#baby quasi yes

[frenchublog]

[falinscloaca]

late 2010s quasi-almost-"new-weird" feminist fantasy comics failing to live up to the same themes done better in the 1997 anime Revolutionary Girl Utena

[vaspider]

If you have celiac or otherwise can't eat wheat, btw, and you like bread, I highly recommend investing in a breadmaker. Even the best store-bought gluten-free bread does not hold a candle to the stuff that comes out of our breadmaker, and it's cheaper per slice even when we buy bread mix in single-loaf bags.

This is our breadmaker. Evie got it on sale, but it is an investment. I'm not going to pretend it isn't a chunk of change up front. There are cheaper ones, but the reason I like this one and think it's worth the money:

It has two smaller paddles, where our older bread maker that my mom got us and got destroyed by getting construction dust in it had one big paddle in the middle. This leaves a big hole in the middle of the finished loaf, which makes the bread much less useful for, like, sandwiches.

Zojirushi is not as well-known a brand in the US, but it's a Brand Name in Japan for good reason. Evie's had our Zojirushi rice cooker for over a decade & we had to replace the inner bowl once bc someone used metal utensils in it and scratched the non-stick coating. We expect to use this machine for at least a decade.

You can program your own cycles, which we found really useful. Evie built a custom cycle that removed the punch-down sections (gluten-free bread tends not to rise as much) and that made our perfect loaf.

A lot of bread machines produce very tall, square loaves, which are awkward to slice, store, and make sandwiches with. This produces loaves that make good sandwiches and toast, and the French toast slices don't crowd the pan.

The top heating element on this gives a really amazingly browned top crust that we definitely didn't get on our old machine.

It's so pretty.

So how is it cheaper in the long run if the machine costs $300+? A little like this:

We use Pamela's Bread Mix bc it's really consistent and easy - you need the bread mix, water, yeast, 3 egg whites, and oil. (We use avocado oil and find it best and most consistent, but regular vegetable oil works!) We buy Pamela's in bulk, and without any subscription discounts or whatever, the $48 pack of 3 bags makes about 11.5 loaves. With the cost of yeast and eggs and stuff, it ends up costing about $4.50 a loaf. (If you buy your yeast in larger bags & store it in an airtight container, you can create less waste and it's also cheaper.)

By comparison, a loaf of Franz GF Bread costs $7-8, and Canyon Bakehouse usually runs about the same.

However, that's not an apples to apples comparison because the Franz loaf is an 18 oz. loaf, whereas our breadmaker makes a 2 lb. loaf. Assuming even the lower-end cost for getting a Franz loaf at the store, an equivalent amount of bread would cost $12.42, and it's not nearly as good.

(Yes, gluten-free bread is fucking expensive. That's part of why I'm writing this post in the first place.)

Anyway, assuming you eat 2 lbs. of bread a week in your house - a breadmaker loaf, basically, to make the math simple - you'll end up spending $7.92 less on bread every week. That means that even at the most expensive cost for the Zojirushi, if you buy it at its highest price (don't do that! wait for a sale!) it'll take 50 weeks - about a year - before the breadmaker pays for itself. If you manage to get it on a 25% off sale (which we did), it pays for itself in about 9 months.

Nine months, I must stress, in which you are eating much more delicious bread.

We tend to go through a couple of loaves a week because toast, sandwiches, and melts are great food for people with low spoons.

Evie and I perfected the Pamela's mix recipe for this particular machine - I'll get it typed up when I'm downstairs next, along with the quasi-babka recipe. (Really, it's like a marble cake and babka and bread had a baby, and it's a family favorite.)

Bread good. The end.

[mixtapedoh]

and it was all yellow | y.j.

welcome back to SVTU ! lost your way? refer to our campus map for directions.

pairing: yoon jeonghan x gn!reader with guest appearances from c. seungcheol, h. joshua, w. junhui, and more !

word count: ~5.9k genre: neighbors to friends to lovers warnings: language, intermittent Lore Dumping™ (i have to kick us off into svtu somehow), jeonghan is a little shit, light suggestive themes (heavily lampshaded and perhaps only occuring twice?)

☄. *. ⋆

olive's notes: these individual headcanon sets are going to be very ~stream of consciousness~, so bear with me, here. second, cheol and jeonghan are brothers (and there's a secret third brother i'll introduce eventually, don't you worry), also, thank you for stopping by <3. now here's the content you signed up for.

☄. *. ⋆

now playing... ılı.lıllılı.ıllı. ... ⌜ angel baby — troye sivan ⌟

AND IT WAS ALL YELLOW ☄. *. ⋆

— it all started when jeonghan realized that jun was loaded.

now, don't get him wrong. it wasn't as though he had befriended jun because jeonghan had been looking for someone rich and easily persuaded. it's not like jeonghan used his ineffable charm to win over the quasi-cryptid that was wen junhui because of jun's apparent legacy funds.

not that jeonghan couldn't have done — he clearly had the persuasion and cunning to do it — he just didn't. jeonghan wasn't in need of someone else's money. please. he was very capable of taking care of himself, thank you very much, he was just also, however, very good at knowing things.

especially those things that could be used to his advantage.

— and well... wen junhui was loaded. wealthy as shit. a classic trust fund baby. a walking dollar sign that just so happened to share classes with jeonghan every year since he started SVTU as a political science major (of arts, of course. he hadn't taken latin in high school to not absolutely crush the romance languages in uni).

— you see, SVTU had this fun little program for long-suffering students interested in the government and manipulating it to their will wherein if you took merger courses — lectures that ate up a hell of a lot of your time and money but gave substantial credit hours that counted for both applied and allied course credit — you could get a jump start on your degree, be offered more opportunities for internship, and explore a subject's "many facets" through "multiple lenses."

to jeonghan, it meant working faster and harder so that he might graduate early and get into the actual politics of pol sci quicker — at a more “genius” and “revolutionary” age.

(half of politics, after all, was being appealing enough to make headlines. there wasn’t time to waste, in the long run.)

to wen junhui it had to mean something different — after all, jun was a pre-law student with a completely different career path from the other party involved (though jeonghan had considered law at one point in time — something he’s not above admitting though certainly not pining after). merger courses for him likely meant an expedited process to law school. but that was truly beside the point. an aside.

— what mattered in the end, was that jeonghan and jun had more than enough shared merger courses to go around, and in the process of things, had gone from strangers to acquaintances, then study partners (blame it on the fact that jun — the altruistic leaning bastard he was — actually tutored in his free time. willingly. as in, not a joke.) to committed group project members, and eventually to that nebulous thing called friendship.

ask them both when that final stage commenced and you’d get varying responses — jeonghan always far more generous than jun in such regards, but almost annoyingly so, like he wanted to be the one leaning more on the ridiculous.

— yes, it was quite a ways into their friendship when jeonghan learned that wen junhui, his sweet jun, was loaded. like, living alone off of campus in his own two bedroom apartment on the wealthy side of the city that prospered from the University Living Aesthetic™, loaded. as in, so loaded he could have easily found more than enough willing bodies to become roommates with him and help pay for the exorbitant expenses but simply decided against it because he hadn’t, and i quote “thought about it before.”

“never thought about it? jun. how much does this place cost?”

and jun had to think for a minute. genuinely think about how much he paid in monthly rent. “i suppose for a month’s rent i pay around… [REDACTED].”

and jeonghan was no stranger to dramatics, to be sure, but anyone else would have gaped the same as him. “[REDACTED]??”

"[REDACTED]."

"...shit."

— yes, jeonghan finding out that jun was loaded, living in a (rather well kept) apartment with an empty room, no roommates, and an assortment of (dying) houseplants that needed care, was truly the beginning of it all.

— after all, while the chaos settled in a year after the fact when he and joshua would finally move in with jun because of circumstances that aren't truly relevant to the here and now, all true origins start a little before dramatic changes. there's always a gentle precursor, something soft that sets the stage. rumblings of change are necessary forefathers to the strength of revolution; jeonghan learning that jun was a walking line of credit with property to his name and a work ethic that would make any professor blush was necessary groundwork for the events that would follow.

and goddamn, if things didn't follow.

— but i suppose, if we're back tracking all the way to jeonghan and shua moving in with jun on one very ill timed sunday (jun had an exam in his special topics in deviance, crime, & the law course the next day), we are also brushing up against jeonghan meeting you.

another precursor to the chaos that would follow. another tremor that would shake the ground and cause things to tumble.

— you also lived in the terraces on 17th and attended svtu. you lived on the same floor as jun — two apartments down from his, no less — and his first week there, you showed jeonghan the campus shuttle routes that passed right outside the complex (he'd come to learn that the domino route was the one you took most often, as it led right to the heart of the university, but the pinwheel route was also a convenient option for evening courses).

— you and jeonghan weren't friends right away. no, you were always a friendly face around the complex and a decent conversationalist when stuck in the elevator together, but it wasn't as though you and jeonghan became fast friends. you were just neighbors for a while; just another person grabbing mail on monday afternoons, stopping at the in-residence coffee shop on bleak wednesday mornings, ordering pizza on saturday evenings and giving joshua a slice after he weaponizes his big, brown eyes.

— and then came The Series of Fire Alarm Mishaps.

— you see, at some point in the middle of the semester, someone new moved into the apartment building, in the same hall as you and jeonghan. at first, you barely even noticed the change, and then they started cooking.

— which wouldn't have been a problem. if they had been good at it.

the first few times the (incredibly loud and not unreasonably sensitive) fire alarms from down the hall had gone off, it had been unfortunate - a mild nuisance that disrupted what jeonghan had been doing, and nothing more. but then, the first few times became multiple, and from multiple, came a pattern. every other day, at least twice, the fire alarm next door would go off. and it would always be at different times - breakfast, the afternoon, early evening, even sometimes at 1:28 in the morning. the fire alarm would sound, and while it would mostly be no longer than a minute or two, it was still enough to be irritating.

you and jeonghan talked about it every time you saw each other in passing, or just so happened to be taking the same shuttle to campus (which happened quite often, anymore, since jeonghan enrolled in an extra course to help him graduate all the sooner). your neighbor and that damn fire alarm. your neighbor and their inability to cook, yet unnecessary dedication to the craft. you both joked about the inevitability of them actually burning the apartment down.

— and then, one day, the fire alarm went off at 2:19, waking jeonghan up out of a dead sleep (he hadn't meant to fall asleep at his desk, and his neck would pay for it all the next day). he heard it, and immediately decided to ignore it, knowing it would stop soon.

but then it didn't.

at about 3.5 minutes of non-stop alarms, jeonghan was annoyed enough that he left his room and staggered into the kitchen for some water, where shua and jun were already waiting around, likely with the same idea (though it was clear that shua hadn't ever fallen asleep, and perhaps jun was in the same boat, though he'd changed into sweats and a light t-shirt).

at about 6 minutes, jeonghan opened the door to see if anyone else was, well... concerned.

and at 13 minutes, he was standing outside in the brisk autumn air, agreeing with jun as he whispered that if there wasn't an actual fire but just their talentless neighbor attempting to cook in the middle of the night, he was going to kill the bastard himself.

— and there, in the middle of all this stupidity — sleepily rocking back and forth from one foot to another — and on the other side of him, was you.

— and, well, when you offered to buy him and the rest of his roommates coffee at the convenience store that was just down the street, not far, he couldn't do much beyond say yes. what was he going to do? decline your offer?

and so all four of you walked to the convenience store and aimlessly wound your way through the almost neon colored aisles. jeonghan used the opportunity to stick to you like glue and get you to open up — about yourself and your roommates, both of whom had gone home for two weeks for (separate) family vacations (not that you were jealous. clearly the superior option was to stay at the apartment, embroiled in course work and standing outside at 2:00 am because of some loser neighbor who can't cook a singular meal without burning the building to the ground, and yet refuses to have anything delivered).

— in the end, the fire hadn't been bigger than something contained in the pan ("thank god," you had said, shaking your hands in lackluster triumph, "i have a physics exam next week. i need those notes more than you know"), but at only 4 months of having a new neighbor, someone new moved in within 2 weeks at most. and, after being neighbors for almost 7 months, you and jeonghan were decidedly friends.

after all, you bought him a triangular gimbap, ice cream, and convenience store coffee. jun had slipped away with just a banana milk (which he promptly paid back the next day), and shua nearly bought out the whole store once the two of you got to talking about the best midnight (and hours after) snacks lining the walls. at the least, he was indebted to you, which could only be solved by more trips to the convenience store with more mindless conversation, and more time for the both of you to endear yourself to the other.

and the way jeonghan saw it, friendship at that point was inevitable. especially when, at the start of the next semester, you and jeonghan both had an early morning class and used the domino route to get to class via campus shuttle.

(and sure, jun had an early class, too, and drove himself to campus everyday, meaning jeonghan could have easily just gotten a ride, but he didn't. for no particular reason, really, he just never did; but one frost bitten morning after a snowstorm, when jeonghan was waiting at the shuttle stop and you stood beside him, bundled up in a thick winter coat and rubbing the tips of your fingers to keep them warm, you turned to him, the cord of the wired headphones the both of you always shared swaying from the movement (a streak of yellow against all this white, the sun in the middle of stark winter), and smiled, "i'm glad you're here with me." and maybe — just maybe — that was reason enough.)

— and thus, for reasons above explained, in the end, it all started with jeonghan learning jun was loaded. if it weren't for that simple knowledge, he wouldn't be anywhere near where he currently stood.

— which was the open doorway of jun's apartment, garbage in hand, falling in love with you.

"what?"

and you at least had the presence of mind to be flustered by it.

jeonghan could laugh, really. "is that my jacket?"

it totally was, and perhaps the way you fiddled with the sleeve of it and scoffed awkwardly, refusing to meet his eyes, was the true giveaway that you knew it most certainly was. "i don't know, is it?"

you were met with smug silence, so of course, you'd elaborate.

"i thought it belonged to my ex. i just chose what looked the warmest. it's storming out there — you might want something more than a sweatshirt if you're taking that all the way to cans." you gestured to the garbage bag — a detail jeonghan had almost forgotten at the sight of you in his clothing.

"you think your ex would have bought that?"

of course he wasn't going to take your bait in changing the subject. that would make things easy. you rolled your eyes, spinning your key ring and making it jingle. "hoseok has great style. it's just different from yours."

"and that jacket is more my style than his."

"it is," you conceded. under jeonghan's gaze you stuck one half of the jacket out, towards him. "do you want it now? you'll need it out there."

"i don't think i will. not when i'll have your sunny presence to warm me."

and for a split second your eyes narrowed. you had just come in from the storm — that much was plain to see from the wet of the jacket to the reusable grocery bag in your hand, full of pantry odds and ends. there was no need to go back out, and you and jeonghan both knew it. and not to mention that the invitation (thinly veiled) was unattractive — stay inside where it was warm or brave the stormy weather once more, all for a garbage run?

"race you to the elevator."

— and see, the truth of the fact was, it wasn't as though you made it difficult to fall in love with you (though even if you had, jeonghan would have liked the challenge, perhaps. there's fun in plenty of things). you were generous, a good conversationalist, you bitched about people with jeonghan but still tried to see the best in them, you were knowledgeable about the most random yet oddly applicable things, and for all of his teasing, you put up with him. perhaps enjoyed him.

— it certainly confused seungcheol, to say the least (but don't such things always confuse brothers).

"as someone who's had a lifetime to cherish your personality, there has to be something wrong with this y/n if they're willingly spending time with you. i'm trying to save my soul, putting up with you on the daily. they have no excuse."

"if i'm going to respond to that, you'll have to give me five minutes to run first."

and it ended with jeonghan quickly pushing away from the table, trying to duck out of seungcheol's grasp; but of course, the older brother and president of the boxing club would get him anyway, and through laughter, attempt to knock some humility into jeonghan (it wouldn't stick).

— but no need to focus on all of that, now. after all, this deep into the semester, jeonghan was busy enough without Crippling Thoughts of Romance.

— the worst damage you wrought thus far was making him choke that day you wandered into karaoke club and he was in the middle of a duet joshuji had managed to cajole him into doing on the spot (you swore up and down that you didn't know he was even in the club to begin with, but something about your flustered behavior and shua's glee at the whole affair made him consider otherwise); while it had been a (minor, he claimed) blow to his pride, it was easily pushed aside. jihoon, the bastard, might bring it up on occasion — the one (1) time angel voice yoon jeonghan chokes, and it's all on camera — but other than that, jeonghan? cool as a cucumber.

the last thing he'd do is be awkward around a crush. jeonghan was cool; jeonghan was suave; jeonghan was speaking in the third person because joshuji had been on a self-love bender a few months back and had said daily affirmations into the mirror every morning, and after finding out and teasing him relentlessly for it, jeonghan unfortunately picked up the habit.

AND IT WAS ALL YELLOW (CONT.) ☄. *. ⋆

— and now that we've gotten this far, i suppose it's time we bring up Jeonghan Habits™ because there were many, the closer you and jeonghan got to each other, strings of fate drawing you ever nearer, joining you at the hip.

— for one, it seemed that ever since that first unfortunately timed run to the convenience store at hours after-midnight, jeonghan felt comfortable just showing up at all odd hours of the evening, all messy hair and too-big hooded sweatshirts (most stolen from seungcheol, he'd reveal to you one day when you were confused as to just when jeonghan had picked up a love of coton de tulear puppy conventions — enough to get a commemoriative sweatshirt, no less), with the oh-so-enticing offer of going to grab a snack.

he even called it a date, once, when you were wrapped up in three blankets and your fuzzy house slippers, weakly try to convince him to just rummage through you're cupboards instead

"you're so cold you're going to cancel our date? and here i thought we had something real."

(you'd been so flustered by the whole exchange you simply ended up going to the with him, hoping that the act of Just Doing It would buy you time against his rapid fire machine gun comebacks — probably exactly what the fucker had planned in his 4d chessboard of a brain — and jeonghan took the opportunity to file away in his mind the cute expression that crossed your face in the split second that the words hit you fully in the chest and you floundered, wide-eyed into recovery)

— another, of course, was his habit of casually leaving things at your place whenever the two of you hung out; the first few times he left something — his jacket, a pair of sunglasses, necklaces that you don't ever quite recall him taking off to begin with — you promptly returned it with the naive belief that it was a one-off mistake not like to happen again. but it just kept happening, and so eventually, you just stopped returning.

if it were important, jeonghan would have texted you about it — he texted you about all kinds of random things, anyway, his lost socks would be no more strange than texts of ootds or how particularly sparkly his eyes looked that day.

and he never did...

until you started to wear the things he left, of course.

'should i get two of these?' the text came in while you were walking to your next class, taking your sweet time since the weather had cleared up nicely and the campus shuttles were running smoothly — not a single one hand been late all week, a sure change from usual. a moment later your phone chimed again, and jeonghan had sent a picture of a silver ring with a greek key styling. it was cool enough, and fit in nicely with jeonghan's usual style of accessory (not that you were particularly knowledgeable of such things... haha.)

'sure, but why 2?'

'so you can have one of your own instead of stealing it.'

'???!?'

'look at your outfit right now. you're wearing MY necklace. it's been missing for weeks.'

'YOU LEFT IT AT *MY* APARTMENT??????'

'you still have necklaces of your own; didn't have to be mine.'

'😑'

'so what's your ring size?'

'stfu'

— in your defense, you didn't think it was an issue, borrowing the things he'd randomly leave at your apartment. it had started off innocuously enough — seonghwa and momo (your roommates, bless them) needed you to go grab a few last minute ingredients for dinner (they were the ones cooking, so charitably you offered to do the grunt work) and when you couldn't find your own sunglasses, there were jeonghan's, just sitting on your dresser and waiting to be used.

and after that, well... jeonghan had nice style, okay? you were not immune to convenient and accessible clothing. if jeonghan wasn't so forgetful of his own articles of clothing, it wouldn't be the case that you steal his favorite sunglasses and borrow his usual rings and get a little too caught up in the way his cologne lingers on his jackets and night shirts, a smell all-too comforting and somehow tempting...

— you attempted to give the necklace back later that week when you and jeonghan met up to take the domino route to university, but he just shrugged it off and told you that you might as well keep it. he already bought himself another.

and besides. it looked good on you.

— and as for the last of Jeonghan's Habits™ (certified and trademarked, of course, everything jeonghan did was protected by common law)... well... the discovery of this one came later, at a time you weren't expecting it, and so perhaps that explains why it makes you as flustered as it does.

— see, it's of no surprise that yoon jeonghan is clingy in a very positive sense.

being friends with jeonghan is always being kept in the loop, having an ongoing dialogue about most everything, doing lot of Things together and always knowing that if there's something you're even thinking of doing, jeonghan has already cleared his schedule in anticipation of going to do said thing alongside you.

— what surprised you, but really shouldn't have (so perhaps the right word is simply astonished, flustered, made giddy by the realization of), was that he was also very cuddly. and very hard to be talked out of, no less.

— and like, okay, sure, it was kind of hypocritical of you to be taken aback when you'd been indulging jeonghan of his affinity for physical touch for quite some time, now.

the surprise hugs whenever he caught you waiting for the campus shuttle or simply Minding Your Own Business, his inclination towards taking your hand to make you walk a little faster when the two of you were going convenience store diving (yes, again), the quite literal poking and prodding whenever he was attempting to get you to change your mind and agree with his worst impulses... it was all pretty damning, in retrospect. but it never really fazed you: jeonghan's cuddly sort of behavior.

though you had gotten a smug kind of glee whenever you initiated contact and jeonghan's cheeks would warm to a beautiful shade of pink before he'd counter his own seeming embarrassment with a comment like "aaahhhh y/n, you're so familiar, what would others think if they saw you?"

randomly touch jeonghan's forearm, whether to pull him closer for some reason or another or just to softly massage the skin while you absentmindedly scrolled on your phone (instagram scrolling was sacred time you and jeonghan shared — then you didn't have to send him the reel with your comments, you could just tap him on the shoulder and show him). they way jeonghan would get all shy at the touch — like maybe he felt some of those butterflies that perpetually fluttered about in your stomach whenever he was around — was all the satisfaction you could ever need.

— so yes, you were quite used to clingy jeonghan. but cuddly? you had never quite strayed into full cuddle territory... until you did.

— that fateful night, you had lovingly been given notice via a very abrupt group text that you would not be able to return to your apartment for the evening (someone was going to have company over, doing... things that familiar company do) and when you had told jeonghan of your plans to join seonghwa in his trip to the computer rooms at crescent hub (they were open 24 hours and while it was based on reservation, you were almost always able to get a seat), he offered you come to his apartment instead.

either that, or i guess you could spend your time watching the gaming club host whatever tournament they had going on — apparently jun was planning to be gone for Quite Some Time (as a senior member of the club) and shua was there... for moral support? that part was unclear, to be quite honest, but it wasn't as though shua ever needed a reason to be Busy and Outgoing, so it didn't quite matter much, in the end.

"why aren't you at crescent hub with your roommates, then?"

"and encourage them? ah... don't make me look soft."

and you're sure that the way you roll your eyes can be heard through the phone.

"i had an assignment to finish." / "you had work to finish."

"but! it's all been submitted now."

"then i'll meet you."

— after all, it's not like you were a stranger to jun's apartment — you'd hung out there plenty of times as your bond with jeonghan deepened and your friendship to shua and jun grew — and they did have a rather comfy couch... you were almost certain jeonghan's offer implied and unspoken 'you can at least get some comfortable sleep on our vertiable cloud of a couch when i'm done prying at the finer details as to just who momo decided to bring home.'

you both, after all, had a deep-seeded delight for gossip.

— and when you got there, it was exactly what you expected: jeonghan had seemingly raided the pantry finding ingredients so the two of you could make dakdoritang — excepting the carrot, of course.

despite his seeming love for convenience store runs and general lazy attitude toward preparing his own meals, cooking together seemed to be something jeonghan enjoyed lately — or at least, that's what you surmised. to you, it seemed that one day jeonghan woke up and chose cooking as a new hobby.

if you were to ask jeonghan, he would brush it off, of course, probably saying something about his mom visiting and praising jun's affinity for cooking and there was no way jeonghan could let the bastard win — but really all it had taken was one (1) absentminded hand on his chest from you and a "hannie, can you pass me the garlic cloves?" for him to make cooking with you a new personality trait of his. go figure.

— and so the two of you made your stew while debating which movie you should watch when you were done. you ended up compromising on some drama that you'd seen people claim was so bad it was good, and it really was. the cringe,,,, the mutual yelling at the tv,,,,,,, threatening the lives of fictional characters,,,,,,, talking over whole dialogue scenes because you had a brilliant rewrite in mind and jeonghan simply couldn't resist the way you looked when there was an earnestness in your eyes and an opinion on your lips,,,,

it was quite late, indeed, before you even knew it. and when you switched the tv to a music video you really wanted to show jeonghan, the autoplay sort of took over, and your mind sort of shut down... drifted off to sleep.

— you woke up at some point in the early morning; the sound of the lock clicking and the door opening wasn't the sound you were used to, in your apartment two doors down, and it was just enough to snap you awake momentarily, still half in dream yet with one foot in reality.

it was just shua and jun, and they whispered an apology before padding off to their respective rooms (jun his own, shua his shared room with hannie), clearly worn out from their gaming activities.

— but that little push to semi-wakefulness was just enough for you to take stock of where you were, and you noticed belatedly that jeonghan had never left to go back to his room. you were both sleeping on the couch, legs intertwined; jeonghan was resting his head on your shoulder and your hands were reaching out, as if almost to give him a subconscious hug.

— the embarrassment ran through your nervous system almost instantly, and when you made to slowly and gently move your limbs so you were less... interwoven, jeonghan stirred and, still sleeping, pulled you back towards him. perhaps even closer than before.

you couldn't help yourself. a giggle escaped you; perhaps half nerves, mostly endearment. jeonghan stirred again and the sound and you covered your mouth, not wanting to wake him.

he stilled soon enough, and before drifting off again, you kissed him on the forehead.

— when you fully woke up the next morning, jeonghan had already began his day, but he didn't even try to hide the fact that the both of you had unwittingly unlocked a new feature in this friendship of yours. he sort of just... took the night prior as a confirmation that cuddling was on the list of approved actions and refused to let go of you, after.

not that it bothered you, of course.

it just seemed that the butterflies in your stomach were given wild energy at this new development; all your strategies for calming them suddenly ineffective.

AND IT WAS ALL YELLOW (CONT.) ☄. *. ⋆

— so.

if you had asked jeonghan at any point in his life if he were good at manipulating, his answer would be an unequivocable yes.

deceit? of course.

scheming? obviously.

lying? naturally.

blackmailing? most assuredly.

gaslighting, gatekeeping, girlbossing? undoubtedly.

changing criteria? yes.

moving goalposts? clearly.

hiding the apparent? well...

— see, the thing is... you get so good at the others that concealing the obvious isn't exactly necessary. everyone might know to be wary of the scheming, cheating, self-serving yoon jeonghan, but it didn't change the fact that he was so astute at the rest of it, image didn't exactly matter.

and besides, why save face when it was so fun to see people accuse him of what they were all very aware?

— so yes, jeonghan was quite skilled at all manner of deception. the one facet he was not so adept in was hiding his feelings toward the matter.

— thus, it should be no surprise that everyone and their mother knew jeonghan had a crush.

and it was only getting worse.

— don't ask jun when he put the dots together — he was more emotionally intellectual than he let on most of the time — and don't ask joshuji when either — that fucker had this quirk where he joked about something before it had real honest basis, but in some way only attributed to the gift of clairvoyance, he always seemed to be right. if you were to ask joshua, he'd likely recall the first time he had looked at jeonghan and wiggled his eyebrows and call that he knew then (he didn't; at least, not really).

— as for s.coups... well, don't ever ask cheol anything about jeonghan. he'd rather die than give it to you straight.

please. when he could embarrass jeonghan? seungcheol lives for that shit.

after all, what else are older brothers for?

— so yes, it was obvious to those close to him that jeonghan was in the long-suffering limbo of Having A Thing For Your Best Friend But Not Acting On It, and it had been apparent for months.

— after all, it felt like centuries ago that joshua had offered to play matchmaker for jeonghan and you — the veritable apple of his eye — and set the two of you up on a date.

it had been some lazy morning and jun nearly spit out his breakfast.

"you'd both love it! i'd get jihoon to play something romantic on the violin; well, maybe recorder—"

cue jun choking once more.

"and you could be there waiting in full suit and tie."

"with couples rings waiting in the bread basket." and joshua's eyes went comically and maniacally wide at jun's inclusion.

"ah, cheol would crash any date like that."

"but then y/n could get his blessing!"

— at some point, jun was at his wits end.

in his defense, it was him who had to see the two of you be all sweet and love-struck all the time, giggling and teasing each other on his couch in his apartment while all he's trying to do is eat a sorry excuse of a subway sandwich (eat fresh.) before jetting off to his internship again.

if you had to see that shit while eating soggy bread you'd be annoyed, too.

one more "aigoooo" while jeonghan squishes your cheeks, and you bat him away with a roll of your eyes and jun would take a knife out of the block behind him.

— especially when jeonghan started calling you "angel" at every chance he got. had jun's eye twitching, it did. never had he regretted getting roommates until jeonghan fell in love.

one day jun learned that the phrase "get a room" made at least one of you self conscious enough to at least tone it down, and he never stopped weaponizing it, since.

— of course, overtime jun's protests became background noise, but once, when your roommates and jeonghan's all went to the museum of fine arts together to celebrate the end of finals week (it was free admission so long as you had your svtu activities card), jun had deadpanned his new favorite phrase in the middle of the outdoor conversation area. jeonghan had turned to you grinning, like it was the excuse he'd been waiting for all day, and after a lighthearted "shall we?" you grabbed his hand and the two of you pranced off to explore the sculpture terrace.

jeonghan had raised an eyebrow at your choice of exhibit, but you pulled him over to a sculpture of a human figure with black wings and flashed a smile: “it’s not a private room, but i think it works.”

“if you’d prefer it, i’m sure there’s a custodial closet we could go to instead. i bet there's one right outside, even.”

you snorted. “and if i did kiss you? what would you do then?"

— you stunned him into silence. him. yoon jeonghan. 

— right as he was about to recover and shoot back some smartass comment, you laughed — the sound clear and playful, bright and radiating with warmth — and then you wandered to where they showcased student work.

— umm... uhhh... WHATTHEFUCKWEREYOUDOING WHATTHEFUCKWASGOINGONNNNNN

“angel.”

you hummed absentmindedly, only half hearing jeonghan through the internal screaming reverberating in your skull.

“y/nnnnnnnnnnnnnnn…”

he was closer now, if you focused, you were sure you could feel him, inching closer, right behind you, just to your right…

— he kissed your cheek: half on the corner of your lips, half on the soft of your skin.

— you couldn’t help yourself. you turned.

“if you were bold enough to kiss me here, i’d kiss you back. then i’d be scandalized, ‘how forward!’”

your mouth opened: in shock, in delight, in laughter, in a heavenly mix of the three. jeonghan just stood there, all self-satisfied grin.

“you could waste your time finding a comeback, or you could be forward.”

“i think i have time for both.”

☄. *. ⋆

end of file .

SVT (sophrosyne; virtù; truth) University hopes you've enjoyed your stay !

[eisforeidolon]

To treat Jack like a helpless woobie take Jack seriously as a character, you have to ~*consider*~ the harm Dean did to him! Dean was forced into looking after Jack in a parental way despite his feelings about it would be a terrible parent, just look at how he treated Jack!

I'm not saying Dean doesn't have issues, because ... oh yeah. However? Come the actual fuck on with this harmless abused baby woobie Jack bullshit.

Starting from the bottom, oh noes, Dean was "a terrible parent" to the creature he thought he was going to have to be the one to kill. Especially because Sam was too caught up in his own issues of desperately needing to believe Jack could be good despite Lucifer (so he could believe he was good despite Azazel), and fixated on an opportunity to use his powers to get Mary back. Neither of which are exactly parent of the year material either, sorry. No shit! It was only as they leaned harder and harder into the absurdly fluffly two men and a nougat baby premise (where they even went so far as to give him magical consumption ffs) that it even makes sense to describe Dean's role towards Jack as "parental", because initially he was watching the dangerous monster Sam brought home in the hopes he'd somehow manage to protect both of them and everyone else from an unpredictable, invulnerable supernatural creature more powerful than Lucifer. Whether or not Dean's approach was a good way to treat a potentially explosive nephilim bomb is a whole other conversation, because asserting Dean would be a terrible parent because of that? Okay, sure, don't ask him to act like a parent to a supernatural threat he has no idea how to neutralize that could easily destroy the universe, that's clearly a bad idea, yes. 🙄

Again, when Jack was introduced, the Winchesters were literally concerned he was an unkillable monster and might destroy the universe - possibly on purpose, possibly on accident. Not just because he was Lucifer's son, not just because he was a nephilim, but because he literally almost did when tricked by fried chicken suit. When I consider Jack as a character and try to take him seriously, that includes remembering he's an unreasonably powerful supernatural creature who has issues controlling both his powers and his emotions, that starts out ignorant as a post and gullible as shit. Frankly, IMO, that doesn't improve much as the show goes on. The narrative itself swung wildly from treating Jack like a literal baby to a quasi-adult person to a cosmically powerful supernatural threat. On the whim of the script-of-the-week with little to no consistency. Then, after literally joking how absurd it would be to make an idiot woobie baby creature that didn't know shit Chuck's replacement, they went ahead and made him the new God because ... Dabbernatural, woo!

So yeah, I guess it's not like I actually can take Dabb's pet teenage stu seriously anyway. Let alone get palpitations over Dean not immediately treating poor wittle Jackie-poo like his child but instead the dangerous supernatural creature he was actually set up as when Sam wanted to adopt him for his own purposes.

[sweetmariihs2]

Since I got a Hunchback of Notre Dame (Disney movie mostly) hyperfocus I've been wondering about some stuff:

Quasimodo poured molten bronze from the top of the cathedral onto the people below, especially Frollo.

1 - He didn't cared about the innocent citizens down there which is weird for his character - maybe it was the stress idk. Or he just knew that the closest ones from the cathedral were the guards, which is where the bronze would fall. But it could have spilled on anyone. Weird.

2 - In the following morning there was no molten bronze (or smoke, or even the stage where Frollo tried to burn Esmeralda) on the square anymore. And everyone was fine?

3 - Why was there molten bronze in Notre Dame, specially in that place? I don't know much about the Middle Ages but it doesn't seem normal for that fire to be lit all the time, it would be a waste of time and firewood. Logically, it would only be melted when a bell needed to be repaired, and Quasimodo was stuck in those chains since they got out of the Court Of Miracles, probably. So it makes no sense.

4 - Poor boy was probably starving there. It was the next day. (Edit: or maybe the Court Of Miracles scene just happened at the previous day 11:00 PM and the fire scene happened at the next day 03:00 AM, who knows?)

5 - I only heard it was molten bronze. First time I watched I got so confused, I'm pretty sure that they didn't said that on the movie. Also, I never heard about churches having that kind of dangerous material inside them. People fixed the bells there? People made them there? Help I'm so confused. Can someone answer me? With real pics please? I tried to make a research but couldn't find anything.

I would also point out that Frollo standed on a gargoyle he HIMSELF had cut in the middle. He dug his own grave. lmao. you can see the cut mark of the sword on the gargoyle next to his feet. I think that's not really obvious and someone out there didn't got it. I only did after like my fourth watch.

Something I also wonder is if the archdeacon told Quasimodo the full story of what Frollo did to his mother. And yes, you may think "of course, I would love to see it that way, Quasimodo deserves to know", and while I agree with you... imagine how he would feel when knowing that the archdeacon knew the truth for years and kept it from him. Let Frollo lie to him, let Frollo abuse him and tell him that his mother abandoned him because he looked like a monster, for years, years and years. He wouldn't be fine. I can only think about his rage when Frollo tried to stab him at the end of the movie or when Phoebus appeared right after Esmeralda escaped from Notre Dame. Poor boy would never be able to look at that archdeacon's face again.

Why did the archdeacon let Frollo just take care of Quasimodo after what Frollo did?! He clearly didn't wanted to take care of the baby, the archdeacon just pushed little Quasi onto his hands for Quasi to suffer! When someone is denying something, they may do it but they'll do it grudgingly. If it was something stupid than it would be fine, but that's a whole life in his hands. The archdeacon just forced abuse on Quasi for years. What did he thought? That because Frollo felt guilty he would be a good father? He knows Frollo's character and saw how reckless he acted with that child's life. And even worse, he could have stopped it. But no, he saw Quasimodo suffering for 20 years and just let it happen.

Just found this on pinterest:

THE GARGOYLES ARE ALIVE AND I DON'T CARE ABOUT WHAT ANYTHING ANYONE SAYS. I also love them. Idc.

We see them interact with the environment around them all the time, mostly during the rebellion in front of Notre Dame by the end of the movie. I know that the sequel is not really good and maybe not even canon but Madeline sees them too. "They can be both schizophrenic" at the same time and seeing/hearing the same stuff? No way. Shut up I won't hear anyone out.

Quasimodo's pure heart and sweet - insecure behavior doesn't come from Frollo's childrearing. It comes from the Gargoyles and the insecurity Frollo buried into Quasi's head.

If Quasimodo was only raised by Frollo, he would be a thrash bag. He would have prejudice against the romani people, instead of just repeating in doubt what Frollo says during the scene where he shows the cathedral's terrace to Esmeralda. He also wouldn't be that sweet kind of guy who covers his view when suddently bumps into a girl changing her clothes. Basically he would be cruel and stupid, just like how Esmeralda said "How could such a cruel man have raised someone like you?"

And the answer is that: He didn't! Frollo taught him everything he needed to know, brought him food, and then left him alone for the rest of the day like we see him doing in the movie. You know who raised Quasimodo? The gargoyles. It's them who turned him into someone sweet and nice to have around. They're his adoptive parents in a way, you know?

And I also think that idea of them never showing themselves to humans but seeing that poor boy being left alone in that belltower made them want to do something about it. Make him some company, and teach him the right stuff - which is what Frollo wasn't doing right, just like everything else he does.

And I'M SURE, I JUST KNOW THAT IT WAS LAVERNE WHO DECIDED TO DO IT FIRST. She tried to convince Hugo and Victor about starting to help little Quasi, but they were afraid of doing it so. Laverne just said "you know what? I can't keep watching this in silence. Fuck it" and they just went along.

Also, something I learned in practice was that when you make someone insecure, convinces that person to believe they're less than anyone else and that they're stupid, dumb and ugly, this person tends to be extra nice to get approval of others. They don't even do it on purpose, the're just trying to make up for their appearence and stupidness through acts of kindess and service. And if that's done to them since a young age like it was done to Quasimodo, they do it unintentionally, and it turns into a personality trait. In a "I'm sorry for being like this. Let me make up for you" way. Like Quasimodo said "I know that I'm ugly", and in my opinion that's one of the worse ilnesses someone can have. It's not even a real ilness, and yet it's so damn hard to cure. Lmao that's totally not based on something I experienced, of course not. That's exactly why I absolutely don't kin Quasimodo. Of course not.

Children come into the world with a natural desire to discover and explore. To make Quasimodo so quiet and submissive, Frollo must have given the worst kinds of punishments to "discipline" him. He probably hit him more than once. Locked him somewhere? Maybe worse, Frollo tends to be quite creative when punishing innocent people. He broke all of Quasi's stuff he made for weeks, maybe years, just to scare him, and because he was angry.

It makes me even more worried to see how Quasi reacts to Frollo everytime they're together. He just reacts with fear and respect every time. Fear, mostly fear. What kinds of things hasn't this boy endured by disobeying or responding in a way that didn't pleased Frollo? To have to pick up the plates correctly and immediately sit down to study, and call him his "master" instead of just "Frollo".

I would also like to point out how Frollo stopped calling Quasimodo "Quasimodo" and started calling him "hunchback" closer to the end of the movie. That's how he sees him after all these years. A dumb, ugly and miserable guy who obeys him and is not even seen as a human. Have you ever watched The Goonies? You know that guy? Yes, that guy? I think that Frollo sees Quasi like this. The novel version reinforces this even more, with Quasimodo not being able to hear and barely talking.

I also headcanon that Disney's Quasimodo is still a bit deaf because of the bells. He can still hear, but lower. Sometimes his friends need to call his name twice.

And now these thoughts deserve a whole part of the post to discuss (Frollo and Esmeralda centered):

Frollo was probably considered ANCIENT because the life expectancy during medieval times was around 25-30 years. The guy was at his 66 years old.

1 - I know that in the book he's described as being afraid of woman, and a priest, so it made sense that he wasn't married. But that didn't happened in the movie. And as a (pervert) 66 yo old man, christian, white, powerful (judge and I still headcanon him as a fiefdom owner in the movie idc it makes sense in my head), traditional, who claims he's the only right person in the world and who does all kinds of atrocities, and who literally threatens (and tries) to kill Esmeralda if she refuses to "be his". Why didn't he had a wife? I mean, he could manipulate a woman or anyone for that matter if he wanted someone to... yk. I want to discuss more about this in the following topic.

What did Frollo meant when he said "Choose me or the fire"? I mean, there were three meanings for that quote in that context: "be in love with me", "hook up with me" or "be my wife (both, except that she would be stuck with him forever, and that's probably what he meant)"

Since he's a traditional christian guy and probably a sexist too based off his character, it would only made sense that he's the kind of guy to say "the man provides, the housewifes do the house chores and take care of the children".

As we see in 'Hellfire', he seems to support the purity culture, celibacy. And he's blaming himself for feeling attraction towards Esmeralda.

But this also can be for two reasons: because he choose celibacy, OR because she's a romani girl, which are people you know he despises. Or it can be both. That's also a doubt of mine.

Continuing my train of thought and taking this into consideration, Frollo feels extremely guilty for feeling attracted to her, and he claims "Destroy Esmeralda and let her taste the fires of hell; Or else let her be mine and mine alone" (I know you sang it).

Based off this, and knowing that Frollo is a radical (and hypocrite, but somehow he refuses to accept his lust for a long time) conservative christian, it would only made sense he would consummate after wedding. And by his word choices "let her be mine and mine alone", "choose me or the fire" sounds like he would like to MAKE HER HIS, PERMANENTLY. Maybe these words don't have this meaning? Maybe they're just about having her once? Maybe. But who knows. He's that kind of religious guy.

On the other way, he despises romani people and is disgusted of Esmeralda at the same time he's crazy about her. He calls her a witch, says it's her fault he was having those thoughts, "look at that disgusting display" (that classic kind of guy who says short skirts are innapropriate and too provocative but it's trying to look under them, iykyk). Basically he hates Esmeralda, who she is, despises her dance and calls it "disgusting display" and yet he's lusting over her. Considering this, it would only make sense he would do what he wants and leave her aside somehow, Frollo wouldn't want people to know that he married a romani girl, or a "vulgar girl" like her, maybe Frollo doesn't sees "the potential in her to be in a christian marriage", you know that that's extremely in character for him.

If Esmeralda had accepted his offer and did what he wanted, what would have happened? He would marry her and would exhibit her as a recanted woman? In a "I fixed her" kind of way, "and now she's my wife"? He would wipe all of her originality, personality and being out of her and turn her into his puppet like Elvis did to Priscilla in the movie "Priscilla", but worse? She would live an unhappy life with him and probably have his children too because this kind of guy believes in "only indulging in carnal acts when the purpose it's to reproduce"? Or maybe not, maybe he doesn't want children, but it doesn't matter because guys like him usually leaves all that on their wife's backs.

Also during the song "Hellfire" we see how fire Esmeralda "burns at the stake" and turns into smoke, flying into his direction with open arms. That's kinda metaphoric about him torturing her in that stake, stripping her of who she is and turning her into a ghost of herself. One that doesn't burn like flames, is softer, quieter, and willing for him and his twisted love - the kind of wife this kind of guy want.

While it also makes sense of him only having her once and considering Esmeralda "too promiscuous and part of the 'the common, vulgar, weak, licentious crowd', not good enough to be his wife", it's also possible that he's hinting about turning Esmeralda into a quiet, submissive and sad wife. "I can save you in this world and the other" maybe also hints at that, changing her so she's not "sinning" anymore by being who she is.

YOU KNOW WHAT? MADONNA AND THE PROSTITUTE THEORY ALL THE WAY UP. THAT'S WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT.

There's a great channel on Youtube called "Final Girl Studios" and the owner of the channel makes video essays, she LOVES to mention this subject. It fits perfectly what we're talking about.

And ALSO I WOULD ABSOLUTELY LOVE TO MENTION HER ESSAY ABOUT THE MOVIE "VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS". She talks about the Madonna and the prostitute theory and how the movie surrounds around this. And it's relevant to mention here that this movie has everything to do with the dynamic and topics discussed between Frollo and Esmeralda, not only in the Disney movie but also in the other adaptations and in the original novel.

I mean, it's a movie that's about a young girl called Valerie who just got into her puberty and spent a week finding out about how harsh the world is towards woman in general. So many things happen in this movie, but you can get what I mean when knowing that there's a scene when the priest tries to take advantage of her but fails because he remembered he should be celibate, and later then on the movie he tries to burn her at the stake, saying that she's a witch and seduced him to sin. Valerie then shows him her tongue.

Gosh that was so fun to take out of my chest and share. Someone needs to make a full post or video about how the Madonna x Whore subject is related to Esmeralda and Frollo. It's too much work for me, but maybe you guys would like to.

Also my friend mentioned about Esmeralda wearing different clothes during the stake scene. And yeah, okay, but if she was wearing different clothes, someone made her dress them, or dressed her themselves. She (my friend) was afraid that Esmeralda may have been assaulted or abused in any way during that period of time. I don't think Frollo did anything drastic like she does, or else he wouldn't be asking Esmeralda to "recant" and accept his offer.

[pedropascallme]

im just so obsessed with dad pedro rn😓😓😓

AN: Fuck it girl dad Pedro. This genuinely made me weak in the knees. (I'm PMSing and the baby fever is insane and ???? do I need any excuses really?? For dad!Pedro??)

“Papa, hold your hands like this.” Your daughter barked orders at her father, pulling him down to her level and molding his hands into a position she could work with.

Pedro sat crisscross on the floor, your daughter across from him rummaging through a giant bag of nail polish and small stickers. It hadn't taken much convincing to get Pedro to sit for her, let her use him as a canvas, but she was far too stubborn to ever throw away any of the dry, crusty bottles of polish in the deep bag.

“What color, mija?” Pedro hummed and watched her continue to toss the small bottles over the carpet, looking for the ideal shade. She let out a triumphant huff before pulling out a bottle of purple sparkly nail polish, placing it on the floor in front of her father as if asking for approval.

“This is the one we’re using.” She nodded, before quickly reaching her small hand back out for the bottle, satisfied with Pedro’s smile at her as a form of assent.

When you had found out you were pregnant, Pedro didn’t let you do a thing on your own. He went to every doctor’s appointment with you, did all the chores you had planned for yourself—he cancelled every audition, every screentest, just to stay home with you, to rub your feet at the end of your long day of doing nothing. (“You aren’t doing nothing,” he had fussed every time you said it, “You’re growing a little baby! Inside of you!”) Pedro was gentle with you, and with her, and kind, and ever so patient; always willing to model for a fashion show, always willing to watch her school choir performances, always thrilled at the prospect of having breakfast for dinner with her. It was as if he knew from the moment you announced your pregnancy that she would be a daddy’s girl, and the love he had for you multiplied to include her immediately.

Watching them now, from the couch, going back and forth about what animals they might see at the zoo later today, your daughter occasionally reprimanding Pedro for moving, him turning to smile at you where you sat on the sofa, eyes glistening with pride at the tiny person the two of you had created, your heart swelled.

He was such a good husband. Such a good father.

“Let them dry now, papa.” Your daughter stood up, brushing her hands on her capris as if she had just finished a long day of manual labor. “Mama,” she made her way to you, both hands planted on your knees leaning into you before collapsing onto her knees and wrapping her hands around your legs, head buried in your lap, “look at what I did to papa’s nails!” She squealed and her giggle was muffled by the denim of your jeans.

“Beautiful, sweetheart. You did such a good job!” You reached down to lift her up, letting her clamber into your lap, “He’s never looked better.”

“Hey!” Pedro laughed, spreading himself out on the floor, laying his head next to the bag of nail polish.

She leaned in then to whisper to you, her small voice somehow carrying more loudly when she attempted to be sly; “Can I use your makeup to make papa pretty?” Pedro smiled up at you, anticipating your answer.

“Yes,” you quasi-whispered back, “but only the makeup in the top drawer.” It was all she needed to hear, practically leaping off of your lap and bounding to the main bedroom to root through your drawers.

“You can borrow my nail polish remover, if you’d like.” You watched Pedro get up, wiping the palms of his hands on his knees before moving to enfold you in his arms where you sat on the couch.

That’s where she got it.

“No way,” he peppered your face with kisses before dipping down to capture your lips with his own, smiling into the kiss in a show of how pleased he was with you, with your daughter, with his nails. “Want everybody at the zoo to see my new look, querida.”

[catholic-character-tournament]

Round 1 - Side A

Propaganda below ⬇️

Claude Frollo Propaganda:

This man got horny and his response was “that woman must burn”

I love him so much. More seriously Book Frollo is much more ambivalent than Disney Movie Frollo which makes sense because we're talking about Victor Hugo VS a children's movie. He didn't kill Quasimodo's mom, he took him in (when himself was only nineteen and already in charge of his own baby brother since their parents had died not long before) when he was left on the church's doorstep. I mean, he does quite a few reprehensible and slightly evil stuff afterwards but he had a good start, you know ? He taught Quasi to communicate by signs when he became deaf because of the bells. He was also very much into alchemy which was pretty cool. His behavior towards Esmeralda was still very much not okay but I'd like to point out that Phoebus is also a jerk in this one. And Quasi's quite a bit amoral because no intelligent enough to understand some stuff

I actually haven't gotten very far through the book yet but from the musical (not the disney one the other one it's SO GOOD) I can confirm he sucks at being catholic. literally tells a child over and over that he's ugly and unlovable until he fully believes it and won't let the kid go outside. https://genius.com/Alan-menken-out-there-lyrics (lyrics to the song in which frollo convinces quasimodo he's unlovable. ableist as hell and shitty in every way you can possibly imagine and it breaks my heart every time. feel free to listen to the actual track but it doesn’t get good until about 40 seconds in) frollo keeps saying it's good and right to punish sinners himself, and it's not right that the wicked go unpunished. there's a really satisfying moment in the musical where quasimodo sees him for what he is and repeats his words back to him (7:45 - 8:54, frollo is the one with the insanely deep voice) and it gives me goosebumps every time to hear that "yes you do" link to that video: https://youtu.be/HL7WZcTIgus

I honestly wrote this submission because I suffered from severe insomnia for being reminded that I might have poor taste when it comes to enjoying media since I enjoy Disney version of Frollo even after I watched other versions of this character. (I am so sorry the host yes I am that annoying anon lying in the dark little corner of your ask box. I have no other thing to do in my life so hello again) His character is different from the original novel version, and to be honest as an adoption, that is NOT necessarily WRONG. He had more struggles with his pride and his self-imagine in the Catholic framework. "Beata Maria, you know I am a righteous man, of my virtue I am justly proud" as the opening line of his villain song, clearly states his main struggle throughout the movie--pride and self-imagine (super-ego) vs lust and instinct (id). Once his self-imagine in the Catholic framework was on shaking ground, he bent his twisted sense of "righteous" to make him less painful. Tbh, the novel version used the example of Bruno d’Ast to justify his hornyness, so it's just classical Frollo behaviour no matter which version it is. (SMASH THE TABLE) HAVE YOU READ~~THE NOVEL~~ I REPEAT: HIS CHARACTER IS NOT JUST "I HATE WITCHCRAFT AND I AM HORNY AND RACIST". I REPEAT: HIS CHARACTER IS NOT JUST "I HATE WITCHCRAFT AND I AM HORNY AND RACIST". I REPEAT: HIS CHARACTER IS NOT JUST "I HATE WITCHCRAFT AND I AM HORNY AND RACIST". I am sorry for the noise pollution in your submission Google form. I should have taken my sedatives regularly. I am truly sorry. Also please don't bully me in the debate, novel/musical enjoyers. LOOK, I AIN'T YOUR ENEMY. I LOVE NOVEL/MUSICAL FROLLO, I JUST LOVE DISNEY VERSION AS WELL, I AM AS TORMENTED AS YOUR FAVORITE CATHOLIC PRIEST. I am not a native tongue, so I tried my best to express my thoughts/feelings/justification why Disney version should be a qualified candidate as well. If you tried to debate with me, I would be drowned in my poor English. Sorry again.

Javert Propaganda:

His whole deal is like, “can someone still be good even if they’ve broken the law? Can you still be godly if you’re a felon” He really believes that by upholding the law, he is absolutely in the moral right all the time. And when he realizes that’s not true, it absolutely destroys him

he is the law and the law is not mocked <3 he is also. so gay. i'm sorry i refuse to believe you're even a little heterosexual if you chase jean valjean for like over 20 years for breaking parole and/or bread theft and recognise him by his muscles and have a major moral crisis as soon as he's nice to you one (1) time also he gets called out by a child that one time?? that was fun ALSO HE UHH???? THINKS HE SCREWED UP ONE TIME AND LIKE. ASKS HIS BOSS TO FIRE HIM???? (the boss is valjean he doesn't know that yet dw abt it) also uh uhm. he jumps into a river,,,, but before he does that he feels the need to put his hat on the fence nearby so it doesn't get wet lmao he's so silly goofy <3333

[ppeonppeonhan]

2023 BL Breakout Actors

I really hope to see more of these actors next year.

Louis Chiang | Kiseki: Dear to Me

He played a tiny lovesick tyrant who pined for his childhood bff and fellow gang member. I could've watched an entire drama just about him and his journey from impulsive orphan thug to feisty romantic. He was simply electric.

Suggested Role: There's a sports trend in BL right now, and he's so good at the physicality of acting that I'd love to see him play a competitive professional tennis player who's conflicted when he's forced to partner with his nemesis.

Lim Ji Sub | The Eighth Sense

He had to play such a heavy character -- a college student and surfer suffering from depression and survivor's guilt -- and his heartbreaking performance made you want to reach through the screen and give him a hug.

Suggested Role: South Korea does slice of life SO well that I'd really love to see him switch it up and pine for someone in a quasi comedic role. He could play a young real estate agent who starts to fall for one of his picky clients, and they learn together that the perfect home is one you make and not one you find.

Film Thanapat Kawila | Laws of Attraction

I honestly did not enjoy this drama, but I did enjoy his performance. He is so captivating as Charn -- this scenery-chewing, maniacal, traumatized, good-boy-turned-bad lawyer -- that his romantic love interest could not manage to keep up.

Suggested Role: I dunno. I feel like I'd happily watch him play this role again, and take down another corrupt politician.

An Jeong Gyun | Love Class 2

It's so easy to get lost in an anthology when there's three couples and when you're not traditionally attractive, but his character stole the whole damn series. He was so bold and upfront about his emotions in a mature and refreshing way that it made you ignore the beige flags of playful manipulation that comes with courtship, and root for him to win his crush's heart.

Suggested Role: He's actually older (30), and I appreciate that South Korea is exploring more love stories between older men as Thailand conquers the under 25 demo. So for him, I'd say a divorced storyline. Maybe explore the story of how two ex-husbands rebuild their lives apart and rediscover their friendship while they fall for other people.

"Silvy" Pavida | The Warp Effect

Speaking of bloated casts, this series had like a million people in it playing characters of a variety of genders and sexualities, because it was intended to be -- in part -- a modern sex guide that pushed against traditional constructs. But in the midst of all that was a brief performance by Silvy, who was only tasked with playing an aspiring "plus size" actress, but managed to leave a lasting impression, making you want more.

Suggested Role: She's a singer and she's half-Italian. There's gotta be something we can do with that. Maybe the story of a shy singer, who is often hired to record tracks for rising tone-deaf artists, and is encouraged by one to make her debut as her opening act and help her write a romantic duet in Italian for her international audience.

***

Now...most of us agree that Step by Step was...not great. But it did have a lot of Thai actors that I hope to see again soon -- in an entirely different storyline far away from whatever the hell that was.

"Saint" Paramee Matthanadul | Step by Step

Was his character a whiny little shit? Yes. Is he so gorgeous you almost forgot how hot his big brother was? Also, yes. The fandom was pissed his romantic subplot did not get a resolution, because there was so much he could've done with this character if given the opportunity.

Suggested Role: I think he has baby girl potential, so I really want to see him either play a spoiled mafia kid who falls for his mentor OR a rich kid pretending to be a working class waiter at the restaurant he owns, marinated in gay panic every time the head chef scolds him.

Zorzo Nathanan Akkharakitwattanakul | Step by Step

I have yet to watch a proper GL series, but if she was starring in it, I'd clear my TV schedule. There's something so femme fatale about her and her features. She had no business stealing scenes from the nearly full cast of dudes, but she did. Every time.

Suggested Role: I really want to see her in a mystery produced by whoever is doing The Sign right now. Maybe she could play an undercover cop trying to solve a missing person's case in a small town, and her love interest is married to her prime suspect.

"Ben" Bunyapol Likhitamnuayporn | Step by Step

Last, but not least, is the adorable Ben. Who, in spite of wasting our time with the most anticlimactic drama ending, played a character that was an inspiration to every office employee who has been dying to tell their ungrateful and abusive boss to step back and let a bitch cook. He played him with such naiveté and earnestness that it made you want more for his character than a lustful boss who struggled not to abuse his power.

Suggested Role: It's so easy for him to get sucked into passive roles opposite the zaddys of BL, so I'd like to see how he fairs against an equal. Maybe another workplace ensemble comedy where he plays a reporter posing as an intern at a new social media company run by an unhinged mogul spreading fake news, and falls for another intern who helps him take the company down.

[fluff-writing]

This idea has been percolating in my brain.

Buckle up this idea contains implied mpreg (which so does D4 itself so who gives a shit lol) and referenced past noncon. Also discussion of possible infant death, and Inarius being his usual bastardly-self.

But a D3.5 AU thing.

Tyrael discovers his brother is not only alive, but also free and on Sanctuary, by way of having him show up like some kind of fucked up stork and drop a scuzzy infant into his lap. Turns out its a certifiably 50/50 genuine angel/demon hybrid Nephalem. Not the quasi-super-humans Sanctuary usually gets nowadays. The real deal. He's got little horns. And a tiny, boney whip-tail.

Oh, it came from Inarius in some manner or another, but he wasn't interested in raising the first baby Lilith spawned in specifically for them, he sure as hell isn't taking on this one by himself. He can barely function for himself on account of the 3k years of torture. Whose the other parent? Who the hell knows, a lot was happening to him in hell and it's not like he was keeping track of who put what where. Torture, for three-thousand or so years, Tyrael.

Why didn't he just kill it? Fuck you, that's why.

(He certainly thought about it. He couldn't get rid of it while it was in him, and once it was out...it would've been easy. All he had to do was leave it where it'd been birthed, out in the Pandemonium wastes. It probably wouldn't have even lasted hours before something came along and had a fat little snack. He'll deny any kind of love or attachment to the little beast. The only thing that had him bundling it up in pieces of his own torn away robing and tucking it against his shoulder was...spite. Yes. Spite. He'd make this thing someone else's problem, and see how they liked being saddled with a tiny destroyer-of-worlds packed into a pudgy, useless, screaming little body. And if the way it swung clumsy fists in the air and grabbed for his face was the first truly gentle, innocent touch he'd had in millennia...well that was no one's business but his.)

(Somewhere, Rathma is laughing at him. And also concerned for his new baby brother pls don't drop him it would take at least a day for him to make it out to Pandemonium from the bottom of Sanctuary's ocean.)

Who better than to care for this thing than his treacherous, hypocritical, mortal-loving brother?

Well, he's not sticking around, so good luck when the brat figures out fire-breath, Linarian was burning entire barns to the ground by age twelve.

Tyrael takes all of this in stride, and he, Lorath, Donan and Elias now have a baby to raise. A super-powered baby the likes of which Sanctuary has never quite seen before. What could possibly go wrong. He names the kid Lee, in honor of Leah, and doesn't know how much the two would've had in common had she lived.

Lee is mostly a good kid. A little too clever at times, a little too eager to test rules and limits and break the rules anyway just to see what happens. But once he understands that rules are in place for reasons (we don't scale the bookshelves because they're not sturdy enough and could break, we go to bed on time so we're not so tired), he usually follows them.

True to what Inarius said, he figures out how to start a lot of fire way to quickly for anyone's taste. Usually he's good about using it only for defense, and not Dastardly Actions. Sometimes Elias is asking for it though. His stuff is the most fun to burn, he gets real mad about it.

Donan is inspired. He loves this little stinker. He wants one of his own. Lorath is a little bit horrified at the thought of another kid underfoot, as he finds Lee to be quite the handful. More than the other three, he worries about what happens when the nephalem grows up. He's going to be big, and he's going to be powerful. Inarius's last son changed the way people study magic, and commands the bloody dead. What's this one going to be capable of? And Donan wants to throw a regular human child into the mix with him? What the Hell man.

He's quietly supportive when Donan meets Braega and starts a little romance tho.

Tyrael loves his nephew. He's never had actual, proper family the way humans count it before. Yes Inarius is his brother, that's why he's in this whole situation to begin with, but there's has never been a 'brotherly' relationship.

Lee is so clearly his brother's kid it's a little scary. It's like having Inarius 2.0 running around but tiny and he grew like a damn weed the first few years so now he's all skinny-stretched out with lanky arms and legs. And that whip tail. It taps when he's annoyed or goes question-mark when he's happy, and rattles when he's scared or mad. Lee is usually scheming about something or another, and proud as a five-year can manage. He cares passionately and wants to know everything. Tyrael is enchanted watching him grow and change, and is certain this is the Mortal Experience in real time.

They encounter Lee's older brother a few times. Tyrael finds this unnerving. Lorath is defensive the whole time. Elias tries to get him to stay around and teach them death magics, to which he is politely but firmly rebuffed.

Lee doesn't know what to make of the tall, dark person who looks and feels and smells like he should know him. Rathma doesn't know what to make of him in turn, but does clock his other parent immediately.

They have the same nose, see.

It's not until Elias does something absolutely boneheaded and brings forth Sanctuary's ancient mother back into the world that this really becomes and issue though. After all, if her goal is to destroy her father, and she is a construct of his, then of course any other children he may have must also be destroyed.

Doubly so that this one happens to have come from her treacherous, disloyal, ungrateful fool of a former mate.

[calisources]

QUEEN CHARLOTTE: A BRIDGERTON STORY. sentences quotes from netflix's queen charlotte: a bridgerton story. these include mentions to royalty, high society england, babies and some foul language and suggestive scenarios. please change pronouns as you see fit. a reminder that bridgerton is a period romance drama in a quasi-historical setting. spoilers for the entire series.

"It is quiet here."

"(name) is going to he a father?"

"Yes. Your line will live on."

"Fancy meeting you here. You did not go over the wall."

"Do not feel sorry for me. I do not know anything else. I've always been this. An exhibit instead of a person."

"You are a person to me."

"You're breathtaking."

"It is pretty. But it has a thousand tiny buttons. I'm suddenly concerned that I may have made the wrong choice."

"I'm very good with buttons. (name)."

"Do you know what happens on our wedding night?"

"Ah, yes. I know everything. I've...seen drawings and had a detailed explanation as to what is to occur."

"I do not like the part where my head hits the wall over and over again. Is there a way to avoid that?"

"Yes, there is a way to avoid that."

"Impressionable? Trust me. No sexual innuendo makes an impression upon your sisters. "

"I wish it did, that they might get idea to marry and start fornicating."

"Perhaps, then, I might have legitimate grandbabies. Instead, virgins to the left of me, and whores to the right."

" You are doing it correctly? Making sure he's putting it in the right place?"

"Hello, my Lady. Are you in need of assistance of some kind?"

"If you must know, I'm trying to ascertain the best way to climb over the garden wall."

"Oh, well, that is impertinent. None of your business. The King. No one will speak of him. No one. He is clearly a beast or a troll."

"I'm a lady in distress. You refuse to help a lady in distress?"

"I refuse when that lady in distress is trying to go over a wall so she does not have to marry me. Hello, (name). I'm (name)."

"Not Your Majesty. (name). I mean, yes, Your Majesty, but to you, just (name)."

"I almost asked a footman to lie on top of me today".

"How joyful it is to be a lady."

"There are worse fates than marrying the King of England."

"You have good hips, you will make lots of babies."

"A problem is only a problem if the palace says there is a problem."

"By “business,” do you mean fornicating with your mistresses, or do you mean producing more bastards for me to ignore?"

"You are the (noble title); you can do whatever you like."

"I’m completely alone, and you prefer the sky to me."

"I’m not quiet; it’s simply that my husband is loud."

"They dangle joy in front of me and never let me grasp it."

"If you were not the (noble title), if you were not, your life here would be very different."

"You’re not some simpering girl. You are the queen."

"The king has not been himself lately."

"I thought that terror was a price of being royal."

"Every man and woman in the British Empire obeys the queen’s whim. We would go to battle to save her. "

"What does any woman of the ton know of true friendship?"

"We are untold stories. Yesterday, you told me some of your story, and I thank you."

"My garden did not die with my husband because it had never been planted."

"I want to be gardened as much as possible."

"Love is determination. Love is a choice one makes. You take someone in marriage, and you choose to love them."

"A queen’s first responsibility is not to her whim but to her people."

"I care not for his sanity. I care for his happiness. I care for his soul."

"Let him be mad is mad is what he needs."

"This darkness is my burden. You bring a light."

" I cannot breathe when you are not near."

"You are a rare jewel."

"A girl is wonderful. And a strong queen is just what this country needs."

"Come. Hide from the heavens with me."

[emiarainewrites]

Since (pretty sure) no one can disprove this, and in quasi-celebration of Pride Month, I’m headcanoning that Onyx The Fortuitous, Slayer Of The Bright Realm is both Autistic & Asexual!

From the way he interacts with people and is extremely passionate about what he likes to a very thorough degree, I instantly related to him (being autistic myself).

Seriously, there were points in the movie where he was talking and making references to people that made sense to him, leaving everyone else kinda confused, and I was just sittin’ there like “oh my god…I do that” or “is this what it’s like when I try to interact with people?”

He’s socially awkward and straight forward, but if you get him going about his special interests or relate to him on some level, he’ll talk your ears off (something else I’m extremely familiar with).

Plus, his little vocal ticks seem very neurodivergent to me.

And I believe he might be asexual but just doesn’t realise it (also something I could relate to). Yes, he is shown to have private fantasies and gets upset over speculation regarding his virginity, but nowhere in the movie do we see him cozying up to anyone in any way that isn’t purely friendly. Also, for those unaware, some asexuals do experience forms of sexual desire and fantasies. Spectrums, baby.

And I’d say there tends to be a bit more pressure on men and a certain ridicule concerning their virginity, so he more than likely feels embarrassed for those reasons also. It may not necessarily be that he feels like he just can’t seem to quote-un-quote ‘lose it’ yet, but rather that he may not have any interest and doesn’t consciously think about it until someone else brings it up.

Even at the end when Farrah heavily implies a sexual union by him joining with her, he doesn’t immediately spring for the obvious answer. He guesses something more tame before she has to specify that there’d be sex involved. This could just be him getting shy or something, but I see it more as Onyx not feeling strongly about engaging in intimacy (particularly with someone that he probably doesn’t feel strongly towards). He’s kinda the same in the musical sequence, if I’m recalling correctly (where Farrah even goes as far(rah) as taking on the image of his personal fantasy to further coax him to her side - and it still doesn’t work).

Onyx The Fortuitous, Slayer Of The Bright Realm (as played by Andrew Bowser) from the movie Onyx The Fortuitous & The Talisman Of Souls (2023) is Autistic & Asexual. And he probably doesn’t even realise this.

I dunno.

[mangoshorthand]

Thing of the Past- [Five Hargreeves x F Reader]. Ch1 (Hard Feelings Part 4)

SUMMARY: You can't avoid it any longer: Five has to meet your parents. It goes more wrong than you could possibly imagine, spiralling to bring up secrets he'd rather stay buried.

⚠️TRIGGER WARNINGS⚠️ Chapter One - Chapter Two - Chapter Three - Chapter Four - Chapter Five - Chapter Six - Chapter Seven - Chapter Eight - Chapter Nine - Chapter Ten - Chapter Eleven/Epilogue

You're getting married. You have a baby. No avoiding it.

Reader is unavoidably an OC at this point. When I tag this as #Number Five Imagine, I never said it wasn't going to be tough. 😜

⚠️Please heed content warning⚠️

Chapter One: Bone Structure

You couldn’t put it off forever. You had a fifteen-month-old daughter and you were about to get married. They’d known you were seeing a ‘famous guy’ since the JUICED scandal. Your mother scolded you for only telling her you’d been pregnant once Aoife was born, but had then quickly forgotten it in talking about how nobody appreciated her at work. You've always thought that your mother seems to struggle with object permanence- she behaves like the stereotype of a beleaguered mother when directly confronted with you, but your existence doesn't seem to occur to her otherwise. She always seems to forget that the phone goes two ways.

Aoife’s asleep in the car seat. In the passenger seat beside you, Five reaches over and removes the pacifier drooping from her mouth. He can’t resist running his thumb down her chubby cheek as he does so.

Your knuckles go white on the wheel.

“Are you ok?”

The familiar feeling of foreboding is rising. You’re a block away and the familiar sights assault you. Home, yes, but not like the Academy, or even like your apartment. The old feeling of resignation comes on you again. It’s not dread, it’s more an obligation weighing in the pit of your stomach.

He senses you’re not okay.

“…You don’t talk about them often.”

“And there’s a good reason for that.”

To Five, you don’t sound like yourself. You're…detached; something hidden behind an ironic cynicism that would have looked better on him.

“Pull over,” he murmurs.

You do, a little way down the street. Though the engine stilling has been known to wake her before, Aoife stays mercifully asleep on this occasion.

“Tell me.”

You breathe in.

“Can you…play nice? For me?”

His brow contracts, “I’ll try. But why would I have to?”

“They’re…weird.”

He tilts his head, “You know I can cope with weird.”

You stare directly out of the windshield. There it is, the modest colonial in which you’d spent the first eighteen years of your life. White picket fence and all. The one you’d left and never looked back. He won’t get it unless he sees it- how to even begin to explain?

“It is what it is.” you sigh and give him a rueful smile, “Just…don’t be as honest as usual.”

He gets it; he has to up his bullshit-taking capacity. He places a hand on your knee, “Babies are excellent meat-shields.”

You nod and prepare yourself.

“Let’s get it over with.”

You get out of the car and unstrap Aoife from her car-seat. She stirs and fusses, so you replace the pacifier. She rubs at her eyes with one clumsy arm and then sneezes suddenly: as always, a blue flash accompanies it and she judders in your arms: a quasi-spatial jump she can't control. Though she has Five's power, she can't use it volitionally yet and the effects she does experience are weak and fleeting.

According to Five, he had been similar, only managing to control the ‘sneeze-blinks’ when he was four. 

"Apparently every time I was sick, I used to blink to random places in the house and throw a tantrum,” he’d explained

“That’s still how you act when you’re sick,” you’d laughed.

Now, with Aoife’s diaper bag over one shoulder, Five takes your free hand and you lead him down the sidewalk, through the front yard and to the door.

You ring the bell. The ding-dong inside tolls with gloomy portents.  The door creaks on its hinges just the way you remember.

“Oh BABY!” Your mother pulls you into an abrupt, rib-crushing hug. “Oh it’s SO good to see you!”

She holds you on the doorstep, eyes closed. Five pastes on his customer service smile, hands clasped behind his back and waits patiently. He looks down at Aoife, struggling under her grandmother's arm pinned to her head.

She is probably in her mid-sixties. She’s angular, hair tied tight in a scrunchie and glasses at the end of her nose.

To Five’s eye, she hugs her daughter for a little longer than is necessary or, indeed, comfortable for an onlooker. He notes your poker-stiff body language.

“Hi Mom. Hi…” you try to extricate yourself, “I’ve brought them to meet you.”

Finally, your mother lets you go and her eyes fall on the baby.

“Oh she’s BEAUTIFUL. Oh, just look at her little hands. Oh, she gets those fingers from me.”

She looks up at Five, shoves past you and pulls him into another of the too-hard-too-long hugs. He recoils a little...but he has to play nice…

“And oh, aren’t you a smart young man? It’s SO good to meet you Five.”

Great. ‘Young man’ again.

“Er- thank you, Samantha, likewise.”

“Oh no,” she says, arms holding him shaking with the hand-gestures she would otherwise be making, “Not Samantha. I go by Geri now. It’s my middle name. Suits me better.”

“Okay. Geri.”

You feel your eyebrow raise. This is new. Her voice as she says it is affected. It reminds you of the time she signed up to an Ancestry site and didn't shut up about how she could trace her lineage back to the Stuart era for roughly five years. She releases a highly uncomfortable Five and holds him at arms’ length.

“OH, and so handsome!”

He laughs politely as she ushers them over the threshold, cooing over the baby and asking inane questions about the journey.

“Oh, your father won’t even drive on the interstate anymore. I’ve said to him so many times- if you can’t drive the interstate, you can’t drive, (OH look, she knows her grandma! Look at that little face!) But will he give up his license? No siree. You know what he’s like, never listens to a word I say. I may as well talk to that wall.”

The house is like something out of one of the Commission’s training videos; a time warp to approximately 1978. The furniture is good quality mid-century. In the right setting, he’d definitely approve, but not so much here. Assorted VHS tapes and saccharine china figures of women in period clothing line the dresser. All along one wall are pictures of you as a little girl. Yearly school photos, horribly staged first-communion photos and many others. He notices there’s much fewer pictures post-puberty.

Your dad sits in an easy chair in front of the TV. He’s older than Geri- has to be pushing eighty. He’s thin, reedy and unhealthy looking. He turns his head with difficulty as they walk in.

“Hello sweetheart. Long time no see,” then he turns to Five, “And hello to you. You’ll have to excuse my not getting up to greet you, I’m a little stiff today.”

Five shakes his hand and sits on a couch nearest to him.

“Nice to meet you sir. Old age. Quite the bastard, ain’t she?”

Your dad laughs.

“Bert,” he introduces himself, “Five, right?”

“Mhm.” Five gives a little nod.

“Yeah. Part of that…Umbrella thing?”

“That’s the one.”

"She had the action figures I think."

Five looks over at you, amused. 

"You never told me that!"

"I'd forgotten. Was it Klaus and Allison, Dad?"

"No idea." he mumbles, his attention span already waning. 

"Not me?" asks Five

"Nah. I was never particularly interested in you."

Five grins, "What changed?"

Geri cuts in.

“Oh FIVE, you have to show us your powers. Are you the one with all the tentacles?”

He sighs, “I’m the space and time-travel one. The tentacles were Ben. He's dead.”

Geri’s delighted expression doesn’t falter as Five mentions this loss:

“You have to show us.”

Five demurs but she keeps trying to persuade him. After his second refusal, you feel obligated to intervene on his behalf:

“He’s not a performing seal, Mom.”

“Leave the boy alone, Sam- I mean, Geri.” Bert’s voice is stern but low.

Geri ignores her husband.

“But you can time travel?”

“Only a little.” he smiles politely.

“Not enough to avoid knocking up my daughter, am I right?” 

This is clearly Bert’s idea of a joke so Five graces him with a strained smile.

“Even if I could, I wouldn’t.”

“Oh! Let me hold her!!”

Geri springs for Aoife with speed that makes her jump and cry.

“Slow down Mom- it’s upsetting her.”

“Oh, don’t be silly. She just wants a Gam-gam hug.”

Aoife begins to fuss and wriggle in the grasp of the unfamiliar and loud person.

"Ma Dada ma!" she protests, as Geri bounces her ineffectively on her knee.

Five looks at her with sympathy. Tell me about it, Bambino.

“So- how do we actually pronounce her name?” asks Bert.

“Ee-fa.” 

Five notices the twitch of annoyance on your face.

“It’s spelled funny,” says Bert, eyes still predominantly on an old episode of Cheers, “You young folk like your kids to be different.”

“It’s an old name actually,” says Five, struggling now to keep the annoyance out of his own voice. His smile has become rather fixed. “It’s Gaelic. I was born in Dublin.”

 “Coffee?” asks Geri, dumping her grizzling granddaughter unceremoniously onto her mother’s lap. There’s a noise of general assent, “can you help me, Five? I don’t know how you take your coffee.”

“Just black, thank you.”

He smiles and gives her the sort of nod that usually quells people…but it’s ineffective on Geri. Apparently, nothing can stop her when she gets an idea in her head. A little like her daughter, he supposes.

“Still, there’s a lot for little old me to carry.” She smiles at him expectantly.

Pasting back on his customer-service smile, he claps his hands to his knees and rises; always in anticipation of old-man back pain that never comes. He follows Geri towards the kitchen.

As you try to soothe the fussy baby, Five exchanges a glance with you. You try to convey apology.

“I’ll get her some food,” he says, shouldering the diaper bag.

The kitchen is more of the same. Formica surfaces, patterned linoleum and miles of wood panelling. As Geri fusses with the coffee pot, Five places his hands in his pockets and leans against the kitchen surface as the puree warms in the ancient microwave. He crosses one ankle over the other. He’s in control here.

“So,” she turns around. “You’re an Irish boy? Top o’ the mornin’ to ye'.”

Five supresses a cringe. Play nice…play nice.

“I wouldn’t go that far. Sure, I was born there but I stayed for less than a week before getting adopted. I'm a New Yorker, really.”

“Oh, don’t be silly. I’m Irish, you know. My paternal great-grandmother was born there."

She steps in front of him. She's uncomfortably close, her feet are either side of his protruding ankles.

"You can always tell an Irish lad…it’s in the bone structure.”

 She places two fingers either side of his jaw bone in a way that reminds him forcibly of The Handler. As with her, he maintains his unfazed demeanor; the only way to win this game is not to play. She runs each finger down to meet at his chin, leaving the skin in their wake to tingle unpleasantly.

The microwave beeps and he’s pleased to have an excuse to step out from in between her and the kitchen surface. As he stirs and tests the temperature against his inner wrist, she lowers her voice to a stage whisper.

“I am so sorry about Bert. So rude. I think it would be nice one day for me to come visit the city and spend some time just us four. Bert doesn’t get out much these days and it would be nice to have a little time away from him. Maybe you can show me the city.”

Something about her tone lets him know that 'you' isn't plural in her last sentence. He searches for a response, but she doesn’t really require one.

“We’ve not really seen eye to eye in over fifteen years now, Five. You know how it is? I stay because of the house but we’re not husband and wife anymore. Not really. He's never known how to treat a woman.”

“Okay.” says Five, his veneer of politeness starting to crack as annoyance at this woman begins to build. What is happening here?

She carries on as if he hasn't spoken:

“I spend most of my time in my room. It’s easier than dealing with his sniping. I got plenty of friends,” she lowers her voice even further, “I even have a guy, Jude. That makes it easier. Of course, you can’t tell her this. She’s tied to her father’s apron strings. She just doesn’t want to understand.” she sighs, looking put-upon.

Are you crazy, lady?

He bites back the instinctive response.

“Coffee’s done,” he says, smartly stepping to the pot and grabbing a tray from behind the microwave.

“You understand how things are, right Five?”

“Oh I think I got that pretty much straightened out,” he says, “Milk?”

She places the carton on the tray while he opens various cabinets in search of mugs. Gotta keep busy.

“So, Five, when’s the wedding?”

"A month, today, actually." he surprises himself with this reflection, "Invitations will be sent later this week. We're a little tardy but it's a small wedding."

“Which church?”

He snorts a little, his resolve cracking, “Yeah, not gonna be a church.”

“But why?”

“I’d guess two more-or-less atheists and their bastard child might be out of place.”

Okay…he has to roll back the sarcasm.

She doesn't react, changing tactic unconsciously- he doesn't think she's aware that she's employing tactics. Finally, he finds the mugs and grabs four. He turns back to place them on the tray to find her nearer to him.

"I take it the dress code is black tie?"

"Not strictly. We'll both be dressed formally though."

"It was nice of you to dress up to see us today, Number Five. You cut an impressive figure." 

It's not her words that get to him, it's the conspiratorial smile she gives as she moves even closer to him, the little flick of her eyes as she looks him up and down. Suppressing a shudder, he steps out smartly from her path. He places the mugs haphazardly onto the tray along with Aoife's finished food. Before she can respond, he blinks out of the door.

He catches your eye as he re-emerges from his spatial portal. His eyes widen, communicating disbelief. You pass a brief, unspoken conversation behind Bert’s back.

What the fuck was that?!

Oh God, what has she said?

He places the tray on the coffee table, tests the food's temperature again and sits down next to you. He holds out his arms for Aoife and begins to feed her. He’s deliberately placed himself in between you and the arm of the couch.

"Hai fame, piccolo? Ti piacciono gli ignami?"

As Geri comes into the room, his efforts to avoid her seem in vain. Unable to sit beside him on the couch, she sits on the arm instead, right next to him, effectively thwarting his attempts to block her.

“And he speaks Italian- what a man!” she simpers and he avoids her eye. Then, turning to you, “You’d better believe I didn’t have any help when you were this little.”

Bert grunts.

“No, I had to do everything myself. ‘I don’t know what to do with babies’, that’s what he said-”

“Well, I didn’t.” he mumbles, still watching Cheers.

“-But Five knows it’s all about practice, don’t you?”

He ignores her, spooning a little pureed yam off Aoife's lip. She turns back to you.

“You girls have it so easy these days. There were no modern men when you were born.”

Five doubts this. The 90s weren’t exactly the dark ages.

“Ooh! Show me the ring!”

Your mother leans over Five and Aoife and grabs your left hand. Sensing this, your father turns over to baseball: you’re thankful- this was one of your past rituals when Mom became too full-on. If you put on sport and comment on the game, you can kinda talk together while having an excuse to not talk to her.

She twists your wrist, looking at the ring in different lights.

“Darling, an engagement ring is supposed to have a diamond.” she says, as if you’ve never heard of the concept.

“I don’t like diamonds, Mom."

“But how will people know it's an engagement ring?"

"I know it's an engagement ring. That's all that matters."

She scoffs, "I just wish you'd consulted me before you chose it.”

“The cubs are doing well this season,” no more than a mumble from Bert.

Five breathes out through his nose, “I chose it, actually. Considering it’s an engagement ring, that would make sense, don’t you think?”

“Oh, well it is lovely, but a diamond symbolizes eternal love-”

“Oh really?” says Five, the dangerous sarcasm you recognize creeping into his voice, “Does your engagement ring have a diamond, Geri?”

“Of course!” she shows him. Clearly, she has not understood the sting in his question’s tail.

“Very pretty." he says, testily.

You draw Five's eye and give him a slightly pleading smile. He nods minutely.

"Well, Five chose perfectly. He knew I wouldn't want a diamond."

“Convenient for your bank balance, eh Five?” grunts Bert.

Geri shoots him a filthy look. “Don't be stupid. Money is no object for Reginald Hargreeves’ son.”

You feel like your brain is about to turn inside out from embarrassment, looking down at the phone in your hand, you send Lila a quick message.

YOU: 🚨🚨🚨INITIATE EMERGENCY PARENTAL PROTOCOL. EXTRACTION NEEDED. GO GO GO.

And, thank fuck, she replies immediately.

LILA: 10-4 good buddy.

In under a minute, she calls you. You owe her flowers.  Five looks at your phone ringing and then back at you.

‘Don’t you dare leave me’, his eyes say.

Still on the couch, you answer the phone and turn the volume way down.

“Hello?”

“Hey sweet. Let’s get you outta there.”

“Yes.”

“So has Five murdered anyone yet? Is that what’s happening here?”

You decide the best way to take advantage of this opportunity.

“Oh no!”

“Huh?”

“Wow that sounds serious.”

She begins to chortle and you answer her pretended utterances,

“You need the whole Academy? Now?”

“Yeah, there’s a shitload of scotch flooding a subway station and we need Five’s particular skills.”

“Okay, I’ll tell Number Five immediately. We’ll come as soon as we can!”

“Tell me everything.”

“Of course, goodbye Police Commissioner.”

You hang up to her laughter.

Five looks questioningly at you.

“It’s terrible news. There’s a…quantum suspension…node back in the city. Spatial anomalies everywhere.”

Five cottons on, you see his mouth spasm.

“Heavens, not a quantum suspension node!”

You give him a look: ‘don’t ruin it asshole!’

He stands up, drawing himself up to his full height and squaring his shoulders in a way clearly designed to make you laugh. 

“There’s no time to lose. Geri, Bert, we’re sorry to leave so soon...but the world needs me.”

You supress a laugh with difficulty. Your mother, gullible as always, looks impressed. Though you can’t see your father’s face, you’re fairly sure this won’t have fooled him. You’ll call him later.

“What the fuck was that?”

Five drives down the street, determinedly avoiding the eyes of your waving mother from the bottom of the yard.

“I told you.” you say, palms of your hands pressed against your eyes, "I need a fucking drink."

Once you’re back onto the main highway, he says,

“Seriously: what the hell?”

“What happened in the kitchen?”

He sighs. He can’t not tell you. He is not equipped for this.

“She…your parents’ marriage. I’m getting the impression it’s a little…unsteady?”

“Oh god.” You put your head in your hands.

“This might be hard to hear. She told me not to tell you but fuck that. She told me she’s been having an affair.”

He braces himself for the hurt, for the shock, but instead you just snort darkly.

“Yeah? Sure she has. What's this one called?”

"Jude." he says, confused.

You laugh fully this time, “Probably just some guy she met over online poker and never in person. She was 'with' this guy from Ontario for years and it never went beyond spicy messages.”

“What?”

“It’s a fantasy Five. Everything is with her. She tells herself whatever story she can to get through the dull-ass life she refuses to actually do anything about. I’ve known about this shit for years.”

 He takes a deep breath.

"She also...kind of came onto me a bit."

"Oh no." 

Again, your face doesn't register the shock he'd expected, you just crumple into a deep cringe.

"I'm sorrrry."

"It wasn't so bad. She was just a little creepy. Touched my face and backed me into the kitchen counter a bit. Called me Number Five."

You make a disgruntled little noise that conveys disgust and sympathy in equal measure. 

"Are you ok?"

"Sure I am. I've dealt with worse than her. Are you ok?"

You sigh deeply, "I don't know why I didn't expect it. I'm sorry. I don't know why I let her get you alone. She did the same thing to my boyfriend in high school. She'll go for any man she can corner. First she'll bitch about my Dad and then she'll go all 'oooh I need a big strong man to save me from my meaaan husband.' "

Five keeps his eyes on the road. How did you come from her?

“Up until I was thirteen it felt like she was the best Mom I could have asked for. Affectionate, loving, supportive…but then she just…withdrew. Pretty much as soon as I stopped being a kid she could dress and project her personality onto. She just disappeared one day- moved into the spare room and sat on the computer for the next five years. Dad was a shit parent but at least he stepped up then; actually spoke to me on my own terms, cared a little about what interested me. With Mom it's a single question about me and then right on back to her bullshit.”

You fall into exasperated silence. He doesn’t know what to say. As trauma goes it’s fairly tame, but it still sucks

“Families, eh?”

“I much prefer yours to mine,” you mumble.

He laughs a little to himself. 

“You’re telling me the Von Trapp Family Killers are the normal ones here?"

"Don't kid yourself Five." a smile breaks through your dour expression, "you could never pull off lederhosen."

Tag list: (please comment to be added or removed.) @dilfjohhny , @sunsunhe, @w4stedtr4sh, @nevbrooke-555, @theredvelvetbitch, @td-miley01, @five-hxrgreeves, @rorygi1more, @jamiebower88

Masterpost

Alternatively, join me on A03.  Here is a link to the whole series

Comments would be appreciated here or on ao3 because I'm a needy ho.

[jerzwriter]

The Great Outdoors

Thank you to @petiteboheme for this ask. And yep, once again, it exceeds 100, but it's all good! This actually ties nicely into an old edit of mine, New Adventures, so I imagine this little scene taking place during that trip. Thanks so much for the ask! :)

Book: Open Heart (Book 3 timeline) Pairing: Tobias Carrick x Casey MacTavish (F!MC) Rating: Teen Words: 656 Summary: Casey proves she'd do just about anything for love when Tobias takes her camping. A/N: Participating in @choicesseptemberchallenge2023 Day 2, Stars

Casey stepped out of the camper, applying a dab of chamomile lotion onto a mosquito bite. One of her collection of mosquito bites. She had just finished showering if you could call it that. She had gone twenty-eight years without knowing solar showers were a thing, and she was quite confident she could go another twenty-eight without using one ever again.   

She made her way over to Tobias, sitting by the lake, eager to claim the space at his side. After a quick side hug, she fell back to the soft earth beneath her and gazed up at the stars. She never saw this many in Boston, nor back home in Philadelphia. They looked so close she felt she could reach out and touch them, and it was magical, though she wasn’t about to admit that.  

“I can’t believe you took me camping,” she groaned, catching the smirk on his lips out of the corner of her eye.

“What?” He fell to her side and wrapped his arm around her waist, pulling her close. He was well aware that this wasn’t her thing... and that was putting it lightly. But she knew how much it meant to him, so she was willing to try, and that meant more to him than she could possibly know. “Is it really that bad?”

His voice was sincere, a marked departure from his usual bravado, and when she looked into his aqua-blue eyes, glistening in the moonlight, there was no way she could let him down.

“It would be,” she grinned, reaching up to caress his cheek. “It would be if you weren’t here.”

She only saw the smile her words elicited for a split second because, before she knew it, his warm lips were on top of hers. His arms enveloping her as she pulled him close, surrendering in a deep, passionate kiss. Surrounded by such beauty and lost in the moment’s rapture, it was hard to remember that they weren’t the only two people in the world, and suddenly, she understood the appeal. Pulling back breathlessly, they lay there, lost in each other’s eyes. 

“I know this isn’t your thing, baby, but you’re still willing to try for me, and you have no idea how much that means to me.”

“Hmmm, you know I’d be willing to do just about anything for you,” she smiled as he eyes went afire.

“Oh, honey, now that’s an open invitation,” he growled as she began to giggle. “I hope you know how much I love you.”

“I think I have an inkling,” she assured. “And I’m camping, so I don’t have to explain how much I love you.”

“Do you think you’d do it again?” he asked earnestly.

“Mmm, I might be persuaded. But only if there is indoor plumbing next time. I nearly had to wrestle a peeping tom raccoon as I quasi-showered!”

“Hey,” Tobias laughed, “I can’t blame the raccoon. I’d be wanting to sneak a peak at this, too!”

His lips captured her again, and he rolled atop her, tugging at the hem of her shirt. He was about to cross an item off his bucket list when a howl in the distance stopped Casey cold.

“What is that?” she asked in horror.

“I’m assuming it’s a coyote.”

Casey stood up and rushed back to the camper before finishing the sentence. “Then we need to take this inside!” she insisted as she ran inside. “It won’t be able to break into it, right?”

“Not unless it grows opposable thumbs, hon.”

“And the likelihood of that?”

“None.”

After quickly locking the camper door behind him, he resumed his place atop his beautiful girlfriend. 

“Now, where were we?”

“You were trying to show me how camping can be fun.”

“Oh, yes,” he grinned, pulling her shirt over her head. “It the camper’s rocking, don’t come knocking.”

“Mmm,” she giggled beneath him. “Tell that to the coyote.”

@choicesficwriterscreations @openheartfanfics

Other tags on reblog.

[dg-outlaw]

Blue Beetle - Movie Review

Finally got to see this on HBO Max... yes, "MAX" we still think of you as HBO just as Grogu is still Baby Yoda. Deal with it.

So, back to 'Blue Beetle'.

Long review, short, I thoroughly enjoyed this movie and think it's one of DC's best in their quasi-DCEU/not DCEU or whatever is going on with WB and the DC movies these days. From what I understand, James Gunn/WB is not scrapping everything from the Snyder-verse/DCEU, but changes are coming and there's rumor that this iteration of Jaime Reyes/Blue Beetle will stick around and I really hope so. I also think it helps that there were no character cameos in the film, only mentions of heroes like Superman, Batman, etc. so this Blue Beetle could easily be folded into the upcoming Gunn-verse.

As a latino I'm both ashamed to say I don't know much about Jaime Reyes' Blue Beetle outside of his appearances on the 'Young Justice' animated series, but I was also excited to see him on the big screen (metaphorically) and plan to go back and check out his comics.

I won't do a random synopsis as you can easily hit up a Youtube trailer or read an IMDb blurb to get that info, but I will talk about some of things I really enjoyed about this film. Warning: Slight Spoiler's ahead.

First off, this was overall a well-polished, well-written, directed, acted, and enjoyable film. The CGI was CGI, but it never felt janky and I could see the attention to detail in a lot of the VFX work, even with Jaime's practical Blue Beetle suit. I also truly appreciated that this film took risks and didn't shy away from taking those risks, creating stakes and sometimes following through, and addressing certain cultural and socio-economic subject matter without being preachy. In some ways I compare it to the MCU's 'Black Panther' in tackling the cultural and socio-economic things that mainstream, especially Disney, often tries to shy away from.

While 'Blue Beetle' isn't as serious in tone as 'Black Panther' there were several moments in the film where you knew that the writer and director had some creative leeway as opposed to having lots of studio oversight, just as Ryan Coogler had in the first 'Black Panther' film. I'm not sure if this is because WB wasn't paying attention because the DCEU was dying off or if they were somehow convinced to let the creators do their thing.

There were also so many moments where my Hollywood Blockbuster/MCU-trained brain said, "now is where they pull away from the hard moment, make a joke to pull away from a real emotion, or water down the stakes", but that didn't happen in this film. Yes, it was funny throughout, and jokes were made to lighten the mood where appropriate, but it was never at a disservice to the story or the characters. There were no moments where I felt like some director/screenwriter/studio-exec was getting embarrassed because it's a superhero movie so [insert Whedon-esque quip here] to avoid showing feelings.

Plus, you had George Lopez bringing his well-known loud, wild humor as the conspiracy theory spouting, 1% hating, mad-scientist Uncle Rudy, but if anything I think he was needed to give light to a story that potential to be really dark and sad at times. This is not to say there weren't moments that tugged at your heartstrings and made you feel or think. This movie went there because yes, we can think it's cheesy because it's just a superhero movie, but in-universe these events are reality for the characters and I think other superhero movies need to remember that. This was really well done in the first transformation scene of Jaime into the Blue Beetle as it started with light humor and slowly morphed into an almost horror-film like scene. There was no gore, but you felt the terror that Jaime and his family were feeling by watching things unfold. We, as the audience know what's going on, but for him and the family, the shit was hitting the fan and they didn't know what was going on.

Honestly, I didn't know what to expect from this film. Having recently watched Shazam 2, which I thought was really funny and better than the first, but also forgettable and the Flash movie (which I also thought was fun but forgettable), I just expected more popcorn fun--the last sugary drops of the DCEU slushie before the Gunn-verse got underway. What I recalled about the trailers and vague reviews about this film was that it was a fun superhero movie that focused heavily on family.

But unlike the popcorn, turn your brain off and enjoy chaos of the Fast franchise, it didn't require Vin Diesel, 30 movies, and an endless string of memes to drill that concept into your head. Yes, Jaime Reyes is the hero in the film, but it's the collective efforts and support of his family that ends up helping him win in the end and it's what gave the movie heart.

This is also not meant to take away from Xolo Maridueña's performance as Jaime Reyes as the hero, an actor I've enjoyed since first seeing him on the Netflix series 'Cobra Kai'. Just like in 'Cobra Kai', I continue to enjoy his almost innocent boyish charm, shyness, and vulnerability he exudes on-screen. In some ways his character and performance remind me of Tom Holland's Spider-Man as just this kid trying to do the right thing, but is totally in over his head as a teen superhero (even though Jaime is a recent college grad from Gotham U). And just like Peter Park, Jaime didn't ask to be a hero and had no real aspirations for being a hero, other than to his family, but in the end he stepped up. This was not for cool points, though Jaime eventually learned to embrace the scarab's many cool powers, but because he knew it was the right thing to do. And yes, Mr. Vin Diesel, because of family.

I could go on and on about all the cultural moments and subject matter addressed in this film that I thought was really brave and refreshing in a superhero movie, but I won't as that's a giant article in it of itself. But I honestly think Disney/Marvel could take some pointers here as they often pull away just as they are about to get there. Also, no hate on MCU. There are many of the MCU films I enjoy, but the overall formula hasn't gotten tired and needs a revamp. Again, another post for another day, but just putting in a BIPOC, female, or LGBTQ character in a movie doesn't make it good and marketable. And no, we don't need PSA sob-story movies beaten into our heads, but what does it mean to be part of a marginalized community and be a hero? What does that look like? What different perspective does that character bring to the table?

In the end, yes, enjoy 'Blue Beetle' as a superhero movie, but also keep an eye out for the smaller messages and heart of this film as it was a delightful surprise for me. I hope we get to see more Blue Beetle in the future of DC films and I'd even be down for a live-action adaptation of 'Young Justice', with Jaime on the team.

[krsnaradhika]

A snippet from Krishavyayam hehe-

Small points to be noted before you get started—

Kamalnayani/ Hridayaa/ Mohini are the same person. The same oc has multiple names.

Mohini is also Hari here, as we know. Hence, Mohini and Mohini it is hehe-

Please if this offends you, tell me and I'll pull it down. This is purely fiction and does not intend to offend any religious beliefs and sentiments.

You'll find the whole book on Wattpad, so cheers! ✨

She was bewitching. The woman before whom demons swooned and caelitis were rendered wordless. Dark as the zenith hour of dusk and as radiant as a nymph who rose from the cerulean waves, she had her wife in a daze for she had poof-ed out of the blue (god).

Kamalnayani looked half amused, half moonstruck as Mohini grinned at her, winking notoriously. She sported a red and black lehenga of chiffon, diamantes stuck to the flowy fringes as well as her kohl-lined eyes and she swung a vial of mead in her willowy fingers— all too coquettishly.

Why, you ask?

"Because I last saw her so long ago," Hridayaa accentuated, sheepishly batting her eyes at Kanha and linking an arm of his to hers. The latter had mirth dancing in his very handsome features and it wouldn't be wrong to say he missed those precious moments either.

Ogres raced hither and thither for one touch of Mohini who swaggered through the waves, effortlessly charming all. Flowy tresses wrapped in the whiff of lotus and pearl ornaments dangled on her voluptuous form. She was beautiful and lethal. Woman and vulpine.

"And I miss her."

He snorted out a laugh, tendrils jumping up to his forehead to kiss them and then he obstructed them with a rake of his sculpted fingers, "I am literally right here, Hridayae."

"No, Mohini." She whined, almost hopping in her place but he disciplined her with quasi glare. Krishu pouted, seeming more of a child than a mother— as if demanding not a woman but a candy. "I want Mohini! She can give me excellent company these days and you know we're nearing the due date. Also she had a kid so she can give me great parenting tips meant for mothers. Kanha pleaseeeeee?"

"As my queen pleases."

And so, Mohini and Mohini were now face to face after ages— giggling vivaciously and maniacally at each other's sight.

"So where should I escort you now, wife?"

"Jhumka shopping!" Krishu tugged her, then waddling around to the brass and copper caskets to arrange for casual robes for herself. Mohini hummed and slipped herself in the quilts of the soigne bed, then spat her beverage right through her mauve lips out of pure whammy when the whims of Kamalnayani surprised her again.

"And we're hitched. We are begetting a kid through the blessing of an austere sage. I don't want anyone ogling at you in the marketplace, hmm? They don't have any right to."

She shortly inclined her head in a yes, inarticulate. Of course, they were married.

"Right. Only you do." The goddess simpered through the chalice sitting on her mouth. Then she clipped her bracelet against her dainty wrists, kissing where the pulse chanted the name of an archeress.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

"This for Bhadra Jiji, this for Lakshu Jiji and oh— Jambavati Jiji adores teals and turquoise!"

Oxidized silver bracelets, bronze armbands, floral rings and arabesque silks brimmed the tawny stalls on wheels as the two goddesses stirred past them, riveted by the grandeur of the city that was their latibule. Krisha and Mohini walked hand in hand, occasionally picking a bloom or two to profess their love in dramatic whispers as their secretive chortles became the fantasies of little girls who watched them from afar.

The ivory and maroon turban with pearl motifs caught her attention and then she waved her hand at her husband- urhm, wife.

Kamalnayani smiled at the lady vendor who beamed at her with gentle eyes. "What do you expect?"

"A healthy baby. Nothing more." She shrugged cordially, looking over her shoulder to find Mohini partially veiling herself as she peered at the bustling streets through the rich translucence of her raiments.

"She seems new here. Do you know her?" The genial old woman squinted, "Why would she do that? Does she not know it's not normal to mantle her face in Aryan practices?"

"She's new here, Kaaki," Hridayaa answered in a jiffy as Mohini sprang to catch up with her, flashing the gleam of her cloaked dagger to the bandits who gawked at her. The bunch inhaled sharply, going about their own businesses when they recognised her as a beguiling mirage. An elusive dream.

Women with lethal beauty were to be feared. It was doltish to trust her who had other eyes trailing on every gait she took.

"Mohini. She's enchanting and gravitates a lot of attention to herself she doesn't wish for."

"Oh. Your friend?"

"This is my wife, aunt." Mohini giggled instead as the seller flushed, then ducked her head while murmuring a small apology. "No worries."

"Exquisite couple, best wishes to both of you." She fished out a leaf of tamarind from her purse, then slid the velvet turban from the honey-eyed woman to the one whose smile was as sweet as it. Kanha— now Mohini, brought a pair of suryakanthi jhumkas and slipped in Hridayaa's lotus palms.

"Pretty moms make pretty babies."

Kaaki Sulochanaa— with eyes as pulchritudinous as her name— chuckled once again at the flushed women who squirmed a little closer to each other, surreptitiously stealing gazes and then shuffling in opposite ways, the presents never seeming enough.

"Oh, so you both aren't yet out of the mushy-mushy phase?"

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

The dusk and the moon and their realm in Dvaravati wasn't exotic to their ardor for each other. It was the atelier of the art they painted each other in.

The scarlet roses and ivory jasmines embraced each other in the curls of the enchantress who sat between the legs of her wife, inclining her swan neck to the side as her eyes shut themselves when ivory fingertips skimmed through her scalps and skin. The sleek obsidian waterfalls and warm breaths of the woman of flames fondled her nape and Mohini wanted to flee into the aisles to escape from her namesake, but she knew the sacred smokes and ambrosia would chase her still. For the woman who carried their child was said to have seized the sense of a thousand men too around her.

"You are seducing me, good lady Kamya?" She crooned, her voice as soothing as the psithurism of the forest they promised to be each other's.

"Keep dreaming. I have always wanted to do your shringara," Agneyaa murmured lying through her teeth and when she felt a frisson run down below her touch she smirked. "Hesitate for nothing though, darling. I am quite a charmer I am told."

Mohini let out a shuddered breath, rolling her eyes and then she caught the hand of Mohini who was yet sniggering at her. "Enough now. Your skills are laudable. I have never looked this beautiful." Her gaze traversed to the mirror which gaped at two women like long lost lovers. The stones of lapis lazuli and rubies and diamonds were bestrewed upon her lithe physique like stars on the ether. A spark birthed in her guts and she was an art. An art to be ravished by her lover.

Kamalnayani giggled and pressed a chaste kiss to the cheeks of that beauty who turned pink. Then she filled the dips of the curves of Mohini's spine with her fingers binding the kamarbandh, husking near her earlobes, "Lies."

She stifled the throes of her heart and an amaranthine smile stayed on her visage. As they multiplied and she was unwavered, she was the epitome of every mother. Mohini whisked around and pulled her in a slow dance, unhurried and buoyant as their limbs swayed in poised waves— grinning as they found forelsket again and again.

Afterall, nightmares were dreams too. The heart of Keshava was living a vision of a lover for now.

───  ⋅ ∙ ∘ ☽ ༓ ☾ ∘ ⋅ ⋅  ───

Kanha found blue roses, azure water lilies and peacock feathers all tied together by a string as a gauzy navy robe enveloped them. "They reminded me of you, love." The whimsical note read, stuck to the spruce wood table and he grinned plucking them from it.

"And oh, I loved being with Mohini."

He was a fuchsia yet again.

The setting was an atelier of a picturesque art in making— born of the love of an archeress and the chakradhaari.