#because it feels like everyone is either homophobic and triggering already in a relationship in another country or we just aren’t each

[the-sappho-of-lesbos]

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[confirmeddead]

Hello!

I very much enjoyed reading your theories about Devil’s Minion so if you don’t mind I’ll add some thoughts? Would love to hear what you think! I’ve found some hints online - so there might be spoilers so feel free to skip obviously if you’d prefer!

1. I agree that if Daniel is turned it’s going to be Armand who does it. Nothing else really makes sense to me, especially since the show has emphasized the maker-fledgling bound to such an extent. Armand’s possessive tendencies have also revealed themselves already. If Armand wants Daniel to be turned, I don’t think he would feel comfortable having anyone else do it.

2. I don’t believe Daniel will be turned this season. Listening to EB on a podcast recently he made a comment, following explaining how wanting to play a vampire basically lead him to the show, about how on these shows almost everyone who is around vampires gets turned in the end. Which is true, but more importantly this kind of speculation and the way EB spoke about it made it sound like this hasn’t happened to Daniel yet. That he doesn’t actually know if and when Daniel is getting turned.

3. I do think however that Daniel might be bitten. Can’t really justify it, but I feel like something will happen to Daniel in the finale. Might be bitten by a vampire, maybe by Armand - maybe this triggers some more memories. Thus far Daniel’s memories have been triggered by similar noises/actions. In episode two when Louis started recounting the facts of a “shameful” memory this triggers Armand doing the same in San Francisco. In episode four Armand leaning forward and the noises of Louis slamming the binders of photos on the floor seem to heighten his memory of Armand walking around in that room/leaning towards him etc. I’ve seen some speculation about a medical event happening, but I’m unsure. I just feel something will happen…

4. When asked in an interview with the Nerdist EB replied when asked if viewers will see anything of Daniel and Armand’s complex relationship this season: ”We’re going to have to leave that to your imagination because there is a lot coming. But I guarantee there will be some cool stuff happening by the end of the second season”. And: “But, it’s also going to be heavy. There’s going to be a lot of heaviness.” This could just be the trauma and torture of episode five but I would say it seems to hint that something will happen in the season finale between them - or something will be revealed. The romantic in me think it’s revealed that they were in love, that some of Daniel’s memories of Armand has been mixed up with Alice and that the feeling freer in Paris thing might be about Daniel’s internalized homophobia. He felt freer in Paris because either it was long away from home (so no one would know him) or because Paris was less homophobic (not sure if accurate though). And Armand might have had someone who saw him at his worst but still loved him, i.e someone who loved and accepted him fully. The heaviness could then be the separation, be it due to Daniel’s addiction, want to be immortal, Armand believing him to be better off living a full life - or something completely different. All of this does however sound a little to wholesome in a way for iwtv tbh. So to adjust expectations, the comments could very well just be about Daniel’s trauma in episode five.

What do you think? Also, if you would speculate where do you think the show is going next with the DM relationship? What would you like to see? Thank you!

Hi! Thanks so much for sending your thoughts. Let’s discuss!

1. Yes! I think the majority know this will stay the same. They haven’t changed anyone’s maker as of yet so why start now?

2. No, he won’t be turned. I’ll reference Rolin’s words from last week when answering a question at the Texas panel. It seems a lot of stuff is up in the air regarding DM and he exasperated the point that it’s three books ahead. So, in saying this, we know he wants to do TVL for season 3 meaning QotD would be season 4 (possibly). Of course they could change things but I think he wanted to really drive home the point that they have a lot to do to get to the point of Daniel being turned.

3. Going back to one of my theories, I do think Daniel’s SF memories will be a big trigger for Louis. Learning the extent of what happened might really upset him (whether it was his attack on Daniel or what Armand proceeded to do). As for the sounds triggering memories, this is a great point! And it seemed every glance at Armand triggered Daniel’s memories.

So about the medical event… I’ve seen people theorize Louis will attack Daniel. I genuinely don’t think this will happen but if Daniel were to be hurt (book falling scene in trailers), I could see either Vampire rushing to his aid. I’d say only Armand would but I think Louis cares for him enough to help him.

4. Okay, so when I hear heaviness I hear trauma, I hear broken hearts, I hear a LOT. I think a lot of Daniel’s trauma will be addressed next episode or even episode 6, so what is left for the final two episodes? Revelations. The interview is ending, Armand and Louis’ relationship is probably ending, but the rest is kind of… unknown. The trial is happening episode 7 and the secrecy of the title of episode 8 and what even happens has my brain scrambled. The “surprise character” Rolin (?) mentioned appears at the end of the season is likely Lestat or someone else entirely.

So what’s left regarding Armand and Daniel? I think a lot of people want to see Armand as controlling and straight up evil, but in the books HE left Louis. He left Louis because his (Louis) passion for anything was gone and Armand knew there was nothing he could do to fix that and it was dead in the water. Who is there to turn to? The flame whose memories you erased? I could see Daniel comforting him and so begins the chase (again).

Of course that last part is just a theory but I think this is the “end of the season” event that might happen. Daniel is a different person now. The internalized homophobia of his youth is gone. He’s an old man with all the triggers that come with it. He’s twice divorced and an empty nester. What’s there to lose? I always go back to the first scene of Daniel and how bored and over it he was with his life.

[hellomynameisbisexual]

“QUEER”

First of all, let’s clear up a common misconception. Queer does not just mean gay. It’s an umbrella term for an identity which deviates from society’s perceived norm: heterosexual, or straight. Queer can refer to sexualities — gay, bisexual, pansexual, — or it can refer to being gender-queer; i.e, any label that deviates from the perceived gender norm: the binaries, male and female.

“Queer” is a reclaimed slur.

If you do not fall under the umbrella of queerness, it is safe to assume that you cannot use it. At all.

I am bisexual.

This means I experience attraction to plural genders. Pansexual also works fine. For the difference between bisexual and pansexual — see here:

Being bisexual isn’t easy. I went through similar hardships to gay women: I experienced attraction to women and was scared of what this meant for me, in such an oppressively homophobic society.

I am not saying being bisexual is harder than being gay, nor the inverse. But my experiences are distinctly bisexual, not gay.

Without further ado, here are the 3 things I’ve found to be the hardest about being queer, but not gay (enough).

#1: Finding My Place

Or, not being queer enough

I always knew I wasn’t straight, but I didn’t know what I was. Up until recently, I was still questioning. This didn’t feel enough to join groups or conversations with LGBT+ folk, let alone go to pride. Was I even LGBT if I was never L, G, B, or T?

I am still yet to attend a pride, even though I identify (fairly confidently) as bisexual. I am in a relationship with a man. This is (problematically) known as a “straight-passing relationship” and makes me feel even more undeserving of a place at pride.

This has been upsetting to me at times. But for others, it can be outright devastating. Growing up and needing support, but feeling like you’re ‘not gay enough’ to ask for it? So many young people are being left alone and afraid. Finding others like you is vital to figuring out who you are. Likewise, finding spaces which are safe and inclusive is vital for anyone, regardless of their sexuality or gender identity. A friend of mine happens to be a transgender man, and he summed up the issue perfectly:

“One thing that I keep noticing is how all hangout spots are “gay bars”, or (far less common) “lesbian bars”. I’m a straight man, so I don’t feel like I’m supposed to be there, but hanging out at regular bars is still too much of a gamble, so I don’t really have anywhere to go.”

It goes without saying that gay folk aren’t always safe in these spaces, as seen by the homophobic attack on the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, in 2016. Bigotry hurts the entire LGBT+ community. Bigotry doesn’t stop to ask whether you identify as gay or otherwise queer before it pulls the trigger.

But the LGBT+ community itself is much more welcoming to those who “pick a side” and just come out as gay, already. The infighting is inexplicable when one looks to attacks such as that in Orlando: bigots don’t care which letter you are in the acronym. So why does gatekeeping exist when we need to be strong in the face of intolerance when fragmentation only makes us weaker? Who are we helping by continuing to exclude identities from the discussion?

#2: Myths and Misconceptions

Well, it stands to reason that if bisexuals are what they seem in TV and movies, why would anyone want to make them feel included? They’re “greedy” and inauthentic. They’re attention-seeking, not to mention their propensity for threesomes. Now, I haven’t been in a wild orgy yet, but it seems like it will only be a matter of time before I follow my natural path.

Straight men, in particular, need to own up to their assumption that bisexual women are down for a threesome. The thing is, we are. But not with you, you big ASSUMER.

Infidelity

All jokes aside, the stereotyping of bisexuals is not only hurtful, but leads to difficulties finding and maintaining relationships.

As I came to terms with my bisexuality, I also had to accept that I might never be fully trusted by my partner, regardless of their gender or sexuality. I was shocked when my partner reacted to my coming out with the equivalent of a shrug — so much so, that I burst into tears of gratitude that my soul-bearing moment hadn’t been met with slut-shaming or assumptions of disloyalty. Nothing has changed. If anything, our bond is even stronger for me having been more authentic after coming out.

But cruelty came from elsewhere: when I came out, I was told that my partner was to be pitied, either because I’m gay and in denial, or bound to cheat on him. The main consequence of such attitudes has been the crippling fear of coming out to my partner. It saddens me that I felt so relieved when he accepted me for being who I am, and loving him just the same as I always have.

This outcome is not the case for many couples, with straight folk worried that their bisexual partner will realise they’re gay and just leave them. This fear of abandonment comes from a place of ignorance. When the media presents bisexuality as a steppingstone on the way to “picking a team”, it’s no wonder that people struggle to trust their queer partners.

Other Queer Myths

The myth that all trans folk medically transition invalidates those who choose not to do so, and let’s not forget the ignorant jeers that it's all just a mental illness. Asexual folk battle the stereotype that they can never have a relationship and shall forever remain a virgin (because what an awful thing that would be, right?) And pansexuals… well, at the lighter end, they’re asked if they have sex with cooking utensils. But often, they’re erased as irrelevant because “we already have the label bisexual”.

This brings us onto the third and final difficulty that comes with queer folk who aren’t easily categorizable as gay: erasure.

#3: Erasure

Erasure refers to the denial of an identity’s existence or its validity as a label.

Non-binary folk face ongoing and loud claims that they simply do not exist. This is despite the historical and scientific evidence to the contrary. Plus, the most important evidence — them, existing. Asexual folk are told they simply have not found the right person yet, or that they are just afraid of sex. Demi-sexual folk are told “everyone feels like that, unless they’re just sleeping around!”. And bisexuals are dismissed as simply being in denial that they’re gay.

Monosexuality & The Gender Binary

Our culture is so built on monosexuality (being solely attracted to one gender — for instance, gay or straight). Monosexuality is reinforced through everything from marriage to dating apps, the media to what we teach in schools. People cannot fathom that someone might want to experience more than one gender in their lifetime.

The binary models of sex and gender are also deeply ingrained. These rigid belief systems combined are to blame for our inability to accept that bisexuals do not need to “pick a side”. I was paralysed by fear for 17 years because I found girls attractive and that might mean I’m gay, because bisexuals are just gays who haven’t realised they’re gay yet.

Bierasure

Bierasure is dangerous, firstly because it leads a child to have to internalise both biphobia and homophobia. For instance, I had to work through being taught to hate gayness, whilst being taught that any attraction to non-male genders made me gay.

Women were cute, and so I was gay, and this meant I was disgusting.

My own mother told me this. She also told me that something has “gone wrong in the womb” for a child to be gay. (Well, Mum, I’ve got some bad news about your womb!)And she, like any bigot, extended this theory to anyone who experiences same-sex attractions — anyone queer. This is another reason why bi-erasure is perilous. Whether you’re a gay, cis-male or a demi-bisexual, trans woman… if your parents will kick you out for being gay, they will likely kick you out for being any sort of queer.

If we deny the bigotry that bisexuals undergo, we will continue to suffer. It won’t just go away. It will fester, with bisexuals having no one they can go to who believes them. And thus:

Erasure Kills

Bullying and suicide rates of queer-but-not-gay people continue to sky-rocket. We must direct funding, support and compassion to every queer individual, as they are all vulnerable to discrimination and bullying. The problem is being left to fester. This is in part because bigots treat all queer labels as just ‘gay’, deeming them equally unworthy. This is how far erasure can go.

Conclusion

Earlier on, I stated that my experiences are distinctly bisexual. The same applies to any queer identity.

Emphasising our differing paths and struggles is important to avoid the aforementioned erasure of already less visible groups. But this does not mean that the LGBT+ community should be fragmented by these differences.

If we can unite in our hope to live authentically and love freely, we will be stronger against bigotry. We are fighting enough intolerance from without: there is no need to create more from within.

So out of everything, what’s the hardest part about being bisexual?

It’s the fact that nobody knows it’s this hard.

[pan-fangirl-345]

I'm Coming For All His Monsters

Summary: Shinso Hitoshi is determined not to make friends, but you and your friends have different plans, though Mineta seems hellbent on being the worst person in the world.

TW: panic attacks, abuse, homophobia, transphobia, discrimination, Mineta being involved in the last three, Mineta is a general trigger warning because I think the fandom collectively hates him, and I think that's it, but if I missed anything please contact me! I don't want anyone to be uncomfortable or regret clicking on one of my posts by accident!

A/N: Please for the love of all things holy, read the trigger warnings! Sorry I've been so inactive lately, I've been busier than I thought I was going to be! I'll start posting more in the following weeks hopefully!

Mineta was despised by everyone on the U.A. campus. It was a simple fact that was known by anyone who met the short perverted grape rat.

He made the girls feel like objects, and like they had to look over their shoulders every time he walked into a room.

The guys hated him for his disgusting personality and- for most of the boys in 1-A- his homophobic comments.

Mineta was the embodiment of what everyone hated in the world.

"Mineta," you warned, feeling his eyes on you as you strolled into the common room, "if you touch me, I will break your arms, do you understand me?"

Nobody was spared, whether they were female or not.

If it had boobs, Mineta was groping them, even if they were already in a relationship with someone.

Sero and Iida, along with Tokoyami and Shoji, took the brunt of the homophobic slurs (since Mineta had said something to Katsuki, who put him into the hands of Recovery Girl when he said something during training and Shouto had left him frozen for four hours in the woods after Mineta made Izuku cry).

Kaminari was spared some comments, because he played along with Mineta sometimes, and had yet to come out to that one student about being trans (everyone in 1-A had assured Denki that he didn't owe the grape rat anything, and he only had to tell the people he felt comfortable telling).

The newest victim of Mineta, was Shinso Hitoshi, the newest addition to class 1-B (and hopeful Mineta replacement).

Not only was Mineta a perv, homophobic, and transphobic, he was also a huge quirkest.

Hitoshi, after making friends with Denki and Izuku, had been spending a lot of time in the dorms.

You had been fast friends with him also, being an honorary member of the Bakusquad on account of being Eijirou's twin sister and Denki's best female friend.

For the first week or two that you had known Hitoshi, you had been worried that you made him uncomfortable.

Every time you walked into a room, he disappeared, and every time you tried to talk to him, he had avoided eye contact and bolted as soon as he could.

Until one night, when you had gone down to the common room after a nightmare, you had found him on the couch, staring a hole in the wall like it had personally offended him.

"Hey Shinso-san," you murmured, trying to announce your presence to him, but also trying not to wake anyone else up.

You saw no reaction, and called his name again, moving into his line of vision.

He tensed, and winced, at your arrival, and it made you frown.

"Why are you up?" you asked softly.

"Haven't you heard?" he replied playfully. "I'm an insomniac."

"Not after the training we had today you shouldn't be," you told him. "Everyone was so exhausted, short of the building collapsing, I don't think anyone's waking up for a while."

"You're up," he pointed out.

"I guess I'm just built different," you mused, and he chuckled, which made you smile.

"You spend too much time with Kaminari," he said.

You shrugged, sipping your water before you said, "I'm sorry. If I've made you uncomfortable, that was never my intention. I just wanted to be your friend."

Shinso tensed, glancing away from you before he pulled his legs up onto the couch, burying his face in them for a few moments before he reappeared.

"I'm sorry for making you think that you made me uncomfortable. You aren't doing that," he informed you. "I'm just . . . not used to a girl that gives me physical affection so easily. You aren't afraid of me, it's just taking some getting used to."

"Huh?" you asked, sitting on the far end of the couch, just to make sure that he had enough space. You had started to notice that he flinched when you got too close. You had an inkling about why, but you didn't want to assume anything and be wrong about it.

"I . . . I don't know how much Kaminari has told you about how I grew up-"

"Nothing," you interrupted. "Denki doesn't talk about stuff like that, especially if you've asked him not to. He might be dumb sometimes, but he's loyal."

Shinso nodded, stewing for a few quiet minutes before he said, "I wasn't raised in the most . . . stable household ever."

So you were right about your hunch then.

"Did they . . . you don't have to answer this if it makes you uncomfortable, but did they hurt you?" you asked softly.

"I don't remember much about my life before my quirk appeared- just flashes here and there- but they weren't the best parents in the world."

"So that's why you flinch whenever I touch you," you murmured. "I'm so sorry. I should've stopped sooner. I figured that might be the case, but I wasn't sure."

"You don't have to apologize," he said, glancing at you. "I don't mind- when you touch me I mean- it just jumps me when it happens unexpectedly. Especially when people come up behind me."

You nodded, scooting a little closer, turning to face him completely.

"Still, I'm sorry. I know Denki and I are tactile people, and sometimes we do it without thinking, since most of our friends and classmates respond well to it. I should have noticed when you didn't."

"I don't mind when you or Kaminari touch me," he said. "I flinch because it's a natural reaction for me. I really don't mind you or Kaminari touching me. It's pretty much everyone else that's the problem."

"And yet you still kick ass in combat training," you praised, trying to lighten the mood.

Shinso had given you a small smile and a breathy laugh, and you had smiled back at him.

"I'm sorry, I never meant to make you feel like you made me uncomfortable, it's just that girls aren't really my forte. Not like Kaminari anyway."

"Kaminari can dish it out, but he can't take it. And besides, this might be just me, but that kind of flirting doesn't work. Too overused. And the way he says it, well-" you made a face and Shinso laughed. "Thank you for telling me, by the way, about your family. It means a lot to me that you trust me enough to tell me."

Shinso nodded, glancing at you.

You couldn't tell in the dark, but you were pretty sure he was blushing.

"So, Shinso-san, what do you say?" you asked, slowly reaching out a hand to him in what you hoped was a non-threatening way. "Wanna be friends?"

He nodded, taking the hand that you held out to him.

That had been the start of your friendship with Hitoshi, but as the months passed, you had realized that you feelings for the insomniac weren't entirely platonic.

But you weren't sure how Shinso felt about dating, and you sure as hell weren't sure how he felt about dating you, so you ignored them as best you could for the time being.

But then Mineta made a dumb move.

It was an unspoken rule that when one of the squads, either the Bakusquad or the Izucrew, was having movie night or a hangout in the common room, Mineta stayed in his room.

But he had come down to the kitchen to get something just in time to see you hug Shinso in welcome.

"Ugh, it's bad enough that he's interacting with us," Mineta groused, drawing attention. "But you guys have to make it worse by letting him into our dorms?"

"Shut up Mineta," you growled. "I would choose Hitoshi to hang out with 100 times out of 10 instead of you. Go be an ass in your room or better yet, throw yourself out the window."

"At least put this on him," Mineta said, tossing something to Shinso.

He frowned as he tried to figure out what the item is.

You saw him tense as he realized that it was a gag.

You saw red, zeroing in on Mineta as Shinso tensed behind you.

"You slimy son of a bitch," you whispered, hands clenching so hard your fingernails bit into your skin.

Mineta tensed, clearly sensing your rage, and he tensed even further as you slowly raised your hand and pointed it at him.

He goes pale as your quirk takes affect.

Sweat beads on his forehead, and then he started to scream.

Everyone had agreed, silently of course so that Katsuki didn't get offended, that your quirk was the most terrifying.

Being able to dig through someone's mind and implant something close to their greatest fear was something the others had been wary of before they had met you.

You usually hated using your quirk on people, but Mineta was an exception.

Ignoring the sounds of Mineta screaming, you turned your attention back to Hitoshi, who is still staring down at the gag, his hands shaking slightly.

"Hitoshi," you murmured, moving so that he can see you.

You take the gag from his hands, careful not to touch him, handing it to Katsuki, who lights it up like a dry piece of paper.

"Hitoshi," you murmured again. "I need you to blink if you can hear me."

He blinked hard, and he turned his gaze onto you, though it was glassy and terrified.

"Hitoshi, blink if you can talk," you suggested, keeping your voice level, ignoring how Mineta goes quiet in the background.

Hitoshi blinks again.

"What do you need from me?" you asked softly.

The others were clearing out, giving you space, though Denki lingered, ready to jump in too.

"Talk to me," he gasped.

"What do you want me to talk about?" you asked. "I can tell you about my day, or I can tell you about the plot of the last book I read."

"Just talk to me," he gasped.

"Alright Hitoshi," you murmured, releasing your hold on Mineta.

Denki picked the grape rat up by the color of his shirt, leaving the room once he was certain that you had the situation under control.

"Can I touch you?"

Hitoshi thought for a moment before nodding, and you slowly reached out to take his hands, linking your fingers together.

"Okay, you know how I get when I read, so you can imagine how pissed I was when my favorite character was killed off. I mean, I cried, obviously, but I was so pissed! I wanted him to live! So far he's the only good male character! He actually reminds me of you. He's got that 'too cool for you' attitude, but he really is such a sweetheart. I love him, he's such a good character too. Seriously, if he managed to fall into our world and asked me out, I would totally say yes."

Hitoshi laughed tensely, and you ran your thumbs over his knuckles in soothing circles, settling him down on the couch, turning to face him, your hands still holding his.

You attempt to pull them away once, but he tightens his grip and you adjust your grip on his hands.

"Anyway," you continued, spewing about your latest reading spree, holding Hitoshi's hands in yours, sometimes pausing to make sure that he was still okay.

Eventually his shoulders relax and he tips forward into your lap.

"I'm sorry," he murmured, turning his face away from you.

"It's okay Hitoshi," you told him, laying a hand on his shoulder, taking your hand back. "The only person who should be apologizing is Mineta. I can't believe he did that. I knew he was a bastard, but this is a whole new level."

"I never wanted you to see that side of me," he whispered.

"Hitoshi," you said, you tone making him turn to look up at you. "I don't think any less of you because of this. I don't understand everything that you went through, and I don't know your exact experience, but I do understand the feeling. If something ever triggers you like that again I need you to tell me or one of our friends, maybe find a way to remove yourself, alright?"

He nodded, looking a little relieved.

"Hitoshi, do you need to talk about it? You don't have to," you assured him, "but . . . I just want to make sure that you're okay. I have a hunch, but I'm really hoping I'm wrong."

"You probably aren't," he murmured. "My father used to gag me whenever I tried to use my quirk to stop him from hitting me."

"Oh Hitoshi," you whispered, reaching out to touch his face before you remembered and pulled back.

He sat up again, took your hands, and placed them on his face, leaning into them, a small smile spreading across his lips as your thumb caressed across his cheeks.

"You don't have to pity me," he whispered.

"Hitoshi, this isn't pity," you told him, feeling your throat close at the torrent of horrors that flashed through your mind when you thought about what he had gone through. "Yes, I'm sorry that you went through that, and I'm sorry that you didn't have the family that you deserved until later in life, but I know that it helped shape who you are. And I love who you are, okay? If I could go back in time, I would become friends with you sooner so that I could give you all the hugs and safety you needed and deserved, but unfortunately, that's not my quirk. For now, I can try to make up for all the affection that you missed out on as a younger child, and be one of the people that you can count on, even when it's three A.M. and we should both be sleeping."

You leaned your forehead against his, content to just exist in the same space as he was, breathing the same air, hoping that he understood what you were trying to say.

He shuddered under your hands as your words sunk in, but you could tell that this wasn't a bad shudder, and you pressed your hands into his cheeks a little harder so that he knew you weren't going anywhere, but not enough to hurt.

"Are you okay?" you asked softly, opening your eyes to see him already looking at you with those beautiful eyes of his that were too old for the age of his body.

"I think so," he murmured. "Thank you, for sticking up for me."

"Always," you told him fiercely. "No one does something like that to my family. Ever. Especially not him. Do you want me to do anything else? I will break his arms."

Hitoshi shook his head, holding your hands against his face, leaning into their warmth, making your heart melt.

"Will you stay with me?" he asked softly, like he was scared of making you uncomfortable.

"Always, for as long as you need me to," you promised vehemently, kissing the tip of his nose.

As Hitoshi slept on your chest that night, your hands threaded through his hair as you ran your hands through it, you made a promise to yourself.

I'm coming for all the monsters that ever touched him. I'm coming for all the ones who twisted his stars and light into shadows. They tried to turn him into a nightmare, so I am going to be theirs.

[mishhasgrace]

Let’s Talk

Okay..... I feel like it’s my job to set the record straight (it’s not, but I’m gonna do it anyway), so strap in I guess. (I know that we don’t talk about the finale any more but I have to get it out of my system so!)

To anyone..... ANYONE that still thinks that Cas’ confession in 15x18 Despair is anything other than an explicitly romantic confession (all those people that are saying Cas confessed his love for Dean as a brother, as a best friend; I’m looking at you), fuck you and your homophobic heteronormative bullshit.

Time to set the record straight (or gay, heh.)

First, I just need to say that Misha Collins, after the episode aired, on a panel with Richard Speight Jr. (who directed that episode), as well as Mark Sheppard, Ruth Connell and some others, said, and I quote “Castiel tells Dean he loves him and, like, basically makes Destiel canon.” Him saying this means that that’s how he acted the scene. That is how he portrayed the dialogue for the confession. Richard, who, once again, directed that episode, was in that Zoom call, and as the director, he didn’t say anything contradicting that or going against what Misha said either.

Before I go in with dissecting that scene, which I, as well as I’m sure a billion people did, let’s jump back for a second to episode 12x12 Stuck In The Middle With You

Now, in this episode, Castiel thought he was about to die, and in what he thought were his last moments, told Dean, Sam, and Mary that they were family and that he loved them, all of them. This. This was an act of familial love. This was the “we’re family. I love you” that y’all apparently THINK the despair scene was about. The tone for this scene in 12x12 is SO SO different than in 15x18 it’s not even close. So if you’re so desperate for a familial “brotherly love” confession, watch 12x12, you won’t be disappointed.

Okay now that that’s out of the way, let’s move on with taking about the actual scene. My point with reminding everyone about 12x12 is simply because why would Cas’ confession in 15x18 be familial if he already said his familial love piece three years prior. Dean already knows that. That’s not much of a confession if it’s things he already knows...

Okay time for dissection! I’m not going to copy and paste Cas’ confession, bc we’ve all heard it so if you don’t know the specifics of what I’m quoting, it’s on YouTube.

In the beginning of the confession, before Cas goes on about how everything Dean does is for love, Castiel contemplates what he could’ve done to trigger the Empty, when he knows that the one thing he wants is something he knows he can’t have. Now, we’ve heard something akin to this before in the show (6x14 with Lisa, 14x10 with Pamela) both in regards to Dean and both with a meaning of romantic or amorous intent.

Castiel then remarks that happiness is not in the having, it’s in the being. It’s in just saying it. And what does he say? A three minute blurb about why Dean does everything for love. How Dean changed Castiel. How because Dean cared about everyone and the world, so did Cas.

How Cas Loves Him.

Now. All this build up. All this talking. All of this confessing. It’s a love confession. A romantic love confession. Castiel is saying that he is in love with this man, this man who made him care so much when it went against every single ounce of programming. Castiel, who in his last moments alive, sacrificed himself to save the man he loves. Because when you love someone so deeply, you’re willing to do anything for them. Even if that means giving your happiness for them.

Castiel is in love with Dean Winchester.

Now this post is already long as fuck (I apologize) so I’m not going to go into the implications of this approaching the finale, or how the finale was hot garbage because it threw away the most meaningful and psychologically complex relationship and characters in television history, or Dean’s reciprocation, but if y’all want me to make a part two I gladly will.

And to those naysayers that I addressed in the beginning of this very long post: if by this point you’re reading and you still don’t think that Castiel’s confession was written, acted and directed as a confession with romantic intent, you are beyond help and I truly truly am sorry. Maybe rewatch the series and try to pay a little more attention to the Dean and Cas scenes and less attention to idk, Jared’s hair or whatever it is you were watching for the last 12 years.

Finally, to all you sexy heller bitches, I love you with my whole ass heart. You rock you funky little shippers.

And as always:

[uncurlinglikeflowers]

Queer Trauma, Coming Out, & the Long Road to Self-Love and Healing

As I’ve reflected on my past, I’ve discovered that my adolescence may be one of, if not THE most traumatic time of my life thus far as a queer person. The last few months with my incredible therapist have made me realize that the years of anxiety, panic, fear, self-loathing, confusion, and depression have scarred me deeper than I had previously thought. She also made me realize that this is at least partially because I have never really talked about it openly and in depth in a healthy and productive way before, which is what inspired me to start this blog to share my experiences with others that are currently struggling with their identity, or to allow those that are also currently healing from the trauma of their previously closeted life feel a little more seen.

I knew from a VERY young age that I was different, but didn’t know how or what it meant. I was a lonely kid for a lot of my childhood without many friends. I didn’t want to play football with the boys during recess. I sought companionship at lunch with a table full of girls more often than not, which in itself also made me feel incredibly self conscious at the time as well. 

I asked, (with incredible shame) for the “girl’s toy” from the backseat in the McDonald’s drive-thru because I loved to play with the mini-Barbies and craft entire storylines for them. They were easier to hide in my room than regular sized Barbies. I spent most summers off school alone playing video games and reading book and book after book. I didn’t really click with the boys down the street. I was obsessed with Britney Spears and the color purple. I was lonely without really knowing what it meant.

I feel as though that fear I felt in my childhood and adolescence held me back from SO much. Middle school in particular was absolute hell. I hated it. I always felt constantly insecure and uncomfortable. I had absolutely zero confidence or self love. I hated my body and how I looked. 

While other kids experienced their first relationships and first feelings of romantic love, I was convinced that it was just not a possibility for me. On top of being deeply closeted, scared, confused, lonely, and in deep denial, girls didn’t go for me anyway. I was the awkward chunky guy struggling with his identity feeling like he had to make up for it by working extra hard to get perfect grades and give himself 100% to other people. I tried not to think about it too much, but hearing about relationships, seeing people kiss in the hallways between classes, and girls talking about what they liked in boys which was the complete opposite of me... it was hell.

To make my self consciousness worse, I felt supremely uncomfortable in gym class and the boys’ locker room in particular. I was ashamed of my body and also self conscious for wanting to look at the other boys; terrified that they would catch on and beat me senseless. Hearing them consistently call each other f*g in a very VERY negative context drove me deep into the closet as the identity I already felt shame for was directly correlated with being a ridiculed outcast, and something that was inherently, disgustingly wrong and unacceptable. The worst insult teenage boys could deliver to each other in the safety of an unchaperoned locker room in a hick town often not kind to queer people or those that were different. I SO desperately wanted to fit in with the other boys instead of being any version of who I actually was.

Part of that façade of blending in with my hetero peers involved having a girlfriend for two months in 8th grade. We didn’t even kiss, let alone approach any sexual situations. I’m sure she had her suspicions. I was utterly obsessed with the concept of blending in by having a girlfriend like the other boys and just having someone special in my life, even if we really didn’t even do any couple things. 

Upon reflection, I don’t think the concept of ever being sexual with her ever crossed my mind in the slightest. Even the idea of kissing her scared the hell out of me, and not just from first kiss nerves. Deep down I knew it wasn’t right for me. Don’t EVER tell a kid they’re too young to know. Fast forward to modern times, my first kiss with a girl was with a close friend YEARS after I came out. Go figure. 

The idea of caring about and loving myself was non-existent at that time. It’s a very VERY new and ongoing journey for me. I didn’t really care about myself at all. I hadn’t learned how to. Mom was in and out of cancer treatments, and would later pass during my senior year of college and kick off my coming out process, but that’s a whole other post for another day. Spending pretty much my entire childhood watching mom deal with being sick, I didn’t want to cause my family any more discomfort. I was full of self loathing, fear, and confusion, but it seemed irrelevant and unimportant because I didn’t want to be a hindrance. 

Instead, I tried so desperately to be the perfect kid and son by befriending my teachers, being a model student, and joining band and a bunch of organizations to stay as busy as possible to stay distracted and impress everyone else.I didn’t love myself because I didn’t think I was allowed to or deserved to in my own head. While I did finally make more meaningful friends in high school, I continued to go through the motions to make my family proud to make up for the scared closeted kid who thought he had to make up for his queerness as though it were a shameful weakness, and it seemed to be the only thing that could possibly matter at the time.

Non-surprisingly, I never really knew any openly queer boys in grade school. It probably legitimately wasn’t all that safe to come out in that environment. I’ll never forget the two boys I saw holding hands in a Wal-Mart that absolutely shook up my entirely reality, because I had never seen romantic same-sex affection in person before. 

There was a lesbian couple at my school, but people said awful, degrading things about them behind their backs constantly and acted like they were the biggest freaks. Another boy in my grade in high school hadn’t come out yet officially but was very flamboyant, and thus was treated just as awful as the lesbian couple, if not worse. Other kids just regularly said despicable things about him without even knowing him at all. I even heard parents make blatantly homophobic jokes about him. 

His life had to have been hell, and as a fully out queer adult, I still regret not being able to stand up for him more. That definitely forced me deeper into the closet. He wasn’t even out but got talked about like he was some disgusting abomination. How could I ever assume that I could ever come out, let alone kiss, date, and love another boy? I HATED the idea of any attention being placed on me, so I just wanted to survive school at that point.

I had multiple people throughout high school ask me if I were gay just as though it were the most casual question rather than a triggering inquiry that sent me into a mental frenzy every damn time it was presented. Having one of the jock boys ask me such a deeply personal question in passing on the way to my seat in Algebra class was traumatizing. I of course always said no, as at the time I was still convinced it was a passing phase and that I couldn’t actually be gay. 

At home, in the days of Myspace, I got anonymous messages telling me they were pretty sure I was gay. The anonymity was arguably worse in some ways. 

At a young age, I became hyper aware of how I carried myself, talked, and acted. I loathed hearing my voice or seeing myself in pictures, for fear of sounding too feminine or standing or emoting too gay. I obsessed over the concept that boys and girls carried their books a certain way, or the boys would be labelled as queer. I was paranoid about where I shopped for clothes, the colors I wore, and the length and fit of my shorts. 

In middle school, I got a lilac colored trapper keeper for school that I ultimately had my parents take back to the store for a different one because I felt so self conscious about it all day. At home I played with my little Barbies, but didn’t dare tell the kids at school for fear of rejection and isolation. Overall, I felt grossly incompetent, irrelevant, and unimportant in my own mind. Unworthy of love and of course, deeply ashamed for my attraction to the other boys.

I never had anyone whatsoever to help guide me through the coming out process, because I didn’t know a single queer person who could. I’ve now dedicated a good amount of my energy trying to be that person I desperately could have used then for anyone else that needs that role to be filled, and for someone to tell them that someone is incredibly proud of them. An obscene amount of queer people don’t ever hear “I’m so proud of you!” when they really need it the most. 

I also didn’t have any good queer representation on TV or in movies, so I really did feel completely alone at times. Most queer characters in media existedly solely to be made fun of and mocked, ratcher than celebrated, properly represented, or God forbid, given a legitimate love story, and the public’s reaction was so frequently one of such repugnance and disapproval. 

This was also probably about the time that a close family member told me that he had punched a gay guy for hitting on him when he was younger, a story he again felt the need to share with a now ex-boyfriend and I when we were dating, as though that’s not a horrifying thing for an already scared and closeted queer to hear from their own family. 

I think during middle school in particular is when my anxiety and depression issues started, but I assumed either that I was being a baby and that my feelings were invalid, or that it was just teenage angst. The idea that boys and men should mask their emotions and feelings and feel shame rather than expressing them was, (and seemingly appears to continue to be) a very real thing in small towns and society in general. 

It didn’t occur to me at the time that I was experiencing varying levels of almost daily trauma that would fuck me up well into adulthood. If you take anything at all from this post, let it be that the conversation around mental health, (and men in particular in this instance) NEEDS to change.

Another particularly noteworthy event in my queer adolescence was when two of my friends, (both girls, shocker) discovered gay porn on my computer. While they pestered me about if it were mine while they laughed, I of course lied. I felt a deep shame and utter humiliation. On reflection, fucking IMAGINE if they had been able to be gentle and understanding with me and told me they loved me and still would even if I were gay. From then on I was terrified that they would bring that day up to our other friends as a joke. Perhaps they did a time or two, I don’t recall. These same friends made jokes about the queer kid I mentioned earlier, and both parents of one of the girls regularly gossiped and made homophobic jokes about him when I was at their house 

By the time school dances rolled around, I knew I would never be able to go with anyone but friends. Even if I weren’t still deeply closeted, I’m pretty sure my school still had pretty strict rules against bringing same-sex dates to Prom. While I definitely had fun with my friends at the dances we went to, I so desperately longed for a world where I could dance with a boy who loved me like everyone else was able to.

The loneliness and isolation I felt at the end of those nights could be unbearable because it didn’t seem possible for me, even as I looked into the future. I was fully convinced I would live a very lonely life without anyone to love me the way I craved. I didn’t belong in that world, and wouldn’t ever be set up for that kind of happiness, joy, and feeling of content. I would live for everyone else but myself because that’s just the way the world worked for us queers.

I wish I had had just one single person then who gave me full permission to be my authentic queer self on any level. Someone who could hug me and tell me life after high school and college could and would be vastly different. Someone to tell me I wasn’t an unlovable disgusting freak, but rather a kind-hearted boy who deserved a deep love someday because I was a valid and gentle soul who deserved the world. I certainly deserved more than the shame and pain that constantly haunted me. 

Maybe then I wouldn’t have thought about death before 30 so much and obsessed over it well into my college career. I might have realized that I needed to learn to be gentle with myself and take care of and prioritize me and my own happiness. So many people let me down and convinced me that I was a filthy sinner and an over-emotional kid with invalid perspectives and feelings. As most of my closest friends, (that I cannot stress enough have been the ones to save my life and encourage the authenticity that I present so proudly today) came into my life after I had already come out fully, they weren’t around during those dark early struggles. 

Sometimes as an adult I still wonder what it would have felt like and how profoundly different my life could be if someone had held me close and sincerely told me they’re proud of me for what I survived and overcame, and told me that they can’t wait to see my eyes light up with the love I’ve always dreamed of in a boy, and that I still continue to seek. 

Young, baby gay Travis would be in absolute awe if he knew what life had in store for him back then. To see a future version of himself painting his nails, wearing whatever he wanted, dancing with strangers at pride festivals, having the time of his life at drag shows with his queer family and falling in love with boys? Proudly holding a boyfriend’s hand walking downtown in a busy city? Openly telling his dad about the cute boy he’s going on a date with? Going Facebook official with a boy? Being a super vocal advocate and inspiration and mentor to not only queer family, but to people he hardly talks to but manages to influence and inspire just by unashamedly being himself? Genuinely looking forward to kissing his new husband in front of family and friends on his wedding day, knowing it’ll be one of the happiest days of his entire life? 

Holy. Actual. Fuck.

Travis of six or seven years ago wouldn’t have even dared to dream this big, let alone baby gay Travis. He probably would have been utterly mortified but SO comforted to see that future life when he didn’t believe it to be any level of possible.

I’m so fucking proud of myself for this journey, and no one will ever take that away from me or water down my trauma or the grueling work I’ve put in. Genuinely, this is the one thing in my life that makes me absolutely burst with pride. 

I think I want to learn how to keep baby Travis in mind with this pride without having to revisit the trauma in the process. Look back at him with open arms, excited to see him learn and blossom into his actual self someday. Even if he could have desperately used someone like the me I am today, he survived then, and continues to persevere today. 

He’s queer as fuck, and proud to shout it from the rooftops. He’s a voice and an advocate for the voiceless. A shining light and beacon of hope for those still navigating their terrifying escape from their closeted life. He’s going to meet a man someday and love him so deeply in the way baby Travis always dreamed of. Above all, he’s going to continue to make that little guy so incredibly proud because he knows now the importance of loving himself in the process. 

I’m so proud of that scared little boy. I just wish he could have known then how proud he would make himself one day.   

As you talk with the queer people in your life, please keep in mind that just about all of us have incredible trauma directly tied to our identities. Talk to them with love, compassion, and understanding. Tell them how proud of them you are for pursuing their own happiness in the face of oppression and rejection. 

Demand better from elected officials. Advocate for us. Shut down homophobic ideals, even if you think it’ll make your family and friends uncomfortable to hear. Support queer content, artists and creators. Be a proud ally, but don’t ever allow yourself to take the spotlight away from actual queer people or our queer spaces. Mourn, love, and celebrate with us. 

Understand why pride is SO fucking important to us, and why you never have to worry about needing your own pride events. Listen to us and love us for exactly who we are, and were always meant to be. Love is the most incredible, beautiful, and often rare human experience we’re able to experience during our short time on this planet, and it should always be celebrated.

Happy Pride!

[dontbesoevil]

Let’s talk about the dinner scene (and the entire latter half of ep 9)

Can we talk about That Scene? The dinner scene? (and the aftermath) When I started watching this show, I knew there would be meta, but I didn’t expect for it to be so real! Man I haven’t felt so attacked in my core by how real a storyline was since watching Gaya sa Pelikula (I don’t think I’ll talk about it more here, but if you feel like reading my thoughts on this show, I wrote a 1900-word review on MDL about it). I think every single queer person has experienced or fears that they will experience a scene such as the one that Gene and Nubsib experience. It is something that shakes you to your core even if you know it is coming.

I’m putting a readmore because this got a bit too long

It is so important to me that Gene and Nubsib talked about it before and that Nubsib said to Gene that he would 100% support him, that he did not have to do it, and that regardless of what happened, he would continue to support him all the way. Because they both knew that the battle would be difficult and I think they might not have gone with it if they hadn’t had that talk before. But they did. And then That Scene started.

Not gonna lie, I had to stop watching that scene and I had to take a break because I was shaking and it triggered me and brought me some bad memories. I am lucky that I have the most accepting mum ever, but I have been in situations where I felt like I had to hide and was just a shell reacting and observing every single details of everyone’s behaviour because if I were to step outside the lines they would know and I would be thrown to the lions. If anyone had to go through this, especially for an extended period of time, they know how traumatising an experience it can be (i.e. as opposed to remarks which is also traumatising, but more in a micro-aggression type of way). The incident I am talking about was 6 years ago and although I am mostly over it, it has scarred my relationship with some people and groups probably forever.

This scene was so powerful because of how well it was done. @jiminisverynofun said it better than I would when it comes to the mothers in that scene and the next, but I am so glad they are tackling the fetishisation of mlm relationships by straight women and the very real impact it has when it is only objectification and not any kind of real support.

Something else that I also see in the reactions of the others around the table is the brothers. In the previous episodes, we have seen them be somewhat supportive of the whole thing (although not necessarily in the best way) and here when seeing their parents act in such homophobic ways, they not only not say anything and go along, but they even go further and say really homophobic words, all the while knowing about their brothers. They redeemed themselves (at least Jab, but I’m assuming Sib’s brother’s too) afterwards by defending their brothers when it was just them. But the fact is that they also played along with the homophobia. They did the reverse of what the mothers did. The mothers were okay as long as it was a fiction and then were distraught when it turned out to be real. But the brothers both said homophobic things about gay people in general even if they support their brothers individually. It felt a bit too much like those people who shout against immigrants being the worst, but telling their immigrant neighbour: “oh but not you because you are a good one.” I get that it is hard to get in front of your parents, truly I get it, but I feel like they still went too far the other way, either because of fear or because they truly think that (in which case, boys, start working on your homophobia because you are the only allies your brothers have in the family and they don’t deserve shitty allies).

And then the dads. I am mainly going to be talking about Gene’s dad because we haven’t seen too much of Nubsib’s dad and the preview made it seem like we’ll see more of his pov next time (but I feel like a lot of the same things are applicable to him). I spent the entire scene (and the ones after) wanting to deck him and I wrote so many “fuck you” and other sentences where I was not very polite towards him in the chat because he made me absolutely furious. I was like *surprised Pikachu* when Gene said that he’d dated guys before he dated his mum. I don’t whether he’s gay or bi and honestly at this point I do not give a single shit because he went too far and his internalised homophobia is no excuse for the constant abuse and homophobia he has thrown at his son for years. Nothing could excuse it and even if he comes to realise the error of his ways, he’ll need to do way more than just say sorry for me to be okay with him coming anywhere close to Gene (I need someone to make me a Gene protection squad banner). I am so glad that Gene, soft spoken Gene, confronted him and did not let him go. That scene was directed like a theatre scene. When I started the scene, it jumped at me! The mum at the window, the brother at the table, and the dad on the couch. And Gene just kept talking at the dad who was cornered on all sides. Regardless of the other two characters who still have (more or less) atoning to do, I’m expecting the brother to be helpful by next episode and the mum by the end of the show, the one who needs to be worked upon is the dad. I know it, you know it, Gene knows it. And this is why he is not letting go. His dad has always been treating him as a child (I think it is him who says they are just children when at dinner, but I cannot remember and I am not strong enough to go and rewatch it) and he doesn’t want to have this conversation so he just tells his son to “go to his room” (i can’t remember exactly how old he is, but it’s something like 27, so his son who’s been an adult for 10 years and presumably was already pretty autonomous before because his dad had sent him to boarding school because of the GayTM). I am so happy for Gene standing up for himself. I am so happy for Gene telling him that he is gay and using those words when you could see only a few scenes before that he wasn’t completely there yet (did I pause at that point to cry? Yes, yes I did). Gosh I am so proud of Gene!

But going back to the dinner scene proper and what I was talking about re: Nubsib and Gene talking before and knowing what the other wants (they both want to come out and Gene says explicitly to Nubsib that he doesn’t want to hide anymore (and he knows his dad so he knows that he will probably react as he reacted). And then you have That conversation and you can see the two of them looking at each other (gosh the number of silent conversations they’ve had this episode, I want what they have!). And like as hard as it is, they have each other. And then you have Gene starting to come out by asking a question “and what if it’s true?” (this feels way too real and I relate way too much because talking explicitly about things like that is way too hard so you find a way around it, you wait for the others to say something that you can react to while not saying explicitly what you want to say) And then Nubsib sees this, understands it for what it is and goes for it because he is way more sure of himself and secure in his identity. And they have each other, they look at each other, they hold hand (talking about Gaya sa Pelikula, this very much reminded me of the hand holding between Vlad and Karl duing That dinner scene too). I am so happy that they have each other and that Gene can use Nubsib to help. I relate a lot to Gene and it is easier to talk about your relationship to someone than what it means, but once you’ve talked about the one, it’s easier to talk about the other.

This scene was given all of the space that it needed. I am so glad that they decided that time didn’t matter and that they could give us a 1h27 episode because I did not feel like something was missing, but I also did not feel like something was unnecessary about that whole section (or any of the ones before because you can really see the development of their relationship (not that I don’t have any gripes with some of the lines and story choices, but this is not the place). I’ll probably finish this and be like “oh no, I forgot to talk about this”, but I’ve already gone and written 1500 words so I should probably stop.

[butterflyinthewell]

Adult fandom antis scare me.

You know how the most violently homophobic people end up being gay themselves?

That’s why I’m immediately suspicious of any 20+ adult fandom anti who uses the same rhetoric as 15 year olds and presents themselves as a “safe adult”.

There’s no way they’re safe, they’re using the rhetoric to deflect suspicion off themselves and they’re probably saying and doing really gross shit to kids in private.

❌❌❌❌

— TW CSA MENTION —

Just imagine how they could find the kid that’s the most on the fringes, make them feel special, reel them in more, get them to share nudes, and then threaten to take away all that friendship and turn everyone against them if they tell anyone what happened. Imagine how scared that kid will feel when they see this monster, feel disgusting and deflect all that terror and guilt into telling people to stop being alive over Loli artwork.

——

Predators are slick like that. They’ll hide in plain sight if it means accessing their chosen prey.

That’s why people need to educate minors about what grooming can really look like, cuz I promise it’s not icky artwork just existing on a server somewhere.

Being groomed is never the child’s fault, blame always lies on the predator. Always.

I looked up info about online grooming warning signs and here’s what I found. This may be triggering for survivors.

⚠️⚠️⚠️⚠️

The Steps of Grooming

Any person of any age, gender, sexual identity or ethnicity can groom someone for the purpose of abuse. That person may be someone you know or someone you don’t know. Children and teens are not the only victims of grooming, but this guide focuses on young people.

Grooming was first recognized in abuse cases where the abuser knew their victim in person, like Ariana Kukors, a US Olympic swimmer who was abused by her coach. Kukors has spoken publicly about the role grooming played in her story, and how the manipulation kept her under the control of her abusive coach for years. In addition to in person grooming, online grooming has become equally dangerous, prevalent and damaging. More and more of our lives are lived online, which is why we need to think more and more about our safety online.

1. Targeting a victim

Unfortunately, any young person is at risk of online grooming. Abusers typically look for someone who is more vulnerable or in a vulnerable situation, like someone living in foster care or someone with a disability. Online, abusive people look for teens who are lonely or expressing sexual curiosity. Sometimes online abusers pretend to be teenagers themselves, but more often they are adults trying to play the role of an older boyfriend or a mentor who can “teach” the victim about love or sex.

2. Gaining access

Sexual abuse is most often committed by someone that you already know, and this is because the abuser usually needs to be in your circle of acquaintances to get access to you. They want to be nearby and to have opportunities to be alone.

This is often not the case with online abuse, because the internet provides that access. Instead of being in the same city or neighborhood, abusers can meet potential victims on social media, in games, chatrooms, or anywhere that users correspond. Online platforms also allow anonymity, which works in the abuser’s favor. It can be difficult to determine who a person is and their intentions.

3. Building trust

A key part of grooming for sexual abuse is building trust with the victim. In person or online, abusers try to fill a need. You may be lonely, feel unpopular, isolated or bored, and the abuser will pretend to become a friend you can confide in and who can listen. They may act sympathetic, always take your side, and portray themselves as the only person who understands your problems. Their goal is to become your main emotional support. They may also try to make you feel special by treating you like an adult and commenting on your maturity. They may quickly look for a favor they can do for you to make you feel indebted and more likely to do something for them return. This stage is particularly damaging because it closely mimics a positive relationship.

4. Isolation and risk assessment

When an abuser thinks they have established trust, they test that bond. They may try to isolate you from family or friends, sometimes to the point of you becoming very emotionally or otherwise dependent on them. With online grooming, they may ask if your parents check your phone or if you are home alone. They may also start asking you to keep secrets, either about conversations or gifts they send. This is one way the abuser assesses whether they can move to the next step and you will stay silent.

5. Sexualization of the relationship

The final step occurs when the abuser believes they have built sufficient trust that you will do what they request and keep everything secret. They may commit sexual assault in or request sexual images or videos, often increasingly explicit in nature.

While in person and online grooming both follow these steps, abusers work at different rates. For example, Ariana Kukors swim coach began grooming her when she was 13 years old and the physical sexual abuse began when she was 15. Online abuse can occur faster, sometimes in even less than one hour.

🚩🚩🚩🚩

Red Flags and Warning Signs

It is not reasonable to say that you should avoid the internet if you don’t want to be abused. The responsibility and blame always lies with an abuser, not someone they victimize who is simply engaging in modern life online. We believe it is possible for you to still have fun online, meet new friends, and stay safe. The key is awareness. It may be difficult to identify a step in the grooming process in real time, but there are red flags and warning signs that you can recognize, especially if they start to accumulate. They can help you protect yourself when sexual requests slide into your DMs.

Flattery

It can feel nice to be noticed. Lots of likes and comments on your social media can feel good, but excessive compliments from a stranger can be a warning sign, particularly sexualized comments about your appearance. Flattery is one way online abusers gain access to their victims and begin building a relationship. “Wow, you should be a model,” may seem harmless, but it often isn’t. You have the power. Just because someone gives you a compliment does not mean you have to continue the conversation.

Gifts

Online groomers might send video game currency, cash, electronic devices, or other gifts to you to ingratiate themselves. This is a clear red flag. There is no reason why an adult should be sending gifts to a minor they met online, nor is it typical teen behavior to send gifts if the abuser is posing as a younger person. In actuality, gifts are one way abusers assess risk. They may ask you to not tell your parents about the gift to test how much you trust them and if you will stay silent after sexual abuse.

Asking for personal information

It is safest to avoid sharing personal and identifying information about yourself online or with those you don’t know. If you are playing video games, chatting, or sharing photos for fun, there is no need for personal questions about where you live or go to school. Do your parents read your messages? What is a secret no one knows about you? Abusers want to know as much as they can about their victims so they can better manipulate them.

Secret conversations

Secrets work in the abuser’s favor in two different ways. To build trust, they may confide in you by telling real or made up secrets to try to make you feel special. Abusers also use secrets to test that trust before escalating to sexual abuse. If someone asks you to keep a conversation secret, ask yourself why? Is the conversation inappropriate, or is it dangerous?

Sending sexually explicit photos

In the online dating world, it is almost assumed you will receive sexual photos whether you asked for them or not. Sexting is considered normal, but still has risks and consequences, particularly if you are under 18. Unfortunately, abusers rely on the normalization of sexting. They expect you to dismiss or think nothing of an explicit image, but in reality, abusers send explicit imagery to try and desensitize their victim to future abuse. It is a priming tactic. Keep in mind, that in many countries it is illegal for an adult to send an underage person pornographic material,nor is it lawful to send nude photos as a minor to another person. In any online exchange, it is not okay for anyone to send unsolicited explicit photos. This is poor etiquette and ultimately a nonconsensual act and red flag no matter what.

Requesting sexual photos

Online abusers sexualize the relationship by sending and requesting explicit photos and videos, explicit letters or phone calls, or asking detailed questions about your sexual history or experience. They may begin with a seemingly harmless request, like a photo of you fully clothed, before asking for increasingly sexual images. Others brazenly ask for explicit material straight away and even demand live webcam performances. Remember that after you send an image, you no longer have control over what a person does with that image. Ask yourself how well you know the receiver. Did you meet in person or online? Do you know their real identity and their intentions? How does the request make you feel? Many young people enjoy the attention that comes from the potential of a new relationship, but requests to send nudes can still feel like unwanted pressure.

Threats

After the abuser receives one or multiple sexual images, they may try to blackmail you into sending more images of increasing exploitative nature. They may send threats that they will release the images online or send them to your family or school. This is a kind of extortion, or rather sextortion, and is another form of sexual abuse. You do not need to respond or give in, despite how terrifying the threats may seem. An abuser does not want to put themselves at risk by exposing the relationship, so the threats may be a bluff. Seek immediate help.

🚨🚨🚨🚨

Next Steps

If you feel uncomfortable about an online conversation, the next thing you should do may be the hardest. Reach out for help and support. Telling a parent, guardian, teacher or someone else can be daunting because you can’t know for sure how they will react, but confiding in someone with some power who you can trust and who won’t blame you for the abuse is key to moving forward. Alternatively, you can call a helpline which allows you to remain anonymous and get accurate advice about your situation.

An online conversation with someone abusive can spiral out of control quickly. You may feel ashamed or embarrassed, but if there is anything you should take away from this guide, it is this: it is never your fault. The blame is not yours to bear.

—source: Scarleteen website.

⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️

My advice: keep receipts. Take screenshots, save emails, save photos or videos if it’s safe/legal to do so (ie they’re not another minor sending sexually explicit stuff, saving that might be cited as CSEM possession), and document whatever you can. It will help you expose the person to either law enforcement or in a callout post if a callout is necessary.

[tundrainafrica]

I just find it so unfortunate that some aggressive shippers ruin a ship and a character for so many people. A popular Erwin x Levi artist got hate comments by some Levihan shippers and so many people are bashing it now on twitter because of that. Its just so sad considering LH was one of the most beautiful and fun dynamics in such a depressing story. Even Hange is getting hated because LH is pretty much the default ship involving them and it just breaks my heart :(

Twitter has some great content and I actually hang around AOT twt for some quick content. It’s like every time I’m feeling fast food I just hang there, like a few tweets, read a few soc med AUs etc etc. 

But god. It’s a mess man. Last year I was constantly on twitter to be honest and it left me in a bad mood everyday because people are just being assholes for little to no reason really but just to put themselves in what they believe is a morally higher ground from their peers. And people just like fighting and the funny part is no opinions are actually heard, no views are actually exchanged. It’s just “you dont agree with me so you’re a bad person.” 

Ad hominem attacks are just everywhere.

So I like staying in my small little hole and just talking to myself there and just liking the content of the Levihan people I actually follow. I see stuff I don’t agree with but I’ve kinda accepted that a lot of people there are just there to push an agenda because really if people were that open minded, I don’t think lynching and call out culture would have gotten this far.  

I’ve used this same analogy so many times but I feel like in Twitter, people are just scrambling for some sort of moral high ground. Because of that, it is completely useless to engage in discourse there because one thing I noticed is most people who are vocal there already have a set stance on something and the fact that they’re ready to just bully anyone who stands in the way of their agenda, just makes convincing them out of the agenda impossible and a complete waste of time. And there are two issues in particular among the LH community which are really unsettling for me: the ship wars and within the LH community, the gender war. 

Ship wars

I find the ship wars unnecessary because really what makes a superior ship? 

Probability of being canon? How much fuel they were given in canon? Healthiness of the relationship?

The truth is people ship for many reasons. But really, who are we to judge how a person goes about the way they decide to participate in the fandom and ship? As long as it is something they keep within personal spaces and do it responsibly, I don’t think it’s our business to judge someone or lynch them. The important thing is people are able to not be an asshole about it. People can ship the most questionable shit, create the most dubious content, as long as that person is respecting boundaries and putting the right tags and trigger warnings, who are we to call them out right?

Of course I prefer LH over other Levi ships personally but is there really a need to attack other people’s ships about it? I probably do poke fun at Ereri because until now I still do not get why people enjoy Ereri in the first place but why destroy the fandom experience for people just because we don’t agree with them.

My general intention behind shipping Levihan is because above anything I value the healthiness in the relationship and the things people can learn about love and relationships by analyzing Levihan’s dynamics and headcanoning them. I love Levi and Hange’s dynamics to death and I like digging deeper into them and pulling out lessons from it about love, life and relationships and just sharing them with people which is my whole point for participating in this fandom in the first place. 

But in the end, ships are just preferences. Some people like getting a kick out of dubious pairings and toxic relationships. As long as they consume these responsibly and don’t emulate them in real life, I see no problem in it. 

The toxic ones are the ones who actively crucify people for preferences. 

The Gender War

One really disturbing thing I found about twitter is that deciding to use ‘she’ to refer to Hange can get you lynched. I found a few accounts that would reblog tweets where someone says something like “Yes, Hange, Queen” which gets retweeted by some NB Hange folk who say stuff like “Unfollow this transphobe now.” 

Because apparently deciding to headcanon Hange as a woman or just preferring to use ‘she’ makes people a transphobe. Which is personally just... really disturbing. I don’t believe words like homophobic, transphobic, racist should be so easily thrown around unless there is hard evidence to believe that someone is really one of the epithets above like for example: 

There are things I find completely assholish like of course, refusing to use someone’s preferred pronouns if they ask you. 

But Hange is fictional and Hange is a gift to the fandom.And I don’t even think the issue about Hange’s gender should have ever reached this far. The only thing Yams ever said was that Hange is just not the type to be tied down to a single gender. 

And policing Hange’s gender and saying NOPE SHE’S NON BINARY USE THEY Is just counterintuitive to the whole idea that she’s a free spirit. In the end, Hange as a character wouldn’t have given a fuck whether people called her a they, she or even a he. 

And yeah, it’s frustrating really that these two issues I just discussed above are ruining Hange as a character for a lot of people and consequently, ruining Levi x Hange as a ship. 

Apparently, a lot of people are closet LxH shippers or closet Hange stans because the moment they tweet something about Hange, there are people who will attack them. If people refer to Hange as they, they get attacked. If people refer to Hange as she, they get attacked. There are so many antis apparently to the LxH ship, some apparently are jealous because ‘it’s the closest to canon’ while others just apparently deem it a toxic ship because of our own internal gender war.  

There’s no winning really. And to be honest, there’s nothing I can do either and I don’t want to engage in any arguments in twitter if at the end of it, I’m just gonna end up wasting my time listening to ad hominem attacks directed at me just for not agreeing with someone in a fandom related matter. . 

I’ve said my piece about the Hange gender issue so many times. There are NBs who use she. There are those who use they. Being female and being NB aren’t mutually exclusive. You can be both at the same time.

But yeah, we still have people being assholes about this and pushing factually wrong agendas. I love research and I have been writing research papers and metas for a lot of things even before I started this blog in the first place. And I eventually learned that the world is so complex that no opinion is completely and absolutely correct. 

And ideally, opinions shouldn’t be made so easily. 

Don’t get me wrong. I believe everyone is entitled to a preference and when I say preference I mean the type of food they like, the type of wallpaper they like. 

But no one is entitled to a moral judgement or opinion just for existing and when I say opinion I mean questions on morals, on what’s right or what isn’t, what is or what should be. Every single person has the responsibility to research, hear both sides of a discourse and understanding them before deciding for themselves what’s right. And this is why hearing accusations that someone is ‘transphobic,’ ‘homophobic’ blah blah over how we hc a character just really does not sit well with me. 

Passing moral judgement on someone requires discernment, deep thought and lots and lots of evidence. But yeah this is a philosophical question and a political question so I ain’t going to delve into it here.

Because, in the end, fandoms are preferences. The way we choose to participate in a fandom and create content are preferences more than anything.

So what? (Btw, if you reached all the way here, thank you for listening to me ramble lol and sorry if you weren’t expecting this type of ramble)

I know I’ve just been rambling a lot up there for a lot of reasons but really what message do I wanna give? 

Fandoms are preferences more than anything so I don’t even believe that there should be a discussion on moral judgement here. People can have the weirdest kinks, the most questionable preferences but as long as they aren’t going around romanticizing abuse, beating up people in real life, killing them and lying in real life, who are we to judge?

Even if someone says they have a rape kink and abuse kink when it comes to fics, as long as they acknowledge it’s something they shouldn’t emulate in real life, as long as they can keep an adult conversation about it, I think these people are generally kinder and more pleasant overall than people who force their healthy canon ship and lynch everyone for having more questionable preferences. 

Ship and let ship. Live and let live. Headcanon and let headcanon. If a person has a differing opinion, listen. (Or really, if you just don’t want to deal with listening to differing opinions coz you’re just gonna get stressed, don’t lynch? Don’t send hate? And just ignore it?)

Ask yourself. Does the person acknowledge that it isn’t right in real life? Do they acknowledge if they emulate it in real life it has the potential to be harmful?

Honestly, all I wanna do is just let people stan Levi and Hange however they want to. There are obviously hcs I dont agree with. But in the LH community we just all love Levihan, let’s not ruin the fandom experience for anyone. In the AOT community, we all just love AOT, let’s not ruin it for anyone. Let’s not hurt anyone, attack them etc. 

If someone doesn’t agree and they can hold an adult conversation about it and they don’t emulate these toxic opinions in real life and they recognize that there is the option to just agree to disagree, why don’t we just listen and engage in this discourse to learn more about other people and to build more perspectives?

Because really it isn’t the questionable hcs or the multiple genders which leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. It’s the people who just go straight to attacking instead of actually considering that there’s potential for discourse and there’s potential to ‘agree to disagree’ because in the end, fandom discourse is a question of preference more than moral judgement. 

It’s easier said than done really. But personally for me, I just try to keep my fandom experience as non toxic as possible while at the same time as mentally fulfilling as possible. I enjoy discourse, I like hearing differing opinions and I really believe with something as light and as inconsequential as fandoms as our common ground, we can learn to peacefully co-exist despite differing opinions on what the best ship is or what Hange’s gender is. 

Note: I won’t delve too much on the Hange gender issue here because I have pending asks about those which I’ll answer in one go, but I really believe that both they and she are valid pronouns for Hange. 

I have a general preference for ‘she’ because it’s just easier to read. But personally I don’t think too much about the gender identity issue because it’s really just too complex for me and i like spending my time thinking of other headcanons about Hange than gender and people who push the Hange is nb agenda and people who push the Hange is a female agenda and just insult each other and lynch each other are both equally unsettling. 

[the-queer-look]

Couple Theory

Name: Lucy Age: 24 Location: Glebe Occupation: Bush Regenerator Sexual Orientation: Lesbian Gender: Female

Name: Aisling Age: 21 Location: Glebe Occupation: Customer Service Sexual Orientation: Queer Gender: Female

Lucy – I feel like I’m still figuring out how I’m comfortable presenting because I didn’t come out till I was twenty, which was quite a time after I realised I was gay at sixteen. When I moved to Sydney I really wanted to show people that I was queer, and with much of my influence being from the internet, I wore a lot of the stereotypical lesbian clothing I saw on there – mostly sporty sorts of clothing – but as I’ve gone through, whenever I find something that I don’t hate myself in I wear it over and over again until something new comes along. Recently I’ve been vibing with the look of boots, singlet tops, and making my tattoos very visible. I make myself look somewhat unapproachable with my resting face being a frown, and my outfits being if not aggressive, then non-welcoming, but if people do actually come up to me I really want people to like me, so it all falls away.

Aisling – My daily presentation is just the easy T-shirts and jeans, lots of bouldering merch, maybe a button up if I’m being a little fancy, just a classic chapstick lesbian.

Lucy – Where did your inspo for that come from?

Aisling – What? Jeans and a shirt? Does that need inspiration? I guess I tuck my shirt in to make sure its queer? I have a lot of Vans, and a milk crate full of socks I guess. I used to save up money when I was in high school to put towards my first pair of Vans and I was so excited. I think I have twenty pairs now? Lots of converse, runners, and climbing shoes as well. Colourful socks and shoes are my thing I guess.

Lucy – I remember I was sixteen when I realised I liked girls, but I don’t know what triggered it. I think it was something on TV? I think it was an NCIS episode and they had a really awful portrayal of lesbians, who were identified as gay because at the end of the episode they held hands, and that triggered some kind of twinge in my chest that I’d never felt before.

Ailing – That was your gay bone

Lucy – My gay bone?

K – Yeah, your sternum is your gay bone

Ailing – I’ve torn that twice from being too gay

K – you need to remember to stretch before going out and being gay all night.

Lucy – It was a really weird feeling, I didn’t know what it was. I couldn’t stop thinking about it, so I went and found out about the episode, and it was of course one of those “oh no homosexuals are evil” sorts of plots. I think that negative portrayal contributed to my negative feelings about being gay, and being so scared to come out. I don’t know where else that would have come from because my parents never expressed any opinion about homosexuality. Those feelings were confirmed when I had my first crush on a girl in my school. I was nauseous more than anything when I realised it, and I just ignored that feeling for years which isn’t healthy. What helped me overcome it though, as I’m sure helped a lot of people from small towns with not much queer representation was the internet, and YouTubers, The Legend of Korra, and Tumblr. (The ending of Legend of Korra) was ust so beautiful, and so revolutionary as well. I remember seeing the ship of Korra and Asami come up on my tumblr, but it was years before the end fo the show, when it actually happened. I remember watching it on a family holiday trip and had to leave the dining table and I was shaking and crying because it was such a huge, beautiful moment that was probably one of the most significant moments of accepting myself. Looking back I definitely associate that final image of them holding hands before going to the spirit world together with my final stage of accepting who I am.

Moving to Sydney was my time to finally come out and explore. I came out to one of my Canadian exchange friends who was here, and they took me to Birdcage (lesbian nightclub in Sydney) where I met some of my friends. My first time in a queer club was like being surrounded by a family who I felt like I knew even though I hadn’t met any of them. That was also the year that the marriage equality vote was passed, So I took that opportunity to find out what my parents thought about homosexuality by asking them what they were voting for. They both said they were voting yes, which made me feel comfortable enough to come out to them the next week.

I’m still learning what are the most appropriate ways to describe myself and my relationship with myself, and how to present myself to the world. The more I learn, the more I will change the way I present myself, and there is a lot more of myself to explore.

Aisling – I think I was around thirteen or fourteen when I saw the show “faking it” - a show about a girl in high school figuring out her sexuality – and I just noticed that I was relating to every situation that the character was going through, and suddenly realised I was questioning my sexuality. I mentioned it to one of my friends that I used to walk to school with, and she would just keep egging me on with “come on just say it, just say you’re gay its fine”. I came out to her as bi at one stage, but I didn’t like that term, I didn’t like the term lesbian either, and still don’t, I prefer to think of myself as queer, or just gay.

When I actually came out two or so years later, I remember telling my close friend group that I was bi… and then later that week just said “nah I’m gay actually”. It was about 7:30pm, on a Wednesday night, after basketball, in the shower talking to myself saying “im gonna do this, im gonna do this”. Just me and my dad home, I psyched myself up for ages and then walked in and out of the kitchen about five times before going “Dad, I have something to tell you” sweating bullets “Dad, I’m gay la di da.”

Lucy – La di da?

Aisling – yes, Father, it’s la di da for me I’m afraid

Lucy – please put my sexuality down as la di da

Aisling – The first thing he said to me was “yeah I always thought you had a bigger obsession with the female tennis players than the men.” and yeah damn he had me there. I hate that I remember the day and everything… like the first of September 2016?

I moved out from my mum to my dad’s mostly because my mum’s partner at the time was very homophobic, and any dinner conversation would turn to him deriding gay marriage, or coming out with some racist shit. Eventually I decided “this bothers me too much, I’m going to have to say something” and it was… really upsetting when he didn’t agree. So of course I came out to my dad first and made him tell mum, which was then an interesting conversation…

“Your father tells me you’ve told him you’re gay?”

“yep, that’s it”

She contacted my school supervisor that night and told all of my teachers to look out for any homophobic acts towards me, letting them know that I was gay and to look out for me.

Lucy – I feel like together we tick a lot of stereotypes

Aisling – We really do

Lucy – We moved in together really quickly

Aisling – We own a cat together

Lucy – Theres that Subaru…

Aisling – I also had a lot of influence from those same queer YouTubers, and seeing their coming out videos and how free they felt afterwards made me really want to share it.

Immediately after I came out everyone at school was very supportive, like they already knew and assumed I was gay because I was just that sporty chick, so being gay just sorta went with it?

Lucy – I think I looked for validation from my parents. When I came out to mum there was no huge deal made about it, butI think validation from them comes in small snippets. Every time mum sends me something, like recently she arranged her coloured chopping boards into a rainbow and sent me a picture with “these are for you!” it’s very small, but its very significant. When I had a really big hickey on my neck, my dad said

“oh who gave you that on your neck? Does he sleep in a coffin?”

“it was a she actually”

“oh does she sleep in a coffin then?”

he just wanted to channel it into a dad joke, but it was a weird way to come out to him actually.

Aisling – To me the term Queer means “everyone included” even just an ally of the community, or a parent of an LGBT person doing your best to make them feel safe and welcome, you’re welcome in the community you know? By properly supporting something, you become a part of it.

Lucy – For me it’s very similar with those lines of community and family. It can be a label, but I feel that its evolving more into a term that indicates embracing all people. I use it sometimes to refer to a collective group of… well queer people. I refer to my close friends as my queer family.

Aisling – It feels better to use than assuming someone’s sexuality or gender without knowing the specifics.

Lucy – Individually I wouldn’t refer to any of my friends as queer. I know one friend refers to himself specifically as a bisexual, man, rather than a queer person. So I definitely like its a more family, community term, rather than a specific label, though It can still be used as one.

Aisling – I like the term because when I first came out I identified as bi, then gay, then bi, then gay, than they? And it feels more appropriate to use for myself because I’m still working it out, and it can cover a lot. For example I don’t think of myself as completely feminine, but I also don’t like the term non-binary to refer to myself, but the idea of “They” still, rather than just being she/her, I like the idea of she/they. And referring to myself as queer feels more of an accurate description.

Lucy – Ever since moving to Sydney and coming out and going to that first club night I’ve always thrown myself into as many queer events as I possibly could. I want to be able to contribute more to the community rather than just be involved in it, a lot of my friends are very engaged in the queer community, and I feel like I don’t have that level of involvement. I love that I’m never scared or intimidated to go to queer events, by myself or with my friends. Whilst I feel very connected to the queer community, I wish I could be more involved. I’m scared that since my friend group is all finishing university and looking to the future, that I’ll lose that sense of connection as everyone moves away, even though I’m sure we’ll all stay in touch.

Aisling – I feel little to no involvement in the queer community at the moment because I’m focusing so hard on my training. I’m involved with Queer Climbers Sydney though, and am looking to get more involved in the future, as soon as I have the time to do stuff.

Lucy – Challenges facing the queer community here isn Sydney… I feel like we need to create a wider variety of safer spaces in more areas. There’re certain areas of Sydney where queer people I know just don’t feel as comfortable. And the ones we do have are always pubs and clubs. Not to detract from queer nightlife; but having so much of queer culture based around adult only areas reinforces the idea that being gay, or trans, or whatever is an adult thing, and makes it easier for people to excuse restricting education about it to kids, which can be so harmful growing up and not having the education to understand yourself.

Aisling – I feel like theres more acceptance towards gay, lesbian, and bi people. But there’s less of an acceptance of trans people, like they can understand being gay, but they cant seem to understand what a trans person even is, much less how to approach them. Probably need more education about it in schools. More comprehensive sex ed instead of just how to put a condom on a fucking banana.

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[ksmutclub]

Let’s take a step...

Good Evening Everyone. Admin Tomi here.

I think we’ve reached the need for a full stop. 

There’s going to be a lot here - please hang with me. I ask that you read this thoroughly, because I would like to have this be the cease fire for the current situation. 

Firstly,

We are deeply sorry for any hurt, pain, trigger, or traumatic essence that has arisen in the midst of viewing the Monster Smash prompt list. 

These prompts are based on popular horror movies and books. Things that we easily associate with Horror via authors like James Patterson and Stephen King [which a good chunk of these prompts come from]. So to us, and a majority of the voters/members, who wanted it to return? There was no issue. 

The club rules *specifically* state that we do not allow the following

WHAT WE DON’T REBLOG

Sexualization of minors,

Incest,

Eating disorders,

Self harm,

Glorification of mental illnesses,

Animal abuse,

Any controversial topics,

Political topics,

Masterlists,

WIPs posts,

Domestic violence,

Abusive relationships,

Pedophilia,

Necrophilia,

Homophobic topics,

Racist topics.

Rape.

That has been the long standing no-no’s of this club since its inception.  We didn’t understand why the anons, and few members that came forward, would think that we would: 

A - allow any story that breaks the rules to pass through. B - that any of the writers/creators/esteemed members of this club would dip down to those levels to create material that does exactly what we ask not to be done.

We’re all adults, and trust that everyone knows right from wrong, and understands the ramifications of such issues.

We in no way intended to cause trauma, downplay anyone’s trauma, or ‘insult’ anyone with mental health issues. 

But.

We cannot stop creators from writing things that may include dark topics. 

We believe in the portent of trigger warnings required on each story. Because what could be a trigger for you? Could be a cathartic release for someone writing from a similar experience, or someone with an interest in said experiences.

We trust and believe in you all to believe in self-care. Meaning that if someone happens to post a yandere story with a trigger warning for blood? That you would move to the next story. We believe that every reader and creator are the masters of their Tumblr experience and will act in accordance with the safety of their well-being and mental health in consideration.

With that all being said? The h***ler prompt was missed/misstep. Again, we profusely apologize for that one making the list. There is no excuse, I will attempt to offer none. The K Smut Club Admins will do better to be more mindful/careful/watchful of such things in the future.

Now, a point was made during the back and forth of the evening. That one message cleared most of the confusion. A trigger warning on the prompt list. Which in hindsight, may or may not have made a difference. But, it would at least show that we DID hear you about the certain prompts [esp. the h**ler one, cause that should've never gone up. So we thank that member for catching it]. 

So going forward, since this has been a lesson, we will make sure to trigger warning as best we can for the next Monster Smash event. As a reminder, the prompts are purely voluntary to serve as an example of what you could possibly write. None of these were mandatory, or necessary to participate in the event.

Again, with any event the idea of your story and where it goes is always up to you, the creator.

To the matter of the prompt examples list? 

We can all agree to disagree. Everyone perceives things differently. Again, we trust you all to be mindful of the rules and not write anything that would be considered illegal. For example:

A brother and sister find an old door in their basement that wasn’t there before.

Hansel and Gretel; or Brother and Sister monster hunters, sister gets kidnapped by demon that’s been lusting over Brother. Or in secret relationship with brother - sister is kidnapped with ultimatum to come on over to the bad side or they’ll make the sister disappear. So, no incest. 

The abused animals of a zoo are unleashed and wreak havoc on a small town.

Based on James Patterson’s Book ‘Zoo’[and there was a miniseries]. Animals of the world suddenly developed a genetic abnormality that caused them to rise up and try to take the planet back. Believe it or not? There was romance/sex involved in the people trying to save the animals, the world, and themselves. One of the scientists fell for a reporter as they worked together for a cure. The story written could have the two people getting together and that amount of care they have for solving the menace - solves it. So, no abused animals.

Deceased soldiers return to their Civil War-era homes.

Based on multiple episodes of the Twilight Zone or the Outer Limits. People that may have died with strong regrets and the people who miss them terribly are given an opportunity to come back for one day. Fully alive, flesh and blood, breathing living - to spend one day with each other to help them move on. Also the movie Warm Bodies where a zombie regains his humanity, and undoes the curse of the undead by falling in love, of all things. The ‘zombie’ fully regains his humanity, living breathing, and bleeding - there’s even a kiss. So, no  necrophilia.

A monster is terrified by the scary child who lives above his bed.

Based on Monsters Inc. and I’ve seen some Monster Inc Kpop fic smut out there, so it’s absolutely possible to have a single parent cleaning a kids room and shenanigans ensue, or not, and just be a super crack horror fic.

A family dog runs away from home. He returns a year later to the delight of his family. But there’s something different about him. Something demonic.

Based on Pet Sematary, Stephen King classic. Synopsis could be that parents lost a family pet, trying for a child, pet returns, horror ensues. 

A child sleep-walks into their parent’s room and whispers, “I’m sorry. The devil told me to.”

Based on Case 39. A movie where the kid was a literally a demon posing as a child, and manipulated everyone around her and caused a bunch of deaths/mishaps. 

I’ve made these few scant examples to prove there was no ill, illegal, or sick intent with the prompts posted. Each of them can be connected to a movie, book, or television series that many are familiar with. 

Even though the rules state smut is required, where the smut happens within prompt depends on the story. But, wherever it should so appear would be required, of course, to act within the bounds of the clubs rules. 

Because we trust you, the creators, to abide by them.

In closing,

Everybody has had different experiences in their lives. We are not going to pit pain against pain. No one’s pain is greater. Pain is pain and we all have suffered it, or will at some point. We must do what we need to in order to protect ourselves from things that hurt or trigger us. 

I believe every network feels this sentiment and uses the trigger warning requirement in order to protect their readers from consuming content which would hurt them, while allowing the creator the opportunity to explore and create in the medium they see fit. 

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[echo-bleu]

You always address Alex’s disability so thoughtfully in your writing. “I wish you’d write a fic where...” Michael thinks Alex is blowing him off, but he’s actually at a medical appointment for his leg.

Thank you!! This is a great prompt, I loved writing it. I set out to write maybe 500 words, but as usual that’s not what happened. I hope you like it!

Wordcount: 2322

Also on AO3

Lunch at the Crashdown? Michael types out while getting ready for his day. It's Saturday, so Alex should be off work and they can finally have that date they've been planning. Michael wanted it to be yesterday night, but Isobel dragged him with her to the Wild Pony instead. She keeps doing that, to the point that Michael is starting to suspect his sister isn't going to that bar for the beer.

Not today, sorry, Alex answers after a few minutes.

Michael frowns. He and Alex have been going out for a couple of months now, in that weird limbo between friendly outings and dates where they stay in public to keep themselves accountable. It precludes anything but the chastest kisses, and then only when Alex doesn't freak out at being out in a homophobic town, but it has made them actually talk rather than fall in bed at the first occasion, so they've agreed to keep going.

But this is the third Saturday in a row that Alex has blown him off without an explanation. Michael doesn't understand. He doesn't often have his Saturdays free, since five days a week don't quite bring him the income he needs to keep up with his recently extended social life. But he's been picking up restoration jobs around town that pay much better than car-tweaking recently, so it's allowed him to take his weekends off.

And Alex doesn't want to have lunch with him.

Okay, he answers simply, sadness pinching at his chest. He doesn't bother to offer another option. Alex is allowed not to want to spend time with him, he supposes, and he'll see him tomorrow at Isobel's anyway.

He drags himself to his car instead, deciding that since he doesn't have a lunch date, he might as well do something useful with himself. He picks up some groceries at the store, then heads to the hospital, where he and Liz have been working at her lab since it was rebuilt.

Liz briefly looks up from her microscope to smile at him when he walks in.

“Hi Mickey! What are you doing here on a Sunday?”

“I could return the question,” Michael says.

“I didn't really have anything else to do,” Liz shrugs. She's been working a lot, both for her actual paying job and on their side projects. Max's resurrection, it turns out, is not an overnight thing, even once they figured out how to restart his heart. He needs to rebuild the huge amount of energy that he lost, and that means he's still in a coma, hooked up to machines Alex bought off the Internet and Valenti set up in his house. So, coupled with Rosa leaving town, Michael gets why Liz uses work to take her mind off things.

“I think Alex blew me off again,” he says.

“Alex? I just saw him,” Liz frowns, her eyes still on her microscope.

“Here?”

“Yeah, he had a gap between appointments, so he came to say hello.”

“Appointments?” Michael stops in the middle of setting up his station in surprise.

“Hm. PT or something. You wanted to see him?”

“I wanted to have lunch with him.”

“Alex never does Saturday lunches,” Liz says absently. “The last time he did, we spent the afternoon with Maria and Mimi and he was so exhausted I had to drive him home before we made it to dinner. That's why Isobel settled for Sunday brunches even though Kyle has to bail off every other week. I thought everyone knew that.”

At Michael's silence, she finally looks up. “Wait, you really thought Alex just brushed you off?”

Michael nods wordlessly. He feels like an asshole, suddenly. But then, Alex didn't tell him.

“Wow. Um, I feel like I shouldn't have just told you all this.” Liz bites her lip. “You didn't know?”

“It's okay,” Michael says, his heart in his throat.

“Alex doesn't like talking about this, but I don't understand why he didn't at least tell you−”

“It's okay, Liz,” Michael repeats. “I...I didn't ask. We haven't really talked about this stuff.”

“Well maybe you should. He could use another friend. Someone more available than me or Maria.”

Michael just nods and gets to work. Liz's words have triggered a hurricane in his head, and he needs to quiet it down. He longs for a guitar, but working is the next best thing. How has he missed so much of Alex's life? Even Isobel seems to know more about him than Michael, and yet he hadn't even noticed that Alex isn't really letting him in.

Grand declarations of love and epic sex are not the same as actual communication, but Michael thought they were finally getting there. After the mess with Maria−a fling that ended after just one kiss when Max died, but still hurt them all more than Michael ever wanted it to−it's taken him months to gain Alex's trust back, but he thought that was behind them now, that they were working on building a solid relationship. But how much is Alex still holding back?

They need to talk, Michael realizes. They need to talk before his head manages to spin this into anger and resentment. There could be some innocuous reason why Alex doesn't want to share his Saturdays with him, why he didn't tell him about his medical appointments.

Before he can change his mind, he types a text on his phone. Can we do dinner? I can come over with Crashdown burgers. They haven't done this yet, eaten at each other's place rather than a neutral public space, but maybe it's time. Michael can easily imagine that Alex doesn't want to spill out medical details in a crowded bar.

Alex doesn't answer for another two hours. Michael forces himself to work rather than spin out, until Liz drags him with her to have lunch with her father. Michael feels bad for imposing on their time together, but Arturo must feel how much he needs a distraction as well as his daughter, because he treats Michael to a mountain of food and a dozen different anecdotes about Liz's childhood.

Okay. I have beers. Michael stares at his phone for a moment, lost in thoughts, then sends a thumb-up emoji back.

“That Alex?” Liz asks kindly. She knows what's on his mind, of course she does. She and Michael have grown pretty close in nearly six months of working together in the lab and holding each other up after Max died.

“Yeah. I'm meeting him for dinner.”

“Good. You want to visit with Max until then? I've been trying to read to him in hope that it will wake him up, but it's a bit lonely.”

“Sure,” Michael accepts. It will give him something to do, at least. And he can't imagine what it's like for Liz, who has moved into Max's house to be able to look over him. She needs all the company she can get.

Max seems a little more responsive than two days ago when Michael last swung by. Valenti was able to wean him off the ventilator over a week ago, and he opens his eyes more and more often, though he can't yet talk. It's going in the right direction, at least.

A little before six, allowing for the drive to Alex's cabin, Michael goes back to the Crashdown to pick up the order he gave Arturo. He tries not to let his mind wander too much on the way, because he doesn't want to be angry when he gets to the cabin. He thinks of the positive instead. He's going to see Alex. Even after months, he still marvels that he can just take his car and drive to him, rather than have to imagine him half a world away, maybe in danger, always out of reach.

Alex greets him with a tired smile and, when he steps back to let him in, Michael realizes he's leaning on his crutches. His prosthesis is off, the leg of his sweat pants pinned up, and he's wearing an oversize Star Wars hoodie Michael knows he wouldn't be caught dead with in public.

“Hey. Are you okay?” Michael frowns a little.

“Yeah, just tired,” Alex answers. He drops back on the couch rather than offer his help with dinner, which tells Michael that he must be in pain, too. “Beer's in the fridge.”

“If you need to sleep or something, I don't have to stay,” Michael says, despite his instinct to smother Alex with care.

“No, it's all good. I do need to eat, and I miss you. Bring me water, though, please?”

Michael comes back from the kitchen with a beer for himself and a glass of water for Alex, and starts unloading the Cashdown paper bag on the coffee table, since Alex doesn't seem to want to move from the couch. “I got some milkshakes, I know you like to dip your fries,” he says. “Not that I'll ever agree with that.”

Alex snorts lightly. “Thanks. Sounds nice.”

“Alex, can I ask−”

Alex looks down at his hands. “Yeah. I've been waiting for you to ask for a while, actually.”

“Really? I didn't...I didn't want to intrude, and I figured maybe I was already asking for too much time with you. But I spent the day with Liz, and she said she saw you this morning−”

“No, no, it's not about you, okay? I want to spend time with you,” Alex stops him. “I'm sorry, I should have given a reason.”

“I'm not entitled to your time, even though I tend to forget it,” Michael says. “That's what Liz made me realize.”

Alex watches him for a moment, then nods. Needing something to do with his hands, Michael hands him a burger and arranges the cartons of fries between them. They eat for a while in silence. It's not an easy, natural silence, not quite, but it's not tense, either. Just expectant.

“I have back to back appointments every Saturday morning,” Alex explains. “Shrink, then PT, then the prosthetist every other week. They often run over lunchtime and I'm usually too tired to do anything else for the rest of the day.” He keeps his gaze firmly on his food, and Michael hates to think that he's ashamed. “PT's pretty brutal right now. We're trying out some blades, so it's a lot of running and jumping around. It makes me really sore, so that's why I have my leg off.”

Michael nods slowly. “I feel awful for thinking that you were blowing me off,” he says. At Alex's aborted huff of annoyance, he realizes that he's once again bringing it back to himself. Damn. He needs to start thinking before he talks. “I mean, thank you for telling me.”

“I didn't want to say yes to lunch and then show up late, or bail on you because I'm too tired.”

“I understand, Alex.” Michael reaches out almost by reflex, taking Alex's hand in his. “I get it, it's fine. I wouldn't have asked at all if I'd known. I'm realizing that I've never shown interest in your...health. It's not because I don't care, I do.”

“There's probably a lot we still don't know about each other, Guerin,” Alex says. Michael raises an eyebrow at the use of his last name, an old habit that Alex has given up for the most part. But it's an appropriate reminder of their history. “We missed ten years of each other's life. Just because I know your big secret doesn't mean we don't have anything left to share.”

“I want to share things, though,” Michael breathes.

“Yeah, me too. This,” Alex gestures to his leg, “It's hard. I don't want to...it's hard to let myself look vulnerable. Even to you. Especially to you, sometimes.”

“Especially?”

“You remember what you said, 'if anyone's gonna destroy me, it might as well be you'? Sometimes I feel like I shouldn't give you too much ammunition. Because when you lash out, you know exactly where to strike.”

Michael reels back from that, shocked. “Is this about something I said recently?” he asks.

Alex shakes his head. “No. Look, I'm not saying that to argue with you. I'm just...trying to show you where I come from. With my father and my brothers, and then in the Air Force...any vulnerability you show will be turned against you. So my default mode is to hide. I don't want to be like that with you, but you've done it before, too. You go straight for the throat when you're hurt.”

“Shit,” Michael mutters. “You're not wrong. I don't like that it's my defense mechanism, but it is. I can't help it sometimes.”

“I know,” Alex says with a sad smile.

“I can't promise that it will never happen again, but I can promise to work on it? Like...I don't even know how, off the top of my head, but there has to be a way. I−I want to say that things like your leg will always stay off limits, but−”

“You can't promise that, either,” Alex murmurs. “I get that, too. Maybe I just need to take a leap of faith and decide to trust you.”

Michael bites his lip. “Maybe we could meet in the middle?”

Alex meets his gaze, large brown eyes shining just a little, and he nods slowly. Michael leans closer, putting down his fry, and their mouth meet before he even has his hand around Alex's neck.

“In the middle, yeah,” Alex breaks their kiss briefly to shift into a more comfortable position. “Sounds good.” He crashes his mouth against Michael's again.

Michael closes his eyes. This isn't a problem solved, not even close. But they can work on it, and that's all he needs for now.

[silverandarsenic-hcs]

Ghost BC x Murder

im a simple girl. i have mental illness. i fantasize about being brutally murdered. is this problematic? 1000% yes. am i going to get canceled for this? 1000% yes. Have I been posting on borrowed time since that little caesars post? again, 1000% yes. Here’s this anyways.

TW: murder, blood, gore, manipulation (Papa II, Papa III), stalking (copia), domestic abuse (Papa III), substance and drug abuse (Papa II), Suicide (Papa II and Dew), Sex crimes - all consensual (Dew) these are about how they would murder you so im sure you can imagine the types of bad things it will entail. 

Papa I: For him, it’s a fit of emotion that drives him to kill. One thing piles on top of the next, frustration turns to anger, anger turns to rage. He doesn’t mean to hurt people, but when he gets so worked up, theres nothing that can stop him. All he can see is red until he’s snapped back into reality and sees the red staining his hands and his favorite robe. With you, all you had to do was walk into his office after a few bads days in a row, more bad news in tow, and that’s all it took. He loses his temper on you before your brain can even register that you should run. Before you can even scream. He’s not particularly a weapon guy, he’s more likely to choke you to death or anything he can do with his hands. If he feels so inclined, he’ll grab the nearest solid object to crush you with. He feels remorse, in the end, but still covers it up and hushes the room when they speak about your disappearance. Decently classic case of homicide - its usually someone you know, crime of passion, unplanned.

Papa II: This one hurt me very deeply to write. His case was classic, when he was a kid. Everyone says that when an adult loses it, you could tell from the time they were a kid that they had cracks - too abnormal, or too perfect. Papa had odd behavior but Nihil never had him tested or even looked at for anything because his ego got in the way, and nothing could possibly be wrong with his son. And nothing was really wrong with him. Something just wasn’t right. He felt things strongly: love, hate, depression, elation, anxieties. Sometimes it was too strong for him to cope. Sometimes he would turn to things that would help him deal with the emotional rollercoaster he couldn’t get off of. Other people just got on with him. He started smoking weed in his twenties. That wasn’t enough. He started drinking heavily at 25. By thirty that wasn’t enough either. Stronger, more potent vices were what he needed. Cocaine. Heroin. Anything to make him feel okay - anything to make him feel. And you, you were the light of his life. The only good thing he’d ever known. You were the only person he had met who could keep up with him, but keep him safe at the same time. But eventually you got swept up in the parties and drugs and drinking too. Lost more control as the months and years passed. And one night he thought you were pussing out. Not being fun. That you were being boring and killing his mood. He pushed you until you did more lines, and kept pushing you and pushing you until your nose began to bleed. But he was so gone he didn’t realize. He pushed you and you accepted it because it was the first time you had ever truly been afraid of him. When you overdosed and died on the couch in the living room of your shared apartment, Papa had already passed out in the bedroom. It was three days before he sobered up enough to wake, and when he found you, he called the police and said there’d been a murder. But he knew what happened. He knew what he did. Cocaine has a funny way of making things stick like that. He hung up the phone, and before the police could arrive, took his own life the same way he took yours. 

Papa III: In the beginning, he has a silly little crush. He steals glances your way. He brushes up against you and makes you blush. As you two talk more, he falls deeper. You two become a couple, an item. You tell each other you love them. Years could pass. You move in together. You don’t notice any cracks in him, but he sees them in the relationship. He saw you talking to the new guy at work today. What’s that, you had lunch with him? That’s interesting. He sees the way you look at the barista when he says your name, and hands you your coffee. You say he makes it the best. He sees the way your friends look at him. He goes through your phone once, when you’re sleeping, and doesn’t find anything. he kicks himself for months about invading your privacy and promises himself that he’s going to stop digging. But he can’t tear himself away. When youre in the other room, he’ll go through your purse. The next time he sees you smile at another man in passing, when you get home he confronts you. you say he’s being crazy. he says your crazy for cheating on him. he just loves you. cant you see? he loves you. when he finally chains you to the radiator in the bedroom so you won’t leave him, you’re shocked at how a man you once loved could be this way. When he finally kills you he’s begging you, with his hands around your throat, to understand that he’s not a bad person. He's not a bad person. He's not a bad person. He’s not a bad person.

Cardinal Copia: He stalks, but never gets close. Not like III. He’s aware of the mistakes of his predecessors. He’s smarter than that. More calculating. He would learn you schedule - morning routine, where you work, what you eat, when you get home, night routine, how long you sleep for. When you touch yourself. When you see your friends. At first it was from interest, but he begins to hate you. The way you walk, the way you talk, who you love, who you hate. And he wants you dead for it - but he wont be hasty, no, he’s still smarter than that. he has to remain calm and collected to pull this off. Hate you as much as he wants, he still knows you’re smart. Not as smart as him, but smart. Its thursday night, and you’re home alone getting ready to go out to the new bar in town with your friends. he climbs into the kitchen through a window he knows you leave unlocked for when you yourself forget your keys and need to break in. In the end, he slits your wrists with a knife he pulled from the wooden block on the counter. Good thing he followed you to work and school, he knows your handwriting wonderfully. He watches you bleed out on the floor while he writes your suicide note. You have never met him in your life. Good thing he always wears those gloves to keep everything clean of fingerprints, because the cops never suspect any foul play, and no one has a clue.

Swiss: He doesnt get close to his victims - he doesn’t have time. When you’ve gone through this many people, you start to forget their names, if you even knew them from the start. He takes jobs as an assassin when he needs the money - and it does pay well - but whenever he needs to blow off steam he’ll really go at it. Get creative. He’s a weapons guy, gun by choice but he’ll really use anything, and he knows each in his collection very very well. But in his eyes he isn’t doing anything wrong, he’s killing people that deserve to die, for good reasons (Edward Cullen who??). Racists, fascist, misogynists, homophobes. He was on the news once for throwing a brick at a nazi. You’re the anomaly on his list of victims though. You were an accident of sorts. He got sloppy with one of his jobs, got noticed, and the vic took a hostage - cue you walking into the back room at work at the wrong time - the only way he can get his shot in without risking his own life or alerting others is to shoot right through you. And now that he’s been noticed, he can’t give up the job and run. He memorizes the details of your face before he pulls the trigger, and kills you and the man with his arms around your torso in one shot. He feels the worst out of everyone. Attends your funeral, but stands very far back. Something about your face, the look in your eyes when you died. He thinks about you often, for a long time. When the exact dip of your nose and contours of your cheekbone begin to fade, he pulls a picture of you he cut from the newspaper from a shoebox under his bed. If he regrets any of the bad things he’s done in his life, it was hurting you.

Aether: He’s the one you don’t expect and he knows it. He’s the cult leader of the group - but that doesn’t make sense. He’s not even a leader in any capacity. He’s no Papa, not even a Cardinal. He doesn’t even lead the ghouls, really. But people trust him, and respect him, and that’s enough. The most pull he has in the church is being what you would compare to an advisor for the cardinal. helps him make decisions here and there. They get more drastic as things go on, and the church slowly burns itself down, but Copia is the only one people blame, including Copia, because Aether makes him believe every choice he made was his own idea. Eventually, when the cardinal has become useless, Aether will have him removed. By whatever means he has to take, but ideally not murder, it’s too early to have blood on anyone else's hands in his name, and far too early to have blood on his own hands. Aether promises to rebuild the name of the church, and fix everything the cardinal destroyed, and make things better.. Make people happy, and health again. And every single person drinks the kool-aid. Soon, rather than worshipping any Dark Lord or Old God, people are worshipping Aether. People believe in him with their hearts and souls. People believe he’s the savior. You are the anomaly. You were close with Aether before all of this started, before he was even the cardinal’s advisory. You just think the power has gone to his head, and blame the cardinal with the rest of him. But when you start digging, you realize it’s been his plan all along to have complete and total power To start his own cult. To be worshipped like a god in a place that was built for it. Your death is a stepping stone on the path for Aether to achieve ultimate power, but of all the stones cast, yours was the only one that meant anything. He didn't want to have to kill you. He didn't want you to defect, and put everything he'd worked so hard for at risk. He couldn’t have that. But the road to his ultimate power ends with his own death too - you can’t really be appreciated for everything good you've done for the world until you die, and he knows that. But until then, he will think of you often.

Dewdrop: Kills you for sexy reasons. Not because you wont sleep with him, or he wants to actually hurt you, but because you both got too swept up in the moment. There’s a movie called Sexual Predator and he’s pretty much the guy in that. One minute he’s got his belt wrapped around your throat, tugging on it hard while he’s hitting it from behind. He’s too caught up in the moment to realize you’ve gone limp on the bed. He doesn’t realize anything is wrong until he finishes. And it’s bad. Oh it’s bad. Unlike every other crime he’s committed, he calls the police, and he’s honest about what happened. He’s disgusted with himself. He’ll never have sex again. He’ll never wear a belt again. He’ll never touch another person’s throat again. He’s sentenced twelve months incarcerated along with probation and some hefty fines. Everyone knows what he did, how he did it. You were friends with all his friends - You weren’t together, but you were friends. And they all know he killed you. If any of the above are likely to have their own suicidal thoughts after the murder, Dew is the most likely to do it. He can’t stand the way everyone treats him after he did it. He can't stand living knowing what he did to you and what hes capable of. He can’t go on like this.

Cirrus & Cumulus: When they kill it’s for each other. In a LOT of other HCs i mention that II’s solution to things is to simply “kill them” if they’re bothering you, but the girls actually just do it. If someone touches Cirrus in a club, Cumulus will absolutely pull a gun out of her back pocket and blow their brains out right there. Good thing for the masks. They’ll spend the next few months or years on the road, saying under the radar until it’s safe to go home again. The ghoulettes have a lot in common with Swiss - they kill for what they believe to be a good reason. The difference is that Cirrus and Cumulus aren’t opposed to the more gorey ways of doing it. Torture, manipulation, blackmail, you name it they’ve probably done it. They know a lot of dirty things about a lot of big people, and at their whim they could have all their hearts desire. Trouble is, knowing everyone’s secrets is just a little bit more fun than that. They’ll kill to protect their friends and family, anyone who has ever unintentionally hurt an animal, and anyone that’s standing in their way. They’ll even collaborate with Swiss on a job if it’s gonna take some more elbow grease, and he needs people he can trust to get the job done without leaving behind a crumb trail of evidence.

- Kat

[lets-talk-appella]

i’m nobody’s but yours

Chapter 1/25 - Beca’s Prologue

Summary: Beca is straight as an arrow. 100%, totally, completely, straight. Except for one problem that 100%, totally, completely changes everything: Chloe Beale.

Title borrowed from Calum Scott's "If Our Love Is Wrong."

Thank you to everyone who has shown interest in and support for this fic, and a MASSIVE thanks to @acabellas, because without her it wouldn’t even exist. Stay litty, fam!

Word Count: 4k

Rating: M (for dark themes, homophobia, masturbation, and eventual smut in later chapters) Title borrowed from Calum Scott's "If Our Love Is Wrong."

AO3 and FFN

Keep reading below the cut:

Note: This fic is not inherently sad, but it’s not a happy fic, either. It’s a life fic, one that focuses on Beca’s difficulties in coming to terms with her sexuality – which she will not label in this fic – as well as depicting struggles that she and Chloe go through in developing their relationship. Themes of guilt, shame, and self-hatred are discussed, as are depictions of homophobic attitudes and comments directed toward several characters. I chose to write it this way because these are real struggles and challenges faced by many in the LGBTQ+ community. I will place trigger warnings in chapters that are more intense or contain slurs and homophobic language. I hope that, by having these issues in fic form, we can explore the LGBTQ+ experience through Beca’s eyes and find strength to face those struggles together, and eventually, be freed.

TW: homopobic/hate language

Beca’s first crush is on Dylan Erickson. They’re in kindergarten, and she likes him because he shares his Oreos with her at lunch. He’s cute, with dark skin, brown curly hair, and chocolate-colored eyes, and he always swings with her outside at recess. He holds her hand on the way to the lunchroom and she likes the way that makes butterflies erupt in her tummy. She’s pretty sure she loves him; at least, she gives him the “I love you” hand sign from across their kindergarten room every now and then.

Everything changes when a new girl, Melissa Simmons, joins their classroom following winter break. She looks a lot like Beca, with brown hair and dark blue eyes, and Beca doesn’t miss the double-take Dylan does when he first sees her. It makes Beca angry, and when Melissa smiles right back at Dylan, her blood boils.

Beca doesn’t like Melissa.

But Dylan does. It isn’t long before Dylan invites Melissa to play with him and Beca on the swings at recess. Beca tries to be a good sport about it, she really does, but the little smirk adorning Melissa’s face as Dylan pushes her on the swings tells Beca everything she needs to know.

Once recess is done, it’s time for them to head to lunch. Beca reaches out a hand to Dylan, expecting him to hold it like always, but he doesn’t. Instead, he turns to Melissa, leaving Beca to trail behind as the three of them make their way to the lunch room. And Beca tries not to let it bother her when Dylan spends most of lunch time talking to Melissa instead of her, but when Dylan opens his pack of Oreos and hands one to Melissa, Beca sees red.

She stands and shoves Melissa off her chair and down to the gross floor of the lunchroom. She does it because she’s in kindergarten and because she’s pretty sure she loves Dylan, and nothing has ever felt better in her short life. She fully intends to continue to the fight, but then Melissa starts crying and the lunchtime supervisors all rush over, concern written across their faces, and Beca knows she’s in trouble. Sure enough, before she can even blink, she’s being sent to the principal’s office, feeling Dylan’s eyes on her back as she goes.

She’s scolded, but only lightly; they are in kindergarten, and she hadn’t done more than push Melissa. Her real punishment comes after, when she returns to her classroom – lunchtime is over by then – to see Melissa and Dylan sitting together at the same table, hand-in-hand and talking to each other like they’re the only people in the room.

After school, Beca goes home utterly distraught at the apparent ending of her first relationship. Immediately after stepping off the school bus, she flings herself into her mom’s arms. Her mom simply sinks down, wrapping her in a big hug as she cries and chokes out the story. She tells her mom everything, even how she pushed Melissa, needing to get it all out. Her mom only holds her tighter, her fingers running through Beca’s hair as they sit on the curb outside their house.

When Beca is finally cried out, her mom pulls a Kleenex out of nowhere and helps Beca wipe her face. She tells Beca that it’s okay to be sad, but that she can’t let it make her sad forever. When she tells Beca that that kind of thing with Dylan and Melissa happens sometimes, and will probably happen in the future, Beca nearly bursts into tears all over again.

But then her mom says, “I’ll always love you, no matter what,” and Beca smiles, then screeches when her mom lunges forward to tickle her sides. They both fall to the ground laughing until the tickle attack ends and leaves them both straining for air against the grassy ground.

Later, sitting at their kitchen table between both her parents and eating her mom’s homemade chicken noodle soup, Beca can’t remember why she ever cared so much about Dylan Erickson.

Beca doesn’t think much about boys for a little while, beyond the occasional realization that they have cooties and are generally covered in some form of dirt. It’s not until she’s in the 4th grade and Nick Walker moves to her school from Michigan that she finds herself thinking that not all boys are bad. Nick is blonde, blue-eyed, and incredibly athletic even for the 4th grade. He immediately becomes involved in every after-school sport Beca’s relatively small school has to offer and already shows promise to become a high school sports star.

Pretty much every girl in Beca’s grade and in the grade below are beside themselves over Nick Walker. If Beca’s honest with herself, she doesn’t really see why. Sure, he’s cute, but the more Beca hears about Nick, the less she likes him. Beca’s more of a reader than a runner, and Nick seems to only talk about sports, sports, and more sports.

She mostly admires Nick’s looks from afar as he “dates” girl after girl in their grade. Her best friend Kelsey shows her a notebook of hers with “Mrs. Kelsey Walker” written in cursive all over the pages. She seems scandalized that Beca hasn’t done the same. So, Beca tries it, but after her second “Mrs. Beca Walker” scrawled near the top of a page, she decides she’s not really that invested and would prefer not to ruin a notebook.

When Beca’s in 7th grade, she finally gets her period a week before she turns 13. It feels like everyone else had gotten theirs much, much sooner; Alexis McMahon certainly had. At 13, Alexis looks like a 16- or 17-year-old and is the talk of the school. She’s blonde, tall, and very pretty, with curves and stylish tops and skirts that make Beca’s hoodies and jeans look like trash bags.

It’s no secret that all the boys like her and that most of the girls are jealous of her. Beca wonders sometimes if she’s jealous of Alexis, too; she certainly spends more time than totally necessary thinking about her and looking at her. It’s hard not to, when she has three of her classes with Alexis, one of which is gym class.

Kelsey, still her best friend, is in gym with her too, which is fun. They’re on the soccer unit right now, and Beca loves playing on offense with Alexis and Kelsey. Mostly, she likes to watch Alexis, but she also likes to show off a little; she’s pretty good at soccer, and she’s filled with pride when, during one particularly good play, she gets the assist when she passes the ball to Alexis, who scores a goal.

Alexis smiles at her, nodding happily, and it makes Beca’s chest feel kind of funny and fluttery. She keeps staring at Alexis, even after Alexis turns away to reset in the middle of the field. She doesn’t even realize she’s doing it until Kelsey steps up beside her and hisses, “Careful Beca, someone’s gonna think you’re lesbo.”

Kelsey’s words sting and Beca flinches away. She doesn’t really understand what Kelsey means, but she knows enough not to want to be called that in front of everyone else. And especially not in front of Alexis. So Beca shakes her head, laughs, and brushes it off, not quite meeting Kelsey’s eyes.

She lets her friendship with Kelsey fade gradually after that without really acknowledging – even to herself – why exactly. She starts to withdraw, not letting herself stare at anyone she finds attractive, boy or girl. She doesn’t want people to assume anything, even though she’s not a “lesbo” at all.

Beca doesn’t let her eyes linger on Alexis again.

Beca’s parents divorce when she’s 14. On the day her mom kicks her dad out of the house for cheating on her with one of his TAs, Beca blasts her music at full volume through her earbuds. It’s the first time she uses music to drown out the sound of her thoughts.

She’d liked to spend time with her dad; he’d spontaneously take her to get ice cream with a wink and a “don’t tell Mom,” (which seems ironic now, considering it turned out there were lots of things he didn’t tell her mom) and whenever she couldn’t sleep, he used to sit on the floor next to her bed and hum “Yellow Submarine” by The Beatles until she finally drifted off.

But as she watches Warren – that’s what she decides to call him from now on, now that he’s undeserving of the “dad” title – walk down the driveway and out of her and her mom’s lives, Beca shoves those good memories and warm feelings of her father away and locks them in a tiny box where they can’t hurt her. A strange hollow ache replaces those feelings, opening in her chest and startling her with its emptiness.

As Warren gets into his car and pulls away, Beca’s mom glances over at her, eyebrows drawn together. Beca tries hard to school her expression but knows she didn’t quite fake it well enough when her mom pulls her into a hug and whispers, directly into her ear, “I’ll always love you, no matter what.” Beca focuses on the warm arms wrapped around her, the only secure thing in her life in that moment.

Later that year, the movie Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix comes out. Beca and her mom go to the opening weekend together, both dressed in Hogwarts robes (Gryffindor, of course) her mom had found at a secondhand store. Beca’s sure they’re both feeling Warren’s absence, but they don’t talk about it. Instead, Beca loses herself in the excitement of the crowd at the theater and spends her time surveying others’ costumes. She’s not sure if she’s more excited for the movie or if her mom is; she hasn’t seen her mom smile this much since Warren left.

The theater is crowded and she ends up squished between her mom and an older teenage girl. The girl has an annoying tendency to giggle and fan herself whenever Daniel Radcliffe comes on screen – which is a lot. While he may be kind of cute in the right lighting, Beca finds herself more focused on Emma Watson than anyone else. Hermione is definitely her favorite character.

Beca doesn’t see Warren on her 15th birthday. There’s a rumor floating around that he’s stopped seeing his TA and started dating someone more age-appropriate. It doesn’t matter to Beca, though. She takes the $50 out of the card he mails her and then throws the actual card in the recycling without reading it. Her mom doesn’t say anything, though Beca knows she sees the card in the bin. The double-chocolate cake she makes for Beca is massive that year.

At 15, she gets her first kiss from Drew Metrie under the bleachers at the homecoming football game.

They were sort of dating, she supposes. At least, he’d asked her to homecoming three days prior. The short notice had been annoying, but thankfully, her mom was able to take her to the mall in time for them to find a blue dress that mostly matched her eyes.

The football game is the night before the dance. Beca hadn’t been planning on going to the game, but Drew had insisted. At the game, they sit awkwardly on the bleachers with several of his other friends and their dates. Everyone seems to know each other really well; they talk through most of the game, Drew becoming involved in a heated discussion about… something (Beca doesn’t know or really care), which leaves her to stare at the field in front of her in quiet boredom. She’s pretty sure Drew had forgotten she’s even there. That is, until the third quarter, when he turns suddenly and grabs her hand to lead her down and behind the bleachers.

The kiss is good, she supposes. She doesn’t have anything to compare it to, but it’s still nice. Drew keeps his tongue in his mouth – thankfully – and cups her face gently with his hands. She loops her arms around his waist, and is actually kind of disappointed when he pulls away first.

He smiles at her shyly before they return to his friends on the bleachers. He keeps talking to them, leaving her sitting on the end of the group, but she doesn’t really mind. Her lips – actually her whole body – feel warm and a little tingly for the rest of the game. She does really like Drew Metrie, even though they don’t talk much.

The next night, Drew drives to her house to pick her up for the dance. Her mom insists on taking way too many photos of her and Drew, who’s wearing a suit that’s a little too big for him. The tie matches her dress, though, which is unexpected. Drew helps her down the front steps of her house, even though her heels aren’t that high, and he opens his passenger car door for her, helping her climb inside.

The dance is surprisingly fun, considering it’s being held in their high school’s gymnasium. They dance together and with groups of their friends. It’s really more jumping up and down than dancing, but Beca prefers it that way. The few slow dances that the DJ does play are a little awkward; she and Drew just stand and revolve slowly on the spot. He kisses her again at the end of the last slow song of the night, and again, she finds herself liking it more than she’d expected to.

After homecoming weekend, though, nothing really comes of it. She sees Drew in the hallways sometimes and they always greet each other with a smile and a wave, but nothing more. They only hang out one more time, grabbing dinner one Friday at a local pizza joint, but it’s pretty obvious it’s just as friends. They stay in touch and text occasionally, but that’s it. He doesn’t kiss her again.

Just three days after Beca turns 16 and get her driver’s license, her mom dies in a car accident. Everyone knows you’re not supposed to swerve for animals; it’s one of the first things Beca learned in her driving classes. Yet, witnesses to the accident said that’s exactly what Beca’s mom did when a family of ducks tried crossing the highway in front of her.

It’s the worst day of Beca’s life.

The day of the funeral is a close second, though. She hates having to stand there as scores of people file past, telling her how sorry they are. She gets tired of hearing it after a while and does her best to tune it all out by thinking of music she likes, interwoven with her mom’s voice whispering in her ear, “I’ll always love you, no matter what.”

The realization that she’ll never hear her mom’s voice again makes her mentally blast her favorite music as loud as she can, trying desperately to fill that hollow ache tearing through her chest, reappeared and renewed, a thousand times worse than when Warren left them. She’s not sure this ache will ever ease.

She moves to live with Warren and his new wife of less than six months, Sheila. They’re only half an hour away, so she doesn’t have to switch schools. Not that that really matters; she withdraws from people after the accident. She blocks everyone out, telling herself she doesn’t care when even the friends she’d been closest to eventually give up on her. With her earbuds in and at full volume almost constantly, she builds a wall between herself and everyone else, using music as a crutch.

Living with Warren again is difficult. It makes her angry, and it also makes her sad because it reminds her of how it used to be. She hates seeing how affectionate he is with Shelia when she so clearly remembers how he used to be like that with her mom.

Sheila “the step-monster” is truly unpleasant. She doesn’t try to hide how much she resents that Beca had come to live with them.  She never says anything in front of Warren, but the glares she often sends Beca’s way are clear enough indication. Beca tries not to let it bother her; the feeling is mutual.

Beca’s with Warren and Sheila, trailing beside them in the mall one day when two men holding hands, clearly in a relationship, exit a store ahead of them. The sight makes Beca feel wistful for some reason, but makes Warren’s expression harden and Sheila’s mouth twist. Glaring, Sheila mutters something that Beca doesn’t fully hear, but she makes out the words “perverted,” and “in public.” She then asks, more loudly, which of the men is the “woman in the relationship.”

It makes Warren glance quickly at Beca and away before laughing once. Beca frowns at the tiled floor ahead of her; she doesn’t see humor anything Sheila said.

During her junior year of high school, Alicia Harrison – a girl in Beca’s grade – comes out as bisexual. She’s teased mercilessly by her peers, many of whom imply she’s sleeping with the entire student body. Others say she’s doing it for attention and that bisexuality isn’t real. Beca never joins in on the teasing, but she doesn’t stop it when she sees it happening, either.

She makes sure to never mention Alicia in front of Warren or Sheila.

Beca’s 17 and a senior when she meets Carrie Lawson.

It’s only Beca’s second day of work at the music store in the mall, but she already hates it. Her boss is an overweight, middle-aged man who always has some sort of stain on his shirt. His eyes linger too long on her recently-developed chest for her comfort, but she really needs the money. She isn’t sure what she expected – it’s not like she could make her mixes while on the job – but spending all day trying to sell CDs to people is somehow worse than she thought it would be.

She’s already been yelled at by two different customers for being too slow on the register, still needs to learn the layout of the store and merchandise, and has had to restock shelves of Justin Bieber three times already, which, ew. People need to learn what real music is.

The only bright spot in her work life is her coworker, Carrie. Carrie goes to the neighboring town’s high school, which is why they haven’t met before. Beca would certainly remember if they had; Carrie is even shorter than her, blue-eyed, sandy-haired, and very pretty. She’s also incredibly funny, kind, and just as into music as Beca is.

They bond quickly over how creepy their boss is and how crappy everyone else’s music taste is. As they get to know each other over the days and weeks, Beca learns that Carrie lost her mom about three years ago to cancer. They bond over that, too. Carrie is easy to talk to; so easy that she becomes the only person Beca opens up to. They text almost constantly and eventually start to spend time together outside of work, too.

Carrie begins to hug her a lot, sometimes even coming up from behind her while she’s at the register and wrapping her arms around her waist and pressing close to her back. Sometimes Carrie will brush her fingertips along Beca’s arm or across her lower back. Beca’s surprised to realize how much she likes the affection; she can’t remember the last time she let someone hug her. At her mom’s funeral, maybe? It’s not like she lets Warren or Sheila touch her, and she’s driven away her friends. It’s been a long time since someone touched Beca, and she’s missed it.

She tries not to overthink it.

But then, suddenly, it’s all she can think about.

She misses Carrie’s touch, Carrie’s presence, Carrie’s voice, Carrie’s perfume. She misses her friend, even when they only go hours or a few short days without seeing each other between work shifts. Carrie calls her “my little DJ,” and that makes Beca’s chest feel funny. Carrie touches her more and more, texts her more and more, sends her heart emojis more often than Beca would have tolerated from anyone else. Once, Carrie steps up behind her and brushes her lips to Beca’s cheek, leaving a burning imprint before spinning away with a laugh.

They’re not dating. They don’t talk about it. It’s just a thing.

Until it isn’t anymore. Carrie doesn’t show up for work one night, and she doesn’t reply to Beca’s texts. When she still doesn’t reply hours later, Beca calls, only for it to go to voicemail. When Beca becomes truly desperate, she tries Facebook, then email, only to get silence in return.

It’s not until almost a week later – a week filled with fear and stomach-churning anxiety – that Beca’s boss bothers to tell her that Carrie had quit. Her parents had heard rumors of Carrie having a girlfriend at her high school and had shipped Carrie away to live with her religious grandmother, without access to her phone or the Internet. Lip curling with mirth as he tells the story, Beca’s boss growls, “Good riddance. Don’t need a dirty dyke in my store.”

The words hit Beca like a truck. She has to hold onto the register for support as the words sink in. The idea that Carrie’s absence is due to her having a – a girlfriend sends the room spinning. It’s only made worse by the realization that she’s more than a little jealous of this girlfriend.

The thought makes something ugly and unbidden rise within her, something she doesn’t want to address now or ever. Beca instantly shuts down that line of thought before it can really form, locking it behind a cement wall where it presses and strains to be freed, but she keeps it restrained. The touches hadn’t meant anything. They had been brought on by emotional vulnerability and shared trauma. They’d been emotionally close; surely it was just natural for them to be physically close? It doesn’t mean anything beyond that.

She isn’t into girls. She isn’t bisexual. She’s certainly not lesbian. Even the word – so often sexualized or ostracized – feels dirty to her. What she feels for Carrie isn’t gay; they were just good friends. Beca tells herself that over and over again until she believes it, until she’s almost convinced herself. She’s straight. That’s all there is to it. She shoves Carrie forcibly from her mind, locking her into a little box of her own.

She quits her job a few days later. It doesn’t matter anyway, not when she’s graduating so soon and moving to LA (assuming Warren gets over his college kick).

Through sheer force of will, she maintains that she is straight as an arrow and that Carrie – whatever that whole thing had even been – was just a fluke.

Then, at 18, against her will and recovering from her past wounds, Beca meets Chloe Beale.

[nicolekidmanwigfactory]

my current depressive episode was caused by “Lady Bird”  TL;DR the end

this is just a rant. i didn’t edit it except to correct errors as I went. Either read it or don’t. the run up to finals are stressing me out and bringing out my insecurities so i need to vent. don’t reblog. Beware it goes all over the place. 

Other than the fact i’m now depressed, i really did like lady bird (laurie metcalf is my current pick for supporting actress, but it’s still early to be definitive)

tl;dr at the end.

i saw lady bird over the weekend and the experience of going to a single sex catholic high school has me dwelling on everything i chose to miss out on bc i was fat, bc i felt i didn’t deserve to be happy bc fat people don’t deserve happiness (or at least if they;re me). she was doing all of that teenager bs and i don’t think there was a single thing in that movie she did that I can say I did in high school.

like, i lost the weight in undergrad. but got cancer and developed and eating disorder in the process. so it’s like i was never intended to be thin. always destined to be fat and unhappy bc fat = unhappy. yes i know that’s not true but it’s still my gut rxn even though i always challenge it

but since lady bird all i can think about is what i missed out on. had i been thin in hs, would i have realized i was gay then? would i have realized i didn’t actually like girls bc maye then i’dve gotten some attention from them. i mean, that was my main evidence for denial in undergrad. i can’t be gay bc “i’m not thin enough for girls to like me yet. i’m only having this attraction to guys out of desperation” or some shit like that. had i been thin in hs, maybe i’d’ve had a support system for the eating disorder and depression- those are in the family history, idk if they’d have gone away if i’d been thin to start with. if i’d been thin in hs maybe i wouldn’t be so jaded about the catholic hs i went to. maybe id still be in the blind about what a hypocritical republican vote machine it is (through no fault of the jesuits themselves). that it’s just a mecca for the wealthy to put their sons in one place, or that its emphasis on catholic social teaching attracted them to the school but then they get angry when theyre busted for telling the few (mostly) lower income hispanic students to go back to mexico (i saw that on the news) or telling the black students they only liked and voted for obama in ‘08 bc he’s black, a “half N-word” meaning a “good” black person (that is seared in my brain) or that white people only voted for Obama bc that was the cool thing to do

but rn, i’ve been dwelling on a lot of the social experiences i missed out on in hs. i wasn’t out of the closet yet, but i wasn’t even doing the “straight” ones. i don’t regret not going to prom and homecoming (never appealed to me) but i didn’t have a group of friends to hang out with on the weekends, or meet anyone from the all girls school through them. being “cousin” schools of sorts seemed to make it possible for everyone to reach those milestones of puberty- first kiss, make out sesh, dry hump, and on... everyone but me it seemed (obviously not though). i was already struggling with being gay and trying to deny it, and seeing how my homophobic classmates treated the one out kid my freshman made me never want to go through that. it just seems that if i’d been thin, i could’ve hetero non-confirmation and figured out i was gay earlier and learned to handle it with confidence. bc there was a gay my senior year i could’ve fallen for if i’d let myself

i’m rambling i know. i didn’t intend to write on and on like this but here i am

but since i saw lady bird the other night the stuff that i’m really dwelling on, in case you can’t tell, is the romance stuff from my hs days, and that’s what i really struggle with in terms of my body image and eating disorder issues. lady bird got herself two really cute guys just like that it seems. and they were both thin of course. the romantic aspirations of the one fat character in the movie was, of course, treated mostly as a joke by giving her a crush way out of her supposed league (I mean, he was also a teacher and clearly wasn’t sending or returning signals).

so i again got to witness others having the adolescence i denied myself bc i decided i didn’t deserve it. because i was fat. because fat people don’t deserve happiness. because fat people don’t deserve love. because fat people don’t deserve anything good. because fat people don’t deserve good things

i know this is 100% false. but i STILL fight these thoughts everyday. they’re not consistent and active, but they’re still in the background, nagging at me and reminding me why i’m worthless and a failure if something goes wrong or something bad out of my control happens. “that parking ticket is bc you’re fat” or “that chair broke bc you’re fat, not bc your knee was in the weak spot.”

so when i saw lady bird having those adolescent experiences, it just reminded of the adolescent experiences that i’m not having now. i didn’t come out until after i graduated from undergrad, so they say at age you live through the teenage growing pains and such of sex and romance in your twenties bc you didn’t have the chance to do it when your were “supposed” to. but i’m not doing it now. i’ve only gone on a total of three dates since i came out and in all of them i was still catfishing with my old photos before regained the weight i lost in undergrad when my bulimia turned into non-compensatory binge eating disorder. the first guy didn’t show. the second guy seemed disappointed by saw it to the end. he never texted me again (but i didn’t either bc i was so ashamed). and the guy i liked most, i confessed what i did and cancelled the date bc i felt so bad. he was disappointed but i think he appreciated the (eventual) honesty. we still chat on snap from time to time. and then there was a really hot guy who knew what i actually looked like and wanted to go out, but he turned out to be an escort

even looking like i do, i know i could go out and find a quick hook up but i guess being the product of 18 years of catholic education has impressed on me the value of commitment in a relationship before sex. i’m not saying you gotta be 100% exclusive or get married, but for me, i need to know the person, even if its just a friend. the idea of a nsa hook up leaves me uneasy and while i fantasize about having a hoe phase, until i at least go through that adolescent phase i saw my classmates go through and then relived when i saw lady bird, it’s not gonna happen.

this all makes sense in my head but i’m not going back to edit or clarify what i’ve written. it defeats the purpose of a rant

tl;dr i saw lady bird and it triggered a weird depressive episode rooted in the  extent to which i denied myself happiness during my teen years bc i was so ashamed of being fat since i thought i didn’t deserve to be happy. seeing lady bird have so many of the experiences i’ve never experienced, even as a gay man in his 20s when late-blooming gays are supposed to go through that phase, makes me feel like i’m wasting my time on earth. i’ve beaten cancer and i’m successfully treating my eating disorder and depression, but have nothing to show for it. and when else except the homestretch of the semester for all of this to occur?

[ajokeformur-ray]

Hello! Can I get a self ship, please? I ship myself with Remus Lupin and Sirius Black (preferably in a polyamorous relationship). If you still have my description from my matchup request, you can just use that. If you need more details, please let me know. Thank you so much!!!

Interests- writing poetry, doing my makeup, listening to show tunes, hanging out with friends, reading fanfiction, making up stories in my head watching movies and tv shows

 Likes- being dramatic, correcting people, being right, learning new things, being able to bitch with certain people, making people smile, music, alone time, being the center of attention with certain people, shiny/sparkly things, wearing black, wearing dark makeup 

 Dislikes- being told to stop being dramatic, homophobic people/comments, being wrong, people who don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about, being crowded, being alone with people who I don’t know, being in large social situations, being alone for a prolonged period of time 

 What you look for in someone- as a person with severe anxiety and depression, I look for someone who will be patient and understanding with me; willing to learn how to help me through anxiety attacks and long bouts of depression. I also look for someone who is dominant. I need someone who can take charge of a situation and make decisions. I need someone who will take care of me when I can’t take care of myself. I want someone who is passionate, protective, and sincere. I also look for someone who will understand my love languages, which are quality time and receiving gifts. I am a very shy, quiet person. I don’t really talk that much and don’t like to socialize. Once I’m comfortable around you, you’ll learn I’m also dramatic, creative, analytical, loyal, honest, protective, and a bit of a bitch at times. I tend to be drawn to the people that others are scared of. I always look for the good in people, and am not quick to judge. Although I’m a very kind person, I’m not quick to trust. And once you’ve broken my trust, it’s extremely hard to earn it back. In addition to my general anxiety, I also have social anxiety. I can’t be in a group of people without someone I know and trust. It doesn’t matter what kind of social situation it is; if someone I know and trust isn’t there, I’ll be very uncomfortable and might have a panic attack. If I’m alone in a large group of people, I feel like everyone is looking at me, talking about me, judging me, crowding me, suffocating me. It sucks. I generally don’t like talking to people I don’t know. The only exceptions to this are if they start talking about a fandom I like, or if they start spewing incorrect facts about one of my fandoms. I get made fun of a lot for being quite, which really annoys me. It’s not that I don’t have anything to say, I’m just scared of making a fool out of myself and I freeze up. That, or I don’t feel like I have anything to add to the conversation and choose to remain quiet, which makes people think I’m weird.

I love writing OT3 requests! Hope you like this and that it brings you some comfort and/or smiles. As specified in a DM - they’re dating you but not each other, set during the Marauder Era! 

- Okay omg your hobbies are right up their streets! I headcanon that Sirius is heavily into Broadway so he knows all the lyrics and will spontaneously break out into song and dance, no matter where you all are. If he feels like dancing and singing, he will. Remus tends to face-palm but he can’t help but smile when he sees you enjoying yourself, especially if you join in with Sirius. When you’re in your own head daydreaming, the boys tend to leave you there… Or, Remus does. Because he’s studying. Whereas Sirius is the type to throw himself - and I mean, launch himself at you from the other side of the time kinda throw - into your lap and beg for your attention. On quieter days later on in Hogwarts, he’ll curl up beside you as Padfoot, instead.

- Yes ohmygoodness okay bitching is one of Sirius’ favourite things to do. He engages in all the gossip around Hogwarts and is usually the caue of it all, if we’re being honest, and he makes sure that you and Remus are caught up on it too.

“Hey, Remus, did you know about Marl -”

*Sigh* “Yes, Sirius, we know, that’s the fifth time today!”

“Hey, Erika, do you know - “

“Sirius!!”

Not only that, but the three of you, being in an openly poly relationship, tend to be the centre of gossip. Sirius and Remus couldn’t care less, they’re two of the four Marauders (six if you count the two honourary members; you and Lily), but if it ever got to you, they’d be there with withering glares and snapped comments that effectively roast the poor sod who dared to try to offend you.

- As you all get older and James spends more time with Lily and Peter mysteriously disappears for long hours at a time, you’re all left to your own devices so you’d become their entire world. Both are quite possessive - one’s a werewolf, one’s a dog - so it’s almost built into them but they do their best to never fight about you in front of you because that’s the last thing you’d ever need to see. If one started to monopolise you, a quick glance would make them step back and let the balance be restored, as it were, but generally they’re at the friendship stage of not knowing who’s clean underwear is whose, so there’s rarely a problem.

- You would be their biggest shared priority, even for Remus who typically prefers to study. You’re his girlfriend and Sirius is his best friend so really, what more could he ask for? if either you or Sirius are unhappy, Remus is right there to do what he can or either or both of you. If Remus is unhappy then naturally you and Sirius are there for him too. There’s so much balance and love in this poly, it’s unreal.

- They’d never let anyone, including each other, say something homophobic or generally rude to you. Woe betide anyone who tries because like I said, they’d be roasted and probably Cursed into next month. They’d also be sure that one of them is always with you at any given time unless you specify that you want to be alone or if they’re both busy with detentions or lessons. If they’re in detentions it’s almost guaranteed that you are too, even if you have to deliberately get detention rather than get caught for what they did or didn’t do.

- Both boys know anxiety and depression because they both have it, Sirius because of his family and Remus because of his furry little problem so you’re always well-looked after, all three of you. You all know each other’s triggers and you all know how to comfort each other, so there’s never any need to hide (looking at you, Remus). You had to learn but the boys already knew and they were happy to show you what they both needed in any given situation.

- Both boys can and will take charge of you when they need to. Remus tends to be more subtle - “Erika, please eat something. For me?” and he’d hold out a huge chunk of chocolate, smiling at you kindly in a way that only gives a hint of him doing it as a professor, and Sirius tends to be mroe obvious about it - “why aren’t you eating?” *adds more toast to your breakfast plate* Both are passionate so woo boi, any NSFW stuff you all do is heaaaaaavy asf! ;) 

- Sirius tends to spoil you bothwith gifts and you and Remus prefer to share chocolate and spend time together. They love how you are when you’re comfortable and when you’re in a social situation one of them stays by your side at all times to make sure you’re comfortable and if you need to get out, they’ll take you straight out, no questions asked. If Sirius whines, Remus glares and you all go.

- People tend to avoid Sirius because of his last name and the affliations it has but Remus is well-known and loved. Neither can tell you just how much they appreciate how you got to know them for who they are not what people tell you they are and for that, you see sides to them that no one else will ever get to see. 

- Remus likes to kiss your cheek and hug you from behind but Sirius loves giving and receiving neck kisses and hugging you from the front so sometimes you’re the filling of a Marauder Hug Sandwich, especially if James comes from behind one of you and attaches himself to the three of you, mock-crying about being left out of the group hug. It really is just such a loving, fulfilling and supportive relationship and the boys can’t imagine their lives without you.

@bingewatchingmylifegoby