#I actually am pretty okay with the fact that the ending is so unfinished. It leaves a ton up for the fans to decide what happens!

[my-name-is-jefferooni]

MYEHEHEHEHEHE YEEEEEEEESSSSSS

I LOVE the idea that post sonic prime, sonic and shadow start to get close and they don’t fight anymore. (No serious fighting at least, they absolutely still spar of course!) and everyone else is just wondering what the hell happened.

Like, suddenly sonic and shadow are racing??? For fun??? They tease each other and it’s civil??? Sonic and shadow sometimes just chat??? They’re trading book recommendations???

And just seemingly out of nowhere!?

[sueske]

Not to come off as pretentious but it really feels like no one but people on tumblr are able to really understand sasuke, naruto and their relationship. Like on other sites like tiktok, twitter or Instagram, of course you have it infected with hinata and Sakura fans who just naturally have bad takes but you also have sns fans who just like….. have embarrassingly bad takes.

I remember seeing a tiktok video about sns and it was an okay “analysis” it was just discussing like very base level things Sasuke’s character. but then they just go on to say that’s why he’s a top. Because “he needs to be in control. He likes having control. His abandonment issues lead him to needing to dominate someone to help him feel like he finally has agency in his life. Naruto being that someone is natural because of his fem / wife coding throughout the series. It’s been stated subliminally numerous times that naruto is the submissive in their relationship, he needs to be controlled unlike sasuke because he’s so rowdy and chaotic.” And like………. That’s an interesting take.

And the fact it got like around 2000 likes just kinda made me realize that sns tiktok fandom does not really understand sns at all and have likely not actually consumed the media and just got their information from other tiktok people or YouTube.

not the top bottom discourse crap…

I agree with u actually, the most nuanced and comprehensive takes I’ve seen about naruto have been on tumblr, including Japanese stuff as well that non speakers wouldn’t know about. Doesn’t help the viz official translation censors and changes stuff either. Granted there are bad takes on tumblr as well but u won’t find well written canon only essays about sns on a TikTok slideshow (at least from what I’ve seen.) personally I feel that tumblr is the easiest to use, I don’t like the character limit on Twitter and am pretty sure Reddit mods can do whatever they want. I’ve found some okay analysis on YouTube about naruto and sasuke and their bond, but I feel like they’re surface level, or could go deeper in some places and then don’t, and even if they do get it right for the most part the fact of the matter is sns’ bond is also romantic, not touching on that leaves things unfinished imo. Some naysayers in the comments section always seem to want to clarify that their bond is platonic or ‘sns are just bros’ - which, if people addressed one of sns’ biggest running plot threads that happens every single time they meet up in person (and not clones) from vote1 to the end (what are we?) - they’d perhaps realise something and sing a different tune. but yet no one does (at least from what I’ve seen?) or take moments singularly which I think is a shame since they’re very obviously connected and they’re very important. I guess it speaks volumes that they don’t and leave that untouched. I’d really love to watch a sns analysis video so it can reach a wider audience that covers their entire bond, their mutual understanding and pure love and empathy AND how it’s also romantic, the tropes, the literary devices, etc used to achieve this. I know some people complain that romantic bonds are glamorised in media and that they’re seen as somehow ‘more’ than platonic bonds, as a means to dissuade people from shipping sns romantically, but like sorry. sns are romantic and that’s how kishimoto wrote them and I can see it and others can see it and even if people can’t see it clearly they can at least feel it which is why sns are gay comments are everywhere lol.

[stars-and-darkness]

20 questions for fic writers!

many many thanks to @garglyswoof for tagging m

How many works do you have on ao3? 63. i need to calm down.

What's your total ao3 word count? 747 502. i need to calm down.

What fandoms do you write for? the vampire diaries, shadow & bone, avatar: the last airbender, star wars, marvel. also, that one suez canal x ever given fic, and that one goncharov fic.

Top five fics by kudos: A Queen's Gamble (you know it's an old one if the title is capitalised lmao), make them bow., the fate makes for a lousy poet., where the heart moves the stones, nyctophilia.

Do you respond to comments? i try. i am not very good at it, but every now and then i sit down, crack my knuckles, and go about emptying my poor inbox.

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? the end. is like ... the only fic i ever wrote that ended unhappily.

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? see above, lol, literally everything else. i'm a wuss.

Do you get hate on fics? i mean ... not really? i would mostly classify the rude things i got as entitlement rather than hate. the impression i usually got was that those people liked my writing style, or the plot, or characterisation, or whatever--there was just one thing or several that they wanted to happen differently, and they felt the need to tell me that.

Do you write smut? looooooo, no, my ace ass would probably spontaneously combust.

Craziest crossover: i don't suppose i've ever written an actual crossover, but today i put dracula-the-historical-figure into the vampire diaries universe, so ....

Have you ever had a fic stolen? ... maybe? okay, strap yourselves: a few years ago someone asked if they could translate a fic of mine into spanish and post it on wattpad, and i said yes. (THIS is one of the reasons why i don't allow translations anywhere but ao3 anymore). they did, and they sent me the link. i linked the translation to my fic, the usual. then, a lot later, i actually went to check their post, and i realised that i wasn't credited though the person said they would. yaaaaay.

Have you ever had a fic translated? well, other than the fiasco up there, the incredible @winterandmistletoe, who made the edit that graces the beginning of make them bow., has two chapters of the russian translation of that fic up on ao3. there's also been an offer to translate The Manifesto of a Last Love into russian, but that one hasn't been posted yet.

Have you ever co-written a fic before? i have not! and honestly, i don't think i'd be very good at it. i'm a bit of a tyrant, so in an effort NOT to be perceived as such i'd probably be super lenient of whatever the other people came up with even if i didn't necessarily like it. i'm pretty particular in my tastes, and one of the things i love about writing fic is that i have nobody but myself to answer to.

All time favorite ship? ehhhhh, nooo, i can't choose between my children!

What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will? considering that tvd has had me in its claws for two years now, it feels unlikely i'll ever go back to my wips in other fandoms. you never know of course, but it feels that way. i mean. those unfinished wips don't exactly haunt me, but sometimes i remember them and feel awful about it, lmao.

What are your writing strengths? i'm told i do dialogue and humour well!

What are your writing weaknesses? ughhhhh probably action? it's so hard. oh! and my tendency to describe how a character's eyes look in every other sentence.

Thoughts on dialogue in another language? SO fun fact that dracula fic that i posted today? the one where half the dialogue is in french? i had originally written it all IN FRENCH, and then decided to take mercy on my readers and just put the english translation into italics. yeah. anyway, rule of thumb, ig: if the pov character understands what's being said, then english in italics (or if it's just a sentence or two the spoken language with a footnote). if they can hear individual words, then the language that's being spoken, without translation. if they hear only gibberish--maybe they're super unfamiliar with the language, maybe it's being spoken very fast or with an accent--then just 'character x says something in z'.

First fandom you wrote in? marvel, for my own peace of mind. star wars is the first one i actually posted for.

Favorite fic you've written? again, you can't ask me to pick between my children.

tagging: @morningstargirl666 @kirythestitchwitch @helpless-in-sleep @marxandangels @purplesigebert @darkestgrays @averseunhinged

[the-missann]

I don't think I've shared this with anyone besides a friend I don't really talk to anymore; and while I feel extremely nervous sharing them, I'll think I'll ease that by expressing the fact that I'm not an artist. I have been self teaching myself how to draw for years, so if this looks kind of bad, that's why.

Anyways, I obviously like it enough to share, so I am very proud of my work regardless.

That aside, I wanted to detail this story before sharing everything I did for it (I guess this'll be a short series about everything I drew for it).

A Fourth Dimension Reality is a series of books I'm writing about two inter-dimensional kids trying to find out what dimension they're actually apart of. Along the way, they meet other people who are integral to their goal. Each of these characters will be introduced as I go along.

Now, as for the real world logic, I wrote this story after me and that friend were talking about how some shows that are suppose to be comedy/satire lost that along the way.

So, I was determined to make a story where that stays intact even in the finale. Essentially, this is a long shit post that needs to be stopped, but it's still going well into five books with a unfinished total of 100k and seven books officially planned.

Each book ranges from 23k-30k and no book is any longer... yet

So, anyways, here's the actual cover of the first book (I have two more made).

Later on though I ended up drawing something goofy where all the characters find a dimension that does space tours. That was my excuse as to why they don't have shoes (because you don't want to get the dimension dirty do you?)

But this is everyone and presents their personalities pretty well. I'll showcase them separately over the next few days.

For now, this is perfect showcase of this story:

“So this means no one can hear me scream!” Cassie used all of her breath in that howl. Larson groaned and went to hit her, but she moved out of the way and spun slowly in the air. “I can dodge you better out here.” She mocked.

With a growl, Larson said, “this isn’t some kind of joke. We need to do what Jax said.”

“Yeah, yeah whatever.” She dismissed his comment. “We’ll get there eventually, let’s just have a little fun!”

Larson just stared at Cassie as she continued to spin around happily.

He was brought back to reality when he felt his phone vibrate. “Oh, I forgot,” he answered it swiftly, “you can hear me right?”

Back on Earth, Jax could clearly hear them through the phone. “I’m surprised that it even works! I really didn't think it would.” He said with amazement present in his voice.

“Yeah, doubt me, why don’t you.” Jax laughed at Larson’s remark. “But I’ll try a video call now.”

“Alright.”

Larson was about to press the button when he saw Cassie still spinning around in front of him; he sighed and turned on the video call. Once it came up, he saw a smile grow to Jax’s face.

“So it does work, great.” Jax paused. “Cassie!” He called out.

“Yeah?” She said while turning to look in their direction.

“The video call works.” Jax announced.

“Okay!” She began to slow her spinning down.

Cassie took out her own phone and called Jax once more. She put it on the video call and stuffed the phone inside of her bag. She zipped it closed and turned to Larson.

“Okay, I can see him, so that means we’re good! I’m screen recording so you guys can do whatever you have to.”

“You don’t have to tell me that,” Larson said.

Cassie huffed. “Stop being so mean. Anyways, we will Jax!” Cassie confirmed.

“Good luck you two!”

With their method of documentation set, they started putting their plan into action. Larson slowly moved over to Cassie.

“Stop acting like a kid and let’s get to work.” He snapped at her.

“You’re so boring. We’re in space dude! We can breathe without astronaut helmets, why not live a little, Lars?”

“Maybe on our next trip.” Larson went ahead and turned back once he was a small distance away from her.

From his jacket pocket, he pulled out the rope he brought. Needing to be as air resistant as possible, he couldn’t carry a bag with him, instead he just already tied the rope around himself and stuffed the other end into his jacket pocket. He pulled out the other end and threw it to Cassie for her to grab. Cassie caught it and was now being pulled by Larson.

Once she was in front of him, Cassie pulled him. Their motions created a way for them to move about in space with the most amount of ease. After a few minutes of their maneuvering, Cassie let out a sigh.

“See, this is all business,” Cassie said with a pout.

“Yeah, yeah. Looking like a bitch doesn’t help you.”

“At least you used the right word, but I wasn’t trying to give you puppy dog eyes.”

They remained pulling each other in a still silence. This was maintained until they could finally see Pluto. Cassie giggled as she stared at it.

“Oh it’s so cute!” She paused. “Do you really think anyone will be there?”

“I don’t know, but if we do find someone it would be better to stick together.”

“I wonder if it’s like a superman thing.” Cassie started to talk about something else. “Like we’re stronger because we were on Earth for so long.”

Larson scoffed. “If anything, being on earth made us weaker.”

“See, I don’t think like that,” Cassie began, “I really feel like we’re stronger because we’ve been exposed to different mindsets and then we’re going to learn this one. So by default, we’ll be smarter!”

“Always on the bright side huh?”

Cassie giggled.

Also, fun fact: I'm so bad at spelling I kept writing Dimension as Dimention and I still don't really know if I'm spelling it right😃

They kept pulling each other until they were caught into the gravitational pull of Pluto and were able to land...

Next post

[iraprince]

hi ira, you're a big inspo for me! especially as a fellow adhd artist.. i often struggle with "letting go" sketches / leaving them be, i always end up focusing on each as if it has to become a full piece. i personally feel this is bc of my adhd and was wondering if you struggled with something similar, or had any advice on sketching?

thank you so much! and yeah, okay, let's chew on this one and see what we can come up with.

so i actually usually have the opposite problem: I can generate a bunch of loose sketches really quickly, but i have a really hard time buckling down and putting the focus in to take any of them all the way to being full pieces. i think sketching and leaving those sketches as-is comes easily to me because i enjoy it (as in i physically enjoy the feeling of drawing in a loose, gestural style, AND i aesthetically enjoy how unfinished sketches look), and i'm extremely accustomed to it (most workdays i start up by doing ~45-90 mins of sketches, usually a few digital pages worth). these things combine so that the habit of churning out a bunch of little images and then immediately moving on is something that's really natural to me.

HOWEVER i am def not just advising "sit yourself down and sketch for an hour and a half every day" with no other context; i think "draw every day" as ironclad advice is usually pretty clumsy and isn't always applicable to how people work best, or always effective against what actually trips people up with art stuff. i think a lot of this is abt getting mindset right!!! drilling and repetition is good later for building speed and confidence but it's not as useful until u've figured out the underlying struggle imo.

so, some thoughts:

do u keep going on the sketch bc u get distracted by the idea of the final piece, and u just get sucked in to progressing toward that? for me, sometimes i do nail a sketch and im like "ooh, i want to do something more with that!" — but because these sketches happen during my warmup time and i need to keep moving, i don't do it right away. i usually just make a note right on the canvas, or i copy/paste the sketch into a separate file to come back to later. if u get the urge to keep going on a piece bc u want it to have more, but what u Actually want is to do a few more sketches, consider scooting the sketch over into a wip file/folder/etc for later (if ur working digitally; set it aside in a physical wip folder if you're working traditionally).

do u keep going on the sketch bc ur insecure about the fact that it isn't polished, or bc u feel like it "needs" more to look good? u may be affected by The Spectre of Posting. something i have wrestled with constantly and that i think many artists wrestle with is that, even if we aren't having these thoughts consciously, whenever ur drawing there is kind of this little voice in the back of ur head that's like. "is this gonna be good enough to post. if it turns out crappy i won't want to post it and then i will have wasted all this time. will this flop? if i post this will it make me look like i'm bad at drawing? what if this isn't as good as the last thing i posted and then it looks like im getting worse" and on and on and fucking on. this is all fucking nonsense, but also it's really hard to break out of. try, as hard as you possibly can, to start becoming okay w the idea that not everything is for posting, and that if something doesn't turn out great or u don't necessarily want it to like Artistically Represent You then nobody ever has to see it, and i think u might find that a lot of the tense little subconscious urges and hangups and anxieties you have about your work will start to unravel. any statement abt your art that starts with "i feel like i need to...." or "i feel like i should...." is probably somehow tangled up with the idea of other peoples' eyes on your work, and as long as you're letting a vibe like that breathe down your neck, you really can't draw freely.

do you keep going on the sketch bc you just don't like the sketch and you think if you keep picking at it it will eventually get better? well — okay, sometimes you're right! sometimes picking at something endlessly is how u eventually get something really nice and fleshed out and cool looking. but also we are mortal creatures with a limited amount of time on this earth and i am assuming from the fact that u asked for advice that u want to create More drawings. so the only real advice for this category of sketch hangup is: dude, fuck it. make a bunch of bad sketches. do it on purpose, if that helps loosen you up! designate "fucked up stupid sketch day" and make a bunch of the most dogshit drawings you can muster. remember when earlier i said part of why this is easy for me is bc i do so MUCH of it? sometimes it's about volume. if every time u start on a sketch, it ends up being the only thing u pick at for the next few days, of COURSE it's going to start feeling super precious and high stakes to you. you're not being irrational for getting attached to stuff u spend time fussing over. but if u want to be LESS fussy and LESS attached, probably the fastest way is to just start making yourself churn a bunch of shit out, because if you've made TWELVE little sketches today who actually cares if four of them are dogshit. make MORE of them, and it becomes way less serious. u can use time limits to push yourself along, if that helps — an exercise i really like is putting my music on shuffle and then doing a bunch of little drawings where i work on each one for ONLY the duration of one song each. when the song ends, i stop working on the sketch i'm on and move on to a new one. and sometimes they're totally dogshit, because the best songs in the world are all sub 2mins! or draw yourself a bunch of very small rectangles on a sheet of paper and fit a bunch of little drawings into those. anything to help Shove u past the idea that a drawing has to, like, LOOK LIKE anything or be cute or appealing or look good in any capacity will help break up the apprehension u get about wanting sketches to come out a certain way.

i have talked ur ear off as always but i hope that some of this is helpful!! or if i totally missed the mark and none of this connects w u re: why u find this stuff challenging, pls feel free to send me another ask clarifying what u get stuck on and i'll see if i can think of any potential fixes :)

[docholligay]

Never Have I Ever

This is a short story collection I got as a gift quite awhile ago, and as one might expect it took forever for me to work it into my reading list because I’m just like this and I have 86 things I always want to read. 

Anyway, very glad this wasn’t a commissioned read, as I apparently have managed to lose the book somewhere between my room and pool deck, which is admittedly pretty impressive, even for me. I’m hoping it’s just under something back in the room. 

SO! Non-spoilery: This is a Filipino-American paranormal collection of stories, that leans heavily on the knowledge of FIlipino culture and creature. Like all short story collections, it’s definitely patchy, but comes in with some really beautiful stuff here and there. Yap seems to struggle a little bit with endings occasionally. 

SPOILERY: 

So I can’t actually decide if I liked this or not. Yes? But also no. I saw the pull quote from Tamsyn Muir on the cover and was like, ‘Oh great, when it came down to it, I did not like Gideon the Ninth. Fantastic” BUt there was a lot lot lot more for me in this book than Gideon. 

I CAN tell you that I wish I hadn’t been reading it poolside, because I don’t have a lot of exposure to Filipino culture and go I had to google a LOT for this collection, which I absolutely do not mind doing, I like to learn, but while I’m trying to relax in the hot spring, having to google a bunch of stuff to try and grasp the context of what’s going When I say this book requires a solid footing in Filipino culture, I mean, there are entire lines of dialogue, untranslated, in Filipino. 

It is patchy--A Spell for Foolish Hearts, for example, feels TOTALLY out of place in the collection, which is mostly darker in tone and subject, and then...we have a fluffy gay boy story in San Francisco. The story itself, while not being to my taste, isn’t BAD, just a bit saccharine--okay, a LOT bit saccharine, and it turns out he’s dating the mist of San Francisco and there’s a funky sitcom mixup that leads to a romcom style breakup and gag gag lots of you would LOVE this but it just ain’t for me-- but it feels like a friggin pothole in the interruption of the flow of the collection. The first story, which I can’t remember the name of, was, for me, very “yeah, yeah, the monstrous feminine, we’ve all seen it” and while it’s not terrible, I suppose, it doesn’t break any ground. Many of her stories end hanging, which is fine, but they feel unfinished in a way. There’s not a lot of great drop lines. Sometimes I think Yap gets real tangled up in THE MESSAGE I AM CONVEYING and it takes away from her truly good handle when she allows things to get creepy. 

Now, to stories I loved: 

Have you Heard the one about Anamaria Marquez?: This was a great story that really played into gossip and what it is to be remembered, with a fairly light touch of possession and belief. I loved the way the rumors about Anamaria’s ghost wavered from wildly ridiculous to plausible, in keeping with the ways that all high schools have a ghost and that ghost always has a tragic story. 

Asphalt, River, Mother, Child: This was maybe my favorite story in the whole thing, despite the fact that if someone accused it of being heavy-handed, I wouldn’t disagree. My friend actually said this story reminded her of my writing, which I found insanely flattering. Its about corruption and death and innocence and best intentions, and the exhaustion of compassion, how you can help so little, even if you are a goddess of sorts, but that small but still means something. 

Hurricane Heels: This is a grown up magical girl story! I could have written a variation on this idea, I fucking love it. I don’t even know that I think it’s the most artful story in the collection, but this was the story that made my friend decide to give this to me, and you know what? She’s right. 

How to Swallow the Moon: You see literally every beat of this story coming, if you’ve been around the block once or twice, but it kind of doesn’t matter. The only thing I don’t like about this story is that it’s written in second person, which is not the first time Yap does that. I don’t know if it’s to prove that she can, but there’s nothing about this story that fucking requires it to be in the second person. But, otherwise, it’s a beautiful and lyrical take on the whole ‘princess and handmaid’ type story trope, which really flattens how good I genuinely think the story is. The description in this story is as good as Yap ever gets in the whole collection, and I actually suppose if I had any other mild criticism of this story, which is once again a criticism of the collection itself, is, this story doesn’t fit. I actually think this would go better in a different collection, maybe one with Spell for Foolish Hearts, actually. I think many of y’all would love this one--nicely written stock fantasy beats, gay, happyish ending but not cloying. 

So, yeah, there we are! I guess I would say I DID like it, in general

[cloudys-fics-and-art]

Hey! It’s CureDeity (sorry tumblr makes me ask from my main). I am here, in your inbox today, to rattle my little empty coin can and ask you to list some of your favorite beyblade fanfics! I’m going around asking a lot of people this, so feel free to ignore it if you want, but I thought this might be a good way for people to shout out some of the fanfic they really enjoy! Btw, if you can, I thought it would be helpful to list which site this fic was on so others could find it easier if they wanted to. Also, if you’ve written any fic (or have fic ideas, as we all know, imagining the same scene over and over again is the bread and butter of a writer), please also take this chance to have a massive, amazing ego and tell us which of your fics you're most proud of/is your favorite/etc.

Favorite MFB fics:

Boy was this not an easy question to answer. I’ve been in this fandom for a very long time, so I’ve read many MANY fanfics! In fact! The MFB fandom was my first fandom ever, it’s how I discovered fanfiction at age 13! Another funfact: many MANY fanfics I loved were deleted many years ago. So, I will go with what’s left!

Choosing my favorite fics was a toughie but I did my best to compile them in this answer! (I put links in all the titles, so you just click on them if you want to check them out!)

Life at the WBBA: Written by my lovely long time friend Liv aka Ollie! This fanfic is pretty much a lot of one-shots about the legendary bladers living at the WBBA, this fic eventually inspired my Adoption AU! So…If you want to see the OG, read this!

Almost Got 'Im: Also written by my beloved friend! Based on the iconic episode of Batman the Animated Series, the villains of the show reunite for a poker night while discussing how they almost beat Gingka. Spoilers: None of them did.

How to Make a Successful Match in Only Three Phases: This fanfic is something the lovely Liv actually wrote for me back in the day! As many of you know, I actually came up with the Yuki/Motti ship, and I’ll be honest, I thought I would get kicked out by the fandom. But instead Liv reached out to me and told me they had been inspired to write this thanks to one of my fics! This story is Benkei being a matchmaker, need I say more??

A Season Of Festivities: Now we go to another absolute legend! JuniperGentle aka Pippin! Their fanfics were always an absolute delight and this one is one of the most heartwarming ones! An anthology of MFB characters celebrating their winters holidays! Your fav character probably has a chapter, so give it a try!

Phosphorus: THIS FIC OMG! Okay, so, it’s still unfinished BUT GOSH IS IT GOOD! It’s an AU where Tithi is the one that follows Ryuuga around instead of Kenta!

Kenta's Imagination: This is one of the first fanfics in English I’ve ever read, and frankly, the concept of Kenta playing pretend is timeless!

 Underappreciated: Ever since the old fanfic days, Madoka would get the short end of the stick thanks to weirdos writing hate fics about her like there was no tomorrow. HOWEVER, there were a few good writers that wrote nice fics featuring her. I think this is my favorite, it’s simple, adorable, and it explores her character nicely!

Yu and Kenta's Scavenger Hunt: Literally what the title suggests! The sillies in a scavenger hunt!

The Best Nickname: Hands down THE BEST old fanfic that explores Yu’s and Tsubasa’s friendship. Tsubasa ponders about why he is the only one Yu never gave a nickname to! But little did he know, he has one. Yu is just secretive about it.

What Makes Her Different: Okay, so this one is a bit personal. This was the very first fanfic in English I read by myself without google translator. I was still struggling learning the language, but I loved the few things I understood about this fic, so I would read it over and over until I managed to fully understand it! It’s an abandoned fanfic (the writer had an incident with their old computer and could never finish it). It’s about Madoka suddenly getting sick and her friends taking care of her because she always looks out for them. It might be incomplete but it’s sweet!

As I was writing this list, I realized that most of the fics I like from AO3 are already on your fanfic list, so I decided to not add them. I hope you like this little list of recommendations!

To answer you another question, it is very hard to choose because I love most of the fics I’ve written.

However…I think I would have to go with five fanfics:

The Backdoor: I cannot express how much fun I had writing this. I loved coming up with the bits of Beyblade history, including details from Zero G, and having Yuki and Motti go through this little adventure! I am also pretty sure this was one of the first fics I wrote after I got back into the MFB fandom after many years. Thanks to a silly series of events on Tumblr, I met a lot of wonderful people in the fandom that I’m glad to have in my life!

So a Few Villain Kids Walk Into a Youth Group and...:

Writing this was such a challenge, but I am so happy I managed to finish it! I been having a lot of headcannons about the cult of Nemesis for a long time and this fic is just the tip of the iceberg! I loved writing Johannes dealing with group therapy and having to face the fact that he has friends.

 They Are My Boys:

When I wrote this fic I was a bit scared of sharing this AU with the world. But the fact that it was received so warmly just encouraged me to keep writing!

I'm Not Nice!:

So…Writing this one was a surprise even for me because I have a confession to make…I can’t stand Kyoya. But something about writing a fanfic with everyone dunking on him and his bad boy persona was so fun!

And finally…

The Drawbacks of Being Raised in an Isolated Temple:

So, writing this fic took me a lot of work because I had to talk to a lot of people about some questions I had to make this fic work, and the amazing support I got from those friends made me realize how much I love to write friendship and found family. I loved writing the friendships and dynamics in this fanfic and then the reception was so overwhelmingly positive, I was ecstatic!

There is another reason why this fic means a lot to me, it’s a bit personal but let’s just say that it brought something back to my life and I couldn’t be more thankful!

Thank you so much for this ask! I hope my answer was satisfying!

[armchairaleck]

Sadly for me I have come to the end of my writing ideas for one shot stories which means I am now faced with the unpalatable dilemma of trying to actually write and finish one of my long fic ideas, and this level of commitment fills with me with existential dread.. well actually I think other shit does that and I write to try and forget the yawning chasm that opens up beneath me, but oh well, never mind eh…

I currently have four multi-chapter WIP ideas all of which exist in various degrees of very unfinished states on my hard drive, none of which I’m certain I can complete, but even so, I will outline them below, I will ponder them, I will be totally open to any suggestions that probably no one has..

Viren Origin Fic

Okay so my TDP original idea was always to write Viren’s background and relationship with Harrow from around age 13/14 right up to the start of the show... the main problem with this is - all the known cannon stuff seems to squeeze everything into about 8-10 years in the middle, while leaving the decades on either side of his marriage up until the magma titan debacle like a blank void of stuff I would have to make up and get totally wrong - due to my blinkers with Viren, my desire to make the world a lot darker than it’s probably supposed to be, and my unshakable belief that Harrow and Viren’s friendship becomes a twisted and suffocating vine that sucks them both into the pit of their own poor moral morasses.. but is also all they have.. and it’s sad..

So the plus side of this - I just really kinda love to explore the Viren/Harrow, Viren & Kpp’Ar, Viren/Lissa relationships, along with Sarai… I also love the slow descent of Viren from carefree boy, to loving dad to errr… not loving dad?

Down side – I could start writing this and find it is totally blown out of the water by the new cannon that will appear this summer and that often derails me, because while I am absolutely able to misread a character and their motivations and level of evil intent, like a fucking pony prancing around a field on a spring day.. I can get oddly OCD about additions to story cannon that mean this could very easily get destroyed and then I would have utterly wasted my time… also there are A LOT of missing pieces to fill in..

Viravos dead souls fic

Urgh, following on from this.. I also thought I could round it off with some vaguely cannon Viren/Aaravos.. um.. two years dead lost souls fic.. that could also be a stand alone. So for some reason my brain did not go down the horny Aaravos emerging from the cocoon s3/s4 gap fic, that people might actually want to read, and instead went to the hey.. what if Aaravos had to give the traumatised soul of Viren two years of therapy, in space, while his body lies on earth stitched in stasis.. anyway, it’s basically a lot of moping and angst between a middle aged man regretting all his life choices and a near eternal elf who has been irreversibly psychologically damaged by 300 years of solitary confinement.. fun times? This is not.. I also want to give them an unrealistic level of softness here because I'm pretty sure Viren will get no happy ending and I want him to have something.. I’m a sap and I have to just deal with this sad fact..

The plus side of this - I guess.. oh.. I don’t even know if there is a plus side.. people might want to read it? Until they discover that for an E rated fic it will really offer them nothing at all.. just slightly traumatised bad sex.. well, haha, that’s all my E rated fic to be fair…

Downside - I cannot really write Viravos to save my life.. meh..

Viren/Kpp’Ar Gothic AU

Alright, I switched this to gothic for more historical leeway and more opportunities for brooding, crazy mansions, resurrection and ghosts in the attic.. anyway.. this is a time when humans have fucked the world up even more fully, when they have destroyed nearly all magical components and dark mages are a dying breed of unhinged self-destructive maniacs that make Jack Parsons look sane.. I have a vague outline for this stitched out that I will probably expound upon in a different post, it’s pretty dumb and deranged and exists mostly so I can write some Viren and Kpp’Ar together..

Plus side of this – I mean despite the fact I’m patchy on the historical details I do love me a bit of gothic - brusque anti-social Kpp’Ar energy, mixed with Viren channelling his inner hysterical lady vibes… (just kidding olden days hysterical girls with smelling salts, you could never be as overwrought as Viren gets in front of a mirror..)

Minus side – this is literally as ridiculous as it sounds, there would be A LOT of plot I would have to write to fill inbetween the main beats, and I would probably have to do a lot of research.. watching old black and white horror films and reading the first 100 pages of gothic novels that I’ll simply forget to finish.. sigh.. okay maybe I’ll do the research and forget the writing..

Cyberpunk AU

Welp.. despite the last one, this is probably the most insane of all my ideas and exists solely because I wanted to ship Viren with Ibis… What? Why did I want to do this? I have literally no idea, except that often for some reason my brain will think.. oh.. I wonder what would happen if those two completely incompatible characters that have no way to actually get together in cannon met up and had a fuckin ridiculous and unlikely relationship that literally no one else in the whole world would care about?

So despite the fact that I know I don’t have a quarter of the world building chops necessary to actually write this, I have thought about it quite a lot..

Dumb things this AU contains:

A physical border between human kingdoms and Xadia where armies are constantly lined up in a don’t blink first cold war scenario…

An online version of the breach that separates the shitty human commodore 64 8-bit level of technology from the apple mac in 100 years sleek levels of advancement the Xadians have achieved..

That humans, god bless their ingenuity, have discovered a way to hook into, in order to try and steal the technology of the five nexus powers and boost themselves out of the depressing state of their own existence..

Defection from Xadia to the human kingdoms by various elves who have grown tired of the 1984 levels of state surveillance imposed on them by the dragons.. and who now work with the humans as primal jumpers, i.e. those who can get into the breach naturally..

Dark jumpers, who are social pariahs with both humans and elves and destroy everything they touch.. as per cannon..

Zero magic in the human kingdoms because they’re so awful of course they’ve destroyed it all, they rely on the dirt and smog of fossil fuels, while Xadia is renewable and magical all the way, but also under the grip of dictatorial state control.. seems like you just can’t have it all eh..

Just the whisper of Aarovos existing out there somewhere in the online breach like Jeff Bridges in Tron Legacy…

Weird pseudo sex pollen stuff that I would really have to remove to stop a decent into pure insanity..

Um.. drugs.. this is cyberpunk and the ONLY cyberpunk type stuff I have read is either by Philip K Dick or is Neuromancer… which means I figure cyber punk just has to involve a heinous amount of drug taking, which is probably inappropriate for a kids cartoon fic..

Alright, this makes total sense in my head but I am aware that trying to write it down makes it sound pretty nuts..

Plus sides – none?

Minus sides – I think those have all be listed above… so I should probably leave this here…

Alright, that's all I have thought about, which is probably for the best..

Honestly I do not know what to do here, maybe work on everything concurrently and finish nothing.. maybe do nothing.. maybe try and learn to draw better so I don’t have to worry so much about writing and plot and pacing and world building.. maybe wait for the sweet inspiration for a one shot of below 15k words to hit me..

..and yet I feel compelled to write SOMETHING.. which sorta sucks..

[prompt-master]

henlo i am sorry to bother you but i am ten years late to the danganronpa fandom and two years late to your fanfics but i was wondering if you might consider finishing your Bear Trap story? like even if its just a quick lil synopsis of what you wanted to write, or if its an unfinished chapter, id take anything 👉👈

also ur lovely ok bye

Ok this was worded very kindly so I'm going to justify it with a full geniune response.

I'm honestly probably never going to update Bear Trap, but I WILL give you a synopsis. I did however want to first quickly explain why I don't plan on finishing that fic.

To keep a long story short. I kinda hate BT. It was my first fic after a two year break and imo it shows in the quality. I thank BT for temporarily getting me back into the writing groove, but I cringe way too hard looking back on it. I do have an unfinished chapter draft, but I'm not sure if I'd ever post it. I'll have to reread it at some point and see how I feel.

I would also like to say that if anyone else is willing to write the last part, I am more than willing to work with them.

Now, here is what I had planned for BT, bare (haha bear) in mind that it's messy because it was just self indulgent nonsense:

The format of BT was meant to go; build up, impact, aftermath. With each chapter focusing on a different story beat.

There was going to be a fake chapter released only on tumblr where Naegi died, only for the characters to go "did you actually think that would happen?" meant to poke fun over how many people thought I was going to kill Naegi.

This means the last chapter was going to entirely focus on the aftermath of Naegi's injury. I wanted each character to get an analysis of how they're feeling and each individual relationship would get a spotlight

This also means that. Tbh. The aftermath segment probably would not fit cleanly into one chapter since it would be pretty big.

It began with the hospital ride from the helicopter, Togami and Kiri watching as medics struggle to keep Naegi stable. There's a very dissociative vibe going on.

Because Togami and Kiri are closer to Naegi then they are each other, they don't really know how to comfort each other. It's awkward, quiet. They only speak to share facts and speculation. But there's a moment where they lean shoulder to shoulder.

Naegi was going to lose his leg, and have to get a prosthetic. Some of the fic was going to focus on him relearning how to walk with his new leg with the help of his partners.

I wanted to make sure that Naegi becoming disabled wasn't a "bad" ending. It's obviously upsetting to lose a limb in a tragic accident, and Naegi does have to cope with it. But I wanted to feel more empowering in a "see this shit? It's proof I survived"

Togami was ofc going to lovingly call him a cockroach

There was going to be exploration over how despite being known around the world for surviving a tragedy, they still don't really know how to LIVE with tragedy. They are just forced to keep moving on without getting a moment to breathe.

Due to Naegi seeing how freaked out Togami and Kiri were, he tries to keep everything together and stay lighthearted for their sake. He knows they want to see he's okay. This meant he pushed aside his own coping however.

The fic was going to end with Naegi finally letting out his emotions and crying in front of both of them, admitting that he was scared and thought he was going to die, and that he was so grateful they were there. Even if he had died then, he wouldve been more okay with it if they were with him. But that doesn't mean he was actually okay with it.

Togami negotiates them all a 2 week vacation lmao

If I remember correctly (I did not reread the fic to check, I'm going solely off memory) I was going to make a point about how despite feeling like they nearly lost their chance to tell Naegi they love him, both Tog and Kiri know that a confession shortly after a traumatic experience isn't the best idea. But also, Naegi doesn't need a confession to know they love him.

There were certainty more details to thefic that I can't fully recall ATM, such as the specifics of each individual character/relationship analysis. Let me know if you have any questions! Ty again for your kindness

[orangepanic]

7, 17, 18, and 33 for the ask meme pretty please? 🍊 🍊 🍊

7. What’s the fic you most want to continue (unfinished or no)?

Definitely, without a doubt, Smoke, my Equalist Asami Irosami fic. It's a massive undertaking that I poured a lot into, and we're so close to the end. I've just got to be in the right headspace to do it, and to have the time and attention to do it properly. Which I haven't had for like six months. But I'm getting excited about it again and hope to get back here soon. Honorable mention to Firestorm, the third fic in my Irosamiverse canon divergence series that I half started and then actually pulled down to re-work. I still think it's got a cool premise, but need to invest in some plotting and make a few hard choices and kill some darlings to keep the narrative tight, which is what was wrong with the first version. George R. R. Martin I am not, and my original vision of writing from a lot of different characters' perspectives and locations wasn't working. But I'll get there.

17. In your opinion, what’s your most overrated fic?

Strictly speaking, probably The Mango Tree. Not because I don't adore this fic. I do. It's sweet and sad and lovely and everyone should read it. But it's also Maiko, and therefore has more kudos and bookmarks than all but my major Irosami multichapter projects that are closer to novels, like AWOL and Smoke. I wrote The Mango Tree in a day or two. Smoke is going on two years. It's a great illustration of the challenges rarepair authors face. If you liked The Mango Tree, maybe you should give some other works a try? You might be surprised.

18. What’s your most underrated fic?

All of them. I guess I was surprised at the reception of Yaoja's Number One Fan. Or maybe just disappointed. There's pretty much universal recognition that for a main character Asami Sato is very underdeveloped in canon. To some that makes her boring, but to me that means she has so much potential! And people clearly want to read about her as she appears in just under half the fics in the Legend of Korra tag. But almost all those fics are Korrasami (like really, nearly all of them), and fics about Asami outside that pairing are rare and low traffic. I'd have hoped there were enough Asami fans in Korrasamiworld who'd be interested in a short, sweet fic about her as a kid that for once didn't center around her mother's death or any ship, but I was wrong. No one seems to love or care for Asami by herself. Low kudos might be the author, but this fic has less than 50 hits. No one is interested. Goes to hug Asami in a corner by myself making self-indulgent pity noises.

33. Is there any particular character whose scenes always wind up being longer/more frequent than you expected? Does the quality hold up?

Okay, there are two ways to answer this: 1. OMFG Iroh. This guy is so much in his head, I'll realize I've written two pages and he hasn't moved. He's still standing there doing dishes, thinking. Any one-shot from Iroh's perspective immediately becomes a multichapter slog. In fact, I went back and looked and in all my 85 works I've only written three one-shots from Iroh's perspective. Because he can't fucking do it. But I love him dearly and I guess he's just going on longer adventures.

2. Asami self-insert. You know that gif with the model walking out from the door all sassy like "heyyyyyy" yeah, that's Asami. I write fics she's not in and she shows up anyway (seriously - she wasn't supposed to be in either The Cabin or Uncle Iroh's Firebending Academy and she just decided she was needed and in she goes). Then she also doesn't listen to directions. I'm writing a fic right now (Tis the Sea Sun for Love) and she's twice wound up adding scenes because she wanted to do something else, like go get a pedicure or shop for a dress for her date. I just... I've given up. Asami is in charge and I'm just here to record it.

Anyway since these are the characters I write the most often now you understand why my fics are so damn long.

Ask me writing stuff

[crystalcatgamer]

Fic Stats Game

Got a ping from @foolofatook001 for this one. And wow, who would have guessed, it’s almost all DSMP. Even after I anon-ed and orphaned a few lol. God that phase was so wild. And I’m sinking back into it goddamnit

rules: give us the links to your fic with the most hits, second most kudos, third most comments, fourth most bookmarks, fifth most words, and fic with the fewest words.

Most hits: There are days where I don’t know the person in the mirror (And there are days I don’t care) with 24,247 hits~! It’s Tommy-centric, villain Dream, filled with dehumanization angst, and hopes of a happy ending with SBI at the end of the road. Currently unfinished and I’m going to update it in three years <3

Second most kudos: Run, run (Here comes the boy with 1,394 kudos! This is actually my favourite multi-chaptered fic, and I admit, the fact that it’s actually completed (though not in the overall series, haha…) plays a big part. Werewolf!SBI, centred around Tommy meeting them for the first time! Some discduo too, because I’m as much a sucker for big brother Dream as I am for bad guy Dream. It’s a duality, I know.

Third most comments: Look what you've done (Do you regret playing with our lives?) with 183 comments. It’s a typical content creators get booted into the Dream SMP (near their counterparts!) fic. Unfinished, and admittedly I haven’t touched it due to regular controversy on the content creators. But recently I’m like, fuck it, DSMP lives in 2021, and so does this fic, and so am I, so I’m probably going to just go ahead and ignore 2023 drama. After all, I’m writing about the ccs’ personas and not their true selves! I’m having fun and that’s what matters ✨

Fourth most bookmarks: I am back with Run, run (Here comes the boy at 209 bookmarks! All hail werewolf AU. I need to write the doomsday trio prequel sometime. Eventually. Ahah. 🤍

Fifth most words: I wish for this no more (I wish to be fixed) with a cute 9,319 words. This is Doll!Tommy on the DSMP with bad SBI, bad Dream, bad bunch of people except my beloved benchtrio. It’s old, unfinished, and I don’t enjoy it much these days, but I do enjoy certain chapters where I feel like I did pretty good. The plot doesn’t call to me much anymore especially since I wrote it because I knew people would like it back then. It’s still a pretty okay relic from 2021, all things considered.

Least words: These ice cold hands of yours with 593 words. It’s a (platonic) Ganyu and Xiao fic from Genshin Impact, written for Whumptober 2022 featuring a fight with some Fatui! Xiaoyu, either platonic or romantic, is quite dear to me. They are both Adepti that fought by Rex Lapis’ side, and now Ganyu is learning from Xiao how to become stronger in order to protect Liyue with him! It’s great! It’s cute! They are family!

Andddd I’ll tag @polynomialpandemic, @eclectickefi and @imperialkatwala! Anyone else can join, and you’re not obligated to either. May your dreams be temporary and your rest be pleasant, adios!

[eepyvictim]

Okay, here's my feelings. They're mostly negative and I don't want to ruin someone else's enjoyment with my immense frustration so click at your own discression. Spoilers obviously it's a Big List.

This game is a complete exhausting mess and I can't even begin to describe how disappointed I am. The misogyny, the badly told story with more plot holes and unexplored ideas than I can count, the overall tone and pacing. I've never thought a Final Fantasy is bad before, or that one doesn't contain a single thing I can enjoy. I play FFXIV for Christ's sake and that's an exercise in futility with moments of bad writing decisions and frustrating game design. But XVI? It's so frustrating how a game could be so complete but say so little except metaphorically shout about its views on women. Here's just some of my complaints:

The game starts with Benedicta dry humping Hugo (important later)

Benedicta gets killed (sure fine) then after the fact, is beheaded and her head sent to Hugo got man pain

Benedicta is then shown in a flash back with Barnabus post-sex to flesh out his character before we don't see him again for awhile

After this the game is pretty much sexless for dozens of hours

Jill shows up to be a crutch for Clive's brooding about his dead brother

Oh Joshua is alive actually! Now Jill can be a crutch for Clive's journey to find his alive brother!

Time skip!

Jill's backstory is finally explained now that it's relevant because in an hour of gameplay we're fighting Hugo and she needs some connection to the plot so fuck it she was abused mentally, physically (and possibly sexually???) by Hugo and his men along with lots of other women and this was never brought up prior to or during the 5 year time skip.

After Hugo dies Jill's plot and feelings are all wrapped up! Now she can leave the party until it's convenient for her to be emotional support for Clive again! And again! AND AGAIN!

Several points in the game a medicine girl is shown multiple times in multiple locations conveniently at big plot events, literally never actually matters other than plot convenience for one moment to save a major character but she had to be established for some reason. Only character to get that.

Joshua's dedicated guard is a woman whose entire character revolves around him, she even ends up explicitly in love with him but no time is she ever shown being her own character.

Dion is gay! First one screen canon gay character in the Final Fantasy! He... lightly kisses his lover once. In the character relationships page Jill and Clive end up with an "in love" status. Dion's relationship with his partner is only ever listed as "master and servant."

Dion kills HUNDREDS of people as Bahamut. Clive and Joshua's mum mum finds out Joshua is alive! She promptly kills herself in front of everyone. Dion gets to survive though! I guess they didn't want to kill off a gay man just yet but it's clear if you're a woman you're irredeemable and have to die but if you're a man you can be saved.

Jill finally gets to join the plot again! She protects Clive and Joshua! ...so they can run away and she gets kidnapped

It takes a good 10 minutes of dialog for anyone to even address Jill is still alive actually because thank God they can sense her aether from a across the continent

The game reveals there's Eight eikons! One for each element! Except we have two fire and no water ones. They list all the elements, including water but nobody explains why that's weird.

HOURS later "Leviathan the lost" is mentioned in one throwaway line by Joshua. It's never explained or brought up again. Ever. Like ever ever. But all the eikons are super important for Ultima to get full power and destroy the world! Except Leviathan I guess??? Biggest plot whole in any FF game. Worse than Bahamut showing up in FFXV because at least FFXV had the excuse of being unfinished.

We see Benedicta again, naked and making sexual remarks towards Barnabus before turning into two other men, then Ultima, and finally into Barnabus' mothet??? She's naked??? This is never explained and a lore entry isn't added until the end of the game where she doesn't even have a name. She's never given clothes, just a naked model with no character which is the point in which I realised this game really wants you to know how it views women.

Dion's lover breaks up with him! Can't have happy gays in Final Fantasy! Fang and Vanille are such good examples of a gay relationship but it's never explicitly stated which is extra frustrating when we finally have a gay kiss on screen but they have to be miserable

Jill saves Clive's ass from getting beaten by Odin. Then naked and on the beach she willingly gives Clive her powers after a speech about Clive and then they have sex. When they get back to the Hideaway Jill's benched.

She then shows up after Clive beats Odin for a moment, immediately offers herself with the others to fight off waves of enemies for Clive before Clive gets teleported out of the room

Before the final fight Jill gets benched so hard she literally gets told to stay home while The Boys (Clive, Joshua and Dion) go fight Ultima. Incredibly insane that this game has a more misogynistic finale than FF4 in which two women get straight up told "it's too dangerous for you" and they sneak on the Lunar Whale and fight the final boss anyway because they're not useless.

It's explained that when Clive takes people's eikon powers they can no longer control their eikon forms and Dion makes it clear he'll just rest??? And get the mental fortitude to still turn into Bahamut. Jill can't do that though!

Final section of the game and Dion finally dies! Redeemed himself and died a noble death but it's one he chose, unlike every other woman in this game. Benedicta and Clive's mother were clearly the result of circumstance while Dion actively chose to murder people as Bahamut because he was mad at his dad and his step mum making a 10 year old boy emperor but he's the real hero. Still funny they killed off a gay man though. His boyfriend left him and he died for the protagonist lmao

Joshua dies for Clive in one of the most depressing final sequences in a Final Fantasy game I've seen and that's insane because Type-0 exists. I don't think it'd be as depressing if Ultima was a better villain but he's not? Clive's also Jesus Christ superstar chosen child of destiny so it makes it not really sad anytime something bad happens to other people because it's usually pretty arbitrary. Joshua dies because he had an Ultima avatar trapped inside him sapping his energy but not once did Joshua ever go "hey it's weird that despite me trapping Ultima in my chest he's still here??? Killing people??? Fighting Clive???" because the characters can't think about the plot until it's convenient.

Another example of this is Barnabus points out it's a good thing the mothercrystals are getting destroyed and despite this, when Ultima goes "Haha we wanted you to destroy the crystals all along!" Clive responds with a "what!?" like it wasn't increasingly obvious??? Everything over the course of 70 hours got worse every time one of these things got destroyed and someone literally told you but go off I guess

Anyway Clive dies so Jill, after existing entirely for Clive for 80% of the game is left alone. Literally nobody in the main cast can be truly happy I guess

Like, Christ. I have even more complaints than that. Like the pacing sucked, massive chunks of world building and story being shoved into lore entries so the story feels even less polished than FFXV. The way so many things were never explained. The horribly visuals in that the eikon battles were made SO flashy there's absolutely no consideration for people with visual disability or motion sickness. I literally couldnt look at the screen for more than five seconds in a whole phase of the final boss because it made me want to throw up.

I'm just so frustrated. I had high hopes for FF16 especially as an action game fan and a Final Fantasy fan and all I got was disappointment. "We're taking Final Fantasy in bold directions." Yeah by hating women more than any game has yet and by creating the least accessible Final Fantasy game to date. At least I have Stranger of Paradise.

Edit: THE SLAVERY PLOT??? I FINALLY PROCESSED IT??? Dominants are given high positions because they control eikons and magic. Bearers control magic but not eikons so they're enslaved by people who can't use magic. Weird but okay sure. It's revealed that the use of magic is turning bearers to stone but it's also revealed that unlike what they thought (it was the mothercrystals) it's actually just that magic is a poison??? It causes the blight and turns bearers to stone??? So what??? The bearers were right to be oppressed because yeah nonbearers made them use magic but magic is in fact fucking scary if it literally destroys the world and would turn them to stone anyway??? The slavery plot in this game is so cringe and bad especially when fantasy slavery is already trite enough as it is in 2023 but also that there's MANY games that tackle the ideas of slavery way better. What the fuck was this game.

Finally finished FF16 and Boy Christ do I have feelings.

[multifandomwritings]

How the slashers would react to their S/O painting their nails

So sorry again for how slow I am these days! I promise I’m not ignoring anyone or haven’t forgotten! (also my confidence in my writing has once again plummeted so aslfkdj) I hope you all like this ^^ (if anyone has any character suggestions lemme know! Like horror characters and slashers. However if I end up adding more I might have to start splitting these up a bit!) 

Thomas:

- Thomas might be hesitant at first, but the second you took his burly hand into your own, he'd melt

- You would get complete creative control — he wouldn't mind what colors you chose, and any worries of being teased by his family would disappear as he watched how eager you were 

- Seeing you so fixated on his hands would make him blush beneath his mask, though he would appreciate the opportunity to freely stare at you as you worked

- He'd smile to himself every time he looked at them, and would happily let you do it again (No one, even Hoyt, dares to tease him about anything relating to you after a certain point, knowing it’s off limits! So he’ll happily show them off. Luda Mae thinks it’s precious, but is also kind of salty that you haven’t offered to do hers lol)

Brahms:

- Brahms would take any affection and attention he could get, so the second you even suggested it he'd just sit down and put his hands out for you

- You wouldn't be able to stop smiling at how seriously he took it. He'd have a surprisingly good eye for color combinations, handing you the colors he liked and making you blush with how he focused on you

- He'd want to polish yours too: matching colors, of course (when you noticed this, you'd smile even wider, which would not go unnoticed by Brahms, who would smile in self satisfaction)

- This would probably become a regular thing. He’d adore anything like that, that made him feel close to you. Of course you have to match though! Or at the very least, coordinate��👉👈

Michael:

- Michael wouldn't really know how to react to you asking about it, to be honest. He wouldn't really mind, he'd just be kind of iffy about it

- It would probably take him a while to warm up to this (or pretty much anything) but he ~might~ allow it, since it's you

- If you reach for anything pastel or colorful he'd just take your hand to stop you and shake his head, causing you to have to hold back a laugh

- He wouldn't admit it, but he'd actually like how it looked. He'd forget about it, and would think of you every time he noticed them. He isn't really soft but he would be for you

Jason:

- You’d be going through your nail polishes when you’d gesture for him to come over and sit, offering to paint his nails

- He agrees of course! Like he’s gonna refuse anything you wanna do for him like that!...Although you’ll have to excuse his slightly crusty hands

- He always admires your own nail polish, thinking the colors are so pretty and cute. If you offer to let him pick out the colors he’ll just shake his head, knowing you’ll choose something nice 

You, reaching your hand to hold his while you polish: Okay, gimme your hand

Him, ~misunderstanding~: *takes your hand as if to hold it* 

You: 🥺🥺🥺

(A bonus thought that you might disagree with: if you’d been in a relationship with Jason for a while, he’d begin to pick up on his own cuteness. Or at least, what you think is cute. And he’d take advantage of it, if only to make you smile. Also, he secretly loves the effect he has on you alsdkfj) 

Bubba:

- Bubba would love this. He'd carefully watch and learn, already planning on doing yours too

- If you hold his hand while you do it his stomach would be full of butterflies, cheeks all pink beneath his mask. He adores when you’re soft with him like that

- He'd probably chip them up really quickly, to his own dismay. When he would notice, he'd want them done again asap, as they'd remind him of you

- You would melt when he did yours. He hold your hand close to his face, focusing intently and going slowly to make sure it was perfect

Chop Top:

- It would probably be his idea to be honest. He'd see you doing your nails and would excitedly pester you about it until you did his, too

- You end up getting ~playfully~ annoyed, as he'd keep pulling his hands away to look and would keep changing his mind on what colors to use

- Eventually you just snatch his hand and hold it still so you can finish. He'd stop whatever he was saying with a nervous laugh, getting surprisingly flustered at you being like that with him 

- He'd be another that would paint yours, too, trying his best to pick colors that would suit you. He'd adore his, and would want to impress you by doing his best!

Nubbins:

- Nubbins would see you doing your own nails and wouldn’t even give you the opportunity to offer to do his. He’d just pick up a random color and would start doing it himself (badly)

- You don’t really notice at first but after a while you glance up and chuckle at what a sloppy job he’s done, prompting him to smile at you so sweetly that you don’t even say anything about it

- Instead, you just gesture for him to hand it over, which he happily does. You can’t help but smile at how delicately he drapes his hands into your own, allowing you to fix his mistakes and finish it 

- Once you’re done he’ll continue holding your hand, too. Good luck getting unlatched for a bit. Nubbins will use any excuse he can to be close to you (tbh he doesn’t need an excuse but if he has one he’ll use it) 

Beetlejuice:

- Beetlejuice would probably tease you for suggesting it, despite the fact that he'd be choosing his colors as he did 

- Spooky colors only, of course! Neon purple, black, green, things like that. He'd love it, tbh

- He'd be flirting with you the entire time, enjoying the close proximity as he could watch your face flush as he spoke

- Despite his teasing, he'd actually enjoy things like that a lot. He'd love that you wanted to do things like that for him, feeling all special and cared for

Candyman:

- Daniel would probably seem a little indifferent to it at first, although he would enjoy seeing you dote over him like that

- He'd smile to himself as he watched you carefully pick colors, refraining from suggesting anything because he'd want to see what you thought would suit him

- He makes you melt the whole time, his hand gently draped over yours as you try to ignore his intense gaze, gnawing at your lip all the while

- He would unintentionally show them off *a lot*, showing off his hand way more than he normally would. You'd have to hold back smiles as you noticed, finding it so sweet

Bo:

- Sort of like Beetlejuice in that he'd tease you and act playfully annoyed like, "You want to paint my nails? Pfft, I don't know..." (he says, while sitting down and stretching his hands across the table for you) 

- Isn't really paying attention (or so he'd have you think), just looking around or closing his eyes while you polished away, occasionally glancing over to see what you were up to when he thought you weren't looking

- If Bo liked you, he'd pretty much go with anything tbh. You could paint his nails the softest, brightest colors and he wouldn't even really have the heart to gripe about it, seeing you all smiley over it 

- Will be all smiley himself anytime he looks at them, but if someone else notices (besides you) he'll shoot them a death glare

Vincent:

- You wanna paint his nails? Okay! He has no hesitation whatsoever and will ask no questions — if you want to, you can 

- You’re so cute to him and he loves your attention, anything you want to do like that he’ll allow. If you want to do his nails, brush/play with his hair, or anything like that, you can! In fact, please do 🥺

- Will be smiling the whole time behind his mask, happily suggesting colors if you ask. He’ll end up with cute and sparkly rainbow nails because you both keep finding different colors you like

- He would do yours, too. All the colors you couldn’t fit on his hands will go on yours! You both have equally colorful nails that will be teased by Bo and Lester, who are both secretly envious of Vincent (plz do their nails too)

Lester:

- When you asked if you could polish his nails, he'd immediately light up, loving the idea of it but quickly getting shy

- He'd disappear for a second so he could go scrub his hands and make them as clean and pretty as possible for you 

- He'd be kinda nervous?? His eyes would be flickering back and forth between your face and his hands, smiling as he watched you

- Little things like this would make his heart flutter endlessly, and he'd try so hard to keep them all tidy and unchipped. (This would result in him being ridiculously delicate with everything he touched) He'd love them no matter what colors you chose!

Graverobber:

- Graverobber has some clammy, crusty hands, (I mean, he hangs out in dumpsters) so beware. Still, if you offer to paint his nails, he’ll just lazily offer up his hands without a second thought

- Watches you the whole time with a satisfied smile. Anytime you glance up and catch him, he’ll give you a look that somehow manages to be both sheepish and smug, wiggling his eyebrow to make you laugh

- He'd smile every time he looked at them, thinking of you. You’d match them to the streaks in his hair which makes him just :o !! Will show them off a lot too

- He'd wear them until they were completely chipped up (which wouldn’t take long), patiently hoping you'd offer to do them again

Luigi:

- Luigi would initially agree with no complaints, but chances are you’ll only get a few nails done before he gets impatient 

- He feels kind of bad about it later, though, seeing them unfinished and smiling a bit as they reminded him of you. If he’s in a grouchy mood he’ll ease up right away when he sees them

- He’ll let you finish later, though not without some amount of awkwardness, as he’d be embarrassed to bring it back up 

- Of course, you’re happy to do it though! You snatch his hands right up and get to work, choosing colors such as black, red and white. He’d smile the whole time he watched you. His expression would change freakishly fast if someone interrupted, though

Pavi:

- He probably paints his nails anyways, but he’d always be happy to be doted over by you, so of course he’ll accept your offer!

- If you offer while he’s already wearing nail polish he’ll quickly run off and remove it so you won’t change your mind 

- Compliments you the whole time, even if you’re just messing around. You end up giggling the whole time at how extra he is, calling you an artist and talented and actually making you blush quite a bit with how sincere he was about it

- Shows his nails off endlessly, staring at them constantly and making it a point to be as showy with his hands as possible. The moment they chip he’ll be so over-the-top dramatic, only feeling better once you’ve redone them (you will forever be Pavi’s manicurist from then on, sigh) 

Billy Lenz:

- Probably confused by it, but he'd be happy to give it a try. He'd watch you intently the entire time, saying very little

- ...Which would result in you getting nervous, low-key trying to rush through it and accidentally messing one or two up (Cue Billy looking at you like smh, Y/N, smh...)

- He’s only messing though, he genuinely couldn’t care less about it really. You could be painting his whole finger and he doesn’t even mind because he’s more focused on you and the fact that you’re doing something like that for him

- He is unused to being treated like this so he never really knows how to react. Any kind of looking after will always be met with some amount of nervousness, though he adores it. Will retreat to the attic afterwards and just stare at his nails like 🥺 (Even the messy ones! Especially the messy ones tbh)

Asa Emory (The Collector):

- He'd agree to you doing his nails so quickly that you'd actually be shocked, not expecting compliance at all. He'd offer up his hands so willingly that your jaw would almost hit the floor

- Nothing flashy! He just wants tidy, pretty nails. He's very sure about what he wants, which would almost make you laugh, as he'd be quite assertive about it

- Needless to say, he'd stare at you intently the whole time, lips twisted into a small but wicked smile as he noticed your cheeks flushing and eyes refusing to meet his

- He'll do yours too, of course. You have to bite your lip the whole time to keep yourself from smiling because he’s so meticulous. He’ll carefully choose a color, eyeing you for approval before pulling your hand close to his face, seriously and slowly polishing each nail 

Otis Driftwood:

- Otis will absent-mindedly swat your hand away when you try to do his nails. However, when he glanced over to see you frowning at his grouchiness, he’ll feel bad and will just roll his eyes as he gives up his hands

- Will complain the whole time though. It smells! It’s cold! Stop squeezing my hand! (Tbh he loves these kinds of gestures, but he’s guarded, to put it simply, so he doesn’t know how to deal with it. So, he’ll gripe, all while staring at you lovingly when you aren’t looking)  

- You end up using simple colors such as black and white, and he would end up liking it much better than he thought he would. In fact, he’d want you to do it again in the future, but would be too embarrassed about his complaining to ask

- You’re going to have to give the whole family manicures now too though, especially Baby (honestly probably pedicures too? They’d get greedy lol) 

[lucemferto]

Okay, scathing Wilbur Hot Take-Time™, I guess. I didn't proofread, don't come for me.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while, but the release of Revived has really put it at the forefront of my mind yet again.

So, we all know that I’m pretty sympathetic to Wilbur all things considered. I wrote a number of times about the complexities of his character and I’ve come to see his Season 3-character journey as a very morally complex affair that will (most likely) not fall into something villainous.

However!

I think it’s not unreasonable to have interpreted his “This is my sunrise”-scene as a sinister or foreboding moment. To be honest, I don’t vibe with the line of “This is the fandom unfairly villainizing Wilbur”, at least not fully.

Let me explain. In my opinion, this sinister/foreboding energy manifests itself in three ways.

1. The narrative arc of the Revival-stream itself

The stream itself is not kind to Wilbur as a character. His revival comes at the cost Ghostbur, beloved ingénue character who gets sacrificed in a very harrowing scene with the end-result being Wilbur’s resurrection.

Now, Wilbur is not an “active” part of the resurrection – I’m not saying he’s at fault for Ghostbur’s death – but what I am saying is that the entire framing and dramatic built-up around Wilbur’s return lends itself to being interpreted negatively.

Regardless of what you think of Dream, his situation in prison, Ghostbur and Wilbur himself, the storytelling language itself and the fact that this scene is focalized through Tommy’s eyes makes Wilbur’s return a dark, foreboding affair.

The participant pushing for the revival – the person framed as the main beneficiary – is Dream, who has previously been framed rather negatively (to put it lightly). Tommy, our POV-character and – I’m just gonna say it – Hero of the previous season explicitly doesn’t want Wilbur to return.

The “Hero” fails – Wilbur’s return, the dark climax of the stream, is framed as Dream’s victory. (And, again, this is about narrative language, not about the actual facts of the scene)

So, on the whole, Wilbur’s revival is already framed badly.

2. Wilbur’s problem with possessiveness

This one is short and sweet: One of Wilbur’s big character flaws in the first season was possessiveness. “If we can’t have Manburg, no one can have Manburg”; “My unfinished symphony”, etc.

Possessive language was at the very core of Wilbur’s darkest scenes in Season 1. So, while I’m saying “This is my sunrise” is – in a vacuum – not an inherently sinister or negative statement, in context with what we have seen of Wilbur in Season 1 and with the previously described narrative arc of the Revival-stream, it’s perfectly understandable that that statement would activate the alarm bells for the fandom.

Especially considering …

3. The whole Season 3-build leading up to Wilbur’s revival

This is the biggest point for me.

Some may have forgotten, but Wilbur’s return was negatively connotated since Tommy’s Imprisonment. The ultimate conclusion of that arc was: “Oh no, we definitely need to kill Dream, otherwise he will bring Wilbur back.”

Tommy was horrified at the prospect of Wilbur returning and compared Dream favourably to Wilbur. That’s big!

That’s the biggest reason, why I can’t act like the “Big Bad Villain Wilbur” is something that sprung fully formed out of the fandom’s shared imagination like Athena from Zeus’ head. The content creators seemingly deliberately planted it there.

Now … we can argue as to why they decided to build-up Wilbur like he was the Dark Lord of Mordor. Especially in hindsight – knowing what we know about which direction Wilbur’s arc seems to take – this seems more and more like a very weird creative choice. It has a very Soap Opera “The build up and hype is more important than whether or not it fits with the pay-off” vibe to it.

But, nevertheless, the content creators build it up that way. In retrospect, we can rationalize a lot of the individual dialogue pieces and details to “fit” the actual direction of Wilbur’s arc, but little isn’t what sticks, especially not with something as sprawling as the Dream SMP.

What sticks is the framing, the general “feeling”, the atmosphere, the build-up.

And in that regard, I find it hard to blame and shame the fandom, when the content creators so clearly played into it.

[miss-choco-chips]

F’coffee

-.-.-.-.-.-

Honestly. What did Bruce even think would happen? He should have known better.

Tim wasn’t Dick, indoctrinated from a young age to be a good, somewhat (when convenient) obedient son. Tim only went along with Bruce’s shit because, more often than not, it aligned with what he himself wanted. He also wasn’t Damian, so easily manipulable when one knew which buttons to push. And he certainly wasn’t Jason, who would sink his own ship to kill the captain.

So, when Tim and Bruce fought, and his adopted father decided to pull the ‘you live under my roof and work in my company, so I’m the boss all the way through’ card, well…

Yeah. Tim wasn’t going to take that lying down. He had a childhood of zero authority figures to obey and an overabundance of sass, plus a complete lack of fucks to give.

It was bound to go down like this.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-

And, well. Tim had money. Like, an absurd amount of money. Even before being adopted by playboy billionaire Bruce Wayne, Tim had his own no small fortune stashed away, a couple of properties gathering dust, two trust funds and more antique cars that he knew what to do with. So he could just… burn through that money, or sell the cars, or make a living of renting the buildings he owned, and he would barely even scratch the surface of his deep wealth.

But it wasn’t about being able to live comfortably with minimum effort. Tim was trying to prove a point here. What point, fuck if he knew. But a point.

So here he was, on the other end of the wooden counter, a cute red cap falling over his eye as he looked dead into his friend’s eyes.

“Tim. Tim, you’re rich. Why are you working in a coffee shop?”

Seeing as Kon and Cassie were currently too busy being shocked, Tim shrugged and went back to cleaning the cup in his hands.

It was a plastic cup. It didn’t need cleaning, he could just toss it away. But it was his favorite plastic cup, and he was gonna save it as a family heirloom forever.

(The fact that the pretty customer from the morning shift had drawn cute little doodles all over it had nothing to do with it’s worth.)

“Teenage rebellion”, he finally said, carefully putting his treasure away.

“You are twenty.”

“Time is a social construct and I’m but a slinky falling down an endless flight of stairs.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Your face doesn’t make any sense. How is it so symmetrical? It defies nature.”

-.-.-.-.-.-

“What can I get for you?”

“I'll have a mocha caramel latte-chino, made with skim milk, no whipped cream.”

“Bart, no.”

“Please put that in a grande cup”

“I’m begging you, don’t do it.”

“But use the same amount of coffee that you'd put into a tall.”

“I’m warning you, you don’t want to do this.”

“That way there's about an inch of extra room on top.”

“I wish you had an extra inch so I could look straight into your eyes when I murder you.”

“To stir in my own nutmeg without spilling any coffee at all.”

“You’re dead to me. Also, I AM going to make you that drink and you WILL finish it or so help me God.”

“What do you want, Kon?”

“To not be here when Tim’s looking like he’s planning both our unsolved murders.”

-.-.-.-.-.-

When Kon entered the shop, the messenger bag slung over his shoulder bumping against his hip as he rushed in to get his caffeine intake before his evening classes, he wasn’t surprised at the scene.

Cassie being there was a given, since there was always at least one of them there at all times, supporting Tim in this ‘independence’ thing he was dead set on trying. Kon himself had his Tim Shift later that day, after his creative writing course. Bart had probably just left, considering the amount of empty cake platters littering the counter.

Tim being face down in said counter, uncaring about the mess, was also old news. The dude barely ever seemed to leave (Kon was almost completely sure he actually owned the place, since he’d never seen any sort of manager and Tim’s hours seemed to work around his weird sleep patterns all too perfectly), and distraught was his general state of being, so. Normal day as far as he could see.

Still, he had to ask. “What is it today?”

Cassie, eyes never leaving her magazine, chin resting in one hand as the other one scratched at Tim’s scalp, snorted.

“A cute boy started working in the tattoo place next door. He came in for a morning fix, when Tim was barely awake, and he said something stupid, so he’s been having an existencial crisis ever since.”

“I said ‘you too’, Kon. He said ‘thanks for the coffee, I’ll enjoy it!’ and I said ‘you too’. What is wrong with me?”

Kon snorts a little. Tim doesn’t seem to be very interested in doing his actual work, so he just jumps over the counter and starts working the machines himself.

“You know that’s a question you can only ask your therapist, Tim, but if you need to know, I’d say you’re highly sleep deprived and a dysfunctional bi?”

At that, Tim does turn to look at him. There’s some cake frosting clinging to his eyelashes, and his hair is a mess. It looks cute, to be completely honest, and Kon has to leave his unfinished latte on the side so he can hug the little shit.

“Aw, don’t pout, Timbo. I’m sure he thought you were cute. Just try to sleep a bit more tonight, so when he comes back tomorrow you’ll be a little more alert and won’t embarrass yourself.”

“What do you mean, when he comes back?”

“I mean, if he works next door, he’ll probably get his morning coffees here all the time, right?”

That seemed to drive Tim back into the distraught spiral. He smashed his head back into the counter, making dying whale noises until Cassie’s hand returned to his scalp.

Kon privately thinks Tim’s life is starting to sound like fanfiction. He wonders which type of background character he would be, in it.

-.-.-.-.-.-

The shop is called F’coffee. That’s why Cassie is convinced Tim is the actual owner; no one else would really think that’s a proper name for a serious establishment. Kon isn’t convinced all the way yet, but with Bart on her side and Tim staying silent on the subject, it is just a matter of time until she convinces him it’s totally okay for him to do his gym routine there. She thinks, with Tim being his own boss, no one would tell him to stop it, and it would help his friend’s business to bloom with new customers.

The place's general aesthetic is exactly what you would expect, with old wooden tables, comfy chairs, potted plants hanging from the walls and tall windows just a little bit stained. The smell is constantly of the strongest brew Tim has, Death Coffee (which he’s actually not legally allowed to sell, so he keeps it for himself), and just setting a foot in makes her feel instantly awake. It's also always warm, and the sweets on display look mouth watering no matter your personal preferences.

In short, it looks like something out of a movie. It’s a tad too perfect for her friend, but she thinks it also fits his obsessive need for perfection.

Except for the board. Oh, the board. Cassie loves it more than life itself.

Tim has divided the drinks in categories. And made up names for all of them.

“Yes, hello! I’d like to order a grande, iced, sugar-free vanilla Latte, with soy milk, but I can’t seem to find it in your menu…”

Tim’s dead eyes turn to Cassie for a second, before facing his customer again.

“You’re probably looking into the Normal People section”, he points out, before raising his hand to signal a bit to the left. “There you have the Pain In The Ass selection. There’s nothing just like you asked, but you have the It’s Britney Bitch beverage, which is almost exactly the same except I’ll add a middle finger drawing in the cup and charge you extra for emotional damages. Also, we’re out of soy milk.”

Or…

“Hey, good morning! I’d like to order…”

Tim raised a hand, stopping the chirpy, good looking young man dead in his tracks.

“Don’t tell me, I know what you need. I’ll just go ahead and prepare it.”

“But you don’t even know what I/”

“You’ll have a Cougar Bait. It has cacao cream, a strawberry pucker and some grenadine seeds. I think it's fitting, for you.”

And also…

“Hey, hum… Sorry, I just have to ask… what’s on the ‘Barista’s heart’ drink?”

“Cacao powder, almond milk and espresso. Also some organic coconut ash, that gives it the blacker-than-night color, that’s just a shade lighter than my soul.”

“...noted.”

Cassie snorts into her cup of Jack it up (coffee that tastes just like a Jack Daniel’s; having Tim working here has opened up her eyes to the possibilities), watching as Tim makes his own usual.

“What’s in that one?” She asks, out of curiosity, when she’s sure there’s no other customer close by.

“Six espresso shots.”

She waits for a second. Tim finishes the drink, carefully handling the dark liquid inside his favorite plastic cup.

“...okay, and?”

“And that 's it.”

“Tim, that-- that would kill you?”

“Duh. Why did you think it was called The Last Sip?”

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

[thatsgay-writes]

Day 16

PREVIOUS

"Here they are, the brave young women whose tale of struggle and survival has gripped the nation." The host says as she sends the camera a smile. "The unsinkable nine, as we have come to know them. Ladies, you must have dreamed of coming home for so long. Now that you're here, what do you wanna do most?" She questions as she turns towards you and your friends. "Honestly, smoke about a hundred cigs, you know? Like, really rip through a carton or two." Dot starts as she leans forwards on the couch. The host gives her a slightly awkward smile, "Okay. How about the rest of you?"

"I don't know; Maybe hit up the OG for a never-ending pasta bowl and just... I don't know... Get back to our real lives." Toni says next followed by Nora. "I'd like to read the Odyssey again, rather than, like, live it." She jokes awkwardly, causing some of the girls to laugh in response. "Leah, what about you?" "Oh, um, I just wanna reconnect with certain people... People who may have been worried and-or felt like we had unfinished business. And if that person is watching right now, I just wanna say that I did not not miss you every day." You cringe at Leah's little monologue, still not feeling 100% about her after her fight with Shelby.

"My turn, Brooke, and I've got a nice, straight answer for you. I'm going to fuck the rowdiest guy with the biggest dick as soon as I fucking can." Fatin says, causing everyone to pause the fantasy you all shared and look at Fatin. Fatin turned to look at you, since you were at the end of the couch, and you couldn't contain your laugh. "Holy shit!" You belt out as you roll onto your side, "I don't think you can say that." You tell her after you finally catch your breathe. Fatin rolls her eyes, "Okay, make it more media-friendly. I am going to fornicate with the healthiest penis I can find ASAP." You let out a laugh at her newly formed answer.

After that, Dot changed her answer and Fatin got on Leah for her "emo shit show" answer and how Romeo's would be in everyone's DM's, before they finally started cheering over the fact that there was a chance to return home. "We're going home, bitches!" Martha yells as she holds up the bottle of vodka, causing all the other girls to cheer. You go to celebrate with them but notice how Shelby stays silent and slowly pulls away from the group. You watch her go, debating if you should follow her, as Toni helps you stand. Her face holds a large smile that slowly falls as she notices how distracted you are and that Shelby was walking away.

Ever since kissing Shelby, Toni had been confused on her feelings between the both of you. She had loved you for years but Shelby just had something so attracting about her. Unknown to her, you were having the same thoughts. "I'll, um... I'll be right back." You say as you pat Toni's hands that were still holding your own after helping you up. Toni just nods her head as you hop away after Shelby.

---

"You don't seem very excited..." You try and joke as you hop around the rock Shelby was sitting on, closing your mouth as soon as you see how sad she looks. You fidget nervously for a few seconds as Shelby doesn't respond to your presence. You let out a deep breathe before sitting down next to Shelby on the rock. "Are you okay?" You ask as you slowly reach out your hand to grabs hers. You move slowly so she has enough time to pull away but she doesn't. When you tangle your fingers with Shelby's, she finally reacts some and turns her head to look at you. She opens and closes her mouth a few times wanting to say something, but ultimately ends up closing it and shaking her head. You let out a sigh but nod your head. You lean forwards and cup one of her cheeks, giving her a quick kiss on the other one. Your face gains a small smile as you notice Shelby blush, "I'll leave you to your thoughts... If you ever need someone to vent to or a shoulder to lean on I'll be here." You tell her as you slowly stand up and start hopping back towards to other girls, missing how Shelby stared after you longingly.

---

As you get closer to the other girls, you smile as you hear them all laughing and joking around. "Oh, Martha, you're gonna be trippin motherfucking balls dude." You hear Fatin say as you finally reach the group and collapse next to Toni. Hopping around was not fun and you were going to need to find a walking stick or something soon. "And she won't be alone." Rachel says as she holds her hand out towards Fatin. Taking what looks to be a bag of gummy bears? You nudge Toni with your shoulder and send her a questioning look. "Martha ate edibles." She whispered to you before turning back to the group and reaching for the bag. You covered your mouth in shock and laughed at the fact that Martha, sweet and innocent Martha, ate edibles. "You want one y/n?" Toni asks as she holds one out towards you. You think about it for a second. Your doctors back at home would probably advise you not to get high but you had been feeling fine the past few days. "Why not." You answer as you take the gummy bear from Toni and pop it into your mouth.

---

"Marcus!?" You hear Martha yell out for the 5th time as almost everyone laid on the beach, high out of their minds. The only ones not laying down were Fatin, who looked like she was meditating, Shelby, who still hadn't returned from the rock, and you, who had taken a seat on Toni's back and kept tracing out random letters and shapes on her back. "I'm so fucking blissed out. Not even from the gummies, just from the thought that in 48 hours I can have an orgasm." Was the first thing Fatin had said in an hour, causing you to giggle and almost fall off of Toni's back. Unlike Toni, who always got more relaxed when she was high, you got more giggly, enthusiastic, and talkative. You being high rivaled Shelby's whole "Who wants to play an ice breaker?" persona.

"Wait? You haven't like self-induced?" Leah asks, seriously but still with a playful tone. "No, I can't do it with my hands actually. I have this weird cello-vibrato PTSD. It's a whole thing." Fatin responds, breezing over the subject. "So your electric toothbrush hasn't seen any action?" Dot asks causing you to laugh more and add on, "I mean we all kind of assumed." You send a wink Fatin's way before turning your attention back to Toni's back, effectively spacing out on the conversation.

When you do focus back onto everyone, it's from Toni tapping your thigh to get you to get up. "Huh?" "C'mon we're gonna go play in the water." Instead of standing up and hopping your way towards the ocean, you just roll of Toni's back and lay on your back in the sand. "I'm good... I think I'm just gonna lie here." Toni gives you a questioning look but you just push her thigh towards the water. "I'll be fineeeee, go have funnnnn." Toni rolls her eyes as you purposefully draw out words and follows the rest of the girls into the water.

You could hear the girls from where you laid, all of them letting out screams and laughs of joy. You would have joined but hopping around on one leg isn't fun and tired you out pretty quickly. You rolled onto your side once the sun felt too hot on your face and you noticed that Shelby hadn't joined in on the fun either. You contemplated going up to her and trying to talk to her or give her more space, but went with the first choice. If she had rejoined the group than maybe she would want some company now.

---

"Not a fan of the water?" You ask as you let yourself collapse next to Shelby, taking note how she now had the bottle of vodka and it had a less in it than it did before. "I... Um..." Shelby stuttered out as she purposefully did not make eye contact with you. "It's fine." You say with a shrug and lay on your side. "No need to talk, just relax." You say as you suddenly get hype fixated on making shapes and letters on her back. Missing the way she tensed up before finally relaxing. You spaced out again from what was going on, a common thing that happened when you were high.

---

The rest of the day blew by as everyone did their own thing. Nora and Rachel went off talked somewhere, you noticed that Toni and Shelby got into a argument, and you just chilled around with Fatin, Dot, and Leah, while Martha decided to adventure into the woods. "Guys! Guys! Guess what I just saw!?" Martha yells as she runs over the hill and back towards the group. "I just saw Marcus and he's alive!" She yells out, out of breath, causing everyone to laugh at how ridiculous she sounded. "No, guys, I'm being serious!" Martha defends and grabs the nearest person to her, Dot, and starts dragging her along. "C'mon, he's in the woods." Dot turns to give the group and exasperated look but you all decide to follow along.

You had your arm wrapped around Toni as you all journeyed through the woods. You had tried to get out of going, but Martha wanted everyone to go with her. "You're just saying that he, like, fucking pinocchio'd?" Dot asks, having not stopped laughing or joking about the situation since you all headed into the woods. "Yes. That is exactly what I am saying." Martha says in relief, missing that fact that Dot was still making fun of her. "He turned into a real boy." She finishes as you and Toni see Marcus... Who is still as fake as he was the day he was found. "I don't know, he kinda looks the same to me." Toni says as you release her arm so she can pick up Marcus. "Hey! My leg!" You say excitedly as you notice it laying under Marcus. When Fatin goes to kiss Marcus, you kiss your leg. It was all fun and games until Leah had to mention the fact that Marcus and your leg had been swept away but suddenly ended up in the middle of the forest. You had thought the same thing but hoped to just ignore that fact. "Leah. We're mellow. We're leaving."

---

"Oh Shelby, you love America so much. USA! USA!" Martha cheers, trying to get Shelby to join her but the other girl is completely zoned out. "Is she okay?" You and Toni ask at the same time. Both of you sharing an awkward look with each other, neither of you had told the other about your own kiss with Shelby. Luckily, Fatin isn't stuck in an unknown love triangle and walks over to Shelby. You all watch as Shelby starts to brush her hair, it seems to stay tangled no matter what she does. Until the brush gets stuck in her hair. Fatin attempts to help her but Shelby goes into full freak out mode. "It's all ruined." She says as she grabs the scissors out of Fatin's bag. Fatin attempts to stop her but Shelby was inconsolable.

"I don't' fucking want it! I don't want it!"

NEXT