#because he only had his memory of the performance in question mixed with my own interest in avoiding being emotionally punished

[tumbloggingattheendofitall]

Hi I know I sound insane but like what if we agreed nobody films their next show

Don't misunderstand me

I know they haven't even actually announced a Next One as of this exact moment

But

Hi I'm stupid and crazy but what if that's the point

What if "my chemical romance is more than a band" has more application than just the number of new songs, or whatever?

What if Gerard's known frustration with video becoming largely a ubiquitous party of playing a show combined with all their other stated reasons and they're waiting for us to graduate to the Biggest Picture yet - that the Idea, which they espouse as gospel is actually just Being in and of The Moment

Like don't get me wrong I love the archival footage but what if they're savvy to that and just want all of us to let go of the control that filming (in spite of venue regulations almost always) provides

What if the only time that's actually holding back the next thing is us collectively being so separation anxious that we can't stop filming, to the point they're paying for that in their personal lives in a way the collective would all agree is intrusive

What I'm saying is I Am A MyChem Fan and some of my secret theories panned out tonight, while the Big One Didn't so I do invite you to disagree, However I have a new and more well-rounded theory that makes me actually believe more strongly in MCR5 and that might seem silly but after watching tonight, I have two central thoughts

They want to (and likely have been already) work together again to make music

They don't generally appreciate some aspects of modernism like the thing where we now know about Gerard's lyric flub in the end and his subsequent anxiety about it

Like I'm just saying maybe the MCRmy needs to actually work against the band culture of the last decade and agree that we come together, fan club style

Back in the day, bootlegs existed. And when VCR became a thing, filmed bootlegs also became a thing, but even excusing that, we've always wanted to save the Thing.

But back in the day, so to speak, I'm just thinking that, my mom and dad both always talked about a specific person (whose name or "name" they've still never shared) who provided bootlegs of their significant Date Night concerts

And like. I know it's silly and stupid but what if we became what the fanclubs of old tried for and found, say 3 people in the fandom with exclusive filming right for a given performance and then forget agreed to gently discourage finding by anyone but the hypothetical 3

What I'm saying doesn't actually make sense but let me add another hypothetical

Picture being Just A Guy whose lyrics happened to hit with the music and all of a sudden you're dealing with the awakening of the Internet on top of the Standard Hero Band Journey of the time. And then imagine that you're trying to do something new by being more authentic to encourage people to not make horribly addictive decisions, but that not only adds fame, now makes it actively impossible to disengage from the culture because you wanted to have this platform to encourage people to do better but you never wanted to be the Personal Face of what others consider Better because (for whatever reason) you feel and/or know that you're not Better so you think maybe dipping is better

Estival cause it worked for your heros

But then life and turn-of-a-century plus technically leads to finishing returns and Way Too Many People having Even Your Most Intimate Performances at their fingertips

What I'm saying is maybe we appreciate the ways that the Before Times can clubs worked - they worked for and with the bands, but it never excluded the valuable message of the given band

Maybe we create and create and become a community that agrees that regardless of our fandom and Opinions on Same, we all want More, and we will all be technically dense and In The Moment at the next show unless we're the (however many) agreed-to streamers, and we'll collectively but gently reinforce that only those 2-6 people can film the name without being paid

What I'm saying is that most early bootlegs of any given entertainer were created and then further curated by the band and their willingness for outside influence

What I'm saying is if this post gets 5 likes is at least 50% understanding where I'm coming from, then Imma build an Actual Fan Club with a central Club manifest that might actually lead to changes in the culture for At Least MCR's already-scarce blessings upon their fans

[jaestrz]

𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 - 𝐤𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐨𝐨𝐧 캐빈문

૮ ˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶ ა ✩°｡⋆⸜ 🎧

𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗿𝗲: fluff | little angst | established relationship

𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴: kevin moon x afab!reader

𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴: mental breakdown | mentioned of stress

≡;- ꒰ °you had a hard time with being insecure of yourself and kevin was there for you꒱

*ੈ✩‧₊˚ a/n: i went to take a break after I wrote this. I want my own kevin ㅠㅠ

-

There wasn’t a time where you think you were ‘enough’ for him comparing to his fans that treated him better than you did. Especially when you’re his girlfriend. There was a sense of insecurity blew your mind when it comes to this. You couldn’t blame Kevin for it or course. This made you blame yourself for couldn’t be the best for him.

You wondered if he ever felt that way. Although he did talked about how both of you should be transparent with each other. But humans can say words with empty promises anytime they desire. It’s just up to you to believe it or not. It doesn’t make it any better, the way your own mindset is thinking is making you look like you don’t trust Kevin. You don’t want it to be that way. But you were scared to death each time your life depends on Kevin too much. Once he leaves you, with or without reason, you didn’t want to feel the unbearable pain. If it was going to hurt at least make it less.

Leave is a powerful word. It’s something he could hold onto and use it anytime if you did not live up to his expectations. That’s what you had in your mind. It’s more awful to think how much you have tried your hardest to be a better partner for him. For Kevin.

He’s talented. Kevin is the most talented person you had ever met. He had always been since high school. Kevin was everyone’s dream boy as far as you could remember. A boy who knew how to sing, dance, cook and more things you could list in your mind. It was no surprised that a lot of people liked him. But compared to everyone else, you couldn’t understand the way he sees the world.

It was definitely clear in your memories. You remembered when it was the first performance for Kingdom. He came back home with a worn out figure. Very different than when he went out the door in the morning. There were bruises on his body’s, your guessing is that he has quite a fall during practice. But then again out of all of that sweat and minor injuries, he looked like the happiest boy you could possibly imagine. When the group gained more fans from the show, you couldn’t forget how excited he had gotten.

There was a night, where both of you were sitting down in the living room. The only thing that could be heard was songs from his phone with a mix of yours and his playlist. It was 2 in the morning and a layer of glass was formed in his eyes. The tears threatening to fall out. He was stressed. Kevin talked about something that has to do with not getting the choreography right, the song was hard and the album was a total mess. He was completely a different person at this moment. He wasn’t smiling like he always do, wasn’t laughing nor cracking up his stupidly funny jokes. It was just Kevin who let out and spill all of his struggles. Which soon leads to him breaking down with you comforting him.

You can’t deny, the world is a scary place.

He felt too much pressure in his head. It seems like it could burst if he didn’t let it out.

That was the last time you had seen him breakdown.

‘I don’t think I could even cry, because then I couldn’t be the one that he could lean on’ the sound of pen scratches against your notebook paper, leaving nothing but ink. Your knuckles turned white from gripping the pen too hard, feeling your hand going numb.

Your heart questioned you. What do you know about Kevin and yourself?

You stared blankly at the white wall. Nothing came up to your mind except the not so nice ones. A tear slipped down from your eye, following by a few more so it was non stop.

Kevin loves midnight driving in the middle of the highway with nowhere to go. He prefers speaking English with you and Jacob because to him it doesn’t sound as awkward as speaking Korean. He doesn’t like to be called by his Korean name, he doesn’t have a reason why but people rarely calls him Hyungseo.

Was that really all you could recall after dating him since high school?

‘I can’t even understand my own emotions. Something is hurting but I can’t tell what it is’ You scribbled, pulling your knees to your chest as you cried. Forgetting about the world around you as everything seem to fade away.

Kevin won’t be back until another few hours. I’ll be fine you thought. You couldn’t even sleep. Tears were streaming down your face that you didn’t even bother to wipe away.

And you didn’t even bother to turn on your phone to see the miss calls from Kevin and notifications from his text messages he had sent you.

Kevin was indeed, a little bit skeptical about your quiet behaviour this morning before he left for practice with the other members. He had actually asked if you were alright but you just replied with a dry ‘yes’ to him. He almost made up his mind about going to work and just stay at home with you to keep an eye out for you. He couldn’t skip today due to an important meeting. But that doesn’t mean he won’t ask about your condition in text. Which also, you replied dry.

‘what would happen if I could not be the one enough for him?’ The notebook was stained with tears.

You were too lost in your own thoughts to hear the sound of the front door creaked, signalling and a reminder that Kevin is home. He saw you sitting in the dark living room on his work desk with your notebook opened. The only thing that could be heard was your slow sobs.

And through the night was playing on your phone.

Kevin’s eyes softened at the sight of your silhouette. Slowly approaching you so he wouldn’t startle you to death. He took a glanced at your notebook before he touches you, watching as your tensed body suddenly eased at his skin contact. The unfamiliar temperature of your body pulled his heartstrings, taking you in a hug.

“i’m home love. I’m here now.” He whispered as you buried your face in his chest, letting out every single of your worries by crying. He could tell you had so many problems in your head that you were afraid to admit. Kevin could read your eyes that was screaming how you were not okay. And his heart broke more to see your ill body that you had neglected. “don’t cry, it’s okay shh. I’m right here with you. I’ll keep your problems away baby. Trust me. I will hug you so tight, until you forget about every single problems that’s stuck in your head.”

It took a few minutes for you to calm down. The tears were still flowing but it had definitely lessened. His hand was rubbing your back repeatedly while he gave you forehead kisses every few minutes. You were avoiding his eye contact. “Look at me sweetheart.” His request was soft, he could see the glassy layer in your eyes when you look up to him. “What were you thinking baby? Was the fever bothering you?” He wasn’t completely wrong about the fever part. You do tend to get in a 5 emotional stages when you don’t feel well.

Your voice was stuck in your throat. You were trying to swallow whatever was in your throat so you could speak. “Deep breaths baby.” He said and you followed his breathing.

“I was- not feeling like the best person today. Maybe not just today, for the past few weeks as well.” You admitted. Kevin let out a hum, signing you that he was listening.

“I felt like I wasn’t good enough to be your… girlfriend.” There was a slight frown formed on Kevin’s expression before he reached his hand to cup your face and wipe the tears with his thumb. “You were everyone’s favourite person since high school and i’m- just. Not up to your expectations.”

Kevin guided you to the sofa and placed you to sit on his lap before he started saying. “You’re the most precious and wonderful person that had entered in my life. No matter what really happened, you’re the first person I will come to at the end of the day.” Kevin told you. “You’re the actual reason why I’m still here and performing in front of people. I don’t think I could even continue if you weren’t here.” He tucked a strand of your hair behind your ear.

“I don’t want you to feel like you’re not enough for me. You’re everything love. I swear if I could take you to see what you are in my life, I would. Just to proof to you that you worth much more than you thought.”you felt his lips connected with yours. It wasn’t full of lust or anything lewd. It was full of sincere.

When you pulled away to catch a breath, you stared into his eyes. You didn’t know how to say thank you. You weren’t good at expressing yourself. But Kevin could read your thoughts better.

You snuggled up in the croak of his neck, inhaling the scent of his cologne while he starts telling you about his day and something interesting that had happened at work. Some made you laugh and he felt like his mission was complete.

“Did Eric really lost his phone?”

“Changmin found it underneath the couch. But Eric accused Jacob for taking it” Kevin replied with a slight laughter.

Both of you ended up talking more about his days. Until he realised both of you had to go to bed.

“Now that my girlfriend is smiling, you have to take your medicine before bed you old sick ahjumma” Kevin joked. “Then you’re ahjussi. We’re the same age.” You laughed.

He was grateful that he could be the reason you could smile again. Kevin wouldn’t trade you for the whole universe. He wanted to stay like this for the rest of his life.

With just you.

[amarantine-amirite]

The First Stop

I don't want to talk about job hunting right now. I'm feeling a huge case of battle fatigue.

This isn't yet another story about someone who lost out on their dream job because they mixed up the forms. I didn't mix anything up, despite what everyone says. I never found out what the title was, but it had the requisition number DS-2229061.

I came across the job at my college's job fair. The job had the following description:

What you'll do:

Analyze, design, develop, and manipulate business and financial data to influence and drive decision making.

Collaborate with business and add technology partners to elicit information/date requirements.

Communicate requirements in a manner that can be easily understood by team members.

Employ data mining techniques to produce analysis and business insights.

Provide conclusions or recommendations on business performance based on analysis.

I looked at the job description and could easily see myself doing this type of work. After I got home, I went onto the company's website and looked up the requisition number.

My jaw dropped when I saw the results. The job description was even better than what was on the sheet I picked up at the career fair.

Your responsibilities:

Develop offline and real-time algorithms for processing EEG, PPG and other biosignals.

Develop and implement biosignal-based applications.

Run cloud studies on our large-scale EEG database.

Contribute to the development of internal research tools.

This isn't some business analyst job where my skills would be underused. This was something where my background as a physicist would come into play outside the classroom. I'd be putting my physics skills to use. Can you even imagine what a terrific opportunity this would be for me?

Except...it didn't come through. Do you know how I said I was suffering from battle fatigue? Well, I made a massive tactical error.

Ten days after I sent in the application, I got a callback. The check-in process required me to punch in The requisition code. I punched in DS-2229061, and it returned this job description

Duties

Reviewing internal order form to confirm availability of product

Complete the product process by reviewing the account number and processing the order

Maybe some data evaluation and assistance with invoicing

This confused the crap out of me. I still went to the interview, if only to ask why the same requisition code pointed to three different jobs. I brought both the printout of the job from the job fair and a printout of the job description from the website.

"Abby?" The hiring manager called my name. I recognized her from the career fair. "Jade, right?" I asked.

"Yes!" Jade nodded, "Good memory"

We chatted for a bit before Jade got her notebook. I hoped that she could at least try to answer my question.

No such luck. She didn't even let me ask. "I remember you from the career fair, and I just have to ask, why are you even a physicist?" She didn't seem particularly pleased to see me. "Based on what we saw, both your autism and your emotions are way too intense. Why are you studying something that's pure logic when you're all emotions and no rational thought?"

None of that was true. Even if it was, it doesn't stop people from going into physics. Believe me, we have no shortage of pathetic mathematicians, loser physicists, and astronomers on the heels of a breakdown.

Anyone who has done a college degree in STEM subjects knows this relatively well. Hell, I have a litany of stories about physicists just completely melting down. We had a physics lab that concerned how surface tension dictates how efficiently fluid can solve a maze. The lab technician asked us to bring our own alcohol. The kids took this as permission to bring as much wine as they could and everybody got too drunk to do the lab. Over the course of the semester, our thermodynamics prof got progressively shabbier. Then he came to the exam wearing nothing but his boxer shorts. My TA for relativistic physics had difficulty accepting that Nature does not permit political statements in acknowledgments. I read his paper, and from the looks of it, he spent more time crafting the blurb on how badly he was bullied for his sexual orientation than on his research.

I decided to tell my personal favorite physicist meltdown story: the time a grad student in the astrophysics department swore at somebody on Twitter. "You see," I began, "it's not unusual for physicists to lose their cool."

The hiring manager rolled her eyes at me. "I see."

I may find this story funny, but the underlying mechanics point to a deeper problem: a department full of people who only have their jobs because they couldn't find work anywhere else. "The astronomy department decided to fire three cosmology researchers for forging data. This left two grad students, Carol Calabasas and Julia Glidden without a supervisor. The former dropped out to work in equity research, while the latter stayed behind. Within a week, Julia got an email commenting on her lack of progress and how she wasn't suited to continue in academia. She replied with a reminder that on top of being unable to find a replacement supervisor, numerous individuals in the department harassed her due to her dyslexia and nonverbal learning disorder for the better part of a year. Worse still, Dr. Linkletter, a prof who had been Julia's advocate, left to work in the private sector."

"How is all this relevant?" she asked.

"It's relevant because things came to a head when Carol joked that working in capital markets was looking better and better." I opened the Gallery app on my phone and showed Jade two screenshots. Julia posted two career-bricking tweets: the first calling Carol a stupid fucker, and the second accusing the department head of being the Zodiac Killer. "As you can see, Julia did not appreciate Carol's suggestion that she drop out and work in capital markets. On top of that, she also publicly accused Dr. Broom of being the Zodiac Killer." As insane as Julia's Twitter meltdown was, she had a point. If you assume the Zodiac Killer started when they were in high school, the dates like up shockingly well.

This story left Jade confused. "You still didn't answer my question."

"Well," I chuckled, "I might be intense, but I have a better handle on things than those guys."

She ended the interview right then and there. I never did figure out what the issue with the requisition code was. I don't think it matters, because if that job interview was any indication of the corporate culture, then I do not want to work there.

I don't have time to worry about that now. I heard from one of my TAs that what I said to Jade in the interview got back to Julia. I do not know how this is going to end.

@void-of-self

[chronicsheepdeprivation]

Honestly Frank's revival could've been more interesting if we saw more of his turmoil mixed in with his wonder about the future.

I want to see his anguish over losing everything he knows, wanting to go home when he's already there, being reminded of his family in little moments- maybe even thinking he should call his brother Martin or his parents and check up on them when there's nothing to check up on. We saw him collapse over realizing they were long since dust, but that was only once and not touched on again, I can't believe he'd only have one moment of grief in adjusting to his revival.

Along with that, it's hinted at in 3001 that Frank is Jewish, but Indra mentions how religion has changed and even the word for God isn't the same as in his time. Show us more of his struggles with his faith and tradition and how his views and customs are seen as 'outdated' ( being rejected and being told he's 'mutilated' because of his circumcision, a common practice in his era, must've been humiliating! Have him question his worth as a partner and a human since something so personal to him and tied to his beliefs might be seen as a 'disfigurement'! ) and trying to follow important holiday dates or teach them to his children, if Indra would even be okay with that, when no one still keeps a record of when they should be performed, or crafts kippahs, mezuzah, or scrolls of the Torah. Frank doesn't seem like he was that religious but now he's the only one keeping his faith going and not just have it relegated to history. Considering how Judaism has had attempts to be wiped out in the past that must be heartbreaking.

I love seeing Frank's character explored more and he should absolutely feel joy about living in this new and exciting time and finding out everything he can do, but it would've had a stronger impact if we got a better look at how he feels like a stranger in his own world and can never return to the life he once had. To Earth it was 1000 years but to Frank it was just a short rest, he woke up and has to live a life completely unknown to him.

It's also of my personal opinion that Halman lied about the Firstborn's plans, but as the book is from Frank's perspective we wouldn't know that.

The Firstborn saw that Halman and themselves had become too entwined with humans and came up with the excuse that 'our planet's information from 2001 just reached them and it just so happened to be during humanity's worst era so the Earth is going to be destroyed', despite their constant communication with Halman ( and also how even in that time we'd made massive progress in human rights, by no means is the subjugation of several kinds of people over but it's arguably not as openly acceptable as in the past ) to give themselves an excuse to seemingly disappear. Hal, as we know, has issues with deceiving others but that was within the constraints of Discovery's computing systems as well as having to deal with conflicting mission orders- with his consciousness in a much more advanced machine and with Dave and The Firstborn agreeing on their course of action he may be a lot more comfortable with lying to others in order to successfully carry out their goals.

Frank, on behalf of humanity, gave Halman a collection of computer viruses in order to eradicate the Monolith threat as well as a memory chip to escape and store themselves on, but let's be honest- the Firstborn had billions of years of advanced technology on us by the time they made contact- developed on a totally different, alien operating system. No matter what humanity throws at them it isn't going to work, even if Halman were to try and format our attack to operate on their machines, we're just too primitive and foreign to this sort of threat; and while the Memory Chip is a nice gesture again we're vastly behind what The Firstborn are capable of and it wouldn't be able to handle the large amount of information that Halman would try and bring with him- he couldn't store himself on it without losing a lot of memory ( that and there's the risk of humans bringing him back simply to exploit him for what he knows ).

So make up a threat that The Firstborn and their technology poses, pretend that whatever Earth chooses as a course of action can successfully combat it, and make humans think they've won against their enemy and that you've been stored inside the device they provided- all while you simply step back and continue to observe but at a further, less intrusive distance.

Part of why I believe this is that in the Epilogue the Firstborn say that ' Their God is still young ', it's in the present tense and there's no doubt that he will continue to be their guide no matter what. They know what they're doing.

Also like.... we just forgot about the other Hal units, Sal, and Floyd, huh?

Me with the space odyssey series

Clarke you did not need to continue after 2010. You clearly did not want to. You could not have been annoyed that much to continue- Clarke - Mr. Clarke listen to me

“All slightly different universes so it doesn’t matter” I am in your walls.

[absolutebl]

Why I Don’t Love Body Swap

I really am not a fan of body swap (or spirit possession), and before you ask, yes I include Big in this. I find it tests the actors’ a little too much, and there are very very few actors who are aware enough of their own bodies to carry the performance requirements off - generally you need to come from dance or physical comedy. (I talk about this kind of acting ability with regards to Saint.) 

I should preface this by saying, Vice Versa has only recently started, and I am enjoying it very much. This is not a criticism of it, I’m just using it as a jumping off point to talk about the body swap trope used in film - BL in particular.

Here are some of the ones I know of that use body swap as a narrative device. 

2017 HIStory: My Hero (Taiwan) 6/10 

Girl dies and her consciousness transfers into in the body of the boy who (maybe) had a crush on her boyfriend. She has a week to make her old boyfriend fall in love with her new body. On Viki.

First we should address the fact that if it’s a girl trapped in a boy’s body, it’s a girl and therefore her having a relationship with a man calls into question if this is BL at all. It IS queer, but is it gay? Grey area, as we often stray into with these narratives. This show, and Great Men Academy are particularly impacted by this quandary. 

ANALYSIS: I don’t have much to say about this one, I’ve only watched it a few times. I didn’t respond well to the actor playing the lead at all out the gate and I don’t think he handled being “inhabited by the spirit of a girl” very well. He never made me believe that was the case. Possession is a bit more loosey goosey than plain only body swap, a case could be argued how much of her consciousness would be in her sense memory of body movement, but still... eh, I never believed it. I know, fantastical premise, but as a watcher, the actor still needs to make me believe the innate truth of what i am watching. And Jiang Yun Lin just didn’t, maybe because it was his debut? 

2018 PickRome's Our Skyy episode (from Puppy Honey) (Thai) 5/10

Boyfriends accidentally body swap into each other. There’s some nice play on the height difference, This OffGun vehicle is cute and the first time we really got to see them playing affectionate boyfriends. Also the first time Off did soft on screen for us. Important to the cannon of their ship, but not my favorite. 

ANALYSIS: Sorry to the OffGun obsessives out there but this was one for the physical comedians out there. I talk about thsi with older actors playing younger characters but you HAVE to move differently. Teens, for example, are way loser in their spine and around their body posture and movement (often because of growth spurts, they clumsy af). Teens are all elbows and angles, and slouching. I don’t mind older actors playing younger, because I’d rather not see minors having to kiss etc... but rarely does the actor get thsi right. Off and Gun didn’t do this right either. They got the personality switch okay, and the aspects of scripted comedy done well too. But both these actors have very specific ways of walking and moving, and we are all very familiar with both. And frankly they shoudl be with each other’s quirks too but the time this show rolled around. But Off is ALWAYS Off and Gun is ALWAYS Gun, I never believed for one second they had switch bodies - even if Off was being unnaturally cuddly, smiley, and sweet. 

2022 Cupid's Last Wish (Thai) 6/10 

Brother and sister swap bodies. The sister remains in a coma (inside her bother’s body) which the brother, inside his sister’s body, has to go on a quest to rectify the situation. Win is such an incredibly unlikeable character I really struggled with this show, no skin off Mix’s acting, but holy fucking irredeemable tsundere. The final ep tried (and for some it may have been successful) but even EarthMix’s chemistry (which has improved since Thousand Stars) didn’t save it.  On YouTube.

ANALYSIS: Mix and Jan actually did better than I was expecting in this swap. But I think it was mostly Jan. Mix is a decent actor, don’t get me wrong, and he was handed a very difficult part to play (I found his character highly unlikable). But Jan was pulling a lot more weight to make them look like they were actually in each others body then he was. Now Mix is relatively new to acting, and he’s the lead, while Jan is experiences and a secondary couple, so the weight should be in this direction. Also there’s a real challenge when the body swap is male/female, not only skeletal structures but the way flesh is distributed on bone (external sex characteristics). We are all profoundly effected by puberty and self-consciousness about different parts of the body, which means that most women and the men move differently. Especially in the context of this narrative where neither character is intended to be trans or body dysmorphic. Jan was a bit better, she made her movements bigger, widened her stance, pulled back and stacked her spine differently (men tend to slouch snd support from the lower back - stomach, women from the upper one - boobs). But she still didn’t exactly move like Mix. And Mix never looked like he was trapped in a girls body. (Smaller feet, stance and stride change, pelvic position, even how you stand in a relaxed position, it should be slightly different for him to convey being trapped in a small, slighter body, with different flesh distribution.) 

Am I nitpicking? Sure, it’s what I do. 

2019 Great Men Academy (Thai) 6/10 

Love has a crush on popular Vier who goes to an all boys challenge school. She meets a unicorn and wishes to get close to him. Love wakes up to find herself changed into a guy so she can attend the same school. Difficult to get hold of. 

ANALYSIS: This one is a body swap where it’s a girl whose body is turned into a man’s, so there is no “other character” to compare too. That makes it I think a lot easier on the actor because he gets to interpret what she becomes physically because of the transformation (and we don’t have something to compare it to constantly and visually). I actually think James did a pretty darn good job (he’s an experienced actor). This is one of my favorite body swap executions. That said, I always think there would be a period of adjustment, a physical adaptation to the awkwardness of inhabiting someone else’s skin even if it’s yours transformed - in terms of clumsiness, spacial awareness, which James managed to touch on with this show but should have been pushed into a bit more for humor if nothing else. But this is really difficult to do. 

2022 Vice Versa (Thai) - still airing at time for writing, unrated 

This one showcases boys body swapping into other boys bodies, but played by all four actors back & forth on screen with each other. On YouTube. 

ANALYSIS: Please don’t get me wrong, I really love Ohm & Nanon. But, none of these actors physically move, vocally speak (cadence, tone) like their counterparts. And as the secondaries in this show, it is on Ohm and Nanon to do the hard work in this matter, to attempt to match to their respective lead actor. In the end, I just do not believe that any of them have swapped bodies. When you see Nanon, he doesn’t hold himself the way to Jimmy does. He doesn’t have Jimmy’s arrogance and pride, or that sort of svelte beauty of physicality. Jimmy is elegant about his movements, precise and smooth. He inhabits space with care. Nanon does not. With Ohm and Sea, it’s more that their voice cadence and tone are so completely different. 

So in scenes where we swap back-and-forth between the two playing the same part, I feel a profound disconnect. There’s just no way that is the same person, and the actors are not being directed to make it feel that way (or they’re not sophisticated or workshopped? enough to execute smoothly). It’s a little disappointing and, frankly, it makes me just a tiny bit annoyed whenever Nanon or Ohm is on screen, because it’s so much “oh THERE’S Nanon!” not the role he’s playing. 

It might have been a different story if they had been, heh he, swapped: Jimmy|Ohm versus Sea|Nanon. Because physically those match-ups move a little more like each other naturally. Jimmy is such an elegant and almost aggressive way of holding himself with that perfect posture, and Nanon just doesn't, he’s slouchy. Ohm is a bodybuilder and moves like an athlete, while Jimmy is more floaty like a dancer, but at least that’s a little bit closer to each other in the arena of body awareness. 

Frankly, I’m looking forward to it being more just JimmySea, and less OhmNanon on the same screen, and not just because... Jimmy, but because I’m finding this aspect so very jarring. And I do think a smart director will move towards just the dominant couple in this matter. 

A good example: What is the best examples of this kind of thing for me, weirdly, is actually Men in Black.

If you’ve ever seen this movie, Vincent D'Onofrio who plays the bug character is a truly remarkable physical comedian. It’s him inside his own body, but the entire time you NEVER forget that an alien creature is inside that body. That creature is not used to bipedal motion, to the smaller size, to talking with that voice box, and we know this ALL THE TIME. Yes he has makeup and CGI helping him, but that man can move his body.

Of course this isn’t the same as a body swap or a body move from one biological sex body to another, but D'Onofrio highlights how important it is to show with the way you inhabit space, hold your head, walk (stride, foot position), stiffen your spine, even breathing is different and when you switch bodies it manifests primarily in the physical.

Before you ask, Saint is the best BL actor I know at physicality performance, but I don’t know who he should swap with... 

(source) 

[gardenerian]

hi! i've just come across a story you wrote (the one after ian and mickey steal the ambulance and they listen to each other's hearts, you know the one?) and it has me thinking about emt ian, as always! this is going to be long (i'm sorry! i just have so many thoughts, where do i put them!? feel free to ignore this entire thing even ajdjsk)

i'd say i hope not for them in real life, but if something were to happen (to a stranger on the street or in the apartment complex or something) and was in need of that kind of life-saving medical assistance ian hasn't needed to use for years, and ian and mickey are the only ones around and able to help - how do you think that would play out?

i mean, ian knows what to do, he's been on the job and he moves with muscle memory. he's talking about all these things like vitals and medical terms that mickey has no clue about and ian is working to get the stranger in correction positions, prodding at their body for any signs of what happened, maybe removing his jacket to sustain a bleeding wound, and maybe mickey just kinds of stands there trying to understand what the fuck ian is saying or waiting for ian to tell him to do something?

does ian need to perform some serious things to keep this random person alive? snap a bone in place? calm down a hysterical stranger? carry someone down a flight of stairs? don't know! but i am interested in how ian reacts after it being so long, and how mickey reacts to seeing ian in this element and how they both deal with the panicked energy. how do they deal with it when its all over! they're back at home, how are they emotionally? do they just need to shower it, slump into bed and hold each other tight? surely they'd talk about it, even if only briefly. how does this affect them. god! i am interested in this.

H E L P

first things first, can you drop a link to this? aksldjfh because i remember writing this, but for the life of me i cannot find it on my blog! i would like to reread and see if i stand by it 😇 (edit: found it!)

next up, i will never ignore emt ian, he is the light of my pathetic little life! please always talk to me about him! AND THESE THOUGHTS? EXCELLENT. we're getting unhinged under the cut:

gosh, i bet mickey is kinda stunned? like. he knew about emt ian, he's kinda seen him in mild action. patching the family up, dealing with frank, etc. but something like this! this is unprecedented! it's probably some mix of awe, pride, and anxiety. maybe mickey calls 911 while ian tends to the person, and he keeps asking ian questions and he's just! amazed at how ian slips back into this role!

and when it's all over... hmm. they're quiet for a bit, i bet. each in their own heads. but staying close! they don't let the other out of their sight when the adrenaline wears off. i totally see them slumped on the couch, reliving the day and and leaning on each other.

and mickey's freaking out because holy shit that was amazing and he's so proud and he's so impressed and he's so in love but oh my god how is ian gonna react to this and what if he's feeling bad and mourning it all over again and what if this triggers something and what if that was actually traumatizing or how can he help ian feel good about himself and support him and oh god is it bad that he found the whole thing really hot???

and ian's sitting there like god he missed that he was so good at that and he's still good at that but he don't get to do that and he hopes that person is okay and he hopes he did it all right and what does he do now that he remembers it all so vividly and wow mickey really got to see it when he never got to before he never saw ian when he was so proud of himself and riding around in their ambulance is fun and he loves working with mickey but holy fuck look at what he had and look at what he lost and -

and mickey snaps out of his own freak out and stands, pulls ian in close and holds him for a moment, then leads him down to the bathroom where they shower and help each other clean up and relax. mickey tells ian he did so good, he was fuckin incredible and mickey loves him so much. and ian kinda hums in thanks, breathing deep through the hurt and letting himself feel proud.

later, i bet, when they're feeling more steady, mickey does lean over and ask if it's okay that he thought the whole thing was super fucking hot and ian's like. fuck yeah 😇

[jenohi]

stranger

PAIRING ▸ Watanabe Haruto x fem!reader

GENRES ▸ pining, high school au, lacrosse au, I’m not really sure what genre this is lol

WARNINGS ▸ traumatic events?

SUMMARY ▸ When Haruto moves halfway around the world the last person he expects to see is you. His former nemesis...or so he thinks.

PLAYLIST ▸ Still Don’t Know My Name by Labyrinth

WORD COUNT ▸ 9626

UNIVERSE ▸ YG High; Treasure Lacrosse Team

A/N ▸ I’ve decided from here on out all my stories will probably fall within the same universe. I only really have like 4 universes in mind so I’ll label them just so you know. Also, I’m looking to add some art to my stories to bring them more to life but I am useless at graphics/edits, so! If you’re really into making graphics/edits and you enjoy my work please please PLEASE reach out to me!!! I would love to work with an amazing artist! <3 <3 Plz enjoy.

A/N 2 ▸ This story is like a lot of crossover with Jeongwoo’s story but I hope I was able to bring justice to Haruto’s character and bring his story to life. :P ok now enjoy for real realz.

You were the prettiest girl Haruto had ever known in his life. But to him, you were also his rival. You always managed to score just a few points higher than him on each exam, each quiz, each assignment. To him it always felt like the teachers liked you more, so he made sure your classmates liked him more. The thing that made him really mad was that you were so unbothered. You were ambivalent to him and you didn’t even know his name. If you really were strangers and never sat in the same class he could understand. But you had been in the same classes for years. Each time you spoke to him, you politely asked for his name. As if you were strangers.

When his parents told him that his family was going to move to another city, far enough that he would have to transfer schools, he had mixed feelings. This was his last chance to confront you. To understand why you’d never bothered to remember his name, but each time he approached you he found you furiously scribbling in a notebook. Although he resented you for not knowing his name, he could never get himself to disturb you when you looked so stressed scribbling whatever it was in your notebook.

What Haruto didn’t know is that you did notice him. You noticed the handsome, tall, skinny boy that was always in the corner of your line of sight. But you had no idea what to say to him. So you never approached him. He was a stranger.

Haruto wished he could forget you. He was a bit uncomfortable transferring to a new school at first but thankfully, three other boys had transferred with him. Asahi, Mashiho, and Yoshi had become literal brothers to him. The school also had a transfer students program and he made a new friend, Hanbyul. She was a chatterbox and sometimes she could literally chat his ear off, but she was also sweet and helpful. But she wasn’t you.

But that didn’t matter because Hanbyul had another guy on her mind all the time anyway. “You know we’ve just been friends for such a long time and lately, I’ve started to...I don’t know. I feel different. Nervous. Is it normal to feel nervous around your best friend?”

“I don’t know. Is it?” Haruto responded.

“No, I suppose it isn’t. But he probably doesn’t feel the same way. I doubt he’s ever even thought about me in that way.”

Haruto felt someone nudge him, he turned to see that it was Asahi. Haruto leaned over to hear what he was going to say. “Is she talking about Jaehyuk’s brother?”

Haruto nodded.

“Jaehyuk talks about his little brother and this chick all the time. She’s so off the mark. The little brother definitely has feelings for her if Jaehyuk is anywhere near the mark.” So both parties had feelings for one another but both parties were too chicken to say anything to each other. And for no good reason.

In a way that reminded Haruto of himself and it pissed him off. He knew that spending so much time with his new friend would raise suspicions but he didn’t care. He knew that spending so much time with her pissed Jeongwoo off. It didn’t take a genius to recognize it when they went to the Big Bang Concert together.

Haruto thought he was going crazy when he spotted you a few spaces over at the concert. He rubbed his eyes and blinked a few times to make sure it was really you. Haruto stormed over to you once he decided that it was in fact you. He had spent months thinking about what to say to you if he ever saw you again, he wasn’t going to miss this opportunity. Haruto didn’t even think to tell his new friends where he had gone.

You saw a tall, handsome figure approaching your direction. You took a second to check him out, but then turned back to the performers and continued to enjoy yourself. Your parents were reluctant to let you go out to this concert on your own but it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that you wanted so badly. You smiled sadly at what might happen when you woke up tomorrow.

“I didn’t know you were a fan of Big Bang.” You heard a voice from behind speak into your ear. You jumped in surprise and turned around to see that it was the handsome stranger you saw sauntering your way earlier.

“Hi, what’s your name?” You asked with a polite smile on your face. This is probably exactly what your parents were worried about, creepy men that would try to approach you. You started to think about the best way to remove yourself from the situation safely. The now unamused expression on his face alarmed you.

“When are you gonna cut the shit. You know who I am.”

You looked at him puzzled. “I do? How? From where?”

Haruto felt something in his chest crack. “I used to go to school with you. You’re Y/N right?”

“Oh, yeah. That’s me.” You furiously racked your mind trying to remember what you had read but your memory came up blank. You couldn’t help but cringe and turn away. This is why you tried your best to keep to yourself and away from people. You looked up to see Haruto staring down at you with a curious expression. “I’m sorry I don’t remember you. You said you used to go to school with me? You don’t go to school with me anymore? Can I get your name again? I’m really sorry. I’ll try and remember.”

“My name is Haruto. I don’t go to school with you anymore. I transferred to a new school a few months ago.”

“Oh, I see.”

Haruto wasn’t sure how to feel when he realized you actually had zero recollection of him. For some reason seeing you up close and seeing you really trying to remember him made him feel a bit sympathetic. He couldn’t understand why. It still totally irked him that you didn’t know his name. But something told him to sit down with you and get to know you.

“Well, do you like your new school?” You asked, looking up at Haruto. Your heart was beating hard and fast. You prayed that your face wasn’t flushing.

“Why don’t we just enjoy the rest of the concert for now and we can grab a late night meal after the concert?” Haruto proposed. His own palms were sweaty and his heart was beating fast.

You thought about it for a second, then nodded and smiled. Haruto felt like the world had a glittery filter for a second. He’d always acknowledged that you were attractive, but up close smiling at him, you were drop dead gorgeous.

“Awesome.”

After the concert, the two of you walked side by side as you left the crowded venue. You noticed Haruto took a second to text someone on his phone. He caught you snooping and laughed as you turned away. “It’s fine. I was just letting the friends I came with know that I was gonna head out with you.”

“Oh, if you need to get back with them it’s fine.” You said, maybe hanging out with Haruto was a bad idea after all.

“Not a chance, it’s been so long since I’ve seen you. I’m honestly curious to know how you are and how things are back home.”

Your face flushed at his words. You couldn’t remember the last time you had spent time with a guy like this. Was this a date?

“Alright. Then what are you in the mood for?” You asked, pulling up a list of restaurants that were still open at this hour.

“What’s available now? What are you in the mood for right now?” Haruto looked over your shoulder at the menu as he asked.

“Um, what about McDonald’s? I’m not that picky and there’s not that much open right now.” you said.

Haruto stared at you with wide eyes, were you always this cool? So the two of you made your way to the closest McDonald’s and debated which was better, Coke or Sprite. To Haruto, Coca-Cola was non-negotiable.

“How is your new school?” You asked Haruto, munching on a few of your fries. “Do you like it?”

“What are you doing here?” Haruto interjected.

“What do you mean?”

“We’re not in Japan. This is far from home. Why are you in America?”

“Oh, I’m uh- I’m visiting family. I’ve actually transferred to a school around here for the time-being as well.” You jumped in surprise when Haruto shrieked.

“You’re here now? Like for good? Like you go to school here? Where?”

You giggled at the questions he rained down on you. The way he asked you with his cheeks full and eyes wide was rather endearing. “Yes I’m here now. I’m actually, uh, home schooled for the time being.”

“Oh, interesting. Why are you homeschooled? I remember you were always really good at school.” Haruto said before he shoved another chicken nugget into his mouth. The irritating thought that you were always better than him at school, just by a little popped up in his mind but he pushed it away. That didn’t matter anymore. He had your attention now.

You felt your face flush. Even with your condition it was true that you maintained your good grades. So Haruto must have actually known you back in Japan. You eyed him again, when he caught you staring at him you turned away. Haruto smirked.

“Enough about me. Tell me about your friends. You said you came with friends from your new school right?”

“Well I’d say one of them is actually who I’d consider a friend. The other one is a mutual friend. A childhood friend that has feelings for her.”

“Her?” it slipped out of your mouth. Haruto’s smirk reappeared and his eyebrow jumped up when he looked at you. You looked away, what was this funny feeling in your chest? It was weird.

“Our school had this transfer student program and she just happened to be assigned to me. She’s really cool, I’m not into her like that and she’s not really into me like that. She likes her friend.”

“How do you know?”

“She told me.”

“Oh. That feels like something important. Like a secret.”

“Well, I told her a secret as well.”

You stared at him. He didn’t indulge in the secret. Haruto was wholly focused on sipping the last of his Coca-Cola before putting it down on the table and letting out a sigh.

“Well so what’s going on with them now?” You asked.

“Hopefully, they both pull their heads out of their asses tonight. I gave them time alone so the best case scenario is that they just talk it out. The dude, Jeongwoo, I actually met him for the first time tonight and he’s a cool dude. It would be nice to have more dude friends around here.”

“You don’t have any guy friends?”

“I do. There are 3 other transfer students from Japan and they’re all dudes and I’m friends with them. Actually, Americans like to play this sport. Lacrosse? My friend told me to try out for the team and I think I might. Mashi, Asahi, and Yoshi agreed to try-out as well so it’ll be fun.”

You nodded, you had no idea what lacrosse was and you didn’t think you would be that interested to learn either. “I should get home.”

“Right of course.” Haruto said, getting up. “Where are you headed? Let me call you an Uber.”

“No, it’s okay. I can actually walk back home from here.”

“Oh really? Well, at least let me walk you back.”

You hesitated for a second. Would it be smart to show this guy where you lived? But then you shook it off, he seemed pretty harmless throughout the night and you trusted that he knew you from school in Japan. So you agreed.

“Do you have to be home-schooled?” Haruto asked.

“No, I don’t think so.” you answered.

“Would you be interested in attending school in person again?” Haruto could feel the devil on his shoulder kicking him. What was he doing? He had already gone to school with you before and the fact that you always did just a smidge better than him drove him nuts.

“Um, I haven’t really thought about it. Why?”

“You should consider transferring to my school?”

Your eyebrows shot up. “What?”

Haruto stepped back a bit and raised his hands. “It was just a suggestion. Honestly, I struggled a bit when I first came here. I can’t imagine how lonely it must be to be here and just be home-schooled so I figured it might be nice to have some sense of community.”

“Um, I’ll think about it.” You weren’t going to think about it. You looked up and breathed a sigh of relief when you saw the familiar apartment complex. “This is me. You don’t have to walk in with me. I’m gonna go now.”

“Wait.” Haruto said. You turned around to look at him, a thin smile on your face. “I, uh, I had fun.”

“Yeah, this was nice.” You said truthfully.

“We should do it again sometime.” Haruto said. You stared at him, he looked perfectly composed to you. But his heart was practically beating so hard he thought it might fall out of his chest.

“Honestly, I’m not so sure that’s a good idea.”

Haruto felt a heat and anger flare up in his chest. But he did his best to tamp it down and get it under control. This was literally the first time you had acknowledged his presence. He put a smile on his face. “Well, then maybe we’ll just run into each other again sometime.”

“Maybe, it’s all up to fate now. Good night Haruto.”

“Good night Y/N.”

The second you made it back into your room you pulled out your diary. You scribbled the notes you had logged into your phone throughout the day as quickly as possible. Briefly reliving each moment as you wrote them down. By the time you had gotten to the end of the list and began to recount the concert you could feel your eyelids getting heavier and heavier and your hands writing more and more frantically until suddenly, you crashed.

The next morning you woke up and read your notes. You squinted at the last thing you had written. Your handwriting became illegible near the end. ‘Haruto?’

The next morning Haruto woke up and smiled at the memory of you. Asahi and Mashiho eyed their roommate as he pranced around the living room and kitchen smiling and singing. But nothing could bring Haruto down. Well until he saw his friend looking depressed as hell.

“Dude what’s up?” Haruto asked. “Did you and Jeongwoo figure your shit out?”

“Uh, about that. Well, no.”

“No? What do you mean no?”

“Well what about you? Did you run into her?”

“Nuh uh, this isn’t about me. You literally had the perfect opportunity to make something of it. To make a moment! Did you guys have a moment?”

“Yes, I think we did. But I got scared. I don’t want to lose Jeongwoo as a friend, but at the same time I don’t think he has any feelings for me like that. I just, I think I need space. Maybe if I just distance myself from him a bit then I can get over my feelings and…”

“No offense, but that’s the stupidest thing I think I’ve ever heard in my life.”

“Well I don’t care if you think it’s stupid. This is my decision and my decision is that I don’t want to see Jeongwoo for awhile. Ok? I’m not ready for the conversation. So you better get used to seeing me more often!”

Haruto sighed as he watched his friend storm out of the room. He turned around and exchanged looks with Asahi. “Did I say something wrong?”

Asahi shrugged. “Honestly, I think you’re valid. I think her logic in avoiding Jeongwoo is pretty dumb. The dude’s in my gym class. Honestly, he’s chill. I don’t think he’d react badly to her if she confesses regardless of how he feels.”

“I should probably find her and apologize anyway.” Haruto said, exiting the room. Eventually he found his friend and they sat together in the cafeteria.

“Sorry about what I said earlier. I’ll admit it was kind of harsh. But honestly I can’t say I understand your logic at all.”

“It’s fine Haruto. You seemed extra happy when you walked in this morning. Who was the friend that you saw at the concert?”

“It was her. Y/N.”

“No way! Isn’t she in Japan?”

“That’s what I thought too. I was so shocked to see her.”

“What did you say to her? What did you guys talk about? Did she recognize you?”

“That’s the thing. The best part of it all was that I actually had her attention. You remember I told you about how she never acknowledged anybody right? She was always reading her notebook in the hallway. In the past when I spoke to her she never even knew my name! She had to ask me every single time. But this time, there’s no way she wouldn’t remember me!”

“Your relationship is weird. But I guess that’s sweet. What does she write about in her notebook?”

“I don’t know. Why does it matter? She knows my name now!”

“That’s another thing. You went to school together for years and she never remembered your name? Why?”

“I don’t know.” Haruto said. Now he was grouchy. All the questions that had been brought up to him were valid, but these weren’t things he wanted to think about.

A few weeks before the lacrosse tryouts in the spring Haruto went to the hospital to get a physical done.

Once he was done he stumbled into a small cafe right next to the hospital. When he saw who was manning the cash register he rubbed his eyes and looked away and looked back a few times to make sure he wasn’t being deluded. When he was confident that he wasn’t going crazy he stood up and walked over to the register.

You saw a tall, handsome, and skinny guy walk up to the cash register. You cleared your throat and stood up straight. “Hello, what can I get you?”

“Y/N! It’s fate. We ran into each other again!”

“Again?” You put a smile on your face and thought of a response. “Hey, it’s so good to see you! How have you been? What’ll you have?”

“Do you...remember my name?”

You felt your heart picking up speed and your palms beginning to sweat. But you kept your composure. “Of course, let me take your order and we can chat for a second.”

Haruto beamed. “Okay, then I’ll just have an Iced Americano.”

“Okay, that’ll be $3.30. The ice machine is in the back so I’ll be right out in a second. You rushed to the back of the cafe and pulled out your diary and flipped through the pages, reading the entries as quickly as possible. Out of the corner of your eye you noticed a torn piece of paper that had slipped out of your bag. You picked it up, it matched the paper in your diary. You flipped it over to see that it had a name written on it. Haruto.

Was that this guy’s name? Who was he to you? Darn it, why hadn’t you written more?

You quickly filled the cup with ice and walked out filling the cup with cold brew. You grabbed the marker and scribbled Haruto on it. You walked back over to the cash register. This guy’s eyes were practically glittering in anticipation. Was it normal for someone to get this excited over a coffee?

“I’ve got one iced americano for Haruto?” you said.

If his eyes were glittering before, they were practically flashing light strobe lights at a nightclub now. A matching beaming grin on his face. “Yes! Y/N it’s fate. We ran into each other again!”

“Right. Yeah, of course. What are the odds.”

“Do you have a minute?”

“Um, I’m working right now. I’d rather not get in trouble. Maybe another time?”

Haruto swiveled around, eying the cafe. “It looks pretty empty to me. I don’t think you’d get in trouble if you came out for a second just to keep me company.”

“Still…”

“Is your manager even here right now?”

“No.”

“Then come on. Just come out for a second.”

You looked around the cafe, cursing at how vacant it was. You tugged at your sleeves for a second before answering. “Fine.”

You followed Haruto out from behind the counter. He walked over to a table and pulled a seat out from underneath the table. He smiled as he waited for you to sit down. You walked over to the table and turned around. Haruto slid the chair underneath you as you moved to sit down. Once you were seated Haruto ran around to the other side of the table and sat down.

“How are you? How have you been?” Haruto asked.

You stared at the boy sitting in front of you. He was so handsome. “I’m doing well. How about you?”

“I’m good. I was in the area because I needed to go to the hospital.”

Your ears perked up. “Why were you at the hospital?”

“Why do you wanna know? Are you worried about me?”

You didn’t say anything. You just stared at Haruto. Haruto cleared his throat and looked away for a second. “I’m just playing with you. I went to get a physical.”

You nodded, tracing the patterns on the tablecloth.

“I needed one for lacrosse tryouts.”

“Lacrosse? What is that?” you asked. Haruto thought the way your nose scrunched in confusion was adorable.

“I told you about it last time! Remember? It’s this sport that Americans like to play. I had never heard of it in Japan either.”

You didn’t remember. “Right.”

Haruto couldn’t understand the dynamics of the conversation. He watched as you avoided eye contact with him and intensely focused on tracing the pattern of the table cloth. Then you would stare out the window of the cafe, it almost appeared as if your eyes were glazed over. “What are you always writing about in your notebook?”

Your head spun over to look at him so fast, you thought you might have gotten whiplash. “What?”

“Your notebook. I remember in school back in Japan I always saw you either writing things down in a notebook or reading the same notebook. What’s in it?”

“Um, nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

“Why? It can’t be that bad. I promise I won’t laugh no matter how embarrassing it might be.” Haruto said. Leaning forward over the table so that he was in your face.

“Forget it.” You said, leaning back and looking away. You glanced over at your bag that was perched far back behind the counter and breathed a sigh of relief. “Look. I gotta go. I’m supposed to be working right now. I think you should go now as well.”

You stood up from the table so quickly that the chair you were sitting on toppled over. You didn’t bother to turn around and pick it up. You walked back towards the counter without looking back.

Haruto watched you as you walked away. He narrowed his eyes when he saw you grab your bag and walk to the back of the cafe. There was only one thing on his mind as he walked out of the cafe. Your notebook. What was in the notebook?

You frantically flipped to today’s page in your notebook. In all caps with your boldest, darkest black marker you wrote at the top of your notebook. ‘Beware of Haruto. Tall, Handsome. Asked about notebook.’

Then you shut the notebook and exited the back room, breathing a sigh of relief when you noticed that the cafe was vacant once again. You walked over to the cafe table where you had previously sat and picked up the chair that had fallen over when you had left the conversation.

The next day at school Haruto was deep in thought. What could possibly be so important about a notebook? When Hanbyul shoved him, Haruto shrieked as he fell out of his chair. “Dude, what the hell is your problem?”

“What are you thinking about? You look like you’re thinking so hard that your brain might break.”

“Do you have an important notebook? Is that like something girls do?”

“You mean like a diary?”

Haruto snapped his fingers and looked up. “Yes! Exactly like one of those. Do you have one of those?”

“I did when I was younger. I don’t keep one anymore though. Why do you ask?”

“My friend. The one from home, Y/N? I think she has one. I asked her about it yesterday and she got all dodgy and weird.”

“Ah, well. Back when I did keep a diary it held all my dirtiest secrets. I don’t think I would want to share it with anybody or for anybody to know about it. Not even now, and as an elementary schooler I really don’t think I had any secrets worth keeping.”

“It was so weird. She got so defensive over it. I didn’t realize bringing it up would be such a touchy subject.”

Hanbyul shrugged. “Different things matter to different people. Are you ready for tryouts? They’re coming up soon aren’t they?”

Haruto nodded. “Asahi, Mashiho, Yoshi, and I have started going to that gym that you recommended. Lacrosse is actually pretty fun. Mashiho is the best though. Are you coming to tryouts?”

“Of course I am. I’m practically making you go so it’s only fair that I be there to see how you do. I reserve the right to totally make fun of you if you embarrass yourself though.”

Haruto rolled his eyes. “Yeah, whatever.”

Soon enough it was the first day of lacrosse tryouts. Haruto had frequented the cafe that you worked at in hopes of getting the chance to speak to you again. Unfortunately, what he didn’t know was that you had quit the job and diligently stayed home and studied.

Haruto was agitated at the thought of not being able to speak to you again. When he tried to sit down and rationalize it himself he couldn’t make sense of it. A year ago he despised you for not knowing his name. You know his name now, right? What more did he want from you?

“Haruto? Haruto! Hello? Are you even listening to me?”

Haruto turned to look at Hanbyul. “Honestly no, sorry. What’s up?”

“I feel bad for how I treated Jeongwoo. You were right, avoiding him was not the right thing to do. But why hasn’t he said anything to me?”

“Look I can’t tell you what’s going on between the two of you any better than you can. My assumption is that he’s a bit hurt and confused at the moment by how you’re acting and he doesn’t want to make things any worse than they are.”

“Can’t you say something to him?”

“Me?” Haruto looked up from his stick that he was re-taping. “What do you want me to say to him?”

“I don’t know. Just...just get him to react.”

Haruto scoffed. “If you want me to do that I can but again I feel like it’s not going to produce the results that you want. Like I think if I say anything things are gonna go really sour so I think you should think long and hard about this.”

“Haruto!”

“Look, I gotta go. Tryouts are starting.” Haruto said, turning away and walking onto the field. He didn’t miss the hard stare coming his way from Jeongwoo. Haruto ignored them and focused on his gameplay. Lacrosse had actually become really cathartic for him and he found that he really wanted to make the team.

Haruto noticed that the coaches seemed to be reacting favorably to how he was playing. He also realized that Jeongwoo was also really good but he played really aggressively, like he had something to lose. At the end of practice Haruto figured his hunches must have been correct because the coaches called him over to speak with him.

“I’m sure you know Varsity tryouts were this morning, all of your friends from Japan did great as did you and so we’re thinking about pulling you up to varsity. So tomorrow I want you to come early and try out with the varsity team, alright?”

Haruto beamed and nodded.

“Good work son.” The coach slapped Haruto on the shoulder. He did his best not to fall over. Thankfully the coach didn’t notice.

Haruto walked off the field and headed towards the school parking lot. Just as he pulled his phone out to call someone for a ride home his phone pinged, he tapped on the notification to see that it was a message from Mashiho.

Mashiho: Haruto have JV tryouts ended?

Haruto: Yes, I just finished

Mashiho: Cool. Have you found a ride home yet?

Haruto: No, do you know anyone who can come get me?

Mashiho: Ya, a lot of the guys on varsity can drive. Junkyu is over now but he offered to come pick you up.

Haruto: Junkyu?

Mashiho: He’s trying out for the varsity team. He’s cool. Kinda goofy but cool. I’ll come by with him.

Haruto: Alright, thanks dude.

Mashiho: Np.

Haruto checked the time on his phone before putting it back into his pocket. 6 P.M. Would you be at the cafe? The last few times he had gone by he hadn’t seen you. He put the thought away when a car appeared in front of him. The window rolled down and Mashiho cheered when he saw Haruto. “Get in the car! You smell!”

“Shut up and unlock the door Mashi.” The car door clicked open and Haruto hopped into the backseat. There was a large dude sitting in the driver’s seat who kept fidgeting with a bunch of random controls.

The guy turned around with a giant grin on his face. “Hello! I’m Junkyu. You must be Haruto! Nice to meet you!”

Haruto bowed. “Hello. Yes, I am Haruto. Nice to meet you as well.”

“Ruto! How were tryouts?”

“They were really good. Coach pulled me over at the end of tryouts and told me to come early tomorrow morning and try out with the varsity team.”

“Damn! You must be so good!” Junkyu said from the driver’s seat. Haruto tried not to be concerned by the way Junkyu was driving. His head kept swiveling from left to right. “Did you guys play sports back in Japan? All of you were insane at tryouts today!”

“We all played football. I think Mashi and Yoshi played basketball as well.”

“Football? Do you mean football football or soccer football?”

“Eh?”

“Do you kick a ball or do you carry a ball?”

“You kick it. Duh. Why would you carry a ball? That’s just dumb.”

“Americans call a totally different sport football. Don’t worry about it too much. But it’s awesome that you guys are so good.”

“Well to be fair, we were told about that Lacrosse Club and we had a few training sessions every week leading up to try outs.” Mashiho said.

“Ahh! How’d you hear about that? A few of us have been playing on their club teams for a while.”

“My friend told me about it. She’s the person responsible for me in the foreign exchange students program. Hanbyul?”

“Oh! I know who you’re talking about. Her brother was a legend at this school. He was a top recruit since his sophomore year here. But right before the most important game of his senior year he tested positive on a drug test and he couldn’t play. It totally turned him, his team, and the school around. He got dropped by the college that was recruiting him. But I heard he struck a deal with a pro-team and I guess he’s been training with them. The dude was in a league of his own.”

“Damn. That’s insane.”

“Yeah, our school takes lacrosse pretty seriously. The best players at our school get recruited to some of the best schools so it’s a great opportunity.”

Haruto knew there were probably more important things to be thinking about in this conversation but he couldn’t help but wonder if he could get you to come to one of his games.

The second day of tryouts Haruto was absolutely on fire. His shorts were shart, his passes were quick, and his steps were light. The varsity team was definitely of a different caliber but Haruto found the challenge fun. It was nice to be able to play with the rest of the Japanese boys as well.

At the end of varsity tryouts the coach pulled him over, “you were great out there today. How are you feeling?”

“I’m feeling alright coach.”

“Up for a few more hours?”

Haruto paused, but then nodded. He wasn’t in a place to argue with his coaches. “Sure.”

“Great. Then I want you to continue through JV tryouts. Grab some water and then head back out onto the field.”

“Alright coach.”

Haruto jogged out to the edge of the field. He was surprised to see Hanbyul sitting at the edge of the bleachers. “What’s up?”

“Hey, what are you doing here?”

“What do you mean what am I doing here? I came to watch your second day of tryouts.”

“Are you sure you’re here to watch me?”

“Shut up. Why are you all sweaty already?”

“Coach had me try out with the varsity team today.”

Hanbyul’s eyes widened. “Dang, you must be awesome. The last two boys that made it onto the varsity team as sophomores were my brother and his best friend Bobby.”

Haruto shrugged. “The game is fun. It would be awesome to play on varsity.”

The coach blew his whistle, signalling all the players to come back out onto the field. Haruto turned around and gathered around. Every so often throughout the day Haruto ran back to the bleachers where Hanbyul sat. His bag was stowed away there as was his secret stash of Coca-Cola. It probably wasn’t smart to be drinking Coke in the middle of tryouts but every so often he needed a pick-me-up.

“You need to quash that habit.”

“Yeah yeah.”

At the end of the day the coach told Haruto to wait for him inside his office. So Haruto did just that.

“So what’d you think about tryouts today?” Coach asked.

“It was intense.”

“Yeah, what did you think of the way the varsity team played?”

“They were quicker, sharper, and more nimble.”

“Good observation. Do you think you were good enough to play on their level?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, then answer me another question. If you had to pick another player from the JV tryouts today to pull up to Varsity who would you pick?”

Haruto thought about it for a second. The answer was obvious. The only other person who seemed to put up a fight with him was “Jeongwoo.”

“Good guess.” The coach laughed. “I don’t know what they feed you kids in Japan. But all four of you are good.”

There was a knock on the door. Haruto turned around to see Jeongwoo. He smirked when he saw the sour expression on Jeongwoo’s face. But it was gone once he had walked into the room and stood adjacent to Haruto.

“The two of you have demonstrated amazing capabilities and I am considering pulling one of you up to the varsity team. Take this opportunity seriously. Tomorrow is the last day of tryouts.”

The last place Haruto expected to run into you was at the hospital. The last thing you were expecting at the hospital was for a dude to come up behind you and scare you. It was horrible, you can’t remember the last time you screamed so loudly, let alone at a public place.

“What are you doing here Y/N?”

“Uh, I’m-” you hesitated, trying to craft an answer that was vague enough that you wouldn’t have to tell the whole truth but not vague enough that he wouldn’t continue to ask questions. But thankfully Haruto seemed to take it upon himself to fill the silence.

“Look, I just wanted to say I’m sorry that I totally misjudged you when I first met you? In fact, I thought I hated you.”

Alarm bells went off in your head. Was it normal for a person to come to you and tell you they hated you? “Uh, thanks?”

But Haruto continued. “But I wanted to say I totally read you wrong. You’re actually really cool. And I wanted to say thank you. For remembering my name.”

That was the first time someone had ever said that to you. You stared at him blankly unsure of how to respond.

“Haruto! Haruto! Haruto! Please report to waiting room 105, the doctor is ready for you now.” The voice over the loudspeaker belted.

“Well, that’s me.” Haruto said with a soft smile on his face. He got up and waved goodbye to you before heading to the back of the office.

Once he was safely out of sight you pulled out your notebook. Your face paled once you flipped through it a few times. You thought about what to do. What did this guy want? You wrote out all these questions in your notebook. Then you came to a conclusion of what to do and wrote that down in your notebook as well.

You ripped out a piece of paper from your notebook and scribbled your number on it. Then got up to the receptionist desk. “Hi, I don’t know if you’re allowed to do this. But when that guy Haruto comes out. Would you mind giving him this?”

You handed the sheet of paper over to her, the receptionist gave you a look and then a wink before accepting the sheet of paper. You figured that meant she accepted, so you waved goodbye and left the hospital.

“Excuse me sir!” The receptionist lady called out to Haruto as he was about to head out of the doctor’s office. What felt and looked like a nasty possible sprain on the lacrosse field just turned out to be a measly bruise.

Haruto approached the reception desk. “There was a young lady earlier. She asked me to give this to you before you leave.”

Haruto looked at the slip of paper. His eyes widened into the size of large gumballs when he realized what was on it. He felt like his heart would explode. But then his mind pumped the brakes, he wasn’t ungrateful, but why did you give him your number?

On the way back home you second guessed your decision at least 30 times. Why did you give him your number? The only reason you could think of was that you didn’t want to not know the guy. Contrary to what your mind and your diary told you. Your heart didn’t want to give him up. Maybe it was selfish and confusing, who knew? But who cared?

Haruto’s excitement was cut short when he finished punching your number into his contacts. Before he could even send a message to you, his phone rang. Hanbyul.

“Hey Hanbyul, what’s up?”

Haruto became alarmed when he heard a sniff and a muffled sob. “Haruto, I miss him.”

Haruto sighed. “He’ll come around soon.”

“Is there nothing you can do to make him come around sooner?”

“Hanbyul. If all goes well he’s going to be my teammate. Plus, what could I possibly say to change things?”

“I don’t know. He probably thinks there’s something going on between us.”

Haruto paused. “Is that why you’re friends with me?”

“No, no I swear it’s not. You’re an amazing person and you’ve been an amazing friend.”

“Hanbyul.”

“I know, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. I’m sorry.”

“I don’t like what you’re asking me to do. But you are my friend. If you’re really sure this is the way you want to go about it.”

“I’m- I’m not sure. I just need things to change.”

On the third day of tryouts Haruto was in a funk. And it showed. The events of yesterday night haunted him, he was happy to see you but he was sorry for Hanbyul. Haruto didn’t really like to fight with anybody, but he found her requests unreasonable and the questions she asked about you probing and uncomfortable.

It seemed as if Jeongwoo was the same way. Haruto gave into the niggling voice inside his head and said probably he shouldn’t have said. “You’re gonna lose your girl to me and now you’re gonna lose your spot on the team to me?”

It pushed Jeongwoo off the edge and the two of them went at it. Haruto played ferociously and aggressively. As did Jeongwoo. The game ended when Jeongwoo illegally body checked Haruto.

“Dude what the hell is your problem?”

“No, what’s your problem? Your comment back there? Absolutely uncalled for.”

Valid. But Haruto wasn’t going to admit that. “Please. Pull your head out of your ass. You’re hurting your friend. Talk to her.”

Haruto stood by as he and Jeongwoo got scolded for their behavior. Eventually, tryouts ended with neither one ending up on the varsity team. Haruto knew he probably should have been more bothered but he wasn’t. He had other things on his mind.

When Haruto exited the office he saw Hanbyul waiting outside. She turned to look away from Jeongwoo back to Haruto. Tired and hopeful that their saga would end, Haruto smiled and jutted his chin out towards Jeongwoo. Hanbyul smiled and ran after Jeongwoo.

Since the fateful day you have Haruto your number. Whenever he had a free moment he would ask to see you. After each time you saw him, you thoroughly wrote down everything that had happened in the day. You didn’t want to forget.

A few Mondays ago, you went to get ice cream together. “What’s your favorite food, Haruto?”

“Me? Anything unhealthy.”

You whacked him on the arm for that.

“Ow! What was that for?”

“For being a stupid teenage boy. And because I’m jealous of your metabolism.”

A couple Thursdays ago, Haruto asked you if you wanted to go watch a movie with him. The Uber and the weather didn’t quite work out. “Sorry we missed the movie by 45 minutes. But on the bright side, it’s not raining anymore!”

You laughed. “I guess you’re right. What should we do instead now that we’re here?”

Haruto looked around. He pointed at the grassy meadow. “We should just lay down on the grass and look at the stars.”

“The grass is wet.”

“Look, they're selling plastic tarps over at that convenience store. Let’s just buy one.”

“Okay.”

Haruto paid for a plastic tarp and spread it down out on the grassy meadow. The two of you laid on the ground parallel to one another. Until Haruto turned to you “can I hold you?”

You felt your face flush and you looked away. You hesitated for a few moments but eventually Haruto smiled when he heard a soft “yeah.”

So he moved his arm as you lifted your head to rest on top of it. You curled into him as his arm wrapped around your upper body. Haruto’s stomach exploded in butterflies. Your face was on fire. But the two of you were happy, blissful.

Last Friday night Haruto asked you to come to one of his lacrosse games. “Y/N, this is my friend Hanbyul. Hanbyul, this is Y/N.”

“Y/N?” Hanbyul stared at you eyes wide. Like she knew something. She looked like she wanted to say something but she held it in. You wondered what it was, but decided not to think too much about it.

Hanbyul was sweet. She kept you company throughout the game. But she was an aggressive cheer-er. Most of her attention was spent yelling at the field. Her energy was contagious and by the end of the game you were standing on the bleachers cheering “Go Haruto!”

Now it was Saturday and the two of you had finally gone to see the movie that you had meant to see a couple Thursdays ago. You clasped onto the arm that Haruto had held out for you as you exited the movie theater. “That movie was so good! It was so crazy!”

Haruto laughed. “Yeah it was okay.”

“Just okay? You didn’t like it?”

“No, I liked it. It wasn’t bad. But I feel like there were better movies from this cinematic universe you know?”

“Yeah I guess.”

“Which one was your favorite?” Haruto asked.

“Huh?” You looked up at Haruto to see him looking down at you. You turned away. “Um. Would you wanna come back to my place?”

“Huh?” Haruto wasn’t normally caught off guard but this time he was.

“I mean. Not like that. I just, I don’t know I’m not ready for the night to end and I figured since my place is close by we could just go back and chat.”

Haruto smiled. “Yeah, that sounds nice. Let’s go.”

Soon after the two of you arrived at your place, Haruto got situated on the couch and after making sure he was properly settled in. You had gotten up to go fetch your drinks. Haruto spotted your notebook sitting on the edge of the coffee table. He glanced over to see that your attention was fully occupied on making your drinks. Haruto turned back to stare at the notebook. No. The notebook was staring at him. Haruto knew it was wrong. He knew he shouldn’t peek.

But he couldn’t help it. Every time he saw you he either saw the notebook with you or he saw you writing the notebook and every time he even remotely looked in its direction you guarded it with your life. This could be his only chance.

And so, Haruto grabbed the notebook. He flipped through it and saw that it was very meticulously dated. Upon closer inspection he noticed that each entry was timed as well and every timed entry had extensive details about what you saw, what you talked about. Then he flipped backwards and found one page not like the others.

This page wasn’t dated. Instead, it was titled. Haruto. Haruto’s eyes widened. Every line of his designated page was filled. There were things about him on there that even he hadn’t realized he had said. Why had you written all these things down? All these details didn’t seem that important to him. They were like things that were probably easily remembered. Or things you could ask him about, he’d answer if you ever asked him about.

Just as he was about to continue flipping through the pages of the notebook. “What do you think you’re doing?”

An index card fluttered out of the notebook right at Haruto’s feet. Haruto bent down to pick it up. But in a panic you kicked his shin and as he howled and grabbed onto his leg you snatched the card. “What the hell Y/N?”

“No. I should be asking you that. I’ve made it abundantly clear that this notebook is not to be touched. It’s incredibly private to me.”

“What is it? Why is it so important? I asked Hanbyul what it might be and she just said it was probably a diary. What is so special about yours?”

“What is so special about mine?” you were so angry you felt like your head was about to pop. While your head didn’t pop. Your mouth certainly did. “What is so special about mine? This notebook? This notebook. Is my memory. I don’t have a memory.”

You tossed the card at Haruto. He picked it up and read the words on the card as you spoke.

“At age 13 you were involved in a very traumatic car accident. The accident left you in a coma for two weeks. After you recovered from your coma you were diagnosed with anterograde amnesia. From that day on, you no longer have the ability to make memories. The memories you make within a day will only last until you fall asleep wherein your memories of the previous day will be wiped. Use your notebooks to keep track of your days. Use these notebooks to help you remember.”

You could hear your voice waver as you finished reciting the contents on the index card.

“Y/N, I-” Haruto said. The world seemed grayer and grimmer. Everything made so much sense now. Why every time he spoke to you in school you had to ask for his name. Why sometimes you looked confused or blank when he mentioned something or attempted to crack a joke.

“So now you know.” You whispered. You could feel your body start to heave, your breathing became heavy. The gravity of what you had just exposed started to weigh down on you. “You need to leave. You need to leave and never come back.”

“Y/N. I wish you would have told me.”

“Why?” You snarled. “Why would I tell you that? Each day I wake up I can’t even remember who you are. Why would I have told you anything? Just so you could go around pitying me? Telling everyone else about me? Absolutely not.”

Haruto started to feel tears well up in his own eyes. He felt trapped in his own body as he watched your body fail yours. When he saw you collapse something snapped in his head and he got up and picked you up. One arm held you under your shoulder blades and the other below your knees.

“Get. Out.” you said in between wheezes.

“No. Y/N. I’m sorry. I don’t want to. Let me help you.”

“Get. Out.” you said, barely conscious.

“Y/N. You’re scaring me. What do I do? How do I help you? Let me help you and I’ll leave you alone.”

Your eyelids were getting heavier and heavier. Honestly, you weren’t even sure what exactly was going on. Maybe it would be smart to have Haruto call your doctor before he left. “Emergency Numbers. Notebook.”

Haruto placed you down on your bed just as you had passed out. Haruto immediately ran back to the living room and grabbed your notebook that had fallen onto the ground. He flipped through it frantically. What page were the emergency numbers on? He saw them scribbled on the inside of the back cover. He grabbed his phone and dialed the first number listed at the top.

“Hello? Is this Y/N’s doctor? She’s just passed out and I don’t know what to do. I’m in her apartment right now. Someone please come help me.” Haruto hadn’t even realized that tears had been streaming down his face until he saw wet splotches appear on the notebook. He wiped them quickly and sniffed. “This is scaring me.”

“Yes, this is Y/N’s doctor. I’m on my way over. Who is this?”

“Haruto. I’m a friend of hers.”

“Haruto. You did good, son. Just wait. I’ll be there in a second.”

“Doctor. Is she gonna be okay?”

“Honestly I can’t tell you right now. I have to check up on her. Right now I’m in front of her door so you can let me in.” The call ended and Haruto opened the door.

“Is she in her room?” The stout man asked.

Haruto nodded and followed him back into your room. He tried to help the doctor but eventually the doctor turned to him and said “son, just relax. Give me some space. She should be fine. She had a panic attack, something must have worked her up. But she’ll wake up. But, it might be better if you aren’t here by the time she wakes up.

“I understand, doctor.”

The doctor took a good look at him. Then nodded grimly before turning his attention back to you. Before Haruto could leave though he saw a stack of index cards, a roll of washi tape, and a pen sitting on your desk. He was still holding your notebook from earlier. He grabbed the materials and headed back out to the living room.

Before he left he scribbled out a note. Then pulled something out of his wallet and taped it to the back of the index card. He then taped the index card to the inside of the front cover before shutting the notebook and leaving it in the middle of your coffee table. He held in a sob as he got up. How had things gone so sour so quickly?

Haruto walked back over to your room and peeked in. Your doctor was still busy doting on you. So he turned around and exited your apartment. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and called Junkyu. “Hey, can you pick me up?”

“Yeah of course. Send me the address.” Junkyu said, trying not to be too alarmed by the tone of Haruto’s voice.

Eventually, you woke up. After reading the note that your doctor had taped to your hand explaining the situation you took a deep sigh. What a shit show. You needed to find the notebook your doctor had mentioned in his note.

It was sitting in the very middle of your coffee table. You flipped through the last few pages to read your entries. Your eyes started to water and you felt yourself get emotional. You could sense that you had grown close to someone. You read about yourself and how you felt about Haruto, but who was Haruto? For the most part you had made peace with your situation but for the first time in a long time, you began to feel frustrated. Angry. Cheated of a normal life that other 16 year old girls got to live.

Just as you were about to shut the notebook you noticed there were two index cards taped to the inside cover. The first one explained your situation. It was more or less what your doctor had just explained to you. But the second one was new. You lifted it up to your face and began to read it aloud.

Y/N,

If you’re reading this, I want you to know that you are the love of my life. My name is Haruto Watanabe and I am 16 years old. I met you for the first time in our freshman year of high school back then when we lived in Japan. We were only 14 years old. I used to be jealous of you, how you beat me in school every time even if just by a little bit. I also resented you because I thought you never bothered to remember my name.

By some stroke of fate, we both ended up in America. Whether by fate or not we saw each other a few more times and met up with each other and I really began to fall for you. You are the kindest, most beautiful, and genuine person I have ever met in my life.

I want you to know that even with your condition. My opinion and my feelings towards you have not changed. I want to be honest with you and tell you what I did and I hope in time you can read this and not feel angry.

Y/N, I did something bad. I invaded your privacy. You see, every time I saw you you fiercely guarded this notebook. Everytime I asked about it or possibly glimpsed at it you would react so strongly so eventually the curiosity of needing to know what was in the notebook killed me. And one day when your attention was occupied elsewhere, I read it.

It seemed like a regular diary to me but you caught me in the act and got upset with me. You explained to me your condition and I want you to know I’m sorry. I’m so so sorry I behaved so insensitively. If I were a more selfless man I would have left your life for good. But I am not. I’ve attached my school I.D. to the back of this card. On it has my name, my picture, and my phone number.

If you ever find it in yourself to forgive me. Please give me a call. I will always love you.

Love,

Haruto Watanabe

You flipped the back of the card over. Sure enough there was a school I.D. taped to the back. You pulled the card off and stared at it. The boy in the picture was handsome. He was tall. His height was 6’2”. You scoffed, at least you had good taste.

You saw his phone number at the bottom. You pondered over whether or not to call him, what would you even say to him? Where would he even fit in your life?

These were the questions that ran through your mind as you pulled your phone out and dialed his number. You stared at the numbers as you recited them aloud again. Your thumb hovering above the green button.

[tokoyamisstuff]

Scandal Ch. 5 - Loki x Reader

Summary: Loki returns to claim what is his - willing to kill everyone in his way.

Warnings: Angst.

Words: ~1800

I Story Masterlist I General Masterlist I

Taglist: @catlover092402152, @hi-there-x, @haloangel391, @misssilencewritewell, @babayaga67, @accioremuslupinn, @mochimommy2002, @just-someone-who-likes-to-write, @damalseer, @bethanystan, @loser-alert, @star017, @nina1800, @queenariesofnarnia, @n1fangirlsblog, @vengefulsokovian, @lunamoonbby, @freyagallileaevans, @emmojoy, @literate-lamb, @aninnai​, @justsomerandompersonintheworld​

A/N: Sweet little Feedback Anon, I took your suggestion. You know which one I mean if you see it. (:

Btw guys I have like 60+ Drafts I need to finish so pls be patient with me.

Word sure spreads fast among the folk of Asgard, about Odin’s shame and your innocence.

Since his lies had weakened the favor among his subjects, the Allfather was desperate to clean his name and reputation, ultimatively inviting you to come back.

But you declined, stating that this wasn’t your homeland anymore ever since they betrayed you to fullfill their selfish ambitions.

However, Asgard’s hypocrisy wasn’t the only reason you chose to stay on Midgard - you just knew that it would break your heart every day you’d spend on a place with so many memories connected to your deceased husband.

Earthlings, the people of S.H.I.E.L.D and especially Thor’s friends Jane and Erik Selvic had basically become like family to you. Even though they could never fill the void Loki had left in your heart, things being like this was more than you could wish for.

“Lady Y/N!” a familiar voice greeted you, yet his worried tone startled you. Thor was already standing in your room, practically kicking in your door as he was visibly upset.

Immediately, you put Liam into his crib and rushed to his side. “What’s the matter?!”

A strange mix of horror and excitement was stretched across his face, making your heart sink to your stomach.

Actually, you didn’t want to involve yourself with the Asgardians any further. All you ever wanted was for your child to be healthy and happy, no matter where this was possible.

But Thor was still your cherished brother-in-law, as well as a wonderful uncle, never ceasing to provide for you and Liam, even when everyone else had forsaken you.

Yet what he was about to tell you let your blood run cold: 

“Loki is back.”

Immediately, all the walls you had built up over those past months were crumbling as you collapsed to the floor, crying out of anger and relief.

“H-How? How is this even possible?! He’s dead! Loki died!”

“Pull yourself together, Lady Y/N!” Thor has always been a rather touchy-feely kind of person, in opposite to his raw and bulky appearance.

But right now, he wouldn’t dare to hug or console you, like he’d usually do. Instead, he was offering you a hand to help you get back up - which you wouldn’t be able to take just yet. “There’s no use in overthinking this! We need to hurry!”

“What do you even want me to do?” you wondered, because if your husband was really alive, you’d doubt him wanting to see you. “He’s changed...killed a lot of people before he disappeared. And still, I don’t wanna fight him. How can I be of any help at all?!?”

“We know he’s probably after you and the child” the God of Thunder stated coldly. “So you need to be transferred to a safe location.”

What can be more safe than a base of S.H.I.E.L.D? If only you knew he had already demolished a whole, giant outpost of them with ease...

“I’ll explain everything to you on the way.” “Let me quickly get the baby.”

“What, did you forget the name of your nephew already?” you chuckled awkwardly, but seeming to have struck a nerve.

Thor was only slowly approaching the crib in which your lovely baby was resting, staring at it with awe while his trembling hand caressed Liam’s cheek.

“Incredible...” he whispered mainly to himself,  as if this wasn’t the thousandth time he would lay eyes upon him. “He’s just like I remember him.”

Something was off.

Of course Thor had a spare key to your flat, but you had never heared him unlock it - he had just kind of appeared in the middle of the room. Could as well be that you had been to invested with something, or buried in thought to notice him, and yet...

“Wait” you stated, making him flinch away from the child and turn around. “My knees are still weak. Help me up first.”

With heavy steps, Thor would force himself away from the crib and towards you again, lending you another hand and easily pulling you up - just for you to point a sharp dagger to his throat.

“Lady Y/N, when did you summo-”

“Shut up!” you hissed, and the god held his hands into the air to assure his goodwill. "Drop the disguse. Now!”

The man let out an amused huff, a taint of green covering his body to revert it back to normal - revealing your husband.

His hair had become longer, and dark rings showed how devastating those past months went by for him. Yet still, he was unmistakingly your husband.

Yet a faint, mad spark in his eyes was what worried you the most.

Now he was holding a knife as well, both circling around the crib with a knife at each other’s throat, as if to dance with each other.

“So it’s really you, Loki?”

“The one and only” he declared, chest swelling with pride at his performance and completely ignoring your hostile undertone. “I missed you painfully, my sweetling.”

He looked to the side where your son was still sleeping soundly, regret clearly visible on his face. “Wha- what name did you give our child?”

“Liam it is.”

The smallest of smiles tugged on his lips, swallowing harshly to surpress the sobs wanting to break free. “Beautiful name. Very well chosen.”

Pain was stretching across your features, desperately trying for the dam of emotions to not break. The dagger in your hand vanished, rather choosing to reluctantly caress his cheek - to make sure this was really him, and not one of his illusions.

And it was really him, leaning into your touch with a content purr. “Yes, my love, just like tha-”

A loud noise drang to his ear, effectively cutting him off. He needed a second to understand that it was in fact you slapping him what caused the interruption.

“Dear, wait, I-” Another hit, this time it was your knee digging into his groin, making him gasp in pain.

With his current power, it would be a piece of cake to block you - yet he knew that after everything that had happened to you, and everything he had done...

...it was what he deserved. So he would allow you to let off some steam.

Yet much to his surprise, you were done already - now grabbing desperately on his cloak and pulling him in for a passionate kiss.

He immediately reciprocated, dropping his weapon as well to embrace you fully, lips mingling with each other over and over again.

Oh, how long had both of you craved for each other?

“Sorry” you panted as your lips finally parted, “Just needed to get that off my chest.”

“Do not apologize, my love” Loki declared, chin resting atop of your head, still no intention to let go off of you. “I deserve far worse than that.”

You looked up to him, the kiss having made something surface in his eyes: So solemn, and incredibly fragile, it made your heart ache.

“Wha- what happened to you? Where have you been all this time?”

Loki’s face contorted at the question, as if the thoughts in his mind were physically painful. But his mind was clouded, unable to make his proper memory resurfacing. “Places far beyond your imagination, dear. And I have learned many things.”

“I-I thought I had lost you...” you ultimatively began to sob, face dug into his chest.

“No” the god whispered softly, his gaze still unwavering. “You always have me. I promise.”

“What now?” you sniveled as he gently pet your head, just as back in good old times. “Where do we go?”

“What do you mean?” Loki’s features creased into a slight frown, “We stay here. There’s no need to leave or flee.”

“Bu-” you hesistantly took a few steps back, to take in his full reaction. “But you’re a wanted criminal, Loki! On Asgard as well as Midgard!”

His manner became more defensive again, glee radiating off of him. “Oh, my sweet, innocent Y/N...still the idealist, I see.”

“And you are still insufferable” you scoffed back, crossing your arms. “What do you mean?”

Actually, you dreaded the answer.

The man seemed to be thinking about many things at once, eyes narrowing before he finally took a hold of your hand, squeezing it ever so slightly when he saw that you were still wearing his ring - even after everything that had happened.

“Y/N, my love, those deaths were a necessary evil.” He tried to peck a quick kiss on your hand, but you pulled away at those words. “The only crime I feel guilty for is having left the love of my life. But don’t you worry, I’ll make up for it.”

He summoned a staff, glowing in the same blue as the tesseract - and much to your terror, his eyes started to adapt to them as well.

“I will create my own kingdom, Y/N! Here on Midgard, with you as my queen! This is what you deserve, my love! You and our child will have everything you desire and more!”

“This is madness, Loki!” It wasn’t the first time he had heared that.

People always treated him wrongly, afterwards wondering why he was trying to create felicity on his own. “Is it?” he croaked, “Is it madness for a person born to rule two kingdoms to create a home he never had?”

His plan did not merit awe or any such feelings he hoped you to have - the only person in the world he thought would understand him.

“Loki, what your parents have done to you is inexcusable, yet-”

“They’re not my parents!” he screamed enraged, eyes then widened in shock that he had raised his voice at you. “My apologies, I...”

“They have kept the truth from you so that you’d never feel different. You know you’re their son, and the Asgardians are your family. You must know that!”

“You speak like mother” he spat, and still Frigga’s words he could not shake off as easily as Odin’s. “There is no going back to that place, and Jotunheim I never had a connection with. You most likely heared that I tried to kill Laufey, yes?”

Nodding in silence, you nervously bit your lip. “Please...” Wrapping your arms around him and placing one ear at his sternum, you could clearly hear how his heart was fighting a war, struggling to decide.

“You can still stop whatever you were gonna do. We can start anew somewhere, lead a peaceful life with Liam. I don’t need wealth or power, and you clearly know any of this wouldn’t give you the satisfaction you’re searching for!”

“As always, you’re right” he grumbled deeply, already regretting what he was about to do. “But it’s not that easy, my naive little dove.”

“No~” With his hand on the back of your neck, he infused a powerful magic inside your body, slowly shutting down your nervous system completely. As careful as possible, he cradled you in his arms and slowly led you to the floor, then proceeding to take his heir.

“The only thing I need for myself is our little family - and I will avenge you by murdering anyone that did you wrong, or tries to separate us again.”

[jiminiesfavouritecolourisblue]

If you leave - bodyguard/royal au part 2

^ that counts as a request right? Angst below, I don’t know what fluff is anymore but I think there’s a sprinkle of it somewhere... I think.

Prev | Next

————————————————————————————————————————

“Baby let’s dance.”

If you closed your eyes you could almost imagine it was Jimin’s voice, but you don’t want to think about him now, that’s not why you’re here in blinding lights and deafening music, you want to forget, you need to forget.

“Not with you,” you say to the man that approached you, walking away to the bar for another drink. Stupid fool didnt realise he unlocked another memory of them, you’d need something more in your system to get it out.

But when you closed your eyes you could see him, reaching out his hands to you, eyes disappearing with how much he was smiling. “Dance with me princess.”

Memories that made you feel warmth now bought you so much pain, since that day you both felt hollow and as if there was a heavy weight on your chest, you didn’t know how to explain it. It just hurt, and you thought it would get better with time but it didn’t. It got worse.

So you didn’t mind the hands on your body when you danced into the night, you didn’t mind the hangovers in the morning, the pain in your head dulling the ache in your heart just a little.

You feel arms wrap around you from behind as you take another swing of your drink. Whoever he was he felt muscular, tall, but you don’t care. It isn’t until he rests his chin on the top of your head you realise he feels like Jungkook and your heart beats back to life again. You close your eyes and let them hold you, pretending for a second that it was your Kookie, that he’d move to rest his head on your shoulder when you ignored him like he always did, squeezing you harder, pouting until he got your attention. You let yourself dream for a second, even though you knew when the illusion shattered the black hole in your chest would expand tenfold. Like it always did when you let yourself pretend.

You could feel tears start to form in the corner of your eyes, you couldn’t do this, the man behind you must’ve felt your discomfort because he suddenly backed away. You hear a ruckus behind you but you don’t give a shit, he’s not Kookie, he’s not any one of the men that can make this go away.

You’re about to take another sip of your drink until you feel the weight of a hand wrapped firmly around your wrist. You know that hand, your eyes are fixed on it, your breathing becomes shallow and rapid as your gaze follows the hand to the body it’s connected to.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” What’s he doing here, he’s the one that decided to leave you, why does he care what happens to you?

You don’t know if you’re refusing to speak or if you can’t with how much his presence has put you in a daze, you can see the way his jaw is clenched the way it always did when you tested his patience. Good, let him be angry, let him feel a little of what you were.

He pulls you to stand and follow him, grip unrelenting and pace unforgiving. You try to get out of his hold but Joon pissed was a different force of nature, you wonder what he was doing in a place like this.

It isn’t until you’re outside you see Yoongi standing with his back to the car, they’re both in uniform, they must’ve been on their new job when they found you. You pretend that doesn’t sting, you don’t care it’s their job how dare they replace you when you felt their absence each and every day.

“You’re not my bodyguard anymore Namjoon, let me go,” you’re quiet but you’re seething.

He slams you back against the car, the only feeling coursing through his system was rage and it mixed with every other emotion he was feeling at this moment; worry, guilt, his heart breaking.

“Where the hell are your bodyguards Y/n?” When he finds them he’s going to put a fist in their faces repeatedly for letting you get into this state.

“Don’t have any,” you’re smiling now but it’s unnerving, it’s fake and it’s nothing he has ever seen before on your face.

“What do you mean you don’t have any?” Yoongi sounds calm, but that’s how you know he’s as angry as Namjoon.

“Why the hell do you both care? You left me,” it shouldnt sting the way it does when the words are out of your mouth, but it somehow manages to hit all three of you.

“Princess, answer the question.” Why does your heart hurt more when Yoongi calls you that? Why does it feel like he’s taking your breath away and suffocating you with his calm demeanour, like he really doesn’t care even though his words should prove otherwise.

“I’m not your burden anymore, so leave me alone,” you glare at them both with all the strength you had left, feeling your body shake from the cold and the anger seeping under your skin. “I dismissed my bodyguards but that’s none of your concern.”

“You did what?” Namjoon is trying to control his rage but your words are causing it to grow. “How could you be so stupid? Do you have any idea the amount of danger you’re putting yourself in? Do you have any idea how hard it is to keep you safe and you’re throwing all our effort in our faces by being so fucking reckless!”

You always hated it when he told you off, you could feel the tears start to form again and Namjoon watched as your doe eyes looked up at him with the anger fading and the hurt revealing it’s way through. Shit, he was too harsh, but you were being an absolute idiot. All of them have been worried sick since they left you, unable to perform the best at their job, they all agreed after you no more long standing positions, so they only did small security gigs or transferring a client for a day. They missed you so much and here you were throwing yourself into every danger like a big ‘fuck you’.

“Why did you leave me?” Your voice is so small and the sheer hurt in it caused his anger to drop out of his body. Yoongi had to look away, he hated it when you cried, they all did.

They didn’t feel like they could hold you the way they used to, so much had changed, and yet all the feelings were the same.

“Princess we had to go,” he tries to explain. “We couldn’t keep you safe because of how much we lo- w-we cared about y-”

“No Joonie if you cared about me, you wouldn’t have left!” You were so angry and upset you were crying but you still yelled your words, you needed them to hear you and you’d make sure they did. “I thought I meant more to you than just a charge but you proved me wrong the day you walked out, because if you cared about me you’d fight to keep me safe, but you didn’t.”

You don’t care if you’re a sobbing mess in front of them now, you don’t care if you look weak, they had to feel what they did to you, see the consequences of their desicion.

Namjoon can’t say a word, how does he explains to you the guilt he felt that day, the only rational choice was to leave you in the hands of someone who could protect you the way he had failed. You came above all else, he couldn’t trust himself to keep you safe anymore.

“Do you know how hard it was for us to go,” it’s Yoongi that finds his voice. “We didn’t want to leave you Princess, we didn’t feel like we had a choice.”

“Bullshit!” You contended. “There’s always a choice and you made yours.”

You hug yourself to keep yourself together because in front of them both you can feel yourself begin to shatter.

“You left me when I needed you the most, and I won’t forgive you for it.”

If you tore into their chests and ripped out their hearts it would’ve hurt less. Yoongi sighs in defeat.

“Okay Y/n,” Namjoon could feel his eyes go red with the way he’s holding back his own tears, he and Yoongi were not ones to cry but he can’t miss the telltale glistening in the older man’s eyes, and how they mirrored his own with regret. “Let’s just get you home.”

“No I haven’t had enough to drink,” you move off the car and try to make your way back but there’s a strong hand holding you back by your arm.

“I think you’ve had plenty to drink,” Yoongi says while opening the backseat door.

How do you tell them you needed more so you’d black out tonight, otherwise your dreams would be filled with them.

——————————————————————————

The ride was quiet, no one wanted to say a word. The only break from silence was when Namjoon called Jin to ask him to meet you all at your place with a medical kit and you insisting it was not necessary.

They didn’t listen, but what was new?

It’s not Jin that meets the car running, but the youngest of your ex bodyguards with Jimin very close behind.

“Princess?” Jimin couldn’t believe your state, you looked like a mess. He helped you out of the car swallowing his own emotions.

Jungkook stared at you with his big eyes in shock, and you wanted the ground to swallow you up. You couldn’t meet his eyes, you could see a his own concoction of emotions swirl in them like a cocktail from the glimpse you got. Disbelief, anger, sadness, his Princess looked so broken.

When the decision was made to leave Jungkook was the one to fight it, he was the one that tried to convince the others it wasn’t a good idea, that you needed them and they needed you. He looked at Namjoon with so much anger but that could wait, he needed to make sure your were okay first.

He strides his way to you, picking you up like the Princess you were when you struggled to stand and carried you to the house.

“Kookie I can walk,” you mumble, but you felt so warm in his arms, you didn’t want him to let you go. You missed him so much, you missed them all.

“What the hell happened?” Jimin’s voice when he was angry was nothing like his usual tone, his voice became deeper and lost its musical ring.

Yoongi waved him off, starting to get a headache from the whole thing, “later.”

They take you to your bedroom where your life was turned upside down, Jin, Tae and Hobi were waiting for you there. They must’ve tidied up, you left the place in a tip.

Jungkook doesn’t place you on the bed, he sits on there instead not letting you out of his arms. The glare he sends the others is very clear, try to take her off me.

You’re starting to feel drained, the earlier screaming match completely wore you out, and you were feeling the effects of sleep deprivation. You don’t even realise how you’re leaning into Jungkook, but the position is familiar, like a key in a lock, and you can feel yourself drifting.

“Princess we need you to stay awake just a little longer okay?” Tae crouches down to meet your eyes, you can see the sadness in them even though he’s keeping a straight face. He can’t help but reach his palm out to feel your flushed cheeks, he wants to tell you he’s missed you, that they were all lost without you, but he knows it would hurt you more than they already had.

“Tae I’m tired,” you whine a little, the defences dropping now your body felt safe, your brain couldn’t catch up with the fact that you were still angry with them, you could almost pretend the last few months didn’t happen.

“Let her sleep, we’ve put her through enough,” Hobi sounded so serious from where he was watching you, back leaning against the wall, arms crossed like a teacher waiting for the class to settle. When Hobi was angry it scared you the most. Tae nodded at his hyungs words, offering you a small smile that didn’t reach his eyes before moving away.

“First take these Princess,” Jin holds two pills in his palm and a glass of water, he brings them both to your lips, gently coaxing you to swallow. He wipes away the little spill you made down the side of your mouth, letting his fingers linger there for a second. He hasn’t been this close to you for so long, he doesn’t want to move away, but he does.

You nuzzle closer to the body holding you, clutching onto his shirt as you finally succumb to sleep. You can feel a cheek pressed against the top of your head, a promise written in the way he holds you tighter against him, but you were too far gone to decipher the words in the warmth of his arms, so you let your dreams take you instead.

[rebrandedbard]

If you’re still doing the sentence prompts I’d love to see either 46 or 9 with geraskier

Ooo nice choices! Since there were two requests for number 9, I’ll answer it on this one so that anon and @itiswhatis-andwhatitisisgay both get the alert. Keep a sharp eye, anon! I’ll do 46 for you next!

9. “Don’t you ever do that again!”

WC:  1371

Jaskier’s Champion

Added a younger Ciri into the mix because my immediate thought was that the phrase sounded like an upset toddler crying. Decided Ciri was going to be Jaskier’s little bitty champion and come to defend him from her mean dad.

-

“It isn’t funny!” Ciri wailed, stomping her little foot in the snow. “It isn’t funny!” she repeated, pushing at Geralt’s legs as if her tiny arms had enough strength to move him. Her face was boiling red and streaked with tears, a bit of snot dribbling from her nose. Geralt tried to bend down to wipe it away, but she batted at his hands, crying out in rage, “No, no no!”

“But Ciri—”

“Go a-way!” she screeched. “It isn’t funny!”

When he tried reaching for her again, she picked up a handful of powdery snow and threw it at him. “Go! Right now!”

Jaskier put his hands on her shoulders. “Now, Ciri,” he entreated. “It was only a little prank, and Geralt apologized already. Nobody was hurt. It was only a bit of fun—nothing but a playful tease. Perfectly harmless.”

“No-o-o-o!” she cried once more, long and piercing. “We don’t want you!”

Geralt winced, looking at Jaskier with a desperate plea in his eyes.

Jaskier shrugged over the top of the hysteric tyke’s head. “She may be no more than a baby, but she has the sense of justice of a morally-staunch old woman.”

He sneezed, startling Ciri, who turned to Geralt with a glare of pure scorn.

“Bless him,” she demanded.

Geralt held his handkerchief out to Jaskier instead. “Bless you,” he sighed obediently.

Ciri reached up on her tip-toes and snatched the handkerchief away, tossing it back at him. She pulled a little hanky of her own from her cloak and handed it to Jaskier in its place. Then, with a sniff, she turned and started pushing Jaskier toward the stables. “Let’s go,” she said, picking up her little knapsack. She struggled, dragging Jaskier’s pack once more through the snow. She made it another two feet from the inn door before she had to stop and catch her breath.

“Cirilla, little cub, I really don’t think this is necessary for a simple—”

“It is nec-ess-ar-y!” she insisted. “He pushed you. He pushed you in and you got sick.”

They’d had a little play-fight in the snow four days ago, happy as a pack of puppies set loose to romp. Towards the end, Geralt had crept up behind Jaskier and pushed him into a snowbank, unaware of the duck pond that lay hidden beneath. Jaskier had come sputtering to the surface, soaked through, and it was a half hour’s walk back to the inn. He’d caught a chill before they could get him warmed up, and for three days after, he’d been resigned to his bed.

Ciri had been frightened, asking over and over if Jaskier was going to die—a question that, when first asked, had doubled Geralt over in laughter. Her little green eyes had been so huge and sincere. He just couldn’t help himself. Ciri hadn’t let him come near Jaskier since.

“It isn’t funny,” she mumbled again, as if she could see the memory playing over in Geralt’s mind. And perhaps she could. She had a touch of magic in her.

“It isn’t funny,” Geralt agreed. He knelt down to eye-level to speak with her. “And I’m sorry I laughed. I would be very sad if anything should happen to Jaskier.”

Jaskier smiled at that, slightly smug. Oh would you now? he seemed to say.

Geralt glanced up at him with a look that told him to behave, then reached out to pick up Jaskier’s wet bag. She grunted at him, but he ignored her, heading towards the stables. He began to strap on Roach’s saddle and tied Jaskier’s bag to the side, speaking slowly as he did.

“So you’ve decided to leave me behind. Where are you going?”

“Not your business,” Ciri huffed, refusing to look at him.

Geralt hummed. He caught an anxious look from Jaskier, but simply reached out and took his lute case, tying it to the saddle next. “Your uncles will be waiting for you at home; they promised you plenty of presents for Yule this year. But I’ll be there too. Perhaps you’d rather go to Oxenfurt with Jaskier. There would be lots of parties in store for you, and the groundskeeper’s dog will be having her litter soon. Maybe they’ll give you a pup.”

Ciri frowned as Geralt took her knapsack and tied it with the rest. She hesitated a moment, then held her head up and said, “Oxfurt.”

“Then you’ll need coin for your travels.” He pulled a pouch from his belt and put it in her hands. “Here. This ought to be enough to put you up in a cozy room on the way. Make sure you don’t walk too much. Jaskier still needs his rest. And feed him lots of soup, understand?”

Ciri looked between Geralt and the pouch. She turned to look up at Jaskier, too confused to remember her temper. When she turned back to Geralt, he had Roach’s reins in hand.

Geralt looked down at her and asked, “Can I come close enough to bid Jaskier goodbye?”

Ciri gripped the little purse tight in her hands. She looked between the two of them, the hint of a pout beginning to form on her lips. Her face was becoming red again as if she were trying very hard to hold something in.

So Geralt leaned over her head and gave Jaskier a kiss. Jaskier blinked in surprise as Geralt gave his face a cheeky pat, then Geralt was off, leaving Roach’s reins in his shocked hands. “Goodbye!” he called, pack slung over his shoulder. “Take good care of Jaskier for me, Ciri.”

Then Ciri was crying, chasing after him with a heartbroken wail.

“Don’t go!” she sobbed, latching onto his leg.

Geralt tried to suppress a smile, hiking up his burdened leg to take one last performative step. “You don’t want me,” he said.

“No!” she cried again, hugging his leg even tighter as the tears rolled down her face.

“You do want me?”

“No-o-o-o-ho-ho-o-oh!”

Despite her unintelligible responses, Geralt turned and dropped his bag, sitting on the frozen ground. The moment he was within reach, Ciri threw herself at him. She beat his chest with her tiny fists, then wrapped her arms around his neck, crying into his shoulder. He hugged her, wrapping her in his cloak to keep warm.

“Don’t you ever do that again!” she shouted.

Geralt nodded. He pet her hair, shushing her gently. “I promise.”

“No leaving! Ever!”

“What,” Jaskier asked, “was that all about?”

He stood towering over Geralt with his hands on his hips. His face was flushed, far too flushed to blame on the cold, and he was looking at Geralt with his sternest no-nonsense expression.

Geralt smiled innocently. “I was doing as I was told. Seemed to work out well.”

“Not that,” Jaskier said. “The whole—!” He gestured a circle around his face, then flicked his hands at Geralt, eyes landing on his lips. He cleared his throat and looked away, flapping his hand in an empty motion. “That.”

“The kiss?” Geralt asked.

Jaskier huffed. “Yes, that.”

“Hm.”

“Oh-ho-ho, no! Don’t you ‘hm’ me! We are talking about this one, Geralt.”

Geralt chuckled, offering Ciri his handkerchief. “Ciri doesn’t like when you’re sick,” he said.

“And?”

“And I don’t like seeing you sick either.”

“But what has that got to do with—”

Ciri wiped her eyes and tugged at Geralt’s cloak. “Did you kiss him better?” she asked.

“Yes, princess,” Geralt replied. “He’s all better now.”

“Then you can stay.”

Geralt picked Ciri up and put her in Roach’s saddle as the realization crept over Jaskier. He turned to take the reins back once more, winking at Jaskier. “Unless you think he needs another kiss, Ciri,” he added casually.

Jaskier scrambled after them, eyes lighting up with excitement. “I need a—!”

“I need a kiss better,” she said, holding out her hands.

Geralt craned up and kissed her cheek before instructing her to hold on tight to the saddle horn. They were only two days away from Kaer Morhen. There would be plenty of time to kiss it all better once Ciri was in the care of Uncle Eskel and Uncle Lambert. They had all winter.

-

Send me a drabble prompt!

[satorinnie]

love and war

pairing; gojo satoru x f!reader

genre; angst

wc; 3,6k

warnings; jjk manga spoilers

notes; i think its obvious the ending is a bit rushed but i still tried my best :/ got the motivation to write the ending but then lost it again...but i wanted to post it today so here it goes. would love to hear feedback on it!

it wasn’t meant to play out like this. no, he wasn’t meant to find out about it, not like this at least.

that was the last thing you ever wanted.

everything was going so fine, maybe too fine, but still, nonetheless, things were perfect between the two of you just this morning. how did it come to this?

he was looking at you, blindfold off, crescent blue eyes reflecting each emotion he held so so openly. the only times you saw him this vulnerable was when the two of you had talked about his past, his regrets, and what if’s. his eyes were full of adoration at that time, looking at you like you were a pure blessing from the heavens, an angel sent to save him from his drowning thoughts, to let him be himself.

but now, now they were looking at you with so much hurt, anger, regret, and oh so heartbroken.

you had seen, witnessed, first-hand what the receiving end of gojo’s furious gaze ended with. it wasn’t pleasant, that’s for sure, and you had sworn to yourself you would never be on the receiving end of it.

oh, how the tables have turned.

it was understandable why he was so mad; god knows you would be too. because you, who had delicately pieced back his broken heart and trust after the events of getou, had now broken it, by your very own hands at that.

how did it all come to this? you had no idea. you knew starting a relationship with him was wrong and off-limits from the very beginning, but the temptation had surpassed your rationality just like eve when she bit the apple. you never thought you’d fall this deep down the hole, so deep that you forgot–no, ignored your true mission.

to monitor gojo satoru and sukuna’s vessel and kill them when you got the order.

it was last year when the head sorcerers in england had given you this mission. if gojo was unbeatable and unrivaled in japan, you were the same in england. perhaps your curse technique wasn’t as strong as his, but it was versatile and a very reliable technique.

after itardori yuuji became the only sukuna’s vessel, japan wasn’t the only country sour about the thought of it; in fact, it had caused a panic in europe as well. and as england was the country that ruled the jujutsu world in europe, you were assigned with monitoring the vessel and the owner of the six eyes. they wanted their eyes and hands on the boy with the infinity.

but you befriending everyone there, joking with the curse himself, and becoming lovers with the one and only gojo satoru was definitely not how you planned for things to go. it spelled trouble from the beginning, getting close to the shaman who had an ego and power rivaling the gods. but, unfortunately, you were now too deep to just leave without explaining everything to him, and even hoping for a chance that he’d forgive the lies you fed him throughout your times together was a little farfetched.

how could you make him believe that everything you said was genuine, and out of true love? the answer was you couldn’t because the betrayal in his eyes was enough for you to gulp down those hopes, taking a deep breath to prepare for the argument that was about to come. “look–satoru, please let me explain and don’t jump to conclusions.” you lifted your hands in front of you as an act to calm him down, walking closer to him with a futile attempt to hold his hands.

“explain what?” a laugh escaped his throat, one mixed with desperation and madness, “that everything between us was a lie? a mission for you? how do you plan on slithering your way out of this now, huh?” his voice rising with each word he was spitting out of his mouth.

you were desperately trying to keep up the expression that you had everything together, when in fact, you didn’t at all. your hands were starting to shake because you were scared of losing the man in front of you whom you were utterly in love with. the boy with the infinity held your heart in his palms, and he had no idea about it. “nothing was a lie, alright! i know how that document looked, and i can’t lie and tell you that isn’t true, but my love for you is–”

“keep those fucking lies to yourself y/n–you know, everyone knows already. megumi, yuuji, maki, even shoko–”

“stop cutting me, gojo! i know it might be unforgivable, but you have to believe me when i say i forgot about the mission. i love you, okay? i am undeniably and utterly in love with you, and that’s why i’ve been ignoring every call, every message they’ve been sending me about the task because i can’t do it!” you were screaming now, hands in the air, trying to voice out every single emotion you were feeling in that moment.

“well, it’s too bad that i don’t love you anymore! you know, i’ve known about this for a few weeks now and was hoping you’d open up to me about it, but–”

you froze at his last sentence.

“–you what? so you’re telling me that everything that happened in between us during those weeks was an act? all fake? you were just waiting for me to open up so you could what, break my heart in a more grand way?” now you had to give it to him, not only was he secretly smart, he was also a great actor who had you fooled for weeks now. the room was silent after your words, both your eyes staring deep into each other; you, waiting for his answer.

and you watched as he opened and closed his mouth, not sure how to answer your question. but you knew what that meant; with his hesitance, you had found your answer. breaking your eye contact, you looked down at the floors of the home you used to share; you could hear your heart shattering into millions of pieces with just the sound of his breathing.

“alright,” you whispered into the air. running your hand over your face, you leaned back against the kitchen counter. “so how will this go? are you going to let me go or are we gonna have a full-on fight right now? or is everyone already waiting outside the door to capture me?” you were doing your best to avoid eye contact, it was already too heard keeping your tears from falling, and you knew one more look at the eyes you loved so much would break you.

there was silence for a few minutes, but in your eyes, a few minutes was an eternity long. the fact that he was debating the question you left was heartbreaking already. but you weren’t afraid to fight; you had come to japan prepared for the worst-case scenario, and getting to know satoru up close, you believed you had a fair chance at winning.

“–im giving you twenty-four hours to leave this country. if you don’t–you know what’s to happen.” this had you lifting your head in the speed of lightning, eyes wide mouth agape, you could only watch as gojo satoru left your shared house without sparing you a single glance.

he was oblivious to how he carried your heart out the door when he left you stranded in the middle of the kitchen.

it was an hour after your discussion, and you were still in the same spot he left you. still standing, still too paralyzed to move. the reality of things being over was just starting to weigh on you, but you knew you had to start packing because not only gojo; but england was going to be after you too.

you failed the mission. and you didn’t plan on returning back.

war is a slippery slope. what would you do? becomes what will you do? becomes what have you done?

looking around the now-empty home, you built with gojo; tears started falling from your hallow eyes. so many memories resurfaced in one moment; it was overwhelming. the day your first saw him when he was trying to crack a joke at nanami to get him to smile. or the time he first asked you out admitting he had found you a force to be reckoned with and how you had managed to bewitch him. the day you accepted, the day he made you see stars behind your eyes from pure bliss. the day he proposed living together. the day you danced around the living room with his obnoxious music playing at the back, head laid against his chest humming to the melodies. how you felt like a family when you saw him and the students act so close–

how long has it been? how long have you been pushing your actual task behind the lies and excuses you fed yourself. was that person you? the ever so stone-hearted y/n breaking her facade for the boy with infinity.

my god, my god, whose performance am i watching? how many people am i? who am i? what is this space between myself and myself?

it was all getting too much. when had you fallen down the hole to never leave again? should you be grateful, or should you curse the fact that despite all misfortune, you can still feel love and unearthly love but still for earthly objects?

finally getting a grip on yourself, your feet moved down the hall to your shared bedroom, and without wasting a glance at his side, you quickly started to pack your stuff to leave japan.

gojo wasn’t doing well himself. he thought he had finally found true happiness after all the loss he had to go through, and it all turned out to be nothing but an act built on lies. after he left your shared home, he had wandered around in the streets with no destination in mind and the cold chilly air blowing past him. his blindfold was still off, the moon making his crystal blue eyes shine even more, still with unshed tears at the brink of it—a dam about to break.

he knew he lied to you when he told you he didn’t love you anymore and only hoped the years of the facade he had to keep up was enough to fool you into believing his words when in fact, it was the very opposite. he loved you so much–so much that it broke him when he read the document that was mailed to you weeks ago. you and him were an inseparable duo–the strongest and his tamer. the boy with the infinity and the girl who held him down with gravity.

upon wandering the streets for god knows how many hours, he found himself in front of a riverbank. the light of the moon was radiating, creating a painting of a million stories for the broken boy. but while being so engrossed with the view in front of him, he had failed to feel someone creeping up behind him; with his infinity down, nanami was able to lend a hand on his shoulder. “i’m assuming you talked with her.” he broke the silence.

his silenced gaze worried his friend; they promised to keep it between themselves. while nanami believed letting the kids know would be the better choice, gojo was adamant about keeping your good image in front of them. he knew how much they adored you, and he would hate to be the one to break it to them. “i did.”

“and what choice did you go with?”

“i gave her a full day to leave, and if otherwise–” he gulped down the lump forming in his throat, “–if otherwise, i told her i would fight her.” tears now slowly starting to trail down his porcelain skin, an odd view to see for his foes.

“you did the right thing.” nanami tried his best to console him in a way. this was a new image for him; he never saw gojo break down like this; the last time he saw his best friend (he would never admit that to his face, though) like this was when he had to kill getou, even then he had managed to keep up the aloof facade. but he knew his feeling for you ran much, much deeper than that. he has witnessed what your companionship had done to him. it was what pieced him back, and now what broke him.

it’s been years since you left, but you were back now. back in japan after two years of staying away, traveling to many different countries, on the runaway from the higher-ups in england. you would’ve preferred your return to be on good news and such, but unfortunately, it was the opposite. your friends back in england had informed you about how they planned on ending gojo’s life once in for all today with a team of experienced sorcerers, and although you wanted to keep away from trouble as much you could, you couldn’t let the man you love die.

with your hood covering your face, you walked down the streets of shibuya, the once war zone that led to many disastrous events in the past years under your feet. you heard about everything; the culling game and the capture of gojo satoru, thank god those were all in the past now, and everyone was well–except nanami, and the new had broken you. just like gojo and the students, he also had a special place in your heart, his calm attitude always grounding you. you don’t think his last thoughts of you were good–considering what gojo had told you the night you left, but still, his death was unexpected news to you.

you didn’t know how you were going to approach the topic; there was a big chance they’d attack you the second you entered their line of vision, not allowing you to voice out the news–but it was worth the try nonetheless. taking your hood down, you entered a cafe; the need for caffeine after the long flight back here was strong, the anxiousness and stress not allowing you to sleep. what you didn’t expect was seeing the three first years–now third years–you loved so much sitting in the cafe chatting idly, not noticing you. you wanted to keep it that way, but on your way out, a feminine voice called out your name. “y/n sensei? is that you?”

your steps halted, freezing in your stop. the confrontation was inevitable now, causing a stir in a crowded place was the last thing you wanted so you turned around to see nobara staring at you with wide eyes, megumi and itadori behind shocked just as her. what you didn’t expect was her running straight at your engulfing you with wide arms; a big grin plastered on her face. “where were you! you disappeared out of nowhere, and gojo sensei wouldn’t tell us anything! we were really worried; you left me alone with these two idiots–you know you’re the only one who understands my pain–”

“–i’m sorry, i had to go on an abroad mission, and it took too long. it’s good to be back.” you hugged her back tightly, still trying to process the new information she threw at you. gojo had lied, and that made you question everything you believed in. had he also lied about his love for you back then? but that was for later–for now, you wanted to cherish this news and spend time with your favorite students, learn about their well-being and their stories.

“come on, let’s sit shall we? we got lots to catch up on.”

it was now midnight, and you were waiting somewhere in the middle of the forest for your dreaded meeting with gojo. you managed to convince the kids into telling gojo to meet you here without actually letting him know it was you. they were excited, to say the least, talking about how you and he were the epitomai of soulmates, two pieces meant to find each other, filling up the gaping hole you both had. you were very nervous, fidgeting in your spot, hiding behind the tree waiting for him to arrive, and when you heard footsteps nearing you–you knew this was it, heart pounding like crazy.

walking out of your hiding spot, you slowly made your way over to him, hands stiff at your sides anticipating his reaction. “gojo.” he looked at you, blindfold on this time. still, you could see his displeasure from how his body stiffened at your voice, looking at you with a straight face. “what’re you doing here? i thought i told you to leave.” you sighed, walking closer to him, “i know, and i am going to leave again, but before that, i need to tell you something–” you were cut off by the powerful shake of the ground, throwing you off balance resulting in you falling to the ground.

behind you were your old friends from england, standing tall and mighty together–a force to be reckoned with; you were once one of them, but alas, that was the past. “thanks you leading us straight to him y/n.” elizabeth smirked looking at your fallen state, “you made things a whole lot easier for us.” she continued. looking back at gojo, you were surprised to see his hands locked in some type of chain. how did they manage to get past his infinity–unless he didn’t have it on in the first place. did let his guard down once he saw you? why would he do that?

“no, no, no– leave him alone, elizabeth! i swear to god i’ll rain hell upon all of you!” you stood up desperately trying to leave the makeshift cage your friend had put you in when a sudden idea came to you. it was risky, but it would save him, and that–that was all you needed, your purpose of coming here in the first place.

“lover boy is being quite over there. what is it? cat got your tongue?” she was taunting you and definitely enjoying it too. walking closer to you, she neared your face while the others were beside gojo, “you’re both fools believing you guys could be together in the first place, that’s how it works–” she was cut off by the stomp of your foot on the ground lifting a piece of rock–the one gojo was on, up to the air, away from your ex-friends. if you couldn’t save yourself, you could at least save him; apologize for your past mistakes.

from where you were, you couldn’t do much, but you used all your might to send rock flying in the air towards them meanwhile keeping gojo away from them. your cursed technique was called upon the tainted sorrow, the ability to manipulate gravity, and it was unrivaled in europe. you trained too much to reach where you were, the strongest just like gojo, but even the strong can fall, and all it takes is the blink of an eye.

you were on the ground again, but this time blood pouring from your insides, a deadly piercing through your abdomen. while you were so engrossed with trying to keep gojo safe, you hadn’t realized he was already off the piece of rock fighting the rest. and he had made the mistake of underestimating them, resulting in the struggle. but that distraction was enough for elizabeth to pierce the cursed knife through you.

one second you were on the ground; the next, you were in someone’s arms. looking up, you were met with the crystal blue eyes you had grown to love staring right back at yours. this reminded you of the moments where you used to lay on his chest, hands tangled in his snow-white hair, his hands keeping you tight against him, eyes staring at each other with nothing but love. how unfortunate things weren’t that way now. you bleeding onto his hands which hopelessly applied pressure to your wound in hopes of saving you, his blindfold now off, tears slowly caressing his face. it was a sight for the eyes. you lifted your hand up to cup his cheek, imprinting a red hand mark right where you touched him, “satoru–”

“save your breath, i called for shoko; she’ll be here any minute, and we can save you–” you silenced him with your thumb on his lips, “satoru, this was inevitable, even if you save me now, they’ll still be after me. it’ll be a never-ending cycle.”

“no, i can keep you safe, y/n. remember? it’s us against the world, baby. always has been and always will be.” he kissed your forehead, still keeping you close. his eyes were shut tight; he could feel your consciousness slipping away and knew he couldn’t save you. but can’t a man hope? and as you uttered your last words, body temperature turning cold, breathing stopping, he knew right then and there this was where he lost it all. this was how he lost the light of his world, in his own hands, between his arms.

“for what it’s worth, i love you, ain’t that the worst thing you ever heard.” and he knew those words would haunt him for an eternity. follow him wherever he went. the ghost of you will always be with him, never leaving. you will hold him down by gravity with just your soul. yet he still wanted to curse the gods for taking you away from him, his fresh breath of air, his anchor.

your love was strong, but the timing was wrong, and love decided that you both didn’t belong.

[ahkaahshi]

so good to me [akaashi keiji x reader]

pairing: akaashi keiji x fem reader

genre: smut (18+) with a hint of fluff

warning(s): explicit sexual content, quirofilia, breath play, light dumbification, swearing, fingering, dirty talk

word count: 3.2k

overview: baking cupcakes ends up being a bit more challenging than you’d originally anticipated when you keep finding yourself distracted by your handsome boyfriend’s pretty hands.

It’s almost poetic, you think: the way your boyfriend’s fingers dance along his laptop’s keyboard. Even though he’s sending a rather heated email to a coworker who’s fallen short on his work, you can’t help but find yourself mesmerized at the sight of his long, slender digits tapping away rhythmically, only pausing every now and then to find just the right word to use to purvey his displeasure in an appropriate manner. In fact, you’re so entranced by watching the tendons in his hands shift with each movement of his fingers that you don’t even realize you’ve neglected your ingredient measuring duties until his voice interrupts you.

“Sorry, do you need the recipe again?” he asks, drawing your (e/c) gaze to his slate blue one that glows behind the screen’s reflection on his glasses.

Quickly, you shake your head and brush a strand of (h/c) hair away from your face. “We can start when you’re done. It’s okay.” The small smile that graces your features has him leaning down to peck your temple gently.

“I’ll be done in a minute.”

Pleasant tingles travel down your back at feeling his lips brush against your skin as they form the gentle reassurance he speaks. To busy yourself in a productive manner while he finishes up his email, you wander around the kitchen to fetch any bakeware you see missing from the island’s wooden countertop—including a muffin pan. A glance at the time displayed in sharp, blue lines on the stove reminds you just how much earlier in the day you should’ve started baking treats for the small gathering of former Fukuroudani team members you’d offered to host. Akaashi seems to sense your concern, since he hurries to finish his message before opening the tab with the recipe you intend to follow and washing his hands.

As the two of you set to combining and mixing ingredients according to the cupcake recipe on his screen, you find it challenging to keep your daydreams at bay and your attention on your own tasks. Each time his hands dart into your workspace for another utensil, your gaze follows them and your mind floods with thoughts that quickly become less than innocent.

Every glide of his fingers along his laptop’s trackpad makes you wish they were tracing along every inch of your body instead, setting your skin ablaze with his touch. Each time they wrap around the base of the stand mixer he’s using to agitate a bowl of creamy contents, you feel your throat tighten in anticipation as your mind conjures hazy memories of his gentle pressure around your neck. His occasional—and almost curious—grazes of the veins beneath the fair skin on his arms remind you of each time you’d decorated them with small crescents as you clutched onto him while feverishly chanting his name. Watching him work is both delightful and maddening.

And it becomes even more of a challenge to slow your racing heart when you notice his fingers dip into the bowl of frosting he’s whipped up to collect some on his fingertips. Experimentally, he tastes his creation, the thoughtful expression on his features soon easing as he gives it an approving nod. Upon noticing that your full attention is on him, he gestures towards the bowl and offers, “Try some. See if you like it.”

Your heart flutters in your chest as you suggest, “Could you get some for me? My hands are all covered in flour.”

For the record, they’re not, and your observant boyfriend knows this, but entertains you anyway. It’s almost shameful, the way your mouth begins watering when his fingers drag through the fluffy, white topping to gather another dollop on the tips, but you can’t help yourself. Not when you know just how much sweeter the sample will taste when delivered to you by his digits rather than your own. He seems to understand at least a sliver of the thoughts racing through your mind, since he utters a gentle command that brings your thighs together beneath the cover of your apron.

“Open.”

Obediently, you let your jaw slacken so he can move his fingers between your soft lips to spread the sugary frosting across your tastebuds. His unwavering gaze narrows ever so slightly when you move your face closer to his knuckle, taking the entirety of his two fingers into your mouth and dragging your tongue along the smooth expanse of his skin. That quiet groan you can barely hear rumbling in his throat is both a warning and a challenge—letting you know that you’re playing with fire but also questioning just how badly you want to get burned. Solidifying your decision of wanting to play this teasing game with him, you suck on his fingers with enough pressure to create a loud pop when you remove them from your mouth by pulling away.

Judging by the low tone in his voice when he speaks, your intentions have been made crystal clear and he’s not going to let you get away with what you’ve done. “I should’ve known, huh?” You furrow your eyebrows in slight confusion at his words, but he elaborates, “With the way you’ve been watching me since before we even started baking. So simple-minded, sometimes, aren’t you, baby?” A gentle tap against your protruding lower lip brings your attention to the fact that you’re pouting, and you quickly take it between your teeth. “Can’t even do something as easy as following a recipe for cupcake batter because you’re too busy thinking about making a mess all over my fingers. Is that right?”

Your breath hitches in your throat when his palm moves to the side of your neck, just beneath your jawbone. “Keiji,” you whimper softly, feeling unbearably hot under his touch all of a sudden. His cool thumb tracing over your warm skin hardly provides any relief, and only intensifies the temperature of the heat pooling in the pit of your stomach.

“Finish up,” he commands gently, placing his other hand on your hip to guide you back towards the bowl of ingredients you’ve yet to finish mixing. He grabs the hand mixer resting on the counter nearby that you’d taken out earlier before placing the device into the palm of your slightly quivering hand. At your hesitation, he urges, “Go on. I would hate to have to tell everyone that dessert wasn’t ready because my girlfriend was too distracted by wanting me to fuck her stupid on my fingers, of all things.”

Another pitiful whine escapes your mouth, but you turn the mixer on and place it in the bowl in front of you to complete the task you’d originally set yourself to. The sensation of his fingers ghosting along the exposed skin on your neck before making their way down to your hips and holding onto them firmly from where he stands behind you makes your core ache. His warmth against the entire backside of your body has you using every fiber of self-control to prevent yourself from abandoning your job and throwing your arms around him. However, you know that no matter how much you want him, he won’t feed into any of your desires until the contents of the bowl have been poured into the muffin pan and safely tucked away inside the warmth of the oven, so you diligently work on taking things one step at a time—since that’s all you can muster, anyway.

“Good girl,” he praises gently when you finish mixing, his breath falling on the shell of your ear, “You always work better when you’re told what to do, don’t you?” Silently, you nod. Both of you know that your intelligence is much higher than he’s currently giving you credit for, but you love the pleasure you reap from assuming the role of his dumb, little girlfriend in situations like this. Pretending as if you didn’t know better or couldn’t perform without being told what to do always gave you a bit of a thrill—which he knew all too well. He didn’t mind, since he had never been a stranger to assuming control.

“In the oven for twenty minutes. Be careful not to burn yourself, sweetheart.”

His gunmetal gaze follows your figure as you shuffle over to the oven to pull it open so you can slide the tray into its warmth. Once you’ve set it to bake for the appropriate time, you untie your apron and pull it off over your head before grabbing one of his hands and leading him towards the bedroom. However, his refusal to budge takes you by surprise, and you nearly stumble backwards when your movements are stopped.

“Keiji,” you huff, “the rest of our friends are gonna be here soon.”

In an instant that happens too quickly for you to be able to process anything, you’re being pulled towards him moments before you find your back pressed against one of the walls in the kitchen. Your (e/c) eyes are wide with shock but clouded by a thin veil of lust as you stare into his own, which you find are watching you as calmly as ever. “I know,” he states, “So why don’t we take care of things right here, then?” Though his words are phrased as a question, the intonation of his voice along with the way his hand is slowly sliding up your shirt reveal otherwise. He’s not asking.

The intensity of his gaze makes your heart pound erratically against your ribcage and draws you closer to him in spite of his strong presence keeping your back flush against the cool wall. After he brings his face down towards yours to capture your lips in a gentle kiss, it’s hard for you to keep track of everything that happens next. His fingers dancing along the expanse of bare skin from your waist to your lacy bralette beneath your shirt has you melting into his touch, and his passionate kisses are soon taking your breath away. His fingertips skimming over the dainty fabric separating them from your nipples makes you squirm and tighten your grasp around him.

“Come here,” he whispers, placing his arm around your back and guiding you into the center of the kitchen. Grabbing one of the chairs at the other side of the island, he drags it behind him so he can take a seat and beckon you to do the same. When you sit down on his lap facing him, he shakes his head and insists, “Turn around.”

With your back to him this time, you slide back onto the seat, perching between his legs. As his hands work their way up to your breasts, sliding underneath the lace so they can cup your soft, plush skin and roll your nipples between his fingers, you let out a soft moan and focus your gaze on the warm glow of the light inside the oven just a few feet away from where you’re sitting. In the faint reflection on the smooth surface of the glass, yours and Akaashi’s forms are barely visible, and you can’t help but watch as he slides one of his palms along your thighs, pausing to give them a firm squeeze every now and then.

“Please, Keiji,” you breathe, placing your hand over his and guiding it to the waistband of the lounge shorts you’re wearing, “want your fingers inside me.”

He hums, “I know you do, baby,” as he toys with the elastic before pushing it away from your hips and down your legs as far as he can reach. You hear a small chuckle bubble in his throat when you hastily rid yourself of the garment, leaving only one more layer between his long fingers and your aching core. “It’s all you’ve been thinking about. It’s all you can think about.”

You nod in agreement, desperate to do or say anything that’ll get him to move with just a bit more urgency to alleviate your discomfort. Heat spreads across your skin in a powerful wave when his other palm comes to rest on the base of your throat. His fingers slowly making their way up and around your neck, gently pulling you back against his chest while his other digits toy with the edge of your panties makes your pussy throb needily. Before you can beg for him another time, though, he’s dipping beneath the flimsy material to trail his fingertips from your already soaking entrance to your clit.

A loud moan of appreciation echoes from between your lips as Akaashi presses his to your jawline. “Take your panties off for me.” His command has your own fingers skittering down to your hips to shed the material as quickly as possible and you ignore the rush of cold air you feel between your legs at being fully exposed. The reflection in the oven’s window is too unclear for you to tell if he’s watching you the same way you’re watching yourself, but, in the bright lights of the kitchen, you can see your slick shining on his fingertips as he spreads it along your sex.

Your small whimpers and mewls begin steadily increasing in volume as he slides his index finger over your pearl in short, tantalizing strokes that leave you wanting more. And while he enjoys every sound that leaves your mouth, littering your skin with gentle kisses as encouragement, he tightens his grasp around your throat, restricting your airflow in the gentlest manner possible. It’s clear, after your countless experiences with breath play in the bedroom, that he knows exactly how much pressure to use to keep you safe and comfortable, yet make you feel restrained and excited.

As he digs his digits into the tender skin around your neck, your cries of pleasure become more labored and your chest heaves with deeper breaths. He’s careful and understanding of your body, loosening his grip slightly whenever he feels the muscles surrounding your throat straining too excessively, and tightening it again when he hears more of your desperate pleas. Safety and respect for you are always his first priorities, no matter what games you’re playing or kinks you’re experimenting with, and knowing he’ll always take care of you is what makes you melt into his arms and clutch onto him tightly as he pleasures you.

“Keiji!” Another cry of his name rolls off your tongue when he finally plunges his fingers inside of your hot core, which welcomes him with a wet squelch. Each thrust of his digits into you, edging them closer and closer to your most sensitive area has you moaning unabashedly with desire. “Faster, please!” He ignores your request and continues sliding them in and out at a controlled speed. “Please, Keiji, I wanna cum. I want you to make me cum,” you plead with an exasperated exhale.

Without warning, the hand on your neck releases so he can shove his fingers into your half-open mouth, making you squeal with surprise. “It looks like you forgot that you’re only allowed to take orders, not give them, silly girl,” he murmurs, pressing his mouth against the shell of your ear so his voice is the only thing you can hear, “Who’s in charge right now, hmm?”

With his fingers depressing your tongue and quickly filling your mouth with saliva, you slur out his name as best as you can. The proximity of his face to yours makes you hyperaware of each breath and utterance that leaves his lips, as well as the heat they send skittering across your skin.

“That’s right,” he answers, “So, be a good girl and let me make you feel good, okay? Promise I will.”

He takes a soft sigh and lack of complaints from you as a sign of you relinquishing control to him once more and pecks your temple tenderly in response. As he continues pleasuring your needy pussy with his fingers, those he has in your mouth muffle the cries you utter in response to the sensations that you’ve been craving all day. It’s not long before you notice your own saliva start trailing down his wrist, glittering in the lights above as you as it leaves a slick path along the soft ridges of his veins and tendons in its slow-moving wake. His thumb pressing against your sensitive clit as he kneads the spongy region inside of you with his index and middle fingers returns you to the moment once again, and your breathing gradually becomes more labored as you grind your hips against him, desperate for release.

Soon, a rush of euphoria overtakes your body as you finally fall apart at his fingers alone. He lightens the pressure he’s exerting on your tongue just enough for his name to be fully formed when it leaves your mouth in breathy cries, since there’s nothing he loves more than hearing it chanted like it’s the only word in your vocabulary in the heat of your orgasms. He hums with contentment into your neck, nipping gently at the skin there as he lets you use his fingers to ride out your high.

You’re barely allowed a moment of rest following your release before the timer for the oven beeps harshly, bringing you back to reality more abruptly than you would’ve liked. Slowly, you close your legs, and Akaashi keeps his hand nestled in your warmth for what feels to be a long stretch of time before pulling it away from your sensitive core. A lighthearted chuckle echoes from his mouth when he tries to move only to have you slump against him and whine with indignation.

Before he can speak, the sound of the doorbell ringing alerts both of you to the arrival of your guests, and your gaze darts to him, then to your shorts and panties strewn across the tiled floor. “Of course, they decide to be right on time today, of all days,” he growls, placing his hands on your waist to help you stand up so you can make yourself decent.

“Kou’s probably excited about the cupcakes,” you giggle as you slide the discarded clothes back up your legs while Akaashi washes his hands. Once you’re dressed, you approach your boyfriend and give him and affectionate kiss that he returns appreciatively. Another chime of the doorbell forces the two of you to pull away so that he can retrieve the cupcakes from the oven and attend to your impatient guests. “Need help with anything?”

He smiles sweetly but answers, “Not now. You can go ahead and get ready,” before giving you a gentle pat on the rear to send you off down the hall.

“Hey, Keiji?”

“Yes, my love?”

You bite your lip before suggesting, “Once everyone leaves tonight, how about I put on that cute lingerie set you got for me and wait in the bedroom for you on my knees?”

“Fuck, baby,” he breathes, “I would love that.” As you prance down the hallway to the bedroom while he approaches the front door, the words you hear him add in a hushed tone make your heart flutter in your chest: “Always so good to me.”

treat me to a coffee! ⭐︎ kinktober masterlist

taglists (see pinned post on my blog for form)

general: @dinablossom, @newfriendjen​, @devlovesramen, @ohbyunhunn, @aftcrlust, @mister-future, @kyleclxin​, @kac-chowsballs​, @osamusmiya​

akaashi: @why-aminot-dead​, @lotsoffandomrecs​, @atsunakaashi​, @heyhinata​

[skulljackxiii]

Total Dangan Island

Contestant No. 1.5: Izuru Kamukura

History: He came from an unremarkable home with unremarkable parents with a lifestyle that wasn’t either tragic or rewarding, therefore of course a child of this background would be nothing special. Early in his childhood the boy knew this, he knew what he could do and what other people saw him as, so he felt why bother striving for things higher if he was already expected to be average. Despite the boy's content with his life, his parents were quite the opposite, they wanted more from him. This goes beyond just parents wanting their child to have a better future out of love, rather there was more of an underlying sense of greed and envy behind their motive.

Just like their son, they were unremarkable people that came from an ordinary background, but rather accepting who they were, they wanted more. Both of them despised losing, and others even more that were gifted that could achieve things that they couldn’t. They craved acknowledgement and valor more than anything that would make them stand out and could be used to exploit their superiority onto others. But they were not deluded from reality, they knew that they didn't have the capabilities to be rewarded anything. So their next big plan was to have a child, by raising a special child that could accomplish their dreams and more, that would ultimately lead them achieving the biggest reward that any parent would want. In their minds, every parent wanted to have a child that was special or had a unique talent to them that could be used for their own benefits and almost as a desired object that most others could only ever dream of having. But their grand scheme was demolished as soon as their son was born which was just like them, unremarkable.

Years later, both parents refused to accept the truth and persistently forced the boy  to practice, study, and train until they discovered what he was talented at. This was all the boy knew in his home; his face in books, exercising with various weights, and most noticeable of all was the disappointed faces of his parents who consistently berated him with lectures and complaints about him and all his flaws. This routine became so consistent that the boy became numb to it all and just saw it as part of his everyday life.

The boy always questioned why his parents were so desperate and acted the way they did, but he held no resentment towards them or anyone else. Though that didn’t mean that he wanted to uphold what they wanted or held himself in higher regards either. However, that was until he discovered this autobiography by an author that soon became this boy’s idol.

In the book it talks about how the author came from an ordinary and mundane household who was consistently underestimated and belittled by others due to his status and upbringings, but later became someone that could accomplish so much that most men could only dream of. It went onto further details that through his determination, hard work, and wit he was able to pass and overcome all challenges and diversities that came his way, thus discovering that he had innate talents that excelled in many categories. Then finally, it states that in his final moments he wanted to build an institution for young talents and give them opportunities that he was never given when he was younger. After finishing the book, the boy became infatuated with the author and adopted principles that reflected the author’s values. He soon treated the autobiography as his bible and uses it at times to help remind him of the tales of his hero that he wishes to be…”Izuru Kamukaura”.

With a fire lit in him and motivation driven to be like his idol, the boy sat down and seriously studied and trained in order to be the best. With days, weeks, and months pass by, the boy’s effort was unwavering and continued onward without stopping. His parents took notice of his change and their demeanor lightened after taking credit for their son’s sudden growth and change in attitude.

After his nonstop assault with his hard work, he finally saw results and was placed first in every academic category in his grade. Once he saw that, he felt completely different and was overwhelmed with joy after all his hard work paid off, but those feelings were nothing compared to the ones he felt once his parents found out about his results.

Despite knowing them his entire life and seeing them everyday, on that day the boy saw his parents as complete strangers to him once they knew of his achievements. Their mannerism and demeanor changed, and they showered him with praise and love for the first time in that boy’s life. The feeling was unreal to him, it was a warmth inside the boy’s chest that he never felt before in his whole life. As he continued watching his parents continue to embrace him with big bright smiles on their faces, the boy cried tears of joy and let it run down his face like a waterfall. That marked the moment when the boy knew that he wanted to preserve this feeling and maintain his parent’s affections.

As time moved forward and the boy continued his pace, his results remained in the top with no change in its order. Soon not only his parents, but teachers, relatives, and even other parents started showering the boy with praise like, “You’re amazing”, “Other kids should be like you”, “I wish my kid was like you”, and “You’re a role model”. But the praises that the boy would hear often and would stick by him the longest were “You’re so talented” and “You’re such a genius”. Those words struck the boy’s mind and filled him with such pride and confidence since those were the exact same lines used by others to describe his hero. Also the boy’s parents would often brag about their child towards everyone and explained that the boy’s exploits were only possible due to their superior parenting methods. Obviously, arrogant bragging like this would cause strain with other parents and relatives, but they had no room to interject since what they said wasn't entirely wrong. The boy had mixed feelings about what his parents were doing, but in the end he was still happy to see them so energetic and loving towards him.

Though his effort won him the affection of the adults, most of his young peers felt differently. It is because he tries so hard for results and the adults would often compare him to them, other children would feel irritated by his presence alone and start alienating him, even small acts of bullying would occur. But despite all that it didn’t affect the boy that much because he still had some friends left to play with, and his parents explained that those children were acting out due to how jealous they were since they weren’t “talented” or “special” like he was. The boy took all those words he received to heart and used them to help elevate his efforts in achieving his goal of becoming the next “Izuru Kamukura”.

But that wasn't meant to be as the phrase “all good things must come to an end”, rang in the boy’s head once he entered middle school. As soon as the boy set foot in that new school, all his previous achievements and efforts were meaningless once the boy met with real “geniuses” and “talent”, the true elites. His grades and performance kept on falling and falling until he was placed in remedial classes to help him from flunking all his subjects. Just as the boy’s performance dropped, so did everyone’s expectations of him as well. From stares of admiration to glares of disappointment, more and more people started mocking the boy for his wasted effort and even more so towards the parents after years of them bragging of how superior they were for raising such a “talented” son. Once the mockery occurred, the boy’s parents reverted immediately back to the state when the boy was small and younger; cold, disappointed, and full of dismissive complaints. Shocked by the setback, the boy refused to give up and sacrificed any means to get back what he lost. The boy discarded his remaining friends, destroyed his social life, and got rid of any meaningless free-time, all in order to use those remaining times to better himself. Alas nothing changed, the boy’s effort was wasted and not a thing has improved.

Now the boy is back where he started...no, he was in a much worse state than he was before. It’s true that his parents and everyone else around are back to thinking very little of him, but now he was completely alone and he even thinks very little of himself now. After experiencing that warmth from his parents and others, and following the footsteps of someone he admired, the boy can’t help but to feel empty and hatred for himself for not being special or talented. He would start questioning his own worth and see very little value in his own existence. There were times when the boy even thought of ending it all, but he would stop every time when he got these sudden flashes of “Izuru Kamukura” and thought about all the hardships he went through before he could achieve anything. He thanked “Izuru” every time for saving him from himself and giving him the strength to keep it together, but there was this other thought in the back of his mind if it was really right to compare himself to someone like “Izuru Kamukura”. Though he did have to overcome many difficulties, in the end he was actually talented, whereas the boy was not and was just ordinary.

A few years have passed and the boy is now of high school age, he was just another face in the background that had no one by his side. Though the boy didn’t stand out or got in anyone’s way, disdain and mockery still lingered towards him as his old peers still retells the stories about him and his past. With not much to do, all the boy did was get through it all and head straight home. At the end of the day, to no surprise there was no one there, the boy just bolted to his room and got started with his homework. His mind constantly wandered off and dreaded memories of his past, thinking up scenarios of his life where he stood out as “talented” and how content he would be with his life.

One day when the boy was reliving his past, he stumbled upon an online ad that advertised recruitment tryouts for a spinoff show of the infamous series “Total Drama” called “Total Dangan Island”. At first the boy wasn’t interested in the show or the prize since he knew of the show’s predecessor and its dangerous reputation, but there was something that caught the boy’s interest. In the ad it stated that only the top 16 most talented and capable youths of the World would be selected to participate in the contest. At that moment the boy had a sudden flash of realization, if he were to enter and win then everyone in the World, and especially to himself, would have to acknowledge that he truly is talented and special enough in order to beat the best of the best.

Once he finished recording and sending his tape audition, he went on and explained his plan to his parents. Despite the resolve he had for entering the show before, in his mind he was still scared since this show’s predecessor is known to be life threatening and is willing to endanger its participants for ratings by any means. So a part of him was hoping his parents would stop him or warn him that it was too dangerous to go out of concern for him. However they were ecstatic and were ready to pack all his things up, even though he was yet to be even nominated. The chances of him being accepted was between nonexistent to miniscule, the boy begged all his might to be let in.

After months passed by, the boy noticed a strange black and white envelope in his mailbox and tore it open. Upon reading the letter, the boy jumped in celebration as it was a congratulation letter from the show for being a following contestant. After telling the news, the boy’s parents quickly got his things together and was at the door ready to send him off. The boy was overwhelmed with various emotions clashing with one another; from joy, excitement, nervousness, terror, etc., and right before he took another step forward out the door his parents stopped him to say some final words. In the boy’s mind he was hoping to hear the words “We’re so proud of you”, “We love you so much”, or even a “Stay safe”, but all he got was “Make sure you win and get the prize.” After hearing those words, the boy’s emotions calmed down and silently nodded back at his parents in response. The boy then turned forward and walked away, at that point the boy was determined to win at any cost so he could finally put to rest all his fears and doubts and prove to everyone, especially himself, that he is worth at least something.

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

Bio/Extra Info: (Read Previous Bio) Early on in the competition during one of the first Challenges, Hajime and the rest of his team lost one of its members. They all agreed to scatter to go look for her, but there was no luck. It became hopeless until Hajime finally spotted her in the deepest parts of the island. As he went after and finally caught up to her, he noticed that they were at a strange location that was like a gravesite for dangerous and decaying machinery.

It was the Dump Pit, a junkyard area where all Monokuma's prototypes and rejected ideas were all discarded to rot away (obviously this was all done without Monomi's knowing). As he was about to reach out to her, the ledge that they both stood on crumbled. Once they fell and got closer to the site, they landed on this strangely-colored puddle that was leaking from something that looked like a large battery, some in particular landed on Hajime’s eye, and they were covered by this terrible chemical smell that almost seemed like it devoured any clean air surrounding the area. In a panic, both team members quickly got out of the site and escaped from the forest together without any visible harm done to them. After thoroughly inspecting themselves they found nothing that was wrong, at first.

After a course of a few weeks, Hajime’s eye continuously got worse as it became more bloodshot red and throbbing profusely, in which he could receive massive headaches that would cause him to collapse onto the ground. In that state, all his fears and doubts would loop in his head constantly, then during that he would hear a faint voice telling him something. He could never make out what the voice said and at times when he was about to decipher it, the headaches would stop and so would the voice alongside it.

Then one morning when he woke up, he noticed that all the pain was gone though was surprised when he got to a mirror to check his eye. He saw that the pupil of his left eye had completely turned red, upon the mirror he saw a figure standing behind him in the mirror. In a scared panic, he quickly turned around and asked who the stranger was, but as the stranger answered Hajime instantly recognized the voice as the same one in his head from his headaches. The stranger answered that he was Izuru Kamukura, but Hajime had a hard time believing that since Izuru was long dead and that he looked nothing like him. In fact the stranger actually resembled Hajime who dressed up ruggedly as Izuru Kamukura.

Hajime cautiously reached out to this Izuru, but he phased through him and immediately jumped back away from him. When Hajime asked what he was, Izuru took a pause and thought deeply about that question. After a couple seconds, after analyzing all the clues and data from Hajime’s memories, he concluded that he was a separate persona that was conjured by his psyche. As Hajime was dumbstruck to the possibility, Izuru continued theorizing that after being exposed to all that chemical waste has created this strainful chemical imbalance in his brain. The area that was mostly affected was amygdala, which controls fear and anxieties, thus causing all those serious headaches he had up until now.

In order to answer and compensate for all his doubts and anxiety, his psyche has created a whole new personality that embodied all his desires and wishes, thus creating this Izuru Kamukura that stood in front of him. After the explanation, Hajime was taken aback and shocked by what he heard. After that’s been done and over, now all that’s left is for Hajime to decide what he’s going to do with his whole new roommate in his head.

(Hajime’s) Goal: (Read Previous Goal) Same as before.

(Izuru’s) Goal: He is indifferent, he doesn’t care about the game, prize, or anything of that matter. He only acts or takes control over the body only when Hajime requests his help or allows it. Izuru could process images in an instant, has access to 100 percent of his brain, and was in complete control of every single strand of tissue that composed his body. Until Hajime calls for him, he’ll just stand on the side and watch him go through huddles and other challenges. Since Izuru views himself as a perfect being that could do no wrong, which makes his existence boring and meaningless, he finds watching others struggle to achieve their goals, despite their flaws and imperfections, a bit intriguing and entertaining.

[unpopularwiththepopulace]

Michael Riedel vs Bernadette Peters – the Broadway Battle of 2003 and beyond

My previous piece gives a fairly comprehensive look at Bernadette and Gypsy through the ages; though there is at least one aspect of the 2003 revival that warrants further discussion:

Namely, Michael Riedel.

Today’s essay question then: “Riedel – gossip columnist extraordinaire, the “Butcher of Broadway”, spited male vindictive over not getting a lunch date with Bernadette Peters, or puppet-like mouthpiece of theatre’s shadowed elite? Discuss.”

It’s matter retrievable in print, or even kept alive in apocryphal memory throughout the theatre community to this day that Riedel was responsible for a campaign of unrelenting and caustic defamation against Bernadette as Rose in Gypsy around the 2003 season.

While “tabloids may [have been] sniping and the Internet chat rooms chirping”, when looking back at the minutiae, none were more vocal, prolific or influential in colouring early judgment than the “chief vulture [of] Mr. Riedel, who had written a string of vitriolic columns in which he said from the start that Ms. Peters was miscast”.

He continued to find other complaints and regularly attack her in print over an extended period of time.

Why? We’ll get there. There are a few theories to suggest. Firstly, how and what.

Primary to establish is that it perhaps would be foolish to expect anything else of Riedel.

Also an author and radio and TV show host, Riedel is best known as the “vituperative and compulsively readable” theatre columnist at The New York Post.

He’s a man who thrives on controversy, decrying: “Gossip is life!”

The man who says, “I’m a wimp when it comes to physical violence, but give me a keyboard and I’ll kill ya.”

“Inflicting pain, for him, is a jokey thing. ‘Michael has this cruel streak and a lack of empathy,’ says Susan Haskins, his close friend and co-host.”

And inflicting pain is what he did with Bernadette, in a saga that has become one of the most talked about and enduring moments of his career.

From the beginning, then.

Riedel started work at The Post in 1998.

His first words on Bernadette? “Oddly miscast in the Ethel Merman role,” in August of that year on Annie Get Your Gun. It was a sentiment he would carry across to his second mention six months later (“a seemingly odd choice to play the robust Annie Oakley”), and also across to the heart of his vitriolic coverage on her next Merman role in Gypsy.

 Negative coverage on Bernadette in Gypsy started in August 2002 when Riedel discussed the search for trying to find a new American producer for the show. It had initially been reported in late 2000 that a Gypsy revival with Bernadette was planned for London, before it was to transfer to Broadway. To begin with, Arthur Laurents was “eager to do Gypsy in London because it hadn't been seen in the West End since 1973”, and he “wanted to repeat [the] dreamlike triumph” he said Angela Lansbury’s production had been. But economic matters prevented this original plan, leaving the team looking for new producers in the US. Riedel suggested that Fran and Barry Wiessler step up as, “after all, they managed to sell the hell out of "Annie Get Your Gun," in which Peters…was also woefully miscast.”

He also quipped: “Industry joke: "Bernadette Peters in 'Gypsy'? Isn't she a little old to be playing Baby June?”, calling her “cutesy Peters” and again a “kewpie doll”.

Bernadette here seen side by side with the actual Baby June of the 2003 production – Kate Reinders.

Other publications to this point had discussed her “unusual” casting. Which was fairly self-evident. In contrast to being a surprising revelation that Bernadette Peters was not, in fact, Ethel Merman, this had been the intention from the start. Librettist Arthur “Laurents – whose idea it was to hire her – [said] going against type is exactly the point,” and Sam Mendes, as director, qualified “the tradition of battle axes in that role has been explored”.

It was Riedel who was the first to shift the focus from the obvious point that she was ‘differently cast’, to instead attach the negative prefix and intone that she was actually ‘MIS’ cast. According to him then, she was unsuitable, and would be unable to “carry the show, dramatically or vocally”. All before she had so much as sung a note or donned a stitch of her costume.

So no, it wasn’t then “the perception, widely held within the theater industry,” as he presented it, “that Peters is woefully miscast as Mama Rose”.

It was Riedel’s perception. And he took it, and ran with it, along with whatever else he could throw into the mix to drag both her and the show down for the next two years.

 As to another indication of how one single columnist can influence opinion and warp wider perception, just look to Riedel’s assessment of the show’s first preview. It is typically known as Riedel’s forte to “[break] with Broadway convention, [where] he attends the first night of previews, and reports on the problems…before the critics have their say”. This gives him “clout” by way of mining “terrain that goes relatively uncovered elsewhere”, and it means subsequent journals are frequently looking to him from whom to take their lead – and quotes.

At Gypsy’s opening preview then, he reported visions of “Arthur Laurents [charging] up the aisle…on fire”, loudly and vocally expressing his dissatisfaction with the show as he then “read Fox [a producer] the riot act”. Despite the fact that this was “not true, according to Laurents,” the damage was already done, with the sentiment of trouble and tension being subsequently reprinted and distributed out to the public across many a regional paper.

News travels fast, bad news travels faster.

 And news can be created at an ample rate, when in possession of one’s own regular periodical column. This recurring domain allowed plentiful opportunity for attack on Bernadette and Gypsy, and Riedel “began devoting nearly every column to the subject,” which amounted to weekly or even more frequent references.

As the show progressed beyond its first preview, Riedel brought in the next aspects of his smear-campaign – assailing Bernadette for missing performances through illness and accusing Ben Brantley, who reviewed the show positively in The New York Times, of unfair favouritism and “hyperbolic spin”.

The issue is not that Bernadette was not in fact ill or missing performances. She was. She had a diagnosis at first of “a cold and vocal strain”, that then progressed more seriously to a “respiratory infection” the following week, and was “told by her doctors that she needs to rest”. So rest she did.

The issue is the way in which Riedel depicted the situation and her absences via hyperbole and “insinuating she was shirking” responsibility. He went further than continual, repeated mentions and cruel article titles like “wilted Rose”, or “sick Rose losing bloom”, or “beloved but - ahem-cough-cough-ahem - vocally challenged and miscast star”. He went as far as the sensationalist and degrading action of putting “Peters' face on the side of a milk carton, the kind of advertisement typically used to recover lost children,” and asking readers to look out for “bee-stung lips, [a] high-pitched voice, [and a] kewpie doll figure”, who “may be clutching a box of tissues and a love letter from Ben Brantley”.

It was quantified in May of 2003 after the show had officially opened, that “out of the 39 performances "Gypsy" has played so far, [Bernadette] has missed six – an absence rate of 15 percent.”

As an interesting comparison, it was reported in The Times in February 2002 that “‘The Producers' stars Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick have performed together only eight times in last 43 performances due to scheduling problems and health concerns,” – an absence rate of 81%.

Did Riedel have anything nearly as ardent to say about the main male stars of the previous season’s hit missing such a rate of performances? Of course not.

 Riedel arguably has a disproportionate rate for criticising female divas.

One need only heed his recommendations that certain women check into his illuminatingly named “Rosie's Rest Home for Broadway Divas.” Divos need not apply.

Not that he was unaware of this.

In 2004, Riedel would jovially lay out that “Liz Smith and I have developed a nice tag-team act: I bash fragile Broadway leading ladies who miss performances, and she rides to their rescue.”

Donna Murphy was the recipient of what he that year dubbed his “BERNADETTE PETERS ATTENDANCE AWARD”, when she began missing performances in “Wonderful Town”, due to “severe back and neck injuries and a series of colds and sinus infections”.

This speaks to his remarkably cavalier and joyful attitude with which he tears down shows and performers. “The more Mr. Riedel's work upsets people, the more he enjoys it.”

He knows he yields influence – it was recognised he had “eclipsed Ben Brantley as the single most discussed element in marketing meetings for Broadway shows” – and he delights in his capacity to lead shows to premature demises through his poison-tipped quill yielding.

When it was reported Gypsy would be closing earlier than had been planned, he made mention of “hop[ping] around on [its] grave” and debonairly applauding himself, “I suppose I can take some credit for bringing it down”.

 His premonition from the previous year’s Tony’s ceremony was both ominous and prescient, when he predicted the show’s failure to win any awards “could spell trouble at the box office”. He was right. It did. The 8.5 million dollar revival closed months before anticipated and failed to return a profit.

Multiple factors can be attributed to Gypsy’s poor success at the Tony’s, but it’s clear to say Riedel’s continual bashing leading up to the fated night throughout the voting period certainly didn’t help matters.

His suggestions to do with Bernadette’s performances were not helpful either.

After alleging Laurents as the director of the 1991 revival “practically beat a performance out of” Tyne Daly when she was struggling with the role, he proffers that to improve Bernadette’s success, “it may be time for [Laurents] to take up the switch and thrash one out of Peters”.

Great.

It was irresponsible and unrelenting commentary that did not go unnoticed.

His “ruthless heckling of beloved Broadway star Ms. Peters” was deemed in print “his most egregious stunt so far”.

Vividly, in person, Riedel was accosted at a party one night by Floria Lasky, the venerable showbiz lawyer, who “grab[bed] Riedel’s tie and jerk[ed] it, nooselike, scolding, ‘It was unfair, what you did to Bernadette’”.

Moreover, the wide-reaching influential hold Riedel occupied over the environment surrounding Gypsy was tangible in the fact his words spread beyond just average readers, and even unusually “started seeping into the reviews of New York's top critics”. Riedel himself, as the “chief vulture”, was indeed what Ben Brantley was referring to in his own New York Times review by stating how the production was “shadowed by vultures predicting disaster”.

Even more substantially, the “whole Peters-Riedel-Brantley episode” became its own enduring cultural reference – being converted into its very own “satiric cabaret piece, ‘Bernadette and the Butcher of Broadway’”. All three parties were featured, with Riedel characterised as the butcher, and it played Off-Broadway later in 2003 “to positive notices”.

 But penitent for his sins and begging for absolution Riedel was not. “Riedel saw nothing but a great story and a great time,” and for many years after, he would continue to hark back to the matter in self-referential (almost reverential) and flippant ways.

In 2008 as Patti LuPone won her Tony for her turn as Rose in the subsequent revival, Riedel couldn’t help but jibe, “Not to rip open an old wound, but I'd love to know if Bernadette Peters was watching”. (He neglects also to mention that “Mendes’s Gypsy was seen by 100,000 more people than saw Laurents’s and grossed $6 million more”.)

More jibes are to be found in 2012 as he reported on the auction after Arthur Laurents’ funeral, or even as recently in 2019, as he asked, “Remember the outcry that greeted Sam Mendes’ Brechtian “Gypsy,” with Bernadette Peters, in 2003?”

As with in 2004 where he points to the “pack of jackals who have been snarling” about Bernadette’s failures, this brings up the canny knack Riedel has of offloading his views to bigger and detached third party sources – thus absolving himself of personal centrality, and thus culpability.

If there was an outcry, HE was its loudest contributor. If there were snarling jackals, HE was their leader.

Maybe Riedel’s third person detached approach to referencing matters was intended to be a humorous stylistic quirk for those in the know. Or maybe it was his way of expressing some inner turmoil over the event.

In some rare display of morality and emotional authenticity, Riedel would at one point admit “I find it kind of sad and pathetic that the high point of my life supposedly has been about beating up on Bernadette Peters”.

Fortunately for him then, a degree of absolution was eventually achieved in 2018, where Riedel visited Bernadette at her opening night in Hello Dolly in 2018, with the intention of ending their “15-year feud”. He “got down on one knee at Sardi’s and extended his hand,” with Bernadette reportedly yelling “Take a picture!” while he held his deferential and obsequious position on the floor.

So if eventually this “feud” has some kind of circular resolution and Riedel was glad it was over, why on earth did it begin in the first place?

One notion is that it was simply another day on the job. Riedel is a man who sees Broadway as “a game for rich people”. Positioned as an “an industry that brought in $720.9 million in the 2002-2003 season”, it is “not a fragile business”, he remarked. As such, he “[could not] fathom the point of donning kid gloves” in covering it, and reasoned the business as a whole was robust enough to weather a few hard knocks. “Thus, Riedel can coolly view Bernadette Peters as fair game, as opposed to, say, a national treasure”.

More to the point, he was a man in search of words. During the season in question, Riedel was “one of just three New York newspaper columnists covering the stage” – a “throwback to a bygone era when…Broadway gossipmeisters…such as Walter Winchell and Dorothy Kilgallen ruled”. Now at the time, as the “last of a great tabloid tradition”, Riedel presided over not just one but two columns a week at The Post. As a result, he was in need of content. “One of the reasons I've become more opinionated is I just have more space to fill,” he admitted. Robert Simonson hypothesises in his book ‘On Broadway Men, Still Wear Hats’ that Riedel may have consequently picked “the thrashing of Bernadette” as his main target simply because “it was a slow news cycle”. Options for ‘titillating’ and durable content were scarce elsewhere that season.

And after all, if Riedel would later cite Bernadette in an article concerning the Top 10 Powerhouses of Broadway in 2004, saying even despite a few knocks or bad shows, “she’ll bounce back” – surely there was no real damage done.

If her career wouldn’t be toppled by his continual public defamation and haranguing, what was the harm?

Feelings? Who cares about feelings or Bernadette’s extremely complex and personal history with the show stretching back to when she was a teenager.

It was just part of the territory, there was nothing personal in it.

 Or was there?

Maybe there was something personal in Riedel’s campaign after all.

He makes a curious comment while discussing ‘A Raisin in the Sun’ in 2004. The then incoming star of the show, rapper P. Diddy, had invited Riedel to dinner, and he makes judgement that this was “a smart p.r. move”. Then he ponders, “you do have to wonder: If Bernadette Peters had broken bread with me this time last year, would her chorus boys have to be out there now working the TKTS line to keep "Gypsy" afloat?”

Might he be going as far to suggest that if Bernadette had indulged him in a meal, her show might not have suffered so, by way of him being more inclined to cover it with greater lenience?

It may seem that way, at least in considering how Riedel reviewed P. Diddy’s performance thus after their dinner: “Riedel pronounced himself impressed. ‘He could have forgotten his lines or had to be carried offstage. He didn’t do anything terrible, he didn’t do anything astonishing.’”

Seemingly all the rapper had to do was remember some words and remain physically onstage, and he sails through scot-free. That’s a rather different outcome, one could say, to being absolutely eviscerated for what became a Tony nominated effort at one of the appreciably hardest and most demanding musical theatre roles in existence.

Though perhaps it’s hard to tell if that was really his insinuation from just one isolated comment pertaining to lunch.

This argument might be fine, if it WAS the only isolated comment pertaining to wanting Bernadette to have lunch with him. But it isn’t. Riedel continues to make a further two references over protracted periods of time to the fact Bernadette hasn’t dined with him.

One begins to get the sense of him feeling desiring of or somewhat entitled to such a private lunch with the lady he’s verbally decimated for years, and a sense of bitter rejection that he hasn’t been granted one.

“If Tonya Pinkins doesn't win the Tony Award this year, I'll buy Bernadette Peters lunch,” he simpered, and later, “I invite Bernadette to be my guest for lunch at a restaurant of her choosing. She can reach me at The Post anytime she's hungry”.

The embittered columnist in this light takes on now the marred tinge of a small boy in the playground who doesn’t get to hold the hand of the girl he wants in front of his friends, so spends the next three years pushing her over in the sandpit in revenge.

Moreover, the last statement makes undeniable comment on Bernadette’s troubled relationship with food, body image and public eating.

So now not only so far has he insulted and mocked her physical appearance and played into all the usual trite shots calling her a “kewpie doll”; suggested Arthur Laurents violently hit her in order to elicit a better performance; continually publicly harassed her regarding a show that strikes close to the nerve with deep personal and psychological resonances due to her mother and childhood; but now he’s going for the low-blows of ridiculing her over her eating habits.

Flawless behaviour.

 Maybe it’s far-fetched to suggest a man would have such a fragile ego to run a multi-year public defamation campaign after so little as not getting his hypothesised fantasy of a personal lunch date. But then again, this was the man who “left Johns Hopkins University after his first year because of a broken heart.” (“I was in love with her; she wasn't in love with me,” he said.)

And also the man described as “an insomniac who pops the occasional Ambien,” living in a “small one-bedroom” that is “single-guy sloppy”, who has “been living alone since a four-year romance ended in 1996”.

The man whose own best friend called “cruel” and with a “lack of empathy”.

The man whose own sister answered that “well, yes,” he’s always been mean; and after being picked on as a kid for “being the small guy and the intellectual”, he grew dependent on using “his verbal ability to beat someone” and put himself in positions of defensive impenetrability.

See, writing Riedel-esque, vindictive and provocative conjecture is no especially challenging or cerebral task.

Riedel may well see his approach to ‘journalism’ or reporting as “all fun and games”.

But I for one am not laughing.

 One final aspect to address when considering Riedel’s reasoning for the depth of his coverage on Bernadette demands attention of how he gets his information. His own personal opinions and motivations aside, crucially he depends on insider providers for insider details. Perhaps somewhat alarmingly then, “leading Broadway producers themselves are among his sources”.

“Half of Broadway hates him. The other half leaks to him”, John Heilpern titled his 2012 Vanity Fair profile on Riedel.

As such, in frequently taking his lead from “theater folk, usually with an ax to grind”, Riedel acts as the mouthpiece to bring secretive backstage reports out front. High-up, influential characters are thus able to funnel their agendas into public view, while keeping their identities hidden.

Notably, it was raised in the above article that Riedel’s “merciless running story” regarding Bernadette in Gypsy “was fed by none other than its renowned librettist, Arthur Laurents—or, more precisely, by Laurents's lover”.

Contrary to the smiley picture below between members of the show’s creative team and it’s beloved star, it was no secret that Laurents did not like Mendes’ 2003 revival. Laurents told Riedel that “Sam did a terrible disservice to Bernadette and the play, and I wanted a Gypsy seen in New York that was good… You have to have musical theater in your bones, and Sam doesn't”. In fact, Laurents admitted the only reason his 2009 book ‘Mainly on Directing’ came into existence was because of how much he had to criticise about the show – it grew out of the extensive set of notes he gave Mendes.

Additionally, it was no secret that Laurents’ lover, Tom Hatcher, demonstrated both a desire and capacity to influence Arthur’s productions. As well as being the driving force for the 2009 Spanish-speaking reworking of West Side Story, Hatcher had intense investment in Gypsy specifically. Patti LuPone writes in her memoir, “From his deathbed, Tom had told Arthur, ‘You have to do Gypsy, and you have to do it with Patti’. It was one of his dying wishes”. Laurents himself, in corroboration of this, explained Tom’s reasoning – “he didn't want the Sam Mendes production to be New York's last memory of Gypsy”.

The allegation in Heilpern’s profile might be hard to prove from an outsider perspective. But given that neither were happy with Mendes’ production and both actively took steps to ensuring it would be superseded in memory, it is not completely implausible.

 Overarchingly, as much as Riedel’s writing may benefit FROM insider sources, it is said he does not write in benefit OF them. For instance, although friends with Scott Rudin in 2004, an animated (nay threatening) warning from Mr Rudin asking Riedel to “back off” from “slamming” his show, Caroline or Change, seemingly “had no impact”.

That’s not to cite total impartiality or exemption from personal connections and higher up influences colouring his reports of shows. Theatre publicist John Barlow would describe that sometimes “if you ask Michael to kill [one of his pieces], he will, if it’s someone with whom he does business”.

But it would be remiss not to mention that his influences and sources stretch beyond just the big wigs. Amongst his other informants too are the more lowly, overlooked folk like “the stagehands, the ushers, chorus kids, house managers, and press agents… the guys who build sets in the Bronx”. Basically, for anyone who’ll talk, Riedel will listen.

“Michael Riedel doesn't work for the producers or the publicists; he works for the reader,” one publicist said. “Sometimes we're glad of that, sometimes we're not-but at the end of the day, that's the reality.”

Sometimes he’s nice, sometimes he’s not – but the world goes round.

Through all that’s been explored, it should be stated how painful and injurious it must be for individual performers or shows to fall upon the unmitigated, maiming force of being on the wrong side of Riedel’s favour. The way he approached coverage on Bernadette is deplorable from an emotional and personal standpoint. Some would argue that it was too far and crossed a line and was most definitely unfair. Others would say it was justified. It’s hard not to sound petulant as the former, or heartless as the latter.

While his actions may indeed be abrasively wounding in isolated (often plentiful) cases, it’s unreasonable to say Riedel’s intentions would be to cripple the Broadway industry as a whole. There are those who purport that Riedel in fact “keeps Broadway alive with his controversies”. His words may not always be ‘nice’ but it’s difficult to argue they're not engaging.

Many are quick to criticize or react impassionedly to him and his columns; but few are quick to stop reading them. And Riedel “knows that the most important thing is being well read”.

Hence it is understandable why Riedel is appraised as “the columnist Broadway loves to hate”. Through his enthralling and stimulating bag of linguistic and dramatic tricks, Riedel knows how to keep the readers coming back. “He’s lively, and he makes the theater seem like an interesting place,” one producer did reason.

“There are times when no one's going to care about Broadway if you don't have a gossip angle that focuses on the backstage drama,” opined George Rush, the Daily News gossip columnist who was once Riedel's boss.

Perhaps it is logically and principally then, if somewhat cynically, a matter of believing “it's just business” and knowing how to “play the game”.

As Riedel himself would rationalise, “It’s all an act. You gotta have a gimmick, as they say in Gypsy.”

It may not be pleasant, but in a world increasingly dependent on sensationalistic and clickbait-driven engagement, it’s probably not going to change any time soon.

 Well then, if he can live with the toll of the position of moral tumult his column puts him in, so be it.

That he described his mind as being “constantly on the next deadline”, saying “I always think about the column”, and likening writing it to “standing under a windmill”, where “you dodge one blade, but there's always another one coming right behind it”, may be some indication that he can't. At least not wholly easily.

I’ll leave that to him to figure out. Off the record.

[ginkgomoon]

Gavin and MC’s High School History- Detailed Timeline

Dedicated to my amazing and kind friend @cheri-cheri- one of the Queens of the MLQC fandom on Tumblr! I literally didn’t know how to use it before but I had learnt how in order to keep up with her posts. Without her work, I literally wouldn’t be on here making my own blog either. Thank you, Cheri!!

This is a timeline following the years of high school that MC and Gavin had together. Compiled of dates, rumours and secrets, calls, texts, and other from multiple servers. The source will be shown allocated to its corresponding sentence. I created this because I was really moved when I rewatched Gavin’s Old Days Date and suddenly thought of the many things other players could have missed out on regarding their high school years. If there is anything you need clarification on, or if you would like to add anything in, feel free to send a post/ask or just comment and I’ll try to incorporate and adjust accordingly! 

Based off of true correspondence of the Chinese education system in Shanghai, where the schools there are very strict, with specific responsibilities and events students must have and attend to. In addition, this is different from Western school systems where years 7-9 are in a seperate schools from years 10-12 before university. Dates and seasons mentioned will also be noted as accurately as possible to suit the Loveland storyline in which different events occurred. I felt like a detective trying to piece a fractured storyline together to solve a mystery, honestly...

Prepare your tissues, your milk tea and your soul because even I almost didn’t make it to publish this...

Timeline

2008

Gavin enters high school.

2009

MC and Minor enter high school. MC does her hair in a nice ponytail, one of the only hairstyles she ever had in school.

Gavin is a grade above her. He is in his last year of high school. [Spring Festival Date]

Late Autumn of October 2010

“I noticed who you were before you ever noticed me.” 

On a rainy first day of school, Gavin helps Mr Keller move the tables and chairs in the classroom. 

Without taking an umbrella, Gavin leaves. 

At the same time, MC saves a cat in the rain with her handkerchief, attempting to shield it from the incoming rain under a roof. She gives it snacks from her bag while sheltering it from the rain. 

Gavin thinks she was nerdy-looking, but couldn't take his eyes off her and watches her from a distance for a long time. He feels out of place standing.

She looks back at him in astonishment, not knowing how long he stood for. 

She smiles at Gavin.

Gavin notes that MC’s smile just like her eyes, were pure and comforting as they start filling his vision. 

The rain starts to get heavier and MC shivers. 

Something stirred in Gavin’s heart as he notices this, and kicks a can in frustration then shelters her with his jacket. 

He runs away as MC shouts, “thank you!” 

She didn’t know it was Gavin who gave her his jacket at the time.

MC goes back and is then told by her fellow classmates that the boy she encountered was the “tyrant school bully”,  and “the Underworld Senior Gavin”, and that she should stay away from him. [Tilted Time- Rumours and Secrets]

-

MC finds piano dull to play the same songs over and over again.

MC in her spare time practices and sings to Liszt’s Liebestraum No. 3 (Love Dream) for a talent show.

At the rooftop, Gavin is wounded by a gangster’s knife. A gradually intensifying melody is heard. 

Gavin kicks the gangster boss but then is pursued again. Outnumbered, wounded and losing consciousness due to major blood loss, the gangster boss kicks Gavin off the roof. 

Gavin reaches out, to something- anything. 

A heavy, surging melody sounded, transcending through time and allows Gavin to reflect on his past- to his father, to his late mother, and invokes deep reflection and epiphanies. 

Heavy notes seep into Gavin’s ears as he almost hits rock bottom. He feels his limbs emerging with the wind and awakens his wind evol. 

Gavin is now reborn.

The music continued to play. Gavin ends up humming with a bird. 

He then hears MC’s singing.

MC stops, mesmerised by the ginkgo leaves flying through the wind. The ginkgo leaves falling was her favourite time of the year in high school. This vivid sight is still engraved in her memory after many years.

Gavin vows to protect her for the rest of his life. [Campus Date]

-

Gavin saved Minor from bullies. 

Minor also happens to be MC’s outgoing, talkative desk mate who sometimes helped old ladies cross the street. How he managed to hang around Gavin and not get beaten up, nobody knew (except us). He would often copy MC’s homework but never dragged her down with him if he got caught. This was MC’s biggest impression of him. 

During science class, MC cooked noodles for Minor on the Bunsen burner when he was hungry. The recipe was Shrimp flavoured instant noodles, mix two eggs in well, then add a dab of sea salt and black pepper. [S1 Chapter 7-1]

-

Gavin is always at the school gates at 7:30am. Carrying his flat school bag, he orders fish balls at the snack kiosk on the north side of the school. It was the third day in a row that Minor notices this. [Minor’s Memory Book]

Gavin would occasionally travel around on his bicycle. (Pre-debut Sparky??) He says he was good at riding it. [Lost Love Date]

It was hard to find Gavin as he’s rarely at school, so she didn’t see him until 3 days later when MC went to the library at sunset. 

She tries to retrieve “Byron’s Poetry Collection” from the top of a 2-metre shelf, and since Gavin was a head taller, he was able to help her get it. 

He musters up the introduction that he recited many times- but MC quickly thanks him and leaves before he could speak.

Minor notices Gavin watching after MC and that he was SMIL-ING. 

He helps him locate MC and reports that every day after school she would go to the library for afternoon revision, always sitting in the same seat. 

Gavin sat at a corner not far, quietly flipping through textbooks he hated. People who were reading in the library would be driven away because they were scared of him LOL

MC would then leave at 5pm sharp to go back home. 

Gavin commits to walking back 10 metres behind her with Minor every day on forward. [CN Tilted Time Rumours and Secrets] 

-

Gavin saves Minor from bullies again. Minor dedicates himself to be his “bro”. 

He finds out that MC is an honours student, but doesn’t know that she’s the school orchestra leader. [Mystery Wings Event] and [Mark Date] However, he does know that she’s renowned as the “campus belle/ school flower”.

Minor idly mentions that more people were giving MC love letters.

Gavin tells Minor to collect all the people who were planning to confess their love to MC. Minor doesn’t want to be wingman anymore HAHA

Gavin stared those boys down as they trembled with fear. He tells them to take them back and if they scare her, he’ll make them regret it. 

Minor realises Gavin’s feelings for MC. [Minor’s Memory Book] 

-

MC eats from a small stall outside the school gate selling red bean puffs. ($3 for one, $5 for two. What a deal!) 

She also encounters the stall that sells sugar figurines [Gift of Life- Sugar Figurine Call]

MC ate chocolate sticks often at school. It's also a memory of student life for Gavin, as well. [CN 2021 March Sign-In Taste of Happiness]

Students would scramble for the small swing set in the school garden. MC never went at lunch breaks, but she watches the sunset on it after school. Gavin is sometimes nearby. MC never noticed him, but she does however notice the ginkgo leaves dancing in the wind. [Mini House Small Happening- Leisure Time]

-

Gavin isn’t his usual self anymore. He sees MC out in the library everyday and starts reading “5 Years of College Examinations and 3 Years of Sample Questions” (book for colleague entrance examinations).

MC watches a basketball match at school. She calls someone from an away team “dashing” because they won with a dunk. This has been engraved in Gavin’s memory ever since. [Dreamers Date]

Gavin found out that he was very fond of basketball success stories, rushing into the court to try hundreds of shots after. He writes “I will beat you” beside Sakuragi Hanamichi from a Slam Dunk poster alongside “not a step back”.

(Slam Dunk starts out with a boy wanting to play basketball to impress his crush.)

Gavin then injures his head badly :(

He realises that basketball couldn’t help him to protect anything he wanted. He determines that he will do whatever it takes (to “beat” himself”). [Mystery Wings Event]

-

Gavin leans against a tree as he watches MC hurry down the corridor as she clutches a textbook. [Boundary Rumours and Secrets]

MC would eat pocky. Gavin would eat them too. [2021 March Sign-In Moments]

- 

MC faints during a sports meet because she didn’t eat breakfast.

Gavin hurries to carry her to the infirmary. [CN Delightful Search Date]

He leaves bread and milk before she wakes up.

-

MC is on duty during PE class, which happens to be on basketball. 

Minor was careless about his aim and the ball almost hit her in the head. Gavin slams the ball away. [Minor’s Memory Book]

Gavin glares at Minor as MC thanks him.

Minor also “accidentally” pushes MC towards him.

Gavin glares again.

Gavin later is continuously shooting hoops. 

MC returns late at night to clean up the gym but all had been returned neatly in the basket. MC wanted to thank him but couldn’t. [CN Basketball Court Date]

-

There was a school sports competition that they attended. Gavin participated in the 10 lap race and came first by an impressive large measure. [Minor’s Memory Book]

MC participates in the sprint race, too. Gavin is worried about her performance, and if she would faint again. 

Gavin requests Minor to take a photo of her on his phone (which probably ended up as the photo that he carried with him in his early days at special training where the other men teased him about hiding a photo of a girl.) 

Approaching the End of October 

Gavin, Minor and MC are walking home. 

The weather is cold, and Gavin notices MC shivering in the distance. Gavin, conflicted by this, tells Minor to buy MC a hot drink without telling her that it was from him. [CN Tilted Time Rumours and Secrets] 

MC would occasionally spot a hot drink or a carton of strawberry milk in the piano room. [Chapter 31-12]

-

Gavin one day is conflicted by their early exchange, recalling how MC looks startled at the entrance of the library after seeing each other. His spirit depletes, kicking himself (metaphorically) in the corner of the classroom at how he might have scared her. 

Minor rushes in with a pink bandaid from MC for the wound at his mouth. 

He carefully took that bandaid, treating it as if it was his world’s most precious treasure.

This pink bandaid was always taped on his heart and whenever he stepped into the swamp-like darkness of the night, it gave off a faint warmth. [Mystery Wings Event]

-

MC starts to notice Gavin everywhere. At the corners of windows, she would see his figure. At the library, he would help her retrieve books from higher places. She would also see books laid out on his table, but most of the time he would be sleeping. Beneath his overlapping arms, he sees “Byron’s Poetry Collection”. Gavin doesn’t understand the poems, though. 

Lord Byron's "Don Juan" - Canto the Ninth, XVI 

"To be, or not to be?" — Ere I decide I should be glad to know that which is being? 'Tis true — we speculate both far and wide, And deem, because we see, we are all-seeing; For my part, I'll enlist on neither side Until I see both sides for once agreeing; For me, I sometimes think that Life is Death,

-

At the music rehearsal room on the fifth floor, she would see a corner of his shirt in the wind. 

MC thinks Gavin is friendly and slowly lets down her guard. 

At the canteen, he would offer her the last bottle of water. 

She begins smiling at him when they see each other, with the small arcs forming on her lips, soon becoming smiles that made her eyes squint.

-

MC would walk along the Senior hallways and subconsciously stop at a certain classroom- catching the sight of Gavin sleeping. On one particular day, she sees him standing by the window, staring at the sky. 

-

Minor asks Gavin if he could form a band with him. Gavin rejects him. He then asks Gavin if he wanted to join the school’s singing competition. Gavin rejects him again, saying that he didn’t perform for unimportant people or have others tell him how well he could play.

MC plays “Falling Slowly” on the piano. Gavin hearing this, learns to play the guitar. He doesn’t know the name of the song but familiarises himself with the melody. [CN Music and the Past Call]

-

Whenever school let students out early, she would go to Lynn’s Kitchen. MC gets her noodles with clear broth, chopped scallions and a half-boiled egg. Gavin usually gets his spicy noodles with garlic, cilantro, thinly sliced beef.

Gavin remembers her favourite order. 

MC leaves a post-it note at Lynn’s Kitchen, “I might never see you again and I didn’t even get to say goodbye. I miss you”, about a friend who transferred schools. 

Gavin knows she hates people who leave without saying goodbye the most.

Gavin, also in the vicinity near Lynn’s Kitchen, writes a post note.  “Until I met you.” [Mystery Box Game]

He saves Mr Noah’s son from an accident, immediately takes him to the hospital and pays for the medical fees. [Anime]

-

Gavin dismisses rumours of high school romance. 

“If you confessed on the 7th step of the stairway in the corner of the 3rd floor then it’ll succeed, or if you carved your name and another person’s name on the 6th tree in the courtyard at the back then your misunderstandings will be resolved, or if a guy gave the girl he liked the second button of his uniform on graduation day then the two of them will end up happy together.”

At lunch, he hears MC talking about the second button, and upon seeing her yearning face, he raises his head in thought, suddenly couldn’t wait for graduation. He tears off his second button. [Mystery Wings Event]

Gavin is just in love at this point.

-

Gavin sees one of the top students stealing money from a shop outside of school. The shopkeeper doesn’t believe him. 

He stops the student on his way home to hand him back the money. 

MC sees him at the alley then leaves.

Gavin spent all the money on a walkman he wanted for a very long time.

Mr Keller was the only one who believed in him. He said to him, “Since you can’t change what others think of you, you might as well just listen to your heart.” This had a great impact on Gavin. [Campus Date] 

Winter 

In the snowfall, the school allowed additional ten minutes of break time. The class next to MC’s stuffed Minor’s shirt with snowballs.

Gavin thought of helping him with a counterattack but MC had already returned a snowball to the male student who pulled the prank. 

Gavin looks at MC the whole time. [CN Recovery ASMR]

-

MC overheads girls in her class say that Gavin had bullied students for lunch money that morning. 

MC rides her bike back home after studying at the library for her finals. 

MC sees Gavin being handed an envelope full of money at Lynn’s Kitchen in an alleyway. 

She mistook it for him taking protection money. 

-

Summer of June 2011

On a humid afternoon, MC looks outside the window of the classroom in boredom. A boy in a loose-fitting school uniform ran by. She couldn’t make out his face. [S1 Chapter 7-23]

MC begins to distance herself from Gavin. She rushes out of class and goes straight home instead.

Gavin is sad. He broods by the piano room, goes to the library to brood, then stares at the place MC sits to brood some more. 

Minor wonders how he’s able to stare all afternoon at an empty space in the library but sleeps all day during class hours. [Minor’s Memory Book]

Before graduation, Gavin’s father expresses his thoughts for Gavin to join the organisation for special training. Gavin refuses, but his father uses MC to influence him to agree. 

Gavin remembers the panic and timidity in MC’s eyes when she first met him. He recalls that moment was probably the hardest to bear in his life.

Gavin in his short period of freedom writes a letter to MC. He ponders about what to say, thinking about their first encounter, and how she started to distance herself from him. But all he writes is-  

“Saturday 9am, I will be at the school library waiting for you.

-Gavin.”

-

MC attends the flag-raising ceremony and rehearses her speech. She then leaves to study for her exams. 

Meanwhile, Gavin finishes a fight with other boys from school in an alley after they talk inappropriately about MC. [Old Days Date]

Gavin, bloodied and bruised, asks Minor to make another copy of his letter. 

This is the only thing that Gavin had asked Minor to do so of course, he agreed. [Chapter 7-11]

Minor thinks the letter is a symbol of passion and fierce love due to the bloodstains and decides to keep the original. 

He writes “GAVIN” and places it on MC’s desk for her to see the next day. 

(In the Campus Date, the older MC is the one who finds him instead of Minor and treats him to his injuries. She ends up seeing the contents of the letter to find him later on.)

MC mistakes the letter as a threat and throws it away. 

That Weekend

Gavin sits for 14 hours in the library waiting for MC, scanning the library every now and then.

With a fingertip, he rubs “Byron’s Poetry Collection” and carefully sandwiches a dried and yellowed ginkgo leaf into the book. He suddenly felt a measure of self-deprecation.

He stands up, and leaves, his heart filled with regret that he didn’t give it to her personally. [CN Tilted Time Rumours and Secrets]

After Summer Break- July 

Minor never saw Gavin, and neither did MC. 

“We met often, but never passed by each other. I remember every moment I saw you in school. Time, location, weather, your expression, your clothes...

-I remember them all.”

[translations-by-aiimee]

Mistakenly Saving the Villain - Chapter 1

Original Title: 论救错反派的下场

Genres: Drama, Romance, Xianxia, Yaoi

TW for this chapter: Mentions of suicide

I wanted to provide some ~variety~ so I'm doing another novel. I'll give a warning that the first few chapters are kind of intense and I'll keep the TWs updated as they come and put a TL;DR at the end if there's anything too graphic.

This translation is based on multiple MTLs and my own limited knowledge of Chinese characters. If I have made any egregious mistakes, please let me know.

Chapter 1 - The Beauty in Red

Song Qingshi is dead.

After his death, he came to in a strange space, and in the space, there was a sphere randomly flashing red.

The sphere said that he is a book-transmigrating system from a high-dimensional world. There was a xiania novel called "The Exceptional Furnace", which was about to be plagued by readers' resentment due to the tragic fate of the protagonist, causing problems in that world. It needed to find someone who is familiar with the tropes of these novels and someone with the power to change and repair the body and mind of the protagonist, and fulfill the readers' wishes - change the fate of the protagonist, dote on him, and let him live the happiest and most fulfilling life □□ □□□□□

The information in the system came intermittently, and in the □□ there were incomprehensible, alien-like characters.

Song Qingshi suffered from Lou Gehrig's Disease during his lifetime and devoted himself to studying medicine to try and save himself. He was a medical student who studied and experimented frantically every day and never wasted time reading novels.

In terms of emotions, he is even more obtuse. Although he is very handsome and has an attractive and obedient personality, due to his physical problems, even the school bully treated him like a precious thing. With all the excessive loving care and sympathy, not only did he never have a crush, but he also suffered from a slight fear of talking to strangers.

This was the worst soul for this task.

Song Qingshi didn't know how he was picked up by the system. He had read Marxist philosophy novels in vain. But from his messy information and analysis from the system's explanation, as long as he accepts the task, the system will send him to the virtual book world, give him a healthy body, and he will come back to life.

After Song Qingshi realized this, he was ecstatic. A healthy body is was his biggest desire. Not to mention the fact that the system only asked that he take care of someone. Even if the system had asked him to swim through seas of fire, he would have accepted still.

Because of this, he ignored his conscience, structured his response, and lied for the first time in his life: "I have read tens of thousands of books that I have memorized. I have extensive medical and nursing knowledge, have taken a psychology course as an elective, and I could solve all the physical and mental sufferings of the protagonist. And love. . . I have lots of experience with love, I know how to communicate, absolutely, I. . . can definitely accomplish these tasks!"

If there was any blood that could exist in a soul, he would definitely be flushed.

The system didn't notice his lies. It registered the identity of the task performer, and sent a series of garbled commands, mixed with all kinds of chaotic and disorderly information into Song Qingshi's mind, sending waves of discomfort through his soul.

Suddenly, the system let out a sharp alarm and the data transmission was cut off. Song Qingshi's vision went black, and his soul drifted away towards a bright white light. . .

. . .

When Song Qingshi woke up, he found himself lying in the woods, surrounded by the faint fragrance of various herbs. He squinted his eyes and looked towards the dazzling blue sky. There was a gorgeous golden luan bird dragging its long tail feathers, letting out a loud caw as it flew past, with countless immortal birds following it.

Was this the world from the novel?

It seemed too real. . .

A soft breeze blew across the forest, shaking off the dew on the trees. The dew fell onto his pale fingertips, bringing a slightly cool feeling. Then, all the memories of the original body flooded into his mind like a tidal wave, trying to merge with his own soul - this body was also called Song Qingshi, the master of the Medicine King's Valley, and the most talented medical immortal and pharmaceutical expert in the immortal world. His medical skills could heal the dead and revive bones, and the spirit pills he cultivates were considered treasures by every cultivator.

However, the original body's temperament was extremely troubling. He rarely left Medicine King's Valley at all, never made friends, and had no interest in matters other than medicine and alchemy. When a patient sought him out, he only looks at their temperament and never asked their identity. When he was in a good mood, he treated mortal beggars. When he was in a bad mood, regardless of the identity of the visitor, he would turn them into flower fertilizer for his garden. He often used living people to test medicines. Cruel, but because of his Nascent Soul cultivation base and various skills with poisons, the immortal sects didn't dare provoke him easily, only secretly calling him troubling behind his back.

Cultivators in the immortal world had long life spans, and the knowledge and memory of this original body had for its hundreds of years of cultivation had not arrived yet. Various data fragments of the system rushed in frantically, with countless garbled codes, tearing the original body's memory into a mess, leaving Song Qingshi at a loss. It took a long time before he managed to figure out his current situation.

This was Golden Phoenix Mountain Manor, the most luxurious place in the immortal world, where there are rare and exotic animals and countless immortals and beautiful concubines.

The owner, Jin FeiRen, was also a great Nascent cultivator. He was a true romantic, an excessive spender, and had friends from both the immortal and demonic cultivation world. He was a well-known figure.

The original body had always been cold, obsessed with his work, and never touched either men and women. Today's arrival was accidental. The Manor Lord Jin wanted to give him Ten Thousand Year Snow Ginseng to exchange a batch of medicinal pills for him. The original body had recently been lacking Snow Ginseng to make his medicines, so he agreed to the deal.

Since Snow Ginseng grows in the secret realm of the snow mountains of the Jin family. If you wanted to get the ones with the best medicinal properties, you needed to pick them at night and preserve it with a special refining method. Therefore, the original body came here to pick it personally, and Song Qingshi somehow ended up here.

Then, Song Qingshi was sent here by the system. . .

Where was the protagonist? What does he look like?

Song Qingshi wanted to ask the system to ask for more information, but the system seemed to disappear. The materials it sent not only contained no plot points from the novel, but also very little character information. There were garbled characters everywhere, even though the protagonist hadn't been introduced yet. Song Qingshi got dizzy going through all this information before he found some descriptions in the copywriting introduction: the best physique, unmatched beauty shou X□□□□□ gong, procured by trickery, sadomasochistic, □□, □□, □□ There were only three texts that could be read clearly: Banquet of Bea□□□.

. . .

If this were someone who often read these types of novels, they would immediately recognize that this situation was problematic.

Song Qingshi, however, didn't recognize any of this as problematic. He believed that this was a test given by the system to assess his reasoning skills and ability to do things. Song Qingshi was very accustomed to being assessed like this. Usually, when he and his teacher started developing a new drug, he often didn't have any prior results in his hand. It required some experimentation and to experience many errors and difficulties in order to reach the final result. Most of the time, that result was not what they were hoping for.

Many pharmaceutical companies invest billions or even tens of billions in drug research. Scholars have spent decades trying, right until their hair turned grey, only to fail during their clinical trials.

Therefore, every drug researcher is a strong man who has experienced many battles, repeated defeats and never-ending setbacks.

These questions from Teacher System were not difficult!

Scholar-Tryant Song expressed no fear! He will definitely find the correct answer and live up to the teacher's expectations of him!

Song Qingshi thought about the information he was given, determined the goal of the protagonist, and then quickly understood the key points of the novel: the protagonist will appear at the Banquet of Beauties, it will be a male, homosexual, unmatched beauty, superb body; a pitiful character with a tragic fate. He needs to save the protagonist, give him the greatest care, heal his physical and mental health, and then help him find happiness and joy!

During Song Qingshi's time, respect for sexual orientation was written into the law, and same-sex couples could get married.

He once found a novel lost by a rotten girl classmate, titled "His Evil Majesty's Spoiled Husband". On the cover was a handsome and domineering man in a period costume holding a beautiful woman with long hair with a super flat chest. He didn't understand it, and returned the book. When he asked curiously, his classmates told him what Danmei was, and told him that the beauty on the cover was actually male. The beautiful male was the "shou", and the domineering one was the "gong". So Song Qingshi is confident that he would easily distinguish between the gong and the shou in the novel. He would never mistake the gong as the protagonist.

He had thought it through and the direction of problem-solving has been determined. All that was left was to wait for the Banquet of Beauties to start the exam.

Song Qingshi's spiritual sea gradually became clear. The soul and body were merged and became flexible. He sat up with his hands cautiously, took off his shoes, raised his feet, and tried to stretch the toes that had been stiff for many years. The white and round toes curled happily. Song Qingshi stood up shakily, briefly walking forward a few steps with hands and feet before finally remembered the walking posture of a normal person, and his movements gradually changed from jerky to steady. . .

Under his feet was soft green grass and moist soil.

Outside the forest was a calm river. Song Qingshi stepped into the water and took a handful of cold river water to wash his face, confirming that he was not in a dream.

Tears fell out of extreme joy, and the big tears fell onto his palms. His hands couldn't stop no matter how much he tried. The river calmed down from the slight disturbance, and the reflection of the boy's figure appeared.

Song Qingshi was surprised to find that the body given to him by the system was very similar to his high school appearance; he was not very tall and significantly thinner. He wore a Daoist cultivator outfit made of many layers of snow-coloured cloud brocade, wrapped tightly around his body. At first glance, all the layers of clothing gave the illusion of a frail man.

His thin hair was simply tied up with some loose hair dangling freely. His appearance may be related to immortal cultivation. He is a bit more refined than his original body, with a cold, pale complexion and clear eyes. Because he often blocks out the world and focuses on his study, he feels a bit dull and extremely gullible, leading many unlucky ghosts to think that the original was harmless and would become the fertilizer or poison tester.

. . .

After Song Qingshi vented his emotions and saw the red-rimmed eyes in the reflection, he was a little embarrassed. He hurriedly lowered his head and fetched water, trying to wash away the tears on his face, but behind him came the sound of fine bells and ridicule.

"It's useless to commit suicide. It will only cause you needless pain. If you are still not reconciled, you can try and sink slowly to see if you can succeed."

Surprised, Song Qingshi turned around and saw the most beautiful thing he'd seen in his life.

There were trees full of peach blossoms, and under the tree was a beautiful young boy in red. Who knows how long he was watching Song Qingshi stupidly crying. The young man's appearance was blooming, like a scroll of rich colours and ink, painted with all the romantic colours of the world. The warm jade-like skin, the most beautiful thing about him were the dark golden phoenix eyes under the crow-feather-like eyelashes. He resembled a noble and dignified phoenix in the sky, but there was an extremely gorgeous red tear-shared mole under the corner of his left eye, desecrating his nobleness. The dignity of his appearance was crushed, and the phoenix rejoined the mortal world, turning into a creature stained with flattery and seductiveness which made people feel unbearable tempted.

His long hair was untied and hung casually around his waist. The ends of his hair were slightly curled, his feet were bare, and he was only wearing a red dress made of shark silk. The shark silk was as smooth as water, clinging to his body, covering all the desirables underneath.

Song Qingshi did not think anything blasphemous, but because he was caught crying, his social anxiety became more intense. After a long pause of building courage, he stumbled and said: "I, I just..."

His hesitation became reluctant approval in the eyes of the beauty in red.

There are dangerous monsters and birds everywhere in the immortal world. Cultivators were equipped with spiritual auras and keen senses, and can easily detect the wind and grass around them. Even the minor cultivators in the time they were establishing their cultivation base would not miss the sound of mortal footsteps with bells, let alone the Nascent Soul cultivators. If they release their spiritual thoughts, the smallest creatures on the mountain would not escape their attention. Except for Song Qingshi, a newly-born soul who had just arrived in this world, and was still very unused to spiritual power and these world conditions. . .

The beauty in red had completely misunderstood, thinking that Song Qingshi was also a mortal. There was only one use for such a beautiful mortal in Golden Phoenix Manor. He clarified: "A new slave?"

Song Qingshi looked up in amazement. He wanted to ask questions, but his eyes fell on the beauty of the red dress. There seemed to be some strange bruises on his neck as if it had been bitten by a mosquito, but it seemed that it might be something else. He took a few more secretive glances, trying to determine what they were.

The beauty in red noticed his curious glances and his heart grew upset. With growing malicious intent, a very gentle smile appeared on his face, and he said in a sincerely blessed tone: "Don't stare, you will have them soon, too."

Song Qingshi was very sheltered before transmigrating. He had never encountered malice and did not understand the mystery behind these words. Although he thought this blessing was a bit strange, he still answered politely: "Thank you."

The beauty in red choked hearing this answer. He was stunned for a moment. He looked at Song Qingshi up and down like a fool, and found that the person in front of him was clean and his skin was free of any injuries. He had never experienced the ravages of hell in his eyes. He was pure.

This discovery made him feel pity for the heart that had been tempered by suffering. He retracted his sharp malice and said softly, "After tonight, you will know that death is a luxury." He turned slightly to his side, looking at the river's flow. He warned, "When I first came here, I tried to commit suicide many times, but it was useless. We are slaves who are branded with the Acacia Seal. Our spirits belong to our master. So long as the master doesn't allow it, we cannot die, even by our own hands. . .

The beauty in red was silent for a long time. He slowly stretched out his hand and stroked Song Qing's hair that was soft as the fur of a small animal.

Song Qingshi saw several red rope marks on his pale wrists. He realized that this was pain that the beauty wouldn't want to be questioned about, so he pushed down his curiosity.

The fingertips of the red-dressed beauty slipped from his hair to Song Qingshi's delicate face, watching his innocent expression. He held his hand there for a moment before putting it down, conflicted. He didn't want to say any more. Since he didn't know those nightmarish experiences, it was useless to say anything more. Being able to preserve this kind of innocence, it was one more moment of happiness for him. Finally, he sighed, "You look good, but unfortunately the more your looks improve as you grow, the longer it will be until you're freed. . ."

Song Qingshi was puzzled: "What do you mean by 'freed'?"

"You'll know soon." The beauty in red's expression suddenly relaxed. He glanced around carefully, then stretched out his index finger and tapped his lips lightly. With a voice so light that he could barely hear it, he said ambiguously, "Tonight I will be freed. . ."

The beauty in red turned around with a smile and, with a crisp ring of the bells, turned to leave. His steps were a bit unstable, and each step was strenuous, like a mermaid walking on the tip of a knife in pain.

A pair of exquisite gold shackles were exposed on the beauty's ankles under the red clothes. Each of the shackles was decorated with an exquisite bell. The middle was connected by a slender golden chain. When walking, the bell shook slightly and made a clear and sweet sound, just like a tethered bird.

The golden chain dragged across the grass, and a few drops of blood dropped onto the green leaves.

Song Qingshi mustered up the courage to overcome his social anxiety, and shouted to the beauty who was about to leave: "Are you. . .injured? I, I know medical skills. . . Do you need me to treat you?"

The beauty in red turned back, looked at him for a few seconds, and he couldn't help but smile. This time the smile finally reached his eyes, like a ray of golden sunlight breaking through the clouds, dazzlingly beautiful. He shook his head towards Song Qingshi, and gave himself a sincere blessing: "I hope you have better luck tonight."

He turned his head, and the sunlight in his eyes disappeared in a flash, as if it had never existed, only the dark clouds that would not retreat.

Having endured these nightmares for years, he has long learned not to remember the kindness of others, and not to care about being offered charity from others.

He walked alone in this prison without stopping, step after step, wearing those painful shackles.