#and obviously ac fics are a lot less popular so there are just a lot less comments on my ac fics than on my twn fic

[devotedlystrangewizard]

sometimes i still go back to my shaytham fics just to read the comments because nothing makes me feel better as a fanfic writer than "whoa ur characterization is so good i love how you write them" multiple times

[alto-tenure]

Fandom: Layton’s Mystery Journey (sorry if this is cheating!)

Ship: Emiliana/Kat

Character: Janice Quatlane

I mean uh. I sent Whiskers Great Ace Attorney specifically, so LMJ-specific isn't cheating. I'm sticking to game-only for the sake of this.

Favorite character: Emiliana

Least Favorite character: Britannias. ACAB is always applicable (ignore my favorite), but even more so for him.

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): Uh. Katriana. Whatever people call Cesar Chance/Taboras Lloyd. I'm fond of Pipper/Liza...uhhh, I don't really feel strongly about any other ships

Character I find most attractive: meh

Character I would marry: meh

Character I would be best friends with: the waiter!

A random thought: I wonder how many people end up being in the Ratman network.

An unpopular opinion:

My canon OTP: Bess/Benjy I guess?

Non-canon OTP: Katriana <3

Most badass character: Katrielle

Pairing I am not a fan of: Sorry, people who ship Katrielle and Ernest...I just can't really see Katrielle reciprocating his feelings. I think seeing more nuanced portrayals of their relationships that dug into how Case 12 affects them would help, but I don't think I could ever really see it.

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): Ernest. The twist with him could REALLY have used more foreshadowing (like how he would react to Katrielle getting buddy-buddy with the Seven Dragons, for instance).

Favourite friendship: I do feel strongly about Katrielle & Ernest's friendship. I think...they're similar to how I feel about Claire & Dimitri, but with much lower stakes due to being nowhere nearly as tragic.

cut here for length, but I did answer the rest!

when or if I started shipping it: It was Katrielle Layton: Wanted that really cemented it for me.

my thoughts: I really like Emiliana growing to care for Katrielle and respect her as a rival and as a friend, as well as developing respect for Katrielle's methodology.

What makes me happy about them: Rivals to lovers is a really fun trope.

What makes me sad about them: Emiliana has a pretty strict moral framework that I think is not impossible to reconcile with Katrielle, but will take a lot of work to really develop.

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: This isn't really a bad thing, but I do wish there was a little less 100% fluff in the tag. It doesn't annoy me, I like the fluff, but I wish there was more variety.

Things I look for in fanfic: I'd love more stuff like the fic I wrote last year, but not written by me, lmao

My kinks: nope, not answering this here

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: I respect the people who ship Katrielle and Lucy immensely.

My happily ever after for them: they reconcile their conflicting moral frameworks

How I feel about this character: I like Janice :) She's a neat character and I really like the parallels to Hershel.

All the people I ship romantically with this character: obviously Melina. and also Emmy

My non-romantic OTP for this character: her and Hershel

My unpopular opinion about this character: uhhhhhhhh I don't even know what the popular opinions are, ngl. I guess...I wish we had gotten more pre-canon flashbacks to establish her dynamics with the Whistlers?

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: I think she should take a break from music and figure out if she wants it for herself or if she wanted it because Melina was by her side doing it. I think she ultimately comes to the conclusion that she does like it, though.

My OTP: Janice/Melina <3

My OT3: a while ago @magicwhiskers29 and I were kicking around an Emmy/Janice/Melina triad after I shared some lines from my Janice/Emmy fic with her about how both Janice & Melina admired Emmy and her abilities. in my head there's also a version of this where Janice and Melina are still sharing a body when this happens

[atjsgf]

📓 📓 📓 (plot per book pls!!)

ALRIGHT LET'S DO IT!

MISS AMERICANA AND THE HEARTBREAK PRINCE

So I have this reylo fic I’ve been meaning to write for years called Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince. It’s a high school AU that is based on A Cinderella Story (one of my top five fave movies of all-time) but doesn’t follow it exactly–it’s a little darker, just bc of the nature of adapting the characters’ backstories, especially Finn and Ben. (They are all seniors unless otherwise specified.) 

Rey plays the role of Sam/Cinderella. Her mom died when she was young, leaving her to be raised by her abusive stepfather, Brendol Hux. Said stepfather favors his kids, Hux and Phasma (Armitage goes by his last name. Phasma is a nickname, but I think she has a real one that gets brought up). However, he also puts a lot of pressure on them as athletes (unsure what sport they do, figure skating maybe.) 

In ACS it’s a running gag that Sam’s twin stepsisters are really bad at their sport (synchronized swimming). In this, they’re good, but it’s to their detriment. (The exploitation of underage athletes is a recurring theme in this fic.)

(I like the trope where the evil stepmother–or stepfather in this case–is abusive to the step-siblings, too, just in a different way, just bc it strikes me as more relatable.) 

Rey works at the business Brendol runs, a mechanic shop/diner. She’s saving up money for college, but she’s also kind of forced to work long hours by Brendol. Her fairy godmother is obviously the manager of the diner, Daae Leira. 

Finn is Carter, but instead of acting, his whole thing is that he was a competitive athlete who fought for emancipation from his abusive family and won, and now he wants to major in journalism to shed light on the issue. 

Rose is Astrid (the DJ in the movie, she does have a name) who wants to major in broadcast journalism. So they both work on the school paper and that brings them together. 

And ofc, Ben is Austin. Captain of the water polo team, known for being aggressive and competitive, but secretly wants to be a writer. He has this kind of ruthless reputation for having gotten his own sister expelled by planting weed in her locker to prevent himself from getting kicked off the football team for having it. 

In reality, he got Cara expelled because his football coach–abusive, manipulative Snoke–was about to turn his attention to Cara, who had joined the girls’ water polo team against Ben’s advice. And Ben was terrified of Cara getting tied up with Snoke the way he had by that point. (Cara now goes to a boarding school in Northern CA, as opposed to the San Fernando valley where everything takes place.)

Anyways, Ben’s friends are Poe Dameron and Sage Skylstad. Poe is on the team with him and Sage is someone he’s been friends with since middle school. 

Ben and Rey have this online relationship. They know they go to the same school, but other than that they don’t know the other’s identity. When Rey finds out, her fear is less about Ben being super popular (he’s not), and more about him having that asshole reputation. (A more mild stressor is Sage–everyone at their school is convinced the two are dating, because of the whole “men and women can’t be platonic friends” thing. They are not and both find the idea gross.) 

Anyway. Rey gets her Cinderella moment, Snoke gets exposed by Finn and Rose, Ben gets his “I’m throwing away YOUR dream” moment, and they live happily ever after. I also wanted to do some sequels about them in college, Poe/Cara getting together, stuff like that. 

BETWEEN TWO POINTS/IN SCREAMING COLOR

So I had this idea for a series of Community fics. The series is called Between Two Points. The first three would each center on one ship. The first one, called In Screaming Color, would be Abed/OC. The second one would be Britta/Troy and the third would be Jeff/Annie. However, I think if I went back and did it now, I’d probably change it to Britta/OFC and Abed/OC/Troy, so I’ll outline it that way from here. 

In Screaming Color would just be Abed/OC, Troy would come into play later, I think it takes place after he leaves but while they’re still in school. The OC–I’ll call her Drew for now, that’s when she was my self-insert but I think I’d wanna make her a full OC if I wrote this–is a Dance major. She’s had a crush on Abed for awhile, ever since the Who’s the Boss debacle where he made the instructor cry or whatever, I need to rewatch the show. (I vaguely remember that I had to move the timeline and have this episode be earlier for things to make sense.) She was in that class and fell in love with how passionate Abed is about things like sitcoms–she’s also deeply passionate about things like that (she writes fanfic, etc) and felt a connection to that. 

However, Abed remains basically unaware of her existence until he has to do a music video for a class. She auditions for the main role (a ballerina in a music box who falls down and has to find her way around the music box–that’s my working theory on what it is, although I may change it if I think of something more thematically relevant) and gets the part. 

From there it’s this psychological thing where there’s a lot of miscommunication (mostly on Drew’s part) and false assumptions (mostly on Abed’s part) where she’s trying to make it clear that she’s genuinely interested in him, but he rebuffs her because he finds the trope of a director getting involved with actresses on set to be tired. (Feminist king.) And also because, you’ll remember in an early episode that Abed says “a lot of girls like me because I’m adorable and my aloofness reminds them of their fathers.” Even as he starts to like her, he thinks that she’s only interested in him because of the director persona he puts on. 

Eventually they have an actual conversation where she admits when she started liking him and why–she doesn’t like him because he’s aloof, she likes him because he’s deeply passionate about stories and storytelling and she can see that in everything he does, even if nobody else sees it that way. And they end up dating and are cute <3 In fics #2 and #3 they can often be found in the background doing fun things and acting out their favorite tropes. (Drew introduces him to the idea of acting out tropes instead of specific scenes or movies that exist, and he becomes obsessed.) 

Fic #2, currently untitled, would take place after the finale and would be a Britta/OC that ends in a decision to not get married but instead have a non-legally binding promise ceremony, because Britta doesn’t want to get married but she does want to be with the OC forever. I still like Troy/Britta, but idk if I see them working long-term, and I also think it would be a fun exercise to look at Britta and see what she would need in someone as a long-term love interest. 

Fic #3, also currently untitled, would see Annie coming back from Quantico for Britta’s wedding, years after leaving in the finale. She would have gone through a lot of personal growth in the years in between, and the fic would have her and Jeff get together in some way. Idk, I haven’t thought that hard about it, I just like them. 

(I also sometimes toyed with the idea of a fic that takes place in before fic# 3 that sees Annie having that personal growth in Quantico–it would be a Criminal Minds crossover and she’d be in the BAU.) 

And the final fic, Fic #4 would go back to right after Fic #1 when they’re all still in school. It would be an anthology fic where each chapter is about Drew’s relationship with the other members of the study group–how they met and what their dynamic is and when and why that member accepted her into their circle. For example, I wanted to move that one episode where Jeff gets bullied by some teenagers to be later in the timeline, and have Drew get involved, and that’s how she and Jeff connect. 

The last chapter–maybe the last few chapters, or maybe I’d make it a separate fic, idk if I could do the character work necessary in one chapter. But it would overlap with fic #3. Like Annie, Troy comes back for Britta’s wedding. (I think he and Britta are still close and there’s a lot of affection there even though they know they weren’t supposed to be forever, and I think Troy is really happy Britta found her person.)

Anyways, this would be when Troy/Drew/Abed gets together as a polyamorous triad. I think both Troy and Abed had those feelings before but never addressed them because they didn’t want to ruin their friendship and because it felt kind of off somehow. But Troy was gone for awhile and Abed didn’t fall apart–in fact, he’s proven to himself that he is capable of being in a long-term relationship that’s healthy. Their relationship has already undergone the worst scenario possible, so I think they’re more confident that if they broke up, they’d still be friends. And that feeling of off-ness is gone with Drew in the mix. 

(Abed and Drew admit to each other that even though they love each other atp, there always felt like there was a missing space in their relationship–it’s just generally this idea that the three of them are supposed to be in this kind of relationship with each other and that’s what’s always been right for them, they just had to wait for the pieces to fall into place.) 

Drew also panics when she realizes so many tropes are based on monogamous relationships until Abed reminds her that she is a writer and she can make up new stories for them, which she does. 

WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?

This was gonna be a reylo role-reversal AU. With Cara in the mix, things that unfolded in canon shifted, and, long story short, Snoke was unsuccessful in turning Ben Solo to the dark side, so he set his sights on Rey instead and since she had no support network, he succeeded. Now Rey is the leader of the Knights of Ren who finds herself inexplicably drawn to smuggler Ben Solo. Would also include Finnrose (maybe a role reversal on them, too? Stormtrooper Rose and maintenance worker Finn?) and Damara (not role reversal I don’t think bc I can’t see Cara as anything other than an engineer, but their relationship may be different in some way.) 

I honestly didn’t have a lot planned for this lol, it was just something I was toying with. I obviously wasn’t the first to come up with the idea but I thought it would be fun to explore and put my mark on it. 

[theamazingmaddyas]

I've been reading Riordanverse fanfictions for a while, and writing them for a while to, and realized that I've read a lot of different Leo pairings. Ironically, I'm not actually the biggest fan of any Leo ship, because personally I think Leo's aro/ace, and has no attraction whatsoever (I could write essay after essay about why, but that's not the point right now). However, thinking back on all the Leo fics I've accidently read over the years (or purposefully, if the main ship or the plot intrigued me enough that I could put aside my preconcieved biases) got me thinking about whether I think Leo would be in a qpr with the characters who others ship him with. So, here's that:

Disclaimer, I'm not dissing on any ships here, ship what you want unless it's actively harmful! These are just my opinions on if I think Leo would be in a qpr with a character, because I really struggle to see him dating in my own head

Calypso — Maybe

Now, I've written Caleo before, when I was much younger and had the need to make every single fic I write canon compliant (still have this urge too, since I use fanfiction as an extension of canon works, which is why I rarely write AUs though I have) but in recent years, I just can't get myself to write them anymore, so my canon compliant fics have them breaking up pretty soon after TON for my sanity. As for them in a QPR, I've written it before (see Self-Discovery on ao3 by TheAmazingMaddy) (actually it might be on Wattpad too, but I can't remember, same name) (Double checked, it is also there) and that was such a fun fic for me to write! However, in the future I see them more as business partners and close friends than queer platonic partners. If you've read my Solangelo future fic Surprise! you'd know in that fic Leo and Calypso have their mechanic shop that they talk about in HOH, but Calypso has her own girlfriend (Sapphic a-spec Calypso is my new favorite thing) and Leo is living his life with his adoptive children, Madalena and Aidan, and they're content. (I won't go into any more details about this dynamic because I'd probably cap the word limit if I try, but if anyone wants elaboration, feel free to ask)

Jason Grace — Very likely

As aforementioned, I mainly write canon-compliant fics post TOA, so I'd probably never write this myself, but out of everyone on this list, Jason is by far the most likely candidate. Valgrace is by far the Leo ship content I see the most, as I've read a lot of aus that include it, mainly for the Solangelo content ngl. But, back to the qpr stuff, I definitely see them being queer platonic partners, as they're friendship is already solid. (Note; I can also totally see Jason having a onesided crush on Leo, which I know is definitely not a popular hc as most fics have Leo as the one down bad, but I also have reasons for this I can elaborate if even one person asks, or if I feel like I'll explode if I don't say it)

Jason Grace & Piper McLean — Likely enough

Disclaimer, I was raised without any knowledge on polyamory, and still have very little knowledge on it, as I struggle comprehending attraction to one person, much less more than one, but just because I don't understand it, doesn't mean I don't support everyone, and am willing to try and learn from more coherent sources

I just wanted to put a disclaimer before this one, as it's the only poly ship on this list, and I'm honestly afraid I'll say something ignorant and offensive, when that's not my intention at all. I'm not 100% sure how poly qprs would work, but I don't see why it wouldn't work? I mean, I haven't read anything on poly qprs, but I haven't consumed much poly content in general, and am being forthright when I say I am ignorant. That being said, the Lost Trio has some of my favorite friendship dynamics, so I see it as likely enough they could be in a poly qpr. Piper, obviously, is romantically dating Shel though, as they are one of my favorite underrated ships. I adore them, and wish we could get some more content on them and their meeting.

Drew Tanaka— Definitely Not

This one is because I very recently read a Solangelo fic that had background Leo/Drew mentions, and I didn't read the compliant story about them the author had written but I still decided to add it. Personally, I can't see it. Don't get me wrong, I love the Drew redemption arcs that a lot of Drew fics have, and I've even written Aro Drew myself for Aro Week 2024 (Aro Allo Drew to be specific) but I really can't see Leo and Drew working. Friends? Possibly, I'm not 100% sure, I could see Drew getting annoyed with him too fast for them to be around each other for more than 5 minutes at a time. QPP? Definitely not in my head.

Austin Lake— Maybe? I honestly can't tell, but the idea has merit

If anyone has read my Apollo Cabin fics, or my Ace 2023 and Aro 2024 oneshot collections, they'd know not only am I a bonafide expert in all things Aro/Ace Leo, but I am also a bonafide expert in all things Aro/Ace Austin, crazy how things work out, huh? Now, does me hcing them both as aromantic and asexual (both leaning more towards repulsed because self-projection? I don't know them)make them a good candidate for a qpr? I honestly don't know. The merit for this one comes from the fact that I can see Leo building or fixing instruments for Austin to play, and I think that's sweet. Austin plays the Valdezinator now, I don't make the rules.

Connor Stoll— Possible, but the world might come to an end if it happens

Leo and Connor are both such chaotic energies that combining them might be detrimental to the human and mythological worlds alike. They'd get along fantastically, so them being in a qpr is not out of the question, it's just the pranks that they'd come up with if they were together often would be the thing of nightmares. When I read them together in a fic, I was honestly scared for the well-being of the camp. They scare me together a bit.

Laurel Victor- No

Okay, admit time, the tagged Leo/Laurel fic I've read was written by me... Now, you're probably thinking why did I write this? The answer is simple, it was the fic First Dates in my Aro Week 2024 oneshot collection, where Jason and Piper set Leo up with a blind date with Laurel that goes pretty badly to try and take his mind off the Argo II building process and him feeling like a 3rd wheel (Because obviously Leo has no attraction towards her), but I feel obligated to add it to this list because I mean I have reread my own works before? I'm just saying it would go really badly because Laurel and Leo are both all energy all the time but in completely different, and butting heads kinda way.

You know, I probably have read more, but these are the ones I remember (mainly because the fics I read ages ago had some really memorable parts, that even if I probably would never find them again, it's forever altered my brain chemistry) at the moment. I'd love to hear if people have read or written other Leo ships, that they'd like me to rate the qpr-ability of!

[evanescentjasmine]

I’m going to talk about a little pet peeve of mine with regard to portrayal of poc in fic, TMA specifically since that’s what I mostly read and write for. 

I suppose I should first start by saying that, of course, poc are not a monolith, and I’m certain there are other poc who have many different views on this issue. And also this post is in no way meant to demonise, shame, or otherwise discourage people from writing poc in fic if they’re doing something differently. This is just a thing I’ve been noodling on for a while and have had several interesting conversations with friends about, and now that I think I’ve figured out why I have this pet peeve, I figured I’d gather my thoughts into a post.

As a result of the fact we have no canonical racial, ethnic, or religious backgrounds for our main TMA cast, we’ve ended up with many diverse headcanons, and it’s absolutely lovely to see. I’m all for more diversity and I’m always delighted to see people’s headcanons. 

However, what often happens is I’ll be reading a fic and plodding along in a character’s PoV and get mention of their skin colour. And nothing else. I find this, personally, extremely jarring. In a short one-shot it makes sense, because you’re usually touching on one scenario and then dipping out. Likewise if the fic is in a different setting, is cracky, or is told from someone else’s PoV, that’s all fine. But if I’m reading a serious long-fic close in the poc’s head and...nothing? That’s just bizarre to me.

Your heritage, culture, religion, and background, all of those affect how you view the world, and how the world views you in return. How people treat you, how you carry yourself, what you’re conscious of, all of that shifts. And the weird thing is that many writers are aware of this when it comes to characters being ace or trans or neurodivergent—and I’m genuinely pleased by that, don’t get me wrong. Nothing has made my ace self happier than the casual aceness in TMA fics that often resonates so well with my experience. But just as gender, orientation, and neurodivergence change how a character interacts with their world, so do race, ethnicity, and religion. 

As a child, I spent a couple of years in England while my mother was getting her degree. Though I started using Arabic less and less, my mother still spoke to me almost exclusively in Arabic at home. We still ate romy cheese and molokhia and the right kind of rice, though we missed out on other things. She managed to get an Egyptian channel on TV somehow, which means I still grew up with different cultural touchstones and make pop-culture references that I can’t share with my non-Arabic-speaking friends. She also became friends with just about every Egyptian in her university, so for those years I had a bevy of unrelated Uncles and Aunties from cities all over Egypt, banding together to go on outings or celebrate our holidays.

As an adult who sometimes travels abroad solo, and as a fair-skinned Arab who’s fluent in English, usually in a Western country the most I’ll get is puzzled people trying to parse my accent and convinced someone in my family came from somewhere. When they hear my name, though, that shifts. I get things like surprise, passive-aggressive digs at my home region, weird questions, insistence I don’t look Egyptian (which, what does that even mean?) or the ever-popular, ever-irritating: Oh, your English is so good!

At airports, with my Egyptian passport, it’s less benign. I am very commonly taken aside for extra security, all of which I expect and am prepared for, and which always confuses foreign friends who insisted beforehand that surely they wouldn’t pull me aside. Unspoken is the fact I, y’know, don’t look like what they imagine a terrorist would. But I’m Arab and that’s how it goes, despite my, er, more “Western” leaning presentation. 

This would be an entirely different story if I were hijabi, or had darker skin, or a more pronounced accent. I am aware I’m absolutely awash with privilege. Likewise, it would be different if I had a non-Arab name and passport. 

So it’s slightly baffling to me as to why a Jon who is Pakistani or Indian or Arab and/or Black British would go through life the exact same way a white British character would. 

Now, I understand that race and ethnicity can be very fraught, and that many writers don’t want to step on toes or get things wrong or feel it isn’t their place to explore these things, and certainly I don’t think it’s a person’s place to explore The Struggles of X Background unless they also share said background. I’m not saying a fic should portray racism and microaggressions either (and if they do, please take care and tag them appropriately), but that past experiences of them would affect a character. A fic doesn’t have to be about the Arab Experience With Racism (™) to mention that, say, an Arab Jon headed to the airport in S3 for his world tour would have been very conscious to be as put together as he could, given the circumstances, and have all his things in order. 

And there’s so much more to us besides. What stories did your character grow up with? What language was spoken at home? Do they also speak it? If not, how do they feel about that? What are their comfort foods? Their family traditions? The things they do without thinking? The obscure pop-culture opinions they can’t even begin to explain? (Ask me about the crossover between Egyptian political comedy and cosmic horror sometime…)

I’m not saying you’ll always get it right. Hell, I’m not saying I always get it right either. I’m sure someone can read one of my fics and be like, “nope, this isn’t true to me!” And that’s okay. The important thing, for me, is trying.

Because here’s the thing. 

I want you to imagine reading a fic where I, a born and raised Egyptian, wrote white characters in, say, a suburb in the US as though they shared my personal experiences. It’s a multi-generational household, people of the same gender greet with a kiss on each cheek, lunch is the main meal, adults only move out when they get married, every older person they meet is Auntie or Uncle, every bathroom has a bidet, there’s a backdrop of Muslim assumptions and views of morality, and the characters discuss their Eid plans because, well, everyone celebrates Eid, obviously.

Weird, right? 

So why is this normal the other way around? 

Have you ever stopped to wonder why white (and often, especially American) experiences are considered the default? The universal inoffensive base on which the rest is built? 

Yes, I understand that writers are trying to be inoffensive and respectful of other backgrounds. But actually, I find the usual method of having the only difference be their skin colour or features pretty reductive. We’re more than just a paint job or a sprinkle of flavour to add on top of the default. Many of us have fundamentally different life experiences and ignoring this contributes to that assumption of your experience being universal. 

Yes, fic is supposed to be for fun and maybe you don’t want to have to think about all this, and I get that completely. I have all the respect in the world for writers who tag their TMA fics as an American AU, or who don’t mention anyone’s races. I get it. But when you have characters without a canonical race and you give them one, you’re making a decision, and I want you to think about it. 

Yes, this is a lot of research, but the internet is full of people talking about themselves and their experiences. Read their articles, read their blogs, read their twitter threads, watch their videos, see what they have to say and use it as a jumping-off point. I’m really fond of the Writing With Color blog, so if you’re not sure where to start I’d recommend giving them a look. 

Because writers outside of the Anglosphere already do this research in order to write in most fandoms. Writers of colour already put themselves in your shoes to write white characters. And frankly, given the amount of care that many white writers put into researching Britishisms, I don’t see why this can’t extend to other cultural differences as well.

[kuroo-shitsurou]

Stay (Tsukishima Kei x Fem!Reader)

note: saw this fic on my old wattpad and decided to post it here. my apologies if any of the details don't match the canonical events that happened in the main story. i think i wrote this a couple of years ago before i read the manga. just wanted to show some love for my favorite salty boi. also, a little ooc because my younger self just wanted a normal high school romance with this mfer okay

word count: 1.2k

Karasuno High.

A well known school located in the Miyagi prefecture. Most famous for the so called little giant, the Karasuno High School's boys' volleyball team has been at it's best ever since a new batch of students joined the team. They were led by Sawamura Daichi, a flexible receiver and a strong captain that everyone could look up to.

Before they went to nationals, one name began to stick out to the public. He started to gain more and more popularity after the shocking events he featured in during the final round of the inter high.

It was none other than Tsukishima Kei.

The tall, blonde, bespectacled boy amazed the Japanese audience with his ability to remain calm even in the dire situations their team has been through during the match against Shiratorizawa Academy. His exceptional reflexes and surprising willpower helped stop the spikes of the top ace of their prefecture, Ushijima Wakatoshi.

Tsukishima paid no mind to the rapidly growing fanbase he had. When people would ask him for autographs or pictures, he'd simply click his tongue and leave them, shoving his headphones over his ears to block out any complaints that came from the fan.

Although they fell a bit short during the nationals, you were still proud of how Tsukishima and the rest of the team worked their asses off to get where they are now. The days of hard, tiring training in the hot and stuffy gym paid off, even if they didn't make their initial goal.

Other than that, many scouts had already offered Tsukishima scholarships to colleges even when he was still a first year. Many people saw his potential, but he turned them down easily. After all, it was still his first year. Why the rush?

You rubbed your eyes and tilted your head to the side. School was still a few hours away, so you had to wake yourself up before you would get reprimanded for sleeping in class.

"Oi, chibi," A lanky blonde approached you and handed you a small can of coffee. "Drink this."

Tsukishima, now well-over 6 feet, towered over you. The third and second years have retired, and surprisingly, Tsukishima was vice captain. He said he didn't care about volleyball, but his actions said otherwise. Now being a third year, he was a lot less sardonic with everyone around him, but he was still incredibly salty (You and Hinata agreed).

"I'm 5'6. I'm not short, Kei, you're just incredibly tall." You took the can of coffee from his hand and nodded towards him as a sign of thanks before taking a big gulp of the beverage.

"Really, really?" He teased, "If you're not short then how come I still need to bend down to be at face level with you?"

"Kei, you're 6'5. That is incredibly tall." You reasoned.

"Aw, _____ is making excuses." He bent down to reach you, "I wonder if-"

To shut him up, you grabbed his collar and smashed your lips against his. His eyes widened, and his face immediately turned red. Once you pulled away, you smirked at his incredibly out of character expression. To add to his embarrassment, you took his black rimmed glasses and put them on. You knew he found you absolutely adorable when you wore glasses, specifically- his glasses.

"How cute." You chuckled gingerly.

"Sh-Shut up." He took a seat beside you, not bothering to take his glasses back, though he couldn't see very clearly.

A comfortable silence wrapped the both of you as a light gush of wind blew past the bench. Your hair was pushed back, and he could smell the faint scent of strawberries coming from you. Ah, he loved your scent. Truth be told, he loved every single part of you, physical and abstract.

"Why are you here so early anyway?" You asked, finishing the coffee.

"I knew you'd be here, obviously." He replied bluntly, scooting closer to you and leaning down to rest his head on your lap. Thankfully, the area was cleared of students other than you two, so this display of affection wouldn't be humiliating for the blonde.

"What about Yamaguchi?" You ran your relatively small fingers through his well-kept hair, feeling the softness of his tresses caress your fingertips.

"He'd come here soon, but I wanted to spend some time with you. Give me my glasses so I can see you better." He grabbed his glasses and put them on his face. He could finally see you properly, though he has memorized every feature there was on your face, so he didn't really need his glasses for that.

Another silent moment passed by. The peacefulness relaxed you, and you felt drowsier.

"About the scholarship," Tsukishima started, and you felt your blood run cold. "I was thinking about accepting it."

"The one to what school? You received so many scholarships I can't remember which one." You giggled, but deep inside, you were crumbling.

"Sendai University, actually. I also want to keep playing professionally even after I graduate."

For a split second, your hand stopped playing with his hair, but you covered it up with a playful laugh.

"Gosh, Kei. You've really gotten far." Your voice cracked, and you could feel your heart breaking in two. You didn't tell him about your plans yet, so it'd be hard to tell him, since graduation was coming soon.

Tsukishima noticed this.

"What's wrong?" He sat up, looking you straight in the eye.

"What? Nothing, Kei."

"_____, we've been together for three years, I can tell that you're hiding something from me."

Tears finally welled up in your eyes, and you didn't bother to wipe them away, since you knew you couldn't get out of this situation that easily. He wouldn't let you.

"Why are you crying?" He wrapped his long arms around you and pulled you on his lap. You could feel his warmth, hear his heartbeat, and smell the vague scent of strawberry shortcake.

"Kei, I'm-," You tried to calm yourself down, "I'm studying college in America."

Tsukishima swore his world collapsed under the despicable wrath of reality. The hammer of truth smashed his dreams of graduating college together with you into millions of tiny splinters. His heart shattered as he stared at your shaking form.

"_____, why didn't you tell me?" Instead of being mad like you expected him to be, he embraced you tighter, and his own salty tears made their way down his cheeks.

"I didn't want you to worry or-" He cut you off with a simple,

"Idiot!"

You piped down.

"Why would you honestly think that I would be worried about you leaving? I'm scared, of course, but I'd never be worried. I know that we can still be together even when we aren't physically near each other. I love you too damn much to let you go. Fuck you, _____ for making me say all this cheesy crappy stuff, okay?" He couldn't believe that he, Tsukishima Kei, was saying all of this.

"Kei," You whispered, hugging him tightly. "I'm sorry! I love you too, stupid megane."

"Who are you calling-?!"

"Shut up." You silenced him with another kiss, and he melted into it easily.

"Y'know, there's a thing called long distance relationship, right?"

"Yeah, but I can't really stand the idea of not seeing your tsundere ass all day."

"Fuck off."

"I love you too, Kei."

[likearecordbb]

about your post on the recent discourse...

it's honestly so confusing to me because like,, you say that ppl pointing out how members of this fandom will make neil very stereotypically 'feminine' is reinforcing the idea of 'masculinity' as one thing and 'femininity' as another.... and i get that we should get rid of these labels. but at the same time... the content itself that ppl are criticising (the ones that 'feminize' neil) are already doing just that. that's why they're criticising it.

i can't point out how ppl are reinforcing the idea that a relationship should have a 'man' and a 'woman', without... saying that that's what they're doing. the writer themselves already sees relationships this way and 'masculinity' and 'femininity' as two different distinct things. that's exactly *why* they're writing neil this way while keeping andrew close to canon.

there's nothing wrong with neil being stereotypically 'feminine' of course. but to act like it's somehow misogynistic for me to go to these ppl and be like 'hey, u shouldn't view mlm relationships through the lens of a hetero one! it can be very harmful' is weird to me... *especially* considering these stereotypes that ppl are pushing onto neil come from misogyny themselves. (ppl making neil much much more emotional than he is in canon while keeping andrew very stoic)

idk, like... ur simultaneously saying that we shouldn't view relationships as needing a 'man' and a 'woman'... while defending people who are doing just that and creating content which reinforces just that.

it's one thing to say 'we shouldn't view masculinity and femininity as two distinct and different things!'/'we should get rid of these labels all together cause they're meaningless'... but if i look at the content that u make/consume and it's practically, if not entirely, all andreil conforming to heternormative stereotypes... then i can't help but feel like ur not as detached from the idea of 'masculinity' and 'femininity' as u would like to believe... i trust the ppl who say these ideas are meaningless while not changing the canon characters because they seem to be sticking to their words.

people will just say that they prefer writing andreil is this heternormative way... they'll just say it what they like or what they're most comfortable writing without ever questioning *why* they prefer it this way.

and if they're projecting.. well then, *why* this couple? why pick an mlm couple to project what is often the experience of a cis woman in a relationship? why pick this mlm couple when there are others that do fit the stereotypical heternormative dynamic? idk. like,, u can do this ofc, but ppl can also call u out on ur shit.

there's an undeniable reason that neil is exclusively the one that ppl pick to make more stereotypically 'feminine'. and there's a reason this type of content is also so popular. and it's certainly not wrong to point this out.

You know, I can see all of these points that you're making. For me, the overall issue of this is very complicated. I am also super uncomfortable with the imposition of heteronormative roles onto...well, onto any relationship, regardless of the identities of the people who constitute it. I was raised smack dab in the middle of the gay community by lesbian moms (together 38 years now, jfc, can you imagine??), so that "man/woman" thing was never something that I grew up internalizing or normalizing. I can recognize that this may give me a bit too much of a sense of objectivity.

However, I'm also like...I've been ruined by grad school. The "feminizing" word makes me really uncomfortable because it starts to stray for me into gender essentialism territory. It also seems to foundationally differentiate between "masculine" behaviors and "feminine" behaviors and I just really hate that? Lesbian moms, trans daughter, bi (and late-in-life trying to see where on the ace spectrum I might fall) self, I've just met so many people with so many expressions of gender and sexuality and I just... Idk, I automatically resist anything that feels like it's upholding "masculinity" and "femininity" as real (as in, not constructed) things. And then I also am like, well, I've known SO MANY gay men who behaved in the ways that the discourse constructs as "feminized" and then I start to feel like, what about these men? Are they less 'men' because of it? How would it feel for that man to read these things saying his identity expression was a problem or a bad stereotype? Do I read *Neil Josten* within that context... no, not really. I think Neil has a 'not enough emotional expression' problem way before he has a 'too much emotional expression' problem.

I'll say here what I often say to my students in complex discussions: I don't have answers. I don't think I'm right and anyone else is wrong. I just have complicated thoughts and feelings and concerns about some of the things that sometimes seem to be left uninterrogated.

So, I do 100% get the need to be vigilant about the imposition of a "man" (dominant, emotionally constipated, sexually driven, stoic) role and "woman" (emotional, needy, teary, dependent) role onto relationships with two (or more!) men or women. I would also argue that we need to get rid of that idea in hetero relationships, too, because it's super damaging. I just wish we could find a way to talk about that that didn't feel like it was accepting this idea of femininity as a given? And I definitely agree that it's problematic when the 'bottom' in a relationship is depicted as the one who's soft and silly and weepy. (Have you read TJ Klune's Tales from Verania series? A VERY fun world that does that not at all and it's great). I'm not saying these things are not worth confronting--I'm just really uncomfortable with the way the conversations are often framed around a concept of femininity/feminizing. It feels like shrapnel, I guess? Like, 'ugh stop feminizing Neil he's not weepy and uwu he's a badass' feels inherently to me like it's making femininity and badassery mutually exclusive? Maybe I'm just looking for a caveat or footnote in the argument that acknowledges that that is constructed *for women too*? And is a part of, like, a larger heteronormative patriarchal structure? And not something that we can just all obviously agree is the way the ladies (should?) behave?

One other question I've been dying to ask, though, is: where are these fics? I don't think I've ever read something where Neil is crying over Jack being mean to him or anything. Maybe if I start to see hints of that characterization, I just close the tab and never end up getting to the 'worst' of it?

Although, if what you said earlier about the "content that u make/consume and it's practically, if not entirely, all andreil conforming to heternormative stereotypes..." was referring to me, then... idk what to say to that. I don't think that's what I do. The heteronormative relationship that you're describing isn't one that I enjoy, desire for myself (or anyone else), or have any interest in reproducing.

Does this clarify what I'm trying to say? I guess it's a really long way of saying, in the old insufferable grad school tradition: well, first we have to define our terms. Because I'm not sure we're all coming up with the same thing when we use the word "feminizing" and that probably has a lot to do with why we keep having this exact same conversation over and over and over again.

If I missed any specific point you'd like to pick at in more detail, please let me know--my very sad platonic life partner (who had to put her beloved 15-year-old poodle to sleep yesterday) and her mom are waiting for me to drive them to the stores for a distraction, so I'm feeling a little time pressure.

[actual-fucking-clown]

I just heard that you're doing requests!!! I already love your content and fully agree that Natsuo Todoroki is King~!!! If I may bother to ask a request? Just all the hcs you want to write about Ice Man bc it's getting to June where I live, and I don't mind cooling down~

Tera, my beloved, I'm going to be honest I literally fucking screamed upon seeing this request!!! I’ve been reading your fics before I even had like an acc here, so we vibin :) Also after the day I’ve had I need some fucking Ice man in my life n hopefully doing this will help me write my way out of the writers block that has been plaguing me for months!!!!

Future Blue here to say I had up to like all done last night and then my internet ate shit and I lost everything after 5. smfh. Woulda been done last night but the loss of my writing got me fucked up lolololololol. N e way

Warnings: cursing obvi, uh like nsfw for a hc or 2, my unorganized hcs that really follow no succinct line of thought and might not even be actual hcs???????

So Natsuo, 

There is not a thing I wouldn’t do for this man, bc honestly after all the shit he’s put up with he deserves the world and then some. But I digress.

1. I think he’s a hesitant but attentive boyf. Like he seems like a genuinely friendly dude but I think it’d take him a while to properly warm up to someone enough to date them. And even then I think he might struggle to open up to his partner about anything like, emotionally. Not to say he’s entirely emotionally closed off or anything but somethings are just harder to trust people with. The main thing being his familial issues. And of course that’s were most of this stems from. 

Now for the attentive part. His family dynamic has set a precedent on what not to do in a relationship so he’s always hyper aware of the things he or his s/o does, trying his best to avoid making any of the mistakes his parents made. Of course if he finds the right person he’ll be surprised to find that having a non-toxic relationship can be less stressful than he thought. It’s like a huge weight was just lifted from his shoulders.

2. He’s fucking hella romantic. Like he’s shitty romance movie romantic. He’s out here trying his best n woof. Gimme gimme. On date nights he pulls out all the stops. Sometimes it’s a nice classic dinner date at a pretty nice restaurant downtown, or it’s a picnic in the park at noon, or it’s stargazing from the roof of his or his s/o’s dorm/apartment/house, or driving out to a beach just for a long walk at sunset, or road trips to nowhere in particular. I could go on, I really could but you get the gist.

3. He’s got shitty pickup lines for days. Whenever I say shitty I mean like “god I hate it but at the same time I love it” kinda shitty. But yeah he likes to see his s/o’s reaction to his stupid pickup lines, whether they get flustered, or die laughing, or groan and make a snide remark, he’s here for it. Shoot one back at him and he get’s so absolutely red. Mans wasn’t ready. Mans will never be ready.

4. This just came to me but let’s be honest a lot of us here, myself included, have some sort of fucking daddy kink and like, I get it obvi but in this situation never call this man daddy. I feel like for him that is an instant turn off. I’m sorry to everyone I’m letting down but sometimes daddy issues don’t lead to a daddy kink. 

5. But on the topic of kinks I think this man is pretty vanilla, he doesn’t scream “freak” to me, you know? Just normal amazing sex. Oh but he does enjoy hella praise both receiving and giving.

6. Hopping off that train of thought and onto another I think he kinda tries to keep his s/o as far away from his family as possible. He doesn’t hate them (when I say them you know i mean everyone except Enji bc he avoids that man like the plague and like keeping his s/o far far far away from that man was a given), no he just likes to have something so utterly untouched by his family issues. Mans needs a breath of fresh air.

-These next 2 I think will veer off from being hcs a bit and just like shit that I like to think about in general. Does that make sense? Who knows lololol. N e way. I like to think a lot about two aspects of this man, well 1 aspect of the man himself and one....dynamic? It’ll make sense in a few so just hear me out. 

7. Ok so like I saw this post somewhere eons and eons ago. It was long before current manga events, maybe around the time we’d just gotten Natsuo in the manga. My memory of this post is hazy at best so bear with me as I stumble over my thoughts. Obvi at this point in time we had little to nothing on this beautiful, beautiful man, so people were left to theorize. So this one post, was really that shitty meme where it’s like “small brain if you think such n such, bigger brain if this, n galaxy brain if this, etc., etc.” Where in essence it was like, “He probably has a weak ice quirk but what if some sort of ice based healing quirk or no quirk at all!” N i think about it a lot to this day. I don’t believe that either of those are true but I do think it is absolutely immaculate food for thought so uh do with that what you will.

8. I guess this is back on hc territory but Natsuo isn’t picky with who he dates, as long as you’re not an asshole he’s kinda set, good to go. Now most of the fics for him you’ll see are like “ay yo, you’re another college hoe or like you’re just a civilian” but like what would the dynamic be if he dated a hero?????? I don’t think he hates heroes but his father has definitely had an impact on his view of them. He’s not enamored with them like I guess the rest of the population is so what if hero s/o?????? Perhaps?????? Have I suddenly had a fic idea??????? I like the idea of Natsuo with a like super popular Pro hero s/o or with like a super lowkey underground hero idk this whole post has been me spitballing shit.

9. Back onto proper hcs, it’s a common one that mans runs cold and ugh pls yes. It is also June rn and while the past few days have been cool and sexy the weeks prior had been hellish and on top of that I despise summer so give me all of that. Mans is your personal ac, he’s not opposed to his s/o just spending a hellishly hot day laying on top of him as they watch garbage reality tv.

10. Can we talk love language? Physical touch. He just radiates that energy. Probably touch starved, obviously due to you know what. But yeah definitely a hard physical touch. (Which is actually my least favorite love language considering I’m quite ✨𝓣𝓸𝓾𝓬𝓱 𝓻𝓮𝓹𝓾𝓵𝓼𝓮𝓭 ✨but hey I’m not here to project I’m just here to tell you what I see n therefore think) He likes to be touching his s/o like 24/7. Out in public shopping or some shit? Holding hands, linked pinkies, arm around the shoulders or waist. At home? Sheesh be ready to be smothered bb.

TLDR: What a man 🥵

I think I’ve gotten most if not all of my thoughts about our beloved ice man out. I hope you enjoyed my nonsensical ramblings :)

Have a good morning/afternoon/night!!!!!

[seventhstrife]

Well obviously I gotta go straight for DesClay?

you bet your ASS I SHIP IT!!!!! 😤😤😤

What made you ship it?

oh god, it's hard to remember when I first started shipping them because I've been in the ac fandom for like. over a decade skjdhfakjsd

bUT I am not immune to the Mutually Fucked Up, Let's Vibe Here at the End of it All dynamic they have going on lol! plus, I love angst more than anything else, and these two together provide that in S P A D E S

I have HARD plans to write some desclay in the future, gotta prove I'm not a Fake Fan™ XD

2. What are your favorite things about the ship?

besides the above? well, they also have really excellent spideypool vibes LOL! like, I can just see them kicking ass, but no one's appreciating their skill because they keep quipping and snarking and are SO ANNOYING lololol

they deserve each other

also, the contrast the contrast GUYS talk to me about the contrast ohmygod

one, a deserter who literally had to be dragged back into the cause, and the other, a man who sacrificed everything, blood, sweat, and soul, for the sake of a war that had used him up and left him to rot. I think about clay's on-again, off-again resentment that was threaded throughout his interactions with Des on animus island every night. I never sleep.

3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

UHHHH UM, IDK??? I don't think I do............aside from the fact that I'm sad a lot of the desclay fics are pretty tragic and have not posted anything yet to tip that ratio lol! I feel like this ship isn't big enough for there to really be popular tropes, especially ones to hate. I'm usually just too grateful to see more in the tag to care lol

a wonderful ask, thanks @twitcherpated I shouldn't have expected anything less! 🥰

[normal-thoughts-official]

Concept: enemies/rivals to lovers au where malec decide to hook up and have "hate sex" bc "I hate u but that doesnt mean u arent hot" but then it somehow ends up getting really tender and sweet anyway (bc of course they're both pining whether they realize it or not... bonus angst: magnus realizes and is Hurting alec is oblivious) and afterwards theres just this awkward silence of hm.. that was... Not hate sex

Bonus if it begins rough (not actually hurtful but rough) like alec slams him against a wall and it's all Flirting and Teasing but them they get to the making out and it's less rough and more very soft. (Also thinking alec slams magnus against a wall and magnus, embarrassingly, melts immediately bc he sub,, alec may tease him a little but hes also nonjudgemental and weirdly soft and magnus is like 😊)

hmmmmm i do love this concept but tbh i have trouble imagining a enemies to lovers au with malec because lmao when would they ever hate each other. i mean they had the perfect setup for this with alec being a shadowhunter but they’re just like nope. we ain’t about that life. like dahdsaidhasihdaihda

i guess rivals works tho, like they’re both competitive and turned on by competition oops yeah magnus reinvigorating sure and talented so i can see them both being like, idk athletes or some other shit who cares, and they’re like on opposing teams and there’s a rivalry going on because they’re both the aces

or if we want to be a healthy amount of ridiculous that fits our boys, they are just like. pool rivals in the local bar. izzy or fucking somebody dragged alec to the bar one (1) time and because alec isn’t big on drinking or noise or anything he just beelined to the pool table, and magnus immediately joined him, and they just turned like. VICIOUS. immediately. because they’re both about as good and competitive

so it becomes kind of a Thing - every saturday night they’ll “happen to be at the bar” and “see each other” and be like “i want a rematch” and monopolize the pool table. i mean other people can join them but it’s hell because they’re so focused on each other they just keep quipping and bantering and basically all but ignoring them. and everyone is like sigh. but it’s fun to watch so other ppl quickly start getting there to watch them and making bets and shit, and it gets the bar considerably more popular, so the owners aren’t mad

(i’m picturing that the owners are meliorn/maia/raphael because hoo boy am i a slut for the polycule. maia is the bartender and raphael cooks and meliorn kind of handles logistics. simon is a musician but he plays there all the time too and they’re all together and it’s cute. anyway that’s why magnus is always there, he always comes to see raphael and they spend most of the afternoon talking - idk he works mostly at the counter along with maia? look don’t question me. also earlier there aren’t a lot of people anyway so it’s mostly slow so they’re going around and getting everything ready and magnus helps okay let me have this - until eventually raphael sighs all like “tall boy is here” and magnus turns and sure enough, there is alec and there they go to the pool table)

okay so eventually alec learns that magnus is usually there on tuesdays as well as saturdays, so he starts coming in on tuesdays too because it’s better anyway and he gets to play and unwind with like, less people around, and it’s nice. and that’s when they start to know each other a little more deeply because they can engage in conversation without anyone watching (well. the polycule is definitely watching, but subtly. raphael will deny it in the face of overwhelming evidence but they all know he’s watching and desperately rooting for magnus and getting way too invested in their pool games) and actually like, talk about themselves without feeling weird? you know. usually they start talking to try and “distract” the other but their banter comes in so easily and they do have a lot of common interests and experiences and it just progresses naturally. talking and playing, playing and talking

(lmao there’s probably a point when magnus won’t be able to go to the bar as usual and he lets raphael know and raphael’s all teasingly like “should i tell tall boy not to come then?” and magnus is like don’t be ridiculous. but alec comes in and raphael tells him that magnus isn’t here today and alec is like *SULKS* and maia just kinda pets him on the head and it’s funny and ridiculous okay)

ANYWAY onto the theme of this ask (god why can’t i stick to the original idea for anything ever) they start to know each other better and fall in love and all that jazz, but their whole relationship is like. laced by the competitiveness and the game, you know? so they’re like ah yes haha we’re definitely rivals not friends at all. yes i did tell him some of my secrets and past experiences and we see each other almost every week why do you ask

and there’s obviously a lot of flirting involved because you CAN’T tell me that they don’t get turned on by competitiveness and each other’s skill, okay. like alec will score or whatever it’s called and magnus is equal parts big mad because they’re tied again and just like oh myh ofd so muhc arm jhmmmm strong competentt,,, god please fuck me until i cant speak and magnus has Even More Arm so alec is just watching him (also he’s so graceful and flexible and focused and every time he gets into position to idk what it’s called you get the idea, do the thing, alec is just. mesmerized by his movements and looking respectfully. and then he scores and smirks at him and alec is like god DAMN it you little brat i’m going to fuck you so hard haha what who said that) 

so anyway they flirt a lot and you can’t tell what is bantering and that is flirting anymore, and the sexual (and romantic but they don’t wanna acknowledge that. tbh mostly romantic because while i love some good ole sexual tension i feel like sometimes fics like this rely too much on that and u can’t feel the romance but like, they definitely start to talk about their lives and have a lot of fun together not just sexyal tension you know? like most of the time they’re really just talking normally about their days and they open up and just talking to each other makes them feel so much lighter and that’s why they keep coming back, you know? but they also flirt) tension is thick and eventually they end up kissing kinda roughly and passionately

and YEAH it begins kinda rough like wall slamming and all and magnus is all melty and like of course they’re not gonna do anything kinky because that’s a kinda spur of the moment thing and they didn’t discuss boundaries, or anything. but just like alec towering over him, kissing him roughly, clearly taking control and magnus being super into it and grabbing him and bringing him closer and wrapping his legs around him and just humping him and moaning? hmmm delicious 

anywAY yeah they’re supposed to have “hate sex” (not like really hate but more like, oh my god i’m so tired of you teasing me all the time and being an asshole and my totally rival not anything else, we should fuck about it) but like. they’re just. in love tbh and soon the kisses turn more reverent and alec’s wandering hands get softer and start just exploring and loving and it’s suddenly slow and sweet and he’s kissing every inch of magnus’ skin (even as magnus is kinda bratty like come on alexander, fuck me) and it’s just hmmm just great and loving. and alec fucks him slowly and magnus kisses him deeply and they’re both holding each other close and when magnus comes he lets out this beautiful moan and alec comes too, all like “oh my god, you are so perfect, so beautiful” 

and then they’re kinda like, panting and coming down from the high, and maybe they even kiss again after they’ve come without realizing what they’re doing? just like hmm good and nice and they’re still embracing and alec’s dick is still inside of magnus lol and they kiss slowly and languidly and then they just kind of come down from the high and look at each other like. oh god. shit. fuck 

but there’s no denying it so they’re just kind of like. hm. i guess we should. talk about this? haha. and they do because we stan healthy communication and that’s the story of how malec used hate sex as an excuse to be boyfriends 

[carbootsoul]

i was tagged by @katarahairloopies!!! thank u :mwah:

name: leo! @/zeitgeistofnow on ao3, @lazypigeon & @timetohope on here, altho i’m considering uh switching back to not having an art blog :/ i have to think abt it.

fandom(s): ace attorney is my main one rn bc i’m replaying the games with a friend of mine and it’s reminding me how invested i am in the characters!! a lot of my recent fic is atla stuff, altho i’ve been distancing myself from the fandom bc i’ve kinda exhausted my interest in it. finally i’ve been reading a lot of mp100 fic but i don’t think i’ll ever write for it. i just love how dumb all the characters r (with the dubious exception of ritsu)

where you post: ao3!! tbh i always get suprised when people say they write/read fic on any other platform like i haven’t messed around w wattpad or ff.net since middle school... catch up........

most popular oneshot: going just by “one chapter” as the definition of a oneshot, the firestarters, bc it’s fluffy and modern au :) i wouldn’t necessarily call it a oneshot tho bc to me a oneshot shows like, one scene? so like by my definition and your sweet sweet sun makes me crazy (i wanna lay you down and see how you amaze me is my most popular!! (also @ kit u thought UR fic titles were unnecessarily long??? i’ve hit the ao3 LIMIT for characters in titles. it’s about the aesthetic

most popular multichapter fic: sdkjflakjlkj it’s two crowned kings; and one that stood alone, which is a w359 fic i wrote back in late 2017. it’s literally the last fic i haven’t orphaned from when i actually wrote podcast fic (i have 4 other podcast fics but they were all borne out of nostalgia and written after i stopped participating in the fandom). i rewrote all but the last chapter? the last two? about a year ago and i fucked up halfway through so like chapter 6 and 7 are repeated and there’s something missing but i’m too lazy to fix it. no one’s going to read it now anyway :) it WAS the top minlace fic for a little while tho which i take great pride in.

favorite story you’ve written so far: oh that’s a hard question akfsldkfj i honestly like most of them!! and i write a LOT so there’s a lot to choose from. tonight, we are young is def one of my favorites- it was fun to write and i got to explore the ways zuko and yue r similar, which i LOVE to do outside of a zukka/yukka view. you can lean on my arm as you break my heart  is one that i’m really proud of? the whole “cooking as an expression of bato’s love” is definitely some of my favorites. a lot of my ace attorney fics would be categoried as my favorites if i hadn’t improved, too, if that makes sense. like they’re no long my favorites because i can see where my writing is shitty and it bothers me, but if i had written them a month ago they’d be my favorite.

fic you were nervous to post: figures 1-5: killing gods def!! it’s a lot more purple-prose-y than most of my fics and it was also written before i’d kinda like emersed myself in the atla fandom so i didn’t have as good a grasp on the general understanding of zuko’s character as i do now. tbh it’s one i’m rly happy w tho!! i have a few people leave really nice comments on it and rereading them makes me really happy. also it was the start of me hating the position of fire lord and being at least passively anti-it in my fics.

how you choose your titles: they’re almost all song lyrics!! only 14 of my 50 words AREN’T song lyrics and about half of those are from before i started writing ace attorney fic lol. sometimes i go into a fic with a song in mind for the vibes and then i usually go with lyrics from that (like in ‘cuz we’re the greatest /they’ll hang us in the louvre), but otherwise i usually pick an artist i’ve been listening to and go through their songs until i find a lyric that fits. sometimes the lyric doesn’t even really fit the fic and i just chose it at random or because i searching up the word “fly” in my spotify library or whatever. honestly i like coming up with titles? i know a lot of fic writers hate it but being able to just use song lyrics is v soothing for me and while i know that most people won’t search out a song just bc it’s a fic title like.. seeing that the title of a fic is a hozier lyric does affect how i read it and i kinda like that.

do you outline? i outline my long form/multichaptered fics with varying strictness. usually anything over ~8k will have some kind of outline. sometimes i go into it with every single scene planned out, sometimes it’s just notes on the side of the google doc that say “it's about MORE family. about how it's not betraying your existing family to find more” and “scenes i want to include: [...]” and “vampires... ngl kinda hot.” i’m trying to outline super strictly less bc i’ve found it’s less fun? but i do try to keep a plot arc in mind. since most of my fics are more character-driven than plot-driven, that usually just means keeping track of what character development i want to happen or what is motiviating the characters. 

complete: um everything posted on ao3 i guess. also the MULTITUDE of orphaned fics out there asksfjldkj i always click ‘leave my pseud on’ so if u look up my username you see all of my fics and then a. lot of other ones.

in progress: - a fic titled ‘dad phoenix’ that is actually just a no DL-6 au with defense attorney miles edgeworth and single dad bartender phoenix where neither of them want to date for A While but phoenix gets wrapped up in one of miles’s cases. it’s about family. it’s about writing teenagers. it’s about the background franmaya which is ALWAYS what i’m here for in wrightworth fics - a franmaya werewolf/vampire au because i’m ~gay~ and love rivals to lovers and also franziska and maya both being angry their older brothers r dating each other. - my secret santa fic!! which i can’t talk about much but it does feature toph and zuko and also piandao and jeong jeong???? idk where they came from but they are Part Of The Fic Now also i forgot iroh existed for half the fic and wrote piandao as zuko’s father figure and now i’m in too deep. - a 5+1 bakoda fic (maybe a bato/hakoda/kay fic??? i need to decide. that’s part of why this fic is still incomplete bc i can’t decide which relationship dynamic i prefer) that’s 5 times bato said he loves hakoda and one time hakoda said it back. possibly i have already written him saying i love u back and i need to change the title a little. - retail au klapollo where klavier works at an overpriced boutique and apollo comes in to buy earrings for nahyuta’s birthday. klavier gives him a punch card (one that the store doesn’t actually offer anymore as a bid to get apollo to come back) and all of apollo’s family come in to use the punch card and also give klavier variations on the shovel talk/find out if he’s actually into apollo. - a LOT of atla fics that i don’t think i’ll ever finish :(

coming soon/not yet started:  - i want to write some blackmadhi bc they’re.. cute..... and it’s a good excuse to also write athena and i love her - my stuff for yueki week!!! i have NOT prepped enough but hopefully i’ll remember in time! i wrote the prompts in a way that kinda set up stuff i’ve already wanted to write (don’t look at me lol) so hopefully i’ll get at least two or three fics finished in time. - i want to rewrite the wrightworth fic i have about them not getting married bc it was interesting and i like what i wrote about but i think i could have written it better and made it more interesting. rewriting fics is hard tho bc i’m never sure if it makes sense to just edit in the new work or to repost it? and then if u repost it do u delete the old one? conflicting so i might just not

do you accept prompts? totally!!! a disclaimer tho i’m not super into writing atla stuff anymore (most of the atla stuff i’m still writing is  something i made a commitment to finish) so if your prompt is an atla one i probably won’t do it :/ basically anything else is fair game tho!! podcasts/aa/sa/uh i don’t remember anything else but like if you search a fandom on my blog and come up with more than two posts about it chances r i’d be happy to write fic for it!

upcoming work that you’re most excited about: oh huh i mean probably the no dl-6 au!!! it’s the longest ace attorney fic i’ve written already and since it’s wrightworth it’ll get more attention than any franmaya fic i write. my standards r so high now tho after getting to much feedback from atla fans... love u all... obviously i have no choice but to pressure my atla mutuals into playing ace attorney. pls ask abt it bc i WIll Give You A Sales Pitch about why you’d like it in relation to atla

tagging: i’m not rly tagging anyone!!! @deadflora if you still consider urself a fic writer also consider urself tagged! also any of my other mutuals who write fic i just can’t think of anyone rn

[ilovemygaydad]

title: super cool

pairings: roceit, analogical, qpr remy/remus

summary: roman, who is a giant nerd, is pining after the most popular guy at school. 

word count: 2.4k

warnings: swearing, anger, frustration, crying, a couple of sexual jokes (skip the tiny scene that starts with remy speaking), sympathetic deceit, remus, threats (as jokes), self-deprecation, lying, meddling with relationships, shame, brief humiliation, embarrassment, the briefest food mention, slight misunderstandings, awkward conversations, and possibly something else

a/n: this was commissioned by the wonderful, lovely @adultmorelikeadolt who suggested that i write this after complaining about not having any ideas on what to write. this definitely has room for a second part, so... maybe i’ll write another? idk. maybe if i get an idea ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ also yes i know that there are a ridiculous amount of ace and aro people in this fic but guess what? idgaf!!!! ace!roman and aroace!pat, remus, and remy are all great and i’d be an idiot if i didn’t add them all in. not to mention a little bit of enby!logan!!!! i’m in love with them all so i get to make the rules

commission info (two slots for 50% off are still open!)

consider buying me a coffee

---

“Roman, stop being a fucking creep,” Virgil chided from his perch on Logan’s lap. He flicked an overcooked pea from his tray, which hit Roman square on the cheek.

“I am not being a creep,” Roman snapped, not taking his eyes off of the boy he was staring at. “I’m admiring.”

Logan quirked an eyebrow, shifting their gaze between Roman and the boy across the courtyard. “I’m almost certain that you’re being a creep.”

“You’re biased because you’re Virgil’s partner! That’s not fair at all,” Roman huffed. He turned to look at Patton. “I’m not being a creep, right?”

“Well...” 

Roman gasped. He dramatically pressed the back of his hand to his forehead. “I can’t believe I’ve been betrayed by all of my friends! I thought you cared about me, but I was horribly mistaken!”

“Maybe if you didn’t awkwardly stare at Damien during lunch, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” Virgil suggested.

“Well, it’s not as if I could talk to him!” Damien Taylor was easily the most popular guy at Sanders High. There was no chance in hell that Roman Fairfield, resident history nerd and drama geek, could so much as stand within five feet of him, let alone strike up a conversation.

Patton rolled his eyes. “It isn’t illegal to talk to him, you know. Just compliment him on his dress or something.”

“It isn’t that easy,” Roman griped. Damien was just so cool. He was suave and charming and unbelievably handsome, and he wore whatever he wanted with the confidence of a million superstars, regardless of the style or if it showed off his vitiligo. Nearly every boy, girl, and nonbinary person either wanted to date him, be him, or befriend him. He was practically irresistible, and despite the attention that he was given, Damien preferred his small friend group of Remy Xander and Remus Adams. Roman was simply another admirer. He wasn’t anything special like Damien obviously wanted.

“Stop doing that,” Virgil said, tearing Roman from his thoughts.

“Stop what?”

“The whole brooding thing.” Virgil vaguely waved his hands around. “I can practically hear the self-hatred from here.”

“Oh, whatever, Danger Days,” Roman hissed. He crossed his arms and turned away, more upset than angry. There was a bit of shuffling behind him, and within a few moments, Virgil’s arms had wrapped around his middle in a comforting hug. His resolve quickly crumbled, and he leaned into his friend’s side.

“We love and support you always, Ro,” Virgil whispered as he pressed a gentle kiss on the top of Roman’s head. “You are incredible.”

---

Despite Virgil’s sweet words at lunch, Roman felt anything but incredible. 

He had stayed after class for forty minutes to chat with his teacher, which was pretty standard, but when he’d tried to turn his car on afterward, the engine refused to turn on. He had half a mind to call one of his friends to drive him home, but Virgil and Logan had mentioned earlier that they were going on a date, and Patton’s sister would be less than pleased to have to turn around to pick up one of her brother’s “weird friends.” So Roman was stuck, and he felt pretty damn shitty about it.

“Stupid car,” he muttered as he kicked angrily at one of his tires. “Stupid old car that’s held together by duct tape and safety pins!”

“You look upset,” someone said behind him, and Roman whipped around to find Damien standing there with Remy and Remus a few feet behind him, holding hands.

Oh, shit.

“Um, yeah, I guess. My car broke down, and all of my friends have left already.” He awkwardly gestured at the mostly-empty parking lot.

“I can help.” Damien walked around to the front of the car, waving Remy to follow. Roman absolutely did not stare as Damien’s yellow dress swirled around his legs like liquid sunshine. “I’m good at finding the problem, and Remy is just fantastic at the actual fixing.”

“Oh, um, thank you.”

Remy slid his shades into his hair with a bored expression. “It’s no problem, doll. Can you pop the hood for me?”

Roman nodded and did as he was told. While Damien and Remy poked around the engine, he sat on the pavement beside his car to watch. Remus, who had been explicitly told by Remy to not touch anything, searched for bugs in the grassy area a few feet away, occasionally making random, lewd comments to his QPP. Remy would retaliate by rolling his eyes and giving Remus the finger, and Damien seemed completely unfazed by their antics.

“So good news,” Damien said fifteen minutes after they had started. “I figured out what’s wrong.”

“And?”

“I can’t fix it,” Remy answered. He spouted off a bit of technical nonsense about how something had broken and would need to be replaced, which Roman didn’t get at all except for the underlying message that his car was still fucked up, and he still didn’t have a way to get home.

“Shit, okay.” Roman rubbed at his eyes in frustration. If he hadn’t been in the company of the three most popular kids at school, he probably would have started crying right then and there. “Okay. Thanks for trying to help.”

He heard the hood slam closed, followed by the retreating voices of Remus and Remy, but he still didn’t move. Hot tears started to well up in his eyes, and he internally kicked himself for feeling so upset. It wasn’t even that big of a deal that his car had broken down, yet he was crying like a baby. He sniffled and scrubbed harshly at his eyes. Thank god that Damien and his group had left already.

His momentary thankfulness, however, was shattered as crunching footsteps approached him. His eyes snapped open, and Damien was standing above him with his hand outstretched. Roman was caught between feeling shameful and confused.

“What are you doing?” he asked dumbly.

Damien rolled his eyes. “Attempting to help you up.”

“Why...?”

“Do I seriously need a reason to lend you a hand?” Impatience was starting to grow in his mismatched eyes, and Roman reached up before Damien decided that it wasn’t worth his time.

“Sorry, I just thought that you’d left with your friends,” Roman said, shoving his hands into his pockets as soon as he was on his feet.

“No, they...” Damien trailed off, looking in the direction that Remus and Remy had gone. “They have plans.”

“Oh. Well, thanks again for trying to help.”

“It’s no problem.” Roman could have sworn that an uncomfortable expression flashed over Damien’s face for a split second, but he unfalteringly continued, “Would you like a ride home?”

Roman’s eyes widened in shock. Damien Taylor was offering to drive him home. “You don’t have to, really--”

“Let me rephrase that. Would it be okay if I took you home? I would rather you not be stuck here for god knows how long.”

Whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck--

“Uh, yeah, sure. That’s fine.”

“Great,” Damien said, smiling gently. “My car isn’t very far.”

“Cool...”

They were silent for the whole twenty second walk to Damien’s car, but once they were sat down, Damien spoke up. “Why didn’t you call your friends to get you? I don’t know much about them, but I feel like they would have been happy to help.” He put odd emphasis on the word “friends,” but Roman brushed it off.

“Patton gets a ride from his sister, and I didn’t want to make her turn around to pick me up. Plus, I think she ‘blames’ me for Patton being aroace since I came out as ace to him, which led to him learning about that whole spectrum in the first place, so she probably would’ve been unpleasant about driving me home. I probably could’ve asked Logan no problem, but they said they were going on a date with Virgil this afternoon. I didn’t want to bother them.”

“Why would you be bothering them?”

Roman burst out laughing, but after a few seconds of Damien not joining in, he stopped. Damien’s brow was furrowed, and Roman realized that he was serious. “What do you mean? It’s a date.”

“Yeah. Aren’t you dating Logan and Virgil?”

“Oh,” Roman exhaled. “No, I definitely am not.”

“Oh,” Damien parroted. A dark blush appeared on his cheeks in clear embarrassment.

“It’s easy to make that mistake, though,” Roman rushed in an attempt to dispel the awkward feeling in the car. “I mean, Virgil is a very touchy-feely kind of guy, and Logan is obviously dating Virgil, so... It’s not a complete stretch to assume that I was dating them.”

Damien nodded mechanically. “Right, well... Where do you live?” 

Roman told him his address, and the entire ride there was silent.

---

“I really don’t know why you’re so upset about it,” Remy drawled. “He’s single. Didn’t you want that?”

“Yes, but I made a complete idiot out of myself!” Damien groaned, flopping onto Remy’s bed.

Remus sat down next to him with an evil smirk. “Dami, you shoulda seen the way he looked at you when you walked past him. It was like he just wanted to reach up your skirt and--”

“I suggest that you stop talking if you want your heart to continue to beat.”

“Kinky!”

Remy glared at Remus and said, “Seriously, though. The guy looked like he was about to faint when you offered to help. I’m no expert in romantic attraction, but I think he’s into you.”

“He was probably intimidated by me like everyone else at this stupid school is!” Damien rolled over and pressed his face into a pillow. “He’s just so fucking pretty.”

“Well,” Remus laughed. “At least now that you’ve seen his pretty face up close, you’ll have ‘shower-nozzle mastur--’”

“REMUS!”

“God, you’re such a buzzkill!”

---

Patton peeked around the corner of the hallway again. Damien was packing up his things, and neither Remy nor Remus were in sight, which was ideal for Patton’s plan. He waited until Damien pulled the zipper shut on his backpack to run over, using the acting skills that he had learned from Roman to look scared and upset.

“Damien, oh my goodness, I need your help!”

The boy in question looked up, surprised. “Uh, what’s wrong?”

“I was in a practice room, and a spider just came out from nowhere, and no one else is around, and I need you to get rid of it for me!” Patton rushed, clinging to Damien’s arm like it was a raft. In reality, the only thing in the practice room was Roman, who was under the assumption that Patton was going to show up to play piano for him, but what was a little bit of meddling between friends? 

Okay, so maybe Patton felt bad for meddling with Roman’s love life, but Roman had called him up the night before fretting over “messing everything up,” which was just absurd in Patton’s opinion. He shared a class with Damien, and the amount of times he’d caught glimpses of the popular boy doodling Roman’s name in his notebook was honestly bordering on an absurd number. Patton had two pining idiots on his hands, so since neither of them were going to make a move, Patton was simply going to... nudge them in the right direction.

“Oh, um, okay,” Damien said.

“Thank you so much!” Patton began to drag Damien to the practice room, talking the whole way there so he wouldn’t ask any questions. “It was so scary! I was just playing the piano, and this huge black spider started crawling on the top end keys! It just showed up out of nowhere like the big, scary, creepy-crawly death-dealer that it is! I’m so glad that you’re willing to help me, Damien. All of my stuff is in there--oh my gosh! What if it’s in my bag? That would be dreadful! Oh, here we are!”

They stood in front of the plain wooden door of the practice room. Patton grabbed Damien by the shoulders and gave him the most serious expression that he could muster. “Damien, I wish you the best of luck in your task. However, if you are taken by the spider, I will not help you.”

“O-okay...?”

“Great! Thanks again!” Patton chirped as he flung the door open, pushed Damien inside, and pulled it shut again. He took out the keys that he had borrowed from the band teacher and locked the door, silently hoping that Roman would forgive him after everything.

---

Roman looked up, shocked to see Damien stumble through the door of the practice room, who looked equally surprised to see him. “Um, hello?”

“Hi.”

“Why are you in here?”

Damien awkwardly looked back to the door. “Uh, your friend Patton told me that there was a spider that he needed me to kill in here.”

“He must have been mistaken. I’ve been in here since school let out, and he told me he was running late to meet here--” Roman cut himself off in realization. Oh, that son of a bitch! “Patton lied.”

“What?”

Roman stood from the piano bench, striding to the door. He tried the knob, and like he had suspected, it didn’t budge. “He tricked us into the practice room!” He kicked the door in frustration.

Damien looked very confused and alarmed. “Why would he do that?”

“Because I have a crush on you, and that bastard is trying to get me to confess--” He clamped his hand over his mouth in horror as he realized what he was saying. To escape the disapproving glare that Damien was bound to give him, Roman turned away, hugging his arms round his waist. He could feel heat pricking at the corners of his eyes in the tell-tale sign that he was ready to bawl his eyes out. It would be super cool of him to cry in front of Damien twice. Not weird at all.

“You... have a crush on me?”

“Don’t,” Roman choked out. “Just forget I said anything.”

Damien shifted around behind him, and a hand gently landed on his shoulder. “Roman, will you please look at me?”

Slowly, he turned his head to look at the other boy, painfully aware of the redness of his eyes and nose and cheeks. There was a softness in Damien’s gaze, and Roman was only able to keep his mouth pressed into a firm line for the few moments that led up to Damien’s hand moving to cup his face.

“I, um... I actually have a crush on you, too.”

Roman felt like all of the air had been sucked out of his lungs. “Really?”

“Yeah. I really, really do.”

They smiled at each other for a few moments when the lock on the door clicked. Roman took Damien’s hand that wasn’t on his face and said, “How about we get out of here and talk about things over coffee?”

Damien grinned. “I think that sounds great.”

[dwellordream]

A bit of a strange question, but as the queen of AUs, what do you think wouldve happened to the course of ASOIAF events if robb had instead been a woman?

Thank you! I’ve actually debated doing a ‘Robyn, eldest child of House Stark’ fic multiple times, but I don’t think it will be occurring any time soon because once I’m done with Haunt/Hunt it’s going to be a while before I want to touch anything set during the War of the Five Kings timeline. assuming literally everything else stays the same, and Catelyn simply happens to give birth to a daughter at Riverrun instead of a son: (WARNING this is just me talking off the top of my head, I am not an acclaimed ASOIAF theorist or scholar haha) I honestly have no idea what Catelyn would name her. We don’t know if she and Ned even discussed potential names for their children in the two weeks they had together before he went back to war, so it’s really anyone’s guess. I *don’t* think Catelyn would have felt comfortable naming her Lyarra or Lyanna or Branda without Ned’s explicit approval, and she certainly would have wanted to give her daughter a Stark or northern name, especially since the child was born in Riverrun and we’re assuming she’s redhaired and blue-eyed like Robb in canon. Robyn was historically a Ryswell lady who ruled as Lady of Winterfell after marrying Jonnel Stark (although the marriage produced no heirs) and it’s also close to Robb, so if it were me writing the fic I’d probably just go with that.  There’s also just the always ‘safe’ name choices of Jeyne or Alys/Alysanne, which Catelyn might have felt were very inoffensive names no one could have an issue with. Berena or Arrana or even Serena or Sansa could be other options, but if I was writing this AU I’d want to keep the name change as simple as possible so as not to confuse anyone. So Catelyn gives birth to a little Robyn Stark. I am sure she adores her daughter, but I think she would be feeling a bit crestfallen and insecure that she hasn’t given House Stark a male heir while Ned is off to war- especially since there has never been a Lady of Winterfell ruling in her own right- a lot of fics like to portray the North as being much more egalitarian than the South, but the canonical evidence for that is... shoddy. I think the first big issue is obviously going to be Ned bringing Jon back to Winterfell. Catelyn shows up with her infant daughter Robyn- already a stranger in a strange place, likely feeling insecure and uncertain of her relationship with Ned, which is nonexistent, and surprise! There’s a bastard son literally sitting in the nursery. So I think we can take Catelyn’s canonical feelings of ‘why the HELL would you RAISE your ILLEGITIMATE SON WHO LOOKS JUST LIKE YOU alongside OUR CHILDREN and EXPECT ME TO BE OKAY WITH THIS’ and magnify that by about 10?  I would say Catelyn and Jon’s already rocky dynamic is going to be that much worse in this AU, especially since Catelyn then does not have a son until the birth of Bran in 290 AC. That’s about 7 years where Jon is the only male child of Ned’s at Winterfell. 7 years for people to wonder if he might be legitimized if Catelyn doesn’t have any sons. Unless Ned takes some proactive steps to reassure Catelyn that Robyn could inherit his seat and he wouldn’t put Jon in front of her, I think the relationship between Ned and Cat is going to be quite tense. Hateful and toxic to the degree of Robert and Cersei? No, but frosty and distant. Maybe it would improve with the birth of Bran, maybe it would improve if Ned caved and agreed to send Jon to ward somewhere nearby, such as with House Cerwyn or House Hornwood or even the Tallharts, but I do think we would then see a Ned and Cat at the start of 298 AC who are not as close and deeply in love as they are in canon. That’s not to say I think they’d loathe each other but it would be different. Anyways, I would still say Robyn has a pretty happy childhood. I think her personality would be reasonably similar to Robb’s in canon- she’s loving and protective of her siblings, looks up to her parents, is proud of her Northern heritage but worships both the Seven and the old gods. I think her and Sansa would be quite close, and I think since Robb is pretty much the ‘ideal’ if young and sheltered male heir in canon, Robyn would pretty much adhere to the gender norms of Westeros. I don’t think she’d be a tomboy to the degree that Arya is, although she might quite enjoy hunting, hawking, and riding, and I think she’d have some close friends in say, the Manderly sisters or Alys Karstark (I like to write female friendships, anyways). But one major difference is, of course, that Robyn is not considered Ned’s heir. Bran is. This changes Bran’s personality a bit. I think he is overall still his sweet, curious self, dreaming of becoming a knight, but I think that is tampered some by the pressure to grow up and become a worthy successor to his well-loved and respected father. So we might see a bit of a more ‘mature’ Bran or just one who doesn’t really have much time to be scampering about Winterfell- he’s busy with his lessons or training. Robyn I think would love both Sansa and Arya and be a good intermediary between the two of them, although Arya might still be very insecure about not being as feminine or graceful as her two popular older sisters. I do think Robyn would help abate some of her insecurity and feelings of worthlessness, though; she could keep Sansa and Jeyne in line from being bullying or just derisive of Arya’s wild ways, and she could also maybe show Arya some of the value in things like needlework and a lady’s traditional duties, etc. The big question here then becomes, when Robert shows up, does he want Joffrey betrothed to Robyn instead of Sansa? We can assume Robyn and Sansa both look quite similar, but Robyn is the elder sister and was born around mid-283 AC, while Joffrey was born in early 286 AC, I think that age difference would be seen as completely acceptable. So I’m inclined to say yes, there is talk of a betrothal between Joffrey and Robyn. Is Robyn as charmed by Joffrey as Sansa is in canon? Eh, she might not hate him right off the bat, but I can’t see her really having much of a crush, either. Does this influence Ned to think differently of agreeing to the betrothal, if Robyn expresses no interest in wedding Joffrey and becoming queen someday, or does he put more value on not offending Robert?  If I was writing this AU my personal solution would be to have Robyn already betrothed by 298 AC, thus averting the problem of having her just ‘replace’ Sansa in her own plot. It would also make sense in that as Robyn would be a 14 year old girl at the start of the story, it would seem like there might be more pressure to figure out a betrothal for her than there was for Robb. Given Ned’s desire to shelter his children and keep them close, I think he and Catelyn would want Robyn either marrying into a Northern house or a Riverlands house where they would know what family she was marrying into well and know what to expect. Just in terms of negotiating this betrothal, the North might be more convenient for everyone. Cley Cerwyn, Daryn Hornwood, Harrion Karstark, Jojen Reed, and Smalljon Umber would all be options. Robyn would be considered a very appealing choice in wife in order to get influence with the Starks, so lots of houses would be vying for her to marry into their families. Obviously Robyn being betrothed to a northern lordling sort of sets her up to be left behind as acting Lady of Winterfell when all the shit starts going on, with Catelyn trusting her to look after her little brothers and keep the castle in order. Does Bran still fall in this AU in the first place? I guess it really depends. He might have less chances to sneak off with him being expected to spend time around Joffrey and Tommen as Ned’s eldest son. If he does fall, that is an even bigger blow to House Stark in the eyes of their allies- Ned’s heir is crippled, what now, would probably be the major thought. Rickon is just 3- it will be at least a decade before he’s ruling anyone. This might provide an opportunity, plot-wise for Robyn to step up to the plate and maybe the North winds up being steered in the direction of ‘we love Lady Robyn and her betrothed, *insert Daryn or Harrion or Cley, etc!*’. If she ends up being the one to call their banners... who knows. Obviously she wouldn’t be fighting any battles, but I think Catelyn would see nothing wrong with her daughter leading and making battle plans.  That’s kind of all I got at the moment but it’s definitely an interesting concept! How does Theon view her? What is her relationship like with Jon? Does she still name her direwolf Grey Wind? How does her relationship with Catelyn develop as she grows into a young woman making serious political decisions, not all of which her mother agrees with? Does she feel differently about suing for peace with the Lannisters and trying to save Sansa and Arya at all costs, being a woman herself?

[lululawrence]

Hey! Have you read any good abo fics recently?

ahehehehehe okay, so, i put this off until now because i needed to be able to look at a few things. so, by recently i am taking that to mean since i last did an a/b/o fic rec, which apparently was june of last year (and january before that). that’s far too long ago, meaning this rec is going to have about 30 fics on it. hahahaha i’m putting them in no particular order other than the order i bookmarked them in, meaning most recent bookmarks will be last, so if june of last year wasn’t recent enough, you’ll wanna scroll a bit. :D

I have also written two more a/b/o fics since my last rec, so i’ll start with a bit of self promo and then start lauding the work of others (hope you don’t mind)

The World Will Open Its Arms - this one is actually one of my more popular fics from last year, which i wasn’t expecting at all. haha my entire goal for this fic was to take a feeling i got while listening to a song on a random drive to take my daughter to her ice skating camp and capture it in a fic. i think i did, and i love the little bit of insight we get into their lives with this one. pregnant and unbonded omega harry, alpha louis. :)

How I Feel Inside - i wrote this one also for wordplay, and while there’s omega harry and alpha louis in there, the real focus of the fic is the fact that niall is missing. you find out why at the end, so i’ll try not to give it away, but i did it kinda as a gag and a joke and loved it so i hope you enjoy it too hahaha

okay! and now to the rest. Let’s do this.

Take What's Mine by @jaerie / jaerieall i’m really gonna say about this one is i first read it as a dark fic read and then she took it off anon so i figured if she was brave enough to say she wrote it then i was brave enough to say i loved it haha so here we are. it’s a bit of a dark fic but is ultimately healing and beautiful imo.

was it all a fake? by @jaerie / jaerieso this is a fic i didn’t realize she was gonna publicly gift to me and i asked for it, so fair enough, but i love it. i love it and it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, so please, like with the fic before, check the tags (i feel like this rec isn’t starting well with me warning about things before people read them, but i really do love these hahaha)

These Lover's Eyes by chasingxrabbitswhat i love most about this fic is it’s a pack fic. i feel like packs are something that used to be explored more in older a/b/o fics in the fandom but that it is often ignored unless it’s in the almost tribal sense of packs, and this is very different. like the summary literally reads “A/B/O verse where Liam is an alpha, Josh, Niall, Louis, and Harry are his betas and an unlikely little omega stumbles into the picture.” and i can’t really say much more than that, but i love it so much. haha so if you’re looking for a totally different dynamic to this verse, this older fic will defo give you that. (if someone also wants to kind of explore this idea and dynamic in their own ways as well, please tag me when you post lol)

hard to confess by @hereforlou / hereforlouACCIDENTAL MPREG! gosh i love fics like this so much and they did this one really well. accidental mpreg with assumptions made that might not be entirely correct and friends to lovers and just SO MUCH GOODNESS OKAY

Desire A/B/o series by @reminiscingintherain / reminiscingintherainthis series is an established relationship, somewhat canon compliant a/b/o series that was such fun to read. super fluffy, super sweet, super cute. basically, if the dark fics i kinda started this rec with aren’t your thing, this probably is. lol

I'm Sure It Happens To All Alphas by @jaerie / jaerieALPHA. LOUIS. HAS TROUBLE. POPPING A KNOT. gosh i died reading this fic. i love it so much. she works her magic, as usual, and does it in style.

The Wilds by @jaerie / jaerieThis fic was just. it was wow. it was such an interesting world for things to take place in and fascinating how it all played out. there are quite a few sensitive subjects that this does broach, so while i wouldn’t necessarily say it is a dark fic, you do need to be sensitive to the tags, so please be careful with those!

You Gotta Swim, Swim For Your Life series by @jaerie / jaeriei swear i do read a/b/o that isn’t done by jenna. lollll but this series is so good. it’s a really incredible fic that takes you through harry’s journey with grief and illness and all sorts of things, so if that’s triggering for you, then please don’t read this, but it’s so so so beautifully done. the emotions in this series are gorgeous.

Where You Lay by @ham-palpert / HamPalpertTHIS FIIIIIIC! gosh it’s a perceived enemies to friends with benefits to lovers fic but there’s such a journey along the way. it’s so so so amazing. it ended and i just felt so complete. hahaha it’s one of those fics. so yeah, love love love.

The Nearness of You by @louisalbumnow / theweightofmywordsTHIS FIC. the nesting in this fic! the description and emotions and just ALL OF IT. it’s just gold. in a 2k wrapper. it’s amazing. i don’t even have words just read it.

One Love by @13ways-of-looking / 13waysthis fic is SO EMOTIONAL. it hit me hard and was another one of those that packs a lot into few words. it was so interesting and a really fascinating world and just. yeah. it’s a great read!

I'll Take Care Of You by @dimpled-halo / dimpled_halojacky wrote me a part 2 of my fic for my birthday! she wrote the part 1 for my birthday too, so i guess she loves me a lot if she was willing to revisit it and write me some more. i love this ‘verse so much, though. the throw back to high school/college like it’s done here is so pure and complex and i love it.

I Know How To Whisk (But Teach Me Anyway) by @2tiedships2 / 2tiedships2mel comes and delivers another great a/b/o fic! i love how she always ties in the idea of soulmates with her fics. and this one is so fun and i love that it entirely revolves around an obsession with a bakery hahaha a great read, as always!

Alpha Seeking Alpha by @jaerie / jaerieOKAY OKAY OKAY. i love this one too. gosh i say that about everyone of these, don’t i? i suppose it’s a fic rec so i would hope i love them all but i’m not thinking well tonight so all you’re getting is read this cause i love it but like ALPHA/ALPHA THROUGH A SERVICE AND JUST AAAHHHHHHH

I Wanna Be More Than Friends by @2tiedships2 / 2tiedships2this is my fav mel fic yet. i kept throwing ideas at her hoping something would stick and then she came up with something completely unique that i’d never heard of before and I LOVE IT SO MUCH. alpha harry does not have a sense of smell. OMGGGGGGGG anyway. toooootally amazing twist on the a/b/o verse.

If I Loved You Less by @allwaswell16 / allwaswell16REGENCY A/B/O!!!! did you hear me? I SAID REGENCY A/B/O!!! With side shiall! i adored this fic because even through the end i was like HOW ARE THEY GONNA MAKE THIS WORK but it does and it’s magical and so great. gosh. so so great.

The Unsuccessful Promise by trysomecatsthis fic actually just got a part 2 added recently and i only just read that part 2 last night! lol good timing, i suppose! anyway, this one is sooooo fun because it’s got feisty didn’t think he’d be an omega louis with super sweet and obviously misunderstood harry with louis’ parents being ZIAM!!! it was a fun story that i really enjoyed reading lol my fav part might have actually been zayn and liam, i loved how they were written

Moments Like These Are To Die For by @fourdrunksluts / alienharrythis is one of those fics that sucked me in and spat me out afterwards and i keep thinking about it! months later i still think about this fic. it stayed with me and i love it. it’s an arranged marriage royalty au where harry and louis are from different packs and AHHHHHHHHH i love it so so so much. PLUS!!! THERE’S AN ACE CHARACTER!!! AN ACE CHARACTER IN AN A/B/O!?!?! I LOVE IT SO MUCH! so yeah this fic means a lot to me and i love it so much so please read it.

Your Touch Is The Only Thing I Feel by @2tiedships2 / 2tiedships2mel delves into touch depri here and i love that being explored! i felt like she did it in a different way than i’d seen it in other fics too, so i really like that as well. as usual, the relationship dynamics in her fics are spot on and hysterical while also making you just love every second. 

The light is coming by @pocketsunshineharry / ishiplouislisten. i have a soft spot for hurt/comfort, especially in a/b/o, and this fic just harnesses ALL OF THAT and makes it just. i can’t. i can’t say much more but i just loved this dynamic and how much louis just needed help and the war within himself and frustration with that but harry was patient and did what he could to help and it was just so great.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year series by @2tiedships2 / 2tiedships2louis and harry didn’t exactly have the best first meeting hahaha it’s okay, though, because niall is there to force them to be friends. this is a super fun christmassy/birthday style two part series that not only explores the up to the point of finding louis’ alpha, but also what comes after that. it’s a lot of fun and i loved it hehe

Do Not Falter (There's a Star Ahead) by @londonfoginacup / LadyLondonderryNESTING HARRY. NESTING OMEGA HARRY. NESTING OMEGA HARRY NEEDING A SAFE PLACE. MUTUAL PINING. CHRISTMAS EVE. AHHHHHH this fic is short and sweet and i want to sit and sink into harry’s nest. it evokes the same warmth and almost magical feel all of emmu’s fics do. i love it.

You Should Be Here With Me by @dimpled-halo / dimpled_haloexes to lovers at christmas with pining and miscommunication and bonding and ahhhhhhhhh. i don’t even know what more to say, other than jacky is queen of exes to lovers, so make it a/b/o and christmas themed and you know you’ve got gold on your hands.

Merry Birthday by @jaerie / jaerieSOULMARK A/B/O. where they don’t even realize they’ve met until afterwards so then they’ve gotta find each other again and it’s just. gosh it’s so great and it’s so much more than just a christmas fic, even though it’s that too, it extends beyond and i love it.

Let Me Feel Your Heartbeat by @angelichl / angelichli love that “louis tomlinson wears harry styles’ clothes” is a legit tag in ao3. anyway. this is another one of those tentative enemies to friends to lovers with heaps of miscommunication and pining and confusion and everything are thrown together when mating cycles come into play and i love it. gosh i love it so so much. it was a great way to kick off the new year with a/b/o haha

Leave Your Mark On Me by @fullonlarrie / FullOnLarriespeaking of kicking off the new year with some amazing a/b/o, lauren tried her hand at it and I LOVED IT. it had so many twists i did not anticipate and i loved it so much. it was as wonderfully written as hers always are and with her signature humor and feelings and development and i adored it.

so that’s what i’ve got for you! i hope you find some on here that you haven’t read yet and that you like them as much as i did! hit me up again in another six months and i’ll see what i can do with another a/b/o rec update hehehe

[takaraphoenix]

So, @kimmycup​ tagged me in this game. Let’s do this. Alternately titled:

Let me rant about the difference in receiving feedback on FFN vs AO3

Because I am really getting lost in the math behind “most popular” fic. And it’s most definitely more than just “reaching a different audience” when the feedback for one and the same fic differs between over 1k comments on one site vs not even reaching 100 comments on another site.

Author Name: Takara_Phoenix

Fandoms You Write For: Okay so let‘s only involve the ones I am still actively involved with, not the ones that are like... eight years old and I haven’t thought of them once, yeah? That’d be: Percy Jackson, Shadowhunters, Marvel, Rise of the Guardians/How to Train Your Dragon, Detective Conan/Magic Kaito, Vampire Academy, Jungle Book, DC Comics/the Arrowverse, Descendants

Where You Post: AO3 and FFN, but occasionally also on tumblr - when it’s prompts or drabbles

Most Popular One-Shot: Depends on where you ask. And what you define as popular. Personally, the only value I see are in comments - kudos are literally just the press of one button, they mean nothing, and hits aren’t an indicator of much either considering it counts as a hit even when you opt out after a paragraph.

I’ve only had my AO3 for five years now, meaning that the fics on FFN still had four more years to simmer on there and gather attention, I suppose. Meaning, a fic posted for the first time obviously gets more attention than a four years later mass repost on another site.

On AO3, the oneshit with most comment threads would be How to Court the Prettiest Omega Ever in Five Years or Less, my first PJO ABOverse fic, featuring Nicercy. Which, you know, is only 37 comments on there. Seriously I genuinely blame the existence of the kudo function for the overall lackluster comment-response on AO3 because “press one button vs actually writing words”... but that’s a different conversation to be had. (I mean, seriously, in comparison, this fic has 51 comments on FFN... and it is by far not the one with most comments I have over there).

The clear winner if you look at FFN is Something Went Wrong, my first Minotaur/Percy smut fest with a whooping 116 comments. And yes. Positive. Genuinely did not expect that when after weeks of debating, I decided to post this story. *chuckles* (Again, for comparison, this fic got a total of 8 comments on AO3... eight... the difference there is staggering... Which, I’d like to tag on that, on top of the kudo-nonsense, the fact that AO3 displays total amount of comments to the readers and not comment threads is also misleading and I don’t think it helps, because I think you’re more inclined if you see it’s only 8 comment-threads in total on a fic you like vs it showing you 16 comments as the total comment-count.)

Most Popular Multi-Chapter Story: THIS IS TOO HARD TO ANSWER. I’d have to consult my chart, but that hasn’t been updated in ages. Because overall amount of comments means little if you don’t also take into account the amount of chapters - 50 comments on a oneshot are a lot, 50 comments on a 5 chapter fic, not so much, and 50 comments on a 50 chapter is frustrating to receive.

Okay, let me go full nerd on this one. Y’all know I love charts. There was a time where I was interested enough in finding this out that I had a chart going of all my multiple chapter fics. With a collumn on how many chapters the story had at that point in time, how many total comments on AO3, how many total comments on FFN and what, by combining those two numbers and dividing them through the chapter-count, was the average amount of comments per chapter.

However, that chart had last been updated on December 31st 2016. There’s been a lot of influx, lot of new stories and other stories gaining/losing popularity, so when I now say Meet the di Angelos with a 2016 average of 57,25 comments/chapter, that is completely exclusing ten fics I wrote since then.

Damn now I really wanna update the charts...

Also if you can’t tell by now how much actual feedback and comments mean to me, I genuinely don’t know how else to convey it... xD”

If you go by total comment-count - which, again, is misleading because you gotta keep the chapter-count in mind - it’d be Chasing Fireflies on FFN with 1749 comments (on 102 chapters. And, again, for comparison, 88 comment-threads on AO3. 88 vs 1749 is insane) and Percy and the Ghost King of Summers High on AO3 with 749 comments (on 50 chapters. On FFN that’s actually on 990 comments. Far smaller difference here compared to other stories).

Though I dunno, if you measure popular by fanart received, Summers High comes in with five, while my Chasingverse is in with 6... and multiple fanfictions written for it.

Favorite Story You Wrote: Favorite to write, or favorite to reread? There’s a difference there. I’m insanely proud of Chasing Fireflies and the plot and world I created there, the character development. I... don’t really reread it it’s over 500k long I don’t have that time.

Currently, I am really loving The Primal Instinct, it is sooo much fun to write, I get to put basically all my favorite headcanons in there, I’ll get to write Aline and Helen more and Jace’s interactions with others, it features both my favorite OT3s at once. (And it is faaar from my most popular one. Just, feel like mentioning this because my numbers-obsession may read as only writing for comments, which I don’t, I mainly write for myself. The comments are just... very, very nice treats to receive. Also, I love numbers and charts and were curious to see if there is a kind of trend there in what does receive most attention sooo...)

Story You Were Nervous to Post: Uuuh every new thing. Every time I step outta my comfort zone. Trying out a new pairing for the first time. Venturing into a new fandom for the first time. Experimenting with a new kink and wondering if this would be too much. Literally every single time, still.

How Do You Choose Your Titles: On a whim. I suck at titles. Mostly I try to force alliterations because I am a sucker for alliterations, but otherwise I do try to go with “as it says on the tin”, or I try a pun/being clever. Aside from my Triton/Percy fics. Every single fic I’ve written for them is named after a song from Disney’s The Little Mermaid franchise and I have yet to run out of songtitles to use for fics and hey, by then they’ll probably have included a new song in the live-action remake so there’s that! :D

Do You Outline: Depends. Oneshots? No. I just write those. Multiple-chapter fics? ...Depends. xD

If I have a clear vision for where it’s going to go, I do tend to divide into chapters and make myself small notes on what goes into said chapters. Mostly, it’s just a rambled “and x happens and then y” at the end though and then I see how I can make it fit into chapters.

Complete: 795 stories on AO3! Damn, I’ve been busy.

In-Progress: As of right now, 4. Because this week features my Ace Awareness 7-parter, though technically we’re right now down to 3 multi-chapter fics because the next one is only due to be released and join the rotation!

Coming Soon/Not Yet Started: Well, that is two entirely different things now.

Coming Soon:

Shadowhunters, Asmodeus/Jace, “The Royal Consort of Edom” oneshot on the 23rd

Shadowhunters, Magnus/Alec/Jace, “Nesting 101″ oneshot on my birthday this Saturday

Percy Jackson, Nico/Percy, “Something Borrowed, Something Green” oneshot on the 30th

Shadowhunters, Magnus/Jace, “Dancing with the Monsters in the Night” an out-side-of-schedule oneshot for Halloween

And I do think that that is what constitutes “soon”.

Not Yet Started:

HTTYD/RotG, Hiccup/Jack, “The Origin of the Blue Hoodie”, planned for November 27th

Shadowhunters, Magnus/Jace, “Set-Up by the Guard-Cats”, planned for December 4th

Descendants/PJO, Nico/Percy, Ben/Carlos, Uma/Audrey, “Demigod Defenders of Auradon”, planned for December 11th

A-and that is as far as I have planned my schedule ahead. Those three are the only fics on my personal schedule that I haven’t started working on yet. I don’t like to plan ahead too much, because then you just completely lose interest in the story by the time you get around to actually writing it.

Do You Accept Prompts: Prompts, not so much. Requests, yeah. For one, prompts always seem so demanding, while requests are more polite - and also more structured. Prompts are always like “here have one quick trope thrown at your head” and like... I do have a well-enough planned-out schedule with more than enough fics of my own set, I don’t need to try and turn one random prompt into an actual story. But if someone has a specific request, a pairing and an actual plot, that they really wanna see, I do always hear them out, I may not always like the pitch and thus not accept them all, but on the overall I do accept requests.

More inclined to accept birthday requests than random requests, because random requests would be put into the rotation of my schedule and, well come on that shouldn’t be a surprise, they tend to be pushed off then in favor of fic ideas I came up with myself because there’s nearly always more enthusiasm about writing an idea that you came up with yourself than the idea of someone else. Whereas birthday requests have a set date that doesn’t disturb my schedule and I am a big softie who has a weakness for getting gifts myself so I do like to do something nice for someone so they get something special for their birthday.

Upcoming Story You Are Most Excited to Write: Most excited to write? Well, that’d be the Descendant/PJO crossover atm, because that is something very new and shiny and I do love shiny, new things to experiment on. But also The Prince of Pluto, my next multiple-chapter fic that I have already started writing.

Tagging: Whoever wants to do it! <3

[brokendevilwrites]

How would Popular Lexa Nerd Clarke both react if they broke up for a while? Ie like would lexa resorts to player Lexa? Maybe when their older.. Also do they leave town when they graduate? Maybe that affects them...?

I’ve answered something similar to this here and here.  The beautiful thing about fic is that while I enjoy keeping some things as realistic as I can, we can bend the rules a little to ensure our babies are happy and healthy and loved. We can build this whole incredible universe for them. However, because these two got together at a young age, an age where they’re still finding themselves, as they grow I do think they begin to bicker more as they navigate through life.

They live in the same city after school. Lexa attends one focusing on Law and Clarke goes for Journalism (though, again, don’t be surprised if this changes. I’m also happy to hear ideas from you guys). Lexa really finds herself in college; she mentioned that the biggest issue she had with school was that she was forced to learn things she didn’t care about. At college her education opens up, she begins taking an interest in more things and that’s, like, the biggest turn on ever for Clarke. Clarke also, in a weird twist, becomes more social. She surrounds herself with people of similar interests and finds her nights taken up with acoustic music in quaint little coffee bars and evening walks through the city with an expensive camera in her hand. Because of this they drift slightly and they come to the conclusion that just for a little while they need to be themselves, rather than Clarke or Lexa, but they’re a little less mature about it than Sunday’s Clexa during their break up…

Have 2500 words of them not knowing how to handle anything at all.

They break up on a Saturday and by Tuesday Lexa is waking up in Clarke’s dorm room. Again.

It’s how it always happens, it’s how it keeps happening and she knows nothing is going to change until one of them puts their foot down and actually does something to actively change it. Thoughts run wild in her mind as she shifts onto her side, her right hand lifting to trace her fingers down the curve of Clarke’s cheek while she lays next to her. Right now Clarke is the strongest that Lexa has ever seen her; with school, with friends, with standing up for what is right. College has opened doors for them that she never knew existed; only she didn’t realise some of those doors would mean she and Clarke would walk different paths. 

“You’re thinking about leaving, aren’t you?”

The pale sunrise coming through the curtains does absolutely nothing to hide the sadness of Clarke’s face, even with her eyes closed and blonde hair falling over her features. Her voice holds a heavy tone of resignation and knowledge. They’ve been here before and Lexa didn’t think they’d ever be that couple; the one who breaks up and gets back together over and over and over again. She doesn’t want to be that couple. She wants to be the couple that stays together forever, that survives through the highs and the lows. But college is busy and she works an evening job while Clarke works a day job and they both deserve more than one or two hours a week. 

But she can’t stay away.

And she can’t let herself give up this space next to Clarke long enough for someone else to fill it. 

“I don’t know what I’m thinking anymore,” she admits and her voice makes Clarke’s eyes open; the watery blue almost too much for Lexa to look at but she forces herself to keep looking. Bare legs move together beneath the covers and Lexa savours it, her skin on fire at each point of contact. “Clarke…”

“I know.”

“We’re pretty terrible at being broken up, huh?” 

Clarke buries her face into her pillow and Lexa misses her immediately, her body tense until she moves onto her back to finally confront a conversation they probably should have had before hurried kisses and desperate touches. Dark grey rings under blue eyes tell Lexa she didn’t sleep at all last night and she’s glad she isn’t the only one. “We’re pretty terrible at being together too,” Clarke whimpers and it feels like she’s been shot because that’s just not true. It’s just not fucking true. “God, Lexa.” 

“Don’t say that,” Lexa snaps and she ignores the glare she gets. Instead she lays back and let’s Clarke crawl over her to get out of the single bed. Her sleep shorts are mused and wrinkled and the old AC/DC t-shirt is riding up her stomach and there hasn’t been a more attractive Clarke to Lexa in a very long time. Heartbroken and full of love, messy and beautiful, adorably annoyed. “We’re amazing together and you know that.”

“Do we feel amazing right now?” 

Clarke’s biggest flaw that she doesn’t look at Lexa when they’re arguing; she always finds something else to do and Lexa gets out of the bed to glare at the back of Clarke’s head. “Obviously not but that might be because you broke up with me on Saturday. Again.”

“Because we deserve better than this, Lexa,” and, fuck, she’s crying. Clarke is crying and it’s not even seven in the morning. “I can’t keep doing this with you. I’m not strong enough. We’re either all in on this thing or we’re not. This limbo back and forth that we’re doing is too much and I thought that this was it on Saturday. When you walked away from me, I thought that was it and that we were actually over. And then you came last night and…Lexa, you make me weak. You know I’ve never been able to say no to you.” 

She turns to look at her and Lexa’s heart stops. She’s pretty sure that would be less painful than what she’s feeling right now anyway. “I know,” she whispers and she aches to reach out and touch Clarke, her fingers physically burn. “I think I’ve forgotten how to make you happy.” 

“I think you have too.”

And, oh.

Four emails come through to her at the same time and she ignores them. There is one from her professor, asking about her attendance, and others from various friends about work assignments. 

On the floor her clothes from work scatter between takeout cartons and college work. The bed is a mess of blankets that have been shoved against the wall and pillows that smell too much like her ex. Music plays softly through the speakers and Lexa just lets herself feel.

Outside of this room she’s composed. Besides not attending her last lecture, she thinks she’s pretty much kept it together fairly well. Anya’s apartment in the city is far enough away that nobody saw a broken girl walking the streets early on a Tuesday morning and when she appeared, two days later, she looked absolutely fine. Inside, her heart is ash. Inside, she’s broken. 

But nobody needs to know that.

“Do you want to go to ‘Mountain’ tonight?” Anya asks from the doorway, she’s leaning against the wood and her arms are folded but her eyes are concerned and Lexa kind of hates that. But she can’t deny the help. She can’t deny that when she came home and cried on the floor that it was Anya who helped; Anya who bundled her into the bath and ran warm water; Anya who washed her hair and soothed her. 

Lexa wonders who helped Clarke.

Wonders if Clarke even needed help.

“No,” she shrugs. She’s not incapable of being happy and she knows that, her happiness wasn’t dependent on Clarke and she knows they’re independent beings from one another. Clarke just made her happier. “I think Clarke’s there tonight and I just don’t want to have to deal with that.” 

“Deal with what? Both of you avoiding one another and spending the night not talking? It’s been two weeks at this point,” Anya grumps a little, her eyebrow raising at her friend. “Lexa, just come out. I get you’re kind of heartbroken and stuff but sitting in your room isn’t helping anyone. Come out for a bit and just leave when it’s too much, okay? But the only way to start getting out of this funk is by putting one foot in front of the other, so let’s get to stepping.” 

She leaves and Lexa wonders what the world would be like without Anya.

—

“She looks really hot,” Lincoln says and he’s so lucky he’s on the other side of the table because the punch Lexa was going to land on his nose would have been a lot harder than the slap to his thigh that Octavia gives him. “Sorry, but…” 

Four pairs of eyes look across the dance floor to the blonde. Hands in her hair, hips swaying, Clarke is the epitome of sexy and it seems everyone is noticing it. Everyone is appreciating it. Everyone but Lexa.

That isn’t her Clarke.

Clarke dances, yes. Clarke enjoys being with her friends, yes. But she’s not the center of attention; she doesn’t grind, doesn’t dance alone, doesn’t make a scene. Or, well, she didn’t. 

Torn between wanting to find out what’s happening and running out of the door, Lexa turns back to her drink. Her foot taps against the floor and she last an entire two lines of the song before she’s looking again at the giggling girl, her steps a stumble, her smile a little broken. 

She’s halfway across the dance floor before she knows what she’s doing.

“Clarke,” she breathes as she reaches her and at this distance she can see the glazed look in her eyes, the sweat on her skin. “What are you doing?”

“No, nope,” Clarke slurs and she stops dancing to glare at Lexa, her eyebrows meeting adorably. “Get out of my head.” 

And, oh.

—-

She’s not taken her pictures down is the first thing that Lexa notices. The second is her room is a lot more organised than her own. It’s tidy but Lexa smiles a little because her pillow is on the floor, the one she always uses, and she’s glad that she isn’t the only one. 

She places a bottle of water next to the bed as Clarke shuffles back into the  room. Her once curled hair hangs limp and there’s toothpaste at the corner of her lip but she falls into her bed before Lexa can comment. There’s a lot of noise as she shuffles under the covers and it makes Lexa giggle a little, even as her ashy heart tries beating again.

“Please don’t get that drunk again,” she says softly, well aware that she’s never been able to tell Clarke what to do. It’s funny to Lexa how often they play pretend at being adults but she hopes she’s smart enough for Clarke to follow her advice, as well-meaning but flawed as it is. “You scared me.”

“I thought it’d help. They do it in the movies.” 

“We’re not in a movie,” Lexa answers and she fiddles at her jacket zip. “If it was then I’d be over you in 90 minutes.” 

Clarke scoffs at that. “You’re not over me yet then?” 

“No.”

“Liar.”

She almost gives herself a headache at how hard she rolls her eyes. There is no way she’s getting into this conversation with a semi-drunk Clarke at this time in the morning. “Go to sleep, Clarke. You’re going to feel like shit in the morning.” 

“How many girls have you slept with since we’ve been broken up?”

And holy shit,that definitely wasn’t something Lexa was expecting. She didn’t even think that was something Clarke would think about. 

“Do you think I would do something like that to you?”

“Well, we’re not together.”

“But do you think I would?” She insists, irritated and hurt. “Clarke.”

“No, obviously not. I know you,” Clarke rubs at her eyes and Lexa hates it. Hates that this is who they are now, apparently. “But Luna said you’d move on to someone else because you moved on from Costia to me pretty easily.”

“I was never in love with Costia. We weren’t together and I didn’t plan my whole future with her. So no, Clarke, I haven’t moved on and I haven’t slept with anyone else. And fuck Luna for ever thinking she could say something like that to you.” 

Pain rushes through her body at having to explain that, at thinking that was something that went through Clarke’s mind, at people getting involved in things that weren’t any of their business. 

She feels sick.

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh,” Lexa mimics. “Drink your water.”

She doesn’t slam the door when she leaves but when the latch clicks it echoes in her mind. It’s over, it screams at her. It’s over, it’s over, it’s over. 

—–

Days pass and it turns into weeks. Snow begins to fall and the browns and reds and yellows of leaves fades to dark branches, which eases Lexa some. She remembers the crunch of leaves under her feet as her heart broke and she replaces the sound with the soft padding of snow instead as she works on fixing her pain.

Her phone stays silent but she still looks at it some nights, hoping for a text. The last one she received from Clarke was a “’thank you. I’m sorry…”’ the morning after she took her home. She didn’t reply.

Rumors circulate about Clarke and Luna but she ignores them. While it hurts, she trusts Clarke to move on to someone else when she’s ready and, even if she doesn’t want to know about it or even see it, Luna isn’t the worst person in the world. 

She’s halfway up the stairs to her and Anya’s apartment when she sees her and she stops completely. There’s a coffee cup at her feet and she’s wearing the cutest little beanie and Lexa’s heart jump starts, the ash from it clogging her throat and burning at her eyes.

“You know, Anya is home. You could have knocked.”

“I did,” Clarke chuckles, barely surprised by Lexa’s voice, and she stands slowly. “She shut the door in my face.”

Ah. That’s fair. 

“Not to rub it in but I think she unfollowed you on Instagram too,” Lexa smiles, reminding Clarke of the conversation from all those years ago. It feels strange directing her smile at the girl but oh God does it feel right. “What are you doing here?” 

Clarke sighs, takes a step forward. “Remember in high school and you told me I’m really bad at reading signals and that you were always waiting for me to make the first move?” 

“I guess.”

“Well, I figure that’s just who I am. I’ve been trying and trying to make the first move in getting over you and I’m failing miserably at it.” 

If there is a point to this, Lexa isn’t getting it. She adjusts her backpack on her shoulders as she waits but Clarke seems to have stopped, her bottom lip stuck between her teeth instead. “Well, sorry I guess?”

“No. Don’t be sorry,” Clarke frowns and Lexa takes the last few stops towards her, the snow on her boots melting into a little pile on the beige flooring. “I’ve been trying to figure out for so long how I’m supposed to get over you instead of figuring out how I’m supposed to make you fall in love with me again.” 

“Why?”

“Because even with the highest grades and good friends and my life on the track everyone says it should be on, I’m not complete. And I think it’s because I don’t have you. Truth is, as much as I don’t want to be cliche or one of those people I just really, really, really miss you. Us. And I need it back.”

Lexa shrugs, lips tight together in a pout. “Even if I don’t know how to make you happy?” 

“You’ve always made me happy,” Clarke defends. “I just got lost learning how to make myself happy and I’m sorry I ever made you feel like that. I understand if you don’t want this but in high school you once told me you were happy being friends and I want you to know that I’ll take that too. I want to be your friend again.”

“But you want more?”

“I’ll always want more but there’s no pressure,” she says and it is such a role reversal that it almost breaks Lexa. Almost. “Can we be friends and just go from there? I know I said we deserve more but, honestly, you always gave me the most and I think I forgot that somewhere along the way or took it for granted, and I’m sorry.”

For a few long seconds Lexa just looks at Clarke before she smiles, a slow smile that builds from the middle at works it way out. “Hi,” she says, pointing to the wall next to Clarke. “Can I sit here with you?” 

It’s the quickest Lexa has ever seen someone willingly sit on the floor of a hallway and she laughs, genuinely, for the first time in a long time. 

And, oh.

Happiness hasn’t felt this good in a long time.