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Phonophobia is a of, or aversion to loud sounds. Those who suffer with phonophobia may react negatively to sudden, or the mere presence of loud noises within their vicinity. This is a specific and common type of phobia among many, found commonly in those who suffer from specified trauma.
Warnings:
Hints of trauma, mentions and signs of anxiety attack.
This story [The second part, mostly, if things go as planned] is going to have a lot of angst and potentially triggering elements. If any of the warnings are something you're sensitive to, consider skipping!
The next part will most likely dive a bit deeper into the actual darker side of their trauma, and potentially more. This is very, very light stuff for the time being.
||Second Person POV||
'Everything is fine.'
Were the words you kept repeating to yourself in your head as you stood idly in the large house party you were practically forced to go to, yet agreed to in the first place. You recalled your friend asking for you to come, something they usually did as they noticed for how socially distant you were when it came to any situation. You know well they meant well anytime they asked you, they simply didn't want you to be all alone in your home, doing little to nothing all by yourself. Most likely just cooped up inside, binge watching various shows and movies and living off of 5 minute prep meals.
They didn't want you to live like that, even if you insisted that it was fine.
Everything was fine.
Usually, you'd politely disregard their invitation to almost anything they asked of you, besides outings where it'd be just the two of you. But, today, tonight in fact. You decided to try to make a change, for both theirs, and your sake. Sure, you were definitely in your comfort zone when you were alone, but you weren't afraid to admit that the loneliness got to you. And it didn't help the fact that you only had one friend to rely on for company.
So maybe, just maybe, this was your chance to socialize. Make new friends, hang out with people, and finally have the better life you dreamed of. Surrounded by people you care and love for. It seemed perfect in your mind, simply walking in the door with your friend and engaging in conversation with a few people. Quickly becoming friends, laughing, and having an absolute fun time at this supposedly "wicked party".
It wasn't what it claimed to be at all.
In truth, your hopes and dreams were shattered the moment you entered the party, feeling like an ant in the sea of tipsy people that crowded into the quaint home. Most, if not every person here, held a plastic red cup that was filled with an alcoholic beverage you could only assume was cheap beer. Their voices almost overlapped the overly loud music that blasted throughout the entire building, noisy laughter, idle chitter chatter, and mumbles of sultry voices surrounded you.
And it was enough to make your head ache within less than a minute, and it was not a pleasant feeling.
If that wasn't enough to overwhelm you, then the feeling of bodies pressing up against you due to the lack of space within the house certainly did. No matter where you went, you'd feel fur graze over your own by either people pushing into you or bristling past you, and it was an awful feeling when you could feel dampness upon it. Most likely from sweat, which made you grimace by the mere thought.
This entire fiasco was way out of your comfort zone, and to make matters worse, you had lost sight of your friend long ago. Leaving you here in present time, clutching onto the plastic cup you had in your hand as if it was some sort of stress toy. Your eyes just stared at the sea of people, while you felt smaller and smaller with every passing second. The heat of the room that was supplied by the body heat formed by the uncomfortable amount of people within this home had began to feel suffocating, your own body beginning to sweat lightly yet tremble as if you were cold.
When in truth, it was just a sign that you needed to get out of here before some sort of anxiety attack took over your body. And truly, at this point in time, it'd make things worse if you were to draw attention to yourself. So, with a breath, you made up your mind.
You needed to get out of here.
Letting out the breath you sucked in, you began to maneuver your way around all the grossly warm people around you, trying to make a beeline for some sort of exit. You let out hushed whispers of "Pardon me"s and "Excuse me"s from left and right as you carefully shoved your way through people, ignoring the glares you'd get along the way. Or at the least, you tried your best to.
As you tried to make your way towards an exit, you tried not to pay too much mind to the way your breath quickened by the extra contact you had to make with all these complete strangers, making you want to peel off your own skin by even the slightest feeling of them. You felt a sense of disgust in a way, and it made you even more desperate to get the hell out of this place.
You felt like you were blessed by God himself once you noticed a door a few rooms away, making you perk up before hastily shoving your way past a few more people.
But, you weren't as blessed as you thought you were.
As you shoved yourself past one particular person, you froze in place when you heard the sound of a drink splashing against something, followed by a gasp. At first, you wondered for a second what you had accidentally done to the stranger, and you were about to dismiss it as you perhaps making the drink simply jostle.
Until you felt a large, rough hand fall upon your shoulder.
You paused in your movements and could only suck in a breath once you were aggressively spun around to face the stranger, your eyes slowly trailing up their body and to their bright eyes. Which were glaring daggers into you, their mouth downturned into a scowl, showing off their sharp canines that almost seemed like they were being shown off. From just a little bit below your vision, you had noticed a dark wet patch upon the, unfortunate, white turtle neck they wore. Most likely permanently staining the article of clothing with the cheap beer that was within their cup.
"Hey, Buddy. Where do you think you're going?"
The person, who you noticed was a badger said to you with a snarl in their tone, their golden eyes boring down into you and making you shrink in on yourself. Especially when you noticed heads turning in your direction, curious on what the commotion was.
Great. Just what you needed. Attention.
"I'm.. I'm sorry, I didn't mean t-"
You had began to say in a quiet voice, only to get interrupted before you could even finish your apology towards the man.
"You didn't mean to, hm? Yet you kept walking anyways, didn't you?"
A mistake on your part, but, your goal to get far away and make situations like this not happen. Looks like despite your efforts, it meant nothing in the end, seeing as you were stuck here with a very, very pissed off guy.
You couldn't even begin to form words, so the only thing you could do was meekly nod. More people had began to notice the little situation you had gotten yourself in, phones at the ready to potentially record some sort of fight that you did not want to participate in. You just wanted to go, and you made it obvious when you tried to nudge yourself away from the man in front of you. Only to wince when the grip upon your shoulder tightened, almost like a threat.
"Come on, now. You seemed so bold before. Where'd that brave little façade go?"
He had said to you in a mocking tone, a twisted grin beginning to replace the scowl that was upon his lips before. As if he was taking some sort of sick satisfaction in watching you try to cower away, which in all honestly, he most likely was. You noticed the way he had taken a quick glance around the room, obviously noticing the attention the two of you had gotten. And seeing the way his grin only grew upon noticing it made you feel frightened.
You were in deep shit now, weren't you?
Suddenly, he had taken his hand off of your shoulder and put his full attention on the people around him, saying for the formed crowd to hear.
"What do you guys think? Should I show tiny here what happens when you mess with me?"
The sick grin on his face had grown by the people around the two of you shouting and murmuring their approval, a booming laugh being heard from the badger by the approval. But, as his eyes landed onto where you had used to be right in front of him, his grin fell by seeing nothing but the carpeted flooring of his home. His head turned this way and that to see if he could catch sight of you, teeth gritting together when there was no sight of you. Only someone from the crowd mentioning for how you had fled the scene.
Unfortunate for him, but fortunate for you.
Especially when he had let out a grunt, seeming to think a moment before an idea came to mind. That same grin had began to overtake his features, his head staring at the crowd with determination in his eyes before he exclaimed,
"Looks like we have some prey to catch then, don't we?"
It was a good thing you had gotten out of there when you could, your legs taking you as far away from the house as you could. It was a bit unlucky that the exit you had gone to was nothing but a backyard, seeming to end by the large trees and bushes that surrounded the back. At first, you had decided to do nothing but hide in one of the bushes or behind a tree, your legs taking you over to the area that looked almost like some sort of backdoor woods area.
You had shifted through the greenery for a bit, trying to go as far as you can from the house to make them by chance, miss you or give up if they noticed you going back here. Surely they wouldn't go through this much trouble just to find you, right? You had only spilled a bit of beer, nothing much.
Well, it definitely seemed to be 'much', guessing by how you began to hear the voices of people chanting the badger on to find you.
Perhaps going to a party where a bunch of drunken, violent idiots reigned was not a good idea.
You had covered your ears the best you could with your hands and closed your eyes as the voices had began to grow louder, ringing inside your head, making the headache from before worsen by the sound. You couldn't even process what they were saying, all you knew is that you didn't want to hear a second more of it.
It didn't... bring back very good memories.
Your legs continued to lead you further and further into the woods, unknowing of how the crowd stopped at the very beginning with their voices lowering until nothing could even be heard. Their determination to find you stalling as they all collectively seemed to think that they shouldn't even try to find one single person in the heavy nature that surrounded you.
You could feel sticks and leaves brush against the fur upon your limbs, thick branches landing powerful blows on you that had barely even phased you due to your vigor to get far away. The only thing you could do was grit your teeth due to the pain that blossomed from the injured parts, your pace growing faster and faster until-!
..Well, until there wasn't anymore greenery that surrounded you.
The feeling of nothing but a cool breeze that slipped through your slightly damp fur had you slowing your pace until you had simply stood there, hesitantly opening your eyes and taking your hands away from your ears. You could feel your ears twitching from left to right as they tried to detect any sounds that may be around you, only catching up on the distant music from the party that seemed.. rather far away. Which surprised you. Just how long, and how far had you ran away?
But the real question was, where are you now?
Your gaze skimmed along the area you were in, only now seeming to notice that you were nearing the end of a cliff, a glance behind you letting you see that the woods just behind the house you were previously in led you here. As you took in the scenery a bit more, you had seemed to notice the sound of running water, which confused you for a moment. Your feet had began to slowly take you to the sound, leading you closer and closer to the edge of the cliff as the sound began to get louder.
Nearly at the very edge of the cliff, you took a slow careful glance over the hard ground beneath your shoes only for your eyes to widen by the sight of a beautiful gushing waterfall to be right beneath the cliff you stood upon. The fresh, clean, blue water was mesmerizing to watch pool into a much further down below area, forming a pool of the gorgeous liquid. Bright, green trees and flowers of various colors were on the outskirts of the pool of water, your eyes relishing in the sight, and your body slowly calming down at the magnificent view.
For once within this entire day, perhaps this entire year and beyond..
You felt at peace.
How terrible it was that you had to be interrupted at such a moment.
You were snapped out of your awestruck daze by suddenly hearing the sound of shuffling coming from the woods a few mere feet behind you, your head whipping to the source. You could feel your body immediately tense up knowing you weren't alone out here, your body stepping away from the edge yet not daring to go too close to the thick trees.
Your breathing had began to get heavier once more as you could see the leaves and branches shifting, moving as someone came closer to where you were.
At first, you could see nothing but a pair of fluffy green hands pushing aside the nature that surrounded them. The rest of the person had shortly followed, your eyes scanning the figure that emerged from the greenery before you. It had taken them a few seconds to notice you, their hands carefully brushing off the stray leaves and twigs that landed upon their frightfully large figure.
They seemed busy trying to clean themselves off, and the moment their hands lowered and their gaze snapped up to look at you, you could have sworn you felt your soul leave your body.
But again, you told yourself the same words you repeated the moment you came to this wretched party in the first place.
'Everything is fine.'
||
A/N: So sorry my scrungle dungles for the very very late update! My motivation to continue fanfictions always dwindles every now and then, and this fanfiction wasn't exempt from that.
I do hope that this 2ker makes up for it though!
So, as said in the title, this is a two-parter oneshot! So stay tuned for the second part that will be written and released... at some point! Hell if I know!
Another thing I wanted to mention is that I may be moving this book to AO3, as I'm much more active there rather than Wattpad. Of course, whatever chapter I write will be going to both platforms! But, AO3 might help pick up my motivation here and there!
Along with that, I am working on two other fanfictions, so each thing will be updated once and a while, making updates shorter.
However, I can guarantee updates! No matter how long it may take.
So, stay tuned for any future updates! I'll let you all know if any changes/advances are made.
Word count: 2429 [As usual, not counting this, nor any previous notes.]
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𝐆𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐟𝐞𝐬𝐭 | Happy Tree Friends Oneshots
FanfictionSalutations everyone, and welcome to yet another new book by yours truly. I've recently been getting back into HTF after a nice few years of never quite being in the fandom, but here I am, nestled nicely into it. Updates may be slow but, with time...
