#almost reminds me of a rousseau

[placeinthemiddleofnowhere]

Had this idea of reader being on this job for 141 being closed friends with everyone for a while (office job mostly collecting informations, statistics), but they often feel insecure if they matter on this, since everyone else is putting their lives on the line going on missions. But they fail to realise that their presence matters a lot without noticing.

Ghost feels calm with their soft presence and kindness, soap has a person to laugh with their humour, Konig is relaxed from his anxiety when it's near them, Price trusts them a lot.

It's the little things that seem unimportant to the reader but mean a lot to the team, not only a distraction from the cruel missions they encounter, but a reminder of the goodness it exists in the world.

Ok so this made me really emotional and I thought it was super cute 💕 So in light of this ask, I wanted a moment of levity in the Rocky Start universe, and have written this lil thing. It's based before chapter 7, in the months they were doing missions in the lead up to Rousseau.

It’d been a long day and it had been a hard one. You couldn't put your finger on exactly what it was, but there’d been a dark cloud hanging over you from almost the moment you’d woken up, and now - as you were coming to the end of your day - you sighed.

From behind the shiny screen of the computer screen, you stared back at endless reports and blueprints and statistics and felt it all blur into a black smudge right in front of your eyes. It was too much. The weight of it all. Wondering if what you were doing was enough. You who sat in front of a computer screen feeding information through the comms while the 141 put their lives on the line.

It felt insignificant. Especially when there had been so many close calls on that last mission. There were times that you’d lost sight of your soldiers, times that they encountered danger because you hadn’t been able to spot a man, times when they needed information that you struggled to find.

What was the point in you?

-

The question echoed in your mind later that night when you walked into the kitchen and saw some of them sitting there. Sneak and Soap were sat at the table scoffing hastily made sandwiches while Ghost watched something mindless on the TV. The scene looked so calming and complete. They all had each other. Did they need you?

You quickly made a cup of tea, intending to stalk back to your room and wallow in your self pity, but you were interrupted before you could complete your mission. Ghost beckoned you down to sit with him, swivelling his head around to see you just before you could leave. 

He still wore his mask, but he was dressed down now. His armour had been abandoned and he was down to just his camos, nevertheless still looking burdened by stress. His big shoulders always carried so much weight, you thought, he never seemed to be able to relax. 

“Everything alright?” you murmured, coming to sit down by him.

“Yeah, s’alright,” he shrugged, tilting his head thoughtfully as he watched you take a sip of your tea. “Are you alright? Today was a rough one, and I know it couldn’t have been easy on you.” 

“Easy on me?” you laughed, in complete disbelief that he had thought of your hardship in the midst of all the chaos of the day. “You were the ones out there fighting!”

“So?” he said, smiling softly from behind his mask.

You knew it. You could see the smile in the curve of his eyes. 

“So you were in a warzone today,” you scolded him, “I was sat at a desk. You shouldn’t be worrying about me.”

“You were a big help to us on the comms today. It must’ve been… a lot. I just want you to know that we appreciated it. You saved my arse more than once, helped the others plenty too. So..thank you.”

You swallowed down a breath, wanting to argue with him, but he stopped you with one look. It was useless disagreeing with him. He had that determined look around him, you could sense the tense of his jaw and the knot in his brow. 

“Well…thank you,” you said awkwardly. “Honestly though it was all of you that did the hard work. I’m just the desk jockey.”

“Jesus, you’d think after the amount of time you’d worked with us you’d learn to stop the hero worship,” Soap laughed, stopping Ghost’s grumbly reply in its tracks. 

“Yeah, you should probably just accept you’re just as much a part of the team as the rest of us,” Sneak added. “Otherwise we’ll have to take drastic action, won’t we Soap?’

“Oh yes…drastic action,” Soap hummed, munching down the last bite of his sandwich. “We’ll have to get you drunk and tattoo 141 on your forehead.”

“Christ, no!” you blanched, quickly recovering as Ghost threw a pillow at Soap’s head.

You laughed as Soap was smacked square in the face with the material and glared at his friend. Now there was the question of if he was brave enough to throw it back.

He raised his arm and was about to throw it back, when he changed course and lobbed it at Sneak instead.

“What was that for!” they protested.

“For gettin me in trouble,” he shrugged.

“Getting you in trouble? Your big mouth does enough of that on it’s own!”

They bickered amongst themselves after that and you and Ghost laughed to each other, watching as they migrated out of the room, presumably to go work the fight out of their systems. The room grew quiet after a minute, their voices slowly fading before turning to nothing down the hallway. 

“Some pair,” you snorted.

“Too bloody right,” Ghost agreed, huffing out a breath.

His body visibility melted into the couch, his shoulders drooping and his neck dropping against the back. He looked comfortable for once. Especially as he closed his eyes, letting them disappear in the black sockets of the mask as his inky makeup blended with the shadows.

“You want me to turn this off?” you asked softly, jerking your head toward the TV as if he could see you. 

“Nah, but you can turn it over to whatever you like,” he grunted, “I just wanna sit here a moment. You should stay.”

Well…you might not have felt entirely useful that day, but at least this was something you knew you could do. This was useful. 

“Ok,” you smiled, watching how his body relaxed further into the old worn leather. “I’ll stay awhile.”

-

Ghost left a couple hours after, saying it was high time he’d gotten to bed. You smiled, and when he’d asked if you wanted to walk with him, said no. You were going to boil the kettle again. 

You had another job to do. 

Ghost left, and like usual, the invisible revolving door of the kitchen went like clockwork. König walked in the kitchen. 

“Hello,” you said simply.

“Hallo,” he hummed, voice sounding heavy with tiredness.

“Usual?” you enquired, shaking a mug with a teabag in it. 

“Yes, please,” he said, watching as you poured four cups. 

After this you fell into an easy silence. König didn’t really talk with anyone. Well, no one that wasn’t Sneak. You saw them sometimes when they would slip out into the night, but you would never mention a thing about it. Apparently they weren’t supposed to be talking, but you were hardly one to rat anyone out. 

Point was, next to Sneak, you were probably the only other person he talked with. Not that you ever exchanged many words, but it was something. And sometimes it even felt like König was grateful for it. For one other person that didn’t hate him. 

“Here you go,” you smiled, handing him his tea.

“You are too kind,” he murmured. “Thank you.” 

“It’s nothing,” you said dismissively, “just tea.”

“And kindness,” he smiled, eyes like crescents through his mask. “...it’s appreciated.”

He walked out after that, but his words stayed with you. 

You were useful and you were good company, and you were kind.

And you were going to leave your cup on the counter and go deliver Gaz and Price their nightly cup. They were both far too used to staying back in Price’s office and combing through missions, trying to hunt for exactly what was going wrong. They needed some fuel to keep them going. 

That’s when you realised, just before you were going to take their cups - maybe you served a purpose after all. Maybe it was quiet purpose. But it was purpose nonetheless. 

All of a sudden the dark cloud that had lingered through your day had lifted and your body felt lighter. Yes. You were a part of the 141, the quiet cogs that kept the machine rolling smoothly. 

[klausluvr]

Klausluvr’s Masterlist (18+)

Klaus Mikaelson

Multiparters

The Fury Of The Fire Bringer * — COMPLETED

My fanfiction with an OC on ao3.

One-shots

True Pleasure

After a lot of turbulence within your relationship, you and Klaus decide to break it off. Still, he goes to watch you, his ex-lover, at the local Cabaret. Things get heated quickly.

When He Forgets Himself

Klaus has been neglecting you, his lover, for some weeks now. You reminds him of the paradise you share with a dominant twist.

Stress Reliever, Heaven-Sent

The Mystic Falls gang are pulling Klaus by his last thread — he had not been so stressed in years. You are needy to relieve him.

Needing Him In Private For No One To See (Not Even Him)

You masturbate to the thought of him.

Sittin’ Hot All Over Him

After a night of teasing him to the edge of his sanity, almost ruining his dispute with his opponent, Klaus is beyond frustrated, but still, he can’t ever refuse you. As punishment, Klaus refuses to fuck you. Still needing you all over him, he has other plans.

Fuck Me To Death

You and Klaus are broken up, and neither of you are willing to beg. Despite this, you’ve been obsessively fighting and crossing each other for any reason you can think of. You may have went too far with your latest trick, and Klaus is furious. He confronts you at the back of Rousseau’s.

Sex On Italian Sand

You and Klaus are sunbathing in Italy on your long-awaited honeymoon. Finally alone and free of your burdens for a short time, you just can’t keep your hands off of each other.

Katherine Pierce

Cummin’ soon…

[altruistic-meme]

S3: Sara reported August, August exposes Simon's dealing, the crown still hates Simon but he's publicly associated with Wille now and they also have to pretend they are supportive of Wille being queer so they offer Simon a way to cover up the whole drug business. Simon is torn between accepting and taking the moral high ground but most likely also losing his scholarship. August now has a horse he doesn't know what to do with but he doesn't want to sell it because it reminds him of Sara and also maybe she'll come back to him if he keeps it. So he starts riding Rousseau, which is how he meets Marcus, who he runs into at the stables. They bond over treating Simon like shit and become best bros. This comes in handy when he gets kicked out of school and moves in with his bestie when Simon decides to decline the offer of a cover-up, the drugs story gets out and it turns out August lied to the headmistress about who was dealing. As a nice bonus, the entire Society gets kicked out for the same reason. Hillerska becomes a far less toxic environment with the entitled first-borns gone, and Wille and Simon thrive. Sara and Simon have a heart to heart about giving people that hurt you second chances, and Simon forgives Sara in the end. This inspires Felice to do the same. They are friends again. The end.

the way this evolved has me losing my SHIT

i gotta be completely honest, i rotated the thought of Marcus and August being best friends in my head during my entire shift at work. almost non stop. genuinely have been obsessed over it. perfect. ideal. beautiful. they are toxic manipulation besties. they would be so good as friends. i love this idea i genuinely love it. let them be terrible together. im going to incorporate this in everything i ever write from here on out. thank you.

nOW THE REST OF THE ASK-

rip the society. henry baby im so sorry this happened to you. vincent can go tho fuck vincent we hate vincent in this house. JJ grumbled when i was typing that he agrees.

do Simon and Wilhelm get kicked out too? they were involved as well >> i kinda want to see them ending up at Marieberg together, somehow, in this scenario. let them thrive in the mundane together.

also let the siblings talk it out!! yes!! gods this is so good. you're a genius. thank you.

[ young royals season 3 predictions - wrong answers only ]

[grandhotelabyss]

Good question! Given the nation-summing implications of Great American Novel, Nightwood—but not Gravity's Rainbow—is an odd choice. Yet it seems to me to be a particularly urgent book right now. As the era of left-identitarian moralism gives way to renewed varieties of right-wing culture, whether revolutionary reaction at the avant-garde fringe or Christian populism in mainstream electoral politics, the political complexity of Nightwood—a lesbian and transgender novel also plausibly described as a fascist one—deserves our attention for conceptual reasons alone. In my almost eight-year-old essay on Nightwood, I tried to sum up its extraordinary complications:

A modernist anti-democrat, like her champion Eliot, Barnes sees the masses as perennial forces of conformity, enemies of art. This is not really surprising; what is surprising is that anybody ever wanted to identify bohemia—sexual and aesthetic—with the political left in the first place. The intention of its various partisans notwithstanding, the left has historically empowered the state and its centripetal agencies. The state, tolerating nothing outside itself, not only threatens to use the masses as justification for the cleansing of bohemia’s cruising-ground pissoirs and carnivalesque circuses, but, as I said above, it also extirpates the tradition against which bohemia necessarily defines itself. It razes the edifice of Christianity, brings the wandering Jew home, and abolishes the night in which Robin Vote and Dr. Matthew O’Connor sport like fauna in the forest. Even internally, bohemia is not democratic: it is, rather, an aristocracy of spirit. For these reasons, Nightwood is among the most reactionary of American classics, despite or even—what will confound the identity politics of today—because of its having nary a straight white male in its cast of characters.

Perhaps now that the American literati, chastened of its moralism, is undergoing a strange fit of Ernst-Jünger-mania—I essayed on The Glass Bees around the same time I wrote on Nightwood; I'll write about On the Marble Cliffs if someone gets it for me from my wish list—they will be prepared to hear out this side of our own homegrown conservative revolutionary, Djuna Barnes.

Your question also gives me a sensory memory, reminding me that literature is not primarily conceptual: the first pandemic summer, when stores and cafés and libraries were still closed, and I would walk around the city for hours and for miles, dripping with sweat—they always tell you how cold Minneapolis gets in the winter but never how hot in the summer—listening to any podcast I could find. My recollection is that Judge said on his show, whatever he would Tweet later, that those were the three greatest works of American prose, which isn't quite the same thing as greatest American novels. Nightwood's prose, the vision it discloses, is incomparable, something like late James in a fever dream:

Like a painting by the douanier Rousseau, she seemed to lie in a jungle trapped in a drawing room (in the apprehension of which the walls have made their escape), thrown in among the carnivorous flowers as their ration; the set, the property of an unseen dompteur, half lord, half promoter, over which one expects to hear the strains of an orchestra of wood-winds render a serenade which will popularize the wilderness.

I first read Nightwood for my oral exams in grad school; when I conferred with my advisor after reading it, her only comment on the novel was, and I quote, "It's a hoot!" I second that.

The virtues of Gravity's Rainbow qua Great American Novel are more obvious. I explored them here:

Gravity’s Rainbow, set in Europe, is a Great American Novel because it criticizes America (or, in the orthography of the period, AmeriKKKa) in the name of universal emancipation. [...] Slothrop, “Providence’s little pal,” descends from the Puritans—his ancestor, William, came over on the Arbella, the ship bearing John Winthrop, though William, a dissident among the elite, stood up for the preterite (the novel’s system of allusions doubling Slothrop with JFK suggests a more historically proximate example of a dissident elite done in by Them). Yet what could be more faithful to Puritanism, to John Winthrop himself, than such a jeremiad? Only a disappointed lover could turn into such a castigating prophet: why rail so furiously against the New World unless you really were expecting a City on a Hill?

Much as Pynchon's brand of stoner comedy sometimes grates on me, much as I find that book harder to read than is strictly necessary even for its radical political purpose, our reclusive author seems to me to have earned the title.

Personally, I wouldn't exclude either book, I would just make a longer list: The Scarlet Letter, The Portrait of a Lady, My Ántonia, Light in August, The Adventures of Augie March, Invisible Man, Song of Solomon, Blood Meridian, Underworld, etc.—each of us can add or subtract.

[vintage-miseries]

Rousseau x Edward The pair meet at a party

1925, England.

He’s done the tour of the house three times in four hours, haunting from room to room until something (or someone) caught his attention long enough to give him pause. He’s been to more of Lyon’s parties than he can remember, and though they’re far from tedious, tonight’s event was quieter than others for one reason or another. So he wanders, dressed simply in a robe and slippers like so many others, and he wanders until he finds the man he’s looking for.

Bousquet is in the refreshment parlour when he finds him. The man is naked, playing with the hair of some pet who’s head is resting in his lap. He inclines his head, Rousseau does the same as he closes the distance.

“Remind me,” The Anatomist chirps as he gives the girl only the most cursory of glances. “What the rules around your staff are?”

Bousquet’s lips quirk back in a smile.

“Why? Which of my staff do you plan on harassing?” The man’s voice is a drawl, his amusement thickened with wine.

“The one in the Play Room,” Bousquet had been looking at him all night, had taken a glass of champagne off of him, had already jerked himself to completion once thinking about him. “With the dark hair and blue eyes.”

Lyon’s brow furrows a moment as he thinks, then he shrugs and waves his colleague away.

“Graves,” He says. “Edward.” His fingers curl in the woman’s hair, gently at first, and then with direction. He relocates her willing mouth to his cock and eases back on the chesterfield with a knowing smirk. “Feel free if he’ll have you. He could do to lose some of the tension in his shoulders.”

Rousseau bobs his head in thanks, turns on his heels, and leaves his host to his pleasure.

*

He enters the Play Room through one of four sets of doors, to the right, unobtrusive and silent. The Play Room is a large room – a study during the day, he thinks, with bookshelves full of knick-knacks and bric-a-brac. The high white walls are broken by a few large pieces of art and several large pieces of taxidermy, relics from Lyon’s Grandfather. Most impressive of the lot is a Bengal Tiger, stuffed and set on display upon a marble plinth overlooking the room. Despite its once vibrant fur having been bleached over many long years sat before the immense window behind it, it was still an impressive piece. It was, the Frenchman felt, the reason that this room had drawn the play-actors in. The walls full of horns, antlers, stags, foxes and badgers (and no less the tiger) had drawn a certain crowd from the get-go. It hadn’t taken long for the room’s fixed pieces (including a few stocks and a set of well-worn Crosses) to be also include a hitching post, a few metal crates and a pen of sorts.

A chest to the left of each door contained various pieces of leather tack, crops, collars, and leashes, but he ignored these as he swanned into the room; easy as a summer’s day.

The man he’d been eyeing was still at his post, dressed in his butler’s blacks despite the heat of the room. He held a tray in his gloved hand, kept his back straight and his eyes forward, his gaze fixed on nothing in particular, and certainly not on a person.

There were a few in the room, a man and a woman fucking against one of the padded crosses, another man masturbating as he watched, and a pup leashed within one of the heavy crates while his master undressed on the other side.

“Bon soir,” He mimed the lifting of a hat as he came to stand to Graves’ side.

“Good evening, sir,” The focus came back into Edward’s eyes as he turned to address the guest. He’s taller than Rousseau, with lovely dark hair and soft blue eyes framed by a hundred fanning lashes. He’s perhaps ten years Rousseau’s junior.

“Can I offer you a glass? It’s a 14-year-old Chateau de Blingny, and is one of the first bottles they corked on the premises. It’s almost a dessert Champagne, with notes of peach, strawberry and cream.”

“Sounds parfait.” Rousseau flashes the boy a smile and takes a glass, giving it an appreciative sniff before imbibing. It is sweet, and he wonders not for the first time how much on alcohol alone Lyon spends for each of his unorthodox soirees. “It is lovely. Have you tried it?”

“Beg you pardon, sir?” He’s caught Graves off guard, and the shock in his face is genuine. “Me, sir? Oh, no sir, this is for the guests.”

“I seem to recall Lyon allows his staff to have a drink on working nights like this.” Rousseau’s counter seems to frazzle the man, though he keeps his composure well enough.

“Yes, sir, he does, but I don’t feel the need to drink as the others do. I’m perfectly happy without it.”

“Mm.” Rousseau makes a sound of ascent and swaps tactic. In all of the parties he’s attended, Graves has always been present in this room, a fixture as much as the tiger. The other staff moved around from party to party. “Non, non, of course; you’re a good boy.”

A touch of heat rises in the butler’s cheeks as his eyes drop to his well-polished shoes.

“Ah, uh, thank you, sir.”

“Not at all.” Rousseau takes another slow sip from his glass. “Do you spend all evening here?”

“Yes, sir.”

“In this room?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You must get tired, or at least bored.” Rousseau laughs, swirls his drink, and arches a brow at it. “It would drive me madness, standing here watching people fuck all night and not being able to partake.”

The man blushes again. It’s a pretty look that suits his bashful blue eyes.

“Ah, well,” He shifts on his feet, “It’s an honour to serve. I couldn’t, well, I’ve a job to do, sir.”

“But you are allowed to take part, are you not?” He keeps his voice light, conversational. It’s a question, not a pry.

“Yes, sir.” Edward’s answer is slow, and again that blush creeps into his face. “The staff are allowed should they wish. There’s an expectation that our, ah, participation is limited. We do have jobs to do.”

“Of course.” Rousseau drains the last of the Champagne from his glass and sets it to one side on a tray. He turns his attention out to the room. The man who’d been watching the couple had joined in, and the pup was now filating his master through the cage bars. He watched them with a passing interest before his eyes flicked back, just in time to catch Edward’s eyes. They flicked away, landed on the pup and his master, and then away again.

“Do you enjoy that?”

“B – beg your pardon, sir?” Edward shuffled again, glanced at Rousseau, and then back at the pair by the cage.

“The man and his dog,” Rousseau explained again. “Do you enjoy watching them?”

“That wouldn’t be proper, sir.” He was fully red in the face now.

“Marin.”

“Sorry?”

“My name,” Rousseau reached out and gently set his hands upon the tray. “Is Marin. Rousseau.”

“You’re Mr Rousseau?” The butler allowed the Frenchman to take the tray from his hands. “Mister Bousquet’s Anatomist friend?”

“You know me?” Rousseau set the tray down upon an end table and shortened the distance between himself and Edward.

“Y – yes, sir.”

“Marin.” Closer.

“Yes, Marin.” Edward’s back was against the wall, but he was looking now. Looking at the pair, his eyes glassy and his lips parted. Rousseau closed the gap, hooked a finger under the butler’s chin to draw his attention and kissed him. Edward made a noise, tensed, and then relaxed entirely. He returned the kiss, clumsily but with fervour, each grappling for the other until Rousseau ended the embrace by stepping back. Edward, dishevelled and panting, took all of a second to catch his breath before his back left the wall and he straightened. He swiftly brushed his hair back into place and smoothed the creases from his sleeves before fixing his tie with a somewhat shaking hand.

“I—”

“Sit.”

“What?”

“Sit.” Rousseau jerked his head towards a chaise lounge sat to their right.

Edward’s lips moved silently, his eyes followed Rousseau’s motion, and then silently he obeyed. He perched himself quickly upon the edge of the seat, his gloved hands digging into his knees, his eyes wide, staring.

Rousseau followed more slowly, pausing only to fish a leather collar and lead from the box by the door. Again, he closed the gap, taking a deep and perverse pleasure in the sight of Edward’s erection, pressed hungrily against the fly of his trousers. The butler watched him close in, and the clouding in his eye furthered as Rousseau’s leg pressed in between his. Edward drew in a sharp breath, his eyes never leaving Rousseau’s. There was expectation there, desire, but fear also; uncertainty.

Slowly, with a practiced flourish, Rousseau flashed the collar and allowed it to unroll. The buckle followed lastly, snapping to a still and dragging Edward’s eyes down. The butler swallowed, licked his lips, and slowly, decisively, extended his neck. Permission granted, Rousseau leaned in and wound the collar around the man’s neck, buckling it.

“Good boy.”

Edward shivered and pressed into his touch.

This close, Rousseau could smell his cologne – applied hours ago and faint, but stubbornly clinging like a veil. Sweet and faintly spiced, a gift no doubt from a wealthy employer. Beneath that, Edward smelled of soap and ever so faintly of sweat. A bath before the main event in the hopes of participation? A smile tugged at the corner of his lips, there and gone again.

Straightening up, Rousseau clipped the lead onto the collar and let it fall. He then made a slow show of unbuttoning Edward’s coat, then his shirt, and then he stepped away to admire Graves’s newfound state of dishevelment.

“Get undressed.”

“Yes.” Breathless, excited now. Rousseau’s cock throbbed in response.

Edward wriggled out of his coat, then his shirt, and then out of his trousers and undergarments. When he began to hastily fold his clothes, Rousseau quirked an amused eyebrow and yanked him down to his knees by the collar. He went willingly, clothes spilling from his grip as he acquiesced. Again, those pale eyes stared up, willing, waiting, and widening when Rousseau removed his robe, revealing his fully naked and aroused form beneath.

Edward licked his lips.

Rousseau smiled, and slowly, began to wind the leash up around his left fist. Tighter and tighter still. When all the slack was gone and Edward’s chin was forced up, his back taught, only then did Rousseau stop. He reached out, ran a hand through Edward’s hair and scratched him gently behind an ear. The butler leaned into his touch, his tongue flicking across his lips.

“You are a good boy, non?” Rousseau purred as he ran his thumb down Edward’s cheek, across his lower lip, and then into his mouth. The butler’s reaction was immediate, leaning in, the flush in his cheeks returning as he sucked at the preferred digit. When pulled away, a line of spittle ran from Edward’s lip and down onto his chest.

“You’ll need training though,” Rousseau’s right hand dropped to his cock where his thumb rubbed a bead of pre-cum into his head. “Vigorous, hands-on training, won’t you?”

“Yes,” Edward groaned, neck straining against the collar. “Please.”

“Bien,” Rousseau pulled the boy’s head closer, keeping him a bare inch from his cock. Edward licked his lips again, and his fingernails dug further into his knees. Their eyes met fully for one electrical moment, and then Rousseau smiled and let the leash go slack. “Open your mouth.”

[mylonelyyear]

24.01.23

I like to rediscover Yeysk. Walk the streets, the ones I've walked since childhood, or find the ones I've never been to. Watch how flowers bloom on trees and in flower beds, and in the flower beds you can measure the seasons by flowers, almost every two weeks new ones of the flora bloom, moving the season from spring to summer.

When you walk alone at a calm walking pace, you see the street better, you notice the nuances that you miss, being distracted by conversation or speed.

There is a study that while walking at a calm walking pace, our mind can calmly fix what is happening around.

These walks remind me of the notes from Rousseau's book Reveries of the Solitary Walker, because that's what I would call my walks too.

(photo on January 24, when I enjoyed the sun and winter warmth, and even took off my hat for a photo).

[valsedelesruines]

"Apples, cherries, pain

Breathe in, breathe out, pain"

[moremaybank]

being the youngest mikaelson (maybe 15) and the boys being overprotective of reader and being close with Rebekah? (fem reader pls)

being the youngest mikaelson while having the boys be overprotective of you & being close with rebekah

warnings: slight violent themes (violent threat mentioned)

mikaelson siblings masterlist

being the youngest of the mikaelson siblings pretty much means that you're the child of 5 disastrous co-parents

like the time they ALL forgot about you being at school

"niklaus, you were supposed to pick up y/n from school today"

"need i remind you that i have my own actual offspring to take care of? why not ask kol, elijah? all he does is sit on his arse all day"

having to let them know your whereabouts if you don’t want them following you around the whole day

and i don't mean a text saying "at the st. james infirmary"

i'm talking full-on coordinates you got off google from pinpointing your exact location

okay, let's talk about the guys

they're all at different levels of insanity so we'll break this up

klaus: level 100

you've almost been daggered for wearing a backless dress

and for "sneaking out" (even though all you did was walk outside the compound to say hi to one of your friends that was just passing by)

don't even get me started on the look on his face when he walked into your bedroom to find you making out with your significant other without telling him

"you know, if i wasn't immortal i bet this would kill me. my littlest sister being deflowered right in front of my eyes"

"you are literally the most dramatic person on earth. deflowered? it's called kissing. and we all know you've done far worse. is your child's existence ringing any bells?"

he's always the first one to threaten any potential suitors

“if you hurt our sister in any way, your death will be spectacular. i can assure you that”

“can you relax? this is literally our first date”

now let's move onto elijah

elijah: level 50

he's the most level-headed of all the mikaelson brothers so he's not thaaat bad

he doesn't lose his mind about you unless he really has too

like that one time he caught your ex cheating on you

man went berzerk

he compelled your ex to the priesthood/nunhood (ok, he got this idea from klaus & although he's not proud of it, he has no regrets)

he's the one who's always pestering you for your location updates (especially when you started going out without your very own mikaelson-sibling bodyguard)

"you informed me that you were going to rousseau's, but i tracked your cellphone & it seems to be showing me that you're in texas. care to explain?"

look, i didn't say you made things easy on them, did i?

you're a mikaelson for god's sake

it's in your very nature to deceive your siblings and do your own thing

lastly, let's discuss kol

kol: level 1-100

the man is his own kind of unhinged if we're honest

he's super chill & then two seconds later he's lost his damn mind

"you snuck out without informing me?! are you insane?!"

*two seconds later*

"bring me next time, though. i wouldn't mind sneaking out at 2am to get drunk either"

he escorted you to a school dance once (mostly because he saw one of your teachers before and thought they were hot)

which didn't suck

it was definitely better than having klaus as your escort

but nevertheless, it did suck when he compelled anyone who wanted to dance with you to get out of his face

brothers

actually, can i rephrase that?

1000 year old, original vampire/hybrid brothers

your sisters are the best though, so let's chat about them

they aren't as overprotective because they understand the whole "independent woman" thing

rebekah always helping you with your hair & makeup when you go to fancy events or you’re going on a date

she compels random women from the street to try on the outfits you're debating so you can choose

fighting over shoes with them (mostly rebekah, she can never peacefully part with her loubitins)

freya puts a special spell on you to ensure your hair & makeup stay in place all night when you have events to go to

going out for mani/pedis with rebekah and freya

extravagant shopping sprees with one sister on each arm

rebekah and freya being your hype-women

being able to talk to them about anything & everything with them

sister spa days

binge-watching current tv shows/movies with your sisters and singing along to your favourite disney movie songs with them

~

[transformers-fan-continuities]

Spotlight: Ties That Bind

This one’s a doozy folks! If you missed the last spotlight you can go read it here, but strap in for The Ties That Bind, an absolutely brilliant take on humanformers. It’s hosted here at @tiesthatbind-tf​ created by @artsy-hobbitses​!

Q) Give us a run down of your cont! What's it about, what's it called, what's it like?

Ties That Bind is a humanformers-based original continuity which is part Science Fiction and part Alternate History where the invasion of Quintessons and introduction of their technology to Earth in 1920 sets the world and humankind on a completely different trajectory. The active narrative spans a period from 1920 to 2070, covering the First and Second Quintesson Wars, the interplanetary Antillan War (leading to the creation of Unicron on Mars) and the Great War which involves the Autobots, Decepticons and Functionist stalwarts, and how it affects the characters.

The cast is pretty sprawling and the narrative is mostly centred around human drama with bits of humor interspaced and a dash of horror (mostly centred around how the previous government often chose to utilize the technology left behind from the Quintesson Wars to create new systems of oppression, which affected many of the characters, in the name of worldwide rebuilding efforts).

Q) What characters take the lead here? Any personal favorites?

I will admit to this continuity being very much heavy on the relationship between Old Bastards  Optimus Prime and Megatron, which is given considerable weight as they were best friends who had known each other since childhood and were deeply intrinsic to each other’s growths as individuals, which makes it all the worse when guilt and betrayal enter the party. Despite being captains in two corners of this battle, there’s a part of them that just cannot let go of their pasts together and they need to reconcile with how this will affect their agenda (Megatron) and how they lead their team (Optimus) who don’t necessarily share their history.

Other characters with significant development include:

Starscream, a Cold Construct in a toxic working relationship with Megatron with whom he is hiding a dark secret, who struggles to balance the underhanded viciousness he believes he needs to gain power and his innate desire from his Senate days to make the world a better place. 

Windblade, a Camien native who fights her government’s apathy concerning the situation on Earth which they see as unsalvageable compared to their more Utopian society. 

Prowl, a Cold Construct raised from childhood to be a cop in a police state, who finds out that he was brainwashed several times  to ensure his obedience and efficacy as a government asset and is now working to reclaim some semblance of the humanity he was never allowed to feel and figure out how much of him is who he really is and how much is programming.

Hound, a sheltered Beastman who joined the fight to ensure that Beastmen the world over would have the same rights he did in his homeland of Shetland Isle, but is forcefully stripped of his humanity and faced with his animal side during the war and has to relearn what personhood means amid his trauma.

Q) Is there a bigger point to this, like a theme or some catharsis? Or is it just fluffy fun?

God with the amount of time I spent sleepless trying to figure out how the logistics of this or the semantics of that were supposed to work in universe, I cannot for the life of me say it’s fluffy fun, but I can’t exactly say it hasn’t been pretty engaging either!

There’s elements of war being messy for everyone involved where there doesn’t seem to be a clear line between friend and foe at times, but I think for most part it prescribes to  Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s belief that people are inherently good, but are corrupted by the evils of society. Despite its dark themes (Including but not limited to child abuse, torture, illegal experimenation  and brainwashing), love and friendships do prevail, kindness does beget kindness, found families are made, even the smallest actions matter, and things do get better because there are people on both sides who genuinely want to, and strive to make it better.

With Cold Constructs and Beastmen, it also delves heavily into what it means to be human; to have agency and personhood.

There’s also a strong undercurrent of taking responsibility for one’s actions, even if they were made with the best of intentions (Avoidance of this is what eats up Starscream and Megatron from the inside, and what Starscream eventually embraces).

Q) How long have you been working on it?

There’s two answers to this!

I’ve had a Humanformers-related universe going all the way back to 2007 around the time the first Bayformers came out---basically I had a choice between learning to draw cars or draw people (I was an anthro artist back then) and I immediately chose people.

The 2007 draft however had no worldbuilding or connective storylines and was mostly a fun little venture into character design and practice which were actually instrumental to me experimenting and learning how to draw humans properly.

I left the fandom for about a decade and when I came back to it in late 2020 around September via the War for Cybertron series on Netflix, I immediately got hooked on the 2005 IDW comics I missed out on and wanted to get around to updating my old designs as well find a way to translate several of the concepts I wanted to explore in a human sense, so the 2020 update became its own full-fledged original continuity with detailed worldbuilding and history.

You can see the artistic evolution of several characters from their original incarnation below!

Q) It’s incredible to see your artistic improvement too! Give us a behind-the-scenes look! Show us a secret ;))

Say hello to my workspace! I’ve been working exclusively on the Ipad Pro since late 2016, which is fantastic because I can basically whip up concepts and sketches on the go anywhere. Nowhere is too out of bounds to work on TTB!

Also, do enjoy this sneak peek at true!form Rung, whose synthezoid human body took years to perfect.

Q) YESSSSS alright I must admit this is one of my favorite Rungs, and certainly my fave within TTB. Amazing. Phew, anyway. Where did you draw inspiration from? What canons, what other fiction, what parts of real life?

TTB was initially conceived as a faithful retelling of the IDW 2005 narrative before it was transformed into its own continuity and as such, it borrows heavily from concepts and mirrored plot lines introduced in that run! I chose to have the series inspired off it specifically for the amount of history and worldbuilding it introduced to the franchise.

Anime like Gunslinger Girl and Beastars inspired the depictions of Cold Constructs, especially the more harrowing aspects of their upbringing as government assets instead of children, and Beastmen (Beastformers) in TTB.

I haven’t depicted the world itself in my art all too much, but the architecture from Tiger and Bunny, which has sort of a futuristic Art Deco feel to it, is what you’d usually see in major cities. There is an in-universe reason for that---with a Point Of Divergence set in 1920 followed by 25 years (an entire generation) of progress basically being kicked to the curb due to the Quintesson wars, mankind was basically in a time-locked bubble until the end of the wars, and by then their heroes were 1920s-style rebellion leaders, which lead to 1920s fashion (especially among the Manual Working Class---Megatron, Jazz and Optimus all rock 1920s fashion at some point of their lives) and architecture being celebrated and retained as sort of a reminder of how things were before The Invasion. This anime’s background design is also where I adopted the tiered system TTB’s major metropolises are often built on (with each tier being designated to a different working class) from.

The main artistic style itself is a love letter to 90s cartoons, in particular Gargoyles’ deep and drama-driven character narratives and designs as well as The Centurions’ take on body armor logistics.

I also take inspiration, especially armor-wise, from the characters’ given heritage and background. As an example, Hotrod who is depicted as Irish has the flames on his armor done up with Celtic knots. Welsh aristocrat Mirage’s armor bears olden knight-style filigree and has his Autobot logo designed as a coat of arms. Indonesian Soundwave’s armor and Decepticon logo takes cues from Batik and Wayang Kulit while their mask is based off the Barong.

Q) They are absolutely gorgeous! Show off something you're really proud of, a particular favorite part of your cont.

The worldbuilding in general! Most Humanformers I’ve seen tend to treat it like a fun exercise which it is and is definitely valid, but I found myself wanting a full-fledged world to lose myself in and I sought to try and make that world myself by drafting a detailed history and timeline of events which would affect ongoing narratives, having indepth worldbuilding to include almost all societal aspects of the universe and  expanding on the concept of Beastmen and Cold Constructs existing in a human setting.

I’m not so secretly proud of the research and diversity included to make the cast look like the multicultural, globally-based team that they were meant to be instead of being locked to a single region! My original draft from 2007 was, to put it simply, quite culturally monolithic and I wanted to improve on that aspect with TTB.

I’m also proud that I’ve kept to it this far! I’m a notoriously flaky person jumping from one idea/fandom to another and to have kept at this continuity for the better part of ten months is honestly a personal feat.

Art-wise, this scene depicting a young Megatron working alongside Terminus and Impactor (cameo by @weapon-up-wallflower​‘s OC Missit!)  is definitely one of my favorites since it helps build up the world they live in and plays to familial bonds and comfort found in one another despite their less than ideal circumstances.

Q) Everything has come together so beautifully, you absolutely should be proud. What other fan canons do you love and why? Would you like to see them interviewed?

I am dying to hear more from @iscaredspider​’s Sparkpulse continuity! Her designs are MIND-BLOWINGLY GORGEOUS and I want to hear more about what inspired her to work on it!

Also YOU. Yes YOU BLURRITO. LET ME HEAR MORE ABOUT SNAP.

Q) [wails and squirms away in the mortifying ordeal of being known but in a very flattered way] I WILL SOMEDAY I PROMISE aflghsdjg thank you QwQ

Well that was fantastic, Oni, thank you muchly! A magnificent continuity with so much to look forward to! Coming up next is another personal fave of mine, the first inspiration for SNAP, so stick around...

[fuckingeviljerseybitch]

hey, anybody give a fuck about the content creators i watch on youtube? no? well fuck you, because here they are:

Jay Nedaj - has a whole Nedajian universe, and most of it revolves around Tequila.

TonyTalks - also has a whole universe, and routinely slams against the fourth wall so hard that i'm pretty sure it tries to dodge when it sees him coming towards it.

Ejspeaks - yes, she does. i think she's the only person prouder than i am of how many times she's gotten fired, and her office sketches constantly remind me why i am SO FUCKING GLAD i was "let go" from bullshit office jobs.

Jenny Lorenzo - i live for Abuela sketches, although i'm amazingly close to being Jaslainey. i'm *almost* that witchy, and definitely that antisocial.

RDCWorld - who doesn't wanna see like eight guys arguing about who has better powerups? or LeBron James sketches? or the Hood Avatar? these guys are total Blerd gold; please treat yourself to them.

Cor Canish - you will never look at The Elder Scrolls the same way again.

Young Scrolls - you will never hear The Elder Scolls the same way again.

Graenolf - an actor who branched out from Skyrim content long ago in the full embracing of every day absurdity. people still beg him to do Skyrim content occasionally, and i pity him every time they do, because Skyrim is literally over ten years old and EpicNate's channel exists.

Dead Sound - amazing and thoughtful illustrator. the depth of the work is just breathtaking.

Trey Moe - does some cute het couple nonsense. with a puppet. and the puppet usually wins.

Philosophy Tube - because i thoroughly enjoy getting the way i process reality washed, wrung, beaten, and hung out to dry. especially good for attempting to learn about and/or accept difficult concepts that people tend to yell about.

Rousseau - who, funny enough in light of the content creator listed immediately prior, is a boss pianist. this person has gotten me through many an "entirely unable to focus" night with the rendition of Moonlight Sonata alone.

[diamondwind99]

I AM NOT FREAKING OKAY

Spoilers ahead. Duh.

The new episode... I am actually freaking the heck out right now. I've got people who can confirm that I was on the floor cry-laughing and screaming alternately for at least 15 minutes after. Oh man. I guess I should just go through everything then like the epic nerd I am! Not in any particular order, very stream-of-consciousness whatever crosses my mind. :)

The format is ADORABLE. So cute. It's so conversational and casual, yet we still managed to have drama... but what's a Sanders Sides episode without a little drama? :D

My boy Logannnn! His wine glass getting bigger is was a great touch. We always knew Logan was our wine mom. They better listen to you soon! (or we'll make 'em...) You totally deserve this celebration, buddy.

Patton is just adorable. That's it. Adorably understandably emotional about all this. When you think about it Sanders Sides really is like Thomas's child... his brainchild that he raised into this epic masterpiece of a show. Someone should really have warned him about that spoiled juice though. And there's sooo much foreshadowing.

Roman came on and I screeched because he's always been special to me :D He's just so gorgeously fabulous and amazing and dramatic and excited... haha yep five years of you :) Also, I'm not entirely sure what the Rousseau and Voltaire thing was about but I'm sure it wasn't anything good. You have pretty good reason for disliking Janus after, uh, previous happenings. Also his only dream is to be a star, the look on his face shattered my heart he's in it for the long haul

Also the nicknames at the bottom were such a cute and hilarious touch. All of the inside jokes were, it was so awesome every time one came up and I was like ha I know what that means!!

Virgil... I know you were trying to be casual but I know you were excited about this lol (the smile though!!). The list of regrets XD

Also, of course Remus's emblem is on his butt like a freaking My Little Pony character. Come to think of it, he reminds me of Pinkie Pie. Nice blue eyeshadow, I always thought it was purple! That manic craziness of his is always hilarious, he's just so much fun. Is it just me or is Remus's mustache a little bit greenish? I look forward to seeing his character grow... we all know we've got a big storm comin'. (Janus, thanks for the spoiler repellent). You know... I wonder if Remus is the reason the mindpalace remained abandoned. We could have used it again, but Remus found it first. Not sure what he's doing in there or if it's still in one piece. Either way, looking forward to seeing you around.

Also, Janus and Remus are confirmed best friends and they played DDR this is amazing I mean we all knew but now it's CANON AAAAHHH

Oh, and Janus's socks were orange. Just putting that out there. For no one in particular. Certainly not the theorists. Who definitely won't say that it wasn't Janus who Remus was playing DDR with, but the orange side.

Speaking of Janus, that little Machiavellian bananaconda... That switch from Patton to Janus though... that was SCARY how smooth that was. It was just so fluid. I don't understand how this man is this talented. Playing seven completely different characters is hard enough, but switching between them on a dime...

The nicknames were such an awesome touch! And I think Roman came up with most of them right? And messing with them... nice one, Remus. Also, we have our second canonical almost-interaction between Roman and Remus!! I so want to be there for an epic fight between them!!

MORE musical numbers. MORE puppies. Yes.

The whole idea was just amazing, so creative and beautifully put together, and it really captured everything Sanders Sides has accomplished over the past few years and how we've developed and a fandom and community. I'm so glad I found Thomas, Sanders Sides, and all of you! I definitely think the sides have grown, Thomas has grown, the channel's grown... we've grown :)

So glad this all wasn't just a dream ;)

[sophiewritesworld]

Drunk In Love | Montgomery de la Cruz

Pairing: Montgomery de la Cruz x Female!Reader

Word count: 2.3k words.

A/N: After a rather long writer block and many many translation projects since I got back to university, I am back folks ! I wanted to upload this a while ago but it didn’t satisfy me at all, so here is something I hope you’ll like. Give me feedbacks ! xx Sophia.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau said: "A drunk mind speaks a sober heart."

It was rare for you to drink past your limits. You only went past that line sometimes, and sometimes happened to be tonight.

Terrible timing.

The night that was supposed to be a girls' night turned into a high school reunion in the local bar of Evergreen when Montgomery, Zach and Justin decided to join you, Jessica and Sheri. But when the boys joined you, you were already a few drinks past your limit and needless to say that the alcohol took away all of your basic inhibitions, including your wish to keep your crush on Montgomery de la Cruz buried deep inside your heart and mind. You were a blushing mess whenever he looked at you or talked to you. “I think Imma call it a night, guys.” The moment you stood up was the exact moment your legs decided not to support your any longer and you almost fell on Monty who caught you right on time.

“Haven’t seen you drunk since that party in senior year (Y/N).” Zach laughed as you balanced yourself back on your feet.

You shook your head and moved your index finger in the air. “I’m not drunk, Dempsey...” But when you went to grab your purse and almost fell again. “Shit maybe I am.” You added resting your hand on Monty’s shoulder to remain on your feet.

“Alright, (Y/L/N), let’s get you home.” Montgomery moved to grab your purse for you and quickly got a hold on your waist before you fall again.

“Monty, you can stay, we’ll take a cab.”

“Nah, don’t worry. I live close to her place it’s fine.”

“Careful on the road, man.” Justin shouted as you both made your way out of the crowded bar. “Wait didn’t (Y/N) have a crush on him in high school?”

“She still does and she is more likely to say things she’ll regret tomorrow I’m afraid.” Jessica said before taking a long sip of her beer already apprehending your drunken words and it sure didn’t take long for you to start mumbling incoherent words on your way to Montgomery’s car.

After he got you in the car and fastened your seatbelt, he made his way to the driver’s seat. “Why did you drink so much?”

“I’m not dead ass drunk Monty…” Seeing him rise his eyebrows following your statement, you added. “Maybe just a tinyyyyyyy bit.” Silence fell in the car. Montgomery kept glancing every now and then at you to make sure you were not getting sick because of the car ride. “Monty?” You said after a moment.

“Hm?”

You looked at him, admiring his features despite your drunken state. “You have a pretty face, you know?”

“Well, thank you (Y/N).” He chuckled. Of course under the influence of alcohol, everything seemed funnier. But you were just being honest because you never had the courage to say anything like this before.

“How come you’re still single, hm?”

Montgomery smiled and threw a quick look at you. “I guess I haven’t found the right one just yet... or nobody wants me.”

You closed your eyes. “I do.” There was a small voice quietly nagging at the back of your mind, reminding you that you would regret your words the next day if you kept talking and that this whole thing had a high percentage of ending in a terrible way. But you were drunk, you were well beyond the point of caring about any repercussions. So you spoke again with your eyes still closed. “Because I like you... I prefer using the word like than love because it’s less scary to say and if I get rejected it’ll hurt less... I am not so sure about this last part because I have kept my feelings for you well hidden for all the time we have known each other and I would be totally heartbroken if what I am saying right now ruins our friendship. Not that we are the closest friends around town but you mean a lot to me.” One big paragraph without stuttering and being drunk? Well done. Sighing, you opened your eyes to look at him. All the courage you have been gathering for years coming to the surface all of a sudden. “Because I like you, my love life has been a complete disaster. I didn’t meet a lot of guys but the ones I met weren’t you...”  

“(Y/N)... You’re drunk.”

“And I am being honest for once.” You sighed. “Why won’t you believe me, uh?”

Even with those honest words, Monty’s brain didn’t want to believe what you said unlike his heart which was beating like crazy inside his chest because he had a thing for you in high school or maybe he still did and he didn’t want to admit it because he thought you were far out of his league. “You won’t even remember what you’re saying tomorrow.”

“I will... I will remember all of it...” And it went silent in the car. An awkward silence you wouldn’t have been able to handle if you were sober. But there you were, drifting to sleep as Montgomery drove in the empty street of Evergreen after you confessed your feelings to him. Minutes later, Montgomery parked his car in your driveway. The sudden lack of movement of the car woke you up but you weren’t able to stand on your own, so he held you until you both reached your front door and finally your bedroom.

“Alright, here we go.” You crashed on the bed and pulled him down with you.

“Don’t leave me alone Monty.” You pleaded, loosely holding his shirt with both hands. “Please don’t.” Those last words came in a whisper before you closed your eyes and fell asleep in seconds result of your lack of energy mixed the generous amount of alcohol in your body. And he didn’t. He sat down on the edge of your bed, gently stroking your hair and thinking about what you said back in the car. How could you even say you liked him? He was a failure from the day his mother birthed him and would be until the day he would die, or so his father made him believe.

Montgomery didn’t make it to college. You did.

He started working in Tony’s garage right after graduating from Liberty because that was the only thing he could do right while you made it to Stanford and graduated top of your class. It surprised everybody when you decided to come back to Evergreen when you probably had better opportunities elsewhere in the country.

He was just a mechanic. You were the most brilliant lawyer in town.

You shouldn’t even think of him.

It took nothing for you to fall deeply asleep and you turned away from him, shifting under the covers and burying your face in the pillow next to you. Montgomery smiled at the sight of you before he silently left the room and settled on the couch downstairs, replaying the things you said in the car until he fell asleep himself.

From the pounding head and dehydrated feeling, you remembered the night before and the drinks you had with the girls when you opened your eyes. It felt like you had an axe planted in your head and your throat felt like sandpaper. Uh, you wished you were nineteen again. Hangovers were just getting worse over the years. Not that you were a big fan of alcohol in general. Ugh, why did you do this to yourself? At least the curtains were closed. Wait... You didn’t remember closing them before you left with the girls and most certainly didn’t do it when you came back home. Hold on... how did you come back home? Your eyes widened and you sat up on your bed quickly, forgetting about the nauseous feeling and the terrible headache when you remembered who actually brought you home. “Monty…” And everything came back to your mind. All of it. You looked down at yourself. You were still dressed in your clothes from the night before, only your shoes and jacket were missing. You threw the covers away and jumped out of bed, not bothering to check yourself in the mirror before you rushed downstairs straight to your kitchen from where a strong smell of coffee was coming. ‘Please let it be Jessica. Please let it be Jessica.’ And of course, it wasn’t her. It would have been too good.

Montgomery greeted you with a big smile. “Morning.”

“Hi.”

“You must have one hell of a headache.” He pushed a glass of water and a bottle of painkillers towards you on the counter. “Here take this first it’s gonna help.”

You hesitantly took a step inside the kitchen and without taking your eyes off him, you downed two pills with half of the water before you spoke. “You stayed...”

“Yeah, you asked me to.” He poured two mugs of coffee and slid one towards you before he sat on the stool facing you. “You alright (Y/N)?"

Should you ignore the fact that you spilled all of your hidden feelings to him the night before and act as if nothing happened? “I said a lot of things last night... right?” Well, obviously you wanted to embarrass yourself even more.

“You were drunk (Y/N), you didn’t know what you were saying. Don’t worry about it.”

Sighing, you pulled the mug between your hands as if you were hoping that the steaming coffee would give you some kind of help to speak and face what you said while drunk. “No... I mean yeah I was drunk but I was saying the truth.”  The seconds following your words were probably the longest and during which you truly started regretting your words unlike last night. Maybe you should’ve considered just keeping your mouth shut and moving on. 

“What-what are you trying to say (Y/N)?” 

“I like you.” You paused. At this point, you might as well repeat yourself. “More than just a friend and I have for as long as we’ve known each other... Now you can believe me because I am very sober and fully conscious of what I am saying.” It felt like you were sixteen again, all shaky and nervous in front of the guy you liked for nearly a decade now. 

Montgomery smiled, a soft and genuine smile, one you saw rarely but whenever you did, it always made your heart melt. “Really?” You nodded. “Me out of all the guys you can get?” 

You winced, shaking and tilting your head to the side. “I don’t get anybody, trust me, Monty. My love life is as dry as my throat right now.” You took a long sip of your coffee.

“I thought you don’t like using the word love?” He grinned to which you responded by rolling your eyes and got another sip of your coffee which made him chuckle. You were really something different. “I like you too by the way.” He added which almost made you choke on your coffee. Montgomery wasn’t one to do feelings, you knew it.Hell, the entire town knew it.

“Say that again?”

"I like you, (Y/N)." He moved from his spot to stand in front of you, taking the mug out of your hands and making you look at him. “I mean I actually really, really like you.” It was the thing about the way he smiled that made your heart skip beats every single time. Including now. And the fact that he was standing just inches away from with a hand on your cheek wasn’t helping with your heartbeat. “I could even say that I am in love with you.”

“What did we say about the love word?”

“You said something. I didn’t.” Montgomery shot you his signature grin before his other hand moved to cup your face and he leaned in, eyes darting between your eyes and your lips but he stopped less than an inch away from your face, the perfect distance so you could feel his breath brushing your skin, almost in a teasing way. “I could make you change your mind, what do you think?” He whispered, looking down at your lips and sending shivers through your whole body. It felt like you were back ten years in the past, you felt like a teenager whose crush was openly flirting with her. The butterflies in your stomach. Your heart beating so fast inside your chest. Your cheeks felt on fire. And you were unable to say a word. So you just nodded as a response, suddenly feeling both fear and excitement rush through your veins. 

Montgomery didn’t waste a second and immediately closed the small distance between you, pouring all the feelings he had for you for all this time into a soft and sweet kiss, his thumbs caressing your cheeks as your breaths mingled. It felt good. So good that you heart ached when he pulled away after a moment. “You know one kiss won’t change my opinion, de la Cruz, right?” 

“I know...” Montgomery replied, his voice low and husky making your heart flutter. Then came that other kiss. The fiery and passionate one. The one that made sparks fly in every direction and the world slowly disappeared around you, taking the worries and troubles with it. The one that said more than words could ever. The one that lead you to end up in the warm bed you were alone in just minutes ago, breathless, wearing nothing but a smile on your lips. “Changed your mind yet?” He asked when you laid on your side to look at him.

“Maybe.” You grinned.

“You really are something else.”

“It wouldn’t be love if it was this easy, uh?”

[fictionadventurer]

Fairy Tale Retellings

I know that @magpie-trove has been recommended enough books to fill several years, but since fairy tale retellings are my niche, I’m going to throw some more titles out there. (I’m limiting myself to 1) books/short stories 2) that I enjoyed 3) that I haven’t seen mentioned in connection to the original post. I’m also trying not to branch out into too many tales, so I’m going to be leaving out some slightly more obscure ones).

Before I go into the specifics, I’m just going to say, that if you only read three books out of this list, read Entwined by Heather Dixon (12 Dancing Princesses),  Brine and Bone by Kate Stradling (Little Mermaid) and Valiant by Sarah Macguire. (And if you only read one series, make it Regina Doman’s Fairy Tale Novels.)

Cinderella

Before Midnight by Cameron Dokey: Short, sweet, autumny retelling that I like for the atmosphere and the loving relationship between Cinderella and her stepfamily.

Silver Woven In My Hair by Shirley Rousseau Murphy: Extremely short, traditional retelling, starring a mistreated girl who collects Cinderella stories while being in one of her own. Has a sweet charm to it.

Soot and Slipper by Kate Stradling: A short retelling set in a traditional fairy tale kingdom, but with an excellent plot twist. I like it very much until the ending entangles it in a far-too-complicated magic system.

The Reluctant Godfather by Allison Tebo: A sassy retelling starring a grumpy fairy baker who tries to get out of his godfather duties by getting his two charges to fall in love with each other. Gets points for a unique, almost Wodehousish parody element that is an extreme breath of fresh air in a genre dominated by YA romances.

The Spinner and the Slipper by Camryn Lockhart: Mashes up the story with Rumpelstiltskin. Clearly the work of a very young author, but I’m putting it on here for the fun use of the fairies from A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Beauty and the Beast

Unseen Beauty by Amity Thomsen: Traditional fantasy retelling from the POV of one of the invisible servants. Writing that’s a cut above most self-pubbed books, with extra points for featuring a female friendship that’s just as important as the main romance.

Snow White

Fairest Son by H.S.J. Williams: Gender-flipped version involving the fae. Is the only Snow White retelling that had me uncertain for a while of where the plot was going to go.

Sleeping Beauty

A Long, Long Sleep by Anna Sheehan: A sci-fi retelling involving a girl who was regularly kept in stasis for the convenience of her corporate mogul parents, then was left in stasis for more than 70 years while the apocalypse happened. She wakes up to a world that’s recovered to become a very different place and has to deal with the emotional fallout of everything that’s happened to her. And it’s intense. This book has the distinction of being one of only two books with scenes that made me put the book down so I could sob uncontrollably. (The other is Rapunzel Let Down). There’s a little bit of content (a couple of kissing scenes that veer toward steamy, and use of futuristic swear words that have clear connections to modern swear words) but easily skippable.

The Little Mermaid

Brine and Bone by Kate Stradling: On first read, I appreciated it as a faithful-to-Andersen retelling, but found it otherwise forgettable. I reread it earlier this year and cannot understand how I possibly came to that conclusion. This has beautiful character work in a unique world that, I cannot stress this enough, is loyal to the Andersen version while appreciating the true joy of that ending.

Silent Mermaid by Brittany Fichter: First half had some excellent world-building and interesting conflicts that fell apart in a more cliche second half, but I remember it being enjoyable overall.

The Princess and the Pea

The Bruised Princess by A.G. Marshall: Part of her Once Upon a Short Story collection. They’re all decent-to-great, but this one is my favorite, a sweet little romance that makes the story make a surprising amount of sense.

I need to give a shout-out to my favorite retelling of this tale. I can’t remember the title. It was on Fanfiction.net back in the day. (I tried looking it up, but it wasn’t part of the collection I assumed it was in). It was from the POV of the servant who had to stuff all twenty mattresses. She has allergies and is miserable by the time she’s done, and gets her revenge by stuffing the top mattress with gravel.

The Twelve Dancing Princesses

Entwined by Heather Dixon: One of my very top favorite retellings, a creative and whimsical and touching story focusing on the twelve close-knit sisters and their relationship with their buttoned-up father in the aftermath of their mother’s death.

The Brave Little Tailor

Valiant by Sarah McGuire: The only retelling I’ve ever seen of this tale, starring a girl who has to masquerade as a boy to get work as a tailor, and winds up entangled in a kingdom’s battle against giants. The first act is very boring, but it turns into a very well-done retelling with excellent characters and worldbuilding.

Bonus: Series

These are series that retell several fairy tales in the same universe, and I thought it’d be easier to present them all together than separating them out by fairy tale.

The Fairy Tale Novels by Regina Doman: Catholic retellings set in the modern day. They have their weak points, but they’re my gold standard for how to write a modern retelling and how to write a religious romance.

The Shadow of the Bear: Snow White and Rose Red. Fun and adventurous. Gets points for introducing me to Chesterton.

Black as Night: Snow White, focusing on the Snow White character from the first book. Darker and more intense, but with some deep themes.

Waking Rose: Sleeping Beauty, focusing on the Rose Red character’s adventures in college. By far the most popular book in the series, it’s overlong, but extremely good.

The Midnight Dancers: The Twelve Dancing Princesses, focusing on mostly new characters with a side character from Waking Rose in the soldier role. A slighter story with a pricklier main character, but it’s a strong contender for my favorite in the series, exploring the connections between beauty and truth and goodness.

Alex O’Donnell and the 40 Cyberthieves: Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, starring Waking Rose side characters. This is a lighter adventure tale. All the stuff surrounding the hacking subplot is slightly ridiculous, but it’s one of the only YA novels I’ve ever seen that explores the realistic nuances of considering marriage with someone very different from you.

Rapunzel Let Down: Rapunzel. By far the darkest themes (it’s classified as an adult book). All new characters with some cameos. I thought it was decent on first read, but on reread, it blew me away with some of its themes (Except for a very melodramatic fifth act).

The Andari Chronicles by Kenley Davidson: Retellings set in a very mildly magical fantasy world, mostly focused on political intrigue.

Traitor’s Masque: Cinderella. 60% longer than it needs to be because of the extremely wordy writing style, and it makes me tear my hair out every time I try rereading, but the core conflict between the two brothers is compelling.

The Countess and the Frog: The Frog Prince. A short prequel novella focusing on a side character from the first book. I think it’s only available as a freebie on the author’s site but may be one of my favorite romances because the leads are so cute and sensible together.

Goldheart: Rumpelstiltskin. My favorite in the series, focused on a shy painter given an impossible task and the friends who help her get through it. The writing style’s much more concise here.

Pirouette: The Twelve Dancing Princesses. Political-intrigue focused. Also much wordier than it needs to be, though not as much as the first book. Twists the fairy tale in extremely interesting ways and has some great characters. (Prologue and epilogue are some of my favorite bits of writing in the series).

Shadow and Thorn: Beauty and the Beast. The most magical book in the series, and the most confusing because of that. There was one really cool moment with Beauty’s father, but otherwise I didn’t care for it all that much.

Daughter of Lies: Snow White with spies. Short, but fun. Reminds me of a Georgette Heyer farce.

Path of Secrets: Red Riding Hood with spies. I remember nothing about this story, which may tell you all you need to know.

Once: Six Historically Inspired Fairy Tales: What I think of as a kind of spin-off to the Rooglewood collections, this novella collection by six different authors retells six different fairy tales. My favorites are a dark but beautiful “Little Match Girl” retelling set in WWII, a steampunkish Rumpelstiltskin, and With Blossoms Gold, a Rapunzel retelling set in the Renaissance. (The only one I didn’t like at all was the Sleeping Beauty story).

Destined series by Kaylin Lee: Includes retellings of Cinderella, Rapunzel, Beauty and the Beast, Red Riding Hood, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty in one interconnected storyline. I’ve only read the first four; they’re okay-to-decent books whose main strength is the unique world they’re set in (think magical steampunky 1930s, which seems like a work of genius after you’ve been reading through a million retellings set in generically fairy tale kingdoms). My favorite is the fourth, Betrayed, which retells Little Red Riding Hood and mostly stands alone (until the last act veers it into a really complicated overarching plot).

[deja-you]

ten ways to say (i love you)

t. jefferson x reader

summary: Thomas has never liked the conventional way of saying ‘I love you.’

word count: 6.1k

warnings: a little bit of angst, high school, karen

masterlist

1.

There is no better way to start off senior year than arriving late to your first class.

In Y/n’s defense, she had left her house early. For once in her life she was actually going to be early to school. She was so proud of herself, and was so certain that she had extra time, Y/n allowed herself to stop at a drive thru and pick up a drink as a reward. Everything was going according to plan. 

That is, until the Karen in the car in front of her decided she wasn’t pleased with her order and made the barista redo it. To make sure she didn’t mess up Karen’s order a second time, the barista was extra careful. And extra slow. Y/n groaned as she watched the time tick by minute by minute. Just her luck.

Y/n watched the barista hand the drink to the Karen and breathed a sigh of relief. Yet, Karen’s car didn’t move. She had her drink, but Karen continued to talk with the barista. Y/n cursed under her breath and banged her head on the steering wheel. She must have been more aggressive than she was expecting, because she accidentally honked her horn. 

She jumped back in shock at the loud noise. Karen poked her head out of her window and immediately began lecturing Y/n on how rude she was being. At least, that’s what Y/n assumed she was saying, she really couldn’t hear the Karen with her windows rolled up. Y/n bit her lip, gave the Karen a little wave, and mouthed an apology.

Eventually Karen had finished her rant and left the drive thru. Y/n got her drink, no longer a reward, more like a consolation now, and sped to school. There weren’t any other students in the parking lot by the time Y/n arrived, remind her of just how late she was. Y/n shoved all her materials in her backpack, locked her car, and quickly walked into the building. 

Of course, Y/n’s first class just had to be with Mr. Rousseau. Any other teacher would just let her tardiness slide. She opened the door to Mr. Rousseau’s classroom, and any conversation that was being had stopped. More than a dozen pairs of eyes turned their attention to her, and Y/n wanted to melt right there and then.

“Miss L/n, nice of you to join us.” Mr. Rousseau addressed her. He narrowed his eyes at her, leaning against his desk as he sized her up. “If you’re done being a distraction to my class, I’d appreciate it if you would take a seat.”

Y/n swallowed roughly, and nodded. Rousseau went back to lecturing the class on how his class would be run, and Y/n did her best to find a seat as quietly as she could. She instinctively made her way over to where her best friends, Abigail and Thomas were sitting. 

Thomas moved his backpack off the desk next to him, and mouthed, “I saved you a seat.”

She gave him a grateful smile and mouthed back a ‘thanks.’ 

Abigail leaned forward and whispered, “Mr. Rousseau wasn’t very amused with you being late, huh?”

“I swear he hates me,” Y/n insisted. 

Thomas rolled his eyes. “He doesn’t hate you, hon’.”

“Thomas is right,” Abigail said. “Mr. Rousseau doesn’t hate you especially. Everyone knows he just hates women.”

2.

Late night study session was code for hanging out at John Adams’s house and messing around.

Abigail was dating John, so Y/n was friends with him and his friends by association. Abigail, Dolly, and Y/n were actually trying to study. John and James were discussing the football team’s chances of winning their next game. Martha and George had snuck off to get freaky somewhere. 

“Okay, Dolly.” Abigail held up a flash card. “What can you tell me about the defenestration of Prague?”

“Um, people were thrown out of windows for fun?” Dolly replied lazily. 

“No. Well, I guess you’re not completely wrong...”

Y/n threw her body against the back of the couch and closed her eyes. If she had to stay here any longer, Y/n would throw herself out a window. Not that she didn’t want to hangout with her friends. After a long day of school, she wasn’t exactly thrilled to spend more time with the people she spent the whole day with. If it wasn’t for her fragile social status, Y/n would have already been home in her bed right now.

“Sorry m’late, had to drop my sister off at a gymnastics class. Or fencing. Or Italian. Honestly, I can’t remember.” Thomas walked into the living room where everyone was hanging out.

“Ah, yes. I had almost forgot that the Jeffersons are all overachievers,” Y/n said with and eye roll. 

He wore an easy grin as he made his way over to Y/n, leaning against the couch and staring down at her. “What can I say? We’re just built different.”

Y/n scoffed but refused to dignify him with any further response. Instead, she closed her eyes again, pretending she was back at home under warm covers. 

“I brought you food.” 

This caught Y/n’s attention. She slowly opened one eye to see if he was telling the truth. Thomas held up a bag of fast food he must’ve picked up on his way over. Y/n couldn’t help but smile as she sat upright.

“For me?” She asked.

“Of course, hon’.” He handed her the bag. “I know you didn’t have time for lunch today, and I know you likely wouldn’t have gotten around to eating anything yet.”

Y/n happily pulled out an order of large fries out of the bag. “Have I ever told you how amazing you are, Thomas?”

“Not often enough.”

“Well. You are amazing. So amazing.”

Y/n finished her fries and was looking through the rest of the bag to see what else he had gotten her when John called out to her. 

“Hey, Y/n,” John said, “what are your thoughts on my cousin?”

“You mean Sam Adams?” Y/n asked. 

“Yep. The very one.”

She shrugged. “He’s cute. Why?”

“He thinks you’re cute. Wanted me to ask if you’re single,” John said nonchalantly. 

Abigail took time away from quizzing Dolly to get invested in the conversation. “She’s very single. Right, Y/n? You and Sam would be so cute together!”

Y/n could feel her cheeks begin to heat up, and she suddenly found the hardwood floors very interesting. “I don’t know... he really thinks I’m cute?”

“S’what he said,” John replied. “Can I give him your number?”

She weighed her options before giving a shrug. “Yeah, why not?”

“Y/n and Sam? I totally ship it,” Dolly said.

“Right?” Abigail grinned. “They’re going to be such an attractive couple.”

“Okay, can we stop talking about this now? I’m here to study,” Y/n insisted, pulling out a textbook.

“I’d rather not fail tomorrow’s test,” Thomas agreed.

Everyone begrudgingly went back to their previous activities, and Thomas took that moment to sit next to Y/n on the couch. She was flipping through the pages of her textbook before she came to a stop. Y/n passed the textbook to Thomas and pointed to the painting on the page.

“Look, this one’s my favorite,” she said.

“Wanderer above the Sea of Fog,” Thomas read. “You’re a fan of Caspar David Friedrich, then?”

Y/n shrugged. “I’m just a fan of the Romantic movement in general. Everything was just so creative, and beautiful, and emotional. There’s just so much feeling in this painting. It’s overwhelming.”

Thomas frowned looking back at the painting, and then back to Y/n. “It certainly is romantic.”

She gave the painting one last look before she began flipping through the pages of the textbook again. Thomas watched her curiously as she read over the vocabulary words for that week. Finally, he decided to say what was on his mind. 

“So, you and Sam Adams, huh?” He nudged her gently with his shoulder.

Y/n bit her lip and focused on a peculiar tchotchke the Mrs. Adams had decorated the living room with. “I guess. I used to have a crush on him in middle school, remember?”

“That’s right. Abbie and I spent most of science class teasin’ you about that. No wonder you’re so bad at physics now.”

She frowned and playfully bumped her shoulder with his. “I’m not bad at physics.”

“Really?” Thomas considered her with eyebrows raised. “Remember that botched science experiment that nearly killed Mr. Newton?”

“Can we not talk about that? He’s still alive, isn’t he?”

He hid an amused look. “Whatever you say, honey.”

3.

You’re tired. The sheets are too hot. It’s been a long day, your body is exhausted. The air in your bedroom is too cold. Your mind is tired, too. The sheets are too hot. If you just close your eyes and stop thinking you’ll be asleep in minutes. The air in your bedroom is too cold. Not thinking isn’t exactly easy. The sheets are too hot. Go then if you must, but remember, no matter how -- damn you, Sophocles, and your terribly beautiful words. 

Thomas threw his covers off his body and sat up in bed. He wasn’t going to get much sleep no matter how hard he tried. Thomas rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, if there had been any sleep to begin with. 

There was no doubt that he was tired mentally and physically. Emotionally? His heart was eternally restless. He crossed his room to sit at his desk, fully accepting that sleep wasn’t a viable option anymore. 

The blue light from his computer was a harsh contrast to the darkness of his room, but his eyes adjusted quickly. Thomas didn’t even know what he was doing on his computer in the middle of the night.

His fingers knew. They opened up an application and began scrolling. No, no, no, yes. Perfect. No, no, no, no, no, yes. This is her. And this went on for an hour or so, Thomas lost track of time. He’d be tired tomorrow, but he wasn’t going to get any sleep until he was finished. 

When he actually was finished, he smiled contentedly to himself. A wave of calm washed over him, and before he knew it, Thomas was back in his bed falling asleep. 

He looked terrible the next morning. Well, as terrible as a Jefferson could look. He had still had the sense to dress nicely, collared shirt, sweater, ironed pants, polished dressed shoes. Thomas was still sharp as ever in all his classes, but anyone who really knew him could tell he was a mess. 

“You okay, Thomas?” Y/n asked at lunch in Mr. Locke’s classroom (Mr. Locke was kind enough to let a group of moody teenagers eat lunch in his class, the lunchroom just wasn’t cool enough for them).

“Hm? Yeah. I’m great.”

Y/n cocked her head to the side. “You sure? You seem tired.”

“Don’t worry about me. Actually, I have something for you.” Thomas fished his phone out of his pocket.

“You have something for me?”

“Yeah, I’m sending it now. Check your phone.”

She raised an eyebrow, but Y/n opened up her phone to check the text Thomas had sent her. 

“Sophocles and Serotonin.” Y/n read aloud. “What is this?”

“I made you a playlist of songs I thought you might like.”

“Seriously?” A smile played on her lips; Thomas couldn’t help but reflect it. “When did you have the time for this?”

He shrugged. “I have more free time than you’d think.”

“With all your APs, varsity sport, and extracurriculars? I highly doubt that.” Y/n looked up at him, a teasing lilt transparent in her tone. “I appreciate the playlist even more, knowing you took time out of your rigorous schedule to create it. Thanks, Thomas.”

She leaned forward on the desk she was seated on to press a kiss to his cheek. Thomas froze like a deer in headlights, and if Y/n noticed, she didn’t say anything. He put himself back together before she could notice he was momentarily put-off, and leaned back against another desk in an attempt to look cool.

“S’what do you have planned for after school?” He asked in his best nonchalant voice. 

“Well, Sam and I are going to go see a movie.”

“That’s still a thing, then?”

Y/n shot him a look that had him raising his hands up in surrender. “Yes, it’s still a thing. I really like him, okay? He’s a good guy.”

“But is he good enough for you?” Thomas crossed his arms, his eyes not leaving her’s. It wasn’t that Thomas didn’t like Sam. Sam was great. It was just a fact that no guy would ever be good enough for his best friend. 

“He is.” She said with an eye roll. “Why do you care anyway?”

“Hon’, I’m just trying to look out for you.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“Oh trust me, I know.”

4.

Summer had felt like an eternity ago, when in reality, it had been less than two months ago. The yellow leaves and the updated fall Starbucks menu were enough to convince anyone that it had always been October. 

It had taken a lot of convincing and a little bit of bribery to convince Thomas to attend the Homecoming football game, but with the assistance from Abigail, Y/n had eventually gotten Thomas to cave. She wanted him there, but more importantly, she wanted him to give her a ride there. 

Of course she could have taken her own car, but Y/n would rather not waste her own gas when she could use Thomas’s instead. It’s not like it mattered to him, his parents paid for his car, insurance, and gas anyway. Plus, his Mercedes Benz had a seat warming function that Y/n couldn’t get enough of. 

She spent most of the ride over to the stadium raving over his seat warmers, and Thomas spent most of the ride making fun of how excited she was about seat warmers. Eventually, they parked outside of the stadium, and Thomas paid for their entrance fee into the stadium.

“It’s co--” before Y/n could finish her sentence, remarking on the obvious cold weather, Thomas had handed her a sweatshirt. She looked down at the maroon sweatshirt, then back at Thomas, her mouth slightly open. “You brought an extra sweatshirt for me? I didn’t even ask.”

“You didn’t have to ask,” he shrugged. She put on the sweatshirt and stared at him with wide eyes. Thomas glanced at, bit the inside of his lip, and shook his head. “Now, don’t go thinking I care about you or somethin’ like that, hon’. Couldn’t have you taking the sweatshirt I’m wearing, then I’d be cold.”

She looked at him with a smug smile on her face that made him regret bringing her the sweatshirt in the first place. “Yeah? Is that all?”

“Yes, that’s all.” He was doing his best to act annoyed by all her questioning, but he couldn’t help but find it endearing. When he came up with another argument, he added on, “besides, ma would be upset with if she knew I let you freeze. It seems like she loves you more than she loves me sometimes.”

“That’s because she does,” Y/n pointed it out like it was obvious. “Can you blame her? I’m funny and adorable. You’re just a grumpy old man I have to drag to football games.”

“That’s it. Give the sweatshirt back. I hope you freeze.” Thomas was giving her the dirtiest look he could muster. Y/n had the audacity to throw her head back and laugh.

She reached into her purse, and after some digging around, she pulled out a five dollar bill from her wallet. Y/n thrusted the money into Thomas’s hand and pushed him in the direction of the concession stand. “Here. Go get us some popcorn, maybe you won’t be so irritable once you get some food in you. I’m going to go find some seats.”

Thomas grumbled something about “not being irritable” but nonetheless ventured off toward the concessions. Y/n climbed the steps up the stadium and immediately found Abigail sitting in the student section, all decked out in school colors and face paint. Abigail greeted Y/n with a warm hung, then holding her at an arms length, she took note of what her best friend was wearing.

“Is that Thomas’s sweatshirt?” Abigail asked.

Y/n looked down at the the University of Virginia sweatshirt she had wrapped around herself. “Hm? Oh yeah, it is.”

Abigail pursed her lips and mulled over this new information. “What’s going on between you and Thomas?”

“What d’ya mean? We’re friends.” Y/n pursed her lips. 

“And Thomas knows that?” Abigail observed Y/n. “Do you know that?”

Y/n narrowed her eyes at her friend. “Yes, of course I know that. I’m dating Sam now, okay? Thomas and I have always just been friends, and that’s all we’ll ever be.”

Abigail held her hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay. If you say so, I’ll believe you. I just don’t want any feelings to get hurt between the two of you.”

“There are no feelings between the two of us,” Y/n said, but she wouldn’t stop thinking about Abigail’s words for the rest of the night.

5.

All week, Thomas had dreamt about the mint chocolate chip ice cream that was waiting for him in the freezer. 

It was his favorite flavor, and there was just enough left in the carton for one last bowl. He had promised himself he wouldn’t eat the last of it until he had really deserved it. After spending a productive hour studying for the test he had tomorrow, Thomas decided he had finally earned that delectable bowl of artificially colored green ice cream. 

He made his way to the kitchen, humming an upbeat tune and sliding across the hardwood floor in his socks. Thomas had made it all the way to the freezer when there was a knock at the front door. 

Thomas paused. He was so close to getting his ice cream. Maybe it was just a delivery? He debated answering the bowl or ignoring and continuing to dish himself ice cream. Thomas was leaning toward his bowl of ice cream when there was a knock at the door again. With a scowl on his face, he abandoned the fridge and any hope for happiness he had left and made his way to the front door.

“Y/n?” He said in surprise when he opened the door.

“Hi, Thomas. I didn’t know who else to come to. Abigail’s out with John right now. Dolly and Martha aren’t good in situations like this,” she was speaking quickly, sniffling between sentences, and trying not to let any more tears fall down her cheeks. “I just--”

He interrupted Y/n by pulling her into his house and his arms. Y/n melted into his touch, her hands gripping his shirt as she hugged him back. 

“What happened?” Thomas asked softly, rubbing circles into her back with his thumbs.

“Sam and I broke up.”

Thomas sighed softly and rested his chin on her head. He bit his lip, weighed his options, and came to a reluctant conclusion. Thomas pulled away just enough that he could look Y/n in her bloodshot eyes.

“I think this is the part where we break out the ice cream, huh?”

She offered him a miserable smile. “Ice cream couldn’t hurt.”

He led her to his kitchen and began digging through the kitchen while she hopped onto the counter to sit. Thomas hid a frown from Y/n while in the process of pulling out the nearly empty carton of mint chocolate chip ice cream. 

“So you want to tell me what happened?” Thomas asked, pulling out a bowl from one of the cabinets.

“It wasn’t a bad breakup.” Despite her words, Y/n still wiped at her tears with the sleeves of her shirt. “We mutually agreed it was best for both of us.”

“Yeah?”

She nodded. “He’s just not... he’s not the one.”

Thomas felt something twist and turn in his stomach, but he knew it wouldn’t be right to be happy when his friend was so miserable. He did his best to hide the smile that wanted to form in the corners of his mouth. “M’sorry about that, honey.”

“I know it was the right decision,” she said, staring up at the ceiling in an attempt not to let any more tears stream down her face. “Doesn’t mean it hurts any less, though.”

“It’s normal to be upset after a break up,” Thomas shrugged.  

“You’re not going to have any ice cream?” Y/n asked quietly as he handed her a singular bowl.

“Not in the mood for it,” he lied. 

6.

“You get enough sleep last night, hon’?”

Y/n was in mid-yawn when he asked her the question. She held a hand over her mouth and nodded. “Yeah. Why?”

“You look terrible.”

She scowled at him. “Wow. Just what a girl wants to hear. Anyone ever tell you you’re a charmer, Thomas Jefferson?”

“You’d be surprised.” He gave her a teasing smile. “So who’s the cause for your sleepless nights?”

“Napoleon Bonaparte.” She held up her textbook for him to see. “Why’d I ever let you convince me to take an AP class with you?”

“Because you like spending time with me?”

“Nah, that’s not it.”

“Ouch.” Thomas held a hand over his heart. “You really stayed up late studying for the quiz?”

“Some people have to study, okay? Not everyone’s as gifted as Thomas flippin’ Jefferson.”

“Flippin’?” He stifled a laugh.

“We’re at school. Gotta keep it PG, right?” She shrugged. “So yeah, I stay up and study sometimes. High schoolers aren’t supposed to get a good amount of sleep. S’not a big deal.”

“Yeah, well, sometimes I worry about you.”

She tilted her head to the side and gave him a small smile. “You don’t need to worry about me.”

“Believe me, if I could just shut it off, I would. I’ll make you a Quizlet next time so you can get more sleep.”

Y/n was about to say something in response when her phone began ringing in her pocket. “I should get this.”

She went out into the hallway to answer the call, and Thomas turned back to his lunch, not even bothering to hide his smile. 

“Thomas.”

He jumped at the sound of a voice and turned to see Abigail sitting at the desk across from him. Had she been listening to them the whole time? Thomas had completely forgotten she was there; a fact he would be certain not to share with her.

“Yes, Abbie?”

“Do you have a crush on Y/n?” 

Thomas blinked a few times, certain that he hadn’t heard Abigail right. “Excuse me?”

Abigail rolled her eyes, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “You heard me right, Jefferson. Do you have a crush on Y/n?”

“Y/n? Where’d you get that idea?” Thomas made a face like he was disgusted by the very thought of it.

“Oh, I don’t know. You’re always following her around and doing whatever it takes to make her happy. Not to mention you always call her “hon’,” seems pretty affectionate to me.” Abigail had a talent for laying out the facts.

“We’ve been friends since I can remember, of course I care about her. So what if I have a nickname for her? Doesn’t mean anything.”

“It’s not like you have a nickname for anyone else.”

“I call you ‘Abbie’. I have a nickname for everyone.”

“We both know that’s a load of B.S. Are you really telling me you don’t like Y/n?”

“I don’t like Y/n.” And it wasn’t exactly a lie, because the feelings he had for Y/n had progressed far beyond liking. 

7.

“There’s nothing people appreciate more than a hand-made gift, right?” Y/n said, pulling out a ball of azure colored yarn.

Thomas crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against a wall. “Sure, ‘cept maybe a nice Rolex or a new car.”

She scowled at him. “I don’t know what it is about me that makes you think I can afford a Rolex or a new car. I’m an unemployed high school student. My only income comes from birthday cards from my grandparents.”

“Ah, I see. Well, I’m sure Abigail will love the scarf you make for her.”

“Yeah, how hard could it be?” Y/n muttered, staring at the mess of strings in her lap.

Thomas’s eyes widened a little. “You telling me you’ve never crocheted before?”

“How hard could it be?” She pulled up a beginners guide on YouTube, and five minutes later, Y/n had a knotted pile of yarn in her hands. She huffed in frustration and began to aggressively pull at the yarn.

“Let me help.”

“You know how to knit?” Y/n raised a skeptical eyebrow at him.

Thomas rolled his eyes, sitting next to her and taking the “scarf” out of her hands. “This is crocheting. You don’t even have knitting needles.”

“Apologies. You know how to crochet?” 

“Lucy went through a stage where she was really into crocheting,” he shrugged. Thomas had quickly untangled Y/n’s “progress” and began to expertly thread together loops of yarn. He held up his work to her once a pattern had begun to form. “See? Perks of growing up with sisters.”

“I hate that you’re good at everything.” 

He snorted and gently began to move the work into Y/n’s hand for her to finish the rest. “’M’not good at everything. Just most things.”

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever.” Y/n was now laser focused on the project in front of her, determined to get it right this time. Thomas would advise her, but for the most part he let her work on it by herself. She was a fast learner.

“You’re never going to get it like that, hon--” Thomas caught himself, remembering the conversation he had had with Abigail earlier. “Y/n. You’re never going to get it like that, Y/n.”

She looked up at him with furrowed brows. “What?”

He swallowed roughly and shook his head. “It’s nothing. Just... You’re going to want to pull the yarn tighter or it’s all going to unravel later.”

“Oh. Thanks, Thomas.”

8.

It was 2 a.m., and Y/n had already came to terms with the fact that she wasn’t going to get more than five hours of sleep. She wasn’t exactly trying very hard to sleep. She had tried to refresh her Instagram feed maybe a dozen times now, but it wasn’t like anyone was posting in the middle of the night. Instagram was doing a poor job keeping her mind distracted. 

Lightly biting her bottom lip, she threw her body back onto her bed with a loud sigh. She wrinkled her nose and caved, navigating to the facetime app on her phone. Hesitating one last time, Y/n tapped his contact with her thumb. Her phone began to hum while she waited for him to pick up.

“Hey, Thomas. I know it’s late,” she said when he finally answered the phone. Y/n frowned when she saw him rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. “Sorry, did I wake you?”

“No, no. Couldn’t sleep anyway,” replied his groggy voice.

“You’re lying. Hey, don’t worry about it. Go back to sleep.”

“I was already up.”

“No, you weren’t. Don’t let me bother you.”

Thomas stopped rubbing his eyes and looked at Y/n firmly through the camera. “Maybe I was asleep, but I’m up now, yeah? Don’t worry about waking me up. I’d rather talk to you any way.”

Y/n pursed her lips, giving him a doubtful look. Thomas was too polite to ever tell someone if they were bothering him. She couldn’t tell if he really wanted to talk to her, or if he was just too courteous to tell her otherwise. 

He noticed the look she gave him and rolled his eyes. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?” 

“Like you don’t believe me. Would’ve stopped bein’ friends with you years ago if I didn’t find all your annoying habits endearing. Promise.” Thomas shot her a smug smile that made her wish she hadn’t called. 

“So kind of you,” she said sarcastically. 

“I try.” His grin widened, if that was even possible. “So what’d you want to talk to me about?”

Y/n chewed on her bottom lip and shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t?” Thomas narrowed his eyes and leaned in closer to the camera. After he had examined her carefully, he leaned back and crossed his arms. “Yeah you do. What is it?”

She shifted, uncomfortable by how easy it was for him to see right through her. Once more that night, she caved. “I can’t stop thinking about how you called me ‘Y/n’ earlier today?”

He tensed up but the action was barely noticeable. “What about it? It’s your name.”

“Sure,” she nodded, “but you never call me ‘Y/n.” It’s always ‘hon’’ or ‘honey.’ Always. Did something happen? Are you mad at me?”

Thomas raised his eyebrows and shook his head. “No, ‘course not. Everything’s fine.” He paused. “That really upset you? Me calling you ‘Y/n’?”

“It’s just not normal.”

“It’s not normal for people to call you by your name?”

“It is, but you are supposed to call me ‘honey.’ Okay?”

He laughed through his nose and couldn’t stop an amused smile from spreading on his lips. “Okay, honey.”

9.

“I’m finally going to get to see your mural, then?”

Thomas rolled his eyes. “It’s not my mural, Y/n. It’s the senior mural. It’s not like I’m painting it.”

“Yeah, but it was your idea.” She gave him a playful nudge. “I don’t know why you haven’t told me what it is yet. I’m sure if the great Thomas Jefferson designed it, it’ll be the best Senior mural ever seen at Charlottesville High School.”

“Don’t get your hopes up, hon’. I’d hate to disappoint you.”

“You could never disappoint me,” she said matter-of-factly. “You’re Thomas Jefferson.”

They turned the corner to see their fellow senior, Henrietta Johnston, working on the mural. The previously beige wall was now covered in black, gray, and light blue paint. In the middle of the painting was a figure made up of colorful hand prints standing above the blue-gray sea.

Y/n stared at the mural with an open mouth. She looked from Henrietta to Thomas, then back to the wall in front of her.

“It was my idea to make the figure all colorful with handprints,” Thomas said. “Thought it would be nice to let our class to literally leave a mark on this school.”

Henrietta smiled at the mural and set down her paintbrush. “It was a good idea. The splash of color is just what it needed. What do you think, Y/n? Do you like it?”

“Like it? I love it. It’s... it’s perfect.” She turned to Thomas with wide eyes. “Wanderer above the Sea of Fog. This is my favorite painting.”

“I noticed -- don’t give me that look. It’s not like I care that much. You just never shut up about that painting. It’s annoying, really,” Thomas muttered, rubbing the back of his neck and looking down at the ground.

She smiled and turned her attention back to the mural. “I can’t even begin to tell you how much I love this. I can’t believe you remembered.”

“Of course. It’s worth it, seeing how much you like it.”

There was a beat of silence.

“You’re the kind of person I could fall in love with, you know that?” She didn’t take her eyes off the painting, and Thomas was glad. 

Maybe if she had looked at him, she would have seen his breath catch in his throat and his eyes widen just a little bit. If he was the kind of person she could fall in love with, then why didn’t she? Thomas was flustered. If Y/n had noticed his lack of response, she didn’t say anything. 

10.

Charlottesville High School was filled with rich kids. The Charlottesville High School debate team had a minimal amount of members. These factors resulted in Thomas and Y/n having their own hotel rooms when they attended a debate function in Washington D.C.

After a long day of debating, Thomas and Y/n walked side by side down the narrow corridor to their respective rooms. Every now and then, they spared looks at each other when they thought the other wouldn’t notice.

Thomas cleared his throat. “So that guy in the green shirt asked me for your number.”

She glanced up at him. “He did? Did you give it to him?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Thought he was out of your league. Told him you snored like an ogre and I gave him Maria’s number instead,” he said with a shrug.

She gasped and shoved his shoulder. “Are you kidding me? I don’t snore like an ogre! He was cute and interested in me.”

“Can’t imagine why.”

Y/n scowled. “For your information, I’m adorable. I’m funny and enjoyable to be around. Even if I ‘snore like an ogre’ I’m also extremely attractive, so it makes up for it.”

“You don’t need to sell me on reasons why you’re dateable, honey,” he chuckled softly.

“Oh yeah?”

At the same time, Y/n and Thomas turned to face each other. Their teasing banter stopped when they realized they were only inches apart, he could hear every inhale and exhale. His eyes flicked to her lips. It was only for a second, but she hadn’t missed it. 

Thomas took a step back and cleared his throat. “It’s late, we should go to bed. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” she echoed. They both hurriedly stepped into their own rooms. 

Had he almost kissed her? Did that really just happen? Y/n leaned against her hotel room door. Maybe she had just imagined it. She shook her head and grabbed a sweatshirt and a pair of shorts out of her suitcase. Maybe Y/n could stop thinking about it after a good nights rest. She changed and was about to brush her teeth when she felt some kind of nagging feeling inside.

It was naïve to think she was going to get any sleep tonight if she didn’t confront Thomas about it. Y/n set down her toothbrush and made her way out into the fluorescent lit hallway. She had made it all the way to his door when she paused.

Is this really what she wanted to do? If Y/n brought up their almost-kiss, would they be able to go back to friends? Did she even want to go back to friends? Y/n bit her lip and glanced back at her own room door. She should just go to bed, it wasn’t worth putting their friendship in jeopardy. But then again, Y/n would always wonder what could have happened if she didn’t confront him.

She raised her fist to knock on Thomas’s door, but before she could knock, the door swung open. Thomas and Y/n once more stood face to face. She had a wide eyed expression that mirrored Thomas’s.

There was an accelerated heartbeat. A flutter. Thomas’s arm wrapped around her waist and pulled her closer to him. Y/n’s hand found its place on the back of his neck and guided his lips to her’s. His eyes were half open, sneaking glances at her to assure himself he wasn’t dreaming. Her overwhelming scent and the feeling of his hands threaded through her hair was all too real. 

Thomas pulled her into his room, kicking the door closed behind them. Placing both hands on his broad chest, she pushed him back onto the bed and climbed on top of him, straddling his hips. 

Thoughts were racing in Y/n’s mind. She tried to put reason to the way he gripped her waist tightly -- there would be bruises there the next day. She tried to put reason to the way his pupils dilated as she went in for another kiss. Y/n came up empty handed.

There was no way Y/n felt the same way, Thomas told himself. There was no way she loved him the way he loved her. For as long as he could remember, he had been in love with Y/n L/n. And for as long as he could remember, she had only seen him as her best friend.

Thomas missed the warmth of her lips when she pulled away, but he couldn’t help but admire the way her lips were swollen and her hair was a mess. Her bright eyes, and the way light highlighted the softness of her skin. Thomas took that moment to memorize every line and curve of her face, branding the memory into his head.��

She leaned in to kiss him again, but he pushed her away this time, sitting up. “Stop. We... we can’t do this. This can’t just be a one time thing.”

“Why not?” Her voice was quiet and delicate.

He felt his heart twist inside his chest and he clenched his jaw. “Because I love you.”

[randomfandom815]

Defending the women of LOST/Sexism in LOST

People say they don’t like Kate Austen because she’s “annoying” “can’t choose between Jack and Sawyer” “always wants to join every single mission”. Kate has way bigger things to worry about than sorting out her romantic feelings. Yes, she is developing feelings for both Jack and Sawyer, but she doesn’t have time to figure them out while trying to survive on the island. And the fact that people don’t like her because of the whole “I’m coming with you” thing is a little ridiculous, because they’re hating Kate for wanting to protect her friends and do whatever she can to help. You know who else does that? Jack. But plenty of people love him for those very same reasons. Yeah, a lot of Kate’s character was centered around the love triangle, but that isn’t the character’s fault, it the writers’s.

Then there’s Claire Littleton. People always complain about her “my baby!” thing, but... she only actually says that a few times, AND, if your child was taken from you or you thought your child was going to be hurt, wouldn't you be worried out of your mind? Wouldn’t you want to do anything to help them? People also criticize Claire for her entire Season 6 arc. She was alone, on the island, thinking everyone had abandoned her, with only the MIB for company. She was also tortured by the temple Others, who she thought had taken her child. Claire was a single mother who just wanted to keep her son safe, give her a break. 

Sun-Hwa Kwon is a character who actually doesn’t receive that much hate, but there is still the fact that people don’t like her because she left Ji Yeon to go back to the island for Jin. Here’s the thing: Sun had no way of knowing what was would happen on the island. She had no way of knowing that Jin had time traveled to the past, and she had no way of knowing what would happen with the MIB/Locke. She thought that she would be able to go to the island, bring Jin and the others back, and the two of them would reunite with Ji Yeon. And then in the submarine incident, Sun didn't want Jin to stay. She wanted him to live and take care of Ji Yeon. It was Jin who made the decision to die with her, not Sun.

Shannon Rutherford is a very unlikable character. Even I don’t enjoy her character, or Boone, and that is a view shared by many other people in the fandom. Many people call her selfish, spoiled, and just plain rude. And she was all of those things, but that wasn’t her entire character. Remember, they had all just been through a plane crash, landed on an island with no chance of rescue. Also, friendly reminder that she was only 20 years old. She was scared, and her way of coping with that was to try to do something normal. Let’s not forget, in Pilot, Part 2, she volunteered to go on the mission to fix the transceiver. She was constantly feeling useless, and it didn’t help that other characters, especially Boone, were constantly putting her down and mocking her. When she started to see Walt, she genuinely made an attempt to help him, even though she wasn’t sure if he was even there. Her death was untimely, and I wished we had gotten to see her grow more as a person. Also, her death was used for shock value and to further Sayid’s character development.

And now, one of the most hated characters of LOST, Ana Lucia Cortez. Now, while the characters I mentioned above were shit on and criticized, Ana Lucia was absolutely hated by the fandom. People hated her attitude, her toughness, her dislike of most of the people around her, and the fact that she killed Shannon (who, by the way, was just as disliked by many Ana Lucia haters). You know who else has a similar attitude? Who has that same toughness and dislike of people? Who else killed someone? That would be Sawyer, a fan-favorite, white male character who is beloved by the fandom. Now, for the last point, what I am comparing here is Ana Lucia killing Shannon to Sawyer killing the man he thought was Frank Sawyer in Australia, right before flight 815. Ana Lucia killed Shannon because she was trying to protect the people she was leading (including Sawyer!) from who she thought was the Others, and killing Shannon was an accident. Sawyer killed the man completely on purpose and out of revenge. Oh, and it wasn’t even the right person. Yes, I am aware of the man Ana killed long before flight 815 out of revenge, but if we can take her very small amount of character development, in which she refused to kill Henry Gale, a known Other at that point. Whereas Sawyer was still willing to kill a bunch of people in Season 6, the end of his character arc. And yet, Sawyer is still in most people’s top five characters lists (just to be clear, I do not hate Sawyer at all, and this is not anti Sawyer but pro Ana Lucia). You may argue that people love Sawyer because of his character development, which I do agree with. However, Ana Lucia was never given the chance to have Sawyer-like character development because she was killed off in the same season that she was introduced in. She wasn’t even allowed to be in the church in the flash-sideways, and she didn’t get to “move on.” Ana Lucia deserved way better than the death for shock value that she got.

Next up on the list is Juliet Burke. She, like Sun, also isn’t the target of a lot of hate, but there are still things that need defending. The first thing is, of course, her sudden change of mind when it came to detonating the hydrogen bomb in Season 5. Yes, it was selfish of her to endanger everyone on the island just because of the way Sawyer looked at Kate. But if the plan did actually work, which she thought it would, that meant she would lose everything she had gained over the past few years, including Sawyer. Juliet is incredibly kind and feminine while also being badass at the same time, which is amazing because you don’t usually see those two traits coinciding (usually a badass character isn’t very feminine and a “traditionally feminine” character isn’t a good fighter). As for all of her motives in Season 3, Juliet was trapped on the island for three years. All she wanted to do was leave and go home to her sister. Yes, she manipulated Sun, but right after that, she made things right by helping Jack make a plan to stop the Others. Her death was heroic, and I’m glad she was finally able to be happy in the flash-sideways. (I am declining to mention her whole relationship with Goodwin and all the drama with Ben, although I might dive into that in another post). 

Now, the character Rose Nadler has almost nothing that needs to be defended. She is a constant wise voice of reason who isn’t concerned with the drama of the rest of the survivors. Her relationship with her husband Bernard is very sweet, but she doesn’t let that stop her from doing the smart thing (like stopping his SOS sign idea). Not only that, but Rose has one of the best (and most meta) lines on the show: “If you say live together, die alone to me, Jack, I’m going to punch you in the face.”

Another character who doesn't need much defending is Charlotte Lewis, but not for the same reason as Rose. Charlotte was done dirty by the writers. Of the science team, she is the least fleshed out and explored. She had a single flashback and a little bit of exposition information from Ben, but that’s pretty much it. Every significant thing she did was for the sake of other characters. She had a fake-out death so Ben would reveal that he had a spy on the boat. She was taken to the Barracks so that members of Jack’s group would have a reason to go there. Her going to the Barracks was also an excuse to get Miles and Kate there. And she only died/was dying for shock value, to up the stakes of the time flashes, to provide more questions to the characters and the audience, and to further Daniel’s character development. In the flash-sideways, all she did was go on a date with Sawyer and further his character development. She didn't get to go to the church and move on. Daniel and Miles, the other members of her team, on the other hands were given compelling backstories and centric episodes.

Penelope Widmore is similar to Charlotte in that there isn’t much to defend because she doesn’t do much that affects the plot. Nearly everything she does is about Desmond, and the writers barely even gave her a personality. I’m sure Penny was an actually interesting person, if they had bothered her to give her any storyline that didn't involve her love interest.

Danielle Rousseau is a character that kind of slides in and out of the story as needed. Now, Danielle isn’t the subject of a lot of criticism just because she isn’t very focused on, but from what I have seen, here’s what I have to say: Danielle was alone on the island for sixteen years. And for sixteen years, she had to live with the knowledge that she was forced to kill the man she loved and her team. Not to mention the fact that her daughter, Alex, was taken away from her when she was just a week old. Can you blame Danielle for being paranoid? Her death was not a fair end to the character, and it was only used to kill off Danielle quickly and provide shock value.

Her daughter, Alex Rousseau, is similar to Charlotte and Penny in that she doesn’t need to be defended because everything she does is to affect other characters. In this case, those characters are Ben and Danielle (especially Ben in the later seasons). Danielle’s entire character is centered around the fact that she lost Alex and has been searching for her, and Ben’s motivations after Season 4 are largely motivated by Alex’s death. She herself doesn’t have much of a character arc, and her death was only to provide shock value and further Ben’s character development.

Another character that falls into the category of not having much to defend because every action is for someone else is Libby Smith. Once the tailies and the main survivors joined together, she was almost immediately shoved in a relationship with Hurley. The only things we knew about her backstory were that her husband died, she was a clinical psychologist, she was in the same mental hospital as Hurley, and she gave Desmond a boat. That’s it. She didn’t have a centric episode, and she only appeared in other people’s flashbacks. Her death was only to provide shock value and further Hurley’s character development, as well to show that Michael betrayed the survivors. 

Notice how many of these women died for shock value and/or to further a man’s character development? Notice how many of these women are disliked for traits that other characters are loved for? Notice how many of them barely exist as their own character without a man? I love LOST, I really do, but their treatment of female characters needed a lot of improvement.

[bonniebird]

Klaus Mikaelson x Reader

Requested by Anon

The door to your class swung open. You didn’t bother looking that way until whispers started spreading through the room. Someone took a seat next to you which was when you pulled yourself away from the notes you were writing down.

“Hello love.” Klaus said with a smile. He looked different, you couldn't place your finger on it. He seemed more… alive for lack of a better word.

“You can’t just break into my uni classes Klaus.” You grumbled at him. 

“Well I wouldn’t have had to if you were home.” He huffed as if not being where he expected had offended him greatly. Looking at him you realised he looked a little more, for loss of a better word, livid. He looked tired too. Not in the way his usual chaos bored him after a while. But he looked exhausted.

“What happened to you?” You whispered, glancing at the professor who had paused, only momentarily, when Klaus entered the room. He sighed dramatically as he lolled his head to the side and glanced at you.

“I angered something very powerful, it saw fit to rid me of immortality for a while.” He explained.

You stared at him with a blank look on his face. Blinked a few times. Took a deep breath and nodded once.

“You mean something uncursed you and you’re human?” You asked curiously.

“Yes and while my siblings fix the problem, you. Are going to show me how to be human or let me starve?” He asked quickly.

“I guess… I can take you to my apartment once the class is over.” You said hesitantly. He frowned and seemed to accept your offer. At least you assumed he had. He nodded and leant back in his chair, listening to the last part of the lecture.

**************************************************

Elijah had turned up at your house to update Klaus on how the search for fixing the spell was going. It turned out they couldn’t just turn him again. They had to lift and curse. You’d agreed to let Klaus stay with you, in hiding.

Which you had assumed would be a few days maybe a couple of weeks. Now, four months in, Klaus had gone from drinking, partying and enjoying mortality to refusing to leave your house. He was convinced his enemies would start to take advantage of his predicament. That he’d been human for far too long and that word must have gotten out.

“Leaving again.” Klaus commented, not questioning your but, acknowledging that you’d be gone.

“Yes, I leave everyday.” You answered with exasperation through gritted teeth.

“That’s wonderful. While I stay here helplessly, you run off to learn things I could teach you for free.”

“Well, you don’t come with education certificates. Besides, No one will come in unless you invite them.” You pointed out with a huff.

“Well it’s nice to know in my hour of need you’ve decided to turn away and abandon me.”

“Klaus. You forget to eat unless I remind you, you got angry and decided to try and bite a bartender and you've been a human for four months and I’ve been looking after you. You need to be less dramatic.”

As usual Klaus forgot to eat while you were at your classes. You had to cook, despite the fact that you knew Klaus was more than good at it. He played the being ill card. You pointed out he probably felt ill because he had stayed up half the night pacing and trying to watch out the window for the imagined watchers.

After eating you decided you were far too tired of him to stay awake for long. You hoped if you had a nap Elijah would appear miraculously and take his needy brother away. That was a long shot hope. The latest Klaus had informed you about them was that they had the right witch but not the right spells. Freya was working night and day to find it. You couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. You’d seen her searching for spells before, frantic in her searching. Elijah had asked how Klaus was the last time he’d visited. That hadn’t been for a long while. You’d lied, a white lie really. You didn’t tell him the worst of what Klaus was going through.

Blinking awake blearily you realised it was dark now. Klaus had laid next to you at some point. He looked peaceful for once. His breath soft, mouth open a little as he slept. He looked so gentle, practically innocent. It wasn’t hard to wonder if he would adjust to being human again. He would, you told yourself, he would thrive and live like he’d wanted to do when he was first made. How he’d spoke about being human when he was drunk in Rousseau’s. But his enemy would take advantage of the weakness it posed.

There would be nothing his siblings could do to convince them to let him be. Almost heartbreaking. At least for this moment, you hoped, he’d be peaceful.