#because he goes on this whole rant about how hes not the man she married because hes a horrible person now and shes like oh yeah thats him

[cherriefishboy]

one thing that pisses me off so much is how people misinterpret one part of "would you fall in love with me again"

after odysseus goes on his rant about wondering if penelope would still love him, penelope asks him to move their wedding bed which is literally rooted into the ground. odysseus gets upset and tells her that he lit can't and penelope replies saying that only her husband knew that therefore it must be odysseus.

a lot of people think this was penelope testing to see if this really was odysseus but IT WASNT

this was penelope trying to prove a point. she asks him to move the bed knowing that he knows he can't. she knows it's still him no matter what but odysseus thinks she no longer loves him because he's changed. this is her trying to prove the point that no matter how much he's changed, it's still odysseus. while she does play it off as though she was testing him, she wasn't. and this makes her line of "no matter how longs it's been, you're mine" so much more powerful. no matter what the circumstances are, she would pick odysseus every single time. no matter how much he's changed and no matter how long they've been apart, that's still the man she married and it always will be

the line has so much less meaning if you think about her testing him. it makes it sound like she doesn't trust him and her whole part sounds so much more ingenuine.

anyways odysseus was NOT having it when she asked him to move that goddamn bed. mans villain arc almost begun

[picklesinabottle]

also I much more read penelope's thing with moving the bed as proving to odysseus that he's her husband than proving it to herself

[phantajam]

my hot take about descendants is that NONE of the core four were ready for a relationship until maybe like, the third movie (rant in tags)

[nezuscribe]

𝐛𝐮𝐫𝐧 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐲𝐨𝐮

pairing: gojo satoru x fem!reader

summary: you have everything you could have asked for in life. a beautiful home in greenwhich, just far away from london so that you don't have to mingle with city life, but close enough to be surrounded by the ton. a library with all the books you could ask for and a friend you care for dearly. all except for the man of your dreams, who just so happens to be your best friends brother. worst of all, he only sees you as such. his sisters best friend. (bridgerton!au)

warnings: 18+ mdni, gojo doesn't know how to communicate his feelings, slight angst (with comfort), smut, eating out (fem! receiving), fingering, (happy ending)

word count: 17.3k+ (i have no idea how)

note: yes, this is inspired by penelope and colin. yes, i know that colin isn't a viscount. their story is coming out later than expected so i took matters into my own hands. tysm @jadeisthirsting for beta reading! (if you saw this the first time no you didn't, i hope tumblr doesn't glitch out again)

jjk masterlist

You had a great life, as far as it went. 

You were born into a wealthy family, far more wealthy than they deserved to be. You had maids at your beck and call and did not need to worry about the future as long as you acted correctly. You had book upon books, as many as you could dream of, so long as you didn’t bore your mother too much with them. You had any sort of food you could dream of and you had the most caring friend in the world who loved you very much. 

Honestly, what more could a woman ask for?

“I say we move the whole ordeal to Friday, seeing how Satoru is only arriving on Wednesday. But my mother insisted that we keep in on Thursday because the rest of London just couldn’t wait to see my dashing brother…” Lily continued her furious rant as she paced back and forth the vast expanse of your family’s drawing room, shaking her head in clear frustration. 

“And you want it to be a day later…because…?” You sipped quietly on your tea, trying to keep your smile at a minimum. It was hard not to get giggly when Lily’s face got red and her eyes bugged out of her sockets. For such a pretty girl it tended to shift her features whenever she got angry or annoyed. 

“Well, he’s going to be tired!” She stopped her pacing as she stared at you with her mouth a bit open as if it were the most obvious answer, “And whenever Satoru is tired he’s so difficult to deal with. He’s going to want to talk about his travels for at least three days before he’s ready to mingle with the rest of the works!” 

You nodded heavily, showing her that you were completely on her side. 

“Has he written to you?” She asked and then quickly shook her head, despite the fact you were going to answer with a quiet yes to her question. He had written you a few letters, all of them stashed in your vanity as you read over them, each going over his travels, sometimes sending you little knick-knacks he saw. 

“Not the point. What I’m trying to say is that my mother always goes over the limit with how much she welcomes her children. And Satoru for that matter! Christ, he’s twenty-five and unmarried!” 

You wanted to sink into your seat in embarrassment. You were only so much younger and had never had even an interaction with a suitor before. 

Life was great, for the most part. 

As much as you couldn’t complain, there was a small matter at hand that was growing increasingly more alarming the more the years went on. 

For as long as you could remember, you and Lily were set on never getting married. Ever since she read that one Jane Austen book she was hellbent on independence and no men. You tagged along, seeing how that was a better excuse than admitting no man had even asked you to join him to be his partner to dance before.

Lily didn’t seem to care much for this. While she was set on her celibacy pact, she had been approached before. It doesn’t change much, but it did at least show her that somebody wants her. You were either such as a spinster or married to some ancient man your mother had to dig out from some corner of the market. 

“And Satoru…” Lily rambled on, but all it did was remind you of an even worse fact. 

You were terribly in love with her brother. 

You have known the Gojo family for ten years, five months, twelve days, and two hours, and you have been in love with Gojo Satoru for ten years, five months, twelve days, and thirty minutes. 

Their family had immigrated from Japan months before the oldest child was born, but they had only moved to Greenwich ten years, five months, and ten days ago. You met them only two days later when you accidentally wandered into their gardens, unknowing that a family had just moved in. 

The first time you met that particular Gojo, you were thirteen and facing serious issues with yourself and your own family. You wanted to move to America in hopes that the boys over there would fancy you more and your mother forbade it. Satoru laughed when he saw your horrified face popping up from their blackberry bush, definitely not expecting to see anybody there. 

“Hello there,” the stranger called out. You thought he was a grandfather with the way his hair was artic white, but he only seemed to be a bit older than you the closer he got. 

“I’m not stealing from you I swear!” You cried out as you let the blackberries tumble out of your stained hands. You cannot be taken to prison, you simply wouldn’t survive. 

“I can see that.” He crossed his arms as he tried not to laugh at the way your dress was stained a dark blue color. 

He introduced himself, and Lily, and soon, you and the girl were attached at the hip. 

It didn’t help that as kind and as charming as he was, he only saw you as his sister's closest friend. It also didn’t help that every other woman in high society seemed to be in love with the man and it certainly made it so much more horrific that he seemed to have his eyes on everybody else but you. 

He, much like his sister, was averse to the idea of marriage, but for a completely different reason. 

He seemed to despise the idea of being committed, which is most likely why he had been traveling the entirety of Europe and Asia for the past year or so. Despite his mother’s frantic worrying about setting him up with a respectable lady, he pushed them all aside and fled (in some sense) and will be making his grand appearance a couple of days from now. Everybody is chattering with excitement. You’re trying not to fill with total impending dread. 

It had already taken everything you had to pretend that he didn’t exist and that he had simply disappeared, and you knew your wretched mind would fall for him just as quickly as it did the first time around when you were set to see him next week. 

“...and, are you even listening?” Lily asked, her voice garbling back to life as you snapped your eyes back to hers, covering your mouth with your teacup as you insistently nodded, trying to keep your smile from faltering as she squinted her eyes to look you over and see what was wrong.

“I’m totally in tune with you Lils,” you insisted, nibbling on a cookie to help you with nausea which only seemed to make it worse. 

“Hm,” she grunted, not seeming to believe you but not truly caring as she continued, “And thank the heavens you’ll be there beside me, for who knows what would become of me in such an unruly crowd of men and women just waiting for my brother to make his entrance. I’d lose my sanity.” 

Yes, you thought, how lucky. If only love worked that way, of ignoring it until it faded. If only.

“I’ll be there.” You promised. 

For better or for worse, you’d be there. 

---

The ball was just as you had imagined it. 

Extravagant, elegant, large, and incredibly crowded. 

One of the perks of being an outsider in these sorts of scenes is you didn’t have to dance anymore (no matter how much it stung the first time around getting used to this fact). 

Lily was off somewhere, being forced to socialize. Your other sisters were also lost in the crowd, either dancing or being swooned by a potential match. 

You were yet to see the man of the hour, but then again, so was everybody else. He was either hiding away or being swallowed whole by the hoards of people eager to get a glimpse of him. 

Not that you wanted to see him, of course. Just curious. 

The food was, as always, a bonus. Nobody was going to judge you for scarfing anything down when you had begrudgingly sworn off marriage, and perhaps one of the good things about Lily's pact was that you didn’t care much about the public eye anymore. 

“Please, at least act like we’re not starving you.” Your mother pleaded, unfortunately, stuck to your side for the night as she eyes you and your plate. 

“I’m trying my best,” you reasoned, making sure you didn’t drop anything on your dress. 

“The Viscount is coming tonight,” she tried to think and you snorted, earning some distasteful looks from the widows around you. 

“And he’s just dying to see me, I suppose?” You rolled your eyes at the idea, to help the sting from your own words. It was better to be rationable than to be delusional. 

“Well it doesn’t hurt to-”

“Try?” You cut her off with another laugh as you chew on an eclair, “Might as well. Right after the Princess introduces herself I’ll go up.” The two of you eye the girl in the diamond-encrusted gown with an equally bright tiara on her head. Your mother gave up the argument. 

For the last couple of days, you have been at a mental war with yourself. On the one hand, it surely must mean something if he wrote you letters. On the other one, he wrote it to his entire family and he probably views you as such. No matter how much you want to pretend that the Gojo cares for you, it won’t be in the same way that measures how much you care for him. 

“I’m going to get some more of these macaroons, I’ll be right back.” You excuse yourself as your mother pressed her lips into a thin line, wanting to push you to dance but knowing no amount of persuading was going to change your mind when it was already set on something. 

Wading through the dense crowd was certainly a feat, but you did it nonetheless. From the dessert table, you could barely make out the pop of chartreuse that was Lily's gown, and you wondered how much longer until she’d be free to giggle and gossip with you. 

Your eyes scanned over the little sweets carefully as you mentally weighed which one would taste good and which one would be a surprise in the kindest sense of the word. The colorful ones were often pretty but they tested either too bland or too bitter and the ones with caramel side sugar tended to be too sweet. All the good macaroons with the pistachio filling were gone, which was odd because you could only count on your fingers how many people aside from you tended to favor that one. 

“Looking for something?”

A green macaron was held in front of your face, slowly forcing you to turn your head in its direction as it began to pull away from you

Him. 

“Oh!” 

Oh? If only you could hit yourself in the head that would be great. 

“Oh?” Gojo chuckled, his brows pinching together in slight confusion at your reaction as his lips threatened to pull into a teasing smile, “I haven’t seen you in a year and that's what you’ve got to say?”

You try not to let your heart flutter at his cheeky manner as you roll your eyes, your smile growing as you take him in. 

He’s gotten taller if that was even possible. His hair is still as white as it was, and it seems that no amount of sun was going to change that. He’s gotten a little bit tanner, no longer that frigid pale hue to his skin that made you worry he’d drop dead at any moment. He’s unfortunately more muscular, which just means you have to cast away the scrawny image you’ve made in your mind in hopes that he’d come back anemic. 

His eyes are just as captivating as ever, blue and inviting. His jaw is sharper and yet he has no facial hair on his face. Which you prefer on most men but you’re glad he’s never given into that trend. 

Most importantly, he still looks like that boy you fell in love with so many years ago, and no time away would ever change you at your core. 

You try to not let your neck prickle with heat as he seems to assess you the same way you're doing to him, try not to feel self-conscious as his eyes roam over your features. Sure, a person can change in a year, but you wouldn’t bet you’ve changed that much that would warrant this amount of staring.

“So…?” 

“‘Toru, hi!” You snap out of your state, watching as his face picks up and breaks into a grin as you set your plate down somewhere, seemingly now realizing that Satoru is here and in front of you, “My, you’ve grown so much!”

“Really?” He looks at his torso and his arms as if he can’t believe it. 

“Well, a bit,” you curse at your awkwardness as he cocks a brow, “I’m sorry, I’m a bit out of my element tonight. I apologize for my earlier reaction.” You duck your head down for a second as he waves it off, hopefully not offended. 

You’re glad this little table is tucked away in an alcove away from most of the public eye, and the only people around the two of you are older people and the people standing outside in the gardens. Either they don’t see the man or they’re being somewhat human and granting the two of you some privacy. 

“Apology accepted, but not needed,” he teases, patting your shoulder affectionately as you try not to act as if that single touch made you reconsider the idea of marriage. 

“How are you?” He asks after a beat, not affected by your out-of-character attitude as he tilts his head to the side. 

“As good I could be,” you offer him a wink that came off as an elongated blink, “Whatever Lily filled you in on has most likely happened to me too.” He chuckles, his laughter the sound of melted honey. 

Fuck, you’re never going to get over him. 

“And you? How were your trips?” You egged him on, eyes tracing him, watching as some pink dusted over his cheeks. 

“Boring. Couldn’t wait to come back.” He says, but you can hear the sarcasm in his voice. Mixed with the way he couldn’t contain his bits of laughter, you laughed alongside him. 

“I’d believe it if not for your tan and newfound outlook on life, or so it seems from how Lily describes it.”

“She exaggerates everything,” he waves it off, and you wonder what that double-edged sword implies. 

“I-”

“He’s here!” You hear a loud voice cut you off as the two of you look over your shoulder to see his mother leading the awaiting princess and her train to where the two of you are standing, “He seems to be getting warmed up with this fine lady!” She says your name as heat rushes to your cheeks in embarrassment. 

It was only seconds before you were surrounded by men and women you had never seen before, all hanging off of Satoru’s words as he scrambled to answer all of their questions. 

And so it begins, you say to yourself as you push away from them, going to find Lily as you wonder why you even try. 

You miss the way he calls out for you, quiet enough so that nobody else hears it, but loud enough that his chest tightens in confusion at the sheer desperation of it. 

---

“I despise men!”

You’re at the Gojo estate for once, and Lily has started a new tirade that has lasted for the last hour. 

“What brought this on?” You press, exchanging worried glances with Satoru and her younger sister as she groans, jamming her palms into her eyes as she vehemently shakes her head. 

“Does this,” she shoves her hand, more importantly, her ring finger without a ring, in front of your face, “Look like I’m keen on getting married to you?”

“No….?” You mutter, scared of what she would say next. 

“Does it look like an invitation to barge into my home?”

“Not exactly,” You say, earning a sympathetic look for Satoru as she glares at him. 

“Does it look like I want to get frisky in the broom cupboards?”

“Christ! Lily, your sisters here!” You shout, jumping to cover the young girl's ears. Lily waves it off and Satoru just chuckles, a twinkle in his eyes as you usher the girl out of the tea room as you slam the door shut. 

“This certainly beats the beaches in Venice,” Satoru says as you near the table again, winking at you as you laugh quietly. 

“I’m so glad I’m not getting married. You should be too,” she points her finger at you as you look up at her, “Men are nothing but evil, money hungry, sex driven-”

“Charming, majestic-” Satoru talks over her as she talks even louder. 

“Dirty animals!” She finishes with a cry. 

You and Satoru share a glance as you try to laugh. She’s not wrong, far from it. The majority of men in this place needed to be sent back to their creator, but Lily had a vein in his forehead that was protruding at an odd angle. 

“You laugh now, but you’ll be thanking me fifty years from now.” She warns as you nod, acting totally compliant with her. 

“You’re still with her on her no-marriage pact?” Satoru asks as he stands up, walking past Lily as he looks out from the window, seemingly admiring the gardens outside. He glances over at you as you sink into the satin cushions beneath you. 

“Yes,” but your answer came out shaky and unsure. 

“Of course she is,” Lily answered for you with a definite nod, “And besides, she’s the luckier one. It’s not like any man has even asked her to marry anyway.” She says jokingly, shoving a biscuit in her mouth as she plops herself down beside you, nudging your shoulder with hers as if it were the funniest thing in the world. 

You wish the sofa could swallow you whole. 

“Hey,” Satoru turns around, brows furrowed as he looks at his sister, but the door opens before he can finish his sentence. 

“Miss Gojo,” their butler, Fred, who you’ve known since you’ve known Lily announces for her as he stands at the foot of the door, “Your mother has requested your presence in her quarters.”

Lily stands up with a groan, wiping the crumbs off of her dress as she makes sure there’s nothing around the corners of her mouth. 

“I’m needed elsewhere,” she pats your arm caring for it despite having her words wanting to make you plummet yourself off of a cliff, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

You give her a weak goodbye, watching as she leaves with the door shutting behind her as you sit up a bit straighter, getting ready to leave yourself. 

You stand up, careful not to make any eye contact with Satoru out of sheer embarrassment as you smooth out the wrinkles in your dress, hoping the silence would suffocate you faster than it would him. 

“Lily talks too much sometimes,” he finally says, stepping away from the window as he takes a two closer to your direction, before passing, “I’d apologize on her behalf but I’m pretty sure she’s already forgotten what she’s said.” He tries to lighten the mood and bless his soul, but you can already feel your spirits for the day sour. 

“It’s alright,” you promise, though he seems to disagree but you continue anyway, “I know her, she doesn’t mean it.” Still doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt, a part of you chides. 

“Are you leaving?” He asked, taking another tentative step forward. 

“I was planning on it,” you say with a little chuckle, hoping that your eyes watering up wasn’t too noticeable, “Is that alright with you?”

He looked at you with his bright eyes and just blinked, taking a while to reach his senses. 

“Y-yes! Yes, quite alright. Let me just get my coat…” He muttered, brushing past you as you quickly tried to reject his incoming offer. 

“There’s no need!” You run a bit to catch up to him and his fast pace, “My house is barely two skips away,” you lamely joke, hoping he’d give it up. You wanted to wallow in your self-pity on your walk home, not have to converse with the one man who’d inadvertently give you more to pity over. 

“Not a chance,” he argued, draping the coat in question over his arm, “What sort of person would I be if I let you walk out alone?”

Any other person, you wanted to say but stopped yourself. 

“I don’t mean to bother you…” You wrong your hands in a nervous state, eyes darting everywhere but his. 

You were trying to work on your silly crush this past week, which had unfortunately ramped up ever since he came back. In response, you worked out that the best solution to getting over it was to act like he didn’t exist and ignore him whenever possible. Clearly, it was working out completely in your favor. 

“Not a bother at all.” He insisted, linking his other arms with yours as you jumped a bit in surprise. He was forward, if anything. 

“Fred,” he calls out, getting the butler's attention as you try to hide yourself away, “Tell my mother I’ll be back in a bit.” The man just nods, opening up the front doors as Satoru leads the two of you out. 

The sun was out and working away, which didn’t help with the heat already prickling away through your skin. The Gojo estate was large, but hidden away, and for that you were glad. You could only imagine the gossip that would arise if certain ladies in society were to see you (helplessly) draped over the bachelor's arm. 

“Are you enjoying being back here?” You asked, trying to exert your confidence when you were feeling anything but. 

It’s not like you were unsure of yourself at most times, it’s just that when you’re around the one man you’ve been in love with since childhood and he feels nothing of the sort, you can’t help but be more conscious over everything. 

Satoru looked at you, shrugging as he pursed his lips, thinking of an answer. 

“I missed it,” he says, “But I mainly came back for my family and my friends and well…” He trailed off, chewing on his lip as he waved off his thoughts as if it didn’t matter, “Nonetheless, now that I’ve been around them, I remember why I wanted to leave.” 

And sometimes, despite him not wanting to, made you feel as if you were the most important person he’s had the pleasure of talking to, when in reality that’s just in his nature. 

“Is Lily pestering you too much?” You tease, a little smile on your face that wrinkles the edges of your eyes. He simply stared at you again, his eyes bright. 

“That,” he playfully tugged on your arm, “And the fact that my mother has bombarded me with the idea of marriage. And Luke is having troubles with his fiancé  and Annie doesn’t want to learn to read…it’s all just very chaotic.” He finished with a tired laugh, as if that’s all he could muster up. 

“Seems like a normal day in your house, if I’m being honest.” You lament, kicking a pebble with the point of your shoe. 

“I guess so,” he heaves a sigh that comes out dramatically, “Honestly, I don’t know how you’ve put up with it all these years.”

You scoff, digging your elbow into his side a bit to show that you were offended by his statement. 

“Your family is perhaps the closest thing I have to a second family!”

“And who says family can’t get on your last nerve?” He argued, and that shut you up. He was, indubitably, correct. 

“Yes, well,” you stumble to find some reasoning and he laughs seeing you falter, knowing that he got you cornered, “‘Toru, you are simply a horrible influence to be around.” Is all you can come up with, and despite the severity of your words it only seems to spur him on even more. 

“And yet you can’t seem to get enough of me, can you?” 

You almost stopped in your tracks, your heart seizing in your chest as you try not to fumble up your well-made facade of indifference. 

All you could remember upon his statement were the words he spoke so long ago, not knowing you’d heard them. 

“Charles, you don’t get it, I don’t want a wife!” Satoru exclaimed as he snapped at his friend. It was a gala held at the queen's palace and you had strayed too far away from Lily and found yourself hiding behind a wall as you eavesdropped on the conversation. 

“Not even the Princess?” Another man pushed as you heard Satoru let out a heavy sigh. You peeled around to see him pinching the bridge of his nose. 

“I don’t want to be tied down. You saw what happened to my parents.” He argued. A part of you sympathized with him. 

“Well,” you could make out this voice as his younger brother, two years older than you he went to thinking, “What about that friend of Lily’s? She seems nice enough.”

The hair on your arm pricked upwards. Surely they couldn’t be talking about you. 

“Who?” Satoru asks and his brother says your name in a hushed whisper, as if you held more weight in your title than the Princess did. 

“Her? No, absolutely not,” he said with such disgust that his friends thought he was joking, “You’re out of your mind if you’d think I’d want to court her.”

Your heart, full of love and hope and dreams cracked, crumbled in your chest. And you left, running away because that’s all you knew how to do and sobbed your eyes out to Lily, stating that you heard somebody talking bad about you, refusing to admit that it was her own brother that was causing you to break in front of her. 

A part of you felt pathetic for still caring for him after that night, but there’s not much fight in you when it comes to the people you loved. You pulled away, sure, and stopped your lame excuses of flirting, but you never stopped. He never found out that you heard, so he continued as your friend and you continued as the shameless woman. 

“Right,” you swallow thickly, glad that your estate is now growing closer and closer, knowing that you feel sick and can’t handle it anymore, “Thank you so much for your help, but I’m sure I can make the treacherous journey on my own now.” 

You wring your hand away from his arm, you smile wobbling as you tip your head in his direction, watching him try to make sense of your quick change in nature. 

“Let me take you up to your door,” he started but you raised your hand to silence him, shaking your head. 

“That would be too much to ask for. I will leave you here…um, Satoru,” you say politely, not noting the way his jaw clenched at your sudden formality when addressing him, “I’ll see you tomorrow, hopefully.”

And you left quickly before he could say anything else. You must stay focused on the reality of your situation;

Your best friend's brother just simply wasn’t in love with you. 

---

“Miss,” 

You perked up from your chair in your quaint little library, setting your book down as you watched one of the maids, Ella, politely calls from the door. 

“There’s a gentleman outside calling for you.”

Your brows furrowed as you found a marker so that you don’t lose your place and purse your lips together in questioning. 

“Do you know who…?” Your head cocked to the side as you stood up, walking near her as you wondered if it were that delivery boy who said he’d come with the new copies of the Brontë books you’d been eyeing for the past month. 

“It’s the Viscount Gojo, miss.” She said simply. 

Your face dropped, and you watched as confusion spread across hers. 

“Him? Here? Did he say what was wrong?” You began to rustle around, trying to find something to throw on top of your slip. 

Did something happen to Lily? Did she run away? Was their mother in trouble? You could recall her telling you that her head was aching, could something serious have happened because of that? Christ, you should have told somebody about it rather than comfort her and make her tea. Was he leaving again? Perhaps-

“He said he wanted to see you miss, that’s all he told me.” She seemed apprehensive, judging your face to see if you were maybe feeling ill due to your reaction. 

“Um, alright, just,” you hurried around, trying your fastest to get to your room, “Tell him I’ll be down in a few minutes! Don’t tell him I’m preparing myself, just say that I was discussing matters with somebody!” You call out as you sprint across the halls, not hearing any confirmation as you lock yourself in your room, ransacking your closet to find something not too flashy but not too boring. 

It took a good four minutes just to find a suitable dress and another five to make your face and hair look presentable enough as you scampered down the stairs only to find said Viscount waiting in the foyer. 

His face turned to yours as he heard your heels clicking on the marble, growing into a bright smile as he dipped his head down to greet you. 

“Hello,” he said your name with that smooth voice of his as he took his jacket off and kept it on his arm, “I’m sorry for turning up on such short notice.”

“It’s no problem,” you try to catch your breath for the first time in the last ten minutes as your chest heaves slightly up and down, “No problem at all. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

He takes a second to respond, eyes scanning your features, your clothing, your chest as it tries to catch a solid breath, and you feel yourself look down to make sure there aren't any noticeable wrinkles in the fabric. 

“I, I just wanted to drop in. See how you were doing.”

You tried not to look even more startled, but your brows creased once again as you gnawed on the inside of your cheek. 

“I’m quite alright…thank you…?” You couldn’t look that out of the ordinary, right?

“Good, that’s good,” he watched as you finished your descent down the stairs, slowly coming towards him as you waited for him to finish, “I’m sorry if I interrupted your conversation with…?” Ella did give him a name you wanted to guess. 

“Lord Cornwallis.” You finished for him, not knowing why that was the first name that came to your mind. It was true that he had been here yesterday, but you didn’t talk much to him in his brief visit. 

“Lord Cornwallis?” Satoru repeated back in shock, his brows shooting upwards as he did nothing to hide his outburst. His face quickly turned into one of disgust, which accurately represented the emotions you felt yesterday when you eavesdropped on the conversation he had with your mother behind closed doors. 

“Yes, you just missed him. He went out through the back door,” why were you making this web of lies even bigger? You have no self-control, do you?

“What was Cornwallis doing here?” 

You but your tongue, having to come up with a lie or tell the truth as to why he had visited yesterday. Either way, both options turned out with horrible results. 

“He asked for my hand.” The truth it was, then. 

His brows seemed to disappear into his hairline as his jaw slacked, mouth wide open. Damn your mind, you should have just lied. 

Lily was wrong in one thing, perhaps. You have gotten a few marriage offers in the last three years, but by all men who were older than your grandfather. You hadn’t even told Lily about them and now you were telling her brother. 

“I…” Satoru couldn’t even find the right words to say. You wanted to bury yourself in a hole. 

“…Cornwallis? Isn’t he-”

“Pushing ninety-nine? Yes.” Nobody was sure of his age, and ninety-nine was perhaps even being too generous. Everybody knew that Cornwallis was simply ancient. 

“Did I save you from the conversation at least? I must say, if there was any man I would wish ill upon, it’s certainly him. He’s a lying old cheat.” He tried to joke again but you swallowed thickly. Perhaps if he came at the same time yesterday he might have. But he didn’t and you had to sit through an hour of him pleading with your mother as the two of you just stared in abject horror and surprise. 

“Yes well, thank you…for doing that.” You lied, cleaning your teeth together as you tried to smile, not wanting to hurt his feelings as you came up closer to him, desperately hoping to change the topic of the conversation. 

“Is everything alright with Lily?” You asked his eyes that were focused on the floor jumping to yours as your lips parted, worry still clear on your face. 

“Yes, of course, I just wanted to ask a favor of you. But, judging from your encounter with men today I would understand if this is pushing it,” he cut right to the crux of the matter. He seemed nervous, which was an odd emotion to see on a man otherwise very confident and sure in himself. It unsettled you. 

You tilted your head, waiting for him to find his words and continue. You could make out the slight blush on his face, the pink hue that spread across his cheeks, and the tip of his nose. He was, by all means, the cutest person you’ve ever seen. 

“My mother's holding another ball, two weeks from now, you see,” his lip caught between his teeth, “And she’s been bugging me about having a date for the night. She wants to appease the rest of the gentry, I suppose. Would you, by any chance, like to be that?” 

You stopped computing his words. 

“...It’s honestly just to get her off my back. And you wouldn’t have to stay with me the entire evening, you could do whatever you’d like after we get some of the necessities over with. Lily was the first who suggested the idea, she said you wouldn’t be doing much other than gossip with her. Of course, if you don’t want to I certainly won’t force the idea, but it’s merely a suggestion.” His blue eyes, ever so convincing and round and caring bore into yours, and despite your better judgment you find yourself nodding. 

“I wouldn’t mind it,” you say a bit breathlessly, completely forgetting about Cornwallis and the way you were debating it and the fact that this means nothing at all, and would most likely cause you more harm than good. 

His nervousness washed away into a big smile, and you cursed yourself at the little flicker of hope you felt deep in your soul as he scrambled to find the right words to say to thank you. The flood of gratitude and appreciation stabbed deeply into your heart as he kept repeating friend, but you were too hopeful for love. 

Your mother always said that loving would always be your greatest weakness. 

---

You should have said no. 

The amount of eyes that were focused on you was enough to make you nauseous, and you couldn’t get sick for you hadn’t had anything to eat today with how hurried everything was. 

Your arm was draped around Satoru’s, and he held tightly onto your hand. He was the image of luxury and charisma right now, and if you were in the crowd looking as he made his way through the crowd you almost would have wanted to bow. 

Time came by a lot faster when you were totally freaking out over it, and before you knew it, you were put in a dress you hadn’t even picked and corseted to the heavens. Your hair was done with extra detail, and they even went as far as putting some Swarovski’s into it so that when the candlelight hit it, you’d sparkle twice as much. 

Satoru, ever the gentleman, had picked you up from your estate as he walked you to their home amidst all the chaos of getting ready for another ball. In all honesty, you have no idea how their mother manages to keep her sanity through all of this.

You were still a bit giddy from your earlier interaction with Satoru, although it didn’t do much to calm your nerves now. 

“I’m sorry for taking so long!” You had said as you rushed down your stairs, careful not to trip over your train as you put your earrings in. Ella said that he was waiting for you downstairs, you just underestimated how early he’d be. 

“Don’t apologize…” He had turned around from admiring a painting, his eyes widening a bit when he saw you. He quickly shut his mouth, but you had already gauged his reaction. You tried not to let it get the best of you, but you could have sworn he blushed more often than usual when you interlinked your arm with his.

“You’re cutting off my blood circulation.” He whispers in your ear as you try to smile, your eyes nervous as they dart around the room. How could it be even bigger than that last ball? Did they suddenly meet thirty new people? 

“Maybe you could cut mine off.” You snap back through your teeth, your hand gripping his wrist as tightly as you could. 

“How are we supposed to dance if one of us is dead?” He grumbles back, putting on a little grin as he makes eye contact with his mother, and then goes back to whispering, “It’s just one song and you’re done. You’ve done this before.”

You wanted to shove him to the ground. 

“No, I haven’t!” You say loud enough that he hears but try to mask it so that nobody else does, “I told you yesterday this is my first time dancing with somebody!” As embarrassing as it was to admit, right now you couldn’t be bothered to care as he led you to the middle of the room, standing in first position as you two waited for the orchestra to begin. 

“Are you saying I’m your first?” He teased, his tongue poking out from between his lips as he watched you grow mortified, rubbing the back of your hand in a comforting way as his means to apologize. 

You wanted to go ahead and argue but the cello and violins started and you were whisked away by his calculated movements, and the only thing you could do was follow in his lead. 

The two of you practiced a bit in the days leading up to this, but it was a lot different when your only crowd was Lily and her constant whining about how boring it was. 

Now, with everybody staring at you and him, it was far more daunting. 

“Don’t look at the ground, look at me,” he whispered in your ear, smiling when your eyes traveled to him. He tried not to crack when he saw the pure loathing and hatred in them, but at least you were looking up and not at his shoes. 

“‘Toru I’m never doing a favor for you again, you owe me.” You groan, letting him twirl you around in a circle as some of the ladies give a polite clap. 

“Name your price.” He egged you on, bringing you back flush against his chest as his hand found purchase on your waist. 

“Not money,” you grumble, eyes twitching as your heart beats rapidly in your chest, you’ve always wanted to dance with him, sure, but not under these circumstances. 

“Books?” You consider it but shake your head. You deserve something bigger for what you’re putting yourself through. Shocking enough, after being a wallflower for so many years, you weren’t handling being in the spotlight too well. 

“I’ll think about it. But it has to be big.” You warn and he lifts up his pinky on your waist to show you his unbridled loyalty to keeping true to your words.

“Where are you going after this is done?” He spins the two of you around, and you watch as more couples rush around the two of you. It’s less stressful when others are dancing, but you still feel tense. 

“I’m probably going to stay with Lily outside.” He seems to deflate a little, though he still stands tall, his suit never crinkling through his movements. 

“No more dancing?” He teased but you vehemently disagree with the idea. 

“Never again.” It’s not as though you hate it, in fact, a younger you would have been jumping with glee to be able to dance with Satoru. But after years of growing accustomed to watching rather than participating, you can’t grow out of that habit. 

You felt a tap on your shoulder and turned around to see the Princess herself as she looked at you with pleading eyes. 

“Would you mind if…?” She motioned to Satoru and then to you. You barely noticed the number coming to an end, and the rupture of applause was the last thing you heard before you scrambled away from him. 

You didn’t even notice how he had held onto your hand tighter, not wanting to let you go.

“O-of course, your majesty.” You winced at your select choice of words and how you said her title almost as if you questioned it. 

“Thank you.” She mumbled and for somebody of such high regard, you wouldn’t think of her to need to plead with somebody, especially you, to be able to have a dance with Satoru. 

Your job for the night was done, successfully might be too loose of a term, but finished nonetheless. You chose not to look back at Satoru, knowing that the wide grin he’d save for the girls he was interested in would only twist that knife deeper into your heart. 

You were a sadist in the most pathetic way possible.

You waved goodbye to Satoru as another number started again, and tried your best to get away from all the twirling bodies as you headed out to find Lily. 

It didn’t take long until you found her trying to weasel out some information from her brother, tapping him repeatedly on the shoulder as he tried to fight her off. 

“…what did you hear, what do you know?” She pressed as he groaned, obviously trying to have a private conversation with the lady next to him. 

“Nothing Lily!” He locked eyes with you as he almost begged silently for you to take her. 

“Lily, I’m here. We can go now.” You looped elbows with her as you dragged her away, giving her brother a quick smile that said you accepted his gratefulness. 

As you walked through the stone path in the garden, she muttered dejectedly about how she was just about to get some good information out of him. 

“How was dancing with Satoru?” She finally asked after a while. The two of you weren’t alone, but far less crowded than it would if you had been inside. 

“Stressful, but the song was short so I wasn’t needed for too long.” You tell her honestly. If there’s one thing you can’t do with Lily it’s lie, for she’ll sniff out of you the moment you come up with it. 

“You look flustered.” She noted, looking over your face and the sweat that dotted over your cheekbones. 

“You dance in a sweltering room like that with the entire ton looking at you and try not to get flustered.” You reasoned and she seemed to buy it. It wasn’t a total lie, but a stretch of the truth. 

“You know,” Lily had terrible balance and often collided with you as she walked, “I was talking to my mother and despite her insistent warnings, I think we should make it official.”

“Make what official?” The lights from the candles above you illuminated her face and she had that look of mischief that either excited or frightened you. 

“That we plan to be unwed.” She grinned cheek to cheek and all you could feel was that same wave of nausea that had been prickling at you since the start of the night. This was the last thing you needed to hear about right now. 

“They’re going to think we’re either lunatics or lovers.” You say with a sullen and heavy sigh, looking up at the sky in some sort of desperate manner as you wait for some sort of angel to save you from this conversation. 

“And what’s the issue with that? Let them think. You have always said you’ve wanted this, so let’s let the world know.” 

Something you wish Lily was was to be more aware. As loving, thoughtful and caring as she was, she never seemed to pick up on the little things. For one, you doubted she noticed just how quiet you got whenever she brought up this conversation. You’d give her the benefit of the doubt and say that you rarely talked much when it came to marriage, but that was just so that you could save yourself from the ongoing embarrassment of never having experienced love or some sort of feeling that somebody would feel towards you to genuinely want to be your husband. 

Not only that, but far from Lily's point of help, is the fact that ever since Satoru has been back, your childish feelings have come flooding right in with him. No matter how many tea sessions you have with Lily and have him sitting in the background, either reading the morning's paper or jotting things down in his journal, it always spins to him sitting right beside you as you talk about anything under the sun. 

And while you know your hopes of marrying him are just too far-fetched, you’ve always been a hopeless romantic. Something Lily just hasn’t ever been able to pick up on when around you. Which is shocking, seeing how the only novels you’ve read for the majority of your life was centered around such a topic. 

“Listen, Lily, I’ve been thinking,” you pause for a second in your place, staring at the pebbles arranged in the formation of a star as you swallow your bile, “That maybe…” 

You were nervously wringing your hands together, a sign that Lily knew all too well. She could read you like any of her books, and she let out a gasp, covering her mouth with a shaky hand as she pointed an accusatory finger at you. 

“No,” she dug the finger into your chest, “You’re thinking of breaking up the pact?” It comes out breathless. Her soft curls of white that had been done up beautifully were slowly falling down as she shook her head in pure shock, not giving you a chance to talk. 

“I mean this is just brilliant. Brilliant! What am I supposed to do now, go out into the world alone as a spinster?” 

You stuttered, your fingers interlaced with one another as you tried to calm her down from causing a scene. Trying to shush her came to no avail as you wring your hands away from her, acting as if your touch was burning. 

If the Gojo’s were anything, it’s overly dramatic in places where dramatics were certainly not needed. 

“Please be rational,” she urged you as she clutched onto your wrists, suddenly pleading to you with her wide eyes, “The season is almost over and you haven’t had any offers. Sooner than later we’re going to be thirty, then forty, then fifty, and husbandless. We should say it now so that it doesn’t come off as a pathetic cry to hold onto what little decency we have in the future!” 

Christ, you hated that she was being somewhat logical. But her rationality stung, the way melted wax does when it burns the skin. She didn’t know just how much she was hurting you, and you doubted she ever would. 

“Look, I know I’m probably not going to be offered a chance at marriage, but it wouldn’t hurt to at least try.” You try to reason with her as she sniffs, her eyes squinted as she looks at you in anger. 

“This was our pact and you’re going against it! What’s next?”

You were going to argue that this pact was only made on the basis of her having too much champagne to drink and you being sullen over her brother, but you were cut off from getting the chance to do so. 

“What’s your issue?” 

You turned around at the familiar voice as you saw Satoru nearing you, Lily continuing her rant as she seemed to completely miss that her brother was coming towards the two of you. 

“What?” You felt overwhelmed with having two Gojo’s corner you, both rather angry from the looks of it. 

“I know that this isn’t your scene but you said you’d be my date. You don’t have to dance with me, but at least be there.” He looks like he’s seething, and you’ve never seen this look on him before. It’s jarring, to say the least. 

You feel like your head is about to explode. 

“I just-”

“....and my mother was only more confident in the idea if you were doing it!” Lily exclaimed, causing you to look back at her as she urged you to think about it. 

“...my mother has given me at least twenty women to mull over in the last twenty minutes. It would have been none if you just acted as my date for the night!” Satoru’s voice rose, and you felt like your heart was going to actually stop. Your head was spinning, your vision was blurry, and you couldn’t hear anything besides a loud ringing in your ears. 

“I’m sorry but-” The two of them talked over you, so stuck in their own worlds that they didn’t notice the tears pricking at your eyes or the way you seemed to be short of breath. It would probably be one of their greatest flaws, never noticing something until it was far too late. 

“Stop!” You cried out, earning some looks from the people around you as you rubbed at your forehead, already feeling it ache under your touch, “Please! Listen, just for a bloody second!” 

You took a deep breath and began. 

“I’m a fucking romantic Lily, and nothing’s ever going to change that! I always have been! And I want to get married, I just agreed to your pact because I know I’m probably never going to get that chance! And god, how can your only takeaway from reading Persuasion be to abstain from marriage?” Your nose crinkles in anger as you turn around to point your finger at her brother's chest, watching as he takes your reaction in obvious surprise. 

“You!” You cry out and he almost backs away, “I was trying to give you some courtesy by leaving! God forbid you gave anybody the idea that you were courting me!” You quickly wipe at your eyes but it does fuck all of hiding how you truly felt as your lips wobbled.  

“Why would…?” He's breathless, no longer angry, just utterly confused and a wee bit frightened. 

“We both know you’re too good for that. How’d you phrase it, you’d be out of your mind if you did such a thing?” You throw his own words back at him, and you watch in some sort of mixture of triumph and heartbreak as realization washes over his features. 

He finally remembers. 

“I…” he swallowed thickly, running a hand through his hair as it fell out of his face, rubbing at his jaw as you looked at you from beneath his lashes, “I didn’t…” but he can’t finish his sentences and instead stops, sharing an unreadable look with his sister as they then look at you. 

“I’m going home.” You say after a beat of silence, breathing deeply through your nose as you look away from the two of them. 

“Let me-” Satoru started but you raised a hand to stop him. 

“I think I’d be better off alone.” You snap, nostrils flaring as you shake your head, pinching the bridge of your nose as you try to stop the already impending migraine that is about to come. 

For once in your life, you didn’t care about the eyes boring into your back or the way that whispers flew around you and twisted around your throat like a vine. You were glad that nobody else other than the servants was home as you ran up into your room, locking everybody else out as you sobbed into your pillows. 

---

The days following your (well-deserved) outburst were more than rough. 

To your knowledge, Lily has visited a total of ten times in the past five days, sometimes twice in the same one, while her brother has visited a grand total of zero. You didn’t expect much from him, but this really cemented your quickly growing disdain. 

Your mother informed you constantly that she was trying to put out the fires from that night but you couldn’t bring it to feel too bad, after all, you were glad that you didn’t say anything more drastic. 

“This is just so unlike you!” She cried, shaking in disappointment as you munched on some sweets you nicked from the kitchen. 

“I know,” you chuckled, “I’m so proud of myself.”

She just throws her hands in the air as a sign of utterly giving up and storms out of the room, most likely to meet with somebody else to “clean up the mess.”

She was right for some part, you can’t remember the last time you actually told somebody how you were feeling. It’s not healthy on your end, but growing up with three older sisters who always got it their way meant that you had some lack of backbone. 

Lily and Satoru, as much as you cared about them, didn’t live like that. Their mother loved them all equally and she made sure that all of their voices were heard. She was always making sure that their priorities were met and she never made them feel inferior. 

Which somehow, didn’t pass on to you. 

Loving the way you do got tiring when you got nothing back, and giving everybody your all when nobody seemed to notice it felt as though you were alone in a world full of people who cared for each other. You’ve read the books and heard the stories, but you eventually realized that it simply just wasn’t in your cards to be dealt the same thing. 

They cared, you know they did. But sometimes, it felt like they expected your care in order for them to show it to you. 

“Miss?” you heard a faint voice and a knock at your door. You sat up from your slump as Ella slowly came inside, shutting the door soundly behind her. 

“Did my mother ask you to make sure I haven’t flung myself off the balcony?” You dust away any crumbs from your pull over as you stare out the window. 

“I’m making sure you didn’t.” 

Your head snapped over at the familiar voice only to see Lily standing at the foot of your bed, looking out of place with her bright purple dress. She looked like she was teetering back and forth between staying out and sprinting away, and you admired her courage after how many times you’ve turned down her offer. 

You glared at Ella but she was no longer there, leaving you and Lily alone. 

“You’re just in time then.” You say blandly, standing up from your bed as you make the covers and are careful not to come too close to her. She seemed to notice. 

“We can’t go about this forever,” she stated, rounding the corner of your bed as she took three steps forward while you took one back, not wanting to be cornered again the way you were that night, “This silent treatment is killing me.”

“Then die,” you don’t mean it and she knows it, but her face wobbles for a second and you watch in horror as tears spring to Lily's eyes. 

The last time Lily cried the two of you were fifteen and her brothers had effectively ruined the singular dress she had actually been looking forward to wearing by staining it with ink. You spent at least an hour calling her down and trying to rationalize with her until you finally gave up and offered to cut holes in all of their suits. 

You’re not sure you could do that now. 

“I’m sorry!” She sprung herself forward at you with full throttle as she hugged you tightly, “You’re right! There’s nothing wrong with being a romantic!” You don’t know what to do as you stand there in shock so you awkwardly pat her back, her long white hair never loose so you’ve never really seen it to its full extent. 

“My brother and I have been at war with each other trying to put the blame on somebody else but I’m sorry! You of all people deserve to find love,” she looks up and her eyes just look like oceans and it’s unfair how pretty she looks when she cries because you just look like a mess, “Please, please forgive me.”

You look as she refuses to pull away from you, clutching desperately onto the thin fabric of your nightgown that your mother reprimanded you for not getting out of, and slowly feel your hands circle around her back as you pull her into a hug. 

“Honestly,” you shake your head as she looks up at you, cheeks rosy with streaks of tears and her lip wobbles violently, “I’m probably going to be on that pact ten years from now. But I just-”

“Want to try!” She finished your sentence for you, something the two of you always prided in being able to do, “and that’s respectable too!”

You try not to smile but the corners of your lips tug upwards as you nod, Lily waiting with bated breath as she scanned your reaction. 

“Don’t ever treat me like that again, you hear me?” 

She vehemently nods, pulling away as she wipes at her eyes, holding out her oinks finger as she waits for you to latch on. Sure, it was a childish way of making a promise, but Lily was never the serious sort of person. If anything, this is the most you’ve ever seen her apologize about something. 

“I promise with the depths of my soul. If I do, brand me with an iron.” Your eyes widen as you go to disagree but she won’t take it. 

“I swear.” She repeats gravely. 

You look at her pinky for another second before you bring yours up, not believing that this is still how the two of you go about making amends. 

“Alright then,” you heave a sigh, “I forgive you.”

Her face breaks into a wide and toothy smile as she pulls you in for a tighter hug, nearly knocking the air out of your lungs as she pulls back away. 

“You’ll never regret this, I swear,” she looked radiant, but quickly stopped as she looked down at the ground, trying to gather her thoughts on how to break the news to you, “Now, be prepared for another one.” 

You blink slowly, brows furrowed in confusion as you lean on your bedpost, arms crossing as your lips purse. 

“What?” 

She almost looks ashamed again, looking at the clock on your wall. 

“My mother’s invited you over for dinner. Get ready to see the other Gojo.”

---

Your mother, as difficult as she was to deal with at most times, somehow understood the concept of showing off through a good wardrobe. 

You wouldn’t put any bets on the fact that if your outfits were significantly better you might have had at least one man approach you in all these years, but it certainly could have been a possibility. 

The cut was lower than all your normal dress, and with the help of your corset, pushed the sisters up a considerable amount. 

The color was the most flattering you’ve ever seen, and through the utilization of crystals and diamonds encrusted in the fabric itself, it shined perfectly when the light hit it. 

For the first time, you were glad your mother picked out your outfit. 

Unfortunately, the outfit gave you only so much confidence. When you walked into the Gojo estate, thankfully with Lily on your side, all the memories from that night came flooding back and your stomach flipped upside down. 

You were glad that Lily was seated next to you at the dinner table as well, but it didn’t help that Satoru was seated in front of you, glaring daggers into your face as you tried to avoid looking at him. 

“Now, you didn’t tell me about your plans for the next year, with the season already coming to an end.” Their mother, bless her heart, asked as she loaded some peas into her fork, looking at you with her kind eyes as you struggled to think of a good enough answer. 

“I’m planning on taking a marriage offer up, actually,” you say, trying not to look at Lily for you knew she was already giggling.

In the past five hours, you filled her in on everything, and she decided the best way to get Satoru to say something was if you went with the idea. 

“Oh?” You watched as she perked up in interest, as did the rest of the Gojo family. An offer? 

“Yes,” you nodded, “Lord Cornwallis, actually, if you’ve heard of him?” 

Lily was gleaming as she saw her brother clench his jaw as he stared at the side of your face that was still looking at their mother. 

“L-lord Cornwallis?” You felt bad for lying to her, but you could just come back later and say you’ve changed your mind, “He must be at least-”

“Ninety-nine?” You answered for her as her cheek warmed, “Some say he’s just in his prime, yes.” 

She drank some of her wine. 

“Isn’t that desperate?” Satoru finally said and you heard a loud clatter from the end of the table as their mother angrily sat her cup down, glaring at her son. 

“Satoru!” She exclaimed, the rest of the girls and boys watching in tense silence as they waited for your reply. 

“It’s alright,” you shrugged, fiddling with the bracelet on your wrist, “And yes, it could come off as desperate. However, I would rather go to a man who finds no problem in courting me rather than somebody who’d tell the whole world just how much it would disgust him to be seen with me.”

You could swear you heard a tooth crack. 

“I’m sorry, am I missing something-” One of the brothers piped up but Satoru acted as if he hadn’t heard him. 

“Well if that man were drunk out of his wits-”

“Then he let his sober thoughts reign free.” You finish for him, nostrils flaring as Satoru twisted the ring on his forefinger back and forth. 

“Again, Miss Gojo, I’m simply thinking over his offer.” You finish, seeing how she could barely take her eyes off of her son as she blinked towards you, giving a shaky smile as she nodded. 

“Of course, there’s no…no problem in that.” She swallowed uncomfortably, as did everybody else. You peeked over at Lily to find her just as you suspected, beaming with silent joy. 

“If you wouldn’t mind, I think my dress has come a bit undone. I’m going to call for somebody to fix it.” You say, excusing yourself as you try to go ahead with the plan you had set in the first place. 

“Make him mad, really mad. Say something about Cornwallis, he despises him,” Lily muttered, sitting cross-legged on your bed as she urged you to listen to her directions, “Then excuse yourself. Say you’ve got to use the privy or something, doesn’t matter.”

You nodded, listening intently as she laid it on thick for what she had been picking up on for the past couple of days. 

“Go upstairs and find his room, you know where it is. Be quick with it too, but there’s this box on his desk that’s full of letters. I swear on my Austen collection that there is a letter with your name on it.”

You felt your heart tumble. 

“Are you sure?” You asked, glancing at the clock to make sure you wouldn’t be late to dinner. 

“Positive. And I’d get it if I could, but he’s so secretive with his room that this is probably the one time it’s going to be unlocked. He’d never suspect anybody going snooping at this hour.”

You grinned, knowing that if you finally got that little something to use against him, he’d have no choice but to grovel at your feet for the rest of his life. 

You quickly scampered up the stairs, telling one of their mates that you’d be able to fix your dress on your own and that you’d be stashed away in Lily's room for the time being, and mentally times yourself as you quickly paced through the halls, looking for the familiar dark oak that would be Satoru’s room. 

Just when you were about to get lost in their maze of a house, you stopped triumphantly behind the last door at the end of the hall, staring deeply at it as you weighed your options. 

You quickly caved, slowly reaching out to the doorknob to see if it was locked. 

It swung open, and you let out a sigh of relief and looked around a final time to make sure that nobody had followed you before you fully let yourself inside. 

It was dark, and you left the door slightly open so that the light from the halls could sleep in a bit, and you went to work on locating the box on his desk that Lily had described to you. 

You squint your eyes, wincing as you bumped into furniture as you made your way to the corner of the large room, blindly reaching and grabbing for anything on the mahogany desk that would resemble a box. 

You let out a sound of triumph as you found a square-shaped glass-feeling thing filled to the brim with papers, holding it upwards to the sliver of light as you quickly ran through the letters with your fingers and you tried to find one with your name on it. 

They seemed like they were all unsent, with many of them labeled to his mother or siblings, and a few to his friends, but you didn’t find any of them labeled to you, and you quickly felt your heart and hopes sink. This was taking far too long.

Just as you were about to give up, you passed a smaller shaped letter with cursive that looked familiar, in the sense that you had seen it addressed before, and pulled it out only to see your name staring back at you. 

A part of you almost wanted to sink into the chair behind the desk, your heart beating rapidly in the small vastness of your ribcage as you held it back up to the light, seeing a note tucked neatly away through the transparency of the envelope. 

Your nimble fingers went to rip the seal of wax off, but stopped as the door swung open. 

“What the hell are you doing?” Satoru stood at the doorway, blocking the rest of the light as his shadow cast over you. 

You dropped the letter, quickly hiding it behind your back as he stepped in, getting closer to you as you abruptly stood up, trying to come up with a feasible lie as you rounded away from his desk, trying to get away from him and his massive build. 

“Oh?” You looked around as if suddenly realizing this wasn’t the place you were supposed to be, “Is this not Lily’s room? Silly me, I couldn’t make it out in the dark. I’ll be leaving now if you’ll excuse me…” You turned around, brushing past him but stopping when you felt his long fingers circle your wrist, turning you around as his eyes squinted. 

“Bullshit,” you flinched, never having heard him curse before as his hands felt around yours, finding the letter you were doing a terrible job of hiding, “You know this house better than your own. Why the hell are you in my room?” 

You didn’t say anything as he brought your hand out from behind your back, opening up your closed fist with much ease to reveal the crumpled-up envelope. Your chest heaved up and down, waiting with bated breath as he stared silently at the letter. You balled your fists back up again, stepping away from him as he followed you quickly in your footsteps. 

“Give that to me y/n,” his voice was low and commanding, unlike anything you’ve ever heard before, and if you weren't in your rebellious mood (and somewhat in your independent, not totally in-love-with-him mood) you would have caved, but you shook your head, looking behind you as to make sure you didn’t back into his bed frame. 

“It’s got my name on it.” You argued, knowing it was a terrible excuse, and you watched him chuckle darkly, knowing that you had no good reason for being in his room and sifting through his letters. 

“And yet it was in my room, in my letterbox, on my desk.” He snapped, eyes a deep blue and different from the usual lightness they carried. He wasn’t joking and he wasn’t lying, he needed that letter back. 

Which just made you want it even more. 

You didn’t know what to do, so the only logical thing in your sporadic mind was to shove it down your dress, hiding it in your chest as Satoru watched your movements like a hawk, not saying anything as you defiantly showed him your now empty hands. 

“Get it now Satoru,” you challenged him, not realizing you had backed up into the wall until your head lightly bounced off from it, wincing at the sting as you looked back behind you. 

He didn’t say anything, and it seemed like his mind was running as quickly as it could as he tried to deal with whatever it was you were doing. Instead, he just three more languid steps forward, nearly face to face with you as he stared down at you, eyes darting from yours to your lips and chest. 

Under any other circumstances, you would have felt like shedding your clothes off from how heated you felt under his gaze. Here, your only resort was to keep them on, to see what was so important about that letter. 

“I came to find you to apologize,” his voice is low and calm, his cool breath hitting your cheek as you struggle to keep your composure, “To be civil. To tell you that I didn’t mean anything I said that night.” 

Despite your mixed emotions, you felt your brows furrow at his select choice of words. 

“Are you here to tell me now that you actually meant every word?” You couldn’t stop the words as they tumbled out of your mouth, knowing that the answer would probably send you into a state you could never get out of as the person you’ve loved for the majority of your life confirms your biggest fears.

But shockingly, he just shakes his head, his lips pink and plush and you’ve never found yourself focusing on them more than you are now. 

If only you knew that he felt the same as he looked at you. 

“No,” he stepped closer, if possible, but still had room to shove him away. But you didn’t, not now, you couldn’t, didn’t want to as his nose nudged yours a bit, your lashes fluttering against your cheek as your lips parted, waiting for him to do something, 

“I’ll show you that I didn’t mean them.”

You couldn’t breathe, your lungs contracting as his face fell towards yours, your lips meeting ever so slowly as they finally landed on yours, soft and somehow delicate as they pushed against yours, finalizing the kiss as he began to move them. 

You’ve never kissed anybody before, often dreaming about it as you lay in bed hopelessly in love, but never thought you’d be here from the man you’ve imagined on the other side doing it with him. 

He moved slowly as if he knew that this was your first time, and you didn’t know how to handle your emotions as he angled his chin to get closer to you, his lips capturing you in such a heated and feverish pace that you knew you weren’t going to be able to sleep tonight as you thought back on it. 

His hands slowly came up to your waist, tugging you flush against his body as your hands somehow found their way behind his neck, finger curling into his long strands of arctic white as he groaned against you when you tugged a bit, the sound coming from deep within his chest. 

You were impatient, always have been, and it probably took him a little bit by surprise as you quickened the pace, hungry after so many years of starving for this as you pushed against him for more fervor, feeling him smile slightly against your lips as he met you in the middle, fingers digging into the fabric of your dress as you whined slightly as the feeling. 

He nipped at your lips, his tongue poking out from in between yours, and you absentmindedly opened your mouth a little bit to make room for him, heart and mind working in tandem as he brought up a hand to cradle the back of your head, making sure it didn’t hit the wall as he pushed against you. 

It was messy and hurried, and for once, it felt as if he felt the same you were feeling. As if he too wanted this, needed this more than air itself, and that thought alone made your mind stop functioning. 

Your hands moved from his neck to his chest, fingers clutching onto the satin fabric of his suit, wrinkling the fabric as your noses bumped against each other, sheer desperation showing from the two of you. 

“Viscount Gojo?” 

The two of you almost jumped at the knock that sounded from the door. 

“Your mother is asking where you are. She’s worried about the lady as well,” Fred didn’t peek his head in, and for that you were grateful. You were sure you looked like a total mess at the moment, but Satoru spoke, glancing at the door as he took a deep breath, almost as if it was his first time breathing in a couple of minutes. 

“Tell her that we’re working things out. It’ll take a bit more time.” His voice sounded steady enough, but from where you were standing you could see how swollen his lips were, the fact that they were red and glistening with sweat. His hand on your waist tightened as if he didn’t want to let you go, and your hand lay flat against his chest.

“Of course,” Fred answered, “Take your time.” He shut the door completely, and the two of you waited until you heard his footsteps becoming softer and softer until you could no longer hear them. 

You waited, looking in the direction for another second before you looked up at him only to see his eyes gauging yours for a reaction, somehow a storm going on behind them as he battled twenty different emotions. 

“I’m still hurt Satoru,” you whisper, his eyes never changing but his shoulders tense a bit as you drop your hands away from him, as if you were suddenly coming to your senses and realizing what you had just done, “I can't forgive you this easily.”

You don’t know how to handle your feelings sometimes, and sometimes they catch up to you later than they should. You could still hear his words from that night ringing around your mind and nothing was stopping it no matter how hard you tried. 

“Come get the letter when you’re ready to apologize with more than just your lips.” 

You look back up at him one more time before you push away, feeling him lightly move away from you to give you space as you smooth out the front of your dress, touching your face to make sure that none of the makeup and powder that was swiped against your face wasn’t wrecked as you left. 

You don’t look back as you left him silently in his room, shutting the door behind you as you stopped, taking a deep breath to calm your nerves as you went back down to dinner. 

---

A week passed since your night with Satoru, and you’ve come to terms with the fact that he regrets it. 

It hurts, it hurts even more when you convince yourself that he probably was trying to take pity on you and test how true his old words were, but you couldn’t spiral, knowing that it would cause even more turmoil. 

Lily came by regardless, under the impression that you and her brother made up and are on better terms, and you're in no rush to tell her the truth of what happened. 

She asked about the note, but you insisted that you couldn’t find it. She grumbled that he probably threw it away after she pestered him constantly about it. 

“What about Lord Balfour?” She was sprawled out on your bed, her legs crossed resting it up against the wall with her head at the opposite end, looking on a piece of parchment in which she had gone around asking for men looking for marriage (and a true romantic connection, she stressed). 

“Hm, too bald,” you said, sitting in your vanity, washing off the rest of the powder on your face as you dipped the soft cotton cloth back into the pitcher of water as you looked at her through the mirror, “Isn’t he a year younger than us?”

She pouted as she thought, looking back to her list as she crossed off that name. 

“Count Alexei?” She seemed to like this one and you set your towel down, trying to place a face to the name. 

“Isn’t he from Russia? Wouldn’t it be difficult for him to come back and forth?”  You asked and she nodded, although she seemed more sad that you didn’t want him. 

“Have you just gone around the ton asking if anybody’s looking for marriage?” You teased and she turned around, sitting up as she wiped the hair out of her face. 

“I take your journey to find true love very serious,” she argued and you snorted, knowing that it was a kid if that and the fact that she liked judging the men of the higher class, “Are you complaining?”

“No, of course not.” You turn around from your chair as you face her, urging her to continue. 

“Duke Cambell?” She looked up from the list with a raised brow, only to find you looking the same, taking more time to consider the name. 

“He explicitly stated he’d consider marriage? With me?” You tilt your head to the side. Surely it would be too good to be true. He wasn’t too pretty, nobody was like Satoru, but he wasn’t that bad to look at either. 

“He seemed quite eager about it, actually.” She said, and you smiled a bit, feeling like a silly schoolgirl with the way you ducked your head. 

“He’s a bit shy, isn’t he?” You said with a little giggle and she snorted, nodding as she circled his name and put a question mark next to it. 

“Just means he’s more apt to moan louder,” she said blandly and your mouth dropped, burrowing your face in your hands at her very open nature. Even after ten years it sometimes caught you off guard. 

“Lily!” You shouted, trying to hold in your laugh, and she just looked at you as if you should have expected this as she rose from your bed, stretching her arms above her head as she let out a frantic yawn. 

The sun had already set and she knew her mother would be expecting her to arrive soon, and you went to stand but stopped you. 

“No need to stand, I’ll bid farewell from here.” 

You rolled your eyes at her dramatics, picking up the cloth again as you dabbed at your cheeks. 

“I assume you’ll be here tomorrow?” Crossing your legs as she shrugged as if it was the most obvious answer in the world. 

“Yes. In fact, I’ll leave this prized list with you so that you can mull it over,” she walked over a bit and set it down on the top of your vanity, looking at you as she put a solemn hand on your shoulder, “Do think over Count Alexis. He is rather dreamy.” 

You chuckled, waving goodbye to her as she left the door with a litter thud, blowing kisses as you snorted at her exaggerated act, turning back around to your mirror as you wiped away the remaining bits of your makeup. 

You were already in your dressing gown, the material soft and light on your skin as you set the cloth back down, drying your face off with another one as you got ready to sleep. 

With meticulous care you took your earrings off and began to work on your necklace but struggled with the finicky clasp, your thumb slipping just as you were about to get it. You let out a quick groan of frustration, shutting your eyes as you tried not to lose your temper over a necklace.

“Do you need help with that?” 

You were getting better at controlling your reactions, but your eyes snapped over to the top of your mirror as he stood there, shutting the door behind him. Your hands fell to your lap as you silently seethed. 

Ella was never going to hear the end of it. 

You said nothing and he quietly walked over to where you sat with your back to him, opting to look at him through your mirror as his slender fingers slowly came up to your neck. 

“I’m getting rid of my maid.” You mutter eyes dropped to your lap as you try to control your breath as his fingertips touch your delicate skin, gingerly getting to work of undoing the clasp. He didn’t say anything and the only sound that filled the room was your slow little puffs of air, trying to get your pulse to stop from doing the strange rhythmic beating it always did when you were around him, as if he somehow became the conductor of your heart. 

You heard a small click and the necklace became undone, and he gathered it in his palm as he set it down next to your little trinkets, dropping his hands from your shoulder as his cerulean eyes found yours once again, and you looked away, his deep stare burning through yours. 

“Don’t,” his voice came out rough as if he hadn’t made much use of it for a while, “She’s always turned me away when I came asking for you. I weasled my way through her right now, almost blew my cover when Lily was leaving.” 

Oh.

“I’m over it.” No, you weren’t, but you wouldn’t admit that out loud.

You opened up the drawer to the left of you, moving some little cases of jewelry around as you found the letter you had hidden away as you brought it out, setting it on the desk as you stood from your chair, pushing it back in as you faced him, “Take it. I didn’t read it.” Despite how much you wanted to, you just couldn’t bring yourself to stoop that low and read through something he didn’t want you to see. 

He glanced over at the letter and then at you, taking the letter with careful movements as he found the letter opener scattered on your desk, ripping through the wax as he opened it up, passing the envelope back to you. 

“Read it.” 

You certainly weren’t expecting that. 

“What?” You couldn’t blink, looking at his outstretched hand that held the very thing that had been bothering you as if it was nothing, “I don’t-” 

“Go on,” he urged quietly, his voice caught in the back of his throat, “Read it out loud. Please.” 

You looked at him once more to make sure he wasn’t going crazy before you gently took it from his hands, your fingers brushing past each other as you opened it up, taking out the letter as you unfolded it, taking a deep breath as you prepared yourself for the worst. 

“I’m terrible at writing letters, you should know,” you start, squinting as you move closer to your candle so that you can read it better, “And you should know that I’ve written this twenty other times. I have-

“Twenty balled-up pieces of paper next to me,” Satoru finished the sentence, not looking at the letter once as he read it from memory, “If only you could see the mess,” he paused, his hands shaking a bit as he continued, “I apologize for not sending as many letters to you as I should, but aside from my travels which have proven to do nothing other than make me regret leaving, I only have one other thing left to tell you. 

“I love you. I’m in love with you. I thought that it would do me some good to leave and get some time to think about how bad it would be if I said out loud that I was in love with the girl who’s my sister's best friend, but I’ve simply gone mad over needing to see you again. I’m in Paris, which is coincidentally the city of love but I’ve grown bitter and resentful over the fact that the woman I love is an ocean away from me. I can’t do it anymore. No, scratch that, no, I can’t do this other letter…” 

“...It’s too pathetic. You’re worth more than this.” You concluded, reading along because you couldn’t be yourself to look up at him, knowing that you simply would break apart and couldn’t take it as you heard the three words you’ve wanted to hear from the man that you never thought would say them. 

You looked at the paper, eyes scanning each word again as you let out a heavy sigh, feeling like you were living in a dream that was wrapping its arms slowly around you and whisking you away. 

“That night, I projected. I don’t know why I said what I said, I just know that thinking it over told me everything I needed to know and I acted like a coward and a fool and I hurt you when really, I love you. I love you, I’ve never stopped. I burn for you, and I always will.” He whispered, his eyes wet with unshed tears as he cleared his throat, wiping at his nose as he sniffled. 

You’ve never seen him like this, exposed and raw. But you knew that you mirrored his emotions, knew that you were in the same state that he was for he carefully brought his hand up to your cheek, wiping a tear away as he cupped your face in his hands. 

“I know that it would be too much to ask for your forgiveness, but please, I don’t know how much longer I can go without at least seeing your face, hearing your voice, your laugh, you’re kind, kind heart.” His hands trailed down your face, down your arms, and your waist, settling on your hips as he ducked his head downward, tears sliding down the curve of his nose as he did something unexpected. 

The Viscount Gojo Satoru began to kneel. 

You froze, looking down in shock as he bowed his head in shame and apology. 

“‘Toru, please, I,” your voice broke and you quickly wiped your tears away, taking his hands that were sprawled out across your waist as you held them, not knowing how to handle this display of vulnerability as you gently made him look up at you, “Just tell me one thing.” 

His thumb caressed the back of your hand, giving a soft nod as he whispered; “anything,” and his hand moved up your waist, holding your back as your hands unknowingly went to his hair, moving it away from his face as your fingers twirled and played with his white strands, basking in the sense of having him at his knees for you. 

“Why did you wait so long to come back?” Your voice is barely audible as it cracks, a year of missing him and ten years of longing for him coming out as he shakes his head, almost as if he was more remorseful about it than you could ever imagine, and he shifted so that he wasn’t resting on his ankles anymore, digging deep into his pocket as he brought out a little box. 

“I went back to Japan. I was trying to find this little ring my father gave my mother back when he started to pine after her,” he opened up the box, a delicately cut blue diamond rind resting on a thin gold band stared back at you, shining in the candlelight, “I wanted to give it to you as a promise…” and he trailed off, a blush spreading across his cheeks as he suddenly became a bit embarrassed, pocketing the box again as he looked back up at you. 

“What was the promise?” You can barely hear your words over the thumping of your heart. 

He swallows, slowly coming to standing back up, never losing his hold on you, clutching onto your thin nightgown as if it was the only thing grounding him to reality. 

“That I’d marry you one day.” He whispered back, his voice hushed as if he didn’t want them to escape the vicinity of your room, this shared space between the two of you in which you stripped each other bare to the soul, only the find that they longed to be in each other's place even when they were miles apart. 

Just as he did so many nights ago, he leaned closer to you, giving you time and space to push him away, to yell, to scream, but you didn’t, nudging his nose with yours as your lips found each other, this time quick and rough and not wanting to be patient because there was no room for such a thing. 

He let out a small groan as you tugged on the hairs at the back of his nape, pushing you further down until your back hit one of your windows, feeling the cool night air from the glass as it traveled through the thin cotton of your slip

It seemed like something in him was finally let go, and you as well, and everything came tumbling down in the best way possible. 

It was so messy and rushed and desperate that you felt like you were going to faint, the air from your lungs being stolen by his hungry and greedy lips as he pushed back roughly against you, needing to taste you, feel you, or else he simply wouldn’t make it. 

Satoru tapped the back of your thighs, urging you to wrap your legs around his torso as you pulled away slightly, questioning him as he scoffed at your doubt. 

“I spent a year getting bigger and stronger for you,” he murmurs against your lips, “and the first thing you said when you saw me was oh. Come on,” he nipped at your lips, his boyish and charming smile growing when you whimpered, “Test me out.” 

You gave in, standing on your toes as you did what he asked, and you let out a little laugh of surprise at how he wasted no time wrapping his arms tightly around your waist as he smirked, going away from the ball as he led you to your bed, basking in the sound of your twinkling laughter as you admired him in all his glory. 

“I shouldn’t have doubted you,” you tease and he snorts, fixing your gown as he hovers above you. He was huge, so much bigger than you anticipated in your imagination, but it was so much better than you ever could have thought. 

“I’d never lie to you,” he promised, pressing another chaste kiss to your lips that left you breathless as he continued downwards, pressing kisses down your jaw, and your neck, spending time as he sucked at one of your vital points, enjoying the way you sounded like you had run a marathon. 

He looks stunning here; his lips look bruised and swollen, pink and wet with spit. He couldn’t keep his eyes off of your body, and if you weren’t crazy about how he looked at you, you would’ve shielded yourself away in embarrassment. 

But he didn’t give you any time to think it over, pushing past your loose nightgown as he pressed delicate pecks to your shoulders and upper chest region, looking up at you to make sure it was okay to continue. 

You quickly nodded, eager to see what he was going to do. 

“Mind if I take this off?” He asks, tugging at the ends of it as you look at him from beneath your lashes, trying to feel indifferent as you shrug, but the way you smile giddily gives away just how badly you want him to. 

“I wouldn’t mind.” You help him move it upwards, your arms coming out from the sleeves as the chilly air hits your naked skin, and you suddenly realize just how out in the open you are compared to him. 

Out of second nature, you go to cover your chest but he tsks, gently pushing your hands away as he eyes your breasts, looking like he had just come back from staring at the sistine chapel with the way he looks at you. 

Your nipples harden from how cold it was, and he slowly dips his head down to one of your tits, kissing the soft and supple skin as he inches closer to your bud, finally latching his mouth onto it as you throw your head back, arching your back into his lips as he sucks like his life depends on it. 

“S-shit, ‘Toru, so good,” you mewl, wrapping your hands around his neck as he flattens his tongue against your nipple, his teeth grazing the sensitive area as you whine even louder, not seeming to care if anybody outside your door could hear. 

His other hand lathes onto your other one, not wanting to leave her unattended as he pinches your nipple between his two fingers, twisting it just enough to make you shut your eyes at how good the attention feels. 

“Let me hear you,” he groans into your skin, looking up at you as you try to cover up your mouth with your hand, “I’ll stop if you cover up that pretty mouth of yours.” 

You simply nod, leaving your shaky hand to grip your bed sheets as he switches his mouth and hand with each other, giving you different sensations to wrap your hands around as you feel a deep part of your pulse, needing more of him. 

“‘Toru, please,” your voice comes out shaky as he releases your tit with a pop, his hands going down to hold onto your hips as you bring his chin up for another kiss of swapping spit with him, growing to appreciate the lewdness of it all as you lay feather light kisses on his jawline, feeling him shudder beneath you, “Wan’ more.” 

At any other time, he would have drawn this out, would have teased and prodded at you to use your words, to tell him where you needed him most, but he couldn’t wait with you, wanting to have a taste of you himself. 

So his wolfish grin comes back, his hand traveling down your stomach, stopping just above your mound as he cocks a brow at the way you seem to grow impatient, reaching the place you seemed to have in mind. 

“Here?” He asked quietly, his pointer finger moving to find your clit as you let out a quiet gasp, his expert fingers having nothing on your inexperienced ones. Sure you’ve touched yourself deep into the night when you made sure everybody was asleep, but it never felt like this. 

You couldn’t speak, so you nodded again, and that seemed to be good enough for Satoru as his finger moved down to your lips, a deep groan coming from within his chest as he felt how wet you were, and prodded his finger at your tight walls, slowly pushing past them as he seemed to be in a trance. 

You sucked him in so delightfully, pulsing against his as your slick stained his finger, making it easier for him to fuck you with a little bit more pace, careful not to hurt you, as he brought it back up to circle at your clit, trying to find what places you liked to be teased most. 

“O-oh my god,” your eyes rolled back in your head as his long find pushed back against your gummy walls, his other thumb finding your nub as you whined even louder, not used to feeling this good, spreading your legs out even further as you tried to make room for him. 

“There you go, s’perfect,” he said against your skin, dipping down as he moved a hand to keep your thighs further apart, “Mind if I have a taste?” And you were in another dimension, just cradling his neck as you pushed him to go further. 

He chuckled darkly, nearly going insane as he neared your glistening pussy, eyes growing dark as he moved his fingers away so that his tongue could have its turn, and you swore you almost came right there. 

He licked gingerly, savoring you first as he groaned, his thumb never giving up on circling and massaging your clit, but he began to eat you out as his life depended on it, licking and sucking like you were his last meal. 

“‘Toru, ‘Toru, fuck!” You screamed, biting your lip harshly as you kept your finger tight around his hair, “Don’t stop, please!” 

“F-fuck,” he murmured, coming up for a quick breath as he looked at you from his long white lashes, “Fucking kill me if I ever stop, okay?” 

He goes back in with the same amount of fervor, your chest moving up and down as you arch into his mouth, your jaw going slack as you quickly feel that rope in your stomach tightening, embarrassed at coming so early but knowing that there was no way you could stop yourself with the way he fingered you out at the same time he ate you out. 

“I’m yours,” he said against your skin, “I’ll always be yours.” It was out of place, but it seemed like he was branding it into your skin so that everybody else knew, knew that he belonged solely to you.

It was too much, and you felt like you were slowly losing your ability to think, talk, or do anything, and the only thing you could feel was him, and you felt it all coming to a crescendo as his mouth latched onto your clit, letting it all go as you came into his mouth. 

“‘M c-coming, mmmm fuck!” You couldn’t even believe the sounds you were making as you clenched around his finger, your essence coating his chin and hand as your legs were trembling, glad that he held a stable hand on your waist. 

You saw white for a couple of seconds, taking even longer to catch your breath, your tits rising and falling with each heave, and you suddenly felt like you came back down to earth, peeking out from an eye to see Satoru smiling down at you, his face soft and you whined in shock at what just happened, hiding your face into one of your pillows as he laughed lowly, the sound dripping down your ears like warm honey. 

“You just came around me, no need to be modest now.” He gently moved your face away from the sanctuary of your pillow so that you could look at him again, and he leaned down, pressing one final kiss to your lips, letting you taste yourself on him as you let out a muffled moan. 

“How do you feel?” He asked as he pulled away, sitting on his haunches, letting you drape the blanket around your sweaty chest as you tried to sit up, shaking a bit as you tried to recover from your mind-breaking orgasm. 

“Good,” you say groggily, wiping at your eyes as you give him a lazy, languid smile, “Really good.” 

“Yeah?” He asks, chuckling as you nod, finding his hands as you play with his long fingers, and he lets you watch as you let them entangle with each other, somehow feeling more connected through this than the previous activity as you slowly pull him back down towards you, wanting nothing more than to curl into his chest. 

“Give me a second love,” he wanted the same thing, but he pulled away, “Let me clean you up.” 

You didn’t fight it and let him go, watching as he found the pitcher of water on your desk as he found a clean rag and wet it, coming back to your bed until his eyes caught something under the sheets. 

He picked it up, reading it as he sat down next to you, running the cold towel across your thighs as you let out a little whimper at the temperature. He pressed an apologetic kiss to your forehead as he turned the paper around in silent questioning. 

Your eyes widened, trying to take it away but he held it above your head. If you had more fight in you, you might have wrestled for it, but you gave up, letting him clean you up as he tried not to laugh at how measly it was. 

“I doubt Cambell would know how to make you come.” He finally says, throwing the rag away somewhere as you groan, pushing his face slowly away as you try to fight the giddy laugh that was going to bubble its way from your chest. 

“Stop! Lily was just trying to help!” You argue and he waves his hands, loosening the buttons of his tunic as he crawls in next to you, pulling you flush against him as he kisses the tip of your nose. 

“It’s fine love,” he nestles his nose in your hairline, smiling when you hitch a leg over his, “You’re mine now.” 

You look up at him, tracing over his features with the light touch of your fingertips as he leans into your warmth. 

“Do you promise?” 

He gives a single nod, sliding the delicate ring over your finger, and closes his hand around yours. 

“Promise.” 

[ifyouknowmenahyoudontt]

ranting about the fandom ( TW: opinions)

- remus is so badly mischaracterized, the shift from him being a soft sensitive kid despite the violent nature of his condition was so so important but now he is turned into this mean angry alpha male. i feel like the point of him being so sensitive was to contrast w him being a werewolf ya know. bring back weird and awkward remus

- gay ships that are just there because they’re gay is pretty strange. i’m speaking of the whole jegulus/pandalily/whatever new thing ppl come up with i don’t really understand the point of just thinking that making a couple gay makes them more interesting. seems a little counterproductive .

-jily loosing its popularity is killing me. bring back my 7 year slow burn prophecy beautiful love story they are the most important ship

-sirius being a feminine dramatic gay twink. this man was a motorcycle owning rebel strong guy. and believe it or not he CAN be gay and still be that. him being gay ( in our head canons) doesn’t mean he’s a woman

- turning gay ships into basically a straight relationship by making them so stereotypical ( wolfstar w feminine af sirius and strong man remus)

- shipping character that died and fought against a certain ideology and people that were actively apart of the problem is kinda crazy. like jegulily? my brother in christ regulus wanted her dead.

-fanon regulus. he was a strong willed DEATH EATER he wasn’t forced into it or abused by his family. it.is.stated.in.the.book.

-deatheaters are interesting characters BUT don’t tell me people are babying and glorifying them in a effort to explore their complexity.

-some of you are blinded by the fancasts and forgot all about what the characters are.

- the new fan casts are meeeh. they’re not all supposed to be supermodels…

- jegulus taking over the fandom is insane.

-andromeda should be getting the regulus treatement she is what you made regulus into.

-frank and alice should be more loved.

- the romantization of that whole pureblood supremacist squad is NOT cute.

-james potter my beloved.

- i don’t really like the idea of the casanova being remus. i feel like it would james or sirius based on how remus talked about his high school years

- jily is way too important to the universe to be discredited.

-lily evans being put behind regulus is CRAZY. my girl did not die for this bs

-sirius being criticized for leaving is wild. regulus was not abused and didn’t even want to leave. sirius was mistreated.

- i kind of like the idea of the developed character of walburga. sirius said she wasn’t a deatheater. and i like people writing her as a more complex character.

- as much as i love wolfstar, james and sirius’s relationship stays the central point of the gang.

-ships have taken way too much importance over the friendships of the group.

-i feel like a people make female characters into lesbians ( like lily ) just because they are strong characters and it’s weird.

- yes once she got married to james she was lily POTTER and she was a mother just like james was FATHER they’re is nothing wrong with that.

- jegulus/ any ship between a member of the order and a deatheater is just plain stupid sorry but if your head canons goes completely against the core of a character it’s just a wrong statement.

before you start “LEt pEoPle dO whAT thEy WaNt” these are MY opinions

please share yours i love to debate

[browniejeane]

Has anyone done a rookanis While You Were Sleeping fic yet? Asking for a friend...

Just imagine....orphaned, alone Rook, working a menial job. falls for Illario at first. he's hurt, Rook saves his life. taken to the hospital. Dun dun dun, he's in a coma! Miscommunications happen - Rook is now a fiancee. Teia, Viago, Caterina are all around his bedside losing their minds as to how this could happen. Not to Illario. Jacobus and Chance are glancing at her like, who tf is this broad. And Rook's just...there. eyes wide, totally lost, but afraid to leave. Out comes the story of how she saved Illario from blood mages/venatori/what-have-you. Gets dragged back to the villa, ends up spending the night. In comes Lucanis, who had been away on a mission. He thinks something is amiss with the relationship between Rook and Illario. Rook leans into the miscommunications and things she's learned just by watching. Manages to convince Lucanis and family that she's really Illario's fiancee. Spends more time with the Dellamorte/de Riva/Cantori clans.

Chance finds out the truth. But loves that Rook loves them all so much, he keeps her secret. Tells her he knows, but that he's going to make sure that she stays part of the family. What's this? Oh no! She ends up falling for Lucanis. Is utterly bewildered by this - rants about it to Taash and Bellara, who are torn between letting it play out and coming clean and letting them all know it was a lie. Before she can make up her mind....Illario wakes up. Family, who have all come to adore Rook, convince him he has selective amnesia. He goes along with marrying Rook.

meanwhile, rook has had a big falling out with lucanis, who no longer wants to work in the family business -- he wants to branch out and do his own thing. see wyverns. run cafe pietra. no more killing. he says that he can't just drop everything and do that. not with the family relying on him the way they do. and how dare she open her mouth and suggest such a thing - she has no right to tell him how to live his life or speak to his family. She snarks back that somebody has to bc otherwise, hes going to be miserable forever. he says hed rather be slightly miserable but with family all around than comfortable and alone. she thinks he's being ridiculous - they part on bad terms. She decides she's going to go through with the wedding to illario.

Enter Zara on their wedding day, ranting and raving about how he actually had proposed to her. Forget the fact that she had run off with Calivan - that man didn't matter to her. She just needed some time apart for perspective. Except, whoops, Rook says she can't marry Illario because she's in love with Lucanis. And Lucanis says she can't marry Illario bc he loves her too. But she can't be with Lucanis bc there's too much they don't know. So the whole story spills out and then she runs while the wedding melts down into chaos. Just as she's getting ready to bounce out of treviso for good, WHAM. They appear. Lucanis. Teia. Viago. Caterina. Chance. lucanis has caterina's prized opal ring. He's on one knees. she says yes. they kiss. crows fly out of nowhere. they get married on a bridge in treviso. they honeymoon in ferelden and go wyvern watching. come home and lucanis runs the cafe, happy as a clam and with family all around. adopt a dog named spite.

roll credits. (no? just a me thought? alright. thanks for coming to my ted talk.)

[pruneunfair]

Characters I hate the most in remarried empress

5:Heinrey

A lot of people dislike him now for being a cruel bastard to the point of torturing foreign nobles just so he can favor his wife. While that is messed up I'll take that over his constant "UwU my queen~" persona that he displays 90% of the time because at least the former is the remnants of his inital personality. It goes from kind of funny to straight up cringey, I do not see what Navier likes so much about his puppy guise, he's so low because to be fair, he was introduced as a scumbag (kind of), he just spends so much time simping that it's basically tossed to the side

4:Lebetti

I know a lot of fans say Lebetti is young and can learn better, she's 17 sure but it took her entire family being executed just so she'd be inclined to care about Ian. She's basically a mini me of Lotteshu and when's she not doing that, she's another blind Navier worshipper who is used for as a stand in for the reader, I don't know how fans didn't realize their stand in is a slave owner but I digress. The only reason she's at number 4 is that while I do find messed up she gets to raise Rashtas child and likely feed a biased view of her to Ian, if she really wanted to be evil, she would've let Ian become a slave for his mother's crimes so I guess there's that.

3:Kaufman

Jesus christ this man is a walking, talking manifestation of second ML syndrome. He's essentially a plot device for no other purpose other than propping up Navier as so beautiful that multiple royal guys want her and so shit can go down , And of course the obvious slipping love potions in others for no other reason then "the plot calls for it", he doesn't even face the consequences. He's fucking creepy as well since he's STILL in love with Navier even after she's married and pregnant GET OVER IT MAN! In the end he just gets with Charlotte (Kosairs ex fiancé) so writting wise: his whole "nice guy" problems can be solved

2:Alan

I really just have a personal vendetta against the whole Rimwell family. The moment I lost all hope in remarried empress is when I was expected to sympathize with a rapist. The narrative wants readers to believe Alan was wronged even though he was the one to participate in keeping Ian away from Rashta until she got rich, even though it was HIM who decided to abandon Rashta after she wanted to run away with him. Yeah he's a good father so what? Wow! A dad actually raising his kid how amazing, it's almost like that's called the bare minimum. The moment he tried to say that Ian deserved to be treated like a prince because he was Rashtas son is when the comments finally saw him for what he was, he makes up for all this by getting executed in the end

1:Laura

Your probably wondering out of all these scumbags, why is a random side character on top? Well, the characters below at some point had personality traits that made then complex characters in the past or they did something to make up a little for it making them a tiny bit more tolerable. Laura however has never once shown any signs of any other personality other than "Your majesty! Your so wonderful and the best! That slave needs to know its place around you!" At least all Naviers other ladies in waiting have some sort of gimmick to them or in rare cases they have other stories going on with just them. Laura's gimmick is that she is willing to hit a slave for Navier even if said slave made a genuine mistake and isn't used to palace intrigue. Her face pisses me off everytime I look at it and everytime she speaks it's never anything besides love for the leads and hatred for anyone against Navier. she needs to get off her glazing and go back to bullying Cinderella with her evil stepsister design she's got.

Anyway let me know if there's any other manhwa/comic to rant about because I'm sure everyone's probably tired of me bitching about remarried empress

[miss-sweetea-pie]

A zutara rant about Aunt Wu’s prediction.

As a proud Zutarian I personally love the idea about aunt Wu’s prediction that she gave Katara about marrying a powerful bender is actually hinting at Zuko being the guy.

But I did see some antics mention “Zuko isn’t a powerful bender and it’s mentioned a lot that he’s not that good, they didn’t even think he was a fire bender bah bah”

First off that’s very rude!

So let’s over, analyze the fortune teller episode. Looking back on that episode we noticed that Aunt Wu’s predictions are technically accurate, but not always as they seem. this gets confirmed by the end of the episode and how that one man smugly tells Sokka that the prediction, said the village wouldn’t be destroyed and it wasn’t. Or that one guy having a safe trip and almost getting attacked by a platypus Bear but the gang saves him, technically, he still had a safe trip.

So the whole prediction is “ I see great romance for you the man you’re going to marry, he is a very powerful bender.” 

(technically that wasn’t actually the whole prediction, considering A.ang was eavesdropping  and well Kat@ang is all about A.ang and his feelings but I digress)

So the first half I guess is more about your taste in romance. I don’t think or feel like the canon kat@ang is this great epic romantic personality. But hey i’m willing to admit it could just be my taste. However the show does give us an example of a really powerful romances between Oma and Shu. In story lore of a romance that is so great it has been remembered for centuries and has a city named after them and ironically it has the famous enemies to lovers trope. hmm Interesting.

What I can defend though is the part that mentions “the man you will marry is a very powerful bender” you see A.ang it is a very powerful bender and once he is a fully realized avatar, he will probably be considered the most powerful bender. but like I pointed out Aunt Wu’s  predictions have a catch or they’re not always as you expect. And she said, A (not most) very powerful bender that could technically be anyone right? considering there are masters for all the different elements and being considered a master is still very impressive and seen as an accomplishment Even if you are not the avatar. So her future husband could be a possible Master. Adding the fact that most of the masters are old so this person could not even be fully realized yet, Insert Zuko.

So people mention that he isn’t that great of a bender or he’s not that powerful and yes, the show does mention that, but also who tells us that? Oh right. His dad the literal villain. The people that try to put him down tell him that he isn’t good enough. personally, I also think the show try to contradict that by showing us moments. for example in book one he did take down Zhao and showed him mercy. (when I watch the show, I think Zuko is actually holding back a lot of the time because he does have a consciences. his whole arc was kick started by him, having a conscience  and being empathetic so I don’t think it’s crazy to imagine him holding back a little). so when Ozai calls Zuko weak it’s kind of similar to how he calls A.ang weak in the finale. But no one questions A.ang not being a powerful bender. Hmmm weird.

Also, the other reason why I think Zuko being the one in the prediction is just better for the story is because the idea that you can become a powerful bender just feels so satisfying to me. In the show people still need to find masters and grow their skills. we are shown that people get better at things over time if they apply themselves. I think that’s a really good lesson. A similar lesson is already applied with Katara I may add, so it’s pretty fitting in a way.

Also the fact that he learns the true meaning of fire bending adds a nice layer of depth. it isn’t just about the skill of fire bending It’s also about the mindset. It really goes to show how he really has become a better and powerful bender in the end.

[sunnyie-eve]

1 | Raised For

Series: Devoted Friend

Paring: (Benedict Bridgerton x Original Female Character Featherington!)

Word Count: 2k

Warnings: none

| MASTERLIST |

"Mama, if we do any tighter I'll die. I can't breathe in this ridiculous thing." Paisley groans in pain as her mother goes on talking about how she could squeeze into a smaller size.

"She looks like she's going to pass out, mama." Penelope says as Paisley does feel herself getting lightheaded.

"Fine, loosen it just a tad." Their mother tells the maid and when Paisley could breathe slightly better her mother says enough, "You are 24 yet still not married Paisley. You are setting no example for your sisters." She adds as Paisley gets her dress put on.

"You act like I never get any suitors, mama. I just don't choose any of them because none of them stand out to me." Paisley sighs as she's turned around to face her mother.

"Which is going to make no gentleman want you at some point."

Paisley looks over at Penelope who gives her a sad smile. Even though one was the oldest and the other was the youngest, they were the closest in their entire family. Paisley was Penelope's best friend way more than Eloise Bridgerton was. Paisley practically raised Penelope pushing maids away from helping at times because she wanted to take care of her growing up.

The carriage ride was silent the whole way not a single family member talked to each other. Paisley hated being presented like she was an item to buy on the market. When it was their family turn to be presented to the queen, Paisley was the only one who acted right in front of the woman walking along side her mother while her sisters were in front. She's had plenty of practice acting doing it for the past seven-ish years.

The queen didn't care much for them but Paisley always caught her eye. She didn't understand how such a beautiful woman didn't have a husband yet. Queen Charlotte stands up walking out of her way over to Paisley raising her chin, "Flawless and beautiful as always, my dear." She goes to sit back down to motion them to them step aside.

Before they could even walk off Prudence faints from her corset being too tight. "She's not used to it being so tight." Paisley tells her mother, who just gives her a mean look.

Heading in the way out back to the carriages Paisley feels a tap on her shoulder causing her to turn around to see Benedict Bridgerton with a smile on his face.

"You please the Queen once again." He says making Paisley laugh, "I'm not surprised as always."

"Oh, quit being a gentleman Benedict. It's so tiring." Paisley rolls her eyes.

"I can't be a good friend by giving you a compliment?" He laughs while she just looks at him.

"No, you can but I find that sometimes it's unnecessary." She continues to walk with him following behind, "For example, just a few seconds ago." She looks back with a smile.

"I don't think it was unnecessary."

Paisley sighs stopping to face him with smile, "You're a man... And men don't think." Before Benedict could respond her Mama called for her to hurry up, "Goodbye Benedict."

Back at the Featherington house their mother rants about Lady Whistledown probably being Violet Bridgenton. Paisley looks over at her younger sister reading her book, who glances over at her as well. Paisley was the only person who knew Penelope was Lady Whistledown because she came across her writing one day secretly then called her out on what she saw the next day put out. It was one of their many secrets they kept to themselves.

Hearing their mother talk about how many ladies she has under her care so Penelope gets up saying she could sit this season out but their mama says no.

"What she is, is two stones heavier than she ought to be." Prudence says causing Paisley to look over at her.

"Mm, those blemishes on her face are quite difficult to conceal. Ooo, perhaps some arsenic and lead might help." Philippa adds.

"What you two should do is keep quiet." Paisley speaks up, "Prudence, you need to work on your smile. Philippa, work on not sounding so annoying with your voice."

"Paisley!" Their mother turns to look at her going through the cards of men.

"They were rude first." She gets up leaving the room to go to her own and on the way passes the cousin that was staying with them. Paisley greets her before continuing on her way.

For the ball at Danbury House, Paisley wanted the night to fly by. It was just going to be the same as always. A rotating door of men having her constantly dance all night flirting with her but in the end disappoint her not catching her interest.

"Why don't you be bold and ask him for a dance?" Paisley bends down to Penelope's level as she watches Colin dance.

"Are you out of your mind?" Penelope looks at her with wide eyes.

"Sorry, I forget you're only confident as LW." Paisley giggles, "I'm off for a drink."

As she was getting herself a drink, Benedict catches sight of her in the distance, "Excuse me, I'll be right back." He tells Colin, who was standing with him.

Colin shakes his head at his brother watching him make his way over to Paisley. To him he felt that Benedict had a secret crush on her but was too scared to admit or just didn't know it yet.

"A lady like you shouldn't be getting her own drink." Benedict states causing Paisley to roll her eyes at him.

"I don't need a man to get me a drink when I'm very capable of doing it myself, Mr. Bridgerton." She gives his a polite smile.

"You really don't want a husband do you?" He laughs.

"You know me so well. That's one of the reasons why me and your sister, Eloise, get along so well."

"She says she inspires to be like you. An independent woman who doesn't care what others think about her. Not afraid to be herself and show off how smart she is as well." He lets her know.

"I must thank her next time I see her then for saying such things about me." Paisley looks around and sees a few other gentleman looking her way at times. "Hopefully no one will come bugging me tonight. I don't feel like dancing acting like I'm interested in what they have to say. It's always the same ones trying every season." Paisley laughs looking back at Benedict, "You would think they would give up but no."

"You're such a strange woman, Paisley. I know how your mama is so how did you stray off from what you were taught?" He asks her.

"I learn other things and I know my worth. I know I could be something bigger than just some man's wife and give him children. Yes, I want to be a mother someday but I want to be a mother who truly loves her husband. I want a special bond with them, Benedict. My mama and papa don't entirely love each other. I want what I your mama had with your father. The way she talks about him and how much they loved each other. The friends to lovers."

"And how are you supposed to have that if you don't give anyone the time of the day to show you?" He asks making her sigh.

"I can read all these men like a book, Bridgerton. I know exactly what they want from me, and none of them want to start a friendship first." She explains walking off from him leaving him alone.

He knew she was right about the fact everything she just told him. He's had many men ask him all kinds of questions about her since they knew how they were good friends. Not a single one really cared about how she was or what she liked to do. It was always about how well does she follow instructions, how seductive she was, asked him if he knew any dirty secrets about her. The most common was has he ever seen anything that he could describe to them about how she looked in less clothing.

"No luck brother?" Colin joins his side.

"What?"

"She didn't want to dance with you?" Colin chuckles.

"I didn't ask her to dance Colin. I was asking why was she getting herself a drink."

"Why ask when you already knew the answer to that? We both know how she has no desire to be here or find a husband. She's ranted to me many of times in the past couple of days when she was over." Colin says looking over at Paisley looking bored as a gentleman man was now talking to her. "I feel bad for her deep down. Just look at her. Poor girl needs saving."

Paisley stares at the man, that was a good amount of years older than her, talking about himself non stop. She would just smile nodding her head not really listening to what he was saying. She would just tune him out and pay attention to the music that was being played.

"Don't you say?" He asks causing her to hum.

"I'm deeply sorry, what did you say?" She asks kindly.

"That the thought of double digits for children sounds ideal for a happy family. I come from a family of fourteen all close in age." He repeats.

She couldn't help but choke on her spit, "Excuse me, I need a drink." She tells him.

"I'll get it for you, Miss Featherington."

"No, please. I can get it myself Lord Albrecht." She smiles then walks away picking up speed to get away faster.

"Miss Featherington," Paisley hears as she walks by someone so she stops to face them.

"Oh, Lady Danbury. It's lovely to see you." Paisley bows to her as Benedict stood next to her with a drink since they had just been chatting.

"Don't you look lovely this evening. Will I not be seeing you on the dance floor once again?" She asks her.

"Oh, you will Lady Danbury." Benedict smiles finishing his glass as Paisley looks at him confused.

"I will?" Both ladies say at the same time.

"Yes. Miss Featherington, shall we?" He takes Paisley's hand into his leading her to the dance floor.

"What are you doing?" She asks as he makes her start to dance with him.

"Saving your butt, that's what I'm doing. You know she'll ask you why once again and I saw Lord Augustus eyeing you while chatting with friends. It looks like he was going to walk over to you with a creepy look on his face." He lets her know so she glances over at him and he looked annoyed.

"He is always creepy when he talks to me. I hate being alone with him."

"Exactly why I asked you to dance." He tells her.

"Technically you didn't really ask if you dragged me out here." She corrects him.

"Do you want me to stop and tell him he can take his turn with you?" He smiles looking down at her as they kept dancing.

"I'll kill you Bridgerton."

"You would never do such a thing because you love me and would die without me." He laughs and makes her giggle as well, "I saw Lord Albrecht chatting with you."

"Oh yes, he was saying how he wants children in the double digits. How he comes from a family of fourteen, all close in age." She lets him know.

"I get I come from quite a large family but it's not that large. I couldn't imagine that many children. And the poor women never getting a break from being pregnant."

"How many do you want?" Paisley asks him.

"Never really thought about it. Like you, I know I want children one day but it's not a main priority of mine at the moment." He tells her the truth.

"Obviously since you're 26 and still not married or engaged. You're not even looking since you hate going to social events. You and Anthony both don't seem to care really." Paisley points out.

"Excuse me, but you're the oldest daughter turning down every proposal she's gotten since becoming of age." He says causing them to stop dancing.

"And you are the second oldest son, who has a couple of years on me, who hasn't even tried finding someone." She stares him in the eyes, "It's unfair. You and every man can get away with it, but us women can't because that's all we're taught to do." She huffs, "Goodnight Bridgerton." She leaves him.

[walkawaytall]

Oh no, I’m participating in Star Wars discourse.

Uh, so there’s a post floating around that I’m not reblogging mainly because it’s just this person’s headcanon and, whatever, people can have headcanons, but the main points they make in the midst of talking about their headcanon that I’ll be addressing are:

Leia and Han getting married and having kids is the most boring thing you can do with Leia

Leia should be a Jedi like every other dang Skywalker because somehow continuing an assumed dynasty isn’t the most boring choice you can make for her

Leia is more cut out to handle lack of attachment than Luke which we know because of her lack of response to Alderaan being destroyed

Leia and Han shouldn’t get married or even be around each other much because Han is a wandering soul and needs to travel and go places

Leia never expresses a desire for marriage or children in the OT, so removing these things won’t contradict George Lucas’ canon

And, look, these are just…missing the point of the character growth that occurs in these two during the OT.

(there's just a whole-ass essay below the cut if anyone cares to read about the many thoughts I have on Leia Organa and Han Solo.)

So, I'm not saying existing or past canon/EU has done it right, but I disagree with the statement that having them marry and live kind of basic lives is the most boring choice. If that's all there was to it, sure, but those two choices by themselves show a monumental amount of character growth for both Leia and Han. (I mean, frankly, I think "Skywalker = Jedi every time no matter what" is a pretty boring choice storytelling wise, but I also think the Jedi on the whole are incredibly boring characters, so, uh...I'm biased.)

Leia was never going to live a quiet life even if Alderaan hadn't been destroyed. Like, she did not have that option, period. She would have either remained in politics or taken over as queen, may or may not have had to marry for political reasons, and may or may not have been involved with the Rebellion. Her life was chaos starting as a teen and she had no reason to believe she wouldn't die living a hectic and chaotic life.

And then she loses everything. This isn't emphasized in the movies obviously because they are fun family romps and not gritty dramas, but, good night, in a single second, she loses every family member, nearly every person she knows, every place she finds most familiar and comfortable, everything and to top it all off, the guilt that it's happened because of her unwillingness to give up the Alliance will probably always be there. She was tortured, they lost lives in battle, and, yeah, they destroy the Death Star, but at the end of that day, literally all she has left is the Alliance and those three pilots who managed to unlock her cell door without too much trouble.

I don't know about you, but I'd be straight-up shut down emotionally at that point. Like, I don't think PTSD even covers what Leia probably has going on in her head. And I think that's kind of what we see in ESB (I know the filmmakers weren’t thinking in terms of PTSD, but there are still hints of it there regardless). She's angry, she's afraid of losing people (she's obviously pissed Han is leaving after he said he'd stay, but also, there's a scene that was cut -- a good move in my opinion because the dialogue is beyond dramatic and Carrie seems out of it, but it stands that this was the intended source of Leia’s frustration -- where Luke is telling Leia he's leaving the Alliance for Dagobah and she is extremely upset that both he and Han are leaving, goes on a whole rant about how she should know better than to trust anyone but herself, etc.), and when she finally lets Han in, she promptly loses him and nearly loses Luke.

And then the events of ROTJ happen and she finds out that the man who tortured her, who stood idly by while her entire planet was destroyed, who tortured the man she loves and handed him off to the space mob to be murdered, who cut off her brother's hand and nearly allowed him to die, who has terrorized the Galaxy in general, that guy is her bio dad. And that guy is the entire reason she's Force-sensitive.

Leia stopping her Jedi training in the new canon was for a dumb reason, I agree there. Leia not wanting anything to do with the thing that, from her point of view, nearly ruined her life and the lives of those she loves about a thousand times over...I dunno, I think that's way more interesting than her just going, "Ope, I'm a Skywalker! You know what that means! Gotta be a Jedi!" And as far as her being more of a natural at it...do we know that Leia is better at healthy non-attachment than Luke? Like, any response to a planet being destroyed could easily just be a trauma response. Is shutting down like that good, actually? Or is it just going to cause problems down the road, Anakin-style?

I don't know, I just think that after living through all of that as well as a freaking war, girly might want a quiet life -- that she gets to choose -- with a husband -- who she gets to choose -- and kids -- who she gets to raise without the threat of the Empire or her nightmare of a biological father looming over their lives. And the very fact that she's able to open herself up to that sort of love and affection when the fear that it might all be ripped away from her is likely ever-present is a big deal. Her having kids knowing they'll likely be Force-sensitive even though that aspect of her biology terrifies her is a big deal. And as far as her not expressing a desire for marriage and kids in the OT...I mean, Leia isn't given the opportunity to express her desire for much in the OT, let's be real (she also never expresses a desire to become a Jedi in the OT either. We can't use what Leia didn't express in the OT to dictate whether she wants or doesn't want something is what I'm saying). They're at war. She's a military leader. She probably can't even hazard wishing for anything beyond waking up the next day. But that's not to say she didn't want such things or grow to want such things once she felt it was safe to do so. We literally don't know, but I don't think the absence of that expressed desire is indicative of anything.

As far as Han goes, I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure in every iteration of his story, his itchy feet weren't like...a part of his personality. He had a highly traumatic childhood that left him with few options and ended up living a transient lifestyle out of necessity. He actually seems remarkably easy to keep around if you don't treat him like garbage. I mean, he's given exactly one day of friendship, and he sticks around with the Rebellion for three years before some run-in with a bounty hunter makes him realize he needs to take care of his debt with Jabba. He's not leaving just for funsies or because he's bored or just really needs to be a smuggler again...and he seems legitimately sad have to leave when he's not busy getting pissed at Leia for not having the emotional response he wants her to have (first half of ESB Han is being a big ol' baby and I'm perfectly fine admitting that). And what character growth to see Han "I'm in it for the money" Solo learn to care for his friends, learn to support a cause, learn to love Leia when he's spent so much of his life unattached. Han making boring life choices is indicative of character growth and learning to care about others more than himself. What a lovely thing for this man to learn.

The call for Leia and Han to remain living separate lives but still committed to one another kind of demands that they move backward in character growth in my opinion. We have two people who are in rough places due, by and large, to trauma, who eventually open up to one another and seem better for it and then they...just go back to what they were doing before except they occasionally see each other? Why would they want that? They've grown as people, they've won a dang war, and they're finally able to live somewhat securely. Why wouldn't they want to live basic lives when they were denied the privilege of such choices for so long? And how is them making choices based on their love for another person — love that they had a heck of a time coming to terms with — boring?

[inposterumcumgaudio]

Could you rant about Arthur and Sally’s relationship? It’s my favorite part of WHF and I’d love to hear your opinions about it

So before we get into Sally and Arthur specifically, I need you to understand something about how shit was. How shit still is in some places, where people are less terminally online and where there's generational ignorance.

Now you and I understand that a wide age gap in a relationship is a red flag. We've seen enough r/relationship_advice posts to know a guy who goes after young girls does so because they are easy to manipulate and mold. But we only know this thanks to the hundreds of nineteen-year-old girls posting about how mean their 30-year-old boyfriends are being to them and everyone else telling them exactly why that is.

In the world that these girls come from, the attention and admiration of an older man is quite flattering. Especially if you are a very pretty girl, but this man is telling you how smart and mature you are.

But I need to make sure this is understood too: I do not believe Mr. Hastings was grooming Sally. I don't think he was out trying to bag a teenage girl.

What I think what happened is, Sally enjoys the attention of men - older or otherwise - as she sees it as her greatest power in the world, especially since she thinks girls aren't worth her time. Arthur remembers specifically that boys would stop to watch her go by and she "always got a kick out of that". And without her mother to try to dissuade her from being so cavalier with this charm, she uses it indiscriminately with every man she meets. Including Arthur's dad.

Now Mr. Hastings should have had the good sense not to think anything of it. But again, it's a time where we don't have reddit for him to know about power imbalances in relationships. It's a time where you have to pick your partners based on geography which means even the prettiest girl has to compromise and pick the best of her options. And he's also a widower so there's not really any conflict as far as he can see since he's not married and Sally is sixteen and therefore leaving school soon which more or less makes her an adult as far as anyone thinks in the 40's.

It shouldn't have happened, but I can see how it did.

And I can see why Arthur gets so angry with her about it without ever really blaming his father for his part in it. To his thinking, she treated his father the same way she treats all her "friends" (all male "friends" because she thinks she's not like other girls) so it's no wonder Mr. Hastings took it to the logical conclusion.

And the thing is, you never actually see Sally blame Mr. Hastings either. She'll say she didn't have a choice, but she never says Mr. Hastings forced her. She doesn't blame herself either. She says sometimes things just happen whether you want them to or not. Which I think means Sally doesn't think of this situation as rape so much as a misunderstanding or, more likely, a transaction that she was only just then told what the exchange was.

Because her whole existence is transactional. She only does things for people if she can expect to call in a favor later. The way she frames it is that she had no choice because her housing hinged on pleasing Mr. Hastings. But she does indeed find somewhere to go, once Arthur finds out.

So this is the crux of conflict surrounding their relationship.

But I actually think this is tangential to their core personality flaws which would have prevented them from ever being happily together, Mr. Hastings or not. It's just the thing both of them fixate on to sabotage themselves.

They're both stuck on the vision of each other as children. And it's literally as they turn sixteen and are about to embark on adulthood when everything changes. The stakes are higher now, but because they diverged at that point, they can't really see each other beyond what role they played for each other as children.

To Sally, Arthur is her safe space because she can expect him to give her whatever she wants without expecting anything in return. He's the only guy in her world who "doesn't want just one thing" and seems to see her as more than a pretty face. She has all these memories of hiding away with Arthur somewhere and commiserating over their shared misfortunes.

Arthur, on the other hand, remembers all these same moments of deep friendship with Sally, but also remembers that "she was always so wonderful when she was there, but a girl like Sally always has so many better places to be, and better people to be with, or worse people that she prefers anyway for some reason. And sometimes she’d just hide in Percy’s old room in the attic and not come down."

He'd always played a role of convenience for her. Maybe that was okay when they were children, when a gangly dork would not get to hang around a popular pretty girl at all otherwise. But they're not in school anymore and the situation's a lot more serious, even disregarding that Arthur's feelings about Sally have matured.

Meanwhile, Sally's feelings about him really haven't. She thinks of him often, but only in terms of her missing the comfort he was when they were young. She never supposes about how he might have changed or who he might have become in her absence. To her, he exists in stasis and (if he'd just forget about the thing with his father) would be exactly the same as he ever was.

The great irony is that when they meet again, Arthur is the one who needs something. And if Sally could just have given it to him without asking for something in return first, they might have had a shot at more. Probably not a successful relationship because they are who they are, but it wouldn't have mercifully ended at her apartment door like it does.

I think it's the kiss that does it in, really.

Arthur has spent all this time playing court eunuch to her Queen of Wellington Wells, all this time with her charming every guy she comes across (including his dad) and never giving that same kind of attention to him.

And only now, when he's off on some fool's errand to make a trade with her, does she finally favor him with that kind of gesture.

He can't trust it. As frustrating as it was to be ignored as an option and as much as he always wanted it, to be acknowledged as one now? It makes him just another one of Sally's "friends" and how committed to any of them was she? It's part of the transaction.

It's really quite unfortunate that this is also the one time Sally ever wanted to do something for someone with no expectation of a returned favor, but necessarily couldn't. If she could have got the Letter of Transit for Arthur without asking him to fetch the cod liver oil, she would have. And if she could have done that, it wouldn't have been a transaction at all and then Arthur maybe could have felt secure in and special for that kiss.

It's better this way.

[kade0--0]

GONNA TALK ABOUT "I WANT TO BE THE WALL" CUZ I HAVE FEELINGS ABOUT THIS MANGA

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

❧ I Want to be The Wall

(Watashi wa Kabe ni Naritai/わたしは壁になりたい)

- Aroace female MC, Gay MC, Married MCs

Absolutely amazing absolutely beautiful I will forever recommend this manga it's genuinely so good

A story of an aroace woman (Yuriko) who likes BL and fears living alone, and a gay man (Takerota) who can't be with the person he loves. Despite their differences they had amazing communication skills and their willingness to accommodate to each other was honestly peak marriage behavior. I also loved how they tried their best to understand each other's sexualities.

There was this part of the manga where Takerota talked to Yuriko's friend about asexuality and stuff, and it made me cry so hard I had to take a break from reading. When I got to that part I really thought "ah I totally get how Yuriko feels". The way her friend explained her fondness for love as a concept was honestly pretty much how I felt about it. Liking romance manga and feeling happy when we see people who are able to love and cherish each other, recognizing how beautiful that feeling must be, but ultimately unable to experience it the same way everyone else does and yearning for it.

Her friend also goes to explain how she likes BL in particular because both main characters are men, so she wouldn't be able to draw a direct connection to herself as a woman or imagine herself in that situation. I totally got that, reading things I can't fully relate to because it allows me to distance myself from the romance happening in front of me.

I'm really talking a lot but this is just from one chapter HAHAH anyway the whole manga is so so good I really recommend it, the part I ranted about was just the one that struck me the most because I was really going thru it when I decided to pick this manga up. All that combined with the feeling of being seen really set me off so yeah

In the end, I loved how Yuriko and Takerota became a (unconventional) family even though they started the whole marriage for the sake of convenience

Honestly while reading it, I just kept thinking how nice it would be if I experienced something similar. I'm also scared of growing old by myself, and in my case, watching everyone around me fall in love while I can't and making their partners their top priority just fuels the fear that I'll never be that important to anyone or have someone to lean on in the future. The way my parent is also starting to talk about boyfriends and babies is also adding onto the pressure that I need to be normal and get married and have kids someday. But if I did that it wouldn't be for my own happiness, I'd just be doing what other people want me to do.

But this manga kinda gave me hope that maybe I can find someone who'd be content staying by my side without expecting any romantic connection. And maybe one day I'll be brave enough to live how I want to live.

To every aroace person suffering from these fears I really hope you find people you can call family and trust to have your back at all times <3

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This was originally gonna be on my list of queer manga I read recently (still working on that), but I got carried away with this part and it ended up longer and way more personal than the others so I made a separate post for it yay!!

Happy reading to anyone who felt like picking this up after seeing this post!

<3

[spaghettinoodlesworld]

The English Love Deception

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4

Jude Bellingham X Reader ft Trent Alexander Arnold

synopsis: Y/n's crush Trent sends her a wedding invitation to his wedding with the person y/n hates the most. Y/n is in a major need for a plus one and a job. Will the rich rude arrogant boy next door be of help?wc: 1988 words

warnings in this part: swearing

a/n: This is my first time writing an enemies to lovers fanfic so do tell me what do you think and if i should work on a part 2. If you have any requests do let me know.

You wake up in your dark bedroom with the only source of light being the eerie-looking full moon. Mind you your room is cute af, but now the room was greenish-dark with extremely weird vibes.

The glass door, which doubles as a window and a door to your backyard, is naked with no curtains viewing your backyard, which now seems to be some sort of a graveyard with graves of random people you don't know.

Despite the uncanny silence, all was fine until a shadow of a man limping in your backyard approaching the door/window whatever it is.

Because of your unlimited intelligence and your possession of a one-of-a-kind brain, you elegantly slid the door to your backyard because stupid you wants to see the danger.

Well, no shit you’re the character that dies first in a horror movie. The one that goes, "oh let's go check out that very creepy-looking, dusty, filled with cobwebs, desolate house with the ripped curtains cause why not it looks absolutely safe haha."

So you slid the door open and some cool vapour gushed into the room. Do you stop? hell no. You look at the dead-looking limping man who now appears to be wearing some sort of football jersey. Yup, it's a zombie what do we do ummm maybe run? you just stays there waiting for him as he moves his rotten hand towards you and says, "you know what's ridiculously tasty?"

You definitely need to stop watching these Neymar edits on TikTok 'cause now this man is not only haunting your fyp he is haunting your nightmares too.

You wake up from the dream looking at the clock to find it saying 7 pm. You have slept the whole day and the reason behind that is your man, the love of your life, the only boy you have crushed on who happened to be your best friend too has sent you an invitation to his wedding.

Trent Alexander Arnold, the Liverpool football player, was getting engaged to the person you hate the most in the entire world, Hannah Atkins.

Trent and you were neighbours and very close friends before he moved when he signed with Liverpool. You used to rant to him day and night about that ugly ass bitch Hannah whose main job in this world is to make your life a living hell by spreading rumours in our friend group and whatnot. He used to comfort you and tell you how to deal with her.

However, due to distance, the communication decreased, but your connection was still there.

That was until pretty Hannah, who somehow got her hands on a love letter you wrote to Trent that you never meant to send to him anyway.

You thought you writing a letter will help you move on from him but little did you know was it ruined everything. She sent him the letter and it ended up with him politely rejecting you and I quote, "you were like a little sister of mine whom I'll continue to support forever."

"Well I don't think you're supporting me Trent when you send me a wedding invitation letter with your name and Hannah's name together," you mumble to yourself.

He's getting married to Hannah next week. You know it's been a year since the Trent incident but you still can't help but feel betrayed by him and you can't fight the urge to slap the shit out of that Hannah.

You got up and remembered that your girls bunny and MJ are coming over and the house has close to nothing to feed the girls.

You lazily put on a random hoodie of yours and throw your hair in a messy bun because you’re not like other girls *wink*. You’re going to the grocery store across the street you down need to go all out so you won't bother to wear your contacts your glasses will suffice for now. Nothing is gonna happen anyway, right?

You leave the house and walk by your neighbours' fancy house You always can't help but stare in awe at it every time you pass by only to be interrupted by their dog who happens to hate your guts. You wonder if you happen to meet the owners of the house will they hate you too

The dog has some serious issues with you cause whenever you pass it starts going crazy and barking loudly this doesn't usually happen with other pedestrians.

You get to the store and start making your way to the snacks aisle choosing them good good chips and as you make your way back to the cart you bump into something that sends your glasses flying away.

"I'm so sorry ma'am," you hurry to say to what you assumed is a female as you without your glasses equal useless.

"ma'am? and I thought my day couldn't get any worse. Even you a monkey-looking desk think I'm a girl now," he, who turns out not to be a she, replies.

You sense that you’re getting humiliated and despite seeing nothing but a blurry tall figure you won't stop and watch your dignity getting spat at.

"what's the attitude bro? You bumped into me, my glasses fell and I apologised when it was actually your fault. If you please hand me my glasses so that I can take a clear look at the person with enough confidence to call me a monkey-looking desk"

"Listen dumbo I don't have time for this BS I got more important matters to solve like dealing with this cheater of a bitch. I have seriously had enough of the female population today," he says as he types something on his phone aggressively.

"I can see why she- I mean I can't see but I can sense the reason behind her cheating I actually pray for her mental health after dating such a man with a lack of self-respect as yourself."

"You're talking big when you don't know who you're talking to," he says with a lower tone in an obvious attempt to intimidate me.

"I don't give a damn who you are I see disrespect I say disrespect. Apparently, your girlfriend saved herself from an ugly crazy dude now it's my turn to do the same."

You tried to move away from him, but you could tell he was getting closer when you instinctively backed away until you found your back pressed to a refrigerator.

"I admire your courage," he puts your glasses on your face and said, " now do tell you do you still think I'm undeserving of the confidence I emit as you said now that Dora the explorer got her vision back?"

You look up to look him in the eyes to find him deeply staring into yours. The distance between you can be measured by a ruler literally. You were at a loss of words your eyes were busy eating him up that your brain wasn't comprehending what was happening.

You were so angry that this man who was indeed taking your breath away. If there is one thing you are not, you are not delusional. You can tell an attractive man when you see one and you admit it to yourself. You should not cower down but something about the way he was looking at you captivated you and it seems he noticed it too as a little smirk grows on his face.

"Cat got your tongue? Now that your vision is back you can't speak? Should i take off those glasses off of you for a sneaky reply?"

"All I have to do is scream and you won't like what will happen to that pretty valuable face of yours," you should try to get away safely and peacefully but the boiling blood in your veins thinks otherwise.

After he uttered those words he doesn't budge but continues to stare you down and study your features as if by doing so he will carve your picture in his brain and curse you forever. You didn't even notice that he left until someone asked if the shopping cart belongs to you.

You return back home to find your friends Bunny and MJ already inside waiting for you. They know your passcode and you trust them with your life.

"Girl, where have you been? We've been waiting for a while now," Bunny says.

"I'm so sorry guys I went to get us something to eat," you said while setting the plastic bags, "I don't think today is my day."

"I don't think any day is gonna be your day if you keep yourself locked in his place," MJ says taking the bags and opening them.

"MJ don't say it like that!" Bunny cries trying to sugarcoat MJ's usual bluntness. They complete each other and you are so thankful for having them in you life.

"so the both of you think I'm a loner with zero life and now that we received those wedding invites my life is ruined," you say as you noticed them taking out their invitation letters form their bags simultaneously.

"umm pretty much," MJ responds. "No of course not," said bunny pushing MJ as she walks to you. You know she thinks so but Bunny would never admit that to your face.

"oh god"

"More importantly, are you going or not? cause you definitely should" MJ said drawing your attention to the fact that you forgot that now you got an invitation you should respond.

"As much as I hate to but I must but there are two things stopping me now" you tell them sitting on the cough crossing your legs while open a bag of hot chips.

"which are?"

"i need a plus one," you responded. No, the invitation didn't say so but you said so.

"Do you need a plus one or do you want a plus one?" Bunny questioned reading your mind and actually knowing the answer to her question.

"I need a plus one. I can't show up to the wedding alone. My pride would never plus it'd would be a sign to Trent that I've moved on and I don't need him or his so-called support."

"What's the other problem?" MJ asked taking the bag of chips from your hand.

"I need money to buy a new dress. I hardly got some pounds to sustain day to day expenses and I won't ask my grandparents for more money they already do much."

"y/n, i told you not to quit the job. We could've went and taught that girl Hannah and her ugly friend of hers a lesson," MJ argued.

"What's done is done now help me think of ideas of a job that'll get me quick money before next week," you say as you get your notebook to write the ideas.

However, the moment you finished your sentence MJ's phone lit up.

"Trent just sent a text," she says, "It says 'Hey MJ. The boys from the English team are throwing a house reunion party at Bellingham's house in an hour. If you and the girls are free join us.'"

Both MJ and Bunny go crazy but you can't hear what they're saying. The fact that Trent didn't send the message directly to you hurt you, and as much as the thought of meeting Trent again angers you. It also warms your heart that you would actually see him sooner and not in tux with his wife next to him. Mixed feelings all over the place.

"I'm cool I don't mind," you finally tell them.

"omg omg omg we are actually doing this? Like putting the Trent scenario aside, we're meeting the English team like the actual team that played in world cup. I need to fix my make up," Bunny said walking to your vanity.

"okayyy but y/n why is the location pointing to the house next to yours? Do you live next to Bellingham as in Jude Bellingham???" MJ suddenly stood up.

"And who must that be?" you said confused. You did watch the world cup but if you're being honest you haven't watched all matches.

'OH MY GOD YOU LIVE NEXT TO WHOM?" Bunny stood too.

"I KNOW???"MJ turned to look at her.

"As much as i like the sudden uplift of the mood and i sincerely hate to be the one to ask but who is this Jude Belli-"

Before you finished your sentence, Bunny shoved her phone to your face.

"Oh hell no" hell no indeed. isn't that.?

"What? know him now?" Bunny asks.

"Um guys no but yes."

"We don't do witchcraft nor do we read minds so please do tell us," MJ replied.

How do you tell them that you made a scene with this boy, apparently an English player who now plays for Borussia Dortmund. Well, it doesn't change the fact that he is a short-tempered piece of shit an attractive one but still shit.

"This is going to be a wild night," you say as you head to your closet to find something to wear. You try to calm your nerves. you don't know what's stressing you out more meeting Trent and his soon-to- be wife if she's there or meeting the self-centered boy from the supermarket.

"Spill the tea about Jude now," MJ demanded.

You tell them the story and wait for their reactions as they were still in awe about the whole encounter thingie.

"I refuse to believe such a thing about Jude. He's an absolute gentleman. Are you sure you met the same person?" Bunny argued visibly annoyed by the scenario.

"I'll get my popcorn this is going to be fun," MJ smirked as she too started to freshen up herself.

[onegianthotmess]

Just imagining Arthur meeting Min when she first arrives at the mansion without knowing a word of English or French-

Arthur is trying to flirt while Min just looks at him funny and then to Comte because he is the only one who knows Korean in this house of idiots and Comte is trying to reassure Min that Arthur isn’t a bad person while simultaneously trying to politely tell Arthur to fuck off.

And somehow eventually, like six months later, Min is using the Holmes novels to help better her reading skills because she can speak English and French better than she can read them. And Min loves the novels, sometimes spending two to three days reading one of the books nonstop because she’s so enthralled by the mystery and unexpected turns the stories of Sherlock and Watson hold. They make her want to write her own stories for people to read so they can experience this same joy she feels whenever she opens a Holmes novel.

So imagine Arthur’s shock when he sees the former empress curled up in a chair reading the very first Holmes novel, which is her favorite.

Arthur gets over his initial shock and sits in the chair next to Min, asking if she likes the Holmes novels at all. And cue Min going on a long rant about each novel and why she likes them, why some scenes were a little weird or just plain bad in parts, and why it’s an amazing series that pulls someone in and practically has them in an iron death grip that refuses to let them go until they finish the story. When Min says she can almost never put a Holmes novel down until she finishes the story, Arthur feels this strange bittersweet sense of pride.

He hates the Holmes novels and hates the very main character for obvious reasons (they’re obvious reasons to anyone who’s read his route. I highly recommend if you also like sad bitches) but he also feels proud and strangely endeared that he’d managed to get such an incredibly enthusiastic reaction out of such a calm and serious woman like Min.

But, he quickly put his little facade back up and thanked her for the compliments before stating that he’d written the novels and pointing out his name on the book. And Min is surprised because she never knew Arthur’s full name, only his given name. She figured that “Arthur” was a common name with Englishmen and left it at that. She didn’t expect a man like Arthur to have a way with words outside of flirting once she’d learned enough English to understand what he was saying.

But this opened a whole new can of worms and the two spent hours talking about books and different kinds of writing and how authors go about the process of writing books. Eventually Arthur was starting to help Min with the process of writing her own book and got her a typewriter and everything, even helping her come up with a pen name.

Yeah, and that’s how their relationship starts and it progresses and goes on and then they end up kissing and getting married and the end-

[misguidedasgardian]

hello! hope your day was well and the watching of the season finale was fun.

here is my rant for this episode lol. i always look forward to your commentary!!

> to start: not jace acting as if ulf and hugh were just regular everyday bastards like no bud, they are targaryen bastards (or at least i think ulf is, hugh confirmed he is). like had their moms been married and had them, they'd have a high claim than both him and his mom. and the projecting is crazy, like baela said, get it together and stand by your mom bro, you have uno jobs.

> daemon is literally a crazy man, like crazier than me on a normal everyday average day.

> also, if we went based on how the succession should've gone, plenty of people have a high claim to the throne like rhaenyra did (baela/rhaena through rhaenys). like many people have the means to challenge her, they just dont have the energy (thanks jaehaerys for not liking women??)

> aemond i swear is a woman beater. like if he is willing to lay a hand upon his sister...imagine if he had a wife and the way he talks down to his mom and helaena is oooo, i'd have him smacked silly. like im so glad alicent interceded for helaena because ... he just lost his damn mind.

> alicent is lowkey wishing she had to put up with aegon at this point (everyone is wishing the same lol)

> gwayne clocking cole was gold and criston cole's smartest line by far was something along the lines of: "perhaps all men are corrupt and perhaps honor blows away like mist in the morning." it kind of goes hand in hand with the quote from game of thrones that's something like "there's a beast in every man and he stirs when a sword is put in his face."

> didn't know we were wrestling in mud today and Tyland is as confused as me every episode.

> the acting kills me every time like no offense because i know i couldn't do better, but like the first episode of game of thrones had better acting like its good in this show but not the best like i swear sometimes they talk like robots or like theyre explaining the plot to us (which alicent did for no reason towards the end like just be evil to be evil. women can be evil too they don't always have to be kind and submissive.)

> these characters have become so unlikeable that i have to dig deep to find ones i like.

> ulf has no table manners and not everyone mentioning they aren't of noble birth but like technically, they are like they're as much royal as jace the only difference is his mom kept him and his grandfather allowed it so he should count his blessings.

> alys is carrying and she makes daemon more likeable and i rather watch them and their friendship than daemon and rhaenyra's weird codependency daddy issue relationship (they are making me hate targcest. matter of fact, all the targayens are making me hate everything about them.)

> helaena gets my cheers because she told aemond who was boss and stuck it to him and proved she has a voice and just chooses when to use it. like im betting she wishes aegon was better because at least he was moldable unlike aemond like you could manipulate aegon to do what you wanted. aemond is a lose cannon that needs to be put out.

> corlys without rhaenys is making me ill because he doesnt care that he abandoned his kids, alyn and addam to start a whole new family and left them to fend for themselves as kids like finish what you started. im sick of seeing bastards left and right and watching their families move on without them like finish what yous started if you can!!

> rhaena's safari quest is like watching an ad for something like if i see her quest again, i might cry.

> season 2= story with no plot

sorry for the essay friend, i feel bad every time you respond to it because its so long, but hey, its the last episode so the rants can become shorter now and less time consuming!!

p.s> otto being locked in a tower when everyone is trying to reach him is so funny.

It's fine, I feel like we all got so much to say, we are so confused, angry, sad, Idk what I'm feeling anymore

>You know what? I'm with Jace on this. Rhaenyra said it herself "they think we are closer to gods than to men, but they say that because of our dragons, without them we are like everyone else", then let's go to Jace, who realises he is a bastards on a very early age, think about the fact that the only way to comfort him, is Rhaenyra assuring him that "you are a Targaryen, that's all that matters", and the only "legitimization" he had was his blood, the fact that he (a bastard) could ride Dragons THAT ONE WAS HATCHED TO HIM ON HIS CRIB, then a war breaks out because of the usurpation, which one of its many "justifications", is that Rhenyra "has no true heirs", and his bastarcy had been called out MANY TIMES BY MANY IMPORTANT PEOPLE, and then.... AND THEN HE SEES THIS "COLLECTION" of bastards like him who can also ride dragons? So yeah, I'd be bitter too, and super insecure, because bastards get KILLED in this world, but I also see your point, but the fact that two of them had the white hair that he does not? dang

>Daemon... yesh, whatever makes you sleep at night dude, like, if you needed an Ayahuasca trip to come to the realisation that you need to support your wife... go for it my dude jejeje,whatever ticklled your fancy JAJAJA

>Yeah but that fizzles because of Viserys was made king... so... no point on resurfacing Rhaenys' claim

>I said it before... they DESTROYED their character, I thought his family was going to be what makes him a great villain, an antagonist even, I DO IT FOR MY FAMILY FOR MY MOTHER WHO DEFENDED ME AND MY SISTER WHO IS AN INNOCENT, why couldn't they keep that in? like in S1E9? it makes it much more attractive, and powerful AND LIKEABLE. I LIKED HIM IN SEASON ONE! i found him such an interesting character! where that was left, idk.

>Alicent is just... incoherent, madder then tripping Daemon

>I found that scene useless and boring, and??? like... why? why there? it was like, they filmed it, they made Criston say some "good" lines (?) and then they didn't know where to put the scene so they just threw it somewhere not to waste it? Why he is recriminating him about fucking his sister (IN FRONT OF EVERYONE? DUMB C*NT) NOW? now after like four chapters since we know him? (and he found out) no sense

>Like I said, they cut out two chapters, so m guess is that it was part of something THAT MADE MORE FUCKING SENSE? hahaha I found it weirdly likeable (more at the end)

>I have nothing to say about the actors actually, they are fine to watch I guess, they are victims on this

>They have nobody sacred, they destroyed Alicent, BUTCHERED Aemond, (because despite what TG has to say... TEAM GREENS ARE THE VILLAINS DUDE (in the books), and they manage in season one to actually have fans that are TG!!! and people who enjoyed their characters!!! I could get behind cult Alicent, because she had nothing else so she turned to the gods, so, I guess that's fine BUT ITS NOT FINE BECAUSE IT WAS FOR NOTHING???

They made TB boring and indecisive, butchering them too?? BORING, IDK, if I was Rhaenyra, Alicent would have been DEAD to me the second I realized what happened... specially after she tortured me, diminished me, bullied me, and put my BABIES in risk for all those years... BUT SHE IS WORTH A LIFE-RISKING TRIP FOR? the septa scene was just straight out of a PARODY (calling it fanfiction is an insult to us) and jsut not speak about this last encounter (GO NYRA, MOCK HER, SCOFF AT HER), but what the writters did to them both, is a crime punished by the gods

>Ulf, I don't even want to talk about that clown, I hate him, but Nyra c'mon, what did you expect?

>I have little thoughts about Alys... I really thought they were going to take her character in a complete different direction, Idk how to feel about her, I like that she could be like a "grey" character, like a Loki of some sorts, like "the end justifies the means", yes I'm going to mentally torture you for weeks, only to make you come to the realisation that you must protect and fight for your wife, like, thanks I guess? jejejeje I'm intrigued of what are they going to do with Aemond and Alys... those trips are going to be... DIABOLICAL hahahaha

>Yes I agree, if they had placed ONE scene with Helaena visiting Aegon... she would have been my top three favorite characters in the season, definitely, what Phia has done with her character (WITH SO LITTLE) makes her worthy of a FUCKING OSCAR, and GRRM said it himself, she is one of the characters who he liked more portrayed then in his own writting so, yeah, PUT HIM ON HIS PLACEEEEE, she was like "fuck around and find outttt" hahah

>Yeah, I thought Corlys was going to pull trough this as a decent man, but what he had done and will do? motherfucker, that's all I have to say, you did not deserve Rhaenys, nor those kids, and his house will collapse in front of hiseyes. (I hope they give Addam the place of his brother in the story taking the lead on House Velaryon) Corlys (like Otto) deserve everything that's coming their way, I wrote it on HOTW, he and Otto sank their teeth into a Targaryen of their choice, and they ripped them apart.

>Yeah, Daemon in Harrenhal all over again, It doesn't help that I don't like her at all, look, I'm not the prettiest doll in the store, but I don't like to "watch her", and thinking about what will happen in the Essos crossing, adding to the fact that she will claim a dragon, infuriates me and hasn't even happened yet, she is behaving like a spoiled brat and just... she bores me, Daemon I get it... (FOR SOCIAL REASONS I'M KIDDING), Baela is hanging by a thread, they must give her something to do besides having scenes with Jace. I enjoyed her scene in moondancer, but like the Rhaenys' scene... was for shock value, and not that important to the plot...

>This was all over the place, I just keep writing and writing this and something else always comes up

You know what? i was so fucking angry, about to go to bed angry, and this actually helped me to "put my idead in order", I really hope you can read this noonie! really, I was all over the place, and this somehow soothed me.

HAHAHA Otto! where is he? can't imagine where... he said he was going to the Tyrells? so I don't know who he could have crossed on his way there since they send Tyland to Essos (in the leaks they say it was gonna be him dealing with the triarchy). I enjoyed that part, they gave the triarchy faces, and that gives them a depth that... I weirdly liked.

MUAHAHA

[frenchtwistresistance]

The way I justify Suzanne’s whole deal in the pilot is that she is really going through it. There is something happening regarding her mental health—maybe she’s depressed because of her most recent divorce. Or she’s still grieving her brother-in-law’s death. Maybe they were close because he was a safe man who didn’t want to have sex with her, who was nice to her, whom she never had to flirt with but could if she wanted to just for the fun of it with no expectations.

Further, she’s not feeling like she’s fitting in at Sugarbakers’ because Mary Jo and Charlene are long-standing best friends and Hayden’s death hit Julia really hard and she’s empty-nesting and she’s kind of taking it out on Suzanne.

So Suzanne’s like… fuck it this is my sexpot era. There are (I’m being generous here) maybe four times through the run of the show that she expresses anything like genuine attraction to men, and the other instances are markedly different than how she implies she and Ted have a lot of sex that she enjoys. For example, the time she and Charlene are into that poster guy. It’s very “he’s so dreamy” school girl crush, and she seems to enjoy the camaraderie of gushing about him with Charlene more than the actual looks of him, which she actually says nothing about.

Yes, she’s seen flirting with men but it’s always very polite and appropriate, no real innuendo except a little with Dash Goff and Jack Dent, both of whom she was married to.

So that pilot and a few references and comments sprinkled throughout season one and two where everyone is working under the assumption that she’s slutty is just so jarring because she just demonstrably is not. Even in the pilot when Mary Jo remarks that Suzanne must’ve been engaged to a lot of men and Julia counters that yes and she’s married them all. Not slut behavior. And then! In the episode about Julia’s son’s girlfriend, Mary Jo says her son heard from a girl in his kindergarten class that if you see somebody naked you have to marry them, and Suzanne says that’s always been her policy! This is early in season one! She’s only been married three times so if she’s having sex with all these men she runs around with, it’s all clothes-on and how likely is that?

Anyway, her whole demeanor is different in the pilot—overtly sexy rather than just attractive and vain and harmlessly flirtatious. Everybody is just a tick off from later, more fully formed characterizations, but she’s the most different and my retcon head canon for it is that she was in a bad place emotionally and not really acting like herself.

I’ve mentioned this in a tag rant before, but one explanation could be that she’s just recently moved back to Atlanta from wherever she was living with husband #3 J. Benton Stonecipher and throwing herself back into Atlanta society to feel normal again and overdoes it and gets a reputation for a while and just kind of goes with it until she gets back to being comfortable with everybody and herself again, especially after becoming better friends with Mary Jo and Charlene (and setting them up with men they really like!).