I've been a manager at a company for three years now. Our department has been through one Director who left a year into my tenure. Now we have another who just joined.
At the start, I was ecstatic. Based on the conversations we had, I really liked her management style. She is systems oriented, as I am. Excited to prove myself and help her get up to speed, I shared all of my strategies, plans, and templates with her.
I had really high hopes.
Then, my insubordinate underling who has been issued two warnings acted up when she wasn't around to witness. She twisted things I'd said to paint me as the bad guy. New director informed me that she'd be transferring the subordinate out from under me. I only directly manage her, so now I have no one below me and the insubordinate underling has effectively been promoted.
Next, new director hired a new colleague, Assistant Manager for a different Manager, and pushed me to send her critical work before she'd joined. She didn't complete it, naturally. I honestly don't blame her, I wouldn't have either. But deadline was "yesterday," and I couldn't contain my frustration and dismay. New colleague read my frustration at the situation as a personal attack and launched her own vendetta against me.
New director praises me to my work to my face, but allows the new, lower level colleague's opinion to override mine. She also takes my material and area of responsibility and discusses it behind doors with my manager, a different department head, and the new colleague. Basically, I'm being sidelined. Or I feel like I am.
I feel really down on my luck and don't know how to recover from this low place.
I'm seriously considering applying for new jobs, but I've had a look at availabilities and it's looking pretty sparse.
I'm not usually one to sit and wallow in self pity, but the BS is really piling up. And I'm not perfect, but I generally have an immaculate personal professional record. No one has ever lodged a complaint against me except one manager ages ago who was upset that I applied for a position in a different department. She was insane and would get into screaming matches with other colleagues. That was 8-9 years ago during the early stages of my career.
If you were my mentor, what would you advise? Any advice welcome.

DISCLAIMER: THIS IS NOT A FACTS-BASED SCIENTIFIC POST
I'm not a scientist/expert and there will be some assumptions thrown around in this post. This idea struck me as a "fun" way to mentally overcome the addiction.
That being said... I'm treating early recovery like a BIG BOSS BATTLE! First I'll lay out the assumptions, then I'll get to the "fun" part!
Assumption 1: A small percentage of metabolized alcohol is stored in fat
Assumption 2: All current body fat has some of this metabolized alcohol in it
Assumption 3: Staying sober = no new accumulated fat will contain metabolized alcohol
Assumption 4: The addiction stands strong until all "possessed" fat is burned
Assumption 5: There are 3,500 calories in 1 lb. of fat
Assumption 6: YOUR BIG BOSS: HP = TOTAL CALORIES NEEDING TO BE BURNED
Going out on a limb here, I'm assuming that this metabolized alcohol is leaked back into your system as you burn body fat. This is why early recovery is so tough. Intense cravings, triggers, etc. are all due to this released metabolized alcohol. The big fight is won once all of the "bad fat" has been burned. That's when you defeat the BIG BOSS! This is when you go from "active battle" to having preventive measures in place to keep the bad guys out. It's like ending a war, but having nukes in place to deter the enemies.
I calculated my body fat % using an online calculator (ABCP Body Fat Calculator). My body fat % was 27%. Weight is 215 lbs. meaning I have (0.27*215) around 60 lbs. of "possessed" fat to burn. Which means my BIG BOSS HP (60*3,500) is around 210,000! That's gonna be a tough battle. That's a lot of calories to burn...
I plan on keeping a log of estimated calories burned as I wear-down the BIG BOSS. Outside of actual exercise, here's some info I found:
Sleep - burn around 50 calories per hour
Watching TV or reading - burn around 50 calories per hour
Working at a computer - burn around 100 calories per hour
Playing video games - burn around 100 calories per hour
I'm lazy and surely don't plan on adding up every single little hour for everything. I'm estimating (outside of exercise) that I can burn around 1,500 calories per day. Once I start exercising, that changes the game, so I will need to add up those calories.
If you have a labor-intensive job, I'm assuming you can be burning over 2,000 calories per day. Mileage will vary from person to person of course.
LET THE BATTLE BEGIN!

Hi I just wanted to know if my idea for my demo in a 2nd grade ICT makes sense. I have 15 minutes and I would like to do a picture walk. We would go through the pictures together and then we would read the book. During this time I would ask questions maybe do some turn and talks. How should I close this activity? I was thinking they could retell the story maybe in groups. I would assign each group a different part of the story (beginning, middle or end) and they would have to draw/write about that specific part. Then we share by putting the class' drawings in sequence? Does this make any sense? I've never worked with 2nd grade before so I would appreciate any help please.

Am I an asshole or was the writing on this film absolute vomit? I like some of Danes acting in other films. The main 3 characters acting wasn't bad by any means but I feel like they were fucked with the writing here. This whole movie was an absolute cringe festival.
The hacking thing is taken to some extreme level like he's on the level of the number 1 hacker on the entire planet but he's busy killing random women? Even then the hacking ability and sheer speed is suspect. It requires a general belief that Hackers can do significantly more than is realistic. Maybe thats my cyber security background speaking but to me I found myself thinking "who the fuck can do that?". Even with the stalker scenario to give him some premeditated time to plan this deal out. I feel like they may as well went supernatural with it and made him a demon or something. The movie could've saved some grace in the writing if by the end you found out she was indeed schizophrenic and imagining up these wild scenarios.
Even the club scene. Randomly from the subway. Like dude I get you want the cool rave scene where the killer is walking through. Saw it in some movies. Maybe you're a fan of Blade and thought I gotta have this in my movie but there were logical ways to make these events occur in a much more believable manner where it could keep an audience hooked. Instead there's this jarring "huh?" Wtf scenario that detaches you from the film every 60 seconds.
I feel like this shouldn't have passed the quality assurance check. The actual initial scenario and general theme of the movie has incredible potential to be an outstanding film but the way the writers connected those dots seemed about as imaginative and skillful as a middle school student. I wouldn't bitch and moan but this has to be one of the worst horrothriller films I've seen in a while. I could not take it seriously for a moment.

Hi! So I am an 18 years old SHS graduate na nag hahanap ng work since wala namang pasok at gusto ko makapag ipon for my allowance at basic needs for college.
here are the things na pwede kong gawin if you’re looking for:

• Mag alaga ng pets I am good with pets and I love pets so much, cats and dogs since ako dati nag lalakad, nag papakain at minsan naglilinis ng mga kulungan ng mga dogs ng tito ko.
  
• graphic designing I can do digital arts and infographics since I learned it from school since need din for school (mga outputs) and as a hobby ko rin.
  
• tutor your kids I graduated Senior High School po STEM strand na with high honors (96 average) plus I am a good public speaker po and I am good with child, for my whole SHS naging tutor na rin ako ng mga friends ko sa mga topics na hindi nila maintindihan. I prefer tutoring with kids kasi ewan ko magaan loob ko sa mga bata and I can teach them how to read, write and do basic math.
  
• virtual assistant I can do simple tasks naman or anything na ipagagawa virtually and madali naman po akong turuan.
  

Any job will do po basta kaya ko naman at hindi masiyadong malayo.
Other informations about me: •I’m from Cavite •I live alone
I can provide proofs naman sa mga interested. Thank you!

Hi I just wanted to know if my idea for my demo in a 2nd grade ICT makes sense. I have 15 minutes and I would like to do a picture walk. We would go through the pictures together and then we would read the book. During this time I would ask questions maybe do some turn and talks. How should I close this activity? I was thinking they could retell the story maybe in groups. I would assign each group a different part of the story (beginning, middle or end) and they would have to draw/write about that specific part. Then we share by putting the class' drawings in sequence? Does this make any sense? I've never worked with 2nd grade before so I would appreciate any help please.

If content is king, then the focus today is on how the king is expanding the empire: Print and traditional media first got augmented by websites, and now websites are being augmented by a fast-expanding landscape of apps, social media platforms and content created by artificial intelligence. Now, a company that’s building for that content horizon has raised a big round of funding to expand its business.
Storyblok, a startup out of Linz, Austria, that provides a content management system (CMS) for organizations built around the “headless” concept, has closed a Series C round of $80 million. The startup targets the middle ground between platforms that offer rigid templates, and those that facilitate a full-control approach that might involve building and maintaining different components of a content and front-end tech stack.
The startup plans to use the funds to continue expanding further into Europe and the U.S., and also to bring new automation and AI tooling into the mix.
Some of that is already getting a boost: Alongside the funding announcement, Storyblok is launching the beta of Ideation Room. The company describes this as a “collaborative space within Storyblok where [users] can develop new ideas together at the beginning of the creation process, using AI to help improve content and bring it to life.”
Dominik Angerer, the CEO and founder of Storyblok, said that the company was working with OpenAI on that AI tooling, so expect to see some generative AI worked not only into making the platform more intuitive to use, but potentially also to populate the content on the platform.
The company now has a staff of 240, and it will also be ramping up hiring.
Brighton Park Capital, a new investor in the company, is leading the Series C. This is a substantial raise for the startup, which last raised a $47 million Series B in 2022. As with that last round, it’s not disclosing its valuation, but it says its users have more than doubled since that last round to 200,000 from 74,000 in 2022, and we understand that this is definitely an “up round.
Storyblok has raised $138 million to date.
Angerer told TechCrunch that he roughly expects the company to be profitable by the end of 2025.
“It’s a massive market,” he said, estimating that the bigger opportunity for CMS players – which include others like Contentful, WordPress and Commercetools (focused on e-commerce) – is around $20 billion to $25 billion annually. “People used to think that content was valuable for B2C brands that were connected with their consumers, but increasingly, it’s core to the strategy for almost any company in any industry,” he said. “The mass market is still controlled by legacy companies, with modern headless players like us taking just a percentage.”

Looking for anyone willing to share their experience of getting a US teaching license and/or Masters while teaching here in Thailand. I've been teaching here for about a year, and love my current job.
Eventually, I'd like to move into international schools, which to my knowledge require a teaching license from your home country, and often a MA as well (if BA was not in education, which is my case) .I've considered doing an online teacher prep course like Moreland University (quite the stigma, I know) because I really don't want to move back to the US for 2 years to get licensure. But, I've been told you can no longer convert a US teaching license to QTS if you completed an online program.
Lots of what I read online and have heard from other teachers has been inconsistent, and I'm feeling confused about the whole process. If you have any insights, or have gone through this I would be grateful to hear your experience.Thank you!

Hello, first off super happy to of stumbled into this forum. I am self taught on most of the research I do, I do not do it for funds or to bring forth for any reason. I mainly just enjoy research and fact check or do my own checks for myself. I am on efile/research tx courts (these two are linked) an I utilize all of the normal things available to the public. FOIA, ORR, a recently began using Osint to keep track of things for my personal case.
My question is, I am starting a course that will be osint, surveillance and then ride along/intern on a case with a PI in order to gain a license in Tx. What are things I should consider to read up on first? Things I can do to prepare myself, and also ask during the classroom course before ride outs. I am not looking to have a career in PI, in the typical sense, more along investigative research/journalism. I’ve considered also going back to law school or paralegal, and possibly just take things brought to me by someone or maybe contract work for attorneys. I feel I could do forensic audits of financials as my career prior to kids was investing and finance, I do feel I would need more training though, so if there are things I can do on my own or courses online, in person etc that y’all may recommend? Long winded way of saying, what is the best thing to consider? I’m not trying to make tons of $$ but something I can do for myself, my husbands job covers our needs so I am fortunate in that aspect.
Thanks for coming to my ted talk sorry if it’s jumbled 3 kids on summer break😬. I’m

Hey everyone,
I want to share my journey with you all, I hope those struggling read this.
At the age of 14 a week after my birthday, I experienced my first ACL rupture, at the time I didn’t really know what this meant, I remember my parents both looking devastated and I didn’t understand the gravity of what had just happened. Once the severity was explained to me I felt so much pain and disappointment and little did I know it was just the beginning of a series of challenges that would test my resilience to the core.
My first rehab was the hardest, I was uneducated, impatient and emotional, I was in highschool and all I wanted to do was play sports with my friends, run around at lunch time, and just be normal. But I couldn’t. Albeit surrounded by an amazing support team, it was still hard. And at that age my friends and classmates didn’t understand, i was taunted about “being soft” and to “not do your ACL again!” When doing meagre tasks, it was humiliating. But through all that I learnt a lot about myself, I taught myself dedication, perseverance and patience. And through a successful rehabilitation I was back to sport and normalities after 15 months post the injury. It was amazing, as huge weight lifted off my shoulder, I’ve never felt happier than playing my first game back from injury.
Fast forward to 17, I had faced numerous injuries between 14-17 such as a pneumothorax and some fractured ribs and a spinal fracture, although nothing a major as an ACL tear. I thought I was in the clear. Until I wasn’t. I found myself facing another ACL tear, along with injuries to my MCL and the posterior horn of the medial meniscus. It was devastating. I felt lost, all of my hard work was gone for nothing, such little time had passed since my last one, and mix that with COVID I felt as I had been cheated by life. I remember hearing the news from my doctor and taking it on the chin, as I felt I couldn’t show any emotion in public. But as soon as I was alone I lost it, I cried and cried. But I was determined to not let this define me. Once again I found myself not be able to participate in the sports I love, I was especially devastated as I was playing and training at a level that players are usually drafted from to my chosen sport, I thought I had my future planned out, I thought my sport was going to support my future. Furthermore I also went through the same taunting from my mates, although it wasn’t their fault as I never let them know that it actually got to me. Although through all this pain a spark of light pushed through, and I’d thought I’d found my calling. I’d decided I wanted to redirect from sport and become a Physiotherapist. I finished high school and got accepted into my dream course and finished my first year with a 6.0 GPA. After all the emotion, lonely times, countless hours rehabbing and feeling as if nobody understood the pain I was feeling I finally began to feel happy again. I finished my rehab again with 13 months away from full contact sport and began to play again, albeit a slower start than hoped I was just happy to be playing the sport I loved.
However, life had another curveball in store for me. At 19, this year, I endured my third ACL rupture, accompanied by a tear to my hamstring (semimembranosus) and the posterior horn of the lateral meniscus. At this point my Physio and I had a pretty close relationship so I called him to get the results, as soon as he told me I thanked him and hung up. It was after a uni class and I felt destroyed. Numb. Honestly a bit useless. Why am I so broken? What did I do to deserve any of this. I sat in my car for thirty minutes in silence, I didn’t know what to do, I was 19 old year who already needed three knee reconstructions. I had a million thoughts racing through my mind, I was worried about my future, what if I can’t run around with my kids because my knees Arnt the same? What if I’m 60 and need a wheelchair because my knees can’t keep up anymore. I was devasted to my core. After 30 minutes I built up the courage to call my beautiful girlfriend and tell her. She was also devastated and was emotional. I wanted to cry but I also wanted to be strong infront of her, as if it was all okay. But I was ruined and felt broken.
A few months now have passed, and I’m three weeks post op, and I’m tracking well, I’m full of knowledge and confidence in what I should be doing and feel strongly about this rehab process and once again have been learning a lot about myself during everything that’s happened.
The point of this post is that amidst all the physical and emotional turmoil, you may discover a silver lining about your struggles. For me these setbacks pushed me to explore new paths, leading me to pursue a career in physiotherapy, which honestly I find so amazing and I’m just fascinated by the human body. And through my own experiences, I found a passion for helping others overcome their own obstacles and reclaim their strength, in both a physical and mental capacity.
Some days I feel lost, emotional and broken. But other days I feel alive, passionate and blessed to be able to receive the opportunities and life that I have, and that’s what I grab onto with both hands and use to drive my life foward. I know firsthand how mentally draining the recovery process can be. It's not just about the physical pain, but also the constant battle with doubt and frustration. And for all of you going through rehabilitation now, whether it’s your first or third acl rehab, grab every little victory by the throat and tell yourself you’re doing amazing, because you are. Whether it’s taking your first steps without a crutch, lifting your leg for the first time, running or jumping again, no matter how little or big, it’s progress, and that’s all you can ask for. Progress.
So, to anyone out there who may be facing their own rehabilitation battles, I want to offer a message of hope. Yes, recovery is tough. Yes, it can feel like an uphill battle. But remember, you are not alone. You are stronger than you think, and you have the power to rise above any obstacle that comes your way.
Keep pushing, keep believing, and never underestimate your own resilience.
Keep persevering my friends, and we can all get through this together.
There’s a silver lining in everything
Thank you for letting me share my story

A couple of months ago, I had two bags stolen out of my car from my apartment parking garage. Yes, it was my mistake leaving my bags visible, but in the years I had lived there it hadn’t ever been a problem. I was getting ready to travel the next day so these bags had things like my expensive headlamp, almost all of my jewelry, my passport, and the journal I had been keeping for 5 years.
This journal was the outlet for my heart and soul during the breakup of a many year relationship and the transition into being on my own for the first time as an adult. It contained poems, detailed memories I never wanted to lose (some nsfw), drawings— like I said, the outlet of my soul. Of all the things lost in the theft, the journal was the most devastating.
Several weeks later I got a text from someone, J, who claimed to have found my journal in a bush near a Circle K about a 30 minute drive from where I live. J had gotten my name and number from the front cover. He swore up and down that he hadn’t read it and said he wanted to get it back to me because it seemed important to me. I was ecstatic, expressed total gratitude to him to the point of nearly fawning, and began discussing how we were going to get the journal back to me.
In our communications, J asked me to look him up on Facebook. In all of his pictures he was shirtless, sporting tough-looking faces, and “prison-ripped” as he self-proclaimed, having just been released. Presumably, he looked me up on Facebook too since my name was in the journal. With all of this in mind, especially as a woman, I wasn’t going to meet with a stranger to retrieve my journal alone, so I asked my dad to come with me which he happily agreed to. For all I knew, although I wasn’t going to assume, this could be the person that took the rest of my stuff and just felt bad about the sentimental value of the journal.
J remained mostly responsive to my texts in the days leading up to our planned day to meet. I didn’t outright tell him that my dad was going to come along because I didn’t want that to scare him out of the deal. Come the scheduled day and time, my dad and I drove to the public place on J’s side of town where we had agreed to meet, and he completely ghosted. In the following two days before I heard from him again, I offered him money, offered to have him mail it, anything to accommodate him. Two days later J sends me a text that a family member had unexpectedly died and he was helping his family deal with the arrangements, which is why he ghosted. He assured me that my journal was safe and I would have it soon. I expressed my deepest sympathy and said there was no rush. A week goes by and I don’t hear from him again. I send a quick text checking in and asking how he’s doing— nothing. That was in mid-March, and still no texts and no journal.
For the last couple of months I’ve been debating getting the police involved. The journal is in the police report of stolen items, and J has a record so I know police wouldn’t have a hard time finding him. It makes me feel so violated to know that some random middle aged man could be out there reading the intimate details of my personal life, especially when he KNOWS from our text conversations how deeply hurtful the loss of that journal was to me. The other half of me doesn’t see this as being worth getting J in trouble with the law. Dude has clearly had a rough go of it, and I don’t know what he’s really going through.
TL;DR: a guy claims to have found my stolen journal, promised to get it back to me, and then ghosts despite offers of money.
WIBTAH if I report this guy to the police to get my journal back? And if so, what do I do instead?

When the edged wind came to our village, it seemed like a typical Alaskan gust. One fitting for late December. Then, as the tall tide of frost lashed against the shore of our home, the sagging branches of the yellow cedar trees stopped bouncing. And I abandoned the idea of the breeze being a breeze at all.
Once others understood that, the time for running had passed.
The unholy wind reached the village’s main road, causing two moving cars to sharply and statically stop. The vehicles were frozen in place, much like the people within those metal graves. Onlookers, enjoying a brisk afternoon in the park, began to scream loved ones succumbed to that supernatural end. Imprisoned in a capsuled moment of time.
Those first few victims were the lucky ones. They’d been oblivious to the fate which awaited them. True terror was endured by those who beheld the raw power of the wind. Those unfortunate enough to see the end coming.
Regardless, the remaining townsfolk, burdened with the awareness of impending doom, futilely attempted to escape the approaching breeze. Those fleeing residents, far slower than the unnatural frost, were halted in haunting poses as the wind bit into them. Limbs were suspended in mid-air positions. Eyes were left wide and unblinking. Mouths were cursed to forever gape in horror.
“RUN!” Dad screamed, sprinting towards us from a nearby park bench.
My brother, my childhood friend, and I were sitting in a sandbox. Already engrossed in a fantasy world, I wondered whether my imagination had conjured the wind. I thought my mind had transcended to a higher plane. It was my way of processing the trauma.
However, I accepted the reality of the situation when my father shoehorned the three of us into his Volkswagen Golf. The icy jaws of the wind were nearly nipping at the rear of the vehicle as Dad twisted the key in the ignition, but the beat-up car rapidly lurched forwards. My father wrenched us away from the frost, seconds before it consumed us.
“Daddy, where are we going?” I tearfully asked.
“I don’t know, Jillian,” He weakly moaned, manoeuvring around fleeing cars and pedestrians.
“Are we picking up Mummy?” Alan asked.
Dad ignored my brother’s question. I was only eight years old at the time, but I knew that my mother wasn’t coming. I understood the significance of the tears in my father’s eyes.
For twenty-six years, I successfully managed to suppress that memory. Did such a good job, in fact, that I almost believed it had all been a dream. I started to believe that we had simply moved away from our hometown, and Mum had simply chosen to stay. Dad never convinced me otherwise. He never talked about what happened. Neither did my brother.
As for Leon, he moved to an orphanage in Anchorage. We wrote to each other for a couple of years, but his replies became less and less frequent. Eventually, he stopped responding entirely. I used to wonder why my father didn’t adopt my childhood friend, but I suppose that would have forced him to accept what happened. And, like me, he had no intention of doing that.
I thought we would run back to England, having failed to achieve the American Dream. But Dad kept us in Alaska. I assumed that he’d been driven by stubbornness. Or guilt, perhaps. We’d already fled our home. Perhaps fleeing across the pond would’ve been a step too far. Perhaps it would’ve felt like truly abandoning our mother. Whatever his reason for staying, Dad didn’t tell anyone the truth. He never went to the police. He never returned to look for Mum.
“Don’t look back, kids,” I remember him whispering as we fled the frost.
I followed that advice for the next couple of decades, only recalling the event for the briefest moments, from time to time. When Dad bought the first computer for our family in 2000, I Googled the name of our old town. I typed the word before realising I was even doing so. I was still young, of course, but I knew that nothing about our speedy departure had been normal. I wanted answers.
I’d expected to discover that my village had become a ghost town. That would have made sense. Alaska’s unforgiving climate breeds desolate places, born to be abandoned. However, the search results revealed nothing, so I told myself I’d imagined the village. I told myself we'd always lived in Anchorage.
As the years passed, I became comfortable with the notion that none of it had ever been real. Not even my mother. And that was why I did not expect to see a certain person again.
“Happy birthday, Jill.”
My jaw dropped when Leon Taylor appeared on my doorstep.
It might seem strange that I would recognise a man who was a child when I last saw him, but Leon always had distinctive features. I immediately identified the mole on his neck, just below his facial scruff, and those sorrowful eyes, shadowed by his unmistakable overgrown brows.
“Leon?” I gasped. “What are you doing here?”
The man smiled weakly. “Sorry, Jill. I should’ve done this the Millennial way. Y’know. Reconnected through Facebook.”
“No, it’s… I just never thought I’d see you again. Do you want to come inside?” I asked, motioning at the hallway.
Leon nodded, so I made a couple of coffees whilst my old friend seated himself in the living room. A boy who I’d almost forgotten. Almost entirely erased from existence, just like our old town. But I’d always known, just beneath the surface of my shallow memories, that it had all been real. The truth of my childhood was always within reach. As I brought the drinks into the lounge, hands trembling, I tried to dispel the thoughts flooding my mind. Thoughts of that awful day.
“How’s your dad? How’s Alan?” Leon asked, taking the cup of coffee.
I sighed. “Dad’s been unwell for a few years. He hasn’t been taking care of himself, and he’s getting old. As for Alan… Well, Alan’s the way he’s always been. Uptight, and distant, but–”
“– When was the last time you spoke to him?” Leon sharply interjected.
The question caught me off-guard. “Huh?”
“Your brother. When was the last time you spoke to him?” Leon asked.
My face drained. He knows, I thought. How on Earth does he know?
“Three years ago,” I answered.
My old friend nodded. “Did you fall out?”
I scoffed. “That’s an understatement. You remember what he was like when we were kids, don’t you?”
Leon shrugged. “He was two years older than us. We must’ve infuriated him.”
I nodded. “Sure. But I grew up, and he never did. We had a big argument, and we haven't spoken since.”
“Interesting,” He responded.
I raised an eyebrow. “You’re a man of few words these days, Leon.”
The man cleared his throat. “Your brother messaged me a week ago.”
My other eyebrow raised. “What?”
“It was a very strange message.”
“Did you reply?” I asked. “I thought you would’ve preferred to ignore it.”
He lowered his head in shame. “I’m sorry, Jillian. I replied to some of your letters…”
“Then you forgot about me,” I said. “It’s embarrassing that I didn’t get the hint.”
“It wasn’t embarrassing,” Leon sheepishly muttered. “I read all of them. Every last letter.”
“Oh, well, that’s great,” I laughed. “Nice to know that you cared.”
“Jillian, I…” Leon paused, lifting his head. “I was scared.”
“Scared of what?” I asked.
“Remembering that day,” He replied. “It’s why I told your dad I didn’t want to come and live with you.”
“It’s… What?” I asked.
Leon tilted his head. “You didn’t know? Did you really think he’d just dump me in that place? He might’ve changed, but your dad was never cold. Still, I refused. Living with you would’ve reminded me of what happened to my family.”
I didn't reply, so my old friend prodded the beast. “Aren’t we going to talk about–”
“– Why did my brother message you?” I interrupted, avoiding the topic.
Leon twitched his lips uncertainly, as if unwilling to part them.
“He told me that I had to see you…” Leon trailed off.
“Right,” I said. “Why?”
“Your brother said something insane, Jillian,” He said. “He claimed that Arnold Walker visited him in Fairbanks.”
My jaw fell. “I beg your pardon? Arnold Walker? My brother’s school friend?”
Leon nodded.
“He escaped? I didn't know others got out,” I whispered.
My old friend’s face was growing paler. “No, I... Your brother said something that seemed impossible. He said that Arnold did not arrive on his doorstep as a thirty-six-year-old man, but a ten-year-old child.”
My stomach dropped. The natural response would’ve been to discredit such an outlandish story, refuting it with a rational explanation. But Leon’s revelation served to do only one thing. It confirmed what I’d always known.
“A ten-year-old boy made it all the way from our hometown to Fairbanks?” I asked meekly.
Leon frowned. “That’s it? You’re not going to question it? I did. I messaged Alan repeatedly, but he never replied.”
“Not a nice feeling, is it?” I asked, sighing. “How did you want me to react, Leon? You were itching to talk about that day. Well, I’m not skirting around the subject now. Let’s talk about it. Okay? I know all of that horror really happened. I’d just never wanted anyone to confirm it.”
“Me neither,” Leon said. “I was trying to avoid your family for the rest of my life. Your brother ruined that.”
“Yeah. He tends to ruin things,” I replied. “So, that’s it? Alan wanted you to tell me about Arnold Walker?”
Leon shivered. “There’s more, but… Look, I know I should’ve messaged you about all of this first, but I thought about the way Alan avoided my questions. I didn’t want you to do the same. I assumed if I were to show up in person, then–”
“– I wouldn’t be able to run away,” I finished. “I understand, Leon. I just hate that my brother is still too childish to talk to me.”
“Funny. He called you childish too. Listening to you two bicker is nostalgic,” Leon smiled, before quickly adopting a solemn expression. “I’m trying to change the subject, but I need to rip off the band-aid. Alan said that Arnold took him to a car on the front lawn. There was a man in the driver’s seat, barely clinging to life, with a face mangled beyond recognition. Your brother said the man’s skin had been peeled from his face… And he was still, somehow, alive.”
I shuddered, vomit climbing my throat.
“Arnold told your brother that the man was Mr Johnson,” Leon whispered.
“The farmer? The one who ran the local grocery store?” I asked, shivering.
My friend nodded. “Yeah. Alan said he’d aged a little. Well, his hair was greyer than he remembered. The pair must’ve been on the road for hours, and your brother didn’t know how they knew where to find him. He had so many questions for them, but Mr Johnson died before the ambulance arrived. And whilst Alan talked to the paramedics, Arnold ran away. He’s missing.”
“Shit…” I whispered. “I’ll call my brother.”
“You might struggle,” Leon said. “Alan ended the message by saying that he was going back… home.”
I gawped. “No. He wouldn’t be that stupid.”
“Maybe not. You should try to contact him,” Leon said. “He hasn’t replied to my dozens of messages, but he might reply to you. Not sure he even has a signal, out there in the boonies, but you’re right. You should try.”
I spent an hour trying to contact my brother, in various ways, but he did not respond. Alan had vanished. And I knew, like it or not, that I had to return to our village too. I should’ve told Dad. Would've told him, had he not been one bad day away from a heart attack. In spite of the man he’d become, I loved him. I didn’t want to remind him of the place we’d fled.
One person should be spared the horror of remembering, I thought.
Leon and I, two strangers who’d spent formative years together, piled into my Kia, and we drove from Anchorage to a place that I’d long hoped had never really existed.
I was going to be horribly disappointed.
On a nondescript road that burrowed into the Alaskan wilderness, my throat started to twist and constrict. The outer edge of my vision shrank, and my head pulsated with a slowing rhythm as the world slipped away from me. I struggled to breathe as I came to terms with an awful fact.
I recognised that endless road.
“Jillian…” Leon whispered.
“Don’t,” I begged.
I didn’t want to hear it. I wasn’t ready. I’d known all along, of course, that our village existed. Even when extensive research had revealed nothing about the town. When I thought of the way the breeze consumed the town, erasing its residents, it made sense that it would erase the very place itself. After all, even I’d started to doubt its existence, and I’d lived there.
Accepting the unearthly nature of the event wasn’t as tough as you might imagine. If anything, I had fought hard to deny it. I wanted to ignore the existence of a paranormal force, though I had witnessed it with my own eyes. Even if there were some Alaskan breeze powerful enough to instantaneously freeze an entire town, we hadn’t witnessed that. We’d seen something else. We’d seen that glacial wind freeze the town. Not its people, but its tether to time.
After an hour of following the frosted landscape, we saw something familiar on the horizon. Leon’s face mirrored mine as our damned village appeared. A bulge of ruin and decay, growing as we neared it. And when we crossed the threshold into the desolate town, the reality of our quest finally dawned on me.
“Where is everybody?” Leon asked.
It might seem a moronic question to an outsider. Our old village was clearly an abandoned place. No rational person would expect anybody else to be there. Of course, I understood Leon. He had asked the same terrifying question that was circling the drain of my mind, refusing to flush away.
I thought back to that terrible day on which hundreds of people froze in time. Then I thought of Arnold Walker and Mr Johnson. The two residents who’d supposedly shown up at my brother’s door. One of them had looked no older than he’d been in 1998.
“Time resumed,” I finally mumbled.
“Yes, but where did everybody go?” My childhood friend asked.
I didn’t have an answer. Neither did my brother, and that was why he’d come here.
That’s not the real reason, I thought. He was hoping to find… her.
I rolled onto my old street, noting that the trees swayed in the wind and birds flew overhead. Signs that time was flowing. I wondered whether others had fled in the same fashion as Arnold and Mr Johnson. I even allowed my heart to soar a little as I considered that my mother might have freed herself. Might have found Dad in Anchorage. Might be wondering where Alan and I had gone.
However, I knew that not to be the case. Mum had not arrived at my door, and there had been no national news coverage about people emerging from a town that didn’t exist. There had only been an old, half-butchered man and a quiet boy. Both were gone. And I had questions about the nature of their escape from our hometown, given my brother’s ominous message to Leon.
Something was still dreadfully wrong with our village. Twenty-six years had not changed that. The people of the village had not disappeared into the sunset. Whatever had happened to them, I knew it wasn’t good. Possibly worse than what happened to Arnold Walker and Mr Johnson.
I pulled onto the driveway of my childhood home, gently trundling over cracked asphalt. Weeds squirmed through the wounds of the suburb, as nature sought to erase my childhood from existence. There was no need for that, of course. The wind of 1998, and whatever secrets it held, had already done a fine job of wiping my hometown from reality.
“Do you think he’s come here?” Leon asked as I turned off the engine.
“Yes. We both know who he wanted to find,” I said.
My childhood friend nodded, and we both sombrely climbed out of the vehicle.
The village was colder than I remembered. For a mid-afternoon day in late May, it was unseasonably chilly. Alaska, for the most part, is not the arctic hellscape that many people imagine. Not in all parts of the state, anyhow, and certainly not in late spring. The air also felt stale. It carried the stench of evil, and it seemed to be tinged with frost. As if that demonic breeze were still lingering in the air, nearly three decades later.
I knocked on the rotten front door, surprised that it did not break with a slight rap of my hand.
“Alan?” I yelled. “It’s Jillian.”
My brother did not respond, but I wasn’t concerned. If he had been there, and Mum hadn’t, then he wouldn’t have wanted to stay. I wanted to use that as an excuse to turn around and leave. I already assumed that my mother wouldn’t be there, but another part of me knew that my assumption was more of a wish. In a similar way, I had been secretly glad to find nobody in the town. There was only one person I hoped to find in my old village, and that was Alan.
I was terrified by the prospect of finding anything else.
“Jill…” Leon started softly. “Come on. We have to do it.”
“Do we?” I asked. “This was a mistake. We should turn around. We–”
“– I agree,” Leon sharply interjected. “But we have to find your brother. And when we do, we’ll convince him to come back with us. We’ll convince him to leave this place behind too.”
“Why did you come to see me, Leon?” I asked. “You could’ve ignored my brother’s message. You could’ve pretended none of this had ever happened. That’s what you did when you started ignoring my letters, isn’t it?”
“I deeply regretted that for years, Jill,” He said softly. “You were my best friend. You were… more than that. We were just kids, but I loved you. I’ve not made another connection like ours. Not even in my adult life.”
“I know,” I replied. “I loved you too, Leon. That’s why it hurt when you let our bond peter out. If you’d cut me off from the start, I would’ve understood. But it just felt like you’d stopped caring.”
“Never. I just lost the strength to bear that trauma,” He explained. “Every letter was a reminder, and I just… That’s why I came to your door. That’s why I didn’t ignore what your brother said. I didn’t want something to happen to him. You lost your mother. I didn’t want you to lose him too.”
“We all lost things,” I sniffled. “You lost… more than me. I just don’t understand why you’d come back. Why my brother would come back. I don’t even understand why I’ve come back.”
“We never really left this place, did we?” Leon asked. “Not in our minds. Even though it doesn’t exist in the eyes of the outside world, it never left us. Never let go. Arnold Walker and Mr Johnson lured Alan back. And he lured us back.”
“That’s an unsettling way of looking at it,” I timidly replied.
“It’s the only way I’ve been able to look at it,” He said. “Whatever claimed this place, it remembered us, and it made sure we remembered it. Not that it would be easy to forget… For years, I thought I’d lost my mind, but after talking to you and Alan, I’m not so sure. I find it hard to believe that we’d have experienced a shared delusion. No, it all really happened. And the memory replays in my mind every day. I’ll never get rid of it.”
“Dad seemed to do a good job of erasing this place from his mind,” I said.
I knew that wasn’t true, of course. He had never forgotten. That was made apparent by his deterioration. Alan and I had a close relationship with our father before we left that village. Afterwards, he changed. We all changed. Losing Mum had fractured the family, but there was more to it than that. I started to consider that Leon might be right. Perhaps the frost hadn’t ensnared the two of us, but it had certainly bitten us.
“Do you want me to do it?” Leon eventually asked.
I wanted to be courageous enough to open the door, but I wasn’t. I nodded meekly and stepped aside, allowing my childhood friend the nightmarish task of facing whatever lay within my old home. He pushed the door handle down, expecting the house to be unlocked, but it wouldn’t budge.
“Shall we try the back?” I asked.
Leon backed up. I quickly realised what he was planning to do, and I opened my mouth to utter a protest. My hulking friend had charged before I spoke a single word, however, and he hurled his body into the door. It quivered in its frame, but did not give.
“Leon!” I cried. “What are you doing?”
“Well, I don’t suppose you have the key?” He panted, massaging his shoulder.
I held up my hands. “Look, let’s just…”
My friend rushed forwards again, and the result was the same. This time, however, Leon released a groan of pain, clutching his arm a little more tightly.
“You’re going to hurt yourself,” I said. “Let’s take it in turns to kick the door. That'll work better, and it won’t cripple either of us.”
Leon nodded, and the two of us firmly booted the door near the handle. The wood quaked, and it only took a few attacks for the door to splinter around the lock. The frame splayed inwards, and the metal mechanism fell loose.
“Whoops… That worked a little too well,” Leon laughed.
He led the way into my childhood home, which looked, unlike the street outside, the same as I remembered. The same as it had looked on the day I’d left. There were no shoes left by the door. No muddy prints on the carpet. No indication whatsoever that my brother had visited our old home, which I’d gathered when the front door had been locked. But this was not a relief. I knew, in my gut, that Alan would’ve gone there first.
He never made it home.
Leon shivered. “This place feels cold…”
“Frozen,” I corrected. “Frozen in time.”
“Is it safe for us to be here?” He asked. “What if we end up like the others?”
“It’s a bit late to ask that now,” I replied. “The breeze passed long ago. This just seems to be the horror it left behind.”
Leon accepted my suggestion, then he wandered over to the staircase. My friend took one step before halting in place. For a haunting moment, I believed that he had been frozen in time too. I believed that I’d been wrong, and the frost had come for us. But I quickly realised that my friend was still moving. Still twitching. He was frozen by fear, not a supernatural gale.
“There’s someone in the bathroom…” Leon wheezed.
With physical dread in every inch of my body, I joined my friend and looked up. Artificial light spilled beneath the bathroom door onto the dark landing.
“There might not be anyone in there,” I shakily said.
“Jillian, this is an abandoned town. There is no electricity. Your house is still frozen in time, and it froze with the bathroom light left on. Somebody must have been–”
“– Don’t say it,” I pleaded, upper lip trembling.
“Do you want me to lead the way?” He asked.
I didn’t. I wanted to run, but I knew I would never forgive myself for doing so. Leon was right, of course. I hadn’t allowed him to finish his sentence, but it was clear that he was going to mention somebody in particular. Somebody whose face flooded my mind as we ascended the staircase, one tentative step at a time. Somebody whose name started to tickle my lips as Leon grasped the handle to the door.
It wasn’t locked.
“Mum?” I moaned as Leon inched it open.
My ageless mother was inside.
I’m sure I would’ve screamed at whatever we found, but I was not prepared for the state of the statue before me. Mum was standing at the sink, hands cupped below a stream of tap water suspended in time. As I had always feared, the frost caught her. It was horrifying enough to be frozen in time for twenty-six years, whilst the rest of the world continued, but that wasn’t why I screamed. I’d braced myself for that possibility. I’d spent my entire adult life coming to terms with it.
I screamed because I wasn’t prepared to see her face.
Mum was smiling. Not a wholesome smile. It was a taut grin that etched an unnerving crescent shape across her cheeks. There was nothing unnatural about the grin, but it looked painful. And it appeared as if cataracts had taken the entirety of her pupils.
“Mum?” I asked weakly. “Do you hear me?”
There was no reply. I peered around the side of her face, and I immediately regretted it. Though she was frozen in time, she did not look unaware. I felt her sightless eyes boring into my face, and I quickly jumped backwards.
“Let’s go and find your brother,” Leon fearfully said.
As I nodded, backing towards the doorway, I locked my gaze onto my mother’s profile. My heart pounded as I started to close the bathroom door. I was trying to ignore the idea that had wormed into my mind. The possibility that, behind the glassy cataract, a pupil might still exist. Lying dormant. Watching me from a face that no longer seemed to belong to my mother.
After I shut the door, Leon and I took a few moments to control our breathing. With a slight tremble, my friend finally walked over to the light switch and raised a hand, but I caught his wrist.
“What are you doing?” He frowned.
“Leave the light on,” I whispered. “I… don’t like the idea of leaving her in the dark.”
My friend’s expression softened, and he nodded, seeming to understand my explanation. Seeming to empathise. But I was lying. I wasn’t worried about leaving my mother in the dark. I was worried about the thing behind that smiling face.
“Alan didn’t come here,” I said. “Did he really come back?”
“You read the message, Jillian,” Leon replied.
“I know, but…” I sighed. “I know.”
“He might not have come to the house,” My friend suggested.
“This is the first place he would’ve visited,” I said. “If Mum weren’t here, he wouldn’t have returned.”
“Well, let’s look around,” Leon urged. “You never know. We might find something else. Something to help your mother, perhaps.”
“You saw her face,” I whispered. “She looked far past help.”
“Don’t say that, Jillian!” Leon shouted, eyes watering.
You idiot, I thought.
I was so self-centred. So focused on finding my brother and my mother. I hadn’t thought about Leon’s parents. His brother, Carl. People we’d left behind when my father saved us. I remembered Leon sobbing as he begged my father to turn around.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “We need to find your family too.”
Leon viciously shook his head. “Only if we find an answer, Jill. Only if we find a way to save them.”
My friend entered my childhood bedroom, and I followed him. I imagine that visiting one’s childhood home is a strange experience for anyone, but strangeness morphs into horror when that home is trapped in a moment of time. I felt physically unwell when I saw the glass of water on the bedside table, fresh as it had been on the day that my dad took us to the park. Life had continued for me, but the town was still trapped in that dreadful, inexplicable day.
“Jillian,” Leon said calmly. “There are people outside.”
He was standing in front of my bedroom window, and when I joined him, eyeing the road below, I saw them. A man and a woman who seemed to be in their mid-forties. The man wore ill-fitting clothes. A chequered shirt two sizes too small, and a pair of torn jeans. The woman, on the other hand, wore a pristine, shapely dress with a floral pattern. She looked oddly familiar, though her eyes were jittery and unfocused. It was the man who’d locked his eyes onto our house.
“I… vaguely recognise her,” Leon said.
I nodded. “Yeah. I don’t know her name, but I remember her. She looks a tad older, perhaps. I don’t know the man though.”
“You stay here,” Leon said, reaching inside his coat. “Don’t come out.”
“What are you holding?” I frowned, noting his shiftiness.
“Just…” Leon concealed his hand within the thick, wintry coat. “Are you going to stay in here?”
My eyes grew as I spotted a glint of metal. “You don’t… No, Leon. Please. Don’t tell me you have what I think you have.”
“We had no idea what we were going to find here,” The man protested.
I scoffed. “Leon Taylor? Carrying a gun? The boy who berated me for killing me a spider.”
Before he replied, there came the sound of the front door swinging open. And when we spun our heads back to the bedroom window, we saw that the man and woman were no longer on the street. I realised they were inside.
“Hello?” Called a man from downstairs. “We mean you no harm.”
“I have a weapon,” Leon yelled, slipping the pistol out of a hidden holster.
“Don’t shoot… It’s Bernie Bradley…” The man shouted weakly.
My mouth gaped. Bernie Bradley was in my brother’s school year. I remembered him. And as I recalled the face of the man I’d seen on the street, I didn’t find it hard to believe it had been the face of that same boy, twenty-six years into the future.
“What do you want?” I yelled.
“To help you,” He replied. “Before they come.”
“Who?” Leon asked.
“I’ll tell you if you put that weapon away,” Bernie said.
“I don’t trust you enough for that,” My friend growled.
“Are you Leon Taylor?” The man asked.
“Why?” Leon responded.
“Sydney Manley pushed you off the swing set, and you called her a fat cow,” Bernie said. “She ran home in tears.”
It wasn’t enough. In a place like that, which defied all laws of rationality, it wasn’t enough for Bernie Bradley to know that. But Leon and I needed it to be enough because we were hopelessly alone. Hopelessly afraid. And hopelessly desperate.
My friend re-holstered his weapon, and we walked onto the landing. Bernie and the woman were midway up the stairs. The man’s hands were raised, but the woman barely seemed aware of where they were. Barely seemed aware of herself.
“Leon Taylor and Jillian Maynard. Is that right?” Bernie asked.
“How did you recognise us?” I asked.
“You were the only ones who escaped,” He replied. “The Maynards and Leon Taylor.”
“The only ones?” Leon asked incredulously.
Bernie nodded. “Others tried, but the frost got them.”
“So, why aren’t you…” I started, unable to finish.
“Mind if we sit down before I answer that?” He asked.
I looked at Leon, and my friend begrudgingly nodded. We all headed to the living room and sat down. Once we did, Bernie Bradley told us an incredible story, and the woman beside him simply rocked on the sofa, face painted with a disturbing smile.
Bernie had been a ten-year-old boy, sitting at his bedroom desk, when the chill swept through his room. He told us that he remembered nothing but a black void. He might’ve been there for an eternity, or it might’ve been less than a moment.
When he woke from that dark slumber, still a ten-year-old boy sitting in the desk chair, Bernie looked out of the bedroom window. He was overcome by the horrible feeling that time had been lost, but he didn’t know how much. And when he saw residents frozen in the street, he realised that something awful had happened. Bernie found his own paused parents in the kitchen, and they were completely unresponsive to his pleas.
The lonely, frightened boy ran through the town, calling for help. Nobody answered. After a long day of searching, he returned to his house in tears. For a week, Bernie lived on cans of food from the cupboards. And then he heard shouting from the street.
“Hello? Is anybody there?” A man called.
Bernie ran outside to find Mr Johnson. The farmer had just woken from ‘a darkness’ to find the town full of statues. Bernie told Mr Johnson that he’d been alone for a week, but he had no idea how long he’d been frozen before that. The boy wanted to leave, but the farmer said they had to save as many people as possible. They had a duty to do so. After all, neither the farmer nor the boy knew what might happen to them if they were to run. The frost might return.
Anyway, Mr Johnson took Bernie under his wing. The crops in his field, thankfully, had unfrozen, as had his entire farmhouse. Mr Johnson fed Bernie, and the two of them survived. A week later, they found Elizabeth Coulter, the local headteacher, wandering through the town. Over the course of the following year, a dozen more unfrozen souls were saved and brought back to Mr Johnson’s farm.
But things changed as time passed. The newer thawed souls were unhinged. The longer a person had been trapped in that black stasis, the less human they became. They were still intelligible, but they spoke only of the voice in the void. A voice that they missed in the land of the living. They were irritable, but Mr Johnson cared for them, all the same. Eventually, they fled.
This only worsened as the years went by. After a decade, Bernie’s mother and father unfroze. However, his dad ran, and his mum only remained because she was lost and confused. She would rant and rave about the Speaker. The one that would make everything better. The one that would make them all eternal.
It was during the year of 2018 that things crossed a terrifying line. Mr Johnson had decided that newcomers were not welcome. It was a decision of necessity, not cruelty. The recently unfrozen folk had become more than unintelligible. They had become dangerous.
“Hark! The Speaker calls!” Walter Frankton screamed.
The middle-aged man, who had once been a police officer, was standing outside Mr Johnson’s farmhouse. When the community of sane people emerged, they screeched at the sight of Walter holding a charred body above his head. Nobody identified the burnt corpse, but Mr Johnson wasted no time in drawing his rifle and giving Mr Frankton ten seconds to flee.
Bernie explained that Walter laughed demonically, before disappearing into the night. Over the coming years, bodies were found in the street. Followers of the Speaker would relentlessly pursue Mr Johnson’s community, so the sane folk kept distant from the people of the Speaker. Few of Mr Johnson’s followers understood why they stayed, yet nobody felt able to leave. Something was keeping them there.
A couple of weeks before Leon and I arrived, however, Bernie said that Mr Johnson finally announced his plan to leave. There were murmurs of uncertainty. Everybody wanted to escape, of course, but fear had always stopped them. Still, they trusted Mr Johnson. If anybody had the power to safely lead them away from the place controlling their minds, it had to be the brave farmer. Packing and preparations began.
However, some days later, Bernie Bradley happened to look out of an upstairs window and notice Mr Johnson. The old man was wandering aimlessly onto the driveway, stumbling like a drunken man towards his vehicle. Bernie said there was a small child standing beside the car. The young boy led Mr Johnson to the driver’s door with a smile, and the two of them fled.
Things disintegrated after that. When a Molotov cocktail found its way through a window, the community dispersed. The sane folk fled in different directions, and Bernie was left alone with his mother.
“We’ve been running for days,” Bernie explained. “I keep finding the bodies of people from my community. Charred corpses in the street. I tried to leave this town, but it wouldn’t let me. The farther I drove, the sharper the pang in my heart. I knew I'd die if I were to keep going.”
“How did you find us?” Leon asked.
“I heard you,” Bernie replied. “Hard to miss the sound of an engine in a dead place like this. I had a hunch that it might be you.”
“You must've heard my brother then?” I asked hopefully.
Bernie frowned. “Alan's here? That might explain the raucous a few days ago… I don’t know what I heard. Noise. Lots of it... You won't find him, Jill. You have to run whilst it still lets you. The frost might be gone, but… something lingers.”
“The Speaker?” Leon asked.
Bernie nodded. “I was fortunate enough to never hear it. Or never remember hearing it. I don't know what it said to them. My mother won't tell me.”
Bernie looked at the woman next to him. The one who appeared to be the same age as him, though I realised he was still a decade younger. The horror of our town had aged him beyond his years.
“It will be so glorious…” Bernie’s mother giggled, eyes bearing faint pupils behind mild cataracts.
“You’re lucky that they didn’t see you arrive,” Bernie said. “Otherwise, you’d be dead already. But they’ll come. Sooner or later. And you need to listen to me if you want a safe way out of here. Okay? We need to distract them. Keep them off your backs.”
I shook my head. “I need to find my brother. I know he came to this town. I thought I'd find him in our home, but–”
“– Walter wanted him,” Bernie’s mother hissed.
The woman stopped rocking. Stopped smiling. And her head snapped to face me with such eerie speed that I thought it might entirely disconnect from her neck. Bernie quivered, seemingly just as horrified by his mother’s words as the rest of us.
“Mother…?” He asked.
“Walter wanted him. Walter wanted him. Walter wanted him!” The woman laughed, taunting me.
“What does she mean?” I sobbed. “Does Walter Frankton have my brother?”
Bernie’s face whitened. “If he does, your brother's either been flayed or charred.”
“Christ, Bernie,” Leon replied.
I sniffled. “I won’t leave until I know.”
“He’s already dead,” Bernie bluntly said.
“We don’t know that!” I cried.
I thought the others were sitting in stunned silence because I’d spoken so assertively. However, as I calmed my breathing, and the throbbing sensation in my ears quietened, I heard it too. The sound of laughing voices. Bernie’s mother strained to smile broadly. She looked as pained as my mother, but grateful for the privilege of the discomfort.
“You don't want to see this. We'll head through the back. Do not look at the street...” Bernie hoarsely pleaded as I rose.
But I was already running to the door.
I flung it open and started to run down the path, with Leon and Bernie in tow. Then, my eyes met the mob spilling beyond the end of the street. The crowd easily numbered a hundred people, and each face wore a terrible smile. Eyes glassy, yet all-seeing.
There was a man shuffling from the crowd towards me, like a terrified toddler taking its first steps. I tried to blot his face from my mind. I didn’t want to see it, though it was too late for that. I’d seen everything the moment I faced the crowd. Eventually, I fell to my knees and howled as I embraced the truth.
The shuffling man, who had been flayed alive, was my brother.
Alan reached towards me with an outstretched hand, weakly shouting something, before toppling forwards. He was reduced to a motionless heap on the road.
“Jill!” Leon cried again, rushing to me. “We have to go!”
I continued to wail as the gleeful crowd surged forwards. I resisted Leon, but he easily hauled my limp body to the car and bundled me into the back.
“He needs help...” I blubbered.
“He’s gone, Jill,” Leon whispered.
“What about your family?” I asked.
“They’re all gone...” He sniffled, stepping on the accelerator.
Staring through the rear-view window, I watched the crowd approach my old home. Bernie stood on the front porch, and his mother had her hands on his shoulders. The man did not run. As we pulled off the driveway, it almost seemed as if he, too, finally had a smile on his face. The mob swarmed Bernie, and I heard a brief cry of agony. It may have been ecstatic or fearful. It may have been both.
After we crossed the border, no chill pierced us. We were free to leave. But I know Leon and I belong to that town. I have always suspected that the wind grazed its teeth against my skin when I was a child. It grazed all of us. For, even now, I still feel that link. That urge to return to the salivating mob with a smile on my face.
When I returned home to find that my father was missing, I knew he felt it too.

Hello everyonee I mostly labeled this as a rant/vent because this is 90% of what it is going to be, as well as also looking for advice. inhales dramatically here it goes:
I am so god dang frustrated with myself and this is one of the parts that i truly cant stand about ADHD: the issue of making a career change or transition. trying to think of other jobs that I might like or enjoy, while at the same time overanalyzing every part of the job and being like oh well i cant do that, i dont have the drive or experience etc. As well as analyzing the money/finances. i grew up with parents who always ALWAYSSSS shoved the importance of stability/financial security and how money rules the world. and if you dont have financial as #1 in your life, you are bound to FAIL. So that is where my money fears come in. 😢 secondly, some of the jobs that i am coming across either do not pay the amount i want or make me question if i CAN even do it. i have a history of job hopping for years and this is the last thing i wanna do. my parents also bring this up to me every time i have talked about making a career change (ive tried leaving my current job at least twice). My parents are a big influence on me still even though i am 27. Its almost like i am still seeking their approval in some way, and idk wtf for. Because they say that "this is your life" but then they turn around and make me rethink every decision I want to make in life. as well as my own brain that makes me spiral. All i want is a job that doesnt make me want to gag every single day. I am so tired of admin work but yet this is all of the experience i have for almost 3 years. and i feel like every other skill ive learned in the other jobs has either a) completely diminished or b) fell out of practice so if i do go back into the job, i will more than likely fail anyway. I desperately want out of the office and corporate world. i only have an Associates in Social work and do not really have the funds to go back to school atm. I am beyond frustrated and angry with myself because I have tried to make a career change/transition in the past, but i just cant freaking do it. Because of my fear of failure, fear of having no money and becoming homeless etc. Its like i have so many interests yet i get disinterested SUPER quickly and get frustrated when i dont pick up on something right away. I'm so freaking tired of trying to think up of or looking for careers online that i will stick to. It's like i just want to cry because i cannot stand the thought of being in an office for the rest of my life. i do not want that. I feel there is so much more of me that i can offer to a job besides sitting in front of a computer and typing emails all god damn day. but yet doing anything else other than that now makes me feel overstimulated just thinking about it. >:( I just want some advice from other ADHDers who did make a career change, how they went about it, how they got over their fears etc.
Now here is some info about my special interests, some jobs i had in the past that i like, my ideal environment/schedule-

1. i am a super creative ADHDer - i love writing, singing, reading etc. I express myself a lot creatively. i've been craving a job where i can express myself more in this way and just have ... like actual fun. I want a job that is STIMULATING and EXCITING. There is something NEW every single day. or it makes me actually THINK. makes my brain go zoom zoom fast LOL.
2. I've enjoyed working as a hostess in a restaurant, a little bit of working with kids (depends on the ages) and working with the elderly. I was an activity aide in a memory care facility. I was a camp counselor for a couple summers and did some basic daycare jobs. I prefer working with kids who are at least 5-6 (or out of the potty training stage). hate changing diapers etc. I like to be more creative with the kids rather than like .. care for them in that sense? if yall understand that lol.
3. I don't mind talking to people. i do like chatting and socializing. i have retail and food industry experience. i mostly deal with people over the phone and email nowadays cuz of my admin job. But i am fairly comfortable (despite my social anxiety lol) i do want a job where I am more front facing again. just not TOOO much.
4. A laidback, more casual environment. i dont like to be micromanaged but i also do need specific instructions and things i have to do, but i do like somebody who can allow me to put my own spin on things or give me space to do it how i feel is best.
5. Flexible schedule is a MUUUUUST for me. i currently work 7am to 4pm M-F. i do like weekends and holidays off... it does help. but i want more flexible shifts. some afternoon, morning and evening shifts. i dont' want like a suppperrrr changing schedule, but more or less set with some changes every couple weeks or so.
6. Salary of 41k or even a bit more is ideally what is best for me and what i currently make. weekly pay would be amazing too but i know not many places do that anymore. but the salary of 41k or potentially more is good.

Whew exhales i know this is a lot to unpack LOL. but to anyone who made it this far... thanks so much for reading. it truly means a lot to me. Im just lost asf right now and just need some ideas, or advice from people who just ... GET it. Thank you for anyone who takes the time to read and comment on this. <3 you are all amazing and thank you for making me feel at home on this forum. love you guys. i hope I figure this out...

Not sure if I'm destroying or confirming AH and Pilestedt's social experiment here, but have been some changes here that were not listed in the changelog. Including, but possibly not limited to:
-severe reduction in AI "speed" on lower difficulties: The homing swipes still occur, but the probability of it happening is reduced from 99% to something more sane.
-patrol spawn distance and alertness level: patrols still "share" alert status, so that picking off stragglers will make the main group aggressive, but the patrols are spawning further away and will not pop up at a distance where they will immediately go "alert". Patrols also hesitate when heading towards mission spawns, although they will still home in on your position(as you move away after breaking los) in the right circumstances.
-patrol spawn size and difficulty has been significantly reduced (read: fixed, likely turned back to previous settings) on solo play.
And don't tell the Baskinator and Musterbuster on twitter or discord, or the Sony people will probably force in the hardcoded hyper-spawn idiocy again, while adding a requirement to put on thumbscrews as an experimental DRM. So let this pass in complete silence while Johan keeps undoing the damage to the game so it won't be evidently and comically unplayable for everyone who logs on to actually play the game for five minutes. Please and thank you.

I am frustrated. I took a video production class at school and had access to a rebel t8, which I started to get comfortable with. I decided to buy my own DSLR to keep up with learning photography skills and making videos (I’m mainly doing interviews). I can’t afford to buy a $1k camera and have it collect dust so thought if I looked for an earlier model to practice with that would be best. I did a lot of research and even asked my teacher how does the t7 compare to the t8? He said there were not major differences and that the picture quality isn’t improved enough on the t8 to make it worth the extra money (for now). I found a t7 preowned from a private seller and read reviews, etc., took a chance and bought it. I ordered an affordable Rode mic to use with it. To my surprise the canon t7 doesn’t accept an external mic😞 WHAT I DON’T UNDERSTAND is why canon would make a DSLR that doesn’t have that feature, it’s not like the technology wasn’t available when they made the t7! I really wasn’t expecting this. I’m now doing google searches and see that this has frustrated others as well. Why Canon, why??? I’m sorry but that’s just cruel. I get the idea that I now have to get a different audio recorder and sync the audio. If anyone has helpful advice for a beginner who is still challenged by creative cloud but has access to it, I would be extremely grateful! What is the best way for me to get audio for my videos on the t7?

I am a senior manager at a large post secondary institution. I have about 200 employees and thousands of students in my "umbrella." I have two associate managers and an operations manager and and administrative assistant. And I am being murdered by email.
In my job, virtually every task comes to me by email, both from above, from below, and from the side in the hierarchy. Some tasks need responses in hours, some can be a couple days, and they range widely in complexity. One email might need a simple "yes" from me, another might need me to do extensive research. Many emails have little traps embedded in them - yes might seem obvious, but it turns out to violate some obscure policy or provision in the collective agreement. So I can only go so fast here.
As a result I have a structural email debt of about 20-25 issues a day. No matter how hard I work, I can never keep up. We also have Slack for rapid response stuff but thats definitely a secondary mode.
There are workflow processes that I've tried to change - tried to unbottleneck myself from processes by empowering others to just make decisions, etc. but there's a limit to what I have the power to directly change. And there's no way I'll be able to get anyone other than perhaps my core leadership team to use tech other than email.
So, heres my question. Is there a software platform that we could adopt that could make things work structurally better here?
I'm imagining, someone sends in an email, addressed to me. But do I really need to see it? First step is a sort of issues triage. An assistant reads it, and assigns it as a task, starting as low as possible in the hierarchy (e.g. for some student issues, only an office staff member really needs to touch it). That person then gets task ownership, types their solution back into the system and any further correspondence stays attached to that item in the database. If they have insufficient seniority to address it, the issue gets escalated. If new information is required, another team member gets tagged and there's an item added to their task list.
But the key to this is every item gets logged as a task and the task is closed at some point. It would need to be a database that is searchable, and it would need to have the capacity to mark some items as confidential where only certain people have visibility.
I'm sure this must exist but I've never seen it implemented at universities however academia is notoriously poor at software adoption and workflow. We typically only procure horrible, complex, and inefficient software that makes everyone throw up their hands and use email anyway

TLDR and main question: If I forgot something on my school committee's app, and I do include it on AMCAS, is this going to be a problem? Will I get flagged for, like, "oh she must be exaggerating" because she didn't include that in the school-committee app?
I'm talking about going through an entire committee review from the pre-med advisory board from your school.
I know sometimes schools pick and choose who they give a committee letter to but this school makes you do it even though it's not competitive. They give a letter to everybody. I mean maybe not like people who are failing out or something but....
They have their own complete application, with all hours noted, a draft of your main essay, their OWN 10 short essay questions, they require your letters of recc to come into them first, etc.
It caused a rush early/mid semester as of course we're in the middle of studying and midterms and then finals. Because they have a lot of milestone due dates, ie Feb 28 these parts dinner, April 1, this piece is due, etc.
I know they do this to kind of move you along and make sure that you're not turning in a last minute AMCAS app that messes up their "admitted to med school" stats.
However, I feel it has the opposite effect. I just want to hit their milestones and get back to studying, knowing that I've reserved late May and much of June to polish my application.
And it wasn't just me. A new professor, who probably hasn't been through the process before, asked me if the letter could wait until after the semester. But it couldn't because the committee at my school requires it in the second week of May!!!
He specifically said he would be able to spend a lot more time and make a much better letter if it could wait!
But nope, it's in my school system and they will specifically send it to AMCAS themselves.
So as I'm polishing my AMCAS application to turn in now, I'm scouring my portfolio and finding a few things that I want to add.
Is this going to be an issue?
Another thing is that I'm currently doing a a summer role that might be willing to write me a letter in August. But my committee closes down applications about now. So I don't even know how I can get this letter added to AMCAS since all my other letters went through committee.
Any thoughts?

I vividly remember reading this book where humans are either in the search of alien life or need to stop on a planet to refuel. The planet they decide to go on is completely covered in ice except for a small "oasis" with no ice where they can find plantlife, aliens, and ressources.
I remember the aliens having an odd kind of sign/telepathy language where the elders had troubles communicating because of either cultural practices like amputations, or due to losing limbs after old age. I also remember them being described as stout with dark skin and maybe having an odd number of limbs like 3 or 5. I believe there was a strong hierarchy among their society.
Whilst it is set on an ice planet, I don't recall the aliens having adaptations for the ice in general, but rather to survive the cyclic cataclysm. Either some of them get culled, or they have a kind of adaptation to survive it. I don't remember exactly what it is, but I believe it was that either the "oasis" froze over every set amount of years, or maybe the plants burned (maybe the oasis is formed because of volcanic activity?).
At the very end of the book, I remember there being tense conversations between the humans and the aliens as they're trying to get everything they need to leave the planet, and the main character offers the elder alien to bring them on the ship, but ultimately it refuses and accepts the cataclysm that makes them leave in the first place.
As for context, I had read the book in high-school in the early-mid 2010's, probably a translation since I read it in French, so the original book might be much older.
I've seen other posts on here, but based on the synopses I've read, I'm not convinced it was Icerigger, however there's some chance it might be The Left Hand of Darkness, but I'm unsure.
Any help is appreciated.