#I always liked how she wrote about kids in difficult situations because I related to some of these kids

[bananahkim]

I loved reading Jacqueline Wilson’s books when I was a kid and now I’m reading them!!

[pennyserenade]

Hello! Hope you’re doing well!! I’m not sure you’d like followers to respond to/ interact with your posts w your thoughts in the tags but I just wanted to say that I totally agree w your thoughts on Coryo and Sejanus LOL. Im v surprised (tho I guess I shouldn’t be given how old I am at this point + the no. of fandoms I’ve been in) that people can read them so differently from the novel. Coryo is an unreliable narrator and that makes it kind of fun to read because his pov shouldn’t always be taken as the truth. In fact I think it’s fun to read how differently his peers view him/ his r/s w other people vs what he himself perceives. Sejanus is such a nice, sweet boy and it’s kinda sad that other people don’t read him that way just because the book is filtered through coryo’s thoughts haha. He’s kind and dares to stand up for what he believes in… I think the saddest thing abt his story is that he was genuinely trying to help others directly but unfortunately the people he spoke to weren’t the most honest/ dependable (I don’t think the stuff with the rebels would have gone down well) and he also trusted Coryo (I don’t blame him cause Coryo was the only “nice” person in the Capitol) 😭 I suppose that’s also how difficult it is to deal w people sometimes IRL (in extreme situations). Anyway ya just wanted to share my thoughts :x feel free to ignore if this isn’t something you’re ok with!!

hi nonie! i'm absolutely okay with followers interacting with my tags and posts/coming to talk about this stuff with me! as you can probably tell i've got a lot to say about this stuff - i'm just a chronic in the tag poster lol.

because suzanne collins wrote the ballad of songbirds and snakes in a third person point of view, i think that readers have taken to assuming that what they're getting is an unbiased narrator, when in fact we are still very much getting a biased point of view from coriolanus. sure, we are distanced from his thoughts--not exactly seeing things through his eyes as we did with katniss--but that doesn't mean we don't have access to him and that his thoughts aren't distorting what we are seeing. i've thought a lot about the reasons suzanne collins might've chosen to use third person pov when she used a first person pov for the rest of the novels, and i don't think there was one definite reason. some of the brilliance of suzanne collins' writing lies in the fact that you do have derive these meanings for yourself at times. personally, i like to think that she chose to use third person pov because this story, while very much coriolanus-centric, belonged to characters like sejanus plinth and lucy gray, too.

the fact that this book came out during the trump's presidency isn't at all lost on me. i think what suzanne collins was saying was: look how badly this system failed this once privileged white boy. for all intents and purposes this should make him angry, and here are these district kids who have suffered just as he has. he can relate more to them than he can to any of his capital peers. he knows what it is to hunger and suffer and fight for your life every day, to be made to perform. when coriolanus turns his back on sejanus plinth and lucy gray baird, it is so tragic because he was meant to side with them and yet at the end of the day he turned his back on them because he wanted to be with 'his people.' he upheld this system that had so failed him because he thought people like lucy gray and sejanus plinth were primitive and less than because that's the mindless shit he had been fed his entire life. this is exactly what happened during that election. i've seen countless white people, who are every bit as poor and destitute as the immigrants that seek to come to this country for help -- if not more -- turn their back on them and support trump. even the poorest of whites think they are better than the richest of latinos or black people because this what their systems teach them, and it makes them feel good to think that.

i think that's why sejanus was district 2 turned capital. i believe that this was commentary on how, no matter how far poc and/or immigrants come, these white people will always view them as less than and that the system will never be forgiving of them. i do genuinely believe that coriolanus thought that sejanus' parents would save him in the end, and the fact that they couldn't was so shocking because he had, up until that point, seen the ways wealth had benefited plinth. he could not conceptualize a world where wealth wouldn't get a person what they wanted because he did not know what it was to be district. they did not see sejanus plinth, heir to the plinth fortune. they saw a district rat, a nameless, faceless traitor to kill. it is no surprise that coriolanus snow climbed to the top on the back of sejanus plinth tragic ending, because that's simply what happens every day.

i do understand and don't absolutely hate the conversations people have surrounding sejanus' privilege and what he chose to do with it/ what he chose not to do, but i think to consider sejanus an annoying, selfish character is erroneous. he was a boy who knew that this system would never favor him and was trying his best to envision a world where it might, and yes he did make stupid rash decisions, but at the end of the day what killed him was coriolanus snow and snow's desire for power. sejanus plinth was not stupid for trusting coriolanus snow, either; coriolanus snow was evil for betraying the boy's trust for his own self-serving agenda.

it is hard to live in a world like this. even as a white woman with a mexican father, i have have had to experience the kind of things sejanus did with people talking poorly about him and his family behind his back, and openly to his face. i am not accepted by either side and never will be, just as he wasn't. i will say i do experience immense privilege because of the color of my skin, and i won't ever pretend that i don't know that, but that's what i'm talking about: no matter how much i look like them, and act like them, i will always be a mexican's daughter and i am happy about that fact. i am mexican as much as i am white but it doesn't make the fight i have to struggle because of it any more fun.

[fae-morrigan]

Hi! I’ve seen your headcanon of jayjon having a bio daughter and I wanted to ask about your thought process on that? Like how would they go about bringing that up (having one biologically)? And then how they might react to finding out they are pregnant? Honestly, I’m just very interested in hearing more about the daughter you have for them if you’re interested in talking about her more

Hi!!! so glad someone asked me about this I was literally just thinking about it!!!

I think originally my thought process was: The gang and I were discussing fankids. And I made one because I am unable to stop myself from making OCs related to characters I like. And then all the other stuff around that came after. Under the cut for discussions of trans pregnancy, which can be rough for some trans people (including me sometimes!):

I think the conversation is a bit of a difficult one for the two of them. Jon doesn't want to pressure Jay into anything, and Jay has complicated feelings on the subject (as most transmascs do like myself heyo), but they both want a kid. I think its a lot of deliberating on whether or not the choice to have a bio kid is right for them as people, and it probably comes up after someone else in their circle has a kid (Maybe its a discussion prompted by Lizzie being adopted by Diana and that whole situation). Its not a decision they come to quickly, they go back and forth on the pros and cons for years. Its something they decide eventually after Jay does a lot of thinking on it. They both want to be dads, and I think Jay kind of gets to the point where he realizes he's comfortable enough with himself to do it. Its a matter of being able to choose for his own body, which hasn't always been a privilege Jay had access to (as a victim of medical torture and all). Finding out is a different story. I think it maybe happens while Jon is off world so Jay is VERY stressed waiting for him to come back. Nat and Lois are some of the first people to know because Jay's freaking out so hard. The two of them share a lot of the uncertainties that Clark and Lois did: What if something goes wrong? Especially with Jay, who's got his phasing powers? Its probably a very difficult experience physically and mentally on the both of them (Jay especially), something they are like "Alright we're only doing this one time."

I've been calling her Dahlia. I wrote a fic about this once, I think they name her after the first flower Jon saw upon escaping Ultraman on Earth-3. A symbol of hope and survival. Much like her fathers before her, she is a WILD kid. Develops her powers early, likes to bite strangers, very Muffin from Bluey energy. Jon gets Lizzie to babysit not as a valuable lesson but as REVENGE.

They're very careful with her. Neither wants to repeat their parents mistakes, and they try and instill as much confidence in her as they possibly can. She takes it to heart- I think she ends up becoming a hero like they did, but not because she felt she had to, but because she wanted to. Its very bittersweet for Jay and Jon.

All of their family are super involved. Damian especially resolves to be the greatest Uncle ever (he and Osul are in constant competition over this). With Sara gone, Jay basically doesn't have anyone left to our knowledge, so I think passing on his culture to her is also a very sad but sweet affair to him.

[meichenxi]

tldr; autistic parents are fantastic and fuck you if you think otherwise, signed, a disaster queer adhd daughter

So on the back of a lot of negative stuff I've been coming across recently I wanted to take a moment and talk about my dad. He is autistic and chronically ill, and has been unable to hold a job down since I was eight or nine. He only ever responds with brutal, crushing honesty when I ask him how he is (and as he's chronically ill, the answers are rarely fun); he doesn't have any close relationships with any other adults and is so afraid of crowds he sprints through them leaving the children to run after him as best they can; he very rarely told me I was doing well and never seemed to understand my point of view, much less my mother's; he would never talk about anything other than bloody knitting, rocks or conservation, he could eat approximately 0.5 foods but also had no job to buy anything better; he frequently goes around naked because 'it feels nice' causing me to SCREAM -

He's my favourite person in the entire world.

Growing up, there were so many things he taught me. His special interests were geology, nature conservation, wildlife gardening, taiji, mythology and knitting. When we were kids, we went out for long walks for miles and miles in the drizzling British countryside - when I was young, my brother and mum would lag behind and me and my dad would skip ahead, jumping over the rocks, and he'd tell with great excitement why THAT twisty line of quartz was actually less exciting that this outcrop here; he'd teach me about the Salmon of Wisdom and the folk that live over the sea and never grow old, and impress on me with utter seriousness how I must never tell a stranger my name unless they tell me theirs first; he'd sit down with me and draw patterns for a jumper he was thinking of in the mud with a stick, and then we'd have a sword fight. I never understood half of the things he told me, but listened with wonder, because he was my dad, and he knew everything.

When I was a little older, we made up stories that lasted for hours, and memorised poetry together from Lord of the Rings (because THERE our interests collided with galactic force) and he'd do all of the voices just perfectly. We went one whole summer just quoting LOTR to each other, and it was our little secret: Mum might hear 'Yes,' but only I would hear what came after: 'Yes,' said Frodo, or 'Yes!' cried Boromir. And when I told him my story about a woman who lived in a volcano he listened quietly and told me that that wasn't how volcanoes worked, but that he could help me write it better.

Everybody's autism is different. For my dad, it rendered him completely incapable to work and was paralysing in social situations, but when it was just me and him, he told the most wonderful stories. I wanted to be a geologist just listening to his voice, and then a writer, and then finally someone who understood the land like he did and the sea.

And he made me feel normal. He made me feel heard. With my mum, as much as I loved her, I would get vague noises of assent as she struggled to look after everybody in this damn house, or irritable 'Would you just be quiet for ONE second?' I was a talented kid, and everybody praised me at pretty much everything: but the only person who would consider anything I wrote like it was an adult's writing, with seriousness and criticism, was my dad. He didn't tell me I did well often. Instead he would take my picture, or my writing, and look at it with great seriousness, and ask me WHY the Queen was so intent on kidnapping beautiful princesses in the first place. I could trust him to tell me whether I did something well or not, because he never, never lied. Not to please me, and not to please anyone. It cost him his marriage and his job, but it was a rock of stability in my life : my mother was volatile, frequently furious enough to resort to violence, and she lied and laughed and told us what we wanted to hear, but he was always reliable. If he was angry, we knew.

When I spoke for hours about my languages, he listened, nodded, and then spoke about his plants. It was a perfect give and take because I didn't expect him to care about my languages, and he never expected me to care about his plants. We just cared about the other.

And when I didn't make any friends and couldn't interact with the other children without despair he was always there with a silent offer of a bike ride, or catch in the park. He was always the fittest person I knew, despite his illness. He had lots of grand ideas - once he climbed the tree outside our house and tried to rig up a platform fifteen metres above the ground. After three days he was inconsolable. He wouldn't speak, he just sat there. But a few days later he started drawing up plans and attacked it again, and this time it worked.

My dad is great for a lot of reasons, and difficult for a lot of reasons too. Some of these are just him - but some are specifically related to his autism, and I think it's important that we talk about that too, especially in the context of parenthood. Because we see a lot of positivity about young autistic adults and kids, but older adults are just as valuable and just as in need of support and recognition, particularly because they may have gone through so much. My dad was made to stand in a bucket of urine for three days as a kid to 'pull himself together'. Spoilers: it didn't work.

And I'm not autistic myself, but many of my ADHD behaviours are so much easier around him because he just. gets it. If I don't like a certain food because of the texture, he never buys it again - I don't need to explain myself. We leave all social events early, which is wonderful because he is very stressed and I am either so high on adrenaline I'm in danger of injuring myself or exhausted to the point of not being able to talk. We run through crowds together because he hates crowds and I like the chance to stretch my legs. We don't touch or keep in contact very much, because neither of us see the point or like small talk, and I'm terrible at messaging anyone, but I know (and he knows) as soon as we need each other we're there. We do handstands on the beach together and he points out plants on the way back along with their Latin names. He never bothers me about talking to my friends or stopping clowning and watching my stupid shows or spending ten hours a day on Chinese or Tolkien. He never mocks me for needing space and time after anything. We lie on the concrete together because it's so damned warm and nice and adgshhhhh. We spend hours playing taiji and doing push hands in the kitchen, and our 'love language', if you will, is him trying to throw me to the ground. We both get 100% of our emotional intelligence from books, and in any arguments can use this to great effect. I talk at him for an hour, and then he talks at me for an hour. I know so much about fucking willow trees.

So people who say that autistic parents are cold and incapable of care? My dad was the most sincere, honest and helpful parent a child could have ever asked for. Things were difficult, but it helped me understand that parents too have needs, and that adults are all just grown up kids trying their best. I didn't know why he was different as a kid, and I didn't much care - I just wanted to be a geologist like my daddy.

[mbti-notes]

Anon wrote: Hi, mbti notes, how are you? I am writing because I really need your help. I am an INFJ and I am going through a difficult process in my new job.

I always wanted to be a teacher and be part of a good school, be part of children's learning process. Be there for them. And I got the job as a Teacher Assistant in a really good bilingual school (my native language is Spanish). Their mission says their approach is being flexible, respect different cultures and excellence. I really got interested in that.

However, it has been 3 days here and I have found many things that left me having mixed feelings about my job. I know these mixed feelings are related to the fact I have Borderline as well, so I'm in a constant idealization/devaluation process about everything in my life.

So, first thing: I believe if you are a teacher, specially a teacher of 1st grade at school, you have the responsibility of helping the children to learn, to listen to them, to empathize with them, to understand their concerns, etc. As being a child determines a lot about your mental health as an adult.

However, I have found that one teacher uses shame and guilt to make the children understand they are doing things wrong. She focuses too much on telling them what they are doing wrong and doesn't really tell me them what they're doing right. She doesn't try to explain the reasons behind her orders, she just tells them what to do and expect them to do it right away, if they dont then she shames on them. I find it... Weird. Wrong. Uncomfortable because I don't agree those are good methods for them to learn. You can see in their faces they don't feel right.

Also, another teacher I have been assisting. She told me she has a lot of anxiety and avoids confrontation. I understand that. However, today the kids were playing soccer and when they came back, one of them was crying and saying things like "you NEVER want to pass me the ball", "you don't want to play with me", and kids instead of empathizing with him, told him "it's just that you need to be faster, you're too slow, u need to practice a lot" and he cried more and said "I am going as fast as I can. I am always practicing!". He seemed devastated because of the rejection of his friends.

I was handling the situation, asking them what happened, and then the teacher came. I was still talking to them, trying to make them understand that it is not only about competition but having fun with your friends and that he wasn't feeling ok and needed an apology. But the teacher interrupted saying "done!! I don't want to hear anything else from that class! It's english class now! Everyone sit!"

Everyone sit but then I approached the kid crying and was comforting him and telling him next week he was going to play. His friend responded "i was slow too! You need to practice all the games to be faster!". I was going to tell him that how would he feel if the same happened to him but the teacher started interrupting abruptly once again "I don't want to hear nothing else about the subject! Let's begin with english class!".

I froze and didn't know what to do. She didn't care the kid was crying. Actually she encourage to not care about it, making others children to say "stop crying!" To the kid. He was obviously hurt and was looking for comfort from his friends. He is really sensitive and emotional. He wanted to feel included but instead they just shame on him for crying and expressing himself.

I didn't feel comfortable with that either. I felt powerless because I am nothing else but an assistant and I know things has been this way since a long time ago before I got here. I don't feel in the position to say anything to anyone. I bet they have more experience than I do teaching. But I have always been loved and respected by my students because that's what I provide to them as well. And I don't feel they care about their kids or think about how their ways are going to affect their mental health while growing. So I have mixed feelings and feel confused.

What should I do about this situation? Am I overreacting? Am I taking it too personal? Should I just ignore what they're doing and adapt to their ways? That doesn't feel right for me. Please give me some advice. Thanks you for ur help!

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As a general point, not about this particular situation: Young and idealistic INFJs should be careful about projecting their worldview on everyone. While it's good to be a caring and respectful person, not everyone is as sensitive as you, and not everyone needs as much emotional processing as you do. Your way of teaching won't fit everyone equally well. The good thing is that kids are very resilient and able to brush off things that you might not be able to brush off. Oftentimes, they don't take things as seriously as you do, unless they have a particularly serious temperament. Don't put pressure on yourself to be the perfect teacher for every student, as perfectionism isn't a good thing to pass on to them. INFJs often have the impulse to remove all pain and suffering from their own life and, by extension, the lives of the people they care about. However, that's not always a good thing. Human beings require a certain amount of stress, challenge, and hardship to grow in life. Keep that in mind when you're dealing with students' emotions.

If you want to be a teacher in a large school system, you have to consider more than just your relationship to the students. Yes, you care about the students and they generally like you. However, you won't be able to do your job well without the full support of your superiors and colleagues. In other words, teaching is a team effort.

I understand the desire to correct the wrongs you see - it's a noble intention. However, without enough forethought, impulsive efforts to buck the system might only backfire on you and perhaps even the students. For example: You might derail your career by branding yourself as obstinate. You might sabotage another teacher's work by adding even more stress to their plate. You might make an enemy who will sabotage your work. You might make a teacher even more abusive to their students by confronting them the wrong way.

Of course, verbal/emotional abuse is unacceptable. Ideally, a good school should have practical guidelines and procedures in place for dealing with such situations, but many don't. If you determine the teacher's behavior to be abusive, by all means, do something about it. What you should remember, though, is that there are many ways to address a problem. Acting out angrily or calling a person out on the spot isn't always the best way to stop their bad behavior, especially if you inadvertently humiliate them or make them defensive.

In my experience, teachers don't get into teaching because they hate kids. They want to be helpful and they want to be a good influence, but the reality of teaching doesn't always cooperate with them. It's a very stressful job and teachers are human after all. You're so supportive and empathetic of the students, which allows you to help them well. Perhaps you need to extend some of that empathy to the teachers, as part of being a good team player, if you hope to discover a way to be part of their improvement as well. What's more important to you, to punish bad behavior or to change it?

School is often full of high pressure situations, which means that stress often distorts people's reactions. There are a lot of students to mind and not much time to attend to each and every student's needs in the exact moment they need help. As an assistant, you don't have the power to change everything or help every student all the time. All you can do is choose the most appropriate time and place for helping students wisely. Before you jump into action, reflect on the best course of action. Mitigate unintended consequences and ensure that you'll get the outcome you want. I agree with you that the education system is full of problems, but the problems are very complicated, which means that the solutions will not be as simple as you first believe. You will realize this with more experience.

[well-in-all-honesty-i]

TW: Suicide

OKAY SO- I wanted to talk about Mafuyu and Yuki’s relationship and why it ended the way it did. I should preface this by saying that the majority of this, although somewhat supported by canon, is my own personal headcanon and speculation. I’ve been surrounded by a lot of people who I believe Yuki to be similar to, but I am not 100% accurate or well versed and this is mostly just from what I’ve gotten from those situations. Also, a lot of questionable grammar-I type like I speak, which doesn't translate well haha.

So I want to chunk this into 3 big pieces because I enjoy organizing things: Yuki’s childhood, how that affected his personality as a young adult, and how both of these lead to his eventual death.

Starting off with his childhood:

This one is heavy speculation (as most of this is-but this bit is particularly so) since there isn’t much canon to support this-or provide a lot of insight. But, what little we do know is that 1) Yuki’s father wasn’t present in his life-probably even before Mafuyu’s father had been jailed-and that, 2) Yuki and his father shared the same bull-headedness (?) and pride that Saeko believes led to his death.

I personally believe that Yuki’s father was someone who might have struggled with some sort of mental illness, as well as has had a problem with alcohol abuse. I also imagine that he probably disappeared or passed-either due to some sort of alcohol-related problem or suicide.

Saeko, from how she is characterized in the story, seems to be a very strong-willed and assertive person. In the aftermath of Yuki’s death, she's relatively composed and seems to have almost expected this to happen, although maybe not in the specific way it did. [Ex: When she tells Mafuyu that Yuki was always the type of person to die in a chicken race (a competition of pride, of sorts, that usually ends badly) and when she mentions him being similar to his father in that sense.]

In the flashbacks in the anime, when Mafuyu tells Yuki that his father beats him when he talks, Yuki’s response of ‘You know, a real father doesn’t do that.’ doesn’t sound like something a small child’s first response would be. It’s a bit of a reach-but considering that, as well as how prompt the response from his mother seemed to be (when Mafuyu’s father was jailed-not much time seems to have passed, and since both of their mothers are present, I've always assumed that Yuki's mother found out through her son and acted accordingly.),- it would make sense that Yuki might have some prior experience with this. Especially if his mother had gone through something similar-she probably would’ve warned him very strongly against the ideal his father had set, making Yuki want to be very far from that.

Speaking of which-I assume that Yuki probably had a very rough-if short-lived-relationship with his father when he was around. Given the stuff above, his father was probably someone who was emotionally volatile and tended to lose control when upset. If he had an alcohol problem, he might’ve caused a financial strain that fell onto Saeko as well.

Since his father was out of the picture and Saeko herself wasn't around as much as Yuki might've needed, it would have made him both very independent from his parents and adults in general, while also heavily reliant on Mafuyu (Hiiragi quotes both Mafuyu and Yuki to have been latchkey kids who found comfort in each other), both of which twist into the situation he found himself in later in life.

Leading into his teen years:

Yuki, as a young adult, is very independent-he works multiple jobs to pay for the expenses of being in a band, makes a point to avoid drinking, and is very affectionate towards Mafuyu. I'm not too sure about the reasoning behind why the four friends chose the high schools they did, but if Yuki's mother didn't directly influence that decision it's likely it was a choice made in direct relation to their band.

There's also very little interference from any adults in Yuki's life-namely, his mother. As someone who was probably very busy working as a single mother to support the two of them, her mentality was just to support him monetarily and let Mafuyu provide the emotional support in her place.

I think she also assumed her attempts wouldn't have been well received-most people noted how close Yuki and Mafuyu were and seemed to always assume that they had each other handled and that nobody had to worry about either of them because of it. In every way, it was simply easier to show Yuki she cared by not interfering and letting him hold the reigns of his own life.

A big indicator of this idea for me what when Saeko talked about how Yuki ordered his own ramen, the type he liked. It's a small thing, but it started me to read because it highlighted the amount of input his mother had on his life; which was very little. I don't know if he even used her money or chose to use the extra from his jobs to pay for it, but either way, it sort of put their relationship into perspective.

The impact it had:

Yuki probably had a lot of resentment towards his father, or, at the very least, a desire to turn out different. And oftentimes when a person is very strongly trying to avoid turning out like someone, they ignore or avoid acknowledging the similarities, rather than accepting and working on them to properly change. Without a strong parental/adult figure in his life, he wouldn't have considered insight beyond his own experiences. He's characterized to be moody and domineering, and Mafuyu is too soft-spoken to have brought up most issues until it reached its boiling point.

I believe Yuki might have had Borderline Personality Disorder to a mild extent. Some symptoms of BPD are mood swings, impulsivity, impaired social relationships, and a distorted self-image. They usually have thoughts of suicide or self-harming tendencies. When they feel insecure in relationships, in which they’re usually very, very invested, they tend to lash out or do rash things to keep them close.

Based on my relationships with the borderline people in my life, I've noticed that they usually bounce between having great confidence in themselves, to being incredibly insecure. It's hard to explain specifically, but they walk a fine line of being insecure and also maintaining a painfully strong ego, which makes them react very strongly when provoked, intentionally or not. Yuki and Mafuyu have a different type of relationship than I do with those people in my life which, for the two of them, means that Mafuyu probably had to provide lots of emotional support for Yuki, while also under the mild threat of Yuki coming to harm by his own actions.

Being with someone with these tendencies who is also unaware of them is very draining, especially for someone as mild and soft-spoken as Mafuyu is. Yuki tended to lead their relationship and was probably very noticeable when upset-and for someone who might not be used to speaking up or someone who has low self-confidence, it is difficult to bring up things. It doesn't feel safe if you don't know exactly how it would be received. Especially if they are the person you are closest to, it can be anxiety-inducing to try and bring up problems that don't seem to be incredibly important or unavoidable.

So, long story short-Yuki was closed off to receiving any kind of proper advice or criticism that would've saved him. Another symptom of BPD, as mentioned before, is suicidal ideation. So, if all these things are combined, it's a lot easier to see how he, surrounded by only his thoughts and ideas, would make the choice to take his own life when provoked.

It wasn't specifically that Mafuyu had caused his death, but more that he just sent him over the edge he had been teetering on for a long while. He was like his father in the sense that they had the same flaws that just came from different places. Yuki's pride came from the flip side of his insecurities and his own early independence, and his mental health issues as a whole are probably hereditary. The specificities of his death, where Yuki drinks after avoiding alcohol for his entire life, feels like he failed in his effort to avoid being like his father. He was different as a person but in the end, their flaws aligned and brought them to their end in parallels to each other.

Calling back to what his mom said-it doesn't feel unexpected. It is shocking, but not a surprise. Yuki was fiercely independent and wanted to learn and do new things, all on his own-including his own death and whatever follows after.

[I wrote this a while back and didn’t really like how most of it was speculation and hard to prove-but decided to post it anyway because I spent too much time on it lol.

Like I said before, most of this is just my head canons, but I hope it made sense! Feel free to add on with your stuff/arguments/headcanons :)]

[potatoqueensays]

Okay okay so I may have wrote an Irondad drabble. It's kinda like a character study or something, idk I just came up with it and was like yeah let's do this. I hope you enjoy!!

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My World Isn't Perfect Without You In It

3,004 words

It started as a simple feeling.

Tony was in his lab with Peter on one of their lab days, as they always were on Fridays. He would work with the kid after Happy picked him up and they would work on whatever their genius hearts desired.

Tony didn't really find himself looking at Peter with pride until Pepper pointed it out to him, she would comment on how he seemed like a Dad all of a sudden with the kid hanging around more.

He would always deny it with that Stark charm of his of course, deflecting was one of his main traits when it came to his feelings.

"Pep, motherhood may look nice on you, but fatherhood isn't kind for me you know." Flattery was said to get you places, but Pepper was known for never taking his BS.

"Tony, I can tell the way you look at him, you love him, whether you want to face it or not." She grinned at him, she was always right, even if he didn't like to admit it sometimes.

He thought back to her words frequently, picking up on how his heart swelled with pride and warmth when Peter looked at him for approval, or whenever he would get a question right, or even when Tony himself was having a bit of trouble with an equation, and he was Tony Stark, he could do anything!

The kid wormed his way into Tony's cold heart, thawed down his icy walls with a flamethrower and melted his heart into a puddle of goo.

The billionaire could never understand how he became so fond of the kid so quickly, but he always knew the reasons he liked the kid. He was so selfless, kind, and brave. A true hero at heart and much better than Tony even thought he would be, he was everything Tony wasn't and more.

He wasn't even jealous at the kid when he would steal the light, his own best friend becoming fond of the kid and mentioning how he was practically his kid.

"Platypus, he's not a Stark, in any way shape or form."

"He may not be blood related to you Tones, but he's your son in everything else, he has your brains even, maybe even smarter than you!" Rhodey teased.

"I'm wounded, Honey-Bear." He placed a hand over his heart in mock hurt.

"Oh hush, you know it better than anyone else."

And if he did, he would never say it up front.

He was proud of the kid even in his worst moments. He would try to console the kid when he came to him for help when close to a panic attack (which broke the hero's heart, the poor kid didn't deserve any of the unfair treatment the world had, it was too cruel for such a pure hearted kid like Peter.) or when he had a nightmare when staying over at the tower.

Tony wasn't always the most physically affectionate, he would give pats on the shoulder or back, arms around shoulders to keep the person close, and side hugs, even if he didn't do full ones.

When it came to Peter however, he slowly broke out of his shell of that. He kept a hand gently over the back of the boy's neck, sometimes playing with the curls that rested there, occasionally giving a reassuring squeeze when Peter seemed a bit nervous or highstrung. It always got rid of a little of his own stress when the boy would lean into his touch, side hugs and pats on the shoulder were gladly accepted.

Even the occasional hand holding when the kid was kept in the med-bay after a stressful mission or patrol, he would keep his hand over the boy's pulse point to reassure himself that the kid was alive and well. He would keep one hand over the kid's wrist while he worked on his suit, improving how he could make sure the current problems never happened again, whether it be even a scratch or a stab wound, he wouldn't let Peter get hurt on his watch.

He would always keep an eye on the kid, letting Peter know that he could call whenever he felt he needed something, maybe even just to chat, the billionaire found himself even endeared to the chatter that came from the spider-kid, it was a nice comforting constant to fill the silence in his life, even if he worked in his suits with FRIDAY blasting AC/DC, he seemed to have a better preference for the chatty kid. He would invest himself in listening to what happened in his day, to what him and Ted did over the week, and even hearing about how Aunt May burned water when trying to boil pasta.

He was fond of the kid, the feeling that was so simple at the start but steadily increasing over time and getting fiercer and stronger with each visit to the med-bay or after every movie night that eventually had the boy cuddled up to him. It grew into a surge of protectiveness, a very parental feeling and yearning to make his the kid happy.

So yeah, he was fond.

He was in too deep, as he wanted the kid by his side for as long as he could have him in fact, he begun to realize that yeah, he liked the kid and was fond of his company, but even more so.

He loved the kid.

He loved Peter.

Tony had a crisis when he was having a revelation about his feelings towards the younger hero.

He felt parental, even if he kept denying the fact when everybody knew how he felt before himself. Even if he tried to hide his grin whenever the kid's smile lit up a room, even if he kept rolling his eyes affectionately and ruffled the kid's curls when they bantered.

So yeah, he loved him.

Loving was dangerous however, loving got you in difficult situations where you don't think and sometimes your actions get out of hand with how much you care.

He cared about Peter with his iron heart, he cared about the boy so loudly in fact it would almost creep those three words up into his throat when he loved too fiercely with kid.

That's how he found himself in a very dangerous situation.

Peter was hurt, badly.

And it was his fault because he loved him, he was someone he got too close to and now it was his fault.

He stayed too close even when he should have remained at arms length, but the kid had to get close.

The bullet was supposed to be for Tony, not Peter, but the kid saw it coming from a mile away and pushed the iron clad man away from the aim of fire and taking the punishment with all the confidence of a self sacrificing idiot.

Peter was laid up in the med-bay as Cho and her helpers ran around to try and nurse the kid, while Tony was trapped in his own mind with how much he let Peter get too close, how he didn't notice that the kid obviously loved him too, so much in fact that he took a bullet for him, when Tony specifically told him not to if something like that happened.

He couldn't find it in his heart to be angry at the kid, no matter how much he wanted to be, he wanted to scream and shout and punch the walls, blame the universe for giving him someone so precious and kind that he would ruin completely, to rip apart a kid's life. It was his fault that the kid was by his side now, wanting to be an avenger because he took him to Germany just to win a fight against his own team, his own family. Or what he thought was.

He was pushed out of his thoughts by a hand on his shoulder, Rhodey's comforting voice making it's way to the man in armor, ridding him of the terrible thoughts and guilt that went through him.

"He'll be okay Tones, he's tough, he can handle it, he always does." Rhodey reasoned, trying to take Tony down from his tower of guilt.

"But he shouldn't have to."

"He did what he did because he cares, I know you would do it in a heartbeat if he was the one about to be shot."

"Because that's how it should be, I'm the adult, and he's the kid. He's just a child, Rhodey, a child." The older hero sighed, his face visible as his helmet was open, anyone could easily see his terror and distress. He tried to tear his eyes away from the frittering med staff, but he could only think of Peter. His Peter. His self sacrificing kid that he loved too much, and now it had gotten him hurt, the panic gripping his chest like a vice and not letting go as he feared what worse could have happened to his kid.

"Listen, he'll be okay, I know it." There was no room for argument with his tone, even if Tony wanted to, he needed to be at Peter's bedside, he was always there no matter what, even if he was mad or trying not to think about his guilt, the boy's presence always seemed to calm him.

The hero sighed softly, nodding even though panic rested comfortably in his chest.

He had cleaned himself up after the fight, after seeing Peter taken away from his side as he bled out and was in pain, even under the mask for the spider-suit, Tony could tell by the way the white eyes of the mask were pinched. It haunted him how he thought of Peter's bambi eyes shining with unshed tears and pain under that mask, those bright doe eyes filled with innocence and brilliance.

He remained stationary by the kid's bedside as he was finally left alone in his room, his accelerated healing luckily used in this moment. Helen had said the bullet hadn't hit any major arteries or organs, so that was a plus, but it still was agonizing to think of the boy in any sort of pain, or to even think of Peter leaving his side. If that happened, he didn't know what he would do. If he didn't have Pepper he would certainly lose it.

He just loved the kid too much to let him suffer.

He had his Stark-Pad resting in his lap as he held onto Peter's wrist, the feeling of the pulse underneath his fingers much more reassuring than the beep of the heart monitor. He kept his eyes focusing back between the notes he had down for what he could improve on Peter's suit and on the kid himself, eyeing his chest to check his breathing and checking the face of the boy in case he was going to wake up anytime soon.

He looked at the features of the boy, taking in the curls swept over his forehead, they were always gelled back no matter how much Tony joked about it. He never had a problem with it, but it was always pleasing to know how the boy liked a hand combing through his curls, whether it be his aunt to Tony himself. His face always bright with a smile that reached to his chocolate doe eyes, shining with talent and excitement for everything and anything. From Star Wars to how the Iron Man suit worked, he was always so smart and inquisitive. The boy was a ray of sunshine in Tony's bleak life. Yes he had Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy, he loved them all to bits and they made his life so much better, but loving Peter was different. He was his son in everything but blood, and that didn't even matter. He was a bright light that warmed up even the coldest of hearts, thawing right through to make anyone wrapped around his little finger.

Tony loved him.

He realized he was looking too much at the boy and swiftly changed to reading the schematics of the spider-suit, although he didn't read far when he heard a small sigh coming from in front of him. He looked up to see those bright and beautiful doe eyes looking up at him with that same amount of adoration that made Tony's heart want to burst, he didn't deserve the kid in the slightest, but here he was with him.

"Good afternoon, bambi." He said softly, aware of how Peter was sensitive his surroundings after waking up in the med-bay, the lights always at a dimmer power than normal to accustom to the spider-boy.

"Hi Mstr' Strk'." The boy slurred, still tired from just waking up and having pain reducing drugs in his system. The man carefully let go of the boy's wrist to hit the button that alerted Helen that her patient was awake, he almost missed the small whine that came from the younger hero at the loss of contact, it cut right through his heart.

"I'm here kiddo, don't worry." He held onto the boy's wrist again, fingers resting over the pulse point with quick muscle memory at this point.

"M' srry.." The boy mumbled, relaxing slightly as he registered the touch again, wide bambi eyes drooping sightly in relief.

"What are you sorry for, kiddo?" The man wondered. Peter always apologized, whether it be for something as small as dropping a pencil or bumping into a dog. He had such good manners.

"Ar' you mad a' me?" The boy's speech improving only a little as his enhanced metabolism burned through the painkillers.

Ah, so that explains it, he was worried the billionaire was mad at him. He gently rubbed a circle into the boy's wrist with his hand, comforting the kid into relaxing and not stressing when he needed to heal and get rest.

The man softly sighed and put the Stark-Pad away on the side table, scooting a little closer to the cot as he could look the kid better in the eye.

"No bud, I'm not mad, anymore. But you worried me a lot, I have a heart condition you know." He moved his free hand to go over the boy's front curls that hung in front of his eyes, getting to see those baby browns even better as the kid leaned into the soft touch.

"I knda' had to, you'd do it too.." The kid had a point, as it was similar to Rhodey's, even Pepper would say something like that, and she was always right, so that had to mean that Rhodey and Peter were too.

"That's different Pete. You're a kid and I'm an adult, we seniors kinda have to take the bullet. Figuratively and literally." He chided gently.

The boy let out a small huff of frustrated air, which was absolutely adorable as his nose scrunched up and he eyed Tony with what was presumably a glare that equalled the look of a puppy.

"But we gotta prtect' each other, otherwise you'd get hurt much worse." He brought up matter of factly.

"Well, maybe that's a risk I gotta take for spider-babies like you." Tony provided ruefully.

"Nt' a baby."

Well you're my spider-baby. He almost wanted to say.

Luckily he was saved by Helen Cho coming in to do a small checkup on Peter, looking over his vitals and smiling softly at her patient.

"Hello Peter, how are you feeling? Any pain?" She eyed over her clipboard presumably to check over his vitals and wounds again, being very perceptive to how Peter responded.

"M' fine, jus' a little sore." At that, Helen nodded and worked on administering a little medicine into his system, making the boy sigh gratefully at that. Both Cho and Tony knew when Peter said he felt a little pain it meant more than he played it as.

"I'll be back in a couple more hours, get some rest okay?"

Peter nodded at that and watched as she left the room, now alone with his father figure mentor once again. He looked over at Tony with a dopey smile, looking very tired now, he was bound to fall asleep. He sightly tugged on the man's arm, they both know that was to invite the man to cuddle, which they never brought up out loud, but they both knew the other enjoyed it greatly. It helped assure Tony that Peter was safe and there, while Peter got comfort and protection.

The man sighted good-naturedly as he stood up to get beside Peter.

"Alright alright, scoot over, this isn't gonna be nice on my back later." He joked. Although he said that, he would gladly take a little pain if it meant having Peter safe in his arms.

The boy obeyed and scooted over quickly, allowing Tony to climb in and get comfy, then let out a small "oof" as the kid rested his head on his shoulder and clung like a koala.

The man chuckled, a hand coming up to cradle the boy's head and play with his curls, knowing that helped Peter sleep much faster.

"Okay cuddle-bug, you heard her. It's nap time."

"Nt' a bug." Peter mumbled, blissfully unaware how Tony's heart practically melted with how easy Peter fit in his arms. He was so small. They were like two pieces of a puzzle, father and son, mentor and mentee. They belonged together and they wouldn't have it any other way as they needed the other.

"Right, arachnid." Tony corrected himself, hiding his grin in the kid's hair as Peter let out a pleased hum, slowly drifting off to sleep.

"Night." Peter mumbled, slowly lulled to sleep by the soft rumbling of the older hero's chest as he responded in kind.

"Goodnight bambino." He mumbled, pressing a small kiss to the boy's hair as they soon both drifted off to sleep.

Yeah, Tony loved him, and he needed him in his life like Peter needed him.

Thank you to @polaroid15 for reading this before hand and your lovely comments!! 🥺♥️

[harpersplay]

Genuine non-troll white woman here - you wrote "So I already knew that Good Girls was a white feminism phantasmagoria...But, jesus fucking christ, y'all are just showing your true colours lately. The way you talk about a MOC in relation to a white woman is disgusting." Not asking you to call out specific people or posts or start any kind of flame war but what would be a general example of what you are talking about? I follow a good chunk of people and I'm not seeing this maybe b/c I'm not following the same people, maybe out of willful blindness, maybe I'm not recognizing it - again, b/c of ignorance, etc. Just trying to understand what you mean - and not do it obviously, if I am doing it.

I apologise for taking a longish time to answer this. Honestly, I wasn't sure I wanted to get into it. Anyway, I'd first like to say that this is all my opinion. What bothers me might not bother someone else. BIPOC are not a monolith. Even subsections aren't. Not all Mexican trans men are a monolith. Neither are all Japanese lesbians. You get the idea. And that's not even including people like Ben Carson or Caitlyn Jenner—people who support and work for policies that actively harm the marginalised group of which they are a part. Secondly, I know this isn't your intention, but asking POC to tell you what is ok to do and what is not is a slippery slope to "my [blank] friend said this was ok." Finally, the fandom is quite small so it is pretty hard to give general examples. I don't know if it's more trouble to quote specific posts or not, because some will think it is about them anyway. Anything I'm going to mention I've seen on Tumblr, Instagram, Reddit and/or Twitter. But there are definitely popular Tumblr blogs that all push the same narrative. Oh, and one last thing, I haven't seen any of what I'm referring to from people I follow.

Ok, let's go. For a very long time, mainly WOC have pointed out the racial problems within the show and the extremely dismissive attitude about those problems from mainly white women. And while these same women have written thousands (even tens of thousands) or words about Beth (it's always Beth) and her struggles and the amazingness of such a complex female character (ymmv), they brush aside commentary about racism as either nitpicking, not understanding the show is about the 3 women (tell that to all the white men with fleshed-out storylines), or misogyny. The last is especially hostile because they are often talking over Black women and misogynoir is a very real fucking thing that couples the fun of being hated for being a woman with the delight of good old-fashioned racism. They espouse the idea that people having a problem with Beth are all covert & overt misogynists. But talk out the other side of their mouths that they can't possibly be racist even when they support racism in the show or ignore concerns brought up by fans of colour. And that is just the absolute height of hypocrisy. Because by the former they acknowledge that people in a marginalised group (women) can still be anti- that group (a phenomenon with which I agree). But in the latter, suddenly they don't understand that concept.

Specific to the post you are responding to, fans that purport to like Brio write about the relationship in ways that reveal how much of their enjoyment comes from Rio being inferior to Beth. It's all about what he can do for her, how he acts against his best interests for her, how he literally denies himself sexual pleasure for her. Those are all meant to show how in love he is with her. But the show never bothers to tell us why. And, no, this is not because the show is so deep. Other romantic relationships they have scenes that are explicit about the characters' feelings. But Rio, after being shot, after being betrayed, after being mocked, is just so in love with Beth....because. (MYSTERIOUS!) And the Beth stans are more than fine with this because they think everyone should be as obsessed with Beth as they are. But it's bad storytelling. And, in this particular case, it gets into very dicey racist tropes. A white women treating her Latino lover like an afterthought is not the same as a white women treating her white lover like an afterthought. It just isn't. And if some of these fans are as smart as they pretend to be, they know that. They just don't care. Much like the showrunners.

There was so much talk defending the drawn-out Boland marriage because why can't we understand how hard it is for Beth—who is, at various times, claimed to be emotionally abused by Dean or staying with him because it is safe and comfortable—and we don't appreciate how difficult it is for her (I may be one of the few divorced people talking about this show on Tumblr, so this has always made me laugh). Yet there was nothing but glee when Rio flipped on his brousin (who was written as both abusive and safe) for Beth. Where was the empathy for Rio and how hard it was for him? Especially because, unlike Beth, he didn't even have one parent? Hadn't the Beth stans used her very tragical history™️ to explain away her every shitty act? idk, not having any parents and going to jail (as a minor?) and being betrayed by your family seems pretty tragic. But I didn't see them all of a sudden excusing Rio's bad behaviour. Because, feminism or something?

What about Beth's feelings? Last season she spent trying to have him killed. This season she spent looking annoyed by him. Throughout both she talked down to him in a specific white woman way that every BIPOC has experienced, even if some of them are cool with it. There were multiple opportunites for Beth to talk about her feelings with Ruby and/or Annie, but the writers made the deliberate choice to always make it about sex (and god, the immature way they had these three grown women talk was fucking obnoxious). She spent the last 2 seasons also wanting him out of her life to the point that a majority of her actions in S4 were motivated by getting to Nevada with her husband and kids. Beth doesn't care about Rio but Rio needs to put Beth above everything because he's just so in love like he's never been before (which is blatant Marcus & Rhea erasure). And anyone who doesn't think Beth would have just as happily been sitting on that bench plotting how to "run the city" (hahahahaha!) with Nick if the situation worked out differently hasn't been paying attention.

So, what do we have? A white woman who is constantly excused (by the loudest portion of the fandom) for all her ill treatment to her Black BFF & her Black husband, her Asian coworker, her Latina "friend," and Rio (among others) because her life is hard and who is not required to even be nice to her supposed "endgame". And a MOC who is expected to accept being treated poorly by the white woman because he loves her.

And, a last thing, this attitude grossly crossed over into talk about real people when the fans—who self-righteously claimed to be above anon sources or talking about the actors—latched on to the narrative and enjoyed blaming the MOC actor for the cancellation of the show, even dragging his insignificant (in terms of influence) Black wife into it. All while conveniently ignoring that the creator/showrunner is a white woman. The star & producer is a white woman. The people making the decisions at NBCU & Netflix were white women. All white women with so much more power than the Latino actor.

Shit, did I answer your question? I know this is a lot. But I could honestly make mulitple posts on each issue I touched on here. Basically, white people ain't slick, be they content creators or fans. We see how & what y'all talk about. We see that Rio not having a last name is not a big deal to you and we know why that is. So we're fucking tired. And we're over a show that had so much potential crapping all over their POC characters to prop up a white woman. And we're repulsed by the white women in the fandom who use their tears to seem oppressed and who toss around the word misogynist because POC dare call a Karen a Karen.

[funkymbtifiction]

thanks a lot for your quick and really interesting response! Yeah, my sister is a funny one to figure out, haha. Her instinct to use thoughtful logic in every situation and be rational is so strong that I’d call her an ITJ if she wasn’t so caring and compassionate. Kindness and sensitivity to others’ emotions is one of her defining traits now, although funnily this wasn’t the case when she was younger.

Hold up.

ITJs are perfectly capable of being caring/compassionate; that has nothing to do with being a feeler! They are caring and compassionate from a place of logical understanding and "fixing" things, ie, rational solutions. Growing into being more kind and sensitive sounds a lot like tert-Fi. That's the journey most of them make when they hit age 20 and realize their rigid morals aren't applicable in every situation and that they can cut people more slack.

I feel like when she was a kid/teen she was extremely judgemental, sharp-tongued and condemning of others like a 1 - and willing to take a stance with strangers even, to answer your question.

*cough* ITJ 1w2 *cough*

She once walked out of someone‘s house because they tried to pressure her to attend a ritual she felt was morally wrong, even though she knew it was socially inappropriate and annoyed a lot of people. <- Te/Fi

She once told my brother she despised him for not having good enough principles, she wrote my dad a long email calling him out for being inconsistent in his ethics, her boyfriend said she made him feel criticized all the time - she could be extremely harsh and disappointed in everyone.

Yup, core 1 and probably further evidence for ITJ.

But, as she got older, she became way more gentle, compassionate and mellow (In fact all the new friends she’s made over the last few years think she has the sweetness and humility of a 9). She told me that after her breakup with her boyfriend, she realized she needed to be less critical and consciously invested all her willpower into forcing herself to be more accepting, humble and appreciative.

1w2 for sure. She leaned into her 2 wing, and used it to grow and achieve forgiveness for others' flaws rather than just "help them" by pointing out how bad / immoral / imperfect they are.

on the positive side I’d say my sister has always been super driven to improve herself, I remember in Grade 9 she literally made a list of flaws about herself to remedy. She loves anything self improvement related so it makes typing a bit difficult because she’s quite different now from how she was 5 years ago. What are your thoughts?

I(S)TJ 1w2.

[lowkeyorloki]

How do you come up with fanfiction ideas?

Hi there :D I hope you don't mind, I put this under a cut because it got a bit long.

It honestly just depends. I assume you're talking more about multichapters than oneshots, but I'll quickly explain my oneshot process: I get some type of idea for dialogue or a scene, and then I literally come up with a scenario/fic to put the dialogue or scene in. I can't really tell you where all those ideas come from, because it's usually just a fantasy I have. A very good rule of thumb, especially with oneshots, is to write situations that you would want to be in with your character (or if you're writing for a ship, just think of what situations you wish the writers of the media had put the two characters in).

For multichapters, it's different for each fic. For example, I wrote my first multichapter She Shall Have because I noticed the very common trope of a reader being betrothed to Thor but in love with Loki. This is a huge thing within the Loki fandom. However, I never felt like the justification for the reader being engaged to Thor made sense. I began thinking of realistic reasons that Odin would arrange/allow a marriage between the reader and his oldest son, and I thought of the reader being able to wield Mjolnir. Obviously, Odin would feel threatened by this and want to keep the reader under control, so it would make sense for her to marry Thor and always be under Odin's supervision and the expectations for royalty.

Also with ssh, I was very fed up at the time by seeing Loki with all these very weak willed readers. Not only do I find it incredibly out of character for Loki to be in love with someone so meek and pliable, but I could never read the fics because I would just simply not act the way y/n does. And so when I thought of the idea of the reader being able to wield Mjolnir, I realized it was also a great opportunity to finally get an Asgardian reader out there who had a backbone and a character outside of her romance with Loki.

For my current multichapter, A Study In Suit, it's similar but also different. I got really inspired while watching a scene from a show. This nanny was putting kids to bed while the gardener was watching, and he was clearly in love with her and the way she was so good with kids. I was just so enamored by the way he looked at her that I knew I wanted to explore some type of similar situation with Loki. Obviously, that inspiration is much different from ssh.

Where it's similar is once again, I saw a trope that I really didn't like within the fandom. Professor! AUs are pretty common. And in every single one of them, it's hypersexualized and the main drive in the stories is a want to not get caught. Usually, it's a jealous girl who outs the two characters. Because I was looking for a way to make Loki a father in the fic and I was over background women being vilified in Loki fics particularly, a modern AU seemed like the answer for my wanting to make Loki a father. And honestly, professor! AUs are the only ones that I'm interested in.

I also realized that a university setting would be a great opportunity for me to, once again, write a reader who has an arc and interests outside of Loki. Being a student makes you inherently have goals and responsibilities. I also wanted to make a relatable reader, which can be difficult in an Asgard/superhero setting. A modern setting, and a school setting, is something most of us can relate to. I REALLY wanted to make realistic characters in asis, and modern settings make that a lot more simple.

Finally, with my fic The Archetype (which I think is my best work, btw) I wanted two things: a fic narrated by Loki, because I think they're sexy and also because I like Loki as a character way more than I like or care about Y/N, and second, I wanted to explore what Loki would be like if he survived his encounter with Thanos. With The Archetype, it was actually based off a oneshot that was written purely because I wanted a fic with angry sex from Loki's POV.

So basically, I get my ideas when I see a gap in the fandom that I want filled (such as my desire for more fics written in Loki's POV) or tropes that I personally dislike and want to counteract. This is actually why I started writing for Loki in the first place - I looked for fics after Ragnarok came out, and the grammar in all of them were atrocious. So I was like, "fuck it guess I have to write my own" (although if you read my old fics... the writing is good but jfc the grammar is not!).

The common thread between my inspo/ideas for both multichapters and oneshots is having a bare bones idea (like one line of dialogue or one aspect of a character that I want to expand on or take an in depth look at) and literally building a piece of writing that I can put that idea into. If my fic writing process was like drawing a person, I wouldn't start with the person itself. I'd start with maybe their shoes, and then I would draw the ground underneath the shoes. The I would draw the bench the shoes are next to, and then the tree over the bench, and then clouds behind the tree. I'd fill in all that background before I finally come back to the actual original thing I thought of.

Please please please send me another message letting me know if this helped! I curious to see what you think :')

[thegeminisage]

hi, sorry for answering you both so late, i am putting your answers together since they are sort of related!

the short answer is, i can’t write a “real” sequel to broken road but the third part of the triptych would be the indirect dean/cas spiritual sequel, except with way more porn. the long answer is:

i just don't think i could write a true direct sequel to broken road set in that same continuity because i don't have anything left to say about john and how he gets along in the real with his family world now that he’s stuck there and they’re all stuck with each other. my main three points of interest that i felt were left unresolved would be the continuation of dean and cas's relationship (more on this in a sec), sam and eileen (ditto), and figuring out if john and mary ever made it work or called it quits for good. so if i wrote a sequel to broken road it would just be a bunch of john/mary stuff that i feel underqualified for because it WOULD involve their sex life and i DO NOT want to write john having sex. them fucking offscreen in broken road was as close as i'm ever getting and even that was weird. and then somehow i’d also have to work sam and eileen into that and it’s not at all related. it would take two fics and i don’t even want to write one. also, i really kind of want to leave the question of john and mary open anyway - i have my own thoughts about how things ultimately end up but i prefer to let the reader imagine what ending they like best, since people have such strong feelings about it. i know that's a little bit of a cop-out and i'm sorry! but it feels beyond the scope of that fic and also a little beyond my scope and area of interest as a writer.

if it helps you any, i imagine going forward their dynamic is a lot like it is in the epilogue, which is part of why i made the epilogue so long, was to give you a good idea of what life is like for them now. but here’s what i imagine might go down after the final curtain call (this is LONG, skip to the section labeled “dean” for the triptych answer):

john & mary: 

john continues to suffer and bite his tongue and probably do a lot of complaining and DEFINITELY do a lot of avoiding being alone with dean or cas or dean-and-cas. john was expecting to retire after yellow eyes died so he really wouldn't know what to do with a family that still hunts for "no reason" and i imagine he'd be pretty pissed that they still hunt at all. i expect he and sam would butt heads over that

mary would probably keep attempting to be supportive and keep being bad at it, and spend a lot of time trying to put a brave face on it while secretly dying inside, because she's constantly at war with herself. here she has john back, but not the john she remembers, and spending time with him is difficult because she wants to let herself have him and take comfort in him and also she doesn't want to be anywhere near him because he abused their kids

eventually mary or john or both would have to leave, though mary would come back - in canon she's in and out a lot anyway, she stays for awhile and visits regularly for game nights. i think john would miss the first game night, get one "seriously?" text from mary, and then show back up every week that he possibly could but also not visit unless it would make things worse if he didn't. i don't think he particularly enjoys spending time with his family for a long time, if ever, because much like season 12 mary he came back to a family he barely knew or recognized (and because of what he knows now spending time with dean would be particularly awkward). HIS sons would be getting married to women and retiring and having biological children. this gay adoptive whatever the fuck makes them feel like they are not his sons. 

anyway, i imagine john and mary would do much better when running into one another outside of the bunker, on their own separate hunts. they might even take one or two together. there’s probably some very guilty sex in their future at some point because mary is real fucked up. john post broken road does a lot of shutting up but i think around mary he would be the most like his old self. they do this will they/won't they dance for the next decade at least before finally making up their minds one way or the other. i do think they all still go on hunts together sometimes, maybe even with the apocalypse world hunters, and since that's sam's deal john is probably kind of quiet and falls in line and does what's needed without chatting much to anyone. i bet the first few times people don't even realize he's sam's father because he's so quiet. it's his way of trying to apologize to sam and also if he steps out of line when sam is in charge sam would <3 deck him. yes. but yeah i see it being very brisk and professional and awkward, until they all get used to each other again

sam: 

as i said earlier the only thing i didn't fix in broken road was eileen, so at some point sam would figure out a way to get her back - since in this verse jack never becomes soulless and chuck never returns and we never get season 15 it's possible she shows back up because she didn't go with her reaper, or because someone fucked up a summoning spell, or sam realized she was in hell and decided to spring her, or she just crawled out on her own like a badass. i think it would be kind of funny if john was involved with her resurrection but maybe accidentally somehow, so it's not like oh sam learns to forgive his dad because john did this really nice thing for him it's more like UGH why did it have to be YOU why are YOU involved in this important thing that has nothing to do with you slkdjfghl but also if you hadn't done it she'd still be down there or something, so, it cancels out. or idk maybe john had to work hard at it or give something up to make it happen. he has to genuinely shut up and be selfless and not fucking complain and feel sorry for himself the entire time, that might be fun too. either way sam would not thank him

(though i do think sam deserves space to explore the fact that he loves john even still, even despite the fact that he also hates him/is very angry with him and always will be. i don’t imagine sam and john ever fully reconcile but i imagine john behaving BECAUSE OF SAM SPECIFICALLY offers sam more catharsis than he thought possible.) 

anyway, john would be so relieved to see sam with a woman even if she is a deaf hunter but then it turns out she hates him like sam does so like. sucks to be him! meanwhile sam and eileen get to catch up and he finally has a willing ear (so to speak) that isn’t cas or mary to talk to about this stuff and of course SHE has someone who very much understands what it’s like to come back from hell. part of what i really love about sam and eileen is the way they sort of instantly and intrinsically recognized and understood one another, even across something that resembles a language barrier, and this hypothetical future would be no exception. there’s no way they don’t get engaged inside a year, and much like in the 15.18 fixit they’d sometimes hang at the bunker and sometimes not. i imagine with the apocalypse world hunters going in and out though it’s never exactly empty or lonely there. 

whether or not their family unit ever retires and/or moves out of the bunker in this verse is sort of beyond me because my feelings on it change daily but you can imagine whatever you like! however i am adamant that the furthest away from each other sam and dean will ever get permanent-living-situation-wise is next door/across-the-street neighbors. their weird little codependency is part of what i like about them and i have a Whole Thing about not “gentrifying” dean. but for the most part sam would be very much doing his own thing which involves john very little, and healing from his own damage with people OUTSIDE of his blood relatives which he very much deserves. and he has moved so completely past the need to care about john that like john is a backdrop in his life, albeit one with baggage. but mostly he becomes someone to keep an eye on in case he makes trouble, no different than a hundred other surly hunters sam’s known. and he can still be there for dean without his life revolving around dean because now dean has other people there for him too. (i ALSO have a whole thing about sam being in the life for dean specifically, that he’s giving up some or all of adulthood for dean because dean gave up childhood for him - kind of the way someone takes care of their kickass single mom in old age. it’s a guilt/love/debt/devotion sort of thing.) 

and speaking of the Eventual future, if babies ever come into this picture (sam and eileen’s, to be clear, dean and cas are probably satisfied with jack, NOT THAT JACK ISN’T ALSO SAM’S CHILD) john is allowed to see them but never unsupervised. i’m picturing like sam and eileen both on their third day of no sleep and sam lets john change a diaper because he’s exhausted and john considers that the best their relationship has been since sam was 6. mary always wanted to raise babies and sam likes her better so she’d get to pitch in with much more enthusiasm (and aw they’d finally get to bond a little more), and dean has raised a baby already so he’d probably try to like help and get waved away a lot like no no raising other peoples babies is no longer your job it’s ok. there is eventually a fight about this

cas & jack: 

castiel lives a great life caring for his newly re-graced son and staring at john when he enters or leaves rooms, and i imagine eventually jack gives him his wings back, since he can do whatever the fuck he wants (i'm not giving jack his own section but he also probably keeps acknowledging dean and cas are a couple like out loud which would be fine except for dean is still half in the closet like a skittish traumatized cat so eventually cas would have to explain very gently that nobody was supposed to know that yet and jack should cool it to give dean time to adjust)

anyway i DON’T believe in human cas, i believe he likes being an angel, so he just gets to stay an angel forever and now he has wings too <3 and he can teleport which spooks john in the exact same manner it used to spook dean in s4 <3 except this time cas is being <3 malicious on purpose <3

cas fully won here because like john does NOT want to speak to or acknowledge him much less be in the same room as him so they tend to have a dynamic where like all 6 of them are in the room and cas dean sam mary and jack all talk to each other and john dean sam mary and jack all talk to each other but cas and john do not talk to each other. cas doesn’t have to threaten him or glare at him constantly anymore like all he has to do is look at him. and john is like. man what’s he gonna do. that guy is having sex with your son and there’s nothing you can do about it! so dean doesnt have to be like ok cool it cas anymore because cas has literally won in every possible way. i think at most it’s very much cas being like “if i were trying to kill you, you’d know it <3″ and john can’t return those vibes to sender because then dean would be like ok cool it at his DAD instead. it used to be cas don’t piss off dad and now it’s dad don’t piss off cas. anyway i think that since cas has let dean lean on him so much it would be nice if he could lean on dean a little. again more on that in a minute

dean: 

and finally, as for dean...i think he needs a year minimum to dean with people acknowledging he and cas are a couple and another 3 for it not to be weird to say cas’s name in front of his dad. absolutely zero pda in front of john ever but he might like eventually get to the place where he and cas can lounge around together on the couch while they watch movies with the rest of fam and it’s not a big deal. sneak an arm around him at a movie theater. kind of the same vibes as the 15.18 fixit but with less anxiety. because like the worst possible thing (getting outed to everyone) has already happened and aside from the outing itself being completely horrible nothing that terrible even came to pass as a result, so he’s just Adjusting. i think he sort of has to unlearn and relearn his habits - his mediator thing, his defending dad thing. i think there’s a lot of times where he just walks out of a room when shit is too much for him to deal with because he has let go of some of the need to constantly micromanage his family’s interactions to make sure they don’t boil over. michael already took that scenario to the max and mary already dumped john so there’s really not much left to be afraid of. i think he gets told “that’s not your job” a lot and maybe listens more than he used to. and to bring us around to the second question...

i also think dean would get weirdly hung up on the fact that he and cas’s sex life is Not Normal - as in, they fooled around a little and that was it. i think dean would have a huge problem with that. like, obviously he has A Few Hangups About Gay Sex given his history but if you’re a couple you’re supposed to bang on the regular and it’s totally homophobic if he doesn’t bang cas as much as he’d bang a lady he was committed to, right? he’s not gonna give cas less than he gave cassie or lisa, that’s not fair to his best buddy and number one pal! 

meanwhile castiel, known asexual, is utterly and wildly neutral to the whole idea except that it’s a way to be close to dean. cas would be just as happy fucking like champions for a six-hour marathon or spending that same six hours curled up in bed together while he plays with dean’s hair. like, same diff. you know that thing about like “cas thinks everything is important he gives the same gravitas to the apocalypse and a nine year old’s birthday party”? like it’s exactly like that with sex and cuddling and sharing a meal together and driving together and watching dumb movies like it’s all time spent With Dean so it all matters just as much.

so we have this conflict where dean is tearing himself apart over the fact that he’s taking a normal human amount of time to “work up” to the whole thing and cas is like. but it’s fine. it’s literally fine. and dean’s reaction to this would be something very offended like hello excuse me i am super hot and fuckable and you don’t WANT me?

if this all sounds familiar that’s because i’ve written similar stuff to it before! if you go to the fic page for broken road, you'll see it's part of a series now (the "triptych"), with my dumb little 15.18 fixit as the prequel. even though continuity-wise these are two totally separate fics i feel very strongly that that fic is the spiritual prequel to broken road, and eventually, a long time from now, after the next @cambionverse​ fic is done or at the very least well underway, i'd like to write a spiritual sequel. a triptych is three works that stand on their own but also make a more complete whole, so even though these three stories would not be related at all in continuity of where they take place in canon, they each set the stage at a different part of the dean/cas relationship. so fic #1, the get-together, had no sex at all, and it was very short. fic #2, pre-established but just barely, had a little sex in it and it was very long. fic #3 then would be pre-established but like VERY pre-established and have a fuckton of sex in it, and be medium length. i’m ha ha basically writing my own nc-17 porn coda since SOMEBODY won’t do it for me (if you got that joke you’re entitled to financial compensation). 

except i actually really do want to tackle this subject myself, it’s stuff i only got to touch on in the other fics because it felt off topic, so in this fic it WOULD be the topic! i really found a groove i like with cas who has almost no trauma around sex but doesn’t care whether or not he has it vs dean who really really wants to have sex but has a minefield of past bad experiences he has to watch out for. and i like writing porn anyway and i didn’t get to write very much these past two fics. i’ve always said that i think dean would snowball (not like that, gross) - it’d take him FOREVER (literally a decade plus) to work up to kissing cas but a fraction of that time to start fooling around with him and a fraction of THAT time to blow him etc etc. the more he does the easier it gets. i feel like it’d be a lot of fun to write. 

so, this third fic would not be an official broken road sequel, because there’s almost no plot outside of the porn to speak of anyway, but if what you wanted was to see how the dean/cas went from where it left off, hopefully that will be satisfying in that regard.

i should say, while the third fic would be almost exclusively porn there is one plot element involving ********** that i am not going to talk about on tumblr because it would ruin the surprise. i have told a few people privately and i will tell you if we know each other pretty well but if you know (or guess) don’t tell anyone! 

see, the other thing i would want to tackle in that fic is how cas has his own traumas and baggage, even if they’re a little different from dean’s, and i think dean sometimes gets so deep in his own stuff he kind of...not forgets that exactly but forgets how profoundly it still affects cas, because by and large cas deals with that sort of thing a lot more quietly and in much healthier ways than dean does. not that his self-sacrificing ass is the poster child for mental health, but for example cas recognized suicidal ideation in himself and actively worked to keep himself away from situations that would make it worse. he translates his bad feelings into meaningful action (well, he attempts to, even if it usually goes wrong). so he hurts kind of quietly and in late season especially most of the worst moments of his life are behind him (barring jack’s death, which doesn’t happen in this verse). so he’s also further along in his healing process which mean dean kind of forgets how fucked in the head he can be. and in the uh...unusual situation...they find themselves in because of this minor plot, it becomes something that he can’t not notice, that they can’t just not talk about, and cas gets to lean on dean a little, they sort of get to know each other better. so that’s part of the point of that one little plot element. but the rest of it really is porn.

i haven’t started work on the third fic yet - i don’t have a title and my outline is just a bunch of choppy ideas and i have about 2000 words of the middle of the fic jotted down out of context. (it was originally going to be a shorter unrelated thing before i realized how well it tied to what i already had.) i have another obligation to see to before i can get started on it (again, @cambionverse​, you should read it if you havent, the concept might sound unappealing but almost everyone who tries it likes it and it’s way better than broken road). so it’ll probably happen a very VERY long time from now! but it IS happening. >:) i just hope after the first two fics in the triptych were so well received that it doesn’t disappoint 🥺

[mrs-nate-humphrey]

What do you feel about amandamaryanna’s video on gossip girl and cosplaying poor? It reminds me of those tik tok videos that are about the most insane rich person behavior you’ve experienced. I feel like it’s subjective because the characters Dan Vanessa and Zoya are basing their poor ness around THEIR environment. So yes, there are MANY people who are actually poor but compared to their UES counterparts they would be considered “poor” due to the fact that they do not have the insane amount of disposable wealth that the other characters have and I do not really see that as them trying to cosplay as poor.

Also what are your thoughts on her argument on GG not really talking about class consciousness and POC issues. Even though the characters Ursula, Jane and Raina had short appearances on the show, as a Black person I think that is was great that they added the few POC characters on GG because their identity was not the main focus of their characters. Usually with Black or POC characters they have to go through some racial turmoil as part of the plot and in GG they got to be rich UES-ers simply because they are. Even though GG is very verryy flawed Penelope, Nelly, Kati, Isabelle and Zoe were shown how POC characters can be rich like the white characters in the show as well GG is obviously a fictional show that’s not based on anything so I don’t think that racial income statistics/racial implications need to be talked about 24/7.

so i started watching this video & just ended up reading the transcript instead. anyway. under a read more:

like, yes. i agree with her on one hand - i think gossip girl 2007 messed up by making dan's grievances be connected to financial status, because the humphreys certainly weren't "poor". like i think this point she says makes sense to an extent:

The comparison between outsiders and insiders and gossip girl is all about relativity. To the average viewer it seems absurd that a character like Dan is supposed to represent the outsider when he is so farther in than any of us could get.

But honestly, something i hate is how people who talk about this show act as if everyone who's watching is expected to know the prices of rent in new york city, etc. like i did NOT realise how expensive that loft is until someone else mentioned it to me and i would not have guessed! who is your "average viewer" - is it an American? someone who lives in New York? someone who lives in Brooklyn? you can't just define an average viewer in that way, i feel! like you are making a BIG Assumption there and it's not necessarily accurate. people who aren't american watch american tv! such is the world we are living in.

but keeping that aside, yeah: dan and jenny had stable and secure housing, the guarantee of meals, and were attending expensive private schools, so i think the show's messaging regarding class was a little strange. they definitely weren't in a financially unstable situation.

but also, you're right. like, dan and jenny weren't super duper broke, and at no point do they actually act like they are, tbh. dan is very 'oh my parents sacrificed so much to send me to st jude's' and jenny is very 'damn i wish i was richer' but there isn't really an instance where the humphreys seem to view themselves as being extremely poor, that i remember at least. in s1, jenny says something along the lines of, "we're humphreys; we're not exactly royalty." and like. she is not wrong! they're financially stable kids, but they're ordinary kids living in an environment where everyone else has the safety net of millionnaire parents to fall back on, and however much money rufus has, he isn't that.

so i think it's a grey area, like, YES, the humphreys have wealth related privilege (i don't know if this can be said for v, because honestly we don't know much about her living situation, but we do know that she works as a waitress for a bit in s1, and also that she's homeschooled, so she isn't shelling out big $$ for school fees.) but also dan and jenny are treated as 'less than' because they are considered nobodies.

and i feel like THAT is the angle the show should have taken. not "i am oppressed because i am not rich" but rather, "everyone at school alienates me and treats me different and it's making things so difficult for me." whenever people say that dan and jenny acted like they were more oppressed than they actually were i'm like. they were both, in different ways, made to feel small and insecure and hopeless, at school? like of COURSE they're gonna feel victimised. dan is treated like he doesn't exist, and jenny is treated so horribly that i don't even have an adjective. like. i think the writing of the show would've been much stronger if it had focused on THAT and not made it a class thing.

i haven't watched the reboot beyond ep02, so i'm not gonna comment on that.

so yeah, i don't think it was 'cosplaying poor' as much as it was 'showing wealth related stuff extremely inaccurately.' like an anon told me, portraying nyu as community college is super inaccurate, as well. and it makes no sense? like i don't know why they had to do this and why they couldn't just... shoot at a regular community college. gossip girl 2007 did not care for representing poor people at all, like, if you watch the show you can tell that it just luxuriates in this aesthetic of like: more food than anybody can eat at every meal. so many luxuries. unnecessarily expensive things everywhere. like the show was very much luxury porn. to me it felt like it wasn't cosplaying poor as much as it was offering people a chance to wank off to the rich. & maybe because of that, the humphreys weren't allowed to be poorer. gg 2007 wasn't supposed to represent all of NY, it was supposed to represent the uber rich elite. and then you have dan and jenny humphrey, and vanessa abrams. they weren't allowed to be rich, because we needed a class conflict. but they weren't allowed to be poor, either, because this show was all about rich people aesthetics. so we got something weird & in the middle instead.

people forget that chuck was canonically a billionnaire - like, that is a LOT of money. and he is dan & jenny's peer! sadly, i think solely because of THAT, a lot of the oppression the humphreys face... checks out. like chuck being shitty to both dan and jenny - he' has an unethical, absurd, uncomparable-to-whatever-the-humphreys-have amount of money. he can do whatever he wants & buy his way out of there. rufus humphrey's ten thousand dollars or whatever amount he mentions are like pocket change to that guy. if jenny is gonna be treated like a commodity by everyone around her, do her upper middle class roots and expensive loft really matter? well, not do they matter as much as like. can they protect her? (we've watched the show. we know the answer is no.)

re: the characters of colour... i think it's subjective. i ADORE raina, and honestly, if we'd had a NJBC that was nate, serena, blair & raina, the show would've actually been AMAZING. like raina was such a cool character to me - i liked that she was driven, passionate, intelligent, sensitive, caring, fun-loving, thoughtful.... she wasn't on the show for long, but her character felt really solid and fleshed out. i remember a review (idk who wrote this one) in which someone felt that raina's character was "lazy" because a lot of her traits and her backstory paralleled chuck, but i strongly disagree. on raina, those traits were interesting. on chuck, any backstory and larger motive felt like a carpet to cover the dust that was his predatory nature, and to me, felt forced and off. like. this dude assaulted people, i don't care about his daddy issues. but raina seemed SO amazing. her backstory actually fit her personality and gave her depth, and to me, didn't feel forced.

i liked ursula, too! she was a really minor character, but she had a whole arc, and i liked that a LOT. her friendship with serena was very cute! i sadly do not remember jane. i think she was... someone's assistant? but i don't remember who. but i agree with you about raina and ursula, their arcs were very interesting and did not end up being about racial trauma & all that, which, like you said, is refreshing when done right.

that said, i think blair's minions were, uh, an example of blair's racism, and i think it would've been cool if the show unpacked that. blair uses her minions as a status symbol - her 17th birthday at kati's place which is anime themed (?) leaves a bad taste in my mouth because it feels very tokenising of a culture that blair isn't a part of? it would be different if blair treated her minions with respect and dignity and like they were her equals and peers, but she doesn't. the word "minions" itself makes me flinch because it's such a "oh you're inferior" kind of word. it felt to me very much like - they never got to be characters in their own right. they solely existed to prop up blair. and i think that is racist. there was a sense of "Oh, I can't be racist! I have a Black friend and an Asian friend" from Blair - like that's what kati & is were to her. and i think that is a big problem, especially glossed over like that.

i also do think that racial stuff doesn't always need to be the focus! but i don't think it can ever be completely ignored, either. an example of something that is maybe unintentionally racist, but racist nonetheless, is how dan cuts vanessa out of his life entirely but forgives his white friends for treating him farrrr worse. it's an inherent double standard, because dan kind of went "oh yeah. my threshold for white people fucking me over is really high, but if my Black best friend who's so close we're practically family does something even slightly wrong i'm going to cut her out of my life 4ever." did the writers realise this? i don't know. maybe they just didn't think about it. but this is exactly the sort of double standards and racist bullshit that woc, especially Black women, have to face irl (though of course i don't need to tell you that at all), except here, the narrative doesn't even address that, hey, maybe dan's being a dick by reacting this way. and i think that's a problem, too.

[threadsketchier]

So I saw the prequels prior to the Originals and it always bothered me how Luke got dumped on a death planet of Tatooine considering the state of that environment and shot that when down in the previous films while Leia got a life of privilege. I was hoping Bail would argue against splitting the twins. I obviously knew why it had to go that route because it had to align and follow up with the Originals. I guess it came off that Luke wasn’t really wanted...?

I already wrote a ficlet somewhat addressing this misconception.

Also, frankly, I’m getting kind of tired of rehashing the same issue - why do people keep assuming that the Larses don’t matter and don’t have a right to be in Luke’s life just because they live on Space Australia?  Why do their feelings not count just because they’re low-to-middle-class moisture farmers who don’t live in a palace on Space Switzerland-Utopia?  Why the fuck do people assume that Luke wasn’t wanted just because the Organas have a personal preference that was obviously previously established before shit hit the fans and they wanted a daughter and Bail, as a senator and Viceroy - essentially co-leader of his planet - is a fucking rational guy who understands the necessity of making hard decisions dictated by logic over emotions?

The twins weren’t just “split up because that’s how the movies have to go,” it does make internal sense within the narrative that it was safer to hide them in vastly separate locations to prevent both of them from being discovered at the same time and thus lost together, or for their latent Force bond to make them a psychic target if they grew up together and established it, acting like a beacon for Vader and Palpatine and any minions of theirs.  It sucks, it’s painful, it has awkward consequences for them later on when Leia’s a bit too loose with her lips, but that’s why these movies have a tragic backstory.  It has to suck real hard before it gets better.

Does it seem crazy that Leia wound up raised in such a screamingly obvious position as daughter of a then-Imperial Senator and princess of a highly prominent Core world being trained to follow in her biological mother’s footsteps and become a senator herself, thus occupying a very exposed role in the Empire, right under the Emperor’s and Vader’s noses?  Yeah.  But also remember that the Superman/Clark Kent illusion can actually work in real life.  Assumption is a powerful thing.  Your average Joe Citizen would assume that someone as otherworldly as Superman, an alien with the ability to fly, strength to bench-press skyscrapers and jumbo jets, heat vision, and other amazing things, would never stoop to living as a normal, humble, inconvenienced human being.  It’s not merely the hiding behind a pair of glasses and hunching over a little with a nerdy tone and habits - it’s the entire idea that a Clark Kent could even exist in the same person of Superman.  They don’t understand that he was raised as a human and actually desires this life, and doesn’t feel the need to lock himself away permanently in his dope Fortress of Solitude and never interact with the very people he wants to save and protect.

Vader was lied to by Palpatine about the nature of Padmé’s death, but there was no disputing that she actually died.  In his crushing despair, Vader accepted with heaps of self-flagellation that his child was dead.  He didn’t even know he had two children.  In his mind, whenever he saw Leia - surely they were in each other’s circles at least at a distance before Rogue One and ANH - even if she reminded him of Padmé six ways from Sunday, he would not assume she was his daughter, because as far as he was concerned his child was dead.  The OT establishes that latent Force-sensitivity also does not automatically make two related Force-sensitives consciously aware of each other until they mutually know one another as being related and Force-sensitive, so not even torturing Leia revealed this to him.

But I’m going off on a tangent.  Let’s break this down:

Tatooine is nothing but a source of anguish for Anakin and his personal loathing for the place made it ideal as a hiding place.  And no, I’m not just haha joking about sand.  He was a slave there and buried his mother there after slaughtering an entire village of natives he knew in his heart that he shouldn’t have.  It holds nothing but misery and failure for him.

Yes, Tatooine is abso-fucking-lutely a galactic cesspit.  It’s ruled by the most vile mob boss in the galaxy, is rife with nasty wildlife that’s out to kill you, and is haunted by the troubles brought about by strife between colonizers and the native population.  It is indisputably a dangerous place.  But it wasn’t Tatooine that killed the Larses.  It was the Empire.  Just because they look like Soft Folks™ doesn’t mean they were - Owen and Beru knew how to take care of themselves, and they certainly knew how to take care of a child in this environment.  They survived to middle age just fine, and would’ve kept going if it wasn’t for those fucking stormtroopers.  Just because they didn’t live a life of luxury also doesn’t mean they were dirt poor either.  When we meet Luke in ANH, he’s a healthy young lad who still has the privilege to fuck off with his buddies around his farm duties.  Life may be tough but it’s not squalor and deprivation for him.

But honestly, even if they WERE dirt poor, they’re still Luke’s family, and they very obviously loved him.  I almost feel like I shouldn’t have to restate it, but I will: Owen and Beru loved Shmi, and upon hearing that Anakin died and left behind a baby son, why wouldn’t they be moved and compelled to take Luke in, and why wouldn’t they deserve to have the chance to raise him in their memory?  Even though they’d be sad that Luke was orphaned, they might even see this as a blessing to be able to raise Shmi’s grandson and Anakin’s son.

As much as he bitched about chores as a teenager, Luke learned damn valuable skills growing up on a Tatooine moisture farm that, coupled with the Force, saved everybody’s asses at the Battle of Yavin, and went on to make him an ideal squadron leader.  Wealth and privilege are not always the best foundation, or at least certainly not the automatic one, for a person to learn good character either.

The Organas are human too.  Faced with a difficult choice, they decided to take this poignant opportunity to fulfill a dream they’d been deferring for some time.  Sometimes parents wish for a specific child, and that’s their prerogative (except IRL they don’t actually get to pick, they get whatever kid they gestate).  If they’d taken Luke and let Obi-Wan take Leia, we’d be having the same argument about Leia growing up on Tatooine.  There was no inequality in this decision.  Bail and Breha wanted a daughter, there was a daughter present among the twins, so they chose her.  This does not mean they valued Luke any less.  Since the twins couldn’t be raised together for their own safety, it might as well have come down to a coin toss.  Bail isn’t evil for exercising a shred of his personal emotions and desires in a situation where he otherwise knew he’d have to restrain himself.  Also, he’d be smart enough to respect the fact that both children had actual family elsewhere in the galaxy and wouldn’t think any less of the Larses just because they live on Tatooine.  The only way his decision would be careless or heinous was if he knew Luke was being taken to people who were abusive or so destitute they couldn’t even care for themselves, much less a third person, and he did nothing about it - but we know this is not that situation.

How do you feel about non-wealthy people living in harsh places here on Earth raising their children?  Would you expect all the rich people in the world to go take those children away from them and adopt them just so they could grow up “privileged” instead?  Think about how that sounds for a moment or two.

Honestly, if Bail had tried to argue about taking both twins because he felt taking Luke to his legal family on Tatooine was “cruel” or “neglectful” because of the planet’s “risky environment and poverty,” I’d hope either Obi-Wan or Yoda would have enough sense to smack him upside the head for being so thoughtless as to insult these people for being seemingly beneath him.

There is more to life than money and power/prestige, and Leia’s upbringing wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.  She was no pampered, air-headed royal spending her days sitting idle being hand-fed space grapes while her “poor” brother ate sand cookies.  She had to undergo intensive academic, political, and physical training from young childhood in order to prepare her to become a covert Rebel agent while she was still a teenager, as if being a child senator wasn’t already stressful and demanding enough.  Sure, she never lacked for anything, but that is an incredible amount of responsibility to saddle on someone who wasn’t even an adult yet (like her bio mother).  Luke was blessed with far more freedom and peace in his childhood than his sister.  And him living on Tatooine with his father’s surname wasn’t nearly as dangerous as Leia existing within the heart of the Empire while actively engaging in Rebel activities that could have cost her her life, even without getting into the whole “daughter of Anakin Skywalker” business.

Also, just because we joke about Tatooine being Space Australia doesn’t mean every single day of Luke’s childhood was THAT eventful.  It was more likely 80% dull farm life and 20% mayhem, and that 20% would be mostly Luke’s fault for being a crazy nut like his parents and getting himself into trouble he could have avoided in most cases.  In other words, growing up there might not have been nearly as “deadly” as we make it out to be.

[sweet-croissants]

Julie and the Phantoms Character Appreciation

Part 1 - Alex

I’ve never seen a character like Alex. No I don’t mean I’ve never seen a gay character/ character with anxiety. I’ve never seen a character where it’s not their entire personality or a show handle it the way they do. They didn’t have his “combing out scene” be this huge dramatic moment, they didn’t stop the spin of the earth so they could “reveal the truth about his sexuality!” No, it’s was said in a way that you could have almost missed it if you weren’t paying attention and it was said so casually that I almost forgot how important the representation he symbolized was. It was normal. They didn’t wait till the the 7th season, or even the end of the season to say it, so there was no queer baiting and no hesitation to embrace who he was in the show. Finally, the guys don’t ever, not once, talk about it to him as if he is going to burst out into tears if they say a word wrong. They don’t treat him as if he’s fragile about it, and I get it for some people it’s a sensitive topic and should be talked about carefully, but they know how Alex doesn’t want to be treated as if he’s weak. (E9 when they are in the hug circle thing “I feel stronger....not that I was ever weak”) And because of this, they don’t treat him like it. Obviously they aren’t insensitive but they don’t act as if they are walking on a minefield. His anxiety is relatable too. It’s not over done, exaggerated, or enhanced so they can get the point across that he has it only to drop in 10 minutes later to never mention it again. And both his anxiety and him being gay I’d done in a way that little kids can understand I think that we think topics like these to hard or difficult for kids to understand, but the truth is they can. You just have to be blunt in a way. Boys can like boys, girls can be boys, you can be whoever you wanna be, and it’s okay to worry over things even if they seem like you shouldn’t because “they are simple”, it’s all okay and natural.

Part 2 - Reggie

Reggie makes me happy to see because it shows certain things about kids who’s parents are divorced and are neglected. At the very least he was emotionally neglected, but neglected non the less. And obviously, not all kids handle this the same way, and that’s why Reggie is so important to me. Reggie obviously rebelled, even a little by joining a rock band and I don’t think he took on all the responsibility to take care of himself. Reggies not dumb, he’s oblivious and half the time I think he’s not as oblivious as we think he is. And he’s only oblivious when he thinks he can get away with it, like when he asks where Luke is going on his birthday as if he doesn’t know what happened. He also does something I found I used to do when I was lonely in a room full of people, and that’s ask dumb questions. Yes, he must know the answer but it’s puts a little attention on himself, and you can guess that he didn’t get a lot of that from his parents. Even if it’s at his expense, he’s willing to dell included in what they are talking about. He still has his serious moments though, which are usually right after he realizes that he can’t just play dumb to get out of the situation. You can also see that it hurts him a lot when he gets played off as being the dumb one, but it’s probably what he thinks of as his only way to get people to listen to him (everyone treating him like he’s an idiot also probably hurts his confidence leading to this too). Another thing I’ve noticed is his attachment to Ray. He knows how amazing of a father Ray is because of how much he loves Julie and Carlos. This is why he respects Ray so much, because even though he’s going through his own thing with his wife’s death, he never forgets to be their for his kids and that’s probably something Reggie never had.

Part 3 - Luke

Like is kinda special. I’ve seen characters similar to him but something about him sets him apart from everyone else I’ve seen. I’ve seen character that are cute and don’t take advantage of it but instead are super nice, I’ve seen that before but the difference is how he does it. In the first episode, right after Julie kicks the out, he’s not even mad or angry with her. Maybe he’s upset, but not at her. He’s upset because he just found out he died and then lost what he considers his second home. So, he explains that to her, but he doesn’t argue it he just wants to tell her his side of the story. And when she explains hers, he’s sorry and apologetic for her bad day and you can tell he’s being genuine. Before it’s obvious he likes her, he helps her get back into her music program because he knows how important it is. He gives her a song that he wrote and talks her up when she doubts herself. You can also tell that he never stopped loving his mom, no matter how many times they fought. He knows that she cared about him, which is why they fought in the first place. His only fear, the reason he never truly apologized, was he was scared he finally blew it. That he had officially messed up and she would want to hear from him, that he couldn’t fix what had happened. One more thing, I’ve never seen a character as passionate about something as him. I’m sure that character exists, no doubt, but personally I’ve never seen it. He doesn’t care about the money, yeah it’s a bonus but not the main focus. The main focus is putting a smile on people, making a difference to people, to not be alone. The entire reason he’s mad at Bobby for stealing is music without credit is that no one, including his mom, got to know his dream was worth it. He died and time erased him.

Part 4 - Julie

My love for Julie is astonishing. She’s a Hispanic girl, with gorgeous hair, and beautiful skin, and an amazing tooth gap. I almost fully expected it to be used as a thing she was bullied for, teased about, and made fun of for and when she fixes it, it shows that “she was always secretly beautiful/she could be beautiful all along” and all that junk. The fact that it’s not mentioned once is so wonderful because all people have flaws! People have tooth gaps, stretch marks, and different body types. No one is perfect and neither are their bodies. It also shows that Carrie, the “mean girl” of the show isn’t going to be like all the other mean girls in teen shows and it makes me appreciate her character more. It shows how they used to be friends and even thought Carrie can be mean, it’s never to the extent of making fun of what she looks like. One more thing with Carrie, Julie has never said a mean thing about her in the show. When Flynn makes the comment on the dance routine, she says “well it payed off” and she even complemented the song and choreography for All Eyes On Me. Not once has she said anything mean back and it shows how kind of a person she is. Even though Carrie humiliates her, she never has it in her to truly insult her back. Also, having a Hispanic girl as one of the main characters is wonderful! Representation is always heartwarming to see and this is no exception. They don’t try to shove it in your face in an unrealistic way, but it’s definitely in there consistently, it’s really nice. On top of all that, how she handles her mom‘s death is just as terrific. She’s right, playing music reminds her of her mom and that’s exactly why she should play music! It encourages others to know that it may hurt but it gets better. That there will come a point when smiles and joy filled where sadness and tears used to be when you think of those memories. She’s such a powerful person and it shows.

[itswhumpday]

Hey may i request whumpee crashing on caretaker? At first, caretaker thinks they're kidding or something, then they realize whumpee is about to pass out from overheat, or low blood sugar, you pick. Have a nice day!

I wrote and rewrote this three times and I’m still not FULLY happy with it, but I have it, so... Here’s some old timey whump! 

I also didn’t use neither of your suggestions, buttttt I hope you like it anyway!

Since the king has been away, the princess and the head of her guard have been awfully close.

Not that there is anything reprehensible about it. They’re always polite in the presence of other people. But every noble person in court will admit she gives them liberties other guards would not get: she asks for their opinion often, as if they’re a counselor of some kind. She does not attend any events under the wing of any other guard. During her mornings and her afternoons, she can be found walking around the castle grounds with her guard.

It is for the surprise of the kingdom that there is gossip going around about a disagreement between the both of them. These pointy tongues – but don’t say I told you this! - say that it’s probably related to the recent presence of lord Oswald. There is even talk that there has been a letter from the king, informing the princess of a marriage that is meant to be arranged soon.

Disagreement or no disagreement, the princess and her guard are seen leaving the castle to walk the grounds at sundown.

“Oh, please, stop making that face.” The princess says, as soon as they’re out of ear range of the same gossipers who have divulged today’s misunderstanding. “I’m getting married, not dying. It’s hardly a danger I can be protected from.”

“I don’t like him!” The guard says.

“Neither do I! What does that have to do with anything?” She looks back at the castle, her eyes following up to the highest tower, as if for the first time, she sees something sinister in the place where she was born. There is something feverish about the action. “You made your opinion pretty clear and you know how much I value it. But I don’t think anything can be done at this point. The man is here and my father’s letter is final.”

She turns away from the castle, her feet picking up the pace, but her guard has no problem catching up to her.

“Is there something you’re not telling me?”

She worries the strings of her dress around her fingers.

“Perhaps.”

Sometimes, the guard swears, the princess really makes me mad.

“Well? Why wouldn’t you tell me?”

“Because you’ll be cross with me, and I can’t have you cross with me.” She fixes her skirts as she climbs a couple of steps. “I need you to be your normal funny self so this all doesn’t feel so… Terrible.”

The guard is taken aback.

“I… I don’t think there’s anything anyone can find funny about this situation. Not even you and I.”

The princess stops, halfway through statues and topiaries. She turns to her guard, pulling out a small pouch.

“They asked me to marry them this morning.” She points at the small pouch where a ring glints inside. It looks like she’s carrying a dead mouse by the way she looks at it. It would be amusing if it wasn’t terrifying.

The guard peeks inside the bag.

“Big rock.”

“The biggest! I even cut myself with this earlier! I know I shouldn’t be touching it before the wedding, but I wanted to see it better.” She shows a small cut near her thumb. “I looked at it now. It’s as ugly as it’s big.”

“Smells… Different, doesn’t it?”

“Oh, please, guard. A fart joke is beneath you, even in this situation.”

The guard can’t help but to smile. This is their princess. Joking, kind. Their best friend. They would break the world in two before they allowed things to change. But, as it seems, there is nothing they could do. The mere idea of someone touching their princess without her consent is bone chilling.

“And what did you say?”

“What could I say?” She puts the pouch away, picking up her pace again. Sweat is starting to shine in her skin in the warmth of twilight, but she looks like she can run a full lap around the castle. The guard knows better than to try to stop her. “I have orders to fulfill, as much as anyone else.”

“But you only told me they were here to marry you this afternoon.”

“Because I wanted to know what you thought! And you made it pretty clear.” She crosses her arms, suddenly stopping. “And what can a princess do when all of her allies leave her for dead?”

“Hey, now…” The guard says, shaking their head.

“What should I do? Fall ill out of hysteria?” She puts her hand dramatically over her forehead, rolling into the hedge labyrinth. The guard laughs, following her in.

“You have never fallen ill, not once. No one would fall for it.”

She turns back, walking backwards to look at them.  

“Maybe I should pretend my own death. You would cover for me, wouldn’t you?”

“I would lose my head. Avoiding your death is kind of my job.”

“It is, isn’t it?” The princess takes a different route. Guard doesn’t mind. They know where all the roads of this labyrinth end. “Perhaps I should just vanish! It would serve my people well! To have no one to gossip about!”

All entrances of the labyrinth end at the former queen’s garden. Guard stands there, waiting for the princess to jump out of the hedges to scare them. Hardly never works because they’ve grown to wait for these kinds of shenanigans, but she is rather resourceful in her antics.

Guard eyes the sky. The light is dimming.

“Fine, vanish then. But come back in the next five minutes. We should probably head back. You have dinner to attend to.” They wait, but hear no sound. Impatient, they walked to the way they saw the princess walk into. “My lady?”

They followed the trail, heart racing as they didn’t hear a reply. When they finally find her, she is standing, one of her hands at her chest, the other grabbing the hedges. They look like the only thing keeping her up.

“Princess?”

She raises her eyes. They have the same feverish glint to them. She extends her free hand, as if asking for help. She tries a step, but her knees buckle. Guard reaches them in a second. Her body crumbles in their arms, as light as a flower petal, as heavy as the kingdom. A difficult sound escapes her throat and her scared eyes are glued to his as her hands grab on to his armor.

With a jolt, they remember. A memory they thought they suppressed from childhood, from his apothecary mother. There would always be sellers mother would turn away. Wicked people, she would say, who sold wicked things. Where is that smell from? They try to remember as they lower the princess to the ground, not knowing what to do.

A black powder, that’s it! As black as the stone in the princess’ ring. A poison. A poison she has cut herself with before she was supposed to.

With her mouth agape, the princess’ head tumbles back. Her beautiful hair is sticking to her face, that was pale as a midnight moon. They stand up, carrying her as a wounded bird.

The guard doesn’t remember ever running as fast in her life.

[starrynite7114]

Four Seasons (Angel Reyes)

A/N: I wrote this after my organic chemistry exam as I was just a mess emotionally. I couldn’t this idea out of my head after I heard ‘Four Seasons of Loneliness’ by Boyz II Men. Hope you all enjoy this story!

Warnings: Angst, I’m honestly so sorry. Please don’t hate me! <3

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It was Spring.

The flowers were blooming yet, the joy that spring usually brought to him, was lost. 

Placing the flowers on her grave, he held the tears back, taking a deep breath.

"Querida, you’re lucky I love you because this place is always so windy when I come by." He tried to make a joke, but the happiness couldn't even reach him.

It was a freak accident. He expected for her to survive, but it just didn't happen.

The first season without her, loneliness seeping in as her death finally sunk in for him. 

She was gone. 

And there was nothing he could do to protect her.

“I still haven’t named her. I feel like the shittiest person because I can’t even stand looking at my own daughter.” Angel sat against her headstone, resting the back of his head against it as he bent his knees, resting his elbows on his knees. “It’s been two months and I can’t look at her without thinking of you. She has your nose, she has my eyes, but every time I look at her, all I can see is your lifeless eyes looking at me.”

Angel broke down then, the traumatizing scene in the delivery room forever embedded in his mind. She was bleeding too much. They both knew that this pregnancy was a risk, but she wanted to have the baby, she wanted to take that risk.

But he didn’t. 

He didn’t want to lose her.

And he did.

“What am I supposed to do without you? I can’t even fucking breathe.” Angel sobbed out. “She’s staying with Pops. I know you’re pissed that I won’t even hold her, but, she took you away from me.” He sounded selfish. He sounded like a prick, but it was how he felt. 

She was able to hold her daughter before everything fell apart for Angel. They happily held the newborn, looking down at her. She was the most perfect thing in the world. But then she crashed, they ushered Angel outside, their daughter being placed in a makeshift crib. When the doctors came back out, the somber look on their faces broke Angel’s heart. 

‘We’re so sorry Mr. Reyes. We tried everything we possibly could, but she lost far too much blood.’

January 8th, 2020 was when he lost her.

Angel never really recovered from that. 

He spent four hours by her gravesite daily, speaking to her about nonsense, but he couldn’t face the reality she was no longer in his arms. When he made it home, Felipe was there with his daughter. She was having her bottle, eyes drifting close as she enjoyed her milk. 

“Pops, not now.” 

“Listen, I’m not too old to smack you around son. I understand you’re in pain, that every time you look at her you see your wife, but she’s your daughter Angel. She made it out alive. Honor your wife and be there for your daughter.” Felipe has let Angel mourn enough, it was time for him to face the music. 

His daughter needed a father. 

Felipe handed Angel’s daughter over to him. Angel cautiously held her, her big brown eyes looking up at him. She studied him, moving closer to his warmth. Angel hasn’t seen his daughter since the day she was born. Looking at her proved to be too painful, but holding her now, seeing his wife’s eyes, it was like he fell in love all over again. 

The tears fell from his eyes, realizing how badly he fucked up, how selfish he was. He had a daughter to care for, her daughter and he wasn’t going to let her down.

He wasn’t able to protect her, but he was going to protect his daughter with every fiber of his being. 

It was Summer.

A season that brought on endless joy since vacations were planned and the kids were out of school.

The days were longer, enabling everyone to enjoy the day.

The heat was unbearable. Nothing new there. Sometimes Angel felt numb to the heat, but other times he would feel it since Michaela, his daughter, hated it. If the apartment even went higher than 73 degrees, she was upset. It made Angel smile, your daughter was so much like his wife.

But the pain was still ever present.

Michaela was now seven months old. 

Angel was overprotective and that was mildly describing how he was with his daughter. 

Little Michaela had her father, tio’s and grandfather doting over her. Every little thing she did, there was a video and multiple pictures as proof. When she even so much as sniffled, she was immediately brought to the doctor. Collectively, they were all raising Michaela, since Angel was still a wreck.

Angel no longer visits her gravesite daily, but he did it every two days with Michaela tagging along. He would tell her about the day they met, when they began to date, he talked to his daughter endlessly and she listened to her father too. 

The ache in Angel’s heart was still present, at night, he would find himself turning to pull his wife against him and she wasn’t there. There were times that he would call her number and would pause, waiting till her voicemail came on and he would hear her voice again. Eventually, the number was disconnected. 

It was painful for Angel, having to raise his daughter all on his own. But he was trying his best.

“Look at my baby with her bow.” Angel had placed a headband on Michaela with a cute periwinkle bow. “You look so beautiful princesa.” He was preparing Michaela for Sunday BBQ at his father’s place. 

Ever since your passing, Angel found that he and his father became closer, relating with one another regarding the pain they felt when they lost the love of their life. He understood now when his father spoke to his mother's urn, he did the same thing at her gravesite. 

Michaela giggled as her father kissed her cheek.

“You look just like mommy.” Angel was having a hard time letting go of her, and he honestly didn’t think he would anytime soon or even at all. “I love Mommy with all my heart and I promise to love and cherish you till the day I die.” 

When Angel arrived at his father’s EZ was there grilling in the backyard. He saw Coco and Gilly smoking at the side. He nodded his head at them before making his way over to EZ.

“Hey, Pops went to buy some milk for Ella.” EZ kissed his niece on the cheek. “Don’t you look beautiful, mi preciosa.” 

“I’ll take Ella.” Coco appeared out of nowhere taking Ella from Angel. He gladly handed her over, trusting his brothers. 

“How you holding up?” EZ questioned, turning the meat over.

“I’m good.” Angel situated himself near the grill, nursing a beer in his hand that Gilly had handed him once Michaela was with Coco.

“You don’t have to lie to me Angel.”

“Ezekiel, my answer is the same every fucking time you asked. It hasn’t gone away. She just fucking died.” Angel took a deep breath, closing his eyes. “I’m sorry, you didn’t deserve that.”

“It’s fine, I get it, you’re hurting.” EZ sat beside his older brother. He couldn’t fathom what Angel was feeling. They were together for almost ten years. He knew how much Angel loved her, how much he adored her and now she was gone. And he also knew his brother’s self destructive behavior. “You know it wasn’t your fault right?”

Angel has been avoiding talking about his wife’s passing for quite some time. It was too painful.

But it felt like it was his fault. He promised, vowed to her that he would hold and protect her, but he wasn’t able to. 

It was what ate Angel up most. 

He couldn’t do anything but wait for the doctor to come out.

“Hard to see that.”

“I can’t begin to comprehend what you’re going through, but I’m here for you Angel. You’re my brother, you know I love you. And you know I’m here for Michaela too.”

Angel smiled. “I love you too punk.”

It was crazy how he was surrounded by people, yet the loneliness persisted and he knew why.

He wanted her, that was all he needed.

It was Fall.

Didn’t feel any different than summer till it was night. 

The nights have become colder, days becoming shorter.

The pain was slowly fading, but from time to time he would find things that reminded him of his wife and it would come back. He couldn’t even take off his wedding ring and he had no plans to do so. 

Fuck till death do us part, she lived on in his heart and that’s what fucking mattered.

Michaela was crawling now and he was currently baby proofing the apartment. She was pulling herself up to stand, but she hasn’t walked, not yet. But he knew she eventually would. It was only a matter of time. Angel saw your mother the other week. They spoke weekly. His wife’s mother was fond of Angel and offered to live with him till he got situated, but he politely declined. He just wanted to be alone with Michaela. He appreciated the help, but he didn’t want to be a burden to her mother. Losing his wife was difficult for her as well.

At times, Angel dreamed of her. It was less frequent but he looked forward to those dreams. They spoke about Michaela, what they wanted for her and how she wanted to raise her. They spoke about it often before she gave birth, but in his dreams, it didn’t feel like a memory, it felt real. It was as if she was communicating with him. 

“She’s so adorable, you’re doing so good with her.”

“It wasn’t her fault Angel.”

“It wasn’t your fault Angel.”

“She’s so loved baby, thank you.”

“I miss you.”

It was difficult for Angel. The loneliness hasn’t faded, no matter how hard he fucking tried.

But the loneliness hit differently because fall was her favorite season. Halloween was her favorite holiday and she always decked out the apartment for it. They watched one film a day, with a marathon of the Halloween franchise on the 31st. 

Now, he was doing the same with Michaela, but more kid friendly Halloween films.

“What should you be for Halloween? You really like Sophia of Avalon, but I think you’d be so good as a little biker girl.” Angel had his arm around Michaela as she watched Casper. It surprised Angel that Michaela was immersed in any movie he put on. At times she would pull herself up, watching the movie standing up. Every little thing Michaela did, Angel was amazed with. Each day, he fell more and more in love with his daughter.

If he was being honest, having her was making the ache less and less. He loved talking to her most because she would just listen, smile, laugh, anything she did, he was marveled by.

“Michaela,” Angel immediately got her attention, she looked up at her father. “It’s you and me against the world mama, okay? Daddy will always be here for you, no matter what. I’ll never leave you.”

Michaela smiled, your smile, and Angel kissed the top of her head.

“You would have loved your mom, she was the kindest person I know. Whenever she would laugh, it was so infectious.” Angel leaned back, smiling as he remembered how you would laugh at all his jokes. At first he thought she was faking it, just trying to appease him, but he realized that she was very easy to please and he made it a mission to always hear her laugh. “She was so excited to meet you.”

“I’ll make sure you never forget her.” Angel touched his ring. “Cause I never will.”

It was Winter.

Michaela’s first Christmas. 

Angel went above and beyond. He picked a Christmas tree, one of the ones in a fucking yard. The apartment was all decked out. He got her a sock that was hanging over his mantle. For once, he felt some excitement. He couldn’t wait for Michaela to open presents, to just do about anything. She was walking now and he loved running after her. She would squeal, laughing as Angel slowly chased after her. 

He took things one day at a time and the pain seemed to lessen. The loneliness just came at night, which wasn’t shocking. He didn’t cry as much as he used  to, but he found himself tearing up every now and then. 

EZ was holding Michaela as Angel cooked some soup. She had been sick as of late, the common cold overtaking her. Angel hated seeing his baby so miserable. EZ had been staying with them so they could alternate taking care of Michaela at night but more than not, she wanted her daddy.

“At least the fever is gone.” EZ soothingly ran his hand up and down her back, Michaela resting her head on his shoulder.

“Shit freaks me out, she’s always so energetic.” Angel frowned as he watched Michaela just looking at him, letting out a cough. 

“She’ll be fine. The fever is gone.” EZ tried to appease his brother’s worries. He was worried as well, but he knew she would be fine.

“Princesa, you ready to eat soup?” Angel questioned her, earning a nod.

EZ sat her on her high chair, causing Michaela to immediately cry out. It freaked out both EZ and Angel, as she’s never done that before.

“Dada!” She shrieked out, Angel felt his world stop.

It was Michaela’s first word. 

She said Dada.

EZ and Angel looked at one another before Angel rushed over to her and picked her up. He kissed the side of her head, cooing her as her sobbing quieted down.

“It’s okay baby, daddy’s here.” Angel cradled her head, letting her lay her head on his shoulder.

“That was her first word?” EZ was in awe of Angel’s transformation. 

“Yeah, it was.” 

Angel laid in bed, Michaela sleeping right beside him, a pillow and a bed rail blocking one side and him on the other side. He watched her, the humidifier helping out with her congestion to help her sleep. 

“Babe, she said her first word today.” Angel softly smiled. He spoke to you often. He felt fucking crazy, creepy even. He regretted thinking that his father was insane by talking to his mother’s urn, but he knew why he did it now. It made the pain in his chest ache less and well, he didn’t miss her as much. “Mi amor, te extraño tanto.”

By Christmas, Michaela was much better. She was opening gifts with Felipe, playing with the wrapper more than the toys she received. Felipe fondly watched his granddaughter as she played with the wrapper of the present she just recently opened. Angel was sitting on the couch, smiling as he watched Michaela open another present.

“Look Ellie, tio got you something.” EZ presented the Stitch Doll that he bought for her. The doll was almost as big as her. 

She squealed in delight, hugging the stitch doll. 

“Dada, ook!” She nuzzled her face on Stitch, her giggles filling the room.

Angel sat on the floor with his daughter, watching her as she hugged the Stitch Doll.

No one would ever fill his wife’s position in Michaela’s life. 

But Michaela was surrounded by people who loved her.

These past four seasons have been fucking hell for Angel. But as the weather changed, the time passed, the pain eased. The loneliness would always be present, but with Michaela with him, he didn’t feel as lonely.

“Hey baby,” he placed the flowers on the bed of her grave, balancing Michaela on his hip. “Michaela is a year old now. You should see her, she’s walking too.” He placed her on the ground, watching as she walked over to the gravestone, sitting down in front. Angel chuckled, smiling as his daughter bent down to smell the flowers. “She’s just like you. Fucking hates the mornings, loves having ice cream at the middle of the night.” 

“I miss you querida, so much. I know you’re looking down at us, watching us.” Angel looked up in the sky, the wind picking up. “We’ll meet again someday, but for now, Michaela needs me. One day, we’ll be together again, like we always planned.”

He could survive.

He could survive for her.

He could survive for Michaela.

Four seasons of loneliness that he survived and he’ll continue to do so.

Maybe someday he’ll meet someone again, but Michaela was his number one priority.

They would meet again.

And he couldn’t wait for that.