#also ngl im kinda scared to post this. i hope i explained what i mean well enough. like i get wanting to vent and express self hate BUT.

[mossy-aro]

ultimately i think my insistence on aro positivity honestly is as much a political stance as a personal one.

when i say aro positivity is crucial and that i dislike doomer-ist posts that express sentiments like 'I hate being aro so much I wish I was dead instead’ it's not because I don’t think there can and should be a space for negativity and acknowledging self-hate, or the many ways being aromantic can really suck sometimes. i find that to be very important!

that being said. there is smth here about how self-hate posts are sometimes just arophobia that we inflict on ourselves. and when we put that out into the ether it (intentionally or not) can become arophobia that we inflict on other members of the community. i think there absolutely needs to be a place for negativity and the expression of anger and frustration and self loathing even - these are all good things to talk about because these are things that we experience. that being said, it can also be genuinely upsetting and triggering to people to have what is essentially arophobia shown to them and then have that be validated by other aspec people. your personal thoughts can affect your wider community on a level you may not anticipate. and i understand it i truly do! it took me so long to be able to recover from accepting being aroace - it threw my entire world off kilter and made me question everything about my place in the world.

but my insistence on aro joy and positivity is because ultimately i do believe that building is at the core essence of it all. that ultimately discussions and the purpose of community should be about construction, not destruction. and this is both a personal and a political stance. talking about how much you hate yourself and cultivating online discussions/spaces where negativity about aspec identity is the main and only theme is destructive - if that’s where we let the conversation end. these thoughts can and should be used as a vehicle to look for a path forward!

joy and positivity create a space where the focus can become on forging a path forward, on construction, on community building instead of tearing ourselves and others down with negative thoughts. it’s not productive or healthy when it stops at a place of negativity - it becomes actively destructive to the essence of community.

and i do think that this is especially poignant considering the fact that being any kind of queer, but especially aromantic (and/or asexual) means forging a path for yourself and making your own happiness where there is no obvious way forward. our communities exist mostly online (right now, anyway), there is little recognition of our existence in the real world, the effects of amatonormativity are both pervasive and actively dehumanising, and there are legal, economic and social structures in place actively making our lives more difficult. yes that all sucks! it’s good to acknowledge that. we need to in order to change it. but more importantly, that’s not the end. we are still here and our happiness, our future is for us to determine. even if we can’t change the laws or society, loving yourself and understanding aromanticism as a political identity (as well as personal), as a radical worldview, and as a protest against amatonormativity is essential for both community and personal well being. the personal is political.

tldr. i guess my point is that as a community, we should focus on building, improving, and nurturing ourselves and each other (construction) as opposed to destruction. we should recognise aromanticism and asexuality as political identities as well as personal ones and rely on community and self-love in the absence of anything else as a form of protest and political power. destruction (the recognition of everything that is wrong) is essential as a starting point - but where do we go from there? we rebuild.

[sipping-ambrosia-wine]

okay i did a LOT more running around and i LOVE the stable quests and how they give us a little glimpse into zelda's life post-botw. like yeah she WAS working on a botanical garden (with MAGDA no less). she WOULD help make a new sheep feed she WOULD take an interest in a rare new type of animal. i love all of these she's a princess and that means taking care of her people, rebuilding and also doing so specifically by supporting and contributing to scientific development.

also HELL YEAH FROGGY ARMOR

AND kaneli is alive he just retired to teach thank goodness.

the stable trotters are really cute ^_^ their names being puns too, and i appreciate their dedication to the fairies.

(but also miss maam i thibk i preferred when yall were asking for lumps sums i only have so many rupees)

finally went to find impa and ngl i'm kinda surprised that purah didnt share her age rune with her... or robbie for that matter. im glad though, it may have been useful for her but i think neither wouldve taken the offer, if for wildly different reasons.

SELMIE QUEEN OF THE DUNES

more geoglyphs- the second i found was the demon king in north hebra (the third was the dagger which is actually back-to-back chronologically but in the other direction lmao but i didnt hit that until later).

the golden horse quest... that one gave me pause. most of these are resolved by weird rumors but this one is ominous and doesnt really leave us with a real answer.

but anyway i registered the horse its name is Tacky :P

!!! okay yona is gorgeous. i love character designs that break the mold and her little headpiece is so pretty. i wonder what her powers are? tulin and revali were pretty similar but there are other ways to do water powers than healing... but i do want some kind of healing ability from SOMEONE... that she's from another domain kicks off SO MANY other questions... there are other zora domains??? like in other countries??? or is it a freshwater vs oceanic evolutionary schism (that would explain why one of mipha's champion trials is just swimming fast)? do the zora have active political ties outside hyrule? does muzu have heritage from yona's domain as well since theyre both stingray zora?

...wait shes sidon's fiance?? LMAO

hmm she IS a healer... i hope we get more from her than Replacement MiphaTM she deserves better.

i love the healing cave i always figured it would be a missed opportunity to not make the mountains surrounding the domain like, hollow in places and have a whole second city layer there. they couldve added a diving function but i guess totk is already pretty heavy on the new game functions.

speaking of i think i might be warming up to the fuse function a bit. its still meh though- i actually LOVED weapons durability but its way more tedious now that i have to make them. but the gemstone magic function is cool.

king dorephan was injured by the muck-like which... yeah i think retirement is the best option for you there. relatively its the size of a rotisserie chicken to you. it cant even REACH your gills. but it looks like SIDON is the zora game representative which is massively disappointing. i didnt even use his ability i had an opal rod i stole from a bokoblin.

good on yona for getting sidon off his ass but like... why is she here... his thing is he's holding back because he's scared that taking action will make him lose someone he cares about. yeah thats a decent continuation from what we know of him from botw. what happened to his sister was horrible and she was avenged eventually but this is a whole new threat. but if he needs someone he cares about in danger... he already has that.

his people are sick his father is dying of it. make it so he's scared to leave his father in case he dies while sidon is away. yona isnt really necessary and i hate it. she deserves better we went from teba to tulin i thought we were getting more new adventuring buddies. if teba is too busy as chief then sidon should focus on purifying the water and being a prince while link and yona kick ass.

sorry to sidon fans but he continues to be largely useless pretty much throughout the whole temple- including the boss fight.

i LOVE the muckrock- it was a super fun boss and i love the sharky bit but after colgera... muckrock has more personality but it feels like a silly early game boss from other games and it kind of tips a bias toward the zora as the easy starter town. colgera had me in awe but the pattern to it was dead easy- but that might be on me for fighting it first so the combat meter hadnt amped up yet.

hmm i hope they dont give us the imprisoning war rundown every time. i kind of. dont really care. we dont get to know the sages of old like we did the champions and we arent supposed to. we dont see their faces or learn their names all we know is that they made the modern hyrule alliance of rito-zora-goron-gerudo-hylian. and rauru. oh and that theyre ancestors to the new champions which. eh.

it makes sense with the royalty and even to some degree ~people with strong magical abilities~ but i dont like it for the rito. i never digged teba being a blood relation of revali- i figured rito village is more communally-minded, inheritance of a legacy being tied less to blood and more willingness and ability to take it on. that was what teba was all about. he admired revali and appreciated his legacy but he didnt care about chosen heroes or goddess quests he was doing what needed to be done. all of the other calamity champions were related to or ancestors of the new ones so that makes sense- but also given teba's own efforts toward revali's gale and the wind sage's similar appearance to him why wasnt he able to?

(the answer is that the line of inheritance actually came throught saki and teba is the chief and she's their current historian and spiritual leader)

lmao two in one coronation and wedding has the end result of really feeling like neither i guess. i could treat you better girl. leave the prince, you dont need him.

i think if they made yona the new zora representative then she would risk sliding even further into being Spunky Mipha but i dunno at least that way she would be doing so in a way that gives her the spotlight thats she deserves as a new profile character. it would even give sidon a legit reason to hesitate to take action if it were about her actually doing stuff rather than her... leaving the house. its just a huge missed opportunity. also if im being petty looking at our current gender ratio... its just riju. one woman allowed :/

this feels a bit more negative so i'll leave off with after the zora i ran to lurelin and!!! the besties DDD: !!! i stealthed the monster raid- its really an interesting new combat mode but very stressful for me but i did it! and then immediately gave bolson twelve palm trunks when he wanted normal trees. and then we rebuilt lurelin together overnight ^_^

it was so good to see kiana and her family again- she was the first npc to personally teach me a real recipe so im pretty fond of her and it was nice to see that lurelin wasnt left behind in the realm of hylian development

Totk thoughts so far

this atmosphere is NUTS and the murals....

this tutorial is too damn long. ppl said the same about the botw tutorial and frankly that was bullshit but. the sky island is four times the size of the great plateau AND you cant track a full circle around it. rauru is cool though he seems too... normal for a ghost.

FOETUS ZELDA?!?!?

oh wow its so nice to see hyrule rebuilding. the emergency hideout is also very fun.

wait noooooo whats happening to rito village not the besties

20s!purah is too pretty, but links little alarm at the guardian arms gave me some kind of feelings.

oh cute purah and robbie have an unhinged little science protege

first course of action i heard your botw horses carry over so im heading to the stable by the great plateau.

[yikesharringrove]

the fic you wrote for my last prompt was amazing, ty 😭 can you do 50 + 56 this time please? and if you want to work in dyslexic!steve too that would be awesome! 🥰

You are speaking my fuckin’ language, dyslexic Steve is my ABSOLUTE jam. Honestly, whenever I write Steve, he’s dyslexic, although sometimes it’s not mentioned because it’s not important to Harry’s journey @ jk rowling

Thank you for your request! I’m really glad you liked the other one I wrote! You’re anonymous so I don’t know which one that is but I really enjoyed writing them all! Sorry for my manic energy rn.

Something a little different, it’s modern au! This is probably nothing like what you were thinking so I’m sorry, but I kinda love it ngl.

50: Secret Admirer

56: “I don’t know if I should be flattered or offended.”

Prompt list!

Billy spent three and a half hours reading through every single tweet on the account.

There were so fucking many of them. The earliest one was timestamped from four days ago, so obviously, this person had no life outside of tweeting.

Tweeting about Billy.

He had a few personal favorites. He had retweeted them to his account, figuring may as well play it up, make a joke outta everything.

@ImHardForHargrove: sorry WHOMST gave you the RIGHT to have eyes that fuckin blue im YELLING

@ImHardForHargrove: watchin u play basketball is a religious experience y are ur arms so BIG hhnnnng

And Billy’s absolute favorite, which he pinned right at the top of his account

@ImHardForHargrove: ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass ass

Billy knew he looked good. Knew he turned heads wherever he went. He did that on purpose. But realizing someone at Hawkins High had set up a thirst account for him, well.

“I don’t know if I should be flattered or offended.” Billy had explained the situation to Robin, letting her go through the account on his phone. “Like, It’s kinda nice, whoever this guy is, he’s got a crush. But also like, It’s kinda creepy. Plus he’s objectifying me,” Billy was talking through his sandwich.

Robin made a face of disgust. “Why do you keep saying ‘he’? All of the girls in this fucking school are practically drooling for you.”

“Hard for Hargrove, Robin. I know you’re like, revolted by the peen and whatever but that does not excuse a lack of basic sexual education and anatomy.” She gagged at him. Honest to God, gagged. He thought she was gonna spew all over the table.

“If I ever hear you call it a peen ever again, it’s on sight Hargrove.” Heather plopped herself down next to Robin, kissing her cheek before zeroing in on Billy’s phone, still in Robin’s hand.

“Have you guys worked out who it could be yet?” Her eyes were wide at Billy.

“Billy says he thinks its a guy even though people with penises aren’t necessarily men.” Robin gave him a pointed look.

“Yeah Robin, I know that, but, I don’t know I just think it’s a guy penis-having person.”

Heather narrowed her eyes at him. “Do you actually think that, or are you just hoping in that goblin little brain of yours that this account is Steve Harrington’s.” Billy could feel the heat spread down his neck.

“Billy, I know Steve is like, the only out guy in this whole fucking town, but you can do way better than him.  PLUS, I feel like it makes more sense if the person running this account wasn’t out and had to channel their gay yearning through social media.”

“First of all Robin, you have this vendetta against Steve that I don’t get. He’s a nice guy. He’s kinda dopey, kinda dumb, but he’s like, sweet and shit. Second, I’m not out, so it still could be him because he doesn’t think I would, like, accept his advances or whatever. Hence, gay internet yearning.” The chime of the bell sent them packing their lunches, Billy’s phone vibrated in Robin’s hand. She rolled her eyes when he realized he turned on notifications for the account

“Get a fucking life you loser.” She slapped the phone into his hand. He opened the new tweet with embarrassing zeal.

@ImHardForHargrove: i saw u talking with ur mouth full and it was yucky but i was still  🥺🥺

His head shot up, trying to see who would have been facing him during lunch, but the cafeteria was almost empty.

The rest of the week Billy took deliberate care of every interaction he had with anyone. Observing who was in his surroundings, and making note of everything he did and said. He took extra caution around Steve, wanting to spot any minute detail that could give away who ran the account.

The account started blowing up. People were retweeting like fucking crazy. Everywhere he went, he was being asked if he’s seen it, like he doesn’t regularly retweet the good ones. The search for the owner of the account had spread throughout the whole school. A few girls even tried to claim the account was theirs, but every time that happened the account would tweet out something to discredit whoever made the claim, proving them a liar.

Billy was starting to lose hope it was Harrington. The tweets were coming at all different times, posted whenever the person thought about it, so Billy was losing track of who was near when he said or did something. And the tweets were always about stupid stuff Billy didn’t register doing. On Wednesday night the account said

@ImHardForHargrove: hi when you chew on your pencil and it makes me 🥴 that is all thx for comin to my ted talk

Friday afternoon gave them all:

@ImHardForHargrove: walked past ur classroom and u were asleep ive never wanted to CUDDLE someone so bad in my LIFE

But Saturday, Saturday renewed all hope for Harrington Billy could possibly have. Lauren Kranz was throwing a party. It was the first real rager in a while, so everyone was there, and everyone was sloshed. Everyone but Billy, who’d agreed to be designated driver for Robin and Heather like some kinda idiot.

He was brooding on the back porch when his phone went off. The account was active, and the owner was drunk.

@ImHardForHargrove: I can seeeeee u oyt the windw I wan u 2 FUC ME. RAW DOG.

@ImHardForHargrove: srry ur so beauitiful nd THICCC

@ImHardForHargrove: I wana shoot my shot but idk if u lik bois

@ImHardForHargrove: (ys i am boi)

@ImHardForHargrove: nd i dont wana get my heart broken agin 😥

He was right about it being a guy. He was right about him being too nervous to approach him outright. His brain was screaming stevestevesteve at him. Hawkins was shook when Steve came out as bisexual in his sophomore year. He was the golden boy, a real jock. He was NOT the kind of guy people would assume queer in a small midwestern town.

He was kind of a douchebag, dumping one girl for another, sleeping with her and never calling again. But then he settled down with this guy from the University of Indianapolis for a few months until Steve caught him cheating. Apparently, he had slashed the guy’s tires. Billy was impressed.

The next year came Wheeler, who only stuck around long enough to make sure Steve was nice and whipped before she fucked off on him too. So Steve retreated. Spent more time with middle schoolers than anybody else. Didn’t want to put his heart on the line anymore until he knew it wouldn’t be stomped on.  Billy could respect that.

Billy couldn’t risk being out in a town like Hawkins. Word always had a way of getting right back to his dad, and in a tiny hick town with nothing better to do than gossip, it was usually only a matter of hours before Neil heard something he didn’t like.

@ImHardForHargrove: srry 4 bad typing rn. drunk nd dysl exic ren’t a happy combo

Billy’s heart stopped. The drunken idiot was giving himself away. Maybe if he sat here staring at the account long enough, enough would be revealed he could figure it all out like a shitty drunk episode of Blue’s Clues.

He was so focused on Twitter, refreshing his feed, again and again, he didn’t notice a very drunk, and very unsteady Steve Harrington stumbling out the back door towards him. Until he crashed into his back.

“Sorry, Bill!” Billy had Steve by the shoulders trying to keep him upright. “Heyy I have a question for you.” Steve grabbed one of Billy’s hands and veered over to the table and chairs arranged neatly on the small patio. When they were sitting, Steve kept ahold of Billy’s hand.

“Hi.” Steve was smiling like a little kid. Billy was in fucking love.

“hey, Harrington. What was your question.”

“So-oo. I have this friend. A very good friend. Super close. And he has a big ol’ crush on you but he’s too scared to ask you himself because he keeps getting his heart fuckin’ broken so he wanted me to ask. Are you into guys?” It’s a miracle Billy understood any of that, every word blending into the next.

“That depends.” Billy leaned in, running his tongue along his bottom lip. He saw Steve take in a sharp breath, following the movement with his glazed eyes. He knew Steve was talking about himself, he just wanted to rile him up a little. Make him blush first. “This friend you’re talkin’ about. He’s our age? Like you’re not trying to set me up with one a’ your kids, right?” Steve physically recoiled.

“NO, you fuckin’ pedo. I’m NOT trying to set you up with a fuckin’, fuckin’ middle schooler. My friend is, uh eighteen. He’s a senior.” Unless Tommy fuckin’ H. suddenly had a penchant for dick Billy didn’t know about, Steve was 100% talking about himself.

“Well, if he’s as pretty as you are, I’d love to go out with him sometime.” Billy winked. Steve went red.

“Okay, but like, does that mean you’d go out with me? Like I’m as pretty as me, right? Because I was talking about me. Not ‘a friend’ I was talking about me. Steve.”

“Yeah, I kinda figured that out. You know, I was hoping it was you running that Twitter. Any time you’d tweet out something you wanted to do with me, I was always picturin’ doing it with you, Baby.” Billy was practically purring. “Especially all the shit you wanted me to do TO you.” Steve gave something between a whine and a groan and flopped himself onto Billy’s lap, straddling him with very little grace.

“Thank God. ‘Cause you’re so fucking hot I’d let you do anything to me. Anything, Bill.” Billy smiled softly at him.

“Then let me take you home. Let me put you in bed to sleep off all this. And let me take you to breakfast tomorrow. Something nice and greasy for your hangover tummy.” Steve was a puddle in Billy’s lap. “C’mon, Drunky, git your ass up.” Steve just giggled and muttered Drunky Skunky under his breath.

Billy sighed and stood up, hefting Steve up with him.

“Bil-ly,” Steve whined. “You’re so strong, this is so fucking hot. I gotta tweet about this.”

“Tweet it later, Sweet Thing.”

It took Billy for-fucking-ever to find Robin and Heather (they were making out in the basement with the stoners). But Steve chirped and cooed into his ear, so happy Billy could lift him and hold him like it was nothing.

The last tweet from the account was timestamped from Sunday evening.

@ImHardForHargrove: Hi this is Steve. Billy’s my boyfriend now 🥰#ThirstWorks