#any other movie could ever have half as much impact

[matan4il]

Every once in a while, the magnitude of the Hamas massacre hits me all over again.

I'm not sure most people get it even now.

In absolute numbers, it is one of the three deadliest terrorist attacks in human history (second or third worst, depends on which estimates you trust for the Camp Speicher massacre), but if we take it in relation to the size of the population in the attacked country (which we should, because terrorism by its very nation seeks to victimizes through psychological trauma the entire target population, and not just those who were physically affected during the attack), then what Hamas did IS the single deadliest terrorist attack in the entirety of human history.

But it's even more than that.

Never, in any other attack, have the terrorists taken over as much land as Hamas did on Oct 7. ENTIRE TOWNS were under complete control of the terrorists, some for SEVERAL DAYS (I specifically remember watching a report on one town, where combat with the terrorists was still taking place on Oct 11, meaning on day 5 of this terrorist invasion into Israel). ENTIRE TOWNS WERE OCCUPIED. BY TERRORISTS. There's not a single Hollywood action movie dealing with such a scenario, because NOTHING OF THIS SCALE HAS EVER HAPPENED BEFORE. Imagine waking up and hearing in real time that the northern half of the American states Washington, Idaho and Montana has been taken by terrorists, who are driving through the streets freely, as they murder, pillage, rape, torture, maim, burn and kidnap people, and almost no one's there to stop them.

And then imagine the world expecting the US government to just... let the terrorists retreat to the other side of an international border in the north, after having murdered over 40,400 American, most of which are civilians, almost 183,000 more injured, and while taking with them across the border over 8,450 American hostages, to God knows what awful fate, for how long, or if they will even ever come back alive. Entire communities and regions would be devastated, without knowing if they'd be able to rebuild. The total would be more than 230,000 Americans directly impacted (I've adapted the real numbers from Oct 7 to the size of the American population... Remember the horrendous 9/11 attack, which saw 2,977 victims killed and a few thousands more injured, and think of what would be the emotional punch of over 230,000 direct victims).

Imagine expecting the US to let that go, and allow those terrorists to continue existing and ruling the land on its northern border. Imagine expecting the US to do so while this terrorist organization openly declares that it will repeat this large scale massacre whenever possible, until the entire country is destroyed.

And please don't come at me with "Fine, Israel can react, but not like this." Unless you have the military expertise to explain exactly how Israel can protect its people from this attack ever being repeated, and to free all our hostages, without civilian casualties (despite Hamas intentionally using them as human shields, and even directly causing Gazan deaths), unless you can translate the vague "not like this" into something practical, some actual guidelines on how this urban war could have been fought differently, even though there's no historical precedent to support that this is possible, "not like this" is just wishful thinking at the expense of the safety and right to live of Israelis.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[for-those-who-wait]

I said I would talk about wax cylinders so here I go a rambling again

So the wax cylinder was first invented in 1888 by Thomas Edison (so they're usually called Edison cylinders or phonograph cylinders). As you can probably gather, it's a cylinder made of wax. It was the first piece of technology that would record and play back sound that was sold commercially (they technically made an earlier version using tin foil back in 1877 but it was shit and was never commercially produced so we don't talk about that one). Wax cylinders by 1889 were typically sold with pre-recorded music on them that had to be live-recorded every time. They were typically bought up by nickelodeons (I could make a whole post about those as well but I'll save you the Google and say they were basically old movie theatres that cost a nickel to attend) before they ever made it to households

To play and record wax cylinders, they made a whole machine for it called the phonograph—and you can stop right there, it's not the one you're thinking.

This one came before the record was even thought of, but it basically works the same as your regular disc phonograph. It was a large box that contained a holder for the cylinder, a way to turn it, a (usually) sapphire-tipped needle, and a horn to expel the sound. Some boxes also contained gears and motors to support two different speeds, which would thus alter how much music you could fit onto a cylinder (or disc). To explain how playing the cylinder works, I'll first explain the process of recording onto it.

To record on a wax cylinder, one would have to first purchase a recording needle and recording horn. These were usually sold with the machine, but the stuff could also be sold separately. When the motor starts and the recording needle is placed onto the cylinder, you would speak loudly into the horn. The vibrations from your voice, focused by the horn, would cause the needle to create very subtle waves and divots in the wax; this would literally scrape the wax off of the cylinder and create a bunch of string and dust you would have to brush away. These divots work in the same way that vinyl records do when you're playing them. You place the needle on the surface, turn on the motor, and the needle runs over those really small divots to replay the sound. Ignore the stupid watermarks this was the best picture I could find on short notice

Now, the problem with wax cylinders was that they could only hold about two to two and a half minutes of sound. The other problem is the fact that they're literally made of wax. The wax they used at first (beeswax and paraffin) was soft and squishy and not a very hardy material in the least. They're easily damaged, they melt, and with all the very small divots etched into the surface, any damage at all severely impacts the quality of the sound. Not only that, but even playing the damn thing is enough to ruin the quality of the sound if you use it too many times.

And guess how many times you can play it before it starts getting all messed up.

Just guess.

If you guessed twenty then you're correct.

As you can imagine, this was completely unacceptable, and the softer wax was eventually changed to a more hardened wax, which could be played over a hundred times. But even that wasn't enough for our cylinder overlords, and they started producing hard plastic cylinders made of celluloid instead that could be played thousands of times (pictured below)

(Also it's called gold moulded because this was when cylinders could now be mechanically mass-produced using the mold from a single master cylinder)

Now I know I was just shitting on the wax, but the one good thing about it is that because the cylinders were very thick and soft, you could shave it down and re-record onto it like it was new. Not so with the plastic. But hey, the good thing about plastic is that it's damn near permanent and it's harder to break. This is also around when they started introducing new colors that you could get the cylinders in. Any shade between brown and white was the OG wax color, which they changed to black when upgrading to celluloid, but they could also produce cylinders in blue as long as people were fine with having slightly reduced sound quality.

Things were good. People loved their cylinders, loved playing them, loved buying and recording on them, it was great

But then in 1912, the pesky phonograph disc was invented and it completely took over the market.

We're mature enough here to admit that the cylinders are bulky and spatially inefficient. There was a new version by this point that could hold up to four minutes of music, but it was no match for the novelty of the disc phonograph and the ease with which someone could make a larger or two-sided disc to completely swamp that length. Discs were cheaper, easier to use, and easier to store. We were no match for them

Although Edison still supported owners of the cylinder phonograph with new tracks, they were recorded off a disc phonograph instead of live, so the quality was actually worse than it used to be. The cylinders fell out of style a few years after the discs' corporate win and their popularity slowly declined until their discontinuation in 1929. So all in all, the wax cylinder survived for 41 good years but became completely obsolete in about 24. Which is actually not bad for a piece of technology like that? It's probably a prime example of the exponential boom of technology getting infinitely more advanced and infinitely more quickly. Like I don't know what modern, highly-consumerist thing can manage to stay relevant for 24 years, that's just insane to me. Like even CDs started getting the shaft at around 19 years

Anyway RIP the wax cylinder I love you

[iavulture]

Headcanon and story time (related to Despicable Me 2)

All right, I know everyone is onto DM4 (or rather, a certain cockroach man), but I've been way too enamored with a headcanon that I have stemming from DM2, which has since evolved into an ongoing AU/alternate continuity fic that further explores it in its own way. Ready to hear it? Because this'll be a long one.

(Spoilers for Despicable Me 2 and a warning due to mentions of death. Also, I will rant a bit, not out of outright hate, but because I wish things were handled better.)

*deep breath

I have this headcanon that Silas Ramsbottom is Lucy Wilde's adoptive father.

Yes, this man.

Now, before you think that's ridiculous, before you go "No way, Silas? That big man who was kind of an arse to Gru in 2 is Lucy's dad?", I can explain that, beginning with a personal story.

See, back when trailers for DM4 were being released, I decided to throw in my lot to the Despicable Me fandom for the first time by writing a future fic featuring a grown-up Gru Jr. following his parents' footsteps as a newbie AVL agent. Following that, I also decided to write another Despicable Me fic that is my take on what happened with Lucy's parents, who were killed by a villain when she was a young girl.

Above is the Twitter post describing Lucy's short backstory. This is back in 2015. 2015! Two years after DM2's 2013 release!

Anyway, after seeing that tweet and browsing through Ao3 and Fanfiction.net for Despicable Me fanfics, I was disappointed to find so few fics that explored that part of her life. Yes, I know that Gru is the protagonist of the mainline films, but does it hurt to shed some light on the character who becomes his wife? Y'know, someone who's one half of a couple, and (ideally) just as important as the other half?

Sigh. Of course, we never see this bit about her in the films: not during a conversation between Lucy and another character, not even a mention or a flashback (though correct me if I'm wrong and overlooked a movie that does mention or hint at it; if not, my point stands).

Not long ago, I brought this up with a friend, and I hypothesized that the reason why this was never implemented in some way in the films is because it's too dark for a kids franchise like Despicable Me, even though I can argue that several other kids series have elements that are as dark or even darker than that: my friend brought up Frozen 2 and Elsa dying, meaning you could definitely insert legitimately dark moments into a kids film. Hell, I can bring up The Lion King, which has Mufasa dying to the wildebeest stampede after Scar lets him go, traumatizing Simba; in fact, Mufasa's death impacts Simba even in adulthood, showing that childhood trauma can have an effect even after growing up.

In any case, it IS possible for a kid's film to be quite mature, but Lucy's backstory? Just thrown into the wind, especially in regards to the films after DM2.

Like, can you imagine the effects of such an event on her psyche? What would Lucy think of villains after her parents died? Would she ever have thoughts of revenge? Forgiveness? Would she hide it from her husband, the kids, or even her past dates? (She mentions having gone on a few bad dates in DM2 and that's the reason why she keeps a lipstick taser.) What would her life be like after they died: would she live a mostly normal life, or would she be trained to be an AVL agent at a fairly young age? Heck, would Silas know that her parents died when a villain attacked them, and would he and the AVL do something about it, perhaps avenge their deaths?

So many questions, so much wasted potential.

(Here's me crossing my fingers for a TV series that'll probably never happen, because I think Lucy's past could be explained well in that format.)

But now I'll turn to a much lighter note and the real cut of lamb of this post.

Going back to my headcanon that Silas is Lucy's adoptive father, I noticed something interesting in DM2.

During Gru and Lucy's wedding, notice the number of frills on Lucy's dress and Agnes' dress? They're both the same, and if you think about it, Agnes was the one who was the most enthusiastic about the idea of Lucy marrying Gru, implying she looked up to Lucy in high regard and thus wanted to dress up like her for the wedding.

"But Vulture! What about the note saying 'same color as Lucy's usual attire'? What's that got to do with anything?" That's likely to show how much Gru loves her, to the point he dresses up with the same color she usually dresses up in. You know what Lucy's usual getup looks like? If not, here you go.

Light-ish shade of blue, right? Now, look at this.

Maybe I've taken crazy pills or need to have my eyes checked, but I don't recall seeing any other AVL personnel having something that's just as light blue on them. I'm pretty sure in reality it's all just to help create a unique character design, to make them stand out from the generic AVL agents, but yeah. It's just something that I noticed, there's nothing to officially confirm that Silas and Lucy have some sort of close connection with each other other than they're both with the AVL.

But given my observation of "character dresses a bit like another character they admire or at least respect," you can sort of see why I have that headcanon.

I still find it interesting how Silas is around Lucy in comparison to when he's around Gru, in that he's never actually antagonistic toward her or any of his other spies and doesn't doubt her skills. Of course, since one of them is essentially a former criminal, it makes sense that he'd have some animosity toward Gru. Heck, I'm pretty sure Silas might've even been hostile to Gru way back then after Minions 2 since Silas told Gru to "stay out of trouble, kid," only for Gru to break that promise by becoming a thief anyway. However, given that Silas appears at the wedding and even helps Gru, Lucy and their children move to a safehouse in DM4, it's clear that things got better for both of them.

About the fic that I mentioned earlier in this post, I based it on this headcanon specifically, along with a few others that I wrote down on a list. There, Silas adopts an orphaned Lucy shortly after her home was destroyed by a villain and her parents were killed. Traumatized that she survived but they didn't, she often gets worried and nervous, even having a hard time at a new school. She also has to contend with living with Silas, who has his own problems to deal with, from being in charge of the AVL and a few things from his past, including his own family. (And yes, I did create OC family members, and Silas' relationship with them is... a bit complicated to say the least.)

All in all, I wanted to try my hand at writing something that explores familial themes, struggles, and dynamics, especially since I feel they aren't handled as well after 2. Plus, I get to play with some tropes and elements present in the canon Despicable Me films (and, rather appropriately enough, other spy/espionage works like James Bond), except instead of a(n ex-)supervillain with his adopted daughters, it's with the AVL director and his (fan'verse) adopted daughter.

*sigh* And now this post is done! It's been a long one, but I just wanted to type out my thoughts on a few things related to a fic I'm currently working on and because I feel upset that things could've worked out better in canon.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 7/2/2024

as of friday i have lived in texas for a full year. that's the most neutrally diplomatic thing i can say about my time in this state so far

listening

i did a lot of driving last week and had the first album from genshin impact's legally-not-France nation on loop bc it's a lot of vivaldi inspired stuff and i find that soothing. however! one of my favorite pieces of music from this nation is this battle track. i don't have any music words but i do like the.. pipe organ emphasis? on the little flourish at 0:28. catholic brain go brrrr

-

reading

thank you mackintosh.

i liked gotham city: year one! many many many callbacks but framed in a way "and this is the start of the blueprint for how everything would go" which made me less annoyed than callbacks for their own sake. a very chandler-esque take on noir, by which i mean a fundamentally good (but tired) man gets beaten to shit and survives a doublecross as he unravels a fucked up little family dynamic for the pure nosy sake of unraveling it.

-

watching

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare (2024, dir. Ritchie). a spy/action/comedy thing about Operation Postmaster, a wwii special operation off the west coast of Africa to disrupt nazi u-boat supplies.

i did not like this at all.

i generally like a guy ritchie film-- the holmes duolgy are movies i would happily rewatch at any time, but this one is very flat. there's very little banter and remarkably little dialogue-- long stretches of this film are of people getting from place to place in perfect silence. even the soundtrack is remarkably toned down. most of it sounds like ai-generatred morricone (very few of the musical passages like. resolve in any sensible manner. there is no theming and no noticeable leitmotif. one of the worst covers of mack the knife ive ever heard is at the climax of the fuckin film. what if someone ominously tapped a hihat to create tension for literally half the movie with NO other accompaniment). when it doesn't sound ai-generated and kind of off (morricone's cowboy western work is not what i expect for a largely seafaring wwii movie) it sounds like they rented a jazz five-piece for a weekend. one of the worst soundtracks i've ever heard. it was extremely distracting.

this is a heist movie that never really figured out how to effectively intercut actions its team is independently taking. there are also a lot of places where the cuts are very strange, especially in the final harbor scene flicking back and forth from the land crew to the boat crew. just felt very underbaked as a movie. i was frequently bored. not an effective comedy, action, or spy movie. just barely a coherent war movie, though not a very enjoyable one.

-

playing

the breath of the wild to genshin ripoff pipeline is pretty clear, esp in the legally-not-India nation with lots of legally-not-koroks. u get a bunch of chests and achievements if u find all 76, i finally sat down on friday with an hour-long walkthough video and found them all. every single four-leaf clover sigil is where one of these fuckers was. and to get to this point, i had to do a whole DIFFERENT quest chain with different collectibles to unlock some of the legally-not-koroks and also make room on my map to free up 76 markers. very annoying process. i fucking hate collectibles for the sake of collectibles and padding out gameplay. i could not imagine doing this if i were employed

-

making

cross stitch update.

i got this belt for the ren faire when my sister came down, finally got around to pulling it out of the freezer and cleaning it the other day, and it was what i can only call yucky-disgusting. an inordinate amount of scunge for a belt with very few signs of wear. it's impossible to photograph bc it's quite late and i did not think to take a before shot, but it straight up changed color. it is much lighter now

[furiroad]

Furiosa spoilers under the cut 🚗

It's actually staggering how much that movie did not need to exist. Gonna bullet point some thoughts

My sarcastic lol @ the lightning fast sisters cameo at the end where they're all played by completely different people. the quick flash of Cheedo's eyes bc they managed to get Courtney Eaton back for three seconds didn't appease me

I guess it technically passes the bechdel test bc right at the start Furiosa says "be still" to Valkyrie but iirc that's the only pass moment. I know not passing the bechdel test doesn't mean the movie is automatically bad I just think it's interesting considering it's following Fury Road

"she talks to her mother" I don't think they ever said her mum's name out loud

You know how mad max fury road could have a silent version w no dialogue + isolated soundtrack and it worked because you could tell what's going on anyway? This movie has the opposite problem. Way too much talking. They over-explain everything

The best bit was the prolonged torture scene at the end where Hemsworth explains Furiosa's entire character arc and the message of the movie out loud to her and also us

Even his teddy had an arm missing, replaced with a barbie arm. Thanks. We get it

Her arm made robot noises

Actually threw MY arms up in disgust when she went back for that boy she supposedly had a romance with despite the film never bothering to actually show/explain that. I'm calling it a romance because the actors did. I guess it was supposed to be a Capable/Nux parallel but it didn't work for me and not just because I'm a dyke and a hater OK, if you're gonna do a ROMANCE, DO A ROMANCE. don't leave me sitting there wondering why Furiosa is risking it all for some guy she's had ONE conversation with, especially after he offers to get her away from the Citadel and back to where she came from, WHICH IS HER ENTIRE MOTIVE EVER SINCE SHE WAS TAKEN

I DON'T GET IT

Them trying to emulate Max and Furiosa's instinctive, perfect we have to trust each other moment by having Jack and Furiosa... look at each other Meaningfully fifty times while they were supposed to be driving cars? Don't make me laugh! You will never be them!!

Max being there for a second wasn't cute! I rolled my eyes

Same at "remember me?" MAKE UP YOUR OWN STUFF

So many things happened because they needed to happen (plot demanded it) and didn't make any sense in context. My favourite was when Furiosa rode her motorcycle up a dune to get away after cutting off her arm and the biker gang couldn't follow her up there for some reason

So much Christian imagery... threw me off tbh

Considering it's Furiosa's movie it sure isn't about her + she doesn't speak at all for almost the first half

This movie was way too long

I called it about the peach seed

I called it that she cut her own arm off

George Miller read some of my blog but not all of it

You know how The People Eater rubbed his nipple that one time and it was delightfully weird and gross and got a good reaction? Well in this movie he's constantly rubbing it, the whole time. Really lessens the impact of the nipple rub

As you can see this movie has made me insane

Like this is not really about the nipple rub but do you get what I'm saying here

Furiosa spends most of the movie hiding her hair (because as we all know, having long hair immediately identifies you as a woman) and then when her head covering gets knocked off and her hair is revealed (omg she's a girl) she leaves it like that and becomes an Imperator. On what planet

The history man frames the entire movie for some reason. Do they show Miss Giddy? Take a wild guess

One of the coolest parts of fury road was that a gang of bikers ended up being hardcore wasteland grannies w guns and loose morals in response to people fucking around for far too long without finding out. Did this movie have anything like that for me? Take a wild guess for a second time

The car fight scenes weren't even that great. Couldn't remember hearing any good music under them (brother in arms truly lightning in a bottle) and they went on for too long which feels wild to say about suped up car battles in the australian wasteland: 2 but oh well. This is how I feel. Fury Road was so good at carefully measuring out high octane action and then downtime and careful, quiet character introspection and this movie had no idea what it was doing either way

Honestly I don't hate it but I feel like it was a waste of time and it doesn't need to exist at all. A real nothing experience. Am I going to see this movie ten times in cinemas? No I am not even going to see it twice in cinemas

I don't know what I was expecting.

oh my god also they played clips of Fury Road over the credits as if to say "remember how fucking good this is in comparison to the dumb shit you just watched"

[self-indulgent-paw-patrol]

You know something I don't see anyone talking about? In the climax of the Mighty Movie, when the giant meteor is coming down, Ryder's response is to tell Skye to save herself, that meteor probably would've destroyed all of Adventure City and maybe even beyond, and there's no telling if they were able to evacuate the whole city by that point, I doubt it, Ryder was willing to let a whole city get destroyed and potentially a bunch of citizens get killed all for the sake of his pup, just goes to show how much Ryder cares for the pups, cause when it comes down to it, he'd choose them over a whole city

Dude THAT SCENE FROM THE MIGHTY MOVIE HAS SO MUCH TO UNPACK I WANNA SCREAM EVERY TIME I REWATCH IT

Also as much as that might sound weird because "he would sacrifice the city for his pups" (it DOES sound terrible), THAT WAS PROBABLY THE HARDEST DECISION EVER IN RYDER'S LIFE SO FAR and I'm gonna explain now why I'll always defend this boy with my life

Under the cut bc it gets long and I'll be talking details about a still kinda recent movie and I know some people who didn't get to watch it yet XD

First, YEAH, they were NOT able to evacuate the city on time. There were still a lot of people on the streets, including the very Paw Patrol team. Just like in the beginning when the first meteor came down and when they needed to secure a landing path for the plane, we see they first make sure the streets are empty before they look for shelter themselves. Same thing happened in the first movie, remember? During the storm, they secured the streets around the skyscrapers first, and only then the pups went for shelter in the building as well. This time, though? There was just not enough time for that. It wasn't about emptying a whole avenue or a few blocks, that giant fucker was going to obliterate AT LEAST HALF THE CITY.

Man, Victoria was indeed crazy. Just where the fuck was she planning to have that shit land as she pulled it down to Earth???

Which brings up another point...

The Paw Patrol was still there too and none of them had a crystal to power up and use their powers to escape. All crystals had been handed over to Skye just a few minutes before.

DO YOU GET WHAT THAT MEANS???

Ryder knew that was it. If Skye wouldn't be able to stop that giant meteor, they were all going to die.

Skye could die trying to stop that meteor.

If she would be successful and save everyone, she could still die while at it.

If she failed, she would die along with everyone else.

Ryder refused to let her sacrifice herself like that, even if there was a chance to save everyone, the risks were just too high. The biggest chance was that they would ALL die there- so if there was one way to save at least ONE of them, he was going to take it.

As much as the franchise relies on crazy and surreal odds (Dinosaurs? Merpups? I think Dragons too, I didn't get there yet? We can just keep going lol), Ryder is still a realistic kind of person. He's a dreamer, sure, but he's also realistic. He's a science kid. He knows the numbers, he calculates odds very quickly, he analyzes every situation faster than you can think so he can choose the best course of action and instruct his pups on where to go and what to do.

The best case scenario there? It was to ensure at least Skye would survive. She had the crystals, she was already out there in the air, all she needed to do was to get out of the way and fly far to stay out of the impact shockwave. No biggie. Anything else, any other idea to try and save the other pups, it would take too long and they wouldn't get away in time, and it would only bring Skye to die as well. Skye wouldn't be fast enough to fly all the way back to redistribute the crystals. She would get there, but then they wouldn't have enough time to run or hide, only Chase would be fast enough to get away and he wouldn't be willing to run and leave everyone else behind.

And there's also the fact that Ryder always puts his pups' safety and well being above his own too. He will make sure they're safe and sound in any given situation before beginning to consider about his own safety. It's his main duty to make sure they'll be okay. They're his responsibility.

And if even just one of his pups would be left behind to die, he wouldn't go either. Even if that meant letting the city get destroyed and taking several other people with them in the process.

The world be damned, his pups are well trained and always putting themselves at risk for the people, but when it comes down to it, their lives will always come first for this kid. And if one stays behind, he's staying too.

On a last note, I don't remember how it is in the English dub right now, but in the Brazilian dub his voice CRACKS SO HARD when he's telling Skye to save herself. He sounds SO DESPERATE and, and, like, he's trying so damn hard to keep his shit together, to get his point across and he knows they have zero chance of escape and survival, he knows these might be his last words to her, IT HURTS SO FUCKING MUCH--!!!!

[unsureofu]

overshare, ramblings at 1am in June:

I stopped smoking almost three months ago and it seems like my two and half year period of hypersexuality has come to a close.

I read the year of magical thinking and blue nights and the time keeper and the song of achilles and now I’m reading time is a mother and the five people you meet in heaven and I feel like I’ve been knocked back into my reality. I was falling in love with him, he said the kindest and sweetest words to me I have ever heard and we shared moments that I do not believe can ever be replicated with anyone else. he reciprocated every sentiment I gave him and more, so much more. he left an impact on me I’ve been trying to hide. the first person to tell me I’m beautiful. we shared stories of our favourite movies, both somehow detailing the great death of a man who leaves a woman behind, unbeknownst as to what was to come. I can still feel his fingers on my check, his hand around my throat, his arms around my waist. and then he ended his own life, two days after one of many phone calls where he said he would see me soon. this time, it won’t be until I pass myself.

I haven’t worn my contacts once since he told me he liked my glasses. I never fixed the broken dresser he promised he would. he was the very first person I told I truly want to be writer. I have had his obituary open as the first tab on my web app ever since. I’ve been waiting for him. now that I no longer smoke and my mind may just be returning from automatic, I dream of him again. I dream that he says he cares about me to such depths that I cared for him, saying the same things he has already said to me but in other words. I was falling in love with him, it was just the beginning. I was not yet done getting to know him, but I probably never would have been. I’m seeing that every person I threw myself at was not him, it could never be him. I feel I failed to honour him by touching any others. I don’t want to spend nights with others anymore and I’m so sorry I ever did. two and a half years after his death, I’m so sorry I ever tried to delay my grief for him. I’m so sorry I sought out others after you. I was not ready then and I’m still not ready now. I want him back and no one else. what happened between us, no one can take away from me. I will always hold those memories, however haunting, and I hope that it’ll never be too late to honour them.

I never believed in any kind of afterlife but now I feel I must, the only way I’ll survive. my mind instinctively refers to what we had as the greatest love story never seen, never given the chance to flourish. because he took his own life in the middle of I falling in love with him.

[lucyandthepen]

a lesson on style - vi . [ ljn | njm ]

pt. i, pt. ii, pt. iii, pt. iv., pt. v, pt. vi

you’ve always been content with being associated with one word and one word only: average. average in looks, academics and social skills, you’re just looking to graduate high school without causing disasters you’ll have to live with until you kick the bucket. when you’re paired with school king lee jeno for the semester-long physics thesis, you can’t help but think the entire situation has pretty much set itself up for failure. that is, until you strike a deal with your partner. 

alternatively: an au tale involving lessons in popularity, eleven consecutive B­ minuses, a secretly sensitive, chess­-loving jock, and an amateur sex tape.

pairing: jeno x fem!reader, jaemin x fem!reader verse: high school au { jocks!nomin ft. a super cute whiny ap physics genius renjun } rating: M chapter warnings: none word count: 8.1k

author’s note: this was actually supposed to go on for a lot longer but... it might've reached a solid 13-15k and i just thought it would be better to split it into half-ish, so nothing major happens, although i definitely enjoyed yet another mc/jaemin real talk session that i also hope you enjoy! :^)

tagging: @justalildumpling, @spiderrenjunfics (no longer available, please give me your new url if you're still interested!)

You think now is as good a time as any for you to say something that’ll easily impact the trajectory of your life forever; after all, Jeno’s essentially given you the floor after such a strange and honestly shocking turn of events. You’re aware of the fact that his thumb is still traveling across your cheek, more idle as an action than anything else, but you seem to be experiencing the feeling as something closer to an out-of-body experience than an actual first-hand one; the tingles they send to your heart are weird and blurry, like your body can’t process his touch well enough to understand it fully. You suppose it’s because of your confusion at what he’s saying, which leads to your second option: asking him what he means. 

There’s little to interpret at face value, but what his words do is essentially unlock a torrent of other weird questions in your head. For instance: how long had he known that you liked him? Had he known this entire time? Did something you did make it painfully obvious? If he wants you to like him — and, as he says, only him — does that mean he’s essentially accepting your feelings? Does this mean… he likes you back? 

You assume this is one of those moments where, because your mind is going a million miles a minute, a lot of time feels like it’s passed even though it’s just been a small handful of seconds. This assumption is quickly broken by Jeno’s expression of concern. 

“_______________? Say… something.”

“Um,” you start before you can even figure out what you want to say. The easiest answer comes to mind: It’s always only been you. But that’s weird, and this isn’t a 90’s Western movie, and if it were, you certainly wouldn’t be the eloquent main romance interest, even if Jeno’s gaze could easily fool you into thinking that. You think about making a joke, but you’re befuddled and also fresh from tears that — if Jeno’s abrupt story is actually true — were totally useless and unfounded in nature. 

Also, you’re really not that funny to begin with.  

“I just…” you try again, and his eyebrows raise slightly in anticipation for your next words. Nothing else comes out after a few seconds, though, and he realizes this is just another false start, his hand falling onto your shoulder (maybe he’s tired of trying to coax it out of you with the thumb-on-cheek method, which admittedly had you clamping up more than anything else). 

“You can just tell me how you really f—”

“I think I have to go.” 

No. No. Why would you say that? The surprise on his face quickly morphs into something that looks almost crestfallen, an expression you’d never imagine seeing on bright, confident Lee Jeno, let alone ever be the cause of. His hand slips from your shoulder quickly, like he’s now worried touching you will electrocute him. 

“Oh. I’m sorry — I didn’t… mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“I’m… I’m not.” You’re not, are you? “Maybe a little, but it isn’t really you —”

“Something I said, then—?”

“No, I…” Your fingernail digs into the pad of your thumb, with you trying to use the sting of the pain to jolt you out of this nervous, inarticulate state. “I just don’t think… I have anything of value to say right now.”

“What makes you think that?” 

“Because…” Grappling for words is like trying to break through the surface of water; you’re almost there, but somehow you’re still floundering, and that only seems to be making it much worse. “Because I never really thought about what I’d do… if you really found out I liked you.” 

When you say it, it suddenly makes sense. For some reason, you’d always lived your life shuttling between point A (liking Jeno quietly in the comfort of your own mind palace) and point Z (fantasizing about your life with him where you live in a quaint townhouse with a cute mailbox and three kids), but you’d never really given much thought to all the points in between, especially not one that contains a scenario in which he’d find out and seemingly be okay with it, which, based on the current conversation, somehow seems like a reasonable thing to assume about him. 

You’ve always wanted it — him knowing, him accepting it, maybe even him liking you back —  but it kind of felt like, deep down, you hadn’t really believed it would ever happen. 

And you were kind of content with that, because you wouldn’t ever really have to deal with the complications of it. Right now, you’re feeling unprepared and a little exposed, weirdly vulnerable to his gaze. It once again, for the hundredth time tonight, it seems, triggers some kind of flight instinct in you that has you looking anywhere but at him all of a sudden. 

“You can think about it… now,” he suggests carefully. Being put on the spot doesn’t really ever bring out the best in you — a fact that might be known to people who were actually paying attention to your failed impromptu speech about whale hunting in your sixth grade English class — so you just pretend that the silhouette of Jaemin’s front yard tree is supremely interesting to you all of a sudden, never mind the fact that it’s about a few inches from Jeno’s ear from your vantage point. You don’t really want to see his expression right now, especially if that means it’ll only fluster you back into speechlessness. 

“I don’t really know if I can,” you admit. From your peripheral vision, you see what seems like a flash of discomfort pass across Jeno’s face; you’re sure you just imagined it, considering you’ve never imagined cool, aloof, king of your heart Lee Jeno as exuding anything other than utmost confidence. Still, his next words do make you question that notion twice over. 

“Did I… misunderstand something? Is it that you don’t have feelings for me?” 

“No, I… you know. I… yeah, I do, but I just —”

“You’re seeing someone else?” 

“No,” you say more fiercely, and for a brief moment, you’re so appalled at the thought that your eyes flicker to his, which ends up being a terrible mistake because the confusion in his gaze is so profound that the guilt in you swells tenfold. 

“Because I thought… maybe the reason Renjun and you —”

“He’s — honest to God — he’s just my friend.” 

“And Jaemin is…?”

“My… next door neighbor?” You blink rapidly at the lights still coming from his house, wondering now what Jaemin has to do with all of this in the first place. For someone who seems like he would be extremely uninvolved in this general progress of events, he seems to crop up time and again, weirdly always around when you need someone. Maybe it’s a neighbor thing, or maybe he’s a little nosier than you thought. But thinking about another element in this situation is starting to give you a headache, and you’re way past the time you’re usually already in bed avoiding homework and watching shitty dating reality shows instead. “I don’t really understand what he has to do with this either. I just don’t think I’m prepared to have this conversation at all.”

“But you like me, don’t you?” 

It’s weird, actually, now that you think about it — why does he have to confirm the fact time and time again? It’s almost like he’s worried, although you can’t imagine why he would be. More than anything, you’d kind of assumed that he would find that information pretty repellent, but with the way he’s asking in earnest, it almost seems like he wants to keep the knowledge of that like a talisman. 

“I do,” you admit, mostly because it’s out in the open, but also partially because you’ve made the mistake of looking at him again, and you start wondering how he could even wonder when everyone seems to like him (you, perhaps, to a somewhat unhealthy degree). 

“More than them?” 

“I—” Your brow furrows, another wave of confusion washing over you. But his eyes are much too honest in their questioning, and you speak before anything else can come to mind. “More than anyone, Jeno.”

What looks oddly like relief settles on his face, and you notice only then that his shoulders have been tensed up because he seems to relax them all of a sudden. “Oh. Good. Great. So listen, now that we’re on the same page, I—”

Jeno’s interrupted by one of the guys in a university sweater calling out to him from across the two lawns, voice booming to a degree that sets off a few annoyed dogs in your area. Jeno raises a hand to signal him to wait, his mouth still open on whatever words he wanted to complete his sentence with, but the sounds he was trying to make quickly die into silence anyway, drowned out by a huge crash inside Jaemin’s house. 

You’re not entirely certain of what he wants to say — on the bright side, he could have been ramping up to a point that could easily make all your dreams from middle school to now a perfect reality, but he also could have been setting you up for some kind of grand, embarrassing failure — not by his design or by malice but just by the pointing out of the fact that you two lead different lives and things would likely never work out, anyway, but it’d be cool that you liked him in your own time, and he’d allow it as long as you didn’t get drool all over his notebook in class. 

Either way, you don’t think now, with a bunch of inebriated college people shouting profanities on Jaemin’s lawn and a gaggle of high school kids panicking about what sounds to be a broken table and a whole bunch of pizza on the floor, is the best time to be processing those things.

“I actually,” Jeno turns his gaze to you again, strangely alert, like you’d just whistled for a dog’s attention. You’ve never seen him like this, and it’s weird to think that, at this awkward moment, you can still find him painfully endearing. You have to shake yourself out of the grip of the already beckoning force that tells you to sigh dreamily about how adorable he is. “Think I should really be heading inside. Looks like they also need you for some kind of damage control, anyway.”

The same college kid calls for Jeno again, dragging out the vowels of his name kind of annoyingly. Jeno sighs, nodding slowly enough for you to know he’s caught on — this probably isn’t the right time to have such a weirdly heavy conversation.

“Yeah. I probably need to help clean up, anyway. No one’s going to want to do it, and Jaemin’s already chewed me out for bailing on mop duty a few times.”

“Why’d you bail?” 

“Just… got busy, personally.” He looks sheepish, and it doesn’t take a bunch of lightbulbs going off for you to cotton on as well. Now, you’re just wishing you hadn’t asked, so you didn’t ever have to imagine it. Still, what’s done is done. You have to focus on keeping the discomfort out of your face this time. “Um… that’s not important, though. Anyway —I’ll talk to you soon, okay, ________________? Like… maybe we can catch up at school? You know, talk about our thing — the project, I mean — and like… et cetera?”

“Yeah, for sure.” Your smile’s weak, and so is your joke, but you should at least try to hold up casual pretenses as much as he does, even though he’s obviously much better at it. “I’ll tell on you to Hwang if you don’t, you know.” 

His laugh is soft, but it at least sounds genuine; his smile still reaches his eyes, which already makes your heart feel a little lighter. But instead of trekking off immediately, he lingers, strangely, until his grin winnows down into just the ghost of a smile on his lips. Even weirder are his hands, slightly outstretched towards your waist, like he’s trying to cross the gap between you (even if it’s admittedly very minimal) but suddenly decides not to. The result is him looking strangely stiff and uncharacteristically hesitant, but you chalk it up to him simply not knowing how to end such a weirdly situated conversation. You know you’d have an even worse time doing it if it were up to you, so you can’t really blame him. 

In the end, he closes the dialogue with ‘see you around, ________________,’ and a quick pat on the shoulder, which, if you think about it, seems a little disappointingly different from when he’d had his hand against your cheek a few minutes ago. Then again, you’re not sure you could handle something like that again, anyway. 

You watch him walk off back towards Jaemin’s house, and some pitiful, pathetic part of you is expecting him to look back, say one last goodbye to you, or something, but the university guy that had belted his name out so vigilantly just swings an arm around Jeno’s neck and drags him to a corner where a bunch of other similarly dressed people, to whom Jeno starts talking to almost immediately. 

Cutting this conversation short was probably for the best, anyway; you have no idea what he would have said, but you’re very sure you wouldn’t have been prepared for it either way. You trudge into your house and up into your room, already mentally prepared to spend the rest of the night obsessively mulling over what it all meant and what he had really been planning to say at the end. The process starts some time in the shower, while you’re shampooing your hair and you embarrassingly remember the feeling of Jeno’s hand tangled in it. The moony expression that the thought of it leaves on your face is present up until you see how stupid it looks in the fogged up bathroom mirror. 

Renjun still hasn’t texted you, which is honestly starting to be a source of mild anxiety because you can’t be sure if he’s dead in a ditch somewhere or just ignoring you for some unknown reason. Whatever it is, you leave like three messages wondering where he’s at and asking him to call you. You’re on your fourth message, which is asking to confirm about tomorrow’s movie (something you’d almost forgotten about save for the fact that you’d remembered this would be a point of argument for you both once again if you spaced on it) when a notification pops up that once again gives you a heart attack. 

Lee Jeno: u looked pretty tonight, btw :) 

You: oh!! thank you…!

You: you looked great tonight too…! :) 

Lee Jeno: haha… cute :) 

Lee Jeno: goodnight, ____________ :) 

This is the most emojis you’ve ever seen used in a single brief conversation, and you can’t help but feel like it might be a little juvenile, but it doesn’t even matter because Lee freaking Jeno called you pretty and cute in the span of five minutes. Your thumbs are shaking as you type back a typo-laden goodnight that takes you a full other minute just to edit before waiting a little more, but nothing else comes. Maybe he’s driving home, or something. You toss your phone onto your bed, away from easy reach, before you can start overthinking what this silence means again. 

Your reflection in your window mirrors the same scene you’d encountered in the bathroom: you, hair bundled up in a wet towel, bare-faced with a stupid grin across it. You’re so caught up in the act of reeling from Jeno’s three texts that you belatedly notice a square of light beyond your bedroom window. You almost duck out of sight when you see a shadow there, thinking about crying bloody murder, until you realize it’s Jaemin, who’s watching the ridiculous expression on your face with a curious gaze from a distance. He’s still in the same clothes he’d worn to the party, but you can see, even from this far away, that there’s this dark patch on it that looks suspiciously close to the way your shirt had on the day his coke had emptied itself out on your back. That must’ve been from the crash earlier, you deduce. 

You think he’s just zoning out facing in your direction, and you find there’s no need to meet his gaze, but there’s still something a little unsettling about having someone spacing out in your general direction, so you reach up to pull your blinds down. Your hand almost reaches the string, but Jaemin’s hand suddenly starts going up too, like it’s trying to follow you, and you freeze in your movements. His keeps going, though, up until it’s close to his face, and suddenly, he’s moving it side to side, in some weird regular pattern.

He’s waving, your tired, overworked brain tells you belatedly. The string of your blinds tickles the tip of your fingers. 

Unsure and a little self-conscious, you wave back, hoping he doesn’t notice that you were about two strong pulls away from drawing yourself out of sight. This is clearly the right response, because even from this distance, you can see the brilliant white of his teeth as he smiles, fully and unabashedly, at you. 

The first thing you do when you wake up the following morning is check your phone. You’re not even really sure what you’re looking for — maybe a text from Jeno, who, if you think about it now, probably has nothing to say in response to your boring ‘goodnight’ anyway (but you can still dream), or maybe a missed call or two from Renjun, who should at least be offering you some explanation as to why he was completely out of sight after parting ways with you and Mark Lee last night. 

Unfortunately, there’s nothing on your screen, apart from the stupid 번장 notification that tells you the pocket punch board you’ve been wanting for no good reason has been discounted by the seller to a price you still can’t reasonably afford anyway. 

You certainly can’t do anything about Jeno’s lack of contact, and to be completely honest with yourself, you’re not even really that sure if you want to. Something about yesterday’s conversation, while not exactly a train wreck, makes you very nervous to have a full conversation with him, and you’d much rather it stick to very basic, kindergarten-level things, like ‘you look cute’ and ‘haha’ and ‘:)’, but since that isn’t completely in your control, you decide you simply don’t want to do anything about it.

Renjun, however, is a completely different matter. You don’t understand why he’s ignoring you if he is, considering you had spent the better part of the night (at least, the parts during which you weren’t crying on your lawn) looking for him, so this silence, if deliberate, doesn’t seem fair or even reasonable. You decide that it’s much too early to be getting an earful from you in the end, so you just send a very emphatic ‘WRU?????????????????’ through both text message, KakaoTalk, and Facebook Messenger to him, hoping the repetition of both sentiment and punctuation mark through multiple platforms is enough to faux-yell to him what you’d otherwise be real-yelling to him over the line. You can’t tell if it gives you any sense of comfort to see he hasn’t been online and active for the last 15 hours. 

All the tossing and turning of last night, courtesy of the endless loop replay of “I want you to like me — just me” Lee Jeno edition, had consequently left you worse for wear; you’d gotten up at the rising of the sun (something you’d sworn never to do during the weekend) and had opted to just stay in bed for another hour, trying so hard to get over the feeling of his fingers against your skin that you end up committing it to long-term memory. The sunlight peeking through your blinds is what gets you to throw off your covers and admit defeat to the fact that sleep would never come back at this rate, and you decide to just head down, rubbing the lethargy out of your eyes before you make a poor man’s breakfast. You’re halfway through the jelly slice of your sandwich when your sister comes through the doorway, yawning loud to announce her presence. 

“G’morning, bedhead baby,” she greets, and you use the non-knife-holding hand you have free to rake through your hair. “Big rager last night, huh?” 

“Yeah — wait, how’d you know?” 

“We live a door down from Jaemin oppa’s house? Na Jaemin? Our next door neighbor and his whole family? We can see out the window into his lawn? Sometimes we get our sidewalk trash cans mixed up with theirs? Hello?” Sooyeon smirks, albeit a little sluggishly, as you wave her grating words away. “I saw you out there with him, you know.”

“With who? Where? Who?” You demand, your jelly-laden knife freezing in mid-air, the grape blobs slipping dangerously off the edge onto the middle of your bread.

“You. And Jaemin oppa,” she says each syllable slowly. “In front of our house.” 

“Oh.” 

“So usually how these conversations go is: I bring up a juicy piece of information pertaining to you, and because you experienced it first hand, you have to then expound on the piece of information, thereby making it juicier. ‘Oh’ doesn’t cut it. Not by a long shot.” 

“There’s not much to tell.” You wonder, briefly, if you’re now obligated to bring up the Jeno aspect of the night — which, for all intents and purposes, honestly felt like more of a big deal than anything else — but you quickly decide against it, chickening out when she approaches you at the counter and starts unscrewing the lid of the peanut butter jar. That might be giving too much away, considering she didn’t even seem to notice that you’d been bawling when you’d crossed the property line. “He just walked me back here.”

“Oh, yeah, because that’s what people who live next to each other in a not-so-close-knit community do: walk each other two steps home, to keep the baddies away.” 

“He’s just a naturally nice person, I think. Most people are, aren’t they?”

“I thought you guys were close. Didn’t he give you his varsity jacket? That sounds like a closeness thing.” She knots her index and middle finger together, and you slap it away. 

“We’re close only in the same way as you are.” When she gives you a quizzical look, you sigh. “Proximity-wise.” 

“Still doesn’t explain why he was out there, caressing your hair lovingly.”

You freeze, as opposed to Sooyeon’s comically relaxed posture as she scrapes the peanut butter across your other slice of bread. “He… was not. Caressing me. My hair. Lovingly.”

“I have eyes for the sake of seeing.”

“There was just something in it. In my hair. A leaf.” 

You’re not sure why you lie; the largest part of the reason is that you don’t want to have to go into the horrifyingly awkward details of your emotional state last night, but there’s something oddly nagging at you that you can’t quite place. It takes a minute of staring at your sister spreading the peanut butter evenly across the bread and humming to herself while closing the sandwich up that you realize that you don’t want her getting the wrong impression about anything.

Which is weird, because there’s nothing to misunderstand. 

Jaemin, albeit the fact that he’s been chattier to you as of late, more so than any other time in your life, is still just your neighbor. Maybe he’s graduated from being your sort-of acquaintance to something that vaguely resembles an arm-distance-ish friend, but the notion that you’re anything closer than that makes you feel a bit strange — almost like it… scares you, which is extra weird to think about, because there’s actually nothing inherently harmful about being casual buddies with some guy who lives close enough to wave at you from his window. 

Maybe it’s because it’s Jaemin, and that’s what might be tripping you up the most. He’s not just Jeno’s friend; he’s practically some kind of counterpart to him, and it feels weirdly like a line you can’t cross. Or maybe it’s because… Jeno had asked you about him last night, which had made you feel even stranger. Like he’d been worried about something — like Jaemin was a no-go zone for him, specifically. 

As you dully watch your sister take a bite off of your breakfast, it dawns on you: maybe you just don’t want people to think you like anyone other than Jeno. 

“Okay, well, you know better than I do,” she singsongs in a tone that tells you that you actually don’t. Sooyeon doesn’t press, but she also doesn’t make you feel like the conversation is over — even if she trills I’m going back up; thanks for the sandwich in that same voice before leaving you alone in the kitchen with half of it on the plate. 

Because the truth is that you don’t really know; you don’t know what’s so unsettling about being associated with Jaemin. Your sister’s not aware of the intricate ins and outs of your (delusional) relationship with Jeno, apart from your (apparently evident to everyone) crush on him, but you also know she’s not really deeply invested in where your heart lies; all she does is make conversation, as is her personality, as a form of bonding you’ve never really quite been able to navigate well. 

You just don’t get why the mention of Jaemin, now, makes you feel… something. What that is, you’d rather not dwell on. So you just won’t. 

You’re walking out of the kitchen, cheeks filled with peanut butter and jelly, when you see block letters on cloth, spelling out a familiar last name: Na. 

You still haven’t given back Jaemin’s stupid jacket. 

Today is the day, you decide. This seems to have started the whole conversation to begin with: the jacket that somehow brought Jaemin two steps closer into your life, the article of clothing that had opened the door to what shouldn’t even be a talking point between you and anyone else. 

This should be the proverbial swan song for this whole topic; you snatch up his jacket (and immediately regret doing so in such a brutish manner, noticing you’ve got a few specks of breadcrumbs on the lettering) and head out of your house, your bedroom slippers absorbing morning dew as you march yourself over to your neighbor’s. You should’ve done this earlier, really; there was no reason for you to hold on to it. 

Honestly, you’d just forgotten, given that you were more preoccupied with things that started with L and ended with ee Jeno, but you’d rather not extend any more misunderstandings. 

And even if Jeno isn’t here to see this grand closing gesture, maybe, just maybe, this will help you stop feeling so cagey about everything he’d asked last night. 

I want you to like me — just me. 

Because why would he even think you liked Jaemin at all? Or make it sound like he thought you did? Ridiculous. Unfounded. Kind of alarming. 

There’s noise in the air the closer you get to the Na household porch; it sounds a bit muffled, like it’s fighting the breeze, but you realize thereafter that it’s music coming from a tiny speaker sitting on the hand railing. It’s playing Dongbangshinki’s Here I Am, and something about that song stirs your stomach into swooping ten miles down as you approach. 

Your initial plan was to ring the doorbell and pray that Jaemin was still knocked out cold on a Saturday morning so you could pass the jacket off to one of his parents and be done with it, but you’ve no such luck; it seems like he’s an early riser, considering how he’s seated right there, on a wicker chair by his door, hunched over a half-played chess board. There’s no one across him to block his view of you coming up the steps, and he looks up the moment he hears the creaks of the wood under your feet. 

“Hey, ______________,” he doesn’t look surprised; in fact, he looks a bit relieved, for some inexplicable reason. “Didn’t think you’d be up so early.”

“Could say the same for you.” You have no idea what causes heat to flush across your cheeks; has Na Jaemin’s gaze always been this intense? “Um. Good morning?”

“Morning.” His laugh is an easy one; it always has been, and it kind of suits him, you note, before you realize how weird it is to think that. “What’ve you got there? Gift for me?” 

“Wha — oh, yeah, I mean — no, but it is for you.” You hold up his jacket, hooked on your forefinger, to reveal it to him. “Sorry it took so long to give it back.”

This time, he actually looks a bit taken aback. “Did you stop needing it?” 

“Um… I haven’t really used it, if I’m being honest.”

“Oh. Well, there wasn’t any rush. You could’ve kept it for as long as you needed. No pressure, or anything. I’ve got others.”

“You don’t need it at practice, or anything like that?”

“No; most guys don’t even keep theirs. They give them away, for… you know. So it’s no big deal.”

You fall silent; for some reason, his tone makes it seem like he wants you to keep it, which is just preposterous. You instead hang the jacket onto the back of the wicker chair opposite him and step back, like you’ve just set up a land mine you’re afraid of detonating. 

“Well, thank you all the same. I really… appreciate your help. That day. You know.” You’re not sure why you can’t form any sentences long enough to signify you do actually belong in the same year level as him, but he at least doesn’t comment on your ineloquence.

Instead, he just stares for a bit, at the jacket and your retreating hand, before piping up over his music. 

“You wanna play a round?” 

“What? Oh, I’m…” You wave your hands aimlessly. “I’m not good at chess. Actually, I barely know the rules. Plus, you seem kind of busy playing against… your imaginary friend?”

He chuckles again. “Just playing myself.”

“Trying to outfox the old fox?”

“Sometimes it helps to know how you’d get out of a sticky situation you made by your own doing. Helps you see what your opponent sees when it all boils down to it.” He gestures again at the chair across him. “Humor me a little. It’s not as fun just talking to yourself.”

You hesitate for a second; you came here to return the jacket, and that much was done easily, albeit a little more awkwardly than you ever wanted to. Jaemin’s aura is laid back and friendly, but you’re not sure why you’re teetering on the edge of panic again. Jeno’s words seem to be echoing in your head.

And Jaemin is…?

Jaemin is your next-door neighbor, it’s true, but you can’t say that’s really your only point of connection; if it were, he wouldn’t be expectantly waiting for you to take the seat across from him. And when you look at his hand now, idle against the chessboard, you can’t say you aren’t thinking of the way it patted your hair soothingly the night before. All that does is make you wonder the exact same thing Jeno asked you. 

What is Jaemin to you? A friend, perhaps, and definitely a nice person — nice enough to help you out, keep you company during a few low points. He’s a person willing to listen to you, funny enough to lift your spirits, and genial enough to not break your fingers for returning his things way too late (a low bar, but a good one nonetheless). Na Jaemin is a good individual, with pretty good music taste (based on the fact that his playlist, trudging on next to him, is now playing H.O.T.’s Happiness), and a good disposition about him that seems to make no small amount of people gravitate towards him. 

But you don’t really want to dwell on what Jaemin is to you; more than that, you can only really be reminded of what he isn’t. 

He isn’t Jeno. 

And Jeno knows you like him; he’s not only noticed it but confirmed it multiple times in a single conversation. Surely, then, nothing else should matter to him — or, for that matter, to you. 

You swallow down the refusal and nod, trying not to read into the fact that Jaemin’s face lights up when you pull the chair back and settle down on it. 

“So let me get this straight; you don’t know how to play chess?”

“I know a couple of pieces go in weird directions,” you admit. “That’s about it.” 

“Perfect.” His long fingers drum against the wood of the table. “I’m going to whip you into competitive chess-playing shape, my young pupil.” 

What starts off as a casual, humor-filled lesson on the roles of each chess piece suddenly becomes an actual lecture; you’re not sure if Jaemin is getting a kick out of instructing a rookie like you on the different plays — which are infinite, a fact he’s drilled into you several times — or if he’s really just enthusiastic about the game (no, sorry, sport, since he’s chastised you about three times on this terminology already), but whatever the reason is, you have chess pounded into your brain for the better part of an hour. By the time he asks you to actually start playing against him, the sun’s fully up in the air and you’ve had to tie your hair up to keep it from sticking to your neck. 

“I’m glad you got home safe last night,” he hums, pushing his black pawn to meet yours in the middle of the board. The Italian Game, he called it — not to be confused with serenading someone over pasta, a different kind of Italian game. That had gotten a long laugh out of you. Your hands flit over the white pieces, unsure of your memory. You only respond when you’ve moved your bishop to the same row. 

“Well, it was a very long and tumultuous journey, but I managed, with some help.” 

His knight comes out next, smoothly and quickly; you pause, rubbing the back of your neck. Surely, there was something else he’d taught you? 

“What a chivalrous, ah, knight, that person must’ve been.” He raps a knuckle onto the table, starting you out of the act of racking your brain. “Perfect joke. Well-timed. Excellent chess pun. I think I deserve an award.”

“Does whooping my ass two moves into the game count as a prize?”

“I don’t want to rob you of the feeling of hope this early in the match. Take your time,” he chuckles, leaning back against the throw cushion behind him. He fiddles with the speaker, and the songs skip one by one, until he lands on a song you don’t know — some Japanese track that sounds suspiciously like an animation opening. It’s lively and admittedly a bit loud, and Jaemin hums to the guitar riffs with surprising accuracy. “Anything interesting happen when I left?”

You freeze for a moment, your fingers still hovering over your own knight in hesitation. You know what he’s asking, and for some reason, you’re tempted to tell him — then you remember that it actually isn’t really his business, and you don’t want to embarrass yourself. 

“Not really.” You feign casual disinterest as you move your knight above your pawn line; from here on out, you have no clue what to do. Jaemin, on the other hand, is so sure-footed about his own skills (which are infinitely more advanced than yours) that he doesn’t even take his eyes off you to look at the board as he moves his next piece. You’re stuck thinking about what to do again — in the game, that is. Not about his gaze, which you try to avoid. “Just, you know. Talked with Jeno for a bit. Nothing major.”

Nothing major to him, you remind yourself. To you, your entire world had just been flipped over onto its belly.

Jaemin hums again, this time in understanding, but you notice (from your very surreptitious glances of him) that this time, it seems like he’s choosing what to do. You think it’s for the game, but when he counteracts your own (poorly planned) move with a swift response from his own pieces, you get the odd feeling he’s trying to choose his words carefully. 

“Was it a conversation where you all got along?”

You hadn’t argued, but you’d never really thought about the whole stint long enough to classify it as good or bad. You supposed it wasn’t anything horrible in the end, although the fact that it had robbed you of precious hours of sleep wasn’t exactly the best outcome. But Jaemin’s not watching your expression now; he’s intently looking at the board, even if he’s not the one about to make the next move. 

You get the feeling he’s suddenly avoiding eye contact too, which is weird, because he’s never been one to shy away from looking you straight in the eye. For some reason, that makes you feel like he doesn’t want to hear an answer. 

“It was fine. Nothing… bad happened.” You know that’s true, but somehow you feel like it’s still not truth. “He explained… stuff. Who she was. Why it happened. Totally understandable stuff, I think.” 

You choose not to mention anything apart from that — that he’d asked you to like him, nor that he’d asked you about your relationship with Jaemin. More than deciding it wasn’t going to be anything contributive to the conversation at hand, you also just didn’t want to. 

Jaemin stays silent for a while; he moves his piece, then taps his queen — for some reason, he’s letting you know something about his next move. What it is, you haven’t puzzled out; it’s not like you know which direction he’d be taking, and even if you did, you’d surely not know how to respond to it, anyway. You guess he’s just throwing you a bone, but why he would, you also just don’t see the reason for. 

You’re pushing your pawn hesitantly diagonal to capture one of his when he speaks up again. 

“Did he tell you how it ended? With the two of them, I mean.”

He says it so calmly, capturing your bishop with his queen in the process, that you feel like you’re just talking about the weather and who won yesterday’s league basketball match. You shift uncomfortably in your seat, clearing your throat, but you only actually manage to shake your head. 

“She cheated on him. Some college guy that she met during her orientation; you know she’s older than him, right? He’s never dated seriously since then. I think he was really hung up on her for a while — until recently, that is. I think. He hasn’t been that close to many girls.” 

“That’s… that’s awful.” You’re not sure why Jaemin’s telling you this; it honestly feels illegal to know. “I didn’t think… anyone would. Cheat on him, I mean.” 

“Even good-looking bastards like him can have rotten luck.” Jaemin’s smile borders on wry. “I don’t know why she showed up, honestly. Word probably got around… but she probably just wanted to know what would happen if she stirred something up with him one last time. He likely didn’t see it coming.” 

You stare at the board, unsure of what to say. It makes sense, but something doesn’t really sit right with you either — why Jeno would let her come close to him at all, let alone allow her to completely eliminate the distance between his mouth and hers for longer than a second. Even thinking about it makes you want to throw up all over again. 

“But deep down, I don’t know if Jeno completely got over her.” Jaemin continues, snapping you out of your short trance. “For a while after, they kept in touch. I think they even tried to work it out, but… obviously, it wasn’t easy. Until now… I’m not really sure.” 

“Why,” you swallow hard. “Why… are you… why should I…”

“It’s not easy to be a player when you don’t know much about the game, is it?” He’s still staring at the board, but you get the sense that he isn’t just talking about chess. “Like I said, Jeno’s a pretty complicated guy. It’s not really my place to say anything, but…” Jaemin’s eyes flit upward for a second, and he offers you a small, almost pitying smile. “I think you need to know anyway.” 

“But it has nothing to do with me. His life… I mean, his ex, and stuff.”

“I’m not too sure about that. If you like him that much… doesn’t that just mean you want to be part of his life?” He topples a pawn of yours, but you barely register the clattering noise or the fact that he drags it unceremoniously off the board. “I think you should at least know what you’re getting into. Jeno hasn’t liked someone seriously for a while, but you seem… to be the opposite. How much do you actually know about what he’s like?”

You don’t know why that kind of hurts your feelings; maybe it’s just because you have to face some kind of truth about how you don’t know much about Jeno’s private life, as badly as you want to. You even have to hear about it from someone else — someone easily kicking your ass in a dumb chess match. 

“I think everyone has baggage,” you say slowly, pushing your rook forward. You realize it’s trapped behind two different pawns, so you’ve essentially backed the piece into its own corner. Jaemin doesn’t seem to care; he’s too busy executing what clearly is a ten-stage strategic win on the other side of the board. You don’t really care.

“That’s true,” he concedes, toppling your knight. “But some more than others, I think.” 

“If he wanted me to know, he would’ve told me, right? Yesterday, I mean.”

“That’s may also be true, although I can’t say that with absolute certainty.” He looks thoughtful, and the pause gives you a bit of reprieve — enough to make a bad move that you instantly regret the moment you put your one remaining bishop on a square. Something like amusement flickers across Jaemin’s face, but he doesn’t make a move immediately. “Do you know what makes chess such a great game? In my opinion, anyway.” 

“No?” The uncertainty in your voice is from a lack of understanding at the sudden shift in topic. 

“Whenever you play someone, you get to see what they’re like — what their priorities are, you know?” His finger lands on a rook, inching it back and forth with idle intent. “You see how their mind works, what they’re like when they’re winning or losing, and what they think of you. Check, by the way.” 

You’re silent as his rook captures your bishop, and he picks your fallen piece up and sets it aside with his growing pile of white. 

“I’ve actually asked Jeno to play with me a few times, just for the fun of it. Sore loser,” he laughs lightly, one hand reaching out to lower the volume of his music. You notice the opening bars of Winner’s Really Really come through moments before it’s toned down. “Doesn’t really know or care about the rules, but he really likes to win. That’s kind of what makes him the star player on the team, actually. He really hates being backed into a corner, but all that focus on winning kind of tunnels his vision sometimes. Leaves him open to some attacks from another angle. He really hates that — which is probably why we barely play chess together in the first place. Apart from the fact that he thinks it’s boring.” 

You’re staring at your pieces, now very pitifully winnowed down in number, and you feel stuck. You’re not sure what to do, but you’re pretty sure any move is going to make you look dumb in front of Jaemin, who’s clearly a pro — so much so that he seems to know what you’re going to do before you even decide yourself. 

“You know what I like about your playing style, though?” He interrupts your train of thought again. You look up from the board, bemused; you’ve just been struggling to humor him since your first move, and it obviously isn’t working, since he seems more invested in the conversation than in the game. “You’re just trying your best, even if you’re new at this — even if you think you’re going to lose.” 

“I just don’t want you to think I’ve forgotten everything you just said,” you respond, smiling weakly. 

“You can’t always predict what’s going to happen in a game, even if you know the pattern anyway. Isn’t that just natural about anything in life?”

“You seem to know, though,” you grumble, tugging on your ponytail. You throw in the only option you have left: pushing your queen in front of your king as a last line of defense. “You’re barely paying attention to the board.”

“It’s just constant practice — a lot of hard work on my part. I don’t mind the grind of it, if it gets me somewhere good in the end.” 

“So is that the kind of player you are? Just… a hard worker?” 

“Maybe. I like to look at things from every possible angle. I guess that’s why I like chess when most people find it a headache.” He picks up his queen, rolling it in his palm. “Although, I guess Jeno and I have one thing in common — as players, that is.”

“What’s that?”

“I also really hate to lose.” 

His queen knocks over your own with a pitiful clatter, taking its place on the board. When he picks up your piece, instead of adding it to his knockout count, he offers it to you. You take it gingerly, opting to focus more on it than on the soft smile that’s now playing on Jaemin’s lips. 

“Checkmate,” he announces lightly. “Good game, _____________. You’ve got the makings of a star player.” 

“You’re patronizing me, aren’t you?” You sigh as the two of you start resetting the board; you have to watch Jaemin’s pieces get rearranged to position your own. 

“Only a little bit. I see a lot of quiet drive in you.” 

You place the last of your pawns in a neat row; the board looks like it hadn’t even been touched. “Jaemin, how did you and Jeno become this close? You seem… I don’t know.”

“Yeah, we’ve definitely got our unique quirks,” he chuckles softly. “But Jeno and I… we just go way back, I think. When you’re friends with someone from a young age, you tend to grow with them. He’s a good dude, really, even if our personalities are different, and it’s always a fun event so long as he’s around. Well — mostly. I’d say a good ninety-nine percent of the time.” 

You pointedly ignore the sheepish smile he throws your way. 

“You said before that you’re not the type to… you know, share your feelings, and all that. Then how do you… like what do you guys even talk about?”

“What do you and Renjun usually talk about?” Jaemin grins. “Anything and everything, really. Movies, games, why the jerk from Yongsan International gets on our nerves when he chews his gum. We just… have a tendency to be interested in the same things, no matter if our perspectives are different.” 

While talking to Jaemin is fun, you can’t help but feel like he has a tendency to speak in riddles. You still don’t really see any strong similarities in their approaches to their interests, similar as they may be, but what do you know, anyway? It isn’t like you and Renjun are exactly peas in a pod on paper.

His eyes lose focus for a second, hitting somewhere behind your ear before they quickly turn back to you. You have no idea why this makes you feel a little put on the spot. 

“Hey, you want to have brunch here? My mom makes a mean soybean paste stew.”

“Oh,” you press your hand against your stomach, wondering if the swooping feeling in it is from hunger or something unrelated. “No, I actually just ha—”

“_____________?” 

You swivel around in the chair, and your heart stops; you're not the least bit prepared to see Lee Jeno standing at the foot of Jaemin’s porch steps, a quizzical look very clearly etched on his sharp features.

[goldrushenthusiast]

What are your thoughts on the District 11 tributes in the 74th (Rue and Thresh) and 75th (Seeder and Chaff) The Hunger Games?

How do you think life differs between Distinct 11 and 12?

*Spoiler alert*

What do you think about the inserted scene of rebellion in District 11 in the first movie (scene after Rue's death)?

Thank you :)

@curiousnonny

I think district 11 is a fascinating district! On surface level it seems similar to 12, which I think deep down Katniss believed too, but it really isn’t like it at all which I think impacts how Katniss eventually sees it.

You know how there’s the Seam and the merchants in District 12? I think it does exist. It has to. I think Dill and Chaff are from it, for reasons I explain later, but I had to get that out of the way because in the same way Peeta & Katniss have fundamental differences from growing up in the Seam vs Merchant, I think it affects the tributes as well.

I think we should also consider Reaper and Dill from BOSAS, so I’m gonna do that lol.

I think that, for Thresh, the hunger games were an opportunity. A chance at something beyond working on the farms, no matter how terrible it might seem. While I don’t think he was excited for it, I think it would’ve been a glass half full situation he was going to utilize. I genuinely think he stood a chance at winning.

He would’ve shared the same knowledge of plants and stuff as Rue, would’ve kept his moral compass working (the thing with Katniss & owing), and it makes sense he got as far as he did. District 11 is definitely a competitor in these games, noticed even by Coriolanus in BOSAS.

For Rue, on the other hand, this was worst case scenario. I saw someone else mention there was a higher chance for her to be chosen because she had so many siblings and probably took out tesserae, and I think that’s exactly right, and having so many would only make the whole thing worse. I don’t think she had a huge chance of winning, but would’ve even more than the average 12 year old and if she fought hard there’d be something there.

Her climbing skills, of course, give her as much of an advantage as Katniss, plus her stealth. I think she could’ve survived till top 8, especially if she’d stayed in the trees. I also think her knowledge of plants would both help her, and hurt her enemies if she was willing, although I don’t think she would be. She could pull a fox face & Peeta move almost, leaving some poisonous and some not harmful berries or something in a “hiding” place for the careers to find. I just don’t think she’d survive in hand to hand combat. Plus, if she ever found him, I think Thresh would help her even though it wouldn’t help him.

Seeder and Chaff, I can’t be as sure about as I don’t remember as much about them, but I think at least one of them (Chaff, I think) would’ve been from the merchant part of D11. Both being statistically liking, and from his outlook on the games, both before and after he became a victor.

Just read up on him at Hunger Games wiki, and the fact he lost a hand but refused a capitol prosthetic is really very interesting, especially in the farming district. He was so assured that he’d be fine, he’d be taken care of, that he didn’t need one. It was probably an act of rebellion, but goes to show how self assured he was about what the capital would do for him.

Seeder grew up in the seam part to me, given the fact that she never turned to drugs, alcohol (like Chaff did) or any type of escape. She’s mentioned as looking strong despite being 60, and you can’t really achieve that without working hard in childhood and stuff, and continuing to, which I think she would’ve felt was her duty.

Thresh and Reaper also have some interesting similarities, both with their thing (& Katniss’) about owing people. I think D11, and their strict policies, force a sense of community upon the residents that binds them together and helps them trust others both more easily and still more carefully, because of how risky it is if you’re wrong.

If anyone is wondering what Reaper’s thing about owing people is, let me remind you how he apologized to the tributes about having to kill them before the games started (also relating to how strong the residents of D11, or at least the men, interestingly enough, are), and promised to make the capital pay. This was before Jessie spat in his eye btw, so there’s really no excuse for him to be saying other than a strategy or actually meaning it.

Reaper collecting the tributes and lining them up, however, could for sure be attributed to the rabies, but I don’t really know. We’re led to believe it is by Coriolanus because of how unempathetic and unfeeling he is, so of course someone caring is automatically categorized as crazy, and of course that part is used as foreshadow, but it’s still something to think about. How d11 views things and people and companionship.

Dill, however…she’s Dill. She’s tiny. Sickly. Couldn’t tell you much about her, and sometimes I honestly get her confused with Wovey, except Wovey lived longer. Dill was literally the first official death in the games, ofc excluding everyone who died from the bombs and such.

Something curious about Dill is that she’s a snitch, and by that I mean she told a capitol guy Reaper killed a peacekeeper (also, what the hell Reaper? Goes to show just how strong he is and why he considers himself so capable). I think Dill was probably merchant, also she did have tuberculosis, which would’ve been not as rare there.

She also probably knew she was dying no matter what and wanted to get everything out there, which I don’t blame her for.

Woah ok I did not expect to write so much about the tributes. Woah.

Anywho, life in 12 vs 11 is definitely as different as, say, life in 2 vs life in 7. Honestly, 12 would probably be more similar to 2, because of the mining and huts as houses and stuff like that.

In 11, you’re expected to be outside. All the time. Working, working, working. Jobs are assigned, roles specified, it’s very orderly and there’s not much anyone can do about it. Work also starts early, probably as old as 10 due to how experienced Rue was working in the trees. Meanwhile in 12, you can only start mining at 18, which Katniss acknowledges as a weakness.

This is a bit off topic, but the mining age probably started to be an issue after Coriolanus showed up and realized just how much worse he could make the lives of d12 people by raising the mining age (both in the games and money wise)

Back to the original point, In 12? If you’re outside, that’s fine. The peacekeepers love the hunters, and we know some townsfolk venture to the edges of the meadow and the woods to forage as well. Getting your own methods of food is fine, nearly encouraged.

11 is also way more strict, which Suzanne makes clear to us a lot. When Katniss visits 12 and they shoot the old man. Talking with Rue about punishments. Lots of stuff that makes Katniss do a double take and realize maybe she was lucky to grow up in 12 instead. It certainly has more freedom, despite 11 having the same working conditions. Truly, I think 11 would be the worst to grow up in, even though it helps so much with the hunger games.

Love the scene, btw!! It really supports my point about the strictness of D12 and how it forces a sense of community and stuff. It was a nice addition and realistic I think.

Also, the fact Rue knew the boy who was slow and his story about forgetting to put back the night vision glasses is so much more than an introduction to the glasses!! it shows how much the residents know about each other and how well they remember based on what the peacekeepers enforce.

Ok this has got to be one of my longest ramblings to date, but I loved it! I don’t focus as much on the original series as I should when I usually do these, and it was a fun change of pace actually having to go through the wikis instead of just remembering like I do for BOSAS.

Thank you for the question @curiousnonny , and I hope you enjoy my answer as much as I liked writing it! As always feel free to debate (but not argue or insult) with me in the comments as I always love having these combed through and stuff and getting a chance to learn more.

[darl-ingfics]

Jin bts sneezing

Took me a minute to put something together, and I hope you're down for fluff.

Quiet Time

Fandom: BTS

Sickie: Seokjin

Caregiver(s): Namjoon

Word Count: 1,622

Namjoon was used to a hive of activity in the dorm. With seven of them sharing the space, there was always something happening: video game tournaments, anime marathons, spur of the moment games invented on the spot that always involved a lot of excited yelling. The dorm was rarely a quiet space, unless a majority of the members were sleeping, or if Yoongi was writing, (which he rarely did seriously at home, but still, if the thunderbolt of inspiration struck, they had to listen to it.)  

So when the boys had been blessed with a rare Friday afternoon off, Namjoon silently begged the universe for a chance for some quiet. The group already had the weekend free from schedules, so the extra few hours were an unexpected treat. Namjoon loved his members, loved their hysterical shenanigans, and loved being at the very center of much of that chaos. But he also loved his quiet time, his space to recenter and recharge. 

And the universe seemed to have heard him. Jungkook suggested they all go and see a movie, something they hadn’t been able to do in a while, and Jimin and Taehyung had quickly agreed. Yoongi, however, opted to spend a few hours in his studio, finishing up a project so he could have the next two days entirely to himself. This shattered the hope of a group movie, but also softened the blow when Seokjin announced he planned to stay home and sleep off the cold that had held him hostage all week. Hoseok had then announced he would join the moviegoers and take them out of ice cream after, much to the delight of the younger members. Namjoon smiled to himself, watching his hyungs work their magic: Yoongi giving Jin the out to stay home and Hoseok swooping in to distract both the eldest and the maknaes from the disappointment of that choice. It was a maneuver he’d seen the three of them enact time and time again to get one another, (as well as the rest of the members, including Namjoon himself), the break they needed when social pressures called. 

For his part, Namjoon had not verbally committed to any sort of plans, but it had been assumed he was in for the movie. When it was time to leave, however, he made the excuse that he had just gotten to the point of no return in his book while the rest of the members were getting ready, and he had decided to just stay and finish that instead. Besides, he’d argued, someone should stay home just in case Seokjin took a turn for the worse. That swiftly ended any attempts from Jungkook and Jimin to convince him to go out, and Hoseok shepherded them out the door, blowing a kiss back to Namjoon as he closed the door behind him. As their voices faded down the hallway, the dorm fell silent.  

Perfect. 

Namjoon had been reading on the couch ever since. And while he stopped reading when he heard the footsteps in the hallway, Namjoon didn’t look up from his book. He did quickly glance at his watch, noting that it had only been half an hour since the other members had left, marking an hour and a half since they’d gotten home. Meaning Seokjin wouldn’t be too out of it when he rounded that corner from the hallway. 

Namjoon wanted to play this casual; when Jimin so sweetly asked if Jin didn’t want them all to postpone their movie adventure until he was able to go with them, Seokjin had very sternly told them all to go out without him, to enjoy their weekend off and not worry about him. Namjoon had, clearly, not listened to a word of that. 

Sure enough, when Seokjin entered the room, the first thing he saw was Namjoon. Despite his sleepy appearance, (all wrinkled hoodie and pajama pants, hair askew), his eyes immediately narrowed. The impact of his glare was, however, immediately interrupted when he bent to the waist by two uncharacteristically violent sneezes, “H’tschue! HA’schue!”

“Bless you.” 

“What’re you doin’ here?” Seokjin muttered, rubbing at his eyes under his glasses before squinting at Namjoon again, checking he wasn’t just seeing things. 

Namjoon held up his book. “Reading.”

Seokjin shook his head, lips pouting. “No, no.” He cleared his throat, wincing slightly. “You’re supposed to be at the movies. With Kook and the rest.” 

Namjoon shrugged. “I wanted to stay here.”

“I told you not to stay back for me.”

“Who said I did?” Jin simply narrowed his eyes at him, unconvinced. Namjoon’s smile didn’t falter as he patted the couch next to him. Despite the frown still on his face, Seokjin didn’t hesitate to slump into the offered seat, head falling against Namjoon’s shoulder. The leader sighed as his hand tangled in Jin’s hair and the older man instinctively wrapped his arms around his friend’s abdomen. Their movements were practiced, sliding effortlessly into an embrace built on years of carrying each other through the churning sea of life. They sat like that, just taking in each other’s presence, while Namjoon finished his chapter. 

“How are you?” Namjoon asked into the comfortable silence as he slid his book mark between the pages. 

Seokjin shrugged. “I’m tired,” he answered honestly. “It’s been a long week.”

Namjoon scoffed. “You’re telling me. And I wasn’t even sick.” He didn’t need to be looking at Jin to see how dramatically he rolled his eyes. 

“You’re all acting like I have the plague,” he griped. “I’m literally fine. They call it the common cold for a reason.”

“I vividly remember you saying otherwise to Tae last month. Something about how ‘just because it’s common doesn’t mean it’s not a big deal.’”

That earned him a not-so-gentle jab in the side. Namjoon squawked in shock more than pain, quickly dissolving into laughter. “First of all, rude. Second, that was entirely different. Taehyung was much sicker than I am now, and we were filming outside, in a rainstorm.”

Namjoon chuckled again. “How was the nap?”

“I’ve barely slept.”

“Are you serious?!” Namjoon lurched away, turning his body so he was facing Seokjin instead. The older man frowned at the loss of contact. “Why not?” When he opened his mouth to reply, Jin immediately held up a finger before burying his face in his sleeve and sneezing three times. “Okay, so that.”

“Yeah, that.” He sniffled, coughing before dropping his arm back to his side. He sighed, shoulders caving forward. “But also when I lay down, everything in my head just feels like concrete and I can’t breathe and then I start coughing and just… sleep is hard without drugs. And it isn’t doctor recommended I take more of those for another two hours.” He rubbed at the bridge of his nose, pinching the space between his eyes, sniffling again. 

Namjoon pouted, wheels turning in his brain. “Are you comfy here?”

Seokjin craned his neck just enough for their eyes to meet. “Always.”

“Then go to sleep.” It was Jin’s turn to pout at him. Namjoon shrugged his unoccupied shoulder, tossing his book onto the coffee table. “If being vertical like this helps you breathe easier, then use me as your pillow.”

“Joonie, I’m not trapping you on the couch.”

“You’re doing nothing of the sort.” Namjoon grabbed the remote from the side table and clicked on the TV. “I’ve got some shows I’ve been meaning to catch up on. You’re actually doing me a favor.”

As he navigated to said shows, Seokjin considered the offer. Catching a few extra hours of sleep had been one of the goals of their half day, and if the normal methods of ‘lay down, conk out’ wasn’t working, why not sleep here, curled up with his best friend? Truth be told, this position propped up against the couch and Namjoon’s shoulder was the most comfortable he’d found all week. The physical contact was so incredibly soothing; Namjoon had a way of knowing exactly what Seokjin needed, caring for him so expertly. And his eyes were suddenly so very, very heavy…

Seokjin nodded ever so slightly as he pulled his knees up beneath him on the couch, settling deeper against Namjoon. The leader smiled. “Glasses?” Seokjin lifted his head just enough to pull off said glasses, and Namjoon gently took them from him, setting them on the side table. His fingers returned to Jin’s hair, smoothing circles at the nape of his neck. The older man simply closed his eyes, sighing contentedly. Namjoon hit play on his show, and reached for a blanket from the basket under the side table. After rather clumsily draping the blanket across both Seokjin and himself, which was no easy feat with only one had to work with, he settled back against the couch himself. 

Namjoon genuinely thought Seokjin was already asleep when the older man whispered: “Be honest: did you stay back for me?”

Namjoon smiled. “Not entirely. I was worried about you, and didn’t want you to wake up disoriented to an empty house. But I also really wanted to lay on the couch instead of going out. You just gave me a solid defense against Kookie’s puppy eyes. So thanks for that.” 

Seokjin chuckled, the sound vibrating against Namjoon’s own rib cage. His arms wrapped a bit more tightly around the younger man’s waist. “You’re welcome,” he whispered with his final burst of energy before slipping into the peaceful, deep sleep he’d been craving for days. Namjoon’s smile widened in time with his friend’s breathing, still congested but soothing all the same. He turned his attention to the TV, and allowed himself to be totally absorbed in the fictional world unfolding before him.

[grishaverse-chaos]

The Darkling

why I like them: could have been SO GOOD in theory okay? I will never shut up about this because "character who everyone thinks is evil is actually just the victim of a smear campaign and some really bigoted propaganda" is SUCH a good character concept and I wish darkling fans were right about him because it would be so fucking cool and aesthetic

why I don't: he uh. he isn't that. he could have been so fucking iconic and instead he was just a vicious murderer. who grooms teenage girls.

favourite episode/scene: LOVE the bit where alina stabs his hand in s1e8. tbf that's more of a fav alina moment than anything else lmao, let me think... okay fr I love the "fine. make me your villain" scene bc it just really showcases who he is as a character and how he sees himself (hint: those two things are not the same)

favourite season/movie: imo he's better written in s1 of the show than in s2, idk though. and I do love his story in the kos duology lmao

favourite line: that one bit in rule of wolves where he says "everything I have done has been for ravka" because it's so clearly Not True and yet.... he clearly thinks it is.... so where does intent stop and impact begin...... it's deep okay

favourite outfit: purely for shits and giggles I'm going to say his black kefta in s2 where there's bits of gold bc I loveeee people being haunted by those they've wronged and I think alina haunting him really fits into that theme

otp: no thank you! in all honesty he prob could have been Fixed™ if he'd had a genuine relationship at an earlier age but he didn't so I refuse to inflict him on any other character. darkolai is interesting to consider though bc I feel like the ways they see themselves clash so heavily.... it's about self image and it's about villainy and law and justice and power and and and. they would Not be a good relationship but I think they should interact more for the Narrative

brotp: his sister ulla! they'd have such a fun sibling dynamic lmao I think it'd be sweet

headcanon: tbh I don't tend to think about him much beyond the big narrative stuff so I'm struggling to think of something that fits the genre of "headcanon".... but let's humanise him a little! I bet he reads really literary fiction and gets ever-so-slightly pretentious about it lmao

unpopular opinion: is it unpopular to say that despite his original good intentions he's a bit of a dickhead and not as smart as he thinks he is? in some corners of the fandom it totally is but idk

a wish: at this point there's not much more that could be done with his character beyond what's already been set up (him being mercy killed so he's not suffering in the thorn wood for all eternity) so I'm going to say that I hope his stans get better reading comprehension bc dear GOD some of the takes I see (posted in the alina tag btw I'm not deliberately seeking them out) are absolutely horrendous. is that too salty? perhaps. idc though it's my blog and darkling stans are free to block me if they don't like my takes

an oh-god-please-don't-ever-happen: I swear if he goes NEAR alina genya or zoya again I will reach through the fourth wall to kill him myself. only half joking btw I'd be so pissed. imo they've all had the closure they need narratively and for him to seek them out again would be a dick move of the highest degree

5 words to best describe them: used to have good intentions. that might be cheating but idk if I can pick 5 random adjectives lmao

my nickname for them: I call him darkles sometimes (bc it's funny and also I think it'd piss him off if people called him that in-universe) also a lot of less positive nicknames ("that prick", "shithead" etc) but idk if that counts

[2offayyo-kzt]

insane ramblings that makes no sense :

I'm much more afraid of Seanzlo's decanonization than Nandermo's, especially as Nandermo can't be decanonized in my opinion because the relationship between the two characters has a romantic aspect.

It's undeniable, and it defines their relationship, you don't have to be a genius to understand it, and people who don't accept it are in denial.

It's not even a question of interpretation at this point.

The problem is that for seanzlo the statue is much more vague, the relationship between Laszlo and Sean is above all a friendship, a beautiful friendship, such a beautiful friendship that I think transcends and is deeper than that.

I'd even use the word soulmate.

On the other hand, from an objective point of view, all the interactions they had were above all humorous.

So I wonder, what direction did the writers take, did they ruin the possibility of creating one of the most interesting and iconic TV characters ever, just so he could keep his "goofy side character bestie with main character" statue ?

I don't want Sean to be gay just to be gay.

But in my opinion, he could have such a considerable impact, because he wasn't designed to be an out-and-out homosexual character, and his bisexuality wouldn't be played as a joke.

It would be something pure and sincere in the sense that it has developed naturally.

A cliché (a jock and a goth) well executed

If the wwdits writers have not been afraid to make Sean a queer character, he will be one of the best TV characters ever created imo.

Imagine, the complete spectrum of the audience watching wwdits loves Seanie (except for certain morons who don't even deserve to have access to internet)

but imagine, you're a 50-year-old man, let's say a typical redditor fan of the show, who sees Sean admit on screen that even though he loves Charmaine with all his heart, it's undeniable that he also feels something for his best friend. This doesn't make him any less of a man, it doesn't make him any less funny, it makes him complete. For Sean is able to see beyond.

He would be one of the first character with whom men suffering from internalized homophobia could identify.

Sean loves what he loves, he loves a mid movie saga, he loves his wife deeply, but he also loves his best friend !

The best experience, is to watch wwdits with the idea in mind that Sean does have romantic feelings for Laszlo, I find that it makes the 'reading' of the series actually more entertaining.

I wrote all of this after midnight being half asleep, probably makes no sense.

[vyrantium]

requesting ambrosia for that ask game pretty please 🙏

ofc!! also tagging @invinciblerodent because they also requested her ♥

this got quite long, so I'm putting it under a cut. thank you both for asking about her, i adore her so much and being able to talk about her is always so wonderful 💕

Full Name: Just Ambrosia. Her "real" name is Lysarra, but circumstance had led to that name being dropped. In her original campaign, the name change was a conscious choice on her part on her journey to becoming a cleric of Nusemnee. For bg3 though, it was a result of the memory loss! When she woke on the nautiloid she was clutching a holy symbol with "Ambrosia" etched on the back, so she assumed that was her name.

Pronouns: She/her!

Gender and Sexuality: Ambrosia has never really thought about her gender and feels comfortable in her gender. She also has never tried to put a label on her sexuality, and struggles to put it into words. She also believes she can't and shouldn't get close to anyone, given who she is and what she struggles with. She doesn't want to hurt them. She's also never really assumed she'd be lucky enough to be in a relationship, and life has... really not been kind to her. Knowing what I know about her, and her past, I'd pin it as like... demiromantic-bisexual? She definitely has to know someone before she can open up to them romantically, even though she desperately craves that connection.

Ethnicity/Species: I don't have a lot to say here. She's a human, she didn't grow up in one place, and given she's trying to shed her past, there isn't anything she feels a strong connection to.

Birthplace and Birthdate: Ambrosia was born small village named Triel, north east of Elturel, to parents that did not care about her. Before she was sold, they never celebrated her birthday, and the mercenary group she was part of didn't care about any of that either. She doesn't know her exact age, but she'd estimate she's in her late 20s. (I'm going to say her birthday is in 1464, making her 28 at the time of the events of the game.)

Guilty Pleasures: murder drinking an entire bottle of wine on her own. Ambrosia is quite Large so it doesn't hit her quite as hard as it might others, but she still feels bad when she drinks an entire thing herself sometimes.

Phobias: I haven't really thought about this before, but something in my guy tells me Ambrosia is a bit claustrophobic.

What They Would Be Famous For: Ambrosia is delightfully unremarkable in most ways. She doesn't want to be famous, she doesn't like that kind of attention. If she had to be, though, she would hope it wasn't for the murders. Something that would leave a positive impact on the world.

What They Would Get Arrested For: Beating up people who are mean to kids. She might not consciously remember what happened to her as a child, but there's some scrap of it there in her subconscious, and it really shaped who she is. If she sees a child getting mistreated, especially by their parents, it takes a lot for her to keep her cool. She'll do anything and everything to care for that kid and show them their worth. The Arabella situation was hard for her, because she had half her brain thinking about the tragedy of it all, and the other part of her screaming to step in and ruin Kahga's week.

Favorite Movie/Book Genre: Ambrosia grew up poor and then was sold off to a mercenary group, so she doesn't actually know how to read 💔 But if she's listening to stories, she loves a slow-burn romance. Not that she would ever admit it out loud. But her life has been such a mess, just a simple slice of life story of people falling in love despite the circumstances always gets to her.

Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: Fake happy endings, especially if the happy ended was worked for/deserved. To rip it away at the last second is the worst thing you could do to someone, she just hates it. (She does not realize how this relates to her own life.)

Talents and/or Powers: Mechanically, Ambrosia is a War Cleric with proficiency in Intimidation, Persuasion, Medicine, Athletics, and Insight. Despite having no proficiencies in it, Ambrosia is really good with animals, she loves them a lot and they're her lil buds! Original Ambrosia loved dogs, so getting Scratch in this game was just so!! good! she got to live her best life and have a friend!

Why Someone Might Hate Them: Ambrosia is. So stubborn. About even the most trivial things. She has her way of doing things, she has ideas of how things are going to happen, and she doesn't back down. Back in her original campaign this was a huge problem, because she was convinced she could show Strahd the harm he'd done and convince him on the path to be better. That obviously did not go well, but she never gave up.

Why Someone Might Love Them: Ambrosia is so stubborn. She refuses to accept a bad outcome to situations, she works hard to make sure everyone's happy and getting what's best for them. That includes herself, she's very hard on herself about the mistakes she's made and for the things she's done, the people that have died because of her. But it also means she pushes her party members into what's good for them and their well being! And she's always searching for solutions to whatever they might be dealing with, because her friends deserve good things happening to them.

How They Change: This is likely still a work in progress, as I'm only in Act 2 with Ambrosia, but so far she's learned to be a lot kinder with herself when it comes to her urges. She was actually able to open up to her party about what she was dealing with, initially out of necessity because of what happened at camp, but as time went on she realized she could trust them to help her through dark times.

Why You Love Them: Ambrosia was my... second? Third? D&D character ever. She was made for a Curse of Strahd campaign that sadly never finished. It makes me so happy to have her have a place again, and to get a story that has been so satisfying! I've always wanted to see how her story ends, and while a lot of her original plot was dropped (she ran like a redemption paladin, though mechanically a war cleric), she's still very much herself and it's just. So amazing. I'm hoping there's a happy ending option for Urge, because my girl has been through a lot, and I'd like to see her happy.

as a bonus for making it to the end of this post: here is my playlist of all of my ambrosia vibes music! it's all stuff from her old campaign, but most of them still apply. i'm going to make a bg3 version soon ♥

[bigendermaki]

ATSUSHI HEADCANONS!!

Please don’t comment anything negative. I promise you, I couldn’t care less!

1) I think that they’re transmasc non-binary and use they/he pronouns!!! I don’t think that they ever really thought about gender until the agency and then they were like “Oh, that kinda makes sense for me…”.

2) Kyouka often asks if he can go into tiger form cause she finds it nice to lay against him like that! I like to think that she tried to ask for a cat and he had to tell her no and so she went for the next best compromise. Pros of having a tiger roommate I guess!

3) He gets scared easily in general but it’s even worse with horror movies. They themselves find it a tad funny that they could handle a lot in real life but struggle with it when it’s fictional. I like to think this was also found out from a movie date with Aku and Lucy!!

4) Speaking of those other two, I think that they are bi and polyamorous!!! And of course, dating both Akutagawa and Lucy!!!! He has two hands for a reason guys /j

5) He definitely has tried to make a good impression Chuuya. I like to think that Chuuya is kinda like an older brother to Aku and I think they would be trying their hardest to make a good impact on him. I also think Dazai would tease him SOOOO much for that.

6) He 100% has learned flower language and tries to continuously give flowers of love and admiration for his two lovers! I love the thought of him trying so hard to think of which ones to give each of them and feeling bad just in case they don’t like it. (They love it each and everytime)

7) Continuing from that, I think that he has acts of service and quality time as his main love languages!! I think that he would eventually warm up a lot to the idea of physical contact as well, but I feel like all three of them would be relatively awkward when it comes to it. Not in a bad way, just in the cute dorky way of “am I doing it right?” and it’s the simplest thing.

8) I like to think that it was kind of an accident that he confessed to Akutagawa and Lucy. Either he just one day kinda said something like “you’re lucky I love you” or he just kinda blurred out his feelings. Either way, I think both Aku and Lucy would be a bit shocked at first but then kinda just laugh a tad at him.

9) I like to believe that Kyouka also heavily judged Lucy and Akutagawa when they first started dating them. Like, of course she did with Akutagawa, but I like to think that Atsushi would just constantly be apologize for Kyouka always interrogating them both.

10) Atsushi almost always falls asleep when the other two are with him. He just finds it easier to sleep with people he trusts so dearly around.

11) I think Atsushi is half japanese and mexican. Do I have reasoning? Nope. But that is the wonderful things of headcanons!!!

So yeah!!! Those are all I can think about for now, but trust me, i’ll be thinking of more!! And i’ll be working on others too!! I think i’ll go through each organization and such!!! If there’s any that are wanted the most though, I might do those earlier than anything!! Anyways, Thank you so much for reading and have a wonderful day!!!!! <3

[solovelyanddry]

#the noms for best adapted screenplay and ruffalo are bad enough but the costumes literally hurt the storytelling in the ffilm! --- hi, i haven't seen the film, but just from what I've read i think it sounds awful and i can't believe how highly rated it is, even by otherwise intelligent people of my acquaintance (i don't say friend, because if they knew me better they'd never recommend this movie to me). Could you elaborate on what you've mentioned about the costumes? I'd be very interested to know!

I just want to preface this by saying that I've only seen the film once (that was enough) and I may have missed some dialogue or a scene that completely refutes my entire argument below.

If you've seen any stills or clips from the film, you've probably seen some of Bella Baxter's (Emma Stone's character) wardrobe. Everyone else in the film is wearing (to my untrained eye) more or less period fashion, maybe a little heightened.

Bella, on the other hand, has a much more avant-garde style, usually keeping the leg-of-mutton sleeve shape but incorporating strange fabrics and patterns, unique structural flourishes, and shorts and slips which give her an underdressed feel compared to the rest of the cast. This is established from her first appearance and continues throughout the end of the film. If you haven't seen the film, you might assume that these clothes tell you about the character - she stands out from everyone else and she is an independent thinker.

EXCEPT! Nobody in the film comments on her clothing. Not when she wanders out half-dressed into the streets of Lisbon, not when she returns home to London wearing some dress-shorts. Not once. Nobody interacts with her differently because of what she wears. She can basically wear whatever she wants with no social reaction. What she says and does do have consequences (well, kinda - survival sex work in this film is treated as quirky profession one does for a few months so you can afford to go to medical school [as a woman in Victorian-era Paris]), but the visual signifiers of her "otherness" have no impact on the plot. She stands out in a crowd to the audience, but apparently not to anyone in the crowd.

ALSO! These clothes - these very unique pieces that allow Bella to express her unique soul? Did she make them? Did she order them or purchase a variety of garments that she mixes and matches to make new outfits? Nope! They were all bought for her by her father-figure! Until the very end of the film, everything you see her in was something that Willem Dafoe's character had provided her with.

For these reasons, the costuming is actively working against the script. Bella is given clothes that nobody else is wearing, which seems to be an expression of this precocious, supposedly feminist character - except nobody ever seems to notice how peculiarly she is dressed AND all of the clothes were bought for her by a man.

This all fits into the extremely shallow "feminism" or "socialism" of the film (Bella says that she's going to a socialist meeting once, and then ends the movie in her walled-off estate garden, living off her father and husband's money). It's even worse when you read the book and find out that there is a whole epilogue where the "real" person that Bella is based on gives her side of the story and de-fantasizes the whole tale, revealing it to be a misogynist narrative born out of her husband's insecurities about being married to a brilliant woman.

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

I’ve mentioned before on this blog that I have a severe phobia of snakes, but I think it’s been at least some time since it’s come up. It’s not a phobia that interferes with my life every day or anything, but it does impact me more significantly than you’d expect, given that I live in an urban area. Here are some effects of my extreme snake phobia:

- I love hiking and camping and other outdoor activities, and snakes aren’t common around here even out in the woods, but it’s still possible to see one, and that means I cannot do anything like that without snake-based anxiety. I didn’t even realize how high my baseline level of snake-based hiking anxiety was until in 2016 I went hiking in New Zealand, and had been told there were no wild snakes anywhere on the island. I still don’t know for sure if that’s true, I can’t Google it because pictures of snakes will come up in the search results (another little way this affects me – I cannot Google anything related to it), but I chose to believe it. And then, for the only time in my life, I got to go hiking in summer without any fear of seeing a snake, and it felt so glorious and freeing. I enjoy winter hiking, partly because I love snow and I hate heat, but also because it’s the only way I can go out in nature, outside of New Zealand apparently, without that underlying fear.

- I can’t go into toy stores because around any corner could be the rubber snake bin. One time, when I was about twelve, my mother was inside the toy store shopping, and I, as always, was waiting outside the store. My brother thought it would be funny to reach outside the store with a rubber snake in his hand and shove it in my face. I screamed and ran out of the mall, causing too much of a commotion. So that was fun.

After that, if I got into a fight with my brother, he could easily win just by threatening to buy a rubber snake and put it in my bed. For years, if I’d had any kind of fight with him, or even if I’d just gotten it into my head that he might follow through on this prank, I was scared to get into bed and had to get my parents to take off the covers and check it was safe first. All this over a rubber snake. I never thought there was any danger of a real snake being in there. The thought of how terrifying it would be to jump into bed and be confronted by a rubber snake was enough to make me concede a sibling fight.

- On that subject: last year, Taskmaster NZ had a task in which they opened the mailbox and found it was full of rubber snakes. They made fun of Chris Parker for how far he jumped in fear and surprise, but as far as I’m concerned, every contestant underreacted. If I ever opened a mailbox expecting it to just have paper in it, and a bunch of rubber snakes popped out… I genuinely think I’d have punched Paul Williams in the face, not even out of anger but just out of instinct. Whatever my instinctual reaction would have been, it would have been so violent that they’d have to stop filming and scrap the task.

Anyway, the way that one’s affected my life is I now get instinctively anxious whenever I re-watch any task from any season of Taskmaster NZ and I see them open the mailbox. Fuck whoever’s idea that prank was.

- Can’t properly enjoy any TV show or movie where there’s any possibility of seeing a snake, I have to watch it through my fingers and be ready to look away quickly. I watched the entire Australian road trip episodes of The Last Leg with my eyes half shut. I was a huge Harry Potter fan as a kid (different time, it was a different time), I read the books over and over but used to hold them by the very edges because I got scared to even put my finger on the word “snake” while I was reading, and the word was written so often. When the movies came out, I saw them all in theatres pretty much closed my eyes every time a new scene started, until I’d heard the first few words and could be sure there was no snake on screen. When they came out on DVD, I watched them with my parents and we wrote down the timestamps for each snake appearance, so that I could re-watch them on my own and know when to close my eyes.

For some reason, if I tell someone who didn’t already know that I have a phobia of snakes, two questions they frequently ask are “Have you seen Anacondas?” and “Have you seen Snakes on a Plane?” And… no. Obviously not. It’s weird that people ask that so much, because obviously not. Though I did used to appreciate that the Snakes on a Plane advertisements started with the words “SNAKES” in gigantic letters across a black screen. That’s nice. I wish everything would put the word “SNAKES” in gigantic letters across a black screen before actually putting any snakes on screen, as a warning. Would make my life much easier.

- Science class fucking sucked when I was in school. Do you know how many different types of studies can involve showing us pictures of snakes? Obviously, units on animals that we did when I was young. I still recall a video they showed us during a unit on the rainforest in grade eight that had a snake suddenly appear and I didn’t close my eyes in time so I saw it and that thing still turns up in my nightmares sometimes. Biology textbooks manage to get pictures of snakes in there in so many ways.

In university, I studied psychology, and my intro course had a unit on phobias. That unit listed the most common phobia, one of which was snakes, and it illustrated this with a picture of a snake. Apparently it did not occur to that author that since this is such a common phobia, maybe some people taking the course will have that phobia, and won’t want that picture in their textbook. I spent the first few weeks of the semester afraid to open my textbook, I had to open it very carefully and just look at the page numbers in the corner until I found the page I wanted, to avoid accidentally opening it to the page with the snake. After a few weeks, I got my friend to put duct tape over the picture so I could open my textbook without worrying.

And it’s still happening. Just a few months ago I had to renew my first aid certification, and the course had a bit about how to treat snake bites, I didn’t close my eyes before they put up the slide with a picture of snake on it. I gasped extremely loudly and instinctively hid my head in my lap. The class stopped, and when I managed to look up, I saw all the students and the instructor staring at me. I had to explain that I have a phobia, the instructor was very kind about it and took the slide down, but still, not a great thing to have happen when you’re 32 years old.

On the subject of snakes turning up in vaguely educational things, do you know how many letters of the alphabet have a type of snake that starts with that letter? Quite a few of them, it turns out. I learned that from QI, with each season having an episode on “[that season’s letter]-animals”. Have to watch those episodes ready to close my eyes every time they start a new topic.

- I’ve gotten pretty fucking good, over the years, at detecting the warning signs that a snake is about to appear on a screen, and closing my eyes or looking away. Looking away or blocking my view, if possible, tends to be better than closing my eyes. Because if I close my eyes while I know a snake is on the screen, I just see snakes in my head anyway.

And that’s the problem. I’ve gotten so good at this because when I fail to look away in time, which I sometimes do, it causes big problems. I see it every time I close my eyes for a while. I can’t sleep that night, or normally for a few nights after that, because I see the snake. And when I do manage to fall asleep, I have nightmares about it.

This was worse when I was younger. As a kid, I used to get into bed and then have panic attacks in which I’d become convinced my bed was full of snakes. So I’d get out of bed and lie on my bedroom floor, but then I’d still be convinced there was snakes underneath me, so I’d get up and pace back and forth to avoid them. Sometimes I’d be up all night pacing, cry because I was so tired but not be able to get in bed, and go to school on no sleep. That hasn’t happened to me in a long time, but I have had nights where I’ve gotten into bed, felt like there were snakes in there, freaked out, and had to get out of bed and do something else until I’m sufficiently distracted.

Every time I see an image of a snake, it gets added to the repertoire of what I see when I close my eyes with snakes in my mind. Which means vigilance about avoiding seeing them on TV really is worth it, not just to avoid short-term nightmares, but to avoid adding to the long-term repertoire. Like I said, I can still see the one from the rainforest movie in grade eight.

- One of the worst times it’s affected me was only a couple of years ago, at my grandparents’ place. My grandparents have this place in rural Nova Scotia, on Canada’s East Coast, and it’s my favourite place in the entire world. They’re right next to the ocean on one side and a forest on another, I’ve been going there once or twice a year for my whole life, it’s incredibly beautiful. A couple of years ago, I saw a snake while heading down their driveway with the bike I ride out there. They’re out in the country and don’t have many neighbours, but they do have some neighbours, enough to hear the screaming. I threw the bike at it, damaging the bike, before running into the house. I was panicking for about an hour, and then too afraid to leave their house for a couple of days. Once I did start leaving their house, I started getting to the ocean via their yard, I couldn’t go on their driveway anymore. I tried to go up in the forest one time, looked around, saw that everything on the ground looked like a snake, panicked and went back inside. I love that forest, and couldn’t go in there anymore. I love that whole place, and had become unable to be there without anxiety.

So at that point I decided this was getting serious enough so I should actually do something about it. Which you’d think I’d have done earlier, but the cure for phobias is exposure therapy, that’s always sounded painful enough so I’ve avoided it. That incident at my grandparents’ place made me read a bunch of books on exposure therapy, and then start doing some very low levels of it (I started by looking at pictures of very non-realistic and friendly-looking cartoon snakes, which was still tough), I think it was starting to get a bit better, and then some other things in my personal life went to hell, I had a bit of a breakdown, and decided I could not deal with that while also subjecting myself to snake images at the same time. Exposure therapy, as far as I can tell, does work. But only if you’re willing to submit to a lot of torment in the short term. I know I should go back to it at some point.

The second most common question I get when I tell people I’m scared of snakes, after “Have you seen [insert snake-based movie that I’ve not fucking seen]?”, is “Why?” So to answer that, I don’t know. I’m aware that it’s irrational, that any snake I’d have any chance of encountering in the wild in Canada could not harm me. I’ve been told that they’re more scared of me than I am of them, which I think is unlikely, but I know it’s a close call.

I didn’t have any traumatic encounter with snakes as a kid or anything. Our best guess as to what happens is my mother says when I was about three years old, she heard me screaming in the middle of the night. She said it terrified her, the screaming was so bad that she was convinced her young child had been seriously injured. She came into my bedroom and found that I’d rolled my blanket into a cylinder, and had my arms wrapped around it. She woke me up and I continued screaming, telling her there was a snake in my bed. She turned on the light and pulled all the sheets and blankets off my bed, even pulled off the fitted sheet and mattress cover, to show me there was nothing there. But I kept screaming and crying that there was a snake in my bed. I refused to get back in bed and she finally let me sleep in her bed for the night. She says she doesn’t remember me expressing a fear of snakes before that, so either it developed because of that nightmare, or it was already there and that’s just the first time it came up. But she thinks the dream was caused by my blanket being rolled up into the shape of a snake. Which means it’s possible that I was fucked up for life because one time when I was three years old I got my blanket tangled into the wrong shape.

I say all this to try to explain how much I mean when I say I don't like snakes. Because just the words "I'm scared of snakes", or even the word "phobia", doesn't seem to quite convey the gravity of the situation. Now that I’ve conveyed a bit of that gravity, I would like to say I really enjoyed that Bob’s Burger’s episode, when I first saw it years ago, that features Gene being terrified of snakes. It ends with Gene singing a song about how scared he is of snakes, which I found hilarious.

I’d forgotten about that song, hadn’t thought of it in years, until today, when I watched a documentary about Eugene Mirman, the American comedian who’s Gene’s voice actor on Bob’s Burgers. The documentary ends with Eugene Mirman singing that song, along with a bunch of other comedians, including Daniel Kitson. The fact that I'd heard Kitson was involved is the main reason I watched it (the whole documentary, that is, not just the song), but it ended up being a fascinating and moving documentary that I’d have enjoyed even if he hadn’t been there, I’m really glad I watched it and recommend it to anyone who wants to see what the coolest comedians in New York were doing between 2008 and 2018. It's called It Started as a Joke.

I'm glad I watched it for a lot of reasons, it was a great (though very sad, at times) story with some really interesting footage. But this song at the end was a total surprise, and so much fucking fun. Absolutely excellent. I think I might have to set the audio from this as my new alarm to wake me up in the mornings.

I am, by the way, fine with spiders. The only non-snake animals that scare me at all are if a lizard or alligator or other reptile looks too much like a snake. Where are their arms and legs? It's not okay.