#withoutjoy

she opens her eyes and everything is red.

red as in the blood that paints the walls trapping her inside. red as in the stains on her hands, all the way up to her elbows. ( god, please spare me from your freudian bullshit. ) red as in the wrath she feels overcome her, leaving room for nothing more. but there’s writing on the walls, beige wall revealed underneath the red in letters.

WELCOME HOME.

her arm slips and her head thumps against the car window, knocking her awake.

she opens her eyes and everything is back to normal.

that is, until they pass by a sign that makes her stomach churn. silent hill sounds oddly familiar, and it also sounds like they’ve made a detour. “this wasn’t on the map.” she offhandedly mentions, sparing noah a curious glance, eyebrow raised and all. it makes sense when she sees that they’re running low on gas, but also doesn’t because she’s certain that they topped up just a few hours ago.

opting not to overthink it, emily looks out the window, keeping an eye out for anything interesting despite something in her gut telling her not to. “does this town even have a gas station? like, a functioning one...” shadowy figures lurk behind boarded up windows and only a handful of people linger around the streets. she can’t help but shudder, finally looking at her boyfriend instead, tacking on a smile that could pass for a grimace.

“i think we should try our luck in the next town.”

@withoutjoy

the sunlight dips warm on her feet, dappling through the foliage. the shrine is unoccupied now that there are fewer and fewer devotees coming to pray and give offerings. ahri would be worried, if not for the fact that the shrine still has a small set of humans who visit and remember to pay their respects. instead she busies herself with keeping the shrine clean and well-loved, and handwrites each worshiper’s prayers to be sent to the heavens. there aren’t a lot of them and she can afford to spend her time doing that.

her favourite ones to write are the well-wishes for family. may my sister be blessed with a safe birth and healthy children, please let my son succeed in his examinations. keep my granddaughter safe and happy until she returns in the summer. she prints them all carefully, in looping, elegant script as she listens to the prayers on behalf of the heavens. and if some of the prayer strips are written with more care, perhaps it’s because their sender and the subject of their prayers have found a soft spot in the almost 400 year old gumiho’s heart.

the elderly grandmother stops by with rice wine and incense, as she does each morning, and prays the same, simple prayer she’s repeated since she was a child. ahri writes it down to be burnt to the heavens, and thinks of the girl who’s so loved by her grandmother, constantly in her prayers. she, too, thinks of eunyoung with warmth, the toddler she’d met who’s grown into a precocious one on the cusp of adulthood. human years are strange, for a spirit still considered young and yet innumerably old by humanity’s standards.

in the parentheses of time, japan has become nothing but blurry lights. they are dissected into segments: his inspiration, his motivation, his aspiration. even when he said the silver medal couldn’t satiate his hunger as a coach, he cannot lie to himself and say that it wasn’t a trick to stay with yuuri. it has been, all along. he’s a liar, if he’s to be painfully honest to himself. conversations about feelings have always been a catalyst that traps him; he’s better off implying the emotions, uttering them nothing if not incapability. it’s something that he’s recognized himself — a boy that grew up in the ice ring did not cultivate the growth of a verbally capable man. but it seems that some things can be left unspoken, and it’s better off that way.

maybe the definition of these lies needs to be redefined. he didn’t lie to yuuri as much as he did to himself: maybe all these denials, of how much he needs and wants yuuri by his side, still need readdressing, but he’s content as he is now, waiting at the airport in the cold of the weather. it’s a matter to revisit in another day, and not at the moment right when he’s waiting for yuuri’s arrival in his country. at the back of his mind would be how he’s going to welcome him, all surprises pushed aside. he’s done contemplating what might shock yuuri after that kiss, and this time it just doesn’t have to be that way. it can be soft this time.

she lets him fall to her feet on the floor surrounded by partygoers who mistake him for another blacked out soul that had too much to drink.

it wasn’t her fault. he had it coming, especially when she was just trying to make her way back home. unfortunately, he made the decision to interrupt her plans, not as well-hidden as he thought he was when he decided to follow her instead of minding his own business. so she does what she does best, never slacking even for a decision as reckless as this. 

anything to feel a semblance of excitement.

besides, he was getting in the way. or rather, he was getting too close, a position he didn’t deserve. she has that spot reserved for a special cia agent who had caught her eye recently — that said, she wonders if this will finally lead to their first meeting in person. this game of cat and mouse can only go on for so long without it.

and when he stops breathing, nobody notices. frankly, it’s a little disappointing. then, she hears a cry over the techno music. she glances up and finds that she was right to be a little hopeful, for her cia agent is making her way through the tight crowd. would you look at that?

caroline makes sure jean can catch a glimpse of her grin before slipping away with ease, heading out through the backdoor, but not leaving yet either.

Send Me A Symbol For A Halloween Starter! ❉: Our muses go into a haunted house together.

            ◖ The girl stood there with an ice cream cone in each hand. She had ordered one cone with two scoops of ice cream; however, the employee at the establishment had given her two separate ice cream cones. To her dismay, she was too soft spoken to point out the error, so instead she wondered what to do with the frozen treats. She could eat both, but the heat would surely melt the second one before she could finish it. 

          Trying to be quick on her feet, she had devised a plan. She approached a girl who appeared nice. Hanayo tried her best to avoid turning a bright red color, she would do all that she could to maintain her composure. Giving away ice cream is a kind gesture, so surely the girl wouldn’t react poorly, right?

withoutjoy

He tugged the collar of the girl's shirt further down in pursuit of hunting for another spot to feast on, already getting bored of her neck. As he pierced his fangs into her shoulder, he felt his victim grip on his shirt with a pained wince-- already depleted by his prior bites. Kou paid no heed to that though as he started sucking the young girl's blood in. He could feel his thirst being quenched at long last and while his bait didn't really have the sweetest of blood, he knew that he couldn't really be picky at this point. This city was too full of other beings that identifying a human being was almost scarce to the vampire.

Finally, he licked over his bite to seal the wounds before straightening up and directing his stare down at his victim, a wicked grin embellishing his pale features as he tilt her head up by taking a tight grip on her chin. His right eye gleamed a luminously vibrant crimson within the dim obscurity of the alleyway and he heard the girl swallow a lump in her throat, her fear practically bouncing off of her. "Should I let you live?" He asked in a somewhat singsong tone. "You don't know who I am after all so there's no way you'd be able to tarnish my reputation--"

His words were cut off the very second he caught on the familiar sound of a camera clicking off. His body tensed. That sound was too close. Far too close. Letting his bait go, he turned around to find a girl standing nearly around the corner as though it was an attempt of hiding. In her hand displayed her cellphone which made another clicking sound.

Shit.

Kou wiped the blood that trailed down the corner of his lips, never taking his eyes off the newcomer while his victim had dropped to her knees-- far too weak to escape.