Prompt #21

words suck

What are words?

What could she say?

Everything she wanted to say was stuck in her throat, all the ‘I care about you’s and the ‘I’m not mad at you, I just care about you so much that I can’t bear it when you don’t care about yourself’ and all the ‘I don’t know’s.

Because really, she didn’t know.

She didn’t know a lot of things.

She didn’t know what to say to the self-deprecating comments on the side or the casual mentions of not eating as much and being to unhealthy or the anything.

Did she talk about it seriously? Did she sit him down and tell him that he was perfectly fine just the way he is? No. That would make him uncomfortable.

Did she just dismiss or negate the self-deprecating comments and hope he took it seriously? Maybe, but there’s a chance it won’t work.

What are words?

Her parents had always told her that she took things too seriously. In truth, she just didn’t see the point in things not taken or said literally. What was the point in saying something if it isn’t true and you can’t help anyone by saying it?

Sometimes, she wished everyone else took things as seriously as she did. If they did, she wouldn’t have to worry about miscommunication and honesty.

If they did, maybe they’d listen to her.

She had so much to say, but finding a strategy to say it and coming across in the right way so they would pay attention was stressful.

She really wished she could find a way to talk to him in the right way.

What are words?

Taken literally, words are a form of communication, verbal and nonverbal. Words come in many languages and interpretations, so there’s a million ways to say anything that comes to mind.

Words are also a way to shape and share thoughts, going above and beyond the basic need for survival most animals prioritize.

But, as humans are the apex predators, they have a lot of freedom to just think.

And think they do.

What is the meaning of everything? Is there a purpose to life? Is there a reason we’re here? Should we even be here?

Should I even be here?

Why?

And she doesn’t have an answer. She doesn’t know what to say. She never does.

She’s been given a thousand answers to her million questions, and although that’s a lot of answers, it’s not enough in the context.

Will she ever know enough?

Will she ever have enough?

…

Will she ever be enough?

And she doesn’t know.

So she keeps asking questions and hoping for a single answer per every hundred or thousand, and hopes she’ll be enough to help him.

Hopes she’ll be enough to help anybody.

Maybe everyone else sees that she helps one person, and that she must be good at it, and they don’t see the dozen before that she couldn’t help.

Is it enough?

...

Words suck.

Prompt #13

(Character A) has the ability to imagine a scenario and make it come true. The problem is, they figure this out after they have already written fan fiction. Specifically, self-insert fan fiction between them and (Character B), a fictional character.

Now, they’re real, and having an existential crisis as the two of them travel through each fanfic. (Character A) wants to make things go back to normal, so that (Character B) can live their ‘normal’ life again, but is starting to genuinely fall in love with (Character B). They feel selfish, but can’t help their feelings.

(Character A) tries to deal with their guilt, and all the while, they’re oblivious to (Character B) beginning to fall in love with them.

Obviously, mutual pining ensues.

Prompt #6

(Character A) is an astrologist. (Character B) is an astronomer. They are in a happy, healthy relationship.

Prompt #7

(Character A) wears dark clothes. They can manipulate the shadows. They’re quiet and intense.

(Character B) wears bright clothing. They can fly and manipulate light. They’re exuberant and bubbly.

(Character A) is a super hero. (Character B) is a super villain.

it went to voicemail

“I want you to understand that I’ll never be sorry for doing this,” he choked out. He couldn’t cry now, not now, when he was already so close. “Remember when I said that there’s probably only one thing in my life that I’ll never be upset about messing up?” His eyes were shifting now, across the moonlit skyline that showcased about five percent of the stars in the sky and the skyscrapers edging higher and higher in a desperate attempt to reach them. His phone, clutched tightly in his white-knuckled grasp, was shaking from where he held it.

“This is the one thing.”

He closed his eyes, staring at the backs of his eyelids flashing a billion fireworks.

“I want you to know that this isn’t your fault. It will never be.” There were tears falling now, falling to the near-empty pavement below and not even leaving a dot on the concrete to remember. He was a fool to think he could keep them in. His free hand clings to the railings and he leans back. His feet are almost dangling off the edge.

“I always loved you, you know? I was so stupid,” and now he was laughing and soaking in his own saltwater tears, as if he came straight from the ocean. “I was so stupid.”

The neon billboards were just as bright as the backs of his eyelids, and now he couldn’t tell if his eyes were open or closed. “I know you will probably delete this voicemail. I know how you hated to listen to them. I know, I know, I know,” and he was near hysterical now.

It had been three weeks of drinking straight vodka and not even recoiling, two weeks of experimenting with drugs he’d never heard of just in case he could finally learn what it was like to forget, one week of crumpled up paper balls because he couldn’t write his own suicide note correctly, how pathetic is that?

Every minute since the Words has been the worst minute of his life. They weren’t gone yet, not even close, and he didn’t know what to do to get rid of them, so he did the next best thing.

“I’m in love with somebody else,” had never been words he would expect from his lover’s mouth, never ever ever. Not a single nightmare had brought up this terror, not a single time had he woken up in a cold sweat thinking of the possibility.

And maybe that’s why he was so affected.

“I still love you, and I hate that. I don’t know how to hate you. I don’t think I have the ability to.” He was talking so fast, so brokenly and so close to a sobbing mess that he could taste the salt lingering on his tongue.

“I… The thing is, I don’t know how to be without you. I never have. And that’s not your fault.”

He can’t blame him for anything, no matter how much he wanted to be able to shout what he’d done wrong and shriek to the high heavens that he had been wronged, no matter how much he wanted to scream at anyone who walked by that he wasn’t okay, no matter how damp his pillow was and how parched his mouth always was nowadays.

“This is the best for me. This is the best for you. This is the best for us, for everyone!” He was smiling too now, and he had to remind himself to hang on for a little longer because his grip was getting loose.

“So, sayonara. I don’t know if we’ll meet again in another life. I don’t know if either of us will want to.” Only a little while longer. “Just… Know that I love you. It’s not your fault-“

And the voicemail crackles and muffles the last words. His last words.

No one knows what he said. What his final goodbye truly was. Nobody could hear him, from twenty-five floors above the ground and wind howling like a banshee. And so nobody will know what his last tears sounded like when the hit the ground, whether or not the left a mark, or whether or not he was still smiling or laughing through the tears, or what he even had to say.

“I still love you. I’m sorry.”

His last words echo across the starless skyline, around the neon signs, through the desperate skyscrapers, away from the roaring sirens and boisterous lights, and never reach anyone’s ears except his own.

He was still smiling.

said softly means you are speaking, but sweetly, and heartfelt. said quietly means it is less sweet, but still not loud or inaudible. whispered means you aren’t speaking at all, and it can have a negative or positive connotation, but more negative than softly. mumbled means it’s nearly inaudible, and has a more negative connotation.

try me, connotations are everything in writing; especially when conveying emotions.

I know adverbs are Controversial, but “said softly” means something different than “whispered” and this is the hill I will die on.

Prompt #14

Take your OTP. Imagine them as an angel and a demon, based on personality.

Switch them.

john watson background!!!!!

(picture not owned by me, btw)

Prompt #15

(Character A), who is a peasant, accidentally saves (Character B), who is royalty, from an assasination attempt. However, (Character B) thinks it was purposeful, and thinks they are indebted to (Character A).

(Character A) is unaware of this, and wonders why the heir to the throne is so interested in them all of a sudden.

She thinks that maybe it’s the bone structure.

Her face was odd, and it was odd in the way that it didn’t seem normal to anyone else. It was something different, and she didn’t like it.

Once, she waxed her eyebrows off entirely. All the way gone. The clock on the bathroom wall showed that it was late, a bit too late to be up. Good. Eye bags would diminish exceptional beauty.

She never got eye bags.

She had panted in front of the mirror, eyes tearing up, but smiling all the same. Finally, she wasn’t perfect. Finally, she felt she could match how pretty she was on the outside with herself on the inside. After so long....

She felt like she was crying happy tears, despite the constant twinges of pain, and it was glorious to feel individuality, as if she could choose what happened! Like she belonged in her body, after trying so long.

And then it grew back in the morning.

Flawlessly shaped and full.

And nothing she ever did changed anything.

God, it was so depressing to think about.

Nothing she did changed anything. Nobody took her seriously, nobody ever looked at her and wanted to see her any less beautiful. The best thing she could be was pretty.

And she didn’t really feel like she matched it, really.

Her body was different from her brain, her face didn’t match her heart - and she didn’t feel like her heart was even that great! She wasn’t super brave or smart or nice or anything, she was just pretty.

She wished she was ugly.

People whispered about her behind her back, and it wasn’t the kind that usually hurt feelings. Normally, nobody would be offended by being called gorgeous or beautiful or hot or cute or whatever adjective English could produce! Normally it would be accepted, craved, even!

But she wanted nothing more than to be wanted for being less than perfect, less than desirable. She was starving for genuine affection, and was getting superficial attention. She didn’t know if unconditional love was real. Isn’t that what a mother should feel?

Does her mother feel that, if she let this thing be her daughter?

It was like a drowning man being showered with money and being told to buy his way out. It would be helpful in any situation other than the one she was in.

Just once, she wished to shave her whole head and wear the ugliest jumper in the history of mankind. Sing like a tone-deaf monkey and break a glass, and have people act horrified and scandalized. She wanted to walk down the street and not hear anything but the cars roll by, and go to a coffee shop without getting five different numbers, maybe enjoy her black coffee for a change.

Anything but perfection.

She wore the loosest hoodies and sweatpants, littered with holes and frayed edges. Her hair was long and smooth. She kept it in a low ponytail, under her hood and away from sight. Nothing she did changed how people saw her. It was like she didn’t matter.

And then she had a brilliant idea; the kind of idea that deserved a light-bulb above her head and sparks behind her eyes. Something new and unexpected, something that could help her be her and not pretty -

A mask.

A mask! What a genius invention, the mask! Something not made to hide beauty, but to disguise an unwelcome face, perhaps. No matter. She wasn’t one to be proper.

She would wear a mask, and maybe people would listen to her words and not her bone structure, or whatever it was that everyone was fascinated with. It could also be her eyelashes or something.

And she got a mask. And went to school.

“Hi,” said her teachers.

“Hi!” said the boys, hoping to get a date.

“Hi!” said the girls, hoping to get a date.

“Hello,” said her friends, who whispered behind her back every time she turned around as if she was deaf.

“Hello!” said everyone passing by her in the hall.

It didn’t change anything.

Dear god, it didn’t change anything-

Nothing she did mattered, did it? She could scream to the high heavens that she’d had enough, and they’d smile and say hello. The holiest demons in Hell had blessed her with ugly beauty, and it was so terribly evil. She wasn’t sure if anyone ever saw her real face. Could she see her real face? Was she being tricked?

She was hiding in the bathroom. Sitting on the floor with her knees curled into her chest and her arms hugging her knees too tight and restricting her lungs so that they screamed louder than the thoughts in her head. It was smelly, and weirdly sticky, but she didn’t care. She was tearing out her hair, or was that even her hair?

The air was being stubborn and hiding from her nose, so she sucked in deep breaths through her mouth, but it wasn’t enough. It was never enough. It was so hot in the room but she was so cold, and her throat was so dry and parched that her tongue felt like rubber on sandpaper.

Breathe.

Breathe. Was this even her nose?

Breathe.

It didn’t matter, she didn’t think.

Was this even her brain?

She didn’t care.

She smiled up deliriously at the ceiling. “Hello,” she said, and she knew it sounded like honey in December, but all it felt like was February rain.

It was too cold for her here.

Way too cold........

She wanted to just fall asleep.

...

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the world would let her not wake up?

She hated that fairy that had given her mother the boon of the most beautiful child.

She wished she could be ugly. She wished that when she cried people didn’t whisper about how beautiful she was. She wished that her anger was horrifying. She wished her ill manners were repulsive. 

She wished she could be ugly.