#ANYTHING I SWEAR

[morg-among-the-stars]

It has been six months since my book One Day At a Time was released to the world; half a year!

I don’t know how many people on here have read it, but it has been a story that I am still insanely proud of. I hope whoever has read it and supported it has enjoyed it. All of the support has meant the world to me. (Thank you @turniptitaness for reading the little one-shots that I send you and for being so supportive of my little story kiddos :D)

So, for this anniversary/milestone of sorts, I'm having my asks open for anyone who has any questions in regards to it, the inspiration behind certain elements, unanswered questions, or anything of that nature. You, of course, do not have to send asks if you do not want to! I'm just happy to celebrate this mark in the story's history. <3

To start off with answering things… here are some fun facts! (Contains spoilers for chapter forty-five and onward)

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-This story is the second story I’ve ever successfully written. The first was a story called Where They Go, which I turn people away from because the improvement in quality and character writing between it and ODAAT is insane

-Every story I’ve written follows a similar theme and similar structure: a WLW friends to lovers story with some element of parental issues from one side (I have a niche and I’m running with it, I guess!)

-There are two other stories that have never (and will never) see the light of day, one being a fantasy story and another very heavily following the “sun and moon” duo trope

-The first story’s fantasy theme was the inspiration for Ava’s special interest in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, a fantasy video game. I was able to implement imagination and fantasy without having to write fantasy, which I was quite happy about

-The first successfully written story, Where They Go, was co-written by my younger sister. She helped me with so many elements, because I did not understand how to write good characters and interactions. With ODAAT, I made it a goal to write it all on my own and it turned out great with an entire year of writing improvement between the two stories being released (My sister did create the original character designs for ODAAT, as well as suggested a few small plot ideas, which I did use and also modify. Overall, this story was more mine than the last one)

-With every other story I’ve written (WTG and the never-seeing-the-light-of-day stories) one out of the two main girls were always autistic-coded. I’ve always wanted to write autistic characters and with Ava, I finally allowed myself to say that she’s autistic, full-stop. I was previously scared of criticism or backlash, but I learned to say, “It’s my characters, I’m allowed to say who and what they are”

-Ava is autistic and there is no trauma about it. She is not treated differently by her friends and family and she is never “asked” or pushed to change who she is. She is seen as desirable by Lilly, not in a pitying way, but out of genuine love. I, as an autistic and queer author, do not stand for all autistic people, nor queer people, or autistic queer people, but it is a niche in writing that I think should be used more (or not, maybe it’ll just be my thing /j)

-Specifically on the Wattpad platform, the writing of parents is either nonexistent or of two extremes: neglectful and abusive, or permissive and non-caring in a different way. ODAAT follows two examples of parents, two examples of mothers. Ava’s mother is a single mother with two other children. She’s kind and the “cool mom” but she has standards and seeks first to understand when any of her kids do something bad or irresponsible. That’s one example; she is not a perfect mom, but she damn-well tries her best. The other example is Lilly’s mother, who’s openly judgmental of “different” people (autistic, neurodivergent, LGBTQ+, or otherwise). She is not accepting of her daughter being a lesbian and that is her biggest problem; she views it as a phase and hopes and prays that it’ll “be over soon.” She is incredibly ignorant but she isn’t stupid. She knows that Lilly has been teased and that her life won’t be “traditionally” easy because of her queerness. She is not the villain of this story, there is no villain. She is an antagonist but in a small way; an uneducated person who’s trying to help her child in an inadvertent way, a way that she learns does not work

⚠️ THIS NEXT FACT MENTIONS SUICIDE AND DARK THEMES! SCROLL TO THE NEXT FACT IF YOU WISH TO! ⚠️

-For a split-second (a couple days) I considered making the ending of ODAAT to be incredibly sad. For that split-second, I was gonna rip away the sense of hope and optimism that comes after things go to shit in chapter forty-five, “Downpour”. I was going to make it that Lilly still gets the chance to get away from her mother and find hope in Ava and Ava’s mother, but as a result of momentarily running away, stuff get worse; Lilly was going to be cut off from her entire friend group and be barreled into a lonesome depression that would end in her… passing away by her own hands. I was going to make her mother irredeemable, a villian in her entirety. (I’ve thought about writing a one-shot for that, though the sadness might be too much, even for my standards). I changed that ending, because 1) there was so much build-up to Ava and Lilly getting together that ripping it all away would (to me) feel like a waste and would feel painful to put the reader through, 2) I wanted to show that ignorant people can be educated/redeemed (even though it’s hard to get through to them), and 3) a happy ending was needed, we don’t need another tragic death of an LGBTQ+ character

-There is no villain and there isn’t necessarily a hero, either. I wanted to show a gray-area of how people are. The phrase, “It explains it, but it does not excuse it” is used to explain that gray-area in terms of conflict and mistreatment

-All four of the main kiddos in the story serve a “traditional” story purpose but done in their own ways. Ava is the protagonist, but so is Lilly. Their stories are separate, but they are closely knit. They are each other’s love interests, not solely Ava or Lilly’s (one or the other). Lucas is the voice of the reader, who sees Ava and Lilly’s chemistry and wants to push them together as much as he can because he (and in turn, the reader) know that they go together like peas in a pod. Rose is logical, the voice of reason to Lucas’ abrupt and sometimes pushy, “Come on, just kiss already!” way of addressing things. They, like Lucas, can see the chemistry but they want it to happen naturally, to progress in a proper and healthy way.

-The four main kids are parallels of each other (which is why they bounce off each other well as a whole friend-group-unit). Ava and Lucas are both imaginative, excitable, and theatrical in their own ways, while Lilly and Rose are both calm and observant.

Those are the fun facts, which might’ve answered every question that a person could put in my ask box. Whoops 🤣😂

-Bonus sorta fun fact not really

I constantly imagine the story as if it were a movie with elaborate and really well done edits to the songs in my story’s playlist, but then I always get sad that those edits do not exist

[seafoodsoda]

This was too silly for me *not* to draw, can I get a uhhhhhh zombie apocalypse AU-

[spider-avenger22]

Every time I read a story about a character that wears glasses and they mention pushing their glasses back up their nose, I do the same thing.

Every. Single. Time. Without fail.

Anyone else with glasses do this?

[cthulhum]

does anyone realize how crazy it is to have the actor of a mostly headcanoned queer ship say the fans were never crazy and they were right all along after 10+ years of everyone just absolutely going nuts over the said queerbaited ship

[nyancrimew]

i think every queer (whether they've realized it already or not) kid should have to go through an emo phase, let's force them to listen to nu-metal while they skip school to cry about a broken heart

[cozylittleartblog]

Columbo and the Knight (1984)

put me in the universe where Columbo ran through the 1980s and had a crossover episode with Knight Rider. I think they deserved it, and I am not just saying that because they're my two favorite Old Shows. @telebeast wrote a little fanfic blurb about it and I HAD to visualize it into a comic (which is also the longest comic I have finished thus far at five pages...), so writing credit goes to them.

Autism W!

[fl00mie]

oughh, BETTER LATE THAN NEVER

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PALETTE<33 ofc took the chance to draw them as a found family, and ink being over-emotional as a plus💖💥 ahh, 21 years, i didn't know he had grown so much

i would've loved to do something WAY bigger but inspiration never came as it should:( hope this is okay!

palette roller by @angeutblogo ink sans by @/comyet dream sans by @/jokublog

[lazylittledragon]

i refuse to believe that boycotting is hard. my favourite thing in the world is ordering maccies after a late night at work/a concert/getting drunk. yes i do miss it sometimes. but the other night i ordered from a small place near my house instead and it was the most orgasmic burger i've ever had in my life. i very rarely say this but fucking suck it up people are DEAD

[riinchu]

Gabriel’s special day ✨

Drew him in a wedding dress :3 he’s so pretty!!!

Heres some close ups of the other drawings ✨

🥺👉 👈

V1 looks so happy i luv him 😭

This might be my last post or awhile, because i am working on a video! So this will be goodbye or now ;v;

[catlaila]

andrew SPRINTED! i need you all to understand! andrew RAN FOR NEIL. i don’t know why this never clicked in my head because neil was about to get fucking killed and of course andrew was there. but the fact that andrew ran for him, after an entire series of neil running and realizing what it meant to stay—this was andrew’s final nail in the coffin that neil’s this isn’t nothing was real after all. i need to lay on the ground

[hyperkitten224]

the ragdoll is a lesbian: my little dumb personal compilation

[umblrspectrum]

i got lazy in the second panel and didnt feel like coloring or whatever bite me

[sergle]

it's the middle of the night, but I made another pixel piece based off some of my older art!

[lilislegacy]

i’m just gonna come out and say it

if luke comes back in a future book, i hope percy is taller than him now.

[candlebel]

🎶 Lights on, Keep them up or I'm gone 🎶

[ryann-44]

excuse me sir he asked for no pickles