#also she’s acting like we need to do every piece of the creative process together and it’s like.

[livvyofthelake]

i’m really not trying to be such a huge bitch about the girl in my group for my production class but like what do you mean you think we need to meet tomorrow to work on our production notebook. we haven’t casted anyone. the production notebook and all the planning stuff literally cannot happen in any way that matters until we have the bare minimum casting and location stuff figured out. which we don’t. what would we even be doing if we met tomorrow. talking about the concept of what we might want a shot to look like. featuring an actor we don’t have in a location we haven’t secured. can we be so for real right now. why is she so hellbent on ruining every monday morning i have. girl i don’t have much more patience to spend on you you’re killing me

[faegoddessog]

  Fantasy Come True  Ch 7/8

  Chapter 7: Confessions 

Chapter Warnings: Explicitly mature content, 18+ only, angst, Unprotected PiV (play safe ya'll), cunnilingus, fellatio, overstimulation, light restraint, fingering, light ass teasing (F. receiving), wee bit of delicious mind fuckery

Series Summary: Breaking into the acting world has been a life long dream. It's been tough, plus your relationship with you partner has some struggles, but who doesn't have struggles. A new guy shows up to your improv classes who seems strangely familiar. He seems rather interested in you and you feel unusually comfortable around him, like he projects calm and reassurance. Once you realize who he really is, and what he really likes... it's game on. 

SERIES WARNING: Explicitly mature content, 18+ only,  here there be lemons.

A/N: This little gem is per request for the lovely and talented @purejasmine . It's been a collaborative project designed to meet her every Austin need as best I can. Here's to you darling! <clink> I hope ya'll enjoy reading it as much as I have enjoyed the creative process with parameters not wholly my own!!

Here is the Masterlist of this series.

  Chapter 7: Confessions 

You did, in fact, make it to his bed before morning was over, however you didn't make it out until much, much later.  Lying in the aftermath of being fucked mercilessly into the mattress, he asks about the scenes you are going to tape. You two spend a little time working on your scenes naked in bed. You have one dramatic  and one comedic. You run through lines and talk about character motivations. His insights and process are invaluable to you. Some analogies he makes are a little out there or just not familiar to you, but you take it all in. 

“What if,” he says, talking about your character's motivations, “she just wants to do whatever she is told because it’s THAT important to her. It’s not that she is powerless, but that she will do whatever she has to, even if it means giving over her power. But in doing that, she is freed to get what she wants. Y’know?” 

“No, I don’t get that, giving up the thing that she wants is how she gets it?” you say. 

“It's like dominant/submissive play, but without the sex, do you see?” he asks.

“Not really, I don’t think there is an undertone of sex in the scene,” you counter.

“No it’s not really about sex per se, but… it’s just an idea of how to look at the scene. How do you see it?” he asks, letting the Dom/Sub thing go. 

After, you entice him into the shower, kissing and washing each other. You are mostly just enjoying the closeness,  the touch of his hands on your skin and the feeling of being  pampered. 

“I’m in the mood for a movie, should we have some snacks and watch something?” Austin says as you are toweling off. 

“Sure, I’m down!” you say excited. You love to watch movies. 

Austin tells you to go pick something out as he puts together a plate of apples, cheeses and prosciutto.  You decide to watch Kingsman: The Secret Service, it’ll be silly and fun. He brings over two sparkling waters, the plate, and a paring knife.

You snuggle up on the couch with his back between your bare legs. You had never bothered putting your clothes back on, just a bra and panty set that you were super excited about finding, as they fit you perfectly, even if they were pricey. You are leaning up against the back of the couch. Austin, in solidarity with your penchant to wander the house in your underclothes, is also clad only in boxers. His long legs stretch onto the oversized ottoman. The plate is on his lap and Austin cuts pieces of apple and cheese, holding them and prosciutto up for you to nibble on. His warm body against your chest is heaven, the clean smell of him all encompassing. 

You have never felt so content, and yet a deep longing bubbles up from within.  THIS should be your everyday life. Comfortable sized home, man that adores you and loves to pleasure you, delicious food, the craft of acting and storytelling intertwined in everyday life. You let out a big sigh pushing away melancholy  thoughts of your supposed ‘ real life’.  Your fingers tangle gently with his hair, massaging his scalp, anchoring you to the here and now and the magic of having Austin’s skin on yours. 

“Mmm, I think I’m hungry,” he growls sexily out of the blue. 

“Hungry?” you glance at the now empty plate as he sets it aside,”What can I get from the kitchen for you babe, I’ll feed you  this time,” you offer. 

“That’s not what I’m hungry for, my amazing Princess,” he twists his head around to look up at you with a naughty smile, “but I'll take you up on feeding me.” 

He flips over onto his stomach. 

“Oh, should I pause?” you ask, picking up the remote.

“Oh no,” he pushes the ottoman away with his feet, “ you keep watching Angel.” He sinks down to his knees on the plush carpet. “I just need this irresistible pussy in my mouth,” he threads his arms under your thighs and yanks your ass to the edge of the couch,” right now.” His face is a picture of nearly animistic lust. 

Your eyes get big as he grabs the paring knife and swiftly inserts the blade on the fabric at  your hip. 

“Like, right now,” he pulls up, slicing through the fabric.

He answers the look of scandalous shock on your face with a gruff,  “I’ll replace them ten times over Princess,  I just can’t wait any longer to taste you.”  He does the same to the other side, his chest expanding with his needy breath, the fabric laying open to reveal your groomed vulva.

His urgency stokes a fire in your belly, your potential outrage at his destroying your underclothes sizzling into inflamed desire. You hadn’t been super wet before, when you were just cuddling, no more than your usual when you are with Austin. But when he grabbed and pulled you toward him, the buzzing down below commenced. When he cut your favorite panties from your body, you practically gushed. 

He nuzzles right into your mons, inhaling your scent, smiling. His tongue takes a big, long lingering taste of your lips. 

“Mmmggghhh, yes” he moans against you, eyes closed, “your juices are like heaven.” 

His head moves up and down as he laps at your labia, dipping in for growling tastes as his hands grip at your thighs, almost like a cat digging in its claws.  His tongue tantalizes as it draws teasing circles around your clit. His fingers pull you apart, revealing your sweet inner lips to his hungry tongue. 

Just the pressure of his fingers on your lips pulls a soft whining moan of anticipation from your throat.  You have one hand curled, fingers between your teeth. The other hand mutes the movie  letting it play on unheeded, before twirling his locks around your fingers. 

He lifts his eyes to yours.

“I want to make you cum in my mouth, Angel, but I’m going to take my time,” he says. A one sided, open-mouthed smile blooms on his wet lips and he winks. 

Something about his wink makes your breath melt away from you in a soft-voiced ‘unghgh’.  Your brows furrow together and all you can do is nod in agreement as his ocean eyes glimmer at you from under his long lashes. Your fingers tighten inadvertently in his hair. You feel as much as hear the little chuckle of amusement he gives against your pussy as his lips meet yours. 

Long and lightly he drags his tongue up then sucks at your clit just as lightly. It’s so soft as to be almost a tickle, but one that leaves you desperate for more. Luckily, he is here for the eating of your pussy, and willing to give you as much as you want.  

He continues his long, slow licks ending in suction on your clit until the sounds you are making and your hand fisting in his hair are clear indications that you need more.

He pushes his long finger inside you. He moans at how wet you are, how hot, how tight. 

He slides his coiling finger out and in, licking your clit lightly. 

You are sure there will be teeth marks left on your bottom lip when he closes around your clit, sucking you into the vacuum of his mouth. 

He falls into a slow rhythmic pace of licking and sucking and shifting his finger in and out with a delicious little curve of his fingertip. All the while, his soft vocalizations of pleasure drift up to your ears.  The wet smacking sounds of his suction off your clit drives you wild. He is unhurried, like he could do this for the rest of time. 

You try to inhale a big breath, but it catches up in short,  little pants. Tingling tightness loops inside you with every drag of his tongue, every immersion of his digit, every wet and sloppy sound as he sucks at your nub. 

Slowly you climb that ramp like a click-clack of a roller coaster, every moment bringing you closer to that plummet into ecstasy. Then you are there, on the cusp. Falling, falling, falling, and  he keeps his measured pace of feasting at your cunt. Your body goes tight, eyelids fluttering, vagina clamping onto his finger. Little grunts shake your body. 

Spurred on by your climax,  he pulls his finger out and buries his face in you, fingertips wrapping under and digging into your thighs. His mouth sucks greedily at your entrance, not wanting to waste a drop. 

His hips are pumping against nothing, his deep moans vibrating against you, heightening your orgasm. He looks up with dark eyes, face messy. You watch as his wet finger disappears into his mouth and he sucks all your juices off it. 

“Do you want my cum, Princess,” he says low, looking for all the world like a feral predator. 

“Yes, ple-,” is all you get out before he stands up, pulling you with him. His mouth closes over yours in a hard, salty kiss, you don’t even notice that he has turned you around in the process. 

“Far be it from me to deny my Princess what she wants.” He says against your lips. His rock hardness is pressed against your belly, you don’t remember him taking his blue boxers off. Still a little dazzled from your orgasm, you reach out to stroke him, but he grabs your wrist. 

“Now, now,  if you want it, you’ll do as I say,” his demeanor suddenly changes entirely. He seems taller and more commanding.  Your eyes narrow for a second, wondering what he’s playing at, then you recognize the line from the scene you had been working on. 

“And if I don’t?” you ask in quiet defiance, pulling out your character and the next line.

“Oh”, his look has a tinge of evil in it, ”I assure you, you’d prefer to follow my directions, Pet,” he adds the nickname to the line. 

“Now,” he lets go of you and leans back away from you, “turn around.” 

His voice and the serious look in his eye, make you lose your breath just a bit. You turn your back towards him, pressing your thighs together, still sensitive from his oral ministrations.

“Bend over,” his words are neatly whispered in your ear, “all fours.” He isn’t pulling lines from the scene now, just commanding you. Clearly he is thinking about his earlier point. 

You hear him sit down on the couch, or would if you hadn’t been gulping so hard. Why did just his tone make you clench?

“Open up further, I want to see,” you hear from behind you.

You step your knees apart.

“Wider,” you feel a finger tip brush your inner thigh, it’s like electricity zig-zagging  to your core. 

“Push those gorgeous hips back.”

You do, in sort of a puppy pose with your back arched. You feel so deliciously exposed to him. 

“Oh, that IS a pretty pussy,” he says almost to himself, then louder, “open it up for me.”

Balancing on your left arm, you reach between your legs and use your fore and middle fingers to spread apart your labia. His spit is beginning to dry on your outer lips. However, the glistening of your inner lips betrays to him how much you are turned on by being told what to do. 

‘Now, “ a little rasp of desire sneaks into his voice, “finger yourself.”

Suddenly, you feel unexpectedly hesitant, like this is pushing you out of your comfort zone for some unfathomable reason. You are fine touching yourself, even fine doing it in front of him, but there is something about being so vulnerable bent over and exposed. You are stopped in your tracks, trying to figure out why you feel this way out of the blue.

“Do you still want my cum?” you can almost hear his eyes narrowing in his voice. 

“Oh lord yes, Austin,” your tone boarding on begging. Just his name out of your mouth is scintillating. His words snap you out of your hesitation. 

You feel his thumbs hold you open, his finger splayed out over your ass and hips bones. 

“Then finger yourself,” he insists. 

You move your middle finger to slide slowly through your wetness. 

“Yes,” he breathes, “just like that. God that is beautiful.”

After a couple minutes, he leans his body over your back, his breath hot on your neck.

“Do you trust me, Pet? “ his hips tuck forward. His hard dick nudges almost lazily against your crotch.

“Yes,” your voice wavers slightly. You stop your finger movement.

“Are you sure?” you can hear his sexy smirk. You twist to look over your right shoulder at him, and are met with a mischievous glint in his eyes. The little dimple that appears over the left corner of his mouth evaporates any equivocation. 

“One hundred percent, Austin,” you give in totally. 

“That’s my good girl, my sweet Pet,” he croons sweetly in your ear. “Keep fingering yourself,” his tone back to demanding as he moves back to watch you. 

As you slide inside yourself again, rubbing over your clit.   You smile at his words, at being his good girl. 

He is petting the back of your opening, pulling at your wet, pink inner lips. You feel his finger sink in next to yours. He moves in opposition to you, when you go in he pulls out, and vice versa. Fuck, the extra friction is so good. 

Then he pulls out and up and  you feel his wet finger drag unexpectedly over your asshole. It makes you jump forward.

“Tch, I thought you trusted me,” he admonishes, grabbing your hand.

“I do, Yes, I do” you pant, “ I just…oh!” you feel his tip nudge again against your wet pussy. He gives you no time to finish your sentence. 

“Good,” is all he says as he slowly pushes in. “Ohhhh,” he lets out his breath in a long low groan. Your hand lingers, playing with his balls as he sheathes himself fully. 

His wet thumb returns to your asshole, just placed there no rubbing, no teasing.  You are still a little nervous about what he might do, you aren’t really into things in your butt. But you DO trust him, you remind yourself.  

At this angle his cock feels long, prodding your cervix, making you groan. 

“Do you want it, beautiful Angel?” his deep reverberations are almost hypnotic, “do you want my cum inside you?”

All you want is for him to fuck you into next week, but he just stays still, dick in you deep, thumb on your ass. 

‘I do, yes, give it to me baby, please,” affirming in all the ways you can think of in your Austin-addled state. 

“Give?” he questions with an incredulous smile, “ Oh no, you have to come get it, my sexy little cum slut.” The fingertips on his free hand push you slightly forward, then wrap around the front of your hip bone guiding you back. Once you get the gist he takes his hand away. 

 You can’t help but move on him. 

“That’s it, pretty Princess,” his voice is hot caramel pouring over you,”fuck it out of me.” 

Your breath leaves you with an ‘oh fuck’ as his words incite a sexual riot in you. 

On all fours, you rock back and forth in front of him, along his length. As you rock on his cock, you rub your asshole against his thumb. It’s unexpectedly good. So good, you let go being jumpy about your ass. Your body wants what it wants.

“Oh look at you,” his sexy voice rolling over you, “so greedy for my cock, so starved for my cum, and it's only been a couple hours.” His breath huffs from him in rising passion, ”grinding your ass against my thumb, all hot and wanting. Fuck you are mesmerizing, Princess.” 

He starts to lose his own control, unable to stop thrusting into you. “You make me so… fucking… hard. I just want you all the damn time.”

You are moving in synchronicity, his cock in you and you back on his cock.  His thumb is giving you that glorious friction, your fingers on your clit; it’s a whirlwind. A veritable tornado of friction, desire, perfect mind-fuckery and magic; Austin Butler magic. 

Your pussy clenches hard around him. 

“Oh fuck, that’s good,” he groans.

You hear yourself moaning loud Uhhghh’s and Ohhhh’s as you undulate in front of him. You jerk forward involuntarily as your orgasm hits you hard. 

 Austin’s hands clamp down on your hips, riding you down. There is no way he isn’t filling you with his cum now, no matter how long it takes.

 Groaning into the upholstery of the ottoman, you continue to be pounded from behind. He simultaneously holds you down and spreads your cheeks with his hands. Fucking hell, at this angle he is triggering all your buttons and you keep cumming. It’s so good. 

He sounds feral behind you.  The moans hissing out through his teeth become deep chested growls that become open voweled groans as he fucks you harder and harder. Sweat drips onto your back. 

You are losing your mind. Your fingers, trapped under you,  are twitching against your clit, you want to stop them, but just can’t quite get them to still. 

Finally he pushes in deep, muscles straining. All sound frozen in his lungs, until his deep growls and groans of satisfaction make their exodus from him to wash over you. His hips jerk pushing him just that much deeper as he empties into you. 

“I guess,” he pants just behind your ear, “I gave it to you after all.” 

“I love it,” you just barely stop yourself from saying ‘I love you’. 

Still in you, Austin rolls onto his side, clinging to you like you are the only refuge in his personal storm. You curl up in the cradle of his arms. Taron Egerton is cleverly, yet silently, kicking ass on the TV, although you are both too blissed out to give it any mind.  

When you wake up from dozing some time later. When had you fallen asleep? You find that you have rolled over in Austin’s arms to face him. He is petting your hair and holding you to him. He has a weird look on his face, like conflicting thoughts are running through his mind. Once he sees your eyes on him, he smiles big.

“Good nap?”

“Oh lord yes,” you stretch and sit up. “I’ll be right back,” you stand up, but Austin grabs your arm. 

“I mean it,” he blurts out. The words clearly by passing his conflicting thoughts and going straight to his mouth. 

“What do you mean, Austin,” your brow furrows slightly. Your hand automatically cradles his face. 

 “I meant what I said, when we were…” his eyebrows lift, conveying his meaning for him, “I want you all the time, I want you here, to stay here,  to be with me always.” 

“What?” you are dumbstruck by this sudden confession.

“Move in with me, be mine,” his hand covering yours on his face.

Your heart jumps in your chest. It’s like every dream you’ve ever had is being plopped into your lap. You blink once, twice, unsure what to say or do next. Then your bladder reminds you why you got up in the first place. 

“I need,” you gesture towards the bathroom,”be right back.” 

Sitting in his beautiful little powder room, you attempt to absorb this new information. You had literally been thinking about wanting this life. The fires of hope that spring in your heart are quickly doused by your practical mind.

 ‘Is this stable? Is it smart to leave all else behind and move in here?’ it asks. Fucking fuckity fuck. You look at yourself in the mirror.

“God dammit,” you whisper to yourself, knowing you can’t ignore her, as much as you want to.  As much as you hate it, you rely on your partner financially right now and that is, if not a satisfying life, a safe one.  Your sense of self preservation insists that you make sure this isn’t some two month infatuation that will leave you in the cold. 

As you walk back into the living room in nothing but your bra, Austin is sitting naked on the couch with his head in his hands.  The TV is off. 

You sit down in front of him on the ottoman. 

“Did I just ruin everything?” he asks, still looking at the floor. 

“Huh?” you ask, not expecting him to sound so emotional.

“I asked you to move in and you walked away,” he says looking up at you, the shadows of abandonment flitting across his face, fearful tears shining in his eyes. 

“Oh Austin, darling,” you take his face in your hands, “I just needed to pee and clean up and think for a second. You didn’t ruin anything.” You kiss him tenderly on the forehead. 

He blows out a big breath, trying to regain his composure. 

“Before you say anything, no matter your answer,  I need to tell you something, ok?” he states.  You nod.

“Remember when I told you before I was falling for you? Well, that was sort of a lie,” he admits.

Your heart falls into your stomach without warning. What the hell is going on? He wants you to stay, but as what? Just his convenient tight pussy? Someone whom he can control by ‘taking care’ of them. Would this just be out of the frying pan and into the fire? Heat rises up your tightening chest. ‘I will NOT cry when he tells me it’s a fling,’ you tell yourself resolutely. You are usually so positive, but the idea of Austin lying to you about falling for you is like a punch in the gut. You brace yourself with a big breath.

“It’s a lie because I’m already so far gone for you. I am so in love with you, my Princess,” his eyes are pleading that you’ll hear his  truth, “I know it’s not been that long, but I feel like I’ve known you my whole life, like I’ve just been waiting for you this whole time.” 

His words stop your internal destructive narrative in its tracks. That was NOT what you expected him to say. The look in his eyes is like a release valve for your breath. In a flash you realize you almost fell into your own trap, the one you’ve been cycling in for over a decade. 

“Oh” is all you can get out. Your mouth is trying to say words, but you are caught, in his eyes, in his hands, in his heart. You finally recover a little from your shock. 

“I love you, Austin,” the words simply slipping past anything else you thought of saying, “I’ve wanted to tell you so many times.  I love you, Austin, oh god how much,” your words tumbling out before you can stop them. 

Relief floods his face, he pulls you in. His kiss is intense. You had no idea what he had been holding back, until suddenly, he is holding nothing back. It’s like a wave of adoration and affection washes over you as he kisses you and holds you in his arms. It’s so hard to describe, like light flooding into your cells. 

He breaks the kiss and crushes you to him. 

“So you’ll stay?” he says eagerly. 

“Babe, I don’t know.” you are on the verge of tears from the yo-yo of emotions.

“What?” he responds almost incredulously before he takes a second to gather himself back in again, terrified his tender heart will get trudged upon. “Ok, what don’t you know,” he says much more calmly. 

“Do you know why I have stayed with him?” you say matter-of-factly,” Security. No, he isn’t a great lover or even a good partner, and sometimes he is an outright asshole. But I know he won’t leave me in the cold as I try my hand at this acting thing.” You ignore the counterpoint of you leaving him, but at least he won’t be in the cold, he’ll just be getting the partner he deserves. Which isn’t you. Austin is the one who deserves all your love and devotion, your thoughtfulness and caring. FUCK, how can you you say no to him, but how can you simply say yes?  How can you make this right in your head! 

“I would never leave you in the cold Princess, I am offering you security as well as everything he isn’t giving you and more.  Please,” he pleads. Even begging with unshed tears in his eyes, he is so utterly beautiful. 

“Oh god, this is hard,” you mutter to yourself, looking up at the ceiling, trying to control how topsy-turvy your emotional world just got. 

“I know, I know Austin. Please hear me when I say that there is literally no one else on this planet that I would leave for, only you. It’s always and ever only been you. It’s… “ you grab his hands, ‘no… you are everything that I want and so much more.” 

Tears spring to your eyes, knowing what you have to say next. 

“I’m sorry I can’t give you the answer you want, the one I want, not yet anyway. And I do want to, my darling, I do. I want to scream yes and go back there, gather my stuff and just walk out. The idea of this being my home, of YOU being my home? It’s intoxicating and almost scary in how perfect a dream it is.  But my practical side just won’t let me. Austin, you have to understand, I have to be sure.  I have to know that this is forever, that this,” you gesture back and forth between you, ”can provide me some stability before I drop that safety net. Once I leave him, I can’t go back and I have nowhere else I can go.” 

Miraculously, Austin is nodding, “Ok, I - I hear what you are saying. I can understand that point of view. It’s a big thing to ask of you.” He ponders in silence for a moment, gears turning in his head. “If I can prove to you, beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am committed to this, that your security and stability matters as much to me as it does to you, will you?”

“I would do it in a heartbeat, I want nothing more in the world, than to be yours mind, body and soul, Austin” you say, sniffling. Geeze, usually you aren’t this emotional.

“Okay, ’he nods again, “okay love, that gives me some hope to go on, something I can work towards.”

 “Something we can work towards,” you correct him. “I love giving you control over me during sex, this,” you push his hand between your legs, ”truly is your pussy, my mouth,” you kiss him, “is only for you now. But, if we are really going to go down the relationship road, I don’t want it to be based on ‘ownership’ like that. I want a partnership, where we can be of equal, if different, support for one another. I want to take care of you as much as you take care of me, y’know what I mean?”

Austin is nodding at you, his hand still pressed to your crotch. 

“I love that and I love you, my Princess,” he pulls you into his lap, wiping an escaped tear from your cheek. “It feels so good to actually tell you. I was holding it in, not wanting to scare you away.” His arm closes around you, cradling your head against his naked shoulder. 

“Austin,  how could your love ever scare me away,” you snuggle in close. 

You press his hand back between your legs, suddenly craving him, craving the comfort of sexual contact, of what you DO know, what you ARE sure of:  that his body was made for you, and yours for his. 

“Please,” you whisper in his ear, “I just want you inside me.” 

He turns towards you, brushing his cheek against your lips. “Are you sure baby?” 

“Austin Butler just told me that he loved me, yes I am sure,” you smile at him, biting your lip. 

He brings his fingers to his mouth, capturing your eyes with his. His wet fingers stroke your labia.

“I DO love you,” he presses in lightly, finding your own wetness already gathering there. 

His fingers stroke you, playing around your clit. 

“And I want you,” he pushes his finger inside of you, ”to be mine...” You moan low as his thumb lazily arcs, tracing the archway of your clit. 

…forever,” he whispers in your ear. 

You melt, you pool, you ooze. You are, in this moment, almost willing to say ‘fuck security’ and never leave. Almost. 

When you cum in his lap and on his fingers, it’s to his whispered voice in your ear repeating over and over, “I love you, I love you, I love you.” 

You straddle his leg to face him on the couch, gathering his face in your hands. 

“I love you Austin Butler, I love you, I’ve always loved you,” now that you have no qualms saying it outloud, you can’t seem to say it enough. 

Arms around his neck you press your lips to his, and your pussy to his leg. He flexes his muscular thigh, which pushes right up into your wet folds. You groan slightly into his mouth. His hands are on your hips pulling you towards him, then pushing you away. Your wet pussy laying down strings of slick on his skin.

It’s like some door inside you unlatched and you are suddenly horny as hell.  His sexy gaze on you and his tongue unconsciously wetting his gorgeous full bottom lip before capturing it in his teeth. His hands guiding you on him. You get so close to cumming as you ride him. You finally climb off him, panting, heart racing, unsure of what you need next to get you there.  The look you give him is so sexy and utterly debauched.

“Oh hunny,” he rumbles, “C’mon.”

He stands and pulls you into a deep kiss, takes you by the hand, walks backward to the stairs. He guides you up the first step. Now, even with his height, he kisses you again. He begins forcing you, with intense kisses, to take steps backwards up the stairs. His hands are on your breasts and your ass;  grasping, rolling, kneading. Your hands are all over him, outlining muscles, fingertips in the light hairs on his chest, rubbing his nipples with the pads of your thumbs. 

Suddenly you sit hard on the bed, you hadn’t even realized you were in the bedroom. 

“Back up and spread those legs, my Princess,” his breath is shaky trying to control his desire for you. “You are fucking incredible and enchanting,” he crawls up your body,  until he is croutching above you like a predator over its kill. “I just can't ever get enough of you, my Angel. You drive me crazy in the best ways possible.”

If you were wearing panties, they’d be ruined. After this, the bedspread may need to be replaced. 

“And in case you are wondering,” his eyes and voice so full of desire, “I’m going to bring that pussy, my pussy, to so many orgasms tonight you won’t be able to walk right tomorrow,” he kisses you hard, pushing himself inside you.

He spends the entire evening and into the night making good on this promise as though it were the first step in proving just how serious he is about keeping you. You cum on his cock as he steadily thrusts into you. He cuddles you sweetly, kissing your forehead, letting your heart rate calm down. Until his hand finds its way to your crotch. You cum on his fingers as he stares deep into your eyes. He holds you tight, nibbling at your neck, kissing your sternum as it rises and falls.  He pulls your nipples into his mouth, sucking them one, then the other. He showers your belly with kisses, growling just a little as he does. Now he is settling between your knees, his tongue dipping greedily into your wet snatch. You cum on his tongue as he laps you into oblivion. 

You beg for his cock in your mouth. You suck his tip as he strokes his own shaft. You hold his base in your left hand while your right, seemingly of its own accord, plays with yourself.  It’s like you just can’t stop. As his hot milky seed spurts onto your tongue, you twitch and swallow, jerk and swallow, cum and swallow. Moaning deep as you lick up every fucking drop of his cum like it’s the nectar of the gods. 

After every orgasm, your body searches for more, you just can’t get satiated. And each time, he waits until you come down from your peak before ramping you up again. 

Late that night, you are floating in a surreal cloud of oxytocin and dopamine, time meaning nothing. Austin has you bent over the bed, your wrists are in the small of your back. His long fingered hand is wrapped around them, using them as an anchor point as he slams into you. You had begged him to go hard and deep into you and never stop.  Maybe, if he fucks you hard enough you might be done. You are moaning on the end of his dick. 

“No, I need…” you moan as you twist one hand out from his grasp. 

“What do you need, my Princess,” he pants out. 

“Over,” you twist your spine, flipping on to your back, legs wide. 

He plunges right back into you. You moan. There’s no reprieve for the wickedly horny. His hands are wrapped around the tops of your thighs, thumbs digging in. 

You hold up two fingers, his tongue licks up the pads then over, sucking your fingers and swirling his tongue. You withdraw your wet digits and press them between you.  Your clit feels huge, engorged as your fingers brush it. Your voice breathing out little yeses as you draw the invisible sigils that you know will get you there. 

He watches you. His brows furrowed together, mouth hanging open in a little ‘oh’. This is so much better, being able to see him.  He is panting, sweating, straining, doing everything in his power to make you cum yet again.  Good lord he is so unbelievably sexy, and he loves you. The thought strikes you, hard.

Suddenly the tinder catches, fire shoots deep into your core as you clench around him, erupting into flames that envelop your pelvis, your spine, your chest  up your neck and into your brain. 

 “Fuck yeah, that’s my girl!” His voice is deep, almost harsh as his hips snap harder, faster back and forth.  

You are jerking on him, your orgasm filling you, just as you expect he is going to with his cum. You remove your fingers only to have them replaced with his, light and fast rubbing side to side on your sensitive nub. 

“Nonononono!” you scream hoarsely, pushing uselessly at his hands.

“Oh yes, yes,” he says through clenched teeth.  “My pussy is getting the works tonight my love, you know what to say and I’m gonna suck, finger, fuck, and shake that pussy until you do.”

You realize he has lulled you into a comfortable cycle of orgasm, come down, relax, then back to orgasm. Now his beautifully evil plan unfolds, and you are so unbelievably sensitive. 

You try wriggling away from him, but his hand is clamped down on your thigh as he keeps fucking you. Your eyes are squeezed shut, it’s overwhelming, but oh so good. In a flash he is gone, for a split second there is nothing touching you, and your eyes shoot open, trying to breathe. Then his mouth closes over your pussy. Your breath is gone again as he pulls your clit into the vacuum of his mouth.  His tongue is merciless against you. Your hips vibrate, your hands grasp his hair. Your screams fill the room, you can’t even hear the sloppy suction of his mouth on you.

“ SS… SSS… No,no, no! STOP!” you finally cry shaking your head. He rises, immediately grasping your pussy in his large hand, shaking it, keeping you writhing. 

“No, I won’t my love, you know that,” his voice is so smooth and relaxed. The palm of his hand pressing and shaking your mons. 

Your orgasm rocks you again and again. Again and again you beg him to stop, but never use your word.  You have backed yourself up to the headboard in an effort to get away from his hands, his fingers, his mouth.  But in the next second,  you are pushing against it and towards him. Your body and mind are locked in conflict; it’s too much, it’s not enough. You are pushed so far into pleasure you don’t know how much longer you can stand it. At the same time, you never want him to stop.

“Ok Princess,” he says, getting on his knees, lifting your ankles to his shoulders,”I’m gonna fuck my sweet little pussy until I cum. Until I’m satisfied.”   His grin is nothing short of devilry as he slides, long and hard, inside you. Your body is responding without your consent, attempting to plank on his shoulders to get away from his cock. 

“Oh no you don’t, “ he pushes your hips back down, impaling you once again, “you are gonna take my cock, darling, like a good girl,” he admonishes.

He leans down, your legs sliding down his arms, your knees close to your armpits. He grabs your arms near the elbows pinning you down like a frog on its back. You can’t push him off, you don’t want to, not that your body is listening to you. It’s insane how fucking maniacally good it feels to be so overstimulated. He slides in and out experimentally in this new position. Fuck, he is deep as he slides right into your g-spot. 

Oh. Holy. Fuckballs. 

You grit your teeth, shaking your head ‘no’. 

No to him. 

No to yourself. 

You refuse to say the word until he orgasms again. You want to hear what a good girl you are, you want to be his incredible Princess, you want to take everything he can give you. 

He rails into you, grunting, growling, moaning; sounds he knows drive you wild.  You had no idea that being held down like this would be such a fucking turn on. No idea that you could feel this good for this long. You are about to give in, scream the word. When he pulls out of you and pumping his cock with his hand, spatters your pussy and your belly with thick, creamy cum. His panting groans fill the air,  his sweat drips onto your legs. You think you are home free, until his palm starts rubbing his cum into your pussy in circles.

“What a good girl you are, taking my cock so deep” he croons at you. “You want more?” He slips his finger in you, “I’ll keep going Angel, my sweet love.” 

You can’t believe he still has the energy to keep going. His thumb falls onto your clit and you just can’t anymore. 

“FUCK!  Sushi!” you cry out once.  You are fucking worn out. Your whole pelvis is buzzing and  sobs start shaking your body in an effort to process the whole fucking thing.

He stops instantly and gathers you in his arms.

“Shh, darling. My good Princess. I’m so proud of you, my good girl, my love,” he says softly against your temple. 

He is fucking amazing. 

He holds you, messy and sweaty, until your heart rate slows and your breathing evens. He holds the bottle of water as you drink, then takes you to the shower. You sit on the little bench, trying not to pass out. He cleans and dries you both quickly and tosses the ruined bedspread off the bed before tucking you into the sheets. He covers you  with a blanket he pulls out from his closet  and turns out the light. He climbs in behind you, warm body pressed against your back. 

“Good night my love. I love you,” he whispers into your ear.

“Mmm, my Austin, love you,” is all you can get out before sleep claims you.

Your eyes flutter open in the morning and you are absolutely relaxed. The revelations of yesterday slide into focus. Austin is in love with you. Austin wants you to stay with him, forever. Austin plans to show you how much your stability matters to him too. It’s like the pieces of your real life are sliding into focus and that fake unhappy life is melting away. When you think about living happily ever after with Austin, you are calm and  completely happy. Austin is breathing heavy and even behind you, still deeply asleep. When you  get up to use the bathroom you find you are definitely sore, but it’s the best kind of sore you have ever been. When you snuggle back against Austin, a little smile creeps over his face.

[nerdnag]

How much do you plot out your stories before you write them?

More than I used to!

Up until maybe 2019 I almost never plotted out stories beforehand. Therefore I have a LOT of started docs saved with little random ideas: some of which never became more than a page, some of which went haywire after a while and never recovered. And there are some entire "books" or fics that were completely improvised as I wrote them. That used to be how I wrote when I wrote for my own enjoyment only.

I tried my hand on an overarching structure for an original work back in 2017/18, but that was probably my real first planning for any story I'd ever written.

And then I think it was @alienducky who really got me into plotting and got me stuck on it for real. We worked on a fic together, and it would have been practically impossible to do that without some kind of joint plan. I remember she started a table at the top of the doc where she listed all the scenes, and I was like yeah, that's a good idea, and it was. After that I started plotting out my own fics in a similar manner too, and now I never want to go back to how I did it before. The stories just turn out so much better when I know where I'm going from the beginning. But I plot in a way that still lets me be creative with the plot along the way.

So this is how I do it nowadays:

Scribble any little initial idea I have - sometimes in a single sentence, sometimes in a paragraph, sometimes in random loose sentences here and there that only make sense to me.

Place the bits I know I want into some kind of organised scene structure - if I don't already know which order things will happen in, I'll get a first sketch on that now. I usually structure this into actual chapter titles (placeholder titles that just give me an idea of what the scene is about) so that step 5 becomes a bit easier later.

Loosely figure out what kind of ending I want - just so I have something to aim for. Usually I have two large threads going and then a number of subthreads; the main threads (like a fantasy conflict or a romantic struggle) have to be clearly solved at the end imo, but some of the subthreads can be more loosely handled. At this point in the process though it's all just a rough sketch.

Slowly fit more pieces I want into the puzzle - any scenes that are necessary to bring me to the end somehow, or even scenes that bring me joy to think about, as long as they don't stray too far from the main threads. I also make sure to always add in early on which pov I think I want for every scene.

When I have a beginning, an end, and a number of scenes that seem to coherently bring me from one to the other, I start fleshing out parts. This usually means that I start writing bits and pieces here and there. Often I wrote the first handful of chapter first before I go on to the rest of the story, so I have a basic idea for myself of what the characters want and how they should be acting. But after the first few chapters, I usually jump from scene to scene depending on what mood I am in and what feels more joyful at any point in time. So I might write half a scene in chapter 7 one day to then write an entire chapter 22 the next day, only to then jot down a few paragraphs into chapter 16 after that. (This is my adhd working, I let it because it's worked out pretty well for me so far.)

Along the way I may come up with new ideas and adjust things, I flesh out scenes that were very barebone in the beginning, I solve and change things that turned out not to work, and when I reach the latter chapters that I wrote early on (for example ch 22, if I wrote that straight after ch 7), I'll usually have changed enough things that I need to rewrite large parts of that chapter. That is fine by me, it's all part of the process.

I should also add that if I've started posting it on for example Ao3 along the way, I sometimes - very rarely, but it happens - adjust my plans depending on what people comment. This is usually only if someone comments something that is so genius or otherwise so perfectly natural for the story that I just cannot let it go by without doing something with it, and only if it fits into the plot somehow. One example of this is when I noticed that several people were suspecting a particular character of having hidden motives. Up until that point I hadn't planned on doing much at all with that character, but when I realized that what I'd already written was leading very naturally to their conclusion, I decided to give that character more space from there on out and even played into the whole hidden agenda idea (but with a twist). That kind of thing can be really fun to do, but I don't do it if I don't think it will work for the plot I already have.

There have also been occasions where conversations with @alienducky have led me to change things in similar ways. One example of this is when I sent her a first overarching plot of my entire then upcoming fic series back in... 2020 I think? And she's great with noticing details, so she asked me how the characters would be able to send letters to each other if they didn't know where the other person was. I told her there was a magically enhanced wolf in there that would be used to bring letters back and forth. She was so into the idea of this wolf, and asked what would happen to it later in the story, that I simply had to make it part of the main cast, and in the end it even played a very important part in a reveal down the line. XD Throwaway details that grow larger like that are also very fun.

Omg I actually found our old convo from back then, I can't not add it in here.

TLDR; I plot out an overarching story with beginning, end and bits and pieces in-between, then adjust as I go.

[ppangjae]

SEVEN LETTERS | Jaehyun

SEVEN LETTERS | THE STORY UNTOLD (SEQUEL)

SUMMARY. On a camping trip, you find a message in a bottle that’s been washed up the shore, only to find out that it’s a message from you in the future. Your message tells you three things:

You must make Jeong Jaehyun fall in love with you because,

He’s your soulmate and

Because of your future self’s mistake, he ended up falling in love with someone else.

GENRE. soulmate!au | childhood friends to lovers!au | slight fake dating!au | fluff | angst

important note: the text from the letters are in bold

WORD COUNT. 10.1k+ words (BIG oof)

author’s note. here she is 🥺 this didn’t take too long to write out, which is very surprising. it is extremely impossible for me to write a 10k fic over the course of two days. i think i’m just really ingested in soulmate!aus and it just triggers so much imagination and creativity. anyways, enough of my ramble, i hope you enjoy this fic as much as i enjoyed writing it! also, it’s unedited so if there are any mistakes, i’m apologizing in advance!

It would be an utter lie for you to say that Jeong Jaehyun didn’t have a tiny little spot reserved for him in your heart. It was like he packed your feelings for him in a suitcase and brought it along with him on the trip to your heart. But just like that tiny spot you have for him in your heart, your courage to tell him how you feel is just as tiny. Maybe a bit tinier.

But you think you’re okay with it. You’re fine with how you and Jaehyun are right now.

Endearing gazes. Lingering looks. Skipped heartbeats. Flushed cheeks. Unspoken words and thoughts—

“The water’s cold!”

You snap out of your thoughts, looking to your right to see Jaehyun jumping up and down in the water. Fortunately and unfortunately, he has a shirt on. He’s shivering with his teeth clattering. You let out a snort, shaking your head.

“Jaehyun, get over here and change your shirt before you catch a cold!” You both hear his mother scolding him. The both of you share a look before bursting into laughter.

“Yes, mother.” He sighs, heading back up the shore before his mother gets even more angry than she already is. You watch him as he walks past you, flicking some water in your face to tease you.

“Hey!” You exclaim, wiping the droplets of water that hit your cheeks.

As you’re left all alone by the lake, you take off your sunglasses to get a nice look at the sunrise. The sun is blinding but it provides much warmth that seeps into your skin.

This camp trip is a yearly event where your family and Jaehyun’s family would get together and travel up to the cottage. It was something you and Jaehyun looked forward to every year. The both of you would be sent off to university in two different cities before coming back for the summer to spend it together at the cottage. It’s the highlight of your summer. It’s been the highlight of your summer for 18 years.

You kick off your sandals before taking a few steps into the lake. The water sure is cold, you think to yourself. When your feet are submerged in the water at ankle’s height, you look up to notice a light glare in the lake. You squint your eyes.

“What the fuck is that?” You ask yourself as the object is floating closer towards you.

The closer it floats to you, the more you make out of it. It reaches your foot and your eyebrows raise in surprise. “A message in a bottle? These things still exist?”

You’re about to call Jaehyun to tell him what you’ve found until you notice your name written in large, capital letters on the message. Your eyes slightly widen. Slowly bending down, you grab the bottle. You’re just about to pry the cap of the bottle open until—

“Y/N, your mother’s looking for you.” You hear Jaehyun say. You freeze in your spot, shoving the bottle into your hoodie before zipping it up. You slowly turn around, quirking an eyebrow. “She needs help baking the cookies. You said your roommate gave you her famous recipe?”

“Right! Thanks.” You fake a smile, rushing past him and patting his shoulder.

Jaehyun turns around and looks at you confusedly.

“Y/N, did you bring your roommate’s cookie recipe—”

“I texted it to you just now.” You cut your mother off as you rush into the cottage, heading straight to the bathroom. Your mother purses her lips into a tight line, grabbing her phone before uttering a soft ‘thank you, honey!’.

Gently closing the door shut, you lean against the door. You unzip your hoodie to grab the bottle. You’re curious as to why your name is written on the piece of paper. It causes you to pry the cap open, flying it into the sink. The cap rolls around in a circle before stopping right above the drain. You pull out the letter and indeed, your name is written on it. As you unravel the paper, your hands start to clammer.

Y/N,

You’re probably wondering who I am and why your name is written on this piece of paper. I am you from the future. Fate brought my message to you and you’re getting this message for an important reason. Take in a deep breath before reading the rest of this letter.

You’re in complete disbelief. Your shoulders slump and you slowly slide down the door. Is this even possible? Is this some sort of prank? A joke? But the handwriting in your letter looks exactly like your handwriting, making it all a bit more believable. You continue to read.

Jeong Jaehyun is your soulmate. Yes, that dorky little dude who’s your best friend? Yes, he’s your soulmate. You know that you’re in love with him. Don’t even try to lie. In case you were wondering, yes, you will still be in love with him in the future. But there’s a huge problem and I need you to fix it to prevent yourself from experiencing regret for the rest of your life.

As I am writing you this letter, Jeong Jaehyun is in love with someone else. He did not fall in love with you; his soulmate. He’s getting married in a couple a months. In order to rewrite the future, I want you to remember three things:

You MUST make Jeong Jaehyun fall in love with you because,

He is your soulmate and

Because of my mistake, he ended up falling in love with someone else.

You run a hand through your hair. This is too much for you. It’s all coming at you in full force. This is too much information for you to process in one sitting. You’ve already done so much at university, you don’t need any more stress for the rest of the summer. Besides, you just got here. You continue to finish reading the letter.

I am counting on you, past self. I don’t want you to live the rest of your life heartbroken, knowing that Jaehyun is in love with someone else, knowing that he’s getting married with another woman that isn’t his soulmate, and knowing that he will start a family with her and spend the rest of his life with her.

Don’t turn out like me, past Y/N. You’ll regret it.

Now go and rewrite your fate.

It’s what you deserve.

Good luck,

Future Y/N.

You let out a scoff.

Great. Now what?

“Are these the famous cookies your roommate makes?”

Jaehyun sniffs the freshly baked cookies and reaches out to grab one for himself. His mother swats his hand away and he lets out a yelp of pain. Your mother enters the dining room with another tray of freshly baked cookies and sets it down on the table. She hands you the other tray that’s already been cooled down.

“Why are you giving me this? I can’t finish all of this in one sitting.” You chuckle as you take the tray from her anyway.

“It’s not for you.” Your mother nods her head out the window. “It’s for the new neighbours. They just moved into the cottage. You know, the cottage that was being built last summer?”

“I was wondering why the cottage didn’t look so familiar,” Jaehyun mumbles with a mouthful of cookies.

“Want to come?” You ask him.

He shrugs his shoulders. “I don’t see why not.”

The both of you are heading towards the cottage. Jaehyun’s busy admiring the layout of their patio while you’re putting on your best girl next door smile. Jaehyun knocks on the door and it takes a couple of seconds for someone to open the door for you.

“Oh—hi!” It’s a woman who looks like she’s around your age. She’s wearing sweats and a hoodie, but she has a warm, welcoming smile that makes you feel a bit uncomfortable. “I’m guessing you’re our neighbours.”

“We are, yes,” Jaehyun beats you to it. You glare at him but he barely catches it. You raise an eyebrow out of curiosity, following his trance that’s landed on the girl. Your eyes squint. “We baked you some cookies, please take them, it’s my recipe—”

“Uh, your recipe?” You scoff and he gives you a warning look. “What? Why are you looking at me like that—”

“Your recipe? Oh, I’m sure they’re delicious.” She cuts you off. She gently grabs the tray from you and you fake a smile. “I’m Yeona. I guess we’ll be seeing a lot of each other this summer.”

“I’m Y/N—”

“I’m Jaehyun!” He cuts you off again.

You frown.

“Nice to meet you, Jaehyun and,” Yeona smiles while giggling. “Y/N.”

“If you need anything, you can always let us know.” Jaehyun grins. “If you’re feeling bored, you could always hang out with us—”

“Nice to meet you too, Yeona!” You throw your arm over Jaehyun’s shoulder, weighing your arm heavily on it. He gives you an irritated look. “I hope we can make great memories this summer.”

“You guys are such a cute couple.” Yeona chuckles.

Your smile is wiped off your face. “Oh, no, we’re not dating—”

“I think we’re a cute couple too.”

“What?” You blurt out. “We’re not—”

When you look at him, his eyes meet yours. He gives you a ‘play along’ look and you find yourself clearing your throat and putting up an act. You fake a laugh, nodding your head.

“We are! Yes, we are dating—we’ve actually—we’ve been together for a year now!” You exclaim, thinking of all the ways you could kill Jaehyun in his sleep.

“We’ll get going. It was nice meeting you, Yeona.” Jaehyun smiles.

Yeona watches the two of you as you interlock fingers and walk down the sidewalk back to your cottage. You’re this close to kicking Jaehyun in the shin until you both get back to your cottage. Once Jaehyun shuts the door, you slap him in the arm.

“Ow! What was that for—”

“Since when were we dating?”

He lets out a laugh. “I just find her really cute and so I figured—”

“You figured that the only way to make her interested in you is by pretending that you’re—”

“Taken?” He finishes it off for you. “By you? Yes. I figured it would be the only way.”

“Why are men so dumb?” You sigh annoyingly, pondering on whether you should start pulling your hair off of your scalp. “Why are men so dense?”

“It’ll only be for the summer—”

“That’s exactly the problem! We’ll be fake dating for the whole summer. I don’t want to be playing pretend and be boo boo the fool for a whole summer.” You argue. “I want to go fishing. I want to go hiking. I want to go swimming! The last thing I ever wanted is to fake date you—”

“Well, too bad. The damage has already been done.” Jaehyun smirks. “Besides, we probably won’t have to put up the act for the whole summer. I’m going to fake dump you for her—”

“You like her?” You blurt out.

“Yes. I like her. I find her really close to my ideal type—”

“Do you think she’s going to date you after finding out that those cookies that she’s probably eating right now are not from your recipe?” You test him. He clamps his mouth shut. “Exactly.”

“It’s not bad to be hopeful—”

“And it’s not bad to just tell her that you like her either.” You fold your arms until you remember something important. And it comes in the form of your own handwritten letter.

You MUST make Jeong Jaehyun fall in love with you because he is your soulmate and because of my mistake, he ended up falling in love with someone else.

“Should I just do that?”

You snap out of it. “Do what?”

“Just tell her that I like her and that we were just joking about us dating—”

“No!” You exclaim with your eyes widened like saucers.

“Why not?”

“Because—” You start, trying to look for the right words to say. “Because you’ve already made a huge mess and if you tell her the truth, the chances of her liking you back will be lower.”

Jaehyun stands there as if he’s deep in thought. You fold your arms, waiting for him to say something—

“You’re right. You’re a genius!”

You think you’re going to get a headache.

Three weeks pass when you get your second letter from your future self. You’re cooped up in your own room, holding the piece of paper in your hands with your eyes reading each word from left to right. Just like the first letter, the second one comes to you in a bottle that’s been washed up to shore. You found it just in time when you stepped outside to get a breath of fresh air.

Y/N,

Remember this specific date: July 31st.

Also, I’m sure you’ve met Yeona at this point. Believe me when I tell you this, Jaehyun has the biggest crush on her. He’s not joking around. He’s truly in love with her. She is the embodiment of his ideal type.

You grab your phone to check the date. It’s July 31st. The letter came right on time. At least your future self is still organized. You were afraid that your future self would grow lazy.

On that day, Jaehyun will ask you to go to the beach.

There’s a knock at the door. “Who is it?”

“Jaehyun, duh.”

You neatly fold the letter before placing it underneath your pillow. “Come in.”

He opens the door and pokes his head through. “My mother cooked breakfast. Let’s go down to eat.”

As you’re getting off of your bed, you notice how he looks hesitant to ask you something. You put on your house slippers and as you reach up to him, you look at him questioningly.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

He will ask you this because he knows that Yeona will be going to the beach. He’ll try to convince you by saying that the weather’s nice—

“Do you want to go to the beach today? The weather’s nice today, we should take advantage of it.”

I want you to tell him this— “Let’s go to the fair instead. I heard it just opened up yesterday.”

He will try to convince you to go to the beach instead. Don’t give in. “You don’t want to go to the beach? Didn’t you say you wanted to go swimming? Tanning?”

“But we always go to the fair. Besides, this year, they’re only open for a week.” Just keep suggesting somewhere else to go.

It will work. “They’re only open for a week this year?”

You slowly nod your head. “Unfortunately.”

Trust me. “We should probably just go to the fair instead, then, huh?”

You smile.

“We should.”

“What if we bump into Yeona?”

Jaehyun glances at you. You know that the both of you won’t bump into Yeona, for she is going to the beach instead. He shrugs his shoulders as the ticket vendor is wrapping a one-day wristband on his wrist. The both of you enter the annual fair and it immediately brings you memories of last summer and the summers before that.

“We should probably hold hands then,” he mumbles softly.

You look up at him. “Huh?”

“We should be prepared in case we bump into Yeona.” Jaehyun suggests.

He doesn’t give you a chance to say anything and grabs your hand. Your hand fits perfectly in his, especially when your fingers interlock. You can feel your heart pounding in your chest. Who knew that the smallest thing to do like holding Jaehyun’s hand would turn out to be the biggest deal to you?

“Your hands are sweaty.” You mumble, trying to stop yourself from heating up.

“It’s pretty hot outside, huh?”

“Yeah, it sure is.” You bite your lip.

He grins. “Yeah, your cheeks are really red because of the heat.”

“Are they?” You gasp, letting go of his hand to cover your cheeks.

He chuckles. “It’s cute.”

Your hands slowly fall back to your sides. “Cute?”

He hums in reply, avoiding eye contact. He grabs your hand and interlocks your fingers. His ears are turning red, just like your rosy red cheeks.

“Why did you want to go to the beach?”

He shrugs his shoulders. “I heard Yeona will be going.”

“Do you,” you begin until you hesitate. “Do you like her?”

He nods. You’re not sure what to say or feel. But there’s one thing you’re sure of.

“I like her a lot.”

Jaehyun’s whipped for her.

The fair will be packed. “It’s quite busy today, huh?”

Jaehyun nods. “I think it’s because they’re only open for a week.”

You won’t bump into Yeona. In fact, you and Jaehyun will have the best day ever. Enjoy it while it lasts.

“What ride should we go on first?” He asks.

Your eyes scan the rides that await you. Your eyes land on one of the rollercoasters a few metres away. It’s right across from the Ferris wheel.

Don’t forget to have fun. This is your first chance to make him fall in love with you.

“Let’s ride the rollercoaster!”

And so as you’re lining up to ride the rollercoaster, you look down at your hands. Your hands fit perfectly together, don’t you think?

You could definitely get used to this.

“I have two seats left for this ride!” One of the operators announce and you’re shooting your arm up into the air.

“We’ll take those seats!”

“Great. Just come on over!” The both of you are rushing to your seats and buckling in your seatbelts. Jaehyun’s still holding your hands.

“Enjoy your ride!”

At the end of the day, Jaehyun will ask you if you want to ride the Ferris Wheel.

“The sun is starting to set.” You point at the sun.

Jaehyun smiles. “We should probably ride the Ferris Wheel. Do you want to ride it?”

I want you to say— “Sure. I’d love that.”

And he will make up some stupid excuse like— “Great. I want to take pictures of the sunset. I think I’ll get a good shot of the sunset when we’re at the top of the Ferris Wheel.”

Thus, the both of you are hopping onto one of the carts. You’re sitting right across from him. In romance movies, Ferris Wheel rides always lead up to the character’s undying love confession to the love interest when they reach the top of the ride. You could definitely see how it will never happen, especially when Jaehyun’s too busy taking pictures of the fucking sunset.

Don’t get your hopes up too high. It’s not going to feel romantic. And it sure isn’t. You’re sitting there, texting your roommate to compliment her cookie recipe that your mother can’t seem to stop baking. You can hear the faint clicking sounds coming from Jaehyun’s phone.

“Y/N—”

“Yeah?” You look up from your phone to hear a soft ‘click!’

But there is one thing that will happen and it will stir up Jaehyun’s heart. You guess this is it. He stares at the screen of his phone for a brief moment before slowly looking up at you.

“Did you just take a picture of me?”

He will make up another stupid excuse by saying— “Yes, I did. I think it’ll be a good picture to use for your Tinder or something. I’ll send it to you.”

“Why, you little—”

“Sent it!”

You look down at your phone to look at the candid photo Jaehyun texted you. While you’re busy looking at the photo and whining over how Jaehyun took the worst angle of your face, you barely notice how Jaehyun’s staring at the same photo but on his phone.

There’s a soft smile beginning to spread across his lips. In the photo, you’re looking at him with doe-eyes. You’re glowing because the sun is facing you. You look… beautiful. Why is he studying the photo longer than he should?

He sets it as his lockscreen.

The third letter from your future self comes a couple of days after you and Jaehyun spent a day at the town fair. But this time, it doesn’t come in a bottle. This time, you find it in your mailbox after your mother asked you to check if she or Jaehyun’s mother had any mail. It’s quite alarming, but it was like you were destined to check the mail that morning.

“Any mail for us?”

You shake your head. “Nope. I’ll head back to bed, I’m still a bit tired.”

Your letter is tucked underneath your bra and once you arrive in your room, you pull it out. You sit against your door, ripping the letter open to see your handwriting.

Y/N,

On August 14th, Yeona and her family will come over for dinner. You and Jaehyun will continue to put up your fake dating act. But it won’t be for long.

After your dinner, Jaehyun will tell Yeona the truth. I don’t remember what his excuse was, but I do remember Yeona feeling relieved because at that very moment, she will confess to him.

You will feel like shit. I’m not even going to sugarcoat it. But there is one thing I want you to do, and that is to stop them from kissing out on the front porch.

That shit hurt like a buttcheek on a stick and I don’t want you to experience it.

“Y/N, make sure to wake up before five because the Kims are coming over for dinner!”

You let out a frustrated sigh. You read the last few words from the letter before crumbling it up into a paper ball. You aim for the trash can near your bedside table.

Things get better and I will make sure that they get better.

The paper ball goes into the trash can perfectly. Swish.

Trust me.

The Kims arrive right on the dot with a tray of lasagna and a bowl of what seems like potato salad. You find it hilarious how Jaehyun’s dressed up with an odd mixture of casual and formal clothing. He has his hair slicked back with hair gel and he’s wearing his best white button-up shirt with.. pink house slippers?

You’re not sure what kind of look he was going for, but Yeona doesn’t seem to mind.

“Come on in! Let’s eat!”

Everything is laid out on the dining table. Yeona looks at the two of you with suspicion as Jaehyun sits next to her and not you. You look at Jaehyun confusedly and he barely notices. You take a quick look underneath the table to see Jaehyun’s foot and you give it a gentle kick. He jumps in his seat, glaring at you.

“I’ll switch seats with Y/N,” Yeona chuckles softly. “It’d be best for the couple to sit next to each other, right?”

Your mother and Jaehyun’s mother share a confused look before bursting out into giggles. Your mother shakes her head, waving her hand. “Oh no, sweetheart, they’re not dating—”

“We are—” Jaehyun tries to cut your mother off but he stops himself when his mother gives him a warning look.

You begin to panic. “I—we just started dating two weeks ago—”

Yeona frowns. “But I thought you’ve been dating each other for a year—”

“Let’s eat, shall we?” Jaehyun insists, flashing an uneasy, nervous smile.

You shouldn’t be feeling embarrassed. In fact, Jaehyun was the one who brought you into this mess. From your future self, you know that the truth will be exposed during dinner with the Kims. But you weren’t prepared for this.

“I’m so confused.” Yeona looks at the both of you.

“Yeona, can we—I can explain—can we please talk outside?” Jaehyun asks, moreso pleads.

She looks at him with a wavering glance. “S-Sure. We can talk.”

The dinner continues and there’s nothing but tension and awkwardness in the room. You’re left all alone with the adults as Yeona and Jaehyun step outside to have a talk. You’re picking at your asparagus and steak, pondering on whether you should stuff your face as if it’ll make you disappear into thin air. You could feel burning stares from your mother and your eyes meet hers. She’s looking at you like she demands an explanation but all you could do is shrug your shoulders and wince.

“So, Yeona’s in third year university like Jaehyun and Y/N?” Jaehyun’s mother tries to change the atmosphere.

Yeona’s parents nod and flash a small smile. “She’s studying Economics.”

“Wow,” Jaehyun’s father muses. “I guess Yeona and I will get along quite well.”

“Really?” Yeona’s mother says.

His father nods. “I graduated from an Economics program. If she has any questions throughout her undergrad, she can definitely ask me.”

You’re starting to feel insecure.

“Let me just say that Yeona is very beautiful, just like you.” Jaehyun’s mother tells Yeona’s mother, who lets out a giggle.

“Oh, that’s very flattering to hear. I try my best to stay young. But it’s nice to see that it’s been passed down to Yeona.”

Jaehyun’s mother smiles. “She grew up very well.”

You will feel like shit. I’m not even going to sugarcoat it.

Hell, you weren’t sure how bad it was going to be but now you know. You feel like utter shit. This isn’t even your fault. If Jaehyun didn’t lead you into this mess, you wouldn’t be feeling this way. You wouldn’t be sitting in the midst of a conversation between adults, feeling like you’re invisible. Your insecurities wouldn’t be getting the best of you.

You slowly get up from your seat. “Sorry, excuse me, I’m going to get some fresh air.”

They don’t even notice your absence. Your feet somehow drag you to the front porch, where Jaehyun and Yeona are having their talk.

But there is one thing I want you to do, and that is to stop them from kissing out on the front porch.

That shit hurt like a buttcheek on a stick and I don’t want you to experience it.

Your eyebrows raise. You shut your eyes, mustering up all the courage. Your hand grabs the doorknob and you open the door just in time to see Jaehyun and Yeona leaning in. They pull away from each other and look at you with surprise.

You fake a gasp. “Oh, sorry! I—I just wanted to see if everything was okay.”

“I—”

“I’m so sorry.” You apologize again, closing the door.

You lean against the door and feel your eyes well up with tears.

Even though the kiss didn’t happen, it still hurt.

It still hurt like a buttcheek on a stick.

The fourth letter from your future self comes from you on your last day at the cottage. Jaehyun and Yeona are officially dating and they plan on maintaining a long distance relationship when Yeona flies back to London for university. Spending the rest of your summer heartbroken felt like shit. You’re kind of glad that summer is over and you don’t have to spend any more days at the cottage in nothing but the comfort of your room.

The letter arrives in the mail, just like the third letter.

“Is this the last bag?”

You shove the letter into your pocket. Jaehyun looks at you suspiciously, specifically at your pocket. He’s holding your duffle bag packed with your clothes. You nod your head. “Yeah, that’s the last bag.”

“What’s in your pocket?”

“Nothing!” You blurt out.

“Doesn’t seem like nothing.” He walks past you to place your duffle bag into the trunk of your car. He dusts his hands off.

“It’s nothing, I swear.” You reassure him.

You feel your heart stop when Jaehyun starts poking your sides to tickle you. You feel his hand sneak into your pocket to grab the letter. He has it in his hands and he’s just about to read the writing on the envelope when you snatch it from him.

“Hey, is that a love letter?” He grins, reaching out to snatch the letter from you.

You gasp. “No! Jaehyun! Please give it back. It’s not for you to see—”

He’s waving the envelope in the air and you’re jumping up and down to get it from him. He’s continuing to wave it in the air until you jump too high. When your feet land on the ground, you stumble and place your hands on his shoulders to prevent yourself from falling over. He wraps his other arm around your waist to stop you from falling over. The both of you freeze up.

You slowly look up to see him looking at you with an expression you can’t seem to make out. His hand that’s holding the letter is still in the air. The both of you stare into each other’s eyes, trying to read each other’s looks. His eyes trail down to your lips, which are inches away from his. You’re the first one to snap out of it, pulling away from him.

You reach up to snatch the letter from him. He looks at you with a daze.

“Sorry.” He says softly.

“Is everything packed up?”

You don’t say anything to him. You turn around to see your mother locking the door to the cottage. You realize that everyone, except your mother, witnessed what had just happened between you and Jaehyun. You feel your cheeks heat up again.

“Well, I guess summer’s over.” Your mother sighs sadly. “I can’t wait until we see each other for Christmas, though!”

“Jaehyun, are you sure you packed everything?”

Jaehyun looks at his father who’s seated in the driver’s seat with his head poking out the window. He nods his head. “I’m one hundred percent sure.”

“I guess this is it. See you guys later.” Your mother says.

There’s no such thing as goodbye hugs when it comes to your families. That’s because you know you will see each other eventually.

You turn back around to face Jaehyun. He’s still looking at you with that look you can’t read.

“I’ll see you later, dork.” You mumble, reaching up to ruffle his hair.

“You better kick ass at school.” He points at you as the both of you head to your cars.

“You too.”

“I’ll miss you, dork.” He adds.

“Me too, loser.”

And man, the moment you hop into your car, you’re already missing him a bit too much.

You almost forget about the fourth letter.

You remember the letter when you reach the gas station. Your parents are inside the convenience store for a washroom break. You rip the envelope open to see a small piece of paper. The letter is short this time, you note.

Y/N,

It’s been a while since I wrote you the last letter. You’re probably on your way back home from the cottage. You’re probably missing Jaehyun already. 

I’m writing this letter to you a bit too early. You can definitely come back and read this letter again when the day is near. 

December 24th. Christmas Eve. You and Jaehyun will be home just in time for Christmas. You will have the usual Christmas Eve dinner with the Jeongs. 

However, your train ride back to the city will be delayed. Jaehyun will be the one to pick you up at the train station. This is your second chance to make him fall in love with you because on Christmas Eve, it will be the first snowfall of the season. 

Now, what is the significance of the first snowfall of the season, you ask?

As your mother hops into the car, you fold the letter and subtly put it inside of your pocket. “Mom, can I ask you something?”

“Sure. What is it?”

“What’s so special about the first snowfall of the winter season?” You ask. 

She lets out a snort. “You’re twenty-one and you don’t know what the first snowfall means? Gosh, you’re so inexperienced when it comes to dating.”

You chuckle. “What does it mean?”

“Have you noticed the brutal amount of couples out on dates on the first snowfall of the season?” 

You shake your head. “Now that you’ve mentioned it, I realized there are a big amount of couples out that day.”

She hums in reply. “They say that if you are planning on confessing your love to your crush, you should do it on the first snowfall. Not only is it romantic, but confessions that are made that day are always reciprocated.”

“Always?”

She smiles. “I claim this first hand because your father confessed to me on the first snowfall.”

December 24th. 

Your future self proves to be right. You’re sitting in your seat, looking out of the window. The sky that was bright and blue when you hopped on the train is now dark. You can see the stars scattered across the sky. A couple of minutes later, the train operator announces that there is a huge delay and the arrival time will be an hour later than the expected time on your ticket. 

You sigh. As you’re pulling out the letter to give it one last read, your phone buzzes in your pocket. 

“Hello?”

“Y/N, your parents told me that your train has been delayed.”

You smile at the sound of Jaehyun’s voice on the other line of the phone call. “Yeah, my father’s going to pick me up so there’s nothing to worry—”

“I already insisted on picking you up instead. What time are you expected to arrive?” He asks. 

You feel your heart flutter. “You’re going to pick me up?”

“Of course. I missed you, you twat. Also, we have to make a quick stop at the diner for your favourite cheesecake. They said that they’ll be open until midnight.” He replies. 

“I almost forgot about that.” You chuckle. “I’m expected to arrive around ten. Are you sure you’re okay with picking me up?”

“I’m more than sure.” You can hear him smile. “I’ll see you at ten. Is there anything you want me to bring?”

“Just you.” You laugh. “And the car, of course.”

“Well, duh. We wouldn’t want to walk home with your heavy ass luggage, now would we?”

“Shut up.” He’s tugging at your heartstrings. “I’ll see you at ten, Jaehyun.”

As you’re hanging up on him, you turn the letter around to finish the last part of the letter that you haven’t read yet. You specifically left the last part to read on the day of because you were afraid you would forget what to do. 

There’s something really crucial that you have to do. If you mess this up, everything will be put at risk. As I said, this is your second chance to make Jaehyun fall in love with you. 

An hour goes by faster than you expected. You’re hopping off the train with your luggage. As you’re stepping out of the train station, you’re searching for a familiar car in the parking lot. 

“Y/N!”

This is completely off topic but Jaehyun will look really cute. He will be sporting a scarf that covers half of his face. He will look extremely cuddly and soft. 

“Jaehyun!”

When he reaches up to you, it will start to snow. 

Indeed, as Jaehyun is a metre away from you, you start to see snowflakes falling from the sky. You can hear your mother’s words echo in your head. First snowfall and love confessions. You can feel your heart pounding in your chest. You’re not sure whether it's the cold wind or Jaehyun’s presence that’s making your cheeks red. You’d like to think it’s the former. 

Jaehyun will stop to look up at the sky. He will say— “It’s snowing!”

“The first snowfall of the season.” You add, letting out a soft giggle. “Long time no see, dork.”

The first snowfall of the season will remind him of Yeona. A frown will threaten to spread across his lips but he won’t let it show. That’s because him and Yeona have been going through a rough patch in their long distance relationship. But he won’t tell you this until after the Christmas dinner when you’re both a little tipsy from the beer. 

You won’t get drunk with him tonight because things will turn out different this time. However, I want you to ask him this— “Do you know what the first snowfall of the season means?”

He will answer with— “First snowfall means first love. It also means that the person you’re with on the first snowfall of the season will be the love of your life.”

You won’t expect his answer because it’s completely different to your mother’s take on the first snowfall’s significance. This will further stir up Jaehyun’s heart. 

“Do you believe in it?” You let out a lighthearted chuckle. “If you do, then that means I’m the love of your life.”

He will jokingly say— “Why? Are you in love with me or something?”

This is the crucial moment. You must say— “Yes. I’m in love with you, Jaehyun.”

His face is washed with shock and confusion. You’re both standing outside of the train station. Your grip on the handles of your luggage tightens when Jaehyun doesn’t utter a single word out. 

He will joke around even more and say— “You’re joking. Stop joking around, Y/N. I don’t think Yeona would like hearing you say that.”

And it will hurt like a bitch. But try your best to keep yourself together. I want you to avoid the topic and say— “Let’s get going before the diner closes. You know the Christmas dinner is not Christmas dinner without that bomb ass cheesecake.”

He tilts his head in confusion. Why are you avoiding the topic? Are you joking? Why does he feel relieved to hear your confession? He shouldn’t be. He musters up a smile. 

“Let’s get going, then.”

The months and days after Christmas Eve and what seems like a rejected confession makes you heartbroken. Your roommate is tired of hearing you let out sad sighs and soft sobs throughout the day. But you couldn’t help it. Your future self told you that it will hurt like a bitch. It truly did feel like a bitch and it still does. 

On the night of your last exam of your fourth year of university, you make a trip to your mailbox to find another letter. It’s the fifth letter from your future self. 

You find yourself sitting in your dorm room all by yourself while your roommate is out partying. You open up the letter. 

Y/N,

It still hurts like a bitch, right? Well, in this letter, I will tell you what happened that caused future Jaehyun to end up with someone else. I hope it will make you feel better. 

On July 31st, we ended up going to the beach. We bumped into Yeona. Yeona ended up hanging out with us and I felt like a third wheeler. Yeona was sort of picking up the idea that Jaehyun and I were fake dating and that it was all just an act. The more they hung out that day, the more Jaehyun realized that his crush on her was more than just a crush. 

That night, I cried to sleep, wishing that we went to the town fair instead. 

On August 14th, Yeona and her parents came over for dinner. The dinner was awkward. However, after the dinner, Jaehyun asked Yeona if they could talk. I was busy doing the dishes until Mom asked if I could take the trash out. I remember walking out of the door to see them kissing out on the porch. It felt like shit. 

He told her the truth. He told her that it was all just an act to make her fall in love with him. 

That night, they were officially in a relationship. 

On Christmas Eve, Jaehyun picked me up at the train station. We both noticed that it was the first snowfall of the season and we were joking around about its significance. He had jokingly asked if I was in love with him and I said no. I told him that I wasn’t in love with him. 

Around that time, Yeona and Jaehyun have been arguing more frequently. They were going through a rough patch in their relationship. It was starting to make Jaehyun question whether he truly loved her or not. 

But around that same time, Jaehyun was slowly catching feelings for me. He had jokingly asked if I was in love with him because he sincerely wanted to know and if I had said yes, it would’ve given him a clear sign. 

Later that night, he told me about his rough time with Yeona. He was slightly drunk and confessed that he was catching feelings for me, but because I said I wasn’t in love with him, I made him realize that he’s truly in love with Yeona. 

I think this is what made him sure of marrying her. 

I regret lying to him. I wish I told him that I was in love with him. 

I started writing letters to you, past self, in hopes that you would get them somehow. Mother said that she started getting letters from her future self when she turned eighteen. She said that if you start getting letters from your future self, it means that fate is trying to link you up with your soulmate in the past after failing to make it happen in the future. 

I truly believe in it. And so I hope you get my letters to you, past self. 

Rewrite your future. 

Jaehyun and Yeona’s wedding is next month.

I’m still pondering on whether I should attend their wedding. 

That night, you cried yourself to sleep. There is still much left to read from the letter, but you’re too sad and heartbroken to read the rest of it. You decide to save it for later, when the time comes. 

Just like your future self, you hope that you will successfully rewrite your future. 

Because you can’t imagine being in love with anyone else except Jaehyun. 

You slam the trunk shut, dusting off your hands before hopping into the front seat of your car. Your father picked you up on move-out day. Although you were supposed to graduate this year, you decided to take an extra year just for good measure. 

Your father starts the car. “We missed you so much.”

“I missed you guys too.” You smile while buckling in your seatbelt. You suddenly remember what your future self wrote in the fifth letter. 

On the car ride home, Dad will ask you if you really don’t want to go up to the cottage this summer. “Hey, are you sure you don’t want to spend the summer up at the cottage?”

And as much as you want to go, tell him— “I think I’m going to pass this summer. I have a couple of online summer classes and staying up at the cottage will be a huge distraction.”

Here’s what happened. I decided to spend the summer up at the cottage anyway. It was extremely awkward. Yeona and Jaehyun took that summer as an opportunity to deepen their relationship. All I did that summer was cry my eyes out. What seemed like a relationship that was crumbling to pieces was mended back together the moment Jaehyun and Yeona reunited for the summer. 

This time, you are not spending the summer up at the cottage. I want you to continue with that internship offer. I wish I did. I regret not doing it. I hope and wish your absence will stir up Jaehyun’s feelings for you. 

“You’re right, honey. I think staying at home for your online courses is the best way to go.” Your father agrees. 

“And it’s even better because if I pass one of the courses, I might be considered for an internship.” You beam at him. 

“Really?”

“Really!” You exclaim. 

He reaches out to ruffle your hair. “I am so proud of you, honey. You better kick some ass.”

But hey, at least something good will come out of your summer away from the cottage. 

The sixth letter arrives months later. You’ve just graduated and this summer, you decided to give yourself a break and spend it up at the cottage with the Jeongs. This time, the sixth letter comes in a bottle that washes up the shore. You’re taking a hike all by yourself when you decide to read the letter. You take a seat on one of the stones overlooking the small town. 

Y/N,

This summer up at the cottage is crucial. 

August 8th. On that night, your family and Jeongs will have a bonfire. When both of your parents decide to head to bed early, they will leave the both of you together. 

You check your phone for the date. It’s August 7th. You have one day to prepare. Your future self was considerate this time around. 

You will most likely have a heart-to-heart talk with Jaehyun. He will tell you that he’s been pondering on whether he should propose to Yeona and ask her to marry him. 

Later that day, you decide to sit out on the dock. You’re dipping your feet into the lake. Just the thought of Jaehyun proposing to someone else makes your heart ache. You can’t even imagine how your future self is coping with the heartbreak. 

“Can I join you?”

You look over your shoulder to see Jaehyun. You pat a spot next to you. “Sure. Come here.”

He takes a seat next to you and dips his feet into the water. You’re both sitting next to each other in silence. You’re sure Jaehyun has a lot of questions he wants to ask you. 

“You know, I missed you last summer.” He starts off. 

“I missed you too. Sorry I couldn’t come, I had a lot of things to do.” You say softly. “How are things with you and Yeona?”

“Things are well.” He smiles. 

Oh how that smile makes your heart shatter in ways he doesn’t even know. “That sounds great.”

“Yeah. It’s a shame that Yeona and her parents aren’t spending their summer here.” He frowns. 

“Yeah, why not?” 

“Her cousin’s getting married.” He replies. 

“Do you miss her?”

He lets out a sigh. “I miss her a lot.”

The rest of your afternoon is spent sitting at the dock in silence. There’s surely a lot on both of your minds. 

August 8th. 

You almost forget what to do when the day arrives. But you’re glad that you remembered when your parents called it a night and left you and Jaehyun outside near the bonfire. You’re roasting marshmallows with Jaehyun for s’mores. 

Start the conversation. “You look like you have a lot on your mind, Jaehyun.”

He snaps out of his gaze to glance at you. “Do I?”

You chuckle, nodding your head at his marshmallow that’s burnt. “Clearly.”

“Ah,” he cusses, pulling his burnt marshmallow away from the fire. He throws it out and replaces it with a new marshmallow. “I guess I do have a lot on my mind.”

Jaehyun is thinking about whether— “Do you think I should propose to Yeona?”

“You’re planning to ask her to marry you?” You ask. 

He nods. “Yeah. What do you think?”

He will ask you for your opinion. This is what you should say— “Do you love her?”

“I love her—”

“With all your heart?”

He will hesitate. It will take him a while to say he loves her with conviction. But after a couple of minutes, he will say— “I love her with all my heart.”

That’s a lie. Ask him this— “How do you know for sure?”

“When I met her for the first time, I just knew.” He says, his look turning distant. You’re afraid that his marshmallow is going to burn again. “She makes me feel happy. Whenever I’m with her, I feel special. I feel like the luckiest man on Earth.”

Tell him this— “Funny because that’s how I feel whenever I’m with you.”

“W-What?”

He’s looking at you now. He’s staring at you. You’re not sure where to look, so you focus on your marshmallow that’s browning. You pull it away from the fire to replace it with a new one. 

He will feel confused. But you have to remind him that you confessed to him on the night of Christmas Eve. 

“I told you that I’m in love with you, remember? On Christmas Eve? When you picked me up at the train station?” You try to help him recall. 

His eyebrows furrow in confusion. “You weren’t joking? I thought you were joking—”

He will tell you that he thought you were joking. But this is what you tell him— “I wasn’t joking, Jaehyun. I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you for the longest time.”

“Y/N—”

“But you’re in love with Yeona and she’s in love with you.” You cut him off before shoving your first s’mores of the night into your mouth. 

He’s not sure what to say. You say that like it’s nothing to you. It kind of throws him off. 

“Jaehyun, your marshmallow’s burnt again.”

“Shit.”

Jaehyun will feel troubled. Your conversation with him ends there. Things will be awkward for the rest of the summer and the both of you won’t talk to each other. 

But there’s nothing to worry about. 

Things will get back to normal. On your last day up at the cottage, the both of you will act like nothing ever happened. 

The seventh letter comes on the day you’re moving out of your house. You’re making a courageous move to a new city, where you’ll be living in an apartment and working at your new job. Jaehyun has no idea that you’re moving out. Heck, he has no idea that you’re moving out of town. But you’ll tell him… eventually. 

“You’re sure you’ve packed everything with you?” Your mother asks as she sniffs. Her eyes are glassy. 

You look at her with an endearing smile. “Mom, the more you cry, the more I’ll dread moving out.”

“Shut up, let me have my moment. You’re growing up too fast, honey.” She wipes a tear that streams down her cheek. 

“She’ll be fine. Besides, we’re going to visit her every two weeks.” Your father reassures her. “There’s nothing to worry about.”

“If you hate it there, you can always come back here.” Your mother rests her hands on your shoulders. “We’ll be ready to pick you up at the train station too.”

“I’ll let you know if anything happens.” You reassure her as you’re walking towards the car. 

“We should get going before your mother starts crying again.”

“We probably should.” You chuckle. 

“Make sure you eat your meals!” Your mother exclaims as you and your father are hopping into the car. 

The car ride to the train station feels different. You’re not sure what the future has in store for you. You’re not even sure if you’ve successfully rewrote your future. Your mission isn’t even complete for Jaehyun is still in a relationship with Yeona. 

You arrive at the train station earlier than the scheduled departure time. You decided to open the seventh letter and read it to kill some time. You take a seat at one of the benches. 

Y/N,

This is my final letter to you, past self. 

You’re probably on a train ride to a new town for your new job. Or you’re probably still waiting for the train to arrive. 

The future feels uncertain, right? If Jaehyun is still in a relationship with Yeona, don’t worry, things are slowly working out. You’ll have to give it some time. 

You will lose touch with Jaehyun for a while. He will be mad at you for leaving him without telling him. But make sure you both reconcile this Christmas. As for Yeona, she might give you a call a few months later, just to check up on you and stuff. 

I just wanted to let you know that you’ve done your best and if things don’t turn out the way you wanted it to be, everything will be okay. Life will go on. 

However, I am sure that the future will be different. I have a great feeling inside of me that things will be different. I am sure that you and Jaehyun will end up together this time—

“Y/N!”

You look up from your letter. It’s become an instinct for you to hide the letter when you hear someone calling your name out. Standing a couple of metres away, you spot a breathless Jaehyun. 

“Jaehyun?”

He’s rushing over to you. You’re standing up to greet him until he crashes you into a tight embrace. You’re caught off guard. “Jaehyun, what are you doing here?”

He pulls away from the hug. “Shouldn’t I be asking you that? What are you doing here?”

You’re confused. Your future self just told you that you will lose touch with Jaehyun for a while. But why is he standing in front of you? 

“I—” You begin. “I got hired at a company out of town. I moved out. I’m moving into an apartment in another city—”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” He frowns. 

Huh? This is the first time your future self was wrong. Does this mean that you can disregard your future self’s seventh letter? Does this mean that you successfully rewrote your future? But your mission failed. Jaehyun’s not in love with you. What is going on?

“I figured it would be best not to tell you because I knew that you would hold me back,” you explain. “And if you held me back, I don’t think I’d ever move out.”

“But you should’ve told me. I came over to take you out for lunch only to find out that you’re moving out of town and into a new city. Do you know how sad I felt?” He frowns. 

“I’m sorry—”

“And then I started wondering why you didn’t tell me about this. I started to wonder if I did something wrong. I couldn’t think straight. I drove all the way here in hopes that I don’t miss you and that I catch you right before your ride.” He rambles on. “If I didn’t catch you on time, I wouldn’t know what to do.”

“Jaehyun—”

“I broke up with Yeona.”

“What?!” You blurt out. “Why would you do that?!”

He looks at you for a brief moment. You’re looking at him with anger. Why would he break up with her? 

“Why did you break up with her? She’s in love with you, Jaehyun! You’re supposed to propose to her—”

“Because I’m in love with you.” He breathes out. 

“Huh?”

Yeah, you’re really confused. What’s going on?

“I’m in love with you.” He lets out a nervous laugh.

“You’re in love with me?”

“I’m in love with you, stupid.”

You blink. “Jaehyun, you’re not making any sense right now. It was just weeks ago when you asked me if you should ask Yeona to marry you. It was just weeks ago when you told me that you missed her a lot. It was just weeks ago when you thought my confession was a joke—”

“On Christmas Eve, I picked you up. Yeona and I were going through a rough time in our relationship and I was starting to question if we were meant to be together. I asked and begged for a sign.”

“A sign?”

“The first snowfall. You and I were together on the night of Christmas Eve, where we both witnessed the first snowfall. You asked me if I knew what it meant,” he explains. “I thought, ‘Is this the sign I’ve been looking for?’ and then I joked around asking if you were in love with me, not expecting you to say yes. And you did. I couldn’t believe it.”

“Jaehyun—”

“And that summer where you didn’t come up to the cottage. I felt lonely even though I was with Yeona. Things just didn’t feel the same.” He lets out a shaky laugh. “Everything started to remind me of you. I just knew Yeona was annoyed about it. I kept talking about how this and that reminded me of you. It was all starting to make sense.”

“But you still had thoughts about asking her to marry you.” You say and he shakes his head. 

“I asked you for your opinion on it because I couldn’t trust my own decision. I wanted to see if you would say no. A part of me was begging you to say no.” He explains further. “But you told me that you love me and that your confession wasn’t a joke. That’s when I knew.”

“So,” you mumble. “You’re in love with me?”

“I confessed my feelings for you three times already.”

“But I want to hear it again—”

“The train is arriving in two minutes. The train is arriving in two minutes.” The speaker announces. You and Jaehyun look at each other. 

“I’m in love with you, Y/N.” He confesses again. “But do you really have to leave me here?”

“I’m in love with you too, Jaehyun.” You feel your heart doing cartwheels. “And yes, I have to go, Jaehyun. I can’t keep taking the train everyday to work.”

“Can I move in with you, then?”

“Not until you give me a kiss first—”

“How about I marry you instead?”

“Babe, I’m going to get the last box downstairs!”

You hear Jaehyun close the door as he goes downstairs to get his last move-in box. It didn’t take long for Jaehyun to make the trip to your apartment. In fact, it’s been a week since you moved in and he’s already moving in with you. 

You’re unpacking his clothes from his bags until you open one of the small pockets to see an envelope. Out of curiosity, you pull the envelope out of the pocket. 

The envelope has Jaehyun’s name written on the front in his… handwriting? You open the envelope to pull out a long letter. As you’re unfolding the letter, a soft gasp escapes your lips. 

To Jaehyun,

Don’t be alarmed. You recognize the handwriting, right? It’s because it is your handwriting. 

I am you from the future. 

You’re probably wondering how and why you’re getting this letter. Read this letter carefully because it will be a lot to take in. 

I made the biggest mistake and I need you to fix it. 

Do you remember Y/N, your childhood best friend? Y/N is your soulmate. You are destined to be with her. As I write this letter to you, I have lost almost all forms of communication with Y/N. 

I made the biggest mistake of falling in love with someone else. I fell in love with someone who I am not destined to be with. I married this person and have been married to her for three years. We had just filed for a divorce a month ago. 

I don’t want you to experience what I went through, past Jaehyun. I don’t want you to lose Y/N. I’m sure you don’t want to lose Y/N either. Y/N is everything you could ever want. 

Here are three things I need you to remember:

The moment you realize you’re in love with Y/N, you must tell her before it’s too late. 

Y/N will be moving out when you get this letter. Y/N will be moving into another city and won’t tell you. 

Y/N’s going to board the train at 4pm. You must get to her before then if you plan on confessing to her. 

Those feelings you have for Y/N? Yes, they are true and sincere. Y/N has been in love with you for the longest time. It was my biggest mistake of thinking it was a joke and letting her become the one that got away. 

“Babe, did you know there’s an ice cream parlour across the street?” You hear Jaehyun enter the apartment. 

He places the box down onto the floor and opens it up to start unpacking. You laugh to yourself, wiping away a couple of tears that flow down your cheeks. 

Who would’ve thought that future Jaehyun would be writing letters to his past self too? 

You feel relieved. 

You’ve rewritten your future. 

You’re carefully placing the letter back in its envelope and back into the pocket of his bag. You zip up the pocket and let out a sigh. 

“Really? We should probably get ice cream after we unpack your stuff.”

Don’t be a hopeless fool like me. 

You’ll regret it. Ever since I married someone else, all I’ve ever done was reminisce and regret. 

I hope you get to her on time. You must get to her on time. Or else you’ll be a little too late… again. 

She’ll be waiting. In fact, all she’s done was wait for the perfect time and moment. 

I wish you the best of luck,

Future Jaehyun.

[slightlyrebelliouswriter23]

hey so i'm hoping to get some writing advice about creative burnout? like i seem to write in fits and spurts. some months i can churn out a oneshot or chapter everyday and some months i can do one (1) creative thing only. so i'm wondering how to prevent creative burnout and how to just create more smoothly <3 thank you!

Creative Burnout & How To Ward Against It

First, I’d like to preface this all by saying you’re definitely not alone. You probably already know this, but sometimes it’s nice to be reminded.

I know from personal experience that creative burnout can leave you feeling hopeless, detached from yourself—the kind of identity crisis no one needs in 2020. 

So buckle in, folks. It’s a dosy.

I. The Symptoms

Not to be the local WebMD page here, but signs of burnout can include:

Procrastination (more than usual)

Dreading writing and feeling stuck or overly perfectionistic when you try

Physical tiredness and/or irritability

Feeling like everything is monotonous

It’s more than just writer’s block. It’s a physical and emotional exhaustion response to something that goes deeper than a simple lack of inspiration. In my experience, and from a bit of research, I’ve found that what your brain is really looking for is dopamine.

Dopamine is essentially your brain’s chemical reward system for doing something interesting or exciting to you. As someone who is diagnosed with ADHD, I have chronically low levels of dopamine, so this is a constant struggle for me—but it is absolutely made worse by creative burnout.

II. The Problem

Studies have shown that the more we do A Thing the less that thing will give us dopamine (unless a component of the activity changes regularly). This is because eventually our brains desensitise to the stimuli provided by the activity, and subsequently, we become disengaged.

But it’s not necessarily The Thing (i.e. writing) that becomes boring. Actually, more than a few factors could be at play here, and the first step to finding a solution is to identify the problem.

1. ENVIRONMENT LACKS EXCITEMENT/CHANGE—

Sometimes, the monotony of everyday life can feed creative burnout. This becomes especially applicable in quarantine when you’re not leaving your house.

What we don’t realise is that even something as small as the variables of driving to and from work, or interacting with passing coworkers, gives us dopamine. So if you have the same routine every day that does not involve any added variables, your brain will begin staunching that dopamine supply.

2. EITHER TOO EASY OR TOO CHALLENGING—

In 1975, Hungarian-American psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, coined the term “flow”, which refers to a heightened state of creativity and concentration on an activity. Csikszentmihalyi posited that if your skill level is equal to the level of challenge in any given activity, you will experience this state of flow.

The chart below is taken from Csikszentmihalyi’s own study on the subject of flow and motivation. It examines “your skill level” on the x axis in relation to the “challenge level” on the y axis.

Essentially:

Too much challenge + not enough skill = anxiety, worry (which might lead to procrastination and perfectionism)

Too much skill + not enough challenge = boredom, apathy (which might lead to monotony, irritability, and other depression-like symptoms)

Skill level = Challenge level = Flow

3. NOT ENOUGH “ACTIVE” STIMULATION—

When it comes to dopamine seeking, there is a distinct difference between active and passive stimulation in the brain.

Active stimulation is any form of activity that you have to actively engage in. For instance; exercising, doing a crossword puzzle, or reading a book. These kinds of activities not only give you dopamine, they also facilitate critical thinking and problem solving thought processes, which act as catalysts for creativity.

Passive stimulation, on the other hand, comes in the form of television, social media, and YouTube. It’s anything you can consume without having to actively engage. Passive stimulation will indeed give your brain dopamine, however, it won’t activate your creativity.

The problem also lies in the speed at which you receive the dopamine from passive activities. Passive stimulation is so easy to access that the more you consume, the harder it becomes to pick up active stimulation. Your brain expects a hit of dopamine just by picking up a phone or turning on the TV—it becomes addicted to the quick fix of a Netflix binge.

III. The Solutions

Based on the problems mentioned above, I am going to list a few solutions. Keeping in mind that not every solution will work for everyone, these can act as both preventative measures and remedies for someone who is currently burned out.

1. CHANGE UP YOUR ENVIRONMENT/ROUTINE—

Aim to do at least one thing per day that will add “variables” to the monotony. This can be as simple as going on a long walk, dressing up in that bold outfit you always wanted to wear to the office but never did, or sitting at a different workspace in your home.

Anything you can do that’s simple, but might provide an extra variable to your day to spice things up. Note: this shouldn’t be the same thing every day.

2. CHALLENGE YOURSELF MORE—

If you find yourself bored by your work, try challenging yourself more. This could mean setting goals for yourself that go a bit beyond what you’ve been doing. 

For example, if you’ve been writing 500 words per day, see if you can beat your own word count every day for the next week. If you’ve been writing mainly fluff pieces, switch it up and do an angst piece. See if you can write a book in a month, or start a blog where you don’t write fiction at all!

Anything you can do to add a little kick to your workload. Note: Beware of challenging yourself too much! This can lead straight back into burnout.

3. CHALLENGE YOURSELF LESS—

If you’re on the flip side of that coin, and find that you are anxious, procrastinating, and perfectionistic when it comes to writing, fret not. Just because you’re experiencing any of these things, doesn’t mean you’re incapable of doing the job with your skillset.

It just means your perception of the job needs to be shifted.

Procrastination, at its heart, is a fear of failure, which results in actively avoiding the negative emotions associated with the task that causes this fear. Perfectionism is a type of procrastination that is a combination of a fear of failure and a fear of success (or, more accurately, other’s critiques of your success) all at once.

Neither have anything to do with your actual skillset, but they have everything to do with your perception of your skillset. Obviously, this is a harder thing to fix, as it has to do with deeply ingrained levels of self-esteem.

What I can offer you is a tactic to trick your mind into thinking you’re capable.

If you have a task, big or small, and you are feeling overwhelmed by it (like you might go curl up in bed and scroll Tumblr), immediately break that task up into smaller tasks. Keep breaking up the smaller tasks until you have the smallest possible part of the bigger task without doing nothing.

Then do that smallest possible thing.

If your goal is to write a 2000 word one shot, a small part of that task is writing half of it. An even smaller part of that task is breaking the one shot up into “scenes” and writing one scene. For instance:

Jude wakes up to a sore throat, a runny nose, and a fever.

She tries to go to work, but Cardan, being the mother hen that he is, threatens to never make her another grilled cheese sandwich (her favourite food) ever again if she doesn’t stay home.

Jude agrees begrudgingly, and Cardan sits her down in front of the TV with a bottle of Gatorade. He leaves to go get medicine from the store.

When Cardan comes back, Jude is worse than before. He makes her soup and saltine crackers and spoon feeds her.

She complains the whole time and, in her feverish state, threatens to never buy him another bottle of wine (his favourite food) ever again if he doesn’t let her feed herself.

Each bullet point represents one “scene” of about 200-400 words each. Obviously, there will be more details that you work out as you write. But with these five smaller scenes, your goal is no longer writing the 2000 word one shot. Your goal is writing the first of the five scenes.

If you complete the smallest possible task, you can stop, and you’ll still feel like you’ve accomplished something because you can cross off that task from your list. But chances are, by the time you cross off one task, you may have inspiration enough to keep going.

4. ENGAGE IN ACTIVE STIMULATION—

Since active stimulation has been proven to turn on the creative “tap”, try incorporating more of these activities into your daily routine:

Exercise: As the resident couch potato, I hate to say that exercising is good for creativity, but it is. Even if it’s just going on a short walk, so long as you’re moving.

Reading: Sometimes you have plenty of ideas, but no words to fit those ideas. Fill your well of words by carving out an hour or two each day for reading a good book.

The Creative Process: In the writing world, the creative process is a process of about 20-30 minutes that the writer partakes in every day before they start writing. This process should be creative, but also have nothing to do with writing. You can try colouring in a colouring book, painting, organising a page in your bullet journal. Anything that is creative but does not make you think about everything you have to do that day. Think of it as creative meditation.

Listen to music: Having APD, I personally can’t listen to music while I write. However, studies have shown that if you listen to at least ten songs per day, it will significantly benefit your dopamine levels and overall mood. If you’re like me and prefer to work in silence, maybe stick on a couple songs during your creative process. If you can manage music and writing together, get out those headphones!

5. KEEP A REGULAR SCHEDULE—

I know this is the most cliche point in the book, but it’s valid. This doesn’t mean do the same thing at the same time every day over and over, because ultimately we’re looking to avoid monotony. 

But having pillars of structure to bolster the excitement can definitely work to keep you from slipping into burnout. Going to sleep, waking up, and having your meals at relatively the same time every day are good examples of this. 

Feel free to change up the things you do between breakfast and lunch, but make sure you have those pillars of consistency so your brain knows that a break is on the horizon and doesn’t get tired.

6. PACE YOURSELF—

This is particularly difficult for those of us who are coming out of a creative burnout, but I urge you to pay special attention to this one. If we are suddenly hit by inspiration and the writing is flowing and flowing and flowing, eventually we will hit the point of highest dopamine capacity for writing.

Not putting a check on the flood of inspiration coming out of a creative burnout, I’d argue, is actually a guarantee that many of us will experience burnout all over again. It becomes this vicious cycle in which we are trapped.

While it feels great to write non-stop and receive immediate validation for that work, try to limit yourself to how much you’re writing and how immediately you post your writing (if you plan on posting it).

Whenever I finish a one shot or a chapter of something, I like to allow at least one day for editing before I post. This timeframe is important, because it acts as a buffer of rest between writing marathons. 

You can take however long you need for the editing process, but definitely make sure you have a set amount of time in place. Otherwise, your brain might not have enough time to come down from what is essentially a writing high, and you will always need to reach greater heights in order to achieve that same level of dopamine.

~~~~

Overall, the most important things to take away from all of this are: 

Change up your environment

Keep your brain actively stimulated 

Have pillars of structure between which you can run about chaotically to your heart’s content

PACE YOURSELF!

Hope this helped. Happy writing!

-Em 🖤🗡

Writing Tip Masterlist

Fic Masterlist

Celebrate 2K with me!

[thanksjro]

More Than Meets the Eye #33: In Which I Write the Word ‘Quantum‘ 19 Times

Dang, I forgot what happened at the end of the last issue. It was pretty important, too, but I don’t have time to reread. Maybe the establishing shot can help me out?

Oh, that’s right, Rewind happened!

Everyone’s pretty jazzed that Rewind is here, non-exploded, and supposedly alive. Megatron carries this ridiculously small man over to a table, while Skids is busy admonishing Nightbeat for trying to put the pieces of this mystery together.

That’s one of the two first canonically, openly gay Transformers, Megatron. You bet your ass he’s important.

Nightbeat’s dragged Nautica over to look at that poster for Crosscut’s play they saw last issue. Together, they discover something interesting, and it’s not that Nightbeat’s chin has elongated to the point of absurdity. On this future ship, the play was completed and produced a mere few weeks after the initial launch of the Lost Light.

While this is going on, Rewind wakes up and asks Skids what the hell is going on. Skids, likely not wanting to poke at farm-fresh trauma, glosses over the fact that everyone on this ship was violently murdered, and that they found Rewind blacked out inside the hollowed torso of his brother-in-law.

…This is a dark story line.

You see, the joke here is that “Dark Cybertron” sucked major chrome.

Megatron reminds everyone that they’re still in grave danger every moment they stay aboard this ship, but Skids is more concerned with Rewind’s mental health. Which is sweet, but maybe not the thing to prioritize in such a precarious situation.

Rewind takes the fact that Megatron is an Autobot now pretty friggin’ well, as well as the introduction of gender into his species. That is, until Nightbeat, the king of social graces, saunters up to the scene to ask Rewind what the hell happened to the ship. He does get his answers, despite Rewind being horrified to the point of speechlessness.

Over at the hole in the wall, Nautica and Riptide are taking a gander at the quantum drums, which house the quantum foam for the quantum engines so quantum jumps can happen.

As Nautica explains the process by which quantum travel works, she realizes that the answer to what happened to everyone who disappeared was right in front of them this whole time.

Quantum, quantum, quantum- doesn’t even sound like a word anymore, does it?

The data slug Rewind made corroborates this theory, showing a series of events that definitely didn’t happen to the Lost Light we’ve been following throughout this story so far. The data slug contains this Rewind’s version of dead Rewind’s “Little Victories”, the travelogue that was never completed, where the question “are you happy?” revealed just how emotionally unhealthy most of the crew is. I’d like to imagine this Rewind’s film is called “Small Achievements”, or perhaps “Dear Fucking Lord, We’ve Been on this Trip for Three Hours and the Captain Has Been Killed by a Goddamned Soul-Vampire”, or maybe even “Where the FUCK is Our Therapist”.

The DJD came into the equation by way of someone having led them to the Lost Light. We get a flashback panel of the gorefest, in which Tarn appears to have learned how to fly, given the angle he’s coming from.

Because Rewind’s big thing in this series is being the guy who records stuff, the DJD take the opportunity to make some movies of their visit to the space yacht.

James, why do you keep getting Rewind involved with snuff films? I’m starting to get concerned.

Now, the thing about Rewind is that he’s almost always accompanied by his other half. Where is Chromedome, anyway?

He’s dead, that’s where.

Turns out, when you tell the DJD that you won’t do the thing they want you to do, they have a habit of doing nasty things in retaliation. Chromedome got stabbed in the friggin’ visor with his own finger needles, because Vos enjoys ironic deaths, I suppose. There’s some other stuff that’s implied to have happened, but we’ll get to that once we learn a little more about the DJD themselves.

While Rewind recounts the grisly tale of his husband’s demise, Riptide notes that the quantum foam has begun to spread at a remarkable rate. This is a bad thing, because that shit can and will explode, given half the chance, and this wreck is floating right above a potentially-inhabited planet.

Though I could have sworn we established that this planet was a Smartplanet, and therefore very much populated by students and staff. I don’t know. Maybe we conveniently forgot that, so we could make this a learning moment for Megatron.

Jiminy Christmas, Megs, do you even listen to yourself?

Skids, who has had a very long day of finding corpses and learning about quantum theory, snaps at Megatron, telling him that in order to actually be an Autobot, you have to have a little frickin’ compassion for those outside of your peer group.

Which is sort of contradictory to the Aequitas trials, the Killswitch debacle, the POW situation back on Cybertron, and whatever the fuck Prowl’s whole deal is, but maybe Skids is speaking about his own, personal relationship with being an Autobot. Hopefully so, otherwise he needs a class on critical thinking, STAT.

Never mind all of that though, because the problem just got a lot worse- the quantum foam has expanded to a point where any holes in the stuff are too small for the Rod Pod to get through. We’re going to have to get creative if we want to save the day.

Luckily, we’ve got a quantum duplicate of just about the tiniest little dude in the franchise here to do the job. Now we just need another, equally tiny little man, so the quantum drums can be shut off at the same time. Nautica commits more microaggressions, and this gives Getaway inspiration for a witty quip, which in turn gives Skids a brilliant idea.

The gang heads down to Brainstorm’s lab, to look for the mass displacement gun that was used for treating Ultra Magnus’s nanocon infestation back in the 2012 Annual. While they search, Nautica explains just why the hell the Lost Light disappeared in the first place. You see, quantum duplication acts on the Cain Instinct— it’s fine, as long as the duplicates don’t perceive each other. However, the moment contact is made, it says “oh man, guess I’m gonna have to end you” to one of the duplicates. The contact in this case happened when the Coffin Rodimus was brought aboard the ship.

Anything that wasn’t aboard the Lost Light at the point of the takeoff/explosion was never duplicated, and thus wasn’t erased from reality once shit started going to hell. This is why the Rod Pod is still around, and why the remaining cast are— well, the remaining cast.

While this conversation is going on, Nautica and Nightbeat uncover yet another dead body; it’s Brainstorm, and he’s a little underdressed.

…Someone run a paternity test, I think Cyclonus might be the father.

Also, Brainstorm’s a double agent.

Fucked up.

Getaway is furious that a Decepticon has been living on the same ship as him for the last six months, right under his proverbial nose. Even Megatron’s surprised, stating that Brainstorm isn’t usually who the recruiters aim for.

So, no mass displacement gun, and now they’re aware of the fact that there’s a traitor on the ship who’s had access to a LOT of weapon tech. It’s at this point that Megatron decides to stop lying by omission and tells everyone that he can mass-displace, since he used to turn into a handgun.

Smashcut to Megatron and Rewind floating out in space, the former now not much taller than the latter, as they traverse the web of quantum foam to get to the drums. Nautica instructs them from the Rod Pod. If this works, anything produced or connected to the quantum engine will be neutralized, and maybe we’ll even get the other Lost Light back! YAAAAAY!!!

Y’all really let this man go out there to fuckin’ kill himself for the greater good, didn’t you?

Rewind is honestly pretty chill with ceasing to be, seeing as he watched 200/+ people die today, including his long-time spouse.

Jesus. I’d say get him a therapist, but in order to do that, we’re going to have to wipe him off the map anyway.

Rewind asks Megatron if the Chromedome that isn’t his and his duplicate are still together. And I mean…

Luckily, Megatron has the good sense to lie.

With that, they flip the switches, and deactivate the drums.

And that’s a series wrap on Rewind! Congrats to Mr. James Roberts for the esteemed honor of burying the same gay twice!

Later on, everyone is back inside the Rod Pod, as their disappeared shipmates return from being nonexistent. Chromedome pops back in, and Skids is on him like a shark, telling him to go on the roof. Skids doesn’t even try to explain why. Which, fair. How the hell do you explain to someone that their dead husband’s quantum duplicate survived both a terrorist splinter cell attack, and the laws of quantum sci-fi bullshit crashing down on his tiny, tiny body, and that he’s right there on the roof waiting for them?

Welp, there goes the Chromedome/Dominus endgame. Shame, that.

Looks like Chromedome finally hit the threshold for having earned Roberts’ pity, and won’t be directly targeted by the plot for a little while. This isn’t something you see very often, so let’s really soak this in.

…Someone had to have told Rewind what happened to the other Rewind, right? I wonder what that conversation was like.

Back inside the ship, Blaster gets word that the Lost Light has reappeared. As they navigate towards it, Megatron requests that an encrypted call be made to Rodimus, to discuss the Brainstorm problem.

In the interim, Ravage is offered the opportunity to be a part of the crew, so he doesn’t have to keep skulking around in the shadows. We don’t get an answer from him, as our focus shifts over to Nightbeat and Nautica.

Nightbeaaaaaaaaaat, stop stating the themes of the comic verbatim! People are going to start thinking you’re a shonen anime protagonist!

Nightbeat’s somehow managed to keep ahold of the briefcase that they found on the other Lost Light. Unless Brainstorm’s boyfriend is in there, I don’t think this one was the work of Huey Lewis and the News’ hit single from the Back to the Future soundtrack.

Over on the Lost Light, specifically in Swerve’s, Brainstorm’s making his way through the crowd, briefcase held gentle like hamburger as he goes. He makes it to the bar, where Atomizer tells him he can’t have his briefcase in here. Brainstorm has what most would accept to be a healthy response to being told “no.”

It’s what I would do.

[dailyniallnews]

Niall Horan: Live at The Royal Albert Hall

While some may argue that too few artists have done their bit to raise awareness for the people of the music industry who since March 2020 have been forced to stop practicing their profession, one artist who has stepped up to the plate is singer-songwriter and former One Direction star, Niall Horan. Joining forces with the crew-led organisation, We Need Crew, on 7 November 2020, the singer welcomed fans from around the globe to bear witness to a one-off performance from the eerily empty Royal Albert Hall, with all profits going to his touring family and technical entertainment charity, Backup.

In the lead up to the livestream, Horan could be found on almost every television network, promoting the show and explaining why the performance required the attention of all music lovers. In his own words: “I’m putting on this gig to raise awareness of the immense value they bring to an industry enjoyed by so many and do something to help them and their families. I ask all my fans to support them with me and buy a ticket if you can, and I encourage all artists to do the same.”

With several weeks passing since both artist and crew took over the RAH, TPi caught up with the crew behind the project and to get their thoughts on this very special event.

PRODUCTION ORIGINS…

“I remember it was a Monday morning when I got the call from Karen [Ringland] and Alice [Martin], who explained the concept of We Need Crew,” reminisced Ant Carr, Head of Production for Modest! Management. Both founders of We Need Crew explained to Carr that the goal of We Need Crew is, in association with #WeMakeEvents, to raise money for touring professionals who have fallen on hard times due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“What really appealed about their organisation was that it was created by crew, for crew,” Carr said. “Around the same time, I was having conversations with Niall, who had already seen a few peers doing livestream performances, and we discussed the idea of performing in an iconic venue to raise awareness for the plight of the industry.”

With these two conversions in mind, Carr began to pull the pieces of would become Horan’s streamed performance together, as well as a big launch for the We Need Crew campaign. Carr and the rest of the Modest! team got to work reforming his touring family, whose album cycle had been stopped prematurely in March 2020.

“We were in LA when everything began shutting down,” stated Carr, who explained how he and the rest of the crew were in their last few weeks of promo before heading into rehearsals for Horan’s world tour. “We were finishing up a week on James Corden when the announcement came that the borders were due to be shut, so we all had to head back to the UK pretty quickly.”

After several months with no work, both Carr and the rest of the crew were all enthusiastic about getting back together to put on a very special performance. “In many ways, it was like we had never been away,” explained Production Manager, Andy Colby. “There was a part of me that thought it might have been a bit strange with it being so long since we worked together, but 30 minutes into the first rehearsal at SW19, it was like we had just got off the plane from LA.”

Colby was one of many familiar faces from Horan’s touring family who got the call to help with the livestream, alongside several technical suppliers including Wigwam and midnight:lights. KB Event provided a Megacube Artic for rehearsals in SW19 along with a Tech Kit for the show, oversaw by Lead Driver, Steve Crawley. Pulse Films and promoter, Driift were brought into the fold to make the event a reality.

In total, some 127,000 tickets for the performance were sold to 151 countries. “The response we had from fans was fantastic,” enthused Carr. “The funds raised are going to be able to help a good number of touring crew and their families and we kept this in the forefront of our mind in all aspects of the show.”

Carr was also quick to complement the attitude of the man in front of the camera. “Niall was very involved in every step of the process. He really gained a full grasp of the situation and during the promotion of the show, he really wanted to educate the public, and his fanbase, about what was going on in the sector.”

SETTING THE STAGE…

A few weeks from the broadcast date, a small group visited the Royal Albert Hall to make a start on planning how the show would come together. Lighting and Show Designer, Emma Bull and Director, Paul Dugdale led the creative vision. The livestream began with Horan performing a song on the piano on the venue’s stage, before walking down to the centre of the room to play the rest of the show in 360° in the centre of the hall. A top priority for the visual team was putting both Niall and the venue in the spotlight.

Bull elaborated: “Although several dance shows utilise the centre of the room, Paul’s Dugdale’s suggestion to do this for a music act felt fresh and was a strong starting point for the design,” she noted. “Having Niall and the band in the centre gave us a few options to really show off the building and take advantage of the fact the whole space was empty.”

One of her design ideas to make use of the space was to fill the empty boxes of the hall with lights. “It really ‘shined a light’ on the fact that there was nobody in the space,” she commented.

Aiding her in both the programming and running the show was Richard White of midnight:lights. “In total, we built 114 bespoke plinths for the audience boxes,” he stated. “On these sat a combination of Robe LED Beam 150s and Robe Spiiders.” The arrangement of these fixtures and boxes created a 360° backdrop of the central stage, with fixtures focussed into the room as well as back on themselves to flood the boxes.

The other key lighting elements included three Robe BMFL Robospots for keylight, which were placed in the venue’s gallery level. “We kept most of the control of these at the console with it being a 360° shoot,” stated White. “We were then able to shift the keylight/backlight across the fixtures as the camera tracked.” Around the central stage, the lighting team deployed SGM Q2s to provide some glowing footlights, along with Litepanel Gemini Softlights for Niall’s microphone position. “From the beginning, I knew I didn’t want there to be any rigging or trussing in the shot,” explained Bull. “We didn’t want anything to distract from the key elements of the shot – Niall and venue – to produce a clean look.” This is also why the visual department moved away from the idea of a backdrop and instead showed off the immensity of the famed venue.

Aiding both Bull and White in their endeavours was Lighting Programmer, Dan Young. In the lead up to the show, both Young and White spent several days in the previs suite at midnight:lights using Syncronorm Depence² to plan the show. “I have worked with both Dan and Richard several times and they have a great understanding of my aesthetic,” praised Bull. “I like things to be quite static in terms of colour palette with refined looks.” During the show, White oversaw the key lighting with Young programming all the moves. This gave Bull the freedom to act as a go-between between both the lighting and the stage to ensure the integrity of the design for the broadcast.

“The main challenge for this show was to provide consistent lighting over the different shooting styles,” mused White. “On one hand, we needed to have soft beauty lighting for close-up shots and steadycam work, but we also needed to make sure that the stage was physically as clear as possible for all the wide room shots and overhead wire-cam.” To add a level of accuracy, most of the live show was programmed to timecode because the visual team were situated outside of the room during the shoot.

LIGHTS, CAMERA, LIVESTREAM…

Jim Parsons was brought in by Pulse Films to assume the role of Producer. “By the time I got involved, the concept had already been fairly well developed by Emma Bull and Paul Dugdale,” Parsons began. “From my side, it was a case of getting all the video and visual elements and working out some of logistics of how we’d get the event to the finish line.”

Parsons has collaborated with Horan several times over the years. “The fact he came from the TV world means he has much more of a grasp than many of his peers of what goes into this style of performance and how to connect with fans through a camera,” he enthused.

Speaking a few weeks after the event took place, Parsons reflected on what he and the team achieved with the livestream. “We always knew we had an opportunity to do something different with this show,” he commented. “The end resulted was big and beautiful, but it was still ‘live’.  It had the feel of a real show and didn’t come across prescriptive or dull.”

Parsons went on to describe the collaboration between himself and Driift, having worked together several times during 2020 on shows for Kylie Minogue and Sleaford Mods. “Ric Salmon and the rest of the Driift team are the kind of broadcasters I really like collaborating with in that they just let you get on with your work,” stated Parsons plainly. “They were obviously interested in the initial conversations and in the creative, but once it was all in place, they left us to it.”

Driift CEO, Ric Salmon offered his two cents on the project. “The fact that Niall ended up selling 127,000 tickets for the event is such a huge achievement, made all the better as it was all for such an amazing cause,” he stated. Unsurprisingly, 2020 was a busy year for Driift as the company offered livestreaming solutions for several artists. “There are almost too many benefits with this format of show,” stated Salmons while discussing the progression of livestreaming solutions that have only expanded in the past few years. “As we move forward, I think you’ll find more people opting for this style of event over, say, music videos,”

Parsons described what it was like working in the RAH. “It’s a beautiful venue, but we have all seen it thousands of times and there’s no denying that making it look different is quite a challenge. So, hats have to go off to the visual team for making this livestream look so unique.”

A Luna Remote System Junior 5 Telescopic remote compact dolly on a circular track along with a Dactylcam Pro point-to-point wire camera system captured the magic of the livestream. The spanned the periphery of central stage to present virtual audiences with a 360° view.

Camera Supervisor and joint Owner of Luna Remote Systems, Dean Clish discussed what it meant to be involved in such a prestigious show. “It was an honour to be involved in Niall’s show,” he commented. “It was for such a great cause and it’s always good to be in the Royal Albert Hall – you can’t go wrong with such a beautiful location.”

He continued to discuss why the camera selection was ideal for this type of performance. “The Junior 5 and the Dactylcam Pro are perfect for this kind of shoot because of the need to socially distance and, of course, with this sort of intimate production, they are both really unobtrusive and discreet systems,” he explained. “We’ve rigged the Dactylcam in the Royal Albert Hall before. It’s a brilliant system to use in there as you can really capture the essence of the hall from a height, in flight, in a way that you can’t with static systems.”

SOUNDING OUT…

The production brought back the audio double act of FOH Engineer, Matthew Kettle and Monitor Engineer, Joe Campbell to oversee the mix for the livestream and the band on stage. Having started working with Horan on his first solo album cycle, Kettle gave an overview of his time with the artist. “I didn’t really know what to expect before I’d heard the debut record and, as I was more known for working with rock music, I wasn’t sure I’d be the right fit,” he commented. However, with Horan’s solo music citing influences including Fleetwood Mac and Bruce Springsteen, the Engineer explained how it had been a fruitful partnership over the past three years. “Niall is really quite involved with the audio production and often during rehearsals will listen to the mixes to get a feel of what is being produced.”

Having been put on a hiatus since the tour’s cancellation in March, Kettle described what it was like to pull the pieces back together for the tour. “It’s really quite a different process producing a mix for a livestream compared to a live show,” he mused. “I have always had massive respect for broadcast engineers as it is such a different craft. When you’re mixing live in a venue, if anything goes wrong, you can fix it for the next performance. However, with a broadcast, everything is under much more of a microscope and under a great deal of scrutiny. Not only that, but you only have one shot at a show.”

Kettle explained that once he and the team entered rehearsals, they soon found their rhythm. “The approach to mixing was not too dissimilar to what we had already been working on for the tour. Just like the visual department, we didn’t want the production to be too flashy, aiming to simply reflect the intimacy of the performance without too much embellishment,” he commented.

For this reason, both Kettle and Campbell virtually replicated their audio setups they had planned to use for the world tour, featuring two DiGiCo SD5 consoles for monitors and FOH, along with Shure Axient Handhelds with Sennheiser 2000 Series IEMs, d&b audiotechnik wedges and a V-Series for side fills.

The console setup was not significantly different from the touring configuration, with multiple inputs from various SD-Racks in different parts of the stage and performance areas going to the broadcast SD5, all connected by an Opticore loop and shared with Campbell’s SD5 in monitor world. “The SD5 is my favourite console in the world,” said Campbell. “I love it and, because DiGiCo products are well proven and rock solid reliable, we rarely have to include them directly in what we do.” Cambpell was initially concerned in the lead up to the show, having not touched a desk since March. “Thankfully, Wigwam had kept the desks in pristine condition – so much so that our show files were even still loaded on the desk from the tour. This saved a great deal of time in rehearsals and certainly made it easier to get back into the saddle.”

Campbell was keen to replicate the same stage setup for Niall and the band. “During the tour, although he uses IEMs, I still have a wedge and side fills just in case he wants to take out his ears to hear the crowd,” he explained. “Even though it was a livestream with no audience, I wanted the show to feel as familiar as possible for him and the band.”

Despite a relatively “meat and potatoes” band setup, Campbell had just under 100 inputs on his desk – the result of several reverb returns and an elaborate talkback system. “Each one of the band members have a talkback mic so throughout the performance they can talk to one another and me,” he noted.

Meanwhile, Kettle’s ‘FOH’ position was slightly further away, setting up in a corridor off from the main hall. “Wigwam prepared an acoustic treatment kit so I sat at the desk with several studio monitors to mix the show and then sent my audio feed to the Pulse team,” stated Kettle. “Before going into the RAH, I was concerned with how the room would react with no audience in there to dampen the sound, but from the first sound check it sounded fantastic.”

Discussing Wigwam’s involvement with the project, Tom Bush commented: “We were all extremely proud to be supplying Niall’s livestream, especially as it was addressing the We Need Crew and #WeMakeEvents funds and highlighting what goes into putting on a production with the unseen and behind-the-scenes rolls.”

Bush went on to explain the approach to this type of performance: “A slightly different thought process can be needed – the standard positions for mixing, for example. The package wasn’t too dissimilar to the one we had ready for the world tour, so we had a good starting point. A few additions and tweaks were needed to adhere to the show setup, but Matt and Joe’s attention to detail made sure the process was smooth. The need for trucks full of PA hasn’t been required yet, but soon hopefully. We currently have a few livestreams pencilled in that we’re all looking forward to.”

#WENEEDCREW…

Looking back at the slew of 2020 livestreamed performances, Niall Horan stands out among the crowd, not only for its aesthetic, but because of everything it represented – not to mention the sizeable pot of funds it raised for the live events industry.

As we enter a new year with the live events sector entrenched in the clutches of the COVID-19 pandemic, the hope is that more musicians will follow in Horan’s footsteps to shine the spotlight on hardworking crew members that are so often out of sight and mind to the average live music lover. In the meantime, more information regarding the We Need Crew initiative can be found on www.weneedcrew.co.uk

[hms-no-fun]

The new interlude was pretty intense, and I wasn’t sure if I followed along with the sequence of events perfectly, especially in the second half. I’m mainly wondering what exactly happened, and also how things could have changed so drastically between them? I’m not sure how much time had passed in between then and their last meeting, but it seems like the way they do things has turned to be more of an exclusively violent thing rather than violence with emotional processing alongside it.

i’m not going to spell out what exactly happened, especially in the latter half. i suggest slowly rereading this fic with an eye towards physicality and symbolism, keeping in mind Dana’s classpect and how we’ve seen her use it in the past. consider, as well, the introductory note’s use of the phrase “aggressively canonical” and what that might imply. this isn’t a huge ask imo considering “stomach” is a measly 3,994 words long, compared to the nearly 40,000 words contained in just one of chapter 8’s many fingers. there are more answers present within the text than you might expect, but you’ve got to put the pieces together yourself. failing that, there’s always the godfeels fan server...

but now to the meat of your question, which i very much do want to talk about at excruciating length (after the break).

this interlude is a lot of things. one of them is an experiment.

other writers besides me have contributed to godfeels before (Taz with Dirk dialogue in ch8 acts 2 and 3, Julia with the Dana v Silverbark fight in act 4), but interlude 3 is the first entry in the series that was primarily written by someone else. not only that, but it’s also the first real glimpse we get into the narrative universe that is likely to become a major focus of our attention in the near future. as much as i talk big about throwing my ego in the trash for collaborations, i have to admit that this was a bit scary for me! and not just in the sense that godfeels is my baby or whatever. you don’t need to look very long to find examples of indie projects like this utterly destroyed when their overly-precious creators decide to throw their collaborators under the bus for the sake of their sacred vision (money).

i don’t want to be that guy. i’ve been personally fucked over by different versions of that guy multiple times in just the last few years, and it terrifies me that i was blindsided every time. i’m terrified that i’ll take every precaution and still wind up becoming that guy somehow. i hate creative dictators. i hate that our primary cultural definition of collaboration still paradoxically hinges on one or two people being the head of the dragon. i don’t want to be the head of anything, i just want to make cool shit with my friends.

HOWEVER. the fact remains that i’ve written nearly 400,000 words of this fucking thing largely on my lonesome. there’s a lot that only i am privy to, and not just in plot terms. so the big test for us was, how do i as ~the director~ ensure that the text is true to canon, in character, and just generally up to my arbitrary standards of aesthetic consistency, without compromising the primary author’s work? this was a big learning experience and involved several long conversations about... well, basically everything i just said.

thing is, everyone in the work server has their own little section of godfeels they tend to gravitate towards, and Julia's been laser focused on Dana and Lenore pretty much since the day i invited her on board. i can't remember the exact chain of events that got us here, but iirc Julia started writing this interlude on her own, i liked it enough to suggest we should work together to make it canon, and she agreed. she finished the first draft maybe a month and a half ago, and from there we talked very openly about how we wanted to collaborate, what we were willing to budge on, what we weren’t, that sort of thing. where we eventually landed was that she reserved the right to reject any of my suggestions on the prose while giving me a lot of latitude to influence dialogue. i added/modified a few lines in the first half, but for the most part it’s all Julia. my big contribution was the final sequence, which Julia improved in several key ways.

i won’t linger on this process talk for much longer, but i think the most fun part of writing this for me was seeing which of my suggestions Julia rejected. i would comment on a single line of narration with a paragraph of thoughts, and she’d reject them... but also find ways to incorporate bits and pieces of my thoughts elsewhere in the text? this was what ultimately eased my mind about this process, because it didn’t matter so much to me whether or not she fixed any given line as long as we both knew that the ambiguity was a choice she was making.

ANYWAY, it made sense for this specific interlude (which features two 29 year old characters we’ve only just met) to have a completely different authorial voice from prior interludes. it even comes down to the title: “penny in a bed of flowers” and “eyes like violet fire” have this poetic energy to them that’s utterly absent in interlude 3’s “stomach.” the dreamy naivety of the young twenty-something giving way to the base bodily functions of actual genuine adults who’ve lived, er, shall we say colorful lives.

(one similarity between all the interludes is that they are fundamentally fanfiction. it just so happens that interlude 3 is fanfic for a canon that doesn’t exist yet :)

the first two interludes were soft, warm, primarily positive sexual experiences. i wanted them to typify some of the beauty of transfeminine sexuality, as a refuge from the pressing danger and trauma of 2.3. interlude 3, by contrast, looks at two transfems who’ve been in an on-again off-again relationship for over a decade. on top of that, this is their first private reunion after Lenore sold Dana and the other upsilons up the river three years ago. there’s a lot going on between them, most of which goes unspoken. we’re eavesdroppers here, there’s no way they’re gonna take the time to contextualize what they’re doing when it’s just the two of them.

which gets us to what i’ve been building up to all along. i want to single out this specific bit from your question, anon:

“it seems like the way they do things has turned to be more of an exclusively violent thing rather than violence with emotional processing alongside it.”

i’ll start by observing that we’ve never seen Dana and Lenore alone together until this fic, and i don’t think i’ve ever met a couple that behaves the same in public as they do in private.

it’s true that their relationship involves a lot of physical violence, but is it exclusively violent? does it really seem like there’s no emotional processing going on in this scene? from where i’m sitting, this scene is nothing BUT emotional processing. the difference is that there’s no resolution. and why would there be? it’s not like Lenore called Dana a bitch on twitter dot com (although she definitely has done that). whatever the nature of her betrayal, it led to Edie and Alphi disappearing, and Dana being banished to starve and go mad all alone on a meteor for THREE YEARS. there’s no cathartic conversation that’s gonna paper over that, especially not on the first night they’re together again. you could draw a parallel here to Dare’s many epiphanies not actually curing their depression if you liked. one might even call it “a theme.”

before i say more, Julia has some things to add:

I am a fan of metanarrative fuckery–for example, I love how Terezi's narration in the latest chapters refuses to turn inwardly, and that refusal collapses as her stress mounts. That being said, I unfortunately just have the one narrative method: I like unreliable PoVs that deny the audience information the character in question wouldn't be thinking about. Dana won't stop doing things to think about the decade-long depths of the relationship Lenore betrayed. This is her life, these are her actions. You, as reader, can but take them as they come.

If I wanted to give myself more credit than's due, I would claim that this also reflects the nature of Dana (and co.) as an internal narrative. She's older, she's more resentful, she's just come out of a situation she spent 3 years coldly simmering about, and it went worse than she expected in some ways (she didn't get to ether Silverbark), but shockingly better in others (she got the Comet and Lenore back). Crucially, Dana is trained for violence, so she's not given to these Egbertian windbag breakdowns that give away the entirety of her thoughts as a response to sudden violence–she just stances up, and acts. She's been doing it for a long time, she's good at it and she likes it enough to be a weakness.

jumping off from that, the thing to understand is that Dana is a fighter. not just someone who likes to fight but a trained, highly skilled grappler who Silverbark at one point thought of as “her finest mentee.” just from the text of this interlude alone, it’s safe to assume that Dana and Lenore have fought each other many times in the past. there’s even this snippet of a memory in the last section where Dana seems to willingly, covertly lose to Lenore for sex reasons:

(idk why i censored the words “fucks” and “orgasm” in this screenshot)

Lenore is less technically skilled than Dana, but she makes up for it by being extremely strong and durable (those troll muscles, baby). if i were to make a Lenore kin onion, Jessica Jones would be pretty close to the center. so they have this back and forth where Dana can just fucking unload on Lenore without causing any real lasting damage. and it shouldn’t go unstated that fighting and sex are basically the same activity!

Lenore says of their relationship that “we like it this way.” they both trained together in the EWL, and despite their differences and the bumpy lives they’ve led they still always wind up back together somehow. i would not call this a healthy dynamic per se, but these are fucked up women who grew up in what seems to have been a deeply ideological paramilitary organization. “healthy” is a luxury for women like these. and whatever you might think of it from the outside, they clearly enjoy it- or, at least, there was a time when they enjoyed it.

this encounter feels to me like muscle memory. the children have been put to bed, medical emergencies are taken care of, now is the time to drink and catch up. what they want, the two of them, is to have what they had, i think. they both know they have to address the shadow hanging over them at some point, but not tonight. tonight is for them. and like, yeah, of course they’d think that was possible. Dana’s been an unwilling bachelor for ages now, and Lenore? i can’t imagine she’s had much free time with her job running support for a high-ranking ewl member. maybe a few one-night stands here and there? but nothing satisfying in the long-term. throughout chapter 8, before their reunion, we’ve seen both Lenore and Dana independently wishing the other were there, despite everything between them. they’re lonely and they want to fuck each other, because they are each other’s best fuck. the entire ritual is so rehearsed, so known, so comfortable start to finish.

but of course, that shadow is just too loomy not to infect that ritual. you think they’d say shit like “i’m fine” and “i’m not mad” if they really meant it? they’re spells to ward off the inevitable and possibly relationship-shattering tension between them. these two already seemed to have something of a kismesissitude going, though i hesitate to simplify their thing (or any pair’s “thing” in godfeels, for that matter) in such basic terms, because they genuinely love each other. we can debate what kind of love it is, but if nothing else it’s pretty clear that that love has endured a LOT. they value that endurance, i think.

Dana and Lenore have been through too much together to escape their mutual orbit. Lenore thought she could, and Dana wished she could, but here they are again, back at it same as always. is it healthy? is it too violent? is it bad? i honestly don’t know. what i like about them is that they can be mad at each other, hate each other even, but still know deep down that no one else gets it the way they do. they’re rivals to lovers to enemies and back again because they’re too stubborn to really, truly let go. they’d never want to. that’s what makes it hurt all the more, one of many reasons they can’t just paper over this betrayal with a cathartic bout of a hatesex, that Dana knows she can’t let Lenore out of her life again. she knew it the instant she saw her step out of the Comet. so it’s this contradiction that can’t be resolved, not when both parties are so proud, and it manifests in this passionate anger, this desire to love and devour, to punish and protect, until they tucker themselves out and wind up just feeling empty inside, because again, the core contradiction hasn’t been resolved. it's beautiful and terrible all at once and buddy if that ain't godfeels from toe to tip

[theowlhouseheadcanons]

So what are the Beta's personalities? I don't think there is a guide. All I know is Luz is a Bustard, Amity is pure bred bitch and Willow is S M U G.

Okay, I have two options: do you want the detailed, serious answer or the over-simplified, stupidish answer? Choose wisely.

Painfully detailed:

All we “canonically” know about them, apart from the designs, is their heavier approach to darker, maybe punk/goth vibes - a lead to all the content the fandom produced so far, creating all kinds of creative views about their characters.

If we take a look to Dana´s unrelated artworks, it's a mix of grim bizarrice with mundane and/or wholesome character remarks that makes the odd creations seem… relatable and emphatic, or at least curious enough to make you crook your neck in contemplation. There is also this faint feeling of madness and gloom (with different variations depending on the piece), but they all seem consistent within the big picture.

Overall, they appeal for complexity, and this is where I think the Betas stand - with deep roots on dark humor too. So, after making this boastful analysis of Dana´s art that nobody asked for, let's get to them.

Amity:

As her canon version, she's a character with layers (and masks, depending on the company she might be bearing at the time).

At first impression, she might seems cold and uninterested, with sarcasm being her favorite tool in conversation; Amity makes the effort to keep most people around her at distance to avoid creating unnecessary attachments, so she´ll come off as rude and selfish - but if you hang around enough or prove you have some guts and values, she might take a liking; And once you become friends, you´ll never meet someone more loyal;

She doesn't mind breaking rules – especially her mother's rules – for the sake of entertainment and for helping her friends. She's a fan of pranks and deception, but do not mistake her impetus for recklessness: Amity plays clever to guarantee he reputation remains intact for the right people (leaving the ones who knows her true ways crawling under their skin (enemies) or smirking at her (friends));

She's not one who easily share personal information, reserving her deeper feelings and worries to a scarce number of people;

She won't back down from discussions, and if she feels like something or someone is crossing any lines of her (surprisingly existing) "moral code" she won't leave it alone until she gives a final word on it (besides, she loves the taste of victory, and hate when the ones she cares get hurt in any sense); She fights with words that hit exactly on people's weak spots, but if she's irritated enough she might put her destructive magic to some use (as a threat);

In school, her notes are good (although she can easily make them better if she just puts in the effort) and if the teachers don't insist on pushing some expected behavior towards her, and instead work with her “flexible learning process”, she won't bother. Actually, if she takes interest in the class, she´ll deepen discussions with interesting topics and good criticism, making teachers raise their eyebrows on her competence. But, if for some reason the schoolmaster gets on a tight spot with Amity, she´ll make sure every minute of their class feels a bit closer to hell :)

(One might imagine how polemic Beta Amity must be among the faculty)

When she's not idly hanging with Boscha and the girls, she can be spotted sauntering alone in the corridors, wearing the portrait of Boredom on her face that keeps most people at distance. The only individual that doesn´t appear to be affected by her subtle threatening aurea is Willow: as anything odd and potentially entertaining, Willow conquered Amity´s attention enough to mold a friendship with her. They work pretty well together, with Willow´s centred personality balancing off Amity's fiery behavior. Hanging out with Willow feels both relaxing and exciting, as she never knows what new “job” her friend might be up to - and she's always down to tag along on her quests;

Willow:

Willow is an intriguing kid – and I'm not talking about her dubious choice of fashion or her ability to keep a poker face to everything and everyone while absorbing more details and information than anyone in the room – everyone that knows her agrees with that definition. And everyone knows her; Why? Well...

Her irreducible dedication and unbiased expertise in the bizarre and all sorts of knowledge makes her a handy option for those who need to get some job done and they don't know who else to call. Her almost obsessive curiosity for everything keeps her constantly busy with some experiment, project or investigation;

She displays the minimum respect to people around her and seems genuinely unbothered by social dramas and average teen stuff; Interacting with Willow might feel awkward or incredibly interesting as she has the habit of infodumping and calling attention to random details in the environment (and you'll never know what's going on her mind); ~Her humor is a little morbid too~

She's the kind of person you can hang out alot but if you put some thought on it you'll get shocked how little you know about them – Willow doesn't have a problem with sharing, but she'll only do when requested;

And besides, she rather have the company of plants and herself (a fact she more show than tell), because neither of them will delay her plans or interrupt them with spontaneous cases of *looks down on notes* needing help; (but don't worry, if she's your friend, she will help)

Willow will defy rules only if she knows there won't be bad consequences for her and her "partners in crime" – and she might not share that part with them sometimes so they won't get comfortable enough to mess up;

Luz:

The main common thing between Beta and Canon Luz is their contagious energy and righteous mind: they're always ready to have a good time while being able to help someone; The main difference, I guess, is that Beta Luz has a more flexible moral on methods she might use to do "good";

She never skips the calls for adventure, even the ones that presents potential dangers (which she generally doesn't take note until it's too late) making her a magnet for trouble;

Her friends are so used to her shenanigans that Luz doesn't need more than a look to have them sighing "what have you done this time?"

She's a sporty girl, but also a lover of video games and anime and trying new stuff – which once again, might be a call for danger;

She's friendly but can't help her passive aggressive humor, which can gets sharp depending on her mood; Aggression and offences are a last case resource, unless we're talking about bad guys; She might be down to break rules if it is necessary for doing good, but overall she rather leave law undisturbed; She doesn't mind taking "alternative" ways to achieve her goals, but she draws a line on cheating – and that buys her some heated discussions with Amity;

Luz swears she tries to not get involved in people's business but she never thinks twice before calling people out when they're being unnecessarily bad or rude. Actually, she has the habit of acting before thinking – the main pillar of her troublemaker reputation;

With all that, one might think she's reckless and slow in catching things up – which is not a lie, but that doesn't mean she can't be responsible: she always keep her promises and is committed to following deadlines and conditions – and I'm not sure if this is the place to add, but she's pretty good with children! For Amity's amusement

In sum (simple version):

[felassan]

Highlights and insights from the MELE launch cast & crew reunion panel

[rewatch link] [highlights & insights from the N7 Day 2020 reunion]

In case a text format is better for anyone (in terms of accessibility for example). Cut for length.

Some paraphrasing.

If anyone’s interested in just the line-reading session, it starts at timestamp ~1:04:45.

In addition to the cast and crew from the N7 Day reunion, at this reunion also in attendance were: 

Mac Walters (Project Director for MELE, Lead Writer of the og MET)

Melanie Faulknor (Lead Producer for MELE)

Crystal McCord (Producer for MELE)

Fred Tatasciore (Saren)

Seth Green (Joker)

Kimberly Brooks (Ash)

Ash Sroka (Tali)

This was the biggest reunion / meetup of the cast so far, and some of the cast and crew were meeting for the first time here.

It’s been so long since the og MET that PW & KW are getting to watch their kids experience playing it for the first time

JHale doesn’t play but since MELE she’s been sneaking around Twitch jumping into peoples’ MELE livestreams to lurk, watch and comment a bit

What drew Seth to the character of Joker? The whole concept of the game. He likes games and MET’s mechanics (different trees of adventure, stacking reputation, choices carrying between games) at the time were the most sophisticated that he’d ever heard pitched. He thought this was new and exciting and wanted to be a part of it. For the character they cast him based on his personality traits (i.e. he sounds quite similar to Joker personality-wise)

Would Seth ever want to play Joker again if the opportunity presented itself? Sure, he loves the character, and if the writers ever had more things to explore/expand with Joker he’d be down for it. 

Seth said that it’s a different kind of fan that approach him about this project. The fans have spent many many hours in an intimate exchange with “him” that he hasn’t been a part of, but they experienced it nonetheless. “I’ve hugged a lot of strangers, you know what I’m saying? It’s great, you get an interaction with fans that you never get as a performer in any other experience”

Seth has been a space guy since he was little, it inspires him

With the state of the world the way it is now [covid, masks etc], does Ash think Tali’s story will be more impactful now than it was before? Ash hopes so, and that anything they do here will have a positive impact on a bigger level. Ultimately that’s why most of them do what they do, they want to reach people in deep ways. She hopes Tali is an inspiration in courage, bravery, standing up for what’s right and thinking about the greater good

The [MELE I think] dev team had a last team meeting with Greg Zeschuk, one of the founders of BioWare, who they had invited to it. He was regaling them with stories of the inception of Mass Effect. “You would imagine this sort of well-laid out, drawing boards everywhere... [but] it was basically just a napkin sketch in a Greek taverna with him and Casey going ‘We wanna do a space opera’, and then it took off”

The process of creating lore through development is very organic. A lot of it comes from character and story development. It builds up over the course of the game’s development. They did the codex entries at the end, the idea being that if they saved them for as late as they could, then they could pull from the story, characters and meaningful moments, and build them from there

PW wrote a bunch of the codex entries, elevator banter & lots of little bits of lore. They describe their time on the og MET as being a “baby writer”. They originally came in after Mac had back surgery and a junior writer was needed to fill in. “It was really fun, it was us sitting in a room together going ‘What do you think a hanar or a krogan thinks about this or that’?” For a first project for them this was an amazing experience - the world building itself creatively with all these awesome people

They tried to add multiplayer in every game but only got it to work in ME3

They had a lot of plots laid out in ME1 that they called “global plots”. These were outside the core critical path and would take players from planet to planet, and were sprawling stories. They pulled out a lot of really interesting concepts and ideas from these that did make it into the game, but all of the global plots ended up getting cut due to time. Mac still has old diagrams and spreadsheets which detailed how all of these would have come together

Q. If you all had to take a long-distance road-trip with two squadmates, who would you take and why? PW: “Jack and Mordin. Mordin because the drive would never lack for things to talk about at length quickly, Jack because you know you wouldn’t pay for the room. You wouldn’t know how you’d get the room, but you wouldn’t be paying for it.” Courtenay: “I’d take Mordin because there’d be singing, and FemShep just to have this thing - happen. In the room that I get for free.” JHale at this point fistpumped while saying “Yeess” [then I think what she said was “steaming hot”]

Seeing as asari are long-lived, how open is Ali to one day reprising her role as Liara? “She’s a character very close to my heart, it was such a great opportunity. In some games that we work on the character has already been created or voiced by someone else, but this was really a group effort. When I first went into the booth, the only thing I’d seen of her was a sort of like, rendering, and we slowly kind of came to her voice and presence. I would love to bring Liara back any time... hey, she can live a really long time guys. :D”

Caroline and people who do what she does (Creative Performance Director) are so critical to the quality of games. Caroline: “This group of people are extraordinary. We were lucky to have such an extraordinary cast. Every [recording] session was new and challenging. It was a labor of love. I’m tearing up right now thinking about it. I’m remembering my last session with Jen, she was the last session, just sobbing and sobbing”. When JHale was trying to say the lines of Shepard’s goodbye with Garrus, a line hit her like a tonne of bricks and she was in tears and was like “Shepard does not cry”. “It took me a second, I got it out and took another run at it, it was in there but stuffed down as it should have been, and I finished the line [and there was silence in the booth when usually Caroline would have been talking to give direction or instruction] Did we lose her? Did Skype crash?” and it transpired that what had happened was that Caroline was in floods of tears

ME was the first time Keythe had ever come across branching dialogue. “Normally when we work on a script and it’s from page 1 to 100. In this it was get to page 5, then go back to page 2 and play it a little differently. The skill and the fun and joy of it was to be able to go back and play a scene in a different way, with different writing, with different outcomes. This was not only a challenge but a real treat. So to all the writers who dreamed up how this build-your-own-adventure plays out, you have my undying respect. It was a real pleasure”

VEDA is a proprietary system that BW use to record the dialogue, which is the closest way of having it feel like having people in the booth together (it’s all digital and VAs get to hear the line someone else has done in that scene). Caroline really pushed for this because of the amount of time etc that was wasted due to lack of this sort of thing on ME1. William: “It was a god send for me, thank you, getting to hear a cue from Jen or Mark.” Ali: “Us being able to bounce off each other helps make it more real. This for me was the most real acting experience on a game I had ever had - the writing being so good, Caroline helping us through, being able to hear each other.” JHale was always early coming in to record relative to the others so only got to use VEDA a few times - a bit of Liara content and the scene with Anderson towards the end. “Those two times, oh my god it was amazing”. VEDA being a thing also helps from a scheduling standpoint

Seth and Tricia Helfer (EDI) only got to be in the booth actually together 1 time, to record/shoot a piece of promotional video. “We actually got to record a scene together and we were like ‘oh my god this is the best thing ever’. It was great, even though I had to stand on a stool. She’s the best”

Seth: “As an actor, the kind of opportunity to do this kind of material in games just didn’t exist.” Fred: “Oh, never! I had never had a villain part that was complicated like that. In a game? Never before, it was really interesting”

Raphael always goes back to the fact that ME brought more women into gaming than any other game before it. “The writing and the complexity of the relationships gave us so much ballast”. “This set this apart from running, shooting, gunning, looting”

JHale: “What I noticed in the times before when I got to be around fans, there was a huge hunger among women in the gaming world for something they could really jump into. They were starving for something which fed them what they deserved and needed”

Mac: “[praising Caroline] Caroline would often come to us as writers and challenge us and say, as an example, ‘Do we really need another male character to do this? Why are we writing another male character for this?’ She pushed that very early and to the betterment of everything we created”

PW: “Karin and Cookie and all of the editors across the trilogy, [were critical in] making sure that Shepard sounded consistent - [especially since] we had a large writing team, writers came and went, Mac is the only one with a significant writing contribution on each of the games”

PW: “[on game dev] It’s a process of getting hundreds of people pointed in the same direction, all believing that this is something worth doing”

Ash: “Having all the different possibilities and avenues, going back to play them all out in the different ways [really helped to round the character of Tali out and make her feel like a natural person]”.

VAs only get paid for the original recording sessions, not again (as in they don’t any royalties or anything from something like the remaster)

In MELE, they left all the original credits at the end of each game in

Fred: “It’s creating in five dimensions [because of all the outcomes and relationships etc]”. Seth: “The cool thing is that the audience feels that. They’re immediately struck by how dense, thought-out, prepared and planned the entire universe is”

How was it for the new MELE devs coming onto this? Crystal: “I knew it [the series and fans’ love for it] was big, but I didn’t know it was BIG! Working on MELE there was this infectious excitement. Being part of it was so exciting.” Melanie: “I came on at ME3, I had a 3 or 4 year honeymoon period with BioWare. Coming onto MELE, I’m getting really emotional. One of my first meetings originally was going into a cinematic review for an epic Tali scene in ME3”. Crystal: “On MELE, we had an hour or 2 every day where the team came together to play the game. In those reviews, a lot of the devs who worked on the original would tell all these stories. It was really fun to hear all the inside stories on ME’s creation and be a part of that”

DC: “Should this unit get vaccinated?” Ash: “Of course”

How do they think ME will be viewed in the next 10-20 years, what do they think its legacy will be? A piece of history, ground-breaking. It broke down some barriers and opened doors for people. It’s a powerful, powerful community. It’ll continue to age quite well and be enjoyed by a new generation, it’s original and evergreen and there’s a lot in it that people go back to. There’s a lot of universal things in it (personal experiences, like there will always be love, people fighting to belong, trying to make sense of their pasts etc)

JHale and Alix did the “I love you Shepard, now go save the world again” Shep-Sam exchange and both got teary. It was then Seth’s turn to line-read: “Jesus Christ, now that I’m good and choked up, fucking mess”. Ali was also actually crying from it

Seth: “It can’t be overstated, this community is so large and global, it is one of the most powerful fandoms that I’ve ever been greeted with. Thank you”. Ash: “It’s the most amazing group of fans ever. We’re all so grateful”

Some funny anecdotes/stories:

PW didn’t realize that Alix could do different accents. They remember a time when they were listening in the booth and an Alliance soldier was complaining about the gear had been given. They said “Wow that’s really good, who is that?” and the VO producer said “That’s Alix, Patrick”, “because she wasn’t doing her [normal British accent but was doing a Californian accent instead]. Alix roasted me later for not recognizing her voice and never let me heard the end of it”

Alix: “[on Sam’s toothbrush] Caroline’s like, ‘So then she pulls her toothbrush’ and I’m like ‘What? Sorry? A toothbrush?’ and obviously it’s funny now as everyone knows that Sam’s thing is her toothbrush. Caroline’s like ‘Yeah, you’ve gotta like, flirt, over the toothbrush’ and I’m like ‘Who wrote this - a frickin toothbrush, are you kidding me? Really guys?’ ANYWAY. I was wrong and it worked. :D”

Fred: “I remember a 12 year old kid coming up to me and being like [flat tone] ‘Oh yeah. I killed you’.”

Keythe: “The other assasin I play is Kellogg in Fallout 4. People come up to me like ‘Omg. I love you so much. And then I fucking KILLED you!’”

Courtenay once went out to dinner in NZ with a few prominent people from the Game of Thrones cast. “Everyone around was making a big deal out of it like ‘Omg, it’s so-and-so from GoT’. I was feeling a bit like ‘Hi, I’m here, just nobody’. And I looked around in the restaurant and there's one guy in the corner and he’s got an N7 shirt on and he’s just looking at me like [knowing look, does a peace sign]. And I’m like ‘I got one! I love you guys!’”

PW: “I have a question for the cast members, because I don’t know if JHale has done this to all of you or if she just does it to the devs. Show of hands if Jen has ever made you do push-ups.” JHale: “It’s just you guys”

Karin: “One of my favorite editing files that I ever had was a ME file. It was before Seth was coming in for a session. I opened it up and it was just 20, 25 lines with the word ‘Shit’, over and over again, and I was like, ‘This file is perfect, I don’t need to do anything to it, have fun!’”

Seth: “Didn’t we do a track that’s like 60 seconds of laughing? Escalating laughing? I don’t know about other actors but for me getting into a laughing fit is kind of like trying to get into a crying fit, it takes the same level of commitment, you start to follow a path until like you’re hysterically uncontrollably laughing. I remember looking through the glass, and I’m deep in it at this point, and I make eye contact, and I can see from the other side of the booth and they’re like [making ‘okay you can stop’ now gestures] - ‘Like that’s plenty, we got it’ and I was like ‘okay, okay [dying]’”

JHale: “The craziest thing Mark and I had to deal with was how many times we had to say ‘I should go’”. Mark: “We also, Caroline and I tended to use that as short hand when I needed to go to the bathroom”

The panel host: “The first time I interviewed Ali was a decade ago. She did the ‘I’ll flay you alive with my mind’ line halfway through, it was my first interview and I literally fell out of my seat [from being star-struck]”

Ash line-read Tali’s drunk omni-tattoo scene and in response DC said “I totally get why people wanna romanticize all these characters :D”. Karin: “We’ve had more than one person come up to us and show us actual tattoos that looked like that”

[source]

[closetfanfictionauthor]

a university au in which genya is a fashion major and david is an engineering student and neither of them are brave enough to admit their feelings to each other but it works out in the end anyway.

(i was working on another story but i just finished re-reading the series and then i binged the show and it was just CALLING to me. this was meant to be like 2k words but it quite got away from me)

this is also on ao3

She meets David when she's looking for a table in the university library to complete a paper on fashion history and he is the only one with an available seat. And because she's Genya and beautiful and unafraid to approach anyone, she asks him if he wouldn't mind sharing the table with her.

David gives her a very distracted yes and she flashes him one of her smiles that's sent men stammering before gracefully sliding into the seat.

What she doesn't know is that a glimpse of her was enough to send David's heart into rapid palpitations and his palms immediately begin to sweat. But he's got to stay focused on his problem set because he fears if he looks at her head-on he might actually have a heart attack right where he sits.

And wouldn't that just be embarrassing.

She expects him to ogle at her like men usually do, but from where she's sitting he looks focused on his own problems, a slight wrinkle in his forehead as he glares at his laptop screen and huffs in irritation. But they sit in silence for three hours and David never looks her way. On the rare occasion he can drag his attention away from his screen long enough to notice she's even there, it feels as if he's looking right through her.

And she should feel relieved. Comfortable. Because he's not doing anything to make her feel uncomfortable. It should be nice.

And she's beyond irritated. Genya can't decide if it's because her ego is really that big that it takes offense to the first man who doesn't notice her or if it's because she finds him so attractive it makes her want to burst out of her skin and he's making it very obvious that he's not interested in her.

She doesn't know which one is worse.

He leaves without a word and she has to sit there and force herself to act like she doesn't notice the vacant seat across from her or why, for some reason, she feels so lonely.

Afterwards, Genya begins to notice David all around campus in ways she didn't before. And every time he's always alone, rarely is he surrounded by anyone she could assume is his friend. David never acknowledges her, never says hi, and she likewise pretends she never sees him.

But one day Genya is studying in the library again. At this point she's developed a sixth sense when it comes to David and the second he steps foot into the library, she knows. Her muscles tense and something in Genya's gut is telling her David is here and to look for him.

She forces herself to relax and shrug it off but only a few moments later, a shadow falls over her and she blinks up in confusion. David stands there, fidgeting from foot to foot, his hands traveling from the hem of his crewneck to his hair to the nape of his neck. He looks so uncomfortable and awkward it's endearing and she's tempted between saving him the anxiety and saying something and letting him stew in the feeling.

"Is it alright if I sit with you. Library's full," he mutters quietly, eyes darting around to the others sitting nearby. Genya forces the corners of her mouth not to twitch upwards like they so desperately want to and calmly nods before turning back to her work. Today she's working on sketching some designs for class.

David shrugs out of his bag and pulls out the chair across from her, all the while avoiding eye contact. Genya looks back at her sketch and picks up another colouring pencil. The whole time she pretends like there isn't an available table three tables over, or another one less than five metres behind David. The library is certainly full but it's not that full.

He could sit somewhere else but he chooses to sit with her and that makes her sit up a little straighter.

After about the second hour of working in silence, David starts to fidget. It's like he's working up the courage to do something but can't quite bring himself to do it. Genya can see him shift in his seat but pretends she doesn't notice. He crosses and uncrosses his legs, slouches in his seat before straightening up again. David opens his textbook, stares at the page blankly and then closes it again and turns back to his laptop.

There's a burning need in Genya to ask what he wants, the question is on the tip of her tongue but something about David tells her if she asks he'll shut down.

Finally David clears his throat and when Genya looks at him, he points to one of her sketches and says in a grave tone usually reserved for imparting condolences, "I really like this one, I'm not one for colours or anything but I like the yellow and brown."

It's the most he's ever said...well...ever.

"Thank you, that one's my favourite too," Genya replies warmly, a smile spreading across her face. In truth it wasn't her favourite creation but it was David's favourite and now it was hers.

She thinks that's all he's going to say and turns back to her drawing but David has mustered all his courage and he seems determined to have out with it and asks her, "What are you making these for?"

"It's for my Fashion Design class. I'm a fashion major," Genya says and blushes a pretty pink at the statement. There's nothing wrong with fashion. People wear clothes. They like looking nice. Genya wants to be a part of that process and yet she can't help feeling silly telling people she studies fashion. But David doesn't look at her as if it's stupid or as if she's dumb, an intent look on his face as he gives her all his attention.

"Do you...do you like fashion design? Is it one of your favourite classes?" he asks her awkwardly. She wants to giggle at the way he looks at her as if she's about to impart the meaning of life to him. But Genya stops herself, because David is making an effort. And she doesn't know this man but she's pieced together enough to know that socializing doesn't come easy to David. Knows enough that underneath that quiet almost stern demeanor his heart is probably pounding from making small talk and she won't be the one to hurt his feelings or discourage his attempt.

She just wishes his shyness didn't make her go soft as pudding inside.

"I love it a lot actually. My favourite aspect is that you get to be creative with whatever you want to design, there's no limit and you don't have to worry that anything will be too outlandish because it's just a sketch and you're not actually wasting any fabric on it. They really push you to your limits on this class, always encouraging us to push the boundaries of style and creativity. It doesn't matter how crazy it is just so we can get used to-" Genya stopped abruptly and feels heat spreading across her face. "Sorry, I didn't mean to go on like that."

"Why are you apologizing?" David asks, frowning in his confusion.

"I got carried away, I'm sure you were looking for a shorter answer," Genya replies. She might as well have told him she's been told to shut up by other people before for talking too much about her passion.

"If I didn't want to hear your thoughts, then I wouldn't have asked," David says matter-of-factly. He sits patiently, looking at her expectantly. She blinks at him and then continues, stuttering at first and then becoming more confident as David continues to gaze at her, riveted. He doesn't interrupt her as she gushes about her sketches, her ideas, the specifics of fabrics and stitching, even going so far as to ask follow up questions.

What's her favourite fabric to work with, is there a designer she's particularly fond of, what kind of film she thinks has the best costumes? And the questions go on.

"I don't really know what I wanna do after, maybe work for a designer, maybe go into costume design for Hollywood," Genya says, finally going quiet.

"I think you'd be a great costume designer," David says with all sincerity and gives her a wide smile. And saints, that smile. It completely changes his face and does things to her insides that she can't voice.

"You think?" she asks and immediately wants to kick herself. What was that breathy voice that just came out of her.

"Yeah, some of these are so creative and different, I think it would serve you well on a set," David says as he picks up some of her sketches and looks through the drawings.

"Thank you," Genya replies timidly. She's about to ask about David but he gives her one more smile before turning his attention back to his work, the conversation over. She wants to interrupt him and learn all about him but she doesn't want to interrupt him.

They leave the library at the same time, walking side by side without saying anything. Genya can't stop herself from glancing at him every few seconds from the corner of her eye. David on the other hand looks deep in thought, like he isn't walking next to her at all. She desperately wants to see him again, wants to reach out and touch his hand but she thinks about it so long her nerves get the better of her and never does a thing about it.

"See you next time," David says at the exit, and then turns around and leaves without waiting for a response.

"We...will?" Genya asks the thin hair because David is gone before she has even comprehended what he's said.

She spends the rest of her day in a daze and then the following days afterward she asks herself if the whole incident in the library actually happened. But then she sees David in the hallway and he nods in her direction and she flushes like she's a girl of fifteen all over again. And then he begins to smile in her direction and Genya becomes so flustered she finds herself walking into pillars and water fountains on multiple occasions.

Genya sees David at least a dozen times a day, more than she has ever seen him before. Part of her wonders if he passes by the places that he's figured out she's going to be in most often. The library becomes their meeting spot. Genya spends as much time there as possible in the hopes that David will show up to see her. It comes to the point where her friend starts to complain that they never see her because she's constantly studying.

"Why are you even in the library this often, you're a fashion major," Alina whines one day when Genya announces she's off to the library.

"Fashion majors need to read," Genya replies defensively. She's shoving books into her bag when Alina reaches over and grabs the opening to stop her.

"Of course fashion majors need to read but you spend every waking second in the library, not even the history students are in there that often," Alina points out. "Is there something you're not telling me about?"

"No," Genya replies too quickly and now she sounds even guiltier. Alina has a knowing look in her eyes.

"There is someone, isn't there," Alina pounces, a gleam in her eye. She leans forward, arms crossed on the table between the two friends.

"There isn't anyone, I just really enjoy the...atmosphere," Genya says. The excuse sounds lame even to her own ears but it's the only thing she can say. What else is there to enjoy about the library.

"Genya you're the most outgoing person I know, sitting quietly in a library for hours on end is the very last thing you'd do. I can't even get you to go to a bookstore with me," Alina scoffs. Genya might have been able to get away with her evasiveness if David hadn't passed by at that very moment.

Her face lights up in happiness at the sight of him, a smile overtaking her face before she's even registering her response to him.

David smiles in return and nods his head and says, "Hey," in passing.

"Hi," she quietly breaths back but he's gone before he can hear it. Genya's gaze immediately snaps back to Alina and her friend looks back at her, smug.

"Oh I see," she says, the picture of ease, slouched low in her chair, legs spread out before her. Genya scowls back at her.

"Not a word," she snaps back mortified.

"No, no, what is there to say," Alina replies nonchalantly. "I just never mistook you for someone to go for the whole quiet nerd vibe."

"David is lovely," Genya says defensively.

"I never said he wasn't, I just said he was nerdy."

A beat of silence.

"Do you know anything about him?" Genya finally asks grudgingly.

"I'm the last person you should be asking," Alina says with a snort. "Mal would probably know more though."

"Oh yes, Mal, your little friend, and how is Mal, your friend, doing?" Genya asks, widening her eyes innocently. Alina blanches, her face going white.

"You know what, maybe you should go to the library, go there as often as you want. We're really not that close," she says. Genya lets out a cackle and wiggles her fingers goodbye before setting off.

***

"So why did you pick engineering?" Genya asks him one day. They've finally progressed to getting coffee together instead of sitting in the library all the time. The social setting makes her more comfortable but she can see the way David's shoulders are tense and he shifts in his chair restlessly.

"I like making things with my hands. Seeing a bunch of pieces and putting them together, like a puzzle," he says. "And you know, machines aren't complicated."

Genya blinks at him.

"I mean, they're not complicated in the way that people are complicated," he amends. "I've never really liked big groups of people or parties, they're so noisy, you can't hear anyone, no one can finish a sentence without being interrupted, so I just keep to myself. It's easier that way."

"But don't you get lonely?"

David turns his head towards the sun streaming in and thinks for a moment. Genya can't help but be distracted by the way the sun turns his hair brown or admire the angle of his jaw, or his nose, or his full lips. Especially his lips. What a shame they're not attached to her. Or her neck, moving down towards her ...

David. Talking. Genya blinks rapidly and pushes the thoughts of David's mouth on her neck (among other places) away to focus on what he's saying.

"Not lately. But I like spending time on my own, I don't have to worry about talking all of the time or thinking about something interesting to say. There's no pressure to be entertaining."

And while Genya hears the rest, her mind is stuck on the not lately part. She's pretty sure he means since meeting her but she's too shy to ask even though she knows David wouldn't think it embarrassing.

"And people are always saying things they don't mean," he goes on frowning. "I can never understand how dating is supposed to work. My brothers try to explain it to me but it sounds like a lot of saying what you don't mean and expecting someone to figure out what you're not saying. You can't do certain things because it makes you look needy or too eager, which makes no sense to me because wouldn't you want the person you like to know you like them?"

This is the most he's ever said to Genya she's pretty sure. Her heart leaps at the idea that he's comfortable enough around her to say these things. Her heart leaps at the way his arms looked crossed in front of him the way that they do in that snug shirt.

"That's true, it's one of the nice things about you though," she replies and when he looks at her in confusion she adds, "I can just say what I mean and what I want and you won't think I'm weird for it."

She swears she sees his cheeks turn the barest shade of pink although his brown skin hides it well.

"I think you have class, I'll walk with you," he says, clearing his throat and the two of them leave the shop together. He does that a lot lately, walking her to class that is. Genya has taken to walking him to his. She definitely doesn't stand outside the room watching his butt as he walks away from her.

Neither of them feels the need to comment on anything as they walk side by side towards the arts building.

They're at the door of her classroom, and David is in the middle of saying goodbye, when one of Genya's classmates shoves David's shoulder to get past them. The man looks Genya up and down and shoots her a wink before disappearing into the room.

Genya turns to David about to apologize when she sees the scowl he sends towards her classmate. It's the first time she's ever seen David anything other than neutral and serene and the fact that it's on her behalf makes her giddy.

"Who's that?" David asks. Genya has never been gladder of his earnest manner more than this moment. It's gratifying to hear the note of jealousy because it means she's not the only one at odds and ends in this budding friendship they have. She shouldn't like it but she does. Alina would have her head if she heard such nonsense.

"Oh just some classmate," she says with a shrug. "He does this all the time. He's quite harmless."

At least she thinks, although the man in question is a little too persistent for her tastes but surely he can only mean the flirting as a joke.

"I have to go," David says abruptly and marches off in a determined manner, leaving Genya behind wondering what's just happened.

She hopes he's not mad at her and agonizes over his behaviour the whole class, completely missing the topic at hand. When she eventually leaves, she's so miserably anxious she doesn't know what to do with herself. Genya is about to call Alina and beg her for advice but never gets the chance to decide because David is standing outside the door.

He thrusts a large bouquet of flowers at her before Genya has a chance to say anything and instinctively she reaches out to take them so they don't fall on the ground.

"For you," David says without ceremony. Genya blinks in bewilderment at him and looks between the flowers and his solemn face.

"Ah….thank you, these are beautiful," Genya says. She's sincere about the compliment but her brain is still playing catch up with her and can't quite get past the beautiful flowers and that David got them for her.

"They're red amaryllis," David offers and shoves his hands in the pockets of his jeans. "It reminds me of your hair."

She can feel tears gathering in her eyes because this is the sweetest thing anyone has done for her and she's not quite sure what she's done to deserve this man. David notices the watering eyes and his brows furrow in alarm.

"I'm sorry if you don't like them. I didn't mean to make you cry, I'll take them back," he says miserably, reaching for them. Genya moves them out of his reach.

"These are happy tears, don't you dare take these away from me. No take backs," Genya says, clutching the flowers to her chest. David relaxes and sends her one of his disarming smiles.

The gestures continue. David brings her coffee, or snacks. Sometimes he'll even hand over his own food because he sees her looking at it just a little too long in the library. Genya buys him lunch or dinner. She seeks him out in the library if she knows he's been hard at work studying and reminds him to go home. She tells him tidbits and facts that she thinks he might like. She gives him her hat if he says he's cold, and he gives her his gloves because he knows her hands are always cold.

Genya brings him little oddities she finds when she's out shopping, and David gives her books on the collections of famous fashion houses. He invites her over to his house and she bakes cookies with his mom and makes plans for a shopping trip with his sister. David agrees to meet Alina and Mal and immediately he and Mal become the best of friends.

Now when Genya arrives in the library before him, he chooses to sit next to her instead of across the table. Sometimes he throws his arm across the back of her chair casually. Sometimes the hand of that arm will unconsciously trace patterns up and down the side of Genya's arm.

Genya doesn't know how to ask him to go on a date even though they're doing things that couples do, but it seems the universe wants the two of them together even more than she does.

It happens when she's on the way to the library one evening to meet up with David. They're planning on studying together, he needs help with an English paper due in a few days, and Genya wants to spend time with him. The fact that she's not that good at writing English papers is not important.

The sun is starting to set, and she's been trying to shake off the man who shoved into David that one day but he's either not getting the hint or he's choosing to ignore them. She tries to make excuses to leave so they'll go their separate ways, but he conveniently also has nowhere to be. Genya gives curt responses and purposely makes it seem as if she's not paying attention to what he's saying. She gives dry responses to his flirtations in the hopes to deter him. When he stands too close, she very obviously puts space between them.

And now he's following her to the library and Genya is praying he leaves her alone because she's got a sneaking suspicion he's going to wait around until she leaves the library and then follow her home.

Eventually he gets to the point and asks for a date.

"You're very lovely," Genya lies through her teeth. Her smile is more of a grimace at this point. "But I'm not all that interested."

"Come on, just one date," he says, taking a step toward her. Genya takes a step back. His tone is light but she's on her guard and she knows how quickly that good humour can turn sour.

"No thank you," she insists. When he opens his mouth to say something else, she blurts out, "I have a boyfriend, his name is David. I'm on the way to see him at the library."

She doesn't know why she says it, it's the only thing she can think of, the only thing that's always worked in the past a hundred percent of the time. And as if she's summoned him herself, David appears as if from nowhere. Her knight in….well not exactly shining armour but in his favourite crewneck at least.

"I was wondering what was taking you so long, sweetheart," David's voice says. He rounds the corner, his mouth set in a grim line as he stares down the man cornering Genya. The endearment sounds a little stilted coming from him, but the natural way he puts his arm around Genya's waist and leans in to kiss her cheek makes up for it.

She feels the tension leak out of her at the contact. David is here and she's not alone, she's safe and he'll take care of this. She leans into his side, absorbing the warmth coming from him and puts her head on his shoulder.

"Hello darling, I was just picking up dinner for you," she replies as lovingly as possible. She looks up at him like he's her hero (she doesn't even have to pretend) and burrows into his side even more.

"How thoughtful of you," David replies warmly. He leans down and gives her a long, sweet kiss that sends her knees quaking. Her classmate thoroughly forgotten, David steers the two of them away from the man and they continue on to the library. Once they're far enough away, Genya lets out a long sigh.

"Thank the saints you showed up, I didn't know what I was going to do about him," Genya says. David rubs his hand up and down her back as the two of them walk.

"The nerve of him to ask out my girlfriend," David huffs. Genya drags the two of them to a halt and stares at David unblinking.

"Your what?" she asks, thinking she's misheard.

"My girlfriend," David repeats, a little slower this time as if she's hard of hearing.

"Since when am I your girlfriend?" Genya asks because she's fairly certain she would've remembered something that monumental. But no, she's certain he never asked.

"Since I brought you flowers after class?" David asks as if he's beginning to doubt himself. "I mean what have we been doing if not dating?"

"David you never asked me to be your girlfriend," Genya insists. Not that she minds the presumption but there are rules to these things.

"I didn't realize I was supposed to, I thought it was obvious. Of course you're my girlfriend, why else would I bring you home to my mom," David says, head tilted to the side. He's looking at her as if she's recently had a brain injury.

Genya's mouth has dropped open as she processes this new development. She doesn't know whether to whoop in elation or burst into song or start dancing or leap onto David right now and ravish him.

"David, you were supposed to ask," she insists and suddenly the whole ordeal is hilarious. Genya's biting her lip to stop from laughing but her shoulders are starting to shake from holding it in. It's all just so ridiculous.

Here she was agonizing over whether he wanted her and the whole time David already thought they were dating.

"Oh, do you not want to be my girlfriend then?" he asks, worry creeping into his tone. He deflates and the look of dejection on his face makes Genya want to shower him with kisses to make it go away.

"No, that's not what I meant. I- never mind, we're dating, I'm your girlfriend," Genya says with a roll of her eyes.

"But you just said-"

She cuts David off by wrapping her arms around his neck, her hands digging into his hair, and pulls his lips down to hers for a proper kiss.

"Forget what I said, okay," she says breathlessly. "You were right we've definitely been dating this whole time."

"Yes ma'am," he agrees in bewilderment. "You know we should be doing a lot more kissing since we're boyfriend and girlfriend."

Genya can't help but beam at him. "I completely agree. More kissing. Lots more kissing. In fact, I propose we go back to my room and play catch up. We've got a lot of kissing to make up for."

[hyperfixationtimego]

IDK IF YOU MEANT JUNKO IS HER GF AND BEST FRIEND BUT!!! Celeste/Kyoto friendship, they’re both man haters 💜 /j

I remember a game night thing back then, Clue reinvigorates Celeste’s interest in murder mysteries and she honestly impresses Kyoto when she tricks Togami into revealing his cards (mainly questioning his truthfulness/credibility)

After that, Kyoto and Celeste try to find videos, games, and books of murder mysteries to solve, but with Celeste able to figure out who’s lying and Kyoto’s detecting ability, they’re unstoppable. Junko likes to nitpick the murder mysteries too, even though she likely has no idea who the murderer is.

After a while of their regular things being too easy, one day they walk into the kitchen area to find Chihiro and Sonia (again no idea if this is in character but her cosplayers are always cute) putting some fake blood on Ibuki. Makoto is upsetting the area, like knocking over the knife holder and such. They’re super confused, until Makoto says (very unconvincingly) “:O someone killed Ibuki!!! you guys gotta figure it out”

That becomes the new regular thing, like every other week they make a new murder mystery for the two and they have to solve it (including the fact that some stuff will be inaccurate, and just how the group thinks it would happen). Peko isn’t that fond of it, but she’ll do it if Chihiro gives her the 🥺 look, and both Miu and Leon absolutely love the chance to play characters (I forgot her name but if Peko does it, Tsumugi/blue hair will do it too, she just prefers to be the victim) - queer eye anon

HDBSBSBS NO U WERE RIGHT I MEANT IT LIKE JUNKO’S HER GF AND KYOKO’S HER BEST FRIEND HDBSBSBD DON’T WORRY!!

and yes yes they are 😌

and also !! legit 👀 like. it pisses Togami off to no end (seriously, how did she do that?? how could he be tricked so easily???) but Kyoko’s like “,,,,,oh my god,,,,,,,,such manipulation,,,,,,,such incredible deductive skills,,,,,”

long story short kirigiri develops a squish (platonic equivalent of a crush) on this weird mean goth bitch and just starts hanging around her more often until eventually Celeste is like,,,,,,,,,fine, if I simply MUST adopt you as a best friend, I suppose I will, seeing as I have ABSOLUTELY NO CHOICE in the matter :)

so they start spending more time together, and Kyoko’s usually the one who’s like “hey I found another murder mystery thing we could try-” to which Celeste’s response tends to be more lighthearted “oh, very well, if I absolutely must-”

It’s incredible - no piece of mystery media stands a chance against them <3

also a little off topic and might be a bit ooc, but I think we should all consider buzzfeed unsolved!kyoko and Celeste because that just seems goddamn hilarious to me ndndbdbdbddbd

and BDBSB YEAH THEY’RE SO SWEET?? Makoto came up with the idea, but Sonia and Chihiro are absolutely essential to the operation as a whole.

Sonia’s interest in serial killers provides a necessary take for the psychological perspective of real life cases, so they know for certain it’ll be stimulating for the detective of the two, meanwhile Chihiro’s brainpower allows for both creative and logical placement of clues, red herrings, and more!

Plus, all three of them are absolute sweethearts that most people have trouble saying no to <3 (they’ve even gotten Byakuya to participate once or twice! Celeste and Kirigiri were both delighted and bewildered!)

THEY ALSO GET OUMA INVOLVED BECAUSE HE’S THE ONLY ONE THAT EVER GIVES CELESTE ANY TROUBLE IN DECIPHERING LIES FHSBSBDBSBS (she usually gets it right on account of her own luck, and if she gets it wrong, It tends to be either salvageable or ambiguous enough that she can pretend she was right and nobody can tell they were ever on the wrong track)

Miu pretends like she needs fujisaki, nevermind, and naegi to beg her for her participation, but she’s honestly more than willing because!!! She gets to yell and be loud and have fun and play weirdos!!!! And sometimes she even invents new things for practical effects, just ‘cause she can! And she knows it makes her friends happy!

Leon’s a pretty good actor until Celeste stares him down - then he immediately either loses his nerve or fucks something up ❤️

and dhsbsbdbsbdb Peko!!!! Peko and Fuyuhiko get involved because a) chihiro gave them both the 🥺 face, as you said, and b) fuyuhiko,,,,,,,thinks the concept,,,,,,,,is fun,,,,,,,👉👈 but shut up he’d never admit that!!!

Tsumugi makes costumes!!!! And totally loses herself in the roles!!! She gives the BEST performances, and Celeste and Kyoko are often left sitting there like “wow ok” because hdbdbdvdvdvdvdvddv????

They get Nagito involved a lot, both due to his luck and the fact that he’s very easy to convince (and often comes up with more cool ideas for the scene of the crime/evidence/general concepts!) though, if he’s involved, then Hajime needs to be as well, becauee everyone can only take maeda’s self-deprecating bullshit for so long until they need someone to shut him up hdbdbdbdb

Hiyoko acts like she thinks it’s dumb, but actually really wants to be included 🥺 👉👈 so mahiru takes it upon herself to “force” her into helping

Sakura and Hina love to help however they can! :D I don’t rlly have anything specific for them, I simply think they’re very cool and would be very eager to help because they love their friends <3

Sayaka is INCREDIBLE when it comes to thinking up “murder” plots! Motives, manipulation, the likelihood of certain actions being taken.....+ due to her high intuition, she’s able to discern what types of things kyoko and celeste prefer during their little games! She also provides insight into emotional response for the actors, which helps to make it a lot more immersive!

Mikan gets very very very nervous as a performer and is usually very unreliable in that aspect, but she gives pointers on whether or not certain wounds would be enough to kill a person! She also provides emphasis on vital organs and helps with anatomical accuracy!

Gundham adores being able to give monologues, and the three in charge of everything do their best to give him macabre, weird roles so he can speak and confuse the two girls to his heart’s content ❤️

if they ever need to talk to chiaki during an investigation, they usually need to wake her up, or get her to stop playing a video game (which she’s not supposed to be playing!!!!) in order to interrogate her (she also forgets a lot of the details and evidence she’s supposed to give them shdbsndbsnsb)

she also likes to give chihiro ideas for plots and things, though mostly uses her games as inspiration !

Shuichi and kyoko are friends so he’s like “yyyeah okay I’ll do it” and so by the same token, Kaede is automatically (and emphatically!) involved as well

Kirumi gets involved because if it’s a request, she’ll do it 💛 plus she kinda loves being involved with this stuff ngl jsnsbsn meanwhile ryoma is like this is dumb but if it’ll make u guys happy then I guess I have no choice

Maki’s pretty difficult to convince, ngl, but if kaito pesters her enough, she might drop by to give her two cents on some of the most plausible and effective methods of getting rid of evidence, as well as what she would do if she were in the position of the murderer (makoto and co. are like wow maki thank u very cool we are absolutely terrified)

shinguji makes it a point in the anthology to embarrass himself at the drop of a hat for his friends’ benefits regarding things like this, so they’re obviously in hbdbdbd plus they love being able to study kyoko and celeste’s behavior while working on each “case,” because without a doubt they are two of the most interesting specimens of human thought patterns and processes he’s ever SEEN <3

since it’s for the sake of two girls, Tenko’s very excited to do whatever Sonia or Chihiro asks of her (she’ll do things that Makoto asks, too, but it takes some convincing....) and Himiko.....isn’t a particularly convincing liar to begin with, but her experience with stage trickery comes in handy pretty often! (though they have to practically drag the information out of her shdbsndn)

Angie agrees to participate on the grounds that all of her characters get to bring up and endorse Atua. she gets picked for murder victim quite a lot bsbssbdb

also highkey 👀 the canon cases get re-enacted at some point (for the first game’s third case, they actually let Celeste be in on it as a little treat for Kyoko! it was absolutely bonkers and they both had literally so much fun!!!)

[vanessakirbyfans]

The six actresses also candidly discuss what outsiders get wrong about acting, juggling work and family and how #MeToo has changed the culture for the next generation: "We're getting all the bad stuff out of the way."

A fiesta grandmother. A persecuted jazz icon. A grieving mother. A sexual assault avenger. A pioneering scientist. A girlfriend scorned.

On a mid-December morning, six actresses behind some of the year's most dynamic performances came together for The Hollywood Reporter's Actress Roundtable: Hillbilly Elegy's Glenn Close, The United States vs. Billie Holiday's Andra Day, Pieces of a Woman's Vanessa Kirby, Promising Young Woman's Carey Mulligan, Ammonite's Kate Winslet and Malcolm & Marie's Zendaya. The group, who gathered via video conference from homes and sets in L.A., Montana, Atlanta and the U.K., discussed the business side of acting, their weirdest pandemic habits, the dangerous Hollywood misconception about creative genius — and the fact that "how women's voices are being received [is] the biggest thing that has shifted."

Let's dive in. What's the most surprising thing you learned about yourself during the pandemic?

VANESSA KIRBY I learned a lot about silence. I hadn't realized quite how much "doing" I was doing. Somehow I hadn't quite realized that, when you're still, it's just as present, you know what I mean? And I think it's taught me to do less. I don't think anything else would have taught me that in the way this year has done.

KATE WINSLET I became, and still am, actually, utterly obsessed with sweeping my kitchen floor. But down to the point where if there's just even dog hair, and our dog is a golden retriever, so it's blond hair, but I've got this microscopic vision where I can see the dog hair gathering in tiny little cracks, between the dishwasher and the sink, and I'll be like, "There's dog hair, somebody, quick, get me the broom." I've just become obsessed. And I didn't really care about things like that particularly before. Don't get me wrong, I like to run a nice home, but sweeping the kitchen floor? I mean, who cares about that? So I've become a bit strange about the kitchen floor.

ZENDAYA For me, it's that I never really got to know who I was without work. I've always been working. I started working when I was so young, and I've always just had a consistent thing happening in my life. I just had never spent that much time with myself. I was like, "What makes me happy? What do I like to do other than work? Do I have any hobbies?" I basically get to do my hobby for a living. So it's like, "What else do I even like?" Facing that was interesting for sure.

What is something people often get wrong about acting?

WINSLET I've been doing this job now for, I realize, 27 years or something. I can't quite believe that, but I do find myself getting almost agitated when I feel I have to explain just how hard the job truly is … I don't think people understand that preparation can take up to four, five, sometimes even six months depending on the kind of role you're playing. And also how absent, I think, you are from your family. Even if they might physically be with you — which, in my case is nine times out of 10, I'm fortunate that they are — but emotionally I know that I'm gone. I'm just not there, I'm not just Mummy, I'm not just Ned [Smith]'s wife ­— suddenly, I'm this other being. And I do find that part quite upsetting sometimes, and I wish I had more of a balance with that.

CAREY MULLIGAN There's a bit of an idea, and maybe more even within the industry, that to make something great, people have permission to behave badly, the idea of someone being a creative genius … that they are so inspired, there's a required level of darkness or unpleasantness that goes along with that, that you need to put up with. And I think people get away with bad behavior because of those reasons. In my experience, some of the most incredible people I've worked with have just been also the most delightful. So that's kind of a common misconception, that there are people who have to behave badly to psych themselves up at work, or that the process is just sort of utterly miserable. I think you can work really hard, but ultimately … the attitude on set should be one of warmth.

ZENDAYA It also is a business, which is something I've had to learn as a young person. Because often you get into it just because you love it, and you just want to be creative, and you just want to do the fun stuff, but it is also a business. There are contracts involved and a lot of things that don't necessarily contribute to the creativity or contribute to this idea of the freedom you think you'll have. I have been learning that as I grow up that there are bigger entities involved … money people … I often encourage young people who do want to do this to read your contracts, be aware, have those conversations, ask as many questions as you can, try to get advice from people, because it's easy to get stuck in a bad situation. And having that knowledge is really, really important.

GLENN CLOSE A lot of people think that anyone can do it. And of course, there have been documentaries and even some movies of people who are not trained as actors — I think that can happen in movies. I really take my craft seriously, and I think people don't know what they're talking about when they think that anyone could do it. I once had a brain surgeon who was the father of one of my daughter's middle school friends … He asked if he could come over and pick my brain about something. And so I said, "Sure," and he came over and he said, "I find being a brain surgeon depressing, I really want to be an actor."

WINSLET Oh my God.

CLOSE And it was all I could do to not throw him out of my house. He said, "But I have to make a living, so how do I do it?" It was astounding to me that he would have such an ignorant idea of what acting was. So I think, for longevity, it is a craft, and I take great pride. There's always something new to learn every day, but it is something that really does count. When you task yourself with becoming, looking through the eyes of another person and telling a story that will have emotional impact, that is craft.

Andra, how did you go about finding the voice of Billie Holiday?

ANDRA DAY Well, first she is very familiar to me just because she is my foremost musical inspiration. I worked with this amazing dialect coach, Thom Jones … Through the breath, that was a huge thing. I remember him always talking about, "Where it is coming from? How is she breathing?" And the emotional part of it as well, too. I look at Billie Holiday's voice as a scroll. And on her voice is written her entire history, every time she had been raped, every time she had been hit, every time she had victoriously sang "Strange Fruit," every time she smoked a cigarette and every time she slammed heroin or did a speedball. Everything is written onto her voice. It was also important for me not to do an impersonation. And that's something [director] Lee [Daniels] spoke to me about, too, we don't want to impersonate her, but sort of bring me through her. … I feel the same way about acting, that not everyone can do it. To be honest with you, I did not think that I could do it, and I'm still a little on the fence about it.

I don't think after seeing this film anyone will have any question about whether you can do it. Let's talk a bit about physical transformation for a character. Glenn, in Hillbilly Elegy, you're physically transformed. How did finding the look of that character help you?

CLOSE I began personally not wanting to be distracted by my own face. I wanted to have very subtle differences so that it was an experience, that you get into the full hair and makeup and costume, and there she is, because she's very different from who I was. But we started with a portrait of Mamaw and just the glasses, the hair, the ears, I changed my nose a little bit. And it was very, very finessed work to make it subtle enough that it wasn't me, but not so … I didn't want people to say, "Oh, there's Glenn Close with a really bad nose." That took a lot of wonderful collaboration coming up with that. We had video, we talked to members of her family who were incredibly generous in talking about her. And I asked just very specific questions: "How did she walk, how did she hold her cigarette? How did she sit? What did she wear?" which is basically what you see in the movie. She was very much a larger-than-life character. "What was her atmosphere when she came into a room?" I mean, all those kinds of things that just was a slow buildup [from] the moment you walk on for hair and makeup, and you feel that there she is.

MULLIGAN With Promising Young Woman, [director] Emerald [Fennell] is very intentional about building a world that felt very enticing. You wanted to build a film that you wanted to see, not something you needed to or should see. Part of the way that Emerald first presented the film to me was this Candyland environment that you're in and that Cassie lived in that in the way that she clothes herself. She's somebody who is very practiced at living with her rage and her sadness and her grief. She's figured out that hiding in plain sight and looking like someone who's functioning, people tend to leave her alone. It's very deliberate that she has candy-colored nails and blond hair. First of all, she looks very unthreatening, so no one would ever suspect that she's about to destroy a life, but also she's someone that you don't need to check on. You can leave her alone … Her main everyday look was just a way of saying, "I'm absolutely fine. You don't need to look at me because I'm just generic, and a girl, and you don't need to take me seriously." Because we so often trivialize the way girls and women clothe themselves. It was just a very easy way of putting up a boundary between her and the rest of the world.

WINSLET Everything about [Ammonite subject, paleontologist] Mary Anning is so, so held and so internalized. I had to learn how to do quite a lot of acting with my posture, or the back of head, or the backs of my hands, or just sometimes my eyeballs. I had to really find a different rhythm for myself, because I'm a very animated person … The longer that you do this, the more familiar audiences become with your mannerisms and how you are or how you sound. I just try to remove everything of myself, and there were days when I would think, "Well, did I do anything or did I just do nothing today?" And it would be really disconcerting, but just finding a completely quiet, physical stillness and heaviness to Mary came hand in hand with the costuming of her and the look of her and making her hair a little bit gray and having no makeup.

Vanessa, you have a harrowing, more than 20-minute childbirth sequence in your film. Can you talk about what that was like to shoot and how you prepared for that?

KIRBY It was kind of terrifying, because I haven't given birth or been pregnant before. We have seen so many deaths onscreen, we've rarely seen birth … I ended up writing to a lot of obstetricians asking if they'd let me come in and shadow them. One said yes, so I went to a hospital in North London and was on the labor ward for many days, which was quite unbelievable for me. I learned a lot from the midwives about what the whole birthing experience is like. One afternoon, my very last afternoon at hospital, one of the midwives came round and said, "Oh, a woman's just come in and she's 9 centimeters dilated. And I'm going to ask if she'd mind you watching." I just thought, "There's no way in hell she's ever going to agree to have some random person sit in and watch this really sacred moment of her life." But she did, she said yes, and so I got to sit with her and watch her go through six hours of … I mean, it was just probably the most profound afternoon of my life. I never, ever could have acted it without watching her, because I saw her go on this unbelievable journey, and I saw the animal in her take over. And it was only because of that, really, that I then felt like maybe I had a chance at attempting it. When we came to it … it was so physical and it was such a primal body thing. We did four takes the first day, two the second, and I think the fourth one is the one in the movie. It was a bit like doing a play, really, where once you're on, you're on, and you can't stop. And there was something magic about that, because you couldn't spend any time doubting yourself, you just have to do it.

Zendaya, when you were making Malcolm & Marie, it was really in the height of the pandemic. Can you talk about how working in that environment shaped how you worked and how the set functioned?

ZENDAYA Obviously, we wanted to do everything as safely as possible, so we created a bubble. I was putting my own money into it, as was everyone else. We were living in a hotel that was empty. It was just us, because everything was shut down. We were in the middle of Carmel, and we shot in this home that was in the middle of nowhere. We weren't allowed to leave for obvious reasons, and in that time of quarantining together, we were allowed the time to work on the material. When we got there, the script was only about 70 pages, and there wasn't a third act. Through that process of every day just being together, sometimes in a parking lot, just working through every moment and having these really long discussions about ourselves, our characters, relationships … Being able to have that time, that space with each other to figure it out, was really, really helpful. And really not having any other distraction, just being in it every single day.

We only had two actors, a very small, small crew. So we're all doing like four different jobs. I'm doing my hair and makeup and using some of my clothes, trying to remember my continuity because we don't have any ADs or scripties [script supervisors] or anything.

Vanessa, you've been shooting the Mission: Impossible sequel. Is there a lot of pressure to maintain safety on these big sets? How does it feel different?

KIRBY My sister's an AD. She started on a movie in the summer, so I kind of learned from her what the new parameters would be and how to navigate. And I was so hopeful when she went back, actually, because it was a funny feeling, I think, for everybody suddenly seeing cinemas closed. All the people that you love and you work with are unable to work in so many different capacities, including my sister. It gave me a lot of faith. But, I mean, you get used to it. There are obviously many guidelines, there are masks and lots of testing and things like that. But it gives me faith in the resilience, actually. And I feel like we will get through it — I can't wait for the day when cinemas are going to open again.

I was skeptical when the #MeToo movement began that there would be any kind of lasting change for women in Hollywood. But now we have more female directors, we have intimacy coordinators, Harvey Weinstein is in prison. Some things that I thought I would not see have come to pass. I'm curious, what has been the biggest change for you, personally, since the #MeToo movement started?

WINSLET The thing that is shifting in ways that will absolutely be long lasting is how women's voices are being received. There is a space that has been created for a younger generation that is going to be safe. My daughter is 20, and she just came into the industry about a year and a half ago. And what's wonderful for me, as her mum, is just watching her have a courage of conviction and self-belief that is just unwavering, because she's entering a time when we're clearing the shit away from them, these girls. These girls are going to change the world, and they're going to be strong, and they're going to be powerful, and they're going to be fucking amazing. And that is because we're getting all the bad stuff out of the way for them and all they will know is to use their voice in positive, powerful ways, to lead with compassion, to be strong role models and friends. And that, to me, is the biggest thing that has shifted.

This is the decade of women championing and supporting other women without judgment. This is happening right now, and that has come as a result of the mass united swell that has emerged from #MeToo. We've all come together, everyone is holding hands and walking in the same direction. And, for me, that is the single most exciting thing that is coming out of the awfulness of the past five years and those extraordinary women coming forward and sharing their painful, awful stories, and the horrendous Harvey Weinstein. The time now is about leading in a different way. Young women being able to lead with courage — in a way that I feel I certainly didn't have, that sense of courage and companionship with my peers, in a way that I think #MeToo has done for this generation of women.

This year, we saw the explosion of the Black Lives Matter movement globally. And at the time it happened, a lot of media companies were issuing statements, making large donations. Do you think there will be lasting changes from that movement as well? Three years from now, will we be talking the way we're talking now about #MeToo in terms of concrete things changing?

DAY My hope is yes. And I hope that it spawns lasting change that moves faster than it has moved in the past. I'm hoping that this is an uprooting of this idea of, "OK, pace yourself, we need to make sure we make people comfortable." That's really not how you achieve lasting change. We can't survive like this, we will not survive. It ends in what? Our destruction, it ends in war, it ends in just unrest.

That was one of the things even on set, there were a few moments that were really quite disturbing, for the cast and me. We were shooting a movie that takes place in the '40s and in the '50s. And there were moments on set that we realized, "Oh, wow, that has not changed." It may have transformed, it may look a little different, lynching looks different, but it's not changed. Truth is going to be a huge, huge, huge factor in seeing lasting change, and sustaining, and transforming, and changing a generation.

As Kate talked about, with the younger generation, I think they have such a need for transparency that will actually be very helpful. Part of doing the movie, the Billie Holiday story, was that the truth of her story had never been told, because the truth of her story was intentionally kept from the public. The respinning of narratives for people of color, or for marginalized people, or for women, has been a constant technique of oppression. And I think that's going to be hugely important moving forward: We have to pop the top off of these things. And we have to tell the truth about them, and understand the scope of certain groups of people, people of color, why the scope of their pain has been minimized or retold.

The retelling of these stories also has to do with telling the truth, some of the gritty, ugly truth about maybe some of our heroes. We have to say, "OK, this isn't for the purpose of destroying people, but we need to know these truths so we can actually move forward and not repeat them."

CLOSE I just have to say I'm sitting here and I'm so inspired by what everyone has been saying. It's quite overwhelming, it's so articulate and so beautiful what everyone has said.

WINSLET Well, we've got you to look up to, Glenn.

CLOSE I can't tell you, it's very moving to me to hear all this. I've been an actress for 46 years, and when I think of the change, the monumental changes that in my short time that I have witnessed, the expectation is going to be phenomenal when we finally can get back to doing what we are here to do. I think there's going to be an overwhelming amount of stories and new ways of telling stories.

What will you do differently in 2021?

MULLIGAN The first thing that came into my mind was that I'm going to go to the theater as much as I can, and the cinema. As soon as we can, I'm going to sit around people and watch something together with them. It just shocked me how much I missed that. I watched a medley of musical theater on television a couple of weeks ago, and it just made me cry. I just want to be a part of that. So it sounds quite trivial, but I think that is something I'm looking most forward to.

WINSLET You know, I never give time to myself at all, really, I don't. People will so often say to me, "Oh, you need to get a massage." And I think, "What? Don't got time for that." So actually, I just have enjoyed, quite honestly, just going really easy on myself. If I had a week where I think, "Oh, I've probably had too much toast. Oh, well." Or, "Oh, well, maybe I should do some more exercise. Oh, maybe I'll do that next week." I'm just kind of learning to go, "Oh, it doesn't matter." It doesn't matter. Life's too short, just enjoy this time, and it doesn't matter about all that crap. I think I'd like to hang on to a bit of that, actually. Because it's easy in this job to have to live by certain disciplines, whether it's just sleep patterns or times that you eat, for example. And actually just letting go of all of that has been really such a joy. Not enforcing any degree of sort of stress or structure on stuff. I've loved all that. So I hopefully I'll carry that on.

CLOSE I came here where I live now [Montana] because my three siblings are here, and I had spent my whole adult life away from them. And we're now in the same town. So, for me, work is so I can come back home. It's kind of changed things, it's not like I'm waiting at home until I go to work. It's really, really valuing the work, because it means that I'll be able to come home.

Interview edited for length and clarity.

[bewitching-elizabeth-olsen]

Press: How ‘WandaVision’s Elizabeth Olsen Brought Her MCU Role To The Small Screen: “It Was Like A Dream”

DEADLINE: When Elizabeth Olsen was first pitched the idea of taking her character Wanda Maximoff into the suburbs with her late android husband Vision, played by Paul Bettany, she wasn’t quite sure how to wrap her head around it, let alone understand the couple’s inexplicable reunion. The president of Marvel Studios, Kevin Feige, and creator Jac Schaeffer had told her their plans for WandaVision to kick off the MCU on the new Disney+ platform. They also explained the concept that each episode would be set against classic sitcom tropes from the ’50s to modern-day.

“I was really worried about launching a show like that,” admits Olsen. “The idea that Kevin had about trying to tell this story in a Twilight Zone-y way through sitcom is so twisted and bizarre to me that I could only be excited to see what they would come up with. Another issue was to bring these superhero characters that audiences are used to seeing on big screens onto a small television.”

“If you’re in a choir,” explains Olsen, “you’re adding a tone to the group. So, in the [Avengers] films, I always felt like I was adding a sincerity tone while everyone was being sarcastic. Wanda has a lot of heart and a lot of pain, but with this, all of that went out the window. The core of this woman is really her lack of having really understood her own grief and trauma, and she’s trying to move forward in the world. Then there’s this strong desire and need for creating a family nucleus allows for her to not be alone in the world. And then everything else, the sitcoms, even her knowledge of what’s happening is just circumstance.”

The big themes hidden within WandaVision’s deliberately forced sugary facade made it a hit among critics, too. Think pieces and fanatical breakdowns of each episode brought a level of kudos never before seen for a Marvel character. So much so, that when the Emmy nominations were announced, WandaVision scored 23 of them, including Lead Actor nods for Olsen and her onscreen partner Paul Bettany. It is the 3rd most-nominated show this year.

“Yeah, it’s odd,” muses Olsen. “After seven years of playing the same character, who would have predicted it? I got comfortable being in an ensemble, and I really liked trying to figure out what my point of view was to the story as a whole. But with this show, we just thought, ‘This is the weirdest thing we’re ever going to be able to participate in, so let’s just swing for the fences and either it will crash and burn or people will like it.’ We just had fun.”

Spearheading the fun was director Matt Shakman who brought his years of collaborating as the artistic director for the Geffen Playhouse onto the set; bringing a cohesive theater troupe feel to the cast.

“I’ve had some pretty great leaders on my films,” recalls Olsen, “but Matt is one of the greatest leaders I have ever had on a job. He had us come in for two weeks to do rehearsals and to all get the same visual vocabulary for every single episode. Everyone came out to Atlanta, even for a couple of nights, or even if they weren’t working until six months later. We literally felt like an acting troupe.”

“A lot of us, Teyonah (Parris), Katheryn (Hahn), Paul, were all trained from different acting conservatories,” says Olsen. “We are all students of acting. I mean it was so dorky, we would do vocal exercises in hair and makeup, trying to find this world together. I would look to everyone around me to figure out, ‘OK, are we really doing this cheese? Is this really what we’re doing?’ But we were all doing the same amount of cheese, and as an ensemble we were supporting and holding each other up. That’s why it felt like such a fun show to work on, because you really felt that camaraderie and necessity of all your scene partners, so it worked.”

Which made the different eras of comedy sitcoms, with its specific sets of rhythm, less of a challenge and more of a celebratory collaborative effort to work through.

“I mean it was like a dream,” smiles Olsen. “It already feels like such a gift as an actor to get to play a genre or tone or period piece or have a playful exploration of your voice. All those things are already just so much fun and then to constantly have to change and alter it, yet keep the same core of these characters. It was a joy.”

“I’m really grateful for this show,” continues Olsen, “I got to have a lot of fun showcasing in a way of being a ham. I haven’t gotten to do that in a lot of my work. You learn in life to become quiet and reserved and polite, and it’s really fun to have that opportunity to access the skills that you’ve learned throughout the years. It awoke my body up to what I love about work and I’m feeling residual effects in a positive way preparing for my next job.”

After traveling through multiple fictional settings, Olsen’s next job took her to the U.K. to continue playing the Avengers’ Scarlet Witch in the upcoming film Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. Leaving behind her tight group of theater comrades and stepping back onto the big screen after two years of playing Wanda Maximoff, something felt different.

“It was great to stay in the same mindset,” says Olsen. “It was also frustrating because [WandaVision] hadn’t come out yet. I had just spent a year breaking down what family meant for Wanda. How our entire show is about family sitcoms, because it gave comfort though so many different time periods. And I knew that Dr. Strange was going to be different for this character, even though I was going into a film with a bunch of new people, to have this new huge group experience, I was completely alone again.”

Now back in the U.S., Olsen can finally give Wanda a break and take on characters outside the MCU, possibly even returning to the independent film scene where she got her break as an actress a decade ago.

“This has been a great gift from Marvel,” she says. “The longer you work for [them], the more included you are in every step of the process. And I really do appreciate that. I’m also grateful from a financial standpoint, because I’m now able to make decisions and take on opportunities not based on the potential of its commercial success.”

Now it seems that seven years later, playing Wanda has come to a perfect rewarding ending for Olsen. That is, unless the MCU needs her back for another round.

Press: How ‘WandaVision’s Elizabeth Olsen Brought Her MCU Role To The Small Screen: “It Was Like A Dream” was originally published on Elizabeth Olsen Source • Your source for everything Elizabeth Olsen

[neocatharsis]

“Finding My Style with NCT 127!” This time, the leader of the group, TAEYONG!

Read full interview here https://mensnonno.jp/post/35509/

MN: In our pre-interview questions, we asked every member of NCT 127 how you would like to introduce yourself to the readers of MEN’S NON-NO as if you were a friend meeting for the first time. Your answer was very simple and to the point;

“I am someone who loves to dance and rap.”

When did you realize that this was the core of who you are?

T: This is actually what I just recently started feeling. It has been four years since my debut, which makes this my fifth year as a performing artist. I have been on many stages. In the past, I think the help I received from those around me, and my colleagues, is how I was encouraged to work hard and somehow gain confidence in what I did. But now, having gone through that process, I feel I have grown enough to be able to adequately show my rap and dance skills on stage.

MN: To the question, “What is the one thing that you can hold your head up high about?” you wrote,

“TAEYONG on stage.”

T: Yes, that’s right! I feel like I have just reached the point where I am fully ready to stand on stage.

MN: Do you have an ideal about yourself as to how you would like to be seen by others?

T: Well… I aspire to show all of me to the audience. So, if they could all just watch over me with a little more interest, I’m sure they will be able to understand everything about me.

MN: From the aspects of “dance” and “rap” that are important to you right now, could you share with us which songs and what sections of each song you really want the fans to see, respectively?

T: For rap, I would say ‘Chain’, which was our debut song in Japan. We have a Japanese version and a Korean version, so we rap in both languages. Then, I would say my solo song, ‘Long Flight’, which was just released over a year ago. For dance, I would say ‘Kick It’, which YUTA-san also brought up in the previous interview.

MN: Speaking of dance, you have posted many online videos of your freestyle dancing.

T: I have a lot of recommendations, but if I were to pick just one, it would have to be the one where I dance to The Pack’s ‘Oh Go’. I have great memories of how much fun it was to shoot that one with other members of NCT 127, and more than anything, the scenery was pivotal. We shot that one in Thailand. When shooting a video for my freestyle dancing, I’m very particular about the scenery. This is because I always want to incorporate the beautiful landscape I find in all the places from each country we travel to when touring. It’s not like I prepare before going to a location, but rather, shoot when we run into a place that I find beautiful. So, the dancing may not always be perfect, but I am pleased about this video where we were able to capture the beautiful landscape in Thailand. 

MN: So, it is a creative piece of work where your inspiration came to life.

T: Yes, exactly. There are times when I don’t quite nail it, but I always aim to get a good one.

What Is Vital For You As A Global Artist?

MN: Is there something that is vital for you when performing in different countries under the slogan “To the world”?

T: I think this is something we share with many other artists. Each country has its own language and some words should not be used. There are also ways you shouldn’t act. So, you have to be aware of these things. Each time we are on the stage, I believe it is important to communicate with our fans in each country. I try to understand the culture and come up with a style that is appropriate for that culture. At the same time, I also want to share with the audience what I feel emotionally at that moment, as well as how touched I am. As I mentioned earlier, the scenery is very important to me, and I honestly just love to see the landscapes, So, when I find the beauty in that country, I simply want to share that with the fans of other countries.That is why I try to take as many photographs as I can.

What Kind Of Team Is NCT 127?

MN: As the leader of the group, what kind of a team would you say is NCT 127? Could you tell us some of the good points?

T: First of all, I don’t really think of myself as a leader, most of the time (LOL). But as TAEYONG, one of the team members, I can honestly say that each and every one of us has so many possibilities, with the power to open many doors. That is why I think we are a team that will be able to continue to enjoy sharing our time with our fans for a long time to come and build on good memories together. For me, all the members are kind, respectful, multi-talented, and I have nothing but praise for their personalities. Even though there are a lot of us, I believe that we all understand one another. This is always something I think about, but we already work hard to do our best and we do live up to expectations. So all we really need to do, is continue to do ‘our norm’, and that to me, is taking our cool to another level.

MN: How wonderful it must be to feel so proud of everyone in your group.

T: Of course, the power in our performances are something to be said for! I personally have also been deeply inspired by NCT 127 when it comes to music. Even with life in general, the great memories keep piling up every day, and it has also been a blessing to meet so many of our fans.

Any Memorable Moments With Your Fans?

MN: Speaking of your fans and being cool, to our question, “What does NCT 127 consider as being cool”, you answered,

“The coolest thing would be the cheering voices of our fans heard from the stage.”

What do your fans mean to you?

T: That is a very tough question (in Japanese). I am always surrounded by many super nice people, and even though I am perfectly happy, we receive further support and love from the fans. I really appreciate how they make me want to try harder, which is a driving force that motivates me even more. So, in the same way, I want to think about our fans as much as they do about us.

MN: What memorable moment do you have of looking into the audience from the stage?

T: On our last Japan tour, I loved the atmosphere when we sang the song titled ‘Long Slow Distance’. The setlist prior to that song was mainly performance-based with intricate staging, but suddenly the mood became very calm and serene. When we were singing this song, I felt like we were able to take the time to really look into our fans’ faces, and that the fans were also able to look into our faces. That was a memorable moment that felt amazing.

How Did You Come To Know About Music and Culture, And What Are Your influences?

MN: When looking over your responses to our questions, it feels like your older sister has had a significant impact on you. In response to the question about your influences, you said, “My sister. My sister has had a big impact on me because a lot of the things I like, for example, Japanese anime by Studio Ghibli and music, like Justin Timberlake, they all came from my sister.” Then, in response to the question about who you admire because of his or her style, you answered, “I used to like Cole Mohr because of my sister. His style was so funk and super cool.”

T: Whenever I had difficult times, my sister was always there to be by my side, so it was only natural that I came to rely on her. Every little thing, really even things that were trivial, became good memories for me. For example, during the hot summer months, sometimes I slept in my sister’s room because she had an air conditioner. That was when she showed me Ghibli movies and we had some good times together. Also, I got a hand-me-down MP3 player from my sister, and when I looked at the song list inside, the music my sister listened to was in there. Justin Timberlake and a lot of other pop songs. I wasn’t that interested in the music at the time, but after I listened to it, I found there were a lot of really good songs. So, that’s when I started listening to that type of music even more.

MN: So, that’s why your sister pops up more than once regarding your influences.

T: Yes. To think those tiny little memories would one day become a huge part of who I am now. I really think I owe it to my sister, That’s why I love my sister so much, and I still rely on her as well.

What Kind Of Adult Do You Want To Live To Be?

MN: There were some responses that caught our attention that had nothing to do with your group activities or fashion, so let’s go into detail regarding those. In response to the question, “What kind of an adult do you want to become?”, you answered, “I want to be an adult that someone can rely on.” Is there a reason behind this?

T: In the process of growing up, other than my parents, I feel like I met adults in society for the first time after joining SM (SM Entertainment, an agency for NCT 127). I mean, I’m sure I was blessed with good adults around me back then as well, but at that time I was a child and didn’t really think about it. But after I joined SM Entertainment, I met adults I could look up to, and there was a time when I knew I wanted to become like that. So, as I grew older and the years passed by, when I started to think “I wonder what kind of an adult I’ll become”, I always felt like I wanted the strength to be able to protect someone, and to have the intellectual sharpness and cleverness to be able to do so. So, I could have just as easily responded that “I want to become a decent adult”, but because I want to be an adult who has the strength to be able to protect someone, I wrote, “I want to become an adult that someone can rely on.”

MN: To the question, “What do you want to conquer?”, your response of “I want to conquer the future to come,” was also quite impressive.

T: Even though I haven’t lived that long, when you jump into society and live your life, I’ve come to learn that you have to conquer your past, the present, and the future. I am able to do what I want to do right now because I was fortunate enough to find a good agency. So, in that respect, I am grateful to both the past and the present. But who really knows what the future will bring, you know? I’m sure that many of you are hoping to live your lives while preparing for the future, and I am the just same. So, in answer to this question, that is the reason why I wrote that I want to conquer the future more than I do the past or present. I feel that I want to place my worries on the future more than anything else because it has yet to come.

MN: You mentioned earlier that you “want to become an adult that someone can rely on”. We can see how you deeply care about the people around you, while also having a positive outlook on the future.

T: Well, I think a big part of it has to do with the fact that I am surrounded by good people. As I continue to work, I can honestly say that I am the type of person who has a strong sense of always being helped by the people around me. The fact is, these people care about me, support me, and work alongside me, and I hope to continue to work with them for a long time to come. This desire heightens my sense of responsibility. The same is true for the other members. The more I am surrounded by good people, the greater my sense of responsibility becomes.

MN: You said you don’t really think of yourself as the leader, but it seems like you are aware of your surroundings and that you have various thoughts on your mind.

T: Hahaha, no, no.

MN: Finally, to sum up your story thus far, what would you say, TAEYONG-san’s “My Own Style” is…

T: It’s about “meeting” others. Everyone around me and the agency has made me who I am today. I love them all. I want to cherish each and every person I meet, so that I can have the opportunities to step into environments that are good and to be able to achieve what I want to do.

MN: Please tell us what we can expect from NCT 127 in the future.

T: Our new 2nd mini-album for Japan, ‘LOVEHOLIC’, will be released on December 23rd. We are working on it now, and you can expect great things! We look forward to seeing you all in Japan soon.

MN: Thank you very much for today.

T: (In Japanese) Thank you right back. Looking forward to the next time〜!

[shimzus-a2]

“when am i gonna get my shrine maiden kiyoko and guy-who-visits-shrine-4-his-granny kita slowburn 3.6k 1.8k word starter,” said @kainan​ “bet,” said i.

        SHE’S NORMALLY SLOW & DILIGENT in her daily ministrations. though simple tasks she’s bound by her word to complete— cleaning the temples by hand, leading guests to the omikuji, & watching over the monks as they meditate in the mornings— kiyoko works at her own speed. there’s no rush to duty, but no reason for her to slack, either. eventually, everything will be completed. 

        she’s lucky to have moved beyond her days as a mere temple servant, into her own right as a shrine maiden. the work is still the same ( & she can’t complain about that, when it needs to be done ), but the expectations for her have lightened. she isn’t drilled to finish her tasks early, or scolded for the ways that she accomplishes them. when she was younger, that was often the case. the monks forced her to RUN FAST & JUMP HIGH, performing at the highest expectations possible. 

        more often than not, the rush would overtake her. with wind sweeping across her bangs & through the sleeves of her yukata as she carried a new branch of wood for the temple fireplace, kiyoko ran the full circle of the temple grounds at the calling whim of her superiors. her reliable legs carried her far, bounding gracefully over the uneven stone pathways that had seen hundreds of years of wear before her. [ had she been the only one to run across them ? ] as far as kiyoko knew, nobody else was likely to run here. the monks walked silently across the stones, & the other servants in her cohort scurried … even the guests took their sweet time when they visited. but she ran.

        gracefulness still has its limits, and running so much was always bound to lead to mistakes. kiyoko fell often, no matter how much focus & attention she paid to her feet or the uneven stones beneath them. one wrong step— her geta catching on the edge of one— & she’d meet solid ground again. it was frustrating, but sturdy : a reminder that RUNNING isn’t FLYING, & for all the excitement it could build up in her chest, the ground would always be there to catch her again … to level her out.

        the monks liked to say that they were spirits tripping her. they liked to play games on people, especially young girls who hadn’t learned much yet. [ kiyoko had learned enough, though, she thought. why target her & not someone more powerful ? ] if anything, it seemed like TRIPPING her would give them nothing but a good laugh. & even then … kiyoko grew used to the feeling of the uneven stones on her back, pressing awkwardly into her spine when she rolled onto them & stared up into the sky to catch her breath. she grew used to the feeling of scars on her legs, too, & felt grateful that her yukata would hide them from view.

        but she doesn’t need to run anymore. her superiors don’t press her as hard, & she’s grown perfectly accustomed to walking instead, now. it delivers the same results, & she doesn’t trip. so at her own pace, quietly but responsibly, she completes her duties as a shrine maiden.

        only … today is a bit different. the temple has always seemed like a SECOND WORLD, & by its own rights, it is. the bridge between a mortal plane & that of the gods must inherently feel different somehow. perhaps their visitors don’t realize it ( since they only ever come to pray in times of hardship, when they need to rely on the gods for good grades or success in love ), but someone who has spent every day living & working here would recognize it. 

        there’s a quiet change in the way that the temple operates, in comparison to the world outside. as soon as kiyoko sets foot beyond the torii gate entrance, the world swells with sounds & sensations of physical GROUNDEDNESS. a horn honks, or someone shouts, or a sign for a convenience store starts blinking from loss of power. they all feel deafening in comparison to the world inside the gate. in the temples, those sounds & sensations are more muffled & subtle. the plinking sound of water being dripped into a stone basin is almost like the steady whisper from a god, leading one along their path. the carefully drawn seals placed above every doorway inside are a reminder of the monks who came before, each with their own life & their own tie to this place. the world outside may be blaringly abrasive & direct, but within the temples, life is quiet & subtle. every element here poses a hidden story & meaning. there is more beyond the surface, laying in wait to be uncovered.

        those worlds don’t mix well. kiyoko finds herself feeling out of place outside, unsure of how to act & how to hold herself. similarly, those guests she always saw visiting seemed out of place here. they may go through the process of making their offerings, praying for luck & guidance, & dismissing themselves … but do they truly know why they do so ? it seems to kiyoko like they’re visitors from another world, wedging themselves into a place where they don’t fit because they don’t understand. 

        even him. she’s spied him here before— regularly, even— but it’s clear that he’s still from another world. he may seem to be more respectful than their usual visits, & certainly more diligent about coming regularly … but not her kind.

        if she were to give into her curiosities, perhaps she’d try to create a story for him to explain his purpose here. [ a man with a gambling debt, & with each day he’d gamble a bit more away & lose, he’d feel he needed to come here to ask the gods for more … or perhaps not even someone with a vested interest in the gods, but instead a budding architect curious about the history of the buildings & their designs ? ] with any less self-restraint to her name, perhaps kiyoko would have given him plenty of stories already. with the frequency of his visits, it would be hard not to exhaust every ounce of creativity her brain might have …

        but she maintains her virtue of self-restraint & chooses not to indulge in those stories when she spies him. it’s not really her business why he comes, in any case ; instead, her interest should be vested in her own responsibilities, than in those of others. whatever reason he has for making his regular attendances, it doesn’t concern her. it’s probably a good enough reason for him, & if he’s found a way to make use of their space, then she won’t bother him. 

        though today, of course, is different. if their worlds are not quite the same, that’s fine. kiyoko can accept the nuances of her lifestyle that conflict with his beyond this place. if the world could be categorized that simply— into two worlds like this— then life would be easy. but a third is at play, & it complicates things. 

        she’s never been to the world of the gods before, nor would she know what to expect of it. simply trying to gather her thoughts to make a guess about it feels like a feeble attempt at pinning down the UNKNOWN, so she won’t even try. there are things that can’t ever know, & this is certainly one of them. the world bends for the gods, & always has : they dip their fingers into her world & his, grazing across each like stray cows in an open pasture. but she can’t turn her eyes to their world in return, or dip a finger into it. as a mortal, all she can do is show her respect & devotion, & hope that in doing so she can appease some of the angrier gods into a state of calm. 

        she can also ensure that she clears out the temple from those in the way of the gods. kiyoko has done something similar before, although not to the degree of this occasion. sometimes, the monks might instruct her to convey to the guests their intent to close early ( for ‘ cleaning ’ ). in that case, all that kiyoko needed to do was to patter around the grounds & share the message : i’m so sorry to interrupt you, but it’s important you know. the temple will be closing a bit early today so that it can undergo its scheduled cleaning. if you can, please be sure to hurry along & finish up your visit— we wouldn’t want to inconvenience you with the ruckus of the cleaning. that, albeit indirect ( & a lie ), usually worked.

        this instance was a bit different, though, & kiyoko hadn’t been given a full explanation as to why. she wasn’t a very high-ranking staff member, but that didn’t mean that she wasn’t welcome at important meetings for the whole temple staff. she would simply be asked to sit to the side & listen, rather than contribute or express her opinion. [ but that’s fine. so long as she was able to observe what was happening, she could form her own approach quietly to herself. ]

        however, at this meeting, even sitting to the side & observing wasn’t enough to understand the circumstances. kiyoko had heard bits & pieces, more so as separate words strung together haphazardly than as anything resembling a true, definitive explanation. THE GODS ARE COMING. YATAGARASU. IT’S IMPORTANT THIS TIME. THE TEMPLE MUST BE EMPTY. THEY’RE COMING. 

        it would seem as though this were just another case of a godly ‘ visitation. ’ kiyoko would have to clear out the temple grounds & prepare to host the presence of a god, though she had never actually seen one visit. they were small, anyways, & preferred not to show their physical selves when the spiritual, unbodied form worked well enough. 

        the looks on the monks’ faces conveyed clearly enough to kiyoko that this was not ‘ just another case. ’ they had stressed the importance of this occasion, & the fact that the space needed to be CLEAR. so although she might not have understood it fully, nor been given the chance to ask any clarifying questions, kiyoko was certain of her tasks.

        she would do as she always did when trying to clear out her world & separate it from that of the mortal world outside. however, this time, she would be a bit more fervent in her attempts, simply to speed things up. 

        it’s why she doesn’t feel bad or impolite about tapping him on the shoulder with her index finger, her bangs unsettled by the rising wind & her cheeks nipped by the cold.  ❛  anou … i’m sorry. i know you come here often, but the temple will be closing early today. we’re cleaning up the space. so if you could … make your peace & part …  ❜