annalisemarlene56 asked:
gingerly-writing answered:
She would have thought it was a hostage situation if not for the shock on the villain’s face. He pushed the girl behind his legs, placing himself between the heroine and his daughter.
The heroine made a split second decision, and pasted on a welcoming smile. The kid was innocent, a sweet girl with a gift for maths and a lisp over the word ‘specific’, and she didn’t deserve to be embroiled in an adult rivalry. “Mr [Name], please, have a seat. Your daughter has been an exemplary student…”
—–
The heroine looked her nemesis in the eyes and smiled her biggest, widest, fakest customer service smile. “So nice to see you again, Ma’am. Shall we discuss your child’s progress? Or would like you like to threaten me again?”
The villainess sighed. “Look, this creepy smiley robot trick really freaks me out. Can you blame me if I tried to threaten you into dropping it?”
“Absolutely!” she replied in her cheeriest voice. “Threatening bodily harm is a crime! Now, let’s move on to talking about why your child thinks friendship is for weaklings.”
—–
The villain catches them at the school gates. “Hey,” they say softly. “Thank you for looking after Sophie at school. And…thank you for not telling her. About me, about us. She adores you in both your identities, and I worry that if she knew what I did after she goes to bed…she would hate me.”
“She couldn’t hate you. I don’t think you see how much she adores you too; you’re practically all she talks about at school. And her art always includes both of us, the hero and the villain.” The heroine smiled softly. “Sophie is a good kid. She wouldn’t be so well-rounded if you weren’t raising her right.”
—–
“I almost died!”
“It’s an extreme sport at a school full of superheroes. What else were you expecting?”
What if supernatural creatures don’t exist anymore? What if they did once, but through the years, they slowly mixed in with humans?
You can see the blood of fairies in the way a ballet dancer hovers in mid air before he or she hits the ground. You can see it in the way that middle school girl never forgets when someone makes her a promise. You can see it in how that one little boy in the kindergarten class seems more comfortable in the forest on that field trip than the others.
You can see the blood of dryads in hikers who never trip over roots. You can see it in that suburban grandmother never lets any of her garden die. You can see it in that one kid who climbs a tree faster than his friends, barely looking at the branches as he goes.
You can see the blood of naiads in the way a professional swimmer seems to command the water to help them. You can see it in how a cross country runner needs a water break more often than his teammates. You can see it in the way that one girl in your class always has a water bottle on her desk.
You can see the blood of mermaids in a surfer who can be tossed around underwater for a long time without drowning. You can see it in a teenage boy who doesn’t have to pretend to be unbothered by the pressure when he races his friends to the bottom of a swimming pool. You can see it in the little girl who wades into every stream she sees on a hike without quite knowing why.
You can see the blood of sirens in people who never have a problem with getting people to date them. You can see it in that soprano who can hit notes most of her fellows can only dream of. You can see it in the camp counselor who all the straight girls have a crush on, who can play guitar and sing better than any of the others.
You can see the blood of shapeshifters in the way an actor adjusts their personality to become their character with scary accuracy. You can see it in the subconscious, barely noticeable changes a tween girl’s eyes make to match her outfit better. You can see it in the way you always lose that one friend in a crowd if you’re not careful, because he’s just too good at blending in.
People who carry the blood of werewolves don’t change with the full moon anymore, but you can still see it in the way your best friend always knows something is wrong, though even they don’t know they’re smelling the changes in your body chemistry. You can see it in the way that one guy always seems to eat more than the reasonable amount of red meat at an all-you-can-eat buffet. You can see it in the way that one werido never has a problem when the teacher turns off the lights before a PowerPoint presentation because her eyes adjust quicker and better than yours.
The blood of supernatural creatures may have mostly faded away. But if you look closely, you can still see it.
Anonymous asked:
scholarlypidgeot answered:
I honestly don’t remember. I’ve always aced English classes and essays, but there’s a lot more to writing than that. When I was somewhere between 10 and 14 (big gap but that’s the best I can get you) I put together a sort of children’s book for my siblings, but it got thrown out. For a few years I RPGed online, and then my junior (?) year of high school I put a lot of effort into what’s become the backstory for one of my characters in my Prism series.
Oooooooooh
I like it
also I think it’s important we realize that being nice to children needs to also apply into their teenage years.
when I was 17, five months after my dad had died in a house fire and I lost my home and we nearly ended up homeless, I was lucky enough to go on a school trip to the bahamas to study the reefs. This was my Ultimate Dream, as an aspiring marine biologist, and I couldn’t believe it was coming true. It was the only good thing to happen to me since the fire, the only thing I’d genuinely looked forward to.
But I had ADHD and could be too loud (by then I was good at not talking out in class so I was only loud when we were ALLOWED to be) and a little whacky. My humor was “weird,” I had asthma, and to top it off, I wasn’t pretty.
When we got there, the outpost where we were staying was run by college students, probably getting their graduate degrees, all aged about 22-26. And they saw us all as their age, even though some of them nearly had a decade on us.
And since they saw us as peers rather than children, they felt comfortable making judgements about us, and they decided I was weird and annoying.
And they were mean to me. They made fun of me, deliberately made me feel excluded and odd in front of each other and my own peers, and sometimes when I’d say something in class they’d make a face, say “Ohhhkaaaayyyy,” and look at each other knowingly while they pretended they were even trying to hold back laughing at me. They avoided calling on me during classes, didn’t want me participating, and generally made it obvious how annoying I was to them.
I even noticed that another person in my class was just as weird, if not more, than I was, but she was gorgeous. And to people looking at us as adults instead of children, that mattered.
And it ruined everything.
Another adult on the trip started paying attention and thinking perhaps there was a reason the people in charge didn’t like me. After all, what kind of adult is mean to a kid for no reason? So one night at a festival when she saw me take apart my inhaler, she misunderstood what it was and told the teacher in charge of our trip she’d seen me using drugs. I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere alone for the rest of the trip, not even the bathroom at the airport, despite my friends and a few other peers defending me.
I was mortified and ashamed and ended up lying there in bed every night, wondering how something I’d looked forward to so much could end up so terrible. I wanted nothing more as a child than to be good and win adult approval, and somehow I’d made all the adults there dislike me. I thought it was my fault.
I’d love to see all of these people again now, as an adult myself, and tell them what I was going through.
Tell them, “did you know, when you made fun of me all week back then, when you made me feel untrustworthy and called me a liar, I was grieving the loss of my father. I went away to try to stop thinking about him and the fire and losing my home and everything else, just for a week, and you stole that from me? You ruined that for me?”
Okay this is so important though. As much as they may act like adults and want to be treated like adults, high schoolers are still developing and maturing and it is So. Very. Important. To be kind and supportive of them. If you’re in your 20’s, a high schooler is no more your peer than the 10 year old next door is. They will expect to be (and should be) treated differently than a 10 year old, but you are still a role model/support system to them.
THIS. SO MUCH THIS.
It breaks my heart how little the teens I work with have been positively affirmed by adults. One of the boys in my youth group, 16 years old, is this incredibly talented young man who can play 30+ instruments, sings like an angel, is the kindest most golden-hearted kid ever, and is an incredible actor. He can be a little too loud and goofy, and his humour can be random at times when he uses it to deal with awkwardness (don’t we all do that a bit tho?), but who cares?! It’s what makes him so unique and wonderful! And if he ever is getting too wild at youth group, I’ll just gently ask him to take it down a level and he will do so immediately because he is a darn respectful kid.
This kid- I have such a soft spot in my heart for him. But one time, after he confessed to me how badly he had been bullied in elementary school, I got the chance to affirm the amazing gifts of kindness and leadership I saw in him and he started crying because he could hardly believe it.
Seriously. No one ever tells him what incredible gifts he has. No one bothers to look past the awkward jokes to the deeply caring young man behind them. No one. Not his peers, not his teachers. Yknow, he told me once that he is sure all his teachers hate him because he goofs off sometimes. It broke my heart to hear that.
Teenagers can be awkward. They can be loud and goofy and they talk too much and forget to pay attention sometimes. And that is OK!!! They are still young!! They are still learning!!! Cut them some slack, for goodness sakes! Don’t take misbehaviour as a personal offence against you. And please, PLEASE, affirm the good qualities you see in them like compassion and kindness and leadership. Teens (and people in general actually) deserve to know that they are worth a heck of a lot more than just a pair of A+s.
I think another issue is how we talk about our teenaged selves. I see a lot of people constantly putting their younger selves down by saying how weird or ugly or cringey they were, and I don’t think it’s healthy. Of course you were probably a little weird, but that’s how it’s supposed to be, you were growing and learning and becoming the person you are today. We need to reframe our mindset, for example instead of “wow I can’t believe I actually left the house like that” try, “I love how confident I was in exploring my own personal style.” Maybe it’s silly, but I don’t know how we can expect to be kind to teenagers and respect the space they need to grow when we can’t even do it for ourselves.
We’ve started saying the St. Michael prayer at school this year and the kids are super into it, and let me tell you, there is nothing quite like an auditorium full of children enthusiastically praying “cast into hell Satan and all the evil spirits that prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls” to get you in that angelic warfare mood.
Anonymous asked:
biggest-gaudiest-patronuses answered:
Stare until it’s awkward. Never break eye contact.
Generally not giving a shit.
Punching a ceiling fan.
Reminding people of their own mortality.
Disassociating.
Actually calling people out when they interrupt/disrespect you. Bonus points if you’re a woman being undermined by a dude.
Mixing sexy lingerie w/ menswear. A lacy cami with boxers. Pantyhose and a baggyass button down. A bra and huge plaid pajama bottoms. See-through tops and giant trousers. Bonus points if roomy pockets are involved.
Say something awkward and then deadpan stare while people respond uncomfortably but you are chill and dead inside.
Pausing a conversation to pick up a phone that clearly isn’t ringing. Bonus points if it’s a landline. Bonus points if you apologize and explain “I really have to take this.” God level if you continue to have a conversation with the nonexistent person on the other end.
Mumbling on purpose and acting confused when people don’t understand you. Bonus points if you change the words each time they ask you to repeat.
On a related note, ending a conversation with a nonsense phrase and walking away. E.g. “hot dog squirrel comet”
People being dull assholes and you just look at them with expressionless nihilism in your eyes until they are discomfited and change the topic.
Eating an entire jalapeño pepper, crunching every bite. Bonus points for not blinking b/c you sold off your soul long ago.
Cursing people out but tonelessly because nothing really matters.
Owning your trauma.
Not excusing other people’s inappropriate behavior just because society has taught you to.
Being overly verbally observant when it comes to analyzing other people’s neuroses. Only use this on assholes.
When people are being trivial, examining your nails for an entirely unreasonable length of time.
Staring down the void. Until the void blinks and looks away.
Tax fraud.
just to reiterate: punch a ceiling fan
let your fangs be blunted and bruises fade to skin; let your eyes grow softer and wear that tilted grin; let yourself relax, and let your smiles win; for something is the better, and that something’s your within.
What are your tips for getting past writing block?
Umm, look up prompts and use them as inspo. Listen to music, talk to friends, and look over old writing. Especially read. I’m on mobile lol. Thanks for asking!! Hopefully at another time I’ll be able to answer this better
