#and for multiple years i have said. stop just constantly being negative about the thing i enjoy bc now i don't fucking enjoy them anymore

[nexus-nebulae]

quick question. if someone says they're "trying to change" but still after 5+ years has shown zero effort (like, even when called out in conversation about it they still have the excuse "sorry i wasn't thinking about that" EVERY. TIME). are they actually trying

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

WIBTA for telling my mom to either go to therapy or shut up + possibly blowing an airhorn or something in response?

(the airhorn thing is like 80% a joke)

We've had a long string of bad events happen in the last few years. And when I say "we" I mean WE. Each of these things have affected both of us. I don't want to go into too much detail for privacy reasons, but it has been 5 solid years (so far) of bad events.

I won't sugarcoat it. Shit's definitely fucked. And I don't blame my mom for being negatively affected by it all. HOWEVER it does not help the situation to constantly complain about it. My mom has been progressively complaining more and more about how miserable she is to the point where I honestly do not remember the last time we had a day without her complaining about being miserable. (Yes, this includes holidays and both of our birthdays, which I've tried to make holidays and her birthday as good as possible for her, yet she complained about everything I DIDN'T do)

That in itself is irritating, but I could let it slide if we were both putting in equal effort. But in the past 4.5 years, I have been the only one working. It's not the best job (retail) but it's better than nothing and I at least make some money. My mom gets disability, which is not much, plus she gambles and sometimes wins, but not much. She pays for food and gas when she can, but 90% it is out of my pocket. She has not been looking for a job. (she herself said she could get a job as long as it's under a certain amount of hours so she doesn't lose benefits or she could work under the table and explicitly said she planned on doing so and then just...didn't) My job has been cutting all of our hours and the job hunt is not going well, so I make about $150 a week.

Now, I try very VERY hard not to complain about any of this. Especially since I was telling my mom about my days at work for a while and while I honestly thought I was just recalling my day, she pointed out to me that I was constantly complaining about everything and didn't have anything positive or neutral to say. I listened to what she said and ever since, I have been very conscious about not complaining about work. Now I only talk about my job if I have a specific question about something that I want to talk to her about or if something unusual happened, but I make sure it is only positive or neutral. (One time, a customer brought in an iguana. I don't work in a pet store. I told my mom about it.)

However, my mom is still complaining regularly about how miserable she is, yet isn't doing anything to help herself. (from what I can tell) She has progressively complained more and more to the point where she hasn't gone a single day in 2 months without saying how miserable she is.

It's irritating and exhausting to be around. I have asked her multiple times to please try not to complain as much and I take every opportunity I can to be away from her (covering shifts at work, going out with my friend, etc) but every time I'm near her, she's either sleeping or awake and complaining. I've just about had it. I don't know how else to convince her to stop complaining. I regularly have earbuds in just to give the appearance that I'm listening to something just so she doesn't complain to me as much. Even this doesn't work, as she then started poking me to get my attention just to get me to take out my earbud to hear her complain.

At this point, blowing an airhorn whenever she complains seems to be the only thing that might work.

[a-strange-inkling]

Ew Grace joined a misogynistic org. U still gonna Stan her?

A good time to say my piece on this and then that will be it. I’m a fan blog for fictional characters, not a celebrity commentator.

Not my field of expertise.

Anyway… People are really losing it right now as they do with anything this woman does and the best thing for us to do is handle this all with awareness. Real awareness. Like everyone needs to stop and take a second to think about this, then look at themselves.

First things first, yes I really enjoy and admire Grace as an actress, she brought to life a character I love and strongly connect with. I consider myself a fan of her work and have also witnessed her receiving a disgusting amount of hate for simply existing in the same space as her male co-star because many of his fans behave so atrociously that multiple articles have been written about them. They’ve made subfandom history as one of the most toxic groups of people on the internet.

I’ve always had sympathy for her having to deal with this and constantly having to stand up for herself for a small role connected to a side character. And then, of course, having to deal with the backlash of actually standing up for herself and continuing to dare to have an online presence. Because how dare anyone try to counter lies and unjustified hate about/directed toward themselves?

That being said, I don’t believe in blind loyalty either. Especially for celebrities. We can admire them all we want, but we don’t know them and they don’t know us. They’re not the characters that they play. Grace is not Chrissy. Joe is not Eddie. Grace is a human being that I don’t know in real life. Being a fan is not the same as really knowing someone and being their friend. I don’t believe in parasocial relationships with actors, actresses, musicians etc, it’s not healthy. As much as I enjoy her as an actress, and will speak up for her against unnecessary hate, I don’t have to agree with everything that she does or says. I don’t put her on a pedestal. She’s liable to make mistakes like the rest of us and I don’t think this was a wise or safe decision on her part.

With all the information I have on this current situation (which is not much), I can say that I’m worried for her more than anything else. This woman has gone through the ringer for a full year now and it seems this will just be used as more fuel against her. Whatever she chooses to do professionally, she is met with so much hate and frankly misogynistic hypocrisy. All that negativity worries me the most. She’s young and trying to make a living doing what she loves, so I feel bad seeing things going in the direction that they are presently.

I don’t know much about the gaming community, I’ve avoided it and have always played solo because what I do know is that it can be a very toxic and hate fueled place. Especially for women. After having to deal with what she already has, angry gamers and her own fans turning on her is going to be sad to see. And I’m not saying calling her out on this decision is turning on her, or hating on her, I think people should call out their faves when they do something wrong… it’s just going to be sad to see the discourse that follows this.

For context, for those that don’t know, this organization she’s signed up with has some really bad allegations against it, really bad, and I don’t condone or support anything to do with that.

But this is where the self awareness has to kick in for anyone in fanbase communities or, you know, just going about their daily lives.

What large entertainment organization or company doesn’t have red in their ledger? Tell me honestly. Anything dealing with a big group of people is going to have skeletons in the closet. Not condoning anything, but also trying not to be a hypocrite here, as we all should.

If you watch and enjoy Stranger Things on Netflix, if you’re a Joe Quinn/Eddie fan, you’re supporting a company that’s riddled with scandal, hiring numerous actors, writers, producers and directors accused of s*xual assault. Do you watch Disney? Visit the parks? Wear Sketchers? Any name brand clothes? Buy from Amazon? Wal-Mart? Target? Listen to Taylor Swift? Support or watch anything in Hollywood? Read Harry Potter? Watch the movies? Are you on Twitter? This website? YouTube? Facebook? Eat name brand food? If so, you’re supporting problematic, at best, people, companies, and organizations all around. We all know they’re tied to histories of scandal, hate, controversy, or even criminal activity, yet we keep watching, buying, wearing, listening, eating, consuming and supporting them as a whole. Unless you’re living off the grid, grow your own food, make your own clothes and don’t watch any form media, no one has any room to talk here. No one wants to hear this, but we’re all supporting things we would normally speak out against either consciously or unconsciously. Hollywood and streaming services are full of misogynistic, r*cist, behavior. They’ve hidden countless accusations and protected numerous r*pists since the beginning of film. But we’re still watching their movies and shows. Not saying it’s right, but we should criticize ourselves first before going after one working actress signing a deal with just one of the many bad organizations out there.

Joe recently did a voiceover for an organization that apparently is really problematic. He’s currently working with a big Hollywood film industry that also has some really shady (again, at best) history, but everyone’s going to go watch his movies, aren’t they? His stans are going to keep stanning him. So make sure you anon ask all of them the same question, kay?

Being hateful and criticizing a twenty-six-year-old actress/streamer really should not be anyone’s first steps toward activism or change. Especially if you originally didn’t like her because she’s standing near the favorite white British boy of the month. I’ve said it from the beginning, if you don’t like her or what she’s doing, block her. Unfollow her. Obsessing over her and everything she does is on the same level of intensity as stanning her.

I am disappointed in her decision, I’m worried what this means for her and her fans who’ve been in the trenches for her, but Grace’s decisions are not mine. From what I’ve heard and seen, she said she considered the risks and wants to be apart of rebuilding the organization that is trying to move forward from the allegations last year and be more supportive of female gamers. All I can do is hope that’s true. What they need to do first is call out and condemn the parties responsible for any and all crimes they’ve committed. I hope they do and that Grace will encourage that as she’s signed on with them. If not, I hope she leaves them for her own morals and safety.

This is how I feel on the matter. I’m not going to get into this any further via asks. This blog is for hellcheer content and will continue to be so. I want it to be a safe space. Anything negative in my anon messages will be reported and/or ignored from here on. So keep that in mind. I’m not into drama. If any mutuals just want to talk or vent about this you can always DM me.

🤍

[rhodesrider]

Healing

CG! LA Knight (Shaun) x Little!Fem!Reader

Warning: Night terrors, Abusive past, mentions of therapy, fluff, regression, cussing, negative naming and degrading, mental healing

~

“You think I wanted to do this?”

Y/N laid on the ground, protecting her head from any more damage, while hearing the venomous words coming from his mouth. He got closer to her grabbing her hair smirking as she yelped and tears fell. He was satisfied of what he was seeing. Feeding off her fear, loving the sound of her cries knowing he was still in control. “All you have to do is listen to me, now all of a sudden you want to talk back to me.” He snarled in her face hearing her sniffle and scream some, her face hurt so bad. He threw her back down again and kicked her stomach over and over in anger holding on to the wall so he doesn’t fall himself. Soon vomit was expelled from her body. “You stupid bitch!” He screamed. His jealousy was a dangerous thing, mixed with his anger could kill someone. And sadly Y/N was the victim. He started to walk away until her heard her soft voice. “I’m sorry…” he turned back and his rage heightens. “Tell me something I don’t know already. I know you are sorry, you’re pathetic, useless. Just worth some holes to fuck.” He then grabbed a pocket knife. While Y/N still had her eye sight she could see him come forth, her vision getting hazy, until she felt herself getting lifted and being forced to watch as the knife was slowly to her neck and she could hear nothing but more screaming.

Y/N jumped up outta her sleep. She knows she screamed to the top of her lungs. Her body was cold, shaking even from fear. She looked around wanting to run away but she felt someone holding her, she looked to her left scared out her mind seeing her current boyfriend Shaun. He was scared with her, holding her while looking in her eyes and talking soft to her. The ringing in her ears finally stopped and she heard him. “Hey hey it’s ok baby…” he constantly said that over and over trying to hold her, but she was fighting back. When she finally calmed down hearing him she gave in and was in his arms. He sighed so worried about her he shed some tears himself. Holding her close not letting his hand wonder because that could trigger her again. “Y/N, honey, it’s ok. I’m right here. I’m not gonna let him hurt you again.” He said softly. Y/N was still shaking and quiet, letting tears fall. She was a victim of horrible abuse where she could have died. She tried to leave multiple times but her ex always found her and dragged her back. She has to take medication now for her PTSD and her night terrors. It’s been two years.

Shaun has been nothing but patient with Y/N, he just wants her to heal and be better. So he’s patient, he goes to her therapy sessions and he’s a amazing support for her, sometimes he feels like he doesn’t do enough or he’s failing but he bounces back and he helps take care of Y/N the best he can. He’s mostly been to himself, parties would have him in a chokehold and his drinking but he stopped. He stopped all that for her. It’s been a challenge and he’s been working hard on helping Y/N so there is frustration but he never takes it out on her. “Hey pretty girl…” he smiled as she looked up at him, finally calm after a good amount of time. “I…I saw him again Shaun…” she voiced and sniffled. “I know, I know you did. If you don’t wanna go back to sleep that’s fine. We can give you a moment.” He said. She nodded and played with his hair on his arm as she tried to clear her mind. He kissed her head holding her swaying her back and forth, be patient. That’s all she ever wanted in a person to be patient. “I’m sorry I woke you-“ “It’s ok. I’m glad you woke me. I need to be there for you.” She didn’t wanna feel like that his whole life purpose is to take care of her, that’s unfair. “Shaun?” He looked down and smiled at her showing the care and love in his eyes. “Yes pretty girl?” She smiled some and kissed his cheek lying on his chest again. “Thank you so much.” He nodded and held her still. “You’re welcome. I love you Y/N.” “I love you too.”

The morning came, Y/N barely had any sleep. She yawned going downstairs seeing what’s for breakfast, Shaun was down starting up her favorite breakfast just to cheer her up after last night. “Pancakes?” He nodded looking at her last minute as she sat at the island, she sighed and she played with her hair some nervous. “Shaun-“ “No more apologies. You didn’t do anything wrong.” He smiled at her while getting her plate ready. “I just wish it would stop, I’m tired of it…” he continued getting the plate done and thought about it. “When’s the last time you regressed sweetie?” Y/N stopped and thought about it as her head was on the counter, she hasn’t regressed in a while. Work and then the night terrors, they have been making it hard to be in the right headspace to even try to regress. “The silence saids not in a while. Maybe if you regress you’ll feel a bit better?” He suggested. Y/N would like to regress but it’s been a while to where she wouldn’t know where to start. “After you eat we talk more about it.” He gave the plate, the syrup, and a fork. “Ok…”

After breakfast she washed her hands and headed to the living room. Shaun was there but he was on a mission. Y/N came in seeing him finishing up a fort. A big one, looking around seeing coloring books, snacks, her sippy cups, and many other items to start a regression session. He finished up the last pieces and turned around seeing a nervous Y/N. “Hey pretty girl, when you’re ready come on in. I’ll be here.” He smiled and got in the fort pulling the cover back as a door closing it. Y/N was always amazed at his work, and so happy he goes the extra mile for her. She looked on the couch and one of the items is one of his shirts. LA Knight. She quickly went to change and was now comfortable going back in the living room and slowly slipping. She grabbed her pacifier and crawled in the fort poking her head in seeing her smiling daddy. That afternoon they watched movies, ate snacks, colored together and even she picked out which gear could he wear before his next show. She wished she had his confidence and power like his alter ego at work. She soon started to yawn and rub her eyes. “You wanna nap sweetie?” She nodded and he got her out the fort setting her up on the couch. “Just sleep some, I’ll be here. I’m not going anywhere.” She nodded and started to drift to sleep.

She woke up in the ex house. She was in her caregivers shirt but in the floor. Hearing footsteps she immediately got up and looked at the door. She started to panic, looking at the door with tears about to fall. But soon as the door opened no one was there. She looked out the door confused, where was he? She soon felt a small bite, “Ow!” She looked down and she was in shock. The man that abused her was small like pocket sized and still trying to abuse her. Biting her ankle and hitting her toes. She looked down confused but also relieved. She picked the small man up with her hands, he’s still going at it. Yelling and screaming for her to let her go. “If I let you go, you have to say sorry.” She mumbled. The small man was confused. “Say sorry? To you? Never.” He Spat. Y/N got angry herself and she went to the window holding the small man. He was asking what was she doing and she opened a window. She hovered him over it showing the long fall. He screamed in horror and was struggling to get words out. “You have did nothing but terrorize me. Over and over again. Say sorry to me and I’ll get you back in. If not, I’m pretty sure a cat would mistake you as a mouse.” The man looked at her felling like she’s bluffing. “Do it. You’re not strong enough anyway-“ she simply dropped him. Right out the window hearing screams. She was sick of the noise the hits the pain. She just did what she felt like was right. “Hey pretty girl…you ok?” She looked back and saw Shaun. She ran to him hugging him and crying. “You are so strong sweetie. You’re amazing.” He praised. She smiled being lost in his arms. Happy that the monster was gone.

Shaun noticed her crying and woke her up, calling her name. Y/N looked up at him smiling and Shaun saw it which was a first especially after hearing her cry in a dream. “Hey pretty girl…are you ok?” He asked. “I’m ok daddy.” She got up stretching seeing that the window showed darkness. “You were sleep for a while, you wanna go ahead and go upstairs?” She shook her head no. “Can we go out tonight? I’m up since I took a nap.” Shaun nodded and carried her upstairs making her giggle. “We could match and go on a small date if you want love.” She nodded and she kissed his cheek. “Thank you for being there for me.” He smiled at her and kissed her back. “You’re welcome pretty girl. Now what color?” She thought about the question. “Blue?” “Done.”

[chevelleneech]

https://www.tumblr.com/dearweirdme/761701380234903552/i-usually-dont-subblog-like-this-but-i-am-beyond

The way the tkkr account has literally twisted your words lmaoo. I get why these people ship taekook, zero reading comprehension because when did you say Jk’s behaviour towards Jimin is because he is neurodivergent? You spoke about his behaviour in general and not specifically towards Jimin so what are they even talking about???😂

I don’t typically like posting asks with people’s blogs linked in, and I am going to state upfront that I hope no one goes to this blog and says a single thing “in defense” of me or my opinions.

However, I will post this message solely because they are in fact twisting what I said, and quoting me in bad faith. It is also impossible to claim this post is about anyone else, so there’s no way it won’t lead back to me anyway.

What I said, @dearweirdme, is that Jungkook has a “standoffish” personality in general. He has been this way for years, and it doesn’t make sense to me that people continue to use it as so-called proof that he doesn’t like interacting with Jimin.

I also said people need to stop picking apart his personality, trying to find reasons why he comes across as rude or standoffish around Jimin only, when it is a fact he acts this way around all the members. And one reason for that, is because he is possibly nd. So instead of the anon I got, and many others constantly trying to say he seems uninterested in Jimin because he’s not being as enthusiastic as they believe he should be, they need to look at his personality as it has been for years.

I also state that all the members seem very much aware of his personality, and don’t care that it may take more effort for him to be as involved as they want him to be. They know that’s who he is, and they seemingly have made space in how they all interact as a group, to accommodate one another’s needs.

Next, I did not say any trait of JK’s is negative, you did. I said this:

Someone being a lot to handle does not mean they are unwanted nor the people doing the handling are unwilling. Lots of us have people in our lives who are a lot to handle, but we figure out how to meet them where they need us to, because we love them.

I said JK seems like a lot to handle, because he does, imo. His personality seems to swing much more drastically than the other members do, with the one example I gave of a moment when accommodations needed to be made. The group and their crew made them, and I don't recall there ever being any issues there. The same way I don’t recall there ever being any issues made when Yoongi needed physical accommodations over the years.

So perhaps you and I simply have different opinions on what it means to love a person who is a lot to handle, but I don’t view any of the traits I listed for Jungkook as negative. They’re just parts of who he appears to be.

As for you deciding I am referring to Jikook specifically and supposedly blaming possible neurodivergent traits as the reason JK acts this or that way to Jimin, that’s your fault, not mine. You have chosen to take what you want from my post and run with it to fit a narrative you want, because you don’t believe Jikook mean anything to each other, I guess.

Because me? I said multiple times that even if he is not nd, his personality has always been what it is. He may not be overt and expressive in his excitement, but he tends to always use his words to tell us he enjoyed himself. Thus, people need to at least try to marry their opinion of his personality to what he’s telling us. That’s it.

That’s all I said and all I meant. It has nothing to do with trying to create reasons why I think JM and JK are dating, and shoving stuff in that don’t fit. Particularly because they don’t have to be dating for me to believe Jungkook is being honest about enjoying spending time with Jimin. I also don’t need to believe he is nd to make his personality around Jimin make sense. To me, JK seems nd, and likes being around Jimin. The two do not go hand in hand, no matter how much you twisted my words to make it seem like that’s what I said.

In any case, next time you have this level of confusion over what I’m saying, try asking for clarification first. I’d have been happy to let you know you misunderstood.

[slytherinsnekxvii]

let's talk about lily evans and the marauders, aka moony, wormtail, padfoot and prongs. given that i didn't use their actual names, i think you can figure out where this is going. it's also long as hell, so. canon vs fanon, marauder edition, except snek is sleep deprived.

now, before we begin, i don't dislike the marauders. or lily, tbh. if I'm being perfectly, genuinely honest, i still go back and forth sometimes but they've been growing on me for a while now. the canon versions, at least. fanon does them real dirty, and that's part of why i'm writing this, because i'm genuinely tired of it. it's an injustice.

you can at least make excuses for james and lily, who were so undeveloped that jkr practically dropped a fill-in-the-blank sheet of character information in our laps, but sirius, remus and peter were around long enough for y'all to get real acquainted with them.

in canon, sirius black is an unhinged mf. genuinely. this isn't to say he's a bad guy, in fact, we see that he's still capable of doing good things, still capable of love, still capable of all the things that prove he's actually not bad at heart, just,,, severely traumatised and very steeped in negativity from his time with the dementors. what i'm saying is that this man is absolutely, no questions asked, no holds barred demented, and how could he not be? the guy sat wrongfully imprisoned in azkaban for twelve years, a good portion of which he spent as a dog in order to protect himself from the dementors. he certainly wasn't completely insane, but you cannot tell me that he was all there. he got out of azkaban fuelled almost solely by the intent to get revenge on pettigrew, tried to commit murder in front of three witnesses who were also children—one of whom was his godson—ate rats and was also malnourished, which i'm certain did not help the situation any. this man is off his goddamn rocker, and you know what? you love to see it. good for him.

oh, but, snek, that's what he's like as an adult. what about when they were at school? before azkaban? my guy, the reaction he has to grimmauld place is not the reaction of someone without trauma. i don't believe that walburga and orion were the type to physically abuse their children, but whatever happened in that house helped to fuck him up enough that he skipped the joke of part of practical joke, and pranked snape by telling him how to meet a werewolf that he knew would be fully transformed and dangerous to humans. more than that, the werewolf was remus, whom he's friends with, and who—best case scenario—would be facing a trial if james hadn't stepped in. you can say that maybe he didn't think about or understand the gravitas of his actions, but at the end of it, that's not how properly sane people react to people they dislike, and that's not how they treat their friends. if anything, it reads like he was in the middle of a breakdown and absolutely losing his shit and he wasn't thinking at all.

my guy went through some serious shit, and was in no way completely mentally stable. we can see pretty clearly that he's got a serious dark side to him that probably would have gone unbridled had he not disagreed with his family, and yet, fanon took one look at him and went, "teehee, uwu bad boi go vroom."

fanon said padfoot is a pretty boy with nice hair who is tastefully traumatised from his horribly abusive household. sirius rides his motorcycle and plays jokes and flirts with anything that moves, but he can do no real wrong and always comes back to his soft, bookish, chocolate-loving boyfriend remus, who will laugh about his lycanthropy and quietly disapprove but secretly laugh at his friends' antics while hiding his smile in his cardigan.

respectfully, what in the absolute fuck.

i'd put that meme in here if i could, the one that's like, "well done, you've broken _______ down to its bare essentials," but no. i can't bc it doesn't even apply. this isn't a meme, it's theseus' fucking ship.

fanon broke it down, and replaced the pieces one by one until we got to this point, where we need to sit down and ask ourselves, "is this even the same character?"

the answer is no, by the way. it isn't. when people talk about woobifying characters—you know, taking away every flaw they have, romanticising everything they do and making them only capable of doing good, wonderful, lovely things?—this is what we mean.

and it'd be one thing if it was just the one character, but, no. fanon went all in and made them all squeaky clean and boring, especially peter, who draws the shortest of the straws.

remus got fucked, too. not just because fanon insists on sticking him into a relationship with sirius. which, we'll tackle wolfstar in a bit, but that's not even the worst of it. here, we have yet another example of blatant, rampant woobifying. again, is he a bad person? no. we know he's a good guy, we know he's generally kind and well-mannered, we know that he wants to fo the right thing but hey, fun fact. did you know that you can be nice and a coward? did you know that you can be benevolent and good and kindly and have the greatest of intentions and still be shady as fuck? no? ask dumbledore. the man played people like chess pieces when he needed to, and he was a twinkly grandpa. these are things that can coexist.

teenage remus is a coward who, understandably, does not stand up to his friends, likely for fear of being ostracised, and doesn't uphold his prefect duties as he should and takes part in their bullying of snape as a result. he lets them romp with him in werewolf form while they are in their animagus forms and then, he lets them continue to do so even after they have multiple close calls, which, again, had anything happened, would have resulted in a trial in the best case scenario.

grownup remus is still a coward, he tells no one that sirius can move about the school in his animagus form despite wholeheartedly believing that he's a mass murderer, he tries to run out on his wife and unborn kid. he isn't deliberately making attempts to harm anyone, but he's content to sit back and let things happen to him and around him so he doesn't rock the boat, although he is capable of action, which we see when he is more than willing to help sirius merk pettigrew in the shack. he can be careless, he runs out to the shack knowing he hasn't taken his wolfsbane and ends up transforming in front of the students he, as a teacher, is meant to be protecting. of course, this doesn't negate his good qualities, it just bears repeating that his flaws do exist, and they're pretty serious.

fanon moony is always pleasant and kind and soft-spoken and bookish, and he always has to have his chocolate. he knows when to tell off his friends, and he'll do it, even if he's secretly amused by everything they do and laughs about it with his best friend, lily evans, who coincidentally spends all her time with them so he and sirius can go on double dates with james and lily and no one has to remember peter exists.

why. theseus' ship 2.0. does the actual character still exist or is this something entirely different thing bearing the same name?

as for peter, who needs peter pettigrew, the actual, legitimate, fourth marauder when you have lily evans? canon pettigrew is opportunistic as fuck. he's latching himself to the biggest bad on the block and he's going all in. for teenage peter, that was james and sirius, and for adult peter, that's voldemort. canon peter is good enough at transfiguration to master the animagus transformation, just like his friends, and he's good enough at potions to brew the potion that gives voldemort a body. and honestly, you can't say he wasn't brave. he could've run off somewhere and died, or changed his identity or something after he faked his death and framed sirius, but, no. he goes and resurrects voldemort. that's fucked up, yeah, but it happened and honestly, i respect that it. he stuck to his guns.

fanon wormtail is lucky if he exists beyond being a spineless sycophant for james and sirius, or an evil conniving little rat who's looking to toss his entire friend group to the wolves at eleven.

of course, this isn't meant to negate his bad qualities, he still murdered people and framed sirius and sold out the potters to die, but his good characteristics do exist, and james, sirius and remus genuinely were his friends.

and now, we get to lily and james.

we have hardly any information on either of them. they're a pair of cardboard cutouts that we can paint and stick flyers to and colour outside the lines however we want. we can do whatever the fuck, as long lily is brave and smart and somewhat kind and james is brave and willing to die for his family. we were essentially handed a pair of ocs.

and yet.

what little bits of canon we have are thrown out of the window regardless.

james is privileged and rich, and he throws hexes for fun. he's willing to hex lily when she disagrees with him, and then, he goes behind her back to continue hexing snape after she believes that he's stopped doing so. and that's all we know about him until he dies for his family at twenty-one years old. once again, say it with me: this does not negate his good qualities. he definitely had them, he took sirius in when sirius ran away from home, he became an animagus to keep remus company as a wolf, and he saved snape in the shack, thereby saving remus and sirius by extension. him having flaws does not make him a bad person.

fanon prongs is a feminist. he fights for equal rights for women everywhere, and he constantly treats his girlfriend, lily, like an absolute queen. he's the hottest boy in school and everyone claps when he walks through the halls. mcgonagall and dumbledore are always patting him on the back and making jokes with him. he has a built-in dark detector that helps him sense when someone is a evil and needs to he punished.

give me a break. the dude's cool and all, but was the gary stu treatment necessary?

...oh, he needed to match fanon lily? right, right.

canon lily is a contradiction unto herself. she's supposedly a great friend, but since we see her at a point where they were already drifting apart, we see her putting little effort into keeping their friendship afloat. she victim blames based on rumours, she doesn't seem to care over much about what snape has to say about the people who have been tormenting him since day one. and she's justified, of course, she doesn't have to stick around. canon lily is a bit of hypocrite, she says that snape calls everyone of her birth mudblood, but then that begs the question why she still hangs around with him if that's the case. he calls her mudblood, she retaliates by calling him snivellus, and finishes up with a dig about his underwear, which, sure, it's kicking a man with a rusty spoon and pouring salt in the wound, but she's, again, justified. i get where she was coming from. and then, of course, she dies for her kid after marrying the guy who relentlessly bullied her quote-unquote best friend for their entire school careers. but, like i said, canon lily is, in many ways, a contradiction.

lily is basically a plot device. she pushes everyone's narrative but her own, and does little else.

of course, this trend would continue in fanon. fanon lily exists to be the perfect girl who gets really angry over the slightest injustice, and of course, she gets to be one half of one of the oldest enemies-to-lovers "it was just sexual tension" cliche pairings in the book. she's just,,, a mary sue. in so many fics, so many headcanons, she's just pettigrew's stand-in, a girl to form a gang with marlene, mary and dorcas—who happen to be more undeveloped ocs who also get the woobify mary sue treatment��to parallel the marauders. there is nothing compelling about her character when she's presented as a saint, and even less when she's supposedly the other moral compass for the marauders that doesn't actually work because she thinks that james is cute.

and this brings me to the next topic. jily. what, why, how. this was supposed to be a healthy, happy relationship that would have lasted in the long run? absolutely not. even for its time, i can't say that i see it lasting.

first of all, jkr presents james' crush on lily as just that: a crush. a mildly obsessive one, but a crush nonetheless, which she tries to liken to the pulling of pigtails. and then, we see that james' way of getting her to go out with him consists of blackmail, and when that doesn't work, he resorts to threatening her. this could have been set aside if he had actually, genuinely changed when they started spending more time together, but as we're told by sirius and remus, he didn't. he just got better at hiding what he was up to. and it has to be that he hid it, because if she knew, this further damages the character that she's set up to have and paints her out to be either unable to stand up to him or an enabler.

regardless, they get married. and while i have trouble believing that it was out of genuine love, there are scenarios that could make some semblance of sense. it's wartime, after all, and maybe lily is worried about her stability in the wizarding world, so why not marry into an established family whose son is already showing interest? or perhaps, she falls into the trap of every bad boy cliche ever, and she thinks to herself, well, i got him to be better then, maybe i can get him to do even better in the future. or maybe, she doesn't get into a relationship with him immediately and sees him on and off, until eventually, she accidentally gets pregnant and they scramble to have a shotgun wedding so as not to leave lily alone at nineteen with a baby. or maybe they marry each other because they're there and sure, neither of then is ready and they don't know what love even is but what else is there to do when there's a dark lord about? anyways, the point is, they get married.

and then what? if we count pottermore into canon, he goes on to further damage her relationship with petunia and vernon, to the point where she ends up crying. if we don't, she fades into the background enough that nobody has anything to say about her. she's harry's mum, she's james' wife, lily potter, she was kind and smart and brave and that's it. her agency is gone, anything else we have of her personality is gone.

jily just,,, wasn't built to last. and, yeah, this,,, this is a hill i'll die on.

same with wolfstar, honestly. there are so many reasons why it wouldn't work, but fanon has made it so fucking prevalent that it's literally everywhere no matter where you look.

first of all, i've said it before and i'll say it again. sirius is more likely to get with james that he is to ever end up in a relationship with remus. their chemistry is just,,, underdeveloped. net zero for a relationship.

secondly, sirius instigated the werewolf prank, and lupin would have paid the price for it. this could have been overlooked, but he doesn't seem the slightest bit guilty about any of it when it's brought up in poa. he could have been responsible for lupin losing the security of his place at hogwarts in the best case scenario, and in the worst case, his life. and he seems to look forward to full moons, even though they clearly aren't pleasant for remus, which,,, yeah, you're going to have fun, but like, maybe be concerned about the fact that your friend undergoes excruciating pain and it isn't a pleasant time for him? read the room, my g.

thirdly, they don't trust each other as much as fanon seems to think they do. they were both willing to believe each other the traitor before ever suspecting pettigrew. sirius thought remus gave away the potters, hell, he thought remus was a spy for voldemort, and remus was convinced that sirius was a mass murderer. neither of them needed to be convinced.

fourthly, maybe i'm reading too much into it, but like. sirius had money. remus had no money, since, yk, he was a werewolf and struggling for cash and still, sirius,,, did not leave him any money. i feel like if you had money to spare, you would give to your friend who is literally poor. but, again, maybe i'm reading too much into it and this isn't as valid a point as i think it is.

and ehh, the fifth reason is that it's,,, actually very much not the representation for the ltgbt community that fanon says it is but y'all aren't ready for that conversation.

anyways, just,,, even when you set the couple shit aside, the power dynamics between everyone here is fucked. like, james and sirius are clearly at the top of food chain calling the shots and egging each other on. then there's lily, who isn't even a marauder, but is always ever-so-slightly above remus but still not on their level, because, well. neither of them actually listen to her. remus is the novelty friend, the friend who's,,, alright, i guess, but you keep them around specifically because they're funny or they can dance or they have something that you can either show off to other people or keep as your little inside joke, your little secret, yk? and peter is just sort of there. like, yeah, he can do what we can but does that make him as good as we are? no. does he have a funny little something about him that we can exploit? nah. therefore he sits at the bottom. and like, yeah, james and sirius are on the same level, but james is yanking sirius' chain, not the other way around. anyways, like i said. power dynamic's fucked and it bothers me that we were given all of this, and fanon decided to take it all and throw it away so they could give us flamboyant!badboi!sirius black x softboi!motherhen!remus lupin going on double dates with feminist!trustfundbaby!james potter and saint!lily evans while ignoring peter pettiwho?

theseus' fucking ship, indeed.

anyways, this needed to be said. it might not make as much sense as i want it to, considering it's 4:12 in the morning as i'm posting this, after taking a break from writing to do some research and coming across way too much content about fanon marauders, but it's here and it still makes enough sense that you can read it and understand what i mean. and like, at the end of the day, you can go ahead and headcanon whatever you please, you can write fic and make art and do whatever you like, just,,, remember that they're exactly that. headcanons. stop presenting fanon as canon. please. i'm literally begging. we actually have evidence against it. just,,, acknowledge that they're headcanons and stop putting them forward as though they're able to fit into canon. please.

[tarosin]

the great adventures of y/n tommy tubbo jack and ranboo - how y/n made friends with everyone

this is an extra to the great adventures series

requested: yes/no

warnings: cursing

tommy

you were actually friends with tommy when he was streaming to a few viewers, and you even watched as his channel grew. eventually he asked you to mod for him, as he knew he could trust you and because had experience being a twitch mod. he was also the reason you began streaming. as for how you met, you were in the same classes as him in highschool, and since you were the ‘quiet’ person in the class, they sat tommy next to you. honestly, you hated him when you first met him and the feeling was mutual. you didn’t want to sit next to the rather loud teenager and he had no one to talk to anymore as his friends were on the other side of the room.

“do you ever talk?”

“heh?”

“i said do you ever talk...do you always do that”

“do what”

“that fucking HeH.”

“are you mocking me simons?”

“noooo why would i do that...”

“it’s y/n.”

“right, yeah, yeah, i totally knew that.”

“great now please leave me alone i’m trying to work.”

“loser.”

“the fuck did you just say?”

“nothing.”

it was that moment tommy decided he was going to make you just like him, and a few years later that’s exactly what he did. by year 11 you and tommy had grown extremely close. the last day of school arrived a lot earlier than expected, everyone was extremely stressed, no one knew what to expect or what was going to happen. you found yourself hanging around with tommy a lot more as you had no idea if you would both be going to the same college, in september you received a text message that made your night:

tommy: college sent out emails telling you if you were accepted go check

*2 minutes later*

tommy: well?

y/n: i got accepted

tommy: me too

y/n: call me right now

tommy: i’m about to stream..have you ever considered streaming?

y/n: absolutely not

tommy: make an account and stream after me i’ll raid you..make me mod you know how people can be

once college started up, you were slightly nervous the two of you would drift away from each other. however this was far from the case, although you both did different subjects and he was only in on wednesdays, the pair of you would hang out together a lot more. he would be in your streams and vice versa, you would either be in his tiktoks, or you would be the one filming them.

“y/n make a tiktok we can be mutuals.”

“please god no.”

you spent so much time at his house either talking about random things, playing whatever game you could find, or streaming. he dragged you to every meet up he went on, allowing you to meet people such as niki, phil, and, wilbur. you didn’t know this, but he would constantly bring you up in conversations with dream, which eventually lead to you joining the smp in october where you would later be able to meet the likes of jack, technoblade and jschlatt. the only person you didn’t seem to see on the server was his other friend tubbo.

ranboo

you had become friends with scott after being his first twitch mod and when he noticed you started streaming, he was extremely supportive, always raiding your stream once he ended his. today you found yourself bickering with scott because he wouldn’t let you in mcc despite the fact you were ‘the best minecraft player.’

“y/n, i watched you die in minecraft 7 times last night within 5 minutes.”

“oh i’m sorry mr perfect, let me in mcc.”

“no.”

“fine i’ll make my own.”

and that’s exactly what you did..well you tried your best.

you started your stream as soon as scott ended and had him call you on discord after explaining to your chat what you were about to do.

“scott final chance let me in mcc, i’ll settle for access to the practice server.”

“fine.”

“REALLY?!”

“absolutely not!”

“fuck you, ill be in it one day!”

you left the call telling chat you didn’t need that negative energy in your life.

you really have scott to thank for you making friends with ranboo, scott made a tweet explaining what you were doing on stream which caught ranboos eye.

Smajor1995: after not making it into mcc again my good friend @y/n has decided to take it upon themselves to make their own on stream!! ill also be in the stream (if they answer my calls) *twitch link*

ranboo joined your stream and was instantly met with you yelling at scott (again) to let you in mcc.

“IM YOUR TWITCH MOD!”

“i will ban you from mcc!”

“you don’t have the nerve... so he left the call this is bullshit watch me land this water bucket clutch down this ravine so we can find axolotls and build an army.”

*you died*

you pulled your hood over your face before sinking down your chair taking a deep breath.

“FUCK!”

you calmly got back up and looked into your camera.

“i was so close, so very close.. HEY CHAT SCOTT SENT ME A LINK TO THE SERVER!”

a few minutes later you were able to get onto the server, only to be kicked less than a minute later. the reason you were banned being ‘i watched you fail the water bucket clutch down a ravine.’

you continued your build on your server and just spent the rest of the stream talking about anything that crossed your mind, that was until you decided to copy ace race. once finished, you looked into your camera and pulled your microphone closer to you.

“so this is race ace, so scott doesn’t sue me, and basically it’s going to be this course, but i’m going to change a random section practice it every day, not tell anyone it changed. of course i’m going to tell my team we have to win, oh fuck i forgot scott was watching my stream..it’s okay he didn’t hear me he’s too busy planning how he can rig the next mcc.”

ranboo found himself enjoying your content and even noticed you in his chat multiple times.

“just a minute chat i’m just sending an important dm to my mods.”

that’s when you noticed chat paused for a minute after you sent a message, it confused you for a minute before realising ranboo made you a vip on his channel and you decided to do the same for him on your channel, from there you added each other on discord. the pair of you made friends extremely quickly, you were constantly part of his streams as you would call him on discord not realising that he was streaming.

“hi y/n, by the way i’m streaming”

“i just wanted to ask if you knew how to break into a house?”

“....why”

“i locked myself out by accident and my parents are asleep come help me.”

“you are in the uk.”

“okay? catch a flight.”

chat honestly loved you and your friendship with ranboo. the pair of you only met a few weeks ago and you were already acting as though you had known each other for years.

jack

you and jack met for the first time on the smp, which would have been fine, however you met during lore and your characters weren’t exactly the best of friends. once lore had ended, everyone said their goodbyes and left the call. a few moments later you received a discord message from jack asking if you were available to call any time soon. since you were back in lockdown, you had plenty of free time. you arranged a time and date a few days later you called jack, where you had your first proper interaction out of character.

“hello jack!!”

“oh hi y/n i just thought it may be a good idea to get to know each other, well you know considering we’re both on the dream smp.”

“yeah, yeah, i understand what you mean.”

the pair of you ended up getting along with each other, it was slightly awkward for the first 5 minutes of the call, but that was expected since you hadn’t really met jack before and were anxious to call him. however, after that the conversation started to flow and you found out the pair of you had a lot in common making it easy to come up with things to talk about. it ended up feeling as though you were catching up with a friend you hadn’t spoken to for a while.

“has anyone told you your accent is really strong.”

“so is yours, y/n, what the fuck is that supposed to mean.”

“it means your accent is strong, duh.”

jack asked if you’d like to stay in call and join him on the smp whilst he streamed, and you gladly accepted the offer as you really didn’t want to do your college work, and you were enjoying your time with him. a few minutes into the stream jack had killed you several times.

“JACK STOP KILLING ME!”

rather than answering you he just sat laughing. he then went on to attempt to mute him microphone, he failed. however he didn’t realise this, so you sat listening to his plan on how he was going to kill you again. this time you were prepared, you sent a message to tommy telling him to log on along with your location. few minutes later tommy was by your side and helped you kill jack several times for revenge.

“Y/N...TOMMY!!”

“you didn’t mute your mic, so i told tommy you were bullying me.”

“im gonna go...BYE JACK, BYE Y/N, ILL SEE YOU SOON!”

“i can’t believe you.”

“hey you’re the one who didn’t turn your mic off.”

“how did you know?”

“i had your stream on my other monitor.”

“ayeee you watch my streams?”

“...i’ve been a sub for 4 months.”

the two of you stayed chatting and playing for another hour. the pair of you were already so close and you had only met each other the other day. this was just the start of your friendship, soon enough you were in a laugh and the stream ends challenge on his stream, however due to lockdown rules this was done over discord leading to you accidentally leaving the call several times.

“and they’re gone again!”

*4 minutes later*

“SORRY JACK IM BACK!”

“stop leaving y/n!”

“oh i’m sorry, let me just go yell at my wifi to stop cutting out!”

a few seconds later you could be heard faintly in the background screaming at your wifi as it would continue to buffer. as soon as restrictions were over one of the first things you decided to do was go to jacks and stream a laugh you lose where there was a punishment if you were responsible for losing the last heart. however everything was apparently hilarious in person as you would constantly laugh, meaning you were responsible for losing the last heart.

“y/n give me your phone.”

“no.”

“you lost let me tweet from your account”

“fine..”

soon enough your fans and friends with your notifications on received this twitter notification

“y/n: jack is so cool and funny he is also really tall i am not”

tubbo

tubbo was actually the last person you met and made friends with, your community were convinced for some reason that you both didn’t like each other and that’s why the pair of you didn’t talk to each other. this was far from the case you were both waiting for the right time, tubbo was an extremely busy teenager and you didn’t want to interrupt him, and tubbo knew you were currently in a stressful position since you had recently joined the dream smp, also you were still meeting people so he didn’t want to stress you out. this doesn’t mean he didn’t want to be your friend, he actually asked tommy since he had been your friend for at least 4 years what would be the best way of getting to know you.

“mate they hated me when we first met, just talk to them or something. you could have met them the last time i went up to visit you, but they ended up not feeling too good and went back to the hotel room.”

“when are you next coming up?”

“how about next week, and i’ll bring y/n, i really don’t understand why you’re nervous tubbo, it’s y/n they wouldn’t hurt a fly..well hmm.”

“see you next week then!”

a week later tommy dragged you to the train station.

“uh tommy where are we going?”

“...on a train.”

“no way, really? oh my god!”

a few hours later you finally got off the train.

“ill go with my dad to check into the hotel room, do you want to come with us or?”

“i think i’ll go for a walk and stretch my legs.”

“right okay, meet you at the beach later”

you spent a few minutes walking around the beach picking up any rocks and shells that caught your eye, little did you know it would result in you meeting tubbo. once you finished putting your new collection in your pockets you noticed a small crowd of people walk up to someone asking for pictures assuming it was tommy you walked over to the boy, it wasn’t tommy it was in fact tubbo. at first you stayed silent not wanting to really cause attention to yourself. you only spoke up when some people started to make inappropriate comments towards him.

“oh sorry to be a pain guys me and tubbo have plans with tommy in a few minutes, we should go so we’re not late. bye guys.”

you smiled and waved as they walked away. you looked over to tubbo, you could tell he was still pretty anxious about what just happened and honestly if you was in his position, you would react the same way.

“we should probably move from here incase they come back and see you’re still here, are you okay?”

“im feeling better now it’s over..thank you”

“oh it’s no problem i’m, y/n btw.”

“wait you and tommy were still meant to be on the train.”

“the train was actually on time, tommy went to check into the hotel i wanted to stretch my legs, i also wanted to collect some rocks.”

“did you collect enough or did you want more?”

“im not going to say no if you wanna go collect some with me.”

the pair of you walked around keeping each other close incase the people from before returned. half an hour later, the pair of you sat on a bench close to the beach so you could show tubbo everything you decided to pick up, he ended up keeping a rock he liked to have as a memory. tubbo wrapped an arm around you as it was getting cold whilst you watched the sunset.

“tubbo i think tommy forgot about me.”

“you can spend the night at mine, i’ll send him a message to let him know.”

“are you sure?”

“of course!”

“this has to be the most unsafe thing either of us will ever do, we hardly know each other and now i’m staying at yours.”

tommy sent you a message explaining that he didn’t forget, there was a problem at the other hotel and they had to go find another one, but you’ll be fine to stay at tubbos for the night. the pair of you spent the entire night learning as much as you can about the other person. it had only been an evening but you already knew the pair of you would be great friends.

taglist:

@dumb-chaotic-bi-energy @uselesssapphickitten @l0ver0fj0y @etheriaaly @xx-smiley-xx @hawarun @kylobensgirl @cawcaw-pretty-thing @reverse-iak @renleicrashed @c1loudee

[charmixpower]

Brandon or Riven for the ask game? 👉👈(I can't decide lol)

First impression: both of my first impressions of Riven we're the same because I hated him them held a grudge since childhood against him for multiple years until I re watched the s1 finale. I'm not joking. "Oh hey that squire guy that Stella is dating" was both for Brandon too, did not think much of either of them

Impression now: Oh my god it's the only man ever and blorbo from my shows 💞💞💞 Riven my precious little bastard asshole jerkass, no one understands you and the way you lash out due to past trauma like I do. And Brandon! 💗💓💗💓💗💞 Best man in the world, and resident brain cell holder of the specialists. Also number on Riven and Sky apologist. Love him so dearly

Favorite moment: "I have a heart, and maybe a few friends", "IF YOU FUCKERS DON'T SING FOR MUSA IM GOING TO DO SOMETHING DRASTIC", *that expression he made when Musa dragged him into dancing*, *comforting Timmy*, and "Chillax mainframe". Vs literally ALL of s1 Brandon. That man could do no wrong in s1. Tho the time he caught Stella in s4 when she fell out of the van was so cute

Idea for a story: I would like to see what Brandon's family thinks of everything that's happened to him maybe please? EXPLAIN THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS THING RIGHT NOW!!! Riven actually joins the Trix, and does his prince of darkness thing or whatever. The specialists get to do something useful after s2 plz, that's all I ask. Sky and Brandon clothes shopping bf s1 and Sky slowly losing his mind at the horrific ass outfit Brandon is picking out

Unpopular opinion: I saw someone on YouTube say that Riven was making it up when he said she's interested in things she was never interested in before and I don't get that?? They interpreted it as him talking about her music carrier, and I always assumed he was taking about her interest in hanging out with Andy when Musa was VERY stand offish in s1-3 before the crime the writers committed on her in s4 and actively snipped at people around her. Also!!! Her fashion and her mannerisms all changed in s4!!! I was also confused on why Musa was acting different!!! Also Riven's personality stopped in s2, I don't count s3 Riven as the same person. S1-2 is one guy, s3 is another guy, and s4 is a different guy. I don't know if I have an unpopular Brandon opnion. UHHHH I think he'd look like a fucking idiot if it wasn't for his personality, and he definitely should of been the leader of the specialists because he obviously has the best teamwork skills. Sky isn't good at working with the other guys if you really pay attention to him. Like he'll work along side but he's bad at working with. If that makes any sense

Favorite relationship: Rivusa and Brella I would do anything for you. Also Briven. Ya know how it is over here. but Stella, Aisha, Nabu, and Timmy's friendship with Riven lives in my head rent free. Not to mention Sky and Riven bonding after Sky gets his own mind control trama. For Brandon....tbh I like his friendship with everyone because he is really good at reading people so he always knows™

Favorite headcanon: Riven is actually really protective of his spot at Red Fountain, and the most obvious sign that he wasn't acting completely of his own will in s1 was him endangering his spot there. But because he wasn't close enough to anyone for them to know that, no one realize that he was under Darcy's control. Being a servant has strongly colored Brandon's opinions of most royalty, nobles, and rich people in a very negative way due to they way he was pretty poorly treated by people like Diaspro. One of the main reasons he was interested in Stella romantically at first is because she caught him off guard with how nice and genuine she was. RIVEN GETS FUCKED UP AT THE END OF S2!!!! FUCK YEAH SCARS!!!!! Brandon being asexual is just a good hc to me, it's so much fun. He's constantly flirting and trying to kiss people and he doesn't experience physically attraction, he just likes it. Riven has a sibling but they take after his mom and are like a terrible person. Their the main reason Riven worked to hard to escape his home town. Brandon has had a crush on ALL of the specialists at some point

[edie-baby]

to have and to hold | juri vips

summary: Juri Vips was a bastard of a teammate. Mostly just because you were insanely in love with him and his flirtatious ways. Juri senses a change in your behaviour and when things begin going back to normal, Juri just fucks it up again. (Similar premise to the Mr & Mrs imagine with Liam, but different[?])

word count: 2894

warnings: swearing, still. i don't think i should have to put warnings about swearing anymore, it's basically a given.

Working with Juri Vips was a fucking trainwreck. There was no light way to put it, it was messy, it was painful, and yet you could never stop fucking staring at him. Being his teammate in F2 for the past year and a half, the two of you had gotten quite close, to the point where his family invited you on vacation with them when they were going, and you had joined them once, but realised about two hours in, that it was a thinly veiled attempt from literally his entire family to get the two of you together.

And while you were all for it, being forced to spend so much time with Juri, while he was shirtless nonetheless, was a literal dream come true, it was also incredibly painful for you to stop from pouncing on him at any given moment. Because as much as his family thought there was something between you, it was purely Juri’s charisma and character to be almost constantly flirting with you.

You remember the first time the two of you, a few other F2 drivers had come along as well, had gone to the beach and he had seen you bust out the bikini you knew made you look like a hot piece, he hadn’t shut up about it, or you, for weeks afterwards.

“Well look at you, little miss supermodel. I would have thought you’d be walking catwalks with legs like that, not pushing pedals like the rest of us. God, you look like you just stepped out of my dreams and onto this beach. If you keep looking like that, I think I might have a problem to deal with later in the shower.” He had hollered, and many of the guys around you either joined in or had nothing to say but gawk. Juri’s comments had cemented themselves in your brain however, calling back upon them whenever you felt less than top dollar, which you had to admit was becoming more often in recent months.

Juri had noticed your slowly waning confidence, of course he had. His gorgeous view of you in crop tops, little skirts, and tight shorts had turned into oversized shorts, hoodies, and ill-fitting jeans. All of which still made you the most beautiful girl in the world, but there was something missing from your aura, a general happiness that had been lacking since the new season started a few months ago. In the entire time Juri had known you, you were never one to listen to other’s opinions of you, whether they be good or bad, the only people you had ever listened to and taken words to heart from were himself, your parents, and your boyfriend.

Somehow in the span of about three minutes, Juri had tracked the four most likely culprits of your diminished ego. He knew he hadn’t said anything harmful or damaging to you since the season began, as many of your conversations had revolved around racing, other drivers in the paddock, or your family. Your parents, he was confident in, he had met them many times before, and they were always genuinely warm and welcoming, he supposed there might have been another side to them, though he believed he would have picked up on it by now. Which leaves only your boyfriend, whom Juri had zero confidence in.

Tye was nice, almost disgustingly so, but he was also much too proud of being nice for it to be genuine. He would open car doors for you, give you flowers every few months, and once bought you a necklace with a pendant of his name. But you would never forget that he did those things for you, because as soon as you would mention something relatively negative, those few acts of kindness were shoved down your throat.

Juri, of course, was not privy to that information. All he knew was that Tye’s possessive behaviour and complete lack of care for your wishes meant that there was something beneath the surface Juri was sure was the reason for your confidence, or lack thereof.

So when you came into work one day, to continue shooting some videos for the YouTube channel, wearing a gorgeously fitted pair of jeans, and a halter-neck singlet, Juri knew something was afoot. Also notable was your lack of gold necklace and your beaming smile toward the Estonian.

“You gonna keep staring like that, or do you want to take a photo?” You asked, your voice holding the teasing lilt Juri had missed in the past weeks. Without breaking his gaze from your body, Juri reached into the pocket of his shorts, his hand retrieving his phone and taking a photo of you standing there, tight clothes and bright smile in all its glory. He smirked when he saw your barely concealed smile.

“You’re in a much better mood than usual. What happened?” Juri couldn’t help but ask, the drastic shift in your mood was more than intriguing to him. Your smile widened, taking the last few steps toward his position in a chair behind the large conference table.

“I lost 80 kilos last night.” You whispered, leaning in closer to Juri, the glint in your eyes, the proximity and the tone were all so familiar to him that he couldn’t help but meet you halfway, barely three inches between your faces as the words processed in his mind.

Juri glanced down at your body confusedly, trying to figure out where exactly the 80kg had disappeared from. Then, the pieces began clicking into place. The lack of gold necklace, the tighter clothes, the glowing smile, none of which would have been staring Juri in the face if Tye had a say.

“You dumped Tye?” Juri questioned, his eyes lighting up, his raise in volume betraying just how excited he was for you, and himself. You nodded, eyes softening as you watched the pure joy cross Juri’s face. Him being happy was something that always warmed your heart, but Juri being happy about you finally being happy? You were sure your knees were about to buckle.

“I’m glad. I can have you all to myself now.” Juri grumbled, reaching for your hands that were braced against the arms of his chair. With a sharp tug, your balance was offset, and your body was tumbling toward Juri’s. You landed with a giggle in Juri’s lap, his own laughter joining yours and the two of you simply enjoyed each other’s presence after having an intangible wall built between you during your relationship with Tye.

Juri couldn’t hold a taken woman like he loved her, not when that taken woman wasn’t his to hold. And you, how could you revel in the feel of man’s touch that was anyone’s but the man you supposedly loved. You couldn’t break out in goosebumps, or have a shiver roll down your spine when you felt the familiar pressure of his calloused fingertips pressing into the skin of your back, desperate to keep you close. You weren’t allowed to sigh in content when you felt the warmth of his body seep into your skin, or whimper when his hot breath rolled over the skin of your neck.

But now you could. Now, without the moral implications of enjoying another man, you could sink into this all-consuming feeling you have when Juri is near.

“Morning you two. We’ve got a video to film in the garage if you want to follow me?” The social media manager, Georgina,  a lovely woman in her 40s whom you always went to for advice and style tips, poked her head into the room you and Juri were tangled in, a cheeky smile on her face when she spotted the somewhat compromising position. A blush fell heavy on your cheeks, and you were quick to try and scramble away from Juri.

He had other ideas though. When Juri began moving, you clutched onto him for dear life, terrified of falling to the ground even though it was only about two feet. Your arms circled around his neck, your legs fully wrapping around his hips from where you were straddling him on the chair. His large hands came to rest on the underside of your thighs, hoisting you up higher on his body. Your legs clenched around his middle, the feel of his fingers pushing into the soft skin of your legs was electrifying, and you were sure if you didn’t have a video to film, you would have been telling the Estonian to find an unoccupied office to take what he needed from you.

But alas, you had a job to do. So, still wrapped around Juri like a vice, he carried you through the Hitech office, nodding to other staff you passed, and occasionally nuzzling his nose into your neck to get a good whiff of your perfume. Juri had said multiple times the scent was intoxicating and could bring any man to his knees. You may have gone out and bought an extra bottle to ensure you never ran out after that.

After a few minutes, you stepped into the garage with Juri, well, he stepped in you just kind of floated in. The scent of grease, rubber and a slight hint of fuel invaded your nostrils, and you sighed in content. Juri chuckled at your actions, he always loved watching you step into a garage, or out onto the pit lane to take in the smells of burnt rubber. You told him every time he laughed at you that it evoked a calm feeling within you, it was nostalgic, filled with happy memories from your childhood and the memories of races you shared with Juri on track.

“Alright lovebirds, can we get you in these chairs and we’ll start explaining while we finish getting set up.” Georgina stated, smiling fondly at the love between her two youngsters. Juri sat you down in one of the chairs sitting before the cameras, not leaving your side for long as he planted himself in his own chair and dragged you as close as possible.

Georgina explained the rules of the game, and the way you would be playing it, choosing you to sit in the background listening to music whilst Juri answered questions about you. First, they gave you a list of questions about yourself, asking to circle the correct answers and they would be compared to Juri’s during the game.

“Ok Juri, the first question. How old was Y/N when she started karting?” Georgina questioned. She watched you in the background closely to ensure you couldn’t hear anything, but you were blissfully unaware of everything around you, headphones in your ears, legs tucked up on the chair, scrolling through your phone with the occasional giggle escaping your lips. Each time Juri heard the angelic sound, he would turn to look at you with a look so soft it made the entire team’s heart swell.

“Uh, I think she was 10, I know she started late because she had to argue with her parents to let her do it with her brothers, and I think 10 is about the right age.” Juri answered, looking as though he was thinking quite hard about it. It had been a long time since the two of you discussed your start in karting, it was one of the first conversations you had together, and since then you hadn’t had to talk about generic teammate topics. Juri was proud that he remembered something seemingly insignificant from a year and a half ago, but supposed when it came to you he could never forget a thing.

“Alright, next question. What is Y/N’s biggest fear? Is it A, the ocean, B, goblins, or C, heights?” Juri’s eyes nearly bulged out of his head when he heard the second answer, trying to figure out why it was even an option in the first place. His eyes focused on one spot on the floor, his brain moving a mile a minute to analyse conversations he had with you.

“Well, we’ve been to the beach together a few times, and thinking back I don’t think she’s ever gotten into the water. So maybe the ocean, but she also said once when we were looking at a castle that she doesn’t like gargoyles, so goblins could be a thing. But she’s definitely not scared of heights. She’s gone skydiving, bungee jumping and climbed bridges and things like that. So I’m going to say the ocean. I feel like I would definitely know if she was scared of something like goblins.” Juri laughed, his eyes still glued to the spot on the floor, his thoughts flowing through his mouth with little consideration of how they could be interpreted.

“What is something Y/N never leaves the house with?” Georgina was hopeful for this question, she was sure it could be the catalyst for the two drivers to finally own up to their feelings after reading your answer. Juri listened to the multiple choice answers, but none of them sounded just right.

“So, the rings sound the closest, but sometimes she will wear lots, and other times only a few, and when she can’t wear them on her hands, she’ll thread it onto a necklace to wear under her race suit, or something so yeah, I’d say the rings.” Juri answered, turning to look at you behind him, wearing the exact ring he was talking about on the ring finger of your right hand.

“And what ring is the one she wears on her necklace?” Georgina probed, knowing the answer and just wanting to see the way Juri heated up when he talked about it.

“Uh, it’s a diamond ring that has a J engraved on the inside.” Juri answered, his cheeks turning an adorable shade of pink. A smile broke out on your face as you watched Juri, his flustered state always made you giggle as he was such a confident and put-together person usually. As a habit, you began spinning the ring on your right hand around, feeling the shape of the diamonds and knowing the initial carved into the inside was a claim over you.

“Do you know where she got it?” Georgina asked. She was getting frustrated, Juri was much more calm about revealing the intimacy of the ring than she had hoped.

“I gave it to her. About a year ago, and then she gave me a necklace with an (your initial) on it. I wear it every day, and it’s the only piece of jewellery I wear while I drive.” Juri answered, his fingers reaching up to toy with the thin gold chain hidden beneath his shirt. He looked over his shoulder at you, spotting the spinning ring immediately and smiling at you.

You looked up at him, a dazed look as you stared at the gorgeous man in front of you. He could see the stars in your eyes, staring at him as though he hung the moon, and if he was honest with himself, if you asked, he would. There was nothing you could ask of him that would be too much, even if you didn’t ask, he would do everything for you. No one had ever held this power over him, he wasn’t even sure it would feel this good if it were anyone else, but you just did something to him. You unlocked a part of him he didn’t know existed.

You were just, everything. To him. You were everything he ever wanted, ever needed, even everything he didn’t know he needed. You opened him up, poured sunshine into his life in the form of your smile, happiness penetrated his bones because of your laugh. He didn’t want to lose that again, didn’t want to lose you to another man. He needed you, and he needed you now.

It was like slow motion, the way Juri surged out of his chair toward you, his hands cupping your jaw roughly as he guided you to your feet. The laptop on the ground pulled the earphones from your ears, your phone clattering to the floor in your surprise. Your hands reached up to fist in his shirts, not wanting to lose this proximity. You had him in your grasp and you’d be damned if you ever let him go again.

Juri pressed his lips to yours, as soft and warm as you’d imagined them so many times before. You kissed him back with ferocity, the eighteen months worth of emotion poured into a kiss to communicate your feelings in a way that didn’t need words. He kissed back just as fiercely, his hands holding your face still to allow him to do exactly what he needed. You were pliable to his every demand, putty in his hands. Juri had always had this effect on you, every fleeting touch or brush of a hand on your waist made your knees weak and your stomach flutter with the force of a thousand butterflies.

Juri pulled away, barely a breath between your lips as he panted slightly. Your eyes were trained on his lips, the fullness of his bottom lip, the redness from your assault on them making them look all the more kissable.

“So, how about we switch that ring to the other hand and really make this a Mr & Mrs video?”

[rkived]

year 22 (m) — jjk

‘‘I knew you’d be standing in my front porch light, and I knew you’d come back to me.’‘ 

Pairing: childhoodfriend!jk x f!reader 

Genre/Tags: angst!!!, drama, a lil fluff, f2l, e2l-ish, pining, slow burn, smut

Rating: M +18

WC: 11.5k

Warnings: time jumps, underage drinking, jk being a douchebag for most of the fic, reader can’t catch a mf break, mention of character death ((no major one tho)). smut in the form of oral (f. receiving), fingering, nipple play, unprotected sex ((wrap it b4 u tap it y’all)), my being called pretty kink making a brief appearance soz

A/N: i listened to cardigan for the first time n had it on replay the whole time i wrote this so ig u should do it too ! this is my first time posting smut on here but who would i be if i didn’t throw in some good angst ? also tysm to @periminkle​ for being my unofficial beta reader n checking it up for me, she knows i’m constantly looking for her validation n i def wouldn’t post this if she didn’t love it ilu vira thx for being the best ever mwah !!! 

You’re five, cowering behind his mother’s legs, sniffing as tears stream down your face. In front of you both stands Jungkook, there’s remorse written all over his face as his mother stares him down with hands on her hips and a look that just screams that this is only the beginning of his punishment. 

‘’Apologize to Y/N right now Jungkook, or I’ll have your father have a word with you,’’ she threatens with a stern tone, making her son quickly shake his head no. ‘‘You need to learn how to share your toys.’’ 

You peek behind her lanky leg and find the slightly older kid looking at you with narrowed eyes, ‘‘I’m sorry, Y/N.’’ He apologizes with a bow, but he’s obviously displeased with the whole ordeal. 

His mother sighs and Jungkook pouts at the look on her face. She urges you to come out from your not-so-secret hiding spot and to go back to playing with him, even though you seriously doubt that will do any good to what just happened. 

Jungkook’s bedroom door is kept open as he sits back down on his city patterned carpet, you twiddle with your thumbs and stare at the Spiderman poster on his wall. There’s an awkward silence between you two until you feel a toy bump your crisscrossed legs. 

It’s the shiny red car he had refused to lend you before, provoking an argument between you two which eventually made you run out of his room in tears as you ratted him out to his mom. 

‘‘Wooow,’’ you whisper in awe, taking the car in your hands with so much care, treating it like it’s one of your newest dolls. 

Jungkook huffs, crossing his arms as he looks at you with distaste and he’s forced to settle with other boring toys as you giggle to yourself, making the car follow the carpet’s tracks. He learns then to never trust his mother again. If she ever says she’ll bring a new friend for him to play with again, he’ll refuse wholeheartedly.

He doesn’t like sharing his toys, and it’ll probably take him a long time to learn how to.

You’re nine as you hand Jungkook one of the multiple Valentine’s Day cards you carefully crafted the night before with your mother, adding all kinds of pretty stickers and shiny glitter to make each one of them unique. His is different from the rest, though. 

You added hearts to the dots in the I’s, there’s a hint of your favorite body splash enveloping the pink construction paper and it fills Jungkook’s nostrils with so much force that he feels he could gag at the smell. 

‘‘What do you think?’’ You ask the fourth-grader with a big smile on your face, cheeks tinted with a light shade of red as you see him reading the little message you wrote inside the card.

Jungkook lets out a mocking chuckle, ‘‘Are you serious? You like me?’’ He asks you, but it doesn’t look like he’s looking for answers. Your smile slowly fades away, looking at him with glossy eyes, ‘‘I don’t like you, you’re just a dumb little girl.’’ 

His card was the one you had invested the most time in and yet it only took him a second to crumple it with his hand, and another five for him to toss it into the trash can near you before he goes back to his group of friends in the school’s playground.

You learn how to hold your tears in then, thinking it’s a great accomplishment and that maybe now he’ll stop calling you a crybaby.

His friends receive him with high-fives and he smiles with gratefulness because they just saw how much of a badass he can be. Once recess is over and everyone’s going back to their classrooms, Jungkook nears the garbage bin where he had thrown the Valentine's card in, but finds it’s now dirty with yogurt someone tossed inside. 

He grimaces at the sight and sighs, there’s no way he can save it now.

You’re twelve and you’re the only girl in the treehouse who hasn’t gone through puberty yet. It wasn’t something that bothered you until just recently, when it became pretty evident why none of the boys would even give you a onceover compared to the other girls.

“I don’t know if I want to play,” you mumble after Kim Jihyo suggests playing spin the bottle. You’re the only one who opposes the idea, though you could count Jungkook in given as he just sat there without saying a word.

Park Yerim rolls her eyes, “You’re so boring, Y/N!” The comment makes the rest giggle as you pout at being the designated party pooper. 

It’s all fun and games of truth and dares to whoever the bottle lands on and you’ve been lucky enough to avoid the tip of the plastic Coca-Cola bottle to point at you, until it lands on Jungkook who has done a few funny dares so far.

“Alright, Jungkook, let’s make things even more fun!” Jihyo announces since she’s been the one who has assigned most of the embarrassing challenges and questions, “I dare you to kiss one of the girls here for ten seconds.” 

The dare makes the boys cheer with excitement and the girls gasp with anticipation, hoping one of them is the lucky chosen one. Your lips part slightly as you stare at him sitting across from you, he’s clearly not comfortable with the dare, but knowing him, he won’t express his current discomfort. 

His eyes land on you as you stare back at him with concern, hoping that he’ll speak up to avoid himself the embarrassment. Has he even kissed someone before? If this is his first kiss, you’ll witness it alongside everyone else and you can only imagine how terrifying that must be. Even though Jungkook’s always been a brave kid, you can always tell when he feels under pressure.

“Uhm, I’ll uh—“ Jungkook keeps staring at you and you feel your heart start to beat like you just ran the usual ten laps around the gym in P.E class. Are you about to have your first kiss? With him? 

You nod your head absentmindedly, a sign to let him know it’s okay for him to pick you from all the other developed girls who probably have more experience kissing than you do, but it’s okay because you’ve always been a quick learner. 

“Yeji,” Jungkook says after what feels like forever, though it’s only been a mere few seconds, “I’ll kiss Yeji.” He adds, removing his eyes from yours and settling them on the girl with the high ponytail and pink colored nails. 

You bite your bottom lip hard, breaking the dry skin as you feel yourself taste blood. It doesn’t matter because no one’s paying attention to you and instead they’re focused on Jungkook’s neverending kiss with Yeji. 

When you get home that night, you look at yourself in the mirror and frown at your lack of everything. Is this the reason as to why he hadn’t picked you? 

You’re fourteen and Kim Taehyung just sent you a message through MSN in which he confesses to have feelings for you. Your eyes widen, rereading the message several times, rubbing at your eyes just to make sure you’re seeing things correctly. 

You run off across the street to Jungkook’s house, ringing the doorbell quickly for someone to open up. You’re greeted by him looking at you with an annoyed expression, he had to pause his GTA game to come and open the door. 

“What do you want?” Jungkook asks harshly, crossing his arms as he stares into somewhere that’s not your face. He’s anxiously waiting for you to spit out whatever it is you’re there to say. 

You calm yourself down by breathing in deep and out, blowing the air right at him, “Does Taehyung like me?” You ask him, making Jungkook’s eyes widen in surprise and his brows to raise. 

His reaction tells you that you might’ve just discovered a secret you weren’t supposed to and it only makes your heart beat even faster because if it’s true, then this is a pleasant surprise. Kim Taehyung is one of the hottest boys in the tenth grade and he happens to be one of Jungkook’s closest friends. You think he must know something since you see them hanging out at lunch.

“Uh—I don’t know, Y/N.” Jungkook mumbles, rubbing at the back of his neck, finally looking at you and he feels a gut wrenching punch in his stomach at the sight. “Taehyung isn’t a really good guy, you shouldn’t—“ 

“What are you saying?” You interrupt him with a question, confused as to why Jungkook was painting a negative picture of his friend. “He was really sweet with what he said, he thinks my eyes are pretty when they sparkle — I didn’t even know they did that!” 

Jungkook grimaces and sighs, there’s really not much he can do here. You’ve always been so stubborn, so relentless. No matter how many times life tries to tell you something’s not meant for you, you challenge each and every one of it’s obstacles until you take what’s yours. 

“Okay, then what are you gonna do? Date him? You haven’t even had your first kiss yet.” Jungkook reminds you with a mocking tone and you furrow your brows together because, how does he know that? 

You stammer, “I-I have! I had it at camp last summer, actually!” That’s a lie, but he wasn’t there so he can’t prove the veracity of your statement. “And what do you care? So what if I want to date him?” You add with anger, not understanding why couldn’t he just support you in search of true love. 

The thought of dating Kim Taehyung had never crossed your mind, thinking he was way too out of your league for him to ever notice you. But that confession sitting in your MSN chat now served as a nice feeling of knowing you aren’t as invisible as you think you are. 

Jungkook scoffs, “Taehyung would never date you, okay? He’s older than you, he’s cool, he goes to parties and has kissed almost every girl in his grade, do you think he’d really like someone as boring as you?” He doesn’t mean to be so harsh, but you’re just so difficult and impossible to get through.

Jungkook’s used to the trembling bottom lip and the teary eyes that you give him everytime he says something that definitely strikes a nerve within you, but he’s always impressed on how you always refrain from crying in front of him. Last time you did that you were both kids and he probably took the last lollipop from your batch of collected halloween candy. 

“Screw you, Jungkook,” you say through gritted teeth, and if looks could kill, he’d be dead already. 

He looks at you quickly stomp your way back to your house, only heading back inside once you slam your front door shut. Jungkook enters his room to find two new messages in his MSN.

$$ kIm tAaEhyYyuNG $$: it worked! 

$$ kIm tAeEhyYyunGG $$: she fell for it xDxD where did u even come up with the sparkly eyes thing?? that’s gold bro rofl 

Jungkook sighs, ignoring the messages and shutting his computer down.

You’re sixteen and you’ve been invited to your first party. Granted, it was Jungkook’s, but he knew that if he didn’t ask you to come you’d probably tell on him with his mom. No matter what age he was, he’d always fear his mother’s scolding. 

“Drink this!” Park Jimin says with his beautiful smile and you’re starting to realize why they gave him that very same superlative on the school’s yearbook. You take the red solo cup without any second thought, placing the rim straight to your lips and choke once you feel the liquid burn your throat. 

“Ugh—What’s this?” You ask, cleaning the droplets of liquid around the corners of your mouth. 

He chuckles, “Fruit punch!” The liquid is indeed red like the familiar drink you’re used to, but there’s definitely something else mixed inside. “Oh, and vodka,” he adds with wiggly eyebrows as he shows off the small flask he was hiding in his sweatshirt’s front pocket.

You gasp and hand him the cup back, “No, I don’t drink alcohol, sorry.” Jimin rolls his eyes and it reminds you of the many times you’ve received this same reaction from your classmates before. Always a party pooper. He’s about to take the plastic red cup from you until you quickly drink the spiked punch in one go.

The boy howls in excitement, “Woo, go Y/N! Another one coming right up.” 

Jungkook knows he should be making sure everything’s alright downstairs. If his mother notices there’s at least one misplaced object, she’ll know right away something went down in her house while her husband and her were away for the weekend on an emergency trip to their hometown. Leaving him unsupervised only because they both believed their son was old enough to tend for himself.

But Jung Eunha had dragged him into his room with the excuse of wanting to see what it looked like, but the mini tour had turned into them kissing on his bed and Jungkook is thankful he changed his Spiderman sheets in exchange for some boring plain grey ones. Eunha smells like fresh mint and Jungkook is way into his head to focus on properly kissing her.

It’s not until his bedroom door is abruptly open, slamming against the wall that Jungkook literally jumps to his feet, making Eunha gasp as they both look at the person who has interrupted their awkward makeout session. 

“Guk-ah, what are you doin’?” You curiously wonder, a hiccup following right after which makes you giggle. Jungkook’s chest rises and falls with quickness as he notices you look different from the last time he saw you twenty minutes ago when you were talking to Jimin. “Guk-ah, were you—you kissin’ Eunha?” You ask once more after not receiving an answer to your previous question.

“Y/N, are you okay?” He asks in concern, coming closer to analyze your weird state. You stretch your arm out to avoid him from nearing you, making him falter in his place as he studies your expression. 

You hum, “Guk-ah, you busy. Sorry,” you apologize in a shy tone, ready to head back down and have more of that fruity alcohol punch you now found tasty, but you stumble and only avoid yourself from falling by holding onto Jungkook's door frame, he’s already reaching out by then. 

“Are you fucking serious, Y/N? Get out!” Eunha complains with irritation, getting up from the bed and ready to kick you out of his room, but his free arm stops her from getting near you. “Whu—?”

“Eunha, go back down. I’ll deal with her myself.” Jungkook says as calmly as he can, thinking three’s a crowd and dealing with you wasn’t an easy thing in of itself. She’s about to argue, but he interrupts her again, “Go down, now.” 

She rolls her eyes and bumps her shoulder against yours harshly once she steps out of his room, “Whatever, that kiss was shitty anyway.” 

He pretends he didn’t hear that and takes you in his arms instead, dragging you to lay on his bed as you cuddle into his favorite pillow and hug it close to your body. How much did you drink? Why did you even do it in the first place? Jungkook knows you’ve never tried alcohol before, which means he’ll be in big trouble if you show up back to your house like this. 

When you open your eyes hours later, your head hurts and it feels lightweight when you move it side to side. The room you’re in is familiar, that spiderman poster is still hung on the wall, but there are no more toys laying around the floor; they’ve probably been stored somewhere in his garage or sent off to a donation center under his mother’s demand.

The pillow that you’re hugging smells just like him and any other day you’d hold on to it tighter and inhale his scent like your life depended on it, but you abruptly sit on the bed as you’re reminded of how you got here. The action is not appreciated by your dizzy head, but you look around the room to notice how dark it is and there’s no more music playing downstairs. 

You quickly jump to the ground, only to hear a “Fuck, ouch!” from below, stepping on Jungkook’s leg unintentionally. It makes you gasp, looking down to notice the older friend laying on the cold floor, having gotten rid of that childhood carpet of his. His head’s laying on a makeshift pillow made out of a towel and he’s trying hard not to shiver. 

“I’m sorry, sorry, sorry!” You quickly apologize, stepping away from his figure as he soothes the shin of his leg you stepped on. “Jungkook, what happened?” 

He sighs, “Someone decided to drink like five cups of spiked punch knowing damn well it was their first time drinking alcohol, stepped into my room like a crazy person, and then crashed on my bed like they—What’s with the face?”

“Bathroom.”

Jungkook grimaces while he holds your hair back, you’re throwing away all the liquid you had taken with a few additional snacks you had munched on earlier, “Are you done?” He asks in a tired mumble and you shake your head no.

He feels guilty that you’re in this position. He didn’t even want to kiss Eunha, but she was one of the most popular girls in his grade and he knew that if he turned her down she would most likely put a bad word in with the rest of the girls and the guys would make fun of him for being such a wuss.

That would’ve been better, because after laying you down on his bed he had to go down and tell everyone that the party was over, putting an excuse that the neighbors had warned him and threatened to call the cops. They all cleared pretty quickly, but he knew he was going to be the butt of the jokes come Monday. He even had to call your parents to let them know you had gone home to a friend’s house for a sleepover, which he knew wasn’t totally believable, but it had somehow gotten them convinced that their daughter was alright because they trusted Jungkook to never hurt you ever. 

Once you feel like you’ve puked your stomach out, Jungkook hands you a pill accompanied with a glass of water and hands you clothes of his that might be more comfortable to sleep in. 

“Good night, Jungkook,” you whisper once you’re laying back on his bed, still hugging the pillow he preferred to sleep with. He makes a sacrifice to make it up to you. 

His back is going to hurt by the time the sun comes out in a few hours, but it’s okay if it means you’ll sleep comfortably after the events of tonight. “Good night, Y/N.” 

He’s unable to sleep, but finds entertainment in your hanging hand beside his bed. The skin on your palm looks soft and there’s this strange urge inside of him that makes him want to grab your hand in his, but he refrains. 

To calm the current chaos in his head, Jungkook finds peace in the light snores coming from his bed.

You’re just about to turn eighteen and your date to the prom is Jeong Jaehyun, who had only asked you out a day before the event because the girl he had initially wanted to take had been asked and he didn’t have a plan B. 

Jaehyun is okay, at least he managed to get you a corsage that matched the color of your dress. He even smiles in the pictures your parents take of you both as you awkwardly try to look comfortable with his arms around you even though by then you had only exchanged a few sentences. 

The prom’s theme is Summer Nights and you think it’s fitting considering this is the very last event before the graduation ceremony, meaning that you’d most likely never see most of these people ever again. You had purposely applied to a college that was outside of your hometown for that same reason. You’re ready to live the life you’ve always wanted to live, without anyone judging or knowing you. 

Your date spends most of the night talking with his group of friends as you’re left alone on your table, looking at your well manicured nails. You knew you weren’t going to get the same prom experience the high school kids on T.V enjoyed, but you at least hoped it would’ve been a little more fun than this.

A tap on your shoulder makes you turn around to see Jungkook trying to loosen the tight tie around his neck. He looks incredibly handsome and you suppose his mother helped him pick the suit out, Jungkook rarely ever wore fitted clothing, so this is one of those once in a lifetime moments..

“Hey you,” you say and he gives you half a smile, wondering why you’re sitting by yourself at an empty table when everyone else was either mingling or dancing. “Where’s your date?” You ask with curiosity, you’re surprised that Jinsoul isn’t trailing alongside him given how she had behaved for the past week ever since he asked her to come with him. 

“Retouching her face or something,” he answers casually, “what are you doing sitting here? Where’s Jaehyun?” Jungkook asks.

You shrug your shoulders, “Don’t know, probably talking with the guys of the basketball team. He’s been gone for a while.” Not like you care, anyway. If your conversation with him inside his car on the way to the venue had been any indication of what it would’ve been like for the rest of the night, you’re glad he's not here trying to make any more small talk with you.

Jungkook huffs, thinking he’ll kick his ass if he sees him. He had asked him to invite you so you wouldn’t come alone, and yet here you are, sitting all by yourself while the douchebag’s making a social life somewhere in the crowd. He calms down once he notices how unbothered you are by it, though. You’re a big girl now, you’ve been through too much to be affected by something as simple as this.

“Is there something you wan—“

“Dance!” You interrupt with excitement and Jungkook chuckles.

“I was gonna ask if you wanted something to drink, but—alright, let’s dance.” Jungkook can’t dance for shit, but you took lessons when you were younger and he can still remember how you’d always show him the routines you learned in class. He’d always boo you, but in reality you were pretty good. He wonders why you stopped, he doesn’t recall you ever telling him.

It’s just his luck that once you both step into the dancefloor, the hired DJ stops the up-tempo song playing before and switches to a much slower romantic one, “Alright everyone, I want all the couples on the dancefloor for this one.” 

You step away from him with nervousness, it’s couples only after all. But Jungkook holds onto your lower back firmly, pulling you closer into his space. Your eyebrows raise as your lips part, “Uh, s-should we, uh—?” 

“It’s just a song, Y/N. You wanted to dance, then we’ll dance.” He tells you with such confidence it makes you feel like this is totally normal and something all friends do. All the known High School couples are dancing together, heads tenderly placed over chests and chins resting lovingly above them. You wait for Jungkook to take the lead because you have no clue of what you should be doing, you might’ve taken dance lessons years ago but you’ve never slowed danced in your life. 

Jungkook places his hand on your hip, the touch makes goosebumps crawl in your arms. He pretends he doesn’t notice it as he takes your right hand in his. You stare at the way he delicately holds it like it’s his mother’s fine china. “Place your other hand on my shoulder,” he instructs and you do as asked, your palm coming to rest on the strong muscle. 

He’s only slowed danced once before at a family member’s wedding where his mother taught him how to, with her as the teacher. Back then he thought it was incredibly ridiculous, but now he’s sort of glad that happened because he’s the teacher now and you’re now looking at him with your big eyes as you sway alongside him. 

You clear your throat, “This isn’t that hard.” Jungkook nods as he stares down at you, noticing how uneasy you are given that you’re looking at everything and not entirely immersed in the moment.

“You look beautiful tonight.” He says out of nowhere, making you look at him like a deer stuck in headlights, cheeks flushed with embarrassment. He had never called you that before. 

An awkward laugh escapes your lips, looking away from his intense gaze as you try not to take his words too literally, “Ha ha, that was a good one.” To you there’s no other explanation than this being one of his mean pranks on you.

But Jungkook doesn’t falter both his words and gaze, “I’m not laughing.” There’s seriousness in his voice and you have to look back at him again just to make sure he really isn’t, “You look beautiful, just take the compliment.” You nod and there’s silence between you two after that. You’re digesting the romantic lyrics that the singer is talking about and hope that the song ends soon, because you’ve never been this close to him and it’s starting to feel too crowded.

You clear your throat, “So…” 

“So…,” he repeats. 

“What are you doing for summer?” You ask him in an attempt to break the tension and wanting to take advantage of the little intimate moment since Jungkook rarely ever lets you pry into his private life. 

“I think I’ll train before heading off,” he answers. It was more than obvious he was going to earn that sports scholarship he had been aiming for, he was one of the best athletes on the school; though you considered him to be the number one between them all. “I’m kinda scared, not gonna lie.” 

You look at him with surprise, tilting your head to the side, “You’re scared?” You ask in disbelief because as long as you’ve known him, he’s never been scared of anything. This is the same kid who instilled your fear of monsters in a closet after watching Monster’s Inc. together, also the same kid who helped you get over it after he realized you had actually taken it seriously.

He chuckles lightly, “Yeah, I’m just scared about starting over.” It’s interesting how his biggest fear is the one you’re looking forward to the most, but you suppose it’s fitting for someone who has never had to worry about what people think of him. In this town, Jungkook has swam freely without any concerns. Out there, he’s just another fish in the big and scary ocean. “Aren’t you?” He questions, hoping that you’re able to relate to what he’s feeling. 

“Honestly, I—“ 

You’re interrupted by Jaehyun clearing his voice in front of you two, making you both turn your heads towards his direction. You quickly separate from Jungkook and he feels his body lose the warmness you were providing. 

“If you wanted to dance, you could’ve just asked. I’m your date after all.” He says smugly and you chuckle awkwardly, nodding because he’s right. 

Jungkook wants to punch his stupid face, how dare he interrupt you both when he had been ignoring you the whole night? Why does he suddenly want to dance with you when he’s probably still upset at him for asking Jinsoul to the prom before he could?

“Your date’s looking for you, buddy. She doesn’t look too happy.” Jaehyun adds with a smirk as he takes your hand in his and drags you away from Jungkook towards another place on the dancefloor. 

He’s left to stare at the way he holds your hand, and he only hopes he’s doing it ever so carefully. 

You’re twenty when Jungkook sees you for the first time since you both left for college two and half a years ago. He’s rendered speechless when he spots you in the crowd, there’s a manly hand around your waist as you giggle into the stranger’s mouth before placing a kiss to his lips. 

There’s only so much social media can provide him, pictures and stories aren’t enough for Jungkook to keep up with you. He thinks you’ve changed, not only appearance wise but you seem way more outgoing, carefree, and happy. Did he miss the boyfriend announcement picture? He’s sure he didn’t, he checks your profile almost every day and he’s never even seen him in any of your stories. 

A gasp escapes your lips once you spot him, completely forgetting about the possibility of bumping into him given that both your schools were playing against each other that night. You tell Namjoon you’ll be right back and he nods, going back to a conversation with the group of college friends you had made. 

You surprise him by jumping into him, arms around his shoulders as you hug him from behind. You let out a shrill of excitement and he blushes as his friends chuckle at the unexpected approach from this unfamiliar girl. 

‘‘Jungkook! You didn’t tell me you’d be here,’’ you say once he turns around to face you and he’s able to see you better upfront. You look beautiful and he thinks the Instagram pictures are not doing you enough justice. You’re glowing, and it has nothing to do with the highlighter you applied on your face and collarbone area. 

The both of you aren’t able to properly talk until you suggest moving to a different area, Jungkook apologizing to his friends as he explained he needed to catch up with an old friend. They don’t complain and instead shoot him teasing looks and small pervy comments that go by unnoticed to you. 

Jungkook listens with intent to your ramble about what you’ve been up to. From your courses, to your roommates, the parties you’ve attended, and even the fact that you handle your alcohol better now. He’s happy that you seem so too, but it irks him that you hadn’t been capable of telling him that you had a boyfriend now. Is there a reason as to why you omitted that important piece of information? 

‘‘And what about you? How’s college?’’ You ask with curiosity. 

He blinks a few times, realizing you had stopped talking about yourself and was now wondering about him instead. ‘‘It’s fine,’’ he answers with a tight lipped smile, the lack of detail compared to you was astonishing, but even though you were still hungry for more you decided not to pry any further. 

There’s fear in revealing that he’s been having a hard time catching up with the rest of his peers. College was indeed fine, but it could be better. He’s settled with the idea that this is as good at it’ll get, some things just aren’t like you expect them to be. At least you’re happy, and that fact brings him comfort. 

‘‘Was that your, uhm─boyfriend?’’ He finally asks after a while, both about to head back to your respective group of friends. 

The question takes you by surprise, looking at him with raised eyebrows and mouth agape. ‘‘Who? Namjoon?’’ He nods, though he doesn’t know anything about the guy he had first seen you with. You let out a wholehearted laugh, ‘‘Hell no, too many commitment issues with that one,’’ you answer and Jungkook’s forehead creases with confusion. 

Why were you kissing him then? 

‘‘We’re friends with benefits,’’ you inform him as if you had read his mind. ‘‘He’s a nice guy, though. Also, super smart, he’s helped me with a few of my─’’ 

‘‘You’re not a virgin anymore?’’ He abruptly asks, disbelief in his tone as he internally screams to himself for thinking out loud. Jungkook expects you to berate him about such an imprudent question, but is surprised when he sees you giggling. 

‘‘Duh, silly. I think I lost it freshman year?’’ The carelessness in your voice makes him look at you like you’ve gone crazy. Why are you so lax about this? Why are you telling him about losing your virginity without a care in the world? ‘‘Anyway, are you going to be home for the─’’

Jungkook interrupts you once again, ‘‘Was it with your boyfriend at the time?’’ He asks in genuine curiosity and you sigh, rolling your eyes slightly at him. 

‘‘No, it was some random dude at this party I went to. Could you please─’’

‘‘Y/N, are you insane? Why would you give up your virginity to some fucking stranger like it’s nothing?’’ Jungkook’s voice raises as he scolds you about being so negligent about yourself, ‘‘You can’t do shit like that!’’ He fumed, making you let out a breathless chuckle. 

‘‘Could you stop treating me like a fucking child for once in your life? I’m perfectly fine, Jungkook. I’ve been doing pretty well for myself without you here, actually. I don’t know why you think you have a say on what I do, is it the entitlement you have of me that you still carry around because we grew up together? Because if that’s it then you can drop it, I let go of my little girl who wanted a friend and was treated like pure shit in return complex a long time ago.’’ 

He knows you’re right, but he thinks he’ll always have this odd sense of protection over the five year old girl who cried to his mom about not lending her his favorite toy. He’ll always want to apologize to the eight year old girl who declared her love for him with a Valentine’s Day card while he ended up breaking her heart in exchange. He’ll always wish to look for help within the twelve year old girl who witnessed him give out his first kiss to another girl who he didn’t even like. He’ll always feel guilty towards the sixteen year old girl who had gotten tipsy on a spiked fruit punch and crashed on his bed. He’ll always hate himself for not asking the seventeen going on eighteen year old girl to prom when he knew he could’ve, but chose not to in fear of ruining your friendship. 

You only wanted someone to be there for you growing up and Jungkook had never been the brave boy you thought he was, always running from his fears in hopes he’d have a wide advantage margin from them. Yet here they are, standing right in front of him in the form of a twenty year old you, and they’re there to let him know that you’ve never needed him, yet he’s always needed you.

He can’t even apologize, he only looks at you with wide eyes as he fidgets in his place. Either you’re both too old now to understand each other or you just realized that you’ve outgrown Jungkook. 

Your mouth set in a hard line as you crossed your arms, the night’s breeze feeling colder than usual. ‘‘I miss you Jungkook, but I can’t keep playing this cat and mouse game with you any longer.’’ 

You leave him behind to go back to Namjoon’s arms, seeking refuge in his sweet embrace as you try your hardest to put on practice what you learned all those years ago when Jungkook broke your heart for the first time, you should be used to it by now.

You’re twenty-one when you’re back in your hometown to attend the funeral of the old lady down the street, the one that always scolded you and Jungkook growing up. 

You had been scared of her as a child, but always following along your friend’s footsteps when he proposed playing around her garden. It tugs at your heartstrings even if you hadn’t known the woman well. Her death was imminent seeing as she’d been ill for quite some time. 

A taller figure stands next to you as you both stand way in the back of the ceremony. He looks tired and you figure that it’s because of the fact he arrived late into the night, you heard his car’s engine from your bedroom window. Dressing in all black, you notice he bought a new suit. You’re sure that the one he wore for prom no longer fits considering he’s bigger now. 

You haven’t talked to each other since last year when you both left off on a sour note. The hurt you felt was no longer present, though. You chewed on your bottom lip as you thought of a way you could talk to him again without making things awkward, but you let out a small gasp once he placed his arm around your shoulders, giving it a small squeeze as he sighed and kept his focus on the service. 

Watching the casket be lowered into the ground felt weird. She was a human being just like you, but her existence was a reminder of your childhood. Would it be okay to say that her death meant a part of you leaving with her too? 

Once it hits you, it’s Jungkook who consoles you by hugging you tight. Your eyes are too blurry with tears for you to realize this is one of those rare moments where he’s holding you close without hesitation. He lets you ruin his tuxedo’s jacket with your mascara covered tears as he brushes your hair as a sign of comfort. 

You know things are back in order when he proposes the idea to go back to the old lady’s porch, for old times sake. ‘‘Will we ever let her rest?’’ You ask him with a small laugh as Jungkook sits on the doorsteps of the old lady’s empty home, opening the bag of candy worms he bought at the grocery store. 

He shrugs, ‘‘She loved us, always told my mom how much she missed us running around the street.’’ The revelation makes you smile, hoping it was true. He pats the empty space next to him, indicating for you to fill it up with your presence. Once you do, you feel the familiar warmth of his proximity. 

Jungkook seems different and you only hope he’s changed for the best. 

‘‘When are you going back?’’ You ask him with curiosity, hoping that he’ll be in town for a few more days so you can catch up with him on a better note this time around. 

He munches on one of the snacks, ‘‘Tomorrow morning, I have training camp and can’t miss it.’’ His answer makes you sigh with disappointment, but you nod nonetheless. ‘‘What about you?’’ He asks in return, and you inform him that you’ll stay for a few more days to spend time with your family. There’s silence after that and Jungkook can only offer you the gummy worms in the bag, you take one with a small thanks.  

‘‘College fucking sucks,’’ he says out of nowhere and it makes you look at him in bewilderement, ‘‘I hate it there, I wanna drop out so bad. But I’m a year away from graduating so it’s too late now.’’ You see his shoulders visibly relax, like a weight had been lifted off them. ‘‘Plus my mom would kill me if I do so,’’ he adds with a chuckle. 

Last time you asked everything was fine. Had things changed or had they always been this way and he was just now being honest with you?

You rest your head on his shoulder and focus all of your undivided attention on him as he keeps rambling about what his life has been ever since he left this town. He’s had bad games, bad grades, and bad girls. But he’s also had incredible games, good grades, and a couple great hookups, and yet he still feels empty, it’s not enough. 

‘‘I miss you,’’ he mumbles as he faces you, ‘‘I’m sorry for being such a shitty friend, you deserved better.’’ His apology is genuine and you can feel it in the way his voice trembles, sincerity has always scared him after all. 

Jungkook’s never known when the time is right, and he misjudges the look on your face. When he leans down to press his lips against yours, he’s blinded for a mere moment into believing that you wanted to kiss him just as much as he had been waiting. 

You abruptly separate from him with wide eyes and parted lips, ‘‘Jungkook, I’m─I’m dating Namjoon now.’’ He can physically feel his heart shatter, the revelation coming out like an old newspaper headline he should’ve read a long time ago. 

He lets out a breathless chuckle, ‘‘He got over the commitment issues?’’ The rhetorical question is bitter. 

You scoff, ‘‘And what about it? I preferred to wait than to rush into getting my heart broken.’’ Plus it’s not like you were expecting Namjoon to grow feelings for you, the whole no strings attached arrangement was named that way for a reason. 

Jungkook looks at you with narrowed eyes and he shakes his head sightly. Old habits never die down, still so stubborn and challenging as ever. 

He’s startled as you stand abruptly, fuming as you look at him, ‘‘I don’t even know why you care! Did you forget that you threw my Valentine’s Day card into the trash? Or that you kissed Yeji in front of my face? Or that you let Taehyung date me as prank between your friends? Or that you were making out with Eunha while Jimin kept giving me alcohol? Or that you asked Jaehyun to take me to the stupid prom even though I was perfectly fine going without him or anyone for that matter?’’

‘‘We were just kids!’’ Jungkook argues back at you.

‘‘It still fucking hurt,’’ you counter, ‘‘still hurts, actually. You think that by giving me a measly apology and kissing it better I’ll suddenly forget about all of it?’’ Jungkook knows it won’t ever make up for all those years, but he had at least hoped you’d be willing to give him a chance. 

He wishes he could say something else. Explain that he had just tried to protect you in his own shitty way from everyone else or himself maybe, he doesn’t know anymore. He wants to speak up again, but there’s disappointment written all over your face, you’re not angry at him...just saddened. 

‘‘Hope you have fun at your training camp.’’

Jungkook watches as you leave him sitting by himself on the old lady’s doorstep. A hand runs through his hair as he feels his eyes water, and he can almost hear a whisper in the wind that asks him why he didn’t stop you when he could’ve. 

Jungkook didn’t think that his family coming together with yours for Christmas dinner would’ve been a great idea. You’re cold to him at first and it’s fitting for the winter weather, but as always it only takes for him to sit next to you for things to warm up again. 

It’s with the excuse that you’ll run over to your house to grab a new bottle of wine from the kitchen counter that Jungkook trails behind you, both slightly tipsy on the different alcohols your families had offered each other. 

Years have passed since he last stepped foot inside your home, you used to visit him more often than he did anyway. It still smells and looks the same; the only difference is that there’s new pictures of you hung up on the walls, updated accordingly to the changes you’ve made ever since you left off for college.

You’re sporting a big smile in all of them, which in exchange makes him copy the action as well. His lack of presence in your life has done you better than compared to when he was around, and if that’s the case, then at least he did something right. 

There hasn’t been much said since the beginning of the night, just a simple hey out of courtesy. There’s so much he wants to say, but with no clue where to begin. Another apology is due, though he thinks it’s a little too late for that. He also wants to ask about what you’ve been up to since he last saw you, are you still dating the Namjoon guy you had told him about after he kissed you? If he’s still there, Jungkook rather keep quiet and not wonder out loud to you, he’s sure that it’ll hurt if it’s true. 

Growing up Jungkook always mistook your bravery with stubbornness and your courage with relentlessness. You’ve always been challenging, but only because you wanted him to do so too. It’s moments like this that prove him that you’ve always been the stronger between the two.

‘‘So, we’re just gonna pretend like nothing’s wrong between us?’’ You ask, speaking directly to him for the first time that night. It makes him look at you like a deer stuck in headlights, surprised by the sudden question and out of all the years of knowing each other, he feels small under your gaze for once. ‘‘How much time is it going to pass until you want to finally talk things like adults?’’ 

Jungkook gulps the lump in his throat, his brain quickly thinking of the right thing to say, ‘‘I just wanted to protect you from─’’

‘‘From what? From you? Everytime you’ve done that I end up getting hurt in the end. I’m left to pick the pieces up by myself,’’ you interject with anger in your voice. ‘‘It fucking pisses me off that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you kissing me, I haven’t stopped thinking about you and─’’ A sigh, you close your eyes to center yourself again as Jungkook waits for the final blow, ‘‘and you look like none of this has ever bothered you in the slightest because, you don’t really care about me do you?’’

‘‘I do care about you.’’ He’s sure about it, even though he’s been extremely bad at showing it. 

Even though your eyes are threatening to spill tears, you still muster up the last bit of what’s left of your courage to step closer to him until you’re a few inches away. ‘‘Prove it, then. Show me that you care.’’ 

His brain is sent into quick overdrive due to your close proximity. There’s a slight hesitation because he only hopes that what he’s about to do is what you’re demanding him to prove. He doesn’t care if you’re still dating the Namjoon guy because he’s settled with the idea that it’s okay if you don’t correspond, it’s not like he did the same to you when you were both younger. 

Once his lips press against yours, there’s no turning back. He’s waiting for you to push him back and let him know that your heart’s still taken, but you kiss him with such fervor that he knows in that moment that you’re right, it’s better to wait than to rush right in. 

It’s no fairytale kiss, though. There’s desperation in the way you chase his lips, as if you were to slow down he’d find a way to escape from you. You grip the cotton material of his crewneck into your small fists, holding on to the fabric like your life depended on it. The small kiss you had both shared last year was nothing compared to this, and Jungkook’s taken aback by your neediness. 

He doesn’t know how you manage to drag him to your childhood bedroom without missing a beat, only separating once you both realize you need to catch your breaths, and even then Jungkook can’t have a minute to take just happened in because your lips attach to his neck to get more of a taste. His fingers curled around your arm, sighing at the way your kisses felt like electricity on his skin. 

‘‘Y/N,’’ he calls your name out in a breathy tone, but you’re too immersed in your little bubble to even realize it. 

Jungkook groans when you bite into the skin of his neck, then blowing over the red mark as you kissed it better. It’s going to be bruise and he doesn’t like when that happens, but he’s not bothered at all if it comes from you. He forcibly grabs your chin so you can face him, looking at him with big eyes, a small pout, and with your chin messed with drool. 

It’s then that Jungkook kisses you hungrily, making you feel like you’re in a dream-like state,  though you could partially blame the Christmas eggnog for that. The way he bites at your lips and how your tongues clash together is an extreme juxtaposition as to how you could describe this moment. It’s as if you’re floating on air, clouds surrounding you in a heavenly embrace, angels singing in the background every time his hands touch, grab, hold and caress every part of your body. And yet, even with such a difference, it’s perfect because it’s Jungkook. You’ve been waiting for this too long, which is why your hands creep beneath his crewneck, touching his tonified abdomen tentatively and enjoying the way goosebumps arise on his skin at the sensation of your fingers trailing patterns wherever they caress.  

It’s only fair that he pays attention to yours as well. Jungkook’s lips trail from your mouth onto your jawline, planting wet kisses on each space until he begins sucking on the skin of your neck, making you moan in the process. He chooses then that his new favorite sound is the way you voice out the pleasure he gives you. ‘‘Hurry up,’’ you say, ridding the bottom of the crewneck higher over his stomach, making him shiver at the sudden change of temperature. 

Jungkook chuckles before completely getting rid of the material, ‘‘Calm down,’’ he sighs as he gives you a sweet smile, ‘‘You know our moms could talk forever.’’ 

You ogle his chest, admiring the way his training camps have obviously done wonders to his body. ‘‘It’s not them I’m talking about,’’ you correct him with a teasing smile that only makes his grin grow wider, chuckling at your impatience. Jungkook lets out a small gasp of surprise when your hands grasp at his shoulder blades, turning him around so you can back him until the back of his knees hit the edge of your bed. It’s funny how he lets himself be bossed around by someone who’s way smaller compared to his frame.

Jungkook finds leverage on his elbows splayed against the mattress, your knees resting on each side of his hips as you leaned into him and kissing him just as widely as you had done before. Jungkook could fill just how quick things were escalating, especially the way his crotch area was beginning to become a problem he couldn’t possibly control at the moment, not with your own being directly on top of it. In any other situation he would’ve apologized with an awkward laugh, but his breath hitches once your hips start grinding over him.  

His hands make their way on the inside of your knitted sweater, provoking goosebumps on the exposed skin. You let out a shaky laugh, halting your movements so you can quickly get rid of the fabric as Jungkook’s eyebrows lift in surprise at your haste and then at the sight of your bra covered breasts. His hands are still steadily placed on each side of your waist, only brought up because your own had redirected them over your breasts, hoping he gets the message on what you want him to do now.   

Jungkook hesitantly squeezed one of the round globes, provoking a small moan to come from out of your lips. He wishes to hold you as close as he possibly can because the idea of ever being away from you again has been his main fear as of lately. But he refrains, you look so delicate and he feels like you could easily break. He stares at your body lovingly and your cheeks heat up at the way his eyes ogle your chest like a kid in a candy story. You give his arm a light slap and he chuckles, leaning over you to place a passionate kiss on your lips.

“You’re beautiful,” he says frankly. It doesn’t help to dissipate the flush on your face, but the compliment doesn’t bother you in the slightest. Jungkook leans in to trail kisses past your collarbones and into the swell of your breasts, making you bite your lip with anticipation. He looks at you asking for permission and you nod quickly with parted lips as you start to become impatient for him to make his next move. Jungkook lowers the cups of your breasts, freeing your hardened nipples and immediately envelopes one of them with his lips. “Mph—!” A sigh escapes your lips as you try to memorize the way his tongue traces over your tit. He pays attention to your other one, fingers rolling over the bud and pinching ever so often. 

You can feel your panties damp by then, trespassing into the fabric of the black leggings you’re wearing over them. Reaching behind your back, you fumble in unclasping the hooks of the now uncomfortable bra. Jungkook’s forced to stop the undivided attention he had places on your breasts to look at you like he’s lost, why are you going so fast? 

Once your hands delve with the buckle of his belt, he has to hold on to your wrists with a firm grasp, ‘‘What are you doing?’’ He asks with quick breath, you blink stoically towards him. 

‘‘Uh─getting you naked?’’ You answer with a nonchalant tone, but his hands don’t let go and your demeanor changes, ‘‘D-Did you not want this?’’ Your voice turns smaller, embarrassed that maybe you had pressured him into something he didn’t want to participate in. 

Jungkook quickly shakes his head no, ‘‘No, I-I do want this! It’s just─you’re going so fast,’’ he tries to explain, ‘‘I’ve been waiting for this for too long, I don’t wanna rush.’’ Your eyes lit up at the revelation as he waits for you to answer back, only for his back to hit the comforter with a small thud, giggling at the way you urgently kiss him again, but this time with much more care. 

‘‘Why didn’t you say so before, stupid?’’ You mumble with a sheepish look, ‘‘I thought it was just going to be─nevermind, I need you right now.’’ You have to force yourself from spitting out any details that could possibly ruin the moment between you two, deciding to wait instead for any emotional confessions you want to make. 

He switches positions between the two, panting as he brings you down to the mattress and Jungkook can feel the goosebumps on your skin, whether from the coldness of the room or because of the sheer electricity of his hands caressing your body like it was molded just right for him. He dips his hand lower, cupping your clothed heat on his hand. It makes you tremble and you whine, encouraging him to keep going. 

“Baby, you’re really wet,” he comments with a teasing tone and you pout at him. His fingers hook into the waistband of your leggings and he pulls them down as he travels with them, greeted by the sight of the damp cloth of your panties. He exhales with content, caressing your thighs in an up and down motion. You twist underneath him and he has to hold your hips down to calm you down, “Patience is a virtue.” 

“I’ve been too patient, do some—Ah!” Your whining is interrupted once Jungkook moves your underwear to the side holding it with his free hand, fingers coming to trace the slick covering your pussy lips. He becomes entranced with the transparent gooey liquid, bringing them close to his face as he separates his fingers and sees a strand connecting between them. “Guk-ah, p-please…” Your needy voice brings him back to reality, delving his fingers back into your exposed heat but this time with intent. 

Jungkook’s thumb lifts the hood covering your clit, mouth coming down to give it a small tentative kiss. That action alone has you writhing above him, it makes him chuckle to himself as he dives back in. The moans you let out are loud and clear inside your bedroom, thankful that it’s only you and him inside your house. Your hand pulls at his hair, making him groan against you and the vibrations are felt throughout your body, only adding to the euphoric pleasure you already possess. His fingers trace the inside of your thighs until they reach your entrance, circling the fluttering hole which makes you pull at his hair harder and with your other you hold on to the bedsheets of the comforter tightly into your fist. 

Jungkook’s tongue is still working your engorged bud, but he focuses his eyes on you as he dips the first finger inside you. “Oh—fuck,” you let out in a breathy moan. He tries to maintain a rhythm between his two ministrations, but it’s hard when he wants to focus on all of them at once. “‘Nother, please,” you begged once he let your clit rest, quickly following your request by adding another into your warm heat. He lets out a breathless chuckle as he notices how easy it is to thrust both fingers inside of you, your whole crotch area is covered in slick and his wet chin is a dead giveaway to where he was seconds ago. 

He watches you unravel over him with such adoration, not even his wettest dreams or dirtiest fantasies could prepare him for this. Seven minutes in heaven he plans to stay in forever. “Guk-ah, I wan’ you. I-Inside, please.” You plead with teary eyes, and he slowly stops, removing his arousal covered fingers from inside you as he makes you sigh in the process. He kisses you again and again, your hazy brain is probably hallucinating all of this right now, but damn is it good. You tug at the crewneck he’s wearing, he’s too overdressed for this occasion. He tends to your demands, quickly getting rid of all the layers of clothing that stop him from being inside of you fully. 

“I don’t have a—“ 

“I’m on the pill.”

You both speak at the same time, making each other chuckle. Jungkook gulps at the idea of taking you raw as the first time together, and you salivate at his hardened length; the head already oozing precum out and you want nothing more than to wrap your lips around it and lick the tip up. You’re just about to when Jungkook quickly grabs your wrist to stop you from reaching him, you look up at him with the big sparkly eyes he has loved for too long. 

“I just—I wanna be inside you right now,” he sheepishly admits, and you smile with a nod; sharing the sentiment. You back up until your head rests on the pillows comfortably, relaxing into the mattress as you wait for Jungkook to ready himself. He places a kiss on your lips before placing a hand next to your head, using it as leverage above you. His free hand takes his cock and rubs the tip along your folds, making you squirm with anticipation. Jungkook chuckles, “Are you ready?” He asks with a sweet smile. 

“I’ve always been,” you whisper, your hand tucking a strand of his long hair behind his ear. 

A caress to his cheek as he nods, slowly pushing the head of his dick into you. You bite into your lip hard, it’s been a while since you had sex with someone and Jungkook’s size and girth was different from the rest. Your walls are tight around him and he has a tough time trying to reach the hilt with you squeezing him so hard, “Baby, relax for me.” He pleads and you nod apologetically, breathing in deep as you feel him reach parts inside of you, you didn’t know existed. Once he’s all the way in, he waits for you to give him the go ahead while he presses kisses into your heated cheek. You wrap your legs around his waist and give him a nod, letting him know he was allowed to start thrusting.

Jungkook manages to hit all the right places, keeping a steady pace as he enters and exits you each time. You’re left to moan and writhe underneath him, letting him take you as he pleases. Your kisses become messy, teeth biting into each other’s lips, teeth grazing against each other as you both tried to fight for the dominant position. It’s that heavy makeout that incites you to push at his shoulders, making him turn in his back, exiting you in the process. Jungkook pants, chest rising and falling with quickness as you straddle his lap, arms connecting behind his neck. 

“You always want to win, right?” He chuckles with half lidded eyes, enjoying the way your pussy lips grinded over his twitching length. You bat your eyelashes at him, offering him an innocent smile. The same technique that used to get you everything you wanted when you were younger. Same determination as you seek for what’s yours. He’s under you after all, still a victim to your charms.

Jungkook takes the bulbous head of his cock and teases it in your clit, if you weren’t holding on to him tight you would’ve collapsed into his chest. And by the way you moan his name out, he knows you’ll always look for him no matter the weather. “What a pretty girl,” he coos into your hair and you pinch his nipple in retaliation which only makes him groan in return. “My pretty girl.” He states before sinking himself deep into you again, sighing at the feeling of your hips circling over him. His rough hands guide them as you bounce up and down his length, moaning every time you rose and hissing when you came back down. 

He makes sure to keep this image engraved on his head forever. Your breasts bouncing over his face, your thighs working extra hard to keep up with his thrusts, and the way your sounds bounced off the walls of your bedroom. 

“You’re doing s-so good, baby.” Jungkook praises you, kneading your ass cheek. “Taking my cock s-so well,” he falls into a trance of admiring the way his length would appear and disappear inside of you, covered in a thick layer of your arousal. It makes him drill into you faster, sitting properly against the bed’s headboard as he takes your hips with force. He’s too turned on to keep treating you so delicately, and the way you moan and pant at the increase in speed only lets him know you enjoy him like this way more. “I-Is it good, baby? Am I-I fucking you well?” He asks in between rapid thrusts, your thighs had given out by then. 

You nod and a whimper escapes your lips, “Y-yes, Guk-Ah. S-so good, feels amazing.” Your praise is honest, the fucked out tone in your voice is a clear indicator of how well of a job he was doing. A minute longer and you’ll be right on cloud nine, never wanting to come back down. “Wanna cum Guk-Ah, plea—“ There’s no need for you to even finish your sentence because his thumb rubs your clit in figure eights, making you groan with the intensified feeling of his hips circling inside you deliciously. You can almost see the blinding white light ahead as Jungkook kisses you feverishly. You feel tears escape the corners of your high, the familiar feeling tickling inside you as Jungkook’s thrusts don’t let up. ‘‘Ah! Yes, yes, fuck,’’ you cry out once your orgasm hits. Jungkook holds you close to his chest, trying to soothe your shaking body with his arms. Your walls squeeze and relax continuously around him, it serves him as the impulse he needs to chase his own high. 

‘‘I love you, Jungkook,’’ you confess in between panting breaths, ‘‘so much.’’ 

His release shoots out and he groans, digging crescent moons into your hips. You hiss at the sensation, but giggle at how his eyes are screwed shut and brows still furrowed together, as if he was holding on to the last of his orgasm. In reality, Jungkook is just hoping that once he opens his eyes you’ll still be in his arms. Your fingers tilting his head to face you are very much real, he sees spots once he opens his eyes as they adjust to the room’s lighting. 

‘‘I love you too.’’ He says with a fixed gaze and you coo at how perfect this is.

You’re twenty-two when Jungkook’s finally yours.

You’re both twenty-three and it’s another weekend spent at his apartment, he’s been playing for three hours now and you’ve given up on having him pay attention to you. Deciding to switch your plan around and join him instead, if only he would let you play.

‘‘Jungkook, you said it was going to be my turn five rounds ago!’’ You complain with a pout, crossing your arms across your chest. 

His gaze is still stuck on the T.V screen, ‘‘Baby, shhh, you’re gonna make me lose.’’ He mumbles as he tries to remain concentrated on the game in hand, but he can hear your humph’s from behind him, ‘‘Patience is a─’’

‘‘Virtue, yeah, who cares.’’ You interrupt him with a roll of your eyes, familiar with the saying a little too well. ‘‘Hope you remember that for later tonight,’’ you add in a mumble, but he doesn’t hear it because of the loud sounds coming from the game on the screen. 

‘‘What did you say, babe?’’ He asks with a raised brow, hitting the buttons of the controller with expert ease. 

‘‘I’ll call your mom and tell her you don’t wanna share.’’ You joke with a threatening voice, but Jungkook knows better than to take your words so lightly. He pauses the game and turns to look at you with an are you serious? expression on his face, you giggle as you’ve finally got what you wanted. 

He apologizes by covering your face with kisses, pleading for you not to tell on him with his mom. You promise not to do so this time, knowing that the woman was probably tired of having to scold his son at his big age. 

Plus, ever since Jungkook surprised you with the almost exact replica of the Valentine’s Day card you gave him all those year back, you’ve taken advantage to tease him even more knowing he’s at your beck and call. You always remind him that he came close because the stickers he used were not like the ones you had, but he remembered to add the hearts on the I’s so that’s good enough. 

‘‘Alright you can play, but━!’’ He says after he finishes his attack of kisses, ‘‘I’ll be your guide, I can’t risk you messing my record up, no offense baby.’’ None taken as you nod excitedly, you’ll always take whatever chance he gives you. 

Jungkook’s finally learned how to share his toys after all.

[ficforthought]

On being SO DONE with M*sha, a rant a decade in the making!

After giving this some thought I'm going to go ahead and give my opinion on Misha and yesterday’s situation in public for the first time ever. I was going to just post on Twitter but since this has been 12 years in the making I have exceeded the number of tweets I can put in one thread! There’s A LOT in here, so my summary is also long. I'm aware that I will lose followers over this, I'm not looking to offend anyone but it will inevitably happen. I wish anyone leaving all the best as fellow human beings.

TL;DR - having kept quiet for so long I’ve finally reached my limit and it’s all come bubbling out. I’ve never been a fan of Misha, I’ve been ambivalent for the most part, but have never criticised him in any hateful way, that's not who I am, but after all these years of putting up with his bullshit, attention seeking and troublemaking I am DONE. Deleting his tweet containing the word Wincest and replacing it with an APOLOGY just to pander to his Minions and save face is the straw that broke the camel's back. He has consistently pushed his ship on not only fans but on other actors (despite Jensen's discomfort, and him having repeatedly made his feelings known on it), he has stood by while his Minions/Hellers have harassed, victimised, doxxed and sent death threats to people based on their FICTIONAL ships. He has pandered to their gatekeeping, constantly demanded attention in obvious and not so obvious ways, and to the best of my knowledge never criticised their actions even though he's aware of it in a very real way. Some of his Minions have now taken their shit into The Boys fandom and created negativity for Jensen before the guy has even got a foot through the set door, and how is that supporting one half of your ship?

Misha has claimed to be a victim of targeted harassment from Wincest/brother fans (not only shippers) yet his fans have said and done the most despicable things on his watch, all in the name of what he must think is entertainment, or even his idea of a ‘joke’.

Any respect I had for the man based on his humanitarian work has gone because I can only take so much hypocrisy. He and his pandering because of a desperate attempt to be woke and wholly inclusive (which is actually impossible, no matter how good intentions are) are beyond pathetic. Whilst I have never seen why people think he’s so great I have friends IRL and online who genuinely adore the man, yet they have been shocked and upset by his contempt for half of the fandom that made him somewhat famous. It's disgusting and I'm not scrolling by any more. Misha, I hope to never see you on anything J2 related in future because none of us need that kind of negativity, *especially* not J2. Be gone, foul fiend!

OK, so to the too long part. Please be aware that these are my opinions as a fan of the show, of Sam and Dean, and J2, not only as a shipper. I can separate canon and fanon, and can view canon from a gen or shippy PoV. Whether you agree or disagree with my opinion let me be clear that I do not condone constant bashing and hate of a person or character so this isn’t the start of a regular thing for me. It's possible to have an opinion and not show the same vitriol that has been following this man around for years, and that’s what I’m doing. I've not posted this to prompt more negativity, it's simply to get it off my chest and make it clear how I feel. I stand by my philosophy of ship who you want to ship, enjoy it, but don't force it on other people and don't be a dick about it…hmm, that kinda sounds like familiar behaviour, though, does it not?!

I have ABSOLUTELY NO ISSUE with other people liking Misha, Cas or Destiel when it’s for the love of the characters and the ship. What I *do* have an issue with is people who are the true definition of a Heller. I don’t see that as a generic term, don't be ignorant and think I do because I know the difference between actual ship fans and the crazies, both ships have ‘em and I want no part of either of their venom. If you are reading this and class yourself as a Heller then you are part of the problem so run along and as you are all so fond of saying, 'get help' and take your bestie king with you.

I’m stating my opinion in what I feel is the most mature way I can, because unlike many people on SM, I am an adult and can act accordingly, with forethought and without resorting to temper tantrums and bullying of other people to get my point across. I am able to tell the difference between reality and fiction, I don't tar everyone with the same shipper brush and I don't expect everyone to agree with my opinion, but as we know opinions are like arseholes, we all have them and sometimes they stink. Unlike some, for the most part in life (online and offline) I *do* stand by what I say and don’t backtrack or delete things to appease the masses. I have spent a lot of time writing this out to be as clear as possible without being intentionally hateful. Bear with me jumping between actor and character where relevant, at this point they're conjoined. I will say this before I go any further, it doesn’t end well for Misha, I don’t mince my words and if you don’t like seeing facts and opinions laid out, this isn't the post for you.

I’ll say right off the bat what most of you have surmised - I’ve never held Misha (or Cas) in high esteem but I have never *hated* on him. I have shared mild criticism of his actions and opinions on Cas over the years but never, I feel, in any way that has made me feel I have something to apologise for. I have said several times I've been unhappy about Misha crashing con panels, taking attention away from J2 when at those cons *most* people paid their hard earned money to see the STARS of the show they love, first and foremost, and anyone else is a very nice bonus. The odd appearance here and there crashing a panel is fine (and Misha isn’t the first or last person to do it), maybe take up a few minutes then leave, but when someone commandeers an entire panel, that's just not on. It's not only selfish, rude and attention seeking but also disrespectful to other actors, fans and to the organisers who work hard to make sure everything ties in to give us the best con experience we can have. Everyone gets their turn on stage, there's no need to try and hog any more of the limelight, Veruca Salt style. Oh, and if you’re reading this and not getting that reference, (a) you shouldn’t be on my blog because you’re far too young, (b) look it up, and if you still don’t get what I’m saying… well then please refer to point (a). Thank you, kindly!

There was a time in Kripke's era where Cas was - I feel - intentionally used as a pawn by the writers to divert *canon* from the ‘questionable’ relationship between Sam and Dean, i.e. Wincest focus. Prior to that people (other fans) lightened up and just accepted the fact that Wincest had been there since day one in terms of the writing of the show and the fandom. All the cast and crew knew - J2, Kripke and JDM in particular - and made light of it, never judging, never shaming and often encouraging it because they understand it’s a fun part of fandom. Wincest was present enough to be part of the not so subtle subtext, as I said people just accepted it. Kink tomato was alive and well, so was ‘don’t like, don’t read’ and we all just scrolled over things we didn’t like without turning everything into a personal vendetta and excuse for bullying others who didn’t share our views. When the angels came into the plot I think most of us Wincest fans gave the Dean/Cas innuendos the small laugh they deserved and then turned back to the focus of the show which was the brothers, as it had always been intended. Misha, however, milked those moments as much as possible which was amusing at the start but got old *very* quickly, not just for fans (shippers and non shippers alike), but for other actors, in particular Jensen who is on record MULTIPLE times showing his dislike for Destiel. He told people outright that's not how he was playing the relationship between the two characters and CATEGORICALLY said "Destiel doesn't exist" but did it end there? No, it did not because neither fans or Misha let it go, in fact Misha only pushed more, goaded fans into flogging the same dead horse as much as possible. He’s never stopped, not even when there was so much discord in the fandom, a huge wedge was driven into it because of ships, which IMO he heavily contributed to.

Fast forward to over a decade later (a decade, seriously man, let it fucking go!) he didn’t even stop when Destiel did partially go canon. I have never doubted that Cas loved Dean (Sam, too) because in SPN lore angels are made to love, even rebellious ones. I, along with many others, liked that about Cas because who doesn't love a rebel, especially one rebelling for very good reasons, and because of those two wonderful men? Sam and Dean allowed him to see beyond what he'd been brainwashed to believe his entire existence. The fact is that although the nature of that love changed for Cas, it never did for Dean and was CANONICALLY UNREQUITED because Dean was incapable of loving anyone else as much as he loved Sam. All that mattered to Dean, even when he saw other characters as "family" was still Sam…ALWAYS Sam, every step of the way. Again for those who have too much Misha shaped wax in their ears, that’s canon. Whether people choose to see that love platonically or romantically is up to them, soulmates don't always have to be romantic, either way, brotherly love won out above all else on the show. No amount of Misha screaming ‘hey look, Destiel!’ changed that, but it sure didn’t stop him trying, did it?

So now that the obvious has been stated, here's something else we all know - never once in all of the years on the show did Misha drop rallying of the troops to his precious, ego stroking ship. Never once (that I am aware of) has he called out his Minions and Hellers on their continued harassment of everyone involved in the show and other fans despite the fact that they have bullied, victimised and wished bodily harm, rape and death on people who don't see their ship and because didn't get the ending to the story that they wanted. Not once has Misha shown any remorse for the trauma his "fans" have caused, and I’m taking REAL trauma, here, not the kind Twitter stans see as ‘triggering’ - people have been driven to close SM accounts, attempted, and in some cases succeeded in taking their own lives. These Minions have openly mocked Jared’s struggles with depression and anxiety, and Misha - who claims to be friends with J2 and be supportive of them in every way  - has stood by and let it all play out, knowing full well some of the goings on, if not the full extent of how toxic these people are. We know he sees things being said online, and I have absolutely no doubt he spends time online searching his name for things that are relevant in some way to him in an effort to insert himself into a current conversation, or even start one so that attention is on him. Gotta stay relevant, somehow, right, Mish?

He has actively encouraged bullying by his actions of enabling the behaviours above, both by the flogging of the aforementioned dead horse, AND by not objecting to unacceptable behaviours. Remember when Minions and Hellers were slating J2, particularly Jared, for not posting on SM about BLM and other topics? Yeah, he didn’t ask them to stop doing that, either, even when he was tagged in things along the lines of ‘If Misha can post why can’t J2?’ etc. There have been some token protests, con vids I've seen have show his 'objections' which IMO have been done in a very tongue in cheek way, meaning that those people who needed to be pulled aside and told to change their ways just carried on, because their evil overlord didn’t explicitly explain it in terms a three year old could understand that bullying and forcing your opinion on others is WRONG. Not all of his cult are young and impressionable, not by a long shot, but many of the more vocal and vitriolic ones are.

As a father himself I wonder what Misha would do if he found out that his kids were behaving in ways his Minions are? I’m aware they’re young, but kids are cruel and bullying doesn’t just happen online. Even at whatever age they are, would he laugh it off the way he appears to have done with all of this fandom toxicity? Not bloody likely! I wonder if he’s as desperate to gain the approval of his family, friends and colleagues as he appears to be for that of his Minions/Hellers? I would certainly hope so, but that question can only be answered by Misha, himself, and I can and will not presume to speak on someone else's behalf on things in their personal life. For the record I would never presume I know what J2's answers would be on anything, however I do feel that after 15 years I have an accurate gauge on what kind of people they are so would be confident that any opinion I had on a matter aligns with their morals and ethics. As much as J2 have shared of themselves with us - willingly and under no pressure to do so, I might add - we don't *know* them, but we know enough to have an informed opinion. I can’t say the same for Misha because based on the behaviour he’s repeatedly displayed, things I've heard about from other fans as well as people I know IRL who have had direct dealings with him through cons or GISH (including some very actively in the early days when it was GISHWHES) he just hasn’t seemed like a person I wanted to follow on SM. I’ve never watched any of his solo panels, though I have watched ones with both or one of the J's, mostly being left irritated because of his behaviour. Watching the J’s put up with that shit is painful, and it’s a testament to how good they are as actors that they managed to hide at least some of their disdain for as long as they did. Microexpressions give them away, particularly Jensen, and they certainly have faces I have spent many years watching closely. Beautiful faces to go with beautiful souls, both of them! <3

I have precisely ZERO interest in Destiel as a ship, very little interest in Cas as a character anymore (though I did like him in the early days,and his relationship with Jack in late seasons) so I have absolutely no reason or desire to follow anything Misha does. That said, I've obviously been peripherally aware of some things he's been involved in because of friends, from things I’ve seen on SM and general fandom stuff. Despite the things I've already mentioned about his behaviour, up until now I have been able to maintain a level of respect for him as a person because of the humanitarian and charity work he's done. He seems like someone who really does want to change the world for the better and I am in full support of that fact, so much so that I have supported TWO campaigns relating to him. I bought one of the Super Good t-shirts for the campaign he did with Michael Sheen (a true angel!), the SPN/Good Omens x-over to help homeless charities, and I chose the design with text only and not artwork of Michael and Misha on, basically because I didn’t want to be wearing something with Misha’s face on it and I make absolutely no apology for that, whatsoever. I also bought Alex's #TheEndHasNoEnd shirt, which some of the profits went to Random Acts who do great work, so again, despite not liking Misha I still willingly contributed for a cause bigger than me, and to support Alex, who I absolutely ADORE. I'm aware that Stands aren't popular with some of the fandom, however since most of the cast of SPN are happily affiliated with them then I don't feel it's my place to either judge, or to discuss topics I know next to nothing about. But I digress, as a decent human being I have shown support tangentially to a man who I don't care for out of respect for the work he does outside the fandom. Telling you this isn’t to paint myself in a good light - I don’t need your approval, I’m a big girl, unlike some I don’t need constant validation! - only to provide background on how I’ve actively *not* hated on Misha.

Now though, any respect I had for him has come to an abrupt end, the events of the past 24 hours has seen to that. Whilst I have been annoyed at his behaviour in regards to shipping, I don't feel it's ever gone this far, or at least not that I've seen first hand. This man has, IMO, contributed to so much toxicity in the fandom by way of things I've mentioned before, he's claimed - without actually saying the words - that Wincest fans weren't interested in him as a character when he came onto the show, and hasn’t felt included because of the fans’ love of the brothers. Um, hate to break it to you, love, but when you come onto an established show that is about two people, and you’re a *guest star* you can’t expect everyone to love you. Some characters we as individuals do fall in love with straight away (Bobby, Charlie, Crowley and Rowena are good examples for me), it takes time to establish a dynamic, so if that’s how he felt then it was incredibly naive of him as an actor to expect instant acceptance from anyone. Also, why wait until after the show finished to bring it up AGAIN … oh wait, yeah, that would be to step back into the limelight in a way intended to garner sympathy from Minions and INTENTIONALLY piss off bro fans and Wincest shippers alike? How fucking self centred, desperate and disrespectful do you have to be to shit all over the finale of a show that for the most part accepted you and kept you in paid work for 12 years? Well, Misha Collins levels of all of those things, obviously.  

So, on the topics of self centred, desperate to stay relevant, attention seeking and being oh so needy, the tweet yesterday from Amazon mentioned Castiel. He wasn’t tagged in it, so I refer to my earlier comment about searching online, because how else would he have possibly seen that? It’s possible someone sent it to him, I appreciate that, but if we go off past behaviour it’s not any stretch at all to believe that didn’t happen. So, once again, having seen the tweet he took it upon himself to - oh so predictably - turn it into something relating to Destiel. When I saw it I immediately rolled my eyes and thought ‘here we go again’, but then also had a little smile because I really liked the fact that he explicitly mentioned Wincest, therefore seeming to accept that his poor old dead horse wasn’t the only one in the race. I actually mentally tipped my hat to him then because it appeared that he’s matured enough to acknowledge by name the ship that predates his inclusion on the show. Great, I thought, this is a positive thing in a sea of negativity surrounding the man and his sunken ship, because what followed was Wincest trending in the US (it may also have been other countries as well but I had to sleep!) … largely due to the fact that Hellers were responding to it, calling him out on mentioning the dreaded ‘W’ word. I’ll repeat that because it’s been a rare occurrence up to that point… the Minions were actually disappointed with their overlord for mentioning another ship. We all know what they think of it and I for one, don’t give a flying fuck about their opionion. Ship and let ship, it’s all fun (or meant to be) so we have different tastes, that’s life kiddiwinks, deal with it. I mean, you really don’t have much of an example set for you when your king has proven several times over to be one of the biggest obnoxious brats out there, but just give it a try for your own sakes, yeah? Awesome, good on you, besties!

An unexpected development - to my joy and that of other Wincest shippers - them doing that got the topic trending, only *kept* trending by the fact that were all coming online asking why it was trending. Wincest shippers barely lifted a finger, we just flooded each other’s timelines with lovely content and basked in the Hellers - and Misha - shooting themselves in the foot, which was awesome. But did the vitriol stop? No. Did he get the attention he so clearly craves? Yes. Was it in the way he wanted? Fuck no, so poor, emotionally wounded baby backtracked after seeing that his name was trending alongside Wincest because that’s *so* not what someone narcissistic to do it in the first place, wanted.

Now here’s where I could easily have just moved on with an unusually fond chuckle, giving him an ironic pat on the back and a ‘thanks, Misha’ for being the one to instigate hours of fun, but once again his despicable behaviour made that impossible. It’s been more than obvious for many years that he cares more about what his fans think than anything else to do with the show and the fandom in a larger sense, but to delete the tweet and APOLOGISE for daring to be so insensitive to the snowflakes’ delicate sensibilities for mentioning Wincest in the first place was absolutely disgusting. Stating , “I used a term that I had never really given any thought to other than, "that's a thing?! Yuck." is not only complete and utter bullshit, it’s pandering of the highest order.  

We all know he has referred to Wincest on multiple occasions, so to say he hadn’t thought about is a flat out lie, which IMO is an insult to everyone, not just Wincest shippers. Does the man have no self respect at all, why would you contradict yourself in the face of such overwhelming evidence? Instead of either ignoring all the people calling him out, or addressing it with another tweet saying ‘yeah, that happened’ or something similar he chose, I repeat, CHOSE the route of claiming he didn’t realise he was being offensive to people who felt ‘triggered’ by him using the word Wincest. He basically shat all over an entire ship and large sector of the fandom in an attempt to appease his own fan base which consists of a lot of children (or those that act like children) who have no idea what RL is like.

Once again, he’s reinforced the idea that if you shout loud enough at someone just because you don’t like something they said, they will back down and apologise for something even when there’s nothing to apologise for. If he wants to be such a role model then he could easily have pointed out that a fictional ship doesn’t condone RL incest, any ACTUAL trauma people have suffered because of RL situations, and made an effort to make sure people understand that. He COULD have used it as an opportunity to do some good in the fandom by encouraging people to build bridges, to accept that people are entitled to their beliefs and that sometimes we see things differently but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t treat others with BASIC HUMAN DECENCY because of it. Instead he YET AGAIN chose to show that he cares more about what Minions think of him, keeping them onside to constantly stroke his unbelievably fragile ego in everything he does.

It is my understanding that Misha is big on (or claims to be big on) putting positive energy out into the world, treating people with respect, helping others and accepting people for who they are, not who you want them to be… all this after YEARS of consistently practising what he preaches only when it suits him. He sends out a message that it’s perfectly OK to bully, to spread hate, to draw attention to yourself at the cost of others, to throw colleagues and friends under the bus and at the same time use them to further your own agenda and get hits for your YouTube channel. Is this really the legacy he wants to leave? Is this an environment he wants his own kids to grow up in as well as future generations? Is this what he thinks is a valuable contribution as a human being? JFC, the arrogance, hypocrisy and the need for constant validation this man exhibits is nothing short of cringeworthy… actually it’s beyond that. It’s deplorable behaviour, it’s not new, and he will continue to act like this for as long as he’s being enabled and this harmful cycle needs to end.

I have friends IRL and online who are (now, possibly, were) big Misha fans, who have supported him from either the beginning of his run on the show, or since they started watching, and this is how he repays this behaviour? He’s willfully alienating decent people (including multishippers) all to make himself look good by being seen to do everything he can not to offend people. Spoiler alert, you DID offend people, you continue to do so time and again and we’ve had enough. I can’t imagine how exhausting it must be to be such a perpetual people pleaser, but let me say it’s not doing you any favours in any way, shape or form.

Misha, you are *not* a role model, you’re *not* someone to look up to when you can't live up to the ideals you preach. You’re spitting in the face of people who have supported you even after some questionable things in the past, who gave you the benefit of the doubt because we’re all human and we all make mistakes. The key to growing as a person is not to keep repeating the same mistakes over and over, understanding *why* what you said and/or did was a mistake and making a concerted effort to make changes. I don’t ever see you doing that, you will continue down this path of only caring about Minions under the guise of caring for people in general. You are transparent, you are sad and despite the fact I’ve never particularly liked you, I didn’t speak up because I didn’t want to get involved in the drama. Well now I have spoken up and I’m saying you’re a disgrace, you have no respect for other people and nobody is fooled anymore. If it hadn’t been this tweet it would have been something else, but I for one am glad it happened so soon after the show ended so we can finally be rid of the limpet-like behaviour. It’s over, let it go for the sake of what dignity you might have left, for the sake of your family and friends and for the sake of anyone who isn’t capable of seeing through your ‘it’s a joke’ mentality.

You have been weighed, you have been measured and you have been found wanting. Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, Misha.

For anyone who made it to the end of my ramble, thank you. This has been a cathartic exercise and I’m drawing a line under it now, I don’t think I could possibly make my thoughts any clearer. I urge you not to get caught up in any petty squabbles with his Minions, let’s celebrate J2 and other cast and crew members who have shown us all respect and who I am proud to call part of the SPN family. There’s always one member of the family who needs to be frozen out for the good of everyone else.

[shihalyfie]

A meta and analysis on Takaishi Takeru

Of all of the Tokyo Chosen Children, Takeru is lucky enough to get significant attention for two full series from beginning to end, and his character also goes through some drastic changes in the process, especially through Adventure and 02. There’s so much going on with him that it makes it hard to give a short answer to the question “what is Takeru like?” because there’s so much you could say about him at so many different times.

Fortunately, that’s what we’re here to talk about today!

Takeru in Adventure

At first glance, Takeru seems to be the “tagalong kid” -- the obligatory “little kid character” you have whenever you have a party in a fantasy story. Generally, these “obligatory kid characters” are the kind constantly struggling to catch up with the older ones. Adventure being a series that loves to play with tropes and expectations, though, very quickly says no to that.

Seki: ...We also mixed up the children’s ages, for a bit of variety. Kakudou: The oldest one would be the most unreliable, and the smartest one would be one of the third youngest. Just a little to throw you off the usual, conventional track. Seki: The youngest one would feel too much like a burden to everyone else, and conversely would actually have himself together.

Takeru “doesn’t want to be a burden” -- meaning his feelings on this issue are actually rather much like Hikari’s. Unlike Hikari, though, Takeru reacts to this compulsion differently -- instead of simply repressing things and pretending the problem doesn’t exist, Takeru’s reaction to his own negative feelings is to “have himself together” and act as if he’s got everything under control.

Or, more accurately, pretend he has it together and has everything under control.

Takeru, for all intents and purposes, was not supposed to be on the camping trip the others were on, not having gone to everyone’s school -- he had to get special permission to go. Takeru’s family is very, very split harshly at this time, with his mother not even able to treat Yamato comfortably. Yamato deals with the familial estrangement badly -- alternating between approaching everyone awkwardly and exploding like an emotional fuse bomb -- but Takeru tries to take it as a sign  that he needs to be “responsible”. A lot of his actions in Adventure are him basically exuding this aura of “I can take care of myself!”, and in fact he works very hard to “assert” himself as if he were yet another peer. We even see him make the complaint directly in Adventure episode 43 -- while he is correct in calling out Yamato for coddling him and him only while recklessly disregarding the others, the fact he specifically complains about Yamato approaching him as someone holding them back if he’s not protected reveals a lot about his own mentality regarding the situation.

One of his first major scenes in episode 2 is him offering his own food for the pile of supplies everyone has, even though it’s just snacks. Which is, probably, a pretty accurate summary of Takeru’s character at this point: on the surface he’s responsible, well-behaved, and capable...but, in fact, he’s still about as immature as an average eight-year-old child would predictably be.

Yamato spends his Adventure character arc pretty openly angsting about his relationship to Takeru and how his family’s split has affected them, but throughout the entirety of Adventure (and, eventually, 02 as well), not only does Takeru rarely if ever touch on it, there are indications that Takeru deliberately tries to dodge the subject or not dwell on it too much. In Adventure episode 12, he actually outright lies to Patamon about his younger childhood memories, claiming he “probably doesn’t remember” anything about it despite the audience very clearly being shown that he very much did, and in episode 26 he comes very close to leaking his actual feelings about the group being separated being tied to what happened to his family, before quickly covering it up and trying to move on with the topic.

In other words, unlike Hikari, who knows exactly what she’s feeling but is compulsively unable to vocalize them, Takeru actively suppresses his negative feelings and tries not to dwell on them too much. Again, this comes from his desire to “not be a burden” on others -- he’s got this situation under control! Everything is fine!

And this has a very, very nasty payoff. While Yamato clearly deals with his emotional issues badly, tending to get very explosive about it, Takeru’s way of coping isn’t actually all that much better in the long run, because Yamato’s frustration and openness about his emotions at least lead him to being very straightforward about his feelings, incredibly self-aware and sometimes even self-conscious, and ultimately able to get at least some degree of catharsis from the situation. Takeru...not so much.

Takeru is a child, no matter how much he tries not to act like one, and it ultimately results in him reacting disastrously whenever something hits him too emotionally hard -- which results in Takeru suddenly becoming irrationally stubborn and even angry. We later see what it takes to actually break through Takeru’s facade of “totally having this together” in Adventure episode 22, which is also the first time he openly breaks down wailing in front of anyone besides Patamon -- and it’s, of course, when PicoDevimon convinces him that Yamato hates him. The interesting part is that this is so blatantly a lie that even Tokomon is able to quickly call bullshit on it, but Takeru, previously having worked so hard to maintain this facade of being responsible, falls for it completely with utter irrationality -- and it really does suggest that Takeru’s fear of losing yet another member of his family, and being a burden to Yamato, runs so deep that it causes that entire facade to shatter in one blow.

Which is where the problem lies: Takeru’s habit of suppression is so bad that once one of his triggers is hit, he completely loses all sense of rationality and blows up, and it becomes nearly impossible to reason with him because he locks down on becoming stubborn. It’s also dangerous because even he isn’t particularly self-aware of what he’s doing when he blows up like this; at least Hikari was very consciously aware of her suppression problem, but Takeru never really seems to have any awareness of the fact that his covering up of his feelings is directly related to some of his worst moments. We see it cause problems between him and Patamon again in Adventure episode 33, when Patamon asks a rather innocuous question about the brothers, and it hits Takeru’s trigger so badly that he snaps at him, resulting in the fight that kicks off the plot of the episode.

Adventure episode 52 is basically a major test for Takeru as to whether he really can hold himself together in a situation where everyone else older than him is gone, and “having himself together” is something he has to actually do instead of just have the surface facade of. He does, ultimately, pass, and this is why the Crest of Hope glows this episode -- but it’s also made clear that it wasn’t quite as easy for him as he would normally pretend it is. Of course, it also helps that Piemon is genuinely the scariest threat they’d faced during that time, but it also reveals that, yeah, ultimately, Takeru is an eight-year-old child who still has to struggle to put on a brave face so that Hikari doesn’t get impacted by his own fear.

For all it’s worth, although we get a ton of depth into his background and mentality, Takeru does not actually change that much as a character over the course of Adventure. This incident is probably what changes him the most in terms of him gaining a more solid core, and he also learns to accept the inevitability of fighting after his stubborn refusal to engage in it all the way back in Adventure episode 12 -- but for the most part he still does remain a bit naive about the world at large, and, more importantly, his issue with trying to cover up his problems with a confident smile never really gets addressed. At most, he’s willing to admit his grief over being separated from Patamon in Adventure episode 54, but even that is something Takeru tries to bounce back from quickly, much like with the first time he cried with Patamon in Adventure episode 12. But there’s nothing to indicate that his problem with emotional management isn’t going to continue being a problem from here on out if left unchecked.

That problem ends up taking another three more years to get addressed.

Takeru in 02

Takeru is one of the first people we meet in 02 (for reasons that end up revealed in the final episode), and right off the bat we learn that he’s a bit...evasive. He leaves a cryptic line to Daisuke about his goggles without coming even close to what we all know is the full extent of what’s on his mind (that the goggles specifically remind him of someone important to him), and later just...deflects Daisuke throwing accusations at him with a mild dismissal. In fact, even though Takeru pretty clearly understands very quickly what’s going on with Daisuke and how touchy he gets with the Hikari issue, he keeps dodging the question and constantly saying things that are evasive about it and therefore never truly helps his case until episode 17, when the circumstances between why Hikari and Takeru knew each other are finally properly clarified to Daisuke and he stops getting on their case about it on his own.

There were multiple points in time before this -- especially in episode 7, when Daisuke is practically at his worst in regards to approaching Takeru -- when Takeru could have easily said something to at least attempt to get Daisuke to stop bothering him, but Takeru never even asks him to cut it out! He simply continues to handle everything with a “yeah, okay, sure! :)” attitude, which of course confuses Daisuke (who’s rather allergic to people not being straightforward) rather thoroughly, and you wonder if he’s practically enjoying seeing Daisuke’s antics to the point he’s just enabling it further.

As a point of aside trivia, the official 02 website adds the fun detail that apparently he's popular with the girls at school but doesn't show much interest in them himself, and the Animedia audio commentary CD for Armor Evolution to the Unknown had his voice actor even express the opinion that he saw Takeru as someone who wasn’t really the type to think about romance at this age (adding in a separate interview for the 02 DVDs that he felt Takeru was respectful of girls primarily due to having been taught by his single mother to be such). The latter part of course isn’t something that comes from the writing, but given the website trivia I’m inclined to personally agree with it -- and, more importantly, the implication is that Takeru is at least aware of these kinds of things, but actively chooses to not think about it and deal with it when the time comes.

So in other words: That part about how Takeru actively suppresses things that are negative or inconvenient to think about, all for the sake of keeping a smile plastered on his face? Yup, still there.

In fact, a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment from 02 episode 17 implies heavily that, even with their parents having developed a more cordial relationship after the events of Adventure, Takeru is now emotionally dealing with the aftermath of his parents’ divorce worse than Yamato is, since Yamato is at least able to speak about it casually and even joke about it openly, whereas Takeru keeps his mouth shut and the framing of the shot heavily implies he’s still extremely sensitive and unable to vocalize his feelings on it. Takeru never brings this up as something eating away at him for the entire series -- but BelialVamdemon uses it against him in episode 49, revealing that, yes, this is a problem that’s still tearing away at him, and yet he’s refusing to be open to anyone about it, even to Yamato himself. (Especially since, again, Yamato seems to be doing a great job trying to move forward; why kill his mood and thus be a “burden” to him?)

Even so, Takeru is very different in 02 partially because his circumstances are completely different. Adventure had him as the youngest in a group of older kids, so in terms of “being a responsible child”, that naturally meant being deferential and polite to everyone due to standards of propriety. 02 is where we learn a lot more about how Takeru interacts with peers his own age and people who are outright younger than him, when he has a bit more leeway to be more assertive.

On top of that, back in Adventure, Takeru was a young child who had a very small “range of periphery” -- as a young child still rather naive about the world, his emotional investment in things primarily pertained to loved ones and the people around him. But now that he’s a bit older, he’s gained a certain degree of strong feelings about “what’s the right thing to do”, and now has very strong opinions on it.

These things ultimately manifest in, unfortunately, Takeru losing his composure much more often than he did in Adventure, and for reasons that pertain to much wider things than just his brother. Still not having recovered from the trauma of losing Patamon back in Adventure episode 13, Takeru starts physically fighting Daisuke in 02 episode 11 because he perceives Daisuke as not doing enough to prevent Patamon from potentially becoming a slave to the Kaiser, and in 02 episode 13 he lashes out at Hikari in frustration about her refusal to do anything about her situation (which he of course ends up deeply regretting later in the episode).

Takeru’s infamous scene of suddenly switching modes on the Kaiser and punching him out in 02 episode 19 is basically the pinnacle of this -- because, yes, the Kaiser really did deserve it, but this really is not a good thing for Takeru either. This is Takeru getting the closest we ever see him to being a genuine sadist, and it’s basically everything to do with his emotional stuntedness coming out at once -- blowing up in anger out of nowhere with a passive-aggressive demeanor, succumbing to the weight of his trauma in the worst way possible, and mixing the ^^ front he puts on with his tendency to blow up angrily at anything that cuts him a little too emotionally close.

And for the first time, we see someone actually acknowledge how bad this is. Iori, one of the most consciously perceptive of the group, witnesses, for himself, the sheer jarringness of Takeru seeming to only really have two modes between “all smiles” and “unreasonably angry”. Sure, Takeru had shown a penchant for getting active as soon as there was something he needed to protect, but the moment it got personal, Takeru suddenly blew up in front of his eyes and almost turned into a completely different person. (Perhaps he’s not that different from Yamato after all...)

This is a very important moment because it sets up the base for what ultimately becomes the Jogress arc between Iori and Takeru. Daisuke ended up reaching out to Ken because Ken was someone who needed someone to accept him and teach him to move forward instead of drowning in the past; Miyako ended up reaching out to Hikari because Hikari knew herself to have a suppression problem but had difficulty doing anything about it, so the extremely in-your-face and aggressive Miyako could go in deep. But with Takeru, since his personality is genuinely volatile, and because Takeru goes out of his way to hide the fact he’s having emotional problems, personalities like Daisuke and Miyako wouldn’t help much because they’re too straightforward for someone like this who’s a bit unpredictable -- whereas Iori, who’s assertive but also methodical and thinks through everything consciously, is eventually much better able to reach out to him.

Once the relevant arc kicks in, in 02 episode 34, Iori continues to observe Takeru, and quietly notes the many “contradictions” in Takeru’s behavior -- since, after all, Takeru starts to sometimes violate what you’d think would be common sense whenever he gets too emotionally compromised. The fact that ostensibly one of the outwardly “nicest” kids in this group suddenly blows up in certain circumstances and basically goes “absolutely nope, needs to be killed!” in the midst of a few moral debates over killing sentient Digimon disturbs him deeply, and really, it’s not even about the killing part (after all, it’s later established in 02 episode 43 and after that Takeru and Hikari have a certain degree of acceptance of the inevitability that the others don’t) as much as Takeru’s being pretty gung-ho about it. Not “I don’t like it, but we have to” like he said earlier, but NOPE, GOTTA DO IT.

Iori refers directly to the duality of Takeru that he doesn’t quite understand multiple times in this episode (including in regards to the incident back in 02 episode 19), and it continues to torment him until the end, when Takeru only gives a very cryptic “clarification” that he doesn’t necessarily hate the darkness per se.

Iori, too intimidated to ask Takeru about it directly, goes to ask Yamato in 02 episode 35, and Yamato finally clarifies the background that we as the audience knew but Iori didn't: the story behind Takeru's trauma regarding the loss of Angemon back in Adventure episode 13. Yamato also makes a conjecture about why Takeru has been acting so ambivalent towards Ken -- you'd think he'd still be under Takeru's scorn after the events of 02 episode 19, but in fact Takeru's judgment of him in episode 25 was simply that he was certain something had changed, yet he couldn't tell what he was thinking (really rich coming from someone who refuses to tell anyone else what he's thinking himself!). Yamato guesses that Takeru is inclined to be a bit more forgiving of Ken due to understanding the feeling of losing a partner -- and the ultimate conclusion here is, basically, that Takeru's behavior is contradictory because he's acting based on what's personal to him, not necessarily via principles that make sense. After all, back in Adventure, it was clearly demonstrated that Takeru isn’t exactly rational when things hit too close to home.

The other important thing that happens this episode is that Takeru learns that Iori is actively trying to reach out to him, when Yamato drops him a line informing him that Iori asked. Despite complaining that Iori could have just asked him directly, after Takeru witnesses the face-off between Iori and BlackWarGreymon and a demonstration that Iori is clearly trying his best to make sense out of this entire mess, Takeru actively reaches out to Iori and says something to comfort him -- “a life is beautiful simply by existing.” It’s still cryptic as hell, but it’s not something he would have said in the midst of his anger in prior episodes.

It would be one thing if it were simply that by itself, but the following episodes further push the idea that Takeru really is starting to change after witnessing all of this. 02 episode 36 has him explicitly acknowledge what Iori’s been doing this whole time in trying to understand him for the sake of their Jogress, and, finally, during their meal later that episode, he says, very openly and honestly, that he thinks they’ll be able to do it now. After two instances of Jogress, these kids are very aware of what that entails -- so this is basically Takeru consciously acknowledging to Iori “yes, I understand that you’re trying to reach out to me, and I accept it and want to understand you.” Because Takeru is such a convoluted sort of person, this “understanding” ended up being something that didn’t span a single magical moment as much as it took several episodes and a diplomatic, conscious affirmation on both ends -- but it’s a fitting way to go for someone who had always indicated some pretty poor conscious awareness of where his feelings were taking him.

This is especially because, in 02 episode 37, his statements to comfort Ken are in pretty significant opposition to the sort of anger he’d displayed in earlier episodes, and are now a more pragmatic view of the issue in light of Iori’s efforts and everything he’d just witnessed with BlackWarGreymon -- and to drive the point home, the episode has, at the very end of it, Takeru making his first true explicit show of goodwill towards Ken after having been a bit touchy with him for so many episodes.

Iori himself, being the youngest of the 02 group, still has a lot to learn, and so Takeru, who had previously been one of the youngest in the Adventure group himself, now has his role inverted to effectively be a guiding mentor to Iori as he finds his own way. Basically, Takeru becomes responsible for the welfare of this young child, and so his way of treating Iori is markedly different from the more detached and playful way he would treat others from here on out. This is especially because, earlier, Yamato had informed him that Iori had taken a very roundabout way to help understand him better, and so Takeru probably understands that he scared the hell out of Iori earlier and needs to do better. While the Takeru of 02 episodes 38-50 still has a way of being playful, and while he still isn’t completely straightforward about his intentions, he is definitely much better about being open with the others, especially Iori, instead of doubling down on his “everything-is-fine” mode.

And perhaps this is what the other meaning of “hope” thus became in this situation -- learning to be forward-facing even in the midst of truly knowing and understanding everything that’s wrong with the situation.

Post-02

Although Takeru’s Spring 2003 track is addressed to no one in particular, meaning that it’s the most likely reason he’s so willing to be open about it, Takeru outright admits he’s having problems with his emotions -- especially those pertaining to Angemon’s death. We do, however, learn that Takeru’s started writing the early, early drafts of what’ll eventually end up becoming the novels he writes as a future career.

This being only a year after the events of 02, Takeru’s position is interesting. His decision to start writing is that he wants to have a record of everything before it’s forgotten -- because these things are very personal to him -- but he’s not emotionally ready for the huge task of finalizing everything in words, to the point he still hasn’t told his mother he’s started writing yet. After all, this is a book we eventually find out takes upwards of twenty years, and so this is the presumable reason why -- being able to get this down in a rational way that’s not emotionally compromising is going to be an upwards battle for him.

Even come Kizuna, there’s still a long way for him to go, because an actual line (in a very fast-paced movie) is dedicated to establishing that he’s still uncomfortable with his novel progress to the point he won’t even let Yamato see it. His official character profile and background details are revealing, too -- although he’s currently taking language classes in university and is even part of a children’s literature club, he still hasn’t actually decided on what to do with his future, meaning that he hasn’t determined that he’s going to be a full-time novelist with these yet. That means that even though he’s clearly still clacking away at his novel (multiple indications in the movie are given as such), his memoirs are still at the level of being so deeply personal, and not something he feels comfortable telling well, just yet.

I’ve pointed out before that despite not appearing directly with them in the movie, Takeru and Hikari have more in common with the others in the 02 group than they do with their Adventure seniors, and this is fully codified in the drama CD when Takeru is content to basically just “do whatever” with the rest of his friends instead of having any particular concerns about his future. And as someone who has a tendency to kind of just let his emotions take him wherever they’re going, this isn’t too surprising. Although he approximates as the closest to level-headed during most of the group’s antics during the CD, he’s still completely guilty of enabling them full-force, after all...

So, with the 02 epilogue, we get the massive meta reveal that the entire series was Takeru’s novels the whole time. This was planned to be the ending for Adventure before recording for the first episode had even started, but was postponed to the end of 02 when the second series was greenlit -- and if you’d followed the Japanese version, there are a ton of meta hints scattered around from day one:

The narrator of the series is Hirata Hiroaki, who played Takeru and Yamato’s father, and is revealed in this episode to voice him as an adult as well;

Episode 12 of Adventure is named “Adventure! Patamon and Me” and is the only episode title in Adventure or 02 to use a first-person pronoun -- and it’s of course a Takeru-centric episode, with the episode title using Takeru’s boku;

02′s first episode kicks off narrated by young Takeru opening the story, with Takeru himself suspiciously omitted from the opening vignettes;

02 episode 18 suddenly has the narration cut in when discussing Takeru’s trauma from Adventure episode 13, with the younger Takeru even filling in part of it himself;

02 episode 49′s “next episode” preview for 50 suddenly also starts using “we”, which also includes Takeru’s boku;

Finally, Takeru starts narrating right after Oikawa’s death, which fades into what’s revealed to be his adult voice.

In the context of Adventure, Takeru was “the youngest child”, so the idea makes sense that “the littlest one” would be the one to grow up and reflect on all of the adventures they had as kids -- and once 02 was added, it practically made sense that Takeru would be the one to recap both adventures, being the one person who was there to completely witness both (it also explains why Takeru and Hikari’s character arcs remain somewhat unresolved by the end of Adventure compared to others, since by this time it was apparent their story would be continued in the second series). So on a meta level, Takeru is, in a certain way, one of the most important characters in both groups.

On a level relevant to his personal character arc, on the other hand, the point here is that Takeru finally managed to put together his book and story in a way that he was comfortable telling the entire world about, to the point of choosing to make his entire career into it. That’s something that requires a lot of coming to terms with what happened, how he feels about it, how others feel about it, and everything about the whole ordeal in general, without compromise or (too much) bias.

And in the end, that’s really a lot!

[starleska]

when Logic twists: an analysis of Logan, cognitive distortions, and a future Side

spoilers ahead! this is a little deep-dive into some foreshadowing in the latest Sanders Sides episode, and what i believe the team are going for in terms of Logan’s arc. just some thoughts i had after the episode - i hope you enjoy, and would love to hear your thoughts too :) tw for discussion around mental illness, trauma, abuse, intrusive thoughts, therapy, etc. 

so, we all know that Thomas does a marvellous job portraying difficulties with mental health. he uses interactions between his Sides to carve out fun stories that dramatise the the internal struggles which come with facing complex situations, including those which arise from your specific history and mental illnesses. the writing behind Sanders Sides often uses consideration of real symptoms and therapeutic techniques in order to impart useful advice to the audience who may be struggling with similar issues. with all of this in mind, i thoroughly believe that a good chunk of you are correct about this new Side (foreshadowed in Logan’s eyes) being Wrath, or some variant of Stress or Anger, and here’s why: 

Logan is the side of Thomas which is constantly needing to pick up the slack. not only does he spend a good deal of his time de-escalating conflict between the other Sides, he is constantly letting his own dreams (and consequently, needs) fall by the wayside to comfort, validate and assist Thomas' overall desires. we even literally see him benched during the court case with Janus - his input is considered unimportant unless he is deemed as the voice of reason. with this understanding, Logan is viewed by the other Sides as a Side who doesn’t need help. He’s Logic, so they believe he always knows what is appropriate, and how to control himself - or even that he doesn’t need to control himself at all.  yet i don’t believe this to be the case, and i think ‘Working THROUGH Intrusive Thoughts’ foreshadows this in an intriguing way: by utilising the dynamic between Logan and Remus. for context, i am speaking as an individual who suffers from Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD), a form of PTSD. whilst the Thomas we know in the Sanders Sides universe is of course somewhat sanitised and simplified for the easier imparting of moral lessons, we know that this Thomas suffers from issues with intrusive thoughts, low self-esteem, and high anxiety. whether or not these can all be attributed to an underlying condition is irrelevant, but what is intriguing is whether these symptoms are being exacerbated by traumatic, triggering or otherwise stressful events affecting Thomas’ life - which, based on the direction ‘Working THROUGH Intrusive Thoughts’ went (using the relationship with Nico as a conduit), i think is true. when you experience a number of traumatic events or an acute amount of stress, your Logic can become faulty. let’s think about Logan not as a super-genius who just knows what is the correct thing to do all of the time: his knowledge comes from a bank of information and experiences, which he constantly uses to provide a ‘rational’ stance next to the more ‘emotional’ traits of each Side. yet Logic relies on evidence in order to build up this ‘rationality’. let’s think about a scenario wherein you are told every day by someone that you are ugly. now, if this occurred later in life, your Logic might have already rationalised that this is not the case - that you are beautiful just as you are, that this person is seeking to hurt you, that they are projecting, etc. your Logic would make those reasonable counterpoints based on past experience. however, if you were told by multiple people throughout your life, every day, that you are ugly - say, from caregivers, or close friends - you would internalise ‘i am ugly’ as part of that internal Logic. in the first scenario, you would be able to accurately evaluate the thought, ‘i am ugly’ as a cognitive distortion. however, in the latter scenario, you may be unable to, because you have this bank of ‘evidence’ that other people perceive this as reality. even if those people are abusers, or have an ulterior motive, the notion will be internalised and become your reality - so your Logic will say, ‘i am ugly, based on all of the evidence.’  i find this interesting because in this latest episode, they specifically had Logan call attention to cognitive distortions. we must remember that Logan is a part of Thomas. this is Thomas attempting to rationalise with himself, to implement mindfulness and CBT techniques which he knows to be successful, because they have worked in the past and he has it on scientific authority that they help with intrusive thoughts. but this leads us to a question: what happens when you experience so many traumatic events, or so much stress, that your Logic turns against you and begins to validate your intrusive thoughts?  imagine for a moment Logan’s awesome rational power - but levied in support of all of Thomas’ deepest fears. in my own experience with CPTSD, a horribly thorny mental trap is the one you fall into when you start down the path of ‘i must be a horrible person, just like they said. i must have deserved everything done to me. look at all of the evidence.’ these thoughts often appear rational due to the intense nature of the sufferer’s pain, particularly if that pain is repeated or prolonged. i believe that Logan’s outburst, paired with Thomas’ fretting over not receiving a call back from Nico, are supposed to represent the building stages of this mental trap. such thoughts are difficult to emerge from, but they become even more difficult to deal with when met with a powerful emotion: Rage. if you have cause to think thoughts of the ‘i am a disgusting human being’ variety thanks to trauma, stress or similar negative events, often there is a good deal of pent-up Rage stored alongside. justifiable Rage, one might say - it certainly feels so in the mind of someone who has suffered so terribly. if one is prone to hating themselves, feeling inadequate or other fertile breeding ground for intrusive thoughts, they may also sometimes snap into the opposite extreme - becoming infuriated by everything that has happened to them, and that they are still needing to deal with yet more pain in the present. this is something i have suffered from personally: when mixed with trauma, it is equal parts emotional dysregulation, and being triggered by something. you might be enRaged by the idea that you were ever ‘passive’ as a victim of something terrible, and want to ‘fight back’. in other words, the emotional state of your Rage will feel justified - and this can cause you to engage in some deeply destructive behaviours. this is why i believe this new Dark Side will be Rage (or an equivalent). Logan’s ‘STOP IGNORING ME!’ speaks of a breaking point brought on by years of fixing other people’s problems, only to receive very little in return. there’s a misconception that people who are ‘good’ at handling stress or fixing other people’s problems (i.e., not showing much of the strain) are simply less stressed as a whole, and therefore should be saddled with yet more stress. Logan’s screaming at Remus, and Remus’ delight at Logan’s response, shows us that Logan is exhausted from all of the hard work that he’s had to do in order to fight Thomas’ intrusive thoughts and cognitive distortions, alongside the massive amount of stress in his life. likewise, by giving into his impulsivity and opening up more opportunities for further stress, Thomas has allowed Logan - and his Logic - to become vulnerable to Remus and intrusive thoughts. Logan may have successfully been able to dispel the intrusive thoughts which had no basis in reality (for instance, a murderer hiding in Thomas’ closet) - but what happens if Thomas is given validation for an intrusive thought? in other words - what if Logan feels he has reason to listen to Remus? i believe this Rage has been simmering within Thomas for a long time, and his debut is going to be explosive. there are lots of ways this debut could be written; some have theorised that Logic and Rage will be a kind of antithesis to the Creativitwins, wherein the two are fused as Thomas has internalised his Rage as having a Logical root. this would have Rage not as a separate side, but a kind of version or alternate mindset for Logan, a bit like how he was when in Virgil’s room. i would not be surprised at all for this episode to include both Remus and Janus - Remus, revelling in the intrusive thoughts which Logan/Rage is now allowing to fly free, and Janus, delighting in Logan/Rage’s validation of destructive behaviours, which may well include Deceit. i could also see Virgil being drawn in by this irresistible combination of Anxiety-fuelling thoughts - intrusive thoughts inspiring inadequacy, Deceit inspiring fear of being found out, and the terror of Logic being twisted to validate every fear Virgil has ever had for Thomas. you know when someone has hurt you really badly, and so in your head you come up with countless (awful, unrealistic, hurtful) ways to ‘get back at them’? that’s what i think the next Sanders Sides episode is going to be like.  of course, like Anxiety, Intrusive Thoughts and Deceit, Rage will have his uses too. i believe, if any of this theorising is correct, that the next Sanders Sides episode will follow a narrative discussing if Rage is justified when one is hurt to a massive extreme, and what Logic can one follow when it backs up every destructive impulse. are you being Logical if you are full of Rage? basically, i think Logan (influenced by a breaking point and giving over to Rage) is going to do everything in his power to be destructive, under the idea that it is the only Logical thing to do. i believe he will fall to the horrific power of cognitive distortions and mental illness, and that the other Sides will need to use their strengths to bring him back. anyway, that’s all my thoughts! my apologies for any inaccuracies, or if anything in here was upsetting. i’d love to hear what you think about this, and your own theories! :D take care 💏

[captain-jensen]

The Most Powerful Thing

Chris Evans x Reader

Request: Are you taking requests? If so, can you do a Chris (or Sebastian) x reader one where they're at an event and his ex (also an actress) comes up to Chris multiple times. Even when the reader isn't there but she sees from afar. And his ex is constantly flirting and bringing up the good times they had. And the reader feels insecure cuz how can she compete?

Warnings: Some angst, fluff, swearing.

Authors Note: It’s been a while since I’ve written so I’m rusty. No specified race or gender for the reader! I hope you all enjoy it. It hasn’t been proofread though so just a fair warning. 

       Stepping out of the car and into the flashing of the cameras for the first time ever was an extremely overwhelming experience to say the least. Tonight was yours and Chris’ first time going public with your relationship. It’s only been 6 months and you had no idea how people were going to react to one of Hollywoods’ most eligible bachelors dating a normal person, someone who isn’t a model, or an actress, or a singer. To be honest you were really scared. Scared of the judgement from his fans, and scared of the judgement from the public in general. Everyone was going to be looking for any possible imperfection that could exist. Chris on the other hand, couldn’t be more thrilled. Even though he understood your anxieties about tonight, he could not be more exstatic to show the world that you were his and that he was yours. Chris had become so used to the attention that was paid to him that he knew nothing anyone said could change how he feels, but he still made sure to pay extra close attention to how you were feeling and was very reassuring. Even though you were scared shitless you knew all you had to do was try really hard to not pay any mind to the negativity. One thing you absolutely could not get your mind off of however, was the fact that one of Chris’ gorgeous exs’ would be there. 

   Walking the carpet was easy enough. All the press seemed thrilled that they now had a juicy new piece to write about Chris Evans’ “mysterious new woman”. Getting inside the venue was something out of a dream. A great big ballroom lit up with beautiful coloured lights and decorations. You couldn’t stop yourself from gushing to Chris and taking pictures of everything, wanting to commit the evening to memory as best as you could. Chris watched in amusement as he realized for what seems like the first time ever how wonderful all of this stuff could be. Watching you experience it all made him develop a whole new type of appreciation for his life. Then, out of nowhere a voice came up from behind you and Chris. “Awe how sweet! Taking pictures to show to your mommy and daddy when you get home?” You heard a high pitched voice feign adoration. Just as you turn around you see a pair of small arms wrap themselves around your boyfriends slender waist. Chris very reluctantly gives a half-assed hug to the woman. “Chris it’s so good to see you again, it’s been a few months now hasn’t it?” 

“Well it’s actually been more like a year or so” Chris corrects her. “This is Y/N, Y/N this is an old friend” Chris moves to wrap an arm around your waist to introduce you. 

“Hi, it’s nice to meet you” You sheepishly greet. She gives you nothing more than a daunting once-over before turning her attention back to Chris. You decide to shake it off though. 

“Chris you look absolutely delicious tonight! Is that the tie I bought for you for that one birthday? As I recall, we had some good times with that tie” She coos with a smirk and reminiscent eyes as she reaches a perfectly manicured hand out to his chest.

“No actually, this is just the tie that came with the rental suit” Chris replies emotionless. 

“Oh, well it looks really familiar” She says, clearly trying to get the last word. 

“Well you’re mistaken i guess. Anyways, we should find our seat” Before she can get another word in, Chris turns you and ushers you infront him with his hands on your waist. “Don’t pay any attention to her. She just really likes stirring the pot and getting attention”

Trying to seem chill and secure you simply respond with a sarcastic “Oh really? I thought she seemed really nice” which earns a chuckle from Chris. After finding your seats and settling in Chris offers to grab drinks for you both from the bar. Noticing that he’s been gone for a bit you turn to scan the crowd for him. When your eyes finally find him your heart stops beating. From a distance you see his ex girlfriend basically draping herself over him, giggling and obviously trying to fuck him with her eyes. Unable to bear the sight and the embarrasment you make your way to the bathroom. Just as Chris sees you practically running to the bathroom he pries himself out of the grip of the clout vulture to make his way to you. He makes it just as you’re about to open the door. Grabbing your wrist Chris gets your attention with a small “Hey!” When you turn around he can see the tears brimming your eyes and the poorly hidden pout on your lips. “Can we go talk outside?” he asks, earnestly concerned about you. Following him through the crowd you spot her eyes trailing you a glint of smugness that you just wanted to slap right off of her face. 

   When you finally maneuver your way across the building you find yourselves in a peaceful garden scene. “Do you want to talk about this” Chris asks, attempting to make eye contact with you. 

“What is there to talk about? Last time I checked you’re allowed to talk to your exes”

“Not when they talk to you like that though. Not when they purposefully try to make you feel like shit” he says. 

“What’s done is done Chris. Can we just go inside and try to have a good night?” You pry, wanting so badly to not dwell on this and have a good time.

“Not until you know that she’s just trying to be a bitch. It was barely even a 2 month fling. I don’t want you thinking badly about yourself just because of some attention seeker” 

“Chris, I said what’s done is done. There’s nothing I can do to make it go away now anyway” 

“You’re right. There’s nothing YOU can do. But I can make sure that you know what you mean to me. And that just so happens to be everything” Chris puts a finger under your chin, glancing in your eyes to make sure you see the full meaning of his words. “I love you so much Y/N. You know that” 

“Yeah I do. But it makes no difference knowing that I’ll never look like she does, or do what she does. I’m just some random person you met at a party” You admit. 

“First of all, what’s wrong with how we met? I love our story! Secondly, do you really think you can’t compare to some talentless wannabe actress? Y/N you’re a fucking genius! I can’t believe you’re being so dumb right now!” Chris exclaims. You get slightly annoyed at that last comment but decide to let him finish before making your rebuttal. “You are genuinely, the most beautiful person I”ve ever met. I mean your hilarious, you’re driven, you’re smart as fuck, and you’re the most genuine person in existence. You’ve honestly got the longest list of amazing qualities I’ve ever seen. Her? All she’s got is her legs and plastic surgery. I love you so fucking much I can’t handle it sometimes”

 You stand there shocked at Chris heartfelt admissions. Unable to speak, Chris senses your hesitancy and moves his hands to the sides of your head, placing a tender and loving kiss on your lips. Still unable to comprehend what he said you just reply with a simple “I love you too Chris, with everything I am”. He gives you the most glowing smile ever and you walk inside with a new found sense of confidence and security. You’ve never experienced this kind of love before, but you were sure it was the most powerful thing in existence. For the rest of the night the 2 of you were attached at the hip. Hearing praises from Chris’ friends about how happy you were and how much of a beautiful couple you made. Now when you scanned the room and found her eyes, there was nothing but an annoyed look in her eyes and a triumphant look in yours. 

[kierancampire]

There's one thing that confuses me about modern society, and another that i am so sick of.

I never share this view as it sadly is a controversial view nowadays and one that people will react strongly to/mock me for, but that for me will only prove both my views. I hate how society is with the police. So we have said that we should not judge the actions of an individual as the actions of the many, that everyone deserves respect and equal rights, that harming people is bad, violence is bad, that people aren't their careers, it is wrong to kill, it it wrong to get joy out of people killing others, it is wrong to celebrate peoples deaths (unless they were incredibly bad people), and that we just need to care for one another as people. Yet the moment the police are mentioned, all cops are bad, all cops deserve to die, people laugh when they get killed, people encourage violence towards them, it doesn't matter who they are or what they've done, they are a bad person and deserve no remorse. Literally everything society says and i feel what we are all fighting for, suddenly it's the complete opposite when it comes to the police, but that's okay and correct? I don't get it? I find it upsetting, hypocritical, and backwards. And this isn't to say police aren't bad, power hungry, have complexes, and haven't done bad things. But there are minorities who are like that, so why does on matter and the other doesn't?

I also am just SOOOOO fucking sick of extreme reactions and violence. Wanna know what happens literally any time i share anything online lately? I have literally at least one, but usually multiple people, who are complete dicks for no reason. This includes sharing my art, photos of otters, my night terrors, dealing with QAnon people, photos of Roxy, asking people if they are a morning or night person, sharing that i took a walk, sharing that i was groomed, venting about being unable to sleep, sharing photos of my plants, sharing that i was stalked, sharing a photo of my eye, and asking people what made them happy last year. I could go on, but these are all things recently that i have shared online, and i have had at least one, but usually multiple people insult me over, get nasty, mock me, and just react so strongly and negatively for absolutely no reason? And people say "Welcome to the internet!" but it is because i have spent so much time on here that i am sick of it. And i swear it has gotten worse!

But even other things, like corporations at Pride. Do you know what? Personally i would rather corporations shell out for my money and potentially pretend to be an ally, pissing off their homophobic customers and slowly normalising the LGBT+ community, than be hated and assaulted for being gay. Which i have been. Multiple times. Yet people react as if corporations celebrating Pride is as bad as that assault! And that's the thing, this isn't political as any and all sides do it! I am just so incredibly sick of people just always being so hateful and negative and constantly having such violent and strong reactions to things just cause! Like, this random asshole this morning literally admitted he was randomly a dick to me just cause he felt like it, that was it. Why!?! And i deal with this daily! Often multiple times daily! But it is in real life too, people are becoming the same in person! A few times now i have literally put my phone on silent and only checked it when i wanted to, as i am at my limit of this unrelenting stream of bullshit that hits me daily.

I dunno what the fuck society needs, but god i hope we reach a point where we stop all this nasty bullshit, people are forgetting how to be people, people are forgetting respect, decency and care. People just act like entitled children having a temper tantrum. This is why i love a silent woods.

[mbti-notes]

Anon wrote: INFP with social anxiety here. I have a therapist but we're focusing on some other issues right now. In the meantime, I was wondering if you had some advice for me. I know you're not a professional (you say that multiple times in your posts) and of course I'm not asking you for a fix for my social anxiety with this - I'm just asking your help to understand what part my cognition could be playing in all of this cause I'm really curious.

Basically, my problem is the time frame right BEFORE I meet someone and, sometimes, immediately after. I don't really have problems socializing in the "middle", if you get what I mean; I'm easily adaptable and once I'm relaxed, once I realize no one is there to attack me, my mind starts getting ideas and I kind of know what to say, even though I'm a bit out of practice and I still have problems convincing other people of my emotions (like, mirroring their emotions so that they know I agree with them and stuff like that; for some reason they never ---believe me when I say it with words).

When I make plans, anyway, and I still haven't met the person, I get this anxiety: like I would rather stay home than go there because it's going to be "boring" and I'm probably going to feel like an idiot or make some sort of social gaffe. I mean, I do kinda get bored after a while anyway, but I also know I tend to overestimate that level of "future boredom" to the point it hurts me to even think about showing up and forcing myself to think of stuff I can-- say.

I get anxious because I start thinking about the way people used to treat me in the past (I've always been the black sheep of my family and/or my social circles and I vividly remember some bad things they used to say to me) and I start worrying that, deep down, they still think of me like that and they're never going to forget that "preconception of my identity" and open their eyes to who I am now, or I guess to who I've always been.

I do realize it doesn't make much sense, this "who I ----really am" part - but I've always had the impression that I was a bit different than the "me" they percieved, maybe because after many, many years of being accused of "selfishness" and "inability to tune in with the emotional atmosphere" I learned that in order not to ruin the "social mood" I should've adapted myself to the group - but the problems is that I suppressed "myself" in the meantime (and with myself I mean, like, my real interests, the things I'd like to talk about for ages without-- having to be interrupted or looked down on because, quote unquote, "ok, cool, but we don't really care").

I understand now that if they don't give me hints of actually caring about the subject I should stop rambling like a fool, but this is making me feel like I have nothing "useful" to offer them and therefore bringing the anxiety I'm struggling with. It makes me scared that I'll never be able to be myself around them because of the "social rules" I want to respect to be accepted, & to make----it worse I'm out of practice like I said before and sometimes it just gets too awkward and I want to get out of there.

I bet I'm doing something wrong because friendships and relationships in general are not supposed to be "boring", am I right? And yet until I don't get distracted by the actual conversation, I feel like it's going to be really boring and uncomfortable and sometimes going through it is SO horrible... most of the time I end up making up some excuse to go home earlier and talk----my internet friends instead (thank God for the internet!!!!). Anyway, thank you if you'll answer! And have a good summer vacation c:

-----------------------

The first thing I notice is that your thought process bears a very striking resemblance to many INFJs who struggle with social anxiety due to poor Fe development (see past posts). As a general rule, if I have good reason to suspect that someone might be mistyped, I won't provide info about function development until they undergo a proper type assessment. Otherwise, they might adopt the wrong method of improvement.

You say you want to understand what part your cognition plays in the social anxiety you experience, so I will mention the aspects of your cognition that seem most significant:

1) No Chill: You overthink things to an extreme, to the point of self-sabotage, perhaps even creating a self-fulfilling prophecy (i.e. when expecting the negative actually makes the negative happen). Overthinking means that you're not confronting the real obstacle getting in the way of your socializing. You're constantly trying to envision, imagine, or predict what will happen in a social interaction? WHY? What's the point of that overthinking? It's how you avoid confronting your fear head on.

2) Insecure: Your "predictions" are too often faulty because of being tainted by your underlying insecurities. You're insecure about being attacked, being accused, being misjudged, doing something wrong, being deemed of no value or unworthy of care, not being accepted or acceptable, dying of awkwardness, feeling bored, feeling uncomfortable, and on and on. You've described your thought process in detail. But nowhere do I see you confronting your insecurities, digging deeper into them, in order to understand the root of them. Insecurities are a manifestation of fear.

3) Control: Irrational anxiety is oftentimes about trying to control things that you shouldn't be trying to control or cannot have any control over - it wastes mental energy and leads to futile behavior. As long as you're trying to control social situations and their outcome, you are either trying too hard to make reality match up with your expectations or you're fumbling whenever reality unfolds outside of your expectations - you become rigid and frail. You claim to be "adaptable" but everything you say after that only proves you don't know the meaning of the word. You can't handle unpredictability, hence, the attempt to be in control by trying to "predict" everything. Do your attempts to control actually work? Do they help or hinder you? If they mostly hinder you, then isn't it time to change your strategy? Anxious people often believe that having more knowledge or control is the answer to their fear. But, in your case, the huge cost of being controlling is being incompetent. What's worse, the fear is still right there running the show.

4) Unresolved Trauma: You attribute your troubles to your past. Fair enough. Growing up in a social environment that did not respect and appreciate you is painful, even extremely traumatic for certain personality types. It also makes people too hungry for validation. It's natural that you wouldn't want to feel the pain of it again. However, if that pain remains unexamined and unresolved, you will unconsciously keep seeking to resolve it, which means re-enacting the trauma over and over again throughout life. The proof? Every time you meet someone, your first stance is defensive, because the first thing that comes into your mind is that you don't want to be attacked or invalidated. That old pain is running the whole show because you are deeply afraid of experiencing it again, yet you don't realize that YOU are the one calling it back up and rehashing it. What are you doing to resolve the pain rather than indulge the fear?

5) Self-absorbed: Social anxiety makes people too absorbed in their own thoughts, feelings, hopes, and expectations. They are too preoccupied with what they want, what will happen, how they will be perceived, how they might make a mistake, how they might be attacked, etc. This means they're not truly present with people, so the relationship can't really go far. Driven by fear and insecurity, they are always behind a wall, too difficult to reach.

Even if you happen to meet the right people, do you make it easy for them to befriend you? It seems that you can't open up with ease, you can't go with the flow of the other person when they don't live up to your expectations, you can't keep your emotions in check and misjudge situations, you get bored when it's not about you, you run away instead of making things better. Looking at yourself objectively from the outside, would you want to be friends with someone like that?

If you want to have good friends, you first have to BE a good friend. You want care, love, and validation? We all do. The best way to receive it is to be the first to give it. By being more aware of other people's needs and doing more to show that you care about them, you put them in a better position to care about you and meet your needs in return. This is the difference between actively trying to "make" a friend vs passively wishing for a friend to drop into your lap.

Being a friend isn't about what "value" you have, as though you're some kind of object being appraised and sold. Being a good friend is quite a simple matter of putting out the energy to care and show that you care. When you meet someone who's moved by your care, they will care for you in return. When you meet someone who's unmoved by your care, figure out the real reason why, in order to determine whether you should keep trying or put your energy elsewhere.

You never really know who you'll hit it off with. One of my favorite experiences in life is making a friend in the unlikeliest of places. As an adult, meeting new people is a numbers game. All you can do is keep pushing yourself to meet new people. The more people you meet, the greater the odds of clicking with someone. If you're looking to meet like-minded people, go to places that are likely to have people who share your interests. If you don't hit it off with someone, simply move along. You don't have to be friends with everyone, do you?

Yet, you take every little social interaction so seriously that each step is like life or death - that's what makes socializing tiring, laborious, and unfun. Why not enter into every social interaction with an open mind and an open heart? Why not truly go with the flow, without having to undergo the repetitive ritual of predicting what will happen or fussing over what did happen?

6) Poor Emotional Intelligence: This point is the common thread that runs through the previous points, which is why I keep repeating the word "fear". You have extremely low tolerance for negative feelings and emotions, which means you really need to work on learning how to deal with your emotional life better. Any little sign that things won't turn out the way you want and you start to panic, overthink, blame, or flee. Why do you recoil from yourself and your own feelings and emotions? Why are you so easily shaken by boredom, awkwardness, invalidation, failing, other people's negativity, etc? Why do you react so badly to these things (when others just brush it off and keep going)?

7) Low Self-Awareness: It's not enough to just name the fear ("I'm afraid of____"). Does the label explain why you have this particular fear and not some other fear? It's not enough to blame the past ("It's because of ____"). Why did someone else with a similar past as yours not develop this fear? To get to the root of fear, you have to identify, in exact terms:

what aspect of you has to change to overcome the fear

what aspect of your identity has to "die" (i.e. be let go of) in order to evaporate the fear

Until you answer the fear properly, it won't go away.