#anyway cabeswater's magicians everyone

[kindnessinsilver]

Just a fun little Pynch sketch

[whoslaurapalmer]

finished rereading the raven cycle and you know how last year i said i could be pickier about the raven king but didn’t want to? this year i did want to! 

-i mean, i love the raven cycle. interesting magic, very comfy, would sell my soul for the gangsey.  -but most of this post is gonna be me complaining about the raven king  -the tl;dr of it all is ‘the pacing of the raven king is too fast and too slow at the same time. it’s not that i think it was terrible, but i don’t think it was written as successfully as the previous books. i think, because the pacing of the book is so uneven, that the balance between events, and perhaps the balance between the magic and the characters own inherent internal coming of age power, is off. oh btw i am considering reading call down the hawk but Have Concerns’ 

-noticed the ‘blue is calling gansey from the phone/sewing/cat room and gansey is calling blue from the bathroom-kitchen-laundry’ parallel which i thought was very, very cute. that has my whole heart  -also noticed a lot more of gansey’s whole person just constantly thinking about (or not-thinking about) his death  -BUT THEN THE PROLOGUE TO THE RAVEN KING SMACKED ME IN THE FACE AGAIN HOW COULD I FORGET THAT GANSEY LIKE. LITERALLY KNOWS HE’S GONNA DIE AND THE RAVEN KING IS HIM TRYING MAKE SURE EVERYONE WILL BE OKAY AFTER HE’S DEAD -I CANNOT HANDLE RICHARD CAMPBELL GANSEY THE THIRD MY GOD THIS BOY 

-canNOT overstate how much i really do love gwenllian.  -i love her so much. i love her so much  -same with malory. still love him. 

-okay i guess i appreciated artemus a little more -i think my thing is like. do i have a problem with blue being part tree? no not necessarily. but the pacing in the raven king is so uneven that i think what i dislike is how the reveal happened  -no i don’t know what i’d do differently!!  -every time i disagree with a writing choice in a book i try and think ‘now lulu, as someone with a Literal Degree In Putting Words Together, what would you do differently?’ which is a REALLY good writing exercise but mostly just ends up with me going ‘uhhhh. idk. probably have to backtrack a couple plot points and restart from there. no i will not elaborate.’

-last time i thought the raven king moved too fast and this time i agree but also thought it moved too slow?? -i devoured the first three books every time and then both times i read the raven king i kept putting it down because i thought the pacing was so off, so i was simultaneously interested and not interested in what was going on -too fast re: there were A LOT of characters going on, laumonier and piper and henry and neeve and plot points were just piling up and more like slamming together than converging (piper being laumonier’s daughter and henry’s mother being seondeok especially feel less like pieces falling into place than, oh look! ~a thing!!~), ALSO GOD NOAH NEEDED TO SHOW UP MORE (just like. a smidge more noah. would’ve put a lot together), and the speed of finding glendower/driving back/gansey dying/the epilogue -too slow re: somehow so many things are happening but nothing is happening in some parts, some parts dragged, people are just moving around with no real direct sense of working towards the end, blue and gansey were at lunch while adam and ronan were in cabeswater that one time?????????????  (-not that they can’t get lunch. but they had time to get lunch???????)  -oh i think the four of them maybe felt the most disjointed as a group in this book, which is again not necessarily terrible, but a thing  -and these things are just so disappointing because i thought the pacing of the first three books was so GOOD!! things take their time to happen but HAPPEN and i love that so much!!!!  -i do feel bad criticizing the raven king bc i know maggiestief was going through health problems at the time and it took longer than she wanted to finish. but i am still criticizing it because it’s still a very unsatisfying ending 

-reading this time i felt EVEN MORE FIRMLY that gansey should’ve been glendower, and even went so far as to consider, is the text saying he’s glendower, it’s just not explicitly stated?? because of all the parallels??? of gansey being old and young at the same time, gansey + his own magicians, the parallel between glendower shoving that guy in a tree and gansey wanting to do the same to ronan over the pig, the timelessness of the things gansey loves, the Power of command in his voice, a resurrection in the first place  -and i was going to just say, yeah, it’s there, until i got to noah’s chapter again. -i think noah deserved at least one chapter per book (and maybe more during the raven king) and that would’ve made an already tight plot even tighter, especially in the raven king.  (-i was also thinking that if gansey was glendower then something else would’ve happened when they found him, no i still do not know what) 

-big respect though to maggiestief saying glendower had to either be dead or evil and by that page number there wasn’t enough room for him to be evil -and big respect to the fact that, of course it’s not about teens finding a hero, it’s about teens becoming heroes (these thoughts also pulled from her twitter reread), finding glendower (alive) would never have been narratively good or satisfying  (-especially because it makes sense that glendower was dead all along -- if gwenllian was put to sleep wrong, who’s to say that glendower wasn’t, too?) -BUT, IT ALSO MAKES SENSE IF IT’S GANSEY  -but then you have like. the whole time it wasn’t even glendower. it was noah  -which is why i wanted more noah!!! to better lead to that!!!!!!! cause i feel like that kinda comes out of nowhere!!!!!  -the balance of the magical and the real is just off in the reveal i think  -man i don’t know. this is a lot of words. 

-i also appreciated adam’s character arc better this time, which was really nice. -but i still feel no great attachment to ronan and adam’s relationship  

-you know what. i want more mr. gray and maura -idk if i agree with him leaving henrietta. much like the previous paragraphs and my whole gripe with the raven king, it’s not terrible but i don’t think it’s done well, as well as it could’ve been, as well as the previous books  -also! more adam and persephone would’ve been good 

-i was rereading maggiestief’s tweets where she reread the books and i forget which thread this was in but she picked out one of the ‘character x says something that makes character y reevaluate every single interaction previously’ lines and she was like ‘that’s all these books are’ and i was like ‘YEAH MAGGIE. I FEEL LIKE I SEE THIS LINE EVERY SINGLE SECOND.’ and not necessarily in a good way  -sometimes you can reuse a line and it is a parallel or a connection. sometimes you are just reusing a line over and over. 

-she also mentions writing arguments from a point of, both characters are right, or think they’re right, or as right as they can be or something to that effect  -which i really like, and i absolutely 100% see in her writing  -and so i don’t know if this is just a me thing, because i have this obsessive need to backtrack through even the tiniest disagreements after the fact to calmly figure out where i’m coming from and acknowledge where the other person’s coming from, so while i like that every character comes from a place of ‘i’m right’ i feel like it leads to a lot of arguments left unresolved  -but i think that’s just me feeling like everybody should always talk everything out as much as possible so  -and like resolution doesn’t have to be a big dialogue acknowledgement  -but i still didn’t feel like it left a lot of room for these characters to really work towards change -they do change! but i wanted to see it more 

-oh hey so. did gansey successfully sell of monmouth? did ronan get a diploma anyway? 

-me: ‘thing’ is ultimately a vague, unspecific word and should be used sparingly in a narration, much like ‘interesting’  maggiestief: /flinging out ‘thing’ all the time me: you know what, though???? sure, good for her 

-i like henry. but he’s written terribly, the poor guy comes OUT OF NOWHERE too and should’ve shown up earlier more than his two times in blue lily lily blue, and adam and ronan’s super casual racism towards him is like..................................................................mostly unchallenged and really unnecessary  -if a racist comment is going to remain unchecked and unchallenged by the narrative and the characters, what does it accomplish? -especially because it never ever shows up again or showed up before -and gansey just kind of scoffs it aside and blue doesn’t even really truly call it out which is like, the amount of other things gansey will call out???? the amount of stuff blue will call out??????? AND THEY JUST LET THAT GO?????? -so, again! it’s not necessary!! it does nothing!!! it just adds unchallenged racism that has no place!!!!!!!!!!!!

-also reading this time i felt like maggiestief went out of her way to just not say what race blue was  -that shouldn’t be a thing you just repeatedly dance around and never confirm for your main character 

-so my library still does not have the ebook for call down the hawk but i am vaguely considering buying it to read it but also....................i don’t know -i did read the first eight chapters because they were online and i’m like. Intrigued but also?????? Concerned. idk. idk

-looking at it from a distance i have the same concern with it that i do with king of scars.  -do i think dreamer trilogy is necessary in the way that it explores things that are set up in the raven cycle and have big potential consequences? yes. the hunt for the ‘greywaren’, kavinsky proving that there are other dreamers, trying to make sure a dreamed thing can still exist if something happens to the dreamer, the possibilities and limits of dreamers, ronan trying to dream another cabeswater, ronan’s fear about what’s real and what isn’t/what he dreamed and what he didn’t dream, and maggiestief clearly loving writing ronan and wanting to write more of him -do i think those things are executed well in the dreamer trilogy? from what i’ve read about it, maybe not????  -especially re: ronan and adam’s character arcs????? -which i feel like, stupid and bitchy being picky about. -change and recovery do not happen in straight lines. but i think this kind of cycles back to the way she writes arguments with like, is it too unresolved to the point that no change, either positive or negative, is happening?  -ugggg also makes me worry that i just wasn’t Reading it enough or thinking about it enough  -my additional concern is that maggiestief should’ve maybe had firmer rules for what can and can’t be taken out of a dream  (-yes i suppose that limiting the very nature of a dream goes against the power of ‘the dream’ so it makes sense for it to be limitless BUT i feel like especially the dreaming of people is gonna paint you into a corner if you’re not careful)  -but i am also BIG worried re: the character arcs.  -also where ronan’s character arc is after the raven king, do i think he would do the reveal in mr. impossible?? i...........do not know  -well i didn’t think so AND THEN I READ OPAL which i kind of enjoyed, with reservations, which is mostly back to ‘is no change happening’  (-i love that opal is like, ‘ronan’s inner child’ or whatever it was and i liked her more this time around but last year when i read the raven cycle i was like ‘but what’s the point of taking opal out cause they just kind of shuffle her around?’ now, what was the point of taking opal out if they’re gonna put her back??? and actually almost COMPLETELY IGNORE HER in the short story????? there was so much potential there for her and ronan and it didn’t happen...........) -nightwash kinda just happened too, huh.  (-in general ronan bringing his nightmares back with him is like. God Perfect) -but this all really takes me back to maybe there should’ve been limits on dreaming -also after reading the first eight chapters, i’m like -i 100% respect maggiestief for not wanting to rewrite the raven cycle and not wanting to just write about henrietta, i absolutely do -but it feels so strange to read about ronan and adam and not read about gansey and blue as well?  -which isn’t TERRIBLE, but.  -but when i see like, single lines from or little sections i’m like ‘oh that looks like a good time’ because i do like the way maggiestief writes because a great deal of it is so rhythmically poetic and beautiful, but so is a great deal of the raven king while still being disappointing.  -i feel like i’m just gonna feel about it like how i feel about the raven king honestly -and well king of scars.......

-ANYWAY -might read it. might not. still going back and forth on this a lot. i was leaning towards, i’m gonna do it, but now i’m leaning more towards, i don’t want to, i want to keep the image of these characters where i like them, and right now i am aggressively combing through fanfic because i care a great deal about post-raven king trauma discussion and that’s mostly what i want at the current time

[bookish-mind]

I read the dream thieves, buckle up this one is a train wreck:

*spoilers*

RONAN POV RONAN POV RONAN POV

WHAT IS HIS SECOND SECRET THAT HE CANT ADMIT TO HIMSELF

Is it that he’s, y’know.. is he gonna have an oh moment..?

Also, he’s a FARM BOYYY WHAT

“Ronan Lynch, keeper of secrets, fighter of men, devil of a boy” my god this Ronan content is >>

Blue saying Adam is kinda an outsider now.. wow that shit hurts

“In that moment Blue was a little in love with all of them” ME TOO BLUE ME TOO

Wait wait wait isn’t ronan the greywaren ?? Whatever that means ?? Anyway, the gray man can fuck off

Gansey: am I in your dreams ?

Ronan: *loses his mind for a minute*

Me: hmm that’s not a very heterosexual response my friend

Tf since when is the Camaro ‘red-orange’ ? it was just ‘orange’ before (yes this is important)

What is this with kavinsky and ronan 👀

Why can’t blue just tell Adam that she can’t kiss anyone oml

“Fix me” *sigh* my boy Adam is rlly goin thru it

ADJKSGSJKFG NOAH AND THE GLITTER MY PRECIOUS BOY

“If Adam was stupid about his pride, Gansey was stupid about Adam” ...no thoughts.. only adansey..

Noah knows Ronan’s secret and I think I do too

Ronan threw Noah out the window I- 😂💀💀

“I’m losing him to Cabeswater” WELL U BETTER GET YOUR BOY BACK GANSEY

Cabeswater isn’t a place it’s a state of mind

Broooo waaaiittt did kavinsky dream Ronan’s bracelets ?

Matthew lynch has been in one (1) scene and I’d already die for him

Adam is not a train wreck ! (well maybe a little, but you don’t need to tell him that)

For the love of- Maura pls stop flirting with the gray man

PLS THE WAY ADAM AND GANSEY BECAME FRIENDS IS SO PURE

Adam chapters have no mercy I just be sitting here like 😩

CABESWATER IS GONE WHY DO I FEEL LIKE CRYING

That dream about Adam- And then the nightmare creature following Ronan out of the dream- And gansey realizing that ronan never tried to kill himself- And the two of them killing the nightmare- We don’t have time to unpack all that

Noah and Ronan are a certified brotp,, I love their shenanigans

LOL blue seeing gansey in jeans and a tshirt for the first time has the same energy as Simon snow seeing baz pitch in jeans for the first time

“Poverty Twins” I-

My name is ronan lynch I like fast cars, adrenaline, the taste of gasoline, talking with my fists, and holding little baby field mice up to my cheek to feel their little baby heartbeats

Real friends are the ones who will bury a body with u 🥰

CABESWATER ISN’T A STATE OF MIND IT’S A DREAM

Noooo ! Don’t u dare touch the miniature Henrietta ! Anything but that !

You’d think gansey would’ve bought some sort of security system or something smh

There’s like 50 types of tension in this boat rn

Gansey is absolutely smitten with blue

Oh god Noah reenacts his death.. is that really necessary

Omfg they’re at the fairgrounds,, Gansey boyyy who are you ??

Ronan chapters are actually so poetic I love it

Gansey and Adam are gonna be in DC for like two days and everyone is acting like it’s the end of the world.. the separation anxiety is real

Ronan’s dream.. about Adam and kavinsky.. I-

This blue and Noah bonding time was so heartwarming and then it turned depressing real fast I was so not prepared to be sobbing over a Noah/Blue kiss

Holy shit Ronan almost died and the camaro is fucked,, he’s gonna dream a new one isn’t he?

Oh dear, must my boys fight?? My adansey heart aches

A d a m i s m i s s i n g

Gansey said “dream me the world” and then Ronan rlly learned how to dream the world

The gray man be like “yeah I kill ppl but I draw the line at kidnapping” tf??

“I am unknowable” absolutely broke me

WAIT Adam just pulled The Magician card and I realized that the tarot symbols correspond to each of them: coin = gansey, cup = blue, sword = Ronan, wand = Adam !! tell me I’m wrong

Ronan tells kavinsky “it was never gonna be you and me” Blue tells Adam “it’s not gonna be you” Adam tells himself “it was just going to be him and cabeswater” idk man these parallels just made me feel somethn

“Who has he ever had to love him? Ever?” You gansey, Adam has you and blue and Ronan and Noah. maybe instead of going on a forbidden romantic night drive with blue you could go make sure your best friend knows that he is loved

holy shit did- did kavinsky rlly kill proko and then dream another one into existence ??

“You didn’t say you don’t swing that way” “No, I didn’t” ronaaan finalllly I’m so prouuud

That’s it Persephone and Adam are my favorite power duo

Nevermind the greywaren and the magician are my favorite power duo

“Dying’s a boring side effect” damn kavinsky’s death hit me harder than I would’ve expected

The way the epilogue mirrors the prologue has me feeling so many things,, full circle

Ronan being unafraid, no longer hating himself, knowing who he is, knowing what he is, no longer feeling alone, taking control of his nightmares by coming to terms with the parts of himself he couldn’t face, laughing and smiling and dreaming the world and waking his mother and hugging his brother and going home. I cannot express how much this beautiful Ronan arc means to me, let me go cryyy

“Ronan’s second secret was Adam Parrish” I SCREAMED

Give me pynch I’m so ready

(this post got very long and there’s still so much more I could’ve said, thanks for reading my ramblings if you made it this far! Lemme know if you want one for book 3)

[abarbaricyalp]

You Are Artwork (I could admire you forever)

Flower Shop/ Tattoo AU/Coffee Shop AU 

Pynch, Rated: T, No archive warnings apply

@pynchpromptweek

AO3 Link

“Okay, lemme see your deck again,” Ronan said, slamming the BMW door behind him and hopping onto the concrete walkway in front of the the strip center. Adam followed him, lazy and easy and happy, and spread his deck over the warm hood of the car. “No, face up,” Ronan ordered, and Adam scooped them back up and flipped them over.

“This defeats the purpose of drawing a card,” Adam said drily, leaning into Ronan’s side as Ronan reached out to pluck the Magician from where it was stuffed between the Emperor and the Lovers. He tapped the edge of the card against the hood and held it up for Adam to look at. “I know what it looks like,” he assured with a half grin. “I know it’s your favorite.” He gathered the cards up again and Ronan finally handed over the card. Adam placed it back to back with the deck and a thrum of energy ran up his arm pleasantly before he replaced the deck in his back pocket.

“You’re gonna look so hot, babe,” Ronan said, walking on Adam’s good side, which meant he was between Adam and the buildings, which meant he kept Adam from detouring into his favorite tarot shop.

“I’m so nervous I think I’m gonna vomit,” Adam answered.

“Hope you’re not getting it on your stomach, then.”

Adam didn’t answer and he felt Ronan’s eyes flicker over to him but he still didn’t say anything.

“Anyway, you better not get one on your stomach. I may break up with you.”

“It’d be awful of you to essentially brand me and then leave me on our anniversary,” Adam finally said, rolling his eyes. 

“Letting you choose your own tattoo and shit isn’t the same as branding you. It’s not my fault if you wanna put my face on your body. Can’t blame you, but it’s not my fault.”

Adam snorted and elbowed Ronan’s ribs before they came up on the new tattoo shop. Adam had liked the feel of it as soon as he’d gone in out of curiosity when it opened and one of the artists had worked with the guy who’d done Ronan’s tattoo. They’d watched it for a while and Ronan got too invested in everyone who worked there and the art was good and a late night bad idea had turned into anniversary gifts. If it could be considered a gift when they were each paying for their own.

The only catch was, they’d been working on it for three weeks and hadn’t told each other anything about their tattoos. Adam definitely worried about his own tattoo but he couldn’t begin to imagine what Ronan was planning to add to his sprawling masterpiece. He was so fond of it the way it was, that the thought of it changing made his heart ache.

When their respective artists came out, Adam found his fingers clenching around Ronan’s in a moment of childish selfishness and fear. The artist Adam had been working with--Mae--smiled gently. “You know, you could always just sit with each other,” she suggested. “I have my next slot open too. I could wait.”

“Get fucked,” Ronan said and Adam pretended like he didn’t notice all the bravado in his voice as they shook their hands apart. “We said we were doing it this way. We’re doing it this way.”

“He just doesn’t want anyone to talk him out of his tatt,” Ronan’s artist said. “It’s pretty out there.”

“If you make my boyfriend puke, I’ll kick your ass,” Ronan warned.

“If Devon gave his blessing, how bad can it be?” Mae said, for Adam’s benefit. When the guy who’d done Ronan’s original tattoo had given his own for this guy to do the addition, half of Adam’s worries had disappeared. Well, until this afternoon when they’d piled into the car and it all became much more real.

Adam took a deep breath and his worries were side tracked as Ronan reached over to muss his hair roughly and then grinned at him. “Catch you later, handsome.”

“Only if you’re lucky,” Adam responded with his own grin. They knocked their fists together and Adam followed Mae back to her work space.

“Alright, Adam, you can leave your jeans over there. Didn’t I tell you to wear sweats?” she asked as she prepared her space.

“Yeah, but it would’ve given it away,” Adam said with a shrug. “I told you, I can handle pain and irritation. We’re not that far from y’all anyway. I’ll change when I get home.”

Mae hummed and tossed Adam what looked like a sock. “Put it on now,” she suggested. “We’re gonna have to get pretty far down your groin and I don’t want you fumbling with it while there’s ink on you.”

Adam stared at it for a second and felt a jolt of regret. But he shook it off and reached into his boxers to fit the not-sock over his length. It was awkward and heavy but welcome. He wanted to be the cool suave guy who didn’t care what people saw, but he was decidedly not that guy and he really liked Mae, so keeping her sanity intact was important to him too.

He hopped up on the chair when Mae motioned for him to and pushed his boxers down as far as he was willing to. “I’m gonna shave you first,” Mae explained, not for the first time. “And then sterilize the area. No need to jump yet.”

And, really, by the time it was all said and done, the pain was no more than he was used to. Just a bit sharper and longer laster. Some spots hurt worse than others, but he’d been prepared for that. Mae had really, really, really tried to talk him out of his placement for a first tattoo, but it was the only one he was getting and it meant something and he wanted it where he wanted it. Which, he guessed, Mae understood because she didn’t argue with him again after that.

She did snigger when he didn’t bother trying to button his jeans though, which he defended with an exasperated, “How was I supposed to know?!” and wave of his arm, to which she responded by handing over an aftercare book and sending him back to Ronan’s waiting arms in the parlor.

They lasted eighteen hours before they were pulling each other’s clothes off under the guise of helping put cream and ointments and new bandages on. Adam found the mess of bandages on Ronan’s side, just below his ribs, wrapping around his waist. When he uncovered it, he found more black ink in bold strokes, like the rest of his tattoo. At first, Adam thought there was only more vines, intricate roots continuing from the tree, but once his eyes adjusted, he realized it was a man--a magician.

“Is this my card?” he asked, ghosting his fingers featherlight over the tattoo.

Ronan still sucked in a soft breath, though it was up for debate if he was in pain or if it was the normal way he gasped any time Adam was near him. “Yeah, it’s your Magician,” he said. “My magician.”

Adam was wrong, it wasn’t just black. There were faint green lines, so immediately different from the rest of the tattoo that Adam couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed it. They made vines tumbling out of the Magician’s hands, pooling around his feet and sneaking into the rest of the tattoo.

When Adam traced them, Ronan said, “Because you’re interwoven with me. All of me.”

“Not going anywhere,” Adam promised, leaning up to kiss Ronan.

Ronan found Adam’s bandages when his hands went to Adam’s hips and he barely paused before hoisting Adam up to carry him towards the bed and dump him backwards onto it, much to Adam’s fond delight. Ronan crawled over his thighs and leaned down to kiss his way down Adam’s chest to his stomach as his hands gently pulled at the sweats he’d been living in.

Ronan’s mouth suddenly leaving the flushed skin of Adam’s lower abdomen had the man keening in response, legs pushing against the cool sheets of their bed helplessly. “Ro,” he whined and turned his face towards his arm, fingers tightening in his own hair. 

“Jesus motherfucking Christ, Parrish,” Ronan breathed, fingers brushing the clean edges of Adam’s hips, away from his tattoo.

Adam lifted his head lazily, gazing down at the span of his body. The critical gaze he’d cultivated as a lonely teenager had been washed away years ago by a habit of looking at his body the way Ronan might be seeing it. Right now, it looked like familiar tan skin, cuts of muscle, scars that he was beginning to look over without pausing. Then, at his hips, a bouquet of color.

Bouquet was the proper term too. Blooming over his hip bones and continuing down his adonis lines were stalks of lavender, bushels of baby’s breath, and rich green vines with thick ivy leaves. Even through the bruising, the colors were exactly how he wanted them to be.

"When I gave myself over to Cabeswater, my nightmares got worse. But Cabeswater was always there to soothe the tension almost immediately. I'd get wrapped up in the forest and always the first thing it held were my hips, to keep me still, I guess. And my hips are always the first thing you grab too, whether it's falling in bed or being jolted awake in the middle of the night. So I wanted to remember that. Even when I'm waking up alone, I have magic. I have you."

Ronan’s thumb glanced over one side of the tattoo and he let out a shaky breath, hungry eyes flicking between the tattoo and Adam’s face.

“You really know a thing or two about product placement, huh?” he asked and Adam laughed breathlessly, throwing his arm over his eyes.

“Just kiss me, asshole.”

And Ronan did.

[sophygurl]

Adam/Gray parallels

One of the (many) things that I love about The Raven Cycle is how rich it is in character parallels. I have ideas going for parallels between Gansey and just about everyone; Blue with Maura, Calla, Ronan, Adam, and Gwen; Adam with Ronan and Persephone; Ronan with Kavinsky, Calla, Gray, and his father and brothers, Gray and Greenmantle, and more.

But I’m gonna start with Adam and Gray. Partially because it intrigues me the most, and partially because I did tell @sparkly-things I’d do a Gray-focused post months ago. (Also more Fox Way/Maura stuff. I swear I have so many things to say about this damned series I will never run out)

Okay, so Adam and Gray have a lot in common both on some obvious surfacey levels, but also some more hidden in-depth ones.

We can start with the big obvious one. They both come from dysfunctional families in which violence was inflicted on them regularly. 

With Adam, his father fills the classic abusive parent role. Adam has memories going back to early childhood of his father saying vile things about him when he didn’t even know he was listening, but Robert also regularly yelled at and beat Adam. Adam was made to feel worthless, always on edge for what the next excuse his dad might have to be angry with him about, and generally terrified of what might happen to him next.

With Gray, however, it’s his brother. And the abuse is less typical in his case, both because it comes from a sibling and because of the nature of it. His brother was a violent sociopath (I’m making the distinction here because not all sociopath’s are violent). Gray’s brother not only physically abused him, but tortured him and ensnared in games of torture of others. This left Gray feeling worthless, powerless, and always on edge waiting for the next horror. 

Both Adam and Gray experienced physical abuse and terror from a family member, but in addition to that - they also experienced familial neglect. Adam’s mother not only doesn’t intervene in his abuse, but encourages Adam to go along with it, accept culpability for it, and cover it up. We don’t know much about Gray’s family, but his parents either never saw what his brother was doing, which suggests a level of neglect, or they saw it but refrained from intervening or stopping the behavior. 

So both Adam and Gray grew up not only being terrorized both physically and emotionally from a family member, but ignored and allowed to continue to feel unsafe from at least one other family member. Neither of them had a family member to intervene, to comfort them, to tell them this wasn’t okay or normal.

In some ways, we can see Gray as a possible outcome for Adam if Adam hadn’t found Gansey and Ronan and the women of Fox Way when he did. And, in fact, we can see how both Adam and Gray are healed by interactions with these people. 

One thing both Adam and Gray have in common is their longing for a life other than the one they’re currently living. 

Adam is always dreaming of becoming his own man. The way Adam envisions this is by working hard, earning a good education, and eventually becoming rich enough to be able to leave his family and home behind. He doesn’t think in terms of love or friendship or family - it’s all about earning what he can on his own so that he can have the things that he sees other people having. He sees the Aglionby boys and thinks about how he can get the lives that they have. 

Gray, on the other hand, had at one point in time pursued an academic interest that he was passionate about, but felt forced to leave behind. He can’t even recall exactly how he became a hit man, but when he wants to feel better, he takes out the syllabus’s that have his published works on them - reminding himself of a better life.

Gray also becomes attached to Henrietta and to Fox Way very quickly. He begins to imagine a life there, one where it’s safe for him to be with Maura and be close to Blue and live in this small magical town. 

It takes Adam a little longer to feel attachment to this home because of it’s association with his parents. But eventually, due to his friends, and to Cabsewater’s influence, he starts to imagine a life for himself, too. And it’s no longer a life of being by himself surrounded by things he can now financially afford. It becomes about him and Ronan and Opal and the Barns and living in community with those he loves. 

So both men have a journey of understanding that it’s okay to want something for themselves, that they are capable of love and of being loved, and that happiness is actually achievable for them. Both of them begin by feeling solitary and alone, but both find love and community in the end. 

Both Adam and Gray also have to overcome quite a lot, psychologically, owing to their abusive families. Both men dissociate, for example. Gray talks about having gray days where he loses time and literally just gray’s out - not being awake or asleep. Adam uses Cabeswater as a way of dealing with his dissociativeness, allowing the forest to take some of his pain away, and learning how to have enough focus to come back again on his own. 

Both men have trust issues, understandably. Early on, we see how Adam is paranoid about other people knowing about their quest and taking it from them. Gray leaves his entire identity behind in order to escape from his brother. Both of them channel that paranoia into sharpness. They’re both very intuitive about other people’s motives and emotions, they’re both observant of their surroundings to the point of hypervigilance, they’re both insightful and clever in their thinking and capable of coming up with painstakingly thought out plans to achieve their goals - using all that they know about the world and the people they need to manipulate to make those plans perfect. 

But more than all of that, underneath all of the thinking and planning and careful observation - both men are inherently kind. Everyone copes and heals differently, but for both Adam and Gray, coming out of what they did made them able to sense other’s pain and gave them a desire to do something about that pain, when able.

I’m thinking of the way Gray drapes his coat over Blue when they’re sitting out on the patio missing Maura together. I’m thinking of the way Adam gives Opal his watch when he senses her fear about being left at Cabeswater. They both have a willingness to help others, and beyond even that, to sacrifice of themselves for others.

Despite Adam’s need for control over his own destiny, he sacrifices the use of his hands and his eyes to Cabeswater. Adam is someone who knows how much this will cost him, and he does it anyway. More than that, he learns how best to communicate with the forest and is willing to do what’s necessary to live up to that sacrifice. 

“When it came down to it, Adam had been making sacrifices for a very long time, and he knew what the hardest one was.”

So too, does Gray give up what he most wants for himself - a small quiet life with Maura - when he realizes that to keep Henrietta and everyone who lives there safe, he has to become the new head of the supernatural artifact business there. 

“He wanted to stay so badly, in this place where he had begun to put violence down. In this place where he’d learned how to feel again. In this place that he loved.”

Gray goes from being closed off to opening himself up to realizing he needs to make a sacrifice for what he loves. Adam makes his sacrifice earlier on, and it’s partially the consequences of that sacrifice that allow him to open himself up and to feel love. In this respect their journey’s don’t so much parallel one another. But in another way, they do again.

Gray has to leave behind the life he was starting to get attached to in Henrietta with Maura. But he wants to come back to it. He asks Maura “will I come back?” He doesn’t receive an answer, but the fact that he wants to, is open to, and is not closing back down entirely is an answer in itself. Gray sacrifices the life he wants, but not permanently. Gray is no longer giving himself up as someone else’s weapon. He’s making decisions for himself in the name of helping to make the world a little better.

Similarly, Adam is finally off to college, on his way to making the life for himself that he always dreamed of. To do this, he has to leave the Barns, has to leave Ronan behind. But he makes it clear - he’s coming back. 

So both Adam and Gray are learning that things don’t have to be such extremes, doors don’t have to close forever. They can leave, attend to other business, and come back ... come home.  

Another interesting parallel in the narrative between the two characters is in their tarot readings.

Adam draws the Two of Swords and Maura interprets it for him. It’s about a hard choice he has to make, about his ambition, about someone wanting him to make a choice that compromises his principals. She guesses his father, Persephone says she thinks it’s a brother. (We know he is torn between his father and Gansey, who is like a brother to him)

When he asks what choice to make, Maura further tells him there is no one right choice, just one he can live with, and that it might be a third option he hasn’t thought of yet. She tells him he’s an analytical thinker, that he’s learned to ignore his emotions, but that this isn’t a time for that. 

Later, when he’s forced to make a decision about where to live after the arrest of his father, when he’s trying to decide how and if to go against Gansey’s wishes regarding Cabeswater, he asks Blue for more advice concerning this reading. Her advice? “Keep being brave.”

Later than that, under Persephone’s guidance, he draws the Magician card for himself. 

Compare to Gray’s reading. He first picks up the Ten of Swords. Maura tells him that this is the end of the cycle, so good news for the Ten of Swords - this is the absolute worst it will get. He and Maura banter about him being the man with the swords in his back and her being one of the swords. 

Then, after playing the game with Maura, Calla, and Persephone for awhile, Persephone calls out for the King of Swords and predicts exactly where it will be in the deck. She says this is Gray’s card. The King of Swords is described as “master of his own emotions, master of his own intellect, master of reason.”

When asked, Maura explains that the card is powerful - strong, but impartial and cold. The King of Swords is good at making decisions based on facts and not emotions. Then both she and Calla admit that, when interpreting the card for Gray, they are picking up a sense of violence. This is when he admits he’s a hit man. 

Later, when he’s seeking guidance from Maura, he guesses this is his Ten of Swords moment. She advises him “You’re going to have to be brave.” He says “I’m always brave.” She replies “Braver than that.”

Later than that, he realizes that he wasn’t at the end of his cycle yet then - it was still getting worse for him. He remembers Maura telling him to be “braver than that”.

Okay, where am I going with all of this? 

First, both of them are given cards from the Swords suite (is it suites in tarot? whatever). Both are told by Maura that they are used to making decisions based on intellect instead of emotion, and that they’re going to have to change that when the going gets rough. Both are given a different card from Persephone (Adam chooses the Magician card on his own, but under her guidance - whereas P. gives Gray the King card). Both are given further instructions from a Sargent (Blue in Adam’s case, Maura in Gray’s) about bravery. Both characters are thinking of one situation, when the guidance is really about another (or about both). 

So we have Adam, the Magician, given the Two of Swords to help him understand that he needs to consult his emotions when making the difficult decision to 1) leave his parent’s home but also not run straight to Gansey’s and 2) make the pact with Cabeswater. 

And we have Gray, the King of Swords, given the Ten of Swords to help him understand that he needs to consult his emotions when making the difficult decision to 1) defy Greenmantle and 2) confront his brother head-on. (Interestingly, when he makes his sacrifice in the end, he thinks of it as becoming a king - just as when Adam makes his sacrifice to Cabeswater it’s about him becoming a magician)

Very similar journeys, these two. 

[swimmingwolf59]

I am He as You are He as You are Me

(A/N) Hey guys, sorry this took so long! My mental health took a turn for the worst yesterday so I didn’t get as much done as I wanted to, but I feel much better today and was able to crank this out for you all! I had a lot of fun writing it – body swapping is one of my absolute favorite tropes EVER!! I wanted to write more honestly, but it felt like it was already getting out of hand, and I wanted to focus on pynch since, you know, pynchweek xD Who knows though, maybe I’ll come back to this universe someday :P

Anyway, hope you enjoy and thanks for reading!! I know technically pynchweek is over soon, but I still have another two entries that’ll be coming your way hopefully soon!

P.S. Cabeswater is a prankster change my fucking mind

I.

It all started when Gansey suggested they go camping.

Instead of wanting to camp in a national park of some kind like a normal person, Gansey wanted to camp in Cabeswater. His logic was that they always wanted to explore it and start trying to make a map, so why not spend a full two days there, submerged in the forest, learning its ways? At the time, everyone had been enthusiastic about the idea.

They might not have been if they’d known what was going to happen.

It started out fine. They spent the day wandering and mapping and getting lost in nature. At one point, Ronan found himself physically lost in nature with Adam; though they were the Greywaren and the Magician respectively, neither of them asked for Cabeswater to help guide them. There was a part of Ronan that enjoyed being lost in the woods with Adam, and it seemed like Adam might feel the same way.

They’d been skirting this…thing between them for some time now. Neither of them liked to mention it directly. They both knew it was happening, and they both played the game, but neither of them had tried to win it. Ronan no longer looked away when Adam caught him staring at him, but he didn’t do anything more either; he was afraid to, afraid that the teasing and smiles that Adam gave him would go away if he did.

But here, right now, in Cabeswater’s warm protection, it felt like anything could happen.

“Aha!” Adam exclaimed suddenly and hurried forward. Once he reached the tree, he slammed his palm on its trunk and turned to Ronan triumphantly. “See? I told you we’d eventually pass this tree more than five times.”

It was a strange tree, but that was what made it so wonderful: it was an oak tree, but somewhere along the way in its growth it had become twisted and convoluted until it grew every which way. One of the trunks had grown completely horizontal for a while before suddenly jarring upwards at a 45-degree angle and then straightening out again. The horizontal bit looked like it made a good bench to sit on, if one was willing to try and climb up to it.

Ronan had bet Adam they wouldn’t pass it more than five times on their lost adventures. The loser had to try and climb the tree.

“You just want to see me fall on my ass, don’t you Parrish?” Ronan scoffed but shirked off his shirt and began climbing the tree.

It was actually quite easy, considering how weird the angles were: there were ridges and cavities bored into the trunks by animals or insects, making perfect handholds for climbing. The only times Ronan got stuck was when the trunk turned in a really acute angle, which forced him to shimmy around to the other side of the trunk so he could climb more safely.

But he made it, and when he did he stood on the flat surface triumphantly. “Ha! Bet you can’t make it up here, Parrish!”

Adam was already at the base of the tree, his hands on the trunk and his eyes gleaming with challenge as he stared up at Ronan. “What do I get if I make it there?”

“…I’ll tell you my deepest, darkest secret,” Ronan said, because Adam looked gorgeous staring up at him like that in his natural forest element and it felt like anything could happen.

Adam hesitated for only a second before taking off his shirt and beginning to eagerly hoist himself up the tree. It wasn’t often that Ronan offered his secrets for such a cheap price, after all, and Adam was a sucker for bargains.

Ronan carelessly draped himself across the tree ledge as he watched Adam climb. This was a prize in itself, really – watching Adam’s muscles move with no clothes to block his imagination. He watched the sweat gleam off of his tan skin and imagined licking it off of him, imagined what it would taste like, imagined what kind of noise Adam would make as he did it, imagined how his breath would stutter under his tongue.

It was dangerous, letting himself think these thoughts when Adam was so close. There was no telling what he might do.

But then again, he knew Adam was an excellent climber. And he knew exactly what he was going to tell him when he made his way up here.

Adam didn’t make Ronan wait long. He dragged himself onto the ledge quicker than Ronan had, pushing Ronan’s legs aside to make room for himself to sit down. He was panting lightly and his skin gleamed even brighter under the light filtering in from the canopy now that he was closer to Ronan. And he smelled wonderful, too, like the crushed needles of a grand fir.

This was dangerous.

“Alright, Lynch,” Adam said when he caught his breath. “What’s the secret?”

He was looking at Ronan in a way that made it impossible to doubt how he felt. They’d been playing this game together all along, and yet neither of them had quite believed they were both playing the same game. Ronan believed it now; looking at Adam like this, so close to him, and smelling that citrusy scent, he could believe anything.

So he sat up, cupped Adam’s cheek in his hand, and kissed him.

When he pulled back, Adam had a small smile on his face. “Oh. That? That’s not a secret – I already knew about that.”

“Asshole,” Ronan growled through a laugh, but didn’t pull away when Adam leaned in to kiss him again.

Suddenly, the light disappeared. It was so abrupt that it made both of them jump and nearly fall backwards out of the tree. The stars started to break through the total darkness, much faster than they would normally, and eventually one burned so bright that it cast a dim light over Ronan and Adam.

Ronan straightened into a defensive posture. “Horror movie setting.”

“Romantic candlelight,” Adam corrected.

They stared at each other. And then they burst out laughing.

“Cabeswater, you little shit,” Ronan gasped. The trees shook around them and it felt like they were laughing, too.

“I feel like Cabeswater’s become more playful lately,” Adam said, leaning forward to kiss his way up Ronan’s jaw. He whispered into Ronan’s ear, “It really does take after you.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Ronan growled, a shiver slicing up his spine. He gingerly placed his hands on Adam’s chest, let his fingers splay out across his ribs. “But yeah, next thing we know it’s going to be playing practical jokes on us.”

“Oh God, I can’t even imagine what it’ll come up with,” Adam laughed, but they didn’t waste time on speculating.

Instead, they sat in that tree and kissed and kissed until they had utterly lost all track of time, not that time worked normally in Cabeswater anyway. They kissed until their lips were bruised and they had traced over almost every inch of their bodies with their fingers, touching and probing. In a way, they were doing their own kind of mapping; exploring and worshipping and finding out what touch and where made the other gasp.

And in the background, Cabeswater changed the ambience to fit their moods. It increased and decreased the light when it thought it was necessary, changed the colors around them, blew wind across their fevered skin when it felt like the heat was too much to bear. At one point it sounded like a song whistled through the trees, but Ronan couldn’t catch what song it was before Adam distracted him by biting down on his skin.

It was magical. It was perfect.

But eventually, they parted, knowing their friends would worry if they didn’t find their way back soon. Ronan could hardly breathe; he felt like he’d been underwater for hours.

“We should’ve done that months ago,” Adam said as they caught their breaths and carefully picked their way down from the tree.

Years, Ronan almost said, but he didn’t really want Adam to know just how long he’d been playing their game.

They put on their shirts and walked back to the campsite hand-in-hand, Cabeswater showing them the way now that they both wanted to head back. Ronan’s palm was entirely too sweaty—despite how long they’d spent making out, he was nervous about handholding of all things, Blue would never let him live it down if she found out—and he prayed that Adam couldn’t tell.

That night, they all roasted marshmallows and made s’mores, Ronan teaching Adam how to get it just right since he had never done anything like that before. Gansey told stories about Glendower and Henry told Korean horror stories and Blue talked about the endangered rainforests. Ronan made up stupidly hilarious stories about Declan and Adam made up hilariously stupid stories about Declan until they were all rolling around laughing.

But eventually everyone started to get tired, and they all retired to their tents. Gansey, Blue, and Henry were sharing a tent that was barely big enough to fit the three of them while Ronan and Adam had each brought their own. After the events of today, though, Ronan wondered if he really had to sleep alone.

Poking his head out, and watching Adam struggle to fix a shitty pole on his tent, he barked, “Your tent is actual garbage Parrish, just get the fuck in here.”

“It’s good enough,” Adam protested, like the stubborn asshole he was.

Ronan rolled his eyes. “I’ll make Cabeswater knock it down at night if you don’t get in here.”

Adam glared at him, but after a moment of a locked stare-down he must’ve realized what Ronan’s true reasons for wanting him in his tent were because he threw the poles onto the ground, stalked over to Ronan’s tent, and forced himself inside.

Ronan’s tent was humongous, so there was no reason to lay close to each other, but they pretended that wasn’t true and curled close together anyway. It was too hot to be in their sleeping bags so they slept on top of them, staring at each other in the faint light.

Adam moved first, tossing his leg up over Ronan’s.

It was more or less easy after that; they knocked limbs and shoved each other around until they settled into a comfortable, tangled position. Adam’s legs were hooked around Ronan’s knees and Ronan had his arm thrown around Adam’s waist and his face shoved into his neck. It was still too hot for this behavior, but they pretended that wasn’t true, either.

Instead, Ronan pressed closer to Adam.

This was how it should be.

 II.

The next morning, Ronan woke up next to Gansey, not Adam.

Rearing back, he flailed, trying to wrench himself out of his sleeping bag. His body felt weird and disproportionate and he couldn’t figure out how he’d gotten into Gansey’s tent. And actually, why the hell was he in his sleeping bag?! It had been hot as hell when he’d gone to sleep!

But holy shit, had kissing Adam been a dream? Had he kissed Gansey in some fever-induced haze?!

In his panic, Ronan accidentally knocked Gansey in the knee with his foot, causing Gansey to sleepily blink his eyes open. “…Blue?”

…Blue?! He knew Gansey was blind without his glasses or contacts, but holy shit! Wait…Blue? Gansey almost never called Blue Blue.

“I’m not—!” Ronan shouted but stopped because that was not his voice. It had come out higher-pitched and…womanly.

Glancing down warily, things started to click into place: he was wearing some kind of weird nightgown that looked like it had started off its life as a sparkly blue bath curtain. His skin was dark and long hair drooped down into his face from where part of it was clipped up. The nails of the foot he’d kicked Gansey with were covered in neon yellow nail polish.

He was also about five feet tall.

…Oh fuck no.

“Blue, how did you get in my tent? Where’s Ronan?” Gansey asked, and Ronan suddenly realized with growing horror that Gansey wasn’t Gansey either. He had to be…

“…Parrish?” Ugh, he couldn’t get used to talking in Blue’s voice.

Gansey—no, Adam—scrunched his eyebrows together. “Why are you calling me—?”

And then it seemed to occur to him that something was off. He glanced down at himself, blanched, and glanced up at Ronan. “…What the fuck? Blue, I’m—”

“Yeah, I know, I am too. I’m not Sargent by the way,” Ronan growled.

Adam squinted at him. “Lynch?”

“Unfortunately.”

Adam squinted at him some more before he rolled onto his back and started hooting with laughter. It was unsettling watching Gansey’s body laugh so uproariously at someone else’s suffering.

“Shut the fuck up!” Ronan hissed and attempted to kick him. It felt like there was no power behind his tiny limbs. “You’re literally fucking Gansey right now.”

“Yeah, but—” Adam could barely speak through his laughter. “You’re Blue.”

Ronan growled and decided he’d had enough of this, so he threw himself out of the tent. As he stomped outside, he saw Adam climb out of Ronan’s tent. Except, it couldn’t really be Adam, because Adam was currently inside Gansey.

“Bluebird?” was the horrific thing that came out of Adam’s mouth.

Oh God it was Henry.

“…What in the world is going on…?” a familiar voice said as someone else climbed out behind Henry.

…Oh God that was his body climbing out of his tent over there.

Ronan didn’t know how to process any of this. It was unreal; it was somehow stranger than anything else they’d ever faced before. For a while he just stood there, stupefied, as he watched his body slowly approach him. “…Jane?”

“No, that’s Ronan,” Adam said as he finally joined everyone outside the tent. “I don’t know what the hell’s going on, but I think we should figure out who’s in who’s body to avoid any more confusion. I’m Adam.”

“And I’m Henry,” Adam’s body said.

“I’m Gansey, but…” Ronan’s body said as he thumbed at his lip. Ronan decided that he hated watching Gansey’s habits manifesting on his body. “I’m sorry, but am I Ronan right now?”

“Sucks, doesn’t it?” Ronan snapped at him.

Gansey shook out his legs. “I’m not used to being this tall.”

Ugh, Ronan was getting a headache watching his own body do stuff.

“Cabeswater, what the fuck?!” Ronan shouted at the sky, already done with this nonsense. “Change us back!”

Nothing happened.

“Cabeswater!” Gansey—no, Adam, fuck this was confusing—shouted. “Change us back!”

Again, nothing happened.

“What the shit?!” Ronan hissed.

“Maybe it’s not listening because we’re not in the bodies of the Greywaren or the Magician,” Adam speculated.

“But it did this to us – shouldn’t it be the only one not confused?”

“Perhaps it wasn’t purposeful,” Gansey said. Ronan did not like looking at his own body talking like an old person. It was just wrong. “Here, I’ll try – Cabeswater, uhh…”

Ronan had to acidly supply him with the Latin. When Gansey stumbled over the pronunciations, but more or less said it, however, Cabeswater still did nothing.

“…We should ask Fox Way about this,” Adam said eventually.

“Great,” Ronan grumbled.

Gansey looked over at him, amused. “You may have to live there for a while, Ronan, considering you’re Jane right now.”

Ronan reared back. “Oh fuck no—”

Just then, Henry, presumably Blue, crawled out of the tent and glanced around at all of them. She stared for a good minute before saying eloquently, “Well this is fucked.”

 III.

Of course, the women at 300 Fox Way had known immediately what was happening.

Maura opened the door in a fit of hysterics. “I must say you kids certainly get yourselves into a lot of strange situations!”

“How can you laugh about this?” Blue demanded. She pointed at Ronan. “Ronan’s in my body!!”

Adam snorted. “You have to admit that’s really funny.”

“I don’t think it’s very funny,” Calla hissed, appearing out of nowhere and latching onto Ronan’s shoulder, her hand like a claw. “How dare you inhabit Blue’s precious body, snake.”

“Trust me, I don’t want to fucking be here either,” Ronan growled, attempting to shove her off. A horrible thought occurred to him suddenly and he turned to Blue. “Oh God, you’re not on your period are you?”

Calla smacked him in the back of the head as she withdrew her hand. Blue glared at him, though most of the heat of it was lost in translation to Henry’s face. “No, God, why would you even ask that?”

“I don’t want to fucking deal with that! I already have to deal with having…woman parts.” Ronan shuddered at the thought.

“Oh, poor you,” Blue snapped as she crossed her arms. “I hope my period does start when you’re in my body, just to spite you; then you’d know how awful it is.”

Ronan bared his teeth at her but, before he could say anything, Gansey stepped forward. It went against all laws of nature that Ronan’s body was attempting to mediate conflict. “Ms. Sargent, do you have any ideas on why this has happened or how we can fix it?”

“How many times have I told you to call me Maura – none of that ‘Ms. Sargent’ crap,” Maura snapped. Ronan shuddered as Gansey made his face look remorseful. Fuck Gansey was going to ruin his reputation.

Maura sipped her dubious tea concoction as she settled down on their ratty couch. She seemed entirely unphased considering the situation. “Honestly, I think Cabeswater is just having a little fun. It sees you guys clowning around all the time and wants to seem more like its human companions, so it’s playing around.”

“So Cabeswater’s pulling a prank on us,” Henry said.

Ronan pointed at Adam. “I fucking told you it would!”

“Is there a way we can ask it to stop?” Gansey asked.

“We already tried that, remember?” Adam said. “It didn’t respond to me or Ronan.”

“Just let it have its fun, I’m sure it’ll return you all to normal soon enough,” Maura said, smirking around her tea cup.

Ronan glared at her. “You’re fucking enjoying this, aren’t you?”

“I’m mainly looking forward to forcing you to do things as my daughter,” Maura cackled, a gleam of something sinister in her eyes.

Ronan got out of there as fucking fast as he could.

 IV.

It turned out that the worst thing Maura made him do was go to school. She insisted he go to school because Blue would and it turned out that Mountainview Shitty High was way worse than Aglionby. Mainly because Gansey and Adam weren’t there, but also because Blue was so short that he couldn’t intimidate people as easily as usual so people kept trying to…talk to him. He even had to go to a guidance counseling meeting that made him want to kill himself. (Honestly, by storming out of there and getting nothing accomplished he was doing Blue a favor.)

The whole experience was horrific.

But at least after it was over, Adam came to walk home with him because Gansey would’ve done that for Blue.

“Parrish, thank God,” Ronan said as he saw him lurking on the sidewalk outside of Mountainshit. “This place is giving me hives.”

“You’ve been here for six hours,” Adam said, a smirk on his face. He was truly doing a poor job of imitating Gansey.

Ronan shot him a horrified look. “God, don’t remind me.”

Adam laughed before glancing around suddenly. It was only then that Ronan realized people were staring at them, leaning their heads together to gossip quietly. He stared at Adam. “Fuck, how do Dick and Sargent usually act in public?”

Adam did a weird little half-shrug. “I don’t know, should we kiss or something? They’re always all over each other now that Blue’s no longer cursed.”

Ronan scoffed and glanced down at the ground. “Man, I can’t kiss you when you look like Gansey… I know short girls with weird outfits are your type, but—”

“You’re never going to let that go, are you?” Adam sighed. “Here, we can just hold hands or whatever – that should be fine, right?”

Ronan swallowed. “Uh, yeah, I guess.”

Adam grabbed his hand and essentially started dragging him off down the sidewalk. And even though they’d just done this last night, it was weird because it was Gansey. Even though he knew Adam was currently occupying his body, it was disconcerting to glance over and see Gansey’s face instead of Adam’s.

Despite all that, though Ronan’s hand was still so fucking sweaty. How goddamn embarrassing.

“This is so fucking weird,” Ronan grumbled, kicking at stray pebbles along the side of the road. The one good thing about dressing like Blue was that she had some killer Doc Martins. “Did you know girls have to sit when they piss? Talk about inconvenient.”

Adam snorted. “Of course I knew that, Lynch, how did you not know that? Do you think everyone has a penis?”

“I wish everyone had a penis.”

Adam shoved him. “It is kind of weird becoming comfortable with someone else’s genitals, though…”

“Please don’t tell me you were admiring Dick’s dick in the bathroom.”

“I wasn’t!” Adam snarled, a blush on his face. “…Though that wouldn’t be the worst thing I’ve done to Gansey today…”

Ronan grinned, delighted and intrigued. “What the fuck did you do?”

 V.

-five hours earlier-

Adam thought that everyone must know something was off.

He couldn’t be a convincing Gansey. He had spent many nights agonizing and wishing he could be, but he couldn’t pull off the flawless politician’s smile or seeming genuinely interested when schmoozing with people. He was having trouble even pretending that he could do it. Just this morning, he’d lost his dignity because he’d had to dress himself in a hideously bright-colored polo underneath his uniform and put on those…boat shoes. When he’d walked out and Ronan had practically been rolling on the floor from his laughter, he’d sworn and flipped him off before stalking out, a decidedly non-Gansey action.

And his behavior hadn’t much improved once he got to school. Adam had had no idea really how many people Gansey knew and engaged in pleasant conversation with. It was exhausting. Every step he took someone was whooping at him or slapping a hand on his shoulder or asking him about something mundane. It was hard not to act like Adam Parrish—ignore them, flinch when they touched him—and it was even harder to act like Gansey—act interested, have something interesting to say back, know who the fuck these people even were and how Gansey knew them.

It was a disaster.

He at least took comfort from the fact that Gansey was doing no better of a job imitating Ronan. In fact, he was arguably doing worse – he was bad at permanently scowling, and more than once Adam had had to nudge him in the ribs because he’d been walking around with a goofy, utterly non-Ronan smile on his face. Every time he had to swear at someone, he stumbled on his words so much that it almost came out sounding polite. It was endlessly entertaining, and Adam almost hoped they stayed in each other’s bodies long enough just so he could show Ronan how bad of a job Gansey was doing.

He’d be mortified.

“This is incredibly difficult,” Gansey said to Adam as they walked to fourth period. (History, a class Ronan would never be caught dead in, but if Gansey was going to do anything with this opportunity he was going to make Ronan go to school.) He was thumbing his lip, which made Adam realize that maybe he should be doing that, too.

“I know what you mean. I don’t know how you talk to so many people,” Adam grumbled. “Who even are they all?”

Gansey smiled and shrugged. “Mainly people I know from old clubs.”

“You do too many things,” Adam said, and Gansey laughed.

“I feel that way sometimes too.”

“Hey, Lynch!” a disgusting voice sneered. Adam and Gansey looked up to see Kavinsky grinning at them down the hall. “Still following Richard III around like a dumb dog, huh?”

This time, Gansey had no trouble. He glared at Kavinsky, tilted his chin up threateningly, and spat with venom, “Fuck off, dumb shit.”

And it was actually so much like Ronan that Adam acted completely on instinct. He laughed, and then, when Kavinsky had flipped them off and moved on, leaned over to press a chaste kiss to Ronan’s lips.

Except it wasn’t Ronan.

It was Gansey.

Adam reared back, horror flooding his body. Not only had he just kissed Gansey but he had done it in the crowded halls of Aglionby, which meant that at least thirty people had watched him do it. Holy fuck, was he so desperate that he couldn’t help himself, even though he knew that Ronan wasn’t Ronan right now?!

Oh shit oh fuck.

“…I’m very confused,” Gansey said. He looked it, too. “Do you usually do this with Ronan? And did I just get kissed by myself?”

Adam gaped, flustered and at a complete loss for words. He tried to explain himself, but it just came out as a big jumble: “I—I mean, yeah, recently Ronan and I have been…But Gans, I didn’t mean—You just looked—Ronan—”

“…I think I’m going to go find Jane,” Gansey said, slowly inching away. He had on his politician’s smile, which looked like a nightmare on Ronan’s face. “I am happy for you and Ronan though, I truly am! I just don’t see you in that way, Adam, I’m sorry!”

Adam groaned and buried his face in his hands.

 VI.

Declan stalled when he saw Ronan at the end of the hall. Declan often stalled in the hall because of his younger brother—either because he was beating someone’s face in or passed out drunk against a locker—but this time he stalled merely because he absolutely could not believe what he was seeing.

Ronan was laughing. Ronan was smiling. He wasn’t slouching or wearing his tie improperly and he honest to God looked like he was flirting. Or trying to. The other boy seemed both charmed and offended by whatever was coming out of Declan’s brother’s mouth, which honestly wasn’t that surprising. But this…this was surprising.

Declan didn’t mean the whole gay thing. He knew Ronan was gay—it had been obvious to him since the time he found a cut out picture of a shirtless Leonardo DiCaprio underneath Ronan’s bed—and it didn’t bother him. A lot of things bothered Declan about his younger brother, but being gay was not one of them. In fact, it was probably the least offensive thing about him.

But for the love of God, did the person of his younger brother’s obvious affections really have to be Henry goddamn Cheng?

 VII.

-the present-

“I can’t believe you kissed Gansey because he actually managed to act like me,” Ronan gasped, struggling to breathe through his laughter. “And cursing out K of all people!”

“Will you shut the fuck up?” Adam hissed, a blush on his cheeks.

They had made it back to Monmouth before anyone else and were thus lounging around in the main room. Ronan was lying in Main Street of Gansey’s model of Henrietta—Blue’s body was small enough to do it without crushing anything, and Ronan had always wanted to—and Adam was spread out across the couch.

“No, I can’t, you’re so fucking desperate,” Ronan cackled, kicking his legs in the air. “Holy shit.”

Adam threw a notebook at him and nearly took out the library. “I’m never kissing you again.”

“Yeah, good luck with that,” Ronan snorted. “I think today proved that you need to kiss me every time I say ‘fuck’.”

“I hate you.”

Ronan sarcastically blew him a kiss.

Just then, Blue burst her way into Monmouth. “We need to go back to Cabeswater and make it fix us. Right. Now.”

“Not having a good time as Cheng, Sargent?” Ronan asked, amused.

“No, Henry’s fine! I love him dearly, and it’s kind of fun hanging out with the Vancouver crowd at school and actually getting something accomplished when I protest!” Henry shot her a thumbs-up as he slipped by behind her. “No, the problem is Gansey – he couldn’t control himself at school today and made me kiss. Ronan.”

To his credit, Ronan held it in for about one second. Then he burst out laughing, resuming his limb flailing with how little he could keep his shit together. “Holy fuck, Parrish just told me a similar story! What the fuck is wrong with you guys? Am I the only one who didn’t try to kiss someone today?”

“I haven’t kissed anyone either, though I think Tad Carruthers wanted to,” Henry said. Adam and Ronan both made a noise of disgust. “I also totally bombed that history test, sorry Parrish.”

Adam looked like the world had just ended. “You what?!”

“See what I mean?” Blue shouted, gesturing wildly. “We’re all a disaster! We need to get our own bodies back!”

“I agree,” Gansey said, placing a hand on Blue’s shoulder. “Being Ronan is too exhausting.”

Ronan’s grin was sharp. “Isn’t it hell?”

“Being you, Gans, is too exhausting,” Adam said, standing up from the couch. “Alright, let’s go back to Cabeswater.”

“Maybe if we camp again, Cabeswater will kindly switch us back while we’re sleeping,” Henry suggested.

Everyone mumbled their agreement and grabbed their camping gear that had been tossed haphazardly around Monmouth after the last excursion. When they headed down to the Pig to pack it all up, however, everyone realized there was a problem: Ronan—who was really Gansey—had automatically grabbed for the driver’s side door of the Pig.

“It’d be weird if someone saw anyone but Three driving the Pig,” Henry pointed out.

“Especially if the person driving was Ronan,” Adam added.

Gansey set his jaw but reluctantly handed the keys to Adam. “I dislike this plan.”

“Hey, at least I’m not the one in your body,” Ronan sniped back, but there was a part of him that really, really wished he was. “I call shotgun.”

Gansey’s mouth dropped open. “No.”

“Blue usually does occupy the passenger’s seat now,” Adam pointed out. Ronan pointed at him.

“Just because you’re dating now doesn’t mean you can gang up on me about my car,” Gansey chided, but folded himself into the backseat, smacking his head on the way in. “God, Ronan, how do you stand being so tall?”

“Wait, wait, wait!” Henry shouted. “Lynch and Parrish are an item?!”

“Since when?” Blue screeched. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“It literally just happened yesterday,” Adam snapped as he plopped down into the driver’s seat. He was determinedly not looking at anyone.

“Then why does Gansey know?!” Blue demanded.

“Because Parrish fucking kissed him earlier!” Ronan shouted, falling into laughter again.

“God, shut the fuck up,” Adam hissed and jammed the keys in the ignition so hard that the Pig started up without protest.

They were all silent for a moment, and then Henry said, “Oh, because he looks like Lynch right now?”

“It was a confusing time for me,” Gansey said. “I wasn’t sure who Adam was trying to appeal to honestly.”

“Shut up!!” Adam shouted and revved the car forward.

Everyone laughed, but dropped the teasing for now.

As the backseat dissolved into some ridiculous debate, Ronan cranked the window down and leaned his arm out. Just because he could—and because he had the station saved on Gansey’s radio—he switched on his pounding EDM. For once, Adam didn’t turn it off.

Perhaps he was starting to realize how great it was to drive to. Especially in the fucking Pig.  

Because he was sitting next to him, Ronan heard the little gasp that escaped Adam as he pushed the Pig onto the freeway. He must’ve been able to feel what gave Ronan chills whenever he thought about driving the Pig: the engine growling under his thighs, the squeal of the tires as he pushed the Camaro as fast as it could go. There was no high like it in the world; not even Kavinsky’s dreamed up drugs could do it.  

“Parrish,” Ronan said.

It was all it took for Adam to slam his foot down on the gas. Ronan let out a whoop as Adam shot into the HOV lane and blasted down the freeway, easily pushing the car to 70, 75, 80.

“Adam!” Gansey shouted, but whatever else he was going to say was lost to the wind and the music.  

Ronan glanced over at Adam, admired the satisfied grin across his face and the energy thrumming in his eyes. As he was watching, Adam turned and flashed him a grin, one full of wildness and adrenaline and gasoline.

God, how Ronan wished he didn’t look like Gansey right now, because he wanted to kiss him.

“Hey Gansey Boy!” someone shouted from the next lane over. Ronan glared out the window to see Kavinsky’s band of merry fucks all packed into the car next to them. Kavinsky was strangely absent, however—they were in some other shit car, rather than the Mitsubishi—and it was Prokopenko sneering the taunts. “You teaching Lynch how to drive?”

Ronan almost snarled back before he remembered that he had to let Gansey answer.

“Fuck you, you know?” Gansey shouted back.

“Fuck me,” Ronan groaned and put his head in his hands. Adam snickered. “Is that how he’s been all day?”

“Pretty much,” Adam replied. Ronan groaned again. To his surprise, however, Adam leaned over him to say to Kavinsky’s pack, “Lynch would be lucky to learn how to drive like this.”

And to Ronan’s utter delight, pushed the car up to 90 and zoomed past the other car.

“Parrish, I think I might love you,” Ronan said, grinning.

“Gross!” Blue shouted.

Ronan cheerfully sent her the middle finger.

“You heathens are going to wreck my car,” Gansey bemoaned.

Adam just grinned at Ronan and Ronan felt the weight of it in his chest.

Fuck, he was so far gone.

Despite Gansey’s worry, they all made it to Cabeswater in one piece, and in record time if Ronan did say so himself – he was so fucking proud of Adam. As before, they trekked into Cabeswater and set their tents up in the main clearing. No one was as eager to explore this time around—as it felt dangerous to do something vaguely unsafe when none of them could get used to the bodies they were in—so they set up the campfire right away. They roasted marshmallows and made fun of each other for all of the dumb things they’d done in each other’s bodies today and all around them Cabeswater hummed with amusement. Ronan could feel it in his skin, and seeing Cabeswater so happy almost made him willing to forgive it for this.

The outcomes of this adventure had been fucking hilarious, after all.

But they were all ready to go back to their own bodies.

So as the fire went out, they crawled into their respective bodies’ tents, Adam, Ronan, and Blue diving into Gansey’s tent and Gansey and Henry settling into Ronan’s tent. Around them, the forest quieted as Cabeswater created a safe and peaceful setting for their sleep.

“Gansey Boy, it’s a good thing we love each other or this would be very awkward,” Henry could be heard saying from Ronan’s and Adam’s tent.

“What the fuck are they doing in there?” Ronan hissed.

Adam shook his head. “Hopefully we’ll find out tomorrow.”

“Or hopefully not,” Blue joked.

But they were hopeful as they all fell asleep. Ronan was especially hopeful, as right before Adam drifted off, he reached across the small space between them and grabbed Ronan’s hand.

This time, Ronan’s hand was not sweaty.

 VIII.

Ronan woke up to Adam’s face and hope shivered down his spine. “…Adam?”

Adam’s eyes slid open slowly. He didn’t seem to be processing anything, as he was always groggy when he first woke up. (Ronan knew this from his time spent at St. Agnes; one time he had witnessed Adam get up, shower, and then come back into the room and tell Ronan he had to take a shower. Ronan had had to tell him—making fun of him all the while, of course—that he had already taken it.) But then his eyes focused. “…Ronan?”

Ronan breathed out a sigh of relief. “Fuck, yes.”

“Oh thank God,” Adam said and pulled him into a searing kiss.

“I told you you wouldn’t be able to never kiss me again,” Ronan snarked when Adam let him pull back for a second to breathe.

“Shut the fuck. Up,” Adam growled.

Turned out that Ronan had a hard time disobeying Adam when he worked his mouth like that.

 IX.

Declan approached Ronan on his way to first period the next day (he couldn’t believe he’d been forced to go to school twice in a row). Ronan was immediately defensive – a purposeful visit from Declan was almost never a good thing, and it usually ended in throwing punches. They’d been trying to be better lately, but Ronan was still too easily riled and Declan was still too easily an asshole.

However, this time, Declan completely threw him for a loop. “Ronan, I really must talk to you about your taste in boyfriends—”

Ronan reared back, startled but refusing to show it. “What the fuck do you have against Parrish? And how did you know about that, anyway? Are you spying on me?”

“You’re…dating Parrish?” Declan stammered before breaking into a huge grin, which Ronan honestly found disturbing. “Oh thank God, as long as it’s not Henry Cheng I really don’t care who the fuck you’re dating.”

Ronan reared back again, this time out of offense. “Why the fuck would you think I was dating Henry fucking Cheng?”

“I saw you flirting with him yesterday.” Declan said ‘flirting’ like he would say ‘debauching’.

At that, and to Declan’s obvious confusion, Ronan burst out laughing. He laughed so hard he bent over himself, clutching at his stomach. Holy fuck he couldn’t breathe…!

“Ronan, are you okay?” Declan asked. “You never laugh this much – are you dying?”

“Fucking yeah I am,” Ronan wheezed before sending his older brother a grin. “Don’t worry, Dec – that was just a mistake. Thought he was someone else.”

“What.” Declan seemed even more confused. “How could you mistake Henry Cheng for anyone but—”

“Oh God, would you look at the time? Bye, Dicklan!” Ronan shouted over his brother and ran off to find Adam, ignoring Declan cursing at his back.

 X.

Tad Carruthers was walking down the hall when he saw Adam Parrish.

Tad was always on the lookout for Adam Parrish, as he lived off of the occasional glances he could get and thrived off the conversations Adam allowed him to have with him. He had become a pro at scanning the crowd for him, so it was easy to spot his dirty-blonde, wind-blown hair and his freckled face. Looking for Adam had even become something to look forward to every day that Tad went to school.

Usually, Tad approached Adam immediately. But this time, he stopped right in the middle of the hallway and gawked.

He couldn’t believe his eyes.

Sebastian had said he’d seen Ronan Lynch kissing Richard Gansey III yesterday. Atticus had said he’d seen Lynch kissing Henry Cheng yesterday, and apparently these events had taken place mere minutes after each other.

And now Lynch was kissing Adam Parrish?!

…Just how many boys had Ronan Lynch kissed at this school?!

(A/N) Let there be no doubt in your minds that immediately following this Tad went to confront Ronan and made a fool of himself. And probably got his ass kicked ;)

[felixjoyful]

The Bite of Death

Gansey is shaking. Ronan is vaguely aware of the fact at the edges of his consciousness, but it barely even matters. All he can think of is all the blood, and the pain, and the empty way his heart quakes in his chest. Adam died. Adam is dead. Here. Right before his eyes, right below his hands, and there's fuck shit he can do about it now. He is too late. Too weak. He wants to punch something, rip into somebody, fuck something up. Fuck himself up.

Everyone knows to give him space that night. Even Chainsaw is unusually quiet, even Opal is hiding somewhere. He knows they hurt, because they are a piece of his soul and his soul is tearing apart. Sleep doesn't come east. Sleep doesn't come soon. Sleep takes its time, but inevitably it comes. He doesn't want to face Cabeswater, tonight, because he knows of the horror waiting for him.

But when he finds himself stranded in the familiar forest, it is dead silent. Grieving. Cabeswater is grieving its Magician. No monsters will come after him tonight. Until...

"Ronan ?"

Ronan's head whip up, startled, hopefull, tortured.

Adam is here.

No monster will come after him, tonight, but he will suffer, because the forest knows him too well, the forest gives him what he wants, one last time, and it might well kill him.

"Ronan, you really took your time. I've been waiting for you for hours."

Ronan closes his eyes. Wants to close his eyes. He can't. He doesn't want this. He doesn't want how much he wants this. But he doesn't look away.

"Go away. You're not real. You're not fucking real. You're a shitty illusion, the worst good bye gift ever."

Adam rolls his eyes. Adam fucking rolls his eyes, like he's done with Ronan's bullshit. It's too fucking real. No, it's not real. But it feels so much like Adam. Ronan never lies, but he always could lie to himself splendidly.

"Oh, I'm real."

Ronan scoffs.

"I'm real, Ronan."

Ronan clenches his teeth. What the whoring fuck is going on ?

"I made a deal with Cabeswater, remember? I bonded myself to the ley line. I anchored my soul to it."

Adam is looking at him, expecting, like it's suppose to make a lick of sense, like Ronan is supposed to exclaim 'oh but of course!' and everything is supposed to go back to normal. But Ronan says nothing, because that's nonsense.

"When I died, my soul didn't move on. I have no body to attach myself to, but my spirit is still in Cabeswater. I've been waiting for you to dream, to talk to you. That's what I told Maura and Calla."

Maura and Calla?

"I asked them not to tell you just yet. You wouldn't have believed them anyway."

He sure as hell wouldn't have. He wasn't sure he believed Adam even know. This was a cruel joke, his mind, his heart, denying Adam's death. Adam is dead. It still hurts so much.

But Adam is frowning, like he knows what's going on in his head. Of course he does. They are in his head right now. A product of his imagination, powered by the ley line.

"Can you stop acting like you're the one who got stabbed here? You're the only one who can bring me back, here, okay?”

"What is that supposed to mean ? What, I'm supposed to sing abracadabra and whoop! Adam was alive all along, guys, its was just a fucking joke! I'm sorry to tell you this, Adam, but life doesn't work that way, so stuff it."

He's lashing out, he knows that. Anger is easy. Easier than tears anyway.

"It worked for Gansey.” Adam is using his patronising voice, the one he learnt from Gansey, the one he uses on Ronan when Ronan is being a generally shitty person. “Use your brain, Ronan. I told you, I don't have a body anymore. But you can change that, can't you. A body. It's all I need. Please?”

Adam never asks for anything. It must feel like acid on his tongue... Begging for something. But he's right. Ronan is the only one who can give him that.

"Is this... is this really you ?"

Adam smiles.

**

Ronan wakes up. He knows he's dreamt because he can't move. He isn't back in his own body yet. Is this how Adam is feeling? Like he just needs some times to make a piece of flesh his own again? He hears a gasp behind him. He doesn't dare hope.

He turns around.

He's here. He truly is here.

Adam is rushing along the corridor. Said he wanted to take a look at himself in the mirror, see if Ronan fucked up anything. Ronan knows he didn't, so he follows him. Part because he wants to tell him 'I told you so!' part because Adam is right here and he's not letting him out of sights again. He finds Gansey, stunned, in an armchair, looking at Adam's back.

“Ronan, what is this?”

Ronan only answers with a grin and soon, they're both chasing after Adam.

There's a full body mirror at the entrance of the Barns. That's where they find him, studying his own reflection.

"A-adam?" Gansey is stuttering. "Are you really back?"

Adam smiles at Gansey's reflection before turning to Ronan.

“Thanks for the straight teeth.”

[konshokoentaiko]

Adam Parrish

send a thing!!!

How I feel about this character: adam parrish is the light of my life and i would die for him and he’s my favorite character (not even in this series, just In General). i really love him beyond words, i love the way he’s always striving for something more, i love that he’s alternately distant and empathetic and snarky and perceptive and contemptuous and ruthless and affectionate and needy, i love his determination and i love that he wants better for himself than what he was given, i love that despite wanting to be Unknowable and a One Man Army he needs other people on a fundamental level and despite wanting to be normal (for a given rich-aglionby-boy definition of normal) he fell in love with ronan lynch, i love that he’s at once the magician and (imo) the most deeply human character in the series, i love that he saved himself and wanted to save others as soon as he realized that. I LOVE HIM. he is so quiet and still and he kept thinking he came from shame and dust but he’s so alive and wonderful and real and i’m genuinely so struck by his story every time i think about it. adam parrish is singlehandedly responsible for my level of investment in this series tbh.

All the people I ship romantically with this character: ronan

My non-romantic OTP for this character: i guess blue but like, the version that exists in my head, where instead of the horrible miscommunication and failed attempt at dating it’s just a bunch of scenes of them mocking/complaining about rich assholes together

also gansey but that’s complicated

O P A L.

My unpopular opinion about this character: idk lmao maybe that adam parrish is better than everyone else. don’t know if this is an unpopular opinion but it shouldn’t be.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:i wish canon had given even the tiniest measure of attention to his partial deafness. it’s something that would obviously have affected him a lot but it basically goes totally unmentioned through most of the series and that’s annoying. i think it should have been shown to have a clear effect on his life – as much as (and paralleling) the cabeswater bargain, even, as both adam moving out of his home and adam making the sacrifice were huge decisions/turning points in his life that happened on the same day and had physical + mental consequences. also i really wonder why ronan didn’t just like… dream him a magical hearing aid or something but idk

my het ship:none

my fem/slash ship: pynch

my OTP: pynch

my OT3:none

my cross over ship:¯\_(ツ)_/¯

my kink: UH IDK i guess i like the idea that adam really loves ronan’s tattoo to an embarrassing degree and can’t stop staring at it/touching it (i mean, it was the first thing he wanted to see when he had access to ronan basically). ronan has no idea where this came from but loves that adam loves it and is rather surprised and pleased in general. also, adam is incredibly touch-starved and can’t keep his hands off ronan when they’re finally together and ronan’s caught off guard by that as well. (again, this is basically canon though?) other than that i don’t particularly have any lmao with pynch im vanilla and i honestly just want them to be super gentle and soft and earnest with each other and cuddle and tell each other how much they love each other sdfkhjsdkkh

a head cannon fact:so adam is bi and he figures it out pretty early on (though in the beginning there’s still that question of ‘am i attracted to this snazzy rich male magazine model or do i just want to be him’) and then he just accepts it as like, a fact about himself and doesn’t really think of it as a good or bad thing. in general his sexuality isn’t a super big deal to him bc he has more pressing things to worry about, and he does think about it sometimes but only really reflects on it later, after he gets together with ronan and they finally talk about their sexuality (which they definitely do at some point, especially since accepting it was such a huge part of ronan’s character growth). i’m not saying he couldn’t have some internalized bullshit about it but imo that would be more related to wanting to be the default Typical Rich Heterosexual Man in a Business Suit than being ashamed of liking boys in itself. i like the idea of adam knowing he’s bi without having to go through any particular angst about it, he already has enough of that.

and speaking of which (to answer one of the questions above again), i also wish that in canon adam’s bisexuality had been more clearly stated. tbh in my Ideal Fix-It of the series we would have known (or at least been able to extrapolate from clear evidence) that adam was bi by the end of trb but whatever lol

my gender bend: everyone is a girl and ava parrish meets blue sargent before aglionby bc they’re both waitresses at nino’s (replacing the factory job, though she still fixes cars at boyd’s). they become best friends and talk shit about raven girls together, even after ava becomes one. possibly they try to date for a while but they break up soon and amicably, before ava goes to aglionby, so there’s no adam(ava)-blue-gansey love triangle involved at all bc that shit is just tiring. idk how this affects everything else i just want a wholesome adam(ava)/blue friendship free of pointless drama :’) also blue is a lesbian and she and ronan eventually bond over this. ronan notices ava early on whenever gansey & co go to nino’s and develops this vague distant crush on her but ava doesn’t notice ronan (maybe?) and then once ava transfers to aglionby ronan has an entire crisis about it.

anyway in my head ava has double braids and freckles and she’s as still and elegant as ever and ronan can’t stop staring at her hands (so everything is the same lol). one thing i guess is that she hates makeup and can’t stand the feeling of it on her face – she can’t really afford it anyway but ronan lends her some of her dream makeup for the dc trip and she’s not used to it and spends the whole time feeling painted-on and wrong, and it adds to the frustration and the dissociation and cabeswater’s tugging that builds up until everything comes crashing down. this is 100% just me projecting bc i despise makeup and cant even speak normally with lipstick on and i lowkey have a complex about it lmfao she loves seeing ronan’s makeup get all mussed up (from kissing :D) though, and she likes the way ronan wears hers – it’s a statement just like the shaved head and tattoo, not to look pretty or fit a standard, but like war paint, like art, screaming out for the world’s attention.

[hausvonklaus]

Tattoo

[Day 1- Something New]

Ronan’s in the middle of having lunch –a bowl of the stale cereal Matthew left behind last weekend– when he gets a text from Blue. He expects the usual photo of whatever hideous shoes Gansey’s decided to wear for the day, but instead he gets a short and sweet Ahhhh! followed by a smiley emoji. Another text rolls in a moment later, with a tree emoji and multiple exclamation points. Ronan suspects that Cheng’s hijacked the midget’s phone, so he doesn’t bother with a reply.

Hours later, when the sun is setting behind the treetops on the back end of the property, Ronan gets a phone call. Blue’s cheeky smile illuminates his screen and draws Opal’s attention from her spot beside him. They’re both sitting on the steps of the front porch, eating watermelon and playing an old board game Ronan found stashed away in a closet. Opal has no idea what she’s doing, but Ronan pretends he’s getting his ass handed to him anyway.

“Blue!” Opal cheers, clapping her hands together and splattering juice onto her wool dress. Ronan uses the back of his sleeve to wipe her mouth and grumbles at her to go inside and clean off. Once she’s through the front door, he accepts the incoming call.

“What?”

“Lynch, my favorite disgruntled seal boy! How are you?” Cheng’s annoyingly chipper voice greets him. He doesn’t give pause for an answer and follows up his question with a laugh. “You won’t believe what Parrish did!”

Ronan’s interest piques at the mention of Adam, but he says:

“What are you doing with the pipsqueak’s phone?”

“Being an excellent hype-man,” Cheng laughs again. “Really, guess what Parrish spent his afternoon doing?”

Ronan sighs. He’ll admit that he’s come to somewhat of an understanding with Cheng; by understanding, he means that he knows the other man’s a fixture in Blue and Gansey’s life now, so he reins back on his impulse to deck him in the face and Cheng usually leaves him alone in return. Usually.

“I don’t need to guess,” Ronan scratches at his ear with a pinky finger. “I’ll find out when he gets back.”

“Tattoo,” Cheng says abruptly, ignoring Ronan completely. He sounds excited. “Parrish got a tattoo.”

There’s a voice that’s distinctly Blue’s shouting from somewhere in the background, clearly pissed that the cat’s out of the bag, but Ronan’s too stuck on the word tattoo to pay any attention to what’s being said. He ends the call and rubs a hand at the nape of his neck while attempting to picture Adam with ink. It’s not a complete surprise that the other man got a tattoo; they’d both been discussing it off and on over the last year, with Adam indecisive over what he wanted.

“It has to mean something,” Adam had said once, while scribbling ideas onto the back of a notepad.

Ronan’s dragged back to the present when Opal pushes open the front door and peers out with scrunched eyebrows. Her wool dress is soaked and there are suds along her forearms that are dripping onto the floor. She looks mad, even though she’s probably the culprit behind whatever happened. It’s a very Lynch expression. 

“You had one job, kid,” Ronan motions her back inside and they both go to the bathroom, where the faucet is pouring a steady stream into the sink and overflowing onto the white tile. The cold water knob is broken off and lying on the floor, the bottom end rusted. Ronan simply grimaces and rubs his palm along the back of his shaved skull. “Well, fuck.”

“Language,” Adam says, appearing behind them as suddenly as Noah used to. His voice is warm and his accent thick, like he’s genuinely happy to come home to a flooding bathroom and a sopping wet goat-child. He moves to sit a few grocery bags on the dining room table, the familiar white of tattoo wrappings peaking out from under his collar.

Ronan’s fingers twitch with the desire to pull back the gauze and take a look, but he does have a sink to fix first.

“Adam!” Opal shrieks excitedly, trotting from Ronan’s side and plastering herself against Adam as if she’s not seen him in ages. Her eyes are round and bright with unfiltered adoration for the man and Ronan recognizes that look. Yeah, definitely a Lynch. “Welcome back!”

Adam smiles, simple and sweet.

“You’re soaked,” he says and tugs on one of Opal’s wet sleeves. “Why don’t you go and put on something else? I have a present for you from Blue and Gansey, so I’ll be up there in a minute.”

Opal doesn’t need to be told twice because she’s scurrying up the stairs in an instant, hooves like gunfire on the hardwood.

Ronan and Adam simply stare at one another for a few seconds before Ronan makes a turning gesture with his finger. Adam understands, turns around, and carefully lifts off his shirt until the wide expanse of wrappings are exposed. Ronan’s surprised at how large the area is; it covers skin from the nape of Adam’s neck, flares out along his shoulder blades, and ends half way down his spine. There are even a few pieces of gauze secured on the curve of his neck that leads up to his left ear. 

“No fucking wonder you were gone all day. Jesus fuck, Adam,” Ronan means it like high praise, his voice lilting with excitement as he ignores the flooding bathroom in favor of slowly peeling back the coverings to view the ink beneath. It’s a slow process and Adam complains under his breath, but Ronan is in complete awe once he has the tattoo uncovered.

The majority of it is a single, monstrous tree: dozens of branches join into a lush canopy that spreads across Adam’s shoulder blades and reach to the base of his neck. There are a lot of details in the leaves, in the knots of wood along the branches and the trunk. The many roots of the tree twist together into a final point on his lower back, centered on his spine; an infinity loop.

Ronan gently touches Adam’s side, as close to the tattoo as possible without causing any discomfort. He leans closer when he notices writing within the base of the tree and actually laughs when he realizes it’s all of everyone’s names. Gansey, Blue, Adam, Ronan, and Noah are inked into the skin along Adam’s spine, as if someone had actually carved their names into the bark of the tree with a knife.

Beautiful. Ronan has no other word to describe the piece of art on his boyfriend’s skin. Then his eyes snag on Adam’s neck again, as the other turns to see what’s taking him so long. There are ravens emerging from the canopy of the tree, wings spread and flying in a curving pattern that leads to the back of Adam’s deaf ear.

“Well?” Adam asks quietly.

Ronan can’t wait for the ink to settle and the irritation to fade because he wants to trace every single line with his fingertips.

“It’s amazing,” he answers genuinely, then steps back a few paces to really look.

The water flooding the bathroom floor has begun seeping out into the living room. It’s already around Ronan’s work boots and reaching for Adam, pressing around his feet like it’s trying to embrace him. Standing in the pool of water, with the tattoo on his back and his left ear facing Ronan, Adam looks like a creature torn straight from Ronan’s dreams. A secret. A magician.

Ronan can almost feel the memory of Cabeswater whispering to him: Magi. Our hands, our eyes.

“Ronan?” Adam asks while pulling his shirt back on. “What’s wrong?”

With a small shrug of his shoulders, Ronan steps in closer until his lips are almost touching the shell of Adam’s deaf ear. He presses a kiss right behind it, barely missing a small raven, and grins at Adam’s short intake of breath. Right before he pulls back, he whispers you’re gorgeous against warm skin, but Adam doesn’t hear it.

“What did you say?” Adam frowns, the tips of his ears pink.

Ronan grins.

“I asked if you’re as good at fixing sinks as you are at fixing cars?”

Adam’s face scrunches up into an expression Ronan somehow finds both unpleasant and attractive. It makes him want to kiss him.

“That’s not what you said, asshole. And I’m not fixing the sink. You broke it, you fix it.”

[gentlebcnes]

betterdcyz​.

Adam eyed back down at the card. Two of Cups. He knew he had to figure this out by himself, but sometimes he found it hard to know if he was right or not. He wasn’t like her; she had years of experience and knowledge, and Adam was merely an apprentice, new to the world of psychics and tarot card reading and scrying. But what Persephone said was correct. 

He needed to navigate it in his own way. To learn. To understand. To be confident with his answers. Adam squared his shoulders and smiled a little, matching Persephone’s grin. “I need to keep being confident with my answers, I get it.” In a way, Adam needs to keep on being independent. “And it feels right. I understand what they’re saying. It’s balanced for the moment. So I supposed they’re giving their Magician a bit of a holiday break.” It was a little bit of a joke, knowing that Cabeswater wasn’t the boss of him, or so Persephone had informed him. 

“But I do want to keep on learning. More about tarot reading, and perhaps other stuff that I might be capable of doing?” 

Persephone kept a careful gaze on Adam. It didn’t take her long to be able to read was his expressions meant. How he overthought everything, wanting to get it JUST RIGHT. However, this was all still very new to him, it wasn’t something that could be learned in a matter of days, or weeks. It took TIME and practice. It took her years and with her experience and practice, she had been able to hone her skills. 

And because of that, she was able to help guide Adam in his journey to do the same.However, that was all she was for him A GUIDE. The journey was entirely up to him. There was only so much she could do for him. She gave a nod of her head at Adam’s words. She could give him the answers he sought, but he wouldn’t be learning then. He cannot depend on her all the time, and she could not always be her for him if he needed her. 

A hint of a grin curling at the corners of her lips at his next words, the tiniest joke, but she found herself amused by it. “Mmmm, everyone DESERVES a break.” She gave another nod of her head. “Good, it’s always good to want to learn more. I will help you in anyways that I can, Adam.”