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raz-writes-the-thing · 8 months

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Sleepy Things (Good Omens Drabble)

Aziraphale x Crowley x GN!Reader / requests are: open

Summary: Aziraphale and Crowley sleep much, but they love to cuddle you to sleep when the opportunity arises.

CW: none, just incredibly soft.

Gomens tag list: @coffee-and-red-lipstick @quickslvxrr (send an ask to be added to a tag list!)

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Neither Aziraphale nor Crowley tend to sleep much. They didn’t need to. Aziraphale, in fact, didn’t like to sleep at all if he could avoid it. He’d much rather spend the time poring over a first edition from 1270AD, or restoring old manuscripts than spend the time with his eyes closed and asleep.

Crowley on the other hand, did like to sleep. Not all the time, and not overly often, but sometimes he’d enjoy a little kip. The only thing that was unpredictable about Crowley’s sleep pattern was how long he’d sleep for. Would it be three hours, three days or three weeks? You’d never know for sure until he deigned himself to wake up.

And yet, despite neither of them being overly fond of sleep, here they were. Curled up on either side of you. Crowley was currently occupied being your big spoon, and Aziraphale was cuddled up to your front, your face resting on the soft cotton of his pyjama top. He’d bought a pair just so he could cuddle in bed with you.

Crowley was shirtless, the heat radiating off him in waves. Crowley’s choice for pyjamas was either completely naked or a dark pair of faded track pants slung low on his hips. He was nuzzling up against your hair, taking a soft sniff of your shampoo every once in a while. You were fading in and out of consciousness, trying to hang on to keep yourself awake and in this precious, soft moment.

“Come on now, love,” Crowley says quietly into your ear. “No use in fighting it- eh?”

“He’s right you know,” Aziraphale says. If you didn’t know better, you’d almost think he sounded vaguely scolding. You can feel the loving smile coming off his face, though.

One of your Angel’s hands traced over your side and across your body to draw lines into Crowley’s exposed torso. The Demon took a deep and contented breath, and you yawned quietly, trying to hide just how harshly sleep tugged at you. Aziraphale brushed your nose with his forefinger before returning it to its former place across the both of you. “Look how tired you are, sweet thing.”

Crowley snuggles closer to yours and Aziraphale’s touch, trying to expose as much skin as he can to Aziraphale’s reach. He’d never admit it out loud, but he was quite the fan of casual contact. He was always sidling up to one of you, or both if available and subtly touching you, or quietly requesting someone touch him. A pat to the thigh, a brush of the hair, a chaste kiss when no one was looking.

“Mm-” Crowley grunts quietly, sounding like he’s close to dropping off too, to be honest. “Exhausted. Absolutely worn out, aren’t you, Pet?”

You hum in agreement, your eyelids drooping closed. Your legs stretched out, the muscles squeaking from disuse. Aziraphale chuckled and pressed a kiss to the top of your head.

“My loves,” he says softly. “Sleepy things. Go on and sleep now. I’ve got my Austen, I’ll be here when you wake.”

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multitrackdrifting · 8 months

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My latest video is about how shame can be an effective narrative device for exploring certain themes & and ideas within a story. Spec Ops: The Line is the main reason this discussion exists. It's a generic military shooter that often gets mistaken as a critique on war or violence, but it's not actually a critique of either. It just has the appropriate aesthetics to work as one. The game is mostly a meta-commentary on gaming influenced by the medium in the early 2010s, interrogating game & narrative design.

To dispel the idea that agency is required to make shame a meaningful narrative device, I thoroughly explain why the lack of choice is essential to the setting of Spec Ops, before it contrasting with Baldur's Gate 3 which gives you plenty of choices, but vocal fans will still criticise the game for disengaging them by presenting them with confronting dialogues & outcomes.

Shame often grounds meaningful consequences, and some people despise that no matter what form that takes.

youtube

#video essay #spec ops the line #baldurs gate 3 #gaming essay #heed the content warning before watching thanks #Youtube

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ejbcya · 1 year

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Tengoku Daimakyou / Heavenly Delusion by Ishiguro Masakazu

Volumes 1–8

#Tengoku Daimakyou #Heavenly Delusion #i know that seinen and monthly series are real niche niche but like no one posted any cover art here yet x.x #saw the anime pv and was intrigued so i binged the 52 chp out and whew #really really compelling worldbuilding but do heed the content warnings orz #excited for the anime next week nonetheless lots on the watchlist this spring

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will-ow-the-wisp · 11 months

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You WILL play Echo VN

#it's free!! do it NOW #Echo vn #Arches vn #Echovn #Heed the content warnings tho cause it's A Lot lol #furry #furry art #Leo Alvarez #Chase Hunter

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teruthecreator · 1 year

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(tw for racism, pedophilia, transphobia, child impregnation mention)

yeah idk why y'all read this

i was originally going to just post this and have some tags with my reasonings, but i realized that opens me up to too much bullshit from people who may think i'm being unnecessarily mean or whatever. so i'm going to explain exactly why the screenshots above are something i hold issue with.

firstly, and i just want to get this out of the way, this post is not intended to be a hit piece against the creator. i've seen how she reacts to any mild-mannered or slightly joking criticism, so i know this post is probably going to not land well. but it isn't my intention to make her mad or anything--she's writing a piece of content for the internet, which means she is just as open to criticism as any other poster. and what i intend to go into in this post is criticism. i'm allowed to do this, as that is the nature of the internet. people are allowed to critique whatever they please, and if you don't want critique then you shouldn't post. simple as!

i am also making no attempts to posit myself as better than the creator. i'm not doing this for clout or moral superiority or any of that dumb shit. i simply want to discuss something that's been bothering me for a bit, while simultaneously warning people who haven't read this yet (who may be sensitive to the issues above) to steer clear. if things like casual racism or transphobia aren't properly tagged, then readers who are affected by such things run a risk reading this! same goes with people who are triggered by lewd content involving minors. i wanna make sure people are getting a more critical scope of this work than what has been hoisted up by others.

okay, now that i've gotten that out of the way, i'm going to get into my points.

firstly, the subtle and not-so-subtle racism throughout this fic, especially in relation to serizawa. i'm white, so there is only so much i can speak on without trampling over the words of other fans of color, but some of this feels so blatant it's odd it hasn't been noted earlier. it's important to note before i go into it that serizawa is specifically written as half-black half-japanese for this fic, in case the screenshots don't make it abundantly clear. but there are just too many moments of casual racism in this fic. i'm not talking about the plot point of serizawa being bullied as a kid for being mixed; i'm not mixed, so i can't speak on the accuracy there but it is well-known that black people face a lot of racism in japan. i'm talking about how it seems everyone else has these racist moments that aren't acknowledged by serizawa or the narration as being bad.

reigen hypothesizing over serizawa's exact ethnic background is just strange. yes he's a fairly observant guy (he has to be, with his job), but there is no canonical evidence to suggest he would immediately jump to theorizing whether serizawa is american or not. and the way it's posed in that first quote--"he has darker skin and the kind of hair texture that would likely indicate African ancestry"--is not great. that's an extremely inappropriate way to bring up someone's race. i don't think most people would stare at someone and be like "hmmm well your nose shape and hair texture would suggest you're of this race". it's racial essentialization that is only slightly covered up by the excuse of "oh he tweets in english". there are some other smaller moments of questionable wording, like calling serizawa's afro "sloppy" when it isnt (which btw there's another issue with the creator only referring to an afro as a "fro". it's a hairstyle; you're allowed to use the actual name of it). even if reigen cuts his hair in canon, he never states it's because serizawa's afro looks sloppy. (also there's something to be said about the casual racism baked into making your employee cut his natural hairstyle for a job, as that is a very real issue many black people face when wearing their natural hair or even protective styles in the workplace.)

i'm especially bothered by toichiro's very casual racist remarks. toichiro in this fic is a general bother of mine (most of which can be boiled down to "he would not fucking say that"), but the way she chooses to characterize him in relation to serizawa feels gross. calling a black man a slave should be a very obvious red flag, but also saying serizawa (again, as a black man) has a "brutal masculine appeal" is also extremely stereotypical and racist. and really there is just no need for it; toichiro's actions in canon prove how shitty of a guy he is without the need for him to be racist (along with other things i'll get to in a bit). as my girlfriend put it: he doesn't need to be a member of the fucking kkk to show he's a bad guy.

there's also, again, the very casual racist remark of calling serizawa a "dog". i don't care if that isn't the intent; when you are writing a character of color you need to be aware of your wording, even in insults (unless she intended to make tsuchiya racist, which i don't think she did).

secondly, the eugenics/child pregnancy bit. it is surreal to even have to write this, but i seriously do not understand the purpose of either of these bits in the story. they are so minor yet so jarring you can't help but wonder why they're there. once again, i do not think you need to have toichiro doing esper eugenics just to prove he is an evil guy. he has nuance, and by making him casually reference child pregnancy (like that isn't an INSANE thing to say) reduces that nuance to nothing. that's the only reason i could see why that bit was included: to make toichiro look worse. but, even still, the author is running the risk of potentially triggering victims of csa or people who don't want to see that by not properly tagging the mention of it (or, at the very least, warning readers in the intro notes). the only other explanation for it would maybe be shock factor??? but that's a pretty shitty thing to use for shock factor, if i'm honest. also the fact that the esper eugenics was referenced again in a more recent chapter just has me very disturbed and confused. there isn't a canonical explanation for why we see less espers who are women than espers who are men, but that doesn't mean we need to jump to fucking Eugenics. it's weird!

thirdly (and this is probably one of my biggest problems and the main reason i wanted to make this post), the weirdly lewd/sexual language shou uses constantly, along with referring to reigen as a pedo or a creep at several points. frankly, i think it's pretty fucking gross for someone in their near-40's to be writing a 12-year-old talking so casually about sex like that's normal. which, i'm sorry, but it's not. yes, teens know about sex and like to joke about lewd shit. but a 12-year-old is not about to make references to a grown man's virginity. 12-year-olds draw dicks on their desk bc they think it's funny. 12-year-olds say the word "buttfuck" because it has the words "butt" and "fuck" in it, and those are the two funniest words on earth to a kid that age. i literally do not understand the purpose of having shou be so lewd all the time. for one, it doesn't make sense for his character. shou is shown time and time again to be extremely mature for his age, but that maturity extends to shit like assembling a counter-terrorism unit and extending a hand to his father to allow him to try again. and even then he's still just as naive as any other kid his age! the omake where he's telling his guys to go to the "far right corner" based on ritsu’s advice proves that he still has plenty of blindspots that are indicative of his age. leaning into this raunchy, lewd version of shou is just weird. and, again, i think it is made a bit weirder given the author's age!!! not ageshaming or whatever--i'm 23 and i write fanfic, clearly i cannot judge there--but it is just extremely inappropriate in my opinion. also having shou be more versed in sextalk than serizawa is odd too and speaks to a larger issue of serizawa's infantilzation throughout this fic, but that's something i can get into in another post if people want an explanation.

also, the way she constantly calls reigen a creep and even has him being accused of being a pedophile during the twitter cancellation is extremely inappropriate when, again, there is NO CANONICAL BASIS FOR THIS! everyone just calls him a fraud and a scammer during separation arc; there is never a reference to reigen being seen as a pedophile in that arc. and, yes, while there are versions of mob psycho where reigen is very clearly written as a creep (looking very specifically at the netflix adaptation), that doesn't mean it's good. honestly, the creep mentions all just feel like really poor jokes that do not land in the slightest.

finally, the transphobia (aka WHY IS SHIMAZAKI A CHASER). i literally do not know what else to say other than: why? why is this a thing? why is he a chaser? what is the purpose of this? is it a joke? i feel like it's supposed to be, but seeing as the author is cis i don't think that's a joke she should really be making. it not only comes out of left field, but it's just kind of a weird thing to ascribe to a character for no reason. not to mention, it's uncomfortable! trans women deal with enough creepy antics from cis men in real life--why must they be accosted by this guy too? it's just weird and uncomfortable.

i wanna round out this post by saying, once again, that i'm not trying to attack anyone with this post. but i do hope people come away from this with a new perspective on this work, and maybe think twice before recommending it uncritically to someone. to the author specifically, i hope you can read my post without rage or indignance blinding you. i might be a little blunt or rude in parts, but it's only because i'm passionate and i don't mince my words when it comes to things i'm passionate about. to the readers, understand i am not judging you for reading this fic without noticing these things. your own life experiences will give you certain blindspots and there's nothing wrong with that. i have plenty of blindspots of my own! it's what makes us human.

there is more i could say, but this post is long enough. i ask that if you come to me in my inbox or in dms about this that you treat me with respect, as i will do that for you. writing something like this took a lot out of me, as i'm usually not so open about my opinion on shit like this.

have a good day :-)

#mp100 #side quest #yeah this is all from <- that fic btw #ive been sitting on this for about a week or so bc ive been nervous abt posting something like this #i dont want people to think im making a callout post just to call shit out #im doing this bc i dont want people to get triggered by this content and because i want fans to be more critical of the content they consum #media literacy is something A LOT of fandoms struggle with and it leads to things being praised uncritically #i simply want people to have perspective when going into a thing #anyways uh. goodbye <3 #edit: took the tw tags off bc tumblr was suppressing the post bc of it #so PLEASE heed the warning at the top if u have specific triggers and things

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wuntrum · 9 months

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visceral horror book leaves thousands mouths agape in equal amounts of disgust and awe

#personal #just finished chlorine by jade song. AOUGH #its very intense but very good #if you want my shallow end thesis piece to be real: read this in the mean time #definitely heed the content warnings in the authors note though #the whole thing isnt intense body horror but when it goes there. it Goes

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emmalovesdilemmas · 8 months

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[chuckles] i’m in danger

#brainwyrms #alison rumfitt #i did not heed this advice and i don’t regret it #she did it again #it being making me feel viscerally ill and upset (affectionate)#def check out content warnings for this book if you’re thinking of reading it #i love books that play around with structure #and the way she used second person was really cool in this one

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blocksgame · 9 months

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This is not the first time Pac and Cellbit have been trapped on an island together. Everything's changed, but by how much? Months later, isolated and afraid, Pac poisons himself to find a cure. After it works, Cellbit tries to prove to him that he is not completely alone. Sure, everything's changed, but by how much?

I heard we were whumping q!Pac and or giving him bespoke weird trauma-derived hurt/comfort/flirty/fear dynamics with q!Cellbit, for instance vis-à-vis the thing where he ate Pac's leg. I love that. I want in. Consider my entry.

#qsmp fanfiction #qsmp fic #celltw #q!pactw #q!cellbit #heed the content warnings! enjoy!

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saturnisfallingdown · 2 years

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consuming media that makes you go "how am I expected to integrate into society normally after this"

#red valley #this post is about podcast red valley #please please listen to red valley (heeding the content warnings)#red valley syndrome. instead of brain there is red valley

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silverliningspidey · 1 month

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dps book has been bouncing around the mail since friday maybe its a blessing in disguise

#where are you going little book? why are you across the country #look i have heard ur warnings and i’m heeding none of it #dead poets society #also need to hunt down the script somewhere #i will suck all the marrow out of dps content #i just want to annotate it ok 😔#dps

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sapphicstacks · 10 months

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“There you are,” Ava smiled softly. Her heart settled slightly when Beatrice softened, too. The fear and grief in her eyes were starting to ease, though regret was growing to fill the space.

chapter 16 of choose the devil i know (over the heaven I don’t) on ao3 now

#heed the content warning for this one #i beg of you #avatrice firefighter au #sapphicstacks ao3

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susielesbianism · 4 months

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Been watching people play Home Safety Hotline recently and oh my god y’all please fuckinng play it it’s so good

#heed the content warnings though. it is a horror game and as such can be heavy at times #chief among them is unreality. including but not limited to the fact that the game uses a windows 95-esque ui #the game also has implied child death and implied animal death at certain points #there are also phobia settings that you can check and uncheck if you don’t want to see certain things #other than that it’s the type of game you should definitely experience as blindly as possible #I know im posting this on the ut/dr blog but I have more followers here so. exposure yknow

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rambunctioustoons · 1 month

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They tell you. Over and over, they don't have Sun or Moon's memories. Yet here they are, mumbling phrases all too familiar. In a voice that's not reminiscent at all.

eclipse / reader

#writings #holds this out to you and lets it splat like cold soup all over the ground #this isnt connected to anything just garbled hurt/comfort :v #pls be gentle and heed the content warnings!!#eclipse is sweet everyone is just sad lmao

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omgpurplefattie · 5 months

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When Di Feisheng took his revenge on the old man at Di Fortress, he accidentally freed all the current little assassins-in-training, but wanted nothing to do with them. Fang Duobing involved his mother and her resources from Tianji Hall, who found sects and trades for all the children -- except three who seem too broken to hand over to other sects or masters. Zhan Yunfei and He Xiaofeng try to take responsibility for them, but it's not that easy.

When Di Feisheng first comes to Tianji Hall post-canon, he realizes nobody can talk sense to these kids except him, so he takes the kids under his wing, professing to hate every moment of it. However, it seems to be working -- until the morning of the second Qingming festival after Li Lianhua's death, when suddenly, dramatically and catastrophically, things go wrong.

Di Feisheng and Fang Duobing have to deal with the consequences -- for the children, for the He family, for themselves.

Many thanks to @lyselkatz for cheering-on and help with this fic! 💜

@deepbluewithyellow -- here is the fic I mentioned when you asked for DFS centric recs. Enjoy!

#mysterious lotus casebook #di feisheng #fang duobing #what happened to the di fortress kids?#post-canon #li lianhua is dead and gone #heed the archive and content warnings for this fic #heavy themes #difang #with special guest apearance by #zhan yunfei

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agerefandom · 1 year

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Baby Steps

Fandom: Twilight

Characters: regressor!Bella Swan, caregiver!Charlie Swan

Words: 2,900

Summary: After Edward leaves, Bella is left in a shattered, dissociative state. Her father doesn’t know what to do, but eventually he starts to put the pieces together and discovers that age regression might be a way to get through to his daughter again.

Warnings: Detailed descriptions of depression: lethargy, dissociation, disordered sleep and eating. Hurt/comfort with a lot of angst. A lot of feelings about mental health and helplessness.

for @little-biscuit2

It had been almost three months.

Three months, and Charlie didn’t know what to do.

It had never felt more like he lived alone. Bella spent most of her time in her room, and when Charlie coaxed her down for food or to watch TV, she didn’t seem to process any of it. He had even tried putting on reality TV instead of sports, but her blank expression didn’t change, her eyes reflecting the glare of the television.

She didn’t eat if Charlie didn’t feed her, and even then her appetite was small: she was losing weight and she was already too thin to begin with, in Charlie’s opinion. She swung between oversleeping and sleeping far too little, with Charlie coming in and finding her sitting in her chair, gazing out the window well past midnight.

He had just been getting to know his daughter: independent, clumsy, smart as hell, always taking care of the people around her. And now she was gone, retreated somewhere deep inside herself, and he had no idea how to get her back.

It was killing him. It was killing both of them.

Charlie had Renee fly in for a weekend, just to see if that would shake Bella out of her fog. Bella had smiled, and hugged her mother, but it didn’t reach her eyes, and she still wouldn’t speak more than a few sentences. Renee wouldn’t stop holding her, and Bella just laid in her arms, her expression as still as the lake in the morning, and revealing just as little.

Renee had cried, and Charlie had given her an awkward hug, and made food for everyone. Renee stayed for two nights, and left in tears. Bella hadn’t moved to comfort her, had hardly seemed to register Renee’s presence.

‘Desperate’ didn’t begin to cover the way that Charlie was feeling.

Bella’s grades were dropping, though she seemed willing to be driven to school and to walk through her classes in that same disconnected haze. She didn’t participate, and only occasionally finished her homework. Charlie had met with her teachers and they were willing to give her some leeway, but their worried expressions left Charlie feeling sick. He was her father, he should have been able to help.

He should know what to do.

“Bella! Time for dinner,” Charlie announced, opening Bella’s door. He never would have entered her room without verbal permission before all this started, but now he knew that she wouldn’t come downstairs to eat unless he came to fetch her.

She sat in her chair, arms wrapped around her knees, eyes fixed on the trees outside her window. This was how Charlie usually found her.

“C’mon, Bells, we got homemade mac and cheese tonight. Very fancy.”

Bella didn’t respond. Charlie came closer and squatted beside the chair, trying to catch her gaze. Her eyes didn’t move from the window.

“Sweetheart, will you look at me? It’s dinnertime.”

Still nothing.

At this point, Charlie usually had two choices: he could let Bella be, or he could bring up the food to see if she would take it and start eating once it was in front of her. But today, he was tired and worried and couldn’t bring himself to leave his daughter’s side.

“You’re scaring me, Bells. If you don’t come down with me, I’m going to have to carry you down.” From Bella’s blank expression, she either didn’t hear him, or had no opinion on this proposal. Charlie clapped his hands on his knees and rose to his feet. “Alright, let’s go.”

She was already curled up, and Charlie took a moment to judge the best way to pick her up. He was getting on in years, but his job demanded that he stay in some kind of shape, and he was confident he could get her downstairs.

“Here I come,” he warned her, and then wrapped his arms around her, pulling her up out of the chair.

Finally, Bella’s expression changed: she looked surprised, eyes flashing wide and then moving over to Charlie’s face. Then a furrow appeared between her eyebrows, like she hadn’t expected to see him.

“Hey Bells, we’re taking you down for dinner. Do you want to walk?”

Bella shook her head and even shifted slightly in Charlie’s arms, getting comfortable. She was far too light for a girl of her age, and Charlie was even more determined to get a decent dinner into her. Still, he couldn’t hold her for too long, so he headed for the stairs.

He carried Bella all the way to the little table in the kitchen, pushed out one of the chairs with his foot, and settled Bella down on the seat. She looked more aware than before, and her eyes followed Charlie to the other seat.

Their food was already on the table, and Charlie pushed Bella’s bowl towards her with the spoon beside it. “You gotta eat. Mac and cheese, right? It’s still hot.” Bella’s gaze flicked down to the food in front of her, then back to Charlie. “It’ll be good,” Charlie added.

Seeing that Bella was making no motion to pick up the spoon, Charlie sighed.

“Do you want me to feed you? I will, so help me.”

To his surprise, Bella opened her mouth like a little baby bird. It was such an unexpected gesture that it startled a laugh from Charlie. How long had it been since he’d laughed?

“Okay, you got it.” Charlie got up from his chair and came to stand beside Bella’s, scooping up a spoonful of cheese and noodles. “Here it comes.”

Bella accepted the food and chewed, then opened her mouth again. Charlie laughed a second time, still overtaken by the ridiculous scene of feeding his newly-eighteen-year-old daughter like she was two years old again, but also relieved that she was eating at all.

The second and third scoop were similarly accepted, but then Bella didn’t open her mouth again.

“Well, you can’t be full already,” Charlie said. “Come on, kiddo, two more spoonfuls.”

No response. Charlie poked the spoon into Bella’s lip, which got some cheese on her face, but didn’t change her expression.

“Alright, we’re getting silly then. If you don’t want your dad to get silly, you better eat the pasta.” After giving Bella a few moments with that statement, Charlie nodded and got the spoon ready. “Here comes the airplane, Bella.” He dutifully flew the spoon around with some airplane noises, and watched Bella’s eyes start to follow it. “It’s coming in for a landing, open wide.”

Finally, Bella opened her mouth and accepted the food.

Charlie pulled out all the stops for the rest of the meal: airplane, train, very important delivery: he wiggled the spoon and made the kind of sound effects he hadn’t made for sixteen years.

But at the end of it all, the bowl was empty. He’d gotten a fair amount of cheese on Bella’s face, but she’d eaten every last spoonful.

“Good job, honey. Thank you for eating,” Charlie said, somewhat exhausted by the ordeal. His own food was cold, but he was satisfied with the situation. “Do you want me to get you cleaned up, or would you like to do it yourself?”

Bella blinked at him, and Charlie nodded. That would be his job, then.

“Can you drink this water while I’m gone?” He pushed the glass towards her. “Both hands, sweetheart.”

To his surprise and delight, Bella wrapped her hands around the glass and raised it up, beginning to drink.

Charlie retreated to run a cloth under warm water. Returning, he saw Bella had drank half the cup before setting it down.

“Still want dad to do the honours?” he asked, offering Bella the cloth.

When she made no move to accept it, Charlie leaned over and started wiping the cheese off Bella’s face, finishing with a flourish.

“There you go. All clean.” He couldn’t resist pressing a kiss to the top of her head on the way back to the sink. “Should we go and watch some TV, then?” Charlie dropped off the cloth and returned to Bella’s side, offering a hand to hold on the way.

Bella put up both hands, stretched towards him.

“Fair enough,” Charlie shrugged, and scooped his daughter back up into his arms, carrying her over to the couch. He held her the same way Renee had on her visit, with her chest and head cradled in his arms, her legs laid out on the couch. “Do you want to watch the game, or do some scrolling?”

Bella was already staring at the screen in faux attentiveness, as if she hadn’t processed that Charlie hadn’t yet turned on the screen. She didn’t seem to have an opinion, so Charlie turned on the television and started flipping through channels.

He could feel Bella perk up when he flipped onto some kind of kid’s cartoon, so he left that playing. It was mind numbing wash of colours and songs, but Bella was leaning forward and her eyes were actually tracking the characters, so Charlie let it play for a whole hour before turning it off and carrying Bella upstairs to bed.

Charlie left her on top of the covers, with her pyjamas laid out beside her. Whether she would change and get under the sheets or just sleep in her clothes, he wasn’t sure, but he made sure to keep the temperature turned up in case she didn’t make it under the covers.

Then he pulled out his laptop, and pulled up the search engine.

Charlie learned a lot that night, about trauma and depression and age regression. He booked Bella an appointment with a doctor in Seattle, which he probably should have done a long time ago. He also ordered a few things online, curious and cautiously hopeful.

It was possible this evening had been a fluke, but he was willing to do anything to help Bella back to being herself again.

It took over a week for the supplies to reach Forks, and Charlie was doing everything he could to help Bella in the meantime. He didn’t want to cross any of his daughter’s boundaries, so he never helped her get dressed, but he started tucking her in at nights, singing lullabies until he saw her eyes close. He woke her up in the morning with breakfast in bed, and changed the sheets after dropping her off at school, to get the crumbs out.

In the evenings he would feed Bella her supper: sometimes she would lift the fork herself and he would sit back and let her eat, but when she looked at him with unseeing eyes, he would pick up her fork and start with the airplane noises. Every empty plate was a victory.

When the package arrived on his doorstep, Charlie picked it up and took it to his room, then unpacked it. He had gotten some bath toys, and a pacifier, and a soft blanket with ducks on it. He’d also picked up a couple of Bella’s favourite books from her childhood: Anne of Green Gables and The Chronicles of Narnia, new copies with beautiful embossed covers.

But the last thing he found himself holding in his hands, unable to let go of, was a brown stuffed dog: the exact same style as one of Bella’s first stuffed animals. She’d gotten it as a gift from one of her mother’s relatives, and they hadn’t been able to pull her away from it. Bella had chewed the ears bald and eventually pulled off one of the legs, and they’d gotten rid of it when she was ten. But here it was, soft and shiny as the first time Bella ripped it out of the tissue paper with her chubby little hands.

Charlie wasn’t sure that Bella would even remember the toy, but he thought it might be nice to have something to hold.

So he tucked away the books and the toys and the pacifier and the blanket, and he went to Bella holding the little dog.

Bella was sitting in her chair, staring out the window in the same direction as always. It hadn’t escaped Charlie’s attention that she was looking into the woods, towards the spot where Charlie had found her collapsed on the night after the Cullens left. Towards the last place she had seen Edward.

“Bells, honey, I got you a present.”

No reaction. That wasn’t unusual.

“It’s a silly little thing, but I thought you might like it.” Charlie shifted from foot to foot, already feeling uncomfortable with the build-up. “Here you go.”

Without further hesitation, he presented Bella with the stuffed animal, holding it out in front of her. Bella slowly looked at Charlie’s hands, and then at the dog. Her forehead creased in that same little mark of confusion that Charlie had become familiar with, when she was brought back from wherever she went in her absence.

With one hand, she slowly reached out and ran a finger down the nose of the plush puppy. Charlie put the stuffed animal onto her chest, half-cradled by the arm that was still in her lap. Bella blinked and looked down fully at the stuffed animal. She curled her arms all the way around it, and held it to her chest.

Then she looked up at Charlie and burst into tears.

Charlie panicked for a moment, retreating several steps from the sudden distress. But then it occurred to him that this was the first time he’d seen Bella cry since the day he found her in the woods. There had been no break to her blank unresponsiveness, and this was just as shocking as if she’d burst out laughing. Was this a step backwards, or was this progress?

Either way, Charlie steeled himself and went over to pat Bella on the back. She reached out for him with both hands, in a gesture that was becoming familiar. The dog fell to her lap and she stopped to pick it up, then tried to reach out for Charlie again.

Charlie scooped her up into his arms, stuffed dog and all, and made his way over to her bed so that he could sit down with his daughter in his arms. She was sobbing and gasping and there were tears running down her face, and Charlie didn’t know what to do except hold her. He cradled her on his lap, rocking vaguely back and forth, and just held on as her body shook.

“It’s okay Bells, it’s gonna be okay,” he murmured, over and over again.

The crying lasted for longer than Charlie thought was possible. His back was starting to hurt from all of the rocking back and forth, but he kept it up. Eventually, led by memories of long nights taking care of Bella as an infant, he started humming a Bon Jovi song. As though in response, Bella’s sobs slowly started to subside. Before long, she was lying heavy in his arms, and he wasn’t sure if he’d managed to put her to sleep. That cry had seemed exhausting, but the atmosphere in the room felt a little bit lighter, somehow.

Charlie gently guided Bella back from where her face was pressed into his shoulder, lying her down on her pillow.

Her eyes blinked open, still shiny with tears, and Charlie grabbed a Kleenex from the bedside table and started cleaning her up. There was snot and tears everywhere and his shirt desperately needed a wash, but he dutifully wiped off his daughter’s face, then held a new Kleenex up to her nose and said “blow your nose.”

Bella obliged, and Charlie got her to do the other side as well, then tucked away the tissues.

“Good job, kiddo.” Bella looked at him, her eyes clear in the dim light of evening coming through the window. “Hi, Bells.” Charlie touched her nose gently, and smiled.

Bella smiled back, a sudden dawning of happiness across her face. Her hands curled around the new stuffed animal, and Charlie could finally believe that everything was going to be okay.

Epilogue:

Alice liked to check on Bella every once in a while.

She didn’t believe that Edward had done the right thing in leaving Bella, and had worried over the months that Bella had been unresponsive: Alice’s visions of Bella’s future were changeable, and there were some futures in which she saw that Bella never emotionally recovered from the abandonment.

But then, something changed.

Suddenly, Bella’s future settled into a more secure form, something that Alice hadn’t expected. She saw Bella cradled in her family’s arms, first her father and then the flickering of possible future friends. She saw Bella crying, and laughing, and smiling. She saw Bella drinking from bottles full of milk, having her hair brushed by gentle hands, playing with dolls.

Alice went to Jasper and folded herself into his arms, hiding her smile against his chest. It was the kind of smile that would be accompanied by tears, if she had still been human enough to cry: a bittersweet loss and relief at the same time.

She had loved Bella, had wanted to be her sister one day. Even this side of Bella made Alice want to be there for her, to hold her and cradle her. But now that she was certain Bella could be happy without Edward, without the dangerous world of the supernatural, and Alice could let her go.

“Are you alright?” Jasper asked, soothing her with a hand on her back and a touch of his powers, washing over her.

“Bella is feeling better,” Alice said, still not letting go of her mate. “She’s going to be okay.”

Jasper hummed and held Alice close, tucking her head under his chin. He didn’t say anything, but Alice knew he understood.

They held each other, and wished the best for Bella Swan.

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