#and then wove in the explanations about her situation

[bookshelf-in-progress]

How many times do I have to learn the lesson that I should start the story when the story starts instead of trying to tack on introductory worldbuilding?

Seriously. My instincts about when to start the story are almost never wrong. But I always assume the first scene in my imagination requires set-up that people outside of my imagination don't have. So I tack on an intro to set the mood and to set up the plot and characters and world. And it's boring. When I should have just started where I wanted to start so I could weave explanations into a scene where things are actually happening.

[nikodimopoulos]

Brows knit together as he listened to her explanation, noting the pain that laced her words. He knew the basics about her situation: that she'd once been connected to Dante, that she'd been a sex worker for some time now to help pay her mother's medical bills, that she somehow found her way to Los Santos and was now under their protection. Niko hadn't realized, though, the intricate web that wove it all together in the first place. Head tilted to the side as he observed her, observed the way he refused to meet his gaze -- guilt was something that ran thick through his veins, something he'd pushed aside for years to make himself a more effective solider, a more effective capo.

"You did what you had to do to survive." Niko offered, perhaps his way of extending comfort -- and honestly, he didn't know why he felt the need. "I've certainly done the same." Maybe the drinks were making him feel more human, maybe something in her words resonated with him, maybe --

The elevator suddenly rumbled, beginning to continue its journey upward after -- actually, Niko didn't know how long it had been since they'd gotten stuck. "Finally," he breathed, though a strange feeling washed over him -- was it disappointment? Shaking his head, he made his way to a standing position. "Took 'em long enough." The capo's gaze flickered between the elevator doors and MIkayla, suddenly feeling paranoid again. "You, uh, think you can get to your room okay?"

"You're right that I wouldn't have asked, but more because I wasn't raised in a barn than because I'm too nice," Mikayla replied with a soft chuckle. It was strange, the ease at which their conversation progressed now in comparison to even just the last few meetings they'd had, but she didn't mind it. The alcohol probably helped, and she could start to feel the warmth of it through her limbs, relaxing her even more. That is, until he asked her about her deal with Rio. She wasn't sure how much he had actually been told before he was assigned as her chauffer, but it was clear the message she had made clear to Rio about her wanting to make amends for what she had done before hadn't reached him.

She took in a deep breath, placing both hands into her lap as she prepared herself for what could inevitably walk back any progress they may have made that evening. "I was under the impression I was going to be working when Dante approached me. He knew who I was -- the real me -- and basically blackmailed me into feeding him information... He said between my work as an escort and a waitress, I was exposed to a lot of powerful people. At the time, I hadn't been in town for that long and I'd barely made any connections, so I agreed to save my own skin and take his money in the process to help pay off my house. Then people started dying."

She looked away then, unable to meet his gaze. "If I'd known what he was using the information for... I wouldn't have agreed to help him. I approached Matias initially, but Rio agreed to extend the deal I had with him: feed Dante false information to see if they could figure out who he was working for, and in exchange, he'd pay off my mortgage." She frowned. "I guess this is my way of making up for what I did."

[princessozera]

Haruhi Fujioka is the MC

When the letter arrives to her home, Haruhi thinks it's all an elaborate joke to announce the host club's next theme. Knowing how Tamaki could get, she decides to play along, signing the paper and forgetting it in her backpack, never noticing that it disappeared by itself.

Haruhi was getting ready for school like any other day, saying goodbye to her father as she opens the door to walk out- straight into the RAD student council room.

:)

It's too early for this shit.

Haruhi takes one look at the people lined up in front of her and immediately turns around to walk back through her door, but it's already gone. With quite literally no other option, she turns back around to look at RAD's student body council.

She's only half listen to Lord Diavolo extend pleasantries on behalf of all the students, and when Haruhi has nothing to add, he assumes she must be trying to process everything so he just pushes on with explaining where they were.

Haruhi had gotten a good look at the council room during Lord Diavolo's introductions, and cuts him off halfway through the explanation- "This is about the exchange program right? Living one year in the 'Devildom'?"

After getting confirmation, Haruhi immediately begins to apologize for the misunderstanding, trying to explain that she couldn't actually stay and she was expected back home for her regular school and her father didn't know where she'd gone, but it was all for naught. Diavolo wove off all of her worries, saying how a letter was left back at Haruhi's home, explaining her situation and promising to send bi-monthly reports on her school work and well being. All of her protests shot down, Haruhi reluctantly took the student code of conduct book and her new DDD, following Lucifer's instructions to call her new 'guardian'. He certainly made an impression on her.

"Oi, give me your money"

"Get your own"

This was going to be an interesting year.

For the most part, the story continues as normal. Haruhi came with experience of elitism and how to handle emotionally stunted people, so tackling the demon brothers' family trauma wasn't too much of a reach. Her level headed but blunt nature were perfect for surviving in the Devildom, but her way with people was best for the house of lamentation.

While Haruhi turned out not to be a descendant of Lilith, and figured out pretty early on that Belphie was murderous and up in the attic, but she took a different approach.

She did start to collect the brother's pacts (albeit accidentally at first), and after getting Satan's she came clean to them. She told Satan and Asmo first, about Belphie being locked up in the attic, and soon after told Mammon and Levi. She worked together with them to come up with a plan to confront Lucifer, and if they succeeded there, Diavolo.

It was risky, but eventually, everyone settled on a tense compromise and Belphegor was set free- albeit confined to the house of lamentation for 3 months (as long as it took him to stop actively putting Haruhi in harms way) until he was allowed back into demon society.

After quite the eventful year, Haruhi was excited to go home, even though she knew she'd miss the brothers and the other exchange students. As the glow of the transport portal, she finally realized that she was about to face something much more troubling than a year with demons- cleaning up the mess of having disappeared for a year.

"HARUHI!"

Haruhi didn't stand a chance, immediately being tackled to the ground by her father. It took everything she had to convince him to not call the police and that she was in fact okay- yes even without taking a duffle bag of clothes and no warning before disappearing off the grid for a year. Haruhi let her dad cling on to her for as long as he wanted, feeling how he doubted she'd returned, even as she sat there right next to him.

It was after a few hours of silence, sitting like this, that Ranka finally mentions that they should call the other members of the host club. To Haruhi's absolute horror, Ranka told her that even after the police gave up searching for her, the host club had put up a reward for any information on her, upping the reward for Haruhi's safe return every other month, and at this time the total amount was double the amount Haruhi had originally owed the host club.

With everyone present, it was Haruhi's turn to lie her heart out. manages to convince her father that she was safe, and apologizes profusely for not telling him about the elite exchange program she'd went off too, making a point to avoid mentioning that she'd lived for a year with 7 men and her life was constantly being threatened.

The host club, however, was not so easily convinced (well, Tamaki was, for a second). Kyoya had investigate the so called "Devildom" from the very beginning and knew such a country didn't exist. They figured Haruhi just wanted to soother her father's nerves, and let her. But the second they could pull her away, they demanded the REAL explanation.

Haruhi debated on either telling them the truth and seeming insane, or play into Stockholm syndrome before remembering she had proof in her DDD. Even Kyoya didn't have access to technology this advanced, but she still had to show them pictures of the Devildom, RAD, and the different events she'd attended throughout the year. When it seems like they still don't believe her, Haruhi decides on the spot to call Diavolo and convince him to let the entire host club be the next group of exchange humans.

It was actually easier to convince Lord Diavolo than she'd thought it would be, but this time they did have to plan their cover story out a bit since the disappearance of 6 super wealthy children was going to be more notorious than Haruhi's disappearance, but then it was official .

The host club was coming to the Devildom.

Haruhi gave them all advice on what to pack for their year and how the currency exchange worked, holding a mini seminar for the most important things she learned in her year so they wouldn't have to hard of a time.

When it was time for the host club to go to the Devildom for the exchange program, Haruhi used the opportunity to come back for a little bit to say hello to the brothers, Lord Diavolo, and Barbatos. She stayed in the background as Lord Diavolo gave the welcome speech, this time actually listening to it gave her a happy sort of nostalgia of her own time in the Devildom. Haruhi let everyone introduce themselves and heard the room arrangements before interrupting Lord Diavolo to say her goodbyes.

The bright smile he gave her sent chills down her spine, and she already knew she wouldn't like what he was about to say next.

"Oh, hasn't anyone told you? You've been accepted back for another year in the exchange program! Your room in the House of Lamentation is still untouched and ready for you to come back!"

:)

These damn rich people aristocracy

((Side note; When Mammon sees how much the host club was offering for Haruhi's safe return, he considers re-kidnapping them for the reward, just for a second.))

[kryptsune]

World Building Wednesday! ~Felldritch

🌼I got a request to do a WBW for Felldritch and since there have been updates to the overall world and lore I wanted to make sure this was all in a nice little package! If you have questions and want to learn more let me know the ask box is always open!  So let's get started! Oh and here is a link to the fic! FELLDRITCH

Felldritch

Classification: HorrorFELL

Cult  Alternate “Nicknames”:

Red: Saw Boss: Corvus

Gaster: Sephtis

Asriel: Saber Toriel: Ameria

Asgore: Kirnon

Undyne: Ryx Alphys: Vesh Muffet: Carmilla Grillby: Noire MTT: Faust

Doggo: Croix

Riverperson: Bastet (Tet)

Main Plot Synop: Felldritch takes place after a pacifist run by Frisk. The story briefly goes as follows. Frisk ends up in the Underworld (Underground) and befriends the monsters and wants to set them free. It is basically a way watered down version of WTU in essence. Once reaching the end of her journey the monsters refuse to let her be that final soul. They would rather wait and figure out something else but with her Determination she promises to return to them and set them free. At this point in time she is around 18-19. Asriel sacrifices himself to that end to see her leave through the barrier only for the humans to capture the poor girl after she leaves. They conclude that she is not mentally stable due to her insistence that monsters are real and throw her into an asylum/sanitarium to be “treated”. Nearly 5+ years later and she manages to escape finding herself once again in the Underworld only it is far different from what she remembers. At this point, she is questioning whether anything is real or not. After being “treated” for so long she doesn’t quite know which reality is the true one. As Red (aka Saw) points out:

The Brothers: 

Red: The younger brother of the two. His attachment to Frisk stems into more of a relationship though he blames himself for loosing her all those years ago. This psychological state causes him to throw himself into the problem that is befalling their world. At first nothing seems to combat this intrusive forest and horrifying beasts but he learns to utilize his magic in a different way. Prior to this he is what one would think of a a Red type but after meeting Frisk he promises to not only change his heart but also the hearts of others. Instead of destructive magical ability he follows in his brothers footsteps and takes up healing practice. 

In the world he is known as the merchant, the one that tends to give out healing items in exchange for coin but the bulk of his business relies on talismans or charms to ward off the evil plaguing their home. As far as they all know these magically infused charms are powerful and have incredible protective capabilities. He runs a wagon that travels around the entire Underworld.

In the current timeline he more sympathetic and empathetic. The concept of Kill or be Killed is no longer a factor. This is mainly about survival and for the most part the other monsters are aware that working together is their best option though their heightened paranoia (validly founded btw) makes it difficult sometimes. His personality is lighthearted on the surface, making jokes, and being a good guy. In a way he reminds me of Jester who tries not to dwell on what is going on but is fully aware of the situation. Red wears a blindfold in public to keep up appearances but he has no vision or eye light problems.

Boss: After Frisk’s departure from the Underworld, Boss, takes her words to heart. Unlike the majority of Fell Pap characterization he is very soft. When he feels his brother no longer needs his guidance he begins to feel purposeless until he learns that like his brother he has the magical ability for healing. As Red is the charm merchant of the two, Boss is the apothecary. His design harkens to plague doctors back in the 17th century. He grows all his own herbs and spices but he is particularly fond of tea. He also wears a blindfold just like Red but unlike Red he does in fact have damage to his left eye socket where the teal color of his eye lights no longer inhabits. 

The two combined help their fellow monsters as much as they can but in a world of uncertainty how are you supposed to know who to trust? 

Frisk’s Mental Demons: The psychological toll on Frisk is great as she has been told constantly that she made up her time in the Underworld in order to shut herself away into a fantasy world. A world where she had a family… where she is loved and wanted. This happens frequently as the “Doctors��� continuously try to refute her experiences or sensations medically.  Every time she goes to sleep in the Underworld she ends up back at the Asylum tied down kicking and screaming. 

She only wakes up again when she is sedated. Rinse and repeat. The question is… is it real? Or rather which is real. The doctors go on to state that her dark state of mind twisted her original concept behind her “family” making them this eldritch styled horror. He also goes onto explain that the reason she is so drawn and close to Red is that it is her “flirting with death”. That she is accepting that outcome because if she continues to resist treatment she will die and the moment she trusts him in her “fantasy” that will be the end. These kinds of situations happen a lot.

There are also instances when the lines between real and fiction are blurred as Frisk's behavior consists apparently of defensive aggression, auditory, visual, and olfactory hallucination, acute paranoia, anxiety, and PTSD. One such example of this is her apparent psychiatrist, Dr. Cyrus Reycroft, who happens to have an uncanny resemblance to her skeletal friend if he was human. 

The Beasts: Felldritch plays off Eldritch horror aka the fear of the unknown. As Frisk reunites with Red she is subjected to a rather concerning conversation in which he explains the situation they are in. He mentions having crossed into an upside down broken and colorless world which drew both himself and his older brother into. It is implied that the two stepped into a dimensional space that was able to then afflict those within their own dimension. Over time the inhabitants begin to go missing and great otherworldly hellish beasts begin appearing. The inhabitants come to the conclusion that these creatures can not afflict you with their corruption if you can not see, hear, or speak in their presence. This mindset has some rather gruesome implications as inhabitants become irrationally desperate mutilating themselves to adhere to the new "See no evil, Speak no evil, Hear no evil��.

The Occult World: The cult as I keep referring to it as is a group of powerful monsters. After the deposition of the King the other monsters begin to become influenced by outside sources. They begin to believe that any fallen humans are the angels of death and because of this they will kill humans on sight, of course, they want to live in denial of their horrible deeds because monster souls are supposed to be made up of love and kindness. Unlike the cult that wishes to break the barrier, the rest want to stay hidden from the beasts above believing that the humans are to blame for all that has happened.

The senses play a huge roll in this idea as the beasts are rumored to be able to use souls like puppets, as in spys, if they are corrupted. It essentially becomes like a hive mind with the main entity being able to see, hear, and speak through those it comes in contact with. It’s no secret that Red is in fact infected by this entity in some form as this is a quote from the fic:

A set of antlers snagged the velvety cape as he worked the metalwork to release its hold on the material around his throat.

Bony fingers tugged on the bunched up fabric and pulled it back, revealing a charcoal grey sweater underneath. It was soft to the touch but just hidden beneath the wool she caught a glimpse of off white colored bone. There were bits and pieces that had been chipped off, knicks, and cuts. Even before they had met Red had some scars especially around his collarbone but that was not what caused her to gasp. His hood remained over his head as if using it to shield his expression from her view, “See?” He flinched when her fingers traced some of the scars.

She didn’t want to appear like she was fearful of what she was witnessing but her fingers quivered, pulling them back toward herself. A soft whimper of a voice left her, “R...Red…” There intertwined with the magically composed vertebrae of his spine were branches. The same deep blackish red wood that plagued this entire forest. It wove itself through the bone engulfing portions of his ribs, twisting it into chilling patterns. If it was allowed to continue its infestation it would crack his ribcage open in a bloodless gaping fissure. She could just make out that gentle white and crimson glow shrouded by the wood. Was that his soul? There was no other explanation.

It looked like the branches were trying to worm their way toward that glowing heart, pierce it, and absorb it into its oily black, almost pulsating bark. That was only one singular aspect of horror that she was now subjected to. Her eyes followed the trail that crept through the bone following the knots and twists that crept up and underneath where his skull attached to his spine.

The grip that he kept on her hand only tightened while the other shifted to pull the hood off his skull. Her eyes widened, reddish-brown irises wavering within a sea of white. A hand rose to land on her mouth, now agape in a silent gasp. She could see the same strange bark that comprised his antlers exited straight out of his skull. There were fractures that radiated from above the temporal portion of his cranium in concentric circles. The same kind of patterning one would see from blunt force trauma. Only this had pushed out the bone externally rather than internally. His sockets no longer contained those ever dulling carmine eye lights as her own eyes traced the hairline cracks along his head. She could not imagine the kind of pain a transformation like that would have caused him. There were places where the bone had tried to heal and suture itself back together, forming around the bark.

Angel of Salvation (a.k.a. The Eldritch Horror)- What the cult has been working toward is summoning their “savior” with the help of the human souls they are bound to. It gives them extra abilities and power. Each within the ranks is bound to a human soul. Their leader ??? wants to use this power to summon an “angel.” It turns out that is actually an unholy amalgamated eldritch beast/god out for blood instead. Humanity will perish and the monsters will take control of the surface once more. That is the reality. (The cult including Red is told otherwise).

[muffindaddystyles]

Okay but vamp!harry x reader where the reader goes for a late night walk alone because she’s feeling anxious (Harry tries to insist on coming with but she says no) but soon he can sense somethings wrong and goes to look for her and finds her in a dangerous situation! I need protective vampire Harry 🥺

Disclaimer: Reader with ADHD, Vampire!H x fem!reader, cock warming.

Harry's been doing humanly things. Moreso trying for his little human whom he doesn't want to dissapoint when she's making ećlairs or pop tarts for him and all he knows is to eat them despite of being a helping hand. His fingers are magical —--- they relax her in the most livid way while he's feeding from her. Honestly, it's all she wants. Her making sweets for him and him pleasuring her in the most bizarre way.

But. Sometimes she get's emotionally exhausted that the physical activities looks like breaking a mountain for her and all she does is snuggle under the snoozy layers of her childhood blankets cuddling her cat to calm her down.

Now her tranquility is Harry.

It's one of those days. She's been feeling like a failure. An utter dimwit for not getting what's happening in her sociology class, why her neighbours are always grumpy with her and why she isn't able to study anything. It's depressing her.

Harry never left her side. She's like a honey gooed all over him not even letting him bring the pizzas he ordered for them, "Don't!" She squeaks in a weak voice catching his wrists and he sits back cupping the nape of her neck looking straight in her eyes to assure her with his whole existence, "'ey baby . . my sweet girl 'm not goin' anywhere. Delivery boy's been waiting outside -- just a mo', yeah?" He sponges a gentle kiss at her temple stroking her cheek to calm her down.

They've rented a VR receiver and alot of silver movies watching them while eating pizza. She giggles and Harry smiles goofily when he had to hit the receiver twice to make it work, "c'mon you should know how all of this work old man." He strides towards her pulling her up with armpits into his embrace and tickling hard.

"Old man huh!? Ol' ma —" He pretends to eat her whole and she squeals between her laughs, "'m sorry you're my man!" Huffs smugly giving her a breather and pecks her not twice but thrice. If he could kiss her all day. He would. She's his human. It surprises him sometimes when he's alone with his thoughts. He loves her to fucking bits and pieces.

When she's like this everyone and everything feels outta her reach. As if they're miles away from her and she's standing in barren cold. In the amidst of sappy movie she shrinks closer to him stuffing her face into his ribs wounding her leg around his abdomen and he makes her feel warm wrapping his arms around her to push her up on his thigh. Snapping his gaze down at her when the lil sniffs of her reached his ears, "What's wrong kitten . . . hurts to see ya like this baby. Love you so much." He never fails to promise that he loves her to core.

"'M jus . . . thinking tha –-- that when I'll die you'll be still here 'n . . . 'n y'would get so lonely." She hiccups without a break, "Dunno. Can't stop crying 'm sorry." She gives out an ugly sob into his chest. It's breaking his already feeble heart. God he could scream the affection to the moon he have for this girl. In such a tragic moment all she is thinking is about him.

He cups squishes both her cheeks with his calloused palms telling her to breath with slow gestures then when she's way better speaks in his softest voice, "My baby listen to me hmm? We're never thinking of future don't wan'ye to wreck ye'r beautiful brain for stupid deaths --- secondly too bad miss Y/N 'm gonna cling to ye like leech of your nightmares." He wipes her tears away ever so caringly and gives her eskimo kisses while she giggles snorting at the end when Harry brought his big goldfish orbs in the middle to make her laugh.

"'M glad to have you." She whispers smudging her wet lips softly against his's into a heart melting blood warming kiss and Harry shushes her when she whines clutching the hem of his sweater, "bite me? She asks politely rather than being batty as for she was being within past days rilling him upto extreme to get her neck and skin sprinkled with hickeys that turns into bites.

"Don't wanna hurt ye', lovie." He pushes her hair away peering down at her with pleading worried eyes, "you wouldn't. promise." He nods flushing her against his chest positioning her head into the crook of his neck. Making her hug him like a koala bear.

Rubs her back. Pats her hair. Sways her along him rather than the seductive warnings he used to give her. He's afraid. She's too fragile at the moment. He'd never forgive himself if something will happen to her, "'m gonna bite. Stop me if ye' don't want it o' hurts." He runs his palms at her sides making her all squirmy.

He pushes her fangs ever so gently to her sweet spot. If she's made of glass making her moan and tight her grip around him warming up his cock in his trousers. It's not always about you dumber. He scolds himself. Suckling lightly and pulling back in a pinch of moment. It's the first time he has almost pretended to drink from her. She's all sleepy in his hold. He carries her to bed and when tries to untangle himself so he could turn the telly off she whines not letting him.

Despite of these much blankets she's still feeling cold. From inside. It feels empty and she isn't liking it at all. Writhes and squirms causing Harry to ask, "ye okay there lovie'?" When she shakes her head with glassy eyes and a pout he understands.

"Cold." Is all she had to say and he's guessing the next, "in ye'r tummy?" When she bobs her head confirming he sighs softly pulling the elastic of his trousers down to free his dick getting rid of the item woving his calves with her, thighs between thighs and places a firm hand on her back moving his thumb into circles non-stop.

"Oh me lil dovlin' c'mere . . want me cock to warm ye up baby? 'S okay s' okay darlin'." He murmurs against her lips tugging at his foreskin hissing when the head of his thick cock gets pushed between their bellys due to approximty. Precome oozes from his strokes and he takes her panties off swiping his crown over her hole to lubricate her. Wounds his arm around the nape of her neck to lap at her mouth swallowing her whines and cries while sliding inside her compact walls twisting his stomach awfully, "shhh. shhh baby love. I got ya. Gonna take care of ye ---- try to sleep. I'll be waiting fo' ye in the morning." Once, situating himself deep and snug inside her. He keeps on embracing her like a little baby.

Next morning though she woke up happy. Harry made her brekkie. Special smiley pancakes with heart shaped eyes from the little strawberry toppings. He really took advantage of his time while she was snoring her ass off. A peach smoothie and cashewnuts. Fed Meowsie. Gave her his morning lovin'. They had the meal together.

He helped her learn some of her course. Then in afternoon made lunch together egg fried rice and stirred vegetables Y/N went to give some of it to their neighbours. Lady Nat asked her if she's okay cause she has stopped stomping in her flat and it made her feel good, weirdly.

//

Maybe it's seasonal sadness that she couldn't get out of it. Harry's in the kitchen cleaning up shelves when he hears the rustle of carpet. He peeks from the wall to find her pooling into a big hoodie and slipping into her shoes. He frowns throwing the rag away to walk towards her immediately, "where ye' goin' lovie? Ye' okay what happened?" He runs his hands over her shoulders to her hair making her meet his eyes.

She nods squeezing his wrists, "don't worry just wanna . . . take a walk — clear my head." Hearing this he quickly moves to wear his jacket.

"'M goin' with you." He declares and she knows if that'll happen she wouldn't be able to, "No. Alone." She fumbles with the strings of her hoodie. He sighs not fond of the idea brows knighting together thumbing at her jaw with concern screaming in his eyes.

"Can I mark you then?" He asks knowing what hides in the shadows of outside; creatures evil than his entire existence. He doesn't want to make her feel like she owes him explanations for her each and every movement but gosh does it scare him to his bones. She's the only person who could make him weak into knees and a mesh of puddle at the thought of even the thorn pricking her, "okie." She cranes her neck and it still amuses him she's exactly how she was when he first met her. That gentle rose under the moon meant for Harry to care and water with love.

After adorning her with a crimson mark and little peck he tugs her closer hooking his nose to her hair taking a good sniff of her cocoa scent, "keep your phone in ye' hand and don't walk through the cherry street." There's nothing there but stray dogs that she's afraid of. It's better he advises her.

"Ai. Ai captain!" She salutes him stomping her feet and he chuckles kissing her cheek wet-ly, "Go before I change me mind."

//

He wanted it not to creep it to his mind but it's not helping AT ALL. He's been restless and it's been fifteen minutes since she has left. He's sitting sunk into sofa with Meowsie snuggled under his chin while he shakes his knees, cracks his knuckles, combs his hair and groans into his palms. In short throwing tantrum like a toddler missing her already and constantly worrying about her. Something doesn't feel right at all. That gut wrenching horror of losing her biting him alive.

He mutters a fuck it going to look for her and bring her back home. He was right. He has always been. Good at instincts. For fuck's sake. He's a vampire!

Y/N was walking along the path which's the lead way to a park when a dark vibe gloomed over her head. The next she knows is she's being pinned to a wall with demonic eyes snatching at her soul: it takes her breath away outta horror.

"No wonder why Harry kisses the earth you walk on." He chuckles darkly accent an old Scottish and she gulps eyes stinging with tears, "I would to . . if I get to drink such sweet ripe blood." Her eyes widens when his fangs pokes out from his gums glistening under the lamp light.

She tries to kick him in balls to get rid of his painful grip when an angry growl echoes towards them loudly and the person who had her trapped wooshes from her sight in a bolt to ground making her shriek.

"She's not a fuckin' feeder stay the fuck away from her!!" Harry grits spitting venom. Choking the person under him, "tol' ya she's my girl and I'll shred everyone alive if they'll even breath in her direction." She has never seen him this furious. Tone harsh and snappy she never heard coming from him it makes her cry.

He had warned his fellows when the news of him spread that he has bonded to human. But well they've thick skulls.

The man under him just smirks pushing him away and coughing into his elbow standing up. "Whatever thought sharing is caring, Styles." Harry glares him resentfully. Fisting a punch at his side but stables himself when a dainty hand wraps around his fingers clutching tight.

He turns ducking down to her level cupping her cheeks and tries to examine her for any kind of injury, "ye' okay? Did he hurt you? Tell me and — " she rubs her nose with the sleeve of her hoodie shaking her head vigorously.

"No. 'M fine sorry should've listened to you." He puffs out a breath of guilt letting his forehead fall against her's, "don't be sorry -- it's none of ye'r fault baby."

"Glad you're safe." He whispers hugging her with the sway of bodies, "I love you." She tells him honestly tip-toeing to kiss him and it unfortunately reaches his silky jaw only.

"And all the things you do for me." He grins down at her. He lives on praises. The cheeky bastard.

"How about eatin' ice-cream while taking swings in the park?" He intertwines their hands warmly kissing her knuckles and she quips excitedly, "sounds great!"

.

AN: idk why read more button isn't working sorry for the bug.

[timeguardiansarchive]

Melody ought to known something was off the minute she let her eyes rove the imposing building. The architecture is something of a mystery. For such a large facility, there are very few windows. The few windows that existed, had bars over the windows. Something the ebony-haired princess inquired about. Phillipe insisted that the bars existed to protect them from the violent neighborhood gangs. It is a fact that Melody doesn't seem to question, for it seemed to make sense.

When Phillipe insisted she see this place as part of the Royal-Tour, how could Melody refuse? Especially when he talked incessantly about her meeting his dearly beloved grandmama. If she was going to marry him, she might as well get to know his family.

The halls feel a bit claustrophobic, and they boast none of the warmth or decor she had anticipated to find in a senior living facility. A cold chill rampages through her form as she hovers closer to Phillipe as they stop by the front desk. "Ask them what room your grandmama is in---" She whispers, feeling her discomfiture growing.

Phillipe's grin turns sharkish as he turned his eyes down upon her smaller form. "Oh, my grandmama's not here. She's been dead for ten years." He revels with no shades of remorse for misleading her.

"Then why did you bring me here?" Melody questions, bristling. She suspects there is a rational explanation like he wanted to show her where his grandmama spent a lot of time. But that hope dwindles the minute a few men in lab coats begin to close in around her.

Puzzlement and confusion befall Melody's features as she pulls herself closer to her fiance. Both intense emotions rapidly dwindle into a fathomless well of betrayal. "What is this?!" She demands through gritted teeth. "Phillipe, I want to go home. You're scaring me!"

Phillipe was grinning unabashedly, unperturbed by the precarious situation he had walked her into. "Why princess, don't you want to greet your royal subjects?"

No! No! "NO!" This is all wrong. "I command you to take me home!" Melody orders. "This isn't funny!!!" Her pitch changes to one filled with a desperation laced fervor.

How had she ever trusted someone so wicked and vile?

"Command?"Phillipe croons bemusedly. Melody had just unwittingly ambled into the tale he wove to get her committed. Turning to the nearest doctor, he hurriedly explains. "She has delusions of grandeur. Thinks she's a princess of a far off nation. Don't you, sweetheart?"

"Unhand me!" Mel snips, her voice losing its typical kindness and patience. "I AM A PRINCESS and I'm NOT staying here." She looks to Phillipe, expecting him to add the words 'just kidding', but he does not amend his tale.

She yanks her arm forcibly free and attempts to dart for the exits.

It seems Phillipe had anticipated the bolt for every path out of the place was barricaded by a body. "Be careful. She has a great propensity for violence. Why just the other day she wailed on my gardener just because he wasn't planting the pansies in the right place."

Melody has been left little choice, but she has to unwittingly prove his falsely conjured claims. She takes a few futile swings before being poked with something sharp. Muscles that had once been solid feel as though they liquify and she drops to the marbled floor. Though she can not will her body to react the way she requires it to, she is still hyper aware of what's happening at the desk and beside her. A part of her swears she saw a thick wad of money leaving Phillipe's hands and being pressed into a doctor's.

The sound of wheels glossing over the same surface she was resting her head on manages to garner her attention. A bed is being brought over to her. Had she imagined the prick and collapsed? Mel's mind begins to wonder. In all of the chaos, she misses Phillipe's giddy exit.

She finds herself powerless to resist as she's scooped up and wrestled into a strange, restraining jacket, flopped onto the rolled mattress and strapped down. There's a second shot. She only vaguely feels it this time.

The leering face of a doctor, accompanied by a light being shone in her eyes, are the last things she remembers before a descent into a relentless darkness.

_______-

Her lashes flicker open at the sound of steps beside her bedside. It's Phillipe. A dopey, dazed smile of relief sprawls across her parched lips. "Have you come to get me out?" She hoarsely murmurs as he brushes his fingers through her curls. The gesture could easily be mistaken for one of considerable affection especially, as he drags his knuckles sweetly down the globe of her cheek.

"Not yet, Melanie. You're still too sick and violent. I can't have you hurt yourself or others." He calmly answers. "I'm going to wait here with you for the doctor's report then I have to get back to work. Okay?"

Melanie? Considerable confusion warps her countenance at the unfamiliar name. "Phil, I-- I'm Mel-- Melody. Princess Melody. Don't-- don't you remember?" She stammers, though the assertion is lost under the same wave of fatigue tormenting her bones. Violent didn't sound right-- and she was SICK? Why couldn't she remember any of this?!

"You're wife Melanie needs to remain with us for a while. It's not yet safe to return her to society." A doctor breezily pronounces over her, having only given her chart a brief glance. "We'll up her medication intake. If she does well with that, we'll remove the restraints." Mel find herself groaning in protest which both men deliberately ignore.

When had she gotten married? When did she turn violent? She can not pinpoint any such moments...

..... likely cause they never truly existed.

Repetitively, for lord knows how long, the cycle seems to feed into itself till she can no longer distinguish what day it is or fact from fiction. Melanie is dangerous. Melanie is sick. Melanie must take her medicines when the cart comes around.

__________________

Finally, the bonds are released, and she is allowed to roam her windowless, white walled room. Her bare feet grace the marbled towel softly, as if she were little more than a long forgotten wraith. Panic kindles inside of her, warming and twisting her intestines into painfully tight coils. She can't stop herself from beckoning out-- utilizing her voice for the first time in lord only knows how long.

"Can you hear me? Hello?" The words threaten to strangle in her throat. She knows there will likely be no reply. The floor is a desert place except for the occasional screams and wails of other patients. Still, Mel tiredly braces herself against the wall before slinking her fatigued bones downwards.

“Hello?” Street hopes his voice is loud enough to make it through to her. “Can you hear me?”

Heated streams of silver slip down the curbs of her cheekbones at the sound of light wrapping. Perhaps, its rats, Mel reasons. However, the ebony-haired young woman remains hopeful, braced and listening for further sign. The voice that follows startles her. There's a man! Not just any man, a man who hears her. "Yes, yes. I hear you. I hear you very clearly." She cries in utter relief. If it is just a machination of the mind, she no longer cares. It beat being completely alone.

Porcelain hands grace the white dry-wall as she scoots herself closer to the sound. "Wh-- who are you?" Mel beckons after several moments of silence. Then she swallows a bit fearfully. "Are-- are you still alive?" Okay. So that's a stupid question but she can't think clearly above all of the medications she's being pushed. "Do-- do you know what day it is?" Sure. She is pressing her luck, but none of that seems to matter now.

can you hear me? hello? Mel uselessly calls. (Asylum au? For Street and Mel?)

@timeguardians (for Melody)

The room he had been locked in has no windows, leaving Street only able to guess at how many days have passed since the orderlies tossed him in here. Assuming that the medication cycle only comes once a day, it has been over a week since he arrived. Street suspects he is missing days, though. Two days after arriving here, he attempted to escape. He failed, and woke up strapped to the bed in his room while a nurse plunged a needle into his arm. He had no idea how much time passed before he became lucid again. That was five days ago, he thinks. Now he dutifully takes the medication when the orderly brings it in, and mimes swallowing it. As soon as he is alone, he spits the pills out, and tries to gather whatever information he can by listening at the door. So far, all he has learned is that this whole floor is classified—only a few staff members are allowed to work on it. A few more snippets he collects suggest that he is not the only sane person unwillingly trapped in this hospital. Locking unwanted enemies away in an asylum is a lot more efficient then killing them—no body to dispose of, no evidence to deal with, and who would think about looking for a missing person inside a psychiatric hospital? The information does him little good, though, without a way to share it with his team on the outside. At least he hopes Hondo and the rest of the guys are still free. If all of them are trapped in this surreal nightmare, then he really is in trouble. The medication round had been, it feels like, hours ago and no one is in the hallway for him to eavesdrop on. Flopping down on his bed, Street stares at the ceiling. He has to come up with a way to keep his sanity intact. What did the guys in Nam do when they were in solitary at the POW camps to keep their heads together? Before he can ponder the thought too much, he hears a voice on the other side of the wall. It is the first time he has heard another patient on this floor. Maybe he is just hallucinating it…

Street hesitates, knowing that if he is wrong he has likely just spend up his own descent into madness. Then he raps his knuckles lightly against the wall to catch the attention of the occupant in the other room. “Hello?” he hopes his voice is loud enough to make it through to her. “Can you hear me?”

[ratonnhhaketon]

Still Breathing

Read on Ao3 | Next Chapter

Summary: Six months after the defeat of Thanos, the world is still in chaos. The threat of the Flag Smashers combined with the new headstrong Captain America means it's time for Valencia Zicari to help save the world one more time. But, in doing so, she also has to pick up the pieces of a broken relationship.

Warnings: Major TFATWS spoilers, Swearing, Angst, Fluff, Slow-Burn, John Walker (just in general)

A/N: HHH, new fic time! TFATWS has been consuming my brain these past few weeks and it was only a matter of time before I made another oc and wrote for Bucky. I’ve had this in the works since the first episode but I’m super excited to finally be ready to start posting! This fic will be relatively short but I do also plan on doing a prequel fic eventually to further flush out my marvel oc, Valencia Zicari. I apologize that this starts off kinda slow, with just two phone calls at the beginning, but it will pick up a lot in the upcoming chapters. In the meantime if you have any questions or comments about the fic or Val’s story, don’t hesitate to send them my way! Hope you enjoy!

Chapter 1 - Your Number On Speed Dial

Bucky’s eyes shot open, his throat closing and lungs gasping for air. He felt the sweat covering his body, the thin blanket tangled between his legs. The cool metal of his dog tags swung against his chest as he sat up, chest heaving as he sucked in breaths and tried to regain his breathing. He looked around his surroundings, slowly calming down as he noticed he was in his apartment. 

Another goddamn nightmare. 

Realizing he was alone, Bucky instinctively reached up onto the chair next to him for his cellphone. He flipped open the phone, eyes squinting to adjust to the light of the small screen in front of him. He noticed the time, 3:08 am. While he knew that she would more than likely still be up and wouldn’t mind talking, he felt guilty for instinctively reaching out for her this late. Still, he let his hand press accept and after only two rings he heard her familiar voice pick up. 

“Hi Buck,” she said with a smile, exhaustion evident in her voice.

“Hi,” he replied with a hoarse voice, sleep still clinging to his vocal chords. “Shouldn’t you be asleep?” 

“I could ask you the same question,” she said with a small laugh. “But, yeah. Probably. I’ve been working my ass off trying to get in contact with Fury and nothing is working.”

“Not even through the SHIELD lines?”

She sighed, a hand coming up to rub at her temples. “I’ve tried, but he’s ‘on vacation’ and is only taking messages if they’re life or death.” 

“I mean, shouldn’t he be able to make an exception for you? Given, y’know..”

“Unfortunately I lost the ‘you’re my adoptive daughter’ privilege when I decided to grow up and join the Avengers.” Bucky chuckled in response, his nightmare finally starting to fade from the back of his mind. “I’m just.. worried about Wanda. The whole situation still isn’t sitting right with me, especially since any information has been classified and no one at all can access it.”

“Val,” Bucky said quietly, his metal hand coming up to rub against the chain hanging around his neck. “When was the last time you took a break?” 

He heard an audible sigh over the phone and a pause before she spoke up. “Not since half of the world disappeared.” 

“Well, how about this. Thursday, you finally put all of that aside for a few hours and we can grab lunch. I’ll buy.” 

She thought it over for a moment, Bucky’s breath hitching in his throat in the few seconds it took before she spoke up. “Yeah, that sounds nice. We can go to that sushi place you used to take me to.” 

“Sounds perfect, doll. I’ll see you then. Now go get some rest.” 

“You too, old man.” 

~~~~~

Valencia stood in the common room of the compound, a scowl present on her face as she watched the tv. John Walker’s Good Morning America interview was playing at a low volume. She hadn’t even met the man yet and already hated him. Partly because of how he talked about Steve without knowing the first thing about him, and partly because every journalist in the state of New York had been contacting her in an attempt to interview her about the new Captain America. Pulling her eyes away from the screen, she noticed her phone vibrating to announce an incoming call. She answered, a smile tugging at her lips for the first time in the past day. “Hey Bucky.”

“Hi,” he said shortly. She could feel the anger in his voice. “Have you seen the news?”

“Absolutely,” she replied, her scowl returning to her face. “Everyone has been bothering me about it for the past day. I had to tell Pepper that if one more reporter asked to take a statement from me I’d throw someone out of a window.”

“Jeez. Little harsh, don’t ya think?” 

“Probably,” she said with a small laugh. 

“Hey, have you talked to Sam recently?”

“Yeah, I was just talking to him earlier before you called. He was telling me about having to go to Munich today, something about the Flag Smashers? I don’t know, he didn’t really give me a lot of information.” 

“No, that's great. Thanks, doll. See you Thursday.” 

“Alright, Buck. See you then.” 

~~~~~

Any normal person would be astonished by the amount of trouble one person could get into in the span of 18 hours. But, in terms of being an Avenger, it’s just a normal Wednesday. Especially when it’s Sam and Bucky’s fault. But, Valencia still found a way to be freaking out when Pepper rushed into her room, shoving a phone into her face to announce that Bucky had a warrant out for his arrest. And had subsequently ended up in a Baltimore jail. 

In under an hour she had flown down to the city and found the facility Bucky was being held in. She pulled open the door to the jail, eyes quickly scanning the crowd of people before landing on Bucky’s literal partner in crime. 

She made a beeline straight for the dark haired man. “You want to explain to me what’s going on here, Sam Wilson?” Eyes narrowed, lips pulled into a tight line.

Upon seeing her he pushed himself out of his chair. “Val! How ya’ been? You been doing okay?”

“Oh cut the shit, Sam. You better have a good explanation for why I found out that Bucky not only had a warrant out for his arrest, but then ended up in a Baltimore jail leaving me to haul ass down here to figure out what in the hell is happening.” 

“First, I need you to calm down. Promise me you won’t freak out?” 

She glared at him. “Are you-” 

“Val,” he said in a stern tone. 

She let out a huff before nodding. “Alright, fine. I’m calm.”

“He helped me with that mission in Munich I told you about and then wanted to introduce me to someone in Baltimore. And he may have missed his therapy appointment in the process.”

“He missed-!” Val immediately yelled out, voice louder than anticipated, which drew the attention of the people around them. Sam put an arm around her shoulder and led the two of them over towards an unoccupied side of the room. “Sam, are you serious? He’s been doing so well! He put in so much effort to make sure he made the appointments and you let him go with you?”

“First of all, I told him repeatedly that I didn’t want him coming, but you know how stubborn he is.”

She let out a defeated sigh and dropped her hands to her sides. “So what do we do now?” 

“Well lucky for you they’re actually releasing him.” 

Before Val could reply she was cut off by the sound of heels clicking before a familiar voice spoke near them. “Sam. I’ve heard a lot about you.” She reached out to shake his hand. “I’m Dr. Raynor. I’m James’s therapist. It’s good to see you again, Valencia.” 

Val gave her a smile. “Good to see you too, doc.”

“So nice to meet you. You two already know each other?”

“I took Bucky to the first few of his appointments to make sure that he would, y’know, actually go. But that was before..” she waved a hand in the air, “everything.” 

Sam nodded. “Well thank you, Dr. Raynor, for getting him out.”

“Oh, that wasn’t me.” 

From across the room a booming voice spoke up, instantly grabbing their attention. “Christina!” The three of them all turned in unison and were met with none other than the new Captain America himself, taking pictures with a bunch of fans. “It’s great to see you again.” 

“You’ve got to be kidding me. You know him?” Sam spoke up with a frustrated sigh. 

“Yeah, we did some field ops back in the day.” 

“I heard you were working with Bucky, so I thought I’d step in.” Val watched as he approached the group, her arms instinctively crossing over her chest. “Miss Zicari, it’s nice to finally meet you. I’ve been trying to reach out for a formal introduction for several days now.”

“It’s Agent, actually. And unlike you I’ve had a lot of other pressing matters that required my attention.” 

“Right. Well, anyway. Bucky’s not gonna be following a strict schedule any longer.”

“What?”

“We haven’t finished our work. Who authorized this?”

“Um,” John used both hands to gesture up towards himself. “He’s too valuable of an asset to have tied up.” 

Val’s attention went from John to the sound of a metal door closing behind her. Her head turned towards the sound and she was met with none other than a familiar set of blue eyes side-eyeing the blonde man in front of her. She felt the corner of her mouth turn up in a half-smile as his head turned and saw hers. Almost instantly the token frown he wore at all times faded and turned into his own partial smile. She walked over to him, her arms finding their way around his neck subconsciously. “Hey, Buck,” she breathed as his arms wove around her middle, pulling their bodies flush together. 

“Hey to you too,” he said with a small laugh. “Pepper finally let you leave the compound?” 

She pulled away to look at him. “Less her letting me leave and more so her immediately getting me a flight and shoving me out the door when she found out you got arrested.”

“Alright lovebirds, break it up.” Dr. Raynor said from behind them. Val’s arms dropped to her side and before she had the chance to correct her, the woman spoke up again. “James, condition of your release, session now.” Bucky let out an audible groan, rolling his eyes slightly, to which Val couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle. “You too, Sam.”

“That’s okay, I’ll be out here with Val.”

“That wasn’t a request.” 

She pulled her phone from the pocket of her leather jacket and noticed an incoming call. “Just go, I’ll be outside. I gotta take this anyway.” Val walked outside of the jailhouse, sliding a thumb across the screen to answer the call in the process. She partially paid attention to what Pepper was telling her as the new Captain America walked past her, obviously checking her out with a side-eye as she leaned against the chipped bricks. Her eyes narrowed at him as he turned to steal another glance her way before turning her eyes away and down the opposite side of the road. 

“Yeah, he’s okay… no, I don’t know the specifics of how it works out with the pardon... I’ll keep you updated, but it doesn’t look like I’ll be back any time soon. I kinda feel like I’ll be joining the idiots on whatever they plan on doing next… Alright, I will. Keep me updated on the whole Westview situation and tell Morgan to stop stealing the snacks from my room. Oh, haha. Take care, Pepper.”  

As she hung up the phone she saw the door next to her swing open with a visibly angry Sam walking out of it. Bucky trudged out a few seconds later, looking angry but more upset than the man in front of him. As the door started to close behind him he saw Val and walked over to her.

“Do you think Steve was wrong about me?” She could tell he was fighting back tears by the way his voice cracked at the end.

Her hands cupped his face. “Bucky, no, absolutely not. Why would you say that?”

He looked away, not able to look her in the eye. After all the nights they spent together, her talking him down from a nightmare, reassuring him and chasing the negative thoughts away, he couldn’t admit that part of him still felt that same way. “It.. doesn’t matter.”

“If it’s making you this upset, then yes it does.” 

He let out a huff as her thumb began to lightly rub against the stubble on his cheek. “Sam shouldn’t have given up the shield.” 

“I know, Buck, I know. But there’s nothing we can do now, so let’s just try to figure out what’s happening with..” she lifted a hand from his face and used it to make vague gestures around them. “Everything right now.” 

The loud siren from a police cruiser halted their conversation, the sound making Val physically jump. She looked towards the source of the sound and scowled. This asshole again. “Gentlemen,” John’s eyes scanned Val’s figure quickly before adding, “and lady. Good to see you again.” Begrudgingly, she followed Sam and Bucky’s lead and walked towards the blonde haired man and his sidekick. “Look, if we divide ourselves we don’t stand a chance, you guys know that.” 

Sam crossed his arms over his chest. “So what do you got?”

“Should she be hearing this?” John gestured to Val. 

She scoffed. “I’m on board now, so out with it.” 

“Alright. Well the leader’s name is Karli Morgenthau. We’ve been targeting civilians that have been helping Karli move from place to place. They geotagged a location, then scrambled the signal. But our satellites have found their symbol popping up in various displaced communities all across Central and Eastern Europe. We think that she's taking the medicine she just stole to one of these camps.”

“Well there’s been hundreds of those put up across the planet since The Blip,” Valencia interjected. “So I guess you’ll have to look real hard.”

“Good thing I have 20/20 vision, huh?” John shot back, annoyance prevalent in his voice.

“Where is she now, Walker? Do you know?” Bucky spoke up, patience quickly being stretched thin.

“No, we don’t know, Bucky,” Walker’s voice rose dramatically. “It’s only a matter of time before we find out.” 

Bucky cocked his head to the side, eyes narrowing at the man in front of him. “Things are really tense for you, aren’t they Walker?” Val rested a gentle hand against Bucky’s chest, holding him back as a reminder not to do anything irrational- although she definitely wanted him to. 

Sam approached the super soldier, putting a hand in the air to further make him back off. “Take it easy. Look, Walker’s right. It is imperative that we find them and stop them. But you guys have rules of engagement and all kinds of authorizations you have to get. We're free agents. We're more.. flexible. So it wouldn't make sense for us to work with you.” 

The trio started to walk off before Walker stood up from the cruiser and spoke. “A word of advice, then.” The three of them turned to look at him once again. “Stay the hell out of my way.” 

Knowing that it wasn’t worth it to get a final word in, Sam put a hand on either of their shoulders and pushed them to keep walking away. Once they were a reasonable distance down the street, Val turned to Bucky and noticed he was deep in thought. “What’s on your mind, Buck?” she asked with a hand coming up to rest on his shoulder. 

“Well, I know what we have to do. When Isaiah said “my people”...” he trailed off, still staring ahead. 

“Oh, don’t take that to heart. That’s not what he meant-” Sam tried to correct him before Bucky cut him off. 

“No, he meant HYDRA.” He paused for a moment, feet coming to a stop as he looked between the pair next to him. “HYDRA used to be my people.” 

“Bucky,” Val spoke up cautiously.”

Sam scoffed. “Not a chance.” 

“Walker doesn’t have any leads.” 

“I know where you’re going with this, no.”

“He knows all of HYDRA’s secrets. Don’t you remember Siberia.” 

“Oh, you cannot be serious,” Val said as she dragged a tired hand over her face. 

“So you’re just gonna sit in a room with this guy?” 

Bucky hesitated for a moment, obviously not thinking about his idea that much ahead of time. “Y-yes.” 

Val sighed, shaking her head slightly. “Out of all your ideas, this has got to be the dumbest.” She looked at Sam, who shrugged his shoulders and nodded. “Fine. Let’s go see Zemo.”

[viciousbite]

@tvrningout​ asked: kaiya wakes to akaza’s hand upon her shoulder and his worried gaze staring down at her. it was just a dream, kaiya wants to reassure him. she wants to tell him she’s fine, that she’s sorry for troubling him, but the words are held hostage by her racing heart and gasps for air. it wasn’t just a dream; memories she’d rather forget wove together with her imagination, forcing her to relive a modified version of them that made kaiya’s stomach turn. she wants to forget -- why can’t she ever forget? just as fresh tears spill over her lashes, kaiya pulls akaza close, wrapping her arms around him and hiding her face against his shoulder. “ sorry, ” she manages to whisper. kaiya wants to provide more of an explanation, but it’s all she can offer as she wills away the images replaying in her mind. “ i’m sorry. ” // i still owed you from my inbox call! sorry it took so long ;n; not sorry that i decided to toss angst at you tho ; )

Her distress gained his attention. The side of him, which used to hide in a layer of carnage, worry for others. To see Kaiya make noises of discomfort in her sleep, Akaza couldn’t ignore it. When she woke up, his hand gave a reassuring squeeze upon her shoulder. He didn’t know what kind of nightmare she saw, if that was possible for a demon, but he could tell she wasn’t well. The tears in her eyes only confirmed it. He didn’t know what to do in the situation,  he was used to gasps of sickness, this one sounded more of an emotional occurrence.

He didn’t struggle from her arms, he leaned downwards, closer to her and let her do  what she felt like. He didn’t expect the words at all. Why was she sorry? She didn’t do anything wrong. Ah, he really didn’t know what to do when people cried other than go with what they desired. On this case, it seemed like comfort and closeness was what she wanted with the way she buried her face into his shoulder. “It’s okay, Kaiya...” He whispered out as he circled an arm around her and placed his tattooed hand against the back of her head.

“As long as you’re okay...?” He gave a questioning tone to his voice as his fingers began to pet along her hair in a comforting gesture. His body was cold as ever, so he couldn’t bring warmness to her in a bodily way, but he hoped his presence was enough to ease her mind.

“I’m here if you need to talk about it.” He reassured. “But you don’t have to if you prefer not to tell.” He added as he wrapped his remaining arm around her form to hold her closer. She may have given him his cursed memories back in the past, but surely she had her own tragedies. Tragedies that gave her nightmares, or memories that haunted her. Demons truly were tragic creatures, and they needed as much comfort as a human at their most vulnerable.

[bulkyphrase]

Everybody & the Avengers Team

I've got a new fic rec list for you!

The stories in the "X & the Avengers Team" tags focus on one person's relationship to the Avengers team as a whole. Courtesy of AO3's tag browse and Excel, here's a ranked list of the top 20 most popular pairings:

Tony Stark | 2470 total, 240 OTP

Peter Parker | 2255 total, 85 OTP

Steve Rogers | 602 total, 56 OTP

Loki | 387 total, 26 OTP

Natasha Romanov | 308 total, 35 OTP

Clint Barton | 268 total, 46 OTP

Bruce Banner | 244 total, 15 OTP

Thor | 209 total, 7 OTP

Avengers Team | 174 total, 24 OTP

James "Bucky" Barnes | 156 total, 7 OTP

Wanda Maximoff | 143 total, 4 OTP

Phil Coulson | 105 total, 9 OTP

Darcy Lewis | 91 total, 6 OTP

Matt Murdock | 60 total, 8 OTP

Sam Wilson | 53 total, 5 OTP

Nick Fury | 41 total, 5 OTP

Harry Potter | 40 total, 0 OTP

Pepper Potts | 31 total, 1 OTP

Vision | 29 total, 2 OTP

Stiles Stilinski | 25 total, 0 OTP

In chart form, if you like charts:

Notes:

The numbers after the names are the number of stories tagged with that ship. OTP means the number of stories where that is the only relationship tagged on the story. Numbers are accurate as of July 2021.

Story Recommendations

For your reading pleasure, included below is at least one fic rec for each pairing except the crossovers from non-Marvel fandoms (apologies to Mr. Potter & Mr. Stilinski). Most are gen fic, and even in the ones with a romantic pairing, romance is not the focus.

Tony Stark

As Subtle As Cognitive Recalibration by petroltogo (Teen, 8949) tumblr: @tonystarktogo

Standing inside his penthouse, listening to Rogers, Barton and Banner explain to Fury how they just happened to stumble over the Tesseract on a routine security check of Stark Tower’s roof and wouldn’t you know, they’ve managed to fight off the looming alien invasion before it could really start and secure the missing overpowered nightlight is one of the most surreal situations Tony has ever had the displeasure of experiencing.

Peter Parker

the worst field trip ever by shrill_fangirl_screaming (Teen, 3420) tumblr: @i-am-having-an-emotion

"We're on a field trip," Peter said. "To here. And Tony decided to be our tour guide and absolutely embarrass me, so can you please help get him under control?"

Which is how Peter Parker, architect of his own destruction, ended up with not one but two superhero pseudo-dads being annoying on his school field trip.

Steve Rogers

Do You Remember Being Happy? ('Cause I Sure Don't) by GalaxyThreads (Teen, 11022) tumblr: @galaxythreads

That seems about right. He doesn't know how he knows that, though. He does have vague memories of an annoyed fondness at finding peanut butter in some sort of jam. Thor's doing, because he doesn't see the point of using two knives when one works just as fine. He knows that. How does he know that? He knows all those little details, though, almost innately. How can he know these strangers so deeply?

Everyone else below the cut!

Loki

Proprietary by TheThirdMarauder (Teen, 7639)

No, Loki simply wants the Avengers conquered. The details of whom, how, and when matter not. Unless, of course, said details interfere with Loki's plans. Then, well, then none can fault him for protecting his own interests.

Loki has always been exceptionally good at lying to himself.

Natasha Romanov

What Girls Are Made Of by enigma731 (Teen, 4613) tumblr: @enigma731

She rolls her eyes but does as he’s indicated, using his shoulders to leverage herself up onto his back, her arms around his neck and her legs hugging his waist.

“You know,” he says blithely, “this isn’t really what I tend to picture when I think of a hot girl riding me.”

Natasha groans, deciding that if his sense of humor gets them arrested, she’ll kill him herself. “Just go.”

Clint Barton

Dear Clint Barton (circa age 7) by pollyrepeat (Teen, 4221)

With a normal person, this might count as blackmail material, but a) this is a case of mutually assured destruction if ever there was one, and b) Fury is immune to embarrassment. Not just in the regular, Tony Stark way, either, oh no. Things that could possibly end up being embarrassing to Fury get somehow warped and changed until they go from mortifying all the way over into useful and/or good for his image. It’s like a superpower.

Carrying Clint’s small child self around on his shoulders more than once has probably already hit the interagency rumour mill as an example of Fury’s innate awesomeness: good with rocket launchers and small children.

Also available as a podfic!

Bruce Banner

They're Not Wrong by Trumpeteer34 (Teen, 10163)

As Tony began to pace around the hole in the road to keep himself from shooting repulsors at the nearby buildings in a fit of rage, Thor began to study the nearby area. There was no sign of either the Hulk or Bruce Banner beyond the crater. The surrounding area, aside from the rubble of the fight, held no clue as to their friend’s location.

“Guys, he’s gone,” Tony growled into the communicator on their private line, drawing Thor out of his darkening thoughts. “Someone tranqed him and took him. He’s gone.”

Honorary mention goes to the Responsible Science series by @letteredlettered - the stories don’t have the "Avengers Team & Bruce Banner" tag, but they could, and they are amazing. The best Bruce Banner writing I've ever come across.

Thor

Fortunately, I Am Mighty by onward_came_the_meteors (General, 3062)

Steve was the first one to speak. “Are you okay?”

Thor nodded. Which was a bad idea, as it turned out, because now there were little gray lights flashing in front of his eyes. “I’m fine.” Absolutely everyone narrowed their eyes, and he added, “But, uh. Could we possibly not get back in the car just yet?”

Avengers Team

Civil Wasn't by onward_came_the_meteors (General, 7123)

"We're having an ideological conflict here," Tony stated with disbelief. "Are you telling me you still want to go out to dinner?"

"It's a standing engagement, Tony," Rhodey reminded him.

"Not you too—"

"We already had to reschedule from Friday when Natasha was..." Rhodey frowned. "What were you doing?"

The question was directed toward Natasha, who shrugged and said, "Spy stuff."

James "Bucky" Barnes

You Know How I Feel, aka, The Adventures of Bucky and Muffy the Dinosaur by ifeelbetter (Not Rated, 4511) tumblr: @ifeelbetterer

“As you may have heard, Bucky Barnes, a.k.a. The Winter Soldier, recently rescued a tiny part-robot dinosaur during the Avengers’ battle with Dr. Doom in Antarctica,” the other newscaster explained. “Pictures of Barnes and the dinosaur were posted on twitter by fellow Avenger, Clint Barton, a.k.a. Hawkeye, and immediately made Barnes’s new pet America’s sweetheart.”

“Her name’s Muffy,” said Steve."

Wanda Maximoff

and the woman was young again by Mira_Jade (General, 3669)

Tony Stark called them the Cap's Kooky Quintet, and sometimes the term amused her – causing her to lift a sardonic brow where someday a smile would truly smile. She enjoyed the presence of comrades – true comrades – and she enjoyed the way their minds wove and bound together about each other to fluctuate against her senses as one. There was something soothing about being in their midst, and even when their loud and brash ways – their painful Americaness - rubbed her raw and drained on her, it was ever the knitting of their minds that soothed those moments over, and made them inconsequential.

Phil Coulson

Coulson's First Day of School by storiesfortravellers (Teen, 3055)

Coulson looked up at him. “I like drawing pictures with Mr. Rogers. I like having tea parties with Ms. Potts. I like it when Dr. Banner reads me books, and I like it when Natasha teaches me things. And I like when you play with me. You do really good voices when we play action figures. And you’re the only one who lets me do stuff like jump off the high diving board at the pool or eat three cupcakes or play tackle with kids at the park.”

Clint didn’t realize that. He was pretty sure that meant that he was doing something wrong.

Darcy Lewis

Beginner Yoga for Dummies (Darcys) and Sad Hobos by chailover (Teen, 3434)

Darcy had a theory: crazy attracted crazy, working kind of like gravity. It was pretty much her explanation for her life after Thor. And if she had thought the type of crazy Thor attracted was bad, be it Loki or the Warrior Three and Sif, or the dark elves and the Convergence, it was still nothing against what the Avengers manage en masse.

Matt Murdock

Double Blind by smilebackwards (Teen, 2381) tumblr: @smilebackwards

Stark snaps his fingers. “You can’t see half of my inventions. This explains so much about you and why you’ve never been properly impressed by me.”

“Does it?” Matt says, ambiguously.

Sam Wilson

Bystander by scribblemetimbers (Teen, 52029)

“I just want you to know,” Sam says loudly, cautiously raising his hands, “That I’m very poor and very sleep-deprived and literally the only thing you can kill me for right now are my notes.” He pauses. Wait. On second thought: “Please don’t steal my notes.”

“I’m not—I’m not a mugger,” Not Mugger rasps out, and for all that he looks about to keel over and die, the man actually manages to sound offended.

Nick Fury

Bedtime Story by dixiehellcat (Teen, 2532) tumblr: @deehellcat

Fury snorted. “I have to check in with the duty officer. I’ll be back in, let’s say twenty minutes. I expect all of you to have whatever your pre-bedtime routines are completed, and be in here pajama’ed and ready to be read to.”

He tapped the book under his arm, then left with the usual dramatic swish of his long coat. Bruce scratched his head. “Did…he just say be ready to be read to?”

Pepper Potts

Pepper and the Avengers (Which She Knows Nothing About) by rebelmeg (General, 6696) tumblr: @rebelmeg

The Avengers, that mismatched group of hurt and heroism, was one of the most important things in Tony Stark’s life. So, naturally, Pepper had made them an important part of her life too.

Vision

039. Intoxicated by aimmyarrowshigh (Teen, 100) tumblr: @aimmyarrowshigh

It might be nice to fit in, just this once. To lose a bit of composure.

Vision floated over to the refrigerator and, with some timidity, pulled off a magnet. He stuck it to his forehead.

[gffa]

I was talking with @himboskywalker​ about Tolkien and fandom and fic, because I’m always curious where people’s “area” of the wider Legendarium are at, whether they’re a fan of the Dwarves or the Humans or the Elves or the Valar or what!  (As a surprise to absolutely no one, the Elves are where my heart is at, where I very much love the Noldor, but if you give me a choice I’m going to run over to that Sindar-centric fic every time.) Which got us onto the topic of fic recs, where, yes, I’ve done a LOT of Tolkien fic recs but I tend to read something of a wide variety and this is a list specifically aimed at those who are familiar with the wider Tolkien world, but haven’t really read much fic and want to know where to start! Other Recs First: - If you haven’t gotten further into Tolkien’s work (like say beyond the movies), I’ve done something of a primer here, which includes fic recs and brief explanations and links to videos that help explain some things.  It’s not as hard as it seems to get involved, honest! - Some other fic recs here, as an addition to the above. - My Tolkien blog (which I haven’t been on in awhile, though, I haven’t let it go in my heart yet) has, I’m not kidding, A LOT of fic recs, I did recs regularly for about three years, so it’s almost as massive as my collection of SW recs. If I Could Only Pick Three To Start You With: ✦ And What Happened After by thearrogantemu - This is the fic that took me from enjoying the Silm characters to diving face-first into really loving them, because it wove such an engaging story about the characters sailing to Aman at the end of LOTR, where various characters you wouldn’t think interacting would be as meaningful as they are, but the fic absolutely sells them on it.  Frodo and Feanor having a conversation about language?  Sam and Maglor sharing a boat to the West?  These things are amazing, as this is a fic about healing and what it means to sail into the Undying Lands.  Also, it has a Feanor and Fingolfin reunion that literally put tears in my eyes. ✦ Interrupted Journeys by ellisk - I’m generally not someone who does a lot of rereading of fic just because I have so many new ones to get to, but I’ve read my favorites in this series (parts 3 to 5 are my sweet spot especially) probably four times through now because “Elfling Legolas growing up in Greenwod with a whole cast of characters around him, as the Shadow so very, very slowly creeps towards them” may sound somewhat simple, but the worldbuilding here is off the scale.  The weaving in of how much the First Age and various Elven politics influenced Thranduil’s ruling of a Silvan people is a major theme, but it’s also good parents raising that precious Elfling right and he and his cousins+friends getting into all sorts of mischief, so it’s balanced between humor and drama in the exact amounts I want.  You can skip the first two fics and jump into the third if you like, which is when Legolas is introduced, but I enjoy the whole thing. ✦ Return to Aman OR Quenta Narquelion by bunn - I can’t pick between these two, they’re both incredible.  Return to Aman is basically “Elrond grabs Maglor and drags him to Aman with them” and it breaths such incredible lift into all the characters of Aman, it doesn’t negate the terrible things the Feanorians did, but neither does it negate Elrond’s love for them and his biological family, too.  It’s another fic that’s about healing and forgiveness and it made me glow to read it.  Quenta Narquelion is basically��“Feanor refused the call of Mandos after he died and everything started to snowball from there” and it’s an absolutely heartbreaking look at all our Problematic Fave Feanorians and how they were once good people trying to do the best they could, but bit by bit they slipped into the dark.  It’s especially amazing for capturing the complexities of Feanor, as he hovers over his children as a spirit and it really brought me around on his character. The Silmarillion and other First Age Batshit Faves: ✦ The Starlit Sky by Cirth is the fic that really made me get the potential of reading about Maedhros and Maglor raising Elrond and Elros, where it does such a fantastic job of showing that there was genuine affection there, even the midst of all the angst and trauma and pain.  You really get why Elrond could never give up on them, after reading this fic. ✦ In Courts of Living Stone by ncfan - “What if Maeglin never left Nan Elmoth and instead, several decades later, found himself on an errand to Menegroth and developed a relationship with Finduilas instead?” isn’t a fic I expected to capture my heart, but boy did it ever.  Beautiful characterization and beautiful writing, it really captured my imagination, but also gave me ALLLLLL the Maeglin feelings, as well as made me pine that this Finduilas couldn’t have been more common in fandom. ✦ naught but the shores and the sea by ncfan is more of Elrond and Maglor, where it’s an AU that has Elrond finding Maglor after the disastrous attempt to recover the Silmarils and I loved it a lot. ✦ The Crane Wife by Trebia is one that takes an underused character from Tolkien (Lalwen, in this case) and breathes this incredible life into her, gives her personality and joy and sorrow and meaning and, look, any fic that can convince me that Thranduil would marry a Noldo and utterly believe it, you know it’s well-written! The Second Age Is Kind of Quiet in Fandom But I Love It Regardless: ✦ The Art of Long-Distance Grandparenting by Kazaera is a lovely and bittersweet (but mostly lighter in tone) fic about the separation of the Sea between family members and does a wonderful job with Idril’s character, as she tries to stay connected to her grandchildren while being so distant from them and unable to see them, unless they choose to come to Aman.  There’s joy to be found here and it’s a lovely read. ✦ Relativity by French Pony is a lovely look at the final meeting between Elrond and Elros and strikes the right amount of bittersweetness, where it’s awkward and difficult and heartbreaking, but also feels natural and like this was how it was meant to be.  I had many, many Elven Twin feelings during the whole thing.  (I like all their fic, they’re worth checking out their other stuff for, too!) ✦ A Thing or Two About Elrond by Crookneck is a series of fics about Elrond and the various relationships he has--with Celebrian, with his children, with Gil-Galad, etc.--and I remember being really charmed by all of them and how much shit Elrond has seen over the course of his life. The Third Age, Lord of the Rings Version: ✦ Boromir's Return by Osheen Nevoy - This one is sort hard to summarize, but it’s basically “Boromir lives, makes a friend, and slowly changes everything about the LOTR plot”, but it’s so much more than that, where the worldbuilding is phenomenal, the pacing is incredible, it made me fall in love with Boromir as a character all over again, it contains probably the best portrayal of Denethor I’ve ever read in fandom, and I really loved the OC and so on.  It’s utterly engrossing and honestly I cannot recommend it highly enough, even if you’re not usually into this sort of thing. ✦ The River by Indigo Bunting is a fic where Legolas and Sam get separated from the others for a brief time and I love fics that take two characters who don’t interact much, throw them into an intense situation, and sees what happens.  It’s not precisely a light-hearted fic, it’s very intense, but it’ll make you fall in love with the sheer good in both characters and the friendship they develop.  It’s brilliantly written and I cannot recommend it enough. ✦ A Bit of Rope by Aiwendiel is a fic where Gandalf doesn’t fall at Moria and it changes everything--not necessarily for the better.  The slow, creeping sense of things changing, things going just a little bit worse here and there, until you realize how much darker the Fellowship’s journey could have been, was brilliantly done, and one I thought did justice to the idea, it’s not grimdark, there’s still light and hope here, but it makes you feel like, oh, maybe things happened as they did for a reason, even as hard as that seemed sometimes.  Gorgeously plotted and utterly engrossing. The Third Age, Mirkwood Version: ✦ daw the minstrel has an entire series of fics about Legolas growing up in Mirkwood and there’s absolutely a reason why she was one of the most well-known authors in that corner of fandom.  Her ability to create new characters (including two brothers for Legolas) was incredible, I cared so much about the family dynamics and got swept up in the drama (which was in a very loving family, but Legolas was definitely a mischief-seeker) and they’re fantastic.  If you find yourself in something of a stretch with too many OCs and your attention wavers, you can always skip around, they don’t have to be read in order and a lot of the non-canon characters can be skimmed over, imo. ✦ In a Field of Blood and Stone by ScribeofArda is so much better than what The Hobbit movies gave us of the Battle of Five Armies, it does such beautiful justice to the complicated character of Thranduil and Legolas, not sacrificing the warmth there for how difficult these times are and the war they find themselves in the middle of.  This Bard is also really engaging and fun to read--I read pretty much the entire novel’s worth in, like, a day or two because I could not put this one down. ✦ Swordplay and Swimming by cliodna_bright has an incredible meeting where Thranduil comes to visit Rivendell, runs into Elladan and Elrohir, who are young enough that they speak without thinking, and it’s not precisely a humor fic, but I was screaming the entire time because it’s so sharply written and so absolutely delightful, I LOVE IT. ✦ Deep and Crisp and Even by rivlee made me fall in love with how Elves and humans may look very similar, but there’s this sense of otherworldliness to the Elves, as shown through Bard’s eyes when he has a meeting with Thranduil.  Beautifully written and just the right amount of atmospheric. The Fourth Age Where Everything Actually Does Mostly Work Out: ✦ Far Horizons by Bodkin is the Fourth Age fic of my heart, where the various Elves that we came to know in Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit are all in Aman and decide to build their own realm there.  Which is difficult because Elven Politics even just amongst themselves, much less clashing with all the established politics of the other Elven realms in Aman!  But it’s a light-hearted fic (for the most part) that’s about healing and moving forward, balancing their ties to their history versus that Middle-Earth changed them, and I love it for soothing my soul.  (Thranduil sailed, you can’t tell me otherwise!!!)(Bonus moments of Glorfindel being pretty hilarious.)  I like all of bodkin’s work, but this one has a special place with me. ✦ Age of Healing by trollmela is one where Maedhros and Legolas have a conversation in Aman and it’s about the bittersweetness of healing and how difficult it is, taking two characters who would never have met in canon and weaving something entirely engaging and poignant out of it. Collections That Span The Ages: ✦ This Taste of Shadow by Mira_Jade - This is a collection of dozens of various shorter stories (or sometimes 10k “ficlets”) that you can largely skip around in if you have specific characters you like or you can just start at the beginning and read through.  It contains looks at pretty much everyone, from Maedhros to Galadriel to Thranduil to Elrond to Caranthir to Glorfindel to the Valar, etc.  I’ve enjoyed pretty much everything I’ve read in this collection! ✦ Fiondil's Tapestry and Tales from Vairë's Loom by Fiondil are in the same vein and I have really enjoyed everything I’ve read from both of them!  I especially remember that there was one chapter that had a scene between Thranduil and Cirdan and thinking, ahhhh, why has no one ever written that before!? as an example of the neat things it does.  But also lots about Elrond and Glorfindel and the Valar and so on! This probably doesn’t feel like a super extensive list, but those collection series will give you an excellent spanning of Elves, Humans, Dwarves, Hobbits, etc., not just the same central characters, but giving time to a lot of lesser focused ones as well.  Like, I feel I’ve read a fair chunk of Elwing fic, but I couldn’t point you to a specific one in my list of recs, which means I’m pretty sure it was in the collections ones or else she got some good scenes in one of the Aman-based fics, so I swear the above is at least a solid place to start for dipping one’s toe into Tolkien fic. AS ALWAYS, OTHER PEOPLE’S RECS ARE WELCOME, god knows I haven’t read anything in the last two years (and will have missed a lot even before that) and so I always need more recs, too!

[thecaffeinebookwarrior]

The Dos and Don’ts of Writing Smart Characters

Since I started this blog, one of the most common questions I’ve received has to do with the portrayal of intelligent characters.  This is also one of the most difficult to answer -- excluding questions about characters with specialized knowledge sets, which are fairly easy to answer with source compilations.  Most of the questions have to do with:  how do you portray a smart character believably?  How do you make the audience relate to them?  Can I still make them likable?  How do I avoid the pitfalls of popular media?

Well, I’m finally here to answer, utilizing examples from some of my favorite (and occasionally, not-so-favorite) media.  Let’s jump in to the dos and don’ts of smart characters!

1.  Do let the audience follow the character’s thought process.  

As demonstrated by:  Tommy Shelby from Peaky Blinders

Albert Einstein allegedly once said, “If you can’t explain it to a five-year-old, you don’t truly understand it.”  And the sentiment rings true:  true genius doesn’t need to dazzle with big words and technobabble.  Instead, it makes the complex appear simple.

The same rings true for brilliant characters.  BBC’s Sherlock (more on that later) ceased to satisfy in its later seasons because it began to rely too heavily on visual glitz to avoid actually explaining its mysteries and how they were solved.  Similarly, the biggest complaints with block buster franchises -- Star Wars, The Avengers, Game of Thrones -- is that they became obsessed with “subverting expectations” cleverly instead of leading the audiences to their most logical and satisfying conclusions.

Meanwhile, the smartest and most satisfying media dazzles not by staying over the audience’s head, but by illustrating how simplistic the solutions can be.

Let’s start with my boy Tommy Shelby, the charismatic, swaggering protagonist of the charismatic, swaggering crime drama Peaky Blinders.  Using only his intelligence (and complete disregard for his own life/suicidal tendencies, but that’s not the point here), Tommy claws his way up from the near-bottom of the social ladder (an impoverished Romani in early 20th century Birmingham) to being a decorated war hero, to being the leader of a feared razor gang, to dominating the race track business, to becoming a business mogul, to becoming a member of parliament and trying to assassinate the leader of the fascist party. He’s also one of the paramount reasons why I’m bisexual.

So how can such a drastic social climb be conveyed believably?  Because Tommy -- as the viewpoint character -- is placed in seemingly inescapable situations, and then proceeds to demonstrate that the solutions to those situations have been there the whole time.  I recently watched a brilliant video on how this is done, which can be viewed here.

Early in season one, for example, he responds to aggressive new methods by the police by organizing a mass-burning of paintings of the king, and uses the press this garners to publicly shame the methods of the chief inspector who’s been antagonizing him.  In the next season, he talks his way into a deal by bluffing that he planted a grenade in his rival’s distillery.  My personal favorite is in season four, when he responds to being outgunned by a larger, American gang by contacting their rival -- none other than an Alphonse Capone.

All of Tommy’s victories are satisfying, because they don’t come out of nowhere -- we have access to the same information he does, each victory is carefully foreshadowed, and we are reminded at every turn that failure is a very real possibility (more on that later.)  So when he wins, we’re cheering with him.

Other examples:  Mark Watney from The Martian, who explains science in its most simplistic terms and with infectious enthusiasm.  He would make every character on The Big Bang Theory cry.  

Also, Miss Fisher from the AMAZING Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries.  The dazzling, 1920s, female Sherlock Holmes of your dreams.  I cannot recommend it enough.

To apply this to your own writing:  Remember you won’t dazzle anyone if you smack them in the face with a “brilliant” plot twist.  They want to take a journey with your character, not be left in the dust.  

Also, for everyone in my askbox concerned that they’re not smart enough to write intelligent characters, just remember how simple the problems confronting smart characters can be.  Put them in a difficult situation, and provide them with a means of getting out.  Then, just let them find it. 

2.  Don’t assume the audience is too stupid to keep up (or try to make them feel too stupid to keep up.)

As demonstrated by:  Sherlock Holmes from BBC’s Sherlock.

Say what you will:  there were reasons why everyone was so captivated by this show during its first two seasons.  It felt fresh.  People had yet to become frustrated with the inescapable thirst for Benedict Cumberbatch.  The writing was sharp, and the editing clever.  And it wove a tantalizing web of mysteries that demanded solution.  The problem was, there weren’t any.

The most frustrating for many was how Sherlock faked his death at the end of season two, after which devoted fans spent two years creating intricate theories on how he might have pulled this off.  The creators responded by mocking this dedication in the opening episode of season three, by showing a fan club spinning outlandish theories (one of which included Sherlock and Moriarty kissing.)  This might have been laughed off -- at the time, many seemed to consider it quite funny -- if the creators had bothered to offer their own explanation of how Sherlock survived.  They didn’t.  And so began a seemingly endless loop of huge cliffhangers that promised -- and consistently failed to deliver -- satisfying answers.

The most egregious examples occur in season four, which provided answers to questions no one asked, and withheld answers for things everyone wanted to know.  For example, did you know that the real reason Moriarty engaged Sherlock is because he was hypnotized by Sherlock’s secret evil sister?  The same one who killed Sherlock’s best friend, whom Sherlock convinced himself was a dog?  Yes, that was a real plot point, in the climax of the series.  It’s an effort to befuddle the audience with brilliant and unexpected writing, but instead pulled them out of a story they were already invested in and made them far more critical of its pre-existing faults. 

It’s pointed out in the brilliant (if bluntly named) Sherlock Is Garbage, And Here’s Why that Moffat can be a great writer, but is a consistently terrible show runner, because he’s more interested in dazzling the audience with cleverness than actually telling a satisfying story.  The video also points out that the show often implied Sherlock’s brilliance, without ever letting the audience follow along with his actions or thought-process in a way that DEMONSTRATED his brilliance.  

I highly recommend giving the aforementioned video a watch, because it is not only a great explanation of how Sherlock Holmes can be best utilized, but about how writing itself can be best utilized.

Other examples:  The Big Bang Theory.  As Wisecrack points out in their wonderful video on the subject, the punchline of every joke is “oh look, these characters are smart nerds!” which is repetitious at best and downright insulting at worst.

How to avoid this in your writing:  Treat the audience as your equal.  You’re not trying to bedazzle them, you’re trying to take them on a journey with you.  Let them be delighted when you are.  Don’t constantly try to mislead them or hold intelligence over their head, and they will love you for it.  Also, cheap tricks do not yield a satisfying story:  readers will know when you went into a narrative without a plan, and they won’t appreciate it.

3.  Do remember that smart people can be kind and optimistic!

As demonstrated by:  Shuri from Black Panther.

Yes, brilliant people can be unhappy and isolated by their intelligence, or rejected by society.  But remember that intelligence isn’t synonymous with a cantankerous attitude, or an excuse to be a pugnacious ass to those around you!  

Part of the reason why Shuri of 2018′s Black Panther was such a breath of fresh air was the fact that she subverted almost all preconceptions about how a genius looks, acts, and regards the world.  And it’s not just the fact that she isn’t a sullen, middle-aged white man that makes her stand out:  Shuri has an effervescent attitude, and genuinely loves contributing to her country and family.  She referred to sound-proof boots as “sneakers” (and then explained the pun when her brother didn’t get it.)  She’s fashionable.  She teases her older brother, and cries when he is apparently killed.  She’s up on meme culture.  This makes her unlike pretty much every other genius portrayed in the MCU.

Except maybe the Hulk.  He can dab now.

Shuri is also allowed to take pride in her genius, and can be a bit insufferable about it, which makes her more enjoyable and rounded.  But she is an excellent example of how genius can be explored and portrayed in fiction, and I will forever be embittered that she was underutilized in Infinity War and Endgame.

Why, for example, are all geniuses portrayed as arrogant misanthropes?  Albert Einstein battled depression, but he is also said to have enjoyed blowing bubbles and watching puppet shows.  He was kind to those who knew him.  Similarly, Alan Turing behaved little like his fictional counterpart, described as “shy but outgoing,” with a love of being outdoors.  Nikola Tesla fell in love with a pigeon.  Why do we have to portray these people so damn gravely?

Other examples:  Spencer Reid from Criminal Minds.  Also an excellent portrayal of an intelligent person on the autism spectrum, as he struggles to interface socially but cares profusely for his fellow human beings.  He is brilliant, and completely precious.

Also, Sherlock Holmes -- the original version, and all faithful adaptations thereof.  Anyone who thinks Sherlock is an austere, antisocial jerk isn’t familiar with the original canon.  He blushed when Watson complimented his intelligence, for God’s sake. 

Then there’s Elle Woods from Legally Blonde and Marge from Fargo.  Brilliant, upbeat, optimistic geniuses.

To apply this to your own writing:  If you have a smart character who hates everyone around them for no identifiable reason, ask yourself why this is necessary and what this adds to the plot.  Are they angry about injustice, towards themselves or others?  Are they frustrated with an inability to relate to people?  Do they want to protect themselves or their family at all costs, including politeness?  If not, question why your brilliant character can’t also be kind to those around them.

4.  Don’t make your character perfect at everything they do.

As demonstrated by:  Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Ah, Wesley.  Some call him the original Mary Sue, and it’s one of the only times I’ve seen the term applied with some accuracy.  He is somehow the most gifted and least qualified person on The Enterprise.  He’s Hermione Granger without the charm, jumping in to answer questions before any of the trained officers in the room have the chance to, always in the right.�� His only obstacle?  Why, the boorish adults he’s surrounded with simply don’t understand his brilliance!

As early as the series’ very second episode, Wesley -- inebriated by an alien illness -- forcibly takes over the ship from Captain Picard, only to later save it from a threat with a reverse tractor beam of his own design.  

Wesley was obviously inserted as a means of attracting younger viewers, but failed egregiously, because he was too annoyingly perfect for kids to relate too, and not cool enough for them to be invested in.  I binge-watched the various Star Trek series in my youth for Spock, Data, and my wife Seven of Nine, not to watch seasoned military and scientific officers get lectured by an adolescent.  Even Wil Wheaton, who had the misfortune of portraying this character, expressed a dislike for him.  

Precocious children are great, if you get them right.  But get them wrong, and they can easily become your most annoying character, marring the face of otherwise great media.  The most important thing you can do for a brilliant character is endow them with weaknesses and flaws -- even something as small as Shuri’s fondness for teasing her older brother made her enjoyable, as anyone with siblings could relate to their dynamic.  

But, what if you want a supernaturally talented character who not only fails to be a ray of sunshine, but is something of an arrogant, antisocial jerk?  Can they still work, especially if they also happen to be a child? 

Yes, under one extremely important condition:

5.  Do keep your characters out of their depth!

As demonstrated by:  Number Five from Umbrella Academy.

Okay, he’s not exactly a child.  He’s a fifty-eight-year-old trapped in a child’s body, who’s traveled back in time from a post-apocalyptic future to warn his siblings of an incoming Armageddon.  In other news, Umbrella Academy is a weird show.  Unlike the comics, however, the apes don’t engage in prostitution. 

 The effect, however, remains the same:  a preternaturally talented child who talks down to everyone around him, including his (apparently) older siblings.  So why does he work while Wesley fails so egregiously?

For one thing, it’s demonstrated early on that Five has the skills to back up his sanctimonious attitude, with the delightfully ultraviolent Istanbul (Not Constantinople) sequence.  It also helps that he lacks Wesley’s squeaky-clean moral code, to the point at which he can get drunk in public or kill without remorse.  

But:  the element most vital to his success as a character is the fact that he’s kept completely, and consistently, out of his depth.  He knows the world will end in eight days, but he doesn’t know how this will transpire or how to stop it.  Ultimately, he fails again to stop the apocalypse, and must travel back in time with his siblings for another chance.  

Most authors have the impulse to demonstrate a character’s brilliance by allowing them to succeed against insurmountable odds, but the Umbrella Academy writers show tremendous wisdom in allowing Five to fail.  This allows the audience to empathize with him, and countermands the effects of his arrogant attitude.

This advice isn’t just true for pint-sized prodigies.  Look back over this list, and take notes of how often the most successful characters are allowed to fail, to have flaws, and to ascend past their comfort zone.  

Other examples:  Virtually every successful example on this list.

Tommy Shelby, a character of limitless ambition, conducts a new, perilous climb outside of his social rank each season, which almost always puts him in positions of mortal danger.  He faces threats both external (rival gangs, evil priests, and rising fascists) and internal (hello PTSD, suicidal tendencies, and crippling addiction) but either way, we understand that his fast-paced climb is not for the weak-willed or faint-hearted.  

Mark Watney is a brilliant scientist who has been stranded in an utterly impossible situation for which absolutely no one could be adequately prepared (spoilers:  it’s on Mars.)  We are drawn in by his plight, and how he could possibly escape from it, and there we come to admire him for his courage, optimism, and humor.

Shuri, though not the main character of Black Panther, is allowed to show off both tremendous gifts and vulnerability, as she is powerless to stop the apparent death of her beloved older brother.  She watches Wakanda’s takeover both as an innovator and a young woman, and a large reason for her success is that she is allowed to be both.  

How to apply this to your writing:  When portraying intelligent characters, take stock of how often they fail, their level of control over their surroundings, their vulnerability, and their flaws.  We don’t want to read about flawless deities.  We want to read about characters who embody and personify our humanity.  So remember they need to fall down in order to pull themselves up.

Happy writing, everybody! 

[hela-avenger]

poison & wine- part 32

Author: hela-avenger

Word Count: 1482

Summary: Prince Loki of Asgard is in need of a date to take back home. That’s where you come in with a task of your own to make the whole trip with an insufferable prince worth it. Too bad that things don’t always go as planned and you end up giving more than you can take. Fake-Dating AU.

A/N: Thanks for your comments, everyone! The last update certainly brought the drama and I know I broke some hearts but it will be resolved! I promise! Only three parts left! With some bonus scenes too! 

poison & wine masterlist

Loki had told you to leave. In fact, he yelled at you to leave. As if you had been a hindrance to him and perhaps you are for having convinced him to continue with the lie to this exact point. 

You’re stupid. 

Incredibly stupid to have thought that this could ever work. 

Loki did not love you. Maybe he cared, but he did not love you. You mistook his friendliness for love and now you were suffering the consequences.

You’re humiliated and worst of all you’re alone in a random hallway of the palace far away from the home that you know and love. A home that hadn’t made you suffer like your time spent in Asgard. 

Yes, you’re a half-breed, a demi-god, a girl split between two realms.

You’re also an orphan. A traveler with no sense of direction. A flower with no roots. 

Most importantly, you’re a heartbroken fool who thought that a royal prince could ever find you worthy of his love. 

You didn’t know where to go. You don’t know where you were meant to go. You were too focused on trying to keep the tears at bay to formulate a plan at the moment. All you desired at the moment was to leave this realm once and for all and forget everything that’s happened here.  

So why not? Why not leave the realm once and for all? It was what Loki desired just a day ago and for good reason. He had tried to spare you the heartbreak and you had still asked for it. 

You pick up your silk skirt once again and start to run. 

You somehow manage to find yourself back at the royal stables but any luck you had, which was not much to begin with in the first place, is all gone as the Lady Sif looks up at you in clear surprise.

“What are you doing here?” you ask. “Shouldn’t you be at the celebration like everyone else?”  

“Someone has to keep guard,” she answers before glancing at your gown. “What’s your excuse? Isn’t it for your honor?”

You don’t know how to respond. You may be upset but you weren’t ready to let all your feelings out to the first person you found. Especially to someone who showed her clear distaste to the man you loved. 

“I had to get out of there,” you answer. “I just… It’s not what it turned out to be.” 

“So you came to the stables?” she asks, confused. 

Your impromptu plan was falling apart all because of a nosy knight. 

“Look, I just came for a ride so if you don’t mind…” 

You try to move past her but she’s quick to catch your arm. 

“You’re very upset,” she notes. “What did Loki do?” 

“Why do you think he had something to do with this?” 

“Because I know him.” 

“Well, it’s clear that you don’t,” you argue. “He��� He did nothing. This was all me.” 

You let out a sigh knowing you wouldn’t get anywhere without revealing the truth. 

“I fell in love with him, and he didn’t,” you confess. “My heartbreak is my own to blame.” 

Surprisingly, Sif relents and lets you go. 

“I understand,” she whispers. “The princes have a certain allure, don’t they?” 

It takes you a second to realize who she’s referring to.

“Oh,” you answer. “You and…” 

“Yes, and we don’t have to speak about it,” Sif remarks sharply before softening. “I’m sure you don’t.” 

“I don’t,” you agree. “But I love him and he doesn’t which is why I can’t be here anymore. I have to get out of here.” 

“So where do you wish to go?” Sif asks as she pulls her horse out of the stable. “I’ll take you.” 

“The Bifrost,” you state ignoring her obvious surprise. “I wish to go home.” 

The moment you left the royal hall, Loki turned to his enraged father. He did not dare to offer an explanation until you were far enough away from the scene. Loki hated himself for having to raise his voice at you but it was better than the alternative. You didn’t deserve to be caught in the aftermath of his lie. You didn’t deserve to be hated by Asgard and incur Odin’s wrath because of him. 

“Tell the musicians to start,” Loki orders the nearby servant as he hands the case holding the apple for him to take. “And keep the guests away from the throne room.” 

With that order done, Loki turns to his silent and angry Odin. 

“My father and I wish to discuss in private.” 

Odin refrains from snapping at him as Frigga comes into his vision. Just a gentle touch from his wife seems to bring him back from the brink of disaster and allows for Odin to be led into the nearby throne room without uttering a word.

“Now, son,” Frigga begins calmly. “Please explain to us why you’ve caused such disruption on a day like this?”

Loki looked between his mother and Odin unsure of how to speak the truth he had evaded and ignored for so long. 

“I lied,” Loki states simply. “I’ve been lying to you this whole time. The courtship and now this engagement…” 

Loki pauses and looks at Odin with a sigh. 

“You were right,” he whispers. “I made a deal with her to fake a courtship with me and she accepted.”

He can’t help but laugh now, bitterly. It drove him mad trying to figure out when things had suddenly gone wrong. At what moment were fake emotions became real and true. 

“And now… Now, things have become such a mess,” Loki exhales as his dark humor fades away. “Such a mess and I have no idea how to fix it because I love her. I love her with my entire being and she doesn’t even know. She doesn’t know that I would follow her till the end of the universe if it meant I could be by her side always.” 

Loki turns away from them, his hands shaking, and he doesn’t know why he's confessed more than he had to. 

“I love her,” Loki whispers. “And because I love her, I couldn’t force her to take a bite from the Apple of Idunn. She already detests time for having taken her away from her family, a home, and… love. How could I let her take a bite of that apple when it is the last thing she wishes for herself?”

“It was not your decision to make…” 

Loki is surprised by this calm response from Odin prompting him to turn around to finally face him. His father’s wrath was gone, replaced by gentle understanding. As if the patient wisdom that Odin’s always described with finally made itself known in Loki’s presence. 

“The gift I offered was for the Lady Y/N,” Odin continues. “She should have been the one to accept or reject it, not you.” 

Loki opens his mouth to argue but Odin raises his hand to stop him before he could even utter a word. 

“No, no, it’s time for you to listen to me now,” Odin interrupts him. “I’ve known all along the game you were playing, Loki. The timing of it all was too convenient to be true, but the lies and stories you wove to explain it all were convincing. They were convincing because in brief moments of clarity you two were speaking the utmost truth about the way you perceived and felt for each other.” 

Odin glances over to Frigga who offers him a small smile. 

“When I spoke to Lady Y/N after the incident of your tournament match, a tactic I hoped to unveil the trickery you were pulling, she met me strong and unafraid. She further revealed the loyalty and trust she held for you as she defended you quite strongly.” 

“I already know this,” Loki tells him. 

“I know you do, but what you don’t know is what she told me afterward.” 

Loki waits for Odin to tell him but the Allfather remains silent. 

“What? What did she tell you?” 

“That, my son, is something you will have to hear from her,” Odin answers with a hidden smile. “I have spoken more than enough on her behalf. I believe it is time you have an audience with her. Tell her how you feel and allow her to do the same.” 

Loki doesn’t trust Odin’s genuineness in the situation but a glance to his mother reveals that he should as Frigga nods for him to go. 

“We will make excuses for you and Y/N’s absence in the hall,” Frigga tells him. “Go after her!” 

Loki doesn’t need to be told twice as he quickly runs out of the throne room in search of you. There were many places you could be hiding in, but Loki doesn’t get the chance to look at any of them as a flashing of lights on the horizon catches his attention. 

The Bifrost. 

You were already gone.

poison & wine tag: @damalseer @just-the-hiddles @jessiejunebug @nonsensicalobsessions @smollest-soybean @assassinoftheworld @readerbandit @doyoufeelikeayounggod @strangemcuvlogs @ha-tep @i-dont-know-eiither @gene-king @day-dreaming-fox @bn-studies @is-it-madness @devilbat @victor-criss-bish @skinny-macncheese @musicconversedance @baby-bunnyxn @fandoms-allovertheplace @marvelloonie @jinxjinxednova @queenmuahaha @accio-boys @eternalqueensworld @umlvk @roger-the-reindeer @punkrockhufflefluff @your-local-abyss @horsesandwolvesaremyanimals​ @rogerrhqpsody @imsad420 @pandacookieowo @justnerdystuffs @hanoi15​ @oneprolificqueen​ @nikki-who-likes-coffee​ @fandomrelative​ @nikki419ninja​ @onedollarduck​ @help-i-need-a-social-life​​ @ephemeraljade​ @catsladen @amwolowicz​ @captainmarvelnerd​ @thegirlbeyondtheuniverse​

Loki Tag: @unicorniorosacomefrutillas @thesilentbluesparrow @oddly-drawn-muse @josiehosiedaninja @hp-hogwartsexpress @sadwaywardkid @wolf-lover74 @sizzlingbarbarianglitter @sigyn-njorddottir @aoirohi​ @defunctcherrybomb​

All Works Tag: @jmb959 @astudyoftimeywimeystuff @hellocookiecutter @steve-rogers-personal-hell @buckybarnesyard @not-zari-tak @strangersstranger @thefridgeismybestie​ @moonlightprime

[dwellordream]

“Jeanne Boydston’s study of housework suggests another possible explanation for the tendency of parents to withdraw their daughters from domestic employ: the devaluation of housework itself as an activity of any economic value. The introduction of a cash economy into the interstices of post revolutionary American life meant that activities that did not customarily generate cash—including those myriad duties of domestic maintenance—became ‘‘invisible,’’ defined as something other than work both by those who did housework and by those who did not. 

Women themselves increasingly devalued the importance of their own work, as evidenced by Lydia Almy of Salem, Massachusetts, who ‘‘wove, attended to livestock, made cider, carted wood, tanned skins, took in boarders,’’ but nonetheless, recorded in her diary that she was disturbed to know that she was ‘‘in no way due any thing towards earning my living,’’ unlike her mariner husband. The increasing tendency to define housework as hardly work at all, because of its unwaged (or low-waged) character, influenced the calculations of parents as they made decisions about their daughters’ lives. 

Mary Virginia Terhune’s advice explicitly attributed a cash calculation— and an invidious distinction—to the attitudes of both daughters and their fathers toward daughters’ work, especially when girls had received educations. Fathers, she felt, imagined that ‘‘the labor of an educated woman,—especially if that woman is his child, and her scholastic education has cost him thousands of dollars—should . . . command a better market-price than that of an illiterate Celt, whose schooling cost nothing.’’ Daughters themselves might have adopted a wage theory of value to assess the value of their own labor, Terhune speculated. A middle-class daughter’s ‘‘time and strength are worth more than a seamstress’s, or chambermaid’s or cook’s wages. The world teems with seamstresses, chambermaids, and cooks, clamoring for the very work she abhors.’’ 

Frances Willard’s book of advice to girls put a different spin on the situation, based on a similar hierarchy of class. She urged middle-class daughters to aspire to higher work than housekeeping, arguing that opening a place for a domestic servant in their homes created a place for a destitute young woman who otherwise ‘‘might be tempted into paths of sin.’’ (Prostitutes themselves often compared the two vocations, to the disadvantage of housework.) Writing in the 1880s,Willard and Terhune did not lament the graduation of middle-class girls from housework; they seemed to agree that middle-class girls either had priced or should price themselves out of the market for domestic labor. 

…One of those who worked for her living was Ann Ware Winsor herself, who ran a school from their home and sought other ways to eke out the family’s subsistence. In a letter to her daughter the previous summer, she informed Annie of several schemes she had for making money; for one, the boys would raise chickens. ‘‘While they make money out of hens, I expect you girls to make it out of small fruits, and I have engaged a lot of plants to be delivered here in the Spring for you to cultivate!’’ Ann Ware Winsor assured her daughter that not only would it provide a welcome contribution to the family coffers, but ‘‘That’s the way out of head-aches and other ails. Read some books on the subject and you will grow enthusiastic.’’

Despite the economic worries of the Winsor family, however, only one child, a middle son, actually worked at a paid job outside the home in 1880: seventeen-year-old Paul was a clerk at the railroad office. The eldest, Robert, was in college, and all the rest were in school, including nineteen-year-old Mary and fifteen-year-old Annie. Presumably the ‘‘opportunity costs’’ of educating the girls were low enough that it weighed against sacrificing their education. Family calculations also suggested that the daughters’ extra energies would be better used in assisting in teaching in their mother’s school than in doing housework. For the 1880 census indicated that the Winsor family employed three female servants. (Annie’s private journal recorded cryptically, ‘‘Maids are an abomination for children.’’) 

…The growth of the market economy during the course of the nineteenth century meant that girls as well as their parents felt the need of cash. Those without access to cash sought strategies to make some, whatever their attitudes toward women’s wage work as a social development. Away at school in the cash-poor South, and largely abandoned as well by her father, Mary Thomas fantasized about alternative lives. In one of them she sold things, ‘‘for I mean to work a patch next year and make some money, if I don’t have to come back to school; and then at Christmas, I will have a right good lot of money to do as I please with, I think I shall get a watch with it.’’ Despite her clear disdain elsewhere in her diary for the notion of working for a living, Mary Thomas was willing to countenance work for wages in order to be able to participate in a consumer economy. 

A fourteen-year-old subscriber to the youth magazine Harper’s Young People reported that she had earned the money for her subscription herself ‘‘by sewing for the black people.’’ She reported that she had to sew ‘‘very cheaply, because they are so poor’’; presumably her low wages also reflected her low level of skill. A correspondent to St. Nicholas also reported that she and her brother had earned the money for their subscription themselves—in this case by selling hickory nuts and onions. Elite girls came late to money earning. Mary Virginia Terhune charged late Victorian parents with discriminating against girls in their differential training in the basics of money management. 

‘‘Jack raises chickens and sells the eggs and ‘broilers’ to Mamma. Willy splits kindling-wood for the kitchenfire and draws his lawful wages from Papa as would any other laborer. Mamie comes down to breakfast, as gay as the morning, hair bound with a blue ribbon that matches her eyes, waltzes up to Papa, in a gale of affectionate glee, throws her arms around his neck and begs for a kiss. She gets two and a gold dollar, fished up from the vest-pocket nearest the paternal heart—‘because she looks so pretty today.’’’ Terhune’s charge that girls were not given experience managing money had some basis. 

Women were not paid wages for housework; instead, their work was supposed to come ‘‘from the heart,’’ and to be inspired by devotion to the family good. To the extent that girls shared in their mothers’ lots, they too were encouraged to dust, to make beds, and to shell peas not as entrepreneurs but as part of their responsibilities to womanly service. However, just as housewives made some cash through the nineteenth century for a variety of home manufactures, girls too might learn to work for profit in performing those home tasks still considered ‘‘productive.’’ 

…Good parents saw to it that daughters had some skills in handling their own money—and because few urban girls had the money-making possibilities available to Margaret Tileston on her family’s farm, some of them began to receive small sums in the form of a regular allowance. An 1897 study on ‘‘Children’s Sense of Money’’ found that 7 percent of all girls were given a regular allowance. Jessie Wendover, the daughter of a prospering Newark grocer, was one. At the age of nine in 1881, she received ten cents a week allowance, which was raised to twenty-five cents by the time she was fourteen. She kept a careful account of every expenditure. 

At fourteen, her expenditures included an occasional soda water (ten cents), ice cream, Sunday school donation (five cents), a variety of school supplies, carfare, ribbons, music. Although she was not usually responsible for buying her own clothes, she also recorded paying twenty-five cents several times for a bustle, perhaps because it was not encouraged by her mother, or more likely because it was one of the few ready-made items in her wardrobe. She paid for her own magazine subscription to St. Nicholas, $2.75, or nearly three months’ allowance. As befitted her regular habits, Jessie Wendover customarily carried a balance of $5 or so from month to month, except when depleted by the Christmas season. 

By 1887, when Wendover was fifteen, she was receiving fifty cents a week, and recorded paying twenty-five cents ‘‘to see picture ‘Christ on Calvary.’’’ At sixteen, she developed a taste for milkshakes, a habit of occasionally eating lunch out, and a preference for having her bangs cut by a salon. Chewing gum, peanuts, and marshmallows made their appearance in her accounts in the summer of 1888, but so did regular contributions to the missionary box, and in the fall, a donation for yellow fever sufferers. The following year she noted frequent small outlays for hokeypoky—ice cream—and she once spent seventy-five cents to have her hair shampooed. 

But in October of that year she was sufficiently ahead to deposit $3.00 in the bank, and in September of 1892, her twentieth year, $20.00. Clearly Jessie Wendover’s ample allowance and her own prudence allowed her early to learn not only how to spend money and account for it but also how to save it—all important lessons for bourgeois helpmates. Another pattern though seemed to be gaining currency at the same time. Increasingly, household chores began to creep in as part of the way that parents justified giving money to youth. 

…Occasionally, and unevenly, girls’ diaries began to suggest that they themselves were beginning to expect and to receive wages for work done for their families. Marian Nichols reported receiving wages for family sewing. ‘‘Worked on some drawers for Margaret. Mamma is to pay 30 cts a pair for them.’’ The next year she reported that she was even getting paid for exercise. ‘‘Went to school. Walked in and out by myself. Rosy doesn’t like my getting money from walking out. I get 3 cts.’’ Jane Addams’s father paid her for every volume of Plutarch she read and reported on, as well as for every volume of such things as Irving’s Life of Washington, ‘‘after the manner of Victorian fathers,’’ according to Anne Scott.

The custom of paying daughters for their work in the bourgeois family suggested a new approach to girls as well as to family economics. The same study that tracked the development of the ‘‘allowance’’ also discovered that fully a quarter of all girls reported making money for doing housework. It is no wonder that girls increasingly began to resist doing housework as part of their womanly lot that others were getting paid to do. Giving girls allowances was good Victorian practice—encouraging regularity of habits, responsibility, careful accounting, and prudence. 

Yet in its tendency to evolve into a quid pro quo for performing household and other kinds of chores it contributed to a radical new notion well expressed in the economic writings of Charlotte Perkins Gilman—the notion that daughters, if not their mothers, were autonomous economic beings in control of their own labor, and able to exchange it for currency. When Victorian fathers paid their daughters wages for housework, they were laying the seeds of turn-of-the-century rebellions against conventional notions of female self-sacrifice as woman’s natural lot.”

- Jane H. Hunter, “Daughters’ Lives and the Work of the Middle-Class Home.” in How Young Ladies Became Girls: The Victorian Origins of American Girlhood

[hadestownmodern]

“Will You Help Me?”

apparently I don’t know how to post on this blog technology baffles me sometimes. mmmmm I was going to wait and post but god, I love Demeter, i’m full of yearning this day 11 of quarantine, and I would lay down my life for her happiness. Here is my public declaration: Young Demeter could get it.

----------

              “So…you’re sure you want to do this.”

              She’d made her request a week ago, as she’d taken him through her nana’s house and admitted the longing within her heart. He’d let the words sink in at first, watched this figure of gentle beauty lean awkwardly against the counter. The words had come tumbling from her lips before she could take them back, truly think of a way to ask him that was more well-crafted than the simple

              “Will you help me have a baby?”

              There’d been an innocence in her voice, a pleading wish hidden between the shrug of her shoulders, the bite of her bottom lip. The request did not come easily. She’d confessed her wish, the wanting that had been consuming her every thought and the inability to make the certainty of her future come to truth on her own. And within that; within the unease of the situation and the vision of her thin frame with a rounded belly and the glow of pure peace, he’d been unable to say no. It was there, in the tiny relic of a farmhouse, that Theo had been wrapped in the intoxication of her pure, wild-hearted nature.

              On this unseasonably warm fall day he’d come in the new nature of their own routine. They’d been hanging around together every day since then, although the unorthodox nature of their agreement existed unwaveringly in the space around them each time. She hadn’t brought it up since that day, had filled their conversation with the trial of her mother’s disapproval at her move to the country, the busy nature of Theo growing his family’s business. He wove her fanciful tales of the hives they watched to distract her from it all, which queen would be overthrown, which hive held the hardest working bees and which seemed to do nothing more than sit uselessly.

              He tells her now about her favorite hive, one she’d gotten to see a few days before, with a queen she’d declared the best of them all. He makes it light, brings forth a tone of humanity to his work. He declares the inevitable uprising of her workers-she disagrees lightheartedly. There’s a pause in his story and Demeter takes in a breath of air through her nose, sighing audibly as she turns her earthy eyes toward him.

              “So…you’re sure you want to do this?”

“As sure as I’ve been every time my best friend has asked me to help them make a baby.”

              “It’s not funny, T.” She betrays herself in an unhidden smile, the very nature of her own request sounding nothing short of ridiculous when spoken in the air between them. The day is sweet, warm for the impending chill October typically brings. They are surrounded by the yellows and oranges of the season, patches of magnificent goldenrod and tiny white aster. He’d brought her honey-laced scones and she’d spread a fresh compote of hand-picked figs, sitting atop an old quilted blanket she’d made with haphazardly placed fabric scraps. There’s a gentle wash of peace in the moment, Demeter laying contentedly in the last golden hour of sunlight as Theo lounges casually, picking at the grass as he speaks.

              “I mean it; I want to help you.” A tinge of affection is settled within his low-toned voice, makes her eyes linger on him in time to completely hook her, an unfamiliar tethering of herself to him. She’s sure it’s the nature of the promise he makes, the future he knows she so desperately wants to have. Still, she feels the breath hitch in her throat as he crawls closer to her, props himself on one large, muscular arm. He brushes back her hair, brings a hand to her cheek as he moves closer.

“Oh, you think you’re smooth,” She teases, using the strength in her arms to scoot herself away from him on the blanket, eyes widened and full of a new sort of playfulness. It’s her feigned resentment that calls him, the way she turns her head to him while an easy-spirited giggle. He follows her, crossing the short length of the blanket. He presses his leg against hers, bringing a hand to her thigh and resting it between her legs. She turns her head to face him, sun-kissed curls tumbling over her shoulder and threatening to cover the glimmer in her eyes. She bites her lip, his hand roaming just below her hip. Demeter turns into his touch, sighs and brings her forehead to his, lips just inches away from his. Before he can close the gap she’s risen, bubbling over with a lighthearted laughter, a non-verbal teasing.

              Theo sits back on the big blanket, rests his weight against his arms watches as Demeter retreats, just far enough to be out of his reach. Within the line of grass where the field meets its edge is a big tree, all low-hanging branches and a comforting sort of presence, one that rounds out the expanse of open space with a landmark sense of protection. She raises one arm up casually, holds onto the branch with the bend of one knee, the flash of her profile. Within her thin frame her thighs are muscular, exposed through the slit of her long, intricately printed skirt. He watches her move, skillfully hoisting herself up to a low-hanging branch and swinging her legs underneath her.

              From this vantage point Demeter is nothing short of an ethereal being, a direct source of housing for all the glowing warmth of the sun. The magical tones of golden hour settle naturally within her, dance between the expanse of branches, begging for the opportunity to completely wash over her.

“Come on, bee man,” she raises one finger, gesturing for him to meet her. “Come kiss me.” The nickname comes out lovingly, teasingly. She speaks with a confident air, an attempt to break the ice that holds their fragile boundary in place. Theo moves from the blanket, dusts off his jeans. His lips are turned up slightly, enough to convey the silly nature of their intention. His hands find space on the roughness of tree bark first, on either side of her legs. She has taken the incandescent light of the hour, soaked it within freckle-kissed skin and her playful nature. She tilts her head, a cascade of coiled curls and a crinkled nose, her bottom lip caught momentarily between her teeth.

              “Don’t laugh,” she implores, although her dulcet alto, smooth as molasses, is bookended by a breathless sort of giggling. She moves both her small, slightly work-roughened hands to his cheeks. Fingers resting against the line of his jaw, thumbs subconsciously brushing tamed stubble, Demeter gently bends her body forward, an effort from her place on the low-hanging tree branch. His hands meet her hips to steady her just in time for their noses to bump, for Demeter to collapse into him with the release of unfiltered laughter. They each let out a fumbling apology, her forehead on his shoulder.

              “Ok, I’m serious.”

              “And so am I,” His voice is certain, sure and honest. He keeps his hands on her waist, Demeter finding hold on his shoulders as she sits back up. Before he can blink she’s kissed him; quick, almost childlike in nature. When she pulls back she’s searching his expression, bringing her hands together in her lap. Before he can process the moment she’s slid from the tree, landing between his arms. He moves to reciprocate, to kiss her as she’d kissed him. She slips underneath his arm, retreats from the tree as she looks back over her shoulder.

              “Interesting,” Her voice is light and airy as she speaks, shrugging her shoulders teasingly.

              “What?”

              “Oh, I don’t know,” Demeter sits back on the blanket, kicking off her sandals. “Kissing you.”

              “Kissing me is interesting.” The statement is a half-formed question. He stays where he is, watching as she settles herself back into the comfort of the blanket, looking imploringly his way. Theo hesitates, waits for further explanation, but none comes until she pats the space next to her, grinning as he walks her way.

              “Interesting is the best word for it, because you are my best friend.”

              “Well…is it okay for me to kiss you?” He moves closer to her, watches her cast her gaze at the sky momentarily. She takes in a deep breath, closes her eyes and hums lightly as she exhales. When she turns back toward him the humor has been joined by something more, a release. The boundary thins as she looks at him, the way his mossy eyes hold her captive in their tenderness. “I want to make sure you’re okay with this.”

              “I am.” She nods, her voice almost a whisper as closes the distance between them, the first move. His lips are sweet, and she kicks herself for thinking of the hours he’s spent tending to the bees, bottling the honey that dances along her tongue. It’s chaste, slow. A contented sigh leaves her as he brings his hand to her hair, keeps her against him. How lucky she feels to have this moment; one large, work-calloused hand on the small of her back, the gentle nature of his soul in hesitation as his eyes warm to her, stay present with her. Her face has reddened considerably, made its own heat against the crisp chill of the autumn air. How lucky she feels to have his voice, low and soft and slightly wavering as he guides her down onto the picnic blanket. Their breathless, wild kind of laughter mixes in hot breath and honey-sweet lips as he kisses her, slow and meaningful, a new kind of promise solidified in the air between two best friends.

              “We can always try again if this doesn’t work,” Her hands find their way under his shirt, brush along the well-defined structure of his large body as he hovers over here.

              “We can always try again.”

[cowgirlontheloose]

The Man Who Cried At Railway Stations

1.  You grew up in the country, so diversions for you and your brothers were mostly outside. Trees to climb, bushes to hide in and a weedy ditch where you collected tadpoles or sailed sticks and leaves. Best of all though, were the CPR locomotives billowing smoke and glory past your home that brought you running always. 

Your ribcage vibrated to 17 tons of thunder and steel huffing by. The engineer with his red neckerchief and one elbow leaning from the window, waved and pulled the cord to ding-dong the brass bell of enchantment. You were close enough to see his moustache and easy smile.

You don’t recall how many trains passed daily, but certainly a couple and at least one night flyer at 11 p.m. heading for Hull, Ottawa and Montreal. You know that for sure. As a kid you lay awake for lonely hours fretting about school which you despised; wondering if you could play sick again. Maybe a stomach ache this time. Finally, thankfully, you heard the first distant chuff of the train. By the time it wailed past the house, your bed had transformed into a magic carpet drifting off to dreamland, the train labouring far below, streaming smoke and sparks into the night. 

Decades later you read accounts by others online who had the same experience. You also find an endless trail of sites offering statistics, studies, commentary, facts, fantasies and minutiae about trains. You find photos and videos, such as an 8-hour train sound track on a site called Virtual Dreamer (”We design sleep sounds for insomnia, tinnitus and noise masking.”) You note that over three million people have visited the site. One fan comments: “I almost cried when I saw this. I thought I was the ONLY ONE who had to hear the sound of a train horn in order to have a peaceful sleep. God bless you.

There are medical studies too. Some indicate that trains passing at night can raise heart rates and lead to cardio-vascular issues. Others enthuse about the calming and reassuring effects of the same. You also discover that people of all ages on the autism spectrum are fascinated by trains. Dr. Amanda Bennett of Philadelphia encourages parents to use this as motivation to reward desired behaviour in kids by “taking the train,” either with a model train or through Youtube videos. 

2.  Your son, now a parent of teenagers, may have genetically inherited his train love from you. The unpretentious depression-era brick farm house where he grew up was far enough from town that only the faintest sounds of passing trains (now diesel) could be heard if the wind was blowing from the south-east. But more likely, it was your partners influence that did it. This man, who spent six years in your lives, brought with him, besides a wicked sense of humour, an abiding affection for all things train.

He constructed, with your blessings, a waist high model train platform ostensibly for your son. It took up half the living room. Together and separately, son and partner tinkered, repaired, upgraded, dusted and ran that railroad like highly paid pros. Yes, they wore engineer hats. You have the photos to prove it. 

One evening as you lie aching in bed with a fever, you begged your man to fill a water bottle with near scalding water from the kitchen kettle. He disappeared downstairs. You waited. And waited. You moaned loudly, hinting. Then from the living room you heard the murmur of voices and yes, the clicking-clack of the model train rocketing across vast plains and through tunnels. You had been sidelined by an obsession. 

3.  At a writing course in creative non-fiction at the University of Minnesota, you meet a delightful couple. Greg and Jean are both in their early 80s. They are feisty and frail, full of curiosity and ideas drawn from long lives of exploring and risking in whatever situations they found themselves in. They became the dominant force in the group in a most charming way. Jean walked heavily with a cane and wore her white hair in one pigtail. At first you wondered if Greg had dementia, or whether he even knew where he was, but you soon discovered otherwise. Although quiet for long periods where he seemed to doze, he would suddenly open his very blue eyes and offer a thought with clarity, insight and humour. 

You all grappled that week to understand what creative non-fiction is or isn’t. You never do get clear about it, but really, who cares. The best explanation is written by Laura Wexler in an excerpt from “Saying Goodbye to ‘Once Upon A Time.’” She says:  “People tell stories to serve their political and psychic needs. Most of the stories aren’t the basis of their truth. Postmodernism allows us to see that even the most unreachable stories -- the stories in which truth seems to purposely hide in the shadows -- can be written as nonfiction by focusing as much on interpretation as event.

So you all write and read aloud some of your own shadowy truths. Several times readers pause when tears well up. It’s hard to explain that sort of thing, but it’s gorgeous when it happens. You yourself choke up reading aloud about your first cookbook and again over a day spent with three biologists and hundreds of rare snakes on a tiny island in Manitoba. Your tears are neither nostalgic nor sad. You are grateful to say them aloud and have them acknowledged with such tender respect.

When Greg reads you are blown away. His very short piece is titled “This Man Cries At Railroad Stations.” He describes how as a small boy, he and his brother spent every weekend without fail riding the transit system around the city. They did this to escape their scary parents. The brothers invented their own transportation system and wove names like Forty Fort, Wounded Knee, Fiery Siding, Temperance River, Steamboat Spring and Thunder Bay into fancied railroad schedules, rejoicing in the evocative, liberating names. It saved them from the hell at home.

As an old man, Greg said he still cries at railroad stations.

You never forget them. You tear up now as you write about them. Somewhere you still have a wee yellow ticket Greg gave you. It says “Good For One Fare Between Minnehaha, Minnesota and All Points West. 

[ladyherenya]

Books read in June

I didn’t read everything I had planned. I was distracted reading other things and now I have to decide which library books I will return unread.

Part of me is stubbornly convinced I should retain my eleven-year-old self’s ability to borrow armfuls of books and read all of them at least once before the return date. Which is ridiculous. Back then I had fewer responsibilities and read shorter books. And having too many books to read is a better problem to have than running out of books.

Favourite cover(s): Thorn, Battle Born and White Eagles.

Reread: All Systems Red by Martha Wells.

Still reading: Descendent of the Crane by Joan He and Riviera Gold by Laurie R. King.

Next up: Aurora Burning by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff, and The Enigma Game by Elizabeth Wein.

One day I’ll get back to posting other things on Tumblr but for now, it’s just book reviews.

(Longer reviews and ratings on LibraryThing and Dreamwidth.)

*

Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett (narrated by Stephen Briggs): The wizards of Unseen University play football. This is humorous, clever, sharply observant about people -- very much what I’ve come to expect from Pratchett. I enjoyed it a lot. 

Girl Gone Viral by Alisha Rai: Katrina is horrified when a conversation she has with a man in a café is overheard, twisted into a romance, documented on Twitter -- and goes viral. Her bodyguard offers his family’s farm as a safe retreat. I enjoyed reading this and liked how it’s romance about a woman dealing with panic attacks, but by the final act, its priorities had diverged somewhat from mine. It wanted to get to its happily-ever ending, whereas I thought it had raised interesting issues worthy of further exploration and slower, more complex solutions. I wanted a happy ending, too, but wanted more story first.

Blame It On Paris by Laura Florand: I’ve read a few of Florand’s romances and even though the descriptions of Paris and chocolate shops were lovely and vivid, as stories they were not really my thing. But I loved her memoir, which is very funny. During her year in Paris, Laura isn’t looking to give up her independence, travelling or career plans for romance. But then her friends talk her into asking out the French waiter she admires. Getting to know Sebastien allows Laura to see France from a different perspective, and challenges her assumptions about serious relationships, her (American) culture and her own family.

Stepping From the Shadows by Patricia A. McKillip: A story about growing from childhood into adulthood. Published in 1982 as McKillip’s “first book for adults”, I can see why this is now out-of-print. It is strange, even by McKillip’s standards for strangeness. In merging the mundane with the magical, the mythical, it attempts something rather interesting and thoughtful, but it isn’t quite successful. However, the descriptions of places are wonderfully vivid, the narrator’s emotions are conveyed with intensity, and there were moments that felt like catching a fleeting glimpse of myself of a mirror. I didn’t always like it, but I’m glad I got to read it all the same.

True to Your Service by Sandra Antonelli: Kitt is sent on a mission to the Netherlands and his boss insists that Mae accompany him. This spy-thriller is, like At Your Service and Forever in Your Service, a bit too violent for me. However, I liked that Mae and Kitt talk about their reactions to distressing events with each other. In fact, the two of them are constantly discussing their thoughts and feelings about what’s happening, including the way Kitt’s job collides with their personal relationship. I really like the way their relationship is an on-going conversation.

The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer:

Cress (narrated by Rebecca Soler): Following on from Cinder and Scarlet. Cress, born without the Lunar gift for manipulation, has spent years living alone in a satellite orbiting Earth, using her tech skills under the orders of the Lunar thaumaturge Sybil and dreaming of escape. I really enjoyed this. I like how it wove in elements from “Rapunzel”, and dealt with Cress’s perception of herself as a damsel in distress, a girl in need of rescuing.  There is an increasing focus on teamwork and friendship -- this means we see the characters from different perspectives, and we also see different sides to them. 

Winter (narrated by Rebecca Soler): Princess Winter, step-daughter of Queen Levana, is determined that she will never use her Lunar gift to manipulate others -- even though refraining makes her a bit crazy. Meanwhile Cinder and her friends plot to overthrow the queen. This is tense and entertaining, and the narrator does a wonderful job of bringing all the characters to life. I love that the gang are so accepting of each other’s weird quirks and that the romances are given time to develop. I love their teamwork, banter and perseverance. The focus is on the characters’ relationships and the action, and both are excellent.

Thorn by Intisar Khanani: Fifteen year old Princess Alyrra is sent to marry the prince from another kingdom but en route is forced into swapping places with her lady-in-waiting. This retelling of “The Goose Girl” is riveting. I instantly cared about Alyrra, and appreciated how thoughtfully and effectively the story walks a line between darkness and hope -- between fear and trust, sadness and joy. Alyrra’s new life has dangers and difficulties, but also positive things -- satisfaction in her work, a supportive found-family. She becomes increasingly aware of injustice around her, but her story is shaped by her choices -- to be kind, to seek justice and bring change.

The Physicians of Vilnoc, a novella in the World of the Five Gods by Lois McMaster Bujold: Penric and Desdemona are summoned to deal with an outbreak of a mysterious disease. This could easily be an intense story and, oddly enough, it isn’t. Given the current state of the world, I’m glad Bujold didn’t go with the dark, harrowing possibilities and instead wrote about Pen investigating how the disease is transmitted while treating as many patients as he can. Still a stressful experience for Pen, but I was confident his worst fears wouldn’t transpire. And it was satisfying to get a better understanding regarding the best way for Pen and Des to use their knowledge and skills.

Hamster Princess: Ratpunzel by Ursula Vernon (aka T. Kingfisher): Like Of Mice and Magic, this is another entertaining twist on a fairytale. When Harriet helps her friend Wilbur to find a stolen hydra egg, they come across someone else in need of help -- a rat with a very long tail.

Battle Born by Amie Kaufman: A satisfying conclusion to Ice Wolves and Scorch Dragons, with a couple of unexpected developments and a lot of expected emphasis on wolves, dragons and humans working together. I liked the realism of this. Anders and his sister Rayna have both cool shapeshifting abilities and special status arising from their parentage. But their success depends upon the support of resourceful friends and wise, trustworthy adults. They save the day, not because they know all the answers but because they bring people together. This trilogy is one I wish I could send back in time for my eleven year old self.

Time of Our Lives by Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegemund-Broka: Two teenagers cross paths while touring East Coast colleges. There’s a lot I found interesting: Fitz’s fascination with words; Juniper’s enthusiasm and passion for the college-choosing process; the way they challenge each other; their intense family situations; and the glimpses of university life. However, I ended up feeling oddly annoyed. I was drawn into the story because Fitz and Juniper’s perspectives and motives were so very real and understandable, but something about some of their later choices and thoughts seemed too pat. Like the level of realism slipped slightly because the authors wanted to get their Message For The Teens across.

Tweet Cute by Emma Lord: Two teenagers, two business Twitter accounts and one very public argument about grilled cheese. Pepper and Jack see each other in class and cross paths training at the pool, but they don’t realise that they’re at war on Twitter nor pseudonymously chatting on a school-based app, like something out of You’ve Got Mail. This was a lot of fun -- super cute and full of Pepper’s passion for baking, Jack’s passion for his family’s deli, complicated-but-ultimately-supportive family relationships, and references to internet culture. I like how the story explores the strengths, the pressures and the problems of social media.

Text, Don’t Call: an illustrated guide to the introverted life by INFJoe by  Aaron T. Caycedo-Kimura: The text offers a basic explanation of introversion. It might be a decent introduction for someone new to the topic, but I found it a bit too basic to be interesting. However, the illustrations were great! Very funny and often relatable, and in one or two cases, usefully thought-provoking.

White Eagles by Elizabeth Wein: When Germany invades Poland, eighteen year old Kristina of the Polish Air Force has a chance to escape with her aeroplane ‐‐ and an unexpected stowaway. Her journey allows for a fascinating bird's-eye view of Europe in 1939 and of the challenges posed by such a trip. This novella-sized story is aimed to be both accessible and interesting to reluctant or dyslexia readers. It has moments where I, personally, would have liked more detail but I've worked with struggling readers and I think it's so awesome this sort of thing exists.