#I only mention aroace because this has happened to me several times and it makes me uncomfortable

[chaos-potat]

Why does this keep happening?

Me: ew kisses?? <-I'm joking, I say that a lot

Someone: Are you aroace????

Me: I'm not aroace

Someone: You sound aroace to me, I think you are actually

Chat, I'm not aroace, I have no problem with aroace as a whole, I have made so many aroace characters, it's my go to for characters at this point. I am not aromantic or asexual, I thought I was for a while, but I am not, telling people their romantic/sexual orientation and insisting is really weird and uncomfortable to hear. It's not your journey, not your self discovery, not your business, don't be like this

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for "unknowingly" cheating on my girlfriend?

🤍🍇 so i recognize post

preface: yes i am, theres no excuse, i just want to hear more ppl's thought because different ppl in my life have very different opinions on this??? even though i think cheating is cut and dry?

earlier this year, i (20nb, tho i was 19 at the time) was in a purely monogamous relationship with my ex (19f). there were ups and downs, i had some issues that i really shouldve talked to her about, but overall it was the best experience. id never dated anybody before. she's the only person who ive ever loved in that way. i think shes the best person, funny, smart. i was really lucky to have her.

i have another friend, who i'll call H (21f), who has been my friend for years. we're really close, and we've shared a lot with each other. i also love her deeply, though in a different, entirely platonic way. she has told me that she loves me, and has loved me in romantic ways, even though i've never reciprocated (im fine with that, everyone in my main friend group is a little bit polyamorous).

there were two main incidents that happened between me and H. the first, i didnt really understand what was going on or that it was entirely wrong. we were cuddling, which i do with all of my friends, and she started getting really into it and getting on top of me. she asked if she could kiss me (on the lips) and i said no, partly because, well, i had a monogamous partner, and partly because i hate kissing on the lips. i probably shouldve entirely cut it off at that moment. my only excuse (which is pretty flimsy) is that, im kinda aroace so physical affection and the difference between platonic and romantic have always left me a little confused. i kinda thought this was normal, especially because H is polyamorous and in several relationships that heavily blur the lines between platonic and romantic.

then, about two weeks after that, H and i hung out again, but this time we were smoking marijuana. weed makes me highly suggestible and also incapable of remembering anything past about five seconds. not that im blaming the drugs, just describing the situation. basically, H and i were cuddling again when she decided to move on top of me and got flirty, with a lot of touching sensitive places for the purpose of getting a reaction (all above the belt). i went along with this because i respect H, ive known her for a long time, and i didnt want to say no to her. again, not an excuse, because she didnt force me to do it.

in the moment, i didnt think this was cheating. we werent doing anything explicitly sexual, we weren't making out, but we were definitely frisky and i know H was horny at the time. a couple hours later, when i sobered up, i suddenly realized what we had done and asked H if i had just cheated on my girlfriend. she also seemed to realize what had just happened and we agreed that i had cheated, that it was entirely wrong, and we should never do it again.

i decided to tell my ex about this immediately, because i thought she should know. i asked if she was in a position to hear bad news, and when she was, i was completely honest. she obviously didnt take it well, mentioning how she felt like she could never trust me again despite being the person she trusted most in the world. she loved me but this was unacceptable and a huge violation. i agreed, and after a bit of thinking, i told her that i thought we should break up. i had terrible guilt about what i'd done and assumed that we'd never recover, and it didnt seem like she could pull the plug, so i did.

she proceeded to get even more mad at me because of this, which in hindsight is completely understandable. from her perspective, i had just dropped two emotional bombs on her, and maybe i was implying that i liked H more than her. i wasnt, and i dont, but i know why it came across that way.

my other friends agreed with me that i shouldve broken up with her after that. in hindsight, i dont know if it was the right choice. i miss her dearly and wish i had worked more on the relationship.

we've since talked about it. i told her that i still loved her (bc i do, very deeply, and i dont know if i'll ever get over her) but said that i dont expect anything, dont expect a relationship, etc. she was okay with this because, in her words, she trusts me to not make it a big deal or awkward. we hang out frequently now, we watch anime together, and we get along well as friends. i feel so lucky that she is willing to spend time with me, that she still enjoys my company even a little bit.

the confusing part is that i told my dad about this and he basically said, "you were 19yo in a long distance, online-only relationship. this was inevitable and you shouldnt feel too bad about it. it was wrong but not the worst thing ever." i dont really agree with that, because it was a pretty serious relationship despite being online. we even met up at a convention and spent several nights together in a hotel. it was the happiest weekend of my life. i thought i could marry her maybe someday. and i dont think being 19yo justifies it. 13yo maybe, but i was old enough to know right from wrong, even if my knowledge about romantic and sexual relationships was underdeveloped.

basically, im looking for nuanced opinions. i fully expect the results to be YTA. im hoping ppl can give me any sort of insight in the comments.

PS: H is partially to blame bc she knew i was in a monogamous relationship but please dont hate on her too much in the comments, we've had a lot of talks about this and what happened drastically changed the way the both of us see relationships and each other. basically, she learned her lesson and she was never trying to be a bitch or a homewrecker. i know her well enough to know shes a good person at heart. she's also not on tumblr to see any of your comments. direct all of you criticism towards me, please.

What are these acronyms?

[compassionatereminders]

Tw: sexual topics, slightly non-con mention?

So...Im a bit confused...

For context, I have alexithymia and have a very hard time understanding my emotions. Most of the time I can fully understand what Im feeling about a situation only after days after that situation is gone

So...I have a friend who we are in a very weird relationship. Like, she confessed her love to me and I started to date her because I always wanted to be loved (it was my first relationship) and also I was (and still am) in a very big denial of me being aroace so I just wanted to prove myself that I'm "normal" (I know that its horrible and im working on that). But that didn't worked out. She loved me so much it made me really uncomfortable cuz I couldn't say the same back. After less then a week I broked up with her. She was mad, of course, but after a few days we were okay and stayed friends....with benefits. I don't know how that happened to be honest, but we're both very touch starving people and I don't really I divide physical contact into romantic and platonic, so we were both happy with what we had. She could still to things she wanted with me and I could be friends with her knowing that she knows im aromantic

But then it got even more confusing... We were at me place alone and she started to touch me under my shirt. I was okay with that, it felt nice and I just like the feeling of someone's skin touching mine. Then things became more... intimate and she said that she's really afraid of making me uncomfortable, so I said that I kinda was prepared that things will go that way to comfort her (and yes, I knew, she always joked about it and she's a very sexual person, so I knew what can happen when we are alone. I don't think I was waiting for this or something, I just knew it's coming and there's nothing I can do about it). And I guess it was enough for her to get started. So we did it. And I don't know if I liked it. It was my first time and I don't know how I *should* feel, but I mostly feel numb... (A more detailed description of the process is ahead. Sorry if this is unnecessary information, but it is important to me)

She told me not to be shy about my sounds and at first I didn't understand what she was talking about, and then I remembered that I needed to moan. I had to fake my moans because nothing fucking came out of me. When she finished playing with me the first time she asked if she should continue with mockery. I didn't know what to answer because I didn't feel anything. Yes, it was nice, sort of, but nothing more. I didn't feel like continuing, I didn't feel excited, I just wanted it to be over. And I'm not saying I didn't like it, again, it was nice, I know I felt some joy at that moment, but now I don't feel any of that. Just shame. I don't even know if I came (and neither did she)

Since then, she often reminds me of that day, trying to tease me, telling me how bad I will feel when she leaves (Hinting that I would be too excited. I don’t feel anything), throwing sexual jokes and everything like that. I feel disgusting and most often I just keep quiet or joke about it

But here's the problem, I still feel sexual desire. In fact, after that day, my libido seems to have decreased threefold, but I still get aroused sometimes, just... not from her. And not from any living person (usually I like to read about this than to see it and, apparently, feel it myself...) But what if I'm wrong? What if I was just too anxious? I felt good then, I felt so happy when I was thinking back about it (remembering it now, I was thinking about her, and not about what we were doing) Maybe I made it all up and it's worth giving it a second chance?

Another problem is that I can't even talk to her about it. She has a severe fear of hurting me because of personal traumas (including sexual ones) and I know that if I tell her about it, then she will be afraid to even touch me, and I don’t want that. I just don't want to lie to her again the next time she starts joking about it. What if she gets mad again because I "lied to her"? Does that count as lying?? I don't know what to do. Should I feel this way? Is this normal?

In my experience, consenting to sex you don't actually want never ends somewhere good. Even if you say "yes", it isn't going to be a great experience if you wanted to say "no." And even consensual sex can be an unpleasant or even traumatizing experience if you disregard or simply aren't sure of your own boundaries. So I recommend stopping this "relationship" and at the very least saving sex for someone with whom you can actually have an honest and constructive conversation about all of this!

[hyperfixation-or-death]

🏳️‍🌈 for Leo Valdez?

ooh, heroes of olympus! Fun fact, as far as I can remember, the very first ace headcanon I had was Leo Valdez. I had just figured out recently that I was aroace. I knew a little bit about being ace from tumblr blogs, but basically the only knowledge I had about being aro was the definition and that it accurately described me, and that was it.

So, younger me happened across some post mentioning the asexual Leo Valdez headcanon, and I immediately thought it was awesome. Because hey, I was ace, and I think Leo was my favorite character from any media at the time, so that interpretation made me feel really happy about my identity. (Not to get off-topic, but I think representation in fandom is great for kids who are still figuring themselves out like I was! Because that was years ago, but I still remember how positively seeing that post affected me.)

Anyways, out of loyalty to my younger self's journey of self-discovery, and because I still genuinely think it works great with his character: I headcanon Leo as ace.

More recently, I also think he'd be somewhere on the arospec. I had seen that headcanon when I was younger, too, but I unfortunately had some internalized ideas about romance going on at the time.

Anyways, I think he'd have some complicated and frustratingly vague feelings about romance, and I think he's definitely overcompensating for that for a while. Fake it 'til you make it, and all.

I think he also has some issues surrounding who he is in relation to others that were definitely made worse by the seventh wheel prophecy thing, but idk, it's been a while since I've reread the series. I would think he's somewhat romance-favorable, to an extent, so when you factor that into all the layers of denial he has going on, he definitely doesn't realize he's Probably Not Straight until post-canon.

And also, you know what. He can be bi also. As a treat.

Long story short: Ace, (somewhat) romance-favorable arospec, and bi in some way.

(Wow, that was definitely one of my more complex headcanons, I just started typing and next thing I know I have several paragraphs.)

Thanks for the ask! :)

[thevoidstaredback]

CW: Mentions/Implications of Transphobia, Religion, Aphobia

I do end up telling at everyone, btw. I'm a bit pissed off near the end.

I'm a bit pissed off still...

I think the main reason I haven't come out to my parents as AroAce is because they're both very conservative Christans (LDS). They grew up that way, and they raised me that way. While they're open minded about a lot of things, they're close minded about a lot of things, too.

Both are very family oriented, my mother moreso than my father. They both want me and my sisters to get married and have kids and I don't know how to break it to them that I don't want that.

I've tried telling them without coming out. "The best I can offer are cats." or "I'm not interested in relationships." or the one I've been saying since I was in my single digits "I'm gonna be the crazy cat lady. I can't do that if I have other people I have to take care of."

(Honestly, that last one shoulda been my first clue. How the hell did I not know until senior year of hs?)

Both parents have brushed me off or ignored me completely. On several occasions. My aunts have all done the same. Some friends have done the same. All with varying excuses that I've already mentioned here before (and on TilTok).

I think the worst part is that they're both a bit transphobic, my father moreso than my mother. Mom is a bit more open minded (at least that I've noticed). She's a bit confused, but does her best to understand. Dad is a lot less so. He's actively watching things that are transphobic in nature or in passing, though I think he's realized that shit makes me uncomfortable, so he doesn't listen to it when I'm around. Only when he thinks I can't hear. (Doesn't work very well. I've got crazy good hearing and he watches with his speakers on full blast)

I'm not trans, but I have friends who are. My thought process is, if they can't accept that people are sometimes born in the wrong body, how will they ever accept someone stepping way back from what they were raised on?

Okay, I know those two things probably to connect in the way that I'm trying to convey, but I- I don't know how to explain it?

How do I convince people that I don't fall into the norms they were raised in when they can't even accept the norms that have been since the time of gods?

Does that make better sense?

The Queer Community has been around since humans started to walk the Earth. How does one explain this to people without things going to absolute shit?

I think I've gotten a bit off topic...

How does one tell their parents (who have been dreaming about their children having children to the point of "cursing" us with triplets) that getting married or having kids is not in their plans?

How does one get past the years of (what I can only label some kind of manipulation attempts) convincing that having kids and getting married will be the best thing to ever happen?

As I'm sure my fellow Aspecs can relate or attest to, it's extremely hard to tell a heteronormative society that you don't quite fall in with them. It's equally as hard to tell s homonormative group that you don't quite fit in with them, either.

On all sides, we're being pushed and pulled to fall in love and have families and have romances and have sex and all of these things! I think the reason we (at least from what little I've seen) feel so lonely is because we have little to no support. People on all sides are telling us we're wrong. People who are supposed to be on our team are telling us we're wrong.

Do you know how much that hurts?

Straight friends, gay friends, trans friends, queer friends, even fellow Aspecs have all told me some version of "You just haven't met your perfect person yet."

Fuck you.

Fuck whoever has ever said that in their life.

Fuck whoever has said that to someone who trusted them.

That line, and any line like it, is harmful.

I'm sorry you can't look past your rose coloured glasses to see the world. I'm sorry you can't pull your head outta your partner's(s) ass long enough to realize that not everyone is like you.

Yeah, I'm yelling at all of you. No discrimination here.

....

I really did go off topic...

I guess I really needed all that off my chest...

Regardless, I don't take any of it back.

[doomalade]

Behind the Scenes / Meta Commentary on RWBY: Amity Mega Thread.

I kinda want to take this time to and make a post detailing the kinda behind the scenes and processes that I went through while making this fanfic.

It’s nearing a full year that I’ve been working on this (the anniversary is June 1st I do believe). So I kinda. Just want to have a place to share and ramble on about what goes on inside my head while writing.

I started this fic when I was fresh out of high school and I have been struggling through college. The first 10 months was spent purely note taking. I was bing watching FRWBY and started to compare it to canon. Mostly V1-4 that is. Some parts of canon I really loved, such as the food fight or the Tyrian fight, or the lore. Man the lore is still something I think has me hooked to RWBY to this day. Of course this was a time when V8 was the last bit of RWBY content, so I was very not happy with the state of the show. So, I decided to write my own rewrite!

It was full of cliques and most of it took things either directly from FRWBY, canon, or other rewrites. This would become apparent to me down the line but for the first 3 months, it was nothing but making an outline for everything I needed.

It was a 10 Volume plan, structured into episodes that I would use as chapters. I think it was about 20 “episodes” per volume and it followed canon very closely. I only managed to write up an outline for one chapter, the very first one, and it was basically Salem and Ozpin’s talk from V1E1 mixed into the color trailers. It kinda worked out well because the last line of “a more simple soul” lined up with Ruby’s appearance in the Yellow Trailer. I also used the fractured moon as a transition, to really allow everything to feel connected. I had all of the color trailers happening in a single night, which looking back still feels like a cool idea.

Some parts of the original draft/notes have managed to remain a thing to this day. AroAce Ruby, Qrow being Ruby’s dad, Cardin being saved by Velvet, and Pietro and Maria having Ciel as their daughter are a few that come to mind.

Some more notable parts were scrapped when I later reworked the story into an AU. The Bees happening in V6, Summer turning out to be alive in the end, and Ironwood heroically sacrificing himself to slow down Salem. Some of those even if I wanted to keep now, would have no place in the story I’ve crafted today.

A story, with plots that I have planned out. The original draft didn’t have that until V9 and V10. The rest of it was basically canon retold. V1 ends fighting Torchwick, V2 ends with the Breach, V3 ends with the Fall of Beacon, etc. Anything else “original” was a long list of head canons that took up over 100 pages on Google Docs. My notes were all over the place and some conflicted with others.

I believe it was October that I decided to move from a rewrite to an AU. That was also the time that all of the stuff about RT came out and made me look back at some of the things I was going to include in my fic and made me realize: “Well I’m just repeating things that I find problematic in the show in my fic so am I really improving or changing anything?” That along with the lack of original ideas and direction made me sit down and get to work reforming my fic.

Before I get into that I want to mention that I did V9 both in a good and bad way. The good is that I really focused on each member of RWBY in the Ever After. Ruby with her role as a leader, Weiss with losing Atlas, Blake with feeling like she betrayed the Faunus, and Yang not feeling like she was able to protect those who she cared about. They all would talk and work together to help each other get back to Remnant and work through their problems. The bad is that half of the Volume was Ever After, and the other half was in Remnant following several factions across all of Remnant trying to gain support for the final battle at Beacon. So it was all over the place and no one got time to truly shine. Also I think this was the time that V9 was beginning to be teased so I was also trying to quickly add in details to an already messy Volume.

Step 1 was to organize my notes, which I did over the course of October to December(2022). November I spent diving into the wiki and this is where my 300+ characters came from. Worst part is? That the wiki has 400+ characters, I had to combine names and cut down a bit to make sure that everyone fit into four person teams. It’s closer to 200-250+ characters subtracting the major ones like Ruby or Coco or Whitley, etc. The rest were character names on Qrow’s scroll in V4, the huntsman boards in V7, and obscure mentions in books and side content. These names are mostly made up of those who worker on RWBY the same way game devs will include their names to plaques or memorials in games. To this day, I only have 12 of these characters figured out. Most characters are in Mistral with the least being in Vacuo. Can you guess which one I did first?

But yeah, that should be it for the start of this AU fic/project/thing. I will try my best to continue adding to this in the future.

[neetifice]

PART 2 LETS GO!!!!

~~~

~Mavis is the only girl in this group but that means nothing in the face of Dreamtell America. 26 year old fish tank cleaner-eyed trans girl with Stocking Anarchy for a voice claim who is the only known person to ever match up to Lucifer's energy. And also the richest of the entire ever-expanding group, currently at 16.

~Yes, like Lucifer, she's very charismatic and friendly. In fact, she's even more friendly, calling everyone silly petnames. With this comes higher emotions of course, so she's quick to irritate and hype back up again. Main special interest is fashion, but she does video games yes (Fortnite, she got her own Fortnite skin in-universe).

~No partner (she's aroace, she's cool with not having any), but she does have a kid with the power of Kopia's very own The Gender Wizard (canon). This kid's name is Bonnie (so young she's just a baby she cannot be aged). She also has a cat of her own named Chip.

~~~

*Marcai is the youngest out of the main 6 1/2, and compared to all of them, it's by a lot. 20 year old Afro-Latino (born in Mexico) kid that happens to be roommates with Mavis and is a complete polar opposite to her.

*He's not as outgoing as the rest, even less than Nile, preferring to keep to himself and having a more realistic or pessimistic outlook on things. That doesn't mean he's completely down all the time, of course, but he's generally not the social type. Main special interests are Hatsune Miku (Vocaloid in general) and game development. Funnily enough, he leads an indie game studio that's put out two games so far, both having their own little fandoms.

*He has a boyfriend of around a year named Christian (21), Chris for short, and that's really it. He's yet to reach a significant position like the rest of the squad, but that's okay.

~~~

;Brayson would've been the final member of this group if not for what happened to Cyle, so we're here now. 30 year old gray-eyed scruffy man with fancy canes because of a bad leg and magic powers. You heard me: he's a wizard. Okay, not entirely, but he works with shadow magic and can summon ghosts and stuff. That's how they first got a hold of Cyle! Neat, huh? The fancy wizard canes only add to his energy.

;Veerrryyy chill, and friendly like the others, but in his own way. Tends to frighten and become defensive easily, but that's more due to trauma. Be patient with him, because he's very cool. Main special interests are witchcraft and animation. Also happens to be a furry, his fursona being a protogen named Speckles.

;Has a girlfriend of a few years named Taylor (28), a daughter from a previous relationship named Maylene (15), and a silly kitty named Obsidian.

~~~

^Finally, we come to the final member after the Cyle event, Deter. A 27 year old enby redhead with pretty purple eyes, a lovely aesthetic and flower powers. Yeah, they're a flower human, they can make flowers grow and stuff. They're also deaf. As a result of knowing they exist after so long, they own several pairs of hearing aid earrings to go with their aesthetic (favorite pair is the one with the bats).

^They're more shy compared to the rest, but they come around easily, especially if you know ASL and you're cool with their speech impediment (the #1 thing they're self-conscious about). Absolute cat person. Main special interests are art, video games and gothic literature in that order.

^No partner (they're aroace), but they do have a daughter they grew out of the ground for a plant human science experiment named Tulip (3) and two kitties named Ivory and Pumpkin. Tulip is also deaf.

^BONUS: Deter used to be an Undertale OC. No, I won't elaborate. Yes, I kept the name.

~~~

That's it for the main 6 1/2!! I mentioned there were more, so...if you want more, I've got plenty more for ya :3c

i'd like to introduce my silly billies for later usage (part 1/2)

Dreamtell America, the America that tells dreams. They're a streaming group. They dub themselves the main 6 1/2. And a large majority of them are autistic and love video games and disability awareness so so much.

+Nile is their leader. 32 year old scruffy blond guy who has Weird Al Yankovic as a voice claim and very pretty eyes (heterochromia, one side blue one side brown).

+Chill, but can get pretty anxious and even hostile if he doesn't know you very well. Trust that he is pretty friendly otherwise. Main special interest is art (mainly webcomics, he has a webcomic in-universe).

+ Walks around with his golden retriever service dog named Lily, so 100% expect her. Don't bother her though. Nuh uh. Also he's married to a GINGER (/j im ginger idrc) named Nicholas (31), and they adopted a kid named Yuri (as of writing, 20), who recently adopted a girl named Jules (4). That would make Nile a grandpa. God damn.

~~~

-Cyle is the reason it's 6 1/2, because he's a ghost. A perpetually 25 year old black-haired demi-boy with eyes that change depending on his mood (/j it swaps from ice blue to pitch black in a heartbeat) that's really friendly, but any kind of negative tones will have him taking you in all the wrong ways.

-He loves being silly, and that's all he wants in life, but he can definitely be more professional when it's required (sadly you can't be silly all the time). Can be commonly seen walking around with a Hello Kitty cane in abandoned malls. Main special interests are Pokemon and The Caretaker, followed by video game glitches and broadcast hijackings.

~~~

=Lucifer is surprisingly more popular than those last two, but it's because of his charisma. 30 year old amber-eyed trans redhead whose transition goal was Engineer from TF2 (he succeeded that's his voice claim now) and who managed to convince the prosthetist to give him a peg leg.

=Absolute charismatic silly guy, maybe a little too energetic at times. If he doesn't like you, you did something horrible and you should be ashamed of yourself. Main special interest is video games (he likes Genshin Impact and Fortnite the absolute most), followed by woodworking (which he doesn't do much following his leg injury).

=Has a wonderfully supportive husband named Drake (28), and they somehow birthed a child prodigy named Ezekiel (2) that got his entire personality from Lucifer. They also have an Australian shepherd named Ruby.

~~~

Will continue in a second part ofc because I have so much built up things about my silly billies that i love so muchh. :3

[demlunzel]

“RADIODUST MAKES NO SENSE! BESIDES AL IS ACE”

Many people who ship radiodust happen to be ace, aro, or both (Including myself as I’m ace). Acearo has a spectrum. There are sex favorable and sex repulsed if u wanna be more generic. For sex favorables, it is often the mental and emotional experience that is most important in terms of attraction. Sex itself is not appealing to us. There are acearo sex workers as well, because as the position implies, it is a job, a performance, a persona. Not actual attraction. Ergo not only can Alastor be shipped with Angel, but Angel themselves can be ace too (Headcanoned obviously). He is under a soul contract after all and likely signed it due to the fact he has no other means of survival.

Angel is usually under some sort of high or intoxicated in some manner. This plus Valentino’s emotional manipulation/abuse and physical abuse and rape, adds onto the fact that none of this is via Angel’s consent. At best sex and drugs are a numb distraction. In the comic, we see a box of toys Angel has. At first, it is labeled “For fun” with a heart. It’s then crossed out and relabeled as Work shit. He’s reaching his breaking point and that distraction isn’t working anymore.

This is only further proved in Addict

If Angel did crave a relationship or ever got into a serious one, his sexual needs wouldn’t be as intense as people portray. He’s had enough of just sex. He wants actual love.

Which by the way

Aroace is, as mentioned before, a spectrum. One can be demisexual and demiromantic and still be considered aroace. This also goes for angled aroaces, who usually only feel attraction once or twice in their life

If Alastor were ever to gain a serious emotional connection with anyone, that would be his main focus. Alastor is one of the few demons in hell that doesn’t want Angel for his body. It’s likely extremely refreshing for Angel, bc then he knows that Alastor’s intentions should they get together, would never be to use him like that.

And in Alastor’s case

Most demons usually view him in three ways;

Someone that should be feared and avoided

Someone that should be feared and treated aggressively as he is a threat

Or, someone with great power and can be used if on his good side

Angel views him in none of those ways.

He never treated him aggressively, nor did he run from him. And he isn’t the type to get involved in more overlord drama

Another thing that bothers me is that people sometimes portray Angel as pushy to get Alastor in bed. Which is just not in character. Out of everyone, Angel knows what it’s like to be forced into sexual situations without one’s consent. And he and Alastor both have a moral code. A fucked up one, but a moral code nonetheless.

During their first meeting, Angel had no way of knowing Alastor wasn’t into that sorta shit, as he just learned about his existence (Likely from constantly being high and drunk all the time since with knowing Vox he should’ve heard Alastor’s name mentioned at some point). Once Alastor turned him down Angel didn’t make any sort of pushy comment or sexual action towards him afterwards. He simply brushed it off saying “Your loss”.

As for personality, despite the two appearing extremely different, they have several similarities as well that balance things out. Both are mischievous, witty, quick mouthed, and would often banter as proved in the hunicast streams. (The VAs may not have them completely accurate, but they have a better understanding of the characters as they are the ones performing as them)

Both Alastor and Angel also lived within the same era. The 20s if you wish to be specific. Alastor died in 1933 whereas Angel died in 1947. It wouldn’t be surprising if Angel himself would listen to the radio quite a bit while alive. Not to mention, music tastes (While still extremely different) could overlap.

And while this is hardly any solid means of evidence, while I was studying Alastor’s heritage (Creole) and voodoo, I stumbled across this

“The spirit of beauty, jewelry, dancing, luxury and flowers”

“She represents the epitome of femininity and compassion”

“Her colors are white and pink”

“Sometimes referred to as angel”

So yeah. There’s that.

While I’m aware they won’t be canon, the dynamic this has along with the character development is too appealing to ignore and I’m tired of ppl shitting on Radiodust as an excuse as to why they just don’t ship it. You don’t have to hate a ship in order to not ship it. Just respect others.

[altschmerzes]

Hey! im ace and aro and was wondering if you could talk about what being engaged and getting married means and looks like to you as an aro person? I feel like so few people talk about it that i have no real frame of reference. it’s really cool that you’re happy and living authentically doing all these things and i guess yeah i just wanted to hear more about that if you felt like sharing! have a great day <3

yeah!!! i'm happy to talk abt that!! it's definitely nothing i've seen any kind of like..... broader awareness of, or people talking about, and i probably would've been like. more optimistic about my future if it had been something i'd seen, i think. this got a little long so i'm throwing it under a cut but here it is!! a bit of an explanation of like. How My Engagement/Marriage Works And How That Came To Be. (signed off on by my fiance, for the record - i didn't want to write out an answer to this without checking with them, but they're totally fine with it!)

i think it's probably wildly confusing to some people to see me post and talk abt being aro A Lot (it's one of the most prominent aspects of my online personality i think sdlfjs) including being like. incredibly romance repulsed, and then mention being engaged or having a fiance or referencing 'my wife' (though we're not married yet it is one of my Favourite jokes to make because 1. i think it's very funny, and 2. i just like saying it). people contain multitudes etc etc but i do wonder if people are confused by that sldfjs. my engagement is like... honestly everything i'd ever have hoped for if i'd asked myself at any point in the years since i started identifying as aromantic what my ideal life would include.

i've always had a hard time being alone and i wanted the intimacy and mutual support and just. ability to Do Life with someone that a relationship involved, while also being, as i've said, intensely romance repulsed and not really open to sex either. really just sort of figured that wasn't going to happen for me. the odds of not only meeting an aroace person (the only sort of person i thought might have an interest in the same sort of relationship i wanted and was comfortable with) irl never mind being compatible with them personally and in our priorities just seemed incredibly slim. which like... made me sad sometimes. i'd always sort of daydreamed about getting married which is wild for someone who is as romance repulsed as i am, which i know i keep saying but it really is an incredibly intense feeling for me (i tried dating once in high school and had several panic attacks before breaking it off after our third extremely mild fourteen/fifteen year old date, and often feel physically ill trying to read about fictional romance/watch it on tv). but y'know. sometimes we just don't get what we want in life, and i was fine with the idea of having my friends and my synagogue community and like. hoping my friends wouldn't all leave me behind alone as they all got into relationships.

what ended up happening is obviously not that. i'm really truly unbelievably thrilled every day to wake up and remember what i've got to look forward to every day. my engagement is entirely platonic, and it's exactly what both of us want and are just. beyond happy with and excited for. my fiance is a lesbian, actually, and has been incredibly good and patient with reassuring me that the relationship we have, exactly as it is, is what they want too, that they don't feel like i'm depriving them of anything. we love each other very much, and we're building the life together that we want, in exactly the way that we want.

and that's how it happened, really. we talked about what we wanted. i got engaged at the end of what i've referred to as a 'several hour long conversation' which is the truth sdlkfs. a close friend and i both had sort of 'evaluating the next couple years of our lives and how we wanted pivotal parts of our futures to go' moments about the same time, and it came up i think mostly as a half-serious suggestion that we could get married. for logistical reasons, it made sense for us. and then we started talking about what that might look like - what we wanted, from our lives and our futures, and our hypothetical marriage. and the more we talked about it, the more serious it got, the more real it got, and the more we both i think realized we wanted the same thing. the same life, the same way, together.

we talked about a whole lot in that first couple of days. one of the very first things we talked about actually was kids - did we want them? what was important to us about having and raising children (names, religion, etc)? then it was stuff like did we have strong feelings about where we lived. did we want our own rooms in our home, did we want to wear rings (i love my engagement ring. it makes me smile every time i notice it on my hand), what did we want to tell our friends. we had conversations about whether and how we wanted a wedding. what sort of physical intimacy we were comfortable with, what sort we might want (really glad we did that, and that we were honest and open about that - nothing better, it turns out, than Cuddling Your Wife). what sort of affection we were comfortable with around other people.

our relationship, our life, is what we want it to be. exactly what we want it to be. what makes us happy. we've built it from a vast and beautiful array of choices and options, adding the things we want and leaving the things we don't. it's an approach i would highly recommend to everyone, honestly - talking about what you want out of your relationship, what you want to do and how you want to be with someone rather than just picking which of a short list of proscribed 'types of relationship' you want to have. it leaves a lot more room for nuance and what will actually make you happy than much less contextually nuanced things like assuming your definition of 'dating' will match the other person's, or that the kind of relationship you want just isn't possible. setting up that kind of foundation in communication and honesty and being clear about our expectations and needs has fostered a relationship where i feel respected and valued and heard - and i'm reasonably certain (and i hope!) that they feel the same.

we travelled to my birthplace so they could be introduced to my family and my childhood best friend. it's always both surprising and amusing to me every time someone assumes i'm gay (gender is complicated but we both tend to read as women) - this happened a lot there, and as i've told my extended family and other more casual friends about my engagement. this doesn't bother me at all (i'm not out to almost anyone irl as aromantic, and it's a reasonable conclusion to reach given what information they have) but it's extremely funny when i also get to find out which of my family members/people i knew in middle school always sort of wondered if i was gay but never asked sldkjs. turns out the answer is 'a lot'.

re: assumptions, for the most part, we don't bother explaining the nature of our relationship to people. this is also something we talked about! we discussed how much we wanted to clarify or contextualize, and decided that ultimately like... with the exception of people we're very close to, and in contexts like this (fairly anonymous post on ye olde internet with the ability to immediately block anyone who clowns on it), it's really nobody's business unless we decide it is and we're cool with just letting people assume whatever. that does lead to some like... i can't speak for them but it gets a little weird for me sometimes, i'm not gonna lie. it feels a little like getting misgendered, having people assume that i'm in a romantic relationship. i say that as a nonbinary person who's mostly just. chill about not being out about that irl. that's the best descriptor i have to help people understand what might be a hard thing to understand. but it doesn't bug me enough to want to put myself - or my fiance - through what correcting that assumption would involve. i mostly don't blame anyone for it - it's extremely reasonable to assume someone who is engaged is in a romantic relationship with the person they're engaged to - except for when friends who know i'm aromantic and somehow think this means that's... changed, somehow? or jump to assuming i'm in a romantic relationship before considering i might not be in one and still be engaged anyway. so it's kind of weird, and feels a little bad, but not enough to really do anything about it except hope the world changes a bit and stops making assumptions about other people's relationships at some point.

that's really the only downside, hand to gd. that and worrying that there might be consequences, legally, if the wrong person finds out we're married but Not Like That. everything else is honestly amazing. it's the best thing that's ever happened to me and i'm so unbelievably happy. i never thought i'd ever get to be this happy, or have a future this bright and warm and full of love to look forward to. having spent a lot of my life for various reasons thinking i just wouldn't have a future at all, it's like every day is a really incredible dream, except i'm never going to have to wake up.

the moral of the story i guess, if you've made it this far in this novel of an answer, anon, which i wouldn't bet on, because it's so much longer than i planned on it being (SORRY SDLKFJS i guess this is more than just a 'writing fic' problem for me now XD), is that your relationships are what you make them. assuming that what you want isn't possible, or that nobody could possibly want the same thing, is a great way to cheat yourself out of something wonderful. nobody has to have any kind of relationship, obviously, if they don't want one, but i think there are a lot of people - aromantic and not! though i do think this probably impacts aro people. more. - who could benefit from the idea that there are more options out there than just like... 1. romantic relationship constructed in a specific way and following a specific path, and 2. being alone.

[thefools-journey]

So. Some of you may be wondering why we haven’t written a whole ton about the secondaries or what have you. Here’s the reason: we were waiting for them to end before we really dug into the problems we were noticing. We felt that it was only fair to wait for the routes to finish so that we had an understanding of the writers’ vision. Who knew, we thought, maybe they would see the problems themselves and course correct, maybe they are building to something we can’t quite see yet and these issues will have actual payoff, maybe-

In light of Muriel and Lucio’s endings, and the general mess that has dominated Portia’s route for a year plus now, we are breaking our silence. We are actually going to talk about this shit show.

The fandom at large has talked about a bunch of issues with the secondaries but for me, the cardinal sin, the thing that really all the issues lead back to, is this: the writers lost sight of the tarot themes which so strongly defined and held together the primary routes. Let me explain.

The primary routes each center around three thematic cores:

The Love Interest’s Major Arcana and its Reversed/Upright meanings

The MC’s Fool’s Journey, both how it can go right and how it can go wrong

A question about the MC’s identity and their relationship to said identity

Asra’s route asks: Who was the MC? How does the MC navigate a past they cannot and will not remember? What do they owe a past they cannot remember? How do they handle the revelations of what Asra, Nadia, Julian, etc did? How do you right the past? Can you?

Nadia’s route asks: Who is the MC? The MC has no past. Are they the Fool only? Are they actually the same person they were? How can they tell? Who are they, really? Are they an imposter? No one can answer these questions for them.

Julian’s route asks: Who will the MC become? How does the MC see their future? Is there anything worth fighting for for that future? What will become of them and their loved ones? 

Now, if you notice, these themes are expertly woven throughout the primaries. Asra’s past dominates his route, Nadia is also missing memories and trying to construct her identity both with her family and with Vesuvia, and Julian’s fear of the future drives his flailing for control. Asra has to learn to take a broader view of his actions to get his Upright Ending, Nadia has to learn to trust herself and those around her for hers, and Julian has to learn how to let go for his. These lessons are the issues their cards stand for. The primaries are so dang elegant and delicate in their handlings of theme it is honestly awe-inspiring.

Thematically, the secondary routes have completely lost their hearts. First of all, the MC does not have strong, core questions which need to be answered. They just don’t. I suppose the writers did not want to retread old territory (which is weird considering how tightly bound the primaries are; it really tricks you into thinking you’re living the same events but from different angles depending on your route) but they did not replace the old with anything new. Muriel’s route is, on the surface, about discovering and owning his past, the good and the bad. Why not tie MC’s self-discovery to that story? Or they could have taken the angle that Muriel’s route is about convincing him to be present and active in the world while MC builds an identity for themself outside of Asra, the shop, and the memories they cannot retrieve. Why not tie the investigation themes running through Portia’s early route back to MC and their past? Portia has the unique angle of being as in the dark as MC about all of this, why not discover the past together? And for goodness’ sake, Lucio has no future when his route begins, why not tie that to his need for growth, responsibility, and MC’s own future between the Fool, the Devil, or something mortal and in between?

Secondly, the routes lost their tarot backbone. We have a primer on how to get specific endings for each LI and it still holds, but the writers did not follow through on the thematic coherence of each secondary. The Hermit is looking for something, be it perspective, insight, a solution to a problem, whatever. The key here is that the Hermit must find or learn what they are searching for, this thing must change their understanding of the world, and finally, they must bring this lesson back to the world from which they retreated. Can someone please enlighten me as what exactly Muriel learns then teaches the world around him? Nothing Muriel learns from Morga, MC, or even the Hermit ties back into anything. The Devil warns that you are out of control and exerting a lot of manipulative, destructive behavior on the world around you. It asks you to take responsibility for yourself and your actions. So can someone tell me why Lucio’s route actively avoids any interaction or reflection on two of Lucio’s biggest victims: Muriel and Julian? Why does the route only try to make amends with the “easier” of his victims in the cast? The Star is first and foremost the card of clarity, the light at the end of the tunnel. Perseverance, if you will. Yet Portia’s route has been the muddiest of the trio; the writers drop the investigation aspect of her route in favor just handing her and MC information they could have easily found and muddying the waters with Tasya (she blows up the palace but it’s all okay bc she has a secret daughter Julian never thought to bring up or mention) and the complete removal of the Devil as antagonist. 

So that leaves just the Fool’s Journey trying to hold this stool up with only one leg. And well...it doesn’t go well. At best, the secondary route books pay the barest surface level homage to the themes of the individual cards. At worst, they ignore the cards completely. Muriel's Moon book has nothing to do with illusions or delusions or lies or even an Alice in the Looking Glass upside down world. Portia's back half is a complete and utter mess, starting with her Temperance book being so badly mangled that Muriel's aftermath book does it better. Lucio's route too bungles the Tower and the Star. There just isn't enough here to carry the routes alone.

Add to the core loss the loss of intertextuality. The primary routes are very good, even great but they too do have their moments and mistakes. What helps strengthen them when the cores stumble is how the trio is woven together. Things you learn in Asra's route can inform the way you play Nadia's, for example. Julian's route informs what is going on in Asra's route and slots some missing puzzle pieces together. Nadia's route tells you of the power struggles she is facing and informs the other two routes' handling of Julian and his trial. On and on, the three routes support each other because they are built out of the same basic plot beats, just tackled in very different ways. Now, the writers are allowed to try and write whatever they want. They apparently wanted to be more experimental and less tied down to an overarching plot with the three secondaries. Okay, fine, they are allowed to do that. The problem is that they sacrificed one of the key strengths of the primary trio and didn't replace said strength with anything else. They also, on some level, harmed the very premise of the game, which is that only the player's choices and route selected change the overall plot. Instead of feeling like legitimate possibilities or offshoots of the same timeline/plot, the secondaries feel almost like Arcana AUs. The secondaries throw out all relations to the primaries and each other as quickly as possible and for what? 

It is probably the height of arrogance to suggest fixes for works whose behind the scenes I do not know. At the same time, some small, obvious changes could have salvaged Muriel and maybe Lucio's endings (rip Portia). Instead of having the Hermit appear as a disappointing cameo, why not have him say something cryptic to Muriel, then have MC start trying to seal the Devil. Then let Muriel use his forget me mark to cloak MC and hide them from the Devil's attacks. Protecting MC by hiding them from Lucio, keeping him focused on Muriel, seems to me a simple third solution between Muriel's desire to run and his desire to never fight again. It lets him stand up to Lucio and let him have it while holding onto who Muriel has become. The Reversed End would have MC try to draw Lucio's attention at some point, disrupting the sealing, and eventually leading to Muriel killing the Devil. With Lucio's Upright End, I just have to ask: why doesn't MC fully claim the power of the Fool instead of the Devil? We don't need the other Arcana involved in this fight; we have three routes that demonstrate that. Just have MC pull Scout into the conflict, then have Lucio tell MC he believes in them, then add his power to the mix. You got yourself a full Fool who leaves Scout guarding the realm until they and Lucio's mortal bodies fail and they return to the realm to be together forever. Boom, you're done, you can even add some ambiguous lines so that players can decide how happy their MC is with this arrangement, send me the check.

Here is the bottom line. Our group is full of aroace, and several combinations therein, individuals. We are the last group who should have gotten into a dating sim of all things. But the Arcana did something with the primaries that was special; they wrote a compelling plot with dazzling lore, complex characters, and strong themes wrapped up in a dating sim bow. The writers know better and we know they know better. I do not know what happened with the secondaries, especially around books 10-11, which is where minor issues slowly start spiraling into major ones, but it is clear that Nix Hydra needed some more planning before they released these routes. Hopefully they will learn.

TL;DR: Nix Hydra fired their tarot consultants about eighteen months ago and it has wrecked their secondary routes until they were just embarrassments. They never intended for the secondary routes to even exist and once they had to make them, they scrambled and threw out everything that made the primaries work.

- Mod Telos

[variousqueerthings]

Tom Hardy Movies rated least to most queer

I made a list of some Tom Hardy movies and I rated them based on my own, non-specific criteria about what makes a movie queer. Results below the cut.

(Some films not included, because I haven’t watched them yet, because Mr Hardy’s only in them for a few minutes, because the subject matter doesn’t lend itself to this list, or because I just don’t want’em here. TV series also not included. The list is organised into both groups and ratings, because I’m doing The Most.)

Movies are divided into four groups and rated from 0 – 10 on the Queer-Scale, scroll down to the bottom if you want the ratings without the commentary.

Disclaimer: This list is subjective. Don’t come at me because I didn’t rate Inception higher, Nolan himself is as queer as cargo shorts. 

1. This movie would make more sense if it were queer

If this movie were queer it… might not become a perfect film all of a sudden, but it’d make a hell of a lot more sense than what’s actually going on. With an occasional dose of “are the cis-straights okay?”

This Means War (2012): So Chris Pine and Tom Hardy are ostensibly both in love with Reese Witherspoon, but say “I love you” to each other pretty much constantly throughout the movie and their friendship is often presented as a domestic partnership. Cool, cool, cooool.

Queer Rating: 2 out of 10. This movie hate-crimed me by having Tom Hardy literally spell out his relationship with Chris Pine, only for the script to then have him say… “can you imagine all that… but with a woman…” Later on the movie explicitly denies polyamory is possible. Fuck this film.

The Dark Knight Rises (2012): Batman movies should always be queer. Mr. Hardy’s the only one who acceptably camps it up, despite Nolan’s best attempts to make him “acceptably gruff.” No matter what you do, Bane is a massive daddy in a mask and thanks to Mr Hardy’s honestly iconic fucking speech pattern in this film, it goes from pretty atrociously straight to just queer enough to imagine a future where Robert Pattinson plays batman and maybe adopts a bunch of kids.

(the only truly decent mask in this franchise tbh)

Queer Rating: 3 out of 10. Mr Hardy’s back is the one that’s actually broken carrying any semblance of fun in this overly long movie all on his own.

Lawless (2012): Wow, this really was the year of the not-queer-enough, wasn’t it? Look, it’s “based on a real story,” but it’s also a movie and movies don’t need to stick to the truth, and this one certainly doesn’t. Was the guy queer in real life? I don’t know. But that doesn’t matter, what matters is that it’s just kind of an eh movie and maybe being queer would add something to it. One of those “but why make someone queer? because it’s always more interesting to do so,” movies.

Queer Rating: 3 out of 10. It’s just not queer. But Tom Hardy wears cardigans and described his character as a “mother figure,” which adds an interesting dynamic to him.

2. Actually Queer but in a homophobic way

Tom Hardy plays a canonically queer character, yaaay. The whole movie contains a strange sense of the director being too not-queer to actually engage with that and everything around him is almost aggressively straight, noooo.

RocknRolla (2008): Honestly this movie has the funniest coming out scene ever + that familiar undertone of “all these manly men secretly want to fuck each other” is only heightened by one of them actually being gay and in love with his best friend. It’s such a fucking… it’s such a movie. Personally I find Mark Strong, Idris Elba, Thandie Newton, and, of course, Tom Hardy to be really hot in it, so that’s a plus. There’s a scene in which Strong’s character teaches another gangster how to do a proper backhand. It’s really gay of him. Also slow-dancing at a gay club. Butler’s character needs to get himself together, you really don’t think 2008 Tom Hardy is hot? Mate.

(left to right: functional queer, disaster queer, distinguished queer)

Queer Rating: 6 out of 10, for having an actual gay character who is played by Tom Hardy doing a sexy phonecall voice to another guy, but then there’s that feeling you can’t shake that the whole movie is vaguely uncomfortable about it, like a family member awkwardly patting you on the shoulder after they found out you were queer second-hand, but they’ve still got 50 years of bias to unlearn. Also Thandie Newton is killed, fuck that noise. 

Legend (2015): If I had a nickle for the amount of times Tom Hardy’s played a gay gangster, I’d have two nickles. Which isn’t a lot, but weird that it happened twice (looks at Peaky Blinders and thinks it ought to be three times). I’ve watched Legend three times and every time it just… loses me. And because this is a biased list, I’ll only specifically mention that it fails to make Ron’s queerness anything but a way for him to shock others. Gangsters could be gay? Gasp! On the upside Tom Hardy has so much sexual tension with everyone in this movie, including himself (why would you do that? Asks Ron, bemused. Because I can’t kill you, no matter how much I fucking want to, hisses a blood-soaked Reggie right into his ear. It’s hot).

Queer rating: 5 out of 10 because the film is just not very queer for a movie with several queer men in it.

3. Straight as a forced family dinner

It’s straight.

Locke (2013): He’s a married man who had an affair and trying to deal with the fallout of it. This isn’t a spoiler for most of the movie, it’s a pretty neat movie where we look at Tom Hardy having a bit of a mental breakdown and taking lots of phonecalls (my personal hell). Is it queer? Not in the slightest.

Queer Rating: 2 out of 10 for Hardy’s face being in almost every shot.

The Revenant (2015): Yeah, yeah, DeCaprio’s and Hardy’s characters are obsessed with each other, yeah it’s a man’s world where the only women are dead wife, kidnapped sexually assaulted native princess, or background whore, yeah, they fight each other and there’s a ton of grunting, but also… I just fucking don’t like this movie. The thin line where a storyline like this one becomes queer might be crossed for others, but not for me. Fuck these guys and their stupid  bear fights.

Queer rating: 3 out of 10 for it being about dirty men in the middle of nowhere (but you could just watch Brokeback Mountain or The Lighthouse or God’s Own Country or any Mad Max, or, or, or…)

4. Queer? Queer. Queer? … Queer…

The plots, aesthetics and/or characters played by Tom Hardy lend themselves to a queer reading, even if there is no overt intention towards queerness. Often this is because of a deliberate lack of heterosexual and/or cisgender writing, which in this day and age is still pretty uncommon not to include within a plot.

Inception (2010): Okay, I don’t even need to write about the added “darling,” or the “go to sleep Mr Eames.” I don’t need to go on about the absolutely bonkers amount of fanfiction written for Eames and Arthur, based on a few minutes of film and a boatload of chemistry. It’s queer.

Queer Rating: 7 out of 10, because the actual plot of the film isn’t very queer, but between the Arthur/Eames dynamic and Elliot Page, Nolan was really given a gift he didn’t deserve.

Warrior (2011): Okay, so first off, this might be my favourite Tom Hardy film, at least some part of my brain is fixated on it at almost all times and I’m considering watching it for the third time in two weeks. I don’t only consider it queer based on Mr. Hardy’s character, although he has no romantic or sexual interest and could be read as aroace, but because of the themes, especially those surrounding said character, who is coded as a caregiver to women and through close emotional connections to men. It’s got possibly unintentional deconstructions of masculinity and two men (brothers) who need to forgive each other and can only do so through the catharsis of violence. It speaks to me as a transmasc with several cis brothers, struggling with my own masculinity. It’s not at all written for me, but I find myself all over it. I could talk about this movie forever.

Queer Rating: 8 out of 10. I’m not allowed to say any more or I’ll never stop writing about it. I love you Tommy…

The Drop (2014): Bob’s lack of sexual and/or romantic interest in Naomi is so strange to her that she doesn’t know what he would want from her otherwise. Bob really just wants to raise a dog with her (and also forgiveness for past sins). Bob is such a rare ace and possibly aro coded character, it really throws me every time I watch this film how obvious it is. Bonus points for also being autistic-coded and not in the stereotypical ways.

(Tom Hardy’s most challenging role: pretending he doesn’t know dogs)

Queer Rating: 9 out of 10 because it’s so fucking rare to see ace and aro coded characters that aren’t, you know…. serial killers. Also Tom Hardy adopts a puppy and has a very cute, kinda lispy voice. How often does Tom Hardy play softer men like this?

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015): Very deliberately no sexual or romantic writing included in Max’s and Furiosa’s relationship. Sure, there’s not a lot of time for that in the post-apocalyptic wasteland, but it was also done with a purpose! “It was always going to be two warriors on par, starting off with very little respect for each other and ending up with a massive respect for each other.” - Charlize Theron. “So of course they meet, of course there’s a relationship, an unspoken understanding. A recognition.” - Tom Hardy.

Queer Rating: 9 out of 10. It’s not just the characters, but the world and it’s apocalyptic BDSM leather scene, the questions it asks about sustainability and about people as tools, and the found family. It’s about overcoming violence through multiple kinds of love. And it’s about watching a guy playing flame-thrower guitar. What could be queerer?

Venom (2018): Talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing, show stopping, spectacular, never the same… No, but Eddie is queer. The only question is whether the sequel will acknowledge that aspect or not, but even if not. Even if it manages to straightly bypass the reality of a symbiotic relationship with a genderless? genderfluid? being from another world that is linked to you down to your very cells and understands you more intimately than any other person possibly could… even if all that: Eddie is queer. Venom and Eddie are in a relationship. Any relationship Eddie ever enters into will automatically become a thrupple. He makes out with Venom in the movie! Eddie is queer.

(aw yeah that tongue is going down his throat)

Queer Rating: 9.5 out of 10, because it’s still coded by the creators in the language of bromance (hey, bro, is it gay if we’re physically and emotionally closer than any other people on earth?), but the movie is so, so camp and Mr Hardy’s acting choices are beautiful – the screaming? The lispy soft voice and lack of taking up space? The lobster tank? The only people who don’t know how queer this is are the people making it apparently. Fingers crossed for that sequel!

Hon. mentions:

Star Trek: Nemesis (2002): Star Trek – even at it’s worst (especially at its worst?) – is camp af + Hardy is a straight-up baby in this film.

Bronson (2008): It’s about a real person who’s still alive, so I won’t comment on the actual man. However the film seems to code the character Bronson along an ace line and also has genderqueering Vaudeville. Someone let Tom Hardy do more of whatever was going on in those stage-bits.

(this right here: this the good shit)

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011): Another ensemble piece not massively about Hardy’s character, but it’s a movie that centers around queerness in a strange, depressing way. Tom Hardy’s character isn’t queer. Colin Firth and Mark Strong are though. The book makes me cry.

Peaky Blinders (2013-): Because it’s a TV series I left it out. There’s a lot of straight nonsense going on there, but Alfie Solomens is gay. There’s nothing in the series that disputes that and plenty that lends itself to the reading.

Dunkirk (2017): Tom Hardy plays an RAF pilot in a deep emotional connection with the other main RAF pilot. That’s immediately gay. However he’s not in the movie much because of the way it’s constructed, so I left it off.

Queer Ratings (least to most)

No queer to be found here traveller:

This Means War: 2 out of 10 - illegal movie, Tom Hardy swore he wouldn’t do another rom-com after

Locke: 2 out of 10 - straight Welshman and his straight problems. He pretty though

Lawless: 3 out of 10 - cardigan-Hardy being a mother-hen, but very straight for all that

The Dark Knight Rises: 3 out of 10 - a superhero movie that doesn’t deserve Mr Hardy’s camp talents (unlike Venom)

The Revenant: 3 out of 10 - doesn’t give me what I want out of a movie full of dirty, bearded men

Queer but we deserve more:

Legend: 5 out of 10 - timid homosexuality, considering the source material. 

RocknRolla: 6 out of 10 - hey bro, is it gay if we kill the only female lead in our massive ensemble cast

The queerest of Hardy’s:

Inception: 7 out of 10 - Elliot Page and JGL kissing was an all-around terrible choice that made no sense, we know the truth, Nolan

Warrior: 8 out of 10 - I’m still crying, Edgerton’s crying, Hardy’s crying, we’re all crying, and I think that’s really emotionally healthy and queer of us

Mad Max: Fury Road: 9 out of 10 - non-romantic love in the time of BDSM post-apocalyptic wastelands is something that can actually be so personal

The Drop: 9 out of 10 - “Fucking punk. Go out to dinner dressed like you're still in you living room! You wear those big hippity-hoppity clown shoes! You speak to women terribly! You treat them despicably! You hurt harmless dogs that can't defend themselves! I'm tired of you man. I'm tired of you. You embarrass me!”

Venom: 9.5 out of 10 - Sometimes a relationship is an anxious reporter, the sentient goo inhabiting his body, his kinda-ex-girlfriend and her new doctor boyfriend, and I think that’s beautiful

[donttouchtheneednoggle]

My interpretation of the relationships in canon

Inspired by this spectacular post from the queen of meta herself @camelotsheart 💕💕💕

Warning this is incoherent and I got very carried away

Okie dokie so

Pre canon

Gwen’s only ever liked girls at this point and has gone through several crushes (which Elyan used to tease her about a lot and in return she teased him about the pretty boys and Leon stood there like. Wut) including the Lady Morgana (you know how Gwen’s 'type’ is someone who resembles Merlin? Yeah) but she’s never gonna say anything because Morgana’s still a Pendragon and therefore a mess and Gwen would never get involved with that crazy familyhdshhjfjfkbgjgbjgn

Ahem

Merlin’s never liked anyone like that (he’s aspec)

Arthur’s decided he likes girls because that’s what princes do

Morgana is obviously a lesbian and also has it bad for Gwen (one of the only plausible explanations as to why she ends up hating her so much)

Season 1

Gwen sees this feral gremlin fight the prince and is like I Must Befriend Him and so she meets him and then is like wait he’s pretty and lovely and funny hnnnggnhh what is this

Merlin meets Gwen and is like wait she’s pretty and lovely and funny hnnnggnhh what is this

Gwen gets very emotional in 1x04 and kisses him spontaneously and both their brains short circuit like what the FUCK just happened so they just. Never mention it because Merlin’s very confused and Gwen can’t work out if she likes men too or not. It’s a bit of a grey area (ofc Merlin’s not actually a man which might be why)

Then she meets Lancelot and is like OK SO I LIKE GUYS TOO

Merlin proper falls for Lance and is like huh this is a thing and they end up drunkenly making out and he doesn’t freak out quite as much this time

Arthur gets sent into full bisexual crisis mode OH MY GOD I LIKE MEN which goes on for literal years until he learns his wife is the same and its ok

Lance is so gone for all three of them

Merlin and Gwen literally never have a single conversation about their feelings because they’re awkward dumbasses

(I think it would’ve been different had Lancelot stayed I'm not saying read my fic but read my fic)

Merlin realises his feelings

(When I say feelings I don’t think they’re traditionally romantic like he actually wants to be with him he just cares very very much for him and it might have something to do with him beginning to base his whole worth on him but I digress)

for Arthur in 1x09 crap is it 1x09? I mean Excalibur with the help of Gwen and her knowing looks. This is also when Gwen gives up on crushing on Merlin don't ask me I’m aroace is that how that works because he's never gonna look at her like that

Like a week later she starts crushing on Arthur and is incredibly put out by the fact that Gwen 'who'd want to marry Arthur' Smith and Merlin 'not me' Emrys are so gone for this asshole

Arthur becomes aware of Gwen in 1x10 when she starts calling him out (funny that) and starts thinking hm

Season 2

Gwen continues to be pissed off at her feelings until halfway through 2x02 when she realises this Arthur bloke isn’t completely terrible (which he set about proving)

Arthur meanwhile is like OK SO I LIKE GIRLS TOO

And the rest, as they say, is canon

2x04 is kind of a ‘you get captured and your bi awakening who you thought you’d never see again rescues you and he likes you and you like him and he’s about to die for you so what do you do but kiss him’ type situation for Gwen

(Her feelings do fade over the intervening years. Sometimes you say stuff you don’t mean idk)

Merlin immediately feels very strongly for Freya and decides to run away with her basically immediately because he’s never met anyone like him before and it’s an incredibly powerful moment and he’s literally willing to give up everything to be with her

And then... well yeah

Season 3

Percy and Lance meet and it’s like hot guy! Shared trauma! All the other has! You know where this is going- except no because Percy quickly learns sweet holy fuck this is the angstiest guy in Albion he's not even the one whose family died two months ago and he NEVER shuts the fuck up about the same three people who he hasn't seen for like two years he really shouldn't be this gone on them also he exchanges letters with one of them and NEVER stops smiling when he’s reading them- so they remain friends and all cuddling sessions (and there are a lot) are strictly platonic

Gwaine shows up in Camelot and crushes on Gwen and FALLS for Merlin

Merlin feels the same because Gwaine’s so easy to be around and talk to but doesn’t make a move because in his experience everyone he cares about like that leaves at best and also Gwaine doesn’t know who he really is and it might not be safe for him to know

Then Gwaine leaves for myriad stupid reasons

And leaves again

Then when Merlin goes to find him he has to leave again and this time he even confesses his love! In a way and Merlin feels he can’t properly confess back because of myriad stupid reasons

In 3x12 Elyan and Gwaine become friends in about two seconds flat. When they're going to check out the dungeons Gwaine makes Elyan jump to try and cheer him up cos he seems kinda bummed and Elyan deadass nearly kills him and they’re inseparable from that point on

Everyone hiding in the cave with these little bastards hate them because they get into frequent brawls and talk loudly about all their (illegal) adventures to pretend they don’t feel left out of things

3x13 basically goes like this

The little bastards take one look at Percy and are like hot guy who everyone is ignoring! You’re in our gang now and Percy’s like all right guess this is my life now I'm not saying go read my fic but-

Basically Merlin gets the one person who actually knows him back and a promise that he's never going to leave again (ouch) and that's that, no one else is ever going to come close to that

Season 4

Merlin and Lancelot got together pretty quickly as their correspondence had been going that way anyway and they live together that whole wonderful year and would've been very happy forever except...

Well yeah

(Lancelot never got over Gwen or Arthur either. I don’t actually think he knows how to do that??)

Percy and Elyan get together after 4x10 near death experiences are conducive to romance have you seen Sword in the Stone they are SO dating so now poor Gwaine is pining AND third wheeling

Merlin and Gwaine hook up night of Arthur and Gwen’s wedding for completely unrelated reasons and kind of get together except Merlin’s in kind of a really bad place after losing Lancelot and between them they’re pining for like four people so they end up ending it because it’s just kind of terrible (which GODDAMNIT IT SHOULD’VE BEEN THEM!!!!!! But alas this is canon not should’ve been-on)

After whatever’s a suitable length of time to get over someone but not actually Gwaine starts dating Percy and Elyan and it actually works

And for a long time everything’s great and balanced and it’s the closest thing to the golden age as they ever get except as usual that balance relies on Merlin sacrificing everything he is and losing himself in the process

Season 5

Elyan’s death of course wrecks everything and things are really difficult between Gwaine and Percival, and Gwaine having lost one of his best friends becomes gradually disillusioned with the whole knight thing and also self worth thing and ends up returning to the whole reason he ever came here – Merlin – and is like right guess I’m living for that now

Cue even more pining

Eventually Gwaine can’t stand the grief and longing and distance and apparently unrequited but not actually unrequited love (it’s not that Merlin doesn’t love him it’s just that he can’t afford to) anymore and gets himself assigned to that garrison away from Percy and Merlin because god forbid he learns to communicate properly

Where he gets together with Eira who’s really easy to be with and makes him feel better, which of course was the whole idea he just walked right into Morgana’s trap

And after that whole debacle Percy’s still there for him, because god forbid Percy be anything but unflinchingly loyal and caring

And then… well yeah

Arthur comes to terms with the approximation of feelings he has for Merlin

(I’m saying approximation because I just can’t see Arthur seeing Merlin as an actual separate person past mid s1, he’s more a punch bag and unlimited emotional labour do-er and I don’t think you can truly be in love with someone who you just see as an extension of yourself, but I digress)

Sometime between ‘where have you been’ and that scene where they’re sitting on the log you know the one? You know the one

And yes he’s still just as in love with Gwen as ever until his dying breath and beyond. This doesn’t change that.

Post canon

Gwen platonically marries her beloved aroace oldest friend Leon who is very happy with the situation so she can get the council off her back and grieve properly and eventually starts a thing with Mithian now I’m not saying ot3 with Merlin but I’m saying ot3 with Merlin

I’m not a fan of ‘everyone who can be paired up should be’, but if you want I think Percy and Elena would get along great. She wouldn’t treat him like a tragedy

And they all live happily ever after

Until Gwen and Percy die and Merlin and Leon are left to spend eternity with each other-

UNTIL the round table clamber out that goddamn lake in modern times and finally TALK and form the goddamn polycule like this

 that would’ve solved all this mess in the first place

THEN they live happily ever after for an appropriate amount of time that doesn’t leave anyone immortal and miserable

[stoneswords]

CHERRY MAGIC TIMELINE (DRAMA CANON)

I rewatched Cherry Magic over the last couple days as one does and thought it’d be fun to keep track of the dates/when things happen. For the most part it’s very easy as there are several very specific dates mentioned in the show.

You might notice several Saturdays where they’re at work-- this seems to be pretty standard in Japanese office culture, to work a couple Saturdays a month.

You also might notice a very major time jump that would have happened between Episodes 10 and 11-- I could write this off as a suspension of disbelief type thing, but since there are so many specific dates referenced in the show, and going off Adachi’s pain at keeping his secret from Kurosawa for so long in Ep 11 I think it might be accurate. Please let me know if I missed anything!! :)

Sometime in 2013 - Adachi and Kurosawa are both hired at Toyokawa. The dinner with President Matsuura happens and Kurosawa falls in love with the first person who's ever told him he's more than a pretty face.

Feb 14 2020 - Kurosawa gives Adachi some free chocolate he got off the street.

Oct 1 2020 - Urabe teases Adachi for never having had a girlfriend, tells him of the urban legend of becoming a 30 y/o virgin wizard.

Fri Oct 2 - Adachi's 30th birthday, he discovers his powers.

Fri Oct 9: this is the day the episode aired, and it also works with the timeline in later episodes - Adachi bumps into Kurosawa in the elevator and discovers his feelings. That night Kurosawa offers to help Adachi with his extra work, they're there so late Adachi misses the last train and Kurosawa insists Adachi stay over at his place. We get scarf wrapping, geeking out over manga, Kurosawa fantasising about Adachi in his jammies, neither of them can sleep.

Sat Oct 10 - Kurosawa makes them breakfast. At the office Kurosawa scolds Urabe for putting down Adachi's work. At the end of the day Kurosawa offers some files to help Adachi with the extra work Urabe gave him. Adachi chases after him and asks him out for dinner, but Rokkaku interrupts before they can go and tells them to come out drinking. We get Kurosawa lamenting over the lost date, Adachi helping out Rokkaku, The King's Game drama. Adachi goes to comfort Kurosawa and we have Kurosawa being sad and gay and Adachi assuring him he's just an anxious virgin and Rokkaku interrupts an almost kiss.

Oct 11-Oct 25 - Adachi avoids Kurosawa.

Mon Oct 26 - Urabe asks Adachi and Fujisaki to go buy desserts, they talk about love and life, and are harrassed on the way back to the office. Kurosawa comes to the rescue. Adachi discovers Fujisaki is the aroace queen of our dreams. Kurosawa patches up Adachi’s hand. Kurosawa has trouble with a big client and Adachi uses his power to help. Kurosawa thanks him and gives him a couple mochi cakes as thanks. Rokkaku invites Adachi for lunch, giving him a bunch of food and snacks in thanks for his help at drinks a couple weeks ago. As the two are leaving work that night they see a beautiful woman run up to Kurosawa and beg to stay the night with him. Adachi walks home in the rain and falls asleep in his wet clothes in a fit of despair.

Tue Oct 27 - Adachi is sick all day, and goes to leave work early. Kurosawa notices and insists on taking him home, and as they’re getting into a taxi the woman from the night before jumps in. She turns out to be Kurosawa’s sister and demands to stay over at Kurosawa’s again, making him go home with Adachi to care for him. Kurosawa spends the whole night nursing Adachi back to health.

Wed Oct 28: Kurosawa directly references the date, and it retroactively works for all the previous dates - Kurosawa makes Adachi porridge, and the “day one of our private sweet life!” fantasy. Rokkaku interrupts again, and asks to join Kurosawa and Adachi for the night. We get Kurosawa being adorably jealous, Adachi being a very sweet and supportive friend. Kurosawa thinks about how special Adachi is to him and wonders what he’s doing to himself and leaves in the middle of the night.

Thurs Oct 29 - Adachi is worried over Kurosawa leaving early and his distance throughout the day. As they leave the office Adachi awkwardly talks about how he’s never had anyone to take care of him other than family, and Kurosawa tells him he can’t stay with Adachi anymore. He confesses his feelings and claims the next time they see each other everything will be back to normal.

Fri Oct 30: When Adachi is confessing, he mentions “yesterday” so this does happen the next day - Kurosawa is away in Osaka for the day and reflects over his history with Adachi, and how he has to let go of his feelings. Adachi realizes how much he enjoys Kurosawa’s company and how he’s always thinking about him, and runs to meet Kurosawa on his way home. He confesses his feelings and they hug and we all cry, and as they walk home Adachi asks if he wants to go out to eat and Kurosawa teases him about going to his place.

Sat Oct 31 - Kurosawa bought a one-way ticket to flirt city this morning. He finds Adachi in the break room and asks him to spend the day together tomorrow.

Sun Nov 1 - Tsuge shows up at Adachi’s right before Kurosawa, and we have some prime clown to clown communication while Tsuge talks about how he agreed to go watch Minato dance. Kurosawa suggests they all go and we get: Tsuge being awkward around his crush, Kurosawa and Adachi giggling over Tsuge being awkward around his crush, a fight and Kurosawa blanking out for a solid four seconds over being called ossan. We get some more clown to clown communication, Adachi and Kurosawa walking home and having a very sweet conversation about taking things step by step, Tsuge catches Minato’s friend kissing him and runs away.

Tue Nov 10: Adachi refers to how they’ve been dating for 9 days - Kurosawa apparently stayed the night and they played video games together aww, they have a goofy morning together being in love. Urabe points out how happy Adachi is lately. Kurosawa and Adachi share onigiri for lunch and Rokkaku interrupts again. As they’re leaving the break room Kurosawa asks Adachi to have another go at their date this coming weekend and they see the poster for the design competition. Rokkaku later finds Adachi and angrily asks him to contact Tsuge. That night after work Adachi, Kurosawa, and Rokkaku meet Tsuge at a coffee shop and Rokkaku immediately starts a fight with Tsuge over his apparent homophobia, since he’s been avoiding Minato ever since he caught him kissing his ex. Tsuge assures them he has been avoiding Minato but not because he’s gay, and runs off to find Minato and they confess to each other, and later that evening have sex. As Kurosawa and Adachi walk home Kurosawa gives him the forms to sign up for the design competition, saying he’ll be rooting for him if he gives it a try. Adachi says Kurosawa has given him the confidence to try and they hug.

Wed Nov 11 - Rokkaku thanks Adachi for his help with Tsuge and Minato. Adachi hands in his application for the design competition.

Sometime in the next couple days - Adachi and Kurosawa go for coffee after work where Adachi apologizes for how much of his time the competition will take, and Kurosawa says their date can wait, but he’ll be expecting a reward later. Tsuge calls Adachi to gush over his relationship with Minato and tell Adachi not to be afraid of losing his magic, and Adachi starts to really think about being intimate with Kurosawa.

Sat Nov 14: Adachi mentions how there’s only three days until the deadline for his proposal. On the application form, it says the proposals are due by 5pm Nov 17th - Adachi shows his ideas to Fujisaki and Kurosawa, but Rokkaku calls it boring. Kurosawa tells him not to worry about it, that inspiration sometimes comes from nowhere.

Sun Nov 15 - Adachi and Kurosawa are hanging out at Adachi’s place, and they talk about the expectations of other people. Kurosawa suggests they get out to clear their heads and have a “practise date”. We get the sweetest montage of them having fun at Tokyo Dome, and then when Adachi gets sick Kurosawa privately worries about not being able to always keep Adachi happy. That night Adachi finishes his project proposal.

Mon Nov 16: Adachi refers to their date as “yesterday” - Adachi hands in his proposal, and asks Kurosawa to have another practice date with him that evening. He takes them to the bookstore and izakaya, and Adachi shows Kurosawa his proposal. They have a conversation about communication and how they should be able to relax around each other. As they are walking home Adachi accidentally responds to Kurosawa’s thoughts and thinks about how if Kurosawa knew they couldn’t be together in the same way anymore.

Sun Dec 13: This one is mostly speculation, but I feel it works as the conversation between Adachi and Tsuge is so fresh in his mind the next day, and Adachi also refers to Tsuge’s problems when they see each other on Christmas Eve - Tsuge and Adachi get lunch and Tsuge talks about his relationship troubles, and warns Adachi about not relying too much on his power.

Mon Dec 14: Kurosawa mentions how they have a week to prepare for Adachi’s presentation - Adachi has passed into the second phase of the design competition, and Kurosawa promises to spend all their time special training for his presentation. Adachi apologizes for how much of Kurosawa’s time he’s taking up, but Kurosawa assures him it will all be worth it to enjoy their “first Christmas together and the best date ever”.

Dec 16/17/18 - Montage of the two of them preparing for Adachi’s presentation. It’s also at some point during this week Kurosawa talks to Fujisaki about a restaurant for his date with Adachi.

Mon Dec 21 - Also known as Kurosawa and Adachi’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. Kurosawa gives Adachi a bento reminding him to believe in himself, Adachi uses his power to connect with the planning and development committee and then feels guilty for cheating and then doesn’t pass anyway. Adachi tells Kurosawa about his powers and then admits he doesn’t know if he’ll be able to be in a relationship with him if he doesn’t have them, and they break up :(

Dec 22/23 - Kurosawa and Adachi are very sad and literally everybody knows. Urabe and Fujisaki both have conversations with Adachi about being happy/true to himself.

Thurs Dec 24 - Tsuge goes to see Adachi and tells him that he has to learn to communicate with the people he loves, even if it’s hard. Adachi races off to meet Kurosawa, they reconcile and hug and Kurosawa asks Adachi to be his office pal for life and fireworks go off and everyone’s cryin’.

Fri Dec 25 - First day of the rest of their private sweet life!!

Sometime over the next couple months - Rokkaku tries to suss out what Adachi and Kurosawa’s relationship and determines they’re just really good senpais to him... truly pure of heart, dumb of ass. Tsuge and Minato have a misunderstanding and then talk it out.

Feb 14 2021 - Kurosawa is in a jealous fit all day over himself, and then he and Adachi exchange true love chocolate <3

[angelsndragons]

Day 1

Day 1 of the Caduceus Clay celebration week, folks, so you know what that means: I get to gush about my favorite character. I did warn y’all I would word vomit.

So, what does Caduceus mean to me? 

Well.

My brother lives in a separate state and has for several years now. We talked on the phone pretty much every day but we still missed each other a lot. One of the last things he did to me in person was introduce me to D&D. I loved it. It gave me a community away from home and a way to meet new people and form new friendships in new areas. I would tell him all about my weekly game shop adventures, he would tell me about the homebrew campaign he was in online. He also told me about this little show called Critical Role. I, like the dumb oldest sibling I can be, pretty much ignored it, outside letting him talk to me about it and engaging with it secondhand. Then, my brother’s party lost one of their players. They were down to four players and no full casters, just a gunslinger, a barbarian, a monk, and a non-healer warlock. Things started getting dicey. Like, really dicey. He worried with me over how close their fights were getting and how he felt it was only a matter of time until someone legit died and they couldn’t do anything about it. So, I asked, “Well, can you ask them if I could play? You’re looking for someone and we’re looking to try to do something together, it could work out.” Two years later, that campaign is going strong and (thankfully) no one has died yet.

I bring up this context because it matters: I rolled up a level 10 Grave Cleric. I had never played a cleric before but I had wanted to before my game shop sessions fell apart. And here I was, willingly thrown into the deep end of one of the most complex subclasses of one of the most complex classes in the game. And initially, I was not happy with it. Not just because there was a lot to learn but because of sheer mechanics. By rote, I could not keep up with the damage that the rest of my party was doing. At all. My high level spells weren’t doing much more damage than my freaking cantrips and I just felt stuck. I wanted to contribute outside of healing but really just couldn’t. I shared my frustrations with my brother, who, being the little troll he is, said, “Well, you know Critical Role has a Grave Cleric now, right?” So, to start this love fest, Caduceus taught me how to be a better cleric and because of that, I will never be able untangle the character from my relationship with my brother. Even if he died tomorrow or went evil or whatever, I would still be fond of him just for that.

I don’t remember which episode of campaign 2 I first watched all the way through. I know I started paying attention around Fjord’s chicken game and was fully on board with the series by Yasha’s loss in the pit fight. What I do remember is Caduceus. I remember being drawn in by this guy for some reason I still can’t articulate. 

Caduceus is a complex character who is difficult to fully understand and love. People have said unkind things about him, about how he is a glorified NPC or that he is boring or that there is just no ‘there’ there or that he should just go home already. I have seen people say that they think Taliesin should go back to the drawing board and come back with a ‘better’ character, one who vibes better with the group or something. And the sad thing is, I can kind of see where these people are coming from. Understanding Caduceus and what Taliesin is doing with him requires people to pay attention to him, to actively think about him both when he is and is not in the spotlight. And that is hard. Because Caduceus is that character who aggressively tries to divert attention from himself. So right away, we have this tension, this push/pull when it comes to engaging with him. And I do love me a challenge in my favorites. Also love the polite but judgmental assholes who have Opinions they would never say but nevertheless own.

For me, Caduceus’ arc has been about duty and desire, what duty means, how to prioritize yourself, and how to grow. Caduceus’ interrogation of identity as it relates to duty and his blossoming as a person fascinate me most. What is your duty, really? What does it mean to find balance in your life? How do you take down the walls you built to protect yourself? Where do you end and where does your duty begin? What does faith look like outside a strictly Western/Christian lens? Can we find ourselves in other people? What does it mean to grow beyond your wildest imagination and the people you love most?

Caduceus begins the show as a passive, apathetic shadow of a man who has cloaked those traits in duty in order to not deal with his feelings. He had basically grown up in a literal paradise on earth where the problems of the world couldn’t reach or affect him. Until they did. Until his family left. Until the Nein crashed into his temple. Caduceus makes the choice to basically leave paradise, at the Wildmother’s urging, sure, and experience the world in all its messy beauty and ugliness. It is nothing like he expected. It is hard, it is cruel, it tries to drown him at every opportunity. It is also good, the animals, the people, the experiences he has. Hearing Marion sing, learning of a lighthouse to the Wildmother (which he does not fully appreciate yet, this light in the dark storm). Caduceus spends his first chunk of episodes waking up, seeing life outside of paradise. I love these early episodes because they demonstrate just how far Caduceus has actually come (can’t imagine this guy buying an overly large pirate hat as a prank or helping the Traveler offload some followers through an elaborate ceremony, for example).

The crux of Caduceus’ midgame story right up until he saves his family is this: You’ve seen the world, young cleric, are you sure you want to continue to save it? You can go home and turn your back on all of this, what makes you stay in this imperfect world with these imperfect people? We see this a lot, in the questions he asks the Gentleman, in his insistence they save Yasha, in his newfound appreciation and companionship in Fjord, in making the Xhorhaus a home, in his dealings with the stone giants, in his determination to help Nott and her family. And this is the part that made me love him because Caduceus doesn’t shy away from these moments or tough questions. Like most of what he does, he contemplates them quietly and lets his actions speak for him. Caduceus allows himself to get involved, to become invested.

Caduceus’ new major arc is his realization that he is not just some vessel, some passive thing through which the Wildmother’s will will flow. No, he learns that he has to make choices, that he can affect change, and that if he wants this messy, beautiful world to get better, he is going to have to do something about it. Not just wait for Her to tell him it is okay. Taking ownership of his future and what that means to him have shaped Caduceus these last thirty or so episodes. Caduceus has blossomed so damn much. He continued with the Nein because he wanted to, and that led to the discovery of the Astral Sea City. (side note: Anyone want to take a gander what would be happening right now if Caduceus hadn’t been with them?) He not only felt his feelings towards the Nein, he began expressing them. From the man who refused to Scry or Send to his family to one who has a friend call up his sister and tell her he will be back, from the man who clung so tightly to his need to be useful to the Nein to one who openly declares how much he loves these people and how reluctant he is to leave them, from a man who wanted to save his home to one who is trying to save the whole damn world, from a man who couldn’t articulate his feelings if you threatened him to one who is trying so hard communicate, from a man who needed saving from his own apathy and grief to one who saves others, this is who Caduceus Clay has become and I for one am excited to see how the next 100 episodes influence him.

Also I cannot end this word vomit without mentioning the fact that Caduceus being aroace and so warm, loving, and caring is so damn important. Because it is; there are too many people out there who think aros/aces are loveless robots or fake or whatever. And having this person, this caregiver, this annoying little brother, this compassionate man, to hold up against that kind of hate, ignorance, and indifference means more than I will ever be able to express. 

[mcrmadness]

This is just me talking about (my) asexuality and aromanticism and mainly about how I figured I'm aroace. I'm from Finland and recently turned 30 so my experience and "lgbt+ history" might not be what you know it as, especially if you are not from Europe, or if your native language is English.

Also this is highly personal, so I doubt anyone here will have 100% same experience. But that's fine because remember: we're all individuals here and these are NEVER universal. You're still valid even if you wouldn't relate to what being aspec is to me.

It might be IS a long post so beware, but I've just been feeling like writing down some thoughts so here we go...

What I have been able to track is that I was 17, in 2008, when I first stumbled upon the term "asexuality". I don't remember exactly how, but I just remember reading about it and immediately going "yeah that's me". But what I do remember is that no one talked it being about sexual attraction. Basically how understood it was: asexuality = sex-repulsion.

I was 17, and somehow I knew I was sex-repulsed, but at the same time also thought I'm just a minor, so it's normal to be sex-repulsed. But even after turning 18, I don't recall ever feeling sexual attraction. I didn't think of myself as a "late bloomer" but just as someone who just has no interest towards sex. At some point I became really anxious of men, however. Nothing has ever happened to me* but still I, for some reason, developed terrible fear of men. I'm afab and just did not want to be seen as an object, and it made, still makes me, terrified to think someone might look at me and have Emotions. I know that we can't control our brains, I mean, I can't look at someone and force myself to feel attraction - just like those who do feel attraction, can't force themselves to stop feeling attraction. They can only control their actions. But yeah, I also had horrible (sexual) intrusive thoughts due to my generalized anxiety disorder at some point, which did not really help. They got a bit better when I came into terms with my asexuality and aromanticism, but sometimes they still come at me and it's never fun, but at least they're not as strong as what they used to be.

*(Unless if you can count that as sexual harrasment when, CW, I was 11 and a classmate was "into" me and tried to touch my face and talk "sweet things" to me but made it into a show despite me being uncomfortable and usually crying cos as a neurodivergent I didn't know how else to react.)

But anyway, back to the topic. So for years I understood asexuality as sex-repulsion, but I guess it's because I, well, am a sex-repulsed ace. So if I'm sex-repulsed, why would I then look at someone and feel something if I'm repulsed by the thing anyway? Like, it probably can't get any simpler than this :D And I know today that it's not as simple anymore. But that was 2008, at school (in ~2005) they only talked about gays a little, on one page in a sex.ed. book that otherwise was maybe 100 pages long. Only one page. About gays. And it was basically "Some boys like boys or some girls like girls and it's totally fine." and that was it, but the overall assumption was that everyone likes someone. And also there were no romantic orientations. Liking someone = both sexually and romantically. Not liking = not a thing except when you were depressed or otherwise mentally ill, or autistic or mentally disabled (which is a SUPER ableist take btw). I don't remember teachers ever talking about this, but it could also just be my adhd, maybe they did mention, but I just don't remember. At least in my notebooks there is no mention of this, everything was very much heteronormative and amatonormative, and also there was only two genders. I don't remember ever hearing about transgender people, apart from foreign documentaries and in them they were always portrayed as some shocking freaks of the nature, and loads of wrong terms were used. And this is still the mid and late 2000s we're talking about!

So this takes us to the other part aka aromanticism. Back then asexuality was not only sex-repulsion but also merged together with aromanticism, because people didn't talk about romantic orientations yet. So asexuality was not only sex-repulsion, but also you simply just not wanting a relationship. Again, nothing about attraction, just someone who did not care about sex nor relationships. A "forever single", if you will.

This was already annoying me a lot back then because I was really annoyed by sex "running the world". I was so angry because why is asexual the only sexuality that doesn't like sex? All the other sexualities had the assumption of them always wanting to have sex. Like, even think about someone who is straight, you hear that someone is straight, and you automatically assume(d) that oh they're into sex too cos why wouldn't they be. This was really driving me nuts because I was sure there are people who want to have a partner, but never want to have sex! I was still experiencing crushes, and I knew for sure it was nothing sexual, so it annoyed me that just because I'm asexual, it means I can't have crushes. That's why I actually called myself as "asexual bi" for a while, because "bisexual" indicated I would have not been sex-repulsed and I wanted to point out that I'm NOT into sexual things, at all - and remember that this was still the late 2000s or early 2010s and I had not heard of romantic orientations yet! So I was up to something, there just were no terms for that yet! Today that would be called bi-/panromantic asexual.

I haven't been able to track the exact date or even year when did I figure out I'm aromantic, or when did I hear about romantic orientations for the first time. From the messages I've been able to find, I was already in my early 20s. Aka somewhere around maybe 2011-2013. In those, I have still been wondering what I am or if I even want to have a relationship, not being really able to tell what I wanted or didn't want. Again, no one told me romantic orientations are about ATTRACTION and not about whether you have commitment issues or not (this as a half-joke, cos I have severe commitment issues with everything :D I need to feel free!).

Anyway, I do remember my key moment with aromanticism, or the "aromantic awakening" as you could call it too, was when I was 17 or 18. Or maybe I was older? I don't know, I have time blindness. Anyway, I had this one online friend I had a "crush" on (I think it was just undiagnosed adhd's person hyperfixation) and I even told her about it. Everything just is super shady, from those years, I was not really on my best and there are so many overlapping memories that feel like different alternative universes instead of memories on a same timeline. Anyway, I just remember at some point thinking about this girl and I thought about some "romantic" stuff, like kissing, and I just remember my brain going "NOOOOOPE!" I had wanted to meet with her some day so bad, but when I started thinking about actually meeting with her, I started to nope the fuck out. All I had in my head was awkward embarrassing "first kiss" scenarios from movies and I just was not having it! I basically went "lol I guess I'm aro too, then XD" but I still don't remember when did I have this realization. Was I 17? Or was I, say, 22? I guess I need to go through my old MSN Messenger and Skype convos some day to investigate this further because I really want to know. I couldn't even find anything from my Tumblr from those times (I registered here in 2011), but I don't know if that's just me not tagging or Tumblr search functioning normally (aka it never finds anything).

But yeah, I am touch-repulsed. And kiss-repulsed, and romance-repulsed, too, (unless it's my OTP we're talking about). I'm still not exactly sure if I'm touch repulsed because I'm aromantic, or if I'm aromantic because I'm touch-repulsed. I only know that because of my sensory issues (I'm neurodivergent), I have never liked touching nor being touched. Even as a little kid I hated hugs and never liked sitting on anyone's lap. I only tolerated my parents, mainly my mom, because they were my safe place as an extremely shy baby/toddler/kid, who was especially wary about men. I can't explain the latter, but there was something about adult men that caused me (as a baby) to hide my face against my mom's shoulder if they talked to me. I did that to everyone I didn't know, but especially to men I didn't know. No idea why.

I also remember how my siblings loved to sit on people's laps and were always climbing onto their laps, and I didn't like this. And once my (late) grandma was so touched when she asked me if I want to sit on her lap (I was maybe 5-7?) and I agreed just to make her happy. I still remember how it felt, and I did not like it at all, but it still made my grandma so happy that I THINK she almost cried when she told my mom I actually agreed to sit on her lap. I'm not sure how real this last part of the memory is because I was so young. But I do remember thinking I do that for a change because I knew my grandma would be happy.

So yeah, my touch-repulsion is not exactly a new thing but just something that has been a part of my personality forever. But is that the core reason for why I only feel aesthetic attraction? I never look at people and feel like I wanna touch. More of the opposite, the idea of having to touch them or them touching me makes me go "eeewww". If you have seen that video of a gibbon shaking their whole body after seeing a rat in their exhibit? That's what I feel like when I think about touching or being touched, in just any way, also platonically.

The only time I feel "sensual attraction" is when I see photos or videos of animals. The urge to pet a tiger is insane. But the feel of another human's skin or muscle (or hair or whatever) is very repulsive to me.

I still remember how disgusting it felt to e.g. sit on a cousin's lap. We sometimes used swings like this, and somehow I was aware of it not feeling nice, but still not doing anything about it cos it also was okay? Only later I have realized I really, really loathe the texture of human skin. Or the warmth and overall feeling of a human body. For example, I was at least 7 or younger when I sat on my cousin's lap while we were sitting on a swing and STILL, after over 20 years, I have that all in my body memory. I remember how the thigh bone felt under my legs and how freaking disgusting the muscles felt inbetween. Also at school, on the 1st grade, we often had to walk in a line of twos after the teacher and hold the pair's hand so no one gets lost. My then-friend had so ridiculously dry skin that the only thing I could think of was how I felt like throwing up because the skin on her palm felt so damn disgusting. I still can feel that in my hand when I think of it. That's one of my "core memories" from 1st grade - how disgusting the human skin can feel like.

I don't think I have ever felt actual romantic attraction towards anyone. It's really difficult to differentiate because as I mentioned, I get those people hyperfixations easily. I guess it's the same hormones but I never really want to do anything with them? I guess it's the emotional intimacy that "attracts" me and what gets me excited, but I'm still not exactly sure what emotional intimacy means to me. I don't exactly fall into the QPR category either, in a way I wish I had a best friend whose best friend also I would be, and that neither would have anyone else who is "better" than the other one. But the only intimacy there would be emotional intimacy, nothing else. And I need my freedom so I wouldn't move in with any human being, either.

Sometimes I've thought my "ideal partner" would be a robot because if I get annoyed, I could just turn it off and stuff into a closet and leave there, and if I felt like not having a "relationship" anymore, I could just remove the harddrive and destroy the robot, or both. That way I would be the only one with the memories, and I wouldn't have to worry about someone out there knowing things about me, things that only the closest can know, and I'm really afraid of letting anyone close in case it won't work (also with regular friendships) because I can't stop thinking about how much I wish I had that MIB memory cancelling device so that they would again know almost nothing, or at least much much less about me. There's already one friendship that ended a few years ago and I still keep thinking about how I wish I could take everything back and how I wish they delete(d) all the files and drawings and stuff I sent them. There are so many things about me I wish I never told them, now as we are no longer friends. Back then it felt like "of course this is gonna last a lifetime!" but turns out that nope, not all friendships will.

I guess it's time to stop rambling. This post is really long already. If you read it all the way here: congrats. And thanks. You probably just wasted your time but... that's on you I guess :DDD But yeah, some thoughts from a 30-years-old aroace who has been aware of their identity for at least or almost 10 years now.

[pluviophile-bookworm]

Understanding and acceptance: a short story consisting of things that actually happened

[A/N: I was on the phone with my mum and she told me that I seem to be in a creative mood and that I should write something. I decided to kill two birds with one stone and share a personal story while also writing it as if it’s fiction. So here goes.]

Word count: 2K

-- 2 weeks ago --

It’s a quiet Saturday evening. My brother Max and I are walking home together, deep in conversation. I have no memory of what the conversation had been about when it started, but I do remember that it somehow got to this:

‘...all this assuming you’re straight, of course, and I’m not assuming anything--’

‘What does being straight mean?’ Max says in a tone that tells me he genuinely doesn’t know. So I feel obligated to explain it in the simplest terms possible. ‘Well, in your case it would mean that you, a boy, like girls.’

‘Well, that’s the normal thing for any person!’ He nearly cuts me off with this. I calculate my next step carefully.

‘Not every person,’ I say, keeping my voice as calm as possible. ‘I’m not straight.’ Of course, he knows that. I came out to my whole family at once three years ago, hoping for the awkward discussions to be over with that. It hasn’t worked out quite as I envisioned it yet.

‘Yeah, but you’re not normal either,’ Max parries. Can’t argue with that. Lucky for me, that is when we reach the front door and each one goes off to mind their own business.

I know very well just how ‘not normal’ I am. Not in that cliche ‘I’m not like other girls’ way, but in a way that causes Bulgarians undereducated on mental health and identity labels (which is unfortunately most people over 30) to brand a person clinically insane, unstable, a threat to the Traditional Bulgarian Family™. Being aroace and having severe social anxiety and ADHD to top it off, I hardly classify as ‘normal’. This is a frequent cause for arguments at the dinner table at home, most of which end in a. tears and/ or a panic attack on my part, b. my father storming off and pretending to be asleep whenever someone goes to call him back to dinner, c. my brother gluing himself to his phone, leaving his plate half-untouched, d. my mother crying over ‘what kind of mother am I that I can’t even have my family together at the table once’, and usually e. all of the above. 

For this scenario to play out, however, the whole family of four is required to be present. So fortunately it only happens every other weekend when Dad and I come back home from the capital, where we have been living for the better part of three years now, ever since he got promoted and I started uni. When I’m away from my loving but over-controlling mum and my brother, who seemed to become obnoxious overnight the moment he turned 13 a little over a year ago, I usually have significantly fewer reasons to cry or feel anxious about... you name it. So we do fine. For the most part.

-- this evening --

I am watching Joe and Frankie’s performance of A Whole New World for the thousandth time today when I get a text from Mum.

Mum: How’s my girl doing?

Mum: I haven’t been able to hear from you with all the fuss about your brother.

Max is at that point in his education where he’s applying for high schools. His exam results have just come in and now everyone in the family is stressing about whether his scores will be enough to get him into the school he wants to go to. It’s a big deal, but with all the Rodfini magic going on (and with how terribly behind I am on my internship assignment) I have just been completely unable to care.

Speaking of Rodfini and A Whole New World, I have been repressing the instinctive urge to send my mum the video all day, and when I get her texts, I almost nearly muster up the courage to do it. But between me and her, this is not something you do over text. So I give her a ring instead. 

When she picks up, the sound of her voice combined with the anxiety over what I want to tell her makes me tear up and the words are stuck in my throat. 

‘Erm-- Mum, can I tell you something?’ I say, still not sure if I’m not about to regret taking up the subject at all.

‘Dear, you know you can tell me anything,’ she says, sounding concerned at my obviously-trying-to-swallow-tears voice.

‘You mean it?’ I ask, listening to her tone to make sure. I wish I could read tones better. ‘Anything?’

‘Is something wrong, honey?’ Oh gods, she’s in a really benevolent mood. I grow more and more afraid of ruining that with my ‘obsession with gays’. 

‘Erm, so I guess you should know Dad and I had the tiniest disagreement just now,’ I say, deciding last minute to start with something she might deem ‘more relevant to the family’s personal lives’. ‘You know, we were watching the Euros and then the match ended and we watched the news, and then Dad changed the channel so he could watch the next match. And I was like ‘whoa, what’s with the video quality’, and so dad was like ‘you really need go get your eyes checked out’; and I tried to explain that there was a very obvious difference in quality between the two channels, and he kept yelling at me that I was ruining my eyesight spending all day staring at a screen.’

‘Did he sound annoyed or just concerned?’ Mum asks me.

‘I know what you’re thinking. And I know full well that he’s my parent and he’s concerned about my health. But you should have heard his tone.’

‘So are you two in a fight now?’

‘No. Well, I don’t know.’ I really don’t. It’s hard to tell when one side of the argument refuses to talk about his feelings as if that will kill him. But I don’t tell Mum that. She’s been dealing with Dad since long before I was even planned, so she knows him better than I do. ‘The thing is, he called me back and said that, well, one of the channels was HD and the other was not, so there was indeed a difference, but he thought it was ‘unnatural’ that I was able to register it so immediately, and he kept insisting there was something wrong with my eyes. I should think that seeing something quickly would be a sign of good vision, not bad. Besides,’ I keep talking, nearly  desperate to justify myself, ‘I did some research and sensitivity to light is a symptom of ADHD. So it’s nothing new, really.’

‘Oh, please, dear. You’re of a new generation, and ADHD is something of the older generation. Don’t be so quick to self-diagnose.’

I guess there’s some reason to what she says, or at least the last part of it, so I give up on pursuing the subject further. ‘Yeah, anyway,’ I say, ‘I just thought it was all a bit rich coming from the man who refuses to wear his prescription glasses. I haven’t got any prescription glasses, you know.’

I don’t want to come off too cheeky because I still want to try and talk to her about how happy Rodfini have made me today. A while ago, Mum would accuse me of only calling her to complain when I was unhappy, so I have since made it a point to call her when I am happy and tell her so. That’s why I’ve been itching to share this with her. And now the time has come.

‘You know, I’ve been crying in a completely different way today,’ I begin tentatively. ‘A good way, A really, really good way,’ I add quickly before she can get worried again.

‘Yeah? So what was it that made you so happy that you cried?’ Goodness, there’s no turning back now. I decide to proceed with caution.

‘Oh, well, it was this performance, you know. A really beautiful song. So I’ve been wanting to show it to you, but I was worried about how you’d react.’

‘And why would that be?’ she asks in the same kind tone that keeps making me anxious about potentially ruining everything.

‘Well, erm...’ I feel myself start to stutter. ‘See, it’s a love song, and it’s... ok, I’ll just say it. It’s sung by two guys. As in, a couple, you see.’ I keep feeling up the ground with my words, anxious to hear her reaction. It’s like when I’m opening an exam result -- I want to know, but I’m too scared to look. And so now, in my anxious despair to know what she thinks about it, I miss the beginning of her response. ‘And I know how you are about those things, so I...’ I genuinely don’t know what to say. I’ve done my thing again. I’ve kept talking so much that she hasn’t even been able to react audibly. So I trail off, determined to let her speak this time.

‘Ok, but... why do you get so affected by those things?’ Mum says, starting to sound suspiciously like she’s about to question my own orientation again. I feel the need to justify myself for the second time since the conversation has started.

‘Well, it’s just that... I really wish you would just see them, Mum. If you could just see how they look at each other, you’d see that there’s just love. So much love. And joy at being able to express themselves as they are.’

I’m speaking from the heart now. I am finally letting out how much I want her to give them a chance because she deserves to see and hear their magical performance. She must be sensing the anguished sincerity in my voice as I finally manage to stop crying and I smile through the tears, because she says, ‘Dear, are you... are you trying to tell me something there?’

I sigh. She’s asked me this question nearly every time I’ve started speaking ‘too’ passionately about anything LGBTQ+ Which isn’t an awful lot in her presence, but there have been several occasions. Once about Solangelo, at the beach. Once about NPH and his husband David and their children, at the dinner table, as I was trying to explain how same-sex couples can have kids; that one resulted in a seriously bad scene of the type I described earlier. Once about a participant in a reality show who identified as a gay man then, but has recently come out as a trans woman; whenever she’s been mentioned on television, I’ve fought to repress my inner urge to express my happiness for her and the representation she is for the Bulgarian LGBTQ+ community. I wonder even now if my parents have noticed my silence on the subject -- because they certainly do notice when I am not silent.

So now, when the time seems to have come for me to set things straight about my non-straight-ness (bad pun very much intended), I try my best to keep my voice from shaking. ‘I’m not trying to tell you anything I haven’t already told you, Mum. Really.’

‘Are you perhaps attracted to the same gender, dear?’ It seems so unbelievable that she’s said it, and even more that she’s worded like that, but she really has. I force myself to be calm and patient.

‘No, Mum. I’ve told you -- I am not attracted to any gender, be it male, female or anything else, really. You know that.’

‘Well, it sounded as if you--’

‘No, Mum. Really. But I do need you to understand that part of my identity is that I feel the need to support people with other identities different from straight. I’m happy for their successes. I'm concerned about their issues. They’re a sort of family to me. Do you understand that?’ I say, relieved to be speaking my truth at last. At the same time, I try to sound as reasonable and mature about the whole thing as possible. I don’t want to put her off, especially not now that I’m knee-deep in the subject already. I’ve gone too far to turn back now.

‘Yes, honey. Yes, I do. I just don’t want you to exert yourself emotionally, is all. Plus I’ve been so stressed out about your brother and all, you know...’

‘Yeah, I do know. And I know he’ll be fine. He’s a nice boy. I just wished he didn’t keep calling me ‘abnormal’ all the time...’

‘Oh, well, don’t listen to him. He’s been quite stressed out too. And he’s 14. It’s just how he is at this age.’

I’m not too sure about that. ‘Boys will be boys’. It’s ok for boys, then, to pour salt into their neurodivergent sisters’ wounds? I don’t think so. But I can’t fix every problem in one talk. Plus my mum sounds tired now.

So I just say, ‘I guess... Well, anyway, thank you so much, Mum. For hearing me out, and for supporting me, and for everything else. Please don’t worry so much.’

But I know she can’t not worry at all. I’ve got that from her.

‘If you’re sure you’re all ok now, dear...’

‘Yeah, mum, I am. Or I will be. You know, there’s this expression with English, ‘to run with something’. So I’ve been telling myself, I’ll at least try to walk with things. You know I’m not much of a runner anyway.’ I actually laugh, even though the pun is quite untranslatable into Bulgarian.

‘You know I’m proud of you, right?’

I know that has very little to do with the kind of pride I’ve been celebrating all month, but I say, ‘Of course I do. And you know what? I’m quite proud of myself, too.’ I can’t believe I’m saying it, but I mean it. I mean it wholeheartedly this time.

‘I’m nearly falling asleep, though, dear, so I say we call it a night?’

‘Good night, Mummy. And thanks.’

I hang up. Then I forward the video to her.

I’ve come so far, indeed. I reckon we both have.