the amount of narcissistic, manipulative, ugly gaslighters that rp creates, houses, and is protects absolutely and positively the worst part of this whole thing and i’m kinda ready to dropkick everyone and dip but that’s just me
pro tip about relationships, you can call them all sorts of cheesy shit and they have to sit there cause they love u. i call my bf “lover”. if i ask him “whos the cutest boy in the whole world?” he has to stand there whole six feet of grown ass man with a news anchor voice and say “i am”.
uneven odds.
”as your guardian, i was instructed well.”
katie, 11 + cristal, 11
utah valley hospital, provo, utah.
"I think I’m gonna be a nurse when I grow up.” Katie spoke up after minutes of comfortable silence. This was their routine, now, when Cristal got to visit: sneak Cristal into her bed, rest their heads on each others’, and bask in each others’ safe presence like sunlight. Sometimes, Cris would tell her about what they did in school that day, but only when Katie asked. And, oh, did she ask a lot. How she missed her desk and Mrs. Jones and making flashcards just for her and Cristal to use, no one else (although, she’d always end up sharing to those who asked, the curse of a generous heart).
“Really?” Cristal asked, readjusting her head on top of Katie’s.
“Yeah. My nurses are really cool...and they’re pretty, and they get to use pink stethoscopes all the time. When I grow up, I wanna be cool and pretty and use a pink stethoscope all the time, too.”
“You’re already cool and pretty. Hm...” Katie’s brunette counterpart took a look around the room, eyeing something resting on the sink’s counter. Without missing a beat (and oh how it was always her favorite thing about her best friend), Cristal stood up from the bed, careful not to tangle in Katie’s IV.
“What are you doing, Cris?” She asked, her big and curious blue eyes following her best friend’s every move.
“Making you a grown up right now.” Cristal’s voice was always canorous to her, bathed in melody and song in times when Katie needed it most. She always came through for her, and even in the scariest moments, with a reaper painting her hospital room walls blacker and blacker each day. Cristal fought him off herself without even knowing it, and Katie caught it every time with her own two eyes. Even losing just the slightest bit of sight in one already, she could see the safety that exuded from Cristal, like it was her very aura of being. How she knew she always would emit this feeling to Katie—ditto.
Grabbing the lone stethoscope from the counter, Cristal trotted back to the bed, reclaiming her spot next to Katie but sitting up just a little bit, so that she could carefully place the eartips into Katie’s ears. (When you’re a cancer patient, you have to be mindful of any and all germs. When you’re eleven, however, it’s a much different story.)
“There. Now you’re cool, pretty, and get to use a stethoscope. It’s not pink though.” Cristal Ramirez offered the kind of smile that made Katie’s heart soar in too many ways to count, that made her want to tell the reaper in the corner of the room to screw off, I need to see this smile forever. She gave one back, too, her kind of smile that made a crease form just barely underneath her right eye. This was a new development, and she’d soon grow to hate it once the consciousness of adolescence hit her, but for now she was okay with Cristal seeing her so raw and true.
“I can paint it pink. Thank you, Cristal. I love you!”
“Love you, Blue.” And they hugged, and once again, the black paint on the walls seemed to grow lighter again. And, see, there was this much, too: in just the smell of Cristal’s day-old shampooed hair or the feeling of her heartbeat against Katie’s increasingly visible bones, life was breathed into her. She didn’t care what any doctor had to say, see, she was full of life. Thanks to this, thanks to her, she was still so full of life. “Can I try it out on you?”
Created using still images taken by the Cassini spacecraft during it’s flyby of Jupiter and while at Saturn. Shown is Io and Europa over Jupiter’s Great Red Spot.
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