#But that’s if the people involved are actually characters I. Care about??
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coming up roses
pairing: bang chan x female reader
summary: most of the time, you're grateful to have such a good relationship with your older brother, minho. but when you find yourself falling for his best friend, chan, you can't help but be worried how he'll react when he finds out. you soon find yourself struggling with the unexpected consequences of keeping your feelings a secret.
word count: 10.2k
tags/warnings: hanahaki!au (read a/n), brother's best friend!au, hurt/comfort, angst, lots of fluffy sibling dynamics between minho and y/n, bad communication by the reader, mentions of: coughing, blood, and vomiting
read it on ao3 | masterlist
a/n: i have finally written my hanahaki au!!! this took me ages, but i really really wanted to write a fic based on how this post describes hanahaki because i love this interpretation (hanahaki is from supressing feelings instead of unrequited love) a lot more than how it's usually written (not that that version is bad!). i actually wish i could have drawn this out more, but didn't have it in me haha
the phrase "it's all coming up roses" means that everything is going well with someone and i thought it was so perfectly ironic for a hanahaki fic where a character actually has roses coming up in the literal sense.
Minho has always been protective. You had felt cool and invincible as a child, having an older brother that was willing to have your back and scare away anybody that teased you.
You’re grateful that he cares enough to be so involved in your life, but now that you’re in university, you can’t help but feel a little stifled. Minho takes his role as an older brother very seriously, especially since the two of you have moved out of your family home and are sharing an apartment closer to campus. It's a mixture of doting and enough teasing to drive you crazy.
Growing up, your family home had been the regular haunt of Minho and his friends. It was more common than not to get home from cram school and find the boys either lingering in the nearest convenience store or hanging out in your apartment. You wouldn't say that you were friends with the boys, but you were at least familiar enough that you would say hi to them if you saw them in the hallways and they would offer to walk home with you if you were ever leaving school at the same time.
Starting university had been hard for you, most of your friends had ended up moving to other cities or even going abroad. You, however, had decided to stick closer to home. Your program had a good reputation and your parents had promised that they would help you and Minho get an apartment close to campus as long as you lived together. Minho had readily agreed, he had commuted for his first year and had always complained about how long it took.
It was a difficult adjustment, moving out of your family home, balancing your course load, and making friends. Unlike Minho, who had used dance to find his close group of friends, you didn't have any hobbies that you were particularly passionate about and you weren't naturally outgoing or charismatic.
Especially in the first few weeks of classes, it feels like such a relief whenever you see one of Minho's friends that you latch onto them. It’s kind of awkward at first, especially because you don’t know his friends well enough to speak with them casually, but they get used to your presence. You would even consider some of them to be your friend, especially Seungmin, who shares a class with you, and Chan who usually has his lunch break at the same time as you.
You make your own friends eventually, slowly getting to know some of the people that share your program, but you’re definitely a lot closer to the boys than you were prior to university. While you spent most of your childhood calling Minho and his friends lame, you can now admit that you enjoy spending time with them, although you’d never say it to Minho’s face.
Still, Minho doesn’t always approve of who or where you hang out. Sometimes he’s even nosier than your parents were, always asking you about your schedule and calling when you’re out late. He warns you about spending time one-on-one with men and makes sure that you always have your location shared with him. You tolerate it for the most part, knowing that it’s his way of showing that he cares about you, but sometimes you just find him overbearing.
—
“I’m going out next Saturday,” Minho tells you one evening as you step out of your room to get a glass of water. “You’ll have to figure out something for dinner on your own.”
“Oh,” you say, suddenly a little nervous. “I uh- I also have plans that night.”
“Sure,” he agrees easily. “What are you going to be doing?”
“There’s a party that I was invited to,” you say, biting your lip when you see Minho freeze. You turn your gaze to the ground, but you can still feel Minho's stare intensify.
“What party,” he demands, not even bothering to frame it as a question.
“Does it matter?” you whine, annoyed by how protective Minho is. It’s even worse that you have an audience, Chan is over and you can see out of the corner of your eye that he’s watching your conversation curiously.
“Yes.” His tone leaves no room for argument.
“I think it's at Taehoon's,” your voice is barely a whisper. Minho hears you anyway.
“Taehoon?” He repeats in disbelief. You glance up briefly. Minho's ears are flushed bright red and the tendons in his neck are standing out. He's furious. “Taehoon, who is four years older than you? Taehoon, who holds off-campus parties?”
You grimace and don't respond. There’s no way that he’s going to let you go, you resign yourself to a weekend stuck in your room watching dramas while your friends enjoy themselves.
It’s bad enough that you had to mention Taehoon, who doesn’t have the best reputation, but you’ve forgotten that Minho would easily be able to recognize the type of party that he throws. You haven’t been to many university parties, but even you know that without the dorm restrictions, off-campus parties are often the wildest and were harder to get invited to. It’s not that you particularly care to attend this party in specific, you just don’t want to miss out since all of your friends will be there.
“Minho,” Chan steps in, clasping a heavy hand on your brother's shoulder.
“Who invited you,” Minho seethes, shaking Chan off.
“Just one of my friends,” you deflect.
“Minho,” Chan says again, this time jostling Minho enough that he turns his attention away from you finally. Your body sags in relief. “Chill, we're going to Taehoon's next weekend. It's just a party.”
“Yes, we are going. Not my baby sister! Y/n-ah, the answer is no.”
“Oppa!” you complain. “I'm not a baby anymore!”
“You don't know anything,” Minho hisses at you.
“We were going to way crazier parties when we were Y/n's age,” Chan interrupts one more time. “Come on, at least we'd be able to keep an eye on her.”
Minho is about to reply when he stops and tilts his head in thought.
“Okay,” he says slowly, turning back to you with a gleam in his eye. “You can go, Y/n.”
“Really?” you brighten instantly even though you’re a little bit suspicious of his sudden change in heart.
Your breath catches in your throat as you excitedly make eye contact with Chan. He winks at you teasingly before turning his full attention back to Minho, who thankfully hadn’t noticed.
“You're coming with us,” Minho says, nodding decisively.
“Are you kidding me,” you reply flatly, all enthusiasm vanishing instantly.
“Yes. I'll make sure that everybody knows not to mess with you and you still can have fun with your silly little friends. Unless you don't want to go anymore?” Minho raises an eyebrow at you.
“Fine, I'll go with you,” you grumble.
“It'll be fun, Y/n! I promise that I won’t let Minho embarrass you,” Chan says, slinging an arm around your shoulder. You try not to shiver as he leans in to whisper to you, close enough that you can almost feel his lips touching your ear. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure to find something or someone to distract him enough that he’ll forget you’re even there.”
“Okay,” you breathe shakily.
“Hey!” Minho pulls Chan off of you and into a headlock. “Whatever you’re scheming, cut it out. Y/nnie, don’t listen to a single thing this idiot tells you.”
“I try not to listen to idiots,” you say. “That’s why I never follow any of the advice that you give me!”
“Y/n-ah-” Minho starts.
You stick out your tongue at him childishly then dart to your room, slamming the door and locking it behind you so that Minho can’t follow you. The sound of Chan’s resulting laugh echoes through your head for the rest of the day.
—
By the time the weekend rolls around, you're a little worried that you’ve caught a cold. Your throat is achy and talking too much makes you cough, but you're not feeling any other symptoms so you don't think you're actually sick. Minho wasn't exactly pleased when you told him you were still planning on going, but he kept his word and didn't try to convince you otherwise.
Your friends are all getting ready together at one of their dorms, but your brother was adamant that he wanted you to go to the party with him and his friends. You're more comfortable getting changed and doing your makeup at home anyway, so it's not a big deal, but it's still not the same.
Conversation pauses when you finally exit your room. Only Chan, Hyunjin, and Minho are still in the living area since most of Minho's friends are crowded around your apartment's entryway, shuffling to get their jackets and put on their shoes.. Their eyes widen and you see Hyunjin choke on the drink he had just taken a sip of. You tug at the hem of your skirt slightly, suddenly feeling self conscious.
You've worn this outfit before with friends and while it's definitely not the most conservative option in your closet, it's nowhere near as revealing as what you expect other girls will be wearing. It's just that you're not used to being around Minho's friends when you've put so much effort into your appearance and are showing off a bit of skin. They’ve seen you at your worst and are most familiar with the comfortable sweats and hoodies that you usually wear around your home.
Minho recovers the fastest. In a flash, he's made his way to you and has a death grip on your arm, trying to drag you back into your room. You resist, digging your heels in to try and make it harder for him, but it barely even slows him down.
“Oppa!”
“You are not leaving looking like this,” Minho huffs through gritted teeth.
“Minho-ya, come on. We're going to be late if you make her change,” Chan calls out. It draws the attention of the rest of the boys, who turn to look at the commotion. You hear Jisung wolf-whistle teasingly which only makes things worse. Minho's hand tightens even more around you, hard enough that you're sure it's going to bruise, and he whips around to glare at Jisung.
“Hyung, it's fine. Y/n-ah looks good,” Seungmin chimes in, before winking at you. You groan internally, knowing from the look in his eye that you're not going to like what he says next. “Is there a boy that you're trying to impress tonight?”
“No!” you deny immediately, still trying to pull your arm from your brother's grip to no avail. Your chest tightens at the idea of being forced to stay at home. Minho immediately latches onto the idea that Seungmin has thrown out, his expression darkening even further.
“Is it true?” he questions you.
“Oppa, I promise, I'm just matching with my friends. Which you would know if we actually go to the party!”
“If there is, you better tell me,” he warns.
“Yes, yes,” you groan. “If there was, which there isn't! You're just wasting time now.”
“At least put on a jacket, you’re going to be cold.”
“Fine.” You wrench your arm out of Minho's grasp and stalk to your room. You grab the first jacket you see, intent on ditching it the second that you get to the party, then head straight to the door, breezing past Minho on your way. “Happy now?”
“Thrilled,” he says in a flat voice that says he is anything but.
—
Your apartment is not too far away from the party, so it’s not long before everyone is unloading from their cars and approaching the party. You can hear the bass pounding even from outside the building and you’re sure that there will be a number of neighbours that file noise complaints by the end of the night.
When you make it in, your friends greet you enthusiastically, but are all a little bit weird, fixing their hair more than usual and giggling nervously. You’re not close with all of the girls that are in the group, some of them you can’t even recall if you’ve met before, but you can still tell that everyone is acting strangely.
It's not until you turn around that you realise that Minho has practically stationed himself behind you and is glowering at anybody who looks your way too long. After years of being on the receiving end of his glares, you’ve grown immune, but everybody else is clearly at least a little intimidated.
“Oppa,” you hiss. He barely spares you a glance. “You're not seriously going to babysit me all night, are you?”
“I'm letting you do what you want so you should let me do whatever I want,” he replies primly.
You know there's no convincing him on your own. From across the room, you manage to catch Chan's eye and nod your head in Minho's direction. Luckily, he knows exactly what you're trying to say and makes his way over quickly to stand beside Minho.
“Minho-ya, you don't have a drink yet?” he asks, before pointedly taking a sip of his own cup.
“I asked Yongbokkie and Seungmin to make me one,” he replies, unphased.
“And you trust them that much?”
At the same time, the two of them glance over to the kitchen. You follow their gaze to find Felix, Seungmin, as well as Jisung mixing together a concoction that looks not only toxic, but also disgusting. You want to gag when you see them add in soju, hot sauce, milk, and maraschino cherries in quick succession. That’s not even considering whatever they’ve already put into the cup before you looked over. There's no way they actually think the combination could taste good and Minho must agree because he stands up and starts stalking towards them, swearing to himself the whole time.
After Minho leaves, Chan wanders a bit closer to you and brushes a hand against your shoulder lightly. You have to fight the urge to lean into his touch.
“I told you, I got you tonight. Don't worry about your brother breathing down your neck,” he says lowly. Just like when he first promised to distract your brother, Chan winks at you, then follows after Minho.
You force yourself not to stare after him, cheeks flushing as the rest of the girls squeal. Some of your friends have met Minho in passing a couple times, but not any of his friends. Your brother's dance crew has become wildly popular this year, but luckily it's not widely known that you are close with them. You prefer to keep it that way, but it seems like revealing your relation to them is unavoidable tonight. It's just your luck that some of these girls are among the ‘fans’ that your brother has somehow amassed.
“Y/nnie,” a girl beside you pouts. “How come you've never mentioned you know Lee Minho and Bang Chan before? I can't believe you've never introduced him to us!”
“I-” you splutter, still flustered by how close Chan was to you.
“I saw you show up with all eight of them,” another girl interupts. Someone else gasps as if you've committed a serious crime. “You actually know them?”
“Well, yeah-”
“I heard that you called Minho oppa, are you two dating?” the first girl asks.
“What? No!” you quickly deny, disgusted by the very thought of that.
“Oh come on, you don't think that they're ridiculously attractive?” someone else chimes in. The whole group murmurs in agreement. They have more and more questions for you and start to talk over each other.
“Minho's my brother! As in, we share the same parents, that’s why I call him oppa.” you exclaim, before things can spiral further. “And ew, he is definitely not attractive!”
The group is stunned into silence for a moment before exploding in noise. There are girls offended on Minho’s behalf, some asking what him and his friends are like, and others who beg you to introduce them.
Your best friend chooses that moment to speak up, reminding you why she is one of your favourite people in the world.
“Let’s play a drinking game!” she exclaims loudly. She holds up a couple bottles of soju that you’re not sure where she’s been hiding and starts filling up everyone’s cup. Luckily the girls are easily distracted by alcohol, enough that the topic is changed without too much of a fuss. You breathe out a sigh of relief.
—
After a few drinks, you eventually excuse yourself to the bathroom. You’re definitely on your way to being tipsy, but not enough that you feel unsteady on your feet. The loud music makes it a bit difficult to focus and people have filled every corner of the house, but you’re somehow able to find an unoccupied bathroom.
You take an extra moment to splash yourself with water before you leave, you’re feeling a bit sticky from sweating and when one of your friends spilled a bit of their drink on you. When you finish, you swing open the door and immediately apologise when you narrowly miss hitting a guy who has been waiting in the hall. He waves it off, but doesn’t make a move to enter the bathroom, instead stepping a bit closer to you.
“What’s a pretty little girl like you doing here all on her own?” he slurs, crowding further into your personal space. It’s dark, but you can still tell that his eyes are red and unfocused and hair is matted to his forehead. He's drunk.
You swallow hard, trying not to panic. You have to treat this situation delicately and somehow make your disinterest clear without provoking or offending him.
“I’m not alone.” You can’t help but laugh nervously, taking a step back. Your stomach churns when your shoulder knocks into the wall behind you and you realise you have nowhere else to go. “My friends are actually probably wondering what’s taking me so long, I’ll just-”
“S’okay, I’m sure they wouldn’t notice if you were gone a little longer.” He leans in until he’s close enough that you can smell the sourness of his sweat and the alcohol on his breath. “I just wanna get t’know you a bit better.”
He smiles down at you in a way that he must think is attractive. It makes you want to vomit.
“No thanks, I’m just going to head-” Your voice is shrill with panic, you can barely recognize it.
You try to shuffle to the side, but the guy slaps his hand against the wall, trapping you even more. Your heartbeat pounds in your chest. He reaches out and traces one of your cheeks with a clumsy hand, ignoring the way that you cringe away.
“Aww c’mon darling, don’t be like that. I can promise you a good time.”
You know a bit of self defense, but this is far from a fair fight. This guy is significantly taller than you and probably double your weight. Even drunk, he can likely overpower you without even trying.
Before you can make a move, an arm slings around the drunk guy’s shoulder, jostling him to the side. Your heart sinks. There was a small chance that you’d have been able to escape, but not if you’re outnumbered.
“Hey mate,” the new person says. Your head shoots up at the familiar voice. Chan. “You seem pretty sloshed.”
Chan nudges the guy again, this time creating a little space that makes you feel less trapped. His body language is loose and relaxed, but the expression on his face is another story. His gaze is intense as he scans you, softening by a fraction when you nod that you’re fine.
“M’not,” the guy argues. He squints up at Chan. “Do I even know you? Get lost, I’m busy right now.”
“Why don’t you go outside and get some air? It’s gotten pretty stuffy in here.” It’s not a suggestion. Chan’s words are friendly, but the tone of his voice sends shivers down your spine.
The guy opens his mouth, likely to protest, but promptly shuts it when he sees the look on Chan’s face. The two of you watch as he stumbles away without a fight, bumping into a few other people in his haste to leave. Now that you’re alone, Chan backs up, giving you more space to breathe.
“Sorry about that,” Chan says, hand scratching at the back of his neck nervously. “Didn't want to be too aggressive. It just- you looked like you needed some help.”
“Some people just don’t know how to take no for an answer,” you say quietly. It’s just another thing to be grateful for when Chan doesn’t comment on the shakiness of your voice. Instead, his expression darkens further before he composes himself.
“Are you okay?” he asks tentatively.
“Yeah, you came at just the right time.” You look away, a bit embarrassed that he had to step in and rescue you, but he puts a finger under your chin and uses it to turn your face back to him. It feels so different from when the drunk guy touched you that you don’t want him to stop. His eyes search yours for a moment and whatever he finds must satisfy him.
“You should probably rejoin your friends.” Chan starts to step away, but you reach out and snag his sleeve before he can go.
“Chan-oppa.”
He pauses, turning back to look at you again.
“Yeah?” There’s a hopeful lilt to his voice, although you’re not sure what he’s hoping you say.
“Please don’t tell my brother about this,” you plead. Chan’s expression drops a little, clearly that’s not what he wanted to hear, but he’s still quick to reassure you.
“No, yeah, of course. I won’t say anything.”
“I don’t want him to worry about me.”
“Of course,” Chan repeats.
“And… thank you.” You rise up on your toes and kiss his cheek quickly, then slip away towards where your friends are before you can see what his reaction is.
—
It takes a few days for you to recover from the party. You hadn’t drunk enough to be hungover, but just remembering your interaction with Chan makes you want to bury yourself in your bed and never leave. Luckily Minho hasn't questioned your change in behaviour much, but you can tell that he's getting sick of your wallowing, even if he doesn't know the reason behind it.
“Yah, Y/n-ah!” Minho bangs on your door. “We’re heading out for gukbap in 5 minutes, are you coming?”
He doesn’t specify who the ‘we’ is, you know who to expect. Of course, Chan is included. It’s easy to make a decision.
“Go without me!” you yell back.
“Eh? Open up.”
“Just come in, it’s unlocked.”
You hear the door open and Minho approaches. He prods at your prone form with one of his feet.
“What’s up with you? You never say no to gukbap.”
“Nothing!” you groan.
“You’ve been acting strange since that stupid party, what are you hiding?” He pokes at you again, this time a bit harder.
“Oppa,” you complain, lifting yourself out of your blankets to swat at his foot. “I promise that I have nothing to hide, I just don’t feel like hanging out with your friends today.”
“They haven’t done anything, have they?” Minho asks, eyes narrowing in suspicion. “Channie-hyung asked me if you were doing okay.”
“No! I-” you choke on your spit in your haste to answer, leading to a coughing fit that leaves you with tears gathering in your eyes. You clear your throat roughly then continue. “No, Chan-oppa and the rest of your friends have all been nice to me.”
“Oppa?”
Whoops, you hadn’t meant for that to slip out.
“What?” you whine. “You’re the one who forces me to hang out with them all the time! You told me to stop being so formal around them. They kept telling me too, it got really annoying.”
“Hmm,” Minho huffs, not quite convinced.
“Really,” you insist. “I just don’t want to go out today, I promise.”
“Okay,” Minho says reluctantly before he gets uncharacteristically serious. “But you know, you're my little sister, you can always come to me if something or someone is bothering you right?”
“I- yeah of course, oppa.” You feel kind of touched, not used to Minho openly showing that he cares about you, even though you know he does. It's enough that your throat feels tight with emotion, but you force yourself to speak through it. “Thank you. I always know that I can count on you.”
“I'm the only one allowed to mess with you,” he says sweetly, ruffling your hair so that it sticks up the way he knows you hate. “If anyone else does, I'll make sure that they regret the day that they were born.”
You try to ignore the guilt that curls in your stomach as you watch Minho leave. You hate hiding things from him, but you're still confused by your own emotions and you're worried by how he'll react. Minho has always been your biggest supporter in everything except for your love life, which he is strictly against no matter how much you try to reason with him.
You can’t imagine how much worse it would be if he found out that the person you’re interested in is one of his friends. You’ve heard him warn the whole group that you were off limits. He’d use a joking tone, but everyone knew that he was actually serious about it.
In the end, it doesn’t even matter because you’re almost certain that nothing will ever come of your feelings, Chan is way out of your league so there’s no point in even imagining a relationship together.
—
Unsurprisingly, your attempts to avoid Chan fail pretty much instantly. You're not sure how the stars aligned exactly opposite to what you were hoping, but the studio that Minho's (and therefore Chan's) dance crew uses had a schedule conflict that ended up shifting their practice times.
To your dismay, it works out so that multiple times a week, you're leaving campus at the exact same time as your brother. That in itself is not much of an issue, it's the fact that Chan lives close enough to you that the three of you commute back together. To make matters worse, Minho always invites Chan over to have dinner and Chan always accepts.
You can't fault Minho though, you know that he invites him over partly because he wants to hang out with Chan and partly because he knows that Chan might end up working throughout the night in an empty apartment and completely forget to eat. It does also bring you comfort, knowing that Chan is being cared for, that he's eating well and taking time in his day to not worry about school or dance. It's also nice for you, you've grown so used to preparing and eating dinner on your own that it's started to feel more like a chore than something to look forward to.
It's just hard. You haven't had a private conversation with Chan since the party, but you know that he wants to talk to you.
You were so sure that he would never reciprocate your feelings, but now, you're starting to doubt yourself.
While you're on the bus home, listening to your music, you sometimes glance over to find Chan staring at you, though he's quick to look away. When the three of you are cooking in the kitchen, he's more affectionate, resting a light hand on your waist or back when he passes behind you or nudging your shoulder playfully after he makes a joke. During dinner, he makes sure that you're also engaged in conversation, asking about your classes or the few clubs that you're involved in. He sometimes brings you and Minho little treats from the convenience store and they're always in your favourite flavours.
The thing is, Chan is friendly and generous to everyone that he meets. It's hard to tell if you're reading too much into your interactions with him or if he's actually paying you more interest than usual. You've never heard of Chan dating, actually you can't recall if any of the boys in Minho's dance crew have ever had partners, but it's not for a lack of interested parties.
At times, it feels so impossible that you're embarrassed to even admit to yourself how much you like Chan. You're not blind, you know that there's a fair share of girls who are just as delusional as you are, giggling when he looks over and insisting to their friends that he's interested in them because he helped open the door for them or waved as he walked past.
In fact, some of the very moments that you keep closest to your heart sound so similar to experiences that you've heard other girls gushing about that you hate yourself for having hope that Chan would be interested in you of all people.
It's easier to pretend that there's nothing going on between the two of you. You know that if you were to confess your feelings to Chan, something you would never do, that he would be nice about it. You can almost imagine it, how flustered he would be, making up some kind of excuse about not being interested in dating because he was too devoted to school and dance. He would promise not to tell your brother about it and assure you that it wouldn't change the way that he treats you.
You've run through this hypothetical situation so many times that not only have you experienced enough mortification for a lifetime, but you've convinced yourself even further to lock your feelings up inside of you. There's no point in confessing when you're so sure that nothing will ever come from it.
—
One day, Chan is over as usual and the three of you are cooking in your tiny kitchen, elbows bumping and arms reaching over as everyone tries to make do with the small space available.
The food is almost ready when Minho's phone rings, the special song that he has saved for Jisung. He picks it up instantly, shoving the pair of chopsticks that he's using into your hands in his haste. You can't hear what Jisung says, but Minho rolls his eyes and leaves to his bedroom, lecturing Jisung about something the whole way there.
“Hey,” Chan says softly. You try to keep yourself busy, picking up dishes and putting them into the sink for washing, but he tugs at your wrist lightly so that you face him. “Is everything good with you?”
“Yeah,” you say, nodding quickly.
“You just seem, I don't know, distracted or something these days.”
“No, it's-” You take a deep breath to collect yourself. “Thank you for asking, really. But I'm fine.”
“Okay,” Chan says, still looking concerned. “Listen, I know we haven't-”
You've never been so glad to hear Minho re-enter the room.
“Eh? You guys haven't even finished with the food?” he complains in a whiny voice that he only really uses around Chan. “What have you guys been doing this whole time? Come on, Y/n-ah, go set the table. Hyung, I know you can't cook to save your life, but at least scoop out the rice into our bowls. I'm hungry!”
Chan drops the subject for the rest of the night, but you know that you’ve only delayed the conversation.
—
The next day, you wake up to a dry and achy throat. This isn’t that unusual, you suffer from seasonal allergies that sometimes block your nose and force you to breathe through your mouth as you sleep. This time, it feels different. Your throat has been bothering you more than usual the past couple of weeks and while drinking a glass of water does help you wake up, it doesn’t dull the pain that persists.
You shuffle out of bed to wash up, then head straight to the kitchen, brewing yourself a steaming mug of yuja tea. The taste is comforting, but doesn't help as much as you hoped it would.
You get ready for school quickly, hoping to leave before Minho wakes up. You know that your classes start before him today, but he's always been an early riser, preferring to work out or spend time in the dance studio before it gets too busy.
“Y/n-ah,” Minho calls out, right as you're starting to put on your shoes. “You were going to leave without saying bye?”
“I didn’t know if you were awake,” you say, wincing when your voice still sounds rough.
“You didn’t even check.” Minho steps out of his room and unlocks the front door for you as you pull on your backpack.
“I was in a rush-” you start to say, but the rest of your sentence doesn’t manage to make its way out. Clearing your throat only irritates it further, triggering a cough that you can’t contain.
“Y/n,” Minho says, genuine concern shining in his eyes. “Are you feeling okay?”
He raises a hand to your forehead, but you slap it away weakly before he can check your temperature.
“I'm fine, I just have this stupid sore throat that won’t go away,” you reassure him. “I don’t think I’m sick though. The air has been so dry lately, I think I need a humidifier in my room while I sleep.”
“Aww.” Minho pinches your cheek and goes straight back to teasing you. “My delicate baby sister.”
“Ugh, forget I said anything.” You push your brother away. “Now let me go, I'm going to be late for class.”
Minho doesn't say anything in response, but the next night when you go to sleep, a new humidifier has been installed on your bedside table.
—
In the next few weeks you find that the discomfort in your throat that has been plaguing you has evolved into something else. There’s a persistent feeling of something caught in your throat and you find yourself with a lingering dry cough that no amount of tea or medication can relieve.
One night, you wake up feeling like you can't breathe. In a panic, you untangle yourself from your sheets and get yourself into a sitting position. The change in position allows a deep cough to rattle through you, enough that you’re finally able to suck in a breath.
Instead of phlegm or maybe a piece of food that could have been stuck in your throat, you feel something velvety in your mouth. You blindly reach for your bedside table to turn on your lamp and wonder if you’re still asleep when you find a single, dark red rose petal in the palm of your hand.
You squeeze your eyes shut and pinch yourself, hard, but when your eyes open, nothing has changed.
Suddenly, you’re wide awake and a cold sweat starts to form, making your pyjamas stick to your back.
You’ve heard of hanahaki disease, of course you have, but you’ve never known someone who has suffered from it.
It makes sense, you’ve had a sore, scratchy throat and dry cough for weeks now with no other cold symptoms.
You can’t believe it though.
Hanahaki disease was almost like an urban legend at this point, having been exaggerated and twisted so much in media that you’ve almost forgotten the reality of it. While most of the shows and books that cover this have a somewhat romantic take on it, declaring that it's caused by unrequited love, you know the real cause is your refusal to admit your feelings.
You knew that lying, to Chan, to your brother, to yourself, would have consequences. You had heard stories about how people who kept their feelings a secret were slowly choked by them, petals and leaves representing every time you had held yourself back.
You just never thought it would happen to you.
Sure, you were interested in Chan. You found him kind, hard-working, funny, and attractive, but it's not like you were in love with him.
You crumple the petal in your hand and throw it into your garbage can. If this is your first time finding petals, you still have months until things progress to be more serious. A part of you hopes that this was some sort of one-off, that this would be the first and last time your body creates any flowers.
You turn off the light and pull the covers tightly over your body, praying that you'll wake up in the morning and find that this was all some crazy stress-related dream.
You don’t fall asleep for the rest of the night.
—
You had thought that you were pretty good at covering up your tracks, but it doesn’t take long before Minho starts piecing things together. It doesn't help over the past few days, your symptoms have steadily worsened. You’ve found yourself coughing up petals every day, enough that you're starting to grow concerned about how quickly things are progressing.
It starts when he calls you into your shared bathroom one evening. You don’t think much of it, until you find him staring at something on the ground.
“What’s this?” he asks.
“It’s a rose petal,” you say easily, stooping down to pinch it between two fingers and dangle it in front of his face. “You’ve never seen one before?”
Minho rolls his eyes at that, swatting at you half-heartedly. You manage to dodge out of the way, but lose your grip on the petal. It flutters to the floor, but Minho swipes it out of the air.
“What’s it from? Is a boy giving you flowers?” he asks warningly, crushing the petal in his grip.
“Oppa, stop jumping to conclusions!” you groan. “It’s from a bath bomb that I tried out, I guess I missed this one when I was cleaning up.”
“Since when do you take baths?”
“Since I got a bunch of bath bombs on sale. I thought it would be relaxing.” This time you’re the one rolling your eyes. “But if I knew that it would lead to you interrogating me, I wouldn’t have bothered buying them in the first place.”
“Fine, sorry, just- just clean up next time you’re going to make a mess in the bathroom,” Minho says, before throwing the petal at you and leaving you alone.
You watch as the petal falls onto the tiles, crumpled into a little ball from being in Minho’s fist. When you reach out to pick it up, your fingers are trembling. You’ve never been a good liar, but it seems that at least this time, your acting skills have been good enough to fool Minho.
You hear the front door close and you finally give in to the cough that you've been trying to suppress the whole conversation.
Tears spring to your eyes, but you can't stop the coughs that wrack your body. This time, even after you spit out a couple of petals, it still feels like there’s something stuck in your throat. After what feels like forever, that something dislodges and you find yourself holding a tiny rosebud complete with a short stem.
You stare at it in horror, you haven’t had more than petals until now. There’s a deep sense of dread that fills you. You thought that you’d have more time, it hasn’t even been a month since you had started coughing up anything.
You throw the flower into the toilet, flushing quickly so that the red petals swirl out of sight. Even after you rinse your mouth, there’s a tinge of iron that lingers.
—
You don't often visit the boys when they're at dance practice, in fact you actively avoid going to the studio. It's one thing to know that their dance crew is quite popular and another to experience it yourself.
But today you don't have much of a choice, in your rush to leave for an early lab, you completely forgot to pack an assignment that was due the same morning and had begged Minho to bring it to campus for you. You were lucky that he hadn't left the apartment yet, but he only brought it on the condition that you brought him coffee and picked your assignment up from him directly.
It's just before 10am when you head over, which means that there's a lot of students waiting for their dance class to start, but it still surprises you to find a fairly significant crowd outside of the studio that Minho had texted you to go to. You can hear music faintly from the closed door and, as you push your way closer, find that there's a large horizontal window that has caught everyone's attention.
You get more than a fair share of dirty looks as you squeeze through the crowd and one girl even stops you as you move to open the door.
“Sorry, excuse me,” you say politely.
“You're not allowed in,” she says in a haughty voice. Her acrylic nails bite into your arm, surprisingly strong for how thin she is. “Their practice isn't over.”
“You're not allowed in, I don’t need an invitation,” you say under your breath, rolling your eyes. You must not have said it quietly enough because she gasps dramatically.
“Please, you think you're special?” She looks you up and down dismissively. “You wish any of the boys would talk to someone like you.”
“You must be referring to yourself, they would never want to have to associate with someone as desperate and pathetic as you,” you snap, shouldering your way past her. She squeals, but finally lets go of you, maybe hoping that you'll get in trouble for interrupting.
You open the door just enough to slide through and carefully close it behind you so that you don’t disturb them. It’s mesmerizing, watching them all dance. They’ve been together for so long that it looks so natural for them to move in sync, although you know it’s more to do with long hours of practice and Minho’s eagle eyes pointing out any mistakes.
None of the boys notice you at first, caught up in the chorus of the song that they're practicing, but Jeongin catches sight of you after a moment.
“Noona!” he says excitedly, abandoning the dance to run over to you. “Is that coffee for me?”
“Innie if you drink that coffee you will not survive long enough for the caffeine to make it into your bloodstream,” your brother warns from across the room.
Jeongin falters at that, but when you shake the cup enticingly in front of him, he throws caution to the wind and takes a sip.
“Yah! What did I say, Yang Jeongin?” Is the only warning Jeongin gets before he’s chased around the room by an angry Minho. The familiar chaos is almost enough to lift your mood and make you forget about the terrible interaction you had outside.
“You look annoyed, did something happen?” Chan asks, approaching you from where he had gone to turn off the music on his laptop. You curse how observant he is, you thought you had done a pretty good job of hiding how you felt.
“Nothing, just had a weird encounter with a defensive fan out there. It's like you guys are idols or something” you joke, nodding your head towards the window where people are watching curiously. You can still feel the sting from the girl’s nails digging into your wrist and when you lift it up to examine it more closely, see a little bit of blood beading at the deepest crescents.
“They’re not fans,” Chan says in disgust, before he does a double take. “I- you’re bleeding?”
“It’s nothing,” you say quickly, wiping at the wounds but only succeeding at smudging the blood so that it looks even worse. “It doesn’t even hurt.”
“Come here, we have a first aid kit somewhere. We don’t want it to get infected.”
Chan takes your hand delicately, making sure to avoid the inflamed areas, and leads you over to the bench closest to where all their bags are piled up. You sneak a glance over to the girl that stopped you and can’t help but feel smug when you find her, pale and slack-jawed. Chan sits you down, only leaving your side to pull the blinds down on the window and dig around until he finds the first aid kit.
“Sorry, it might sting a bit,” Chan apologises as he pulls out the disinfectant wipes.
You peek at Chan and your breath catches in your throat at how concentrated he looks, brows slightly furrowed as he tries to gently dab at the scratches. Most of his hair is hidden under a baseball cap, but you can see a little duck tail forming at the base of his neck which draws attention to the trails of sweat that disappear under the collar of his shirt. You must make some kind of noise, because Chan looks up, eyes wide with concern.
“Sorry, does it hurt a lot?”
“No, you're good,” you say, cheeks flushing.
“I’m almost done,” he says, searching around for a bandage. He’s just finished applying it, tongue sticking out in concentration, when you hear someone else approach.
“What's going on here?” Minho asks.
“Nothing!” you say at the same time that Chan says, “I was just helping Y/n put on a bandage.”
“Did you hurt yourself?” Minho's eyes widen and he reaches out to take a look at your wrist, even though he won't be able to see anything under the bandage. You pull your sleeve down and stand up in a rush.
“It’s nothing, really oppa! I'm sorry, I have to go, my class is starting soon!” you call out, lying through your teeth as you run out of the room, clutching your assignment. “Thank you, Channie-oppa!”
You rush into the nearest bathroom, not even caring that there are people in the other stalls, and throw up an explosion of petals. By the time that you finally make it to class, just in time, your throat stings more than the wound on your wrist.
—
You start trying to avoid Minho and well, you never really stopped in your attempts to avoid Chan.
You leave early in the morning, only come back well after the sun has set, and do everything in your power to contain your cough when you're at home.
You know you're not solving the problem, only prolonging it, but every conversation, every lie, seems to accelerate the growth of the roses that have taken up residence in your lungs. You know that it's not helping, that keeping this secret is just strengthening the flowers that are slowly choking you. It's just that no matter how many conversations you've rehearsed in your head or text that you've drafted, something seems to stop you.
You're just so so scared that waking up with a mouthful of petals and thorns, bloody coughing fits that you can't prevent, and the raspy tone of your voice that has developed is preferrable.
As much as you hate him sometimes, you've looked up to your brother for your whole life. You don't know what you would do without him that the thought of losing him terrifies you beyond belief.
You don't always get what you want, though. It's not long until Minho confronts you again.
It's not really a surprise, when you look in the mirror these days, you're shocked by your appearance. Your face is pale and drawn, you have deep bags from not being able to sleep at night, and you've lost weight since most solid food irritates your throat enough to trigger a coughing fit. Add that to the fact that you know your apartment's walls are paper thin which means it's impossible that your brother can't hear you coughing at all hours of the day.
“Y/n-ah. I know that you're not doing well right now. Don't even try to deny it,” Minho says. He closes his eyes for a moment before seemingly deciding something. “I- you don't have to tell me what it is. I would prefer it if you did, but just- what can I do to help?”
You take a deep breath, preparing yourself to reassure him that you're fine, but regret it when you start choking instead. You lurch upright and head directly to the bathroom, Minho trailing behind you worriedly.
“I-” Trying to talk just makes it worse. You're used to it now, the way that the thorns seem to claw at your throat on their way up, how even the brush of soft petals against the raw flesh hurts, the metallic taste that you can't seem to get rid of no matter how many times you wash your mouth. Still, it doesn't make it easier.
Minho watches in silence as you heave over the toilet. He puts a hand on your back, rubbing slow circles to try and soothe some of your pain. Your eyes water, partially from coughing and partly because you're mortified that your brother is finally witnessing this.
You throw up finally, mostly petals and blood, which is a relief. The stems have been the most painful by far, each thorn digging into the already abused flesh of your throat.
When you finally finish rinsing your mouth, he's holding out a tissue which you accept gratefully. Minho doesn't comment until you've finally caught your breath.
“Y/n-ah-”
“Yeah,” you say miserably, tearing at the leftover tissue in your hand. Your voice both sounds and feels like you've been swallowing gravel. “Hanahaki, who would have guessed that I'd be a romantic at heart?”
You laugh weakly. Minho doesn't.
“I knew it. All those times you locked yourself in the bathroom with the water running… That stupid bath bomb story you told me… I hear you up at all hours, coughing your lungs out… You’ve been hiding it this whole time, haven’t you?” he accuses you.
“I can explain-”
“Go on then,” Minho says impatiently.
“I- It's-” You bury your face in your hands, unable to get the words out. “It's stupid.”
“Y/n-ah, it's obviously not stupid. Whatever it is, it's bothering you enough that it's hurting you physically.”
“I like someone,” you say in a small voice. “Okay? That's it.”
“Why won't you tell them?” Minho demands. “Why won't you tell me who it is?”
“No, I can't. There’s no point, it wouldn't work out,” you insist, shaking your head.
“What are you talking about? No point? Y/n, can't you see it's killing you.” You've never heard Minho sound so desperate. He's angry, he's frustrated, but most of all, he's scared, you realise.
“Oppa-” you say cautiously, but you're interrupted by yet another coughing fit. You can't hide it from your brother when the tissue that you've used to cover your mouth is tinged red by the time you're done. You can feel there's still something lodged in your throat, it takes everything in you to ignore the urge to continue coughing to try and get it out.
“I can't lose you, Y/n,” he whispers. Your eyes widen when you realise his are filled with tears. You don't think you've ever seen Minho cry. “I can't let you do this to yourself, please.”
“I need more time-”
“You don’t have time!” Minho interrupts frantically. “Have you even seen a doctor about this?”
You look away guiltily at the question.
“No, but-”
“Are you kidding me?” Minho says exasperatedly. “We’re booking you an appointment right now.”
“Is it going to make a difference? I know what’s wrong-” As if to prove your point, you can’t stop yourself from coughing again. “It's not that bad yet, oppa,” you lie, the croakiness of your voice giving you away.
“Y/n-”
“I promise! I promise that I am trying my best. I- if it doesn't get better, I'll see a doctor in two weeks.”
“Not good enough, Y/n-ah. If you can't tell me, at least talk to whoever you like,” he pleads.
“Fine,” you say. “I- I'll talk to him in the next few days. And if the flowers don't go away, then I will see a doctor.”
Minho lets out a heavy sigh of relief, pulling you into his arms for a tight hug. You try your best to sink into his embrace, but just can't ignore the guilt that seems to consume you.
—
Chan catches you outside your last lecture that night. You're not sure how exactly he found out your schedule, but you exit the lecture hall to find him leaning against the wall directly across from the doors.
It could just be that he knows someone else taking this course or that he has a class in the same room, but somehow you know that he's waiting for you. Not ready for this conversation, you try to keep your head down to pass by unnoticed, but you know that he's spotted you when he calls out your name.
“Hey.” Chan reaches out, tugging on your sleeve without actually touching you. You turn around, stomach sinking slightly. Yes, you had promised your brother that you'd confess to Chan, but you didn't think it would happen so soon. “You're heading home right?”
“Yeah,” you say warily. “What's up?”
“I'm going back too, can we walk together?”
“Sure,” you agree slowly, not able to think of a way to get out of this situation.
The two of you walk in silence towards your bus stop. Chan's being uncharacteristically awkward and you're not sure what to expect.
“I wanted to talk to you about something,” he says suddenly.
“Okay?”
Chan stays quiet for so long that you’re about to ask if he’s okay.
“I like you,” he blurts out, right as you open your mouth to speak.
“What?” Of everything he could have said, this is what you're expecting the least. There’s no way that you heard him correctly, you must need to get your ears checked.
“I like you,” Chan repeats. You blink up at him, stunned. “But if you don't feel the same way, it's- don't worry about it. I promise that I'll respect it. I'll back off and everything will stay the same. I just wanted to get it off my chest. And maybe, I don't know if I was just making things up, but I thought that you liked me too?”
“You can't,” is all that escapes your mouth.
“I… can't like you?” Chan asks, baffled.
“No, it's- you can't- we can't,” you stammer. “My brother-"
“What, you think I'm afraid of Minho-ya?” Chan asks cockily, raising an eyebrow in a way that you can't help but find attractive.
“I just- he always said-”
“Y/n-ah,” Chan says gently. “I like you and I don't care what your dumb brother thinks. He can complain all he wants, but as long as you're happy, I'm happy. And-”
“You actually like me?” you interrupt.
“Yes, is it really so hard to believe?”
“I just always thought, you only saw me as Minho-oppa's baby sister,” you say glumly, kicking at the ground.
“I did when you were younger for sure,” Chan laughs. “But since university, I feel like I've actually gotten to know the real you, to see how funny, talented, kind, and thoughtful you are. I like you for you, not because I'm friends with your brother.”
“But there's so many other girls you could choose from that are much prettier or smarter than me,” you argue, still not wanting to get your hopes up.
“Y/n-ah, are you actually trying to convince me not to like you?” Chan pouts. “If you don't feel the same way, just say so, it's okay.”
“No! I-” you trail off, suddenly feeling incredibly shy.
“You what?” Chan prompts you gently.
“I like you too.” Your voice is barely a whisper, but you know that he's heard you from the smile that grows on his face.
“What was that?” Chan asks cheekily.
“I said I like you too!” you say louder this time, before hiding your face in your hands so that you don't have to look at Chan.
Even though you're beyond embarrassed, you feel better than you have in a long time, giddy with the idea that Chan actually reciprocates your feelings.
But when you breathe in, instead of relief, there's still that familiar tightness in your chest.
You have to talk to Minho, you realise. As much as you've been keeping it a secret from Chan, you know that a majority of your inner turmoil stems from hiding our feelings from the closest person in your life. You had hoped that talking to Chan would instantly cure your hanahaki, but clearly you were wrong.
—
For the first time in weeks, you purposely seek out Minho. Luckily, you don't have to look far, when you get home, Minho is stretched out on the couch watching anime.
“I told him,” you say. Minho immediately sits upright, turning his attention to you. “The guy I like. But it didn’t help, the flowers are still-”
“And he feels the same way?” Minho interrupts you.
“I- yes, he’s the one that confessed first.”
“Wow,” Minho whistles. “Who’s crazy enough to have feelings for you?”
You had already made up your mind that you had to tell your brother, but his reaction makes you even more confident in your decision. Maybe it's the way that Minho is treating this so lightly, but you’re no longer nervous to say it out loud.
“It's Chan-oppa,” you say, bracing yourself.
“Chan?” Minho repeats, shell shocked.
“Channie-hyung? Like-” he takes out his phone and pulls up the photo he has of Chan in his contacts.
Chan has the craziest bedhead and his face is puffy from sleep in the photo. He's squinting up at the camera, a hand coming up to try and block his face. He looks adorable.
Minho watches your face carefully as you visibly melt a bit looking at the picture.
“You really do like him, huh,” he says in a quiet voice, no longer joking around. “This whole time?”
“Yeah.” You look down. “I'm sorry.”
“That's it? That's the person you've been so scared of telling me that you liked?"
“I- yes? You don't think it's weird?” you ask tentatively, looking back up at your brother. “The two of us being together? He's one of your best friends.”
“Oh no, it’s definitely weird.” Minho laughs. “I do not understand it at all. But Y/n, Channie-hyung is one of the few people in my life that I trust. Do I want him to be dating my baby sister? Of course not! I don't want you to be dating anyone. Do I think he’s out of his mind for being interested in you? Definitely.”
“Hey!” you interject. Minho carries on like he can’t hear you.
“Do I think he fully understands that if he hurts you in any way, directly or indirectly, on purpose or on accident, that I will hunt him down and make him regret the fact that he ever existed in the first place? Yes, I think he knows.”
“Oppa,” you say in horror. “You will not give your best friend the shovel talk.”
“I don’t have to.” Minho smiles brightly, a picture of innocence if you didn’t know him. “My reputation precedes me. Channie-hyung's one of my closest friends, he would never expect anything less from me.”
“Oppa-”
“Y/n-ah,” Minho softens his voice. “I also know that of all the people that I've ever met, Channie-hyung is one that is least likely to ever hurt you. I trust him, but I also want you to know that I trust your judgement.”
You look away, sniffing. You never could have imagined that Minho would accept your relationship so easily that it's making you feel emotional.
“Aigoo, Y/nnie,” Minho coos. He pulls you into a tight hug, ignoring the way that tears finally escape from you and stain his shirt. “You were really worried about this, weren't you?”
You nod into his shoulder, unable to provide a verbal response.
“I'm sorry that I made you feel like you couldn't tell me about this. It's definitely going to take a bit of time to get used to it, but I'm happy for you, really. I know I can seem overbearing sometimes, but I just worry.”
“I didn't want you to be upset at Channie-oppa or me,” you murmur. “I didn't want to do anything to hurt your friendship. I didn't want to hurt our relationship.”
“Y/n-ah,” Minho says gently, but firmly. “I want you to know that there is nothing that could hurt our relationship. You're my baby sister, I'm always going to love you.”
After months of keeping all your feelings bottled up, of denying your feelings for Chan, of dreading Minho’s reaction, you’ve felt a constant dread, guilt filling your insides. Now, you’re just filled with an overwhelming sense of relief. It’s as if an enormous weight has been lifted off your shoulders.
It feels like you can breathe again.
read it on ao3 | masterlist
#coming up roses#chahnniesroom#skz fanfic#skz angst#skz fic#skz x reader#stray kids angst#stray kids x reader#stray kids x y/n#stray kids x you#skz x you#stray kids fluff#stray kids fanfic#bang chan angst#bang chan x reader#bang chan fluff#chan x reader#chan angst#bang chan x y/n#bang chan x you#lee minho fluff#skz imagines#stray kids#chan#bang chan#lee know#lee minho#lee know angst#lee know fluff#skz fluff
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@grievingbovine I am always happy to gush about Paul ;w;
Also I feel like... I'm not sure if it's more "codependency isn't always bad" or "codependency is a term we've grown to use too liberally when what should actually be the defining factor isn't the behaviors involved but whether or not those are actually hurting the people involved" or something in between or adjacent to that. It also feels like there might be kinda two definitions people use interchangeably? One being the more medical term and the other a looser thing of like, deeply dependent on each other.
But semantics aside I know what you mean, and yeah.
It is, generally speaking, unhealthy to be SO dependent on a SPECIFIC person that you can't live without them. Cam and Pal post-explosion had a very unique situation, whereas for most cases in real life, it's better to at least like... need SOMEONE, a purpose, a cause, but also be capable of seeking a new one if you lose that, after time to process and grief. A Camilla whose whole life revolved around Palamedes but didn't get him back learning to live again for Nona, as a hypothetical, or Harrow who would not let herself survive alone but can live for God and for Gideon and for Alecto and for the memory of those lost to conceive her and who may find other purposes still. Ofc no one is arguing Harrow is healthy about that, but like, if you CAN'T find an internal sense of worth, a purely external one is still infinitely better and healthier than none!
It feels very silly but a straight up life-changing thing for me as someone who does the same shit was the anime Gurren Lagann throwing around the phrase, "believe in the me who believes in you." Over time it morphed into "believe in the you that I believe in", and ultimately into having genuinely self-assurance, but taking even one or two of those steps is like... YEAH? Yeah! You know? External validation can be so meaningful and powerful, and isn't antithetical to internal by any means. If you can find it in even a handful of different sources, even better. A thing I try to tell people a lot when it comes to mental health too is you don't have to Get Better to get BETTER. It's not "you're unhealthy and must be fixed" or "you're 100% healthy in all ways". Less unhealthy and more functional than you were is amazing and to be celebrated actually!!!
But at the same time?
Ya know, no, I agree, I DON'T think it's a bad thing to need to NOT be ALONE. I understand the importance of being capable of surviving alone, at least long enough to seek new connections. And living for a person or cause is always easier than dying for them ("you could have lived for her, but you didn't know how"...), especially if you're living for their memory after they're gone, but people should try to do it anyway! But to just..... want to be devoted to someone? To thrive on supporting or caring for other people???
That's not what I'd call "toxic codependency", that's humans being a social species. Hell, that's looking at stories and seeing how many supporting characters are vital to helping a hero succeed and deciding "that sounds awesome actually! Not everyone needs to be the hero, I would love to be a supporting character!" Especially when you're not losing sight of your own needs in the process.
Like... Sacrifice and martyr mentality can be horrible destructive things that do more harm than good, but sacrifice is also objectively a major way people show love. Parents doing without a little more to make sure their kids get something nice, someone doing a chore they don't like because they know their partner hates it more, etc. The difference between "my needs aren't important, I'm not important, I'll always prioritize others because I don't take care of myself in general" and "I have weighed the pros and cons and decided that I can handle this and wish to put someone else first in this situation" is not always apparent from the outside but it's an extremely important distinction. There's a difference between being needlessly reckless and hard on yourself versus making a decision to achieve an end you want even though it costs you something.
Cam trying to hide how rough carrying Pal was on her wasn't her being needlessly reckless, it was her being a stubborn bitch who knows she's tough as hell. If anything people have more grounds to criticize her going against Pal's interests and wishes by not giving him information he needed to make properly informed decisions! To think that he was in any way taking advantage of her when she'd have found a way to kick his ass if he'd tried to force her to stop is wild lmao. (Not to mention Pal literally killing himself— he was still Around but objectively dead all the same!— in the "dying for someone is the cruelest thing you could do to them" book. Like he ain't making big sacrifices fueled by his love for and trust in her too smh.)
And honestly? Yeah that does sound like the kind of thing that could save the world. Our world would be a better place with less people striving to be main characters and more people eager to support each other. More people should be saying "No you will let me help you, you son of a bitch. Don't you dare tell me it's Too Much." >:( So many people are afraid of Being A Burden but more people need to understand— from the perspective of the person with that fear and as friends wishing to help someone who has that fear— that only the person offering help can decide what is A Burden to them! It's not the other person's decision to make!
Palamades didn't have a right to tell Camilla not to push herself to keep him around when that was her choice, and anyone fearing their loved ones sacrifice too much for them don't have a right to tell them to love them less, either. Sometimes— often, really— the alternative is worse. And part of me has to wonder if some people are averse to acknowledging that because if they did, then they'd have to acknowledge that letting someone else help you can be actively beneficial to them, and constantly refusing to ask for or accept help is in turn actively depriving them of something that would help them too. <.< Too bad everyone, gotta let people love you.
Locked tomb hot takes:
Insisting that the birth of Paul is only a tragedy because of the uneven power dynamics between Palamedes and Camilla as Necro and Cav invalidates Camillas autonomy and undermines her as a character capable of making her own decisions. It also undermines Palamedes constantly checking for consent. He understands more than most that there is an uneven power dynamic and actively works to respect her autonomy as much as he can while also respecting their bond/positions as necro and cav.
In a world where those who identify as men have no natural power over those who identify as women or neither, we can not apply the same cisheteronormative expectations of male behavior to male characters.
Camilla made every. Single. Choice. Willingly. She had reasons for it, and Palamedes respected that more than readers seem to. We get plenty of examples.
"What would you do if you discovered Camilla was a murderer?”
“Help her bury the body,” said Palamedes promptly.
“Sextus.”
“I mean it. If Camilla wants someone dead,” he said, “then far be it from me to stand in her way. All I can do at that point is watch the bloodshed and look for a mop. One flesh, one end, and all that.”
GtN chapter 30
NtN chapter 17
The relationship between these two may be codependent, but it's predicated on trust and consent. The whole way through. This is the life Cam wants to live. Becoming Paul was what *she wanted*.
I find it strange that some people think they know what's best for her more than she does, just because she's a cavalier.
#hello i am#infuckingcapable of speaking in less than 40 pages apparently#but many thought....#I am just Nona okay. Bursting at every seem with love and also maybe I don't know what it means but that won't stop me. Always spread love#and hope little by little it does help save the world#(minus the part about also being the world lmao)
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I love how maturely you handled the negative asks from The Anon I really admire you for it! I would also like to add on to your already on point analysis: Each arc is really significant for Sakura. Shishitoren arc I feel highlighted what could've been Sakura's future had he followed the same path he planned on that is becoming the top of Furin. Ume teaching Sakura how to use fighting as a conversation was a significant moment and the beginning of Sakura's change as a person who isn't all about fights, the moment he started evolving. Keel arc further steeled his character in the sense it showed a vulnerable side of him. Sakura, who had never been cared for, realizing he has people he wants to protect and struggles with it. His senpai and friends take the spotlight because they are there to help him. Just because other characters are getting a spotlight doesn't mean Sakura is losing it, it's simply to highlight their role in Sakura's life, and of course to give an insight about those characters themselves. Also one thing a lot of people often fail to notice is how much the plot revolves around Sakura. Everyone actually praises him for valor. Especially when you notice how Nirei was awestruck watching Shishitoren and Roppo Ichiza be friends because he's from the town, he knows how dire the situation used to be and now those enemies are Furin's friends but Sakura doesn't realize that because he wasn't there before the New Furin. He doesn't know his own impact so he doesn't think he has done much when he changed so much, not just as a person, but the town as well. Also how Ume said he didn't consider asking help from others like Sakura did because he thought Sakura considered that a possibility because he was from outside but he didn't consider the probability that maybe Sakura thought it was okay to ask for help because that's what he's been taught since he joined Furin. "Rely on your Brother" as Ume put it and Sakura really did. This town, this school and even the other gangs, they shaped him and are still doing so. Sakura's character isn't something you can interpret in isolation neglecting the role of his friends. Sorry for the rant I have been getting peeved by the Anon and wanted to share this. Sorry for any mistakes English is not my first language. Thank you for your time!
Thank you so much!! I mostly started this because I wanted to give the guy a chance to actually talk about their opinions on Wind Breaker and it's writing !! I figured that there might actually be something there other than just trolling or rage bait.
AND I WAS RIGHT !!
And thank you for adding your own analysis to this!! You've explained Sakura's involvement in the arcs really well!! That was something I kind of struggled to do in my analysis! I wasn't sure how to explain how involved he truly is in the story, even if it might seem otherwise to some!
And don't worry about the writing, English isn't my first language either!!
#wouldve responded yesterday but i was unfortunately busy all day#thank you for this ask <3#im hoping to keep the conversation going a little while!#also psst im totally willing to stop tagging these as wind breaker and keep it to my blog if me continuing to interact w the anon#is bothersome in anyway !!#saying this mostly for the rest of the fandom . not aimed at you specifically#i know some people were starting to get really irritated by it all#wind breaker#laauranenn
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HMMM yeah starting to understand why a lot of people don’t like the Dressrosa arc
#Listen. Normally I ADORE tournament arcs#But that’s if the people involved are actually characters I. Care about??#And I know tournament arcs are LONG. So I gotta sit here and watch randos fight for 20 episodes#WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE. I DO NOT CARE. GO AWAY#Rolls my eyes into the back of my head#Shima speaks#I’LL SURVIVE BUT UGHH. BORINGGGGG please show me more Strawhat hijinks instead of this#One Piece
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there’s been a rise of “was silco a bad dad” discourse on tiktok and i’ve seen too much of it against my will but by far the craziest thing i saw was someone saying one of silcos faults with jinx was “pumping her full of shimmer” op purposely left out the context of why he did that and when someone in the comments was like hey she was literally dying! op said silco should’ve… just let her die. there’s so much to unpack here
the wording “pumping her full of shimmer” is purposefully done to frame his action as worse. we see how silco treats people with shimmer. he dangles it in front of them, taunting them, before throwing it to them like he’s giving a dog a treat. he can watch the effects the drug has on them like it’s nothing. with jinx he carried her in his arms, gave her a lil kiss on the forehead, and had to be knocked out before her procedure began because he wouldn’t have been able to handle seeing jinx go through it. he wasn’t feeding jinx shimmer her whole life, it was a desperate last resort he went to in order to save her life.
saying he should’ve just let her die is. fucking WILD. if he let her die they’d hate him for that too! if you hate this character just hate them as is! you don’t need to make his misdeeds even more awful he’s done enough for you to reasonably dislike him. whether you like it or not, silco was her father. jinx was his daughter. whatever view you have on silco, those two facts will always be true. of course he’d do literally anything to keep her alive. if vander did this, would you have the same reaction? would you say vander should’ve just let his daughter die? or would you call it sweet and say he was so caring and such a good father for saving his child’s life?
again you can hate silco but hate with reason. he’s a complex character in the terms that he is a complicated man in the universe. he’s not complex in the way that it’s hard to understand his actions. it’s actually really easy to figure out his motives, especially for something so clear as his daughters life literally being on the line. people are purposefully being ignorant of his nuances to feel justified in disliking him and im so fucking tired!!!!
#silco arcane#fandom critical#i’m trying not to get involved in this stuff too much#but jesus some of you have nothing in your skulls and i can’t be quiet about it#becoming a silco apologist out of spite im so annoyed#i’m very aware of his abuse and manipulation and i’d actually love to talk about him in depth#but people who bring that up don’t care about the character! they only bring it up to make you feel like shit for having the AUDACITY#to like a fictional character#‘am i the only one that thinks silco was a bad dad? am i the only one who thinks silco was manipulative?’#NO YOURE NOT YOURE LITERALLY NOT#stop trying to act like you have the moral high ground because you saw someone enjoy a villain in a work of fiction
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Is this fanfic friendly? I feel like an outlier.
I guess this is my sign it's time to throw together a FAQ post to link to lol.
Yes, every event for this blog is fanfic friendly :D
Though as I mentioned on my Ominous October post, for events that include multiple short stories, I encourage everyone to flex their creativity and take one of their planned short story fanfics, and at least *attempt* to turn one of them into something entirely original; rebuilding a character and story from the ground up to stand on its own two legs is no easy feat, and that is what makes it so fun!
It really gets your creative gears turning, to make an "au of an existing material" to be something entirely original, and you can be pleasantly surprised about the things you come up with!
As a few people say, its not just a matter of "filing the serial numbers off" -- you have to add in just as much *or more* as what you take out when you are turning a fanfiction into something that is original and completely divorced from its original source material / inspiration, and that is a hard, but very rewarding challenge!
Obviously, this is not a requirement (there's no hard requirements for any of the challenges, other than no cheating, including no using AI),
but if you would like an extra challenge for the short story events and you're planning on doing entirely fan-fiction, I highly recommend trying it out at least once, and seeing where it leads you--
you may find yourself pleasantly surprised by what you find down that rabbit hole!
#replies#novella november#long rambly tags to follow lol#including anti royalist / anti billionaire shit#ominous october#this is what my novella november is going to be#something that WAS a huge earth-shattering fanfic AU#but before I even got past a WIP Oneshot I'd already realized that what I was planning was going to turn canon so far on its head it would#be unrecognizable and it would be much better off and more coherent if I made it entirely original#so now it is!#not only does this involve changing every single characters name#everyone is now a completely different species other than human because thats always fun#and of course we're also tackling all the issues that had annoyed me in omega verse fics since I was like 14 and liked the#creature aspects but hated the biological essentialism and misogny / caste systems#if your fantasy people have an enforced caste system you gotta actually treat that like the horror and systemic oppression it is#not just say 'biological = right' like dude what do you think people have been saying about real women this whole time????#people literally insist women are biologically inferior to men do you really think supporting that idea is going to make you sound#progressive just because your main character is a tomboy independant woman?#also like she lost all her independence as soon as she found a man to marry so uhhhhh#what happened to being ready and willing to hit the bricks if people kept talking down to you and condescending you for being a woman????#why did you go from independant badass tomboy to fainting damsel who spends all her time worrying about failing to produce an heir#so her husband can take power#instead of just straight up telling your husband#'hey I don't want to deal with the bullshit from your father how about we do the-#- socially acceptable thing and just go off to make our own independant settlement with some of the villagers who are on your side'#like your husband would literally be escstatic about this idea of finally getting out from under his dad's tyrannical thumb#and its more like way more than half the villagers would go with you not just a handful#theyve been sick of the kings shit for years and only your husband's potential rise to rule kept them in check#cus he actually cares about the villagers and goes among them#while still clearly having some biases to work through when it comes to class and gender equality
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Regarding the whole "Fandom Is An Escape, so why should I have to care this much about misogyny/racism/ableism/transphobia/etc." thing. Idk about the rest of you, but it gets kind of hard for me to "escape" when I keep seeing people say the same vile things about characters who share aspects of my identity that I hear all the time in real life.
#gotta say: it doesn't make me feel any better getting ignored/disparaged on account of my gender irl and then seeing every fictional woman#also get ignored/disparaged when there is no material difference between her and popular male characters other than her gender#how do I escape from irl misogyny if y'all keep willfully ignoring and flinging gendered insults at 99% (<-lowball estimate) of#female characters? how do I put aside the ableism I face in real life when y'all discuss disabled/mentally ill characters in the most#absolutely out-of-pocket way? how do I forget about biphobia when the 'arguments' you make 'for fun' about bisexual characters#in fiction sound EXACTLY the same as the things people say about my bisexuality outside of the internet/fan culture?#and then obviously this gets compounded if you are trying to even simply EXIST in fandom as a poc or a trans person or an intersection of#any or all these varying identities/life experiences#like yes caring about fictional characters is not the same as caring about real people OBVIOUSLY I can't BELIEVE I have to keep clarifying#that. and at the same time!! because multiple things can be true at the same time!!!! engaging in behavior that enforces pre-ingrained#societal biases and prejudices!!!!!!!! does not help dismantle those biases and prejudices!!!!!!!!!!!!!! in a real-world way that DOES#involve caring about actual people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!#it's also. interesting. when people go on & on about how some newest show about thin cis white (male) gays is So Important & Revolutionary#So We Must Do Everything To Keep It Relevant And Visible and then act this way about women/poc/trans people/disabled people/fat people#in media. so like. you DO agree that seeing a variety of life experiences represented in fiction is beneficial. you DO believe in the#value of depicting marginalized people. interesting that that only seems to apply to a VERY narrow and specific category of marginalization#(ugh remember when I talked about this and someone called me a straight person good times)
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Every week someone makes a post about how annoying it is that Dick Grayson fans don't acknowledge his flaws, and every week someone replies with an explanation that the flaws OP listed are entirely fanon and inconsistent with canon as it actually happened and at this point I have to assume that none of those explanations are ever going to stick because clearly some people just want the fanon to be true.
Anyway, I'm just putting this here for me to edit and add relevant-to-the-topic links later so I'll have them nicely at hand to read and sooth my frustrations when it gets real bad out there. (Echo chambers are good when we use them to drown out character mischaracterizing fanon.)
#dick grayson#canon vs fanon#yes this is about 'dick was a bad brother to jason' yet again#😮💨#super problematic how dick didn't pack up his life & become a devoted big brother to the new son of a man who had already disowned dick#like in-universe he is respectfully supportive of the kid who's wearing his name and uniform#but he was also a 19 year old living in a different city and not given any indication that he was a member of bruce's family so...?#dc comics#this fanon tendency to try to cram nuclear family dynamics and angst onto relationships that do not fit that mold arghhh#add to that how real-world knowledge makes it extra ridiculous to act as if 'omg dick was such a jerk for not being there for jason!!!'#yes their interactions were minimal - I'm pretty sure that keeping dick as a titans character was the entire reason jason existed!#let's be real about jason: his character & what led to him being robin were completely different pre-crisis + his post-crisis run was brief#understandably there are 'flashback' stories to flesh out his time as robin. the worst of these disregard characterization from that time#but even with flashbacks the worst that canon actually shows would be that they weren't close? which...okay?#idk what kind of expectations some people have for the former-ward so sort of foster kid who was explicitly kicked out of bruce wayne's lif#apparently he should've 1) begged his former guardian to acknowledge him as family & 2) assumed the role of bestest big brother either way#i'd ask people to stop and really think about the 'family' structure that existed in this time period where they insist dick was the bad gu#but at this point it's clear that people who want him to be the bad guy truly don't care about why we think it's absurd#anyway i'll end this with a reminder of what I'm pretty sure were the ages etc of the parties involved:#jason (12) gotham. adopted son of bruce.#dick (19) nyc. former ward of bruce. fired from role as partner to batman.#bruce (30+) gotham. raised dick as his ward → fired dick as a partner → never indicated dick still had any place in his life → adopted jaso#oh so my tags just cutting off the final letter like that? i will not be correcting them 😡
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they really have the gall to say they aren’t biased against byler when these are their reactions to both of these posts:
like c’mon bffr
#byler#not gonna tag this as anti m*leven because the last time i did that my post ended up on the actual m*leven tag#so tumblr clearly can't be trusted#but lol I don't much care for m*levin romantically but it just blows my mind how…#idk…let's say…passionate the st subreddit is about ensuring it's sanctity#like they're always like ‘i have no problem with people who ship byler my problem is with people who want mike to break up with el for him’#and idk it all just seems like a cover for what the actual problem you have against byler:#it's a gay ship involving a character you've projected all your straight fantasies onto (mike) and you feel that#because byler shippers ‘force’ people to admit it will be canon#it says something about your own sexuality#like please touch some grass and work on your homophobia because you can relate to a character who is gay#it's okay#you're not going to magically turn gay if mike ends up being gay#now I'm not saying byler shippers are all little angels btw#(we could probably do better if we just focused on enjoying the ship and the characters instead of arguing with homophobes)#but i definitely think the hate towards byler shippers is queerphobic (it's no secret most of us are queer in some way or another)#where the hate towards m*levin shippers (simply by the fact that it's a straight ship) is just not#and no I don't buy the argument that it's misogynist to want mike to leave el#(as if el's character arc hasn't been intrinsically tied to how misogyny and heteronormativity are#tied together under oppressive systems like the patriarchy#and that her idea of romance and boyfriends under it has been harmful to her independence and sense of self)
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jesus christttt im not surprised at all to hear that the knuckles series focuses on wade and other human characters a lot i saw this coming a mile away with how almost all the news we were getting before the trailer came out was about the human characters/actors and not about knuckles (or sonic or tails or any other animated characters) but the fact that somebody calculated how many minutes of screentime knuckles has and it came out as LESS THAN HALF OF THE ENTIRE SERIES' RUNTIME when the series is NAMED after him is ridiculous. after this show comes out wade will likely have more screentime and overall plot relevance in the entire scu than tails does. did they actually think wade is a popular enough character for people to be down with this. what the fuck
#was gonna pirate the series but at this rate i might not watch it at all LMAO or at the very least only watch the parts with team sonic#because my interest in this series is dropping every second and i already wasnt very interested in it.#and i love knuckles so you know theyre doing something wrong if knuckles getting his own series isnt interesting me#the thing about wade is i dont even hate the idea of human characters. i dont think its bad for human characters to be present#and i dont think its bad for them to be involved in the plot and have relationships with the existing sonic characters#i personally didnt mind the wedding subplot in the second movie and i know a lot of people hated it#but. it becomes a problem when the random humans are overshadowing the characters people are actually here to see#like the show is literally called knuckles and all the marketing focuses on knuckles but its mostly about wade. allegedly.#and . i wouldnt have minded knuckles having a human costar. but again. they should be getting equal or less focus not more.#and also. its fucking wade who cares about wade enough to want this. would have been more forgiving if it was maddie or jojo or something#because i actually care about those characters. and also theyre not cops#for a moment i was willing to believe that the complaints about wade having way more screentime than knuckles#were a little exaggerated since a lot of people just get mad when the human characters have any screentime at all#but then i saw the article showing that knuckles really did show up for less than half the show and i was like Ummm. What#sorry for being so negative lately#its just that every new piece of info we get about upcoming scu projects has me like that reaction image of the guy holding a cigarette#like WHAT ARE THEY DOINGGGGGGG
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sire squawks was cooking with mimic recreating what it saw from the fnaf games irl and mimic being the original form of glitchtrap like vanessa and vanny
#that was a good theory vid#i like how he actually gafs about narritave satisfaction and also involving the. characters of the story#insane right#also his exasperation describing how dumb the idea of henry or michael writing the wall code is so real#im also sick of the people shoving in the old characters bc they find it impossible to care about the new ones too dude#pandas.txt
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guys i think this website is recreating misogyny
#i cant say specifics of what the media is or who the character is but like. if theres a character (who happens to be a woman) who is never#directly shown on-screen. but shes absolutely integral to the plot. and it's all with an extremely serious tone. maybe headcanoning them as#a silly ditzy bimbo wifey who believes in astrology and doesnt know anything about computers and her only interests are animals and plants#and taking care of her husband and cleaning the house and she also only wears bright pink and dyes her hair bright pink......#maybe. just maybe. thats fuckin awful?!?!? 💀💀💀💀#IM GOING INSANE HERE. LIKE GOD DAMN I THIUGHT I COULD TRUST TUMBLR USERS ABOUT THIS MEDIA TOO. I WAS SO WRONG. BLOCKED INSTANTLY.#also im not even going to begin to tackle the casual whitegirl racism involved with the interests listed for this character. like idk people#loooove to be vaguely spiritual without respecting a single culture who actually does these practices. 😀.#but im so mad like. i cant even say shit like 'ummm think about this for a sec!!' because the OP clearly put tons of time and effort into#their insanely misogynistic post. multiple drawings lined and full colored. like. they thought about this and thought it was amazing. 😐#anyway... ive noticed lately that a lot of people think misogyny is a dying bigotry or that its 'not as serious' as other forms of hatred?#but sexism is a very real systemic and individual issue. drawing cismenkissing.png doesnt auto-clear the sexism allegations 🫢#anis gaymer moments#ok sorry for the long rant im done now i prommy
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one thing i was not prepared for when i started this rewatch of sdmi has been for it to finally sink in how absolutely heartbreaking daphne's whole deal is. this poor kid, man
#sdmi#scooby doo: mystery incorporated#daphne blake#abused kid with zero self-worth: casually; gruesomely self-harms in the *second episode* unprompted to get an extra clue#me: 😰😰😰😰#someone help her please actually god#i know it tends to get overshadowed by people being annoyed by the Obnoxious Het Teen Drama and all; and i get it#but like. that's a major manifestation of her *larger* deep-running issues; sexism and misogyny have shaped how she tries to deal with them#and it kind of sits less and less right with me these days that of her and fred#she's the one whose issues get dismissed and ignored with 'i don't care about boring hets so i'm not gonna bother 🙄'#whereas fred's issues which his involvement in that subplot are an expression of get explored and taken seriously#and treated as Tragic Best Boy Protect Him#(which by itself i don't have a problem with! he is very dubious and fucked up but he's also really tragic and likable)#especially since he's a *catalyst for or outright cause of* a lot of the heartbreaking stuff that happens with her in the series#i understand he has issues of his own and the misogyny is a manifestation of his own abuse history; that toxic masculinity has harmed him#but it is a plain and simple fact that he is a misogynistic abuser toward daphne in sdmi. like. he just is. that's a thing#and i think it is. revealing. that of the characters involved in the Annoying Het Subplot(tm)#it's the man who is a perpetrator of misogyny who's considered Worth Exploring the Tragedy of Despite the Annoying Het Subplot#and the girl who is a victim of misogyny; in ways her entire life is shaped by and suffocated in; is fair game to ignore the tragedy of#and the way the most i have ever seen her get in the show or otherwise on that front is#She Deserves a Better Boyfriend and to Be Confident in Herself Hell Yeah Girl Power#and not 'the way this kid's parents talk to her in the car outside the college is a punch in the gut to watch'#........bothers me. it bothers me.#anyway#misogyny cw#abuse mention cw#abuse apologism cw#self-harm cw#SDMItag
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made the realization my vampire story would work best as a video game and now i can't stop thinking about it
#personal#like. vtm meets cyberponk. do you understand#it would be very focused on prioritizing... because you do play as a fully established character#but you get a bunch of jobs to take care of and you have to decide what you do first and most importantly how you solve it#you can combine certain jobs to do at once to save yourself time and effort but everything you do comes with consequences#if you ignore a problem for too long or deal with it poorly it will come back to bite you in the ass later. you can lose friends and such#basically you have it all from the start and then gradually like. work your way towards a single ending#locking yourself out of other paths because of the choices that you make etc etc and so on#friendships can help you out but they can also get in the way of other things so you have to think about like#how far you're willing to let yourself get distracted. but also no distractions is also a bad way to go at it because you'll end up alone#it would have a wide variety of endings but i suppose the 'canon' one would be the one where everything works out#because of the whole already established character thing. and also this is not real this is my story so i can do what i want#if it was an actual video game it wouldn't have a canon ending but it's never gonna happen so i can say it has a canon ending#but yeah you can play as heavenly the vampire hunter or as sun the vampire and then you get cool vampire abilities :]#i do like the idea of romance availability but they're different depending on who you play as#valentine can be romanced by both but he's a little brat so idk if you'd want that#isaac can only be romanced by heavenly because isaac is a gay man. valeska can be romanced by sun only because#valeska and heavenly are exes. so you can have a one night stand with her as heavenly and then she ghosts you LMAO#you can go into clubs... you can play carousel with npcs. it would be a very immersive experience#if you hang out at certain clubs too much then other vampire factions will be warier of you when you visit their club instead#you can forge alliances to be allowed into certain areas in town. you can disguise yourself. you have to hide your weapons#there's actual ways you can research locations or people involved in gigs so you can prepare yourself properly and potentially like#learn new things that open up a new way to deal with a situation#sometimes you have to wait until nighttime to be able to go somewhere because it's quieter around those hours. or vice versa#sometimes you have to wait a few days before someone can meet with you but if you miss the meeting you have to reschedule#and then you have to wait even longer. and some quests don't give you that much time so then you'd have to improvise#being spotted in a location can be dealt with by wiping security footage / killing the person who saw you. or just reloading your save#but if you've been spotted and you don't take care of it then that will ALSO have consequences. etc etc and so on#difficulty level in the game would determine how generous the game is surrounding stealth / time for quests / resilience of the guy you pla#and it wouldn't like. necessarily turn enemies into bullet sponges because that's lazy. it's much more fun to change other things
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just went through all my ao3 fics and edited all the tags because i feel like i overtag a lot and it always bothered me. tbf the most overtagging happens in my relationship/character tags but i find it super difficult to judge who/which relationship is important. like friendships are So Important in my fics i dont feel like i cant tag less there? especially my longer fics. amtc james&sirius and black brothers are in my mind at least if not more important than literally amtc jegulus. i know its a jegulus fic but also jegulus is just the catalyst for other relationship dynamics. how do you tag that stuff
#honestly same with operation wanker#i finally put the wolfstar tag at the end of the relationship list#because genuinely when i first wrote the fic i debated leaving that out completely because i just do not focus on them At All#but considering theyre the very reason for the whole fic i couldnt not tag them#but james and sirius in operation wanker are as important to me as jegulus#and they go through a similar plot line of developing and changing so ?? yk???#idk how to tag i am really bad at it honestly#as you can tell i have exam season#hence me doing anything but the things i should be doing#hp#fic rant#i need a tag for general ramblings#i did take out a lot of character tags in a lot of my fics#like in some of them i literally now have a relationship tag but not the character tag which im also still not sure at#like on lies and spies still has the peter&marlene tag but it doesnt have a marlene tag anymore#and im still debating if i should also take the relationship tag out but also its important for peters actions??? idkkk man i am bad at thi#took out a lot of tags from amtc because i just felt it was too long overall#like i do think they were not completely unimportant but it was such a wall of text i felt a bit overwhelmed#tagging fics where its literally just 2 characters and theyre romantically/sexually involved is so much easier#like on high delight the tags make perfect sense because its very obvious what the focus is on#but i so seldomly write fics that are confined to just a ship (/) dynamic#maybe this is my arospec that ive been eyeing for the past 10 years and keep ignoring showing#i just care about writing relationships (&) so much more honestly#ok thats actually a lie im not tooo good with just platonic fics but i like writing romantic stuff in the context of friendgroups#i like characters having to keep secrets from the people they usually tell evrything to#love exploring characters finding out they have friendship boundaries they previously didnt know about#love writing about trust and and conflicting feelings and having to make choices#also lmao very iconic of me to have 5km of tags on a post of me saying i am prone to overtagging. really proving my own point here
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hoo boy
that is
quite a take sitting there in the leon kennedy tag
what’s with all the really bad takes happening on tumblr today, did i miss a memo or a meeting or something
should i also put forward a really bad faith and stupid take about something, just so i can fit in
i’ll have to think about what i can say
#imagine misunderstanding leon's character so much that you think that ada is the only source of conflict he has in his arc#that he has absolutely nothing going on outside of her#and without her he'd just be a shallow cookie-cutter good guy archetype#holy shit dude#where does one obtain a drug that would make one so delusional#this just further proves the point that aeon nation doesn't care about either leon or ada as characters#and just wants to ship two pretty people together and gloat that it's canon#like i personally have done more in this fandom over the past three months in service of aeon as a ship#than aeon fandom has done in the past 25 years of its existence#AND I FUCKING HATE THE SHIP BRO#but i actually give a shit about both characters involved in it so#what a strange place i've found myself in
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