. 

“If I’m going to breed you, it’s gonna be special,” he murmured almost directly into your ear, a tinge of slumber in his voice making his voice even more seductive.

Breed? The thought itself had your heart racing but not as much when he added,

“I’m saving up to fill you with the biggest load possible, sweetheart.” 

With that, he patted you on the head before whispering for you to go to sleep and anchoring an arm around your midsection to snuggle with you, but the thought of what he would do to you had you wide, wide awake.

---

The fact that you were so focused on the main event made it easier for Ushijima to surprise you with the rest of the activities he had planned for Valentine’s Day.

It wasn’t the first since you’d been married, but he’d absolutely put even greater efforts into this one, starting with waking you up (after letting you sleep almost into noon) to an oversized box of chocolates and bouquet of roses and a handmade card with a haiku written in his neat script. If that weren’t enough, he’d brought you brunch to enjoy together, cozied up in bed, and topped off morning kisses with the revelation of a tennis bracelet to go with your engagement ring.

“Toshi, it’s perfect…,” you all but blubbered out, ready to burst into tears. He treated you so well.

“Not as perfect as you,” he said with a smile, welcoming you to bury yourself in his chest.

Dinner warranted more of an effort from you, and so you dressed up in your finest attire for the upscale restaurant, armed with the complete awareness that your husband planned to rip every inch of fabric off of you tonight. It didn’t help that while your meal was pleasant, you could see Ushijima grow impatient with time, adjusting and readjusting the sleeves of his blazer as night approached.

When you finally returned to the front door of your home, you were stuffed but not to bursting, and that very little bit of space left in your belly seemed to fill with new butterflies, especially with Ushijima’s hand resting at the small of your back as he opened the door. 

Why were you so nervous? You’d had sex before, many times over, but something about today felt… different? Maybe it was the looming idea of purpose, and Ushijima knew purpose very well. 

When the door clicked shut, he wasn’t on you immediately as you expected, but he was still ready, as were you. He leaned down to plant yet another kiss on your lips that seemed to whisk the nervousness away - again he was your Toshi, and you were his, and you were going to create life.

“Baby?” He asked, tentatively. 

“Baby,” you agreed, wrapping your arms around his neck to start another kiss anew. He carried you effortlessly, keeping his lips pressed to yours as he pulled off your high heels and tossed them haphazardly, leading you back into the bedroom where a smattering of rose petals along the shag carpet and in the center of the bed greeted you, along with a lightly diffused essential oil blend with heavy notes of ylang-ylang and cedarwood.

Laying you carefully on your back, his eyes shifted from soft to focused, practically to match the level of intensity you saw when he was on the court, and your pulse started to pick up again. While he didn’t exactly tear the clothes off of you as you had anticipated, your dress was pulled over your body quite hastily to reveal all of you. Inches of skin to mark, a beautiful body to fill. 

“You’re so beautiful,” he murmured again, leaning into your neck for soft bites and kisses. He was still mostly fully clothed, and you could feel his swollen length press against your pubis, thick and heavy.

He let out a sigh, and climbed off the bed to undress.

“Don’t move,” he ordered as he pulled off tie, shirt, pants, in that order, and you couldn’t tell if you were more distracted by the sculpted muscles of his shoulders, arms, chest and abs, flexing and relaxing with every minute movement or the swell of his fat cock at attention, anxious to bury itself inside you. 

You gulped. You knew this was a ridiculous thought, but for a moment, you wondered if it was somehow bigger today?

Before you even realized what you were saying, you were already pleading, “Toshi… please be gentle…”

Ushijima smirked at your wide-eyed look, then shifted back to taking in your splayed out body with his eyes, as though mapping out his strategy while he idly fisted his length.

“Of course, love. I would never dream of hurting the mother of my kids.” 

Yet, he was absolutely going to have his way with you.

It didn’t take him long to make a decision on how to attack, anyway, because he quickly resumed position hovering over you, taking a moment to appreciate the sight of anticipating, open lips, slightly knit eyebrows over a curious gaze. His lower half pressed against you closely enough that again, you could feel the entirety of his warm, girthy length pressing against the bottom of your quickly wetting cunt to your abdomen.

The sheer span of his cock reminded you that he was basically designed to do this.

The fact that he started moving first, rubbing his length across your belly as if trying out the course before he dove in also reminded you how much your body craved him always. 

His fingers entered you hastily, and he reveled in the way your cunt already made the lewdest of noises, soft audible squishes with every pump of his fingers as he prepped you.

“So eager… so sloppy, waiting to receive all of my cum, aren’t you?” He teased, withdrawing his fingers to show you some of your slick. “You’re receptive,” he added, pulling his two fingers apart to show you the stringiness of your arousal. 

“I-I want this too, you know,” your face growing hot from the tease, hotter still when he sucked your wetness right off his fingers.

“What do you want?” He said, raising an eyebrow, still moving painfully slowly on top of you, but angling his body so that he was just running the entire base of his cock against your wet slit, killing you with every second he wasn’t immediately filling you up.

“Your babies, Toshi...”

That made him smile, and you earned the slight entry of his cockhead into you, forcing a slight moan out of your throat. The stretch was intense, as always, but the fact that he slowed had you squirming for more, as fast as possible. 

“T-Toshi… please, more,” you moaned as you raised your legs to slide down further on his cock, and he held them, pressing both firmly along his side.

“How much cum can you take in this little body of yours?” he asked, pressing right at your umbilicus with one hand, as he pushed in a mere additional inch.

You let out something between a moan and a scream from the overwhelming sensation of being stretched with so many inches to spare.

“Just fill me!!! Please, just put everything inside me,” you whined. 

“As you wish, darling.”

His arms hoisted your legs above his shoulders and he did you the service of thrusting all remaining inches inside you, forcing tears from your eyes from the too full sensation, kissing your ankles beside his head as he gave you time to breathe and adjust. Once you’d settled from the sound of your whimpers slowing, he reached for the headboard behind you before he started his onslaught.

Thrust after thrust after savage thrust, you could hear his groans deepen as he plowed the grounds for his seed, his hands tightening firmly against the wood of your headboard as it creaked for mercy. 

He felt so good, so perfect, so fitting, stretching you out like this to make room for his kin. 

Your fingers etched desire into his back, as you choked up a demand for more sensation, more him, more closeness..

“More, daddy!”

“Daddy is quite correct,” he mused, his hands moving from the headboard to quiet instead the jostle of your breasts, palming them gently. 

They were so pretty to him, he couldn’t wait to see them swell. 

He leaned down again to swallow your moans in a kiss, then opted to flip you above him instead, before he continued to snap his hips, bouncing you into the air.

“T-Toshi, you’re ah- too fast!” You shrieked, barely able to stand upright, the ride too rocky and intense for you. Palming his abdomen to walk your way up despite your movement, he brought you back down flush against his chest again, holding you tightly. 

“Let me do the work,” he whispered, kissing you, making your head swim to distract from the fact that he really was rearranging your guts. “I’ll do at least this much, since you’ll be carrying our child.”

And to that promise, you came almost instantly, an impulse of shock traveling from your slippery cunt up that you could almost feel in the tips of your fingers that made your body clench, your toes curl and the sound that came out of your throat less dainty and more primal, coming from so far deep inside you, even you were afraid.

As if on cue, his fingers dug into the flesh of your waist, holding you steady as he pounded into you even further, faster, pushing past fluttering walls and soundless cries coming from your lips, until he finally came with a shudder, spurting thick, hot gobs of liquid that you could feel hitting your cervix.

And it kept coming; he held you tighter, so desperately you thought you might break under his touch, burying his face in your chest - you could feel yourself still clenching around him, so greedy, trying to milk him for even more than the generous amount he was giving you.

It would be a miracle if you weren’t pregnant.

When it finally stopped, he left an arm around your back pressing you close to him, letting out a soft, pleased sigh with lowered eyelids. You stayed against him for longer, cockwarming him, your hands languidly coming to rest on both sides of his face.

Your darling Wakatoshi…

He stayed hard inside you, slowly giving you just one more stroke to atone for the small amount of semen that was already threatening to leak out around him, then laid you on your back.

“You’re doing so well already…” he encouraged, scooping up drops of him spilling out of you. “Keep it all in,” he said breathily, a warm palm pressing on your opening. 

“I will, baby,” you nodded, and he gave you another peck on the lips, then moved to one of your mounds to take a pert nipple in his mouth and suck softly. 

His hand lingered on your hot cunt, warm and dripping; he instead focused on stimulating your nipples with the other hand and his lips, forcing another orgasm out of you with time and dedication.

He’d obviously read somewhere orgasms themselves made pregnancy more likely. Always so thorough.

“You... f-feel so good,” you mewled, your back arching with pleasure as he used a thumb to stimulate your clit gently as he kept his semen inside you. 

He smiled, stroking his already re-hardening cock in his hand, preparing for the next round. 

“Anything for my Valentine.” 

With that was implied, the love of his life, and the mother of his kids.

you have an eating disorder

prompt: “you never had issues with food - that is until your boyfriend makes a remark about your weight.”

pairing: katsuki bakugo x female! reader

word count: 1.6k

warnings: MAJOR TW!! anorexia, there’s swearing

genre: fluff, angst 

NOTE: this is not proofread at all and it’s kinda short, i was struggling to finish it a lot, sorry :(

you were never one to pay special attention to your diet or anything

life is short, why spend it worrying about how your body looks?

food is food man, and you need it to live 

there was no fun in dieting either, it’s not like you were ever fat anyway - with daily training you were in shape!

sure there were thinner girls, but like i mentioned, you just liked enjoying food without having to worry about losing weight all the time 

your boyfriend, bakugo, just does not know how to express himself 

he’s not the type to really pay any mind to your figure, he finds you pretty anyway 

and its a plus anyway - whenever he feels full he can just push his plate towards you and you’ll gladly finish it for him 

that is until one day

you were sitting with the baku squad at lunch

mina was telling you about a new tiktok trend she had stumbled upon and found hilarious 

denki was currently fighting for his life against bakugo after saying his hair looked like he was just hit by an electricity quirk before he proceeded to zap him lightly 

kirishima was regretting all of his life decisions when he decided to try and help denki 

sero was just sat there,, recording it so he could show them just how stupid they looked afterwards

kirishima finally managed to pull said angry-boy away from kaminari 

you always said he’s like a little angry pomeranian when angry lol 

back to the plot omg i got carried away

after bakugo was calm enough to take his initial seat beside you, he was already too full and just overall not hungry

so he pushed his plate towards you 

“eat up, fatass.” he grumbled out

you just looked up at him with wide doe-eyes, not expecting an insult to slip off his tongue

it was bakugo, what’d you expect lmao 

you looked down at the plate, suddenly feeling very not hungry anymore, instead pushing the plate away as you grabbed your bag to stand up

“actually, i’ll head up to my room, i feel a bit sick”

you immediately left after that, not seeing the confused glances the table exchanged, mina smacking bakugo’s head

you went to your room and laid down, not knowing why bakugo’s comment had made you feel upset

you never get upset when he makes dumb remarks!!

so why now!!

oh 

you realised it when you were stood in front of the mirror, shirt lifted, staring at your own body

you did gain some weight.

you were upset at yourself because you usually didn’t mind!!

you know weight fluctuates, you know the small amount of chub you have will eventually pack it’s little bags and leave again 

but it hurt because you wanted to be pretty for your boyfriend.

how could you be when he says you’re a fatass?

eventually, you ended up scrolling through your phone, looking at thin girls all day

you also looked up a few diets that worked very fast 

by the time bakugo was aggressively knocking at your door you had closed all of the pages you were previously looking at 

as soon as you swung the door open he strutted in, seating himself on your bed

“what was with you running off at lunch today?” he looked at you 

you were still stood at your door like.... mm ok i guess make yourself at home 

“huh? i told you, i felt a little sick.” you mumbled, closing the door again, it was getting late and you were not looking to be beheaded by aizawa

he scoffed “if you say so.” he laid down, kicking your blanket to the side

“i brought you some snacks - incase you got hungry..” he said, his face looking like >:( 

he didn’t get them because he knew you liked them and wanted to make you happy! not at all!!

he just didn’t want to put up with you being whiny

that’s for sure the reason 

you giggled, throwing yourself ontop of him - sounds of protest coming from him but he did wrap his arms around you 

“since when are you so nice, katsuki?!” you teased

lol wrong move 

in 0.01 seconds you were flipped over and held down as he started tickling you 

“i’m not nice!”

the next morning you left extra early to avoid getting breakfast with bakugo

he didn’t seem to be bothered by it, he also has days where he just doesn’t feel like eating early in the morning so 

it does start to bother him when that one day of skipping breakfast turned into every day

his google search bar is like 

‘why does my gf not eat’

‘do girls not eat breakfast’

but this bitch is also too scared to approach you at first because he doesnt want you to know he truly cares 

his ego is still too high for that 

but you know better

you know he cares but sometimes you don’t feel good enough for him

you can’t help but compare yourself to other girls at your school

you distance yourself unknowingly, lost in the counting calories and exercising every day

everyone but you notices that you’re literally spiraling 

you don’t notice that you look sick, skin paling and cheekbones getting more prominent every passing day 

you don’t notice the growing eyebags under your eyes 

all you notice is other pretty girls and how you want to look like them.

at first, your friends decide to give you some space, thinking that maybe you have to fix this within yourself and need space

and you do, but someone needs to snap you out of your little bubble 

that someone is bakugo 

so it goes like this 

during training, he noticed your legs being a little more wobbly than usual 

and he noticed that you were unfocused, not being able to dodge all of the enemies attacks 

but something inside of him snaps when aizawa has to stop the fight because you were not even fighting back anymore

before aizawa even arrived in front of you, your world went black and you collapsed

bakugo was so angry at your training enemy 

didn’t they fucking see your struggle?? 

did they really have to be stopped by their teacher??

would they even have stopped if it werent for aizawa?? 

probably not

but he didnt have time to go and yell at them because he was running towards you 

aizawa let him pick you up

“bring her to recovery girl.”

of course he did 

everyone watching was so shocked 

because bakugo didn’t let out a sound the entire time 

his face was pulled into a frown, as usual, but he wasn’t speaking- no, yelling

he showed past his classmates, walking towards recovery girl’s office

“ribbit, why was he so quiet?”

recovery girl was like ?!?!?! what the fuck happened when was the last time she ate

she had to give you a total parenteral nutrition

(that means nutrition/fluids are delivered into your body via a catheter placed in a vein of your body, usually lower arm)

when you woke up bakugo was sat next to the bed, reading the back of some medicine bottle he found there

when he noticed you awake he perked up a little, shoulders visibly relaxing

“what happened?” 

he narrowed his eyes, wondering for a second if you were serious 

“you’re starving yourself to near death, that’s what happened.”

you immediately grimaced

“did i pass out in front of everyone?”

“is that seriously what you’re worried about?!”

you remained quiet, looking away

“y/n, look at me.” he gently guided your head to face him

“i don’t know what drove you to do this to yourself, but i need you to stop. you’re going to die if you don’t stop. what idiot made you think you need to do this to yourself?! i’ll kill them!”

..

“you told me i was a fatass”

his jaw dropped

fuck

“you know i don’t mean when i insult you! i hide the fucking fact that i WANT you to eat by using insults! i’m so sorry..”

his voice went soft at the end

he truly felt so bad :(

he was the one that was supposed to protect you from others hurting you yet here he was, being the one that caused you to hink you weren’t worthy enough

“i know, but there’s so many much more prettier girls than me, i was afraid you’d lose feelings if i wasn’t thin enough.”

“are you kidding?! you’re the only one i have eyes for! all those other extra’s can fuck off, i don’t give a single shit about them!”

you were kinda tearing up

“do you promise?”

god, he felt so bad.

he sat on the edge of the bed, reluctantly pulling you in a hug 

“i promise”

from that day on he made sure to remind you to eat meals, even if it was just something small

he ripped everyone’s heads off if they made a comment about your eating habits and/or weight

and he made sure you were the only one he loved

the day he saw you collapse something broke inside of him

it opened his eyes that hiding his emotions from you wouldn’t help you in your relationship

so while he supported you to build your feelings of self-worth and eating habits, you helped him start to open up, teaching him that showing emotions wasn’t embarassing

no one else knew how soft he could get with you and it should stay that way

you had a long way to go but it was all worth it in the end

he was your little angry pomeranian <33

requests: open

read rules before requesting.

Fuck Diet Culture

This is going to be long.  It’s going to be rambly.  It’s going to be sad.  It’s going to be angry.  There’s going to be language some people don’t like. I can’t NOT talk about it though. 

Fuck diet culture.  Let me say that again.  Fuck. Diet. Culture. It has taken such a huge chunk out of my life.  I have lost pieces of myself I’m not sure I’ll ever get back.  The only way to heal is to go through.  I can’t go back.  I have to move forward.  But I can’t do it quietly.  I can’t hide.  I can’t live in the same shame I’ve spent the last 40 years in.  Literally.  40 years of my life wasted to this.  I can’t bear to live the back half of my life in the same way.  What the hell is the point? I’m not going to write this in any particular order because all of the thoughts and feelings swimming around are snapshots of things in my life that diet culture has broken in me or stolen from me. A lot of you aren’t going to agree with me.  That’s okay.  Truly.  This is about ME.  This is to help ME heal.  You can talk to me about your struggles, your diets, your ups and downs, your successes and whatnot.  I am here for you in all of it. But I won’t diet with you anymore.  Never again.

Currently I am having severe knee pain.  One knee is worse than the other, but both are bad.  I should go to the doctor.  I should have gone to the doctor years ago for it.  Want to know why I didn’t?  My weight.  I have injuries from overuse and over exercise and I am terrified that I am going to go to the doctor and the first words they’re going to say are “Well, if you lost 20, 30, 40, 50 pounds, it probably wouldn’t hurt so much.” instead of listening to me, examining me, scanning my knees and HELPING me.  I don’t feel this way irrationally.  This shit happens.  I am in pain.  I don’t know how to get help without being told to go on another diet that will not work.

Because diets don’t work.  Not long term.  I am excellent at losing weight!  I’ve done it over and over and over.  Then I stop restricting, counting, starving, and pushing myself.  Then my body says “What the fuck were you doing?” and puts it back. I lost the ability years ago to know whether I’m actually hungry or not.  I eat too fast when I do eat because if I snarf it down super fast I can get it in before my brain says “You’ve had too much.  Did you count those calories?  How many miles on a treadmill will you do to make up for that?  Did you actually earn this meal?”

Every time.  Every meal.  Every morsel.

I have never been officially diagnosed with an eating disorder.  Only been told by therapists and psychiatrists that I definitely engage in disordered eating.

No shit.

Every diet under the sun.  Cabbage soup.  Phen Fen.  Weight watchers (MULTIPLE TIMES), TOPS, Noom, My Fitness Pal calorie counting, intermittent fasting,  and every whacky bullshit thing in between promising results.  I’ve purchased fancy scales.  I’ve even tried one that wouldn’t show you your weight, but the color of your progress in the app.  Here’s a hint… if you gain, your color is black like death.  I’ve failed a million times and I’ve blamed myself.  I am the failure.  So I hate my body a little more every day and I stress about how I’m going to NOT pass my disordered eating and my food issues onto my kids.  My stress levels are through the roof and 98% of it is diet culture related. What the fuck is that about? Every time I start a program I hit it hard.  Last time I tried anything involving tracking or counting I was so starving by the time I got home from work that I almost ripped a child’s head off (not literally OBVIOUSLY) but I screamed at her at the top of my lungs because she hurt my feelings.  It wasn’t until after finally allowing myself to eat another morsel of food that I realized I was hangry.

Why is living in a larger body not acceptable?  We all talk about diversity and equality as though we believe it with our whole hearts, but that doesn’t cross over to fat.  Or skinny if we’re really being honest.  How many times have you heard or seen online “Oh my god, she’s so skinny.  Feed her a damn cheeseburger!  She looks anorexic.”  I know I have.  I know I’ve said those words.  I will punch myself in the gut if I ever say them again.  

Every body is different.  We are supposed to be.  Let’s not BLAME genetics like it’s a bad thing.  Let’s realize that it’s what nature has intended.  My father is over 6 feet tall and a large man.  He’s just a big man.  He went on Nutri System when I was young, lost a ton of weight, and put a bunch back on over the years because he is a big man.  My mother was not tall, but was always large.  I hated her body because HER PARENTS told her all the time she was fat and unworthy and cautioned me not to grow up to be like her in any way.  Even when she was poor and homeless she was still large.  That was the way her body was.  I wonder how different her life might have been if the size of her body hadn’t been a factor in the way she was raised or treated.  How might that have made my life different?

I know a lot of you are probably rolling your eyes at me right now about being vocal about another health plan or saying to yourself “just because you have trouble with diets doesn’t mean they don’t work”  I know there are people close to me thinking “She just always gets excited when she discovers a new diet, that’s probably what this is.”  NO.  

This is me finally realizing that I can heal and healing doesn’t mean I need to weigh 157 pounds. (That’s the weight limit for women my height to enter the air force when I did in 1992) This is me finally realizing that I’ve been lying about the weight on my drivers license for 30 years because gods forbid anyone saw my real weight on that document. This is me realizing that I’ve spent my life trying to live up to other people’s ideals of what I should look like because I assumed they wouldn’t like me otherwise. This is me realizing how much unintentional harm I could have been doing when sharing another diet, another idea, another bout of “well this is working really well for me!” with people I care about. This is me realizing how much damage I’ve been doing to myself living with this level of shame for 40 years. Hiding what I’m doing.  Suffering in silence.  Hiding food. Restricting.  Binging.  Over exercising to compensate.  Spending money on one last diet.  Spending emotional energy on one last hope. We were in Las Vegas for what was supposed to be a fun vacation last week and I was so hot and miserable and so steeped in hating my body because my painful knees were betraying me that my internal monologue was a never ending loop of “I’ll hit weight watchers REALLY HARD when we get home and get rid of this weight, then I’ll figure out my knees and work on maintenance” Let me say that again, clearly.  I struggled to enjoy my vacation because I was obsessing about restricting food AFTER my vacation. One last time.  One last meal.

BULLSHIT.

We walked by shops with weird and pretty fashion dresses. (I freely admit I don’t understand fashion) the husband and I would both point out ones we thought were pretty.  My brain would get stuck on “Yeah, but they don’t make them in my size” or “Yeah, that would NOT look good on me.  It looks fine on that size 0 mannequin”  Pretty on other people.  Other people are pretty.  Not me. Diet culture is pervasive and all consuming.  In big ways and little ways.  I’m 5 ft 9.  I’m not a tiny person at any weight.  I’ve always been told I’m too big.  Even when I sit, I slouch a little and/or tuck my legs and feet up under me to try to make myself appear smaller and less invasive.  This is subconscious.  I don’t always realize I’m doing it until my knees remind me. Most of my life has been things that get in the way of my diets.  “I should start the diet today, but it’ll have to wait until next week because so and so’s birthday is this week and I want to be able to enjoy that.”  or “It’s late fall, I should just start now but first there’s my birthday, and then Thanksgiving, and December happens and there’s all kinds of treats then.  Better wait until January, but not the first because that’s new year’s...maybe the following Monday.” or the ever popular “I already had a bad eating day today, I’m a failure.  Why bother?  Fuck it.  I’ll try again tomorrow.”  That one was always followed by binging because of the last supper mentality.  If I’m starting a diet tomorrow I better eat EVERYTHING NOW. This is how I’ve lived my whole life.  The time not spent dieting was just the time in between diets where I was planning my next diet.  So much life wasted.  The only time I was not actively dieting or planning the next diet or suffering from “I’m just too exhausting to put effort into food right now” was during my 4 pregnancies.  I let myself eat whatever and whenever because I was nauseous all the time anyway and something in my brain made me fuel my body for the babies. When the youngest was born and the on call doctor who delivered her told me I was too fat to have my tubes tied I definitely started planning diets again in that moment.  I believe now, years later, that my diet and diet culture ruined mind and body is part of what kept me from being as successful at nursing the kids as I wished I had been.  I assumed my body was broken and not good enough for my babies.  The last time I lost a LOT of weight it was because I didn’t want to ruin someone’s wedding pictures.  True story.  This was nothing that person felt or anything they told me.  IT’s what my brain said to me.  It’s how I de-valued myself.  There are very few current pictures of me now because I’ve been stuck in a place where I feel shame when I see them. When I’m dead, memories and pictures are all my kids and grandkids will have, and I hate myself too much to let anyone take them. That’s not okay.

I dream about food.  I daydream about food.  Food I “shouldn’t” eat.  Food I “should” eat.  When to eat.  When not to eat.  Every spare ounce of energy is spent thinking about food or hating myself which leads to more thinking about food. I am not in a place where I can prepare dinner for my family right now because it’s too hard to put that much energy into food.  I force myself to pick the recipes from the app and get the shopping done via instacart so all anyone else has to do is pull up the recipe and make the food.  If I’m looking at the ingredients or trying to prep anything I stare at every individual thing debating whether or not I “should” eat it.  This is going to take me a long time to break free from.  Today I finally feel like I CAN break free. There is nothing wrong with being in a large body or a small body.  Food is not good or bad.  Food is food.  I have to say these things.  I have to repeat them to myself or I fall down the rabbit hole again.  None of this is work anyone can do for me.  I have to live it.  I have to work through it.  I have to figure it out. If you read this far, my statement stands.  If you’re on a diet, I will listen to your woes and hold your hand and I will not judge you for it.  This was very hard to write because I am certain some of you who believe in diets, ways of life, and wellness eating may block me now because I spoke my mind.  I’ve clung so tight to the people I love and refrained from being honest and speaking my mind for fear of abandonment.  I’ll have to live with it if that’s the case here, because people sometimes need to do what’s best for them.  Airing this out is one of those things for me.  It’s a scary thing for sure. I also want to say that I’m happy for this to lead to discussion.  I’m not going to shut anyone down for wanting to talk to me about this.  I am always open to learn new information and see different perspectives.  Just know that if I’m emotional and feeling a lot of strong things about how my life has been up to this point, and I am entitled to believe what I believe just as you all are.  I’m happy to share sources and books I’ve been reading on the subject.  They are not diet books.

Here’s to doing better from here on out.

Here’s to finally being free.

Emerging of Kalon

Request: I need some new johnny depp fics in my life where I want a reader with insecurities and johnny reassuring her that he loves her the way she is.Maybe she is a bit more chubby than his past gfs and she has to wears glasses.Abd thanx so much for accepting it.

Yooo this imagine is soo important to me. As a person who had a lot of insecurities and has suffered through depression.It is really important for me to spread a certain message to others like me. I have this belief that you aren’t born with insecurities,you are made to have them.Don’t point out things to people that would make them uncomfortable in the long term guys it becomes quite scarring for them and it also makes you a damn bully. Also it is normal to have stretch marks, tummy rolls ,acne, scars ,body hair and all that stuff, Man or Woman or any other gender you identify as.That’s what makes you human.If people can’t accept you for who you are please cut them out of your life.Ya’ll beautiful and I love ya’ll. Hope you like this !!

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Pairing : Johnny Depp x Reader

Warnings : TW,Nosy people who like putting others down for fun, Signs of depression,Suicide attempt,Angst,Swearing, Fluff, Johnny being the absolute sweetheart he is.

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Kalon ;Latin for ideal beauty in all, physical ,spiritual and moral forms

1.Instigation.

“I still can’t believe THE Johnny Depp went for you after his past ones”,said someone snapping her out of her trance.”Pardon ?”,she asked as if to confirm whether she heard him right . “I mean look at you....His exes were all supermodels weren’t they? Not a single flaw..”,the man guffawed.”Well you have have a micropenis why did your wife choose you?”,her bestfriend snapped crudely making her cringe.”Let’s go Y/N “, Y/BF/N said dragging she out of the restaurant .Well this wasn’t how I wanted college reunion to end up like,thanks Nathan she thought. “Are you alright Y/N ?”, Y/BF/N asked. “Of course”. No I’m not. “It doesn’t bother me at all.” It bothers me too much. “Nathan’s a dick .Don’t let it get to your head EVER”. But he’s right, his words are already in my head. “Yeah...”

2.The disquieting

“Hey glasses ! Looking ugly as always.”

“Look at her hogging like a pig, hey fatty you want more?”

“Darling why don’t you try going on a diet.”

“Don’t watch telly, you’re blind enough already”

“Jason what do you think of Y/N ?” “Damn man she was not even my type”

“Please Stop !”, Y/N woke up with a jerk, breathing in short gasps .”Johnny-”,she stops cutting herself off as she looked at the empty looked at the empty side on her bed. He isn’t in the country she remembered . Silence. She stared at the framed picture of them together on the wall. Plip. A tear fell. Plip Plip. Two more,before she couldn’t control it any more. The past wouldn’t change.She knew it would haunt her forever. But they had stopped for a while. But since Nathan ,it came back harder than ever. She didn’t tell Johnny, she’d never tell him , the last thing she wanted to do is to become a larger burden. So she cried herself to sleep every single day.

3.Repressing

Y/BF/N frowned as she looked at Y/N’s lunch. “Since when do you eat salads ?Hell,that isn’t even salad it’s just *ugh* lettuce....”,she says looking at the leafy stuff with absolute disgust. Y/N looked at her as if she did not understand what she was saying “I love salads,you know what? I’m not that hungry.....better get back to work! See you later!”,she said leaving as she didn’t even let the other speak. Starving, Hurting, Looking into the mirror and hating herself. The cycle continued.This was going to be dangerous in the days to come and she knew that too. 

4.Avoiding

6 missed calls from Mom

19 missed calls and 87 messages from Y/BF/N

40 missed calls and 150 messages from Johnny 

3 notifications from Twitter. 

No one had seen her in 4 days .The telly changed channels at Johnny’s apartment .Things scattered around as a trembling hand set down the remote . Fat tears dampened the pillow as her eyes read the news headline. ‘Johnny Depp at a dinner date with ex wife Vanessa ? Is he finally done with his simple girlfriend ?’

5. Falling

This was it.She ended up the way she predicted she’d end up 10 years ago. Weak,Tired,Empty and Lonely. She stared at the bathtub as it filled itself until it was overfilled,water spilling out of its sides as it splashed onto her feet. She didn’t flinch at the coldness.She stayed robotically still, looking down at her palm. A blade. Without hesitating she got into the tub,the tap still running. She didn’t think anymore,tears wouldn’t fall even if they wanted to. She closed her eyes as she let her self go ,ignoring the frantic ringing of her phone and the banging on the apartment door.

6. Alerting

To say Johnny was concerned was an underestimation.Y/N wasn’t picking up his phone since several days .He was distracted, couldn’t concentrate and worry filled his entire existence.He didn’t know what to do,even going as far as asking his ex wife for advice.He decided to go back ,back to his girlfriend’s loving arms.

The moment he stepped back into the city he took his time.Picking out her favourie flowers ,the chocolate she always loved and a little something of importance. He ignored the notifications is phone was chiming with, his mind only full of thoughts of her....The thoughts were short lived , disturbed much to Johnny’s dismay by Y/BF/N’s call. He ignored once,ignored twice but after that he knew something was wrong.”Johnny !”, panicked voice spoke through the phone. A frown replacing the man’s smile “Did Y/N text you that absurd note too?” “No,wait Y/BF/N let me check”,he put the call on hold as his eyes skimmed over the words displayed on his screen. His phone now dropped on the car floor he wished all of it was a dream.They stopped as he stormed out, back to his apartment. He knocked wildly on the door but not a voice came nor a cackle. He threw his body on the door several times ,”Goddamitt Y/N OPEN THE FUCKING DOOR DON’T PLAY WITH ME RIGHT NOW !”.In his panicked feat he had forgotten he had the keys until they dropped out of his jacket pocket.He didn’t wait a moment as he fumbled it into the key hole ,kicking the door open as soon as it opened.

Silence. 

Splosh . The sound of water hitting the ground from the bathroom echoed in the whole house.

“Y/N ?”, Johnny softly whispered as he pushed open the bathroom door. A horrific scene unfolded before him.

7.Mourning

It had been two days and Johnny wouldn’t budge.He saw red that day and the site still wouldn’t leave his thoughts alone.He would neither eat,nor sleep as he sat beside his beloved girlfriend who lay on a hospital bed. Dark Enough by Amanda played on the radio. The text message, and the talk with Y/BF/N replayed in his head as if war replayed in a retired soldiers dreams. “I didn’t know you were hurting that bad”,he whispered, tears threatening to fall again. He place his head on her stomach as he let the silent tears fall,until her hand fell on top of his head.

8.Resuscitation  

Johnny jerked up ,his eyes as wide as saucers, as he froze with eyes full of pain and hurt.Y/N did not dare meet his gaze.She felt ashamed and disgusted. But those feelings were immediately replaced with shock as Johnny almost lunged at her,hugging her tight. “I was so scared I was so fucking scared when I saw that text and then you drowning in the red water filled in the bathtub ! I thought you’d left me ! I thought you died you weren’t breathing...How dare you think of yourself that way how dare you think you were not good enough !? You were the best fucking thing that happened to me since my kids goddammit !”. Y/N had never seen Johnny this mad.Hell, she had never even seen him cry. She didn’t know how to answer him, she was too ashamed.He wouldn’t break the hug, as if he would loose her if he did. He loved her too much. “Why ?”,he asked again,as if he was begging for an answer. Even a word. He just wanted to hear her voice. “I was scared...”,her voice cracked coming out much broken than she predicted. “ I didn’t think I deserved you, I thought I’d never reach the levels of those beautiful actresses and models.I was scared to tell you about my past..I was scared to bother you...”. Johnny’s heart broke. He never thought his Y/N would think that way. She was always smiling .Not even a little frown on her face. Always there for everyone. Yet no one comforted her. How could he never see it? Of course he couldn’t see it she was perfect to him.His Y/N was the most perfect person in the world. “I love you”, he blurted. He never said that.He was too shy. But he hugged her tighter ,” I love you so much. Even with scars,insecurities or that ugly face you make when you see things you do not like. You were, have and always will be the most perfect to me. Please....don’t do that again...”

9.Emergence

Y/N was discharged from the hospital in a few days. Johnny wouln’t leave her side. All his attention would be on her to see if ate well, and loved herself. Y/N felt safe. And she wasn’t wrong . Johnny was everything she deserved.

They sat on the rooftop of a cafe in Paris. A calm silence passing over them. “Y/N ?” ,Johnny asked. “Hmm?”,she hummed along, silence entailing after. ”Marry me ?”,he asked. That was the day Y/N was the most happiest, and did the beautifully emerged Kalon say yes? you’d ask. She said it without a second to spare. After all our Kalon had found her wings.

“No one is born ugly, we’re just born in a judgemental society”~ Kim Namjoon(BTS)

----The End----

Whew ! After all the procrastination and time I took brainstorming this baby is done! This was requested by the wonderful @anycsirp​ I really really hope you liked this ! Also I meant what I said before the start of this oneshot . YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL. PERIODT. Please do like and comment your opinions! I really hope to read em ! I’m not that great of a writer but I did my best ! 

~Love, Hri

BTS reacting to your daughter wanting to become an idol.

pairing: bts x reader fandom: bts warnings: language genre: angst ; fluff word count: 2k+

a/n: sooo, I wasn’t sure if you wanted the main argument to be the dieting, but I feel like there are a lot more reasons why they’d be worried, so I hope you don’t mind me only putting diets as one of the many reasons. nevertheless, I hope you like it ♥

kim seokjin

“We were seven men and we had our own struggles. What do you think happens when it's seven women who are constantly getting compared to each other?” Jin stood in front of your daughter with his arms crossed in front of his chest, “Do you know what's going to happen? They're going to say things like: 'Oh, you've gained more weight than her, you need to be put on a diet now'.”

“I'll deal with that if it comes down to it, dad, but I'm old enough to know what I'll be putting myself through and I'm making this decision with or without your approval,” she got up and copied his pose and once again, you could see that she truly was his daughter.

You got up with a sigh, standing between the two before the argument could escalate any further.

“We're worried and you know we have every reason to be. So how about we make a deal. You do your thing, you agree and join the company, but your father is allowed to monitor everything.”

“What, like I'm a baby?! I'm 16!”

“No, like a manager,” you turned around to look at your husband, “You've been itching to work in the industry again as well, just differently this time, this would be the perfect opportunity. Sira could become the idol she wants to be without having to worry about much, because you'll take care of her like the father that you are and the manager that you could be.”

It certainly was an odd proposal, there weren't many idols that were managed by their parents, but it has happened every now and then.

And it was something that both Jin and your daughter were ultimately okay with, because they both got their ways, even if not exactly how they thought they would.

min yoongi

“Aren't you... going to say anything?” your daughter pushed her food around, her eyes on her father who wasn't looking at her at all.

You were feeding your baby to your right, your eyes switching from her to him, afraid of what this might turn into.

“So you want to become their slut.”

“Yoongi!” you immediately complained.

“No, (Y/N),” Yoongi looked up, first at you, then at your daughter, “You have no idea how fucked up this industry really is. Why do you think I left when I did? Why do you think I did everything I could to protect you from this life? Do you want to starve yourself for the rest of your life? Do you want to portray a version of yourself that you're not until the day you die?”

“I didn't do anything yet, dad! They just made an offer, I didn't say anything yet!” she was upset, clearly, “I'm sorry, I should have just said no.”

But when she started sobbing, Yoongi's hard shell broke down immediately and his shoulders slumped with a heavy sigh.

“Listen, I know you love music, but becoming an idol is not the way to go. If you're serious about music, I can help you get in touch with the right people, people that won't use you like the agencies would in a position of as an idol.”

She nodded, even though she was still crying.

Later that night, you ended up joining her in her bed, holding her close while explaining to her why Yoongi had been so upset. Why he was so scared for her and that he didn't do this to punish her, but simply to protect her.

And thankfully, she understood.

jung hoseok

“How much sleep do you get nowadays?” Hoseok asked.

“I don't know.. seven to nine hours?”

“Forget that. You'll get four if you're really lucky, two on a normal day and none if you have comebacks. How much do you weigh right now?”

“Why are you asking me this?” your daughter clearly became uncomfortable.

“Because they will be asking you. They will want to know whether to put you on a diet or not because you are 'too fat' for this industry.”

You let out a frustrated sigh and cupped your daughter's face, “He's not sugarcoating it like I would have, but he's right. This industry isn't as beautiful as you think it is and your father has seen it up close, so he’s not just saying these things to scare you off,” you kissed her forehead, “I know that you're currently in a stage of your life where you don't know what step is the next to take and I know that it's scary not to know, but please do not make any rash decisions and sign any contracts. Think about this... carefully.”

She did... because you didn't raise her to be naive and stupid.

kim namjoon

“Do you know why we disbanded, sweetheart?” Namjoon's voice was gentle, his eyes on his other daughter picking flowers in the garden.

“You... never really went into details about that,” but she was instantly curious and straightened her back, crossing her legs on the bench that she was sitting on.

“At that time, we reached the peak of our careers. There truly was nowhere else to go, but people still expected us to go higher and reach for more stars. But we were exhausted. We were.. depressed,” Namjoon's eyes flickered to you, since you had been the one to pull him out of that dark place once, “What me and your uncles have accomplished will forever be something I will cherish, but it is not a life I would wish for you. The never ending diets, the never ending stress and expectations... it's... horrible.”

“But there's perks too, right? I mean, you had amazing fans.”

“We did. And then we also had the ones that stalked us. The ones that sent us creepy letters. The ones that threatened to hurt our loved ones,” finally, he turned his head to look at her, “You and your sister should not grow up in a world like this. I want you to be able to eat what you want to eat without someone telling you that it has too many calories. I want you to be able to sleep in on the weekends after a long week of hard work. I want you to be able to go on vacations with your friends without having to worry for your safety. Do you understand what I mean?”

She didn't respond right away, but ultimately she smiled a little and nodded, “I understand, daddy.”

And boy, did you both let out a relieved sigh.

park jimin

“No,” Park Jimin was not the kind of father to say no without giving a reason, especially because he hardly could say no to his first and only daughter, the apple of his eye. But when she asked him about her possibly getting into BigHit, he instantly shut her down.

“But..-” her eyes widened, her lower lip already beginning to tremble and you, being stuck in the middle, turned your head to Jimin with a small smile, “Can you check up on Seungmin? Tell him it's almost dinner time.”

Jimin knew that you handling this conversation would be better anyways, so he did end up walking outside to check up on his son, while you turned around to your daughter and grabbed her hands, “Your father had a great life. He had a wonderful career that he doesn't regret having, but the wonderful things that you see online and hear from fans and friends and family... it wasn't always like this.”

“What do you mean?”

“When your father made his debut, he ended up struggling... a lot. Not because he wasn't good at singing, or dancing.. but because he felt like his face was too chubby. He felt like his abs weren't good enough. He felt like his legs didn't look strong enough,” when she looked confused, you kept on talking, “He went on one diet after the other and went days without eating anything, just because he felt like he had to. Now, imagine him having been a woman. And I really hate saying this in a modern time as this, but the world isn't as lenient with us as it is with men, and your father knows it, sweetheart. If one fan were to ever mention that you're one gram too heavy, the company would take it to heart and put you on a diet. And not just a diet for a week, a diet for a month, maybe a year. Your father has experienced this first hand and he just doesn't want you to live a life such as this too,” especially because she had inherited his beautiful cheeks from him and so he was worried that she’d go through the same things just because of that wonderful detail.

She hadn't known about this, because if she had, she never would have brought it up.

And after that day, after thinking about what you had said once again and after actually looking up what you had said and confirming it all, she never brought it up ever again.

And Jimin was more than glad about that.

kim taehyung

You both should have assumed that this would happen at some point.

Not only because of who Taehyung is and used to be, but because of who your daughter was. Confident, breathtakingly beautiful and talented. Of course, she'd want to pursue a career in a field such as this one.

“Listen,” Taehyung brushed a strand of hair behind her ear, “You know your mother and I support you, no matter what you want to do, but this life that you're envisioning right now is not the life that you'll have.”

“He's right, sweetheart,” you sighed, “You are already struggling with keeping your life private, if you join BigHit, it'll get even worse. Then there's crazy fans, more so for you because of who your father used to be. And the diets.. the never ending diets..”

“I know you're worried and I can't blame you for it,” she grabbed her fathers hand and pulled it to her cheek, leaning against it, “But whatever happens, I know you two will have my back. That's why I want to do this, because I know that no matter what, I can always come back here and get my slice of normality and love.”

It... kind of made you really proud to hear that, even if it didn’t decrease your worries.

jeon jeongguk

BigHit had been trying to get Jeongguk to sign up your daughter ever since she was old enough to walk and talk, but he had always denied them.

Now, however, she was old enough to make her own decisions, and her saying yes, didn't come as a surprise to either of you.

“Don't you think there's a reason I kept telling them off?” Jeongguk was angry. Angry at BigHit, angry at his daughter and most importantly, angry at himself that he didn't put a stop to this once and for all, “Do you want to starve yourself for the rest of your life to be the perfect doll that they want you to be?”

But instead of yelling back, she actually listened to every little bad thing that he had to say.

Only when he let out a frustrated sigh and dropped down on the couch next to her, did she speak: “I know this isn't what either of you wanted for me and I'm sorry I'm worrying you like this, especially you dad, but this is my life and my decision.”

You decided to join in, your hand on your daughter's lower back, “It's not that we wouldn't support you, but this life is hard. We're just scared for you.”

“I know, mom,” but she was stubborn and so with one last glance at her father, she said: “I'm sorry, daddy, but it’s what I’m going to do,” and got up to go into her room.

All that Jeongguk could do now was keep BigHit in check. Every little thing they wanted to do to your daughter had to go through him.

She didn't know about this and he made sure that she never would... but it was the only way that Jeongguk would allow this to happen.

BTS Reaction || Accidental Idol Pregnancy [Request]

Seokjin:

One night. It was one night and you were going to have to face the consequences about it for the rest of your life, you stared down at the stick in your hands and wanted to scream at yourself. Your manager had pointed out that she thought you were gaining a little weight, and you were always wondering why you started to feel sick every morning and your boobs were sore so you took a test just to be sure.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck." You whispered rolling the test up in tissue and putting it into the bin, you sat down on the toilet seat and let the information sink in that you were pregnant with Jin's baby. You'd been together for four years but neither of you was ready for kids, you were both Idols but your career was only just started to take off and your manager had rules about you dating Jin, the number one rule being no babies.

"Babe, you okay?" You almost jumped out of your skin, you flushed the toilet and came out to greet Jin with a smile, hugging him and looking at what he was cooking in the kitchen,

"I'm fine baby, what smells so good?" You questioned, he smirked kissing the top of your head and walking further into the kitchen with you to show you what he'd been working on,

"I made us some stew, and then I made-" He stopped as soon as you ran off into the bathroom to throw up, the smell of beef hitting you too soon and making you want to vomit.

(X)

"We should get you to a doctor," Jin said as you emerged from the bathroom, you shook your head sitting down on a kitchen chair and taking a glass of water he was holding out for you,

"I know what's wrong with me, and I don't need a doctor." You knew you had to tell him, you told each other everything and you knew hiding something like this from him would be bad news.

"What's wrong? Do you have a bug?" He sat down in front of you and you took his hands in yours, trying not to tear up but doing it anyway, you cursed yourself.

"I didn't want to cry, fuck." You whispered rubbing your face on your shoulder and looking up to look him in the eyes, his face was full of concern, worry and sadness, your eyebrows knotted together. The news was either going to ruin his life or make his life better, you'd had conversations about kids before, you both wanted them but you didn't know if it was soon or if it was so far into the future that you didn't need to think about it right now.

"What is it?" He whispered trying to reassure you that he could handle the news, you swallowed the lump that was forming in your throat and turned to look at him, taking a deep breath,

"I'm pregnant." He stared at you blankly for a couple of seconds, it was hard to read him at the best of times but now he was completely blank and you had no idea if he'd heard you or if he heard you and was planning his nearest escape route.

"Jin?" You questioned, his hands slipped from yours and he stood up from the chair, turning to face the wall. You let the tears go and stood up,

"How? When?" He questioned turning to look at you, his expression still unreadable,

"You plus me equals baby...And I think it was when we had that one night without protection...We were just too heated that night to even think about it." You whispered playing with the chair, he stayed on his side of the kitchen and you cleared your throat before speaking again,

"I'll leave. I'll move away and I'll make sure the company hides me away, no one will know and it won't ruin your career, It'll be like I never dated you I promise and you don't have to be apart of their life if you don't want to be." You ranted on but Jin came over to you and grabbed your arms, kissing you on the lips to stop you from talking, you relaxed against his touch and he smiled, pulling away from you and pushing the hair from your face as he stared down into your eyes.

"We're ready for this, sure it's sooner than expected but we're going to be parents." He was smiling now and you felt as though a giant weight had been lifted from your chest, you were engulfed in a giant hug and he chuckled making you shake a little.

"We're going to be parents!" He repeated pulling away from you and going to look for his phone, probably to tell the boys what was going on and you knew you had to call you manager and tell her the news as well, but you were just so relieved that Jin was happy about it too which meant you could finally relax and be happy about it.

Yoongi:

You didn't know what to do when the test came back positive, you were freaking out over every small detail, wondering if you could even have a baby while you were an Idol, if the company you worked for was going to drop you as soon as they found out that you were with child. Yoongi was asleep next to you in the bed and you slowly got out, wanting to leave him to his break, you'd text Jin asking to meet him to talk about something serious, he was one of your best friends before you started dating Yoongi and you knew he would know what to do in the situation.  

"Where are you going?" Yoongi grumbled when he shifted over and you weren't laying next to him, you looked at him and smiled even half asleep he looks amazing.

"I'm just going to see Jin, stay here." You whispered leaning over the bed and kissing him on the nose, he chuckled and rolled back over, pulling the covers over his head and going back to sleep. You walked out of the bedroom and grabbed your car keys, going to meet Jin at the BigHit building, the only place you could have a decent private conversation without someone overhearing you both.

(X)

You were sat in a board room across from one another, he'd brought you a cup of tea and some biscuits to eat with them and you thanked him, bringing your knees up into your chest on the chair and staring at him.

"So what's wrong? You normally sit like that when something is on your mind," You shifted a little and looked out of the window at the city, before glancing back at Jin who was starting to look worried for you.

"Hypothetically speaking," You started, leaning onto the table and looking him in the eyes, he leant forward as well.

"If an idol was pregnant, and wasn't married to the father what would happen to said idol?" You questioned trying to make it seem as though it wasn't you, but clearly failing.

"Well, hypothetically speaking the idol would have to go through her contract and see if there was a clause about it." He said to you, taking hold of your hand from across the table and squeezing.

"How far along are you?" You stared down at the table and let a couple of tears go.

"Three months...I didn't know until I was two months in and then I hid it because I was scared of what Yoongi would think and then what my boss would think." Jin was out of the chair and pulling you into his arms within seconds and you cried into his chest as he rubbed your head.

"Have you and Yoongi ever talked about kids?" You shook your head and took the tissue he was holding out for you and wiping your face with it.

"You have to tell him sooner or later, you can't wait until you're giving birth and just drop it on him." You knew that of course you did but it didn't make the situation any easier.

"I don't know how Jin...Will he be excited about it? Mad?" He sighed taking hold of your hand again and looking at you in the eyes.

"He's Yoongi, unpredictable but you of all people know him best." You nodded, you had been together for six years so you did know him the best but it didn't mean you knew how he was going to react about the whole thing but lucky for you, you didn't need to tell him about the pregnancy, he burst through the door and you jumped up from the chair, he said nothing but just rushed to your side, wrapping his arms around you in a hug.

"Yoongi?" You stuttered looking over his shoulder Jin who was smiling, you hugged Yoongi back and he pulled away with a giant smile on his face.

"You're sure you're pregnant?" You nodded and he placed his hand on your small unnoticeable bump under the baggy clothes and smiled, you didn't expect him to be this excited but you loved it all the same.

"Parents, us." He chuckled looking up at you, he could tell you were still worried and he sat you down on the chair.

"We'll bring your contract out and we'll go through it later, make sure there isn't a clause that will let them fire you and if there is we will figure this out together, no one will let your talent go to waste, I promise." He kissed your cheek and you nodded in agreement, starting to feel better about the whole thing and Jin smiled at you both.

"I'll let you guys talk it through." He got up and you reached for his hand, giving it a squeeze and smiling up at him.

"Thank you, Jin." He smiled and let go of your hand, leaving the room and letting you and Yoongi talk everything over.

Hoseok:

"Hobi I'm so fat." You complained looking at yourself in the mirror and groaning, he sighed coming over to you and wrapping his arms around your waist, leaving kisses on your neck as he shook his head.

"You are not." You grumbled something back at him about your jeans not fitting you anymore and then he sighed,

"If you really think you're fat, which you're not, we can go on a diet together...Start working out together?" You nodded in agreement, it sounded like a good plan to do together. You were an idol, you couldn't risk gaining weight and having your bosses comment on it, it was one of the rules that you had to look a certain way, everyone knew that

"Sounds good to me Hobi,"

(X)

That was a month ago and you finally know why you were gaining weight so quickly, you were pregnant but you hadn't told Hoseok yet. You wanted to tell him but you didn't know how to, so you continued to work out and diet with him but when he wasn't around or was in bed you would sneak to the snack cupboard and eat the cookies that were in the jar. You'd been craving them a lot since the pregnancy. You figured if you ignored the pregnancy long enough you could pretend it wasn't really for a little while longer, you were scared about losing your job and scared about losing Hoseok if you came out as pregnant, you'd already spent a lot of time crying over it, scared that this could ruin your life or Hoseok's life but you were also excited to bring another human into the world.

Hoseok was at the studios again and you were sat on the sofa watching a new drama you found, you had the cookie jar in your hands as you ate from it, eyes not moving from the screen. The door opened and Hoseok walked in, you didn't have the effort to hide the cookies and you didn't want to lie anymore.

"Diet." He reminded you taking the jar away from you but you snatched it back, going back to your drama and eating.

"I'm pregnant, I can do what I want." You said blankly, not concentrating on Hobi's reaction if you did you would have seen him laughing and shaking his head.

"That's a good one," He said thinking you were joking and taking the jar away from you, going to place it on top of the fridge where you couldn't reach it.

"Hobi!" You pouted following him into the kitchen, he stared at you with an eyebrow raised and arms folded over his chest.

"I thought you didn't want to gain weight." You rolled your eyes, taking his hand in yours and walking him upstairs towards the main bathroom, you sat him on the bathtub edge and went through the cupboard looking for the tests you'd been saving, you found them and slid them over to him in the box they were sitting. All 12 of them sitting there and staring up at him with the words 'Positive' or 'pregnant' written across them, some with a smiley face and others with a plus sign.

"I wanted to be positive I was." You said to him, reaching back through the cupboard and pulling out the hidden stash of chocolate bars and bit into one of them, Hoseok was still staring at the tests in shock while you snacked out in front of him.

"I have a scan soon...I was going to tell you but I was scared." You whispered finishing off the chocolate bar, Hoseok looked up at you and dropped to his knees, kissing your lips and cheeks before placing his hand on the small bump.

"We created another human." He chuckled kissing your lips again and smiling at you brightly, all the worries you had before were out of your mind and you felt more relaxed now that you had told him about the baby.

Namjoon:

As soon as you knew you panicked over the test, you threw it into the bin and hid it under a bunch of other rubbish as soon as you heard the front door of the dorm's opening, you didn't have time to hide that one properly like you had the others, you came out of the dorms bathroom and hugging Jungkook as he came home from the studios wrapping his arms around you as a greeting. It had become a tradition that when he came home he walked over to you and hugged you first, it was to tease Namjoon at first but now it was a habit of you both.

"How was your day?" You questioned as Namjoon came over and replaced Jungkook, he smiled picking you up and spinning you around in the air, making you giggle a little as he did so.

"Amazing! How was yours?" He questioned putting you down on the floor and kissing your nose,

"Brilliant," You lied. You'd taken three weeks off work to get some writing done but you'd spent those three weeks throwing up and taking multiple tests, one after the other to make sure you were actually pregnant and not just sick, you hadn't told anyone about it. Not even your manager who was going to have to know sooner or later, you knew you couldn't hide it from everyone forever but you could keep it a secret for a little while, or just until you figured out what to do with it.

"I'll start dinner soon." You said with a smile looking over his shoulder at Jin who walked in with bags of food that you asked him to get for you, Jungkook walked off down the hallway and you walked over to Jin, smiling and asking him how his day had gone.

(X)

Dinner was finished, the dishes were done and now all the boys were crashed on the sofa watching some movie. Jungkook had been on edge all night and as soon as you locked eyes with him he nodded over to the kitchen, you got up from the sofa leaving Namjoon on his own.

"What's up?" You questioned, he took something from his pocket and laid it on the dinner table, you frowned opening the tissue it was wrapped around and wanted to scream.

"Why are you going through the rubbish?" You whispered staring at it and then up to Jungkook who was staring at you with a raised eyebrow.

"I tripped over the bin and it fell out...Have you told him?" You shook your head and looked at the floor, you didn't know how to tell anyone.

"This is a good thing right?" He questioned you, you looked up with a sad smile. You saw it as a brilliant thing, Namjoon was going to be a terrific father but what about both of your lives, you didn't mind quitting being an idol and looking after your child but you wanted Namjoon to stay doing what he loved, you didn't want him to give it all up for you. Both you and Jungkook were so lost in thought you hadn't heard the kitchen door open and Namjoon walk in, his eyes went to the table.

"Is that a pregnancy test?" Your eyes shot up to meet Namjoon who had a giant smile across his face as he saw the test that said positive on the front of it, you looked down at the test and then back up to him.

"You're not scared?" You questioned, he just stepped closer to you and bent down to kiss you, wrapping his arms around your waist and smiling brightly.

"Excited and scared...Mostly excited, hey! At least those booties I bought will go to good use now." He chuckled bending down and kissing you again, all thoughts of worry were gone for now. You could worry about the details later, right now you wanted to spend time with the man who would be the father of your child and celebrate with his friends. Jungkook smirked, going into the living room and screaming it out that he was the first to know which made him the first godfather, you and Namjoon giggled to one another.

"You're going to be an amazing dad." You whispered to him, running your hand through his hair, he chuckled and kissed your nose.

"And you're going to be a fantastic mother."

Jimin:

"Jimin! Can you get me my chapstick?!" You yelled from downstairs, he shouted back a yes and he walked into your shared bedroom, looking one the bedside table and not seeing it, he frowned walking over to the drawer and trying to open it but it was locked, weird, you never locked the drawer. He took the key out from under the pumpkin candle holder you owned and unlocked the drawer, it was a stupid hiding place but he wasn't going to tell you he knew where it was because you would move it, he reached through the drawer and spotted the chapstick, taking it out and knocking over some pens, he moved them back into place and then saw a white and blue stick, he frowned. Taking it out from the drawer he read the front of it, and then found another one. He dropped them onto the desk and walked down the stairs, handing you your chapstick and giving you an excuse to leave the house.

"I told Joonie I would help him with something." The front door slammed before you could question him and you went back to folding the laundry. You went up the stairs to put the clean clothes away when you noticed the drawer to your desk open, you walked further into the room dropping the clothes onto the bed and going to look at the desk, you could have sworn you locked it but you must not have. It wasn't until you got to the drawer that you noticed the pregnancy tests were on top of the desk and not in their hiding spot, Jimin...Shit! You rushed down the stairs again to find your phone and called his phone but he was either ignoring you or didn't hear his phone ringing so you called Hoseok.

"He knows...Can you call him? I don't know where he is, he found the tests and now I'm freaking out Hobi." You panicked down the phone, you hadn't told Jimin you were pregnant because you were trying not to freak about it yourself, you told your manager and she told you she would get back to you because your contract had a clear clause in it that if you fell pregnant your contract would be terminated and you wouldn't be able to work for that company anymore and she was going to do anything she could to work around it. You told Hoseok the moment you knew because he was like a brother to you, you could tell him anything and everything.

(X)

You were crying onto Hoseok's shoulder when the door opened, Jimin walked in followed by Namjoon, both of them staring at you and Hoseok.

"Jimin?" You whispered sitting up straight and staring at him, he walked into the living room and came to sit down next to you, taking your hand in his and smiling at you.

"Look I know it's scary but my manager is trying to figure out how I can still work and even if I can't, I have enough money saved so I will be okay...You don't have to be around if you don't want to, I totally understand if you don't want to be here...It was an accident." He shook his head at you and you shut up, Namjoon nodded at Hoseok for them to leave you both alone. Jimin had gone straight to him after finding out because he was the most mature and he knew he could trust his leader with everything, and wanted strong advice from him,

"I talked to Joonie. I didn't mean to run out...I was just scared but I didn't think about how scared you must be," You sniffled and nodded, scared was an understatement you were terrified about how this was going to affect everything now.

"It's a happy accident, we'll make it work. I promise." He whispered to you, taking hold of your face and kissing you, you relaxed against his grip and smiled a little. It felt good to have it out in the open to him that you were pregnant, it meant you could stop hiding your midnight eating sessions and that you were going to go through everything together instead of being alone.

Taehyung:

You paced up and down in the women's bathroom in the hospital, you were supposed to be going to have a scan but once you got to the hospital you panicked realising that it was real. You had a baby growing inside of you and that you were here alone, you looked at your screen. You had to call Taehyung and ask him to meet you but you'd been hiding the pregnancy for the last 14 weeks. You hadn't even told your manager about the pregnancy, you just told her you had to take a couple of months away for a 'creative' break which she granted and you told your fans about, but it was getting harder to hide now. You'd snuck out of the house this morning, leaving a note telling Tae you'd gone for a jog but you were supposed to be getting a scan. You hit his caller ID and waited for him to pick up.

"Baby?" He questioned as he answered the phone, hearing his voice made you relax a little but not enough because where you were standing brought your reality back to you.

"Can you come to the hospital, I'm okay...I just need you here please...I'm on the first-floor women's bathroom." You said to him, he didn't question anything, he just told you he would be there soon and hung up the phone. It was what you loved about Taehyung, he wouldn't question anything, he would show up if you needed him and be there to hold your hand through everything, he always told you that no matter what it was, you would get through anything together. Like when there were rumours about you cheating on him with Hoseok after you'd been spending a lot of time together which of course it wasn't true but a lot of companies blew it out of the air and made it a bigger deal than it was.

(X)

"Are you going to tell me why we're here?" Tae questioned as you sat outside a nurses room waiting to be seen, you nodded and went to talk but the nurse called you over, you took his hand and squeezed it.

"I guess you'll find out now." You whispered, Tae was worried about you. When he came to the hospital and told you he was there you came out of the bathroom crying into your hands and walked with him towards a set of doctors offices, telling him nothing but crying into his shoulder, he wanted to know what was bothering you so much but he also knew if you were going to tell him you would tell him in your own time.

"Find what out now?" You sat on the doctor's bed and the nurse smiled at you, lifting your top up and applying the cream to your stomach, as soon as the machine came out Tae knew what was happening but he said nothing, he just took hold of your hand and stared at the screen with you as you waited for the first sign of your son or daughter on the screen.

"How long have you known?" He questioned after the nurse left to get the images of your child for you, you wiped the cream from your stomach and sat up.

"Since I missed my first period...I panicked Tae, I didn't know what to do and I figured I could hide it a little longer and pretend you were going to be happy about it when I told you." You whimpered but he took hold of your face and kissed your forehead.

"I'm more than happy about it...I would be ecstatic if I knew before now that you're carrying my child but I'm so happy." You smiled at him and the nurse came in carrying some photos and handing them to you, Tae smiled taking them and putting them into the bag you had with you.

"We'll figure this all out together... In the meantime, we need to start coming up with names." He chuckled causing you to laugh as you got down from the bed and headed out into the hospital, both of you calling out names to one another.

Jungkook:

You told Jungkook the moment you were late and the moment you realised your period wasn't going to come. He spent the week getting people to go out and buy you both tests on the down-low, he didn't want to get either of you caught buying pregnancy tests, setting off the rumours and having unwanted attention on you both. You were both young and knew that this was an accident, yet he was excited about it. He was excited about the thought of being a dad, having a son or daughter and being able to spend time with them and raise them, you were excited too but more worried about what it meant for your singing career and for Jungkook's, while Jungkook was planning the future nursery you were panicking about how it was all going to work with you both being idol's.

"It's time." He said as the alarm went off, you snapped from your daydream and looked at him. He'd woken you up early as he read that to get the best reading you should be awake right away and taking a test so that's what you did. He'd been doing a lot of research on it while you were busy worrying about how to deal with everything.

"Turn it over for me." You whispered looking at him and not the test, he spun it around and you couldn't read his facial expression so you stared down at the test, a plus sign.

"You're going to be a dad." You whispered to him as you took the test from his hand and looked at it, shaking it a little and then staring at the plus sign again.

"We're going to be parents!" You yelled, the excitement of being a mum overwashing the worrying thoughts now, Jungkook was smiling widely as he watched you finally getting excited about it, he was worried you weren't as happy about the thought of being a parent as he was but seeing you getting excited over the test he began to relax, but not too much because everything that needed to be doing crept into his mind, he was going to have to tell BigHit and then get the nursery stuff, then tell the tabloids. He was going through everything you had been going through before the test came back but once he felt you kissing him the thoughts all melted away and he wrapped his arms around you and pulled you closer to him.

"We're going to be parents." You giggled pulling away from the kiss and looking him in the eyes, you pushed his hair out of his face and then kissed his forehead.

"You'll be the best dad." You reminded him, you knew he was going to be worrying about it, you saw the look on his face was the same as yours when you realised you could have been pregnant and you wanted to reassure him that everything was going to be okay.

"I'll talk to my manager about everything...I'm sure I can take as much time as I need off to look after our baby...and you can still work, There is no way I'm letting you not work because of this one." You said putting your hand on your stomach but Jungkook was smiling while shaking his head at you.

"We'll take all the time off together to raise him or her...I'm not letting you raise them on their own." He promised you, kissing your lips and then walking out of the bathroom, he was going to have to find a way to tell the rest of the boys in a funny way, he didn't want it to just be a statement of 'We're having a baby' he wanted to prank them first.

"Parents!" You yelled coming out of the bathroom and jumping up and down.

"We're going to be parents!" You giggled, going into the kitchen to make you and Jungkook some breakfast, forgetting your worries for now and enjoying the moment.

tagline:

@yoongisdumplingcheeks​ @yourguessisasgoodasminemate​ @kpopfanfictionhoes​ @snowy-meowl​ @lynnthevirgo​

Elven Rambles About Character Builds

So! As we know, SWTOR’s body types (especially for the women) are sorely lacking in proper variety in-game. It’s something that’s always bothered me, and I have specific images in my head for how I imagine each of my main girls to look in terms of their figure. But the problem is, for all of them, none of the in-game body presets that are available come close to their actual builds, I’ve just had to settle for “eh, I guess this is as close as I’m gonna get, whatever”

I’m putting the rest under a cut because it gets quite long, I do talk a little bit about the slavery plot point of the Inquisitor storyline so that’s something to be aware of before proceeding, but it’s mostly just a lot of me rambling about my dumb space children so be prepared for a lot of reading, I guess (there’s pictures too tho!) haha

Aria is certainly the “worst” for this, because while she has a “baby” face, her torso is a lot chunkier, and most importantly, she’s short, ya girl’s 5 ft 1 for God’s sakes! I don’t know if it’s just my eyes, but to me, BT2 looks the “shortest”, so even though BT4 is probably the “closest” I can get in game to her overall structure, it’s too tall for her. So, I’ve ended up having to “settle” for BT2 even though it makes her look way too slender, really. (honest to God, can we have someone on character design that doesn’t insist on every woman having a perfect hourglass figure because “they have to be that way or they’re not attractive”, PLEASE Bioware! Bigger, round or square, or pear-shaped or whatever, ladies, can still be beautiful too!)

And let’s not mention that there’s such a vast difference in all the different male body type options (look at male BT2 and male BT3 for instance) And yet for the ladies, the differences are so subtle that I honestly have to squint to see them (and yes, I have kinda crappy eyesight but it should be more easily noticeable, if you can do it for the men you can do it for the women, you fucking cowards) because that’s a whole other rant. ANYWAY

SO, Ela shared the link to this site in our wonderful SWTOR content creator discord that I’m resident in and of course my brain went “wait a minute, I can use this”

So I did. It’s certainly not perfect but it’s good enough to give a much closer representation of how I imagine their builds/shapes to look. As mentioned I have a general idea of how I want them to be shaped in my head, but it helps to have a visual reminder when I’m trying to draw them, so now I have been making these silhouettes to add to their (new) ref sheets when I get round to em

This is more along the lines of how I imagine Ari to look. She’s smol, and very square-shaped, with a fair bit of fat on her lower half especially (it all goes to her hips, I feel ya girl XD) So, I reiterate again, BT4 would be “correct” enough in terms of the pudge and the general shape, but it’s way too tall-looking in all the cutscenes I tried it in. So, BT2 was what I “settled” with, but this is the sort of build she should have.

and then in-game, Vano, Ni’kasi & Saarai are all BT3, because it’s the only “tall” option, but there’s a big problem with this because as the only option, it means your character has to be “tall and perfectly hourglass” which is....not the case really for any of them. There’s literally no options to have a “tall/big” lady but also have a different build or muscle structure and it frustrates me to no end, because even though they’re very close in height, their body types couldn’t be more different.

Exhibit A, the twins, put side-by-side to really show the difference between them:

Saarai is a 6 ft 3 wall of pure muscle, she’s a literal tank & even though she’s fit, she’s very “broad” in stance & stature, she does have a sort of hourglass dip on her hips but it’s very subtle because she’s just that muscly (thanks dad, she’s definitely your kid pfpfpfpf) Ni’kasi, on the other hand? She’s only 6ft, she took more after mom than dad height-wise, and there’s no way for me to show it easily on this silhouette (I’m working on other stuff & don’t have time to make an edit in Sketchbook just for this post), but she actually did get Kissai’s broad shoulders...the problem is, that unlike Saarai, Ni’kasi hasn’t had a steady, healthy diet after she got turfed down the social ladder into the slave pits. Poor diet (and a shortage of enough food, too, they had to keep her in line & stop her escaping somehow, obvious solution: “make sure she’s too weak to even think about it”) means she’s a lot skinnier and more “twiggy” than her twin. She’s not grossly underweight anymore, obviously the Overseers and Zash had to make sure she was fed up properly to gain enough strength to be able to train & then run around the galaxy killing things at Zash’s bidding, BUT because of the malnourishment she suffered at that point in her life, she’s never going to get as much muscle as Saarai did and even though she’s a healthier weight now, she’s still slender. She has more of an hourglass than her twin, but her hips are much narrower than her shoulders, so it’s not as prominent (and even this silhouette has too much of an hourglass for her as is, but as I mentioned earlier, don’t have time to make the edit myself rn, will do it later XD)

And finally, Exhibit B, Vano:

Now, I would argue Vano would be the closest of the three to being pretty much BT3. But note “the closest”, not “exact”. Why? Vano’s 6 ft 2, so she’s only an inch shorter than Rai, but their builds are very different. Saarai’s a beefcake, but Vano’s a Mirialan, so she’s got muscle, but she’s lean and tall. Vano here is about 80% or so legs and 20% the rest of her body, she’s got legs for daaayss and that’s what gives her the height, but apart from a six pack, you won’t actually see most of her muscle, whereas Saarai could flex with her guns out and you’d totally notice.

This got very long, so if you made it all the way to the end of this post of me blabbing about how I wish the body types had more variety & why I want that for my girls, I appreciate you very much, have a cookie! 🍪 🍪 🍪 🍪 🍪  < take one and pass it on as they say ;) hahaha

Bluegrass-Chapter 24

                    Much love to @Statell for making my stories flow.

Previous chapter on AO3

Chapter Twenty-Four

The shop owner bent over his worktable and pried the stones out of the gold setting. The ring was fourteen karat gold and would fetch a nice price. When the bell above the door tinkled, he looked up at a lady coming to the counter. She tossed a large ring on the counter.

“Sell or pawn?”

“Sell.”

He looked at her and reached for his loop. She looked like a street person so how did she come by this, he wondered. To his amazement the diamonds were real, and the gold tested to eighteen karat. His heart was ramming.

“Who’d you steal this from lady?”

“It’s mine, you ignorant asshole.”

“Sorry, I can’t help you. Try down the street.”

She grabbed the ring and looked at the man with her one good eye. “Fuck you.”

He watched her carry her bulk toward the door and waved his hand in the air to chase away her body odor.

The woman tried two more pawn shops and the third was owned by someone with fewer scruples. He bought the ring for one thousand dollars plus a gun. It was a lady Smith and Wesson five-shooter. She grabbed a box of shells on her way out, looking at the man defiantly. He ran to lock his door and start making calls. This ring would sell quickly for ten thousand. If it wasn’t hot, he could ask fifty thousand easily. He flipped open his phone book and started dialing.

The sweaty woman stumbled into Walmart and felt the cool air inside provide a little more energy for the last item she needed. Twenty minutes later she held her new phone to her ear and ordered a taxi to take her to the Motel 6. She paid the driver without a tip and heaved herself out of the car. There were working girls and ugly people all around the place. She would fit right in.

Walking up to the desk, she pulled her shirt down over the roll of fat that bulged from her tight waistband. The clothes she was arrested in were now three sizes too small. Prison food is created to keep hundreds of people full for a few hours. Not much thought went into the caloric intake or a balanced meal. Carbohydrates and fat were the main ingredients of her diet for eleven months and she tipped the scale at two-hundred and fifty pounds. The clothes she wore were donated by the prison and they were cutting her in half.

Pulling her coach wallet out of her bag she pulled her license and scooted it toward the clerk. Ten minutes later she was locking her door and scowling at the traffic noise right outside her window. It would have to do.

She was exhausted. It took all night to get processed out of jail and then shown the door to freedom at five o’clock in the morning. She would sleep a bit and then call her father. He will want her to come home because there was nothing for her in Kentucky. He would put her mother on the phone who would beg and cry for her daughter to come back to Scotland. That could wait as well, she decided.

For eleven months she has thought of little else then Jamie Fraser, the man who stole millions of dollars from her by denying her any rights to the business or his new horse. Word went around the prison that Midnight Runner won the Triple Crown and that meant an extraordinary life was now his to live while she was shipped back to Scotland like yesterday’s trash. God she hated him.

Isobel laid down on the bed but thinking about Jamie got her so riled up she couldn’t sleep. Maybe a hot shower would help. The rundown hotel had a small mirror in the bathroom, the first clear mirror in eleven months. She looked at her face and tears rolled down her fat cheeks. One of her eyelids opened only a slit after she was punched in the forehead during a prison fight. The nerve damage was permanent. She looked at her hair cut almost to her scalp. A going-away present from the bitches who hated her and kept her in solitary much of the time. She recalled being held on the ground while the meanest of them cut off her hair. It stuck out in all directions and she tried to smooth it down with water, but nothing helped. She was raging inside at what he did to her. This was all his fault.

Isobel’s father kept money on her books, the maximum allowable at the insistence of her mother. Isobel had nothing but disdain for other women making it quite impossible to make friends who could help her. She bargained her commissary for favors and finally found someone with a relative who would look up Chad’s whereabouts. He was in the Kentucky State Penitentiary in Eddyville and she wrote to him every day and couldn’t wait to hear back. Months went by with no word and she became hurt, and then mad. She sent another letter and on the outside of the envelope in small letters, she wrote “you little puke of a man why won’t you answer me?” She didn’t expect a response and when one came it was short and to the point.

‘Enduring your disgusting presence and vomit worthy sex was a means to an end. You self-absorbed cow. You never figured out I was gay because you were busy looking at yourself, with or without a mirror. It made it easy to manipulate you. Happy now?’

That was Jamie’s fault as well, she stormed in her head. He deserves to be skinned alive and forced to watch. She wouldn’t risk him getting the upper hand, so she had to settle for a bullet in his head.

She picked up her purse and left. There was a liquor store on the corner and she needed whisky, and a lot of it.

Claire woke up in an empty bed and noticed a note on her side table. She smiled as she read it.

“It is a perfect day to sit on the sundeck and read. There is nothin you need to do today, and I won’t be long with Michael.”

They had purchased a new double-wide ergonomic chase and had not tried it out yet. Maybe they could read the book together. While she waited for Jamie, she chose pages throughout the book to read and was very impressed with Michael’s writing. The theme running throughout the book was about kindness to the horse through various means, particularly the whip. He advocated the elimination of pain as a motivator. It would change horse racing completely because the competitors would be running because they wanted to win. The horse had to love running and it could be done, according to Michael, but training and reward had to change.

Claire wondered how this book would differ from Nosh’s. He was coming to Kentucky the following week and would spend the day with them. She was excited to fulfill her promise to finish her story, whether he believed her or not.

Jamie dropped Michael at his hotel just after noon. He would be joining them for dinner tonight and would UBER back around seven o’clock. Jamie looked forward to an afternoon lounging with his best girl.

For the rest of the day, Jamie and Claire took turns reading the book and powered through half of it before cuddling on the chase to nap a bit.

“Sassenach.” Jamie ran his hand down her arm until she opened her eyes. “Will ye come with me to bring the horses in?”

She smiled up at him and nodded yes before pulling her jeans and boots on. They walked to the barn and discussed the book, both commenting on how much they had forgotten about those crazy days. They brought fifteen horses in, two at a time, then went to bring in the mares and babies. Claire laughed at the antics of the foals, running ahead and then freezing with fear when they couldn’t see their mothers. When all were put away for the night, they made one more trip for Runner and Porcelain. When Jamie watched them running to the gate, he looked at Claire with a big smile.

“I’d like to bring Porcelain into season early and breed her in February.”

“To him?”

It was settled. Porcelain would be Runner’s first cover and Claire was thrilled. A touch of romance in an otherwise clinical setting of the breeding room. They would be each other’s first.

As they walked home, Jamie threw up his arms and announced he had finished the repairs on Runner’s stall, and they could move them back to their larger accommodations. Claire held his hand and told him tomorrow would be soon enough. She had a shower and cooking to do.

It was a delightful time to sit with their old friend, spoil him with steak, roasted vegetables, and copious amounts of whisky. Claire considered inviting others to dinner but decided she didn’t want to share Michael’s time. They ate at the table outside and simply moved to more comfortable seats to continue the discussion.

Jamie answered the doorbell and spoke to a neighbor before announcing he would be back in ten minutes. The neighbor needed a jump. Michael offered to come and help but Jamie told him to relax, he had this.

Michael had Claire in giggle overload reminding her of times they were on the road. Claire got up to grab the coffee pot and stopped in her tracks.

“Michael, do you smell something burning.”

He stood up and said he smelled it too. When Claire opened the front door, she screamed for Michael. It was definitely a fire and somewhere close. They started running and a quarter-mile never seemed so far. The closer they got; they were more convinced it was the barn on fire. Claire punched numbers into the keypad, and Michael opened the roll away doors as smoke poured out.

“Chase them all out, Michael!”

Claire ran down the aisle pulling stall doors open until she got to Runner and Porcelain and they were not moving. None of the horses were running outside. She slapped Porcelain hard on the rump knowing Runner would follow. The mare whinnied loudly and took off for the big doors.

Claire looked at the smoke filling the barn and coughed into her shirt. She saw horses running by but could not see Michael. She continued to work her way down the aisle smacking horses so they would run to safety. She looked up and saw babies running alongside their mothers and knew Michael had gone to the dams’ wing to set them free.

Jamie waved to the neighbor as he drove down their shared road. He caught the scent of burning wood and jumped into the bed of his truck to look for smoke. Finally, he saw the embers rising into the air on his own property! With a hammering heart, he drove through the gate and saw horses scattered all over. He knew someone was at the barn and drove as fast as possible, ever watchful for a horse running across the road.

Jamie ran to the barn. His heart rate was in the stroke zone and he started coughing the second he was inside. He called for Claire as he ran down the aisle looking for any stuck horses. The dams’ wing was empty, where the hell was Claire and Michael? Or whoever let the horses out. He turned the turbines on that pulled air from the interior. They were all over the roof so he ran as fast as he could flipping them on high.

He called the fire department as he ran for Runner’s wing. The door was open and something inside him told him to proceed with caution. He could hear Claire and Michael coughing. Why were they in there? When he heard Isobel’s voice his blood turned to ice. He forced himself not to cough and give away his presence. He searched frantically for a way to get the drop on her. He had to do something before Claire and Michael died from asphyxiation.

He ran to the back of the barn where the smoke was too thick to see. He ran his hand along the wall until he felt the switches for the turbines. Filling his lungs with air he ran into the equipment room and pulled out a ten-foot length of steel pipe, very relieved it wasn’t burning hot and ran back.

Claire wasn’t coughing any more and Jamie knew she passed out with death coming for her. Without another second to think he rammed the door open and kept running as Isobel’s startled face came into view. She raised the gun just as he rammed the pipe into her stomach, impaling her on the back wall. He threw Claire over his shoulder and helped Michael to his feet pulling them outside to safety.

The fire engines were coming in slowly with no siren because Jamie explained there were horses scattered all over the property. Michael was bent over coughing and Claire was silent, unconscious. Jamie lowered her to the ground feeling more terrified than he had been in his life.

“Claire! Claire!”

The EMT’s pulled him away to render lifesaving aid to his wife, his soulmate, his whole world. Fire hydrants were installed on the land according to zoning rules and the men soon had two flows of water directed at the fire. Jamie heard more sirens coming only to go silent as they negotiated the gate and keypad.

The ambulance EMT’s were given instructions to open the gate and wait for it to close to make sure no horses escaped. The driver knew there were critical injuries and it took all his training and willpower not to barrel ahead to the injured. Jamie was covered with soot and sweat as he gripped his wife’s hand.

“Please Claire, ye must fight yer way back to me or I will surely die with ye.”

He was pulled away as they wheeled the gurney into the ambulance, Michael was loaded into a second vehicle. Jamie sank to his knees as a great crash came from the barn and a plume of embers rose into the night sky. Jamie didn’t flinch. He couldn’t move as he was locked into his pleading prayers to God.

A great fireball exploded into the dark sky and men were yelling about a secondary fire. Jamie heard none of it and continued to pray.

The captain pulled Jamie up and brought him under the light spreading out a schematic of the barn interior.

“Is there anyone else in the building?”

Jamie pointed to Runner’s wing. The fire captain pulled him to the large engine and told him to sit down. The huge fire engines took up all the space available in front of the barn and police cruisers were lined up behind them. Officers were standing by a short distance away and the captain went to speak with them.

Jamie felt the tears fall off his face, he knew his business was in ruins, his prize horse chased into the darkness, but none of that mattered as much as Claire’s pale, soot-stained face. He looked up at the commanding voice above him and stared at the officer with blank eyes.

“You identified an area where someone was left inside. I am sorry to inform you that the roof caved in above that wing about five minutes ago. Did anyone go back inside to pull the person out?”

“No. I impaled her against the wall with a ten-foot length of steel pipe.”

Jamie stood up and walked toward his vehicle but never made it. It took five officers to hold him back and he was finally cuffed and dropped into a cruiser. He had no comprehension of what was happening, and he fought against the restraints until he felt a blinding pain as his wrist separated. He slumped forward choking through this added suffering.

“Mister Fraser! Stop struggling I have news of your wife. She is in intensive care, so is the other man, but they are expected to pull through. They are gonna be fine. You have confessed to a capital crime. You belong to the Lexington police force now so you might as well cooperate and sit still. You’re a big man and tasers hurt, so walk when you’re told, sit where you’re told and answer our questions. It’s the best advice I can give you.”

Jamie did as told and explained who Isobel was, how she tried to kill his horses before. He did not know she was released on parole. She had set fire to the barn and held Claire and Michael at gunpoint as they slowly choked to death in front of her. She wore an elaborate gas mask and just stood by as they struggled to breathe. She had raised her gun to Jamie’s head as he rammed the pipe into her stomach. He did not bother to go back in to save her because he was too busy with his wife and friend.

“I didn’t know if she was alive or dead. I didn’t care.”

Jamie was a pillar of the community and the officers made quick work of releasing him with the warning to not leave the state. There was an officer waiting to take him to the hospital. Jamie sat in the back seat holding his throbbing wrist. The officer decided to break the rules for the poor man and turned on his siren as he raced to the hospital.

Jamie piled out of the car and ran into the emergency department. He approached Claire slowly with tears streaking through the grime on his face. He was so overcome at the sight of her his whole body started to shake.

The nurse taking her blood pressure almost fainted at the sight of Jamie but recovered quickly as his face softened looking at his wife.

“She has been asking for you if your name is Jamie that is.” She had a warm smile and a concerned face.

“It is… my name is Jamie.”

The nurse ran for the chair that was shared among the visitors because it looked like he would fall any minute. She pushed Jamie into it and asked if he was alright.

“As soon as this lass opens her eyes, I will be fine.”

“She is doing really well physically. Her doctor may keep her tonight, not sure yet.”

Jamie looked down at Claire’s open eyes, looking at him. She seemed to look at everything she could see and then he watched her dissolve in tears. She was fighting to stop crying but she just couldn’t. She tried to speak to him, but no sound came out.

“Her voice will come back. Two or three days.”

Claire was asleep again and Jamie felt lost suddenly. She just closed her eyes to the pain that was making her cry, leaving Jamie alone. He picked up the phone and called Jason, then Angus. He knew he had to leave her and get back to what was left of their barn. He kissed her face and walked toward the entrance, there lingering at the doorway was the officer who drove him to the hospital.

“Mister Fraser, I waited to take you home, sir.”

Jamie looked battle-scarred and fatigued at the moment, so they headed for his home without further comment. The fire was out, and firemen continued to crawl through the haylofts and roof structure looking for live embers. They had done an excellent job limiting the damage. The fire marshal approached Jaime and shook his hand. His voice was commanding yet tempered with understanding that Jamie appreciated.

“Mister Fraser, it’s a tragedy to be sure, but we minimized the damage and found all the clues, I think. The fire was set on the north-facing side, right here.” He pointed to Runner’s wing on the barn schematic. Gasoline was used as an accelerant that was provided by your fuel tower. The perpetrator used your five-gallon buckets that were stacked at the hose in back, filled them with your fuel, and left the nozzle open to drain the fuel into the ground. When embers landed there it all went up in a fireball. You will have an ugly reminder for a while I’m afraid. It’s safe to bring the horses in except for this area. The roof caved in and it’s burned badly. It is where we found the body of a woman, but I hear you have given a statement to the police already and believe her to be responsible. The coroner has removed the body. I will be in touch as the investigation progresses. He walked toward his vehicle throwing his clipboard on the seat before getting in.

Jamie looked around feeling lost until he saw Rupert and Angus walk out of the barn with two leads each and lariats attached to their belt loops. They looked at Jamie’s haunted eyes and simply nodded as they made their way to the pastures. The horses were tied to a fence once caught so they could be identified and counted. Jason and Lulu pulled up looking shell shocked. Lulu was crying and asking about Claire. Jason ran to the barn for halters and leads and handed a lead to Lulu as they left to search for more horses.

Molly and her fiancé were next, followed by two of the vets that Claire had befriended. They would check the horses that were brought in and treat any issues. As word spread, neighbors and owners came in to join the search and by afternoon, all but two horses had been rounded up. The missing horses, Porcelain and Runner.

The horses were split up into groups and led to graze in the multiple pastures. They would stay outside for the day and let the barn air out. Jamie continued to call Claire, to say I love you and give progress reports. Jamie’s voice cracked when he said they had not found Runner or Porcelain and Claire sobbed for the lost horses but mostly for Jamie. Michael had fared better and was released to rest in his hotel room. Jamie wandered through the pastures calling for Runner until dark.

Jamie stayed with Claire overnight. She was moved out of critical care and there was a fat Lazyboy right next to the bed. He had full trust in his crew, so he stayed until she was released the next day. She mostly cried when she was awake, and Jamie couldn’t wait until he could hold her and give her comfort.

Driving into the compound was very hard on Claire as visions of Isobel taunting her, saying she would shoot Jamie in front of her and then let them die, came back to haunt her. Jamie explained that he had killed Isobel, but Claire expected her to jump out from every corner.

Claire couldn’t yell for Runner, but she insisted on walking the far pastures to help look for him. To no avail, the two of them were gone. Jamie held Claire through the night, waking up every few hours because she was crying and shaking. He eased her back to sleep much quicker than he was able to follow her. By the next day, he had deep circles under his eyes as he drove the property in search of his horses.

The other horses were returned to the barn, back in their original stalls because there was very little damage to anything but Runner’s wing. Jamie shivered to think he wanted to go back to the barn and move Runner and Porcelain back to their original stalls. He closed the wing off with plans to rebuild once the insurance was settled. Not one of the owners moved their horse to another barn. They knew Jamie was honest and ethical. This was not his fault and he had taken care of the problem.

Jamie sat down hard on his office chair in the early evening. The silence was such a relief after playing hero for the past two days. He wasn’t a hero. He was terrified about what could have happened and what will happen next. Could his business recover, could Claire feel safe again, could they find a new normal without Runner? Picking up his ringing phone he heard the deep voice of Dunsany, and he lost it.

“Jamie, it's going to be alright. You aren’t hurt, you will repair the damage and go on. Now listen to me son, get it out, and then get back to work. That’s a good lad, I’m here for ye, depend on that.”

Dunsany waited, speaking quietly to encourage Jamie, trying to infuse him with the will to start over. They talked for almost an hour and Dunsany told him arrangements had been made to bring Isobel’s body back to Scotland. She could never threaten them again. The older man worried deeply about Jamie pulling out of this nightmare and his anger at Isobel kept him secluded from his family for several days. It wasn’t right for a father to hate his own daughter and he would keep that to himself.

Jamie walked the pastures as the sun was coming up. He had a distinctive whistle that all the horses were used to. It always brought them in, no matter how far they had roamed. He heard a whinny and turned his head, heart beating like thunder in his chest he watched the pasture turning in all directions and finally saw her. Porcelain ran toward him crying out her fear in loud whinnies. She came to him and snorted while he slipped the halter on her and snapped a lead. He started walking back expecting Runner to run up on them any second. When he closed the door to Porcelain’s stall, he dropped his head in defeat.

“Where have ye gone laddie?”

Jason, Lulu, Rupert and Angus put the barn back together, ordered supplies, rented stalls, answered calls from worried owners, and assisted whoever and whatever was needed in the moment. Their fearless leader searched for Runner day and night and Claire was not often seen. She looked shattered and they didn’t know how to approach her, so they didn’t.

Michael came on the fourth day and took Claire to drive the property boundaries. Claire searched the pastures through field glasses as they continued to drive for two hours. He was just gone. He jumped a fence and just kept running she assumed. There were thousands of acres of forest that bordered their land and he was lost in that forest somewhere, starving to death. Claire’s sobbing broke Michael’s heart. He stopped the car and pulled her out to hold her to him. He promised her they would find him.

“We need to walk the land, Claire. He’s scared and hiding somewhere in the trees. Let him see us walking.” He pushed a lead in her hand, and they ducked between the white slats of the fence to walk the endless acres of Bluegrass.

Runner watched them from behind the trees. He watched her mostly and wanted to go to her. He could hear in her yell, something foreboding and fearful. If she would just get on his back, he could ride her to safety. He tried a couple of times to break out of the tree line, only to retreat in fear. They were getting closer to him. He was about to turn toward the forest and run but he saw images in his mind of Claire hugging him. It made him so happy. She was telling him she needed a hug. In the next second, he bolted toward the fence boundary and jumped it with ease running toward her, happier than he had ever been.

“Stop Claire. Turn around.”

Claire turned to see Runner galloping toward them. She started to giggle and then she held her arms out like she always did, for him to run into. He stopped ten feet from her and showed her images of being hugged. She kept her arms out and walked to him until she could wrap them around his neck. She put her hands on his cheeks and Michael could swear they were having a conversation as Runner would nicker at times and drop his head on her shoulder.

Are you hurt?

I do not hurt.

Where you afraid?

I was afraid.

She kissed his face a dozen times and asked him to walk back to the barn, assuring him the smoke was gone and he would be safe. She dug a handful of sugar cubes out of her pocket and he feasted on them.

Very hungry.

Let’s go home.

Michael called Jamie to tell him they were walking back, with Runner, and he started running to meet them. Runner nickered and lifted his head when he saw Jamie running toward them. Claire unsnapped the lead and Runner took off stopping right in front of Jamie’s beaming smile. They were still hugging when Claire and Michael caught up to them.

Porcelain whinnied loudly in the air and stomped all over her stall. Rupert looked at her and wondered what got into the lass when he saw the movement in his peripheral vision. He was almost in tears when he saw the three of them with a giant black horse behind them. Runner went to Porcelain for a make-out session and Claire could see images of Rupert pouring grain into his feeder. She laughed quietly to herself.

“Cheeky bastard.”

They said goodbye to Michael at the airport and made him promise to visit soon. Claire hugged him and cried while Michael complained she would surely melt with any more tears. Once on the road home, Claire leaned against Jamie and wrapped her arm around his middle. They had not made love since the fire and the feel of him was suddenly intoxicating. She kissed his neck until she was breathless and when she pulled his belt away and grabbed his zipper Jamie pulled onto a logging road into the forest where he pulled her to him and kissed her deeply.

They were frantic to join their hungry bodies after a long hiatus from passion. Jamie pulled her shirt over her head and reached around to unclasp her bra setting her breasts free to bounce with their efforts. When she finally pulled him into her body, they both moaned loudly before the rhythm of arousal took them to a new plane of existence.

Officer Josh Baker was heading back to the station while he daydreamed in heavy traffic. When he saw Jamie’s pickup truck veer off the road, he shook his head and blinked several times. It couldn’t be, he told himself. What are the odds of finding them in the same predicament as before? Some people never learn he thought. He pulled off onto the logging road to wait.

Traffic along the four lanes where Jamie took the detour slowed way down due to the cruiser parked along the side of the road, presumably for radar speed checking. The officer pointed his radar gun out the window and waited. When he heard Jamie’s engine start he pulled into traffic, and they were none the wiser about his protection.

Slowly, life at Highland Brothers returned to normal and Jason, the new custodian of Claire's truck, would pick her up for a day of medical treatments and do his best to remember any of the details when she asked him. On long rides she would describe the lab assays they would run to get him used to the terminology and procedure. From February to June, she would reduce her hours away to ten hours per week so she could take care of the breeding operation. She was anxious to be working with Jamie again.

Claire sat across from Nosh at the kitchen table and looked at the sheets of pictures. There had to be at least five-hundred pictures of her and runner. She answered Nosh’s questions thoughtfully and held nothing back. Nosh recovered quickly from the declaration that she can talk to animals. He always knew there was a major component of the story missing.

“I have wondered how an untrained jockey could ride that horse through all those races.”

“It was my yoga training. My balance was very good and if you hadn’t noticed, I didn’t move at all, once the race started, I just hung on to is mane for dear life. He told me what to do, when to do it, and I felt safe after a while.”

“How could he hear you during the race, there’s too much noise?”

“Are you saying you believe me?”

“You are an educated woman Claire, a veterinarian, and you won the Triple Crown as a novice jockey. I’ve been on the track all my adult life, so I knew there was a secret to your success. What I wouldn’t give for photo evidence of you racing him on foot.”

“Oh! I have photo evidence. Jamie took loads of pictures from the equipment barn where he hid for the first month. They are amateur at best, but I will be happy to show you..”

Nosh was on his feet in seconds, “please, yes I would love to see them.”

Claire settled Nosh in a chair close to the computer monitor and brought up the pictures. There was a perfect sequence of them at the starting line, Claire running full speed around the track, and Runner staying on the rail to pass her. Claire bent over panting and Runner circling her with his head and tail in the air. In the last picture, Claire is scowling at the horse with her hands in the air.

Nosh laughed so hard and sputtered “pure gold!” when he could catch a breath. “Good God, I haven’t laughed like that since I was a kid. Name your price, I’m sure the magazine will pay it.”

“Certainly not! You can have them with my thanks.”

This was the icing on the cake to Nosh. The book he had dreamed of for the last year would be better than he could have imagined.

Claire told Nosh everything from cutting Runner out of his dam to winning the Triple Crown and all the baiting and psychological tricks she used to keep him wanting to win. The story was told, and she sat back and took a deep breath.

“How would you like to spend some time with Runner?”

They walked out to the pasture and the two horses made a bee-line for them. Claire stood in front of Nosh and opened her arms for two frothy-mouthed horses to assault her with smells and snorts. She stepped aside pulling her phone out of her pocket and launching the camera app. Nosh seemed frozen as he watched Runner come toward him. Claire moved farther away and started snapping pictures. Nosh, nose to nose with Runner, the colt draping his head over Nosh’s shoulder from behind, stroking his neck, laughing at the assault on his pockets looking for treats. Claire kept snapping until she had sixty-five pictures of Nosh and Runner. She would transfer all the pictures of Runner including these to a thumb drive and send it to Nosh. It made her happy inside to give something back.

Claire walked the reporter out to his rental car and hugged him, thanking him for everything. Nosh saw no reason they might meet again so he made his words count.

“You feel like the daughter I never had. I am so proud of what you’ve done. If your actions with Runner are any indication of motherhood, I hope to live long enough to see your kids cure cancer and win the Nobel prize. Goodbye Claire, and thank you for the interview.”

Motherhood? What an odd thing to say, she decided and waved goodbye.

Claire walked back into the house feeling her mood turn dark when she looked at the ugly furniture she and Jamie had failed to replace. She wished for a happy feeling when she opened the door to their home and hated this furniture even more after the fire. A call to the Salvation Army to pick up a high-end living room set pushed her to the front of the line. They would pick it up this afternoon. When the living room was empty, she called Jamie and asked if he could finish early because there wasn’t a chair or couch to sit on anymore. They needed to visit the furniture stores in town.

Claire got dressed up with straight hair and makeup because it felt like a special trip, something to be remembered. They would finally take ownership of their space and rid the memory of the most heinous woman on earth. With only one week until Christmas, she was excited.

Jamie watched a beautiful, confident woman walk toward him when he came home. He looked at her long pretty hair, short dress, and high heels, feeling his stomach do flips.

“Yer beautiful Sassenach, and our living room is empty sure enough.”

“You have ten minutes James Fraser.”

Survey #430

“when the girl in the corner is everyone’s woman, she could kill you with a wink of her eye”

What kind of dog do you find most ugly? What a mean question. ;-; I don't think they're ugly, but I probably find chihuahuas to be the least visually appealing. Do you like wood floors or carpet better? Wood. Do you think the USA bullies other countries? Quite frankly, yes. Are you currently in love right now? No. Favorite fast food joint? Sonic. What would you do if your ex contacted you? THE ex, have a panic attack. Cry. Be wordlessly ecstatic. Be scared and confused. Do you still have feelings for your ex? Two, yes, but one is unrealistic considering I have no idea who he is anymore. It's been way too long for me to possibly, accurately like him. Ever tasted a flavored condom? No. Do you know CPR? No. How much do you care about your best friend? I'd die for her. Do you watch Dr. Phil? No. What age would you like to have a child? I don't want kids ever. Are your parents wealthy? Mom, absolutely not. Dad seems to be financially stable, but not wealthy or anything. Pick one state you’d love to live in? Alaska. How many pets do you want? And of what? Man, I want a LOT. I know I want more ball python morphs, a plains hognose, a woma python, numerous tarantulas, a fat-tailed gecko, a boa, orchid mantises, a sphynx, a tegu would be super cool... I'd love to have like an empire of pets one day, aha, but only so long as I could maintain them all and adequately provide for them. Have you ever asked someone out? Yes. When do you want to get married? I mean, I don't have a set age in mind. I want to get married when I'm ready. Can you play a musical instrument? I played the flute for yeeeaaaars in middle and high school, but I remember almost nothing by now. What if you stopped orgasming for the rest of your life? Idc, honestly. Does money make you happy? Money probably makes me happier than it should, but I'm not like madly in love with it or anything. Happens when you're poor your whole life. Your favorite breakfast food? Ugh, cinnamon rolls are a godsend. When was the last time you went to a funeral? I actually don't think I've ever been to one... only wakes. I really, really wish I could have gone to Jason's mom's, though... There was just no fucking way that I was going to risk upsetting Jason on THAT day of all days by popping up. Have you ever stolen someone’s boyfriend/girlfriend? Well, we never actually dated, but you could say that... Tell me the date of your first kiss. I don't know the exact date, but it was March 2012. Are your legs long or short? Normal, I guess? How many phobias do you have? Man, a lot. Is there a bookshelf in your room? No. Do you use the Facebook chat often? Barely at all. I only really use it to chat with Girt on the rare occasion we talk. Who got you hooked on the addiction you're addicted to (If you have one)? I discovered Mark on my own; I needed help in an Amnesia: The Dark Descent custom story, so I found his playthrough and watched it. Got a few laughs, subscribed. It was Jason who introduced me to Amnesia, though, so I can indirectly thank him, I guess? haha Are you currently worried about your parents finding out about something? No. Have you ever lived with a friend? Yeah, for a couple months. Have you ever only liked someone because you found out they liked you? No. Ever been on a real diet, or did you just stop eating? I've tried multiple diets. Have you ever known a white supremacist? I know multiple. Welcome to the South. Do you like the smell of a barbecue? Yesss. It's funny because I hate the food itself. Have you ever gone out in public in your pajamas? Yeah. It's not rare, if I'm being honest. How many times have you been to the ER? Too many times because of being suicidal. How many people are you currently texting? None. Anything exciting coming up? My nephew's birthday is in a few days! Would you rather get money or gift cards for your birthday? Money, so I can use it for anything. Do you have Instagram? I have three, ha ha. One for my basic photography, another for my morbid photos, and I went through a very short phase of having an Instagram for my pets. It still exists, but I don't really use it. Have you ever spoken to a detective before? No. Do you believe in ghosts? Yes. Do ladders scare you? Yes. Hot dogs or hamburgers? Cheeseburgers may possibly be my favorite food. Do you have any tattoos on your arms? I do. Have you ever owned or known someone who owned a black cat? I've owned plenty of black cats. What album is the last song you listened to from? It's from Disguise. What’s the last funny movie you watched? Probably Elf. Can you remember your parents’ birthdays? Mom's, yes. I only remember the month of my dad's. If you had to get a tattoo tomorrow, what would you pick? I think I want to get my tribute to Teddy next. How do you feel about band tattoos? Hey, go for it. I see nothing wrong with it. What piercing do you like most on the opposite sex? Probably snakebites. Lip piercings in general are hot lmao. Are you any good at applying make up? Noooo, my hands are so shaky. How old were the last 3 people you kissed? Sara's 23; idr the exact ages of Girt and Tyler. I think Tyler was a year younger than me, and Girt is at the bare minimum three years older than me. If you found out you got someone pregnant, what would you do? Well, I'm a cisgender female, so... Do you ever wonder what your ex is up to? Very frequently. Do you like your cell phone? I mean it's fine, but I'd like a new one. Is rap your favorite genre of music? No, it's actually my least favorite. Have you ever thrown up on anybody? Oh god, no. Do people think you’re happy? I think it's safe to say most people who know me know I'm clinically depressed. Or you know... maybe not. Quite a few people have been surprised to learn that about me because I can put on a good facade. What band would you stand in line for 24 hours to see? None, honestly. That's way too long. What was your worst childhood experience? I guess my dad's alcoholism. As a child, I thought it was a normal thing, but I do wonder if my fear of men has anything to do with how volatile drinking had a 50/50 chance of making him. He never hurt anyone, but he was just so mad and hateful towards the world sometimes. You can trade another person’s emotions for your own. Whose do you take? I have no idea. What was/is going to be your first waltz at your wedding? That'll depend on my partner and what song means the most to us/fits us best. "When It's Love" by Van Halen has been a consideration for forever, though. When it’s not summer, what do you miss most about it? I hate summer. I miss nothing about it. Do you consider yourself patriotic? No. What is the one thing that you need to do to die happy? Feel like I accomplished something notable. Do you consider yourself mainstream? No. What’s the riskiest thing you’ve ever done? Overdosing on cold medicine. What is life’s greatest mystery? Probably from whence we came. Humanity has fished for a definite answer forever. What was your favourite make-believe game as a kid? Pretending I was a meerkat hiding in a "burrow" that was a blanket fort, ha ha. Do you try your best at everything? Honestly, no. Who is your shoulder to cry on? My mom, without fail. What’s your standard excuse for not doing something? I dunno... it depends on the topic. Name the most beautiful person you know. As far as physical appearance goes, my friend Alon. Have you ever been to jail? No. What is one moment you wish you could have taken a picture of? Sara's face when I surprised her at her house for her birthday. It was absolutely fucking priceless. What place holds the most memories for you? Jason's house. Who was your first date? My puppy dog-love middle school bf Aaron. We went with a group of friends to a skating rink. My first one-on-one date was Jason. What’s the best trip you’ve ever been on? The zoo in 5th grade. It's the one and only time I've seen meerkats. For some weird reason, our zoo moved the meerkats not long after that visit. I THINK they said the environment just wasn't suitable for them, which I never really got... I think they mentioned the cold, but like, you have heating for them, and also, have you ever experienced a desert night? You consider all the other areas that have meerkats in their zoos and it's like... why, man. Bring my meerkats back. ;_; What do you think the earth will look like in 1,000 years? Oh dear God, I do NOT want to visualize that. My gut tells me it'll be a wasteland, probably without humans or most forms of life we have now. We have to get our shit straight, so very badly. I could rant for hours about how horribly and ungratefully we abuse our planet. Who makes you happy to be around? Sara! I feel like I can be my 100% authentic self, and we just vibe really well together. Like every time I've been there and she here, our friendship felt so natural and chill. I really, really need to save up for another trip up there. What secret have you tried to hide but it got out anyway? I kept the Joel situation to myself from pretty much everyone, but it eventually came out in front of Mom and Jason. It was actually the night of the breakup; I don't remember how it was relevant at all to mention, but I did in some form. Mom wisely never asked about it, and Jason obviously didn't. I was a stupid 12-year-old anyway, it's whatever now. Who/what is your everything? I will never. Ever. In five billion millennia. Let anyone be that again. How many people have you turned down when they asked you out? Ummm three? I think that's it. How many exes do you have? If I include everyone who ever had a title of "boyfriend/girlfriend," I have six. Who was your worst relationship with? Tyler. It was just pointless and the result of nothing but loneliness. What’s your ‘label’? (ex. punk, prep) I really, really don't care. Do you swear? How much? Like a sailor. I swore some beforehand, but I got really bad when Jason and I started dating. He swore a lot, and his mother did even more. I was around them as much as possible, so it rubbed off on me. What is the one thing that would make everything in your life fall apart? Losing my family, like being disowned or something like that. Especially when it comes to Mom. I rely on her so heavily, as much as I hate that. :/ What takes your breath away? Nature is very capable of that. Something like seeing big waterfalls in the mountains or something would marvel me. Are you patient? No, honestly. Are you a good dancer? No. Even when I took dance, I don't think I was great; however, I do think I was pretty skilled at clogging. Who would you call first in a life-threatening situation (not 911)? My mom. Who do you miss? Jason and his family, Megan, Alex, Hannia, Emily, Journee... a lot of people. Do you like snakes? I adore snakes.

Baby We Made It (Jankie) - Katy

A/N: please forgive me, anon, whose bodiposi! Jan prompt I took from here and made it sad. I promise the last paragraph at least is happy. Also smut writers, please forgive me. I kept it short because I can’t write write anything other than mental breakdowns and sad people for the life of me. Let me know if you enjoyed! X

Jan absentmindedly stood in front of the full-length antique mirror in her and Jackie’s bedroom, fingers running over the dips of her stomach, the stark contrast between the softness of her skin and the slight itchiness of the lace trim on her panties bringing her back to the present.

She’d seen comments, again. Not about how she was robbed of the Rusical win, or how she owns the colour purple, Shuga Cain be screwed.

But about the way her thighs now meet in the middle. How her stomach isn’t perfectly flat, her ass a little rounder, her arms a little bigger. The pressure she felt before going to Drag Race was off, and now, with Jackie making love and Iranian dishes she remembers from her childhood, she was happy.

She knew the fans would notice, their eagle eyes catching every little detail, from when Jackie leant Gigi her earrings on the show, to the way someone had spotted her heels in the back of Jackie’s Instagram Live. It unsettled her at the best of times, so after perhaps the seventh time Jan had struggled to get into her jeans that month, she dreaded checking her social media.

Her fans were good, kind to her and to each other, bringing her bath bombs and fanart on tour. She knew they meant no harm. She knew that they’d be horrified to think they ever upset her. She knew that they had no idea that she burst into tears every time one of them asked her to wear one of her outfits from the show, thinking she’d bust the seams open and only be able to get it past her shoulders before she couldn’t tug it down any further.

She was more worried about the ones she couldn’t call fans. The ones who send anonymous confessions to those stupid Instagram pages that come up on her explore feed, those who hide behind private pages calling her a cry baby, questioning why she got on the show, and why she’d gotten so fat since drag race.

She’s not fat.

She’s not fat.

Tears begin to well in Jan’s eyes as she stares at herself with a critical glare. With trembling hands, she prods and pokes her body like she’s nothing but their words. She squeezes her arms, watches the way the skin tightens and releases, puts her hands on her waist and pushes her stomach as far inwards as possible. The faces of the haters have stick and poke tattooed themselves between her thighs, disfigured but still distinguishable, unprofessional yet very much permanent. Jackie will never look down there the same again.

Shit. Had Jackie noticed? Was she heavier when she sat on Jackie’s face in bed or her lap on the couch? Jackie wouldn’t want a fat girlfriend. Jackie deserved the world, as far as Jan was concerned. Love, cuddles, lavender oil scented baths, the left side of the bed.

Jan is so lost in her own mind that she’s completely oblivious to Jackie arriving home from the store, carrying shopping bags and a smile down the hallway, into the bedroom to find her girlfriend.

Jackie stops when she reaches the door, peeking her head in to check Jan wasn’t asleep before she barged in, knowing how Jan gets when she’s woken up from a nap. Her heart plummeted to the bottom of her feet when she saw Jan, and before her body could catch up to her mind, she was pushing the door open heavily and dropping her bags in sheer shock.

Stop.

Jackie stood in the doorframe, eyebrows knitted together with concern for her girlfriend, who was currently standing semi-naked, crying in front of the mirror. Jan’s feet were turning 180, forcing her to walk away, to get away from her reflection like it was flammable and her face was a open fucking flame.

Jackie.

She runs to Jackie, lets her lower her to the ground because she’s not convinced Jan’s legs are going to hold her upright much longer, lets Jackie pull her onto her lap, sees the absolute heartbreak in her eyes when she tries to scramble off because she’s ‘too heavy to hold’. Heat’s radiating off of Jan and Jackie almost wonders whether Jan’s in some sort of fever-induced delirium because there’s no way in hell she’s just heard Jan call herself heavy. Her tears won’t stop and she won’t let Jackie hold her and it’s breaking her heart. Jan’s face is buried in her hands, tears leaking out from between her fingers, and Jackie takes her chance. She stands, tiptoes over to behind Jan, and scoops her up into her arms in one fluid motion, holding her to her chest. Jan’s shaking and swatting and screaming for Jackie to put her down and Jackie’s internally doing all of the same actions out of fear and desperation. She’d never seen Jan like this, the younger girl being an effervescent light of energy and excitement. Jackie knew she had to start calming Jan down, whatever it took, before she ended up with an unconscious girlfriend and a broken heart.

Jackie supports Jan in one arm, wraps it securely around Jan’s waist and stars rifling through her shopping bags to find what she’d been so excited to come home and show her. The bag’s inside of another bag in typical organised Jackie style, and when she pulls it out, the receipt flies out over their heads and she thinks Jan may have stifled a giggle into her shoulder. Jackie’s bouncing Jan on her hip in such a child-like fashion, that when she takes out the delicately tissue paper-wrapped item, she presses it into Jan’s hands like a game of pass the parcel.

Jan snorts inelegantly, wipes her nose with the back of her hand and shifts in Jackie’s grasp until she’s facing her girlfriend. Jackie motions for Jan to open the gift, nudging her shoulder with a gentle hand. Jan’s acrylics rip the tissue paper, and she’s left staring at lingerie. Delicate lilac, adorned with lace and crystals and everything sparkly. The bralette is sheer and lacy, diamonds decorating the straps and clearly so very overpriced, but she can’t bring herself to care when Jackie’s lifting her chin with a careful finger, and they lock eyes for the first time since Jackie arrived home.

The tears come back thick and fast, wetting the lace with something other than pleasure, Jackie’s smile turns to a grimace as Jan begins mumbling how sorry and she is.

‘Baby’, Jackie starts, sitting them down on the bed. ‘What’s going on?’

‘I’m so sorry’ Jan hiccupped, her breath getting caught in her throat. ‘You’re so good, too good and I don’t deser-’

‘Stop’.

Jackie’s grip on her waist gets stronger and Jan tenses in fear, relaxing only when Jackie starts wiping Jan’s tears with the pad of her thumb. ‘Take a breath. You’ve got to start breathing properly before you talk, baby.’

They sit in silence for moments, minutes with Jan’s shaky breaths and Jackie’s slow counting the only noises.

‘I was reading Instagram comments and they were so fucking mean Jacks’.

Jackie’s eyes turn dark and her hands subconsciously squeeze Jan’s waist tighter and tighter until she has to unpeel Jackie’s fingers from around her, feeling an organ rupture or permanent crescent shaped nail indentations weren’t far off if she kept her grip up.

Jackie looks at Jan with an unreadable expression, before she’s pressing their foreheads together and locking her fingers at the base of Jan’s head, Jan seated in her lap. The tears still run freely from Jan’s eyes and in turn, they spill onto Jackie’s cheeks, sharing her pain.

‘What were they saying, baby?’

Jackie wasn’t stupid, by any means. She’d seen the comments on Jan’s Instagram, and after one mid-afternoon shower turned into Jackie’s fists repeatedly hitting the tiles like a makeshift punch bag, she vowed to herself she wouldn’t bring it up to Jan, her own futile effort to protect her girlfriend from the cruel world of fandoms and stans and biggest fans.

Sure, she’d noticed Jan’s stomach was a little squishier, her tits more rounded, but Jackie still, always, though she was perfect, no matter what.

Jan gasps in a huge breath, holds the air in her lungs before her mouth is running like a runaway train. She tells Jackie everything. How the sight of her stomach makes her want to cry, how the way her thighs press together makes her feel like she’s suffocating, how Jackie makes her believe she’s beautiful but she can’t help but listen more to the guy on social media with 14 followers and a car that’s definitely not his as his profile picture, telling her that she needs to go on a diet.

Jackie’s in shock. Her whole body goes rigid, stiff to the touch and she hears nothing but Jan’s sobs vibrating through her ears. She’s so completely overwhelmed that it isn’t until Jan starts hiccupping, the lack of steady breathing but the steady fall of tears catching up to her, that Jackie zones back in and internally curses herself for not being in the moment.

Jan’s next coherent thought is that she’s being moved, lying down under the covers with Jackie pulling her head down to lay on Jackie’s now topless chest. The skin on skin contact is too much in her current state of sensitivity, and she whines, moving to instead lie next to Jackie.

Jackie knows she needs to give Jan a minute, but every second she’s not holding her whilst she’s this upset is torturous, and eventually when Jan’s hand starts seeking Jackie’s under the blankets, she pulls Jan into her arms and kisses her softly.

‘Jackie?’

‘What is it, baby?’

‘I’m so sorry.’

Jackie’s lips smash themselves into Jan’s, not wanting to hear anymore of Jan’s needless apologies. She curls an arm around Jan’s waist, pulling her closer until they’re pressed flush together, Jan laying on top of Jackie.

Jackie’s hand moves down Jan’s body until she reaches her bra, gently tugging on the strap to ask permission.

Jan’s brain goes into overdrive, and the desire to put a huge hoodie on to cover her body is insane, but then she remembers. This is Jackie. Her Jackie. Her Jackie doesn’t care about being able to fit two fingers around Jan’s wrist, how big her tits are, what dress size she wears. Her Jackie loves her, no matter what.

Jan nods and tries unsuccessfully to help Jackie remove her bra, as she grabs both of Jan’s wrists in her hand, and tells her ‘No, baby. Relax. Let me make you feel beautiful.’

Jackie rids herself of her jeans and flips them over, Jan now lying on a sea of pillows as she presses their chests together, intertwining their arms and legs, with just the lace of their panties separating their bodies. She cups Jan’s jaw, smiles at her with childlike innocence, yet X rated lust filters through her eyes as she wedges her thigh between Jan’s legs.

Jan lets out a breathy moan at the unexpected action, and attempts to grind down to gain friction. Jackie lets herself be used, reminds herself that this is all about Jan.

‘Let me tell you something, baby’ Jackie whispers as she moves up to hold Jan’s face.

‘You may not agree with me right now, but I want you to know how perfect you are, to me. From the top of your head to the soles of your feet. I need you to understand that you are beautiful, and nobody can tell you otherwise.’

There’s a stray tear leaking out of Jan’s left eye, and Jackie quickly swipes it before it can fall, and then she’s moving down Jan’s body to play with her quickly hardening nipples.

‘These tits, baby? Are so fucking sexy’ Jackie emphasises, swirling her tongue around Jan’s right nipple, taking it into her mouth and sucking to hear Jan let out a series of exquisite, high-pitched moans. ‘They look so good when you wear those dresses with the low neckline, but they look especially good like this.’ Jackie pinches Jan’s nipples, hard, and she almost screams in pleasure, but before she can plead with Jackie to do it again again again, Jackie’s lips are travelling down towards her stomach, pressing kisses into the soft skin. Her hands trace the lines of her curves, and Jan almost starts crying again at the tenderness and care of Jackie’s movements. This was probably Jan’s most hated area of her body, and she conveyed that to Jackie through her eyes falling closed, not wanting to look. ‘Do you know how comfy your stomach is to lay on, honey? So damn comfy. I swear you have the softest skin in the whole world,’ Jackie starts, punctuating each sentence with hundreds of little kisses to the area. Jan’s body jolts, and Jackie immediately stops, moving back up and cradling Jan’s head.

‘Baby, your jean size doesn’t define you.’

The tears return and Jackie holds her through it, stroking her hair soothingly and whispering comforting words of reassurance. Once she’s sure Jan is okay, she starts moving back down, towards Jan’s thighs, and looks up, mouthing an ‘Okay?’ to Jan, before she spreads her legs.

Jackie peppers kisses to the inside of Jan’s thighs, and much to the amusement of the girl above her, tells Jan that her favourite thing about her thighs is the way they bracket around her head. Jan laughs at that, but before too long, Jackie’s hand is inching towards the waistband of her knickers, and the huge, breathy moan that escapes Jan’s mouth when Jackie dips her fingers under it lets her know what she needs now.

‘Jan, you’re so gorgeous baby. Especially here.’

Her panties were on the floor, and so was her jaw. Jackie’s tongue circled her clit whilst two long fingers entered her and began scissoring her opening. The vibrations of Jackie humming around her clit made her moan brokenly, and she pushed down onto Jackie’s fingers, desperate to be filled. Jackie crooked a third into her and Jan was gone, back arching, hips bucking, hands shaking. Jackie licked her through it, her hands on Jan’s hips to ground her, an attempt to stop the girl from falling off the bed in her relentless pleasure.

Once Jan was settled, a dreamy smile and wide eyes, Jackie crawled up to Jan and wrapped her in her arms. ‘How you feeling, baby?’ Jackie questioned.

‘Beautiful.’

Jan wore crop tops and mini skirts for the next two weeks, figure hugging bodycon dresses and jeans her new go-to. She’d broken the antique mirror that night, and they replaced it with a new one that her and Jackie spent all afternoon gluing post-it notes to, little notes of encouragement. Jackie told her she was beautiful, every morning and night, even on harder days when despite her team working hard to filter through Jan’s comments, she’d see something and get upset.

It got better. Jan learned to love the body she was in.

It’s different now cause I love the mirror every time.

Fake It Till You Make It - Three

A Sam x Reader Series

PART THREE

Y/N knows it’s a bad idea to try telling her family that she’s dating Sam Winchester. But it’s just for the week of her sister’s wedding, and it’s all fake anyway. What could go wrong?

Word Count: 3900

Warnings: plus size! Reader, fatphobic & diet comments, Y/N’s family are demons, allusions to drug use, cuddly Sam

A/N: We’re getting somewhere! Also, Tom the baker is based on a grocery store cashier from my childhood. She was about seventy and would always tell my mom she remembered when my mom was pregnant with me, and then comment that I was growing so fast and when was I getting married. The kicker was that my mom didn’t start shopping at that grocery store until after I was born. Shout out to Rosie.

In the cold light of day, waking up on the bedroom floor with a Sam Winchester-shaped octopus wrapped around you was a lot more panic-inducing than you’d expected. Then again, you’d somehow gone from one fairly innocent arm slung across your waist to being wrapped up and tucked against his chest, legs tangled up and Sam’s face mostly pressed into your neck.  

You wondered briefly if he had enough room to breathe, immediately snapping at yourself that that was hardly the most pressing issue here. Your very fake boyfriend was using you as a human teddy bear and you had no idea how to escape, not without waking him. And waking Sam was very much not an option right now. As long as you somehow got out of this without his knowledge, you wouldn’t have to wade through the awkwardness or hear him try to politely tell you it meant nothing. You wouldn’t have to see the look on his face when he realized he’d snuggled himself up to--well, to someone like you. You’d heard it all before, of course, but hearing it from Sam would be infinitely worse.

Cursing silently to yourself, you glanced down at Sam to ascertain how deeply he seemed to be sleeping, your entire body tensing when you were met with one sleepy hazel eye already blinking at you. “Hi,” Sam mumbled into your hair, like this was completely normal.

“Hi,” you managed to squeak back, kicking yourself for not moving when you’d woken up in the middle of the night. This was what you got for thinking with the part of your brain that seemed to exist purely to drool over Sam friggin Winchester. 

He seemed to suddenly notice how stiffly you were holding yourself, and raised his head to look at you, looking entirely non-threatening and far too sweet with his fluffed-up hair and the crease of the sheet you’d been sleeping on pressed into his cheek. “Are you okay?”

“Uh-huh,” you returned dumbly, caught somewhere between get out get away run away now and continuing to stare at his face. “I don’t know, could you just...um...let...go?” you fumbled through, looking pointedly down at his arms banded around your stomach. 

Sam looked like he was still half asleep, following your gaze in confusion for a moment before hastily pulling his arms away from you. “Sorry,”

You were scrambling up the second he let go, beating a hasty retreat to the bathroom without sparing a look for the man still sprawled out on the floor, scolding yourself for your idiocy the whole way. You went through getting ready almost angrily, berating yourself for getting into a situation that taunted you with what you couldn’t have and embarrassed you in the process. Still with the toothbrush clamped in your mouth, you grabbed your phone and shot off a text to Charlie: Who TF thought this was a good idea????

Her response was almost immediate. Good morning to you too. 

You: Char I’m serious. Should have just brought you and said I was a flaming lesbian.

Charlie: Except for that you’re still totally into Sam

You: Not. Helping. 

Charlie: You could always just tell him that. 

You didn’t bother giving her a response, rolling your eyes in the mirror and putting your phone back down. Charlie had always been that way, relentlessly urging you to go for whatever it was, eternally confident that it would work out in your favor. Experience had told you it usually didn’t. And you didn’t even need past experience to know how “fat girl asks out the hot guy” ended.

Giving yourself one last look in the mirror, you steeled yourself to walk back out of the bathroom. The best option, of course, was just to ignore the morning’s situation, which you imagined Sam would be equally on board with. After all, it had to be at least a little awkward for him too, waking up curled around someone he thought of as basically family. Or at least that was what you were telling yourself. 

Sam was already dressed when you reentered the bedroom, and you spared a second to firmly remind yourself that nothing productive would come out of you staring at his ass in a pair of jeans. He spun as soon as he heard the door open, a faint blush of color still on his cheeks. “Hey, Y/N, I--”

“So I need to go pick up a cake today,” you blurted before he could finish, “and flowers. Is it cool if we use your car?”

Sam stared at you uncomprehendingly for a long moment, his eyebrows furrowing up. “What? I didn’t--yeah. Okay. Do you want me to come?”

Somehow you’d made him look like a kicked puppy and this was not the morning you’d been aiming for. “Unless you’d rather stay here,” you arched an eyebrow dryly, trying for humor. “Get stared at by my family like a zoo animal,”

Sam’s smile didn’t reach his eyes, but he just shrugged. “I’ll come if you want,”

“Okay,” you returned briskly, using the excuse of grabbing your wallet to break up the sudden tension in the room and give you something to do. 

The two of you made it downstairs without any major incidents, hastily skirting past the room where your Aunt Abaddon could be heard shrieking angrily, and you exhaled in relief when you finally made it out to where Sam’s car was parked on the driveway. He immediately went around to the passenger’s side, while you paused in front of the grill. “You don’t want to drive?”

He shrugged easily. “You know the area better than I do,”

Somehow, driving his car felt like more of an intrusion than it had when you were just driving up to the estate, but you sighed and climbed behind the wheel, wondering for the millionth time why anybody had ever thought this was a good idea. Just get over it, Y/N. You forced yourself to smile at Sam. “Florist first? So the cake doesn’t start melting?”

He still had a little bit of the kicked-puppy expression, but he nodded easily, turning to something on his phone while you pulled out of the drive. Way to go, Y/N. Is there anything you can’t fuck up?

The pickup from the florist went off without a hitch, and soon Sam’s backseat was stuffed full of sweet-smelling bouquets wiggling cheerfully with the movement of the car. Say what you would about Ruby, but she did know how to pick a good color scheme. 

More pressing than the flowers, though, was the fact that Sam hadn’t said a word to you so far beyond what was necessary to load the bouquets without crushing them. You could feel his eyes on you when you were looking at the road, but he’d stayed silent for the entire drive to the bakery Ruby had ordered from. 

You’d half expected to leave him in the car, but he followed you inside dutifully, standing a few steps off to the side while you gave Ruby’s name to the girl at the counter. 

“Y/N!”

You winced, turning to greet the baker with a hopefully-genuine smile. He was a friend of your mother’s more than anyone, but he’d always been polite to you, if terribly pushy. “Hi, Tom. I’m just here for Ruby’s cakes,”

The big man looked over your shoulder with a wiggling eyebrow. “And when am I going to make yours, hmm?”

You stared at him, uncomprehending. “Sorry, make my what?”

“Your wedding cake!” he went on cheerfully. “This young man’s yours, isn’t he?”

“Uh,” you turned hastily to look at Sam, who reached for your hand with a swift, reassuring smile. 

“Yes,” Sam answered for you, and you briefly considered the merits of stepping on his foot. You didn’t need to sell this lie to everyone in the tri-state area, for god’s sake. On the other hand, that would mean letting go of his hand, which you really didn’t want to do. 

“I thought so!” Tom announced triumphantly. “What’s your name, son?”

Sam dropped your hand to reach over the glass display case and shake Tom’s. “Sam Winchester, sir,”

You blinked at the scene unfolding in front of you, wondering if it would be more or less painful to watch a train wreck in action. Of all people, of course you had to run into nosy old Tom. The conversation went on over your head for a few more minutes, with Sam explaining his law career briefly and then doing a lot of nodding and smiling and casually touching you while Tom went rambling on about seeing you as a small child with your mother. 

You weren’t even sure what story he was telling, and given the fact that you only came up to Aunt Abaddon’s a few times a year at best, it was entirely possible he was mixing you up with some other mother and child. More than likely, in fact, since you found it hard to believe your mother would have ever taken you somewhere with a lot of calories and sugar. 

“You’d better take good care of her, now.”

Sam’s hand slid to hover at your lower back. “Of course.”

You cleared your throat roughly, looking up at Tom. “So, uh, the cake?”

“Yes, yes, of course! Now, you just let your man there take care of this,” Tom slid three enormous boxes toward Sam, “and I’ll get you rung out,”

That would normally be a job for the cashier girl, but no one really ever bothered arguing with Tom. Handing over the car keys to Sam with an apologetic wince, you trailed over to the register, digging out your card in advance in the hope of making this fast.

“I like him,” Tom announced, pulling up the order sheet on a clipboard. He peered at you over the glasses on the end of his nose, studying you. “Why do you look awkward?”

“Uh,” you stuttered eloquently. “Well it’s just that Sam and I, we’re kind of...I mean it hasn’t been all that long, I just--” It’s fake. You wanted to scream. The whole thing is fake and he’s just being nice and I know that and I still want to keep him. Like, forever.

Tom’s eyebrow arched as he slid your card through the reader. “But you do know he’s in love with you, don’t you?”

You swallowed hard. “Oh, I don’t think--I mean, no?”

The old baker frowned, taking his time wrapping the receipt up around your card. “That’s how he looks at you.”

“O...kay,” you chirped out cheerfully. “Thanks Tom, bye Tom,” You scurried out the front door of the shop before he could yell anything else after you, breathing a sigh of relief that was immediately cut off in your chest at the sight of Sam, busy sliding flowers around in the backseat to make room for the cakes. That’s how he looks at you.

As if he’d somehow heard your thoughts, Sam paused in his wedding-themed backseat Tetris puzzle, looking up over the top of the car door at you and lighting up with the brightest smile you thought you’d ever seen on his face. Your heart clenched at the sight of him, and you wondered suddenly what the hell you were going to do when the wedding was over. God, I am so screwed.

“Sorry about Tom,” you said aloud instead, automatically taking one of the boxes out of Sam’s hand while he wrestled the plant he’d been supporting with his hip. “And sorry there’s so much crap in your car.”

Sam just chuckled, fitting the last of the cakes inside and carefully closing the door, lest he behead any of the bouquets. “It’s not a big deal, Y/N,”

“I still feel bad,” You weren’t sure if you were apologizing for commandeering his car or for everything else you’d messed up.

“Well, don’t,” Sam said stoutly, and that was that. He watched you get back into the driver’s seat, your hands on the wheel and a pout on your face. “What?”

Your nose wrinkled, your foot steady on the brake even though you knew you should be driving back. “I just realized how much I don’t want to go back,” you confessed. “I’m just whining, I know…”

Sam reached out, laying his hand on your shoulder easily. “Switch with me,” he said suddenly, making you blink.

“What?”

“Switch with me,” he repeated, his hand vacating your shoulder to hit the button releasing your seatbelt. “Let me drive,”

You had no idea where he was going with this, but you got out of the car anyway, doing some imitation of a two-person Chinese fire drill in Tom’s parking lot. While you settled yourself into the passenger seat, sparing a nervous glance for the flowers in the backseat, Sam pulled out of the lot, looked both ways, and promptly turned down the road leading directly away from your estate. “Sam,” you hissed out. “What are you doing?”

“Not taking you home?”

“Sam, if the cakes melt Ruby will kill me,”

“Well, they’re not ice cream cakes,” Sam said reasonably, reaching for the A/C dial. “There.”

“I haven’t been so concerned about anything since I babysat small children,” you said wryly. “God, I hope nothing dies,”

“They’re cut flowers, Y/N, they’re already dying,” Sam deadpanned, taking another arbitrary turn that put you even further from Abaddon’s. 

You tilted your head at him, a laugh escaping you in spite of yourself. “Have you always been like this and I just didn’t notice?”

“You just listen to Dean talking about me,”

That was probably true, you reflected. Dean’s narrative of his brother, while undoubtedly very loving, boiled down to “nerd, lawyer, smart, goes for runs and doesn’t like bacon” most of the time. You didn’t answer immediately, just studying Sam while he drove fairly aimlessly, somehow leaving you lighter than you’d felt all day. “Seriously, though. Where are we going?”

Sam bit his lip briefly, turning to look at you with his forehead wrinkled in concern. “I don’t...know. I might be lost,”

You burst out laughing in the passenger seat, jerking forward so hard that the seatbelt’s automatic stop kicked in, holding you dangling against the belt while tears ran down your face. Sam pulled over on the shoulder, his eyes crinkled up as he watched you laughing at him, and when you finally straightened up and wiped your eyes, he was smiling fondly at you. “Why did I let you drive?” you asked dryly, before turning over your shoulder and glancing back down the road. “Okay, turn around and turn left at the first intersection,”

Sam followed your directions without question, and if you’d have been a bit bolder--and hadn’t had Ruby’s bridal bouquet in the backseat--you might have kept directing him straight to the interstate. As it was, you led him to the little park a few miles behind your aunt’s property, pointing out the window to the creek that was visible from the road. 

“Meg fell in when we were kids,” you narrated, smiling vaguely at the memory. “I was twelve, it was Easter, and we got this brilliant idea to sneak away from dinner and go run to the creek. She just kind of tipped over,” you giggled softly as you recalled the day. “It was an early Easter that year, too, so of course the water was freezing.”

You shook your head. “Then she convinced me that Uncle Az was going to kill her for getting wet, so we snuck her upstairs to steal Abaddon’s hair dryer. We thought we could somehow dry her clothes, I don’t know. Anyway, my aunt found us, sitting on her bathroom floor in a puddle of creek water. That was the only time I’ve ever seen her laugh. She always liked Meg more,”

Sam had listened to you with rapt attention, and now he tilted his head in the direction of the park and its little creek. “Show me?”

You couldn’t deny the little rush of happiness up in your chest at the question, and you made a face at him over the top of the car as you both scrambled out. “If you get me wet I really will kill you, Sam Winchester.”

“Noted,” He jogged around the car, hopping over the curb to catch up with you, and stuck close to your side as you both walked through the grass. For a moment, you almost reached out to grab his hand, reminding yourself at the last second that you didn’t need to. No one was watching. You didn’t need to play the charade. And that was all it was, you reminded yourself firmly. 

You reached the little creek a few minutes later, Sam sitting down on a boulder while you peeked down the sloped bank into the water. “Is that your favorite memory?” he asked after a moment. 

“Probably, yeah,” you shrugged, trying to make it casual. “Most of the rest of them I was either getting blamed for something Ruby did or told to go on a diet.”

Sam frowned at you, reaching his hand out to you. You took it hesitantly, letting him pull you closer to his boulder without really knowing what he was trying to accomplish. “You shouldn’t have had to deal with that, Y/N,” he said seriously, tugging on your hand gently again as you realized he was trying to get you to sit down with him. 

“Don’t Sam, I’m too heavy,”

“You’re not,” Sam said firmly, pulling your hand just hard enough to unbalance you. You fell with a squeak, landing easily across his legs, and to your immense relief, nobody died. “See?” he smiled at you. 

“Okay, you’ve proved your point, Mr. Lawyer,” you feigned a grumpy expression, trying not to give any attention to the butterflies that had decided to take up residence somewhere in your stomach. 

“Good,” Sam murmured. He leaned his head briefly on your shoulder, and for just that moment, it felt like you were in your own little bubble, and everything was perfect. And then your phone rang. 

“Y/N where the fuck are you? Did they fuck up the order or something?”

“No,” you said hastily. “No,  everything’s fine. They’re all safe and sound in Sam’s backseat.” God, you really did sound like you were talking about children. Beside you, Sam was stifling a laugh and you elbowed his chest lightly.

“Okay so then where are you? Gramma wants to see the flowers,” Ruby snapped impatiently. “I figured you’d be able to get this done for me, Y/N.”

“Coming,” you sighed out, and Sam squeezed your free hand reassuringly. “We’re coming.”

“Did you stop for car sex? That’s gross.”

“No, Ruby,” you glanced at Sam. “We did not stop for car sex.”

Sam snorted, loud enough that Ruby definitely heard him. Figuring you’d gotten the necessary communication over with, you opted to just hang up before she could start shrieking again. 

“That would be our cue,” you said wryly, hopping up off of Sam’s lap. Your foot came down on a half-buried rock as you shifted to standing, your ankle rolling sideways and your balance faltering. 

Sam’s arms came around your waist just as you were pinwheeling your arms, preparing to take a dive into the creek. You yelped, hearing a reassuring laugh from Sam as he pulled you away from the edge of the creek bank. “I’ve got you. You did tell me not to let you get wet.”

Your adrenaline rush had melted into a fit of giggles, and you let Sam hang on to you on flat ground while you laughed, totally at ease. And right there you decided that even if it was going to suck when the wedding was over, at least you would have had this week. You followed Sam back to the car still laughing, and he didn’t let go of your hand. 

Gramma Lilith was on the driveway when you finally pulled up, hands on her hips, white skirt billowing in the wind, and possibly more botox in her lips than the last time you’d seen her. “Took you long enough!” she was shouting before either of you had gotten a car door open. Not that it mattered; you could hear her shrill voice anyway. 

You and Sam both hastened to the backseat, pulling out bouquets and potted flowers in an attempt to placate her. It only served to bring Ruby outside to stand beside her grandmother, both of them snipping at you while simultaneously complimenting Ruby’s choices. It made your head ache just listening to the two of them. 

“Ruby, the cakes should go in the fridge,” you tried, holding the boxes out to her in the hope that it might motivate her to actually do something instead of watching you. 

“So what are you waiting for?” your sister asked instead. You sighed, trekking into the house with the cake boxes and sliding them into the fridge, thanking the heavens for small mercies that there was enough room without having to also play Tetris with the food. 

You got back out onto the driveway just in time to hear your grandmother turn her attention to Sam. “Are you where my salad went, boy?” she asked shrewdly, hands on her hips. 

Sam froze, halfway out of the backseat with a pile of flowers in his arms. “Well,”

“Gramma,” you hurried to interrupt, but she wasn’t having it. 

“I don’t care,” she went on, still looking at the moose-in-the-headlights. “But I do appreciate straight answers.”

Sam swallowed and straightened up, arms still full of purple flowers. “Yes ma’am. I was...hungry.”

You had been valiantly biting your lip through the entire exchange, but between his awkward reply and the look on your grandmother’s face, you burst out into a fit of giggles, diving into the backseat hastily to cover it up with more flowers. 

Lilith humphed, her eyes flitting between you and Sam. “You don’t deserve someone like her,” your grandmother informed him, having evidently decided he was alright. And all of you knew that she meant it in that Sam deserved better than you, but he just smiled and caught up to you in front of the car. 

“I know,” he said, and then he leaned down and captured your lips in a kiss, crushing the flowers between you as he wrapped an arm around your waist. It was surprisingly heady, tinged with desperation as Sam devoured your lips, tongue sliding and teeth clashing once in his haste. You were drunk on it, on him, reaching your free hand up to tangle in his hair as you rose up onto your tiptoes, trying to fight the height difference, your audience completely forgotten. No one had ever kissed you like that before. 

And then Sam was pulling back, eyes almost black as he stared at you but somehow keeping his composure as he moved to finish taking the flowers into the house like he hadn’t just kissed you senseless. 

Ruby and Lilith looked equally stunned at the display, and somewhere in the back of your brain, you remembered that that was why he’d done it, that it was all part of a show and that if you were a real couple, you’d have kissed plenty of times already. But as you stood speechless in the driveway, all you could really think about was him. There was no way you’d survive this wedding.

-

tags: @vicmc624​,  @thebookisbtr​, @alicedopey​

The Body Cannot Lie

Ledger Joker x Reader Oneshot

Word count: 2.7k

Summary: this oneshot explores a relationship between J and a reader who is determined to lose weight, and become healthier, and change her constant habit of turning to food for comfort.

Warnings: mentions of sex and some language; reader is unhappy with her body and wants to lose weight- if this concept is triggering for any of you, don’t read it! I’m not your mama.

A/N: I wrote this to cope with some angsty emotions I have been feeling. I am a firm believer of “journaling as therapy,” so I just kind of indulged myself as the thoughts and ideas came. I might add more if I fancy it, I might not. If you enjoy reading this, cheers! Eating healthy food is very important to me, and it is something that is obviously something that I worked into the oneshot.

______________________________________________________________________

 "Jesus Christ!" you groaned at your reflection in the mirror.

That was it. Things had to change.

Why you still chose to comfort eat was beyond you.

No more I wish I didn't eat all of that food.

You were going to simply quit turning to food for comfort.

You were going to introduce a little Control into your Life.

Control, meet Life. Life, meet Control.

I hope you two can become properly acquainted with each other, you bitterly thought to yourself.

As much as you would like to think that you ate a healthy and organic diet, you knew that in the midst of it all, food represented a comfort to you. Actually, you could trace that pretty far back into your childhood.

Growing up, your mother had always used food as positive reinforcement, as a reward. Soda, junk food, restaurant food, fast food, she bought it all for you and frequently looked for reasons to “celebrate” with food.

But at 23 years old, you were an adult and no longer a child.

You had more in your life than to continue seeking that kindred and warm feeling in food.

Simply put, eating two desserts after dinner was excessive. Christ, where had your standards gone? Had you chucked them out the window?

J was out and about taking care of some business, and God only knew when he might return.

For now, you were stuck staring at your uncouth reflection in the mirror.

Your sad eyes took in the bloated stomach, the splayed thighs, and the too-rotund face.

Deep down, you knew it was the laziness that you despised most about yourself.

The fat deposits on your body were only a physical manifestation of the lazy, slothful attitude inside.

Not going for that 7 mile run, opting for pasta for dinner instead of that kale salad for dinner, sleeping in when you could have been cleaning the house, or doing the washing, or even working out… all of the self-criticisms seemed to come at you full-force. Heck, even meal prepping for J who Lord knew didn't eat consistently enough to sustain his quick-paced criminal lifestyle.

Deep down, you knew it was all unchecked laziness.

You resolved in your mind that you weren't going to let it go any further.

Although you didn't want to, you stepped on the scale and forced yourself to write down the number that you saw.

130 lbs.

Cringe!

On your 5'4" frame, that was simply too much fat and mass. You had to burn some of it off.

You knew that you wanted to be 20-35 pounds lighter than that.

You made a promise to yourself that you were going to lose the weight, and you were going to check in with yourself each day, to make sure that you were hitting your goals.

You needed discipline, and you needed to lay off turning to food for comfort.

Sex, you thought. Sex burns calories. A smile crept upon your face as this thought crossed your mind.

J couldn't complain with you asking for more, when it was usually him nudging up against your body under the covers or bounding after you in the shower.

Well hey, it would be like getting another workout in during the day, with as hard as J liked to go. You didn't know how it was possible, but sometimes it seemed as though he could go on for hours. His appetite was insatiable and consuming.

The way he would grab onto your hips and just thrust and grind, it was like he could go on forever. The ecstasy would build, and build, until it would become too much, and you two would both collapse in a hot and exhausted heap on top of each other.

Your gaze returned to the mirror, and reality dawned upon you. Why would J ever want to fuck you? You were… dare you say it?

Fat.

You had grown up with a mother who struggled with her own weight, and who probably hovered at or around 200 pounds for as long as you could remember. You had memories of her lifting up her shirt in the mirror with tears in her eyes, mourning the rolls on her stomach, and you knew.

You didn't want that to be you when you got older.

If it was something you had learned in the past, if you didn't have a set goal, you would never get where you wanted to go.

You resolved to weigh 119 at the end of the week. Today was Monday, so by Friday, you resolved to weigh 11 pounds less than what you currently did, which also included water weight.

Happy and set on meeting your goal, you set about cleaning the living space that J shared with you. Crikey, you thought. Things could sure get messy when you weren't paying attention.

119 was just enough to get you motivated to lose more, to eventually get down to 110 and eventually 105. you were excited just thinking about the possibilities, sure, J enjoyed fucking you now, but when you were 20 pounds less? He wouldn't be able to keep his hands off of you. You would be tantalizing. A delicacy he couldn't resist.

You fantasized about running longer distances and being so much more light on your feet without so much weight weighing you down. You were so excited to meet your goals. You knew that you could do it, you just knew that it would take a lot of hard work and determination.

Of course, by being diligent and losing weight, you would be proving yourself a dedicated and goal-oriented person. Someone that J would be proud of! Although he never divulged details with you, you knew that he pored over his plans and perfected them to a T, so that they would go off without a hitch.

Yes, you loved food, and it brought comfort, but you reminded yourself that it was for fuel, nothing more.

As you were thinking about your new weight-loss endeavours, you made your way into the kitchen to take a quick inventory of what was in stock.

Hmm. You would have to make another trip to the store to buy some fresh things. You knew that J really needed proper fuel, and so you thought of all of the delicious meals you could make him, while making salads for yourself. You prided yourself on your healthy but tasty and delicious cooking.

You knew that he liked practically anything you made, that he wasn't picky.

You checked the time. It was 1 in the afternoon. Hmm. If you started now, you would have time to finish cleaning the apartment and get everything else done. Maybe later in the evening you would even get to the online coursework that you had.

You poured yourself some more coffee (magic get 'er done fuel, as you liked to think of it), and set to work.

****************************************************************************************************

You already felt much better after your run, and much more refreshed.

You checked the clock. 6:14 pm. Perfect. You set to preparing J's dinner and chopping up the ingredients for your salad.

You set the surround stereo system in the kitchen to play your favourite 90s music. You didn’t hear the door open as you were singing along to yourself with the Gin Blossoms about Mrs. Rita.

J loved sneaking up on you and scaring you half to death.

"Gotcha!" he said suddenly as he came up behind you, seizing your arms.

You were temporarily taken off guard, although not frightened, by his antics.

"J! I have a knife!" you protested, as you wielded the stainless-steel IKEA knife you reserved for chopping your salads.

"Do you really wanna threaten me with that, sweet cheeks?" J asked you suggestively, his voice suddenly going all throaty.

Damn, why did he have to go on arousing you, here, in the kitchen? You were making a freaking salad, for Christ's sakes! A kale salad!

"J, just hold on, not now, okay? I am making you dinner."

J looked temporarily put out, but then perked up at the prospect of eating a homecooked dinner you had made him.

"I was wondering what smelled so good," he wondered aloud, as he peered over your shoulder to see the pasta that was in the skillet on the stove.

"Can't have my favourite raccoon starving, now can I?"

"What? Did. You. Just. Call. Me."

A giggle escaped your throat.

"Nothing, nothing, not a thing…."

Truth was, you thought that J looked a bit like a petulant raccoon with his kohl eyes and white face when he was in full costume. He could be a bit melo-dramatic sometimes. It just made him more endearing to you.

J blinked, and then conceded, "Aw babe, you have no idea. I've been starving, for you. All. Day."

The words made you blush, and you felt a kindred warmth grow in your abdomen, but you set to finishing his and your dinner.

You started to plate his food, and the temptation to pour yourself a glass of wine was very strong, but you remembered your resolution earlier today, and stuck with water. How a beverage that was so fermented managed to have so much sugar was beyond you, but you remained steadfast in your prior determination to lose 11 pounds by the end of the week.

You handed J his food, and saw his eyes widen in anticipation.

He didn't even sit down, he just started eating it standing up right after you gave it to him. Such was his appetite.

He had already plowed halfway through the giant plate of pasta you gave him, by the time you sat down to eat your plate of kale salad with flaxseed crackers.

"Babe, I don't know how you do it, but your food is always perfect," J stated, between mouthfuls of vegetable pasta.

"Aww gee thanks, I am flustered," you blushed.

"How far did you go today?" J asked you, his eyes taking in your running clothes and flushed face.

Ever so observant.

"8 miles," you replied, actually slightly disappointed you hadn’t gone further. Tomorrow, you would go farther, you promised yourself. Tomorrow, you would make it 10 miles.

He glanced at the contents on your plate, once again looked at your sweaty running attire, but said nothing.

His eyes roamed over to the skillet on the stove, obviously hoping for more pasta. You were going to plate yourself some, but thought better of it. You would make do with your kale salad and flax crackers. Heck, you might even treat yourself to an orange for dessert. Lord knew the metabolism of the man seated in front of you never stopped and was going miles per minute. He simply required lots of fuel to keep going.

You took his plate and refilled it with what was left on the stove, returned it, and sat back down.

You actually weren't hungry after running, but you knew that if you didn't refuel now, you would be hungry in the middle of the night. You also knew the importance of eating plenty of fiber to keep a flat stomach.

You asked him questions about his day, and as per usual, he responded with vague one-word answers. You didn’t press for more information, although you knew that it most likely included “criminal activity.”

J's eyes still continued to roam the kitchen, and you realized that he was still hungry. Boy, to say that he had an appetite to rival your own was an understatement. You had boiled a whole box of quinoa-brown rice spaghetti! And he ate it all! And still wanted more!

You walked over to the counter and plated him some of the leftover salad and toasted some sprouted gluten free bread, and you set to preparing him some fruit. Goddamn it, if he had an appetite, he was at least going to be fueled with real food, no processed crap, like what you grew up on. If nothing else, you had standards when it came to food quality. That was an unshakable and indisputable fact.

You returned to where he was seated at the table with a whole new plate of food for him, which he readily set to eating.

You thought he might appreciate dessert, so you whipped up some dark chocolate avocado mousse with some of the ripe avocadoes and bananas that were on the counter. You really did feed him well.

When dinner was over, you cleaned up the dishes and went upstairs to shower and crash in bed with a mug full of hot tea and a full water bottle. You actually really didn't want the wine, now that you thought about it. This actually wasn't going to be as hard as you thought it was going to be.

You made your way to the bedroom that you and J shared, and you began stripping off your sweaty running clothes. Peeled off, more like. Fully bare, you made your way into the en-suite washroom and let your body relax in the shower as the hot, steaming water washed over you.

Fully clean, you stepped out of the shower, and toweled yourself off. You slipped into one of J's shirts, which fit loosely (thankfully, if it fit snug, you would know that you were really overweight) on you, and climbed into bed with a book, hair drying.

You were so immersed in your book, you didn't notice that your tea had gotten cold, nor that J had entered the room, nor did you notice the time.  

"Thought you can just steal my clothes, hmmm?"

Your head shot up at hearing J's voice. You had a very focused attention span, so when you focused on something, you were easily startled by interruptions.

What time was it? Jesus! It was nearly midnight. Your hair was long since dry.

"What?" you thought, a bit unfocused. Your mind was still in the book you were reading.

"You know stealing is punishable by law," J drawled, coming closer to you, taking off his green vest and unbuttoning the light purple dress shirt underneath. As he spoke, you heard the swish! of one of his many pocket knives.

"You wouldn't dare," your voice, taunting, was laced with the anticipation that you felt at the insinuation in his tone.

"You bet, sugar. I've waited all day for this. Work before play, I always say. I won't deny that you have wicked skills in the kitchen, but in the bedroom, they are just downright sinful."

You noticed that his tone dropped to a significantly more throaty decibel that wasn't quite human anymore. The dawning realization made you shiver, but you weren't cold.

J prowled to where you were curled up underneath the covers, and already you saw the excitement in his trousers. The body of a man cannot lie, you thought, with relish. Actually seeing it made you feel excited, too.

You saw the glint of the knife in his hand.

Honestly, there were no boundaries with what J might bring into the bedroom.

His eyes were suddenly not human anymore. They were purely feral. Primal. Animalistic. Hungry.

He wanted it, and he wanted it, now.

And you were going to give it to him. More calories burned, you thought happily.

Visit with Trish

It had been a few weeks since Jessica saw her adoptive sister. This was hardly unusual; Jessica had been known to simply drop out of any form of contact with Trish for various lengths of time, either because she couldn’t or simply didn’t want to bother with talking to or seeing her. She loved her sister, far more than she could or was comfortable putting words to, but the woman could be damn difficult to be around sometimes.

 It wasn’t because she was prissy or bougie, although she could be both of those; Jessica was used to her more irritating mannerisms, and could either mock them or shrug them off as being unavoidable when genetically related to Dorothy Walker. It wasn’t even because she was always not so subtly prodding at Jessica to make “better choices” in her life, meaning to drink less, eat and sleep more, and do something for mental health other than punching people and avoiding all efforts at expressing actual emotion. No, the reason Jessica usually chose to avoid Trish, when she went through her spells of doing so, was because the woman knew her well enough that she could usually figure out when something was going on in Jessica’s life that Jessica didn’t want to tell her about. And once she was on the trail, for someone who wasn’t actually a private eye herself, she was pretty damn good at getting to the truth.

 But Jessica found herself thinking of Trish after her latest “meet” with Luke- she wouldn’t call their interactions dates, not yet, not even in her own thoughts. Maybe because she had spent some time talking about Trish to Luke, or maybe simply because Trish was the only person Jessica had spent any degree of time with back in their teen years that Jessica still had active contact with or cared to know. And back then, during the period of time where most teenaged girls did spent the majority of their time gushing to their friends about boys and crushes and sexual exploits, Jessica had not had friends, let alone boyfriends or crushes. She had been too busy grieving her dead family, reeling from her new life as the adopted kid of a pop star’s stage mom, and trying to protect Trish from physical abuse from said mother and sexual abuse from far too many older men in the movie business to have any energy or inclination left to gossip about some acne-ridden adolescent at their school.

 She was 31 years old now, a ridiculous age to even think of words like crush or boyfriend. The most she ever talked about with Trish was whether or not she’d had sex with someone recently, and Trish was usually too skeeved out by that to want many details. But although Jessica told herself that she in no way wanted or intended to talk about Luke and whatever was going on between them with her sister, she nevertheless found herself feeling an urge to visit her.

 That didn’t mean anything, right? It had absolutely nothing to do with Luke. Jessica was allowed to have a spontaneous visit with her best friend/sister.

 She waited until she had wound down her research on her latest case for the day and had enough drinks to feel comfortable before heading to Trish’s apartment on the subway. It was beginning to be evening, but Trish had a daily routine most of the time that was fairly unvarying. Normally at this time of the day she was finished with work and would be home, working out in her private gym. Jessica was not one to give her warning about her approach with texts or calls. Instead, like usual, she simply jumped up onto Trish’s balcony and banged on the door until she came to let her in.

 As Jessica would have predicted, Trish was dressed in perfectly coordinated workout clothes, light blue leggings and a sports bra, her blonde hair back in a smooth ponytail. She looked Jessica up and down carefully, plucked eyebrow raised, and didn’t immediately move away from the sliding glass door.

 “I’ll bite, what’s wrong?”

 “What do you mean, what’s wrong?” Jessica threw the question back at her, shrugging. “Do I look like I’m bleeding or gasping for breath or something? ‘Cause if I am, your bedside manner sucks.”

 “Well, generally when you show up like this, after ignoring my texts for a while, something’s wrong,” Trish informed her, her tone calm, even pleasant, rather than rising to Jessica’s mild jab. “Like someone is stalking you, someone rose from the dead, someone is dead, you’re close to death after an attempted murder, something to do with death or attempted death. Or else you’re so drunk you can’t remember how to get to your own place.”

 “Well, maybe I’m shaking up the routine,” Jessica muttered. “Can’t be as predictable as you, Yoga Barbie.”

 She held her arms out as though to present herself to Trish for her inspection. “Not dead, not dying, not any more drunk than usual. You gonna let me in, or do I have to be in an actual crisis to decide to visit, “Patsy”?”

 Trish tried to scowl at her, but Jessica saw that she was fighting a smile. They both knew Jessica never called her by her very much hated former nickname unless she was mocking her or trying especially hard to piss her off. “I still say something’s up. But sure, come on in.”

 She stepped back to give Jessica room to come inside, shutting the door behind her and locking it back. Jessica made her way into Trish’s kitchen and helped herself to opening the fridge, making a face when she saw that all of Trish’s drinks were diet, had impossible to say ingredients, or water. She dug until she found a normal Coke miraculously pushed to the back and took it back with her to the couch, popping the tab. Feeling Trish staring at her, she looked back, raising her eyebrows.

 “What?”

 “There’s whiskey and bourbon in the cabinet, like usual,” Trish informed her. “You know I keep it for you, just in case.”

 “Yeah, I might get to that in a little bit,” Jessica shrugged. “I’m good for right now.”

 Trish’s eyes about bugged out of her head as Jessica took another swig of the soda. She rushed over to sit beside her, deliberately knocking her knee into Jessica’s.

 “Okay, now I know something is up. Jessica Campbell Jones just knowingly, deliberately chose a Coke, knowing alcoholic beverages were available. What the hell is going on, Jessica? What happened?!”

 “Chill out, stop being so dramatic,” Jessica rolled her eyes, but Trish noted that she wasn’t looking at her straight on. “Nothing’s going on, nothing’s happening, can’t a woman change things up once in a while without you pulling amateur PI moves to figure out why?”

 “Are you trying to quit drinking?” Trish pressed, not bothering to acknowledge her denial. “Because good for you if you are, you know I’d support that all the way, Jess, but something must have pushed you over into that decision.”

 “I said I’d ransack your supplies later, does that sound like I’m quitting drinking?” Jessica pointed out. “Jesus, stop already, you’re gonna make me regret deciding to see you when I could have visited a bar.”

 “Are you trying to lose weight?” Trish tried next. “Because if you are, switching from alcohol to full fat soda isn’t any difference in calories, actually it’s got far more fat and sugar, so that would be pretty inefficient-“

 Jessica set her can down and stared at Trish, narrowing her eyes.

 “Seriously, that’s your advice on me hypothetically trying to lose weight? What, no protests about whether or not I need to, or the psychological reasons behind my desire to, just straight to calories and fat grams? Tell Dorothy to get out of your mouth or I’m leaving.”

 “What? Oh, sorry, it’s- it’s kind of automatic,” Trish said apologetically, leaning back onto the couch with a sigh. “That’s not even my soda, it’s left from Simpson, so you know how long that’s been in there-“

 “I was wondering if you had a secret sugar stash you’ve been hiding, Patsy’s dirty little secret,” Jessica smirked.

 Trish ignored her, continuing as though she didn’t hear. “I don’t think you need to diet, Jess, of course I don’t. Look at you, you’re skinnier than I am, you know I’m always telling you that you need to eat your calories in food more than alcohol at least some days of the week.”

 She furrowed her brow, still clearly trying to figure the other woman out.

 “So if you’re not trying to quit drinking, and you’re not counting calories, what is it? You don’t look hungover, and that normally wouldn’t stop you. What, did you meet a guy or something?”

 She said this with a chuckle, dismissing it even as she said it, but when Jessica took another long gulp of her drink, studiously avoiding Trish’s eyes, Trish sat up straighter, her expression sharpening.

 “Wait, did you?”

 “How much vodka do you have for me, again?” Jessica deflected, starting to stand, but Trish gave an excited near squeal and seized Jessica’s hand, pulling her to sit back down.

 “You did, didn’t you! Jessica, why didn’t you say something?”

 “Probably because I knew you’d do this,” Jessica muttered, exhaling. “Can I have my hand back now?”

 “No,” Trish said decisively, giving it a squeeze. “I need details, now. Where did you meet this guy? How long ago? What’s he look like? Have you been on a date yet?”

 “We fucked, does that count?”

 “Oh Jessica, come on!” Trish groaned, giving her hand a little tug before letting it go. She shifted to face her more fully, her blue eyes alight with her interest and what Jessica thought of as far too excessive enthusiasm. “You’re not going to throw me off of this by being you. What really happened?”

 “We did,” Jessica insisted, deliberately keeping her tone casual and flicking the tab of her soda repeatedly, in effort to annoy Trish with the sound. “First night we met, too. You said you want details, you want to hear about positions, or just penis length?”

 “Jessica,” Trish sighed, shaking her head. “You’re not going to distract me. Or gross me out.”

 “Oh good, then I can tell you everything. First he took his shirt off, then I tore his zipper down with my teeth-“

 “It’s more than that to you,” Trish cut her off, speaking over top her continued efforts to disgust. “It wasn’t just sex. I can tell that just by looking at you. You actually like him. This actually means something to you, doesn’t it? You actually feel something for him, Jess.”

 “Well, yeah, I felt plenty with his dick in me-“

 “Jessica,” Trish said quietly, placing both hands on the other woman’s shoulders with a firm pressure and looking at her directly enough that Jessica stopped, uncomfortable against her intensity. “Stop. You do care about this guy. I can see it. I could see something different about you the second you walked in tonight.”

 Under the weight of Trish’s hands and the serious way she watched her, Jessica exhaled, squirming uncomfortably. Even if she continued to deflect, it wasn’t going to stop Trish, and to continue to deny was dishonest and felt wrong.

 “His name is Luke,” she muttered, looking towards Trish’s ear rather than into her eyes. “Luke Cage. He runs a nightclub in Harlem. But I barely know him, Trish. He barely knows me. So don’t hold your breath or anything.”

 “But you like what you do know,” Trish pressed, squeezing Jessica’s shoulder lightly. “And so does he.”

 “Trish, this is me we’re talking about here,” Jessica snorted, attempting to duck out from under her hands. “Don’t start designing wedding invites. I’m sure I’ll do the me thing and fuck everything up within the next week, so don’t be too excited for me.”

 Although her tone was light, Trish reacted with emphatic dismay at her words. Hanging onto Jessica, not letting her shrug out of her grasp so easily, she gave her a little shake, looking at her with far too much earnest, wide-eyed feeling for Jessica’s comfort.

 “Don’t do that, Jessica. Don’t write yourself off or put yourself down. You do deserve this. You deserve to be cared for, and desired by someone who sees you as special and unique and wonderful even in the ways you can’t see for yourself.”

 “Sounds like you’re giving yourself a pep talk, not me,” Jessica shot back at her, again shrugging off her hands. “Or else maybe you’re secretly into me yourself.”

 But for once, Trish didn’t rise to the verbal bait. Letting Jessica pull her shoulders back and instead resting a hand on her knee, she continued to look at her steadily and seriously.

 “Jess…just don’t tell yourself that you aren’t worth it. Give yourself a real chance here. Please.”

 Jessica shifted, even more uncomfortable, and let out a loud exhalation, rolling her eyes again. Even so, she gave Trish’s hand a quick, awkward pat before standing.

 “Whatever, if my love life is that important to you, you obviously need to get out more yourself. But just for you, maybe I’ll consider it. Now I definitely need some booze.”

 Making her way towards the cabinets Trish always kept her drinks in, she called over her shoulder, “What kind of ridiculous kung fu panda shit you call self-defense have you been learning lately? Or are you too busy learning to make those so called health drinks that look like dirty water mixed with seaweed?”

 She was glad when Trish finally let her change the subject, educating her on far more on either subject than Jessica wanted to hear about. As she settled down on the couch again with several bottles set before her, she tried not to think about what Trish had said to her, and how very similar her views were to Luke’s. It was far easier to try for low expectations and cynicism; after all, wasn’t that how she’s lived her life so far?

  **

 Trish Walker was usually pretty good at easing information out of people that she wanted to know.

 She was a talk show host, after all; it was part of her job to set people at ease, to get them on the topic she wanted them on and to keep them there, with as many juicy details put forth as possible. But Jessica Jones was not like most of her subjects, and even seventeen years after them becoming family of sorts, she didn’t have any better techniques of getting things out of her when Jessica wanted them kept in.

 And Trish’s curiosity, when it came to Jessica’s new love interest, was driving her mad. Jessica was not the sort of person who was ever really interested in anyone, at least not beyond a roll in bed for a night or two. Certainly not since the trauma of Kilgrave and everything he had put her through and the choices he had forced her to make. Even as teenagers, Jessica hadn’t been the romantically inclined type. The last Trish could remember her really being into someone had been back in their early twenties, when Stirling had still been alive- and that was nearly ten years ago. She had almost started to think Jessica truly wanted to go through her life more or less alone.

 But as much as Jessica tried to downplay it and shut down any details, Trish could see the difference in her with this guy. She was less reclusive, for one thing, and less sharp in her words and expressions. Hell, she was even drinking less, and that was something like a miracle.

 But Jessica didn’t want to talk about him much, or really at all, and when Trish suggested meeting him, she about took her head off. So that left Trish with only one option, the way she saw it. It could be fifteen years before Jessica decided it was time for her guy to meet her, and by then she might very well decide to cut him loose in some misguided effort of “saving him from herself”. If Trish wanted to meet this Luke Cage, she was just going to have to meet him for herself.

 It wasn’t very hard for her to find the name of his club with a simple Facebook and google search, given that she already knew his name and its location. The first night she had the time, she “casually” checked in with Jessica that she was working- it wouldn’t do to run into her and Luke together at the club- and then made her way with her personal driver to Harlem, putting off the confused and suspicious looks he gave her for wanting him to take her to a city and a club that was normally very far from one she would frequent. She quickly found that she was very much a stand out in its environment, given her pale skin, blonde hair, and the shimmery blue but not exactly club-hopping dress she was wearing. Somewhat disconcerted, but determined, she made her way to the bar and flashed a bright smile to the bartender, taking a seat.

 “Hi, I’m looking for the owner, Luke Cage? Is he here tonight?”

Your body is a temple.

Nobody ever says who to, though, so I will. Your body is a temple to the soul that resides within, and exists to let that soul live the life it was meant to live.

I used to be 120 lbs at 5'2, and my doctor called me obese. I was going through puberty at the time, and my image of myself heavily depended on the validation of the adults around me.

I'm 18 now, and at probably around 180 lbs (I hesitate to use the scale) I look like an average sized person. I'm still 5'2, because the only thing puberty gave me was blood and a sex drive.

Weight looks different on everyone. I happen to gain muscle very easily, and although it is covered in a comfortable layer of fat, it does make up a good majority of my weight.

Remember that if someone tries to tell you that you should change your temple, you should probably tell them to change their opinions on the temples that do not belong to them. Or just tell them to fuck off. :)

During the four years I was in High School, I hated my body with a passion that was entirely uncalled for. For three of those years, I lived alone with my narcissistic grandmother, who tried to relive her teenage years through me. She would criticize me anytime I ate, and force me to work out whenever she wanted. I was not allowed to be in my own bedroom unless it was night, because quote, "It's like I live alone here; why are you here if you're not going to be around me?" Despite the fact that I'd been invited to live with her.

She would change my diet if she felt I was gaining weight, and if I didn't tell her how much I weighed she would throw a fit. Now, you're probably wondering why my parents didn't intervene? She is incredibly two-faced. Not only did she put on an angel granny persona around them, she made me feel like such a burden that if I said anything they wouldn't care. I drew the line when my younger sister moved in with us, for reasons I can't remember.

She accused my sister of eating weight loss pills and dieting when she lost weight, when in reality the diet my grandmother had us on made her lose weight. My sister was a thin, athletic girl with a reasonable amount of meat on her, and she was accustomed to the meaty, well portioned food my dad would make for her, and my grandmother hated meat. Her favorite meal to make is literally beans and cornbread. And salad, must never forget the salad. Anyway, my point is that she lost weight because my grandmother obviously wasnt feeding her the right things. She looked sickly, and thinner than she was comfortable being. So, my grandmother had her drug tested. The works, even pregnancy. Of course, it all came back negative.

What I learned through this is that no matter what your size, terrible people will always take advantage of your insecurity and try to change you into a version of you that they would prefer.

Protect your temple. Love your temple. And most importantly, do not listen to the opinions of those who don't know a damned thing about your temple.

The sun will rise again, and you will find people who will love your temple the way you do.

I still hate to look at my body in the mirror, but after moving in with my parents, I don't feel the need to starve to fit into a dress that a 10-year old would feel tight in.