Promise

⋆˙⟡ "Are you awake?" - "I am now." - "Good."

⋆˙⟡ "I keep thinking about something you said. Two years ago."

⋆˙⟡ "I don't want to be alone right now."

⋆˙⟡ "Do you ever think about what we could have been?"

⋆˙⟡ "I'm not okay." - "I know." - "How did you know?" - "You called."

⋆˙⟡ "I think I've been lying to myself for a really long time."

⋆˙⟡ "Stay on the line. You don't have to talk."

⋆˙⟡ "Why does everything feel worse at night?"

⋆˙⟡ "I miss you and I don't know what to do with that."

⋆˙⟡ "I should let you sleep." - "Don't hang up yet."

⋆˙⟡ "If I tell you something, do you promise not to make it weird?"

More combat examples

(originally posted in If You Can See It, You Can Write It)

Source: Batman: Arkham City

A description of the move:

Two palm strikes to the torso, a quick punch to the gut, another palm strike, then an upward elbow strike to the face. The sequence then repeats very quickly, making the attack look like a rapid, relentless flurry.

How I wrote it:

“The first palm strike landed with a resounding thud, knocking the wind out of the assassin's chest. The second palm strike came almost instantly after, causing the assassin to stumble back further. Espio seized the opportunity and delivered a quick, powerful punch to the assassin's lower gut, doubling them over in pain.

✮ Standing slightly in front of whoever they love in a crowd without noticing they do it

✮ The threat assessment that runs automatically in every new room they enter

✮ Learning everyone's allergies preferences fears exits on the first meeting just in case

✮ The voice that goes very quiet and very calm when something is actually wrong

✮ Absorbing conflict before it reaches the people they've decided to shield

✮ The violence they are capable of living quietly beside the gentleness they choose

✮ Remembering every person who ever hurt someone they loved with a precision that never fades

✮ Saying I'm fine through injuries that are not fine because worrying people feels worse than pain

✮ The tenderness that exists beneath the armor that only specific people ever get to see

✮ Being the person who stays sober at the party without being asked because someone should

✮ Noticing the shift in someone's energy before they've said a single word about what's wrong

✮ The apology they give for being overprotective that doesn't fully reach the eyes

✮ Carrying the weight of keeping everyone safe and never naming it as a weight

✮ The flaw of loving people in ways that leave no room for them to need anything from anyone else

✮ Fighting for everyone else's right to be soft while never allowing it in themselves

✮ The exhaustion visible only in private when the door is finally closed and no one needs anything

✮ Needing to be needed in a way that is both a gift and a wound

✮ The person who finally protects them back and the way that completely undoes them

✮ Having kept everyone safe for so long they don't know who they are when there's nothing to protect against

Finding all the paragraphs where you used some hyper-specific word more than once

Rearranging paragraphs that you swear you wrote in the right order but turned out to be totally backwards

Going for a walk, coming up with the perfect line, and forgetting it as soon as you get home and open your laptop

Creating a separate document where you can dump all of those nice sentences that no longer fit in anywhere

Fandom creators spend hours of their free time to create something to make fandom thrive...for free and for the love of the game.

And what do they get? A wholeass heap of fuck all. No reblogs, no comments, no nothing. And people are surprised that creators are dropping out left, right, and centre??

"Why is there no long fic anymore?" "Why did my favourite writer stop?" "Why is my favourite artist not posting anymore?"

And that is what she brings into that final conversation with Robby. That is her frame of mind when she says that maybe she will go into geriatrics. It’s defeat. She’s hurt and she’s demoralized and she's lonely, and she's opting for the path of least resistance. Again, she's practically begging Robby for some encouragement, and all he can tell her is that she should go into this field she's never expressed any interest in, that it'd be "smart", following up from how the way he suggested it in the first place was really mean. He didn't stress the value of the field or point out that she has unique skills that would make her great at it; he said that there are always openings. And in the final scene, that's still his attitude – it'd be smart, not fulfilling, not exciting, not meaningful. Nothing about her or even the worthiness of the subspecialty. Just about it having openings.

Part of socializing and having friends is being a good listener even when you don't actually give a shit about the subject.

Your are hurting other people's feelings when you bluntly respond with "Anyway..." and then change the topic.

It can not always be about your preferred topic.