I’m tired of being the person that everyone thinks that I am

She might not come across as friendly, but that’s fine. It doesn’t matter if he likes her. She…probably won’t be finishing high school here, anyway. Besides, the less people she keeps close to her, the less likely the people are to get hurt. It’s fine.

She just has to keep her head down through college. Major in biochemistry, maybe try and come up with a way she can fix herself. Honestly, the hope of being able to get rid of her powers is the only thing pushing her forward. Maybe then she can have a life.

Then he apologizes, however, and she does feel a little bad about being so blunt. “It’s whatever. I really don’t care.” She sighed, looking at the product descriptor for the project, trying to see if there was any way to split it up so they didn’t have to meet outside of school. 

|🎭| ❝I-I’m a straight A s-student, so I assure you th-that my work i-is up to-to par.❞ He mutters, not... really talking to her, but the implication that his work might not good enough bugs him. |🎮|

Her asking when gives him pause. When is... difficult. He doesn’t have any extracurriculars... but that’s because he doesn’t have time for them. He honestly misses theatre, but frankly... even if he had the time, he doesn’t know if he could handle it right now, if just for the noise of theatre. 

It’s funny how quickly he wanted to go back once he really couldn’t. 

He... can make time though. For school work. He has no clue what he’s really doing with his life yet, but he can’t let his grades slip at all. 

BI PANIC™

You can’t “just stop saying sorry”. You do something, something so little, like accidentally bump into someone. You feel horrible about it. Your brain starts panicking and you have trouble trying to breathe. You stutter an apology. They say it’s okay, but you accidentally do it again, and you apologize again. They just say “Aha, you can stop saying sorry.” And you feel horrible that you’ve probably made them angry or upset, so you mutter out an apology for the third stupid time, and they just say to stop saying sorry. Stop saying sorry. 

If you actually want to support the person,  reassure them instead.  It can be a simple rote thing like “it’s okay” or “no worries”, as other people have suggested; you’re not responsible for ‘fixing’ them or discussing the behavior. Make a reassuring noise and move the conversation on.   

“First off, nothing is on fire. Yet.”

“Put it back, put it back, PUT IT BACK!”

“Nope! Nope nope nope.”

“This is not as bad as it looks, but it’s as horrible as it sounds.”

“Get me down! Please!”

“In the time it will take to explain this, the situation will get twice as bad.”

“Did you forget the… oh no. Oh no…”

“How are you so calm?!”

“No! You lead off with everything is fine, and then tell me the bad news!”

“Don’t. Panic.”

“Just don’t move, and don’t scream, but there’s a… thing on you.”

“I followed the sounds of increasingly loud screaming, what’s happening?”

“Don’t. Just don’t. I know what you’re gonna say!”

“Help. Help, help help help.“

“The problem is right THERE. Can we get along for five minutes please!?”

“Are you help? Please tell me you’re help.”

“How did I let this get so bad? I’m so dead!”

“There is no calm! Don’t tell me to be calm!”

“Everything is fine, it’s fine- nope I retract that statement.”

“I left for exactly two minutes and this escalated how!?”

“Help first, shame lecture later.”

“There was a gross misunderstanding when I said “I got this”, just so you’re aware.”

“Are you the void? Because I need to scream.”

“OW! No, stop, don’t do that!”

❝ Fear is a strange thing, isn’t it? ❞

❝ Simply put, I have found that I do not believe in any sort of afterlife. ❞

❝ It feels odd to consider the fact that you will no longer exist some day, but you didn’t exist for billions of years before your birth, so, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to conclude that you will not exist afterwards in much the same way. ❞

❝ I try to see life as a pleasant holiday from non-existence. ❞

❝ They’re dead, so they can’t be diseased in the normal sense, can they? ❞

❝ Something about the mutual loneliness seemed to create a real sense of community. ❞

❝ Maybe hindsight is colouring my memories. ❞

❝ I… couldn’t let it go, though. It just kept playing in my mind. ❞

❝ Knowledge makes for a good defence, but leaving quickly is a better one. ❞

❝ Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go wash my hands. ❞

❝ If I’m scared I’m going to lose [name] like I lost everything else, then I’ll curl into a ball and never get up. I won’t be able to do anything to stop it. ❞

❝ There’s no-one to blame but my own stupid self. Blundering in where I had no right to go. ❞

❝ Everyone gets so caught up on how small Scotland is compared to other countries, but it’s still huge compared to a single idiot wandering through the forests. ❞

❝ God knows I should have just left; it’s not like there weren’t plenty of warning signs. ❞

❝ Now there’s only one thing I have left that I value. That I love. And I cannot lose him. ❞

❝ I’ve been in the antiques business for a long time. It’s not what it used to be. ❞

❝ I love that one; I think it’s clever, but in my whole life it’s only ever gotten a laugh once. ❞

❝ I do not remember having that thing, which means it belongs to you. ❞

❝ I wasn’t worried. Not like I should have been. ❞

❝ My perceptions are the only ones I can trust. Maybe. I don’t know. ❞

❝ I know these things were real. I know they existed. Why won’t anyone just believe me? ❞

❝ I want to smash that thing. I want to dash its maddening patterns to the ground and stomp on it until there is nothing left but powder. ❞

❝ Guys? Is everyth - OH CHRIST! ❞

❝ I don’t want to become a mystery. ❞

❝ I refuse to become another goddamn mystery. ❞

❝ Whoever takes over from me is going to know exactly what happened. ❞

❝ Only an idiot would stay in this job. ❞

❝ I mean, it made sense at first, but now? After everything we’ve seen, after everything you’ve read! ❞

❝ Of course, I believe. Of course I do. ❞

❝ Because I’m scared, [name]! ❞

❝ It’s like… like if I admit there may be any truth to it, whatever’s watching will… know somehow. ❞

❝ The skepticism, feigning ignorance. It just felt safer. ❞

❝ We’re clearly doing a whole heart-to-heart thing and, truth be told, the question’s been bothering me. ❞

❝ I can’t… move on and the more I struggle, the more I’m stuck. ❞

❝ Er, I’m not a doctor, but I know dumping a lot of CO2 on people isn’t generally considered a good idea. ❞

❝ Funny story really. I ran into the office, worms everywhere, horrible death and everything, tripped and fell in some boxes and there were like 20 cans of gas in there. ❞

❝ Gas… bit light-headed. Not a lot of ventilation in the tunnels. Come on! ❞

❝ I never understood why they keep this stuff secret. ❞

❝[Name] , I think there’s someone here. Hello? I see you. Show yourself. ❞

❝ I see you. ❞

❝ [Name]… as your boss, I’m telling you to go home. ❞

❝ It’s the last thing I remember before blacking out. ❞

❝ Tens of thousands of… things without mouths screaming as one. ❞

❝ I’m fine, though. Except for the holes. And the pain. And the blood and the nightmares. ❞

❝ After that… my memory gets a bit fuzzy. I think the paramedic called it ‘respiratory acidosis’… from breathing in all the carbon dioxide, rather than your more traditional oxygen. ❞

❝ It’s important to me. ❞

❝ I’m sorry I left you. ❞

❝ I thought you were right behind me. But when I turned round you were gone. You were both gone. ❞

We’ll make pretend that you and me, Lived ever after happily.