#and highly dysfunctional relationships

[famouslysleepy]

okay i’m changing the family dynamics yet again but i think i may unfortunately have to abandon the bee villain concept because these two characters are now siblings (to say these siblings are estranged is an understatement) and the idea of a Hornet and Wasp as siblings appeals to me more now

[nekropsii]

ALPHA TROLLS RANKED BY HOW WRONG THE FANDOM AT LARGE IS ABOUT THEM:

This is a personal challenge, based entirely on my own experience and perspective, and also ranked from Most to Least Correct. I was bored, and thought this might be fun.

Putting this under a cut, because it's long as hell.

MEULIN LEIJON

People get her mostly correct, from what I’ve seen… Most of the time, fan content of Meulin is absolutely recognizable as Meulin, but her pride in her deafness + joy of learning new ways to interact with the world through/due to her disability is always removed, and I do not often see people tackle the Toxic Positivity aspect of her character. That seems less like character assassination, though, and more like a combination of people not actually playing through the Openbounds, people not being able to fathom disabled people (especially those who gained a disability later in life rather than being born disabled) being happy, and general fandom distaste for the idea of touching anything uncomfortable, especially when that uncomfortable topic is highly mundane, normalized, and potentially applicable to them or their loved ones. Meulin’s toxic positivity was, of course, commentary on Tumblr’s ecosystem at the time, so… It was much harder to touch back then.

ARANEA SERKET

People tend to get her general, broad strokes personality right, but unfortunately she gets treated pretty roughly for the crime of Being A Serket. People refuse to understand her motivations, and she often gets demonized for what she was doing around/during [S] Game Over, even though that was something she’d gotten pushed to and also was cool as fuck to watch. God forbid a woman do anything.

DAMARA MEGIDO

People are right about the racism, 100%. It is completely despicable, hard to look at, and extremely blatant. She does, however, have character outside of that. No, it isn’t “whore”, it’s more like “angry, dysfunctional abuse victim”, and she’s genuinely a very interesting and tragic character. But, again, people are right about the racism, so she gets to be placed way up here.

MEENAH PEIXES

She is such a chaotic little bastard. I love her. I really do. Please understand that she genuinely does not understand the concept of consequences. This girl didn’t have a Lusus, she didn’t have parents, it was functionally illegal to tell her “No, you can’t do that.” That would fuck up literally anyone’s moral compass. That’s not me hand waving away all the fucked up and bad shit she’s done, we all know what she did, but people tend to forget this aspect of her character and it pains me deeply, because it is a very genuinely interesting concept that I want to see more of. She’s capable of regret, we’ve seen her feel it, I just don’t think foresight is her forte. No one raised her to consider consequences, or help her experience them in a healthy way, because nobody raised her period.

Also, her ass is not butch, she is the girliest girl in the entire comic. She is about hot pink and glitter and kiss marks and unicorns and cute little puns and you will respect that. She is not masculine. Her ass is not masculine nor is she butch. Let her be her hyper-feminine self.

LATULA PYROPE

Please for the love of god there is more to her character than “Gamer Girl” and “Mituna’s Girlfriend”. You are falling for her fucking ruse. Please. Please. Please recognize that her entire character is about internalized misogyny, and being forced to overcompensate for misogyny in gaming circles as a gamer who happens to be a woman. Please. I’m begging.

KURLOZ MAKARA

His character is not that deep, it’s mostly just a string of events he is mysteriously, inexplicably involved with. The Makaras are extremely Function Over Form- their characters practically do not exist, they're mostly just plot devices that exist to push the story along. I'm sorry to Makara fans. You just invented a guy in your mind and decided he was real. He is also not that soft, though, and his relationships with both Meulin AND Mituna are not healthy. Hard to stop people from ascribing cutesy squishy lovey dynamics to random men who happened to have looked at each other once, though. Some people truly haven't graduated from 2012.

HORUSS ZAHHAK

I am begging people to consider that maybe the biggest issue here is not that he is “Bad Otherkin/Therian Representation” and is in fact maybe the fact that Hussie was actually making fun of Systems when he was writing Horuss. Because Horuss is canonically a system. He uses the word system. He uses the word switching. He uses the word host. He literally talks about his Plurality at length in extremely upfront, plain terms. I don’t know how him being “Bad Otherkin Representation” was and still is the main discourse about him. It makes me insane. That is a commentary that truly writes itself. Talk about having your priorities out of wack, honestly...

PORRIM MARYAM

No, she is not a MRA, she’s just a regular feminist who happens to live on a different planet with different politics and social hierarchies from Our Real World Earth’s USA. Whatever argument you’re about to pull out of your ass to say that she sucks is bad. She already explained what she meant by that, in more detail, very clearly, and she was right. Half the time she’s literally just giving you factual information about what Beforus was like, and literal plot synopses. She isn’t saying anything insane. She’s literally normal. I don’t know why people cannot handle or process this. Porrim has not ever said anything controversial. If you disagree with this you’re either misconstruing her on purpose or you fell for Kankri’s bait, and that’s just fucking sad at that point.

Also, she’s more than a sex object, and her tits are not huge. Honestly, half the shit she was saying was just “I am more than my sex life”, and so many people took that and made her main character trait her sex life. Just pathetic.

RUFIOH NITRAM

This man is a fucking war criminal and I will stop at nothing until he is behind bars for his crimes against Damara. Raging misogynist. Total fucking cunt. Just the worst. If I talk any more about this, this part will be 1,000 paragraphs long. But also, I’m begging people to recognize his relationship with disability, too. He was similar to Meulin in the sense that he didn’t mind his disability, and his biggest gripe with it was the way that Horuss tried to “fix” it… Which is an interesting way to expand upon how Beforus’s culling system is not only very explicitly ableist, but mimicking real world systemic ableism. I also want people to recognize that Hussie is actively having a conversation about the reclamation of slurs with Rufioh’s character, and how not letting people reclaim such language is doing nothing but giving the word power against them while stripping away their own personal agency. Rufioh’s a complicated guy, and he’s interesting and also the worst, and I am really tired of how he gets watered down to nothing but “Pretty Boy Victim Of His Inexplicably Psycho Ex”.

MITUNA CAPTOR

Holy Fucking Shit, You Guys Are Ableist.

KANKRI VANTAS

To this day I see people saying he was just Hussie making fun of SJWs. To this day. To this day people think Hussie was trying to make Every Tumblr Leftist look bad, and that he hates them Because They Are Leftists. When will people recognize him as a bootlicker to the oppressive class and the violently bigoted. When will people recognize that. When will people recognize that this is more of a commentary on the legitimate real flaws of Tumblr’s politics at the time. When. When.

When will people stop portraying him as a lovey-dovey Catholic Whore. I’m going to stab my fucking eyes out and then kill everyone in this building. Me when it's based and cool to ship an aroace character with a sexual predator. I GUESS.

CRONUS AMPORA

I say this with every ounce of sincerity I can possibly muster as a person: What the literal actual fuck.

[dreamwritesimagines]

The Eye of the Hurricane [26] - Breaking the Rules

A.N: Thank you so much for your wonderful feedback, you made my day! ❤️I hope you’ll like this chapter as well, and please don’t forget to tell me what you think! ❤️

Summary: Fighting for the crown comes with decisions.

Word Count: 2600

Pairing: MobBoss!Bucky Barnes x Female!Reader

Warnings: Violence, guns, crime, blood, explicit language, dysfunctional relationship, mentions of sex. This is an AU, friendly reminder that I don’t condone any of the actions depicted on this story and please read with care.

Series Masterlist

Growing up as your father’s heir, you had to memorize certain rules.

Honoring the alliances was one of them. No family could survive on its own in this line of work against all the others, and it was a matter of honor not to cross or go behind your allies.

Not putting civilians in danger was another. The business and its deals or disagreements could only affect the people who chose to be in it, civilians were always off limits.

But the most important rule that was drilled into your and every heir’s head?

Never, ever do anything to break the truce.

“Y/N?”

Your head shot up and you tried to smile at Becca. “Yeah?”

“Are you okay?”

No.

No you really weren’t.

What you and Bucky were planning was way too dangerous, which meant that you couldn’t say that to anyone, Becca included.

“Sure!” you said as Leila came back to the table, carrying coffees.

“Thanks babe,” Becca pecked her on the lips and she smiled at her.

“Not a problem!” she said. “So, is there any reason why you look so gloomy, Y/N?”

Shit.

“Gloomy?” you asked with a small laugh. “I don’t look gloomy.”

“Is Ethan being his tortured lover self again?”

“He’s not—” you stopped yourself. “I haven’t talked to him in a while actually.”

“Bucky then?”

“Oh is this about that girl you told me about?” Becca asked. “Anna?”

You blinked a couple of times. “Uh…”

“Anna?” Leila asked and Becca waved a hand in the air.

“This incredibly hot woman Bucky is doing business with.”

“Did I say she was incredibly hot?”

“You said hot and I stalked her,” Becca said helpfully, “She is incredibly hot.”

“Thanks a lot Bec,” you muttered and Leila tilted her head.

“Let me see!”

“I’m not gloomy because of Anna,” you said and paused for a moment. “Although, Bucky does have a meeting with her today.”

“Here,” Becca said, handing her the phone and Leila raised her brows, staring at the screen before licking her lips.

“Maybe she just has a terrible personality.”

“You guys are the best,” you muttered and Becca let out a laugh.

“We’re joking, obviously you’re hotter.”

“For some reason I highly doubt that,” you pointed out and Leila rolled her eyes at you.

“You are,” she said. “But jealousy is less about looks and more about the vibes.”

“I’m not jealous!” you said, your voice going a pitch higher before you cleared your throat. “I wasn’t even thinking about her until you brought her up.”

“Then what—” Becca started but your phone started vibrating on the table, making you grimace when your eyes fell on the caller ID.

“Excuse me for a moment,” you said and grabbed your phone, then walked out of the café to answer it. “Auntie?”

“Y/N hi honey!” her cheerful voice reached you. “I hope I’m not interrupting anything?”

“Nah, I’m just with my friends,” you said and she hummed.

“Well then, clear out your schedule for the afternoon because we’re having an aunt-niece lunch,” she said, making your eyes widen.

“Oh I actually—I had this thing—”

“I already made the reservation, I’ll send you the details,” she cut off your stammering. “See you in two hours!”

With that, she hung up and you threw your head back, letting out a groan.

“Great,” you muttered to yourself. “Just what I needed today.”

                                                       *

Of course your aunt had picked a restaurant in your father’s territory and of course it was already swarming with your father’s people. Unlike you, she had no problem with being followed by bodyguards even if the restaurant seemed to be closed to any other people but you two and the bodyguards, so you tried not to roll your eyes as you sat down, the waitress bringing your food almost immediately. You pulled your brows together and your aunt sat up straighter.

“I ordered for the both of us already,” she said, making you hum.

“Wonderful,” you said. “Thanks.”

“So,” she smiled at you. “I figured today is as good of a day as any to catch up!”

No, today was supposed to be about you having an existential crisis at home, and yet here you were.

“How’s marriage going?”

Jesus Christ.

“It’s going well,” you said curtly before digging into the salad in front of you. “And you? How are you after the break up?”

“Oh,” she waved a dismissive hand. “Let’s not talk about that. Bucky seems like he grew into such a gentleman!”

“Mm hm.”

“And George is happy being retired?”

You thought for a moment, then shrugged your shoulders.

“Bucky is doing a great job,” you said, unaware of the proud tone in your voice. “So yes. He probably does miss being more involved in the business but it’s Bucky’s time now. George knows it.”

“Promising heir turns into successful king, not much of a surprise there,” she commented and you sipped your wine.

“Exactly.”

“And speaking of heirs…” your aunt said, making your eyes shoot up to hers.

Fucking—

Yeah, you had walked right into that.

You knew that everything you said and did, even the smallest reaction would be reported back to either Ian or your father, so you had to keep your calm. Even though anger had started to boil deep inside you, you lowered your wine glass, tilting your head at her.

“Hm?”

“Your father may have mentioned that things between you and him are rather tense lately,” she said. “Especially after him naming Ian as his heir.”

You frowned, feigning confusion before taking your fork into your mouth again.

“I didn’t think they were tense,” you said after swallowing your bite. “Is that what he thinks?”

She paused only for a moment.

“It is,” she said. “And you know how important family is. We don’t always have to see eye to eye, but we do have to support each other.”

“Does father think I won’t support Ian?” you asked silkily and she licked her lips, deep in thought.

“Ian worked really hard to be where he is right now, Y/N,” she said, making you pull your brows together. “I am aware that you might feel some resentment but that position belongs to Ian now. And we as his family must make sure to make his job easier.”

You wanted to laugh at the audacity but managed to keep your expression under control. Of course she supported him, that much wasn’t surprising but—

Ian working for where he was?

He hadn’t even bothered to go through half of the training you had.

“I don’t know why you’re telling me this,” you told her. “It’s father’s job to make Ian’s job easier, he was the one who named him heir. What I think about his decision doesn’t hold any power in this, I’m not in the business—”

“Yes you are.”

You scoffed. “Well, that’s news to me then. Do you know something I don’t?”

She shot you a look.

“You and I both know that some bosses in the city support you to become the heir, not Ian.”

You bit back a smirk and took another sip of your wine.

“Which is normal, outsiders can have different ideas, it’s the family that decides on the heir,” she said. “But Bucky…Bucky is family now.”

You shrugged your shoulders. “I don’t control Bucky.”

“Yes you do,” she insisted. “And Bucky doesn’t necessarily like Ian, does he?”

The realization dawned on you in a second; your father hadn’t put your aunt up to this.

Ian had, because he felt threatened by Bucky.

Which in all honesty was a bit insulting, because even with other bosses supporting you to become the heir, he still didn’t think you yourself were a viable threat to him.

You pushed at your salad with your fork, pretending to be nonchalant.

“Strange as it may sound, me and Bucky don’t really spend our time talking about Ian,” you said and your aunt heaved a sigh, then reached out to clasp her hand over yours.

“Honey,” she said. “You know what will happen if a war breaks out.”

“Tell that to Ian, not me,” you said. “He seemed to be very interested in a war the last time we spoke. I know what happens if a war breaks out, does he?”

“He’s still very excited to prove himself,” she said, making you clench your jaw. “So he may come across a bit… wild but he will not start a war.”

“Funny how everyone around him seems to have to make excuses for him.”

“So many people died before the truce,” she insisted. “So many families. I know that your father promised you that position, but you cannot set the whole city on fire just because he changed his mind. Ian is the heir now, you and everyone else need to make your peace with it.”

Anger was pulsing through your veins and you dug your fingernails into your palm, then pushed at your plate and stood up.

“I have this thing, so…”

“Y/N—”

“And for the record, I’m not setting the whole city on fire,” you told her. “Make sure to hear the same thing from Ian, will you? Because from the looks of it, people aren’t that thrilled to do business with him when he’s been foaming at the mouth to start a war.”

With that, you walked out of the restaurant with your bodyguards following you.

                                              *

As much as you hated to admit, your aunt’s words did manage to make you even more restless. You had tried to take a nap but it was no use, and by the time Bucky got home, you had been pacing in the apartment for almost an hour now. He had some blood on him so he had gone straight to the bathroom to take a long shower, and when he came back, he found you by the window, your gaze fixed on the skyline.

“Hey beautiful.”

You looked over your shoulder and tried to smile at him.

“Hey,” you said. “Whose blood was it?”

“Some idiot,” he said. “Not important. Are you okay?”

“How was the meeting with Anna?”

“It was good, everything is going pretty smoothly. Are you okay?”

You turned around to see him better, then nodded your head.

“Sure!” you said. “There’s uh…there’s dinner in the—”

“What’s going on?” he cut you off, stepping closer to you and you heaved a sigh, then shrugged your shoulders.

“Nothing, it’s just…it’s been a long day.”

“I thought you were meeting Becca today.”

“I did,” you said. “Then my aunt asked to have lunch together so that totally ruined my day.”

He raised his brows. “What did she say?”

“Usual bullshit,” you said. “She wants me to support Ian.”

Bucky snorted. “Yeah, that’s gonna happen.”

“And Ian is intimidated by you.”

“Good,” Bucky said. “Does he also know the only reason he’s alive is because of the truce he’s been so excited to break? Someone should let him know.”

“He thinks he’s untouchable, you know that,” you said with a roll of your eyes. “He doesn’t even carry a gun, he’s that sure of himself. Ryan carries his gun for him.”

Bucky threw his head back. “Does he—” he started but was cut off when his phone vibrated on the table. Your heart skipped a beat as he read the text message, then held up the phone.

“So…” he said. “Are we doing this tonight?”

You swallowed thickly, your heartbeat getting faster before you ran a hand over your face.

“Bucky, is this a mistake?”

He tilted his head. “Why would it be a mistake?”

“We’re ordering a hit on a shipment,” you whispered. “That’s breaking the truce.”

“Eh, it’s not like they’ll know who did it.”

“But if they somehow figure it out?” you insisted as you stepped away from him to pace in the room again. “I keep telling myself Ian is the wrong choice, but what does it say about me that I’m willing to risk war? That I’m willing to risk so much bloodshed just to get there?”

“That you have what it takes.”

“Do I?” you asked him. “At that cost? You heard the same thing I did while we were growing up, over and over again. Never break the truce—”

“We’re not breaking the truce,” he assured you. “No one will know it’s us, and even if they did somehow figure it out; your father will kill me on grounds of breaking the truce sweetheart, nothing will happen to you.”

Even the thought of it was enough to send a shiver down your spine.

“Don’t say that,” you murmured, rubbing at your eyes. “Just don’t.”

He shot you a playful smile. “I thought you wanted me dead.”

“If I wanted you dead, you’d be dead,” you grumbled as you approached the window to look outside again. “It just feels…”

“Overwhelming?” he asked you as he came closer before his hands clasped over your shoulders, massaging there, making your eyes flutter close.

“A little,” you admitted and he hummed.

 “Of course it’s overwhelming, we’re pushing you to the top.”

You opened your eyes again, then turned around to look at him better.

“Why are you risking your own life for this?”

“Because I want to see you at the top of the food chain,” he said, then flashed you a smirk. “And on top of me but—”

“Bucky,” you said warningly as if that didn’t make your stomach do a happy flip despite the tension and he chuckled.

“Because unlike what your father seems to think, you’re the right choice for this.”

“And you still think that about me even if I’m putting the truce in danger right now?” you asked and his smile widened.

“You could shoot me right now and I’d still think that, princess.”

You nibbled on your lip, a warmth spreading in your chest before you let out a bitter chuckle.

“We’re both fucked up, you do realize that?”

“I know,” he said. “But fucked up or not, will you be alright when Ian inevitably burns your father’s empire down? The empire that belongs to you?”

You swallowed thickly as he ran his fingertips over your bare arm, awakening fire underneath your skin.

“Stop playing by your father’s rules,” he said, his voice a low murmur. “It’s your game now, you make the rules.”

You pursed your lips together before taking a deep breath, then looked up at him.

“Give the order.”

Bucky smiled at you, then touched the phone’s screen before taking it to his ear.

“Do it,” he said, then hung up, making you let out a breath, your head spinning because of the adrenaline rushing through you. Bucky stepped closer to press a kiss on your temple and you rested your forehead on his chest for a moment, letting his irresistible scent fill your nostrils.

“You’re alright.”

“I’m alright,” you muttered to his chest and pulled back to nod your head as if trying to convince yourself. “I am.”

“You are,” Bucky said, then smiled at you. “So let’s get drinks and dessert, hm? To celebrate your first ever hit order in the business?”

A nervous laughter climbed up your throat. “What?”

“Yeah I’ll even put a candle on the champagne— or on the cake, I haven’t decided yet,” he told you, pulling you by the wrist through the room while you giggled.

“Bucky wait, I need to do my makeup if we’re going out—”

“Less whining more walking princess, come on,” he said and you snatched your coat off the hanger as you walked past it, then followed him out of the apartment, still smiling.

Chapter 27

[pinazee]

So, to be honest, spelling bee is an ep that had to grow on me. It just always seemed too outlandish of a crime i think, idk. But the ep does show us more about shawns dysfunctional relationship with his father and Gus’s motivation to participate in Psych. Not to mention Juliet.

Gus is highly intelligent but in a way that feels he never utilized it properly. He has the mental fortitude to become a doctor if he wanted, he has the drive and the willpower it takes to become invested (as shown with how deep his knowledge of the bee and other subjects goes), yet he never did. We see in the pilot how little he actually cares for his “real” job. It pays the bills, thats it. At the end of the day, Gus plays it safe, and you get the feeling in the pilot that he’s not happy with where he’s at. He’s stagnant. Unfulfilled. Just as lost as Shawn.

In a lot of ways, they’re similar with that aspect. Both him and shawn have a variety of interests and skills, yet neither seemed to pursue a career in those fields. In shawns case, in his own words “he mastered it and moved on.” He got bored (ahem, ADHD). But i think in Gus’s case, he was too afraid to try. Or maybe nothing quite gave him enough of a spark to want to. As everyone later points out, Gus has a shit ton of potential that never seemed properly used.

Until Shawn comes around. And he needs him. He needs all of Gus’s knowledge and skills. He even finds the clues that the doctor was fake and Jari was sitting next to the kid with the inhaler. And its fun. He’s excited. Psych brings him joy.

As for our intro to Juliet- fantastic. We learn so much from so little screen time. She can banter with Shawn easily, and isn’t afraid to give pushback or to give Lassiter pointers (which considering she’s like brand new and he’s a bit of a prick is saying something), and she trusts her instincts to follow through with Shawns advice. Shes a good cop. Almost the antithesis to Lassiter. Shes warm, friendly, and trusting to his cold, distant, and weary.

Side note:

James motorcycle face makes me lol every goddamn time

[verysium]

i need to know what blue lock boys think about “male-female friendships” a.k.a do they think they can exist without one of two thinking “what if” situations (it can, i repeat, it can🗣️)

👏 give it up to anon for making me visualize the most stress-inducing scenario of the year. the first thing that comes to mind is that this would not sit well with a majority of the bllk boys.

however, the situation is particularly a no-go for the following:

the itoshi brothers would not approve. if you just look at their interactions, you can already tell. sae literally kicks rin for even thinking about replacing him when he goes to spain. they already have trust issues due to their dysfunctional sibling relationship, and to my knowledge, they don't have any female friends of their own. hence, i don't think they would understand that a male-female friendship is just a friendship and nothing more. regardless, this could go one of three ways. (1) they would probably give you the silent treatment and be secretly upset. would not spill anything unless you pry it out from them. (2) they would give your friend an absolute death glare. hyper-vigilant when it comes to any form of physical contact between you two. seething jealousy and possessiveness. and (3) for sae specifically, he would be petty about it. probably decides to leave you on read for the rest of the day. may or may not ghost you. and when you ask him to hang out, he's like....😒 don't you already have a friend?

reo also would not take this well. i mean....he had a whole mirror monologue and mental breakdown when nagi left him. i think he is highly insecure about people abandoning him since he doesn't really have anyone he is close to. would probably welcome your friend and hide his discomfort, but after a while, it becomes difficult for him to act like he's okay with your friendship. you would have to heavily reassure him that there was nothing beyond platonic going on between you two.

barou acts like he's alright with this situation, but your friend better have zero flaws because he's not going to tolerate anyone substandard. still, i feel like he would get jealous even if he doesn't show it directly. would probably make a fool out of your friend on purpose.

kaiser wouldn't think anything of it at first. after all, you're dating the great michael kaiser, why the hell would you need anyone else? but then, it starts getting to him. why is your attention on your friend and not him? is he not good enough for you? given his self-esteem issues, i don't think he would take this well. he would probably blame your friend first and then you. would be a dramatic baby about it, but it's secretly eating away at him from the inside out.

ness probably plots the entire murder of your friend and hides a body bag and shovel in his trunk. acts all sweet and sugary when you're present, but the moment you're not there, he's grabbing your friend by the collar and shaking the living daylights out of them. probably whispers "get the hell away from y/n" in the most menacing tone. your friend better leave because delusional ness does not come to play. his obsession is no joke.

shidou terrorizes your friend to the point they don't want to be friends with you anymore. this man just exudes a traumatizing aura. your scary dog privileges are revoked because he is now going rabid. i don't think he's going to have a problem with a male-female friendship, but you just might (as in you're not going to have much of a friendship anymore by the time he's done dismantling your friend's corpse.)

the only characters i can imagine this playing out healthily with is isagi, kurona, yukimiya, and maybe nagi.

isagi is usually highly understanding, and he has many friendships of his own. i think he would also encourage it if your friend happened to be one of his teammates or someone interested in football. but this does come with a caveat. if he senses something wrong with your friend, it's immediately game over. he's usually pretty open-minded except with the people he holds extreme dislike for. for example, isagi is willing to at least try to understand rin, but he clearly doesn't have that same willingness when it comes to kaiser. so...just don't befriend a jerk, and you're good.

kurona wouldn't mind because he's kurona. he trusts you, and he usually rationalizes his insecurities enough to keep them at bay. the only time he would have a problem is if you start neglecting him in favor of your friend. since he's pretty introverted, he probably wouldn't confront you about it, but he might feel a little bit slighted. just check up on him from time to time.

yukimiya is usually easy-going. i don't think a male-female relationship is going to be a huge problem for him, but they better treat you right. you mean the most to him, so he's going to support you through thick and thin. to be fair though, you probably won't even want to spend time with your friend because of how magnetically charming yukimiya is.

nagi doesn't mind because he just doesn't care. he's too lazy to deal with any resulting drama, and the only sense of personal attachment he has is with his bed.

[anthurak]

Ruby's and Yang's Family Reckoning

Has anyone else noticed how each of the post-Beacon arcs thus far have featured a member of Team RWBY returning home and reconciling/repairing issues with their family? Volumes 4 and 5 had Blake returning to Menagerie and reconciling with her parents, while Volumes 7 and 8 had Weiss returning to Atlas and helping repair the broken relationships with her siblings and mother.

With that in mind, I think it’s easy to imagine that Volumes 10 and 11 will be Ruby’s and Yang’s turn to sort out their long-standing family baggage. I mean, they’ve got two of their parents/parent-figures already in Vacuo, the third and their childhood home is just a quick bird-mom-portal away, and it turns out they ALSO recently got information that their fourth parent might not be as dead as they thought.

And here’s the other thing: we’ve also seen an escalation in just how complicated, dysfunctional and overall ‘fucked-up’ the family issues faced by our heroines have gotten over the last two arcs.

As many have noted, Blake has the only unambiguously good parents among her team, with the worst of the ‘issues’ they had to deal with being some simple estrangement. Instead, the real family ‘issues’ Blake had to deal with Volume 4 and 5 was reclaiming her family’s legacy, ie; the White Fang, from Adam and the Albain brothers.

Then we went from that, to the long-abused mess that is the Schnee family.

So going off that trend, as well as several other factors…

Yeah, I have NO doubt at this point that the STRQ family is going to find a way to be an even BIGGER fucked-up, messy, dysfunctional train wreck that Ruby and Yang are going to have to sift through and repair.

Now I know some people are probably wondering how Team STRQ could possibly be worse than the Schnees? After all, they had actual Worst-Dad™, Jacques Gele. How could Summer, Taiyang, Qrow and Raven be worse than that?

Here’s the thing though: The Schnee family may have been a wreck, but it was also a fairly uncomplicated wreck with a singular, easy-to-understand root cause; one utter shitbag who was making life terrible for everyone else. And the solution to the family problems (or at least the START of the solution) wound up being likewise simple and straightforward; just kick out the aforementioned utter shitbag and the family can start healing. I mean, it took less than a day after Jacques was given the boot for Weiss, Willow, Whitley and even Winter to make major steps in patching things up between them.

The STRQ family on the other hand aren’t going to be anywhere NEAR that simple. They are ACTUALLY messy and dysfunctional and complicated and ambiguous and all the other things fandom claims to love yet more often seems to just break their black-and-white-morality-loving brains when they actually see it.

Because unlike the Schnees, Team STRQ DOESN’T actually have just one terrible person who can easily be pointed to as the root cause of their problems (No, not even Raven)*. Instead, I think it’s becoming more and more apparent that Summer, Raven, Qrow and Tai are simultaneously good people who all love their daughters and genuinely want the best for them, and are also all MASSIVE dysfunctional fuck-ups in each their own way who have FAILED Ruby and Yang as parents in one way or another.

Summer the ‘supermom’ who also obsessively chased her hero-complex into martyrdom.

Raven the ‘daddy had a good reason for leaving you’ who actually didn’t have a good reason.

Qrow the ‘cool uncle’ who’s actually spent the last 15+ years wallowing in alcoholic depression.

Taiyang the at-first seeming ‘reliable’ father who turns out to actually be a MASSIVELY dysfunctional wreck.

All while Ruby AND Yang can both state openly and matter-of-factly that YANG was the one to RAISE RUBY. The kind of sibling relationship we might generally expect to see in two orphans. Which does NOT, in any context, speak highly of the parenting they received.

And I think Volumes 10 and 11 are going to be when the story finally shines a light on all those problems and forces Ruby and Yang to finally confront them.

Simply put, I think this is going to be when the story effectively yanks the rug out from under us and flips the script on basically everything we, plus Ruby and Yang, long assumed about Team STRQ has been wrong. Or alternatively for Ruby and Yang, everything that’s been right in front of them, yet have been refusing to confront all this time.

Things like just about everything Yang thought she knew about her family when she explained her backstory to Blake in Volume 2 (and which has served as the basis for nearly ALL of our assumptions about Team STRQ) turning out to be wrong in one way or another.

Or things like Taiyang being shown to be just as big a dysfunctional fuck-up parent as Qrow and Raven.

Or things like Qrow being called out for ditching the family pretty much just as much as Raven did to join Ozpin’s secret society.

Or Raven turning out to be Ruby’s dad.

Or Summer turning out to NOT actually be dead and is basically Salem’s Darth Vader via horrific grimm-hybridization.

And ultimately, just how much Summer, Raven, Qrow and Taiyang all FAILED Ruby and Yang as their parents, as illustrated, once again, by the fact that Ruby considers her primary parent-figure to be none of them, but rather YANG.

Ever since Volume 1 featured songs like Red Like Roses Part 2 and Gold, the fact that Yang raised Ruby has been a proverbial Sword of Damocles hanging over Team STRQ. Representing the fact that that ALL of them, Summer, Raven, Qrow and Tai, FUCKED UP as parents.

And I think in the next couple volumes, that sword is finally going to fall.

--

*Okay, maybe Ozpin.

[ash-says]

This one is for my girlies who grew up in dysfunctional families.

Girls who don't know healthy love, care and affection. Girls who grew up watching fights, in violent and stressful environments, being picked on by their peers, their own family members.

Know that it's not your job to maintain peace, people please and accommodate yourself to other people's expectations.

Take this as a BLUNT reminder for yourself:

1) Have strong boundaries. Surprise. I know you read this a thousand times but before you eyeroll read this again.

2) Stand up for yourself. It might be scary but sometimes fighting back against your family can be helpful. Do it strategically. Don't rush in blindly. The main goal is survival afterall.

3) No doing drugs, self harm, compulsive relationships, casual sex, alcohol and many destructive, addictive and escapist behavior won't help you in rebelling against your family. What are you three years old???

4) Establish your relationship with God or whatever the hell you believe in. Have a strong belief system. That's the only way you can save yourself and keep yourself on track. Even if you deter on the wrong path it will swing you back. Trust me.

5) Form strong female friendships. PLEASE. Female friendships are literally holiness in disguise. My girls are my biggest assets. The amount of emotional intelligence and support a female can provide. Chefs kiss.

What ? You can't vibe with girls?? You are more of a girl who vibe with boys?? Girls are secretly jealous of you??

Okayyyyy... I am no one to criticize but I think we need to reassess somethings.

At least one female friend. Won't cost you a fortune. Will it???

(If you think you got no one around you. My inbox + Gossip Box is always open.)

6) Academic Validation>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Male validation. Always.

7) Exercise and work out. Woahh did not see it coming right. Well it's important because it helps you in calming down your mind and expressing those repressed energies. Any anger issues babe in the house?? Guess what it's the best outlet for all your angst.

8) This is for those girls who are into toxic households please find a way to get out of there. I won't suggest permanently cause I believe in mending things and parents are a crucial part of your life. But find a way to live your college life or at least two to three years of your life out of your hometown. A lot of things you will understand by yourself then. If you know. You know.

9) Sharpen your people and survival skills. I hate to say this but we are highly susceptible to attracting people who want to take advantage of us. So listen to your gut the next time it warns you against someone.

10) Tone down your intensity. Not everyone is trying to get you or attack you. Coping mechanisms are great they kept/keep you alive but make sure they won't create trouble for you. Keep them in check. Got it??

[lesbianslovebts]

Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder, which means it is "in the brain." But since the brain is responsible for processing all of the information given to it by the body, autism affects my relationship to my entire body. So while the dysfunction often originates from the brain itself, I experience the effects in different parts of my body. Here are some personal examples:

Eyes: visual processing issues, photophobia, and visual snow syndrome. Ears: auditory processing issues and hypersensitivity to sound. Nose: hypersensitivity to smell and chronic sinus infections and allergies due to immune system dysfunction. Mouth: food texture and hygiene issues. Gastrointestinal tract: chronic GERD and IBS. Limbs: poor proprioception, coordination, and balance. Skin: hypersensitivity to touch, sensitive skin, and eczema due to immune system dysfunction. Heart: frequent spikes in heart rate due to an overactive sympathetic nervous system. Brain: insomnia, chronic migraines, anxiety, depression, memory issues, learning disability, and a fragmented sense of self.

I am not saying that all of these are necessarily caused by autism, but they are highly correlated. Remember that autism is a spectrum, and everyone's experiences are different and personal.

This post is about autism. Please do not derail and only add your own experiences if you are autistic.

[asexualityinhistory]

Welcome back!

Today I will discuss “CHAPTER IV Gender and Asexuality in Academic Sources” by Petra Filipová. Today's post will shine a light on how asexuality has been addressed in the past. Following the outline of the previous post, I will provide a summary of the material as it may not be accessible to the public. I highly recommend exploring this source if you have access through your school, university, or other means. It references several resources that go into great depths of today's material and are beneficial in an academic stance and in personal interest.

Richard von Krafft-Ebing provided research or a study on sexualities. in doing so, he considered asexuality and physical/sexual dysfunction and gave it the term anaesthesia sexualis meaning the lack of sexual feeling. It was not considered a sexual identity and was often treated as a physical illness. Outside of this, asexuality, along with other sexualities, were diagnosed as mental illnesses. There were strides made to find a link between sexuality/sexual behaviors and mental illness. Such treatments and diagnoses were apparent in and around the 1880's (Krafft-Ebing published his research in 1886).

Filipová then addresses Alfred Kinsey and the Kinsey Reports. As a refresher or as newly learned information for some, the Kinsey Reports were made to create a scale of sexuality from 0 to 6, 0 being completely heterosexual and 6 being completely homosexual. Asexuality had no place on this scale and Kinsey made it its own category termed "X". One way to look at this is alienation of a group of people, which fed into the negative connotations of asexuality known today. After a later review, the Kinsey Report showed that women were more likely to be asexual compared to men.

Although there is no clear data on why this is, this source does provide some assumptions or speculations. The main argument was how societal pressures were presented during different historical points. It was often expected for men and women to be 'coupled up'. Women were most likely expected to engage in romantic and intimate relationships with men as our society has always been heavily heteronormative.

One particularly intriguing section is Asexuality in Diagnostics. This section discusses how our society was and is considered hypersexual. Continuing the discussion from above, asexuality was deemed a mental disorder as well as a sexual disorder. The diagnoses within the diagnostics were different for men and women. They were put on a scale of asexuality where women were assumed to experience "a lifelong lack of sexual desire". Whereas men were expected to eventually "be a man" and be sexual. In the past and the present we see the expectation of men to be sexual because that is what defines a man in the eyes of our society.

This chapter also has a section on discourse on asexuality. I encourage you to take a look if you have access as there are multiple discourses regarding the study and understanding of asexuality. For those who may not have access to the material, I will provide a brief summary of the section. The many surveys and other discourse material had flaws that were not taken into account to create fully reliable data. Certain studies did not take into account other gender identities such as non-binary. This mistake left out a potentially key group in their demographics. Filipová includes one study done by Brotto and Yule in 2011 the ‘Physiological and Subjective Sexual Arousal in Self-Identified Asexual Women’. I want to specifically mention this study because it is different and addresses a matter that some may not consider. Brotto and Yule hypothesized that regardless of sexual orientation, women would experience sexual arousal from an erotic film. The concluding results of the study proved that their hypothesis was true. They stated that asexuality is not a lack of sexual arousal but rather a difference in sexual response. These results show that asexuality is less of a dysfunction than it is made out to be.

This source provides multiple resources and insights into the historical research and studies of asexuality, making it an excellent reference. Societal expectations have led to a near alienation of acceptance of asexuality. Such expectations include gender roles/stereotypes, heteronormativity, and hypersexualization. This source provides insight into how research and studies have been used to define and better understand asexuality while acknowledging limitations and room for improvement.

This post is a continuation of defining and understanding asexuality in its historical and modern context. The significance of asexuality will continue to be examined in later posts. The next post will discuss a different perspective of asexuality once more. Thank you for following along and feel free to share your insights!

Bibliography:

Petra Filipová. “Gender and Asexuality in Academic Sources.” In Gender in Focus: Identities, Codes, Stereotypes and Politics, edited by Andreea Zamfira, Christian de Montlibert, and Daniela Radu, 1st ed., 108–22. Verlag Barbara Budrich, 2018. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvddzn5f.7.

[youryurigoddess]

The Small Back Room — Hour of Glory (1949)

Good Omens 2 begins with the visit to The Small Back Room not because it was meant to serve as an exposition scene for Maggie and her record shop. It’s a substantial foreshadowing of the main plot and the relationship changes between Aziraphale and Crowley.

As all the other classics referenced throughout the show, this 1949 Powell and Pressburger production is easily available online — whenever you have 100 minutes to spare, I highly encourage you to watch it.

Our story begins with the arrival of Stuart, a British military captain, who makes his way through a labyrinth of offices towards a small building — the research section led by an eccentric, queer-coded, bow tie wearing professor Mair — to ask for help with a secret Nazi weapon.

That’s when the professor calls our hero, Sammy Rice — an engineer and bomb disposal expert in the service of Her Majesty’s government and, not accidentally, the most brooding, wounded man in Powell and Pressburger’s impressive canon of dysfunctional and alienated characters.

Due to a prosthetic foot keeping him from active service and confining to work in the titular back room instead, Rice is dramatically slipping into alcoholism. Haunted by self-loathing and disappointment with the internal politics, he can’t see the point of his research anymore.

Sammy is also conducting a clandestine affair with the secretary of his research unit, Susan. They live in the same building and meet regularly, but can’t openly enjoy their company or even dance due to his injury, which makes him even more bitter and pathologically determined to wear her angelic patience down.

Susan puts up with it until the minister is forced to resign. She knows that if non-scientists take over, their section will become useless, Rice even more difficult, and the war possibly lost. She urges him to take action and when he dramatically refuses to make a difference, she leaves him.

Seemingly at his lowest now, Rice becomes a sudden chance to redeem himself. Captain Stuart calls him about two unexploded booby traps found in Wales, but left to himself, he dies during a heroic attempt to dismantle one of the thermos-like devices before our engineer arrives at the scene.

In a nerve-jangling finale, Stuart’s notes help Rice dismantle the second device. He becomes a hero, gets an officer commission as head of the new scientific unit, and discovers that Susan not only came back in the meantime, but repaired everything he drunkenly destroyed in the apartment after their breakup.

The parallels seem straightforward enough for me to add that in this context the role of Maggie through most of S2 may particularly reflect Crowley’s stagnancy in both work and love life. And if you’re unsure why the demon identifies with the heroic roles and characters, you might want to read this post on the subject.

Now, The Small Back Room was distributed in the US under another title — Hour of Glory. Which happens to be a specific Bible term referring to Christ’s “hour”, the period supposed to consummate all of his work on Earth and reveal God’s ultimate plan of salvation: the Son’s death.

John 12:20-36 Jesus replied, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me. Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.” The crowd that was there and heard it said it had thundered; others said an angel had spoken to him. Jesus said, “This voice was for your benefit, not mine. Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”

Christ’s hour began in the garden — this time the garden of Gethsemane — as he prayed passionately for the cup to be passed from him, similarly to Aziraphale declining Metatron’s offers on screen, both regarding the hot drink and his reinstatement as part of the Heavenly Host:

Luke 22:42 “Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”

All throughout the Old Testament, we see God’s wrath being described as a cup poured out on sin and those guilty of it. By accepting it, Jesus took the toll of all the sins — from Eden up until the last one to be committed right before his Second Coming — on himself, for the sake of his beloved humanity.

The passion of Christ continued as Judas betrayed him with a kiss, his disciples abandoned him, and the high priest accused him of crimes he was not guilty of. Even Pilate, the prefect of Rome, pretended to uphold the law; and remember we already expect a S3 trial based on another Archers movie.

All in all, it’s an hour of great injustice and pain, but also glory of God. We’re led to believe that the Ineffable Plan will similarly triumph over the great one (or whatever Metatron tries to implement at the moment), as it did in S1. And its ending will be a good one, back in a garden.

[gatheringbones]

[“The more women are defined in terms of an ideal myth, for example, the more possible it is for men to ignore or actively abuse women who do not meet that ideal. Thus in the nineteenth century, the cult of True Womanhood was perfectly compatible with the exploitation of female slaves and factory workers. In the twentieth century, a recurring theme in rape and sexual harassment cases has been the notion that if a woman has ever departed from ideal behavior in any way, she has no real “womanhood” to be violated or offended. The wives and mothers of rapists almost invariably, and usually in good faith, defend them as the soul of chivalry—at least toward women who conform to the prevailing myths.

Gender stereotypes about men create binds for them as well. One of the reasons that the majority of the homeless are men, and in turn that the homeless receive so little sympathy, is that men who cannot sustain an independent existence in the competitive world, like women who do not exhibit a dependent existence in the family, are often considered unworthy of sympathy or aid. As Peter Marin, researcher on homelessness, points out, “An irony asserts itself: Simply by being in need of help, men forfeit the right to it.”

Ultimately, these stereotypes are destructive even for those who do live up to them—or down to them, as the case may be. A noted psychiatrist points out that until very recently, most theories of family “normalcy” have been based on highly gender-biased criteria. One study that sought to distinguish the characteristics of dysfunctional and successful families, for example, defined “adequate” families—which they also termed “normal”—as those that produced men who functioned well in their work and social relations. But the women in such families, they noted, were typically “overwhelmed with responsibility,” “psychosomatically ill,” and “sexually dissatisfied.” The researchers, finding that most American families fell into the “adequate” range, concluded: “The Family is alive and well.” By this definition, of course, a normal family is composed of a healthy husband and a sick wife.

From a different perspective, it is becoming clear, families based on a rigid gender division of labor have led to equally serious disabilities for males, by denying them access to intimacy except through women. This is one reason that men, but not women, are often much healthier when they are married and why their health deteriorates sharply after experiencing divorce or widowhood. Recently, seeking a substitute for the unconditional love they fear women will no longer give or they no longer believe they have the right to demand, many men have begun to reexamine their relationships with their fathers to find an alternative source of nurturance—often, they come up with nothing. In a men’s group retreat attended by one of my students, each man was asked to set up an imaginary meeting with his father and tell the father what was uppermost on his mind. The woods echoed with three refrains: “Don’t ever hit me again,” “Please tell me you’re proud of me,” and “You never told me that you loved me.”]

stephanie coontz, from the way we never were: american families and the nostalgia trap, 1993

[scatteredskittless]

so this is a half-joking request but can i req a vox x reader who watches skibidi toilet and uses gen alpha slang LMFAO also just in case you don't know gen alpha slang but it's like the 'caseoh fanum tax ohio mogus livvy dunne rizzing up baby gronk' things can you make it fluff hcs?? i just thought this would be funny asf lol (idk what to do for the relationship thing you can make it romantic, platonic, familial, literally anything i cant think of anything rn) alright tysm in advance i hope you have a good day :D - (can i be gyatt anon)

Vox x Gen alpha having humour! Reader

A/n: Never did I ever think I’d be writing headcanons with vox that involve SKIBIDI TOLIET. This is humiliating…………. I’m doing it (And sure you can be gyat anon 😭)

Warnings: gen alpha slang/j, you’re also a crusty little iPad kid lol so this is familial

Fluff✔️ Comfort❌ Angst❌ Smut❌

📺☆ The first time you ever used gen alpha slang around Vox he was… very confused to say the least.

📺☆ I mean, this guy literally died in the 1950’s bro would have ZERO clue what you’re talking about 😭🙏

📺☆ but he’d probably laugh at how dumb what you’re saying sounds sometimes

📺☆ Like who are these people? Who is caseoh?? Livvy Dunne??? Baby gronk???? Might ask Velvette if she knows about it to try and understand you better

📺☆ She’d probably end up laughing at him. Especially after she was informed you told him he has “zero rizz” (Radiosilence is so funny to me lmfaoo)

📺☆ Tell him about “skibidi toliet” lore and he’d disintegrate on the spot.

📺☆ I can’t stop imaging reader as like... an iPad kid Vox scooped up off the street after an extermination or something and brought back to the Vee tower. (Haven’t figured out the logistics as to how this would go down though)

📺☆ Originally he wasn’t gonna keep you but one thing led to another and now you’re basically his kid lol

📺☆ And as much as you confuse him and the other Vees with your sense of humour and the slang you use, they still love you ♡

📺☆ Oh and if you headcanon that they’re a polyamorous couple?? Congrats, now you have THREE parents (Highly dysfunctional ones yeah.. but still parents)

Please do not repost, translate, or plagarize any of my fanfictions/headcanons/writing without permission ◟( ˃̶͈◡ ˂̶͈ )◞

ᯓ★ Scatteredskittles

[dreamwritesimagines]

The Eye of the Hurricane [19] - Couples Therapy

A.N: Thank you so much for your wonderful feedback, you made my day! ❤️I hope you’ll like this chapter as well, and please don’t forget to tell me what you think! ❤️

Summary: A therapy session can be enlightening.

Word Count: 2300

Pairing: MobBoss!Bucky Barnes x Reader

Warnings: Violence, guns, crime, blood, explicit language, dysfunctional relationship. This is an AU, friendly reminder that I don’t condone any of the actions depicted on this story and please read with care.

Series Masterlist

It wasn’t like you thought taking Bucky to couple’s therapy for your technically fake marriage was going to be easy, but you didn’t think it would be this difficult.

Bucky bounced his leg beside you on the sofa while you both sat in the waiting room, his eyes darting around the room as if he expected someone to attack him at any moment.

“What happens if she asks me questions?” he asked you gruffly and you pulled your brows together.

“You’ll be fine.”

Bucky huffed out and turned to you.

“How about instead of doing this, I just pay you money to walk out of here?”

“Not gonna happen, Bucky.”

“I’ll put the weekend house under your name, you like it there.”

“The weekend house will be mine once we get a divorce anyway,” you reminded him. “It’s on the prenup.”

Bucky licked his lips. “Do you want another house?”

“Stop trying to bribe me,” you told him as he eyed the door to the therapist’s office before fixing the gun in his waistband and you gasped.

“Why did you bring a gun to the therapy?!” you hissed and he narrowed his eyes.

“We don’t know what expects us in there!” he whispered back, making your jaw drop.

“Do you seriously think—Bucky, look me in the eye and tell me you think our therapist is going to try to shoot us in couple’s therapy—”

“Mr. and Mrs. Barnes?” the therapist’s voice reached you as the door opened and you both turned to her before you smiled at her sweetly.

“Hi!”

“You can come in,” she said, stepping aside and you let out a breath, then stood up, holding Bucky by the arm to signal him to stand as well. Bucky heaved a sigh as if he was being tortured but followed you into the room dutifully and you both sat down on the couch, the therapist taking her seat soon after.

“Dr. Raynor,” you said and she smiled back at you.

“Mrs. Barnes.”

“Y/N is fine,” you said and motioned at Bucky. “And this is Bucky.”

Bucky gave her a curt nod quietly and you cleared your throat, shifting your weight.

“My therapist Dr. Cooper recommended you,” you told her. “She speaks very highly of you.”

“Dr. Cooper is a very respected colleague of mine,” she told you. “The feeling is mutual. So what brings you here?”

“Well, we’ve just got married,” you said. “And I’ve been in therapy since I was a child, basically. Bucky on the other hand has a more distant stance towards it so I figured it could help us both if we did it together.”

Dr. Raynor nodded and turned to Bucky.

“And what about you Bucky?” she asked. “What brings you here?”

Bucky raised his brows before pointing at you with his thumb. “She did.”

You crossed your arms, leaning back in the couch and Dr. Raynor hummed.

“You don’t think you should be here?”

“Honestly doc, I have no idea why I’m here,” he said. “I’m fine, our marriage is fine, so...”

“It hasn’t been a month since we got married,” you added. “Just putting it out there. But I think it’ll help Bucky if we build this—habit.”

She turned to Bucky. “And how about you?” she asked. “How do you feel about therapy, Bucky?”

“My dad would always say whatever your problems are, they should stay between your two ears instead of anyone else’s,” Bucky replied, bouncing his leg again. “Hate to agree with the guy, but he has a point.”

“George isn’t exactly the epitome of good mental health, Buck.”

Bucky shrugged his shoulders. “Either way.”

“Fathers may have different viewpoints especially when it comes to mental health,” Dr. Raynor said. “Given their generation.”

Bucky clicked his tongue. “Well, he and my mother have never been to therapy and they’re fine.”

“Your father had like one thousand mistresses,” you pointed out, making Dr. Raynor raise her brows and Bucky made a face.

“Allegedly.”

“It’s not allegedly, Becca literally told me she once—”

“Bucky, how would you describe your parents’ marriage?” she asked and Bucky heaved a sigh.

“They’re fine.”

“Would you say you look up to their marriage?” she asked. “Or that you want to have a similar one?”

You scoffed. “Good luck with that.”

“You wouldn’t want to have that?” she asked and you shook your head.

“Bucky can’t disrespect me like that.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

You pulled your brows together, then shrugged your shoulders.

“Both,” you said without looking at him. “We have a deal, so I believe he will hold up his end of the deal.”

Out of the corner of your eye, you could see the proud smile curling Bucky’s lips and Dr. Raynor nodded.

“Anything else you feel like you took after your father, besides your opinion on therapy?”

“Why are we talking about my father?” Bucky asked back while you tried to hold back the retort. “I thought this was couples therapy.”

“We can talk about anything you feel like we need to talk about,” Dr. Raynor said. “But most of the time, our parents’ relationship is the blueprint of our own relationships even if we don’t realize it.”

“That’s not what’s happening here,” Bucky said, motioning at you. “It’s different.”

“How?”

“What she said,” Bucky said curtly, nodding in your direction and you heaved a sigh. “He’s good with my mom, and he’s great with my sister, no need to talk about him.”

“But not with you?” Dr. Raynor asked and Bucky dragged his tongue over his teeth.

“He’s fine.”

“Bucky,” said and he shot you a look.

“What?”

“He’s fine with you? Really?”

“Y/N, not everyone needs a father, okay?” he insisted. “Some of us need a boss while growing up in this business.”

“I don’t think you needed a boss instead of a father when you were a kid, actually,” you insisted, making Dr. Raynor tilt her head.

“Would you mind explaining that?” she asked. “That boss comment?”

Bucky drummed his fingertips on his knee.

“It’s a part of…” he stopped himself and cleared his throat. “My father knew what I was capable of, so he pushed me until I saw it. Until I proved myself. That’s not a terrible thing, it worked out after all.”

You licked your lips.

“Really?” you asked. “So you’d be totally okay with following his footsteps?”

 That made him stop for a moment and he scoffed.

“Fine, I wouldn’t do the cage fight because that shit’s medieval but it was because he knew I could handle it,” he defended him. “He’s great with Becca, and I don’t need him to be good with me. We don’t have that kind of relationship.”

Your stomach did a painful flip. “I forgot about that.”

“Cage fight?” Dr. Raynor asked and you both turned to her, Bucky crossing his arms over his chest. You nibbled on your lip.

“Um,” you said. “Our fathers are... CEOs and we both have family companies. There’s this tradition that—the family company has a boss and an heir and when you’re the heir, you need to show that you can handle the job.”

She frowned slightly.

“And the job can get pretty physical,” you said as Bucky let out a bitter chuckle beside you. “And one of the requirements is…when an heir is picked after years of training and everything, once the boss decides it’s time for them to prove themselves, they put you in a cage with other um—” you thought for a moment. “Some professional fighters that happen to be in the business as well, working under the family. Bodyguards, if you will.”

Not bodyguards.

They would put the heir in a cage with the best fighters working for the boss.

“But usually the bosses ask the heir to prove themselves right before they pass the crown, so to speak,” you said and stole a look at him. “Not George though.”

“I was ready to prove myself.”

“At sixteen?” you asked him. “No one fucking asks that of the heir at sixteen, Buck. My father didn’t even put Ian through that yet.”

“I was already his heir, he wanted to make sure,” Bucky said. “I beat everyone up in that cage, didn’t I?”

“Your nose was broken,” you counted with your fingers. “Three of your ribs, you could barely see through one eye for like two weeks because of how swollen it was—”

“But I proved myself,” he pointed out, making you clench your jaw and Dr. Raynor sat up straighter, trying to shake off the shock. “I’m glad I did it, I’d do it again.”

“You see?” you asked. “And then he asks me why we need therapy.”

“I don’t need therapy,” Bucky shot back. “I don’t even know why I’m here, I'm perfectly fine.”

Dr. Raynor licked her lips, then grabbed the notebook by her side while Bucky pursed his lips, slipping a little on the couch.

“Great,” he said. “She has a notebook and everything. Charm, how soon can we leave?”

                                                   *

Well, no one had gotten shot during your first couples therapy session, so as far as you were concerned, it was a success. Bucky had to drop by his office for half an hour to check on something, and after that you figured you could go to lunch together to discuss the next step in your plan so you tagged along.

Becca was already there in his office when you two walked in and Bucky tilted his head.

“What are you doing here?”

“Mom sent me,” she told him before coming to kiss your cheek. “Hey!”

“Hi there,” you said, kissing her cheek back. “We’re going to grab lunch after this, do you want to come?”

“Sure, I could eat,” she said, flinging herself on the couch. “Steve is here too, by the way.”

Bucky frowned. “Did you two come together?”

“Nope, I ran into him by the entrance,” she said while you took your spot next to her and Bucky walked to his laptop to switch it on.

“Mom sent you?” Bucky asked and rolled his eyes. “Let me guess, dad asked her to?”

Becca raised her hands while you gritted your teeth at the mention of George.

“You can’t shoot the messenger, there’s truce now.”

“Then why does it feel like I’m going to get shot by the messenger?” Bucky asked back, making her grin.

“You know how mom is,” she reminded him. “She wants all of us to get along. I take it you’re not willing to have another dinner anytime soon?”

“Fuck no—”

“Hey,” Steve said, knocking on the door and waved at you before turning to Bucky. “You’re busy?”

“Not at all,” Bucky said. “Did we have a meeting today? Did I forget?”

“Nah, I was just around,” Steve said. “Figured I could give you the news myself. Clint is flying to Chicago.”

Bucky pulled his brows together. “What?”

Steve shot him a grin. “My reaction exactly,” he said and came to sit on the other sofa. “How was therapy?”

“Ask Y/N,” Bucky said, clicking on something on his laptop. “She was the one who dragged me there.”

You rolled your eyes at him. “He brought a gun to therapy.”

Becca’s eyes widened. “Did you shoot the therapist, Bucky?!”

“No!” Bucky exclaimed. “Jesus, you two have zero trust in me.”

“How was it, really?” Steve asked you and you shrugged your shoulders.

“He’ll find it easier in the following weeks.”

Bucky frowned at you.

“Following weeks?” he asked. “We’re going there again?”

“Bucky, therapy is not like getting vaccinated,” Becca pointed out. “You can’t just have one session and expect it to fix your shit.”

“I don’t have the time—”

“I already talked to your assistant for the next month, try me,” you said sweetly and Bucky let out a groan, then turned to Steve.

“What is it about Clint and Chicago?”

“Well, he seems to believe that he can convince Rhett.”

Becca’s head whipped up and she blinked a couple of times while you tried to keep a straight face, and subtly pressed your index finger on your lips, giving her a slight grin. She let out a breath, then turned to Steve while Bucky scoffed.

“Yeah, that’s impossible.”

“What’s that about Chicago?” Becca asked and Steve heaved a sigh.

“Chicago’s prince became the new king recently,” he explained. “I thought it was hard to talk to his father, I spoke way too soon.”

“Yeah, he’s a dickhead,” Bucky pointed out while you bit inside your cheek to keep your laughter in. Becca sat up straighter.

“Why?”

“He doesn’t trust anyone who’s not from Chicago,” Steve said. “Refuses to do business with anyone else.”

“But doesn’t he kind of have to do it?” Becca asked. “Even we do business with other cities.”

“Chicago is different, Bec,” Bucky said. “They have their own rules, and as of now, they don’t actually need other cities.”

“Word on the street they might have to do it soon though,” Steve said. “Every boss in New York is trying to convince him, but as Bucky said, he’s a dickhead so…”

“That’s pointless, I’m telling you,” Bucky said as he typed at his laptop, then slammed the lid shut. “Okay, I’m done. Lunch?”

“I have a meeting with Sam,” Steve said as he stood up from the couch and he and Bucky walked to the door while Becca clicked her tongue, turning to look at you with a huge grin on her face.

“So,” she said and you hummed.

“Yes?”

“I take it he doesn’t know?”

“Nope.”

“None of them do?”

You shook your head, still smiling and Becca let out a laugh, then threw her arm over your shoulder.

“Nice plan,” she said and you giggled.

“Thank you,” you said, wrapping an arm around her waist. “Let’s go, you know how hungry therapy makes me.”

Chapter 20

[junnieverse]

LOGICAL ➳ Y. JUNGWON

➙ synopsis: you had known from the beginning that your relationship with jungwon was far from perfect, many would simply put it as toxic because of how manipulative he was but you were too blinded by love that all the lies and deceit felt meaningless. it was too late before you realised how dysfunctional it all was, love wasn't logical after all.

pairing: yang jungwon x gn!reader

genre: angst, lovers to exes au

word count: 1.1k

warnings: not proofread, jungwon is toxic (and so is your relationship with him), reader cries at some point

a/n: this is officially the first one done for the series! I hope you guys enjoy it, reblogs are highly appreciated too! :)

— GUTS X ENHYPEN SERIES MASTERLIST !

Everything had seemingly came crashing down and you were stuck right in the middle of the storm.

It felt like everything you knew that he'd told you was just acid burning through a surface.

Yang Jungwon was no saint. He may have looked like one but, looks can be deceiving.

Everyone had warned you about him and his manipulative ways but you were smitten.

You had fallen for him and hard, nothing anyone said could've stopped you from letting go of him and the deep connection you had.

You were brainwashed, yes, but what made you feel stupid was how long it took you to realise that your relationship with Jungwon really meant nothing to him.

He simply drew you a picture of everything you wanted, the picture perfect relationship with the most perfect boyfriend but you couldn't see the cracks in this little fantasy.

You were mislead into a fake reality that seemed so perfect that you were afraid of losing it.

Only after you saw the truth behind it all did you realise how much control Jungwon had over you.

He made you doubt the obvious and simply believe and stay in the fantasy he'd painted out for you because 2 + 2 actually equals 5 right, it didn't make sense at first but then again nothing in your relationship did and so you just chose to blindly believe whatever and every grain of critical thinking seemingly dispersed slowly.

"I really am a fool huh. I could've stopped it from going on for so long but I let that master manipulator have his way." you say laughing bitterly as your best friend sat beside you rubbing your back comfortingly.

Constantly seeing the signs that he was never a good influence to have around and yet you ignored the warning signs because he made you 'happy'.

You had heard all the rumours about him and yet it went through one ear and right through the other choosing to not believe the truth behind everyone who was trying to protect you from getting hurt.

"Jungwon, who was that girl I saw you with the other day with your friends?" you ask him looking down nervously.

"Hmm? Oh that was... a friend of mine." he says monotonously as he walks past you not bothering to say anything else.

You knew deep down that it was better to trust your gut instincts and they were telling you that he wasn't being completely truthful yet you once again turned a blind eye to your boyfriend mistreating you because the following day he would shower you with gifts and tell you how much he loved you.

He deserved just that much forgiveness right.

You were blind in love and this little world you both had was enough for you.

All you needed was Jungwon to feel complete you thought.

It was evident that you were holding onto something that wasn't pure and sincere, your relationship with Jungwon was nothing but lies and deception but you still saw 'the good side' in him.

How he lead you to believe he was changing, becoming a better man for you.

And yet, the more he lied to you, the more you started believing the things he'd say.

"It's possible for people to change. Jungwon is changing just for me, don't you guys see it?" you tell your friends thinking fondly of him as your friends shared a knowingly worried look between one another.

"(Y/n) snap out of it, Jungwon keeps messing with your feelings, he's gaslighting you." one of them says trying to calmly express herself.

Leaving him wasn't any easy either, you'd been committed for a solid two years now and you weren't willing to throw that away.

He would call you less, he was less affectionate, he was staying out with friends more and he was gradually gravitating away from you.

Everytime you finally had enough of him and would call him out, he somehow found a way to win you over to give him another chance.

"You know I would never hurt you baby. I had too much to drink and did something stupid but you know I'll always love you." Jungwon said holding your hand in his as he wiped your tears with his other hand.

He sure was convincing you thought, he knew which exact poisonous words to use just to have you running back to him.

It was nothing but broken promises and the same story.

He would mess up, you would call him out, you both would get into an argument and he wakes up the next morning begging for forgiveness but never owning up to what he did.

You couldn't let yourself keep suffering like this anymore.

Nothing made sense, you thought he was the perfect guy you fell in love with in the beginning but now you don't know who Jungwon became, better yet maybe this was a side of him he hid from the very beginning like everyone warned you about, but you were slowly losing yourself through the dysfunctionality of your toxic relationship with him.

The fantasy world he'd created for you was crumbling down and you started to see him for who he really was.

You started to see how distorted everything he'd say was only after you finally chose to see the truth.

You thought it was a bright and magical island but this fantasy had it's faults, from the green skies to the red grass... how didn't you see this all before.

"God I'm so stupid." you say thinking back to your past relationship.

You tried making him happy, that was your main goal your entire relationship, to see Jungwon smile and be the reason behind it.

It made you blame yourself thinking you couldn't even keep your own boyfriend happy.

He trapped you.

It all felt like endless drowning and you didn't know when you'd hit the bottom.

Jungwon made sure he had you wrapped around his finger just so he could use you as he pleased and wiggle his way back into your life by painting a false picture of someone he never was... and you fell for it each time.

You both had so many problems in your relationship, very clearly your problems were unsolvable and you just kept trying to make something out of nothing.

Who was to blame but yourself.

You put yourself in this position, you could've stopped it all from the beginning when you realised how all Jungwon did was mistreat you but you didn't.

Because you 'loved him' ?

He couldn't even give you just that much back so why did you put yourself through so much heartache.

"This whole love thing is fucked up." you say looking at your best friend who nods beside you.

Love was never logical but you had to learn it the hard way.

SERIES TAGLIST: @enhastolemyheart @jungwonscafe @firstclassjaylee

[sygneth]

I am not even sure if I will be posting this (though, if you're reading this, I did), but, nevertheless, I have a few points about Jean that I have to make. He is no saint. He is an asshole and I’m not gonna pretend that he is not. But there is so much more to it. 

Let me start with the most obvious. He is said to have clinically diagnosed depression, with, apparently, no distinctive source, and, from what he says, we may assume he is under some sort of psychiatric supervision. 

He was diagnosed seven years ago. Diagnosed with depression, which probably means he’s been dealing with it for a good while longer, only at a certain moment he decided to seek help/had an attempt/any other circumstance that lead this man to get a diagnosis. He is now 34, seven years earlier he’d be 27. 

The reasons for such unspecified depression may be many, from some kind of a rare neurological defect causing one’s brain to be incapable of properly producing/transmitting/I’m-not-a-biologist-neither-is-English-my-first-language-so-I’m-not-gonna-dig-into-neurological-dysfunctions-further-but-you-get-the-point, serotonin, through a burnout, all the way to having other, undiagnosed disorders/illnesses as *checks Luiga’s tweets* Schizoid PD (I am not convinced that what Jean presents is a 100% textbook SPD example, rather SPD traits/behavior patterns? But I’m no specialist and even if I were, it’s hard to diagnose someone based on those few dialogue lines) and codependency tendencies. The doctors didn’t diagnose any other disorder, or at least he never mentions it, but looking at the world of Elysium, those disorders may not yet have been widely recognized, especially if not presenting themselves in the most typical ways/high-functioning. And Jean tends to be high functioning despite his issues. Yet, I assume that in Elysium, and Jamrock especially, the access and quality of psychological and psychiatric services are poor and probably limited. Not to mention education on the matter, which is probably low if not near none. (Just looking at how is alcoholism treated by *everyone* there, or the short mention of McCoy’s brother gives me a good 90’s/early 00s Eastern Europe vibe of mental issues/disabilities public awareness.)  Now, keep that in mind. 

Alright. Next up: a codependent, close relationship with an alcoholic. 

Jean’s relationship with Harry is an interesting one. I found this interesting research on codependency among spouses of alcoholics, that states codependency is related to, among others, SPD traits. (That’s an, uh, disclaimer? I was just curious how that two may coexist, but apparently, they do.) 

Back to the main thought. 

As someone who has been in a close, codependent relationship with a person who had problems with drinking, I can tell you something. It’s more than hard to get out of one. You see a person you care about do stupid, drunken, dangerous shit, you may be angry at them, you may be furious, yet you will still feel responsible for them in a way, and you will take that responsibility and try to get them out of the shit they got themselves into. I’ll say more, if that’s an actual relationship, you will feel social pressure that you are responsible for your partner’s behavior and you’re the one to take care of them. If it’s your work partner, then it’s highly probable you actually will be held responsible for their behavior, so you’re even more likely to clean up their mess. And when you help them out, because you care, because you feel like you should, because you don’t want to be “dicked” for it, maybe all of the above, they will be grateful and they will praise you and love you and even if you feel like this is not the right thing to do, you will do it again.

It takes a lot of work and self-awareness to get out of something like that healthily. And if you have some psychological knowledge, it also helps a lot, to understand how to deal with it. And the only way to do it, regardless healthy or not, is by setting boundaries. If you can healthily set them, and make the other person respect them, that’s very good. But if you have some other mental issues in addition to that, if you lack knowledge on how people’s behavior patterns work, on how exactly addictions work and that, you are maybe having some problems with generally understanding relationships between people, how and why they work, it’s very likely that you won’t be capable of setting those boundaries and enforce them to be respected. It’s very likely that one day, when something will happen and you will realize how toxic and unhealthy this relationship is for you, you will panic and you will start to do anything to get out of it, like a cat drowning in a well. That you will start acting cold, maybe even merciless from a certain perspective, maybe you won’t let yourself believe in their pleading and assurances of change, because you will know that letting yourself *feel* sympathy for the person you had this relationship with may lead to spiraling back into the wheel of codependency. Maybe you have already tried this, and letting yourself trust them only led you back to the point where you started and maybe this time, you don’t want it to end up this way.

And you know what? There is nothing wrong with trying to ensure your mental well-being. “Before approaching the casualty, always make sure the area is safe.” YES because if you’ll get hurt trying to help somebody, there will be one more person to help. The same applies to helping people get their life together. If you won’t have a good mindset to help them, if they will only drag you down, maybe the area isn’t safe? 

Moving on. 

Now, remember when I said that the level of social and psychological awareness seems very low in Elysium/Revachol/Jamrock? About that. 

You know what else I see, looking at the Harry-Jean-Dora-Kim situation? A bunch of people with self-awareness in terms of emotion, and emotional development of teenagers, but problems of grown-up people. And they are not to blame, the system is to blame. Harry seems to be very self-conscious and connected to his emotions, yet for six years he couldn’t find a healthy way to get over a heartbreak. He has tendencies to act violently, to randomly drunk-phone his ex to harass her (I mean come on, he was asking her if she is naked), not to mention a tone of other things. 

What happens here to Jean, is his situationship/best friend, whom yeah, he decided to ‘have a break’ with, immediately gets over it, and starts to go out with someone else. Taking, that this man has probably understanding of his emotions on a level of a high-schooler, he WILL be salty. He will be mad at Harry and he will be salty towards Kim when he sees them in Whirling. (Not to mention that it’s probably how they just roll in the precinct, and I’m quite sure that Harry’s and Jean’s relationship has been japing on and teasing each other, and as long as they both knew how it works, it was all good, compare: this post. So yes, Jean will be angry with Harry and he will act like an offended drama queen partially because that is just how their relationship dynamics probably looked like for the last two (at least!) years, and partially because he is an offended 16-year-old drama queen, whose bestie told her to fuck off and found a new (boy)friend. 

Is it good, that grown-up men have the emotional capabilities of high schoolers? No. Should we blame them, or the fact that their system seemingly doesn’t provide any prevention, doesn’t promote awareness, or offer any proper healthcare for that matter? I’ll leave that to you.

To add to all this, yes, the RCM’s fucked up system, hierarchy, and mentality don’t help. Yes, it would be better for both Harry and Jean and probably Kim too, taking for his PTSD, to get the fuck out of there and live peaceful lives. But you know, changing your whole lifestyle isn’t easy. Understanding that maybe it’s better to leave now and that it doesn’t mean you’ve “wasted” your years is a process, a long and hard one. I had to learn this. My close ones had to learn this. Some of them still didn’t, especially, that where I come from, there is this CEE culture of not letting yourself fail with peace of mind. You got to do everything the best you can, you gotta do it 120%, and if not, you’re a rotten piece of shit. Looking at how Harry treats himself, Revachol seems to have this in common with Central-Eastern Europe as well. 

Another thing, we don’t even know what Kim or Jean did before they joined the RCM, and Harry was a gym teacher. Thinking that it is easy to just switch your job in, again, a place with a CEE mentality, is a huge mistake. At the age of 40-odd years especially. In the 90s, especially. We don’t even know if Jean or Kim have any other education on their account, besides being cops, so changing professions would mean additional education, and for Harry, how many places, realistically, would take in a 45-year-old gym teacher?

I generally see that many people seem to forget/not understand how CE European mentality works, and it shows. I am glad that we live in a world where awareness of things such as homophobia, ableism, misogyny and else is common knowledge. But it wasn’t here, not even those 15 years ago. I remember people using names of dysfunctions and disabilities as slurs. Grown up people. I remember my classmates and my friend calling each other faggots or laughing at each other for not being gender-affirmative enough. Half of us turned out to be queer, and nobody had a problem with that, because in those times this kind of language wasn’t necessarily indicating someone’s worldview, it was just a bad habit, a very common one. I am more than happy, really, that we got rid of this kind of narrative and are more aware of the weight of a spoken word now. But when talking about past or settings that resemble this past, let’s please not forget that it DID look different and take that into consideration. Please. 

Remembering what we derived from and what a great progress as a society we did is important, as it shows the way we managed to walk, but also reminds us of what people had to deal with. And is a warning, because now we’re probably still all doing things that in 30 years will be so, so wrong. 

So concluding this ridiculously long consciousness stream, I love you, DE fandom. Now, I have an interview to watch (probably not anymore) and a comic page to draw (as always). I’ll leave you with this here.

[jacevelaryonswife]

You set my soul alight

It was shocking, to say the least, to discover by your own realization that the feelings nourished by your friend were more overwhelming than normal.

∴pairing: Modern!Aegon Targaryen x fem!reader

∴warnings: english is not my first language

aegon targaryen masterlist

It was shocking, to say the least, to discover by your own realization that the feelings nourished by your friend were more overwhelming than normal. There were two problems in this situation: it was your friend, and that friend was Aegon.

A tragedy announced, obviously.

For all the people your heart could beat stronger, Aegon should be the last in the romantic aspect, after all, he wasn’t romantic and never tried to hide it. All cases that lasted more than one night were unsuccessful when the other side realized the intentions (or lack thereof) on the part of the Targaryen.

That didn’t mean that he was scarce in qualities. Aegon was the fun friend, that was the function he liked to play, and with that the craziest nights of your life were next to him (and the most embarrassing days too). But he wasn't just that, as you learned over time. He was a shoulder to cry on, a chest to deposit secrets and, incredibly, a great encouraging.

He was also very cute, lazy, sly and eager for physical affection, but especially in need of emotional affection. Aegon didn’t know how to deal with his feelings, the result of a rich and dysfunctional family very concerned about their own interests. You judged a lot of actions he took, but putting yourself in his point of view wasn’t pleasant. Poor rich boy, as you mocked sometimes. However, you were an easy person to deal with, even with your flaws, Aegon not so much, although your both believed that your mostly opposite behavioral characteristics were responsible for your friendship. He was sloppy, he never cared too much about studies or running his family's company, he was the king of parties and bad vodka, highly chaotic and never cared about maintaining the social cycle with well-born people. You, on the other hand, in your few options for personal success always chose to dedicate to school and college, rarely went to parties or drank with strangers, got a full scholarship at a renowned college and worked to get a curriculum that would open up good opportunities.

Aegon was a friend of a friend, eventually a friend's cousin, a friend’s brother and the kind of company you never had. Until everything changed.

Obviously it started when he tried to have sex with you while smelling like watermelon cigarettes, which made you almost laugh at his face. Your friendship was built slowly, imperceptible to both eyes even when it was really happening. If something in common that you two had was the failure continues in serious relationships and a conflicting sense of humor at times.

You tried to convince yourself that it wasn’t a big deal, it couldn't be a big deal, it shouldn't be a big deal. But it was, and you didn't know how to deal with it besides avoiding it. It was an odious action that broke your heart, but maybe it was the only way to remove the confusion of platinum hair from your mind. However, Aegon wasn’t uninhibited or controlled like normal people. That night when you came home after buying a cheeseburger, there he was lying on the couch of your newly rented apartment with the guitar on his lap, an unknown melody filling your ears.

“Glaciers melting in the dead of night and superstars sucked into the supermassive...” he hummed again before looking at your figure in silence. “Hey, I was worried about you, it's been a while since we've seen each other,” he said.

"That's why you broke into my house?" You asked, walking to the small counter in the kitchen.

“It's not an invasion if I have the key,” he replied. "And I ordered a snack to eat, I didn't know what time you would arrive."

"How long did you intend to stay here?"

"Until you arrived, I was really worried."

Your mind was divided between a "What the fuck?" And a "Stop being cute." Not knowing which one to answer. Instead, you just said: "although it's lovely of you, it's still an invasion since I wasn't here.

Sitting next to him on the couch, you placed your cheeseburger on your lap and the drink in the center.

"Don't be dramatic," he rolled his eyes, "so, what's going on?"

Obviously you lied. "Nothing, I'm just stressed about college."

He has heard that a thousand times, and always suggested something that involved alcohol to relax. But surprising was something that Aegon was terribly good, so he only said in a playful tone: "I've already offered the vacancy of being my sugar baby, but you denied it."

"Because you can't be a 24-year-old daddy."

“Some girls disagree with that,” he blinked cheeky, causing different sensations in you. On the one hand, you would like to stretch and kiss him, on the other, all you wouldn't want to know was details of his sex life with other people, since that almost made your fists close and a frown appear.

"I really don't need to know that," was all you said before delighting yourself with the greasy food. “Hmm. That's very good," you fell back on the couch.

Your friend pouted as he watched the cheeseburger shine in his hand, almost drooling at the sight. "I want a little bite," he supported the guitar on the floor and hugged you sideways like the sly child he was. How to resist that? Sending him a selfish pout, you directed the food in his mouth, watching him bite a medium piece.

"Jesus Christ, that's good, where did you buy it?" He asked.

“In the Jack on the front street,” you replied with your mouth full before taking a sip of Pepsi. "So, new song?"

He settled even more on you, raising his mouth to get another piece of your cheeseburger. "Yep, but it's still a draft, and you, how's it going in Black Sheep?"

Oh yes, let's talk a little about you now. Music was one of your favorite things in the world, always listening to them in your headphones or in full sound in your apartment. It was one of the things that Aegon and you had in common, but incredibly when he said he was planning to set up a band with his friends, you didn't initially believe the idea — although didn't mention it. But he was good, very very good, and with the money and influence of his family he would be the perfect nepobaby. However, Aegon used to abandon his projects after a while, too bored (and privileged) to keep his focus on a single thing, but incredibly that time it was for real.

Even with your support, when your friend found out that one of your hobbies was writing, he practically begged you to compose music with him. “Be the Paul of my John,” he said, making you choke.

Initially you were afraid, feeling incapable, after all what you wrote was different from what a musician wrote, but in slow steps you made an interesting partnership, where of the ten songs from the band's first studio album, four had your participation in the composition.

“I stopped at the chorus, I still don't know how to continue,” you answered about your individual project.

"Do you already have a melody?" He asked.

"Yes, I've been imagining something." He stretched out to pick up the guitar and give it to you. “Dude I'm still eating.”

"Don't be for that," he bit a considerable piece of your burger, "I ordered a burrito for us," he justified when he heard your angry scream. "I want to hear it, it's been a while since I've heard your voice."

“Good for you,” you grumbled at his last sentence.

“Stop that, you're great.”

It was Aegon who taught you to play the guitar and encouraged you to sing with him, although you were not sure about yout voice. But what didn't he ask you crying that you did laughing?

With an audible sigh you began to reveal your sketch.

“Hello again, friend of a friend, I knew you when… our common goal was waiting for the world to end,” you hummed, “now that the true is just a rule that you can bend… you crack the whip, shapeshift and trick the past again. Send you my love on a wire, lift you up everytime and everyone ooh, pulls away, ohh, from you oh.”Yes, it was about him. "I'm still fixing some things, but I liked the beginning.

“You're kidding? That's fantastic, holy shit. It will be perfect in the sound aesthetics of the new album!" He seemed really excited.

You only agreed weakly before returning the guitar and eating the last piece of your snack.

"I'm serious!"

"And I believe," you countered, "but I'm sorry if I don't have the same faith in me as you have. What about the show?"

“I expected you to say you could go,” he replied.

"And I can."

“Can you?”

“Yeah.”

"Can you really?"

"Yeah dude, I can go."

"Awsome, you'll love it!"

"I hope."

You were so willing to detoxify your mind from the platinum mess in front of you that you didn't notice the satisfied glow in his beautiful violet eyes. His band, The Usurpers, was underground by choice of the members themselves (so far) with an uncommercial and alternative sound, they usually performed for average audiences, however, opportunities like Lollapalooza came a few months ago to boost the audience. That Sunday, exactly in a day, they will perform at the dynamic arts center of the Targaryen Corporation network. A few minutes ago you would find a way not to go and invent any excuse to avoid it, but you didn't want to raise suspicions of your actions, so you thought you could go to the event and then recalculate your route to get it out of your mind.

But fate didn’t intend to collaborate with you, not when the other day arrived and he left your house only in the morning — having slept hugging you in your bed. He sent you some messages throughout the day, all about your presence at the show and the details of the organization. You sent him a "stop sending me spoilers 💀", in which he just replied with a "SORRY 😩 IM JUST ANXIOUS”

Your clothes had been chosen as soon as he left, cool, modern and nocturnal. Obviously you would be in front as a good friend where he could see you — at his own request. And even though you hated arriving early on these occasions, you did, staying with the band behind the scenes since you knew them. Relaxed, Aegon told you to wait for him at the dragon story session after the end of the show, without explaining why.

But not even the fact of having him by your side the night before prepared your heart for what came next, not when he was so beautiful and vibrant that night when announcing at the end of the show:

"So, the next song is part of our new album, and it was made for the love of my life. It's not my first composition made for her, but she still doesn't know it, neither of the song nor of the fact that she is the love of my life."

And then the violet irises were directed at you, firmer than ever, in a seriousness never seen before by you. Your heart was failing, you were sure you would faint.

"Or maybe you know but don't want to accept, anyway, I want you to know that I love you, I love you like hell, in every way you could imagine, and I want you to know that."

What the f-

“1,2,3,4… Oh baby don't you know I suffer? Oh baby can you hear me moan? You call me under falses pretenses, how long before you let me go?” You couldn't believe what was happening. “Oooh oooh you set me soul alight. Oooh oooh you set me soul alight.”

It couldn't be... that really meant... he couldn't be talking in the sense you interpreted, could he?

“Glaciers melting in the dead of night and superstars sucked into the supermassive.” But then, you recognized the excerpt, the same lyrics he was humming yesterday. A surprised smile escaped his lips, too amazed by what was happening, by what he was doing. Did he love you? Really? Aegon, your friend? What have you never fallen in love with?

“I thought I was a fool for no one, but mm baby, I'm a fool for you; you're the queen of the superficial, and how long before you tell the truth? Oooh oooh you set me soul alight... Oooh oooh you set me soul alight.”

Your eyes remained connected for almost all that magical moment, and you couldn't believe that a teenage literary cliché was happening between you and the hot vocalist. When the song was over, he just said:

“Maybe when you finish your music inspired by me we can sing together on stage,” he blinked before finishing the show.

He knew... how?

It was a lot to process, but your legs were quick to guide you to the place agreed by him, your heart beating at almost a mile per second. He was stupidly fast to leave the stage and run to you, assuring the fans of the band that he would return for autographs, but a guy just reassured him with a "Go get your girl!" While he ran to you.

Those were the longest and most nervous minutes of both your lives so far. Your mind hammered on what had just happened, wondering if you had truly understood his message. It can't be, it can't be, it can't be.

"I've been imagining this for so many days and yet I don't know what to say," the low timbre lifted all the threads from the back of your neck and indicated the male presence behind you.

Your eyes full of expectation faced him anxiously, sharing the same feeling as his phrase. "And what did you imagine?"

“Exctly this,” he said, “at this moment, just the two of us.”

He approached slowly, gradually breaking a different barrier: the one that protected your feelings.

A tightness in your chest followed by a squinting was the way your body chose to make you analyze the words you would say next. Although the enigmatic and platonic game was fun, it was as torturous as knowing about the nature of your feelings.

"When you said you love me in every way, did you refer to romantically too?" You tried to keep the tone calm.

“Yes, I did. In every way,” he replied. "And I think you do too. Trying to get away in the last few weeks and Black Sheep, uh? Friend of a friend... it wasn't very subtle on your part, you know."

Heavens... you felt a sudden urge to hide. “I thought it was subtle enough,” you said with a weak smile.

"So it's true?" Aegon asked.

"What?"

"That you love me?"

Expressing romantic feelings has always been difficult for you. Much of this came from the fear of rejection, the other just didn't want to deal with a relationship, but there he was, Aegon, your friend, openly saying that he loved you just as you loved him. You were terrified.

"Yes, I love you," you confessed, "I realized this some time ago, but... I didn't know how to say it, and if I would say it."

“I know. Me too.” He stopped in front of you, "we are complicated people, romantically, me more than you. I was scared when I realized, but it was the first time in many years that I didn't want to run away from this feeling,” he confessed.

"I can't say the same. I tried to get you out of my head to pretend that this wasn't happening, I didn't want to destroy our friendship and especially my heart, we are not references in relationships, especially you."

He let a weak and aerated smile escape. "I know," he sighed, "I don't even know what to do about it,"

"Neither I," you said honestly, "I feel that if we try to take this forward we will ruin what we built and I don't want that."

"Do you think it won't work?"

"Yes, I think, but I don't just want to imagine what it could have been. Even though I'm scared, I'd like to try."

A restrained smile illuminated his beautiful features. “Me too. So... will I finally be able to kiss you?" He circled your waist with one hand and held your face with the other, making you laugh.

"Is that all you think about?" Your question was humorous when you touched it on your beautiful face.

"In fact, I also think about the other things that will come after the kiss," he joked, "only if it's okay with you."

Touching your lips on his, you shared a sweet and calm kiss, as if you had all the time in the world.

“Yes, everything is fine for me,” you whispered.

———————————

songs mentioned:

supermassive black hole - muse

black sheep - metric (brie larson version)

General taglist: @chompchompluke @fan-goddess @kravitzwhore

Aegon taglist: @lovelykhaleesiii @f4ll-for-you @faces-ofvenus