#and he consistently chooses to believe others can without extending the same to himself

[tiredassmage]

on the OTHER end of the game, back on agent tyr run #2, i smoked through tatooine because i love the agent segment on tatooine, there is something INHERENTLY tragic in his relationship with mia.

one, i could accuse him of low-key catching feelings - yet another instance where he doesn’t really do anything about it. except he absolutely does. he does what he can within the confines of the situation. (there’s absolutely an almost unacknowledged mutual crush here that will never go anywhere bc... it isn’t where this story goes but. hrhrhghghg my emotions)

he asks mia what she would do, if he let her have a choice. she chooses to start over. i don’t know if there was ever really a part of him committed to cutting her off as a loose end once he started working with her. i know it’s in the mission outline, and then he just... never thinks of it again. literally. he just. decides somewhere (rather early) that she’s been genuinely helpful and decides not to hold operational hiccups against her because they’re beyond her control - to him. it’s probably wildly trusting of him given that he didn’t trust watcher x farther than he could throw him and the entire bit of the ghost cell is imitation and he says it himself to shara that it sounds like a setup from the get-go and then it just... hrk. i care her.

idk, i’m just in my feelings because he lets her go and you can’t convince me that he doesn’t do it by telling her ‘you’re going to pick any flight out of here that you want, we never met, and you’re going to start over, whatever you’d like.’ and just.

he never gives himself that choice. even this early in his career, that’s... that’s never a part of his plan. and just. ow, y’know?

no talk me. >.>

[kodzukyan]

the long way home (to you)

notes: happy belated birthday, rissa! cheers to our tokrev momster, the baby of group therapy, and the light of my life!! words can’t describe how much joy you bring to my life, and i’m thankful every day for you. thank you for putting up with all the dumb shit i say on the daily HAHA. i love you so much. 🥺💖 @seishue (also thank you to annette and ilayda for putting up with me as i overthink every thing HAHA 🥺) 

summary: the concept of home redefined through the years. - kokonui

wc: 1.6k

Home is an abstract concept, but it’s something Koko has always been able to define.

At eight, it was sitting in Seishu’s room and the sound of pencils scribbling on summer homework as the air conditioner hummed through the silence. At eight, it was the sound of his laughter as Seishu pouts about summer homework. At eight, it was Akane with her golden hair and sky-blue eyes as she brings in barley tea and snack cakes. At eight, it was the warmth that blooms in his chest as his heart thunders excitedly and recklessly at the sight of Akane’s pretty smiles and playful teasing.

At eight, it was the sound of fire crackling and tearing through the home he knew.

(All he sees is the painted reds and oranges of fire, burning, burning, burning through home as he knows it.

He runs into the fire anyway because he promised. He will save her, save love as he knows it. As if he’s running on autopilot, he just bulldozes through the building of burning wood and flaming memories because he purely has one end goal. He runs, runs, runs, and finally sees her, sees the promise he vowed to protect.

He doesn’t think because all he cares about is Akane, his promise, and he grabs her and runs. He sighs in relief as they make it. As he breathes in the fresh air, he sees light blue eyes staring right back at him, too light to be paired with the soft smile that flutters his heart, and he feels like he can’t breathe. He stares vacantly at Seishu, and as pain reflects back from his blue eyes, Koko hates himself for feeling upset that he saved his best friend instead of his sister.

His eyes drift from downcast eyes to the blazing building, and his heart stops. He’s breathing, but his body is frozen and his mind is dazed. The forbidding feeling in his chest swells into a looming shadow, and he feels crushed as it devours him whole.)

At eight, home burns. All he’s left with is Seishu’s hand clutching his as they stand in a white room. The love of his life laid still, and the steady beep of the heart monitor drowns out their cries.

-----

At fifteen, home was found through crimes and bonds built through money and blood. At fifteen, it was wistful thinking and forcing the image of Akane onto his best friend, hoping, praying that she will still smile at him all the same. But she doesn’t because all he recognizes is Seishu and his steady eyes as he looks forward. In contrast, Koko feels increasingly aware that he was the only one running in circles with no destination.

Seishu has constantly seen him, always looked at him as him. And despite conventional belief, while he still detects traces of Akane, he sees Seishu too. He cherishes him too, in a different way than how he loved Akane, in a way that reminds him that love is steady.

He loves Seishu in a way that he will always, always choose him. Like the consistent beat of his heart, love flows softly, tenderly, subtly. Unlike the blazing flutters of his heart he felt with Akane, it's more like the stars that twinkle night after night. With Seishu, he doesn’t have to be the Koko who exclusively knows how to break things and make money. With Seishu, he can completely just be Koko. A gentle lull, rest stop, a stronghold against the world where he doesn’t have to run, where he can finally sleep.

Seishu deserves better, though. He deserves someone who isn’t chasing after the image of a dead girl while being half in love with him. He deserves someone who isn’t running in circles, both mentally and emotionally. He deserves someone who loves him fully instead of his half-baked feelings that grow and surface with every moment, but he refuses to acknowledge.

(Because if he does, what will he have left? Who is he without money and his feelings for the one who commenced it all?

He’s a little more lost than found, so he just keeps on running, running, running in hopes to discover some answers, to finally reach somewhere he can just be.

(He doesn't know how to stop.)

Somehow, he thinks Seishu knows all along anyway with the way he still squeezes his hand and looks at him like he’s still worth it. He still enables him to lean in and tuck himself in between the crook of his neck and breathe in the scent of home.)

But home, Koko thinks, becomes a little more undefined when they part ways. Because he can no longer protect Seishu, who keeps on going and facing forwards while he’s still stuck on a repeated loop. Because he knows he’s gripping Seishu back from growing and becoming someone who can take on the world.

(Because he loves him.)

So, he lets go of home and wonders since when did it become so cold without Seishu’s hand holding his.

-----

At eighteen, he is completely lost. The sight of Akane’s smiling is long gone and the warmth of Seishu’s hand in his has gone cold. The looming shadow that has been following him is always ready to overtake him, but he fights on anyway because he has to see it through.

(See what through? He doesn’t know exactly.)

Ironically, it has incessantly been the bleakest moments when Seishu appears beside him. He’s still running loops on repeat, but he thinks an alternative path opens up when Seishu extends his hand out. He wants to take it, wants to altogether stop running because he’s so tired.

“Koko.” Seishu prompts as he holds his hand out, “I’ll give you half of my burdens, so give me half of yours too.”

He grasps Seishu’s hand, and Seishu pulls him up. Koko leans into the crook of Seishu’s neck like he did before, and as if all the years of exhaustion finally caught up to him, he cries. He cries for the loss of Akane, cries for the loss of what could have been, cries for the loss of home.

Seishu just stands still and supports him tightly in his arms as he breaks.

“I’m with you.”

He used to think he was the one who supported Seishu, but he thinks he’s been proven time and time again that it’s the opposite way around.

“We don’t talk about this,” Koko sniffles as he leans into Seishu’s hold.

“Okay,” Seishu promises and places a tender kiss on his temple.

Koko has never believed in God. God wasn’t there when he needed him; God still isn’t here when he needs him. But as their bodies press together, limbs tangled and eyes locked, he wonders if this is what heaven feels like.

("Koko," Seishu starts. A conversation that has been lingering in the back of his mind; a conversation that has to be said. He pauses, wandering eyes hesitant to confront black ones before he inhales sharply. "I’m not Akane."

Koko's teasing smile fades, intense eyes meeting crystalline blue ones that are slightly lighter than the girl he loved once. He used to imagine the boy in front of him as his sister, the one he swore he would protect, but he can’t even fathom the thought now. He can see her traces, but he thinks he never desires it to be her anymore. He just wants his best friend, his comfort, his home, him. "I know."

His callous hands reach for Seishu’s burn scar, caressing it gently before he trails down and brushes Seishu’s soft cheek. He cradles it for a moment before he presses his forehead against Seishu’s, softly, fondly. He’s earnest as his eyes staring straight into blue ones, a vulnerability in his gaze. A realization, a truth, something he’s long figured out but didn’t want to admit because he didn’t want to let go of all that he knew.

But he notes the man in front of him now, feels the warmth of his cheek and the softness in his glance, and Koko finally smiles and feels like it’s okay to stop.

“I only see you, Seishu. You, and only you.”)

At eighteen, he comes home after wandering the world, thinking maybe he can ultimately stop his journey to obtain something because he had someone all along.

-----

At twenty-one, home looks a lot like the one from his childhood. A modest one-bedroom apartment with an equally small living room and kitchen, but there’s still the sound of pencils scribbling as Seishu writes down the grocery list and the air conditioner still hums through the summer daze.

Life feels so calm that everything before this moment feels like a fever dream. He wakes up next to Seishu, drinks coffee — black for him, two sugars and heavy on the milk for Seishu — together before they part ways for work or whatever they have for the day. They take turns picking dinner or leave it to the roulette when they can’t decide, and sometimes they go out with their friends for drinks at night.

Within these four walls of the apartment, there are memories immortalized as pictures, and furniture far too expensive for a little place like this. Heels line up in the doorway, name-brand jackets fill the closet, a set of matching silverware picked out together.

A home meant for two, and love blankets every crevice in this small home and his heart.

Home, Koko thinks, perchance is a person all along as he stares at Seishu, who only smiles and holds out his hand as he catches his eyes. Koko reflectively smiles back and laces their fingers together.

“You ready?” Seishu asks, a grocery list in hand and his heart in the other.

“With you? Always,” he responds back with a grin, knowing he equally holds Seishu’s heart too.

Home, Koko thinks, is definitely Seishu all along. 

[papers4me]

Fruits Basket, Se03, ep10 (part 1)

“ What to do? & how to do it? the answer & the method are so simple, so simple but difficult as hell. it was hard for me to get them, & that’s exactly why I treasure them/ makes them valuable”. kyo~ This is my favorite quote in all anime.

How many times a domestic abuse victim was told just leave this abusive partner? report them? easy. just make a call. Report your abusive parents? tell someone. easy. Just speak up. It is true. It is easy but difficult as hell. To believe it is your right to fight. No, to believe you deserve to fight. to Live. This abuse is not a punishment you must endure. Hope is not dead. How simple yet so difficult to do that. ugh! my heart!

- Seeing Death vs Facing Death: ( The abuser who was stopped):

Abuse is a form of slow death. An actual intentional murder of an innocent soul. Abusers suck the life out of their victims & kyo’s biological dad is the poster monster for that. His appearance:

thin deathly demeanor, lack of nourishment, excessive drinking, lack of desire get out of the abyss, wide eyes, tiny pupils, manic laughter. shaky body movement. pathetic outlook at things.

heavy breathing, lack of logic & distorted facts, blurry speech, bizarre mentality, toxic behavior, tendency to hurt, injure, both physically & verbally.

inability to grasp reality, desire for inflecting pain on others, finding joy in that as it justifies his entire toxic mentality.

Fear of being hurt like he hurt others & being paranoid since he KNOWS he should receive punishment.

Kyo stood watching this man spit, rage, shake, scream. The man from his past, the authoritative figure in his early tender years, the person who must always be right: a parent. Facing his dad, Kyo’s entire gradual change was fantastic:

Kyo went from feeling utter fear from this man, hatred towards him, grief at the loss of a father & a mother, to force himself to stand his ground & not leave” easy but difficult as hell“ , to talk ” easy but difficult as hell“ , to announce that isnt gonna die ” easy but difficult as hell“ to say I’m loved & I want to to be with someone ” easy but difficult as hell”

to then realize the source of his mom’s misery isnt him after all, but this jerk! & not crumble at this realization ” easy but difficult as hell“ to grief over his mom’s tragic life & still announce again that he’s anit throwing his life away ” easy but difficult as hell“ to still look at his dad with pity rather than immense hate & anger ” easy but difficult as hell“ to remove his hand & leave him behind in the past while he moves forward ” easy but difficult as hell“ to say “ i’ll come visit again, cuz I anit afraid of you anymore, I’m not running, but I’ll try to extend a hand if you wanna do the same one day. It is your choice to be the abuser who must be stopped or the one who is atoned! you can choose, dad! We heard his choice as kyo was leaving, didn’t we? locking himself in an eternal cage that he made for himself. After all, he is the monster in his own story by his own choice.

-Seeing death (1): Kyo watching his mom’s suicide is a traumatic experience especially considering she chose such a graphic way to exist this world. Kyo once said to tohru “ mom went flying”, he now said“ mom threw her life away” very graphic ways to explain her death both literally & figuratively. This alone coupled with his father accusing him, resulted in a 4 year old screaming” I’mma yuki & kill myself, this would make you happy, dad”. This explains kyo’s 2 meetings with yuki as kids“ I hate you” at the sohma estate, the 2nd meeting “ I hate you” at the street. Mimicking the toxic behavior of the dad. Why didn’t kyo mimic kazuma? cuz trauma doesn't work like that. Kids can live safely for time then one traumatic experience shatter their self-worth into an endless cycle of self-hurt, low self worth & anger issues or withdrawal. The writing that set kyo/yuki against each other is perfect.

-Seeing death (2): Kyo watching kyoko’s death hammers all the insecurities of child kyo deep down into teenage kyo. Kyoko too, went flying, blood everywhere. too much pain happening again, crashing hope & killing his fighting spirit over & over. Be with tohru? why? to kill her, too?

-Seeing death (3): Kyo watching tohru’s injured body. Yup. You caused this. not by pushing her or failing to catch her. No. but by hurting her with harsh words. by forcing her away from you.

-Facing death (1): Kyo facing his dad, the symbol of deadly-abuse. To stand & announce to live is huge. -Facing death (2): refuse death: being caged till death, -Facing death (3): To say, I wanna be loved & love someone, life is not just being outside, heck! kyo was outside for 17 years! life is abt being with those who give it meaning! -Facing death (4): To not demand others to die as a punishment. Walking away from his dad without igniting the cycle of revenge & hate. ahhhhhhhhhh~~~  Chef’s kiss!

-Seeing eye to eye: ( I don’t need to be you, but I appreciate you):

Kyo & yuki toxic relationship has been ongoing since their birth. The moment kyo’s dad was dismayed that he got the cat of all zodiac & the moment yuki’s mom was delighted she got the rat of all zodiacs. From that moment it became: look how lucky the rat parents? You shamed me? Look how pitiful that cat? eww! stay away from his filth. The explosive nature of kyo’s tragic fate tainted him with the blood of his mom & the daggers of his father’s hateful words, while the nature of yuki’s sheltered & locked fate tainted him with fear & isolation. They meet & both carry out the feelings of rejection & hate all while envying the other. The toxic nature of their relationship consist of fights & condensing words. Tohru connected both. Through her, they became civil. Even talking abt perverted shigure. Now that she is hurt, they are lost without her. Their lives are empty.

Yuki’s “ kyo has his own pain & reasons”  (to not see tohru) is my fave line! even better than all the epic lines after they confess their feelings. cuz this like happened before they connect. it shows that, I see his pain, I get he has his reasons. But whatever issues he have shouldn’t hurt tohru. this is when yuki interferes in kyo’s choices. For tohru. This is also when kyo really allows him to. For tohru. Had tohru nor be part of the fight, kyo wouldn’t even engage in it & yuki wouldn’t initiate it.

-“I wanted to be you!” : Kyo said it first. I loved this so much! Cuz kyo said I hate you first! it is so fulfilling that the truth is now out. From kyo first. Cuz really... that hate was all toxic inheritance from a toxic father & a toxic system.

- “Why do you have to say it firs!” Yuki was mad, cuz he was struggling with it for the longest time. to be kyo. He even mused on how kyo interacted with ppl in school, got himself his own mini kyo. lol. studied how kyo filled tohru’s world just by existing. yuki can't do that for tohru. he looked for someone whom he could do that for! yuki/machi scene at her house paralleled kyo/tohru scene at her room when she was sick (se01, e023) & when they eating the somen together (se02, e02), yuki/machi chalk scene paralleled kyo/tohru scene at the beach where he coaxed tohru to tell her mom’s story (se02, e07). Yuki really was having a hard time finding his true self & accepting it without needing to learn from kyo. It is hard to say “ i admired you” after being rejected by you! so kyo saying it first helped yuki say his after. Also, both boys were hella shocked they admire each other. Like both were deeply shocked! stupid boys! XD

Side Notes:

Kyo’s confrontation with his dad is furuba’s most powerful scene & most well-written one! From the fear of facing him, to talking to him with low voice, to physically stopping him, to the exposed last piece of locked memory abt the mother, to the freedom gained by walking forward! Heck, even how it was weaved psychologically to perfectly mimic children’s self-defense mechanisms & children copying their parents theme. The realistic depiction of abusers both in their most powerfully menacing moment & in their weakest cowardly moment. Top-tier writing! Hands down my fave furuba scene! Can’t ask for better! Can’t even imagine better! genius- writing Takaya-san!

The boys had a necessary fight & confrontation & the yuki’s entire speech was valid & perfect speech. However, as usual, I’m not a fan of how violence is depicted in furuba. I was actually “warned/ ordered” by an anon to not “ sh*t” on the boys fight scene. I don’t know why someone who’d read my reviews would think i’d have anything but love for both boys. I criticize the writing not the characters. Also, furuba fans have always been good to me, I state my opinion frankly & they talk to me! “ talk!”. You don’t have to throw virtual fists over different perspectives on fiction. Talking kindly does magic, also having different opinions is natural & normal for humans.

I love yuki so much, he’s one of my top faves in furuba & I get why the boys would quarrel & throw fists. I get the history between them, the current state of mind, their emotions & mentality & I get it’s fiction & drama that needs its “ OMG” moment. However, I cringe when I see violence used as a bonding moment in fiction in general. That’s just me. I wish the fight was done in a more artistic style without showing that scene where yuki corned kyo & punched him in full view of the screen. (again not hating on yuki nor the fact that they needed to fight). I’m jus saying I didn't need to see a one-sided beat up from a character I love to another one I love. That’s just me again~ feel free to enjoy this moment to its fullest. It’s fiction & I’m not judging anyone at all, nor hating anyone from real life or fiction <3<3<3.

Yuki’s last piece of character development is in my part 2 review! Along with machi. Also, yuki’s Japanese VA was awesome!!

Also, let yuki have deep various facial expressions!!!! ugh! In the fight scene they did yuki so dirty with his hair covering his eyes all the time! then followed by low quality shots of him breathing! Why?! The voice acting sold the entire excellent emotional rage more than the animation! Yuki can look pretty even when mad, heck! screw looking pretty! just give him deep facial expressions to mach his feelings! boy was hella mad like he never was his entire life! always forced to wear a mask or be diplomatic! now he’s screaming his lungs out, you hide his face??? really?? Sigh~ the anime always do this wit yuki, replace facial expressions with hair on eyes or having his eyes without light. I wanna see them expressive eyebrows so bad!!!

Another powerful VA performance was both kyo’s dad VAs! both the Japanese (with his excessive breathing) & the English VA (with his range). They sold the mad abusive character! they gave me chills!

Also, I sound like a broken record, but kyo’s both VAs did phenomenon in the dad’s scene & tohru’s scene. Honestly, I only watch the dub to hear Jerry! I learned his name & would watch the dub for him!

Akito, Arisa, Kureno in part 2 of my review as well.

Shigure/yuki returning home scene is call back to ep1. Ok, everybody loves a call back scene & the full circle thingy. but C’mon! you dont have to copy everything! the walk, the scenery, its purpose, dialogue & all! The anime really took advantage of kyo being missing. XD

Tohru’s dress/top color matches the color of kyo’s old hat (The hat). symbolic of him finding her? As if he did find her when they were children? cool. I love this detail. But i do NOT love this color on tohru at all !! lol. it is so dull on her. The dress style/ design mimics her same dress in se01, ep26 as she was talking to kazuma & kyo fought him. Their first intimate moment after nearly loosing the other. Heck! tohru was even hurt on her hand as well. but the color was a nice pastel yellow. It suited tohru. The hat’s bluish-greenish color matches tohru’s own pajama at home!!!! & kureno’s hospital pajama! T_T... why couldn't the hat be red!!!! a color that both represent kyo & yuki! both were compared to red before~ oh well~~ minor issue~

[extremelyblackandwhite]

innocence - 05

PAIRING: bodyguard!bucky barnes x innocent actress!reader

WARNINGS: age gap, wounds

A/N: another day, another chapter. thank you guys so so much for the support, i am so glad you’re enjoying the story. much love xx

NEXT CHAPTER

Bucky’s free days weren’t something that would look good on a movie. He enjoyed being outside, away from everything. Headphones on, hat on, no one really looks at him, no one cares. Bucky learned that a long long time ago; people don’t care. He is thankful for that, he is thankful for the bleak reality where the Winter Soldier can walk the streets of New York without calling much attention to him. Sure, he has to cover his arm and hand but that’s the worse of it. Other than that, he’s free to roam the streets until twilight, headphones on, not a single thought on his mind. It’s almost as if he can escape his body. 

He kept walking down the street, eyes roaming the crowd. He didn’t know why he constantly looked through the crowd, maybe he was scared but that was something he didn’t want to delve in. He grabbed his phone off his back pocket once it rang, not expecting the sender’s name. Y/N. The text was vague, mostly asking him she needed his help and as such he changed ways on his walk, instead going to SoHo, to her flat.

Various reasons as to why she was asking for help ran through his mind. She could’ve been burgled, hurt, someone could be trying to hurt her and suddenly the walk turned into a run. Her flat wasn’t too far away from where he lived, you could reach it in a mere 20 minute slow walk yet 20 minutes seemed like an eternity. 

He reached his apartment as fast as thunder, opting for the stairs believing it would be faster if he climbed them up. The hallway was silent, he could hear his heart beat as he put his hand on the handle of her entry door, too his surprise it was open. What if she’s getting mugged? He got into position to bring down whatever threat awaited him under the door. Instead, he found the actress of her knees surrounded by various sizes of broken glass, trying to pick them all up with her bare hands while hiccuping. 

     - Y/N? - Y/N turned around, noticing Bucky standing in front of her door. Her clenched hands opened, glass rolling to the ground. - What happened?

     - I dropped the vase. - she sighed, forcing a smile which he could see through. He walked up to her, extending his hand to her. - It’s fine, Bucky.

     - Come on. - she settled her hand on top of his and he flexed his arm, helping her up. His eyes moved to her knees where some pieces of glass had lodged themselves, some merely glued by sweat and others bleeding streams down her leg, her hands too were stabbed with little pieces of glass from trying to gather it all up. Still, she moved her heel, trying to assemble the glass all in one spot. - Do you have any first aid kit?

     - There is one in the bathroom. - she pointed down the hall. She remembered Miss Olson telling her where it was in case there was any wounds, wounds which certainly weren’t acceptable considering she would have to be in short outfits the whole time during the shot. With that in mind, she looked down to see small streams of scarlet coloured blood rushing down her legs. Oh no. 

Bucky, on the other hand, was more interested in getting her proper first aid for the wounds on her knees and hands. As they reached the bathroom door, he opened it using his elbow. It was a rather small bathroom for such a big apartment, he thought to himself, could barely fit the two of them without them having to be glued together. In an effort to get some space, Bucky wrapped his hands around her waist, upboosting her in the air before sitting her in the marbled sink. Y/N could feel her whole being fire up as his hands made contact with her fabric covered skin, looking the other way hoping the cold air coming from the open door would sooth her. Once she looked back at him, he had his arms up, raising to grab the first aid red box standing just above her mirror. Her eyes darted to the muscle in his flesh arm, wondered at how his metal appendage seemed a perfect reflection of it. Maybe she shouldn’t have been so invested in the marvellous work that was his metal arm as when he returned with the box, their eyes locked in a manner that was definitely uncomfortable for both of them.  It was her who broke it, looking at the bathtub to her right but Bucky was still very much inspecting her; her decoultage on display from the low cut of the dress, collarbones poking through the skin as her chest went up and down. It crossed his mind that the Winter Soldier would easily kill her if he wanted. At that thought he seemed to snap of whatever daze he was in, opening the small and unwell equipped first aid box in his hands.

    - I’m gonna take the glass with some tweezers first. Is that okay? - Y/N nodded as he leaned down, putting himself on his knees so he could extract whatever bits of glass had embedded themselves with her skin. Luckily for her, she only had a few that would need to be removed as the others were merely stuck on due to the sweat covering her legs. His hand went behind her calf, slowly rising it up before starting to pull glass off her knee.

It didn’t hurt, the glass it is. There were plenty of things that were hurting at that precise moment but the glass wasn’t one of them. Nevertheless, she couldn’t help it but look down at him, brow furrowed as he concentrated his task and cold hand propping her leg up. She wanted to apologise, she wanted to apologise but she didn’t know what for. Maybe she would apologise for her phone sending the message later than she intended, maybe she would apologise for destroying his day. She didn’t know about what she should apologise but she needed to apologise. Lost in her mind, she didn’t notice he had already finished extracting shards from her knees until he rubbed a wet towel on her leg, getting rid of little stuck on shards and blood which was starting to dry. As if she would break at any harsh movement, Bucky slowly let her leg return to its natural position, slightly turning around to grab an antiseptic bottle and some colourful cotton balls Y/N keep on an acrylic display atop of her skin. With those in hand, he dripped some liquid onto the cotton before returning to tend to her knees, spreading the antiseptic and then wrapping both her knees in gauze.

    - Let me look at your hands. - he got back on his feet. Y/N extended her hands towards him, a weird feeling of shame coursing through her. Luckily for her, there wasn’t much damage to her hands; a cut here and there but that was the worst of it. Just like for her knees, he got rid of extra glass and cleaned the wound before wrapping her hands with the same type of gauze as her knees. -  You don’t have any deep cuts so you’re lucky you can take that off tomorrow.

    - Thank you, Bucky. - she wanted to look him in the eye, she really did, but his fingers on her palm had her unable to take her eyes off her own palm. - I’m sorry for ruining your day off. The message was supposed to have been sent earlier, it bounced off and I guessed it must’ve sent once I got some signal.

    - Why? Was there something wrong? - he helped her from the sink, leading her off the bathroom so they could hopefully have more space.

    - It’s really nothing, I just … It’s nothing. - she sighed, forced smile on her lips which Bucky could clearly read through. - I’m sorry.

    - You’ve apologised two times in the space of a minute. Trust me, you don’t need to apologise for people doing their job.

    - But it’s your day off.

    - I don’t have days off, Y/N.

It was true, he didn’t have days off. He knew what people, what Steve, what people in the Avengers considered a day off. It was a day when all worries were gone and they could do what they loved without the stress and weight of daily life. Bucky didn’t have days off. His demons followed him, shackled to his ankle, not allowing him to forget, to sleep. He merely had days in which he wasn’t bothered by work, not that it bothered him. In all honesty, he’d rather be working, at least he could avoid his mind, run from it. He doesn’t need his consciousness when he’s working. Y/N didn’t know how to reply to his answer, there was bitter sweetness attached to it, a bitter sweetness she was unsure he wanted to share and as such she decided to change the subject.

    - I should sweep the floor. - she scratched the back of her neck, readying herself to grab a vroom but Bucky stopped her. 

    - You should sit down before you get hurt. - he suggested, pulling one of the kitchen’s highchairs so she could sit. - I can clean that up for you. 

    - Are you trying to get hired as a housemaid, Bucky? - Y/N joked, little child-like smile gracing her lips as Bucky held the vroom in both hands. Even him couldn’t help but smile at her joke. 

    - If you keep throwing jars, I think you might just need one. – he pushed the glass onto the the dustpan, opening the bin and throwing it all inside. 

    - How do you know I threw it? 

    - The pattern of glass on the ground was consistent with it. - he shrugged. - Were you trying to defend yourself? 

     - Sort of. - she sighed, looking at the bandages on her hands. - I will spare you the story.

      - Might help if you don’t.

Y/N felt ridiculous. Here she was upset over an industry she had willingly entered when a man who had his life stolen away from him was sitting next to her. You’re ridiculous, she told herself. He didn’t have a choice, he didn’t get to choose but she got to choose moving to NY, joining this industry. Just because the yellow brick road didn’t lead somewhere doesn’t mean it was any less her choice. He was forced to kill people against his will, you just need to lose weight, she told herself once again.

     - It’s silly. - she smiled the worried look in her face away. - I just miss home. This apartment doesn’t really feel like home, everything here was bought for me. I didn’t get to pick my cutlery even.

     - Then decorate it the way you want.

     - I can’t do that. 

     - What’s stopping you? - he furrowed his brow at her and Y/N opened her mouth to say something before closing it again. - It’s your apartment, Y/N. 

     - What do you suggest? Going to IKEA and buy stuff that I already have? 

     - Okay. - Bucky got up from his seat walking over to her cupboard. Y/N watched curiously as he opened the cupboard and grabbed one of her mugs before throwing it to the ground, breaking it into million pieces. - Look at that, you need a new mug.

She smiled at him, jumping over from where she was standing. Walking over to him, Y/N reached into her cupboard, grabbing a stack of plates before walking over to her window. Unceremoniously, she opened the window and let the plates fall of her 5th floor onto the ground, watching as they all broke into a million pieces onto the sidewalk. Bucky followed through with whatever contents she had left in her porcelain and soon enough, the two of them had thrown glasses, bowls, cups and jars of flowers off the window, forming a pile of shattered glass.

      - Thank you, Bucky. - she smiled at the shatters of the ground floor before looking up to him. 

     - It’s no problem. 

     - No, this definitely wasn’t part of your contract. - Bucky watched as the late afternoon wind blew her hair ever so slightly, goosebumps on her skin from the change of temperature. There was this weird sensation, a sensation only the Winter Soldier had felt and Bucky couldn’t remember, one that was the same yet a foil of the one he used to feel. He couldn’t really explain what it felt, he could just feel it. - Could you not tell Ms. Olson I messaged you?

     - Whatever happens between me and you isn’t broadcast to anyone else. My loyalty lies with the person I was contracted to protect.

     - Thank you. - she pushed the window down closed. - Do you wanna get dinner? It’s on me. 

     - I think you need to get dinner we just broke all of your plates.

Bucky and Y/N went to a small burger joint near her apartment. Y/N adored it, it reminded her of home, it reminded her of when she came back from the pub with her friends and went to whatever was opened to get chips with melted mozzarella on top. Even the scent of it brought her back home and while she had never experienced the drunk taste of chips with melted cheese, she surely enjoyed eating them at unholy hours of the evening.

     - Why would you put cheese on fries? - Bucky questioned as the employee handed her two cartoons of chips with cheese. - You put ketchup on fries.

     - Don’t knock it until you try it. 

     - I’m too old to try new things. 

     - Oh, I noticed. Only old people whine that much. 

The two of them sat down in a red booth, picks in hands as they ate the chips which Bucky found weirdly satisfying. Sure, he wasn’t gonna tell her that but she was right, it was an godly satisfying favour. Mid meal he looked up at Y/N, she had a little mindless smile on her face as she ate her fries, hair slightly in front of her eyes. It was rather ironic, one caged bird staring at another caged bird but here’s the thing about cages: they don’t last very long. 

taglist: @disasterbii @lookiamtrying @buckysteveloki-me @nsfwsebbie @americasass81 @jamesbarnesappreciationclub @lostinthebeans @mariahthelioness29 @buckyandsebastian @peaches-roses-sins @theadorasabditory @sipsteacasually @tonystankschild @saiyanprincessswanie @booktease21 @noiralei @learisa @everythingisoverrated @uglipotata72829 @naturalthrone22 @husherstan @mandiiblanche @vicmc624 @newyorkgoddess @itsallyscorner @chipilerendi @emzd34 @writerwrites​ 

[soranis-sunshadow]

Why it’s not ok to compare Wrong Hordak to his defective brother.

It doesn’t sit right to me when someone pits two abuse victims against each other based on their coping mechanisms because their circumstances are never the same.

Wrong Hordak was immediately adopted by people who slowly de-indoctrinated him and offered him a supportive environment for all of that growth and healing to happen. When the BF squad kidnapped him, he was ardent about his service to Prime and he only followed them because they deceived him in believing they were servants of Prime.

By providing clear irrefutable evidence of Prime’s fallibility, deceit and the squad’s moral support throughout this moral crisis, they were able to wean him off of his programmed behavior and offer him a new onlook and an informed choice.

Hordak was a defective clone that was sent to die on the battlefield, in essence he was abandoned by his maker for being worthless and deflective. This is why his own disability is such a source of crippling shame and self-loathing, it made him unlovable in Prime’s eye, the person he was literally programmed to worship, love and blindly obey.

For all intents and purposes, Prime is the horde clones’ God. He appears to be all-powerful, omniscient, omnipresent and he is their literal creator. Through doctrine, clones are taught that all creatures are beneath Prime, only His light and His love is relevant. (Prime is that much of a narcissistic monster)

 Even while stranded on an alien planet, cut off from his Maker, it makes sense for him to prove his worth through the only means that he was ever taught (worship and conquest), perhaps, that way, he may repent for his failure of being created defective.

It makes sense for him, a brainwashed cultist, alone and stranded on a strange and hostile world to try and bring it into Prime’s light. He didn’t know that he could have been free of Prime if he chose to integrate with the natives. Every time he detected Light Hopes’s portals on the surface of the planet, he went to investigate, hoping Prime had come for him. That is how he found Adora after all.

Of course Hordak was brutal, brutality was all he had ever been shown. Of course he conquered in Prime’s name, that is why he was created. Of course he condoned the training of children to become soldiers once they reach maturity, that is how he was made after all, he didn’t know any better.

It's important to note that before Entrapta, Hordak is essentially a recluse. He hides away in his laboratory and he doesn’t directly interact with most of his underlings who avoid him. In many of his appearances he clings to the shadows or is only shown on a monitor. 

Instead of proving his worth to Prime, he seemingly fails at all of the (impossible) tasks he had set himself to accomplish in gaining his God’s favor: He doesn’t conquer the planet (it’s a whole damn planet), he can’t treat his defect (it’s gotten to the point that he’s an emaciated sickly wreck dealing with crippling chronic pain and is immobile without his prosthetic armor), his attempts at making a new body for himself have failed (he is defective, any clone made from his genetic code would also be defective) and he can’t even open a portal to go home (the planet’s magic does not allow an exit from the different dimension it is in). After decades of failure after failure, that he blames himself for, he has grown bitter and hopeless.

That is why Entrapta and her message is so important to him. She teaches Hordak that he has inherent worth as an individual. His imperfections do not mark him as something lesser, to be discarded, to her, he can be beautiful just the way he is. This is when he starts considering  to stall the portal project, a project that has been his purpose for years, and considers staying on Etheria with her. "There was even a time you wished I would not come for you." - Prime

When he is told by Catra that Entrapta "betrayed” him, he doesn’t want to believe it at first but his own self-loathing plays a huge part in why he buys the lie. He is after all a defective and worthless failure. Catra’s lie is so much more plausible than anyone ever finding worth in him. As such he comes to reason that another person he has dared to get attached to has abandoned him.

Whereas Catra believes that everyone leaves her, when really she pushes them away, Hordak genuinely has had everyone important in his life "leave" him, as far as he knows. This is why we see Hordak in his most evil during season 4 when he has the arm cannon and he is sacking Salineas. He's completely fueled by insecurity and loss, he has something to prove again, to Entrapta and to Prime. He was eager to face her and show her, on the battlefield, that he can be worth something (affection).

When Double Trouble reveals that Entrapta was sent to Beast Island, Hordak believed she is likely dead after so long. He thinks his gullibility has cost Entrapta her life, another failure to add to the long list of sins.

When he is teleported on Prime’s ship, he is terrified of him. He tries to appease Prime in whatever way possible. His body language, his meek, scared tone of voice, and the terrified expression on his face coupled with the fact that he is literally shaking in fear convey the fact that Hordak himself knows he will not be shown mercy. In order to adapt to Etheria and further his goals, he had committed unforgivable blasphemy, he had taken a name and shown initiative. Prime violates his mind and erases him.

It comes as no surprise that once his memories of Etheria resurface because of Catra’s presence, memories of abject failure, of loneliness, of grief and of betrayal, he submits himself to erasure once again. (in season 4 he had actually let Catra in, he trusted her, they had started a tenuous friendship that weirdly enough went both ways. She too was glad to see a “friendly face”)

Once he finds the crystal Entrapta gave him, he starts remembering her. Her memory is so dear to him that he actively tries to hold on to whatever fragments of her he can hold on. He even hides this from Prime (his only lie in the whole show).

In the final confrontation, while still linked to the hive mind and in the presence of his god, he chooses Entrapta, not because Prime was proven to be wrong or evil or fallible but because Entrapta found worth in Hordak despite his imperfections. He goes against his creator still believing that Prime is all-powerful, omniscient, omnipresent because he cared for Entrapta that much.

This is why Hordak's defiance against Horde Prime has so much impact, at least for me personally. Hordak is a character who never really got a choice up to this point. Arguably, it was less a decision and more of a last resort to protect Entrapta in whatever way he could. And even this choice was a zero sum equation. He either killed the one person that has ever shown him unconditional kindness or he turned against his God. It was a loss either way. The inescapability of Prime and the magnitude of his control over his clones is underlined by his possession of Hordak after he had declared his individuality and tried to kill him. In the deleted extended scene, Hordak himself is horrified at the fact that he had shot his Brother. His conditioning and indoctrination is still there. He never learned that Prime is a narcissistic monster and that he used his little brothers as chattel and had been consistently lied to.  He just wanted not to hurt Entrapta, this one choice is his first step towards individuality and freedom. This is the first time he actually exerts his own will and not Prime’s. He’s even making this obvious by saying "I am Hordak." I am someone, I exist.

I think Hordak is actually one of the best written characters in the show, and not because he's a sympathetic villain, but because he is very realistic to how a lot of children that experience neglect or other forms of parental abuse behave as they grow up. They only know anger and rage, never being shown love because they hide themselves in the shadows. Only when someone breaks down those walls can that person begin to heal.

Hordak and Wrong Hordak may be identical clones but their circumstances are anything but and it is wrong to pit them against each other. They are both victims of severe abuse. The comparison is not a fair one since one of them had all the means necessary to break conditioning while the other had all the circumstances necessary to enforce it. Despite what Hordak has done, he deserves to live and he deserves a chance to rebuild what he has destroyed in Prime’s name. Some of his victims may never forgive him, that is their choice. Nobody should have to forgive him. That is not how forgiveness works.  Etheria’s justice system is focused on rehabilitation, not on punitive vengeance.  Hordak too deserves a chance to heal after all that has been inflicted on him from the moment he was created. He deserves a chance at redemption.

I am open to more discussions on the subject if anyone is willing.

[molanran]

breaking up and getting back together with wooyoung

headcanons

now playing: diary - gugudan & 1, 2, 3 - nct dream

you have to admit, your relationship wasn't perfect. there were a lot of factors that led to you two breaking up.

wooyoung is so busy all the time. between his job, spending time with his friends, studying and travelling for extra curriculars, you'd be lucky if you to spend an hour with him once a week. he also had the habit to leave your texts unanswered and leave you in radio silence for extended periods of time.

with that being said, you weren't so perfect either. you weren't quite as active as wooyoung was, but you still had your own life to plan. you weren't a fan of public places so you were more of a recluse, choosing to enjoy your time in your apartment. as such, when he wanted to meet with you in what spare time he had, you preferred to spend your time together inside away from judging eyes. this led to wooyoung believing that you were ashamed of your relationship.

you had a very small friend circle, consisting of around five close friends. you were especially close to your roommate, yunho. there were a lot of times where wooyoung had come to your apartment to find the two of cuddling on the couch watching a movie, making breakfast together or even just wearing matching clothes. because of your close friendship, wooyoung often felt like a third wheel.

and last but not least, you don't want to admit it, but your insecurities got the best of you. wooyoung is the brightest star in the universe. he's got so much talent, so much personality, so much love for everybody who he crosses paths with. but because he is so loving and handsome, its so easy for him to be with anybody who he wanted.

the burning question that gave you so many sleepless nights never left your mind, did you deserve to be with him?

the breakup was hard to say the least. you had tears the entire time as you tried to explain yourself. things weren't working out and they weren't for a long time. you had tried to cling on to the last remnants of what was there but soon enough there was nothing left to cling on to.

wooyoung had started off yelling, trying to understand why you were doing this but when the realization had finally hit him, he went silent. it was a roller coaster of emotions but the last thing he said to you, broke your heart the most.

"i am losing the one person i never thought i would lose."

it has been three years since you've last seen wooyoung.

you first see him when you're on your way to the park for a picnic with your friends. you've changed a lot in this period of time. you've become a lot more open as a person, you've started to broaden your horizons and pursue your interests, and overall, you've come to terms with your insecurities and become more confident as a person.

wooyoung looks just as breathtaking as the moment you first saw him. he's with a friend, judging by the way they take goofy photos, but you can't help but notice how much happier he is. the bags under his eyes have faded, his back isn't slouched anymore and the smile on his face is so genuine.

seeing him for the first time in years, it's like you've fallen in love all over again.

to be honest, you hadn't planned on reuniting with him again. just seeing him again, a bright smile on his face and holding himself with such confidence was all the closure you needed. you were more than content with just leaving him be, but what you weren't expecting was to hear him call your name. you froze in place, not knowing what to do but turned to see him staring right at you, a hand over his mouth in shock. you're alarmed and feel incredibly awkward, so you settle for a friendly wave before you suddenly have wooyoung in your arms for the first time in forever.

even before you two dated, you were best friends. you knew everything about each other, all the good things, all the bad things, and continued to shower with the other with as much love as they could. in that moment, with your arms wrapped around each other, you knew that you two would be okay.

you don't go back to dating straight away. you both have accepted what happened and decided to move forward slowly as friends. it takes some time for them to figure out how to be in each other's lives again, but all it takes is one question and everything just works itself out.

it turns out that your friend groups have already mingled together and soon enough, everyone's meeting up whenever they can. the gathering's usually end up in chaos, something wild happening at some point or another. you always attended every gathering your friends planned but always ended up in a corner by yourself just looking at your friends fondly, and sometimes with a camera. soon enough, you were no longer alone and instead became accustomed to wooyoung throwing himself on your lap as he started to drunkenly mumble his thoughts to you. you always tried your damn hardest not to blush when he inevitably started nuzzling your neck, every night falling asleep with him in your lap.

when christmas had rolled around, wooyoung confessed that he had finally come out to his parents. they didn't take the reaction well and now he was on his own. you were hoping that wooyoung's family didn't have the same reaction as yours did but you can't bring yourself to hold a grudge. now, wooyoung is your family. his new year's wish was for to live a happy life and not be alone. the very next day, you told him that yunho was moving out to live with his boyfriend and you were looking for a roommate. he moved in that same day.

you never made a big deal about your birthday. ever. even when you were younger and with your family, nothing special seemed to happen. it was just like every other day, you would get a cupcake if you were lucky. wooyoung was always the one that cared about birthdays, constantly rambling about how you should do something special. you disagreed, instead just telling him that you would rather spend the day with people that cared about you. your next birthday, there was a sleepover in your apartment and instead of everyone bringing you presents, they all wrote you a letter of why they loved you. you haven't yet had a birthday where you haven't broken down in tears.

you two began a tradition for going out for breakfast every saturday. every saturday morning, without fail, you met up in your town's local cafe and spent the entire morning just spending time with each other. the staff had quickly grown accustomed to your regular visits and you two had secured yourself a booth near the window as your regular spot. the barista that served you would constantly ask if you two were dating and you would quickly deny them every time but one day, something felt different. when asked, you didn't say anything, instead you just smiled and looked at wooyoung before you dragged him over to your regular spot. wooyoung had noticed your hesitance, a questioning look in his eyes. you took a leap of faith and kissed his knuckles, an unspoken question in your eyes. he smiled as kissed your knuckles back, never separating your hands even after the food arrived. no words were needed, you both knew what you wanted.

"if you had asked if i regret us breaking up, i would say no. we've grown so much as people, become more comfortable in our skin and we've learnt to love ourselves. i truly think that we just needed time to learn how to love ourselves before we loved someone else and our relationship has become better because of it. it was a long and bumpy road but we're here together, standing strong as equals and partners."

[xlady-saya]

Hello! I don’t really use this account a whole lot but I wanted to go ahead and make a pinned post, which I’ll hopefully remember to update frequently lol. Anyways, here’s a collection of the fics I’ve written for aftg, andreil, and others so far ^^

progress comes in small steps series [complete]

and we’re just starting to get it [Rated T, 11.1k]

Neil is nothing and everything all at once, the entire universe for Andrew, however small of a universe that is. Even Aaron is starting to see it, though the pieces still don't line up.

And Andrew is trying to convince Aaron that he's never jealous? Yeah right. You don't spend your entire life being denied, being hurt, going through foster care with nothing to call your own only to be okay with someone else trying to take the one bright piece of life you call yours.

Or, Aaron is done with Andrew's shit and makes it his job to prove his brother wrong.

there’s always more to learn [Rated T, 12.3k]

The subject of Katelyn and Neil hasn't felt like dangerous territory in a long time, but Aaron feels the bomb countdown already coming to an end before Bee even opens her mouth.

"Well, the two of them are so alike," Bee goes on, oblivious to the tension leaking into the space. Her smile is pleasant, teasing. "It just goes to show how you and Andrew have similar tastes despite being so different."

The world freezes on its axis.

Andrew inhales a little too loudly the same time Aaron chokes on his spit. "W-What?"

trust is a slow process [Rated T, 7.3k]

If Katelyn had been stealthier, she could've escaped the crowded dance floor without Andrew seeing her.

But of course, she's no Neil.

Or: Katelyn and Andrew spend some unwanted quality time together, and Katelyn sees things for what they are.

someday there won’t be scowls [Rated T, 8.1k]

Neil finds that even with his mind's best efforts to hang onto the wounds of the past, his opinion of Aaron just isn't what it used to be. He can thank Andrew and Katelyn for a lot of it, but his own observations certainly help.

When he sees Aaron like this, the mix of worry and adoration on his face as he thinks of Katelyn, Neil can't help but feel too exposed himself.

It's a start.

I want this touch to be familiar [Rated E, 38.1k]

Deep down, Andrew knew he would always reach this crossroads, a time where the thought became too strong to ignore.

Going all the way with Neil. It's not something he can continue to avoid thinking about. When Andrew looks back to the days where he held Neil's hands down, when he never got off with him in the same room, he's forced to acknowledge how much he's allowed.

Not allowed. Welcomed. Wanted.

But that’s not all there is to it, and the desire to make a decision finally makes itself known.

if magic exists, you’re the closest thing [Rated T, 16.2k]

The concept of love is not one Andrew understands.

For a long time, it escaped him. It's always fuzzy, always distorted. He'd given up on it long ago, so why is he still chasing answers?

Whatever the reason, he's content to blame Jean Moreau for a lot of things, Katelyn too.

It's their fault he's here, at the happiest place on earth.

this red is for you [Rated T, 10.8k]

Katelyn never considered herself capable of doling out violence.

It has always been a far away thought, dampened by college courses and late night dates with her boyfriend. She lives a stereotypical life, despite everything she's been through with Aaron. Aside from her growing connection with the notoriously troublesome Foxes, nothing much about her life has changed.

Even then, she's learning she's still able to surprise herself. When Katelyn witnesses Neil defending Andrew, her own protective rage rears its head, ready to be explored.

And maybe that's a good thing.

an unconventional crossing [Rated T, 8.1k]

Aaron likes to believe he and Andrew have a lot more practice navigating their conversations now. And he’s right, mostly. But sometimes, challenges arise at the strangest times, and especially when their significant others are concerned.

In which Andrew and Aaron run into each other at the grocery store, and choose not to part ways.

the roads I traveled with you [Rated T, 35.5k]

When his brother gets engaged, Aaron doesn't expect it to send his head spinning as much as it does. Marriage has always felt like a dream, or a nightmare, one he never thought either of them would be able to achieve.

In that moment, Aaron remembers what he's always known, what keeps his head above water. He wants to be with Katelyn forever. That's never been a question. But marriage hadn't been brought up. For so long it was this abstract concept, a fantasy. He'd always reasoned with himself that it would happen, rationally of course it would, but now...

Now Andrew has made the idea a reality, and Aaron has to confront his own wants for his future.

one shots/multichapters

I’ve had a love of my own [Rated T, ongoing]

Despite everything Neil could’ve imagined for his life, he never thought he’d be here, finally giving the world the interview they’ve always wanted.

It’s been decades, but even with his numerous accolades and sports wins, he finds that they’re the least important thing about his life.

Neil can’t help but laugh. Andrew would be so annoyed if he were here.

Of course, Neil only wants to talk about him, and the life they spent together.

slurred [Rated M, 1.6k]

They're not the type of people to give up control, but with each other they're willing to bend the rules.

growing pains [Rated T, 10.6k]

Stuart knows it’s perfectly normal for teenagers to have crushes. That’s why he’s not surprised in the slightest when Neil starts acting strange; lighter, happier. However, what he doesn’t expect is for the crush to leak into his everyday life—or literally take up residence in his house. Or: five times Stuart knew Neil was hiding a nighttime guest, and one time he actually met him.

your hands are mine to hold [Rated E, 6.7k]

It has taken a long time for Thea to accept a lot of aspects of their past. Her eyes track the fear in Kevin's eyes, emboldened by how his own resolve wears it away year by year. She'll never take that sight for granted.

It's hard to ignore the weights on both of them, with their lives so eaten up by the Exy world and memories of the Nest, but one thing has always remained consistent.

Thea trusts Kevin Day with her everything, and she'll never hesitate to follow him into battle.

better than a night light [Rated T, 7.3k]

Neil hasn’t had the chance to examine the feeling of fear in a long time. He’s all too familiar with it though; from the nightmares, to the memories of a cold basement floor, he knows the feeling like the back of his hand.

But this fear is new, loaded with ridiculousness and a complete lack of reason. It’s nothing more than pixels on a screen, far away theories that can’t hurt him like his past can.

Maybe that’s why he’s beginning to not mind it as much. It doesn’t hurt that Andrew is also there to hold him through it.

Playtime [Rated E, 6.7k]

There was a time when Andrew might've questioned being so into this.

Not anymore.

take what you want [Rated E, 5.4k]

Laila has come a long way from her freshman year, past all the worries and pressure to behave a certain way. She never thought she’d realize it here, lounging poolside with her girlfriend.

The urge to seduce Alvarez is just too good to let go.

a product of absence [Rated T, 7.8k]

It’s funny, Andrew thinks, that this would be seen as a curse in any other situation. Two people, thrown apart by time and circumstances, desperately searching for one another.

But Andrew has never doubted Neil’s return. He’s not running, he’s not worried. It’s perhaps the only waiting game that’s been worth it, that he understands, because this bond with Neil has only ever made sense to him.

In another life, Neil made this much clear: they would always find each other in the end.

here I am, there you go again [Rated T, 17.5k]

There's many things about the past Neil chooses to leave behind, and most of the time it's for the best. For some reason though, his brain can't help but cling to the last memories of him.

"My Ex." Neil bites his tongue at the word, because it never feels right. At this point, so many years later, that man is no one. A stranger. He shouldn't presume to know him anymore than his ex should presume to know Neil.

If he remembers Neil at all.

But Neil should know better than anyone that the past always has a way of catching up to him, and this time, he's not as willing to run as he might've initially thought.

losing battle [Rated M, 3.4k]

It's always been Nicky's dream to be closer with his cousins. However, when he opens Andrew's mail to find more than he bargained for, he finds himself regretting the wish. Unfortunately, no matter how much Andrew's warmed up to him in the last few years, Nicky's pretty sure he'll die (literally) if Andrew finds out.

Nicky's mission begins.

temper, temper [Rated T, 3.7k]

"You paid for the deluxe package," Neil says as he scrolls through his payment history to find his client's invoice. His system is simple:

Basic Package: Fuck you. A general statement of displeasure and a brief description of the wrongdoing.

Intermediate Package: Fuck you, with passion. Everything in the basic package, but with additional insults. Customizable for an extra fee.

Deluxe Package: Fuck you to hell. Everything from the first two packages, for an extended period of time, and with extra viciousness.

And it looks like Andrew Minyard is the unlucky soul today.

a new contract [Rated T, 7.2k]

Neil’s request is simple on its face, but infinitely complicated given his history.

“Convince your team to sign me.”

And this was Andrew’s deal: If Neil can prove that he’s serious, that he can build a new life for himself so that he doesn’t end up crawling back to Riko, Andrew will convince his coach to recommend him for recruitment in the fall.

Yes, it was meant to be black and white…

But Andrew should’ve known better. Nothing ever is.

What a Rush [Rated E, 1.6k]

It's always Andrew's goal to stretch Neil's pleasure to its limits, and he's barely begun to scratch the surface.

locked together [Rated E, 8.3k]

Andrew licks his lips and tugs on the tail of the beast inside him, righting it so it can point him in the direction of what he's searching for. Neil looks good on top of him, panting and giddy, and it's rare that Andrew doesn't want to flip them over and make Neil fall apart.

But...every once in a while...

Well, he's relaxed today. He wants to listen, he wants orders, he wants to be controlled so long as the control comes from Neil.

do you like scary movies? [Rated T, 22.5k]

To say Andrew has never seen the benefit in the make-believe would be a lie. However, he finds less and less use for it as he grows older. He especially fails to see the benefits of anything from the horror genre; he’s made plenty of his own mistakes, has seen more than enough to terrify him in his life. He doesn’t need to rely on jump scares and idiotic protagonists.

But when he meets Neil, self-proclaimed horror archivist, he finds that maybe he never gave the genre the credit it was due, and he ends up thanking the dull movies eventually…

They lead him to Neil, the realest thing he’s ever known.

[utapriyanderes]

Yandere Sub AU (Fairytale AU) - Tokiya Ichinose ver.

    Ever since Tokiya was a young boy he always loved music. He wanted to pursue it as a career and travel around the world sharing his love for the art. His parents however did not support this wish of his. No matter how hard he worked or how talented he was his parents did not want to join in on this journey of his life. Leaving him by his lonesome as he struggled through.

    He worked very hard and was an amazing vocalist. He would always take small gigs and do outdoor work for small tips. Yet it was hard to live with that sort of salary. With no parents or someone to rely on he had to get another job alongside trying to make his dreams work. Day in and out he worked hard in his job and tried to get his dreams rolling.

    It ended up becoming the same repeated pattern everyday. Work then focus on his dreams second. There were times he thought he would never be able to accomplish what he wants. The flame inside of him burning lower and lower.

    On a usual monday afternoon he was stacking books on shelves as he normally does. How he did it was automatic due to doing the repeated action so many times. Occasionally a person would interrupt this pattern to ask about something, which he would reply to quickly and politely.

    “Umm, excuse me.” Someone caught his attention breaking his usual flow. He gave them a polite smile, “Yes, what may I help you with?”

    The person holds up a music book, “I was wondering if you could point me in the direction of your music books?” He points and tells them where they can find them before returning to his work. Except the person stays.

    “Do you need my help with something else?” He asks them, being slightly bothered by their presence. He watches them shift uncomfortably, “W-Well, I don’t really know what to get. So could you help me choose?”

    He gives them a simple form of agreement then sets down the book he was putting on the shelf before leading them to the music section. From there he asked what level they were, “excuse me, but how advanced are you in music?” He watches them think before giving him an answer, “I know how to play the piano well, but I can’t play complicated pieces yet.”

    He thinks over their words before picking out a few books in the section, “here, these should work for your level. Then this one should help to challenge you so you can move on.” The person’s face lights up as he explains each book chosen in detail. They accept the books and tell him, “Wow! You really know a lot about music! Are… or were you involved with it somehow?”

    Their words leave him speechless as he wasn’t expecting them to be that impressed. Finding the words he says, “...I’m involved with music. I do some gigs from time to time, but it’s mostly outside work.” He sees them bubble up with excitement.

    “Really?! Can I watch you perform sometime?” There’s a sparkle in their eyes. He smiles a small smile and is about to reply when someone interrupts, “Ichinose, stop talking about your hobbies and get back to work.” They jump in surprise while he’s used to this. He gives them an apologetic expression while his eyes are clouded over in a deep sadness.

    Before the person he helped leaves they whisper something to him, “don’t worry, I’ll look all over town to see you perform if I have too.” Their smile is incredibly bright as they give him a ‘thanks’ before walking off to go buy their new books. He stares at them in silent awe before going back to his original mundane task at hand.

    A few days later in the central town square he sets up the few things he has which consists of a wooden box, a can for tips, and then his sheet music which he keeps beside him just in case he may need it. Yet he already knows all the songs by heart. Today as he gets ready he can only hope that the person from a few days past ends up hearing his song.

    He takes a deep breath in then sings. He sings with a brighter flame inside his heart with as much passion as he can muster. Quite a few onlookers watch him sing but still not the one he was hoping for. When he sings his last song someone shuffles their way up in front to watch him. That person is them.

    He gives them the best performance he can and once he’s done he bows to his audience. They clap at his public concert and when he stands back up he’s looking at them. Clapping happily and bouncing in awe.

    Once the clapping dies down the people make their way to give him whatever spare change they have. As the people clear out he finds the last one standing to be the person from earlier. They walk up to him with a smile on their face.

    “Did you enjoy it?” He asks them with a hopefulness inside him. They eagerly nod their head, “Yes! I did! It was amazing! I never saw anything like that before!” Their comments and praise made him happy. Like what he was doing was finally worth it. Like he should continue with his dreams.

    “Oh! That reminds me!” They suddenly exclaim causing him to look at them in confusion. They dig around in the book they are carrying before pulling some papers out and extending them his way.

    “Here, these are for you!” They smile as they hold the papers out. He takes them and looks them over. They are compositions. He looks back up at them, “Why are you giving these to me?” They end up blushing at his words.

    “Y-You see, once I met and talked to you… I suddenly heard a melody to play. So the song is inspired by you, and since you sing… maybe you could write lyrics to them?” They talk bashfully as they get their reasoning out. He takes another glimpse at the compositions noticing their name in the top right corner. He thinks about how much they must believe in him to give him a song. They support his dreams.

    “Thank you for these songs. I’ll write fitting lyrics for them.” He gives them a small smile of hope as they bring their book in front of them and hug it to their chest. They look down at the ground as they smile. Something crosses their mind before looking back up at him.

    “I-If you would like… and if you like my songs. Then possibly… we could work together?” They tilt their head to the side. Someone wants to share his dreams with him? He never thought that someone would want to join in with him. He thought this was all just a lone journey and that he wouldn’t have anyone to share his joys and pains with. A spark of something shines in his eyes.

    “Yes, I would like to work with you from now on.” He bows at them in agreement making them do a quick curtsy/bow back. When they spring back up they give him an encouraging smile, “I can’t wait to start working with you!”

    The two of them share a few more details and where they will meet up and practice before going their own way. Both of them are light and happy at the prospect of the future. For the next few weeks the performer works on writing lyrics to the songs he got and when the two meet up they work on the songs together.

    Doing this however pushes the performers job to the back of his mind. Still going to work to pay his bills but not really getting into the usual patterns he normally does. Causing him to do less than perfect work. That only became more prominent with them coming into the store.

    “Hey, Tokiya!” They shout and wave at him as they walk up. He pauses his current task to give them a smile.

    “I think changing these measures makes it sound and flow better with your lyrics here.” They point to the changed part in the score. He looks it over and gives his agreement. They talk over the piece some more, before they are once again interrupted.

    “Talking about music again Ichinose? You know I can tell your work is really slacking lately too. Maybe if you were just as focused as you are in your hobby then you could possibly keep your job.” The two of them look at his boss.

    “I would prefer it if you didn’t call it a hobby.” He stares at the man knocking down his dream. All he does is laugh, “Do you really think you can be a singer without having to work another job? Come on Ichinose, you need this job.” Tokiya can feel a deep pit starting to form in his stomach. He doesn’t need this job. All he needs is them and their music.

    “You’re wrong. I don’t need this job.” He takes off his apron and places it on the books, “I quit.” Both his boss and them are shocked at his words and actions.

    “Let’s go.” Tokiya says to them as he walks by. The boss is trying to find his bearings as they snap out of their state of shock to follow after him.

    “T-Tokiya… w-wait! Don’t you think that’s being too rash?” They ask him as they leave the bookstore. He stops to turn around at them, “It’s fine, I don’t need that job. All I need is our music and you.” The composer can’t help but to feel butterflies in their stomach. They look away with a blush forming up to their ears.

    “D-Do you really feel that way? I-If you’re quitting because of me, then maybe this wasn’t a good idea to work together…” Tokiya has to convince them that they were the right choice, that they were the one he wanted to be with all the time with no interference from his job.

    He walks closer to them and grabs their arms. They look up at him with the blush still on their face, with their eyes looking lovestruck.

    “Everything will be alright. Now we have more time to focus on our music and each other. Let’s make our dreams come true together.” They nod their head slowly at him. In the heat of the moment, the both of them close their eyes and lean closer. Feeling their lips connect together. Only parting when they need to breathe.

    He brings them into a hug planning on not ever letting his precious composer go. He won’t give up the only person who supported his dreams. Together they’ll reach that happily ever after.

   With no one to support his dreams he was by himself. Now he has you to help make it all possible. The missing beam of support to help him reach his goal.

[sortinghatchats]

On Slytherin Primaries

Slytherins believe in the importance of taking care of their own. Everyone else is a person, but so are they, so a Slytherin’s job, before everything else, is taking care of them and theirs. This makes what Slytherin are known for, their ambition and ruthlessness, stand out strikingly even while a Slytherin’s core is not inherently selfish or cut-throat.

All of the Houses contain people with great ambitions and great desire for accomplishment and the furthering of their goals. Gryffindors will take on the world to do what they think is right, and are willing to make sacrifices and overrule those who would compromise on what needs to be done, and that’s nothing if not ambition. What makes the Slytherin ambition stand out so significantly is that it’s seen as a selfish ambition, and a guiltlessly selfish one at that. That drive is tied to personal achievement instead of idealistic achievement, and that makes it easier to point at. 

But this is key: selfish ambition is idealistic ambition for a Slytherin. A Slytherin’s first priority is to their loved ones not because they love deeper or harder than the other Houses (they don’t), but because it is wrong to betray or abandon your people and right to defend and promote them. Loyalty and defense of your own is an inherent part of the Slytherin morality.

A Slytherin does not generally feel guilty for valuing themselves, for taking time for their own mental or physical health, or for sacrificing other things for the safety and happiness of the people they love. They might feel vulnerable, or judged, or guilty for not feeling guilty, especially if they live in the kind of family or culture where humility and self sacrifice are seen as the greatest goods– but without watching eyes and the words of peers and authority figures bouncing around their skulls, a Slytherin would feel comfortable and even validated in the idea that they have both a right and duty to take care of their own selves before anything or anyone else. 

An exception to this is a Slytherin who’s managed to kick themselves out of their inner circle. For whatever reason, they don’t feel like they deserve their own help or kindnesses. Their “me and mine” priorities are still apparent but now it’s only “mine.” They fiercely and selflessly prioritize the individuals they love, value, or feel responsible for, while excluding their own self. A Slytherin like this can look somewhat like a Hufflepuff Primary, erring towards selflessness, but take a look at how they prioritize between their best friend v. a stranger in need. If they feel guilty for abandoning the stranger, they’re probably a Puff; Slytherins feel desperately like they owe things to their people, but they don’t feel like they owe people in general. (Also keep an eye out for a Burned Hufflepuff in this example, though– a Slytherin wouldn’t care strongly about not helping the stranger, except for general empathetic tickles; a Hufflepuff would be survivably eaten up inside; a Burned Puff would force themselves not to care because it’s the only practical thing). 

Not prioritizing their own would feel wrong to a Slytherin. It would feel selfish, and might feel like giving into social pressures instead of standing up for what matters to them. This can hold true emotionally even when logically, prioritizing you and yours is not the best thing to do. In The Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen, a Slytherin Primary who only wants her family to be safe, almost runs away from her place as an important political symbol on the chance that she and her loved ones could make it on their own, hiding from the capitol. She doesn’t– but she really wants to, and when things go wrong she feels guilty for not acting to put her loved ones first. 

Canonical Basis

Individual loyalty is something tied to Slytherins in the books and movies, but isn’t something that gets focused on. “Or perhaps in Slytherin you’ll make your real friends,” the Sorting Hat says in the song from Harry’s first year. It doesn’t explicitly use the loyal like it does for Hufflepuff, but that’s consistent because often, Slytherins don’t look loyal. If you’re not one of their most important people, who you can often count on one hand, they’re not particularly loyal. Loyalty doesn’t have an inherent worth for Slytherins the way it does for Hufflepuffs. Loyalty is less given and more earned.

And we have canonical examples of Slytherin loyalty, extreme and dramatic as it is. Slytherin loyalty is Narcissa Malfoy abandoning her Dark Lord for the sake of her son. Slytherin loyalty is the way Pansy Parkinson freaks out every time something injures Draco, and the way she was willing to sacrifice Harry to save herself and her friends (and the way she expected other people to agree with that judgement call). 

It’s Slughorn’s guiltless willingness to distance himself from Dumbledore’s war–until old Dumbly gave him a reason to risk his own precious skin. It’s Snape, unwilling to let go of Lily Potter even after decades have passed and her son has grown up an orphan; even when there is nothing still to gain from holding onto his loyalty to her, and even when he hates her son. 

Moving outside of canon (because there are nearly no positive descriptions of Slytherins with canon– Narcissa is a bigot, Pansy a bully, Slughorn a spineless creep, Snape a child abuser): 

Slytherin is Ender Wiggin going back to Battle School not to save the world but because his sister asked him to, and Bean going to Battle School because he could get an education there that would save himself and then staying to save Ender. Slytherin is Pepper Potts telling Tony that, to hell with the world, he needs to take care of himself first. It’s Andrea from The Walking Dead pulling a gun on the people who try to get between her and her sister’s body. It’s Toph Beifong not giving any fucks except that hey, Twinkle Toes needs her. It’s Briar Moss of Circle of Magicplunging into death itself, refusing to let Rosethorn go. 

Where Molly Weasley, in HP canon, weeps but drops her son Percy when he turns on them for the Ministry, blood purist and loyal daughter of House Black Narcissa Malfoy betrays the Dark Lord and saves Harry Potter for Draco’s sake. As the final, epic battle of good and evil culminates and commences in Hogwarts, Narcissa takes her family and she disappears. The ideals of her war were only her priority until her son was in direct danger. 

Slytherin v. Hufflepuff

Slytherin and Hufflepuff are the two Loyalist Primaries. People, and not ideals, are at the core of their judgement calls. But where Hufflepuffs tend to bond to groups, Slytherins bond with individuals.

Slytherin Primaries are horrified to see someone let down a friend. To turn on a loved one for words as insubstantial as truth or justice or the greater good feels like a very particular kind of madness. Sure that’s what you’re supposed to do, a Slytherin might say, but that’s not what you actually want, is it? Your person is right here. They are real, and they are breathing, and they need you, and they are yours. It’s an extreme Slytherin who would let the whole world burn for the sake of a friend, but every Slytherin Primary would be at the very least tempted.

We discuss in the Hufflepuff Primary post how when someone is dropped from a Hufflepuff’s group of “people,” it is a dramatic fall into becoming a dehumanized “thing.” This Hufflepuff dehumanization can take many forms– outsiders, “other”ing people, having strong beliefs in the justification behind more institutionalized types of exclusion like racism, sexism, classism. But it’s a divide where there are people who are people, and then there are people who are not-people. 

The Slytherin divide is very different. There is no mechanism inherent to the Primary that removes someone of their personhood. Rather, they are removed of their status. There is a possessive drive to Slytherin, and while that varies in intensity across different individuals, it puts the divide on the basic line of “mine” and “not mine.” We find it helpful to talk about it in terms of being in someone’s inner circle, but it’s not usually that binary. Like it is with everyone, loyalty comes in a gradient. 

But Slytherin’s loyalty is more selective than the other Houses’. Where a Hufflepuff extends some initial degree of loyalty on the basis of your being a person, with a Slytherin any loyalty you gain is earned from the bottom up; you start at 0. 

A Decided House

But when the major part of your moral system that you feel viscerally is to protect yourself and your people, there are a lot of gaps in how you interact with the world and with moral situations. What do Slytherins do when confronted with gross wrongs like slavery, like murder, like unjust war–wrongs that don’t touch their people? It depends on the Slytherin. But this is why we count a Slytherin as a Decided house along with Ravenclaw, despite the core of their moral system being very much felt. 

Some Slytherins simply don’t care–they opt out of the moral complications of the rest of the world and what touches other people and choose a contented apathy about the things that don’t intrude on their space– but other Slytherins construct ways to interact with these situations. 

Perhaps they do so by understanding that other people have connections as strong and important as their own, or by building something more complex. Sometimes Slytherins can build systems that look like Ravenclaw systems– systems based on observational data, on adopted systems, or by keeping the moral guidance that they were taught growing up. The defining difference between these constructed additional Slytherin systems and the Ravenclaw Primary system is that the Slytherins are aiming for function and don’t have the same drive for truth. It matters much less if the system they build is true than if it is functional. The system should optimize for what they care about and what makes them happy, but this moral code is not viscerally driving like a Slytherin’s desire to protect those closest to them. 

Some Slytherins latch specifically on to the morality of their most important person (or people), either because they trust them or because they value them. Samwise Gamgee, the loyal hobbit who follows Frodo through hell and back, adopts Frodo’s system. Sam does great good, bravely and well, but he does it, “For Mr. Frodo! For the Shire! And for my Gaffer!” Jeff Winger from Community also sometimes follows this pattern, absorbing the moralities of his study group and best friends. Both these characters are, to put it simplistically, wearing bracelets that read “What Would Mr. Frodo Do?” and “What Would The Study Group Do?” etc. For Jeff, it’s a bit more because Annie will pout at him if he’s doesn’t at least try. 

Aang, from Avatar the Last Airbender, builds himself a stunning replica of his beloved deceased father figure Gyatso’s ethical system and he lives in it all his life. Latching onto a parental figure or early (sometimes, in media, deceased) influence’s morality is a form of love common for young Slytherins. Train Heartnet of Black Cat (who Saya changes so completely), Kai of Korra (who takes in Jinora’s culture like it’s his own morality), and Edward Cullen of Twilight (who takes Carlisle’s pacifism to self-hating extremes), are all examples of that. 

Alternatively, a Slytherin might spend a lot of their time living in a Primary model–it might matter deeply to them to do good and right. If they have that drive for truth, they might have a Ravenclaw Primary model as opposed to just a Slytherin’s functional construction. They might also have a Gryffindor Primary or a Hufflepuff Primary model. They could even have a Slytherin Primary model– but one that is loyal and dedicated to a larger group of people, like a whole peer group, the population of a whole city, or even humanity in general. (This can look a bit like a Hufflepuff– one major visible difference is that particularly Slytherin sense of possessiveness.) They could live in that model for all conflicts and decisions that are separate from and non-threatening toward their most important people and be very functional with that. 

MCU’s Tony Stark is an example of this type. (He’s also an example of a Slytherin who has kicked himself out of his own inner circle). He is a Slytherin Primary dedicated to Pepper and Rhodey (and, as of Avengers 2, he’s likely coming to value the other Avengers this way), but he has built a driving model to allow him to interact ethically with the rest of the world. It is this model that drives Iron Man and his sustainability and charity projects. This model (we think it’s probably Gryffindor Primary) is likely also what will drive him to one side or the other in Civil War. As long as Pepper or one of his own is not in direct danger (though the danger to himself is irrelevant), Tony will act firmly in service of his model. 

But dropping that model in order to stand by someone you love, or in order to protect yourself, doesn’t feel like a failing. Sticking to that modelled morality at the expense of betraying or abandoning one of their own would make a Slytherin feel guilty and wrong. Being able to put the things and concepts you like aside for the sake of the people who need you feels more righteous than any moral posturing. It feels practical and it feels right, just as strongly as a Gryffindor Primary’s internal moral compass points them. 

It’s a people based system, but it’s still an intuitive model of right and wrong. Betraying your own is the worst kind of crime. Loyalty is precious and terrible; it makes you vulnerable. It’s given sparingly, deeply, and a Slytherin will stand by their loyalties through the same death and fire that a Gryffindor would brave for the sake of doing the right thing, or a Hufflepuff to help someone in need.

In the same vein, when a Slytherin realizes that someone else doesn’t put the same value on the people they profess loyalty to, they might react similarly to a Gryffindor realizing that morality isn’t intuitive to everyone. Some things are just wrong, a Gryffindor might protest. But they’re your child–your spouse–your friend, a Slytherin will cry, confused and unsettled. How could you?

Petrified or Burned Slytherin

While there are certainly Slytherin Primaries who don’t care about any people who aren’t theirs, many Slytherins, especially ones who enjoy being more social, have wide circles of friends and acquaintances; people they will go out of their way to help, and whose company they enjoy, whose confidence they trust (to a point). What defines a Slytherin is not a lack of these concentric circles, but rather how sharply those lines of stratification are drawn. Wanting to help someone doesn’t mean you’re loyal to them. Wanting to help them at the expense of your comforts, your values, your commitments and sometimes even your self–that does. 

You end up with Slytherin Primaries on both ends of the spectrum: ones who have decided that a huge group of people are “theirs” (to the extreme of: the world is my responsibility and I have bonded to every single individual contained in it), and ones who have decided that they themselves are not one of their most important people, but maybe a friend or lover is. 

You can also get Slytherins whose only important person is themselves. This can be done healthily, especially for short periods of times, but when it’s driven by a fear of those close attachments, it becomes a phenomenon we call the Burned or Petrified Slytherin. 

The Petrified Slytherin is a Slytherin who has no inner circle and no plans to get one. Whether through death, betrayal, abandonment (from either side), or through never having had any to begin with, the Petrified Slytherin has decided that having important people is too dangerous. Having those strong ties leaves you open to pain and weakness, and the pleasure of those connections aren’t worth the despair that comes from their seemingly inevitable loss. In this way, they close themselves off to meaningful connections out of what is ultimately fear (though from the inside, it’s far more likely to be experienced as a rational, sensible decision given the circumstances of the world), and gives them a stony exterior that seems impenetrable, resolute, and cold. 

Even when not Petrified, though, the Slytherin Primary often seems cold. This comes not from any actual inherent coldness, but because they often show their warmth only to their inner circle. This is hugely influenced by your other houses, especially when you get the warmth of the Hufflepuff Secondary involved, or have a warm model– but even then, there is a special and somewhat exclusive kind of warmth saved for those who are held the closest. 

A Slytherin Primary in our system is defined first and foremost by the intensity and priority of their loyalties to individual people, however few or many. And the way to break a Slytherin– whether you’re stopping their plans or crushing their will– is to either take away their people or to threaten to. Narcissa betrays Voldemort, fully aware of what that could mean for the safety of herself and her husband, because Draco was more important than anyone or anything. Azula of Avatar the Last Airbender, for all her coldness and lack of mercy, does what she does because she wants desperately to be loved and accepted by her father. When Annabeth, his friends, or his mother are threatened, Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson loses all other priorities– his canonical fatal flaw is that he would let the world burn to save a friend. Nothing brings out the fierceness in a Slytherin like getting in between them and their loved ones.

To a Slytherin the inner circle of close loyalties is likely to be a much smaller number than the people they care about and consider friends. A petrified Slytherin is therefore not necessarily someone who is friendless, or who has no social ties, or who lacks affection for people. It’s not even a Slytherin without some sort of a hierarchy of important people.

A petrified Slytherin is a Slytherin who has decided, either consciously or not, that letting people into that inner circle– devoting themselves to someone with that deep, thoughtless Narcissa-type or Azula-type loyalty– is too dangerous. It’s too terrifying. When someone is that close, they become a huge risk. They might die, or you they might stop loving you, or stop liking you, or something awful might happen to them and it might be your fault. Something awful might happen to you because someone might threaten your people and use them against you, and you would be helpless. If you couldn’t find a way to maneuver through the situation, you would have to do whatever was demanded of you to keep your people safe, because nothing would be worse than losing them and having it be your own fault.

Surviving a situation like that (losing someone or having their lives used as collateral against you) is one of the ways we see Petrification often happen. 

Not all Slytherins will Petrify in such a situation– Finnick from The Hunger Games, a Slytherin Primary whose only people are Mags and Annie, has resisted Petrifying even when there are good arguments that it would be a far more adaptive thing to do. The Capitol’s only way of controlling him is by threatening to hurt the people he loves, and even after Mags is killed, he stays resolutely attached to Annie. It gives him the strength to carry on, but is also the weakness that the Capitol is exploiting. If Annie died, Finnick would be very likely to Petrify.

Bean, in Ender’s Shadow, is a Petrified Slytherin for most of the book. He likes people, and sometimes idolizes people, but their main purpose in his life is the utility of them. His connections are a cold, logical thing, closer to an alliance than to a friendship, and often not mutually so. Bean is interesting because we never see the Petrification process. He’s born into a survival situation and is cold and hard and determined to live from the first page. It is only at the very end, when he grows attached to Nikolai and allows himself to consider the possibility that he, too, could have a family who he loves and who loves him, that we see that Petrification begin to melt away. 

Jeff Winger from Community is another example. A ruthless lawyer only out for his own gain and without an attachment in the world except to maybe his car, he’s the perfect example of a Petrified Slytherin. His tentative, slow-moving back and forth journey into attachment to the other characters is a character arc of un-Petrifying. He’s better at it some days than others. 

With female characters in particular, the petrified Slytherin is hugely tied to the trope of the Ice Queen. From TV Tropes: “Her signature characteristic is that she is cold; the ambiguity comes from what “cold” means. She has a cold heart, a frosty demeanor; she attracts but will never be wooed.” Characters who fit this trope are not always Petrified Slytherins, but the trope is an important parallel if not just because of the imagery they share: cold, hard, unyielding, nothing to lose. 

When a Slytherin loses their closest attachments, they are left with only their personal ambitions and with the morality system that is usually constructed around those loyalties. In the sense that the way that they now primarily frame their interactions with the world is constructed, they often appear to look like Ravenclaw Primaries here. The most visible and useful difference here, especially from the outside, is that they don’t have the Ravenclaw drive for truth. Their system doesn’t have to be true or right, but simply functional. If they have a Ravenclaw Primary model that gives them some of that drive, then they might be indistinguishable from the Ravenclaw Primary unless there are are counterexamples of Slytherin loyalty from other points in their life. 

Despite it seeming to at least be a trend, not all Petrified Slytherins look like Ravenclaw Primaries. Petrified Slytherins with models of other Primaries might happily and healthily inhabit those models as their main way of interacting with the world, and this has the potential to be entirely functional. The reason that the model would remain a model though, and not indicate an actual change in Primary, would be that first, there still remains the possibility to un-petrify, and second, even if there is nothing substantial underneath it, the model could still be dropped.

This potential for to drop that model and fall to an underlying lack of structure and direction is part of what gives desperate Slytherins their reputation of being fearsome. Azula is a great, if extreme, example of this when she loses everything at the end of season 3 of Avatar. Mental illness (in the form of at the very least hallucinations and almost definitely a lot more) and trauma also have of course a huge influence on the intensity of everything that happens, but that basic directionlessness, the way that Azula has nothing left after she loses her father, the way she’s so susceptible to being haunted by her mother’s memory, hits so hard because she had structured everything around her Slytherin morality. She had no real goals or ideals underneath that, and so she had no structure to keep her up when that crumbled.

One of the good things about Petrification, as scary and awful as it is, is that it’s a good way to survive a bad situation and it’s possible to un-petrify (see: Defrosted Ice Queen). Because fear of attachment is at the heart of petrification, instead of needing reality to prove your doubts wrong (as the other fallen Houses must), you only need one person to prove that attachment is worth the risk. 

Elementary’s Jamie Moriarty follows a common path here in that, despite her pretending to be un-petrifying for our protagonist Sherlock, the one person she ends up actually attaching to her is her daughter. She is the Slytherin woman who un-petrifies upon becoming a mother. Regina in Once Upon a Time also follows this path, becoming through that a subversion of the Evil Queen, who is often a Petrified Slytherin who does not un-petrify (see her mother, Cora, and the symbolic plot of removing her heart so that no one can use it against her). 

It’s really common in media for characters who have closed themselves off to attachments to be called psychopaths, both by the fans and the writers, when they are, in fact, not. A lot of them have empathy, or at least the capacity for it, and are instead Petrified.The definitive and intentional split between the self and meaningful attachments, due to loss, trauma, selfishness, or fear, is different from the inability to intuitively create those attachments. Calling this “petrification,” rather than inaccurately calling it “psychopathy,” gives the character flexibility to recover from it that doesn’t end up as either a contradiction of established character or as a downplaying of actual serious mental illness.

To sum: Petrification happens when a Slytherin cares about their important people so intensely that pain from their loss, or the potential for future loss, outweighs the positives of having important people. It stops being worth it. Even if it leaves the Slytherin with a directionless system and a cold center where there is an aching potential for great warmth, it feels safer and better to not attach to anyone that strongly.

tl;dr Slytherin Primary

Slytherin is a Decided House, and Internal House, and a Loyalist House. 

As a Decided House, Slytherins, unlike Hufflepuffs (our other loyalists), prioritize "their" people first. Those people are found and chosen by the Slytherin. It's not about who is in front of them,  or who needs them most, but who they have decided to love.

As a Internal House, like Gryffindor, Slytherin Primaries carry a certainty and a moral fortitude inside of themselves. When they are sure they are right, in the defense of themselves or their loved ones, they will not be swayed by outside influence or pressure.

As a Loyalist House, Slytherin puts people first. Unlike the Hufflepuff, they put their people first. They’re content with valuing some people over others without necessarily thinking some people are better than or worth more than others. In fact, putting their own people first feels right. This is something owed. Not valuing the people you profess loyalty to most would be a betrayal, a cowardice, an abandonment. The best thing you can be is there for the people you love. 

Ambitions live in all Houses but Slytherins’ is notorious because it often looks the most selfish– it often is the most selfish. Part of a Slytherin’s morality is understanding that your first duty is to yourself and the people you love– higher minded goals are all pomp and circumstance, trying to make yourself feel good. At the heart of things, this is why we are here: for ourselves.

[dear-mrs-otome]

In Defense of Theo...

Nobody asked for this, and probably nobody even wants this, but somewhere out there is at least one person wondering….how can anyone actually like this asshole? He’s a sadistic prick that belittles MC left and right, and I gotta admit  - I was right there with you. When I first started playing Ikemen Vampire, I could barely stand Theo. The ‘dog’ thing was grating, the smug smirk didn’t seem as if it could possibly cover any softer sides, and especially with the sweetheart Vincent always nearby - why would anyone even look twice at his little brother?

Then I played one route with a Theo cameo. And then a second. And I started to notice a pattern...that when MC needed someone to lean on, Theo was always there. That somehow, quietly and with every bit of solid advice he dispensed, he forced me to think that maybe, just maybe, I’d misjudged him.

Maybe you’ve already made up your mind. Maybe he’ll never win you over. But for those curious as to why he torpedoed every preconception I had about him, feel free to read on - just be forewarned that after the cut, there will be unavoidable spoilers. I tried to keep things fairly vague, but some specifics are impossible to skirt when you’re talking about Theo and his motivations.

Starting with a simple list of Theo’s traits, so we can get those laid out right off the bat:

Theo’s strengths

Passionate

Idealistic

Ambitious

Reliable/Supportive

Selfless

Charismatic

Observant/Good at reading people

Protective

Theo’s weaknesses

Tunnel-visioned

Self-sacrificing

Doesn’t value self/Bases value on others

Bad Communicator re:Emotions

Wrathful

Stifling

Stubborn

Just like the vast majority of people, Theo’s strengths and weaknesses are often just reflections of each other - a trait when taken to its extreme becomes a flaw. Passion and idealism can become an inability to focus on anything outside of your values, selflessness can be taken to rash lengths, a desire to protect those we love can result in us smothering them and restricting their own efforts to grow.

But at heart, what to keep in mind when trying to understand Theo boils down to two things: 1) he will give anything, and I do mean anything - up to and including his very life - in service of those people and things he cares about and 2) deep down he undervalues himself criminally, no matter how arrogant and full of swagger he seems on the surface. More than once he says he’s just a ‘regular man’ and nothing in comparison to the geniuses and great figures that fill the mansion.

When MC first interacts with Theo in his own route, she’s terrified of him. He’s gruff, intimidating and intense, and strong-arms her into a working partnership she has little to no interest in initially. But over time she begins to see him for what he really is, and how her first impression of him was so far off the mark. She falls in love with his enthusiasm, his enduring love for art, and his dedication to artistic expression and frankly that’s very relatable. Who hasn’t been swayed by witnessing someone else’s passion and activism? His example inspires her to find her own commitment to a cause and the determination to stand up for things she believes worth preserving, no matter the cost.

Later on in his route is when the revelation comes to light that for certain reasons, Theo feels intensely responsible for her presence in the mansion. Everything he does, both in his own route from the very start, and the hints we see in other people’s, points to his sense of obligation to her and his desire to protect her and be a support she can rely on.

Despite all his talk of her being the ‘dog’, it’s Theo who is the real dog - a guard dog, fiercely loyal and committed to those he loves and incredibly protective of them. He grills Arthur’s MC to be sure that she cares about his friend for the right reasons, he jumps to Vincent’s defense at the slightest provocation (the same way he has ever since they were children and he defended him from bullies), and he is ready and willing to sacrifice everything he’s known and valued to preserve MC’s happiness - going so far as to choose to travel to the future with her in one of his endings so that she doesn’t have to give up the things that are important to her for his sake.

One of the things I find fascinating about Theo is that unlike the vast majority of tsunderes, his ‘walls’ and his outwardly off-putting behavior aren’t the result of some traumatic experience. His special brand of asshole-ism isn’t a reaction but more a proactive, conscious choice - it’s a role he’s opted to mold himself into. In Theo’s route, Vincent confesses to MC that their parents favored Theo, and he believes Theo has always pushed himself to act the way that he has so that their parents would hate him and love Vincent more. It’s easy to see how this is a pattern that has extended itself into adulthood, with Theo ready, willing, and able to make himself the ‘devil’ to Vincent’s ‘angel’ if it makes Vincent look better by comparison.

That’s not to say that he doesn’t naturally struggle with being open emotionally, in the other grand tsundere tradition. Theo often is tripped up by the fact that he’s so very adept at reading other people (in his own route, he’s clearly aware of MC’s affection long before she tries to tell him, and says as much to Arthur) that it seems to him as if the way he feels should be obvious, without being stated. He’s a man of actions and to him, they hold far more weight than words ever could. He struggles to comprehend that MC especially needs vocal, concise affirmation of his feelings...but anytime his errors or flaws are pointed out to him he takes quick action to rectify them and reassure her of her importance to him, and that’s a consistent trait across his route and events.

And, important she is. Theo repeatedly expresses the sentiment that MC has saved him, or is his salvation (we’re keeping with the devil theme here clearly) - that he’d be damned without her. His second life is dead-set on a disastrous, tragic course when she comes crashing into it, and through nothing more than recognizing his good qualities and supporting his ideals she eventually proves to him that his life is worth something. That he is worth something. She gives him a new definition by which to value himself, and he is impossibly and eternally grateful to her for that.

As a couple, they come to find support and strength in each other, and truly realize that they can be and do far greater things together than apart. It’s refreshing to see an otome couple that goes through hell and comes out the other side not just lovers but partners in every best sense of the word, because that is what real lasting love is built on - not the chemistry and the passion of moments, but the enduring commitment to face the world and its hardships together and realizing that unified...there’s nothing that can you can’t conquer.

There’s a vast amount more I could unpack about Theo - the relationship between him and Vincent alone is complex and borderline toxic, as much as I adore it, and it deserves an entire essay as well. But in the interest of not completely spoiling his route I’m going to save that rambling for another time and place...although if anyone wants to discuss that or anything else I’d mentioned here, please feel free to hit me up anytime to chat. I’m always happy to blather about my favorite fang-faced asshole.

[communisticrevolution]

I wrote another essay about homoeroticism - this one’s on The Great Gatsby

I’m not sure if anyone cares about this because I can’t envision The Great Gatsby fandom being as desperate for such content as the Lord of the Flies one, but I hope that anyone who can be bothered to read enjoys it! Thank you for all the positive feedback, and check out The Great Gatsby if you haven’t already :))

-

Although on a purely superficial level, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is a blatantly obvious examination of the American Dream, the shallowness of the upper classes, and the underlying corruption and hedonism perpetually underpinning affluent 1920s society, an alternative and previously analysed reading of the novel lies partially below the surface, yet evident enough to possess a significant critical following. This theme is, undeniably, homoeroticism, perhaps hidden and coded implicitly within the text to disguise still criminalised components, but crucially important, particularly from the perspective of understanding Nick Carraway’s narration, and the nature of his conspicuous bias towards Jay Gatsby which skews his reliability significantly when recognised by the reader. Despite his proclamation at the end of Chapter 3 stating that his ‘cardinal virtue’ is that he is ‘one of the few honest people that I have (he has) ever known,’ from the beginning of his subjective account of events, his descriptions of others suggest that his statement of being ‘inclined to reserve all judgments’ on the first page is contradicted by his profiling of others, both physically and in regards to their personalities. This is almost relentless and lacking in exclusive scrutiny, offering an insight which appears to be detached, consequently lulling the reader into believing Carraway’s points surrounding his allegedly objectively accurate retelling of the summer – however, even before this, Nick admits the one major and vital fault of his perception, which is Gatsby. Even as it becomes clear to all parties that Gatsby is, in many ways, extremely morally flawed (he is an illegal bootlegger by profession, he is obsessive and somewhat manipulative of Daisy, he facilitates and encourages her infidelity, he is fixated on materialistic wealth, and he frequently lacks consideration for others if it ensures his ability to pursue his ambitions), to Nick, he represents ‘everything for which I have (he has) unaffected scorn.’ For our narrator, this character is symbolic of hope, success, and romance, and when the inherently decaying American Dream inevitably collapses, as exhibited by Gatsby’s murder towards the end of the plot, Nick’s portrayal in hindsight is not altered by Jay’s faults, but by his positive attributes. Prior to a genuine introduction with a scene involving the two, Nick writes that ‘there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life,’ and this permeates all. Regardless of whether or not the assumption is made that Nick is describing merely Gatsby’s metaphorical and figurative role in the story, it is clear since the book commences that his perception of the titular man could, in many ways, be interpreted as one of intense passion and attraction, far beyond the platonic relationships he has with other individuals, and later extending to him conveying the physical beauty that is highly appealing to him concerning Gatsby. Even Nick’s love interest, Jordan Baker, is not exempt from his reproval, and is, in fact, articulated to be ‘dishonest,’ with negative and emotionally lacklustre depictions that prompt questions surrounding the easily debatable strength and plausibility of his romantic interest in her.

One major scene that is consistently referenced and considered to be majorly indicative of Nick’s sexual orientation occurs very early on into the novel towards the end of Chapter 2 – it is incredibly subtle and often overlooked especially by first time readers due to the cryptic nature of its language and the seemingly comparatively unimportant series of events that ensue. In fact, one could argue that there is generally very little need to include such a scene, and thus contemplate why Fitzgerald decides to do so regardless. Usually, from a literary perspective, for something to be rendered worthy of inclusion, it must serve to develop plot, characters, or a specific setting and atmosphere in adherence to overriding themes, and the focus upon Nick, still as a relatively submissive bystander who is simultaneously immersed enough to offer a narrative insight, indicates that the only feasible value available must be revolving around his character development. The plot is not advanced as the occurrences are entirely overlooked and left with no true contextual repercussions, and the setting at this point is not focal nor enhanced with adjectives and figurative language that would suggest a distinct relationship between the whole surrounding set of dates and the West and East Egg regions which become recurring areas with allocated symbolic values, and ergo this being the reason.

Here, most notably, Fitzgerald must be attempting to prove or infer something about Nick Carraway, which I believe, largely due to substantial implicit evidence within the text, to be referring primarily to one of the many factors culminating to formulate his broad unreliability; a sense of sexual ambiguity, and the blatantly apparent evasion and withholding of information, but still without avoidance of the subject in its entirety, implied by the use of ellipses to signify both time passing and suppressed detailing of the true events. In regards to homoerotic subtext, this component potentially begins with the description of Mr McKee, the character that Nick purportedly has an affair with, as ‘pale’ and ‘feminine’ upon first encounter, two adjectives directly referencing a lack of masculinity and, in turn, the stereotype of effeminate fragility typically associated with homosexual men. His involvement in the ‘’artistic game’’ has, again, subtextual connotations with homosexual and, possibly to a lesser extent, bisexual males, as the following of artistic pursuits was perceived to be more traditionally feminine, and perhaps later adhering to forms of aestheticism and the almost synonymously analogous and prominent figure of Oscar Wilde, who was and still is renowned for both aesthetic and philosophical reasons and his historical persecution for gross indecency. With this evocation of Mr McKee in mind, suggesting his lack of conformity to societal norms through sexual deviation, at around 10 o’clock, Nick wipes ‘from his cheek the spot of dried lather’ that had ‘been bothering him’ over the course of the evening, a remarkably intimate gesture, and an otherwise broadly inexplicable fixation within the context of this man’s likely homosexuality. Later, Mr McKee proceeds to leave the room, and Nick follows without hesitation, implying almost a non-verbal communication which results in the scene in the elevator, laden with highly euphemistic linguistic choices. Mr McKee uses the command ‘Come to lunch with me some day’ in a manner reminiscent of an individual asking another out in a cryptically heteronormative tone, coupled with the pair ‘groaning’ down the elevator, a verb synonymous with overtly sexual onomatopoeia. Nick agrees, saying he’ll ‘be glad to,’ perhaps an admission to both the reader and Mr McKee that the feeling implied by the latter is to some extent reciprocated, indicating that Nick himself is not heterosexual. Just before this, a ‘lever’ is incorporated which Mr McKee is shunned for allegedly touching, seemingly a clear phallic symbol due to its vague resemblance of a penis, reinforcing the layers of homoerotism and the ambiance leading up to a romantic or sexual encounter involving the two characters that have distanced themselves from the overwhelming group, potentially a metaphor for the exclusion and separation of the LGBT community necessary for protection in an intolerant outside world. This scenario, abruptly led and finished with a series of ellipses, concludes with Nick, our narrator, ‘standing beside his (Mr McKee’s) bed,’ as Mr McKee is ‘sitting up between the sheets, clad in his underwear, with a great portfolio in his hands.’ Nick ends up at a train station waiting for the ‘four o’ clock train,’ leaving what truly happened with Mr McKee largely a mystery, but the aforementioned’s nakedness and the presence of a bed, as well as the feasibly metaphorical ‘portfolio,’ all indicate that a sexual encounter took place between the two, as little other explanation is given for the passing of six hours shown to have been almost exclusively in each other’s company. As always, Nick’s bystander-esque lack of involvement even in situations centring predominantly around him leaves room for plausible deniability; maybe the scene is exclusively a reflection on Mr McKee’s sexual orientation and subsequent moral perversion, or, more significantly, Nick’s willingness to go along with anything without reaffirming his own beliefs or desires, painting him as a fully submissive and detached narrator. Regardless, this relatively brief passage is undeniably dense in highly homoerotic content, portraying Nick largely as a closeted homosexual (or simply a heterosexual man who had a short and sexually intimate relationship with someone of the same gender, but this is far more difficult to believe in the surrounding circumstances), with this conveying an image of both and unreliable narrator and one who could conceivably be infatuated with the protagonist (Gatsby).

Nick’s relationship with Gatsby is vital throughout the novel, in both plot and in how Nick chooses and is capable of narrating a story focusing mainly upon the latter – one which is, evidently, biased invariably in his favour, even amidst ethical decay and his eventual death, which appears to influence Nick far more profoundly than the others, all of whom decide to abandon Gatsby by not attending his funeral as the book comes to a close. Despite the brevity of the period in which they interact and become extremely close, Nick organises the majority of Gatsby’s funeral, as previously mentioned, is loyal to him throughout with consistently lacking personal gain, offers him advice and support, and after his death, decides to write a memoir framing him in an overwhelmingly positive and complimentary manner, one which is likely far from the reality of his existence and impact upon others. Physically, Nick is evidently immensely attracted to Gatsby; when his love interest is given an unenthusiastic paragraph with phrases including ‘I enjoyed looking at her’ and emphasis upon her more masculine features and attributes (‘small-breasted,’ and ‘like a young cadet’), Gatsby’s intrigue is delivered impactfully, with several sentences dedicated to his smile alone, which is stated to have had ‘a quality of eternal reassurance in it.’ The last interaction between Nick and Jay consists of a long and emotional confession delivered by the latter, involving the true history of his origins, a story which he escapes explicitly mentioning, denies, and formulates lies to detract from right up until the end of the text, signifying that the bond established between both men may even be greater than the romanticised superficiality of Gatsby’s infatuation and fixation with Daisy. Whether or not Gatsby ever truly loved her is easy to speculate, with the most common theory being that he was simply enamoured with an idea that he had attached to her for his own sanity and aspirations – in a more uncommon homosexual reading of Gatsby, perhaps he ascribes an idea of the American Dream, wealth, success, and integration with the ‘old-money’ elite to her as a means of distracting from his real sexual and romantic interests, although this is admittedly far from substantiated. Nick finishes the dialogue with allegedly the ‘only compliment I (he) ever gave him,’ which is stated as written: ‘’They’re a rotten crowd,’ I shouted across the lawn. ‘You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.’ Gatsby responds to this with his ‘radiant and understanding smile,’ one glimpse of a world in which Nick’s love for him may have not been so apparently unrequited, and potentially a revelation into the growing mutuality of what could have been a romance in different circumstances. Nick’s description of Gatsby and his actions is close to being perpetually complimentary, and usually resumes to this position quickly when it falters, so this reinforces his unreliability and a degree of obliviousness to his own feelings and emotions, whilst simultaneously demonstrating to the reader what is already salient at most levels of observance – that Nick views Gatsby and his worth above all others, including his friend of many years, Tom, his cousin, Daisy, and his romantic interest, Jordan. This level of attraction and love is usually reserved to forms outside of what is known to be platonic, suggesting that what Nick feels for Gatsby also transcends friendship. In Tom and Nick’s last interaction, Tom states that Gatsby ‘threw dust into your (Nick’s) eyes just like he did in Daisy’s,’ conveying that he might himself have deemed Nick and Gatsby’s relationship to be of a similar nature to Daisy and Gatsby’s. Gatsby ‘throwing dust’ into her eyes was a way of performing a romantic illusion that caused her to fall in love with him, implying that Nick also fell in love with Gatsby as he became similarly enchanted by his hope, dedication, and beauty, leading into his romanticised retelling of the man himself.

Ultimately, I personally believe that homoeroticism is definitely existing and, at times, prevalent within The Great Gatsby, and that above all, it is critical to Nick’s characterisation and generating an acceptable explanation of his behaviour and actions, as well as his identity as a character. Many of his attributes, such as his submission and tendency to behave as a bystander in his own life and social interactions, could be found as possessing origins in both a desire to fit in as a social chameleon and avoid extreme scrutiny under the masculine ideal, and also in the repressed identity exhibited by a vast number of sexual minorities in communities and historical contexts of heightened intolerance, where it would be necessary for non-heterosexual individuals to conform to norms and avoid confrontation. In Chapter 7, as Nick remembers that it is his birthday, he reflects on ‘the promise of a decade of loneliness, a thinning list of single men to know,’ a poignant evaluation to finish this essay with – adhering to his consistent writing style and internal monologue, Nick focuses on men here, not women, avoiding the topic of getting a wife and settling down into the rhythm of 1920s America, and instead accentuating his declining list of opportunities in romantic prospects, as well as concentrating on the ‘promise of loneliness’ that homosexuality undoubtedly was prior to at the very least decriminalisation. He will remain incapable of finding love and fulfilment in the sense that others can with relative ease, and he will continue to restrict his personal identity and expression for safety in the aftermath of the death of arguably his only true friend (and genuine romantic interest), with even Gatsby failing to treat him with equal respect and admiration. Some argue that the true tragedy of The Great Gatsby lies in the story of unrequited love detailed by the narrator, and I would not fully dispute this; this great American novel is, on the surface, a story surrounding the corruption of the American Dream, capitalism, disillusionment, and the ethically abhorrent upper classes, but more obscurely, it could potentially be interpreted as an enlightened representation of closeted sexual identity, genuine love (not concerning Daisy and Gatsby), and unreliability in narration.

[ofelvie]

joe keery. cis male. he/him.  ／  elvie croft just pulled up blasting spooky boy by danny gonzalez  — that song is so them ! you know, for a twenty - four year old youtuber, i’ve heard they’re really scatterbrained, but that they make up for it by being so loyal. if i had to choose three things to describe them, i’d probably say 80s horror, buckets of halloween candy, and blurry photographs of mysterious figures in the woods. here’s to hoping they don’t cause too much trouble ! ( sam, 23, est, she/her )

hey there demons! *ba dum tss* my name is sam and i’ll be writing elvie, a brilliant harvard law graduate who threw away any shred of credibility he ever had in order to make silly videos on the internet. more info under the cut. feel free to message me if you would like to plot!

i. stats

𝖋𝖚𝖑𝖑 𝖓𝖆𝖒𝖊: elvin tupelo croft

𝖕𝖗𝖊𝖋𝖊𝖗𝖗𝖊𝖉 𝖓𝖆𝖒𝖊𝖘: el, elvie, the ghost guy

𝖍𝖔𝖒𝖊𝖙𝖔𝖜𝖓: salem, massachusetts 

𝖉𝖆𝖙𝖊 𝖔𝖋 𝖇𝖎𝖗𝖙𝖍: october 31, 1995

𝖟𝖔𝖉𝖎𝖆𝖈: scorpio

𝖔𝖗𝖎𝖊𝖓𝖙𝖆𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓: demisexual

𝖔𝖈𝖈𝖚𝖕𝖆𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓: lawyer youtuber

𝖕𝖔𝖘. 𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖎𝖙𝖘: loyal, open - minded, exuberant.

𝖓𝖊𝖌. 𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖎𝖙𝖘: scatterbrained, obstreperous, impulsive.

𝖎𝖓𝖘𝖕𝖎𝖗𝖊𝖉 𝖇𝖞: shawn spencer, psych ; fox mulder, the x files ; stiles stilinski, teen wolf.

ii. history

elvin tupelo “elvie” croft was born in salem, massachusetts ( yes, really ) on halloween day ( yes, really ). an only child, his father is the district attorney for essex county, massachusetts while his mother owns a store in town that sells witchcraft supplies such as crystals, herbs, grimiores, etc. fun fact: she’s the descendant of an accused witch, meaning that elvie is as well.

as it turns out, beneath of the surface of the few tourist attractions that it has to offer, salem has a small town, stuck in the past vibe. it’s the sort of place where everyone knows everyone all their lives because no one ever leaves and no one ever moves in. he grew up in this...eccentric...environment, living in the same house all his life and only ever leaving to visit his grandparents in boston. 

he was five years old when he saw his first horror movie ( an apathetic teenage babysitter let him stay up long past his bedtime to watch nightmare on elm street ) and from that moment on he was HOOKED.

when he started school, two things about him became apparent: 1) he was highly intelligent and 2) he struggled greatly with tasks such as sitting still and staying focused. he was tested, and it turns out that he has a through the roof genius level iq and he also has adhd, which he was put on a few different medications for until something finally seemed to work for him.

he could have been one of those child prodigies who finished high school at the age of ten and then college at the age of fourteen, BUT his parents decided that they didn’t want him to miss out on the experience of going through school with people his own age.

as the smartest kid in class with glasses and braces and an insatiable obsession with all things horror and halloween, he…was picked on. mercilessly.

so, he didn’t really have any friends...............................at all.................................but he didn’t mind. he was perfectly content to go right home after school and spend the rest of the day reading comic books or watching horror movies or researching local urban legends and paranormal stories.

he started his youtube channel when he was a teenager and it was…trash honestly. it was basically buzzfeed unsolved if buzzfeed unsolved consisted of one ( 1 ) dorky teenager yelling at the air in the middle of abandoned house at 3am, but it turned out that people found it entertaining. his first few videos were flops, but he would soon start amassing subscribers in the hundreds, then thousands, then hundreds of thousands.

so, when he got to his senior year of high school, he was a shoe - in to be named class valedictorian ( he was ) and he was even getting ivy league offers. at the same time, his youtube channel was starting to gain momentum. his parents mainly his father were really pushing him to attend college and elvie, genius level iq and all…didn’t want to go. he wanted to focus on his youtube channel, but his dad was absolutely not having it.

he attended harvard for both his pre law and law school studies, breezed through classes, graduated with honors at the top of his class and once he passed the bar exam there were countless job offers waiting for him. elvie ignored them all and moved to los angeles so that he could finally focus on his youtube channel.

it’s been almost two years since he moved and he likes it in california!

iii. extras

his name is elvin but basically no one ever calls him that. his own parents don’t even particularly like the name. long story. most people call him elvie and some who are super close to him just call him el.

while he is the “ryan” aka the believer of his youtube series, he’s definitely NOT a scaredy cat like ryan the poor guy. in fact, all his life there’s been this running joke that HE DOESN’T SEEM TO BE SCARED OF ANYTHING, and who knows? maybe he isn’t.

has the most cartoonishly exaggerated boston accent that one could ever hope to hear, except he doesn’t seem to realize it at all. 

10/31 blaze it he’s a HUGE stoner.

he’s got jokes. stay vigilant.

he’s OBSESSED with all things horror, halloween, and 80s. he makes a lot of film references that are often so obscure that most people don’t even catch them.

he is legally permitted to practice law in the states of massachusetts and california, so basically: he’s a lawyer! however, this is not at all common knowledge because...

most people don’t know how smart he actually is because he intentionally plays dumb and he’s really good at it. being high all the time and his natural chaotic energy is quite helpful in hiding his intelligence. he just doesn’t like to be seen as smart, so the whole once - brilliant law student thing? not common knowledge whatsoever. he tries not to mention the college he attended by name at all, but if he has to then he lies and says that he went to salem state.

and yes, he has SO MUCH chaotic energy. he’s the kind of person who will stick a fork in his microwave just to see what would happen out of sheer boredom. he has two pet mexican redknee tarantulas that probably aren’t even allowed on campus named freddy and jason who he just…fucking loses track of every other day. his favorite drink is literally black coffee mixed together with a can of monster energy and 5 ( f i v e ) teaspoons of sugar. he is c h a o s. he has absolutely NO IMPULSE CONTROL whatsoever. 

he has slight Daddy Issues™. slight. when he was born, his dad was hoping that he would get a star athlete kid who would go on to follow in his footsteps and one day become a successful, respectable lawyer but instead he got…elvie. he’s never outright said that he’s disappointed but he didn’t need to. elvie’s a really difficult person to rattle but every time, without fail, he ends a phone call with his dad and he’s in a bad mood for the rest of the day. 

his car is this PIECE OF JUNK giant turquoise van that he painted to look like the mystery machine. her name is laurie strode.

even though he makes constant pop culture references about horror movies and the 80s, but outside of those areas he’s completely clueless about pop culture. like, he can recite the entire scripts of the shining and empire strikes back and ferris bueller’s day off word for word, but if someone tried to talk to him about the new post malone song or the latest marvel movie he would just stare blankly.

he has a HUGE sweet tooth. his favorite food is halloween candy and his favorite candy is black licorice disgusting i know.

he takes adderall for his adhd and he’s usually good about keeping up with it. started keeping them on his person in college because he realized that his meds were getting stolen and it’s a habit he's held onto that doesn’t really keep his shit from getting stolen.

.he’s good at…A LOT of things because he’s a really fast learner. he can play the guitar, he can draw, he did drama in high school. he just has to watch someone do something once and then he can usually immediately do it himself. this skill doesn’t extend to physical activities such as sports, however. he’s terrible at those.

he’s basically a cartoon character

iv. wanted connections

friends

cousin  ( their grandparents would probably be from boston but otherwise anything really goes for this )

his weed dealer lmao

smoking buddies

people who don’t like him / find him annoying

has stolen his adderall

maybe someone who knows how smart he really is

exes and flings

( these are just ideas and i’m trash at coming up with these, so please don’t feel limited by what’s listed here. )

[cupofcowboys]

Can I request that while charles is out hunting, he encounters witch/reader who is very lonely and looking for something to live for in life so he takes her back to the gang?

I really loved this concept so much, and I had a ton of fun writing it! I apologise that it took me a long time. I’m a slow writer at the best of times and I had a busy week. I hope it was worth the wait!

I went for a ‘realistic’ rendition of a witch, rather than fantastical. It’s my first time writing this so I’m kinda nervous lol. Enjoy!

TAGS: Minor Spoilers (Ch3), Femme Witch!Reader, SFW, Friendship, Romantic Friendship, Slight Angst, Witchcraft

TW: Depressive thoughts 

2,278 Words

-♥-

Wild rumours ran rampant throughout small towns. Yet Charles had never encountered a rumour quite so prolific as the “cursed woods”. Any traveller shuddered at the mere mention of its name, too afraid to recount the supposed horrors it held. From the little he could gather it was believed a terrible creature roamed the woods, slaughtering anyone who dared tread in its territory.

Pure superstition, he believed. If anything, it would turn out to be a particularly beastly bear or a cougar. Even so, he couldn’t deny that something felt off about these woods.

The air itself seemed to hum with energy. Whether benign or dangerous, he couldn’t tell. Whatever it was, it set him on edge. Constantly checking behind his back, half-convinced something was following him, lurking just out of sight. He shook off the feeling. Pure placebo stemming from campfire horror stories.

He had been tracking a small herd of deer for some time now. One of them had a beautiful pelt, but a mutilated leg. Putting it out of its misery would earn him a few dollars and fill bellies at camp. Crouching low, he stalked, pausing only to check if he was still on track. He hardly noticed the deathly silence pressing in around him.

That was until he felt a tug and snap on his navel. Glancing down, he half expected to see a tripwire. Yet there was nothing but air. He hesitated, the skin on his neck crawling as minute hairs stood on end. A distinct feeling of being caught in a trap crept upon him. Just as he considered turning tail and running, an uncharacteristic desire, his attention was diverted again. A door creaked open just beyond a clump of bushes ahead of him. Swallowing, he shifted behind a thick trunk to his left, concealing himself from view.

The soft patter of bare feet on grass grew louder as someone approached. Charles drew an arrow from his quiver, nocking it and tracing the feathers absently as he focused.

A shadow of a figure hit the forest floor beside him, and he leaped out from behind his hiding spot. Aiming straight at the figure, ready to release at a moment’s notice. He almost released the arrow from shock.

A woman unlike any other jumped in surprise at his appearance, clasping a hand to her chest. Her hair was loose and unkempt, her dress several years out of fashion and patched with a myriad of mismatched fabrics.

“Oh my, sir!” She breathed hard, chuckling good-naturedly. “You didn’t half give me a fright, jumpin’ out like that!”

It took Charles a moment to lower his bow slightly, still unnerved by this unusual person.

“You frightened me, too.” He explained, eyeballing her nervously.

“Well, it happens. Not many folks in these parts.”

You gazed at the curious stranger who had disturbed your wards. Many a year it had been since anyone came to visit. You had almost forgotten what other people looked like. Witches were rarely accepted into society. The last time a stranger found you, they had run away in terror at the sight of your powers. Isolation was a natural part of the cards fate had drawn for you. Now that the opportunity presented itself, you weren’t about to reject a guest. Especially not such a handsome one.

“Why don’t you put that away.” You suggested, gesturing to the bow in his grip. “I just brewed a pot of tea and there’s enough for two. I’m (full name), by the way.”

“Charles Smith.”

“A pleasure, Mister Smith.”

With a short incline of your head, you turned heel and made your way to your cabin. After a brief pause, the sound of heavy boots told you he had complied.

The cabin you called home was small. Barely larger than a single room in a normal house, it was easy to miss in the trees. Mostyour domicile was outdoors. An expansive garden was your pride and joy. Full of herbs, vegetables, and flowers. Each one held a use and more value than any could fathom. Your carefully placed wards were a preventative measure on the wildlife, who loved to snack on your hard work. But they were handy for alerting you to intruders too. Pushing the door open, you stepped into the cluttered mess you lived in. A prickling of embarrassment rushed to your face. Years of not expecting company enabled bad habits.

Aside from the roaring fireplace, all had was a single bed, dining table, a few chairs and a kitchen. Most of it was lost under tomes, handmade charms, unfinished projects, and trinkets. Humble and messy, but home.

“Sorry for the mess. You’re my first guest in… years!” You laughed, busying yourself with your aged teapot.

When he did not respond, you glanced over to find his eyes sliding over your domicile. You could practically hear him piecing together what you were. While you made a show of pouring tea into old, chipped cups, you were on the alert. If he turned into a threat, you were ready.

It was only at the sound of your chair scraping that he snapped out of it. Turning around, he stared at your unassuming frame, gesturing at the cup balanced on a book about birds. He reached forward and took it, but did not move to sit. His dark eyes followed your every movement like a bird of prey. Bringing the tea to your lips, you took a small sip and watched as he mirrored it. However, he sniffed the liquid suspiciously.

“It’s chamomile.” You smiled. “I usually add honey but I ran out.”

He took a small sip of the liquid and withdrew his hand. His eyes bored into yours, half-suspicious and half-curious. All you could do was smile back benignly.

“You live out here alone?” He questioned.

“Just me and the wilderness.”

“I see.”

“Are you a dangerous man, Mr Smith?”

“Maybe.”

Together you stared at each other, gauging and judging. A silent game of chess. But you were a better judge. Honing into the aura he possessed; light and darkness danced together, a haze of grey smoke from a burning fire. Hatred turned him into a fighter. Battles fought only when necessary.

“I don’t think so.” You shook your head, smiling. “You’re just the same as I am. Good people hated for what we can’t change.”

His eyes widened at your words, darting across your features in search of lies or malice. All he found was a genuine desire for connection. His shoulders relaxed, and he tugged the vacant chair towards him, dropping into it and lounging backwards.

“I guess so.”

Swirling the tea leaves in the bottom of your cup before taking a hearty gulp, you grinned. Now the tension was gone, you marvelled at the opportunity. How long had it been since you made a friend?

“So, what brings you to my little patch of woods?”

–-

Hours of conversation pass by without alerting either of you. Charles turned out to be a man of few but well-placed and educated words. Admittedly, the conversation consisted primarily of your ramblings and gushing. Years of pent up news, opinions and ideas rushed out with minimal prompting from your guest. At first, you felt nervous of irritating him, but he proved to be a thoughtful and inquisitive listener. Your openness and honesty provided him the courage to open up in turn. So, by the time your tummies began to rumble, you knew each other quite well.

After polishing off several helpings of your stew, Charles rose from his seat. You had forgotten just how tall he was.

“I have to go…” He began to explain, giving you a look that plainly told you he wished he didn’t.

“Of course! It’s nearly nightfall.”

“Thank you for the food and conversation.”

“It’s been a pleasure, Mr Smith.”

You stood and extended your hand out for him to shake. Taking it in his, he shook it gently and exchanged warm smiles. There was a single moment of hesitation before his hand left yours. He moved to the door and was pushing it open when you gasped.

He turned to you curiously, but you were busy rifling through the clutter. Scrabbling through years of untidiness, you finally found what you were looking for. Grinning, you hurried over to the man.

“Here.” You held a closed hand out to him. “Take this. For protection.”

Charles reached forward slowly, and you dropped a small trinket into his hands. A protective charm you’d made some months ago. He looked down at the object, thumbing it around curiously. Then, looking up at you with a smile that sent butterflies to your stomach, he spoke;

“Thank you. I will treasure it.”

You were still staring after him in embarrassed bewilderment when he whistled for his horse. Standing in the door as he mounted, you watched as he cantered off into the trees, a salute in your direction his final goodbye.

Wandering back into your home, you spotted Charles’ empty cup. Smiling, you picked it up. Gazing down into the scattered leaves, you began to read the shapes within. Hints to the future filled your heart with warmth you’d never dared feel or hope for.

–-

The coming months brought return visits from Charles, always staying longer than he intended. More than once he pitched a tent outside and stayed overnight, much to your delight. Loneliness, once an intimate friend, became a foreign entity. A relationship of trust grew as you revealed more of yourselves to each other. He knew the truth of your identity and you knew his. You were unsurprised to hear about his gang. The life of an outlaw had its tells, even to you. Yet if he had a choice, you knew he would never choose it. Just as you wouldn’t have chosen a life of isolation. This simple understanding was the foundation of your friendship. Never judging, always kind.

And yet… there was more. A spark that kindled into a flame. A quiet, subtle sort of shift. In his absences, you spent many hours mulling it over. Before Charles, your life had been empty. Void of any light and purpose. It sounds ridiculous to your own ears. The idea that men gave women purpose angered and frustrated you, it wasn’t an ideology you welcomed or embraced. But if Charles were a woman, it would be the same. Years without human interaction took its toll. Nights spent wondering if it would even matter if you were gone.

There was no one to mourn you. No one to notice. Just the forest. If it wasn’t for your will to live, you may have given up.

So when Charles failed to visit for almost a month, you began to lose hope again. The only person you had to share your life with was absent. Not a word came. Not since he’d promised to “see you again soon” and vanished. Part of you knew that he was prevented from visiting, but there was a darker part. A part that wanted to convince you he just didn’t like you. Or he was dead. You couldn’t decide which was worse.

As time slipped by, each day the same as the last, you found yourself devoid of light. Hope dwindled away and distractions proved ineffective. Too many hours spent staring off into space, wondering at the fate of your friend.

That was where you found yourself now. Sprawled on your back, staring up at the vast blue sky, listening to the sounds of the forest. A book lay by your head, forgotten. Slowly, your eyes began to droop. The summer heat and idleness a blanket pressing down upon you. Darkness fell and you knew no more.

“(Y/N)?”

“Mm?”

“Are you okay?”

You opened your eyes. A pair of dark, muddy boots were inches from your face. With a cry, you recoiled and looked up in shock. There he was. The man you had been dreaming of. Staring down at you with mild concern was Charles. Jumping to your feet, you hugged him tightly.

“Oh, Charles!” You exclaimed, pulling away to beam at him. “I thought you had forgotten about me!”

“Never.” He affirmed, taking your hand in his.

“Wh-Where did you go?”

“We had to move. I was afraid to bring you trouble, so I stayed away.”

“I appreciate it but… I missed you so much. It’s… lonely out here. I never noticed it before, but now… it’s unbearable! I can’t stand it!!” You detached yourself from him. “All this time I’ve been trying to hide it but… I… I just wait for you to visit. It’s the only thing that makes me happy. I’m sorry… I shouldn’t tell you all this.”

You turned away. Shame and embarrassment throbbed in your heart. It was one thing to think it all privately and another to dump it on his shoulders. He had no responsibility to keep your happy. No responsibility even to visit. But as you turned to apologise, he took your hand again.

Pulling you closer to him, he looked into your eyes. Matching his gaze, you could tell he was considering something.

“Come with me.” He muttered.

“What?”

“I said, come with me. It’s not an easy life but… if you joined the gang you would be safer.”

“Y-You mean become an outlaw… like you?”

“No. Not an outlaw… there are women. They help in other ways.”

You stared. Out of all the suggestions you had expected, none of them were this. But now you thought about it, why shouldn’t you join?

After all, the world already hated you.

“I think… I’d like that, Charles.”

-♥-

My Masterlist

AO3

[evien-stark]

✧I Need You✧ Chapter 82 [End: Iron Man 3]

In his continuing questioning of the machinations of the universe, when tasked with where to run off to to be alone for a little while, of course Tony chose Switzerland. He told you this only after the jet was in flight, which was probably your fault. Maybe you should have checked up on the plans or even thought to ask before just boarding a plane and taking off with him. The problem was you trusted him. ...maybe that wasn’t such a terrible problem to have. 

But as he told you the two of you were headed for St. Moritz- Badrutt’s Palace, in fact- you couldn’t help the little lift of your brows. “After all this, I thought you’d never wanna go to Switzerland ever again.” God forbid he pissed off anyone else over there, who knew how that would end? 

He was all grins, hands moving over the table top holoprojector, getting some work in while you were still in flight. That was fair game, apparently. You chose not to bother him about it. “Let’s see what other chaos we can attract while we’re hamming it up in the Hitchcock suite and all alone in the spa. I’ll make sure to tip the staff double, just in case.” 

While he was being his usual sassy, sarcastic self, you appreciated him laying it out there- which was the reason he was talking about it like that in the first place. Basically letting you know that he’d probably emptied out the place, and the two of you could rest, relax, and be alone for a little while. Which was really the important thing here. ...along with him double tipping the staff so he didn’t piss anyone off. Couldn’t take those chances. 

The other…? Showing off. But you had long stopped minding that. 

“Here, by the way…” His head was down as he spoke, startling your attention away from the laptop in your lap. It had been quiet in the cabin for more than fifteen minutes, so he must’ve remembered something important. 

But when you looked at what he was sliding your way after fishing from his pocket, you could only tilt your head. “We expecting something serious to happen on this vacation?” A brand new Heart Reactor. Polished. Definitely upgraded. The design was a bit less blocky, a little more obvious this time around. You understood the inner workings were probably also upgraded. But still. It was beautiful in its simplicity, just like the last one. Silver with blue finishing. 

“No, I just finished it before we boarded. Wanted to make sure it made its way to you.” Parts of you were slightly unsure if this was true or not. But… 

You picked it up anyway, and twisted sideways to reach for your bag. No longer really threatened or terrified of its presence- if you were ever. There had been some apprehension- as if wearing it was the reason trouble was always finding you, but… that was a moment for therapy, you supposed. “Thank you.” After securing it in your bag, you reached over to gingerly place your hand over his leg with a soft squeeze.

There was no way to signal your gratitude, really. Even in your earlier feelings brought on by the Battle of New York, you had known one thing to be true. When Killian had destroyed it, you’d felt a deep sense of sorrow. Tony had worked hard on that. For you. To protect you. To keep you safe. It was his own small peace of mind as it had- or should have been- yours. To have it again… you supposed both of you were feeling better. 

Although… “Are you revising the earrings?” You missed those, too. Even though it wasn’t like you couldn’t reach LUNA whenever you wanted- and had in fact spoken with her several times. Same as JARVIS. Good thing about an AI program was it was sort of just wherever you put it- except for the weirdly specific times when Tony hogged JARVIS and you had no access to him at all. Like. When the house blew up. 

Oh well. Better not dwell on it. 

His smile was telling then, as he zipped his finger through the air, over whatever it was he’d been working on, sending the image of 3D holographic schematics spinning until it stopped, facing you. He was reworking the visor’s design, it looked like. You weren’t quite sure what to feel about the mock-up image of your face smiling- slightly pixelated and blue. Probably better not to ask, but you couldn’t help it. “You have a full design of me?” 

“I took scans of you, in case you don’t remember.” Ah, that was true, wasn’t it? The first time he’d introduced you to the glasses, if you remembered correctly. ...did that make you feel better? Not quite sure. “But. Not to worry. I only use them in a completely professional capacity.” 

“I wasn’t even going to ask.” 

“Well then let’s pretend like I didn’t say it.” 

At this, the two of you could only share similar wry smiles at each other, and you stowed your laptop away so that you could tuck your feet up on the couch and lay your head on his shoulder. Vacation was already doing the both of you a world of good. 

                                                 -----

Landing was smooth, as always, and you made sure to give Happy an extra squeezy hug on the tarmac. He promised to be back in a week to get you, because of course he did, even though he didn’t have to. Tony had opted to be without “security” for this little quiet vacation, and although you could tell that made Happy a little… unhappy, he seemed to understand. 

This was meant just for the two of you. The press hadn’t even gotten wind of it. Which was great, but the longer you were out in the open, the higher the chance people started finding out was. It was why you and Tony hopped into the car he’d rented (all gassed up and ready on the runway) and made good time to the hotel. The staff was not only well-tipped, as per Tony’s good thinking, but triply so, to make it worth their while not to spill your secrets. 

There were only one or two other couples around in the other suites, and both you and Tony kept your heads down as you let yourselves into your room. While it hadn’t been immediately clear why Tony cared so much about having the Hitchcock suite, unless that was something new you had yet to learn about him (a love of Hitchcock thrillers?), it became more so once you stepped inside. The interior was darker than most of the other rooms you’d spied passing by. More roomy. More lived in. Made sense, if it were true that the man himself had spent extended stays there. 

After walking through the the lavish front room, and the somehow even more lavish living room, you found the master bedroom, which you promptly flopped on and spread out over after dropping your bags. “You know-” Calling out to Tony, who had disappeared into the bathroom, sink water running quietly, “-for all we do in hotels, we could easily just get a regular room. And spend less money.” As if money was really a concern to a man who had billions of it. 

But… still. You couldn’t help but tease just a little. Especially considering you believed yourself absolutely correct. Really all the two of you did consisted of relaxing on a bed, if you weren’t out and about. 

“For all you worry about PR sometimes…” His voice came out in a sigh that you could hear a grin through. 

“It’s economical!” Protesting dramatically. “That’s a headline. Stark Conscious of His Resources.” 

“You know it’d be more like- Stark Going Broke? Besides…” You saw him shaking water from his hands as he came out of the bathroom, leaning his arm against the door after. Probably posing. You didn’t mind it. “Top floors bring more security.” He came closer until he was just at the foot of the bed, and then climbed up and over you. “Less eyes…” His were currently watching yours, as his hands fell just at the sides of your head, holding himself up above you. “More…” Leaning down, his nose brushed yours, and his grin somehow spilled to your lips. “...sound proofing?” 

Giggles escaped you purely without your permission. There would just always be something about Tony’s boyish charm that tickled you. Your hands rose, gingerly brushing up his chest. “What do we need sound proofing for?” 

“Well- out of the two of us- and I’m not complaining- you-” 

Immediately you pushed your hand to his mouth. “That’s enough.” 

His brow arched and you felt his lips curve against your palm. Removing it might have been unwise, but you flicked a few of his bangs as you did so. “I think it’s not even close to enough.” His warm bubbly laughter mixed with your own as he slid his forearms on the bed, easing down to kiss you. 

Less than a half hour in Switzerland. The sights were lovely. The hotel was grand. But as always. The two of you were far more interested in each other. 

                                              -----

Choosing to sneak down to the spa’s indoor pool at night was a smarter move, you thought, than having Tony just pay staff to close it off. People tended to get nosey if they thought something was happening, either good or bad. You still had a sneaking suspicion he was paying staff to hang around to keep people out, though, even though it was late enough to not have to worry about it. Going for a swim wasn’t really on your tippy-top list of priorities, but it was one of the notable features of the hotel Tony had picked, so… in some sense you were a little required to check it out. 

It was rather gorgeous, with floor to ceiling windows that showcased the beautiful snowy landscape beyond and the beautifully bright starry-speckled sky. There was some sort of waterfall feature, and a fireplace roaring quietly just off to the side. Quite a lovely little picturesque place. Not to mention to huge pool that was really too big for just two people to be spending time in it. But… life was a luxury sometimes, and while you were here, it’d be silly not to heed it. Or pretend you didn’t enjoy it. 

The water was heated too, which was nice, as you noticed a little opening in the pool that led outside to some steaming water. “What’d’you think? Too cold?” To trek outside, you knew he meant, just as you two had gotten to shoulder level and relaxing. 

“There’s still snow on the ground. So.” If that wasn’t an answer to his question, what else might be? 

“The water’s heated.” Already you knew he was planning to go. Maybe with or without you. As often the case when he got a little idea in his big brain. “I bet the view’s nicer…” 

“If I get sick-” 

“I will nurse you back to health with only the utmost tender care.” 

“You could also get sick-” Which would be a terrible thing, right after surgery, no doubt. But you noticed he was already lightly swimming his way over- and you also noticed you were doing the same. Following him. As always. 

“Cold doesn’t bother me.” 

“You say that now.” 

“I say that always.” 

“I’ve certainly never heard you say it before.” 

“We live in California.” 

The two of you pretend-bickered your way under the arch of the windows and out into the cold you were play-fighting about. Although it smacked you rather intensely, you were able to shirk down neck-deep into the hot water, leaning against one of the walls. Casting your head up, you had to agree- 

“The view is nice.” 

“Nicer.” He came up behind you, wrapping his arms around your shoulder from behind, the both of you looking up into the starry beyond. It was nicer, yes, even more so than your current semi-permanent locale. In New York it was impossible to see more than a few errant dots. Not like here. Where the whole sky was lit up. 

There was a subtle slip in the silence. You felt part of him just… drift. In almost inexplicable feeling. And one impossible to describe to him. It just felt like part of him was fading off somewhere into the distance. Casting a glance back, “You okay?” Breaking the silence wasn’t all too pleasant. 

“Hm?” A bare hum of thought, seeming to not really register that you’d spoken to him, much less asked a question. His eyes turned down from the sky to meet yours. “You say something?” 

“I asked if you were okay.” Something was off. Hard to tell what. 

“I’m fine.” It came out of him so quick that you immediately knew he was lying. He must have knew that you knew, because a soft sense of guilt permeated out from him. A similar look after that. “I- ...I’m not not fine. Just. Thinking.” Being a little more honest with you. 

You rewarded the notion by sinking further back into him. “Tell me.” Hoping he was okay enough, now, to open up. But that was selfish, and perhaps foolish, too. He hadn’t started therapy yet, and maybe he wasn’t. Maybe you were lulled by the false sense of everything being okay because you’d only just gotten out of a big mess, he was healing- physically- and vacations tended to do that. 

A much longer silence went on, and you let it. Deciding not to drill him for answers, it wouldn’t do any good. Eventually he moved to sit on one of the underwater ledges, bringing you with him, arms around your middle from behind as you sat in his lap. You tried to stay mostly under the water to keep warm. But both of you were, once more, fixated on the sky. He was seeing something else up there. You already knew. 

“I’m sorry.” He said finally, which made your heart squeeze with hurt immediately. “We’re thousands of miles away and I just can’t stop thinking about it.” 

“You don’t have to apologize.” Soft as you could, trying to impart to him that it was okay. It was okay to still be there, mentally. It was okay to not be okay. “What is it?” It being the thing that was torturing him, still, but that you couldn’t quite grasp yet. 

He drew a breath in, and then let it out, crisping in the air as he did. “Intelligent life being out there had never been a farfetched theory. It’s incredibly short sighted to think this planet is the only one that can sustain life- any life. I just hadn’t- ...it was never a priority thought. I was busy worrying about other things. And… sometimes not even important stuff.” Nothing you could fault him for, and certainly not things he should be faulting himself for, either. Life just wasn’t that simple. “But something came here. With malicious intent. And I saw it. Up there. If it’s not Thor and it’s not Loki- and it’s not- what we fought…

It’ll be something else.” His voice drew so much quieter then, “You heard what Thor said. Back on the helicarrier. We signaled something. Maybe… maybe everything. You can’t unbake a cake. You can only stand back and look at what you made. And make improvements. ...for next time.” 

Because there would be a next time he was saying. Inevitably, because of SHIELD or whoever- because of the Battle of New York, because of Loki- and maybe even because of Thor- the blame really didn’t matter anymore. It just didn’t. What was done was done. And now there was only… next time. 

“It doesn’t have to be you.” The thought left you without much actual thinking behind it. Because you were protesting. You were begging, even without the tone behind it. Trying to beg him to understand it didn’t have to be him. It didn’t have to be him that stayed up late at night, worrying about what was coming, or when. It wasn’t his job to protect the entire earth. That wasn’t right- it wasn’t fair- it- 

“You know I’m not gonna be able to stop thinking about this.” His arms squeezed you just a little bit tighter. “And maybe it doesn’t have to be me. But. If I have the means to try and stop this- or… at least try to defend us… and I turn my back… inaction- especially when I know I can do something- is tantamount to letting it happen.”

Damn him. Damn him and his growth and his… his being right about this. Was it even possible anymore? For him- or just both of you, to turn your backs on something you knew wasn’t right? To not do the most you could to try and help? Wasn’t that why you’d allowed yourselves to be absorbed by SHIELD for the Avengers? Wasn’t that why you’d taken the Department of Damage Control? To just… to try and do right, where you could… 

Tony saw something. And he was fearing the worst now. Had been for a long while. And would, still, no matter what therapists he talked to. You knew that now. 

You wanted to continue to protest. To say- but we don’t even know if anything else is coming. Or maybe- but we don’t know if everything else coming is bad. But you knew none of that mattered. A single thing had rained down on New York, had threatened literal global subjugation and destruction. It wasn’t even remotely possible that out of the entire galaxy, unmapped by man, no telling how huge it actually was- 

It wasn’t possible that those things, that Loki, were the only things that either knew of Earth- or would learn about it- and that would decide to try and snuff it out. Mathematically, statistically… impossible. Which was why… 

“So what do you think we should do?” Trying to not-so-subtly remind him he wasn’t on solo missions anymore. That he didn’t have to be. You were there. And the two of you were a team. No matter what. 

“I don’t know yet.” Painfully honest with you. “I don’t know… but when I figure it out… you’re the first to know.” 

 Another small silence as you snuggled closer to him, half wrapping an arm around him, resting your head in the crook of his shoulder. Finally, as it occurred to you, “...no nuking space, though.”

 Your levity was rewarded as he laughed softly. “No. No nuking space. ...again, anyway. I think I like your thing. Defense. I think I’ll look into that instead.”

                                                   ----

The vacation wasn’t ruined after that, but it had taken a somewhat … not somber but… quieter turn. Giggly lust-filled afternoons were replaced by just being with one another. Alone. Talking. Sometimes not. Just spending time together. And that was enough. It was enough for now. 

You had Happy fly you back to California first, so that you could pick up what remained from the site as the authorities were calling it. Your home. Gone. At some point the two of you would have to decide if you were going to have another. Improbable that you would- ...you hoped. Because you didn’t want to just live in the Tower forever. It was nice now, but not a permanent thing. No matter how nice it was. 

You wanted a home with Tony. Somewhere that was only for the two of you. Maybe not something as lavish as the Malibu Mansion had been- and that had been solely his, anyway. He’d planned it and built it. The two of you, you hoped, one day, would sit down and make a home of your own. For now… 

Even though it hadn’t been yours, it was still tough to sift through ash and rubble. Tony seemed extremely (though silently) pleased to find DUM-E waiting for him on the curb. Along with several laboratory knicknacks. Tools that he could just buy again and other things that… probably had some sentimental value to him. Unlike him, you were going to have to start anew. While some of his things had been safe in a deeper level of the house, anything you’d bought was probably sitting at the bottom of the ocean now. 

It was fine. A fresh start… that could be good. And even if it wasn’t, you had to make the best of it, whether you wanted to or not. 

After pulling the little recovery cart to the back of the car and hitching it, ready to drive back to the airport to go… home, to New York, you waited. Tony was standing just at the edge of the cliffside, staring off into the ocean. There was one more thing he wanted to do. It had been an unspoken request. He hadn’t made an effort to necessarily hide that he’d brought along his old Arc Reactor- recovered from his chest during surgery, but the two of you hadn’t spoken about it. You’d thought maybe he was going to use it, or something… for when he was working on his tablet during flight. 

But instead now, he was holding it. And immediately you knew. 

He was saying goodbye, too. At least he was trying. But he stood there, a long, long time. So long you thought about going to him. But… this one was not meant for you. So you waited patiently. Waited for him to make peace with it. 

Eventually, as a soft breeze kicked up, he did. Lifting his arm up and over his head, he tossed the Arc out into the ocean, and then stood there watching the sunset a few seconds more before turning, hands in his pockets. His smile when he lifted his head and spotted you looked like he was somehow surprised to see you standing there, but happy. 

Happy to see you. Happy you were there. 

You held a hand out, and as he walked closer, he reached back out, closing his over yours, lifting upwards to press a kiss to the back. Your smile then seemed just as hard to hide. “Ready?” Asked gently. 

“Yeah. Let’s hit it.” 

Time to move on. 

[c-hristy]

Character Sheet - Franklin (Hazbin Hotel)

Franklin

Character Information - 

True Name: Franklin Magne

Nicknames: Frankie / Frank / The Moon (by Charlie) / Shitstain (by Bea)

Likes: Pranks / Carnage / Murder / Meat / Video Games / Streaming / Smiling / Sarcasm / Peanut Butter

Dislikes: Nativity / Religion / Redemption / Emotions / Humans / Pickles / Low Frame Rates / Yellow

Biological Information - 

Species: Deer Demon / Wendigo

Gender: Male

Sexuality: Gay

Abilities: Wendigo Transformation / Light Manipulation / Playing the Saxophone / Tap Dancing

Professional Status - 

Occupation: Prince of Hell

Relationships - 

Family: Alastor (Father) / Charlie (Mother) / Margret (Sister) / Beatrice (Sister) / Lucifer (Grandfather) / Lillith (Grandmother)

Friends: Valentino / Sir Pentious / Angel Dust / Husk / Razzle and Dazzle / Niffty

Frenemies: Vox / Vaggie 

Romantic Interests: N/A

Enemies: ...just a lot of demons

Franklin Magne is a hell born demon birthed to Alastor and Charlie and by line of succession, the prince of Hell. He has very little empathy or sympathy for the demons in Hell and mainly does whatever suits his fancy, not caring much for those around him.

Appearance - 

Franklin, as an adult, is 7’8”, the same height as Alastor. He is nearly identical to Charlie, only sharing the same ears and antlers of his father. He has the same eyes, nose and blackened lips, as well as the same dark red cheeks that Charlie has. There have been times that people have confused him for Lucifer because of the likness and there have been times that he has used this to his advantage. 

He usually wears a blue sweater and black jeans. The reason why he wears blue is because when Franklin was a child, he had an uncanny ability to just wander off and seeing a blue-clad child was the easiest way to find him among the red landscape of Pentagram City.

 

When in full Wendigo form, his antlers grow and branch and he also grows a few inches in height. His claws and teeth extend. He has double radio dials, much like Alastor, though instead of red, they are shades of grey. His hair grows longer and rougher to the touch and he is impossibly strong - though he has never once been able to defeat Alastor in a fight. He enjoys the terror that his Wendigo form beings and will occasionally allow himself to fall into it just to remind those around him to be scared of him.

Personality - 

Franklin has very little to no empathy. He’s a sociopath and he knows it; when he was younger, he did try his best to latch onto some sort of emotional connection but he was met with failure with each attempt. Because of this, he grew up to be snarky, sarcastic and cruel with a lot of the things he says and does. He does not believe in his mother and Margret’s ideology of redemption, believing that demons who go to Hell are meant to be there; they should suffer for the sins they committed.

He does have a soft spot for smaller things, however. Egg Bois in particular are demons he’s fond of and he enjoys carrying them around and talking to them. He’s an avid streamer of whatever video games he can get his hands on and has garnered quite a following in Hell for his streams. 

Franklin likes to inflict pain and doesn’t feel pain himself; the only times he can remember some sort of negative emotion is when he feels guilty for breaking promises that he made to Charlie when he was younger. He also enjoys protecting his sisters from any wrongdoing, though there have been times that he’s actually became friends with the people who have hurt his sisters.

Background - 

Franklin was born in Hell to Charlie and Alastor, the Princess of Hell and the Radio Demon. Instinctively, he doesn’t care much for the process that goes on around him, though he does have a strong tendency for violence. He has two sisters and he cares for them, though he isn’t quite sure he’s as attached to them as they are to him.

Relationships - 

Alastor:     Alastor is Franklin’s father.

Franklin inherited much of Alastor’s personality and mannerisms, though the distance from empathy is something he had on his own. The two butt heads occasionally, due to Franklin wanting to believe that he is stronger than his father (he gets put back into place rather quickly). Franklin convinced Alastor to come onto one of his streams once and it’s an annual thing now; they’ll get together once a year and play video games on stream for a few hours.

Charlie:     Charlie is Franklin’s mother.

Growing up and still currently, Franklin is a mama’s boy. He respects the decisions she makes in life, though he doesn't believe in her ideologies. She is pretty much the only person he feels he is connected to emotionally and he relies pretty heavily on her optimism in order to feel down to earth. They tend to spend a lot of time reading together or dancing, since they both can tap dance pretty well.

Margret:     Margret is Franklin’s sister.

Franklin doesn’t have a large opinion on his oldest sister; she’s neat and organized, which he can respect. Their age difference, her being seven years older, kept them at a distance that neither knew how to work with. Because of his difficulty feeling emotions, Margret keeps her distance because she’s not able to really handle his manic moods.

Beatrice:     Beatrice is Franklin’s sister.

Bea is five years older than Franklin and she is his best friend. They enjoy pulling pranks and telling jokes together, though he finds much more entertainment out of Alastor’s dad jokes than Bea does. The two were nearly inseparable growing up and he has a much stronger fondness for her than he does for Margret; they share a lot more in common and the age difference doesn’t seem to be that big of an issue. 

Valentino:    

Like Beatrice with Angel Dust, Franklin and Valentino are also best friends. Though there was a lot of drama that happened between Val and Bea, Franklin thought the whole ordeal was hilarious and found himself hanging out around Valentino a lot more. At first, the pimp was against Franklin and tried to deter the demon from latching on, but the two eventually found a mutual interest and then their friendship formed.

Sir Pentious: 

Franklin thinks Sir Pentious as a means for comical relief. The cliche snake demon makes Franklin laugh and he also enjoys being around the Egg Bois; he uses Pentious as a way to be around the little demons. 

Angel Dust: 

Angel Dust and he have a good relationship. When Franklin casually mentioned that he was gay, Angel almost immediately swept him up and the two bonded. 

Husk:

Franklin adores the stories that Husk tells. He thinks the detailed descriptions about how humans fight wars are interesting and fun to listen to. If he’s forced to be at the Hotel, since he tends to avoid it as best he can, he’s usually found at the bar with Husk.

Razzle and Dazzle:

Frankie doesn’t have much to say on the two goat demons; they spend most of their time with Margret and Charlie at the hotel and he doesn’t have too many fond memories of them. He just knows they’ve always been there and aren’t going away any time soon. 

Niffty:

Franklin thinks Niffty is adorable and he has tried in the past to talk to her to become her friend, though she seems to want to not be. He isn’t sure why and continues to pester her, since he thinks that most demons should either be scared of him or love him and there should be no in between and he doesn’t want her to be scared of him.

Vox:

Because of the relationship that Bea has with Vox and the entire process of Franklin becoming Valentino’s friend, the two are passive of each other. Franklin knows that Vox is stronger and way more powerful than he is and chooses not to test that boundary.

Vaggie:

Franklin isn’t sure why, but he knows that Vaggie doesn’t have the greatest opinion of him. He supposes it’s because of his urge for violence and death, though he can’t quite put his finger on it. He doesn't ever remember a time where the two of them had any good memories together.

Trivia - 

-Jakarva came up with the name Franklin, as well as the names for Margret and Beatrice.

-Franklin means ‘landowner of free’ or ‘free man’.

-Franklin constantly pushes Alastor’s temper. There have been times during Franklin’s childhood where Alastor has threatened to eat him, to the point where he has nibbled a finger or two of Franklin’s to get him back in line.

    -Charlie has absolutely forbidden Alastor from actually eating Franklin, though the younger demon doesn’t know that.

-Frankie consistently eats the family cat. When the cat reappears, since it wasn’t killed by an angelic weapon, he lets the cat live for a few months before he gets bored of it and eats it again. Both Bea and Margret hate when he does it and they do their best to keep the cat away from him.

-Franklin doesn’t see himself getting into a relationship anytime soon; he sees most demons as inferior to the point where he would be uncomfortable with being with one.

-He is frequently touchy and continuously forces himself into everyone’s personal space, though he would snap if anyone where to enter his without permission. 

-He plays the saxophone quite well and Margret hates it because he continuously will only play songs that are memes.

-Franklin is a total memelord. 

-Keeping with memelord status, he can play the mash up of Sandstorm and Never Gonna Give You Up on the sax. 

-He swears that he taught Alastor how to floss, whip, etc, but if we're honest, he really didn't. 

-Franklin is probably the funniest character to write, and by god, even if he can’t feel a wide range of emotion, he’s still hilarious (and he knows it).

((If you so decide to use him, give me and @trinswhimsys a tag! We like to see any use. Please don't use him without tagging / permission, thank you, we are protective of our beanie boy))

** Want to see more of Franklin? Follow this link **

[filmmakersvision]

Kumbalangi Nights - Character Analysis

Disclaimer: This article contains SPOILERS.

July 7, 2019

by Inakshi Chandra-Mohanty

Kumbalangi Nights, is a Malayalam film, released in 2019, about four brothers who share a complex relationship with each other, due to the absence of their parents, and how the presence of three women in their lives change them. Below is a detailed character analysis of each main character in the film.

Saji – Soubin Shahir

As the eldest brother in the family, Saji is expected to take care of his three younger brothers after his father passes away and his mother leaves to become a nun. However, when the film opens, we see a broken family. He is constantly fighting with Bobby, he is estranged from Bonny, and Franky is detached from him. His inability to take care of his brothers, makes him mentally disturbed, and he reaches his breaking point when out of rage he slaps Franky, and in response Bonny beats him up. Even though Bonny id not a blood relative of his as Bonny’s mother and Shammi’s father married after those two were already born, he and Bonny became inseparable within a few days of their parents’ marriage. So when Bonny beat him, Saji was completely broken.

Saji was a complete antithesis to Shammi. While Shammi was the representative of what it traditionally meant to be a man, Saji broke the norms, by showing that men have emotions and can express it as openly as women do. Despite being the eldest in the family, he wasn’t afraid in asking his youngest brother to take him to a psychiatrist, when he was feeling low. Normally, an elder brother would be like a parent, and would have to mask his emotions and hide his vulnerabilities from those that he was taking care of. But Saji opened up and that was what allowed Franky to connect with him.

Shammi – Fahadh Faasil

We know there is something wrong about Shammi, when he is first introduced. While in the bathroom shaping his “masculine” moustache, he notices a bindi stuck on the mirror and scrapes it off, washing it away in the sink. He then proceeds to look at himself in the mirror and repeat a dialogue from an advertisement in a deep, “manly”, voice. His character reeks of toxic masculinity from the first frame, as he is unable to bear even a small blemish of femininity on his idea of the perfect man. He has this need to control everything around him. Despite living as a “ghar jamai”, in his wife’s home, since he is the only man in the household, consisting of his wife, his mother-in-law, and his sister-in-law, he sees himself as the patriarch of the family. This is apparent in the scene where he sits down to have dinner with the whole family. He and his mother-in-law sit beside each other at the table, but before he begins eating, he makes an excuse that there isn’t enough light where he is sitting. He then goes on to slyly move his chair to the head of the table, establishing himself as the head of the family.

In the shocking climax, we finally see this toxic masculinity and need for control extend beyond just simple actions and turn into fully psychotic behavior. He is vehemently against his sister-in-law, Baby’s, relationship with Bobby makes it clear to her that they do not have a future together. However, when she refuses to break the relation, he becomes rude and controlling with her, leading to his wife, Simi, standing up for her sister. At this point, Shammi realizes that he has lost control over his wife and that puts him over the edge making him violent. As he is fighting with Bonny and Saji, after imprisoning his wife and her family, he consistently yells phrases like “I am the man” and makes it clear to the two brothers that they are fighting what he considers a “real man”. Finally, when he is captured, it marks the downfall of “toxic masculinity.”

Baby – Anna Ben

Baby is a strong independent woman, trying to live her life on her own terms. She guides her relationship with Bobby. Having had a crush on him in school, she is the one to initiate the relationship and take it forward. She even rebukes him for trying to come close to her, despite her repeated refusal. Her personality and her values are strong, which is why she is never afraid of saying what she feels, whether it is to Bobby or to Shammi, her brother-in-law. Unlike most girls, she doesn’t expect her boyfriend to be her savior and instead fights for herself against her family. She openly challenges her brother-in-law that she will elope with courage that very few characters in this film have.

She earns money through showing tourists around the village and also giving up her family guest house for rent to these tourists. Unlike her mother and sister, she isn’t fearful of her brother-in-law, Shammi, and in many instances stands up to him. For example, when Shammi throws out Nylah for allowing Bonny to stay with her overnight in the guest house, Baby questions him, despite her mother instructing her not to say a word. Even at the end, when Shammi tries to manipulate her into giving up on Bobby, she stands up to him and refuses to end her relationship with Bobby, even threatening to elope.

Bobby – Shane Nigam

Bobby is the most frustrated of the four brothers. He constantly fights with Saji and is angry at Bonny for abandoning them, leading him to seek refuge outside in Baby. Living in a house in an absence of any female figure, he initially doesn’t know how to behave with women. Early on in their relationship, he misbehaves with Baby, and tries to get intimate with her to which she refuses multiple times ultimately slapping him out of frustration. Unable to bear the humiliation, before leaving he says to her that he is the man. Surrounded by only men in his life, he has only learnt how to behave with women by watching movies, and clearly, Arjun Reddy, the film they are watching at the time of this incident, has an impact on his psyche. But eventually, after spending more time with Baby, and spending more time with women in general after the women enter his home, he begins to understand a different way of interacting with women and tries to identify with their perspective as well.  

Franky – Mathew Thomas

The youngest of the four brothers and the first to be introduced in the narrative, Franky is mostly the silent observer as his brothers go through many tumultuous emotions. Seeing his brother’s constantly arguing with one another, and at the same time missing the presence of his mother, his home has now become a matter of shame for him. This leads him to lie to his friends that his family is ill, in order to prevent them from visiting his house. Out of his three brothers his only proper bonding is with Bonny, but Bonny spends most of his time away from home, so most of the time Franky is alone.  Without a mother figure in his life, he feels lost and lonely. Therefore, when a female presence enters the house, he is rejuvenated.

Due to him being the youngest, his older brothers always keep him out of important matters. He is always seen as the “child” in the family. For example, when Bobby wants to speak to his brothers about keeping two women in the house, he refuses to speak in front of Franky and takes Bonny and Saji to another room to have a conversation. Soon, Franky begins to experience FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), and in the climax of the film follows his brothers as they go to check on Baby. Eventually his presence is what leads to Shammi being caught and defeated by the brothers.

Bonny – Sreenath Bhasi

Bonny represents an elder version of Franky. He is ashamed of his home and of his brothers, barring Franky, and rarely returns home, choosing to spend most of his time with a new gang of friends. Witnessing Bobby and Saji fight on a daily basis bothers him, and rather than trying to serve as a mediator, he instead decides to live in denial and avoid them whenever possible. With Franky, however, he has a very strong bonding. He serves as a guiding force for Franky, unlike the other two brothers who are too busy fighting with one another. The fact that he is unable to speak, doesn’t hinder him from opposing his brothers, and from later finding love in Nylah. Nylah, and his love for her, are what ultimately lead him back home. Having a female presence in the house makes the brothers cautious and gives Bonny the opportunity to reconnect with Saji and Bobby.

Sathi - Sheela Rajkumar

Sathi is the mother figure who comes into the lives of these four brothers as an angel. Despite Saji indirectly being the reason for her husband’s death, she doesn’t have any hard feelings against him, as she know how much her husband cared for him. She even goes along with him to his house as she needs help after giving birth to a baby. The scene where she and Saji arrive at his home on a boat is one of the most beautifully shot scenes in the film. Sathi, with her head wrapped in a scarf holding the baby in her arms, looks like a mother figure. Nylah is a female presence that these boys desparately need, but Sathi is representative of the guidance they need. Having a baby and two women, a mother and a foreigner, in the house, turns these four aimless boys into mature men.

Simi - Grace Antony

Married to a controlling man, Simi is expected to be the perfect caring wife, who quietly listens to her husband. She never objects to this position as she believes that it is her duty to be the submissive force in the relationship. Her husband is her god as he came as a savior to their family taking over the role of the patriarch of the family. She doesn’t dare to say a word against him and her mother also makes sure her two daughters don’t oppose her son-in-law. However, when the time comes need, Simi does raise her voice. When Shammi expresses his disapproval of Baby’s affair Simi doesn’t disagree and even lets him speak to Baby as an elder brother. But, when Baby refuses to listen, Shammi gets angry and begins to speak rudely to Baby, finally making Simi reach a breaking point. For the first time, she stands up to her husband, quietly but firmly. And this moment of feminine power is what ultimately leads to Shammi’s outburst of psychotic and violent behavior.