#.happy stuff and comfort scenes are the hardest thing in the universe to write.

[dreamerdrop]

How many different grotesque and mortifying ways can I whump Julian Bashir: a memoir.

[there-are-things-i-dont-forget]

SPOILERS FOR CRITICAL ROLE CAMPAIGN 2 BELOW

I just wanted to talk about how much the Mighty Nein and Matt and Critical Role have meant to me over the past few months. I started Campaign 2 in January this year, when I moved out for university and was able to live on my own for the first time. They quite literally saved me, because I cared so much for the setting and the characters and the story that Matt wove and how the players interacted with them that I hung on just to see how it would end. 

For me, it was amazing how I could relate the characters to aspects of myself, and how watching them all get their happy endings have made me be able to look forward with a bit more hope.

Let’s start with Beau. I’ll be honest, Marisha’s characters are always the most challenging for me, because of how real they are. Marisha is a stunning actor, incredibly skilled, and Beau was the character I responded to the most as if it was a real person. Everyone else I could enjoy and play into the metagame of watching the players be characters. With Beau and Marisha, it was so real. Moreover, I could see myself reflected in the character (which is probably why I found her so challenging to begin with). Trauma, hurt, being an asshole to other people before they could reject her first. Not the best at compliments, giving in to anger and sarcasm, struggling to connect. And I got to watch her grow, and be accepted, and learn from her mistakes, and be appreciated by who she was, and in the end get vindication on her abusers, and find love and acceptance. Beau’s story is incredibly special to me.

In that same vein is Yasha’s. Manipulated, taken advantage of, forced to do things against her will. Yasha’s story is the one that I can relate to the most, in terms of trauma, and to see her quite literally rip the wings off of her abuser was cathartic in a way that I did not expect, but should have foreseen. And in the end, she also got her happy ending. I’m gonna leave it at that, because any more will make me cry. But I hold her and her character arc so close to my heart.

Liam’s performances are the hardest for me to watch because he feels so much, and I love it. He really gives it all to the scene and it is incredible. Caleb was a character that I overlooked for a bit in the beginning (as Jester had quickly become my favorite), but he quickly climbed as we began to see more of his character and his backstory. Manipulated and groomed by someone he was supposed to be able to trust, forced again to do things against his will, falling in to flashbacks and panic attacks, struggling to rejoin society and interact with others, a love and a passion for learning to a nearly obsessive sense, both for the love of it and for the possibility of gaining the power and strength needed to take back control. Slowly learning to love, to grow, to find friends and see that there can be more to life, that you don’t have to be ruled by your trauma or let it define you, but also still acknowledging it and its effects. But also just how long it takes, and how it can affect you in ways you cannot imagine. He also got his vindication on his abuser, and again, I cried, tears of happiness for him and of grief and hope for me, that one day I might be able to do the same.

Caleb, Yasha, and Beau are the ones I relate to the most because their story is my story, and watching them grow and love means it can happen to me as well. I cannot stress how important and incredible it is for me to realize that. In the more material sense, they all got closure and catharsis against those who hurt them, and they all learned to love again, to open their hearts and let others in again. And that means I can too.

This brings me to the Shadowgast love story. I know this is really controversial for the fandom and I don’t care. For me, their arc was perfectly realistic, and their ending was exactly what I expected for the characters. Finding a kin spirit, learning together, hesitant but trusting in the other’s passion for study at the very least, slowly and naturally growing closer and learning more about each other, revealing more. The betrayal from Essek, the scene on the boat, the slight recoiling on either side, and then learning again, slowly trusting again and teaching each other to forgive themselves, that they were both victims in a sense and that they can take back control and do better, and choose to do better and be better. Slowly healing, and healing together, knowing the worst of each other and choosing to stay but still acknowledging those parts of each other. The scene where they return to the T-Dock and they talk about time travel, and Caleb disintegrates the whole thing? That’s growth, and that’s growing together. And they continue to grow for years, and heal for years, and eventually they end up together, but it takes time. Of course it does. And Essek’s character and this ending really helped me understand some of my own feelings in terms of friendship and romance. Everyone upset that there wasn’t any “on screen” romance or whatever, to me, fundamentally misunderstood the character, especially since his love language does not seem to be physical touch at all (if anything it’s gift giving/acts of service - teleporting the M9 around? Helping Caleb solve the spell? Giving up to dunamis gem to help the M9 get a long rest?). But yeah. Watching characters like that help validate my own experiences in friendship and romance and it was fantastic. 

The others I have a bit less in common with, but there’s still stuff to talk about. Veth having her body changed by someone else, something out of her control, feeling alien in this body and struggling to find a sense of self, then finding friends willing to pour everything into helping her be herself again? Fjord learning he is valuable whether or not he has powers/can serve others, that he has worth just as himself, and that that is enough? Those were stories I needed to hear, to know that something like that is possible.

Caduceus growing out of his comfort zone, exploring, learning, but still being a rock for the others (and for the viewers), and "Pain doesn’t make people. It’s love that makes people. The pain is inconsequential. It’s love that saves them."?  Molly’s loyalty and “leave every place better than you found it”? Even if I couldn’t relate directly to the characters didn’t mean they didn’t have an impact, and these are things that I will carry with me always.

Jester. I have just about nothing in common with Jester, and I loved it. Her optimism, her jokes, and her art (including the dicks), just the absolute light and joy that was her character was exactly what I needed to get through some of the toughest times of my life. Watching her grow from episode one to episode 141 was insane, to mature but not lose her creativity and her fun for life. She was my reminder that there is good and light and hope in the world, even if sometimes you have to create it for yourself, and that is what kept me going sometimes.

And finally, Matt. I cannot give enough thanks to you for choosing to share this amazing world and this story with us. Your storytelling is what prompted me to finally put my ideas into writing, and now I’m working on my own book. Along with Jester, Essek is one of my favorites, and his story arc and characterization was incredibly important to me. I truly have no words for how Critical Role and especially you, with the care and passion and obvious love for storytelling that you have, have changed my life. And I cannot thank you enough.

Am I sad that the campaign ended? Maybe a little. I will miss these characters. But I truly believe that Matt ended the campaign at the perfect point, and I loved the final episode, it made incredible sense for the end of the characters (maybe a teeny bit more Marion/Babenon? But I digress). I’m sure Campaign 3 will be just as astounding.

My love and thanks to the cast and crew of Critical Role. Rest well knowing you did a fantastic job, and I’ll see you in campaign 3.

PS: I know there’s a lot of tags, I want to make sure I cover all my bases so people don’t get spoiled if they have these tags blocked because I have been spoiled too many times by people who tag badly.

[rueitae]

Writing Roundup 2020

This is a writing reflection I’ve been doing for myself every year for the last four years. Its a positive boost to myself see how far I’ve come and look back on my progress for the past year and look forward to the new year. 

Everyone is welcome to use this same format if they’d like to do the same! 

~~~~~~~

Stats:

Words written:

330,000, which is nearly half of all the words I’ve written on Ao3 in the last three years. 

One Shots Posted (all fics plance unless otherwise stated):

In the Arms of the Ever(pink?) Tree (4463 words)

For the Plance Secret Santa exchange. Post s8 date/not date on a snowy moon. Love confession. 

Birthday Treats (2129 words)

For Pidge’s birthday this year! Domestic family fluff, breakfast in bed, plance kids.

Begin Again (Together) (4805 words)

Canon divergence from before episode one! Pidge and Lance are established dating when alien intervention brings them to where they are supposed to be: with the Blue Lion. Just a brief look into what the AU would look like. 

Common Ground (4521 words)

A treat for my friends who introduced me to Magic Knight Rayearth and pointed out some fun character parallels. There is this beautiful art Arya made to go with it because we’re all trash for both series. Plance meet up with Fuu and Ferio post series for both couples. 

Bonded To You (1808 words)

For the Langstron Halloween Exchange! Established plance with a baby Lance is trying to keep safe from a witch who would take advantage of the child’s heritage. 

It Tasted Good (6785 words)

Pikelavar for Pikelavar Month! The premise is crack, but it's mostly treated seriously. Pike ate the Jewel of Jitan by accident and doesn’t realize it until Haggar finds them. Meklavar gets Protective.

The Remainder of Days (3188 words)

Part of my Bad Things Happen Bingo. Fantasy AU where Pidge is a minor forest goddess and Lance is her neighbor mortal farmer. 

I Love You a Lily More Each Day (3232 words)

Another of the Bad Things Happen Bingo. Canon compliant where Lance is undercover at a flower shop and knee deep in an illegal smuggling operation. 

Lease on Life (4978 words)

This one was also part of Bad Things Happen Bingo and was an experiment. It’s POV of an oldest plance kid, canon verse. Her parents’ Paladin days come back to haunt them one night. Some cute family stuff too in there. 

Ready to Dance (4135 words)

For the Valentine’s Day exchange! Post series. Lance tries to get back into the party scene and Pidge rescues him from a disastrous night. 

Loopholes (5476 words)

Technically I didn’t write this fic this year, but a very kind reader asked if I would post this to Ao3, so it was my first fic of the year on Ao3. It’s Lotura! Originally a gift for a dear friend I’ve had since elementary school. It’s a fantasy AU where Lotor stumbles into Allura’s kingdom needing help. 

Next to Me (7311 words)

Also for Bad Things Happen Bingo, this is probably one of my favorite fics of the year. This is the canon verse AU that went all wrong in s7, and Sendak succeeds in destroying Earth. Lance and Pidge end up not only his prisoners, but also two of the last humans in the universe. Ends open ended, but it became a series in the end!

Into Me (14248 words)

The sequel to the above fic. There are two versions, this and the one below. The title tells all. Lance and Pidge come to terms with their new life aboard Sendak’s flagship and do their best to keep the other comforted.

Into Me (non-explicit version) (7228 words)

Exactly the same as the fic above, only this one is SFW

Sunshine (3831 words)

A Bad Things Happen Bingo! One of my favorite concepts. Canon verse. Pidge gets sick while she and Lance are on a scientific mission. 

Showoff (635 words)

A really short fic for a friend on their birthday, featuring their plance kids!

Respite of the Heart (4181 words)

A fic I have been wanting to write for a very long time. I love the concept of Pidge as a Disney Princess in the sense she has the forest guardian theme and all these animals love her. So there’s some play on that as the Paladins stop for lunch on their journey back to Earth in early s7. Lance comes to a realization and they have a chat surrounded by the animal friends. @anchoredtetherart did a phenomenal piece to accompany it. Please look at it in awe here.

The Hardest Part (3960 words)

For Bad Things Happen Bingo! An AU of the episode The Reunion where Pidge doesn’t return when she’s supposed to. 

A Planned Sacrifice (4988 words)

Another Bad Things Happen Bingo. Canon verse. Pidge assumes that being a sacrifice for the ‘forest god’ is strictly ceremonial and at worst a wild animal. It’s actually Sendak, who no one has seen since Shiro shot him out of the Castle. He remembers Pidge and is far too pleased to see her again, tied up on a silver platter. 

Almost Forgotten, but Not Gone (3946 words)

Bad Things Happen Bingo. AU sometime in s1 where Haxus isn’t as dead as Pidge thought. 

Touch (7519 words)

Written for the Lance Goes Boom bang! It was inspired by @fenixseraph ‘s amazing art here! It’s a different take on The Way Forward, where Pidge and Lance are separated from the rest of the team and placed in their own cell. And the Red Lion causes issues. 

Chaptered Fics started/added to:

Wolf In Thieves’ Clothing (4516 words)

An AU of The Castle of Cagliostro from Lupin the Third series. Lee, you have my thanks forever for making me watch this finally. Pidge is a literal princess whose kingdom is in the middle of an internal coup. Lance is a gentleman thief who rides with his best buds Hunk and Matt. Their paths are destined to cross again when Lance goes back to the castle he used to call home. 

Game of Love (4593 words)

The most crack of the bunch. AU of Fall the of the Castle of Lions where Sendak and Haxus get away with it all. Pidge and Lance are prisoners on Haxus’ new ship, and Lance finds an opportunity for eventual escape when he learns that Haxus has a crush on his second in command. Operation matchmaker begins. (happy ending planned for all)

What Tides May Bring (20704 words)

Collab with the fantastic @anchoredtetherart for MerMay! Established plance as mermaids and guardians of their elements with adorable mer child. Then angst because they are all captured by a ‘research’ institute. 

Seasons of Magic (16546 words)

I actually added a chapter this year! Ongoing collection of one-shots with mage Pidge who lives in the country and cultivates her plant magic and makes potions with the assistance of her dragon familiar, Lance. Mostly domestic fluff. 

Too Soon and Not Soon Enough (11438 words)

Added another chapter this year to my Keith-centric AU. It’s basically VLD but five years early and they’re all literally child Paladins. Keith gets to meet Krolia earlier and its fun to go into tween friendships as they try and navigate the reality of their situation. 

Seeds (48833 words)

Added a ton earlier this year. A collection of plance fics all or mostly under 500 words. All meant to be adopted by others if interest strikes. Covers many genres.

Chaptered Fics Finished:

Resolve to Fly (75799 words)

Written for the Pidge Angst Bang. My artist @alchemie0 did an outstanding job capturing the feel of the fic. Look at the art here! Canon verse AU where Pidge encounters Haxus, who has crashed on Earth. She helps him repair his ship in excitement and good faith, which he pays back by kidnapping her. For two years she survives as little more than a housepet on Sendak’s ship. Gen.

Who's Protecting Who? (28989 words)

Also technically not written this yeah, but posted. A collab with Hush waaaay back in 2018. It's a plance Altean AU with Pidge as distant royalty and Lance as a bodyguard.

A Dish Served Cold (21533 words)

Finally finished this one! Canon verse in which Pidge accidentally runs into Sendak on an isolated planet. Sendak takes advantage of this encounter and tries to return to the Empire with her in tow. Much Pidge whump. Gen

Reflections: 

Best title 

I still really really love Too Soon and Not Soon Enough (11438 words). Because it's too soon for the Paladins to be Paladins, and for Keith it's not nearly soon enough for Krolia to return. It just feels like it has a lot of heart to it. I hope I can keep it going, but my ideas are incredibly scattered for it. 

Worst title 

Touch (7519 words). Yeah it’s a play on ‘Don’t you touch her’ but it feels soooo dry. 

Best/worst last line

Best: This was really, really hard choice this year, but ultimately, making up for the terrible title, its Touch (7519 words) 

“It feels good to escape the ship with all of his teammates, secure in the knowledge that he has a way forward not just as a Paladin, but also with Pidge.” 

- Not only did I manage to fit the title of the episode in there, it's got that hopeful tinge to it and reflects on personal growth both internally and with Pidge. 

Worst: This one isn’t necessarily bad from Begin Again (Together) (4805 words), but it could be better. It didn’t get quite the epic sense I was hoping to pull from it.

“Okay,” he smirks, hand firmly on the throttle. “Operation save Earth starts now.”

Looking back, did you write more fics than you thought you would this year, less than you thought, or about what you predicted?

Definitely wrote way more. Even with posting two fic that are essentially the exact same, I still ended up writing nearly half of my total Ao3 word count this year. (330,000/670,000). Doing Bad Things Happen Bingo was a bit part of that - I was very inspired at the beginning of this year - but also there were many events I participated in (8 total!!) on top of my personal projects. 

What’s your favorite story this year? Not the most popular, but the one that makes you the happiest.

A really hard decision this year, because there are several that make me really happy. I think oddly enough though, it’s Game of Love (4593 words) because of its potential and how much crack it is. It has such whacky rom-com energy to it but also that underlying angst of the situation I can fall back on. My favorite trope to explore is what happens to the characters when they’re captured. I just really enjoy the concept and the challenge to make such a concept believable with minimal suspension of belief. 

Okay, NOW your most popular story.

Using kudos as my gauge (and not counting the chapter fics), the winner is: 

Respite of the Heart (4181 words)

Not surprising because Ivy’s art is STUNNING.

Story most underappreciated by the universe?

I think that’s It Tasted Good (6785 words), the pikelavar fic. Pikelavar is underappreciated in general

Story that could have been better?

For all I was excited to write Sunshine (3831 words), it didn’t quite fall the way I had imagined in my mind. I don’t know if it was the structure or I was running out of steam or what. All i know is that I wanted more but all I could concentrate on was that scene where he’s caring for her in bed. Maybe I was just too ambitious.

Sexiest story?

No brainer it's Into Me (14248 words). Literally. Which really shocked me that it happened. Didn’t think I’d write any smut at all, let alone this year. This particular fic just kinda called out for it 

Saddest story?

The prequel to the above fic: Next to Me (7311 words). How much more sad can you get than Earth being destroyed, being Sendak’s prisoners all while trying to tell each other ‘i love you’ without seeming weird because you’re the last humans in the universe. 

Most fun?

I think it's Ready to Dance (4135 words). Just Valentine’s fluff and impromptu slow dancing in the park at night. 

Story with single sweetest moment?

I’m picking What Tides May Bring (20704 words). Listen, mer Lance and mer Pidge playing with their mer baby in their domestic paradise is probably one of my favorite things I’ve ever written. Dad Lance has my heart. 

Hardest story to write?

The last chapter of A Dish Served Cold (21533 words) was like pulling teeth. I’m pretty happy with it in the end but at the time man it was so hard. 

Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them?

I wrote smut. It was...weird? But also strangely calming. I wrote more for another fic but it's still a WIP. I definitely need to be in the mood to write it. 

Proudest Achievement:

The Pidge Angst Bang. Resolve to Fly (75799 words). Look at that word count. I only wanted something under 3k at first, so it was just going to be Pidge meeting Haxus. But by the time I finished that part it was already 10k. So even though I was going through a rough part of my life, I just kept going and it ended up being my therapy. I’m really proud of the fic and I love my artists’ pieces. It really lifted my spirits. (You should all really go check out the Ao3 collection of all the bang stories and art they are AMAZING you won’t regret. If you love Pidge angst they are all must reads.)

What are your fic writing goals for next year?

I’d like to finish my Bad Things Happen Bingo card and then focus on my current WIP, that includes the Seeds collection. There are days I still feel a bit overwhelmed, and I’m still trying to find a routine after moving. I’d like to do more events too, but I think I need to be more selective about which ones I do. I don’t want to burn myself out. 

Apart from that, I’d really like to try and give back to the community more. I’d like to start consciously writing fics for others without an event to go by. 

Past Years:

2017

2018

2019

[di0rtaeyong]

1 Sided Love

➸ summary: Mark breaks up with you, leaving you reminiscing. finally having the courage to face him again, you both to rethink your situation. based on ‘1 Sided Love’ by blackbear. 

➸ genre: college nct!, angst, drama, fluff

➸ word count: 9.5k

➸ warnings: breakups, crying, alcohol use and mention, marijuana use, suggestive scene (?).

➸ authors note: thank you for reading this! this is my first time writing a story this long, i hope you like it!

➸ media:  click here for song

｡☆✼★━━━━━━━━━━━━★✼☆｡

 ACT 1

I swear lettin' you down, lettin' you down is hard enough…

… When it's one-sided, one-sided, one-sided love…

…Our time is, our time is, our time is up…

…Is your heart worth breakin'?

 “We need to talk”.

Everyone resents those dreaded words. They are never followed by anything positive and more often than not left someone in tears, especially when your boyfriend of two years says it to you, nervous energy radiating off of him and refusing to make eye contact.

Mark had always calmed you down. Even when he was the one mad at you, there was something about him that allowed you to keep your cool and listen to him. You were an easy crier, so having someone like Mark allowed you to practice keeping your cool. In a way you had thought Mark was your soulmate.

“Hi,” he barely whispered, still refusing to make eye contact as you both settled into your chairs in the corner of the room. He nervously twiddled with his fingers, so you reached out to grab them and interlock fingers as you had done millions of times before.

Only this time Mark flinched away which cause you to pull your hand quickly and a deep furrow form between your eyebrows.

“You okay?” you asked Mark cautiously, trying to offer a comforting smile. He had never refused to hold your hand before. It was one of the only PDA action’s that both of you felt comfortable with, the innocence in your relationship still giving you both a youthful glow.

“You wanna get a drink? I’ll get you one. The last time we came here was with Hyuck, remember? You guys got the lemon tea; I knew none of you would like it but you both insisted… I’ll get you the choc- “

“Y/N.” he said firmly. He had never used this tone with you and frankly you were more curious than scared. Mark didn’t scare you. Mark was a lot of things but scary he was not. He was always there for you. He would alw-

“I think we should break up.”

If the world had ended right there and then it wouldn’t have made a difference to you because what you felt like inside was a hundred times worse.

“I- Uh- What?” you asked stupidly.

“Do you not feel it, Y/N?”, Mark asked finally looking me in the eye. The tears were starting to well up and Mark knew how much you hated crying in front of other people. But he wasn’t just ‘other people’. He was Mark and you would allow yourself to cry in front of him because he loved you and you loved him. Right?

“What are you talking about, Mark? Is this some stupid joke Donghyuck is making you do? Because it’s not funny.” You said through your teeth trying to swallow the lump in your throat that seemed to really want to ruin your strong demeanor.

Watching you try to keep yourself composed and doing nothing about it was one of the hardest thing’s Mark has ever done. He so badly wanted to reach out to you, brush away the hot tears you fought so hard to blink back and hold you against his chest as he had done over a thousand times over the past two years.

You had fallen for Mark a while before you had started dating, begging Jeno to introduce you to his ‘cute older friend’ who just so happened to be working as a children’s basketball camp coach the summer before you went off to university.

Jeno finally caved when you annoyed him enough and introduced you quickly and with no enthusiasm (“Y/N this is Mark, Mark this is Y/N, can we please go now?”). And it was that moment where you knew you wouldn’t be able to get rid of the hearts in your eyes that easily.

You had initially thought Mark was way too perfect if you were being honest. He was fit (played on his school’s basketball team), he was smart (he had gotten Dean’s list), he was good with kids (hence summer camp coach), and he was nice. He was so many things that you could go on and on about (which you did, which led Jeno to literally pay you to shut up about Mark- “Here’s a ten, it better be enough.”- which you happily allowed him to do).

After Jeno had introduced you, you and Mark had instantly hit it off. Never before had you felt like this around any boy. Of course, you had your fair share of crushes, but Mark felt different. He made you laugh in ways that made your stomach churn with more than laughter and made your head spin with happiness and your heart ache every time you parted. It was early but if you were being honest, you were in love. And you had fell hard.

But as the summer ended, you were forced to part ways with Mark. You were both getting ready to go off to university, Mark entering his second year, you your first. Countless nights spent with Mark were full with the both of you sharing your fears and dreams as you sat in the trunk of his dad’s van looking up into the sky eating melted ice cream he would buy you from McDonald’s every Monday and Wednesday night after work.

You had heard so many reassurances from him since the day you met him, that when he suggested something negative it really took you by surprise. Him telling he thinks you two should break up? Surely there must have been something you misheard.

“Y/N? You still there?”. Your gaze snapped to Mark and you finally took in his appearance.

His hair was pushed back off his face but under his eyes were dark circles from late nights and his nose was slightly red. He was wearing a black hoodie, one of your personal favourites to ‘borrow’, paired with his worn-out jeans you silently loved on him. You couldn’t see his feet but you knew he was wearing the pair of black and white Converse you had bought him for his birthday using your whole pay cheque the summer you worked together at the community centre. Jeno had laughed at you, saying you were ‘whipped’ and the expression on Mark’s face when you gave him the shoes definitely made you realize that yes, you were whipped.

Mark had spent the whole month of July talking about how he wanted new Converse, but he was trying to pay for some stuff for school, so he was waiting it out. The day after he had brought it up to you, you couldn’t help but go off to the mall and buy his size. You had regretted it the minute after you did it thinking it was too overbearing, too affectionate for someone you had just met. But when you saw the look on his face when you gave them to him eased your worries as you mirrored the smile he gave you.

What your eyes decided to focus on was his left hand, more specifically his ring finger.

The steal band still wrapped around his finger, the more delicate equivalent present on your own ring finger. The engraved initials inside the band seemed to burn against your skin.

“You’re wearing it.” You stated simply. You didn’t want to talk too much in case your voice decided to crack.

Following your line of vision, Mark focused on the ring. “Yeah. It’s a habit now I guess.”

Mark and you had exchanged these rings on the night of your second anniversary. You had mentioned you had wanted something to show Mark off (‘as a joke’ you had insisted) even when he wasn’t there, and Mark suggested rings. Sputtering out an explanation about how you were both too young to get married and to ignore him, you grabbed his hand and interlocked fingers with him. “I think that’s a great idea”.

The memory left you smiling, meeting Mark’s eyes seeing him holding a reminiscing smile as well as he played with the ring.

“Y/N…” Mark started.

“Why do you want to break up, Mark? I thought we were happy?” you whispered.

“I know, I know Y/N, we were, uh, we are, but… like… there’s so much on my plate right now you know school and the team and internships and summer jobs and you! You’re going to be even more busy and we’ll hardly see each other and- “,

“Mark, that sounds so stupid. We can just work with each others’ schedules, its not a big deal.” You said, trying not to sound desperate.

“Y/N… I don’t know how to put this…” he said, struggling to find the right words.

You were getting agitated. “Well spit it out. Say what you want then,” you said angerly.

“Okay well… umm… I umm…” he said looking down at his lap.

“Mark. Just say it.” You said blankly.

“Well… um… I’m not in love with you anymore.”

“Mark- “, but your words were caught in your throat. If earlier you felt like the world was ending, right now would be described as one million times worse.

Your ears started ringing and the room suddenly started feeling way too hot for an early September night. Your vision blurred slightly as you felt hot tears stream down your face uncontrollably.

“I have to go.” You said standing up way too quickly. The room spun with your actions and black spots danced in your vision.

“Y/N, wait, can we just talk?” Mark pleaded quickly, standing up.

A few minutes ago, you would have found your height differences endearing, adding to the long list of things you loved about him. He was always a few inches taller than you which you had always loved but now it made you feel as if he was further away than ever.

“Mark, I think that’s all you needed to say. Maybe we can talk again another day?” You proposed, knowing full well you would not be able to face Mark again without feeling that horrible lump in your throat.

Staring deeply at you for a while, he said “Yeah. Yeah, yeah that’s fine. Can I walk you home? It’s late.”

It’s 8:30, you wanted to say. It’s not late. Its not too late to think about us.

But the words didn’t come out. You just nodded your head knowing Mark wouldn’t take no for an answer and you also didn’t trust your voice.

Quickly picking up your stuff you rushed out before you could hear Mark say something about you going to fast.

‘That’s not us anymore’, you thought. You would no longer hear Mark complaining close behind you as you walked at a quick pace, would no longer laugh as he ran up and grabbed your hand swinging your arms in pure bliss.

Hearing rustling behind you, you glanced behind to see Mark rushing out to catch up with you and tears brimmed your eyes. What went wrong?

As you walked in silence for a while, focused on only the road ahead you tried to block out Mark’s warm presence next to you and the cold wind biting at your uncovered arms, the t-shirt you were wearing not doing anything to block the wind.

“Here take my sweater, you’re gonna get sick.” Mark said already pulling it off his body and handing it to you.

Weakly shaking your head in protest, you tried not to focus on the heat radiating from Mark and tried to focus on the road ahead. You were almost home. Just a little longer and yo-

“Y/N.” Mark said. You were starting to really hate this tone. He grabbed your hand and forced you to turn towards him. He struggled to slip your arms through the holes as you left your limbs limp, refusing to look at his face.

Pulling the sweater over your head and pulling your hair out cautiously he muttered, in his own world not aware that you could hear him mumbling to himself. Nothing coherent but you were always aware that Mark talked to himself a lot, a sound that used to soothe your mind now making your heart twist in a way that could only be described as immense pain.

When the sweater was on and Mark retracted his hands, you didn’t hesitate to turn around fast on your heel and continue your borderline run home.

Quicker than usual you arrived home. The porch light seemed to be almost mocking you as it shone in the autumn night. ‘Almost there.’ You thought to yourself. You wanted to be inside your warm house so bad. Wanted to be in your bed, despite knowing you would not be able to control your tears once your head hit the pillow. You just wanted to be anywhere that wasn’t with Mark.

Turning around you finally looked at his face. His eyes were red, and hands curled into fists in order to keep his fingers warm. This would usually be the time you reached out with a laugh and hug him, rubbing his arms and back of his neck as you tried to share your body heat. But those times were over.

“Here, take your sweater back.” You said breaking the staring contest you were both participating in. As you went to pull it over your head, he stopped you.

“Keep it, its going to keep getting colder.”

“I have my own sweaters.”

“I know, but I know you loved borrowing this one.”

Love, you thought bitterly.

Sighing, you blinked quickly to get rid of more tears that started forming. Turning to face your house you muttered, “Bye then.”.

Staring at you for a long moment, a deep expression on his face, you knew he was going to say something that would only break your heart further. Something like “One last hug?” or “Can I at least get a kiss goodbye?” so you didn’t wait for him to say anything at all.

You made your way to the door, and while unlocking it, you paused.

Taking a deep breath, you used any and all strength in your body to turn around and see if Mark was still there. You knew he would be. He always waited until you got inside and would wait for a text to see if you got in alright. Tonight, he would wait for you to go inside but there would be no text following.

Making eye contact you mustered up the best smile you could, a small quirk of your lips, as you waved to Mark.

“See you when I see you!” He called, sad smile on his lips.

“See you when I see you,” you repeated lowly, turning back to open your door letting yourself in. You didn’t stop moving until you were inside, door locked, ignoring your mom’s questions about how your night was, wondering why you were back earlier than you told her.

You didn’t stop until you were in your bedroom, shutting the door quietly and climbing into bed.

You didn’t stop crying until there were no tears left and you could see the sun rising in the sky.

You didn’t stop loving Mark even though it caused every piece of your being to ache because he was Mark and no matter what he did you knew he was going to be a presence in your soul no matter how much you hated to admit it.

One-sided, one-sided, one-sided love.

                                          ⋇⋆✦⋆⋇ 

ACT 2

You’re too busy talking over me to hear what I’m sayin’

You’re too high to realize I see through the smile that you're fakin’

You're so into yourself, everyone else is overrated

And everything’s changing; is your heart worth breakin'?

 You opened your eyes, sun peaking through your blinds, causing the throbbing in your head to worsen. The buzzing from your phone also didn’t help and your roommate/ friend seemed to agree.  

“Pick up your damn phone before I throw it out the window.” Snapped Raven, pulling the blanket over her head.

Groaning, you stretched your arm across the bed with your eyes closed trying to feel for it under the mess of blankets.

Letting out a sign of relief when you finally grasped it, you swiped, accepting the call with your eyes still closed, hitting the speaker button by accident.

“Y/NNNNNNNN!!!”, sang the most irritating voice you could have possibly heard at 10 am, hungover on a Saturday morning.

“Tell Donghyuck to shut the fuck up, Y/N, I can hear him from over here!” shouted Raven angerly, muffled by the blankets.

“Donghyuck do you have to be so fucking loud? Its early and I have a huge headache,” You said into the phone, cracking an eye open to glance at the caller ID. “, Also why are you calling me from Jeno’s phone?”.

You heard some shuffling and some yelling that sounded faintly like “give me my phone back you fucking-“ and then you heard what you assumed to be a pillow hitting a body and finally Jeno’s voice.

“Y/N! Good morning!” He chirped. You wanted to wince at his tone, but his positive energy always made you smile no matter the mood you were in.

“Hiiiiiiii”, you drawled, resulting in a groan from Raven and laugh from Jeno. “, To what do I owe this pleasure?”

“Well I wanted to ask- “

“WE!!! Wanted to ask,” yelled Donghyuck.

“Ugh well, I guess we wanted to ask on behalf of Johnny- “

“Y/N you have to come to Johnny’s birthday party! Its gonna so fun and he’s gonna have drinks and- oh OW!” yelled Donghyuck followed by the sound of a pillow whacking a body again.

“Anyways, I wanted to know if you would come to Johnny’s birthday party with us. It’ll be fun and he’s gonna have drinks and food and stuff.” Said Jeno calmly.

“Hey! I literally just said that!”

“Yeah but she doesn’t want to listen to you, you fucking idiot” commented Jeno, hint of humour evident in his tone. You could practically see Hyuck pouting.

Johnny Suh was about five years older than Jeno, Donghyuck and yourself. You had first met him by accident when you ran into Jeno at the store back in seventh grade and you had decided to race shopping carts while your families did groceries. Picking a spot in the store where you thought there was no one you quickly started racing. Looking back to see if Jeno was going to beat you, you smiled triumphantly when you saw that he had stopped quite a few feet behind you. Turning back to the front you wondered why Jeno had stopped when you were faced with a tall figure and a display for toilet paper.

Desperately trying to stop your cart before you crashed into the display, or the tall boy, you managed to skid to a stop but not without taking down a few rows of the display. You had fallen right on your bottom, ache quickly spreading through your body as you heard Jeno run up behind you.

“I’m so sorry we didn’t mean to, we were just- “

“It’s fine. Just clean up. Are you okay?” Was he talking to you? You couldn’t tell through the stinging pain on your palms and ache in the bottom half of your body. His voice was deeper than you expected and his hair way too long, covering his entire forehead, swept to the side reaching his left eye and his outstretched hand looking way too big for his lanky body.

Looking from his hand and back up to his face you couldn’t stop the blush spreading across your face. You knew him. You had heard your older family-friends who lived in the area talking about ‘John Suh’, who went by Johnny to friends, and how he was so nice, so involved, so handsome and a senior in your future high school.

Hearing Jeno scoff made you snap out of your trance, charming smile (as charming as a twelve year old could muster) on your face as you grabbed John Suh’s hand and he pulled you up.

“Thank you so much! I am sorry about the display, Jeno and I will fix it!” I exclaimed quickly, smile never leaving my face.

Fixing his grocery store uniform shirt and flicking his hair off his face, John Suh offered you what you had thought at the time was the most amazing smile in the whole world, and agreed to let you do so as he had to go to the registrar’s.

“Hey, thanks again, um sorry, I didn’t catch your name?” John Suh asked looking directly in your eyes.

“Um- I uh- uh…” I stuttered. Was a senior really asking for my name? The senior in question being John Suh?!

“Its Y/N.” Jeno answered for you, annoyance laced in his tone. You could practically feel him rolling his eyes but that did nothing to ruin your mood.

“Well thanks Y/N! Be careful next time!” said John Suh. Smiling you nodded enthusiastically, not missing the way John Suh walked past Jeno, ruffling his hair, telling him to stay out of trouble.

Waving to him until he was gone, you turned angerly on your heel to face Jeno. He was making retching sounds behind you, acting out throwing up.

“Y/N, you are so lame! ‘Thank you so much, Johnny who I am most clearly in love with! I will clean up anything you ask!’” said Jeno, raising his voice a few octaves in imitation of yours.

“Shut up! First of all, why would you not tell me you know John Suh?! And that you’re close enough to call him Johnny?! Also, second of all, I do not talk like that!”

Making the talking motion with his hand, Jeno just walked by you and started picking up the toilet paper you had forgotten about.

Following his actions, you bent down to pick up a few rolls, not waiting a moment to keep bothering Jeno. “Hellooooooooooooooo. Please tell me how you know John Suh! Why wouldn’t you tell me?!” you asked as if it was vital information tethered to your life-line.

“Ugh, Y/N, I don’t know it just never came up. I’ve known him for a few years, our moms are friends. Happy?”, picking up the last roll and stacking it the same way it was before your cart collided with the display.

“Delighted.” You said.

Now in present day, you now called John Suh ‘Johnny’, much to the delight of your twelve-year-old heart. He was now one of your closest friends and confidants, or perhaps was. You had run into Johnny a few times after the grocery store incident but at the end of your seventh-grade year Johnny was to head off to university. Girls in your area, including yourself, were saddened by the loss, Jeno pretending to be disgusted whenever you complained. It wasn’t until the summer you worked at the community centre that you had gotten close to Johnny.

Mark had brought up a bon fire his older friends were throwing, inviting you to come claiming everyone there would love if you came.

After some coaxing you finally agreed to go, not without Raven, Jeno, and Donghyuck (both who were already invited because they knew the host. Jeno wouldn’t tell you who’s party it was) by your side as Mark opened the front door to greet you guys.

“Everyone’s in the back, guys you can leave your stuff in Johnny’s room.” Said Mark to Jeno and Donghyuck.

Nodding and walking off, the two boys started walking away to leave their stuff in Joh-

“Wait, who’s house is this?!” you asked worried, looking nervously at Mark.

“Oh, I thought you already knew. Jeno said you guys knew each other. It’s Johnny’s house.”

You inwardly groaned. You looked at Raven for help, but all you got was a nervous smile. She was as nervous as you. This was a party. A party with college guys, and their college antics, and Mark, and-

“Lets GOOOOOOO!” yelled Donghyuck, bolting down the stairs towards the back door.

“You ready?” Mark asked you and Raven as you made your way to the door, nodding but not missing the insulting comment Raven made about Hyuck. Snickering as you crossed through the door back into the hot night of July, you walked smack into a brick wall.

Well this brick wall was much softer than a brick wall, and also just so happened to not be a brick wall and rather the strong and broad chest of John Suh.

“Y/N! I’m so happy you could make it! Mark has been talking about you all summer, I was so happy when he said you were coming!” exclaimed John Suh, arms embracing you like old friends. Awkwardly returning the hug you tried to calm your thoughts; ‘John Suh was hugging me. The John Suh. Wait till I tell- Wait Mark talked about me?’

Moving to greet Raven, you heard him introduce himself “Hi! You must be Y/N’s friend. Hyuck doesn’t stop talking about you. I’m Johnny!” he said to her charming as ever and you already knew the earful of gushing you would hear after the party.

During the party you had met many of Johnny’s university friends; Yuta, a quiet guy with the nicest hair you had ever seen, Taeyong, a shorter, skinner man who had a precious smile and Jaehyun, two years younger than Johnny with one of the most handsome faces you had ever seen and the most delicious build.

The bonfire had been a lot of fun. Mark hardly left your side which you didn’t mind at all, even offering you his sweater when it got chilly. Laughs were exchanged and everyone was so welcoming towards Raven and you, you couldn’t help but feel disappointed when it was time to leave.

All of the boys bid you and Raven goodbye, tights hugs filled with well wishes and see you soon’s and beer and expensive cologne. Mark insisted on walking you both out, accompanied by a grumbling Donghyuck who only got up when Jeno elbowed him in the stomach with a pointed look.

Walking slowly behind Raven and Donghyuck, trying to block out the sounds of their bickering, you turned to Mark, speaking in a low tone. “Thanks for inviting us tonight. It was really fun.”

“I’m glad you came… it was really nice to have you here with me- uh I mean with us! It was really nice to have you here with all of us you know all the guys a-“

Laughing, you gently nudged Mark with your shoulder. Feeling brave you replied, “It was really nice to be here with you too, Mark.”

Finally reaching the front door which was left open courtesy of Raven and Donghyuck who had taken their bickering to the front lawn.

“Y/N… umm what I umm really wanted to umm say to you was… umm….” Began Mark, rubbing the back of his neck with his left hand.

You were about to prompt him to continue when you were both interrupted by a semi-drunk Donghyuck, “Mark did you confess already? I really can’t keep talking to this one, she’s annoying the shit out of me,” jutting out his thumb in Raven’s direction.

With your ears ringing, you watched as Mark turned to you slowly, eyes wide and mouth agape, while Raven scoffed and started a string of curse words directed at Donghyuck.

“Um so yeah… I wanted to tell you that umm… I like you. Yeah, umm you don’t have to say anything right now… damn, I’m sorry, I really didn’t want it to be this way, I- “

You suddenly grabbed his right hand, pulling him down to your height and planting a quick kiss to his cheek.

A blush spread almost instantly at the contact across Mark’s face to the tips of his ears and started opening and closing his mouth like a fish.

Face hot you whispered a quick goodbye to Mark walking briskly out the door to your car. Hearing rustling as you tried to pull out your key, you were about to ask Raven why she was coming to the driver's side, but you were met but a warm hand on your wrist-twisting you around and warm, nervous lips meeting yours.

You took in Mark’s face for a few milliseconds, bangs blowing in the summer night wind right before closing your eyes and enjoying the feeling of Mark’s lips on yours.

Everything seemed to be happening in your own world, you almost missed Donghyuk yelping and pulling out his phone. Flash going off, Mark and you separated, sheepish smiles on your faces as you avoided eye contact with each other.

Taking the keys from your hand, Raven pushed you away from the driver’s door and plopped herself down behind the wheel. “Bye Mark! It was great seeing you!” she quipped with a smirk, starting the ignition.

Walking to the passenger’s side, Mark and you talked quietly and minimally.

“I’ll text you? See you Monday?”

“Eight am, as always.” you had replied happily.

“Y/N? You still there?” spoke Jeno, bringing you back to the present day.

“Ah, yeah Jeno I’m here, sorry just spaced out. What was the question?” you asked. ‘Ugh why does everything make me think of Mark? Its been months…’ you thought to yourself.

“Hyuck and I wanted to know if you were gonna come to Johnny’s birthday party. It's not formal, just at his house but he would love to have you there. We haven’t seen you in ages.” Jeno said, a hint of sadness in his voice.

It was true you had not seen your friends in a while. The last time you were all together was at the end of August, followed by the… Mark incident in September. After that, you had limited interactions with mutual friends (including Jeno) and skipping out on birthday’s (including Yuta’s; you told him you were swamped with work and would make it up to him, to which he just responded with a thumbs-up emoji) and even the Christmas and New Years parties.

You knew Johnny would definitely be disappointed if you didn’t go…

“Yeah Jeno, of course, I’ll come! Can’t wait!”.

                                                   ~

 You now stood in front of the floor-length mirror hanging on your shared bathroom door pulling at the hem of your short black dress the following Friday night.

“Raven, are you sure this isn’t too much? Or too short? Jeno said it was casual…” you complained to your friend for the hundredth time that night. And you hadn’t even left yet.

Stilling her hand that was applying highlighter she groaned. “Y/N for the millionth time, you look fine. But you know if you really want to change go ahead. But you look great.”

‘That’s because you picked the dress,’ you groaned inwardly.

Slipping on your shoes, you waited for Raven to finish up. You both debated bringing jackets but opted not to because they would just ruin your outfits and be a hassle to carry.

The cab ride to Johnny’s house was uneventful, just on your phone, watching Snapchats Jeno had already sent you.

Midway through the long thread of videos you witnessed Donghyuck snatching the phone out of Jeno’s hand and running off. He was probably already drunk from the way he was talking but the laugh you were about to let out got stuck in your throat.

“MAAARRRRKKKKK!!!!” you heard from your phone as you watched the video. The camera turned to face Mark who laughed at the camera and wrapped his arm around Donghyuck’s shoulder.

Shutting your phone off you took in a deep breath. Of course, you knew Mark would be there. You knew but you refused to acknowledge. Living your life in ignorance since Jeno told you about the party had worked all up to this moment.

“It’ll be okay.” You heard Raven whisper, but you didn’t stop looking out the window until you were parked outside of Johnny’s house.

Paying the driver, you fiddled with your dress as you made your way up to the front door.

“Y/N, you’re completely sure you’re okay with this right? If not we can go home, its not a big- “

“No, its fine. I said I would be here so I’m here right? Besides we’re gonna get wasted!” you said, forcing a smile on your face.

With one last look at you, Raven rang the bell.

The thumping bass of the music could be heard from the end of the driveway, accompanied by loud yelling making you doubt that anyone would hear the bell until you saw the door finally crack open.

“Fin-allyyyy. I was waiting for youuuu.” Slurred Donghyuck as he opened the door for the two of you, Jeno following close behind him. The entire house smelt like alcohol and weed and sweat which suddenly had you feeling a lot more confident.

Hugging Donghyuck and Jeno, you made your way into the house, surprised Donghyuck and Raven had hugged and were actually talking civilly.

The kitchen was filled with faces familiar and not. “Y/N! Raven! You came!” yelled Johnny. He was currently standing over a shorter man who was lying shirtless on the island, pouring tequila into his belly button.

“Of course we came! We couldn’t miss John Suh’s birthday, could we?” you teased.

Groaning but holding a drunken smile on his face, he wrapped one arm around your shoulder and his other around Raven.  

Taking in his familiar cologne along with the scent of alcohol calmed your nerves a bit. You had almost forgotten what you were nervous about until you heard his name.

“Mark! Let’s take shots!”, yelled a good-looking boy (everyone here seemed to be attractive) who was sporting a nice shade of pink hair. You had never seen him before but by the way, he had himself practically hanging off of Mark made you think they were close.

Closing your eyes, you took a deep breath. You were here for Johnny. To have a good time. You would not let your ex-boyfriend ruin that.

But when you opened your eyes, you found the familiar brown ones staring back at yours. He now had added blond highlights to his brown hair which looked surprisingly good (although you would never admit that out loud). He was wearing what looked like a varsity jacket and you instantly thought about how he was doing on the basketball team. Did they make it playoffs?

Seeing his mouth open shocked you back into reality. Looking ready to say something to you, you panicked. Spinning on your heel you looked back to see the shirtless man waiting impatiently for Johnny to continue the body shots.

“So, when can I start drinking?!” You laughed as you approached Johnny, back turned in Mark’s direction.

“Y/N…” you heard a voice whisper. You knew who it was.

“Ah, Johnny, where was she this whole time? Finally, some fun.” The man lying down said coyly. The smirk on his face would normally make you feel uneasy but was now the most amazing distraction.

“Y/N”, you heard a little louder now.

“So, where’s my drink?!” you practically shouted, trying to get away from any contact with your ex-boyfriend who you just so happened to still be in love with. Great.

“Right here, pretty girl.” Said the smirking, crazily attractive man, still lying on the counter and pointing to his belly button. There was a line off salt between his pectorals leading down to his navel, his defined but slim tan torso looking absolutely sinful.

“Y/N!” the dreaded voice said a bit louder, sounding way to close for you to think rationally.

Panicking and seeing no other way out, you stepped forward to the man on the countertop who was holding his head up with his hands behind his neck, smirk looking almost teasing as it did lazy.

You leaned forward to start at the bottom of the salt line, not forgetting to wet your tongue before sticking it out and licking up the salt all while holding your gaze with the man.

His body was warm and smelt slightly of what could only be a very expensive cologne. His gaze was inviting, combined with his scent making him almost so intoxicating you almost forgot the reason you were doing this.

You paused when your tongue reached the end of the salt line, spot closet to his face. Not saying anything he just jutted his chin out, reminding you to finish your mission.

Moving to his belly button you leaned your head to the side, landing it in the space between his navel and hip bone. Holding eye contact you noticed some of the tequila had spilt across his torso, moving to lick it up before it fell off his body. When you finally reached his navel and started lapping at the alcohol you felt his let out one shudder when you started, the only action in your whole interaction that led you to believe he might not be as cocky as he wanted to come off as.

Finally, when you were done you stood back up and took the lemon he handed you. Sitting up he finally spoke. “Damn, didn’t think you had it in you, pretty girl.”.

His voice was higher than you expected, and held intoxicating tone, almost sounding like a cat talking to its prey. Trying to return the cool attitude, you tried to ignore the heat you were feeling all over your body. “Well, I’m full of surprises,” you said, voice coming out way more confident than you felt, much to your delight.

“Hm, well I hope I can be a witness to more surprises,” eyes never leaving yours, almost hypnotizing. “I’m Ten.”, he said, his hand reaching out to shake yours.

“Y/N.”, you returned, taking his hand.

Eyebrow quirked; he gave you a look that you really could not decipher. Then his signature smirk reappeared. You had almost started to think it was his permanent expression. “Enjoy the party, Miss Y/N.”, he practically purred as he slid off the counter and disappeared into the crowd.

You didn’t turn around to see if anyone specific was waiting for your whole spectacle to be over and practically skipped into the living room to find Raven.

Finding Raven was not a problem as she was standing on top of the living room table dancing to the Rihanna song that was blasting through the speakers at the moment.

As she danced, Donghyuck surprisingly close to her, she spotted you and let out a sound of happiness. Pretending to pull you with an invisible rope, you made your way over to her, laughing on your way there.

She was quick to pull you up to the table, but you didn’t plant your feet properly causing you to slip.

Certain you were going to land straight and knock your head, you were quickly caught by a pair of strong arms around your waist. Head falling against your hero’s shoulder you heard their voice, familiar velvet enticing your ears for the first time in months.

“You gotta be more careful, princess.” Yuta whispered in your ear, low tone wrapping its ways around your mind, fogging your thoughts.

“Yuta. Hi.” You said as he helped you down from the table. He looked almost the same as every time you saw him, handsome as ever with striking features and perfect teeth almost as if someone had taken the time to draw him to the utmost perfection. The biggest difference in his appearance was his hair; much longer than you remembered and dyed a bleach blond, only contributing to his good looks, and the lack of red tint and glazed over look in his eyes.

“Didn’t smoke yet?”, you asked really hoping he hadn’t.

“Was just about to head out. Joining me?”, he asked, lips curling up into his signature Cheshire smile. You had always thought he was hiding something when he smiled like that, always feeling like he knew something you didn’t.

Tapping Raven’s leg and signalling that you were going outside with Yuta. After she nodded you followed him to the back door, remembering the first time you ever walked through the doors and met Yuta for the first time.

Not saying anything you watched Yuta take out his blunt and light it, smell not waiting a second to infiltrate your nostrils.

Taking a deep breath in as Yuta took a drag, you basked in the smell, patiently waiting your turn.

Yuta turned to you, placing the blunt between your lips. Moving your hand up to reposition it, you brushed against his. Trying to block the wind with one hand, he brought the lighter up to the blunt keeping it there for a good few seconds.

“Surprised you came”, he said as you inhaled deeply.

Taking your time, you moved the blunt from your lips and inhaled as much as you could before letting the smoke out.

Feeling it immediately in your lungs, you started your coughing fit, handing the blunt back to Yuta, him just lighting it up again, waiting for you to recover.

When you were done, you turned to him expectantly. Taking the blunt from him, you placed it between your lips waiting for him to continue.

“Wasn’t sure to expect you or not,” he said as he lit the ashy end of the blunt for you.

Inhaling again, this time more smoothly, you made a confused face at him. Tapping out the embers that were starting to ruin the taste you replied, “I said I was coming, so of course I came.”

Yuta shrugged, hair falling around his shoulders, either the moonlight or the weed making him look like an angel.

Yuta just looked at you, face not saying much, or maybe it actually said a lot and you just had trouble reading him. You weren’t sure.

“Glad you did.” Was all you heard as you watched Yuta start to sway slightly.

“Was taking a tolerance break,” you explained when he raised his eyebrows at you. Two hits were usually not enough for you, but that was back when you were spending much more time with Yuta and did not have to pay for weed because he would never let you. “, That’s also strong as fuck.” You giggled.

Reaching out to take another hit, Yuta ignored your hands and just placed the blunt between your pouted lips. Opening them lightly to place the blunt properly you looked up to see Yuta much closer than you expected. Eyes that seemed to be staring into your soul, he leaned away to light the blunt and waited until you pulled the almost burnt out blunt away from your lips. Then he was back to his original position, so close that if you shifted a bit forward you would bump noses.

You slowly let out smoke from your mouth as you continued to stare at Yuta, always curious about his next actions, not really ever knowing what to expect.

Which never came because you were interrupted by the one person you were avoiding.

“Johnny wants everyone to come watch him cut his cake.”, said Mark, standing at the door, blatantly staring at you and Yuta, eyeing your proximity very carefully.

Stepping away from you, Yuta sighed dramatically, tone sounding almost teasing. “Ah well, we better go. Don’t want to miss anything important.” You didn’t miss his infamous smile, looking like he could see right through you.

He walked towards Mark who was still standing at the door frame, giving him the same smile he gave you and slipping past him into the warm house.

Despite feeling the cold wind prick at your exposed skin, you couldn’t bring yourself to move as Mark and you just stared at each other.

After what felt like hours but what must have actually been a few seconds, your gazes were broken but Yuta popping his head through the door, not minding Mark’s startled stance.

“Coming, Y/N?” he asked, faux innocence dripping from his voice.

Snapping out of your trance, you twisted your lips into the biggest smile you could muster and nodded and Yuta. Making your way towards the door you inhaled quickly before passing Mark so you didn’t have to smell his cologne when you walked by.

Mark turned to the side as you passed, your arm brushing his chest when you heard something about how you always forgot a jacket. Looking up to see if Mark had said something you saw his mouth in a thin line. Brushing off it as a part of your high, you grasped Yuta’s outstretched hand and allowed him to lead you to the kitchen where Johnny was waiting to cut his cake without looking back.

The kitchen was loud and hot, only accentuating your high. Donghyuck was quick to shove a red solo cup in your hand, demanding you finish it right this instance. Filled more than halfway, it reeked of vodka and about a splash of orange juice. There was so much vodka the juice only tinted the clear drink a very faint orange.

“You would be a horrible bartender,” you laughed at Donghyuck.

“I didn’t make you a drink to enjoy Y/N, I made you a drink to get DRUNK!”, words slurring together as he laughed with you.

Turing to Yuta, you saw him with a smirk and cocked eyebrow, challenging you. “Can you do it, Y/N? Or can you still not hold your drink?”.

Scoffing, you rolled your eyes. “I’m not an amateur, Yuta. You know that.”

Knowing the smirk would not leave his face, you smiled at Donghyuk. “Bottoms up!” you cheered as you downed the drink.

You didn’t stop chugging despite your body instantly warming and the feeling of bile in your throat. Finally reaching the end you slammed the cup down on the counter and let out a gag.

“Hyuck, that somehow tasted worse than usual.” You complained as Yuta kindly handed you a cup of actual juice.

“That’s because its Johnny’s Belvedere Silver! His parents gave it to him for his birthday, he was so drunk he handed me the bottle,” Donghyuck said, snickering in a sinister way.

“It’s not right to take advantage of the birthday boy.” Came a familiar, cat-like voice.

Ten, who was now wearing a white button-up (that was completely see-through), squeezed his way between Yuta and you, leaving you to press up against Donghyuck who did not seem aware of his surroundings at all. Returning Ten’s cunning smile with a genuine one of your own you felt the effects of the alcohol running through your system.

Looking around, a smile crossed your face as you recognized familiar faces. Johnny was currently deemed “unable to participate in festivities at the current moment and will rejoin the party in approximately ten minutes” by Jaehyun who didn’t fail to gather you in his arms when he finally made his way over to you. Two kisses pressed to your smiling cheeks, the feeling of guilt washing over you as you remembered you had not spoken to him since the summertime.

“Coming to my birthday party?”, he had asked you.

Handsome features struck you all over again, foggy feeling only increasing as you downed three shots while conversing with him.

After the third shot, you watched Jaehyun’s back retreat to go get Johnny when a head of yellow blond flashed before your eyes and were soon being pulled into a warm hug between skinny but toned arms.

“Y/N!”, exclaimed Taeyong. “I haven’t seen you in forever!” he hiccuped.

All you could do in response was laugh, hug him back, and tell him how good his hair looked.

“Let’s cut some cake!” yelled Johnny, practically being held up by Jaehyun.

Cheers were let-out around the kitchen as the crowd suddenly surged forward towards the counter. You were separated from Taeyong but spotted Donghyuck and Jeno from where you ended up. Attempting to make your way over to them, you stumbled, accidentally colliding with the very attractive pink-haired boy that was around Mark when you had first arrived.

“Careful now,” he smiled as he turned to you, gripping a shoulder so you didn’t topple over. Even if you were not as drunk as you were, you would have still smiled back just as wide as you were, trying to reciprocate the beautiful smile the boy was giving you.

“Johnny’s cutting his cake now, Jaemin.” Said the one person you were avoiding. Turning your head to the side so fast you could have got whiplash, you started up at Mark. Where had he come from?!

Before anyone could say anything, an off-tune rendition of Happy Birthday started, courtesy of Jaehyun. The pink-haired boy next to you, Jaemin, started singing loudly, smile still wide on his face as he watched Johnny laugh with glee, waving the knife a little too much.

From the corner of your eye you could see Mark, mouth moving with the words and eyes focused on his phone screen, recording Johnny. His lips were upturned slightly into small smile and hair falling into his eyes.

Snapping your eyes back towards the cake cutting in front of you, you chastised yourself for looking. You were supposed to be moving on, not staring at him!

Clapping with happiness after Johnny managed to cut his cake (not without whacking icing all over the counter) you turned around looking for your friends.

“Y/N can we talk?” you heard Mark say. Looking around you, you couldn’t see anyone you felt like sticking too, leaving you in a moment of panic. Not seeing a way out and senses hazy, you nodded at Mark.

Following him through the crowd you ignored his outstretched hand behind him to make sure you were keeping up with him and focused on the back of his neck.

He led you upstairs and into a bedroom you could only presume was Johnny’s; bikini calendar hiding behind the open closet door, high school graduation photo framed on the desk of him, Yuta and Taeyong. There were university photos including Jaehyun, Ten and many others you had seen downstairs. There was even some with you in them, the one standing out the most being the one taken at the first party you attended, the one where you were able to meet some of your favourite people in your life.  

It was a group photo, everyone standing far enough from the camera to make sure everyone was seen. You were sitting next to Mark on lawn chairs, hair in two French braids (courtesy of Raven who had given Yuta a braiding tutorial earlier that night) and wearing Mark’s grey zip-up hoodie. You had leaned into Mark, head titled, almost resting on his, broad grins across your faces. On the arms of the chairs, you could see yours and Mark’s hands resting very close to each other.

Not realizing you had been staring for so long, you were only knocked back to reality when Mark picked up the frame, shifting your line of vision.

“This night was really fun,” he started, smiling done at the photo. “, It was one of our favourite times together.” He said much more softly.

Sighing, you suddenly felt the room start spinning and a crushing feeling against your skull. Moving towards the bed you heard him ask, “You good?”.

You absolutely despised the genuine concern oozing from his voice.

Sitting on the bed, you attempted lying down but your dress kept riding up. Regretting the outfit choice for another time that night, you struggled for a few seconds trying to figure out how to lie down without flashing Mark until you realized there was no way. Letting out a huff you looked up to see Mark standing in front of you, varsity jacket draping across your lap before you could even protest.

Not saying anything, Mark sat on the bed next to you and then allowed his body to relax, head hitting the mattress with a soft thud.

Mimicking his actions, you lied down next to him, keeping your vision towards the ceiling.

Eyes meeting the night sky and not a popcorn ceiling, you remembered Johnny telling you that when he was younger, he had been obsessed with astronomy. Begging for a skylight, his father somehow managed to create a skylight type window in Johnny’s room. The light from the sky never seemed to bother Johnny, the bed even positioned specifically to look right out into the sky. Only child perks, you guessed.

You don’t know how long you both laid there. Unmoving, just breathing and staring into the sky. It had been long enough for the throbbing in your head to fade, leaving you with heavy eyes, fluttering closed with fatigue.

“I regret it.”

That snapped you awake.

Keeping your eyes forward to the sky, you hesitated in your response. “Regret what?” you asked, voice barely above a whisper.

“Y/N.” he said, turning to look at you. His voice was firm like that day in the café, only this time it held another emotion. Sadness? Desperation? You couldn’t tell.

Unable to stop yourself, you turned your head towards his. The proximity between you two was very limited. You could smell the beer and mint gum in his breath, could see the specks in his eyes.

“Are you okay now?” he asked. You nodded.

“Y/N… I- I’m… I’m sorry.”, he said sadly.

And because you knew Mark you knew what he meant by that. ‘I’m sorry for making you cry.’ ‘I’m sorry for making you hurt.’ ‘I’m sorry I broke your heart.’

Mouth opening to reply, you quickly shut your mouth at the sight of Mark’s watery eyes.

“Y/N… I’m in love with you. I’m still in love with you. If um… you don’t umm… if you don’t feel the same I und- “

He was cut off by your lips meeting his.

You hadn’t realized how much you missed kissing Mark until this moment right here. Pure electricity seemed to instantly course through your veins as your mind was sent into an instant frenzy.

It wasn’t until you felt hot tears falling from your eyes that you pulled away, laughing and gasping for air.

Whipping the tears away, you looked at Mark. He was smiling widely at you, soon joining in on your laughter.

Soon after you both had finished laughing for so long and hard that you were clutching your stomachs, Mark grabbed your hands with his, little giggles still leaving his lips.

“I’m still in love with you too.” You said softly after you had both calmed down.

Smiling broadly, Mark stood up, signalling for you to pass his jacket.

Fixing your dress, you handed him the jacket, him holding is open behind you, waiting for you to slip your arms inside. Basking in the scent familiar scent from the jacket (it just smelt so… Mark) you allowed Mark to pull you up with both hands.

Intertwining fingers, he led you out of the room, back into the hot house and thumping bass.

“Be mine?” he asked nervously, pausing before descending down the stairs.

“I always was.” You stated with a small smile.

Smiling so wide his eyes scrunched, he let out a sound of glee and pulled you close.

Walking down the stairs with his arms around you took you back to all of the times before the… incident and made your heart flutter.

Walking into the kitchen hand in hand, you were pleasantly surprised to see many familiar faces.

“CALLED IT!” yelled Donghyuck, Raven whacking him on the arm for yelling in her ear. “Hand it over.” He said, hand out towards Yuta.

Huffing, Yuta reached into his pocket and handed a very happy Donghyuck a twenty.

“Did you guys seriously bet on us?”, asked Mark, eyes wide.

“Ugh I had really thought today was gonna be a test run. Thought you would actually make up at Jaehyun’s party,” grumbled Yuta.

“Well I’m verrrrry happy you guys are back together,” slurred Johnny, rolling his r’s very harshly. Jaehyun pushed his hand away from a pile of icing that had landed on the counter and smiled at you and Mark.

“Congrats guys. I’m happy you worked it out.” Ever the romantic, Jaehyun smiled fondly at the two of you, Taeyong giving you both a congratulations as well.

Jeno was absolutely ecstatic at the fact that you were back together, complaining to Mark about how apparently you were “mopping around without him”. You didn’t hesitate to punch him in the arm.

“Picture time!” called Johnny, setting up his phone on the stand with the help of Taeyong.

You were surrounded by the familiar faces that had all welcomed you that first bonfire the summer you met Mark.

Leaning your head towards his, imitating the pose from the original picture, you heard Mark whisper as the flash went off.

“I love you.”

And you knew everything would be alright.

 LE FIN

[writingwife-83]

My 2020 Sherlolly Self Interview

Thanks for organizing this fun activity @sherlollyappreciationweek! 🎉 I’ll start out with a very brief “about me” section-

I live in the northeast area of the USA, I’ve been married for seventeen years, have one teenage son, and I’m in my *gulp* late thirties now. I do volunteer ministry work and also work part time from home. Among other leisure activities, obviously I love writing! I started writing original fiction when I was a preteen, but I’ve been writing fanfic under the pen name “writingwife83” for over six years now. I discovered fanfic and the world of online fandom after becoming obsessed with BBC Sherlock in 2014 after s3 aired. I read The Full House, fell in love with the whole concept of fanfic, specifically for sherlolly, and couldn’t help but give it a go myself. And as they say, the rest is history!

Below the cut I’ll talk about some of the topics and fics suggested by followers/readers. Buckle up cuz it’s a lot lol...

Ok, first up to be kind enough to give me some feedback is @readstoomuch. You said- “what inspires you. Any story (I love them all!). Who do you love writing? Who is hardest for you? And which is that one story that you had fun doing?”

As for what inspires me, first and foremost it’s the show and characters itself. Watching those two on screen, it’s not hard to be inspired! But beyond that, I find a lot of inspiration in music and art, and just generally in other creative works and people. I think for a while I had my own internal inspiration and no lack of it, but as months dragged into years lol, I have found that the rest of the shippers are invaluable in filling the gaps when I lack inspiration and motivation. Some prompts I’ve gotten from others have taken on a life I never would have expected, and that’s pretty great. I honestly don’t think writing works best as a purely solitary activity. I know myself and although there is an aspect of my writing that will always be “for me,” that’s absolutely not all it is. It’s the fun of creating with others and it’s the fun of sharing with others.

As for who I love writing and who’s hardest, I think I’ve always felt pretty comfortable writing the main characters in Sherlock. I probably especially love writing Sherlock himself because he’s fun to break down and really dig deep into his emotions and thought processes. There have definitely been times some of the side characters have overwhelmed me and made me nervous about conveying their voices accurately. For instance, Mycroft can be tough if it involves pulling him out of his shell in a way that still feels believable and true to character.

That one story I had fun doing? Well there’s no way I can say just one. 😆 As far as reader response, there’s no other fic that can compare to the fun of I Told You So, that’s for sure. But as far as the actual plotting and creating, I think the fics I’ve had the most fun with are the multi-chapters I’ve done since becoming good friends with @thisisartbylexie. Having her as a sounding board, plotting buddy, and editor has absolutely increased my creating fun and has definitely also made me a better writer.

Thanks so much for asking @readstoomuch 🥰

Alrighty, @thisisartbylexie, you asked- if there's a fic that you ever wanted to go back to change in some way, which one would it be and why? Which one do you feel "oh wow, did I write that?" in a super positive way?

Idk how to choose just one fic. There are plenty that could use some changing lol! One I’d like to fix though, would be Pleased to Meet You. I know (because I’ve been told) that there’s inaccuracies in that one seeing as I’m not personally familiar with university settings in the UK. I did actually attempt research and I thought I got the idea, but apparently it didn’t work out terribly well. But the plotting and progression of that fic is one I’ve always been happy with, so I guess I feel like it’s a shame if it came off messy in some general ways and distracted from the rest of it. I like how I was able to weave that one into the canon of the show up to that point. And tbh it actually still fits as a uni backstory for them without any conflicts to the canon. As much as I enjoy canon divergence and AU, I also have a big soft spot for fics that simply connect seamlessly to what we’ve already been given.

As for “oh wow, did I write that?” I think one of my proudest accomplishments has been Zephyr. That fic kinda has it all lol. The tropes, the pining, the romance, the Victorian setting...ugh I love it. And there’s a climactic kiss moment in that fic that’s one of my faves I’ve written. I’m so glad I wrote it because of the Sherlolly Remix Challenge in ‘16, and at your suggestion, Lexie. But I will also be forever sad that I had to release that fic all at once on AO3 once completed. That fic would have been great fun to be writing and posting as I went along! And on top of being happy with the fic itself and how it came out, I’m awfully proud of the fact that you were excited enough about the fic to illustrate it, and that @goodshipsherlolly enjoyed it enough to record it as an audio fic. Honestly, what more could a writer ask for? 🥺

@mizjoely, you said you’d like to hear anything about The Queen’s Man. Okey doke, you got it lol!

I actually went back and read through most of that fic when I got this because it had been a long time since I’d looked at it. I gotta be honest that in hindsight...I’m a little surprised it did as well as it did.😂🙈 As some may remember, it started because I saw a magnificent manip and wanted to write something to go with it, and then because that was well received, somehow it just kept going. I did very little world building and development of characters in that fic. It was largely just one shippy, romantic, pining scene after another lol. At the end I did kinda tie it all in and wrapped the story up ok, but it was definitely one of those self indulgent fics where I didn’t feel like doing the hard parts and really just wanted to write the fun stuff. Don’t get me wrong, I loved writing it, and I’m so glad it got the positive reception that it did! But it just kinda makes me laugh because it goes to show sometimes you don’t know what’s going to do really well. You could agonize over clever plotting and world building and character development etc, and be so super proud of the finished product and all your hard work, but then you share and the response is like “meh.” And then other times you legit just throw something together with barely any careful thought, and the crowd goes wild! But aside from all that, the visuals in my head of that AU are just too drool worthy to me. Molly in Medieval royal attire? Sherlock in dark armor with a Purple Tunic of Sex™️ underneath? The two of them lingering in the dimly lit hallways and rooms of a castle and gazing endlessly in mutual pining? Yes to all.

Thanks for asking @mizjoely 😘

Ok wow, see what I mean? That was long! 🤣 If you read all the way through this whole thing, *Moriarty voice* thank you...bless you. Honestly, this ship is amazing and I don’t think I’ll ever have a writing experience anywhere else like I’ve had here. I’ve seen the other side of things in another fandom now, so I can all the more so confirm that there’s no ship quite like sherlolly. The warmth, reception, and longevity is mind blowing and I’m just awfully happy to have played a part in creating for the beauty that is Sherlock Holmes and Molly Hooper. 💕

[callmeblake]

Frank Iero, New York, NY, June 2019 (X)

Aug 29, 2019, 09:10am

Frank Iero May Just Be His Own Puppet Master

Photo Credit: Audrey Lew

Interview below the cut

Derek Scancarelli

Contributor

Hollywood & Entertainment

I am a music journalist living in New York City.

Frank Iero is breathing deeply and fighting off nausea. This isn’t uncommon for the 37-year-old guitarist and vocalist, given his predilection for debilitating anxiety. But on this occasion, it isn’t pre-show jitters.

“Oh my god, I hate this f*cking boat,” Iero says, as the docked vessel on which he sits knocks against a pier in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Iero and his band, The Future Violents, just finished an intimate Saturday matinee show as fans sweat, sang and caught a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty.

It had been about 16 years since Iero and his now defunct band, My Chemical Romance (the band broke up in 2013), first performed on water. In July of 2002, the band released its debut album, I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love. In October of 2003, the soon-to-be emo heroes performed alongside New York Hardcore legends Sick Of It All at an aquatic gig booked by New Jersey college radio station WSOU. And in June of 2004, My Chemical Romance released Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, the band’s platinum-selling breakthrough record. In a matter of two years, Iero’s life changed dramatically.

In 2019, Iero still hasn’t found his sea legs, but a lot more has changed. He’s fathered three children, released three full-length solo records (including 2019’s Barriers), and survived a near-death experience. And as he gets older, he finds truth in life’s greatest clichés.

“Time flies, it just screams by,” Iero says. “You think you’re appreciating the time, but it’s easy to take it for granted. It’s a shame.”

But Iero is trying his hardest to pay attention to the little things, especially when it comes to family. He and his wife, Jamia, have three children together: nine-year-old twin daughters, Cherry and Lily, and a seven-year-old son named Miles.

“It’s wonderful to see them evolve and come into their own,” Iero says. “But it’s funny how personalities are innate. We shape the way they experience things or teach them the ropes, but for the most part, I’ve found that we are who we are when we’re born.”

From the start, Iero has seen an even split in the twins’ personalities. Cherry, he says, most behaves like her mother, whereas Lily possesses her father’s attitude.

“Some of the sh*t I hear coming out of my daughter's mouth,” Iero says laughing. “My God! It’s stuff I think but never say — they don't know to be ashamed yet! It's amazing and honest and pure. And I know exactly where she's coming from because I feel the same way.”

As part of fostering a relationship of trust and honesty, Iero has been age-appropriately transparent with his kids about the 2016 accident that almost killed him, his brother-in-law and guitarist Evan Nestor and his manager Paul Clegg.

While unloading gear from their van in Sydney, Australia, a city bus crashed into the group and their vehicle. In a 2017 interview with MTV, Iero recounted, in vivid detail, the moment he was dragged underneath the bumper of the bus, the screams of his brother-in-law, and the blood pooling from his manager.

Although Iero was able to walk into an ambulance carrying one of his friends, the scene was a spectacle overrun with emergency personnel — they even landed a rescue helicopter in nearby Hyde Park. Despite serious injuries, amazingly, there were no fatalities.

When Iero returned home from the hospital, he explained to his children that he was in a car accident, but that it was a singular freak incident.

“You don't want to lie,” he says. “They're getting older. Their friends and their parents are on the internet. They're asking questions. It does get back to them.”

Iero was as honest as possible, but avoided any gory details. He was also conscious that it wouldn’t be long before he would travel for work again — and he didn’t want to scare his kids any further.

Almost four years later, residual damage from the crash is impossible to ignore. Nestor has nerve damage in his leg that may never be corrected. Clegg’s leg and knee have undergone multiple surgeries, but are in poor shape. And Iero still has a tear in his shoulder that hurts every time he plays the guitar. Despite the pain, he’s afraid to undergo surgery.

“I was lucky enough to walk away and still play,” Iero says. “If I were to test fate again and go under the knife, if something were to go wrong… to let that be taken from me … no, I can't.”

On some days, the emotional toll of surviving such a traumatic accident weighs more heavily. Iero describes his recovery as non-linear: some days he feels collected and in control, other days the memory rushes back into his mind.

After his new band finished recording Barriers, Iero and his team went back to Australia for appointments pertaining to the accident and corresponding litigation. As soon as he exited the plane, Iero felt like he’d returned to the horrific scene. For the following week, he was barraged by an unending state of panic.

“You go through these instances of PTSD,” he says. “You never know what's going to trigger and send you all the way back to the beginning with recovery.”

Iero greatly underestimated how difficult his return to Australia would be. When navigating to a doctor’s office near where the accident occurred, he couldn’t bring himself to walk down the street. And suddenly, he felt surrounded by buses.

“I don't know if this is true,” he says. “But it felt like every other car on the street was one of these f*cking buses. They were everywhere. It was frightening. I couldn't do anything. I was shaking like a leaf.”

Despite the traumatic flashbacks, Iero continues to reflect on that day. In the promotional run for Barriers, he discussed the accident at length. And on the record itself, he addresses the complicated ripple effect it’s had on his entire sense of self.

“I don't think it needs to define me,” Iero says. “But it was something I needed to talk about on this record. It's not something I could sweep under the rug. But do I want to dwell on it every day and relive it? No. But I think about it constantly. I feel the pain constantly. It's on my mind.”

In recent interviews, Iero has tended to frame a few philosophical takeaways from his ordeal. In simple terms, the first idea is that he’s found a new lease on life — that everything happens for a reason and he’s been given an opportunity to seize the day. The second philosophy is much darker, a sort of survivor’s guilt compounded with fear and existential dread. The third and most abstract consideration is closest to Simulation Theory — where Iero has the ability to control his own artificial timeline.

Sometimes, Iero questions if actually died that day. He wonders: Is this all real?

“It’s hard. No one can tell you what to believe,” he says. “But you come to this realization, ‘Well, this is real to me, the hand I was dealt, so I have to make the best of it!’”

Through the acceptance of uncertainty, Iero surmises that he just may be his own puppet master.

“If this is a figment of my imagination,” Iero says. “If this is all in my head, then I am the master of my own destiny. If I want to do something, I can manufacture it. And if it's not the case, then at least it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Maybe putting positive vibes out into the universe is beneficial. If we didn't make it and we're just going through this weird labyrinth in my mind, I can do anything I want.”

And lately, he’s been doing just that. Call it sorcery or the power of positive thinking, but Iero is motivated. For Barriers, he was able to assemble a dream band, The Future Violents (different lineups of his backing band have previously gone by The Cellabration and The Patience), featuring his brother-in-law Nestor on guitar, Thursday’s Tucker Rule on drums, Murder by Death’s Matt Armstrong on bass, and Kayleigh Goldsworthy on keyboard.

The theme of the album — and his own internal dialogue — mostly relates to tragedy and timing. Did the universe have a course set out for him? Or was he just some random victim?

“The crazy thing is that you didn't do anything wrong,” Iero says of the accident. “Yet, all of this stuff was taken from you and you have to make these decisions. You get angry a lot.”

He continues: “These random, abrupt, violent actions. Do they happen to us? Or for us? I wouldn't have been able to make this record if it didn't happen. And it made me realize a lot of things about myself. Am I happy it happened? No. But I'm happy where I am right now.”

Iero views Barriers as an exercise in vulnerability. If the aftermath of his accident taught him anything, it’s that success was meaningless to his character, but adversity helped him grow. For the first time, addressing childhood trauma helped Iero expose himself in a way that felt freeing.

“When you put something to song, it gives that memory weight,” Iero explains. “If you never talk about it, it's almost like it didn't happen. There's a fine line between relinquishing that power to this memory, situation or trauma, or holding that power over it and creating your own narrative from it.”

Barriers also intertwines Iero’s childhood experiences with his current perspective as a father. This go around, he felt comfortable writing about his parents’ divorce — the couple split when he was three and divorced when he was seven.

He looks back on the unpleasantness of the process and his consequential understanding of his mother’s issues with addiction, depression and mental illness. On his 2016 record, Parachutes, Iero first referenced his mother’s struggles and his own liability to inherit her traits. He’s still horrified by the idea of predeterminism.

“When you're a young kid being surrounded with it, it doesn't feel right,” Iero says. “You're not happy. You're scared. You're constantly concerned for your parent. It’s almost as if you become the caregiver.”

He continues: “Then you see yourself falling into these patterns that you were witness to and maybe in a roundabout way were taught. That addiction, that depression, runs through you. It's easy to fall off that cliff. I don't want that for my kids and I need to stop this cycle. Like this sh*t stops with me. Whether it be I get okay, or I f*cking turn my lights out.”

It’s this sort of tongue-in-cheek use of concerning language that keeps Iero’s fanbase enthralled, yet somewhat on edge. Take for example, in the comment section for his video “Young & Doomed,” some diehard fans are troubled by his repeated use of the words “hurt myself again.” While he’s surprised to hear about the response, he counters that the record is ultimately meant to feel uplifting and positive, even if addressing dark topics.

“I don't think that we should strive for perfection,” Iero says. “This idea that we should all have this perfect life and be pretty and purse our lips to post a picture on social media is bullsh*t. The things that make us unique are important.”

He continues: “Sometimes we're our own worst enemies and we hurt ourselves. Those scars, though, are important. They're beautiful. ‘Young And Doomed’ is a call to arms to celebrate the things people think are wrong with us.”

Now, Iero just hopes his story and music inspire fans to try, fail and try again.

“You don't find out who you are unless you get a scar and get hurt,” Iero says. “You should be hurt, hurt other people, and learn that it feels terrible to hurt someone else. You should feel sorry for it and make amends for it. These are important lessons to be a better person. You find out who you truly are by attacking things that scare you the most.”

Frank Iero is currently touring Europe with Laura Jane Grace & The Devouring Mothers.

[lutrain2020]

Meet the Creator!

Introducing: Mew!

Commissions:  Not right now but maybe at some point in the future when I improve.

Social Media: Tumblr: @nicetomeetmew​  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nicetomeetmew/

Tell us a little bit about yourself!

I'm Mew and that's pretty much the only nickname I have on the interweb (although I was known as Brandy for a while but that's a very long story). I like drawing, writing, singing, baking, video games and messing about with my melodica. My favourite colour is black but I've recent had a fondness for purple and dark pink. My favourite animal is wolves but I also love sharks!

What got you into creating? what inspires you to keep creating?

I got into art because I kept seeing so many amazing pieces online and I kept thinking to myself: "wow I wish I could do that." I mean I still can't, but I'm trying and it's fun! And as for writing: it's actually my mum who got me into it and inspires me to keep going; whether it's fanfiction or an original work.

What's your creative process like?

Honestly I'm so new to this art stuff, I just start throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks (metaphorically, but that actually sounds kind of fun!). The only thing that's consistent is that I always end up covering my page with random shapes before I start. I think scribbling helps me get my thoughts in order and figure out where to start.

What kind of mediums do you like to use?

I mostly use my tablet for drawing, but I like mucking about with chalk and oil paints for fun.

Is there a specific scene wrote that you are particularly proud of?

"On paper, she was perfectly lovely. Her skin was clear and fair, her hair fell in long gold ringlets around her face, and she moved with such elegance and grace she might as well be floating. But that was on paper. In reality… 'HEY! Are you listening?!'"

Is there someone who inspires you and your writing or art?

Hmm... honestly I find myself inspired by almost every artist I see. There's so much unique and gorgeous art out there and I think that taught me that everyone is different and that my art is never going to look like someone else's; because it's mine.

What got you into writing or art?

I just wanted to be able to do something. I have all sorts of thoughts going on in my head and using all the energy to create something seemed like a good way to go (that was actually my mum's idea).

What's your favorite part of the creative process?

I love character planning. I probably love it a little too much. I have a whole notebook book dedicated to backstories and headcanons and all that fun stuff. Nothing brings me more joy than creating a whole new life. I think I spend far too much time on the planning but hey ho. It's fun.

What's your least favorite part of the creative process?

Excluding my character plans: I hate following a plan. If I it so much easier just to fling words at a page, then mess around with them until the make sense and I'm happy with them. I tried planning out a whole story once and long story short, my notebook ended up in next door's garden.

What's your favorite type of scene to write?

I think I find it hard to find the line between "what I enjoy writing" and "what I'm good at writing". But I'd have to say, while it's scarce in most of the stuff I write these days, I love me a nice little emotional comfort scene. Hugs. Tears. Platonic kisses. *Rubs hands together gleefully* yesss. 

What's the hardest for you to create?

As much as I enjoy fluffy scenes I find them an absolute nightmare to write because my brain immediately says "make them all suffer." I like angst, I really do but it's a bit of annoying when you're trying to finally write something happy for a character an then before you know it everything has gone to hell. Example: Character A has just won some big award, he patched things up with his bestie and things are finally turning aroun- his house is on fire, his mother ran off and he is now homeless and caring for his baby sister on the streets. And yes I came up with that off the top of my head. It's a real problem is you ask me. 

What fandoms do you enjoy creating for?

I don't share all the stuff I draw and write but there are a bunch of fandoms I enjoy creating for mainly: Linked Universe: not one, not two, but nine Links?  Yes please. I love brotherly bonding so much. Fire Emblem Three Houses: is probably the fandom where I love creating about ships the most. Sylvix sustains me as much as Dimileth does. Kid Icarus Uprising: Dark Pit. That is all. Legend of Zelda: Do I love theorising about the BotW sequel and writing about it? Yes I do. Very much. Pokémon: Writing about teenagers traveling the land with adorable and cool creature is as fun as you'd expect it to be. And I fit shipping in there too (Haudion and FerrisWheelShipping sustains my soul). Animal Crossing: The only fandom I only draw for. Tiny lil animal friends I just... yes. 

What's the work you are most proud of?

In my BotW 2 deprived state a wrote a lil fic called Don't Be Afraid, based on the very little we know from the trailer. I put off posting it for weeks but I finally mustered of the courage to do it because at the end of the day, whether people like it or not, I'm proud of it.  https://nicetomeetmew.tumblr.com/post/619037409470971904/dont-be-afraid

Where do you post your finished works?

I don't post a lot of my writing (okay I've posted it twice in my whole life heh) but it's pretty much just on my Tumblr. Although I do have ao3 and I have a longer fic in the works which I plan of posting there (eventually). https://archiveofourown.org/users/nicetomeetmew

If you have any fun stories about the pieces you made, please do share!

The only art I've really shared so far is the Links from LU as Sailor Scouts (Sailor Links if you will). And, fun fact, that all stemmed from a simple discussion about what if Wild had a magical girl transformation when he changed gear with the Sheikah Slate. So I draw him doing the Sailor Moon pose in his Vai clothes and that's that, right? Nope. Next day I was watching Sailor Moon and I couldn't stop thinking about Sailor Wild so that next thing you know I'm drawing Wind as Sailor Mercury and then I'm making a list of the Links as Sailor Scouts and The Sailor Links was born. I even drew Fi as Luna. So a full month was filled with a project that was inspired by one simple discussion. And I'm eternally grateful because it was an absolute blast to do (drawing Time with a tiara is just as fun as you'd imagine).

[winryofresembool]

Things We Lost in the Fire, ch 5

aka Caleo uni au

Fic summary: Calypso starts studying at a new university, but to her annoyance her new flatmate is a loud mouthed mechanic who also likes to sneak his dog in whenever. But as she learns to know him better, she realizes they might have more in common than what she first thought. Eventually, even the darkest secrets come out…

Chapter summary:  Fire alarms make a good reason to talk to your flatmate.

A/N: New chapter! This isn't the longest but we get some important hints about Leo's past. I wanted to involve fire into his story somehow and, well, this is what happened.

Thanks to Cris for betaing and a huge shoutout to smoustart on ig for making this awesome piece of art for this fic! 

Please enjoy and leave a comment if you like this fic because that can literally make my day and it sure as heck makes me more motivated to continue it!

Characters in this ch: Leo, Calypso

Words: 1400+

Genre: romance & hurt/comfort 

Warnings: none

previous chapter / next chapter / AO3

...

"Damn that fire alarm!" Calypso growled to herself as the device made the beeping sound again. "I can't focus when it's doing that."

She had been working on her latest literature assignment ("write a detailed character analysis on one of the characters in Odyssey") when the fire alarm had started making a sound that Calypso suspected meant it was running out of battery. Unfortunately, she didn't have tools of her own so she had no idea how she'd manage to change them before the sound would drive her mad. She didn't want to give up so easily, though, so she took one of her hair pins and climbed on a chair, attempting to unscrew the fire alarm with the pin. However, she had no success. The pin was too thick and the alarm was a bit too high for her, so she had to stand on her toes to reach it in the first place. That's why, when she heard a door open, she nearly lost her balance because she got startled by the sudden sound.

"Wow, wow! Woman! What are you doing?" her flatmate yelped when he rushed to give her his hand so she wouldn't fall from the chair.

Calypso was embarrassed that he had seen that scene unfold, so she let go of his hand immediately once she was standing steadily on the floor and said a bit more rudely than what she had meant: "What does it look like? Trying to change the battery, of course."

"No offense, Sunshine, but were you really trying to open it with a hair pin?" Leo asked, amusement clear in his voice. "Like, sure, hair pins can be used for many things but I'm pretty sure there are better tools for that."

Calypso squinted at him. "First of all, don't call me Sunshine. Second of all, Mister Mechanic, I don't carry tools around everywhere unlike some people. So please get yours and change those damn batteries."

Leo was no longer affected by Calypso's tone. He was secretly happy that for once he'd be good for something.

“Gladly, Sunshine,” he replied cheerfully, emphasizing the Sunshine part. He was already wearing his toolbelt with a screwdriver peeking from it and he seemed unfazed when their fingers touched for a moment as Calypso handed him the batteries she had been planning to use.

“By the way, you’re buying the next batteries in case these will stop working too before either of us has moved out,” Calypso noted as she watched Leo picking the suitable tool for opening the fire alarm.

“That’s fair enough,” Leo said, still smiling as he focused on his mission. Calypso was slightly surprised by his calmness. She was fully aware that she was not acting like her usual self in his company, and at first it seemed to have irritated Leo, but now? He didn’t seem to care. He had taken an entirely new approach and she didn’t know what to think of it.

Leo climbed on the chair (not having issues reaching the alarm since he was about 10 centimeters taller than Calypso) and started unscrewing the lid. When he got it done, he gave the lid for Calypso to hold while he put the new batteries in. Standing in such a close proximity, Calypso noticed the scars on Leo’s olive colored arms that were left uncovered by his T-shirt. She wanted to ask about them but she didn’t know how he’d feel about it so the only thing that came out of her mouth was an “ummm…”

“Yeah? Were you gonna say something?” Leo asked nonchalantly while still switching the batteries.

“Never mind. It’s. It’s none of my business.” Calypso shrugged.

“What is?” Leo kept insisting.

“I was…” Calypso felt her cheeks getting hot. “…just wondering where you got those scars.”

Now Leo’s smile finally faded. He shook his head. “A fire. Long time ago. That’s all.” It meant she wasn’t allowed to ask more questions about that, and she got the hint.

“I’m sorry.”

“Well, what happened, happened.” He sighed, climbing down the chair. “But now that we’re getting serious, can I ask you a question? Why do you act like that? Like you hate me? I’m trying my hardest to think of what I really did wrong but I can’t think of anything other than me just being generally annoying. Most people get past that in about two weeks. But I can’t get a grip of you.”

“It’s complicated.” Calypso said, similar kind of sadness in her eyes as what she’d seen in Leo’s after her question. Then she realized that maybe they did have something in common: secrets about their past they didn’t want to share. “I… I don’t think I actually hate you. It has… something to do with my past. I don’t have a lot of good experiences with people, and… that’s why I’m quite cautious when I meet someone new these days. I admit that when I first saw you, I was… prejudiced. But as I’ve gotten to know you a bit better, I’ve noticed… some of the thoughts I had of you were probably wrong.”

Leo couldn’t help but snort at that confession. “Oh, then what were you expecting? Some tall, handsome, strong, heroic guy who actually prefers spending his time with people rather than with his machines?”

“That’s not it. You gave me a kind of obnoxious picture of yourself during our first conversation. And then your dog broke my desk… I guess that was the final straw. But you did fix it. And you helped me to change the batteries too,” she pointed at the fire alarm. “And I think I understand your machine craziness. You need a distraction, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Leo admitted, starting unconsciously fiddling with his toolbox again. “Doing something with my hands always helps me when I feel anxious or… whatever.”

Calypso could relate to that. “I’m the same. I mean, I’m not as good with tools as you are, but I take care of my flowers, sew, knit, draw… that kind of stuff.”

“I see.” Leo nodded. “Hey, is it just me or did we just have our first proper conversation? Just wait till Jason and Piper are gonna hear about this!”

“What?” Calypso asked, confused about what Leo’s friends had to do with that.

“Oh, sorry.” Leo looked embarrassed, realizing he had said too much. “I probably shouldn’t have said that. But, um, the thing is, I… kinda made a deal with my friends that I would talk to you. Because they thought I was acting stupid. But I swear, this wasn’t planned, I heard the fire alarm too and I didn’t know you were already trying to take care of it. So I was 100 per cent honest about everything I said. Leo Valdez doesn’t lie.”

Calypso raised her eyebrow, but this time there was actually no maliciousness in her voice when she asked: “Oh, so you were talking about me to your friends? I wonder what you said.”

Leo’s face turned as hot as a tomato: “Not-nothing bad! Just that we weren’t off to a good start, but…”

“Relax,” Calypso stopped him, a hint of smile on her face. “You don’t have to tell me more.”

“Huh? You’re not mad?” Leo’s eyebrows disappeared behind his long, curly fringe.

“Nah. I have to admit I may have mentioned you to someone at the uni as well. Turns out she had heard of you too,” Calypso giggled at Leo’s surprised expression. The surprise didn’t last long, though, because it turned into a grin as Leo said:

“That’s the Valdez effect for you! Of course all the ladies have heard of me, I’m irresistible!”

“Right now you’re being pretty resistible, though.” Calypso rolled her eyes, but her mouth twitched with amusement.

“Huh? You’re not feeling my charm?”

“No! Absolutely not!” she said coldly, resting her hands on her hips.

Leo pretended to feel upset by her comment. “Just wait, I will win you over!”

“Oh, we’ll see about that,” Calypso stuck her tongue out. “Hey, if you are done with your weirdness now, I’d like to test if the fire alarm works.”

“What?”

Before Leo had time to say more, Calypso pulled out matches from her pocket, climbed on the chair and took one stick out of the box. Before she managed to light it, though, Leo yelped, his face unnaturally pale: “No, don’t!”

“What’s wrong?” Calypso asked, turning to see him.

“It’s just… I hate the sound it makes, wait till I’m in my room,” he said but Calypso had a feeling that wasn’t the truth. She tried to think what could have possibly triggered him, and came up with only one possible solution: he was afraid of fire.

[the-final-sif]

Sif’s Writing Advice

So, as someone whose done quite a bit of writing, fanfiction and some original stuff, I thought I’d throw together a post with some of the most important things I’ve learned over the years. This is all based on my own experiences, so take it with a grain of salt.

First, concepts:

1) Nothing is universal.

There are a million ways to write. Everything from writing style to getting yourself writing will vary heavily from person to person. There’s nothing wrong with that! In fact, it’s a wonderful, wonderful thing! Focus on improving, yes, and don’t disregard advice without consideration, but understand what works for one person may or may not work for you. Some of the greatest works of all times are those that challenge expectations, so fuck the rules, have fun while you’re writing, and make it your own.

The easiest way I’ve found to draw the line between important guidelines to follow and unneeded rules you can put to the side, is during the editing phase before you correct something. Take a step back and ask yourself why you think what you did is wrong. If the answer is it makes it harder to communicate your point to the reader, it doesn’t say what you want it to say, it makes the writing choppy, etc, probably best to change that. If the only reason you can come up with is “Well, that’s how you’re supposed to do it”, leave it alone.

2) Write poorly, and publish it.

Alright.

This is a fucking hard one.

As someone with ADHD and anxiety, this is one of the hardest things I had to learn, but it is also the single most valuable skill I’ve cultivated over the years.

You don’t get good at writing without doing it. That’s true. You need to write well to write great, you need to write okay to write well, you need to write like shit to write okay. I’m sure you’ve heard that one before. People say it because it’s true. You have to practice to get good at any skill.

What you won’t get told as often is, sharing your work with other people is a skill too. Learning what feedback is useful and what is not, dealing with the anxiety of putting yourself out there, figuring out how to reach audiences, etc. All of that is a skill that you have to learn. The only way you get good at that, is by doing it.

If you wait forever, writing and rewriting things over and over and over again, even if your writing improves, it’s still going to be hell when you try to put it out there, no matter how good it is. Putting your writing out there helps you get over the fact it will never be perfect. Learning to accept the imperfections in your works takes time, but it’s worth it.

I’ve been publishing fanfiction up for almost 6 years now. My early stories are still hard for me to go back and look at sometimes. Despite that, I’m glad I published them. Putting up stories that weren’t great taught me 2 very important things. First, just because it’s not perfect, doesn’t mean it can’t make someone happy and second, just because it’s not perfect doesn’t mean it can’t make me happy.

Even now, I have the same A03 I’ve always had. I’m not going to switch accounts to leave my older works behind. I’m not going orphan them, delete them, anything of the sort. Sure, the writing for a lot of my older stories suck, but was still time and effort I put into creating something. They may not be great, but I’m proud of them anyways.

So write things poorly. Make mistakes. Fuck up spelling, grammar, flow, characterization, consistency, etc. Use every cliche and trope in the book. Leave plot threads half-finished, forget characters existed, have romance come in out of no where. Then once you’re done, put that shit up for other people to see. Let other people see that you have made mistakes, you have created something that’s imperfect, and that’s okay. Be proud of your creation, flaws and all.

3) Write the story you want to read.

It’s good to learn how to write for other people. Taking requests/commissions, experimenting with new styles, all of that is well and good. However, don’t get too caught up in writing for other people. 

When writing, don’t write the story you think someone else will want to read. Write the story you want to read. This goes hand in hand with tip #1. Fuck the idea that you have to follow a linear story path. Fuck the idea that you have to have a climax in the middle of your story. Fuck the idea that you need to have a goddamn plot in the first place.

People read slice of life fanfiction for a reason. Hurt/comfort is it’s own genre for a reason. Fluff is a genre for a reason.

I mean this for fanfiction, but I especially mean this for original writing. Write whatever story it is you want to read. Odds are, someone else wants to read that story too.

Second, here’s more concrete advice:

If you’re feeling like you’re writing is too bland/dry, check your sentence openers and sentence structure. Using the same opener (a pronoun, a name, “the”, etc) for every sentence can make your eyes glaze over when reading through it.

Fuck grammar when writing dialogue. Seriously. People talk in run-on sentences, with weird contractions and odd flow all the time. Putting grammar rules to the side, particularly during your first draft, can really help improve character voice.

Instead of ‘killing your darlings’, move them to a new document. That way if you want to bring them back in later, you can! If you decide not to, hey, you’ve got a file full of awesome scenes for later inspiration or even just posting on their own. 

Keep a sticky note, separate document, irl note pad, whatever, to the side when you’re writing. When you get a random idea for dialogue/scene/etc while writing, jot it down there. That helps prevent too much bouncing around while you’re trying to get through your writing.

Use brackets when you hit a snag. If you don’t know something, like a direction/color/date/etc, put (ADD X HERE), keep writing and come back to it. Again, this helps you keep in the groove. Particularly for my ADHD writers out there hyperfocusing, this can really help get through writing. 

Try voice to text program if you have a hard time getting ideas down. It lets you tell your story orally, put that (very roughly) into text, and gives you a base to work off of. It’ll be sloppy and rough, but it can really help kick writer’s block in the butt. Almost all computers have a built in program for this, but you can find plenty online too.

[areluctantsblog]

Teenker headcanon

I got temporarily obsessed with teenker a few days ago and i had this idea. I haven't made a headcanon post before, but I need to get this out of my system. I'd love to write it (even written one scene) but it'd be such an enormous work that I don't think I'll have time to write it anytime soon. Hope y’all enjoy, have fun :)

tw: pseudo-incest

Canonically, Harley lives with his mother after his father leaves them. In this hc he gets orphaned in IM3 and Tony adopts him.

They move to New York, but Harley doesn't like it there, so they move back to his hometown. Tony buys/builds a lake house similar to what we've seen in Endgame. They also have garage/lab where they tinker together.

Tony is still Iron Man and he works tirelessly with the team. He flies to New York most days, but if Harley needs him, he stays home and makes sure that his boy is all right.

Harley is doing well, he likes his new high school much better than the one he started in New York. He's not a posh kid and doesn't want to become one despite Tony's unlimited funds. He's glad that Tony understands and accepts him this way.

Sometimes, he goes along with Tony to New York. If not forced to live there, he quite enjoys Stark Tower. However, the company that comes with it is more complicated. Being at the receiving end of the attentions of a group of superheroes is flattering and embarrassing at the same time, especially if one is 15.

Ultron happens and it shakes both Tony and Harley.

Harley's always known that Tony - he never thinks about him as his father - could get in danger, but actually fearing for his life is terrible. In the two years since the adoption no mission came close to that of Sokovia and Harley finds himself wishing that Tony would quit.

After his vision, where he sees Harley dead, too, the only thing Tony wants is to hug his boy and make sure that he's all right. He wants to protect him and the others, but it all backfires. They win, but the price is terrible and so is Tony's guilt.

It's hard times for both of them and it doesn't get better any time soon because Civil War happens.

Tony recruits Peter Parker and after the fighting is done, he doesn't ghost him, but invites him to the lake house.

Harley gets jealous and worried, because Peter is so much more like Tony, a genius superhero, and Harley has no idea how he can compete with that. Tony is bound to love Peter more and Harley thinks he can already see the signs in the way Tony's hand lingers on Peter's shoulder and how it slips down lower on his back than appropriate.

But Harley can't resent Peter because the boy really is very likeable. He starts to enjoy his visits and tries not to think too much about the time Peter gets to spend with Tony in New York.

It takes Tony about half a year to admit that he's attracted to Peter Parker. It fucks him up, but he's powerless against it. All he can do is withhold his offer that Peter could spend weekends and holidays at the lake house. May is busy, but she's there and Tony is also better off without the constant temptation. However, with May getting a new job that keeps her away 5 days a week and the summer holiday approaching Tony runs out of excuses. He knows that Peter would love to be their guest and as far as he can tell Harley wouldn't mind either.

For the most part, Harley doesn't mind. He gets along greatly with Peter. Tony is on his best behaviour most of the time, so Harley can deal with their attraction, too. The hardest part might be when Peter goes back to New York to patrol. At those times, Harley has trouble falling asleep. It's not only that he worries for Peter, but also his other issues that he only allows himself to think about alone. The thing is, that despite the support Tony could offer him, Harley doesn't want to go to university. He wants to be a mechanic, wants to help people by repairing their vehicles and other machines, wants the simple life of owning a little workshop. He always had something similar in mind and getting the chance to enjoy the superb workshop Tony put together for them convinced Harley about his plans. The problem was Tony, or more exactly his reaction. Harley dreaded to disappoint him. It was one of the things that got worse after Peter came into their lives. Tony has never shut up about how the kid is bound to get into MIT. Harley knows he has to talk to Tony, but he waits, hoping that it'll get easier.

Peter loves this summer. Despite his worries that Harley might not be happy about his presence, he finds that they are soon becoming close friends. He still goes on patrol three or four times a week. He agreed to share it with Tony, and it works fine, except for the fact that they rarely spend the evening together. Peter is disappointed, because he admires the family that is Tony and Harley - and he also enjoys being near Mr Stark for other, more private reasons.

Homecoming still happens that autumn. Tony is not ghosting Peter, but he wants to spend time with Harley to work on their relationship. At the start of his last year in high-school, Harley tells Tony about his plans and also his fears. Tony has nothing against Harley becoming a mechanic, but he's deeply upset that Harley thought he could possibly be a disappointment. As they talk through it, Harley's jealousy comes to light, too. Well, not the part where Tony wants to get into Peter’s pants, nor the part that it only bothers Harley because it's not him that Tony's after. No, they keep silent about all that, but they still discuss Harley's frustration that comes from being ordinary next to two genius superheroes.

It works and they reach a new level of trust despite keeping heavier secrets than ever before.

Tony is stricken with guilt after what the Vulture does to Peter in his absence.

At first Peter waves it off and says that he's a hero on his own, without Tony's help, but eventually he starts having symptoms indicative of PTSD.

Tony invites Peter over for weekend to work it out together. Peter ends up staying for a whole week and even Harley stays home from school. They all share their thoughts and feelings about the events and sort out all the remorse and resentment that appeared either consciously or subconsciously. If they weren't before, they definitely become a family after this. In the intervals of the deep conversations, Tony cooks for them and the boys enjoy the autumn air by rowing on the lake. They watch movies and torture Tony with 21th century music. By the time next Monday arrives, they are all relieved and happy once more.

The rest of the year goes by quietly. They celebrate Christmas together and Harley only feels a sting of envy when Peter pulls out the flashy new suit that Tony made for him. It only lasts however, until Harley himself opens his gift and finds a comfortable looking, yet obviously high-tech overall in it, tailored to suit the needs of a mechanic. He hugs Tony with warmth and gratitude.

Peter feels pretty much the same. He smiles as he watches Tony hug Harley. They really made it work and now are able to admit their emotions in front of each other. Well, the family friendly ones at least. The thought makes Peter blush.

By the time May arrives, both conspicuous packages are hidden. The delicious cookies she brings make up for her being late.

Next term is quiet for both boys. They chat a lot and seize every opportunity to meet. Sometimes, Tony takes them somewhere, skiing (neither of them knows skiing, but they have fun learning), hiking (Peter's spider senses help a great deal) and to various car shows (where Peter can silently admire the awed expressions of Tony's and Harley's faces).

Harley graduates and he plans to enjoy one last summer before starting mechanic school and work at a nearby shop.

Peter gets there too as soon as school ends.

At first, Harley is happy to see him, then, when he actually looks at him, he knows that he's fucked. Peter got ripped. He's still slender, but those muscles are impossible to miss. When Peter hugs him on the threshold, it's all Harley can do not to pop a boner.

The situation gets worse when Peter comes downstairs after dropping his bags into his room, wearing nothing but swimming trunks and invites Harley to the lake.

It's not easy for Harley to come to terms with the new situation. Peter became hot. He's still lovely, fluffy and cute but now, Harley wants Peter to pin him to the wall and whisper dirty things in his ear. The fact that he's sure that Peter couldn’t talk dirty without blushing and stammering does nothing to lessen Harley's desire. On the contrary, he wants to kiss that blush off Peter's cheeks.

And there's more. They never talked like this. Not just about science, music and other stuff, but about themselves, their hopes and fears. They've never opened up so much without Tony being there, taking care of them.

It's about three weeks after Peter's arrival, while they are by the lake again that Harley walks up to him and tells Peter that if he has no objection, he's going to kiss him.

Peter doesn't object but gets very nervous because he's not sure if they're allowed to kiss.

Harley doesn't push it. They talk, lying on the landing stage. It's still that afternoon when they kiss eventually.

Things escalate fast.

Peter sneaks into Harley's room two nights later. This time, Tony is at home. Harley still gives him a blowjob - Peter's first - and gets off on his dirtiest fantasies about Tony catching them and taking revenge on Harley for being with his precious Peter by fucking him - preferably both of them - hard into the mattress.

Tony spends the next weekend with them. It means less kisses and more fuel for their secret desires.

Once Tony leaves, Harley and Peter continue their game of making out in every corner of the house and the grounds. When Harley suggests Tony's bedroom, Peter hesitates. That's when Harley decides to risk it and he tells Peter how turned on Tony would be to know that Peter got off in his bed. The only thing that could make him more into it, if it was his doing.

Peter doesn't deny it. He noticed Tony's eyes and hands linger on him. He welcomes them, god he does. He'd be so ready to do it - he finds himself going hard from the idea even now that he's with Harley. He feels guilty but Harley kisses it off him. He tells Peter how much he envies him, how he would love to receive such attention from Tony.

Harley takes Peter's virginity in Tony's bed that day. They change the sheets, but the smell of sex lingers. Later that night, without him realising it, it helps Tony come so hard that he can't help crying out. His boys listen.

After this, things change. It's obvious, even though its exact manifestations are imperceptible. They all play it coolly. Tony sees how much closer his boys are and it would be hypocritical if the possibility of something going on between them didn't cross his mind. Peter is scorching hot and his Harley is a beautiful young man. When Tony sees that Harley and Peter are all right, he decides to accept it without looking for an explanation.

Peter falls in love with Harley, too. He had no idea that there was enough place in his heart for two people, but he's happy to find that there is.

Harley realises that - apart from Tony - Peter is the only one to whom he opened up so trustingly. In a way their relationship had been unique a long time before that kiss. And it all led towards where they are now.

The separation that the new school year brings about is difficult for all of them, but it's also exciting. Harley loves mechanic school and Peter - being Peter - enjoys school. They meet as often as they can. Tony helps them, flying almost daily between the city and his home.

The time Tony spent in the lab that summer - his boys are growing up, they don't need him 24/7 - means that he makes ground-breaking progress in nanotechnology. First, he designs and builds Mark L. It has to be him first, so that he's able to protect his family. That word still stings. Of course, Harley is his family and now Peter, but there's Pepper and Happy, too, and Rhodey and even those he lost. No matter what, he wants to protect them all.

After the Mark L, he starts working on the Iron Spider armour. He means to fish it by Christmas, but one month is nowhere near enough to put all the special features in it.

Tony sits down to talk with Harley at the end of the year. He asks him about how the many changes in their lives are working out for him. He's relieved to see Harley content. He remarks that Tony's happiness would add greatly to his and that he'd love to help. It makes Tony feel a pang of guilt.

Tony tells Harley about the Iron Spider suit and offers to make him one, too, in case he ever needs it for protection.

Harley refuses, saying that it's not fair to stay away from the fight if he has an armour and he doesn’t want to fight. "I've got you for protection," he says and tears well up in Tony's eyes as Harley cups his face with overwhelming trust and love.

Infinity War happens.

Peter dies. Tony is stuck in space for three weeks and one day. Harley is maddened by grief. He's curled up on the living room floor, eyeing the door through his tears, when Natasha and Rhodey find him. They bring him to the compound to keep him safe and care for him.

When Tony returns, they don't let go of each other for a long time. Harley sleeps next to Tony's bed and they leave despite the doctor's orders after Tony's return.

The others don't bother Tony with their plan to go after Thanos. He's made his point clear to Steve and he's too weak anyway. But mostly, they respect that he's a father who needs to mourn and care for his other son.

On the first day Tony and Harley just curl up on the sofa and hold each other. They cry, then they sleep. On the second day, Harley changes Tony’s bandages. On the third day, Tony cooks and they eat it. On the fourth day Tony remembers to call May. When she doesn’t answer, he flies to New York. Harley accompanies him despite his reluctance. They find the apartment locked up. Tony blasts in the door. First, they smell the awful stench of an almost a month-old cereal and milk. Then, they see the small pile of ash on the chair and around the table.

Harley drags Tony to the jet. Friday flies them home. They are back at day one, clutching at each other desperately and sobbing.

Happy shows up next day. Later, Harley figures that Friday must have called him. He brings food and moral support. During the three days Happy spends there, Tony gets on his feet. He starts caring for Harley again.

It takes Harley a whole day after it's just the two of them again, to say something other than please and thank you.

He tells Tony that he loved Peter. When Tony says that he understands, Harley realises that this is it, the moment he never thought would come, when they talk about it.

They do, they tell each other everything without being exact once. They don't need to be. They've both known, now it's just confirmation. It's the most intimate moment they've ever shared.

That night, Harley goes into Tony's bedroom. Tony protests, but Harley doesn't stop. "Don't you love me, too?" Harley asks and Tony is torn, because he does and doesn't, not this way, not before...

Harley snuggles close to him, wraps his arm and leg around Tony, not hiding his erection, nor the moan he lets out when he can finally feel the heat of Tony's body pressed against his. He looks at Tony from a few inches distance and asks him if he still wants him to tell how they were with Peter - something he asked that afternoon.

Tony can't breathe from shock and from arousal, but he nods, eyes wide and glued to Harley. He's never seen his son like this, was never supposed to see him like this, light blue eyes darkened by passion, blonde curls already debauched, lips glistening where he licked them in the most delicious way...

Tony is lost. He nods again and wraps his arms around Harley.

Harley tells him how he liked to see, touch and love Peter. Each memory hurts, each fantasy reminds him that he will never able to play any of them out with Peter, but Tony's soft stroking on his back and his erection pressed into Harley's thigh keeps him anchored to the present.

When Tony sees Harley's eyes glisten with tears, he kisses him. His guilt, though heavy, feels nothing compared to their loss. Crossing the line doesn't bring the burning shame of sin, but the relief of honesty. This is Tony's confession to both of his boys.

The weight of what they've done catches up with them next morning. Harley fears that he tainted Peter's memory and their love. Tony fears that he ruined his son.

It takes days for them to figure it out. They spend some time apart but return to each other in their grief.

When Tony learns that the others found and killed Thanos, he laughs. Thor executed the titan and Tony fucked his son. Both are big deal, yet neither made a difference in the universe.

Slowly, in matter of months rather than weeks, Tony starts working again. He builds tech to support the rest of humanity in their efforts to stabilise their world once again. In some cases, he had the plans already. In others, he comes up with new ideas.

Harley goes back to school. Most of his teachers survived and after a few months of recuperation they've decided to go back to work. The class that wasn't too big to begin with now looks pitiful.

Harley's boss at the garage died, too. Only him and another assistant are left. They take over the shop, but the other guy breaks down and starts skipping. Harley understands but he doesn't have the strength to reach out to him. He keeps going on his own, repairing cars and machines. People are grateful but they both know that none of them can repair what really matters.

At first Harley and Tony pretend to go to bed separately, only for one of them to end up crawling into the other's each night. Then, they give in and use Tony's bedroom. Sometimes, they do things, sometimes they just sleep.

When Harley is stricken with guilt, he tells himself that he needs it for survival, but deep down he knows that it's not that. Not only that. He's wanted Tony for a long time and having him is bliss, no matter the pain.

Tony feels much the same, even though he never thought about Harley this way before. However, it's only in his arms that he comes close to feeling something akin to happiness since Peter's death.

Peter's birthday is hell. The New York memorial place hasn't reached the letter p yet, so they have no place to honour Peter's memory apart from their home. Rhodey calls. Happy drops by with Pepper. They make several attempts at conversation but end up eating in silence. The knowledge that Peter would have turned eighteen that day weighs them down.

Christmas is awful, too. It's just Harley and Tony on Christmas eve but Rhodey, Pepper, Happy and even Natasha visit on boxing day. This celebration is merrier than Peter's birthday but still quite subdued.

Their own birthdays, Harley and Tony celebrate with each other.

It's not until a year later that his guilt catches up to Tony and he suggests that Harley should find someone else. Not to replace Peter, but to replace him. Harley is enraged. He refuses point blank and sucks Tony off there, in the middle of the kitchen to prove his point.

Tony doesn't mention it again. Sometimes the idea that he should, that he must put and end to it becomes stronger, but then he embraces their sinful reality again.

When Steve turns up with Nat and Scott Lang, Tony's alone. He refuses to participate in the madness they propose, but he is unable to stop his mind.

By the time Harley gets home from the workshop Tony not only has to tell him about the visit and the proposal, but also the solution he found. Harley breaks out in tears. He asks in a trembling voice if they can get Peter back. Tony tells him that if they succeed, they get everyone back. Harley lets him go, but can't resist running after him from the front porch to kiss him and make him promise that he comes back. Tony promises to do whatever it takes. He doesn't tell Harley that Peter will be his priority. Harley must know, but it's easier to keep silent about it.

Endgame happens. It's Thor who snaps and even in his weakened state, he survives.

After the battle, Tony takes Peter home. Harley flies towards them, sobbing and Peter almost falls as he throws himself into his arms. When Harley kisses him, Peter pulls back. Tony is quick to step closer and assure him that it's all right. Peter's eyes go wide as Tony touches his face. He glances at Harley for an explanation, but doesn’t need it anymore when Tony's lips crush against his.

Half an hour and some hurried explanations later Peter goes home to find May amidst repeated confessions of his love for both Harley and Tony.

That night, Harley takes control and fucks Tony until tears. Tony needs it. As he surrenders himself completely, he can feel the tension of the mission finally dissolve.

The next few days pass in a frenzy of burials and celebrations. It’s almost a whole week before all three of them can return to the lake house and find some peace. Harley is the first to arrive. He flew back a few days ago because he got a van to repair. Peter is the next to arrive. He walks straight to Harley and straddles him on the couch. After a long kiss he tells him that Tony is outside with Steve, talking about rebuilding. Harley groans and tells him to run along and rescue him. Peter is happy to go and he soon returns with a much turned on Tony. At Harley’s raised eyebrow Tony explains how their little boy’s innocence is the sexiest look on him. Peter glows with pride and moans as he feels two sets of hands move to undress him.

[voodoochili]

My Favorite Albums of 2019

As we bid adieu to a decade and a year that many of us would like to forget, let’s take the time to run through some albums that deserve to stay in our rotations at least until the onset of the imminent apocalypse. It’s a cliche, and we say it every year, but as bad as 2019 might have been in the real world, it was an excellent year for music. I listened to at least 300 albums this year and found at least 150 that I liked! Here’s the stuff that made me think, made me happy, and made me drop my jaw last year.

Some themes I found in my listening--I really like rap music from L.A. and Detroit; A few artists who I admired more than loved in the past came out with albums that I completely adored; the nebulous genre often called “afrobeats” or “afropop” has the highest hit percentage of any international scene since dub/reggae in the 1970s (the African Heat playlist on Spotify might be my actual album of the year); a lot of my favorite albums this year came from people who are clearly the product of music schools; my top four contains two excellent bedroom pop albums, and two excellent treatises on race relations in the USA.

I made a Spotify playlist with highlights from my albums list: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6S9kSm5xG3U1vPxhVyBpQc?si=0PHLV0-XQOyNY3XAVRzzAA

And in case you missed it, here’s my list of the year’s best songs: https://voodoochili.tumblr.com/post/189890284724/my-favorite-songs-of-2019

THE BEST:

10. glass beach - the first glass beach album - the first glass beach album combines chiptune synths, frayed emo vocals, jazz piano, and suite-like song structure into an exhilaratingly chaotic mishmash. Mix it with a strong dose of theater-kid earnestness and the result is the most ambitious debut album of the year and possibly of the decade, providing a peek into an alternate dimension where Los Campesinos! wrote the La La Land soundtrack. It sounds like it shouldn’t work, and it wouldn’t if glass beach didn’t buttress their boundless invention with well-crafted songs, like “classic j dies and goes to hell part 1,” the suitably bonkers intro, the prog-pop opus “bedroom community,” and “cold weather,” which shifts from ska-punk to math rock and back in 2 minutes and 20 seconds.

9. Jenny Lewis - On The Line - Long one of indie’s pre-eminent songsmiths, Jenny Lewis’s On The Line is her most personal album yet, digging deep into her childhood trauma and emerging out the other side with pearls of cheeky wisdom. Jenny’s lived more lives than most, enduring an entire career as an in-demand child star before ever even picking up a guitar; when she reached her teenage years, she learned most of her earnings fed directly into her mother’s heroin habit. Some songs like “Wasted Youth” and “Little White Dove” confront it directly (“Wasted Youth” takes the form of a conversaqtion between Lewis and her sister about their late mother), while other songs like “On The Line” and “Rabbit Hole” are testaments to the strength Lewis gained after fending for herself for so long. Appropriately for an album so focused on the past, Lewis enlists the help of rock legends like Ringo Starr, Don Was, and Benmont Tench, whose organ lends a lush poignancy throughout the album, and transforms opener “Heads Gonna Roll” from a pretty ballad to a genuine tearjerker.

8. Burna Boy - African Giant - West African music continued its quest for global hegemony in 2019, flooding the airwaves with passionate, uptempo party music. Though it was a massive year for artists like Mr Eazi, Zlatan, and do-everything superstar Wizkid, the year belonged to Burna Boy of Nigeria, his sonorous deep voice lending authority to each extravagant boast. Following up last year’s promising Outside, African Giant unleashes Burna’s full potential, drawing a through-line between Africa’s past and present--his use of multilingual lyrics, outspoken politics, and supernatural sense of rhythm updates the famous formula of Afrobeat founding father Fela Kuti for the new era. Aided by frequent collaborator and unheralded genius Kel-P, whose lush and genre-bending beats perfectly complement Burna’s melodic strengths, African Giant was 2019’s most reliable mood booster, presenting standout singles like the irresistible “Anybody,” the ambitious and easygoing “Dangote,” and the romantic club anthem “Secret,” before taking time to explain the history of colonialism in Nigeria on “Another Story.”

7. The Comet Is Coming - Trust In The Lifeforce of the Deep Mystery/The Afterlife - With a long list of collaborators and an even longer list of influences, London-born saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings’ musical ambitions can’t be confined to a single form or style. While his work with Sons of Kemet emphasizes percussion-heavy Caribbean influences and radical spoken word poetry, Hutchings aims squarely for the stratosphere with his The Comet Is Coming project, which continued its progressive jazz odyssey with two worthy albums in 2019. Elevated by the interplay between Hutchings (calling himself King Shabaka), synth wizard Danalogue, and drummer Betamax, Trust In The Lifeforce of Deep Mystery is a mesmerizing cycle of songs. Boasting titles like “The Universe Wakes Up” and “Super Zodiac,” each song searches for (and finds) a trance-like groove, transporting listeners to the far-flung locales of the song titles before reaching an emotional conclusion. A more contemplative, but still ceaselessly propulsive follow-up, The Afterlife is music for the “stargate” sequence from 2001: A Space Odyssey, providing a more optimistic counterpoint to Trust while refining the trio’s unique group dynamic. Together, the two works make an immensely satisfying head trip, offering a thrilling soundtrack for the end of the universe and whatever comes next.

6. Moodymann - Sinner - “I don’t even know what you need, but I’ll provide,” grunts Moodymann on Sinner’s simmering opener “I’ll Provide,” “Cause I got something for all your dirty nasty needs.” Possibly the most singular and beloved figure in a Detroit electronic scene overflowing with singular and beloved figures, Moodymann is known for sublimely tasteful DJ sets and sprawling solo works that fuse house music with elements of R&B, gospel, blues, and funk. By his standards, Sinner is slight, spanning only 7 tracks and 44 minutes, but it benefits from a tight focus, showcasing Moodymann’s effortless creativity. Throughout the project, the artist born Kenny Dixon approaches familiar elements from odd angles: jazzy changes and burbling Fender Rhodes invade an intoxicating two-chord vamp on “Downtown”; fellow Detroiter Amp Fiddler adds soulful auto-tune to the blissful “Got Me Coming Back Right Now.” He even manages to find a fresh way to incorporate Camille Yarbrough’s “Take Yo’ Praise,” most famously sampled by Fatboy Slim, into one of the album’s hardest-charging tracks.

5. Polo G - Die A Legend - Way back in 2011, long before he became rap’s first Pulitzer Prize winner, Kendrick Lamar took a moment to explain his ethos on the outro to his breakthrough Section.80 tape: “I'm not on the outside looking in/I'm not on the inside looking out/I'm in the dead fucking center, looking around.” It was a bold statement, but one that Kendrick’s managed to live up to, and finally we’ve found another artist with the ability to achieve all-seeing perspective on record: Chicago 20-year-old Polo G.

It’s been a long time since I’ve been blown away by a new rapper like I was by Polo G in 2019. He possesses a rare combination of melodic mastery and writerly observation, painting a vivid (if bleak) picture of his life on the South Side. His debut project Die A Legend is packed with unflinching observations about the reality of his situation, he touches on his former pill addiction on “Battle Cry” and he reminisces about talking to his younger sister through a prison phone on “Through Da Storm.” As dark as the subject matter can get, Polo never crumbles under the pressures of poverty or fame, staying afloat with crisp melodies that mix the emotional honesty of Lil Durk with the radio-ready slickness of Wiz Khalifa. He’s already mastered the art of the rap ballad, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.

4. Helado Negro - This Is How You Smile - This Is How You Smile overflows with warmth, inspiring a feeling I don’t often get from music. Listening to it feels like a long-awaited return to a physical place of comfort--a childhood bedroom, perhaps, or a reading nook in a favorite library. Our tour guide is Roberto Carlos Lange, an expert sound designer whose plainspoken, pleasantly nasal voice might be the friendliest sound in music today. The album is comforting, yet unpredictable, with songs that range from synth folk to bedroom pop to ambient field recordings, and feature lyrics that vacillate between English and Spanish. Highlights include the bouncy “Seen My Aura,” calling to mind a collaboration between The Brothers Johnson and Ariel Pink, the sweeping and mesmerizing “Running,” combining trap drums and Budd/Eno piano, and my favorite, the devastating acoustic ballad “Todo lo que me falta.”

3. Jamila Woods - LEGACY, LEGACY! - Jamila Woods has a gift for expressing complex intellectual and musical ideas in deceptively simple ways. Her melodies are like nursery rhymes, her lyrics are cutting and conversational, and with LEGACY, LEGACY! she delivers a fiery blend of artistry and activism that rivals peak Gil Scott-Heron. These songs are bold and truthful, tackling heavy subject matter with a delicate touch, commenting on cultural appropriation on “MUDDY” (“They can study my fingers/They can mirror my pose/They can talk your good ear off/On what they think they know”), sexual assault in “SONIA” (“I remember saying no to things that happened anyway/ things that happened/I remember feeling low the mirror took my face away”), and the value of protest on “OCTAVIA” (“It used to be the worst crime to write a line/Our great great greats risked their lives, learned letters fireside/Like a seat on a bus, like heel in a march/Like we holdin' a torch, it's our inheritance”). With songs named after her artistic heroes (a convention that has become a bit trendy, as Rapsody and Sons of Kemet have pulled similar tricks for their recent projects), LEGACY! LEGACY! Is Woods’ audacious attempt to establish herself as an heir to that formidable tradition--one that succeeds without reservation.

2. Raphael Saadiq - Jimmy Lee - A force of nature with one of the most underrated back catalogs in the game (he made hits with Toni, Tony, Tone in the 80s, was a major force behind Neosoul in the 90s and 00s, and produced Solange’s A Seat At The Table in 2015), Raphael Saadiq’s latest is his most powerful effort yet, inspired by the tragic tale of his older brother Jimmy Lee, a heroin addict who died of HIV.  Jimmy Lee tries to find the universal through the personal, taking a deep look into how drug addiction can tear a family apart. Throughout the project, Saadiq approaches his brother’s illness with radical empathy, singing from his perspective on the dangerously alluring “Something Keeps Calling,” and the zonked out “I’m Feeling Love.” He uses his personal tragedy as a springboard to talk about larger issues on the twinkling, self-explanatory “This World Is Drunk,” and the seething spiritual “Rikers Island.” The album veers from style to style, connected with a sound effect that mimics a channel changing on an analog TV, encompassing Prince-like grooves, languid quiet storm, simmering funk in the late Sly Stone mold, and taking detours into hip-hop and traditional gospel. Connecting it all is Saadiq’s raw passion, echoing the pain of everyone who’s lost someone to substance abuse, and singing as if his tenor is the only weapon powerful enough to end the epidemic.

1. Yves Jarvis - The Same But By Different Means - There’s a song on The Same But By Different Means called “Constant Change,” in which Jean-Sebastian Audet layers his voice into a cacophonous symphony and repeats the title phrase for 30 seconds til he reaches an abrupt crescendo. In his first project under the name Yves Jarvis (the 22-year Montreal native used to record under the name Un Blonde), “Constant Change” is his animating philosophy, guiding each second of the most surprising masterpiece of the year. A thrilling and unpredictable effort, The Same But By Different Means overflows with sonic and melodic ideas, shifting and beguiling with unexpected shifts and sounds. The album gets its power from this fluidity--sounds burst into the mix and fade away without notice; songs mutate from one genre to another (traces of freak-folk, tropicalía, funk, and a lot more) within the span of 2 or 3 minutes. It’s a hazy, dream-like collage, at times evoking the likes of Nick Drake, Joni Mitchell, and Nicolas Jaar; the least expected sound-a-like occurs on “That Don’t Make It So,” which could easily be mistaken for an outtake from D’Angelo’s Voodoo. No hour of music in 2019 was more calming, yet more invigorating than this one--an eclectic and restless monument to Audet’s creativity and an addicting, absorbing soundscape. I listened to hundreds of albums this year, but none of them hit me quite like this one.

THE REST:

11. Cate Le Bon - Reward  12. Big Thief - U.F.O.F./Two Hands  13. Vampire Weekend - Father Of The Bride 14. Jay Som - Anak Ko 15. Raveena - Lucid 16. American Football - American Football 17. Purple Mountains - Purple Mountains  18. Kelsey Lu - Blood 19. Pivot Gang - You Can’t Sit With Us 20. Gunna - Drip Or Drown 2 21. Great Grandpa - Four Of Arrows 22. G.S. Schray - First Appearance 23. Bandgang Lonnie Bands - KOD 24. Marika Hackman - Any Human Friend 25. Mavi - Let The Sun In 26. Spellling - Mazy Fly 27. SAULT - 5 / 7 28. Juan Wauters - La Onda De Juan Pablo 29. 75 Dollar Bill - I Was Real 30. Maxo Kream - Brandon Banks 31. Brittany Howard - Jaime 32. J Balvin & Bad Bunny - Oasis 33. Rio Da Yung OG - 2 Faced 34. Desperate Journalist - In Search Of The Miraculous  35. Angel Olsen - All Mirrors 36. 03 Greedo - Netflix & Deal/Still Summer In The Projects 37. Doja Cat - Hot Pink 38. Lambchop - This (Is What I Wanted To Tell You) 39. Sada Baby - Bartier Bounty 40. Rucci - Tako’s Son 41. Floating Points - Crush 42. Bat For Lashes - Lost Girls 43. Young Thug - So Much Fun 44. Samthing Soweto - Isphithiphithi 45. Kim Gordon - No Home Record 46. Sandro Perri - Soft Landing 47. Anthony Naples - Fog FM 48. Quelle Chris - Guns 49. Sleater-Kinney - The Center Won’t Hold 50. Tyler, The Creator - IGOR

Honorable Mentions:

Billy Woods & Kenny Segal - Hiding Places Caroline Shaw & The Attaca Quartet - Orange Leo Svirsky - River Without Banks Martha - Love Keeps Kicking Nilüfer Yanya - Miss Universe Drego & Beno - Sorry For The Get Off The Japanese House - Good At Falling Tree & Vic Spencer - Nothing IS Something Spielbergs - This Is Not The End Fireboy DML - Laughter, Tears & Goosebumps Dee Watkins - Problem Child Daniel Norgren - Wooh Dang

TOO MANY MORE TO NAME--could’ve listed up to 80

[totallyvain]

Vanity Hour with Yung Heazy

Hometown: Vancouver, Canada

Sounds like: If The Beatles and Mac Demarco decided to collab on a bedroom pop track. 

WORDS BY: Thania Garcia 

Jordan Heaney’s indie rock project, Yung Heazy, was initially created as an avenue for releasing mini love songs dedicated to Heaney’s girlfriend. The now-viral track “Cuz You’re My Girl” was uploaded (not by Heaney) to Youtube almost three years ago and since then, the project has become one of the most recognizable in the bedroom pop world. 

Totally Vain: You first started to notice traction in plays when someone uploaded one of your songs on a popular Youtube channel. What was your initial reaction to that? I’m assuming no one contacted you about the upload or gave you any revenue for it either…?

YH: That is a correct assumption. The feeling I got was intense happiness and gratefulness to the universe. It’s still very surreal, I try not to think about it in fear I’ll go insane that all this is real life.

Back in September Heaney released the single “Kool Musik,” a dreamy almost four-minute enormously expressive track with scattered instrumentals. In the past, Heaney has expressed infatuation for hypnotic relationships in music referencing Radiohead’s “Rainbows” and Ariel Pink as inspiration which you can clearly hear in “Kool Musik.” 

TV: With some songs like “Comfort” your musical influences, Mac Demarco & Ariel Pink, are present but what other artistic avenues do you pull from when you create? I mention this because your cover art and overall visual aesthetic is so spectacularly unique to your brand.

YH: I like lots of stuff when I write a song I try to fit as many musical experiments and references as possible. I think the last song I recorded took influence from Walkabout, Moving like Mike, Black Skinhead, Helter Skelter, and Readymade, Bad Guy, a whole set of songs. When I hear a cool musical moment I go, hmm how can I make that work in my world?

TV: What would you say were the defining moments or traits of your environment that inevitably shaped or influenced your start in music and your music industry experience?

YH: I was surrounded by music as a kid, specifically that of The Beatles and 60s/70s music my dad had on tape. I had music lessons regularly...such as violin at age four and then piano a few years later. What made me get invested in music properly was learning the guitar around age 13 and discovering the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.

TV: What is the major difference when it comes to dictating your own music (production, writing, recording, performing) vs. with a band?

YH: In recording/producer world I can just do what I want and experiment, try to make everything sound nice and cool. With the band, I like to keep things a bit open-ended after everyone has learned the parts if someone has an idea on how to improve the song for the live show may as well try it out. 

TV: Congratulations on landing a spot on the Tropicalia 2019 lineup! I think Tropicalia is doing a great job at catering to a specific audience of ‘indie’ ‘bedroom pop’ listeners along with catering to the Latinx community that greatly makes up a portion of that audience. How do you think the ‘bedroom pop’ community will evolve as we dive deeper into the digital age and the accessibility to recording and producing grows?

YH: It will become more diverse and split into subdivisions that will inspire completely new and unique genres and styles. It’s a beautiful thing that anyone can start recording music for dirt cheap these days. 

TV: Do you feel restricted by the ‘bedroom pop’ label? Or do you feel being a part of that genre means you’re free to mix and match thanks to the likes of Soundcloud?

YH: No I mean, if I want to make metal music tomorrow, why not? I don’t need to release it under Yung Heazy, stay tuned for my prog metal project under my new label 2020.

TV: How would you compare your place now in the music scene to where you were when you first began? What kind of struggles have you faced during your journey so far?

YH: When I began I was so excited to have anything to do with the music scene in Vancouver. I’m in a place now that I can kind of show up to most places in North America and play to people who know my stuff. The hardest part of getting here was learning about the industry and doing all the behind the scenes stuff, some tasks less glamorous than others

TV: What do you hope to achieve in the future and what are you most excited about?

YH: I’m slowly but surely working to a point where I can start writing for and directing large scale orchestral music. I want to make songs that sound like if Mozart and John Lennon had a collab. Also to direct a film with my own soundtrack.

TV: What song(s) of yours are you the proudest of and why?

YH: Cuz You’re My Girl and Backup Plan comes to mind, lyrics are the most difficult part for me, when I get good ones I feel accomplished. 

TV: Any last words for our readers?

TV: Keep fucking up and making bad decisions! (in music that is) I think you should expect at least a thousand epic failures on your journey, embrace em and do whatever you can to keep the dream healthy and alive.

[squirenonny]

How you even get people interested your fics, asking for a friend thanks

Aw, man, isn’t that a question for the ages?

So I’m gonna preface this by saying that there’s no magic quick-fix to attract more readers (however much we all wish there were.) Writing for the big ships or posting a fic featuring a popular trope/AU when it’s popular is going to get you more readers than writing niche fics, but chasing trends isn’t going to make you happy and it might even hurt the quality of your work. When you post and whether there was some big fandom or IRL event that drew attention away from the newly published pages (or flooded them, burying your fic under ten pages of Klance week ficlets or whatever) can also play a big role.

Secondly, and I know you’re probably not going to like hearing this, try not to worry too much about numbers like hits/kudos/bookmarks/reviews. They don’t mean as much as you think, and they aren’t a reflection on your skill as a writer or the value of your story. The best thing to do is to find some other way to measure success–maybe it’s how many words you’ve written, maybe it’s whether you stick to a consistent update schedule. Maybe it’s reaching that scene you’ve been dying to write for forever. But make sure it’s something that’s in your control, because depending on the faceless masses for validation sucks, and you deserve better.

Okay, on to some advice for attracting readers.

1. Rework your summary. Confession time: I hate writing summaries. Hate it. I’m already not good with short form and trying to sum up a story in a hundred words or less is even worse. But it’s one of the most important skills for a writer to learn, since it’s your one shot to get people interested enough to click that link. If you’re stuck, here are some suggestions, with examples of how I’ve used them for my own stories.

Pick a (short!) excerpt from your piece. Maybe a brief exchange of dialogue, maybe the opening line, maybe something else. It should be something that doesn’t require context to understand and that makes people want to find out what happens next (or what led up to this moment.) Example:

This psychic—Lance the Lucid, according to the posters, and Keith wasn’t even going to comment on that—was a charlatan, plain and simple, and Keith kind of wanted to punch him. Sure, Lance knew how to put on a show, but Keith doubted there was anything more to the act than charm and dramatic flair.

Pidge sighed, catching Keith’s eyes. “At this point, they’re pretty much our only hope.”

If you’re writing an AU, especially a canon divergence AU, put the focus on what you’re changing. Example:

Shiro used to dream of Earth. That was before the Arena, before Haggar, before he joined the Galra army. At least he has an ally, a Galra officer named Keith. Together they plan to bring down Zarkon’s empire from the inside.

Matt never thought he’d see his family again. Then he crash-lands on Earth and Pidge rescues him from Garrison custody. But his homecoming is short-lived. Now the Holt siblings, along with Lance and Hunk, must find the Voltron lions and free the universe from Galra control.

Or: Galra!Keith, double agent!Shiro, red paladin!Matt, black paladin!Allura, full series AU.

If you’re writing something tropey, or a twist on a cliche, maybe highlight that. Example:

[following a short description of plot] Canonverse Soulmate AU with romantic and platonic soulmates (and some gray areas in between)

Sometimes the simplest thing to do, especially for shorter stories, is to do a one-two punch in your summary. The set-up and the punchline. The scenario and the twist. The status quo and the catastrophe. Think “Long ago, the four nations lived in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked.” Or better yet, the next part of that intro–defining the Avatar and then hitting us with “and then he vanished for a hundred years whoops.” Whatever you do, keep it short. Example:

When Keith was seven years old, he spent a year in La Quinta with a boy named Lance, the best friend he ever had. Ten years later, Lance and Keith reunite at the Garrison–only Keith doesn’t remember who Lance is.

The most important thing to keep in mind is that shorter is (usually) better, but you want to include enough to hook readers’ attention. It’s hard, I know, but keep working at it and it’ll get easier. Seriously–write five completely different summaries for your fic, all under 100 words. Give yourself a 5 or 10 minute limit for each so you don’t agonize too much. Set them aside for a while, then come back and see what works. Or write a list of all the things you’re most excited about in a given piece, cut out any major spoilers, and try to work one or two of the others into your summary.

2. Be strategic about your tags. If you’re posting on AO3, use tags people are going to search. Angst, hurt/comfort, fluff, any tropes that feature prominently, any relationships (especially gen ones) that are a major focus. Be wary of overtagging–Shatt shippers, for example, know all too well how common it is to search for Shatt and turn up only Klance fics with a passing mention of Shiro and Matt going on a date. But plenty of people search for specific tags in trying to find new stories. Use that.

Similarly, if you post on Tumblr, use your tags efficiently. The first five tags on a post are the ones that the post will show up in (i.e. if you have a tag tracker or go to tumblr.com/tagged/____) Tumblr’s search looks at the first twenty tags, I believe. So use your first five tags for either the most popular or the most niche aspects of your fic. (i.e. tagging it “klance” will have a larger potential audience, though it’ll get buried pretty quickly; tagging “matt holt” or “shatt” gives you a much smaller potential audience, but one that’s more starved for content so will probably click your link at a higher rate.) Prioritize, and leave your organization tags/tag commentary for after.

3. Your first chapter should pack a punch. This one may be a little harder to put into practice if you have an existing fic you’re trying to drum up interest in, but it’s worth keeping in mind. If your summary and tags get people through the door, your first chapter (in a multichapter fic)/your first few paragraphs (for any fic) is where people decide whether or not this is worth reading. Goals to strive for:

Your first line, or at most your first paragraph, should hook reader’s interest. It should ask an implicit question–what’s happening? How did we get here?

(the equivalent of) Your first page (a couple hundred words, tops) should establish the situation and forward momentum. Diving straight into action with no context can be confusing, but lingering too long on exposition can make people tune out before they get to the good part. I’ve heard it said that the first 250 words should establish three things: character, context, and motive. Who are we focused on, what’s happening right now, and why does it matter? There are exceptions to every rule, of course, but make sure you know why you’re deviating if you decide to do so.

Your first chapter (assuming you have more than one) should leave people wanting more. Don’t leave them in the middle of the set-up, or they may not be motivated to continue. But don’t give them everything they need to see where this is going, or they won’t bother waiting to find out.

**Update: There’s now a follow-up post talking a little bit more about how to start a story, with examples!**

4. Persistence is key. Out of all the advice I can give you, this one’s going to be the hardest to follow, I’m sure. It can feel like you’re throwing words at a void and getting nothing back. Sometimes you have a real slow start. Sometimes you’re writing self-induldgent rarepare stuff, and it seems like you and two other people are the only ones who ship it–and those other two never comment.

The thing is, writing fic (especially as a newcomer or writing niche fic) is like playing Marco Polo at a death metal concert. Not only are you shouting into a sea of noise, but you’re also trying to find the relative handful of people who are going to answer. But here’s the thing: if you yell “Marco” once and get no response, then go home, you’ll never find those other people. If you keep yelling–maybe stay in one spot and yell over and over, maybe wander around calling out every so often–you’ll find someone, and then you’ll find someone else, and then maybe someone else will start shouting with you and find three more people. It starts slow, but it builds momentum.

In terms of fic, though, what does that mean? It means keep writing. Maybe keep hammering away at this one fic–excellent if it’s something you’re excited about, something you need to write no matter what. You keep putting it out there and you’ll start to beat back the wave of random chance that conspires to bury your fic because of weird posting times or an onslaught from a fandom event.

Maybe write a bunch of shorter fics, participate in bangs and exchanges and other events. You might hook readers with your Klance soulmate AU that you did for a secret santa, then tempt them into trying your other stuff (true story.) You might make friends by chatting in a big bang’s discord, and they can help you write more attention-grabbing summaries, or can signal boost on Tumblr. (Or just be that one person who stans your writing and keeps you motivated through low hit counts on AO3.) Or you might just hit a whole bunch of people’s rarepair/nich buttons and start building a following that way.

Or maybe it means going a little more off the rails. Try a different fandom. Write original fiction. Write an 80k Marauders-at-Hogwarts fic for yourself, edit it, and only then start posting a chapter a week so you can grow your reader base without the low number of comments chipping away at your motivation because joke’s on you, hit counter. I already have the next chapter done. And the one after that, and all of them, so they’re still coming even if no one’s reading. ha-ha! (Also a true story.)

Look, the point is, building a reader base is hard, and it’s frustrating, and a lot if it is based on luck and fandom trends, and you’re always going to want to get caught up in the numbers. Even once you have readers, you might get frustrated because the tropey shipfic with a shoddy plot that you BS’d your way through has ten times as much love as the lovingly crafted, well-plotted AU that you’ve poured literally thousands of hours into. Because writers are all starved for feedback, and with the exception of people lucky enough (or unlucky enough) to hit a fandom sweet spot and get shot straight into the realms of That One Fic Everyone Knows About–with the exception of those freak accidents of fate, the people who have sizable followings are almost always people who just plain love to write and do it regardless of what anyone else says or does.

So don’t write for the readers. Write for yourself first, and love what you write. Write stories that need to be told. Stories you can’t bear not to tell–because when you care that much about a story, it shows, and when the right people find your story, they’re going to love that you love it. Trust me. The right people are out there. You just have to keep shouting until you find them.

[pain-somnia]

Writer Asks

Writer Asks

tagged by @wolf08 :) thank you so much for the tag and sorry for being so late, i literally waited until i came home from work. Warning: this is LONG.

1. How did you come up with your username and what does it mean?

my tumblr url is based on the chronically ill made up term painsomnia. i have always had sleep issues but they got worse when i became ill due to being woken up constantly with pain. my username on FF is ChronicallyChill which is based on, yet again, me being chronically ill.

2. Which fanfic of yours has the most feedback? (bookmarks/favourites, follows/subscriptions, visitor hits, kudos)

The Planning Of A Matriarch wins, hands down. I was so insecure and nervous about sharing anything I wrote but it was so well received! But it’s comedy and so much fluff and who doesn’t appreciate a little fluff? I have lost a lot of love for it because it was stolen and the whole event made me feel like shit. I think I owe a lot of it’s popularity to @mycherryqueen because she rec’d it on her blog. I plan on updating by the anniversary of this fic. But I may put it on hiatus indefinitely after that.

3. What is your FFnNet/AO3 profile icon, and why did you choose it?

I actually don’t have one! I keep thinking I’m going to sit down and draw one or wait until I have the money to commission one of my favorite artists for something. I don’t create anymore but maybe one day I’ll dip back into it so I can finally have a profile icon.

4. Do you have any regular/favourite commenters?

OMG YES. I get sooo excited when I see familiar guest names or usernames. I get so gooey inside and melt when Spanish speakers leave reviews (I can read Spanish guys, feel free to review in Spanish if that makes you more comfortable!) because they wanna share their love even if they can’t write in English well. I have an absolute fave and I shouldn’t but I can’t help it. Monika aka @mcornilliac leaves the BEST reviews and she reviews every chapter.

5. Is there a fanfic that you keep going back to read again and again?

Oh tons. Tons, Tons, Tons! Here’s a few:

The Colors of Midnight by SouthSideStory is possibly my favorite thing they’ve written. I love so many of their SS fics but that’s the one I go back to the most. (also Providence, I love me a soulmate au)

Carrying On by Kiwako

Daimyo’s Daughter by Sakura’s Unicorn (but literally everything of theirs is re-read all of the time)

Spar by D.C. Filbert (warning: major smut)

Life After Detainment by merinxD

You Could See It Change by lavendersakurasasuke (it’s a Gothic Victoria AU but with ninjas!)

Chained by Kirikizu

xxlovendreamsxx has these LOTR AUs....fucking amazing. unfortunately I seem to have lost the link to them

6. How many stories are you subscribed to? How many do you have bookmarked?

lol...i’m just gonna say A LOT. I lost some of them when I didn’t have a FF account and if I didn’t I would have way more but trust me... A LOT.

7. Which AU do you find yourself writing the most?

NON-MASS IS WHERE IT’S AT~ give me more SS non-mass and I will be the happiest person in the world.

8. How many people are subscribed and bookmarked to you in total? (you can view this on the stats page)

if I’m looking at it right....only 373 (me as an author not the individual works). and I love every single one of them.

9. Is there something you’d like to write about but are 😨 of people judging you for it? (Feeling brave? If so, share it!)

Sex scenes. I write it but I always feel nervous about them.

10. Is there anything you would like to be better at? Writing certain scenes or genres, replying to comments, updating better, etc.

I wish I was more comfortable writing action. Also I do so much dialogue...I feel like it’s too much. I wish I was better at replying to comments (I try! like if someone writes me a hefty comment I’m likely to respond if I’m able to). Updating. If I could I would write and update every day.

11. Do you write rarepairs or popular ships more often?

I write for the most popular ship in the Naruto fandom. But I also write ShiItaIzu and as a friend of mine has said before I’m not on an island by myself, I am the island. Google ShiItaIzu and posts to my content is what pops up. my readers seem to like them though so that’s great.

12. How many stories have you posted on FFNet/AO3 to this day (finished and unfinished)?

5. Soon to be 8 if I ever get to publishing the other three. (not including prompt drafts)

13. How many stories do you have saved in/with your writing program?

*maniacal laughter ensues* i have so many....fanfic and original work....some of them are prompts...I’m a mess

14. Do you write down story ideas, or just keep them in your head?

mostly in my head but some things are written down. Most of those are rough drafts already.

15. Have you ever co-authored a story?

No. I’ve made fanfics based off headcanons I practically threw at friends and they told me how they felt about them. But never. I don’t think I ever will, at least not for SS.

16. How did you discover FFNet/AO3?

uh...i have no fucking clue. August of 2016 was when I started loving Naruto again and jumped into consuming all of the SS content I could find. I just googled and read like...everything.

17. Do you consider yourself to be a popular or famous author in your fandom(s) on FFNet/AO3?

LOL....fuck no. I actually think I’m pretty insignificant in the Naruto fandom. But that’s okay.

18. Do you have a nickname or fandom name for your readers?

no. maybe I should.... how about Loves? I’ll try it out in my next author’s note.

19. Was there an author who inspired or encouraged you to write?

I don’t really have an author that inspired me. But @bkceallaigh is the reason anyone reads my stuff. she encouraged me to write and then finally publish a fanfic. And here we are.

20. What writing advice would you give to a beginning author?

Write. Write what you feel. Write what you love. Write what makes you happy. Don’t worry about pleasing people, someone is always going to hate. Just write something you would want to read.

21. Do you plot out your stories, or do you just figure it out as you go?

LMAO. no. the closest I actually get to planning is something like “this is my goal. let’s get to it somehow.” i think I've only planned one story and hopefully I’ll post that prompt soon (it’s the Shape of Water AU).

22. Have you ever gotten a bad comment on a story? If so, what did you do?

Duh! I ranted and bitched to my friends. Some of them were sooooo bad. Like when I say bad it’s like they never even read the story or want to fore their interpretation on people. and then some anti-SS found me and decided to trash SS. like thanks...why the fuck are you here? so I will complain but I don’t care to confront them. Just...don’t like then don’t read.

23. Is there a certain type of scene that you have a hard time writing? (action, smut, etc..)

Smut and action. Mainly ‘cause I want people to see the action in their head when I write but it doesn’t come out right... smut is bad sometimes ‘cause I get a little mechanical and describe the process and forget feeling sometime.

24. What story(s) are you working on now?

Currently I’m mulling over Can I Be Yours? and Kingdom For Two and A Gift From The Universe. I’m really into A Gift From The Universe because it’s non-mass and I’m going to put a lot of focus on InoSai and ShiItaIzu, way more than I’ve done before.

25. Do you plan your next project(s) before you finish your current ongoing story(s)?

lol....I have my WIPs going on at the same time....I’m nowhere near finished.

26. Do you have a daily writing goal set for yourself?

nope. Just write when I can. And wish that I was writing when I wasn’t.

27. Do you think you’ve improved as a writer since you first started?

I want to say yes.

28. What is your favorite story(s) that you’ve written?

honestly....Kingdom For Two is my fic baby.

29. What is your least favorite story(s) that you’ve written?

The Planning Of A Matriarch actually. Like I could have done so much better. It’s still my baby but it’s the one that embarrasses me the most.

30. Where do you 👀 yourself (as a writer) in 5 years?

hopefully with a finished original work lol

31. What is the easiest thing about writing?

The easiest? I don’t know...I can’t really think about it right now...I guess for me, creating dialogue is the easiest thing....I’m really tired right now and may come back to edit this answer lol

32. What is the hardest thing about writing?

Telling myself to love what I write despite not getting the response that I want. There are people who love what I write and I move them with my writing. And I should appreciate what I get.

33. Why do you write?

It’s...so wonderful to see a world that’s trapped in my head come to life in front of me.

I will tag: @kuriquinn @roraewrites @xxxsasusakuxxx @randomwhorcrux @bkceallaigh and anyone that wants to do this

[louandhazaf]

Annual Writing Self Evaluation

1. List of works published this year:

Loudest Thing in my Head

How Many Licks

Aftercare

Swallow My Words

Always Holding on to Stars

Let’s Not Fight in Vegas

Darkest Night Hour

Got Me On My Tiptoes

Let’s Raise a Cup

Those Summer Nights

how long nothing lasts

The Waiting is the Hardest Part

I’ll Be Your Pride

Polish Rider

What I’ve Wanted to Tell You

So When the World is Cold

2. Work you are most proud of (and why):

I have two that stick out to me.

The first is Swallow My Words because it’s on the longer side (for me...) but I was still happy with the pacing which is normally where I trip myself up when writing long fics. And I just really love those characters so much. What I’ve Wanted to Tell You is the first part of the series and I have two other fics that will go into that universe that I just need time to write, but sometimes I’ll just think about what those two are up to these days.

The second is how long nothing lasts because I think I have a lot of emotion in there without it being soppy or overdone. And to me, it was fun coming up with a not-so-literal interpretation of the prompt (... um, even if at the end I had to sneak it in there because I don’t think it was entirely successful without it) and then it’s been absolutely fascinating to see the reaction it’s gotten after I posted it.

3. Work you are least proud of (and why):

Honestly, I’m actually really proud of all my fics this year, for a variety of reasons: pushing myself to write new pairings/plots I normally wouldn’t tackle/under-represented smut/shorter fics/unhappy endings. In 2016 I posted a fic that I wasn’t 100% proud of, and it still raises my hackles a bit thinking of it, so I promised myself I wouldn’t do that this year.

4. A favorite excerpt of your writing:

I chose a bit from Swallow My Words because they’re not great at communicating and I really like how dramatic they both are at this moment as they’re trying to navigate through their own priorities.

While Louis dug through the pantry for the popcorn, Harry idly shuffled some papers on the counter. The corner of one of the sheets near the bottom caught his eye. It had the state university logo. He tugged it a bit so he could sneak a peek. Harry hadn’t gotten his letter yet and Louis said he was still waiting to hear. Clearly he was lying, the word “congratulations” in the first sentence gave that away.

Louis pushed the food around on the shelves, a cacophony of packages rustling and knocking against each other. His voice was muffled from inside the pantry. “I just think it’s funny how you act like you’re so proud and strong, yet you won’t stand up to those assholes. And you’re supposed to be their captain.”

Right. Well, he was glad to hear what Louis really thought of him. It was almost like Louis went to a super liberal private school where they taught things like sex ed, gender studies, and women’s history, where they had a diverse staff who upheld their zero tolerance bullying policy, and where there were already a few out kids. It was almost like he and Louis were living through completely different school experiences. It was almost like Louis hadn’t listened to a fucking word he had been saying for years as he tried to navigate the minefield that was his own school.

And now the person who’d been his rock, his source of comfort through it all, thought he was a coward. He’d been lying to Harry about the acceptance letter from State because he didn’t want to go to college with him or play on a team with such a chicken shit. Louis was probably trying to figure out how to break up with him right now.

“Yeah, real fucking funny, Lou.” Harry turned and left the kitchen in silence. He was at the front door and shoving his feet into his shoes before Louis probably realized he was alone in the kitchen. He slammed the door and caught the tail end of Louis calling after him.

5. Share or describe a favorite review you received:

All of them? But also when ao3 emails me and I see that one reader has kudos multiple fics of mine in a short time. That always makes me overjoyed.  

6. A time when writing was really, really hard:

Every single fic that I posted in 2017 had a deadline, whether self-imposed because of a milestone/birthday that I wanted to hit, or was written as part of a bigger challenge/collection/exchange. Anytime I tried to write something without a deadline, it got swept to the side. (To be fair to me, this is also because of the amount of stuff I ended up modding & pinch hitting, which meant I had a lot of last minute stuff that ended up taking priority.) So, writing for *myself* I think was really really hard this year. I’m making that a priority in 2018.

7. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:

I think the Coach character in Swallow My Words was a surprise. I always knew that in the end he’d be there for Harry, but how it all unraveled was all them.

8. How did you grow as a writer this year:

This year I’ve written more, and faster, than I ever have before. I volunteered to pinch hit a few fics and doing those really stretched me with both writing concise fics quickly and finding my voice in fics that I might never have written otherwise. They were a fun challenge. For the first time, I also did a canon fic, which is still super scary and which I’m not sure I’m going to do again, but I’m really glad I was able to follow through with it. 

9. How do you hope to grow next year:

This is an excellent question that I don’t have an answer to... maybe I’d like to do some more experimental fics? I know I need to work on dialogue, so maybe that too? 

10. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc):

Oh wow. Um, I have a lot. First and foremost, I’m going to say gettingaphdinlarry (@gettingaphdinlarry) for being the most thorough and wonderful beta. Anytime I scream-typed my histrionics and doubted myself “AH! I CAN’T DO THIS”/“THIS IS TERRIBLE”/“WHY AM I DOING THIS?” she was there with calm reassurance that I could, in fact, do it and it was never as terrible as I thought. She’s so much fun to work with because I learn new things every single time she betas for me and I always end up laughing at myself. Plus, her writing is incredible, so getting to work with someone like that is fabulous. Please go read her works. Please. 

I have really really really been into short fics at the moment and in particular myownspark (@myownsparknow) & jiksa (@jiksax) & softly have all written such concise, powerful fics where so much is left unsaid in a really satisfying way. I love when authors trust in themselves enough to let the reader fill in the white space surrounding the words and I hope to do more of that in the future. 

And last, but certainly not least, fullonlarrie (@fullonlarrie) for literally talking to me about fics and writing day and in and day out this year. I cherish your endless support, I’m in awe of your writing speed and how you’re able to spin up stories, and I want us to be friends forever.  

11. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year:

yes, of course, always.

12. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:

I did what any self respecting person would do in this situation and I Googled what better writers than me had to say on this matter. 

I think the two main ideas I’d like to share are:

“I have a sort of idea that isn’t really an idea. .... I just show up in front of the computer. Show up, show up, show up, and after a while the muse shows up, too. If she doesn’t show up invited, eventually she just shows up.” -- Isabel Allende

This is something that’s hard for me to remember sometimes as well, but honestly just sitting down and doing it is the very best advice I think there is. And I’ll follow that up with this, because I think they’re linked:

“You have to finish things — that’s what you learn from, you learn by finishing things.” -- Neil Gaiman

13. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:

I have a boatload of WIPs that I need to finish in 2018. Like... 7. PLUS I’m doing the @1dshortficfest so I’m excited for that. 

14. Tag three writers whose answers you’d like to read.

I’m not tagging anyone, but I know a lot of you writers are out there and I would love to see your answers, so please consider doing this!

*All answers should be about works published in 2017. Also, you can skip any questions you hate or don’t want to answer, but please leave them on the list so that others can do them if they want. 

(also, here’re my responses from 2016)

[jubesy]

2017 Writing Round-Up

Total year-long word count:

368,981

only counting what’s posted on AO3

Word count by fandom: 

Yowamushi Pedal - 4232 Free! - 5126 Haikyuu!! - 10,750 Kuroko no Basuke - 18,953 Voltron - 71,180 (plus 64k waiting to post) Yuri!!! on Ice - 191,981

The math isn’t adding up...I think I messed up somewhere, lol. But you get the gist.

Fics completed:

65 (plus tumblr-only drabbles)

Works-in-progress

3 or 4...or 7...?

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted?

I guess I felt like I hadn’t written very much. But looking at those numbers, I definitely contributed to my fandoms!

What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January?

Voltron, for sure. I was definitely avoiding it, since I’d seen/heard such negative things about the fandom. But I’ve met so many wonderful people who enjoy it (as well as other fandoms I’m in) so it was definitely worth it!

What's your own favorite story of the year? Not the most popular, but the one that makes you happiest?

Uninhibited (OtaYuri - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated T) It was so much fun to write and it felt complete when I finished. The scenes I had in mind worked out just as I imagined and that hardly ever happens, heh.

I also really liked Anastasis (EmiMike - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated T) because I love Hybrid Child and I will continue writing that AU for my favorite pairings until its creator comes after me, lol.

Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them?

I wrote in a lot of languages I don’t fully understand. Not full works, but parts of works were written in Italian, Czech, and Russian - like dialogue - and, if not for the wonderful friends I’ve met on tumblr, I think I would have butchered those beautiful languages.

Your best story of this year:

I think Swept Away (EmiMike - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated T) was probably my best because it had the most responses and reader interaction. I wrote it as I went (not much planning involved, lol) and the support for the pairing and au was just wonderful!

Your most popular story of this year:

Definitely Back to You (Klance - Voltron - Rated T) It might just be because Klance is very popular, but it also has the kudos and comment to go along with those hits, so I think it’s safe to say that it’s pretty popular (in comparison, of course)

Story of yours most under-appreciated by the universe, in your opinion:

Probably a tie between Red Koi (SouRin - Free! - Rated T) any of my non-Klance Voltron fics. That’s not to say that the vld fics don’t get love and appreciation (They do! And I’m so thankful for it!) but Klance is so popular, it sort of takes the attention away when people peruse my work.

As for Red Koi. Free! as a fandom was pretty dead at that time, so that’s probably part of it. I was so happy with how it turned out and it was my first time writing something based on an artist’s lovely creation. I was kind of bummed people didn’t really check it out. (But it’s all good) :)

Most fun story to write:

Either Return to the Space Mall (Klance - Voltron - Rated T) or Gym Dates (Shklance - Voltron - Rated T) Both were fun for different reasons. RttSM felt like I was writing an episode of the show, tbh. Not one they’d air (because there’s a pairing in it) but one that the writers might get a good laugh out of reading. Gym Dates is my ‘I don’t feel like doing work, so let me write for my fun au’ fic.

Story with the single sexiest moment:

Hmmm...that’s a tough one. I’d have to go with Oral Exam (EmiMike - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated M) It’s more implied, but sometimes that’s sexier. Maybe? Idk. But I liked it, hehe.

Most "Holy crap, that's wrong, even for you" story:

Okay, so...I went through a thing where I could write nsfw stuff. Like...I wanted to, but it wasn’t coming out right. I’ve been a real “T-Rated” writer for a lot of this year. So, I’d have to say my one and only nsfw voltron fic. Bath Bomb (Lance Solo - Voltron - Rated E) I just felt forced. The sfw parts are great (imo) and I love them. But the actual nsfw bit seems...lack-luster. You could tell I wasn’t comfortable or happy with it.

Story that shifted your own perceptions of the characters:

I’m going to go with Boundaries (KuroKen - Haikyuu!! - Rated M) because it was my first time really delving into sexuality for the two of them together.

Hardest story to write:

Definitely True Heroes (EmiMike - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated T) Not only was it a cover for someone who dropped out of the EmiMike Exchange, but, as much as I love Super Hero movies...I know nothing about writing them, lol. This was before I watched BNHA or Tiger & Bunny, so I was mostly going off of what I remembered from X-Men AU, haha. I did have a lot of help, though. Thank goodness!

Biggest disappointment:

More Of You (EmiMike - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated E) This was a continuation of Rhinestone Chucks - which I loved!! - but it just...I dunno. People wanted more and I wrote it, but I didn’t feel like it was my best work. This was the start of my inability to write nsfw this year, lol.

Biggest surprise:

I don’t think I planned on writing an Inch-High Samurai AU - Sanzun-bōshi: Shirogane Takashi (Shance - Voltron - Rated G) - but I’m so glad I did. It doesn’t have a lot of hits, but people seem to like it (and senpai noticed me, so...) Yeah. That one was really fun.

Most unintentionally telling story:

Boundaries (KuroKen - Haikyuu!! - Rated M)

Favorite opening line(s):

Opening and Closing lines are hard, okay? But I really liked the way I started Among the Stars (Klance - Voltron - Rated T) - even though I totally abandoned it to write my bb and I haven’t come back yet... oops. Anyway, here’s the line:

“I really don’t think this is a good idea, Your Highness,” Hunk said nervously, gaze darting from side to side before settling on his prince, who was tugging on the rope of knotted bedsheets tied to the heavy desk by his window.

“First of all,” he began, seeming suitably pleased with the makeshift rope’s strength, “It was my idea, so, of course it’s a good one. Secondly,” he lifted the pile of sheets and threw them out the window, watching as they unfurled, creating the perfect escape route. “You’ve known me for, like, my whole life, Hunk. Just call me Lance.”

Favorite closing line(s):

Gosh, these are even more difficult than Opening lines. Wow, um... How about the ending of Peaceful Negotiations (Klance line, but it’s really Shance/Sheith with future Shklance - Voltron - Rated T):

Seeming to mistake his distress for misunderstanding, Keith continued. “Lance, he’s not bigger th-”

But Lance just held a hand up, silencing him. Then he sunk down into the couch, crossing his arms over his chest and glaring up at the other man. “I fucking hate you.”

So much for peaceful negotiations.

Favorite 5 line(s) from anywhere:

Most of these will be Lance because I love writing him and I’ve written him most often, so...

From Return to the Space Mall (Klance - Voltron - Rated T):

Lance’s brows rose to his hairline. “Uh, if you’re asking why I saved us back there-”

“Why didn’t you correct him?” He frowned. “Now he thinks we’re…” Keith lowered his voice to a whisper, “Dating.”

“No.” Lance held a hand up, gesturing between them. “He thinks Lanzo McCool and Fangs are dating.”

Keith groaned. “Stop calling me that. And Lanzo McCool? Are you serious?”

From Back to You (Klance - Voltron - Rated T):

“...we were chasing Lotor through the wormhole he created while trying to keep it open with what turned out to be a wormhole of our own.”

“So, it’s like…wormception?” Lance offered and Pidge gave him a look.

“If that helps you…”

From Lotor Baby (Lancelot - Voltron - Rated T):

“You thought…”

“You were singing your list,” Lotor finished for him. “Odd, but, then again,” he smirked, “You’ve always been a little different.”

“Oh, Baby, no, I-” Lance cut himself off with a nervous little laugh. “Are you telling me you’ve never heard that song before?” he asked and Lotor – looking rather unimpressed – shook his head. “Eartha Kitt? Madonna?” he questioned and received the same response. “Sweet plantains…”

Lotor pursed his lips. “I’m beginning to think I’ve misinterpreted something,” he mused.

From Uninhibited (OtaYuri - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated T):

“Ah, Yuuri,” Victor began, wrapping an arm around his fiancé’s waist. “Remember when I dropped everything and flew out to see you?”

“Yes,” the other man said with a snort. “But at least Otabek gave Yurio a heads up, as opposed to waiting completely naked in the onsen.”

“Good times, good times,” the older man sighed happily.

“Ugh, will you two shut it!” Yuri stamped his foot, chipping the ice. “This isn’t about you.”

“That’s right,” Mila said and before Yuri could thank her, she continued. “This is about Otabek and this extreme gesture of love for our little Yura.”

“I hate this freaking family,” the blond muttered under his breath.

From Swept Away (EmiMike - Yuri!!! on Ice - Rated T)

“But I don’t want you to die,” he sobbed, his face twisted in agony.

“Emil,” he breathed, reaching up to brush some of his tears away. His gaze fell to Emil’s lips, a little chapped but looking just as soft as ever. Just once, he thought. There was no reason to feel embarrassed now. “I’m sorry,” he whispered and then kissed him softly.

He was surprised when Emil wrapped his arms tightly around him, pressing their lips together more firmly and pulling him close to his chest. The kiss tasted salty, but still oh so sweet. And when they broke apart, Michele’s chest felt lighter. He smiled up at Emil, who returned the sentiment, albeit sadly, and touched his forehead to Michele’s. “Don’t go,” Emil murmured against his lips.

“I-” but Michele gasped, a searing pain weaving its way up his legs. He gripped the front of Emil’s shirt to steady himself and whipped his head to the side.

The sun was setting.

Top 5 scenes from anywhere you would choose to have illustrated:

Literally any of them. I would just explode with joy, tbh. I’ve had a few beautiful works of art based on my fics and I’m still screaming internally about them.

Fic-writing goals for next year:

Write more and also less. Don’t stress about it and don’t crank things out like a machine. Also, write what you enjoy. This is for me and everyone reading~