#for clare!

[neojeno]

@haechens asked: #8 - favorite NCT friendship? 🍓

request a gifset

[precariouslyprecocious]

Can I claim your flannel shirt?

Six Word Story #25

[precariouslyprecocious]

what fingernails are made of

They tell a lot. Often unnoticed by the people you pass, but so reflective of the hidden turmoil. I’ve bitten my nails since I was little little little, before I even had a reason too. It’s an awful habit and my mom tried to rid me of it, meticulously painting that peppery polish on my thumbs and pointers, coating my cuticles in a nasty clear coat. But it didn’t taste to me particularly, and I held on to the habit. I bit and ripped through the time my parents almost got a divorce, bloody hangnails after I saw my dad crying on the bed or my mom slamming the door so hard it echoed in my brain. The only constants were the white moons at the bottom of my nails, which my grandma had once complimented me on, and the gallon of orange juice sitting in the noisy, twenty-year old refrigerator. And I pulled and tugged after soccer tryouts, diamonds pooled in the folds of my wet pillows, running across empty fields in my mind, kicking a ball and tripping over and over again, my face slamming into the muddy turf. And I still occasionally bite them. They’re consistently short, but always neat. I think when you’re too busy to examine your fingernails, you’re too busy. Because those with jagged, cut-off fingernails need a hand to hold, a coffee cup to share. Those with long, pink nails are confident, but may still need a compliment. Naked, natural nails are of a soul-bearing earthy person, or someone who has more important things to do than paint them. Round nails that just meet the edge of the finger are thoughtful and measured: invite them to ride the Tilt-a-Whirl with you at the mall’s colorfully lit carnival; but don’t give them time to think it through. Next time you meet someone, don’t ask where they’re from, or their ideal date (beach with cold glass bottles of water) but rather ask to see their hands and hold them, comparing fingernails.