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anolyso · 4 years ago

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Utena thoughts...about 2 weeks later

I've been putting it off for way too long and so most of my thoughts stopped being fresh. On top of watching way too many analysis vids post-watch, but still I do at least want to put my 2cents of Revolutionary Girl Utena out there for the world.

Utena is perhaps one of the most famous "magical girl"/shoujo action shows out there for not only it's transgressive themes of relationship abuse and low-key pretty much being the poster girl for like actual feminist perspective on/in anime...but also just doing it all in both a heavily allegorical and understated, yet super over-the-top stylish fashion

But that's it's reputation preceding itself, is Utena worth while all these years? The answer is Yes, but it also really shows it's age and budget in pacing and repetition, tho as an appreciator for "behind the scenes" compromises in art, it's more showcasing Ikuhara's talent in working around both taboo and long-form budget constraints with just well-thought out and iconic imagery that - while episodic and formulaic - is just very good at filling the 39 eps with feasts for the eyes.

Utena broadly is about tomboy Utena with memories long ago after her parents died being "saved" by a princely figure like a princess...except she's so enthralled by the nostalgia that instead she becomes a full on Prince herself and receives a dueling ring to fight in the Ohtori Acadamy secret duels for "engagement" to Rose Bride Himemiya Anthy.

Utena is divided between 4 arcs, only the first and last being Manga adapted from hearsay:

1: Student Council Saga

2: Black Rose Saga

3: Akio Ohtori Saga

4: Apocalypse

From back to forth I'd say that Akio + Apoc is more just escalation into the finale while Black Rose being anime original comes off as a glorified side-character study which while complementing the secondary cast, feels like one of those Anime movies that has to say "but if you don't watch this part, it's pretty much optional for the main plot" despite it also actually introducing the most important antagonist within it's margins.

More importantly, it's the Student Council (arc and the actual people) that lay the foundation but also a large part of the show's focus which ironically puts Utena in the background until like almost the finale and some in-between developments, so it's less "Utena (and Anthy Himemiya)'s story" until the very end, but more like a showcase of how fucked up the system at large is (pin in that).

By the Council themselves is:

Kyouichi Saionji: The biggest jobber, like actually introduced as the most despicable loser ep 1 and proceeds to be a complete arrogant joke for the rest of the show. Honestly in another shojo "love" story, they'd find some way to redeem him but semi-compellingly they turn him into like an Aqua-lad type pathetic brat with an inferiority complex to the actual Student head

Miki Kaoru: the naive "nice, non-threatening soft boy" that also just never actually listens to the girls around him. Probably adds more complexity to the whole patriarchal idea on analytic reflection since yeah, the whole "nice guy finishes last" plays up better when the kid comes off as that "ally" energy of wanting to save Himemiya from being the Rose Bride but also low-key won't actually not just do the duels and win her cuz he's that sorta wishy-washy hypocrite. Arguably the least hateable guy in the cast (minus mascot Chu-Chu)

Juri Arisugawa: TRAGIC LESBIAN TRIANGLE LOVE. Probably the biggest point to of both "not-explicitly homosexual" but also really freaking obvious since her entire story is her girlfriend stealing her "boy crush" when actually she was crushing on her and being pretty much frustrated throughout her story as pining most of it. It's quaint by today's standards but also like damn girl, get over her she was like the worst back stabbing bitch (literally if Black Rose counts)

Nanami Kiryuu: SPEAKING OF QUEEN BITCH, it's been a long time since I've watched a High School girl bully and honestly it's kinda refreshing. If Miki is "soft-boy uwu" Nanami is a brat that gets her come-uppance often, featured prominently as an anime only with the MOST filler/comedic episodes but also not low-key, being the most out-spoken actual brother complex ironically spins perhaps the biggest twist and ironic relationships of "I love my brother but not-like-that but also like-that" by the end. Mostly comedic relief but I find her inclusion to actually add a lot more to juxtapose...

Touga Kiryuu: Big Student Council Prez himself, the first arc antagonist and also a strong foil to Saionji and later a stepping stone for Akio. Touga is THE image of a Princely Playboy Heart-Throb that in any other Shoujo romance would have the main girl win him over from all those "other girls" despite him being apathetic if not outright manipulative of them. Good thing Utena is better than that and really puts a spotlight on just not-actually-ok his power hunger for "the power to bring the world revolution" that leads him to heavily objectify Anthy, arguably even more than Misogynist Trophy Girlfriend beater Saionji, since he doesn't even see her as more than a means to an end despite professing and looking the Prince part but lacking all the actual virtues.

The Student council matters more since they're characters and subsequent tragic flaws are the ACTUAL meat of the show and on second rumination actual shows more how fucked up the system/gender dynamic/power hierarchy is since - while it blatantly fucks over Juri who can't just outright say who she likes - also show almost it's own sub-text of Masculine failings: Saionji desperately clinging to being TOXIC MASCULINE™ and completely falling short underneath Touga; Miki's "nice boy" act belying him trying to replace his low-key nostalgia for his sister (also a bitch, but apparently was more like Nanami in the manga); and best yet Touga being the quintessential "Prince in all but actual behavior" by emulating a cutthroat and Machiavellian world view but coming up empty because well, he's just an illusion of a prince...but that leads in way more to the big finale piece where I'll reintroduce the actual story's main trio

Utena Tenjou: Tomboy Prince with brain empty except for lesbian thoughts. Honestly probably what every western "STRONG INDEPENDENT WOMAN" archetype wishes they were since while having very tomboyish personality in athletics, blunt speaking and also VERY oblivious to the actual plot for REAL DRAMATIC IRONY, but also never actually demeaning her being feminine partially due to her love of an childhood prince and how she maintains her relationship with both her friend Wakaba and later Anthy. Honestly mostly a plot device after S1 until she gets ACTUAL development by the very end and instead kinda bumbles her way into undoing the entire REVOLUTION OF THE WORLD. I kinda wish she felt either more cognizant or at least felt like she was developing/properly rebuking the rest of the cast's power obsessions but I guess that's for the movie.

Anthy Himemiya: Actual Trophy Wife with a dark secret (darker than ski- wait no that's terrible scratch that). Set-up very much as an immediate princess in distress while also being the most femme Yamato Nadeshiko, Anthy being the Rose Bride as a literal prize who acts and behaves as whom she's "engaged" with desires while otherwise being quiet, wry, mysterious and noticably submissive, by the end it actually plays up into THE BIG REVEALS of just how abused she's been into a hopeless acceptance...like y'know actual abuse victims.

Akio Ohtori: Grade A Antagonist, probably the most insidious I've seen a villain in a while, Akio is notable for, back in 1997, being perhaps the big go-to of actual deconstructing the facade of a whole shoujo genre's "hots for a teacher/sexy man putting the moves" and highlighting how actually exploitative and abusive a person like that really is. Being Himemiya's brother (somewhat justified in the manga by both being a weird Sailor Moon-esque reincarnation of gods/godesses of Dios), despite how much of his motives are runing the background and how the entire back story is uh...brought up in like barely in the last arc with little lead up (some scenes feel like they'd be a full melodrama season and they just have like 1 scene in the final arc episodes) he manages to one-up Touga (in the plot as well) by instead of "just" objectifying girls, not-just-flat out saying Utena looks best as a princess, but y'know the fact that he is implicitly yet constantly exploiting and victim-blaming Anthy for her own suffering for "the power of Dios/Revolution of the world" turns it on its head

I've spent all this time on characters but in truth a lot of the meat of the show relies again on the Council Members fleshing out the issues of system leading to outright divorcing "being a Prince" (heroic altruistic virtues) and "being a man" (considering like all but maybe the comedic relief have some deliberately misogynistic behavior) and beyond just the plot (or rather character) synopsis, the talent goes far more in how it's framed, the symbolic/allegorical shots, the repetition adding a good episode formula flow to character showcases, probably the most "tasteful" allusion to uh...*ahem* sexual abuse that so many other edgier/prentious shows fumble. Both in how intimidating yet understated it's foreshadowing is until they hard-reveal it despite never explicitly naming it even tho it sends Nanami into hysterics

Really it's both a massive blessing and reason for it's cult beloved status for it's aesthetics but also it's burden, for being a full 39 episodic season by season character development study of everyone BUT the main trio except for snippets and the very end that makes it greatly appreciable as a legitimate work of art.

What I wanted more to say however (long overdue) is that a large part of following is, visibly at least, western feminist critiques and yes while it almost seems like Utena fits the "deconstructing patriarchy" story like a glove...it's weird how almost none of them actually can give a good historical account of actual Japanese female/gender/sexuality norms nor Anime contemporaries actually were. Like Tenchi Muyo and Berserk came out the same year (Cardcaptor Sakura the next) and despite how you can "feel" the influence in lots of modern shows like SHAFT's signature visual imagery cuts or many WESETERN shows having straight scene references to Utena....almost no one has a similar feel to Utena until like Princess Tutu comes out.

Really tho probably should've watched Utena and then Tutu because while it's undeniable that Utena is a major pillar of shoujo re-codification - what with everyone before Utena was saying they thought it'd be like a Rose of Versaille or Lady Knight rip-off...whose laughing now? - it's almost like there's a missing link between it and it's major western fanbase (probably with what few anime did get overseas, this one probably rose to the top), or how very noticeable there IS an influence on it's genre in Japan

Almost none of the big analyst fans actually know A) it's not "a deconstruction of Magical Girls" since despite Ikuhara working on Sailor Moon just before this, almost none of the tropes line up and instead more with Shoujo genre as a whole. or one of the major inspirations was Takarazuka theater.

And this is not to dismiss how inspirational it is to it's western fandom, but while I am notably cynical towards placing things on pedestals, there's probably something about cultivating the whole pop-culture feminist reading commune with people making weird time-loop theories while kinda most of it is just filling in a mad-lib mostly thanks to Ikuhara just keeping things on the vague and letting the audience take away their own perspective.

Again, most of the show is completely sub-textual or visually/symbolically depicted and never stated nor properly defines it's weird key words (End of the World, Revolutionize the World, Power of Dios, Rose Bride, all things said constantly but never really said what they "mean". But that's also perhaps its charm, in it's allegory and very Death of the Author approach, it has definitely allowed it's fan theorizing and appreciation to flourish so there's something there for that.

Ultimately I'd say Utena the TV series is great more so for what it isn't...or rather I should say it's great for not just subverting Shoujo tropes and archetypes for the Japanese audience but also that despite dealing with some very serious and heavy subjects in obtuse and perhaps understated ways for the time, people have allowed it to be put on it's pedestal because they can easily fit it in themselves.

Honestly though, not that a more "straight forward" approach wouldn't detract from Utena but I will say that the movie, Adolescence of Utena, is very much the best encapsulation of what Utena strives to be (for another big blog post) and while the TV series has plenty of time and flexes it's directorial muscles with budget constraints and season pacing UNrestrained, the movie will trim a lot of the fat

#long post #Revolutionary Girl Utena #I haven't actually done my Anime thoughts in a while #Maybe I'll keep this on my main blog this time #I wrote this mostly on facebook tho if I wrote it here first I'd better integrate images probably #anolyso's media time #uh...except now that's on my main blog

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fitzefitcher · 4 years ago

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faction conflict soapbox, pt. 2

school 2: I’m tired of faction conflict, in general

@alldepressednshit said: To be honest, it feels overdone. Also, it keeps getting sidelined by *insert world-threatining asspull* BfA could’ve been great if it was an actual civil war. Like a baron zemo type setting out to destroy the horde and alliance from within.

@ashyteg said: I wish we could all hang out and play hearthstone

@baenling said: annoying as fuck. should have been over in mists of pandaria. literally zero reason for the faction war to continue

@swampgallows said: i just like being a zombie lady with a conscience and an ability to be hugged by huge monster people who are my family and would never hurt me

Anonymous asked: I wish people would stop bickering over which faction is worse, admit both factions are problematic and stop trying to morally high road the other for faction pride.

Anonymous asked: Hi yes I have come to talk about Horde vs Alliance. Honestly I use to be a big fan of it back in the day. Two big factions, warring over resources that would occasionally have to realize there are bigger threats. Thought it was fun, had faction pride in grinding up PVP reps to be like: Yes FOR THE HORDE. I just think things took a big downturn in Mists. Before it felt kind of balanced, sure Garrosh was "bad" but at the time i thought: well Varian started the war back in Wrath. 1/?

Having the war break out across the continents when before it was sort of like a cold war with a few active fighting spots was cool! I didn't think the Horde was being portrayed as 100% evil! But after that... I don't think the Alliance has really been shown ever in the wrong or negative. And that's just fucking boring. Not to mention literally punishes half the player base for preferring one faction. The Horde has so much creative potential but they never use it. So really sours it. 2/2

so I think the core issue with this is probably less that the faction conflict itself is happening, and more that it's happening but without any sense or meaning, and that it's happening in such a way that feels extremely unbalanced on either side. faction conflict, when it's done well, can be an extremely rewarding and memorable experience.

like, anybody that's played vanilla will tell you how fun an experience the scarab wall event was, and I myself remember how fun the thunder isle event was. and I think what worked for those events was that they were less like. Dark, Gritty War Conflict, and more played like a high school field day. Like there's certainly competition, and faction pride, but it's actually fun because it's more focused on Achievement than it is on Active Conflict. Like, people meme on the Argent Crusade Sponsored Renaissance Faire, but tbh that's some the most fun I've had with wow, and it ended being a really memorable experience for me and many of the people I was playing with at the time, in part because it was so light-hearted and silly and campy. in my opinion, wow is at its best when it leans into the stupid, silly camp, and that's why hearthstone has a better handle on warcraft and its characters than wow does lmao.

But I will acknowledge that this doesn't always work beyond just gameplay mechanics and overall experience- I love the argent tournament, but as a story, it's dumb as fuck, and at the time, felt extremely out of place for the wrath storyline. Like, we did naxx, then ulduar, and we were revving up to do ICC, which was (and still is, for the most part) regarded as one of its most serious story arcs, and it held a lot of gravity to it in terms of buildup, and the sort of consquences it would have afterwards. Whether or not those consequences were actually addressed afterwards are another issue entirely, but the point here is, ICC is an extremely memorable raid, and was very rewarding as an experience and story end (for the most part, let's stay on topic though), and it absolutely would not have worked if they had leaned into the campy silliness that worked for other things in wow. Here, the grim seriousness does work, because there was plenty of setup and payoff for it. like, even well before we get to ICC, or even wrath, there's buildup for the scourge starting in vanilla, and even in w3.

I think the wrath expansion in general was very very memorable, bc it was an expac where the stakes were pretty well-balanced in terms of alliance and horde content. like, the alliance's bone to pick with scourge is fairly obvious, and while the horde's was less so, the forsaken's was even more obvious, and there was planting and payoff of how the horde needed to go, both because the forsaken are their ally and this is their time of need, and that the scourge are a threat to everyone. truthfully, the alliance side of things I don't remember quite as well, but it was more staged as like, the alliance sort of acknowledging that Arthas (and that many aspects of the Scourge including KT and the cult of the damned) are very much problems that stemmed from the Alliance, and that they had a sort of responsibility to take care of it and make things right, even if they weren't necessarily Directly responsible for Arthas himself. So, there's equal setup in place for both factions, and equal stakes, even if they're not the same, and what faction conflict that does happen within the storyline has a setup and payoff. like, let's look at the wrathgate: a rogue faction of forsaken unleash hell on everyone at the battle of the wrathgate, whether they be scourge, alliance, or horde, and there are immediate consequences afterwards for each faction that feel engaging and meaningful. horde-side, you have to drive out the traitors that turned against your ally and retake one of your core cities, and alliance-side, you're taking immediate action against a faction that just completely fucked you over at a really key battle against a mutual enemy, a particular part of that faction that was already on thin fucking ice to begin with in terms of like. doing morally questionable, reprehensible things. and the ending, while daunting and honestly a little emotionally frustrating, neither punishes nor rewards either faction, and amps up the conflict in a way that feels realistic given the circumstances. And I think that this was really memorable as a questline, and as an expansion, because again, there was setup and payoff, but also, the prior two expansions weren't super focused on the faction conflict as much as wrath had started drumming up.

yes, there was conflict, obviously, but it wasn't so all-consuming as to make it tiresome or overwhelming or frustrating, and didn't feel particularly unbalanced or unfair. I think it should also be noted that faction conflict had never taken the spotlight so strongly in this way before, so it was this novel thing still being explored, and again, working off of things that had previous setup, felt like reasonable or realistic consequences, and above all, were balanced in what sort of story beats were being explored for either faction. wrath for the most part felt like a very natural, very organic step forward in the wow storyline overall, and while I don't agree with every decision made with it, particularly towards the end, I cannot deny that it was definitely one of if not my favorite expansion, and was extremely formative for how I engage with wow, and with stories as a whole.

all that being said, I think it's a fairly reasonable conclusion to draw that faction conflict in recent years has been souring the game for a lot of people, and I can't really blame them, as I, too, have a bone to pick with it. bofa in particular was pretty rough for a number of reasons, but I think the number one reason is how unbalanced it felt in terms of storyline for either faction. bofa imo sortof works as a synopsis for why Horde Bias(TM) is such a huge point of contention between horde and alliance, in that the horde faction spent most of the expansion losing characters, whether that be to character death or death of character development, watched their faction tear themselves apart for what feels like dozens of times now, and basically felt as though that the Evil label was being forced on them, and that they had no choice in the matter for any of this. The alliance faction, meanwhile, didn't really get much of anything. Kul Tiras isn't really as rewarding a leveling experience as Zandalar is in terms of the individual zone stories being strung together, the allied race factions they got didn't feel as fun or varied as the ones the horde got, and seemingly had no actions, issues, or consequences with any sort of serious examination. It's hard to have fun or get any sort of emotional satisfaction from a story that doesn't really let you do anything, and doesn't really show that your actions have any consequences at all, whether they be good or bad, and seemingly is spending all of their time and attention on the other faction. Like, the horde is suffering, and that suffering is definitely, wholly unfair, but the alliance seemingly isn't getting any sort of attention, at all. But because they're not constantly getting a bat to the head story-wise, horde players (including myself) just get really frustrated when accused of favoritism, because like. There is literally no benefit whatsoever to having blizzard's attention, when all blizzard does is take away everything you love lmao. This, I would say, is a matter of violence vs. negligence. Both are forms of harm, but they are radically different in terms of how they hurt you, and neither is inherently more hurtful than the other.

I think if I were to propose a solution to this, I think that the first step should be to pull back on faction conflict as a major component to the story, which they have at least partially. But I think the next step is to give a fairer distribution of attention to characters. Like, I complain about the Horde losing characters, and I'm not taking that back because it's True, but it would be remiss of me not to touch on the fact that, for how many dozens of characters the alliance has, the only ones who really get the attention are like. Human Males. In particular, Anduin. And if they're not Anduin, they're usually characters within Anduin's immediate peer circle. And then the characters that aren't human men and do get attention are usually ones that are getting shafted, somehow, or are getting painted as Wrong and Violent and Stupid for Disagreeing With Anduin- i.e., tyrande. And before Anduin, the only character that really got any sort of serious attention was Varian, which is probably why alliance players as a whole took his death so hard. It's hard not to feel some kind of way about losing a favorite toy when that toy is damn near the only one you functionally have lmao.

I know shadowlands as an expac has been pretty polarizing to people in terms of experience, but tbh I think this is a good step forward in resetting the stakes, and making things in either faction feel a little more balanced. I do think that the consequences of the conflict in bofa has to be addressed Eventually, and I'm honestly a little afraid of what they're going to do next, but this is alright for now.

#essay tag #faction conflict soapbox #warcraft #long post wheezes

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samwrights · 4 years ago

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➳ » 𝕞𝕪 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕥𝕙 𝕚𝕤 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣𝕤 «

⤷ ℂℍ𝔸ℙ𝕋𝔼ℝ 𝟞.𝟝𝟘—missed calls

» warnings and stuff

Language, written portion and the moment you’ve all been waiting for

» playlist is here

»»————-　 ✿ ♡ ✿ 　————-««

As carefully as you can, you tiptoe past a sleeping Matsukawa in the living room and make your way down the hall directly in front of you. Dim lights from the city streets illuminate the walls of the apartment, allowing you to see the door that you perceive to lead to Hanamaki’s room—the only room with a light still on. Still trying to keep quiet, you rap on the door with a nail, hopefully loud enough for him to hear but quiet enough not to disturb the sleeping patrons.

With equal caution, the knob turns before the door is pulled slightly ajar, just enough for Hanamaki to grab you by the wrist and drag you in.

“What’s that face for?” He grimaces when he sees the stupefied look you’re wearing. “Did you really think I was just gonna let you sleep on the floor?” Grumbling to yourself, you toss your overnight bag onto the floor near the doorway, hoping you didn’t have anything in there that was particularly fragile.

The strawberry-brunette resumes what you assume was his previous position—resting on his queen-sized mattress that had the covers made up while you stood on edge before him. The fuck were you supposed to do? You didn’t know—it was the reason you had even called Terushima in the first place.

Listen to what your heart tells you.

Taking a moment to come to terms with the fact that you were standing in Hanamaki Takahiro’s bedroom, you glance all around the stylized space. You could faintly make out that the walls were a rich navy blue and he had an affinity for gold accents, but most of that was hidden underneath what was probably thousands of drawings. From the first Christmas gift he had given you, you knew art had been a hobby of his, but this?

This was far beyond your imagination.

The wall to your right was littered with flash sheets of various themes, large paintings that echoed to his neo-traditional style, quick sketches and doodles, as well as a large, weekly calendar that served as a planner for his work schedule. Flowers, as it seemed, was one of his specialities. Every work of art had a floral accent that screamed of his signature, regardless of how rugged the piece might have been.

To your left was a simple white desk that housed his laptop, tablet, and a few floating shelves that held various sentimental knickknacks. Your hands reach over to grab the dusty golden pocket watch you’d given him for secret Santa in your third year, not even needing to search for it on the shelf—it screamed its presence all on its own. Albeit hesitantly, you gather the courage to sit next to him on the empty space in his bed, mimicking his posture with your back resting against the grey, tufted headboard. “You really couldn’t open this fucking thing?” You ask, holding it up between the two of you before letting it lay flat in your palm, offering it towards the former wing spiker.

“The clasp didn’t work and I didn’t wanna break it.” His nimble fingers take the pocket watch, clicking the clasp that made repeated noises to signify it should open. However, the lid remained shut. Hanamaki shrugs before handing it back to you, turning away so he can hide the overwhelming bubble of emotions boiling in his chest.

You were here.

In Sendai.

In his apartment.

In his bed.

Right next to him.

And the thought that he couldn’t do anything about it was killing him.

Abruptly, you get up from his bed and carefully step towards your overnight bag. Unzipping it, you pull out a small, thin pocket knife that Daichi made sure went with you everywhere before sitting back down next to Makki. Maybe it was you feeding off the anxiety he was putting into the air, but you hesitated on prying the watch open for the first time. “The guy I sent it to for engraving must have ruined the clasp,” you muttered as you forced the tip of the knife at the seam of the watch. Your mind was relentlessly speeding at several hundred miles an hour, unsure of what was to unfold.

Once you opened this watch, everything was laid out on the table.

The pocket watch was meant to be a symbolic confession of the love you held for this man in your younger years—held?

The past tense didn’t seem to be accurate.

Your nail holds down the clasp as you gingerly twist the knife, breaking the inner mechanisms of it and allowing the golden pocket watch to show the custom engraving you had gotten for it. Hanamaki reaches for it, but you yank it away before he can read the inscription.

“Makki...” you whimper out, unsure of how to proceed, “Hiro, what comes after this?” From the corner of your eye, you can see one of his large hands tugging at his slightly longer locks in frustration.

“I dunno, yn. We won’t know until we move forward.” The trembling watch in your shaky hands like an unsteady rhythm of a snare drum as you cautiously place the slightly ajar watch in his hand. Much to his chagrin, the pocket watch no longer worked, the ticking dying down after a couple years. Not that Hanamaki had even noticed in the first place, his own wallowing drowning out the noise back when it had still moved. “‘After all this time, it’s still you’,” he reads aloud, calloused pads of his fingers tracing the inscription and stopping when they reached your initials.

Then he laughs.

He laughs so hard that he all but falls off his bed, not slightest bit concerned at the volume of it, as he clutches the gift to his chest.

“H-hey, don’t laugh!” The tips of your fingers snap against his bare arm as you back hand him, though there’s no real force to your playful strike.

“I’m not laughing at the gift. I’m laughing because...” Makki pauses, fixing himself up so he could face you. “Because it hurts that this is how this all comes out.” There’s a deep cloud that settles over his grey eyes, the pain in them swirling black into the stone. Meeting his eyes, you gnash on your lip, subconsciously grabbing at your sunflower necklace. “You kept it...”

“I’d never get rid of it.” There’s a thick silence much denser than what’s hanging in the air, though neither of you are unsure if you should break it, or even how to. Steely grey eyes drop to where your hand cradles the necklace, reaching out to run his fingers over the back of your hand. Your muscles tense at the touch, dropping the pendant and allows him to hold the golden sunflower.

“So what now?” Takahiro’s voice barely comes out as a whisper, the pads of his fingers still tracing every ridge in the pendant. He won’t look at you—not right now; he can’t. His control is wearing thin and it takes every ounce of him to not be selfish, just this once. But at the end of the day...

At the end of the day, he loved you.

And he would never do a single thing to intentionally upset you, regardless of how much he wanted to close the gap between you and finally feel your lips on his.

“I-I don’t know, Hiro. I’ve never given this particular scenario much thought.”

“I have,” he says immediately. Despite the self-control he’s exercising at the moment, his mouth moves faster than his brain. Hanamaki pulls his hand away from your necklace, finally, opting to rest it on his belly before the thin threads of his self-control snapped.

“Yeah? And how do you see this playing out?”

“Honestly? You rolling over and going to sleep and nothing changing.”

Huh?

You turn to your side, removing yourself from the headboard to rest on your elbow while you face him. What was that supposed to mean? That he had moved on and that you were reading too much into the moment? Shit, wait why were you reading into it in the first place? The feelings you once had—past tense—were exactly that: of the past.

Right?

“Yn,” Makki mirrors your position, resting on his own elbow while his free hand gingerly cradles the space between your shoulder and neck, “we can’t move forward if we’re stuck dwelling on the past. So...” the strawberry-brunette closes his narrow eyes slowly, long lashes dancing along the tops of his cheekbones as he does so. Rather than opening his eyes, however, he leans forward until his forehead rests against yours. You’re vaguely aware of the various spots in his body pulsating, drumming with blaring volume that you swear will wake the whole apartment. “I love you, and I will always love you. But, I came to terms with it a long time ago, that you aren’t mine to love. And I can’t ask you to just up and leave your life just because I’m no longer afraid to tell you I love you, that’s not fair.”

It feels like nails are piercing your throat, your own heavy heartbeat the hammer pushing them deeper and deeper into your chords. Nearly a decade you had waited to hear that this man returned your feelings, and here he was with his forehead pressed against yours doing just that. All while you were engaged to someone else.

Someone you’d fallen so hard and so fast for—a complete one-eighty from the way you’d slowly cultivated your affection for Hanamaki Takahiro.

“None of this is fair.” Before you had time to process the scenario, warm, silent streams of tears clump at your mascara-clad lower lashes before spilling past the dam. You inhale a shaky breath, closing your eyes to match Makki, exhaling forcefully because you can’t fucking breathe.

Perhaps it’s the trepidation in your breath or the rattling of your bones against his that causes Takahiro to pull away, opening his eyes. It almost felt like looking towards the sun, he muses, until he sees your crying form just below him. Instinctually, he wraps his free arm around your waist, pulling you closer until your smaller frame is tucked underneath his chin. “Hey, hey. No crying,” he attempts to soothe, his large hand roaming the cloth covering your side, “there’s no reason to cry, yn. As long as you’re happy.”

Maybe that was why you were crying?

Were you happy with Daichi? And if you were, why was that the second time of the night that you were questioning it?

“W-what do you want, Makki?” You ask quietly, hoping his answer will offer some sort of solace or guidance. Instead, he squeezes just a little bit tighter before relaxing his arm to hold you like a fragile China doll.

“Nuh uh,” he tuts, “this is about you and what you want. I will not let anything I have to say about what I want be any sort of influence.”

Part of you is grateful for that because maybe you don’t have to be the one to wonder what would happen if you left Daichi. Or if you got up and just drove to your parents right now. Or if you decided to indulge yourself for one night. There was no pressure, no hidden agenda to force you into a precarious situation. But if there’s anything you want to do at all in this moment, it’s the fact that you want to tell him for real, so that he can hear it from your lips. “I love you,” you whisper out, curling deeper into his chest so maybe—just maybe—he won’t actually hear you, “and I’m so sorry I waited too long to say it.”

“I’m glad to hear it, even now.”

The two of you remained entangled with one another, your tears and hiccups finally subsiding enough for you to be aware of your current state. You’d probably stained his pillow covers with clumps of black mascara or had it hoarding together in blobs down your face. Even so, neither of you dared to move, enjoying the feeling of being in one another’s company while being enveloped in your own thoughts. Or rather, thought, as in the singular. While you’d pondered the question long before your current state, you took the time to bask in his certainty to wonder what the fuck you did want. Clearly, you hadn’t the faintest clue.

You love Daichi, that’s a fact. He’s passionate and compassionate, he’s the pressure you need to keep you grounded and level-headed. Daichi isn’t afraid to tell you when you’re stepping out of line whether it be going out one too many nights in a row with Terushima or when you’d fallen into a depressive episode and can’t find motivation to do little things like bathe or clean. He keeps you together, despite the broken and dismantled soul you felt you were sometimes. Sawamura Daichi is the present and the future—the matured love you gladly welcomed.

Right?

So why did being in the arms of Hanamaki Takahiro, even in a rather platonic way considering the confessions, feel like a catharsis? Like you’d been drowning further and further into a sea only to finally break the surface and breathe fresh air? Like he was the reason your lungs had been able to inflate and take in oxygen. And the warmth he was bringing to you on a crisp spring evening echoed the comfort of a homemade hot chocolate in front of a fireplace after playing in the snow. Yet, all he had was his arms around you and his head caressing the crown of your scalp, restraining himself from speaking his truth so as to respect your reality. Hanamaki Takahiro was the past—the love of your youth belonging entirely to him.

Maybe you didn’t have to come to a decision right then and there—perhaps thinking it over would be a smarter decision. If anything, your focus should shift to the fact that if you move away from his chest that you’ve precariously buried yourself into, your resolve will crumble.

It’ll crumble, because the only thing you’re certain about in this moment is how much you want to kiss him right now.

But you have to swallow that thought like a bitter, too-big pill and wash it down with limbs wrapped around you carefully as you fall asleep.

»»————-　 ✿ ♡ ✿ 　————-««

𝕥𝕒𝕘𝕝𝕚𝕤𝕥

@levinneheart @hoe4hq @veelafyre @its-the-aerieljeane @disgvste @sunflow3rbab3 @kiyoojima @urdads @kuroos-babie @more-stuff-of-pi @dabi-hates-fish @chao01248 @kuroos-roosterhead @cremepuffingwaldio

𝕒𝕦𝕥𝕙𝕠𝕣'𝕤 𝕟𝕠𝕥𝕖:

THEY FINALLY CONFESSED. SOUND THE ALARM Y’ALL. also, i don’t know why I totally see Mattsun looking for a cougar. But in all seriousness, I KNOW. You guys want them to live happily ever after already, BUT I really like showing how Makki’s grown up over the years without ya.

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whatthathellmouthdo · 4 years ago

Video

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Hello there gentle viewers!

I found this rare public access tv interview with Sarah Michelle Gellar a while ago when I fell down a youtube rabbit hole of old interviews with my favourite actors, and I’ve had it bookmarked since then because I wanted to talk about it but didn’t think anyone I knew would want to listen (i was right)

but I figured that now that I have this blog and given the response to my other unhinged analyses of things in the Buffy universe, if there’s any place for me to talk about it now, it’s here! *sound of the doors being bolted shut behind you*

ok so!

beyond the fact that she just completely drags her character without pausing to take a breath, this clip is like the perfect illustration of something that Sarah sometimes does in interviews that I’ve always found quietly hilarious. There is no better way to say “I am the smartest person in this room and the next and I’ve been working since I was 5″ than to answer any question with the most articulate, insightful yet somewhat canned overachiever response with completely deadpan eyes. I don’t know if it’s the flat tone or the fact that she’s saying it at 110% speed, but it really makes me laugh. You can just see a total professional with a fierce intellect and over a decade of media training power-walking the tightrope of trying to be taken seriously as an actor while also remaining unintimidating and likeable. The end result is perfection to me.

And of course it’s frustrating and unfair that actors, especially women, have to walk that tightrope at all, but there’s something about the way that Sarah does it that shows how seasoned she is and how she can do it practically by muscle memory. It feels like she is humouring the interviewer, like she’s had to do it all time and time again, like she knows how to give the perfect soundbyte while also signalling that her understanding of the material, her job and the entire nature of show business is larger than can be expressed in a single lifetime.

On paper it’s the perfect response, but the delivery has just the faintest sprinkle of impatience, or heavily diluted passive aggression. not towards the interviewer, but more towards the performance of the interview itself. with the proper editing it would hardly be noticeable but the way the mask slips slightly here is everything. She can inhabit the persona of a relatable, easygoing actress that has lots of fun at her dream job, but underneath she’s much smarter, much more professional and honestly much more serious than the confines of that persona would allow her to show. the number of inane questions she’s had to enthusiastically answer, the number of times she’s had to fake excitement or even interest in her press obligations. she can sell a movie in her sleep, she can read a character down to the ground, she can rattle off the perfect answer to any question and tailor how she wants to sound be it charming, capable, fun, anything. but sometimes the rift between her level of engagement in and enthusiasm for a conversation shows in her eyes, either when she stops speaking or actually during her delivery of a verbally perfect response and I find it very amusing every time.

If she answered any question I asked her like that I would honestly feel like I am wasting the time of a higher being or that i’m interacting with the calculated facade of a criminal mastermind. I would feel like I should have used my 5 minutes of interview time with her more wisely and asked her what the meaning of life is or what ever happened to DB Cooper because I have no doubt in my mind that she would tell me and that she would sound more than a little bored while she did it.

(original video can be found here. this person also has an interview with Jennifer Love Hewitt and the director of I Know What You Did Last Summer on their channel if you’re interested)

#real hyperfixating hours lads!#Sarah Michelle Gellar #i know what you did last summer #i'm not gonna tag this as buffy related because it's not #but i figured it's buffy adjacent enough that i could post it here?

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zehecatl · 4 years ago

Note

ive noticed that you and shae really dislike sans. im not here to argue with you or disagree, but i was wondering why you think so? :0 its been awhile since i was seriously into ut so im not up to date... did people decide hes Problematic or something the way they did with Asgore? honestly just curious.

OH BOY... SANS, HUH?

so uh. there’s a lot of history behind The Sans thing, so i apologize if this runs kind of long, but, well. you did ask. and i do like talking about The Sans Thing

so, some background: back in the day, i was a very, very, big Papyrus fan

like, i loved that skeleton. i thought about him basically 24/7, i ran a discord server dedicated to him, i wrote fics, i wrote meta posts, i did the whole nine yard. and this is crucial to why i, and Shae, both have such A Beef with Sans

and, just to make one thing clear: neither of us really have any problems with Sans the character. just like the other UT characters, he’s well-written, he’s engaging, he’s likeable. he has flaws, yeah, and i’ve talked about them plenty in this past, and this ain’t really about any of that, but none of that is why i dislike him. so he’s not problematic! you did not, in fact, miss some huge UT drama

now, back on track, the thing about being a Papyrus fan back in the day: there was no content

like, genuinely, there was no content. i think i was one of the first people to write Papyrus centric content back then, and even then, it was mostly me. this has gotten better, and it did get better back then, but i want you to understand that, because that’s crucial

and the thing is, if there just wasn’t a lot of UT content, this would be fine- but UT took off. like, it was HUGE almost immediately, and i think when i got into it, it was like? a year later maybe? i was a bit late to the whole thing, really

so when i come in, a year late, to a tag BURSTING with content, and find nothing for my fave? a bit disgruntled, but eh, Papyrus isn’t a main, and it’s pretty common for that to happen, so, whatever, right?

except

Sans

Sans was absolutely everywhere. like, you went into the tag, you saw Sans. and you didn’t just see like, a few bits and pieces, oh no. the majority of content was, and still is, Sans centric

now, lemme make something extra clear here: i don’t think people should stop any of this. i don’t have anything against anyone who participated, or participates, in the Sans stuff. people are having fun, and that’s really all that needs to be said

but as a Papyrus fan? as someone who could not just block the Sans tag and find the bits of content there was? it was. frustrating

and that’s not all, because if that was all, i don’t think either of us would have such a Problem with Sans

the thing about Sans, the reason why i dislike him, why Shae dislikes him, is the way the fandom portrays him

now, if you were around back in the day, you might be aware that Papyrus was, back then, mostly just portrayed as ‘Sans’ little brother’. he was portrayed as a naïve, good-hearted idiot, and that’s not me oversimplifying- that was genuinely how people portrayed him, back then

Papyrus, back then, wasn’t a character. he was a prop

i’m sure you’ve seen the Sans angst around; the pictures where Papyrus is dead, and Sans is very, very, distressed about it

the relationship between Papyrus and Sans was portrayed, quite simply, as Sans The Tortured Soul, and Papyrus The One Thing Sans Cares About

and as a Papyrus fan? god, that was beyond infuriating

here was this character, my favourite character, who had SO many layers, who was so clever and good and powerful, and people just. absolutely ignored that. they absolutely shat on him; everything Papyrus had done, they took away. he was, genuinely, seen as a child. no one acknowledged how smart he was, or how powerful he was, because people didn’t care

people didn’t care about Papyrus beyond the fact that he was Sans’ little brother

and as someone who loved Papyrus? that was just. it was so, so, angering

writing it out now, i still feel bitter. i’m still mad about it, to this day

the fandom treated, and still treats, Sans like he is Everything

every little thing in UT was tied back to Sans. stuff that we knew had nothing to do with him, was contributed to Sans. he became, and still is, the literal center-piece of the fandom

people made him this powerful character, the strongest in the Underground- they made him aware of Resets, made him so smart and clever and just-

they took Sans as i knew him, and twisted him out of shape

Sans is a guy trying his best. he’s a guy dealing with the knowledge that life is, inherently, pointless, and he’s dealing with that badly. he’s tired and he’s apathetic, and if you kill Papyrus, he does not care

and the fandom did not care about any of that

there’s a lot of things to be said about how the fandom portrays Sans; i’m sure i could write a thousand more words, but really, the bottom line is that i don’t dislike Sans

i hate Snas. i hate the fandom version of Sans that’s absolutely overtaken the canon, i hate the way Papyrus was, is, treated as nothing more than a prop

i don’t really dislike Sans; i like him, in fact, and there’s a lot of things that could be said about his character, about his relationship with Papyrus- and i’m sure i said a lot of those things back in the day; but the fandom doesn’t care about the canon Sans

there’s a fic Shae’s written, that doesn’t particularly show Sans in the best of lights- that touches on some of these canon failings he has

and people took issue with that. took issue with Shae playing with canon traits he had portrayed, calling them out of character, and, well

i think that really sums up how twisted Sans’ character has gotten

to me, now and then, it was like the whole fandom had collectively made an OC that just. took Sans place. and whenever i pointed it out, whenever anyone pointed it out, no one agreed. they all insisted that, no, this was the canon Sans

and don’t get me wrong, some of these things were based in canon- the Sans fight is cool, is this magnificent display of Sans’ skills, but it was never this huge display of power

i won’t say i’m not being bitter about it, because oh boy, i absolutely am. i am so, so bitter about Undertale, about the fandom, about Sans and Papyrus- and i always will be. i genuinely hate how the fandom portrays Sans, how everything is about him, and that ain’t ever changing

so that’s why both of us dislike Sans. really, at the end of the day, it’s about flanderization, and about being Bitter Bitter Papyrus stans, but eh. what can you do

hope this was, at the very least, an interesting read! and if someone tries to start an argument, just know: i ain’t reading it <3

#replies #undertale #ut sans #almost tagged this as 'undertale cw' kdsglskdlsdg #also just in case: don't worry about me posting any more stuff in these tags!#i am not touching ut with a ten foot pole #this is the only post i'll ever make in this tag #also if i've missed something shae'll probably reblog and add their own two cents #i feel like i have but i'm also tired so WHO KNOWS #anyway. that's all folks!#hope i didn't come across as angry anon skdjdsg #i love making stupid introspective posts so this was fun

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katierosefun · 4 years ago

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well, here we are! june basically flew by and it was a little rough, but we’re back with some long recs on cool things i’ve read/listened to/watched, and i’m about to force everyone to sit down and listen to my sleepover-esque ted talk in which i give unwarranted and unasked for rec lists. so here we go!

kdrama:

while you were sleeping

okay, so i tried to watch this kdrama when it came out in like...2017, i think? but for some reason, i wasn’t able to get past the first episode. i don’t really know why? because it’s so beautifully shot, and i super love the premise, which is basically this girl and this guy are somehow able to see things that are going to happen in the future...but only in their dreams. this whole kdrama really handled the plot super well--each episode honestly felt like a movie in itself, and the filming was just stunning, and i think this has to be one of the most visual kdramas i’ve ever seen. each character is also super interesting and complex on their own, and i really loved seeing such a strong cast of characters interact with each other in this world.

i think the only slight downside of this kdrama was that i couldn’t really get invested in the romance? i’m not quite sure why--i found both lead actors’ performances wonderful, and don’t get me wrong, i did think they were cute together as the drama went on, but i still couldn’t find myself buying into the romance until maybe relatively late in the drama (like...ep 11 or so? ep 16 was honestly when i realized that awww, wait, they’re actually super cute). but then again, i feel like the writers weren’t really prioritizing the romance either--i think they really wanted us to think about the beauty of dreams and redemption and how everyone can touch another person’s life in some significant way, so i can’t really be mad about it!

but anyways, overall i really enjoyed this kdrama and watched it all a lot faster than i thought i would! SOLID music, beautiful cinematography, good acting, mostly good writing, and some really memorable characters! def. a must-watch if you love suspense, aesthetics, and some wonderful characters.

the ghost detective

i’m someone who doesn’t like horror or scary things at all, but i was so intrigued by the plot and whatever material i saw on tumblr, and...of course, choi daniel, lee joo young, lee ji ah, and park eun bin. honestly, this is just a really wonderful and really underrated cast, and they really all brought out their a-game for this 32-episode supernatural / thriller / horror drama. basically, this kdrama follows the story of a young woman who’s trying to figure out who murdered her younger sister...and of course, there’s something supernatural going on.

honestly, this kdrama was such a ride. i loved the crime-solving aspect of it, and i was really in love with the interactions between all the characters, esp. that of eun bin and daniel’s characters. (guys...they’re so ride and die for each other. there’s also so much yearning. so much yearning in this kdrama, it just about killed me--)

the villain was absolutely, appropriately, elegantly creepy, and like...scary beyond belief. basically, the villain (lee ji ah’s character) feeds her victims these harmful thoughts and ultimately get them to kill themselves. it’s sad and haunting, especially when you see that the victims tell their victims “don’t listen to the bad things. try only to listen to the good things”. and...yeah. themes of how to handle all of these bad feelings inside of you really came through in this kdrama, and there were a lot of themes of suicide and the kind of rage and sadness that comes with that. (also! if you’re a fan of lots of angsty/whumpy situations....this kdrama definitely does not hold back with all of your fave whump/angst tropes! literally! every! episode! i! had! to! lie! down! because! too! powerful!)

school 2013

(aww, look at this precious cast…as though they didn’t all make me ugly cry at least five times—)

yeah, yeah, yeah, i’ve talked about this kdrama ad nauseum, and i know i watched it last month, but as i was studying for the lsat, i really, really, really needed some comfort. most notably comfort re: studying life, academics, how difficult it is to study but also be uncertain of your dreams…and if you are certain of your dreams, how that sometimes requires studying but that just makes life all the more overwhelming…can you tell i’ve been thinking about this a lot

i’m not going to ramble more about this kdrama considering i already have done so multiple times, but i enjoyed this rewatch and honestly,,,my love for this show has just grown even more. there’s a good reason why people consider this a comfort kdrama, because. i consider myself deeply comforted. also, i’ve been listening to the ost for the whole month. it’s become a problem. but sometimes. sometimes you need to listen to songs that feel like someone’s patting you on the head and telling you don’t give up, set down your burdens, don’t think you’re alone and dream whatever you want to dream, go wherever you want to go. i’ll stop talking now, but god. when i say that i think everyone who has ever felt incredibly tired by work or school and just wished for someone to give them a big hug either then or now...god. this is just one of those kdramas that i think honestly touched so many people’s lives, and i’m very grateful for the cast and crew and writers for ever bringing this story to life. :’) (god, okay, now i’ll stop talking before i make myself cry i’m fine this is fine)

your honor

so, i watched this kdrama thinking that it would be light and funny given that yoon shi yoon is the main male lead, but boy was i wrong--don’t be fooled by these happy little faces, this kdrama is heavy. this kdrama is about a young man (with a criminal record) who winds up impersonating his twin brother, who happens to be a judge. we also have a trainee who, after seeing the legal system fail her older sister, is on the rise to dispense justice through the courts the best she can.

honestly, the first few episodes were rough, mostly because of the content. big trigger warning for rape, violence, and sexual harassment at work. this kdrama really didn’t hold back when it came to addressing how the very people who use the law can also be the very same people who manipulate and abuse it. because of that, i found this kdrama incredibly powerful. that said, it certainly had its lighthearted moments too.

overall though, i liked this kdrama. the main characters were incredibly complex and genuinely the type to make me believe that for all the injustices in the world, there are still and always will be people fighting for the right thing. as someone who wants to enter the legal field, this kdrama was just uplifting. i was so blown away by the absolute rawness of the main two leads, esp. yoon shi yoon, who i’ve only ever seen in super lighthearted kdramas. so this was a really interesting change of pace, and i genuinely enjoyed watching this!

waiting for love

so this kdrama is just two episodes, and what’s better is that it’s available on youtube! it’s about two college students--a young woman who’s been hurt by falling in love with jerks now just wants to date, not really fall in love...and a young man who’s excellent at giving dating advice except he’s afraid that he’s never going to actually fall in love, so he just dates a girl for the sake of dating.

now, i kinda thought that this show was going to be kinda lighthearted, a little shallow--but it was weirdly...comforting? idk, i found myself liking it a lot more than i thought it would be. this is far from the perfect kdrama, and i kinda wished that we got more than 2 episodes because i think some of the plot points could have been better expanded, but...there were genuinely a lot of scenes that made me think a bit more about what it actually means to be in a loving relationship--like how it’s not enough to just put on a happy smile and eat meals together, but like...you know. there has to be trust and actual liking and also, yeah, maybe a bit of frustration in order to actually know whether a relationship is real or not. and given that the characters were all discussing the pressure on getting married and romance esp. when you’re in your twenties...idk. makes you think about are you dating someone for the sake of appearances? or do you genuinely...like them?

there was also quite a few tropes that i personally adore in this kdrama, which helped balance out the stuff i found more tiring. there was a lot of the “right person, wrong time” stuff going on (you really want the two main leads to get together after a certain point, and you just keep holding your breath whenever they walk past each other and beg please please please let it be this time...), and also that good old “two strangers fall in love with each other purely over writing to each other” (god. first the half of it, then me & au, then greenhouse podcast...something about this trope huh). that said, there were def. some parts that made me “:////” because some of the characters were kind of frustrating, but i’m gonna chalk that up to good writing since i think i was mostly mad about how i knew people like some of the characters lol. overall, i think this might be at least semi-enjoyable--it’s probably not something i’ll watch again, but it def. made me mull over what it means to actually be in a loving relationship, esp. if you’re in your twenties and everyone around you seems to be in happy romantic relationships/getting engaged and whatnot.

movie:

columbus

i’m a firm believer that there are some movies that are meant to cheer you up, some movies meant to make you cry, and then there’s some movies that are just meant to...sit with you. and this movie is definitely one of them. this story follows casey, a high school graduate, and jin, the son of a famous architect. the two of them are both so incredibly exhausted with their lives (casey with her constant worry about her mother, who’s a recovering drug addict; jin with his surface-level lack of concern for his comatose father). in their small town of columbus, indiana, the two of them bond over architecture and just. being quietly there for each other.

this movie’s been compared a few times to lost in translation in the sense that there’s this not quite romance between the two leads, who have a bit of an age gap (john cho and haley lu richardson have about 20 between them!). to be honest, i didn’t really get the sense that there was supposed to be a romance. if anything, it just felt like...two really lonely people finding each other. definitely not a simple friendship--definitely not a familial kind of relationship, definitely intimate.

idk. i think this movie might not be for everyone--i definitely agree with a lot of past reviewers that this movie is on the slower side. there’s some stuff here about complicated relationships with parents, a lot of cool architecture, really beautiful shots...and overall, it’s just...quiet. it’s lovely, and i can’t really stop thinking about it. it’s subtle, bittersweet, and oddly compelling. might not be the kind of thing you’d want to watch in the middle of the day, but if you’re a little sad and in the mood for something not to necessarily lift your spirits but...at least acknowledge them and sit with you, then...this is the movie to watch. idk. i felt kind of crummy the day i watched this movie, and i felt as though someone just sat next to me on a park bench until the sun went down. (mayhaps specific but hush, i’m writing this right after finishing this movie, so i’m...feeling a certain way.)

wish dragon

i watched this movie right after watching columbus because a) decided i was in the mood for something lighter, and b) i learned that john cho?? voiced?? the dragon?? (caroline your crush on john cho’s jumping out this month...)

but anyways! i loved this movie a lot. it was so satisfying? like, just narratively speaking? and the animation was wonderful and also weirdly smooth and satisfying, and there were a lot of funny and touching moments. this movie’s about this young man named din who stumbles upon a magical teapot that holds the wish dragon long--long has to grant din three wishes, and yes, i know, very aladdin, but that said, this movie has so many original twists that it feels weird to call it an aladdin retelling. it really did feel like a movie completely on its own, which i applaud the writer and director for!

i don’t want to spoil too much of this movie, but something i really enjoyed was that din’s main wish is just to see his old childhood friend again. idk, i think we all have that one friend from when we were really little that we miss--and this movie really dug into that, as well as themes about parents wanting to do the best they can to provide for their kids, and!!! and long the dragon gets his own storyline and amazing character development too!!! i was honestly just amazed at how this movie fleshed out the characters so well and had so many wonderful themes that just made me tear up. guys. this movie’s great. highly recommend for its wonderful characters and the power of friendship. just a grand old time in general. :’))

searching

yeah...yeah, i wasn’t kidding about my crush on john cho this month. yes, i watched three of his movies within 24 hours. this movie is about david kim who’s looking for his missing 16 year old daughter, margot. this film is honestly noteworthy for many reasons, one of them being that the entire movie is told through like...a laptop screen, as in we kind of follow david’s frantic search through facetime, facebook, tumblr...which i honestly didn’t think i’d be into, but whoo boy, i was wrong. it just added to the whole addictive quality of this movie, as it usually does when it comes to anything from the thriller genre.

but besides this just being a straight up addictive thriller with absolutely mouth-dropping twists (but like...good twists, and smart twists, good god--), this movie was just...touching? there’s so many themes related to what grief does to a family (because we learn within the first 10 minutes that the mom died due to cancer), and there’s just...something really fragile about relationships between surviving family members. i was absolutely blown away by john cho’s performance as a tentative and grieving widower whose world just absolutely falls apart in his search for his daughter. this movie was just so...real because of that. like, yes, this movie has all of the suspense that you would expect this kind of movie to have, but there was also just...so many beautiful themes about grief and how far parents would go for their kids and godddd yeah no i started sobbing when the movie ended. god.

also, my bias towards john cho aside, i...really loved his character. david kim is absolutely believable, and like? he’s not just the guy putting the pieces together--he’s also the guy who misses his wife and also the guy who wishes that he was there for his daughter. he’s also the guy who pauses and re-writes all his text messages because he’s trying to be a good dad. i feel like with a lot of these suspense / missing person movies, it’s really easy to have characters who are just the stoic alpha male types--and david kim definitely had his badass moments in this movie, but like...something i just loved was seeing the vulnerability that comes with...having a missing child. being a parent. god. this movie messed me up but in a good way. i can honestly say that this movie is now probably going to be one of my fave movies of all time. highly recommend, am literally obsessed with it.

book:

the seven husbands of evelyn hugo by taylor jenkins reid

ohohoho………where to begin with this book. this was one of those books where i was like “huh i kinda don’t understand why people are so obsessed with this book”, but then i hit like...page 20 or 30 and was like “oh god i Literally Cannot Put This Book Down Oh No” and wound up finishing it in like three days (mind you, i only read at like...midnight these days. i don’t understand why either).

i finished this book at like 2 am and promptly burst into tears because this was just one of those books. it follows the story of evelyn hugo, a famous hollywood actress from the 60s or so and onwards. known for her intense beauty and her seven husbands, she’s now giving an exclusive interview to the young reporter monique grant, where she’s about to tell all about her life. this book had me dropping my mouth multiple times, and i think tjr can spin one hell of a story, with so many good twists and turns and intensely memorable characters. by the end of the book, i was actually mad that evelyn hugo wasn’t a real person, because i, too, fell a little in love with her and thought, i want to actually watch her movies. i want to learn even more about this remarkable woman.

but alas! she’s not real, so i don’t get to see her accept an oscar or look up all the tabloids about her and her seven husbands or her speculated (and very, very, very real) relationship with celia st. john. basically...i just loved this book. the last line made me smile and laugh and cry a little bit (actually...cry a lot), and y’know...i’ll admit it’s not totally perfect, but i’m glad this book exists, and i’m glad that even though tjr isn’t bi herself, was very adamant in this book about bisexuality being real. just. like. god. once again. mad that evelyn hugo isn’t real. it’s fine, she’s real in my heart.

#caroline talks #caroline recs

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phynali · 4 years ago

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more spn discussions, just skip this post y’all

@queerbluebird thanks so much for engaging with my post/reply! i really enjoyed reading your response and i have a long reply here.

i’m responding to your post/reply here rather than reblogging it because honestly that thread is - so long. so very long.

so first -

i agree there is a difference between entitlement and what i would call, not promise, but instead “narrative follow-through”. A story that completely lacks narrative follow-through does end up feeling disappointing, or frustrating, or rage-inducing, depending on what’s happened. to me there’s a fundamental difference between critiquing a story based on follow-through and bad storytelling (which your post aims to do), versus say, creating hashtag campaigns about a character being silenced because and spreading conspiracy theories about a bad dub (among other things honestly).

and also - queerbaiting totally sucks, we definitely do agree on that.

where we disagree, i think are these two core points:

i do not see the narrative build-up that demands a follow-through. i do not see supernatural as having built up to the story that many destiel shippers seem to think was there, and no one has ever been able to point out to me any actual textual reasons that do craft that narrative build-up

i fundamentally do not believe that destiel was ever a queerbait. queerbait involves active intent on the part of creators to tease a ship or queer representation in order to draw in $ from queer audiences without ever making it canon, so as not to alienate straight audiences. so, refering to point 1., i do not see the canon text as having laid the groundwork for a queerbait and those romantic tropes, at least not at any point in the past 7 years. and beyond the canon, the writers and producers and jensen ackles all indicated dean was straight, and that they were not writing a romance. if anyone queerbaited the fans, it was misha collins who kept teasing the possibility, and personally i would argue that was irresponsible of him. but that’s a different discussion altogether and tends to piss people off when it’s framed as such, because misha means a lot to them and it hurts to see the man who validated their feelings get criticized for the manner in which he validated them. so i’m gonna leave that aside.

beyond that, I want to engage with some of your specific quotes:

Supernatural loves to say “wait for it.” And I don’t think it’s entitled to feel betrayed if an author uses their story to say “wait for it” in order to convince you to stick with their story and then delivers the opposite after you do.

May i ask, where was the “wait for it” with destiel? this ties in directly to the queerbaiting. i indicated in my post/reply that while i see it from cas, there’s been little to no hint of any reciprocation of feelings from dean, and if anything the past 7 or so years have driven the point home that it isn’t happening. i personally am not able to see the “Wait for it” and that was the point of my question. without the “Wait for it”, i also can’t see the queerbait.

I asked for specifics and while i totally get not having the spoons, you provided a few:

(off the top of my head for Dean though, the mixtape, his response to Cas’ death at the end of 12, subsequent grief arc, and reaction to Cas’ return in the front half of 13 rank highly. His reaction to Lucifer’s prank call in 15x19 might rate, but maybe just because it’s so recent.)

not trying to be unkind here, but i quite genuinely don’t see any of these examples as framing cas and dean in a romantic light, or as hinting at a “what if”. the mixtape is like.... okay, maybe. i had read that as being symbolic of something else, but i can see wanting to read it from a shipping lens. (i don’t however think i’d read it as baiting or “what if” - it was quite textually not framed that way. shipping, 100%, but canon build-up, not for me).

for the other examples -- grieving for someone you consider family? and being happy when they come back? that’s not shippy to me. i mean - contrast the grief he showed over cas’s death compared to his grief over, say, mary? or, less extreme, charlie? and nothing compared to how off the rails he goes when sam is dead or he thinks sam is. so i -- i just can’t see those as creating a narrative that demands a follow-through. and when your friend who is dead calls your phone? of course you hop to the door - i don’t know what is romantic about that. sam would’ve hopped just as quick if “cass” had called his phone instead.

and look - i see what is fun to ship about all that. if i shipped it, i’d be happily collecting these moments with a smile and grinning to myself about how cute they are and much they mean. but shipping it vs. it being romantically framed in the canon are two fundamentally different things. shipping doesn’t imply narrative buy-in or deliberation from the creator.

moving on, you also spoke at length about 15x18:

15x18 made the sort of statement that drew back even people who did exactly what OP said they should do, turning off the TV years ago. It wasn’t a quiet “if you’re still watching, keep waiting,” so much as a shouted “hey we’re gonna do this thing, watch this!”

i guess destiel fans vs. those of us who don’t ship it really see this as fundamentally different. because you discuss that moment as one which requires follow-through, and say that if this were heteronormative m/f love declaration, there would be that expectation of follow-through. not necessarily reciprocity, but more - more conversation, more acknowledgment, more something.

(i mean - if there was more, but that more was “hey i love you too but only platonically, sorry man” would that be better?)

but no - i actually just... disagree with your point on that front. i can see why you feel the way you do and i acknowledge that it can be read as the start of a conversation. to me though -- and clearly, now that the finale is out, how the writers saw it -- that was actually the end of a conversation. the end of, like you pointed out, 12 years. a 12-year conversation that ends in a gorgeous declaration of love, and specifically how love isn’t about being together, it’s simply about being - it’s about the fact that you love someone, and that feeling alone is the most beautiful thing in existence.

to me, that declaration can only be written and interpreted as an ending. a sacrifice, a declaration, and a goodbye. so - while i kind of expected seeing more people in episode 20 and realize that didn’t happen largely due to covid - i’m not disappointed we didn’t see cas, because that culmination of his narrative (and then knowing he was with jack, after, rebuilding the heaven that he rebelled against and finally completing his narrative circle by fixing all the problems with it alongside the good god he sought to find all along) is kind of perfect.

and i genuinely don’t think if cas was in a female vessel this entire time that that would change. maybe some audience members would feel differently, but i think many of us would see it for the end it was nonetheless. there’s plenty of stories with m/f ships that are one-sided and that character sacrifices themselves for the person they love, so i don’t see why this would be any different (except the bury your gays issue, but that’s a whole other and very real conversation about media tropes).

moving on to the series finale.

As many people have pointed out in praise of 15x20, Sam is the absolute most important thing in Dean’s life, his priority above anything and everything… And yet there, at the actual end of the world, Dean ignores Sam’s call and instead cries over the loss of Castiel. Dean’s loss of Castiel plays in tandem with the loss of literally the whole world. But we’re not to take that as a promise that Castiel means more to this story, or to Dean, than a couple seconds of wistfulness after the dust settles?

I... yeah. i don’t see what this even is arguing. that dean taking a minute to himself to grieve his best friend, who just died in part because dean decided to go hunt down billie (who was literally dying anyway). he’s hurting. there’s nothing about this that’s a promise - it’s an end. it’s grief. it’s the horror of losing someone you care about, and the silence that comes after. it’s fundamentally human in it’s pain. and we, the audience, are invited to grieve with dean.

so I mean - of course cas means more to this story. of course he’s meant more than a few seconds of grief, after 12 years. but just because that’s the last time we see him on screen doesn’t mean we don’t value his story, and celebrate how it too came full circle.

You mention cas as a sort of avatar for a different potential ending for the brothers, and highlight him representing:

An ending where higher powers stop yanking them around and they get to actually live in the life they’ve built for themselves.

So while i never considered cas an avatar for that, i do think we all wanted the brothers to have their freedom. “finally free.” so we can agree on wanting that end. but we disagree on whether it was delivered, i guess? because i feel it was.

you also talk about what you and many other fans conceivably wanted a happier ending to look like. can i -- i’m going to be totally honest. i have not seen a single person who’s critiquing the end saying “i just wanted sam and dean to grow old hunting together with their dog until they retire together and die of old age.”

would that be satisfying to those who are mad about the end? i personally don’t think so, but maybe my opinion is being coloured by the most vitriolic fans i’ve seen. if sam and dean got to have the life they wanted free of chuck, and dean didn’t die, and they kept going (or retired and opened a bar together!). maybe sam still had a kid, but again because romance wasn’t the point, the wife wasn’t important and they left her blurry still so we could interpret ourselves if she was a wife or a co-parent or a surrogate or what. maybe dean has a kid too, with a similar question-mark-wife. maybe we get a few images of them having a holiday with jodie and the girls. and then getting to heaven together in old age, greeting bobby with a beer, and going for a drive.

would that be an end that wouldn’t cause fandom uproar? i would enjoy it, soft an slightly discordant as it would be to me. i prefer the ending we got, bittersweet and heartbreaking though it was, but i wouldn’t be taking to social media to yell about it if we got a softer epilogue, so to speak.

on the other hand... would that still not be enough, at least not for so many of the angry fans? i’m genuinely unsure. it seems to me that so much of the ire is about destiel itself, even if people are pretending it’s about more and other things than that. not everyone, but like, a big portion of them. which leads me to believe that nothing short of dean and cas at least interpretable as together is what they wanted. if every other single thing about the existing finale was the same except that cas was the one to greet dean instead of bobby, and even with the same basic dialogue, without discussing the confession, but they have a lingering smile, and dean leaves to drive and wait for sam with the promise he’ll see cas later -

if everything else stayed the same except who greeted dean, i genuinely don’t believe i’d be seeing almost any critique of the finale on my dash. maybe i’m cynical, but that’s where i’m at.

which is part of why i really struggle to believe that people are engaging in good faith when they critique the finale. because i feel like if it offered them either a) everything they’re purportedly asking for but still no cas and zero hint of destiel, vs. b) every other thing they claim to hate stays the same except there’s a wink and nod to destiel - i believe they would take the wink and nod.

On to some other things you raised:

But how can you know to walk away from a tragedy if the tragedy says “the end won’t be a tragedy, keep watching” right up until it ends in tragedy?

Oh i Get this. I hate thinking i’m consuming fun media only for it to rip my heart out at the end. i’ve literally - well, i’ve had a very unpleasant and distressing experience of this, actually. so i get it. also the opposite: i sometimes feel disappointed when i’m consuming media that is gripping and intense and painful, but then the end is too easy, too soft and happy?

BUT - supernatural never pretended it would have a happy end? the end was so. much. happier. than i ever expected. the Swan Song end was going to have Sam in hell being tortured by lucifer for eternity. according to something i read which i am fundamentally too lazy to link because who knows if it would have turned out this way but -- kripke was apparently going to have Dean jump in the cage with him at that end, if the series ended on S5? the ‘horror’ ending. completely devastating sacrifice for mankind (sam), and completely devastating sacrifice for his brother (dean). just -- oof. even if that wasn’t the plan and the series would’ve ended as the episode did - sam was still in the cage and cas was off waging war in heaven and dean was living every day knowing he was alive and his brother was being tortured.

i’m sorry if you thought you were watching a happier show. i know how much that hurts. that doesn’t mean the story was actually that happy though. sometimes, it’s on us as consumers to acknowledge we were misreading the media. i’ve had to do this. it’s hard, it hurts, but it helps you consume things healthier. i’ve had to do this growing recently, and i’m better off for it.

regarding the specific manner of dean’s death - that’s really not what my post was about and i’m not gonna address it here. i’ve talked about it elsewhere and so have others, and @lovetincture‘s original post spelled it out beautifully, in how human it was. i have feelings on how and why i loved dean’s death, and why it was the absolute opposite of what Chuck’s ending was and what he wanted (no blaze of glory), but i’ll leave those for another time.

They cast aside all the relationships they’ve built. [...] They lost/walked away from the life and home they built in the bunker. Dean got a season 1 death. Sam got a season 1 life.

I feel that there is a very huge difference between regression and progression when it comes to cyclical storytelling. And that difference seems to be missing from the ongoing discussions i’ve seen about this in fandom.

Coming full circle to season 1 does not at all mean that the development is ‘undone’ or that the story has regressed or that anything has been lost or destroyed. It can mean that, if the storyteller doesn’t know what the hell they’re doing, but in this case i don’t (personally) feel it’s a fair critique.

Dean’s death might parallel his s1 not-quite death from Faith, but the s15 result of that death is night and day. Dean is no longer alone. Dean does not go up to a lonely heaven filled with bittersweet memories, where even his canonical soulmate and him have wide gulfs between the memories they fill their shared heaven with. Dean dies a hunter, but he dies a hunter who literally saved earth and changed heaven and gets to spend eternity with his brother, side-by-side and together without all the pain and miscommunication, and he gets to see his family and loved ones too. he died having literally made the world so much better.

even without that though?

his story comes full circle, but dean’s character development isn’t about his death, it’s about the fact that in the first several seasons dean could hardly admit he cared without acting like his teeth were being pulled. he was too afraid of abandonment to ask for someone to be by his side. he was too afraid of rejection to let anyone in. and in the end? he asks sam to stay. he tells him that he loves him. he pours his heart out and says all the things that 15 years ago were stoppered in his throat, words trying and failing to claw their way free but his hurt and fears were too deep.

dean is free.

the point of dean’s story coming full circle to season 1 parallels was specifically to highlight this incredible development, not to undermine it. he is different. he is free.

god it makes me tear up just thinking about how happy i am for him despite how gutted i was by that scene??

(i could write a similar analysis for sam, about how he left for stanford to escape his life and how his finale life montage bits were the opposite of that, but honestly this post is long enough already).

Destiel is loosely a part of that promise in the sense that Castiel is a part of that promise. The symbol of free will

You make a super interesting argument about Cas being a symbol of free will. I don’t have much to say about it, because I’m gonna mull it over, because I think it’s kinda cool and I’ve never thought about it.

That’s - all i’ve got. thanks again for engaging. i’m happy to continue the convo if you have questions or want to reblog/reply

(though my followers might hate me omg, i’ve been spamming long spn meta posts for weeks now, it’s just been so confronting to see the ongoing fan reaction on twitter and how divided it is...)

#spn meta #supernatural #supernatural meta #spn #fandom discussions #uhhh what do y'all want me to tag this #it's not wank?#it's an open discussion which i like a lot #hmmm #discourse #i'll just go with that #destiel #kind of #this won't show up in the ship tag because that's not in the first 5 tags so i'm safe i hope #don't wanna be a dick and put this in the ship tag #long post #long post for ts #sorry if there are typos it is almost midnight and i am sleepy

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needletail · 4 years ago

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Nintendogs vs Nintendogs + Cats: a review and comparison.

There’s no doubt that most people want a new Nintendogs game for the Nintendo Switch. But when I see these posts, very few of them are referencing the 3ds variant of the game, but rather the original ds version that everyone continues to know and love.

The addition of cats is Nintendogs + Cats’ most notable feature. It was, while cute and fun for a short period of time, notably worse than its predecessor. But why is that? The formula stayed roughly the same, but the charm didn’t quite hit.

Before we dive into this: these are my opinions on the games, and personal comparisons. Every person experiences things differently, and will likely have different opinions.

We can start with breaking down the original Nintendogs. The graphics have not aged well, but the charm and entertainment factor have. While replaying, I found that the general ambience and the music used endeared me further to the game, and I wanted to play more. The half hour timer on going for walks was frustrating (as was the stamina system), but it otherwise engaged me more to figure out where I wanted to go. The map feels surprisingly big with so much to do, and the side-scrolling walk screen keeps the mystery alive in what you’ll encounter. The competitions were fun and the voice recognition system may have been even better than the 3ds incarnation. The only thing that really suffered were the graphics - but this game is 15 years old and this was advanced for its time, so we can let that slide. The dogs can be a little strange to look at at times, but they’re expressive and distinct, which is what matters in a pet simulator.

The information you can take in is optional, but an exciting part of the game for those who are interested. Your dog’s profile is detailed but easy to understand, going as far as to tell you what it ate last. There’s something so charming about it being displayed as if it were a document you had in front of you - it brings another element of immersion into this sim.

[Image ID: a photograph of the informational sheet on Nintendogs. It includes the name, gender, breed, trainer, time together, coat, hunger, thirst, and things eaten. The trick list and contest results are also on this screen.]

From cars passing by to horns in the distance and dog barks from somewhere vaguely nearby, the sound design of Nintendogs is audibly aged, but still strong. The few tracks spread in the game are iconic, and stay in my head a lot longer than I’d like to admit.

The competitions are another huge highlight of the original nintendogs. The banter between the hosts, Ted and Archie, is something that continues to be remembered. Everyone’s seen the line “you make me feel like a man, Archie”, and the banter they keep up in each competition is less like a mindless tapping chore and just more entertainment. The settings are surprisingly realistic - less so on the obedience, but the ring set up for agility certainly is. The balance between realism and fun is another part of why Nintendogs appealed to all audiences.

Agility is my personal favourite event, and the same goes for a lot of people I’ve met. There’s a level of interactivity here that isn’t met by the successor (something we’ll touch on later). Guiding your dog over hurdles and through tunnels, and later having to balance speed with accuracy - it’s an event that keeps you, the player, engaged. It becomes a sort of fine art once you hit the Championship level, as your dog, by that point, is likely going to be very fast and have a mind of its own, often trying to predict which obstacles it’s going to go through.

[Image ID: an angled photograph of the starter agility training course. The dog is laying on the green, and the hurdles and tunnels are in view.]

Disc is in both versions, and is fun in its own way. I, personally, don’t tend to use the disc competition - in the original Nintendogs, the projectiles can be a little speedier than you intend them to be, and the dogs are a little too determined to hold onto their toys. But, with a well-trained dog, this event can be as fun as anything else. In the original, you didn’t have to contend with the other dogs - something that I’ve grown to appreciate over the years. But, like with the event that removed Agility, I’ll be looking at how the changes fared later.

Obedience is held on a stage, and is a fun event for people who take the time to train their dogs. Your dog can typically learn three or four tricks a day (depending on the dog), and between the tricks listed in the Obedience Guide Book and the unlisted tricks that your dog can learn, you can usually blow the competition out of the park. It definitely requires the most time and effort out of all of the events, and it can be frustrating if your dog suddenly stops listening - but the rewards are surprisingly good. It’s always fun to have a well-trained Nintendog, if only because showing them off when I was a child was my favourite thing to do.

Obviously, competitions are the main money-makers in these games. Tackle a solid few of them, and you’ll find yourself able to afford another dog or two. Though your room is limited to three dogs, there’s also a Hotel to keep some other dogs in. As time progresses and you gain more of a bond with your dog(s), you’ll unlock more breeds.

Something that went over my head when I was a child was the method to unlock Jack Russells, specifically. You need to find an incredibly rare book - something which I don’t ever recall doing, and still haven’t. I found this information via the wikia, so I’m not too sure how accurate is, but it is an interesting breed to lock behind a time and patience-based method.

[Image ID: an angled image of a German Shepherd laying on its side. In the corner is an idea bubble.]

Overall, Nintendogs is a solid and fun pet simulator, and it’s clear why so many people have such good memories. The dogs are filled with personality (even being expressive enough to show you when they’re angry vs happy), the competitions are engaging, and though the format will become stale after playing daily for a long time, it’s always a fun game to come back to after a period of time.

Which is why it’s unsurprisingly that it gained a sequel.

I remember being ecstatic when Nintendogs + Cats was shown in advertisements on television. When I got the 3ds, I also got a copy of Nintendogs + Cats. The Golden Retriever version, specifically, but I do own all three. For some reason? As people got bored with it, they usually gifted me them.

At first blush, it’s almost as charming as the original. The graphics style handles much better than the original, with slightly more realistic movements, and less cardboard-y models. I much prefer the Nintendogs + Cats models to the originals, for obvious reasons - though their movements can be a little repetitive and strange at times, and a lot less expressive than the originals. But that said, I much prefer the Kennel system of petting and exploring the dogs and their behaviours (limited as they are) before you adopt, and I enjoy sorting through colours or getting unique colours/patterns. The rare white variants used to be my obsession, as a child.

[Image ID: a german shepherd holding a present in Nintendogs + Cats. The model is significantly better than the original Nintendogs model.]

Immediately, though, there’s a lot less ambience in Nintendogs + Cats. I play with my volume up all the way, and it’s typically just my dogs and cat making noises. I miss the cars going by and the general background noise that the game can provide. It feels just a little too silent, and the music tracks are repetitive and unmemorable for the most part. Obviously sound design don’t make or break the game, so I won’t harp on this point for too long.

The gameplay is...fine? I’m not a fan of petting a shadow of my dog, but I understand they did that for 3D purposes (something which most people didn’t use, to the point that the 2DS was made. I play on a 2DS). The camera control is an incredibly nice feature to have, the showering minigame is a little more thorough. They didn’t really add anything to the care features, though. If anything, they took away a lot of experiences - reading the care books and instead guiding you through the tricks one by one instead of as you want, forcing you to learn a specific set of tricks before you can move on to the next ones. The game is far more hand-holdy, which can be frustrating at multiple points. But, hey. There’s cats! Let’s talk about the cats.

What’s their purpose? Not much. Which is fine, although they take up a slot in your three-pet designation. As cute as the cats are, they definitely got done dirty. There’s three selections to choose from (Standard, Oriental, and Long-hair), with multiple colours, but not much depth beyond that. Obviously, the cats were just a cute addition - I do like having my little cat wandering around the house with my two dogs, and I know from past experiences that once you bond with the cat, it’ll go out and get presents for you if you leave your ds on. Gaining affection with the cats is very slow-going and if you’re someone who likes your pet simulations to be more interactive, it might be wiser to stick with the dogs. I’m not complaining against the addition of cats - it just could’ve been done much smoother, with better mechanics enabled. Be it adding some breeds and a proper grooming minigame to maintain them, or the ability to train them but have them be much harder than the dogs. There were many ways to put cats into the game, and I just don’t think they hit as intended.

So, how did they do with the competitions? Well.

The short answer: they’re pretty bland, and a downgrade from the original. The long answer...

[Image ID: a white cocker spaniel chewing on a banana lure.]

In the competitions, there’s no more Ted/Archie banter. It’s just Ted. Doing his thing. I honestly do not read the text for this game, and instead tap quickly to progress to the events.

Replacing Agility comes Lure Coursing. I’m not sure about other countries, but that’s an incredibly niche section of dog sporting here, and it’s also notorious for being...very boring. And in the game, it lives up to that. Instead of guiding your dog through obstacles, you wind the cog of a lure and honk it to get the dog to follow it. Sometimes you honk it to get them over hurdles. I have to admit, I usually space out when I’m training my dogs with this - it’s an easy moneymaker once you’ve trained them up to Nintendogs Cup level, but it’s easily the most mind-numbing event. Anything would’ve been better. If they didn’t want to implement Agility, there are other dog sports that could’ve suited well; guiding your dog through the Flyball course and using its name to bring it back until it could do it on command (maybe even utilising a team of three, for reason as to why you can have up to three dogs), or sledding, using your dog to pull a lightweight sled (on wheels) through a course in a race against other dogs (or, again, even using your trio). There could have even been scenting sport in which you teach your dog how to scent and go off to find a mark, or herding. The point is: lure coursing is the most unengaging thing to put in a game.

The Disc competition barely changes, so I won’t say much. I don’t particularly enjoy having the other dogs in the ring to compete with as it becomes all too easy for them to interfere heavily with your own dog, but I understand why it was implemented and know that a lot of people enjoy it. I prefer the throwing speed and the control you can have over the disc, and will admit that overall, the Disc competition is generally improved.

But then you come to the Obedience Trial. AR Cards are mandatory. You don’t have a surface to put your AR Cards on, or lost them years ago? Then you can’t do it. I actually ordered AR Cards, having thrown out my old ones due to damages and general...lack of use. As of this post, I have been unable to play the Obedience Trial, so I can’t say much on whether the system has improved. I do know that AR Cards can work on a laptop screen or something similar, but the 3ds camera is pretty horrible and can glitch out, making it unreliable for screen-based AR cards. Unfortunately.

[Image ID: a white cocker spaniel standing on an AR Card.]

The walking system is fine. I love being able to go to different routes (as limited as they can be - but the original was no saint to repetitiveness once you knew the whole map), and I like having to go between grass patches, with a chance for a surprise present. I think the addition of the BARC stores are a cute touch, and the Miis walking their own dogs are cute, too. The interactions between your dog and theirs is based on your dog’s personality as well as theirs, which makes sense - but there’s basically three outcomes. More than the original, but meeting with other dogs tends to be to see if you can backtrack when you’re near the end of the walk by having them invite you to the cafe or park, or to get presents from Streetpass miis. I like the cone minigame to test your control over the dog and its leash, and as a rule, I just...like it. It’s relaxing. I don’t prefer it over the original, but I don’t prefer the original over it. They both have their benefits and downfalls. The biggest upside to + Cats’ system is that you can take your dog on as many walks as you want.

Interactivity isn’t really a thing, with + Cats. Whereas in the original you could legitimately piss off your dog and it would bark and snarl at you for a while before you regained its trust, this game doesn’t punish you for much. I poked and prodded at my dog for a while, and it didn’t really do much for me. This is a game where you sort of just have cute looking models that hold up surprisingly well for their time, and that’s it. There’s not much game to the game, as it were - and that’s from a game where the gameplay was limited as it was.

Adding multiple accessories to your pets is a very nice addition, albeit expected. Overall, though, the gameplay has been significantly dumbed down and while I understand that kids play it, my generation played Nintendogs as small children and we got by just fine. It’s a very intuitive game, and it’s almost insulting how little Nintendogs + Cats thinks of its audience.

Another nice addition to Nintendogs + Cats, though, is body type for your pets. There’s a few that your pet can be: underfed, skinny, optimal, plump, and overfed. I usually have optimal dogs, but apparently plump and overfed dogs run slower and as such they do poorer in competitions, which is a pretty neat feature to have in-game.

In the short of it, Nintendogs + Cats is fine, but Nintendogs (the original) is Good. I have a lot more nostalgia for Nintendogs which may cloud my opinion, but playing it in 2020 is still fun, and I’m especially happy to play the Agility competition.

For an interactive pet simulator with fun competitions and plenty to do, Nintendogs is the way to go. For a pretty enough game with simplistic gameplay, Nintendogs + Cats is the way to go.

Both games have their perks, but I certainly have a clear favourite. If a Switch edition of Nintendogs ever happened, I’d much prefer the original style with some of the quality of life changes made in the successor. In the end, it’s all up to what you’re looking for in a game - but as someone who’s looking for a fun time, I’m a sucker for the originals.

(Note: I have not played the knock-off Nintendogs for Switch, and would appreciate input on if it’s worth buying or not. Reviews are poor at best, as far as I can tell, though.)

#nintendogs #nintendogs + cats #video games #game review #eph reviews

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renaerys · 4 years ago

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What are your thoughts on the blues? The reds are my otp and I like the greens but I have to confess the blues don't do anything for me. My frustration with this ship stems from people making them "perfect ". They're always the first to get together, stop hating each other early, rarely have turmoil and if they do they get over it quickly. They're written as too cutesy imo. I feel like people think just because bubbles is the sweet one and boomer being her counterpart that means they would get together quickly. It's annoying because the blues can be complex if people bothered to attempt to flesh them out. Bubbles is still a ppg and boomer is still a rrb. Contrary to popular belief and writing they would have difficulties moving forward from enemies to friends then lovers. I really feel the reason they're the least popular of the 3 ships is because they're rarely fleshed out in fics and given obstacles to overcome. Even singular fics focusing on them leave much to be desired. I feel for blues fans because I know they're frustrated with the content for their ship and how it's written. I'm not into the ship and I'm frustrated along with them because Bubbles/Boomer have the potential to be a great ship if people took the time to actually flesh them out. It's not right that the reds get to be complex and so do the greens but the blues...just get to be cute and one dimensional. You and maybe 2 other authors are probably the only ones who actually give them a personality and character. Definitely not trying to bash authors but I do feel as though this a discussion that needs to be had. The blues deserve better and this is coming from a reds fan.

Thanks for this thoughtful ask! I’ve heard this concern before from others, and I also have issues with it generally. I can’t speak to other authors’ intentions and don’t pretend to know their preferences or interpretations, so please keep that in mind for what I am about to say here. I am speaking only for myself.

Based on what I have seen in this fandom and conversations I’ve had with fellow fans, I think there are a few different explanations for the issue you raised, none of which is dispositive.

1) Certain creators may not like Blues as much as other ships, but because Color Code is pretty much expected in most PPG/RRB fics and art, they throw the Blues in there anyway and end up de-prioritizing them. That’s not unexpected, but probably explains the lower effort put into them compared to other ships. It’s side-ship syndrome and you see it across fandoms. Unfortunate, but pretty ubiquitous.

2) There are fandom headcanons regarding ship dynamics and character personalities that appear to be widely accepted, and among those is the lovey/saccharine Blues dynamic. That’s neither good nor bad, but it is pervasive. In concert with 1) above, you have a recipe for a low-effort side-ship that the author/creator isn’t super excited about, and it shows through the recycled tropes that barely reach beyond a skin-deep level of nuance. I suspect that the popularity of high school fics exacerbates this issue at least in part. High schoolers probably are not dealing with experiences such as getting older, questions of marriage/family, careers, debt/finances, and other hazards of adulting that are ripe for interesting dramatic tension and added layers of complexity in a relationship. Again, this is neither good nor bad, just an observation.

3) Separate from 1) and 2), I get the impression that a not insignificant portion of the fandom actively updating fanfic these days is on the young side (teenagers/early 20s) and/or does not have a lot of personal experience with romantic relationships. None of that is bad! Please don’t mistake me, it’s awesome that there are young people creating and contributing, learning and having fun. I encourage and support them; I used to be one myself (and I still have so much to learn and improve on, as we all do). No one can improve without a safe space to practice and learn, and I feel very strongly about contributing to making that space safe and welcoming to creators of all skill levels. The downside of a younger or inexperienced pool of active writers is that it is probably more difficult for those writers to write nuanced, “realistic” relationship dynamics--if they have not lived those experiences themselves (or at least been around long enough to watch them happen to their peers), then how can they possibly be expected to write about them in a story in a believable and honest way? It’s a tall order, and an unfair standard to hold them to. I’m sure some can do it, and my hat’s off to them; they are certainly better writers than I am. But I suspect most cannot. I say that from a place of experience having been there myself. I look back at my fics from like 10 years ago and cringe fondly (what could I have possibly known about adult relationships without ever having been in one myself?).

And that’s not to say teenagers can’t experience meaningful romantic relationships. They absolutely can and do! But when you’re living it in the moment, it becomes hard to take a step back and objectively analyze it as an experience. That really only comes with age and lived experience, which allow you to look back on those times without being emotionally compromised by your personal feelings. You can see the “good” and the “bad” much better in hindsight. And importantly, you have the emotional intelligence and maturity to write about it honestly. What might have seemed romantic at 16 might feel very different at 26 when you factor in experience, worldliness, and cultural/life education that really can only come with age. At least, that has been my experience. (I reiterate that I am only speaking for myself and my journey, not for any other authors.)

All this for my point 3) is to say that the frustrations you have expressed with Blues in some stories coming off as “too cutesy” or being “perfect” or “rarely hav[ing] turmoil” in their relationship are likely due to the fact that at least some of the writers of those stories probably don’t have the life experiences that would adequately prepare them to write a nuanced, complex, romantic relationship. Real life relationships that are “successful” are hard. They are work. Happiness takes so much work when happiness requires another person’s engagement and fulfillment as an equal member of your team. The honeymoon phase is real, but it doesn’t last, and I think that is where some stories miss the mark. I’m all for Blues (or any other ship) to be genuinely happy in love. Who doesn’t like a happy ending? But romantic success isn’t a destination, it’s a never-ending journey with ups and downs. Personally, I’m interested in reading about the ways a ship navigates those ups and downs, and how the characters decide that despite hardships, it’s worth weathering the struggle together because they are happier together than they would be apart.

But that’s so hard to execute! Professional writers, filmmakers, and screenwriters think it’s hard to execute! I have tried to do it myself, and I look back on my recent fics and I’m like okay cool, but we can and should do better next time. It is not easy, and I don’t want to give you the impression that I think I’m amazing at it or that it’s not hard to pull off. That could not be further from the truth, and anyone who tries to tell you otherwise is lying to you. It’s definitely a discussion that should be had in any fandom no matter the shipping preferences. All I can say is that I encourage my fellow writers and creators to keep practicing. We can all do better.

#i guess i'll tag this unless someone yells at me #ppg blues #boomubbles #this ship is lovely and i love reading them in fics <3 #but there's always room for all of us to improve #Anonymous #ppg meta

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lastbluetardis · 5 years ago

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The Real Story of How They Got Engaged

Summary: There are some stories that aren’t fit to be shared with the general public, but are fun memories to have nevertheless. Ten x Rose AU. 2100 words. Rated E. @doctorroseprompts

Prompt: voyeurism

As always, if you enjoy my fics, consider buying me a coffee?

AO3

Rose doesn’t mean to interrupt this, er, private moment. Honestly, she doesn’t. Her plan is to use the toilet, check on the baby, then make coffee and enjoy a lazy Sunday morning with her family. The baby’d had her and James up all night, thanks to teething and a recent bout of sleep regression; she’s sure James will appreciate a lazy morning cuddle on the couch. She can nurse the baby and he can make breakfast, then maybe they can play a video game or catch up on one of the thousand shows or films they’re behind on.

The clank of pipes and the water heater tells her that her partner is taking a shower, but she thinks nothing of it as she opens the door. Over the past three years of living together, they’ve seen each other utterly naked hundreds of times; it’s not uncommon for one of them to use the toilet while the other is showering.

Because of this, it takes Rose a few seconds to register what she’s seeing and hearing. A plume of steam greets her, as does the sound of pattering water and the vent fan. The frosted glass of the shower door is steamed up, but she can still see the lanky outline of James standing beneath the spray.

He has his head tipped back—not an unusual position for someone taking a shower. However, what catches her attention is the rest of his body. Specifically his arm, which is moving rather rhythmically in front of his hips. This is when her ears finally hear past the spray of water to pick up the muffled grunts and groans, noises she is all too familiar with.

Heat prickles across her skin, swooping low through her belly. She should turn around, let him have his privacy. But she’s rooted to the spot, her feet like lead weights holding her at the doorway to their bathroom.

His arm is moving faster now, and she can see it clearly in her mind’s eye. She can see the way he’s stroking himself, the way he adjusts his grip as his hand moves up and down, the way he gives the head a tight squeeze on the upstroke.

Her blood pounds between her legs, a delicious tingle she wants to address.

James lets out a curse and a moan, and Rose can’t hold back anymore. She has never moved so fast in her life, tugging off her sleep shirt and her knickers before she yanks open the shower door.

He lets out an unholy yelp, and, comically, grabs the flannel and holds it in front of his crotch. As though she’s never seen his cock before. As though she hasn’t spent the past minute watching and listening to him have a wank.

“Rose,” he squeaks, his voice several octaves higher than normal. He clears his throat but it doesn’t help. “What- what- what are you doing?”

“Sounded like my boyfriend was havin’ a bit too much fun without me,” she replies. “I didn’t want to miss out.”

She doesn't give him a chance to respond; she loops her arms around his neck and crashes her mouth to his. God, they need to do this more often, snog in the shower. The slick drag of his body against hers sets her nerves aflame with pleasure and desire and a desperation to be touched.

The wet thwack of the flannel hitting the shower floor is followed by his arms wrapping around her waist, hauling her closer. He is so hard at her belly, where he grinds helplessly against her.

“S-sorry,” he pants. “Didn’t mean to… I would’ve stayed in bed with you… fuck, but I woke up so hard and you were sound asleep.”

The sheer need in his voice sends a shiver down her spine, and she clamps her thighs together for any modicum of relief. And for as much as she wants to reprimand him, to tell him he could’ve woken her, she knows she probably would have refused his advances. With how little sleep she’s running on, she would’ve been furious with him for waking her.

“I wanna come,” he croaks, his hands a vice around her arse as he drags his hips up and down, in and out, pleasuring himself against her.

“Were you close?” she asks unnecessarily. With the sounds he’d been making and the somewhat frantic rhythm of his hips, she knows he was.

Still, he breathes, “God, yes.”

He lets out the most pathetic whimper she’s ever heard when she places her hands on his chest and gives him a small nudge. But he dutifully responds, and takes a step back. The heat and steam of the shower have nothing to do with the crimson tinge of his cheeks and neck.

He clenches his hands into fists as his toes grip the shower floor; she can almost see his body vibrating with tension, with the need to touch or be touched.

“Well, don’t let me stop you,” she drawls when he stands there, unmoving.

He blinks and cocks his head to the side. “I don’t understand. Don’t you want…?”

He gestures vaguely between his crotch and hers, and she swallows down a giggle. Instead, she explains, “Remember I nearly broke my arse the last time we tried to shag—properly shag—in the shower.”

“You didn’t break your arse,” he scoffs, rolling his eyes, but one of his hands has migrated between his legs to give attention to his hard, throbbing length.

“Nearly broke my arse,” she insists. “‘Cos you dropped me.”

“I didn’t drop you!” he splutters.

She bites her lip around a grin. Really, it had been entirely her fault, the incident she’s referring to. She had come so hard around him that when she arched her hips, her shoulders had had the leverage of the shower wall, and she’d accidentally pushed him off balance. They both overcompensated in an attempt to break their fall, but it had been no use. Though they each went crashing to the floor, she had higher to fall, thanks to him having been holding her up. Her tailbone had been bruised for weeks, and it took months for either of them to share a shower again.

But she loves teasing him about it, because he gets so adorably indignant. If you think about it, though, he was the one who had made her come so hard in the first place, which was what catalyzed the accident. So really, it was all his fault.

“Sure, love,” she says, blowing him a kiss. “Now, weren’t you in the middle of something?”

“Oh, yes,” he groans, and she can’t tell if it’s in response to her question, or the fact that his hand is moving up and down his cock again.

He moans, his eyelids fluttering shut as his hand works himself harder and faster. His chest heaves with his unsteady breaths, and he reaches out to brace his other hand against the wall. He’s hunched over now, his eyes squeezed shut and his jaw hanging open as he pants for breath.

God, he’s beautiful. She loves watching him lose himself in his pleasure. He so often makes sure to finish her off first before he comes that she almost always gets the chance to see him come undone.

“My James,” she whispers.

Slowly, she steps closer to him, not wanting to startle him or throw him off his rhythm, but wanting to touch him.

“Rose,” he rasps, the muscles of his throat working as his breathing stutters.

She wraps her arm around his waist, pressing herself into his side. She can feel the rhythm of his hand as he brushes against her stomach.

He pulls his other arm away from the wall to wrap around her waist. His fingers dig into her skin as he drops his forehead to her shoulder. She shivers as his breath tickles her damp skin.

Not much longer now, she thinks as his hand speeds up and the noises he’s making turn more urgent.

She bites her lip around an echoing moan when he cries out and comes against her belly. He’s shaking in her arms, gripping her so tightly as though she’s the only thing in the world keeping him upright.

She strokes any part of him that she can reach as he slowly comes down from his high, letting out involuntary sighs and shudders as he does. He is in no hurry to move, and in fact wraps both arms around her waist to hold her closer, keeping his face tucked into the side of her neck.

“I love you,” he mumbles, swaying them slowly from side to side. “Thank you. This was really nice… thank you.”

“Anytime,” she says, giving his waist a squeeze. “My turn?”

She can feel him smile into her neck. “Your turn. Do I get to watch?”

“‘Course.”

James pulls his face away from her neck and then slots his lips over hers. The kiss is soft and sweet, and though she would prefer something harder and more demanding, the brush of his mouth against hers his enough to stoke the fire swelling deep in her core.

But just as Rose is about to let her hand dip between her legs, she manages to hear a far-off wail. Groaning in frustration, she drops her head onto James’s chest.

“Babies. Such a cock block,” he quips. He kisses the top of her head. “I’ll take care of her. You finish your shower. And, er, finish yourself off too, if you’d like.”

“Oh, I was plannin’ on it.” What with how intensely she is throbbing with desire, there is no way she’s leaving this shower without an orgasm, thank you very much. “But you’re gonna miss the show.”

“I’m sure I can catch the encore later on,” he says with an over-the-top wink.

“If you’re lucky.” She leans up to press a firm, parting kiss to his lips. “Go on. Get the baby. And put the coffee on, would you?”

He snaps off a sharp salute. “Yessir.”

“That’s a good boyfriend,” she coos. “I’ve got you all trained up, don’t I?”

He grimaces. “I hate that word. Boyfriend. Makes it sound like we’re thirteen.”

“Well what else would you prefer me to call you?” Rose asks, a little impatiently. Their daughter was only getting louder, and she was still aroused beyond belief; staring at her soaking-wet gorgeous boyfriend was not helping. “Partner? Lover? Father of my child?”

“Well, husband seems like the next logical step,” he says.

And he’s said it so casually, it takes her brain a moment to catch up. Rose blinks once. Twice. But James is simply staring nervously at her.

“You did not just propose to me like that,” she says in disbelief.

“Well, if you don’t want to marry me, that's all you had to say,” he mutters, a little playfully but also a bit wounded.

They’ve discussed marriage before, plenty of times. And it was something they both agreed they probably wanted. But it has been well over a year since they last had the discussion, when they panicked that maybe they ought to get married before the baby came. They never really spoke about it so bluntly, though; it was usually the casual idea that they would end up married.

“James, you know I want to marry you,” Rose says, grabbing his arm before he can flee the room. “Of course I want to marry you. It’s something we always said we’d do, yeah?”

“Yeah,” he says, a small smile curving his lips. “So… does this mean we’re engaged?”

“No,” she says, and before his face can fall, she adds, “I want a proper proposal so I can actually tell people the story.”

“Well, this would make a funny story, wouldn’t it?” he muses.

She snorts. “How exactly would you like me to tell it? “Hi, Mum! Guess what? James proposed? Oh, how did it happen? Well, you see, I was visiting the toilet and heard him havin’ a wank so I joined him, and when we were finished, he popped the question. So romantic, isn’t it?” Yeah, I’m gonna pass on that.”

James lets out a laugh and admits, “Okay, yeah, that’s probably not the best story to share with our friends and family. Oh all right, Rose Tyler. You win. Guess I’ll save the ring for a later date.”

He winks at her and exits the shower, closing the frosted glass door behind him. He has already wrapped a towel around his hips and is walking out of the bathroom by the time the words sink in.

Horniness be damned, Rose yanks open the shower door and shrieks, “You have a ring?!”

#doctorroseprompts #ficandchips #dwfic #doctor who #ten x rose #ten x rose au #my fic #lemons #the real story of how they got engaged

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foxymoxynoona · 4 years ago

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(1/3) Belle & Sasha are Exasperating anon here (BASE anon?): thanks for replying! It's so interesting to see how you view your responsibility to readers as including protecting them from perceived slights in the comments! Tbh as a reader-writer I see comments as extremely optional engagement for me let alone my readers bc that's content that is unmoderated and untagged, the wild west. But us neurodivergent folks have to get good at dealing w places far crueler than fic comment sections anyway

2/3) BASE anon: + I do think saying ‘X is annoying’ is a fine way to express frustration w a character or narrative BUT I think a fundamental difference in how we view writing stories is I don't believe fiction should be didactic or provide a how-to on recovery, and that's fine! that’s not what I’m interested in, nor do I project on Belle’s experience but clearly some of your readers do and have diff needs eg the very heated response to my last ask where I was accused of wanting JK to myself!

3/3) BASE anon: Lol maybe it needs to be said that I’m not out here thinking I’m ‘better’ than Belle (a fictional character...) for my ego or badmouthing her bc I think I'll marry JK? So in a way I do understand your pov now because there are apparently readers who have very different expectations of your fic than me. This is getting too long so I'll leave it here. Have a great one foxy!

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

My engagement hasn't really been a chivalric need to protect anyone from anything. I always respond to every ask I get (unless it just feels trolling). I do like to discuss and explain the themes i write about, especially because I receive a lot of comments like "I never knew this! or this is beyond my experience! or I never thought about this before!" People want to talk to me about those things, which are often things I don't think people talk about enough, so we talk. I like critical thought and learning about other people's experiences, and readers share so much of themselves with me in response to my stories! It's incredible! I am restored when I get comments that are like "oh geez, I thought I was alone! But I really identify with this and I never see this represented!"

In most cases, I refrain from telling anyone they have misunderstood a character or misunderstood my story, because I think people can read a story however they want and take from it what they want and I only have so much power to actually get my intended message across. People read stories for different purposes, and expect different things from stories. I think all "purposes" of stories are great. I actually find it really satisfying to see when people respond differently to the same scene because human experience is so vast and it means I've (hopefully) managed to write something that has depth and emotional weight.

However I do like to clarify with readers when their expectations are not aligned with the story I'm writing, especially if they send me critical or negative remarks about how I'm writing a story that just isn't going to align with what they're looking for, because I don't want to waste their time or frankly, my own. It's emotionally draining to get negative comments from readers who have ignored tags, warnings, and author's notes and now are unhappy that you're doing the thing you said you were doing. I didn't set out to write instruction manuals about recovering from trauma, but I also didn't set out to write stories that would appeal necessarily to what media presents as "mainstream." I'm just writing what I want to read, that tackle some of the problems I am tired of seeing in the shows and books I consume.

The thing that's honestly missing from some of these comments that I wish was there is analysis. There was an early comment that said JK needed to stop apologizing for things that Isabella made up in her mind. I broke down all the apologies in the chapter trying to understand what they meant, and couldn't see it. If someone is having a negative response but doesn't really want to discuss or dig in on why/where that's coming from/etc., then I'm a bit at a loss on the response they're expecting. And if they aren't expecting a response, what was the purpose of sending me a direct message that they're unhappy? If they don't want to talk about it with me but came from ao3 to my blog to send me a message, what's the reason they did that? Maybe I should just ignore things more but I've tried to view these as opportunities for thoughtful discussion.

There are readers thinking critically about character motivations and actions and context and that is awesome, and I don't mind having difficult, loaded conversations about those. It’s not like Isabella’s behavior is being presented as happy, healthy, and final here! A lot of people send me reactions without much context and I can ignore those or I can try to tease out why they are feeling that way, so we can have a discussion about it. Maybe it makes someone think differently about something they've never understood. Maybe it makes someone decide they just don't like a character and this story is a waste of their time. Maybe there's something I've written wrong or badly or mistakenly in my story, something that didn't land the way I intended.

To your point about the wild west: It really is. I used to have to moderate social media for my job and I was so glad to stop that. Now I could definitely ignore more comments, but I feel like responding to the positive and ignoring the critical isn't what I want either, especially when I am intentionally writing challenging things I want people to think critically about. So kinda damned if I do, damned if I don't.

OKKKK sorry this was even longer than yours! Like I said... I like discussion and details!

#asks #amended #mywriting #myao3 #anonymous

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janeofcakes · 5 years ago

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KYFC..: Chapter 16

Thank you! Thank you, everyone for your support and kind words. It’s been a rough week for a variety of reasons and just when stress was the highest, I got another curve ball. Gotta love that, not to mention your very own Cakey Jane using baseball metaphors. Haha. Anyway, I’m hoping things get better and that you all like the chapter. It has also been a source of anxiety for me and I’m a little hesitant to post it. Thanks to MyBAB, who keeps me on my toes and sometimes adds to my stress.

Here we go. John is on his way back to Detroit to hand in his resignation. No good can come of this.

---

You didn’t have to cut me off. Make out like it never happened and that we were nothing and I don’t even need your love, but you treat me like a stranger and it feels so rough. --Gotye, Somebody That I Used to Know

Sherlock’s toes tap anxiously on the floor of his office. He can barely keep still, with no practice or even a team workout day, there is little to occupy his mind. Strategy, analysis and new plays usually fill his entire being on post-bout rest days. He certainly has enough work to do, but all he can think about is John. John, navigating the airport with Janine, getting onto the plane that will bring them home. Transporting her to the hospital after they land and settling her into their usual wing. He should soon be in the stadium where Sherlock can see him and make sure with his own eyes that John is well and truly safe. God, it will take everything in his power not to throw his arms around John or leap into the doctor’s arms and wrap his legs around the shorter man’s waist and never let go. Sherlock has spent a shameful amount of time thinking about such a scenario and has complete confidence in John’s ability to bear his weight.

He glances at the wall clock and eyes the red seconds hand as it drifts smoothly around the twelve, ticking off another minute. It is nearly 6:30 in the evening and Mike had sent a text when John left the hospital around 5. He should have been here long ago. The tapping of his toes increases as he continues to think through the day. He had texted John regularly in search of status updates and if he’s honest, because he simply wanted to hear from him, but had received precious few responses from the doctor and every one was brief. It might concern Sherlock if he did not know John more than had his hands full.

Even so, it does concern him. Why is John being so distant? Has he reconsidered what happened between them in Baltimore? Sherlock’s heart sinks as he plummets into the dark hole of doubt he keeps hidden deep inside his mind palace. John has had the time and space to regret it. He probably did go back to the Poe House for the scarf and their tour guide greeted him with it. She would flirt with him and he would respond in kind. Under the impression that John was interested, she had only come on to Sherlock so shamelessly to get John’s attention. A very odd strategy to Sherlock’s way of thinking.

He stops here to consider whether or not John was actually interested. He didn’t seem so inclined, but she was precisely his type, so it was possible. She clearly enjoyed sport. Anyone could see that from the scuffs on her shoes. Her deep love for baggy sweaters, something Sherlock has never understood, would draw them together as well. Add to that her bubbly personality and John couldn’t help but notice her a second time around. John probably went back for the scarf, wearing that absurd oatmeal-colored sweater he likes so much that does absolutely nothing for his figure, and she complimented him on it. They started talking and went to dinner, spent the evening together. Maybe John invited her back to the hotel for drinks and…

Sherlock stops again, closing his eyes and shaking his head like it will shake the thoughts free from his mind. He claws at the walls of doubt, trying to climb back up and escape, but the dirt crumbles in his fingers and he slides down again. He climbs desperately for what feels like hours and grasps at anything he can to pull himself free when he reaches the top. He opens his eyes to see he is still in his office, his laptop still open in front of him and the clock quietly ticking away more time. His gaze shifts around the room as if searching for something to settle on while he tries to think more rationally once again. Practically, John will go back to his own apartment, but there is no reason to believe he is out of danger. The lack of further attempts on his life means nothing.

Sherlock does not want him to leave regardless.

He buries his face in his hands and yawns wearily. Sherlock absolutely cannot think about that again. He sighs and opens his eyes, looking at the clock again. He couldn’t even begin to think about sleep the night before and never bothered going to his bedroom. The condo felt cold and lonely without John. Instead of doing anything productive, Sherlock sat in front of MST3K until he fell asleep on the couch somewhere in the middle of Catalina Caper. He awoke hours later, stiff and grumpy until he realized a text from John had been what woke him.

*In the cab heading for the airport. Things are looking good. Janine is not in pain.*

That was at 6:45am, since then there had only been infrequent updates. John would not even engage in conversation when they were on a god awful layover in Chicago. Honestly, why everything has to go through O’Hare is beyond all logic. Still, it is only a day of travel and should not worry Sherlock in the least, but it does. He looks at the clock again and stands to pace, stopping only when his phone suddenly rings. He grabs it quickly and raises it to his ear. The three seconds it takes him to glance at the caller ID and see it is not John slow into minutes, the very air around him crushing the hope right out of his chest.

“Greg,” he answers gruffly, resting one hand on the desk as he leans against it.

“John’s on his way to your office,” Greg replies without bothering to greet him. “He’s re…”

Sherlock doesn’t even let Greg finish as he abruptly ends the call when his door is pushed open without warning and John is suddenly standing before him.

“Sorry. Can I come in?” John’s voice is rough and uncertain.

“Of course,” comes an equally soft reply from Sherlock.

Sherlock watches him move deliberately toward the desk that separates them, only just keeping his own eyes from widening in surprise. John does not look tired from the day of travel and stress. He looks beyond tired. He looks wrecked. There is a stutter in his step and a look in his eyes that can only mean one thing: What transpired between them in Baltimore weighs heavily upon him. Sherlock’s heart sinks for the second time in mere minutes.

“We need to talk,” John avoids looking at him directly. His gaze darts around Sherlock’s desk almost frantically before settling on the stapler.

Those dreaded words. Sherlock said them to Victor once years ago.

“Yes,” Sherlock rasps, barely able to speak. He is glad Greg phoned him before John walked in so he could face the doctor from behind his desk. He could never make it through this conversation otherwise, his knees already threatening to buckle. He rests both hands on its surface and leans forward. “Greg mentioned it,” he says as evenly as he can.

“He told you?” John looks at him in shock. Trying to appear as normal as possible, Sherlock clears his throat and stands up straight to face him fully.

“He said you were on your way to my office,” Sherlock answers, frustrated that his voice is not his own. Wobbling at the most inopportune time imaginable when he would rather it be steady and reveal nothing. Sherlock takes a breath and tries to use the frustration to his own advantage, trying to compose himself for John’s next words. Trying and failing.

“Oh. Right,” John bites his lower lip and clearly steels himself. Every part of his body says regret. Sherlock closes his eyes slowly. He does not even try to stop himself from doing it, from showing his own emotions. He is too unguarded around John, too comfortable. He never should have let it get to this point or any point. Sentiment. He is such a fool.

“I’ve resigned,” John’s voice is barely above a whisper.

“What?” Sherlock wheezes, his eyes snapping open wide in shock.

“It’s for the best,” John states firmly, looking directly into his unabashed stare.

“No,” Sherlock’s voice sounds strange even to his own ears. He blinks as if trying to focus and closes his mouth with a pop. He feels like he is going to wretch. Staggering backwards, he nearly trips over his chair, but catches himself on the armrests and pushes himself back up. John’s hands reach out instinctively to stop his fall, but stop when he rights himself. They look at one another for a moment with searching, uncertain eyes.

What is going on?

But John doesn’t answer this time. Instead, his blue eyes turn to ice.

“You just have to trust me,” his voice hardens with his eyes.

“You can’t leave,” Sherlock’s words are coming faster and he doesn’t try to slow them down. He doesn’t care that it lays all his cards on the table or that his body language shows every bit of how he is falling apart.

“I’ll do what I want, Sherlock,” John nearly hisses, slamming his hands flat on the desk in anger. A plain, wooden pen holder falls to the floor and pencils roll under the desk.

“No,” Sherlock insists, tone bordering on desperation. He must stay calm. He cannot let his panic or frustration get the better of him. John is not going to listen if he flies into some kind of crazed, emotional outburst. Sherlock squares his shoulders and takes another deep breath. “You are an excellent physician. The team needs you. I know you haven’t been here long, but you have done so much. All the ladies trust you implicitly. And, frankly, so do I.”

He almost flinches. He sees something in John’s eyes, a glimmer of happiness that says what words cannot. When something means so much there is nothing to say. It fades right before his eyes. John’s shoulders fall as if under a crushing weight and Sherlock’s mind is awash with thoughts and feelings.

I trust you. I need you. I don’t let anyone in, not like this, but you opened the gates as if you always had the key. What happened, John? Tell me, please.

“John, I…” he can’t say it. He can’t risk it.

“Sherlock, I can’t. I just can’t,” John sighs, shaking his head. “I have to go. I’m sorry.”

“No, wait,” he rushes around the desk, but stops abruptly before reaching John, trying to gather himself. He must stay in control. He casts his gaze sidelong and curses his own feelings before looking back at John. “However you feel about me, about...what happened between us, don’t let it hurt the team. Please, John.”

He tries to keep his voice even, but it shakes slightly on the last two words. John stares at him with a startled expression on his face. Sherlock’s sturdy posture wavers as he watches John.

“How I feel about you,” John repeats in dismay, but goes quiet before saying more. He presses his lips into a thin line, affecting a grim countenance and shaking his head. “I have resigned. I’ve told Greg and now you. I’ll tell Mrs. Hudson tomorrow, put it in writing tonight. It’s done.”

Sherlock’s mouth opens, but no words come out. He takes a sharp breath, his eyes on John. How can he make him stay?

“I’ll start cleaning out my office after I speak with Martha,” John continues and then sighs heavily. He touches his own temples in a pained gesture that makes him look more exhausted than when he walked in. “I’m going back to my place tonight. I’ll get my things out of your flat tomorrow evening. I’ll ring you, so you can leave while I’m there.”

“John, no!” Sherlock truly is desperate now and doesn’t give a shit about hiding it or anything else. Fuck staying in control. God, how has everything gone so terribly wrong so quickly? “In Baltimore, what we did, what happened. We can forget it. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t have to mean anything,” he pleads with the man in front of him. If John wants him to, he can lock away all those memories and never touch them again. He has done it before. It will rip him apart this time, but he can do it. They can go back to being friends like before and maybe John would stay in the condo. They could be roommates, just roommates.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” John bites out the words vehemently.

Sherlock can’t stop a quick gasp and silence settles in around them. He can feel his face starting to crumble, his heart starting to fall apart, but just manages to hold his composure so he reveals nothing. All he allows is a mighty crease of his brow and the twitch of an eye. They are not together. They were never together, never a couple. His heart should not be shattered, but it is. It should not feel like his life is ending. John had warned him about this exact scenario. He said he could not love anyone romantically and, even if he could, why would he give his heart away after so little time had passed? He isn’t a complete idiot like Sherlock.

“Sherlock,” the name whispered between them catches his attention, even when he would rather look anywhere but at the man before him.

Sherlock’s grey eyes, filling with tears he will have to blink back, shoot straight to John’s face. The doctor is clearly beside himself, but trying to hide how undone he is. Somewhere in the background of his mind Sherlock knows that does not make any sense. The evidence does not fit the situation. John should be emotionless or even angry about Sherlock’s display, not anguished.

“Sherlock, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. Of course it means something. It means…” he shuts his mouth and swallows hard. “It’s Moriarty. He wants to win it all and he’ll do whatever he has to.”

“What?” Sherlock squints in confusion at this sudden outburst of seemingly unrelated information.

“You are right, Sherlock,” he tells him emphatically, stepping forward and placing his hands on the coach’s shoulders. “Keep looking for evidence and watch out for...others.”

“Others?” Sherlock shakes his head slowly. This is not at all what he expected, not by a long shot. He finds his mind shifting from his own panic and sadness toward this new mystery. Part of him tries to stop it, knowing he should stay focused on John, but he cannot. John’s words begin running through his mind over and over again, trying to piece it all together and it takes only seconds for it to fall into place. Something happened while John was in Baltimore alone. It scared him. Moriarty got to him.

“What did he do?” Sherlock hisses.

The words are out before Sherlock even has the chance to think. His voice is quiet and deadly serious, demanding an answer, but John continues as though he did not hear him.

“It’s Janine. She…” John is warring with himself and if Sherlock was not so distracted with his own thoughts, he would already know exactly what John is trying so hard not to tell him. “Watch everyone! Don’t trust anyone,” John insists again. Suddenly his hands are off Sherlock’s shoulders and he is heading for the door. Sherlock cannot process what just happened or what John said and didn’t say because John is leaving and he can’t. He can’t!

“John, don’t go! Don’t go!” Sherlock lunges forward and wraps his fingers around John’s wrist, holding it with unrelenting strength. “Please, I can’t do it on my own.”

“You’ll be fine, Sherlock,” John says into the space between them, refusing to meet his eyes.

“Yes. Fine, but I don’t want to be fine. I don’t want to be anywhere without you,” Sherlock’s words are coming fast, faster than he can think and he has to think faster. John can’t go. He can’t let him go.

“I need you,” Sherlock whispers, unshed tears obvious in his voice.

Sherlock does not know if he said that out loud or in his head. He doesn’t care, doesn’t care what he says or reveals. John has to stay. He can’t lose John.

“I love you! I love you,” he blurts in a ragged tone.

They stare at one another. Sherlock is breathing hard, chest heaving. He does not take his eyes off John, his shoulders bobbing up and down less and less as his breathing returns to normal. His mind finally catches up with his traitorous panic and instantly rebukes. Idiot! But he ignores it and repeats quietly.

“I love you,” his voice is clearer now. Calmer and more collected as his overactive mind comes to rest. He is stating the truth and has never felt more free.

***

“You...you...you can’t,” John’s voice rasps, his eyes wide in shock and disbelief. He shifts his weight and furrows his brow, a little frown of lines appearing between his eyebrows. Pressing his lips together, he studies Sherlock intently, searching his eyes. “What? You, what? No. No, Sherlock, just no.”

John shakes his head harder with every word that leaves his lips. He tries taking a step toward the door, but the long fingers already wrapped around his wrist tighten. He looks down at those fingers and then back to the coach, seeing a determination that tries to hide pain.

Fuck. Fuck!

He’s hurting Sherlock. He hadn’t meant those words to sound the way they did. He’s fucking up the whole thing.

“That’s not what I meant,” he begins, but flails. “You… You haven’t known me five minutes. These things take time, feelings take time to form, don’t they? Sherlock, you don’t know me,” he pleads.

“I have not known you long, true,” Sherlock licks his lips, looking at John like he is a spooked deer, “but can we agree that I know you well?”

John does not answer, too shocked to speak, but he nods in affirmation.

“Good. That’s good,” Sherlock inches closer.

John keeps his gaze on those grey eyes. He could get lost in them, swim in them for hours. He will never tire of them, or of this man. It is all too much and not something his brain is used to handling. His feelings for Sherlock are so strong and he has no idea how to feel about that or what to call them. John does not feel this way about people. It is not that he doesn’t care, he just…

‘I do believe he cares for you.’

“Is there anything in particular that you are hiding from me?” Sherlock asks over Moriarty’s voice in John’s mind. His eyes focus in again.

“Well,” John swallows, “no. I mean, apart from the not falling in love thing and I told you about that. ’Course I would have thought that’d send anyone running.”

“It hasn’t,” Sherlock’s voice is soft, but steady and his grip loosens slightly. He takes another small step closer.

“So I see,” John replies slowly, full of hesitation.

They stare at one another for a long time, each one willing the other to understand what words cannot say. Finally, Sherlock breaks the silence.

“I know I’m not qualified to explain this. Molly has always been far better at it than I,” Sherlock puffs out a breath, a wrinkle of concentration appearing between his eyebrows. John bites his lip and watches the man search for the right words, marveling at how adorable he is and trying not to show it. “She tells me to follow my heart. It’s not a precise science.”

Sherlock stops suddenly, his face full of doubt.

“Look, what I said, it doesn’t have to mean anything. We can forget it,” Sherlock shakes his head, trying for nonchalance and failing.

“No,” John interrupts, taking his own step toward the taller man. They are very close now. He watches Sherlock with a steady gaze, finally feeling the befuddlement lift. It is like stepping from a thick fog and he can finally see the man more clearly. “We can’t. It means too much. It means...everything.”

Sherlock blinks his eyes wide. They sparkle and shine, and John cannot take his own off of them. He wants this man like nothing else in his life. It is not just sexual desire and is not like caring for a friend. John most certainly does care, but it is so much more than that. It is confusing. He still has no idea what to call these feelings or how to handle them. What should he do? What is he supposed to think? It is completely and utterly baffling.

John swallows and lets his lips part, his gaze locked on Sherlock’s face. It falls quickly to the soft, full lips that John felt against his own only two nights ago. They dropped kisses on his neck and body, hot and wanting. He is sure his eyes must be dilated, his face and neck flushing. John shuffles closer and takes Sherlock’s free hand in his own. He can feel Sherlock’s breath on his face, warm and welcoming. John wets his lips and tilts up on his toes as Sherlock bends his neck down and their lips meet.

The kiss is gentle and sweet. John still does not know what this baffling feeling is, but he tries to put every ounce of it into this perfect kiss. It flows through every part of his body and into Sherlock and back. This kiss, it has to be perfect...because it has to be their last.

“I’m sorry,” John pulls away. “I can’t. I can’t stay. I can’t do this.”

“John,” Sherlock’s eyes snap open, his face rife with despair.

“I can’t,“ he pushes Sherlock away with enough force to knock him back two steps. John feels it in his chest suddenly and winces. The pain of his heart clenching and then trying to defenestrate from his body through any window it can find only to thunk into his chest cavity and fall lifeless and defeated. Resisting the urge to clutch at the nearly unbearable pain, John shakes his head and tries to concentrate. He avoids Sherlock’s eyes.

“I don’t know what it means, Sherlock,” he declares in frustration, not even aware of what he is saying until his mind catches up. “I don’t understand it or how I feel about it, but it’s all… It’s exactly why I have to go.”

“To protect me,” Sherlock ventures as if he already knows exactly what Moriarty said to John and only needs confirmation.

“Yes. No!” John looks at him in growing panic. He can’t say anymore, shouldn’t say anymore. He risks Sherlock’s life with every word. He needs to leave. He never should have come. He should have gone to his flat and phoned Sherlock to tell him all this.

John turns for the door, but Sherlock grabs hold of his arm and yanks him backwards. John twists to free himself, but just gives the lanky-armed bastard more to lock claws on.

“Let me go,” John glares at Sherlock’s hand and then meets his gaze again. He repeats himself in a low, dark voice. “Let. Me. Go.”

Sherlock does not obey the command and the part of his brain works through every strategy, every bout, seems to have kicked into overdrive.

“You’re afraid of Moriarty,” Sherlock is saying now and goddammit, John has already killed him.

“No, Sherlock! Let go,” John lurches forward, taking the coach with him. He has wrapped his long limbs around John like a snake and any attempt to escape results in tightening coils.

John lurches again and they slam against the door. Rolling them against the wall, John pins Sherlock with his body and tries to wiggle free. When he succeeds in getting an arm out, Sherlock pushes off the wall and sends them tumbling to the floor. John comes down with a crack, the coach atop his body. Sherlock takes advantage of the split-second pause John needs to get his bearings, quickly straddling his hips and pushing his wrists to the floor with his hands. Though the two men are very similar in strength, the force of his weight and the fulcrum created by his height play in Sherlock’s favor.

“Sherlock, get the fuck off of me!” John shouts, thrashing this way and that.

“Talk to me, John! Tell me what’s wrong,” Sherlock insists, struggling to hold him still. “Please don’t shut me out.”

“Get off!” John huffs angrily.

“We can do this together,” Sherlock implores.

“No!” John shouts.

“Tell me why you’re doing this because this isn’t you,” Sherlock is begging now and it is tearing at John’s heart.

“It’s too dangerous!” John blurts, already hating himself. He wrenches his arms from Sherlock’s grip and twists his body into a roll. Unfortunately, the bastard just uses the momentum to roll John onto his back again. He looks down at the doctor and grumbles in frustration. John can feel it rumble through his chest. He tries to continue the struggle, but his heart is severed and bleeding out. John is exhausted. He wants to stay with Sherlock forever, but protecting him means leaving. He squeezes his eyes shut and doesn’t try to stop the moisture in them from slipping out.

“Tell me, John. Please,” Sherlock’s voice is low and gentle. It pleads and also demands. It is that voice that makes John stop trying to free himself. That soothing voice coupled with gentle hands tracing a path down his chest.

He raises his gaze to look at Sherlock, beautiful and panting. John’s hands come to rest on Sherlock’s thighs and another tear slips from his eye. He lets his body relax as he loses himself in those eyes, swirling and deep. Greens and blues merging with grey, all focused on John. They can see into John’s mind and pull free the worry and fear.

John tilts his head to the left and looks at Sherlock thoughtfully. Warm fingers cup his cheek, a thumb wiping away a tear that slowly trickles down. John closes his eyes again and leans into the touch. He can still see Sherlock’s face in his mind’s eye, smiling like he has a secret only the two of them know. His lips part as he bends forward to whisper in John’s ear:

“He threatened you...forcing you to resign...we’ll do it together...you’re not alone...never alone…”

“Sherlock,” John gasps, opening his eyes and seeing that the two of them are now side by side facing one another on the floor. When the hell did that happen? His eyes were only closed for a moment. Sherlock is looking at him, searching. Had he asked a question? And then it hits John with the force of a truck.

Alone.

John had felt it deep down in his bones when Bill died, the crushing sense of being truly alone. It took a long time, but he had moved on. At least, he thought he had worked through it and left those feelings behind. Now John can see that he only hid it from himself. Somehow, over the years, especially since his parents died, he convinced himself that alone was better. Alone is what I have. Alone protects me. No real relationships, no love, or close friends. Nothing to tie him to anyone and then coming here turned his life upside down. He likes the skaters, genuinely. And Greg and Martha and Sherlock. He likes Sherlock? No, it’s more. So much more and something he can’t even begin to understand.

“He threatened you,” John finally says in a soft, breathless tone. He meets Sherlock’s eyes and cups the man’s face with both hands. “He will kill you. If I stay, if I tell you anything about why I’m leaving, if I do anything but resign and go, he’ll kill you. You’re too important to me, Sherlock. You’re...I…”

John trails off as his voice gives out. He has no idea what to say anyway, and no idea what he even wants to say. He wants Sherlock to know, to understand how he feels, but he is not sure himself. What he does know is that he has put Sherlock in grave danger. He has killed him with his words.

“God, what have I done?” John mumbles as he releases Sherlock’s face and covers his own eyes.

“He’s lying,” Sherlock’s voice books no argument.

“What?” utter confusion showing on John’s expressive face as he uncovers it.

“He’s not going to hurt me,” Sherlock sits up and offers his hand to John, who takes it and pulls up to sit with him. “If I was a target, he would have made it known by now.”

“And you’re willing to risk your life on the strength of that?” John asks incredulously.

“Yes,” Sherlock answers simply. “He wants me to witness his victory. To feel the defeat knowing I have done everything possible to stop him and failed. That is what Moriarty wants.”

He leans close to John and covers his hand where it rests on the floor between them.

“He won’t hurt me,” he smiles softly at John.

“I wish I could believe that,” John says, resigned.

“It’s true, John. I’d stake my life on it,” Sherlock promises.

“You are,” John snaps louder. Incredulous disbelief racks his body, making it restless and twitchy. He wants to put his hands on Sherlock’s shoulders or around his arms, but sort of gestures aimlessly between the two of them instead. “I can’t believe you’re being so blase about this. We’re talking about your life!”

“And Molly’s and yours,” Sherlock finishes, watching John with razor sharp eyes. With this one look Sherlock makes it clear just how seriously he takes it. “And every skater on our track. You help keep us all safe and alive when we are all at risk. Think, John, think!”

He grasps John’s arms hard, his eyes intense and completely focused on the doctor. John knows exactly what Sherlock is going to say and it is a sound argument. Can he really step away from the team knowing the danger they are in?

“Molly would be dead without you! No one else would have seen what you did in time to save her. That’s why Moriarty wants you to walk away,” Sherlock sounds so sure.

A thought unbidden pops into John’s mind and it sets every gear turning in the opposite direction. How likely is Moriarty to honor their agreement? Rock City and its coach with no doctor…not likely.

“You are a complication, John. An unknown variable. He will tell you whatever he needs to to make you go. He. Is. Lying,” Sherlock pauses to really look at John and, for the first time since Baltimore, John opens himself to the man - mind, body and soul. Sherlock’s mouth falls open at the sudden contrast and John almost wants to giggle, in spite of himself. The quippy coach, brilliant and ever unruffled in post-bout interviews, is speechless. John wants to kiss him. He wants to pull him to his body and kiss those ridiculous cheekbones, his forehead and nose, cheeks and eyelids. God, this man. John has no idea how to understand the depth of his feeling for this man.

“You’re right,” John nearly gasps, the air heavy with emotion. He swallows hard. Swallows down the desire to forget it all and just be with Sherlock. “Whether you’re on the list or not, he’ll keep to his plan. My leaving just increases the danger.”

John nods as he speaks, more to himself, but agreeing with Sherlock nonetheless.

“Exactly,” Sherlock says sensibly. His expression is a bit smug and smacks of ‘There is no other way to view it, John’.

This time the doctor almost does smile, but holds it at bay. There is one more very important thing he must say to the infuriating man before him. John reaches for him quickly, cupping his face in between his hands. Sherlock’s cheeks are warm and soft and perfect on John’s palms. His thumb strokes a cheekbone of its own volition. John looks deeply into those grey eyes. Flecks of green and blue sparkle back, telling him everything, every secret of a man normally so guarded.

“So help me, Sherlock, if you are wrong, I don’t know what…” John’s voice hitches and the words are gone. His tone was a raspy whisper said all in a rush and he thought he could make it through, but welling emotion got the better of him. He swallows hard and tries again.

“I don’t know what I would do,” he drops his head.

It’s true. It may be ridiculous, but it’s true. John has never needed anyone, not since Bill and his parents were gone, and that was fine. He built up his walls and did his job, lived his life and then in walked Sherlock Holmes and it was just....fate.

Words suddenly fill John’s mind, reverberating off the walls of his skull. A song he has not heard in years. Not since he watched a certain movie with his mother. It was the last one they saw together.

I’ve grown accustomed to his face. He almost makes the day begin.

How many times has he felt that way as he walked into Sherlock’s kitchen to see him standing by the stove, making those special eggs?

“Oh god, Sherlock,” he breathes, a tear streaking down his cheek. “I want you in my life. I want you forev…”

John bites his lip. Keeps in the word.

Sherlock watches him with soft and shining eyes. He sighs and tilts his head in John’s hands as he closes the gap between them. Pressing a soft kiss to his lips, Sherlock breathes against John’s mouth and then tips his chin down to rest their foreheads together.

“I will always be by your side, John. Always,” he promises and for the first time in a long time, John believes those words wholeheartedly.

---

Yay!! Yay, Jane, you have taken mercy upon us! John tried, he did, but lying to Sherlock was too much for him AND he’s that much closer to seeing his true feelings for Sherlock. How great is the moment when Sherlock just blurts it out? “I love you!” and he doesn’t try to take it back. He just lets it be. John’s reaction is the greatest too. “You...you can’t. You haven’t known me five minutes.” Hahaha! I love it! I mean, I’m clearly biased so please let me know what you think. I don’t want to beg, but I’m not above it and it has been a bad week. Any encouragement is more than welcome and VERY appreciated. You all mean so much to me. I’m going to be honest. The next couple weeks could be hard and I may not get the next two chapters out on Sundays, but I’ll do my best. Please be with me in spirit. I will definitely be with you. Until next time, my friends. I love you. Jane

@zentris @221b-carefulwhatyouwishfor @tooolforthissh--stuff @shana-movershaker @melmey-fanfics @louise175dk @technicallywiseoncns @underestimatemethatwillbefun @jhamishw @weirdlittlegoofball @superwholockpotterincamelot @superwholocklmt @ladidragonuniverse @kittenmadnessandtea @srebrnafh @welcometomyharddrive @annecumberbatch @kingdomofbrokenhearts @philliphooper @whodwantmeasaflatmate @gloriascott93 @vvaticancameoss @cow-mow @echosilverwolf @spazzz32 @absentmindedsstuff @swissmissing @shuukichan @maeliandmyself @wtgilsa @red-pen-revolution @britishaccentfan @dischorde @plasticstrawsmuggler @youknowyougrow @one-thousand-splendid-stars @irina12maria

#Sherlock Holmes #Sherlock #sherlockholmes #sherlock loves john #sherlock au #sherlock fanfic #john watson #johnwatson #johnlock #Johnlock fanfic #johnlock au #sherlock roller derby

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winterisakillerwrites · 5 years ago

Text

Imperfect Tense - Part Three

Title: Imperfect Tense

One Shot: 3/3

Character: Tom Hiddleston/OFC

Genre: Angst

Rating: M

Summary: Secrets are powerful things. They shape who we are and how we interact with others and with the world. Tom assumed his secret was safe and his life would remain as it ever was. He was wrong.

Authors Notes/Warnings: I thought this story was over when I had posted part two. It was an abrupt ending, yes, but it fit.

And then Molly decided there was more that needed to be said and here we are. This story is now complete….The journey Tom and Molly go on, however, most likely is not. There is too much more to explore for me to say I won’t ever come back to these two. But this particular part of their story has come to a close. I hope you all enjoy.

Thank you again to @nonsensicalobsessions, @redfoxwritesstuff and @ciaodarknessmyheart for being sounding boards for this last part of the story. Your help has been so so valuable and I doubt this story would be as good as I feel it is without your help. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

“What the fucking hell were you thinking?!” Luke’s voice rose three octaves as he yelled at the pale, drawn man sitting before him. There was a fire in Luke’s eyes that Tom hadn’t seen and, gods above, he knew he deserved it. Every last bit of it.

It had been nearly three days since he’d come home and watched the life he’d left behind shatter beyond repair before him. Nearly three days since he’d seen the broken, angry, disbelieving pain swim in Molly’s eyes. Three days since she’d left and he’d learned he’d been a father. Twice now, if that stupid fucking letter was to be believed. God, it was a mess. A complete and utter travesty and there was nothing he could think of to do; no way he could fathom to fix the utter mess he had made of everything.

Luke had found him sitting on the edge of his bed, head in his hands, almost an hour before. Tom had barely moved since Molly had stormed out; forcing himself to use the bathroom when need became too great, but hardly sleeping (when he had, he woke in a panic searching for Molly only to remember she was gone) and barely eating. He’d known time had passed, but honestly hadn’t been at all aware of just how much. His phone had rung incessantly for what felt like hours and after the dozenth time he’d looked and found Luke’s number instead of Molly’s, he’d thrown the infernal thing across the room, not caring if it broke. And frankly he had enjoyed the thud it made as the bloody thing collided with the wall.

But Luke was not one to be ignored and had Tom been in his right mind, he wouldn’t have been surprised when Luke had finally shown up to say whatever he’d had to say in person. He’d come storming in the house, cursing and yelling for Tom to “show his goddamned idiotic face and show it now.” Tom could remember hearing the thunder of Luke’s feet on the stairs and then the intake of breath as he came down the hall and stopped in the doorway.

Tom raised his head, blinking as Luke’s reddened face came into clear focus. Luke paused for barely a moment before charging in the room, brandishing a manila folder in his right hand. He paused and flipped the damned thing open, throwing their contents at Tom, who watched absently as they fell to the floor at his feet. A letter, he noted, much like the one Molly had been holding when he’d walked in the door and lost everything. And several print outs of what looked to be online articles. He blinked down at them and then up at Luke.

“Do you have any idea the kind of madness I’ve been dealing with for the past 72 hours?! You go off the fucking radar, don’t answer your goddamned phone, and this insanity is spreading like wildfire. Are you aware that she went to the press? That’s she’s told everyone?!”

Once again Tom blinked in confusion.

Molly? Molly had gone to the press and told them what he’d done? The thought froze his heart. He couldn’t believe she would do something like that. He’d known he’d hurt her…That he’d broken what they had, but for her to run off and tell the world? That wasn’t his Molly. That wasn’t the woman he’d known, he’d loved. Who’d loved him. “Molly…She couldn’t…She wouldn’t…” His voice cracked as he spoke the words, both from disuse and disbelief.

It was Luke’s turn to blink in bewilderment.

“Molly? Why would Molly…?” He shook his head. “No, she hasn’t answered any of my calls either….I’m talking about Heather James. You know, the woman you fucked in a club bathroom in LA two years back? She’s gone to the fucking press with not only your affair, which paints you in an absolutely terrific light seeing as your relationship with Molly was public knowledge at the fucking time, but the fact that you have a son by her! Jesus Christ, Tom, this is a fucking shit show.” He paused running a hand through his short, brown hair. “I’m barely managing to keep up with all of it. And with your engagement announcement two months back…This is bad. Very, very, VERY bad.”

Tom found himself nodding but not truly comprehending the words Luke spoke. It all seemed so surreal, like a horrid nightmare, and all he wanted was to wake from it and find that none of it had actually happened. To find Molly beside him, holding him and telling him she loved him. It couldn’t be real. This couldn’t be happening.

“…Are you even fucking listening to me, Tom?”

He slowly raised his head and met Luke’s gaze. Tom watched the exasperation and annoyance play across his publicist’s face as it became abundantly clear he hadn’t truly been listening. “What?” he managed to choke out.

Luke bit back a groan. “I was saying you and Molly need to release a joint statement on the matter. You need to say something to counteract this shit storm that is raining down on you. And you both need to do it now. Ignoring it isn’t going to work, not this time.”

Tom shook his head, his eyes burning once more with tears. “She’s gone.” It was the first time he’d spoken the words aloud and they sounded strange to his ears. Like they couldn’t be the truth. “She left.”

“When you say left…” Luke let the words trail off but Tom could hear the steel in them. It was clear he had a very good idea just what Tom had meant. And it was just as clear that he intended for Tom to say it aloud.

Tom cleared his throat, unsure just how to put this whole mess into words. “She…She had the letter when I got home,” he paused, working to clear his throat as the words threatened to choke him. “ She…She’d read it and asked me to tell her it wasn’t true…And I…I didn’t know what to do…I didn’t mean to…”

Luke blinked. “But she knew about the affair. You told her…” He trailed off, staring at Tom in enraged disbelief as understanding dawned. “You fucking didn’t tell her about it did you?” Fire burned in Luke’s eyes and he threw his hands up in frustrated incredulity. “You stupid, selfish, moronic fucking coward! You didn’t bloody ever tell her and she was blindsided by…Oh my fucking GOD Thomas, I am going to murder you!”

“I didn’t think…” Tom pleaded.

“No, you didn’t fucking think at all did you?” Luke ran a trembling hand through his hair, shaking his head in frustrating disbelief. “She had no idea about any of this…Dammit all Thomas, I thought you had fucking told her. I begged you to tell her. Why the fucking hell didn’t you?” Luke’s dark eyes locked on his own and the guilt and regret burned inside him.

“Because I didn’t want to lose her,” Tom snapped, glaring up at Luke. It didn’t matter that everything Luke said made sense. He should have told her straight off. He should have been honest. But he hadn’t and it had cost him everything. “I fucked up, Luke. Is that what you want to bloody hear?! I. Fucked. Up. I was a coward. A fucking spineless coward and now she’s gone! She’s having my baby and she left me because I fucked it all up!”

Luke’s mouth, which had been open ready to fire a snarky retort, slammed shut. He blinked at Tom for several minutes in apparent incomprehension before gathering himself enough to choke out, “Molly’s pregnant…”

Tom swallowed thickly and nodded.

Luke threw his hands in the air. “Fucking hell, Tom.” He paced feverishly around the room, muttering to himself and occasionally shooting daggers in Tom’s direction.

The guilt that had been simmering merrily away for the last several days boiled over and Tom fought to control his breathing. This was bad. This was very, very bad and he felt as though everything had turned violently on its head.

“…she’ll talk to me.”

“All my fault,” Tom muttered over and over again to himself. Because it was all his fault. Every last miniscule bit of it. He’d made one stupid, cowardly choice after another and suddenly here he was having to answer for each and every one with no idea how the hell he was going to do so.

“It bloody is and don’t you dare expect me to sugar coat it for you,” Luke snapped. “You should have told her from the word go. You had so many fucking chances to say something and you fucking didn’t. If you had this would have been bad but we could have fucking managed it…Now, fuck, I have no idea which way this will go. And when the goddamned media finds out not only that Molly’s pregnant but she’s left you…”

“That’s not the point!” Tom hissed, pushing himself to his feet. He fought off a giddy wave of dizziness and nausea at the sudden movement. “I don’t give a flying fuck what those bastards print about me. You think I honestly care?”

“Honestly, Tom? I don’t know. The way you’ve been…It’s like I don’t know who you are anymore.”

The words stung far more than he’d expected them to, but it could not fault the truth in them. This person he’d become; this lying, secretive, dishonest man wearing his face wasn’t one he’d recognized. And that terrified him. “What am I going to do?” He hadn’t directed the question at Luke, but his friend answered him all the same.

“I’m going to head back to the office and try to contact Heather James’ solicitor and see if we can try to sort this mess.” He paused and let his eyes roll over the broken man who’d fallen back to sit on the edge of the bed once more. “You are going to march yourself into the shower, clean yourself up, and eat. After that we’ll have to play it by ear.”

—

Tom had showered, dressed in the first pieces of clothing his fingers touched, and settled at the wooden table in his kitchen, a plate of toast before him, when he heard his front door open and close followed by Luke’s footsteps in the hallway. “Back here,” he called out, half-heartedly.

He let his eyes raise to the doorway as Luke wandered in the kitchen, a sober expression painted on his face.

“I’ve been in contact with Ms. James’ solicitor and as their letter stated they are requesting a paternity test which we are not contesting. They wanted to discuss financial support for the child but until it’s proven that he is, indeed, yours that subject matter is off the table. As are any visitation and living arrangements. I’ve also requested that neither Ms. James nor any member of her team or her family speak with the press regarding this matter…Though I fear that ship as long since sailed.” He paused taking a deep breath before clasping his hands together before him. “Still better to try to curtail this now then try to fight whatever else gets spread across the papers.”

Silently, Tom nodded not quite taking it all in. He might have a son. A son. A little boy he’d never met. The idea was overwhelming. A father…He’d always wanted to be a father. Had always hoped that if the day came, he would have been able to be involved from the word go. To watch his child grow within the belly of its mother. Had hoped to be in a steady, committed relationship. Had always planned on it happening with Molly.

But he’d been a stupid, selfish idiot and ruined any chance he’d had. And now because of it he could so easily lose the chance to be there for Molly and the child she was carrying. Fresh tears stung at his eyes and he pushed the toast away, his appetite all but gone.

“…can get you into have the bloodwork drawn tomorrow morning. It shouldn’t take more than two to three days for the results and once we’ve got them we can figure out what comes next.”

Tom cleared his throat and raised his eyes towards Luke once more. “If…If he’s mine, I want to be there for him. I need to be there…This mess isn’t his fault and I won’t have him suffering for it, regardless of how all of this came about.”

A brief flash of pity mixed with a resigned understanding flashed in Luke’s eyes and he nodded. “I know, Tom. I know. If he’s yours I’ll help make sure you are as involved as you want to be.” He paused and cleared his throat, eyes darkening slightly. “I spoke with Molly…”

Tom’s head snapped up at this. “Is she alright? Please tell me she’s okay…I can’t…”

Luke threw his hands up, trying to halt Tom’s explosion of words. “She is about as alright as she can be, given the circumstances…She is understandably upset and angry…”

“Did she….Will she let me talk to her…Let me try to explain.” The naked hope in his eyes tore at Luke but he shook his head.

“I don’t think that is such a good idea. I think you’ve done enough damage for now. Just…Just let her be. There will be time enough to sort out the details of how you will both handle this.”

“But I can’t just…” Even if it was hopeless he couldn’t just let it be. He had to try, he had to do something.

“Yes you bloody fucking can.” Luke snapped, hitting his fist against the table with enough force to rattle the forgotten plate of toast. “Do you not get it? Molly has every right in the world to wash her hands of you. To deny you the right to see the baby she’s carrying. Every. Bloody. Right. Fuck, she would be well within her rights to drag you through the courts and destroy you if you push her to it.”

Tom blinked in confusion, his heart thudding in his chest.

“This isn’t something you can smile and charm your way out of, Tom. You. Fucked. Up.” He empathized each word with the slam of his first to the table. “This isn’t going to simply blow over. Not only did you sleep with someone else, you lied to her about it. And you kept right on lying. You fucked up every bloody time you had the chance to come clean with Molly and you chose not to. This isn’t one mistake, Tom. This isn’t one slip-up. This is a series of stupid, fucking decisions and they are all on you. Every. Single. One. And you need to own that and then figure out how to live with it.”

Luke took a deep breath and settled himself onto the chair opposite from Tom. Neither spoke for several minutes.

“How?” Tom’s voice was small, almost broken.

Luke took a deep breath, resting his hand on Tom’s shoulder. “You’ll have to figure that one out for yourself.” He turned towards the doorway, pausing momentarily to pull something from his pocket. “Almost forgot.” He placed it onto the table before Tom who looked at it in confusion. “Your mobile was in pieces…Again. And I have to be able to get hold of you. Try not to destroy this one.”

With a sigh Luke turned once more and headed down the hall and towards the front door. A moment later Tom heard it click shut and once more he was alone.

—

The car Luke had arranged arrived mid-morning the following day. Tom tried not to think about the parallel between this morning and one almost two years ago as he silently climbed into the backseat. He’d slept fitfully the previous night, tossing and turning for several hours before giving up the ghost entirely. It didn’t matter, he’d lost the right to sleep peacefully, and he’d known that.

He rested his head against the cool glass of the window as the city blurred past, paying it little mind. Luke had called shortly before the car had arrived to make sure he was up and ready. Tom wanted to resent Luke for doing so, for babying him, but given the mess he’d been (and honestly still was) he couldn’t bring himself to. Not when it was something Luke would have done before everything had fallen to pieces.

The car slowed and then finally came to a stop forty minutes later. He opened the car door and blinked up at the tall, dull, brick building. It was overcast, overhead rain clouds threatened. Fitting.

Climbing out, Tom made his way into the lobby of the building. It was well lit with several uncomfortable chrome and mutely coloured chairs lined near the wall of glass windows. Standing to the side of the main doors was Luke, absently staring at his mobile. He looked up at the sound of the doors and offered Tom a smile (which was honestly more of a grimace). In silence, they headed towards the lifts and then up towards the laboratory. Giving his blood and saliva samples was a simple matter; Tom and Luke were out of the building and back into the waiting car fifteen minutes later.

Neither man spoke as the car pulled off and merged back into the London late morning traffic. Luke turned his attention back to his mobile. He tapped away busily at the screen. Several minutes later Luke looked up, pocketing his mobile. “I’ve let the solicitors know the samples were obtained and the results pending.”

Tom nodded. “Alright.”

What else could he possibly say? There weren’t words to describe the emotions coursing through him and he found himself both wishing that the little boy wasn’t his (how could he be a father to a child he didn’t know?) and that he was (if he was then maybe some good would come of all the mess he’d made). He didn’t dare voice either thought. How could he?

When the car stopped again it was in front of the offices for Prosper. Luke opened the door, looking back at the broken man staring sightlessly out of the opposite window. “Tom?”

Blinking Tom turned his attention from his thoughts and towards Luke. “Hm?”

“Call your mother. She’s called the office and my mobile several times trying to get hold of you. She’s worried sick.”

He nodded. The idea of talking to his mother, of hearing the disappointment and disapproval in her voice, terrified him. She loved Molly. Had been so incredibly happy when Tom told her of the engagement.

“That woman loves you, my boy, with all of her heart. You are so very lucky to have found her.” His mother’s words echoed in his mind, adding to the weight of the guilt and self-disgust he carried. She would kill him for this and he honestly couldn’t blame her. He’d had something amazing, something so fucking special, and he’d thrown it away. God, how could he have been such a fool?

What was worse was that by now his mother would have seen the articles, known what he’d done. And he knew he deserved every disappointed and disgusted word she would say to him. He was her son, yes, but she adored Molly and he’d broken her heart. But Luke had been right, avoiding his mother wouldn’t change what had happened and he knew, despite whatever anger and disappointment she felt towards him, she was worried. And despite the mess he’d made of everything, he couldn’t stand worrying his mother.

Tom barely noticed the car pulling to a stop and the driver had to call his name twice before he realized he was home. With a murmured thanks, Tom climbed out of the car and slowly up the steps towards his front door. The house felt so cold, so empty without Molly’s light and Tom fought back a sob as he pushed the door closed behind him and stood in the dim entry way.

Swallowing thickly, he stumbled his way into the lounge and dropped himself haphazardly onto the sofa. He sat, head cradled in his hands for what felt like hours before he took another deep breath and fumbled his new mobile from his pocket.

Clumsily, he dialed the familiar number, holding the phone to his ear as it rang once, twice before the line clicked. “Oh Thomas,” his mother’s worn voice answered. “My boy, what have you done?”

“Mum,” he breathed, the tears he’d fought finally breaking free. “Oh God, mum. I really messed up.”

—

Luke called early three days later letting him know the clinic had sent over the test results and that he was needed at Prosper as soon as he was able to go over them. Tom dressed with trepidation, his mind racing over just what fate awaited him. He’d been grateful Luke had sent a car, he didn’t think he could face driving or the chaos that public transport had become.

Since the tabloids had broken with the story of the affair and his illegitimate child, Tom found himself once more under a deluge of press attention. He’d been followed and hounded on his morning run (which he’d only restarted as a means to take his mind off of what was happening). Anytime he was spotted in public there was someone with a camera or yelling for his attention and comment on the story. He’d kept his head down as much as possible, knowing that if he snapped at them the way he longed to he would be making matters so much worse than they already were. And there was the fact that Luke would cheerfully beat him to death if he did anything to rock the boat on this.

The car was outside his gate at half past the hour and Tom quickly made his way out of the house and into its cool interior, mumbling a quiet hello to his driver. Traffic was lighter than he’d expected and they pulled to a stop in front of Prosper’s building in what felt like moments. Tom fought to contain the panic roiling inside of him as he made his way into the building and towards the lifts that would lead him to Luke’s office.

The low murmur of an office at work greeted him as the lift doors pinged open. Tom gave Nancy at reception a small smile as he headed down the hall towards Luke’s door. She’d been with Luke since he started the firm and they’d always gotten on well. She was just as no nonsense as Luke and, having worked in the industry for years, was an invaluable asset to the firm. Nancy nodded back and waved him on.

Luke’s door was ajar and Tom could hear his voice pouring out into the hallway. He paused at the door and knocked on its frame. Luke looked up, placing his hand over the mouthpiece of the phone in his hand and nodded Tom inside.

“Alright, I’ll get back to you about the interview…Alright. Take care.” Luke placed the phone back onto its cradle and turned his full attention on Tom who still stood awkwardly in the doorway. “Seriously mate, come in. I’m not going to bite.”

His jest pulled the tiniest twinge of a smile from Tom and he made his way inside, settling on the black leather chair across from Luke’s desk. They sat in silence for several moments before Tom spoke. “You called about the results?” He fought to keep his voice steady and even, though the extent of his nerves were clear in the way his foot bounced against the carpeted floor.

Luke nodded once. “They sent them over this morning.” He reached across the desk to hand Tom a sealed white envelope. Tom couldn’t hide the visible shake in his hand as he took the envelope. It took him several moments to still them enough to slip his finger beneath the seal and break it. With a deep breath and a mounting sense of foreboding, Tom pulled the sheets of paper from the envelope, unfolding them with care, before allowing his eyes to read over the stark black text.

His blood pounded in his ears and he had to read the words several times before the meaning became clear.

Regarding the child Francis Henry James…No paternal match…

No paternal match.

The boy wasn’t his.

The sharp sense of relief he felt at those words was dulled by a flash of disappointment that Tom couldn’t reconcile. This was a good thing. Wasn’t it? Things would be easier this way. But still, for a brief moment, Tom found himself grieving the loss of a child that might have been his. Of a life that wouldn’t ever be.

Tom swallowed against the lump in his throat. In all the panic and worry of the last several days, he hadn’t truly stopped and thought about what all of this would mean if the child hadn’t been his. Stupidly, he’d been laboring under the belief that the boy was his son and no matter what had happened between himself and the boy’s mother, that little boy, Francis…Frank, was his and was an innocent in all of this. And Tom would do everything in his power to do right by him. He’d been, unconsciously, making plans about what room he’d need to change into a child’s bedroom for when the boy would stay with him. Along with the room that would serve as a nursery for his baby with Molly…But that was all in vain now.

“Do I need to be drafting a press release asking for privacy as you and your son get to know one another?” Luke’s voice broke through the tangle of confusion in Tom’s mind causing him to stare up blankly. His publicist sat perched on the edge of his desk, arms folded across his chest with a carefully constructed neutral, yet expectant, expression painted across his face.

It was several minutes before Tom found his voice. “No,” he choked out, coughing to clear his throat. “You don’t need…He’s not…I’m not his father.” He blinked back tears, wiping at his face in frustrated helplessness.

Without saying a word, Luke was at his side with a box of tissue. Tom reached out and took one, blowing his nose and fighting valiantly to get himself back under control. But try as he might, Tom couldn’t stop the way his shoulders shook nor the tears that were trailing down his face. He was grateful Luke wasn’t forcing him to talk because he honestly didn’t think he could find the words to explain what the fuck was happening in his head.

He couldn’t say just how long he sat in Luke’s office, mourning the loss of the only good thing that could come from this mess he’d made. All he knew for certain was his head ached and his eyes felt raw as he was ushered into the back of the car Luke called for him. He would have winced at the brightness of the afternoon sunlight on his face had he not been wearing a pair of dark sunshades which were thrust at him on his way out the door.

“The last thing we need right now are pictures of you in tears,” Luke has grumbled as he shut the door behind Tom.

The ride back to his home was a blur. He could remember bits and pieces of the journey but he still blinked in confusion when the car pulled to a stop at the gate. Tom stumbled from the back of the car, punching the gate code in with shaking hands, and then slowly up the steps towards his door. He dropped the keys twice before managing to unlock the door and push it open.

The house was silent and dark for all that the midday sunlight was pouring in through the curtains lining the sitting room windows. He hated it. Hated everything about it. Tom fell back against the door, hearing it click shut against the push of his weight, and sank to the floor. He rested his head against his bent knees and simply fought to breathe.

He hadn’t any idea how long he’d been sitting there, he was only now aware that the hallway was now painted in growing shadow. Blinking, Tom rubbed his eyes with the backs of his hands and slowly pushed himself to his feet. His back throbbed as he stood upright, attesting to the fact he must have been sitting for quite some time. He rubbed it absently as he made his way into the kitchen.

Pulling a glass from the cabinet, he carried it to the sink and filled it with cool water, downing it in three gulps. He filled the glass twice more before making his way into the living room and dropping himself onto the sofa. Everything he’d found himself clinging to, the faint glimmer of hope in the storm his life had fallen into, had been for nothing and once more he found himself floundering. How could he ever hope to fix any of this now?

—

The next few days crept past, Tom moving through the motions more than anything. He answered the phone when Luke or his mother called, insisting he was fine in a tone which fooled no one, least of all himself. He read scripts and tried to eat on a regular basis; though he failed more than succeeded in that front. Tom felt as though he was living underwater, he could see things happening around him, hear distant echoes but could not seem to reach out and actually be one with them. Not that he was truly trying over much.

Each time Luke called, Tom found himself asking if he’d heard anything from Molly. Desperate for something, anything to let him know she was alright. How could this ever be alright? She hadn’t called him, not that he’d expected her to but still he’d hoped, and each time he tried her number it rang out as disconnected. Luke had brushed him off nearly every time, “This is your mess, mate, and I won’t get myself involved any more than I need to.”

“Just let me know if she’s okay. I just need to know that she’s alright.”

“Tom,” Luke breathed out in exasperation, “Don’t put me in this situation, I am asking as your friend. And as hers. Please, let it be.”

“I can’t, Luke. Not when things are like this. Not if there isn’t a chance I could try to make this right.”

“No, Tom.”

He couldn’t seem to let the idea go. The need to speak with Molly, to know that she was alright. To try all he could do to fix the mess he’d made. And maybe, just maybe now that he knew for certain that the boy wasn’t his…Maybe she would be able to forgive him. Maybe that could make this work. Maybe they could be a family. Maybe…

—

Tom hadn’t let himself think as he made his way down the brightly lit hallway. Hadn’t acknowledged anything more than the blaze of hope that sparked in him when Molly had finally agreed to meet with him. It had taken nearly two weeks to get her to take his call, let alone speak with him, and even then he knew it was with extreme reluctance.

Luke had played middleman begrudgingly and made it perfectly clear though he was paid to look after Tom’s interests, he was firmly on Molly’s side in this. “Keep your head, Tom,” Luke had cautioned him as he handed over the folded piece of paper on which he’d written Molly’s current number. “She is giving you the chance to talk, don’t fuck this up. And please, for the love of god, don’t make this worse.”

He meticulously scanned each of the numbers on the doors until he’d come to Molly’s, trying to ignore the nerves fluttering steadily in his gut. Molly, he’d learned, had initially been staying at a friend’s while she searched for more permanent arrangements and had moved into her own flat the week before. The flat wasn’t too far from the house they’d shared, Tom had stared at the address she’d given him in disbelief. So close. She’d been so close and he’d not been any the wiser. The knowledge of it stung far more than he’d wanted to admit. But she’d agreed to meet with him. To talk. That had to mean something, didn’t it?

Taking a deep breath he raised his hand and knocked gently on the door. He rocked on his heels, shoving his hands firmly into his pockets to stop their fidgeting. He always seemed to fidget when he was nervous. He could hear a rustling from inside and the click of the lock unlatching. His heart stuttered and froze in his chest as the door opened and he found Molly standing before him.

He could see the toll of the last few weeks painted across her features. There were shadows under her light blue eyes and a wariness in them, and in her posture, he didn’t quite understand. She was clearly exhausted and it took all he had to keep himself from sweeping in and trying to fix things, as every fiber in his being wanted him to. She merely nodded at him, standing firmly in the doorway.

“How are you?” The question slipped from his lips without his bidding and Tom wanted to kick himself for it. “I’m sorry that was…I didn’t mean…”

“Just don’t, Tom,” she whispered. “Please don’t.”

Tom felt his heart constrict in his chest at the pain he could see in Molly’s eyes, no matter how desperately she tried to hide it. He was the worst sort of person and he knew it. But maybe…Just maybe if she let him talk, let him explain, this might be a way to begin to rebuild the shattered trust between them.

Please. Please.

Several silent moments passed between them before Molly stood aside and allowed him to walk past her into the flat. He found his eyes scanning the small, but cozy, looking front room. There wasn’t a great deal in the way of furniture; a squashy grey sofa and matching arm chair, darkly stained coffee and end tables, and a wooden and metal bookshelf still mostly empty. Boxes lined the far left hand wall, stacked neatly with the top-most open.

Molly settled herself on the armchair, crossing her arms loosely across her chest. Tom quietly did the same on the sofa. Neither spoke, the silence between them growing more strained by the moment. He heard rather than saw Molly take a deep breath and quickly raised his eyes to her face. “You wanted to talk, Tom.”

Tom clenched and unclenched his hands in his lap. He could feel her cool eyes locked on him. It was now or never. He swallowed thickly before speaking, knowing he had to get the words out. Had to make her understand. The worst was over now. They could try to rebuild. It wouldn’t be easy, he knew that, but it would be worth it. They could do this.

“I…We got the results back. Of the paternity test. The child he…He isn’t mine.” The words came out in a rush and hope burned brightly in his eyes as Tom stared into Molly’s. It was going to be alright, it had to be. He’d been given a second chance. They both had. Surely, she could see that.

He waited, watching the emotion play across her face. Waited for the confusion to break into a quiet joy. For her to understand that it was over and that they could make this work. They could truly be a family. And he would make all of this up to her. He would make it right. This was his chance to do so.

“Oh.” The word tumbled from her lips. “I’m glad it’s settled for you then.” But she didn’t smile. No sign of relief spread across her features. Nothing had changed…

“Oh,” Tom echoed and felt his heart sink. “But I thought…”

“You thought what, Tom?” Molly’s sharp tone cut straight through him and he flinched at her words. “You thought that just because her paternity claim was false that everything would be fine? You lied to me Tom. You slept with someone else and then lied to me about it. You got a fucking STI and you kept that from me. You took what we had and threw it in the fire and you think that just because you dodged this particular bullet I should be grateful and forgive you?” Frustration and disbelief shone in her bright eyes. “I’m sorry Tom, but that is not how it works. That is not how any of this fucking works.”

“It was a mistake,” he started, needing her to listen to him. To give him a chance to fix it.

“No, Tom,” Molly snapped out, pushing herself to her feet. She paced around the room, hands waving as she carried on. “A mistake is getting the reservation times mixed up. A mistake is forgetting to call after you’ve made it home safe. Sleeping with someone else and lying about it for two years…That…That is not a fucking mistake and don’t you dare try to pass it off as such.”

He stood as well, staring at her as the words she’d thrown at him hit home. “I…Molly, please, tell me how to fix this,” he pleaded, unconsciously reaching out toward her. “Tell me what I need to do and I’ll do it. Anything. Anything at all. Just please, please let me fix this.” He took two cautious steps towards her.

Molly shook her head, taking several steps back from him. “You don’t get it, Tom. There is no fixing this.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest and locked her eyes on his. “That time came and went two fucking years ago. You lied to me. Again and again and again. You made the life I thought we were building together into a nothing more than a mockery of what it should have been. You can’t fix this, Thomas. Not now.”

“Please don’t say that, Molly,” he begged, fear choking his voice. This wasn’t how this was supposed to happen. This couldn’t be happening. He had to fix this. He had to. “Please don’t. I can’t…I have to fix this. Please.”

Molly shook her head. “No, Tom. There is no fixing this.”

“But the baby…” His words trailed off as his eyes lingered on her distant form. Her baby. Their baby. This baby needed them both. They had to fix this. He had to fix this.

Molly’s hands unconsciously dropped to her stomach, cupping now barely visible swell there. He doubted he would have even seen it had she not done so. “Don’t, Tom,” She whispered, taking a deep breath before continuing her voice stronger. “This baby is the only reason I am even speaking to you.” There was a fire in her eyes Tom had never seen and truth be told it terrified him. Anger was never an emotion he’d ever truly seen from Molly, not centered on him, and to see it now let loose a very real spasm of fear. “Don’t you dare try to use this baby to get your own damned way!”

Tom leapt to his feet, hands raised before him, and took a tentative step towards Molly. “That isn’t what I’m trying to do.” And it wasn’t…Not completely. He couldn’t let her shut him out. Not now. He needed to fix this before it was too late.

“I think you should leave, Tom.”

Her words didn’t make any sense. “No, please don’t…” He couldn’t leave now. If he left then he might never get another chance to fix this. And he had to fix it. He had to.

Molly shook her head, walking with steadfast determination to the door. “I want you to leave right now. I can’t do this.”

“But…”

“Tom, please.”

He stood for several moments, indecision painted across his features before his shoulders slumped in defeat and he walked quietly to the door. Tom paused, his eyes roaming over Molly’s stoic face. He took a slow, deep breath and spoke quietly. “For what it’s worth, Molly, I am truly sorry.”

“That’s all well and good, Tom, but sorry doesn’t fix anything.”

Tom nodded, forcing the ghost of a smile as he felt the tears burning in his eyes. “I know.” And god I wish it would. Without another word he turned and walked out of the flat.

—

Luke’s call came almost an hour after Tom had made his way home. He thought, briefly, about simply letting the call go to voicemail; it would be infinitely easier than whatever Luke had to say. Instead he slid his finger across the screen and placed the call on speaker. “Yes, Luke?”

There was a resigned sigh before Luke’s voice echoed throughout the room. “Why can’t you listen to what I tell you? Just once, for the sheer novelty value of it.”

“I just…I wanted to fix it…”

Luke groaned. “Tom, you cannot fix this. Not now. The time to fix it was two damned years ago. And if you’d just told her like I all but begged you to…”

“I know, Luke,” Tom snapped, cutting the man off mid-sentence. “I fucking know! You don’t need to tell me I fucked up the best thing in my life because I’m a selfish bastard. I know, Luke. I can’t ever forget it! I just…I had to try.” He fought to keep his words steady as the composure he’d struggled desperately to keep finally broke. Sobs wracked him and he found himself gasping for breath. It took several minutes to calm himself enough to speak clearly. “I just…I couldn’t not try.”

“Well your trying could make this much, much worse. You have to know that,” Luke stressed and Tom could hear the strain in the man’s voice. “The press doesn’t know Molly is pregnant, and thank god for that, but it’s not something that can be hidden forever. Not with the way the press has been on what’s happened. And when it does come out, they are going to be brutal; not only to you but to her as well. You push her too far and she could wash her hands of you entirely. She could up and leave and keep the baby from you and fuck me, I don’t know if I could blame her.”

Tom felt the barely contained panic threatening to break loose once again. Molly leaving and keeping their baby from him. Both of them gone for good. His knees buckled and it took all he had to lower himself onto the floor lest they give out completely and he collapse. “She wouldn’t…Molly wouldn’t ever…”

“There was a time when she would have said the same thing about you and we both know how that turned out.” Luke let out a frustrated sigh. “Tom, speaking as your publicist, I’m asking…No, Tom, I’m telling you to leave her be. Don’t push. Don’t try to fix it. Just let me handle this. Please. Before it goes from bad to worse. Do you hear me?”

It was several moments before Tom realized that Luke could not see him nodding and croaked out his assent. Yes, he would leave her alone. He would let Luke sort this as best he could. The call ended soon after but Tom remained on the floor, his mind racing.

How had all of this spiraled so far out of control? How could he have let this happen? He knew better. He should have come clean to Molly when she had called him back that night; should have told her the truth and begged her forgiveness. But he hadn’t and now there was nothing he could do to fix the mess he’d made.

—

In the two weeks that followed, Tom did his best to keep to Luke’s request. He kept his head down as best he could, kept mostly to his home and went through the small pile of scripts that had started to accumulate. Not that he could actually focus on them; he’d read the same passage three times in the last ten minutes and still couldn’t make hide nor hair of any of it. With a tired groan, Tom tossed the script aside, rubbing his bleary eyes with the palms of his hands. There was no point in trying to pretend he was going to get anywhere with them, not with the way his mind refused to focus.

Pushing himself to his feet, he padded from the living room towards the kitchen. Mindlessly, he set about making himself a mug of tea; loose leaf tea from the cabinet, water in the kettle and setting it to boil, jug of milk from the refrigerator, mug and strainer set aside waiting. There was something soothing about the whole process; it was something he had done thousands of times. It made him think of home and his mum and the times when all the world’s ails could be cured with a cuppa.

As the kettle boiled he set about measuring out the tea and placing it in the strainer atop the green chipped mug. A few minutes later had the kettle boiled, the water poured, and the fragrant leaves brewing. Once steeped he tossed the used tea leaves, added his milk, and carried the mug back into the living room. Tea might not fix everything, but with all that had happened, it certainly couldn’t hurt.

He settled back onto the couch and sipped while he debated picking up the script once more. It wasn’t the best story he’d ever read, but decent enough. Under normal circumstances, and had his head been clearer, he knew he’d been very much taken in by it. As it was though…

Tom let out a soft sigh, resting his mug atop his knee and rubbed his eyes with his free hand. He needed to get himself together. Falling apart wasn’t going to help anyone, least of all himself; he’d known that. But knowing didn’t make it any easier.

A muffled ring echoed from between the cushions of the sofa.

Perplexed, Tom sat staring for several long moments before his wits caught up with him. He leapt to his feet, placing his mug on the edge of the coffee table, and reached between the cushions where the ringing seemed be loudest. He grumbled as his fingers at first found nothing then just as quickly slid against the smooth metal back of his mobile. He yanked it out and slid his finger across the screen to answer, not bothering to look at the number. It was most likely his mother; she’d spent the past week trying to encourage him to come home for a few days to “get away”. He knew she worried over him and with all the goings on, her mothering instinct had gone into overdrive.

“Hello?”

Luke’s voice echoed through the mobile’s speaker. “Tom, is this a good time?”

While there wasn’t anything off about Luke’s question, there was something in the tone of it that set off alarm bells in Tom’s mind. Panic, potent and strong flooded through. He could hear the blood pounding in his ears as he fought for control of his voice. Something was wrong. Molly’s face flashed before his eyes.

Let her be okay. Let her and the baby be okay. Please. Please.

“Luke, what is it? What’s happened?” He knew his voice was shaking, knew all his bloody training was less than worthless now, and there was little he could do to stop it.

There was a soft sigh and a pause before Luke answered. “I’m about five minutes from yours and I have something we need to talk about.”

He managed to grunt something, he couldn’t say exactly what, in response and only half heard Luke’s answer before the call ended. He stared at the now blank screen as he collapsed back onto the sofa. His hands shook and he felt the mobile slip from his fingers to land on the rug below with a soft thump.

It took several minutes for Tom to register that the buzzing he was hearing was coming from the doorbell and not his head. It took another few moments to get to his feet and stumble towards the door. His fingers felt large, clumsy, and useless as he struggled with the lock. It took two tries to get it undone and to pull the darkly stained wooden door open.

Luke stood in the doorway, an unreadable expression painted across his face. He pulled his sunglasses off as he stepped inside and offered Tom a small, half-hearted smile which did little to put him at ease. They both stood in the entryway, silence spreading between them. There were so many things Tom wanted to ask but the words simply wouldn’t come.

“I think we should probably sit down for this,” Luke suggested, putting a hand on Tom’s shoulder and guiding him towards the living room.

Tom felt his heart plummet at Luke’s words and stumbled into the living room, collapsing onto the sofa. Luke settled in the arm-chair adjacent, his hands clasped tightly in his lap. Clearing his throat, Tom forced himself to raise his eyes towards Luke and choked out. “What is it?”

Luke faltered for a moment before answering. He leant forward, pausing briefly to pull an envelope from his jacket pocket. “Over the last week and a half I’ve been in talks with a solicitor.” He paused once again and handed the envelope to Tom. His brow furrowing in confusion, Tom held the envelope in his hand staring from it to Luke. What could Heather possibly want now? Hadn’t she done enough?

“Molly’s solicitor.”

Tom’s head snapped up at this, his eyes widening as the colour drained slowly from his face. “Wh-what?”

“She had them contact me shortly after…Anyway, with all things being equal and with all that’s been happening, she wanted to get things in writing, as clearly as she could, before all of this gets out in the public. Because it will, Tom, whether you or I or Molly want it to or not.”

It was as if Luke was speaking from someplace far off, his voice was muffled and try as he might Tom could barely make sense of any of it. His fingers shook as he turned the off-white envelope over in his hands, only partially registering his name written across its front, and tore open its seal.

The paper inside was of surprisingly good quality; a creamy white which was a strong contrast to the crisp black of the text. The printed words seemed to blur as he struggled to make sense of them. His breath came in short, pained gasps as slowly, agonizingly their meaning became clear.

She wasn’t contesting his paternity and welcomed him to a paternity test if he so wished; if he wanted to be involved in the life of their child she would not deny him. But that was as far as she was prepared to go. He wasn’t allowed to contact her in any way unless in pertained to the child. She would share important doctor’s visits and any and all test results if requested. His presence at the birth would be up for discussion as the time drew closer though she did not want him alone with her in the room.

A choked sob fell from his lips as the paper slipped from his numb fingers to the floor. Tom couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe. God this wasn’t happening. Please, god, this couldn’t be happening. He jumped at the feel of a hand resting on his shoulder and blinked up through tears he hadn’t realized he’d shed at Luke’s impassive face.

“Deep breath, mate. Just breathe.”

Tom struggled to draw in air, his lungs burning with the effort. It felt as though he was simply fighting to keep his head above the surface of a crushing sea. And each time he thought maybe, just maybe, he’d caught his breath another wave would crest and he’d be dragged back under.

“Why?” He managed to choke out.

Luke let out a soft, resigned sigh. “Because she knew you wouldn’t listen any other way.” He gripped Tom’s shoulder lightly. “You push and you push and you don’t listen. She knows you, Tom. And she took the steps she felt were necessary to protect herself. All you can do now is respect that. Don’t push her on this. Please, if you listen to nothing else I ask of you listen to this, please respect her choice in this matter. Respect the boundaries she is setting. Don’t push her to take this further.”

Unable to speak, Tom simply nodded. He didn’t have it in him to fight anymore, no matter how loudly his mind screamed for him to do so. This was his fault. All of it. Molly hated him and if he pushed any further he wasn’t completely sure if she wouldn’t take away the only remaining tie left between them. And he couldn’t lose that. Not after everything. But knowing that and accepting it were two completely different things and at that moment Tom wasn’t sure if he would ever be able to make that leap. And if he didn’t, what would it cost him?

#Tom Hiddleston #Tom Hiddleston RPF #Tom Hiddleston x oc #Tom Hiddleston x ofc #Tom Hiddleston x original character #tom hiddleston x original female character #Imperfect Tense #mrs-captain-evans writing challenge #mce writing challenge

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