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edwardelricsrightarm · 3 years ago

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"A lesson without pain is meaningless. For you cannot gain anything without sacrificing something else in return, but once you have overcome it and made it your own...you will gain an irreplaceable fullmetal heart." - Edward Elric

In honor of disability month and the FMA 20 year anniversary I wanted to address some Thoughts™️ about the series.

It's not often you see a disabled protagonist in media where their disability is integral to the story without taking up their entire character, even more so with anime. Yet, Fullmetal Alchemist has not just one disabled Protagonist, but two. The Elric Brothers are an exemplary representation of disability in media that I find myself reflecting on often as a disabled person myself. If you haven't completed the manga or Brotherhood, skip this as it will be brimming with spoilers.

(Mangahood will be my point of reference because while 03 is good on its own merits it's not as fresh within my immediate memory, and I am far less familiar with it. Keep this in mind, I've watched FMAB 10 and a half times whereas I've finished 03 only once years ago.)

The story highlights their disabilities immediately, Edward being a double amputee and Alphonse being without his ENTIRE body, only having the senses of proprioception, sight, and hearing left. Yet, despite this being key to the story and an integral part of their characterization, it is only one facet of their motivations and doesn't take center in the narrative, which is refreshing. It's not inherently negative to make a narrative centered on the characters' disabilities, but often this model of a story goes very wrong very fast and starts to feel hollow (no pun intended). FMA avoids this by making their disabilities a clear part of the plot and their motivations without allowing it to consume the entire story, so the Elric Brothers don't suffer the "my disability is all of my character" problem that many disabled characters are relegated to in a vast portion of media, all while being strong and competent.

Recap:

The brothers wished to revive their mother, but their good intentions cannot change the atrocity of their mistake, Truth makes this abundantly clear from the start. Edward loses his leg first, a punishment for "stepping" into God's shoes and transgressing the place of humans in their world. Alphonse loses his entire body, unable to feel any warmth or simple comforts like food and rest, when all he wanted was to feel the warmth and comfort of his mother's embrace again. At first, Alphonse's entire being is consumed by the gate, but Edward acts immediately, refusing to lose his little brother and refusing to allow his arrogance in this plan to cause his brother's death for only following his lead. Edward gives his right arm to have the gate give back Alphonse's soul, and stated clearly in his panic that he'd give his entire self to save Alphonse if that's what it would take, but Truth took his dominant arm only, showing something akin to mercy, although the character of Truth is capriciously strict and hard to describe as "merciful".

Through giving up his right arm, Edward regains his Right Hand Man, his little brother and best friend. His only remaining family, who he feels responsible for protecting in the absence of their parents. He felt immediately that he'd made a grave mistake, instantly full of regret as he realized the gate had taken his brother. In that moment he was willing to give anything to take it back and undo the suffering his arrogance caused his brother, yet Alphonse was still to suffer more to come. Ed tied Alphonse's disembodied soul to one of Hohenheim's collected suits of armor, managing to at least keep his brother alive in some way. One could say that Alphonse's punishment functioned as a secondary punishment for Edward, showing him how easily his hubris could have cost him what he has left in his obsession with regaining what they'd lost, their mother. A very clear symbolic reminder of the weight of his actions and how he'd misled his brother in his own naive ignorance. Even in giving another limb away to drag his brother's soul back out of the gate, he couldn't offer enough to bring him back intact. Thus is the law of equivalent exchange.

Now that we've reviewed some of that basic symbolism and the motifs the story draws upon with limbs and body parts in relation to characters, let's move on to each individual brother and break it down, shall we?

Edward Elric is a very realistic protagonist, this is one thing a majority of us familiar with this series can agree upon. He feels like a believable teen boy, with layers of complexity to his character while also showing arrogance and immaturity that is unsurprising at his age. He expresses unwillingness to kill and avoidance of unjust violence from the beginning, and has a strong moral code after the ordeal of committing the taboo.

In some characters his cocky personality would typically become grating, yet the story explains in itself why he is this way, then builds upon this to develop him into an incredibly mature character who is willing to admit when he's absolutely wrong and adapts to new information and context for the crisis unfolding around him as it comes, even if he remains crass. This arrogance is shown from the start to be a manifestation of insecurity, self loathing, and repressed guilt. Edward is a logic driven person, he has a very unique thought process, which is where my interpretation of him as autistic comes in. Edward's awkward social demeanor, somewhat abrasive and cold approach to some, and his trouble coping with nonsensical societal structures all stand out in this way. Furthermore he clearly shows hyperfixation, hyperactivity, special interest, and infodumping behaviors that are all too familiar. He's picky with food (*cough* the milk thing), has very little filter and speaks his mind bluntly even if this can warrant conflicting responses, yet at the same time struggles with vulnerable emotions, and he is frustrated when his own routine or itinerary are interrupted by forces beyond his control. All of these things Scream autism with comorbid ADHD. Many traits are shared between the brothers, and I'm quite certain they're both on the autism spectrum based on behavioral patterns. Neurodivergence aside, Edward's physical disabilities are undeniable.

Despite his bratty persona, Edward is fundamentally kind and uncharacteristically gentle and soft around the edges for a shonen protagonist in many ways. He cries openly on many occasions even if he struggles talking about his trauma and burdens in words at times, he feels pain, grief, and compassion so intensely it throws him into action on a regular basis in the narrative. In this way he's also a fantastic example of non-toxic masculinity (though in other ways he has displayed more toxic traits, he's just a kid). He acts on his heart, even if he's led by his mind and logic in most things. His humanity, value for life, and care for others will always win over his logic, and he shows a sense of personal responsibility for doing the right thing even if it harms him in the process. Ed is clearly shown having ghost pains in his lost limbs which is honestly an interesting detail to include, I don't think I've ever seen that aspect of amputation shown in media aside from FMA. It's also shown that when Ed's automail arm breaks this is a HUGE problem for him, but he's also shown to be very good at working around this in difficult circumstances. He doesn't become completely helpless, even if majorly weakened.

Alphonse is an extremely lovable and compassionate boy, brimming with altruism and care for others. Even in his noncorporeal state he pursues a better future and he's not helpless by any stretch. Edward clearly states Alphonse is the superior fighter for example, and it's not just because of his armor body being so large. He's *talented*, that's a fact. Al is every bit as clever and capable as Ed, moreso in some ways, and I love that about his character *because* he's so clearly disabled. He has no sense of pain, he is completely incapable of sleeping, he can't eat, can't relax or find comfort, he can only exist and think. This causes him to overthink in all his time alone, this is debilitating. He clearly is absolutely sick of the loneliness this causes, and he often feels helpless though he's not. He has doubts and fears that consume him in relation to his armor body, he questions his own personhood, even. Yet, Edward is stubborn and staunch in affirming that no matter what he's dealing with, he is fundamentally still a human being that is loved and irreplaceable. Alphonse is powerful and his body gives him some advantages, but it also sets him back, and the brothers know this even when others claim Alphonse's state is somehow a good thing. I have hEDS, a disability that comes with advantages as well as the major downsides, so I can understand and relate to Alphonse here. I too am told my disability is a boon because of flexibility and because I'm less likely to fracture bones, but I'm twice as likely to injure my ligaments and joints, which people ignore.

The brothers are both disabled, both flawed, both show weaknesses, but they are competent, determined, and strong in their own right. They are rounded characters that exist for more than to be pitied or condescended to by able bodied characters around them. They put their entire being in everything that they do no matter what that is, and they don't know the meaning of giving up. These traits that they're made of truly make them a shining example of disability in protagonists for others to look to for reference when writing their own disabled characters.

Even though by the end Edward has regained one limb and Al has regained his body, this also doesn't just deus ex machina reverse their disability or make it go away. It's clear that Alphonse's body is weak and has to be rehabilitated upon recovery, and Edward is still missing his leg and bears the scars and pieces of the port from his automail arm. They weren't suddenly made able bodied upon recovering these things, they reclaimed what was lost through struggle and grit, but the narrative didn't give the impression that their disability in itself was something to be fixed, which is important. They wanted to recover their bodies, but this doesn't erase the effects of their disability.

It was about Edward atoning for leading Alphonse into their mistake and saving his brother from suffering further, it was about them proving they can keep moving forward no matter what, not about getting rid of their disability in itself or putting themselves down because of the disabilities. This, to me, as a mentally and physically disabled viewer, is so important. They achieve their goal, but this doesn't in any way erase or undo the effects of their initial losses, they find ways to adapt and move on but they're still affected and still disabled. They always will be. That can be so important to see in comfort characters, and as a disabled individual who's had both brothers as comfort characters since I was a child, their impact on my own journey is surprisingly tangible for fiction.

#fmab #fullmetal alchemist brotherhood #fma #edward elric #alphonse elric #elric brothers #character analysis #disability month #disability positivity #disabled #fma 20th anniversary

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senadimell · 3 years ago

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The Mysterious Benedict Society as an adaption

So far, The Mysterious Benedict Society adaption feels very faithful to the books. There are definitely changes (Constance, for instance, has been aged up, and likely has a different background. This is understandable. It would be nigh impossible to portray her as she is in the books in live action format--for example, none of the kids in the book suspect she’s a toddler, let alone two years old). However, most changes have all felt reasonable and add to plot and pacing.

I especially enjoy the additions: showing the adult side of the team, for example, or Ms. Perumal’s growing concern about Reynie’s whereabouts, or the girls’ nighttime conversations. Some changes are more extreme. The Mr. Curtain of the books is clearly a villain. He’s condescending and rude, and the only people who like him are bullies. Mr. Curtain of the show is much smoother. It’s easy to see how he’s managed to influence people. Similarly, the L.I.V.E. curriculum is much less obnoxious in the show (not just memorizing nonsense by rote), and as a result, the school’s students seem less stupid and cruel. You can see why they enjoy attendance.

I’m particularly pleased that Number Two’s weirdness has been amplified. Mr. Benedict’s found family is delightfully strange, and I love watching their unusual rhythms. It will be easy to believe when (or if) it’s revealed that the women have been legally adopted into Mr. Benedict’s family.

Similarly, I love how they intensified the quirky feel of the setting and characters. Of course Number Two built a house in the woods in a day because she has a woodworking hobby. Of course there’s secret tunnels and drawers and compartments in Mr. Benedict’s house. Of course Milligan’s disguises and mannerisms are wackily memorable instead of just matter-of-fact. The books themselves have a stylized feel at times (they kind of remind me of Lemony Snickett’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, though with none of the grimness).

I love the overall aesthetic. When I first read the books, they didn’t strike me as being set in the past, but the vaguely vintage feeling works excellently. (I was also a fully grown adult before I realized that the Incredibles wasn’t set in the present, so...) The color schemes, costumes, and sets have distinctive feelings and coordinate well. The effect is stylized rather than naturalistic, which is appropriate and amplifies the tone of the scenes. The bright colors and rough textures of the wooded hideout and its inhabitants’ costumes contrast nicely with the clean lines of tL.I.V.E.’s vintage-pastel interior and sleek exterior.

I also enjoyed the way they did Kate’s flashback as rough home footage. Similarly, I enjoyed the way they showed four kids solving problems on the same screen, how they illustrated Reynie’s thought process with overlaid sketches of the problems, and the way words show up on the screen during the tests for emphasis. The combination of animations, showing multiple things at once, and creative angles for emphasis did a great job conveying the feeling of the tests. (Unfortunately, I lack the vocabulary to describe the techniques they used here).

There’s two things I didn’t enjoy. The first was killing Sticky’s parents to make him an orphan. It mattered in the books that he felt rejected by his own parents. Making it his aunt and uncle who (seemingly) care more about money and fame than the child they’re raising feels a little too much like the wicked stepmother trope. I don’t know why the showmakers decided that Of Course They’re All Orphans, because while most of the book characters are orphans, Sticky isn’t, which serves to show that you can feel rejected and hurt by your parents even when you’ve got an ordinary, non-abusive nuclear family. It’s about feeling isolated, whether or not you’re technically alone.

Secondly, all the wheelchairs have been removed from the adaption. I’m not sure why this was done. Sticky’s mother has bad arthritis and requires a wheelchair. In the books, this was done without fanfare; it was as normal as anything else to oil Ms. Washington’s wheelchair in damp weather, or load and unload it from cars in later books. She was more of a background character, so it didn’t affect the plot, but the casual background representation was a welcome contrast to many books that assume being disabled is strange and uncommon, and that disabilities only exist when they’re plot-significant. The aunt who replaced Ms. Washington used no mobility aids, which disappoints me, especially as the woman she replaces in the books is ultimately shown to be a flawed but loving parent who’s dedicated to making up for her mistakes.

The other person missing their wheelchair is Mr. Curtain, the villain. I’m also not sure why this was removed? It could be to avoid the Evil Disabled Villain trope, but in the book, I didn’t feel like his disabilities were treated as a moral flaw or an excuse for his villainy. He shares his narcolepsy with the unquestionably benevolent Mr. Benedict, so it didn’t feel like his condition was used to vilify him.

He and Mr. Benedict act cope with their condition differently: Mr. Benedict relies on trusted family members for support and chooses to sit on the floor and avoid positioning himself in tall places from which he could fall, whereas Mr. Curtain disguises his narcolepsy by wearing mirrored glasses and using a wheelchair that secures an upright posture, so that no one knows when he has an episode. He does use his wheelchair aggressively, banging through doors and zooming around and forcing people to jog and keep up, but it felt like his use of mobility aids grew naturally from his character.

The books also include a scene where he shocks the children by leaving his wheelchair to chase them. They assumed that using a wheelchair=completely unable to walk, a common view in US society. Importantly, I didn’t feel like the scene was framed as particularly deceptive, like he was lying to them by using a wheelchair when he could walk. Rather, it fit into a pattern of Mr. Curtain managing assumptions and expectations: he doesn’t want people to take advantage of his weaknesses, yet wants to hold a few cards close to his chest. He doesn’t have to lie to people, just let them see and hear and assume what they will.

I don’t use a wheelchair or have narcolepsy, so I’m not in a position to say whether or not the books have good representation. Maybe the fact that Mr. Curtain is evil, and also zooms around and bangs through doors, is uncomfortable. Maybe the fact that his nefarious devices are wheelchair-accessible and in fact designed around his chair sends the wrong message. Maybe using mobility aids to conceal a disability sends a bad message, or maybe it would be better if the good guy was the one to use a wheelchair to cope with his disability. I don’t know. I do know that Mr. Benedict’s condition is played for laughs in both the book and show, and that might be uncomfortable. I do think it’s worth noting that Mr. Benedict’s narcolepsy is seen less and less as funny as the books go on, and grows to be seen as an endearing quality that emphasizes how much he loves people, since his attacks usually underscore with strong emotions and convey worry for his loved ones or joy at their company.

My own sense is that both approaches to narcolepsy make sense, and neither is shown to be inherently faulty. Rather, it’s Mr. Curtain’s character that’s to blame for his villainy--his arrogance, condescension, and mistrust. Both characters feel well-developed and consistent, and their disability is only one part of them. Their disability is colorful, but it’s colorful in the same way as the main characters (Sticky’s anxiety and memory, Kate’s gusto, eye for measurement, and bucket, Constance’s precociousness, etc).

As for why Mr. Curtain’s wheelchair was cut, I’m not sure. Maybe the show writers just didn’t want to deal with the ramifications of depicting a villain in a wheelchair, and decided to cut it altogether (a lazy reason, I think). Alternatively, it seems like they’re depicting narcolepsy without cataplexy, eliminating the need for a wheelchair (a better reason).

On the other hand, Mr. Curtain’s attitude and mannerisms bear the least resemblance to his book counterpart of all the show’s characters. They’re incorporating some backstory from the other books to build a secondary plotline, and I’m not sure how it’s going to play out. From what we’ve seen of him so far, S. Q. Pedalian is also drastically different (shy, cloistered, and openly acknowledged as Mr. Curtain’s son, instead of the gregarious, bumbling, misfit Executive of the books). The TV dynamic between him and Mr. Curtain is largely unrevealed as of yet. Since these changes constitute departures from the book, I’m not sure how the future story’s going to play out around them, and what that reveals about why the wheelchair was cut when it was so characteristic of Mr. Curtain’s mannerisms while other things (like Mr. Benedict’s use of plaid) were included.

Still, it does disappoint me that two wheelchairs were erased, and no one in the show uses one, not even background students.

Overall, though, apart from the orphan and wheelchair situation, I’m very pleased with this adaption and think that the pacing works wonderfully. It’s a near-ideal format for a video adaption (I think animation would be best, but this is a close second).

#the mysterious benedict society #the mysterious benedict society adaption #tv adaption #the mysterious benedict society show #ledroptha curtain

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katehuntington · 4 years ago

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2020, 2nd edition Disclaimer: ‘Kate Huntington’s Author & Fanfiction Recommendations’ is a platform for writers, to show appreciation for their work and expand their audience. I do not claim to be the author of these stories, neither do I own them. Read each writer’s warnings carefully, most of them are rated +18.

Without further ado, here is my list of recommendations.

One shots

“My Hero” - written by @plaidstiel-wormstache Angst/fluff - Sam Winchester x female reader, Dean Winchester - 1524 words When Sam gets hurt on a hunt, Y/N is the only one who can help him. What I love most about this fanfic is the medical accuracy. I am no expert in any way, but after seeing countless medical dramas and having done plenty of research for characters and stories, I really appreciate it when knowledge about medicine practically drips from my screen. A lovely read.

“Everytime You Leave, I Hit Rock Bottom” - written by @arazialotis Angst/fluff/slight smut - Dean Winchester x female reader - 2050 words This story portrays little snippets of Dean’s and Y/N’s relationship as they struggle to balance her normal life with his life as a hunter. The writer has done a beautiful job showing how much of a challenge it would truly be. The longing for each other after weeks apart, the realistic arguments. It’s liberating to read fanfiction that shows the imperfections that come with being a hunter’s other half.

“Nicotine” - written by @talesmaniac89 Angst - Dean Winchester x reader - 1966 words Dean has plenty of unhealthy coping mechanisms to help him get through his dark days, but the only drug that really helps, is you. This story is inspired by the song Nicotine by Chef’Special and was written for my 1K celebration. The lyrics to this song are surprisingly depressing, despite it being an upbeat song, and the writer has captured it better than I could have ever hoped for. If her writing was music, it would be a symphony played by an orchestra. Her way with words is melodic and moving. Goosebumps all over.

“Over Our Heads” - written by @deanssweetheart23 Fluff - Dean Winchester x female reader - 2482 words The feelings Dean and Y/N have for each other and have been under wraps for years begin to surface during a movie night. Oh my word, what an amazing thing to witness. This sweet story is a gorgeous piece of writing. How the author is able to take such a quiet and simple moment and turn it into something so meaningful and heartfelt, is beyond me. Talent oozes from this fanfic and is worth your time and love.

“The Voices” - written by @fictionalabyss Angst/comfort - Dean Winchester x female reader - 1215 words

Based on ‘I hear the voices when I’m dreaming. I can hear them sing’ from the Supernatural anthem Carry On My Wayward Son, comes this breathtakingly beautiful piece of fanfiction. Perfect lines, spot on dialogue and it couldn’t have been more true to the character. It’s painfully raw, sad, and tears will fall. It makes you feel for Dean in ways that are difficult to describe. The writer of this story is known for her talent with words, but she outdid herself here.

“The Things We Tell Ourselves” - written by @imamotherfuckingstar-lord Comfort/fluff/explicit - Dean Winchester x reader, Sam Winchester Y/N is miserably stuck in a stale relationship, and then an old flame rolls into town. The very first line is already a winner; what a way to start a fic. The picture this writer paints of a flawed relationship is very realistic. I think a lot of people can relate, being stuck, too far in to just pull the plug. The descriptions are very detailed and this story has the reader wishing for more.

“Promise Me We’ll Be Alright” - written by @impala-dreamer Angst - Dean Winchester x reader - 1303 words This one shot portrays Dean’s struggle with bearing the Mark of Cain so beautifully. Everyone could imagine how rough it must have been for him, but this writer took that pain and my heart with it. She has the ability to leave things unsaid in order for the next line for a bigger impact; it’s smart writing and it’s so effective. It’s vivid, it’s realistic, it’s breathtaking.

“Time For Plan B” - written by @thegirlwhorunswithwinchesters Fluff - Dean Winchester x pregnant!reader, Sam Winchester - 1900 words So much fluff, that I smiled all the way through. For one, it’s incredibly well written, it flows so wonderfully. Secondly, the comedy and the lightness of this bit of fanfiction is perfect. Writing something that’s funny isn’t easy, but this author did a terrific job. It’s a perfect blend of fluff and funny. Thirdly, who can resist father-to-be Dean? “Side By Side” - written by @talesmaniac89 Angst - Dean Winchester x reader - 2542 words On the anniversary of yet another fallen friend, Dean is unable to cope with the loss, but thankfully he has Y/N by his side. Another brilliant creation, based on the song Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol. A song which surfaces a lot of emotions, much like this poetic and amazing piece of fanfiction. Words that come to mind are heart wrenching, tear jerking, and in a way comforting as well. A must read.

“Cabin Fever” - written by @slytherkins Angst/explicit - Dean Winchester x Chloe (OFC) - 17002 words This has got to be hands down the best thing to discover in a while. What an amazing work of art. 17K might sound like a lot and original characters aren’t read as much on this platform, but it is worth every second of time. The storytelling is gripping and the well told tail will not let the reader go. The way the creator described Dean and his torment, his inner thoughts and his struggle is absolutely superb. It’s a homage to everyone dealing with chronic pain, disability and depression. This fic had me clutching my chest and praying ‘no no no no, please don’t do it’ all the way through. I haven’t felt emotional about writing like this much, but this writer knocked it out of the damn park.

“I Just Called To Say I Love You” - written by @talesmaniac89 Angst - Dean Winchester x reader When Dean gets lethally injured and has only minutes to live, he calls the woman he loves to have one last normal, happy moment with her. It hurts as bad as it sounds, but in the most wonderful way. It’s exactly how Dean would go down, the characterization beyond perfect. The descriptions, the dialogue, the details, the choices. The song that serves as the perfect title has been forever ruined for me. It’s a Rembrandt painted with letters.

“To The End Of Time” - written by @impala-dreamer Angst - Dean Winchester x reader - 2600 words Talking about fanfiction completely changing the meaning of a song. I have heard ‘Paradise By The Dashboard Light’ by Meatloaf a couple of times on the radio now, and I cannot listen to it without thinking of this story. Dean mourning the death of his loved one is painfully well described. The alternations between the present and the flashbacks, the evident contrast between the happiness that was and the sorrow that is now. It’s beautifully done. The song fits the story perfectly. What a read.

“Calm After The Storm” - written by @thegirlwhorunswithwinchesters Angst/comfort - Dean Winchester x reader - 2200 words What a pleasant surprise this one shot was! As a stormchaser, this little AU had my heart from the beginning, but you certainly don’t need to be an admirer of the weather to appreciate it. Besides that the subject really appeals to me, it’s also incredibly well written. The comfort Dean offers is sincere and moving.

“Bring It On Home” - written by @thoughtslikeaminefield Fluff/explicit - Dean Winchester x female reader - 1207 words Dean comes home to his girl after a hunt, unable to wait to be with her again. This writer has a very poetic way of describing this sweet scene. There are so many wonderful lines in here, little gems wrapped up in heartwarming, carefree and happy fluff. I wish something so pure for my favorite hunter.

“A New Future” - written by @kittenofdoomage Fluff/angst/explicit - Alpha!Dean Winchester x female Omega!reader - 9944 words Dean is unable to deal with the aftermath of losing his brother, but Y/N is there to pick up the pieces. How she puts the battered hunter back together is a beautiful thing to see in words. I’m always amazed how well this author writes A/B/O. Although it might not be everyone’s cup of tea, she certainly managed to get me on the alpha omega train. The storytelling is strong, the characters authentic, the details amazing, every word of dialogue spot on.

“Comfort” - written by @idreamofplaid Fluff/comfort - Dean Winchester x female reader, Sam - 2342 words Y/N and Dean have a routine when he leaves on a hunt, but also one when he comes home to her, and it’s such a beautiful thing. It’s lovely to witness how comfortable Dean is and how he allows her to love him, as much as he loves her. The details are astonishing, how she makes everything perfect for her hunter to return, how they don’t talk about the hunt, but just are. Very well written, I was floating while reading this and felt warm from all the affection. The writer does a wonderful job drawing the one reading in, making it impossible to put down.

“If It Was To Work” - written by @deangirl93 Angst/Fluff/explicit - Dean Winchester x reader, Sam Winchester - 3979 words After a much needed black and white, non-Chuck hunt, the Winchesters go to a bar for a good time. Dean doesn’t expect to run into a familiar face, however. The very first one shot of a new writer and it certainly deserves attention. This new kid on the block has so much potential! This story for instance is an uncut diamond. The writing is smart, with beautiful quotes which call back to the show we all love so much. The author of this fanfic is one to watch!

Imagines:

“Imagine Dean debating asking you out” - written by @luci-in-trenchcoats Fluff/comedy - Dean Winchester x female reader Dean has a crush on a girl, Sam is calling him out. When his little brother threatens to expose his secret, Dean tries to silence him, and it’s honestly the funniest read I’ve had this month. Writing comedy isn’t easy, but this was flawless.

“Imagine depression hitting you hard” - written by @wicked-wayward-warrior Angst/comfort - Dean Winchester x Jazzie Baker (OFC) - 1993 words Jazzie is struggling, but thankfully Dean is by her side. This story is an ode to everyone dealing with mental illness. The way this author put depression to words is both chilling and amazing. Dean being the support and the comforting man that everyone wants in their life if just what I needed.

“Imagine experiencing your worst nightmare” - written by @carryonmywaywardcaptain Angst - Dean Winchester x reader The angst is strong with this one, because Dean expresses what he really feels, but it will not be what you think. The opening is painfully dark, then it takes a turn, and the way this writer described the confusing and anxious thoughts of Y/N is really well done. Everyone can relate to this; being dismissed and hated by the ones you love is worse than losing them all together. A good read.

Drabbles:

“All That’s Left” - written by @impalaimagining Angst/comfort - Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Misha Collins - 559 words Just the thought of my favorite show ending has me emotional, not to mention when it’s put into words like this. God, this is beautiful. The way this author describes Jensen, Jared and Misha is amazing. So true to them, so tangible. She’s brave enough to leave things unsaid, the silence expressing so much more than words ever could. Reading how everyone’s favorite people say farewell to Supernatural pulls at heartstrings in a way that is both sad and comforting.

“She’s Not You” - written by @winchest09 Fluff - Dean Winchester x female reader - 995 words At the night of senior prom, and Y/N’s date stood her up, until someone knocked on the door. I for one am a total sucker for a prom date!Dean; still a teenager, sort of innocent, and yet still the Dean we’ve all fallen in love with. This was written so effortlessly and sweetly. If anyone is in the need of some tooth-rotting fluffiness, this is the go-to fic.

“You’re Home” - written by @impala-dreamer Angst/explicit - Dean Winchester x reader - 682 words Another drabble that’s worth mentioning is this short story. It portrays the hunter waking up from a nightmare about Purgatory, Y/N next to him to sooth him. Beka does Dean’s PTSD more justice in 682 words than the writers have ever done on the entire show. A beautiful piece of art.

“Home Is Where You Are” - written by @muggleishly Fluff - Daddy!Dean Winchester x reader Dean comes home from a hunt to his family, and oh my word, it couldn’t be fluffier. Dean as a father melts every fangirl’s heart, but the creator of this lovely little drabble turned it up a notch. Sweet as candy, uplifting and light on its feet. This one will definitely lift your spirits in dark times.

“Handy Man” - written by @deanwanddamons Fluff - Dean Winchester x reader - 862 words Dean fixing a blocked drain under the kitchen sink in a black shirt and Levi’s jeans; what a sight that must be. The writer of this fic is able to describe the scene in great detail. Besides the obvious appreciation of the gorgeous man, it’s great to see him doing something normal and domesticated. It’s the life we all wish for him. A great little drabble for a Sunday morning with a cup of tea by the side.

“One For Tomorrow, One Just For Today” - written by @thoughtslikeaminefield Explicit/fluff - Dean Winchester x reader - 662 words Sex with Dean is always amazing, but there’s nothing hotter than him singing a classic while he’s doing it. After reading this, that famous song by The Doors will never sound the same. Sit back, relax and listen to the music.

Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed the work of the authors above, don’t be afraid to let them know. I’m sure they will appreciate it. Feel free to share!

If you have any suggestions or would like a tag in the future, drop a request in my inbox or send me a message.

Love, Kate

#Kate Huntington's author & fanfiction recommendations #fic recs #Supernatural fanfiction #Dean Winchester fanfiction #Sam Winchester fanfiction #Dean x Reader #Sam x Reader #Supernatural #Dean Winchester #Sam Winchester #not mine

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starlit-pathways · 4 years ago

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rules: tag people you would like to know/catch up with❤️

thank you so much @faeinthefog for tagging me, you have such incredible taste???? (as always) also, brb adding piranesi to my already-too-long tbr list

...speaking of lists that are far too long!! *cracks knuckles* let's get down to business!!!!

last song: excluding my many varied writing playlists, then probably eclipse by moonbyul or love poem by iu, including my writing playlists then this was my last listen

last movie: the prom. didn't personally vibe with it but i know it meant a lot to some (personally, i feel like a lot of what it was trying to do has already been done better by other films—like ek ladki ko dekha toh aisa laga). it had very pretty colours in it?? and i definitely wouldn't pass up the chance to play emma in an actual musical, but i feel like the story itself is too much of "aaaaand THIS is how the Gay Struggle™‬ applies to the average straight person!!!" which I don't even mind in a story that's done WELL (again, see ek ladki ko dekha toh aisa laga, or even one of my favourite books; the seven husbands of evelyn hugo) but i don't personally feel like it was done well enough here to pass it off

currently watching: oh no. a LOT. uhhhh okay let's try counting

1) godless—a miniseries on netflix which is v. good and very beautiful; essentially a story about fatherhood, masculinity and the loss/lack of it in a historical "wild west" type setting (it's a lot more diverse than it sounds. i promise.)

2) the fresh prince of bel-air—i shouldn't have to describe this one to many people lol, but it's basically a comedy about a quick-witted, very street-smart boy who goes to live with his very wealthy and privileged family in bel-air. it's very funny, and very heartwarming but i'm only a couple episodes in so far.

3) my mister—i'm only a few episodes into this drama myself but. damn. it's a show about two very broken, wearied people whose lives are falling apart in different ways (a very principled slightly older man, and a very... alternatively principled younger woman), who find each other and help each other heal. i've seen their relationship described as "everything but romantic", though the subject of romance and the nature of their relationship is questioned in the show and sometimes by the two characters

4) taskmaster—this one's just FUN, and also quite honestly pure chaos. i'm trading favourite shows with a friend, and damn if i'm not having a blast with this one. it's basically about a group of comedians who get given a set of tasks/challenges to do, to see who does them best—it has the exact same vibe of the joke "how many comedians does it take to change a lightbulb?". if nobody watches anything else of the show, i implore them to at LEAST watch this tree wizard clip. it's a masterpiece.

5) rick and morty—probably not my favourite type of show (monster of the week's not my usual style), but still good if you're it's intended audience. trading this with another friend, and i'm very much enjoying the experience of trash-talking all of the adult characters every episode with them.

6) mr. iglesias—this one's a very new addition. am also watching it with a friend. comedy about found family in a classroom full of underprivileged kids and the one teacher who really cares about them. i like it! i love marisol a lot as a character and mr. iglesias is very wholesome

re-watching:

7) the untamed—i'm going to be watching this show in some capacity for the rest of my life. i'm on my seventh watch by now and it never diminishes in quality. it's a truly epic introspective character exploration, about a quick-minded, entirely chaotic and very free-spirited man who dies and comes back in quite literally the opening moments of the show. you get to see his descent from being the world's envy to being the world's villain. it's a wonderful fantasy series about perception, the nature of morality, of family (born, raised and chosen) and about building a better world. did i mention that the main character is—as far as chinese censorship laws would allow—very bisexual and the story very heavily features a love story between him and another man? this was the edit that got me into it (it has spoilers but without context it won't make any sense anyway)

8) healer—what a drama. this is all about the power of information—how being informed and making information available can heal a nation that was built to be corrupt. starring a character who is basically a man who is a much poorer batman (kind of like a batman for hire?) with superman's love life (the show's got one of the best and most valid love triangles i've ever seen—and that's coming from somebody who typically HATES love triangles with a burning passion) and a woman who is feisty and strong-willed but not in an overbearing way? as well as amazing action, from somebody who normally can't stand action. i love the chemistry between the two romantic leads and just. i love the three leading characters, and a great deal of the periphery ones a lot. this show is absolutely incredible, would highly recommend

9) it's okay to not be okay/psycho but it's okay—a show that says neurodivergency and found family rights!!!! it's a very healing and introspective drama, but equally very intense/gripping/interesting? the chemistry between the two leads is astounding, and i just really love the amount of empathy this show has? it's truly stunning to watch and experience. starring an absolute badass of a woman, who acts almost entirely on impulse and communicates with the world through storytelling and fairytales, alongside a very kind and nurturing man who doesn't know how to communicate when he's miserable and an autistic man, who struggles deeply with his own fight for independence (i wasn't too sure on him at first, but he grows into just as much of an equally important character as the other two and i loved his arc).

currently reading: the earthsea quartet, by ursula le guin—i'm really loving it! it's probably not one of my favourites (yet), but she has such an interesting way of building up her world, and there's such a strong sense of compassion in every word she writes.

also i've recently found and fallen in love with this fic series. it's very nsfw and modern au's aren't usually my thing for historical (or even semi-historical) fiction/fantasy, but there's just something about sex worker!wei wuxian and translator!(and also secret fashion nerd!)lan wangji both being absolute disasters and also really cute and really repressed but also being neurodivergent and disabled characters (i'm SO here for autistic!lan wangji, traumatised!wei wuxian and chronically ill!yanli all being happy) and getting therapy that really appeals to me.

currently craving: crisps. always. of the salt and vinegar variety (this specific variety especially), of course, but there's never a day that passes when i'm not craving crisps

this was really fun!!! now for the worst part of this............ tagging. OKAY. so... please know that nobody is under any obligation to do, or even acknowledge, this—and also, if i missed you, you see this and you WANT to, then consider the act of seeing/hearing this a formal invitation

@ethereal-sserendipity @lillb5678 @genericfandomusername456 @mars-aria @ikatella @juliedohbigny @multiplequestionmarks @itiredwriter @myrim-anna-rose @gaysofmyheart

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seungminotes · 5 years ago

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Necessary | Kim Seungmin

Warnings: 1.7k highschool au

A/N: I consider this to be the best thing I have ever written. I love Kim Seungmin, thank you.

Kim Seungmin was the last person you expected to be taking a lower level math class. Him being one of, if not the smartest student in your year, the only word you could possibly use to describe him was big brain. Yet there he was being seated next to your mathematically-disabled self, bright and early on a Monday morning, in a remedial math class.

Somehow you felt out of place now, as if you’d taken the wrong class, maybe there was some sort of even lower remedial math class where you actually belonged.

Seungmin had that effect on people. Though he wasn’t one to properly notice it. He made others feel inferior, but wasn’t one to take notice. He didn’t care about those around him anyway. A true tsundere, you often hear others call him. But you couldn’t tell if he was cold or just plain arrogant.

The way he sat next to you, with his perfect posture and head held high, and the way he didn’t even bid you a morning greeting, left quite a bad taste in your mouth.

How does one sit so properly and mannerly, yet doesn’t have the manners to acknowledge another’s existence?

Whatever, you decided, this wasn’t going to bother you, or get in the way of you getting better at math. This class wasn’t exactly the place you were used to either, but last year for whatever reason the numbers in your head jumbled around and you couldn’t pass a test to save your life. Now you were here, and you were determined to ace every test this year.

As if he had read your mind, Seungmin turned to you.

“You’re bad with numbers,” he said, no emotions displayed in his voice.

“Why else would I be here?”

He didn’t answer you, he just turned back towards the board, opening his notes and laying his head down on them.

You scoffed, there was no way you were going to fail a test in this class, your pride was going to make sure of it.

As time went on, you noticed Seungmin was not exactly happy about being in a lower math class that was obviously much too easy for him. You really wondered why he was here in the first place.

He never took notes, paid any attention, or even turned in the homework. You’d assume these bad habits were what landed him in this class in the first place.

The workload wasn’t even that bad, would it kill him to spare thirty minutes of his day to solve a few problems?

Despite this lazy lifestyle, Seungmin never received anything below a 100 on any test. Now that you envied.

Because even though you had made a promise to yourself and so far had kept it very well, you struggled to keep it that way. Studying until the wee hours of the night to make sure you could understand the subject with no problems at all, you lost sleep and just a bit of your sanity every time an exam was coming up.

This time was no different, only the restlessness was quite unbearable as you tried to stay awake in class. Your teacher’s droning voice did nothing to help and eventually your head slumped a little heavier on your arm, you had fallen asleep.

Falling asleep in this class was always a nightmare for you. Missing the information you desperately needed to make by in the course, you couldn’t understand how some students didn’t take notes, how did all the information possibly stay in their head.

When you had woken up, your teacher was just wiping down the board full of equations from the period. You looked down at your blank page of notes, regret and anxiety soon sinking in.

You could easily ask a friend for notes, it wasn’t that of a big deal to be honest. But taking in your own made sure you had everything, you couldn’t think of anyone who made sure to do the same.

The bell rang and it was time to go to your next class and you hurried to get your stuff packed up in time. As the boy next to you got up, you noticed he wasn’t sitting in his usual lecture position, head down and eyes closed. Today he had sat straight for whatever reason, and as he stood he pushed a stack of papers onto your side of the desk.

You hadn’t noticed at first, still wondering about his sitting position, but once he walked out of class, you looked down onto your table and inspected the overturned pages.

Considering you were most likely to be late soon, you just shoved the papers into your notebook and ran out of class.

It wasn’t until when you got home that you remembered the odd papers Seungmin had slid you after class and got your notebook out to examine them.

Turning them over you realized the boy you had once considered lazy and arrogant, took such detailed notes on today’s lesson that you could consider it a textbook guide.

His neat handwriting sprawled the paper elegantly and the pink highlighted titles accentuated the already sophisticated aesthetics of his notes. This was the type of organization you’d see on a study blog you only wished to emulate. On the margins he’d put a star next to things considered more complicated, and a happy face at the end of a concept, there were even slightly adorable doodles of a puppy’s face at the corner of one of the pages.

Seungmin never took notes. It was common knowledge. You’d never even seen the boy’s handwriting. Were these even his?

Deciding not to question further, you silently thanked the lord for such a gift. You’d have to thank Seungmin too, you thought.

That night you placed Seungmin’s aesthetic notes in a protective plastic and placed them in your binder. You studied them extensively and even rewrote them. He worded things much better than your teacher ever could. Everything was so simple. That night you could sleep peacefully.

Unbeknownst to you, Seungmin had taken a liking to you and your rather determined nature, something he wished he had when it came to studies, yet didn’t exactly need. Seeing you work so hard for a measly math class seemed pointless to him at first, but when he realized it was quite important to you, enough for you to lose sleep over, he discovered how much of a strong trait it was in you. It low-key made his heart squirm when he walked in to you reviewing notes before a test, or when you had set up your colored pens and highlighters in front of you before a lecture, or when you raised your hand when you genuinely didn’t understand something. Seungmin was deeply infatuated with you, but simply chose to ignore that. Seungmin never wasted his time on things he thought unnecessary. Yet that night he laid in bed, wondering for hours if you were awake and if you were, if you may have been looking at his words.

The next morning you woke up refreshed from a good night’s sleep and ready for school.

In class you placed the extra hot bun and a pink carton of strawberry milk on your seatmate’s desk as a small thank you, you had to repay him somehow. No matter what you had previously thought of him, he had in a way saved you.

You don’t think you had ever seen Seungmin smile. It was a slight and shy smile, but a smile nonetheless when he saw the cute little snack awaiting him on his side of the table. He knew it must have been you and it tugged his heartstrings quite hard, no one had ever really done this for him.

Still he didn’t look at you as he sat down, and he most likely wasn’t going to. You had to make the first move.

“Thank you,” you turned to him, holding out your hand in hopes of a friendly handshake.

Seungmin didn’t respond, though he did turn to face you wide-eyed with a straw stick in his mouth. His hand gently held the carton of strawberry milk and he didn’t make a move to reciprocate your friendly greeting.

You slowly pull your hand away.

“You can have them back, I don’t need them anymore,” you reach towards your binder to pull out the protected notes, but Seungmin finally does move, stopping your hand.

You eye him blankly, confused at his actions. He looks at you nervously before looking down.

“You can keep them,” his voice is firm yet soft and gentle.

Kim Seungmin is not cold or arrogant, you decide, he’s adorable.

You simply nod, absolutely dumbstruck by his change in nature.

Class starts and ends and though you promptly take your notes, you are considerably distracted by the actions of the quiet boy beside you. Today he placed his head down as usual, but his eyes were not closed, instead they traveled around the room, ever so often landing on you and halting.

As you and your classmates begin to put away their materials before the bell, you notice Seungmin softly spring up.

He takes out a pad of unused sticky notes from his bag and quickly scribbles his phone number and a puppy doodle on the pastel pink paper, hurriedly handing it your way as the bell rings.

Once again you look at the boy, eyes blank of emotion, only now his shy smile returns for a second time and he confidently reaches for your hand to put the sticky note in it himself.

“I think you’ll like these numbers more,” he slyly flirts.

“That was horrible,” you laugh at his rather unexpected words, making him flush a pleasant shade of pink.

Seungmin had never been one to flirt, heck he never even really spoke to girls, but he was definitely willing to make an exception. Because Seungmin never wasted his time on things he deemed unnecessary, but now it seemed that you were necessary in his eyes.

“Call me sometime?” His voice was smaller, much more reserved than his confidence outburst from before.

“My pleasure.” You beamed up at him.

And with that smile Seungmin could now guarantee that you were absolutely necessary.

#stray kids #seungmin #skz #stray kids imagines #skz imagines #seungmin imagines #seungmin fluff #seungmin blurbs #stray kids fluff #stray kids blurbs #skz fluff #skz scenarios #skz seungmin #kim seungmin

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paintedvanilla · 5 years ago

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paintedvanilla’s good omens fic recommendations

here we have something I’ve been too shy to make for a while because. to be straight with you. more than half of these are explicit. and well. yeah.

works listed in escalating rating order (general -> teen -> mature -> explicit)

everything is completed unless otherwise noted.

Title: Bowties

Author: dvldegg ( @caerdroia )

Rating: General

Word Count: 776

Summary: “Newt needs help tying his bowtie. Crowley makes fun of Aziraphale. It's just a typical weekend.”

My Notes: This fic caused me to overdose on domestic cuteness.

Title: anywhere i go you go, my dear

Author: chamaenerion

Rating: General

Word Count: 1,533

Summary: “After the Apocalypse-that-wasn't, Crowley is reluctant to leave Aziraphale's side.”

My Notes: I will literally die i swear to god this has nervous and protective crowley and he’s clingy and overall I just wanted to scream I love him I love my boy and they’re so in love and they should always be allowed to be together

Title: Getting a Wiggle On

Author: Kedreeva

Rating: General

Word Count: 7,293

Summary: “Crowley's prank to leave Aziraphale with fake eggs to babysit does not go remotely as planned.”

My Notes: You’ve probably seen this concept floating around tumblr but this fic made me GENTLE because i have daddy issues and whenever people are like “crowley and aziraphale as parents” i have a fucking heart attack

Title: Adopt Don’t Shop - A Good Meowmans Fanfic

Author: lucky_spike

Rating: General

Word Count: 12,434

Summary: “Inspired by Chekhov's cat AU comics 'Good Meowmens', here is a fanfic in which Anathema and Newt are humans, and Aziraphale and Crowley are cats. Not disguised as cats, not trapped in cat bodies, just actual elderly cats that are inseparable.”

My Notes: I know some people think au’s like this are kinda weird but this one is so fucking charming to me idk??? I literally ate this shit up I love being gentle and reading about cats who are in love.

Title: Not Alone

Author: superqueerdanvers

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 937

Summary: “Crowley and Anathema are supposed to meet Aziraphale at the movies, but they can't find a parking place, and they have a heart-to-heart about disability.”

My Notes: I experienced feelings and also emotions while reading this and now i’m a different person

Title: bastard child of water

Author: smallredboy ( @smallredb0y )

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 15,622

Summary: “After a grave mistake, Crowley, a merman, is transformed into a human and exiled out of the sea. Issues crop up as he grows used to his new body, to his new friends and to his new job. But when a merman he's seen in passing pokes his head out of the water one afternoon, Crowley will fall for him and look for a way to regain his body.”

My Notes: THIS FIC MAKES ME LOSE MY SHIT i bribed dave with real life money to finish it and every day i’m thankful i made that decision because this fic is SO. FUCKING. GOOD. IT’S TENDER!! IT’S GENTLE!! IT MAKES ME LOSE MY GODDAMN MIND!!!!!

Title: Demonology and the Tri-Phasic Model of Trauma: An Integrative Approach

Author: Nnm

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 99,423

Summary: “As soon as Aubrey Thyme, psychotherapist, had opened her office door and seen her new client, Anthony J. Crowley, sitting in her waiting area, she was observing and assessing him. At first glance, she paid attention to the following:

His clothing was expensive and stylish;

He wore very strange but noticeable cologne;

His relationship to the seat he occupied could only, very loosely, be described as “sitting;”

He looked angry;

He was wearing sunglasses.”

My Notes: OH!!!!!!!! MY GOD!!!!!!!!! THIS FIC DESTROYED ME EMOTIONALLY!!!!!!! IT RIPPED MY FUCKING HEART OUT AND FORCED ME TO DEAL WITH #ISSUES AND JUST OVERALL TURNED ME INTO A DISASTER!!!! I READ THIS SHIT IN ONE SITTING!!! I WAS HOOKED!!!! EVEN NOW JUST THINKING ABOUT IT IS DEALING PSYCHIC DAMAGE!!!!!! PLEASE READ THIS!!!

Title: The Odd One Out

Author: RainyDayDecaf

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 2,948

Summary: “It takes being thrown into another universe and meeting other versions of himself to make Aziraphale realize there is something wrong with the way his Crowley treats him.”

My Notes: A product of the shit-script, literally had me feeling emotions but also giggling because movie!Aziraphale deserves to be LOVED.

Title: A Single Feather

Author: qwanderer

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 2,521

Summary: “Here's the thing. Demons must be good at improv, at hiding reactions, at carrying on no matter what. They can’t show a moment of vulnerability, not to each other, and certainly not to angels. They were supposed to be tough, untrusting, paranoid bastards, or else.

So Crowley had developed a highly honed skill of automatically bullshitting, boasting, and mocking while covering up his true emotions, and it was in full force now.”

My Notes: I’m a simple woman. I see a nesting fic, I click on it. And it makes me emotional and afterwards I have to lay face down on the floor.

Title: Untouched

Author: Etaleah

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 3,531

Summary: “A demon's life is a lonely one. What Crowley wants is so simple, yet he can never have it.”

My Notes: I will literally fly into the sun if I see the tag “touch starved crowley” i will scream at the top of my lungs. Somebody please hold this demon.

Title: Penance

Author: Blissymbolics

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 5,910

Summary: “And for a while, it’s enough.

It’ll happen, Crowley tells himself. This time, it’ll finally happen.”

My Notes: Listen. This fic destroyed me, it made me tender horny and just overall ruined my night in the best way possible. I’m having a crisis over it as we speak.

Title: Starved

Author: Fyre

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 6,351

Summary: “The first time the angel touches him, it’s as they descend from the walls of Eden.

It’s nothing, only a hand put out to steady him. A kindness. And yet a thousand memories from life below make Crawly flinch instinctively at the contact. It’s stupid, really, and he’s sure the angel doesn’t notice. He doesn’t stop to consider the fact that the angel’s hand was soft and for a moment, his skin tingled where it touched. Not right away, anyway.”

My Notes: AHH!! Crowley really said “I am touch starved please love me” like!! Imagine craving someone’s touch for SIX THOUSAND YEARS!! I’D GO BONKERS!! THIS FIC MADE ME GO BONKERS!!

Title: can you keep me close (can you love me most)

Author: taizi

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 3,268

Summary: “When his angel stretches out a hand, cupid’s bow mouth curved into a familiar smile, Crowley knows better. When he’s led to his own bedroom, pushed down amidst the silk sheets and hastily miracled pillows and a sinful duvet, when Aziraphale leans over him and the whole world seems to hang right there in his eyes, Crowley knows that this is not his to keep. It’s not for him to have this.”

My Notes: I can will and must LITERALLY EXPLODE the tension in this one is palatable and I snort hurt/comfort like cocaine.

Title: please, could you be tender?

Author: deadgreeks

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 6,262

Summary: “The first kiss is only the beginning of a relationship. Crowley and Aziraphale need to talk about things. That is not their strong suit.”

My Notes: I ache and I yearn for this type of content they are literally. They are LITERALLY… I’m going to burst into flames.

Title: The Quiet, Persistent, Gnawing Unease

Author: LillipopCop

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 20,850

Summary: “An exploration of the serious toll Hell's physical and psychological grip has taken on Crowley since his Fall.”

My Notes: Fics where Crowley experiences emotional distress own my ass.

Title: Make a Little Birdhouse in Your Soul

Author: Zolac_no_Miko

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 10,573

Summary: “It was a compulsion that he couldn’t quite define. A burning in his blood, a tingle on the palms of his hands. A restlessness that drove him to art galleries, antique stores, and street markets, seeking some object that would please Aziraphale. Something beautiful, or something useful—something he would want to keep. It started with little things, small tokens that didn’t require a special occasion: an embroidered silk bookmark; a rare and delicate tea from the highlands of China; a steel pen and inkwell to replace Aziraphale’s quill pen, and then a fountain pen to replace that. And then things started to get out of hand.”

My Notes: Another nesting fic that almost wiped me the fuck out.

Title: Crown of Thorns [The Walls, the Wainscot, and the Mouse] 'Verse

Author: irisbleufic ( @irisbleufic )

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 275,000

Summary: ““D’you realize,” [Crowley] said, “that we never tire of things humans get bored with on the regular?” Aziraphale shrugged, lazily basking. “I’ve always assumed it’s that we don’t tire of each other.””

My Notes: Please for the love of god and all that is holy if you have not read this fic, read it. I consider it canon.

Title: fires of the flesh, both literal and figurative

Author: mercuryhatter

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 2,726

Summary: “Pretty standard "there's a sex curse and Crowley has to have way too many orgasms or be discorporated" stuff.”

My Notes: Yeah this is. Where I’m gonna start to get shy about my notes. It’s funny and it’s hot. Yeah.

Title: The Understanding

Author: Zetared

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 37,918

Summary: “Crowley is untethered. Aziraphale knows how to secure a knot. (He’s read many books on the subject, after all).”

My Notes: In which the underlying plot is a little strange but the overlying porn is very good.

Title: Come Fuck Me Hips

Author: AgentStannerShipper

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 3,471

Summary: “Crowley has had a fantasy about Aziraphale for centuries now. Too bad the angel would never take him up on it. Except, as it turns out, he absolutely would.”

My Notes: Everybody has read this and if you haven’t then you better because it’s. It’s good.

Title: If I Regard Iniquity

Author: elektratios

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 1,912

Summary: ““Aziraphale…” Crowley’s mouth worked a bit but no more words would come out. He cleared his throat. “Aziraphale, there’s no,” he gestured vaguely, “iniquity here.” He winced at his choice of words. “No-one is watching, no-one is judging. It’s just us.””

My Notes: I will literally dunk myself in the trash holy shit. It’s. It’s good.

Title: that pulse of my nights and days

Author: Ark

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 1,694

Summary: “Aziraphale laughs, the delighted, breathy giggle he gives after his second bottle of champagne. “Such a shame we didn’t come to this sooner,” he says, pulling back and—oh, naughty angel!—increasing the length and girth of his cock when he pushes back in. Crowley gasps, and Aziraphale—greedy, too!—tilts in to swallow the sound from his lips, flicks his tongue against Crowley’s as though chasing after the flavor of this elongated pleasure.”

My Notes: This one is uh. This is a dirty one. It’s good but it sure is filthy.

Title: A Home at the Beginning of the World

Author: stereobone

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 5,867

Summary: “"Oh," Aziraphale says. "I think Crowley might have moved in with me."”

My Notes: Everyone has read this one too but for good reason because it’s fucking amazing and makes me wanna scream.

Title: The One In Which Crowley Discovers Wanking

Author: for_autumn_i_am

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 5,784

Summary: “It began, like most memorable events in Crowley’s life did, with a bad decision; like most bad decisions, it involved poor impulse control and copious amounts of alcohol. The Antichrist had been born, and he put on lipstick and kitten heels to deal with it, but knew that the clock was ticking, and at times when time was slipping away, it helped to hold onto a bottle of gin.”

My Notes: It’s what the title says and it’s hot.

Title: Love Hath Made Thee A Tame Snake

Author: thehoyden

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 3,484

Summary: “He was the bloody Serpent of Eden, and he wasn’t going to stand for this kind of flagrant trespassing.”

My Notes: It’s uhhhhhhh… it’s hot!

Title: A Bolt From The Heavens

Author: coloursflyaway

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 11,235

Summary: “Aziraphale is going to show Crowley just how much he is loved. Through touch.”

My Notes: I will LITERALLY collapse on the floor… it’s too much for me

Title: Say Amen

Author: SinningPlumpPrincess

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 1,967

Summary: “Despite being in a relationship, they still long and yearn for each other.

Despite being in a relationship, Crowley can't get over that Aziraphale loves touching him.”

My Notes: I’m a very simple woman. I see a fic tagged “dry humping” and I click on it.

Title: Praise Be to Crowley

Author: FishingforCrows

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 2,306

Summary: “A simple comment from Aziraphale gets an unexpected reaction from Crowley. Aziraphale is curious to see what happens if he repeats the same comment in the bedroom.”

My Notes: It has praise kink crowley how am I not supposed to find it hot.

Title: Tea for One

Author: Kaesa

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 3,072

Summary: “Crowley doesn't have a lot of complaints about sex with Aziraphale, but he can't help being miffed when Aziraphale stops just to have another sip of tea.”

My Notes: A two for one: funny and sexy

Title: rest yourself with me

Author: sabinelagrande

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 3,380

Summary: “Crowley has a wonderful invention that he's just dying to try.”

My Notes: It’s funny and it’s hot what more could you ask for?

Title: let the rivers fill

Author: focusfixated

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 4,996

Summary: ““Darling,” Aziraphale answered. “I’m here.” His hand stroked through Crowley’s hair, teasing out the snarls of red that tangled around his fingers, matted with sweat and knotted where Crowley had thrashed his head against the pillows. “Can you turn over for me, love?” Weakly, Crowley’s eyes flickered down, and he saw the angel blushing, as if now, suddenly, of all things, he had succumbed to reticence. He was sat back on his knees, and the soft accordion folds of him were dewy with sweat and moonlight. His heart constricting somewhere in his useless chest, Crowley turned over, and spread his legs.”

My Notes: I see overstimulation and I fucking floor it. Please never stop writing fics where they have limitless stamina.

Title: sweet just like frustration

Author: teatales

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 7,174

Summary: “Crowley danced on the line between self-serving and selfless when it came to Aziraphale. He would do anything, anything for the angel. Anything he asked, anything he suggested, anything he needed but didn’t say aloud. But Crowley was also a terribly, desperately greedy thing. And oh, how he wanted. Wanted Aziraphale with every damned fibre of his infernal being. Wanted to be good for him; so, so good that he would never want to leave. Crowley wanted to be the best, his only, his everything. As much as he wished to lie there in exquisite rapture - he was nothing if not lazy - he needed to at least attempt to communicate all that he felt. To make Aziraphale feel even a quarter of what he experienced. He had to try.”

My Notes: Just LOOK at that summary. How can I read that summary without being expected to fucking faint. Jesus christ!!

Title: The Human Way

Author: battle_cat

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 2,780

Summary: “They're finally about to fuck on the bookshop couch and Aziraphale wants to know what Crowley wants.”

My Notes: I SEE A FIC WHERE CROWLEY DOESN’T KNOW WHAT HE WANTS AND IS JUST TRYING TO MAKE AZIRAPHALE HAPPY AND I BURST INTO FLAMES

Title: We Waited Long Enough

Author: syrupfactory

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 4,170

Summary: “After a few months of (finally) officially dating, Aziraphale is a little hurt when Crowley seems amused by his eagerness for sex. Why? Because Aziraphale actually wants way, way more. Fortunately, that's a fun problem to solve.”

My Notes: THEY EACH THINK THE OTHER ISN’T AS INTERESTED IN HAVING SEX AS THEY ARE AND THEN THEY HAVE MARATHON SEX AND I’M SWEATING.

Title: As Advertised on TV

Author: Mr_Customs_Man

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 1,045

Summary: “Everything that Crowley knew about sex, he learned from watching movies. As fun as movies are, they don't provide a comprehensive sex education. Needless to say, he has some misconceptions in regards to the act.”

My Notes: This is NOT a sexy fic!! It is sad and it wrenches my heart and I WORRY. Crowley please communicate your NEEDS.

Title: until you say it out loud

Author: attheborder

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 6,293

Summary: “And Aziraphale is realizing now, to its fullest, something he’s suspected for nearly as long as he’s known Crowley: the demon is no silver-tongued devil. He is no weaver of words, no smooth talker. It would fit in with his image, certainly— shouldn’t a man-shaped being dressed like an oilslick have speech just as dark and slippery— but there’s very little of either of them that’s as it ought to be, really.”

My Notes: This fic ignited me and I burst into flames. You’re probably starting to see a trend in what I like to read.

Title: Coitus Interruptus with Paperwork

Author: mountagrue

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 3,780

Summary: “The one where Azira Fell (directly onto Crowley's dick, did not pass go, did not fill out the appropriate forms).”

My Notes: Scream this is funny and horny Aziraphale falls and immediately gets to dicking down his demon while Gabriel suffers the aftermath.

Title: What Crowley Wants

Author: crookedashes

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 7,022

Summary: “Aziraphale wants to give Crowley what he wants most. It goes a bit sideways.”

My Notes: I die for this content can they communicate like normal people for FIVE MINUTES? Ft. Crowley feeling inadequate and me flying into the sun.

Title: All The Rest

Author: darlingred1

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 11,416

Summary: “If it weren’t for Aziraphale’s persistence, they wouldn’t have had a sex life at all, and Crowley was a demon, for goodness sake! Aziraphale didn’t understand it. (Aziraphale has the communication skills of a doorknob. Crowley isn't any better.)”

My Notes: Aziraphale and Crowley are like *has horny communication issues* and i’m like *nuts*

Title: and in this way their love rewrites the universe

Author: leaveanote

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 9,503

Summary: “They've been desperately in love for a year since the world didn't end, and they've been making little miracles happen for each other. Crowley's latest? A date outside of London, at a drive-in movie theatre in the South Downs. Yes, they have sex in the Bentley.”

My Notes: IT’S SAPPY IT’S TENDER IT’S HORNY IT’S ROMANTIC THEY INVENTED LOVE!!!

Title: sanctuary

Author: leaveanote

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 6,779

Summary: “It's about making a home together. It takes some getting used to, to take all this longing and transmute it into love, into something shared, but Aziraphale is here to help him get used to it. Especially on a stormy day in the cottage.

What better way to spend it than making love over and over and over?”

My Notes: I am literally a mess I read fics where they’re madly in love and want to stay close and I explode

Title: The Skin And Bones Of You

Author: entangelednow

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 4,001

Summary: “In which Crowley has spent six thousand years wanting something he doesn't think he deserves. It's only natural to assume he won't get to keep it.”

My Notes: I swear to god i will SCREAM!! IT’S TOO MUCH!! PLEASE NEVER STOP WRITING CROWLEY AS INSECURE.

Title: love like the dawn

Author: leaveanote

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 3,755

Summary: “This is sleepy, romantic, domestic morning sex in the South Downs Cottage. Crowley's still getting used to a love this good, the way it remakes him, the way it remakes the world.”

My Notes: I can’t with this like they’re just so in love I’ve lost the ability to breathe this fic stole my lungs and left me for dead

Title: to sleep, perchance to dream

Author: starkhasheart

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 3,023

Summary: “Crowley has a kink. Of course Aziraphale is going to indulge him.”

My Notes: Uhhhhhh it’s. Uhhh. Consensual somnophilia is uh… yeah.

Title: on the same page

Author: Chekhov

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: ~85,746

Summary: “Aziraphale Z. Fell is a rising star of the spiritual literary genre - the next Eat Pray Love guy - and his version of Chicken Soup For the Christian Soul is flying off the shelves. It's not that he's not grateful, but it's one thing to enjoy a career in writing and another completely to be pigeonholed into a specific genre, so much so that you are almost forbidden from writing anything else. So yes, maybe he has a bit of a secret. An outlet for his less... appropriate urges. And yes, if his typical readership got word of the sort of paragraphs he could put out on a particularly inspired night, they might suffer some form of heart attack typical for their age. But all of that is well hidden, and there is absolutely no way anyone would ever find out about his Arrangement with A.J. Crowley - the most debaucherous romantic fiction author of the decade. That is... until they have to pretend to be married to each other.”

My Notes: THIS ONE ISN’T FINISHED YET BUT IT’S A HUMAN AU AND EVERY UPDATE MAKES ME FOAM AT THE MOUTH

Title: be mine

Author: leaveanote

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 4,994

Summary: “It's their first Valentine's Day together, and Crowley is trying to pick out the right present.”

My Notes: I SCREAM I actually did not realize how many of this authors works I had bookmarked and HOLY SHIT!! THEY ARE JUST SO IN LOVE!! AHHHHH!!

Title: do we get what we deserve

Author: Smalls

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 11,064

Summary: “Crowley had not been a particularly good angel.

Unfortunately, Crowley had never been a particularly good demon either.”

My Notes: Cannot lie this had me openly sobbing on a Friday morning and left me emotionally raw

Title: Renting Crowley

Author: Amorous_Flammetta

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 8,018

Summary: “Crowley acts out Aziraphale's Victorian-era fantasy of taking a rent boy home for the night. Their little game includes costumes, champagne, dirty talk and explicit sex!”

My Notes: ITS A RENT BOY FANTASY BUT IT’S ALSO TENDER AND LOVING AND IT HAD ME SWEATING AND MADE ME EMOTIONAL

Title: do me right and do me wrong (give it up, give it up)

Author: seashadows

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 10,828

Summary: “Crowley copes with attention starvation, tries out some new hobbies, and discovers that asking for what you need is better than the alternative.”

My Notes: I’M GOING TO FUCKING EXPLODE THIS ONE MADE ME SCREAM LIKE I JUST CANNOT HANDLE IT ATTENTION STARVATION WILL BE THE DEATH OF ME

Title: For The Longest Time

Author: darlingred1

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 20,370

Summary: “Crowley kind of misses the pining when it's gone. Aziraphale comes up with a solution.”

My Notes: It was hot and funny and lasted just long enough to really make me antsy for the conclusion.

Title: Clementine

Author: Mussimm

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 49,073

Summary: “The seaside neighbours AU exactly one person asked for.”

My Notes: HUMAN AU WHERE THEY LIVE BY THE BEACH AND FALL IN LOVE AKA BE STILL MY BEATING HEART

Title: Gentle but Intoxicating, Nervous but Tender

Author: ShortInsomniac98 ( @devilsss-dyke )

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 2,868

Summary: “Crowley x vulva-having reader. // It wasn’t what you’d expected when you agreed to come home with him. What you’d expected was a maybe a quick, clumsy fuck, then out the door. Not some nervous but tender man who stammered out an, 'Is this okay then?' This was much nicer, much sweeter.”

My Notes: No comment besides uhhhhhh [sweats]

#op #good omens #ineffable husbands #good omens fic rec #good omens fic recs #good omens fic recommendation #some links are n-s-f-w

123 notes · View notes

autumnblogs · 4 years ago

Text

Day 13: Double Mobius Reacharound

https://homestuck.com/story/2073

Of all the characters in Homestuck, Sollux’s self-hatred is probably the most exaggerated, exacerbated no doubt by his role in the death of his girlfriend and his psychic brain. I like him, he’s an alright guy, and I wish I had more to say about him to be honest. I guess if there was one thing I was going to say about him, I think I said it already - Sollux serves as a mirror image of Dave, and Sollux’s decision to bow out early probably foreshadows the way that Dave will eventually decide that fighting is not for him.

More after the break.

https://homestuck.com/story/2082

How does Paradox Space know which angel to use? This is a bit of an odd moment. Maybe I’m missing the refrance, but I’ve never quite understood why Terezi reacts this way, with all of the additional periods. Sollux seems quizzical, but Terezi doesn’t react.

Also, this is the first in a serious of lines I’m going to be examining in relation to Aradia. Keep that on the back of your thinkpan.

https://homestuck.com/story/2085

Sollux and Aradia have a very sweet, tragic little relationship, and even though it doesn’t last into the longterm, I’ve always enjoyed these two together.

https://homestuck.com/story/2101

Whether retroactively, or intentionally, the sensual scantily clad fairies in Tavros’ room are a lot more noticeable on re-reads. Tavros has a pretty unassuming demeanor, and I’m not here to trash him pointlessly, but I think that Tavros has some pretty troubling patterns of behavior that can go unexamined because of the fact that he’s a victim. More on that as we go.

https://homestuck.com/story/2112

Far from a passing fancy, Tavros’ interest in animals does seem to be genuine. I wonder if he had a little farm with a bunch of these critters. We never get to see much of his other Fiduspawn if he has any.

https://homestuck.com/story/2114

Karkat and Tavros both do this, which I think is interesting because of the fact that they have opposite relationships with sleep and dreaming - Tavros spends most of his time in game asleep and dreaming of Prospit, Karkat has horrible insomnia.

https://homestuck.com/story/2122

Our very first conversation with Vriska has her tune in pretty much entirely to bully Tavros. The interesting thing is, while Vriska’s treatment of Tavros is pretty objectively bad, the way that she harasses him is actually pretty closely in line with the way that other trolls treat their friends, mutual aggression and nastiness. Vriska’s aggression isn’t addressed at someone who’s responding in kind though - Tavros is gentle where other trolls are vicious, deferential where other trolls are assertive. It’s this contrast that makes the shamefulness of Vriska’s behavior obvious to pretty much everyone but her.

https://homestuck.com/story/2123

Gamzee and Tavros are a ship tease that didn’t really end up going anywhere, but one of the things I think is interesting is the way Gamzee’s language goes from extremely lackadaisical and chill to kind of energetically violent around Tavros. Most of the time, Gamzee’s pretty laidback, but there’s a lot of language relating to murder in Gamzee’s enthusiasm here.

https://homestuck.com/story/2127

While Terezi’s Dragon doesn’t really have much of a choice in terms of its relative absence from her life, the sparse communication between the two and emotional distance is, I think, a parallel with Rose.

https://homestuck.com/story/2128

Because of the fact that we don’t get as much of a look into the Trolls’ home lives, it’s less easy to narrow down what their “finer” anxieties are, but it’s clear that they follow the same pattern of having their sleeping selves wake up as a result of internal synthesis of some kind - confronting their subconscious anxieties, and consciously accepting a part of their reality that they’ve been deliberately shutting out.

There’s probably a number of things that were instrumental to waking up for Terezi, not the least of which is accepting that Vriska is not the friend that Terezi thought she was - waking up to the fact that she was being used by an abuser in a co-dependent relationship. Coming to terms with her blindness could represent growth into a healthier sense of self, one where she finds validation internally and in healthy friend and family relationships. All that being said, her relationship with Vriska is still her most important relationship, and realizing that a problem exists is only the first step in solving it.

https://homestuck.com/story/2134

Time to stop being cagey about it, I guess. I have long viewed Aradia’s story as being one that is about surviving depression, which I say as a depression survivor. I relate heavily to the language that Homestuck uses to describe Aradia’s lack of passion and lack of enjoyment of things that she used to enjoy - especially the way that she lashes out destructively to try and alleviate her boredom and frustration.

https://homestuck.com/story/2137

On an unrelated note, Aradia has the Crosbytop. I believe I’m starting to remember how it got into her hands.

https://homestuck.com/story/2139

I’ve always thought that it’s interesting that Kanaya’s language directly mirrors Karkat’s from when he was harassing Jade, but their sentiment is almost precisely the opposite. She borrows another Karkatism almost immediately. So pretty much from the word go, we’re clued into the fact that Kanaya and Karkat have some relationship with each other that goes beyond the purely familiar, in the same way that Dave and John’s tendency to mirror each other’s language helps us to understand their friendship.

For a girl who doesn’t feel too many emotions, Aradia can be pretty sassy.

https://homestuck.com/story/2144

I have a friend who’s a bit of a Vriska kinnie (and feel like I’m pretty Vriska-esque myself), and one of the things that we both do that I’m seeing in Vriska here is fill dead air with chatter. I could be reading into it a little, but I think it should be a clue that Vriska is an intensely anxious kind of character.

https://homestuck.com/story/2145

In a parallel to Sollux’s introduction, we can’t immediately be Vriska. We couldn’t be Sollux because he was too busy stewing in his own self-criticism. There’s a push and pull going on between Vriska’s narcissism and her over-the-top self-deprecation.

https://homestuck.com/story/2150

I might be pulling this out of my ass, but I feel like there’s a case to be made for Aradia and Vriska actually being pretty strong parallels to each other - the only two trolls to get the tiger, faciliitators of destiny, devil-may-care grave-robbers. I don’t actually have a fully formed thought to really draw the two together, but I feel like there’s really something there. The way that Aradia puts Sollux to sleep here in order to ensure that the Right Disasters befall him is parallel to the way that Vriska puts people to sleep at clever points to make sure that Jack is created, and so on and so forth.

Maybe in the same way that Sollux serves as a parallel to Dave and helps us to understand what the right decision is for Dave, Aradia parallels Vriska and helps us to understand that roughly the same things are good for the two of them. Much later, (Vriska) basically chooses the same path of staying out of harm’s way and trying to enjoy the rest of her relatively eternal existence.

https://homestuck.com/story/2161

As soon as Karkat talks about Kanaya with anyone else, he further reinforces there is a friendship between the two of them.

Another quick note, as long as we’re here, I’ve kind of been putting this off, but I suppose with the one and only use of “autistic” as an insult in the comic, it’s finally time for me to bring this up:

Homestuck has a pretty problematic relationship with victims of abuse and people suffering from mental and physical disabilities. While on the one hand like, almost all of Homestuck’s main characters are disabled and abuse sufferers in some way or another, there are a lot of ways in which it’s not so charitable to them.

Some of it is stuff like this - early Homestuck uses the word retarded a lot as an insult, and has this single instance of autistic - all in all, that kind of language is problematic but in and of itself, not too egregious - Homestuck is a product of its time in that respect.

Stuff that I take issue with is more subtle - mostly stuff surrounding Jake and Tavros. I’ll have more to say on it later, but I wanted to find a good natural time to bring it up, and now seemed like a fine time.

https://homestuck.com/story/2162

Nepeta and Equius give us some information that helps grow our understanding of troll culture. We’ve already had some conversation about whose blood is better than whose from Sollux, but Equius starts to help us understand that some trolls take blood color extremely seriously.

These kids may not replicate the social anxieties of earthlings 1:1 but they still have plenty of things to be anxious about. The more I read Hiveswap the more I become convinced that most of these characters were never people we were meant to become terribly invested in - a lot of the function of the trolls, from a narrative perspective, is to give us parallels to the human main characters and insight into their lives, as well as to give us exposition on just how Sburb works exactly. And then most of them are pretty promptly killed off or put on a bus once their purpose is served (or in order to serve their purpose!)

Back to the subject of the social anxieties that the trolls have to deal with, Alternia is all about hierarchy baby.

https://homestuck.com/story/2173

Vriska may be a born cheater, but I’ve always sort of gotten the impression, based on the killer nature of FLARPING which is alluded to plenty in other situations, that if she’s cheating here, it may be the kind of cheating that is encouraged.

Between that and the way that Tavros and Aradia were discussing the “True Spirit of Flarping,” I can’t help but remember a description of the way propaganda works from some time ago. Propaganda doesn’t usually follow the story arc we are accustomed to, where we start with a character or characters who do not yet possess the tools or abilities they need to succeed, grow to overcome their weakness, and then overcome the problem that they couldn’t before.

Propaganda, instead, introduces us to characters who are already strong, facing enemies who are weak, or problems who are easy. They are strong because they are the heroes! Their enemies are weak. And the function of it is to intimidate the enemies of the person putting out the propaganda, and to rile up aggressive sentiment in those who are on the side of the propagandist.

We’ve already talked about how, in Homestuck “roleplaying” in both its more figurative and literal uses, is a way in which characters act out society’s expectations for them. In that way, I can’t help but view FLARPING as something of a propaganda tool itself, and one that’s pretty integral to Vriska’s way of thinking throughout the comic.

You’re either someone who is strong, or someone who is weak, and if you’re strong, you’re one of the victors, if you’re weak, you’re one of the losers, and you deserve whatever the victors decide what to do with you.

What I guess I’m building up to here is that there are real world societies that Troll Culture seems like an exaggerated parody of - particularly the more militaristic aspects of the Romans, and the Spartans. I’m going to wait for another time to write down all my thoughts about them, because this is turning into a bit of an essay, but suffice to say, it’s probably going to coincide with the one about Patriarchy whenever I get around to it.

https://homestuck.com/story/2175

There’s an interesting thing going on here between the way that Tavros is drawn (nearly identical to his imagine spot about flying around on Prospit), and the way that his erratic behavior isn’t actually all that different from the way characters normally do absurd and dangerous things here.

I’m by no means excusing what Vriska is doing here, but I think that between the fact that Tavros already wants to fly anyway, and the fact that again, characters do this kind of self-destructive thing in Homestuck all the time anyway, although to less of an exaggerated degree, Andrew is drawing a parallel between the narrative prompts from the Exiles, Vriska’s manipulations, and the intrusive thoughts that we already have on our own anyway.

Vriska manipulates Tavros the way that Doc Scratch manipulates her, although considerably clumsier, by getting him to do what he already wants to anyway.

https://homestuck.com/story/2177

That’s really all there is to say on the matter.

It’s like poetry, they rhyme.

In the same way that Bro manipulates Dave by imposing an idea of what it means to be a man on him - someone who can be beaten within an inch of his life, or beat someone else to within an inch of his life without batting an eye - Vriska tries to manipulate Tavros throughout his arc, and this kind of so-called “tough love” is just the start of it.

There’s a lot of supplementary material that delves deeper into Vriska’s rationale for her mistreatment of Tavros, but she makes it clear herself as we go through the comic that she at least justifies her mistreatment of Tavros by telling herself that the purpose of it is to toughen him up (so he can be one of the strong people, a winner who gets the girl.)

https://homestuck.com/story/2178

As he often is about what’s going on with other people when he’s distracted from thinking about himself by his own agitation, Karkat is probably right about Vriska - girls like her are a dime a dozen in the upper classes, and that’s the point. The point of troll society is to produce people like Vriska amongst the highbloods.

https://homestuck.com/story/2195

Let’s dig into Vriska’s self-stylization as an apocalypse buff for a second because it’s not something I think gets talked about a lot.

Apocalypticism is, in my estimation, kind of a form of generational narcissism. There are doomsayers in every generation, who claim that this is it - this new catastrophe, this new social situation, is the most important thing in the world to ever happen. The end is here. All of world history culminates in this.

I don’t mean to downplay the actual existential threats of our generation of course; climate change, late capitalism, that sort of thing. But I think Vriska’s Apocalypse Buffery fits pretty well into her need to be the most important person in Paradox Space all the time.

On another note, Luck in Homestuck is very closely related with a few concepts like Agency in Homestuck through the Aspect of Light. Terezi will later assert that luck doesn’t matter at all. What’s up with that?

Maybe Luck and Karma are two sides of the same coin (ha!) Both of them are pieces in the puzzle of Theodicy, that is to say, the metaphysics question of why there is bad in the world.

Someone like Vriska (at the beginning of her arc) would say that it’s happenstance - bad things and good things can happen to bad and good people, there’s no greater meaning behind it. Vriska has a hard time taking responsibility for her own actions - her locus of control is external, for the most part.

Terezi on the other hand mostly attributes everything to a person’s actions, hence the need to punish bad people, and reward good ones. Terezi would say that good things happen to good people, and bad things happen to bad people. Her locus of control is internal.

Maybe the answer is both motherfuckin’ things.

https://homestuck.com/story/2202

Just as Vriska’s introduction is through a conversation with her victim, so Doc Scratch’s introduction is through a conversation with his victim. Or at least, his most immediate victim.

It’s like poetry, they rhyme.

https://homestuck.com/story/2204

Kanaya pretty well sums up here what I was getting at when talking about Terezi and Vriska’s different locuses of control.

There’s no real good or bad luck here. Good luck for someone is bad luck for someone else, often enough. What “good luck” means to Vriska is that events go down the way that she personally wants them to.

And so, by seizing control and power in situations where she is helpless, the Thief of Light ensures that she always has all the luck.

Kanaya might not be right, by the way, not 100%. I’m not a stoic. You can’t just magically wish away suffering by deciding that actually, you’re 0k with it, anymore than Aradia can. Like I said, the truth probably lies somewhere between Luck and Karma.

https://homestuck.com/story/2207

While the terrifying violent monitor and the emotionally abusive manipulator are bifurcated, Vriska has a lot of the same emotional responses to her guardians as Dave does to his singular guardian - notice the similar, self-soothing language that Vriska’s narrative employs compared to the way that Dave self-sooths when trying to convince himself that the way Bro treats him is just fine and normal.

https://homestuck.com/story/2211

Equius to me is a super interesting character, because on the one hand, he’s a joke character Andrew uses to antagonize the audience by being gross but Andrew also uses him to say the quiet part loud - Homestuck is already, to begin with, a pretty lewd webcomic full of horny characters whose emotional hangups and destructive relationships with societal norms sabotage their chances at happiness. That’s all Equius is. His entire function from start to finish, aside from a source of ribald humor, is to draw attention to the fact that everyone in this comic is looking for comfort in someone else’s body, comfort from the way that unrealistic societal expectations and their attempts to live up to them don’t match up to what’s inside of their heart. Equius is a parody of Homestuck inside of Homestuck. Absurdly overpowered, ridiculously horny, all twisted up inside.

https://homestuck.com/story/2220

The language here that Equius uses - degenerate - is evocative of the sorts of right-wing authoritarian hate mongers that Equius’ ideology stands in for. Equius, of course, has doubts about said ideology, which he starts to express through transgressive relationships pretty much as soon as we meet him, like the one with Aradia. The fact that he can’t make sense of the warring ideas inside of him almost literally kills him.

https://homestuck.com/story/2221

Except that what kills him literally is a shitty clown.

I think what’s going on here is interesting, because if you want to read Equius as like, Homestuck in a nutshell, Equius’ ideological hangups are co-morbid with his sexual hangups, and resolving one set would probably go a long way toward resolving the other set. Equius is, for lack of a better term, a deviant. The sorts of things that excite him (here, viscerally) don’t match up with his idea of how troll society is supposed to be.

Equius and Gamzee are confronting each other with a different vision for what Troll Society is supposed to be like.

https://homestuck.com/story/2222

In stark contrast to the shallow and insincere hostility of Trolls who are actually friends with each other, Vriska and Equius maintain a veneer of social grace as they mutually plan to backstab each other.

https://homestuck.com/story/2237

Vriska is pretty clearly projecting here, but she’s also 100% right. I guess when you know somebody, you know them. Or it could be happenstance.

Her view of redemption is also transactional. “I will make things the way they were before, and things can go back to being the way that they were,” she seems to say. It’s a very legalistic view of it, and while it might have a place in a justice system, even the extremely legalistic Terezi can tell that that wouldn’t actually fix anything. Maybe the physical and emotional damage could be repaired in theory, but if the actors in the situation don’t change themselves in fundamental ways, this is all just going to recur in the future.

Forgiveness isn’t something an abuser can earn - nobody has the right to claim that they have restored a relationship that they destroyed in the first place by demonstrating token repentance.

https://homestuck.com/story/2238

If Andrew already had in mind that Equius should in some way be a part of the gestalt of souls that is Lord English, he’s foreshadowing it early here by comparing Equius’ voyeuristic habits to Scratch’s.

https://homestuck.com/story/2244

I’ll lay my cards on the table and say I think that Doc Scratch can present the facts 100% and still be dishonest. I’m a compatibilist - I think that Free Will and Accountability are compatible with the idea of a deterministic universe. Doc Scratch doesn’t have to talk anyone into anything, but the material conditions that led everyone to the decisions that they chose to make were orchestrated by Lord English. Scratch may not be making any decisions here that effect the outcomes, sure, but the game was rigged in his favor from the start.

Again, I’m not excusing Vriska’s actions here. But for the same reason that we wouldn’t blame Tavros for jumping off of a cliff just because trying to fly is something he already wanted to do to begin with, I think it’s clear to anyone with eyes that Doc Scratch is at least partially responsible for creating this little monster.

Vriska’s complicated. Let’s move on so this whole post doesn’t turn into more Vriskourse. That’s the last thing anyone needs.

https://homestuck.com/story/2258

You know you’re going to anyway.

I guess what intrigues me so much about this section is the gradation between manipulation and coercion.

https://homestuck.com/story/2263

Vriska might be a born cheater, but Doc Scratch is a sore loser.

She’s pretty easy to root for when she’s against him.

https://homestuck.com/story/2269

Man, Act 5 Act 1 is just absolutely lousy with conversation about choice and luck.

https://homestuck.com/story/2276

Part of what creates ambiguity in terms of how much Vriska’s choices are her nature versus the conditions that shaped it is on display here in her conversation with Aradia.

Vriska doesn’t really know how to interact with people positively, like, at all. Nobody’s ever taught her. She doesn’t know what it means to be a friend to someone. She doesn’t know what it means to help someone. She doesn’t know how to be loved or forgiven.

Is this like the scorpion and the frog? Or does she have free will? (I’ll give you a hint, it’s the second one.)

https://homestuck.com/story/2280

This whole sequence is just a delight. The trolls are really just such disaster people, and if I can be excused, it’s easy to put more emotional distance between myself and say, Equius, than it is between myself and Vriska and Terezi. Like I said, Equius says the quiet part out loud, so there’s really nothing much to analyze there.

Aradia’s inability to control the ribbits is part of a general mood of a lack of control that she has as a character. Vriska’s lack of control causes her to rage at the heavens and lash out at the people around her. Aradia is just 0k with it, and neither is a healthy coping strategy. The result is that the two of them break a lot of shit.

https://homestuck.com/story/2305

For the first time in his life, Karkat is not alone.

https://homestuck.com/story/2319

I could really be mistaken here, but the way this whole sequence is presented here really feels, on an archival reread, to be telling me, “You do not need to care about these characters.” Certainly they serve a function in the story, but with the exception of a few of them (literally only a third of them), they serve as tools in an authorial toolbox to help flesh out the setting - not so unlike the Carapacians actually, but with a lot more personality.

https://homestuck.com/story/2323

Kanaya is threefold one of the few of her kind, making her extra special. While she is closest with Rose, she’s a clear parallel to Jade, who if memory serves, suffered frequent accustations of being a Mary Sue early on. Kanaya’s level of specialness (in terms of combined rare factors) outcompetes even Jade’s. Probably a part of the playfully antagonistic style of Homestuck in general.

https://homestuck.com/story/2338

It slipped my mind earlier that the honey on Sollux’s hands was being directly juxtaposed with Dave’s blood on his own hands, and here Kanaya’s. All three of them are, to some extent or another, contemplating their mortality. As Kanaya said just a few panels ago though, death is confusing without the finality. Just another way that Homestuck plays with the nomenclature of endings and beginnings and intermissions and brings into question the usefulness of those categories.

https://homestuck.com/story/2343

I have always enjoyed the dynamic that Kanaya and Eridan share with each other, and I wish there were more conversations of her just dunking on him.

Also of note in this little conversation is the way that Kanaya and John mirror each other’s language. This is an example though where they could not possibly be mirroring it the way that Dave and John might be when they’re talking about Bec, or the way that she and Karkat might be. They have, it seems, the same penchant for mischief.

https://homestuck.com/story/2345

Like her counterparts from Universe B, Kanaya’s preoccupation with relationships and personal contact is made manifest through her Squiddle Lunchtop.

https://homestuck.com/story/2350

Both of the main Pages in Homestuck are characters whose primary usefulness is seen through their ability to make friends and broker alliances. I suspect that being a Page in Sburb is to some extent a bit like being an ADC in League of Legends.

The ADC or Attack Damage Carry, if you’re not familiar with the nomenclature, is a character who starts the game weak, and remains vulnerable throughout such that the whole team has to play babysitter. If you think that sounds unappealing to play, you’d be right - it can be pretty hard to find someone willing to play ADC, especially with the popularity of high-risk high-reward Asassins (not so unlike a thief!) who are their direct counter.

In spite of their relative vlunerability, the ADC has absolutely dominated the meta of League of Legends for the past ten years for the simple reason that there is absolutely no substitute when it comes to controlling objectives.

Maybe Pages are a little bit like that. Frustrating to be one, frustrating to have one around, but extremely rewarding to invest in. It’s too bad nobody can be arsed to give them the emotional support they need to flourish. Too bad they have such... intractible character flaws.

https://homestuck.com/story/2356

Kanaya’s inability to stop mothering people sabotages her chance at winning Vriska’s affection - no doubt because Vriska has misread the situation as Kanaya being her romantic rival for Tavros’s attention. For the better, I guess, since Rosemary is my shit.

Trolls sure are weird.

https://homestuck.com/story/2369

Vriska has already figured out the point of Sburb, and perhaps the ultimate riddle, although she clearly hasn’t figured out the ramifications of it yet.

In any case, it should be clear how she has interpreted Sburb’s directive - authenticate your own existence through reproduction.

Being a winner, having self-worth, being able to justify your own existence means being strong enough, smart enough, pretty enough to shape the rest of existence in your own image.

She’s missing a critical detail, and its absence means she has it completely backwards.

https://homestuck.com/story/2370

We already know what is on the other side of the portal. Vriska is making herself out to be the final boss.

The final boss and the treasure are the same thing, in her mind.

The struggle is the objective.

The fighting is the point.

https://homestuck.com/story/2374

Just wanted to take a second to say that this whole sequence is so unnerving and horrible that I was sure she was going to murder, violate, and/or eat him, not necessarily in that order, the first time I read through this.

The sad reality is, this is the fucked up courtship ritual of a girl who has no idea how to be intimate with other people.

https://homestuck.com/story/2391

And that’s where we’ll pause for the night, having finished nearly 300 pages as promised.

Hope I wasn’t getting too lazy there at the end.

I’m enjoying my weekend.

Hope that yinz enjoy yours once it rolls around.

For now, Alive and Not Sober, Cam signing off.

#commentary #liveblogging #luck #choice

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kaaras-adaar-a · 4 years ago

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He did not know when the world would end, when the Dread Wolf would raise his head again, so in those quiet moments in between chaos and the unknown, he wanted to love.

Characters: Kaaras Adaar, The Iron Bull Post-Trespasser Warning: Contains adult themes, profanity

The air was like ice to his skin, frost puffing from his nostrils with every breath as the sun had barely risen. He could even feel his lips sting as he licked them with a warm tongue, tasting the sharpness of frost. He could smell it, too. The scent of home. Ferelden. It was hard to describe what the cold air tasted and smelled like. And no, it wasn’t the scent of dog, like everyone claimed. Sure, Fereldans certainly liked their hounds, especially their mabari war hounds, but mabari were not something one saw on a regular basis. They were special hounds, bred for war. The only dogs that would be seen here were common hunting hounds or retrievers. And right now, there wasn’t a single one in sight, not that one could see far considering the thick fog that crossed the fields and hills.

The sharp chill caused Kaaras’ arm to ache, where the anchor had once been. He was still getting used to it, even though it had been months since he’d seen Solas, since he’d been in Halamshiral… since he’d been the Inquisitor.

The thought made him feel hollow on the inside, like a large part of himself was missing. He’d allowed the last few years to consume him, his title, his purpose Now, without it… it was difficult to lead a normal life once more.

Oh, there was nothing normal about Kaaras Adaar. He’d been a war hero, he’d been the man to stop Corypheus and his demon army, and the world would never forget his tale. But it still felt so strange to be away from it all. The companions, even if they were never truly too far away from him. He could always trust Leliana knowing of his whereabouts, Cassandra close in tow. Cullen had also returned to Ferelden, so it was easy enough to catch up with him. The rest, letters were common enough between them, and it wasn’t like Kaaras could ever take his ‘uniform’ off. How could he when Thedas still needed him? They might not know it, but something much bigger was coming, and when the time came, the Inquisition would be there--he would be there.

Kaaras knew, even before the Exalted Council, that he could never abandon the Inquisition, that he could never abandon Thedas. So let the public think that they had disbanded, let them believe that they had put away their swords, but they were still working hard, putting together a force to fight when the time would come. After all, it was not in his nature to simply give up.

He had given the Inquisition his all. He had served Thedas, helped those in need. He couldn’t abandon that now, not when he knew that they would need them again. The choice to disband had been one of the hardest things in his life, and yet… he knew it was right. He knew that Ferelden had a point. So be the hero while they needed him to be, and put the sword down when the time was right. They had served their purpose, they had defeated Corypheus and restored order. Let them remember the Inquisition for the good deeds that they had done, not for the corruption and power that would soon devour it if they allowed Solas and his people to infiltrate. It was the safest thing to do, but the right thing to do by everyone else as well. His companions, his soldiers, they had paid their price. He could not take them from their lives anymore, their families and friends.

Resting his hand against the wooden railing of the balcony, his fingers brushed at the icicles that had formed. Snow was yet to come, but it would be here soon; he could feel it in the air. A few more weeks, perhaps, and the entirety of all he could see across the fields would be covered in white, and the poor, little tavern that they were in would be having it rough. Not many tourists or traders came this way for holidays. A few stray travellers maybe, such as themselves, but that would be all. Such was the life of Fereldans. A hardy bunch, but often struggling to make a living.

Kaaras was used to it. His whole life, he’d had to work hard, harder than most considering his grey skin and horns. People never much liked to give him a chance, and they either stared at him in fear or awe. Sometimes it was both. He’d made it this far, though, and he’d heard just about every insult that could be thrown in his direction. After a while, his skin grew thicker, but it didn’t take much to know that he was soft beneath it all.

The view before him was simple but beautiful. He should have been colder than he was, but this was the weather he’d grown up in, and he was far better at tolerating the cold than he’d ever been at dealing with the heat. Even now, he stood outside on the balcony in nothing but a pair of woollen socks and a gown wrapped around him, his shins victim to the cold chill.

Suddenly, he was pulled from his thoughts as two strong hands made their way around his waist from behind. It startled him, but he was held in place as he felt Bull’s body press up against his.

“You’d better have some pants on…” he teased, pressing himself against the thick of Bull’s chest.

Bull laughed. Of course he had pants on, but only because it was so fucking cold out here. “Where’d the fun in that be?” The Iron Bull replied, a hand moving down Kaaras’ arm and overlapping his lover’s knuckles. “It’d be a pleasant view, to you and everyone else. Better than this damn cold.” Bull grumbled to himself then. “And I thought Orlais was cold…”

“It is,” Kaaras chuckled, though he also looked back just to make sure Bull was actually wearing something. Thank the Maker he was. Nobody was up yet anyway--otherwise Kaaras probably would have properly dressed himself as well. He supposed being with Bull had made him a tad bit more confident, although he still didn’t like the idea of most of his skin showing on any given day. He was truly a private individual.

Bull’s thick fingers intertwined with his own on top of the cold wood as he felt warm lips brush up against the side of his neck, just behind his ear. It tickled and had his cheeks warming, a tingle going all through his body. It didn’t take much to get him going, but he adored Bull’s affections when he was wanting to give it.

“I can still smell the oils from last night's bath on you. How is it that you always smell so damn good, Kadan?” Another hand moved over Kaaras’ shoulder and down beneath what remained of his mangled arm, wrapping around the front to pull the former Inquisitor into an embrace of sorts. Bull had gotten used to waking in a bed beside the other qunari now, and some mornings still caught him by surprise. Pleasant surprise of course. This had never been a life he thought he could lead--a real romantic relationship, one he had found love with. One he could feel so devoted to outside of the Qun. Now… now, the man in his arms was his life, the one he fought for and beside. There were still days where Bull felt himself a monster, a savage with no control, especially ever since he had been stated Tal’Vashoth, but there was one constant in his life, and that was Kaaras. He was what kept him grounded, just as much as Bull was for Kaaras when he needed support and someone to keep his feet steady.

The blush on Kaaras’ cheeks only lingered, a coy smile spreading across thin lips. Even after the last few years, Bull still made him blush as if it were his first time. Turning over his shoulder, he gently pressed his head against Bull’s before he planted a soft peck onto his lips in response.

“I do it just to rile you up,” he jested, though gasped when Bull pressed himself up against him and pinned him to the balcony. If his blush had been coy before, it was certainly flustered now, long ears flicking downward. He would have caught himself with both hands before, but instead, the limb twitched, like it was going to, but nothing came of it and he was a little lopsided because of it.

It made him feel uneasy, the lack of control. Not because of Bull--it had nothing to do with his lover--but because he’d always been such an independent person. Now he felt… hopeless at times. It wasn’t so much that he didn’t like asking for help (although that was true, too), it was more the fact that Kaaras hated to feel like he was burdening others.

It had taken a long time for Kaaras to come to terms with his dismemberment. The mental and physical struggles had been hard to overcome, and he wasn’t sure he’d ever be entirely over it. If it weren’t for Bull’s reassurance (being disabled himself), and Dagna’s hard efforts into making him a prosthetic, he wasn’t sure how far he’d come from it all. Kaaras knew what it was like to be in a dark place from his adolescence, and he pushed himself to never fall back into that darkness. Maker, it had been hard. Without the strength of his lover, he may have fallen.

Mostly, Kaaras missed being able to hold Bull, to feel him in the palm of his hand, to brush his fingers against his skin or… something else. Clearly Bull noticed the reaction, because the next thing he felt was a strong hand gently moving across the muscle on his arm, just above where his elbow was.

“Hey, you know you’re perfect the way you are, yeah?”

Kaaras turned around so he could face Bull now, a saddened smile across his eyes. “I know you say that…”

“Yeah, I do.” He lifted Kaaras’ hand and pressed the man’s knuckles to his lips. Bull also knew that him saying it wouldn’t bring Kaaras’ limb back, nor would it make him feel like he was perfect or complete. Words didn’t always make everything better, hell, sometimes they made shit worse. But Bull was here to let Kaaras know that he wasn’t worthless because he’d been butchered by some ancient bastard. He supposed he could have been angrier, Solas could have killed his lover. Then he’d be everything the Qun taught him he’d be: a savage monster, ready to kill. Alas, he’d not been with Solas those last few moments before he disappeared, but something told the warrior that Solas was on a mission to destroy himself. And if he didn’t, he’d be there to do it for him.

“And I mean it when I say it.” Bull’s other hand moved to cup the stubble-covered cheek, a thumb brushing over the scar on the mage’s bottom lip. “You’re the strongest person I’ve ever known, Kadan. The bravest, and kindest.” Hell, he was willing to forgive Solas when he knew he’d never have that kind of strength, let alone kindness.

“Sexiest, too…”

Kaaras breathed a laugh at that. “I think the cold’s gotten to you.”

Bull smirked. “I’m feeling pretty hot actually, if you get my drift.” The warrior wiggled his brows, the patch that usually covered his marred eye back inside, having been discarded somewhere last night. That was a future issue he’d deal with. Right now, he wanted to concentrate on the beautiful man that stood before him, wrapped in a tedious gown that should be stripped off immediately so he could devour every inch of him from head to toe.

“Why don’t we get out of this cold before my nipples snap off, and before you get frostbite on your tootsies.”

Kaaras looked down. “I was smart enough to wear socks,” he pointed out, raising a brow as he eyed Bull’s shirtlessness. It was no one's fault but Bull’s that he was cold. Bull grumbled in response, which only made him respond with an amused look.

“Well, we could stand out here all morning and argue who’s more dressed than the other, and how damn cold it is, or we could go inside and lay by a warm fire. I’m pretty sure I know which one I’d rather do.”

Kaaras chuckled, his hand moving to Bull’s and holding it. “Alright, alright,” he smiled, jutting his chin in the direction of the door. Bull happily opened it and stepped back inside, Kaaras following. The difference between inside and out was stark. Even if the fire that had been going last night was nothing but embers now, the temperature was still much warmer.

He felt Bull’s hand leave his as he picked up a few logs and put them in, stoking the fire to restart. Despite being around magic for so long, Bull still didn’t rely on it. Nor did Kaaras, if he were honest. He had always been taught to never rely solely on his magical abilities. If he was stuck in a sticky situation, one which would get him into trouble, or one with magebane, then it would not bode well for him to rely upon his talents as a mage. Even as a skilled mage, Kaaras had always used it only when he needed to--aside from his training and meditation. It was no surprise that Bull stoked the fire without asking for his assistance, and Kaaras hardly took any kind of offence.

Moving to the bed, he took a seat at the edge, fingers brushing thick furs. The tavern was no fancy palace or estate that he may have been used to spending his last few years in. In fact, this was far more like the years before being Inquisitor. It was humble, cosy and if Kaaras were honest, comfortable. This was his core being. There was little more Fereldan one could get than feeling the furs on the beds, the fire bouncing off old, wooden walls. All he needed was a slice of cheese and a warm cuppa.

His eyes watched as Bull awakened the fire, just watching as his lover moved, the flicker of light off thick muscle as the sun began to rise above the treeline outside now. Strong, mentally and physically, but surprisingly soft Bull was. He might never admit it, but he was far more romantic than he gave himself credit for. It had been a large risk for him to accept Bull’s company that one evening over three years ago. He had been terrified, terrified of getting hurt, of making some kind of a mistake, but Bull had proven to be one of the most caring and compassionate people he’d ever known. He was hardly the monster that he made himself out to be, the thing. He was a person just like anyone else, and so much more than that.

“There. That’s better.” Bull stood back up as the fire roared back to life from the fresh kindling and logs. As he stood, he cracked his back and stretched his arms before he turned to see Kaaras on the bed.

“You okay, Kadan?”

Ruby eyes looked up to catch Bull’s eye. “Hm? Yes, I’m…” Kaaras hummed through his nostrils and shook his head. “Never better, really. I’ve got a warm fire before me, a comfortable bed and most importantly, you as my company.” He outstretched his arm, beckoning for Bull to come and lay down with him. To spend the morning together before they were back on the road. Moments like this had felt rare when he was the Inquisitor, a calm moment he could share with his lover. Now, whilst he could, he wanted to take every chance he could with Bull. To never miss an opportunity, a moment to love and cherish him. He did not know when the world would end, when the Dread Wolf would raise his head again, so in those quiet moments in between chaos and the unknown, he wanted to love.

It took mere seconds for Bull to be on the bed beside him, laying down facing one another. Bull propped himself up onto his elbow so his horn wouldn’t scratch at the head of the bed, or kink his neck too much.

A large hand moved to cup Kaaras’ cheek, Bull looking between each of those deep, red eyes. “You helped me find my purpose without the Qun, Kadan. I’ll help you find yours without the Inquisition.”

Kaaras’ eyes lowered for a moment, watching Bull’s lips so he didn’t have to look him in the eye, until Bull’s hand moved and propped his chin up so he had no choice. He wanted to say that that had been different, but it hadn’t, had it. They had both lost a part of themselves. For Bull, it had been so much more. He’d lost his home, his culture, his identity--even if he’d been living as a Tal’Vashoth for years. The reality of no longer being welcome, no longer having those contacts to a place called home? Kaaras only felt part of that, but the Inquisition had become a home, a family to him. Perhaps that made him a weak leader, too compassionate and comfortable. But he missed it all, and would continue to do so for a very long time.

Awkwardly, he shuffled himself so that his hand could take Bull’s. He should have attached his prosthetic, but he wanted to be warmer before he did that. The cold made his arm ache and the skin was stiff.

“I believe you.” He meant what he said. His hand moved lower, tracing down the cord around Bull’s neck to feel the smoothness of the dragon tooth necklace that hung between his thick bosoms. “No matter how far apart, we’ll always be together.”

“Damn straight.” Bull pressed a kiss against the man’s lips, pulling him closer and tangling their legs. He didn’t believe in fate or destiny or any of that shit, but he sure as hell believed in Kaaras Adaar.

#Adaar #Iron Bull #the iron bull #Kadan #Captain to Captain #Adaaribull #Post trespasser #My fics #my art #// I'd been sitting on this one for months but thanks to some inspo from Tas I finally decided to work on it today #// Just a quiet post trespasser moment between Kaaras and Bull :3

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omoi-no-hoka · 5 years ago

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Rural Life and Mental Health in Japan as a Gaijin

Heads up: This is a very long, personal post about mental health and the stresses of living in rural Japan as a foreigner. If it’s not what you’re looking for in this blog, please feel free not to read it. If you can’t tell by the gif above, this isn’t going to be a very positive post because I’m not in a very positive mood.

------------------------------

It’s been just shy of five and a half years since I moved to Hokkaido, the northernmost island/prefecture in Japan. In many ways, it’s similar to the American Midwest, which is the region I’m originally from. It’s big on agriculture, it’s got lots of nature and rural areas, winters are long and nasty, and the people have a warmth that make up for the cold snow and ice outside. Heck, even a lot of the flora and fauna are the same.

I think of my current city as my “Japanese hometown” because it was where I stayed during my first trip to Japan and it’s where my hostparents from that time are. I love it here like I love my country bumpkin village of 2,800 back in the states.

But after a little over two years of living and working in this city, I think I need out. I am...tired of it in many ways.

特別扱い Tokubetsu Atsukai, “Special Treatment”

Prior to living in this city, I lived in Sapporo, which has a population of 2 million. There, no one batted an eye at a foreigner walking the streets. A lot of them were surprised that i could use Japanese, but a good few people were used to gaijin that could use nihongo and read kanji.

But in my current city, I have experienced all of the following things, some of which on a daily basis.

DISCLAIMER: I have also had a LOT of very positive experiences with the people of this city. Most of my experiences have been positive or neutral, but a good 40% have been as described below.

Everywhere I go, I am openly stared at. Gawked at, at times. (I am your standard-looking, standard-dressed, slightly overweight white girl. No visible tattoos, piercings, vibrant hair color, or otherwise attention-grabbing aspects about me other than the fact that i am clearly not Japanese.)

I am often spoken to like I am mentally disabled, or if I am with a Japanese person, they will refuse to speak to me and instead speak to my Japanese companion.

I have entered restaurants on my own and had waitstaff make a big “X” with their arms and say “No English” immediately upon seeing my non-Japanese face.

I have had waiting taxi drivers drive off instead of allow a troublesome foreigner into their car.

I have sat down alone at a bar and had the Japanese people beside me openly gossip about me with the assumption that I could not understand them.

When searching for apartments when I moved to this city, I was denied 75% of my picks because they have a “no gaijin” rule. Despite the fact that I can speak and read, that I have a good job and valid visa, and that I have already lived here 3 years without a single late rent payment or complaint against me.

I have built up casual relationships with employees at grocery stores, etc. I frequent, and they have asked me for my contact info because, in their own words, “I’ve always wanted a gaijin for a friend!” In Japan, every girl wants a token gaijin friend instead of a token gay friend.

I have gone on dates with Japanese men who clearly just wanted a white girl to hang on their arm like a piece of swag and insist on taking me to a pasta place because “You must prefer western food to Japanese food” or insisting that I dye my hair blonder to look more foreign.

I am just...so very tired of this 特別扱い (special treatment).

I don’t want to call it 差別 (prejudice) because, the majority of the time, Japanese people think they are doing me a kindness by speaking slowly and simply, or by telling me as soon as possible that they cannot help me in English, etc. While a couple of the above experiences are straight up racism (I’m looking at you, asshole taxi drivers and landlords), most of them are a misguided form of “omotenashi,” a.k.a. Japanese hospitality.

So I try very hard not to let it get to me, because I know that they don’t wish ill upon me. But I’ve worked so goddamn hard to learn this language and speak it well, and it is so frustrating for the people around me to assume that I can’t do what has been my freaking life goal. Or having people assume I can’t understand slightly difficult words and dumb down their language (Even colleagues I’ve worked with for two years now!). In the middle of a conversation they’ll say things like, “It’s hard to deal with that level of animosity--oh wait, omoi-no-hoka-san, sorry, ‘animosity’ means ‘dislike.’”

They mean it in a helpful way, but it just comes across as very condescending and I end up thinking, Oh, so they think my Japanese proficiency is so low i can’t understand that word. Which sends me into doubt over whether my language skills are actually that deficient, or whether I am speaking in a way that makes myself look at bad at Japanese.

The Effects of 特別扱い (Special Treatment)

It’s been gradual, but over the past two years, I have found myself withdrawing from the outside world. I got bad at replying to friend’s messages. I started making excuses to avoid meeting up and hanging out. I would buy all the groceries i needed to last me through the weekend on Friday after work and not emerge until Monday morning to go back to work. Even though I really love the outdoors and used to spend entire days just riding my bike along the river trails here.

...But in the past few months I’ve become unable to answer even close friends’ phone calls and messages. And I’ve even had a hard time phoning my parents, which is crazy because ever since I left home for uni I’ve called my mom on a daily basis. When I think about stepping outside of my apartment, no matter the reason or destination, I am gripped by a dread so strong I nearly throw up. I have gone a couple weekends without food because it would require me leaving my apartment to buy some, or paying for very expensive delivery which also means interacting with whoever is bringing me that food.

I’ve had a stressful summer and fall at work, and that undoubtedly has contributed to my current anxiety overload. But things have settled down at work for the past month now, and not only have I been given an award that only 2% of employees get globally, recently I have been in talks to take on what is very nearly a dream position for me within the company that is a BIG step up career-wise. I have great bosses who recognize my efforts, who listen to what I have to say, and do what they can to help when I tell them I’m in over my head.

But I have had several days where I have woken up, gotten ready for work, and just frozen at my apartment door, too sick at the thought of going outside. And yet, I can’t stand the thought of calling in sick because I feel chronic, self-imposed guilt when I take a day off, no matter the reason. So I call in to work and tell them I have a stomachache and will be in once it’s gone, (which isn’t an absolute lie), and then drag myself into work within a couple hours.

And once I enter the office, do the obligatory bow and apology for being late and causing inconveniences, the dread and anxiety vanish and I am fine until it is time for me to go outside to return home.

This makes me think that work is not a main stressor right now. It doesn’t matter if I’m going to the convenience store or the grocery store or work or anywhere. I think the constant being stared at everywhere I go has gradually accumulated to become a nasty form of social anxiety. I used to have panic attacks in middle school and high school due to home life, but since removing myself from that environment they’ve gone away. I’ve always been a socially-reserved person who shies away from the spotlight, and despite telling myself a thousand times, “Let them look at you--you’re just being you and they’re being them and that’s OKAY,” I just can’t brush it off. I have very, very seriously considered dyeing my hair from its natural brown to black in an effort to blend in, if only slightly. Which is laughable, but that’s just how much it bothers me to stand out.

But the event that really sounded the alarm for me was when my best friend of 10 years, a Japanese girl whom I met by chance my freshman year of uni, who was my roommate for 4 years of uni, who let me sleep on her living room floor here in Japan for 3 months until my work visa came through, who has been with me through thick and thin, sent me a message asking when she could drop off a souvenir for me and

I couldn’t bring myself to reply to her text.

That was when I very clearly knew that I was too deep in this funk to get myself out on my own, and I had to figure out how to get help.

Frankly, despite having struggled with panic attacks and anxiety in the past, I have never sought professional help. Until now, I never felt that my symptoms were so bad that they warranted medication. But the fact that i can’t contact my mother or my best friend, that I would rather not eat anything for two days instead of go outside, means that snorting essential oils and rubbing rose quartz against my temples or whatever isn’t going to be enough.

Mental Health Views in Japan

It’s not exactly a secret that the approach to mental health in Japan is “sweep it under the rug.” You do not talk about it. You may go to a doctor and receive medication, but you do not get counseling, because that involves talking about it. You do not tell your friends. You do not tell your family. You DEFINITELY do not tell your coworkers.

I saw my boss, T, fall into a very similar spiral to my own this summer. Stomach aches in the morning, coming in late, making excuses to get out of outings outside of work, not replying to messages, not sleeping well. And then one day he just vanished. Didn’t show up one Monday.

T wouldn’t respond to our messages so we had to contact his mother to get a hold of him. And once she had confirmed that she had spoken to him and scolded him for being “selfish” by skipping work, my coworkers were satisfied because, in their words, “Now that we know he’s still alive, we don’t have to worry.”

Honestly, that was one of the most fucked up reactions to any situation I have ever seen. I was shocked, because these coworkers truly cared for him, but their mutual reaction to this was to just...let him languish.

T announced to a select number of supervisors/colleagues that he had been diagnosed with general anxiety disorder and would be stepping down from his position. He said that he had been diagnosed years ago, but had not disclosed it because he knew that he would never be promoted if anyone knew.

And that’s one of the big reasons that no one wants to talk about their mental illness here. In Japan, having a mental illness is a shameful thing. It shows that you’re weak, that you can’t keep up with everyone else, that you are flawed in a way that will adversely affect those around you at one point or another.

But my company really is a great company and the people in charge are progressive. T has a lot of great skills and experience, and they didn’t want to let him go. So they told him that they would find someone to fill his current role, but once he had rested and gotten better, they wanted him to come back and do a position that he used to do, one that he really shined in and enjoyed. And that is where he’s at now, and he’s doing much better for it.

So, having seen all of this unfold mere months ago, I grappled with how much I should tell my employers. The talk of this new and big position in Tokyo was underway, yet I knew that I wouldn’t be able to handle it unless I got better.

So I bit the bullet, and on the night that I couldn’t respond to my best friend’s text, I sent my boss a message, explaining my symptoms, how long they’d been going on, what I thought the causes were, and that I wanted to take the morning off to see a doctor about it sometime that week.

And I was really shocked by his reply.

This boss is the guy that filled T’s position, and i didn’t know him that well yet. As it turns out, he used to be a counselor before he joined this company. He told me that I could go to the doctor whenever I wanted, but that he also wanted to talk in person about this the next day.

The next day he called me into the conference room with one other manager, a guy I really trust and like. When T vanished, shit really hit the fan at the office and it was basically this manager and me keeping us afloat for the first couple weeks, so we’ve got a lot of camaraderie going. They asked me to talk more about what was going on, why I was feeling all this anxiety, etc.

And it was during this conversation that I saw the division between the traditional Japanese views of mental health and modern views of mental health.

When I explained to them both why I wanted to see a doctor and try medication, their reactions were mixed. My boss, the former counselor, said that if I thought it was best, trying out medication for a few weeks was a good idea.

The manager looked doubtful and said, “But do you really think that going to a doctor and getting pills from him will fix everything? If you’re diagnosed, what will your colleagues think? I thought you wanted that promotion.”

In that moment i felt intense fear and regret, as well as hurt. T had said that he had withheld his diagnosis for this very reason. A part of me had wanted to think it was paranoia on his part, but now I realized that he had been right to keep it a secret. This manager, whom I knew very well and trusted deeply, clearly was of the opinion that a diagnosis/medication = evidence of weakness.

So I ended up lying and telling them, “I’ll go to the doctor just to get some sleeping pills.” (I’ve been waking up every hour on the hour for a couple months now.) Sleeping pills aren’t frowned upon in Japan and the manager was pleased with this decision.

And after that manager left, I told my boss the truth, that i would be getting anti-anxiety meds as well because I really thought it was necessary, and that I would appreciate him not disclosing it unless he was required to, which he agreed to.

Seeing a Psychiatrist in Japan

So now i had to find a psychiatrist and make an appointment. A Google search provided me horrors. Below is an excerpt of a Google review of a certain mental health clinic in my city, and the record of the exchange between the doctor and reviewer (patient). I’m not going to translate it all because it’s long, but these are some highlights of the doctor’s words directly to the patient.

“You can’t sleep? I can’t sleep either. What, do you want some pills for it?”

“You can’t expect me to believe what a patient says.”

(After he made the patient cry) “You are being so difficult. Could you stop crying?”

He gives her medication, has silent nurses send her out to the waiting room where she continues to cry, and the doctor comes to the waiting room and says, “Could you hurry up and pay and leave?”

Having read this, I was filled with absolute fear. Maybe I was better off trying to fix this on my own after all.

But I kept searching, and I also learned that my city hall has a 心の相談窓口 (Kokoro no Soudan Madoguchi), “Mind Consultation.” You can call them to learn information about what sorts of mental health facilities/options are available in your area. A very kind lady there informed me that it takes about 2-3 months to get in to any psychiatrist in this city, most of them do not take new patients, and that counseling is almost non-existent. Unless I was a harm to myself or others, I would have to wait. However, there was one general hospital in the city that had one psychiatrist staffed. This hospital has no reservation system whatsoever (very common in Japan) and takes a set number of patients in the morning and evening. I could try my luck to get in and see her.

So that was what i did, and I was able to see her on the first morning I went! I think the Kokoro no Soudan Madoguchi lady made it sound harder to get into so I wouldn’t feel let down if it didn’t work out the first time I went.

Having read the horror story above, I had a lot of trepidation stepping into the exam room with her and two nurse secretaries. I had expected it to be a very clinical, dry exchange of symptoms and a sufficient prescription with a token お大事に。

And, more than anything, I had feared that she would say something like, “Maybe you should just go home to your own country where you wouldn’t stand out.”

But she asked me a wide range of questions, with none of them focusing on the fact that I was a gaijin: what my symptoms were, how long they’d been going on, what I had going on in my life, what work was like, past history of anxiety, etc., and she and the nurses all truly listened to what i had to say. It was clear that she cared about the underlying causes and me as a person.

She told me that it sounded like I was experiencing a buildup of stress and anxiety and that she wanted me to try a low dose of anti-anxiety meds and sleeping pills for a week and then come back for another discussion.

That was 3 weeks ago. I’ve since been in the process of working with her to find the right combination of medication. Fun fact: they prescribe you Rohypnol (roofies) for sleeping meds in Japan if they deem your insomnia is serious enough. So. That is interesting.

Where I Am Now

I am keeping my boss informed of my condition and he is still very supportive. He seems to have informed his bosses of my tribulations to some extent, because they have gone out of their way to check in on me and see how I’m doing, which is very kind of them. Of course, they also know that i went above and beyond the call of duty for several months in a row until recently, and they could simply be asking because of that. Either way, I am touched that they would think of me, as I am a lowly translator for a lesser project and they are quite a ways up on the corporate ladder.

I am still in talks about taking on a very exciting position in Tokyo HQ, despite one of those bosses likely being aware of my situation to some extent. I used to dread the thought of Tokyo because I am a country girl who needs to see green, but recently I’ve come to the tough decision that I need to leave my beloved Japanese hometown, just like i left my American one. I love them, but I do not belong in them. I have visited the Tokyo HQ quite a few times, and there are a ton of foreigners in the area so I don’t stand out at all. I think that as long as I can live reasonably close enough to a park, I can satisfy my needs for nature while lessening my social anxiety.

I am having good days and bad days where it is still hard for me to leave the house. But I am having more good days than bad now. And today I was finally able to send a text message back to my best friend. Which really doesn’t seem like a lot, but it is a lot to me. My friend is supportive and understanding, which means the world to me.

I’m getting back to being me. 💗

p.s.: The gif at the top of this is from the anime Mushishi, which I think illustrates various mental illnesses and their effects in a very metaphoric way.

#personal #mental health #stress #anxiety #social anxiety #expatlife #japan #life in japan #rural japan #mental health awareness #expat in japan #mental health recovery #mental health support in japan #love yourself #you can overcome this

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residentlesbrarian · 4 years ago

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The First Book I Read In the Dark: Queer Witches and a Whole Bunch of Redwood Trees

The Lost Coast by Amy Rose Capetta

Let me set the scene...we start Day 1 of this experience curled up next to the white painted fireplace desperate for warmth with two blankets, an extra hoodie, a stocking cap, and my trusty lazy husband for that much needed lumbar support.

Now The Lost Coast was a book I had checked out multiple times over the past year of silence on this blog because every time I saw it on the shelf I would pick it up, flip to the blurb, read it and go, “Man, that sounds so good! I gotta read it!” Then I’d check it out and it would sit in my locker, or in my car, or on my desk for three weeks and I’d turn it in completely untouched. But this time...this time I swore I was reading this damn book! Even if I was reading 10 pages a day during my breaks at work I was gonna finally read this book, it wasn’t going unread sitting somewhere for three weeks again. Little did I know how right I would be!

So as a bit of a precursor this is the only book of those I read in the dark that I had already started. I was 90 pages in when I started reading on Day 1 and I only get more incoherent from here so let’s do this!

Unicorn Rating:

Blurb: Our protagonist is pulled across the country to the yawning redwood forest of northern California and discovers more than she could ever imagine. Her mom thought Danny kissing girls was the worst of her problems but now she has to deal with witches and magic and is that a dead body! This non-stop ride is just getting started!

Disclaimer: I will try my best to not spoil anything from the book, but my book loving rambles may give more away than a traditional review. Here we go! Ramble time!

Review:

Okay so I would say this book pretty firmly falls in a middle ground of okay for me. It was some really great escapism for me in a time when I really needed it, but the way the book was structured and written just didn’t really jive with my usual reading tastes. It felt to me like it was trying so hard to be poetic and artistic that it got a little lost at times, no pun intended with the title of the book.

Now for the plot, which I think was maybe the strongest element of this book. The driving plot of the book never changed and was always consistent and I really liked how the author wove the magic of the world and the unique structure of how she was telling the story while never losing the plot in that unique structure. It was always peeling away one layer at a time and showing us just a bit more without holding our hand. It was very well done and kept me guessing and trying to figure out what was going to happen and how it was all going to end. Next we have what is usually my favorite part of a review but this time...isn't.

I have so many conflicted feelings about the characters in The Lost Coast. On one hand holy giant redwoods I haven’t read a book since Not Your Sidekick that had this many casually queer characters just strutting about doing their thing, but on the other hand I feel the way the story was written leaves so much to be desired. The characters feel so thin and lacking when they had the potential to be so rich and diverse. Don’t get me wrong they are diverse in the bare bones definition, but we know so little about them at the end of the day it feels like it doesn’t really matter. We have our protagonist, Danny, who we know has a strained relationship with her mother but is close enough with she was willing to move her across the country in an attempt to try and give her a fresh start. Now there are somethings that take place in the story that explain a lot of the odd things about Danny’s character and made me a lot less unhappy with her by the time the book ended but it was really hard to get behind her as a protagonist at the beginning not because I didn’t like her but because I wasn’t motivated to follow her into the story. She was just going along from one event to the next with no real drive of her own, which brings us to the Grays: Hawthorne, June, Lelia, and Rush. They at least have a consistent motivation, but they had such potential to be really interesting characters but each one fell just short for me. The closest one to a compelling for me was Rush, we learned the most about her and I think that was mostly because Danny paid the most attention to her for obvious gay reasons. Now I can’t really expand too much more without going into massive spoiler territory for the plot which I don’t want to do, because the book is good and is an experience I don’t want to take away from anyone it just fell flat for me.

So yeah, this book wasn’t what I expected and I think a huge part of that was because the blurb is so much different than what is in the book itself. And I know, as a lesbrarian I should know not to judge a book by its cover or its blurb...but that is your first exposure to the story you are going to be reading and in this case the tone was so much different. Now let me reiterate this book wasn’t bad. There were parts that were so beautifully written I had to reread them several times to take in the layers of imagery and sheer poetry of the prose, but I feel like at times that style took away from the story itself and most of all it took away from the characters so that by the end of it they just fall a bit flat for me. I do recommend you give it a shot though because you won’t find a book with a queerer cast out there and maybe it will speak to you more than it did to me.

Queer Wrap-up: Alright lets look at the this stellar tally shall we. Even with my own lack luster feelings toward the characters from a story perspective you can’t over look the fact that all but one character we interact with on page regularly is queer. That is something I have never seen before, so it more than earned its five unicorns, even if the quality was a bit lacking on the tail end the quantity really pulled it out. So we have our protagonist who is unapologetically kissing girls from page one and doesn’t ever shut up about it but also doesn’t shy away from the fact she also finds boys undeniably adorable and cute. In a scene that makes this tally easier than most she defines herself as queer so we are gonna stick with that. Within the Grays we have Lelia who is a tiny nonbinary gray ace person who will get in your face and is not afraid to be called a weirdo, June is a “femme as fuck” lesbian who is also not white (I belive Danny describes her as vaguely pacific islander at one point. I swear it was more specifically stated what her ethnicity was somewhere later in the book but I didn’t write it down at the time and couldn’t find it in my quick flip threw the book when I grabbed it to jot down their stated sexualities, but she is definitely not white), Hawthorne is a bisexual black witch who states she has “a strong lean toward masculine folks” which is refreshing to see bisexual representation that isn’t just “gay but guys exist I guess”, then we have Rush who very succinctly sums herself up with “Fat. Queer. White. Cello Player.” She is also some add rep in the form of having synesthesia where she can taste words. We also have some disability rep as June has an injury to her leg from a fall out of a tree that never healed properly and it does cause problems for her throughout the book, not the greatest rep but it’s there and shouldn’t be forgotten or not included. Man, oh man, this is the longest wrap-up I think I’ve ever written but I am still not done yet. We have Imogen who is the missing Gray mentioned in the blurb and brought up pretty quickly in the story and without spoiling anything we do get confirmation she is also undeniably queer as well as another character that I can’t even begin to talk about without a giant redacted stamp for spoiler reasons, but just know this book does have queer rep coming out its ears.

Links:

Amy Rose Capetta’s Website

Goodreads

So yes here we come to the end of the first Book I Read In the Dark it was a whimsical journey through redwoods with witches and more queerness than you could shake a widowmaker at (if you don’t get that reference read the book). I finished this book on Day 1 and immediately dove right into Book 2 because well I didn’t have anything else to do and I was kinda reeling from the confusion of this book and wanted something to ground me. The next book was one I had wanted to read for a very long time. You’ll see whether it did the job or not.

As always if you want to read this but don’t want to spend the money without knowing for sure you are going to like it, go to your local library. You’d be surprised what they have on their shelves just waiting to be discovered. Trust me, I’m a lesbrarian.

#The Lost Coast #Amy Rose Capetta #resident lesbrarian #five unicorns #3 queer girls #1 bisexual black girl #1 gray ace nonbinary person #1 lesbian #1 queer [redacted]#wlw rep #ya novel #paranormal #magical realism #go to you local library #but wear a mask #and wash your hands #and stay 6 feet apart #be safe guys gals and nonbinary pals

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iamasjay · 4 years ago

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Skeleton

Sit back and relax I’m about to go off Grab a gas mask in case I cough This is for those that want to talk shit About me so they will not forget

I am tired and I am lost When cold opinions form a frost “You should go die you pollute the air” So does your ass and that’s still here

I’ll admit I can see my skeleton Laying still with limbs like gelatine Six feet underneath the ground Because of words that weigh me down

If only you knew how life was like How I’ve thought of taking a hike What it’s like to feel pathetic For having a brain that feels prosthetic

The constant worry of being too much To handle like a manual’s clutch The fact that you don’t have to think “Why am I flawed for being autistic?”

I only want to be understood Accepted too just like I should How many times do I have to demand For people to see and understand?

So maybe the best thing I can do Is be that fly that people shoo But instead I’ll be the mosquito Falsely hidden like I’m incognito

If you want to spit your insults Good luck dealing with the results You don’t know me or fit my skin Or seen the scars that lay within

“Be like a sunflower n’ look at the sun” “Stand up tall like a really strong one” Said the one who gets it n’ knows Just how to fully describe a rose

So think about the things you say Before you speak like the other day Get inside when the sky rains acid Burning your ego while it’s at it

One thing left for me to embrace Since you can’t diss towards my face Shove your words back down your throat And listen to this and take note

You see I may be disabled But I’m perfectly able To turn this table If you layer me with a label

#skeleton

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arosnowflake · 5 years ago

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Look Out for Your Own

Fandom: No. 6

Wordcount: 2470

Summary: Inukashi is autistic and starts to suspect Shion is as well, and starts helping him out in a mentor-like fashion.

Notes: Written for Autism Acceptance Month.

///

“What’s autism?”

Inukashi turned to look at Shion, incredulous. “What, they didn’t teach you that in your fancy classrooms?”

“Apparently not,” he replied. He’d stopped washing Fluffball, one of the few dogs who actually liked baths, and she looked at him with pleading eyes. Shion didn’t seem to notice, too busy looking at em with that stupid head-cock he did when he was curious.

“Huh.” Eir fingers drummed on eir legs, a smirk playing on eir lips. “Guess sometimes even us slum rats know more than No. 6’s precious genius children.”

“I suspect you guys probably know a lot more than we do,” Shion said dryly. “No. 6 controls the information we citizens receive with an iron fist; the more ignorant we are, the easier we are to control.”

Inukashi nodded. “Knowledge is power, and all that.” If there was anything ey understood, it was that. “Maybe I shouldn’t explain it to you after all.”

“What?” He sounded so shocked at that, as if he hadn’t set himself up for it, but damnit, Shion’s puppy eyes were at least as effective as Fluffball’s. Inukashi clacked eir tongue.

“Fine, whatever. Autism is a thing that makes your brain work differently from other people, and it makes it more difficult for you to communicate with others, among other things.” Ey shrugged. “Basically, I have trouble reading people’s body language, or understanding what they mean. Dogs are way easier to read.”

“So it’s a mental disorder?”

“Yup,” ey said, popping the ‘p’.

Now Fluffball was full-on nudging Shion, but he somehow still managed to remain oblivious, hands clapped together and rocking slightly back and forth. “That explains why I didn’t learn about it, then; No. 6 wants us to believe all disorders and disabilities have been erased from the city, although that would obviously be completely impossible, but regardless, they avoid talking about them whenever possible. I imagine those with a history or neurology specialization might’ve learned about it, although I have no doubt the information would be extremely biased -”

“Aaand I don’t care,” Inukashi cut him off. “Get on with the washing, nerd. Fluffball is about to start crying.”

Shion startled, immediately returning to rubbing soap, to a happy tail wag of Fluffball. “Fluffy I’m so sorry! I tend to get caught up in these things...”

He sure did. If it was about biology, Shion could ramble on for hours uninterrupted, a glint in his eyes and swinging on his toes, like -

Oh. Kinda like ey did, back when ey were younger and less aware of the fact that such blatant displays of emotions could get you scammed or, if you were particularly unlucky, killed.

Huh.

Something to keep an eye on. Knowledge was power, after all.

///

The next time Shion brought it up was on cleaning day. Once a month, Inukashi did a deep clean of the main hall and the more expensive hotel rooms; of course, it wasn’t that people here cared much about cleanliness, but ey liked to make sure none of eir guests left with more infections than they came with, at least. And so, deep cleaning.

Inukashi had offered Shion a job helping em, because honestly, ey could use the help. The dogs were enthusiastic, but there was only so much they could do without opposable thumbs.

They were scrubbing the stairs when Shion asked: “Does the smell of cleaning supplies bother you?”

Inukashi blinked. “What’s it to you?”

Shion looked up at em, and oh no, those eyes were sparkling, he was about to go on a tangent. “I’ve been reading up on autism since you last mentioned it, and it’s quite fascinating, really! Most of the literature I’ve been able to find pertains to the more technical side of the disorder, talking about how exactly it affects the brain, but I’ve been able to get a hold of some personal accounts as well, and one of them mentioned having trouble with the smell of cleaning supplies. And I mean, I get that, I already have a lot of trouble with that and I’m not even autistic, so I was wondering what that was like for you.”

Good god, that boy really was a nerd, huh.

Well, regardless. This was a good opportunity to snoop.

Inukashi dropped eir rag back into the water. “I don’t have much of an issue with it, though honestly, that might just be because the soap here sucks balls.” After a short pause, ey offered. “But I do have a lot of issues with sounds. Everything here’s so goddamn loud all the time, it kills me.”

Shion’s leg began to bounce as he seemed to forget all about the cleaning he was supposed to do, and his fingers drummed against his leg. Hadn’t they done that last time, as well? “I suppose it’s really busy here, yeah, though honestly I like it better than the weird quiet in No. 6. And yeah, the soap here sucks. It doesn’t have much smell here, which is nice, because in No. 6...” he shuddered. “Well, sanitation used to be part of my job, and the smell got so strong that I needed to run outside more than once a day, just to escape from it. West Block’s much easier to deal with. Sure, it objectively smells worse, but it’s also less...” he paused. “Sharp? Less sharp is the only way I can describe it. It hurts less.”

Shion, the genius who said “I’m not autistic” and “the smell of bleach hurts so much I need to physically run away from it” in the same sentence. What an idiot.

“Well, if you have trouble with it again, try to focus on other sensations. Like, focus on how your shirt feels against your body. Or get a bunch of dogs to distract you and attack people who are making you feel bad. That works too.”

Wait. Why had ey said that? Shion hadn’t even asked for advice, and ey’d just given it to him, free of charge. What the hell.

Shion snorted. “I’ll try and see if I can train Nezumi’s rats to attack people, thanks.”

And before ey could stop emself, ey imagined one of the Cleaners getting taken out by a small rat, and ey laughed.

///

Shion was autistic. Like, really obviously autistic. Inukashi had no idea how the kid hadn’t picked up on it himself.

There were a thousand little clues strewn across him, from his drumming fingers and bouncing legs to the way he infodumped about anything at the slightest provocation, his savant-like intelligence and his simultaneous obliviousness to people, his staunch idealism and his gullible nature. Shion was autistic from top to toe and it didn’t even take a month of observation to figure it out.

Worse, though, was that Inukashi couldn’t seem to help emself from mentoring him.

Ey shared some of eir more subtle stims with him in the hopes that he would stop being such an open book (he didn’t, obviously, he was a hopeless case), ey tried to teach him some of eir cheats for interacting with people (Shion was very surprised to learn that ey never looked anyone in the eye, instead staring at their nose, but it turned out that he didn’t have much issue with that, so that was a bust), ey even tried to explain a bit more about autism of eir own volition (Shion hang to eir every word and then applied absolutely none of the information to himself). Ey didn’t know why ey bothered. There was just something about that kid that made em want to protect him.

Not that ey’d ever admit it, not even - alright, yeah, ey’d admit it under pain of death, but ey’d do just about anything under pain of death. Either way, ey finally felt like ey understood how Shion had managed to get under noted asshole Nezumi’s skin. Shion was just like that.

The turning point came on a sunny afternoon. It wasn’t anything special, they hadn’t even planned to meet; they’d simply run into each other at the market, and decided to walk home with each other.

Something was up with Shion.

He was shaking out his hands at his side and hadn’t stopped even after Inukashi had pointed it out (it attracted attention, and attention was never a good thing). His eyes flitted side to side, like a hunted rabbit, and if Inukashi didn’t know better, ey’d think he was being followed by someone. However, there was no reason for anyone to want revenge on Shion, so it must be something else. If there was no actual danger, why did he look so scared?

“Hey Shion, what’s wrong?”

Shion barely looked down, and when he opened his mouth, only a vague grunting nose came out. He tried again. “...Much...not,” was all he could say, and he clawed at his face, seemingly frustrated about something.

Oh. He was having a meltdown.

A few whistles and Inukashi’s dogs were on the move, carving out a path among the people to get em and Shion out of the crowd as fast as possible. Shion didn’t even seem to notice that something was off, but followed em, probably too dazed to do anything else. Within minutes, they were far away from the market, between abandoned houses where fewer people lived. It was quieter here, a little darker, a little cooler, and it was where Inukashi went whenever ey couldn’t keep it together anymore. Hopefully it’d help Shion too.

Not a moment too soon. Shion started clawing at his face with a ferver ey’d never seen before, and Inukashi quickly threw eir mantle over his head to prevent him from hurting himself. “Sit,” ey ordered. “Put your head between your knees.” Simple words, swift orders to provide structure. Things that had always helped em, although eir dogs didn’t talk; they just did. But dog hair was different from human skin, and Inukashi had never liked to be touched by humans when ey were like this, so ey didn’t touch Shion, and hoped he would just follow verbal orders.

He did, dropping against a wall and pressing his head between his knees, fisting Inukashi’s mantle so tight his knuckles paled, holding onto it like it was his only lifeline. He didn’t scream. That was kind of odd; Inukashi screamed a lot when ey were like this. Just a difference between them, ey supposed.

They sat there for a while, Shion rocking in a frantic, but eerily quiet manner, and Inukashi leaning to the wall next to him, keeping an eye out for any assholes who might take advantage of Shion’s weakened state.

Ey didn’t know how long it took Shion to calm down, but he did, eventually, sliding off eir mantle.

“...You,” he started, then shook his head, biting his hand in frustration.

“If you can’t talk, don’t,” Inukashi said. “And don’t hurt yourself. Bite on your sleeve if you need to.”

Shion switched to his sleeve, biting on it hard, and after a few seconds, nodded.

“I’m taking you home for now, we can talk about this tomorrow. Take a nap or something.”

Shion nodded again, too tired to protest.

It took them longer than it should to get to Nezumi and Shion’s little shelter, Shion sometimes stopping in the middle of the path just to stare in the distance. But, finally, they did make it, and thankfully, Nezumi was still home.

“What -” he started, but Inukashi pushed past him.

“Lie on the damn bed, idiot, and go take a nap,” ey ordered Shion, and he did so without questioning, falling asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.

“You want to tell me what’s going on?” Nezumi asked, arms crossed.

“Your boyfriend had a meltdown,” Inukashi said shortly. “If you dare bully him about it I’ll sic my dogs on you, got that?”

“Dully noted,” Nezumi said dryly, still leaning against the wall as if he couldn’t care less about anything in the world, but his eyes betrayed him as they flickered over to Shion.

“You can make him something warm when he wakes up,” Inukashi answered his unasked question. “And keep a notebook nearby. He seemed to have trouble talking.”

“Whatever,” he replied, making a truly pathetic effort to disguise his worry. “Get out of my house, dog.”

“With pleasure, asshole.”

Shion would be fine. Nezumi was an absolute softy when it came to that boy, and by now, Inukashi could hardly even blame him without being a big fat hypocrite.

///

“So,” Shion started. It had been three days since his meltdown, and Inukashi had decided to let him come to em instead of badgering him emself. It had taken longer than expected for him to confront em. But now, here he was, looking like himself again. “I have a feeling I might be autistic.”

Inukashi looked at him, and promptly burst out into laughter.

“It’s not funny!” Shion protested. “I’m not joking!”

“It’s not -” Inukashi gasped. “Obviously you’re not joking. It’s just that it was blatantly obvious, and it’s hilarious it took you this long to figure it out.”

Shion blinked. “It was obvious?”

“Oh yeah, believe me, you might as well have ‘autism’ written across your forehead. And even that would’ve probably been more subtle.”

Shion squinted. “If you knew, why didn’t you tell me?”

Inukashi shrugged. “Didn’t feel like it. I’m kind of an asshole, remember?”

Shion looked at em for a solid ten seconds, before a grin slowly spread across his face.

“You know,” he said nonchalantly, “I just realized you’ve been helping me quite a bit. Giving me tips, helping me deal with that meltdown, stuff like that.”

“I have not!” Inukashi protested, but Shion ignored em.

“So what I think,” Shion continued, “is that you didn’t know how to tell me, so you just let me figure it out myself. While also helping me in the meantime.”

“You’re reading into things that aren’t there,” Inukashi muttered, tapping eir feet rapidly. Shion laughed.

“Sure,” he giggled. “You’re a heartless information broker who cares only for emself, got it.”

“And don’t you forget it,” ey confirmed. Then paused for a second. “Also, the gal who sells meat, the one with the red hair, knows sign language. Just in case that’s something you’d wanna know.”

Shion nodded. “Of course, this has nothing to do with the fact that I have trouble communicating verbally at times.”

“Absolutely not,” Inukashi confirmed. “It’s just something I thought was interesting.”

“Well, thank you anyway,” Shion said, smile softened from a smirk to something friendlier, something you rarely saw here in the West Block.

That boy would be the death of em, one day. Still, it was kind of nice to have another autistic here.

Maybe Shion was onto something with that whole ‘helping people’ thing.

#no. 6 #shion #inukashi #shion no. 6 #inukashi no. 6 #actuallyautistic #autistic headcanon #my posts #my writing #auti stuff #writing wise

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tsauergrass · 5 years ago

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Hi! I noticed your comment on gnarfs fic recs and was wondering what are you favourite fics and which you would recommend :)

oH it would not be an exaggeration to say I’ve been waiting for this ask since practically the day I created my blog lol (I’m so excited!!)

I do have a fic rec list sitting in my drafts (tagged forever ago by @rockmarina and still haven’t found the time to complete 😭) but oh dear here we go! In no particular order:

Running on Air by eleventy7

Draco Malfoy has been missing for three years. Harry is assigned the cold case and finds himself slowly falling in love with the memories he collects.

This fic is so beautiful it will break your heart without you even knowing it and you will be left aching for days. It will forever be my favorite fic and it is the most beautiful fic I have ever read—it is the one that brought me into Drarry when I didn’t even ship them! The loneliness is so well captured, the scenes so beautifully described, and both the suspense and the emotional storylines are so well crafted. td;lr: please go read this stunningly beautiful fic I promise you won’t be disappointed

The Lip-Lock Jinx by cassisluna

It's a jinx that renders the victim mute, unless he/she serves the purpose of the jinx and kisses the person that they desire. It's just Harry's luck that he's in love with Draco. HPDM, one-shot, eighth year.

Already fussed over it once but here we are again! Eighth-year fic, Draco is quieter but still witty, Harry is clumsy in his affections, Ginny is brilliant. It’s so soft you will place your hand on your chest and sigh, you will smile helplessly because your heart is brimming with softness. A dose of this fic on a bad day and I promise you will feel just the bit better.

Stop All the Clocks (This Is the Last Time I’m Leaving Without You) by firethesound

Living with Draco was difficult; living without him is unbearable. But if there’s one thing Harry learned from the war, it’s that even when one life ends, the rest of the world goes right on living.

Warning: MCD, it is—oh dear it is the angstiest fic I have ever read. It tore my heart out of my chest and it is so, so good. The writing is beautiful, I love the way Draco and Harry’s relationship progressed, I adore their characterization, how they bicker and care. Harry’s road to recovery is rocky and winding but it is,, so genuine. (I also adore the structure of this fic lol, the two timelines are weaved together seamlessly and it just fascinated me!) This fic will leave the most beautiful scar in your heart but really, if you can afford it, it is so worth it.

Grounds for Divorce by tepre

Malfoy finds a coin. Harry finds a letter.

A story about histories, a story about families. A story about a lemon tree somewhere in Upper Egypt.

This is, like, the slowest slow burn of all slow burns. It’s a bond fic, as you will discover pretty soon into the story—but it proceeds so differently than I ever expected. It is messy, beautiful, winding, Harry and Draco proceed to take the same freakin path two thousand times without ever reaching the destination—but it’s all good, and you see the beauty in the messiness because that is how life is. And when they finally get themselves together it’s just, so sweet you can’t stop smiling and you can feel their happiness, so close to your heart. It’s a slow journey and you have to take it with them if you want to see it bear fruit, and you realize in the end it doesn’t matter how winding the paths are, because you were always going to reach that place. And stay. Like I lie in bed at one a.m. and I think about how Draco and Harry are sleeping together in Grimmauld and I wanna tear up. The prose is beautiful, and messy like the story itself, and I just adore the way everything is described, so authentic, and the way the start of the end is the beginning (no spoilers yes?) Go read it and afterwards sit at the same place for twenty minutes in complete awe and content

The Generation Who Lived by lettersbyelise

In the months leading up to the 10th anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts, Draco Malfoy writes a series of articles about war survivors.

So far, he’s managed to interview everyone he wanted.

Everyone...except his old nemesis, his one-time lover, and the elusive war hero who stubbornly refuses to be featured in Draco’s interview series; Harry Potter.

This fic tackles so many different aspects of consent—and weaves them into the story itself so well. There are many controversial topics, and they were explored with honesty: nothing is shunned, nothing is avoided, there are many voices that challenge what you really think. And these are the best kind of fics, really. I especially love the characterization of Luna, because it is so difficult to get her right—but she is, wonderfully candid in her whimsical way, tripping you over in your own thought. I love Draco and Harry’s story as well, the misunderstanding and the miscommunication—the confrontation, a reminder for a lot of us that being upfront and honest is so so important. The way Draco is neither redeemed nor un-redeemed yet trying in his own way is also very dear to me.

Sharing Different Heartbeats and Let Them Wash Off in the Rain by talithan

Before Harry ever saw Draco’s room, before they ever shared a greasy order of chips or long-held secrets, before Draco’s boss ever tried to chat up Harry, they hadn’t even exchanged mobile numbers. To be fair, Draco didn’t have a mobile then.

It’s Harry’s first time in New York City, and he is determined to have a good time. How Draco Malfoy figures into this remains to be seen.

I recently discovered them and just, ahhh. Completely adore them! They are not related, just by the same author. Both are so gentle and it feels as if nothing really important is happening—and nothing is—but the feelings are there all the same, gentle too. It’s like sitting by the window listening to soft rain. The sky is grey, the lights are dim, and you’re not really thinking about anything... just listening to the rain falling...

These are some of my absolute favorites! There are many more, (so many more,) and if you’d like you can check the bookmarked recommendations on my ao3! (It’s a messy, rumpled place but) here are a few of them:

fly like paper, high like planes by harryromper

Harry Potter, Head Coach of the Appleby Arrows, is very content leading a quiet life. He has a doddery old house-elf who makes his breakfast, a team of players who love Quidditch almost as much as he does, and a Kneazle that curls against his damaged leg at the foot of his bed at night. The absolute last thing he needs is a fit, tattooed, and wildly talented Draco Malfoy back from living his life on the margins. Soon he’s dealing with goblins for the first time since the war, traveling to Prague, eating dodgy squid, and maybe, just maybe, accepting that Quidditch, Malfoy, and even Harry himself are still capable of change.

(I love Draco covered in tattoos, Draco with a family in Prague, Harry with disability, Harry and his kneazle, amazing OC’s)

Reigniting Harry Potter (A Task For Draco Malfoy) by QueenofThyme

Harry Potter is depressed and won't leave his house, or his bed if he can help it. Hermione has the bright idea to send Draco Malfoy over, who is surprisingly gentler than Harry realised, and might actually just be able to reignite a spark in Harry...if he stops being an arrogant prat of course.

(It’s a gentle story, I love the ending and the description of Harry’s depression just feels really genuine)

To Hurt and Heal by cassisluna

They say that everybody who gets out of Azkaban comes out a little mad. After the war, Draco Malfoy spends three months in Azkaban. He just wants to go insane in peace, but Harry Potter finds that he, inexplicably, still can't leave Draco alone.

(It’s. Heartbreaking and tender all at once)

Don’t let go by parkkate

When Draco ends up having to take care of Teddy’s new pet, he’s sure the universe is trying to torture him. Little does he know things are about to get so much worse. And of course, it involves one Harry Potter.

(The amount of cuddles is atrocious in the fic, I repeat, atrocious. The depth is also amazing and unexpected)

Take Into the Air (My Quiet Breath) by GuardianMira

Draco is dying of Hanahaki Disease. Serves him right, Harry thinks.

(But this is, like, the perfect Hanahaki disease fic. The perfect blend of angst and tension and relationship development with a heartbreaking, beautiful ending.)

Four Times Harry was Late...and One Time He was Late again by dracogotgame

Title says it all

(FLUFF. LOTS OF THEM. And it’s so clever you want to throw your phone across the room and clutch your heart and AWWWWWW, you’ll know it when you get there)

Talk to Me by Saras_Girl

When the usual channels of communication are shut down, the most surprising people can find a way in. A strange little love story.

(The setting is similar to The Lip-Lock Jinx, so very sweet!)

Slow Hands by eleventy7

Blood, shadows, and paper hearts. The Shadow hunts students, but Draco Malfoy most of all.

(This is,, beautiful. Gentle. Quiet, like when you wake up early before dawn and no one else is up.)

Everything a Word Can Mean and Constant Flux by rockmarina

In a world where magical people are born with the nickname their soulmate will call them by tattooed on their skin... what does it mean that the word on Harry's chest is the thing he hates to be called the most?

Harry Potter is the one constant in Draco's life, only each time in a very different way.

(These are just. Soft. Fluff. The first one is so poetic I love it so much, the second one gave me so much Feels)

Inferno by jadepresley

If he was ice then she was the fire, and though he loved her he was quite certain they were destined to destroy one another in the end.

(Okay this one is not Drarry but it will BLOW YOUR MIND. Seriously, the writing is so beautiful, the story so vivid, so strong. It will ring in your mind)

There we go! There are so many more fics I would gladly rec only this post is getting quite long. I would also recommend you check out the rest of an authors’ works if the first one you read fascinates you, you won’t be disappointed!

#fic rec #drarry fic rec #this took me QUITE A WHILE #to assemble and agonize over which ones I should include #as proven by the repeating there are many more!!!#and the formatting #I'm so sorry if it's messy #I literally squeaked in delight when I received this ask #thank u lovely anon

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thesffcorner · 5 years ago

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Get a Life Chloe Brown

Get a Life Chloe Brown is a romantic comedy, written by Talia Hibbert. It follows Chloe Brown, a freelance web designer from a wealthy family, who one day has a near death experience. This shakes her profoundly, not just for the obvious reasons, but also because she realizes that if she were to die, she would have nothing to show for herself; no friends, no boyfriend, no adventure and no interesting events. In an effort to change that she makes a list of things to do, and meets a person that just might help her do it: Redford, her new superintendent. I was interested in this book ever since I heard it was coming out, because the premise, for whatever reason reminded me of a mix of two things: the profoundly stupid, yet profoundly watchable film What’s Your Number, and Michelle Pfeiffer’s story-line in New Years Day. This book is neither stupid nor silly; it’s one of the funniest, well written rom-coms I’ve ever read, and not since Red White and Royal Blue, have I liked two characters this much. Let’s start with the writing. I didn’t know Hibbert was British, but one page in and this book was so British it hurt. From the jokes to the banter, I felt like I was watching an episode of Bad Education, and I laughed out loud more times than I can count. Both characters are very snarky, and Chloe especially has a rather dry sense of humor that comes off as rude to others, because it’s so stiff. I found it hilarious, though the real standout for me was Red, because his internal monologues had me in stitches. Let me give you a sample of the jokes, here are a few. “We definitely have bears” “We don’t. If we had bears, it’d be in the news all the time. You know. Fine upstanding British man attacked by a bear. EU to blame. Brexit now.” Gigi appeared helpfully on her shoulder and said “Don’t mumble, darling. Nice big words. Repeat after me: ‘I want to ride you like a stallion.’” “Red snorted: ‘Who are you, Dr. Phill?’ ‘Ah, don’t start that manly crap. We talk about our feelings in this house, boy.’ ‘Can I talk about my feelings for your wife?’ ‘This bowl would be a great hat on you’” This couldn’t be more up my alley. Outside of the humor, the writing on the characters was equally well done. Not only do we get a very good sense of both Red and Chloe as individuals, but Hibbert makes the chemistry between them palpable. I believed that these two people could barely hold off from ripping each other’s clothes off, and later, when they became more emotionally invested, I believed in their romance. All the characters are well written; from Chloe’s family, especially her sisters, to Red’s friend Vic and even his mother. Because we get POVs from both Chloe and Red, I was worried they might sound the same, because both are such snarky characters, but they didn’t; they have very different personalities and ways of approaching their problems, which I found was translated quite well. The plot wasn’t particularly complex; it mostly just follows Chloe making a deal with Red so he can help her tick off things on her list, and slowly getting an understanding of what is actually important to her and what isn’t. The book does also follow Red coming to some realizations of his own, notably what he wants to do with his life, now that he’s escaped an abusive relationship. Which leads me to two points of caution for this book. The first is that the cover and the synopsis might mislead you into thinking that this is straight up comedy, which it is, but more in the vein of How to Be Single or Trainwreck. There are some really heavy topics discussed in this book: there is the aftermath of an abusive relationship, disability, trauma from loss, PTSD even, and a very brutal verbal fight that doesn’t pull punches. It’s a funny book, but it has surprising depth, and Hibbert really touches on some heavy and complicated topics, while maintaining an overall light tone. There’s even a warning on the first page of the book about some of the triggers, so tread lightly. The other point are the sex scenes. Now, readers of romance, and those who are familiar with Hibbert’s other work, will probably know that this book has sex scenes. I’ve heard from other people that they either found them extremely hot or completely over the top. I fall in the former category; the sex is explicit, but I think the scenes are paced well, are genuinely engaging and steamy and actually explore the characters, and their growing attraction to each-other. The only critique I do have is that the characters, especially Red do sound a bit OOC in them, because there’s a lot of dirty talk that is a bit much even for him, but honestly, outside of laughing at it, it didn’t personally bother me. Let’s talk about characters. There aren’t many, but each gets a moment to shine. Out of the supporting cast, my favorite was Vic, though I can’t wait for Evelyn’s book, because she seemed like a hoot too. Out of the leads, let’s start with Red. Redford, who I imagine is named after the dog, being a ginger and all is a charming, attractive and confident man, who has been through a really abusive relationship that has made him spiral into bad decision making. He has quite a few flaws, the most notable being a chip on his shoulder about being treated as a spectacle, or a commodity, by people who are richer than him and can therefore buy him in many ways; buy him for his looks, his time, his talent or just simply observe him like some kind of circus animal. I found all of his quirks understandable and well written; he does make some stupid decisions, and he seems to be incapable of saying no. But he was the better adjusted lead out of the two, which was nice. He did veer off into being a little too perfect and considerate at time, which was just a tad unrealistic, but I really liked his personality a lot. Then we have Chloe who I adored, even though she falls definitely in the tradition of quirky, type A female protagonists. She is obsessed with lists, organization, planning out her days and her life, and there’s a good reason for that: she suffers from fibromyalgia. I will admit; while I do know two people in my life who have, fibromyalgia I knew very little about the disorder. I didn’t know that it seems to be caused by trauma for one, nor did I know that it leads to brain fog or short term memory loss. I think the way the illness was described in the book, and the way it impacted Chloe’s life was presented very well; I can definitely understand and sympathize with how she had developed her coping mechanisms, the healthy and unhealthy ones. Chloe is a very strong character; she is funny, she is smart, she is witty, and what I liked most was she knew her limits, knew when to push and when to take a break, and was actively fighting to live a life she would be proud of, in spite of fibromyalgia. I really liked how well Hibbert explored both what it’s like to live with an invisible illness, and the toll it takes both on the person and those around them, but also how having an illness or a disability doesn’t mean that the person can’t take care of them-self or live a perfectly good life. I’m not disabled, so I can’t speak to that representation, but as just a humble reader who wanted to learn a bit more, I was satisfied. One other thing to note is that Chloe is both plus size and black. In terms of race I appreciated the conversation she had with Red about privilege, and I think perhaps a bit more could have been explored on that front. In terms of weight, Chloe’s weight is mentioned at several points, but it’s not really a factor. I kind of liked that; Chloe gets to be a fat girl who is content with her life, and it’s not even a factor. It was nice. Overall, this book was great. It’s funny, it’s sweet, it’s very sexy, and it tackles some deeper issues and topics like class and disability in a nuanced and lighthearted way. If you are looking for a good romance with some substance, I highly recommend it.

goodreads

#get a life chloe brown #get a life chloe brown review #book review #moni talks

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