#and my mom is convinced that at one point i was a lesbian when. again. i have never once publicly OR privately identified as a lesbian

[lightningfilledsaber]

What is it with people falsely thinking I am/have been a lesbian

[msschemmenti]

Hey could I please have a Melissa x reader where Mel is meeting the readers parents for the first time and she’s rlly nervous at work and everyone realises including the reader and maybe at lunch the reader asks to talk to Mel. And Mel has a panic attack because she thinks that the readers parents won’t like her and think she’s too old for the reader but the reader is there and comforts and reassures her that they will love her and much as she loves her tysm! 🫶🏻

If Only You Knew

a/n: thank you so much for this request, it’s my first one and i hope i did it justice. also i personally have just been wanting lesbian moms for a while so sorry :)

warning: suggestive language/situations but no smut

“You know, if you keep coming up with me, my neighbors are gonna think you’re moving in.” Y/n called over her shoulder as she worked her apartment key into the lock. Melissa was pressed as closely to her body as she could possibly be and she wasn’t making the task of unlocking the door any easier. The older woman hummed as her lips worked the side of Y/n’s neck, barely registering much of what she said.

“Not my fault I like being around you,” Melissa’s hands smoothed down the younger woman’s arms and hovered over her struggling hands. “But, if you don’t unlock the door soon, your neighbors are gonna think a lot of other things about me. And you.”

A shiver rolled down Y/n’s back and she was finally able to open the door. Melissa pushed her through the threshold and backed her further into the apartment. The women’s lips met in a familiar dance and Melissa was leading as usual. As soon as they reached Y/n’s bedroom, Melissa had her back pressed against the door.

“You know it is Friday night,” Melissa started as she reached for the buttons lining the front of the younger woman’s shirt. Y/n watched carefully as Melissa plucked each button from its hole, hanging on to every word to leave the woman’s mouth. “I’d love to spend the weekend with my sweet girl, how does that sound?”

“That sounds wonderful to me.” Y/n answered dazedly as she allowed Melissa to peel the shirt from her shoulders.

“Good.” Melissa grinned before moving to the button of her jeans eagerly. She’d just successfully unzipped and unbuttoned the jeans when a cellphone ringing broke through the lust filled air. Both women froze listening to see whose phone was ringing and as Melissa drew away from Y/n to search for the phone the younger woman pouted.

“No, no, it’s mine and it’s probably just a telemarketer or something. You know, trying to steal my social security number.” Y/n pleaded as she pulled Melissa’s hands back to their previous place on her legs. It didn’t take much to convince Melissa especially when the phone stopped ringing and she was back to rolling the denim down her lovers legs.

Once she’d shed the younger woman off her clothes, she pulled her over to the bed ready to take her for the first time this weekend. She lay Y/n down gently eyes hungrily taking her bra-clad body in. She moved to line her chest with her fingers drawing a huff from the younger woman.

“Melissa,” She whined impatiently, already ready to beg for some form of satisfaction. Just as the smirk took over the older woman’s face, the ringing returned breaking through the air yet again.

“Hon, I think you should check that.” Melissa said moving to reach for the vibrating purse near the door.

“They’ll leave a voicemail if it’s important.” Y/n tried to reason locking her legs around Melissa’s waist. Melissa rested her hands on Y/n’s legs and shot her a pointed look before allowing the younger woman to draw her in closer.

“If it rings again, you’re getting it.” Melissa stated decisively against the younger woman’s neck as she kissed her way down her chest. Y/n hummed in acknowledgement allowing Melissa to paint her chest in love bites.

Just as she moved to remove the remaining barriers between their bodies, the phone rang. Y/n let out a whine as the weight of Melissa’s body left her body. “Whoever this is, is dead to me.” Y/n mumbled as Melissa fished her phone out of her purse and brought it over to her.

“It’s your mother.” Melissa stated before handing the phone over. With a sigh she moved to sit against the headboard and watched as Y/n answered the phone. As she listened to the one-sided conversation, she had a feeling their plans would not be going as planned.

-

“Alright I’ll see you then. Mmhm, just give me a holler when you get here and I’ll make sure I’m available. You know I have work, but we can get dinner Monday evening after school before your conference starts Tuesday.” Y/n said down the phone as her fingers danced across Melissa’s thigh. After the call continued, she’d changed into one of sets of pajamas Y/n had started keeping around for her. A book Y/n had started was in her hands and she’d pushed her reading glasses on in an effort not to listen in to the conversation.

“I’ll get us a reservation at that place you like, how many should I reserve for?” Y/n asked moving to snuggle into Melissa’s side, knowing a call from your mother was the ultimate mood killer.

“Three? I’m gonna see if Mel is free and we’ll make it four.” Y/n said casually missing the widening of Melissa’s eyes. “Yes, yes, I know you’ve been wanting to meet her. Well let’s just hope she’s free on such short notice, yeah uh huh. Right yes, I love you too. Give Carol my love, yes. See you Monday. Goodnight.”

The call ended and Y/n turned and plugged her phone up to charge. “What a mood killer.” Y/n mumbled with a chuckle curling back into Melissa’s side.

“Parents coming to visit?”

“Yeah! Mom and Carol are coming up for a women’s health conference. We’re doing dinner Monday and I figured if you’re free you could join us. No pressure or anything, they’ve just been on me about meeting you for a while. You know kill two birds with one stone?”

“Oh, Monday?” Melissa started.

“Yeah, I know it’s short notice. She wasn’t sure she was even going but they asked her to moderate one of the panels and so now she’s coming for sure. You don’t have to let me know now, but just let me know.”

“Alright, hon.”

“Great, I’m gonna get ready for bed and then you’ll have me for the rest of the weekend.” Y/n said softly kissing Melissa’s lips before heading to the bathroom to wind down. Leaving Melissa in the room to think about the impending meet and greet.

-

Monday came much sooner than Melissa would’ve liked. She ended up heading home Saturday morning claiming she had a guy coming round the house to fix something for her. She really wasn’t sure she could go through this meet and greet. She hadn’t had to meet a partner’s parents in decades and she’d never cared about the way they felt about her before. She’d been young then. She had been younger than Joe. She’d been the treasure in that relationship, everyone wondering how he’d pulled her. But this was different and her mind and body could feel it. No one said it but she often found herself wondering how she’d been lucky enough to warrant Y/n’s affection. What would stop her mother from asking the same thing? Despite the growing panic within the older woman by Sunday evening she’d agreed to go, knowing it’d make Y/n happy. And as much as she tried to calm herself down, by the time she was due for work she was was slipping into unknown territory.

She walked into the teacher’s lounge attempting to look as normal as she could. Knowing she and Y/n normally walked together there would already be a bit of attention on her but she made an effort to smile at Barb, have her coffee, and draw as little attention to herself as possible.

“How was your weekend?” Barb asked as she stirred her coffee.

“It was okay, had some work done on the house. Nothing too wild, how about you? Didn’t you say something about you and Ger spending the weekend with Taylor?”

“Oh yes, it was lovely. She came down to visit with us for a bit. Told us she’s seeing someone. It’s getting pretty serious and she plans to bring him down for her next visit.” Barbara answered. Melissa hummed quietly listening as Barbara spoke, unknowingly adding to Melissa’s internal panic. “She said she met him at work and they’ve been seeing each other for a few months. I know we agreed to meet him, but I’m not too sure how that’ll go. But we won’t know until we see him.”

Before Melissa could even fake a response the lounge door opened with Y/n and Ava chatting up a storm. “You have got to tell me how that place is, I’ve been trying to get a reservation over there for months.”

“Of course, perks of having my mom. She can get in wherever she likes. With her work in medicine she’s pretty well known in certain circles but that combined with her ice queen demeanor really seals the deal.”

“I knew being mean could get you what you wanted.” Ava sighed with a shrug eyeing the camera men with a glare. Y/n chuckled before shaking her head and making her way over to Melissa and Barbara’s table.

“Good morning ladies, hope your weekends were as good as the both of you look this morning.”

“Well someone’s in a rather chipper mood this morning.” Barbara snickered as she placed her hand under her chin.

“My mom is in town, she’s moderating a women’s health panel tomorrow so we’re doing dinner tonight.”

“Well that’s great sweetheart, how long has it been since you saw each other?”

“When I started here, she moved me up here and stayed with me for a week before she had to go back to work. So it’s been a long time!” Y/n gushed resting her hands on Melissa’s shoulders as she spoke. “Although I think she may be more excited about meeting this one than seeing me. You still good to join us tonight?”

“Of course, why wouldn’t I be?” Melissa asked sharply, her heart pounding.

“No reason, honey. I was just making sure.” Y/n spoke softly eyeing the older woman sat in front of her suspiciously. “Are you okay?”

She wasn’t sure what it was but she suddenly couldn’t breathe. She shrugged Y/n hands off her shoulders with a huff and pushed her chair from the table quickly, rising to her feet wildly. She needed to get out of the room and she needed out quick. The air was thickening and her heart’s pounding was all she could hear. “I’m fine,” she managed to squeeze out before rushing out of the room and down the hall leaving both Y/n and Barbara’s concerned gazes in her wake.

“What was that about?” Y/n asked helplessly as her eyes met Barbara’s.

“Sweetheart, I’m not sure. I’ve never seen her like this, do you want me to talk to her?” Barbara asked moving to stand and follow her best friend. Before either of them could move, the bell rang signaling the start of the school day.

“Uh, no I’ll check with her during lunch. It’s probably nothing right?” Y/n asked.

“I’m sure it’s just some nerves about tonight. You know it has been a while since she’s met the parents. I probably didn’t help talking about Taylor’s new beau and how skeptical I am about him. She’s probably just scared.”

Y/n nodded, taking in the older woman’s words. “Okay, I’ll talk to her.”

-

“Hi.” Y/n called from across the hall. She’d just dropped her students for lunch and was waiting outside of Melissa’s classroom. The older woman had been hiding for most of the morning and now she’d finally caught her alone.

“Hey,” Melissa answered quietly moving to lean against the wall next to Y/n.

“Can we talk?”

“Listen, I’ve been thinking maybe it’d be best of you have dinner without me tonight. You were talking about how long it’s been since you’ve seen your mom and I don’t want to take away from your time together.”

“Well that’s really sweet of you to offer, but I’ve got a feeling that’s not the only reason you don’t want to join us tonight. How about you tell me what’s really going on?”

Melissa sighed deeply, “I haven’t had to meet the parents in…quite a while. And I have to be honest, it’s never really matter in the past. But I have a feeling it does matter now.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, if your mom thinks I’m a cradle robbing predator I don’t see that boding well for us as a couple. She’s your mom and you seem close, when she hates me there’s no way you’ll choose me over her.” Melissa explained.

Y/n sighed resting her hands on Melissa’s cheeks before speaking, “First of all, she’s not going to hate you. The only way she’d hate you would be if you hurt me and I don’t think you plan on doing that any time soon, do you?” Melissa shook her head with a pout. “Thought so, plus I highly doubt she’s gonna say anything about your age.”

“How would she not, I’m probably older than her.”

“That doesn’t matter sweetheart. And if she did say something, I’m sure Carol would happily remind her of their age difference.”

“Wait what?” Melissa asked tilting her head in confusion.

“After my parents got divorced when I was younger, my mom started seeing her one of the Researchers at one of the hospitals she worked in. Carol just celebrated her 78th birthday. So I highly doubt she’s got any room to talk.”

“Oh.” Melissa answered a bit dumbfounded at the new information.

“Even if that wasn’t true, I’d choose you. No questions asked. Even if she hated you, I’d choose you. You’re my forever, no matter what anyone says. And I mean that.”

Melissa placed her hands over Y/n’s with a watery smile, “You know I love you right?”

“More than anything. And same goes for you. Now are we good, I’d seal it with a kiss if we weren’t in the middle of the hall.”

“We’re good. I’m feeling much better about this dinner now.”

“Good, that’s what I like to hear. Now come on, let’s at least try to get a snack to tide us over until our late dinner.”

“Yes ma’am.” Melissa smiled feeling much lighter as she allowed Y/n to pull her down the hallway toward the teacher’s lounge.

[ratguy-nico]

Geneuary prompt Crush / Birthday

This as a matter of fact was the firts Geneuary piece I drew, why? Cause... it was the first prompt that come to mind. yeah Im not that deep. At least not at thinking.

Scene from the movie Sixteen Candles, why? cause for me this movie combine perfectly the Crush prompt with the b-day prompt.

-ejem ejem- Starring in this piece not only my Genie Wieny Beanie but also co-starring as the romantic interest -dum duru dum- ALEXIS!!! oc, child of the awesome @golden--doodler also known as the person to whom we owe Geneuary @goldendoodlerlockerlove -fuegos artificiales, epic solo de guitarra, explosiones piu-piu piu-

fvk forget to mention draw Alexis heavily inspired in @drawthething commision with golden were they drew Alexis so kudos to them too. (love your drawings)

(more about the drawing down here)

... Yeah...

The thing is! As I said before this is a scene from the movie Sixteen Candles starring Molly Ringwald most known for The Breakfast Club movie that actually have an episode of Bob's Burgers dedicated to it. do you see the connection?

So yeah, don't remember if is actually mentioned but I'm totally sure Gene is a big Molly Ringwald fan, is just his type of girl icon.

The movie in itself is a movie that carries a lot of good memories for me. My mom loves to show me movies from her childhood and teen years.

I remember watching this movie with my mom we both laughing of all the craziest shit that this movie had, commenting how different movies were back then and crushing over Molly Ringwald.

And then just a couple of days ago as a way to find the inspiration again I decided to watch it again with my lil sis who almost cry in the end scene (not the romantic one, the one with the girl and her dad)

And we catch sight of a lesbian! Hunting lesbians in older movies since 2024

The thing is even though I love this movie I have to say is from the 80's, wich mean hella racist toward asian people, very misogynist, and it have boobs (that is not a real problem but since people on twit is trying to banned sex I added it) so yeah, watch carefully. But totally recommended.

There's a scene I would also draw with Tina and Bob from this movie.

Second fun fact. Even though this was the first drawing I made I didn't made the romantic interest until this wednesday.

Originally I though Alex, but I wasn't 100% convinced cause at that point I was heart broken at the realization they were probably discarding his character (note: I don't know if they are discarding the character) (read as a Mort situation) So yeah.

Then I though DAH! Courtney, but I don't ship them as a couple so that didn't seem quite right.

Then talking with Golden I got really fond of their OC Alexis and though, why not? I believed in signs.

The universe talk and I have to listen. The fact that Golden decided to tell me about their character right when I was starting to draw this piece was all I needed to know.

Also I though of just letting that spot blank and maybe made a dynamic were people put whoever they wanted with Gene. Which for me could been hella funny. But I don't think anyone would actually want to do that so yeah.

[theajaheira]

upside-down-y

“What do I do?” said Willow. She sounded so little in that moment. Suddenly, Jenny wasn’t imagining that woman in a clean-cut black suit and heels, but the little girl in striped sweaters and white tights. “If there’s no—word—for it? I like being a lesbian, or I thought I did, but I can’t call myself that if I like Oz. And I think I do.” “You don’t need a word for it,” said Jenny simply. “I need a word for it,” said Willow, a stress on the pronoun. “Maybe people in general don’t, but I do.” “Maybe there isn’t one.” “I need—” Willow’s breath hiccupped. “I need the words, a-and the rules. To make sure I don’t—” Abruptly, Jenny knew who Willow needed to be talking to.

decided that, in lieu of tonight's blogging, now might be a nice time to post a tumblr-only exclusive that i've not yet figured out how to work into the canon of what you make! i would like to write a larger fic about willow's adventures at some point, & also figure out when this development will happen within the timeline, and once i do, i think i'll understand better how to work this thing in. (but it is definitely what happens.)

this requires no knowledge of my sprawling fic 'verse except for: it's an everybody lives/nobody dies au, jenny and giles are together with their eight-year-old son, this is a few years post-series.

read for -- giles and willow having frank and very loving discussions about sexuality, jenny calling willow "baby" because she's now a mom who does that kinda thing, briefest sleepiest calendiles child cameo!!!

~~~~~

Willow called at some godawful hour, late enough for it to be edging towards early-morning and for Jenny to be too tired to check the time. She happened to have been pulling an accidental all-nighter that had spun out from a few lines of code that just would not cooperate, so she managed to catch the phone before the second ring, hoping that it hadn’t woken up anyone upstairs. The shrill tone felt impossibly loud to her tired ears. “’lo?” she mumbled, rubbing at her eyes with her sleeve.

Anxiously, Willow said, “Jenny!” and then didn’t say anything else, her breathing nervous and rapid on the other end of the line.

“Willow.” Jenny was too sleepy to think. “You. Need something?”

“I don’t know! I just! Something happened and I can’t tell Buffy about it, and I can’t tell my mom, because she’ll think—well—she keeps saying she approves of the political implications of my lesbianism, so I feel like this is going to go over like a lead balloon, but I don’t know—I mean, I don’t think I’m straight again! It hasn’t—”

Jenny felt very much like this was a conversation that required her to be more awake than she was. Shuffling over to the kitchen table, she took a long sip of coffee. “The political implications?” she repeated skeptically.

“It’s just—we—” Willow took a wobbly breath in, then, in an exhaled confession: “I kissed Oz!”

For one bizarre, sleep-deprived moment, Jenny was convinced that she’d somehow been thrown back in time to 1997. “Oz?” she repeated. “Like, Oz, Oz?”

“Like Oz Oz!” Willow confirmed tearfully.

“Like your high school boyfriend Oz?”

“He was in Istanbul for some—thing—I don’t remember—and I wish I could say that we got drunk or high or something, but I was really only a little buzzed, and he was completely sober, and we were talking about everything we’ve been up to—he was the road manager for this really cool Eastern European band, and, and he’s been doing some networking with other werewolves, and oh, that’s part of why we met! We were talking about all of the complexities of connecting werewolves to resources that will help, and the stigma, and he’s really—well—he never really did much in high school, which I used to have such a complex about because I felt like he could do more than he was doing, but I guess I’ve changed because I just felt, I was so happy to see him doing things that mattered to him! And then that they also have a positive impact! And he’s still got that, that smile where when he looks at you, you sorta feel like you’re the only girl in the entire world! He still looks at me like I’m just the same, and I thought at first, you know, maybe that was why I felt all fuzzy and warm around him, because I’m a horrible person who gets off on validation, but then I started looking at him too and seeing that boy and—and—remembering—”

Jenny had absolutely no idea why any of this was a problem, but her ability to assertively interrupt the Willow-babble was significantly impaired when she was inches away from nodding off in between sentences. “Isn’t that good?” she tried, but Willow had not at all stopped talking.

“—and then we kissed and we actually did a little more than kissed, like, there was some over-the-clothes action and some grinding, except then when we stopped all of that, he walked me to my hotel! Like a gentleman! And he kissed me on the cheek and said he was really happy to share this moment with me, and who even does that??? What do I do now???? What if I’ve just—but I loved Tara so much! I still love Tara! I mean, I have NC-17 dreams about Tara, those wouldn’t happen if I’m straight! And I haven’t been with a guy since Oz, and I haven’t wanted to be with a guy since Oz, but now I want to—to call up Oz and be with him! Which, hello, so clingy, it was just one really nice month and then a whole bunch of kissing—”

“—wait, you’ve been spending a month with Oz in Istanbul and it’s only now become romantic?”

“WE WERE AT A CONFERENCE,” said Willow, as though this explained anything at all.

Jenny sat down at the kitchen table. “Willow—” God, she wanted to be asleep. “People can be bisexual,” she managed.

“But I’m not!”

“So you’re not into men?”

“But I am!”

She was going about this all wrong. “Baby. Are you into men or are you into Oz?”

A long silence. Then, timidly, “There’s not a difference, though, is there? You can’t be a real lesbian if—”

“Please God don’t turn into one of those witches,” said Jenny, who did not have the energy to be tactful. “Willow, there’s no way to be a real lesbian. There’s no manual. We define ourselves with the words that feel best for us, that’s what the queer community is about. What’s the word that feels best for you, right now?”

Another long silence. “I don’t know if the word is lesbian,” said Willow uncomfortably. “I don’t—I didn’t—really—question it? When it happened. It was Tara, first, and then Kennedy, and then a whole bunch of other girls, y’know, on account of the traveling, and then nobody at all for a little while, so I just—I wanted to kiss girls and I stopped looking at guys, and the only guy I ever noticed before Oz was Xander, and Xander, I didn’t know he was everything. They don’t tell you in high school what to do with someone who’s everything, they just say you should marry him if he’s a guy, but I don’t—I’ve never really wanted to marry Xander. We’re not like that. So I figured, Oz, he was just a fluke! Especially because of how everything with Tara happened, and I never thought any guy was pretty like I think girls are pretty, but—I don’t know. Oz is different. I don’t know how to explain it.”

Jenny leaned back against the wall, listening.

“I don’t know if the word is lesbian,” Willow repeated. “But—it doesn’t feel right to say that the word is bisexual, either. I’ve dated more girls than guys, now. I’ve built my life around imagining a girl there.”

“But Oz is different,” Jenny prompted.She was met with a tiny sigh in response. “Is that bad?”

“What do I do?” said Willow. She sounded so little in that moment. Suddenly, Jenny wasn’t imagining that woman in a clean-cut black suit and heels, but the little girl in striped sweaters and white tights. “If there’s no—word—for it? I like being a lesbian, or I thought I did, but I can’t call myself that if I like Oz. And I think I do.”

“You don’t need a word for it,” said Jenny simply.

“I need a word for it,” said Willow, a stress on the pronoun. “Maybe people in general don’t, but I do.”

“Maybe there isn’t one.”

“I need—” Willow’s breath hiccupped. “I need the words, a-and the rules. To make sure I don’t—”

Abruptly, Jenny knew who Willow needed to be talking to. “Baby, can you just stay on the line?” she asked gently. “Just for a second, I gotta—” and she set down the phone, stepping quietly out of the kitchen and into the unlit hallway, halfway up the stairs to the little landing between the first and second floor, where the bedroom door was still ajar.

Her baby was asleep in the middle of the bed, curled against Rupert like a little puppy; his dozing father’s arm was round his shoulders. Jenny leaned over the bed, carefully untangling a drowsy Art from Rupert. Art, always cuddly in slumber, whined; she ran her fingers through his hair, and he settled. “Rupert,” she murmured, shaking her guy awake. “Rupert.”

“Mmh?” Rupert stirred.

“Rupert, it’s Willow.”

Rupert’s eyes flew open. She saw the panic and gave his shoulders a reassuring squeeze, pressing her forehead briefly to his. “It’s okay,” she said. “It’s okay. She’s okay. Nothing bad. She just needs to talk to you.”

~~~~~

Willow waited on the line, listening to the crackly static, trying not to breathe too loudly for fear it would tumble into crying before Jenny came back. She heard rustling on the other end and held her breath, waiting, until Giles, his voice all rough and sleepy like it got during those old early morning research sessions, said, “Hello, Willow.”

“Giles,” Willow all but sobbed, feeling a rush of relief. “Did—did Jenny—tell you?”

“Some of it,” said Giles. “Just the loose pencil sketch, really. But I’d like to hear it from you.”

Maybe the Oz stuff wasn’t really why Willow had called Giles. “How do you know when to stop playing by the roles you made up when you were twenty-two and trying not to be the kind of asshole who destroys the universe?” she said, all in one breath. “I, I didn’t decide I was a lesbian because of the magics, but I decided it while I was in the magics, and I wanted to be good at being a lesbian, but now I’m worried that I’m not, if, if I kissed Oz and I liked it. I don’t know what the word is for that.”

“Bisexual?” said Giles.

“That’s what Jenny said but it isn’t that!” said Willow tearfully. “And lesbian doesn’t feel like it’s right either, even though it did for years before this!I don’t know what it is! I like girls and I like Oz, but I don’t like—I don’t want—I don’t think I want, but I don’t know—I wasn’t trying to look, after Tara, because I thought it was simple as—”

“Does there need to be a word for it?”

“That’s what Jenny said!”

A soft, tender laugh, the likes of which Willow hadn’t heard since she was in high school. She loved that laugh so much. It always meant that Giles knew the answer, and really, the problem wasn’t anything to be that afraid of, and five minutes from now, the world would feel okay again. “Willow,” said Giles. “Nothing in a person’s heart is ever finite. We are always—always—growing and changing past the words we used to describe ourselves five, ten, fifteen years ago.”

“But what if I—” Willow swallowed. “What if I change wrong?”

Giles didn’t answer for a couple of the worst seconds of Willow’s life. Finally, gently, he said, “Then you right yourself, if you can. Lean on others, if you can’t. We’re all muddling through. There’s no certainty that I can give you, as much as I wish that I could, but I can—” Now it was his turn to pause. A heavy one. “I can tell you that I love you,” he said, finally.

She had never heard him say that to her before. Not that directly, anyway. “I love you too, Giles,” Willow whispered. The whole thing felt faintly unreal: that she could say those words, and not snatch them back. Not watch his face contort uncomfortably as he tried to wriggle out of genuine emotional expression. “I just don’t wanna do what I did to everyone. And I don’t—if I was wrong, if I’m not—”

“I don’t think that you were wrong,” Giles countered. “You used the words that made sense to you at the time. Those words might not make sense with who you are now. Who you’re growing into. This is good, Willow. You questioning this is good, and healthy. I think…you need to become comfortable with the notion of not having that neat answer, or that label, if the notion of a label has become…restrictive.”

“I don’t want to not be a lesbian,” said Willow unsteadily. “It made everything make sense, when I found out about that word—”

“Does it help you now?”

Willow exhaled. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know. I don’t want to not kiss Oz. It feels like I got turned all upside-down-y again.”

Giles was quiet again. Then he said, “When I was in my twenties, my group, it was all men, save one. Diedre. It hadn’t been intended, her being a part of the group. We’d all wanted a place to…to be ourselves, free of societal expectations.”

Willow’s heart flipped over. This was not something Giles had ever talked about. She’d known, of course—pieced it together through Ethan, and what she’d learned, later, about the kind of magic Giles got up to, but to hear it from him was completely different. She wanted to say something, affirm that she was there on the other end of the line, but she was halfway afraid that he would change his mind if he remembered that she was listening. She held her breath.

“I…didn’t mind the notion of including women within our group, even then.” Giles laughed softly. “It wasn’t something I talked about with the rest, but I wasn’t—I’ve never really—it’s always been about the person, for me, you see. Ethan and the rest, though, they…it wasn’t usual for them to, ah, prefer the company of a woman. They abhorred the very notion. But that was simply how special Diedre was. To, to all of us.”

Something tight and knotted in Willow’s chest was beginning to loosen. She sat down on the hotel bed, curling her fingers around the phone, listening like her life depended on it.

“You, you don’t need to have the right words for it, Willow,” said Giles gently. “Lord knows we didn’t know any of them. And I’d never—endorse—the other sort of things I got up to back then, but I, I think I’ve spent a lot of time refusing to engage with the parts of my life that have been…joyful. All because I was ashamed of the person that I was then.”

Willow wasn’t ashamed of high school Willow, exactly. It was just that sometimes it was hard to reconcile Willow-then with Willow-now, and that wasn’t even getting into the Willow-in-between. “So, for them, it was…guys plus the one exception,” she said uncertainly.

“Do you need to know what it was?” Giles’s tone was mildly pointed. Instructive.

“If I don’t—”

“What if you don’t?”

“I mean, that’s why I’ve been traveling,” said Willow, halfway timid. “To learn stuff.”

“And what have you learned?”

Willow closed her eyes, half-afraid of the answer. Oz had smiled at her in the light of the full moon, unencumbered, gentle. He’d listened to stories about Tara and Kennedy and everyone with thoughtful patience. He hadn’t made a single move. The kissing had happened by accident, and because she’d initiated it, and the nice thing about Oz was that he didn’t question that. He didn’t have a whole bunch of things to say about whoa, hold on, didn’t you go gay and change your mind about me? He just smiled at her, like he saw her, saw right down into her bones, and like what he saw was good.

And she’d missed him so much. The pinwheeling way he talked about things had baffled her when she was in high school, but now, after years of traveling, it was nice to be with someone who had just as many strange questions and quiet observations as she’d been collecting herself. She liked hearing him tell his stories. She liked him. She liked the person he’d become, and the person that she was with him. The people that they could maybe be together.

“I think I’ve learned that I wanna kiss Oz again,” she said, barely a whisper.

She could hear the smile in Giles’s voice. “That’s lovely, Willow,” he said. “I’m very happy for the both of you.”

~~~~~

Giles went back to bed. Jenny and Art had taken up just about all of it, making it nigh impossible for him to lie down comfortably. An attempt to nudge Art a bit further towards the middle was met by an unhappy, half-awake whine that positively tore at his heart, so he resigned himself to sitting uncomfortably on the edge of the bed for three minutes before Jenny, half awake, said, “Honey. Are you being stupid again?” and pulled Art against her like a teddy bear, clearing space for him in the middle.

“Don’t solve all of my problems for me,” said Giles, lying down and reaching to squeeze her shoulder. Their arms encircled Art, who turned his head towards his mother, soft dark curls against her sweater.

[zinniajones]

Gender Analysis present our remarks at the Seminole County Public Schools board meeting addressing the censorship of LGBTQ+ students in the Lyman High School yearbook.

This is the two-page spread at issue. Several speakers from Moms for Liberty, Turning Point Action, and other extremists called the school staff pedophiles, called trans children demons, said their parents are groomers, and accused the board of advancing the agenda of Satan. Those were their objections to the following two pages, which are now censored and removed:

Our remarks are reproduced below. Also refer to www.floridaban.com for the referenced materials.

HEATHER: Hi, I'm Heather McNamara. I'm a parent of two Seminole County children. One's a graduate, very proud of him. I want to talk about the past for a second, because none of this is new, it's old trash. I really hope the kids here know that -- this is not new.

I grew up as many of us here did in the 80’s and 90’s, and back then, adults did not talk about LGBT stuff with kids. They were so worried about our freaking innocence, okay, and when Ellen DeGeneres came out on network television there was a huge outcry. The homophobic Defense of Marriage Act was passed, I don't even want to talk about that. Parents and children cheered. Adults said ‘God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve’, and ‘you're not gay, everyone gets curious’. Trans people weren't even discussed except on Jerry Springer, which was horrible.

I didn't know many queer kids growing up. At my high school, there was only one openly gay kid and his life was a living hell. We had a gym teacher that we were all pretty sure was a lesbian, but nobody was allowed to talk about that, especially not her. I think she was afraid for her job. Is that what we want to do again?

It was a dark time, so most of us hid ourselves. And you know what, I was exactly what some of you want your kids to be. I was afraid even to think about what I might be. I left high school believing I could live as a straight person – I think most of the rest of us did.

20 years passed, and I was able to reconnect with a lot of kids I went to high school with on social media. Scores of us have come out, because it didn't work. Because whatever you complainants may think, whatever your parental disapproval, just isn't powerful enough. Threats of hell and demons are not scary enough, and an old stupid book, a thousand times translated, and even a government isn't convincing enough to change who somebody is. Don't be your kid's first bullies. Thank you.

BOARD: Order. Order, please. Next speaker.

ZINNIA: Hi, I'm Zinnia Jones, she/her – sorry for the bad handwriting. Heather McNamara is my wife, she's crying right now because of this. I'm a proud mother of a child at SCPS and a graduate. And I'm a transgender woman. I'm 34 years old, I've been doing this for a decade. You call that a phase? I am the ‘gender ideology’ – here I stand. We are many.

We are many!

Board members, restore the censored pages of your LGBT students to their yearbook. Make this right. Calling us groomers is a historical blood libel that leads to pogroms of minorities. To kids and parents everywhere, I'll show you exactly how to stop this. Extremist groups are lying to you here about trans people being too mentally incompetent to know our own genders, and they were lying about us when they said that being trans is a contagion we're spreading to other people. That's genocidal rhetoric.

Who is responsible? The Christian nationalist legal group Alliance Defending Freedom just ordered those talking points as a legal argument from a hate group in Gainesville called the ‘American College of Pediatricians’. They are a fake group, they are not the American Academy of Pediatrics. They are not mainstream, they are about a hundred people – about 12 core members.

The Alliance Defending Freedom ordered those talking points. The talking points came first, the evidence was an afterthought, just like Big Tobacco hiring experts to manufacture doubt that smoking causes cancer. Go read the Southern Poverty Law Center today. Go read FloridaBan.com today, to see their actual documents we uploaded where they planned and workshopped these anti-trans talking points themselves.

This ends now!

I want these queer and trans kids busting open these conspiracies against their lives in the pages of that yearbook. That's journalism. You're only coping with the fallout of this because of a governor who's faced allegations of committing acts of torture against detainees at Guantanamo who were later freed. That is not political, that's the Geneva Convention. Torture is a war crime. [mic is cut] Committing torture would make someone a war criminal. Is he even following the law?

[horror-lady00]

"Okay... Just be cool, be cool", Callie repeated outloud, trying to psyche herself. Taking a deep breath, she opened a door and walked into the office. A young man, in his late 20s was sitting at the table. He smiled to a visitor.

"Ah, ms. Callie Shipman", he said, pointing at the chair.

"It's Taylor-Shipman. I have double last name", said Callie, taking her seat.

"I see", the man smiled and fixed his glasses. "That's not an every day case", he said, with a friendly laugh.

"Yeah, my moms couldn't settle on single one. So they kept both". Callie carefully watched for man's reaction. But he just kept smiling. "So far so good", she thought to herself, getting more comfortable.

"So, let's get straight to the point, okay?" he chuckled. "What lead you here?"

Callie took another deep breath. "Well, I was issued a therapist, because our school therapist... Legit tried to convince me, that I... Decided to transition only because my lesbian-moms made me do that", once again, Callie carefully watched the man. He only slightly raised his eyebrows and wrote something in his notepad.

"Alright", he nodded, "and how that made you feel?"

Callie sighed once again. She was ready to just bolt out of the office, the second that man tried any of that old bullshit she was used to. But he seemed chill, so she continued: "I don't know. Lots of things: Frustration, annoyance, tiredness... Anger".

"You were angry at being doubt?", man looked over his glasses.

"Well, kinda, but... I was more angry about things he said about my moms".

"You really love them?", man asked, as if it was regular question.

Now it was Callie's turn to chuckle. She shook her head: "Of course I do. I owe them my life", man started writing again. "A-and not in like 'They gave me birth, so I owe them now'-kind of way". Callie startes fidgeting with her hands, looking for words. "They kept me alive, when it was they own lives at stakes. What they did for me... I can't just... Not think about it..."

"Is that's why you love your moms?" - question cut Callie out of her thoughts.

She looked at therapist in confusion: "N-no... I-i mean, they are great moms. They doing they best. It's just... I'm sorry. I not sure where I was going with this whole thing".

"It's okay", man smiled. "Let's just continue the conversation".

[spoofymcgee]

i realized i was queer when i was fourteen. we'd just moved to a new city, i was going to a new school, and until that point in life i hadn't put much thought into who i liked. i assumed i would have a husband because i wanted kids, but i was at orientation for my new school, and there was this girl there–

but the point is, i realized i was queer in a new city, a new house, a new school, and.

the neighborhood we'd lived in before hadn't been the most religious neighborhood. some of our neighbors kept shabbat, some didn't, and there wasn't a real community there that we were part of. that was seven years of my life.

and then we moved. and we moved into a neighborhood where almost everyone was an orthodox jew, and my father taught at the yeshiva and we went to shul there on friday nights.

and for the first time in as long as i could remember, we had neighbors with kids closer to our age, who would come over and laugh and talk with my parents, who were friends with my mom, who asked me to babysit their kids on weekends.

and. look, i don't speak for the whole orthodox community, and there are plenty of orthodox jews who are fine with queer people, who are queer people, etc.

but fourteen year old me didn't know that.

fourteen year old me realized she liked girls and her first thought was 'oh my god, what will the neighbors think.'

because in my little teenage brain, we had just settled in this community and put down roots and my parents planned to live there for a long time, and what would it mean if they had a daughter who liked women, what would people think, would anyone ever talk to them again, how could i do that to them–

and i agonized over this for months. november december january febuary march. i remember being listless, crying while doing the dishes, refusing to tell anyone what was wrong.

(this seems like a good point in time to mention that this was all my dramatics and somewhat erroneous conclusions based on uncles-at-family-dinners and the like. as far as i knew my parents were totally fine with gay people , but they were outliers in the community. to be clear.)

i know the date i came out to my mother because i told her after a friend from my old school texted me 'are you part of the lgbt community? don't worry, i won't tell anyone'

(i'd fought with my best friend, who still went to that school, the year before, because she said that she thought gay people were weird. i had no friends in my new school yet.)

(i panicked and googled how to respond to that question and told her yes i was but only on wednesdays.)

she told me that she was pretty sure she was a lesbian, and please, not to tell anyone.

if she hadn't texted me and scared me like that, i don't know how long it would have taken me to tell my mom. she made me realize i couldn't do this alone.

years later, i cut my hair. it was at my waist and i convinced my mom to let me chop all of it off and get it cropped and short. i told her when it was over that i loved it and the only thing i was really worried about was what the neighbors would think, because i babysat their kids.

she told me that one of them had a sister who was married to a woman (she hadn't known earlier) and so i didn't have to worry about it. i doubt i'll ever meet her. she made me feel safer in my parents' community than anyone else in the world.

last year i went to a queer shabbat retreat up north. i met someone there whose parents live down the block from mine. we see each other, sometimes, when we're both in the area for shabbat. we sit and talk on the stoop of one of the apartment buildings and the night before pride he invited me over because he'd made flag cookies and wanted to eat the messy ones.

my father asked me, the week after that yom kippur, if i knew the son of one of the rabbis, because he'd been home and in shul for the first time in ages and had his ear pierced and as far as my dad knew his dad wasn't the most supportive, and he wanted to make sure he was okay.

i asked my friend and he laughed. they'd been friends for years, him and this guy, and my dad was wrong–his dad was very sweet about it.

i don't know where i'm going with this, really.

i've talked to my mom, sometimes, about learning to be thankful for the community being queer has brought me, all the people i get to know and love because of it.

i wish i could go back in time and hug fourteen year old me and tell her that the neighbors wouldn't say anything. they don't care. some of them will say 'do you want to come to mine? i made brownies' 'i like the pin on your bag' 'did you get a haircut recently? it looks nice'.

[yuukei-yikes]

Do you have any headcanons about Hibiya's relationships with the rest of the Dan after the series? I was always a little disappointed we didn't really get to see him interact much with anyone besides hiyori, konoha, and momo. I would have loved to see him properly integrated as a member of the group and hanging out with them 🥲

YESSSSS I'VE ACTUALLY BEEN MEANING TO DRAW HIBIYA HANGING OUT WITH EVERYONE SEPARATELY TO LIKE POINT OUT DYNAMICS but then i never did 💔 i still will at some point

hibiya is the mekakushi dan's little brother.

0. ayano's big sister radar goes off incredibly fast when meeting hibiya. she spoils the hell out of him because hibiya is largely independent and already has momo as a big sister for emotional stuff so when ayano's like WANT ME TO PATCH UP THE HOLE IN UR SHIRT hibiya's like what. i know how to do that myself. and ayano's like fine i will buy your love if i must. so she's always taking him shopping and asking if he needs anything new. he comes back every summer to the city with broken ass sandals and ayano's always sending him back with shiny new ones. he still rly enjoys having her around but he looks at her more in a motherly light than sisterly. he'd DIE before admitting it tho

1. srry to play the cooking card with kido again but. hibiya and kido cooking together :) i think kido is very impressed with hibiya's cooking and hibiya is SUPER used to being taken for granted so when they point it out to him he almost bursts into tears. i think hibiya is always looking for compliments from kido bc kido is super cool and The Leader and they kinda have a teacher's pet dynamic LMAOO hibiya is always asking kido if he can help with any chores so of course it works and he's kido's favorite student. if this was a class which is not. so he's just a rly helpful kid kido enjoys having around and hibiya loves that kido is really normal. also kidomomo. yeah. hibiya and his lesbian moms. also kido teaches hibiya how to bind. ratio

2. with seto... i remember reading this fic in ff/net back in the golden days of kagepro (so like. 10 years ago) that was like hibiya resenting seto bc he was still hurting abt hiyori and while everyone died with a loved one seto lost a DOG. i thought it was so funny bc it's so immature but seems so in character for hibiya. also in the novels when hibiya is unconscious he's taken to seto's room. i think hibiya thinks the whole dan act like fools (bc they ARE) but kind of respects and looks up to seto because hibiya is 12 and according to my intensely calculated family headcanons was raised in a toxic masculinity household so he sees this Buff Guy getting up at 5am everyday and holds more than one job for his family...he's like (nod nod nod) and he also really respects how seto refuses to use his eye power because of its. erm. unethical nature. hibiyas like UGH SETO IS SO COOL SUCH A MAN'S MAN. seto is mostly oblivious to this and always always always ruffles hibiyas hair. everyone does this but seto is the only one hibiya doesnt yell at

3. i think kano would go easy on hibiya cuz he's a kid but not entirely bc if kano isnt totally insufferable to everyone he knows at least once a day he gets sick and dies. i think kano tries to do the big sibling thing abt convincing the little brother of a total bullshit lie like basically his hobbie is gaslighting hibiya for fun. hibiya goes screaming for kido to make him stop lol. also kano's the one who's always saying shit like hibiya is 8 years old. even when hibiya's an adult kano's like how old are u again. u turned like 15 right

4. man mary tries acting SOOOO GROWN UP to hibiya she's like desperately trying to seem like a cool older sister but on purpose. with everyone else it's kind of natural but she is actively trying. momo bestie so also around a lot and sees how momo (hibiyas big sister #1) acts around him and tries doing the same and hibiya's like. this is pathetic. but still endearing and accepts it LOL he's also respectful of mary bc he's well aware of her role in their survival so he's like SIGHS okay

6. takane is everyone's demise because she introduces hibiya to smartphones and gaming. like hibiya rly wanted a smartphone right and then he makes all these friends and has to go back to the village so he takes an intensive course ran by takane abt how to use a phone. which is all good. but the thing is she is ALSO like ur so weird kid. here. play some amongus. this is how amongus hibiya can still win. everyone like vinnie hibiya cant be a fortnite kid bc he has no idea abt gaming he doesnt even have a phone WELL i got news for u buddy my fave character is takane and im also totally delusional. she is the reason hibiya is texting the gc in total typos asking if anyone wants to among us. and he's so thankful to her he expresses his gratitude thru sending her amongus and minecraft memes he finds around that she's seen a thousand times but it's rly endearing. also hibiya is shintaro coded so takane knows how to handle him sorry im so delusional abt their friendship (holds their chapter together from novel eight close to my chest)

7. eheheheheh. like i said. hibiya is shintaro coded like in canon both momo and takane say hibiya reminds them of shintaro like he's a little shin. and momo adopting hibiya means shintaro gets little brother by default too. his ass is always at HIS HOUSE!!!! i talked abt this in a post once abt how seeing hibiya and momo together makes shintaro want to try a little harder at being a big brother. i think they like each other and shintaro always lets hibiya sit in his room if momo is being too insane, and hibiya sometimes is like well shintaro's actually pretty normal!! (immediately sees him act a fool bc ofc he does) eugh. also shintaro helps hibiya with his summer hw, i think hibiya's a good student but appreciates the help and tells shintaro he thinks he'd make a rly good teacher and continues writing down on his hw all casually while shintaro has to act like he didn't get all choked up hearing that

9. i've talked abt the haruka and hibiya shitshow lol but again i love the idea of hibiya just totally refusing to acknowledge konoha's gone and keeps kicking and screaming abt it. bc if konoha is rly gone then it means he regrets everything bc he was so mean to it and its bc of it hiyori is alive (hiyori doesnt act this way bc she's well aware of it) and that SUCKS. so hibiya largely avoids haruka and isn't all that into how hiyori is really accepting of him and all. and haruka is also like. awkwardly trying to approach him because it's the least he can do in konoha's memory but hibiya's like hissing at him. eventually hibiya would accept it after a couple breakdowns. i think momo also punches some sense into him. i want hibiya to lash out at haruka and scream all sorts of things at him abt how it's not fair konoha is gone and like who even is he and just overall say all the things haruka is already super insecure about but then it ends on hibiya sobbing in his arms abt how much he misses konoha. and haruka can only hug him back and apologize :(

[lez-exclude-men]

Some examples of conservative christians in my personal life:

My maternal grandparents and their church community who made my mother make a public apology to the congregation for getting pregnant with me because she wasn't married to my father at the time. She was 20.

My great-grandfather who called my mom a harlot for dating in the present day with no intention of getting re-married

The middle school teacher (a woman) who told me and my friends that women are delicate and need to be treated like fine china and it's the woman's fault of she gets abused bc she didnt pick a man who would treat her right. But also divorce is a sin and she should "live with the consequences of her decision"

My coworker who believes the world is 6,000 years old and the events of the old testament literally happened

The parents of some of my friends growing up who took their daughters to a "betrothal banquet" when they were 13 for the girls to swear their virginity to Jesus and "betroth" themselves to the church. Not all of us had gotten our periods and the parents of these friends of mine were making their daughters publicly amnounce they weren't going to have sex until they were married.

The girl in my girl scout troup growing up who came from a quiverfull family and was homeschooled. As a teen, she was made responsible for partly raising her younger siblings.

The girl who was my first kiss and she told her mom who told her that what we'd done was lesbianism and it was a sin and we couldn't ever do it again because it was dirty

The people that tried to convince someone I used to be friends with that if she just prayed enough and went to church, her physical disability would be cured by god

My dad's parents who tried an exorcism to cure his adhd

The aunt and uncle of one of my high school friends who were her legal guardians before they kicked her out for being "a fucking queer"

There's many other examples, but I hope that gets my point across. These people are everywhere and typically considered "normal". They're not considered extremists in their communities. They consider themselves sane and healthy and believe that everyone should abide by their rules. I grew up in a suburb and I currently live in the most progressive/blue city in my state. These kinds of people run the fucking country. And if you don't believe conservative christians are a threat to women, lgb people, kids, disabled folks, etc... I think you're either very ignorant or delusional.

[just-a-random-raccoon]

Yeah idk if it's a good idea to post this but

Yeah you get Player drawing of poppy playtime! Yeah I'm now into this, yes I just did player transfem and I love her I just wish I could make her a little bit more chubbier but oh well... Things happens sometimes.

UNDER CUT IS MY HEADCANONS FOR HER!!!! Besides some things for my AU... (Yes I did an AU... Again...)

- This is more of my AU thing, but Elliot is her dad! (I know the times doesn't fit but shhh, I needed to)

- Past Player is intersex and uses mostly he/him, but doesn't actually mind being called she/her, Present player is transfem and lesbian, and xer pronouns are she/xe

(I LOVE TRANSFEM PLAYER ALRIGHT???)

-He was called strictly only a "he" by all of the coworkers because his dad was convinced he was a male instead of being intersex.

- Yes, the toys took care of her but she doesn't remember most part of it, Mommy was the one who really considered her child, to the point where Player called her "mom" one time.

- The fabric close when she was in her 23-25 and worked to make Elliot notice her, it didn't work. Actually she is in her 30s (but tries to keep her 'teenage scene' like she likes to call it)

- Xer favorites were Catnap and Candycat before the events of Chapter 1, she actually had one hoodie for Catnap (which is shown on the drawing) and Candycat!

- She got a girlfriend (and she is worried sick about xer)

- Baby long legs was a bit jealous of her, but he really liked having an "older sibling".

- Elliot never payed attention to her, when xe started growing up and buy more female clothing, his dad never noticed. The toys accepted xer (even if they didn't quite understand what gender or these things were but Mommy was glad to have a daughter now) and when she started working in the factory she was treated like the rest.

- She hates her dad but she can't help but wish xe had his attention.

- She never was aware of the experiments the scientists made until she discovered all of it by Poppy.

- Xe has some trouble trusting Poppy later of the train incident.

- Her girlfriend and xer met when her partner was in a "tourist travel" on the factory, she got herself lost from the group and xer guided her back. Then, she got her number.

- Mommy, Kissy and Bunzo helped her to escape the day of the 'hour of joy' hours before: She wanted to have a date with her girlfriend, so they planned a way she could left duty without getting caught.

When she came back, the fabric was in ruins.

- The three did it because they knew that was her partner + this was a great way to get her out of this.

- The only smiling critters she had contain are Dogday, Catnap que solo veía de lejos y Bobby.

[mahoushoujotechsupport]

ok episode 13 time folks

my little gay heart can't take this with lauda being ranked at having better odds than sabina

this little twink

spiderman pointing meme

i feel like the first 2 suits in this battle royale duel are the only cool looking ones lolz

i also can't believe how we got trolled by that 2nd cour trailer and everyone thought everything in it was at least a few episodes worth of footage and instead it was just this fuckin duel suletta blew through in like 5 mins lmao

i don't want to waste too much of the post image limit on the OP but can i just say how much i love these two shots? like when i saw the episode i couldnt stop thinking how cool the grassley girls look in this frame lmao

also will admit i wasn't like super into slash for like the first 2 eps and now i can't decide if i like it better than shukufuku

handsome suletta has entered the building

i will never forgive them for including this shot in the OP... after the OP silhouette of eri changed to actually show eri, i was so fucking convinced at some point the OP would update to pan up and actually show notrette to us

it's kinda nuts that earth house were the ones to step up after the 2nd school shooting later on when right before the school festival and in the aftermath of the plant quetta attack theyre all so traumatized over everything that happened

remember when everyone thought this was gonna be a pantsuit and all the fanart that got drawn of miorine being handsome... yea we got a fake out but she wears a pantsuit later on and timeskip miorine is handsome as hell

ha ha sure glad we don't live in a world where corporations can have say in military matters......................................

these lesbians

no mask prospera spotted and shes sitting down

sorry prospera haters, but it's true

this little goober trying to comfort nika-nee is the sweetest thing ever lol

just dropping this here to go along with miorine's line to prospera that suletta couldn't stop shaking from how scared she was to ride calibarn

the next line in this scene is also suletta p much saying she was able to gather strength to go save miorine because of her mom. i don't think it'd be wrong to say she was able to do the same piloting calibarn although it wasnt just for her mom but her whole family, including miorine

lmao i know dara materials is just one of the front companies shaddiq made up but i'd love to know whatever backstory he made up for them

suletta....

and honestly how bad is asticassia's vetting process? i totally forgot nika's backing company isn't real either. which in retrospect, yeah duh, makes sense

the entire sophie montage is really amazing and on rewatch feels so depressing tbh

initially, i found sophie a little annoying if i'm being honest but thats because i don't like characters who get reduced down to HAHA I LOVE DOING EVIL THINGS... which is not at all what sophie is about once we get to the next episode. she's a victim of capitalism doing it's thing

regardless of went down from this point forward, nika was always gonna play the martyr, which i still think is silly, but honestly out of all the things i have a gripe with in the 2nd cour this like one of the lowest things lmao

i wonder if this was just meant to be a throwaway line or not cuz like yeah... you're not gonna talk your oppressors into being nicer to you lol

suletta doesn't even know how cool she can be sometimes huh?

this line still cracks me up... suletta, sweetie....

norea up in the pharact like sophie cmonnnn

ending the episode on cool suletta again

also mannnnnn remembering watching this ep the day it came out and this scene with red birthmark starting up was so amazing lmao i was kinda iffy on the song at first because it felt kinda whiny? idk what other word to use because i'm not really a music person... i definitely don't feel that way now and if i had to describe it to someone right now i'd say it's a very emotionally-charged song. it's honestly one of my favorite anime endings both the song itself and the actual ending animation

legit one of my favorite frames from the whole ending sequence and i'm so happy to know that this is confirmed to be made to look like calibarn and not aerial in this shot lol

like this literally is one of the most gorgeous anime endings i've ever seen lmao i don't think i'll ever stop gushing about it

cmon look at them

literally cannot believe to this day there are miorine haters or people who think miorine didn't care about suletta enough. miorine's possessions were literally taken away as we see later on when lauda gives everything back to her... but here she is, holding on to cool-san and just longingly staring at this stupid ugly little keychain

i didn't fully mind the sulemio separation arc... but god, i hated that for the first like 3-4 eps all we get of mio are these post-credits minute or two long scenes

all i'm gonna be able to think about while watching this whole cour is what could have been if bandai weren't stupid lol

ok might do episode 14 in a bit, but now i wanna go listen to red birthmark lmao

[alluralater]

Not my normal type of ask but I just saw your reply about what parts of your body you like and it got me thinking. I’m on a journey of working on/finding myself and am trying to regain the body confidence I had a couple years ago.

It doesn’t help that both at home and at uni I’m around some very weight and body critical people, who I can’t exactly cut out. So, I was just wondering if you have any advice on learning to love yourself. Obviously you’re so, so gorgeous it would make sense for it to come naturally to you, I just wish I could see myself the way I see other women.

I get really upset and frustrated when my friends say I look like a mum or an aunty because of my face and figure (I’m quite curvy and they are mostly East Asian so have naturally straighter builds). I think I struggle with it at the moment too because everyone always says how straight I look, and I am a RAGING lesbian, like, will never touch a man again, so being told I look like I’m about to settle with one and pop out some kids at 20 is really weird.

Sorry if that was too much for an ask, it’s tough to work through alone.

-🍯

don’t be sorry <3 you’re right! it is really tough to work through alone.

tw: trauma

let me be clear though, yes i understand that i’m pretty but i had exactly the opposite of things coming naturally to me when it came to the way i was raised. i am one of three sisters and i’m the only one who feels the way i do about myself. the only reason i have this intrinsic feeling like my body is perfect to me is because self love and self worth are skills that can be developed. i was an extremely traumatized child and completely missed that portion of time when people are starting to hate themselves for the appearance of their physical vessels. i had other things to worry about.

when it comes to any hatred toward my body, that’s a doozy. the first time i became aware of how i looked was when my mother literally stood me in front of a mirror and asked me what i wanted to look like and if “this” was what i wanted when i was 4 years old and then proceeded to tell me what her plan was to make me look different. im 24 now and i think about that every single time i look in a mirror. she confided in my uncle and told him of that particular experience among plenty of others and said she regretted them so much. she passed away before we could ever properly talk about any of it. i will never be that way. the way i talk and feel about myself is not something that comes from a feeling like i’m genetically blessed and ignorant to the idea that i fit current beauty standards. i know what i look like. i was bullied for being biracial when i was growing up. i think my experiences are what kept me from ever comparing myself heavily to others. i’ve never wanted to look like someone else. i moved around constantly and yes i saw everyone else feeling that societal pressure to look a certain way. i’m bipolar so my awareness was always really high as a child, i just didn’t… want to be that way. i saw how my mom was, how my sisters were. how everyone was. i didn’t want that for me.

i made a point to try and condition myself. i look in the mirror and i hear those things and i don’t think about it negatively. yes i do love what i look like. yes i do love myself. when i was younger and i got my first ipod touch, i started taking pictures of myself smiling so that i’d immediately feel happy whenever i looked at them, which then turned into me loving the way i smile. i started taking pictures of my body, conditioning that as well. honestly… i think i just cheated the system. now i don’t even question if i’m pretty or not. i don’t compare myself to other people. i work on my style, my hair, my love for my personality and emotional growth over anything physical. i’ve had so many awful things happen to me. when i was 4 i was convinced that i wouldn’t be alive past the age of 18. and here i am!

i know this probably isn’t the answer you were looking for but it’s the truth. i didn’t just stumble upon loving myself. i love myself in spite of every experience and people using my body for their own greed and pleasure. i’m still here and i refuse to waste my time hating any part of myself. self love will ALWAYS feel intrinsic to me because that’s the relationship i’ve created with myself, the way i cheated my brain, the way i want to set an example for others. i love myself passionately and madly, the way i should have always been loved and cared for. the way i care for people and love people is the way i love myself.

btw- fuck anyone else. if they’re so focused on looks then their personality will surely be lacking. if i got third degree burns all over my body tomorrow, i would still pull because i’m hot on the inside too lmao. and it does actually fucking matter. people calling me pretty or gorgeous is something i honestly don’t give a fuck about. same thing for any negative physical comments i could receive. i know my worth and that’s all i need. don’t be afraid to love yourself in spite of other people. you’re beautiful as you are, lean into that FACT. lean AWAY from societal pressure and conditioning. trends change. i’m considered hot as fuck now but in the 2000s it was all white girls built like toothpicks. don’t be too concerned about what anyone thinks, what YOU think is all that matters. body confidence is an aura as well as a skill. fake it till you make it. starting a habit and saying “i love [insert 20 things you love about yourself]” will actually CHANGE the way you view yourself. the human brain is highly suggestible. cheat the system, hack your brain if you have to. self love comes from the self and becomes automatic when you actually lean into it. you have to realize, self love is our natural state. societal pressure and conditioning is what changes us. reclaim what is natural <3

[lightningandfireinmybones]

no no but let’s talk about alicent as a mother-in-law because i can see her being so awful to valaena at first that even aegon is telling her “mom that’s too far” and valaena never says anything in return to alicent she also prevents aemond fron standing up for her because she really doesn’t want to be the cause of conflict between son & mother but alicent slowly sees aemond distance himself from her and even that doesn’t get her to start being nice to valaena. once during their anniversary celebration he toasts valaena & tells her “thank you for teaching me that you were the only thing i needed in my life to be happy. you’re all i need now & forever” and alicent realizes that she’s never seen aemond be happy before & now he’s grinning like a fool around his wife but things truly take a turn when valaena asks alicent to babysit for her because trusting her precious baby with alicent even though she’s been horrible to her makes alicent realize that valaena respects alicent. they slowly start to form a friendship. when otto is yelling at alicent and asking her to remarry his old friend to form new allies, valaena throws a check in his face & tells him “if you come near her again i will make dogs eat your withered balls. i don’t want to see you in the same room, city or even country as her” and alicent sees that this is the first time that anyone has stood up to her abuser for her & she gets so overwhelmed that she just hugs valaena. they become close after that going out to lunches & shopping with nyra. alicent has a huge crush on elenda baratheon and with valaena’s help she gets the courage to finally start dating elenda. also one time valaena goes to check up on alicent in her room and looks at the photos alicent has on her bedside, there’s one of aegon, helaena, aemond, daeron & valaena. and this time it’s valaena who gets teary eyed because she realizes that bedside table has photos of all her children which now includes valaena.

THIS

Valaena doesn’t say anything and doesn’t let aemond say anything bc she already has a wonderful mother in rhaenyra (and you can bet daemon is already making alicent’s life hell over it if he ever catches a glimpse of her behavior towards his daughter) and doesn’t need Alicent as a loving mother in law

But that’s not to say she doesn’t have boundaries or self respect!!! If Alicent gonna be like that, whatever, she’s not adding MORE family tension to the already loaded dynamics, She keeps her thoughts to herself and just pulls away which of course makes aemond pull away too bc where Valaena goes, aemond follows

Valaena is unbothered™️

But she never counts Alicent out bc she knows aemond does love his mother, so Alicent still gets invited to stuff like anniversaries (even if daemon tried to convince her that’s just blatant self flagellation)

And then she hears Aemond’s speech, which is more words and emotion and sheer happiness than she’s seen from her son in,,, ever and that’s all bc of this wild woman who reminds her so strongly of her first love, the one she never got over or really learned from

And holding the baby, watching that baby, this little thing that is so precious to her, is finally her turning point bc Valaena is so protective and keeps her family safe from anything and everything that could harm it, and while Alicent has been so awful to Valaena, she still trusts her with her family!!! Maybe she is family too!!

But finally having that protection extended to her, maybe seeing Valaena eviserate Otto (she’s spying she definitely not supposed to have seen this) is the last straw, she’s known for a while that she needs to be nicer to her husband’s wife but this,,, this is too much and the ice queen thaws

And Valaena (bi queen) helps Alicent (lesbian queen) come to terms with her sexuality and it’s like this weird catharsis for Alicent to have her, with those big purple rhaenyra eyes, help her through it and set her up with the Baratheon woman

And it gives aemond whiplash!! Bc all of a sudden, his mother and his wife are good?? Alicent is dropping off curly hair products, telling aemond to get out of the way she misses her daughter???

[hoardofshinythings]

Gremlin Notes: Stranger Things Ep. 1-S. 1

Byers have a mut retriever? House doesn’t seem dog lived in. Neighbours? Keep eye on pupper in future episodes. 

Creatures mess with phone lines 

Demogorgon unlocks door from outside (telepathic powers), can teleport though so why? Does it have wherewithal to be a haunting dick? Keep an eye on this to see if something like this happens again. 

Will grabs dads gun, knows how to load it (dad teach him... or mom?? I can see his dad getting impatient with him while teaching him, but then Mom latter teaching him with patience to do it... or! OR. Johnathan. Hmmmmm). I am officially on team ‘Give Will A Gun’. Not even as a treat. Fay boys with boom sticks are badass. 

Joyce does not confirm kid is missing with Wheelers mom. No trust? Or just hopeful? Looks like no trust. Is Mrs. Wheeler a gossip?

BARB DEFF A LESBIAN MY GOD. On SITE. She may not know it but I do. Course she dies dammit.

Phil Larson: someone keeps stealing gnomes from his garden. No murders or other big things in the last 4 years (but no mention of before). Keep an eye on reports of weird, silly, or off things that happen in town for background noise or weird connections you can make later.

OMG Ben is just a gentle giant oh rude. Knows all the truckers and old folks in town. Who the shit would believe he offed himself? The look on his face when she said 11. He called the police.  What if they had arrived first.  Did they really have to kill him? They really really didn’t? Though I guess even if they convinced the both of them the lady was child services it’s a small town word would get around about a starving kid in the woods... but who would connect the dots? Could just be one of those ‘weird things’ that happens and then vanishes into the rumor mill. Ben did not need to get capped. What if he brought her down to the station instead what would have happened? Would they have feckin shot any officer involved? Like... your problem solving skills are NOT the best here secret lab. Choose the most normal route to not be noticed. But then maybe there have been a lot of cuts and they don’t have the sharpest staff anymore and ‘quick shot mcgee missus’ is the kind of slapstick crap they got now.... which explains why the place is falling apart at the seams with crazy shyte by this point. Hmmmmmmm.... 

Teacher BIGGEST nerd. Scott Clarke 

Mom took Will to see Poltergeist but not Johnathan. J just not a horror kind of person or is this a favoritism thing? Keep an eye out for this.

Johnathan deff has older sibling syndrome out the wazoo. Used to calming mom, probably forced to be mediator. Anxiety out the ass probably. She tries to bond with him in panic night of disappearance. He doesn’t know what to do with that. She falls apart really fast. He is deff used to managing her. Probably has de-escalation skills tantamount to a Negotiation Specialist due to his parents obvious rough road and then dealing with that in a small town and the rumor mill of it all. 

Mike see’s Steve climbing the side of his house and just goes on because wtf dude I got other shit to do. Very sibling blackmail collection habit.

Observation of Nancy and Steve interactions. Always seems like something disappears in Steve’s eyes when she calls him an idiot. She means it as an affectionate nickname, so he is playing it cool, but that look says he has to TRY to play it cool and not take it to heart. It has probably been used on him by those he cares about before, but meant to hurt unlike her. It does make him back off from what he is trying to do each time. A switch is flipped to Step Back mode.

[discoerot1ca]

I had a friend named sam. he was nice, for the most part. he loved to bake. his favorite thing to make was cheesecake, especially because his mom had loved it. he had this incredible fudge recipe, all from scratch. he made it a couple times, while I was still living nearby. we had one of those if-we’re-both-single-by-35-let’s-get-married kinda deals. he kept dropping the number. he talked about building me a computer, building me a house, all from scratch. he had a plan to survive the apocalypse. he liked guns and wanted to join the military. he made really good fudge though.

he was down to 25 by the time I moved away, talking about how his job would require him to travel a lot internationally and he’d take me with him, put us up in nice hotels and let me vacation it out all the time while he worked. he’d be happy to do the cooking, to spoil his little wife, to build me a beauty-and-the-beast library. he wanted his wife to have the opportunity not to work, wanted kids and dogs and the house, the whole deal. I’d told him I didn’t want to date him, but the deal seemed to be his cop-out. and I was seventeen, it didn’t sound so bad to have a backup plan. and I didn’t know what to do with my life, and working didn’t sound all that attractive, and he was two years older than me. love a man, have his kids, be guaranteed a nice life. my grandparents were certainly on board with that plan.

he visited me that year. my new friends didn’t like him. he called something gay (derogatory) in conversation while sitting in my room with my rainbow flag behind us. I didn’t like that, was maybe overly sensitive about it, and he apologized. he’d always known I was bi; I think one of my reasons for turning him down when he first admitted to having a crush on me was that I was still getting over my first queer relationship, and he accepted that. it was wired into him still, white desert man named sam. he had a self-pitying laundry list of reasons why he would never find love, had three exes who had “turned” bi or lesbian after dating him. he’d come an awfully long way out to visit me.

I saw him again in the summer. I asked him to do something, I don’t remember what. he would say he’d do it if I’d kiss him. he picked me up at one point, bridal-style, tried to lean in a bit. I laughed to keep his face away. I think he had it down to 22.

in the winter we were driving through a town next to ours at night, an area I didn’t know. I asked if we could drive up to the mountain. he said we could, if I was willing to do a friends-with-benefits thing. I said no, tried to convince him we should drive up anyway. he said that was the only way. we didn’t go. after he dropped me off home, I didn’t hang out with him again.

I blocked his number and his snap and his instagram in march. when I was sent home for the pandemic two weeks later, I was paranoid for months that he would just show up to the house one day, demand an explanation.

when I’d put most of the country back in between us, I tried to make fudge one night from scratch. I didn’t have his recipe, it’s still written down on notebook paper somewhere in my old room, but I found one online. I didn’t have the canned milk, so I had to find an “alternative” thing, and that’s probably where it went wrong. I can make microwave fudge perfectly, with canned milk and the right ingredients, but it was late and I just had what I had.

a few months earlier, I had been feeling awful and cold in that new place, wondering if it would work, to call him up and say okay I’m ready, let’s get married let’s do the whole thing give me a new life, give me security, give me all the shit you want for your picket-fence wife, let’s build that house, I can pop out a couple babies if you get me pregnant in vienna. I’m sure his life couldn’t possibly be going in the exact successful way he’d planned, but it couldn’t hurt to find out, keep that door cracked a tiny bit? he was desperate to be loved. we could chalk it up to dumb teenage drama, pandemic panic, whatever. it had been two years.

I didn’t call him. I stuck it out, and then I was in a shitty little kitchen making bad fudge late at night. I remember thinking it was closer to brownie brittle, that it couldn’t be too far off from the oreo recipe actually.

so I was sitting there, and I was nibbling on this crumbly burnt fudge- because it was one of the most interesting things I’d ever tasted and I made it, I wasn’t going to completely waste it- and all I could think about was how I wanted to send a picture to him, to say “hey, I tried to make fudge, I was missing yours, it’s awful”, and I couldn’t. and I couldn’t talk to alec, and I couldn’t talk to aric, and I couldn’t talk to a whole string of boys who made a friendship fun until it wasn’t, until we were thrown into the stark light of the something-more they always wanted. and I don’t want kids that way and I probably don’t want to spend the rest of my life with a man, and I definitely don’t want to be completely financially dependent on one. and I thought about the generations of women in my family who had settled for exactly that, found a nice enough guy with a nice enough salary and a dedication to a life together, and had gone “fuck it, I’m not in love but I can love him into a backyard, I can hold this into wrinkles and grey hair and dust”.

I sat on the floor of my kitchen until my roommates came home. they could smell it, asked what I was making. I said next time I would do better, and we could all have some. I haven’t tried to make fudge since.

( - not quite what belongs on this blog but then again it is about love. this is a love shot over and over in the water. there were a lot of good times with him, plenty of good things about him, I promise, but I forgot most of them because I can’t think about him too often. and it’s really not my worst experience with a man, it just sucks. he was my friend.)

tw: nsfw, implied

i don’t have as lengthy a response for you, on account of my lack of experience with people in general, but i have been thinking about Peter Pan a lot. partly because the actress in the ballet that played peter was my bi awakening (well—mostly), and partly because some boys just never want to grow up.

they don’t want to grow up, and they’ll make their objects of affections bona fide Wendy Darlings. i keep finding ways to sprinkle freud would love this generation! into lighthearted conversations. oh, you wouldn’t catch a lot of them dead saying “make me a sandwich”, but they’ll waste no time expecting you to parent them. and that’s precisely the thing you can’t do—fill that miserable void of love that they never received and that you’re not sure if you ever will either.

poor lost boys with lost-er mothers, lost-er fathers, losing their sanity and losing their children. but there’s a happy ending to this story, right? and you will make that ending so, you owe him that, because after all, he taught you how to fly. he gave you a bit of an escape from the way the world weighs you down like a block of cement, you got high together and he cooked you dinner and because he couldn’t afford flowers he picked them for you off the side of the road. and he wrote you one (1) love letter. and you love him enough to say yes I’ll marry you someday yes I’ll be your wife but then you call your best friend one night crying and you babble to her i feel this weird pressure to keep being a girl, for him and he said something while you were sitting on his chest about how the queer community has gotten all too complicated and you don’t understand why you feel so uncomfortable having this conversation, because he should be safe, because he’s two out of the four main letters of the acronym, but you don’t feel safe right now, you feel pretty fucking invalidated, and how in the almighty hell do you tell that to the only person who you’ve ever really loved?

i spent a life time wishing i was more grown up. i was an eldest sibling, so certainly i needed to act older than my age, and on top of that, i was accelerated by a little bit, academically. doing schoolwork a grade ahead kinda fucked with my social development. another time, i talked with him about getting intimate with someone nearly four years my senior (a legal adult by a huge margin) while i was still underage, and i felt so childish opening up about that. we both agreed, that was a little bit fucked up, but technically not illegal, because i didn’t disclose my real age.

and when you’re wendy you’re going to feel horribly behind, and horribly tied down, and only the fun girls get to go to neverland, and you want to be a fun fairy girl so desperately that you’ll trap yourself in drawers just so he’ll let you out. and you want to be fun, and you want pixie dust, and you want to be cool, and it’s all because of peter, who’s going to age but won’t grow up. so many lost boys with their lost ambition and lost purpose, and you are the one magical girl that can make them remember it again! but oh—one catch—you have to grin and bear it, feel their cold hands on you and in you and never sleep with a shirt on.

i can’t fix my lost boy, and i’m not trying to, but i hope when reality hits, we land gracefully and on our feet. and i’m trying to shake off whatever of Wendy rests on my back, i don’t need her and i don’t need to be her. and out of the several relationships i’ve had with men, i’ve got hope for this one yet. he is by far my best.

—(yesterday i talked about insecurities surrounding my hair and he touched it gently and said: stop it. i love you just the way you are. it’s kind of the bare fucking minimum, but hey—we’re getting somewhere with this.)

[sapphicscholar]

I wish you'd write a fic where.... DJ catches/walks in on Deb/Ava and Deb has to talk about her FEELINGS with DJ.

Ooh okay, so I'm not sure how I feel about this ficlet because, while I like to think I have an okay-ish grasp on Deborah's relationship with DJ, I feel like I am FLAILING when it comes to trying to get DJ's voice. So....we'll see! Anyway, this was also the last of the Hacks prompt I received (unless something new comes in before I get to leave post-exposure isolation in another day or two), so here goes nothing:

*

The fact that all their clothes were still on matters little, Deborah suspects, in the face of everything that was happening. Ava's mostly buttoned up shirt can't change the fact that she was straddling Deborah's lap and trying to convince Deborah that she could be careful enough not to leave hickeys.

Careful. Right. Because it's careful people who get caught in the middle of some torrid late-in-life lesbian affair.

Christ, it's exactly how DJ could pitch it to the tabloids if she wanted to make a small fortune. (Which she most certainly does. Anything to feel like she's prying her way out from under her mother's fingernail, no matter how much seemingly insignificant pain and damage it causes along the way.)

"I need to deal with this," Deborah sighs, tapping at Ava's thigh as she slides her way back out from under her.

As Deborah strides through the hallways, she tries to smooth the wrinkles from her clothes, runs a hand through her hair and hopes it looks normal enough not to conjure up images of everything that led to the moment of their interruption.

She finds DJ in her bedroom, rifling through the bottles of cheap lotion and, unfortunately for them all, CBD-infused lube that now litter the spare nightstand--Ava's nightstand, Deborah's mind oh-so-helpfully supplies.

"No." DJ says upon hearing Deborah's footsteps falter. "Nope. There's not enough therapy in the world to fix this."

"DJ, listen."

"No! Why would I... Where was this version of my mom when you were sitting in front of all my friends and telling me that my own marriage to a perfectly nice guy my own age couldn't last, huh?"

"Nothing had happened then." It's true, even. "This is all very"--Deborah searches for the right word--"recent." She thinks other words might be more apt: surprising, disastrous, revelatory, pleasurable, idiotic, life-changing. She doubts DJ would appreciate them.

"Oh. Oh, wow. So you two really fucking U-Hauled it, huh?"

Deborah hates that she only understands this joke because Ava had explained it to her. (After she'd finished laughing when Deborah offered her drawer space on their second morning spent walking up in Deborah's bed.) "Ava doesn't live here."

"Um, actually, she does. Marcus told me."

"But she doesn't live here," Deborah tries again, drawing a circle in the air around the room. The fact that Ava sleeps here more nights than not is wholly irrelevant.

"Literally does not matter. And so not the point. Why are you boning your 25-year-old employee?"

"Have you ever asked Marty why he only dates women in their 20s?"

"Please," DJ scoffs, tossing a tube of Ava's chapstick into the trash. Deborah could be nice and rifle through the trash to get it back. Or, she could not touch the garbage and instead spend a few bucks to buy Ava a new one. Yes, that's better. "Don't try to turn this into some feminist thing. And besides, what happened with you and Marty anyway? I thought you two were, like, a thing. Some Ross and Rachel will-they-won't-they shit."

Deborah squares her shoulders, her tongue poking at the inside of her cheek. "I decided I was done sleeping with someone I didn't want to look at in the morning."

DJ's movements falter, and she doesn't sweep the lube into the garbage. "So...what? You do want that with Ava? Fucking Ava?"

"I thought you liked Ava."

"Yeah, as, like, a friend. Not as my new stepmommy."

Deborah can't hide the visible cringe, and DJ's gaze gleams triumphant. "I think you're old enough not to need a new mother. Step or otherwise."

"So then what is this?"

There are a hundred and one retorts on the tip of Deborah's tongue about how no matter what it is, it's none of DJ's business. Eventually she manages an overly honest: "I don't know."

DJ's eyebrows shoot up. "You don't know? And you're admitting that?"

"It's...good. That's all I know. It's good enough that I'm standing here trying to find a way to make sure you can be okay with it."

"Wow."

"Good or bad wow?"

"Just...just wow." DJ blinks, then sets down a bottle of lotion. (Deborah actually wouldn't mind if that particular scent found its way into the trashcan.) "I think that's enough talking between us. I need to go throw some axes and interrogate Ava." Deborah would worry if it were anyone else, but somehow, she thinks Ava can handle herself. "Where is your little...what's the lady version of boytoy? Girltoy?" Her nose scrunches up. "No, that just sounds like a sex crime."

"Ava," Deborah cuts in, before this can get any more painful, "is probably still in the living room. Or down in the archives. There was some joke she wanted to pull wording for."

"Alright." DJ pushes herself up off the bed, lingering in the doorway just long enough to glance back at Deborah. "I hope she makes you half as happy as Aiden makes me." It's sweet and sentimental, and it only makes sense that DJ pivots on her heel to turn back with fire in her eyes. "And so help me, if she gets that diamond tennis bracelet in your will, I will find a ouija board and make your afterlife a living hell."

"Wouldn't expect anything less, sweetie."