#HE ALSO SAID BLACK PEOPLE NEEDED TO BE GIVEN MONEY TO GET OUT OF POVERTY AND JUSR AAAAAAAAA | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

smytherines · 5 months ago

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Ugh I had a huge long response typed up and tumblr I guess hates me because it just randomly refreshed and I lost it all? Anyways mars you can't cook like this and keep it in the tags, that's illegal

I know I've said this so many times, but if they didn't love and trust each other, if they didn't have as close to a real relationship as they could have given the time/their jobs, then none of the rest of the show makes sense to me.

Curt falling apart with grief and guilt and shame for four years because he thinks he got Owen killed only makes sense to me if he genuinely loved Owen. Curt hallucinating Owen and feeling so defeated by the way he failed Owen even four years later, only makes sense to me if he loved Owen. Curt believing that Owen would put his drink down and turn his life around only makes sense to me if they had the kind of relationship where Curt knew that Owen cared enough about him to try to help him, to be concerned about him, to want him to move on and be happy again (and for me A1P1 establishes that Owen did)

Owen becoming obsessed with the fact that Curt dismissed his concerns and lied to him and then left him to die, Owen festering in that betrayal, that only makes sense to me if Owen trusted Curt to begin with. If he truly thought that at the very least Curt would always have his back. Owen becoming a black hole of rage and pain and inflicting that pain on others, but still being unable to actually kill Curt any of the many many times he has an opportunity to do so, his hesitation and the way his voice breaks on the staircase, those things only make sense to me if he truly loved Curt. If some part of him buried way deep down is still hurt by what Curt did to him because he loved and trusted Curt.

There's also the issue of putting our modern ideas of healthy vs toxic relationships on this historical (fictional) gay relationship.

Realistically, what can they do here? Go to therapy? No. Talk to their friends and family about their relationship issues? Hell no. They aren't even supposed to be in a relationship- they're two men, they work for different governments, getting any form of outside support for any of their individual issues is not possible.

There's a parallel to this even in modern relationships. Mental healthcare is expensive, it is entirely out of reach for billions of people around the world. And depending on what your particular issues are (especially if you don't have money for concierge healthcare) seeking mental health treatment often puts you at risk for further harm.

There's a misconception that if you have an issue you go to a doctor and the doctor helps you, but very often this is not true, and a big part of why that is is that the mental health field has not significantly updated its view of certain conditions and patients since the 1950s-1960s. One terrible example is how middle class white boys will get diagnosed with ADHD and given stimulants to treat it, while girls will often go undiagnosed until they start to break down emotionally and then get misdiagnosed with a mood or personality disorder, while Black kids will get diagnosed with so-called "conduct disorders" like oppositional defiant disorder, even if all three groups of kids have the exact same symptoms. The mental healthcare system is so abusive to so many that a lot of patients just give up seeking care entirely.

Those people don't necessarily have toxic, horrible, unhealthy relationships, even if they don't meet the definition of "healthy." There are relationships where each partner functions as a caregiver to the other partner. Where they genuinely love each other and try their best to be good to each other, but also have no other option but to try to hold their partner together with their bare hands, even though they need help too. There are loving relationships where the strain of poverty or disability or any number of other issues make things difficult, where it is bumpy and stressful, where two people are so damaged that they don't even know what is making things go so wrong, nevermind how to fix it.

That's kinda how I picture pre-canon curtwen. That in another world, another era, they could have I dunno gone to therapy or whatever and built something that could be categorized as healthy. But that because of the jobs they have and the era they live in and their illegal relationship, the best they can do is try to hold each other together, even from half a world away. I watch A1P1 and see two people who are delighted to see each other again, who adore each other (even if they are totally fucked up little murder gremlins on behalf of their respective governments). Two people who are working perfectly in sync, who are comfortable and grinning at each other and warm and familiar. Two people who are truly friends and partners.

But (in my interpretation at least) Agent Curt Mega definitely has ADHD, and when Cynthia puts Curt down and tries to convince Owen to join A.S.S. (even though Owen immediately shuts it down and treats it as ridiculous) Curt gets jealous about it. He gets that twinge of rejection sensitive dysphoria, he insults his partner and starts making reckless decisions to prove how he is actually a total badass, that he's Totally Not Bothered by it. Its the kind of little fit that would probably blow over in under an hour, but unfortunately on this occasion it just snowballs into something horrible and tragic.

Here's the thing: none of us are right. We each have our own interpretations of their relationship based on less than ten minutes of seeing them try to escape a building they're about to blow up. There is no canon-correct answer here. Everyone is going to see what they want to see in this relationship- me included.

For me, the story is beautiful and meaningful and tragic not because they had a weird little toxic situationship where they mostly made each other miserable, but because they did really, truly, adore each other. For me, the fact that they were able to sustain something despite it being illegal and long-distance and completely irrational, is a sign of how much they loved each other. I see it as an indication of how much they loved each other that *all of this* all the shit they went through post-fall, is what it took to finally break them.

Tumblr won't let me post this from my drafts, but @uhhhitsme this is me responding to what you wrote yesterday!

I think that's right though. This is a long distance relationship. They live an ocean apart, they only get to see each other when their countries deem it necessary to work together. They have to have their entire relationship in secret because it is illegal. And probably treason because they work for two different countries. It is super turbo illegal.

I mean, long distance couples who don't have all those additional issues, who can call or video chat or whatever every day if they choose to, who have support networks there for them to lean on, (who aren't gay spies in the 1950s), most of the time they still don't make it because the distance is just too much to overcome. But Curt and Owen made it work. Even if it was messy and they were both assholes and nothing about it was rational. They made it work.

We don't know how long Curt and Owen were together before the fall, but I'm guessing it was at least a couple of years? They work incredibly well together, they're bantering and giving these goofy lovesick grins to each other (they make me sick)

Even when they bicker it feels like an old married couple. And it has to be that way for the show to make sense. We get less than ten minutes to establish their relationship, and this little section of the show is what gives the staircase scene true dramatic weight. Because there is so much fucking chemistry in that first ten minutes, such a sense of intimacy between them, that when Curt says "the feelings we had" the audience is already there. We don't need to be convinced (especially queer viewers who clocked this shit right away) because yeah of course these two were together.

They were able to keep this thing going off of maybe a couple of days together every few months? Days where they were mostly risking their lives and killing people and getting shot/stabbed/tortured and then hooking up in a hotel room or safe house or whatever.

One thing I think about a lot is if they were able to be that close to each other, function that well together, be so fucking familiar and warm with each other with just those little scraps of time together, I can't even imagine what they'd be like if they actually had time to just be together. Time to learn to be in a relationship. There's a line from Black Box that goes like "a real relationship- the kind of thing with a permanent address," and that's what Curt and Owen never got to have, and its the kind of thing you have to learn, you have to practice.

That's tough though, because I also think Curt's inherent restlessness would make it very difficult for him to settle down into a comfortable quiet life away from everything. I think he's the kind of guy who theoretically wants the comfort and happiness of a happy little domestic situation, wants to be loved and wanted, but it would be torture for him to have to stay in the same place for very long. At least as a younger man. He wants the idea of it. He wants it emotionally, but couldn't handle it practically. What he truly wants is for he and Owen to eternally live out their glory days together as the world's greatest spies- constant adrenaline and pressure and excitement.

This is pure headcanon, but I picture Owen as the kind of guy who has never wanted any of that. Home is where he keeps his shit in between missions. He doesn't want a happy little domestic life, he wants to do the job he's good at until he dies. Until he meets Curt. Then he starts wanting all sorts of things he knows he can never have. He wants to keep Curt safe, wants to know that they'll be able to see each other whenever they want, they'd have control of their own lives instead of being controlled by their agencies. He wants to stop having to work so hard and think so much and constantly constantly plan for the worst.

So it's difficult to say, but in my heart I do think that if they had more time, both in the pre-fall relationship and, y'know, Curt not putting a bullet in Owen's head, I think they could have figured it out. I think if they were able to sustain the feelings they had for so long on so little actual contact, then it would be difficult and painful and even more messy than before, but eventually they could move on to something better.

I think they loved each other enough to try, but after everything they had each been through in their four years apart, after the ways they had hurt each other and broken each other's trust, they just... couldn't see that in the moment. Which is pretty tragic to me.

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stackthedeck · 3 years ago

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Please?????

[Image ID: a screenshoot of tumblr tags reading "I will pop off about Spider-Man's relationship to 'attractiveness' and how that relates to the messaging of classism" end ID]

Oh man you have no idea the gift you have given me!!

Okay, so Raimi's have the strongest class messaging of any of the spider-man movies. Tobey Maguire's Peter Parker is really the only Peter I believe is poor. This Peter delivers pizzas, gets yelled at by his bosses, throws himself into an underground fighting ring for cash, and sells pictures of himself to a guy that hates his guts. This is the most powerful way to express Peter's poverty in my opinion because it captures the soul-sucking feeling of degrading yourself for a paycheck. Like JJ Jameson is a big part of these movies. The Daily Bugle makes Spider-man's job actively harder by destroying his reputation, but Peter needs the money to take care of aunt May and himself. Peter is a genius but he's failing out of college because he has to work to pay for school and be spider-man. Also, this Peter is deeply connected to the working people of New York. Every time he's fighting an evil billionaire, the people help him in some way (see the amazing train scene). When I say Tobey's Peter is the best Peter Parker, this is what I mean.

What most people mean when they say Tobey's Peter is the best Peter, they mean he's a total loser and that Peter Parker should be an incel. The fact of the matter is that in the Raimi movies, the universe hates Peter. Like everything that could go wrong with Peter's life, does go wrong (insert that edit of it's a hard knock life) and I'm alright with that, that's a very spider-man thing. But we are very aware of who is making his life miserable: the rich and the hot. The rich is every villain and landlord of this series (except sandman, but like that's a different essay). The hot are all the people that bully Peter. And hey listen, Tobey Maguire is a very handsome man, but objectively speaking, he's the least attractive person in these movies. Flash, his high school bully, is hotter than him and gets the girl. Harry is his rich hot best friend who steals his childhood crush. JJ Jameson's son is hotter than him and gets the girl. Eddie Brock is hotter than him and gets the well not the girl actually but the freelance job. It's really easy film language to convey that Peter is the underdog. In my personal opinion, I think it's hammered in a little too strong and distracts from the classism message. Like what if Harry did actually get MJ because he has money and can support her dreams of becoming a Broadway star and not just because he's a cute boy that can talk to girls? This doesn't apply to the women of these films, there's no petty comment about Gwen Stacy being prettier than MJ. In fact, the fact that MJ is pretty is usually brought up against her (when Norman accuses her of being after Harry's money). That being said MJ most connects with Peter when she's defying what is beautiful (Harry wants her to wear the black dress, she wears red. the upside-down kiss happens when she is soaking wet, etc). Ultimately, these films were pandering to the kind of dudes they thought liked superhero movies, nerds that can't talk to girls. It's fine, it works, but it only gets more distracting the more years go by. It's very easy to watch these films and say "Peter just can't get his life together because he's a nice guy and also spider-man" and that completely misses the point! The point is he's poor!! But it is hammered in so strongly that this Peter has a bad hand in life that it no longer feels like rich vs poor, it feels like Peter vs everyone else.

The Webb movies have a different problem. For these movies, Beauty is equated with goodness, but I honest to god don't think they knew they were doing this. The class messaging is there, but not as strong as the Raimi movies. They say this Peter is poor, but we don't see him working shit jobs. We see him unable to buy chocolate milk because he's short two cents and that is directly linked to Uncle Ben's death. Tobey's Peter's Ben dies after Peter isn't paid what he's deserved. But Andrew's Peter's Ben dies after he is refused something. It's a subtle difference, but it's like Raimi defines poverty as the presence of something and Webb defines it as a lack of something. Peter doesn't start with selling pictures of spider-man, he's selling pictures of the lizard. The cops hate Peter more than the media in these movies. This Peter doesn't fight evil billionaires as much as Tobey's Peter. He fights petty car theft and Dr. Kurtis Connor in the first film, then Electro-a worker who was hurt by a workplace accident, and Harry Osborn. The villains confuse any class messaging because sometimes he's fighting people who are just trying to get by the same as him, other times it's a billionaire or wealthy scientist. In the first movie, there's this amazing scene with all the construction workers of New York lining up their cranes for spider-man and the audience still feels the connection Peter has with the working-class people. (Personal opinion here, but I think Webb could have just shifted things a little and this could have been a spider-man vs the police movie and the theming of the movie would be so much more compelling, but it's 2012, we can't have that)

Okay but equating beauty with goodness. Andrew Garfield is beautiful, Emma Stone is beautiful, and I wouldn't recast them for the world. But all the villains spider-man fights, are not just unattractive, but disfigured in some way. Dr. Connor is missing his arm then mutants himself into a lizard. Electro looks like the perfect idea of a nerd and then he has a workplace accident that gets him fired and his superpower design is an ugly mess of CGI (no way home, thanking so much for upgrading his design). Harry Osborn has a genetic disease that disfigured him as the movie goes on. Like even the car thief that killed uncle Ben has a tattoo which wasn't a conventionally attractive thing. I don't think this was intentional, but there is this weird undercurrent of ableism in these films. The Webb movies don't have a strong message behind them, but Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone really carry the movies (and that's why a really good anti-cop movie could be there because Gwen has to choose between her father and spider-man) These movies don't say rich vs poor, they kind of say good vs evil, but it mostly reads as Peter vs whoever gets in his way.

But don't even get me started on how bad the MCU fumbles classism when it comes to Peter Parker!

#thank you so much for letting me eleborate #spiderman #peter parker #tobey maguire #andrew garfield #asks #for context I adore all of these movies #even spider-man 3 #I just think that there's room for improvement #and spider-man is one of the most interesting superheroes from an ideological stand point

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le0watch · 3 years ago

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langa grimaces as he steps out of his carriage, shoes chuffing against the pavement ground. the sounds of downtown london fills his ears, ranging from the chitchat of workers and civilians to the clomping of horse's hooves on the streets. it's raining today- of course it has to be raining. why wouldn't it be on his already least favorite day of the week?

his servant steadily holds an umbrella over his and his mother's heads to keep the raindrops from drenching them. he, of course, isnt saved from getting wet, but this is his job. langa will just make sure to pay him extra for his work this month, and make sure that he doesn't catch a cold from the cool breezes brushing by.

today, he and his mother are visiting the busy streets of london per her request. since langa's father died and the large erikson heritage was passed down to langa, shes been asking him for numerous favors, including this weekly walk through the busy, muggy streets of london.

now, langa doesn't hate the people or the peasants or whatever you want to call them. he's just not a fan of the constant rain and loud chatter of said people around him. they're all incredibly loud and irritating, and sometimes he'd like them to be quiet while he and his mother are there. but that's not the point of their trips. his mother came from poverty before langa's father had found her and fallen for her, before he'd proposed to her. moving from japan to england during this time had given his mother a horrible disadvantage against any of the nobility or even white people of the lower classes.

but his father had been infatuated with her, and she became infatuated by him. they married for love, a rare occurence these days. then, they'd had him, and he loved his large home and the days he spent with his mother in the garden or the days he went with his father to the various horse stables they owned.

he can't visit the stables with his father anymore, however. because his father died a year ago, leaving their large fortune on the shoulders of langa, barely old enough to chose what happens with that wealth.

he insists in private that his mother make mistakes of the financial decisions, since he's still in the process of learning his family's buisness. she agreed to do it, in exchange for trips to the busy streets of london, where they could make donations to small charities or poor families that need the help.

honestly, it's a win win situation for langa. he doesn't have to fully handle the responsibilities of his family's fortune, and he has always wanted to help the poor, like his father. because when his father was living, he would hold monthly giveaways of some of their stables' foals to the poorest of the city.

other families of nobility often turned their noses up at what langa's father did for the poor, not that his father ever cared.

that's what probably got him killed.

"where shall we visit first, mother?" langa asks, holding his arm out for her take. she loops her arm through his, smiling up at him for his manners.

"i was thinking the orphanage down the road," she replies as they begin to walk. their servant- kaoru, langa's favorite servant and teacher- follows close behind to keep the umbrella over their heads the entire time. he wants to tell kaoru that he could cover himself with his own umbrella, but he already knows that he would be denied. kaoru has always been very serious about his job.

"as you wish," he says with a small smile.

their visit to the orphanage is longer than they'd originally intended. the owner of the orphanage needed help moving some heavier objects and boxes, and so langa had stepped in. she was instantly grateful to him, and only became moreso when he handed her a large wad of cash.

"thank you so much, mister erikson," she said, bowing low to him. his mother was in the background, entertaining the children. "are you sure there's no way we can repay you?"

"you can by taking care of the sick children here," langa replied, and she nodded eagerly.

they'd left soon afterwards, kaoru waiting outside for them. his long, pink hair is pulled back in a ponytail today, and he's wearing his favorite kamino. he was also born in japan, like his mother, and had been a friend of hers before she'd moved here. he moved not long after her, and she hired him as their servant and langa's tutor. he's been around for as long as langa could remember.

suddenly, there's a flash of red ahead of them, and a kid- not of the orphanage- rams into his side, knocking them both over in the process. langa hits the muddy ground with a grunt, before the kid is apologizing profusely, bowing his head continuously. he's in scrappy clothes, and is soaked to the bone.

"it's fine," langa tells him, and the kid relaxes. "don't worry about it." he wipes the mud from his shirt as kaoru helps him stand, and his mother hurries over to look him over. they're all soaked at this point.

"sorry again!" the kid exclaims, before running off.

with langa's donation wallet in hand.

normally, langa wouldnt bat an eye at stolen money. his family's wealth is nearly endless. but that's the money he's using for his trip with his mom today- and he doesn't have anything extra. he doesn't want to cut this trip short- his mom loves it too much.

he takes off after the kid without much thought, ignoring the calls from his mother and servant. the kid lets out a loud laugh once he notices he's being chased, before two more kids that look identical to him fall in step behind him. langa's eyes widen- they have this thought out.

they end up running through twisting alleyways, and langa is hardly keeping up. every time he gets close, they duck away or slide around another corner, throwing him off. he grits his teeth together, lungs beginning to burn from the exertion.

the kids run across a crowded street, easily weaving through its crowded traffick. langa skids you a stop just before crossing, before giving chase once more. he reaches a hand out, about to grab one of the buggers- when they suddenly leap at a building's front, scaling its side like a ladder. he stops in his tracks, gaping as they reach the roof, pointing at his with laughter.

he's so busy gaping, he doesn't even notice he's still standing in the middle of busy traffick until a coachman is shouting at him to move, with the horses screeching with terror. his heart stops beating- oh god, he's about to die like his father had, leaving his mom all alone. he already knows he won't be able to move in time.

but then something- or rather, someone- crashes into his back, knocking him to safer ground instantly. the horses and carriage roar past where he'd just been, and he pants on the ground, the person who'd saved his life still over him.

"wow- you nearly died," the person- man- above him says between pants, finally peeling away from him. langa pushes up with shaking arms, bruises and scrapes burning at his skin. geez, kaoru is going to kill him- he ripped his pants. he then looks up at his savior, and all thoughts leave his mind.

the most gorgeous man he's ever seen sits in front of him, soaked curly hair still a brilliant shade of bright red, poking out from the under side of a grey ball cap. his eyes are a beautiful honey amber, shining with mischief and a kind soul. his tan skin is peppered with freckles, along the cheeks on his face and his shoulders and forearms. he has a crooked grin as bright as the sun- making langa almost believe that it had stopped raining and the clouds had opened up. he's wearing a thin and torn short sleeved shirt, a pair of suspenders over his shoulders keeping his pair of black pants up.

lord have mercy on langa's soul. he's already fallen for the stranger that had saved his life. it didn't even matter that he was a man. langa could feel his heart thudding in his chest, and heat gathering in his cheeks. he can't even respond. luckily, the man- around his age- does it for him.

"lucky i was there to save your ass, huh?" he says with a bright chuckle. he has the same accent as his mother's and kaoru's, with a similar facial structure to both. he must be from japan too, then. langa opens and closes his mouth like a fish out of water, and the redhead's grin only widens. he reaches a hand out, wiping a splotch of mud from langa's paper white cheek. the heat in langa's cheeks worsens. the redhead then looks up at the roof where the kids are still perched at, watching with wide eyes. "they took something of yours, huh?"

"y- yeah," langa replies shakily, wanting to hit himself for sounding so pathetically like a schoolgirl with a crush. the guy doesnt seem to take notice- either that, or he doesn't point it out.

"right. be right back," the redhead says, before slipping past langa and leaping onto the side of the building. the kids at the top screech with surprise, before disappearing just as the redhead reaches the top, leaping over while calling, "tom, rick, toby- get your asses back here!"

horrifyingly, the kids leap from one rooftop to the next, somehow not slipping and falling off the edge. and even more horrifyingly, the redhead follows with amazing grace, landing perfectly, grabbing to of the kid's by their shoudlers. the third stops, dropping his head like a kid caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

"right. which of you have it," the redhead asks, loud enough for langa to hear. langa is surprised by the strength the redhead has- he's able to lift two children clear off the ground without much effort. his arms aren't shaking or wavering at all! the kids don't answer, pouting. "don't make me talk to your mum about this-"

"toby has it!" two of the kids cry out at the same time, and the third glares at them both with betrayal.

the redhead sets the two kids he's holding back down, and holds his hand out expectantly. the kid- toby- pouts some more before relunctantly dropping langa's wallet into the redhead's hand.

"thank you very much," the redhead says, pocketing langa's wallet. he points at each kid individually. "i catch you three stealing from nice men like him again, and i'll stop bringing home candy for you after work."

"no!" all three kids cry at once. the redhead tuts.

"right. don't do it again," he says firmly, before shooing the triplets away.

the redhead then slides down the side of the building, hit the wet ground with a splash. langa watches with disbelief as he casually saunters over, handing him his wallet back once he's reached him.

"sorry about them," the redhead says. "they live with just their mother, so they take to stealing to help her out occasionally. they shouldn't bug you again." he chuckles. "but if you ever need eyes and ears around london- hire those three. they're amazing at snooping."

langa clears his throat, forcing himself to stop staring at the redhead's pretty face as if he was in a trance. he slides his wallet into his suit pocket yo make sure it's not stolen again.

"thank you," he says, gratefully bowing his head. "i appreciate your help- what was your name?"

"reki kyan," the redhead replies with pride. "i work on the train tracks and take care of the kids around these parts best i can."

"well, mister kyan, you're amazing," langa tells him, surprising himself with his boldness. reki's eyes widen, and his eyes dart away quickly. langa then holds a hand out to him, the other behind his back. "my name is langa erikson. it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

reki chuckles awkwardly, scratching at the back of his head. "pleasure's all mine," he replied, and shakes langa's offered hand. "you can call me reki, by the way."

"then you may call me langa, reki," he responds graciously. reki averts his eyes again as they release each other's hands. "is there some way i can repay you?"

"don't worry about it!" reki says quickly, throwing his hands up. oh, he's wearing a pair of thick, black gloves, langa has just realized. and his biceps are absolutely huge with muscles- probably from working on tracks all day. "just don't get those boys in trouble. they mean well for their mum."

"wouldnt even dream of getting them in trouble," langa replies lightly. then he frowns. he doesn't want to go home and never see this sunny man ever again. he's a delight to look at- ruby red hair and honey amber eyes with a sunshine smile. it would be a shame to never seen him again. "though, i must insist on repaying you." he has a brilliant idea of doing just that, too.

reki shakes his head again, desperatly. "no, really, there's no need-"

"why don't you come and stay at my home, so that i may repay you with dinner?" langa says smoothly, once more surprising himself with his boldness. he's basically asking this man to live with him and have multiple dates with him. hopefully, the redhead doesn't realize that, yet, since gay relationships are frowned upon. but perhaps- later on. "you may stay in one of my rooms, take off from your job, and have warm and fresh meals everyday."

reki's eyes widen significantly, his jaws snapping shut. oh no, maybe langa was laying too much on him at once. "i- uh-"

"please, it would mean the world to me in repaying you this way," langa says, to further convince him. "and it would be a small exchange to you after saving my life."

the redhead scratches at the back of his head again, and langa can't help but stare at the way his bicep moves to complete the action. lord have mercy, reki was good looking. he's always tried to repress his gay feelings and desires, but this ripped train track worker with burning red hair is destroying all of his effort in one foul swoop.

finally, reki lets out a heavy sigh of defeat, lowering both of his arms. "you won't be happy unless i accept?" he asks, and when langa nods eagerly, he lets out another sigh, shutting his eyes. "okay, i will. i'll try not to be too much of an issue while i stay-"

langa cuts him off by catching one of his gloved hands in his, holding it up between them. he offers the redhead a small smile, excitement rolling in his gut. "you could be no trouble at all," langa insists, and reki draws back a little, and is that a tin of red coloring his freckled cheeks. langa sure hopes it is.

and that's how langa takes home a gorgeous redhead, who had in fact, saved his life.

#this is longer than i intended #whoops #sk8 #sk8 the infinity #renga #reki kyan #langa hasegawa #snowgear #my writing #my drabbles #au

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nestasgalpal · 4 years ago

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Your precious High Lord [Nessian fic]

Masterlist | AO3

Sinopsis: So this is a fix-it fic where I give my version of the scene where Nesta calls Rhysand an asshole and Cassian defends him and tells Nesta that everyone hates her 🤡🤡 The idea is to just fix the scene, so everything else (aka Cassian telling her that and Nesta leaving the room etc) stil happens. I just want Nesta to verbalize why she doesn’t like Rhysand, since nobody seems to understand her reasons.

Tagging: @gwynriel @rhaenystargaryn @clolikescloquetas @amelievrstr @t8astr8ng @wanderlustlastsforever @saltydreamcollector @lordlorcan @esrahiba @queenestarcheron @ko0mbayamylord @poisonous-bloom @jemstan300

I might fix the Amren confrontation scene too, so let me know if you want to be removed or added to the tag list ^^

Azriel was having lunch with them, giving Cassian the details for the mission he was going into. Nesta maintained her silence as she slid into her chair, picked up her fork, and dug into the fillet of beef and roasted asparagus.

Cassian cleared his throat and said to Azriel, “How long will you be gone?”

“I’m not sure.” The shadowsinger’s eyes bore into her before he added, “Vassa was right to suspect something deadly amiss. Things are dangerous enough over there that it would be wiser for me to keep my base here at the House and winnow back and forth.”

Curiosity bit deep, but Nesta said nothing. Vassa—she hadn’t seen the enchanted human queen since the war had ended. Since the young woman had tried to speak to her about how wonderful Nesta’s father had been, how he had been a true father to her, helped her and won her this temporary freedom, and on and on until Nesta’s bones were screaming to get away, her blood boiling to think that her father had found his courage for someone other than her and her sisters. That he’d been the father she had needed—but for someone else. He had let their mother die in his refusal to send his merchant fleet hunting for a cure for her, had fallen into poverty and let them starve, but had decided to fight for this stranger? This nobody queen peddling a sad tale of betrayal and loss?

That thing deep in Nesta stirred, but she ignored it, pushed it down as best she could without the distraction of music or sex or wine. She took a sip of her water, letting it cool her throat, her belly, and supposed that would have to be enough.

“What’d Rhys say about it?” Cassian asked around a mouthful of food.

“Who do you think insisted I not risk a base over there?”

“Protective bastard.” A note of affection rang in Cassian’s words, though.

Silence fell again. Azriel nodded at her. “What happened to you?”

She knew what he meant: the black eye that was finally fading. Her hands and chin had healed, along with the bruising on her body, but the black eye had turned greenish. By tomorrow morning, it’d be gone entirely. “Nothing,” she said without looking at Cassian.

“She fell down the stairs,” Cassian said, not looking at her, either.

Azriel’s silence was pointed before he asked, “Did someone … push you?”

“Asshole,” Cassian growled.

Nesta lifted her eyes from her plate enough to note the amusement in Azriel’s gaze, even though no smile graced his sensuous mouth. Cassian went on, “I told her earlier today: if she’d bother to train, she’d at least have bragging rights for the bruises.”

Azriel took a calm sip of his water. “Why aren’t you training, Nesta?”

“I don’t want to.”

“Why not?”

Cassian muttered, “Don’t waste your breath, Az.”

She glared at him. “I’m not training in that miserable village.”

Cassian glared right back. “You’ve been given an order . You know the consequences. If you don’t get off that fucking rock by the end of this week, what happens next is out of my hands.”

“So you’ll tattle to your precious High Lord?” she crooned. “Big, tough warrior needs oh-so-powerful Rhysand to fight his battles?”

“Don’t you fucking talk about Rhys with that tone” Cassian snarled.

“Or what?” Nesta snapped. “Rhys is an asshole. He is an arrogant, preening asshole.”

Azriel sat back in his seat, eyes simmering with anger, but said nothing.

“That’s bullshit,” Cassian spat, the Siphons on the backs of his hands burning like ruby flames. “You know that is bullshit, Nesta."

“I hate him,” she seethed.

“Good. He hates you, too,” Cassian shot back. “Everyone fucking hates you. Is that what you want? Because congratulations, it’s happened.”

Azriel let out a long, long breath.

Cassian’s words pelted her, one after another. Hit her somewhere low and soft, and hit hard. Her fingers curled into claws, scraping along the table. Rage emerged, boiling in her veins. She tried to contain herself, but after months of drinking herself into oblivion, using alcohol to chain her feelings, her emotions, her nightmares, she was having trouble containing all the thoughts that were coming up her throat now that only water filled her cup. Nesta sensed her own anger rise to match Cassian’s.

“I’m done with you and your problems.” he finished.

The words rumbled between them. Nesta blinked. Azriel tensed, as if surprised.

Cassian aimed for the door, his pounding steps fading down the hall.

Nesta had never in her life tried to use her issues as an excuse. There was not one flaw in her character she didn’t know about. She was terrible to be around, and she was aware of it, but she had never expected people to try to understand where it all came from. On the contrary, she used it against every person that crossed her path, so they couldn’t get to see her aching heart. She wore her issues as an armour, so people never wanted to come closer and see why she was the way she was. Nesta had used her anger against almost every person she knew, but not once had she tried to use the cause of that rage, that infinite void in her chest, as an excuse.

But she was so sick of them, their patronizing, them projecting their own issues into her, that the seal that contained her darkest thoughts broke, and the words came out. Because if after everything she had given to them she still hadn’t made it up to Feyre, then there was absolutely nothing else for her to do. She had nothing left to give.

She wanted them to know what their victory cost her. If Cassian didn’t want to see on his own, she would make him.

“I gave my life for you. For all of you” Cassian halted in the archway of the door. Azriel’s eyes were fixed on her, even if her own stare had followed Cassian. “Even before the war, I tried to make it up to my sister for the four years she hunted for us.” Cassian’s body was almost lost in the shadows coming out of the hallway, but still close enough to the door that she could see his back, his wings, the tension in his muscles under his shirt.

“Your High Lord likes to pretend I’m nothing but a burden, but I’m only what you’ve made of me” When none of the illyrians interrupted her, Nesta felt seen for a moment.

Then, she realized the temperature in the room had dropped, her nails had left marks on the table, and Azriel’s shadows were ready to strike if needed.

Cassian was also still, ready to move.

They were not listening to her, they were waiting for her to attack. Like a wild animal. Like Rhysand in his studio, using his power on her to make her sit.

They expected nothing better from her than that. They expected her to unleash her wrath on them, and that’s what she was going to do. She didn’t care.

“To have any kind of contact with fae is a crime in the Mortal Lands. Did you know that?“

She wanted himto know she was talking about a time prior to their last day in the battlefield, because her sacrifice had not been only physical. No, she was talking about the things she did before, favours to help her sister’s cause. Their cause.

“I did everything you lot asked me to do. I sent the letters putting my neck on the line, and risking Elain’s future. I held the meeting at my house and let you come and go as you pleased.”

“Her future with Greysen would have made her miserable” Azriel’s icy tone surprised her. She merely blinked in his direction. His graceful face was covered in shadows of anger, too.

“That was the future she wanted. The one she chose”.

Azriel fought back “He came from a family of fae hunters”. Nesta wasn’t sure why he had gotten caught up on that detail, but she insisted. Now that she was a fae, she wanted to stay away from people like Greysen, but back then, his family and her money combined offered a safety she had desperately wanted.

“Which we both thought was a good thing. We thought Feyre had been killed by fae. We gave her a funeral” Cassian shuddered, his wings reacting to her words, tucking in a little more.

Nesta felt the cold of the room on her bones.

“I still let you into my house. Have you even considered how scared I was to let you in? Do you have any idea of the stories I grew up with about faeries and their tricks, their bloodthirst? I’ve met people who were taken by your kind… my kind, now, I guess. And I still helped you.” She didn’t tell them Rhysand was the one murdering her friend Clare and her family.

“Those stories are about faes like the ones in Hybern, of wild creatures near the Wall. Not Prythian’s folk” Cassian answered. His tone was dark and low, angry, insulted. But he was not screaming now.

“And how was I supposed to know?” She shouted. How was she supposed to know? His words almost made her doubt, thought. In the middle of her rage, his words almost made her doubt herself, like she might be overreacting, like she had gone crazy, maybe, paranoid. But she didn’t fall for it. She hadn’t been careful enough with them, their promises, their requests. “The only explanation I received when my sister came back after months with a new male in her arm -a male she had warned me about before her departure- was that the mortal realm was about to be destroyed by war, and she needed my help. So I helped her.”

It was not only anger or rage, but pure wrath what tinted her words. She could take the blame for all the things she did wrong -she would. She wanted to. But she was tired of them using her mistakes as an excuse to never acknowledge that fact that she had tried. Nesta had given them everything they had asked from her.

Azriel’s shadows were dangerously still. Nesta wasn’t sure if she had ever seen them like that. Cassian hadn’t moved either.

They were listening now.

”I know Feyre risked her life for us. So for her, I risked mine too. And Elain’s. The difference is that I actually died and became this,” she pointed at her own body, everyday stronger, gaining back the absurd beauty that belonged only to creatures from that side of the Wall. She hated it ”while Feyre found happiness. My sister chose to come back to this awful land full of monsters, I was dragged out of my bed and taken.”

“Nesta-” The shadowsinger didn’t move, but his tone had a cautious note to it. She knew her eyes were now quicksilver, flames dancing in them. She had seen herself in the mirror when that happened. She would be cautious too.

Nesta didn’t let Azriel finish. She wanted Cassian to hear the rest. Cassian, who had promised her a future and then vanished. Cassian, who would still defend his High Lord even when he physically threatened her. Nesta wanted him to hear her words until the end.

She wanted him to be as hurt as she was.

Something tucked in her stomach, warning her that both of them would regret it later if she went on, but her blood was boiling, so she did it anyway.

“Your High Lord of friend or brother or whatever he is to you, promised we would be guarded.”

Nesta let the words resonate. She didn’t need to remind any of them what had happened next. They knew. They had suffered from Hybern too that night.

She wanted them to remember. It wasn’t fair that they got to live their happy ever after, but she had to be consumed by it and left alone because she didn’t warm up the room with a smile like Elain did. It wasn’t fair that after everything she went through so they could live this perfect life, they still got to lock her up in a tower and make her the villain.

Nesta didn’t need to look into Cassian’s eyes to know he was remembering the same moment she went over and over in her nightmares every night. The moment she was dragged into the Cauldron. His body in the ground, covered in blood. His shredded wings. Her screams echoing in the hall.

“So the next time I call him an asshole -and I promise it will happen again- don’t you dare using that tone with me.”

There was a long silence. Silver fire remained in her eyes, but Cassian didn’t turn to meet her gaze. He only said “I won’t”, and stalked out.

Alone with Azriel, Nesta bared her teeth at him.

Azriel watched her with that cool quiet, keeping utterly still. Like he saw everything in her head. Her bruised heart.

She couldn’t bear it. So she stood, only two bites taken from her food, and left the room as well.

She returned to the library. The lights blazed as brightly as they had during the day, and a few lingering priestesses wandered the levels. She found her cart, filled again with books needing to be shelved.

No one spoke to her, and she spoke to no one as she began to work, with only the roaring silence in her head for company.

#fixing acosf

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eddiemunsonssoulmate · 5 years ago

Text

Can you save me from this nothing I've become?

Pairing: Kook!JJ x Pogue!Reader

Word Count: 4.5k

Summary: Life Swap AU. JJ grew up as a sheltered boy in a golden cage in Figure Eight and doesn’t even have a clue how life in the Cut is like. That is until he meets you, the perfect example for life in an abusive household drowning in poverty.

Warnings: A little bit of sadness, mentions of abuse, mostly fluffy tho

Available on: AO3

A/N: @outabanks asked me to write this for her so I tried. It’s a little different from anything else I’ve written so far and it was quite hard to find a tone for JJ now that he didn’t grow up in a physical abusive home and probably wouldn’t react with so much violence. I went with him feeling trapped, lonely and just sad inside due to him more suffering from emotional abuse. Also, switching POVs! Have fun!

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“Yes, Charlotte, I make sure to pick out my best outfit.” JJ groaned at his stepmother and went to his own bathroom to take a shower.

She was really annoying sometimes but after his mother and father divorced, he had been quick to replace her to maintain the image, dragging his mother’s name through mud in the process.

Figure Eight was a place where you grew up comfortably and never had to worry about a thing, at least on the outside.

JJ had grown up as the typical rich kid, getting everything he wanted. Problem was, he had been showered with money, not love, meaning he was missing what was most important. Back when his mother was still here, she had been the only person to show him what life really meant but she hadn’t been around for too long. Actually, he never got to know why she had left.

When Charlotte had married his father, it got even worse. Money here, fancy clothes there. She had never been a mother to him, she also never even tried as she wasn’t interested in him and only the money his dad had.

Whatever, he didn’t care about her either, he just wished she would leave him in peace once in a while but whenever he planned to go outside and do something she always came running and told him how to dress so he would look the best.

Tomorrow was another charity event and she had been stressing about the right clothes for weeks and he wouldn’t have any of it.

JJ got out of the shower with a sigh, towel around his waist and hair still dripping a little on the floor beneath him. He knew he had a good life, technically but sometimes he wondered how it felt to be a normal kid, growing up downtown or the Cut. He had never been down there actually, only heard that people from the Cut were poor but in comparison to the people from Figure Eight, poor couldn’t be too bad, right?

The reason he had never been down there was his father. He might look like the perfect father on the outside but on the inside, he was rotting away, fueled by his addiction for money and a wealthy lifestyle. One wrong step and JJ would suffer, in either emotional and very rarely physical way.

He was trapped in a golden cage he couldn’t escape until he was old enough which would still take a few more years. He just had to hold on, pretend to like his life when they were in public and just be done with it.

“We’re off then, son. See you tomorrow!” his father yelled from downstairs as JJ got dressed in some loser clothes so he could enjoy his time home alone.

“Yeah, have fun,” he said nonchalantly, not really caring about them leaving to visit the Cameron’s to talk about some preparations for tomorrow.

When he heard the front door shut he let out a sigh of relief and lay down on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. They wouldn’t be back until past midnight, that’s always how it went.

It was the perfect time to think about how lonely he actually was. His parents divorced, his mother not even calling or writing him, his dad only caring about money and his new wife. Friends? Sadly none. Kook Academy wasn’t the place where he wanted to be and he had a hard time blending in. It was a place where everyone was so narcissistic and wanted to show off all they had. Also really competitive people. Who had the bigger car, who had the more expensive outfit, things like that.

The only person he rarely talked to at events was Kiara, a wealthy girl from the neighborhood next to his own. He heard that she was hanging around with the Pogues in the Cut but he never asked her about it. They mostly just saw each other, nodded briefly and started drinking together. He listened to her rambling about saving turtles in a drunken state later on while he made flirty comments she always shut down very quickly. It was a simple way to pass the time while trying to get through the evening.

His father told him to befriend the Cameron’s but to be honest? No. Wheezie was just a little girl, Sarah was the princess around here and he had no desire to walk around with royalty and get judged by only that. Rafe was a dick, he had actually tried to befriend him when they were younger but that boy had massive issues.

So yep, loneliness it was. On the outside, his life was perfect but on the inside he was struggling. One day he would escape, go to the mainland and do his own thing. He wanted to get far away from Outer Banks and his father, all these riches he had. There was enough money on his own bank account to help him get started but JJ wanted to work with his own hands, get dirty, live the life he wanted.

Suddenly he heard a crash in the front yard and he shot up from his bed, opening the door to his balcony and looked outside, trying to see something in the darkness. It took a moment for his eyes to get used to the missing light before he scanned the garden. A vase was shattered to the left and to the right…

Shit!

Someone was face down in their pool and it looked like they weren’t moving.

JJ rushed downstairs and to the garden, quickly jumping in to get the person out. He put the body down next to the pool, slapping the cheek slightly. Luckily enough he had been quick enough and the person was waking up, spitting out a little bit of water.

“I don't think it’s the best time to take a swim,” he said while he sat there on his knees, looking over at the girl that couldn’t be older than he was.

She wasn’t answering, just looking at him for a moment before closing her eyes again, passing out once more.

When you woke up, you had no idea where you were. The bed under you felt softer than your own and you had a huge headache. Also, you were wearing comfortable clothes for some reason. Still a dream? Maybe.

You slowly opened your eyes, afraid that feeling of warmth would be gone now but it didn’t vanish. As you were looking around you noticed a boy on the ground, wrapped in a blanket and you blinked.

Looking down at your body told you that you were totally not wearing your own clothes. These were really fine and soft, it almost felt like they were giving you a warm hug.

It took awhile for you to connect the dots but then your face turned white. The boy on the ground had seen you naked.

“Perv!” you suddenly yelled and threw the pillow behind you at him which caused him to stir.

“What the fuck,” he mumbled and got up and for the first time, you got a good look at these blue eyes and the messy, blonde bed hair. “This is what I get for saving your ass?”

Saving your ass? You frowned and now that you thought about it, you had no idea what had happened last night after you ran away from home. You knew you had been drinking to try and stop the pain but then it all went black.

“What do you mean?” you asked and tilted your head a little to the side like a lost puppy.

“Apparently you were either really fond of having a swim or trying to drown yourself in my pool,” he said while he got up, stretching and showing off his body to you. Of course he was not wearing a shirt, why would he. It was too hot for that anyway. He was too hot. Shit, focus!

“I wasn’t drowning myself,” you said even though you wished that had worked.

Silence fell over you for a moment while he just stood there, looking at your miserable form before he rubbed the back of his neck and looked clearly uncomfortable.

“Look, I’ve seen the bruises…,” he started and you looked back at him, clenching your jaw. Of course he had seen the bruises, he had seen you naked and they were quite visible all over your body.

“It’s nothing. Where are my clothes? I want to leave.” You didn’t want to stay here and talk to a stranger that apparently saved you from drowning. Oh. That was probably why you were wearing different clothes, he had taken care of them so you wouldn’t get a cold. Well, not exactly the first thought you had but thank god you still had your virginity.

“Do you need help?” he asked softly and crouched in front the bed which caused you to frown. No one had ever asked you that. It took a long moment before you shook your head.

“No, I’ll be fine.” You nodded and got out of bed which made him stand up again. He was taller than you were and you bit your bottom lip while looking around in his room some more. This was clearly not the Cut. This looked like a Figure Eight house. Oh god, had you wandered that far?

“Can I make you breakfast at least? My parents are still asleep,” he said and you chewed on your lip a little before you nodded. Your stomach was dying inside as you hadn't eaten in two days because your aunt prefered to let you starve while she spent all her money on alcohol and drugs. You wished your parents were still alive but that wasn’t an option.

“Alright, wait here, I’ll bring you some up.” With that he was already gone and you went back under the soft blanket. If you would stand up more your head was probably going to explode and you would fall due to it’s spinning non stop. Laying down was good. Sitting upright a little was good too.

You had never seen this boy before which wasn’t a surprise given that you had been to Figure Eight only one or two times with Kiara. The Pogues were the only reason to get out of bed in the morning but currently, they were all doing their own thing which was fine but also made you sad a little.

The blonde boy was up quicker than you thought and he put the tray down on your legs with a smile.

“I’m JJ, by the way,” he said as he grabbed the chair from his desk and rolled it over, taking one of the plates from the try to put some food on it.

You blinked at all the food in front of you and you were sure you hadn’t seen that many at once, at least not something you were allowed to eat. Bread buns, scrambled egg, different kinds of sausages and grapes. He must have noticed how skinny you were.

“I’m (y/n),” you simply said while staring at the food, not even sure if you could eat but when you looked at him eating and he smiled at you, you couldn’t stop yourself.

It was a feast for you. Did he always have breakfasts like that? God, what a lucky person.

“Nice to meet you, (y/n). Wanna tell me now why you were swimming in my pool at midnight?” he asked and grinned a little. He wanted to get details but he didn’t want to completely ruin the mood, something you could appreciate.

You didn’t know him and you weren’t easily trusting a person but he saved you, made you breakfast and you would probably never see him again, so you kinda owed him, right? Also he had already seen the bruises and given all the books he had in his room, he seemed to be a smart boy that had figured it all out on his own already.

“I was trying to get away from life,” you mumbled with your mouth full and he raised an eyebrow at that. “Got beat up, didn’t eat for two days, ran away to drink the pain away and then it went all black but it seems like I wanted to get a look at a life I’ll never have and then I somehow ended up in your pool. I wasn’t trying to drown myself, I promise.”

Well, the mood he had been trying to maintain was totally ruined by your words now. You spoke them so casually like they were no big deal but you saw how his eyes widened and he stopped eating while you still continued. Yes, your life was pure shit but it would be okay one day. One day you’d get out of your aunt’s death grip and get the life you deserved.

“I-,” he started but didn’t seem to be able to finish so you waved off.

“It’s fine. It happens. Something you can’t understand, no offense.” He was living a good life full of privileges and riches, of course he wouldn’t understand what you went through and that was okay. You didn’t want his pity, he didn’t seem to care about people at the Cut anyway.

“I might not understand your life but you obviously don’t understand my life either,” he chuckled and took some grapes to eat. You raised both eyebrows at him, what did he mean? Apparently he could read the face you were making and continued. “Life here isn’t all that great either. I may not suffer from a lot of physical abuse but emotional one. Being rich isn’t always good, ya know.”

“I’d kill for being rich,” you blurted out and it made him laugh. He had a beautiful laugh but it also sounded really sad for some reason.

“Yeah, that’s probably how a lot of people here became rich.” That made you laugh too, he was probably right. You knew a few Kooks that looked like they had killed for their wealth.

You both ate in silence and when you were done, he put the tray away to look at you with a look that you couldn’t quite place.

“Where are my clothes?” you asked to break the stare and he nodded.

“I’ll get them, one second,” he said and walked over into a room which was...his bathroom? God, he even had his own bathroom. What the fuck.

JJ came out with them again and they looked so much cleaner than before. “Did you wash them?” you asked because it didn’t look like it was just the pool water.

“Yeah, they looked like they needed it,” he said and put them over the bed. When you grabbed them you felt how soft they were now after the cleaning and you smiled a little to yourself. They also smelled really good.

You got out of the bed and pressed past him into the bathroom so you could get changed. When you came out of it again you felt old and new at the same time. Thankfully, the headache was slowly fading away.

“Alright, thanks for saving me, I’ll be off then,” you exclaimed as you had occupied him enough now. He already knew more about you than a stranger should and you had to get out of here before he tried to play your savior.

You had already a hand at the doorknob when he reached out to you, grabbing your arm to stop you from leaving. Of course he had to do that.

“I know this isn’t any of my business but if you ever need help, come here, okay? I’ll try my best,” he said and normally you would huff at such an offer as you had been disappointed so many times in your life but for some reason, he sounded so absolutely genuine that you nodded. You believed him but you also had no desire to get back here any time soon. Figure Eight wasn’t the place you wanted to be, it only reminded you of what could have been but wasn’t.

“Thanks,” you mumbled and he let go of you.

Two weeks had passed and he couldn’t get the girl out of his head. There had been something that made him want to save her even though she seemed to be the kind of girl that didn’t want saving.

Something deep inside of him was screaming at him to find you and that’s exactly what he did right now. His father would kill him but he didn’t care anymore. It was like there was a strange bond that was pulling him closer to you and away from the life he didn’t want.

The Cut was different than he had expected. During his sheltered life, downtown had been the only area he had visited, it was almost like an invisible wall that his father had placed here, not allowing him to go any further. As a kid he had been curious about it but after a while of useless attempts to convince his father he had given up on getting to know the rest of the island.

He couldn’t say why he didn’t try again now that he was older. Maybe he really wasn’t interested anymore after all those years. Maybe it was his father’s voice that was echoing in his head the closer he got to that invisible wall.

Until he broke through it. He drove past that magical line that had kept him and suddenly he saw what was really going on. They weren’t just a little less fortunate than the people from Figure Eight. His dad had lied to him and he felt sick for a moment.

He drove past small shacks, some looking like they would get blown away by the next storm. They were just poor and lived in poverty. Well, maybe not all of them but the further he drove away from the downtown area the more sad and wild it looked around him. There was also a strange feeling of freedom to it, he couldn’t really describe it.

Figure Eight was all beautiful houses and big mansions, perfectly cut grass, cars and pools. Everything had to be perfect but this? Lots of people didn’t care about their grass, he saw some old cars and trucks, some people had a small boat but nothing compared to the yacht his father owned. It was so different and he hated himself for never coming here. When did he become such an ignorant person?

Something suddenly jumped out of the bushes to the right and he hit the breaks, barely stopping in front of the person who was standing right in front of his car, looking straight at him.

“What the fuck?!” the girl yelled and he would always recognize that voice, it had almost burned into his soul. She was so different from everything he knew. Looks like the string that was pulling him had reached its destination.

Great, now some idiot tried to run you over while you were busy running away from Barry. This couldn’t get any worse. You were about to keep running when you saw who got out of the car. It was the blonde pretty boy with the sad eyes from Figure Eight that you kept dreaming about for the last two weeks. A wink of destiny? Either way, it looked like he was your escape.

JJ got out of the car and smiled at you, slowly coming over to you, probably wanting to make sure you were okay but he barely scraped you.

“JJ?” you asked in disbelief and he chuckled a little. It was weird to see him here, out of place, so far away from home.

“If I wouldn’t know any better I’d say you tried to get him by a car this time,” he said and laughed when he saw you glare. You really didn’t have time for this bullshit. Yes, being dead would be better sometimes given your circumstances but right now you’d prefer to prevent that.

You threw a look behind you and then back at him. “In the car,” you hissed and shoved him back to his side of the car while you got in on the other side.

“Drive,” you said and looked out to the right side where you had been coming from but he looked at you confused.

Barry came out of the bushes and you turned around to JJ in a split second, pressing your lips against his, hoping to make Barry think that it was just a rich couple that came down here to make out. He wasn’t the brightest candle on the cake after all.

When you saw him leave out of the corner of your eye you sighed into the kiss but only slowly moved away. JJ’s lips felt good, pressed against yours like it was the only thing he had ever wanted.

Reality hit and you pulled back, swallowing slightly. “Sorry uhm...just needed to distract that guy,” you mumbled and licked your lips, still tasting him.

“What was that about?” he asked and seemed a little dumbfounded by the sudden kiss.

“I was running from our local drug dealer,” you explained like it was the most normal thing to do. Maybe you had stolen him some money but you only wanted food and you knew where he stored it so you might as well just borrow it. For a very long time.

“You could have just hidden on the backseat, you know,” he teased and wiggled his eyebrows which caused you to slap him slightly against the shoulder.

“It was a distraction kiss, nothing else. Don’t let it get to your head,” you said ang took a deep breath when you felt your body relax.

“What now? Any place I can drive you to?” he suddenly asked and you looked over at him, thinking for a moment. You’d be safe with John B and the others as you wanted to meet up later anyway. You nodded and gave him some quick directions.

“So, what are you doing here?” you asked and watched him drive. He had such a pretty face if those eyes wouldn’t be so sad. You wondered why he was like that, he had everything you could wish for and yet, he was still so sad.

“Actually, I was looking for you. I also had never been down to the Cut, my father always keeping me from it so I wanted to take a look.” His voice was so smooth and you had the urge to just press your lips against his once more.

What the fuck was going on in your head? God, that needed to stop, he was a Kook after all. No good came from them.

“Why were you looking for me?” It was beyond you why he would come here only to find you. You were just some girl he had saved from her own stupidity. On the other hand, you couldn’t deny that you hoped to see him again shortly after you had left his place back then. There had been something about him that was pulling you closer and those dreams you had weren’t for nothing. He was special in a way you couldn’t describe just yet.

“I don’t know, to be honest. I just had the feeling I had to,” he said and it confirmed your feelings. He also didn’t really know what he was doing here, just like you didn’t know why you wanted him here.

It was a strange connection that had formed within a couple of hours two weeks ago, a connection that didn’t break. Normally people meet other people, establish some kind of relationship between them. Acquaintances, friends, work colleagues, stuff like that. Sometimes you just meet a stranger, talk to them and then break the connection off.

That’s what you thought this would be but the connection was still there, it was deep in your bones and your mind.

Stupid Kook, about to turn your world around.

You arrived at the Chateau where John B was already coming over before JJ could turn the motor off. He obviously wasn’t used to such cars arriving at his place, that’s why you got out first.

“It’s me!” you yelled and JB visibly relaxed before taking another look at the car and the boy coming out of there.

“Who’s that?” he asked and frowned at you but you just waved off.

“That’s JJ. He saved me, two times to be exact. He’s cool.” You waved JJ over and he followed you step to John B. You gave him a quick hug and then saw how JJ held out his hand.

You glared at John B and he groaned slightly before shaking JJ’s hand.

“I don’t know why you’d bring a Kook here,” he grumbled and you hit his arm slightly.

“I told you, he is cool. He’s pool boy.” You might have mentioned that accident to your friends without any names or mentioning that your blonde savior was a Kook. Oops.

“Pool boy?” a female voice said while coming out of the house and you waved at Kie.

“Kiara?” JJ suddenly said and looked over at her, watching how she stopped in her tracks. You looked between the two of them forth and back.

“JJ?” Yup, they totally knew each other.

“Donkey?” you threw in and laughed a little at your Shrek reference, causing the others to laugh too.

“You know each other?” John B said in choir and the both nodded.

“Yeah, he’s the guy that keeps me grounded at all the Kook events. We drink and make it through the night somehow. He’s cool,” Kiara explained and JJ nodded in agreement.

“See, told you,” you teased John B and he just rolled your eyes. He sometimes acted like a big brother when he wasn’t drowning in his own shit.

“Are you staying? I know what it feels like to be a Kook, so I might as well show you my escape”, Kiara said and JJ rubbed the back of his neck with his hand.

You laughed a little because he seemed so out of place right now but you could tell he probably needs an escape from life once in a while.

“Okay, show me,” JJ said and you grinned at him. It was a reckless thing to do, taking a Kook in but technically, Kiara was one too and if she and JJ got along, he would also get along with Pope and John B. It might just take a while but it would be okay.

There was this feeling inside of you that was telling you to help him, to make his eyes look sad and to hear a genuine laugh from him.

#jj x reader #jj maybank #jj imagine #outer banks imagine #jj maybank x reader #obx imagine #obx netflix #kook!jj #pogue!reader #prompt

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heavilycyborgego · 5 years ago

Link

Tamara Adrine-Davis posted two signs on the front lawn of her Cleveland Heights, Ohio, home late Friday night. One warned passersby: “I’m going to jail cuz I’m broke, disabled, and can’t fix my home.” The other read: “PLEASE HELP” with a link to her GoFundMe page.

The 57-year-old freelance journalist is currently on probation due to a handful of housing code issues, like chipped and decaying paint, a loose gutter, and a broken front porch stoop. The city first notified Adrine-Davis of the problems back in 2014, but she’s severely disabled, uses a wheelchair, and hasn’t been able to come up with the money to make the more than $8,000 worth of repairs to her home. Now, she could face the city’s maximum penalty for a housing violation case: $1,000 in fines, six months in jail for each offense, or both.

Her next court hearing — and the deadline for ensuring her home is in compliance — is Tuesday.

“I have been trying to get ready to go to jail, to be honest with you, and trying to figure out where I can get the money, as if I hadn’t looked all over before,” Adrine-Davis told VICE News. She’s already made arrangements to place her two dogs in someone else's care.

In some states, Ohio included, facing thousands of dollars in fines over minor property violations — and even going to jail — isn’t that unusual. The property codes, instituted and enforced on the municipal level, can help regulate residences that are genuinely dangerous to their inhabitants and neighbors. But they can also unduly punish people living in poverty, and people of color, as Adrine-Davis feels is happening to her.

“There’s this kind of bias in a lot of these rules and codes that city’s have against lower-income residents, maybe because they don’t pay enough in tax revenue, or maybe, frankly, because their houses aren’t as nice,” said Joshua House, an attorney at the Institute for Justice, a nonprofit, public interest law firm based in the D.C. area.

In 2016, for example, a black woman living in Cahokia, Illinois, was arrested over an unmowed lawn. A local official watched over her five children while she was carted off to jail. And this year, an elderly white man’s home in Dunedin, Florida, was threatened with foreclosure after he failed to pay nearly $30,000 in city fines related to his overgrown yard.

“Assuming I survive”

Adrine-Davis said she’s been repeatedly told she could face jail time for failing to fix her home. The city escalated her violation to a criminal offense and took it to Cleveland Heights’ municipal court in January 2018. Almost a year later, she pleaded guilty to the charges and was placed on probation and given time to make repairs.

That extra time wasn’t enough, especially since her disability and chronic pain make it difficult for her to earn extra cash through side jobs. While Adrine-Davis paid to fix the gutter, she can’t afford anything else.

She hasn’t been able to secure a loan to help since her home is in foreclosure after her mom, who had dementia, failed to pay property taxes. And the backpay she owes bars her from the city’s numerous repair aid programs. Her GoFundMe page, which she posted in September, has only raised $80.

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snarkesthour · 4 years ago

Text

Happy St George's Day!

· In the midst of a pandemic when schools are all closed, the government votes to not allow free school meals to schoolchildren during school holidays, despite this being the only meal many of them have each day

· Marcus Rashford, a footballer, led the drive to feed the nation’s children, 49% of which live in poverty, and forced the government to provide food for them during the school holidays

· Instead of previous years when vouchers were given to parents that can only be spent on nutritious food, members of government give contracts to friends to provide a week’s work of food costing £5 to schoolchildren for a price of £30. Food is unhealthy and would not last a week

· Parcels also expect parents to cook two tablespoons of rice at a time in the oven and bake their own bread every day, ignoring poverty-stricken families possible lack of access to such equipment

· Wife of conservative MP attacks poor families for eating unhealthy food when healthy food is cheaper, ignoring the fact that not all families have access to equipment needed to store and cook it

· Nigel Farage, head of the Brexit party came out strongly against the government for their stance on starving schoolchildren. Not a good look.

· Another MP came out and said that poor families should not receive government assistance because the money would be going direct to brothels and crackhouses and the parents would spend it on drink and drugs instead of feeding their kids, a dangerous and persistent stereotype of working class people

· For the first time in its history, UNICEF is feeding kids in the UK – the 5th richest country in the world – and the head of the House of Commons accused them of “playing politics” and said they should “be ashamed of themselves”

· J.K. Rowling came out hard as a TERF (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist), writing a book about a serial killer that dresses up as a Muslim woman, which isn’t subtle when you look at her history of transphobia and other “-isms”

She also publicly supported an author who wrote a book about the destruction of Europe by waves of Muslim immigration

· Speaking of J.K. Rowling, the government’s response to the Gender Recognition Act.

· It is now impossible for under 16s to receive reversible puberty blockers

· Wait times at NHS Gender Clinics, of which there are only 7 in the country, have doubled, with wait times now up to 60+ months (5+ years)

· Keir Starmer, head of the Labour (left wing) party says he doesn’t want to get involved in trans issues

· With the loss of Labour, no major party supports trans rights

· Self ID is no longer allowed, meaning every step of transition is medicalised and involves the trans person having to prove that they are “trans enough” at every stage to panels of cis people

· Government wants to invalidate non-enrolled deed polls, essentially making available a public list of every trans person in the UK

· Hate crimes have quadrupled

· Anti-trans campaigners are now setting their sights on trans adults’ access to hormones

· A petition was formed to counter this and was reviewed by the government, who determined that nothing was wrong with the GRA except that it might have been a bit lax.

· The Guardian newspaper ran child labour and child starvation supporting stories

· Internal border now along the border of Kent and lorry drivers must produce travel papers (Brexit Passport) to cross it, placing the county of Kent in a state of “no man’s land”

· Government fails to lockdown on time, every time

· Government refuses to ban conversion therapy in the UK

· Scotland adopts Human Rights of Children, which requires the government to better support children and families, especially those who are poor, disabled, minorities or young carers. England does not

· The government declared that sleeping rough is now grounds for deportation

· Schools reopened several times despite being warned not safe to do so

· The government banned NHS workers from speaking out about COVID

· Do Not Resuscitate orders proposed for those in care homes, with learning disabilities and who are autistic

· The government cut pensions as the COVID death toll rose

· The government learnt about new South-East COVID strain in September and didn’t come forwards until December

· New COVID strain targets kids, teens, and young adults, and yet none of those groups are allowed vaccination unless a serious pre-existing condition is had, even if they are key workers

· Downing Street says UK should be model of racial equality because government report says no institutional racism in the UK

· Report also says young people are young and foolish for thinking it exists and that minorities are superstitious and irrational and are sabotaging themselves out of success

· It came out that the government was given the independent report and rewrote it to the version that was released to the public – the version that says racism doesn’t exist in the UK

· The rewritten report also refers to the slave trade as the “Caribbean experience”, like those enslaved were on holiday

· Woman in London abducted, murdered and dismembered by off-duty cop and when socially distanced vigil goes ahead, police wait until dark before trapping women, arresting them, using excessive force on them, and also destroying memorial

· Bill passed in government that allows undercover officers to commit serious crimes such as murder, torture and rape

· Plainclothes police to now patrol nightclubs and bars due to aforementioned murder by police officer

· Bill passed that bans any protest at all, no matter how quiet, unobstructive or small it is, including single-person protests. Bill also includes a 10 year sentence for damaging a statue, which is a longer sentence than for rape

· TV programmes critical of the government have been cancelled

· Universities have been told what to platform and schools have been told what to teach, including banning material speaking about BLM and calling for “overthrow” of capitalism

· Voting has been supressed, mainly those who are working class or POC

· During protests in Bristol, press was assaulted and pepper sprayed by police and two legal observers were arrested

· Being Roma/Traveller and living the traditional Roma/Traveller lifestyle is now illegal under that same bill that bans protests. They also have to register as such and receive a licence or risk losing their vehicles

· Hours before Eid, lockdown across the UK with no warning whatsoever, meaning people woke up the next morning after visiting relatives to find themselves “criminals”. The country was opened up specifically for Christmas though

· Conservative (right wing) party blamed BAME (Black And Minority Ethnic) communities for dying of COVID more than white people

· Landlords have been protected extensively and renters blamed for living in close quarters or having to take public transport to work

· Conservatives have launched investigation into possible corruption in Liverpool Council. Liverpool is a Labour stronghold and if corruption is found then the Conservatives can seize control of the council. No evidence of corruption is present as of yet

· Military threatened to stage a coup if Corbyn (then head of the labour party) became Prime Minister

· Government orders all government buildings in England, Wales and Scotland to fly the Union Flag every day to boost patriotism

· MPs call for the curriculum to require teaching the history of the Union Flag rather than Britain’s many atrocities

· The first fortnight of April saw a mini heatwave with temperatures up to 20°C immediately followed by snow, and this is ignored in favour of debating “vaccine passports” in order to visit the pub

· UK allows for international summer holidays despite being warned it will cause a third wave, such as the situation in Germany

· Government placed asylum seekers arriving in the UK in army barracks where they were to sleep 24 to a room with no open windows or air circulation, and when COVID inevitably ran rampant, the Home Secretary accused the asylum seekers of not following COVID protocol, such as social distancing

· Several accounts of self-harm and suicide attempts were reported from the asylum barracks and were dismissed

· UK to deport unaccompanied minor asylum seekers

· UK refuses entry into the UK for radicalised teen failed by system who joined ISIS. Case is difficult and controversial because teen wishes to return to the UK temporarily to fight for her citizenship after the UK broke international law by stripping it from her, despite her not having dual citizenship. Argument given was that her parents were from Bangladesh and so she could apply for citizenship there. Bangladesh refused. Teen is now stateless and living in a refugee camp after losing several children, unable to fight for her citizenship to be reinstated.

· Rioting in Northern Ireland, which included the first use of water cannons in 6 years, a bus being hijacked and burnt, a press photographer attacked, and people throwing bricks, fireworks and petrol bombs at police, not to mention some of the clashes happening over a peace wall in west Belfast, completely ignored in British media and then later drowned out by non-stop news of Prince Phillip’s death, obscuring any important news from being heard. Riots were over Northern Ireland’s being a part of the UK

· MPs take vote on whether China’s treatment of Uighurs constitutes genocide. They decide it does, but that it isn’t their job to do anything further

· Home Office released their spending for the 2020 fiscal year. It’s a mess, including over £77,000 at an eyebrow salon in March alone, and £6,000+ in Pollyanna Restaurant which doesn't appear to exist.

· When people started questioning the spending, the Home Office sent a tweet fact checking themselves

· Country reopened over the summer for Eat Out To Help Out, a scheme to boost the economy. COVID cases rose sharply and the government then blamed people, but mostly working class people, for not following restrictions such as only leaving the house when absolutely necessary, after telling them it was safe

· Foreign NHS workers denied COVID vaccinations

· GCSEs and A-Levels were cancelled due to COVID-19 and expected exam grades were to be used instead. Private school students received grades much higher than they were expecting, and state school students received grades much lower, some grades falling as far as an A to an E. This was because the government couldn’t imagine state school students being smart enough to receive the high grades they were predicted to get; after much uproar the grades were scrapped, and a new method was introduced

· BBC offered staff grief counselling following Prince Philip’s death, but not after having to report on the ever-rising COVID death toll

· The COVID-19 Infection Survey closed in mourning for Prince Philip, with workers to contact participants to reschedule visits for “as soon as possible” when they return to work

· Census workers told to pack up and go home and were placed on immediate unpaid leave due to the death of Prince Philip, but told they must make up the hours later

· Conservative MPs lobbied for a new royal yacht after voting to keep schoolchildren hungry (see first points)

· The BBC’s complaint page crashed over the amount of complaints they got of their coverage of Prince Philip’s death. It was covered non-stop for over 24 hours and the page came in at over 100,000 complaints before going down

· BBC also fast becoming politically biased despite their requirement to be apolitical, after cutting out the audience laughing at Boris Johnson on Question Time, displaying Corbyn as a communist figure in front of a prominent piece of Russian architecture, and providing a platform for a Conservative MP to tell a stage 4 bowl cancer patient that her life wasn’t valuable on live television

· On the COVID-19 pandemic, the BMJ, (British Medical Journal) said about the government that “science was being suppressed for political and financial gain” by “some of history’s worst autocrats and dictators”

· Not only did Boris Johnson launch Eat Out To Help Out when he was warned it was dangerous, lifted lockdowns too early when he was warned it was too dangerous, reopened schools when he was warned it was too dangerous, but when scientists said the second COVID jab should be delivered within 3 weeks he decided that was too tall an order and it should be within 12 weeks – after a period of radio silence, suddenly the science fit his plan. No scientists came forwards to defend it

· The Home Secretary, Priti Patel, blamed protestors for protests that became violent from police attacking protestors, bullied staff members under her, bought members of staff in her department, said it was “disgraceful” to topple the statue of Edward Colson, a slave trader, in Brighton because it undermined anti-racism protests, held treasonous meetings with Israel with the plan to divert aid money, and threatened to starve Ireland in order to get them to agree to Brexit

· She also wants to set up Australian-style asylum processing centres on British islands, but the islands she wants are in the Atlantic ocean and over 4000 miles away from the UK. This is because she wants to help asylum seekers enter the UK legally, completed ignoring or oblivious to all the reasons that asylum seekers might not be able to do that, and for the fact that to seek asylum you must essentially walk up the border and ask for it

· The bungling of the Track and Trace system – the government spent £10bn on a system to track and trace the spread of COVID-19. All data was stored on an Excel spreadsheet which developed a technical glitch and many results were lost before the system was scrapped

· As Autism Acceptance month began, the BBC ran a story saying the autism causes fascism, and that an autistic person who had chosen to embrace the ideology was incapable of seeing that a neo-Nazi group he joined was morally bad because he was autistic

#st george's day #uk politics

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innuendostudios · 5 years ago

Video

youtube

Here’s How to Radicalize a Normie, a video essay on how the Alt-Right and their fellow travelers recruit. Clocking in at 41 minutes, 6756 words, 633 individual drawings, and 27 sources (including three full books), it is by far the longest and most heavily-researched video in The Alt-Right Playbook. I am very tired.

It took so long to put this behemoth together that my Patreon started to dip. So, maybe a little more than usual, if you want to keep seeing videos like these, please consider backing me on Patreon.

Transcript below the cut.

Say, for the sake of argument, your friend Gabe is starting to worry you.

Gabe’s always been just, you know, a regular guy. Not very political. He likes video games, sci-fi, comics, Star Wars, and anime. White guy shit. The only offbeat thing about him is you suspect there’s like a 20% chance he’s a furry. For all intents and purposes, Gabe is a normie.

But recently Gabe’s been spending a lot of time on some radically conservative forums, and listening to radically conservative podcasts, and picking some radically conservative arguments with you and your friends. You never would have expected this, not from Gabe, and, given the speed it’s happened, it’s worrying to think where it might be headed.

How have the Alt-Right gotten their hooks into your friend?

If you’ve ever known a Gabe, this video is for you. Here’s How to Radicalize a Normie.

Step 1: Identify the Audience

What you need to know before we begin is: around 2013, the Nazis went online.

Hate groups in the US, as tracked by the Southern Poverty Law Center, had been growing in number since the noughts, but, between 2012 and 2014, they dropped by almost a quarter. Patriot groups dropped by over a third. However, hate crimes stayed about the same. Radical conservatism was not shrinking, but decentralizing. Still radical, still often violent, but now full of white nationalist nomads unlikely to join a formal organization.

This didn’t make them harmless. What it did was protect their asses from the typical hate group cycle: getting the public’s attention, making allies in conservative media, swelling their numbers, and then eventually disgracing themselves with failures, infighting, and, often enough, members committing horrific acts of violence, which come with social and sometimes legal consequences for all the other members.

So the Alt-Right and their fellow travelers these days don’t so much have members. They have hashtags, followers, viewers, and subscribers. This insulates them from their own audience. If Gabe, as a member of that audience, were to go out and commit a crime on their behalf, there’d be little doubt they had a hand in radicalizing him, but it’d be very hard to claim they told him to do it. On some of these sites, where Gabe spends hours and hours of his day, he’s never created an account or left a comment; the people radicalizing him don’t even know he’s there.

This distributed nature is what makes the Alt-Right, and the movements connected to it, unique. (You may remember a notable proof-of-concept for this strategy.) Doing almost everything online has, as compared with traditional hate movements, dramatically increased their reach and inoculated them from consequence. The trade-off, as we will see, is a lack of control.

And so we come to Gabe.

Gabe exists at the intersection of the kinds of people the Alt-Right is looking for - straight white cis men who feel emasculated by modern society, primarily, though they do make exceptions - and the kinds of people who are vulnerable to recruitment. Gabe fits the first profile in that he got bullied in high school, and often feels he has to hide his nerdy side for fear of getting ridiculed. The Alt-Right also has success with men who can’t get laid or recently got divorced or feel anxious about an influx of non-white people in their community. These things can make one feel like less than the confident white man they’re “supposed” to be. And it’s the closest they will ever come to being minoritized.

Regarding the second profile, it’s important to know that Gabe is not categorically different from you or me. He’s a cishet white dude - his problems are not unique. There isn’t a ton of research into the demography of the Alt-Right, but there may be a higher-than-average chance Gabe has a history of being abused or comes from a broken home. You don’t know if it’s true of Gabe, he’s never said. But most abuse survivors don’t become Nazis. The things that make people like Gabe recruitable tend to be situational: it happens often during periods of transition, as dramatic as the death of a loved or as benign as moving to a new city. Things that make people ask big life questions. Gabe has concerns like economic precarity, not knowing his place in a changing world, stressful working conditions. In other words, Gabe is suffering under late capitalism, same as everyone, and it’s entirely plausible he could have gone down the path to becoming a Leftist.

This is not to make an “economic anxiety” argument: the animating force of the Far Right is and always has been bigotry. But the Alt-Right targets Gabe by treating his “economic anxiety” as one of many things bigotry can be sold as a solution to. It is their aim that, when dissatisfied white men go looking for answers, they find the Alt-Right before they find us.

Step Two: Establish a Community

Were Gabe pledging an old-school hate movement, there would probably be a recruiter to usher him into an existing community. But that’s the kind of formalized interaction modern extremists try to avoid. Online extremism has many points of entry, and everybody’s journey is unique, so rather than be comprehensive we will focus on what are, in my estimation, the two most common pathways: the Far Right creates a community Gabe is likely to stumble into, or infiltrates a community Gabe is already in.

The stumble-upon method has two main branches, one of which is just “Gabe ends up on a chan board,” which we’ve already done a video about. The other is kind of the polar opposite of 4chan’s cult of anonymity: Gabe ends up in the fandom of a Far Right thought leader.

These folks are charismatic media personalities (that’s charismatic according to Gabe’s tastes, not ours; I don’t understand it, either). These personalities may gain traction on any number of platforms, from podcasts to reportage to blogging, though the most effective platform for redpilling is, and yes I am biting the hand that feeds me, YouTube. They may get Gabe’s attention through fairly standard means, like talking about or even generating controversy to get themselves trending, while some of the more committed will employ dubious SEO tactics like clickbait, google bombing, and data voids (just pause for definitions, we don’t have time).

What they tend to have in common, especially the most accessible ones, is that they don’t present themselves as entry points to the radical Right. In fact, many did not set out to be Far Right thought leaders, and may not think of themselves as such (though they are often selling products, of which the Alt-Right are among their biggest purchasers, and it’s not like they’re turning the money away). How they present is the same way anyone presents who wants to be successful on social media: accessible, approachable, authentic. The face-to-face relationship a budding extremist forms with their recruiter or the leader of their hate group’s local chapter are here folded into one parasocial relationship with a complete stranger.

Why this person appeals to Gabe is they’re not selling politics as politics, but conservatism as a kind of lifestyle brand. They rely heavily on criticizing or ridiculing the Left: feminists are oversensitive, Black people unintelligent, queer folks doomed to loneliness, and trans people insane; I dunno if it’s a coincidence that these are all things Gabe thinks about himself in his low moments. By contrast, they don’t sell conservatism as having sounder policies or a more coherent moral framework, but that abandoning progressive principles and embracing conservative ones will make Gabe happier. Remember, Gabe isn’t looking for white nationalism or misogyny, what he wants is the cure to soul-sickness, and these friendly micro-celebs are here to offer a shot of life advice with politics as the chaser. It is extremely important that politics be presented as a set of affects, not a set of beliefs.

The second pathway is infiltration, which is its own beast. Media personalities sometimes become gateways to the Right almost by accident: they do something edgy, a part of their audience reacts positively, and, facing no real consequence, they do it more; this leads to further positive reinforcement from conservative fans, the rest of the audience acclimates, and the cycle repeats, the personality pushing the envelope further and further based on what flies with their increasingly conservative audience. In this way, they become a right-wing figure by both radicalizing and being radicalized by their audience.

Infiltration is deliberate.

The Far Right will reliably target any community that has 1) a large, white, male population, 2) whose niche interests allow them to feel vaguely marginalized, and 3) who are not used to progressive critique of said interests. This isn’t to say progressive critique doesn’t exist, or hasn’t been baked into the property from the beginning, but that it has been, so far, easy for white guys to ignore. As such, progressives within that community probably don’t talk politics much, and women and minorities are perfectly welcome to post, same as anyone, but just, you know, don’t, don’t make identity politics, you know, like, a thing.

Given Gabe’s proclivities, he’s probably already in a number of fan communities where he can geek out and not get teased. And this is where the Far Right will go looking for him

Communities are at their most vulnerable to infiltration at times of political discord. This can happen naturally - say, a new property in the fandom has a Black protagonist - or it can be provoked - say, a bunch of channers join the forum and say provocative things about race to get people arguing - or both. Left to its own devices, the community might sort out its differences and maybe even come out more progressive than they started. But, with the right pressure applied in the right moment, these communities can devolve into arguments about the need to remove a nebulously-defined “politics” from the conversation.

The adage about bros on the internet is “‘political’ means anything I disagree with,” but it’d be more accurate to say, here, “‘political’ means anything on which the community disagrees.” For instance, “Nazis are bad” is an apolitical statement because everyone in the community agrees. It’s common sense, and therefore neutral. But, paradoxically, “Nazis are good” is also apolitical; because “Nazis are bad” is the consensus, “Nazis are good” must be just an edgy joke, and, even if not, the community already believes the opposite, so the statement is harmless. Tolerable. However, “feminism is good” is a political statement, because the community hasn’t reached consensus. It is debatable, and therefore political, and you should stop talking about it. And making political arguments, no matter how rational, is having an agenda, and having an agenda is ruining the community.

(Now, it is curious how the things that provoke the most disagreement tend to be whichever ones make white dudes uncomfortable. One of life’s great, unanswerable mysteries.)

You can gather where this is going: a community that doesn’t tolerate progressivism but does tolerate Nazism is going to start collecting Nazis, Nazis whose goal is to drive a wedge between the community and the Left. Once the Left acknowledges, “Hey, your community’s developing a Nazi problem,” the Nazis - who are, remember, trusted, apolitical members of the community who might just be kidding about all the Nazi shit - say, “Did you hear that, guys?! Those cultural Marxists just called all of us Nazis!” Wedge. Similarly, any community members who say, “but Nazis though” are framed as infiltrators pushing an agenda, even if they’ve been there longer than the Nazis have. They get the wedge, too.

This is how fandoms radicalize. They are built as - yeah, I’ll say it - safe spaces for nerds, weebs, and furries, and are told that the Left is a threat to their safety. Given a choice between leaving a community that has mattered to him for years and simply adjusting to the community’s shifting politics, the assumption is that Gabe will stay. This assumption is right often enough that a lot of fandoms have been colonized.

What is true of both of these methods - Gabe finding the Right or the Right finding him - is that Gabe does not come nor stay for the ideology. He’s here for the community, the sense of belonging, of being with his people, of having his fears validated and his enjoyment shared. The ideology is simply the price of admission.

Step Three: Isolate

There is a vast, interconnected network of Far Right communities out there, and Gabe is, at this point, only on the periphery. In order to keep him in, they need to disrupt his relationships to other communities, and become, more and more, his primary online social space. Having made this space hostile to the Left, they now seek to break his connections to progressives elsewhere in his life.

This is hard to do online. The whole appeal of moving radicalism to the internet is that your away-from-keyboard life doesn’t have to change. You are crypto the moment you log off. Some thought leaders will encourage their audience to cut ties with Family of Origin, or “deFOO,” but, even then, they can’t monitor whether the audience has actually done it the way an in-person movement could. And so alienating Gabe from the Left is less controlled, and, consequently, may be less total. How much Gabe isolates is up to him.

But the vast majority of Far Right media presumes an alienation from the Left. Part of conservative bloggers and YouTubers making the Left look pathetic is doing a lot take-downs and responses. This is a constant repetition of the Left’s arguments for the purpose of mockery, and, for Gabe, it starts to replace any engagement with progressive media directly. He soon knows the Left only through caricature. It also trains him, if he does directly engage, to approach the Left with the same combative stance as his role models. (For reference, see my comment section.) And this is only if he doesn’t partake in one of the many active boycotts of “SJW media.”

In addition to mocking the Left’s arguments, they also, curiously, appropriate them. This is one part sanitization: liberal centrism is more socially acceptable; indeed, many figures on the outer layers think of themselves as moderates, even as they serve as gateways to radicalism. But, also, many of Gabe’s problems could be addressed by progressive leftism, so they sell him racist, sexist versions of it. Yes, there is a problem with workers being underpaid and overextended, but the solution isn’t unions, it’s deporting immigrants; yes, there is a chronic loneliness and anger to being a man in the modern age, but it’s not because of the toxic masculine expectations placed on you by the patriarchy, it’s women being slutty; yes, wealth disparity does mean a tiny percentage of elites have more influence over culture and politics than the rest of us combined, but the problem isn’t capitalism, it’s the Jews. And it’s hard for Gabe to reject these ideas without, in the process, rejecting the progressive ideas they’re copied from; the Right’s “take the red pill” is, to the untrained eye, similar to the Left’s “get woke.” (Or, at least, the bowdlerized version of “get woke” that is no longer specifically about race which came to fashion when white people started saying it, grumble grumble.)

Take the red pill or reject them both; either is a step to the right.

As this rhetoric slips into his day-to-day conversation, even as seemingly harmless “irreverence,” it may strain relationships with people who are not entertained by this shit. Off-color comments about race and gender can certainly be wearying for female and non-white friends, which can lead to a passive distance or an eventual confrontation [“why is everyone but me so sensitive?!”], which only seem to confirm what his reactionary community says about liberal snowflakes. If he says these things on social media, he may get his account suspended, and, if he comes back under an alt, you can bet his new reactionary friends will be the first to reconnect, applaud the behavior that got him banned, and repeat should he get banned again. A few cycles of this and he’s lost touch with everyone else.

Also, his adoption of the insular, meme-laden terminology of this community makes him less and less comprehensible to outsiders.

Over time, sources of information get replaced with community-approved ones: conservative news, conservative YouTube, conservative Wikipedia if he’s really committed. The Algorithm soon takes note and stops recommending media from the Left. He stops watching shows with a “liberal agenda,” which usually means shows starring women and people of color. Now, there is evidence that the human mind responds to fictional characters similarly to real people, and that consuming diverse media can decrease bigotry in ways roughly analogous to having a diverse group of friends, which is one of many reasons we say representation matters. By consuming a homogenous media diet, Gabe stymies his ability to have even parasocial relationships with anyone who isn’t a cishet conservative white dude or one of their approved exceptions.

To the extent that any of this happens, it happens at Gabe’s discretion and at his own chosen pace. It has not been forced on him, only encouraged and rewarded. But the fact that it hasn’t been forced can make him all the more willing to accept it, because it seems safe to consider; even though his life and social circle are changing to accommodate, he does not feel committed. But many Gabes have walked these halls, and, if they close the door behind them, there’s nowhere left to go but down.

Step Four: Raise their Power Level

(...and they say we ruined anime.)

Consider the ecosystem of the Alt-Right as layers of an onion, with Gabe sitting at the edge and ready to traverse towards the center. (No, I’m not just going to reiterate the PewDiePipeline, though, if you haven’t seen it, go do that.)

The outer layer of the onion is extremism at its most plausibly deniable. Without careful scrutiny, the public-facing figureheads could pass as dispassionate, and the websites as merely problematic rather than softly fascist. It is valuable if Gabe believes this as well; that, at this stage, he believe the bigotry is simply trolling, the extremists an insignificant minority, and any report of harassment faked. That he believe where he is is as deep as the rabbit hole goes. And that he continue to believe this at each successive layer.

People in the deepest crevices of the Alt-Right self-report getting redpilled on multiple issues at different times in their journey to the center of the onion. If Gabe’s first red pill is about the SJWs coming for his free speech, he’ll think that’s all anyone in his community believes; there’s no racism here, people are just making a point about their right to use slurs. Then, when he gets redpilled on the white genocide, he’ll laugh at those Alt-Lite cucks who tried to sweep the race realists under the rug, and at himself for having once been one, but acknowledge that those channels and websites are still useful for onboarding people, so he won’t denounce them. At the same time, nobody takes those manosphere betas seriously.

And this process is reiterated with every pill swallowed: gender essentialism, autogynephilia, birtherism, Sandy Hook truth, pizzagate, QAnon if he’s really out there. The heart of the onion is typically the Jewish Question, but these can happen in any order, and in any number. But each layer sells itself as being, finally, the ultimate truth. Each denies the validity of the others; the layers ahead don’t exist, they’re made up my liberals, while the people behind are asleep where you are now awake. That’s why they chose “the red pill” as their metaphor: take it, and everything will be revealed. That’s why it cozies up with conspiracism. But what’s supposed to follow is that this knowledge help Gabe in some way, and it doesn’t. Blaming immigrants doesn’t actually fix the economy, and hating women doesn’t make men less lonely. But, having been alienated from everything outside the onion, once that sinks in, the only recourse on offer is to seek out the next pill.

And pills are easy to find. Those within the network have laissez-faire relationships, even as they, on paper, disavow one another. When they need a source or a guest host, they aren’t going to go to the Left; they’re going to feature each other. The Left is the enemy; their ideas are beneath consideration, and the only reason to engage them is for public humiliation. [Shapiro’s book.] But you can interview “western chauvinists” and that doesn’t mean you’re endorsing them, just, you know, it’s fine to hear ‘em out, nothing should be off-limits in the marketplace of ideas. Besides, Nazis are apolitical.

And because these folks keep showing up in each others’ metadata, regardless of what they say, Google thinks there is definitely a relationship between the guy “just asking questions” and the guy denying the Holocaust. Gabe is softly exposed to many flavors of conservatism just slightly more radical than he is now, and is expected, at the very least, to not question their presence. This is an environment where deradicalizing - listening to the Left - would be sleeping with the enemy, but radicalizing further? You do you, buddy.

Gabe’s emotional journey, however, is somewhat more complex. If you’ve spent any time reading or watching reactionary media you’ve probably noticed it’s really. fucking. repetitive. It’s a few thousand phrasings of the same handful of arguments. Like, there’s only so many jokes about attack helicopters! But these people just crank out content, and most of it’s derivative; the reason to pick one personality over another isn’t because they say something different, but because they say it differently. Gabe just picks the affect it’s delivered in.

Repetition dulls the shock of the most egregious statements, making them appear normal and prepping him for more extreme ideas. Meanwhile, the arguments themselves? They’re not good. (BreadTube will never run out of shit to debunk.) They are repetitive because they’re not good. They’re mantric. A good argument you only need to hear one time; if you can follow it, internalize it, and explain it to someone else, you know you’ve understood it. But a bad argument can’t convince you on its own merits, so it will often rely on affect. This can be the snappy, thought-terminating cliche, or the long, winding diatribe that sounds really sensible while you’re hearing it but when someone asks you for the gist you can only say “go watch these 17 videos and it’ll all make sense.” Both these approaches are largely devoid of content, but, gosh, if they don’t sound sure of themselves.

And that mode can be very persuasive, but it doesn’t stick the way a coherent argument does. It needs to be repeated, the affect replenished, because the words matter less than the delivery. There needs to be a steady stream of confident voices saying “we’ve got this figured out and everyone else is stupid” or Gabe’s gonna notice the flaws. They are not well-hidden.

And the catch-22 of returning to that stream over and over is that these communities are stressful even as they are calming. People afraid they will die virgins go to forums with people who share and validate that fear, and also say, “Yes, you will die a virgin.” People afraid Syrians are coming to kill us all watch videos by people who share and validate that fear, and also say, “Yes, Syrians are coming to kill us all.” Others have already pointed out that rubbing your face in your worst anxieties is a form of digital self-harm, but I need to you understand the toxic recursion of it: Gabe is going to these communities to get upset. Every emotion is converted into anger, because sadness, fear, and despair are paralyzing but anger is motivating; Gabe feels less helpless when he’s pissed off. And so, while he’s topping up on reassuring nonsense, he’s also topping up on stress. And, being cut off from everything outside the network, the only place he knows to go to release that stress is back to the place that gives it to him. It’s a feedback loop, pulling him deeper and deeper on the promise that, at some point, relief will come.

It is a similar dynamic that keeps people in abusive relationships.

When someone in Gabe’s community makes a racist joke, they are presenting Gabe with a choice between the human interaction of laughing with his friends and his societal responsibility not to be a fuckin’ racist. And not laughing seems ridiculous; everybody’s friends here; no one’s getting hurt; this is harmless. And so the irreverent race joke draws a line between the personal and the political, and suggests that one can be safely prioritized over the other. One way to look at radicalization is being asked to stick with that seemingly innocuous decision as the stakes are raised incrementally: first with edgier humor, and then comments that are funny because they’re shocking but you couldn’t really call them jokes, and then “funny” comments that are also sincerely angry, but, in each instance, since he laughed with his bros last time, it stands to reason he should keep favoring the personal over some abstracted notion of “politics.”

This is why the progressive adage “the personal is political” is among the most threatening things you can say in these spaces.

I’m not trying to make a slippery slope argument. Most of us who laughed at edgy jokes when we were teenagers didn’t grow up to be Nazis. It is a slippery slope in the specific context of being in community with people trying to radicalize you. Gabe is a lonely white boy in need of friends, and laughing at a racist joke is personal, while not laughing is political. Staying in a community that has Nazis in it is personal, and leaving is political. The personal is what brings people together and the political drives them apart. (The “only if some of them are bigots” part of that sentence is usually lopped off). There’s this joke on the internet that nerds perceive only two races: white and political. Following that logic, what could be more apolitical than an ethnostate?

They are banking on his willingness to adapt his beliefs to suit an environment that meets a need. That same need can be satisfied by white nationalism. There are few things more seductive to people who doubt their own worth than being told you are valuable simply for being white. And you can sub in male, cis, straight, allosexual, or able-bodied. It just takes priming: by the time Gabe officially embraces bigotry, he’s already been acting like a bigot for months. The red pill is simply the moment he says it out loud.

Change Gabe’s surroundings, and you change Gabe.

Step Five: ???

The final step in a traditional extremist group would be getting a mission. But that is one thing the Alt-Right can’t do. Once you start giving clear directives, you can’t play yourselves off as a bunch of unaffiliated hashtags and think tanks; you are now a formalized movement accountable to its followers, and can be judged and policed as such.

To my mind, Charlottesville was an attempt to become such a movement, taking things offline and getting all the different groups working collectively. And, as so often happens when these people get in the same space - especially with no official leaders or means of control over their members - it backfired. Their true colors came out before they were ready and a counter-protester lost her life.

This would be the point where, historically, an extremist group starts to disintegrate. Their veneer of respectability gone, they’re now hated by the public, the media wants nothing more to do with them, and everyone not in jail turns on each other or goes underground. This is also the point where the liberal establishment says, “My job here is done,” and utterly fails to retake control of the narrative, allowing the next batch of radicals to pick up more or less where the last one left off.

But to an already-decentralized group like the Alt-Right, Charlottesville was bad but eminently survivable. People retreated back to the internet, with its code words and anonymous forums, but that’s where much of the work was already done anyway. The platforms where they organized kept tolerating them, the authorities still didn’t classify them as terrorists, and any disgraced figureheads were replaced with up-and-comers.

The major change in strategy is that it doesn’t seem anyone has tried to formalize the Alt-Right since.

So where does that leave Gabe? He’s gone through this whole process of largely hands-off indoctrination - and I should stress his journey may look like what we’ve outlined or it may look different in places, this video is not comprehensive - but now he’s swallowed every pill he cares to, he blames half a dozen minorities for everything he sees as wrong with the world, and no one will give him anything to do. You’ve got this ad hoc movement frothing young men into a militant fervor and then just leaving them to stew in their own hate. Should we really be surprised at how many commit mass shootings?

This is a machine for producing lone wolves.

Leaving men to take up arms of their own volition is a way of enacting terror while being just outside the popular conception of a terror cell. There are also, of course, more classic militias that will offer Gabe clear directives - they’re recruiting from the same pool. And Gabe may stop short of this step, settling in a middle layer that suits him or finding the inner layers too extreme. But violence is the logical conclusion of an ideology of hate, and, should Gabe take this step, he can approach violence in the same incremental fashion he approached conservatism.

He can start with yelling at people on Twitter, and then maybe collective brigading, DDoS attacks, sharing dox, leaking nudes, calling their phone numbers, texting them pictures of their houses from the sidewalk. These acts of cruelty become games of oneupmanship within his community. All this can start as far back as Step 2, and get more intense the deeper he goes. Some people join explicitly partake in harassment and violence the way Gabe joined to talk about anime.

But this behavior can serve as a kind of buy-in. The Left and the feminists and the LGBTQs and the Muslims and the immigrants are all, within his community, subhuman. You’ve maybe heard the conservative catchphrase “feminism is cancer”; well don’t treat cancer by having a respectful exchange of ideas with it, but by eradicating it down to the last cell. Cruelty against the Left is framed as righteous.

From any other perspective, posting someone’s bank information is something you might feel ashamed of. Which creates a psychological imperative not to consider other perspectives. A thing that keeps people in is staving off the guilt they will reckon with the moment they step out. Gabe is also aware that anything he’s done to the Left could be done to him if he leaves; some communities even keep dox on their members as insurance. And the things he’s been encouraged to do to the Left will likely make him feel that the Left would never take him now; the radical Right is the only home he’s got. Harassment becomes another tool of isolation.

Steadily, options for Gabe are whittled down to being a vigilante or a nihilist. There are periods of elation: moments the Alt-Right feels it’s winning - or, more accurately, the people they hate are losing - are like cocaine. They are authoritarians, after all. But the times in between are mean and angry. They are antisocial, starved of emotional connection, consuming incompatible conspiracies that may at any point run them afoul of one another, devoted to figureheads who cater to but cannot risk leading them, and living under constant threat of being outed to the Left or turned on by the Right for stepping out of line. Gabe took this journey for the sense of community and purpose, and, but for the rare moments everything goes their way, the Alt-Right can’t maintain either. They can only keep promising his day will come, a story he could get from a $5 palm reading.

The feeling there’s nothing left but to kill yourself or someone else is so common it’s a meme.

But there is always a third option: Gabe can leave.

Pre-Conclusion: For Fuck’s Sake Do Not Make Gabe Your Whole-Ass Praxis

Before we continue, I want to state plainly that Gabe went off the deep end because he found a community willing to tell him that, because he is a cishet white man, the world revolves around him. Do not treat him like this is true.

If a fraction of the energy spent having debates with America’s Gabes were spent instead on voter re-enfranchisement, prisoner’s rights, protections for immigrants, statehood for DC and Puerto Rico, and redistricting, Gabe’s opinions, in the societal sense, wouldn’t matter. Reactionary conservatism is a small and largely unpopular ideology that is only so represented in our culture and politics because they’ve learned how to game the system.

And I get it. Those are huge problems that are going to take years to address, where, if you know a Gabe, that’s a conversation you could have today. And, if you think you can get through to him, it is worthwhile to try. This is a fight on many fronts and deradicalization is one of them. But it is only one, so please keep it in perspective. It sends an awful message when we spend more time trying to get bigots back on our side than we do the people they are bigoted against.

Your value as a lefty does not hinge on whether you can change Gabe’s mind.

Conclusion: How Gabe Gets Out

He may just grow out of it. These communities skew young, and some folks hit a point where hanging with edgy teens doesn’t feel cool anymore.

He may become disillusioned after the movement fails to deliver on its promises.

He may become disillusioned if something goes wrong in his life and his community isn’t there for him, if he feels they like his race and his gender but don’t actually care about him.

He may be shocked if he sees the Alt-Right at its worst before being appropriately conditioned. Charlottesville was a step too far for a lot of people.

His community may turn on him for any perceived unorthodoxy, and he may leave out of necessity.

He may be separated by circumstance from the community - a trip with no internet, hospitalization, arrest - and not be able to top up on the rhetoric. This may lead him to question his beliefs.

His community may disappear, either tearing itself apart or getting shut down by authorities.

He may have incidental contact with populations he’s supposed to hate, and have trouble reconciling who they are in person with what he’s been told about them. In his community, people bond over shared intolerance, but, suddenly, being tolerant helps him make friends. (This is one reason the Alt-Right has made a battleground of the college campus.)

He may form or revisit relationships outside the network, people who can offer him the connection he’s been looking for. This may reintroduce outside perspectives. More importantly, it rekindles his ability to have healthy relationships at all, something the Alt-Right has estranged him from.

As with recruiters, it seems these “escape hatch” relationships can sometimes be parasocial; coming to respect a public figure who is on the Left, or is critical of the Alt-Right.

Someone he is close to may compel him to choose, “me or the movement.” A lot of young men leave to save a romantic relationship.

Hearing stories from people who’ve already jumped may help; there aren’t a lot of public formers, and some raise suspicions as to their sincerity, but it is getting more common, and may be the closest we get to exit counseling for the Alt-Right.

He may become aware of the ways he’s being manipulated, or have them revealed to him, maybe because he stumbled into BreadTube, I dunno. Knowledge that you are being indoctrinated is no guarantee it won’t work - you are not immune to propaganda - but it can help one resist.

And he may revisit a core belief system that used to guide him, be it religion or social justice or a really wholesome fandom, and be reminded of the identity he used to have.

Moments like these, in isolation or in aggregate, can inspire Gabe to jump. They are also good times for friends to intervene. The reach and the impunity that comes with the internet means it has never been easier to fall into reactionary extremism. It has also never been easier to get out. People who exit skinhead gangs often fear for their lives; for Gabe, there’s a chance getting out is as simple as going to a different website. Much of his community does not know his name or his face and he may not important enough to dox.

What doesn’t get Gabe out - not reliably, not that I have seen - is an argument with a stranger who proves all his facts wrong and his ideology bunk. Facts don’t always work because facts don’t care about his feelings. This was about staying in a community, and holding onto an identity, that mattered to him. It was about belonging, and that is something a rando from the other side of the culture war can’t give him and probably shouldn’t be responsible for.

The theme here is human connection. Before he can do the work of disentangling himself, and facing the guilt of what he’s believed and maybe done, he has to know there’s somewhere for him on the other end of it. That the Right hasn’t ruined him. They’ve told him all of history is groups fighting each other over status, and, without his clan, he’ll be an exile. He needs a better story.

I don’t know that lefty spaces are ideal for this, in no small part because bringing someone who’s a bit of a Nazi but working on it into diverse communities is… questionable. And it probably wouldn’t be good for him, either; having just gotten out of a toxic belief system, he’s going to be deeply skeptical of all ideologies. In a perfect world, people who care about Gabe could build for him - to use a therapy term - a holding space. Someplace private - physical or digital - where Gabe can work out his feelings, where he is both encouraged and expected to be better but is not, in the moment, judged. That comes later. It is delicate and time-consuming work that should not be done in public, but we find these beliefs, built up over the course of months or years, tend to fall away very quickly with a shift of environment. Change Gabe’s surroundings and you change Gabe.

But, instead, a lot of people who jump are functionally deprogramming themselves, which is working for a lot of them, but it’s haphazard, and there are recidivists.

If you don’t personally know a Gabe, or have training as a counselor, you may not be in a position to help him. Possibly there are things you can do to disrupt the recruitment process or prevent infiltration of spaces you’re in - I’m looking into it, but talk to your mods - but, elephant in the room: meaningful change will require reform on the part of platform holders. Tools to disrupt this process already exist and are being used on groups like ISIS, but they’re not being used on the Alt-Right because they try oh so very hard not to get classified as terrorists (and also any functioning anti-radicalization policy would require banning a lot of conservative politicians, so there’s that...).

But what makes our story better than theirs is that the fight for social and economic justice, though it is long, and difficult, and frustrating, when it works, it fulfills the promise the Right can’t keep: it materially make people’s lives better. I am not prone to sentimentality, or to giving these videos happy endings. But one thing we have that the Alt-Right doesn’t is hope.

#video essay

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cowboypossume · 4 years ago

Text

so i reread keeper of the lost cities and here’s my fresh input:

a note before we begin: you know how people fake throw up at things on tik tok? this book is the reason i now unironically do that.

dex and fitz really have the enemies to lovers troupe going for them and i’m ok with it. i really am.

so do sophie and biana at the beginning but it fizzes out so a better description is enimies to friends to lovers

marhella and stina give me such power top energy i cannot express how much i think that contributes to people not liking them

speaking of stina i wish sophie didn’t just immediately hop onto the bandwagon of “oh she’s evil” without investing further, especially with how much she is written as a ‘good’ person (which i can and will defend to the day i die that good people don’t exist but that’s for a different day).

there’s way too much heteronormativity and Patriarchical Ideas mushed into the book. like three hole pages of a 488 page book of teenagers being like “oooooo girls like guys and guys like girls” only for della to join in. not to mention the amount of times keefe is the reason for those ideas because he’s teasing like “oh fitz has a girlfriend”

keefe and fitz didn’t have as many bonding moments™️ in this book as i remember, but they stil know each other really well, have comfortability around each other, and would make a 10/10 best friends to lovers troupe.

oh my god s o many crushes i swear. like two teenagers of the opposite gender really can’t not like each other apperantly

i miss read a line and really thought there was cannon sexism for me to do a whole ass rant about in the notes part of my analyzation but n o p e

but we do have classism, sexist stereotypes, and the fact that there’s been SO many characters who’ve spoken and ✨🌺far too many of them are white🌺✨

oh also: no ones disabled. which annoys me because their society is described as ‘euptopic’ almost implying that it’s something that makes people problematic, which,,,, no

ok a side note on the society, i understand that the story’s message (kinda) is that things that seem perfect are probably deeply flawed, but something tergan said stuck with me. on a page i can’t remember at the moment he says something like “[the black swan exists] in a society that doesn’t have rebels”, which it suck with me bc that’s boarderline dystopic if it’s not there already. it’s one thing for laws not to be broken, but when you think your society is so perfect despite it having obvious flaws and you think that no one rebels, then i really hate to break it to you, you have a massive rebellion about to occur; it’s just scented as foul under your resplendent nose.

please stop flirting. i get its part of teenagers being teens but i swear if i read “s/he realeased a breath” or “their heart fluttered” or literally ANYTHING like that god no.

yall. i missed dex. he actually has more role in this book than ‘you can gadget and we need one’ and oh boy i really missed him. he’s a BEAN and deserves better.

hole’s said everyone deserves better and i absolutely agree so we’re adding that note here.

if you do what i did and read this book out loud to one of your best friends who has no clue anything about this weird fandom and give fitz a really deep voice for no reason it’s comdy GOLD.

i really think i’m reading too much into this point but iggy seems,,,, symbolic to me?

like ok with humans, sophie didn’t ‘fit in’, right? like she grew up hearing things like “why can’t you be normal like your sister” (which i can do a whole other rant about how that will affect her for the rest of her life just a s k)

not to mention looking really different from her family and graduating high school at age twelve

but you know who never judged her?

m a r t y

so anyway sophie meets this teal-eyed, movie star smiled wonder boy who takes away her entire knowledge of everything she’s known while taking away her family too

and it turns out even in a place of weirdos she still manages to be the exception to everything

and she doesn’t have the comfort to hear what people are really thinking about her anymore (which as i said before say the word and i’ll deadass write a whole speech about how everything she heard will completely fuck up every relationship she has) which unfortunately means that she grew used to confirming people didn’t like her but now she doesn’t have that

she has to adapt to this new space and feel like she’s always felt, like an outcast in a place that was accepting, but yet again, she the exception to everything

but about halfway through the book she starts to become more comfortable around grady and edaline and that’s when iggy comes in

she finds him while cleaning garbage, and grady compliments her. they have a bonding moment and it’s because of this t h i n g. and then sophie actually feels proud not only does she take up a room, but she did something

and her new parents are proud of her

so she finally feels like she BELONGS because she helped out at the place where she lives/they work

to me it seems iggy is kinda a manifesto of the world building and character development that happens in this book

i think the plot/character arc is fixated a little too much on how different sophie is. like, i get it, she’s exception to everything, but the plot really didn’t need her to be that quirky. yes, she’s different, but there’s a lot more to the plot and her character than how different she is.

also, i had to reread pages a lot bc i needed an exact paragraph number and,,,, it’s really paced like a fanfic

some questions i have about the society is:

it’s established that they use books, physical papers, etc., and the only thing i remember about trees is the speech alden gave her about how she doesn’t know the name of their most popular tree, and the fact that people become trees when they die. even then i don’t think the second one is in this book. never o n c e do i remember something about planting trees that aren’t dead elf’s, so do they feel the affects of deforestation and that jazz?? like if they use trees, will they run out of them? can they??? and do they use the coffins of elf’s for paper??

this is more of a rant than a question, but here it goes anyway. in foxfire, students have a testing system very similar to the one in america: a huge test at the end of the year determines the future of a student. that in of itself doesn’t sound too drastic, right? well,,,,, not necessarily. several studies have shown that tests in general, but especially these types, don’t work. despite how good or bad of a teacher i think my past and current teachers have been, every single one of them hates this system that we have in place. they know it’s an unfair assessment that does it’s damnist to make you fail, and they’re trying so hard to denounce it. however, that doesn’t happen at all in the lost cities. in fact, most of the teachers pride themselves on failing students. so if elf’s are in such an advanced society, why do tests still exist? especially in an environment where the consequences are far greater than just staying back a grade.

so sophie’s figuring out that major problems exist in the world the elf’s created, right? i wonder if more society structured problems exist more than ‘oh bad people do things and the law justifies which is what’. like, as i’ve previously stated, there’s sexist stereotypes presented (like girls like dresses and guys don’t), but does sexism still exist? does racism exist? it’s established that poverty isn’t a thing because of the fund elf’s have at birth and their limited usage of money (which if you understand please explain bc i don’t really get how they buy stuff but still don’t use money) but if someone gets shipped off to exile, do they lose their money? is it possible for elf’s to starve to death because they can’t afford food? do they pay for food?? if they did starve who would they call? because someone on this website, who’s post i tried to find but i couldn’t so if y’all know what i’m talking about please link it, brought up a good point that elwin is a school physician, he shouldn’t be dealing with the near-death experiences sophie has, so who would they turn to? especially if they don’t have access to foxfire because they got exciled??

is therapy a thing in this world? sophie and dex could really benefit from it, yet mental health has only been brought up when someone went insane, which REALLY shows how little they think about it.

that perfectly transitions into my next point: sophie and dex’s trauma. i really don’t get the vibe that there was much thought going into their kidnapping, other than sophie needed something to trigger her inflecting ability and establish the black swan are on the good side, which really sucks because wow trauma doesn’t happen lightly. and the fact that it happened seems rushed to me, but i’ll come back to that. but anyway, their trauma doesn’t get developed that deeply in this book because it wasn’t given the space to. they were beaten, tortured, starved, gagged, and who even knows what else for t e n d a y s, only for them to find them again, repeat the process, but someone saves them and dumps them into an illegal city and they both nearly die from dehydration, coldness, and lack of concentration, and you’re telling me after three days of conscious of bed rest sophie wants to get her failing out of school over with? ma’am, it takes more time than that to adjust to THAT alone, not to mention the realization that “hey your entire life is fake because people genetically altered you to be their weapon in a war so much bigger than yourself” that was recently dumped on her. like,,,, you really expect me to think that three days is what made her feel prepared and CONFIDENT? no sir. i don’t buy it.

coming back to it being rushed: the book starts out slow and then really hits the ground running and doesn’t stop. so much more stuff happens in the second half of the book than the first and it never gets fully developed it feels like. in the first half sophie moves away but gets a new family and struggles a bit but adapts, fires maybe but hey don’t worry about it, dex hates fitz, fitz is ✨d r e a m y ✨ but our main girl doesn’t like him like that, right?, stina’s a bitch, and sophie is a quirky girl and telepath but can’t tell anyone. pretty basic stuff, not too plot intensive. the second half though: sophie almost fails her midterms but doesn’t, grady and elaine want to unadopt her (which that’s never really explained as to why they do that but ok) fires exist in san degio but they’re fine but they’re actually a rebel elf so..., sophie accidentally breaks a law but it was an accident so it’s fine, update on the fires: sophie burns herself trying to get the evidence that it’s a rebel elf and it works, she’s the moon lark and basically a weapon bc no one knows her well enough to evaluate her safety, sophie and dex get kidnapped but fitz can now transmit to her and she has two new abilities so it’s all good, trauma doesn’t exist except for nightmare you can fix with sedatives, sophie doesn’t fail out of school, and yayyy her family doesn’t want her remove their adoption. there’s probably a lot more that i missed, it’s just that’s a LOT of stuff crammed into a little bit further than the second half of the book that really could have been devolped or explore further instead of forcing into less than 244 pages, ya know?

fitz’s eyes are mentioned seven times, the first time being on page TWO of the novel

his smile is mentioned three times

alden says “no reason to worry” five times, he writes it once, and sophie points out he says it a lot so he chances it slightly to something like ‘don’t stress about it’ so i didn’t count those though i should have

speaking of alden, in this book he’s absolutely creepy, but something that stands out to me is how much he calls sophie girl. i didn’t count it, but he said “that’s a good girl” to sophie too many times for it to be normal especially when you consider how he doesn’t do it to anyone else.

i kinda forgot i was annotating for sophie’s anxious habit of pulling out her eyelashes so i got she did it twice, but i highly doubt that number

but i will keep adding to this when i actually do the words with my annotations.

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suffering-and-happy-about-it · 4 years ago

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Into the Unknown (The Big, Big Bang; Part 1.)

Series summary: Sometimes, you might feel lonely in the entirety of the universe; of all of the stars, planets and constellations... Until it comes. The big bang that turns the world upside down, the reason why all the stars collide and why you, in the first place, are alive.

Part summary: Remus wasn’t as social as you’d maybe assume when you’d got to know him. Yet althrough his personal struggles, for some reason, Dumbledore had chosen him as his new DADA teacher.

A/N: Okay, this is more or less the first, informative, get-into-the-story chapter and there’s not much happening at the moment. I swear, we will pump it up, just give it at least two parts.

Word count: 2.3 K

Tagging: @notaliteraltoad

Series playlist: H E R E

Series masterlist: H E R E

If you'd ever put a piece of parchment, inkwell and a goose quill and asked Remus John Lupin do describe himself with a few sentences, the parchment would be empty for a few minutes before he'd settle on one small word: a loner. He was alone for quite a time, he wasn't too attracted by the idea of a human accompany; after everything that happened with Sirius, James and Peter, he wasn't quite sure if he would be able to connect with a someone new at the time of speaking. The second word he'd most probably used would be ill - then, he would cross the word and write 'seriously ill' instead.

There wasn't a lot of people who knew what Lupin was going through or what kind of illness he was diagnosed with thanks to hiding away at the edge of every thinkable society; his bad state was visible just from looking at him. His skin was dry and almost transparent almost all the time and when his illness was getting the best of him, he even appeared lightly green. His hair was slowly thinning out as he grew older, but it still wasn't as bad as it could be. The only thing that remained the same over the last few decades were his eyes.

The last sentence he would write would most likely say 'down to earth'. It was a rather generous name for not having much money, always looking shabby and, as some wizards or witches would say, second-like hand. Not that Lupin would be proud of what he was looking like, but there weren't many things he could with it - wizards with his sort of 'illness' rarely got a good job proposition if they ever ended up having one.

For everything that was stated above and far more, it was a miracle when he got approached with a job offers from one of the most well-respected, smartest and brilliant wizard of all time, Album Dumbledore himself. The old man found him hidden away in Yorkshire, living in one tumbledown, semi-derelict cottage at the line of poverty itself. Remus felt like he didn't have the right to complain; he was a damn werewolf. And thanks to the small reminder spoiling his whole face, everyone who could order him something to do for a living knew about this aspect of his life way sooner than Remus would've liked them to.

The night Dumbledore had walked into his humble home, he barely got one shirt that held together without patches; most of his clothes was patched up already - all of his trousers and coats surely. At first, he vehemently dismissed Dumbledore's wish for Lupin working at his school as a DADA teacher. What Dumbledore was suggesting was pure madness. Remus always thought he's a calm and tolerable man - yet when Albus told him everything that he was asking of him, Remus almost lost it.

Yes, of course - there were the mad werewolves like Fenrir Greyback who hunt children down just for sport and making sure that more and more people would be carrying this sick curse. Lupin hated these sons of bitches the most. He himself was one of their victims in the end. And Albus Dumbledore, the most brilliant man Lupin had ever met, one of the few that Lupin had real respect for was asking him to be a teacher at the biggest wizarding school in all of England, Ireland and Scotland? No. That was an offer that couldn't be accepted, that was pure madness. He would never willingly get near such a cluster of young people who were full of dreams and had their lives ahead of themselves. What would happen if he would lose control? How many people would get hurt because of one slip? Did Dumbledore realize how many things he was betting by asking Remus such thing?

But to Remus' surprise, Albus smiled dismissively and stood up from his half-broken-down sofa. With a serious face, Dumbledore had told him that now, he had a professor who could brew the perfect Wolfsbane potion every month and according to Albus, this said the professor was a potions master and genius. However, if Lupin wouldn't trust himself as much to spend the night of wolfing out inside the Forbidden Forest, there still was the Shrieking shack, just like Remus used to remember it. As a small topic for consideration, Albus left there a small bag with thirty Galleons laying on the coffee table, so Lupin could at least buy himself the most basic needs - whether he would take the job offer or not, the money was his to use, to keep or to give to someone else.

After that, Albus left the cottage. He knew what he was doing and what Remus is capable of. When Albus was leaving, he was smiling and humming a jolly song; he knew very well that he's leaving Remus with his thoughts alone and he knew very well that this lycanthropic wizard had one of the biggest potentials for teaching Albus had ever encountered.

Everything got sealed on one dark August night. It was mostly the idea of him and Black meeting that made Remus send an express letter to Hogwarts. Sirius Black, the insane wizard that had murdered twelve muggles and his very own best friend, had escaped from Azkaban. Anyone could tell how he had done it, anyone knew where he was and what was he planning to do. Yet Remus had the feeling he should be counting on Sirius visiting him; in the end, Black already murdered one of their small group of friends and helped with murdering the second one... Remus had the feeling that Black might be wanting to finish what had happened in 1981 and for that, he accepted Dumbeldore's proposition. He was to be one of the Hogwarts teachers.

During the rest of the summer and hiding away, Lupin started to study the materials for each year he was to teach; back in his school days, he was one of the greatest students Hogwarts had seen. There was rarely a test in which Lupin got worse than Exceeding Expectations. It was mostly caused by his natural interest in the art of wizardry and by Remus' gratefulness - Dumbeldore let him study like every other normal student and prevented him from hurting anyone else during the full moon. And DADA? Dear Merlin, he always had a deep appreciation for this class. One of his biggest DADA achievements was that he could cast the Patronus Charm without too much of a trouble. Also... The creatures were quite brilliant and before Lupin could comprehend, he was looking forward to sharing his knowledge with all of the young people in Hogwarts.

At the same time, he realized that he will be there. Son of James and Lily Potter. His name was Harry and he had last seen when he was smaller than Lupin's forearms. He was nothing more than a sweet, laughing boy covered in one big blanket. How old was he now? Twelve? Thirteen? Remus couldn't even count it down properly, he just knew that the boy's going to be there once be starts his teaching career.

As to be expected, the safety precautions around Hogwarts got more intense - Nd so did everywhere else. Lupin was especially aware of that once a Dementor harassing a black-hearted boy had woken him up. And to his realization, it was Harry Potter himself who got into trouble. The most logical thing that came to mind was to talk to the staff and to make sure there are no more dementors inside the train.

Yet once he made sure the train was safe, he couldn't bring himself to go back to the coupe and rather stayed in the corridors on a watch, trying to ensure the safety inside the train. His mind, on the other hand, was racing - James' son, his murdered best friend's son, was inside and he looked just like James. Except for the eyes. Those were, without a doubt, Lily's. Lupin didn't expect such a low blow on his very first day. At that moment, he promised himself to be better. He promised himself that he'd teach the kids everything he knew; and he was particularly excellent in this subject, so the kids had.

The first days at school were... Good. Lupin wasn't particularly all over the place because he wasn't quite comfortable with the all-the-time type of company. The other teachers tried to talk to him, to make him feel good about himself and the purpose of his staying inside the school's walls and he didn't avoid the introduction where the whole Great hall had given him short applause.

McGonagall, who was sitting next to him, persisted on Remus calling her "Minerva" and every time he dared to call her Mrs professor, she gave him a furrowed look, correcting him in her straight-to-the-point type of voice. Madame Pomfrey was also fond of seeing him after such a long time in a pretty good shape and Hagrid tried his absolute best to behave; there was still quite a lot of memories inside other's minds that connected him with Sirius and Remus could understand the worried looks and careful words. Needless to say, the whole feast was delicious as it usually was in Hogwarts and after such a long and draining day, he was glad to walk the quiet and dark halls before he took off to his room, located close to the DADA schoolroom to have some proper and certainly refreshing sleep.

First classes after the feast in the Great hall were the worst for Remus. There were new faces to remember, a lot whole more of names and... At first, he was lost when it came to some of the students. The name of Justin Flinch-Fletchey didn't crawl into his brain until the end of the first week; however, there were people of whom he was very aware against his better judgement.

One of them was Harry and his two friends, Hermione and Ronald - no matter what they said or did, they always looked there are about to cause some mischief. This, of course, could be only a feeling inside of Lupin's guts; yet from other professors, he listened to the wild stories about the past two years; all of which had Potter himself in the centre. Another student he was keeping his eyes on was Neville Longbottom, the son of Alice and Frank. The fates of his parents were heartbreaking and growing up with his grandmother, who was a persistent and unpleasant woman at times, had to be hard for such a gentle soul. There were moments when Lupin could see glimpses of his own uncertainty and shyness in Neville's words. At last, there was a girl from Hufflepuff named Rosamunda who caught his eye simply because her mother was one of his former schoolmates.

Kids who caught his attention naturally without having some sorts of a past connection with him were Fred and George Weasley who were friends with Lee Jordan, another Griffindor student - they were quite a loud and jolly party who, when the topic was right, had a lot of questions and were very curious about the subject. On the other hand, when they didn't have one of those days, they could be annoying, to say the least. Another girl, Heather from Ravenclaw, had caught his eye simply because of her unusually deep interest in DADA. There were no students who would give him any sorts of trouble, which was also a win. As Lupin got a hold on his classes step by step, it suddenly didn't seem to be so out worldly that he'd have the potential to be a teacher - and a good one.

Sure, there were concerns expressed by others member of the staff, especially by Snape, that were regarding his lycanthropy. Yet as Dumbledore had sworn to him, everyone was doing their best when it came to that - madame Pomfrey made sure that the Shrieking shack is at the disposal all the time, Snape was brewing the potions even though his mostly anti-Lupin agenda and Dumbledore himself sworn to him that if there would be a situation in which a student was to be harmed, he himself would prevent that.

Everything seemed to be falling in its place.

It was the break between the noon and afternoon classes in which Lupin was to assigned to have a patrol on the small courtyard opposite the Great hall where some students took their lunches so they could spend some time out in the open before the weather gets bad. And the occupation of the courtyard was quite big - some students were just taking a short break and played Exploding snap throughout, the Weasley twins were throwing some kind of small, non-burning fireworks at each other and there were even people who simply chatted the whole period away. Lupin himself was quietly standing in one of the corners, leaning into a wall dressed in one of his shabby sweaters and ate an apple while overseeing the whole situation.

There was a moment where he didn't notice it at all - someone had crashed into a group of three students, taking two of them down onto the ground. It was hard to see what was happening there since there was quite a lot of people in the way. The only thing he could see were people picking off the ground as another person was running off inside the castle. Honestly, he didn't know where to jump first - if he should go to help the students laying on the ground. - "I am so sorry! I will buy you a lollipop or something!" - The woman who jumped at them yelled over her shoulder and disappeared inside the castle. He could only see a grey sweater, long black pants and her hair flow in the wind as she ran for... For an unknown reason.

The only thing he had seen was her back, he could hear her yelling some nonsense at the students and even though, it knocked the apple out of his hand as he looked at her disappearing. There was something. Remus couldn't exactly name it, but there was some energy about her. Yet in the end, he walked to the group to check on them, letting the woman disappear inside.

#remus lupin x fem!reader #remus lupin x y/n #remus lupin imagine #remus john lupin #harry potter movies #harry potter books #harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban #harry potter

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anarchist-soupkitchen · 3 years ago

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ooop its a really long essay

A brief list of why the Tories is pretty rubbish

Before we start, I have a few things to say. As this is intended for UK audiences it might be a little difficult for people outside of the UK to understand the wording of certain topics, I will include somethings that need more explanation up here but if I do not include it here, please feel free to ask down in the comments.

Tory: someone who is a part of the conservative right

Anglicanism: the English church’s version of Christianity

This essay is a PERSUASIVE ESSAY this means its BIASED I hope you could tell from the title. This essay is from the view of someone who is white I am not trying to speak over people of colour on issue like race and I encourage you to look at non-white creators within the UK to get views on this matter.

I am pretty armature when it comes to my writing so do not expect something ground-breaking. And with that out of the way, let us begin.

1. The tory party we know today was founded in 1834, you would think that would be plenty of time for its members to grow and shape the party into the best organization it can be. But with the tory party still stuck on the same ideas that Anglicanism is the only true religion, and that queer people should not have rights you would think that the party is straight out of the early 20th century, or still stuck on the same ideas the party was founded upon. It does not matter what side you are on and how your choice to view the tory party, people can agree on the prominent figures inside the tory party from old to recent. An example of a prominent tory of old was Winston Churchill a well know racist who also, coincidentally got us through WW2 when he was appointed by Chamberlin. He fostered such views that white people should govern over the “primitive” black and indigenous people of Africa and that Indian people “bred like rabbits”. To anyone who knows their UK history, 1983 was a very eventually year for politics and the UK as a whole. You now have to wear seatbelts in the front seats of cars, the dismembered victims of serial killer Dennis Nielsen are found in his London flat, unemployment was on a record heigh since the 1930’s and a general election found that Margaret Thacher was to be the next prime minister after a landslide win in the polls. Over the course of her 11-year reign of terror she periodised free-market capitalism and privatised public sectors including transport, railways and mines. Then because she did not like the Scottish government, she through a hissy fit and closed all mines in Scotland. Just like that she fucked up the economy, where in the big mining areas of the past are still experiencing the aftershocks today. I remember my granny telling me how she made up food packages for the miners around town and how it was so devastating to the town’s economy. Everyone was unemployed and starving, even my grandad. These examples really show that the Tories will support people who are the worst in British society if they have the parties’ interests at heart. You would think the tory party cannot get any worse but with modern polices such as pledging to get 50,000 nurses for the NHS while only giving them a 1% pay rise, which is only £7.78 for a low band nurse, by 2023. Or being “tough on crime” even though 96.4 crime were recorded by every 1000 people in 2019. You can see how tough they are about carrying out their polices. Let me tell you my favourite of the lot, Boris Johnston, our current PM, wants to limit immigration by 100,000 people. They want to only let in “the brightest and the best,” what a load of shite. Our immigrants are the backbone of our society doing everything people like the Tories would not even dream of doing. Imagen seeing Boris working in a McDonalds or in your local call centre. That fucker probably has not worked a day in his life. According to the migration observatory, migrants make up 50% of the low pay workforce. Either way you look at it, its abysmal. The government should do more for these people that letting them rot in a McDonalds or in a low paying job. If you have taken time to be a model citizen, train and get your qualifications, possibly learn a new langue to mover over to a shitty wet rock I do not see any problem with the government providing necessities to get you started in your new life. We have got the money.

2. Can I ask you, what side do you think Boris Johnson is on? I will let you think for a moment. The Working class makes up more than half of our population according to the BBC’s class calculator. They say that a government is reflective of the people’s views and I think that is bullshit. Out of the working-class eligible to vote, who do vote, only three in ten vote conservatives. Do you want to know why people in the working class do not vote tory? Because under tory leadership since 2010, 6000,000 more children and their families were forced into poverty. The need for foodbanks skyrocketed 12.3% in the last five years and that is no even accounting for the pandemic. It is clear by now; I have given you enough time to think. “we know whose side Boris Johnson is on- the billionaires, the bankers and the big business.”- labour shadow chancellor, John McDonell. We know the conservatives are very busy committing acts of voter suppression and giving money to their friends instead of caring about you. They are buzzy introducing laws that make it mandatory to have voter ID in order to vote. If you do not make it free people will stop coming. The electoral commissions think 3.5 million voters just will not come back. this is all a part of, “takle[ing] every aspect of electoral fraud”- tory manifesto. It is well known that many rich people have been investing in the party for quite a while. Here is just a few: Anthony Bamford head of machinery in JCB, he gave £12.1 million since 2005. Charles Cayzer owns a shipping tycoon, he gave £480,00. Did you also know, Boris is known to be very generous when it comes to giving back. You’ve probably herd in the news about the conservatives handing out £3mil in contracts to tory owned covid PPE companies over the course of the pandemic. Some of that went to a MP, Nadim Zahawi who is a shareholder in SThree. SThree was given £1mil in contracts over the course of the pandemic. With all the evidence I have given above you’d think the government its rolling in it, I suspect they are but I doesn’t look like it from the outside. They have cut funding to courses drastically, as well as benefit schemes. Like cutting access for eighteen- to twenty-year-olds to the housing benefits. Yet with all the money they been cutting away from services and councils who desperately need it they still have enough money to cough up a commission for a royal yacht named after the duke of Edinburgh, costing over £200 million. Seems sweet does it, name a yacht after the ghoul of Edinburgh, right? You probably know the just of it now, your wrong. Not only is the yacht being paid for by taxpayers, but they are also naming it in honour after a racist. Or how the BBC would phrase his words as “memorable one-liners”. Here is a selection I find quite fitting: “The Philippines must be half empty if you’re all here running the NHS”- while meeting with a Filipino nurse. “If you stay here much longer, you’ll be all slitty-eyed”- he said to a group of British students while on a royal visit to China. My favourite must be “It looks like it was put in by an Indian.”- referring to and old-fashioned fuse box in Edinburgh. He is supposed to be the duke of the bloody place! I really like how one article what I read put it “[Prince Philip] screams out loud what other racists like him have learned how to conceal and camouflage in what they think and project as civilised demeanour.”- Hamid Dabashi.

3. What I find absolutely astounding, is the Tories inability to show compassion to the people who have nothing. If you did not know the vagrancy act among other things crimeless the homeless and rough sleepers, which is by far a very bad mixture with the recent homelessness statistics, homelessness has risen 28% since labour was last in office and if the Tories continue down the path they are now, it is only going to keep rising. What you would find is most shocking is that there’s solutions for the homeless crisis right in front of us, what the Tories must to not be able to see. Layla Moran of the liberal democrats thinks they “must take a more compassionate and holistic approach, starting by scrapping the vagrancy act”. I think that would be a step forward and away from the old ways of prosecuting people for not being as fortunate as the rest of us, but there is something even more simple than that. Repossessing the 200,000 buildings that have been vacant in the UK for more than six months. Not only would that put a sizeable dent in the houses we need, but it also saves space. The UK is small collection of islands and I do not think the Tories can see that. We do not have the land available to just start building everywhere while leaving all those homes empty and unfilled. Its not a way to solve the housing crisis and its certainly not a way to save the money we supposedly need. Even the homes the Tories are building are left dormant because they are too expensive for the area, they are located in. With the way things are going the Tories will have to build more houses than they ever built before, because by 2041 homelessness is expected to doble. That is 400,000 more households if things do not change -a study by heriot-wat university. The evidence suggests that whatever the Tories are doing to end homelessness it is not working. Everything is not as bleak as I just told you though, the conservative has ended homelessness before. In the hight of the pandemic the conservatives got 90% of all rough sleepers off the streets and put them in hotels or hostels. This helped people apply for benefits, find jobs and get some more permanent assistance. People was helped during the pandemic, but when the funding ran out last July, homeless and the rough sleepers in the hotels and hostels where back out in the streets again. Alone and forgotten by the government that promised to end the very crisis they are apart of years ago. Theis shows that the Tories have the money to help the unfortune but they would rather sit on their arses chatting about what colour they should paint the walls of their house. More recently the Torie introduced a law what will fine people for sleeping in doorways. It really shows what the Tories care about, getting linings for their pockets. The Tories have the money to stop homelessness and when it was a danger to them, they stopped the issue what has been so recuing in our politics for decades. They helped the people who so desperately needed it only to chuck them back into the cold when covid-19 was no longer a danger to them.

4. The conservatives fail to keep minorities safe in the society that they created. It is not surprise that the Tories are the most incompetent as ever. A study by BBC radio 5 found that hate crimes have doubled since 2013. An optimist would assume that is great, that there must mean that people have been reporting it more, right? Partly so. Although we have seen a rise in reports of hate crimes, the rate of prosecution has dropped down from 20% to just 8%. And that is just the tip of the iceberg, in a survey of faith-based organizations; the home office found that seven in ten of the employees surveyed has never reported a hate crime to the police where one happened. For a country where we are supposed to be the most tolerable it is no surprise that a big portion of the hate crimes committed are ones where the religion the victim followed played a big part. Our population, like many others, is influenced by our politicians. After Boris described Muslim women in burkas as “letterboxes” in an interview; citizen UK found that there where a surge in hate crime directed to Muslim women where the word “letterbox” was used. Again, continuing with the theme of hate crime against religions, Muslims made up half of the statistics in 2018 – 2019. The biggest spike we have seen in the last few years has been to Jewish people, where hate crimes against them have more since doubled. It is not a surprise since people seem to relate being a ‘good’ Jew to being a Zionist. Other minorities like trans youth under sixteen in England and whales now must go through everything that goes with puberty on top of not wanting to have the body you cuntly have all because TERF’s and conservatives do not think puberty blockers should be available to them. At this point I genuinely think they want trans kids dead, how could you not see that the benefits of puberty blockers far out way the potential consequences. If puberty blockers really where the target they would have taken them of the shelfs completely, but they did not do that did they? They just restricted the rights of an already marginalised group more. Its not just trans kids but the fight for a third gender to finally get recognised is still waging on despite it being a battle since 2018. The government petition has been signed 136,000 times demanding non-binary finally be recognised as a valid gender in the eyes of the law. I hope I can get recognised as well as everyone else. It may not seem a big deal to some of you reading this but it is to thousands. Especially the people who want to go on hormones and medically transition. Because right now I and many other people are restricted and not allowed to get that service. If you are in the UK and you are of age, I urge you to signs the government petition. In other news the conservatives are just now getting to outlawing conversion therapy three years after they announced they would do so. It just shows how the party is not on target. On the topic of not on target let us talk about the increasing number of racial minorities becoming homeless because of lack of funding to their communities. Since the conservatives got into power in the 2010 racial minorities now make up 40% of all homeless despite being only 15% of the current population. It really shows how much they care about anyone who is not white. Yet people like my gran will continue to say they are doing enough for these underfunded communities.

the tory party really has nothing going for them, they are certainly not for the working class, they cannot solve homelessness and they do not give two fucks about minorities. To think anyone would vote form them is just amazing. Its fucking stupid to believe that they are anything but a bunch of rich shites dawdling around and thinking up ways to get more money into their pockets. To end this really all over the place essay, if you vote tory you are a massive twat.

Sources in comments:

#essay #uk #uk politics #uk politics essay #persuasive essay #tory government #tory #left wing politics #conservatism #conservtive #if any reads this well done #im sorry #its long #heehee hastags go burrr

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wherevermyway · 4 years ago

Text

we’re professional. (1/??) // minbin // 18+

❄ part of yuki’s favourites! ❄

we’re professional. chapter one: sophisticated series navigation: [desktop] [mobile]

pairing: lee minho x seo changbin rating: explicit! 18+ warnings/tags: slow burn, angst, eventual sexual content, age difference, art student changbin, artist minho, fake dating AU. word count: 4,807 also on AO3

originally posted: 17 december 2020

series summary: Lee Minho, or Minho: The Heartless, is a famous artist, which comes with an annoying entourage of paparazzi that are very invested in his life.

Two years ago, a piece at UBC's annual student's exhibit catches Minho's eye: "arranged: in black", a series of greyscale paintings crafted by sophomore Seo Changbin. Minho talks with Changbin at length for hours, then offers to help him financially if they pretend to date for a while, so Minho can please the press. Naturally, a walking exhibit of the "starving artist" stereotype, Changbin accepts the offer wholeheartedly.

There are no strings attached: Changbin can leave at any time. Hell, Minho doesn't even ask him for sex in exchange for the money, just companionship and occasional skinship. Changbin knows that Minho is emotionally damaged from several bad relationships in the past, so to have someone pay him just for providing them company is nice. Sure, he could go off and date someone and work on settling down, but he just doesn't want to. Minho is too interesting, too valuable.

Eventually, something's gotta give. When it does, it could potentially damage their relationship and careers forever.

disclaimer: this is a work of fiction! any reference to persons in this work of fiction are purely coincidental. the characters referenced from Stray Kids are interpretations loosely based on their personalities in the group and do not represent the real people behind the personas. if this, or any of the content included in the warnings above make you uncomfortable, please stop reading now.

chapter summary: Minho brings up an interesting proposal while celebrating the second year of his professional arrangement with Changbin.

“I can’t accept this.” The young, blue-haired man at the opposite side of the table of a middle-aged brunette pushes an open envelope back across the table. “It’s too much. You’ve already given me so much this month, I couldn’t possibly accept anymore.”

“Changbin,” the brunette smirks, bringing the crystal glass of wine up to his mouth. “Please, don’t insult me. I’m not offering this just off the cuff. Besides, it’s not just cash that’s in there.”

The bluenette frowns, bringing his gin and tonic to his mouth, taking a careful, prescribed sip as he watches the older man cautiously. He lets the gin burn its way down his throat before he sighs. “It’s sex, then. That’s what you want, Minho?”

“No.” Minho’s expression quickly turns serious and slightly sour. “Not at all. I told you when we first started this arrangement that this wouldn’t turn sexual.”

“Right.” Changbin cocks his eyebrows up in response, his tone somewhat sarcastic. He brings the glass up again, tilting it and his head backwards, letting the ice slink down and hit him in the nose as he finishes off his drink. He sets the glass down on to the table, ice settling with a soft clink, before he rolls his eyes up and frowns. “What’s all this for, then?” The young man rolls his wrist around, bringing his chin down to his right hand. “You’ve really gone all out for this date.”

Minho softly smiles, then mimics Changbin, mirroring him in the way that he places his head in his left palm. “It’s been two years, officially.” He makes eye contact with a server somewhere off in the distance, and nods upward.

“Two years, eh?” Changbin tuts. “Surprising that neither of us have gotten sick of each other, nor found other people to spend time with.” He takes in a quick breath, then flashes his teeth with a lazy smirk. “Sure you’re not getting serious with me yet?”

The older man opens his mouth to speak, but quickly recedes his statement as a lanky waiter confidently struts over to the table. “Hyunjin, could you please bring me the bottle of Clos D’Ambonnay I have in the back?”

“Of course, Mr. Lee,” the blond waiter nods his head once with a polite smile before he makes his way back to whence he came.

Changbin squinted, knitting his brows together as he shook his head once. “You own this restaurant, too, don’t you?”

“Mmm, I wouldn’t necessarily say own it, no.” Minho hums, bringing his index finger in between his teeth as he ponders. “It’s a partnership with an old colleague of mine, Chan; you met him at the Vivace Vancouver exhibit over the spring. He had that dreadful red hair, the one where you said he looked like he got electrocuted and then spray painted by an angry ex-lover.”

The younger man’s eyes go wide as he tries to hold back his laughter. “Oh my god,” he sighs, “I remember that. How do you forget something so audacious, is that even possible?” He regains his composure and rests upright against the back of the chair. “In my defence, though, I was two glasses of Chianti in when I said that. Please tell me that his hair isn’t that horrible shade anymore. It was so bad.”

Minho smiles widely and softly shakes his head. “No, no, god, no. I met with him the day after and told him that he needed to go back to see my stylist immediately and never go back to the hellspawn that butchered his hair.”

“Apologies for the interruption, Mr. Lee,” the lanky waiter from before returned, presenting a black bottle before he placed it on top of the table. “As requested.” He placed well-crafted champagne flutes in front of both Minho and Changbin.

“Hyunjin,” Minho tutted as the waiter grabbed the bottle, “I’ve told you several times that just ‘Minho’ is fine.”

The blond waiter half-smiled as he wrapped a hand towel around the cork, deftly wiggling it off with a muffled pop. “And I will tell you each time,” he poured some of the champagne into Changbin’s glass first, “you will always be Mr. Lee when I’m at work.”

“You’re too stiff,” the brunette gently pushed his glass towards the blond as he set Changbin’s glass down. “I know that Chan — sorry, Mr. Bang — is strict with all of you, to maintain a pristine image,” Hyunjin picks up Minho’s glass and bites his lip as if he’s holding back commentary, “but you’re still in your prime. Bend the rules a little while you can get away with it.”

Changbin watches the way Minho’s eyes flutter around from the glass to Hyunjin, catching himself getting caught up in the way the light sparkles against his brown eyes, the way his eyelashes paint shadows on his irises. He doesn’t mean for every detail to be etched into his memory, but there was always something about remembering the details of Minho’s soft face that warmed him. If it were any other world, any other person, perhaps he would be catching feelings.

This arrangement, however, was strictly professional. There was no room for feelings.

Hyunjin sets the bottle back down onto the table. “Sure thing, Minho,” he sarcastically scoffs as he wiggles his shoulders in some sort of strange dance of mockery. “Would you like an ice bucket to keep this chilled?”

Minho shrugs, seemingly indifferent, but his expression turns a bit more serious. “I suppose. Don’t worry about us, though. Tend to the other customers first — we’ll be here for a while longer. A bit of champagne slowly warming won’t be the end of the world.”

“You got it, Mr. Lee,” Hyunjin says, tipping his index and middle fingers off of his forehead in some sort of joking salute before he spins on his heel and walks off to another table.

Minho grabs his champagne flute and flashes his teeth at Changbin. “Sorry about that, love, I’ve just gotta give the staff here trouble every now and again.”

Changbin blushes as he picks up his champagne flute, bringing it close to Minho’s. “Don’t apologize.” He tries to restrain his embarrassment, still mentally replaying the way that Minho called him ‘love’, desperately trying to get the sound to imprint upon his memory. “Anyway,” he lifts his head from his palm and stares directly into the brunette’s eyes. “Two years? I can’t believe it’s been this long since I met you.”

“Your ‘arranged: in black’ series captured me, Changbin, what can I say?” The older man tilts his head to the side, tugging his lips into a smile. “I still think about it every day.”

“It’s hard to avoid thinking about it when all four pieces are hanging behind your bed, wouldn’t you say?”

“Suppose that’s fair,” Minho bites his bottom lip as he avoids laughing. “But, wow, two years. Two very eventful years. To think, you were a scraggly sophomore two years ago when I met you. You really kind of fit the ‘starving artist’ stereotype back then, hmm?”

Changbin’s eyes subconsciously darted down to the maroon tablecloth. He avoided thinking about his life before he met Minho, since it wasn’t something he was overly fond of. Sleeping for a couple of hours a night after a late dishwashing shift at the restaurant, waking up before dawn to run to his part-time barista job, then somehow getting to class just in time to nearly doze off mid-project sketch, all to repeat it again the next day. The chronic sleep deprivation painted him in an ashy grey, and he perpetually smelled of instant ramen and coffee.

No. That was in the past.

He shuddered at the thought of his past life. It was stressful, and he was thankful that Minho came along and offered him some kindness. Most art students either came from wealthy families, or lived in the same shoes that Changbin did. The ones that weren’t from wealthy lineage would probably stay under the poverty line for the rest of their lives, but at least they would be happy creating things that came from the depths of their soul.

For some, it was worth the sacrifice. He knew what he was getting into when he was accepted into the visual arts programme at the University of British Columbia, and he was prepared for the pain and agony it would cause him for the small chance he could make it big while doing something he loved.

“Binnie, love?” Minho’s soft voice pulled Changbin from his memory. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Changbin nodded his head a couple of times, almost as if he was willing himself to be calm. “Sorry, I just kinda got distracted. Thought about when we first met and kinda got transported back in time.” It wasn’t entirely a lie, but it definitely was far from the truth.

The older man softly smiled and nudged his champagne flute forward. “Well, here’s to two years of whatever the hell this is. Here’s to however long we have left and to wherever we may go next.”

Changbin smiled, turning his chin slightly inward as he tapped his flute against Minho’s. “I like that. To whatever the hell is next.”

“‘Whatever the hell is next’,” Minho smiled as he brought the flute up to his lips. “That’s a good one.”

They didn’t get to the bottom of the bottle of champagne until about a half-hour past closing. It had been two years of the same company every Tuesday and Thursday night, and usually most Fridays and Saturdays, yet they still found new things to talk about each time they met. “You’re still so foolishly young and in university,” Minho would scold Changbin over the phone, “so go out and get hammered at a stupid house party and I’ll come by tomorrow and help nurse you out of your hangover.” Minho was really a sweetheart, even if he didn’t want to date and was, to quote Minho himself, ‘emotionally unavailable’.

It had been two years, and Changbin still didn’t fully understand why people were so pressed on calling Minho heartless.

“And so,” Changbin took a sip of water from his glass, setting it down a bit roughly, some of the water sloshing around and splashing on to the table, “I had to sketch a live model, right? Turns out Seungmin makes a horrible model at two in the morning, but we thought the idea was brilliant.”

Minho loudly cackles, throwing his head back and clapping his hands once in front of his face. “You had just gotten done downing several shots at the bar. What made either of you think that sketching in charcoal was a good idea?”

The younger man folds over, resting his head in his palms as he tries not to collapse on to the floor in laughter. “The project was due on Monday! And, hey, we got it done, and I somehow got a decent grade in the end.”

“Ah,” Minho leans back into his chair as he looks up to the wall to his left, smiling as he wipes a tear from his eye. “I’d love to scold you for that, but the truth is, I can’t. I did the same things in uni ten years ago.”

Changbin rests his chin against the back of his hand, languidly smiling as he watches Minho get lost in memories past. These moments that they shared, where they were just so plainly human — not a famous artist, not a struggling art student, but simply Minho and Changbin — these were why Changbin never sought out another partner. It was unconventional to most people, especially those his age, to have such a hands-off relationship, but it just worked for them. Sometimes, the things that came off the most discordant could somehow still find a way to harmonize, and that was what they did.

“You know, you didn’t totally open the envelope,” Minho points at the middle of the table with an open hand, as if he were guiding Changbin back to the thick paper.

Changbin shrugged his shoulders and bashfully looked away for a moment before staring Minho down. “Come on, Min,” he lowers his voice a bit, “I don’t need to know how much you’re giving me, at least not now.”

Minho dismissively waves his hand before nudging the envelope back to Changbin. “It’s not just money, love, I promise. Nothing too domestic, either. Just,” he pauses, bringing a finger to his chin as he looks up at the ceiling, “I suppose it’s partially a token of my appreciation? Yeah, that sounds right. A way to tell you I’m thankful you’ve stuck around for so long, even with all of the weird shit we’ve gone through. There’s more to it than that, but that sounds nice, doesn’t it?”

“I dunno, you’re making this feel like a real relationship,” the bluenette sarcastically mumbles a bit as he gingerly picks up the envelope, squinting a bit at Minho. He opens it, then pulls out a few plastic-like polymer bills: some green, some red. His expression quickly shifts to confusion when he comes across papery stationary, the textural difference causing a nerve to spark up in his arm. Stationary. A letter? He pulls the light grey paper out of the envelope, eyeing Minho as he opens it. “Really? Getting awfully boyfriend-like on me, Min.”

“Oh, come on, just read it,” the older man tuts, rifling through the inside pocket of his suit jacket. “I promise, it’s not as sappy as it looks.”

Changbin plucks his glasses from the table, wiggling the temples to fit just behind his ears, then clears his throat. He tries to swallow down the smirk on his face as he mocks Minho’s intonation and speech. “My loveliest Changbin,” a laugh creeps up from his stomach as he reads on. “Every single day, I wake up and I see your ‘arranged: in black’ pieces, intricately framed behind my bed, and I’m taken aback by the fact that your mind knows no bounds when it comes to expressing creativity.” The younger man peers over the sheet again, studying the somewhat bored, slightly flustered expression on the elder’s face.

“So I had a couple of glasses of wine while writing, I got a bit sentimental.” Minho flutters his lips as he rolls his eyes and flicks his wrist. “At least it’s not as bad as last year’s letter.”

Changbin smiled, but quickly brought the paper in front of his face to hide the subtle reddish tint growing on his face. “I usually don’t like keeping my own work, as you know,” he continued to read off of the letter, still avoiding eye contact with Minho, “but the graphite portrait of you, asleep on my bed from your last bout of finals — it holds a special spot in my heart. I love seeing it every time I enter my closet. It’s like there are little reminders of you scattered across my apartment, and across my heart.”

Oh.

There was a warmth that blossomed and grew in Changbin’s abdomen. The warmth reminded him of ivy hanging off of old buildings, quickly encompassing and embracing everything within its reach. It was a strange sensation, and it gave him pause before he continued reading the note.

Perhaps this was more than sentimental.

Perhaps Changbin was reading too far into things again.

“Changbin?” Minho’s voice pulled the bluenette from the cavern of thoughts he had recessed himself into. “Where did you go?” His tone was firm, distracting Changbin from the fact that Minho had interlaced his fingers between the younger man’s left hand.

This was something they always did. Minho was always touchy-feely, even if it didn’t progress past shirtless embraces as they slept next to each other, or walking hand-in-hand. The way the pads of Minho’s fingertips softly caressed the back of his hand, though, made things seem different. Special.

“Your closet.” Realizing he had spent too much time losing himself in between the grooves of Minho’s fingerprints, Changbin sputtered out some words to barely form a coherent thought. “You reminded me that I still have one of your Burberry hoodies lost somewhere in my apartment.”

Minho furrowed his brows for a moment, trying not to get caught up on how distant Changbin’s response was. “The oversized black one? You know I don’t mind if you keep it, Bin.”

“It was nearly a thousand dollars, Minho.”

The older man scoffs and rolls his eyes a bit, bringing his left hand up to the table, a small brown box of sorts covered up by his palm. “Well,” the brunette squeezed Changbin’s hand a bit, causing them to make eye contact, “when you’re done reading that letter, I’ll be sure to avoid telling you how much your ‘anniversary’ gift is.” Minho winked as he ended his sentence, right when Changbin was thinking about saying something in protest.

“Minho,” Changbin whines, drooping his shoulders a bit as he frowns.

“Changbin,” Minho teases a bit as he mockingly whines in response. “Trust me, it’s not just me spending money aimlessly. It’ll tie into the idea I have in that letter. You know, really make some of those tabloids make us look nice and get off our backs for a while.”

The younger man bit his tongue and scanned his eyes down the letter, trying to find the last spot he had read over. Across my apartment , reading the words caused his hands to sweat, across my heart, made his stomach clench. Domestic and soft, exactly what they were, but also, somehow exactly what they were not. He continued reading off the letter, but his memories started creeping up during the empty gaps between sentences.

There was the callous bite to Minho’s tone during their first real meet-up. “Our arrangement is for mutual gains: you’ll be able to live comfortably, and I’ll get the press off of my back. You won’t be a starving artist, and I’ll no longer be ‘Minho, the Heartless’. We’re professional boyfriends: all of the benefits, none of the downsides, like feelings.” His bony hands felt cold, like ice, when they shook hands to confirm their arrangement. Changbin had felt in over his head then, but he knew he didn’t have anywhere else to turn.

In contrast, there was the night that Changbin had recently stayed over at the end of October. They had gotten back shortly after one in the morning after celebrating Minho’s thirty-first birthday with a handful of his friends and several well-renowned professional artists and gallery owners. Sure, Changbin had been Minho’s quote-unquote “boyfriend” for the night, but it benefitted his art career a bit, just to branch out and connect. None of that had mattered, though, because the best part was when they had gotten half-undressed and passed out on Minho’s duvet together, giggling about how some of the attendees thought ‘artist’s birthday’ meant ‘licence to dress as insanely as humanly possible’. The one-on-one time was always what Changbin looked forward to the most: that soft, personal connection with another person on such a raw, human level.

That was the weekend he borrowed Minho’s black, oversized Burberry sweater to wear home. Changbin lied earlier. He knew exactly where it was: curled up next to his wall in his bed. The soft scent of bergamot and mandarin of the Dior Sauvage that Minho wore on his wrists and in the divots of his clavicles had slowly started to fade into hints of vanilla and sandalwood. While he knew that his arrangement with Minho wouldn’t last forever, he wanted to live in the moments that made him feel like he was in a true, caring relationship. He had a friend in Minho, he truly did. It would probably hurt like hell when they eventually decided to move on from their agreement.

We're professional. Changbin would remind himself every night as he curled up into Minho’s sweater, remembering the way Minho’s arms felt warm on his back and on his shoulders, how soft his manicured fingers were when they fit perfectly in between Changbin’s. We are not real boyfriends. The sweater would catch his inevitable tears as he lost himself in the confusing haze they had painted themselves under. Business dynamic. This was the price he would pay to get into the elusive elitist art world. Strictly professional.

Even if it cost him his sanity.

“Did I just read that correctly?” Changbin’s voice was alarmed, and he frantically re-read the words on the paper before darting his eyes around nervously. Minho smirked as Changbin leaned over the table, dropping his voice to a just-audible whisper. “You want to do what to get the press’ attention?”

Minho grabbed the ashy brown jewellery box from the table, letting go of Changbin’s left hand. He opened the box and his expression flattened. “Exactly what the paper says, Bin.” Inside the desaturated box sat a contrastingly bright, rose gold band.

It was a ring embedded with actual fucking diamonds.

To anyone else, this would be serious. ‘Call your parents, scream at your best friend, even at two in the morning’ levels of seriousness. However, Changbin and Minho were not ‘anyone else’. They were in their own strange, unique bubble where the rules of modern society did not apply to them.

“How about we graduate from professional boyfriends to professional fiancés?”

Like most Sunday mornings nowadays, Changbin woke up to the scent of freshly-brewed coffee. Minho may have travelled to fancy galleries across the world and tried extravagant blends of coffee during his tenure, but he would always fall back on Starbucks’ blonde roast for his morning routines. “Why bother going through all of the effort of getting my hands on something overly fancy from Europe? I have yet to be let down by this one, and it’s been over ten years since I started drinking it. Why stop now?”

The logic made sense, really, and the coffee wasn’t bad.

“The Vancouver Sun’s already got an article out,” Minho excitedly muttered under his breath, setting a ceramic mug down on the nightstand closest to Changbin. He stared at his phone as he made his way back around the bed, causing the mattress to sink as he sat down. “So many people are speculating, like it even matters. If they had really been following me these past two years, they’d know better.”

It was too early for this. Minho was always business as soon as he woke up: endearing in theory, terribly annoying in practice.

Changbin rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands as he rolled onto his back, sleepily glaring up at Minho. “You’re loud.”

“And you’re hungover,” the brunette quipped, not looking away from his phone as he smiled at himself. “Drink your water and your coffee, love, you’ll feel better.”

“Whatever,” Changbin grumbled under his breath as he sat up, reaching over to the nightstand. There was a sheen on his left hand that caused him to momentarily lose his breath. Shit. He drew his hand into his face to stare at the ring he had conveniently forgotten about overnight. It felt like nothing before he noticed it, but now that he was staring at it, it felt like the ring was going to cut off the circulation to his finger. It felt like a boa constrictor was tightening around him, making it hard to breathe.

Changbin had every intention to pull himself away from the suffocation of the ring. Instead, he found himself trying to count each small diamond wedged between the two layers of rose gold. A sudden dip right behind him and an arm around his waist literally pulled him from his thoughts. “Min!”

“It’s pretty,” Minho gently grabbed Changbin’s hand, tucking his chin into the younger man’s shoulder. “I didn’t know if you’d like rose gold, but I know you hate gold, and silver’s too simple for you. For a fake engagement ring, seems pretty convincing, hmm?”

As much as he doesn’t want to, Changbin sinks into Minho’s embrace. Blame it on the fatigue, he figured, but found himself surprised that the older man didn’t pull away. For the shortest of moments, it almost feels like they’re meant to fit together like this. “It’s expensive,” the brunette whispers, “to no one’s surprise, so please don’t lose it.”

The younger man squints in disapproval. “How much was it?”

“It’s impolite to ask a fiancé something like that, you know,” Minho huffs a bit dramatically as he feigns irritation.

Changbin, however, seems plenty irritated for the both of them. He rolls around, mere centimetres away from Minho’s face as he frowns up at the older man. “It’s a good thing this is all fake, then, right? How much was it?”

“Bin,” the brunette’s expression falters as he cocks his head to the side. “It’s not important, I don’t understand why you’re so—”

Changbin desperately wants to stay this close to Minho, to drown in his embrace and the warmth of his touch. Professional. Fake boyfriends, fake fiancés. “It’s just for show, I know. Since it’s fake, though, you shouldn’t have a problem telling me, right?” There’s a layer of hurt in his voice that he knows he can’t hide. He dips his chin into his chest and closes his eyes, desperate to make this all just stop and go away. Something about this, though, just felt too real, too close to an actual relationship.

What the fuck were they doing? All of this had to cross some sort of unspoken relationship rule somewhere, right? The blurred lines between what was real and what was fake in their arrangement was causing Changbin's head to spin.

Minho doesn’t seem sure about how to handle the situation. The moments pass by in silence until the older man takes in a deep breath, then he wiggles his index finger under Changbin’s chin, tilting his face upwards. “Hey,” he quietly demands, “look at me, Bin.”

So, the bluenette does as requested. He stares into Minho’s eyes and instantly softens.

“If it bothers you that much, I can go out and get something simpler.” Minho’s voice quivers a bit, almost like he feels how uncomfortable Changbin is. “I just… I don’t know what I was thinking when I went out and I got this one. I looked around with the agent for over an hour, and then that one just caught my eye, just as things were looking hopeless.”

Suddenly, Changbin’s hand is in Minho’s again, and the older man stares at the band with purpose, rotating the younger man’s hand around freely. “I guess I put in a bit too much of a personal flair on this. I really prioritized what I figured you’d like before the importance of keeping up the façade that this is all fake.”

They both stare at the ring for a moment, then look at one another. Neither of them moved, neither of them breathed as they stared at each other with shared panic, concern, worry. There was an unfamiliar emotion that lingered at the back of their gaze, but it was hard to place. Changbin hadn’t felt anything like this before. He was equal parts nervous, nauseated, and lost.

If this were like the romantic comedies that Changbin and Seungmin would watch while hungover, this would be the part where Minho would roll on top of him, say something like “fuck the rules, I just want you”. They would cry and kiss and roll around the sheets together. There would be a swell of uplifting orchestral music in the background, indicating that fate had given its blessing on the couple.

This wasn’t a movie, though. This was fucking reality, and there was nothing but tension in the air and a yearning in the bottom of Changbin’s stomach. Their situation was complex and convoluted and it was going to end in heartbreak for him, and only him. Really, he had no one to blame but himself.

Our arrangement is for mutual gains. Minho’s voice was so loud.

We’re professional boyfriends. It was sour.

All of the benefits, none of the downsides, like feelings. It hurt as it echoed in Changbin’s head, but Minho’s voice was all he wanted to hear.

Feelings.

Feelings?

That’s when it hit Changbin: he was falling for Minho — Minho, the (supposedly, yet to be proven) Heartless — and he couldn’t stop himself, no matter how stupid he knew it was. Perhaps the most terrifying part of this, though, wasn’t the fact that Minho didn’t feel the same way.

No, the most terrifying thing was that Changbin couldn’t tell if Minho was actually interested in him or not. Minho always felt strongly one way or another. For them to sit here, struck dumb in silence, was unnerving. The silence meant uncertainty.

It meant possibility.

#we're professional #skz fics #lee minho x seo changbin #seo changbin x lee minho #minbin #minho x changbin #changbin x minho #wherevermyway

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frobster · 4 years ago

Text

Offer of a Lifetime: Chapter 2

Both chapters now up on ao3!

☆☆☆

Peter stayed where he was for a moment, shocked by what had just happened, before his phone buzzed again and brought him back to himself. He looked down at the number of missed messages and quickly read through them, MJ becoming increasingly frantic when Peter didn’t immediately answer.

> Peter: So, James was just in my apartment

> Peter: Also, he told me to call him Bucky

The buzzing started again before Peter could even lock his phone. He ignored it as he went around getting dressed, pulling on underwear and sweatpants before checking again.

> MJ: PETER WHAT THE FUCK

> Ned: BRO ARE YOU OKAY???

> Peter: I’m fine. He left. Gave me a week to think about his offer. Also said he would leave me alone completely if I turned him down

> MJ: And u believed him???????????

> Peter: He didn’t give me a reason not to. There weren't any threats, and he did wait wait a whole day before contacting me

> Ned: Sugar daddy already getting to you smh

> Peter: Come on, you know it would be amazing to have a sugar daddy

> MJ: Ya but this one could put u in a lot of danger

Peter bit his lip as he thought. MJ was right. While it was his dream to be a kept boy and never have to worry about anything, he wasn’t sure if it was worth the dangers associated with Bucky. He would definitely need the whole week to think.

> MJ: We’re gonna talk more tonight. I’ll see u at 7:45

> Peter: Sounds good

Bucky was at the forefront of Peter’s mind for the rest of the day. He didn’t really have anything to do until the evening, so he lounged around much like the previous day and tried to find more on the internet about Bucky.

“Where did that name even come from?” Peter muttered to himself as he clicked on yet another tabloid article. The gossip papers had a lot to speculate about him since they loved to lie about crime and drama. He mostly skimmed the articles since they all seemed to be sensationalized and mostly rumors.

One thing that stood out to Peter was the consistent inclusion of a broad blonde man almost always on Bucky’s right. The few pictures that weren’t blurry or grainy made the man seem relatively attractive, and Peter had to wonder if he was a past fling or just a confidante. Bucky obviously liked men, given his interest in Peter, but that still didn’t confirm anything.

The day oozed by in a cloud of laziness - naps, articles, snacks. Peter didn’t leave the couch except to get a snack or use the bathroom. By the time 6pm rolled around, Peter finally got up to start getting ready. He never took too long, but he didn’t want to rush either. The weather was still decent, so he decided on a pair of shorts that would help show off his legs and a mesh tank top that wouldn’t really cover anything. Beneath the shorts, he had red panties. Even if it led to him getting misgendered more often, the panties did help him get more money out of clients.

Peter ran his hands through his hair to make it fluffy and messy, swiped some gloss over his lips before tucking the tube into his bag, then looked at his measly pile of shoes. There weren’t many to choose from and most of them were bought purely for style rather than function. He ended up going back to his room to grab a pair of knee-high socks before sliding on a pair of black high-top sneakers. People still liked scene twinks, right? The socks would help keep his legs warm too once the sun went down and the air got cooler.

Picking his outfit didn’t take very long, so Peter was left with almost an hour until he had to leave. Then he remembered that Ned and MJ went grocery shopping for him, so he took a tour of his own kitchen to see what they got for him. Most of it was canned goods so it wouldn’t go to waste if he didn’t eat it quickly, but there were some fresher foods too like prepackaged salads and frozen chicken.

Settling on the chicken and a salad, Peter hauled out the bag of chicken tenders to check the required oven temperature. He got the oven set and preheating before wandering back to his couch and flopping over the back of it. Upon checking his phone, he finally saw the few messages from Bucky that he missed while showering.

> I’m coming to visit soon. Try to look presentable.

Sent almost as soon as Peter stepped into the shower. He grimaced at the bad timing and scrolled down to read the rest, sent after Bucky had left.

> Obviously you did not see my message beforehand, as I assume a towel around your waist and a bare chest is not what you would typically consider “presentable”.

> You have until next Wednesday to make your decision. If you do not give me an answer before then, I will assume you’re uninterested and leave you alone, like I promised.

Peter sighed and reread the messages a few times. Then he saved Bucky’s contact number before taking another screenshot to send to his friends.

> Peter: See? I told you he would leave me alone if I turned him down

> MJ: I guess he may not be such a terrible person…

> Ned: He literally runs the New York mafia

> MJ: Yeah, but he knows how to treat a boy right

> Peter: I’m feeling heart emojis. Should I change his name in my phone to Daddy?

> Ned: NO!!!!!!!

> MJ: skjghalfaldfk YES

> Ned: Do NOT encourage him!!

Peter laughed to himself and quickly changed Bucky’s contact name to ‘Daddy’ followed by pink and purple heart emojis. Then he took another screenshot of the saved contact and sent it to the chat.

> MJ: I expect updates every time he texts you. We have to decide if he’s good enough for our baby

> Ned: I will not approve of Peter being the kept boy of the HEAD OF THE NEW YORK MAFIA

> Peter: Aw dad, you’re no fun

> Ned: Don’t make me ground you

> MJ: Not allowed, Peter and I have work tonight

> MJ: Maybe daddy will bring us some coffee

> Peter: Hey! Only I am allowed to call him daddy

> MJ: Aw, possessive already? ;)

> Peter: ...maybe

> Ned: I’m doomed. We’re all doomed

Their casual, friendly conversation continued for a while until Ned had to put his phone away for class. Peter and MJ switched to single texting as they talked about their plans for that night. She had got them a new corner a few blocks away from where Bucky had picked Peter up, but they both knew that Bucky could find them again if he really wanted to.

The oven soon beeped so Peter got up to put a couple chicken tenders on a pan and into the oven. He set a timer on his phone then looked around his apartment as he tried to figure out what to do to pass the time.

But rather than finding something to do, Peter just realized how shitty his apartment really was. The walls were thin and dirty, there was a crack spiderwebbing up the wall in a corner, the floors were stained and worn out from countless tenants. He sighed and slumped against the kitchen counter, a cheap laminated wood that creaked even under his slight weight. There were multiple different bug problems through the building - cockroaches, ants, spiders, wasps. He had a roach problem in his own apartment, leading to all food in the cabinets needing to be canned so they couldn't chew into it.

It was exhausting to live in poverty. Peter hated his apartment but it was all he could really afford. The life insurance policy from his aunt was used to pay off his surgery bills and the rest was funneled to any other medical costs that came up, including his hormone prescription. While he did have some money in savings, it would not be enough to allow him to live somewhere better. He was losing money faster than he made it back.

Bucky’s offer was slowly becoming more and more attractive.

When the timer went off on his phone, Peter swiped it away before carefully taking out the tray of chicken. He set it on the stove to let it cool while he took out the prepared salad bag and set to mixing everything together. Then, since he didn’t feel like using multiple dishes, he cut up the chicken on the baking pan and scraped the pieces into the salad bowl.

“Yeah, I can provide for myself,” Peter said to himself before taking a bite.

The salad was filling and Peter actually felt like he had a decent amount of energy. He took the time to wash all the dishes he used rather than trying to jam them into the dishwasher, brushed his teeth, reapplied his lip gloss, then checked the time.

MJ had sent a few more messages with details of their shift that night, and Ned announced the end of his class and the offer of searching Bucky more. Peter bit his lip as he considered it. If he was going to really give Bucky’s offer some serious consideration, he felt he needed to know the man better. Or he could just text Bucky.

Before he could chicken out, Peter sent a quick text to Bucky and pocketed his phone so he could finalize his outfit and wait for MJ.

> Peter: If you want me to live with you, I’m gonna need to know more about you.

There wasn’t any reply before MJ arrived. Peter sighed as he looked at his lack of notifications before he tucked his phone away, grabbed his bag, and headed out to meet MJ.

There was some tension in the car as a lackey drove Peter and MJ to their new corner. The random guy was humming along to music on the radio while the other two held hands in the back of the car. He didn’t say anything as he stopped at a new corner and unlocked the door, a clear signal for them to get out.

Peter stepped out with his mini backpack shouldered and fixed his shorts once he was standing. MJ followed him out and fixed her skirt too, her own bag slung across her chest and accenting her cleavage. Another reason why MJ was slightly better off than Peter was her assets. People just tended to want her more often than him. He wasn’t upset about that, he knew his friend was gorgeous and she deserved the attention and money. He just couldn’t help but feel a little jealous of her slightly better financial state.

“Did Bucky say anything else?” MJ asked as the car drove off.

“Nope. I don’t really know what he would say,” Peter replied, hyper-aware of his phone in his pocket. He couldn’t remember if it had buzzed while they were in the car since his mind was wandering. Already, just one day after meeting the man, Peter couldn’t stop thinking about Bucky.

8pm wasn’t very late, the bars were just starting to fill up. Peter and MJ had time to talk before people would start showing interest in them. The sunset was nice to watch and offered a serene backdrop to the chaos of their lives, purples and reds blending together like the mundane and unusual of the past few days.

“I would think that he would try to sweeten the deal somehow, y’know? You’ve clearly been hesitant about accepting his offer, so wouldn’t he want to tempt you?” MJ looked at her nails and flicked a speck of invisible dust off the shiny finish, then winked at someone who was looking at her as they stepped into the nearby bar.

“I dunno how much sweeter the deal could get. He offered to pay for everything for the rest of my life, or leave me alone without any trouble. It’s a win-win situation.” Even to his own ears, Peter knew it sounded lame. He was so tempted to accept Bucky’s offer, and MJ could clearly hear that in his voice.

“You deserve to know more about him at least. Even Ned had a hard time finding anything on this guy. And now that we know he’s got some dangerous connections, it would be in your best interest to find out everything you can before making a decision, especially since you’re tempted to agree.” Peter MJ would’ve been an excellent counselor. Maybe she still could be. If they ever found themselves in a position to start saving up money, she could put it towards college classes.

“Yeah, I know. I’m just not-” Peter cut off when he felt his phone vibrate against his ass. He reached into his back pocket to pull it out and blinked as he read the message.

> Bucky: We could discuss that over dinner, if you’d like. I know you’re working, but I could talk to your boss and have him pardon you for the night.

Before Peter could reply to the text or finish what he was saying, MJ snatched his phone away to read the message.

“Hey! Give that back!” Peter squawked as he tried to grab his phone back.

But MJ was taller than him even without the heels she was wearing, so she just held the phone up and angled it down so she could read the screen. She laughed aloud when she read the message and finally lowered her hand again so Peter could have his phone back. He huffed as he stuffed it into his pocket again without bothering to answer.

“It’s cute that he’s already offering to cover your shifts for you. Maybe he’ll even give you some cash to make up for missing a whole night,” MJ teased with a grin. Peter felt too flustered to really register that she seemed to be encouraging him to leave with Bucky.

“There is nothing cute about this situation,” Peter huffed, cheeks flushed pink with embarrassment. He wasn’t really sure what he was embarrassed about. Maybe he didn’t realize how tempted he was to accept Bucky’s offer until MJ gave him that little nudge.

“Well, you’re pretty cute. It’s cute how often you blush when we talk about him.” MJ’s tone was more genuine that time, and Peter felt a little surprised.

“Did Ned tell you something else about this guy? Why do you seem so supportive of him now?” There was another buzz in Peter’s pocket but he ignored it, wanting to hear MJ’s answer first.

“You deserve a good life, Peter.” She looked at him, entirely serious, and placed a hand on his shoulder. “You’ve been through so much and you’re only nineteen. I want you to be happy, to have opportunities that we could never find in this line of work.”

“MJ…”

Before Peter could say more, his phone started buzzing like he had a call. He sighed and reached into his pocket, making a brief note that it was Bucky calling before he answered.

“Hello?”

“You didn’t answer my text, Peter. So I called your boss anyway. I’m coming to pick you up. Would MJ like to join us for dinner?”

Peter just squeaked, his jaw dropped open as he tried to think of what to say. MJ rolled her eyes and snatched the phone away again so she could talk for him.

“Hi, Bucky. Peter would love to go to dinner with you, but he seems to have forgotten how to speak.” She snickered at whatever Bucky said, Peter watching with wide eyes as she spoke with him so casually. “Aw, thank you! I would love to join you for dinner. If you intend to steal my boy away, I have to see if you’re worth his time.”

“MJ!” Peter finally came back to his senses and made a grab for his phone, but she held him back just like before.

“Yeah, that was him. He’s just so excited to see you again. We’ll be waiting for you!” MJ hung up the phone before handing it back to Peter with a grin. “He will be here in about fifteen minutes so zip up your hoodie and try to not look like such a whore.”

Peter swatted at MJ’s arm, making her cackle loudly as she pulled a balled-up shawl out of her bag to wrap around her shoulders and cover up her chest. She tended to wear shirts that showed off her cleavage but now that she wasn’t actively trying to attract customers, she wanted to look more modest. Peter had a sleeveless hoodie that he zipped over his mesh tank top, though he started to feel overheated after just a few minutes.

The hoodie got unzipped again as Peter rocked restlessly in place, anxious and eager to see Bucky again. MJ was updating Ned since Peter was too scared to look at his phone, snickering to herself every now and then.

Soon enough, a sleek black car pulled up. The windows were so heavily tinted that they looked black, but neither of them had to guess at who was inside. MJ tucked her phone away and Peter stepped closer to her, seeking out her familiar comfort as his nerves spiked.

The back window rolled down and a familiar face was revealed. Bucky looked at them both before nodding and pushing the door open.

“Come on, we got reservations in twenty minutes,” he said as he shifted to a seat on the other side of the car.

MJ stepped in first then tugged Peter in with her. She sat across from Bucky and not-so-subtly nudged Peter over to sit next to him. The seats were smooth and cool, and Peter was thankful for the air conditioning that let him zip up his hoodie again to hide his chest. Bucky had already seen him shirtless, but he felt awkward about it now.

The car pulled away from the curb as soon as the door was closed. Peter didn’t have a chance to buckle in so he swayed and ended up leaning into Bucky for a moment. He blushed and scooted away so he could clip his seat belt, then sat quietly and picked at the hem of his socks.

“So,” MJ started casually. “You’re who Peter has a crush on.”

“I do not!” Peter insisted, head snapping up so he could glare at MJ. She just grinned at him as Bucky made an amused sound.

“A crush, huh? That’s cute.” Bucky tucked his phone away and looked over to Peter with a smirk. “Have you given my offer any more thought?”

“It’s been like, six hours,” Peter pointed out, feeling a little more confident with MJ there to back him up.

“Plenty of time to think.” Bucky was watching Peter, eyes glued to him as he waited for a proper answer.

“I mean…” Peter sighed and slumped back against his seat. He did want to say yes, to agree and let Bucky carry him off into the sunset like some perfect romantic dream. It just didn’t feel real.

“We need some proof that you’re the real deal,” MJ finally said.

Bucky’s gaze flicked over to her as he raised an eyebrow. He clearly wasn’t someone who was used to being challenged like that, and for a moment, Peter feared for MJ. But then Bucky laughed and Peter’s heart skipped a beat at the sound.

“Conveniently enough, that is why I invited you along tonight. It’s good to know Peter has a friend looking out for him.”

“Two friends,” MJ corrected. “Ned has been diligently mining through the internet for information about you. He is the only reason why I agreed to dinner.”

Peter huffed as a faint blush dusted his cheeks. MJ was acting like her and Ned were his parents, and he was feeling a little embarrassed about that. Sure, he was the youngest out of the three of them, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t handle himself.

“Two friends,” Bucky amended. Then his gaze turned back to Peter and he reached over to gently rub the boy’s back. “You can relax, Peter. I promise my intentions with you are honorable.”

“And what exactly are your intentions?” Peter looked up again, finally meeting Bucky’s eyes.

There was a moment of hesitation and even MJ could feel the electricity hanging between Bucky and Peter.

“I want to take care of you the way you deserve. To spoil you, pamper you, give you anything you could ever want or need.” Bucky sounded honest and there was no nervous tic that would clue Peter in to a lie. But he still couldn’t believe it.

“Why?”

Another pause. Bucky looked torn between brushing it off and turning to a new subject, coming up with some flowery words that didn’t really answer the question, or actually telling the truth. He took a deep breath to steel his nerves, and decided on the last.

“You are beautiful. Handsome, gorgeous. Whatever term you’re most comfortable with. You are like a work of art, and I don’t want to see you waste away in the streets. You deserve so much more and what am I gonna do with all this money anyway? Hell, you could turn me down here and now and I would still send you money every week. I just want you to be happy.”

Peter blinked. He hadn’t expected such an emotional answer, but he felt touched by it. A quick glance over to MJ showed that she felt affected by it too, her eyes wide in surprise. For all the research the three of them had done, they never would’ve thought Bucky was the sentimental sort of guy.

“Oh.” Peter’s voice was faint as he tried to process all that Bucky said.

Bucky swore under his breath and leaned back in his seat. He had moved closer to Peter as he spoke, but now he felt he should give the younger man some space. But to everyone’s surprise, Peter reached out and set a hand on Bucky’s knee before managing a smile.

“I appreciate that, Bucky. I really do. Thank you.”

There was a beat of silence before Bucky cleared his throat and nodded. He gave Peter a tight smile, seeming a little less confident than when they first got in the car. Then the car stopped before anyone could say anything else and Bucky looked away to the window beside him.

“Ah, looks like we’re here. Don’t worry, it isn’t anywhere too fancy. I figured you two wouldn’t really be dressed for that.”

Bucky’s confidence seemed to slowly come back as he smirked and got out of the car. Then he held out a hand for MJ, and reached out again for Peter once she was standing. But unlike with MJ, Bucky didn’t let go of Peter’s hand. And Peter didn’t really mind.

☆☆☆

#winterspider #peter parker #Bucky barnes #bucky/peter #mcu #marvel fic #offer of a lifetime #my writing #hello. this was written weeks ago and i only just now posted it #oops

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