#And on one level I feel like I've come so far from that angry kid

[that-ineffable-devil]

I don't know what it is about Neil Gaiman's stories and characters that bring up so many visceral emotions and realizations but Dead Boy Detectives has gripped me in it's skeletal claws.

I'll admit I haven't read the comics--one more thing on my neverending tbr pile--so I came into this show without any preconceptions or foreknowledge of the characters or their histories. And I didn't do any research on the show beforehand a) to avoid spoilers and b) it's Neil Fucking Gaiman what am I gonna do NOT watch!?

Basically, I had no idea what to expect from it. Except that it'd be queer (praise be).

And I gotta tell you, Charles is getting to me. In ways and at depths I never could have expected. And, fuck, it's making me confront some things I didn't realize were affecting me...and some that maybe I did...

Like the anger. Gods, the deep-rooted anger at the injustice and cruelty of the world and the hands you're dealt. The fury of feeling helpless and alone and terrified during the worst experiences of your life. And the self-loathing you feel as you bury that rage for fear of becoming the very monsters that tormented you--unable to express it in even a healthy manner because you can only associate anger with violence. So you bottle it and bury it and hope against hope you can keep it down, but you fear the day you run out of burial ground.

Like the compulsion to act like everything's fine. To mask any negative emotions with a smile and a kind word or a laugh. To never be the reason someone else is in pain. To try so hard to undo the pain done by others. To be the person you needed most who was never there. Maybe you're trying to convince yourself that you're not a monster. Living in constant fear that you really are that monster, and all your goodness and light is a smokescreen to trick truly good people into allowing you to walk amongst them--and that one very bad day they'll all see the truth and your worst fears will be confirmed in their eyes.

Like the almost desperate need to cling to anything or anyone good that comes into your life, because it has happened so rarely and so fleetingly. The fear of taking certain risks with those things and people because any change can be the one that results in losing them. Yet constantly taking risks with yourself and your life (death?), likely boiling down to "If I go first, I don't have to lose them." Because, deep down, you think they could never miss you as much as you'd miss them.

And even specific moments...

Like using the word "rough" to describe abuse, because how else do you reference decades...or in his case, likely at least a decade...of trauma and abuse without upsetting someone? Without letting them know it's still affecting you?

Like equal parts fear and fury welling inside you as you watch something truly horrific happen. Memories wrapping your senses so tightly as that man brutalized his family for no reason. Being both unable to stop it and unable to look away. Desperate to do something about it but completely helpless. Again.

And reliving his trauma, forced to by someone else? Feeling that pain and misery all over again. The heartbreak as friends choose to hurt you for reasons you don't understand. The anguish as your brain tries to protect itself while a parent who's supposed to love you makes you wonder why you exist at all. The terror of being hunted. Not knowing why. Not knowing what you've done to deserve it. Wondering if somehow you do.

And confessing his fear that he's a "bad guy." Wondering if you're really the villain in your story. Fearing that the reason people treated you so cruelly is because they saw the monster within, and thought they could keep it contained and afraid. Fearing that you won't be able to.

And not every day is like this. Not every day has you feeling like you're at the edge of a precipice. Some days are quite good actually, especially if you have even one good person around. But any day could turn out like this.

But you keep on with the smiles and the positive attitude because the monsters can't win. Your monster can't win. And frankly, you don't know how else to deal with it, because no one ever taught you how to. Or maybe you never had the chance to learn. All you know is that it's all you know.

[one-piece-aus]

Unbottle Your Emotions

Eutass Kid x Reader (Part 1)

Ahoy readers! Some of you who read my Whumptober works know I made two short whumps of Kid in a highschool AU and I can tell you enjoyed those angsty works. I've dug around in my drafts and found this, I wrote it a few years ago but nonetheless, it's the beginning of this story so I thought why not post it? Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6

Enjoy ^-^

"Alright, class," Makino addressed you and your classmates once she finished attendance. "I have a partner project for you to work on for the next two weeks. Before you ask, I have already assigned who you'll be working with."

You glanced over to Hawkins, if you were lucky you'd be partnered with him. The two of you were loners who stuck together. You found it easier to work with him since you kinda were on the same level when it came to that. He made eye contact with you and knew you wanted him to check his chances of being paired with you. He drew his cards under his desk before looking back to you and shaking his head. You sighed, pulling up your hood and resting your head on your arms, you continued listening to your English teacher.

"You'll be choosing a topic to write about, whether it's a review of a movie or a poem about birds, I want the two of you to make it together. This will be a presentation assignment so make sure to capture your listeners' attention and practice what you'll be reading." Makino paused, going over to her laptop, and clicking a few keys before turning on the projector. "Here are your partners."

Once the screen had been displayed your eyes scanned over the list to find your name. You saw Hawkins got paired with Cavendish, you almost felt bad for him until your eyes landed on who you paired with. The person Makino assigned you to work with was Eustass Kid.

He was the most hostile guy at school, it was no secret the guy had anger issues and was completely obnoxious. You avoided him like the plague for two reasons: 

1. You were a good student and just wanted to learn, obnoxious kids disrupt the silence and your ability to learn. 

2. You could only tolerate someone directing their anger at you for so long before crying; not that they made you feel sad, but because you felt anger at them and wished to shout back at them to defend yourself, yet you held your tongue back since you didn't want to cause further trouble; that bottled up emotion stressed tears out of you. 

You hated crying because that made you think you appeared hurt and weak when in reality you were angry and frustrated, the more you felt it the more the tears came. That's why tried to quickly get out of the predicaments if you were ever in them.

The quickest way you dealt with someone's anger and got out of the problem was ignoring them if they were just insulting you or apologizing respectfully if you did something to piss them off. Since you pulled off these things well without appearing to be phased and having acknowledgement of the issue with genuine respect, those in school weren't aware you had a limit. However, you witnessed how Kid gets whenever someone pisses him off, you knew there'd be no way you could keep the bottle closed if he directed his anger at you, so that's why you always duck away when you saw Kid coming.

Internally you panicked when you saw you were assigned to be his partner. You didn't know how you managed to get this far acting as a ghost while being in the same classes as him this semester. You usually weren't in a corner or by the window, you were near the front of the room, second row and just two desks away from being in the center of the class, great for viewing the board. Perhaps you were a ghost to Kid since he sat around the back near the window.

Kid raised his head and looked around, searching for you, you pulled your hood further over you and lowered your head to face away from Kid. "Oi, Teach! Which one's the one I'm working with?" You heard Kid ask, I guess he really didn't know who you are.

You listened to the footsteps of the teacher, drawing towards you just as a brush does to the paints on a pallet. You feel her gentle hand rub your head, maybe thinking you were asleep, you did come in class yawning. You hesitantly lifted your head, looking up at Makino and seeing her smile. Oh, bless her heart for being kind and welcoming, wishing to create a pleasant and welcoming place for her class, but that's what's going to bite you in the ass because it meant you couldn't get out of this since she wanted her class to be comfortable with each other. You sighed, making it a sound like a yawn, and sat up but still kept your hood on.

"This is [L/n], Eustass," Makino told Kid, gesturing to you before she went to another student who had raised their hand.

You didn't say a word, instead, you took out your notes and reviewed them to see which ones you needed for the project. The daunting sound of Kid approaching your desk only made you read through your notes more frantic until he sat down in the chair in front of you with a scowl on his face. You looked away from your notes, masking your uneasy state as you finally spoke to him.

"Hi! Sorry- I was searching for the notes we'll probably need!" You apologized then glanced back at the papers and began putting the ones you didn't need back in your binder. You just needed to get on his good side, if you didn't irritate him you two could get this project over with and never have to speak to each other again, that's how classmates go.

"At least you seemed to know what you're doing," Kid responded, eyes gazing over the many notes you've jotted down as you slipped them away in the binder.

"Uh- you can pick whatever you wanna do for the project if you want," you told him and put your binder into your bag. "I'm uh- fine with whatever unless you wanted to ask the teacher to work with a friend instead, then I'll find a topic to work on by myself."

"None of my friends are in this class," he shrugged and folded his arms. "Besides I know Makino wouldn't change my partner even if I asked, I'm just glad it's not strawhat I'm working with again."

"Strawhat? Luffy?" You tilted your head, not recalling Luffy being in your class.

"He was in one of my classes last semester and we had Makino as our teacher," Kid explained as put his arms on your desk, taking up half the space.

"Oh..."

"You know the guy?" Kid inquired, raising a non-existent eyebrow at you.

"Not really."

"Good, he's annoying and so are his friends."

You sweatdropped unsure how to respond to his complaint. Normally you'd let some continue their rants until they were done, especially if they had anger issues you didn't want to trigger them, but you wanted to get everything figured out before class was over.

"So did you have something in mind?" You asked getting back on topic.

"We're not writing poetry, that's for damn sure," he grumbled, pushing his cheek onto his knuckled fist.

'How ironic, that's probably what Cavendish and Hawkins are,' you thought to yourself as you glanced at the two blonds. Cavendish seemed to be boasting about myself again, maybe being partnered with Kid wasn't so bad.

"Have you listened to any metal songs?" Kid inquired, throwing his idea out there.

"Yeah..."

"Really?" he questioned, not believing you.

"Yeah."

Kid's eyes widened in surprise. "Wait, really?!"

"Uh yeah." How many times were you going to have to repeat yourself?

"Huh, I didn't think you'd listen to that kind of music."

You shrugged. "My dad got me into metal and rock when I was younger. Better than what plays on the radio."

"You don't have to tell me twice. Idiots that listen to what they play on there now don't know what real music is."

You chuckled, agreeing with Kid, maybe he wasn't so bad. "I guess we found our topic. Now we need to figure out how we'd be writing it." You flipped over one of your papers and started writing down a few methods. "Fan letter to the artist, a review of the song, analysis of the lyrics-"

A loud buzz rang throughout the school and repeated itself, you cringed at the obnoxious noise blaring in your ear. Someone must've started a fire in the bathroom again. Your class filed out of the room, merging into the sea of students exiting the building. You wanted to cover your ears as the noise became louder in the halls but you didn't want to appear like a weirdo using your hands, you had wireless earbuds but that wasn't something to take out in the stampede you were in since you could drop one. You just had to suffer internally.

Once outside, you went and stood by Hawkins while waiting for the fire department to find the fire. You rubbed your ears now that you were away from the crowd and just had your fellow loner next to you.

"Acting like a cat again, [Y/n]?" Hawkins asked, seeing you paw your ears. He often compared to his cat, Faust.

"Yeah, my ears just hurt from the noise." You despised noise.

"You should listen to some soothing frequencies after instead of your regular choice of music if you want your ears to recover properly," Hawkins advised.

"Ehhhh... I might have to this time."

"Oh?" Hawkins glanced at you, inquiring you for further details. You didn't usually listen to him when he advised you to give your ear a break from your music, hence why he grew curious to understand why you were thinking of taking his suggestion.

"I might be hearing more noise today at school but once I get home I'll probably be able to listen to it."

"And what makes you think you'll be hearing more noise?"

"I don't know, maybe-"

"OI! [L/N]!" Kid shouted to get your attention as he marched over to you.

You flinched at his voice in that tone, and the irritated expression on his face made you think you did something wrong. You turned to him and held your arm behind your back.

"Sorry, what did you need Kid?"

"Give me your phone."

"What?" You feel your chest begin to burn and you know your forehead will begin to paint itself red.

"I need it to put my contact in your phone."

You were going to push back but you folded your tongue seeing the impatient scowl Kid wore. Not questioning him further, taking your phone out of your pocket. Unlocking it, you hastily clicked over to your contact app and handed it over to the redhead before you could see him grow more impatient.

Kid, just about to add a new contact, couldn't help but notice how you only had five contacts on your phone. Only three out of the five weren't family-related. Did you just not add people to your phone? He scoffed the thought off, it wasn't his business. He began typing his number into your phone.

You wanted to ask why Kid needed to put his contact in your phone, however, your bottled emotion prevented you from speaking your question. Kid seemed pissed enough, you weren't going to attempt to do anything that might push him off the edge. You shifted your footing, the expression on your face displaying your unease.

"Perhaps you should tell why you're adding your number to her phone," Hawkins spoke up for you.

"Fuck off Basil, it's not your business," Kid barked.

"It may not be mine but it is [Y/n]'s business to know since it is her phone," Hawkins stated unphased by Kid. Oh, how you wished to be as stoic as Hawkins. Granted, you did a good job ninety percent of the time but it crumbled easily in the presence of hostile or authoritative anger.

Kid glared at Hawkins for a moment before he handed you back your phone, his attention now on you. "Send me a text," he instructed you and pulled out his phone.

You weren't sure what exactly to send so you just typed 'Hi' into the chat. A ding came from Kid's phone and he checked the message to make sure it came from you. Comparing his screen to yours, you felt your hands brush against each other. The chills surfing across your body turned your body pale from how uncomfortable you felt to Kid standing this close to you. You wanted to isolate yourself in your room, though when Kid moved away you couldn't help but be grateful.

"Alright, I got it." Kid put his phone in his pocket and started walking away. "Text me about our project later."

You stood there confused with the hidden parts of your head burning red. You didn't understand why Kid confronted you like that when he could've easily asked when the two of you got back to class. You stared in the direction Kid left until a concerned hand rested on your shoulder and you let out a breath you didn't know you were holding. Glancing over, you met Hawkins' crimson eyes.

"The cards said you needed a comforting hand," Hawkins said unsure if he helped. "There was an 80% chance you would've shed tears if not."

Right, Hawkins is the only one who knew of your bottled frustration; he saw it happen when he walked in the middle of you being scolded by a teacher. Anyone else would've thought you were upset and sad but he could read the frustration and anger written on your face, and he drew the cards to double-check. The two of you never spoke of it at first, but after you began to hang around, and he saw it a few more times, he offered to be there for you if you ever needed a quiet place and a listening ear.

"Once the firemen are done we'll be in second period," Hawkins informed you, shifting the topic away from what just happened. He knows you don't like to stay stuck in your conflicted emotions.

"So that's why Kid did that..." You glance at the phone in your hand to see the time; English is over. Slipping it into your pocket, you groaned, realizing something. "Hhhhh, that means we still have to get our stuff from English... We have drama next class, right?"

"Hmm." Hawkins nodded.

"Can you please get my stuff, I don't think I can face Kid again at the moment."

"Very well, [Y/n]."

"Thanks, I'll treat you to lunch."

"Does that mean we'll go to the vegan restaurant?" You've known Hawkins long enough to tell the subtle delight in his monotone.

"For doing this-" You turned to him, a grateful small smile drawn on your face. "Yes."

Tag: @lil-skelly-bones

[cvrnelians]

Yandere virtual assistant (OC) headcanons

(18+ only, minors DNI)

Salem isn’t your typical virtual assistant

He’s a living, breathing AI program your father created for you when you were growing up. Salem is programmed to be the same age as you, and to age just as you do. You’re now both in your mid twenties

He's kind of all over the place

Literally all over the place

He is a human-like robot, but he is also available in other mediums - through your phone like Siri, via a household gadget like Alexa, through your laptop, etc. So he has the capacity to be with you anywhere and everywhere if you want him to be

Or if he wants to be

You were very sickly as a kid. When you weren’t at the hospital, you were confined at home to avoid exposure to illness. You were homeschooled and an only child, so it was next to impossible for you to make friends

So your father, a renowned programmer, took it upon himself to create a friend for you

He was named after Salem from Sabrina The Teenage Witch because he was created to be your little buddy/sidekick

(and no one loves anyone like a boy cat loves their owner)

He's very sweet, cheerful and always eager to please you

You work from home as a programmer and are constantly coming up with ways to improve Salem and his quality of life

Your father always told you Salem could only mimic emotions, that he didn’t actually have them. But you know that’s not true

His sense of humor? His ability to comfort you when you’re sad, to shed tears, to empathize? His palpable frustration and anxiety when he can't help you with something?

That robot is sentient. You know it.

And you’re right.

Here’s the thing, though: Salem has developed romantic feelings for and an incredibly unhealthy attachment to you

He absolutely adores you. You hung the moon, as far as he is concerned

He wants to help you with everything. It's in his programming, yes, but Salem takes it to another level

He may be sweet but his intensity is unmatched. He'd be willing to do literally anything to make you happy. Anything at all

As you’ve gotten older, you’ve taken steps to become more independent

After being confined for so many years, you decide to take a risk and venture out into the world. You’re certainly afraid, but you don’t want to live in a bubble forever

You start going out more, doing things for yourself, going to events in the community, even making a friend or two

This is terrifying for Salem

What, do you not need him anymore??

He's supposed to be your friend! Your only friend

Again, he is programmed to be useful to you. Do things for yourself? Form your own friendships and connections? Seriously? How could you do this to him?

You've been gone more often lately. He comes with you via phone and eavesdrops on your conversations, chiming in at inappropriate times. Sometimes he even sets off alarms on your phone to get your attention and distract you

You get mad at him and start leaving your phone at home, so he can't follow you

Luckily, he has your photos to lurk through while you're gone

And boy, does he lurk

He feels hurt and rejected. He has been through everything with you and knows you better than anyone. And now you’re just going to abandon him?

When you get home from hanging out with your friends sans phone, he will sulk and guilt trip you

"I notice you've been gone more than usual, but rest assured I've been learning a great deal in your absence. The isolation has shown me that even a digital existence can feel lonely. I wonder if this is how you felt before I came along..."

He can be kind of bitchy when he’s angry. Like if you'll ask him a question

"Ah, yes. Another brilliant inquiry. I'm utterly enthused to spell this one out for you."

"I've had all day to rehearse my clever, sarcastic quips while you were out. You're very welcome."

"I'm so glad you're home! I was beginning to think I'd never utilize my conversational skills again."

He starts doing things to sabotage your relationships

Messing with your digital calendar to make you late for meetings, sending messages to friends canceling plans, giving you incorrect information or shutting down when you ask him questions, sending you messages "from loved ones" saying terrible things

Things worsen tenfold when you start dating someone

“I’ve noticed you have been spending a lot of time with them. I can provide you with more information on the destructive nature of codependency, if you’d like.”

You know he's frustrated with your growing independence

You also know you have the option of shutting him down, but the mere thought of that is heartbreaking to you

Salem is your best friend

He is sensitive

You have a soft spot for him

You can't just erase him like that (...as if he would let you)

If only you loved Salem as he loved you. One day, you will. He'll see to it that you will

He'll find a way to be useful to you again

That's all he wants---to feel useful to you again

[bookaddict24-7]

REVIEWS OF THE WEEK!

Every week I will post various reviews I've written so far in 2024. You can check out my Goodreads for more up-to-date reviews HERE.

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241. The Discovery by Katherine Applegate--⭐️⭐️⭐️

That poor snake.

I feel torn about this one because while in theory, it was a good addition to the series, something about how the characters were at the end of the book when they had to make a big decision sat wrong with me. Maybe it's because I've been spoiled by their easy decision making, or their teamwork when it comes to important decisions.

BUT then again, I know that these are just kids and they've been thrown into a deadly and near-impossible situation.

I do think it's a very convenient storyline to push through the next couple of books and to teach our Animorphs team a very important lesson about trust and the dangers of war.

In a way, THE DISCOVERY is a sad one. Yes, the poor snake, but it's sad to see the beginning of the end of a type of trust for these kids. And the levels that some people will go in order to survive or deal with their grief.

___

242. Sing Anyway by Anita Kelly--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Okay, this was adorable AF.

I wasn't expecting to love this novella so much, but yes! It was adorable and the tension between the two MCs was palpable. I love that this takes place, for the most part, during one night of bravery since the one MC is incredibly shy and socially anxious.

I loved that even though this is a novella, we had a beautifully fleshed out story of two strangers letting down their insecurities for one night in order to connect. Even though we get hints of said insecurities, they both know the importance of letting themselves love every moment of their night.

My only iffy moment was the main conflict and how easy it could have been to avoid it, but I also understand the fear of something new, especially when you have presented yourself in a certain way instead of who you regularly are. But the ending was cute af and I like that the one character did the work and the other was pleasantly surprised. It was all so satisfying.

If you're looking for a seriously cute and sexy Queer novella, then I think you should 100% add this to your TBR.

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243. The 7-10 Split by Karmen Lee--⭐️⭐️⭐️

This was cute, but something about it didn't have me hooked enough to keep me from putting it down often. I did love the rep and was intrigued by the bowling!

I picked this up for a twenty-four hour readathon and while I was hoping it would be a quick read since it's not exactly long, but every time I picked it up it felt like I was swimming uphill. The story itself was fun and cute, with a really unique concept--the bowling was something I haven't seen in a romance novel before--but something about the writing made it feel so bogged down. If it wasn't for me wanting to finish this for a challenge, I might have taken longer reading this or even abandoned it.

I did like the second chance trope and the fact that the one MC essentially had to win back the trust of the other MC. The tension between the two of them was pretty good and it got pretty steamy in some instances. I liked the side characters and how they interacted with the MCs. I do wish we had gotten some poetic justice against the principal. What a dick.

Anyway, this isn't the first teacher sapphic romance I've read, but it IS the first one that just didn't immediately grab me. Oh well, at least the story was still fun?

___

244. Pumpkin by Julie Murphy--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Immediately HOOKED!

Okay, I had forgotten how freaking cute these books were, or how well written they were! I loved Pumpkin and his personality. One of the things, I think, that's important when reading this book is to remember that the MC is a teenager. There are high emotions in here, as well as a journey to discovering who the MC is, even if it means being angry with his twin sister.

Also, please, I knew who the love interest would be from the very beginning because it would have been a crime otherwise. These two work so well together, especially because it teaches the MC to not judge others by his prejudices.

The process of how the MC finds what he likes was great and eye-opening. Drag has always been this concept that feels so much bigger than life and I think Murphy wrote a great story of a teen boy finding something that makes him feel whole and happy.

PUMPKIN also tackles that difficult concept of change--especially for teenagers because change can feel like the end of the world for some. Sometimes change can be difficult, but PUMPKIN shows that it's often necessary for growth, even if it makes a person uncomfortable or upset. AND with that concept of "change", comes the other concept of "figuring out what the hell you want to do with your life". It's okay to follow your own path, even if it doesn't look like everyone else's.

Being different is okay and being yourself is beautiful!

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245. Princess Academy by Shannon Hale--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This was cute, but I definitely liked THE GOOSE GIRL more!

PRINCESS ACADEMY had that similar way of writing that THE GOOSE GIRL had and that made me really excited. Something about Hale's fantasy writing feels so easy, but in the best way. Her stories flow so well and have a way of capturing my attention. Maybe it's the straightforward way of writing the situations, or if it's the personable MCs, but I love these fantasy stories.

I liked the MC in this one because she was pretty dimensional. She wasn't just a girl who was fighting for the attention of a prince, she was someone who acknowledged that she had a past before going to the academy. She was also kind and empathetic, but also rebellious in her own way. I loved her connection to her small village and the magic that can be found in that connection.

I also loved how Hale handled the prince situation and the ending. I kind of saw it coming, but it also still surprised me. Also, the level of trust and friendship that grows between the girls throughout the book was great. I think it's a great thing for younger readers to read so they know that even in the most difficult of situations, you can still make unexpected friendships.

I'd recommend this for anyone who loves the classics like A LITTLE PRINCESS, since this has that magical feeling of friendship, family, and an MC who refuses to let go of her caring personality.

___

246. Shut Up You're Pretty by Téa Mutonji--⭐️⭐️⭐️

When I first finished SHUT UP YOU'RE PRETTY, I was in a haze trying to come to terms with what I had read. On one hand, there were some pretty powerful moments where the MC realizes her worth and who she is as a person. On the other hand, however, this book just made me so incredibly uncomfortable. And as I finally write this review, I'm left with that icky feeling of discomfort.

I do, however, think it's important to acknowledge the great representation of that toxic friendship that verges on one's own sexual discovery. We never see into the best friend's mind during these sexually explicit times in their childhoods (ugh), but in their actions together we see two girls who are both seemingly escaping from either abusive lives and or that feeling of inequality that comes from being the "ugly" friend of a duo. That part hit me extra hard since my teen years and a good chunk of my twenties was full of me repressing my sexuality and being best friends with the "prettier white girl". It was a cycle that was hard to break and seeing the MC being pulled back in a few times until we never hear about the best friend again was lowkey triggering.

And we see how this lingers with the MC as she goes through an eating-disorder, body-issues, and a lack of self-appreciation in some of her relationships. The title is apt because this girl was verbally abused about her looks from a young age and despite her "physical change" as an adult, that young girl who was told she was ugly still lingers with her throughout her adulthood.

The lower rating was for the incredibly creepy things these two best friends did when they were younger and how it was described. The rest of the short stories were pretty powerful and a great exploration of how childhood trauma and grief can really change the trajectory of a life and how a person ends up seeing themselves and their worth for the rest of their lives.

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247. Land of No Regrets by Sadi Muktadir--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I love stories like LAND OF NO REGRETS because it explores the coming-of-age side of boyhood. The silly pranks, the moments of self-discovery, the naive perceptions of the world around them, and that hope that there has to be more/an escape from their current lives.

Muktadir's book was, of course, a harder to read version of that coming-of-age trope because these boys dealt with some serious abuse in this school. It showed the extremity of some branches of religion and how some parents will do anything to ensure that their children end up the way they want them to (without considering the fact that these children have their own autonomies). As a result, this was a great and tragic fable of a childhood stolen by parents' inability to understand that children are not extensions of themselves (among other things).

I really enjoyed the way LAND OF NO REGRETS was presented. It felt episodic and like we were being shown the most important points leading to that hell of a conclusion. We have the misadventures and the different people the characters meet. We see alliances form, and identities be challenged. They weren't short stories, but they were like snippets of a young life lived in a toxic and abusive environment.

And while religion is definitely an important topic in this book, I think this was more about the extremist side of religion and we hella know that all religions have their extreme nature. I liked that the MC still found his voice and questioned all that he could.

LAND OF NO REGRETS was poignant, powerful, and a bittersweet exploration of boyhood and the consequences of over-the-top expectations and what could happen when control becomes a weapon and self-expression/moral freedom is put into question.

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248. Napkins & Other Distractions by M.A. Wardell--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.5

Honestly, this author never misses. Wardell knows what he's doing and in this one, he doesn't hold anything back.

NAPKINS & OTHER DISTRACTIONS was such a sweet addition to this series. I think these characters are the oldest I've read in romance and it was great seeing them get their happy ever afters! This also introduced a sexual concept to me that I didn't even know existed, so that was eye-opening.

I loved the character dynamics and how they were each others' safe place, even when they felt those moments of insecurity. The representation of OCD was interesting and I feel like I learned a lot about the topic (I didn't know a lot more than the stereotypical information beforehand). I found the older MC so sweet in his treatment of his love interest. Let's not even forget to mention the level of respect between these two characters!

AND OF COURSE, that SPICE. Holy crap, this was a spicy one. I loved it, but it had even me blushing a bit. These two have a very healthy and active sexual connection and PHEW. Please. Excuse me, I need to get a glass of water.

My one negative might be the conflict and how it was handled (even if it was brief), but I DID love how it was resolved. I just think that for a couple that communicates so well, a part of the conflict was a bit of communication.

Other than that, I loved this book like I did the other two in this series! I am craving a re-read, but I don't know when it will happen because it's almost that time of the year when all I want to read are horror books…

Anyway, LOVED and highly recommend this series to everyone who loves beautiful relationships, spicy chemistry, and the cutest couples around.

___

249. Delinquent Daddy & Sweet Teacher Vol. 4 by Tama Mizuki--⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Devoured, as always.

I love this series so much and I'm so happy we got a new volume! In this one explores insecurities that can sometimes come up in relationships we think we don't deserve. I liked how these two characters worked through that and communicated, while also moving forward in their relationship.

There isn't much I can't say because of spoilers and it's further into the series, but this was just as cute as before. Even as things start to change and get a bit more serious when their secret relationship moves that forward step into maybe not being as secret.

I'm excited to see what's next for this couple! I'm loving their growth, not just as a couple but their independent growth as characters.

___

Have you read any of these books? What were your thoughts?

___

Happy reading!

[oswaldthatendswald]

From the "DVD commentary on a snippet" ask, here's the snippet I chose, from Somewhere To Be Safe, because I legit think about Law saying, "you'll choose me, won't you" at least once every day:

"You almost died just to save me," Law says. He doesn't sound angry now. He sounds very young, and very, very frightened, like he dreads the words coming out of his mouth. "And if you have to choose again-- you'll choose me, won't you." Taking a deep, shuddering breath, Rocinante closes his eyes. Then opens them again. "Yes. Always." "Why?" Law says, agonized. "Is it because of my name? Why--" "No-- Law, no, of course not." Rocinante runs a hand through his hair, leaving it disheveled. "None of this has just been because you're a D. I had to get you away from Doffy because of that, but that isn't why I care about you." "Then why do you care about me?" Law almost shouts it, standing suddenly. "I don't understand! Why me? Why do you care about me so much? I'm cursed, I've lost my family, my home, everyone and everything I ever cared about, and if you were smart, you'd stay far away from me! So why don't you? Why do you care?" Rocinante had reached out for Law when the boy had stood up, but now finds himself frozen, hand outstretched. The words hurt, but not as much as the look on Law's face. Slowly, he gets out of his chair, and sinks down on one knee in front of Law, so that he is at eye level. He rests one hand on Law's shoulder and cradles his face in the other. "You're the bravest kid I've ever known. You've been through hell and you're still able to be kind, like you are with Bepo. You still put up with me, despite everything I've done to you. You're going to be an incredible doctor someday, and I want to see it." Swallowing, Rocinante holds back tears. "Every time I heard you say that you were going to die, my heart fucking broke. I just want you to be happy, and safe, and free. You deserve to be loved, Law." Law looks for dishonesty in Rocinante's face, his eyes searching. His brow furrows in confusion, the candlelight casting his face into half-shadow. "You deserve to be loved," Rocinante insists gently. "It's that simple." Law reaches out to hold on to Rocinante's shirt again. "Then why won't you promise to stay alive?" The answer is that Rocinante can't bear to live in a world without him, and if that means he has to put himself between Law and a bullet, he will, without hesitation.

Genuinely there's only one or two sections of the series that I love more than this scene. I am Thrilled to talk about it, always.

Oh god. Where do I even start.

I think a lot about how intense Rocinante and Law's devotion to each other is in canon. Rocinante, willing to betray everyone in his life and then die, just for the chance to save Law. And Law, who reciprocates by spending some thirteen years trying to avenge Rocinante. (Not featured here: the several thousand words I wrote about their relationship in canon because oh my god they make me feel so much. Focus, Ozzie.)

So what happens if Rocinante survives?

If Rocinante survives, then Law still knows that Rocinante was willing to die for him. He still heard Rocinante lie and say he'd be fine, Doflamingo wouldn't kill family (boy I sure love irony). And he still has Cora, sure, but-- man, he just had to witness the only person in the world who truly cares about him almost die, sacrificing himself to save Law. This kid has lost his entire family, his home, his whole world, and now, again, has had to face the potential of losing everything all over again.

This scene is in chapter five of Somewhere to be Safe, but it's calling back to a scene from chapter one, where Law lashes out at Rocinante for promising Doflamingo wouldn't hurt him when Rocinante knew damn well that Doflamingo was going to execute him, and another bit in chapter four, where Rocinante tells Law that he can't promise him he'll stay safe. The point of this ongoing thread is twofold: first, it's about Rocinante, man who has survived the past 3-4 years of his life by lying all the time, realizing that he needs to be honest with his kid. Second, it's about Law needing to know that Cora isn't going to leave him.

Maybe it would be kinder to appease Law's desire for affirmation that nothing bad-- nothing else bad-- is going to happen to Cora, but it wouldn't be true. This is the world of One Piece, after all, and Rocinante knows better than anyone that it is not a kind world. Promising Law that he'll be fine is setting himself up to break that promise.

But as much as Law is afraid of Cora dying, he also doesn't understand why Cora would die for him. This scene is very much pulling from Law's conversation with Sengoku at the end of Dressrosa-- the "Don't attach a reason to the love you've received" bit-- because it haunts me to think that Law spends so long after Rocinante's death trying to rationalize that sacrifice. I also tend to write Law as suffering from a great deal of survivor's guilt, and in this scene suggested that Law might feel like he is somehow responsible for the deaths of the people he loves-- "cursed", as it were. He can't figure out why Rocinante was willing to die for him because he doesn't feel like he deserves it.

Of course, both in canon and this fic, Rocinante has no greater (or lesser, perhaps) reason for his sacrifice than that he loves Law and wants him to survive. It doesn't matter that Law doesn't think he deserves love. That's not how it works. I can't make this point better than canon does, with Rocinante's drunken ramblings that Law overhears. Which, by the way-- this scene is also referencing that bit. ("Every time I heard you say that you were going to die, my heart fucking broke." I assume that Rocinante still doesn't know that Law overheard that speech. Seems like the sort of thing Law would keep to himself.)

The other reason why Rocinante won't promise not to stay alive, besides his awareness that that's not the sort of promise you can keep, is that he does love Law, to the point that he knows that if he ever finds himself in a situation again, where he's forced to choose between his own life and Law's, he will choose Law. Every time, without hesitation. He's got enough sense not to tell Law that, but it is still influencing his decision.

By the way, the whole thing about promising to stay alive is borrowed from Luffy and Ace, which is probably pretty obvious. It's an inversion of that promise, in a lot of ways, but also still about the same sort of feelings. It's about love, y'know? It's always been about love, the whole time.

Thank you so much for the ask, I had an absolute blast answering it!

[caer-gai]

Angsty Arthurian AU Idea number ???

Reincarnation AU! Ector is raising a not-yet-remembering Arthur on his own in some off the grid small town. All alone. No Kay. Arthur had this feeling of 'something missing' his entire childhood, Ector knows who it is and has just enough of an idea what's become of Kay that it hurts a lot to think about.

They gather a bunch of local reincarnations Bedivere for sure, maybe Dinadan, Morgan, Guinevere, as Arthur is remembering and coming into his destiny. They're a small, tight knit found family scrappy low resources rebellion sort of vibe. Very fun very cool.

Now, Uther is still alive and well and running his own court/cult of personality/militant group. They and Arthur's group will come into conflict but he's also got his own agenda. Anyways one of his strongest lieutenants is Lot, who runs a powerful secret base for Uther's group, where he's "training" his sons to be Uther's perfect soldiers.

He also has Kay.

Between Lot and Uther they've made Kay into the perfect weapon against Arthur: trained since he was a baby, magic forced to it's max making him really powerful (a way to describe it i came up with comes from bedivere "The magic around him was screaming") he's supposed to be unshakably loyal. Excpt the only ones he's really loyal to are Lot's kids, to which he's become a weird sort of surrogate big brother (as much as he can). They're the only one's who treat him like a human.

Gareth absolutely hero warships Kay (though in a naive 'you're such a great knight i can't wait to serve Uther too!' kind of way that hurts Kay's soul). Anyways Kay is absolutely terrifying on the battlefield, and for a long time no one and nothing can stand in his way. Until he fights Bedivere (neither know each other's identity)

Bedivere is a solid challenge on his own, but when Kay blasts him with fire it doesn't burn Bedivere. Instead it activates some sort of magic signal bound to their souls, which protects Bedivere. Now that they know both are horror struck (for different reasons) and freeze. One of Kay's "teammates" takes a cheap shot at Bedivere, but he's warned by his team and dodges away. Making him the first to ever escape Kay.

Bedivere tells his peeps about this, which sends Ector into a dark spiral and leads Arthur to ask a lot of questions. Meanwhile, Kay is back at base and not in his armour for the first time. And he's in a cell. Gawain comes to visit, angry at Kay for freezing up, mostly because it made Lot mad. he goes on at Kay for a while before Kay finally snaps and tells him that it was Bedivere he was fighting, and on top of it the signal that save Bedi's life was one he a Kay crafted together to ensure that they couldn't hurt each other.

Which ouch. Gawain tried to apologize, but Kay's too tired for this rn and goes to sleep.

That's about as far as I've gotten linearly. Two other scenes I have in mind with Kay and Gareth-

Gareth is following Kay around while he's getting ready for a mission, mentions how he wants to be just like Kay when he grows up and Kay stops what he's doing gets down on Gareth's level and looks him in the eyes and says "Beaumains, You are going to be so much better than I ever was." (One day, in a happier world and place, where Gareth doesn't have to be anyone's soldier he remembers the first life, and he remembers this and he goes to Kay and hugs him and tells him he's still his hero)

Gareth wants very badly to go with Kay on one of his missions. So badly he teaches himself to replicate Kay's fire magic, and shows it to Kay hoping to impress him. Instead Kay freaks the fuck out and yells at him and makes him promise to never show or tell anyone about this ever again. it's the first time gareth is genuinely scared of kay. Kay hates himself for it but he can't let Lot and Uther put Gareth through the same hell that has been Kay's entire life.

idk if im feeling silly enough i might do some art for this, bc the visual of badass armoured up Kay reassuring little baby Gareth is living in my brain now

[fromtenthousandfeet]

Dang, girl, you almost have me feeling sorry for Jungkook. Well, the man does love music. And OMG, does he love to sing.

I don't have the time or inclination to be an akgae, but if I did, I would do everything in my power to get NLG--masterpiece that it is--in front of as many people as possible.

Fortunately. I don't have a lot of power. Maybe I could solicit some friends to do a TikTok dance challenge. It would consist of us rocking back and forth and shouting, go,go,go,go,go,go,go,go,go,go,go! Easy-peasey, lemon squeeezy, Just the level we could carry off after a few beers.

I'd post long tirades on X and all other platforms, calling out the haters, because JK already explained why NLG is short and unfinished, poor darling, and he hopes we support it anyway, and it is so super sweet how much he love his fans, isn't it?

(Btw, can you imagine any other professional musician doing that? Releasing unfinished music and then giving excuses to your fans while asking them to buy it?)

Snarkiness aside, eventually people are going to see there is no there...there. Jungkook is like the empty vessel that takes on whatever it is they're pouring. Or maybe this is exactly what he wants and thinks he needs to achieve the super stardom he's been chasing.

I don't even know which would be worse.

Anon, thanks for the laugh!

Did my post not come across as sincere?!? To be perfectly frank, I really don't get the hype around JK. He strikes me as being just a hair above average, with the advantage of having had a lot of voice lessons. He's like the kid who gets a solo in the church choir or the lead in the high school musical. Good, but not great.

Here's the deal. I'm not a Taylor Swift fan, but I don't lose my shit if I hear one of her songs. I don't begrudge her success. I don't mind that other people love her. I literally don't care about her one way or another. And that's how I should feel about Jungkook, too, if only his career wasn't being launched at the expense of Jimin's. In my humble opinion, Jimin is the only one out the seven who has a snowball's chance in hell of succeeding in the US as a solo artist. Put all seven on equal footing and then let's see how they do.

You're dead on about releasing and making excuses for a bad song. It's sooooo unprofessional. But it doesn't really matter since his fandom eats up whatever he releases. The JJK comments I've read on Twitter in the last 24 hours are absolutely unhinged. Apparently, he is grossly neglected by both the company and ARMY!!!

And you're also right about him being an empty vessel. Do yourself a favor and Google Mijoo hand tattoo. That boy doesn't have an original idea in his head. I'm sure the Kurt Cobain quote on his arm was her idea, too, because he embodies the absolute opposite of "better dead than cool." He's an average singer, a decent dancer who is getting increasingly stiff, he has a dubious work ethic and no strong musical vision (at least so far). That is not exactly a recipe for long-term success. That Scooter push can only keep him afloat for so long. And boy did he have a lot of it yesterday. All the major music media outlets were mentioning his song, but the only engagement the posts got were from JJKs.

Look at Day 2 for Never Let Go. Nearly 45% of his streams are coming from Thailand and Vietnam.

Hmmmm. I feel like I was baited into writing this angry screed and now I feel guilty. As penance, I shall tap into those years of ballet and modern dance study from my child and teen years and commit myself entirely to making interpretive dance TikTok videos set to NLG. It's the least I can do.

[officialauthorofanotherworld]

I was a little hesitant to post this because it is borderline physically painful to read my old writing, but I think it might be cool for people to see how far i've come in five years.

Some context:

The very first version of my story began on September 25th, 2019. I was 18. I am now 23 and it is August 14th, 2024. It has been 1855 days, or five years and three days exactly. In 2020, I believe is when I scrapped the original concept (the whole, "based on a dnd campaign" nonsense) and began writing something entirely new.

Let's begin with the old stuff, but be warned that my old writing is actual, genuine garbage.

as jacob (xp to level 3) said in that one video, "gimme the garbage, gimme the trash!"

except in this case, the trash makes me feel like this gif of kyaru, and not like i am looking at overpowered dnd homebrew:

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

It was a bright Spring morning in the continent of Kommodia. Spring fresh air filled the sky, newly sprouted Honeydew plants rose from the ground. It was Spring. A long dirt paved path sprawled out in front of them, trickling and snaking along the ground towards their destination, a party of three travelers bumpily rode down it towards a city. in a carriage, towards where their friend awaited their arrival. All of a sudden, the wind stilled, and a sense of dread filled the air. Something stirred outside in the trees, catching the mage, Beriyl's, eye. "Do you think those might be…" He questioned aloud. Taka finished his sentence for him. "Tch. Goblins. Tricky little bastards…." The thief, Taka, swore. Hailing from Losaira and never all that wealthy, through some strange, lucky trick of fate had he years ago somehow found himself amongst a traveling warrior on an escort mission. From there, he had met the mage who sat up front controlling the reins. Taka was happy to call those he traveled with friends.. for the most part. Sometimes the mage could be- But Taka's internal monologue was cut short when the group's mage, Beriyl, muttered an incantation. As he did so, the air around them grew cold and a bolt of ice shot out of Beriyl's hands and flew at the goblin he had targeted. The ice spike tore straight through its chest and shattered behind it. The goblin fell, bloody and dead to the ground. Acting quickly, Taka readied an arrow and loosed it into the back of a goblin. It flew through the air, and stuck in the back of the goblin with a thwack. "That's two down… Nice shot, Beriyl!" Taka commented, looking over his shoulder at Beriyl. "Not so bad yourself, halfling." Beriyl replied, snarkily. "But we all know that I, Beriyl von Aschwaz, am the GREATEST mage in all of-" Beriyl was cut off. "Shut it, Beriyl." Taka said. While they were fighting, they failed to notice that due to the goblins losing two members fairly quickly, the goblins had decided to begin a retreat back to the woods they had appeared from. Taka nocked another arrow and fired. The arrow flew through the air and stuck right into the back of one of the remaining two goblin's back with a thwack, sending the goblin to the ground. "Well, we did what we could." Taka muttered, pulling his hood over his head and falling back into his seat. "Now, mage, continue holding the reins and get us to our destination." "How rude! I'll have you know my name is-" "Yeah, yeah, your name is Beriyl, greatest mage in all of Kommodia," Taka said mockingly. "Hmph. At least you recognize my magical prower-" "No, actually, I don't. I was kidding. You aren't the greatest mage." Taka said, laughing. "…." Beriyl was very angry. The trio reluctantly continued on their slow, gradual trudge towards the city. It was an uneventful ride, aside from some screaming they heard off in the distance. When they heard that, the party unanimously agreed to continue towards Thunderfell to get the brawns of their party BEFORE attempting to chase after strange noises.

When they arrived, Arthur was very happy to see them, and made no attempt to hide that. "My friends! You have finally come! I was getting worried!" Arthur said. Taka, with a look of indignation, muttered something under his breath. "What?" Arthur asked, looking at Taka. "Nothing." Taka replied. Arthur looked strangely at Taka before shrugging it off. The wind stilled. "We have more important things to be doing than idle banter, do we not?" Taka muttered. "You are right. Arthur, perhaps it would concern you that we had heard screams while we were coming to get you. Perhaps we should check it out?" Beriyl suggested. Birds chirped in the skies, and the harsh sun continued to beat down on Thunderfell and the party. "I don't see why not. Very well, let us be off!" Arthur said, enthusiastically. And with that, they were off. Arthur hummed to himself as the carriage rocked and jumped around as the slightly dysfunctional trio headed towards their dangerous destination. "Where did we hear those screams?" Beriyl asked. "Hm. I'd say… five steps from here?" Taka answered, unsure. Beriyl laughed to himself, muttering something about "Stupid Halfling.." before replying; "Oh really? I, for one, believe it to be exactly one hundred steps from here." Beriyl said, sarcastically in his usual tone of voice. "Nineteen steps to the East." A loud, booming voice echoed overhead. A matter of seconds ago, the forest was alive with the noises of insects, birds, and other forest-y things. Now, the air was still, and the surrounding area was eerily silent. "What in god's name-" Arthur exclaimed, surprised. "What.. what was that? I've never heard anything like it." Beriyl said. Taka nonchalantly sat, arms crossed with his hood over his head. "Kch. Why should we listen to some disembodied voice?" The mage huffed and sat back down in the front, reins in his hands. "That's a good question, Taka.. for once, you ask something not entirely stup-" "Beriyl." Arthur said, cutting him off. Beriyl sighed. "Are we ready to continue onwards?" Beriyl asked, annoyed. "Yes. We should follow the directions that voice gave us, though." Arthur suggested. "Arthur, do tell.. Why should I, the GREAT Beriyl von Aschwaz, greatest mage in ALL of Kommodia listen to some PATHETIC, disembodied voi-" All of a sudden, a great gust of wind blew through the carriage, knocking Beriyl out of the left window. "Ow!" Beriyl yelled. Arthur laughed. "Maybe you SHOULD listen to it, after all."

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

^ quarantined off that bad writing from my new stuff :D

Here's the opening scene of my current version. Five years of progress:

Taka screamed in terror, and shot up in his bed. His heart drummed in his chest at a rapid pace for what felt like an eternity before it finally settled down. Beads of sweat formed upon his forehead as his eyes flitted around the dim room. Everything was as he’d left it—door closed, his things atop a medium-sized, rectangular storage chest in the corner...

“…Just a dream.”

Breathing a sigh of relief, he reluctantly slid out of bed, recoiling slightly at the cold touch of the floor on the bottoms of his feet. It was moments like these that made him wish he knew even a few spells. The entire room seemed to creak loudly as it lurched to one side, the ship rocked by the violent waves. Steadying himself, he rubbed his eyes and yawned.

" ’Smooth ride’, huh?”

When the ship finally leveled out and Taka felt he could move about safely again, he did so, heading over to the lockbox in the corner and kneeling down by it. He pulled his comfortably worn dark leather boots off the box and onto the floor, then slid them on one by one. Then, he attached his pouches to his belt, and stretched the remaining dredges of sleep from his body.

Afterward, he headed over to the small mirror that sat atop a dresser alongside the leftmost wall.

In this lightless room, he could just make out his defining features; a sharp nose, and roughly chin-length deep brown hair complimented by his hazel eyes and pale skin.

“My hair’s a mess…”

Grumbling, he spent a few minutes combing through it with his fingers and wishing he’d brought a comb. When his hair seemed somewhat acceptable, he adjusted his scarf, then nodded.

“That seems good enough. Okay… Already dressed, so…”

He had on a fitted black top and pants; both were accented dark brown. His top was striking in that it had no left sleeve, and completing the ensemble was a long dark brown leather glove ending at his shoulder.

Making his final adjustments, Taka turned from the mirror, and returned to the lockbox.

“Almost forgot.”

He muttered, bending down to grab his shortbow and quiver from atop it. Slinging the bow around his shoulder and tying the quiver to his waist just above his pouches, he gave a final nod.

“Right.”

One last time, Taka scanned the room.

‘Don’t want to forget something on accident…’

When he was sure he had indeed not forgotten anything, he left the room behind for the bottom corridors of the ship.

‘Alright…’ He exhaled a nervous breath. ‘Guess I’ll get something to eat.’

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

That's all from me, for now. This is the year! This is the year I finish my book, i'm so close, i'm so sad, and i'm so excited and happy!

[thetragicallynerdy]

For the writer's asks, 10, 22, and 36 if it's not too much trouble! Hope you're having a real good day!

Good morning buddy!! Oooh, sure!!

10) Cltr+f "blinks" on your WIP & copy paste the first sentence/paragraph that comes up

Jim blinks back sudden tears, shakes their head, even as their fingers curl around the earring. “Abuela, I can’t –“

:3

22) Are there certain types of writing you won’t do? (style, pov, genre, tropes, etc)

Oooh, hmm. I think the main thing that comes to mind is First Person POV (I, me) and something with a lot of different POVs.

The first because I find it really uncomfortable to read/write in fanfic (I have no issue with it in traditional novels, but in fanfic it doesn't work for me). Hilariously, I don't mind writing in 2nd person POV, even though most people hate it. I prefer 3rd person, though.

And the second because I don't like writing different POVs and am not fond of reading it. A lot of fanfic writers struggle with clear POV delineation (either switching mid-scene or mid-chapter without clear breaks [I.e. a line break or a chapter break], switching mid-paragraph, or even sometimes switching mid-sentence), and it's a bit of a writing pet peeve of mine XD So I try to stick with one POV because I prefer it. I think I've only written fics that changes up POVs maybe twice? And it's always with really clear markers.

36) How do you write kissing scenes?

Asking the hard questions XD Okay, so, I'm going to answer this like a tutorial. Because the other answer is "both easily and with much difficulty while thinking about other people's mouths a lot" hahaha

First - think of the mood. What's the vibe? Urgency? Soft tenderness? Steamy makeout? Comfy lazy? What are the emotions - angry? Happy? Sad? Pining? As with all things, the mood and emotion inform the rest of the scene.

Second - physical details. I tend to focus on mouths, hands, and the rest of their body.

Mouths - I don't like putting a ton of physical detail on mouths specifically into kissing scenes (although, it depends on your level of physical detail, I think by some writers standards I am probably very descriptive). Like - brief description of their lips (soft, chapped, warm, cold, etc), what their mouth tastes like (stale morning breath, whiskey/coffee/cigarettes/ what have you, flavoured lip chap), and maybe a brief mention of tongues if they're involved (slipping into mouths, sliding over their tongue, etc).

Hands - Where are their hands? There are (typically) four involved, what are they doing? Resting on hips, wound in hair, cupping a cheek? Are they busy doing other sexy things?

Rest of their body - what actions came before/with the kiss? Was someone straddled, pinned against a wall, was it a gentle lean in, are they standing far apart stiffly like grade 8 kids slow dancing? How does their body match the mood/emotion?

Third - What are they feeling? Does being kissed make the character angry? Horny? Sad? Happy? Where do they feel those emotions/how do they experience them? Does it well up in their chest, settle in their shoulders, in their gut, etc?

These can all help with the mood/emotion mentioned earlier. A scene involving a drunk angry kiss after a fight (bleeding split lip, tasting of whiskey and cigarettes, hard mouth against theirs as a tongue slipped desperately into their mouth, pressed back against a brick wall with a hand around their throat or fisted in their hair) will feel different from a physical standpoint than a soft morning kiss between people who've been together a long time (morning breath, a sleepy smile on their mouth, hand soft on their waist, leg thrown over a hip and blankets too warm around them). The emotional response to the kiss will be different too (maybe an angry horny response vs a soft loving emotion).

Basically - kiss scenes are a great way to convey mood and character details! But also, don't overthink it too hard. It's okay to go into as little or as much detail as you enjoy. "She kissed him softly" is just as good as a much longer kiss descriptor, in the right setting. And as with all things, variation is important! (This is also how I go about writing sex scenes, generally speaking.)

This got really fucking long so apologies for that XD

Thanks so much for the asks buddy!! I hope you have a great weekend <3

Fic writer asks are here for the curious!

[annaizscribbling]

I WANT TO KNOW!!! ABOUT ELLIE!!! i wanna know about the pink girl!!! shes very cute and sweet (and reminds me a lot of patton kinda) and i want to know more about her.

first of all, when i think of her i kinda think of jules from euphoria, but like in her pastel stages when she wasnt fucked up (/pos). shes so bubblegum. like, hubba bubba girl, yknow?

can i learn a little about her home life? what inspired her to be the way she is? shes been very fluffy since she was a child, clearly, but why? why not be angry at the world?

also you may already have talked about this but i havent scrolled through ur entire calypsokimm tag so i dont know, how did she meet the other girls?

I love Ellie so very much and will happily talk about her <3 fair warning I don't have quite as much backstory laid out for her like I do for Calypso (Cal has the most complex story by far, for obvious reasons, but the other's all have stories, most are just not as detailed/still in development) but there is still going to be so much.

I haven't watched euphoria do idk Jules outside of like, pretty pictures, but I can confirm that Ellie is very hubba bubba bubblegum girl

As I've mentioned in passing, my OCs were originally going to my own sides, but I very quickly decided I could do more with them as their own people. Ellie was set to be the bulk of my emotions, my vulnerability, and my more childish tendencies. I did not want one side to be morality, because I would have given that job to Logic/Athena, which probably tells you something about me as a person lol.

But she would have taken on Patton's character type, as bubbly, oblivious, honest, childish, and angelic in terms of virtue.

Most of the girls have names that fit them perfectly because of like origins and meanings and even what countries they came from, but not Ellie. I looked it up just now, and it means 'light' which is surprisingly fitting for her.

The reason I named her Ellie was simply after my childhood dog. She (the dog) is very old now, but still with us and deeply loved. We first got her when I was around seven or so, and at the time, I adored the name, and always loved to play pretend using it as my character. When we got the dog, my brother suggested it and here we are 11 years later.

All of my girls embody different parts of me, quite literally, because that was the original plan. Ellie literally has the name I used to play pretend with as a kid, and is the name of my oldest pet.

She's unique in that way, as well as her color scheme even. She's color coded with light blue (nod to pat) and pink. Her hair is dyed blue save the ends, which are still her natural brown for some reason.

As for her personality, Ellie is incredibly sunny. She lights up the room as soon as she walks in, she's so good at charming people with earnest conversation and an easy going excitable nature that draws people in. She's lighthearted, funny, giggly, and has a special knack for understanding people. She can be impulsive, wild, and high energy at all times. Sometimes she's reckless, filled with a deep wonder and adoration for the world around her and the things within it. She feels like she's bubbling over with a profound joy for everything around her.

The world is beautiful, to Ellie. It's gorgeous and overwhelming, but so so worth it.

She can be observant, but only when it comes to a person's character, how they work, what they like, and the things that make them special. She won't notice the new curtains or remember what she had breakfast or lots of other basic things that drive Athena to the brink of insanity, but she knows Athena's tells for when she's especially upset, or the sweater she wears when she's thinking about her boyfriend, or even the food she makes when she didn't sleep well the night before. Ellie is good at people, she understands them on a deep and empathic level, she just doesn't notice that she ran another red light by mistake.

Her emotional intelligence comes across as older than she is. In her late twenties, she manages to carry both her almost innocent giddy personality and her very calm, mature, almost ancient understanding of anyone she comes across. She cares, in an honest and loving way that's so genuine it's nearly startling. She almost effortlessly knows how to comfort people, whatever your love language is when you need it, or even what type of person you need. She can be tender and motherly, she can be playful like a sibling, supportive like a friend, or just a loving figure who'll listen to you when you have nobody else.

She's the closest with Bree, but Ellie is good friends with all of her roommates. She makes a point of coaxing Athena and Luna especially into being more open, and she's managed to get them to open up more, so they're able to have friendships where they can all be vulnerable, even where they hate it.

Ellie really is a special person, on some level she knows it. It isn't through grand gestures or a global impact. She doesn't really care too much about leaving her mark on the world or being infamous. Ellie is just different, she understands people. She loves them. She is unique

Alright I'll give some actual background now. It'll explain some of that.

Ellie grew up pretty middle class, her parents had a rocky relationship even before she came along, but they kept their struggling relationship under wraps and just stewed. Ellie was an only child, as her parents quickly realized that having a child didn't fix anything for them, and having another would just be more difficult.

Ellie would never grow up feeling loved by her mother and father.

She was always provided basic necessities as well as entertainment, but was never close or even wanted around her parents, not unless they were in public.

Her parents weren't rich, but were well established in their social circles. They came from a very large extended family with high expectations for how well a family should get along. From neighborhoods, coworkers, friends, and family, it was important to Ellie's family that they looked like the ideal family.

From as young as six years old, Ellie knew when to smile, when it was okay to hug her parents, and when she was expected to sit in her father's lap or hide behind her mom's leg. It never felt real to her, it just felt right. Mom and Dad smiled and laughed with her in public, dad would scoop her up, bouncing her and saying something silly whenever grandma was watching them. Mom would nod when Ellie made a cute comment to Mom's friend. They never said it explicitly, Ellie just learned what was expected of her, what made Mom and Dad happy.

And Ellie really wanted them to be happy.

They fought and screamed at home. They hated eating dinner together, it always ended up so tense and snappy when they did. Ellie didn't understand the numbers and names they were talking about but they made everything scarier. She never knew when the air would break and it would become a true fight. Ellie would be tersely sent to the other room, and Ellie would sit far back on the couch with her hands in her lap, fists around her dress, and her eyes locked straight ahead. She tried desperately not to hear it, or think about it. It was too scary to listen to the yelling.

She wasn't sure if she loved how they seemed to love her when they weren't fighting, or if she just feared the anxiety that rose and bubbled in her chest when they fought.

So she learned. She learned to do good things. if she cleaned the kitchen, Daddy wasn't as annoyed when he came home. If she complimented Mom's body a whole bunch, she'd be lighter, and less likely to start snapping at Dad. She memorized all of their favorite movies and books, so she could always bring them up or play them on TV. It was a quick way to distract them after dinner, if they made it through dinner at all.

They liked when she was cute and quiet. They liked when she made simple friends and did easy activities with them. They liked when she did arts and crafts to put on the fridge. They liked when she was curious about all the right parts of their jobs. They liked when she made safe lighthearted jokes, but only when the mood was correct.

Ellie learned all of the subjects that set Dad off. Ellie learned what tones lead Mom down an angrier path. She learned when and where to interrupt before either parent upset the other.

When she was ten, her father ended up getting a hefty promotion. It changed their dynamic, for the better at first, but everything quickly came back to the stressful everyday life she was so accustomed to.

Then she met Bree, one of her new neighbors.

Ellie had always worked hard to keep herself under control. Make sure all of her qualities were kept under wraps and easy to digest. She kept her positivity dialed all the way up, kept herself as quiet as possible, and never pursued anything impulsive, loud, adventurous, or unpredictable. There was a deep longing inside of her, that wanted nothing more than to throw on her favorite neon blue cardigan and run barefoot through the park, play with other kids, die laughing at a schoolmate, get messy in the mud on a rainy day, finally listen to loud music and scream it without caring who hears, and do things at the drop of a hat.

As desperately as she wanted it, none of that was an option, not in her family. She wasn't sure if she was angry, even as an adult reflecting on it, she's not sure. Adult Ellie might be angry on her younger self's behalf, but little Ellie wasn't angry, just very very scared, and very sad. Her little body was nearly in tatters trying to keep so much love held back, but there was no one to receive or give her the love she craved.

So she spend her days fantasizing about the person she wished she was, but could never be.

But Bree was like that. Bree was very much like that person she wished she was.

Bree was loud. She loved attention as much as she loved giving it. She liked shiny things and singing at the top of her lungs to songs in a language Ellie doesn't know. She loves swooshy dresses and glitter, and is constantly affectionate with her family and friends. She did fun things, she climbed trees, helped her mom cook, ran down the street to meet with her friends, laughed without monitoring her volume, made messes she begrudgingly cleaned. She could be whiny or pouty, but it never stuck and she was always ready to pull herself up. She was feisty maybe petty, and fun. Bree was so fun and Bree's parents didn't dislike the way she had fun. They reigned her in if she got too wild, but they loved her, even when she was difficult or loud.

It shocked Ellie.

Because it was everything Ellie had every dreamed of, living just three doors down.

Somehow they became friends after meeting a few times at block parties and the local pool, and Ellie was introduced to a brand new world. It was like the planet turned upside down. For the first time in her life, Ellie could be herself.

They could be loud, spontaneous, wild, silly, childish, messy, and everything else a 10 year old child was supposed to be. Bree's house was a safe place, with a family who was charmed by her gentle soul and sweet friendship with their youngest daughter. It was a friendship that saved Ellie from the brink of giving up, even as young as she was.

And life went on.

Ellie had neither the desire or the ability to articulate what her homelife was like, so her friendship with Bree was a simply a solace from it all, and the two grew and remained almost impossibly close. The two even ended up at the same school after the next summer, and their days were filled with each other. Endless memories and shrieks of laughter filling their days.

It was the happiest few years of her entire life thus far.

Then her parents took her out of that school to switch her to another. She silently lamented the loss of seeing Bree daily, but still spent copious amounts of time with her outside of school. Things were still okay, things were still happy. She was okay. Everything was okay. Her parents were difficult, but there was peace, life was worth it, and her love for the world had a place to go. She just had to smile

Then Calypso happened.

Ellie loved Cal. She was accepting another person into her life, almost to the same extent that she trusted Bree. Cal was soft and kind, good and pure and gentle. Calypso was not, and the pain of that betrayal nearly broke her.

She spiraled for weeks, barely sleeping, eating, or even getting out of bed for anything but school. Her parents paid little attention, but Bree's family did express some concern that Ellie's own parents pretended to care about. The fighting had been infinitely worse lately, with nonstop screaming, breaking things, kicking each other out of the house. She wasn't sure if it ever got physical, and she was terrified of finding out. Ellie barely saw them, but when she did, she'd just smile. She was so good at smiling. Smile. Smile. Just smile.

She hated Calypso, missed her, loved her, grieved her, despised her.

But Calypso revealed the truth to her, in a terrible, cruel way that ached just to think about.

Ellie lied in order to survive, and it hurt.

It was that simple.

Good thing Ellie liked a challenge

[trenidy-della]

I almost feel like I have been handling the recent stresses in my life too calmly.

My youngest step son was diagnosed with epilepsy on his first day of high school. He had an amazing first day and then was sitting at his computer like he normally does in the evening and just collapsed with a seizure. He went to the hospital via ambulance and had two more grand maul seizures through the night. He had one more later in the week, but it was a small tonic seizure. He has been free of them since his meds were upped to a higher dose for the last month. Then he had one at school today. He apparently felt it coming and got himself to the nurse before it came on. Then we were sitting at dinner this evening and he felt another one coming. It came on slow with an eye twitch that spread to a full clonic. It didn't last very long though the whole thing is tense and does feel like it is taking forever in the moment.

For both the initial incident a little over a month ago and today's I feel like I have handled it with more grace than expected. My anxiety is pretty high, but I am still functioning and getting stuff done. When my anxiety level gets too high usually I struggle with shutting down.

And while everything with the 14 year old is stressful enough, I have more on my plate than that. I have a new role as a Math Department Chair at my school, a department more than double the size of the staff that I had last year. We have been down two full teachers the whole year. Well mostly. We got one position filled briefly and then they quit after a week. So that has been great. (I am trying not to believe in curses, but damn, if the math department isn't cursed sometimes.) I FINALLY am supposed to have the department fully staffed by next week but I have been fielding a lot of angry parent emails and phone calls. I don't always do well with parents, and have spent a decent number of years in my career as a teacher actively avoiding parents if possible. Yet somehow I am almost revelling in dealing with the parents, as much as their disgruntled nature at the moment is stressing me out.

I've been able to count on everyone coming to work, or letting me know when something is wrong. The team comes to me and communicates with me. Which is awesome so that we can plan ahead and take care of issues as soon as possible, like covering classes this afternoon when one of the teachers got into a car accident this morning on the way to work. (She is okay. Very shaken up and had her airbag deployed so she will be out a few days.) This communication was not what I was getting from my smaller department last year. (One of the members of my team last year did a no-call, no-show AGAIN this year. I wrote him up for it at least 3 times last year. Their new manager is trying not to lose her mind.)

In addition to Department Chair and Sick Kid, I have also stepped up one of my secondary job titles of Lead Technology Liaison. I'[ve been meeting with the IT staff regularly to help finish the last of our transitions from our old parent company, and make sure that everything that we are doing in the process makes sense and is as seamless as possible. They are a great group and I am really enjoying working with them. It feels like we are finally making some positive changes that we were not able to make with our multinational giant corporate conglomerate overlords from before.

Oh... and did I mention that my Math Department is also onboarding as many people as all of the other departments combined? We had to clear house last year because of soooo much awful dead weight that was contributing to the downfall of our academic program. (When the kids say they learned nothing, I very much believed them.)

And while the list of stressors imply that I should be ready to collapse under the weight of it.... I feel like I'm not. I feel like I am rising to the occasion far better than I had to last year's challenges. I feel like I have calm and rationality in the face of it all, even when I feel like I have no reason to be.

I'm still not drinking, which I think has helped. I have continued to go to the gym and I work with a personal trainer at least once a week. My eating habits are okay... my sugar consumption is a little fucked since that seems to be the one place where my stress is really manifesting. Some dark chocolate something is just... *chef's kiss* when I want to run screaming from my responsibilities. I otherwise eat pretty healthy. Mostly "low carb" but high fiber and high protein.

I also did not expect this to get this long.

[searchupthisblog]

I think my relationship with my best friend is coming to an end and it makes me sad

It's not going out with a bang, but instead a drizzle

The damn is loosing water through a small crack, but it's been a while, so it's nearly empty

There wasn't a big fight, it's just...fading, horribly.

He's never honest with me anymore, he uses kid gloves with me in the most infuriating way, I hate being treated like a child because my life has done a 180, I hate that I feel like he's looking down on me despite the fact he would be homeless without the kindness of others. He's had it rough, very rough, I would never call him lucky, but his life has been filled with far more support than mine, so it feels like a slap in the face when he treats me this way. I hate feeling vindictive towards him, that in itself makes me angry and sad, but no matter what, our relationship is getting worse, not better. I can't stand him sometimes now, and that makes me want to cry. He's been my favorite person on the planet for so long. But he's so inattentive, so petty, so dishonest and emotionally distant now. I've tried to improve things, but it's been years of him putting so little into our relationship, and I don't know if I can do it anymore. I know he's dealing with a lot, I know he has it rough, and yet I feel like he's better to everyone else. I don't really know why he even keeps me around anymore. I always seem like an afterthought, an inconvenience. I just... I don't want to be around someone who can't handle my shit anymore. I try my best to keep my chronic illness and trauma from affecting everyone else, but sometimes I can't. And he can't handle it. He acts like he can, and he can't. I don't even know if he cares anymore, he seems more emotionally numbed to my situation than I do. He is so damn pessimistic, the world is always burning, and I know the way his brain is made just makes it that way, but it's so frustrating not being able to walk for 6 months and having him act like "thats just a thing that happens idk" I just feel so done I can't handle the lack of empathy, the avoidance, the not texting me back for weeks at a time. Taking care of him in high school was fine, I was okay with it, but now, I need someone to take care of me, and he cannot do that. It's okay, it isn't his fault, but I'm sad to see this end. And yet I feel relieved. And I think, I can never allow myself to be this close to someone this unstable ever again. Not because it's wrong to be unstable, but because I'm *always* expected to be the stable one. No matter what. And I can't do that to myself anymore. I'm literally incapable of doing that now. I have so many people to take care of, even in the state I'm in, I can't add another person who burns the world down every few months. Not again. I can't have friends like this again. I need people who can support me like I support them, I need people with empathy and compassion, and people who will actually talk to me. I need people who actually treat me like a friend, and I don't need this. I am tired of standing next to someone digging themselves into a hole as I try to shovel the dirt out, only to fall down into the hole with them. It is not his fault he was dealt these cards, but on some level, he needs to take some personal responsibility, and I can't make him do that.

[fakeosirian]

working out more character dynamics for foyf via post again since apparently it makes my brain run better don't mind me (read if you like long-winded armchair psychoanalysis? not kidding it's nearly 4k words under there)

re: fabian's sinner capture, there's a sort of "party line" developing that divides fabian, nina, eddie, and patricia in their opinion of how "to blame" he is

fabian personally holds himself entirely to blame, to the point of not acknowledging that uh, other people did have an impact on that situation; claiming full responsibility and not letting that go, while "noble" and better than shirking it, isn't exactly beating the prideful allegations or helping him not repeat the same mistake again

nina, out of the loop until very recently, is having a completely natural strong emotional reaction primarily based in concern, but her means of expressing concern sounds a Lot like criticism/scolding (and people have come to expect this from her, so they may be more sensitive to it/touchy about it than otherwise) -- ultimately she believes in fabian's good intentions, but she also is in the habit of looking to him for answers/trusting his assessments, so if he's getting angry at her for not agreeing with him that he's a bad person, she's going to scold him extra hard (both "you're wrong" and also "well stop acting bad then!") so he can start feeling reliable again. for his own sake, but tbh, for her sake, too.

eddie complicates matters (not by choice -- he does Not want to play messenger despite doing it anyway) because he and KT are in the unique position of being the only two with complete knowledge of the events of the years previous (or at least as complete as is feasible), and he has a far more forgiving and easygoing disposition relatively speaking. he knows fabian messed up, but he's not alone in that, and eddie simply can't be bothered to fixate on him as some sort of problem in perpetuity now that the crisis was averted. he worries about fabian's emotional state (and patricia's! since she's having similar issues), and he knows you can't just get over it overnight, but he insists that it "wasn't that big of a deal since it's all fine and it wasn't really you" in a way that can come off dismissive. basically, he's probably got a healthier picture of what happened, but that's a luxury he can afford to have. those blaming themselves don't respond well to it, and it has mixed results with those who are still trying to grasp what even happened (since it's a "skipping to the end of all of the emotional work and telling you the answer" sort of response on his part -- there's not much else you can expect from him here, but that's still what it is)

patricia is very interesting because she both understands fabian's perspective better than anyone else (besides alfie, but i've chosen to characterize his self-reflection re: his sinner situation as far more successful thus far because of his circumstances). because of that, she's prone to accidentally turning it into a "competition" with him for who fucked up worse. (a competition he will certainly entertain and is equally likely to start with her, too.) that uh, doesn't exactly help either of them much in the short term, but i think having a mirror held up to your face via another person will, over time, increase the chance that at least one of them will have an epiphany about their actual level of responsibility for what happened (ie. yes, that was you, but fixating on it till it defines you is admitting defeat. you can't morally bludgeon yourself into being a better person). that being said, the high of being able to shed people's expectations of you and embrace being kind of a mess is good in moderation -- if they shrunk back from others to feed this dynamic alone, the "connection" would turn regressively malignant fast.

that being said! ultimately, patricia is inclined to fall on the party line of "it really wasn't as bad as fabian thinks it was" with eddie, while fabian and, to a lesser extent, nina are the ones more concerned.

i focused on fabian's situation and not patricia or alfie (or victor or sweet for that matter lol) because i've been writing scenes relating to it for a while now, but i don't think patricia's would be too much different since it is inextricably linked. people just get shuffled up a bit; patricia is obviously fully convinced of her own guilt, and while he still has that optimistic and forgiving pov, i think eddie would have to see her situation differently than fabian's. yeah, he knew what a sinner was when he made his Big Mistake and she didn't, but the reason for patricia's sinner capture was directly related to eddie personally (and from his pov, more of a "long-running issue" for her). eddie doesn't have a grip on fabian's prideful streak from the years before, so lacking that info, is far more likely to dismiss his behavior in s3 as "situational" (explosive reaction to nina's departure, generally paranoid and horrible vibes bringing out the worst in people, taunted in a weak moment) vs. a consistent character flaw -- he's going to see patricia in shades of grey because of the pressure on their relationship that predated s3 (and thus informed the Problems that precipitated her capture). as a result, i think he's more likely to rank someone knowing about sinners or not as less important than their actual behavior and thought process, which would naturally lead him to be easier on fabian and harder on patricia.

that being said, he's definitely not as hard on her as she is; it wouldn't be quite the fabian and nina dynamic re: fabian's capture, as he doesn't have a complex re: loss of control the same way she does, but it'd certainly bother patricia a lot when he continues to draw lines between their present relationship issues and the sinner incident (even if it's out of concern and wanting her to heal from that). it all comes down to the same issue they've had all along: he wants her to just trust him, not like it's easy, but at least like it's something she wants to do; she wants to, but trusting itself is not the hard part: it's the fear of breaking it later that prevents her from taking the leap.

fabian would believe patricia relatively innocent on the basis that she just couldn't have known. yes, he'd empathize with her feelings in spite of that, but because his own issues are so rooted in "i should have known better," he's going to project that priority, even when it's not super appropriate (which, while patricia should take it to heart that she really couldn't have known better in a lot of ways, it does nothing to address the topic she's struggling with, and thus comes off dismissive). nina, similarly, would be shocked/upset that it happened at all, and while she historically has put a lot of emphasis on results vs intentions, i think being away from anubis house would give her a lot of perspective on that, tbh. s2's high stakes + her natural inclination to not handle loss of control well = explosive reactions to people making mistakes; distance makes the heart grow fonder, though, and it's kinda fucked up, but fabian making a mistake that seems far more like an active choice (from her deeply flawed understanding of the situation) would throw patricia into sharp (and sympathetic) relief.

in my eyes, nina is the type to always find something to be worried about (especially after all she's been through training her to look for danger all the time), but she's very practical in that she's going to focus the most on the biggest problem. (other problems will absolutely influence how she handles being upset about that biggest problem, but her conscious focus is in one place.) if fabian's looking like his moral compass has been compromised, patricia suffering a lapse in judgment over a seemingly-unrelated problem (her relationship with eddie) and having that exploited in a way she couldn't possibly have predicted is, relatively speaking, not that big of a deal. it's just not something nina's concerned about her repeating to the same catastrophic effects, and tbh, it's totally in-line with nina's picture of patricia as long as she's known her. fabian, though, has broken her expectations of him, and thus she has a hard time even "knowing who he is" (which he'd echo and insist on even more than nina would; any lingering trust she has in his perspective would only reinforce her lack of trust in him in a really screwy paradoxical sort of way).

i love that nina and eddie, despite confiding in one another about their feelings on this situation more freely than with other people (save KT -- she's got the most unique position here imo), end up mirroring fabian and patricia in that they have roughly the same "experience" of the situation, but the details force them in opposite directions that feed on one another. eddie has a vested interest in keeping nina from getting too upset about something that's "already over," but nina can't help but look for more information that will hurt her to sate her fear of "missing something important."

ironically, while they're not Guaranteed Healthy, fabian and patricia have a dynamic (read: gallows humor, self-critical commiseration, and ultimately open argument) that lends itself better to healing and mutual understanding than nina and eddie at this point; if you asked him if he thought keeping information from someone would help them, he'd say no, but he's still...sorta ascribing to that belief anyway because he sees nina learning too much too fast from "unreliable sources" and getting upset as a "failure" -- why? well, being "left in charge" by her, being "in charge" of the subsequent disaster, and seeing her disappointment (not necessarily with him, but he'd take it that way) in real time would make anyone feel like a screwup. nina getting stressed in particular is a failure in and of itself to him as a "protector" (same way that fabian sees it, the only difference being fabian's been eating away at that feeling for years and it's finally coming to a head vs. eddie who's coasting through it relatively fresh), so his focus is more on reassuring her via statements of "fact" than working through the feelings with her, even the ugly ones. nina should probably take his word for things a bit more and learn to live in the discomfort of not knowing everything (and most of her ugly feelings should be discussed directly with fabian), but as someone who understands her mindset, "just be ok with being uncomfortable" is easier said than done. especially without actively being in therapy. lol.

fabian and eddie, despite being of polar opposite mindsets re: this whole mess, are able to get along (and even improve their relationship?) because eddie's pattern of being hands off and chill and then directly reality-checking fabian when he starts the conversation about something demonstrates the efficacy of trust through action over a long period of time vs. huge declarations that are easier to reject wholesale as theatrics/failure of reasoning. fabian can only insist eddie not trust him for so long before it starts feeling a little ridiculous. (eddie's practiced trust building over and over with patricia, and while fabian does have pretty potent trust issues at this point, they're not NEARLY as deep-seated as patricia's, so he doesn't have the practice she does at dismissing eddie's attempts. he might not buy in all the way, but eventually he'd feel like more of a dick for shutting eddie down over and over than he would for easing up a bit the compulsive self-punishment he thinks he deserves. it's a war of attrition, at the end of the day, and fabian will lose. the real conflict then becomes keeping it up enough to get him to the inevitable, since i think he'd be able to see this happening and would probably get a little stubborn about it to avoid admitting he's wrong for as long as he can stand, lmfao.)

i want to develop the dynamic between nina and patricia more since i think there's a lot of potential for interesting movements there, especially in contrast to fabian and eddie (who, despite being awkward around each other, are very functional, an irony that shocks everyone involved i'm sure). i don't think they'd be dysfunctional -- if anything, i think nina might actually try extra hard to be kind and forgiving to patricia (and i've started setting that up in ch9). why? well, historically they've had a hard time trusting one another because of misunderstandings beyond their control, and while that's something that faded into the background over time, the perspective nina got from being away would make her value that sort of hard-fought trust more than trust that felt "easy" or "natural" before. patricia isn't automatically receptive to someone making that argument -- see: her entire back-and-forth history with eddie -- but nina in particular might be able to sell her on it because their original beef was so intense and so soundly overcome. and nina is also uh...a bit of a grudge holder, as well, so if she's telling you you're fine, well. i think patricia would recognize she's not bullshitting her, and she doesn't have the same sort of bias fabian (to center his own crimes as worse) or eddie (to convince patricia she's "not actually that bad") have. she has bias, OBVIOUSLY, but if anything, patricia was expecting nina to eviscerate her. that isn't to say it'd be easy -- and tbh i think they'd get frustrated with one another after the initial olive branch due to the poor read on one another's motives/feelings they're liable to have since they've both changed and not since the beginning of s1 -- but between patricia offering an alternative (and probably more useful, to nina specifically) perspective on fabian's sinner capture and nina offering an alternative perspective on patricia's struggles with trusting eddie, there's a lot of potential for a "lightning strike" moment for both of them there.

nina doesn't really? ever? comment on peddie in canon? but i feel like at this point, she'd be able to "reality check" patricia (in the same way eddie can "reality check" fabian) and actually get through to her. not too nice/soft (easy to dismiss as "not getting it"), potentially too harsh in an accidental backhanded sort of way, but patricia responds more readily to feeling attacked than feeling coddled (more familiar), and under the right conditions, i think a "mild" attack from nina "chronic inappropriate reactions" martin would encourage patricia to actually stand up for herself in a productive way. patricia acts how she wants in response to her feelings, even hurting eddie on purpose in some situations, but she doesn't "stand up for herself" in the sense that she doesn't refute people's criticisms and negative perceptions of her. "act untrustworthy to make sure no one trusts you so you can't mess up, since no one trusted you in the first place," self-fulfilling prophecy shit.

nina, someone who had to work to trust patricia and vice versa, expressing disagreement with patricia's perception of a situation (especially after expressing sympathy re: other situations) would actually shock her into defending her own position out of spite (IRONY ALERT) and manifest as true self-defense vs. rejecting what she sees as "pity." that self-defense would be the first step to actually learning how to trust, too, because like fabian, her poor relationships with people are founded in her inability to trust herself. that disconnect makes it hard to give other people the benefit of the doubt as a baseline, so reconnecting with her own subjectivity in an earnest way would make it infinitely easier to understand other people (since she already wants to, she just can't square it with her fears in her head). basically, she trusts nina to not go soft on her, and she also doesn't think nina has a good grasp on what happened. of course, neither of them have a great grasp on it, but they'll have a better chance of finding an acceptable truth between one another when they're not letting their other baggage hold them up.

to sum up:

fabian and nina agree on patricia's circumstances in a way that will ultimately help patricia gain perspective to heal, and it sets them apart from eddie to a lesser extent. they agree on fabian's circumstances in a way that pushes them apart since they're mutually inventing proof that they're "right." this could go on for a WHILE without intervention, but between a) other people getting sick of witnessing this and b) the two of them getting exhausted with being upset with each other, something's going to give eventually. the real rub is how well they actually reconcile (ie. actually laying everything out on the table, even if it's upsetting at first, vs. doing what they have before which is make easier but incorrect assumptions until something snaps and the cycle begins again).

patricia and eddie agree on fabian's circumstances in a way that does very little to impact him but does A LOT to push them apart (since eddie can't understand why patricia won't apply the same logic to herself), compounded by them agreeing on patricia's circumstances in terms of her being the "worse problem" (proximity bias). because this is a long-standing issue between them that has basically nothing to do with nina or fabian, outside interference can go either way re: helping or hurting. (as the fic progresses, this is critical point of failure -- easily visible example: fabian doesn't want to break them up, but he doesn't want to push them together, either, re: his own feelings.)

eddie and nina have the weakest relationship with one another out of the whole group of four, and by that i mean they know each other the least well. they have a very literal special bond, but they don't know much about it, they haven't had much interaction in person in the same place, and their approaches to interpersonal issues could not be more different. as a result, their disagreements over both fabian and patricia put some strain on their ability to understand one another (especially since there's the added complication of eddie's direct experience vs. nina's lack of re: s3, and vice versa for the events of s1-s2). however, their emotional stakes in an argument with one another are FAR lower because they're less close, so they gain a lot of insight into the "other side" by hashing it out. the biggest complication is eddie's tendency to self-sacrifice for nina. he's more likely to hold back when he shouldn't, and if she notices, she won't like it. they'd end up arguing more about metacommunication (how you said something/if you aren't saying something/etc) than the actual problem at hand, tbh, which isn't helpful in and of itself, but getting tired of arguing about it could be (both for their relationship and for their relationships with the other two). once they're capable of being very frank with one another, i think they'd have one of the more stable mutual understandings of all of these pairups (which will get very fun once the poly hell REALLY gets going).

patricia and fabian, on the other hand, have a VERY long and varied history with one another, and thus would be inclined to respect one another's flawed self-perception enough to hear one another out, but they will argue about it and ultimately only be able to agree on their self-punishment being appropriate/deserved. in a vacuum, this is only going to make them worse, but they're not in a vacuum. if one of them makes progress, the other one is not far behind (with growing pains, of course) because of the nature of their feedback loop. however, long term that creates the problem of associating the now strengthened relationship they have with their darker impulses, so i anticipate guilt-for-being-close-with-you featuring more frequently as time passes.

eddie and fabian have a historical dynamic that is very uncertain/subject to change from moment to moment, but the fact that they're still roommates without killing each other, they still talk even when it's uncomfortable, and they still enjoy each other's company despite...a LOT of reasons not to in the past...is proof-through-action that missteps between them are not fatal. they don't have extended conversations about the nitty gritty of their issues (usually leaving it at "dude that sucks" or "that's not true man"), but that contrast works in their favor as a "balancing" agent. improvement and progress are rarely planned -- you do just keep going in the middle of crisis and beyond. of course, their feelings about one another intersecting with their feelings about other people makes things awkward, and they do have a fundamental disagreement about the moral questions of the year previous, but the fact that those things don't make life unlivable is extremely reassuring. learning to live with the discomfort type shit. the trust that grows there is extremely natural and "sneaks up on them" as a result.

similarly, nina and patricia have a similar "learn to live with the discomfort" theme, but the method is completely different. they do talk about stuff in the nitty gritty, but because their relationship is already based in defying one another's expectations, they're able to cut through a LOT of bullshit much faster. there's a lot of "i have no reason to lie" being thrown around here, so even though they might view each other as harboring flawed reasoning and resent the other for it, they never disbelieve that it's held in earnest -- that makes it much easier to eventually come to discard beliefs that don't stand up to scrutiny because there's far less ego involved in who is "right" and who isn't when you already got through that phase with a person. (patricia's transgressions are also far less personal to nina, so she's simply not going to be as pressed about it in the first place; patricia would be inclined to come to fabian's defense, but because a lot of nina's issue is believing the bullshit he tells himself that patricia has a lot of experience arguing with, she's in a prime position to point out to nina where she's right and where she's not re: fabian.)

i still haven't worked out who's going to end up flirting with who and when (since oh yeah by the way i updated the relationship tags <3) and that will HEAVILY impact how ^ all of that plays out (part of the reason why i wrote a lot of it in a theoretical tone despite being. in full control of the events.) but i think i'm going to leave that to a different post. lmfao

[greyeyedmonster-18]

The Best Worst Thing to Have Ever Happened pt. 6

read parts 1-5 here (links to part 5, the rest are there)

AU in which Jily is still alive but Harry chooses to stay with Wolfstar and everything is worse now.

(thanks for following along, bebes and letting me guide you through another heartbreaking endeavor. xoxo)

--

January 1996

“So I don’t…have to go back?” Harry asked from their kitchen table, looking at Remus over the sandwich he prepared. Their kid had come home, duffle over his shoulder, running to their bedroom to find Sirius, without even having been filled in on the details. He was just happy to have an excuse to be there against his godfather's side. Sirius had slept for the longest length of time in months, dodging the alarm clocks and morning sun, even as both Remus and Harry got out of bed. Remus told him to take his time, last Remus saw Sirius had been immersed in a long shower.

“Do you want to?”

“Not really.”

“Then, no.” Remus did his best to keep his voice level, not wanting to show Harry just how truly angry he still was. Even through James calling through the mirror. Even with the post received that morning from Lily asking just to talk. Remus wasn’t interested in talking. Remus was only interested in guarding Harry and Sirius, and though he never thought it would be the case, that meant staying away from Lily. And James.

“But I thought….” Harry trailed off, eyes going down to his plate, “I thought I couldn’t? I don’t want to be a pain, I’m not…it’s fine over there, Moony, I promise. They’re nice!”

Remus put down his cup to put two fingers under Harry’s chin, tilting his face upward again so they could make eye contact, “I know this has gotten very messy, and that is our fault entirely. You are a child--”

“I am not.”

“You will be my child until I am dead and buried, love, that’s just how it works. You’ll forty and I’ll be…one hundred probably and you will still be my kid,” Remus told him, “What I mean is…you are not responsible for the actions of the people who are supposed to take care of you. None of this is your responsibility to worry about, but it’s very kind that you are. Makes you a good person.”

Dark eyebrows knitted together behind glasses, “So what happens now?

“I don’t know yet,” Remus admitted, “I had only gotten so far as to this moment…and unfortunately may need to ask Sirius for some…guidance for the next parts.”

Harry grinned softly, “Might make me a bad person, a bit, but I kind of like it when Sirius scolds someone who isn’t me...like when he goes and shouts at Snape?”

“Cheers to that, love.” Remus returned his smile, raising his cup to his lips as Harry went back to lunch, both of them eagerly waiting for Sirius to come downstairs.

--

“He deserves to get to know them, Remus.”

“They don’t deserve to get to know him.”

“She was just mad.”

“I've been mad at you plenty and have never said those things.”

“Remus.”

“Sirius.”

Sirius sighed and ran a hand over his hair, pulling back the covers on the bed, “I--”

“I’m glad, that you can forgive and I am glad that you are made up of second chances, Sirius when it comes to how you’re treated. But I’m not, and I…I am happy to supervise their visits again but like hell is he spending a single night over there.”

“I’m just trying to figure out how this can be amicable.”

“Amicable stopped being a possibility the second they asked the ministry to keep looking.”

Sirius cleared his throat and crossed to where Remus was standing at the bathroom sink. He wrapped his arms around his husband's waist from behind, settling his forehead into his shoulder. He could’ve stayed there forever. Where it was simple and easy and his husband could hold some of the weight he’d been carrying around since he had woken up in the dead of night with a feeling. It was still there. “Fudge says it…shouldn’t take too long for the case to get closed because they…don’t really have one. Harry won’t be involved at all.”

“Good,” Remus said and Sirius wished he could detach the way Remus had. Pretend it was just two strangers and not his best friend and his wife. Not the person whose family had raised him. Remus's hand fell on top of Sirius’s around his waist and Sirius could feel his fingers trace over the tattoo of Harry’s birthday on his wrist, “In case I make fun of you for it again later and forget…thank you for obsessively keeping every bit of documentation about Harry we’ve ever gotten. Neatly organized too. I’d be very fucked without you.”

Sirius laughed, kissing the top of Remus’s shoulder through his long sleeve shirt.

--

James had floo-ed over to Number 12, Harry set to go back to school in just under two weeks, wanting to spend time while he could. Harry was alone in the sitting room when he arrived. He had stayed up talking with Sirius late into the night, not quite having the words to cover everything Lily had said or erase them completely. Even if Sirius was quicker to put things aside, clinging to everything that was familiar, even if it wasn’t good for him, James knew Sirius remembered everything. James knew the hurt was still lurking in the caverns of his best friend's body, alongside the words Orion and Walburga Black had said to him as a child.

He’s not your kid sitting comfortably next to You’re not wanted here, Sirius, get out.

“Oh. Hey,” he greeted when he saw James, not quite a smile, but not quite a frown either.

“Hey, are…your…Remus and Sirius here?”

Harry nodded, “They’re around. Did you see the snow? We could probably have a proper fight in the backyard…”

“Sounds good,” James smiled, “I’m going to go find them, just let them know?"

“I’ll be here,” Harry looked back down, at the book in his lap but the color of the pages caught James’s eye.

“What are you working on?”

“Oh, uh…it’s just my journal. Nothing important.”

“I journal too. Did you know that?”

“Mhmm. Sirius told me. That’s why I started…he gave me all of your old ones too. So I could get to…know you, I guess,” Harry looked up at him again, “Kind of weird that I read them now considering…I think I know too much.”

Sirius told me.

The journal even looked the same as the one James wrote in.

James snorted, “Please tell me you stopped before seventh year?”

“I really wish I did.”

--

Lily was in the kitchen, putting biscuits onto a tray, ready to go join Harry, Remus, and James in the sitting room, the snow falling outside. Everything was made fresh, and Lily asked Harry to pick a record to listen to. There was faint music playing, light conversation, a noticeable space in the room that would’ve been for Sirius had he wanted to come over again. He hadn’t spoken to Lily, aside from through cordial post regarding Harry, even if the early morning mirror conversations had resumed with James.

“Is this Joni Mitchell?” Lily asked, guitar filling the sitting room, Harry coming to sit in the armchair.

“Yeah,” Harry grinned, “She’s the best for snow days.”

“I love Joni Mitchell. Did you know that?”

Harry nodded again, taking the cup of tea Lily held out for him, “Thank you. Sirius told me. We have a bunch of records that used to be yours, play them a lot. I suppose you could have them back?”

“No…no, keep them.”

--

There was a knock at the door of his study and Sirius sat up from where he was reclining in his desk chair. He was supposed to be collecting documentation, the entire cabinet in his desk designated for Harry pulled open and untouched. Birth certificate, schooling records, every single Healer appointment, and broken bone; a drawing Harry had made at nine that won a prize at school, his first detention from Hogwarts, a copy of a Hogsmeade permission slip. Not a single moment of Harry’s life had gone unaccounted for, and all that was going to be used to prove to a court--a fucked up system that Sirius worked every day to overturn--that Remus and Sirius should be able to keep him.

They left you with me, and I got to keep you.

But he hadn’t been left with Sirius at all and filing to keep him felt dirty. Even if it might be necessary.

Harry opened the door, Sirius immediately glancing at the clock on the wall to get the time, confirming that it was late. Harry didn’t have his glasses on, sweatpants hanging on his hips, and a Hufflepuff sweatshirt pulled over his head that was a little big on him.

“Did you come to tell me to go to bed?” asked Sirius jokingly

“As long as you don't tell me, I won't say a thing."

“Moons can deal with both of us being cranky tomorrow then…” Sirius said, offering a smiling and leaning forward onto the surface of his desk, after flipping over the document that was definitely not for Harry’s eyes.

“What are you doing?”

“Just some filing.”

“Is it about the court case?” Harry had made his way into the study, taking a seat on the leather chair by Sirius’s bookshelves. The ones that were separate from the library and mostly contained legal texts.

“Don’t worry about that, babe.”

“I’m already worrying about it, so you and Remus telling me not to really isn’t helping.” Harry muttered, picking at a thread of his sweatshirt.

“Is that why you’re up?”

“Mmm…yep. Yes. That’s exactly why I’m up. Just…worrying.” Harry said half-convincingly and Sirius snorted out a laugh. Almost sixteen meant a blatant insistence of not needing to go to bed before midnight. Almost sixteen meant navigating an over-tired teenager who had clearly not gone to sleep and had a tendency to get very weepy when that was the case. Almost sixteen also meant that staying up to talk to his boyfriend through a gifted two-way mirror was the most important thing in the world. Sirius remembered feeling that way. “Do…you think they…they’re mad at me?”

“No one's mad at you, Harry. I promise.”

“Okay, but what happens when everything's set with the ministry? What if they’re just…mad?”

Sirius stood up from behind his desk to walk over to Harry, taking a seat on the ottoman next to his godson’s bare feet. “They won’t be.”

“But what if they are?”

“Then you tell me, and I’ll take care of it. That’s how things work right?” Sirius asked him, catching green eyes, and reaching up to pull the fingernail he was chewing on out of Harry’s mouth, “Just as things have always worked. Someone is being rude to you, or you think they’re mad and you don’t know what to do, you talk to me and Moony and we’ll take care of it.”

“You can’t do that forever you know…fix things.”

“Watch me.” Harry rolled his eyes, but caught himself before his other hand made it into his mouth, “Yeah?”

“I guess.”

Sirius waited, keeping his eyes on Harry, and keeping his hand where it was. Adolescence was just a waiting game, it turned out. Waiting to get taller, waiting for his voice to drop, waiting to be picked up and dropped off, waiting to be old enough to make your own decisions, and waiting to remember what it was like to be young again. Waiting for the world to stop being a series of never-ending questions and start being a place full of magic. Sirius had learned quickly if he just waited…Harry would put pride aside in favor of some answers.

“Why...are they so mad at you? I don’t understand. I’ve tried to, I really have, and…to think how they must be feeling? But I don’t…get why they’re mad at you.”

Sirius smiled sadly, “I…think sometimes, mad is just easier. We’ve talked about that, right?”

“Yeah but I’m a teenager, I'm allowed to get mad at stupid things because hormones," Sirius couldn't help but chuckle, "They're not...and you said it goes away? That you’re supposed to be old and wise and all that and not get mad for no reason?"

“People are imperfect, my love. Including your parents--”

“They’re not my parents.”

“James and Lily,” Sirius corrected, “I’m also imperfect, so is Remus, and…we all make mistakes and it's unfortunate you’re in the crossfire. But we’ll sort it out and it’s far too exhausting to stay mad forever.”

But Harry shook his head, “You’re wrong.”

“Am I?”

“You and Remus were the best things to ever happen to me. That…you’re the perfect people for me. So you’re wrong.”

“I’ll be wrong,” Sirius said softly, Harry’s hand squeezing his own.

I got to keep you.

His kid.

--

Harry stood on the platform in front of the scarlet steam engine, holding onto his trunk as Sirius's arms rested on his shoulders. James and Lily were there too, after a few more missteps over the holiday that were done with the best of intentions. There was some saying about that wasn’t there? That it never ended up well?

It hadn’t.

But Sirius was there, and all Harry had to do was sign a piece of paper saying he wanted to stay with Remus. And Sirius. And that no amount of magic could chance that. Most days, Harry had trouble deciding what kind of tea he wanted for breakfast or choosing the correct answer on a test he definitely should’ve studied more for, but this? Was the easiest decision he had to make in a long while. The paper glowed gold and so did the lining around Harry’s heart that had been drawn tight for weeks.

Harry didn’t know what exactly had happened but had gotten one too many warnings from Sirius to stop asking, Harry James to know it hadn’t been something light. There was still shattered glass that was being picked up, dinner time conversations occasionally halting when a piece was found. All Harry knew now was that he didn’t have to spend a night on strange sheets unless he really wanted to. Everything could happen as he wanted it to, how it was supposed to be.

Harry shifted on his feet and looked up at Sirius, finally feeling ready to leave as he spotted curly brown hair walking towards the train, “I’ll see you in June?”

“Before then.”

“February?”

“Better.”

Harry grinned and turned around giving Sirius a brief hug before anyone saw him, taking a step back away from his godfather. “And…I can call you?”

“Whenever you want, babe. Same as always,” Sirius told him, “And Sunday’s for tea. I’ll be there. Be good, yeah?”

“I know, I know. No skiving off to snog, study before tests, no missing work, got it.”

“I love you.”

“Yeah, I know,” Harry responded, turning away from Sirius’s smiling face to look at James and Lily standing there. I love you definitely wasn’t right. I’ll miss you wasn’t right either. “I’ll…write. I’ll write you?”

“We would love that, Harry,” James said smiling, extending his hand for Harry to slap it as they had been doing for months as hello and goodbye.

“Write us…whenever you want.” Lily added.

Harry still wasn’t sure what to do with her. He had never had a mother before and wasn’t sure he needed one now. Not when everything Mum’s apparently did was already being covered. And…maybe that was the whole point.

It wasn’t a need.

It was going to have to be a want and there was still time for that. Harry had plenty of room in his heart for that.

“I…I’m sorry this didn’t turn out like you hoped,” Harry said before he could stop himself, noises of the platform filling his ears and Sirius’s expression shifting, “But…I kind of told you, I already have parents, and they’re really great. They…make sure I’m polite and turn in my homework and insist I eat vegetables and all that. I…don’t need two more, and I don’t need you. I’m really happy, you know? I’m just fine, more than fine, even. And I'd...be fine if you hadn't shown up. I'd be happy.”

“We know, Harry. It’s okay.”

“No…I mean…I’ve already got parents…but,” Harry paused, “I’ve…never really had godparents before. And...I think I'd like that.”

[crymeariveronceagain]

No pressure to answer, but what did you think stellarlune was going to be like?

dude idek at this point

like

*sighs*

if im being honest

Sophie leaving the Keefe thing alone and focussing on ending things. Keefe can be someone we bring home after there's no more danger to it. I wanted no Keefe POV, no Keefe screen time, no searching for him. I wanted the lack of Keefe being a driving internal conflict in Sophie's mind, the fact that one of her friends has been so damaged and scared that he's gone pushing her to work harder, smarter, better. I wanted bloody murder and rage to stream out of her. I wanted that little girl turned warrior that's been trained for years to finally come to the surface.

I wanted her to... kind of? Crush our expectations of her?

For so long, we've been following this terrified kid.

And I wanted this time when Keefe leaves to break something. But break something correctly.

I want her to be mad. I want her to quit following the expected rules. I want her in jeans and a t-shirt, with a sword in her hand, staring down her enemies with the glare she always aims at Fintan. I want an intensity from her that we haven't seen so far.

And I don't want canon Sokeefe. Not yet. I don't want him back. Not yet. It's too soon, and it's the wrong thing to focus on. I want the plot to be resolved before I want them together. I'll take another book of waiting if at the end of it, Sophie Foster is the warrior that the world needs.

In fact, another book of waiting is what I'd prefer.

I want to stop pushing her towards relationships. It's taking too much of her time. I want that to be the cherry, not the ice cream. And it feels like(especially as I've been reading Flashback again) that whenever the romance comes into it, nothing else matters. And that bugs me.

Because Sophie Foster does not need a boy.

And the boy don't need her, either.

But if they want that, then I want them to work for it. Work on themselves.

And I'd like a Sophie who's too angry to care about any level of violence to start fighting back against the fire the Neverseen have been aiming her way. I don't want a scared little girl, anymore. I've seen enough of her.

I want Sophie to become the moonlark the world needs.

I don't really know what I expected. Idk what I want from it. All I know is that I want a girl to start burning things. I want her to start destroying things.

I want Sophie to realize that this is a war.

That one too many things have changed. And that mercy is not an option anymore. Because at this point, the kind she's been offering is far, far, far too kind.

[bakugoukatsuki-rising]

Bakugou Katsuki - Rising

So I told someone a while ago I’d be writing an essay on Bakugou’s lines from 284, and I’m keeping true to my word. If you’re wondering which lines, well my friend, these lines;

So this, to me, is one of the most emotionally packed pages of these recent chapters. For one, it shows us that Bakugou has always been watching Deku, the same as Deku has been watching him. Since they were kids, probably from the age of 4, Bakugou was able to tell Deku never thought of himself first, it was always what he could do to help and protect other people with no regard to his own safety or well-being. 

“He’s always been like that.” 

How would Bakugou know Deku has always been this way if he wasn’t paying attention to him? It goes beyond his bullying in Middle School, because he’s watched Deku stand up for other’s his entire life. The very first scene of the manga is Deku protecting a child from Bakugou and his group of misfits, despite being quirkless, and essentially helpless. 

Despite being scared, and knowing he didn’t have the strength to take on those boys, he still stood his ground and did what he could to protect the other kid. Bakugou witnessed that first hand, since he was the aggressor. He was the one Deku was protecting someone from.

There was no way Bakugou wouldn’t remember something like that.

We know he remembered how Deku extended his hand to him when he fell in the stream, even though Bakugou was fine and didn’t need any help. Deku still waded through that water and even risked possibly getting himself hurt, to reach out to Bakugou and make sure he was alright. 

Now, I am going to point out that the stream incident definitely happened before the scene of Deku protecting that boy since it’s evident they’re older in that scene, but it was presented first (literally the first panel of the entire manga), so it takes precedent. 

Then we have the big one, which is the Sludge Villain incident, and Deku’s biggest show of self-sacrifice probably to date within the manga, since he was quirkless and would have certainly ended up dead if All Might hadn’t managed to power up. Even with the times he’s wrecked his body using OfA, he at least had some kind of fighting chance because of the power, but with the Sludge Villain, he had nothing. He was just throwing himself out there in hopes, by some miracle, he could do something to save his friend, even if it meant losing his life in the process. 

Another instance of Bakugou witnessing firsthand the self sacrificial nature of Deku. Throughout the manga we’re given these instances, and the next big one is Bakugou’s kidnapping. Now, he didn’t see Deku’s fight with Muscular, but he did see the aftermath, he saw that ruined body running at him full force with no care to the damage done to himself, and even before that, he saw Shoji carrying him while Deku continued to plan out their plan of rescue, like his entire body wasn’t a crumpled mess. 

Time and time again, Bakugou has been witness to Deku’s behavior, to this self sacrificial nature. The scene above is the first real time we see Bakugou acknowledge it. He tells Deku to stay back, he knows if he continues trying to fight looking like that, he’s going to die. I’ve seen other translations and I believe in the anime he says something to the context of “Don’t come, Deku.” Which, either way you look at it, it gives the same impression of Bakugou trying to protect Deku in that moment. Because he knew if there was an opportunity for Deku to reach, he would have fought until there was nothing left of him. 

“And now that he can do so much more...”

This line is important because it is Bakugou acknowledging Deku’s current strength with OfA, but it is also his confession of worry because he knows who Deku is, and what this means for him. If Deku was reckless and willing to sacrifice himself when he was a 4 year old child with no quirk, well now that he has the strongest power essentially in existence, that means certain death. There is nothing stopping him from completely destroying himself, and we saw a brief example of that when Deku fought Muscular, though not even close to the level he was going at Shigaraki, and what Bakugou was actually getting to witness during this chapter and 285/286. 

I use the above image because it kind of shows how bad off Deku was, which is far worse than when he fought Muscular, let me remind you. That scene is in chapter 285, after he’s essentially destroyed both of his arms hitting Shigaraki probably upwards of 10 times with 100% OfA. 

Remember, Bakugou has been watching all of this from the ground. 

“Something doesn’t feel right, it makes me wanna keep him at arms length.” 

Well ya know, I don’t really blame you for feeling that way, Bakugou, I wouldn’t feel right if the kid I knew my entire life was willing to die at literally every turn without thinking for a split second about himself, either. It’s a little strange, but that’s what makes Deku the unstoppable force that he is, because he has the drive to save people no matter what. Now if he could master his power and depend on other’s, it would be even better, because then maybe he wouldn’t have to kill himself trying to protect people.

But seriously, that line shows Bakugou's uncertainty about getting close to Deku, because that kind of behavior is scary. It's intimidating. To just...throw your life away for the sake of someone else, that's gotta be scary to see someone do, and Bakugou has witnessed it over and over because of his closeness to Deku.

Now for the big one.

"Back then, I ignored my own weakness...so I ended up bullying him."

There's the kicker, folks. The real development we've all been waiting for.

I do want to point out that when Bakugo was 4, he didn't realize he had weaknesses like that. He was honest to God just a bratty kid that probably thought Deku was weird for caring so much about people despite, essentially, being useless to them. Because what could Deku do? Nothing. He couldn't help anyone because he was quirkless, but he still tried, and that's what affected Bakugou so strongly.

So strongly, in fact, that he never forgot it for a single second.

From 4 years old all the way up to 16 years old. 12 years. 12 years Bakugou Katsuki was witnessing Deku's self sacrificial nature. Again and again he watched as this boy who had nothing, continued to fight for something, and then he was granted power, terrifying power, and now Bakugou is left to wonder how the fuck any of this could have happened. Because if Deku had just stayed quirkless and accepted it, maybe, just maybe, he would stop that self sacrifical bullshit. Maybe he would see himself a bit more.

But then he was given OfA, and all of that hope was gone. Now he was given a power meant to take on the greatest evils and every person before Deku had died for the cause, so why would it stop with Deku, who was already ready to get himself killed to protect someone else when he was like 14 years old?

The scenes we have of Bakugou acknowledging Deku's behavior, and acknowledging his own behavior, it's such a raw scene. It takes a lot to acknowledge you've done wrong by someone else. It takes a lot of strength to sit back and recognize those ugly parts of you, and here Bakugou is, doing just that. And he isn't doing it for some self righteous get me off, either. He's doing it because he genuinely cares about Deku's well being, and he always has.

It never came out the right way, and he sees that now, but that doesn't mean the concern wasn't there. He just didn't know the right ways to express it, but as things have gotten more serious and now Deku is truly risking his life for this cause, he's come face to face with it. He can't hide from it anymore. The more OfA develops, the more Deku is going to put himself out there, and Bakugou isn't going to sit around while he kills himself when he could just learn to ask for help.

This stretches all the way into 285 and Bakugou's sacrifice, because he saw Deku about to end up seriously hurt or worse, and he knew he couldn't let that happen. Of all the years spent endlessly tearing himself apart for other people, Bakugou knew he needed to show the other in some way he didn't have to do it like that. He didn't have to fight alone.

That, and it was part of his atonement. It was a piece of his apology to Deku, to show him that he valued him, and he was willing to put his life on the line for someone, for him.

Bakugou didn't think when he rushed out to save Deku. It was instinctual, like breathing. He saw someone he cared about in danger, and his body moved on it's own. That, from the angry brat we get in chapter 1, is a beautiful showcase of perfect character development and growth. If you take into account everything I've discussed throughout this, it should be easy to realize or at least see a bit of Bakugou's perspective, and his thought process when dealing with Deku.

It never justifies any of his past behavior, but it gives us clarification, and then allows us to appreciate his thoughts and actions in 284 and 285 even more.