#and yes the title is a ts sides reference

[setthishouseablaze]

Fortnight - post mortem

"Fortnight"

(feat. Post Malone)

"I was supposed to be sent away, but they forgot to come and get me

I was a functioning alcoholic till nobody noticed my new aesthetic

All of this to say, I hope you're okay, but you're the reason

And no one here's to blame, but what about your quiet treason?"

To be sent away is to be committed to the psych ward, or sent to jail. From the music video (MV) it seems that in this case it's a reference to an involuntary stay in the psych ward - she's chained up in a bed being made to take pills, however, asylums and prisons are a theme throughout the album as a whole.

In the opening scenes of the video she is dressed up to look like 1920s movie starlet Clara Bow (who is referenced directly as a song title later on the album.) Her hair is pinned up with an extreme number of upside down bobby-pins which on the right side of her head make the roman numeral for 13, and she is wearing a wedding gown.

Clara Bow is known to have engaged in lavender marriages while having secret affairs with women during her stardom. "dropping hairpins" is a piece of historical queer slang, meaning dropping hints that one is queer, and the inverse, having your hair pinned up means that you're pretending to be straight. Hair pins reference back to the lyrics of Right Where You Left Me "Dust collected on my pinned-up hair." I read this scene as "maximum closeting," by force.

The entire room is shown to be upside down and at an angle which reminds me of the classic Emily Dickinson poem "tell all the truth but tell it slant" Given Emily is a favorite poet of TS the Dickinson reference is likely intentional and it's fair to assume that there are red herrings and metaphors in abundance throughout this song and this album. Remember the 'redherring' error code on the website pre-release.

This song and video also reference A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, which tells the story of a person released from prison who has mental health issues due to being tortured during their prison stay, who is then taken by their family from Paris(!) to London (!!) Book 2 of A Tale of Two Cities is titled "The Golden Thread" which reminds me of Invisible String "one single thread of gold tied me to you," and in the second book we're told the tale of how the golden haired daughter provides financially for her family in addition to repairing and maintaining their good reputation. A Tale of Two Cities feels oh so very appropriate as a touchstone for listening to this album.

"I was a functioning alcoholic" is this metaphorical, literal, or both? Other mentions of use and abuse of drugs and alcohol in her discography include Closure "I'm fine with my spite and my tears and my beers and my candles" Clean "Ten months sober" and Don't Blame Me "My drug is my baby I'll be using for the rest of my life" I think in this case I think it might be both metaphorical and literal. The loss of her love drove her to drink, but also, she was addicted to her illicit love and maybe got away with it until others noticed-?

"All of this to say, I hope you're okay, but you're the reason. And no one here's to blame, but what about your quiet treason?" reminds me again of the song Closure "It wasn't right the way it all went down looks like you know that now. Yes, I got your letter, Yes, I'm doing better. I don't need your closure" It's just as direct, but less aggressive in tone. She hopes her muse is well but they are the reason that she is where she is.

"And for a fortnight there, we were forever

Run into you sometimes, ask about the weather

Now you're in my backyard, turned into good neighbors

Your wife waters flowers

I wanna kill her"

A fortnight is two weeks, though, it may be a metaphorical stand-in here just meaning that for awhile it seemed like they were going to be together forever, but now they are acquaintances who make small talk.

"Now you're in my backyard, turned into good neighbors" reminds me of the ever so quotable line "Good Fences Make Good Neighbours" from Robert Frost's poem Mending Wall, the irony of the poem is that while setting clear boundaries with a wall prevents petty disputes over property lines the constant need to maintain the wall they've built brings the neighbours together to talk. The line is often quoted by people who've never read the poem without heed for the irony. As a reference here it seems very sarcastic - we're good neighbours look how polite and appropriate we are with our boundaries set in stone.

There are many references to gardens and flowers in the TS back catalogue but for me this in particular recalls the lyrics from Clean "The drought was the very worst. When the flowers that we'd grown together died of thirst." and this line translates to me as I hate your partner because they're growing a relationship/family with you, whereas ours is dead.

The MV shows TS wiping her face to reveal tattoos that almost match those of Post Malone who plays the part of love interest in the MV. The differences are the addition of two tattoos that spell out DDP, an extra heart, and a change from a playboy bunny to what looks like a diamond. The tattoos seem to have been covered with make-up while she was chained up in the asylum, and they disappear as soon as she steps out into the other room - only to reappear onto the face of Post Malone. I don't have any theories about what DDP stands for I would love to hear other peoples. Seeing TS with secret tattoos reminds me of Dress, "made your mark on me a golden tattoo." another song about secret love.

"All my mornings are Mondays stuck in an endless February

I took the miracle move-on drug, the effects were temporary"

Mondays being the most notoriously hated day of the week because it's the start of the work week for many people, and Feb being post-celebration winter in the northern hemisphere, I read this as - all I do is work I'm stuck in a bleak winter that won't end. I've tried every option available to get over you but it didn't work.

When she enters the writers room she's wearing a mourning dress, which could lend another layer i.e. all my mournings are mondays i.e. all of my break-ups are work/business.

The whole video is in black and white except for the sparks that fly off the pages into the air between their desks, and the fire once she sets things ablaze.

"And I love you, it's ruining my life

I love you, it's ruining my life

I touched you for only a fortnight

I touched you

But I touched you"

This is pretty direct but in context I read it as - I'm still in love with you, I feel stuck, I can't move on and my public image won't let me let you in, we may have only been together for a short time but we were together and I can't/won't forget it.

In the MV there are an endless array of masked figures also in black mourning attire, all with masks and hats sitting at identical desks disappearing into the horizon. Are these the other tortured poets from history, made to mask and hide behind their typewriters in a black and white world?

"And for a fortnight there, we were forever

Run into you sometimes, ask about the weather

Now you're in my backyard, turned into good neighbors

Your wife waters flowers

I wanna kill her

And for a fortnight there, we were together

Run into you sometimes, comment on my sweater

Now you're at the mailbox, turned into good neighbors

My husband is cheating

I wanna kill him"

"My husband is cheating I wanna kill him" This could be literal cheating, however, she is not literally married so maybe that's a hint - maybe he's violating the terms of a contract? After all she's probably not in love with him since she's pining so badly after the muse of this song-? So, why would she still want to murder him? Maybe they were supposed to get lavender-married but he cancelled the wedding and now everything is in upheaval?

She is laying on the ground with PM in the middle of an image of herself made up of pages reading from "The Story of US" book, "So many things that I wish you knew. So many walls up, I can't break through" they seem to be stuck there and then they break free, pages flying in the air, and hold each other laughing. The tattoos are now gone from both faces.

"I love you, it's ruining my life

I love you, it's ruining my life

I touched you for only a fortnight

I touched you

I touched you

I love you, it's ruining my life

I love you, it's ruining my life

I touched you for only a fortnight

I touched you

I touched you"

In the MV she's back in the asylum now, hair undone/pins gone, strapped to a table surrounded by men about to have electro convulsive therapy (ECT) administered, a black dog runs through the frame. The ECG read-out is showing "I love you it's ruining my life" in the read out of her heart beat. One of the panels in the background reads "Master Control." In literature The Black Dog represents depression.

So, when her hair is unpinned she wants to be publicly out as in love with a woman, and the men who surround her and control her and her music deem it inappropriate, they want to 'fix' her. But, when the ECT runs sparks fly, the machinery overloads, she screams, and PM runs over to release her from the table.

"Thought of calling ya, but you won't pick up

Another fortnight lost in America

Move to Florida, buy the car you want

But it won't start up till you touch, touch, touch me"

"Thought of calling ya, but you won't pick up. Another fortnight lost in America" You won't answer my calls so we've lost another fortnight of our lives to the American culture wars - reminds me of Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince and Paris, which are also songs about running away.

They are now outside in a raging storm stuck on top of a mountain with treacherously steep sides, TS sits atop a phone box in a dress that looks like chain-mail, while PM is inside the box making a call begging..

"Move to Florida, buy the car you want but it won't start up till you touch, touch, touch me." TS has said in interview that moving to Florida in this album is a reference to people running away from their mistakes and starting fresh. She's telling the muse to ditch their partner and runaway with her, this ties back to Getaway Car which opens with "It was the best of times, the worst of crimes" which is a direct reference to A Tale of Two Cities which opens "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way".

"Thought of calling ya, but you won't pick up

Another fortnight lost in America

Move to Florida, buy the car you want

But it won't start up till I touch, touch, touch you"

TS is back in the writers room, tearing open the draws, letting the pages fly into the air, crying, then stone faced in her mourning dress while the pages swirl around her burning. It reminds me of Dear Reader "Dear reader, burn all the files desert all your past lives" The version of her in the asylum smashes down the window.

And finally the version of TS on top of the phone box reaches down and holds hands with PM. She's created imagery of herself stuck inside cages, boxes, glass boxes, etc over and over through the years and this is the first time we've seen her outside and making contact with another human.

Conclusion: our protagonist has been held by force in the image of a virginal heterosexual bride, going slowly insane while she pretends that the woman she truly loves is just a friend, and she's now completely fed up and her bearding situation has gone to hell, she's asking her love to runaway with her and she's willing to metaphorically set fire to her history/her body of work to be with the one she loves.

[anonymityisfunwriter]

🥇 Comment Hall of Fame 🥇

I really like when people comment. What better way to encourage interaction than by rewarding it? Here's a running list of some of my favorite comments, the ones that made me laugh, the ones that made me cry, the ones that kept me going. I love all the comments I get but these are just some of my faves from AO3, Tumblr, and Wattpad. You guys are all the best. 💛

"This series has the same equivalence to the mini episode cartoons like teen titans go but like BETTER I LOVE THIS SO MUCH" - @/thatboyisagunn · I remember watching the OG Teen Titans as a kid, so I really loved this comment. Plus, it sort of gave me the idea to do like one-shots as 'mini episodes'.

"“…morally ambiguous, sarcastic, charming brunette“ I know this is supposed to be referring to Flynn Rider, but it sounds an awful lot like Bucky to me. Loved this whole story! I was smiling the whole way through." - @/bookish_irish_dancer ·I laughed for an hour when this lovely commenter said this, because, yes, that is absolutely what I was going for.

"T Swizzle is a national treasure and I will fight to the death for her." @/aswiftlytiltinguniverse ·I will too. Okay, maybe not to the death, but I will post a lot of fics with TS references.

"I GODDAMN LOVE THIS SONG DUDE. THE ANGST, THE PAIN, THE CONFUSION AND GODDAMN JOHN I HATE YOU. BARNES I LOVE YOU AND SAMUEL YOU BIG BROTHER. I'm LOVING this Tay Swift-ness author." @toomanyfanficsbruh ·I like inciting John Walker hate. Especially all caps hate. This just made me laugh so hard tbh.

"Sis, as much as i love your stories and this story.. THIS WAS A PUNCH TO THE GUT, WHY WOULD YOU DO SOMETHING LIKE THIS *VIRTUALLY PUKES BECAUSE YEAH, I HAVE A FULL STOMACH RN* (but whatever i still love you uwu😊🤣😭🤗)" @/youraveragehotmessofabisexual ·The "why would you do something like this" really had me cheesy grinning like I know I just hurt my entire audience, but wasn't it fun?

"“LeTs NoT gEt EmOtIoNaL” my ass. I’m emotional. Let me emote 😭" @/BuckySimp101 ·This comment made me emote. And keep going with the GrumpyxSunshine series after Two Sides of The Same Coin.

"I challenge you to a duel anonymityisfun. You hear me duel, I hope you have a blood donner cos you're gonna need it ( I'm hating where this is going but loving your update speed. Keep it up )( side note I moved to mars so you're going to have to come here for out duel. )" @i-wanna-burn-the-world ·I can say with absolute certainty that I'd never been challenged to a duel before this comment. It's happened a few times since then to be honest.

"THIS MADE ME CRY AND I DONT MEAN JUST TEARED UP I MEAN I FUCKING CRIED MAN" @/Jwritesstuff ·If you couldn't tell, I really love comments that yell at me about what I made people feel. I love it.

"WHY WHY DO YOU HAVE TO DO THIS TO US IM LITERALLY CRYING RIGHT NOW WHY OH GOD WHY ARE THEY TREATING HER LIKE HOW HYDRA TREATED WINTER SOLDIER 😭😭😭 THEY DONT EVEN LET HER TAKE HER BELONGINGS ITS LIKE SHES NOT EVEN HUMAN THE WAY THEYRE TREATING HER OH GOD YOU'RE PAYING MY THERAPY 😭😭😭😭 THE TITLE ITSELF GOT ME HOLDING MY SEAT LIKE WDYM LAST KISS" @/Marquiserose ·This comment always makes me cheesy grin. I love the enthusiasm.

"SAM YOU BITCH! YOU CANT JUST LEAVE US! RULE NUMBER ONE!!!" @/any_ways ·Now, you guys didn't know what I knew, but the visceral reaction everyone had to Sam at the end of Two Sides of The Same Coin was *chef's kiss*

"When I gave this story my heart it was under the impression that you wouldn’t tear it out of my chest and stomp on it" @/HopeMAnd21 ·I know it sounds silly, but I like knowing that I can make people feel things. That the words I write can actually impact a person warms my little heart.

"I always have no feedback, criticism or words, but…I once again am lost. This whole this has twist and turns, one right after the other. I really don’t know what to say. This should be a mini book that I can hold in my hands and it has that little penguin on the spine, and anonymityisfun written under the title. I’m going to cherish this. When I’m bored and want twists and turns and sorrow, this is what I’ll read. You should be very proud!" @/any_ways ·Listen, I am, by no stretch of the imagination, a crier, but this comment made me cry. Being published, being able to call myself an author, even the idea of ever getting to put something out into the world, it's been my dream since I was a kid. Ugh, it just made my heart swell.

"you really did take all these characters and made them your own. from all the fanfictions i've read, your version of marvel characters are by far my favourite. i also feel very happy seeing this full circle moment because i still remember very vividly how sad i felt when i read how alone sunshine was. thank you for this series and i hope this is not the end!!" @/khirtelt ·This felt so important because, while legally I own very little rights to these characters, they do very much feel like my characters and my stories. They all have little pieces of me, both good and bad, and I'm very proud of the work I've put into these stories.

"110% babygirlification of Bucky Barnes" @/thesweetestheart ·I do not mind being attributed to the continued babygirlification of Bucky Barnes. It's now my life goal.

"I was thinking of you when the Taylor swift album dropped I HOPE U LOVED IT 🕺🏾🕺🏾🕺🏾 Also another Drabble masterpiece as PER USUAL" @buckbuckyoongs ·When you think Taylor Swift, I hope you think of me.

"I need a friend that loves me as much as Sam and Sunny love each other... AHEM, I SAID I NEED A FRIEND THAT LOVES ME AS MUCH AS SAM AND SUNNY LOVE EACH OTHER. please? (Now I just sit and wait until someone starts talking to me... I'm gonna be here for a while.)" @i-wanna-burn-the-world ·We all need a friendship like Sam and Sunshine.

"i ADORE THIS. I LOVE ITI WOUL KILL AND DIE FOR THIS. YOURE AMAZING AND I APRECIATE YOU POSTING YOUR WRITING, SO MUCH. I LITERALLY WIND DOWN AT NIGHT WITH YOUR STORIES-" @/ValerieQ "TYSM💜 AND OFC YOURE LITERALLY A GODDESS I DONT THINK YOU UNDERSTAND-" @/ValerieQ ·This was all one comment thread and when I tell you, I was having a rough go of it, I needed this. You all hype me up so much, but this comment just made my heart melt. I'm so glad that my silly little stories are a place you guys can go to unwind and hang out. I love that so much.

"another beautiful work from @/anonymityisfunwriter and i can’t tell if i love or resent them for the pain they put me through. every. time." @mediocre-daydreams ·I wonder if they decided if they love me or they resent me yet. Either way, I'm glad I make you guys feel all the feelings. It's my goal.

"Binged the shit out of this and fell in love. I cried, I weeped, my heart swelled with so much love for these two. Honestly this series felt like a hot bowl of homemade soup on a cold day." @kjdara ·"A hot bowl of homemade soup on a cold day" Please, the way that made me choke up. One of the best, sweetest comments I've ever gotten.

"I found the sound on TT literally just scrolling through and screamed "Bucky don't leave her! She's your sunshine"... Needless to say I have a meeting with the boss man about time theft" @/MandaRinne ·The time theft part made me laugh, and also worry, but I'll take it as a good thing you guys think of the Grumpy x Sunshine series while scrolling TikTok.

"I'm glad they made up and love love the twist at the end. Because it truly signifies that sunshine is a fighter. And I love sunshine and I try to strive towards adopting the better parts of her personality into mine everyday. Fr." @/youraveragehotmessofabisexual -This, and I'm not even exaggerating, left me a little speechless. It will never not blow my mind that anyone actually cares about anything I've written.

I'll be adding to this every now and then. I just wanted to do this to show my appreciation to everyone who's supported me, it's the greatest feeling in the world. If you're here, if you've ever left comment, I thank you from the bottom of my heart, I love you all so much. 💛

And please, take this as a sign to show support to other amazing creators and authors, comments, reblogs, kudos, it makes a world of a difference. 💛

And, if for whatever reason, you're on this list and don't want to be, just let me know and I'll take it down. 💛

[victory-cookies]

It’s Curtains, For Sure!

A/N: Alternatively titled “Jonas and Poet go to Walmart”. This is a) the longest one-shot I’ve ever written (for fic or ocs) and b) the first time I’ve ever written a curtain fic story. It was fun. I hope you enjoy. Also, have I ever mentioned that Poet and Jonas are in a QPR? They’re in a QPR.

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

“Y’know, I’m pretty sure that if hell exists, it’ll just be a really big Walmart,” Jonas muttered as he and Poet walked through the entrance to the store. “It’s so loud and crowded and bright and the people, Poet, the people can be so mean!”

Poet rolled her eyes as they walked over to the shopping carts, ignoring Jonas’ exaggeratedly woeful expression. “You didn’t have to come with me, dingus. It’s my shopping week, not yours,” they said, inserting a quarter into the nearest cart and pulling it free of its brethren. 

“And leave you to endure this torture alone? I would never!”

She snorted and began to walk towards the store proper. “Chivalrous of you.” 

“I know,” he replied, hurrying after them.

Once inside, Poet pulled out a list and scanned it. “Alright, so we need, like, the general weekly food stuff, as well as baking supplies for dessert tomorrow, laundry detergent, dish gloves, Mariah wants some yarn, I need some new makeup, and Marcus wants, and I quote, ‘a new boardgame or something because Catan is boring as shit and you all know it’, which, to be fair, he is right about. Anything I forgot?” They looked back up to see Jonas lounging in the cart. 

He shrugged. “Don’t think so? If you’re getting makeup, though, I want some too.”

“Sounds good,” they said, stuffing the list back into their pocket. “Upstairs first? We can grab the yarn and a new game or two and get everything else after.”

Jonas flashed her two thumbs up. 

There was a short pause as she looked at him, one eyebrow raised. “You gonna stay there?” she asked finally.

He grinned, ignoring the uncomfortableness of the metal pressed into his back. “Gotta find some way to have fun in here.” 

They sighed and began to push the cart through the store. 

***

It was only when they arrived at the escalators that Poet realized letting Jonas stay in the cart may have been a bad idea.

“Nuh-uh. No sir. I am all for committing fun and stupid crimes, J, but I am not letting you defile my good name by getting us banned from Walmart.”

In front of them, sandwiched between the up and down escalators, was the shopping cart conveyor, currently ferrying many a customer’s groceries between the two floors. And in Jonas’ eyes, there was a sparkle of mischief that Poet was very much familiar with. 

“You are not riding the cart escalator, Jonas.”

“Oh, c’mon—”

“No, absolutely not, they will see you and they will kick us out and we will never be allowed back into the only nearby Walmart—”

“Can’t see me if I’m invisible,” he said slyly. “Besides, even if we do get banned, you can just shapeshift into someone else and bam. Back in the Walmart, though I don’t know why you’d want that.”

They squinted, looking back and forth between Jonas and the escalators and biting back a smile. 

“I’ll buy you that cream blush you want,” he sang, his eyes sparkling brightly. 

She sighed fondly. Asshole. 

“Deal.”

Jonas pumped a fist into the air and then promptly disappeared.

Poet wheeled him over to the up conveyor and pushed the cart onto it, eyeing the “CARTS ONLY” label on its flaps and the signs above them warning against leaving children in the basket. “I hope you get stuck,” they muttered as the cart began to ascend, and they got the feeling Jonas was flipping them off (though it was hard to tell, him being invisible and all). They stepped onto the up escalator and leaned against the railing as they rode it up, watching the seeming empty cart rise beside them. Eventually, they reached the second floor and she pulled the Jonas’ ride out of the cartveyor, dragging him into a nearby aisle. 

“How was it?” she asked, the cart rattling as Jonas hopped out.

“Thrilling!” he replied, dropping his invisibility and stretching. “And see? No one’ll ever know I did it! It’s a perfect crime.”

They punched him in the arm and swung the cart around. “Sure, Jan. Now shall we get ourselves some yarn?”

***

“Wait, how the fuck does yarn work?”

Jonas shrugged. He and Poet stared at the shelves of yarn in front of them, both somewhat confused by the surprisingly large, colourful selection. “My guess is as good as yours, Poe,” he said. “Did she say how many bundles to get or anything?”

Poet pursed her lips. “I didn’t think to ask. She wants red, though.”

“Alright… but neither of us have any idea how much yarn one would need for… general knitting?”

“No clue.”

There was a moment’s pause.

“Let’s just grab lots?”

“Let’s.”

Jonas stepped forward and grabbed an armful of skeins of red yarn, tossing them into the cart. He looked towards Poet, cocking an eyebrow. “Board games?”

“Board games.”

“Cool.”

Jonas took charge of the cart, leading them into what was arguably the best section of the store. They wove through aisles upon aisles of toys, shelves stacked with dolls and toy trucks and far too many brands of surprise boxes, trying to ignore the urge to meander and fuck around with any box that made a noise when you stuck your finger through the front to press demo button. They sped by the shelving unit housing the trading cards because Jonas did not need more, he really shouldn’t, he had so many already— but like one pack couldn’t hurt, right? He tossed it on top of the bed of yarn literally lining the bottom of the cart before sighing. 

“Mariah’s gonna laugh at us, isn’t she? This is so much yarn. There’s no way she needs this much yarn, right?”

Poet shrugged. “I dunno, man. She’ll be stocked up at the very least,” she replied as they came to a stop at the boardgames section. “Anyways, what game should we get?” She picked up an Apples to Apples box, flipping it to read the back.

“Isn’t that just, like, G-rated Cards Against Humanity?”

“Yeah, kinda looks like it… how about, uh—” They grabbed another box. “Trouble?”

J shook his head. “Pretty sure we already have that one.”

“Shit.” They scanned the shelves, searching for something interesting, before they froze and silently pulled a box labelled “Pandemic” down. A Look passed between them and Jonas, and they placed the game into the cart. 

“Okay, you better be glad we don’t have a pandemic going on in this universe or I swear to god…” muttered Jonas as he began to head back towards the escalators. Poet snickered and followed. 

***

The two of them rode the escalator back down to the main floor, Poet having managed to convince Jonas to stay out of the cart this time. They began to knock out some of the more boring tasks on the list, heading over to the home goods side of the store to grab the cleaning supplies they needed before entering the food area to get the main groceries. 

“Whose idea was it to let eight teenagers live together again?” Poet asked, looking at the grocery list to see they needed ten frozen pizzas. “I feel like this isn’t healthy.”

“Eh,” Jonas replied, shrugging as he opened the freezer display to grab the aforementioned pizzas. “We haven’t died of malnutrition yet.”

“Fair.” 

They continued through the store, piling the rest of the week’s food supply into the cart. When they reached the baking aisle, Poet added what could only be described as an industrial-sized bag of chocolate chips to the stash, earning a half-puzzled, half-amused look from Jonas. 

“You never know when you might need ‘em,” they said, grabbing a bag of cake flour. 

***

It was as they bagged and tied the last of the fruits on the list that Poet began to notice how quiet  Jonas had gotten. They glanced over to see him fiddling with the bracelet on his wrist and pursed their lips. “You doin’ alright there, J?” they asked.

He looked up quickly. “Oh, yeah, I just— it’s… a lot in here, y’know? It’s...” he trailed off. 

“You wanna hit the makeup section real quick and then we can blow this popsicle stand?” 

He nodded. “That would be cool.”

They quickly made their way over to the makeup section and Poet made a beeline for the display for the cream blush Jonas had promised her while he walked over to a display of eyeshadow palettes. He deliberated for a moment before grabbing a small palette of blues and purples, wincing slightly as a baby over in the next aisle began to cry loudly. He then felt a gentle hand on his shoulder and turned around to see Poet, holding her blush as well as a tube of mascara and multiple eyeliners of different colours. She reached around him to grab a palette for herself before smiling at him. 

“Shall we?” she asked. 

***

The cart clattered as they rolled it out of the store, packed tightly with bags full of various necessities and absolutely-non-necessities, and Jonas sighed with relief. 

“And we’re free!” he muttered. “Free from the actual, real hell.” 

Poet pursed her lips. “I’m sorry about that,” she said.

“Nah, it’s okay,” he replied. “It didn’t get too bad, all things considering. And hey—” He put his hand on top of theirs as they pushed the cart along. “I may have actually had a little fun. It’s nice spending time with you. Also, you did help me ride the cart escalator, which slapped.”

“Oh, shush, you sappy bastard,” they laughed, grinning and turning away from him. “You’re still paying for that blush, y’know.”

“Of course,” he said, amused. He smiled, bumping into their shoulder. “Love you.”

“Love you too, idiot.” 

[merlins-hurt-comfort]

If You’re Gonna Be The Death Of Me, That’s How I Wanna Go

Summary: Remy really goes “head empty, only Emile” in this one. He is a cocky, little flirting shit for everyone except Emile, also Emile is non-binary because I say so. I love the “it’s my fanfiction and I get to say who’s queer/dying” attitude, can you tell? Fandom: TS Sanders Sides Warnings: Swearing and food is mentioned in a pick-up line but I think that’s it, check out the tags down below Pairing: Remile Characters: Remy Sanders, Emile Picani and Logan is mentioned once as Remy’s brother Wordcount: 1790 Uploading date: 5th of june 2020

A/N: This is for @shut-up-emrys-deactivated202005 <3 I hope you like it and I hope you're having a fantastic birthday. I am so extremely glad that you're my friend. I love you. As you can see, this piece is a bit shorter than usual and I am blaming it on the fact that it’s all fluff, no angst but hey, I have three wips right now :D

One step in front of another, that's how you walk, right? There was no big deal about what Remy was going to do. He was only going to ask out his dearest friend Emile. Emphasis on the only because it was nothing big, absolutely not at all. He would do it and he would ace it and everything would be chill and he definitely had everything under control.

He walked down the hallway of his school, on his way to Emile's locker, since that's where they would most likely be.

The students seeing Remy passing by saw someone filled with confidence. Head up high, straight posture, self-assured steps and a pair of sunglasses resting on his head, not on his nose, simply because people considered it rude to wear shaded glasses in buildings.

What they didn't see were his increasingly bad shaking hands or how he started to fidget with the hem of his leather jacket. They didn't hear his heart beating way too loudly, providing him with enough adrenaline for what his brain apparently thought was a fight, flight or freeze situation, and they didn't hear his loud racing thoughts either.

They would have noticed all those signs of Remy being a disaster gay though, if they just stopped him and casually had a conversation or simply looked a little bit closer.

Remy wasn't nervous, no. He never was. He wasn't nervous before being introduced to someone new, he wasn't nervous before class presentations or even exams because he studied really hard for them and he certainly wasn't nervous now either, no.

He was just, to quote a show he had recently binge in a sleepless night: "Uncertain of how things would go and therefore deeply terrified".

There was nothing new about this. He had flirted with a lot of people on this school or in dancing clubs he sometimes liked to go, only rarely though. The point of this is- you name them and he could probably tell you the pick-up line he had used. But then again, that had all been nothing more than play pretend, all for fun and everyone knew that, no feelings were harmed.

But this, today? That was kind of actually something new after all. He was about to ask out his best friend- with all seriousness and no play pretend! He wanted to ask them on a date and go on those dates and be a cheesy couple and not only flirt for fun but flirt to tease and flirt to let everyone know they were each other's. But he had to admit, it would also be fun to flirt simply to make them blush, yea. Remy decided he'd like that.

He walked a little faster before his brain could chose the flight over fight or freeze and he'd chicken out again, like he did the week before. That did sound good, though, he would just turn around in his path and maybe he could try it again another time when he was less... deeply terrified and-

"Remy!" Too late. Emile was putting some stuff in their locker and they hadn't actually seen Remy but noticed their best friend's presence anyways.

"What are-" They stretched to get a book from the top compartment of their with cartoon stickers decorated locker, "Could you help me out?" Remy handed the smaller friend what they couldn't reach.

"Thanks." Emile closed their locker and faced Remy. "So. What are you doing here? I do love your company but aren't all your classes today at the other side of the building? Speaking of your classes, did you get your test back? You told me you had to study a lot and after what you told me about it I am sure you did great and-."

"Yea, I- uhhh." If Remy hadn't interrupted Emile's flow, they would have continued for the rest of the break. Not that Remy was complaining, he loved to hear them talk, he could listen to their voice forever. He wanted to fall asleep and wake up to it.

"I wanted to ask you something." Remy scratched their neck and stared at Emile's locker. To look his friend in their pretty, chocolate brown eyes would only throw him off his game, even though it looked like he was already losing. Why was this so much harder than usually?

"Remy, are you alright? Did you get enough sleep last night?" Emile's hand waved in his unfocused vision.

The taller student blinked a few times to see Emile stepping a little closer, their head tilted to the side and an eyebrow slightly raised in equal worry and curiosity.

To look at their friend was a mistake, his heart could not stop pounding, he just wanted to hold them and hug their hidden worries away and everything sad they didn't deserve that would consume them in the middle of night when they texted Remy out of seemingly nowhere. Of course, Remy was always awake to text them back. But wouldn't it be better to be there for them in person?

Emile was still looking at him like Remy was a ghost or another supernatural being. He got lost in his thoughts again, didn't he? Time to say something! He tried to make his mouth work.

"Sure, sure. Uhhh, I'm good, I'm chill." He crossed his arms and actually intended to lean back real smooth and casually, but he had miscalculated the space between himself and the lockers and almost slipped, almost. But hey, his sunglasses fell down on his nose so this not impressive, far from flirting (yet) situation brought something good, at least now Emile couldn't see where Remy was looking. He smirked, to play it off.

"Something is up with you, you're acting strange." Emile, too, crossed their arms and for a quick second Remy remembered that he once read online that if you cross your arms and the other person trusts you, they will copy it, consciously or not. His heart warmed even more, it was all fuzzy and he sighed. He was sure this blood pumping organ was going to melt, he already felt warm in the leather jacket and Emile being this adorable without even trying did not help at all, believe it or not. How was he supposed to flirt with them, he was a mess. "Come on," he thought "Make it quick like ripping off a bandaid."

Remy took a deep, shaking breath. Now or never. The longer he waited the harder it would get. "I wanted to ask you if you want to do something with me this evening.... Or not today if that's not good with you, tomorrow or the weekend would also be fine, but only like... if you want to and also have the time and-."

"We do a lot of things together why is asking that big of an act for you?"

Well, then he'd have to do it blunter. Oh, this was so stupid but the only pick-up line his mind could give him at the moment. "You like raisins, don't you? How do you feel about-"

Emile's eyes lit up as they realised what their best friend was trying to do and they completed his pick-up line way more seductive than Remy could have ever dreamed of doing it himself. They smirked and lowered their voice. "-a date?"

Remy didn't even have to see that smile to know it was there. He could see it in Emile's eyes. His friend always showed their emotions way more through their eyes than anything else and those eyes looked mischievous as hell. But he made the mistake to look at the smile anyways, he was weak after all. Weak for Emile. "Are you asking me out?"

Fuck, the cat's out of the bag. "Well," Remy cleared his throat. "I am trying to but you're just too... uhhh."

"I am too what? Throwing you off your rhythm, huh?" Emile let out a short laugh and Remy was sure that this was straight up bullying. What else could it be? He felt the heat rising in his cheeks. Was he blushing, oh fuck, he was blushing, wasn't he? Full on blushing. But hey, in his defence, he could not help himself, not even a little bit, when Emile was being so- not to say attractive but that's exactly what they were. "Yea, that's precisely what you're doing."

"What?" Even though Emile hadn't seem to expect that answer, it didn't throw them off their game at all, which was quite frankly just rude. How could they be so calm, so collected, while Remy was a blushing, melting disaster? Emile then had the audacity to correct their pastel blue tie. Emile really liked wearing ties and as one knows, ties and suits and dresses and fancy clothing in general make one look ten times better than usual. Did they even know what that quick movement did to Remy? Maybe they did not- but then again- yea, no. Remy was sure Emile did that on purpose and was completely aware of how handsome they were and how many butterflies they just put in his stomach. Butterflies in the stomach, feeling nervous in all the right ways. Or as his brother would say "A phrase that is commonly used to indicate the feeling of clenched anticipation for something desired one feels deep in one's gut". Yea, Logan was a nerd.

Remy found his voice again, it was nowhere nearly as sassy, confident and loud as usually. "So, will you go on a date with me?"

"If that means I get to make you blush more, always." So much to the thought of Remy making Emile flustered, seemed like it backfired. They put their backpack over one shoulder. "Fantastic, see you this evening. I'll text you."

They put Remy's hands in theirs and softly squished them before turning around and leaving Remy right where he had stood all the time. His pulse seemed to get slower again, he had done it. Well, he shot his shot and it halfway worked before Emile took over. Now they would have dates together and they could do everything Remy not only dreamed of at night but intentionally thought of when he daydreamed and-

Oh no. Oh fuck, no. Now he would never escape being flustered and blushing, wasn't he? He let out a long sigh, it felt good to get actual air in his lungs since he hadn't properly breathed for the whole break.

He had a feeling the butterflies would stay. "If Emile's gonna be the death of me," he thought as he made his way to his next class, his hands still slightly shaking. "Then that's how I wanna go."

[kristalpepsi]

Temptation Stairway Thoughts™ + Theory Discussion

TW: blood + Death mentions, Implied (forced/pushed) integration (systems), racism (against asians), unreality stuff bc the show is Like That, Trauma causd by therapy

TL;DR = I mainly talk about implied integration, n as some1 in a system tht! mkes me uncomfy! I mainly will talk abt wht I’m calling the multi-ena theory (n anothr theory ill call the Multiple/Multi-Enaverse Theory) thts been popping up n disccng how thts kind of the bggst thng keepng me on board! I won’t LIE I might b a little biased bc I rlly do like thise show b I am NOT blind so I will try 2 address som things. I also talk alot abt the Shepard n Phindol bc I love themb so much they make me very heart Big.

DISCLAIMERS:

Obviously Joel G Highkey/definitely/most probbly did not intend 4 any of thise, but media is very complic8d so u cn end up accidntlly making problmtc things or implyng not great things

I hav a typing quirkkkk so if u cant understand my post I rlly dont blame u! I’m sorry how I type is Incomprehensible™

Not an angry post, more like my brain is holding me host-ge until i talk abt everyth dskfjhd!!

DO NOT Send anyone in thise post hate or angry asks/messages or perish by my sword

OK so this recnt episde has me w vry vry mixd feelngs!!! I’m both happy n exctd! b litrlly 2 things is whts bothrng me. While I CLD jst say :I Am Lookng Away: i rlly do need 2 write it down. Under a Read-more bc im secure SKSJ

Part 0: I’m uncomfortable help

The Section wher i tlk abt n bring up othr ppl’s concerns

So fr most if nt all the frnds I hav who also wtch Ena ALSO has a vry “vr vry mixd feelngs now tht I’ve seen the episde!!” mood twrds Temptation Stairway! It’s 4 a bunch of rsns, like thise post (tw racism) mde by a frnd whch brings up a good point

Part 1: The Actual Intro

Episode 1 = Auction day (AD) Episode 2 = Extinction Party (EP) Episode 3 = Tempation Stairway (TS)

Who is Ena

Ena can b describd as an "abstract girl split in half, w 1 blue side n the other is her yellow side!" Each side (emotion/mood, 2 b specific) seems 2 hav their own voic actor credited along with seper8 credits 4 each mood! So far the canon sides r Ena (happy), Ena (sad), n Ena (drunk)! They seem 2 act accordingly: Happy acts happy n optimistc, Sad acts sad n especlly depressd, n Drunk acts confused n dizzy [In the Credits, it would look like thise: Ena (happy) by Gabe V., Ena (sad) by Lizzie Freeman, (drunk) Ena by Sam Meza

4 Episodes 1-2, thy follow thise pattern exctly! So we cn expect wht 2 see from them, n each voice actor is creditd accordngly as seper8 b all a part of Ena

On epside 3, Ena is seen as actng diffrnt!! She's suddnly less predictabl! I say thise bc Suddenly, her voic Actors r not stuck 2 Only their sides. Thise is also emphasized when looking at the credit list! No longer is it "Ena (happy) by Gabe V., Ena (sad) by Lizzie Freeman" it's now jst "ENA by Gabe V. and Lizzie Freeman"

Happy's voic can sound STRESSED n sad, Happy can tlk w Blue's side in mor control n Sad's voic can sound Really happy n optimistic. Somth's Diffrnt n Not The Same

Temptation Stairway Summary

Skipping 2 my point, The summary of the episode Temptation stairway is tht Moony and Ena have a bet 2 race 2 the Great Runas! The Great Runas, can grnt u any wish accordng 2 Moony n som of those Ena passes by on the wy. The wager, is tht "whoever reaches the top of the Great Runas n makes their wish 1st, has 2 pay the debts of the loser" (yes it’s phrased like that) As Ena journeys thru, The DIFFERENCES between Ena Temptation Stairway and Ena Extinction Party n Below, is mor obvious as the epsde progrsses, even 2 wher Happy's voic actor is the 1 screamng in agony 2 jst get murdered already. The Episode ends w Moony beatng Ena (but it's 100% possibl it can be the other way arnd, that ENA Beat Moony, b thats somth I'll discuss in a bit L8r). Moony splits in half, revealing that according 2 her, "she wished 2 be skinny" n a humanoid coms out of her previous form. As 4 Ena, Her blue side slowly dispprs n its not answrd why.

Theories so far, are:

Moony wished 4 Ena 2 b happy (or 4 her sad/blu side 2 go awy. 4 wht reason can b eithr wholsom or 2 Moony's advntge [like so she "doesnt have 2 deal w Sad Ena"]) - b if Moony wished 4 Ena 2 b happy/b rid of her sad side, tht wld mean perhaps she lied about wishing 2 be skinny (her new humanoid form may be how she is "paying her debt 2 the loser"). Unless the Runas can grant u more than 1 wish.

Ena ws the 1 who wished her blu side awy, whch is a little depressng tbh

If both the above r tru, it may b possibl bc it wsnt clarified (afaik) tht the great runas can only grant ONE person a wish (or more). I think we only get tht implica8ion bc we see 1 (open) door while in the distance, ther r more doors tht look like their eyes r closed. We hav 2 remembr Moony said "whoever makes their wish 1st whch means Ena n Moony can totlly mke wishes @ the sme time

Somhow, turning pure yellow/only happy is how Moony is payng her debt 2 Ena(??) (opposite 2 the 1st theory)

OR If Ena won the race, it can even b possibl 2 consider tht Ena did not make ANY wish, n her debt 2 pay 2 Moony is her sad/blue side removed (I do not subscribe 2 thise) 

This info that was brought up 2 me is high evidenc that Moony won the race, n it explains how Moony surprises Ena whn Ena arrives. “I’m The Best and you’re the worst! I wonder who got the hair chest?” said by Ena, is a direct reference 2 a phrase usd by kids when they lose that goes “First is the worst, second is the best, third is the one with the hairy chest.”

“Whoever reaches the top of the Great Runas n makes their wish 1st, has 2 pay the debts of the loser.“ Might be phrased tht way as a weird way 2 pay 4 ur greed? (Last minute addition from me since some people wld think this is quoted wrong in and outside of the youtube comments)

i'm p sure ther may even b mor theories b i dont rmmbr them OOPS

Part 2: The Implied Integration Part AKA: How the System!Ena theory is affected by this episode

TW: Final fusion discussion, medical trauma (Is that the right word)

Disclaimer: This is 100% unintended by Joel G. That’s y the Alternative title 2 thise part is “How the System!Ena theory is affected by this episode”

2 GET IN2 the whole Implied Integr8ion part of my Essay™ I hav a theory calld system ena or sys!ena! (Check out my #system ena tag. This is in chronologicl order!) While thers no canon explan8ion 4 how Ena herslf is how she is, she mkes very intrstng n almst good accdntl Sys Represent8ion 2 me! They even show cofronting rlly well! I headcanon Ena as a system bc of the accidentl system!rep, but it explains 2 me y n how she switches! she has triggers 4 when she switchs 2 a diffrnt side, etc!

Ther hav been theories about Temptation Stairway in the past (before the episode cme out) wher ppl try 2 explain y the trailer Looks Like Tht. Besides theorizing abt the introduction of a new forme (I'm ok w just calling it Scared/Anxiety 4 now until 4rthr notic), 1 of the theories ive seen is tht Temptation Stairway's new introduced forme is due 2 being something akin 2 being "integr8d" (probably by force, accordin 2 the OP) (in other words, all her sides merge in2 one) n Ena being devast8td abt it

While tht theory is now DEBUNKED, bc the new forme clearly did not come out bc of being One Single Mind now, the "integr8ion" part of tht theory is unfortun8ly a littl tru

What is Integr8ion?

Integr8ion is not inherently a bad thing. In systems, ther are 2 definitions: "the breaking down of barriers 2 form healthy multiplicity, n then healthy communic8ion n less amnesiac barriers" and the othr, n mor FAMOUS definition bc its the oldest 1, is "final fusion"

Fnal Fusion is when all the members "fuse/merge" 2gether until ther is 1 single mind left. While not necssrlly a bad thng, final fusion n ther4 "integr8ion" is a scry thing 4 a lot of systems 2 talk abt, because in the history of Treatment, Final fusion is uslly somthng forcd on2 systems 4 the longest time :^(

Very valid 2 hav final fusion as a goal, b showng it as a desire n end goal is uslly seen as a sad n even scry thing 2 promote accdntly or not in media, bc of the previous traumas in the medicl/therapy world of system treatment etc

What's Worse. is tht if we apply the Ending 2 Temptation Stairway to the System!Ena Theory, thts wht hurts!!!

Scrolling back up 2 the possibl theories of who won the race and wht happened aftr, Either Moony or Ena wishing 4 the blue side/Sad Ena 2 go awy is rlly painful!

B I'll be honest, thts a RLLY biased n personal opinion i hav!! I've seen ppl think its rlly wholsom altho a bit Sad, tht the blue side disappears. I've seen ppl think its rlly sweet esp if it was Moony who mde tht wish

BSCLLY If I were to hold on2 the System!Ena headcanon while watchng the Temptation Stairway episode, its Hurtful, not rlly bc of the implied Integr8ion of Sides, but bc most top theories r that the blue side disappeard on Purpose either from Moony or Ena wishing her away or involvng the debt! It's like asking 4 ur sibling irl 2 Disappear and cease 2 exist. it's scary n rlly sad esp whn the audienc can c tht Sad, Happy, n Drunk cn almst b seen as their own persons n mite even b abl 2 interact w each othr (as seen by the many fanart of Happy n Sad having their own seper8 forms)

  Ok so Now tht ive described my intro n Main Beef w the Episode, here's a theory I cn rlly get behind tht dsnt mke me wnna cry behind a Denny's. Prsnlly it's a rlly relievng theory even if it mite b hard 2 take in

Ther's no name 4 it, som call it the Enaverse, b just so it dsnt get confusd w other definitions (like, u wldnt call it the Marvel Cinematic Universe theory, the MCU is jst wht it is) I'm gnna call it the Multi-Ena theory! Bsclly, there's mor than 1 Ena in thise universe. But I'll get in2 a sub/partner theory tht is also possibl: ther is mor than 1 enaverse n somhow u may or may not b abl 2 travel between them

Part 3: The Multi-Ena theory

Something interesting I noticed was that the shepherds says “another ENA troublemaker?” Which definitely means more than one ENA/person has been there before.

(I blockd out the rest of the commnt not bc it ws bad, b i wantd 2 focus on this part of the commnt, but thise commnt will come up again L8r)

Not connected 2 System!Ena or the integr8ion issue I mentioned earlier, the multi-ena theory seems 2 b 1 of the top suggstd theories bc of many thngs! Bsclly n in short, thise theory believs tht in the series (or Enaverse), ther is multipl ena's! So fr i havent seen a post tht RLLY went in2 depth on thise so here is my attempt!

Evidence:

(See: above explanation on how the voic actors r credited 4 their roles individlly 2 explain my system!ena theory/intro) In episodes 1-2, Ena's diffrnt emotions/sides r creditd individually! In Temptation Stairway, Gabe n Lizzie Freeman r all creditd undr the sme nme, just as "Ena" (mening thise is a completely different Ena from the past)

Again, as said in my summry 4 Tempt8ion Stairway, thise Ena acts compltly diffrnt n is not follwng the sme "pattern" or rules as Ena did in Episodes 1-2! (Read above in my summary section) Either ther r stuff we've missd between Extinction Party n Temptation Stairway, or thise is a diffrnt Ena entirely.  I'd hav 2 sy prsnlly tht I'm leanng 2wrds the latter bc of how the VA's are crdtd. but if ur not convinced, let me continu:

When we meet the Shepard in 7:52 of the episode, they say (verbatim) "Arghh... Another ENA trouble maker." which implies there r more than 1 Ena's

9:08 - 9:19 when Ena jumps in2 the "Holy Code" where we head undrwtr in2 a sea of diffrnt doors, we see floating Ena models (n the comment section seems 2 gravit8 2 callng them "dead bodies") (Honorary mention: You'll notic they glitch in2 Mannequins if u pay attention 2 them). This piec of info is Direct Evidence 2 the multi-ena theory, bc ther r Explicitly mor thn 1 ena's on screen! wht's concernng n unanswrd tho, is y do they glitch in2 mannequins? Does tht mean all the mannequins we sw on screen in the begnng of the video (n onwards) were all previously an Ena? Is it only an Ena tht can transform in2 a mannequin or cn othr chrctrs also become mannequins?

Not the strongst evidenc b i'll input it anywy: Ena's Action boxes (Like when she receivs or gives items) spell her nme her as ƎNA (with a backwrds E). The thing abt thise 1 is tht we can't compare it with Auction Day n Extinction Part bc they don't have any action boxes. BUT What we CAN compare is how she is spelled in the dialogue boxes of those speakng in diffrnt languages AND in the Credits! In Episodes 1-2, She's Spelled as Ena with this captialis8ion. In Temptation Stairway the dialogue and credits consitntly spell her as ENA in all caps. May or may not allude 2 her being diffrnt, b i will admit this is the most Strechiest piec of evidnc. Tru or not, I'd like 2 refer 2 Tempt8ion Stairway ena as TS!Ena or ƎNA, prsnlly 2 differenti8 her frm the othr episodes

Pronounci8ion: BUT 2 build on the above evidence, In the beginning of the episode, Moony DOES pronounc Ena's name in different wys a lot, startng w I-NA (ai-na), ENA (ehna), n finally JENA. And this isnt new! She’s been doing it sinc Auction Day (ee-nah/ii-na) n Extinction Party (ay-nah). Thise may or my not sggst that perhaps Moony's inconsistancy is bc these othr pronunci8ions or names cld b of other ena's she's met in the past w similr or diffrnt preferences! I’d say because of her constant switchng in the beginning of Temptation Stairway, it would lean 2wards that she may know different Ena’s @ once. Otherwise, c the Multi-Enaverse theory below

Note: Every othr charctr besides Moony (So far; Merci and the Shepard) Pronounces Ena as ehna (or ehna) so it might be that perhaps Eh-na is the universal way of pronouncng Ena?

Conlusions/thghts on this theory: I prsnlly like thise a lot!! It makes Enasonas Very Possible, b also tht any interpret8ion of Ena cn b corrct or possibl! It knda saddens me tho bc im not rlly sure if we'll ever return 2 the Ena we're used 2, I wldnt rlly want 2 b stuck w/o Sad bc I thnk her role is rlly neat n can b importnt, b im biasd. I also rlly subscribe 2 thise theory bc it means whtvr happend 2 TS!Ena ds not hav 2 be permanent in the long run; Again litrlly the only thng keepng me from gettng supr upset abt the ending of Temptation Stairway, is tht the prev ena’s r not the sme n wld possibly not do thise, or tht ther r othr ena’s out ther besides THISE episod 1, who wld nvr do tht, etc

Part 4: The Multiple Enaverses/Multi-Enaverse Theory AKA The Alternative In Defense of Moony Mispronouncing Ena’s name over and over

An alterntve 2 the Multi-Ena theory, is tht there is MORE thn 1 Enaverse! So bsclly, a multiverse theory. Primarily thise my explain Not jst Ena's sudden Shift in how diffrnt she is in thise episode b may also explain how Diffrnt Moony is actng in thise episode 2. While thise isnt the top theory i prsnlly subscribe 2 (sinc ther isnt explicit evidence besides it bein an explan8ion 4 Moony n Ena's weird/diffrnt behavior), it DOES open a lot of doors 2 intrstng things 2 thnk abt!

Bsclly Moony keeps mispronouncing Ena’s name a lot (in Tempation Stairway) n its Really Rude, esp consdrng she’s always said it properly (As in @ least 1nce in an episode n not switchng multiple times) b4! so 2 Explain her Sudden change in behavior, this is actlly a Different Moony, besides a different Ena. this is a whole different universe/timeline!

LIKE If not multiple Ena's, The different Loca8ions in Ena cn probbly b traversible across dimensions! The Holy Code may b the door 2 diffrnt enaverses. The Shepard's garden cld b an interdimensionl place tht is singular n deals w diffrnt beings passing thru! While i dnt hav mch 2 sy on thise, its RLLY Interestng 2 thnk abt

Like the Multi-Ena theory, thise also opens the doors 2 enasonas being vry possibl :^) Som ppl's evidences r all involvng Moony besides how Ena's rlly diffrnt

Moony can skateboard??

Moony's square shape hole can shrink 2 hold an item

while not strong ATM or frm wht i cn see, its still very inch restng!!! Tho I would sy it is VERY on par w the Multi-Ena theory anyway

Part 5: Honorary Mentions: Mini Theories

The Great Runas is actlly a play on the "Run As" Command! I'm not very Smart engh 2 break thise down vry well, b bsclly w all the allusion 2 "codes" n the Blood ID looking like a Chip, The Great Runas being abl 2 grant u wishes makes a lot of sense! This ws brought up 2 me from a friend (@ambercard​)!

like its a command line. so then the great runas being able to grant wishes makes sense if its digital world like all the code stuff says Allows a user to run specific tools and programs with different permissions than the user's current logon provides.

Runas is a command-line tool that is built into Windows Vista. To use runas at the command line, open a command prompt, type runas with the appropriate parameters, and then press ENTER.

In the user interface for Windows Vista, the Run as… command has been changed to Run as administrator. However, you should rarely have to use the Run as administrator command because Windows Vista will automatically prompt you for an administrator password when it is needed.

and my friend who i was talking to said that probably explains what the password was for and the blood id being a login or something?

its possible using the blood id akin to using the run as administrator command since idk their name but one of the people ena met said the blood id didnt seem like her which is like. if she isnt administrator then it would make sense that using that command wouldnt match who she is

My response:

man do u realiz Ena uslly does not hav the corrct passwrd/admin privileges all the tme? Bc the guardian entity in extinction party askd her 4 1 b i guess it ws so Low Game tht it wsnt supr necsrry in the end

The Enaverse is all a computer code of some sort- most probbaly a game! AKA: This is a digital world

... If we were too treat this world as a video game this would make more sense since different play through bus and all that. Oh god this feels like a fnaf situation, taking a video that just wants to be a video and turning it into a big serious thing

Going with the whole ‘there are multiple enas representing the player’ theory, perhaps this ENA realized that she’s in a video game and isn’t taking it too well? But the game is kind of glitching out because of it.

Honorable Mentions: Random Info + Unanswered Questions

Ena seems self-aware of smth! (10:24 Ena screams "YOU'RE ALL LIVING A LIE!") May help the Run as command idea n the video game/digital reality idea! If not a video gme, they sure r Somewhere

What does the Great Runas look like?? is it the door? is ther mor thn 1 Runas?

What is Mariya n Gabo's Job? R they just like the Guardian Entity in Extinction Party but are assignd 2 this part/location of where they are?

In 6:30, wht does Ulysses mean by "Desires r never fulfilled nor quenched"? "You Will fail like the rest of them" Is he referring 2 the other Ena's that's passed by? who else have come n failed?

This Post Also brings up som good points I hvnt noticd yet!

Thise comment pretty much says everythng:

Standout things from this animation:

-This Ena switches between a male & female voice at seemingly random instead Happy speaking with a male voice and Sad speaking with a Sad voice. The text boxes noticeably refer to this Ena with a reversed E, and The Shepard says "Another Ena troublemaker", implying that there are multiple Enas. We also see some Ena corpses flickering into the mannequin bodies at one point. Third, at the end we see Ena's sad half turn from blue to yellow over the course of Ena & Moony's conversation. My personal theory is that this Ena is possibly 'broken' in some manner. -Moony either doesn't care or dosen't realize that Ena's voices aren't matching the personalities anymore. -The grey personality appears to come out when Ena gets too stressed out. Notably the transformation involves the happy half turning into static and exploding out, erasing Ena's face in the process. It also appears that some physical trauma (in this case, Brick Frog kicking Ena) is necessary to exit the grey personality, unlike the previously seen 'blackout' personalities which can possibly be switched by the other personality exerting themselves (in the auction episode, Ena enters her sad blackout/depressed personality, then switches to Happy!Ena, who apologizes to Moony about her depressed outburst). -Moony's hole is capable of closing to hold things, and she also knows how to skateboard. -Judging by Ena's reaction, Moony's transformation at the end is weird even by this universe's standards.

aaaand thats all 4 now! I really hope thats all my brain can think of skjsdhfsdfkh

Feel free 2 send me asks abt Ena theories n stuff! While this is a Comprehensiv post, it’s definitely mor focused on the Multi-Ena theory n my thghts on the episode whn it comes 2 how it affects the System Ena theory. I’m open 2 questions!!

Last Edit: Feb 19 2021 (GMT +8)

[bananaofswifts]

“I’m on some new shit,” Taylor Swift sings in the opening lines of Folklore, announcing with a smile and a wink that the many Taylor Swifts of her previous seven albums — even the not-quite-year-old Taylor of Lover — can’t come to the phone right now. 

Swift has always conceived of herself, first and foremost, as a singer-songwriter. But she’s never presented herself to the world that way with quite so much clarity as on Folklore, the surprise LP that she spent the past four months recording with a who’s who of atmospheric indie rockers, including Aaron Dessner and Justin Vernon. The most surprising aspect of the album, though, is just how ultimately unsurprising it feels to hear Swift on her new shit, singing over fluttering High Violet trumpets, morose Dessner piano runs, and gently thundering 22, A Million programming glitches.

That’s because Swift has spent the past 15 years developing an internal world of melody and song structure so sui generis that her songs now belong more to her than to whatever sonic palette she’s working in at any given time. Take “Better Man,” the 2016 power ballad she wrote for country group Little Big Town, or “This is What You Came For,” the EDM hit she co-wrote for Rihanna that same year. Dressed up slightly differently, either song could have fit seamlessly on any of Swift’s last three albums — because at heart, neither of them is a country song or an EDM song, so much as they’re both Swift songs.

Swift could have chosen any number of directions for her latest step forward, but on Folklore she clearly relishes working in a realm that might be a little closer to the way she’s always heard her own songs in her head. “Just like a folk song/Our love will be passed on,” sings the woman named after James Taylor. Even if these songs don’t actually present as folk music in any strict musicological sense, it makes sense that Swift has chosen folk music as the broad aesthetic template for her deepest dive into writing third-person character sketches. “I found myself not only writing my own stories,” she said of her new album, “but also writing about or from the perspective of people i’ve never met.”

Like many who were melodramatic twenty-somethings in the late aughts, Swift has likely spent time with Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago, the album that redefined folk in the popular imagination a music of deeply felt cabin-in-the-woods seclusion. Faced, then, with an unfamiliar period of physical isolation under quarantine, Swift did what anyone in her position might: She called up Justin Vernon and started writing some sad songs. 

Swift’s ability to effortlessly try on new sounds and styles comes from her lifetime of devouring every record she could get her hands on. As with all of her albums, there are hints of her wide-ranging listening all over Folklore: the Dashboard Confessional singles she obsessed over as a teenager; the light Avril Lavigne and Colbie Caillat singer-songwriter pop that helped inspire her first two albums; the Death Cab for Cutie, MGMT, Band of Horses, Tunnel of Love-era Springsteen, and Flaming Lips tunes she expressed love for on the Speak Now tour; and yes, the various National and Justin Vernon-related songs she’s been putting on her own curated playlists since as early as 2017. (In 2018, Swift shouted out the National’s “Slow Show,” which features the band’s all-time most Swiftian couplet: “You know I dreamed about you/For 29 years before I saw you.”)

As such, Folklore doesn’t signal any sort of declarative pivot from the past, so much as it opens up a new world of future costumes that’d surely fit her just as well, from pop-punk (as others showed on ReRed, last year’s scrappy garage-rock remake of 2012’s Red), to the spectral Ingrid Michaelson indie-pop she always seems one step away from diving into headfirst, to the dobro-laced Patty Griffin roots record Swift seems bound to one day gravitate towards a decade or two down the line.

There’s no question what genre any of those records would ultimately belong to — her own. But part of the fun of watching her genre-hopping is in the way she enjoys playfully embodying the outward aesthetics of her latest collaborators. In the case of Folklore, she’s been referring to newfound musical buddies like Vernon in public since at least 2014, and you can hear her taking up the role of a record-collector nerd even as she commands her own sound. On the chorus to “Cardigan,” Swift tries on her best version of Matt Berninger’s wine-tipsy “This is The Last Time” mumble, singing the word “I” as “i-i-i-i.” “Your favorite song was playing/from the far side of the gym,” she sighs later, alluding to the National’s 2017 song “Dark Side of the Gym,” one of Swift’s favorite of their tunes. (Leave it to Taylor to write a line about the fact that she placed a certain song on an Apple Music playlist.) 

That line comes 14 songs into the album, on  the Dessner-produced “Betty,” a rootsy, harmonica-driven number that, on one hand, feels like one of the precious few purely acoustic tunes you might expect from an album with a title like Folklore. On the other hand, the melody of “Betty” feels like an amalgamation of Swift’s entire balladeering career: the tender, “Tim McGraw” loping verse phrasing, the folk-pop Fearless pop turn in the chorus, the gently ascendant Speak Now bridge. “I showed up at your party,” Swift sings in the song, addressing, in part, any skeptical genre gatekeepers wondering what she’s doing with her newfangled sounds. But Swift has the last laugh once again. She knows she’s been at the party, lurking over on the dark side of the gym, the whole time. 

[tulipanthousa]

a moonbeam brushed across my face

Patton does not have a “magical boyfriend” kink.

He just has magic boyfriends. Who are super hot. It’s coincidence.

Pairing: the series is LAMP but this is mostly just moxiety

Word count: 3164

Warnings/tags: Slight exhibition kink, Marking kink, Dom virgil, uh bratty (?) sub/switch (listen I don't really know the specifics of the terminology, I just write Patton How He Is in my head XD), Patton being a lowkey monsterfucker, multiple orgasms. Honestly this is. SO fucking fluffy, I had a harder time keeping a straight face writing the fluff than I did with the smut

Notes: part of my Love and Other Fairytales Verse (most of which is sfw and found on my main ts blog @tulipscomeinallsortsofcolors​) taking place about ehhh a year and some change after the main story.

For the prompt:

Patton's playful, teasing nature VS Virgil's ability to be "patient": fight! (okay but for real though I'd be fascinated to see that dynamic. could Patton push Virgil far enough that he'd give in or would Patton come to him begging before that? I'd /love/ to see Patton tease Virge just far enough to make him snap--in a fun way, of course). (From 🌈🌻 anon)

this is a little Adjacent to the exact prompt, hope thats chill

The title is from Bright by Echosmith

Many thanks to @trivia-goddess​ for beta reading!

---

The thing about being the only human in the fairy hills (or for several miles in any direction, for that matter) was that it was lonely a lot of the time.

Not in the sense that Patton was alone – he was actually hardly ever alone, between White and Bell and Virgil.

But sometimes one of them – usually White or Bell, to be honest – would say something that just… flew over his head, an idiom or some kind of cultural reference that Patton didn’t understand, and he’d have to either stop the conversation and ask them to explain or let it pass and risk he was misunderstanding completely.

It was just… lonely.

And then a little awkward, because all Patton really wanted was to go find Virgil, but he wasn’t supposed to wander around by himself, which meant he had to ask Bell or White to take him there.

So that’s what he was doing now, and that meant Belladonna being… well, Belladonna.

Patton reached out to knock on the door to the hall, but Bell leaned around him and threw it open before he could. Virgil was sitting at the heavy wooden table with another gentry Patton only barely recognize as the head of either the Spring or Summer court – it was June, so it could be either. Virgil looked up immediately, frowning, but then his face smoothed out the second he saw Patton in the door.

“I’ve brought the little bird, your highness,” said Bell loudly, “He was moping,”

Patton sputtered, but Virgil’s mouth ticked up at the corners.

“I- well, not really moping,” said Patton weakly.

“I’m sure the mortal can wait,” said the other fae primly.

“I’m sure you can wait,” said Virgil bluntly, “You’re not listening to me anyway, might as well do it somewhere else,”

The fae turned scarlet immediately, and Patton bit the inside of his lip. He wasn’t sure if he was going to chastise Virgil for being rude or laugh, and he figured both were probably not super great ideas.

Bell cheerfully led the Seelie woman out of the hall, chatting about something Patton wasn’t quite listening close enough to catch. The door shut, and Patton was already across the space between them, climbing into Virgil’s lap and tucking his face into his neck with a sigh.

“Bad day?” murmured Virgil, his lips pressed against Patton’s forehead.

“Not bad,” Patton assured him, “Just...”

He trailed off, not sure how to articulate it.

“...Yeah,” he finished lamely.

Virgil smiled. Patton couldn’t help but mirror it, tapping Virgil’s chest lightly.

“Shame on you, laughing at me,” he muttered, giggling a little.

“Not laughing,” Virgil assured him, kissing his cheek. Patton hummed happily.

“Dance with me?” said Virgil gently.

Patton’s shoulders slumped in relief.

“Yes, please,” he said.

Patton didn’t have time to try and get up – Virgil just stood from the chair and lifted Patton with him, setting him lightly on his feet. Giggling, Patton looped his arms around Virgil’s neck and cuddled close, relaxing into Virgil’s chest as he led them into a turn.

The first thing was always the sweet-iced-tea-taste that bloomed on Patton’s tongue, so real he could almost hear the click of the ice. And then it was like he flopped back into a huge, fluffy snowdrift, powdery flecks of cold puffing up in clouds around him. Relaxing the rest of the way, Patton closed his eyes and imagined his breath wisping out of him in little white whiffs.

“Comfy?”

Smiling against Virgil’s chest, Patton nodded, rubbing his cheek on the fabric of Virgil’s hoodie.

Virgil starting humming, a spinning little tune that never seemed to repeat. They drifted around the room, slow and aimless and without Patton ever once having to think about where to put his feet next.

He was outright grinning now, and could feel the same from Virgil, pressed to the top of his head. He nuzzled his face into the hoodie again, and Virgil’s hand drifted from the small of his back to the nape of his neck, trailing his fingers over the skin there.

Patton giggled, squirming.

“Tickles,” he murmured. He felt Virgil’s grin widen, and the fingers scrabbled a little.

Squealing, Patton scrunched up his neck, and Virgil laughed outright, pressing Patton closer and digging one hand lightly into his ribs, the other in the bend of his neck.

Patton shrieked, trying to squirm away, but Virgil just swooped him off his feet and spun faster. Patton couldn’t stop laughing, his head spinning right along with them as Virgil pressed tickly kisses all along the side of his neck.

“Feel better?” said Virgil smugly after a minute or so of this.

Patton giggled, breathless and beaming, pressing his own smattering of kisses all over Virgil’s face.

“Mhm,” he hummed, “So much. Thank you,”

“Good,”

Patton pecked him a few more times, and he felt like he was… sparkling or something, like ice crystals catching the light on a window. Pressing one more firm kiss against Virgil’s lips, he sighed dreamily.

Virgil’s hand moved to grip Patton firmer under his thighs. Their lips softened, and Patton sighed again, quiet and pleased.

“Love you,” he mumbled.

“I love you, too,” said Virgil, the words pressed right up against Patton’s parted lips. Patton leaned in again, kissing the words out of his mouth.

Virgil made low noise, so quiet Patton almost didn’t hear it. Smiling faintly, Patton gave curious little nibble against Virgil’s bottom lip.

Virgil’s fingers tightened even more, and Patton couldn’t help but squirm a little in his grip.

“Are you trying to start something?” said Virgil, voice so low Patton felt it rumble through him where their chests were pressed together.

Patton’s head was still spinning, though it was suddenly a lot more tilt-a-whirl than merry-go-round.

“… What if I am?”

Patton was pressed up against the wall practically before the words were out of his mouth.

“Of course you are,” purred Virgil, his lips brushing Patton’s neck, “Always up to something, aren’t you?”

Patton let out a breathless giggle that flipped halfway through into a low, drawn-out groan when Virgil dragged his teeth down Patton’s throat.

“Someone’s going to hear you,” teased Virgil.

Patton’s reaction – a short strangled keen, his knees and fingernails digging in everywhere he touched Virgil – surprised him as much as it seemed to surprise Virgil.

“Fuck,” hissed Patton.

Virgil’s breath was unsteady on Patton’s throat, his hands so tight on Patton’s thighs there were definitely going to be bruises, the mere thought of which made Patton moan again.

“Is that what you’re after?” growled Virgil, “You want to sing for me, beloved? Want everybody to hear how good I make you feel?”

“Yes, yes, Christmas cookies, Vir-”

Virgil bit sharp on his neck, and Patton arched into it with a pitched groan.

“Again, please, please-”

Pressing Patton’s back flush to the stone, Virgil licked into his mouth, cool and firm as marble against him and seeming totally unfazed by Patton’s nails scratching at his shoulder.

“Please what?” he said, faux-innocent.

Patton huffed, petulant.

“I want you to mark me up,” he whined, “I know you like to, why do you make me beg you for it every time, honey,”

“You sound so pretty, how could I resist?” Virgil teased, “And you love it anyway,”

Huffing again, Patton tossed his head and arched his back, letting out as wanton a moan as he could manage. Virgil’s eyes were dark and electric, and Patton grinned at him.

“Like it a lot more if you did it faster,” he breathed.

Virgil’s answering growl wasn’t anywhere near human, and neither were the teeth on Patton’s neck, too sharp and Virgil’s mouth so cold it burned – Patton’s cock was straining in his jeans, mewling as Virgil started rocking their hips together.

“Shameless minx,” said Virgil, reverent, “So beautiful, fuck, you drive me up the wall-”

“Oh, good idea,” groaned Patton, “Great idea, you fucking me up against the wall, yes, please,”

Virgil shifted his grip, and when Patton felt the hard line of him pressed right up against his own cock he whimpered weakly.

“V-”

Patton cut himself off with a glance at the door, a little irritated. His head was still a little hazy, but no too much for him to miss that might be a bad idea.

“I- I wanna go to our room,” he said.

Virgil didn’t stop grinding against him, but he did slow down. One particularly firm press made Patton’s eyes roll a little, gasping.

“Thought you wanted people to hear?” said Virgil, sounding half-playful and half genuinely curious.

“I thought- I thought I did,” said Patton. Swearing, he lost his train of thought until Virgil backed off a little.

“… But?” said Virgil a touch of anxiety creeping into his voice.

Patton giggled a little breathlessly.

“Your name,” he laughed, “Wanna scream it for you, sweetheart, just for you-”

The room spun, and Patton didn’t have time to get dizzy before his back hit their made bed, Virgil’s weight pressing him into the mattress and his hands pushing up Patton’s shirt to suck wet kisses into his skin.

“Virgil!”

“Perfect,” groaned Virgil, “You’re perfect, love your pretty sounds so much, beloved,”

Patton sat up just enough to wriggle the rest of the way out of his shirt, tossing it who-the-heck-cared-where as Virgil trailed his lips down Patton’s belly, soft and wet and the occasional sharp nick of teeth that made Patton feel like he was gonna burst right out of his skin.

Virgil sucked a particularly harsh kiss into the crease of Patton’s hip, his firm grip keeping Patton still no matter how he squirmed.

“Oh my god, Virgil, if you don’t fuck me I’m gonna lose my mind,” whined Patton.

Virgil was still holding him in that iron grip, but he leaned back, staring up at Patton and grinning wickedly.

“Impatient,” he murmured, “Ask nicely,”

Patton shivered.

“Come on,” said Virgil, kissing Patton’s stomach softly, his eye so focused that Patton felt them like a physical weight.

“Be sweet for me, love, ask me,”

Letting out a shuddering breath, Patton gripped Virgil’s wrist, shifting just to feel the pressure of Virgil’s fingertips digging into his thigh and his ass.

“Please,” he whimpered, “Want you to fuck me so bad, Virgil, please,”

Virgil kissed him like he was trying to memorize the inside of his mouth – Patton had barely even registered that Virgil had moved at all before he was bucking his own hips against him, groaning against his mouth. Virgil’s tongue slipped against his and Patton’s nails scrambled uselessly at his shoulders.

With one more firm, punctuating kiss, Virgil sat up on his elbows to stare down at him.

His face was half in shadow, his eyes glittering black and startling purple – he looked half-reverent and half like he was going to eat Patton alive, which probably shouldn’t be hot but Patton had long ago made peace with his not-so-average turn-ons.

He blinked, and smile had shifted a fraction – softer, and when Virgil gently tucked a lock of hair behind his ear Patton’s heart gave a shaking lurch forward.

“Strip for me?”

Patton nodded eagerly,  which made Virgil giggle a little, so then Patton giggled and when Virgil rolled off of him to fish in the bedside drawer Patton could barely resist the urge to follow him and just make out until their lips went numb.

Patton had barely kicked off his jeans and underwear when Virgil looped one arm around his waist and pulled him into his lap. Not quite expecting, Patton let out a short yelp of surprise and brace himself a little on the headboard just above Virgil’s shoulders.

Virgil had lost his clothes in the interim, which made Patton huff just a little – he would have liked to see the process.

“Now who’s impatient?”

Virgil pinched his ass.

“Oh, am I getting punished?” Patton teased, wiggling in his lap.

“You’re not going to behave at all, are you?” said Virgil, kneading Patton’s hip.

Patton really was going to say something very sexy (or at least, he definitely meant to) but then Virgil’s slick finger pressed against his rim and he just let out a strangled mewl.

Another thing that probably shouldn’t be hot – Virgil’s fingers were almost always cold, except on the (amazing, wonderful, so lovely) occasions when he’d already had them inside Roman for a while before he stretched Patton, which was its own special kind of treat.

But Patton loved it, loved the way he couldn’t possibly ignore Virgil inside of him or that it was Virgil, and when Virgil’s other hand slid up his hip to press against the small of his back Patton went without any resistance, his chest against Virgil’s and his cock trapped between them.

Virgil didn’t so much stretch him as coax Patton open, gentle and maddeningly slow, biting leisurely kisses along Patton’s neck like he had all the time in the world while Patton was starting to feel like he was literally going to combust on the spot.

“Virgil- ah – Virgil, please, baby, I want you to fuck me, I’ll be good, I promise-”

Virgil let out a guttural snarl and pressed so hard on Patton’s prostate he saw spots.

Patton was already close, panting into Virgil’s mouth and so hard he was nearly tearing up.

Sliding his hands to cup Patton’s ass, Virgil finally, finally, pulled Patton up on his knees, and Patton couldn’t even be salty about Virgil’s mouth twitching into a self-satisfied smirk when Patton groaned at the first slow thrust.

“Oh, oh,”

“Look at me,” growled Virgil.

Their foreheads touching, Virgil's hands lifting Patton so easy, and Patton’s fingers tangled in the ink-black strands of his hair – it was all already so much, and when Patton looked through his lashes into Virgil’s half-lidded eyes he was completely gone.

“That’s it,” purred Virgil, “That’s perfect, let go for me. You’re so pretty, taking my cock like you were made for it,”

Patton didn’t look away, didn’t even try to string a sentence together from the spinning kaleidoscope of his thoughts or the wordless noises spilling from his mouth, just let Virgil guide the slow roll of their locked hips while the pressure in his groin built, until Virgil suddenly wrapped a hand around Patton’s cock and ran a firm thumb up the vein along the underside.

Patton wailed, barely registering the sound of random things in the room rattling as he spilled all over Virgil’s hand and both their stomachs. Virgil slowed, but he didn’t quite stop, watching Patton with unwavering intensity.

Patton let out a faint, strangled sob - but when Virgil did stop then, Patton gave a weak roll of his hips that made Virgil hiss something too low to make out.

“Want me to come in you?” Virgil asked, “You wanna come on my cock again, for me to fuck you until you can’t think about anything else?”

Nodding desperately, Patton groaned when Virgil shifted back for a different angle, squeezed Patton’s hips like a vice, and thrust up so hard one of Patton’s hands flew up to brace himself against the headboard.

And now he couldn’t speak or understand what Virgil was saying, couldn’t think about anything but the sunspots of overstimulation and the feeling of Virgil pounding up into him, his chilly hand still stroking Patton’s half-hard cock and the way Virgil was looking at him like he was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

“Love you,” gasped Patton, cutting off whatever he’d been babbling before, “Oh, I love you, I love you so much,”

Hips stuttering, Patton felt Virgil’s breath hitch across his lips.

“I love you, too,” he gasped, fingers starting to dig restlessly, “Fuck, you’re perfect. You’re so beautiful, always coming so pretty for me,”

The pressure was building once more, even as Patton’s cock was barely hard again. He nodded, too far gone to kiss his boyfriend properly but pressing their gasping mouths together anyway.

“Perfect,” Virgil moaned, and god he meant that, didn’t he? Meant it and believed it – Patton’s heart felt too big and his skin felt too tight, like he was gonna shake apart completely in Virgil’s arms until he was just spinning little dots like dust motes in a beam of light.

Virgil’s hips stuttered; he laced his fingers through Patton’s hair, pulled his head back with a sudden yank and bit Patton’s throat, and Patton whited out completely, groaning weakly as he came again with Virgil spilling inside him.

It took a while for him to come out of it, lying on his side and tucked up against Virgil’s chest, the fluffy comforter pulled over both of them. Virgil was pressing feather-soft kisses all over his face, and a couple to his throat that Patton realized were laced with that soothing numbness.

Patton flicked him halfheartedly.

“No lidocaine kisses,” he muttered sleepily, “You know I like them,”

“It’s only a little,” huffed Virgil.

“Hmm, nope,” said Patton with a little pop to the ‘p,’ grinning up at him.

Virgil rolled his eyes, kissing Patton’s lips instead.

Patton prodded gently at his own neck, humming at the fresh sting.

“You got me good,” he purred.

Virgil bit the inside of his cheek, turning a little pink and clearly trying not to laugh.

“I am venomous, you know,” he said dryly, “You could pretend to be nervous,”

Patton whined a little.

“I need at least ten minutes before you start being all… spooky-sexy again,”

Virgil choked on a laugh.

“Before I start being what?”

“Oh, you know exactly what I’m talking about, you faker-”

“Do I? You’ll have to elaborate,” teased Virgil.

Patton whacked his shoulder gently.

“Yes, you do,” he laughed.

“Hmm, maybe,” smiled Virgil, “You and your ‘magical lover’ kink,”

Patton squawked, shoving Virgil away when he started cackling. He grabbed the pillow behind him and started thumping it against Virgil’s chest.

“It! Is! Not! A kink, you goof, you all are magic-”

“Pat! Okay, mercy, mercy, I give-”

“Damn straight you give,” said Patton, but he was pretty sure it didn’t really have the full effect because he was still very much laughing. He flopped down on top of the pillow, still resting on Virgil’s chest.

Virgil laid his hand on Patton’s back, running his fingertips in light circles. Sighing happily, Patton snuggled a little closer, leaning into Virgil’s hand when it trailed up to card through his hair.

“I love you,” said Virgil.

Patton smiled.

“I love you, too,”

Someday, Patton would figure out a way to explain it. That it wasn’t really just that Virgil – or Logan and Roman, for that matter, were powerful, but more that they were powerful and his. Dangerous, yes – but never dangerous to him.

But for now, he just scooted back up to tuck his face into Virgil’s neck, pulling his boyfriend’s arms around him and settling in with a happy sigh.

Virgil started humming, low and never looping, and Patton smiled.

---

ko-fi

[luvtessascott]

SOI Hamilton Part 2/2 Write-Up (Retakes & M&G)

Part 1

The retakes started with Scott and quickly after Tessa coming out for their little speech to past the time while some of the skaters got ready to do a retake. Scott works the crowd with great confidence even better when Tessa got out there. The fake proposal was so cute I was laughing SO hard as was the whole audience. Lots of screaming and laughter. When Scott asked the crowd for something else for them to do, of course half of the crowd started chanting KISS KISS KISS, lol that’s when my second hand embarrassment kicked in hahaa...anyways he talked to an adorbs little girl after and then someone suggested to talk Marie and Patch. Anyways, the video of this whole thing is on my youtube. I also want to add, that I love that Tessa was the one to pull off the joke LIKE YAS give me more T. I also thought their low light, highlight was really funny. The retakes for the Boy’s number was really fun of course Scott when HAM again and chanted on the other boy through the whole number. I’m glad they decided to do the whole number again when really they only had to do part of it.

OKAY MEET AND GREET! So we took our time getting down there, had a quick chat with our friends, had a washroom break, and then took to the line. We were about third last in line but the line moved at a good pace. At no point did I feel like it was taking too long. We talked to some fans in line, I’m always happily surprised to see just how many fans come from the states for our shows. @makeitcountmeggy and I briefly discussed things we really wanted to say to each of the skaters and the general order we wanted to do things for when we got to TS.

The first table had Jeff and Kaetlyn. We walked up and said Hi, we congratulated Kaetlyn on her World title and on the olympics and jeff on a great show. I told Kaetlyn that when she was skating at worlds I used all my data to watch her skate and it was totally worth it. We all laughed and Jeff echoed that it was worth it and Kaetlyn said thank you. She’s very striking in person, maybe it was how her make-up was done but her dark features are so bold. That was my first time meeting both of them. They were really nice.

Next, we moved to Eric and Meghan. Began with the Olympic congrats. We had pre-planned to talk about TSL with Meghan. @makeitcountmeggy started off  by saying that we had discussed it and wanted to tell her that she was the best thing to ever happen to TSL. She laughed and thanked us said that she wanted to put a positive spin and bring some new discussion to the table. I told her that it was refreshing and we really valued her insight. She said thank you so much. I had met them once before in 2015. They’re a little quite but if you bring up topics they’re easy to talk to.

Kaitlyn and Andrew!! Another pre-planned topic was to talk about Nationals in 2018, both of us had attended it. I said that their Je Suis Malade performance at nationals was one of our favourite moments. They both said ‘Awh thank you’. @makeitcountmeggy told them that we were there in person and when the whole audience was willing them on before it started it felt so special. Kaitlyn sighed happily and said she couldn’t believe that happened. After having a rough SD, they were really nervous going into the free and just knowing they had the whole crowd behind them...Andrew cut in and said that it was then a moment of well we need to pull it together and really deliver now. Kaitlyn agreed yeah now that everyone was behind them they had to do it. I said but wasn’t it a relief to do it?! And they both exclaimed yes of course such a big relief. I’ve met Kaitlyn and Andrew twice before in 2015. They’ve gotten much better at talking with fans. They were pretty awkward in 2015, hahaa.

Then we got to Gabi and Javi. We didn’t have much to say to them, just congrats on the olympics Gabi said that she loved our outfits and we looked super cute. We asked them how they were holding up since we were the end of the end. They laughed said they were tired. 

There was a bit of a line for TS obviously fans were talking time with them. So they re-arranged the line and we waited. The girl and boy behind us were super hyped and emotional and shaky so we allowed them to go ahead of us and opted to go last. I’ve mentioned this before but my favourite thing to do for memories is to pop my phone on voice record before a meet and greet and then just lay it on the table so I have the memory later. I have it for this one, I don’t feel comfortable posting because of the now much larger size of the fandom. Message me off anon if you’re really curious and I’ll consider. I’m only going to write my side of the meet and greet to allow @makeitcountmeggy to tell her side if she wishes. Meg went up first and went to Tessa’s side of the table and began talking. I went to Scott’s side and said “HI”. He said, “Hi, nice to see you again!” Tessa repeated as well ‘Good to see you again!’ and I said “yes, great to see you!”. Then Scott opened his arm and said ‘come here.’ And I walked in and gave him a hug. (lol, guys I was so close to the flow.) I stepped back and handed him his present and said “This is for you”. It was in neon green wrapping paper that was a tad see through but I put his card on the front so it blocked for the most part what the gift was. He said “Oh you didn’t have to do that.” He took it into his hands and rubbed his fingers over the wrapping paper and said “Is this what I think it is?” I didn’t respond I was processing just being hugged by Scott guys and he repeated, “Is it?” He had this excited tentative smile on his face almost vibrating and then I said, “What do you think it is?” He said “I don’t want to say it.” And I pushed further, “Say it.” He continues to slip his hands under the paper and he says, “No I don’t want to say it.” So I said, “It’s a record...” He says “YA?” And i repeat “It is a record.” And he said “which one is it?” and I said, “Uhm Apple... I forget what it’s called.” He makes his first tear of the wrapping paper and I said “Yeah open it, go for it.” He makes quick work of the paper revealing the record for ‘Road Apples’ by The Tragically Hip. He gasped and jumped out of his chair and pulled me into him for a hug. I was laughing because it was legit adorable such childlike excitement. He said “You’re the best! I’ve never..I’ve never opened a present before opening a card, that is SOOOO amazing, THAAANK YOU.” I said, “You’re welcome, I’m so glad you like it.” He then said to some of the crew that was hanging around, “it’s awesome eh?” and security said “Road Apple?” and he said, “Yeah, road apple.” He said, “That is the most thoughtful thing, thank you so much.” He hugged me again. Then he sat down and said, “You know Rick (referring to the annoying security guard), was the secuirty guard on tour for the Hip well a lot of times but on that last tour?” And I said ‘oh?” Scott said, “Yeah he’s a big star, he’s a bigger star than us. He’s in that Long Time Running documentary...” Then I turned to Tessa (who had been talking with Meg, I didn’t just ignore her LOL). I said, “Tessa this is for you it’s an early birthday present.”  Handed her a large hot pink sparkly flower gift bag, that had a small box that was wrapped in paper in side. Tessa said, “Oh thank you so much! I Can’t wait to open it.” She peaked inside and said, “Ou I see some chocolate down there.” And I said, “Yeah, always chocolate.” She said, “Thank you so much,” with a smirk and continued, “I’m going to save it so I can open it at home.”

Incase you’re curious, I got Tessa the record for Moulin Rouge but it came in this box so I wrapped the entire box so it fit nicer in the gift bag.

We then slide our prints from Danielle on the table for signing. And they both leaned in to look at the pictures. The pictures were ontop of envelopes where Danielle had written us cute messages and Tessa slide it down and was glancing at them. I said, “Of course Danielle took these.” Then Tessa said, “She’s the best.” Meg said, “She’s awesome.” Tessa said, “That’s so cool, they’re both cool.” They start to sign them and Tessa stared at it for a moment and said “she’s so amazing.” Then we took our picture and said ‘thank you!’ Scott again said, “That is the best [reference to the record], you’ve just inspired a new collection for me.” We said “Bye, thank you!” And headed out.

(Anything from Ts was word for word based off my audio clip)

We basically skipped back to meet Danielle absolutely thrilled. Such a great meet and greet experience we had a ton of fun.

[destiniesfic]

29 Hux POV in TSverse, pretty please? Cherry on top being undertones of Reylux?

kyloslightsabertwirl said: For Becca 😏 14 + Hux

Remember those one-word prompts from a while back? I was sitting on these ones until after TS 19. Uhh warnings follow for talk of sexual acts, prostitution, sadism of dubious consent, something about restraints in there, a brief child abuse reference, allusions to torture? And just generally Hux being not a good dude. :/

14. bitter + 29. preparation | now on AO3

Is there such a thing, Armitage Hux wonders, as a well-reputed house of ill-repute? Certainly, there is no good name for one. “Brothel” is the most straightforward term, and as these things go it’s fairly neutral, although not quite complimentary. One would think that those who deal in the galaxy’s oldest trade would have found a way to rebrand by now.

Then again, perhaps it’s best to be straightforward. Clients know why they’re here and what they’re paying for. Everything else is just trappings. But trappings do matter, Hux muses as he waits in these rented chambers, one arm draped over the back over the low sofa upon which he reclines. The receiving room’s furnishings are simple yet elegant, as is his preference. The upholstery is dark to hide stains. The name of this place doesn’t matter. It is an undiscovered gem, the best whorehouse in the Unknown Regions, and although one would think competition isn’t stiff outside the boundaries of mapped space, the industry underwent a rapid expansion as the First Order swelled into being and colonized all they saw.

Hux sips his tartine tea from the thermos he himself brought, having declined a servant droid’s offer of food and drink. He pays well for discretion, extra because these sessions are always exacting on the staff, even more to ensure that these rooms go unused by anyone else and are thoroughly cleaned prior to his arrival, and more on top of that, for security. Even so, one never knows when a servant or an ally will choose to stab one in the back.

In a roundabout way, that’s why Hux is here. Recent events have left him with troublesome thoughts, and he knows that the longer he ignores them, the more persistent and intrusive they’ll become. Best to find an outlet, and quickly, before they become truly distracting.

As such, his demands are a bit more specific today, different from his norm. The madame here knows his usual tastes: human, naturally blonde, no unnatural markings on the skin, some extra flesh, but only in the right places, and sturdy, durable. No fun for anyone if it ends too soon. But this time he made contact a few days in advance to ensure the madame would have someone on hand that suits his current preferences. Hux doesn’t care whether she finds willing recruits or buys her workers from slavers, as long as he gets his way.

And he always gets his way.

Before long, there is a gentle rap at the chamber doors. Hux takes one last bitter sip from his thermos, then sets it on a side table. “Enter,” he calls.

The door slides aside, and a young woman enters, wearing a cream-colored synthsilk robe and some visible signs of nervousness. Hux is both irritated that she seems willing to fold so early, and pleased to see that she’s very close to his specifications. She allows the door to close behind her and begins to approach him, opening her mouth to no doubt introduce herself, with some coquettish pseudonym. He holds up a hand, to stop her.

“You know who I am,” he says.

The girl closes her mouth. Good, that’s good. No use standing there gawping. But she looks unsure about how to answer the question, and while Hux understands her trepidation given the recent political upheavals, he doesn’t want to waste time. “Honesty,” he directs.

She nods. “Yes, sir. I do.”

Hux wrinkles his nose, slightly. The accent is wrong. His fault for not including that in his list of demands. He’ll just have to ensure she speaks as little as possible.

Not an unpleasant voice, though. A robust, resonant alto. He wonders how it’ll sound when she screams.

He indicates the hexagonal rug in the center of the room. “Stand over there,” he says, his voice tight. “Where I can look at you.”

To her credit, the girl doesn’t hesitate. She walks right to the center of the rug and stands there with her arms at her side, watching him. There is a slight spark of intelligence in those brown eyes, one that Hux is pleased to see. The girl’s nervousness had worried him, but this one is no broken slaver’s pet. And her appearance is about right: early twenties, deep brown hair, delicate features, slender with narrow hips. Hux stands to get a better look, hands behind his back, circling her as a predator might stalk its prey. The girl’s eyes track him, and she begins to turn to follow his progress, but a slight shake of his head is all the instruction she needs to jerk back to face forward. Good girl.

As Hux examines her from behind, he allows two fingers to trace a line from one scapula to the other over the silken fabric of her robe. Were he a creature entirely of logic and reason, he’d say that he merely has to go through these motions every once in awhile to sate a primal biological urge. But while he prizes himself on his ability to analyze, to calculate, to strategize, he never makes that claim, because he knows it’s not quite true.

He does so enjoy himself.

“Take this off,” he tells her.

She does, a little slower than he’d like. She’s still pulling the sash free of its bow when he comes back around to her front. But something must give away his impatience, because she quickly sheds the robe once she sees his face. There is nothing underneath.

Hux sighs, pleased. It is, of course, easier to note what is wrong than what’s right. Her shade is two shades too dark, and she is that shade all over, not paler in the places she kept covered while working for years in a desert. No faint freckles smattering her shoulder, the bridge of her nose. But oh, so very much is right. The curve of her ass, the wiry muscles on her arms, the tight abdominal core. He lays a gloved hand on it and then slides his hand up to cup one of her small breasts, run his thumb contemplatively over the hardening bud of her nipple. And as he does, he says, “Look at me, now.”

She’s half a head shorter than him, and her eyes first find his mouth, drawn in a narrow smile, before meeting his eyes. That little spark is still there, although she tries to hide it behind coy fluttering eyelashes, and Hux thinks she may not want him to see her true feelings. Her little body, stripped of all hair save that on her head, is tense with nervousness, and there’s a hint of reluctance to thin mouth. Unsurprising. Even if she’s a new arrival at this particular brothel, she would have heard stories. She would know what she’s in for.

Or she would think she does.

“You know who I am, pet,” Hux says, his voice a little breathy with anticipation. “You know what to call me.”

The girl’s throat bobs with her swallow. She says, “Yes, Supreme Leader.”

Hux can’t help but shiver at that. Had he been feeling particularly indulgent, he might have hired another player to watch them from that sofa, restrained, to growl and hiss and huff when Hux touches the girl, to wail, later, when he strikes her. But that’s what imagination is for, and Hux’s is up to the task. Besides, any playacting would fall woefully short of the real thing.

He so badly wants to order her to kneel, to kneel before her Supreme Leader, to feel that pretty little mouth wrapped around his cock, but— it has to wait. He hasn’t broken her yet. He jerks his head at the next room, the bedchamber, just on the other side of a curtain. “Get on the bed,” he says. “You’ll find a spreader bar. Secure your ankles and wait for me.”

“Yes, Supreme Leader,” the girl says again, dutifully.

Just before she vanishes through the curtain, he says, “Oh, and no more of that talk now. Not until you’ve had more than you can bear and want to stop. Do you understand?”

The girl hesitates, and then she says, “I do.”

“Good.”

Then she is out of sight, and Hux takes a minute to collect himself before returning to her. He is not wearing his uniform — he won’t sully it with this — but he still wears a number of layers, stiff and formal, and he has to undo his jacket to access his belt, slip it free of the loops of his trousers. He keeps his gloves on, and relishes the whisper-crack of leather on leather as he slides his belt over his palm, noting the perfect shine of the buckle. It’s a rudimentary tool, as these things go, but classic, and there’s a reason for that. There was a point in Armitage Hux’s young life where he found himself on the receiving end of such lashings. His father— well, who could say what his father had meant, in truth? Perhaps he meant to teach Hux obedience. He had taught him something else, instead.

Hux much prefers doling out punishment to taking it.

Torture is an art, one Hux studied and improved as he rose through the First Order’s ranks. Kylo Ren, for all his mysticism-fueled rages, is an amateur. Ren would use a bludgeon when what’s required is a scalpel. And so Hux does wonder, as he slides the belt over his palm, how Ren managed to bend Rey to him in so short a time. Oh, Ren loves the girl, true, but he’s an idiot with no idea how to handle that. Hux has no doubt that Rey’s first few days aboard the Conquest II were thoroughly unpleasant. Even so, Ren had somehow managed to coax loyalty out of her.

Or perhaps she believes she loves him back.

Revolting.

But what is bent may yet be unbent, and bent again. Rey will learn. He’ll break her, first, until she’s past the point of crying or begging, until she’s been molded to fit him. Then she’ll praise him, respect his proper title, thank him for freeing her of delusions, as she should. Yes, the day will come when Hux takes everything from Kylo Ren, and Rey is no exception.

The girl in the other room will play that role, and she will do for now. After all, this night serves a dual purpose: preparation and satisfaction. He would like to think he will only need one or two such sessions before these fantasies abate.

But he knows that’s not quite true, either.

[juliethewicked]

Dress ━ a Kaylor analysis & explanation.

I still can’t believe I’m actually doing this 

The point is that I litteraly can’t stop listening Dress & Dancing With Our Hands Tide and overthinking about Kaylor, so I decided to share my most accurate analysis with you, you’re welcome. 

FIRST OF ALL, the TITLE.  Now, “Dress” is not a bad title and neither a brilliant one, but it fits perfectly to a SUPER MODEL, doesn’t it? 

OUR SECRET MOMENTS in a crowded room  ] ↝ so they can’t show their love if there were people around. 

They’ve got no idea about me and YOU ]  ↝ not only Taylor choose to speak directly to the person she is singing about, avoiding the use of pronouns ( good call, babe ), but here and everywhere in the song ( and in DWOHT too ) there are some references to “I know places” ( another gaylor song that is probably about Karlie ). 

There is an INDENTATION in the shape of you  ] ↝ here she’s koding with Klossy, but I’m not taking credits for this: so clik here if you want read the original theory. 

Made your mark on me a GOLDEN TATTOO  ] ↝ are you talking about this golden tattoos, tay tay? That’s from Drake’s birthday party, she had three golden tattoos ( one on her back, one on her decoltè, one around the arm ), and guess who was with her that night… 

( let’s skip the first part of the chorus, we’ll talk about it later. )

Say my name and everything just stops

I don’t want you like a BEST FRIEND  ] ↝  Taylor has so many friend… but her bestie is Karlie, case closed. 

Only bought this dress so you could take it off  ] ↝ if she’s talking about Karlie, this quote have a double meaning: 1) I bought this dress so you can undress me // 2 ) I bought this dress FOR YOU, and I want to undress you later. 

Carve your name into my BEDPOST  ] ↝  you guys remember when Taylor declare she had a bed just for Karlie in her houses, don’t you? 

Cause I don’t want you like a best friend  ] ↝ and that’s the reason why Karlie’s name is not on your junior jewels t-shirt, Tay? 

Inescapable, I’m not even going to try  ] ↝ double meaning, again: they can’t escape from the world they live in, a world that will judge them // or she can’t escape from Karlie, she can’t help but falling in love with her. 

And if I get burned, at least we were electrified 

I’m spilling wine in the bathtub, you KISS my face and we’re both drunk ] ↝ are we talking abut the kissgate? 

Everyone thinks that they know us, but they know nothing about…  ] ↝  this line is GORGEOUS. She is saying that everyone thinks to know them and the relationship that they share, but they know nothing about:  

All of this silence and patience, pining and anticipation My hands are shaking from holding back from you (ah, ah, ah) All of this silence and patience, pining and desperately waiting My hands are shaking from all this (ah, ha, ha, ha) ] ↝  more like “they think they know us, but they know nothing about the way that I love you ( or the way that I want you)”. 

Flash back when you met me  ] ↝  Victoria Secret Fashion Show, 2013 Your buzzcut and my hair bleached  ] ↝  Taylor had hair bleach in 2016, “buzzcut” can be an hairstyle or a dress, they both can fit on Karlie.  Even in my worst times, you could see the best of me  Flash back to my mistakes, my rebounds, my earthquakes  ] ↝ so this is a long relationship, they have been through a lot of ups and downs, from the 2013 to the 2016 ( / 17 ) maybe?  Even in my worst lies, you saw the truth in me  ] ↝  you can also read this as “even if I was pretending I was 100% straight, like the perfect America’s Sweetheart, you undestood I was actually bisexual”.  And I woke up just in time, now I wake up by your side  ] ↝  did I have to remind you that Taylor had a fucking bed for Karlie in her houses, and that they had been seen more than once leaving her appartament together in the morning?  My one and only, my lifeline My hands are shaking, can’t explain this ] ↝  she is basically saying that she couldn’t explain to herself ( or to Karlie ) why her hands were shaking and what she was feeling when she still thought that they were just friends. 

There is an indentation in the shape of you  ] ↝  in the end, she remark to important things related to Karlie: 1) the code - language  ( Only bought this dress so you could take it off ) You made your mark on me, golden tattoo  ] ↝ 2) the golden tattoo.  ( Only bought this dress so you could take it off ) 

and I’ll leave you here some EXTRA kaylor facts about this song: 

The handwritten lyrics of this song are in the Deluxe Edition, vol 2 ( which is the gayest ). In the same magazine, we can also find two pics of Taylor wearing her rainbow dress and the handwritten lyrics of DWOHT; 

She NEVER said this song was about Joe ( unlike for Gorgeous or Call it what you want ); 

But she said that she’s been working on this song for long time, trying to choose which quotes were the better ones. That not only cut Joe out of the game, but is also totally understandable: she wanted to write a song about her girlfriend without either hiding it or saying it out loud, I bet it was hard ;

Some people keep saying that there is a connection between Wildest Dreams and Getaway Car because they are both the 9th song in their album. Interesting. Do you remember what was the 12th song on 1989? Exactly, it was “I know places”, a gaylor song ;

Now, let’s talk about the end of Look What You Made Me Do, with the 15 Taylor who represent the 15 songs. As you can notice, the 13th Taylor is the Snake Queen, and it totally fit with the 13th song, “This is why we can’t have nice things”, while the 9th Taylor is the one with the boy who were wearing the i-love-ts t-shirt, and the 9th song "Getaway Car”, which is about Tom Hiddleston. Now, Dress is the 12th song, and the 12th Taylor is the ballerina from Shake it Off. The ONE & ONLY REASON behind this choice must be the fact that Karlie was a ballerina ( & Tayor spent a whole interview talking about it ) ;

Ruby Rose said on instagram that this song remind her of her girlfriend. Now, here you need to know about something that has been said about the people in Taylor’s squad. According to this articol that I found time ago, everything that they wrote about Taylor must be approved from her before it goes online on socials. If that’s true, this can be an important hint, don’t you think? 

At last, this is a very sexy song, and they met in a very sexy event, the VSFS. Can this be a little clue? 

So, my job here is done, let me know what you think about it and feel free to add more, I’ll be happy to read it. And, yes, I’ll do a “Dancing With Our Hands Tied” analysis too, wait for it 

[sailorrrvenus]

Why Your Photography Business Is Failing

The biggest and most common mistake I see in photographers in all genres is that they aren’t honest with themselves. They love the idea of being a photographer — the romantic side of it all. Sounds cool, right? But they hate the work part, the hustle, the grind, the guts of what it takes to run any successful small business.

They just want to do the fun part of taking pictures, spending their afternoons hanging out in coffee shops, shooting only things they are interested in, and talking smack. You have the right to do this, but you aren’t going to make a sustainable living doing things this way.

The second biggest mistake I see is photographers do is falling into the blame game spiral. It’s easy to blame the industry, blame people who are giving their work away for free, blame everyone else but yourself. Next, they blame their gear. Maybe if I just had that new camera with more megapixels, more features, etc. I’d get those assignments or clients instead of Johnny or Jenny Successful Photographer getting all the work in my market.

Guess what? That’s not going to help either. If your work sucks or is average, a nice camera isn’t going to get you more work. Yes, I own some pretty expensive gear, but that hasn’t always been the case for me. I worked my way up to afford it using some pretty basic cameras.

It’s time to look inward and do something about it, so step in front of that mirror you love to check yourself out in, stare deep inside your photography soul, and ask yourself if you want to have a go at this. If your answer is yes, here are a few things you can do now to start heading in the right direction.

Strengthen Your Portfolio

Get off your butt and go shoot the work you want to get paid to shoot. If you want to do wedding photography, go work as a second shooter, take portraits for your friends, intern, do whatever it takes to get more reps and more images, get out there and shoot.

If you want to shoot architecture, go find some buildings that inspire you and spend hours shooting them and experimenting with them. If you want to do documentary work, start a personal project (read my article here about that).

You get what I mean. Go shoot the work you want to get paid to shoot. Be proactive.

Shot on assignment for Conde Nast Traveler (Editorial)

Follow Pros Not Influencers

Follow (I don’t literally mean follow them around, that’s creepy. I mean follow them online) and study the people who get the work you aim to get and learn their process from start to finish. Don’t aim to mimic them, but you can learn a lot from people on their social media feeds. You can learn about how they approach their clients, business in general, BTS on shoots, and stuff like that. People are open books these days, so go online and read them.

As for influencers on places like YouTube and Instagram, they make all their money doing reviews and tutorials and there is nothing wrong with that and nothing wrong with learning some things from them, but don’t confuse their success with subscribers or followers as being successful in their photography.

I’m not being an ass — those guys are better at doing that than I am and some make great money doing so, but most simply aren’t talented photographers. Seriously, look at some of their work and client lists — they are rarely receiving assignments from paying clients other than advertisers and camera companies, and I’m sure that is just fine with them.

Again, not a knock on those influencers — the last thing I need is their audience attacking me — just learn how to separate what they are saying. Also, some working photographers do both well, like Joey L.

Damn, that was long. I should’ve just said learn how to influence from influencers, learn how to run a successful photography business from successful photographers.

Shot for InterContinental Fujairah (Commercial)

Find Your Vision

Figure out what your unique voice is with your photography and learn how to sell it and who to sell it to. That is way easier said than done, but to give you an example of how to achieve this, I can tell you a personal story.

As the editorial market was drying up years ago, I expanded into commercial photography. I had a lot of experience shooting for Conde Nast Traveler and the New York Times travel section. I noticed a lot of hotel photography was quite stagnant and boring, especially the lifestyle shots with models. I knew I was strong at photographing people in a realistic and natural way, so I sold those skills and morphed my editorial style into commercial work for hotels and resorts. That turned into a successful business for me, Mott Visuals — we now shoot hotels and resorts all around the world.

You’ve Got to Grind

If you got into photography to sit around coffee shops and b**ch and moan and sound cool by telling people you’re a photographer, that’s exactly how you are going to end up, a coffee shop photographer. I kind of like that phrase, you heard it here first: “Coffee Shop Photographer.” Next time you use that phrase you need to reference me, I’m copyrighting that. Oh man and when I titled this tip I had no intention of using the word grind, and coffee, sometimes it all just comes together.

Sure, I spend a lot of time in coffee shops, but I’m hustling, man. I’m studying my competition’s work, studying my own work, I’m learning new skills, I’m writing to editors, working on newsletters, and just grinding — it never ends.

Ditch the Negativity

Some of those photography threads are an endless rabbit hole of negativity. Be positive and surround yourself with positive and helpful friends both online and in person. I used to hang out with a lot of negative Nellys (not the rapper) who were always negative and jealous and it was taxing and infectious, so I stopped. I get a lot of negative comments when my articles go on major outlets but guess what, I could give two s**ts. That dude or dudette isn’t hiring me, and chances are they aren’t working nearly as much as I am and a big part of that is their attitude. That sounds cocky, but it’s true.

My first personal project in Vietnam about victims of Agent Orange which led to my first assignment for The New York Times years later.

Be Patient

Don’t expect to get in the New York Times overnight. My path to this work was getting accepted to The Eddie Adams Workshop while I was studying in university and working on a personal project I self-funded in Vietnam. Then I met some editors, then my work was passed around, then months later I got my first assignment. Everyone’s trajectory is different and some people can get in quickly by referrals, but that’s not the norm. It takes time, hustle, and a solid body of work, so don’t get discouraged if things don’t pan out overnight.

The same goes for commercial work, I shot a lot of 3-4 star local hotels and honed my skills before I became an official approved photographer for InterContinental Hotels, it took time.

Shot for a global campaign for Intercontinental Hotels

Shortcuts Don’t Work

Don’t lie about your resume or exaggerate your skills. This will eventually catch up to you, ruin your reputation, and it’s simply not ethical.

Treat Yourself Like A Business

Successful photographers treat themselves like a small business. They have a budget, they either do their own or outsource their accounting, and they have a marketing strategy. When you’re not shooting, you should be putting in full days working on the things I listed above, not just hanging out with the coffee shop photographers.

My apologies if some of this comes off harsh or brutal, but this has been my experience in my career so far, and I aim to help, not just to rant. I’m a fan of Adam Carolla, so I learned how to rant from the best.

If you have any questions for me, please ask away in the comments section and I’ll do my best to help out. Negative comments for the sake of being negative will be absorbed but not answered.

About the author: Justin Mott is an award-winning editorial, travel, and commercial photographer and director based in Vietnam for over a decade. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author. Mott has shot over 100 assignments throughout Vietnam and Southeast Asia for the New York Times covering tragedy, travel, features, business, and historical moments. You can find more of his work on his website, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram. This article was also published here.

source https://petapixel.com/2019/03/05/why-your-photography-business-is-failing/

[pauldeckerus]

Why Your Photography Business Is Failing

The biggest and most common mistake I see in photographers in all genres is that they aren’t honest with themselves. They love the idea of being a photographer — the romantic side of it all. Sounds cool, right? But they hate the work part, the hustle, the grind, the guts of what it takes to run any successful small business.

They just want to do the fun part of taking pictures, spending their afternoons hanging out in coffee shops, shooting only things they are interested in, and talking smack. You have the right to do this, but you aren’t going to make a sustainable living doing things this way.

The second biggest mistake I see is photographers do is falling into the blame game spiral. It’s easy to blame the industry, blame people who are giving their work away for free, blame everyone else but yourself. Next, they blame their gear. Maybe if I just had that new camera with more megapixels, more features, etc. I’d get those assignments or clients instead of Johnny or Jenny Successful Photographer getting all the work in my market.

Guess what? That’s not going to help either. If your work sucks or is average, a nice camera isn’t going to get you more work. Yes, I own some pretty expensive gear, but that hasn’t always been the case for me. I worked my way up to afford it using some pretty basic cameras.

It’s time to look inward and do something about it, so step in front of that mirror you love to check yourself out in, stare deep inside your photography soul, and ask yourself if you want to have a go at this. If your answer is yes, here are a few things you can do now to start heading in the right direction.

Strengthen Your Portfolio

Get off your butt and go shoot the work you want to get paid to shoot. If you want to do wedding photography, go work as a second shooter, take portraits for your friends, intern, do whatever it takes to get more reps and more images, get out there and shoot.

If you want to shoot architecture, go find some buildings that inspire you and spend hours shooting them and experimenting with them. If you want to do documentary work, start a personal project (read my article here about that).

You get what I mean. Go shoot the work you want to get paid to shoot. Be proactive.

Shot on assignment for Conde Nast Traveler (Editorial)

Follow Pros Not Influencers

Follow (I don’t literally mean follow them around, that’s creepy. I mean follow them online) and study the people who get the work you aim to get and learn their process from start to finish. Don’t aim to mimic them, but you can learn a lot from people on their social media feeds. You can learn about how they approach their clients, business in general, BTS on shoots, and stuff like that. People are open books these days, so go online and read them.

As for influencers on places like YouTube and Instagram, they make all their money doing reviews and tutorials and there is nothing wrong with that and nothing wrong with learning some things from them, but don’t confuse their success with subscribers or followers as being successful in their photography.

I’m not being an ass — those guys are better at doing that than I am and some make great money doing so, but most simply aren’t talented photographers. Seriously, look at some of their work and client lists — they are rarely receiving assignments from paying clients other than advertisers and camera companies, and I’m sure that is just fine with them.

Again, not a knock on those influencers — the last thing I need is their audience attacking me — just learn how to separate what they are saying. Also, some working photographers do both well, like Joey L.

Damn, that was long. I should’ve just said learn how to influence from influencers, learn how to run a successful photography business from successful photographers.

Shot for InterContinental Fujairah (Commercial)

Find Your Vision

Figure out what your unique voice is with your photography and learn how to sell it and who to sell it to. That is way easier said than done, but to give you an example of how to achieve this, I can tell you a personal story.

As the editorial market was drying up years ago, I expanded into commercial photography. I had a lot of experience shooting for Conde Nast Traveler and the New York Times travel section. I noticed a lot of hotel photography was quite stagnant and boring, especially the lifestyle shots with models. I knew I was strong at photographing people in a realistic and natural way, so I sold those skills and morphed my editorial style into commercial work for hotels and resorts. That turned into a successful business for me, Mott Visuals — we now shoot hotels and resorts all around the world.

You’ve Got to Grind

If you got into photography to sit around coffee shops and b**ch and moan and sound cool by telling people you’re a photographer, that’s exactly how you are going to end up, a coffee shop photographer. I kind of like that phrase, you heard it here first: “Coffee Shop Photographer.” Next time you use that phrase you need to reference me, I’m copyrighting that. Oh man and when I titled this tip I had no intention of using the word grind, and coffee, sometimes it all just comes together.

Sure, I spend a lot of time in coffee shops, but I’m hustling, man. I’m studying my competition’s work, studying my own work, I’m learning new skills, I’m writing to editors, working on newsletters, and just grinding — it never ends.

Ditch the Negativity

Some of those photography threads are an endless rabbit hole of negativity. Be positive and surround yourself with positive and helpful friends both online and in person. I used to hang out with a lot of negative Nellys (not the rapper) who were always negative and jealous and it was taxing and infectious, so I stopped. I get a lot of negative comments when my articles go on major outlets but guess what, I could give two s**ts. That dude or dudette isn’t hiring me, and chances are they aren’t working nearly as much as I am and a big part of that is their attitude. That sounds cocky, but it’s true.

My first personal project in Vietnam about victims of Agent Orange which led to my first assignment for The New York Times years later.

Be Patient

Don’t expect to get in the New York Times overnight. My path to this work was getting accepted to The Eddie Adams Workshop while I was studying in university and working on a personal project I self-funded in Vietnam. Then I met some editors, then my work was passed around, then months later I got my first assignment. Everyone’s trajectory is different and some people can get in quickly by referrals, but that’s not the norm. It takes time, hustle, and a solid body of work, so don’t get discouraged if things don’t pan out overnight.

The same goes for commercial work, I shot a lot of 3-4 star local hotels and honed my skills before I became an official approved photographer for InterContinental Hotels, it took time.

Shot for a global campaign for Intercontinental Hotels

Shortcuts Don’t Work

Don’t lie about your resume or exaggerate your skills. This will eventually catch up to you, ruin your reputation, and it’s simply not ethical.

Treat Yourself Like A Business

Successful photographers treat themselves like a small business. They have a budget, they either do their own or outsource their accounting, and they have a marketing strategy. When you’re not shooting, you should be putting in full days working on the things I listed above, not just hanging out with the coffee shop photographers.

My apologies if some of this comes off harsh or brutal, but this has been my experience in my career so far, and I aim to help, not just to rant. I’m a fan of Adam Carolla, so I learned how to rant from the best.

If you have any questions for me, please ask away in the comments section and I’ll do my best to help out. Negative comments for the sake of being negative will be absorbed but not answered.

About the author: Justin Mott is an award-winning editorial, travel, and commercial photographer and director based in Vietnam for over a decade. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author. Mott has shot over 100 assignments throughout Vietnam and Southeast Asia for the New York Times covering tragedy, travel, features, business, and historical moments. You can find more of his work on his website, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram. This article was also published here.

from Photography News https://petapixel.com/2019/03/05/why-your-photography-business-is-failing/

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New Post has been published on Literary Techniques

New Post has been published on https://literarytechniques.org/assonance/

Assonance

Assonance Definition

Assonance refers to the repetition of identical stressed vowels in nearby syllables when they are followed by different consonants or consonant clusters. Even though sometimes omitted for brevity, the latter part of the definition is equally important as the first one, because If identical stressed vowels are followed by identical consonant sounds, then the literary device in question is not assonance, but rhyme.

Thus, the phrase “white knight” is an example of rhyme; however, the title of Dylan Thomas’ poem “In the White Giant’s Thigh” is an example of assonance. In both cases, the “long i” [aɪ] is repeated in all of the stressed syllables, but only in the first one the consonant behind it sounds identical as well (“waɪt naɪt” vs. “waɪt ˈʤaɪənts θaɪ”).

Assonance was frequently used as a substitute for rhyme in early Celtic, Spanish, and French poetry, which is why it is sometimes (somewhat unsuitably) still called “vowel rhyme,” “vocalic rhyme” or even “half rhyme.” When Augustan and Romantic English poets started using rhymes on an almost regular basis, they saw in assonance a great way to amplify the musical effects of their poems. However, at least since the second half of the 19th century, modern poets once again have started employing assonance in place of a rhyme for the exact opposite effect.

Some of literature’s most skillful users of assonance are Alexander Pope, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Emily Dickinson, Edgar Allan Poe, Algernon Charles Swinburne, and Dylan Thomas.

ExamplesQuizFlashcardsWorksheets

Assonance Examples

Assonance in a Sentence

Example #1: Idioms

For nearly a week afterwards, the domestics observed significantly to each other, that Miss Isabella was as ‘nice as pie!’

OED lists this 1855 Which: Right or Left? sentence as the earliest occurrence of the idiom “nice as pie.” As is obvious, the idiomatic expression—as many others (“a good look,” “a dead end,” “high time,” etc.)—is made memorable through the use of assonance, as both “nice” and “pie” contain the “long i” but not repeating consonants.

Example #2-3: Proverbs

Variety is the spice of life.

In the proverb above, all of the nouns contain the “long i” [aɪ]. Interestingly enough, according to a wide-ranging 2012 study, about a quarter of English proverbs assonate. In the example below, assonance of the “long o” [əʊ] is effectively resolved in the “short o” of the last word (“moss”):

A rolling stone gathers no moss.

Example #4: Nursery Rhymes

As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives, Each wife had seven sacks, Each sack had seven cats, Each cat had seven kits: Kits, cats, sacks, and wives, How many were there going to St. Ives?

The nursery rhyme above is actually a riddle – so do try to solve it if you want a break from all this literary talk with a simple mathematical exercise. Highly assonant, this riddle employs effective assonance of both the “long i” (in “I,” “Ives” and “wives”) and the “short e” (in “met,” “man,” “seven,” “sacks,” “had,” “cats,” and “many”). In one instance (“sacks”/”cats”), assonance works as a nice substitute for rhyme.

Example #5: Advertising Slogans

Finger lickin’ good.

KFC’s famous slogan—“finger lickin’ good”—works so well because of the assonance of the “short i” repeated three times in the initial four syllables. However, it works even better when the first two words are paired up with KFC’s actual product—”finger lickin’ chicken”— which adds two more [ɪ]’s to the mix and spices the assonance with a dash of rhyme.

(Further Reading: 10 Examples of Assonance in a Sentence)

Assonance in Poetry

Example #1: Alexander Pope, First Satire of the Second Book of Horace 25-26 (1733)

Rend with tremendous Sound your ears asunder, With Gun, Drum, Trumpet, Blunderbuss and Thunder.

Alexander Pope was a deft user of many rhetorical devices, and assonance was certainly not an exception. In the second verse from the couplet above, he manages to achieve an almost onomatopoetic effect, combining the assonance of the “short u” vowel [ʌ] with bilabial consonants (“b,” “p,” and “m”) to create the effect promised in the first verse: “tremendous sound” which rends the ears asunder.

Example #2: John Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn” 1-2 (1820)

Thou still unravished bride of quietness, Thou foster child of silence and slow time…

There are not many verses more beautiful than the two which open John Keats’ great “Ode on a Grecian Urn.” However, it often goes unjustly unnoted that a large portion of this beauty the verses owe to the assonance of the “long i” which Keats masterfully uses in all five nouns present in the excerpt: “bride,” “quietness,” “child,” “silence,” and “time.” And to make the verses even more sweet-sounding, this grand assonance is nicely prepared by the humble introductory assonant pair “still unravished,” tightly linked through the repeated use of the “short i.”

Example #3: Algernon Charles Swinburne, “August” (1866)

The colour of the leaves was more Like stems of yellow corn that grow Through all the gold June meadow’s floor

Even detractors of Algernon Charles Swinburne hail him a musical genius; and, indeed, his mastery of the phonetic literary devices is, to say the least, impressive. Even though published in his debut poetry collection, “August” already exemplifies this brilliantly. The repeated “o” sounds—whether short or long—permeate the excerpt, appearing in almost every second word: “colour,” “more,” “yellow,” “corn,” “grow,” “gold,” “meadow,” and “floor.” This produces a highly euphonious effect, which Swinburne strikingly manages to sustain throughout the whole poem.

Example #4: Gerard Manley Hopkins, The Wreck of the Deutschland I.7.1-4 (1875)

It dates from day Of his going in Galilee; Warm-laid grave of a womb-life grey; Manger, maiden’s knee;

Considered by many to be perhaps his greatest masterpiece, the 35-stanza Christian ode “The Wreck of the Deutschland” demonstrates wholly Gerard Manley Hopkins’ masterful use of not only his unique contributions to prosody (instress and sprung rhythm) but also of some much more common literary devices such as assonance and alliteration. The “long a” hauntingly dominates the four verses excerpted above, appearing no less than seven times, twice in combination with the alliterative “d” and “m” (“dates”/”day” and “manger”/”maiden”).

Example #5: Dylan Thomas, “Ballad of the Long-Legged Bait” 49-52 (1941)

Whales in the wake like capes and Alps Quaked the sick sea and snouted deep, Deep the great bushed bait with raining lips Slipped the fins of those humpbacked tons.

Not many modern poets—if anyone—have managed to replicate Dylan Thomas’ verbally dense and rhythmically resonant verses. In the thirteenth quatrain of his “Ballad of the Long-Legged Bait,” he demonstrates how exceptionally skillful he is in using assonance to produce enduringly evocative imagery. And it’s fascinating to think that even though seven words in the stanza use the “long a”— and six of them are monosyllabic—none of them rhyme with each other: “whales,” “wake,” “capes,” “quaked,” “great,” “bait” and “raining”. “This symphony of vowels and consonants proves Thomas a master,” notes William York Tindall in A Reader’s Guide to Dylan Thomas. “Not Hopkins himself could put sweeter sounds together.”

(Further Reading: 10 Examples of Assonance Poems)

Assonance in Literature

Example #1: William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 1 III.3.48 (1591)

When Death doth close his tender dying eyes.

In Shakespeare on Theatre, Robert Cohen provides a list of all 136 different adjectives that William Shakespeare uses in his plays to vividly describe the human eyes. As in the example above (“dying eyes”), many of them are quite melodious, assonant adjective + noun sets. Can you find where the Bard uses three other assonant pairings of this kind: “admiring eyes,” “desiring eyes,” and “fiery eyes”?

Example #2: Edgar Allan Poe, “Annabel Lee” 38-39 (1849)

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride…

Much like Swinburne, Edgar Allan Poe was a skilled user of assonance, mainly for its musical effects. To some—like the French symbolist poet Charles Baudelaire—this made him the designer of verses “carved like diamonds”; to others—such as Aldous Huxley—Poe’s use of phonetic literary devices seemed analogous to a sensitive man wearing “a diamond ring on every finger.” You can understand both sides of the argument if you try reading the above couplet out loud. As you can already see, here, in merely two verses, Poe uses the “long i” no less than eleven times! However, it is difficult to deny how melodious and memorable this makes the ending of “Annabel Lee,” Poe’s last complete poem.

Example #3: Robert A. Harris, Writing with Clarity and Style (2003)

So flows the river, going past the town, its whole load of toxins, fish, and sediment pouring evermore into the sea.

The example above is borrowed from Robert Harris’ celebrated “Guide to Rhetorical Devices for Contemporary Writers.” It’s only fitting to borrow the analysis of this highly assonant sentence as well. “The repeated ‘long o’ sounds in the [highlighted] words,” explains Harris, “create a drawn-out sonorousness, suggesting both flow and inevitability of movement.”

Songs with Assonance

Example #1: Alan Jay Lerner, The Rain in Spain

The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain

In My Fair Lady, the 1956 musical adaptation of George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion, Eliza Doolittle is a Cockney flower girl incapable of breaking her dialect speech patterns even after hundreds and hundreds of elocution exercises with Professor Henry Higgins. For example, instead of saying “reɪn” and “Speɪn” she says something along the lines of “raɪn” and “Spaɪn.” She finally gets it while singing the above verse in which five words (three of which rhyme) contain “the long a” [ei]: “rain,” “Spain,” “stays,” “mainly,” “plain.”

Example #2: The Doors, Light My Fire

You know that it would be untrue You know that I would be a liar If I was to say to you Girl, we couldn’t get much higher

Come on baby, light my fire Come on baby, light my fire Try to set the night on fire

Widely considered one of the greatest songs ever written—reaching #35 on Rolling Stone’s list of 500 Greatest Songs of All Time—The Doors’ “Light My Fire” offers an exquisite example of the sonorous power of one-vowel assonance. In addition to the rhymes—which necessarily all contain the “long i” [aɪ] (“liar,” “higher,” “fire”)—the lyrics also add many other words which include the same vowel sound and, thus, serve to build and/or keep up the momentum: “I,” “light,” “try,” “night.” And this goes on in the second verse as well, which adds few more assonant words: “time,” “mire,” “try,” “funeral pyre”!

Example #3: Radiohead, Exit Music (for a Film)

We hope that you choke…

Radiohead often use assonance in place of rhyme in their songs. As you can hear in this all but a textbook example, it is this literary device which has helped them pen some of the most hauntingly beautiful and yet chillingly disturbing verses. Rhyme may be at times too complete and childlike to carry the burden of heavy thoughts; assonance is much more adult and generates a lingering effect. Fittingly, the verse above is not the only one in “Exit Music (for a Film)” which employs assonance. You can also hear it in “the long a” of “today/ we escape” and “the long i” in “breathe/ keep breathing.”

(Further Reading: 5 Songs with Assonance)

Quiz

Flashcards

Worksheets