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fanficsforheartandsoul · 11 months ago

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Happy Ending | Simon "Ghost" Riley x Fem!Reader

Note: This has been ghosting around in my head for some time now because of the song "Wallpaper" by Megan Cromwell. I noticed that whenever I don't have the pressure of a request in the back of my head for a story it's much easier to write. That's why I wrote this rather easily and quickly. I just wanted to post something again lol. So yeah, have some good ol' super dramatic angst. I'll be more active again hopefully.

Fandom: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II (2022)

Warnings: Angst, Heartbreak, Unrequited Love, Mentions of NSFW Stuff, Trauma, Reader has some Issues

Summary: Ghost wants a happy ending but not with you.

Word Count: ~2k

If you want to be tagged in my stories send me a pm with the fandom/character name! Or comment on the fic :)

Masterlist

Call sign: Vigil

"We can't do this anymore."

You had known from the start that sleeping with him was a bad idea.

Generally, people advise you against sleeping with a co-worker. Because it makes things complicated. Even more complicated when you're both in the military.

Because technically you’re not allowed to fuck, your actions could be clouded by emotions, potentially risking not only your but the lives of your fellow operators as well. But that little clause in your contract was printed in that tiny font, and so you decided to ignore it.

It didn’t stop you from getting involved with your lieutenant. You were never a big fan of rules after all. Your rank as a sergeant after so many years of service in the military said enough about that.

But at the start, you truly believed that a physical relationship with him wouldn't cause trouble to you or anyone else.

You thought you had it under control. At least in the beginning.

Yes, you had been attracted to him since your first meeting when you had signed your contract with Taskforce 141. Mysterious men were your thing, and he embodied such a man with his skull mask.

So yeah, you did allow yourself to daydream about him, and have some dirty thoughts every once in a while. It wasn’t like you were the only one.

You were attracted to him and you knew he was attracted to you. It was mutual and actually pretty obvious.

You could feel his searing gaze on you just a few days after you had joined the taskforce; the way his eyes trailed up and down your body. The looks he gave you were charged with want.

But attraction doesn't necessarily lead to a romantic relationship, right?

He was a good-looking man in your opinion; tall, rugged, buff, with muscles and fat in the right places, just the way you liked it.

His face couldn't be considered conveniently attractive yet that made it so much better for you. The arch in his brows, the dark eyebags, the scars on his cheeks, his cheekbones. He was your type. And his rough appearance fuelled the fire in your lower stomach and your imagination.

What was the harm in joining him in the sheets and having a bit of fun? It wasn't like you loved him.

That’s what you had asked yourself.

It was much better to get rid of your pent-up frustration with him instead of a toy or a rare one-night stand when you were off-duty. And damn, was he good in bed.

Rough, fast-paced, keen to try out every possible position, and not shy of pleasing you. You could've expected it. He was a man who wasn't afraid to get down and dirty. Dirt, blood, sweat, and other fluids... It didn't matter.

Short summary: It was pure ecstasy every time.

You two had lots of fun together in lots of different positions and locations, and that was all it was. Just some fun.

No strings attached, as you both declared at the start. Just fuckbuddies.

"I'm not a relationship kind of guy, Y/N" he had told you after you had spent your first time together.

You had snorted because shit, you weren't either. Both of you were too broken and bruised by the baggage of your pasts. Your traumas would probably weigh you both down in the long run. So you were fine with the line he had drawn between you.

It was okay. No emotions, no obligations, no lovey-dovey shit, just a means to an end.

Just a meeting in your room after a mission, a phone call on your days off, then a quick meet-up in a hotel. Just pleasure. Not love.

Until it wasn't just that anymore.

You two had settled into a routine where he would join you in your room late every other night.

After you had pleasured each other enough, he would leave soon after, and somehow - with time, you began to miss the warmth next to you on your bed.

The feeling came slowly creeping, and it took you by surprise.

You never asked him to stay; you didn't dare cross the line. To ask for a bit more affection. But you wished.

That he held you just a bit closer during the act. That he remained next to you just for a few more minutes after it. That he kissed your scars, your lips. That he touched you as if you were something, someone precious to him. Someone important.

Sure, you liked it when he treated you like an unbreakable object when his grip left bruises on your body - in a way, they satisfied your need for more. They marked you as his. But just for once, you wanted to be treasured by him. To feel that you meant something more to him.

You didn't know when your feelings for him had turned into a fluttering mess in your chest. He wasn't just a means to an end anymore. You valued him. Not just as a soldier who had your back. Not just as a friend. But as a man, a partner. A man you wanted close to you. For the rest of your life. No matter how long that would be.

Because Simon had done something no one else had been able to do before.

He made you wish. For a future. A future with him.

He made you wish to be better, to be a little less broken. To pick up the pieces that had once made you whole. You wanted to be better. A better version of yourself. For him. To have a chance to be truly happy. To get that fairy tale life others dream about – you once had dreamed about when you were younger, your shoulders lighter.

His attention made you excel, it made you stronger, faster, harder. You were just better when he was around. A better soldier, a better woman, a happier person.

And you thought, no, believed that he understood that. That he helped you to be better. That you needed him. Not just in your bed, but by your side. As your other half.

You both were people of few words, so you thought that through your actions, your eagerness during missions, and your gentle touches during your time together, you conveyed all these feelings. That he got it, saw how you felt about him.

But you never spelled it out. Never said; I've come to love you.

Just let these feelings simmer under your heart, hoping that one day he'd get what you felt for him.

"We can't do this anymore, Vigil."

You'd love to say that it came as a surprise when he, one day, called you to meet up and told you these words.

But you knew subconsciously. Felt it. Long before he actually said the words, they were coming.

His calls had been less frequent, his visits rarer, and to your confusion, his eyes began to look different whenever you saw him. They looked clearer, and happier.

Only after you saw him at the party after your successful operation in Chicago did you understand. He did look happier.

But not because of you.

And only then did you realize that your brain had played a trick on you. You were so consumed by your feelings for him that you didn't realize how big the rift between you two had gotten.

He laughed.

Simon Riley laughed heartily for the first time since you knew him. Not just one of his usual chuckles that he reserved for your or Soap's jokes.

No, true deep laughter that came from deep within his chest.

And all because of a joke that the woman next to him had told him.

You didn't know her; you had never even seen her face before. She was a complete stranger to you, and yet Ghost rested a hand on her hip as if she belonged to him. As if she was his fucking girlfriend.

Soap looked at you, then who you were staring at.

"That's Ghost's new lass, I heard. Can't believe that guy found someone before us, eh? Surprised me too, I tell ya."

His words were like poison, and you tasted bile in your mouth. So much made sense to you now.

"Why not? I thought you liked it?! I enjoy it every time."

"That's not relevant anymore. I'm just telling you, Y/N. This thing is done. I won't come here anymore."

"But-"

"Let's just forget this happened, alright?"

"...."

"Okay."

You hadn't even been able to argue. Or tell him your feelings.

After all, you were the one who said you could never be in a relationship with him or fall in love with him. It was pathetic to get back on your words and admit it in front of him.

So you just shut your mouth and accepted his words for the time being.

A tiny voice in your head whispered that you could tell him your feelings later when he calmed down a bit. When he started to miss you.

You knew the whole situation with Hassan was getting to him and the others, so you cut him some slack. You thought he would change his mind. Believed it. Blindly.

But now, here you were. Looking like a fool. Feeling like one. Being one.

And the thing was, you couldn't even say anything to him.

He was the one who made you happy. Who made you want to be better. Less traumatized, more whole.

You could see in his eyes that she was that to him. Not you.

So, what right did you have to intervene?

You wanted him to be happy, after all.

How could you deny him that? You both had gone through so much.

She seemed to be the complete opposite of you. She basically glowed in the room, her smile radiant, and her aura was light as if the world had blessed her to never know hardship.

Her frame was soft, and her skin unblemished, untainted by the cruelty and darkness that existed in the world.

You couldn't help but compare yourself to her.

Your cracks, the marks of your trauma, made themselves known through various scars on your body. Your hands were rough, covered with old blisters; so unlike hers, and you were all jagged and sharp edges, while she looked so cute and bubbly.

You could see her appeal, and it hurt to think that way, but in another world, in different circumstances, you could see her as your potential friend. She just had the appearance and aura of someone who people gravitated toward. A soothing soul.

In that sense, you could understand Ghost. Why he searched her side. But you fucking hated it.

As lovely as she seemed, right now in this bar; you couldn't help but despise her.

She took him from you.

A voice whispered in your head. The ugliness of that thought made you want to throw up, because didn't it prove that you weren't completely right in the head?

Ghost wasn't your property. He had his own free will, and just because she appeared didn't mean she stole him away.

After all, he never belonged to you anyway.

This was probably why Ghost didn't chose you, you thought to yourself. Your ugly jealousy and possessiveness were rearing their heads.

I wouldn't choose myself either.

You felt like crying, but you couldn't even do that.

You hadn't cried for years now, and although the pain in your heart was worse than any of the bullet wounds you had received during your career, not a single tear welled up in your eyes.

You were truly broken. And the man who could fix you wasn't at your side. He would never be.

You looked at the two of them once more. An ugly thing clawed at your chest, begging to get out. Your vision turned red. You clenched your fists.

You had to get out of here. Now.

"You okay, Vigil?" Soap asked next to you, noticing that you seemed a bit off.

"Yeah. I just- think I didn't turn my stove off. I got to go."

You mumbled before you turned around and hurried to the exit of the bar. Soap tried to protest, but you were out the door before he could even finish his sentence:

"But you just arrived- Damn... off she goes."

He sighed and looked towards that woman and Ghost. They made eye contact. As if Simon was already looking at him. Or you.

#call of duty #call of duty modern warfare ii #modern warfare II #modern warfare 2022 #simon riley #simon riley x fem reader #x fem reader #ghost x fem reader #ghost x female reader #ghost #soap #john soap mctavish #simon ghost riley #soldier reader #141!reader #special forces reader #fem reader #fanficsforheartandsouls

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clementineofmine · 3 months ago

Note

For the ask game :)

Same Weird Family (the series): 1, 4, 5, & 9

Thanks, @assaily, for the ask! I'm going to answer this based on Same Weird Family, the first in the series because I haven't gotten to talk about that one yet. It's the first fic I wrote (that you know of, lol) so while I now find parts of it a bit rough, it'll always be near and dear to me as it came about due to a visceral need to word vomit about these characters.

1: What inspired you to write the fic this way?

I started this fic a few weeks after S2, and like many I was absolutely inspired by the absolute savagery and increasing desperation of Five in that season. From killing the board to rewinding time, Five did so much for his family that season and none of them knew about it. Plus, the season ended in a new timeline, so the "what's going to happen next?" opportunities were almost endless.

I was also deeply inspired by those who took a stab at post S2 before me, including but definitely not limited to NonLinear Theory for Dummies, The Walls Kept Tumbling Down, Creeping Towards Extinction, and Tangled in the Hanging Tree. If you haven't read these and you like my fic, you're going to love these. They are all angsty and excellent.

4: What’s your favorite line of dialogue?

I'm gonna call out Allison here, because while she didn't get a lot of focus in this fic, I think she deserves a chance to yell at her brothers more often.

“Well, if we can’t take him to the hospital-” Allison’s words returned them to the practical matters. She looked around as Diego and Luther both shook their heads at her as confirmation. Vanya looked torn but didn’t disagree. Klaus remained focused on Five. “-we’ll have to watch him. We’ll take shifts.” “Oh boy, Five’ll just love that,” Diego scoffed. “He’s unconscious. He’ll deal,” Allison pointed out, closing the discussion. She finished cleaning up Five’s injuries and straightened his clothes. “And if you guys are done with playing pissing contest,“ she gave a pointed look to both Diego and Luther, “you can help me get him upstairs to the bedroom."

5: What part was hardest to write?

Chapters 1-6 and part of 7 came at me fast and furious, but I floundered a bit trying to get through 7 and 8 to the end. I think the writing is a bit awkward and it does make me cringe a bit.

9: Were there any alternate versions of this fic?

Not alternate versions so much as I did a lot of rewriting (I'm a pantser; I try to let my characters speak and sometimes they surprise me)

If you'll permit me to tag onto your ask, I'd also like to answer 3: What’s your favorite line of narration?

I spent a lot of time dissecting Five's internal emotions during this fic, trying to make sense of what drives Five - the anger and frustration and desperation that we saw on screen in S2, and beyond. I'm quite proud of some of it. Here's a snip:

“FIVE!” The shout cleaved him violently from his thoughts. Five blinked, confused, and looked up. His mind registered that his name had possibly been said more than once. Oh, he remembered, almost absently. His siblings were pestering him. Five sighed. All of the energy that had once fueled his rage was gone, drained away as quickly as it had spiraled up. Anger merely simmered now, rather than burned. He no longer felt dizzy, just…tired. In the clarity of hindsight, Five knew he hadn’t ever really been angry at his siblings. Annoyed, sure. Frustrated. But anger was reserved for the fact that Luther and Diego’s questions dragged things out of the little box, things that snagged and pulled at the cracks and exposed his weakness. For the memory of the light fading out of Klaus’s eyes, reaching for Five but still dead before he hit the ground. For the way that Vanya’s body crumpled like a discarded paper doll. Mostly, Five’s anger was directed at himself. For being played, and not figuring out the only possible end to the Handler’s deal until it was much too late. If he had been thinking clearly. If he only… Stop, Five. There’s no good destination down that road. “Five, we just want to help you” the soft voice said. He still didn’t care to pick out its owner. It didn’t matter. He couldn’t bear to keep listening. His siblings had died because of him. Again. And everything that happened afterwards – his survival, his thoughts, his actions – he could give them everything and still would never be enough to make it up to them. Never.

fic ask game

#tua #the umbrella academy #fic ask game #five hargreeves #thanks for the ask!#i wrote it

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fuckmeyer · 1 year ago

Note

This is gonna be LONG but I stalk ur blog now. I’ve read ur tags, and I’ve come back for more, Maria discussions, Maria headcanons, and Maria love… Jasper can come along too ig, only because he worshiped the ground she walked on. (His words not mine lol.) Anyways, it’s loving Maria hourz.

I wanna talk about the strikethrough because YES! Maria totally didn’t expect to develop feelings for Jasper down the line but she did. They ARE lovers! I don’t give a damn what Meyer says! I don’t care about all the “Mate” stuff because none of that holds up when you really look at what we are shown instead of told. Their actions portray that of two people who have love for each other and it’s so ridiculous to me that some ppl try so hard to deny that when it’s obvious. It’s honestly so much more realistic and interesting to have them be lovers, and damn what the deniers say! They’re just mad and uncomfortable bc they think Maria will be a threat to their ship but she’s just existing and minding her business lol. Maria deserves to have love and be loved. Latinas in general deserve to be love interests and not just “evil brown seductress”. *eye roll*.

They’re obviously into each other. It’s the only thing that explains their weakness for each other. They’re both known as people who are willing to kill anything that threatens them… except for each other lol.

They spent a few years paranoid around each other knowing they were “planning” to kill, and both parties could have easily done so… they never did the deed and now I lowkey believe they weren’t even that serious about it lol, they were both on edge and probably just trying to scare each other away bc they’re dumb and can’t handle their feelings.

Ppl claim Jasper left so quickly when Peter and Charlotte came back for him bc he was just so miserable and all that, but I think another reason Jasper left so quickly is because he really didn’t want to have to face the possibility of killing Maria and/or he simply couldn’t handle this new sour relationship with her when it was never like that between them before. They were each others closest companion. She’s the reason he stayed so long because he loved her, and being around her… her confidence, ambition, brightness, genius, vibes, and mind-blowing sex was his getaway from everything else and was his only source of goodness when they were both surrounded by war and destruction.

I highly doubt he would have stayed so long if Maria was just so mean, bitterly angry, disrespectful, and violent towards him the way some ppl try to characterize her. To me, logically speaking, Maria is and would have to be hella charming, charismatic, bubbly, hospitable/warm in a scarily insane way for her to have so many followers who are not only afraid of her but are also blindly devoted to her, especially when one of them is an emotion detecting/manipulating empath. If she’s this hugely manipulative person as they say why would she be ruthlessly angry and bitter towards everyone?? Why would anyone follow her?? She wouldn’t have been as successful with & without Jasper if she was just stone cold evil all the time. I think she breathes life into everything she does (even war and destruction lol) because that’s just who she is.

We later find out that Jasper was actually Relieved that he didn’t have to kill her. Imagine that lol. Peter suggested they go back and do so… Jasper said No. He just didn’t want revenge against her and vampires are like, known for revenge in their universe. Like what’s the explanation for Jasper:

1. Being so willing to protect Maria, even from himself.

2. Being relieved he didn’t have to kill her.

3. Rejecting his friend Peter’s suggestion to go back and kill her.

4. STILL not killing her later when she found him in Calgary and ultimately “forced” them to move (still don’t know how), theoretically putting his new family and Alice in danger… He was ready to kill Bella for the slightest hint of danger that she brought, but Maria??? No, she must be spared, she’s just a baby lol.

5. Still being kind/thoughtful enough to wish her well, even telling his friend Peter to relay that message to her if he sees her because it’s THAT important apparently and not just a passing thought to keep to himself…

A lot of ppl like to say Jasper was “saved from Maria”. But not only was Peter okay with Jasper’s rejection to killing her, he was also okay with him asking to tell her he wishes her well, even when they both knew how unlikely it was they’ll run into her. If Peter saved Jasper from Maria why are they so chill with her now? Why not actually go seek revenge? Peter saved Jasper from War and Destruction. Not Maria. Because Maria wasn’t really the core problem like some ppl make her out to be. It was their surroundings.

She’s lowkey still considered a friend. Jasper is so okay with her existence that he’s even thinking of seeing her again to ask for help. Like he’s such a big ass softie for her, even in times when you’d think he wouldn’t be and she’s not his lover??? Make it make sense please!!! Like I said, no man is doing ALL THAT for a woman he doesn’t love. If going to literal war for a woman for nearly a century isn’t enough evidence then this should be… That man loved her (and probably still does) and whoever disagrees is blind.

More: Ppl seem to believe that Maria didn’t care at all about Jasper and had no romantic feelings for him but she literally treats Jasper with the same caution and softness that he does. They’re BOTH weird asf when it comes to each other.

Maria is seen as this ruthless, unfeeling demon�� but she had a whole family and a lover before, so obviously that means she’s capable of feeling love and she’s also loveable. Allegedly she’s an evil person who doesn’t care about anyone and will hunt you down and yet, not only did she let Peter and Charlotte go. She let Jasper go too. She put Jasper in charge and trusted him with things I’m sure she used to handle herself.

When Lucy & Nettie betrayed her, I think she became closer to Jasper considering he was the one who warned her and they took them out together. They protected each other on and off the battlefield. When their relationship soured she still couldn’t kill him even tho it was her army, she trained him, and it could have been done without much effort on her part… now if she was this evil unfeeling devil, she would have. But she didn’t. She’s a ruthless warlord who has killed for less, she didn’t trust him at the time and she believed that he was thinking of betrayal like Nettie & Lucy so she had a STRONG motive to get rid of him, and she just waits for a couple of years with only a hanging threat of killing him??? She didn’t really want to kill him and it shows. She didn’t wait that long to kill Lucy & Nettie lol. If she truly didn’t care about him she would have easily and quickly gotten rid of him at the first thought of betrayal. She wouldn’t have waited those few years and if he did manage to escape. She would have found him much sooner and killed him.

Speaking of finding him, why did she even care enough to look him up years later, and decide to visit anyway? (For the record: I don’t believe Maria initially came to kill or cause trouble bc why would she? If that’s the case she wouldn’t have come alone for a whole coven of vamps. She’s too smart and good at survival for that) If Maria is this uncaring person, why would she care enough about someone that is supposedly “disposable” to her??? Probably because he meant more to her than she’d care to admit. I can only imagine/headcanon how badly she was AT WAR with herself over that too. Especially considering how she previously lost her “mate”. I have so many headcanons about how she handled her feelings for Jasper when she finally realized and bbygirl was going thru it! Lol.

Because lbr, she may not have had strong feelings for him in the beginning but she definitely developed feelings for him after all that they went through together. That’s literally the only explanation for her actions with him. We are told she’s more ruthless/dangerous than Jasper yet she’s literally let him get away with so much and still thinks about him and she’s CONFLICTED about it! Which is gonna be yet ANOTHER conversation that I’m totally gonna return to your inbox for lol. I love angst, love, and complicated things between these dumbasses who clearly have unresolved feelings for each other. They are SO interesting and their story is so powerful. Like imagine what JasperxMariaxTherapy would look like. 😭

TLDR: Maria was the one that got away and Jasper is not over her.

👏Latinas in general deserve to be love interests and not just “evil brown seductresses.”👏

María & Jasper were mates! to quote a wise bestie (i.e. you):

no man is doing ALL THAT for a woman he doesn’t love. If going to literal war for a woman for nearly a century isn’t enough evidence then this should be…

to me the whole "lost her mate" & the "never treated him as an equal or thought of him as her mate" biz was thrown into the guide just to make her look like a non-option for Jasper. canon paints a different picture. vampires mate for life, but nowhere does it say they can only have one mate. you never "get over" your mate... but you can always make room in your heart for more love. (RIP Marcus but girl you gotta get outta the house). & that's what María did without realizing it! girl is so traumatized & focused on war, she probs fell in love & didn't even notice. then when she did she got scared of her feelings & tried to run lmao stupid baby i love her sm

The Saga of María & The Major

if i had to guess the progression of their relationship (PASS ME THE MIC LMAO) i'd say it went roughly like:

María turns Jasper

he impresses her w/ his gift & his military expertise. he wins. they celebrate. she rewards him with responsibility. he loves that he's serving a purpose & loves feeling needed. she loves that he makes her feel accomplished & in control

more wins. more victories. he's her major. she's his queen. they're in love with victory & bloodshed & war. they're toxic, they're powerful, they're young gods, they're partners. always late-night strategy seshs & early-morning briefings. always on the same page in combat. they break off & do solo missions together. they only hunt with each other. this is a v normal relationship

they get to know each other (of COURSE María is warm & bubbly & charming; she may be a warlord but she's a leader first) & find out they had similar thoughts & values in life. they hated the upheaval of their lives caused by invaders (ok Jasper), they hated feeling like losers in war, they are very driven & goal-oriented. flirting is involved?? wow, is this friendship??? (no, this is patrick)

there's a romantic spark. Jasper feels it. he knows she feels it but wonders if she knows it ykwim? it feels amazing but he keeps it to himself. then one night (late night hehe) María accuses him of using his gift to make her attracted to him. oop. girl OUTS HERSELF as having a crush on Jasper &, even after he insists he never used his gift to make her feel things (true), GETS MAD at herself for having feelings & kicks him out. goodbye loser. except...

she hates having a crush! she cannot stop thinking about him & he knows it! she feels like she's replacing her mate! she can't concentrate around him! he's her major & it's inappropriate! he can taste her attraction all the time! why is he the only one who gets to taste! she wants to taste him!

THEY FUCK

also they kiss

a lot

they sneak around & keep things buttoned up on the battlefield. HOT. we love a forbidden romance

María gets scared of the intimacy bc she's María (feelings? no entiendo). which is around when she finds out what the Civil War was really about. ew. he's basically a colonizer. she thought they had similar experience vis-a-vis war but he's a colonizer? ew.

she's disgusted. she feels like a fool. she's angry at herself for still having feelings for him. she feels oddly like a hypocrite considering she purges all these newborns. she maintains a professional relationship. cold. distant. he hates it. he reaches out. several times. says he wants to understand. ok

[you want to understand? here's all this rage & pain & grief over what the white men did to me & what Benito stole from me & this is how i felt when i was displaced from my home & my family whom i loved more than a lot of things & people who are NOT YOU; keep telling yourself we're "so similar" bc you lost your "way of life" & bc you also had to witness the deaths of your friends & family whom you loved more than...other people you may (have) love(d). p.s. fuck you (metaphorically) p.p.s. next time it's on sight.] she's a professional & he will never understand. get back to work. GOODBYE LOSER x2

except... she depends on him too much. vice-versa. they're partners. they're toxic. they can't untangle. the war effort suffers. he's desperate to win her back. things are weird.

then one day he finds out Nettie & Lucy plan to kill her. fuck. now she needs to kill her covenmates. too old for the bullshit. Jasper offers to help. she takes it. grudgingly. she's DISTRAUGHT but so traumatized she's doing what she does best & closing herself off from the pain.

except Jasper knows better. after the deed is done & she retires to her chambers he goes in with her. & as soon as he starts prodding she cracks & unleashes all this pent up emotion. this is a whole different María. Jasper has never felt such deep emotion ever. or so many emotions at once. how does so much emotion fit into such a smol lady??? science is still uncovering the phenomenon

& underneath all that pain & anguish & exhaustion & fear & hate & disgust, Jasper feels love. raw, aching love. for her family. for her past. for her country. for her life. for him. he will drown in her before morning. sometimes you just gotta hold a girl & cry with her

OHP THEY FUCK PT. 2 ELECTRIC FUCKAROO

WOW actually openly being in love engaging with your emotions is kinda rad (& scary). María can really reflect on her life & herself. like maybe this war isn't the end all be all? maybe there's more to this life than revenge? maybe for the first time she can see her future on the horizon? maybe saving Mexico is futile bc war is never-ending, & maybe if she didn't spend all this energy killing she could spend more energy loving...

& maybe Jasper feels that way too. maybe that's why he's depressed. maybe he's just as tired as she is. maybe he's losing his mind over all this death. maybe he feels trapped. maybe he resents her. maybe he hates her. maybe he's plotting to kill her. maybe she should kill him before he kills her because even if he didn't kill her he would definitely kill her just by killing her because she loves likes loves him & she can't let him go even though he wants her to which is why he's going to—

oh.

jasper left.

she won't need to kill him after all. jasper left. he didn't want to kill her. he just wanted to leave her. alone. so he left.

jasper is gone.

...oh.

***

The Calgary Incident

Speaking of finding him, why did she care enough to look him up years later, and decide to visit anyway? (For the record: I don’t believe Maria initially came to kill or cause trouble bc why would she? If that’s the case she wouldn’t have come alone for a whole coven of vamps. She’s too smart and good at survival for that)

first: let's acknowledge the fact that the Cullens weren't able to detect María until the last second & that a coven of seven with THREE (3) gifted vampires was too scared to take on one (1) María. QUEEN

second: María DEF wasn't there to harm them bc 1) wtf does María care about Canadian territory? 2) if the Cullens were her enemies they would already be dead.

she's there for Jasper. probably not to ask him for advice/help. she got by fine without him. María being María she's also not going to come to him like "i'm still in love with you."

that said, she IS a ride or die. if she thought Jasper was in exceptional danger she would warn him. the Volturi likely have their eye on María & (for other reasons) the Cullens, & she got wind of it. she was looking out for him, & maybe even hoping for better diplomatic relations Just In Case. even if the Cullens naïvely believed their happy little (powerful) family wasn't being watched, María knows better. she's careful, calculated, & she knows the Volturi will make trouble for the Cullens (& by extension her) in the future.

Jasper is also a ride or die. & him telling her to "keep her distance" is to protect HER. not him. not Alice. not the Cullens. bc he knows "keep your distance" as a threat/warning is pointless. girl will do whatever the hell she wants. but he also knows she put herself in a vulnerable position to find them. he knows if the Volturi weren't watching her then, they certainly are now that she has visited the up-and-coming Cullen coven. "keep your distance" is akin to him saying "take care of yourself."

this, & "tell her i wish her well," is the closest they will get to saying "i still love you."

but they don't have to say it. they already know.

#maría my beloved #happy loving maría hours everybody #anon i love you #su-angelvicioso #(still tagging in case she sees this lol)#also PLEASE give me any/all headcanons & if you think this relationship should go a different way I NEED TO KNOW #that goes for anyone reading this just pile on headcanons i want this story so bad #sigh #twilight #twilight renaissance #twilight headcanon #jasría #jasria

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parameciam · 2 months ago

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i'm so tired of fandom police and people that demands that i justify why i like the things i like / ship the things i ship -.-

CW: mentions of SA, CSA, ableism + long rant incoming about my own experience in fandom as an autistic person

this morning i stumbled on a post (not here) about my fav ship, saying that we should talk about a certain scene (dubcon) and that their shippers never talks about it.

i read the whole thing and ended up so fkn annoyed and spent all day thinking about why i was so mad.

it's not because someone doesn't like my fav ship, btw, i couldn't care less about other people ship preferences. i only care about my own and wish everyone else did the same so i can enjoy my "problematic" things in peace, thank u very much.

it wasn't about the dubcon part either, i know it's triggering, it's complicated, and many people won't ever ship them because of that. no one is required to ship them, or like them at all, btw. (addendum: it's a canon side ship, not fanon) and of course i'm not going to question other people's squicks and triggers, esp since i was sexually abused as a child.

and then it dawned on me that that i was mad because the post wasn't really an invitation for us shippers to share our views on them. it was an invitation for other people to be scandalized with them about shiping something like that, and since they directly mentioned the ship and the characters, i stumbled upon it.

for a moment i contemplated the possibility of actually replying and going meta over my blorbos, but decided against it because i don't have the emotional capacity to participate on discourse without fear of ending up having a meltdown.

but i kept thinking of how this kind of thing has happened all my life: the things i like, the ships i ship, the characters i love, the media i consume, and the ways i enjoy them have always been questioned (for different reasons across time). being autistic equals being perceived as wrong, broken, too much, too little, too weird (long list of misc etc) and people outright tells you that or shows it anyway, even if they think they don't lol so I'm like, extra tired of feeling excluded and/or constantly being made to feel wrong and immoral.

it's not like i don't know that some of the thinks i like/write/read etc are dark, morally wrong, unsafe irl, etc. it's just that i enjoy all that in fiction, i think it's a safe place to explore delicate issues and themes, and esp enjoy finding the nuances that the narrative wants to explore. i love imperfect victims, i love good people making wrong choices, i love the realism of gray characterization.

i don't anyone to tell me shit i already know, i have eyes, i read/watched the same novel/manga/whatever. maybe we have different interpretations, but that's it. i don't think i'm morally superior, nor do i want to be. what i do want are discussions in good faith.

maybe that's why no one mentions that scene either, because we already know how that's going to go (and it's already a small side of fandom, so why bother).

sorry for the looong ramble, i needed to get this out of my system. i don't want to tag the ship/fandom because this was mainly about my own feelings and don't want to bring hate or initiate discourse about them.

in fact, most of my thoughts and feelings about them are going to take the form of a fic relatively soon: i don't feel qualified to write meta about them 😅 but i want to explore so many things about them, and disability, and ableism, autonomy, agency, etc etc etc.

#parameciam's autirants #yes i treat this blog as a diary and i'm not sorry #fandom discourse is tiring #ship and let ship #actually autistic #autistic loneliness

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actualaster · 2 years ago

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Okay, I got curious about how the "lloyd shipping dynamics" pie chart got broken down since I knew there were more Lloyd ships than just those in that specific chart, so I decided to check it out for myself. Wondered if maybe they didn't have any fic on AO3, or if there was some other reason to exclude them (plenty of reasons for that depending on the type of data you wanna look at--like if you only look at pairs not trios, or if you only want to know about ships that have more that one fic and such)

I did try to do a pie chart but no matter what I did, some fics just... Never were displayed because it could only display so many entries (especially when they were tiny %) that the smallest slices just.. Got excluded. I tried.

I was also curious how it would break down if you took into account the fact that ship tags are not mutually exclusive and thus fics can have multiple ship tags on them. Why are there two sets of numbers here? The first is "the % calculated comparing the ships to the fics. The second is pure ships. Basically first being "this is what % of the fics are tagged with these ships" the second is "this is what % of the total ships each one makes up".

Anyway, the data and some extra details about what data was collected and how and such below the cut.

Basic takeaways: Colloyd, Zelloyd, and Kralloyd are the Top 3, but Lloyd gets shipped around a bit, with 10 different canonical character's he's shipped with (either via a single pairing or as part of a trio) and several OC ship fics. Popular guy!

First breakdown, what % of the surveyed fics are tagged with each ship?

Colette: 55.30%

Zelos: 33.06%

Kratos: 6.03%

Sheena: 2.08%

Genis: 1.66%

Colette/Lloyd/Zelos: 1.66%

Yuan: 0.83%

Kvar: 0.62%

OC: 0.62%

Colette/Lloyd/Genis: 0.42%

Lloyd/Sheena/Zelos: 0.42%

Genis/Lloyd/Mithos: 0.21%

Kratos/Lloyd/Yuan: 0.21%

Lilia: 0.21%

Lloyd/OC/Sheena: 0.21%

Lloyd/OC/Zelos: 0.21%

Presea: 0.21%

Second breakdown, what % of the total ships does each one represent?

Colette: 53.2%

Zelos: 31.8%

Kratos: 5.8%

Sheena: 2.0%

Genis: 1.6%

Colette/Lloyd/Zelos: 1.6%

Yuan: 0.8%

Kvar: 0.6%

OC: 0.62%

Colette/Lloyd/Genis: 0.4%

Lloyd/Sheena/Zelos: 0.4%

Genis/Lloyd/Mithos: 0.22%

Kratos/Lloyd/Yuan: 0.2%

Lilia: 0.2%

Lloyd/OC/Sheena: 0.2%

Lloyd/OC/Zelos: 0.2%

Presea: 0.2%

I'd be curios how this would change if I included data from sites like FFN, honestly. Or even if I could find some old archives with ToS fic, or maybe DA, or possibly even Wattpad? Mostly because I wonder how many ships I'd find that didn't make it to AO3 (there's at least one lloyd/mithos fic on FFN, for example). However the sheer amount of work that would be to compile the data across multiple sites and try to correct for cross-posting gives me a headache just thinking about so. Lol nope, not happening.

Moving on to info about the data collection, and such...

First up, some base info on the data gathered:

481 fics total, 500 tagged ships total.

All from AO3

Data taken as of March 10th, 2023. Uh... Let's say 7am, -6GMT.

Data was gathered manually by going through AO3's entire 1,461 and manually tallying things up. (Including repeated checks to make sure no new or updated fic posting messed with stuff)

By this I mean "I had a sheet of paper and color-coded the tally marks as I went so I could check every 10 pages that I was getting everything I wanted to include and my math was adding up

(...I still have the feeling I overlooked a few but at this point I've spent way too much time on this already for an informal survey so.)

Counting by hand ensured that I didn't overlook ships for not thinking about them (Kvar/Lloyd, a few of the trio combinations).

(Fun story: I discovered that the Lloyd/Lilia tag, if you click on it, points to the Lloyd/OC tag which is incorrect. For those who don't know, Lilia is a canonical minor character from Dawn of the New World, the sequel game. In DotNW it's revealed that Lloyd proposed to her. It makes some sense in context but yes it's still weird, and yes the fandom had an understandable fuss about it at the time. Also, yes people are still annoyed by it.)

ANYWAY. Moving on from that... For a fic to be included, it needed to meet the following two criteria

Ship must be tagged in the relationships field. So adding a ship in the additional tags field would not get it counted.

Ship was a romantic and/or sexual pairing.

Some additional notes on that:

Ship was marked as implied, mentioned, or any other indication it was not a major focus but was still tagged in the relationship field: included

Ship was indicated as one-sided: included

Ship included a ship event (e.g. a ship week) but did not include a ship tag in the relationship field: excluded

Additional tags made it ambiguous if the author intended for a fic to be considered romantic, sexual, familial, and/or platonic: excluded

Furthermore, no fic was excluded due to content--so you have the fluff-fests and the fucked up darkfic all included in the above data.

Honestly if I were to do something like this again I did learn several things that would make it go smoother, but at this point I have spent over 30 hours over the last... IDK, 2.5 days or so? on what started as idle curiosity because my brain got locked into an obsession spiral and refused to let me drop it so I'm not going to go through and try to do this again anytime soon. At least not unless it's for a fandom with a hell of a lot less fic lol.

Anyway, based on my own data stuff I assume that OP of the pie chart actually used ships for their sample size, not fics because that was the only way I was able to get close to reproducing their results when looking at those ships only? Not something that matters much in this case, however--they did their math based on ships and it all checked out so.

#tales of symphonia #lloyd irving #shipping #lengthy post #sorry no fancy pie chart everything i tried kept eating a few of the ships #tos #anyway that's enough math for the year now i think

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fbfh · 2 years ago

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light up the dark [X] - Leo Valdez x reader

wc: 6.3k

genre: domestic fluff, slice of life, smut, character interactoins

pairing: Leo Valdez x goth gf!child of eros!reader

warnings: reader might be starting to warm up a little, Leo being an absolute lovemuffin (he's so sweet), c*lypso mentions, c*lypso shit talking, reader nico goth kid friendship, leo hazel friendship, hazel being adorable, possible soulmate au????? v brief, good old fashioned friend group tea spilling/gossip sesh, penetrative sex, closet hookups, emotional sex, oral (f recieving), leo making everyone's heart do backflips, switch leo, gratuitous use of the words cunt and clit, gratuitous clit play, sex w a side of feelings

summary: after a surprisingly enjoyable movie, many important conversations are had while everyone splits up to do chores in groups. your ability to resist Leo is getting weaker, and he's starting to make you feel things.

song recs: that's amore - dean martin moonstruck soundtrack, canzone per loretta/gioventu mia tu non sei morta - moonstruck soundtrack, dear future husband - meghan trainor, don't know how - ricky montgomery, hangin - bastille, let's generalize about men - crazy ex girlfriend soundtrack, she knows - j. cole, bad ideas - tessa violet, haunted house - florence and the machine, if my heart was a house - owl city, I'll make love to you - boyz II men

a/n: struggled with this bc of a change in my environment that ate up an hour of my writing time!! hate it :) the movie they're watching is moonstruck if you didn't catch that lol.

tags: @yesv01 @magcon7280 @avashaye @perseajohnson @afidiofobia @thatmultifandomloser @yelenabel0vaswife @almostjollypizza @fictionalcomforts @lizziebitch33 @jacksondeeznuts @girlfriendwhoseawitch @urmum-xoxo @Asunnyhunny @dustyinkpages @cowboylikekelsey @legramilis @youkissedareaderinthedark @mrscarolscaramoucheplease @cosmiq-cloud @anything-forourmoony @i-dont-remember-a-lot @chasingpj @1dpjohoohp @mystic-writings @babiesimagines @dreamerball @demirunner @if-only-i-was-fictional

You spend all day waiting for the shoe to drop. You sit through “family meetings” of chore wheel arrangements and board games and movie night schedules with your stomach in knots, waiting to see if Nico told anyone yet, or if he’s going to. One move from him and it could be dramageddon. Dread sits cold and heavy in your stomach, like an unwelcome but familiar old friend. For the whole time everyone’s piled in the living room, dividing up chores and tasks, taking turns picking games and movies, you look at everyone’s faces a little too closely, trying to figure out if anyone knows, if anyone suspects anything yet. It's going to be tough, being in such close quarters like this. You just have to act totally normal, not give them a reason to suspect anything. All these bonding activities and let's split up gang tasks are a minefield, each one laying the potential groundwork for more and more to go wrong.

But as the time draws nearer to actually do all the things you've spent the morning planning out together, you don't find yourself nearly as worried as you thought you would be. After breakfast - which was obviously delicious because Leo made it - you all cram back in the living room to watch a movie. As you curl up in an armchair that's not too close to anyone and the opening credits begin to play, the only thing on edge is the voice in your head insisting that something is going to go wrong if you're not careful.

You glance over at Leo, who's scooching an ottoman over to sit a little closer to you. It's enough to make you smile, but not so much that it feels like someone cornering you or encroaching on your personal space. You both settle in in tandem as the opening shot of the movie glows across the screen. You try not to pay too much attention to that voice, try to focus on the movie. You even manage to ignore the grinding pain between your shoulder blades that feels like something’s going to rip through your flesh for most of the time. You did try looking at your back in the bathroom mirror, but the skin around where it hurt just looked a little irritated. You don't know what this is, but you hope it goes away soon.

The she-devil has been nowhere to be found for all this, the planning and arranging, even now during the movie. You can't say it's an unpleasant surprise, though it still escapes you why anyone would rather sulk then be spending time with a group of people that actually aren't terrible. Granted, Calypso's absence has made it a lot easier to get along with everyone else, keep the conflict to a minimum. Leo did go to check on her once earlier. All you knew was what you heard her berating him about on his way back down, how stupid and pointless she thinks all this is.

You're not the biggest fan of it all yourself, but hearing the way she talked to him led you to adamantly take the opposite stance out of spite. Group bonding is so important. You'd even go as far as to say it's enjoyable. Your favorite fucking thing since Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge. It's not like you'll get to say it to her face, she only shows up for mealtimes, if that. You could easily bitch slap her for never helping with cooking or cleaning either. The only thing she actually does do is make everyone uncomfortable, talk shit about you, then storm off in a huff and expect everyone to worry about her, but turn down anyone who tries to talk to her. So yeah, it's probably best that you haven't seen much of her.

By the end of the movie - that you actually enjoyed, in spite of the lack of things you usually look for in movies, like blood or the occult - everyone had a great time. You got some laughs, and even a few inside jokes out of it, including the phrase, 'it's like a big snowball' said in a thick new york accent. Percy didn't have to change anything to mimic the line perfectly, which was easily the best part of the whole thing. Once everything is all wrapped up, everyone splits up into teams for chore duty. You and Nico head to the laundry room, Hazel and Leo head to the store for groceries, and everyone else tidies up and starts to get dinner ready. Normally you hate laundry, but you realize this is actually the perfect opportunity to get some more information on children of Eros. You just have to play your cards right, be extra careful with Nico. You can’t charm your way out of this one.

On the way to the grocery store, Hazel is quiet. She’s quiet when Leo plays old Megan Trainor songs, she barely replies when he asks how her craft projects are going, and she barely even bats an eyelash when they drive past someone walking not one, but two dogs. That’s when he knows something is really bothering her. It takes him until they’re half way through their list to figure out what’s going on, and get her to talk to him about it. Once she does open up, it seems obvious. He wonders how he didn’t piece it together before now, but he��s just glad they’re finally talking about it.

“I just…” she starts, hesitating at the awkwardness of the subject. “I think that if you’re- putting out for each other, that that should mean something.”

Leo nods, and she continues, avoiding his eyes.

“That if you like her enough to… you know… roll in the hay,” she mumbles, and Leo bites back a smile at the turn of phrase, “then you should ask her to be your girlfriend.”

Leo lets out a dry laugh.

“Be-fucking-lieve me, I want to.”

She looks at him confused as he tosses bread into their cart. He lets out a sigh, trying to find the words he’s looking for.

“The thing is,” he starts, skimming the aisles for the next thing they’re looking for as they walk, “I think she does like me like that. And I definitely like her like that. I just…” He trails off, feeling her silent question hover between them. If you both like each other, he should just ask you out! He thinks back to you, to how careful he’s been to not push you away or come on too strong.

“I just don’t want to move things too fast and scare her off.”

Hazel nods.

“Like a horse.” She says solemnly. That gets a laugh out of Leo.

“Yeah,” he says, scratching something else off their list as she places it in the cart. “Like a horse. So like you said, us doing the diddly-”

“Rolling in the hay!” She interjects with a humorous frown.

“Whatever.” He says dramatically, getting another giggle out of her. “The point is, it does mean something - at least I think it does, between us - so I don’t want to pile on all this commitment on top of that. At least until I know she’s ready for that.”

He glances over as she listens.

“We’re just doing things backwards, I guess.”

She hums in response. That all makes sense, sure, but there’s something that’s still bothering her.

“Well,” she says, picking out some nice looking fruit from the produce section, “you shouldn’t keep your backwards relationship a secret from your friends.”

She really called him out with that one. After how many unnecessary problems arose between the time they came to camp and actually defeated Gaia, all because of keeping secrets and not sharing things that are (in hindsight) really important, they came to the conclusion that keeping secrets is stupid. They all agreed to be much more open with each other, to tell each other everything and rely on their friends when things were hard. This informal no more secrets pact had only been broken twice. By Leo not telling them what’s going on between him and you, and by everyone else not telling him what they’ve really thought of Calypso all this time. Aside from those, things have never been better between them. Leo lets out a sigh.

"You're right." He concedes, "I promise I'll tell them soon, I just don't want to scare her. I mean…" he sighs with a smile, thinking about how much you've opened up to him already. "She's finally starting to warm up a little, you know?"

Hazel nods. You really do remind her of a horse. You're skittish because you're scared, not because you're actually dangerous. You just need the right person to take care of you, brush you and feed you sugar cubes until you realize they're not all bad. She thinks Leo is probably that right person. She hopes this will be enough of a resolution, but as they walk to the next area of the store, she can feel that antsy feeling beginning to erode at her insides again.

"So when you say soon…" she starts, getting a laugh from Leo, "do you mean like, tomorrow night at dinner soon, or this weekend soon?"

He considers. He's prioritizing how you seem to be doing, the silent cues he's picking up from you over a specific time. He shrugs.

"If the right opportunity strikes, sure, it could be as soon as tomorrow night." He says with a chuckle, half joking. As they scratch the last items off the list and head to the front to check out, they both feel a sense of resolution about the whole situation. Leo concludes the conversation with an emphasis on timing, waiting for you to be ready to take things further without taking on too much. Hazel concludes the conversation with an emphasis on the specific timing of dinner tomorrow night. She feels better knowing that she won't have to keep this secret from the people she loves more than anything for much longer. The only thing she needs to do now, is figure out how to keep it for that long.

While you and Nico start sorting laundry into different piles, you try to figure out where to start, and more importantly, how to bring this up at all in a way that feels natural. You can't charm your way out of this with him, so you need to be a little more strategic. Once you decide where to start, which burning question to ask first, you break the comfortable silence that fills the room.

"So," you start, not looking up from what you're doing, "how did you know that little trick of mine wouldn't work on you?"

He looks over at you with a dry hint of a smile, like he's been expecting this. He lets out a long sigh, and you brace yourself for wherever this is going.

"Every once in a while, my dad - Hades," he clarifies, before continuing "he'll try to have a… father/son heart to heart with me."

You shudder in tandem at how uncomfortable that sounds.

"After a few seconds, he realizes how painstakingly awkward it is, and give me a bunch of random information instead. I used to think it was useless, but…"

He looks over at you, seeming to size you up, aligning what he knows about you with what his dad has told him about children of Eros in an attempt to avoid awkward dad talks.

"I guess not."

You wait in silence for him to continue, but he turns back to sorting laundry. It's quiet for a few moments before you cave, trying not to seem as desperate for more information as you are.

"So…" you start again. You try to seem nonchalant, but all it does is bring a good natured laugh out of Nico. You find yourself laughing along with him, and the realization sets in again that you can't make him perceive you the way you want to like you can with so many other people. It's somehow both alarming, and strangely comforting. Nico sighs before answering.

"Children of Eros can invoke lust, sort of like how some children of Aphrodite can use charmspeak. The thing is, you can't draw on feelings that aren't there. Your powers are only going to work on people in the right age group - within a year or two of your age until you're 18. It's also not going to work on people that aren't attracted to your gender. I have a boyfriend, not a girlfriend, which is why-"

"None of that worked on you." You finish, grateful both for the information and to have someone to talk to about it.

"Yeah." He agrees, as you finish putting the first load of laundry up in the washer as he continues.

"So basically, it's not going to work on someone who's not compatible because of their age or preference," he says, summarizing his knowledge on the topic, "or your soulmate."

Your eyes flare at the addition. Soulmate? The curiosity in your eyes is obvious, so he continues.

"But soulmate connections are pretty rare, so I wouldn't worry about that."

"Oh," you chuckle with a sigh of relief. At least that's one more thing you don't have to worry about. "Thanks."

The rest of your time in the laundry room is quiet, the white noise of the machines adding to the comfortable silence. You don't know if this counts as an actual friendship considering you're both just silently doing laundry in the same room, but you actually don't mind it too much. You're looking forward to the next time you do laundry together.

Everyone else has made their way to the kitchen, starting to get everything ready for dinner and keeping each other company. It’s not long before the conversation turns to tea spilling, as it tends to when close friends are spending time together. It’s not long before the conversation turns to you. Annabeth asks Jason more about when you first met, and Jason is happy to go into detail. He’s mostly just glad he can finally talk to his friends about all this. After a while, they’re caught up on more or less every interaction he’s had with you before they arrived.

“And then you guys showed up the next morning, so that’s basically everything. What do you think?”

Once they’re up to speed, Piper’s the first to speak up.

“I mean,” she starts, brow furrowed, “I’m worried about Leo, for obvious reasons.” Everyone agrees, none of them needing to go into detail about Leo’s taste in women. Historically, it’s been questionable at best, sometimes even bordering on self destructive. In the midst of Calypso inserting herself into their lives, something none of them are a fan of, the last thing any of them want is for Leo to jump from one toxic relationship into another, or worse, backslide to Calypso. Again.

“Yeah, me too-” Jason starts, about to reiterate this point.

“Wait,” Annabeth interjects, brow furrowing, “you said she scared off Calypso? When she first showed up?”

“Yeah.” Jason nods. Annabeth considers for a moment.

“I like her.”

It brings a laugh out of everyone, but none of them disagree. Frank pauses chopping up vegetables for a second.

“Honestly, I’m just worried she’s going to say something mean.”

“To Leo?” Percy asks, getting another coke from the fridge and handing a redbull to Annabeth.

“Yeah,” Frank shrugs, “or to any of us. I mean, we’re already dealing with enough shit right now, you know?”

“Wait, has she actually said anything mean to anyone here? Like, targeted any of us?” Will asks, thinking back. Jason lets out a dry laugh.

“Uh, yeah?” He says, stating the obvious, “She was super mean and terrifying when we first met.” He thinks back to how intimidating you were that first day they found you.

“Wasn’t she, like… scared out of her mind then? Like, she just woke up from a magic coma and probably didn’t even know she was a demigod. Has she done anything mean since then? Like, after that?”

Jason’s brow furrows as he tries to remember.

“...I don’t think so.” He says, and Will chuckles.

“Yeah, she was probably just scared!”

Jason has no idea how he didn’t think of it like that before. He realizes that now, since your life isn’t in mortal danger, you haven’t really been snapping at anyone but Calypso that much. Everyone else seems to come to the same conclusion.

“I mean, she did call Calypso a wilted jagweed the other day.” Frank points out.

“In her defense, Calypso was being a wilted jagweed.” Percy says, nonchalantly.

“I think that’s the nicest thing I could say about her…” Annabeth agrees, drawing a loud laugh through the room. They start remembering your best Calypso roasts and funniest zings over the last few days, and in doing so, they notice a pattern. All of that, every mean but honest thing you’ve said about her, has been in response to something less good natured that Calypso said or did. You haven’t been the one starting shit since day one.

“Okay. If no one else will say it, I will.” Piper says, and everyone braces themselves for some scalding hot tea, “Am I the only one who’s noticed how much shit Calypso talks about her?”

Everyone in the room could not agree more.

“Especially behind her back!” Piper points out incredulously. They’re all reminded of the various mean girls they’ve had to deal with over the years. None of them want to admit it, but ever since Calypso left Ogygia, she’s been steadily getting worse than Regina George. Percy lets out a dry scoff while he stirs the contents of a frying pan, a dish towel casually tossed over his shoulder. It’s something he’s seen his mom do countless times, and it feels weird cooking without one.

“You know, it’d probably be a lot easier to gel as a group like Chiron said if Calypso wasn’t picking fights all the time.”

Annabeth turns to him, agreeing adamantly.

“Yeah! And have you noticed she only shows up to eat?” She scoffs, “Where is she when we’re all cooking and cleaning up?” Facts have truly been spoken, and no one shies away from agreeing with her. At least you’re actually participating. Even when it seems like sometimes you don’t want to, you still make an effort to be there. You still show up where Calypso doesn’t.

“Yeah, literally!” Jason agrees, “She actually helped me and Leo go grocery shopping on our first day here. She made a list and divided it up so it would be easier and everything.”

The silence speaks volumes. There’s more than enough evidence that in spite of your prickly exterior, you’re actually much nicer than Calypso is. Granted, with her track record it’s not hard to be nicer than she is, but they all still appreciate the effort from you. Frank finishes chopping the vegetables as cooking smells waft through the air, a preview of the delicious food to come. He finds himself relating to you. After the blessing he got from his dad, he noticed the instantaneous difference in the way people look at him. He suddenly got so much taller and more buff than he was, and that paired with the Mars energy can make him seem really intimidating. He knows what it’s like to be written off as mean and scary before someone even tries to get to know you, because he’s been through that too.

“I feel kind of bad for her…” he muses. Between how much Calypso has been shitting on you, and gods know what you went through before they found you, they all find themselves agreeing with him. It makes sense that you would have a chilly attitude if you’ve been hurt by people in the past. The tides continue to shift in your favor, leaving them feeling a little defensive over you. It sinks in that even though you’re a little rough around the edges, you haven’t done anything to hurt them. You’re trying to get along with them as best as you can, you seem to want peace.

Not only that, but you really do seem to make Leo happy. It’s pretty hard to miss. Even earlier during the movie when he scooched his way over to you, and kept whispering to you about what was going on when you missed something or forgot a character’s name, no one could deny that it was sort of… cute. He gets excited when you walk in the room, his gaze always seems to linger on you. They’ve even seen your gaze flick over to him enough to clearly see you’re not totally uninterested in him. Knowing you, that might just be the tip of the iceberg.

The way you look at each other has Percy and Annabeth, and Jason and Piper sharing meaningful looks. Frank and Will stare into space for a second, thinking about their girlfriend and boyfriend, respectively. Leo seems more confident, more at ease, more himself when you’re around. At the very least, definitely more than he is with Calypso. If it comes down between you and Calypso, which it looks like it is at this point, they all know they’re going to side with you. Because in spite of your thorns and rough edges, you really do know how to make Leo feel good.

“Oh f-fuck!” Leo sighs out in a strangled moan. You're in a cramped closet you slipped into - or more accurately, dragged him into - when he got back from grocery shopping and you finished the laundry. Nico went off to take a nap and Hazel said she has an appointment with her diary and a hot cup of tea, to please not disturb her. You pounced on him like a goddamn animal the second you got the chance. Now you're biting his lips, scratching his back, sucking hickies into his neck. It really didn't take long to rile him up, get him fuck into you wildly, so deep and good that neither of you can get enough. He has a hand clapped over his mouth in a desperate attempt to muffle his moans. It barely stands a chance against the way you grip him, dripping more arousal with every thrust, but at least he's trying. He's lost all sense of time since you first dragged him in here and pulled him closer by the collar of his shirt, connecting him in a deep, open mouthed kiss.

He forgets himself, forgets everything outside that door. The only thing he can think about is you. You, and the way your nails bite blissfully into his skin, your sweet smell invading his senses, making him feel high. He can’t hold on, can’t stop himself from moaning out your name like a prayer, over and over as he climaxes inside you. He throbs and pulses against your cushy walls as the condom bulges inside you, stuffing you full with all his cum. In spite of the thin - but incredibly important - layer of latex between you, the feeling of him filling you up is more than enough to push you over the edge. You clamp down hard around him, clit throbbing, as you climax. You do your best to stay quiet, but there’s not a sigh, not a single pant or heavy breath of yours that escapes him. He commits it all to memory.

He peppers your face with kisses between heavy breaths and murmured praise against your skin as you both come down from your high.

“So good for me, so, so good,” he mutters, breath mixing with yours, “gods, I love you so fucking much…”

You feel your stomach slowly stop twisting, feel that hollow emptiness begin to go away as he kisses you and kisses you. You indulge yourself, letting him keep kissing you while you attempt to get yourselves straightened up. You have hookups and quickies down to a science at this point. You mentally run through your list of things to fix and check, but keep losing your place at how soft his lips and kisses and breaths are against your skin. He sighs again, all blissed out from you, making your head spin for a moment. It’s really, really distracting. Eventually, you try to pull away from him and his soft, addictive lips and touches and longing looks to fix your lipstick.

You open the door, nudging him out before someone starts to wonder where he is.

His gaze, his hand in yours, all of his attention all linger on you. He knows you’ll be a minute or two behind him, and these last few moments in your presence will be enough to sustain him until then. He hates to part from you, every time you’re near him is better than the last, so he takes a leap of faith. He presses the back of your hand to his lips, gazing up at you through his thick eyelashes. From the moment his lips meet your skin until you’re finally out of each other’s sight, you stop breathing. Your stomach flips, feeling less empty than ever. You hoped it was just the way he looked at you, but trying to find your breath in that dark, stuffy closet, it’s also his kiss that lingers.

When he enters the kitchen, he tries his best not to seem like he’s on cloud nine, he really does. But as he walks through the doorway, making conversation and checking on the food, he smells like you. Piper’s the only one to notice. Her eyes flare in realization as she pieces together what seems to her to be completely obvious, and she takes a sip of her drink to disguise the knowing look on her face. She pulls it together, helping with dinner, joking and laughing with everyone, bringing Leo up to speed on all the gossip that wasn’t about his love life. Both parties remain unaware that just moments ago, while you were milking his cock dry in secret, everyone else was talking about you and him and Calypso, and the two exceptions to the no secrets pact remain broken.

Leo sleeps lightly that night, every noise startling him awake, in hopes that it’s you creeping into his doorway like a cute little Nosferatu. He tries to reason with himself, reminding himself that you might not even come at all tonight. It’s not like you’re obligated to or anything. But he knows you will. You always do. He wakes back up suddenly, only realizing he’d drifted off when his eyes open back up. This time, he’s finally met with your familiar silhouette, quietly closing his door as your inability to resist temptation won again. He smiles that sweet smile of his at you, knowing he was right.

You want to see him. You still like him enough to do this, to show up here. All it takes is one look and you know he can tell how weak your attempts to hold onto your chilly persona are becoming. You’re going soft. You walk over to the bed as he sits up, looking at you in that way that makes you wish he wouldn’t. You feel unnerved as you approach, and it fights the conflicting yet simultaneous cravings for him that leave you feeling empty and impatient. The hollow twisting feeling in your chest and stomach always makes you less stoic than you usually are, and you don’t like it. You don’t like that you didn’t feel like this before you met him. He just smirks up at you, eyes all soft and sweet as they trace over your features that look so pretty in the moonlight. He thinks you look even prettier during the day, when he can see you properly instead of sneaking around in the dark like this. His hands are warm and cathartic on your hips as he pulls you into his lap, leaning his whole body in to kiss you.

“It’s just sex.” You insist unprompted. He pauses, lips millimeters from yours.

“I know,” his voice is low, intimate, and he leans closer. You hesitate.

“I’m just using you for your body.” You demand.

“I know…” there’s that signature note of playfulness to his voice, and your words only make him smirk more. He doesn’t seem convinced, because it’s not at all convincing. Not like it was the first time you said it. He learned how to read you like a book in such a short period of time, now he knows you so intimately, and it’s obvious that the words you’re saying aren’t lining up with the way you say them, with everything else you’re telling him. There’s a vulnerability to you, just below the surface. He knows not to press you about it, to let it rise up naturally, but he wants to let you know that he sees it. Just the corner.

Finally his willpower runs out, along with yours, and he kisses you deep and warm. He pulls away for a moment, looking at you like that again, before he leans back in to really kiss you properly this time. You’re relieved every time he kisses you, every time he touches you and looks at you in that way you don’t like and it makes that feeling go away. Sometimes you don’t even know it’s back before he’s dusting off cobwebs and taking sheets off furniture in your haunted house of a heart, turning on lights you didn’t even know were there.

You can feel him getting harder under you. It’s enticing, feeling his cock come to life for you. You savor the feeling of how it teases you, rubbing against your hot, puffy folds and nudging against your clit. You squirm against him, hoping it seems like it’s for his pleasure and not because you really, really want him inside you. You reach into his pants, beginning to wrap your hand around the base of his cock, feeling a vein pulse under your touch. Right when you’re about to do something fun, his hands move to your waist and he flips you over before you can blink. He hovers on top of you, faces so close, lips almost brushing. The air freezes in your lungs.

“Not yet…” he whispers low into your ear, punctuating with a kiss to the tip of your nose. You don’t have time to worry about not letting him see how flustered that made you, how much such simple words and gestures affect you, before he starts to move down. He pushes up your shirt, pressing a few kisses against your soft stomach, sending butterflies erupting through each place his lips make contact. He reaches your waistband, fingertips slipping comfortably below the fabric. He tugs off your panties, nudging your knees further apart, encouraging you to open up your legs for him.

“Good girl, just like that.”

He murmurs the words softly against your mound, before pressing another soft kiss against your skin, this time, directly on your cunt. It’s hot against his mouth, and if the way your breathing hitches at the contact is anything to go by, sensitive. He parts your lips slightly, dipping his fingertips between them to trace your entrance. You feel him smirk at how wet you already are for him. You want to tell him to shut up, to stop smirking like that, but the words don’t reach your mouth. In the moment you think them, he spreads you all the way open, and starts pressing soft kisses to your throbbing clit. The sentiment evaporates, leaving your mouth as a shuddering gasp instead.

He kisses you again, making the slightest contact with his tongue, and you feel the thoughts flying out of your head at the sensation. You forget what you wanted to say anyway. You don’t think things could possibly get better - or maybe get worse? You’re not sure - than they are right now, as he floods you with more pleasure than you knew was possible to achieve from soft, warm kisses. You’re proven wrong by him again, as he fully wraps his lips around your puffy, twitching clit, going to town with his tongue on your sensitive bundle of nerves. The noise you let out is unholy. You clamp a hand over your mouth in a futile attempt to muffle your moans. You feel him smile - not smirk this time, actually smile - and it hits you like a ton of bricks; he’s doing this for your pleasure alone.

This isn’t prep or foreplay, he’s not trying to get you ready for him, all he wants is to make you feel good. The last time you can remember a guy going down on you, it’s been as a way to get you ready for him - or as a way to get something in return. But not Leo. Leo Valdez, sweet Leo who smells masculine and spicy, with his soft lips and soft hands and soft looks, and his warmth… he’s between your legs, placing your hands in his hair, sucking on your clit for your pleasure. ‘And his, apparently,’ you think, feeling the bed start to bounce as he ruts his hips into the mattress, moaning into your cunt.

It makes your head swim, and it’s mere seconds before you’re cumming, rutting up into his mouth and dripping for him. When you come down from your high, you realize he hasn’t stopped. He’s still going, slowly and gently, squeezing your hips tight as he does. He moans into you again, the vibrations of his voice feeling even better than they did before. You’re so sensitive, and he’s so good at this that it doesn’t take you long until your legs are shaking in climax for him again. You lose track of everything except the dizzying feeling of him slowly and lovingly making out with your clit.

You don’t know how many times he’s made you cum - three or four? Maybe five, you’re not sure - until it’s eventually too much. He can feel your pulse racing against his tongue, feel you dripping down his chin, wetter than you’ve ever been as you tug at his hair, trying to get him to detach from your clit and close your shaking legs. He lets go, very, very reluctantly, and looks up at you. You don’t think there’s anything he could say or do to drive you crazier, then he rests his head on the inside of your thigh, blinking up at you through thick, dark eyelashes. A ghost of a smile nudges the corner of his lips as he leans over enough to press a few affectionate kisses to your puffy, sensitive mound, and you’re proven wrong again.

“Just fuck me already…” you plead. Your hands are still in his hair, and you find yourself simultaneously wishing for more of these intimate acts from him, and for him to just use you to get off, like you’re used to people doing. He smirks again, climbing up to hover closely above you. You’re once again face to face, lips millimeters apart.

“Yeah?” He presses kisses across your face, your nose and cheeks that sends a chill down your spine, “You want that?”

You do. You want that so bad. You need to feel him inside you like you need air, or Palaye Royale’s entire discography. You nod frantically, humming in response as you close the gap, tasting yourself on his lips.

“Okay,” he murmurs into your mouth, barely comprehensible from the way your tongue is pushing past his lips. He lines himself up with your entrance, and you wrap your legs around his waist, pulling him inside you as soon as possible. He moans into your mouth at how wet you are, the way your pussy sucks him inside you. He takes his time, fucking you good and deep, his kisses never ceasing. He takes care to grind the base of his cock against your clit, not too much, but just enough so you feel it. You definitely feel it. Every thrust has you whimpering, has your eyes rolling back and moaning into his mouth.

The whole time he has you like this, there’s one phrase that’s on repeat in your mind, and it makes you realize something. He’s not fucking you, he’s making love to you. There’s a huge difference, and it’s something you’ve only known one side of until now. All this swirls around you in an intangible and undeniable amalgamation of feelings that you can’t dismiss as just lust anymore. You know lust and sex better than anyone, and in the back of your mind, you know for sure it’s not just sex. It’s probably too late now, you think, and if you want any chance to get away from this as cleanly and not messy as possible, you need to leave right now. Like, right now.

But you don’t. You let him hold your hand, let his fingers intertwine with yours. You let him kiss you sweetly and gaze into your eyes like that, you let him hit all those spots inside you that he knows make you feel good. You let him make you feel good. You let him make you feel like you’re in a movie. And not some artistic psychological horror flick with an overuse of narration and too much dramatic irony, something sweet. Something romantic. Romcoms have never been your genre, but it feels okay with him. Good. You let him make you feel like a leading lady in a campy, wonderful romcom, like a love interest. You’re sure this will complicate things at some point, but you’re too terrified and dizzy and drunk on him, on how good he feels, to worry about that right now, so you stay where you are. You let him make love to you.

#leo valdez #leo valdez x reader #leo valdez smut #heroes of olympus #heroes of olympus x reader #heroes of olympus smut #light up the dark

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diamondcitydarlin · 1 year ago

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I'm not gonna tag this because shadows fandom loves to be contrarian and base their metas directly on people who didn't like things while calling them stupid and shallow and whatever (because apparently I can't not like the way a thing was written without directly insulting someone else who did?? Or being stupid? make it make sense) but I honestly am all for Guillermo being and staying a human. I've been all for it since day one, honestly. To me, everything about his story from the first episode, first season suggests that this is the kind of idealized dream he's going to wake up from eventually and realize it's not everything he wanted. I've always been 100% on board with that, especially with the reveal that he was a vampire hunter which came with its own set of powers. In fact, I was working on a fic a couple years ago that I intend to return to that is ALL about Guillermo finally eschewing his dreams of vampirism for a purpose that better fulfills him etc.

So no, my problem with this last episode is not that 'Guillermo needs to stay a vampire or it's bad writing phwah', my problem is with the swiftness that all of this happens, coupled with the fact that Guillermo is between a rock and a hard place and more or less just being guided into place by what everyone else in the situation thinks is best for him. Despite the fact that he literally DRINKS BLOOD FROM A CUP to fully come into his vampire powers naught but a few scenes before, the fact that he cannot bring himself to drain a human directly from the tap until dead (which I still don't think makes a lot of sense on it's own but fine) is treated as this insurmountable problem they can't possibly get over so, obviously, he needs to be reverted via Derek's death (a character who also doesn't deserve that). Can't just let him drink blood from cups or bottles for a while. Can't just let him half drain someone but not to the point of death. Maybe at least to give him some time to decide??? Maybe give him better reasons (of which there are many) to decide to revert? He has been idolizing this for most of his life, after all, I just think it's a shame that we're meant to accept that ONE moment of revulsion towards killing someone (KILLING SOMEONE OF ALL THINGS) is enough to make him just nope out completely. That's a disservice to him and what he's capable of, if you ask me.

See, I of course enjoyed the deliciousness of the whole cheating/sex parallel to Guillermo being bitten by someone else, loved that, I'm just not sure how I feel about that storyline ending with Nandor being like 'im gonna forgive you for this but only because you're too much of a stupid little baby to know what you want, but I know what you want better than you do, now lemme kill the guy you cheated on me with real quick ok' LIKE. I KNOW that they are toxic I KNOW they are unhealthy, but Guillermo is a character that has constantly been struggling with his own agency, often seizing it on his own by very aggressive means, often being shown as smarter and more capable than most of the household, and for this storyline to just end with Nandor 'fixing' it all because Guillermo's just too dumb to know what's best for him...IDK YALL. DIDN'T LIKE IT. I can see how people would find it romantic and I do think it's meant to be but...nope. I don't find that romantic lmao I find that insulting and patronizing. Maybe that's the point? But it wasn't funny either. Or interesting, really. (The Freddie stuff was fucked up but at least it was funny to some degree lol)

I guess my point is that I wish there had been more time spent on this. We can't keep excusing these cop-out, rushed and dropped storylines on 'well it's a goofy show' because yes, it's ALWAYS been a goofy show I get it, but there's no denying that seasons 1-3 did a better job of holding on to arcs and creating consequences for the characters as a result of these arcs and their actions, such as the Vampire Council tricking them into custody after a season of Guillermo killing a bunch of vampires etc. There's precedent in this GOOFY GOOFY show to think that there will be follow through and consequences of characters actions etc, so no, it doesn't come from nowhere and it's not people just seeing what they want to or whatever.

I do kind of think this was rushed because the next season will most likely be the last, but even if that is true, I don't see why we couldn't have dedicated more time to it in this next season. It's deflating, it's boring, it sucks that one of the main narrative questions of the show 'Will Guillermo transform or not?' has been answered with what I find to be more or less a wet fart that doesn't even really make sense or fully take into account who the characters are and what they're capable of.

Yes, it's a goofy show that is usually just episodic moments of whatever crazy shenanigans the vampires will get into today, but it used to be elevated and tied together by story arcs and narrative consequences that would, eventually, sooner or later, show up for the characters to deal with. It used to be arcs that spanned episodes of Guillermo coming into his power and feeling conflicted about his dreams versus his destiny. It used to be the Vampire Council or the Baron being a certain kind of existential threat. It used to give us the idea that while funny stuff was happening, buckle up, because it's going to get REAL in the last few episodes.

But now that's uh...more or less just not a thing anymore. Everything is dealt with in a 25 min runtime and there are no consequences for anything that last or mean anything. To me, that sucks, and not in a cool vampire way lmao.

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ziskandra · 2 years ago

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Fic Round Up 2022: Questions and Stats

I posted the actual list of fics in a separate post to keep things from getting too unwieldy! I produced 38 written works across 10 fandoms this year, which means that despite writing less than 2021, I actually dipped my toe into different waters! Thank you @queenaeducan, @mxanigel & @little--abyss for the tags! 💖 Now, onto the questions. Words posted: 68,731

Additional Words Written: Probably another 10k or so all up scattered across various half-written exchange treats...

Highest Kudos: At 69 kudos (nice) it's White Noise, my first, and so far only, foray into Hot Fuzz fic! Definitely could be tempted to write some Butterangel again. 🧈👼 Highest Kudos to Hits ratio: Possibly because of recency bias (it hasn't had time to accumulate more hits!), but it's with no place to go, the angsty Franziska ficlet I posted just before Christmas this year! (That being said, there are a few fics of mine with less hits, so I think it's doing well regardless 🥰)

Highest Hit Oneshot: two in the bush, a Cersei/Sansa fic I wrote for nonconathon this year. Never underestimate the power of porny fic in a large fandom: this work received four times as many hits as the next fic on the list (which was Kristoph/Phoenix hatesex).

New Things I Tried: I did a lot more drafting and rewriting and starting things earlier than I have in the past, and I think it's really improved the quality of my writing, and I've found that I actually quite enjoy it? Surprise, surprise, this was the first year I tried writing after starting ADHD meds 😅 (the autism really takes over once I can actually focus, lol.)

Fic I Spent the Most Time On: All's Fair, the arranged marriage Meresino fic I wrote in an exchange for @venatohru! I kept wanting to add things to it, and then a whole actual plot evolved that I had no hope of actually completing in the time allocated, so I had to then rework the actual fic I submitted to be properly standalone and ahh. It was so much fun, though! Still working on that sequel...

Fic I Spent the Least Time On: Funnily enough, also an exchange gift for @venatohru! This time, an Ace Attorney twincest fic, (be)longing. I literally sat down, wrote the first draft in forty minutes, and when I looked over it again a few days leter to edit, discovered it didn't really need much improvement!

Favorite Thing I Wrote: Basically anything from Orsino's POV, which is still a massive surprise to me. Here's a couple of my favourites. From Precipice:

And Orsino was so, so tired of losing more of his own to the crushing oppression of the Gallows. It had been bad enough when he had been an apprentice, templars breathing down the necks of those who didn’t learn fast enough, or conversely, those with too much ambition. Only those who were able to adequately toe the line between these two different types of danger had successfully escaped notice.

Fortunately, Orsino’s childhood in the alienage, what little of it he remembered, had served him well when it came to knowing when to keep his head down and when to speak up. Make too much noise, or too little, and one could disappear.

It was why his parents had said nothing when the templars had come for him. Better the Gallows than the alienage, better this than dead.

He’d always held onto the hope that so long as he lived to see another day, he might one day bear witness to a better world, and perhaps even be granted the chance to help shape it himself.

Only here in the Gallows would he, an elf, a mage, an elf and a mage, be granted such an opportunity. Only in this unique set of circumstances could Orsino be the kind of man who might ascend to the ranks of First Enchanter.

It hadn't mattered that no-one else had wanted it, that the chalice was tainted, nor that he had most likely signed his own inevitable death warrant. In the absence of a silver spoon in his mouth, or indeed, any spoon at all, Orsino would always make do with whatever scraps of success he could scavenge.

But also the entire masturbation scene in end and the beginning, wherein Meredith becomes an unwilling passenger in Orsino's body after The Last Straw and nobody's truly having a great time. A tinier snippet because I don't want to make this post too nsfw:

Meredith had known that someone like Orsino would find her actions indefensible long before the red lyrium had entrenched itself in the recesses of her mind, promising her the power to fix everything she had broken, the ability to save everyone she had failed —

I suppose, Orsino interrupted, dead is a type of safe.

Favorite Thing I Read: My reading tastes are wide and eclectic! (I've actually been working on a small project to do themed fic recs, starting with weekly DA recs, so keep an eye out for that!) If you're really burning for recs right now, my bookmarks are pretty reliable!

Writing Goals for 2023: I'm actually hoping to write less and read more. (Both in fandom and otherwise.) 😅 I'm planning on doing less exchanges and working on more of my own fic ideas.

Tagging: @ineffableaz, @venatohru, @darethshirl, @bogunicorn, @chocochipbiscuit, @syrupwit, @fandomn00blr, and YOU!

#as in please feel free to tag me if you do this I wanna see your stats too #tag memes #long post

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deerfests · 3 months ago

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20 Questions For Fic Writers

Tagged by: @zonkutonshorrifyingpeenie (thank you!)

How many works do you have on AO3?

70! We surpassed the funny number.

What's your total AO3 word count?

227,690 (only 5,014 more since last time).

What fandoms do you write for?

Still the RCU.

Top five fics by kudos?

In need -128kudos

Try to sleep -115kudos

Good Boy -113kudos

Cupids' Misfire -112kudos

Like Newlyweds Do -110kudos

Casual reminder, kudos are nice but ultimately don't mean shit.

Do you respond to comments?

I try to, but sometimes I just mentally do it and forget to actually do it then too much time passes till I remember/notice, and it is too awkward to do that.

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Finality, or Honeythief because both deal with dark subject matter, but then I also hate both those fics.

What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Still the Cartography series, but who knows.

Do you get hate on fics?

I know I've gotten an angry comment or two, considerably unprovoked on completely tagged content but that's neither here nor there. I am not aware of anything beyond that, but been told it's a possibility.

Do you write smut?

Occasionally, though I'm moving further away from it because now I find it a little boring... or I just don't seem to care. To say, there's nothing wrong with PWP even, I've just gotten to the point where PWP is not my thing, and I'd rather have a plot that includes it eventually. Sometimes it just ends up the plot doesn't need it.

Craziest crossover?

Not a fan of crossovers, the craziest I'll ever get is probably within the RCU but that doesn't even count.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Currently unaware of that, so I can't say. I've had my headcanons lifted with no nod or acknowledgment though, which is... whatever -- but still stung a bit.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes...

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

There were two attempts, both failing.

All time favorite ship

ScratchWake owns my soul :/ I've spent 12 years with them and I'll spend 12 more.

What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Could make an endless list, tbh. I just wanna finish something, but for the last month, I've just been scrapping WIPs.

What are your writing strengths?

I said dialog last time, but upon reflection, I don't actually know.

Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

Okay, now I'm gonna get into it:

If it's a pattern of how the character talks in canon (for example: Ahti), then absolutely as long as you're being mindful and using the correct resources (AKA: not Google translate)... However, if it's a character talking in one language throughout the entire series, may it be not English, but you're writing in English and we're supposed to assume they're talking in the language they talk in canon? Do not include random foreign words, it not only kills the flow imho but it also just feels cringy. Lastly, if it's a character capable of speaking two languages, then actually note that forgetting a word would not suddenly mean I'm saying the word in their native tongue and awkwardly amending. It'll be closer to "I'm going to -- um fuck forgot the word-- what's that thing, you know..." or whatever. Also, some native speakers of their language wouldn't call their lover(s) pet names in their own language or tell them they love them in their own language because they feel it's awkward and kinda cringe.

Sorry, but it's the truth of how I feel.

First fandom you wrote in?

It was a sitcom...

Favorite fic you've written?

I really and genuinely do not think I've written anything that I feel good about currently.

If you were forced to write only one genre for the rest of your life (like James Patterson lol) what would you want it to be?

I guess romance because I like human interactions the most. I sadly am not as decent at anything else.

+++

Tagging: I don't actively know who to tag. Sorry.

#I did something similar again because i was tagged by a cool person #and also because some things have changed lol #txt #tag meme

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springbons · 1 year ago

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YOU LITERALLY TAGGED ME AND I MISSED THE ASK QUESTION THING LOL.

Here ya go :)

For CY:

Halloween, Paranormal Activity, Orphan, Texas Chain Saw Massacre

gonna bullshit the other 3

PP:

Black Christmas

CC:

Misery

And DiTD:

Scream

(Man I don't know ANY of these other than CY)

Oh Goodie! These are all amazing. Let's see! [CY] -Halloween Riktor LOVES Halloween! Not only is it Noah's birthday, which is already a great time, he gets to do all sorts of freaky magic in the one day the bridge between worlds is so Short! Derringer likes Free Candy. (He stole from the bowl for kids.) Kurt appreciates Day of the Dead because he essentially becomes a celebrity; an actual Skeleton. Tarrel has no idea what it is but he's willing to learn! Vyra never passes up a good chance to dress-up. Moira does whatever the people she's with do.

-Paranormal Activity Riktor... Obviously. Derringer IS one more or less. Kurt is Literally undead Tarrel has no choice but to believe what he sees. Moira would have rathered not to find out, personally. They freak her out. No-one else of note.

-Orphan Riktor often dreamt his late mother would emerge from the depths of the water to take his soul, for whatever reason. Possibly guilt that he'd never found her body. Derringer cannot feel fear, but he used Riktor's fear against him once. Kurt's biggest fear when he was first made was that he wouldn't have any friends. The fact he only Really Clicked with One, lost them, and then spent something around 8000 years looking for them... Didn't go well mentally. Tarrel was afraid of the dark, like any normal child... He hates it even more now, knowing what monsters lie within it, but when you're a Roman you live in Rome... No-one else of note. (Vyra doesn't wish to speak about this.)

-Texas Chain Saw Massacre Obviously the whole crew is in a carpool, sooo! Riktor likes Driving, but he'd MUCH rather be the map. Noah gets the wheel, probably. Moira's the most responsible so she's in charge of snacks... And in charge of keeping Jackson, Sparrow and Kurt away from the bag of snacks. NOBODY is trusted with the aux cord. That is a turn-based system until they weed out who's going to blast earrape and shitty techno music the whole ride. Tarrel's asleep the whole ride unless something breaks down. He's like a Trunk Monkey, only comes up if you need him. That's how he likes it, nicer to sleep than to watch the chaos.

[PP] -Black Christmas He has nobody left to call him. The call is not for him, he shall not pick up. [CC] -Misery Samson's had many run-ins with freezing weather, even having to work in such conditions given his status as just a peasant in the working colonies. He wouldn't understand the concept of Winter Fun, but if you taught him he'd have alot of fun with it. The Tourist likes nothing more than sitting in warm lighting, enjoying a warm cup of something brown. Tea, coffee, cocoa, he really doesn't care. The Doctor's too insane to do anything but run more experiments. No rest for the wicked! The Rider has no sense for such childish games, they have more important matters to attend to. M23 is a robot... It can handle cold weather though! It'd probably just do home maintenance to keep itself busy. [DiTD] -Scream Henry loves anything Sci-Fi or Supernatural. He loves the idea of there being more to this world than what he can see on the surface. So, Andromeda doesn't really watch movies buuut he'd watch anything Gabe put on... Partly because he doesn't really have a choice, but mostly because he just enjoys her company. Chohko can't see, but she loves audiobooks, anything that can get chills sent up her spine. They usually just make her hungry though.

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smute · 6 months ago

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(tags by @memyselfandmystupidity-isback )

step 1: be unemployed student

step 2: have a big project to procrastinate on

step 3: live with aging parents for extra motivation

step 4: success! kfkfkfkls

more serious answer (not addressed to you necessarily, i ended up writing a lot more than i thought lol):

i spent the last 2 years living in a tiny studio apartment. it came fully furnished so i moved in with only 2 suitcases and a few boxes worth of stuff, and it ended up being a very efficient and well-organized space. i think that was a key experience for me because it gave me an opportunity to approach housework (and all other everyday maintenance tasks) from a completely new angle.

for the previous *quicks mafs* 9 years of living on my own it had always been this huge, endless, impossible-to-complete list of things that i HAD to do no matter what, which meant that i usually ended up doing those things either very reluctantly (=badly) or not at all. but now, for the very first time in my life, i was living in a home where everything felt... manageable.

i think most of us have an appreciation for nice surroundings. not everyone cares about interior design or color theory or throw pillows, but we all prefer to spend our time in a clean environment. so its not like the reward for the task (e.g. washing the dishes or putting stuff away or cleaning the toilet or doing the laundry) is meaningless. it's just insufficient relative to the effort required.

for me, living in a smaller, more manageable space simply meant that the effort needed to complete those tasks was now much smaller. basically, i learned that it isn't an impossibility, that it can actually be done. i gave my inner sisyphus a smaller boulder, and he made it to the top of the mountain. and, if i may exhaust the metaphor, it is much easier to enjoy the view from up there. so its not just that i finally proved to myself that it was possible at all, but it also allowed me to focus more on enjoying the rewards.

most importantly though, it gave me a chance to develop better strategies for myself. and that is something that simply isn't possible when you're constantly exhausting yourself and struggling to just get half the things done that you want to. you don't really think about how to improve when you routinely fail to meet even the minimum goal.

this is probably all very adhd specific (and ofc it's all anecdotal) but here are some of things that helped me make the boulder smaller:

IDENTIFY THE PROBLEM(S)! it could be that you have too much space (2 rooms are easier to clean than 4), too many things filling the space (im a maximalist but i got rid of a lot of things when i realized that i wasnt dusting my shelves because i hated taking those things off the shelves and then putting them back every time), or maybe it's just that the space is badly organized

get more storage. open storage is great because i tend to forget that things exist when i haven't seen them in a while, but obviously closed storage is better for keeping things out of sight and reducing visual clutter (and dust). the goal here is for every item to have a "home" that you can return it to. nothing throws me off my game like a random object lying around. two hours later it'll be 5 things, and the next day it'll have grown into a whole pile of crap that i now have to put away. untested theory, but i firmly believe that clutter reproduces by binary fission.

storage bins, shelf dividers, boxes, baskets, trays, whag ever. these things really help with the whole "everything has a home" idea. put labels on things if necessary and marie kondo the shit out of your place. tidying up an unorganized space can feel like rebuilding new orleans after katrina on a weekly basis. but once you are organized, it becomes infinitely easier to STAY organized—maintaining order is easier than creating order.

MAKE A PLAN! ive mentioned this on here before (and again, this is very adhd specific) but i have a list for every single chore that i can refer to when i "get stuck" or start running around like a headless chicken. breaking tasks down into smaller sub-tasks means you can just do them with a no thoughts head empty kind of attitude. the brain's done its job, you're just the muscle.

example: my current list for cleaning my room is actually a keynote presentation that i put on fullscreen before i start, so whenever my adhd brain goes "where was i?" i can just look across the room and bam. keep going ⬇️

i also put stuff like "laundry" or "clean bathroom" in my calendar. setting aside an hour or two on the weekend is much more effective in my experience than doing a little bit here and there whenever you can. its also a big psychological help: if you see that your hamper is getting kinda full and you go "oh i guess i should do laundry but i dont want to/can't rn/don't have the time," it just becomes another thing hanging over your head and taking up mental space. but seeing a full hamper and going "today isn't laundry day" means the file can be closed immediately.

also, when you start a load of laundry, set a timer!!!

dont be afraid to ask for help/advice, or just look things up. most chores require skill. i learned how to clean a toilet from a very nice lady on youtube. turns out the way my (adhd) mom taught me was thorough, but neither fast nor efficient lmao

USE THE RIGHT TOOLS!! example: i love vacuuming because i have a vacuum that actually works. it doesnt have to be a dyson, mine is chinese and i got it for less than a hundgie bucks on black friday. its cordless, its gorgeous, and it sucks dust like a motherfucker. the reason i love doing laundry is because i have multiple small hampers. it means i can pre-sort my laundry, and one full hamper equals the exact capacity of my warshing mashing. actually starting a load requires almost no effort because i can just grab one and dump it into the washer. my drying rack also fits a full load (hard cut back to me a few years ago and laundry day meant hangers everywhere, clothes drying over armrests and chairs, it was a nightmare). cleaning my kitchen counters is a breeze because i use disposable wipes. yes, the planet is dying, but for me they're an accessibility tool. of course i could force myself to use a cleaning rag that i have to hang up and dry and switch out and wash regularly, but that would just mean i'd never touch it. if you're not eating carrots because you hate peeling them, the solution is not to stop eating carrots. it's to buy peeled ones.

anyway. sorry, this escalated kind of quickly. but honestly, if i had figured some of these things out when i first moved out 11 years ago, i could have saved myself a lot of frustration. so if any of it helps just one person despair a little less the next time they have to clean or wash something or do whatever, im happy.

i know how insane this sounds but laundry has become one of my favorite pastimes. i am 100% serious. i was looking forward to doing laundry today because the weather is perfect for airdrying and was shocked to find my hamper empty? im also finding more and more enjoyment in housework in general. i love cleaning and tidying up, now that i am finally somewhat organized and most things have a designated place. i have somehow managed to turn this sisyphean hell into a wellspring of dopamine. most chores provide both visible progress and instant gratification and i now realize that the only reason why i always hated doing them was that i was overwhelmed with too many other responsibilites. i cook dinner almost every night now, even after a busy day, and i dont mind doing the dishes. in fact, i delight in the low stakes challenge of loading the dishwasher as efficiently as possible and i love handwashing the pots that are too big to fit. i vacuum almost daily because it is so satisfying, and i spend every free minute decorating my space, hanging pictures, making my bed, watering the plants. i oil squeaky door hinges now, and i rewire lamps, i pull weeds in the front yard and paint walls in the basement. PLEASE WILL SOMEBODY JUST LET ME BE A QUEER STAY AT HOME DAD im not built for salaried work

#&#adhd #housework #chores

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jonathanslms · 2 years ago

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Here's what I missed on ! Tumblr !

It's pretty weird to return to this site after so long. (I'm not exactly a "Twitter refugee" as they seem to be called lmao, more like someone who, because of the whole Twitter stuff, realised that there are still people on Tumblr? And apparently the site stopped their weird filtering/post banning system bc they now allow porn again? Anyway,) I don't remember when I was last active on Tumblr because I deleted my old blog some years ago, but if I had to guess I was probably active from around 2013 to 2015/16 at the latest? And boy, there's so much new stuff...

Firstly, the quality and functionality of themes seems much higher? Maybe that's just because I'm older now, but there are just so many original and innovative themes and pages that, like, are so interactive?? And such a broad variety as well!!!

Adding on to that: Javascript is sort of forbidden?? The work-around is pretty fast and easy (just ask support for permission basically), but still, that sucks lol.

Then there's the whole "you can have an account but no actual blog"-thing?? Idk if I really like that. A lot of people seem to use the site like that, so it's apparently at least somewhat popular. But as a Tumblr-conservative (as in conservative about Tumblr, not a conservative on Tumblr) I must say that having a blog and customizing it was sort of the whole Unique Selling Point of the site, so... interesting choice. (As long as that's still possible I'm still happy either way, I think)

The whole Dashboard experience in general is just so different now. For one, there are ads? I'm not a fan of ads (shocking opinion, I know) and I'm sure had they done it right Tumblr could have become like Ao3 and not even needed them. Still, I don't mind them too much (haha certainly not bc I use adblock :) idk what that is, sounds very morally wrong to me) and I read somewhere that the premium version is only 40€/year, which isn't a lot a lot, but still unfortunate.

I can't even tell which features are new and which aren't most of the time (except for the replying to posts? and THE CHAT?? now that there is one I can't help but wonder why there wasn't one from the start?). I think there's a lot of stuff Tumblr implemented that used to only be possible through xkit before.

Speaking of which: xkit! There's a new version - xkit rewritten - and it's incredible. I didn't even think about re-installing xkit until I stumbled upon a post that mentioned it. Now that I am aware of its existence again, god have I missed it. Being properly on Tumblr without it just isn't the same, man...

Pretty sure the search and follow tags/trending/etcetc stuff is completely revamped as well, but I don't think I used that very often back then anyway. Once I followed a big chunk of blogs I just found new ones through snowballing.

The last thing I can think of that noticably threw me off was the slang? Like wtf is a blorbo? (I actually think I get that one now) What are those other scrinkly, scrumblo, beedy weeby words? Why do I feel several generations older all of a sudden? I can feel the immediate and visceral impulse of disgruntled rejection welling up inside me everytime I see people use any new slang word (or meme, looking at you old scorsese movie that doesn't exist) whose invention I wasn't there for. (please if you've been (back) here for a while, feel free to educate me on the new tumblr etiquette, memes and slang words, I'm curious, I wanna know)

Though that being said, the overall vibes have not changed much. It is still a site that embraces its nerdy lameness and unnecessarily deep deep-dives into ANYTHING. And after the last few months to years of seeing people attacking anyone and anything, and feeling angry/depressed every time I spent some time on my social media site of choice, I think this is a very nice change of pace.

#a bit of a rambly list on my thoughts of the changes on here over the years #god i remember when i first made an account here #my english was terrible #i did not have the first clue on how to change my theme or what that was even called #AND i was a full on larry shipper directioner (my first url was sth along the lines of “larrystylinsonmonstaaa”#i say along the lines...#i think that was it exactly #making myself a tumblr account in 2022 just so i can go on an internet powered nostalgia trip #this time i'm going to fully (and self-aware..ly?) embrace the cringe though #off into the void you go

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breadedsinner · 6 years ago

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I was tagged by @ladyennefers for the OC Aesthetics Builder Meme, created by @lavellanpls

tagging @trevorhelmont, @maelacri, @mirandaputsherbestbuttforward, @vulpixelates, and @corasharper. Please tag me if you decide to do it, too!

#Dragon Age #*mine #daedit #The Warden #Hawke #The Inquisitor #Aeducan #cadash #oc aesthetics #aesthetics #Aesthetic Baords #Hervor Aeducan #Judith Hawke #Rota Cadash #Tagging as many things as possible because I spent too much time lol #And yes the ‘home’ for Rota is her and Blackwall ;3 #Was tempting to do the same for the others but that would make it less...poignant?#Aesthetic Boards

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wavesoutbeingtossed · 1 year ago

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Oh my gosh, now that you’re putting me on the spot and asking me to actually organize my thoughts instead of the stream of consciousness that are my tag novels, I don’t know if I can actually make it coherent 😂

Warning: Long Post Ahead with a lot of extraneous detail about my own fandom history because I talk too much about things

(Also I’m going to divide my answer into sections because it’s way too long and old habits die hard lol.)

Her-as-Narrator

Firstly talking about separating her-Taylor from her-narrator I think at a certain point becomes necessary, or at least it is to me. I’ve mentioned it before, but I wasn’t an online fan until, like, this past March when tour started. I enjoyed Taylor’s music and owned a couple of her albums in the Debut-1989 period, fell in love with “Lover” which made me realize I was a bonafide fan and then absolutely became In It For Life with Folklore. Like… I could write essays about Folkore and what it means to me. It like opened up a whole new world to me, the same way it did the first time I heard albums from my other favourite bands (like The Lumineers etc.).

Which is to say, until recently, I enjoyed Taylor’s music on its own without any significant knowledge of the lore that went into them. (I didn’t even know she was dating anyone until the speculation about a possible engagement being hinted at in “Paper Rings” when the album came out if that tells you anything.) I knew of her relationships with JG, JM, Harry, etc. Because I spent years following Hollywood gossip, so I knew of the general history/ick as in “gross why is a 19 year old dating a 32 year skeeve” kind of way, but I didn’t know of the History™️. Or that all of her music was so deeply autobiographical and intertwined. (I mean, I knew, yes, she was inspired by her life, but figured she took creative liberties which I still believe may be true just because I know many musicians in my own life but that’s a whole other discussion.)

It’s been fascinating taking a deep dive into all the History™️ and I do agree with many of the discussions here that understanding that colours in the lines between the songs, and how her discography refers to and builds upon itself to create this giant contiguous story. But along with that, also blurs lines between Taylor the Author and Taylor the Person. They are one and the same, obviously, but at least to me, it makes it easier to view the discussion about Narrator/Subject vs specific people, only because as Taylor has said herself, these songs take on a life of their own once they’re out there, and even for her they change meaning and context throughout her life. (All Too Well being an example of an extremely difficult song for her to sing a decade ago being a fan favourite she relishes in now.)

It reminds me of when I was in high school and in English class one year, we had a module where our teacher assigned us songs to analyze as poetry, and I happened to pick “Both Sides Now” by Joni Mitchell one day from the pile, and it just absolutely blew my mind and I couldn’t believe no one else was as riveted by this piece as I was. (Actually going back further, I remember in sixth grade, we had a student teacher for a semester and we did something similar with Alanis Morissette’s “Hand in My Pocket” which also absolutely blew my mind, so apparently I’ve been thinking too hard about lyrics most of my life.) But the key thing is that I wasn’t thinking of it as, what or who specifically is this singer singing about, it was, what does the song mean, what are the links between these other themes, how would you interpret this. So I think that as much as I’m fascinated by Taylor’s work and her life, part of me still has that instinct to approach the music as narrator/subject, though I admit that that is harder to do precisely because Taylor is so open and vulnerable and for better or for worse, so much of her life is public knowledge.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m right up there with everyone in screaming about how JM is a predator and JG was (probably) a pretentious douchebag and being sad for her after her breakup with Joe etc. And I absolutely am right there with everyone else when listening to a song and going, “omg THE TEA!!!” But, the thing is that her music deals with such universal themes (unfortunately in the case of the predatory things…) that I think that it’s easy to give yourself “permission” to see them as almost anonymous characters vs. A factual retelling, if that makes sense. So while we absolutely know who she’s singing about in WCS for instance, it’s also easy to see it as the cautionary tale of a young woman agonizing over the predatory actions of an older man, because it’s a tale as old as time. Just like how I knew nothing about Joni Mitchell besides the fact that she was from the same area as my parents that day in English class, but I knew I loved this song the second I read the lyrics.

The Girl in the Dress

When it comes to the line about the dress in Dear John for instance, I almost feel like I have no choice but to take that step back and think of her as Narrator, because that’s where that line between Taylor’s personal experiences and a story in a song become jagged edges. Because it’s kind of uncomfortable to speculate about what really happened between her and JM (though I know we all have our own ideas and theorize anyway because we’re human and I’m as guilty of that as anyone), but as a piece of art, it’s an image that speaks volumes. I don’t want to attribute feelings of shame, pain, implied abuse (or other) to a real person who hasn’t explicitly voiced that truth herself about a situation, but the girl in the dress in the song is so rich in storytelling that 30 years from now when another high school English class is analyzing songs from a pile, they’re going to have a field day with it without trying to pinpoint which boyfriend of Taylor Swift’s did what when.

And the reason why that line always hits me is that it says so much, especially coming right off of, “Don’t you think I was too young to be messed with?” The dress is obviously shorthand for her youth, that the very thing that (probably) attracted the man to her — her naïveté, her inexperience in the adult world, her sunny demeanour, her girlishness — are the very reasons she shouldn’t have been “messed” with. (Hahahahahaha don’t think about the contrast of seeing the guy in his suit and his necktie in “I Can See You” and doing the Very Adult Things with him there vs. Her withdrawing into the “girl in the dress” in Dear John.) It’s clear she does not see them as equals, and even in her youth, she feels that a serious boundary was crossed. (Which dovetails so painfully into the discussion on here when Speak Now TV came out last week about how the album is about her being hurtled into adulthood before she was really ready and desperately craving the safety of her girlhood in the wake of some very painful situations.)

But it’s also darker, because the image I’ve always had as I heard that line was of a girl leaving a situation that has scarred her. It’s probably easy to dismiss it as, “the girl is crying on the way home from a breaking up with the man” or something relatively benign, but that’s too simplistic when you look at what’s between the lines in the song as a whole, and especially in that chorus. And again, coming off the heels of “too young to be messed with.” It implies a girl experiencing some sort of trauma, grief, pain, shame, you name it, in the wake of an experience she deeply regrets — and experiencing the fallout completely alone. If this song were a movie, it’d be the scene where she’d jump into the back of a cab on a rainy night and heave-cry into her lap.

The whole song is about how everyone around her warned her it was wrong, but her naïveté (and burgeoning sexuality) coloured her rational brain and the love-bombing (giving love before later taking it away) effectively isolated her from her circle. She kept up appearances around her loved ones (kept being the girl in the dress they all knew and love) to hide what was really going on, even though they knew she wasn’t herself. But this was part of the chess game, giving her all to a man who could discard her as easily as he’d paint her sky blue.

(The “messed with” is a whole thing in its own right. Because obviously it ties into the chess game, tests, etc., as in, playing mind games with her to keep her guessing. But it also has… other connotations which are much darker and insidious.)

The chorus in particular is a lament for the person she used to be: I was too young, you knew I was too young, you knew better when I didn’t, but you still did this to me, and I am grieving for the person I used to be before I knew you. I cried the whole way home because I can never really go home again.

And when it finishes with, “You should’ve known/ Don’t you think I was too young? You should’ve known,” that basically is the prologue to “Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve.” (Give me back my girlhood, it was mine first.)

The song isn’t about losing a man. It’s about losing herself.

(Sidebar: I think a lot of the darker themes get missed because musically, despite the electric guitars, it’s kind of a slow, classic country waltz and the cheeky “Dear John” double entendre of the title making reference to WWII pop culture as well as the explicit reference to the man in question. It’s easy to overlook the grooming of teenagers when you’re swaying to 1-2-3-4-5-6.)

(Sidebar 2: There’s probably a whole other essay to be written about the “dress” in her discography, but the one that jumps out to me is in Holy Ground when she says she’s, “spinning like a girl in a brand new dress.” Again, the dress represents her carefreeness, the blank slate, the excitement of the world before her. Contrast the dress

Pain/Pleasure

OK this one is a little less coherent in my brain, but when it comes down to it, I think that the experiences described in “Speak Now” and specifically in “Dear John” paint a lot of Taylor/the narrator’s views of relationships going forward. Jumping into Real Taylor for a minute, we seem to know that the relationships she had before JM were basically puppy love in the sense that they were mainly with her peers on the same maturity level and life experiences. So when she says she was “too young,” it doesn’t mean she may or may not have had other experiences of love (or lust/intimacy/desire) before that, but they seemed to have been for all intents and purposes age-appropriate between two people at the same stage in their lives, which is evident in much of her music up to that point. This is the Debut/Fearless era, you belong with me, I don’t know how it can get better than this, first kisses and first loves. Even her angry or sad songs at the time are endearingly childish — which is not dismissing her songwriting talent at all. But they’re the experiences of someone going through the normal trials and tribulations of teenagedom and young adulthood in a safe space.

But Speak Now is where the themes get darker; being haunted by someone, feeling shame and regret (which is now particularly evident on the vault tracks), feeling unmoored at what’s happened, desperately trying to return to the safe space but realizing it doesn’t exist anymore and not knowing where to find that safety anymore.

And yet again jumping into Real Taylor for a moment, it’s clear that the JM experience completely altered her notion of what relationships and love could be. This being her first adult relationship seems to colour how she thinks (or at least writes) about love and lust and relationships going forward. As everyone has so eloquently stated in much better and more succinct ways than I can, it seems to tell her that love is “treacherous,” doomed to fail, often based on playing each other and trying to maintain the upper hand, etc. This is all over Red and even 1989 to an extent.

So many of her songs from that point forward are about the dichotomy between being infatuated with someone and waiting for the other shoe to drop. “Dear John” starts that off (you paint me a blue sky and go back and turn it to rain), but then Red really runs with it. E.g. Treacherous (I’ll do anything you say if you say it with your hands/I’d be smart to walk away, but you’re quicksand; this hope is treacherous, this daydream’s dangerous), Red the song (lol the entire thing — every line is about how the good was euphoric and the bad was devastating but she couldn’t help herself because she couldn’t help herself), We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (the constant breaking up/coming back together), Come Back Be Here (This is falling in love in the cruelest way, This is falling for you when you are worlds away — the whole song is about falling for someone who keeps withdrawing from you), Better Man (again the whole song is about staying with someone despite knowing they treat you wrong until you finally break) etc. The thesis of Red seems to be, love will break you but the pleasure (the attention, the affection, yes the sex on the good days) is the reward for the pain (the alienation, the disappointment, the mind games, the disinterest on the bad days).

(Even The Last Time is very “I will hurt myself for you to notice me and love me like you used to” coded which is a whole other discussion in light of “You’re Losing Me”…)

The theme does continue on following albums like 1989: Style (we go crashing down but we come back every time), All You Had To Do Was Stay (people like ou always want back the love they gave away/people like me want to believe you when you say you’ve changed), Wildest Dreams (the whole song is basically wanting to sleep with someone in spite of knowing they’ll leave you), This Love (I know this is considered a love song, but it’s quite a sad song — it’s literally, this love is good/this love is bad/this love is alive back from the dead — it’s inherently broken but can’t be left alone) etc. So much of the album is about falling into patterns you know are bad for you but giving in because you’re blinded by desire.

I’m sure there are other songs that can be used as an example in later albums too, but the post-Speak Now to at least 1989 seems centred on the futility of romantic relationships but taking the crumbs anyway. When you look at the songs in bulk like this, it’s kind of sad. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with sexual relationships or casual hookups or lust or desire, but the contrast between the Debut/Fearless Taylor who dreamed of dancing and dresses and kissing in the rain and finding her Romeo and Red/1989 Taylor who believed love will take from her and all she can hope to receive is rare moments of affection and failing that, some nights of passion, is striking. Sure, part of that is just growing up and growing out of the fairytale constructs she’s grown up with, but Speak Now is definitely where that line is drawn.

Which brings us to Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve and “the god’s honest truth is that the pain was heaven,” which plays into all this. Because the sad thing is that those rare moments of affection probably sent her flying (especially if you consider Real Taylor who is an admitted people pleaser who thrives on praise). And as the lows got lower, the brief flashes of pleasure mean even more and provide instant gratification. The pain was heaven because she did want to explore her sensuality and femininity and adulthood (I mean, I Can See You is a song that exists lol), and presumably this felt like an avenue to do that, but she couldn’t have predicted the toll it would take on her. Because again, she was a young woman navigating these desires without a safety net, and he (presumably) took advantage of that to fulfill his own. The highs may have felt exhilarating, especially when the lows were crushing. Which comes back to the point of your orignal post about equating Him being an addiction, except in this case, it’s every Him.

Which leads into a whole other hypothetical essay about the role guilt and shame play in a lot of her music. I joked a few days ago that it’s the Catholic guilt vibes of it all, feeling inherently dirty for feeling lustful and giving in to those feelings. (I mean, I use “Catholic guilt” loosely here. Insert your denomination of choice as appropriate lol.) Despite some references to church/God/religion in her music, she hasn’t been especially religious/pious in her writing, but whatever the nature of those feelings, there is definitely a sense of shame both for exploring her sexuality and for not seeing whatever trauma this was coming.

About Love

So I don’t have much to say about this because I guess I said this in the Pain/Pleasure answer, but I think it’s just obvious from all this that that singular experience in Dear John caused a fundamental shift in her world view. She’s sung about heartbreak prior to that, but they usually fall into the angry girl betrayed (Picture to Burn, Forever and Always, Should’ve Said No, You’re Not Sorry, Better Than Revenge, etc.) or sad girl vibes (White Horse, Tim McGraw, You All Over Me, Teardrops on my Guitar, Last Kiss, etc.). In most of those cases, the heartbreak affects her, but she’s often either wistful about the relationship or certain that one day she will find that love again with someone else who will treat her right.

On the surface, Dear John may seem like one of her trademark angry rebukes, but like I said before, to me it feels more like a lament for her former self as she begins to grapple with how the experience marked her. It’s kind of striking looking at the track list for Red afterwards and realizing that there are few purely happy love songs like there were before. Even some of the more upbeat ones like Treacherous, Holy Ground or State of Grace are all based on the principle of, “this will never work but I want the high while it lasts.” Which is also part of growing up and adult relationships so it’s not purely a trauma response lol. 1989 is more of the same with even catchier hooks, but she leans even deeper into that in some ways, trying to own the narrative with being like, if men are going to do this, I’m going to have my fun with it. Blank Space may be satire, but all satire is rooted in truth, and the truth of it is her learning to “love ‘em and leave ‘em” for lack of a better term. (Which later shows up on other songs like “I used to switch out these Kens and skip town like an asshole outlaw…” most recently but could be applied to so many others.)

Reputation is where it starts to shift again, but it’s interesting that some of the love songs on it (e.g. Call It What You Want, Delicate) begin toying with the idea of herself being somehow unlovable, in the sense that she is Too Much and that her partner loves her in spite of herself instead of because of it. Sure, that’s owing to the theme of “reputation” on the album and about the contrast of the way the outside world sees her and the way it really is behind closed doors. The bravado of 1989 starts to crack, though it’s still very much present on Rep (e.g. Getaway Car, Ready For It), and we have a couple of songs that fall into more traditional expressions of love (Dancing with our Hands Tied, my fave New Year’s Day). Whereas the previous few albums seem to dive into the idea of the power imbalances in relationships, of the push-and-pull of something that was built to fail, rep is the first time since probably Fearless where she feels like she’s on equal footing with a partner in some respects, where something suddenly feels completely different from the others, because seemingly for the first time in her adult life, she’s able to write about something other than mind games in love (or lust). Which only continues through Lover, where by that point we’re almost full circle, back to talking about rings and church bells and forever.

This is not to say there aren’t other sides to it of course; there are still darker elements in Lover, from the worries of jealousy in the title track, to the tension of miscommunication in False God and relying on sex to fix problems when words won’t, to the fear that who she is will inherently cause her lover to leave in The Archer or even Cruel Summer, etc. But that’s a whole other thing and maybe it’s wrong but those are almost “normal” problems compared to the very problematic ones of Dear John/WCS/Speak Now etc.

If I had to sum it up, it’s that Speak Now through at least Rep is dealing with the fallout of “Dear John”: the forced push into adulthood, the processing of grief and trauma, rebuilding her sense of self and her place in relation to others. Her reaction to the mind games of “Dear John” is to continue to choose relationships that repeat those patterns of inherent instability or unavailability, knowing it won’t work but going through anyhow for whatever reason, whether it’s the thrill of the chase or the affection when it’s good or more lustful reasons, whatever — it doesn’t matter. It’s the pull between wanting to be loved but not feeling worthy of it, so she chooses situations that are doomed to fail because they have an expiration date, whether it’s age, distance, careers, personalities, whatever. She is not the exception and she will never learn her lesson. And it isn’t until Reputation where her castle crumbled overnight (again) and she was forced to step back and reconnect with herself that those themes change in her writing.

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I have no idea if any of this made sense, and I’m too scared to proofread it because it’s so scary long, but I hope that answered your question 😂 Don’t threaten me with a good time, which in this case is deep dive analysis of works of fiction or otherwise 🙃

Starting to think too hard about “I could see you being my addiction” and now I feel unwell 😵‍💫

#me thinking too hard about taylor lyrics #speak now og #speak now tv #dear john #long post #why yes I can write essays about anything why do you ask #should I have put this under a cut?#do cuts still work on tumblr?#it’s been years since I’ve written anything long enough to warrant a cut lol #lyric analysis #writing letters addressed to the fire

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