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hockeylvr59 · 1 year

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Here With Me Part 11 || Taylor Makar

Author’s Note: Taylor has to tell Kelsey about his idiot suspension but makes it up to her with a Friday night date and Kelsey makes him further pay up for it with some light but competitive 1-on-1 since he's not playing in that weekend's game. FC: Marina Laswick (@marooshk on instagram).

Warnings: cursing, tension, social alcohol consumption // Word Count: 3,626

~~~~~

Ten

With Taylor in Boston for a game against Boston University on Wednesday following their first intimate encounter as a couple, communication was limited to text and a short phone call Tuesday afternoon. It was during these conversations that they’d made plans for another date Friday night and Kelsey left the planning in Taylor’s hands at his request.

She hadn’t expected to hear from him Wednesday with it being a game day, but when her phone was still quiet all day Thursday she became a little concerned. Figuring that he was just tired, Kelsey found other ways to occupy herself and tried not to let worry overtake her.

Friday morning finally brought a text from Taylor but it was just asking her to come over an hour earlier than they had previously planned because he needed to tell her something.

Immediately a pit formed in Kelsey’s stomach. Oh god, what had happened.

She couldn’t fathom that he had cheated so that was off the table. Had he gotten hurt Wednesday night? Or had her Uncle somehow found out about them. She couldn’t imagine it was that without her hearing something from her Uncle himself or her aunt at the very least.

Though she was confused and on edge, Kelsey agreed to Taylor’s request and drove to his apartment at the newly arranged time.

Immediately upon seeing Taylor’s face when he opened the door, Kelsey could tell that she wasn’t going to like what he had to say.

Following him back to his room she raised an eyebrow at him, her expression screaming ‘out with it’.

“I uh…know you were thinking about coming to the game Sunday so I figured I’d let you know now that I’m suspended for it.”

“Suspended or benched?” Kelsey asked needing to figure out what the hell happened and who she needed to be mad at.

“Benched because of a suspension.” Taylor mumbled, ducking his head. “For spearing.”

“YOU DID WHAT!” Kelsey exclaimed, eyes going wide. High hits were one thing, it was hockey and sometimes moved too fast. Even a slew foot could be just a bad mistake. A spear….no that was intentional and so incredibly stupid.

How the hell was she supposed to defend him to her Uncle if he was doing idiotic shit like that??

“What the hell Taylor? You fucking know better than that.”

Red hot, Kelsey took a few deep breaths attempting to calm herself and sighed, a bit resigned.

“What the hell were you thinking. Oh wait you weren’t.” She ranted, hands on her hips. “I can’t believe you Taylor.”

There was a piece of her mind buried under the disappointment that saw Taylor deflating where he stood in front of her. It was that piece of her mind that then saw a pair of athletic shorts in the pile of Taylor’s laundry with a split seam right down the inner thigh.

Knowing that it was one of Taylor’s favorite pairs, Kelsey moved to grab it from the pile before grabbing her mini sewing kit from her purse. She could do a better repair job with her sewing machine but some hand stitching was just what she needed right now anyway.

Flopping down on his desk chair, Kelsey adjusted the fabric between her hands and examined the seam, cutting away the loose thread before going to work repairing and strengthening it.

She could hear Taylor pacing back and forth, his hands running through his hair catching the corner of her eye.

“Taylor would you sit the fuck down while I finish this.” She stated, all venom dropped from her voice.

With him complying and flopping onto his bed, Kelsey was able to finish her mend job on his shorts, testing the strength of the repair before dropping them back into his laundry and tossing the string fragments of her repair after cleaning up and returning her sewing kit to her purse.

Heart rate back to normal, she looked up at him, his expression broken as he scrolled through his phone.

“I’m not mad. Just disappointed.” She whispered softly. “I just want you to succeed and you go and shoot yourself in the foot like this.”

“I’m sorry.” Taylor replied, his face sullen.

“I don’t want apologies, it’s not me you’re hurting, it’s yourself.” Kelsey stated, sighing again. “I want you to figure out what the hell you need to do to make sure it never happens again.”

“Spent all day yesterday talking to the coaches and sports psych.” Taylor explained, though he was still withdrawn into himself as he sat on his bed.

Pushing herself off his desk chair, Kelsey moved to the edge of his bed and motioned for him to come closer, pulling him into a hug.

“I’m so sorry.” Taylor repeated, ducking his head into her neck as his arms tightened around her. Rubbing his back, Kelsey sighed and let him hold her.

“You’re good Taylor, so good, you just need to not be stupid and control your stick.”

****

At least twenty minutes passed with Kelsey just letting Taylor cling to her before she finally pulled away to lift his head into her hands, pressing a soft kiss to his mouth.

“C’mon T. Enough depressing hockey thoughts for the day. I need food and last I checked you had planned something for tonight.”

Though Taylor nodded, he made no attempt to let her go. Kissing him a few more times, Kelsey finally got him to release her and was able to pull him up so they could head out for a meal and whatever else he had planned.

Though dinner wasn’t anything crazy, just a stop for burritos at a local restaurant, it hit the spot and Kelsey was full and a little more settled by the time they got back in the car, Taylor pulling up gps for her to drive to.

Seeing that the address was in NoHo, Kelsey started driving on instinct, only relying on the GPS as they actually got into town to direct her where to go.

“So…you like to sew?” Taylor asked softly, looking at her from her passenger seat.

“I do.” Kelsey nodded, vaguely remembering having told him that before and glancing over at him while at a red light. “It helps me to relax, just getting wrapped up with a needle and thread and making something that is torn whole again or making something fit better than it would off the rack. It’s peaceful.”

Taylor seemed thoughtful about that but didn’t say anything right away.

“Thanks for mending those shorts. I wasn’t looking forward to only being able to wear them with compression shorts under them.”

“Not a problem T. I really don’t mind.”

Settling back into the quiet of the radio, Kelsey continued to drive, once again checking GPS to make sure that she was headed to the right place.

When it directed her to a parking lot she found a spot before climbing out and pulling her coat on tighter. Then she looked at Taylor like where to now because she had absolutely no idea what he had planned.

After offering her his hand with a slightly unsure expression on his face as to whether she’d take it, Taylor pulled her along with him first to a liquor store for her to pick out her wine cooler of choice. Kelsey couldn’t help but be a little worried wondering if Taylor was having more trouble coping with the suspension than was initially evident.

Seltzers obtained, they continued on to a small building that looked like a schoolhouse. To say Kelsey was confused was an understatement but she quickly realized that this was a concert venue as Taylor led her inside after giving his name at the door.

The room was bigger than it appeared from the outside though still couldn’t possibly hold more than 100 people. Tucking herself closer to Taylor’s side, Kelsey let him pull her through the room to seats roughly in the middle but closer to the wall than the aisle.

The alcohol made more sense now and Kelsey slipped her jacket off before settling into a chair and taking a can that Taylor was offering her from the open box.

“So who is playing tonight?” Kelsey asked trying to engage with her boyfriend and keep his mind away from those nagging thoughts she was sure he was having. When he just shrugged she laughed, causing a flicker of a smile to cross his face.

“Nice T.” She murmured. “Just a go with the flow kinda thing I see.”

“Problem with that?” He asked softly causing her to shake her head before stealing a light teasing kiss.

“Nope. Long as it doesn’t make my ears bleed.”

“I think we should be fine. Well I hope.” Taylor admitted, running his fingers through his hair.

It didn’t take long before the band took the stage, introducing themselves before jumping into their set. The music was kind of indie/folk and the lead singer was a woman who actually had a pretty amazing voice.

Drinking her seltzer, Kelsey relaxed against Taylor’s side just letting the alcohol and music combine into a sort of buzzed feeling. It was nice spending time with him and she could tell how much he loved listening to live music by the expression on his face and the way his body vibrated and bounced to the music. Even seated she could feel him enjoying himself and it made her smile because he needed that. Partway through the set, Taylor slipped his free hand down to her inner thigh and when she didn’t stop him he relaxed further enjoying the additional touch.

The set was just over an hour long and by the time they finished for the night, Kelsey was feeling a little sleepy but relaxed. It had been a good time with Taylor whispering in her ear between songs and just having some much needed time alone with him seeing and learning about something he enjoyed outside of hockey.

Gathering up their coats and the box with the remaining can of seltzer, Taylor guided her back to the car to drop off the box before asking if she wanted to go for a short walk and get some tea or coffee or something and maybe dessert before heading back.

Though she knew she wasn’t buzzed enough to be impaired, it never hurt to be extra cautious and so Kelsey nodded, agreeing to let Taylor drag her along down the ice cold street to a quaint little shop. The warmth of the building was welcomed and she stuck close to Taylor’s side as she looked over the menu, deciding on some hot green tea and asking if Taylor wanted to share a brownie.

Nodding his agreement, Taylor ordered a drink for himself before paying and then tugging her off to the side to wait, wrapping his arms around her from behind and nuzzling against her hesitantly. It was clear he was still a little uncertain about being so touchy after earlier and tipping her head back, Kelsey stole another short kiss trying to reassure him that they really were fine.

After getting their drinks and brownie, they settled in at a small table, legs bumping underneath as they just ate and sipped at the warm beverages, both sobering up further.

“So I had fun tonight, thanks Tay.” Kelsey murmured after they had polished off the brownie and their drinks were mostly finished. They were simple words and nothing but the truth but she immediately saw their effect as Taylor smiled at her like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

“I’m glad.” He declared softly, his fingers brushing against her own as she rested her hand on the table.

“You ready to head out?” She asked, a yawn overtaking her body. It was already almost nine, she still had to take him home and then get home herself and she was starting to feel the day catch up with her a bit.

Standing up, Taylor offered her a hand and when she took it he pulled her up and helped her back into her coat before gathering up their trash to dispose of it as they exited the cafe. Stepping outside, he laced his fingers with hers and the two of them headed back to the car where he stopped her at her door softly asking if he could kiss her.

“You know you can T, you don’t have to ask.” Kelsey declared before pressing up to meld her lips with his even as the cold swirled around them. Sliding her hands into his jacket, Kelsey deepened the kiss for a moment before pulling away with a happy sigh because she really did love kissing him.

Sneaking one more kiss, Taylor opened her door for her before heading around to the passenger side to climb in himself while she started the car and cranked up the heat to warm them as she drove him back to his apartment.

When they arrived he asked if she wanted to come in for a bit but Kelsey shook her head, declining.

“I would but I have a tournament with my girls tomorrow morning so I should get home and get some sleep, we start at eight so I have to be there by like seven am.”

Though Taylor was obviously a little disappointed he respected that response and turned to steal a few more kisses before thanking her for coming with him tonight and asking if she’d text him when she got home to let him know she was safe.

Kelsey promised that she would and pressed one more lingering kiss to his lips before watching him climb out of her car and head inside, letting her head back home. Once there, she gathered up the remaining seltzer and took it inside, popping it open once she was safely in her room curled up in bed before texting Taylor she was home as promised.

*****

Taylor: How was your tourney this morning?

Kelsey: Good, they won and we wrapped earlier than expected. You busy?

Taylor: Nope just finished lunch after practice this morning.

Kelsey: Think your practice rink is free?

Taylor: Pretty sure it is.

Kelsey: Cool. Meet me there in 15.

Taylor: uh sure.

When Kelsey arrived at the practice rink at Mullins she pulled her equipment bag and stick from her car before heading inside, swiping her security key card to enter the building. Her timing was perfect because Taylor strode through the door only a moment after her, coming to her side and kissing her lips when he reached her.

“Go gear up.” Kelsey insisted before Taylor could even get out a greeting. His look was one of confusion and Kelsey rolled her eyes. “Don’t give me that look, you aren’t playing tomorrow, you can come play 1 on 1 with me.” Patting his ass softly, Kelsey urged him to go change as she moved to the bench area to pull her skates on. Once ready in just her usual joggers and coaching jacket with skates on her feet, Kelsey fixed her ponytail before stepping onto the ice to skate lazy laps and warm up while she waited for Taylor.

There really was nothing like the feeling of ice under her blades and once her legs were warm she grabbed her gloves, stick and a puck just stickhandling to warm her hands up as well.

She knew that it would take Taylor a little while to get all of his gear on and so by the time he stepped onto the ice to join her wearing a practice jersey but only lower gear and no helmet, she was warm and ready to go. Shooting onto one of the nets, Kelsey gave Taylor time to warm his own body up before pushing the puck his way as she skated back toward center ice.

“All right. You start shooting toward that net.” She directed, pointing at the one behind her. “And I’m that one.” She declared motioning toward the one in front of her. “Play until I get tired.” Taylor stood there looking amused as he fiddled with the puck before he started with a jolt, pushing off to gain speed. Luckily Kelsey read his movements quickly and started skating backwards.

She definitely wasn’t fast enough though and Taylor skated right around her to bury the puck in the net. He looked so proud of himself and Kelsey could only shake her head before skating over to pull the puck from the net. Taylor was skating lazily backward toward center ice and Kelsey gathered the puck onto her stick before carrying it toward the other net. Just past the offensive blue line, Taylor stepped up into her space and took the puck off her stick smoothly and efficiently.

It wasn’t like she expected him to go easy on her, nor did she want him to, but he didn’t have to make defending look so easy.

Switching roles again, they proceeded to go back and forth up and down the ice, Taylor almost always scoring - unless he missed the net - and then promptly shutting down Kelsey’s attempts at offense.

With Taylor missing the net again, Kelsey couldn’t help but chirp him about how the net was over there, not in the corner.

He certainly gave as good as he got though, chirping her back when she stumbled and fell defending or failed at shielding him from the puck given the length of his stick.

It was competitive, albeit uneven, but also fun, Taylor flirting shamelessly as they went back and forth with little touches, bumps, and teases. After numerous rounds of him just stealing the puck from her, Taylor backed off a bit, letting her get a shot off only to promptly block it long before it got anywhere near the net. She knew that as much as it was him practicing a different skill it was also him teasing her and she couldn’t help but pout slightly.

Despite starting to feel the ache of a good workout setting in, Kelsey was determined to score on Taylor just once. As they continued up and down the ice, Kelsey tried to think of a way she could get an edge up on him just for a moment.

Calling for a water break, Kelsey skated over to the bench and pulled a bottle of gatorade from her bag, drinking almost a quarter of it while panting softly. When Taylor joined her she offered him the bottle before adjusting the waistband of her joggers down an inch or so as the waistband was starting to bother her. If it also gave Taylor the tease of skin then that was just an added bonus.

Deciding that a little skin might be the only way to get an edge on her boyfriend, Kelsey also unzipped her jacket halfway and adjusted her tank underneath it revealing cleavage to her boyfriend’s gaze.

By the time Taylor handed her bottle back, Kelsey was done with her wardrobe modifications and she tossed it back into her bag, putting her gloves back on and grabbing her stick. Immediately she could feel Taylor’s gaze on her darken and she mentally smirked because yeah he was nothing if not predictable.

He still managed to defend against her and of course he still scored but Kelsey could see his focus slipping little by little. She just needed to pick her moment.

Continuing to go back and forth, Kelsey picked the puck up when it was her turn and as she picked up speed, she twisted to bump Taylor off with her ass. Though he poked the puck away he froze for just long enough that Kelsey was able to regain control and send the puck flying into the top corner of the net.

Throwing her hands up in celebration, Kelsey cheered as Taylor followed up, pinning her against the boards.

“You play dirty.” He grumbled into her ear, voice filled with want.

“Pretty sure not a single thing about that was illegal.” She teased, sparks in her gaze. “Bout time I score on you.”

“Still dirty.” He mumbled, kissing her softly. Kissing him back briefly, Kelsey squirmed out from between him and the boards and skated back to the bench. She was worn out and it was probably time to call it since they’d been here at least an hour and a half already.

“Thanks for coming to skate with me.” She declared, sipping at what remained in her gatorade bottle.

Taylor’s cheeks were pink but he was smiling as he leaned against the boards beside her.

“It was fun.” He admitted. “You know you’re actually really good given that you’ve only been playing a couple years.” He complimented.

“Thanks T.” Kelsey murmured, stretching out her legs on the boards as she worked to cool down slowly before finishing their skate all together. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Taylor shake his head because she was very clearly making him horny just stretching. He was such a boy.

“Go change and I’ll see you later.” She declared. “Mom is expecting me home for dinner tonight so I probably should get a move on.”

Though that was probably not what Taylor wanted to hear he nodded, looping back to steal another kiss before making her promise to text him later.

And she did text him, laughing as he complained about his legs cramping while watching the men’s basketball game with the team.

He might frustrate the shit out of her sometimes but man oh man did she actually adore him. She couldn’t help but smile knowing that even with some bumps they had so many more cool things to explore with each other.

#taylor makar #taylor makar imagine #nhl imagine #nhl imagines #hockey imagine #hockey imagines #colorado avalanche #colorado avalanche imagine #cavalanche #046

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lovely-necromancy · 3 years

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A Cure for Insomnia CH.12

It's late Friday night or very early Saturday morning depending on how you want to look at it. You're just laying on your couch playing Stardew Valley when your phone goes off. Without looking you answer it.

“Why are you even up?” comes Kirby's exhausted voice from across the line.

“Medical condition, wbu?” you place the phone in between you ear and shoulder but don't really change your position as you continue with your game.

“Jesus fucking Christ you did not just pronounce 'wbu' like 'wah-bah-u'.” he's ranting a bit and you know from experience this is the tired slap happy ranting where he sets himself off every five minutes on new topics. So, you wait it out and continue your quest in learning the wizard's secrets.

Kirby finally calms down after a few moments to get to the point of why he called. To remind you that Saturday Night Dead was canceled tonight due to the Pride Picnic tomorrow.

“I know.” you said plainly barely paying attention to the ginger on the line.

“You're a little shit.”

“I know that too.” a smirk graces your lips and you pause your game.

You listen to Kirby's rant for three minutes before asking if anyone else still “needed” a reminder. And when he said 'no' you sent him off to bed and said you'd see him Sunday morning. With a cranky man toddler dealt with you went back to your game.

Contrary to what you had originally thought, this week had been pretty chill. Everything had been going great, no drama in the town, no set backs with the picnic, your stalker had been keeping a low profile, and sure you were on day three of no sleep but that's just a you issue really. You didn't even have a foreboding feeling about the picnic. Everything was going great...at least it would be had Jo not specifically requested you wear something red, to her recital in a few weeks.

It's going to be so hard to thrift something school appropriate, red, and in your size. You thankfully have three weeks but unfortunately you're limited to weekend trips since you work during the week and wouldn't be able to go a few hours out to larger thrift stores to drive a few hours back home.

Your do nothing day is turning into a do something day. And you definitely can't get any sleep tonight because now you know you have something to do at five AM and you just wouldn't be able to rest peacefully at all. Scared that you'd fuck up the shopping trip you had planned. God you hate executive dysfunction and the anxiety it gives you, even for something like sleeping.

Thursday evening you spent all night googling the towns within a five hour radius and their second hand shops, after Jo had made her request to you. Your big ticket shops were two closer to the border of Pennsylvania. They were in pretty medium to high income neighborhoods so were the most likely to have formal wear on hand. Your plan was to drive there and get to the closer one by eight maybe get some breakfast while you waited for the shop to open. Then go to the second, and if you still hadn't met the requirements for an outfit you'd go to the town an hour away from there. Just to rinse and repeat until you went to all eight locations on your list. Making one big circle back to Kepler.

You really hoped you find something to wear at the first two. Seriously you don't want to be out shopping all day but you'd rather have a buffer of looking for things now than rushing the night before her recital.

Checking the time you see it's just a little after one in the morning. You've been playing Stardew for a few hours and are starting to get bored. Maybe you should switch games? Exiting out you ruin any progress you've made for the day, but you couldn't remember so it probably wasn't important progress. And you are now scrolling through your games looking for something to play.

Spiritfarer? No you don't feel like crying right now. Undertale? No you really don't feel like crying right now. Onion Boy Commits Tax Evasion? Hmm, possible...but it's a quick game and you'd be done and back here in thirty minutes. Sally Face? Yea! You've been meaning to replay it for a while now and this seems as good a time as any.

Loading the game you settle deeper into the couch to become a teenage ghost detective. And you stay like that for the rest of the night until your alarm goes off mid way through chapter two. You'd been so focused on trying to get secrets that you hardly noticed the time going by. Okay, you were looking at Gizmo and taking pictures of the silly furball.

Stretching you get up and make your way to your room to grab a change of clothes, neck snapping to the side as you went. When you enter your room you're met with a white face with blocks of black for the eyes and black lipstick as its only facial features looking at you from the corner just feet away from the door. Even though your heart jumps into your throat at the sight you notice the figure doesn't get closer to you. Noting that and its immobility you figure it's a really weird and specific hallucination.

'Fucking weird?' you think as you ignore the hallucination and start rummaging through your closet.

It wouldn't be the first time a source of media has either triggered or inspired one of your hallucinations. But the face isn't exactly Sal's mask but it is mask like. Maybe Sal mixed with a panda. That's a fun thought. But overall nothing you need to worry about. Just have to get sleep tonight so you could enjoy the picnic tomorrow without any issues.

When you turn back around with your clothes in hand the hallucination is gone. You shrug before going to your bathroom to change. In a blink you are out the door and on the road by five after five. You hope you pass a Dunkin' in an hour or so, you'll need a little energy boost to get your day started. But pushing that thought aside you turn up your radio and turn off your thoughts.

Just vibes for right now, just you and the empty road.

Making it to the first thrift shop you are pleasantly surprised to see a string of old ladies shopping today. Wonderful, they'll look at knick knacks and you'll look at clothes. Looks like there won't be a need to guard clothing with your life. However when you get into the store it becomes incredibly apparent that the only thing to look at here are in fact the knick knacks.

Sighing you figure it'll at least be worth it to comb through skirts and shoes. Skirts are very limited to paisley prints that give you middle school dance flash backs, and long khakis. Neither are really what you're looking for right now so you leave them be. They'll find their homes with some home schooled kid eventually. Shoes are a bit more promising as you find a pair of red kitten pumps in your size immediately, they're a little worn but nothing a little shoe polish and leather paint can't fix.

That is until you think you see something grab at your wrist.

When you jerk back a shoe drops from your hand and the heel pops off. Again a very easy fix, plus this may get you a discount. Dropping to your knees you try to grab the heel from under the rack and when you do you notice a pair of boots that look like they've been hidden behind several pair of knee high riding boots. You grab them, they're reddish brown suede heeled boots. They're in pretty good condition and the price tag says thirteen, not bad. And they're in your size! Best find of the day, calling it now. You quickly collect your shoes and make your way to the register. While you may not wear the kitten pumps often you for sure have just found your new favorite boots.

Getting back in the car with one of three pieces for your outfit and one store down you make your way to the next town over for its store. The second store had a much wider selection of clothing however you didn't find much of anything this time. But there was a cute mini pencil skirt that had a tiny orange heart on the left side hem. You couldn't resist it when it was only two dollars.

Third times a charm or so they say. But as you're looking through the racks of dresses and skirts you start hearing whispers. Briefly looking up to see if anyone was actually around to where you'd be able to hear them you see no one. It's weird that you'd get auditory hallucinations without a visible one or without being asleep. That puts you on edge but you ignore the feeling to continue your shopping.

You've just turned to go have a look at the blazers when a voice pops into your head.

'He's here.' there's an edge of static following the words and the buzzing is enough to cloud your own thoughts.

Neck snapping to the side twice before cracking on the third time, “There we go” you say as you look around only see families with kids in the store with you. No one is on their own or even looking your way.

'That you can see.'

Your heart is pounding harshly against your chest and while every fiber of your being is saying run. You can't it'd be obvious or it'd make you look like a whack job. So with a sharp intake of air you steady yourself and being to walk calmly to your car.

It's broad daylight and you would definitely be making a scene if your stalker tried anything. If anyone even came near you right now you'd probably scream in self preservation.

But it turns out you didn't need to worry as you got into your car, locking the doors without hassle. You didn't bother turning your radio on as you drove to the forth store. There wouldn't be a point not like you could focus with your nerves so frazzled. And that frazzled feeling doesn't go away as you arrive at the store.

Staying in the car a moment you wait to see if any other car near by seems familiar. Or any persons exiting seem familiar, like you've seen their faces in passing. No one does, and while that puts you at ease you'll still be vigilant of your surroundings.

The store's much smaller than the previous three and you decide to start with the blazer section this time. It seems like a good choice, even though it looked like a sea of black ¾ sleeve blazers and jackets you caught a glimpse of red from inside one coat. Pulling the hanger off you notice it isn't a richly colored lining but that someone shoved a red Chinese inspired silk skirt into the blazer. You aren't sure if they were judging the compatibility of the items as an outfit or if they were trying to hide it, but either way it's ended up in your hands. It's beautifully decorated in golden swirls and a dragon pattern embroidery. Putting it up to you it curls around your waist. Could mean it'd be a bit big for you, but nothing a little sewing couldn't fix.

You're pretty sure you had a black turtleneck tank top that would look great with this, and still be appropriate for hot late July weather. But maybe an additional red blazer or shawl would be a good idea. Looking at the sea of black before you you think it'd be best to continue this hunt another week.

Right now your nerves are fried and the sun is already starting to set. With thoughts of getting caught alone in the dark with your stalker you can't help but want to get home as soon as possible or at least get to a town where people would know you if your body showed up in a ditch.

Checking out with your skirt you once again find yourself in your car driving along the highway.

You get back to Kepler a little after nine, gas tank near empty so you drive on to the mini mart rather than stopping at home. You notice another car, which isn't strange for a gas station but very rare that more than two customers are here at the same time. Getting in to pay for gas you're stopped by Ronnie's pissed off voice.

“Leave Dave or I'll ban you from the shop!” she seems to seethe at the man in front of her.

“You don't have that kind of power Veronica.” gross it's David.

Whatever feeling of uncertainty you had before vanishes instantly at seeing the slime ball try to “flirt” with Ronnie. He continues to pester her and the two don't even register your entrance. Unfortunately for Ronnie she really can't do anything to stop these advances without getting in trouble. Fortunately for you, you have no such qualms.

“She said fuck off.” you push past the man shoulder checking him as you get to the counter to start talking with Ronnie.

David stumbles away not expecting the rough push. He glares down at you and you ignore him now that you're in a setting with another person. A person who has access to a silent emergency police button if things go sideways. You have back up this time and an escape plan, there's no way David can harm you right now.

“Hey, I'm gonna need thirty on pump four.” you said hoping you could just ignore the man and stall by talking about useless merchandise in the store to get him to leave. But that was before you're interrupted.

“Oh did someone grow a back bone while I was away?” you roll your eyes and pause before you lie.

“...anyway is Tim on break yet?” hoping she caught the look in your eyes to play along.

Tim was a new hire that David probably didn't know since he just got back into town. Easiest one to lie about and make excuses for why there wasn't a fourth car in the lot. The boys only seemed to have the RV and the sedan so perfectly reasonable that he got dropped off because one of his roommates needed the car.

The way Ronnie's eyes widen at you aren't out of relief but more out of realization. She shakes her head slightly, and you want to smack her for being an idiot and ruining your attempt to scare David off when she turns and yells towards the back.

“Hey Tim! You have a visitor!” you jump a bit at her volume and notice that David tenses by your side as well.

'...is she bluffing...' if she is this is the dumbest fucking bluff in the world and so easy to catch on to. You'll have to get her acquainted with true crime podcasts and shows so she can be better prepared in the future.

It isn't until you hear muffled swears and the sound of thudding from the back room of the store. It isn't long before the door to the back opens and you hear Tim's hushed voice speaking to Marigold for a second, “can you please not walk in front of me.”, and you see Tim walk through the door.

Tim's brown eyes scan the store clearly trying to find either Brian or Toby. His gaze barely passes over David but when it settles on your form leaning away from said creep and Ronnie shifting from one foot to the other the situation seems to click.

It was such a subtle change in his eyes, something you're sure that had you not been trying to catch his gaze to get your message across you would have missed. The way the highlight died before picking back up. It was probably just a trick of the over head lights, maybe he shifted a bit and it caused the light to hit differently. Something you could brush off...something you would have brushed off had you not heard a different voice speak when he opened his mouth.

“YN hey, did'ya need somethin'?” it was a notch lower than normal and somehow the tone was smoother than his usual rumble. For a moment you think he put on a voice for bravado.

Something inside tells you that's not Tim. But right now you need someone who looks like Tim. Someone who despite their “short” stature has an obvious muscle mass to them. One that confidently says “authority” to scare off the creep next to you.

You wrack your brain for something anything to say that would seem normal in this situation while you could try to assert the discomfort of Ronnie and yourself in your current situation. Just as you go to speak David begins to talk over you as he greets the man in the room.

“Hey there, name's David. Nice to see a new face in this place, how long you been here?”

Tim slides his eyes away from you and back over to David. He seems to straighten out his posture and looks over you and Ronnie before staring back at David.

“A while, is there a problem up here?”

“Oh no 's nothing like that!” David says jovially as he wraps an arm around your shoulders. You jerk from the contact. “Just talking to these nice ladies.”

'Disgusting, disgusting, disgusting' plays over and over as you squirm out of his arm.

There's an emotion you can't quite place running through you as you heart rate picks up. You feel sick as if you can feel the bile rising to your throat. Are you having a panic attack? No that's not it you're too conscious and your thoughts aren't a jumbled mess. You're probably just over stimulated. You want to calm down.

'Do you' the whispered voice is back, 'Do you really?'

It's mocking you and the strange emotion from before spikes. Is this...is this rage? Are you so upset at being touched that you're experiencing genuine rage? One with such a burning passion that you can feel your body grow warm all over.

But what did the voice ask 'do you?' do you what? Do you want to calm down?

….no....

No you didn't you can feel it in your veins, in your bones, in your entire being. You didn't want to calm down you wanted to hurt David. You want to tear him to pieces. You wanted him to give you a reason...any reason at all. Any reason to fucking destroy him.

You aren't entirely sure where these thoughts are coming from. Maybe you're just overstimulated, your nerves fried from the weird feeling at the thrift shop today and then paired with someone you hated very much, touching you out of no where seemed to be your ultimate breaking point.

It's Tim who brings you out of your thoughts.

When did he get so close to you?

“I think you should leave. I know for a fact YN's boyfriend won't take kindly to you upsetting them like this.” he stresses the 'them' and it seems you've missed a few key points...like when the hell you got a boyfriend?

“Oh right, what's that scrawny kid gonna do twitch at me.” when did David start taking that tone with Tim and why was he talking about Toby? What did Toby have to do with this? How did David even know about Toby?

Seems David's taunt and knowledge of Toby unsettled Tim as well, if the hand on your shoulder gripping tightly had anything to say. Has that been there this whole time? When did he put it there?

“Trust me the kid's bite 's lot worse than his bark.” there's humor in Tim's voice as he says that but it's like an old joke no one else has context for.

'Fuckin' dick...is that suppose to be a joke about his mutilated mouth?' it really does sound like it. Maybe you're reading the clues wrong...maybe you heard Tim wrong.

Thankfully whatever the fuck is building up comes to an end when Pigeon walks through the doors. Oh she's on duty, Deputy Pigeon. She looks at the four of you and your positions. And although she has a pretty good idea what's happened from Ronnie's texts she can't help but ask.

“Al'ight, what's going on here?” it's clearly been a long day for her.

“Harassment. We've asked him to leave the store but he's refused and keeps bothering our customer and us.” Tim's fast response had you and Ronnie stumped.

Did a white cis male actually come to the aid of two decidedly not male people...instead of the other white cis male? Has Hell frozen over?

It's like he knew just what to say to the officer. And he didn't try to tiptoe around it to save the other man. Tim clearly didn't want this dragging out any longer than it already has. Even David himself seems a bit taken aback by Tim's, accurate, claims. Meanwhile Pigeon looks around the room and sighs. While she knows her younger sister wouldn't have texted if this wasn't serious she was the only one on duty tonight and would only be able to take the other three's statements.

“Al'ight I'll grab y'all's statements starting with you Nychn c'mon.” the tired looking woman took David outside so he could tell his side of the story. But even with two against one he'll probably end up getting a ban from the store. Especially since he did harass a customer and not just an employee.

After getting his statement and watching him drive off from the establishment Pigeon returned back inside.

“I swear tha' boy's head has never been on right.” shaking her head.

Pigeon asked for both your and Tim's sides of the story taking you a little ways away from each other to “prevent compromising the other's story”.

“So... looks like I've got everything, I'll have the station call Monty in the mornin' and let 'im know that he's got a new ban.”

“What about Ronnie's statement?” Tim asks as Pigeon put away her pocket pal.

“Oh Tim, Pigeon's my sister.” it's the first time Ronnie's said something since calling for Tim.

At least you think it is after all you did have a little spell after being touched.

Tim nods and Pigeon heads off after warning the three of you to stay out of trouble. Now with just the three of you in the shop you turn to Tim.

“Thanks for the save Tim.” He just nods again.

“No problem, but you really should'a said somethin' sooner.”

“I don't know what happened I like blanked and forgot you went on break before he came in.” Ronnie pipes up looking flustered.

Weird. You've noticed that does tend to happen when David's around. Maybe you should look into memory stealers. Might be why David's vibes are all off. That or he's a fucking serial killer and your instincts are trying to warn you but there are so many red flags your brain glitches instead. Whatever the reason may be you'll have to keep your guard up when he's around. It's super sketchy he left when Bambi went missing and it's a strange time to come back to town after “helping” your sister after her divorce. Two months isn't enough time to find a new routine or settle court battles.

Tim leaves to clock in and continue his break for another twenty minutes. You aren't sure that's right but Ronnie doesn't seem to complain and you've got to admit he did save you guys from that creep unpaid so he kinda deserves it. You go to pay Ronnie for gas and for some of the frozen taquitos that they normally have on the rotation cooker. But she puts thirty dollars on your pump and then just hands you a pack of the taquitos.

“Thanks for...y'know.” she might be a bitch but Ronnie can be nice if the situation calls for it.

Plus you can see by the expiration date that she'd have to just toss these out at the end of the night anyway. Who are you to turn down free food?

You head home and take your clothes and taquitos inside. You toss the clothes in an arm chair in your living room. And fall asleep on your couch shortly after eating. You are thoroughly exhausted and you had actually been tired last night. Had it not been for errands you'd have slept last night. Now you definitely have to sleep early to wake up early to finish cooking for the picnic.

#ticci tobyx reader #timothy wright x reader #ticci toby #ticcitoby #timothy wright #timothy wright x brian thomas #brian thomas x reader #brian thomas #masky #masky x reader #creepypasta fanfic

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i-am-my-own-goal · 3 years

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Mini rant.

I’m going back to work Tuesday the 2nd. My therapist said she could send an email regarding the extended leave, but….then she didn’t.

I asked her Thursday evening (we talked Wednesday) and reminded her that it was time sensitive and apologized for sounding pushy, but that my boss needed it by Friday to get approved by HR. She gave a snippy response, but said she would do it that evening.

This morning, my boss said she still hadn’t received it. So we agreed that I would start Tuesday and use Monday to recoup.

——

I’m fine to start Tuesday. My therapist said I was in an “acute stress response” and I do feel better, less scared, but still very sad. Me, my bestie, and her sister have not slept much since it happened. There was also a major storm that knocked out power on the whole east coast of the state, so we didn’t have power Tuesday-today (Friday) and we’re all scared of the dark and also all traumatized.

Last night was the first night we slept in a bed and bestie and I slept together in hers with ALL the lantern lights and candles to be as bright as possible lol.

Mainly I’m just tired. I’m ready for work though

—-

I am, however, really annoyed with my therapist. On Wednesday she should have said “I’m not able to write a letter that quickly” so I could have problem solved with my boss vs telling me yes yes yes and then Friday still not have sent anything and have my boss chasing me down and an awkward conversation about start dates.

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arvandus · 3 years

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Personal Life Mini Update/Rant: COVID

So, turns out a kiddo at my son’s preschool was exposed to COVID and came to school the next day. Lucky for us, my son happened to stay home from school that day, so there was no chance of him getting exposed.

But now we have to do the fun, wild dance of figuring out child care for him while we keep him home from school until the exposed kiddo gets tested (he’ll be tested on Monday and Thursday). I can’t send him back to school until I’m certain that child doesn’t have COVID. Because even though he wasn’t exposed directly to that child, that child could have infected others who could then infect my son if I send him back too soon.

And this isn’t just about my son and my family (although that’s reason enough). But if my son gets exposed to COVID, then that could pass it on to me, which would then impact my clients - clients who are too young to get vaccinated themselves. Clients who may be at greater risk due to being immuno-compromised.

Our current plan is me staying home to watch him in the mornings then going into work to do my afternoon therapy sessions while my husband watches him. He’ll try to multitask childcare and working from home until my mom can come over to support him when she gets off work.

Where am I going with this? It’s showing how delicate everything is. How one little slip up, one little choice can change everything. I’m fortunate that I have have a husband that works from home and can be flexible enough to watch our son so I can at least go to work some of the time. I’m fortunate enough that I have family members available to come help us in our time of need. I’m fortunate enough that if for some reason my job becomes in jeopardy because I have to put my child first, then we can afford to lose it since my husband earns enough to cover our current bills.

I’m 100% standing from a place of privilege. Other families/individuals aren’t so fortunate. There are single parents out there who can’t afford to keep their kids home for their safety. Or don’t have the support of the village to ease the load of childcare. Or the financial security to afford a last-minute babysitter or take time off from work.

Please be safe out there. Be responsible. Get vaccinated, and don’t put our young ones at risk.

#arvandus rambles #personal #COVID #get fucking vaccinated

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flowerslut · 4 years

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DAY FIVE: ANGEL/DEMON Rating: T for language. Words: 3,728

A/N: Again: it’s not cheating if it’s on theme! Here’s chapter two of Edge of It All. (Read chapter one here)

EDGE OF IT ALL

Dinner that night was rough. Jasper, to his benefit, had been raised with enough manners to know not to leave the table until dismissed; he might have been defiant at times but he wasn’t into dramatic displays of brattiness. So when Wilson started to rant about how badly he’d needed Jasper to listen and how thoroughly he’d been let down today, Jasper simply sat there and took it like a man. He’d made his choices, and now he had to deal with the consequences.

And usually, the consequences began and ended at ‘a firm talking to’.

At least now, in a harmless little town like this, the worst thing he could get into was school trouble. He had old foster parents who hadn’t expected him to make it through middle school, and there he was, months away from graduating high school. The fact that they weren’t astonished with his progress was frustrating to him on most days, but then again, they’d received Jasper in their care months after he’d already dug himself out of rock bottom.

They didn’t know how good they had it with him right now, he realized miserably as he picked at the roasted cauliflower on the plate in front of him.

Eventually the topic switched from Jasper’s shortcomings to random anecdotes from Wilson’s and Meg’s workdays. While Wilson worked at the urgent care clinic at the edge of town, Meg was a teacher at the elementary school. It had been a baffling thing at first to Jasper, who knew the woman swore like a sailor and could put away more wine than anyone he’d ever met, but it made sense when she shared stories about her day.

She actually appeared to like children.

It made Jasper wonder how disappointed the couple had been when their first placement had been a delinquent teenager as opposed to a cute little toddler.

There was a lull in conversation then, and Jasper took his chance. “You guys have my medical records right?”

The couple exchanged a look. “Of course we do,” Wilson wiped his mouth with a napkin as he spoke, still chewing a bite of food. “Why do you ask?”

Jasper half-shrugged. “None of my other foster parents let me see them. I wanted to know if I was allowed to.”

He’d turned eighteen a couple of months ago but had been allowed to remain under Meg and Wilson’s care. It was a mutually beneficial agreement, really. Wilson and Meg could still receive compensation for housing him even though he worked part-time and fully supported himself as best as he could already. And Jasper was still allowed to stay with the couple.

His social worker, a nice older guy Jasper had known for a few years now, had recommended the extension.

So far the plan was to get Jasper to graduation, through the summer, and hopefully onto school in the fall. As the months passed though, Jasper knew his chances of scoring any sort of scholarship, or even gaining acceptance into any University in or out of state (with or without taking out loans) slowly dwindled.

“How about this?” Meg proposed, lifting her red wine to her lips before continuing. “What is it? Tuesday? Make it through to Friday without skipping any classes and Wilson will get them for you this weekend.”

Jasper gritted his teeth at the proposal. He had to remind himself that Meg wasn’t withholding the information to be cruel. It was a simple request, really. But that didn’t mean Jasper enjoyed having her dangle this type of information above him in exchange for ‘good behavior’.

He wondered if he could just text Greg—his social worker—and go around his foster parents, but Jasper bit back a sigh as he knew Greg would likely agree with the motivation behind Meg’s proposition.

“Fine,” he agreed quietly, dread already pooling low in his stomach as he thought of tolerating the remainder of the school week without interruption.

That night he had trouble sleeping.

He woke up several times, expecting to see red eyes watching his every move, but instead all he did was sit up, calming himself as he caught his breath and swore outwardly into the silent room.

Truthfully the main reason he wanted his records was to see if he had any diagnoses he didn’t know about. It was fully possible that he actually was crazy and that he was simply never told. The chance that he’d hallucinated the demon girl in the woods was still there as long as he didn’t have those records.

And if they came up clean he wondered if he’d be able to somehow find and see his birth parent’s medical records. He already knew addiction ran in his blood—it’s why he avoided drugs, even one a simple as weed, like the goddamn plague—but if either of his parents had been actually psychotic, it would help Jasper to figure out if his mind was also a ticking time bomb.

The rest of the week at school was long and arduous. He held up his end of the bargain just the way he agreed. He didn’t skip one single class. Principal Shafer even commended him on his attendance by the middle of the day on Thursday, as if it were something Jasper was supposed to be happy or feel proud over.

Instead it just irritated him and he’d nearly picked a fight with one of Colson’s buddies in Spanish class. Thankfully—or perhaps it was a bit of a disappointment, really—he was more fluent than everyone else besides Mrs. Posner, so when he insulted the sandy haired fuckhead in front of the class in Spanish, she had been the only one to gasp and reprimand him.

It was worth it for the frustration that rolled off Parker for the rest of the class, irritated that out of the two people who could tell him what Jasper had said, Mrs. Posner had outright refused, simply giving Jasper an after school detention and resuming the lesson.

Maybe he should worry more about his Spanish grade, but Jasper knew that if he got anything less than an A in this class it wouldn’t be due to lack of knowledge…

After the final bell rang, Jasper sat on the stairs outside, watching as the kids who didn’t drive—usually the underclassmen and the poorer kids—piled onto one of two busses that brought kids home from Forks high. He knew he only had a couple of minutes before the driver got sick of waiting for Jasper to join him and simply left without him, but Jasper was going to push his luck today if it meant he could have a moment of peace without constant chatter going on around him.

He’d left his headphones at home that morning and had been pissed about it all day.

Jasper’s gaze wandered the parking lot then, and when his eyes met a golden pair, he found himself staring back.

It was Rosalie Hale. Standing next to her was her younger sister—or was it cousin?—Bella.

At least Bella had the decency of looking away when Jasper’s eyes fell upon them. She wasn’t as outgoing as Emmett was, but the girl was at least polite. Rosalie on the other hand always baffled Jasper.

Back in Oakland a girl that hot would’ve been running the school. But Rosalie kept to herself, did her work perfectly, and minded her business. Occasionally she’d hurt the pride of some unsuspecting fool who didn’t believe the rumors that Rosalie Hale and Emmett Cullen were actually an item—“it’s disgusting,” Jessica Stanley had explained to him on one of his first days, “they live together. It’s like dating your sibling; so, so weird”—and Jasper had even heard a rumor that once she’d had to physically get her point across to a handsy senior a couple years back.

The story went like this: she’d broken his nose, and a couple ribs, and no one had messed with Rosalie Hale since.

Now, she stared back at him with a glare that very much resembled the one Edward had been shooting him a few days prior.

He resisted the urge to shrug and mouth an irritated ‘what?’ before she opened the door to her red beamer and disappeared inside.

One thing that had frustrated Jasper even more about this week was the eyes he felt on him at all hours of the day. And not just from his classmates who were stunned to see him actually attending class, but from the goddamn Cullens.

The more he caught them staring, the more he found himself wondering what the fuck their deal was. And the more he wondered, the more he thought back to Tuesday afternoon in the woods.

Either he was actually crazy and paranoia was beginning to seep into his subconsciousness and force him into thinking he was being watched, or Edward and Emmett knew something Jasper didn’t.

The odds of them also having seen that demon girl increased more and more every day as they appeared in his peripheral during random intervals throughout the week.

Even on the days when Jasper worked after school the Cullens had, just this week, started shopping in that very mini-mart. After almost two months of the store being open and never having seen them in it before, Jasper was beginning to get suspicious.

Or paranoid, he had to remind himself. There was a very likely reason he was being actually insane about this whole thing.

But that night, when he got home from work—thanking Ben Cheney for the ride home and tossing a couple of bills his way for gas money—he was so exhausted that he didn’t even care that he’d done it. That he’d made it though the school week without skipping. He just wanted to sleep for two days. He was so tired he didn’t even feel as if the trade—his attendance for his records—was even worth it anymore.

He was so tired that he almost didn’t notice the red-eyed demon girl sitting on his bed until he’d already tossed his backpack across the room, his keys onto his desk, and his shoes into the corner.

When he looked up and met her eyes, he startled slightly, shuffling back before freezing under her gaze.

“Don’t scream.” She whispered so quietly he almost didn’t hear her speak. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

“How the fuck did you get in here?” He asked, his voice shaking as he blindly pawed at the wall behind him for the light switch. A part of him hoped and prayed that this was his mind playing tricks on him and that once the light flicked on she’d vanish. But when his hands found the switch, turning the light attached to his ceiling fan on and illuminating the room, he felt his stomach jump up into his throat.

She was still there. And her eyes that appeared to be glowing before in the dark were still as bright as ever.

Her hands were folded in her lap as she sat on the edge of his bed. She was so short that her feet didn’t even reach the ground. She was still barefoot, but at least her clothes were dry this time. The same clothes she’d been wearing earlier that week.

“The window,” she provided simply, her bell-like voice soft. “I’m serious when I say I’m not going to hurt you.” There was a pause as Jasper’s fear went haywire and his heart rate skyrocketed. “Oh,” she covered her ears then, squeezing her eyes shut, “please don’t do that. It’s hard enough to be around you as it is.”

“Why the fuck are you in here? How did—”

“Shh,” Jasper didn’t even see as she moved, she just suddenly did. And before he could react she was standing directly in front of him, her tiny hand pressed against his mouth to keep him from speaking. “They’re going to hear you.”

Jasper’s mind went to Meg and Wilson, who were watching a movie downstairs; it was what they did every night before bed. If the same thing happened and they followed the sound of his noises only to find him terrified of an empty room, they might come to a different conclusion than the Cullen boys did. Instead of advising him against tempting bears they might have him put in some sort of psych ward.

And Jasper did not want to go to the looney bin, even if he was crazy.

Slowly, the girl removed her ice-cold hand from Jasper’s mouth and in the blink of an eye she was back on his bed. The bed creaked and groaned, the mattress bouncing the girl slightly from where she’d too-quickly-for-his-eyes-to-catch launched herself back onto it.

“This is a lot harder than I thought it would be.”

“You’re real,” Jasper couldn’t shake the feeling of her firm, cold hand against his face, and now, even though he was still frozen, he could feel his fear slowly ebbing. “You’re actually a real person.”

The demon girl made an exasperated noise. “Of course I am! What did you think I was? Imaginary!” She almost sounded amused by the idea. Then, she paused, her eyes staring at some point behind him for a few seconds. Long enough for Jasper to notice and for his fear to begin to resurface once more. “We should probably be a little quieter,” she commented again, her voice just barely above a whisper.

Not wanting to take his eyes off the girl, Jasper reached behind him and flicked another switch, turning the ceiling fan on and providing them with some small amount of white-noise. Not enough to cover up too much, but his foster parents certainly wouldn’t hear a soft-spoken conversation over it.

Alice’s eyes lost focus and then quickly refocused as she turned to smile up at him. “Thank you.”

Jasper was stunned at her smile, suddenly feeling very conflicted over the fact that this terrifying weird red-eyed girl was so strangely gorgeous. “Who are you?”

Alice’s smile fell immediately. “Oh.” Then, her eyes fell to her hands, still clasped primly in her lap. “So you don’t know…”

“Of course not!” He blurted out before remembering he needed to be quiet, and lowering his voice, “We’ve never met before.” He took one uneasy step further into his bedroom. “I mean, besides the other day.”

“I just,” she sighed. “I thought you might know. But I suppose it wouldn’t make any sense now, would it?”

“You know my name,” he accused, taking another step into the room. For some reason he felt far more confident when she wasn’t looking at him with those red, haunting eyes. She was a tiny thing, after all. Likely barely five feet tall, and she looked like she barely weighed 100 pounds, if even that. “Who are you?”

“I’m Alice,” she spoke her name quietly. “I’ve been looking for you for a little while now.”

Jasper swallowed a nervous lump in his throat. “How long is a while?”

“About four moons now.”

That caused Jasper to stop. “What?”

Alice looked up at him again, confusion etched carefully onto her doll-like features. “Sorry. I’m learning people track time differently, but I’m not sure how.” Then, she gestured upward, toward the sky. “You know, the moon?”

There was a brief pause before he forced himself to reply. “I know what the moon is.”

“It’s been big four times now.”

Jasper felt his brain skid to a stop before stuttering back into motion, attempting to decipher what on Earth she was talking about. Four full moons? Is that what she was counting? Is that how she kept time? “Big? As in, a full circle?” He gestured vaguely with his hand as he spoke. Alice nodded. “So… four months?”

“A month,” Alice spoke the word delicately, as if testing it on her tongue, and smiled. “Yes. A month. It’s been more than four of them.”

“Since… you started looking for me?”

“Yes!” She whispered excitedly, as if remembering to keep her voice down. “And since I woke up!”

“I…” she’d lost him again. “Woke up?”

She nodded, her happiness beginning to display itself in other, more physical ways. She was now kicking her feet out slightly, letting the backs of her heels knock against the base of his bed. It was a soundless movement, but still, it unnerved him somehow. The kicks were too even, too perfect…

“Yes! And then I saw you and knew I had to find you as soon as I could. Of course, I should’ve reached out to Dr. Cullen first. He’ll be quite upset with me when he learns what I’ve done.”

“Dr. Cullen?” That was certainly a development. “You mean, Carlisle Cullen?”

Alice nodded rapidly. “Oh, I’m so excited to meet him! I’m hoping he’ll let me stay if I promise to be good.”

“Alice, nothing that you’re saying is making any sense.” If this was a hallucination than Jasper knew nothing he could do would help him at this point. Instead, he walked over to his desk and pulled out his chair, sitting himself down in it roughly before letting his face fall into his hands. “I have no idea what’s going on,” he muttered into his palms as he shook his head. “So you know the Cullens?”

“Yes! I’m afraid they don’t know me yet,” she seemed regrettable to inform him of that detail, but quickly she spoke up, “but they’re going to love me. They’ll be our new family and—” she cut herself off then. “It’s probably too soon to tell you that.”

“It isn’t fucking stopping you from doing it now, is it?” Lifting his head back up he leaned back into the chair and swiveled it toward her. “Are you deranged?”

“Deranged?”

“Crazy, insane, unstable, disturbed…” he listed the words off irritably, folding his arms over his chest as he stared back at her. “Are you a maniac?”

“I don’t know,” she seemed stressed at the admission, and it forced a strange guilt to catch his next words in his throat. But he wasn’t being irrational, he had to remind himself. She was the one that had broken into his room.

“What do you know then?”

“That I’m supposed to find you.”

“Why?”

“I’m not sure if telling you right now is a good idea,” she whispered the words so quietly Jasper almost didn’t hear. “I don’t want you to reject me.”

Once more stunned into silence by her strange insecurity, Jasper stared at her. He wasn’t scared anymore. Instead, confusion overpowered all other reason. He just wanted to know who and what she was, and why the fuck she’d sought him out.

Alice pouted as her eyes lost focus once more. “Oh,” she gasped as her head turned toward the window, “Oh, I am in so much trouble.” Instantly, she was on her feet.

“What are you?” She looked human, but she moved so fast sometimes he couldn’t even keep up with his eyes.

“I’ll see you later, okay?” Her words were spoken in a rush, and quickly she was standing in front of him again. She was so slight that even though he was sitting and she was standing she was just barely taller than he was. Before he knew it his hands were in hers. “Please, please believe me when I say I’m not going to hurt you, okay? And that I’m only here because I know it’s supposed to be this way. And—” she paused, hesitating—“if they want to know anything, just tell them the truth, alright? Edward will see it anyways.”

“What are you talking about? Who—Alice—”

But before he could ask another question she was gone in another blink of an eye.

It was a handful of seconds later when his gaze shot up—something had flashed across the window, startling him into his feet. Finally able to react properly, he reached in his back pocket and grabbed his pocket knife, flicking it open as he steadily approached the window. He had a very firm suspicion that it wasn’t Alice.

Something was out there, and Jasper wasn’t about to take anymore of this fucking insanity sitting down.

With his hand outstretched, knife pointing toward the window, he shuffled his feet forward. His window faced out toward the backyard, a series of trees decorating the edge of it, separating his foster parents’ yard from their neighbors’.

Jasper stood at the edge of his bedroom, almost not daring to get too close to the window as he struggled to see what was out there. Eyes catching on one of the trees Jasper watched as the tree shook and a few birds flew out of it.

He almost didn’t see the person standing by the edge of the neighbor’s house. It was too dark to make out who—or what—it was, but there was no way that it was Mrs. Connelly; the woman who lived in the house directly behind theirs.

Jasper continued to stare down at it, and when he saw another black shadow step around the first, larger silhouette, he nearly jumped.

“What the fuck is going on,” he felt himself say out loud, and in seconds, both forms disappeared from the yard, gone without a trace.

If he were more of a fool he would go after them. Sneak back down the stairs and into the backyard and demand whatever leftover demons there were in hiding to come out and explain to him what the fuck was happening, but Jasper had no idea what he was getting himself into anyways.

Even now, Alice’s words unsettled him. “If they want to know anything just tell them the truth.”

Tell who the truth?

As he closed his curtains and quickly changed out of his work clothes, Jasper found himself keeping the knife close, even placing it next to his pillow beside him after he eventually forced himself to climb into his bed.

There was still a chance that he actually was crazy. Just, next-level crazy, in which not only were his hallucinations visual and auditory, but physical somehow, as well.

He hoped Wilson would get those medical records this weekend as promised, because Jasper had a hell of a lot of questions, and so far, no answers.

#jaliceweek20 #the twilight saga #twilight fanfiction #jalice #edge of it all #the next chapters won't be posted until all of these fics #the jalice week ones I mean #make their way onto AO3 #which I'll do next week maybe?? probably

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grunge-academic · 3 years

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Can I have a quick mini rant about how I hate this new internet culture of spoilers (esp. Ones without warnings which are still rampant) going into the social media circulation the instant a show/movie is released, essentially pressuring you to watch it as soon as possible, and especially the Thursday night showings which release spoilers before the movie even officially opens and hey some of us have to go to work on Friday mornings

I've found this mainly with marvel movies and it's especially irritating when you don't even particularly want to watch it but this situation guilts you into watching it as soon as you are able

All because you want to enjoy something as it's meant to be seen

I know this is an unavoidable part of social media but I don't want to leave social media indefinitely just to avoid spoilers because of the other reasons I want to use social media

I don't expect y'all to not post spoilers, do what you want, but I guess plz always use very big spoiler warnings? Thanks

[I can do a separate rant about how these blockbusters are written so that spoilers are for purely one-use shock factor and not a natural and satisfying device to enhance a story]

#marvel #hollywood #spoiler culture #social media #film #sorry I'm mad today #yeah I want to use tumblr for rants #thursday night showings are my new pet peeve #some of us work on fridays

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loganscanons · 4 years

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an average evening

Characters: Makani Calipusan, Precious Jones (Makani’s roommate), some fuckboy named Adam

Summary: Makani threatening a guy bc he’s a dick

Makani sat at her desk, leaning forward, her ankles hooked together beneath her chair as she scribbled down a list of spell ingredients. She referenced three tomes that laid open on her desk. She hadn’t quite decided which hex among the three she wanted to use yet and figured she might as well get all of the ingredients for her current considerations. She could always save the extra ingredients for future kulam.

From her bedroom, Makani heard the apartment door open and close softly, followed by quiet shuffling. There was a beat of silence. Then her roommate’s voice.

“Hey, Makani?” Precious called.

“Yeah?” Makani replied. She capped her pen and slid it into the pen loop of her journal.

“Why is there a naked man bound and gagged on our couch?” Precious asked.

Precious didn’t sound surprised or concerned about the bound man in their sitting room. Just curious.

One of the reasons Precious made such a good roommate was her tolerance of unusual and weird circumstances. Within the first few weeks of Precious moving into the apartment, Makani did a ritual that required a goat’s head. On a Thursday morning, as she was preparing her lunch for work, Precious opened the fridge to see a severed goat’s head staring at her. She gently nudged it aside to grab a yogurt, then closed the fridge without comment. Later, she politely suggested that she and Makani get a mini fridge to store things such as goat heads, so they could avoid cross contamination of sacrifices and the chicken breasts that Precious had prepped to eat for the week.

Makani exited her bedroom with her journal tucked under her arm. Precious stood at the threshold where the kitchen, front entry, and sitting room met, looking blankly at the couch. The man tied up on the couch was a textbook fuckboy, with his hair slicked back and tattoos like “Only God can judge me” written across his upper back and the poorly done tribal tattoo on his left pectoral. Makani knew at first glance that he’d be completely inane the moment he opened his mouth, but fuckboys were just so fun to toy with; she couldn’t help herself.

The man’s eyes bugged out as he struggled against the bindings and stared at Precious desperately, trying to incite some sympathy from her. Makani rolled her eyes. With his arms pinned to his sides and her experience with tying knots, trying to wriggle free was useless. The ropes were digging into his muscles, leaving red marks on his skin.

“He deserves it,” Makani shrugged. She crossed the room from her bedroom to the entryway and grabbed her lace-up boots that sat beside the door.

“What did he do?” Precious asked, her eyes following Makani.

“I only wanted a nice fuck, and then I found out he has a girlfriend,” she said, settling on the floor to pull on her boots.

“So?” Precious said. “You’ve never cared about that.”

She was right. Makani didn’t have time or patience to find out if the people she fucked had a significant other. If people were going to cheat, that was their prerogative.

“He called me his girlfriend’s name,” Makani said.

“Ew,” Precious said. “That doesn’t explain why he’s tied up, though.”

“I called him on it, and he started ranting about how much of a fucking bitch his girlfriend is. And how she’s too dumb and pathetic and in love with him to ever realize he’s fucking other girls,” Makani explained.

“Ew,” she said again, her upper lip curling. She looked back to the man with her nose wrinkled in disgust. “What are you going to do to him?”

“Haven’t decided yet,” Makani said. She stood and tapped her journal with a long fingernail painted a glossy black. “But I have some ideas. I need to pick up some ingredients. Are you okay with me leaving him here?”

“I’d rather you didn’t,” Precious said. She gave him a once over and curled her lip again. “It’s distracting. And I’d planned on watching a movie.”

“Hmm,” Makani hummed. She didn’t really need him to be here for any hexes or curses. All she needed was some DNA. Some personal information would be nice, too.

She returned to her bedroom, saying, “I’ll be right back.”

The man’s clothes were scattered on her floor. Finding his wallet was easy enough, tucked in the front pocket of his jeans. She pulled out his ID and copied down the information before returning the wallet to his pocket. She gathered the rest of his clothes, grabbed a pair of scissors from her desk, and returned to the sitting room. Precious had disappeared into the kitchen. Makani dropped the clothes, including his shoes, into the man’s lap. He winced in pain as the shoes hit him, and he made a few muffled noises through the gag. She ignored him.

Makani pinched a strand of his hair between her thumb and forefinger. He tried to pull away, but his movement was severely limited. He could only let out muffled yells as she raised the scissors and snipped away the tips of the small lock of hair. Still ignoring his protests, she held the hair between her fingers and went to the kitchen. Precious was standing at the kitchen island, flipping through a cookbook. She glanced up briefly as Makani rummaged through the cupboards for a small jar to store the hair.

“Okay,” Makani said, once she’d returned to the sitting room. “I’m going to untie you, but if you try to yell for help or do anything else stupid, I will hit you.”

She pulled his gag off and his face contorted in anger as he hissed at her, “You’re fucking psychotic! You’re not gonna get away with—”

“Oh, save it,” Makani said, shoving one of his socks in his mouth. “I’ve heard this speech before. You’re not going to tell anyone about how the crazy chick you met at the bar tied you up and threatened you.” She removed the sock from his mouth.

“I’m gonna call the fucking cops and—” she shoved the sock in his mouth again.

“Stop talking. Your voice is unbelievably irritating,” Makani said. “You aren’t going to call the cops or tell your rich daddy. Here’s the thing, Adam,” She pressed her nails into either side of his throat. “I know your name and I know where you live, and if you go tattling on me, I’ll ruin your life. Or dump your body in the woods. Really depends on how I’m feeling that day. Got it?” Her voice was falsely cheery, sugar sweet as she grinned.

His breath had grown labored and a bead of sweat ran down his temple. This time, when Makani removed the sock from his mouth, he said nothing. She rapidly untied the knots. Before he had a chance to shake off the loosened ropes, she stepped back and flicked open the knife she kept strapped to her thigh.

The defiant, vengeful look in his blue eyes died, and he slowed his rushed effort to escape the ropes.

“Play nice,” she said with a smile. “I don’t want to get blood on the carpet. We just had it cleaned.”

Keeping his eyes on her, he rapidly pulled his clothes on, nearly falling over as his foot got caught in the leg of his jeans. Makani twirled the knife between her fingers, watching with an easy smile.

After her pulled his second shoe on, he stood for a few brief seconds, sizing her up. She hoped he wouldn’t lunge at her. Dealing with that would be such a chore. But he was a rich white boy with a gym membership. He’d probably never dealt with such insult, such injustice, as a woman getting the upper hand.

“Before you go, Adam,” she said, looking up at him through her lashes. “Remember, I’ll fucking kill you. And I’ll enjoy every second of it. Keep a secret, okay, sweetie?”

He bolted, fumbling with the front door before racing into the hall.

“Think he’ll tell anyone?” Precious called from the kitchen after the door slammed closed.

“Nah,” Makani said, following Precious’s voice. “He’s all bark, no bite. Will you pass me the grocery bags?” Makani grabbed her keys off the wall hook in the kitchen.

Precious reached for the reusable grocery bags on top of the fridge, then tossed them across the kitchen island.

“You want anything while I’m out?” Makani asked.

“Yeah, we’re running low on rice,” Precious said. Before Makani could leave, she asked, “What are you thinking of doing to him?”

“I was considering making him impotent, but that’s so uninspired,” Makani said, twirling her keys on her forefinger. “Maybe make him cry every time he climaxes. Or a life of dry orgasms. Or both. He seems to really like his own cock, so something in that realm.”

“There are spells for that?” Precious asked.

“Oh, absolutely,” Makani said. “There are whole spellbooks about hexes, curses, and spells related to all things sexual.”

“Huh,” Precious said. “Good to know.”

“Let me know if you ever want me to teach you any of them.”

“Will do,” Precious said.

Makani smiled, “Alright, I’ll be back soon.”

“Oh, could you get some rosemary from the store, too?” Precious called as Makani opened the door.

#makani calipusan #someday i will make a whole post about precious bc i adore her #uf #my writing #precious lebeau

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tiffanyink · 4 years

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Good morning! 🌞 . How’s your Thursday treating you so far??? . So far I’ve been my most productive in a long time. 😅 . Currently I’m bringing my vision of Titania, Queen of the fairies from William Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream to life. I fell in love with this story around 8 years old. HBO used to show cartoon/puppet versions of Shakespeare’s greatest plays early (7am) in the morning. I loved the premise of a world within a world. Untold stories playing out all around us. . Truthfully I have this thing with Fairie Queens. I created two paintings so far with that theme and it looks like I’ll continue doing so 😁. . Anyway that’s my mini rant for the morning. I do hope you all are staying safe and remembering those that are out there keeping us that way. . Take care my friends and be well! 😊✌🏾👁 . . . . . #womenwhopaint #folkloreandfairytales #figurativeartist #contemporaryrealism #realisticpainting #contemporaryportrait #fantasyartist #womenpainters #artwork #art #painting #artist #mythicalart #artwip #drawingsofinstagram #fantasyartists #americanartist #classicalart #midsummernightsdream #queenofthefairies #queentitania #drawinblack #tiffanyrankinatx #atxartistoninstagram #pencildrawing #atxartist #austinartist #atxartists #austinartists #thursdayart @apothecary_lore @tiffanyrankin_art (at Austin, Texas) https://www.instagram.com/p/B_C-_HelfWA/?igshid=1bck8c9tvocci

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transversal-callum · 5 years

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Sassy Gay Glimmer

[Can also be seen on AO3]

It is dawn at Bright Moon. The crickets are now starting to stop chirping, though they still are rather loud.

Adora and Catra can be seen standing next to each other, holding hands and saying their sad goodbyes. Just as they are seen leaning in for a kiss..

"WHAT. WHAT. WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"

Adora and Catra quickly jerked their heads back, screeching in shock. Turning around slowly, they stared at the dumbfounded princess of Bright Moon, eyes twitching.

"Uh, we WERE going to kiss until you decided to SCREAM at the crack ass of dawn!" Catra huffed, tail lashing in frustration at the rude interruption. Adora still looked like she was recovering from the outburst, her face bright red as she still remembered the taste of Catra's breath. She struggled to form a coherent sentence.

"Glimmer, I swear I can-"

Glimmer whirled on her, not giving the new She Ra a chance to finsh her words. "You LOVE her? You fought her SUNDAY, it's barley THURSDAY MORNING!" she snarled, still ruffled from lack of sleep.

The member of the best friend squadTM then fumed at Catra.

"Slow down. crazy Horde Commander, slow down! And keep your undone clawed hands away from Adora!"

Said Horde Commander huffed and grabbed an outraged Adora's hand again, squeezing it tightly. "Love makes you crazy, GLITTER." she sneered.

"Yeah, I would say so...!" Was the ice cold response.

Catra's eyes widened in fury at the jab and she took a step forward, ears flat on the sides of her head. "Wanna say that to my FACE, princess sparkles-"

Adora's other hand quickly flew up to cover Catra's mouth, allowing Glimmer to go on a rage fueled rant. Catra let out a muffled yowl of fury, struggling in Adora's powerful grip.

"Catra, Catra, where thou art thou Catra?" The rebellion princess yowled, her face twisting in clear disgust.

"TRANSLATION?" she quickly continued, voice seething with harsh sarcasm.

Adora can be seen clinging onto Catra's legs in Glimmer's mind, getting dragged along by a shocked and annoyed Catra.

"DESPERATE. DESPERATE. I AM REALLY DESPERATE!"

With a huff, Glimmer turned around, clearly done with her mini rant. Catra had given up at trying to make Adora let go, settling with muffled profanities and curses that would have made Hodak and Shadow Weaver blush.

Adora felt annoyance pool in her like water. Glimmer didn't have the right to say who or not to fall in love with! If she wanted to be with Catra, so what? It wasn't like she was going to DEFECT. Gods no, she was She Ra now! And She Ra didn't abandon her friends!

'Well, I DID abandon Catra....' the blonde thought sadly. Shaking her head to clear the damp thoughts, she addressed her best friend with an anger edged voice.

"Glimmer, I am an almost grown women!"

"I think YOU are 14 and you're an idiot!" Said girl retorted almost instantly.

Catra was now struggling to make Adora remove her hand from her mouth again. "MPGH!"

"Look at your life, Adora!" Glimmer yowled. "Look at your CHOICES! I mean, have you even SLEPT with this girl?!?"

Adora was quiet for some moments before suddenly gaining a smug smirk on her face. She let go of Catra, who gained a familiar evil expression as well.

The She Ra's chest puffed proudly as she proclaimed her next words.

"I DID."

Glimmer was stunned. She had no words. Her form flicked. Eyes twitched. Adora and Catra shared a smug victory kiss before looking back, clearly eager to see the intruder's reaction.

Glimmer took a deep breath. And then, out of nowhere-

"OH MY GODS, GOOD FOR YOU!"

Glimmer quickly teleported and gave Adora a high five, a big smile now on her face. She put both arms around the couple's shoulders.

"Let's get out of here! My mom would KILL me if I let another Horde soldier in Bright Moon again so soon after the battle. Remember when she saw you for the first time Adora?"

"Oh yeah!" Adora laughed. "And she was SOOOOO mad. I honestly was terrified at first-"

"Come ON, you stupid princesses! The smell of sunshine and rainbows is KILLING me right now!" Catra loudly growled, seemly not impressed at the display at all. Her expression changed when Adora leaned heavily on her, making sure her 'annoyingly intoxicating scent' wafted all over her girlfriend.

Glimmer, Catra and Adora walked away from Bright Moon, arms linked together tightly, Catra's loud purrs fading into the distance.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Some time later, Glimmer was on top of Bright Moon with a horrified expression crossing her sleep-deprived face.

"She is a STUPID BITCH....." Glimmer whispered.

Her head fell onto her chest, quickly being taken into the warm grasp of sleep moments later.

#she ra #spop #she ra 2018 #spop 2018 #catradora #robot writes #oneshot #glimmer #TAKE THIS BS I DUNNO

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ghosty-schnibibit · 5 years

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late amnesty liveblog because my sleep schedule has betrayed me :P

i've scheduled this liveblog to come out around 10:00 am on friday, but as i'm typing this it's around three in the morning. summer has utterly fucked my sleeping schedule lmao, i literally went to bed around 6:00 am yesterday and didn't wake up until a little before 4:00 pm... which is about a normal amount of time to sleep for me tbh, just at a wack time. oi vae. i’m going to try and get to bed a little earlier tonight, but i had to get this done now so i didn’t have to avoid tumblr altogether for fear of spoilers while me and my parents are driving to IKEA tomorrow :P

i've been procrastinating listening to the new ep all day because of well, the same reason i tend to procrastinate listening to every new ep of amnesty: i'm scared as fuck for all of these characters and a lil bit nervous about how griffin intends to unify all the disparate plot threads in a way i wasn't during balance. i'd say that nervousness is less of a product of me being distrustful in the boys’ abilities and more a product of me binging all of balance over the course of a month and only catching up in time for reunion tour, aka when all the main mystery threads were either solved or would be in the next few eps. also, ngl, still a little shaken by ned's death, along with how bloody the last arc was in general and what that means going forward vis a vis character mortality. please griffin, all i ask is that you don’t kill off duck and aubrey, p l e a s e

tl;dr: my sleep schedule is fucked and i'm a nervous wreck about fictional characters, what else is new lol? anyways, onto the liveblog!

the description is probably the least terrifying of the last five or six

"how's the scene doing?" "lil cold" i caught that pun trav

MY BOY :D

griffin what the fuck

good to know indrid isn't at fault lmao

aww duck :'(

"what a delight" bless

the heathcliff is out of the bag

indrid you dramatic twink jfc

i really love these moments of just... pure dialogue

q u e l l

"why did you invoke submarines?" ilu aubrey

... you're not really being helpful here drid

i love thacker so much holy shit

yep, all bummers sums it up pretty well :|

a very finely feathered cast lol

minerva's voice is so similar to indrid’s jesus

i only know of minority report through the lost in adaptation ep on it lmao

well that's not great

"our- well, your world technically" aww indrid

aubrey you dummy ilu

i forgot kirby was there lol

i need fic of aubrey and thacker watching movies together and getting him caught up to modern day, i don't even like the mcu and i want that fic

d u c k m a n

JESUS CHRIST INDRID

what was that noise clint???

indeed quite zany lol

which one of them is clicking their computer mouse a bunch???

"gotta getchu a sword" leo ilu

i know there's gonna be fanart of that lmao

ooooh, new music! very good new music!

yes please keep the together party after splitting it caused so much heartache and literal death last arc

i love thacker's dad energy so much, can't wait to see how that plays out

"WHY ARE THEY SITTING IN RUBBLE" ilu trav

sammiches c:

keith is just d o n e

i just remembered the throwaway line from the last arc about hollis being into saturday night dead and got sad :(

JESUS THACKER

i need fic of thacker interacting with the baby hornets, i need it so bad

duck you cannot just spring all this on them

"my friend the mothman" D U C K

YUP, you need to roll for that

that's better than failure! that's not complete failure!

JAKE! JAKE! JAKE!

OH MY GOD THAT'S SO FUCKING CUTE

they're in it for jake :')

i’m so excited for the new graphic novel!!! hopefully i will have enough money to buy it ha haaaaa for real tho i have no money or autonomy

ghost dewey! :D

who does he need to talk to? pigeon maybe?

that was so good clint! i loved it :D

WHAT THE FUCK, DUCK NEWTON

i know i've said it like eighty times but thacker's peak dad energy is absolute gold and i'm super happy we get to see him interact with juno again after how adorable their last scene was :)

"gross" bless travis

oooh no, i'm getting bad vibes

i have never heard milanos pronounced that way in my entire life

i have to hide mine from my dad lmao

WHO IS CLICKING

thacker you sound like the goddamn unibomber could you please be more forthright about what the plan is

hmm... here's a fun question: did thacker inherit ned's spent luck???

well that answers that lol

i love juno so goddamn much

sensors? stealth could be an option

why is she so scared? like aubrey brought her coworker back to life, i personally would not be afraid of her murdering me after that

"no one needs to go to chicago" ilu aubrey

federal paperwork is an absolute bastard

some monday what???

"well i don't care for the tone!" aubrey ilu

that's a good way to put it :/

WHY IS DEWEY IN THE CLOSET

s p e c t r a l m o m

well dewey is immune to death sooo...

ned was one of aubrey’s best friends... even after everything that happened she still called him one of her best friends... travis you've made me cry ; _ ;

PLEASE MAGIC TRAVIS DICE SHE HAS NO MORE LUCK TO BURN

damn this really is a wild ass scenario isn't it

"you're melting my fucking brain" pfff

thank you clint, i completely forgot too

travis is the irl voidfish lmao

i love dewey so much

"can't kill me twice, i think" i hope dewey can't double die lol

d u c k o l a s

why did you go to buffy and winthrop duck??? why did you want to talk to these weird edward and lydia reskins duck?????

yeah that feels right

okay, it's griffin clacking on his mouse

playing what???

THE WHAT

WHAT ARE YOU PLAYING AT, JUSTIN MCELROY

DUCK WHAT THE FLYING FUCK ARE YOU DOING I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IS GOING ON

i love justin's triumphant laugh so much

i mean i already mentally associated them with the wonderland liches so this isn't much of a jump ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

griffin what on earth is this

"that's it, that's all the latin there is" i wish lmao

THE SHADOW BRETHEREN

we are... so screwed lmao

this was very good! this ep kept up the trend of funnier interactions from the last ep and i’m grateful for it after how sad the past arc was. i am still very worried but i’m happy we’re seeing a lot of npcs that we hadn’t gotten back to in a while just to make sure they’re okay. pretty much anything else i had to say is summed up by the mini rant i made before listening above lol.

see y’all next right thursday!!!

#taz #the adventure zone #taz amnesty #taz spoilers #ghosty liveblogs taz

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just-another-busy-fangirl-writes · 5 years

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Ridiculousness...

I think Chuck has it out for me lately... rant/list of ridiculousness in my life lately below the cut.

Just to preface, this is 100% just me writing down a bunch of crap and if you feel like reading it, great. If not, no worries. I just need to like... vent somewhere.

So I decided to take a two week break from teaching between my spring and summer semesters, which is awesome. (Love being my own boss and being able to decide things like this!) Hubs was out of town the weekend of Memorial Day, and some of you know that I got a shitton of writing done those three(ish) days (like 14k words on Harlequin, woohoo!). My plan was to continue riding that high through the two weeks, finish the Harlequin, write some more, be productive, etc.

Chuck decided otherwise. (Dammit, Chuck!)

Thing One: Last Monday night, I started to get a sore throat. Summer colds are the worst, but this was like... more than that. I’ve been sick my fair share of times in life, and as a singer/musician, I know to take care of my instrument. Tuesday when I woke up and couldn’t speak or swallow without knife pain in my throat? Made a doc-in-the-box appointment. Good thing: Doc said that I had spots in my throat and it was a good thing I came in, prescribed meds, etc. Bad thing: I was sitting in the waiting room for nearly two HOURS after my scheduled appointment time... So that was fun.

Thing Two: I had three days of new students Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday, which in and of itself is...stressful. But new students on top of being sick? Trying to put my best self forward for the students and parents who I’d never met before, while I felt like death? Not so much fun. And the fact that I couldn’t sleep because of the fire in my throat combined with not being able to breathe... I was exhausted by the end of my lessons each of those days.

Thing Three: My in-laws came in town this weekend. Now, of course, this is a great thing - my husband got to hang out with his parents, they got to see our new house, they helped us with some house projects here and there... But for those of you with in-laws, you understand. It was a weekend. Keeping things clean and organized, being on my A-Game (even though I was sick the whole time they were here), providing food and drinks (so much beer) for them, and just...not being able to introvert by myself for a while.

Thing Four: Monday, while on my way home from the chiropractor (the one time I had a legitimate excuse to get out of the house and away from the fam), I was in a hit-and-run. DON’T WORRY I am fine - I was not injured. The damage to my car was all cosmetic, nothing internally damaged. But being in a hit-and-run meant 1) Filing a police report, 2) Realizing that the police don’t have jurisdiction ‘cause it was on the highway, so having to figure out who to talk to in the sheriff’s department, 3) Filing the insurance claim, 4) Being interviewed by insurance to be assessed for the runaway/uninsured driver claim (lower deductible), 5) Taking the car in to be assessed, 6) Getting a rental.... etc etc. Just a big fat pain in the ass.

Thing Five: After brushing my teeth this morning, I realized that the cement cap thing holding one of my teeth onto my permanent retainer had come off. How? I have no idea. But this afternoon I’ll be heading to the dentist to see what needs to be done with that, cause it’s driving me crazy.

Mini-Thing Six: This isn’t really a ~thing~ but it’s been raining so much and that just totally brings my mood down in general.

So really, those things all individually aren’t horrible. They’re minor inconveniences/annoyances in the least. But all together, during the two weeks that I was supposed to be relaxing and getting ahead in work and writing? I’m just super ugh.

The best part of my last couple weeks though? Deciding yesterday that I didn’t feel like doing anything else and binge watching Good Omens on Amazon Prime. Definitely worth it, and definitely a rainbow in this thunderstorm of suck.

Hope everyone is having a better beginning-of-summer than I am! I’m hopeful that all of the bad luck has just dumped on me in one small period of time and that the rest of the summer will be awesome.

Thanks for letting me rant. 💜

#personal

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alittleyellowdinosaur · 5 years

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mini rant plz ignore

jesus christ my life has gone to hell in about a week flat. i lost my job, got a new job, had one day at that job, spent the next night and morning fucking sobbing and getting yelled at by my mom (and sister. and dad. and other sister.) bc i wanted to quit bc i know my fuckin limits and that job just bulldozed them and kept going for a mile further than i could handle and i knew i couldn’t do it do i quit the job after a day (there were no hard feelings w the owner btw) and then im all responsible and looking for jobs i can handle (online jobs that have a million and one reasons why they are super great for me personally including making more money, more freedom and flexibility, able to take the jobs to college, better for my future in general, NOT GOING TO DESTROY ME MENTALLY etc) and im being super responsible and motivated and mom keeps. yelling. at. me about how bad these are and how i need a job in fuckin retail or some shit irl and how online will never match it (even though it will?? and surpass it in a million ways??) and that its not a real job and etc etc and so im fighting about that and my sisters are being horrible douchebags about the quitting after one day shit and then IT GETS WORSE bc of course it does. this morning i find out my mom is ashamed about my weight and thinks its a shame on the family (no this is not me blowing things out of proportion btw this is actually what she said. Maybe not word for word, but that’s the gist of it) and i just. i want to cry more than i’ve ever wanted to cry before and im just so fucking sick of this all and i want to be treated like an adult and for mom to respect my decisions and stop trying to control my life and i just want to get the fuck out of this hell hole of a house and live my own life and get the FUCK OUT OF HERE and i just want to sob so hard but i think if i do i’ll never stop and i know if i do its not going to make things better and i dont know how to talk to my mom about this bc she never listens and never has and she’s so set in her own ways and just gets defensive as shit like im attacking her or something and i just can’t handle this and i stg ive had more Bad Thoughts this past week than i have in a year and i DON’T LIKE IT i’m trying to be better and i AM better but i just. can’t handle my mom right now and i can’t handle my sisters and for once in my life my DAD is the only good one right now and i just. i can’t okay i fucking can’t right now. And IT GETS FUCKING WORSE because my sisters are off from school until THURSDAY meaning they are going to be home with me and being terrible and im going to be dragged into family time bullshit and i just want to cry so bad right now i can’t. i just can’t handle this right now. and anyways life is a fucking nightmare right now and i can’t wait for therapy on tuesday and it cannot come fast enough rn.

#im literally crying rn but im trying not to #ive been getting yelled at for everything #i didn't want to get my haircut today?#you are just being difficult bc its convenient for me now #so you have to #my sister misgenders and infantilizes me like she does every damn day and i don't want to play into it?#you are asking for it bc you said some snide comment earlier this morning #like what the actual fuck #i can't stand this fucking family #thank god im going to a friends tonight #EXCEPT WAIT MY SISTERS ARE COMING TO GOD FUCKING DAMN IT #i can't stand this #the six months until i can go to college cannot come fast enough #im not just being difficult im trying to do what's right for myself mom #WHICH YOU DON'T KNOW BC YOU DON'T KNOW SHIT ABOUT ME AND YOU NEVER BOTHER TO LISTEN WHEN I TRY TO TELL YOU #SO FUCK THE FUCK OFF

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birdiethebibliophile · 6 years

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{fic} All They Were And Something More

Fandom: The Adventure Zone: Commitment Rating: G Warnings: ABSOLUTELY NONE, this fic is nothing but fluff!!! Word Count: 1,368

Here on AO3.

For @halleluland. The promised movie night fic. The pure fluff I said would come sooner or later.

Technically takes place in the universe of That Old Sweet Feeling, but can be read on its own - you just won’t understand some, um, inside jokes.

Title from The Beautiful Not Yet by Carrie Newcomber.

Summary: Every Thursday night, the Wonder Triplets plus Mary get together for a movie night. It goes the same way every time.

__________________

The first one to movie night was always Irene, of course, whether she was hosting or not. She had keys to all their apartments, so she’d walk on in, immediately vacuum the living room, and start setting out any snacks she’d brought. Nadiya and Mary Sage would get there next, bearing hot chocolate fixings and the fluffiest blankets they owned. The last to arrive was always Remy, who would appear at the door clutching the chosen DVD and a sheepish grin.

They would spend half an hour squabbling over places on the couches and/or chairs, and inevitably end up all squashed together on one couch, Mary Sage half in Nadiya’s lap, Remy perched on an arm because he couldn’t sit still, and Irene with her legs cross-legged under her in a way that seemed to take up way too much space for someone as small as she was. Nadiya would criticize any scientific impossibility, Mary Sage would loudly complain about the lack of explosions, and Remy would cry at the sad bits. It would end with them saying they should head home until they all fell asleep one by one, using the others for armrests and pillows and blankets. The next morning, Irene would make blueberry pancakes and Nadiya would make the coffee and Mary Sage would scramble the eggs and Remy would wash the dishes afterwards.

It was a routine Nadiya loved beyond reason or logic, and she hoped it would continue every Thursday night from now until eternity.

“Nadiya, here’s yours,” Remy said, handing Nadiya her mug of hot chocolate with marshmallow fluff and caramel drizzled on top. “Irene.” Irene liked hers with chocolate syrup and peppermint. “Here, Mary –” Hers was topped with what looked like half a can of whipped cream. Remy finally settled down on the couch, squeezed in between Mary Sage and Nadiya. His cup was overflowing with mini marshmallows. “Okay, captions on? Sliders stacked? Sewer granola within easy reach?”

“That was one time, Remy, we were on the run, and they were Power Bars, not granola bars –”

“Yep, we’re all good!” Remy said cheerily, derailing Nadiya’s rant before it could go too far. Irene, always in charge of the controller, started the movie.

“Is there kissing in this one?” Mary Sage asked. “I don’t like kissing.”

“Liar,” Nadiya said.

Mary Sage scowled. She had whipped cream on her nose already. “In movies!”

“Yeah, there’s kissing, but it’s not a kissing movie,” Remy said, already bounced up to the back of the couch and perched there with his legs dangling towards the cushions. “I knew better than to bring one after Titanic.” Nadiya remembered that movie night clearly – it had resulted in all four of them agreeing on how good-looking Kate Winslet was and disagreeing, loudly, on whether there really had been room on the door for Jack. (Kardala made an appearance to decisively say that there was absolutely not. They tried to shout her down, but shouting down a thunder goddess was an exercise in futility.)

“Ugh, fine,” Mary Sage said. “I get to pick next week, though.”

“You always pick Die Hard ,” Remy protested. “Or a Veggie Tales movie.”

“Not always,” Mary Sage said. “One time I picked Die Hard 2. At least I don’t pick Flubber every time.”

“Wasn’t every time. It was just the first five,” Remy said.

“We still haven’t gotten around to watching my favorite movie,” Nadiya put in.

“The Fly is horror, Nad!” Remy said, nudging her with one Spongebob-socked foot. “No horror except for on Halloween. That’s my rule.”

“It’s barely horror! It’s a classic!” Nadiya said. “Plus, Jeff Goldblum and Geena Davis, come on –”

“Three things,” Irene said in her small voice. “One, we also haven’t watched The Royal Tenebaums, which is my favorite movie, if you’ll remember. I haven’t been able to find a copy on DVD. Second, we’re missing the intro.” (“As if we ever don’t,” Nadiya mumbled.) “And third,” Irene continued, standing up from the couch and nearly doubling in size, her voice dropping an octave and a half, “I want popcorn,” Kardala finished. “Did anyone bring any?”

“We have some in the cabinets,” Nadiya said. “The ones above the microwave.”

Kardala headed into the kitchen. They heard the cabinets open and close, the popping of popcorn, and twelve minutes later, Kardala returned with what appeared to be five bags of popcorn, all poured into the biggest mixing bowl Nadiya and Mary Sage owned.

“Thank you, Nadiya Jones!” Kardala said loudly. She sat down on the couch, effectively taking up ninety percent of the cushion space and nearly toppling Remy, who steadied his hot chocolate and himself with a yelp.

“What, you think we’re gonna host movie night and not have popcorn for you?” Mary Sage said with a grin, and Kardala smiled back and held up her bowl so Mary Sage could set her mug on the coffee table and fling herself across both Nadiya’s and Kardala’s laps. Kardala, unperturbed, set her bowl back down on Mary Sage’s stomach.

“They’re as sacred to movie night as sliders and hot chocolate,” Remy said. “Maybe more so.”

“But not as sacred as the sewer granola?” Mary Sage said slyly.

“For the LAST TIME, MARY –” Nadiya started, even as Mary Sage burst into laughter. Nadiya couldn’t help laughing along with her. Mary Sage just had that kind of laugh.

“It’s good granola,” Kardala said, though it was unclear whether she was defending Nadiya or Irene. “Irene’s mothers taught her the recipe.”

“No thanks, Irene’s kind has unshelled pistachios in it,” Nadiya said. “Ick.”

“No, that’s her pgorp,” Kardala said, eating a handful of popcorn that could easily have comprised an entire bag. “Her granola is much better. It has chocolate chips. The mini kind.” Suddenly, Kardala got a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “Sometimes Irene eats it for breakfast.”

“Hell yeah, chocolate for breakfast!” Remy said. He high fived Mary Sage in Kardala’s place, since Kardala’s hands were full of popcorn.

Nadiya finished her hot chocolate, set the mug down, and pulled one of the fluffy blankets up and wrapped it around her shoulders. Mary Sage promptly sat up, nearly knocking the popcorn bowl from Kardala’s hands in the process, positioned herself squarely in Nadiya’s lap, and wrapped herself in both the blanket and her girlfriend’s arms. “No blanket without me,” she mumbled, rubbing the soft edge across her mouth.

“You’re a holy terror,” Nadiya said, half-squished under a rather heavy double armful of Mary Sage. “I’m dating a holy terror. A wild child. An enfant terrible , if you will.”

“Mmhmm,” Mary Sage agreed, making herself comfortable on top of Nadiya. “Comfy girlfriend.”

Remy made a gagging noise from above them. “PDA alert, girlfriends too cute, call the cute lesbian cops!”

“There are no cute lesbian cops,” Mary Sage responded immediately. “Only cute lesbian communists.”

“Are you a communist?” Remy asked curiously.

“Probably,” Mary Sage said. “Statistically speaking.” Then, before he or Nadiya could incredulously question her about what statistics, exactly, she was referring to, she added, “Also, if cute lesbians aren’t allowed, Irene’s gotta leave, so tough beans.”

Kardala beamed. “Irene says to thank you for the compliment,” she says.

“She’s welcome,” Mary Sage said. “Kardala can stay, though.”

“Am I not cute?” Kardala asked.

Mary Sage turned and squinted at her, then leaned back and tilted her head. Kardala was wearing Irene’s favorite Hello Kitty pajamas, and, as always, looked vaguely like she’d just stuck her finger in an electrical socket. “Sure,” Mary Sage said finally. “But are you a lesbian?”

“Probably,” Kardala said agreeably, and went back to her popcorn.

Predictable , Nadiya thought, rubbing her hand through Mary Sage’s curly hair. Routine, she thought as the kissing scene came up on the screen and Mary Sage made retching noises and Remy kicked her and Kardala threatened to throw them both across the room. Ordinary, she thought as Remy dozed off like a cat spread over the top of the couch, and Kardala shrunk back into Irene as her eyes started to droop, and Mary Sage began snoring loudly from Nadiya’s lap, where her legs had fallen asleep.

Nadiya couldn’t remember ever being happier.

#taz #taz commitment #taz fanfiction #nadiya jones #irene baker #kardala #christopher rembrandt #remy #mary sage #space cadet #fluff #the adventure zone #the adventure zone commitment #taz: c #that old sweet feeling #tosf #this will rot your teeth it is so fluffy #mine

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daynamartinez22 · 3 years

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Weekly SEO Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 313

youtube

Click on the video above to watch Episode 312 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

We’re live. Hello, Adam. We’re live. See if I can make my speakers work. Can somebody say something? Hello? Hello, hello? Know You started Hump Day hangout with broken headphones apparently. All right, well, Hey everybody, welcome to Hump Day Hangouts. We’re gonna get into the questions after we have a couple of quick announcements. And I pull up the page I’m looking for Anyways, I’m gonna defer for a minute introduce everyone, and then we will have those announcements. So Chris, hopefully, your headphones are working today. How are you doing? Yeah. Working excellent. Here’s two good complaints. Nice to hear. So yeah, yeah. Sounds good. Marco. How about you, the man looks like, you know, pretty good weather, I guess, man.

It’s as if I lived in the tropics. And I don’t know why. Who knew? Right. But yeah.

Last Wednesday, we had six straight days of rain man. And it was like on NBC on Sunday.

I can’t, we just had so much rain. But then Sunday. It was a beautiful Monday, the last couple of days back to rainy season weather. Beautiful morning, kind of overcast and rainy afternoons. But I won’t complain. And I’m living the life I want to live because I’m a powerful. One thing.

I was told yesterday that my biggest fan is Jennifer. She’s been listening to me for like three and a half years. She’s 12 years old. So she’s been listening to me since she was eight. Oh, man. So I don’t know I feel about that. I’m thinking, do I want my son listening to me? anyway?

Anyway, it’s awesome, too. She’s the one I think I mentioned her. She’s the one who wants to charge 1500 an hour. She doesn’t know what she’s gonna charge it for. But she’s gonna charge 1500 bucks an hour. She’s awesome. You just keep doing the do you do? And you’re gonna get there. So that’s awesome. Shout out to Jennifer man.

Outstanding. Well, I was going to move on. But real quick before we do that, you know, I realized we introduce ourselves and say how things are going but for those of you who are watching today, how are things going for you? If you feel like it, you can join the weather talk and let us know how the weather is but just say hi, let us know you’re watching, and say hello I know we have some people who are watching you know absorb and that’s great. But also just drop a note and say hello. So Hernan How about you, man? How are you doing? Doing great man. I’ve been in back to back calls for the past couple of days for some reason. So when I’m back to back calls, nothing gets done. So what I’m trying to do is to block out Mondays and Thursdays with no calls, no meetings, nothing so you know, I can actually get some stuff done. And you know, there has been that’s been helping quite a lot. So because you know, otherwise. Tuesday I had something like 14 calls or something like that. And then today was kind of similar. So anyway, trying to do that. We’ll see how that goes. Yeah, man. Good on you. I know you’re more outgoing. In that sense than I am. I hit my limit around four or five. I think on Tuesdays I have five and like diam tapped out man at the end of that day. Like I fell asleep on the couch at like eight o'clock at night just exhausted from talking to people so good. Anya Bradley, how about you, man?

Good, super busy. Uh, give me a little teaser as to what I’ve been doing. Were you in the process, we’ve talked about this updating syndication Academy. We’re gonna relaunch that with all brand new updates and everything. And so you know, IFTTT has the like for free accounts to only be able to create three apps Well, we have a pro account, which allows us to create an unlimited amount of apps and you can actually publish them as a pro account to and but it’s been so long since I’ve had to go in and set up all those apps or the applets. Because, you know, we’ve had builders doing it for us now for years. And I have to go in and recreate all of the applets. And to be honest, there, it’s slight like the interface is a little bit different when you create applets to publish as a on a pro account. It’s like a different format and everything else. And so I’ve had to go through and I’ve spent the entire day like trial and error during applets. And now I remember why I trained virtual assistants to do it for me because I fucking hate is so tedious. But it’s really cool because now we have share URLs that we’ll be able to, you know, provide for syndication Academy as well as to our builders to where they can just go in and set up the applets very easily by just swapping out their RSS feed URLs for example. So they don’t have to do any coding at all. It’s it’s really, really cool and I’m glad that this is getting done. Hopefully, I’ll have it done by this evening. And syndication Academy will be updating and

And relaunching that shortly, can’t give me an exact date on that. But we’ve got some updates and surprises prior to the launch of that, that we’re going to be bringing to you guys in the coming weeks. So definitely, and to jump on the upcoming but can’t say too much train, we definitely got some good stuff cooked up for Black Friday weekend, which is coming up after Thanksgiving in the US if you’re familiar with that, if you’re not, that’s going to be on November 27, we’re going to have some great stuff going around the 26, maybe 27th for the few days. So if you’re not on the Semantic Mastery email list, and you’re watching this head over to semantic mastery sign up right there. If you’re on the watch page, right now you just scroll down and hop on over there. By the way, sorry, sorry to interrupt you, but as usual, which we try to over-deliver as much as possible. So Black Friday is not gonna be it’s not going to be different, both for Semantic Mastery and MGYB. We tried to you know, give you guys mind-blowing deals, and this is not going to be any different. So stay tuned, because it’s going to be pretty awesome. I mentioned to you guys yesterday during our corporate meeting, and during, I mentioned it to buy other people in the mini mastermind meeting how just using our stuff, just using it the way that it’s supposed to be used, I took a class 1200 percent gain in earnings in four months. 1200 percent. That’s not a mistake, that’s not a bluff. That’s not a beat that that’s a hockey stick. So over that period, it looks boom. So and like I was telling you, let’s say it dips, I don’t know 10 20% before, before bouncing back up. Well, we’re still at around 900%. So in a month, you know, cuz it’ll do the dance, it’ll still do it over a million links, plus Presley’s bras, all of these other things that we do, post post, the way that we do them, everything, everything, all of the training and everything that we make available in Semantic Mastery, everything that’s going to be available on Black Friday at a discount with you guys know, I hate giving shit away. I hate it. I hate it. But I mean it is what it is we’ve gotten our people used to it. I’m not going to oppose it, although I am. But dude, and I was telling my guys, I said What the fuck is keeping all of you from just going and just burying the competition’s bury them, just bury them. Just to do it, it’s systematic. If you need more, you just apply more, and you charge the client for it doesn’t come out of your pocket, you’re supposed to offer the services and mark it up so that you benefit. And then when you hit that hockey stick effect, you got to have a clause. Of course, I don’t have contracts, what I have is a recording that we talked about, we’ll look at it in we looked at it after 90 days, and then at the six month period, we’ll look at it again, just because of that, because when that hockey stick takes effect, I want to be able to charge for that I don’t want to charge what I’m charging, I want to be able to charge that 1200 percent markup that is gaining business that he’s getting, I want to benefit from that tool. So you got to get all of this working but the way to do it is follow the system the systems in place have been in place for years.

And why are you people not benefiting from the fucking system? That’s what upsets me most that’s what upset that we’ve been offering this for years and years and years your way to go and make that money to rank him back. And you don’t do it. Why?

I’m done. rant over. Alright, well before we get into the questions, I popped a couple of links on the page and just wanted to follow up on that. So if you’re new to Semantic Mastery and MGYB first of all thanks for watching. We’ve got some free information is where you should usually start out right so head over to the SEO shield calm right the SEO shield comm you can find out about you know shielding your site you hear us talk about SEO shields this other stuff, it can be a lot we get it so go to the SEO shield com find out about how you’ll never have to worry about algorithm updates ever again. All right now if you’re an agency owner or a consultant and you want to get more clients, you want to grow your revenue you want to scale your team so that should be three yeses for most people. If you want to find out more about that head over 2xyouragency.com. And last but certainly not least for those of you who do already have agencies you’ve got a digital marketing business maybe you’ve got a physical business that you’re wanting to grow online, then you want to join us in the mastermind at semantic mastermind dot semantic mastery comm not going to bore you to death with reading neither about what that’s all about. You can find out but it’s about having an experienced community. I think all of us here are part of other communities as well as our

Our own mastermind, and we know and recognize the role that plays in growing our businesses and expanding our horizons. And last, but certainly not least of all, I guess it’s a second class today is head over to mg y b.co. That’s the done for you services. You hear us talking about the SEO shield, syndication networks, link building press releases, all that sort of good stuff. You can get it all done for you at mg y b.co. Alright, so with that said, you guys, unless there’s anything else we need to cover, let’s get into it.

Sweet.

Wayne says Chris, move your camera down. Unless you’re naked. What are you hiding? Dude?

Rolling naked.

Internet Marketing lifestyle, man. It’s right. Oh, man.

Instant Indexing By RankMath

All right, we got your screen. Bradley. Did you get it? Yeah. All right. Cool. So it looks like Alana has the first question. I know. She says she sorted it out already as the follow-up, but I’ll just briefly read it and answer it. Hi, guys. You mentioned using rankmath for indexing last week, just wondering if you know if you can use that feature. Meaning like, can you only use that? Yeah. Because and this is what I was mentioning. It’s called the instant indexing for Google. Right? That’s the name of the plugin by rankmath. It’s an add on. So no, you don’t need to use install the rankmath plugin, which has like a ton of different modules and all that stuff. You don’t have to do that just install this separately on its own. That’s it. And again, it’s just this one feature that will connect your WordPress site. I mean, you have to go through the developer’s console and Google and set up the billing. And in the end, you have to turn on the instance or the Indexing API, download a JSON code, and then you upload that to the WordPress plugin settings. And that’s it. Once you’re done, then every time you update a post or page will automatically send it to the in through the Indexing API directly to Google. And there’s also in the Settings tab, there’s a little window where you can go in and insert links there and ask for Google to index them. So again, it’s a great little plugin. I’ve got this installed on multiple sites now. And I’ve been using it for about two weeks. And it’s a really, really cool plugin. Again, it doesn’t cost anything. You do have to pay for the credits, or API usage, but you get $300 in credits for free for the first year to use when you sign up or enable billing on your developer’s account. So your Google account Alright, so it’s unlikely that you’ll hit those limits. Go ahead please get rid of that. bloatware. Please? Yeah, no, I mean, that was the follow up she says she wants to stick with a lot of says wants to stick with iOS for everything else. And I was waiting for Margaret to say why SEO ultimate Jeffrey’s a friend Jeff. He’s a baby. We’re like this Semantic Mastery. And Jeffrey so let’s be crystal clear about this and transparent. We love Jeffrey, do we do we have an affiliate for SEO ultimate? If we don’t we should. We love Jeffrey. He’s active in his group. I meet with him. Every Wednesday, I’d be done on Is he a great guy, but he just does great stuff. And his teaching is beyond awesome. If you happen to catch the webinar that we did, with heavy-hitter where he came on to talk about entities. I mean, that was just that was worth the price of admission for the price of the first two months is what Jeffrey shared. I mean, and that one happened to be for fifth, I think it’s in the training area. But I can’t say enough about Jeffrey Smith and his training, SEO ultimate boot camp, the plugin just everything that he’s doing, man.

Yeah, totally agree. I finally got around to starting to implement the semantic tags. Yeah, through the SEO ultimate pro plugin. And that’s crazy powerful, too. And I waited all this time to really start implementing that. But I just started digging into that this week, actually. And it’s sick. It reminds me to share some wickedness about tags with you. Sure, in private.

Should The Google Site And The Custom Domain Both Remain Indexed In Google When Mapping?

Alright, so next is NYK says, When mapping your Google new site to a custom domain name, does both the Google new site and the new custom domain name site both remain indexed? And Google is the new Google Site eventually get indexed? Just wondering if there was a hack to get them both ranking highly. Now when you do custom domain mapping, I haven’t done it with the new sites. But I’m sure I’m not sure. But I assume it’s the same as when mapping a custom domain to the classic Google sites and that both sites can remain indexed however, the Google site on the sites google.com domain is canonicalized to the custom domain. So in other words, there’s a canonical and HTML header of the new Google site that links or that sets the canonical URL to the custom domain. So by Google’s own, you know, practices, that means the new Google Sites should eventually fall out of the index because it’s canonicalized to the custom domain. However, that gives you an opportunity to have a kind of like a ghost site out there that you can use for link building, still waking up to the Google Sites domain and it still pushes through to your custom domain. So there’s some pretty ninja stuff that you can do with that. But I typically don’t go through that trouble anymore. I did originally when we first started doing that, several years ago. But now I don’t even bother. I just, I just use the Google site on the sites google.com domain.

And in that, that’s it. But you can still canonicalize it as far as I know, more, or you don’t canonicalize it Google does that automatically. Yeah, Google it, Google Google, set up a custom domain. Yeah. But now, the great thing about it is that the G site has to stay live, until Google comes up with a true content management system, right? Because the CMS is the G site. Right? So until they come up with that that new g site is going to stay live. And there’s a lot of good stuff you can do to that. So it says since it’s a Google canonical to your website, I just think that through, and you’re going to see how awesome it is that Google keeps that Google site indexed, or it remains part of the index, although it. I don’t think it’s going to rank for Oh, testing. Yeah, this is nothing but a test. And see, because I stopped doing it. Also, I stopped creating the custom domains, and I’m just going with T sites because they carry so much power. Yeah. So little work. Yeah, same thing. And I was, I was doing custom domain mapping for IDX pages to subdomain ID mapping up and I got away from doing that too because it’s just like an extra step that’s really unnecessary. You know, you can get them just use the s3 bucket URL, and you’re good to go. So

How To Target Multiple Cities Within A County Within GMB Posts?

Alright, moving on. Next one is Josh. Josh says how do we target multiple cities within a county is that through GMB posts, Facebook ads, Google ads and PRs that have the city name included? Well, I mean, what is your when you say target multiple cities? Like in which way? Are you attempting to target them? Because you just listed SEO and paid traffic and content marketing and everything else? So if you’re talking about you know, when it comes to Google ads, or I can’t talk about Facebook ads, Hernan could, when it comes to Google ads, you just pay for whatever keywords you want to target. So whatever search queries, right, if you’re talking about search, PPC, obviously, there’s YouTube and display, and you can set geo-targeting for that. But I think your question is more really relevant to SEO. Right? And that’s if that’s what you’re asking, like, how do you target multiple cities within a county? Yeah, what I do is what, what I do for my clients, and for lead, gen assets are both GMB posts as well as posts optimized on the blog. If we even if there’s a money site associated with the project, which most of mine do, most of my projects do have that, then I have my blog or go out and create an optimized post targeting one specific keyword plus one location, a city within a county. So let’s say a county has 10 cities within it or, you know, municipalities, towns, unincorporated communities, whatever you want to call them. Let’s say there are 10 towns within the county. And what we do is we optimize post blog posts for a keyword plus town. Right. And so we might end up having 10 blog posts within that, within that one county because we’re targeting, you know, a keyword plus the location or town within that county. And we published a post for each one of those. And so and again, Josh, I’ve talked about this a lot in the mastermind I know you were in the mastermind briefly, but I don’t think you are anymore. But the way that I do silo for locations is I use tags talked about that many many times. In fact, if you go to semantic mastery comm slash process, again, semantic mastery comm slash process, I give a very high-level overview of how I create location-based silos using WordPress tags. And so again, that’s the way that I do it. It works really, really well. There are some real ninja things that you can do with tag pages, especially with the G sites and our SEO shield methodology. So that’s the way that I recommend doing it. But like I said, For paid traffic, it’s really about just bidding on your keywords or setting geo-targeting. As far as Google Ads goes, Hernan Can you comment on Facebook? Yeah, for sure. For sure. I first off, you know, totally agree with what you’re saying. I think that this is an SEO related question. If you wanted to do with multiple cities within a county, there’s a couple of options. The first one is to just collect zip codes, you can put a list of zipcodes and the location. So if you’re targeting, that will be number one, the other one will be just, you know, put the name of the city, you know, and then you can do and then sometimes what I do is to just drop a pin, right? So you can drop a pin and then and then, you know, you would do up to, you know, this city plus 10 miles or the city alone and all that. So those are the two-three ways that you can actually go ahead and do that via zip codes via the name of the city itself with the county and the drop in itself. Now, with that being said, once you’re when you’re doing this is a recommendation when you’re doing counties or zip codes, or, you know, you drop a pin and then you target a specific area, what I would suggest is that you don’t add like any interests on top of that or any like demographic targeting on top of that, the reason why is because usually, the Facebook algorithm works a little bit different than that than Google and, and when it comes to Facebook itself, the more you constrict your reach, the more you will, you will pay on a CPM basis, meaning you will pay more per click, you will pay more per per per thousand impressions. So what I would suggest is you drop in you select the zip code, or the or the city name, and even the county name. And you just leave Facebook to optimize and find out you know, leads, or whatever it is that you’re trying to do. If you’re running a lead gen campaign or a conversion campaign to a landing page, you should let Facebook do its thing. And that’s basically how I recommend you do it. So I’m not going to comment on this as far as ads because I always get people. I get asked people they’re the experts. I’m not, but I can’t tell you that if you’re what you’re targeting is map specific. In other words, when you go to the locations, it triggers a mapping and at times it triggers a knowledge panel or both. Then it’s GMB posts and press releases done. The local GMB pro Wait, does that mean that you have to trigger the map pack if it’s local specific, meaning that it triggers a map? It triggers a knowledge panel that triggers a map pack. And so I’m not going to go into details on how to do that. But yes, I mean, Bradley. Bradley is presently stacking, link building embeds all of that so that you can get that that GMB, GMB listing to pop in the three pack and if the city is far away from your centroid, meaning that your business is in one city and the next city maybe is 2025 miles away and you’re looking to trigger that, then you’re going to go with a GMB in that next city, and start doing polls and PR stacks and and and on and on. Now you can get past the proximity filter, you can force your way through. We teach that also in local GMB pro so we have the training.

Okay, so something else I want to mention very quickly if you’re going to be using Google Ads because since Hernan mentioned zip codes, it brought this to my brought this top of mind. But something that I’ve been doing a lot lately with, especially when you’re doing like display ads or YouTube, YouTube ads in Google ads, right. One of the things that I do for location targeting it works, excuse me for just for any type of ads when you’re doing geo-targeting, setting your geo-targeting locations to target within the ad campaign.

What I do know is I kind of just went through the process while the other guys were talking. But you know, you only have to do this once I just wanted to show you kind of what I did. But I go to zip dash codes.com on the left-hand sidebar, you can see where it says other free lookups I always put the county name and so I just use Fairfax County, Virginia is an example. So I just typed in Fairfax, then for the state, put VA, and then hit go, it’ll bring up the last page that you saw a minute ago, this one, then I just click through to the county and it shows all the different zip codes and the cities within that county and then their population too. But then again, there might be another tool, this just a tool I’ve been using for years, guys. So if there’s another tool, that’s great, you know, but I’m just showing you how I typically do it. So then I go through and I clean the data I sort by, you know population because a lot of these are like PO boxes or unique zip codes that have zero population. So they’re not something that you can physically target because they’re not really geographic in that like they don’t have like an area they’re just more like, you know, like a peel box, for example. So I just sort by population, and then I delete everything that has zero population. And what I’m left with now is I know that and again, I know this is probably small, but I’ll zoom in. So what I’m left with now are the city names or the town names within the county and all of the zip codes. Does that make sense? So then what I do is for targeting and I’ve opened up a notepad file is in Google Ads when you go to set your geo locations or your targeted locations, then what you do is you just add in that so for example, the first one would be Fairfax County, then it would be comma Virginia comma the United States, okay. So this is how you would add if you add locations in bulk. So when you go into your geo-targeting or add targeted locations, you can click on a little radio button that says Add locations in bulk. So I format all of this upfront. And then all I do is just copy and paste from my notepad file into there and click search, and then click target all but scroll through and eliminate anything that doesn’t quite line up the way that it’s supposed to. But typically, the way that I’ll do it is like Fairfax County would be the broadest of service areas, right? But then I want to go through and I want to literally target all of these city names within. And I’m going to show you guys how to get super granular on this just because it’s a, it works really, really well for Google ad targeting. And let me explain why. And then I’ll get back to this. When people are doing searches from mobile devices, especially in fact, if I were to go over to let’s go here for a minute and just click into Google and search. In fact, let me close that for a minute and open up a fresh version of this, I think it’s a really good question. That’s why I’m going through this guy. So just stand by for a minute.

See? Firefox is freaking out on me for some reason. All right. So if I go to Google, and I just do a quick search for let’s just say, Tree Service Fairfax VA, okay, we scroll down to the bottom down here, you’ll see that it’s showing my location-based upon my IP, now I’m on my desktop, and it’s showing Cole pepper, Virginia. But what I’ve noticed is oftentimes, like from a mobile device, or sometimes, if my IP changes, or whatever, or if I’m on my laptop, and I’m click connected through a Wi-Fi, sometimes it won’t be a city name, it’ll be an actual zip code that shows up down here. Does that make sense? And so by tart by adding, or specifically adding targeted locations from at the broadest level, based upon this example, county, right, so if you if I type in Fairfax County, Virginia as my targeted location in Google ads, that’s going to target any areas supposedly within that county. Right? Does that make sense? But then if I go in, and I add all the individual town names, as well as separate targeting locations, it adds a second layer of targeting on top and in Google Maps, or excuse me, Google ads, you’ll see that when you add the county makes that targeted county on the map, which is like a little map there, it’ll make it like a very light blue color showing that that’s targeted. But then if you add the town names, on top of that, for all the towns within that county as another additional targeting option, you’ll see that it adds a second layer on top of that initial county blue coloring, so it becomes a darker blue. And then if you go in and add all of the zip codes as well, it adds a third layer, so becomes even darker blue. And so what happens is, especially with people searching for mobile devices, depending on how Google determines their location, sometimes it will be by town, sometimes it will be by zip code, it gives it a much greater chance of your ads showing to them, because it’s relevant, and you’ve covered all of those bases, right? I don’t know if that makes sense to you guys or not. But that’s what I do is I just go through and I extract all the town names and all of the zip codes, just using zip dash codes, calm, I clean it, then I bring it into a notepad file like this, and I format it. So I would go actually copy all of these zip codes, all of these names, I would append comma Virginia, comma United States to each one of these items, then I would do anything, right. So if there are any duplicates, I would do that. And then I would copy this text file and paste it in as my targeted locations, and select target all. And what that does is again, it adds multiple layers of targeting, it’s very specific targeting, but it adds multiple layers. So that it, it almost ensures that your ad gets shown to people no matter how Google sees their location if that makes sense. All right. So that’s a very powerful pro tip there that works really well, especially when targeting people with mobile devices. And lastly, there’s one other thing that I found you can be even more granular. And that’s why I brought up Wikipedia, is if I go here to Wikipedia, go to Fairfax County, Virginia. And I click through if I come over here where it says communities, right and most all, on Wikipedia, if you search for your county, that you’re targeting, you’ll the Wikipedia page for that county will typically always have a community, you know, jump link, which is right here. And so you’ll see that it says that these are the communities as well as the census, census-designated places, and other communities. A lot of I don’t know about the other communities so much but I know that the census-designated places there’s more of those here than what was listed.

In the zip codes data, does that make sense the zip caste das codes data, if I were to D dupe this, it’s only going to have about 23 location names? But you can see that there’s more than 23 in this list right here where it says census-designated places. So you can actually go through and extract those names and do the same thing as where I said, append, comma, dash, Virginia, comma, or excuse me, comma, Virginia, comma United States, to each one of the additional locations that are listed here that weren’t in this zip dash codes, data. And then target those also. And again, that what you end up with is your targeted locations, and Google Ads becomes really, really, really dark blue, because it’s got three layers of targeting options on it. And it almost guarantees that your ads are going to be shown to people no matter where they are within the county. So that’s kind of a power tip there, guys. Hopefully, you understand what I said.

I’m going through a rather quick

How Does Google Treat A Site That Contains 20 Press Releases Linking To Different Anchor Texts But Same Links?

next question, maybe he’s got multiple questions. I wouldn’t expect anything less from me. What’s up? BB? I know that is not the proper way to do press releases, like PR stacking. But how do you think Google treats a site that has 20 press releases linking to it with different texts, but each PR has two links, with different anchor text, but with the same. I guess, URL maybe? Meaning 20 PRs with two links with the same hrefs. But all the text and anchors, texts are different.

I just always wonder what the hell you’re doing. Maybe mark is scratching his head look, knock because I have no idea what he’s talking about. He has 30 press releases, two links in each press release. What is eight? What does href have to do with anything? I think he’s talking about URLs, the same two URLs in every press release, but different anchor texts. So you’re hammering the same URL directly with the 20 press releases? Yeah, I think that’s what he’s saying the same two links in every single PR, but they each have different anchor texts each and each instance. So you had 20 or 20 press releases, and supposing that those 20 only have what distribution of 150 sites, each now you’re talking about 3000 websites potentially linking back to those two pages from those press releases? Or to that page? Is that what you’re saying? I have no idea what you’re saying.

Yeah. Even though the acting anchor text is different, are you still hammering the same page?

Yeah, that’s unnatural as hell. I agree. I totally agree. I mean, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t do that. And I and again, I’m always curious as to why because you’ve got some interesting questions, maybe. And I would be nice to have some context as to why these questions about using, you know, building links from the same handful of domains. You know, we went through weeks of questions about how many links can you get from one specific domain before they’re not, you know, beneficial? And now this is similar, right? It’s kind of in the same neighborhood as that type of a question. And again, I wouldn’t recommend it, you know, we, yeah, I like the specular. Right. They’re asking, or he’s asking us to speculate how Google would treat it. Don’t tell me, you might get hammered. You might not. That’s the best stacking to give you from that. Yeah. supposition. Question. And not only that but, you know. We just talked, the market just talked about the press release stacking. And that’s really the best way that we found to do it. And in fact, I just started implementing Marco and I have done the PR stacking slightly differently. But based upon Marco’s recommendation, he is absolutely the better SEO. So I’ve been doing it another way for quite some time. But within just the last couple of weeks, I started implementing his specific PR stack method, which is just using two links, as opposed to three in each PR, and I’m waiting to see the results come in from that. But yeah, I mean, it’s, it’s much better to just create a link wheel with your press releases with and link from one press release to the previous press release in that chain, right to create that daisy chain, that link wheel effect. And that way, like your initial press release, the top of the stack would be linking to your money site page. But all the subsequent press releases in that silo stack, they don’t link back to that money page at all. The link to the previous press release and maybe one of your other tier-one entity assets. But that’s it two links per press release. And, and not so you’re not constantly hitting the same, you know, your money site with the same you know, press releases over and over and over again, because what you’re doing is you’re using one press release with the link back to your money site page, and then you’re stacking press releases to link back to that original press release. And you can build so much power and relevancy that way. And I think that’s the better way to do it that that’s a hell of a lot more natural-looking for your money site than to keep hammering away at the same two URLs over and over and over again.

With the same PR distribution network over and over and over again, if that makes sense. So I’m gonna say it again, I don’t even recommend hitting the money site with a press release unless you really know what you’re doing. And you really want to do it all the time. Yeah, yeah. But you need to create a good pillow. And you need to know what you’re doing, what we actually tell you to extend your SEO shield, get that extension, get that inner page on that g site, and that inner drive stack. And that aim, the press release had that which is then focusing on the top-level category on the inner page and your website, everything is a mirror, you can even mirror that category, partially with your press releases. And now what you’re doing is you’re amplifying the effect. I mean, you can get really good results if you go to one of your website pages from a reprint from the president, but you better know what you’re doing. Because it’s going to get a lot of power. Once you start blasting those press releases with link building is going to get a lot of power to that page, from that silo from the or from that press release stack.

Does The SEO Shield Help Rank A New Domain With Zero Backlinks Faster?

Alright, just for clearance, I guess clarification, it means if somebody will buy a new domain tomorrow with zero backlinks and no history at all, and say he connects the shield to it, it will post long-form content, then it will rank faster than without the shield. And it won’t get hit and with the sandbox, even if it even exists also do tell it Yes, the sandbox does exist, as well as the Google dance essentially. No, I mean, will it rank faster than without the SEO showed? I mean, likely, but it’s not necessarily the speed that we’re looking for, you know, is whether it will rank at all or not. And just adding long-form content and an SEO showed may not be enough, it likely depends on the keyword sometimes you get lucky and it’s a very uncompetitive keyword. And just adding an SEO shield to the project where you’re targeting, you know, whatever keyword it is, will end up ranking. But that’s, that’s really the exception to the rule. Typically, it’s going to require some sort of off-page work. That’s where we talk about the press releases. That’s where we do link building and embed gigs. That’s where you can do like if you’ve got GMB associated with the project, you can do GMB posts and link back to your entity assets, your SEO shield, your money site itself, the page that you’re trying to rank. That’s right. So that’s all that I consider off-page. And that’s, you know, 99% of the time or 95% of the time, I should say, you’re going to need some sort of off-page in order to get the benefit that you’re looking for. comments. Yeah, because it’s the art of art. Because we recommend activity, relevance, trust, and authority. We’re not to say, okay, so build a shield, build some long-form content, and you’re going to rank that’s not what we’re saying. It Sees, these are these are all it depends on questions BB that you always have. This totally depends, what are you targeting, you are not going to rank for DUI Toronto with a lot of long-form content, and an SEO shield, not gonna happen. No, not gonna happen. Now, if you pick gobbly gook, it’s going to happen. because nobody’s trying to rank for that. All right now.

Oftentimes, you’re going, but not often. So you’re always going to need to make sure that that entity is solidified. And what we do in that first 90 days through the SEO shield, through Bradley’s brand, ads for branding course, through the press releases and through everything else, is to begin that effect of this entity getting activity. Otherwise, one of the three pillars of the art of art is missing, which is activated on all of these links that you’re driving over to this website. That should not be racking in the first place.

Remember that right? You shouldn’t be racking because it’s brand new. Google isn’t supposed to pick it up. We forced Google into doing it because we’re going through Google. We’re going through that g site through that drive site. We’re going through GMB whenever we can and I’m even doing it for national campaigns by the way for national projects. There’s a specific way that you can use that to further solidify the entity and works like a gang but gangbusters but

alright, so we do the initial SEO, SEO and link building then I weighed out the 21 day what dedhia says, Here you go in the link building is finished, I weighed out 21 days. So now we’re out. I don’t know how long it takes to build the SEO show from some from the time the shield is built. And Dahlia tells me a hidden link building it’s done. I still wait 21 days because I want to know what effect

everything has on my rankings. what effect it has on the GMB if I have one what effect it has, on the drive stack on the G site on the buddy site that I’m trying to rank? If it’s brand new, is it getting movement is still getting the bounce effect? Did it drop from rankings? Do I need to wait longer for these? Okay, so at the heavy hitter club, what I’m teaching people is we have to be data scientists, we have to be able to analyze data, we have to be able to interpret the data. And then we have to be able to act upon the data. But the keyword here is data. We need data in order to know what the hell is going on. Without that thing, again, you’re flying a plane blind, blind, and you don’t know where you’re going. You don’t know whether you can land that plane. But that’s actually what you’re doing. Now. When you take that data, and you analyze it, and you can act upon that data. That’s when it starts to happen because that’s where you get the extensions. And that’s when you do the keyword targeting. And that’s when you do the isolations. That’s when you can run more stack, you run embed gigs, you run further link building. I mean, we’re doing a 10 million link test and coming up, which will probably share in the heavy hitter. I’m gonna do a billion. Did you hear that? Doesn’t work. I’m gonna do a billion linked. Yes, I am a billion link test. And more and more, because I’ve been told that we can do unlimited link-building you’ll never tell me that and have me not see what we can try to break with that. But yeah, so we got 10 million workings, the next step would be 100 million. And then we’re going to jump again, 10 x two to a billion and see what happens.

But these are all things that we’re testing, again, to gather the data, and to know what the next step is, in the process, because it’s all a process. It’s a repeatable process that helps us to get to where we want to be, whether it’s in the map pack, whether it’s organic, whether it’s both whether you’re looking for both. It all depends.

We got to her nones. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

He’s multiplying.

I don’t know we can handle another nine.

How To Tell Google To Rank A Page With Long-Form Content With Two Different Keywords That Are Not LSI?

All right, the next question is how to tell Google to rank a page with long-form content, because without it, it won’t be possible. That’s not true knocking rank with short-form content, I prefer long-form content, but you can absolutely brute force in with through off-page SEO rank for short-form content, I just prefer long page because it requires less off-page, if the content is structured correctly, well written, it’s relevant, right, that that’s what I’m taught. So I prefer long-form content because it requires less off-page to achieve results. But doesn’t mean you can’t, you know, Mark has done it millions of times, or, you know, dozens and dozens of times, I’ve done it sometimes where I can rank, you know, thin content, but it just requires a lot more off-page.

So just to be clear about that, he says, so let me get back to the question of how to tell Google to rank a page with long-form content with two different keywords that are not LSI related, meaning like, muscle, dog food, and digestion, dog food? Well, those are related keywords, right? Yeah, they’re both related keywords, because, the overall term I would target in that case would be dog food. And then, throughout the long-form content, you could target or mention or have, you know, heading header sections, and in summer, you know, descriptions of each different type of dog food that there is. And so those are absolutely related keywords. They’re there they’re topically relevant to the broader keyword of dog food. Does that make sense? So you could technically target you know, all the different types of dog food, which I don’t know all the different types of dog food, but you could type you could target in long-form content, let’s say you had a 3000-word article that had, you know, eight different types of dog food on them, you know, described or highlighted within the article itself, then you could have an again, we talked about using jump links, I’m not going to get into that, but you could have like a table of content. Anytime I use long-form content, now I put the Table of Contents at the top of the, with the jump links back down to that section. But then you could that would be like a dog food category on your site, right, that’s a silo, then you could have supporting articles that would target individual types of dog food that would link to that long-form page, that dog food page. And again, it’s just standard silo architecture. And the reason I like to use long-form content is that in the past when trying to separate out like dog food is your top level. And then having using a complex silo structure, we would end up having, you know, muscle dog food and I don’t know that those I’ve never heard of that. But you know, let’s say muscle dog food would be a subcategory and digestion dog food would be another subcategory.

Then you add a bunch of width or breadth to your topical category. And then you can add depth right supporting articles to each one of those subcategories. The problem with that is that’s a complex silo structure. And it is just what the name implies. It’s complex. And so what I’ve switched my method, you know, the way that I build sites now is I use simple silo architecture, which is just top level categories. And in supporting articles, and long-form content, where I used to create subcategories, I can compile all of that onto the long form, top of silo page, and use jump links. And then that way, all I have to do is a simple silo structure with posts that I would, you know, supporting articles as post publishes posts, that would link up to that top category page, because there are no subcategories, if that makes sense. And I do it that way because it’s a much easier site to manage. And so I try to stick with simple silo structure at every chance that I, you know, for every project now specifically for that, and that’s where I found formatting long form content with jump links and headers, and that kind of stuff is the way that you can accomplish the same thing that you could with this complex silo structure. But keep your off site architecture much easier to manage. So I don’t know if that was clear or not. Anybody want comment on that? Yeah. I mean, I don’t know where he’s getting the long-form content information. Because that’s absolutely false. It without it, it won’t be possible to rank in Google that that’s not true. You don’t even have to have your own content. You can there you can rank an iframe of somebody else’s content. You can it, No, we’ve, we’ve done it, we’ve done it time. And again, can you do you can do it? And you do it from multiple keywords, not just one. So I don’t know where you’re getting that information. I’d say either stop listening to whoever saying this, or it’s probably someone who doesn’t know how to rank without long-form content. It’s one or the other because I don’t see how many how anyone can test the different ways that there are two, right, you could rank an image in a regular video that’s not long for. So no, this is absolutely not so. And like Bradley said dog food is the category. So the totally semantically relate I mean, they’re directly semantically related digestion and muscle when they both have to do with POFU.

So, yeah, so And again, I you know, I just prefer long form content, because it gives me the ability to keep my site structure is a simple silo. And I like that because it’s so much easier to manage it really is I got just tired of banging my head against the wall trying to figure out how to manage complex silo sites. They think they’re just a pain in the ass.

Thoughts On Facebook’s Tighter Security And Ownership Verification Processes

Anyway, Aaron’s up, he says, Are you noticing Facebook is becoming more grumpy? Facebook continuously wants to send a code to log in and send SMS text to verify account ownership. Does anyone else finding this to be excessive? I haven’t experienced that at all. No, yeah, that happens.

Specifically right now. Well, I mean, they went on like red alert during the election season. But now that they are, quote, unquote, over, it should go back to normal. But yes, like, that is something that’s happening. In fact, it’s happening randomly across the board. So if you get like, if you get like an SMS verification or something like that, you can even do Google Authenticator. So if you set up a two-step to the two-factor authenticator, you can do Google Authenticator, which is an app that you download to your phone. And, and then it will give you a QR code that you take a picture off, and that QR code will allow you to come up with a random six digit number. So that’s another option for two FA or two-factor authenticator, which is, I think, is going to be enforced across the board on Facebook. Now, with that being said, that could be the case that you can be, you know, asked for ID for verification through SMS. But also sometimes they will even ask you to upload your ID. And that has happened. It’s normal, it happens and sometimes it’s randomly happening to some accounts. So yeah, that’s the way I mean, that’s the way Facebook is going and Facebook in lieu of, or in regards to security. I think that they will start enforcing two-factor authentication. In fact, for everyone running ads on Facebook, it’s almost mandatory that you need to have two-factor authentication enabled on your Facebook account so

Have I ever told you guys that I hate Facebook?

I think you did. Yeah.

For necessary evil. No, it is. But I do I can’t stand it.

I had a page that from alpha land realty business I set up a page but I can’t remember what I did. I did something where anyways, I ended up removing myself as the man

The only admin of the page somehow. And I think I was trying to move it from one business account to another because I was planning on running ads or something. Anyways, I ended up removing myself as the manager of the admin. And it was and I was the only admin. So I contacted Facebook help to tell them like, Hey, I set up the I created this page. But I somehow accidentally removed myself as an admin. They made me jump through hoops. And I’m not kidding like I had to go, I had to draft the document and then go get it notarized. And then sent the notarized, notarized document to them, swearing that I was the one that created the account, and that I had authorization to become an admin of the account, even though I was the one that created or anyways, it was some bullshit. And I was furious, and it took like a week and a half to get it. Finally, to get access back to the very page that I created. There was never any other admins either. So it’s just, whatever, fuck Facebook.

Good Marga says on Facebook, and you got and you got to resolve like, it only took a week. So that’s not too bad. I’ve heard people that, you know, they’re still battling with Facebook to get back ownership up for an ad account. So yeah, you got the bright side of things. So I guess if you can if you can call it that. Yeah.

Does A NoFollow Link Never Get Any SEO Juice?

All right. Moving on. Next question. BB says when nofollow when a nofollow links link gets juice? Or is it never does it never get juice at the end of the day? If a strong site approved by your link?

Then it should tell Google this site is legit and does what it says and has no harm in content? I’m not sure what you mean, I doubt a nofollow link does not pass PageRank. If that’s what you’re asking. I’m not sure that that’s what you’re asking.

So I’m not really sure what the question is here. Just somebody else interpreting the question here.

Ah, nofollow link gets juice. When you link below to a nofollow link.

I still do it. Does it pass? Does? It doesn’t pass PageRank according to Google. Yeah. That’s Google that that’s the nofollow is a bad directive that tells the bot not to pass any PageRank what you get is the trust and authority from the website without accruing PageRank, which is almost as good. I mean, we’ve seen Wikipedia links that are just fantastic for SEO. Now, what is meaning about does it tell Google The site is legit and does what it says has non harming? Now, I mean, how can you transmit all that to Google? This is nofollow. Getting it gives you trust and authority, but everything else is going to come? According to the users and the user information that Google gets back. They don’t know if your heart if your content is harming or non harming, you’re gonna have to try to BB. I don’t mind answering your questions, but try to frame them better. I understand that might be a language problem. But like, I’m not really getting what you’re saying. Yeah, I’m not sure what doesn’t tell Google that nofollow, in fact, does not tell Google that the site is legit. It tells Google not to count the link for PageRank purposes. Yeah, not to pass allow websites like Wikipedia have such

high Hi. Just an authority according to Google, not according to any other metrics. Like I don’t care about any other metrics. It has so much authority and trust, that it does pass that along. So it’s kind of getting like a vote without passing PageRank. But it doesn’t tell Google that the sight of the did what eventually is going to tell Google whether the site is legit. And whether the content is harmful or not army is what the users transmit to Google and what the but find on your website engagement metrics. Exactly. Yeah, and here’s the thing now, this was five years ago, but um, you know, I remember nofollow links are supposed to not pace pass PageRank. And so older SEO methodology was, you know, that you should always try to build do follow links, and blah, blah, blah, but you have to have a good natural looking link profile. And so you’re you’re not a natural-looking link profile is going to contain a lot of nofollow links, right. I mean, depending on number of links that you have, but there should be a fairly high percentage of nofollow links. I had one client project where somebody was negative SEO in them. And for their primary keyword was a local project. So it was like plumbing plus city, whatever that was, I think it was monascus they’re no longer they hadn’t been a client for years. But I think it was like plumbing Manassas, VA or plumber, Manassas, VA or something like that. Anyways, long story short, somebody was negative SEO in them. And they built 10s of thousands of nofollow links with exact match keyword anchor of that specific keyword. And guess what? The fucking site ranked number one for that. And it was like and I and I wondered what it was and I went straight

Doing some backlink analysis on it trying to figure out what had happened. And all of a sudden I see 10s of thousands of links that I didn’t build. It was 100% exact match. And I’m not telling anybody to do this. But they were nofollow links and they were all exact match anchor text. And I ended up that site ranked number one for that keyword. And I always thought that was the funniest thing because they’re they backfired whatever, that negative SEO or whoever that was, it backfired on them because we ended up ranking the damn site. Now. I never tried to duplicate that I probably should up for testing purposes. But um, but yeah, I just thought it was interesting because I mean, I was just doing like syndication network link. So in other words, you know, publishing content, the same method that I’ve been using for years. And all of a sudden, like the backlink profile, shot up through the roof over the course of like, six weeks or so. And it was 10s of thousands of exact match anchors for one keyword. And it just so happened that ranking number one for that one keyword after that. So I thought that was funny because they say nofollow links don’t really count for anything. And I think that’s bullshit. At least that was years ago. It may have changed since then. Do you want to comment on that at all? Marco? Nanami. We know. Yeah.

Do You Use Google Tag Manager?

All right. Ah, okay. Next is BB. He’s got two more I guess we’re about out of time. So this is good. Good timing. He says do use Google Tag Manager for some reason. If so which tags do you recommend? Yeah, I use Google Tag Manager all the time. Because I’m always running Google ads. I’m setting up remarketing campaigns through Google ads. So I use Google Tag Manager to set up all my Google Ads tags, right. So there’s the conversion linker tag, the remarketing tag, then there’s the conversion, Google Ads conversion tracking tag, I also use Google Tag Manager to set up Google Analytics. So I install the Google Analytics Universal Analytics tracking tag, through Google Tag Manager. I also depending on which type of WordPress theme I’m using, sometimes I set my JSON LD, my structured data, my schema, through Tag Manager as well, that’s not the recommended way to do it. But in some cases, some of the sites that are the WordPress themes that I use, they don’t, they don’t like that the front page isn’t doesn’t have its own like page and WordPress pages. And there’s no way to insert code on it’s it’s odd, I’ve got a couple of themes that I use for local stuff that I just I have to use Tag Manager to add structured data to the homepage, there’s no other way to do it unless I inserted it directly into the theme files, which I don’t want to do. So yeah, I use Tag Manager for all of that stuff.

You know, I love Tag Manager, because it’s really easy to manage, you know, push everything through Tag Manager, and it automatically will deploy to the site. So again, I like Tag Manager, I use it for mostly for Google Ad stuff, but also for a few other things. You can use it to for Facebook, like with Facebook, you can do really advanced stuff with Google Tag Manager that you could not usually do with just the facebook pixel, you know, unless you hacked the code or whatever. So you know, you can throw anything in it, you can still like if you have a hot jar, craft, like if you have whatever, like split testing scripts, like you, you can throw anything at it. And the good news about Google Tag Manager is that it will not it will prevent your website from loading slower because you have all of these scripts directly loading in the page. So I think that you know, I love Google Tag Manager as well using for Facebook for some Facebook events stuff on pixels. But yeah, for sure, definitely.

By the way, this guy His name is Julian or some Julius or I don’t know, I think is Julian anyways, measure school Comm. He’s got fantastic training on Google Tag Manager and analytics. And he’s a total data nerd. Which is, I mean, it’s cool. He’s got a really and it’s, at least it used to be I don’t know if it still is, but he has some free had some free training on Tag Manager when I first started learning how to use Tag Manager, it was through measure school. He’s got a great YouTube channel as well with tons of free content that talks about how to set up analytics and Tag Manager set up Custom Event Tracking with Tag Manager and analytics. So like for example, you can set up like scroll, you know, scroll tracking, like scroll depth tags, so that they fire once a certain scroll-like 25% or 50%. You can set up timer tracking. There are all kinds of cool stuff that you can do with Tag Manager and analytics and measure school. Like he’s got a ton of free stuff on his YouTube channel and on his blog here that will teach you how to do all that stuff. So anytime I have to set something up that I’m not real familiar with, with Tag Manager analytics, I just go to measure school and I find it and it’s great. And again, he’s got a really good YouTube channel as well. So I recommend you check that out.

The last question is it does not matter if it’s prs are article directories. The focus is on the same two links. Okay. I think he’s talking about the question, the first question that he asked and he’s saying that he wants to keep targeting the same two links, whether it’s through press releases or article directories.

And again, I would very I would caution against that BB, because you know, at least our methodology has been set up the SEO shield. And you do all of your external link building to the SEO shield assets or tier one entity assets, right instead of direct to your money site, which is what you keep asking about here. And we don’t recommend that because it’s very easy to set unnatural link profiles. If you’re constantly hammering, especially the same two URLs over and over again, um, you know, I don’t recommend that. So I would, I would highly recommend that you work on, you know, using utilizing the SEO showed, and tier-one entity assets is your link building targets, right, you can pass all the relevancy through how you link from your entity assets back to your money site, but then do all of your external link building to your tier one entity assets so that you’re protecting your money so you don’t run the risk of that unnatural link profile. Does that make sense? Yep. Okay.

Should We List The Entire States Or Only The Cities When Optimizing GMB Profiles?

Uh, Josh says for our GMB profile, and I know we’re out of time guys, last question. For our GMB profile. Should we list the entire states we do business in or just our cities? Well, with GMB, I think you’re only allowed to list up to 20 locations as service area locations. I think it’s 20. Um, so what I do, again, is when I was what I was talking about Josh earlier with, you know, looking at the data here, I just target on a county level, or if perhaps the if it’s a service area business, typically they’ll cover the whole county, but not always the case, right. So I’ll just cover whatever their area is. So for example, I don’t usually Tip Top target. I talked about layering location targeting when you’re setting up Google ads, but and I try to layer inside of Google My Business to a degree like in other words, if a tree service company services, all of Fairfax County, and then there are 23 towns within Fairfax County, but Google limits me my ability in GMB to add only up to 20 service area locations, then I obviously can’t add Fairfax County, and then also add the 23 separate, I’d be over limit. And then also, there are all those zip codes too. So I don’t do that. So in that case, I would do the county and then I would do you know, the primary locations or just the county and that’s it. If that makes sense. What I was talking about for doing this is specifically for ad targeting, but for GMB profile, yeah. Like unless your whole of your service area is an entire state. I wouldn’t list the state as the service area. I would keep it specific to whatever the service area is an all in reality for that particular business. Okay.

All right. Thanks, everybody, for being here. We will see you guys next time, everyone. Thanks

Source: Semantic Mastery Weekly SEO Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 313 published first on your-t1-blog-url

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