with love, i live

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 31 - Award

The Afterlife Awards (as told by a very unwilling participant) I was brushing my teeth when the mirror applauded with ghostly clapping. I froze, toothbrush halfway to my mouth. “Please don’t,” I said to the reflection, which was currently smiling without me. From behind me came a raspy voice. “Don’t what? Celebrate your haunting? Tonight’s the big night!” Standing in my bathroom was a…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 30 - Vacant

Astrid hadn’t left her room since they had escaped the explosion. She’d fractured herself shortly after they had reached the safe house and had gone through the files that she had retrieved from the lab, just as she had done with data-stics they’d obtained on a previous mission. This time, however, she hadn’t share what she had discovered with Luke. It wasn’t like she was actively avoiding him,…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 29 - Lesson

When she reminisces about her uni days, she remembers her time as a teaching assistant with great fondness. Teaching Evolutionary Biology and Ecology as well as Organic Chemistry labs 1 and 2 were some of the highlights of that time of her life. She learned so much about herself and her ability to organise information systematically. With an ease she had not thought possible, she found lesson…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 28 - Skeletal

“Are you nearly ready?” Marco called from the living room. “Yeah, just need a couple more minutes.” Kelly continued to work on her make up, adding the final colors before she started to glue on the jewels she had set aside for her costume. For Halloween this year, she was La Catrina, the iconic Lady of the Day of the Dead. The inspiration for her costume was from La Muerta in the animated…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 27 - Onion

The kitchen smelled of garlic and onion sautéing on the stove. It was a staple to every dish she remembers her mother making when she was a little girl. All these years later, she finds herself copying her mom, starting her own dishes with garlic and onion, even though she doesn’t often cook. Together, they make for a flavorful base for whichever dish she decides to make. Tonight, she is making…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 26 - Puzzling

The evidence was laid out in front of them. “This is rather puzzling,” Marco said, turning to Kelly. “I think this is the hardest case that we’ve taken on so far.” Kelly rearranged some of the information, which they had written out on note cards, hoping that it would give her a new perspective. “Yeah, but it’s not like any of the other ones we’ve done were super easy.” Marco nodded, as he…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 25 - Inferno

Fire is a thing of beauty,but also of pain and sorrow.It burns away impurities, Leaving behind ash And purest silver. I find myself at timesStaring into the flames.I can’t help but wonderWhat it would be like To hold fire without burning. Yet I am like impure silver,Ever in need of refining.The infernos of my lifeHave purified my heartAnd cleansed my soul. The trials of lifeAre just like…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 24 - Rowdy

She’s never been to a college football game in her life. The university she went to didn’t have a football team and even if there had been one, she was never into watching sports. Yet, here she finds herself sitting in a stadium full of college kids at her husband’s alma mater. It is an experience unlike anything she has ever been a part of. There are sections of the stadium that seem to be full…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 23 - Firefly

She remembers the late summer nights when she used to go out with a jar to collect fireflies and watch as they glowed softly in the dark. The faint glow of the jar was beautiful, creating a small bright point in the darkness. The memory brings the feeling of nostalgia, a desire for simpler times. Oh, to be a child again, playing outside without worry and letting her imagination run wild. Magic…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 22 - Button

“I’m surprised you wore that thing all day,” Marco said as they entered their hotel room. Kelly looked confused. “What thing?” “The pin.” Marco pointed to the birthday button pin she had attached to her shirt. “It’s not like you to go around advertising that it’s your birthday.” Kelly unclipped the pin from her shirt and set it down on the table as she got ready for bed. “Yeah. I don’t know. I…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 21 - Blast

“Run!” Luke turned as he heard Astrid ‘s scream, finally catching sight of her as she came running toward him in the dimly lit hallway. She looked panicked, her normally braided long blonde hair was now loose, wildly fluttering behind her. It took a few moments for his brain to comprehend that she was telling him he needed to run and by the time he had caught up, she had grabbed his arm and was…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 20 - Rivals

It had started out with small things, childish games played out on the playground. She doesn’t quite know when it started, but she remembers the feeling that something had shifted and that her friend was challenging her in a different way than before. Silly games gave way to comparison for homework grades, grades turned into competitions for class standings. The subtle shift from friends to…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 19 -Arctic

She sat at the gate to her terminal, waiting to board her plane. This was her first solo trip and her first time going abroad. She had brought a book to read, but found that she enjoyed people watching as well. She had noticed the man sitting next to her, reading a book. She wondered where he was going. He looked to be in his late fifties and she thought about all that he must have done in his…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 18 - Deal

Recently, she’s been reading through an old journal. It documents her life after graduating from college, the transitional season she lived while waiting to see what the future held. Her past self was waiting to hear if she would get an acceptance to medical school, documenting her anxiety about whether this was the path she should take for her life and her desired hope for a specific medical…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 17 - Ornate

How does one capture the emotion one feels when standing in front of a painting from one of the great impressionists under 2 centuries ago? There is an awe, a sense of wonder in knowing that canvas and paint that I am looking at, is the very same paint and canvas that were new a fresh when Vincent van Gogh first sat in front of his easel to create his art. A man I will never personally meet is…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 16 - Blunder

The prompt for the day was ‘blunder’. He had spent an hour trying to come up with the perfect image for such a word. There had to be some way to draw out a mistake or intentional error that would give imagery to the meaning of the word. In the end, he decided to draw a chess game, where one opponent had made the wrong move on the board. He set up his desk, gathering paper, pencil, and his special…

[withlove-jo]

Inktober 2025: Day 15 - Ragged

Her eyes were closed when the vision came. She’s standing near the cliff’s edge, grass and wild flowers at her feet, the ocean’s vastness laid out before her. She can feel the wind whipping through her hair and the misty rain dampening her skin. There’s a raw beauty here that words fail to describe. She knows that she could soak in the view for hours if she really was visiting such a place.…