Is this a safe space lmao

'NO MORE HIDING'

[PETER MAXIMOFF X FEM!OC]

WARNINGS — explicit sexual references, strong language

WORD COUNT — 1,608

PROMPT(S) — “just a little more” & “i want everyone to know that you’re mine”

TRANSLATIONS — koroleva; queen

WRITTEN FOR — @lazylangdon’s one shots contest, round four (smut); she is also the one who was kind enough to make the above graphic for me! <3

———

“If we get caught, Maximoff, I’m going to fucking kill you.”

Peter quirks his signature grin, all cockiness and bravado with no trace of humility to be seen. If Peter Maximoff is capable of embarrassment, it is not something that has ever been witnessed by another human being. Certainly not by Arcadia, at least, and she is quite literally capable of feeling his emotions - something she ordinarily finds useful, but in such circumstances as these the arousal radiating off of him in waves threatens to submerge her in a sea of eroticism.

“I love it when you’re feisty,” he growls lowly, dipping his head so that silver hair brushes against her sharp cheekbones. It tickles, but the sensation is sensual as opposed to playful which one may consider strange for somebody with as natural an affinity for immaturity as Peter. If Arcadia has learned over the past few months that the Peter Maximoff the world sees is not the whole man but rather a fragment projected.

Her fingers twitch with the need to move and suddenly Arcadia finds herself sympathetic to Peter’s everyday plight because this must be how he feels in any given situation: like things are moving too slowly. Torturously, agonisingly slow.

“I’ve never really understood the whole academic spiel,” Peter says after a lengthy pause, “but damn if thinking so hard doesn’t look hot on you, Brodeur.”

She rolls her eyes, more exasperated than annoyed, and her hands find the collar of his shirt. Yanking him forward with more force than strictly necessary, Arcadia effectively swallows his sharp intake of breath when her lips crash against his own.

It’s messy and without preamble, as is always the case when the two of them can find a spare moment alone away from the prying eyes of telepathic professors and fathers who aren’t yet aware that their adult son is living under the same roof as he is, currently making out with his girlfriend in an abandoned classroom two floors above his bedroom. There is still the raw passion that consumes Arcadia whenever Peter is in her presence, but the tenderness is quashed in favour of the rapid removal of clothing and skin-on-skin contact which drives her dizzy with desire every time.

“Are you done with the whole hate sex act?” Peter questions, one eyebrow raised. He’s obviously amused, almost definitely aroused if his body’s natural reaction is any indication, and looking at Arcadia through pupils blown wide with lust.

She brings a hand up to his cheek, cradles it for a moment, then lightly drags her nails across his cherry red, kiss-swollen lips. “Just a little more,” she whispers, breaths tapering into uneven huffs when she feels Peter’s hands weaving through dark tresses and lightly tugging the strands with just the right amount of pressure that the pain is gratifying. “How am I supposed to be annoyed with you when you make me feel like this?”

“It’s all part of my natural charms,” he claims brazenly, breath hot against the shell of her ear. The phantom sensation of his words across her skin sends a stimulating jolt of pleasure through her entire body. “Now, do you wanna talk or do you wanna make out?”

“God, you are such a boy,” she scoffs, slapping his arm lightly. It may have been effective in conveying her point, but it only makes Peter’s salacious smirk widen as he grabs her wrist and pins it above her head with a victorious expression.

“You love me for it,” he states.

It is not a question, though Arcadia finds herself nodding along nonetheless. “And what if I do? I could show you just how much, if you like…” She bats her eyelids with a faux innocent expression.

Peter groans, the sound deep and guttural. With her unrestrained hand pressed flat against his chest, she can feel the vibration of the sound. “Don’t say shit like that right now,” he warns, “I’ve gotta meet Jubilee for training in fifteen and she’ll never let me live this down.”

Finally, it’s Arcadia’s turn to smirk as she glances down at his hardening erection. “Not my problem, Pietro.”

Something she has come to learn in recent weeks is just how much her boyfriend enjoys being referred to by his given name in any circumstance, but especially when they are alone and domesticated, so to speak. The pressure on her wrist increases for a second before Peter relaxes, exhaling slowly.

“You’re a fucking tease, Arcadia Brodeur.”

“Don’t you forget it.”

He leans forward to capture her lips in a kiss which is so uncharacteristically soft that it takes her by surprise. His tongue moves languidly, glides effortless with hers as though they were destined to come together in some synchronised dance, and a plethora of metaphorical fireworks explode in the small room they are encased in.

“I love you,” he says against her lips, repeating the words a dozen times when his mouth leaves hers to trail wet, open-mouthed kisses across the expanse of the exposed flesh of her neck. His teeth lightly graze her collarbone, then again in the same place with a sharper bite, and Arcadia lets out a sound somewhere between a moan and a shriek at the paroxysms of pleasurable pain it leaves in its wake.

“I love you,” he rasps once more, tongue flicking out to soothe the stinging pain he had caused. Arcadia finds herself missing it, though the expert way that Peter works his tongue against her flesh more than makes up for the loss. “And I want everyone to know that you’re mine.”

He brushes his lips against her palm before finally releasing his hold on her wrist which hangs limply at her side for a moment before both of her arms wrap around his neck, clasped at his nape. The ensuing staring contest is charged with electric energy, the sexual tension so palpable one could almost certainly reach out and touch it.

“I love you too,” she says at long last when the silence has run its course. “I just wish we didn’t continue to hide away like this is something to be ashamed of.”

He cups her cheeks, thumbs rubbing soothing circles into the grooves of her cheekbones. “I’m not ashamed of us, koroleva,” he insists firmly, “I just didn’t want to put any strain on our relationship with the whole Daddy Issues thing I’ve got going on here right now.”

“You’re an idiot,” she deadpans, “if you think I wouldn’t want to be here with you every step of the way, Peter. Even if your dad is terrifying…”

“Nah, he’s a softie really,” Peter claims, “otherwise he’d have smothered me in my sleep by now with how annoying I act around him.”

“Just around him?”

Peter mock gasps. “I am hurt, Arcadia. Shocked and hurt.”

“You should get over it pretty fast, Quicksilver,” she teases before unlooping her arms and giving his abs a firm pat. “You’d better go now before Jubilee sends out a search party.”

They both know that she would, so Peter doesn’t object beyond a frustrated sigh.

“Maybe deal with that first, though,” she adds. Her hand reaches out to lightly palm him through his jeans, revelling in the ensuing groan he emits as the heat travels from her cheeks to her clit in a way that causes her knees to quiver. She hooks her thumbs into the belt loops of his jeans to steady herself.

For a moment, neither of them speak. They aren’t confident that they could string together a coherent sentence with their hips grinding together with unadulterated lust; their ragged breaths indiscernible from one another’s so that it seems impossible to know where Peter Maximoff ends and Arcadia Brodeur begins.

“To be continued,” he pants after a minute or so has passed. He takes a step back but doesn’t tear his hooded gaze away from the dishevelled Arcadia. “We’ve got unfinished business here.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” Arcadia responds, excitement rushing through her at the thought of continuing their little rendezvous. It’s excruciating to have to wait, but she figures having sex in a classroom with windows overlooking the lake where hoards of people seem to be more often than not probably isn’t the wisest decision, no matter how much she and Peter may enjoy the thrill of sneaking around so carelessly. The soft, red lace of her panties becomes wetter with the thought.

Alas, public makeout sessions are hot in places like the mall or the cinema, not so much at a school.

Pausing just before Peter leaves, she has to ask, “Seriously though; why this room?”

Peter’s smirk returns with a vengeance. It’s unclear whether this is due to whatever answer he may give, or if he’d picked up on the tremor in her voice as she’d asked. “Because Scott and Jean walk past here every day at precisely three pm,” he informs, watching with impish glee as her eyes widen comically, “and would you look at the time. No more hiding, koroleva.”

The clock strikes three hardly a second later and Peter gives a mocking salute before speeding out of the room in the blink of an eye.

“Peter Maximoff, I’m going to fucking kill you!”

Peering through the open doorway, Scott and Jean make no effort to conceal their snickering. “Might want to deal with that hickey first, Cady,” the redhead advises, flouncing away with her boyfriend before Arcadia can formulate a witty retort. She can feel the amusement emanating from the couple as they disappear.

God, she needs to get her own place. And possibly a new boyfriend. First things first: makeup.

Fallen

A03

Logan falls from heaven. Instead of dying, he finds aid from a familiar face.

...

He’s falling.

 Crashing, really.

 Through the atmosphere, through plains of reality, he’s broken the sound barrier, and he wonders if he’ll ever hit the ground. At this point, he wishes he would, just so the anticipation would be over.

 His wings burn and tear and scorch at the edges from the force of the fall. Feathers fly around him, not that they’ll cushion his eventual landing. He can see them blackening at the edges, the wind ripping them to shreds, and it hurts, oh, it hurts.

 But he’s numb. Passive. Apathetic, he supposes, is the best word, because what else can he be? There’s no way to stop this, no way to change it, the only thing he can do is give in, and hope that the ground snaps his neck on impact. Otherwise, it will be a slow, painful death.

 He would pray for mercy, but there’s not much use for prayer, now.

 God won’t answer him.

…

His breath escapes him, his heart stops beating, everything freezes for a just a moment, and it takes his brain a second to catch up with his body, for the agonizing, burning, endless waves of pure excruciation to hit his pain receptors, and he chokes on the torment in his soul.

 He tries to move, to sit, to crawl, but he can’t even twitch his fingers, even that burns with the heat of a thousand stars, sends him reeling into a darkness that swallows him whole, and he doesn’t know how long it’s been, when he wakes, days or hours, but the pain hasn’t diminished.

 He’s almost grateful he can’t seem to turn his head, because he can’t bear to see the state of his wings, he knows it’s a bad sign that he can’t feel anything at all from them, meaning more than likely they go beyond broken to unsalvageable, and that more than anything breaks him down into a howling, wretched, mess.

 He painted the sky, he placed the stars, he wove the cosmos into being, and now he can’t even touch them. Will die here, on this rock hurtling through space, without ever touching his stars again.

 And for what?

 A couple questions? His curiosity? His desire to discover everything and anything and how it all worked, and why it all worked, and somehow, somehow, that was blasphemy, when it should have been considered the purest kind of love, that he wanted to know the humans better, know their world better, well.

 He can feel blood trickling from his mouth, though he doesn’t know if it’s from internal injuries or simply because at some point in the fall he bit his tongue. He’s too tired to care. He’s cold, as well, an unusual feeling, it was never cold in heaven. Even now, his sluggish mind is trying to process the new feeling, trying to determine the consequences, trying to understand, but it was slow.

 Everything feels slow.

 He barely notices the vibrations against the ground, the footsteps approaching, until the shadow is hovering over him. He barely hears the person whistle lowly. Barely manages to open his eyes for a fleeting second, as he feels himself be moved, picked up, held, and he instinctually presses against the warmth.

 “Something did a number on you, didn’t it?” The voice murmurs, rumbling in their chest, a soothing feeling, another thing to catalogue. But he’s already slipping away, as some small movement tweaks his wing joints, and he screams at the electric anguish it sends racing through his veins.

…

Warm.

 He is warm.

 His entire being pulses with a dull, endless ache. His soul feels ripped to shreds. His heart feels shattered beyond repair.

 Yet he’s alive.

 The world is a blur. Warm browns and dark woods, something soft and gentle beneath him. Something fluffy and warm wrapped around him. He can feel something wrapped around his chest, something pinning his wings back, trapped and he hisses, tries to pull at the restraints, tries to get free, tries to escape-

 “Hey, hey, hey, don’t do that.” He freezes at that voice, a blurry shape coming into view, black hair with a white streak, and he recoils, afraid, breath hissing through his teeth at the ache sharpening to a stabbing in his skull. “Sorry, sorry, it’s okay, but, uh, you really need to leave the bandages and stuff alone. One of my friends fixed you all up, I don’t know shit about healing and stuff, but he said if you ever wanna use those again, you gotta let ‘em heal.” His breath hitches at that, and his focus didn’t sharpen, but the ache in his heart did.

 “they’re broken. they shattered on impact. Based on my velocity, into a thousand tiny pieces of bone fragments that can’t ever be pieced back together. Not only that, the flesh itself tore apart from the speed and the crash, I can’t feel them. They’re nothing more than useless weights to drag along behind me. I won’t fly again. Don’t lie to me. I’ve already lost everything, don’t lie to me.” His voice is dull and emotionless, his spark is dimmed to an ember, he doesn’t have anything left in him.

 “I’m not. I swear, they’re not a lost cause. It won’t be fast, or soon, but he said that you’ll be able to fly again. He’s, uh, not really a human, so, he used some of his voodoo magic or whatever, and it seems to have stuck.” He’s too tired to try and parse out whatever that means, but a kernel of hope is soothing the ache, now, because if he can fly, that’s all he needs, he just needs his wings, and he’ll be able to make it. He just needs the stars.

…

 He’s crying.

 He doesn’t know why, but tears are slipping down his cheeks, still half dreaming.

 He hadn’t thought it would be Patton, who would turn him in. Didn’t think he’d done anything worthy of being turned in for, which was why he hadn’t been afraid. Even as he was standing in front of the council, explaining himself, he hadn’t been afraid.

 He’d thought it all a misunderstanding.

 Until the clouds parted under him, and sent him hurtling down.

 Until Patton said he was sorry, but this was for everyone’s own good.

 Until he reached desperately up, expecting someone, anyone, to grab his hand, haul him back up, to say this was wrong, or all a joke, but instead his grasp closed on air, and he fell.

 He’s fallen.

 That doesn’t hurt. Not really. It’s the betrayal that hurts. That twists like a knife in his side, that stabs him through the heart and breaks him, because how long, how long, how long, had Patton been planning this?

 He’d thought Patton was curious, like him, he always listened so attentively, always asked questions, the only one who actually cared about his speculations and interests and studies.

 And it had all been a lie.

 It would make him angry, if he had anything left in him besides tired, down trodden, defeat.

 He should have been smarter than this. He knows how pure Patton sees himself, sees the other angels, sees heaven. He knows how he looks for corruption everywhere, how he supported the flood, but he’d just been glad someone wanted to listen.

 And it cost him.

 “-been sleeping.”

 “Still, I’d like to check on him. Those wounds need redressing.” A new voice, soft and sibilant, soft voice, one he almost recognized, almost remembered, but his memories seem blurry on the subject.

 He cracks open his eyes as footsteps approach, the room slightly less blurry, now, he supposes some of the swelling on his face must have gone down, allowing his eyes to open fully.  

 A face comes into view. One half is covered with golden scales, that trail down from his eyes and extend down his wrist, encasing his hands in their soft shimmer, one eye a snake’s, the other a dark, nearly coal, black, and there’s something strange and graceful and ageless about him.

 “serpent.” He greets, voice rasping and whispery, and he sees the figure inhale sharply, take a step back.

 “logan. Oh, stars, what did they do to you?” He isn’t sure how the serpent knows his name, but he doesn’t care. His eyes are slipping shut and he doesn’t have the strength to keep them open anymore, he doesn’t care what happens to him, he just wants to sleep and never wake up. “Shhh, it’ll be ok, love. Jussst sssleeep.”

….

Remus watches as Deceit smooths back the winged man’s hair, Logan, he’d said, a strange look on his face, a strange combination of anger and fierce softness.

 “You know him.” He says, and Deceit lets out a soft sigh, running a hand through his hair.

 “I know all of them, Remus. I was there when they were made.”

 “But you know him, personally.” Deceit’s shoulders tense, but he doesn’t answer, instead shifting his attention back to Logan.

 “He’ll be out for a while. He’s exhausted as is, and my influence will keep him that way long enough to do what needs to be done. I’d rather he not be awake, it’s going to hurt considerably rebandaging and preening those wings. You might want to lay down a tarp. This will get messy.”

…

 He remembers something.

 Distant, hazy, broken pieces of thoughts.

 Painting the stars, laughing at something someone else said, someone with a golden glow and long brown locks, hazel eyes alit with the cosmos.

 Speaking beneath a tree, well, more of an idea of a tree, a conceptualization of a tree, a fuzzy, hesitant painting of one. They are mapping the sky, planning it out, tracing future constellations.

 Patton. Sky blue wings, ripping away the gold. For his own good. Too many questions, too many doubts, too many mistakes, but he wouldn’t let him, he was wrong!

 Patton froze. His expression morphed into something cold, something that made him feel something new… fear.

 He was afraid as Patton gripped his arm too hard, shoved him back, somehow freezing him in place. Bright light lit the space, Janus screamed, colors flashed, his vision went dark, and everything stopped.

…

He shoots awake.

 His wings are still pinned back, but he can feel them, now, a relief, though they ache, yet.  

 He can hear speaking. He forces himself to his feet, nearly tumbling over at the dull wash of pain, at the unbalanced weight of his wings behind him, which would usually help steady him or be tucked primly back, now hindered by splints and bandages. His head swims, so full of memories and shifting images and he needs to get there, needs to reach him, so he forces himself forwards, leaning heavily against the walls, until he reaches a doorway, trips over a rug, and goes falling to the floor.

 Impact never comes, someone swears, and catches him, and he opens his eyes to those mismatched ones, so strange, but so familiar, and he doesn’t hesitate, now, to throw his arms around him, and cry.

 “I know, darling. It hurts. But it will be alright.” Janus murmurs to him, clearly mistaking his anguish as being borne of his fall, or his wounds, and he shakes as he feels him card a hand through his hair.

 “I’m sorry.” He manages, through great, gasping heaves of air.

 “shh, there’s nothing to apologize for, love.” He’s so kind, even now, he’s so kind, even when Janus thinks he doesn’t know him, doesn’t recognize him, even when Logan is simply another fallen angel, and Janus is supposed to be the tempting serpent, he’s kind, and it’s such a Janus way to spite Patton, who turned him into this, into the face of deception and trickery, accidentally giving him the keys to all the knowledge he’d ever sought.

 “my fault. You f-fell and it’s m-my fault. Patton did this to you, b-because I said he was wrong, he did this to you, and then he m-made me f-forget.” He stutters, feeling Janus freeze, his breath caught in his throat, and a hand is tilting up his chin, to meet those endless eyes.

 “what did you say? What… this is a trick. A trap. A ploy. He wouldn’t-“ He cuts off Janus, pressing their lips together, closing the space between them, and Janus is suddenly holding him close, desperate for his warmth, and he very nearly laughs at the joy surging through him as they part.

 “Janus. You are Janus. The serpent of Eden, the guardian of knowledge, everything Patton did to hurt you only made you stronger, and I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I should have fought harder, I should have remembered, I shouldn’t have let him continue to use me, I should have known-“

 “you can’t know everything, love. His power is strong, he’s ruled as a tyrant for so long, I’m… I didn’t expect you to remember, ever.” Janus murmurs, gaze roving over every inch of his face, his hands caressing his arms, as if once he stopped, Logan would vanish. “I’ve missed you.” Janus presses another kiss to Logan's lips. “I looked at the stars every night, remembering you. I’m sorry for the pain, but I’m selfishly not sorry you fell, not when it means you’re here with me.”

 “I’m not either. I’m not sorry. I’m so proud of you, Janus. I…” his voice breaks, and he buries his head against Janus's chest. “I love you.”

 “I love you, too, darling dearest.”

 “I'm sorry. He took the sky from you. I’m sorry.” He cries softly, feeling Janus rock him.

 “it doesn’t matter. You’ll still have them. And I have you. That’s what matters, Logan. You are my stars. You are my universe, and Patton failed, because we are together, and that is all I’ve ever dreamed.”

 They stay like that, holding each other, whispering memories and I love yous and kissing for a long time, drowning in each other until the sun set and the stars rose.

*2 - G h o s t

It was a rainy month, for the third time. She had been counting, clumsily striking a line in every calendar’s box every year, every month. Third year. Yet she still couldn’t figure out why she should cared anymore. First Sunday. She spent the rest of the day baking cookies, then two minutes of peaceful tea time with some decent books, the clock was ticking and crawling at the same time. She never knew was it her who keep dragging the day off of it’s hook, or was it the time. If she could feel almost none, then maybe it was what she had been desiring and struggling to grasp. The cookies were a bit overcooked, with blackened spots here and there she almost mistook it as the sprinkles and chocochips but the burnt scent told her otherwise. She tried to get a nice, warm slumber in between the threshing of heavy rain, and wild stormy clouds billowing around the tiny house, the tiny world she had formed all over again. She was almost alone considering the fact that her parents worshipped their jobs much more than the average parents would be, and it had it’s perks, like scattered used kitchen utensils, procrastinating concerning dirty plates, et cetera. But it most definitely held all the bad things at once, like the relentless brainstorming that constantly hammering her almost firm fortress. She kept herself busy to fill the empty gaps—sweeping the floor, lurking between the bookshelves, another sweeping the floor, learning the cracks on the wall, painting, avoiding any forms of writing, singing off-key and on, the order wasn’t always like that. Because once she rested for a bit, someone was ready to appear and always on the verge to claim her once more, she knew it better. The darkened eyebags and the evident hollow cheeks were often speaking much more than the words could do. She could never not being dramatic about those lurking shadows—sometime she was choked by memories and she gasped for air. “Why haven’t you gone home?” Her mother once asked, the second Sunday of the rainy month. Rain was being generous enough to allow her tracing the street with her worn out sneakers and thick hoodie in the early morning, some flower were starting to bloom and flourish out of nowhere, but she lamented those newborn flowers. They’d have been dead again by the time the next hurricane arrived, and she was silent for a moment longer, staring at nothing but the blossom. Her mother question had bewildered her for a second longer, her fingernails were polished with brown stains of brownies, she didn’t seem to care enough. “What do you mean, Ma, I am home.” She coughed because the weather had been shabby and even her Dad was starting to catch a cold. “I gotta finish the brownies, or else the taste would be anything but yummy.” I tried to point my smile at her and she smiled a bit back. _ _ _ _ She blamed the scrapbook. Sometimes, you were born petulant, or you were only cranky at some particular points, and some people go breakdown in tears whenever the rage was piling up too much it suffocated their heads, their blood vessels, their stomachs, their hands started to tremble and she could barely think. She had cried in silence at 2 A.M., and she knew she just [had] to call her therapist—her parents had been oblivious to it. So she called and her therapist’s words echoed inside her head for the next six, seven hours. – “Every one has their own limit of strength, and maybe yours is just about this heartbreak, but then it’s your decision to expand your limits or just get stuck right there, for no one knows how long. You can’t lose your demons, honey, you can only learn how to live above them.” The third Sunday of the month, she learned to stop drawing lines with red marker on the calendar, she decided to pack the previous calendars into a medium sized box and was ready to dump it all. The scrapbook smelled of memories, strong stench of the days behind and the particular someone who kept lurking behind her without her noticing. Somehow, she wanted to just befriend the shadow instead of spending her years cultivating a pointless resentment. Hatred is only eating you alive through your bones and flesh, to the extent that you feel like dying and not entirely living. Some nights, she reminisced the way he greeted her for the first time and those sugar coated words whispered in the gloomy nights. They had met, in the middle of summer, two years prior. “Hey, do I know you?” “We... were in the same group?” “Crap. Sorry. Yes, how—how are you?” They started with question marks sprawling in the end of those tiny sentences, awkward smiles and stammering speeches, and the days stampede like a herd of elephants, and she remembered how he had made her smile much brighter than before and showed her bunch of flourishing emotions. Of course, of course what they possessed was astounding and mesmerizing. She woke up alarmed. Her fingers had been trembling until she barked a cough and fetched a glass of water. She always woke up whenever the nightmare was getting to an end, it never let her finish. _ _ _ “Why don’t you just go out? Go somewhere with your friends, you’ve been around at home far too long.” Her mother was like a common mother, who’d get into her nerves because her daughter didn’t look content enough or colorful enough. She wouldn’t blame her; she had felt a bit dull and grayish about herself. “I have. I’m tired, Ma, how many times I’ve to tell you—” “Or why don’t you just. You know,” She was choosing words, “go back, even though the summer holiday isn’t over yet—” “Ma!” I’ve got it. I’ve finally reached the peak—the summit of my stalwart mountain, the pit of my chasm. It suddenly seemed as if the world had been stop moving and also her, and her mother, and her emotions, and her damned past lives and lovers, and she was a frail one, she was the lost one—and that moment hit her like a freight train, so hard, immensely painful and she turned the saucer she held into shards of broken ceramics. “I CAN’T, I can’t, it’s too painful and stop ordering me around, for God’s sake!” She ran, once again dodging from the ghosts from her past, from his fake laced words, from the whispers beneath. She didn’t know—maybe it was her final breakdown, maybe it was the leak of her dam, the water was finally breaking through the plastered cracks, nothing could barely contain it anymore. She stopped somewhere, in the meadow near the house’s backyard, silencing herself, muting the world. And she cried, in a total silence, she heard none. She might had clawed the dirt, because amongst the horrid muted noises, she smelled of blood and soil. She refused. She refused to be played by the shadows. The gauntlet emerging from her past lover—nothing particular, nothing out of common, only a piece of her that had been robbed away with no previous warnings, because nothing mattered more than sharing a piece of you but then they took it away with no guilt. It was not about her and the lover, or how cheesy love storylines ended, it had been all about her and herself all along, and she hadn’t noticed until that moment. The clouds started to assemble, gushes of cold wind cramming her lungs—it was about to rain. And she would let her ghosts get washed away with the rain too. _ _ _ That night she met the ghost once more—the ones with black surroundings encircling, hands were ever so gentle, persuading herself to the past lives. She remembered how he said "love, love, love" affectionately to her ears, and it wasn’t her fault that she admitted those, she succumbed and she approved. Then maybe, he was whispering it, right at that moment, to another girl, another name, another body she could never make out. The thoughts, however, easened up her pain. She faced the shadows. They were about to fade out, the glimmer of worn out candle almost vanished when she reached out, and grabbed it back—the moving haunting shadow she had feared, she would never, NEVER, going to go back to the old her, filling gaps with voiceless movements and dead soul. She had had enough. The shadow before her struggled, forcing it’s shivering arms off of her grip, cursing her loudly. She stood still, pulling forcefully, clambering to her bed. The candle lightened up the face. Her mouth gaped, she could never arrange the words. The shadow was her. Herself. She screamed at the real her, in excruciating pain, rendered her speechless and by the time she blinked, she shouted back: “I let go. I let it all go.” She hadn’t realized there were also real tears flowing down her cheeks, a catapult storming her stance. When it all turned into a silence, the night had felt lighter and easier, although she was still trembling. She let herself go, after a while of restraining herself entirely, imprisoned by the memories, letting all those mockings and snide remarks, letting her hatred towards someone she once loved dearly, she must not hate. And she breathed in a bit. Maybe Mama was right. This was probably not her only home anymore. Maybe where the past and the memories that laid down, that was home too. And all the while she had been rejecting her past, [herself] from encountering her real inner peace. Sometimes, the only escape from those demons is coming back to the demons themselves. That way, you could eventually rescue yourself and that's what matters. Suddenly, after all this time, she was ready to come h o m e. ------ Kepada: Mbak Zaragila Isi: Kalo baper, pegangan. Kalo ngga, hamdalah.

My Southeast Asia Curse

Southeast Asia Part 2: Not for the faint of heart

On my Birthday we took the night train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, and I got sick. I’ve gotten sick before, but I’ve never experienced this: literally, in one moment, I felt it come on 100%. In that moment, I felt my body go from not sick to very sick in less than 60 seconds. One of the weirdest things I’ve ever felt. Now that I look back, I think it was brewing for a while, but it hit me like a ton of rocks. In the throat. (And to top it off, I also started my period and had awful cramps.)

Wish I could have enjoyed it more, because it was beautiful to wake up in the middle of the jungle at sunrise!

This made the night train hard and the arrival in Chiang Mai excruciating. I began to feel delirious, like I couldn’t move or keep my eyes open. I could barely remember where I was. That night, Tim escorted me to a Thai Urgent Care. 

If you’ve never been ill in a foreign country, it’s hard to understand. You’re halfway across the world and feel completely destroyed. You don’t speak the language, don’t have a handle on the currency, don’t know anything about their medical system. Can you trust these doctors? Will they even understand you? Will I know what medicine I’m being given? And yet, there you are, and you have no alternative. Thank God Tim was there to hold my hand through it because I literally couldn’t even get to the clinic myself. We got there and the line was long, the bathroom was dirty, and I was scared. I began sobbing in front of everyone in the waiting room, including 4 monks. But I calmed down, the doctor was grea,  and he spoke English enough to help me. I got out of there with 3 prescriptions and a visit for about $20USD.

So when our Elephant Sanctuary reservation came up a couple of days later, I was feeling better and thought I’d be okay. I couldn’t miss the elephants! Unfortunately after that excitement, I took another turn for the worse. I had a BLAST, but a baby elephant hurt me a little bit when he tried to crawl in my lap and suck on my shoulder. I think he was just playing and loved me a lot. But he didn’t seem to realize that he’s heavy even though he’s a BEBE!

It was kinda cute though and didn’t hurt TOO bad, though I did get a bruise out of it. 

I’m going to skip forward for now and come back to Chiang Mai in another post. Let’s continue on my list of toils and troubles.

I made it to Cambodia on my own. My hotel was to include a free airport shuttle, so I didn’t have to worry about currency exchange just yet. Only problem? They didn’t answer their phone or their email. I had $14USD. Luckily, my ride cost me $10. But it was stressful!

Later I went out to get dinner. I stumbled into an alley toward a temple when, out of nowhere, I was hit so hard from behind that I fell. For a moment, I thought I was being run over by a car and I actually thought it was the end. Then I looked up and saw a huge dog sprinting off in front of me. People stared and looked to see if I was okay. I was so shaken up and was shocked to feel tears coming down my face. The back of my legs were on FIRE. I wiped myself down with some antibacterial clothes I always keep with me (gotta have a safety kit), and was really happy to realize that my skin hadn’t been broken. Otherwise, I probably would have had to get rabies shots.

Here’s a grainy, zoomed in picture bruise a few days later (because I’m trying not to show you my whole tush):

I don’t know if he hit me with his paws or his mouth- it was so fast that I honestly don’t know what happened! But the spot where he hit me swelled up into large red welts immediately. It hurt to walk in the coming days. It has been shifting color to deep purple and green and looks nasty now. It’s still swollen even! So that was scary.

Then I got a Tuk Tuk back to my hotel, only he couldn’t find my hotel anywhere. It was a new hotel and a little off the beaten path. We had agreed to a dollar amount (which I had in my wallet), but because he couldn’t find the place, I was worried I wouldn’t have enough to pay him! And worried he’d never find my hotel! Plus, I had no cell phone. Still reeling from the dog attack, I was again in tears by the time I got to the hotel. And it turned out they had given me the wrong map, a map to their sister hotel. I explained to them how frightening that was for me as I am traveling alone!

I curled up into my hotel room, let it all out in another huge cry, then got ready to take a bath. As I was letting the water in, I heard a huge CRASH. I walked out and found a huge plank on the floor by the desk and could not for the life of me figure out where it came from. I looked at the ceiling. I looked at the furniture. Where did this plank come from and why was there a cat meowing at me now?!?!?!?

(A nearby cat sensed my grief and, I think, wanted to comfort me. She started meowing incessantly at all my windows. I think her intention was good, but it just added to the spookiness).

I tried to relax in the bath but I couldn’t let it go. I came out in the room again and realized that the plank had fallen from the ceiling RIGHT OVER MY BED. So, had I been sleeping, it could have fallen on me.

I’m not superstitious, but at this point I believed I was under some curse:

-I was sick.

-I was having cramps.

- I was stepped on by a baby elephant.

-I was attacked by a dog.

- My airport shuttle didn’t come and I barely had enough currency to make it to my hotel.

- I was lost in a strange city by myself.

- A plank fell from my ceiling over my bed.

I had to get out. I called the hotel manager and said that I didn’t feel safe and I wanted to leave. After he called his boss, he told me that they were going to transport me to their sister hotel, which was luxury Villas. I had a huge place to myself, a rooftop pool, a beautiful bathroom, and a kitchen. To make sure I was always safe and sound, they gave me a cell phone and a private driver for my entire stay. They apologized so hard … I’ve never seen anything like it. It was like they were almost crying because they felt so bad. And then they waited on me hand and foot.

Everything went up from there. The curse has been lifted.

(And I really enjoyed that private rooftop pool).

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Update: The curse wasn’t quite lifted. Got sick (stomach) in Taiwan, got a massive amount of shower gel in my eye one night, and then the upper respiratory came back with a vengeance on the way home. :-0 At least now I am home and can rest up!