#also when I see people talk about what Louis is like in contrast to harry who wants to be famous

[statementlou]

it's always funny to me when people say they don't think Harry and Louis are still together because they're *so different*, especially when those differences are about their public image, because to me the absolute precision of the way their public images divide every possible personality trait is just another one of the things that seems way too tidy to be natural to me and makes me think they ARE. Without each of them having a carefully constructed public face that excluded a lot of things there is just literally no way there wouldn't be SO MUCH MORE overlap given how much we know, even so, that they have in common- and honestly sometimes I wonder if that carries over to business stuff too, if that is also deliberately split in two different directions like, let's try both, you try this way and I'll try this way. When they each had that conversation with a dear friend about deciding to prioritize making music in certain ways and reevaluated what they would be doing, did they also come up with two different ways of doing that stuff and each take one route? Crack theory in a way, but I stand by the first half either way- they have way too many common interests and habits (and too much common history) to avoid mentioning the same things publicly WAY more than they do without an effort being involved. IMO.

[dearly]

Under-18s should not be pushed into pop stardom, one of the UK’s leading songwriters has said, in the wake of the tragic death of former One Direction star Liam Payne.

As Payne’s father, Geoff, arrived in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to arrange the repatriation of his son’s body, fans were still taking in the news of the 31-year-old’s fall from a third-floor hotel balcony. Many also joined the Girls Aloud singer Cheryl Tweedy, an ex-partner, in decrying the lurid coverage of Payne’s death scene in some news outlets.

Speaking this weekend, Guy Cham­bers, the songwriter and friend of Robbie Williams, has called for the industry to hold back from working with talent under the age of 18. “I do think putting a 16-year-old in an adult world like that is potentially really damaging. Robbie experienced that, certainly,” he told the Observer.

The need for better protection for vulnerable young male pop stars has gained urgency in the aftermath of Payne’s death, prompted by criticism of the music industry’s treatment of the former teenage star, who had spoken of his struggles to find mental stability after his sudden fame as a member of One Direction.

The band was formed on ITV’s The X Factor in 2010, when a 16-year-old Payne came back for a second audition on the talent show and joined up with Harry Styles and fellow members. One of the show’s judges was Tweedy, with whom he later had a child, Bear, who is now seven. Payne had first auditioned for the show aged only 14.

Louis Theroux, executive producer of the upcoming BBC series Boybands Forever has spoken of the perils of “getting everything you dreamed of, and it not being what you imagined”.

Theroux’s new series, which goes out on BBC2 in the middle of next month and was made with his wife, Nancy Strang, will look at both the dramatic highs of gaining instant fame and the contrasting depths of despair it can prompt. With “searingly honest” contributions from Williams, formerly of Take That, and Brian McFadden of Westlife, it focuses on the earlier years of the boyband ­phenomenon in Britain and Ireland, from the 1990s to the late 2000s.

Talking about his year-long work on the show, Theroux said the artists will discuss their “highs and lows” over three episodes that centre “on a generation of young men and their managers, who were wildly successful and also immensely vulnerable, having the times of their lives and, also, in some cases, cracking up.”

Due to the death of Payne, issues the series examines have already prompted leading names in the British music industry to urge action.

Chambers said: “I have four children, so I think about this a lot. I know in Robbie’s case, with Take That, there wasn’t any proper protection set up to look after what were teenage boys. That was a long time ago, but I don’t see much sign of change. There is not much more real care taken, that I have observed, from people involved in the big television talent shows.”

Chambers, who co-wrote the hits Angels and Let Me Entertain You with Williams, believes the entertainment business should set new standards: “I would suggest that people should not be in a boyband until they are 18, and the industry should stick to that, too.”

These worries are echoed by Mike Smith, the former music industry boss at Warner/Chappell, who has also worked at EMI and Columbia. “I am not sure if it is something for ­legislation, but the longer a young person can postpone a career in music the better,” he said.

“Of course, there is nothing wrong with forming a band in your teens, but my admiration goes out to anyone who comes out of an early professional career in good mental shape. I signed a young Irish band called the Strypes once, and I was uncomfortable with the level of responsibility I felt. People are still immature at 16, so the very thought of going through all that madness when you have no idea who you are yet is alarming.”

However, Smith, who has worked with many bands and singers, including Blur, Robbie Williams, Supergrass and Arctic Monkeys, as well as the X Factor winner Matt Cardle, believes there is now much more caution about handling young singers and songwriters.

“When I was at Warners in 2018, we did improve on this. We set up a fund in the contract of our songwriters to cover their mental health care because we were seeing around 25% of them suffering anxiety or depression – and these were not even the frontline pop stars.

“Around that time, the major music companies were all doing similar things to help – taking people on to the payroll to advise the artists and their staff. That wasn’t around early enough for Robbie, I know, but it is better now, partly because we are having the conversations about it.

“I don’t think I really understood it earlier. But what hasn’t changed, of course, is the incredible pressure these young artists are under. Everyone expects you to be living your best life, but then you find you can’t function. People want you to be happy all the time and you are constantly scrutinised.”

[sassyfrassboss]

This thing is that Catherine actually seems to be the only one paying attention to the effects Harry and Meghan’s actions are having on the family and how the public perceives them.

>>It's the art historian in her. She pays attention to what the rest of them gloss over because she knows that it's the little things which end up mattering the most to historians. She thinks about things that others don't - like a color palette for her children's christenings to create harmonious portraits, or the diplomacy of fashion on her state visits - because those are the details that create the stories she wants told rather than the story that gets told for her.

Being this detail-oriented is also how Kate gets around never complain, never explain. Kate explains to us what she wants by the images and the vignettes she composes - in effect, she shows us what she wants, rather than telling us what she wants, and it's an incredibly effective tool in media and public perception.

Contrast that to Harry, Meghan, Charles, and Camilla: they always tell us what they want us to see, which is often the exact opposite of what we do see - for instance, Meghan bleats on about women supporting women but she attacks Kate at every chance she gets; Harry bleats on about mental health but he self-medicates with drugs and alcohol; Charles loves his darling mama but he's talking to the Scottish government about giving Balmoral back; Camilla doesn't want to be Queen but she's never smiled bigger than when she was crowned or announced her engagement. Because their actions contradict their words, they're not as effective in the public space.

I also suspect a lot of Kate's intuition on how to handle Harry and Meghan and the public's perception also comes from how the press and the public treated her during the dating years. You don't go through all that press harassment like she did for 8 years without learning some things about yourself, the people you love, and the people who hate you.

This is a very accurate assessment.

Catherine has learned that the attention to detail and perfectionism is an excellent way of getting her message across to the world.

Louis’s christening comes to mind like you said. You know damn well Meghan was to wear a shade of blue or white and she showed in that awful olive green. She has been challenging Catherine since day one for supremacy and she constantly loses.

[twopoppies]

Hi Gina! I wanted to know your perspective on this because you’ve also expressed similar feelings but what is it with the fairly recent discontent with Louis and his “public image”. I’d be stupid not to notice that he mentions the kid now when he didn’t acknowledge him before but outside of that nothing has really changed IMO? If anything he’s been free of any stunt relationships and during FITF era he didn’t assign any BS stunt meanings to any of the songs like he did with Walls. In contrast (and I don’t mean to say this demeaning way) Harry has upped the ante with his stunts with by making out with Emrata and getting O tattooed on him in a giant scrawling font. Do people genuinely believe that in comparison Louis has changed for the worse or do they just not click with him anymore and because of that project a random argument of “he’s unrecognisable nowadays”? For full transparency even though I’m a fan of both I tend to favour Louis so I’m just genuinely curious about this attitude shift from the perspective of someone on the other side of it.

I think the answer to your question lies in the each person’s individual experience and their individual connection to either Harry or Louis. For me, stunts are easier to ignore than behavior I can’t find an explanation to. Sometimes I have an initial unpleasant reaction to a stunt, but most of the time I can see what they’re doing as upholding their closet in the moment, and life goes on. If Harry was constantly talking about the tattoo or continuously walking around making out with people, I’d likely have a much harder time ignoring it.

My personal disconnection from Louis stems from his behavior, not stunts. I don’t enjoy the persona he’s developed. I really don’t want to write a dissertation about it because it just comes across as super negative and all I get for doing it are attacks from people who don’t agree. Suffice it to say that the Louis I see now isn’t the Louis I saw a few years ago. The doubling down on being a father and the random “Larry denials” definitely don’t help.

I’m glad you feel differently. And I’m glad I feel differently about H and still find a lot of joy in him and his music. I hope I find a way back to Louis because I really do want to love him the way I used to.

[louisisalarrie]

Hii... Hope you're well:)

So i was wondering about louis' fanbase. From what i've seen a lot of them, even if they believe freddie is his kid, don't seem to care that much about his sexuality no? Like in harry's fanbase most girls want him to be straight and believe he is. However i haven't seen this happen a lot in case of solo louies.

heya!!! hmmmm I would have to disagree with this one, I think. also this turned into a bit of a welcome to the show moment. so, anon, welcome to the show!

believing F is Louis’ kid is an acknowledgement of his sexuality being anchored, somewhat, towards women. Some may believe he is bisexual/fluid and accept that, but there are a lot of louies who are straight up just against the idea, and some that are pretty neutral. Their main argument is that he does have a kid, which means bbg did its job, and proved to be effective with a new, and expanding, audience that didn’t see him grow throughout 1d.

I’m not in any way suggesting that I strictly for a fact know that Louis isn’t bi or doesn’t have an interest in women, because that’s not been disclosed. However, I would lean towards the fact that he is only interested in men, due to the things I’ve heard, his obvious contrast of behaviour when around them, the amount of and degree of stunts including the party boy louis push, and his mannerisms compared to when he’s around women. So, not only do I believe he doesn’t have a kid, but also that he’s not interested in women.

And I do think there are neutral solo louies who are just like “yeah he could be queer, but that’s none of my business”, but there have been a lot of louies who actively attack people even entertaining the thought. Also, it’s more the idea that he’s ever been with Harry, that they reject. Which is bizarre, like, you believe he may be interested in men, but god forbid it’s Harry?? They pair him with absolutely anyone but him. I’ve had them in my inbox, it’s chaos hahaha.

And same goes for solo harries. There’s this toxicity around the idea of larry, but a lot of them seem to be fine/neutral with the idea of Harry being queer. Though, he again, could never be with louis. It’s truly just… baffling, but also, a lot of these folks didn’t watch them through their journey, a lot of them even refuse to acknowledge 1d because it’s still “not cool” to love a boyband. I’ve seen some absolute gross shit said about both louis and Harry’s time in 1d, but these people don’t care. They’re focused on their fave solo career.

Anyway, this also relates to the very stark contrast in Harry and louis’ images right now. Seeing louis smoke, both pot and cigarettes, and drink, in comparison to Harry who we never really see that side of, is a divide between “wholesome and healthy”, and “laddy and rock and roll”. It’s dark tracksuits and singlets, and it’s bright colours and more feminine/non traditional outfits. It’s louis not talking a hell of a lot on stage to show his personality more, and Harry blocking out parts of his show just for crowd interaction. It’s Harry waving rainbow flags and louis not doing that. It’s louis “having a kid” and not being super active in his life, and Harry not having that extra weight on his shoulders. People seem to take louis’ image at face value a fair bit, and solo harries use that against him. So I’d say it’s a little bit more of the opposite of what you’ve said above.

I dunno, at the end of the day, we’re not gonna see the truth of these fans and how they react, until there is a coming out, in my opinion. Some people will turn against them, some will just be like “ok cool”, and some will rejoice. It’ll all come out in the wash.

Louis being stunt free, apart from bbg, for a while, has been good though. Once they drop that from his career, it’s a slow seeding. It’s the last thing they need to do before a CO. and if they drop bbg, get the boys (Harry particularly) back involved in louis’ life to “support” him through such a wild time, it’ll just be growing to a CO from there. Particularly now that Harry’s publicly single now. It’s the last step, and they can do it positively for louis, and in turn, positively for Harry, and combine the fandoms a little more which will HOPEFULLY stop so much aggression between us and the solos.

Anyway sorry this kind of evolved into something else but thanks for the inbox, anon! <3

[zot3-flopped]

On Letdown they are always saying that Kid and Tyler write all of Harry's music, but it just isn't true. They also say he can't explain his songs, which is just a lie. As usual, he says plenty if you listen. I don't care if they don't listen, that's obviously not going to be interesting to them, but I also think they are stupid for saying X can't be true when they don't know what X is.

First of all, you'd have to discount all the multiple times both Kid and Tyler have pinpointed who did what in a song, and it's Harry did this, Harry searched for that sound, Harry's lyrics are funny (grr he won't tell us why though). They share the songwriting: which is what Harry says, and how he behaves when he goes on stage with them to collect awards. I know they are likely to talk him up a little bit (that's showbiz) but I don't get the hint of anything going on that's not genuine. Contrast with Louis' songwriters who are clear about what they contribute, and with Louis who is also clear if you listen. (Clear that he might contribute an idea but not much else.)

Secondly, I'm not too sure about Tyler, but Kid Harpoon is pretty prolific, and he just does not have the big hits with many people except Harry, and to some degree early Florence + The Machine, maybe Haim. He has produced and written on whole albums that have kind of done ok but not done big numbers, Shawn Mendes' for example.

The exception is he and Tyler were on Flowers by Miley Cyrus which was huge. But it's not like the pair of them are some sort of hit-producing factory and artists just put their names to a song, far from it. There is a lot of team work going on. Which is exactly what Harry presents to us as how his songs are written.

Sorry for rambling, I was just prompted to write this because your anon singled out MFASR as a stunning intro that hooks you straight in and I agree.

Anon 2

I’ve seen a lot of people assume that Harry just writes or something and that kid and Tyler write the music, even though this is very clearly not the case based on what anyone who has worked with Harry have said, the credit breakdown (as far as we can see it, harry has majority or at the very least equal share) etc. He also works with different writers and producers, yet creates coherent work. They’ve repeatedly said that Harry is brilliant at melody etc. Songs like Sott, She, and Cinema were basically written entirely by Harry and then finished in the studio per what his collaborators said. He also gives credit to everyone involved (the one writer on boyfriends said he was surprised to be credited at all) and sometimes seems to over emphasise the role of others (Mitch on TBSL; Harry wrote the melody, lyrics etc. Mitch also only came up with some of the guitar solo, not the rest of the song but harries love to say it’s “Mitch’s song”). I get frustrated by the idea that Harry isn’t the leading creative in his own art simply because he doesn’t brag about himself.

[persephoneflouwers]

Your tags on this post are so interesting to me: www.tumblr*com/persephoneflouwers/716582542127628288/httpstwittercompissingrrystatus1654629281895

Because there’s such a contrast between the way Louis was portrayed in 2015 and 2016 for example vs. today, with partyboy Louis (the Louis who’d get papped with girls and had articles written about how many women he’d taken to his hotel room) being replaced by this almost blank canvas. Perhaps even a blank canvas for people to project their own feelings of desire onto. Yes the media have mentioned his ‘girlfriend’ in interviews and such (before the break-up was announced) but in general his image is mostly of someone who is sexually-unavailable. He’s not marketed as someone desirable and that’s likely a conscious decision, his focus is on the music and that’s totally fine. I also think partly it helps him retain some kind of ambiguity around his sexuality which, understandable! Do what you need to do!

I don’t fully agree with you on this. I don’t think there’s any space with the sexual projections on Louis. For instance, I’ve never seen a y/n x Louis in my life EVER. Even the simple fact Party Boy downright ended up with a kid seems very categorical to me. They didn’t give you the multiple one night stands, the multiple dating rumours, the multiple public partners. He’s the guy who settled down with a girl at 18, broke up, lost the track for a couple of months and coincidentally in that time had a child with a social parasite girlie (what are the chances of this happening in reality omfg) and then went back to the usual gf. He’s not a blank canvas on this topic.

It should tell a lot the fact his own fans perceive him more as a big brother/bestie whom they like to call daddy when he shows a bit of his powerful boss aura. It’s probably an age issue too now. There’s a lot of difference between Louis, who is approaching 32 and the average fan (usually barely 20). And now that I think about it, this could explain why they tried to introduce the latest stunt. She was young, same age as a normal Louis fan, probably into the same stuff too. I’ve never thought it could be a way to reconnect with his fanbase and I’ll have to sit on this and think, but it’s just a possibility at this point lol

The thing is it didn’t work they way they hoped it would because they have been feeding people another Louis for ages. Yes, he was the menace with the best sex innuendos, they took that away. Yes, he was possibly the biggest flirt, they took that out of the brand. And that’s what you have now an insanely hot young man who has potentially every skill to be the daddiest mf in the biz who never talks about sex or shows any interest in it. The contrast with Harry is soooo striking. Like you don’t have a single song in Harry’s entire discography where there isn’t a sex related whatever. Music videos, interviews, just in general the things he says or does (pleasing everyone?)

It’s the polar opposites agenda.

Once you see it, you won’t get rid of it 💀

[alltheselights]

Hey I don't know if you've seen the discourse about Louis' image that's been happening lately but I wanted to get your thoughts. As usual with tumblr people see things in two extremes. On the one end louis' image is awful and toxic and on the other end there is absolutely nothing wrong with louis' image and it's his real self 100% and how dare you criticize anything about him. I guess I fall somewhere in the middle. For me it's how he's been presented during promo. What are your thoughts?

I would say that I also fall somewhere in the middle and I think people have lost a lot of nuance in the conversation over the past few days. I kinda summarized my thoughts on this discussion a couple of weeks ago with this post.

I think Louis likes beer and football and doesn’t like wine or really fancy restaurants. At the same time, I do think he sometimes leans so hard into his “laddy” image sometimes that you lose the complexity of who he is, and I think he can come across as unlikable when he’s railing about things that other people enjoy even if he himself does not enjoy them. I think both he and his team try very hard to contrast him with typical Hollywood/rich people and want to make him fit in with the indie/alternative scene, but in the process, they often fail to show how emotionally intelligent, delicate, and sweet he is.

When you’re a huge fan, you do catch glimpses of that side of Louis through long interviews, interactions with fans, and behind-the-scenes footage. For much of general public, however, they often just see a lot of negativity related to Louis, whether it be the constant smoking or unhappy-looking photoshoots, the constant commentary from both him and interviewers about his drinking and smoking habits, and the comments where he’s talking about how much he hates wine, sushi, nice restaurants, TikTok, and so on. Even if those things are true, they shouldn’t be central to his image when there are so many positive, interesting, and impressive things to learn and see about him.

I think that unfortunately, both the general public AND a significant portion of this fandom fails to recognize that Louis has as many stereotypically feminine traits as he does stereotypically masculine traits. I think Louis and his team are partially responsible for the one-dimensional view of him and that’s why I wish they’d be more creative in how they present him. However, I also think fandom is partially responsible for the one-dimensional view of him (and of Harry, actually), and unfortunately, particularly the Larrie part of the fandom because so many Larries really embrace old-fashioned gender stereotypes and want Harry and Louis to be opposites, with Harry as the feminine partner and Louis as the masculine partner. When you look beyond their surface level images, that categorization is not accurate and they both have plenty of stereotypically feminine and stereotypically masculine traits.

Harry dresses the same as Louis does when he’s off the clock, is obsessed with exercise and fitness, and loves sports as much as Louis, as he enjoys football, American football, AND golf, which are all stereotypically masculine sports (whereas Louis only really cares about football). Louis wears a lot of expensive clothes, is always in tune with his emotions and the emotions of others, and is naturally flamboyant whenever he lets his guard down. So much of the fandom won’t acknowledge these truths because they don’t fit with their one-dimensional view of the boys or their assumptions about what role they both play in their relationship, which is based more on fanfiction than reality.

So anyway, all this to say - I definitely fall in the middle. I don’t think Louis is displaying toxic masculinity because he doesn’t like wine, but I also wish that he and his team would choose to reflect the complexities of who he is because I think it would help expand his audience and make him more likable to people who don’t see as much of him as we do.

I also think the fandom needs to stop reducing both Louis and Harry to one-dimensional and old-fashioned caricatures based on gender stereotypes and their not-fully-accurate public images. I hope that all made sense!

[alarrytale]

I think Nick is closeted bcus like Louis it is noticeable there is no sexual chemistry with women but how is this ambiguous thing going to play out when we see with Harry that he is now getting so much backlash for it. How will he do queer roles while being closeted and not talking about his sexuality. People will eventually be vocal about it. Will he have to do Louis type denials which will lose him his queer fans. Will he go for a het fanbase like Harry which will probably be so mentally damaging to him considering he has mental health problems, and it will maybe hurt his creativity. I saw that he says Harry is an inspiration to him and well if he follows Harry's path then maybe he'll end up the same way as Harry and a negative image.

Hi, anon!

I know people like to contrast and compare nick to harry and louis, because that's what we know and that's our best frame of reference when it comes to closeting, queerbaiting and appealing to your target audience. But i think their situations are very different, and when the situations are differerent we can't expect the same results.

For one, Harry is currently straight presenting. He's holding hands with his current beard, making out with supermodels and getting tattoos for his gfs. His straight presenting isn't subtle, it's full on. It's aggravating for those of us who knows he's gay and with louis.

Secondly, Harry is also gay presenting, at least while touring. Singing medicine and his other bi music and waving rainbow flags and wearing glittery and feminine clothing. He's queercoding. That's a threath to the hets who wants to fantasise about marrying him.

The reason the queer community and some of the gp is calling him out for queerbaiting and his pr stunting is because he's playing both sides and stringing people along. Nobody wants that. It's problematic. He's created discontent on both sides, instead of keeping both sides happy. People are starting finding faults with him, calling him out more, engaging less and he's losing his shine. It creates pressure on harry, who is currently focusing on targeting the hets, who are the largest part of his fandom.

For nick it's very different. Nick isn't really straight presenting. I'd argue that he's queer presenting or presenting a very sexually ambiguous image. What he's presenting is a man who has a gayface, speaks about having both masc and femme traits, takes queer (and some straight) acting roles, attends pride, don't mind being called babygirl, refers to other men as sexy, who talkes openly about his mental health stuggles, his distain for toxic masculinity and advocates for prevention of men sexually assaulting women. He hasn't got time for relationships (his words) and hasn't been in one (publically) for a long time. Women are very comfortable around him and he cuddles up to both men and women, like the man baby he is.

Nick has never spoken directly about his sexuality. Even the daily mail agrees and they are the best source to gauge a celebrity's prefered narrative. He indirectly talks about being straight and it's easy to assume he is if you don’t dig a bit deeper. There are no pics or videos of him with women showing pda.

Nick also got a different fandom than harry. Nicks fandom is more like louis', predominantly queer or thinks that nick is queer. The composition of his fandom is due to his many queer roles. He's often refered to as a queer icon. As long as he wants to continue to do queer roles, i think he wants to keep his queer fandom. By changing the way he presents himself, for example by going very straight, like harry, he'd alienate the largest part of his fandom. I don't see a need for that, he's thriving and the fandom is thriving, by him just being himself. There is no fake baiting of either hets or queers. Harry is an inspiration for him, but i think it's mostly due to the androgynity in his fashion, something that nick wants to emulate.

It's hard to tell what strategy they are going for to make him known. The way he talks in interviews it doesn’t seem like they are going for stunting and pr relationships, but rather let his talent speak for itself. He wants to be taken seriously as an actor and not be known as a celebrity (his own words). That's the opposite of the strategy harry is going for. It also doesn’t seem like the promo around tioy is going to be het focused, but focused on the music. But that might change. I don't think there is a need for a queer denial, he doesn't mind the speculation (why would he) and it would amplify the queerbaiting speculation and alienate his fandom. So no, i think the best course of action is to keep up the ambiguity sourrounding him (that creates engagement on it's own). I don't think queerbaiting accusations will be a problem as long as he's not agressively straight presenting.

[stylesthebrave]

4 & 46? :)

Omg hi!!! I haven’t talked to you in forever!! How are you??? Thank you for sending <3

4 - name three authors that were influential to your work and tell why

Hmm. Does this mean published authors orrr other fandom writers? I’ll give some of both. 

I think one of the defining factors of my writing is that I use long sentences (though I try to balance them out... sometimes unsuccessfully), and I get that from reading classic literature. People like Oscar Wilde and Jane Austen. And also some more modern authors like Donna Tartt. All of those writing styles I adore.

As for fandom writers... there are a ton of people who are influential to me just by writing, but I’m a pretty secluded writer until the later drafts and stages, so there aren’t many people who directly influence my writing in that regard. but I’ll give you one— @larrydoinglaundry my beloved. She’s pretty much the only person who gets to directly influence my work when it’s in the early stages... even though I always have to remind her she’s allowed to give me criticism. 💍

... I don’t think that answered the question at all oops

46 - share a scene of a story that you haven’t published yet

Oh this is interesting. How about this… I’ll give you half of a scene from my fic inspired by cinema. Here’s their first meeting, under the cut so I don’t flood your dash haha. 

Harry is tall, legs long that are almost disproportionate to the rest of his body, but somehow he doesn’t look as lanky as he probably should. He’s well-built, like the type of person who has those disgusting green smoothies for breakfast and salads for lunch, muscles accentuating the shape of his tattooed arms, but they’re pretty, just like the features on his face: brown curls and green eyes and a sharp jaw and nose.

It shouldn’t make Louis freeze and forget what he came outside for, but it does.

Louis isn’t sure if it’s a relief when Harry speaks first, because it excuses him from having to be the one to do so, or if it makes matters even worse, because Harry’s voice catches him so off guard.

“Hi,” comes the simple greeting, the cheerfulness a stark contrast to the deep rumble of Harry’s voice. This man is a walking contradiction already—Louis can see why he’s so versatile in his work.

Or so he’s heard, at least.

Louis feels a little guilty for admitting that he hasn’t seen much of H’s work. If this were a typical first meeting, he’d have already searched his name on their company’s website, the research of his field, to see what kind of things Harry has filmed and what he hasn’t. That usually gives Louis at least a shallow idea of what his partner likes and dislikes, helps him shape a conversation about how this shoot will be different and similar. Not that any of them have anything to be ashamed of, but over the years, Louis has noticed how much more comfortable his partners seem after he’s acknowledged their previous work.

Only now, all of that has been thrown out the window, and he’s standing here in front of Harry, with only the sliver of information Anthony had given him five minutes ago.

Louis only realizes that he hasn’t said anything in response to Harry’s greeting when he speaks again, suddenly standing right in front of Louis instead of next to his car. “My name’s Harry. Uhm, H… is my screen name. And I’m assuming you’re… Louis?”

Louis forces himself to snap out of whatever trance he’s in and actually respond to Harry before his silence comes off the wrong way.

“Yeah, yeah,” Louis finds himself saying, because it’s the first thing that came out when he opened his mouth, “I… figured.” He shakes his head, cursing himself for not being able to come up with anything more profound to say. “I’m Louis, yeah. Or, I guess Felix. My screen name.”

When he’s done speaking, he cringes at his own words.

Louis isn’t quite sure what’s wrong with him. It’s not like he’s never encountered someone this attractive under these circumstances—after all, that’s kind of his whole job—but he’s almost never this awkward about it. He’s usually the one who’s able to steer the conversation in the right direction, the one that’s casual and confident about his job. He never feels this uneasy.

But now that everything has been thrown at him last minute, it’s an entirely different experience. It’s an odd feeling for Louis.

Harry smiles loudly at him, running a casual hand through his hair. There’s the smallest moment of silence where neither of them quite know what to say. Harry suddenly finds interest in scuffing the bottom of his shoe against the concrete below, the first even slightly nervous action Louis has noticed since Harry’s been here. Somehow, that’s what gets Louis speaking in coherent sentences.

“You should probably let Anthony know you’re here before he starts stressing more than he already is,” he says simply, and Harry’s relief shows in the eye contact he offers in return.

“I should,” he says, the hint of a smile in his voice. “Wouldn’t want to cause him a heart attack. He sounded halfway there when I called after Trey canceled on me.”

Louis snorts. “You’re telling me. I thought he was gonna chop my head off earlier, the way he came bursting through the door. Honest to god, I thought he was about to fire me.”

The anecdote makes Harry chuckle, cute and higher pitched than Louis had been expecting. His cheeks form craters of a pair of dimples, revealing his teeth, the front two larger than the others, when his lips part. Louis captures a mental picture, just on the off chance that this is will be their only meeting.

Harry’s mouth opens for a fraction of a second, then closes just as fast. He laughs lightly one last time, then says, “Guess I should, then.”

No sooner than Harry takes a step toward the door, Louis is lurching for it, pulling it open and gesturing for Harry to enter. Harry ducks his head shyly and takes the offer, Louis following just behind.

It isn’t until Louis is sitting at a table with Anthony, Jack, and Harry that he realizes he never got his water bottle from his car.

[causticsunshine]

i wanna see it!! pls we need more momrry content i’m begging u 🥺🤲

my dear anon if you’re talking about that text post i wrote while i was toasted last night, then here’s a little nibble for you—

“Too sore?” Louis asks, gently tracing his thumbs under Harry’s tits and meeting his eyes in question.

Shaking his head, Harry says, “Not f’you,” almost shyly. Fingercombs Louis’ fringe from his face. “Just don’t bite or squeeze too hard, please.”

Louis happily anchors himself on his elbows and ducks down, gently laying kisses under the swallows. Silent promise. Trust comes in turn when Harry cups his left breast and holds it for Louis to suckle at—which he does, happily. With a sigh, he laps around the puffy, sensitive skin of his areola with eager kitten licks and carefully nibbles the tip of his nipple as his thumb and forefinger keep the right entertained with teasing traces.

Harry’s skin is supple and saccharine under his nose, his mouth. Freshly washed and lotioned with no bitter-tasting traces of his favorite cologne to contrast Harry’s spring with its sweet, smokey, autumnal fragrance. Now, he tastes powdery and slightly sweet from his body lotion—milk and honey.Louis sucks eagerly, humming as he goes. He’s angled his body so he’s partially straddling Harry’s right leg, and when Harry lets out a pleased, throaty moan, he can’t help but rock his hips into his thigh a little, weak attempt at softening the blunt edge of growing arousal.

He plans to give ample attention to both breasts before he tries to work one pre-shag orgasm out of his husband by slipping back down between Harry’s legs and rubbing the puddled shea butter from his palms over his hips and thighs, but then he feels more on his tongue, a little salty, and he quickly pulls away. Fears for a moment he’ll spot blood and they’ll have to end this to ring their doctor—he could ring his mother instead because there’d be less people to go through to get an answer, but he knows she’ll prod him with questions after the fact, and he’d really like to avoid telling her that he was just sucking on Harry’s tits, thanks very much—but when he looks down, other than the saliva shining over Harry’s skin, there’s a small droplet of something custard-colored gathered on Harry’s nipple.

Louis’ just pulled away and spots it when Harry scrambles to sit up and peers down himself. Chokes out a panicked, “Oh—” and promptly goes scarlet, gawking.

“S’alright, s’alright,” Louis immediately soothes, thumbing the offending drop away by rubbing it into Harry's skin, “no worries, love.”

“Fuck me, what, I’m leaking now, too?” and Harry gives his tit an experimental squeeze that causes him to inhale sharply, but he does manage to coax another droplet out. Horrified, he hastily reaches for his t-shirt. Apologies come aided with burning cheeks, mumbling, “Sorry babe, fuck, I didn’t know—”

And Louis is having none of that. It’s never happened before but there’s no need to fret, to apologize. He quickly unfurls Harry’s fingers around the corner of his t-shirt and drops the fabric back in its original spot, kisses the back of his hand.

otherwise i do also have this little momrry sketch for a different fic, but i keep getting nervous about finishing it and posting it out of the fic doc:

[statementlou]

Can you help me explain what rads thought was gospel? And that algorithm thing what was that? Thank you!!

oof I'm not going to really do this justice, but the whole party line of this huge segment of fandom (which bleeds heavily into discourse in larrie circles without people really realizing it- people will accept certain things as fact and then use them to base arguments off of without realizing that those ideas are just things said without basis by people who also believe, for example, that Harry is actively working to sabotage Louis' career because he hates him) is that Louis is constantly fighting his label and team because they force him to do things (like for example the reason he talks about stunt stuff is because otherwise 'THEY' won't 'LET' him tour rather than, the choices and trade offs a closeted person makes to make it in the industry are complex and sometimes shitty) and that his label and team don't do the things they should to support him and that powerful people in the industry are actively working to sabotage his career to the extent of paying radio stations NOT to play his songs because he crossed people while in 1D. And so they are very protective of him, which is nice right like aren't we all, but specifically with an inflated sense of self importance-- we have to do promo for Louis because NO ONE ELSE WILL, his label doesn't do anything the only reason any of his releases have any success at all is fan projects (yes people seriously believe this)-- and with feeling sorry for him like POOR LOUIS HE IS SO OPRESSED BY THE POWERS THAT BE (and by Harry, lol) OUR POOR HELPLESS VICTIM BABY. Louis himself, in contrast, has spent the last few years repeating that he would rather people did not feel sorry for him in a way its hard not to feel is pointed, and telling us that he has chosen to do something other than chase number ones in a way that also feels pointed (especially that he would keep repeating that while occasionally also admitting that well... it would be all right if it happened! and making some efforts to see if he can make it happen without compromising what he wants to do), and we have seen firsthand all the things his label and team are doing (including A LOT of promo) and how well it is all working. But you still get folks who will say that he's lying, he's being made to say that stuff, that his team are lying- I literally saw a post saying that the head of BMG Italy was lying about the capacity of the Milan show, that it wasn't really 17k or whatever it was, to make it look like Louis was doing well when really his tour was flopping because BMG didn't want to do their job, or, something. IDEK. So when someone says 'wow look the algorithm put Louis on a spotify indie playlist!', maybe they just don't understand how spotify/promo/capitalism work and think that's how you get a new single on spotify playlists (it's not; your label/ team pay them) but just as likely they are coming from a place of, we know his team doesn't do promo (because some people on tumblr said so) so this must be how it got there!

In today’s article we learn tons about exactly what is being done behind the scenes, and we get Louis saying how he chose the people he works with and is happy with that choice and that it bothers him to be pitied. But I can tell you with certainty that at least one person will unfollow me for this, 3 others I don’t know about will block me, and nothing will change any more than it has at any other point over the last 3 years when he told us the same stuff :/  it’s always simpler to have a villain to be mad at when things happen that aren't what you want (Louis coming out, Louis being the biggest pop star in the world, whatever) after all

[twistedtummies2]

Moriarty the Animal

So, a couple of people - including @belliesandburps - asked me how I would cast an “anthro-ified” take on Moriarty the Patriot. We’ve all seen movies and books where anthropomorphic animals take on the roles typically personified by humans; Disney’s Robin Hood is probably the most famous example, where Robin is a fox, Prince John is a lion, the Sheriff is a wolf, and so on. A couple people wondered what I would do if I created some sort of similar universe, and turned all the characters from Moriarty the Patriot into animal figures.

So, here are the animals I would use for these anthros��

For William and Louis, I would choose Abyssinian cats. For all the visual symbolism of spiders, I always felt there was something distinctly cat-like about the Moriarty brothers in the series, especially with sweet William. Something about the way the good Professor moves and talks and just looks, overall, feels very feline in nature. There are no blonde cats, as far as I’m aware, but Abyssinians are known for their sleek, lithe frameworks and short, tawny coats, which - under the right light - can actually look very close to the golden hair we know both brothers for. Similarly, I would make Albert a Havana brown: similar body structure, but now with a rich brown coat that would match his own hair in the series.

For Sherlock Holmes and his brother, Mycroft, I would choose Black Labrador Retrievers. Black Labs are typically used and bred as hunting dogs, which obviously fits Sherlock, in particular, to a tea. Between the two, I would say Holmes would have a slightly shaggier coat than Mycroft, who would be more sleek and svelte, to match the differences in their characters. Making Holmes a big black dog also fits his color scheme in the show, and makes for a great contrast to Moriarty the Mystery Cat.

Dr. Watson I see as a rabbit. I’m not exactly sure why, but I guess there’s just something sort of rabbity about John, so to speak. And again, it makes for a great contrast when you pair him up with Holmes the Labrador. Similarly, I can see Miss Hudson as an anthropomorphic rodent: a mouse. This is because she sort of reminds me of Mallymkun, the Dormouse from the Tim Burton Alice movies, in terms of her getup…and also because I just think the idea of a cute mouse in pink yammering at and beating up Sherlock is just kind of hilarious, to be honest. Plus, there’s just something sort of “busybodying” about a mouse that I think would fit Miss Hudson in some odd way.

At Scotland Yard, I can see Inspector Lestrade as a bloodhound, with Gregson as a boxer, and Patterson as an English pointer. Arterton, the corrupt Chief Inspector during the Ripper case, I can see as a big, blustery bulldog. Adam Whiteley, the tragic MP, I can see as a white lion: lions, of course, are iconic in England, and are typically seen as regal, majestic creatures - Kings of Beasts. Making him a white lion shows how rare he is and helps to further that “white knight” image that inevitably ends up tarnished.

On that note, Charles Augustus Milverton is the only reptile of the group. He is undoubtedly a snake, and that’s not a far leap to make: in both the original Conan Doyle books and the series itself, serpent imagery is used with him a lot: he has snake eyes, elongated fangs, greenish hair, etc. It fits the cold-blooded, slippery cad to a tea. If I had to choose a specific species, I would say a Green Tree Python. His three henchmen would all be primates: Gosling would be a big, gruff gorilla, Harry a demented little spider monkey, and Ruskin a medium-sized chimpanzee.

Irene Adler/James Bonde would be a Golden Labrador Retriever. I like the idea of Irene being the same species as Sherlock, and again, the hunting dog aspect would be useful once they become Mr. Bonde. Von Herder, a.k.a. Q, I can see as a bat of some sort (partially because the whole “blind as a bat” joke writes itself). Miss Moneypenny doesn’t appear in the anime, but she is in the manga quite a bit; since she has to disguise herself at one point as James Bonde (and does a bang up job at it), I suppose, by default, that means she would have to be a Golden Labrador Retriever as well, perhaps with paler fur and a smaller build.

Sebastian Moran is a grizzled gray wolf, and Jack the Ripper would undoubtedly be a sly ol’ silver fox. It took me a while to figure out, but I decided Fred Porlock would be a lovely little ferret. First of all, there’s alliteration there with Fred the Ferret, and that’s always cool, but I think making him a warm-blooded creature with certain serpentine elements would be fitting, given his skills and personality.

Something I love about this, that I didn’t realize till I finished, is that ALL of Moriarty’s team are made up of predatory species: cats, dogs, wolves, foxes, ferrets, and if one makes Von Herder’s bat a vampire bat or a bug-eater, he’d fit there, too. In contrast, the specific trio of Holmes, Watson, and Miss Hudson on Baker Street consists of only one predatory species, with the other two being typically herbivorous. In fact, when it comes to prey species, mice and rabbits are about as low as it gets on the food chain. There’s something about that dichotomy and the way it can reflect the two sides of the conflict that I rather like. I didn’t intend it that way, but I think it’s good to have it. And again, making all of these characters, with all their shades of gray, into mammalian species makes for a great contrast to the reptilian Milverton.

There are, of course, lots of characters not covered here, mostly in the form of oneshot villains and a couple of minor supporting roles. But I think this covers most of the major players in the cast seen in the anime (and Moneypenny, poor dear), so let me know what you all think! :)

[bluewinnerangel]

I am here to cry. I'm not trying to make everything about Larry and I'm most definitely not trying to downplay the importance of everything Liam said, his friendships within the band, his struggles and his courage or anything like that. I really really respect him and appreciate him saying these things out loud and I definitely want to support him in every way possible. It's just that the podcast brought about so much of Lirry and Lilo on my feed that I just had this moment where I once again realised the stark contrast between any interaction between ot4 with that of L and H. There were sooo many instances after the hiatus began of Liam and Niall mentioning their recent interactions with the rest of the band, even the most trivial of things. Even Louis has discussed about his friendship with Liam and Niall multiple times since. But there are like 5 instances of Harry even mentioning Louis' name and a little more of Louis mentioning Harry ( one of them being the ObVIOuSLy interview 🤮, which , under normal circumstances would have atleast mentioned something like we are still good friends or just good friends or SOMETHING OTHER THAN A DISTINCT BLAME GAME) . The contrast is fucking unbelievable and imo one of the biggest pieces of evidence that something is not right. It is just so sad when it hits you in the middle of the day what an amazing human Louis is and Niall and Liam get to gush about him all the time and all Harry can publicly do is sing Sweet Creature and IICF with all his heart and I'm 🥺🥺🥺 No but SERIOUSLY this is up there with 1D day, as deliberate, as evident as that seperation! How do people never see that? Even the media never publishes anything with their names together but I'm sure 54 outlets will pick up how sweet Liam was about his bandmates in the podcast. It is SO EVIDENTLY FISHY I-

Ughhh

You don't even have to post this, I know you are wary of discourse ( as you have every right to be, I love how unique and fresh your blog is in this fandom, you do youuu♥️) I just wanted to cry here because I just now saw the post you made about Harry acknowledging Louis publicly :''')

Hi! This is a lovely message. Thanks for choosing to fly with Not A Discourse Blog But Who Am I Kidding airways, I mean you can't just throw this in my inbox and then go "ignore me lol" <3

I kinda rambled on and I think the ask is already a scroll so under the cut:

It happens sometimes that the dash throws 2 things at you back and forth and you can't help but go some places again. I mean we all kinda got punched in the face again about what they went through.

Also wanna leave this link because I love it.

I kinda view things from 2 angles here and they somewhat counter each other. I don't think I have to pick which one it is, it could be some shades of both. None of us know what's really going on, we just fill in the blanks with whatever makes sense to us, this is just something I think to be seeing, but you have to kinda pay close attention and have certain ideas of what they're like (for good reason) so it's different for everyone, anyway:

On one hand I feel like it's deliberate, either something that just happened naturally or being an approach to really have seperated public images. No matter what it is it's just a fact, it's clear as day, that publicly their images have been drifting apart for years. Maybe, hopefully, possibly with the hinting of new era's we get a punkrock and a glamrock couple pls universe pls I know your ask is just talking about mentioning each other but like their whole images, the parts that seem reinforced. How they act. How they look. The things they do and don't mention. The vibes. There's a choice of which parts of them to show and bring along to the public view, to emphasize, and other parts that are just kinda shoved under the carpet. Sure these other bits come out sometimes but you wont find them in the TM powerpoint you know. (don't take that literal pls) And to me it almost looks like they both picked one side of the things they're into and stuck with that. Like Louis took the the england boyo football man arctic monkeys loving sweatpants laddy lad let's watch a movie about cars things side and harry took the ... well the soft shit, older music, the romantic comedies, the stereotypical queer, lol. Not saying they're one and the same person and everything one likes the other does too, but if you just pay close attention you see they're not that one sided and they're both both of these things. Yet just when one is loud about one thing, the other's subtle. But the point is that with the image you see at first glance, nothing overlaps. Nothing. (I guess with the exception of ABBA. With abba they just said you know what? We share. I imagine a passionate debate on who gets to have abba and just being too stubborn. like nobody danced in the kitchen that day) And that's suspicious. That's hella suspicious.

So if that isn't a deliberate strategy, it feels like over time they both just kinda snowballed into it, like being on their toes not to mention the things the other is (publicly) into to the point where it's become out of character (I mean do take this literally) to go there. And then we can bring that to other behaviors too, like one is active on social media (to the point where he has the most? is it the most? interactivity on twitter? like son can tell he just farted and half a million people will be hitting that like button with the speed of light), the other went for being a vague mysterious lil siren. It would be quite out of character for Harry to drop vague shit on social media in the way Louis is doing, or for him to casually mention details the way Liam or Niall can. And I don't just mean about Louis, about anything and anyone. His image is absolutely based around mystery.

So all in all with The Contrast so great I feel indeed there's some level of awareness and deliberate choosing to show/not show some parts of them based on what the other's publicly showing, you know?

And no it's not that black and white, they're not one person and it's always been the case that Louis answered interview questions more directly and the kinda I'm a simple man with a girlfriend, which contrasts harry just sitting there and at most just not denying things, again they're not one and their willingness to say/not say stuff has always differed.

That kinda bleeds into the other viewpoint that maybe Harry just has a bit of a "what's it to you" attitude towards mentioning who he's close with, loves, cares about to the public. He's definitely big on confessing his love don't get me wrong it just shows he's full of it in everything, but he's not saying it, not in a literal sense. He hasn't said a word about Mitch and Sarah's baby publicly (and rightfully so, why would he), his TM instagram doesn't even follow his own mom and that's probably a bigger statement than we give him credit for, he remains silent on... well... pretty much everyhing. I think he decided a long time ago it's no need, no use, to try to have that be part of his public image. That it doesn't do anything at the end of the day, and that to try and push that onto his public narrative just.. isn't worth the energy. Like that it's best to just sit back and let the wild world just run off with whatever little thing whatever interviewer is projecting on him because it's not gonna matter anyway and just lemme film my little gay movie and do my little gay dance and sing my little deep songs and lemme go home the the blue skies byebyenow. yaknow? He's said that somewhere, that he only let's those parts of him kinda cross over in his music anyway.

Also I recently watched cosmic leeds' 2019 timeline and I believe there's quite some positive Harry mentions from Louis in there so I'm just gonna plomp that here because ~happiness~:

(context: the very few times harry acknowledged louis publicly post-hiatus)

[weheartchrisevans]

BOSTON — So you're Tim Scott, the Republican senator from South Carolina who opposes Roe v. Wade and wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and you get a call from Chris Evans, a Hollywood star and lifelong Democrat who has been blasting President Trump for years. He wants to meet. And film it. And share it on his online platform. Can anybody say "Borat?" “I was very skeptical,” admits Scott. “You can think of the worst-case scenario.”But then Scott heard from other senators. They vouched for Evans, most famous for playing Captain America in a series of films that have grossed more than $1 billion worldwide. The actor also got on the phone with Scott’s staff to make a personal appeal.

It worked. Sometime in 2018, Scott met on camera with Evans in the nation’s capital, and their discussion, which ranged from prison reform to student loans, is one of more than 200 interviews with elected officials published on “A Starting Point,” an online platform the actor helped launch in July. Not long after, Evans appeared on Scott’s Instagram Live. They have plans to do more together.

“While he is a liberal, he was looking to have a real dialogue on important issues,” says Scott. “For me, it’s about wanting to have a conversation with an audience that may not be accustomed to hearing from conservatives and Republicans.”

Evans, actor-director Mark Kassen and entrepreneur Joe Kiani launched “A Starting Point” as a response to what they see as a deeply polarized political climate. They wanted to offer a place for information about issues without a partisan spin. To do that, they knew they needed both parties to participate.

Evans, 39, sat on the patio outside his Boston-area home on a recent afternoon talking about the platform. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans and spent some of the interview chasing around his brown rescue dog. Nearly 100 million people didn’t vote in the 2016 general election, Evans says. That’s more than 40 percent of those who were eligible.He believes the root of this disinterest is the nastiness on both sides of the aisle. Many potential voters simply turn off the news, never mind talking about actual policy.“A Starting Point” is meant to offer a digital home for people to hear from elected officials without having the conversation framed by Tucker Carlson or Rachel Maddow.

“The idea is . . . ‘Listen, you’re in office. I can’t deny the impact you have,’ ” says Evans. “ ‘You can vote on things that affect my life.’ Let this be a landscape of competing ideas, and I’ll sit down with you and I’ll talk with you.”

Or, as Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who has appeared on the site, puts it, “Sometimes, boring is okay. You’re being presented two sides. Everything doesn’t have to be sensational. Sometimes, it can just be good facts.” Evans wasn’t always active in politics. At Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School, he focused on theater, not student government. And he moved away from home his senior year, working at a casting agency in New York as he pushed for acting gigs. His uncle, Michael E. Capuano, served as a congressman in Massachusetts for 20 years, but other than volunteering on some of his campaign, Evans wasn’t particularly political.

In recent years, he’s read political philosopher Hannah Arendt and feminist Rebecca Solnit’s “The Mother of All Questions” — ex-girlfriend Jenny Slate gave him the latter — and been increasingly upset by Trump’s policies and behavior. He’s come to believe that he can state his own views without creating a conflict with “A Starting Point.” When he and Scott spoke on Instagram, the president wasn’t mentioned. In contrast, recently Evans and other members of the Avengers cast took part in a virtual fundraiser with Democratic vice-presidential nominee Kamala D. Harris.

“I don’t want to all of a sudden become a blank slate,” says Evans. “But my biggest issue right now is just getting people to vote. If I start saying, ‘vote Biden; f Trump,’ my base will like that. But they were already voting for Biden.”

(In September, Evans accidentally posted an image of presumably his penis online and, after deleting it, tweeted: “Now the I have your attention . . . Vote Nov. 3rd!!!”)

Evans began to contemplate the idea that became “A Starting Point” in 2017. He heard something reported on the news — he can’t remember exactly what — and decided to search out information on the Internet. Instead of finding concrete answers, Evans fell down the rabbit hole of opinions and conflicting claims. He began talking about this with Kassen, a friend since he directed Evans in 2011’s “Puncture.” What if they got the information directly from elected officials and presented it without a spin? Kassen, in turn, introduced Evans to Kiani, who had made his fortune through a medical technology company he founded and, of the three, was the most politically involved.

Kiani has donated to dozens of Democratic candidates across the country and earlier this year contributed $750,000 to Unite the Country, a super PAC meant to support Joe Biden. But he appreciated the idea of focusing on something larger than a single race or party initiative. He, Kassen and Evans would fund “A Starting Point,” which has about 18 people on staff.

“There’s no longer ABC, NBC and CBS,” Kiani says. “There’s Fox News and MSNBC. What that means is that we are no longer being censored. We’re self-censoring ourselves. And people go to their own echo chamber and they don’t get any wiser. If you allow both parties to speak, for the same amount of time, without goading them to go on into hyperbole, when people look at both sides’ point of view of both topics, we think most of the time they’ll come to a reasonable conclusion.”

“What people do too often is they get in their silos and they only watch and listen and read what they agree with,” says John Kasich, the former Ohio governor and onetime Republican presidential candidate. “If you go to Chris’s website, you can’t bury yourself in your silo. You get to see the other point of view.” As much as some like to blame Trump for all the conflicts in Washington, Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.) says he’s watched the tone shifting for decades. He appreciated sitting down with Evans and making regular submissions to “Daily Points,” a place on the platform for commentary no longer than two minutes. During the Supreme Court confirmation hearings, Coons recorded a comment on Judge Amy Coney Barrett and the Affordable Care Act.“ ‘A Starting Point’ needs to be a sustained resource,” Coons says. “Chris often talks about it being ‘Schoolhouse Rock’ for adults.”

It’s not by chance that Evans has personally conducted all of the 200-plus interviews on “A Starting Point” during trips to D.C. Celebrities often try to mobilize the public, whether it’s Eva Longoria, Tracee Ellis Ross and Julia Louis-Dreyfus hosting the Democratic National Convention or Jon Voight recording video clips to praise Trump. But in this case, Evans is using his status in a different way, to entice even the most hesitant Republican to sit down for an even-toned chat. And he’s willing to pose with anyone, even if it means explaining himself on “The Daily Show” after Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas posted a selfie with Evans. (Two attempts to interview Trump brought no response.) Murkowski remembers when Evans came to Capitol Hill for the first time in 2018. She admits she didn’t actually know who he was — she hadn’t yet seen any Marvel movies. She was in the minority.“We meet interesting and important people but, man, when Captain America was in the Senate, it was all the buzz,” she says. “And people were like, ‘Did you get your picture taken?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I sat down and did the interview.’ ‘You did an interview? How did you get an interview with him?’ ”What impressed Murkowski wasn’t his star power. It was the way Evans conducted the interview.“It was relaxing,” she says. “You didn’t feel like you were in front of a reporter who was just waiting for you to say something you would get caught on later. It was a dialogue . . . and we need more dialogue and less gotcha.”

“Starting Points” offers two-minute answers by elected officials in eight topic areas, including education, the environment and the economy. This is where the interviews Evans conducted can be found. “Daily Points” has featured a steady flow of Republicans and Democrats. A third area, “Counterpoints,” hosts short debates between officials on particular subjects. Eric Swalwell, a Democrat from California, debated mail-in voting with Dusty Johnson, the Republican congressman from South Dakota.

“Most Americans can’t name more than five members of the United States House,” says Johnson. “ ‘A Starting Point’ allows thoughtful members to talk to a broader audience than we would normally have.”

The platform’s social media team pushes out potentially newsworthy clips, whether it’s Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) discussing his meeting with Barrett just before he tested positive for the coronavirus, or Angus King, the independent senator from Maine, criticizing Trump for his comments on a potential peaceful transfer of power after November’s election. Kassen notes that the King clip was viewed more than 175,000 times on “A Starting Point’s” Twitter account, compared with the 10,000 who caught in on CNN’s social media platform.

“Because it’s short-form media, we’re engineered to be social,” says Kassen. “As a result, when something catches hold, it’s passed around our audience pretty well.”

The key is to use modern tools to push out content that’s tonally different from what you might find on modern cable news. Or on social media. Which is what Evans hopes leads to more engagement. He’s particularly proud that more than 10,000 people have registered to vote through “A Starting Point” since it went online.

“If the downstream impact or the byproduct of this site is some sort of unity between the parties, great,” says Evans. “But if nobody’s still voting, it doesn’t work. We need people involved.”

[artificialqueens]

Fool for You (Crygi) - Frankenvenus

After realising she has fallen for her straight best friend, Crystal’s therapist recommends she write her crush love letters. So instead of communicating her feelings, she scribbles then down and slips them into Gigi Goode’s locker.

A/N~ I hope you like this cause it took forever. I finished it super late at night and I did read through it twice but I apologise for any errors.

Crystal stormed her way into her therapist’s office, throwing herself onto the pink sofa that she sat and rambled on for an hour and a half every week. Her therapist looked at her bemused as the blue-haired girl uttered the words, “I’m in love with my best friend.”

Her therapist, Widow, huffed out a sigh, placing her clipboard down on the coffee table in front and pushing her glasses slightly down her nose, “Well. That’s a common issue for young queer folks like yourself.”

Crystal groaned and rolled over, displaying her puffy eyes and messed up bangs, “But I thought I was immune to it.”

Widow chuckled slightly and leaned towards where Crystal lay, brushing her hair from where it stuck itself in her lip gloss, “Do you need to rant to me about it? You know that’s why I’m here, sweetie; to listen.”

The young girl groaned again before sitting up, straightening her back and recounting the events of her day.

It had started off a normal Thursday. On Thursdays, she would usually peddle to her best friend Gigi’s house before school began so they could scribble down fake absence notes for phys ed, then Gigi would hop on the back of Crystal’s bike and they’d cycle the last half mile to their high school. It was routine for them. Never weird, never crossing any lines. It had always been the two of them, best friends, since middle school. So when things shifted, it took Crystal by surprise.

“I wanna do something different today instead of just sitting in the library until Phys Ed ends. I’m sick of the librarian shutting us up. We literally aren’t even loud,” - Gigi had said, fixing her dirty blonde ponytail in the school bathroom mirror after the bike ride messed it up.

Crystal had agreed with her, before asking her if she wanted to try something new. Although Gigi was her best friend, she hung out with the stoners whilst Gigi hung out with the high-fashion Instagram girls. The dirty blonde had never tried weed, and Crystal never offered - but today she did, and Gigi was eager.

The two of them snuck to the abandoned bike shed at the back of the school, covered in ivy with smashed windows. It was a spot that only Crystal and her friends Daya, Daegen, Lux and Tiff knew, so Gigi was curious to see it.

“This is so cool,” Gigi had gaped, finding a spot in the corner while her friend rolled her a joint. Crystal had to assure her multiple times that they wouldn’t get caught, but Gigi didn’t shut up until the sizzling rice paper was placed in her mouth. The older girl talked her through how to inhale it properly, and soon enough Gigi was coughing the smoke into the air.

“Can you feel it in your chest?” Crystal had asked, and when Gigi nodded, she said, “Good. That’s how you know it worked.”

They sat there, minds foggy, trying to hold conversation despite their thought process and immediate short term memory being cut off every few seconds. At some point, their pinkies intertwined, followed by the rest of their fingers. And then, Gigi was nestling her forehead into the crook of Crystal’s neck. That’s when it all tumbled down on the latter.

The contrasting feeling of the coldness from Gigi’s skin against her own warm, buzzing skin sent jolts of emotion through her, and the gentle brush of Gigi’s wavy locks against her jaw caused her heart to squeeze itself in a way that was unfamiliar to her. It didn’t seem too serious to Crystal whilst she was still in her high, but when the effects of the weed began to fade by fifth period, the sudden feeling of need for her best friend’s touch remained in place.

Her mind kept travelling elsewhere during fifth and sixth period, which happened to be double Spanish. Jaida had to pinch her multiple times, bringing her back down to Earth. Jaida didn’t question Crystal’s behaviour too much though, because the latter wasn’t usually focused in Spanish class anyway, and that’s why she was failing.

Gigi had debate team practice after school on Thursdays, so instead of going home together the same way they would travel to school, Crystal biked alone. She had her earplugs in, blasting Clairo like usual and wondering what the hell it was that she felt today. It wasn’t until ‘Sofia’ by Clairo came on did everything click in her mind. Something about the lyrics ‘Standing here alone now, think that we can drive around, I just wanna say how I love you with your hair down’ made her realise that oh, she wanted to be able to call Gigi her own, and not just platonically. Then she almost crashed her bike.

She swerved into a fire hydrant, gratified that her bike sported thick mountain bike wheels to soften the hit. Luckily, she didn’t fall off - she just got a fright. She decided to walk her bike the rest of the way home, which thankfully wasn’t far.

When she reached home, she spread herself across her bed and allowed herself to make connections that she should’ve made before. Why else could she never take her eyes off Gigi’s plump lips? Why else did people at school assume they were a couple because they were so touchy all the time? Why else did she feel such tremendous jealousy whenever Gigi showed even the tiniest bit of romantic fondness towards someone that wasn’t her.

Her mom knocked on her door, reminding her that she had her therapy appointment in an hour, and that led back to the present.

“That seems like quite the epiphany,” Widow smiled warmly, passing Crystal a tissue box when tears began to spill over, “Normally falling for a long-term best friend is something that you realise over time, but not for you apparently.”

“I think maybe I’m just an oblivious fuck,” Crystal sniffled. “But even if I realised it today, years ago, or tens of years from now, she still wouldn’t like me back.”

“Well, I’m not your friend’s therapist, but we can’t be so quick to assume.”

“Once you see the girl, you’ll know. She’s a hardcore ten. I’m a five, at best.”

“Crystal, remember what we went over…” Widow began, and the blue-haired girl finished the sentence.

“…Instead of self-deprecation, tell yourself you’re the best person ever, no matter whether you believe it or not - yeah, I get it,” Crystal rolled her eyes, “It’s just hard when you know it’s not true.”

“Well, I have a little tip I give my clients when they’re in a similar situation to you. The whole unrequited love thing,” the older woman got up from her seat and walked towards a cabinet, pulling out a packet of fresh, plain envelopes, “I usually tell them to write their crush love notes. It’s up to them whether they send them or not, or whether it’s anonymous or not, but they can be very therapeutic when needing to express bottled up emotion. Do you see where I’m coming from?”

Crystal raised a brow and tilted her head to the side slightly, the hint of a smile on her lips. She actually didn’t mind the idea.

“That’s actually super cute,” she giggled, taking the stack of envelopes from her therapist, “Thank you.”

.

As soon as Crystal got home, she sprinted to her room and grabbed an old notebook from the back of her stationery drawer. It was a plain A5 paper notebook, but spread across each page was a ginormous red opaque One Direction logo. Crystal had got it for Christmas about a decade ago, but it had only been used a handful of times for random sketches and one draft of a Louis Tomlinson and Harry Styles fanfiction.

She grabbed an ink fine-liner from her art pot which she would normally use for her pointillism artwork and began the first letter.

You don’t know who I am. Well, you do but like, not who is writing this. I hope you aren’t scared or anything - cause that’s the last thing I wanna do. I promise I’m not a freak. Well, I sorta look like one but, I know you aren’t one to be bothered by that kind of thing. It’s beautiful, you know. The way people look at you and assume you’ll hate them for who they are cause you’re so pretty and popular, but then you’re just as wonderful on the outside as you are within. That look on your face when you meet a new person drives me nuts. The way you look like you’ve swallowed the sun. Radiant. Always.

Sometimes I wish I could just tell you how I feel about you to your face, but I think you might faint out of disgust. You do that a lot. I sound like a stalker, but I promise I’m not. I think I’m just smitten.

She finished the letter, reading it over to make sure her handwriting looked unrecognisable. Although Gigi wasn’t the most observant person, she and Crystal were so familiar with each other that she was bound to notice her unique handwriting. She also made sure to spray it with an old perfume that she never wore, so Gigi wouldn’t connect their scents. Gigi always made comments about how she loved Crystal’s perfume, so the blue-haired girl had to take precautions. Her strong scent of cocoa and vanilla was bound to rub off on the paper, so she sprayed it with a men’s cologne that she had likely shoplifted years prior, spraying it onto the paper from a distance.

Although Widow had given her the option not to post the letters, Crystal felt like the weight of her crush wouldn’t be eased unless she actually posted it. So, she placed it into the envelope and slipped it into Gigi’s locker the next day at school when the blonde wasn’t around, her heart pounding in her ears with anticipation and verve.

She sat through her first class of the day, social studies with Daya, desperately trying to take her mind off the painful wait. Daya ranted to her about dinosaurs and how everyone’s perception of how they looked was wrong, but Crystal hardly paid attention. She would nod every so often, just so Daya wasn’t insulted, but she wasn’t really in the conversation.

After social studies, she shared a free period with Gigi. She made her way to their meeting spot in the library after the bell dismissed them from their first period, and sooner than she would’ve liked, Gigi was marching across the library towards her with the smuggest grin on her face.

“Oh my God Crystal Elizabeth you will never guess what I just found in my locker,” she squealed as quietly as possible, sliding into the seat opposite Crystal’s.

“What?” Crystal raised a brow, her mouth full of skittles. Now here was the hardest part - pretending to be shocked.

Gigi reached into her blazer pocket and pushed the familiar envelope towards the older girl, who plastered a confused look on her face. The dirty blonde gestured for her to open it, so she complied. She pulled out the letter that was already likely covered in her own fingerprints and unfolded it with a faux-expression of excitement.

“What the fuck is this?” she chuckled, trying to suppress the shake in her fingers as she held the letter.

“A letter. From a secret admirer,” Gigi beamed, placing her beautiful shaped chin into her palm and flashing her angelic white teeth. Wow, Crystal was more whipped than she thought.

“This is so dumb,” she lied blatantly, and to her surprise, Gigi frowned.

“You think so? I think it’s so sweet. And shit… whoever wrote it has a way with words,” she exhaled, tugging her plump, peachy lower lip between her teeth.

Crystal’s breathing hitched and she felt her skin redden. She assumed Gigi would find it painfully corny, but it seemed like she felt the opposite. The blonde promptly took the letter back from Crystal’s grasp, taking a look at it once more. The older girl wished she was imagining the blush that began to cover Gigi’s face, but it was definitely there.

“I hope they write again. I wanna play Nancy Drew,” Gigi smiled sheepishly, taking Crystal’s hand suddenly, “Will you help me, you know, try and crack the code?”

“Sure!”

Fuck. Crystal felt like Hannah Montana.

.

They spent Saturday together, drinking on Crystal’s roof and gossiping about their own respective friend groups, however, the conversation kept moving back towards the letter. Gigi was conflicted on whether or not she knew the person, but her repetitive use of he and him pronouns when she referred to the secret admirer caused Crystal’s blood to simmer.

When Gigi left the next morning after spending the night on Crystal’s couch, the blue-haired girl was quick to begin her second letter.

I hope these letters haven’t made you uncomfortable in any way. The look on your face when you read it tells me they haven’t though. What I want to tell you though, is that I’m not what you think. I hate to disappoint you, but I’m not a boy. I’m a girl. I don’t know if you like girls. If not; I’m sorry, but if you do; so do I. I like you a lot. All I want is to make you smile.

She spent Sunday at the skatepark, smoking with Daya, Daegen, Lux and Tiff, before slipping the note into Gigi’s locker first thing on Monday morning. The two of them, as well as Gigi’s friends Nicky and Jaida, all shared music class first period of Mondays. Whilst Crystal was pulling her viola out of its case, Gigi suddenly began dangling the envelope in front of her nose.

“Another one!” Gigi grinned, her voice cracking with adorable excitement. She took a seat beside Crystal and opened it. “I haven’t read it yet.”

Crystal watched her friend’s face with anticipation whilst she read the letter aloud, quiet enough that surrounding people wouldn’t hear. Gigi’s eyes widened as she read it over, and her grin faltered into an unreadable expression.

“What does it say?” Crystal questioned nervously.

“The person who wrote it isn’t a guy,” Gigi sighed, scratching the top of her head, “It’s a girl.”

The tanned girl pursed her lips, not knowing what to say next.

“Wow, uh. So… what do you think about that then?” she queried stupidly.

“About what?”

“You know… a girl liking you…”

The blonde crossed her legs and looked away from Crystal, “A pair of tits isn’t gonna stop me from loving this girls way of words. The anonymity is sexy. I should’ve known a man wouldn’t have the mental capacity to do something so romantic.”

This could not be real. Crystal felt like she was lucid dreaming.

“So you like… girls?” she pressed.

Gigi turned to her with a glint in her eye, “No gender or sex will stop me from wanting to kiss someone pretty.”

Oh.

“What? Are you homophobic or something?” Gigi added, and Crystal simply laughed.

”As if! Have you seen me? I think I should get ‘flaming lesbo’ tattooed on my cheek. I just didn’t know about you…” Crystal rushed out before she could even think about it. Never did she think she would come out in that way. In her mind, for most of her life, she had anticipated coming out in a very deep, emotional way - likely crying on Gigi’s bed. This was nothing of the sort.

“You’re a lesbian? Wow. I should’ve known,” the blonde simpered, and Crystal shoved her shoulder playfully.

.

When my therapist recommended I write these, I thought it would help me get over you, but fuck I think I’m falling harder for you. That floral outfit you wore yesterday was so cute. When you walked into class, it lit the whole room up. You truly are God’s favourite, huh? Just kidding I don’t believe in God, but whoever sculpted you took their time.

“Crystal look at this one! This is the most poetic piece of artwork I have ever read,” Gigi gaped, rushing towards Crystal after the latter had waited outside her human biology class for her.

The older girl took the letter and read through it, biting hard on her lower lip whilst Gigi watched with a smile, “It’s cute,” she said.

“It isn’t just cute! It’s… beguiling!”

“Do you even know what that means?”

The blonde groaned as they began to walk through the hallways together.

“I think you’re jealous because no one is writing you captivatingly beautiful love letters.”

Crystal shrugged and continued walking, eventually bumping into Daegen and going for a much-needed smoke. The blue-haired girl didn’t want to come off as cold to her best friend, but she feared that if she said too much, Gigi would make the connection. She smoked in silence, allowing Daegen to rant about her weekly argument with Daya that would likely be resolved by Friday. Occasionally she would nod, but she kept quiet.

It was surprising to Crystal that Gigi appreciated the letters so much. She thought the blonde would find them creepy and stalker-like, and perhaps fear for her own safety, but the opposite reaction was apparent. So now Crystal didn’t know what to do. Gigi was falling for her words, but she didn’t know it was her.

Apparently Daegen had been saying something because suddenly the girl was snapping her pink acrylic covered fingers in front of her eyes.

“Are you listening to me, Crys? I asked what you were planning on doing for Halloween this Friday?”

Oh. Crystal had almost forgotten that she had been working on her Corpse-bride inspired Halloween costume since July, putting her entire soul into the concept and causing her fingers to bleed with the many late nights of sewing layers of tulle. Everything with Gigi must have been really getting in her head - so much so that she forgot about the object of her whole summer.

She was too old for trick or treating now, unfortunately, but she had been planning to have a small get-together (edging on a party) with her remote friend group as well as others. Gigi had promised to attend, after spending the last two Halloweens with the popular kids getting shitfaced at college parties.

“Don’t you remember? I’m throwing a party. My dad is out of town for work and my mom is spending time with our grandma. The house will be empty,” Crystal grinned, puffing a cloud of smoke into the air.

“Crystal Lucia Elizabeth throwing a party? Who would’ve thought,” Daegen smirked, “Is Geege coming?”

“Yup,” Crystal said, her smile faltering slightly as she popped the ‘p.’ Daegen didn’t press on, so soon they were both putting their cigarettes out and heading to their next class.

Word of Crystal’s Halloween party spread like a virus, and the prominent conversation around the school was what everyone was wearing. Thankfully for Crystal, most of her friends were art kids, so instead of wearing a slutty (insert random occupation) costume, they’d all be wearing actual thought-out looks.

At lunchtime, Crystal and Gigi sat under the bleachers together, sipping Yakults and talking about their days. The blue-haired girl asked Gigi what she’d be wearing to her Halloween party, but the blonde wouldn’t tell her.

“It’s a surprise.” her eyes were glinting smugly. Gigi was a seamstress, and everyone knew it. She would create intricately designed, beautiful outfits and sell them to big names on Instagram. Crystal often wondered why she hadn’t just dropped out of school, considering it seemed like she had a strong career set in stone.

But oh boy, Crystal knew whatever it was that Gigi was planning to wear would sweep her off her feet. Figuratively and literally - she was quite clumsy.

.

I can’t wait to see you at the Halloween party tomorrow. I know you’re going to look ethereal. You always do. It’s so hard to look at you without kissing you. I don’t know why I would ever think you would kiss me considering I’m not even half as pretty as you, but I will continue to manifest it as long as you’re in my life. I think I love you.

“She said she loved me in yesterday’s letter,” Gigi shouted through the wind, holding onto Crystal’s waist tight as the latter peddled through the neighbourhood.

“Do you love her?” Crystal replied, thankful that her friend was unable to see her expression at that moment. She couldn’t think straight with Gigi holding her in that way.

“I mean. I guess I have to talk to her face to face. For all I know she can’t speak for shit in real life. She said she’s going to your party tonight. Maybe all will be revealed…”

Crystal breathily laughed out a response as she turned into the school gate. She knew she wasn’t ready to come clean yet. Gigi would simply have to wait another day.

The day passed in a blur. The girls skipped Phys Ed as per usual, but instead returned to the library again for extra revision instead of going back to the bike sheds to get high like last time.

Friday night took a painfully long time to come, but when it did, Crystal could hardly breathe the entire day. She managed to flirt her way out of sixth-period history so she was able to speedily bike her way home to make a start on her eccentric Halloween makeup. People were set to begin arriving at 9 pm, and there wasn’t much preparation to be done aside from throwing a couple of fake cobwebs around the place and placing stacks of red solo cups on the kitchen counter. Her makeup would take at least an hour and a half, so as soon as she got home she took a five-minute shower before beginning the look.

She painted her entire body a silvery grey before carving out strong cheekbones with black paint, giving her an undead appearance. She shaped her brows in a way that would make her look constantly mournful. She slipped her dress on, threw on four different silver necklaces, pulled her voluminous black wig over her head, and clipped the vail to it carefully. After admiring her masterpiece through her phone camera for a few minutes, the doorbell rang. It was Lux and Tiff, who had texted to say they were arriving early.

“Oh my God,” Crystal squealed as she opened the door, revealing the two girls. Both of them were dressed in beige prison outfits, and it quickly clicked to her that they were supposed to be Alex and Piper from Orange Is the New Black. “Lesbians, I assume,” she grinned, but the two girls in front of her were too busy gaping at her own outfit.

“Wow. You are Tim Burton’s wet dream,” Tiff said, pushing past Crystal and entering her home.

“No, I’m not. I’m not white, remember,” Crystal joked.

Lux had brought her large overpriced speaker to blast music. She heaved it into the living room and plugged it in, immediately starting to blast Stupid Love cause she was that girl.

Luckily for Crystal, her neighbourhood adored her. Her street was predominantly old women, but instead of constantly yelling at Crystal for dressing slutty, partying and smoking weed on her roof, they would simply envy her recklessness.

After an hour of pre-shots, people began to arrive. Most people brought their own alcohol, but it was clear that many of them were already drunk before they even arrived. Crystal remained in the foyer, leaning against the wall, singing along to Lux’s music and answering the doorbell whenever it rang. Every time the ringing echoed across the house, she’d subconsciously pray Gigi was on the other side, but for the first two hours, it never was.

Nicky, Jaida and Gigi all arrived at once, and Crystal felt herself get cotton mouth for a second when she looked over them all. Nicky was dressed in a basic white gown with her blonde hair down, however, she was absolutely drenched in fake blood and she wore a small prom queen tiara and sash. It was obviously a Carrie cosplay, and Crystal adored it. Jaida had her entire body painted green and wore a black catsuit over it, cosplaying as Gamora from Guardians of the Galaxy.

Crystal complimented their costumes first, but she couldn’t take her eyes off Gigi. Her Halloween costume wasn’t as bold as they had been in the previous years, but there was something about it that took Crystal’s breath away. The blonde had her hair down and curled in smooth waves and she was wearing a loose white dress with a victorian-Esque corset pulling her waist in impossibly tight. She had dripped wax below her eyes, giving a crying illusion, and her makeup was a shimmery purple, making her look angelic. Yes - that was her costume - an angel. Strapped across her back was the largest pair of faux feather angel wings Crystal had ever seen. They were reminiscent of the ones a Victoria’s Secret models would wear, and they shimmered under the moonlight.

“Holy fuck…” Crystal blurted, before squeaking slightly.

“I know right? They’re so fucking heavy,” Gigi giggled before hopping in and air-kissing Crystal on each cheek, “You look so good, girl.”

“Thanks,” Crystal smiled, deciding that she would no longer be taking doorbell duty. She wanted to enjoy herself, so she walked through to the kitchen where Daya was doing body shots with some guy she had never seen before and promptly decided to join her.

Every so often, she would catch Gigi dancing and knocking things over with her wings. She didn’t mind if Gigi ended up shattering a vase. She would glue up every fragment of china for her.

After her second shot, Crystal made her way to the living room with Daegen to observe people’s dancing, and that’s when she saw them.

There was this guy from Gigi’s geography class that she never shut up about. His name was Toby, and he was one of those ‘hipster boys.’ He was a self-proclaimed feminist but probably cried about rejections from women on the internet. Every time Crystal saw his lanky frame enter a room, she felt sick and fantasized about decking him. There was something about him that was just so irritating to her, and every time he stuck his tongue out at her friend or wiggled his eyebrows like a fucking loser, Crystal wanted to cave in on herself.

And there he was, in her home, dancing with her best friend to ‘If You’re Too Shy’ by The 1975, grinding against her cause her angel wings were too large for the roles to be reversed. Gigi was biting her lip and grinning wide - evidently drunk - and she flipped her hair and bounced to the upbeat synth. Nicky was cheering her on from the couch, and Crystal wished she could just shut the party down. So much for Gigi falling in love with her words? Now she was grinding over some flimsy incel that looked like he would have to be pegged by a woman in bed.

It only got worse from there. The blonde caught Crystal’s eye and she walked up to her slowly, her hand still intertwined with Toby’s. Her words were so slurred that the older girl almost didn’t catch them, but she heard Gigi say: “Hey Toby was wondering if your bedroom was free? All the other ones are occupied but I’m desperateeee.”

Crystal had to hold back the mouthful of vomit threatening to spill from her lips. Gigi was so incredibly drunk, and it seemed like Toby was sober, so the entire endeavour didn’t sit right with her at all. She mentally cursed herself for being so generous, because before she could even register what she was doing, she was pulling a small key out of her bra and Gigi and Toby were rushing their way upstairs.

“Fuck, Crys. Have some respect for yourself,” she mumbled when she was out of earshot from her friend. Decidedly, she made her way to the garden where she knew Daegen was smoking with Tiff. She had to ease her mind.

.

“Fuck, Goode, you’re so hot,” Toby grunted, carelessly pulling Gigi’s wings off her arms. Gigi’s mind was hazy and she couldn’t think or speak properly, so she wasn’t able to tell the boy that the wings were handmade and extremely fragile.

“Thanks,” she slurred as he began to undress her, “Wait.”

“What?”

“Let me try and find a condom.”

She hopped off Crystal’s bed and somehow managed to find her way to her friend’s chest of drawers. She found panties and tampons among many other things, but she couldn’t find a condom. She reached the final drawer and frantically poked around for one. Then she grabbed something, and suddenly she sobered up.

It was a red A5 notepad with a black swirly binder. On the red cover, Gigi spotted five faces; Zayn, Niall, Liam, Harry and Louis. She chuckled slightly, before opening the notebook. Her heart dropped. If the familiar 1D watermark print paper wasn’t enough to make the connection, the titular scribble saying ‘Love letter for Geege draft’ at the top sealed it.

“Are you okay, Gigi?” she heard Toby ask from the bed.

The blonde paused and furrowed her brow, not sure what to do next. “Um. I can’t do this. Sorry.”

“But it was gonna be so good… You look so fine…” “Not tonight, Toby. Sorry.”

Her tone was serious, and Toby knew not to cross her. The boy watched as she pulled her dress and wings back on, and squinted his eyes when she saw a small red notebook in her hands.

“What’s that?” he pressed.

“Get out. Crystal wouldn’t want you in her room.”

After muttering a few disgusting insults under his breath, he left the room, leaving Gigi alone on her best friend’s bed with an overwhelming amount of thoughts.

Downstairs, Crystal had a growing concern as to where Gigi was, because she swore she saw Toby leave with another girl on his arm. Instead of being petty, she decided to be a good friend and creep up the stairs. To her surprise, her bedroom door was wide open. Upon entering, she realised it was empty. And then she saw the small A5 One Direction notebook wide open on her bed, and knew it was time to shut the party down.

It didn’t take more than fifteen minutes to get everyone out, but she was still met with groans of annoyance due to it only being little after midnight. Daya stayed back to help Crystal clean up, but the blonde knew something was wrong.

“Crys? What happened?” she asked, placing a hand on the girl’s shoulder. Her other hand was occupied with a large bin bag filled with chip packets, put-out cigarettes and paper cups.

The small motion of comfort caused Crystal to break down, tears tumbling down her cheeks and creating streaks in her white face paint. Patches of caramel skin showed through as she cried more and more.

“No one… touched you��� did they?” Daya questioned, dropping the trash bag and wrapping her arms around her friend’s waist.

“No,” Crystal sobbed, “I don’t really wanna talk about it. I’m fine. I just have to figure out a couple of things.”

“Do you need me to stay over?”

“No. It’s fine. I need some alone time.” The house was back to its usual state after twenty minutes, then D aya’s Lyft arrived and she left. Crystal found herself in front of her vanity, scrubbing at her face with cotton pads in an attempt to remove her many layers of makeup. She turned on her ‘Sad Girl Hours’ Spotify playlist whilst she cleaned herself up and continued playing it when she slid into the bath.

Gigi knew.

She couldn’t even think about why Gigi was snooping about in her drawers, she just knew that Gigi knew. Gigi finally made the connection. Crystal’s mask of hiding behind her romantic words was gone. There was no coming back from this. Part of her wanted to slide her body down the white acrylic bathtub surface, submerging herself in the water and remaining there until her lungs couldn’t function without another breath.

Instead, she simply sat there, neck and below beneath the steaming water, eyes shut. Her mind swarmed with escape plans. Would transferring to another school be worth it? Her current school was the best in the district. Should she give it up merely to run away from her problems? Should she face the issue head-on and talk about it with Gigi? Yes. Will she? Absolutely not.

She clambered out when the steam from the water began to make her dizzy. She straightened her blue hair every morning, but it had returned to its curly, frizzy state when it became dampened by the water. She rang it out into the sink using a hand towel, droplets of water falling from her naked frame. Everything was calm. The only thing that could be heard was the occasional sniffle - for Crystal was still crying sightly.

But, like all things, the peace came to an end when Crystal heard a clattering noise come from her bedroom. She yanked a towel from behind the bathroom door before hesitantly making her way back to her room, gasping when she saw someone climbing through her window. Instinctively, she grabbed a tennis racket that was hanging in the corner of her room.

“Jesus Christ - put that down!” the intruder gasped, and Crystal realised that it wasn’t an escaped prisoner coming to steal her and hold her captive in their trunk - it was Gigi.

Part of Crystal wanted to hit Gigi across the head with the racket painstakingly hard so the blonde’s memory would be wiped, forgetting the humiliating events of the day, but instead, Crystal just placed the racket down and covered herself tensely. She was still in her towel, and her hair was still dripping down her shoulders. She likely looked a mess, but it was too dark to notice.

“It’s almost 3 am…” Crystal whispered. Although she didn’t ask anything, it was clear her statement meant ‘why are you here?’

Gigi’s eyes trailed over to the blue-haired girl’s bed where the notebook still sat. Crystal had been afraid to touch it.

“Listen, if you’re going to ridicule me, do it on Monday, cause I’m too tired for this-” the older girl began, but Gigi stepped closer towards her.

The blonde had removed her costume and had her face now bare of any makeup. She was just stood there in black sports leggings and a pink sweater that was three sizes too large, swallowing up her slender frame. Her hair was damp and now in plaits, and her eyes were as puffy and tear-stained as Crystal’s, yet somehow still so beautiful.

“I’m not going to ridicule you, Crys,” she whispered, “I just wanna know… Was it you all along?”

Crystal didn’t wanna say it. Her body had never burned so bad, despite being bare and dripping with water. It was impossible to look Gigi in the eye, so instead, she looked at the gathering dust on the floor, gulping instead of responding.

“Answer me, Crys.” - she was getting closer.

“I don’t know if I can- if I can say it-” Crystal stumbled, her voice cracking under pressure.

Gigi stepped into Crystal’s bubble suddenly, reaching for the latter’s shaky hand. She took it in her own and pressed a soft kiss to it. “Don’t be scared to talk to me. We are best friends, remember. We vowed to always be transparent with one another - so I need you to tell me.”

After too long, Crystal finally met Gigi’s sparkling blue gaze. She swallowed back yet another lump in her throat before nodding. “It was me. I wrote them. All of them.”

The older girl swore she heard Gigi’s breathing hitch, but if the blonde was shocked in any way, she didn’t show any sign of it.

“I wanted to believe it was you, but when you seemed so disinterested in the letters, I began to question it. I never knew that you could write in such a way, Crys,” Gigi smiled sadly, reaching over to catch a tear spilling from Crystal’s eye with her thumb. The touch seemed to burn, sending electrifying sensations through both of them. “Did you truly mean everything you wrote in those letters or was it all a big joke to make me feel special?”

Crystal gasped slightly and furrowed her brow.

“Gigi Goode… You are special. When we got high during Phys Ed and you were all touchy I- I realised that I liked you. Even though it hasn’t been long since I realised it, I know my attraction to you has been there from the start. It started to become impossible to be around you without telling you how I felt, so I wrote it down in letters and hoped I could send the feeling away.”

Crystal was crying now - hard. She was a crier, and everyone knew it, but there was something about the quiet whimpers escaping her lips at that moment that took Gigi off guard.

“I wish you would’ve told me but, I can’t blame you. It’s terrifying,” Gigi sighed, stepping even closer. “I can’t even begin to explain how those letters made me feel, Crys. They made me feel like I hold some significance in somebody’s life. That someone might want me. That I am good enough for someone. You made me feel all that.”

In a bold move, Crystal was reaching towards her friend and tucking an escaped wisp of blonde hair behind her ear, “I can’t imagine a world where you aren’t good enough, Geege.”

“Your letters made me feel so loved,” Gigi sniffled. “Do you love me, Crystal?”

Crystal parted her lips, her hand still lingering by the side of Gigi’s face. It was a make or break moment.

“Yes,” she breathed, and then Gigi was leaning in.

The blonde paused before their lips could meet, looking for a sign of approval in her friend’s eyes. Crystal nodded, and that gave Gigi what she needed to finally press her lips against the former’s frown. They instantly became so content like that, lips moving together so perfectly like they just fit.

It was so gentle, to begin with, Crystal’s hand barely touching the side of Gigi’s face - but then the blonde’s fingers grabbed the top of Crystal’s arm, pulling her closer and prying her mouth open with her tongue. Their lips shifted clumsily against each other, but it still felt so right. Crystal tasted like teardrops and pineapple juice, and Gigi tasted like mint.

As the kiss became more and more heated, Crystal figured out what to do with her free hand. She took Gigi’s hand and led her towards the knot that held her towel together, staring at the blonde with dark, lustful eyes.

“I want you,” Crystal said, like it was a promise, “I need you.”

“I’m yours,” Gigi replied, pulling the knot loose and watching as the towel dropped by Crystal’s feet, showing off tanned curves glistening in water drops, begging to be marked.

They pulled one another in once again in a knee-weakening kiss, their noses colliding with each other as the passion fogged their minds. Soon, they were falling onto Crystal’s bed, and Crystal was watching whilst Gigi undressed herself in front of her.

“Promise me we’ll do this, and then we will talk everything out?” Crystal asked whilst Gigi was pulling her leggings off.

The blonde pressed a gentle kiss against Crystal’s cheek before whispering, “Of course. I love you.”

While Crystal watched Gigi hook a naked leg over her own, all she could think was: Widow VonDu needs a pay rise.