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arotechno · 4 years ago

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Jughead (2015), Issues 7-8: Discussion and Commentary

Boy oh boy am I excited to talk about this arc!! These two issues hold a very special place in my cold little aro heart.

(By the way, do you see that? I managed to get a digital copy from my library via Hoopla, which means you are spared from my shitty phone grabs. I’ll fix the previous post, don’t worry. Try clicking on the screenshots if tumblr blurs them. And try Hoopla, if you’ve got a library card and have been looking to read these.)

Fed up with him sitting around the house playing video games all summer, Mr. Jones forces Jughead to get out of the house and do something outside. Jughead finds Archie at the pool where he’s working as a lifeguard, and convinces him to take time off to go camping in the woods with him at their friend Dilton’s cottage.

They take Archie’s car out to the woods, only to find that the lake is overrun with Reggie’s over-the-top relatives at the Mantle family reunion. Horrified, Jughead and Archie go out on a hike to get away. This is where things go downhill—literally.

Jughead calls Archie out for his growing fixation with Veronica Lodge, whose father is the one trying to clear out Fox Forest. Archie immediately goes on the defensive, but Jughead, understandably, really doesn’t get it. And here’s where we see that this is a divide that has been brewing between them for quite some time, even if Archie seemingly had no idea it was happening.

The boys end up getting lost, which only serves to fuel their frustrations. It occurs to Jughead, some time later, that the lake they’re camping at is not that far from Camp Lucey, an all-girls summer camp. Shocked and hurt, he accuses Archie of only agreeing to go on the trip to pick up girls, and not to hang out with him. He tackles Archie and they tumble down a hill into the woods below.

This is a really interesting story, from an aro’s perspective. Jughead can’t relate to Archie’s teenage obsession with girls, and it isn’t something they can bond over like other friends may have been able to do. On a simple level, all Jughead really wants to do is hang out with his best friend, just the two of them, just like old times—back when they were younger, before Archie’s interest in girls seemed to take over his every waking moment. Importantly, Jughead never objects to Archie’s romantic pursuits on principle (he does have an issue with Veronica, but that has to do more with her father’s actions than her). It isn’t that he wants to stand in the way of Archie’s happiness—he just feels left behind, and that’s something I think a lot of aromantic people, teenagers especially, can resonate with.

Eventually, Archie and Jughead run into Mr. Weatherbee of all people, who begrudgingly offers to help lead them back to camp. It’s at this point that we get one of my favorite moments in the entire series, one that I have waxed poetic about on this blog before and probably will again.

Archie insists that he is in fact here to hang out with Jughead, and that he’s just being dramatic. Jughead, on the other hand, insists that Archie’s the one being dramatic with his love triangle problems, to which Archie replies:

“Look, I’m not going to apologize for being a normal guy, I—”

And Jughead’s reaction to those words has stuck with me since the first time I read this. He’s shocked, hurt, and clearly a little angry that Archie would say something like that. And it’s a subtle moment, one that you might not even feel the gravity of if you didn’t know that Jughead was aro. What’s most important here, though, isn’t Jughead’s reaction, but the fact that Archie is clearly in the wrong, and he knows it. He tries to backtrack immediately (“Jughead! I didn’t mean it like that! Wait!”), but Jughead ignores him, as Mr. Bee has already gotten them lost again.

This singular page is, to me, a deeper and more nuanced portrayal than many works with “on-the-page” canon aromantic characters. This arc isn’t about Jughead being aro (in fact, none of the comics particularly are). But this is a meaningful incorporation of Jughead’s orientation into his daily life and his relationships with other people—namely, with his best friend. Although Jughead is being somewhat harsh with Archie, never does the narrative place him in the wrong for feeling abandoned, hurt, or angry because of Archie’s words and actions. Even Archie, his best friend, is capable of saying things that hurt him, and his words in this scene are never excused or justified by the narrative.

It also means a lot to me that Archie apologizes the second he gets the chance to, and that Jughead is quick to forgive him and explain that he just misses the time before Archie was so obsessed with girls. I wouldn’t want the story to just turn into a feud between them. You know when you’re on a trip with your friends and you get lost and you’re tired and frustrated you just end up airing your grievances and coming out of it with a new understanding of your friendship while trying to solve the mess you’re in? That’s what this arc is.

Anyway, after a run-in with Reggie’s relative and Mr. Weatherbee’s old high school bully Ted Mantle, the trio manage to make it out of the woods—after several hours of walking until the sun has come up. There, they find that Camp Lucey has actually been renamed, and is now a camp for elementary school girls, where Betty happens to be working. So after all of that, Archie just ends up making a fool of himself, like usual. Mr. Bee’s wife drives over to rescue them and brings the boys back to Dilton’s cottage, where she remarks that she’s heard a lot about Archie and Jughead, and that they’re inseparable.

At its core, this is a story about friendship. It’s about the difficulties that come with realizing you can’t always relate to each other, and you can’t always read each other’s minds, and you sometimes say the wrong thing without meaning to. It’s a story about growing up, but not necessarily growing apart, and being able to reconcile your differences.

Archie assumes that after all of their bickering, Jughead would just want to go home and not hang out with him anymore. But turning back now would be contrary to what Jughead wanted in the first place, which was just to hang out with his best friend.

All’s well that end’s well, and Jughead and Archie patch things over and vow that they will always be best friends. It’s a wholesome moment, and reflects a common struggle for aspec teens that I rarely see addressed in media, if at all. Sometimes, it feels like your friends are all moving on without you, and sometimes they don’t even realize it when they’ve been neglecting your friendship. It takes communication to work these things out, and I’m happy to see that illustrated here.

This arc is my favorite, I think, and there’s reasons for that even outside of the aspects I’ve already detailed here. The kids getting lost in the woods on summer vacation is a fun way of framing the deeper story, and there are a lot of funny and endearing moments in these two issues. (Archie falls on his face, a lot, and Mr. Weatherbee is stoically exasperated with both of their antics.)

These are the last issues written by Chip Zdarsky. So shoutout to him for some of the most nuanced representations of aromanticism in fiction to date, even if he never wrote the word down on the page (I’ll get to that, don’t worry). But these are the first issues illustrated by Derek Charm, whose art style I love (no offense Erica Henderson), and the rest of the volume has a lot of other good aro moments in store. Until then, here’s himbo Archie:

See? Pure of heart, dumb of ass. You can’t be mad at him for long. (He falls into a hole later on the same page.)

Yeah, me too.

#woo!!!#techno's jughead reread #aro #aromantic #aro jughead #ace jughead #aroace jughead #jughead jones #jughead comics #long post #op

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telehxhtrash · 4 years ago

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A masterpost on Togashi’s gay subtext and why it’s intentional.

Hi ! After seeing so many posts about Togashi dropping subtext about Killua's possible romantic feelings for Gon, I thought it'd be a good idea to make a sort of "masterpost" with all the subtext that Togashi has included into his work.

I usually see a lot of people trying to say that HxH isn't about romance and that Togashi isn't interested in writing romance into the manga, but when you analyze all the subtext that's been going on the further Gon and Killua's relationship progresses, I think it's incorrect to say that Togashi has never hinted at the possibility of romance in HxH.

This is going to be a long post, enjoy your read!

Also, please note that I will only base this analysis on the manga, so there can be no mistake that "maybe this is just something the anime made gayer" : i want to prove that the subtext is 100% intentional on Togashi's part.

I'd also like to mention, although I will analyze it further after listing the subtext, that Togashi is a VERY smart man. There are always little details in the story and/or foreshadowing that are easily missed at first but when you notice them, it truly makes you understand how much attention and care Togashi puts into his work. There are countless details and symbolism that are analyzed daily through wonderful meta posts, from the main 4′s birthdays and their link to their character or the religious symbolism in Kurapika’s story arc.... Togashi loves to foreshadow and plant little details into his work, so when Togashi plants subtext, I'm sure he 100% knows that he's writing it, and it can't be seen as unintentional.

I'll also link all my references for this post at the end of it, so feel free to read all the additional textposts and content if you want to know more.

Well, let's get into it!

EDIT : i can’t believe this post is still being used as a reference it makes me so happy... thank you so much !!! i edited this to tweak it a bit because i wrote this a while ago and the phrasing seemed off to me, so if you’re reading or re-reading this post, hi, welcome to masterpost on gay subtext 2.0 !

GREED ISLAND ARC

Greed Island is to me the arc that lays down the nature of Killua and Gon's relationship. It's during this arc that we get to see a bit more of what Killua thinks, how he's lucky to have met Gon and that he feels really grateful. Gon’s behavior in this arc is also very affectionate, with him always reassuring Killua about his place next to him. While the scene where Killua thinks "You've got it backwards, Gon, I'm the one that's glad I met you." can't be considered as subtext, I think it's something that lets the reader know a bit more about how Killua feels towards Gon.

But other than this scene, which can clearly be dismissed as platonic, there are 2 more moments in the Greed Island arc that are layered in subtext.

• The Rainbow Diamond (chapter 151)

During their time in Dorias, Killua uses Risky Dice to gain cards from the slot machines. The first card that Killua gains is called "Rainbow Diamond", the description of the card being "A diamond that shines in a rainbow of colors. Propose with this diamond and she is guaranteed to say "yes"".

There are 3 different things we can take from this panel. First, the card is a marriage proposal card, so it's obviously romantic in nature. Second, the object is a RAINBOW diamond. And third, Killua, wanting to keep the card safe, gifts it to Gon.

In short, Togashi sat down at his desk, decided to draw Killua winning a MARRIAGE PROPOSAL CARD (it could've been any card, but Togashi CHOSE to make Killua win a marriage proposal card) that has a RAINBOW diamond on it and made Killua gift it to Gon.

While I personally don't think that subtext can be used to 100% ascert that Killua has romantic feelings for Gon, I think it's a funny little touch from Togashi, and I'm even gonna say a sort of hint towards how Killua's feelings for Gon are going to evolve in this arc and the next.

• “It has to be Killua” (chapter 166)

Now this is a scene that I've never seen anyone talk about, at least on Tumblr, but when I read a bit of analysis on it I was 100% convinced this was intentional subtext. I'm basically quoting here what this article explains, so if you want more detail, I recommend reading it.

As you probably recall, during their deadly dodgeball game against Razor, Killua decides to sacrifice his hands to ensure that Gon could use all his strength. When confronted about it, Killua insists that it's nothing, and Gon shocks him by saying that he knew all along that he was hurting himself for his sake.

Gon then says that it can only be Killua holding the ball, and that it has to be Killua, resulting in Killua being absolutely awestruck and embarassed. I'm also going to talk about the anime adaptation for this one, because it's perfectly executed and translates extremely well the nuance that the second sentence bears. If you want to rewatch it, this scene happens in episode 70. It's worth noting that in the anime, we see Killua not reacting to Gon's first sentence, but losing his composure entirely when Gon says the second sentence. But why ?

The reason was lost in translation. His exact words are "Booru wa Killua ga motte-kurenai to. Killua ja nakya dame nan da.". Both sentences basically say the same thing : It has to be Killua holding the ball. That second sentence can be translated literally as "If it's not Killua, that won't do." However, the second sentence, in a different context, can also be used to say a totally different thing.

While it's certain that Gon used this sentence in the context of the dodgeball match, the sentence "~ja nakya dame nan da" also serves as a confession of one's feelings in japanese. It's basically the equivalent to "you're the one for me". When you google the sentence, it turns up romantic songs, forum posts asking what it would translate to in English and posts on how to confess to someone.

The sentence basically drowns in romantic subtext. As mentioned before, Killua has no reaction to the first sentence "Booru wa Killua ga motte-kurenai to.", but loses his composure at the second one, and I think that was a very deliberate thing Togashi wanted to convey : this sentence has an additional layer, and clearly Killua is taking it to heart.

I will come back to this specific subtext in a bit, because we can parallel it with another subtext-y situation, so please keep it in mind for now.

CHIMERA ANT ARC

Now onto the sad gay arc! This arc is so RIDDLED in subtext and parallels that it's making me lose my mind.

• Gon, you are light. (chapter 199)

This scene is just... So romantic in nature. I’m not too objective on this, but I really do believe that this moment is the exact moment Killua fell in love with Gon and started to realize he felt a bit more than friendship towards him. It’s Killua respecting Gon for who he is, realizing that he’s light and he’s always been, he’s the one who saved him and who’s always been so bright and optimistic and always makes the best out of any situation. In this scene, Killua lets himself drown in Gon’s light, allows himself to feel this “wow” moment of pure admiration and love, and it’s absolutely beautiful.

It's extremely important to take the context of this scene into account. What happened is that Killua, who has been struggling mentally for the entire series with the fact that he's always running away, ran away once more, leaving Kite to die with Pitou. This ENTIRE chapter is literally adults absolutely DESTROYING Killua, first Kite's troupe bashing him for leaving Kite behind, and then Netero, Morel and Knov coming in like icing on the cake telling Killua that "After all, he's just a kid", and that he should hurry up to his mommy.

Killua is beating himself up for running away again, got destroyed by Kite's team and 3 extremely strong pro hunters. His morale is down in the drains right now. He expects Gon to be mad at him for betraying Kite, for running away once again, for leaving Kite to die alone and ripping Gon away from Kite : he expects that he'll lose Gon for his cowardice.

HOWEVER, the first thing that Gon says to Killua after having been passed out for god knows how many hours is "Thank you".

Gon woke up and instantly eased up all of Killua's fears : he wasn't a loser for running away, and Gon was actually thankful for him. Gon, at this moment, was the only one that showed kindness, understanding and gratefulness towards Killua. Gon even goes so far as saying that he knows that Kite isn't dead, and that they have to help him. At this instant, Gon is truly Killua's saving grace. He's the one that trusts him with his entire heart, and believes in his choices when even he can't believe in himself. Gon is truly Killua's light at this precise moment, because he was the only one who supported him, trusted him and reassured him in this awful situation.

How can someone shine so bright in such a terrible situation ? How can someone be so positive that nothing bad will happen ?

Gon asserting all of this makes Killua respect him a lot. Keep this word in mind, because it’s going to be important in the next piece of subtext I’m analyzing, because those two scenes canonically follow each other and are basically Togashi highlighting that something special happened when Killua called Gon his light, and that his feelings deepened.

• Introduction to Palm's character (chapter 200)

This piece of subtext is very very easy to miss but it's one of the most important subtext-y scene, because coupled with the “Gon, you are light” scene, it’s very clear that this dialogue is deliberately highlighting Killua’s feelings.

This chapter introduces Palm's character (which, imo, is a character introduced for the sole intent of being a catalyst to Killua's feelings towards Gon, but I'll talk about it in my post talking about the CAA parallels) - edit: i talked about this briefly here.

So, Killua having looked into Gon's eyes for like 10min straight and concluded that Gon was the light of his life a chapter ago, is now chilling with Gon as they meet Palm.

Palm takes them to a café and STRAIGHT OFF THE BAT harasses them about how much she's in love with Knov. Like when I say harassing, it's literally a whole page of her explaining her feelings towards Knov.

There are two interesting things that can be drawn from this interaction.

First, it's extremely easy to draw parallels between Palm's situation towards Knov and Killua's situation towards Gon. Palm starts by saying how amazing her master is, that she probably has special feelings for him but the most important thing is to respect the other person. Remember how I talked about how this last scene was Killua having a surge of deep, deep respect for Gon ? Palm makes sure to highlight that special word, that it’s important to respect someone when it comes to love.

She then goes on to say that she hasn't said anything to Knov, and never will. All of this adds nothing to the story, it's empty dialogue, Togashi could've introduced Palm in virtually any other way possible, but he chose to drag her and the gay duo to a café and make her have a monologue about love RIGHT after the extremely emotional panel of Killua declaring that Gon is his light just a chapter ago.

But there's more. Not only does Palm monologue for a while about love, but after finishing her monologue, this happens :

This panel features ONLY Palm and Killua, her looking at him like the psycho she is, and straight up telling him that "love can suddenly spark out of nowhere, don't you think so?".

What's so interesting about this is the fact that Togashi made the deliberate choice to have Palm say this to Killua and Killua ONLY, which after the gay existential crisis he had last chapter, can very much be applied to his situation. Love DID spark out of nowhere, and Togashi wants you to notice. Togashi could've made Palm say this to herself, with no distinct listener like the last panel, but he made the conscious choice to draw this panel with Palm adressing herself to Killua SPECIFICALLY.

Those two pieces of subtext, that fit perfectly together, make me believe 100% that Togashi knows what he's doing and he's not unintentionally planting gay subtext in his work. The fact that Togashi sat at his desk, drew Killua calling Gon his light, and then followed this scene with the introduction to a character who picks Killua apart to tell him that "love is something that just happens, don't you think?" is 100% proof that Togashi knows what he's doing.

• Date with Palm (chapters 217 and 218)

I think this situation has many layers, but many people still dismiss it as bro behavior so I'm gonna try my best to counter argue. First of all, and although that's not proof of anything, Killua looks EXTREMELY distressed by the prospect of Gon going on a date with Palm, but that can be counter-argued by saying that Killua is just worried because Palm is completely crazy.

What I want to talk about is the scene that happens right after, when Gon and Killua go to the gym (because theyre DUDES YEAH WE WORK OUT NO HOMO), and the conversation casually drifts to Killua asking Gon if he's ever been on a date before, valid question considering what just happened previously. There are multiple things here :

1) Killua seems distressed that Gon has been on dates before. While it can be argued that it's a normal reaction because Gon has and he hasn't, I believe that Killua - who is in no way a normal person who would get flustered about "not having been on dates before a certain age" - would not feel uncomfortable that his friend is more experienced than him - especially when literal seconds later, he monologues about how he doesn’t care about dates and just wants to stick with Gon.

2) Gon then proceeds to ask Killua if he's ever been on a date, to which Killua responds :

What I want to highlight is the panel where Killua says "And the truth is, I want to stay by your side... Always...". Basically, what Killua is saying, is that he doesn't care about dates, all he wants to do is be with Gon.

I don't think this can be counter-argued as bro behavior, but with all the subtext I've explained before, this right here is pretty gay. Togashi put this panel deliberately to show that Killua doesn't give a crap about dates when he can stay with Gon, and with the "gon you are light" scene and everything in mind, this is another intentional subtext.

There's also the fact that Killua stalks the date like a jealous girlfriend - but I'm not gonna count that as subtext because it can be argued that he's just worried about Gon because Palm is insane.

• Gon is my best friend ! (chapter 219)

Remember how I told you to keep the "It has to be Killua" subtext in mind because I was gonna come back to it later ? Well.

During Palm's date with Gon, Killua runs into Rammot, who would definitely have ran into Palm and nenless Gon. Killua is forced to confront his worst fear : this is the moment where he knows that if he runs away again, Gon WILL die. Killua is literally overcoming his "programming", the physical representation of years of abuse out of love and care for Gon. He's ripping out the needle from his forehead out of pure, genuine care for Gon, because if he doesn't, then he'll lose him forever.

Now, what I actually wanna talk about is this panel :

What we see is Killua thinking happy thoughts about all his adventures with Gon because he can't - won't - doesn't want to run away anymore, and all this for his sake. But what I wanna draw attention to is the dodgeball panel that's bigger than all the others, and the only one where you can actually clearly make out what's written : "Killua ja nakya dame nan da".

Now, isn't that interesting that the panel that takes a bigger place in the whole panel is the one with this particular sentence? Remember what I talked about a bit earlier, about how "~ ja nakya dame nan da" is a sentence with a lot of romantic connotations (would pretty much equal to "you're the one for me" in English). Clearly this particular sentence stuck with Killua.

I'm not completely objective on this matter since I firmly believe that at this point, Killua has romantic feelings for Gon, but I interpret this as another deliberate thing Togashi did : putting the panel bigger so we can see that it has a particularly significant importance to Killua, and Killua's state of mind right now (not wanting to lose Gon).

In my opinion, two things happened here: One, Killua remembers this specific interaction because he knows how much Gon trusts him and he doesn't want to betray his trust. But I also firmly believe that Killua remembered this specific interaction because of the romantic connotation the sentence "Killua ja nakya dame nan da" has. Those words clearly shocked him, and I think he remembers them in this life-threatening situation, after the "gon you are light" scene, Palm talking about "love just happens", the "i want to stay with you, always" because he realizes that he wishes Gon would say that sentence in a romantic context, and not in the context of the dodgeball match, thus leading him to surpass himself to prove his love and perhaps live to see the day where Gon could say those words in that romantic context.

Now, of course, all of this is my interpretation, so it's really up to debate, but I really wanna highlight the fact that Togashi deliberately CHOSE to highlight this particular interaction between Gon and Killua, this sentence with romantic subtext, to lead Killua to finally break his chains and be able to be protect Gon fully. It’s also interesting to note that the 2011 anime adaptation also makes it a point to emphasize how deep these words stuck to Killua by making it the last flashback that makes Killua effectively rip out the needle out of his head.

Also let's quickly mention the irony in the situation here : while Gon is on a romantic date, Killua fights to protect him, overcoming his weakness to prove his love. It’s not Palm who deserves that date, it’s Killua.

• A lovers’ suicide (chapter 286)

Now, onto the most important piece of subtext, that can not be counterargued as platonic in any way, shape or form. During the palace invasion, Killua leaves Gon's side, proceeds to go kick Youpi's butt only to have to fall back because he used up all his electricity nen. When Killua is charging up, he meets with Meleoron, and tells him that once he's done charging, he'll go back to Gon's side.

They briefly exchange information about the battle, and then Meleoron proceeds to ask Killua what's the plan for him and Gon. That's when Killua explains that "Once Gon is like this, he won't budge an inch. Worst case scenario, it'll be a double suicide.". At worst they both die, cool. They “go down in flames together”. It’s actually much, much more meaningful than that.

The specific word that Killua uses for double suicide is "心中" (shinjuu), which is a heavily romantically connotated word in japanese. Shinjuu, also translated as "lovers’ suicide", is when two people die out of love, by the same method, because there's a belief that this'll allow those two people to spend eternity together. Shinjuu is a major theme of Japanese literature, and it is always used romantically. It's a very uncommon word to use to refer to two people dying together, because of its heavy romantic connotation, and because it always refers to double suicide committed by people bound by love. In literature, it always refers to two lovers, in love. If you want to read more on shinjuu, i suggest this and this, those articles explain its historic roots and the definition, also emphasizing the feeling of "oneness" that characterizes shinjuu. If you’re interested, I also suggest reading the japanese article that defines shinjuu, and hitting the google translate button, it has some pretty interesting sentences like “Shinjuu is traditionally committed by men and women out of mutual love, in the hope that they will be connected in the afterlife because they can't be together in this world.”

So basically, what Killua is saying is that he wants to go back to Gon's side to die with him, committing a "lovers’ suicide" because he doesn't want to leave Gon to die alone, and wants to die with him.

I also want to emphasize how special this word is to Killua, and that he and everyone around him know the special meaning of this word - In chapter 300, Ikalgo literally says "We were... No, KILLUA was ready to commit shinjuu with Gon". Ikalgo is really highlighting the fact that this word holds special meaning, especially to Killua, and that it was HIM who was willing to commit shinjuu by staying with Gon. Ikalgo and company dying with Gon wouldn't be shinjuu, but Killua dying with Gon would be, and Togashi emphasizes this through Ikalgo's thoughts.

This is pretty much the gist of it, but I suggest reading the wonderful post I linked in the references below if you want to know more about this specific subtext.

(edit : i actually wrote a post going a bit more into detail on Killua’s shinjuu wish if you want to read it here ! :3)

• “The one that Gon needs the most is you” (chapter 294)

I will go into this subtext more in details when I write the post about parallels in CAA, but I still want to talk about it briefly here.

Like I said before, to me, Palm was introduced as a catalyst for Killua's feelings towards Gon. Togashi purposefully wrote Palm as having romantic feelings for Gon to foil Killua's feelings for Gon and make him show jealousy towards Palm.

To Killua, Palm is someone who stole Gon from him, he sees her as a threat because maybe she'll make Gon happier than he does ? (ofc we all know thats not true but Killua is baby) - Basically, Killua thinks Palm might be more important to Gon than Killua is, because he believes they are romantically involved. That's why when he sees her again later on, after Gon rejected his help, leaving Killua helpess as to how to save his dear friend, Killua sees Palm as a saving grace.

He knows that if Gon sees Palm as a chimera ant, he will spiral down even more, so he tries to reason with her to get her to be gentle to Gon, because if not her, then who could? Palm would clearly be able to comfort Gon, with whom Killua believes is romantically involved with, better than him, right ? If Gon rejected Killua, then clearly Palm could help, since she seems closer to Gon (BECAUSE HE BELIEVES THEYRE DATING), right?

This confrontation between Palm and Killua closely ressembles a situation like an ex confronting a new girlfriend - and I think this is exactly why Togashi wrote Palm this way. He wanted Killua to confront who he thought was a threat to their relationship, making him believe that this person who's """"dating"""” Gon is more important to him than himself, only to have her openly admit that she means nothing to Gon. The only one Gon needs is Killua.

And that, my friends, coming from someone you believe is romantically involved with your best friend (who you probably have a crush on), someone you're jealous of, the one you thought was the person most important to him, that's a pretty meaningful statement.

Basically, what's happening, is that Palm reaffirms that Gon holds Killua closer than a potential romantic partner. And that's why Killua is so, so happy to hear that. He was questioning his entire relationship, questioning if Gon even cared about him, because he rejected him a few minutes before, but then his "rival" comes in and reaffirms that even she knows that no one comes close to Killua to Gon.

I also want to mention that this act of pure love (Killua only thinking of saving Gon when in a life threatening situation) is what made Palm come back to her human senses. d'awwwwww

• Illumi and Hisoka’s parallel on lovers who die of Alluka’s requests. (chapter 323)

Now onto the final significant subtext - while I don't particularly think of it as subtext-y, I know a lot of people have so I still want to include it here.

When Illumi explains Alluka's powers to Hisoka, he explains that there are two different types of linked deaths when a request is failed : 1) the person who failed + the person they love the most 2) the person who failed + the people they spent most of their time with.

When applied to Killua, Hisoka naturally comes to the conclusion that no matter the outcome, Gon would always be the one dying with Killua, because he's spent so much time with him, and because he's the one that Killua loves the most. In the panel where Illumi explains this, we see a romantic, heterosexual couple demonstrating the effects of not completing one of Alluka's requests, and thus the "most important person dying".

While not making any true parallels, the fact that Hisoka, and the readers, are drawn to compare a heterosexual, romantic pairing to Killua dying with Gon because he's his "most important person" is an interesting piece of subtext.

_______

I want to finish by talking about Killua's birthday and how significant it is in my opinion. All the main 4 characters have birthdays that fall on specific dates, related to Japanese tradition, and often with events that can be associated to their character. Gon's is 5/5, which is Children's Day. Kurapika's is 4/4, the number 4 being considered an unlucky number, and this being an unlucky day to have a child. Leorio's is 3/3, Hinamatsuri (not really any main parallels here but still). But Killua's birthday is 7/7, and is the Japanese day to celebrate Tanabata.

If you are not familiar with Tanabata, the story is as follows : Orihime is a princess who works for her father, working hard and well, but she laments the fact that because of her hard work she can't meet someone and fall in love. Her father arranges for her to meet Hikoboshi, allowing Orihime to leave because he expects her to come back to work for him, but the two immediately fall in love and get married, and she never returns. I won't get into the rest of the story as it's this part that interests me the most, but if you want to read more about Killua and Tanabata I suggest reading the post I referenced below.

Does the story of Orihime remind you of anyone ? Killua also works for his father, but laments the fact that he can't go outside and meet someone. His father then lets him go, saying, and i quote: "he will come back, because he's my son". Doesn't this remind you of the tale of Tanabata ? Killua's story references the tale of Orihime perfectly, and I believe this is intentional : Killua's birthday isn't of any importance to the plot, so why make it Tanabata, a day that celebrates a love story that closely ressembles Killua's story ? The answer is simple : subtext.

With all this in mind, I think it's pretty clear that Togashi is writing intentional subtext to hint at Killua's feelings being romantic in nature. Togashi is a master writer, he has years of experience, and I strongly believe he knows what he's doing and not planting unintentional subtext. He's a very smart man, and knows how all of this can be interpreted.

I will finish by saying that Togashi is NOT an author that would deliberately queerbait his readers. So many people dismiss the possibility of having gay subtext leading onto an actual canon gay relationship because "it's not like the author would ever have gay main characters". While this holds true for a lot of manga authors, especially shonen manga authors, it does NOT apply to Togashi.

Togashi has always displayed interest in queer subjects and queer representation, putting trans characters in all of his major works (Miyuki in YYH, Mikihisa in Level E and Alluka in HxH). There were also canonically gay characters in his previous works : Itsuki in YYH, and a character named Kuramoto in Level E.

Togashi also always had interest in mangas having BL elements, citing Maya Mineo's "Patalliro!" as a manga he was attracted to during High School. If you're unfamiliar with Patalliro, the story focuses on the main character's love life as a gay man. He also admitted to basing Hiei's (YYH) design off a character from that manga.

Last but not least, Togashi mentioned in a note included in volume 1 of YYH that he wanted to write a sports manga, called The Trouble Quartet, where basically all the characters are gay. Togashi said he based it off his own interests as a writer, and that while it was refused by Shonen Jump, he got deeply attached to the project and that he would love to explore this project in a different shape once he made a name for himself. I suggest reading this post because the parallels between The Trouble Quartet and HxH are HILARIOUSLY accurate.

In short, Togashi has always had interest in queer matters, and was always interested in putting queer representation in his work. After YYH, which was a terrible experience for Togashi as a writer, he managed to snatch a contract that basically allows him to do whatever he wants with HxH. Having always held dear BL matters but never being able to explore it to his full intent, I believe Togashi is exploring queer identity further with HxH, because Shonen Jump basically lets him do anything.

To conclude, with Togashi's past experience and skill, his interest in queer representation, and the amount of subtext surrounding Killua, I honestly believe that Togashi is trying to explore further queer representation, and I wouldn't be surprised if HxH ends with Gon and Killua becoming a canon pairing, whether it be delivered in an ambiguous manner or not.

Edit : I actually wrote a post on why I believe it won’t be ambiguous, and that it’s truly never been ambiguous, just developing : here.

I hope you enjoyed the read, thank you for reading all of this, and feel free to show this to anyone who denies subtext in HxH !

REFERENCES

- "It has to be Killua" - Medium article, "Impossibilities in Translating Queerness : The Dodgeball Dilemma"

- Palm's Date Scene - Reddit post, "Togashi's love of Ambiguity: Chapters 217 and 218"

-A thematic analysis of Palm’s character : ”The Issue With Palm”

- Shinjuu - Tumblr post by hunterxhell, "A lovers' suicide, I guess." : + the post that mentions Ikalgo talking about shinjuu

- An analysis on different subtext-y situations

- Illumi and Hisoka’s parallel : here and here

- Killua’s birthday : "Killua, July 7th, and the significance of his birthdate”

- Togashi's interview mentioning Mineo's Patalliro

#hxh #hxh meta #hunter x hunter #killugon #meta #my posts #my meta

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opbackgrounds · 5 years ago

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Alright, friends, you know the drill by now. Here’s Part III of Sarcasticles’ overblown thoughts on sexism in One Piece. If you haven’t already, go read Part I and Part II before proceeding.

I promise after this I’ll be done. By hook or by crook, we’re getting through the point of the original question. To the Anon who originally sent the ask, sorry it took this long to get here, I hope it’s helpful.

Also, I allude to some very, very minor Wano spoilers, so if you’re sensitive to that sort of thing here’s your warning.

Characterization? I Don’t Know Her

What makes a good character?

I’ve spent an awful lot of time talking about character designs, when, funnily enough, it’s one of the aspects I pay the least attention to when it comes to deciding if I like how an author portrays their characters. I personally don’t care for fanservice, never have and never will. But unless it’s particularly egregious, I tend to ignore it because there are other factors I think are more important.

The secret sauce for building characters is hard to define, because a good writer can take a concept that has no right being any good and turn it into something incredible (Oda does this all the time) where bad writers will seemingly slot all the right information in the right holes and still have their characters come out of the developmental oven flat and under cooked.

One of the biggest buzzwords floating around these days is agency. Is a character active in their own story, or are they jerked around by the needs of the plot? Is their voice heard? Is their voice unique, or do they blend in with the background?

This is particularly important, because the term Strong Female Protagonist has been warped into shorthand for “girl who fights a lot and looks pretty doing it”. You can have a girl strong enough to lift mountains and still have her be a shit character. You can write a girl who’s main motivation is to get married and have babies with phenomenal depth. What matters is execution.

The Petition to Call A Group of Rescue Arcs a ‘Damsel’

Both Nami and Robin had to be rescued, their main arcs bearing similarities that are impossible to ignore. But these aren’t copies of one another as much as variations on a theme, and with the existence of Marineford and Whole Cake Island I think anyone would be hard-pressed to say that One Piece’s rescue arcs are a girl’s thing. At this point it’s a feature, not a bug.

Which makes sense given how fundamental the idea freedom is to the series. Hell, the first thing Luffy does after becoming a pirate is free Coby from Alvida’s tyrannical reign. Then he frees Zoro from an unjust authority that would have killed him had Luffy not intervened.

Notice a pattern here?

One Piece is written like Pachelbel Canon, in that a very simple core of ideas are repeated over and over with layers of complexity and nuance added over time, examining the same themes from every possible angle.

And when you look at the Four Big Rescue Arcs -- Nami, Robin, Ace, Sanji -- you’ll see that it’s Ace who’s given the least agency throughout his arc. Nami chose to hijack the Going Merry, repeatedly chose to push away the Straw Hats until she reached her breaking point, at which she chose to ask for help, with Luffy only intervening once she does.

Robin is a little less obvious, but during the post-Water 7 party chapters, Aokiji makes the interesting observation that Robin could have escaped CP9, but chose not to

Remember that before Robin’s backstory was shown, Luffy specifically said he didn’t care if she wanted to die or not, so long as she was with the Straw Hats when she made her decision. No one bullied her into “I wanna live”. It was a choice she made of her own volition after realizing the depths the Straw Hats would go on her behalf.

I know there are people who disagree with me, but Nami and Robin are well-written characters. I’ve expounded enough on my reasoning both here and on my main that I don’t want to spend the time belaboring the point. What I do want is to note that Luffy wouldn’t be able to attain his dreams without them. Nami keeps them on course while also severing as a sort of moral compass for the crew -- remember she was the one who insisted on saving the giant kids at Punk Hazard -- while Robin’s ability to read the poneglyphs is what’s going to get the crew to Raftel.

Robin admittedly doesn’t have the same presence within the Straw Hat Pirates as Nami, but I would hardly call that sexism. Since Water 7/Enies Lobby she’s been pretty content to go with whatever Luffy says, and the fact that she’s literally quieter than anyone else in the crew means she doesn’t get as much focus. I think there could be more scenes with her using her specific skill set, like her investigations in Wano and the forensic anthropology scene in the pre-Jaya chapters, but I’m okay with her being a supporting character.

The East Blue Crew have consistently gotten the most focus of any of the Straw Hats. They are the core of the crew, something Oda admits in a roundabout way in the Color Walk where they all appear together for the first time in a color spread

With the main cast as large as it is, not everyone is going to have the same amount of focus or development. Robin is given a unique voice within the story because she doesn’t overreact the way literally everyone else does. Through her silence, she stands out. I find there to be very meaningful character development when she feels comfortable enough with the Straw Hats to start calling them by name in Thriller Bark, relaxed enough with her friends to comitt her first facefaults in a series lousy with them in both Dressrosa and Wano.

In an ideal world, Oda would better rotate through his cast, much like how Brook was the unsung MVP on Whole Cake Island (where Nami was also excellent in a supporting role) but I don’t think people realize how hard it is to juggle almost a dozen different people in a story that’s bloated exponentially over time. To his credit, Oda has handled his expanding crew better than most writers.

I also find it hard to judge this aspect of the series because the manga’s not done yet. I don’t know how Robin and Nami will be used in the future. I mean, Robin never got a chapter title declaring her “The Seventh” which I find suspicious, so Oda could very well have events in store that completely turn our perceptions upside down. It’s impossible to say.

I will acknowledge that the lack of big fights is somewhat disappointing, but neither Robin nor Nami’s dreams revolve around them getting stronger. Robin doesn’t need to use her power to make people explode from the inside out, Nami doesn’t need to fry end-game bosses with her lightning stick. That’s simply not their narrative purpose. With the exception of Tashigi, I’ve found that the female characters advertised as fighters have lived up to their billing. Hancock came out of Marineford unscathed. Carrot’s sulong form was awesome, in the old-fashioned sense of the word. The whole climax of Whole Cake Island revolved around surviving Big Mom’s wrath. Not beating her, not fighting her, it took all the Straw Hats had to just survive. Once again you’re left with a number’s game where where there just aren’t enough female characters to even pretend things are balanced.

All said, I think if you’re going to complain about the lack of Robin fights then I think you also have to complain about the lack of Brook fights, and that’s just not something you hear about, especially after Whole Cake Island. You can’t have it both ways. Either there needs to be more even distribution of major fights throughout the entire crew, or you have to acknowledge that a character’s worth isn’t dependent on their fighting prowess.

One Piece is a battle manga, and I do think that it’s fair to criticize when a character isn’t allowed to fight when they’re perfectly capable of kicking ass. But it’s also an adventure story, and that opens up entirely new space for a character to occupy, and that’s where I think Nami and Robin (but especially Nami) really shine

That Moment You Realize Humor Isn’t A Universal Language

I’ve spent so much time defending Oda’s designs and characters that it might seem like I’m perfectly okay with everything that’s portrayed in the manga. To be clear, I’m not. If the messages and comments I’ve gotten over the past several days have taught me anything, it’s that many fans share the same sticking points I do, namely in regards to some of the gags.

I again want to be careful here, because I’m hardly an expert on Japanese culture and it’s really hard to tell if Oda writes his jokes because he thinks they’re funny, or if he thinks his audience will find them funny. I’m again going to default to somewhere in the middle, because if Oda truly found the perviness distasteful he probably wouldn’t have included it, and I’ve read enough SBS to know the guy likes his dick jokes.

First and foremost, one must address the culture gap. Japan ranks last among G7 nations on gender equality, In 2004 two-thirds of Tokyo women in their 20-30s reported to being groped while on public transport. There are numerous barriers that make it difficult for a woman to succeed either in the workplace or politics.

From what I can gather, some of these trends are reversing, albeit slowly and with great resistance. Contrary to what many people seem to believe culture is not always value neutral. And I say that as an American, recognizing there are plenty of things about my culture and country that are really fucked up.

But who gets to decide who’s right and who’s wrong?

When inside that kind of environment, that kind of culture, it’s a lot easier to understand how a character like Sanji can exist. It’s easy to understand why Momo shoving his face into Nami and Robin’s boobs might be played for laughs. It’s not an excuse, but an explanation. And with Sanji failing more often than not, being the butt of his own joke as he slowly turns into a parody of what he once was, one could almost say Oda is pointing those types of people and saying, “Look how pathetic this guy is. Now go laugh as he gets a nosebleed so bad he needs multiple blood transfusions in order to not die.”

I say almost, because Sanji is never condemned for his actions, nor does he learn from them. Instead you have this character who’s supposed to be one of the kindest characters in the series decide to immediately go peep on a woman’s bath house after gaining the power of invisibility.

Stay classy, Oda.

As distasteful as I find it, I don’t find fanservice to be an inherently evil thing that must be eradicated at all costs, and with Oda doing things like putting his entire cast, male and female, into skintight leathers you can hardly say that he’s excluding the men.

Everyone will have their line in the sand, and mine goes back to agency. When Nami did her Happiness Punch way back in Alabasta, that was of her own volition. When Nami and Robin dress in clothes that show everything but the nipple, that’s something they chose and feel comfortable in.

But when Smoker and Tashigi swapped bodies at Punk Hazard, Tashigi specifically asked Smoker not to strip, and he did anyway, opening her coat and removing her bra. This is especially egregious as Tashigi is one of the very few women in the series who is always shown wearing very conservative clothing. Oda specifically showed Tashigi getting upset at Smoker’s actions, and Smoker repeatedly refusing to listen to her.

That’s where I draw my line.

Some Final Thoughts I Couldn’t Fit Anywhere Else

Thought The First--Oda has an interesting habit of turning his most despicable, scummy pieces of flaming human garbage into the butt of the joke. Villains like Crocodile and Doflamingo are certainly evil, but it’s the idealized, cool type of evil that makes you almost admire them. There aren’t very many real-world Crocodiles, but just about everyone knows a Spandam, or an Absalom, or a Vander Decken. These kinds of villains aren’t scary because of their physical prowess, but their unyielding obsessions and the power they’re able to wring from the system, and -- surprise, surprise -- all three are either actively trying to be creepy sex pests or coded as such with the visual language of the comic.

And Oda turns them into a mockery.

While there are some who feel like not treating serious issues like sexual assault seriously are doing a disservice to people who have endured similar experiences I think there’s merit to turning them into a laughingstock. As someone much smarter than me said once, if an opinion cannot withstand mockery it’s revealed to be ridiculous, and these scummy-scum villains are certainly ridiculous.

Thought The Second--It’s hard to say how much sexism is a thing in-universe. Kuina is the only one who is explicitly told her dreams were impossible because of her gender, but with the recent reveal confirming that her family came from Wano, which in turn is based on Feudal Japan, it’s hard to say how widespread these beliefs are. Tashigi brought it up again at Loguetown and Bellemere specifically told her girls that they lived in an era where “girls needed to be strong, too”, but otherwise it’s not a topic that’s been explored in any depth

Thought The Third--The in-universe fetishization of mermaids has some implications that I think are unintended but worth discussing. Shirahoshi has a reputation of being one of the most beautiful women in the world despite not leaving her tower for over 10 years (she’s 16). Mermaids whose tails have split are worth less on the slave market than those whose are intact. Even Zoro erased Kokoro from his memory after meeting the more attractive Caime. It’s one of those odd things that when combined with the more obvious racism themes could have some unfortunate implications, and I think could have been avoided had Oda show a little more restraint with some of his jokes. Unintended consequences are still consequences.

Thought The Forth--There are many other instances throughout the series that people bring up with talking about sexism in One Piece. I feel like a lot of these can be explained away individually -- for example, both Belo Betty and Rebecca’s stripperific outfits were inspired by other media, the painting Liberty of the People and Red Sonja respectively; Lola chasing after an obviously abusive man makes a whole lot more sense when you meet Big Mom; Hancock’s love sickness could be seen as an emotionally stunted woman experiencing her first crush, etc., etc -- it’s when they’re all put together that they begin to read as “Problematic”.

It would be impossible to go over all these individually, but I tend to fall on the side of leniency. In the end, everyone has to make their own decisions based on their own values. I’m hardly unbiased, and my enjoyment for the series will undoubtedly make me look the other way when another might call the exact same incident The Worst Thing Ever. The thing is, opinions are like assholes, everyone has one and most are convinced that theirs don’t stink. I include myself in that statement. In the end it’s a comic for kids. It’s supposed to be fun.

Thought The Last--I have spent entirely too much of my time writing this up, but in the end I guess I have to go back to what I said when I talked about my thoughts on Sanji: Everyone has their own personal line of acceptable bullshit, and for me Oda does more good than bad. Sanji specifically gets very little leniency from me because I don’t like a lot of the gross behavior Oda passes over as a joke. But the female characters themselves, generally speaking? They’re fine. There are other mangaka that have more equal male to female ratios or have women play more active roles in the story, but Oda does a lot better than most other shonen titles I’ve read.

It’s okay to be critical of media you enjoy. It’s okay to complain. But remember that One Piece is a very long series, and there are some fans who have been a round for literally decades. I myself started reading weekly around the time Duval was introduced, way back in 2008. Every time a new batch of fans comes in the same old arguments get stirred to the top of the pot: Sanji is a creep, Oda can’t draw women, why doesn’t Robin ever get to fight?

It can be exhausting to go through the same hoops time and time again. So if you’re someone who is being critical and feel like no one is listening, or that a bunch of fans are going out of their way to defend Oda, that could be one of the reasons why. They’re tired of having a series they enjoy be shit on.

There are other fans who legitimately don’t think that Oda’s done anything wrong, that jokes are just jokes. If you happen to fall in that category, remember that not everyone feels that way. Art reflects life, which in turn reflects art. One Piece is a few million copies away from outselling Batman. To say it isn’t influential to young readers, both in Japan and abroad, is beyond asinine.

I thank everyone who’s taken the time to read this so far. I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how civil the discussion and my inbox as stayed. Even if I didn’t respond to your message, I promise that I did read it.

I wrote as much as I did because I know this is a topic a lot of people care about, and also so I hopefully don’t have to write about it again. A lot of hours has gone into this project, and it’s been exhausting, but in a good way, if that makes any sense. I’m ready to put it to rest.

I was joking with some friends that I think I’ve hit just about every hot topic issue now, so hopefully I can go back to fun questions like speculating if Wapol can eat a person and poop out a devil fruit.

Until then, Sarcasticles, out

#sexism #one piece #long post #sarc talks

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freshlybakedspiderbread · 4 years ago

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I brought up hanyang type 88 here and i said i’d explain, so here I am!!

okay so first off here’s a bunch of likely useful context about girls frontline. There is this feature in the game called digimind upgrade, or mod 3, where certain t-dolls can be upgraded past the normal maximum levels and stats, and at the same time gaining whole new abilities and also a new design. Basically a reinvention. There are like hundreds of playable characters in the game, and only a fraction will get mod 3s, typically the ‘main characters’ who are relevant to the major ongoing plot.

two things about getting a doll who has the ability to do digimind upgrade, to actually do that. One, is that it can be very costly in terms of in-game materials. like, maybe i just played the game wrong but I would have to grind for weeks in order to amass the materials to upgrade just one doll to mod 3. So even though by now there are dozens upon dozens of dolls who are capable of this feature, i’ve only actually done so with like, less than one dozen. A normal player probably has to be picky.

secondly, and this is the big one, every t-doll’s mod 3 comes with story cutscenes that become available for you to view upon upgrading them. Personally, i think most of the only worthwhile mod 3 stories are the ones that are associated with the actual major characters of the main story, especially since their upgrades actually happen in-canon and their mod 3 stories fill in blanks or otherwise expand upon the regular story chapters.

for the t-dolls who aren’t major characters that get digimind upgrades, their associated stories tend to follow a very basic pattern. They’re feeling like they are falling behind other T-Dolls in abilities or are otherwise experiencing a drop in confidence in their abilities, but then find the resolve in them to either change themselves or stand by an aspect of themselves, and this leads them to heading to the lab to get upgraded. obviously theres some nuances here and there depending on the character, but a lot of them, from what i saw, follow this basic pattern.

hanyang type 88 has a mod 3 but i certainly never wanted to see it. Firstly, using the feature at all takes up resources are kinda precious so i wasn’t just gonna use it on anyone. Secondly, she is just one of many one-off t-dolls that basically dont ever show up in any actual main story cutscenes or even funny events. Thirdly... you saw what she looked like in the linked post, i was in no rush to make use of her.

That being said, even if you don’t ever upgrade a t-doll, simply having them in your possession allows you to at least view the first of four parts of their mod 3 story, which nets you a small amount of those materials needed to see the rest (its a pretty fiendish system, huh o_O). I was lacking in some materials to upgrade a doll i cared about, so i just mucked around, eventually happened upon type88 again and decided that instead of just immediately feeding her to the furnace, I’d watch the first chapter of her mod 3 story. I watched it, it made me just curious enough to look further, and well. ...I got into it. Exactly what I got into, i shall now just elaborate and summarise the whole thing in my own way! Warning, it’s long!

(disclosure: my summary will bias towards my own preferred interpretation whenever any aspect is somewhat vague.)

The story starts with type 88, or as she is called by others in griffin base, Ai, working her shift in the base’s cafe, because what else would she be doing.

i hate looking at her! Anyway, its just a pleasant peaceful day and Ai is taking the logistic person, kalina’s order when suddenly in the middle of a conversation, Ai freezes in place and starts making worrying sounds.

kalina here and the t-dolls present in the cafe are concerned, and talk about how Type88 has actually been crashing like this more and more frequently lately, yet has not reported any of this to the maintenance crew despite the advice of her friends. They try rebooting her on the spot, but it has an even more concerning effect, because she starts erratically acting like she doesn’t recognise the others, and talks about how she is a maid in “Jiangcheng Cafe”. Afraid that her neural cloud (her mind) has been scrambled, they put her to sleep and bring her to the repair bay.

Its in the repair bay where they explain exactly what is wrong with type88. She is a fairly old doll, and her processing capacity has been severally clogged up for a long time. Her internal memory is overflowing because many large sections of her mind is filled with very large encrypted files (memories that she stored away). she is likely to keep crashing and possibly even cease functioning entirely one day if those encrypted files are not deleted, but nobody is really keen on just deleting parts of her mind without her consent. For now, kalina just opts to try and decrypt the files and see what they are.

And from here, we watch type88 memories from her perspective. Sort of. Kind of. It gets complicated later but for now, we view the first memory of her life, not as a combat t-doll type88, but...

...as 59898, a doll designed to be what is basically a ‘crash test dummy’ for testing artillery technology in a research station. With a purpose like this, 59898 has an (ostensibly) rudimentary AI. Her learning ability is intended to be used to better aid the results of their testing, but she also knows how to understand and even imitate specific human gestures in order to better respond to instructions or conversation, even though she herself has no voice module to speak with. She is assigned to assist one specific person.

first off, i was pretty shocked right off the bat that this story above so many others actually has unique assets to it. The above two sprites don’t show up anywhere else in the game, i don’t think. Secondly, this woman’s name is only ever spelled with those white squares, so I’m stuck with having to just calling her ‘the pilot’, as dry as that sounds... I just don’t want to type out weird characters every time, or call her ‘triple cube’...

Anyway, so 59898 is assigned to help this woman in testing artillery tech (stuff like mechs and tanks). I should mention really quick that in the game’s story, during this point of time is when world war iii is happening, but that’s just a backdrop for robots to eventually gain more prominence. Anyway, we move on to the second memory, where some time has already passed. At the beginning of this memory, the pilot is visibly depressed, which 59898 takes note of.

Her ‘comfort mode’ consists of patting the pilot on the head, who while surprised, actually is grateful. She feels comfortable enough to talk about her worries aloud to the doll, mentioning how she is a war refugee and has to make a living in the research base because she can’t go back to her home in china, at least not before making enough money for a very expensive and exclusive train ticket. She continues to talk at length to the doll...

...not that the test doll is capable of responding to anything she says. The pilot insists that she’s happy just to have someone listen to her though, since she feels like she can’t really express her feelings to any other person on the base. Despite that-

That aside, the pilot says that referring to 59898 by her serial number all the time feels a bit weird, so she decides to give the doll a name. (I sure wish the story would give this woman a name too, other than ‘three white squares’ but oh well...)

She talks more with Jiangcheng Ai, or just Ai, after that, asking her if she’d like a change of clothes sometime, like some casual clothes, or an old maid outfit from an old cafe job she used to have (I guess they had to throw in any explanation for that outfit somehow) Point is, more and more time passes.

As time passes though, and we go into the third memory, the pilot brings up complaints to her superiors about how the more recent testings, becoming more increasingly intense and frequent, are putting a great strain on Ai, and even repairs can only help maintain her chassis so much. She insists on wanting to take Ai’s place in the testing, but they refuse because, well, Ai’s entire purpose is to take the strain of these tests so that the human pilot doesn’t have to, and the doll is just a tool there to pave the way for the pilot to eventually take over the mech in action

The next time Ai wakes up from her most recent repairs, the pilot is there to greet her, and Ai can tell straight away that she’s unhappy and tries to comfort her again. The pilot is not surprised at this and talks about how this is how Ai has been since they first met. She goes on to say how all the other people on the base don’t know her half as well as Ai does. Ai tries to understand and determine what the pilot’s intentions with saying all this is, but she cannot do so and can only listen while offering ‘executing - affirmative nod’.

The pilot talks about how once the war is over, she’d like to take Ai back home with her, where they could go to all sorts of gatherings, and the pilot would introduce Ai to her friends.

Ai reviews her personal data, confirming that she has no owners or obligations other than the pilot, so she executes another affirmative nod, and the pilot says this:

As Ai tries and fails to further determine this, something bad happens! if you’ve read this far, i’m sure you’ve already guess what happens next...

At that exact moment, a warning goes out and the research base is being attacked by nebulous enemy forces. With no time to talk anymore, both the pilot and Ai head out into their first real fight.

They spend a good long while repelling enemy forces, working well together and apparently using all sorts of wacky anime weaponry like beam blades and whatever ‘retrograde evasion’ is!

obviously though, you already know this isn’t going to end well for them... When the pilot takes a breather, Ai moves to protect her, but at a critical moment, a sudden high-speed projectile comes her way. In the next instance there’s a crash, and we move onto another memory. Where its all fire and debris, and Ai can’t move.

^ this text box actually repeats several times, indicating that she is repeating her scan for life signs over and over. She gets an internal warning from her systems (differentiated with red text) that she has insufficient power and it warns her to immediately cease ineffective operations. [Unable to detect owner life signs] repeats again.

At this point, uuuuh, its a little stupid actually? because two humans show up, reusing generic ‘bad guy’ sprites from other events that don’t match the current environment and situation at all (one is in a suit and the other is in casual clothes). but the reason they’re here is to provide exposition out loud about what happened. It looked like the human’s mech took a hit for the doll and was blown to bits, though they talk about how that doesn’t make any sense.

Ai at this point tries to execute a bunch of different actions like hugging [target not found] and screaming [no relevant module] but they all fail, and her internal systems tell her that her power is running out and she will cease to function in 30 seconds.

So in those last 30 seconds, Ai decides to quickly review her internal files. the damage she took has corrupted her memories and she doesn’t have the time to properly go through them, so she executes a ‘simulated processed records’, which basically mean she’s just filling the blanks of those memories herself with simulations.

And I have to say. I was decently into and enjoying this little story so far, but its this part that’s the reason i became forced to make this stupid giant post. the first ‘memory’ loads up, and we see the pilot.

Different ‘memories’ of the days spent with the pilot are loaded back to back, each are very short and only last a few lines. Across these files, the two of them talk comfortably with each other, Ai is invited to go get coffee with her, the pilot talks about how going alone is boring and would rather spend time with Ai, Ai saying back with her own words that she always likes spending time with her, etc etc etc.

And then finally, she loads one last ‘memory’, from earlier that same day, before the explosion and the fighting.

and she shuts down.

i passed by this scene the first time all calm, but an hour or so later when I was in the bathroom replacing shampoo bottles, i started thinking about it and I literally started sobbing. And then again later that night when i was in bed. I hate this game!!

so that’s the ‘end’ of that, and the next scene opens, once again in griffin base’s cafe, except...

Ai is sporting a brand new (ugly) look. She says she’d like to take kalina’s order but she was just leaving on other business, as she likes keeping herself busy with all sorts of work around the base ever since she got upgraded into a gundam gajinka. and after she leaves, kalina talks with the other dolls about how Ai used to have some cache issues because her neutral cloud was too full, but upgrading into this new chassis easily fixed that and even allowed her to make use of her old locked away abilities.

Because of the way this scene in the cafe opens up exactly like the very first one at the beginning, it makes me believe that this final scene is also a simulated ‘memory’, that is, Ai filling in the blanks of her corrupted memories with what she wishes to be reality. And i feel confident in believing that because after the scene fades to black, we see more of her internal system monologue.

She (the system) says that the priority execution is to preserve those encrypted memory logs. She does so, and the neural cloud upgrade is complete with confirmation of no loss files. With no risk of deletion in this new form, she executes the command to unlock the encrypted memories. And finally...

[spiderbread dies]

i still wouldn’t use her in gameplay because i can’t stand looking at her design but i told you all i eat up robot with feelings stuff and this is like prime example of exactly that... and if i didn’t make this post, i think my own neutral cloud’s cache would be at risk of overflowing x_X!

#spider bread crumbs #gfl

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rachelkaser · 4 years ago

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Stay Golden Sunday: That Was No Lady

Dorothy dates a married man and struggles with her conscience. Blanche tries to sell Rose her car.

Picture It...

Blanche interrupts Rose and Sophia’s game of Trivial Pursuit to say she’s buying a new car. She can afford it if she can sell her old car -- and, as Sophia points out, Rose needs a car. Blanche is initially resistant, as she doesn’t like the idea of selling to a friend. But she does come around to the idea and offers it to Rose. Rose initially says the car isn’t her type, but Blanche offers to let her have it on a trial basis for two weeks, and Rose accepts.

ROSE: What the heck? You only live once. Might as well be daring! SOPHIA: Rose, it’s a used car. It’s not a seat on a space shuttle.

Dorothy, meanwhile, enters and effuses about her date with a gym teacher named Glen O’Brien. She’s very excited, though she doesn’t know him very well. Rose relates how she was hit with love at first sight for her future husband Charlie, when they were 7 and 8, respectively. He had a small insurance stand, and Rose bought a policy for her wagon. When it was promptly demolished by hogs offended by the smoked ham she was hauling, Charlie paid for a new one out of pocket. The other three Girls can only look on in bafflement.

Weeks later, Dorothy is with Glen in a hotel room. She’s floating on air with happiness, and Glen professes his love for her. Everything seems to be great -- maybe too great. Dorothy asks him to go away to the Bahamas, and Glen says he can’t do it. His whole demeanor changes, worrying Dorothy. He finally confesses the truth: He’s married. Dorothy is shocked and horrified, accusing Glen of lying to her. He tries to justify why he’s still married, but Dorothy doesn’t listen and storms out.

BLANCHE: Oh Rose, wake up and smell the coffee. An auto mechanic is the last person to take a car to. They only make money if they tell you there’s something wrong with it. ROSE: Oh that’s a good point! SOPHIA: . . . Boy I wish I had a car to sell.

Later, Rose complains to Blanche that her car is making funny noises, which Sophia says sounds like a bad sign. However, Blanche talks Rose out of going to a mechanic. Sophia is amazed at Rose’s naivete, and leaves the room. The phone rings, and Rose initially thinks it’s Glen and harshly tells him off -- but it turns out to be an official from the school district, offering Dorothy a teaching job.

Dorothy isn’t ready to go back to work, as she misses Glen. Rose and Blanche play angel and devil on her shoulders, respectively: Rose thinks she needs to stay away from Glen, as he’s married. Blanche, meanwhile, thinks Dorothy should seize happiness with him, even if it’s not in the most moral of ways. The phone rings again, and this time it is apparently Glen. Dorothy turns him down, to Rose’s approval. Rose and Blanche go into the kitchen, and Dorothy immediately calls Glen and asks to meet him.

ROSE: A motel, Dorothy? A cheap, tawdry, bare-bulb den of iniquity? DOROTHY: We didn’t drive to Sodom and Gomorrah, Rose.

Dorothy returns from her date in the middle of the night and instantly gets defensive when she encounters Rose. She confirms to a judgmental Rose that she and Glen went to a motel. Blanche finds them both in the kitchen, and they continue to argue about the morality of what Dorothy’s doing. Rose is still harsh in her judgement, and Dorothy says at least Blanche can relate. But Blanche can’t: She’s never been with a married man. Sophia enters, having overheard, and firmly tells Dorothy she should have more respect for herself than to be a side piece.

Later, Sophia is rocking out on the lanai to a censored song. Rose comes running in, frantic. Blanche also enters and confesses the truth about the car: It’s a piece of junk, and she was hoping to pawn it off on Rose for full price to pay for her new car. Rose says it doesn’t matter now: The car’s been stolen. When Sophia points out the insurance will reimburse Blanche the full price for the stolen car, Blanche is ecstatic. Dorothy enters and Sophia chastises her again. Dorothy begs her mother to leave her alone, as she’s happy, but Sophia doubts that, especially as Glen isn’t going to leave his wife.

ROSE: Blanche? Was the gist of what you were saying before that you intended to cheat me? BLANCHE: Cheat you? Rose, you just analyze everything to death!

Dorothy is in a motel room with Glen (the same motel room from the last time we saw Glen, strangely), and tells him they need to talk. She says she doesn’t want to be the Other Woman, and Glen isn’t willing to divorce his wife, so the relationship isn’t going to work. Glen continues to try and justify staying in his marriage, but Dorothy says he’s trying to have it both ways, and that’s not fair to her. She tells him she’ll hurt after this, but it’s the right thing to do, and walks out.

Dorothy returns home and tells Sophia, asking if her mother’s still angry. Sophia says she wasn’t angry, just concerned to see Dorothy in so much distress. Blanche and Rose return, and ask if Sophia and Dorothy want to go cruising in Blanche’s brand new car. Dorothy initially says she just wants to relax after the day she’s had, and the other Girls agree. After three seconds of silence in the kitchen, Dorothy’s had enough.

DOROTHY: Boy, this is DEPRESSING. Girls, let’s go cruising. BLANCHE: Hey, I know a place where guys wrestle naked in the mud!

“Another date with Mrs. O’Brien’s husband?”

Episodes that deal with the Girls struggling over moral issues are a thorny one, because Golden Girls can -- and does -- handle such quandaries well. This episode, however, isn’t a particularly engaging one. It’s not a total letdown, as it’s saved by the B-plot and Sophia being the voice of reason for everyone involved.

The whole quandary at the heart of the episode is basically, “Dorothy sees married man, tries to make it work, and then realizes it’s not worth it.” If you want to see a nuanced take on infidelity . . . I don’t know, watch The Women, or something, because that’s not what this is. It boils down to Dorothy realizing that the arrangement is too morally wrong for her, and that’s basically it.

DOROTHY: His name is Glen O’Brien. ROSE: Where’d you meet him? SOPHIA: His name is “O’Brien.” Two-to-one, she met him at a gin mill.

Dorothy realizing that Glen’s absolute refusal to leave the wife he claims to no longer love is incredibly unfair to her is a good moment, but the process it takes to get her there is plotted strangely: She insists, right up until the final moments of the episode, that she’s not going to stop seeing Glen and that she’s comfortable with doing the “wrong” thing for the sake of her own gratification, but then switches in those final moments. Sophia keeps insisting Dorothy’s morally conflicted about it, but she denies this right up until the end. It’s not that I don’t buy Dorothy’s internal conflict -- I just would have appreciated it if she herself acknowledged it at some point before the break-up.

Rose and Blanche representing the different moral stances on the matter is also a little unusual. While Rose is coming at it from the morally correct stance, the show makes her judgmental attitude unbearably smug, possibly to make it a little more understandable when Dorothy ignores her. It’s also strange that Blanche is so insistent that Dorothy continue the affair when she later admits she’s never had one herself and didn’t think a married man would be worth the effort -- oh, and it’s also a little mean that Dorothy and Rose just assume Blanche has at some point slept with a married man.

There’s one omission that’s so glaring by its absence that I can’t help but feel a scene or line was cut somewhere: You’d think that, at some point, Sophia would call Dorothy out on the fact that, as a victim of a cheating husband herself, she should be the last person to try to justify an extramarital affair. Even just a single mention of Stan’s name would have been a very effective way of Sophia getting her point across, but it doesn’t happen, and I don’t for the life of me know why.

SOPHIA: So you started up with your married man again. DOROTHY: How did you know? SOPHIA: I’m the Amazing Kreskin. I was listening at the door. DOROTHY: Oh Ma. SOPHIA: Oh, I can’t put my ear to the door, but you can put your--DOROTHY: Ma!

It’s a shame, because the hypocrisy is what makes Dorothy the perfect protagonist of this episode. Her very first spotlight episode was her tearing into her ex-husband for his blatant infidelity, and yet she’s doing everything she can to justify being the Other Woman, trying to find a way to reconcile her morality with her emotions. It would have made the ending, in which Dorothy realizes that she wants to be better than her ex-husband, mean so much more.

For the record, this episode doesn’t do Dorothy any favors by the way it characterizes Glen. Maybe the actor, Alex Rocco, just lacks the necessary charisma -- when this character comes back played by Jerry Orbach in a later episode, it’s much more obvious why Dorothy is attracted to him. Or maybe it’s just a matter of time constraints: Here the character gets maybe three lines of dialogue before he confesses and starts trying to justify himself, and I don’t know if even Jerry Orbach (or any actor, for that matter) had enough charisma to make that work.

Something about the way Glen is written is just... slimy. While he professes to love Dorothy, his dialogue is just littered with manipulative bullshit. When he first tells Dorothy the truth, she immediately gets mad at him for lying to her, and he says, “I couldn’t lie to you. That’s why I told you.” Dude, you did lie to her -- you dated her for three weeks before you told her you were married! Then, when Dorothy breaks up with him, he says, “Please think about what you’re throwing away,” implicitly making her the bad guy who’s ruining the relationship, when he’s the one who’s creating the problem by trying to have his cake and eat it too.

BLANCHE: What’ll you give me for it? ROSE: Oh I couldn’t buy your car. It’s not my type. I want a car that says, “Practical.” Your car says . . . “Available.” BLANCHE: Well just take off my personalized plates.

I do like the B-plot of the episode, because it does exactly what a B-plot needs to do in a serious-ish episode like this: It adds levity and makes the final scene after the painful break-up funny, so the episode ends on a light note. I mean, there’s no rhyme or reason to Blanche saying she knows a place where men wrestle naked in the mud, but goddamn do I need that laugh by that point.

This is also one of the better episodes when it comes to balancing all four Girls evenly across both plotlines. Blanche and Rose are equally preoccupied with the B-plot, while Dorothy gets the lion’s share of the A-plot. In previous episodes, when this has been the case, Sophia’s gotten short shrift, usually consigned to a handful of lines -- though usually, they’re all the best ones.

In this episode, however, Sophia’s the connective tissue that ties the two plots together, being the rational one to point out the problems with Blanche and Rose’s car loan, and also being the voice of Dorothy’s conscience. It’s also one of the first episodes that really makes use of Sophia as an older mother/mentor figure to the other Girls.

One thing to note is how this episode has been edited strategically for copyright reasons: In both the Hulu and Amazon versions of the episode, they’ve carefully cut around Sophia rocking out on air guitar to a particular song on the lanai, probably because neither company owns the rights to the song she’s singing along to. For the record, it’s “Purple Rain,” by Prince. Here’s what the scene looks like on the DVD release:

youtube

I really wish they hadn’t cut this part out of the episode, even if I understand the underlying copyright reasons, since it’s actually very appropriate. “Purple Rain” has lyrics about not wanting to be someone’s “weekend lover” and how the singer “could never steal you from another.” I know that’s not what Prince said the song was about, but with a strictly surface listen, it sounds very apropos to the episode’s story. Also, the part where Dorothy expresses her frustration with Sophia by twisting the volume knob all the way up and blowing out Sophia’s ears is pretty hilarious, not going to lie.

By the way, there’s also a weird subtitle censor in the Hulu version of this episode. Blanche in the opening scene quotes her great-grandfather as saying two things you never sell to a friend are a car and a slave -- “because if either one of them quits working, you’ll never hear the end of it.” Hulu changes that second word to “sleigh,” which I found amusing.

Episode rating: 🍰🍰🍰 (three cheesecake slices out of five)

Favorite Part of the Episode:

BLANCHE: Oh honey, you’ve been hit by the thunderbolt. Love at first sight! It happened to me once. SOPHIA: Once? You’ve been hit by more lightning than the World Trade Center. ROSE: I was hit by the thunderbolt once. SOPHIA: Probably a direct hit to the forehead.

#blanche devereaux #rose nylund #dorothy zbornak #sophia petrillo #picture it #golden girls #stay golden #stay golden sunday #s01e14 #that was no lady

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thecoleopterawithana · 5 years ago

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When you were young and your heart was an open book

Don’t Let Me Down | Paul’s Upbringing

John, because of his upbringing and his unstable family life, had to be hard, witty, always ready for the cover-up, ready for the riposte, ready with the sharp little witticism. Whereas with my rather comfortable upbringing, a lot of family, lot of people, very northern, ‘Cup of tea, love?’, my surface grew to be easy-going. Put people at their ease. Chat to people, be nice, it’s nice to be nice.

— Paul McCartney, in Barry Miles’ Many Years From Now (1997).

Paul grew up in the warm embrace of a loving family. There was hardship, certainly: they were definitely working-class, and the war had been unkind to the cotton exchange business, so it fell on mother Mary to be the main bread-winner of the family, as a domiciliary housewife. Her nursing job also made it so they were always on the move, from one new outskirt council estate to the next, “always on the edge of the world” that was the rebuilding of a war-torn Liverpool. But despite this surrounding instability, the core of the family itself was a safe harbour of reliably loving parents.

I got my compassion for people from my mother. She was a midwife. I think that would probably be the most important quality. Again, respect and caring for others.

— Paul McCartney, interview w/ Jonathan Wingate for Record Collector: Paul McCartney gets back to work (July 2007).

[My mum] was very kind, very loving. There was a lot of sitting on laps and cuddling. She was very cuddly. I think I was very close to her. My brother thinks he was a little closer, being littler. I would just be trying to be a bit more butch, being the older one. She liked to joke and had a good sense of humour and she was very warm. There was more warmth than I now realise there was in most families. [...] They aspired to a better life. That idea that we had to get out of here, we had to do better than this. This was okay for everyone else in the street but we could do better than this. She was always moving to what she saw as a better place to bring her kids up.

— Paul McCartney, in Barry Miles’ Many Years From Now (1997).

Not only had this notion of rising out of their current situation been instilled in Paul and his brother Michael from an early age by his mother – by encouraging them to speak “the Queen’s English” and insist on their education, for example – his father, Jim McCartney, also did his best to pass down his values of “Toleration and Moderation”, a good education and a special emphasis on an honest and responsible work ethic.

I think I got my respect and tolerance for people from my dad, which is a pretty cool quality to inherit. He was very big on tolerance, my dad. It was a word he used to use all the time. I think I grew up with that attitude. You know, you’d say, ‘Bloody hell, I hate that guy.’ and then you’d stop and go, ‘Alright, wait a minute, maybe he’s got a point,’ and you’d try and consider it from his or her point of view. I think that was a great lesson.

— Paul McCartney, interview w/ Jonathan Wingate for Record Collector: Paul McCartney gets back to work (July 2007).

He had us out aged about nine. I was virtually a door-to-door salesman by the time I was twelve. [...] I was certainly not shy with people, I think because of all these activities my dad encouraged us into. I think it's probably very good for your confidence with people. It was all right. That was my upbringing.

[...]

My parents aspired for us, very much indeed. That is one of the great things you can find in ordinary people. My mum wanted me to be a doctor. 'My son the doctor' - and her being a nurse, too. No problem there. And my dad, who left school at fourteen, would have loved me to be a great scientist, a great university graduate. I always feel grateful for that. I mean, God, I certainly fulfilled their aspirations, talk about overachieving! That was all bred into me, that.

We had George Newnes Encyclopedias. I can still remember the smell of them. If you didn't know what a word meant or how it was spelled, my dad would say 'Look it up.' I think that's a great attitude to take with kids. It steers you in the right direction. It was part of a game where he was improving us without having had an awful lot of experience of improvement himself. But I always liked that, and I knew I would outstrip him. By going to grammar school I knew I'd fairly soon have Latin phrases or know about Shakespeare which he wouldn't know about.

— Paul McCartney, in Barry Miles’ Many Years From Now (1997).

Just from these passages alone, we can spot the origins of Paul’s tolerant and caring nature, social skills, self-reliance, and tireless drive for self-improvement (with its nuances of social climbing and fierce competitiveness).

All in all, it was a good solid childhood: exploring the woods outside of his house – “Mother Nature’s Son” through and through – playing and running from Speke teds with his friend George Harrison, going to school and working the occasional odd job, helping his family and making them proud.

And then, Paul McCartney’s secure existence was shattered.

My head was in a whirl, only then I realized, I lost my little girl

On the 31st of October 1956, Mary McCartney abruptly dies from complications following her mastectomy. She’d been admitted at a far too advanced state of breast cancer after she’d kept working – while in pain – for several weeks, choosing not to divulge this symptom or the fact that she had a lump in her breast to her colleagues.

The whole family is caught unawares, but the boys especially are mostly kept in the dark.

I remember one horrible day me and my brother going to the hospital. They must have known she was dying. It turned out to be our last visit and it was terrible because there was blood on the sheets somewhere and seeing that, and your mother, it was like "Holy cow!' And of course she was very brave, and would cry after we'd gone, though I think she cried on that visit. But we didn't really know what was happening. We were shielded from it all by our aunties and by our dad and everything.

— Paul McCartney, in Barry Miles’ Many Years From Now (1997).

The boys are sent away to stay with relatives, noticing that something was wrong but unaware of what was going on, unable to actually say goodbye.

Two days later, it’s too late.

Paul is 14.

As Jim comes to break the news, and his brother Michael breaks down in tears, Paul has an unexpected response.

Mum was a working nurse. There wasn’t a lot of money around – and she was half the family pay packet. My reaction was: ‘How are we going to get by without her money?’ When I think back on it, I think, ‘Oh God, what? Did I really say that?’ It was a terrible logical thought which was preceded by the normal feelings of grief. It was very tough to take.

— Paul McCartney, in Ray Coleman’s McCartney: Yesterday & Today (1996).

It would not be the last time that Paul McCartney’s initial shock response to grief is considered “flippant” or “callous” by the people around him; a fact that has haunted him throughout his life.

I’m very funny when people die. I don’t handle it at all well, because I’m so brought down that I try to bring myself up. So I don’t show grief very well. It actually leads some people to think I don’t care, and I do. I’m not good at it like some people. [...] But I’ve always been kind of inward about those things. So I just deal with it myself.

— Paul McCartney, in Ray Coleman’s McCartney: Yesterday & Today (1996).

By virtue of nature or nurture, Paul exhibits from early on an extreme difficulty or unwillingness to deal with his less pleasant emotions.

His response to the alarm that is pain is to deny that it is ringing altogether.

And this manifested not only in inadequate optimism for some situations, it most often took the shape of what appeared to be too hard and cold pragmatism. Some people, unfortunately, saw his defence-mechanism of turning completely rational in the face of crisis and mistook it for him not caring; when, in fact, he cared so much that his only solution was to try and shut it off.

He carried with him a great burden of guilt and regret; not concerning his reaction to his mother’s death but also due to other misdemeanours and minor hurts he’d caused her when she was alive.

There's one moment that I've regretted all my life which is a strange little awkwardness for me. There was one time when she said 'ask' and she pronounced it posh. And I made fun of her and it slightly embarrassed her. Years later I've never forgiven myself. It's a terrible little thing. I wish I could go back and say, ‘I was only kidding, Mum.' I’m sure she knew. I'm sure she didn't take it too seriously.

— Paul McCartney, in Barry Miles’ Many Years From Now (1997).

In retrospect, he even theorized that the lyrics to his acclaimed ‘Yesterday’ were related to his mother’s sudden departure.

With ‘Yesterday’, singing it now, I think without realising it I was singing about my mum who died five or six years previously, or whatever the timing was. Because I think now, “Why she had to go, I don’t know, she wouldn’t say, I said something wrong…”

— Paul McCartney, interview w/ Pat Gilbert for MOJO: Don’t look back in anger (November 2013).

So in the aftermath of life completely pulling the rug from under his feet, Paul was not only struggling to deal with his own emotions, trying to bury them far from sight as best as he could, he was being consumed by terrible guilt for doing exactly that.

More than that, he was under the care of his uncle and aunt for several more days, trying to rally his brother so that they wouldn’t appear ‘softies’ in their cousins' eyes, while friends and family tried to hold together a shattered Jim McCartney, “whose first thought was to join his wife”.

Seeing his father break down like that had a huge impact on Paul.

My mother's death broke my dad up. That was the worst thing for me, hearing my dad cry. I'd never heard him cry before. It was a terrible blow to the family. You grow up real quick, because you never expect to hear your parents crying. You expect to see women crying, or kids in the playground, or even yourself crying – and you can explain all that. But when it's your dad, then you know something's really wrong and it shakes your faith in everything. But I was determined not to let it affect me. I carried on. I learnt to put a shell around me at that age.

— Paul McCartney, in The Anthology (1995).

This is very important.

Not only had the only reality he’d ever known been destroyed by his mother’s sudden death, his own father – who was supposed to be this strong, unshakable pillar in his life – couldn’t be relied on to hold it together.

Paul had been let down. He was on his own.

Fear steems from a feeling of powerlessness. You feel painfully vulnerable to whatever life might throw at you, at constant risk of being hurt again, and the only solution is to be on the lookout. Be prepared.

Paul was caught unawares because the people he’d counted on to always be there suddenly weren’t. And with his compassionate and reasonable nature, he probably didn't even blame them at all. But the facts were that Paul had been left hanging, not once but twice, when he needed them the most. So he kind of lost his faith in everything.

Life is chaotic and unpredictable; and people, through no fault of their own, are just as inconstant.

And so, in order not to risk being let down again, Paul took matters into his own hands. He tried to escape the pain and dread of being powerless by seizing control of whatever he could. And that was mostly himself.

And so begins Paul McCartney’s saga of isolating independence and other control-issues.

As Paul said above, he’s “always been kind of inward” about grief and other “negative” emotions. He’d rather be alone at this stage because he doesn’t want to expose his vulnerabilities. Not to others and much less to himself. So he needs a distraction. Something to devote himself to that’ll take his mind off the pain.

The saving grace, as usual, was music.

— Paul McCartney, The Q Interview (2007).

His brother Michael, probably the closest observer we could have of this period, recounts how Paul was like in the aftermath.

Paul was far more affected by Mum’s death than any of us imagined. His very character seemed to change and for a while he behaved like a hermit. He wasn’t very nice to live with at this period, I remember. He became completely wrapped up in himself and didn’t seem to care about anything or anybody outside himself.

He seemed interested only in his guitar, and his music. He would play that guitar in his bedroom, in the lavatory, even when he was taking a bath. It was never out of his hands except when he was at school or when he had to do his homework. Even in school, he and George Harrison used to seize the opportunity every break to sit and strum.

When we left our auntie’s house and returned home, it was agreed that Dad, Paul and I would take it in turns to do the housework.

“We’re a family on our own now,” Dad said. “We’ll all have to help.”

But time after time when I came home from school, I would find that Paul hadn’t done his bit. I would go looking for him and sometimes I would find him, up in his bedroom, perhaps, sitting in the dark, just strumming away on his guitar. Nothing, it seemed, mattered to him any more. He seldom went out anywhere – even with girls. He didn’t bother much with any of his friends except his schoolmate George Harrison and John Lennon, who was at the art school next door. Work and work alone – his school books and his guitar – appeared to be the only thing that could help him to forget.

— Mike McCartney, Woman: Portrait of Paul (21 August 1965).

So Paul takes to complete dedication to work and music to help him ignore his pain. And he’d rather go through this process of burying it on his own. We see him isolate himself from his family and friends, according to Mike socializing mostly with George, also in the context of playing music. John is also mentioned; this could be a smudging of the timeline in Mike’s recollections, as Paul would only meet John the following year. That or Paul’s mourning lasted until the autumn of 1957, when John was enrolled in art college.

We also have a clue about how guarded Paul was with his “negative” emotions – how resilient he always wanted to be – that no one imagined he would be so affected by his mother’s death as he was.

This will also be a repeating theme through Paul’s life: his wish to always be strong, positive and reliable will make others and himself overestimate his imperviousness to trauma. People will then feel free to burden him with their own pain or unload their frustrations on him, without feeling that there would be consequences; because Paul is so tough as to be unaffected by all that. This proved, time and again, not to be true.

His true strength arises, in my opinion, not in the fact that he is unshakable but in his determination to quietly pick himself up again and again.

Losing my mum when I was fourteen was a major tragic event in my life. But, when I think about myself, I am, overall, pretty optimistic, pretty enthusiastic, pretty much into getting on. One of the reasons being, she would want that. I know for certain she would want that. I know Linda would want that. I know John would want that, and George would want that. My dad would want that. They were very, very positive people. And the idea that their deaths would plunge me into some sort of morose depression would bother them. I know that for a fact. So that helps me to not go there.

— Paul McCartney, interviewed by John Colapinto for the New Yorker: When I’m sixty-four (4 June 2007).

But as a 14-year-old Northern lad, his tactic of picking himself up didn’t involve dressing the wounds, which would continue to bleed silently in the recesses of his mind.

I certainly didn’t grieve enough for my mother. There was no such thing as a psychiatrist when I lost her. You kidding? I was a 14-year-old Liverpool boy. I wouldn’t have had access to one and I do now.

— Paul McCartney, interviewed by Nigel Farndale for The Telegraph: Love me do (17 May 2002).

But soon, Paul would find an even greater outlet for his love of music, almost magical in its specialness:

Someone to perform with.

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big-bad-ulf · 5 years ago

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Untethered || Ulfric & Luce

Location: Dell’s Tavern

Timing: Before the last full moon

Tagging: @big-bad-ulf and @divineluce

Content: Family death mentions, thoughts/discussion of self-harming behaviors, alcohol abuse

Description: Ulfric and Luce lower their guard after a night of drinking and have a more successful heart-to-heart about their respective losses. If swearing loyalty to each other’s revenge plots can be considered a ‘success’

Grabbing the next round of beers from the bar, Luce walked back to the high top table she and Ulf were sitting at in the corner of Dell’s. The noise of the tavern was a comforting sound to her-- the roar of sports games playing on the screens in lieu of a band playing music. Balancing the two large steins of beer in her hands, Luce slid one across the table to Ulf and took her seat across from him. Lifting the large glass up in his direction, she gave him a slightly unsteady grin She’d matched him drink for drink which would have been fine… if he wasn’t a beast of a man. In a literal sense. Werewolf metabolism had to do something for processing alcohol. Whereas she was decidedly neither of those things. Taking a long drink from her glass, she nodded a bit more emphatically than she normally would, “When you’re right, you’re right. This German stuff is pretty fucking good.” Setting the glass back down, she idly pressed the back of her forearm against the glass, pressing one of her bruises to the cold surface.

Walking into Dell's this time had felt disconcerting, the place familiar yet slightly foreign after his prolonged absence. While both Bennets and Layla had resided under his roof Ulfric had always needed to be on watch, always needed a clear head. Now that threat was gone and there was no one waiting up for him, so he was free to unwind, the buzz of activity and alcohol keeping him from dwelling for too long on how that change in situation came to pass. "Those American light beers have no taste, they practically go down like water." Ulfric insisted as he took a long drink from the stein Luce place in front of him, repeating the argument he'd made several times throughout the night with increasing conviction as the beverages kicked in. "That's new, since I saw you last," He mentioned, casting a glance down at the bruised arm she pressed against the glass, the observation that he'd usually keep to himself finding its way out past his lowered inhibitions. "Did sword training get a little hands on?" He continued, providing a half-hearted out as an apology for stepping slightly over the line they'd drawn regarding talking about each other's personal bullshit. "I wouldn't have thought that would be allowed. Doesn't it defeat the purpose of, well, swords?"

“Yeah, yeah, American beer sucks, Budlight is basically pisswater, Coors may as well be La Croix of beer.” Luce said before drinking deeply from her mug, letting the cold carbonation rush down her throat. The bar around her was just a little fuzzy at the edges, which was just how she wanted it. Made things easier, to see it through a filter like this. And there was no better filter than a beer or four. Glancing down at her bruised forearm, as though she didn’t realize what he was talking about, Luce shrugged. Adam had fucked her up. Granted, she knew he’d been holding back-- Hunter strength and all that jazz. If he had wanted to, he could have broken her arm, broken her ribs without even trying. But, even with the pulled punches, she was still sore and bruised all over. Which was exactly what she wanted. “Nah, me and a dude beat the shit out of each other in the woods.” She said, the truth slipping out easily over the rim of her stein. “No swords involved, otherwise I probably would be really fucked up.” She said with a laugh. Training swords, even synthetic training blades, were still weapons. Still dangerous. Still very capable of knocking out teeth and breaking bone. It was a good fucking thing they’d stuck to hand to hand.

“Yes, it’s all fun and games until someone gets stabbed, I suppose.” Ulfric tried to match her laugh, to restore the bubble of alcohol-infused levity that had previously surrounded them, but it was a little strangled and forced. Somehow he seemed to have crossed the threshold between contentedly tipsy and sad, wallowing drunk, creeping over the line between the two without realizing it. Though in fairness to himself, with the way his vision was slightly blurring it would’ve been difficult to see it. “That sounds like the sort of thing I would do, the woods part, especially,” The werewolf conceded, he could hardly just her for brawling, but it just didn’t fit her style. With her powers, as he understood them, no one should’ve been able get near her, at least without risking a fiery retaliation. Which meant something was wrong, or she’d let herself get hurt, which was even more wrong. “I don’t get why you let this guy touch you without inflicting severe burn damage to his balls. It just doesn’t seem like you, Luce.” He found himself voicing his thoughts aloud, before sighing and running an agitated hand through his hair once he realized what he has said, how he’d skirted their rules again. “Faen, sorry… I know I promised, but it’s not funny for me to see or think about you being in pain.”

“I dunno, a good stabbing makes it all the more fun.” Luce said with a wry grin, not noticing the forced tone that her boss’ voice had taken on. With another large gulp of beer, she looked at her stein for a moment-- fuck, how was it already half empty? Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, Luce focused on her boss as the world began to tip pleasantly from side to side. Or maybe her head was wobbling? Uncertain. “It was a good time.” She replied, though the smile that had remained on her face slipped slightly as Ulfric spoke again. A lump formed in the back of her throat at his words and she stared at the rim of her glass for a moment. The thought of her being in pain? It… fuck, it sounded melodramatic even in her head but… ever since Bea had died, her life had been nothing but fucking pain. The worst kind of pain. The pain of the soul, the pain of losing someone who she had spent much of her life relying on. It was the sort of pain that came with agonizing numbness that she would do anything to get rid of. Including fighting Adam in the woods. For a brief moment, Luce contemplated telling Ulfric to fuck off. To mind his own business, that she had this under control. But did she? Was any of this “under control?” Swallowing, Luce looked at him, “Sometimes hurting feels better than not feeling at all. It helps to feel a different kind of pain.” One I deserve.

Ulfric had fully expected a rebuff, so when Luce didn’t dodge the question he was thrown off-kilter. The sensation reminded him of when his parents had first been teaching him how to track and he’d misjudged his footing, expecting solid ground but suddenly finding himself falling. As it was then, this was unknown territory he found himself in, and he’d be wise to tread carefully. But both ‘wisdom’ and ‘caution’ were concepts that had become unappealing and difficult to comprehend several drinks ago. “If you truly felt nothing underneath all this, you wouldn’t have to work so hard to cover it up.” He countered bluntly instead. “And what is that work getting you? Bottle things up and the best-case scenario is they stay trapped that way, and things stay the way they are.” He took a long swig of his beer and contemplated the container it came in as he spoke, as if some deep truth lay within it. “More likely they spill out when you don’t want them to, or explode, and you’ve got a predisposition towards the more fiery outcome.” The image of the cup of coffee boiling over in her hand flashed through his mind, an inopportune and involuntary manifestation of the power she kept inside. He could relate to that, even if he didn’t understand the nuances of how her magic worked. “It… can help to let whatever you’re feeling flow through you on your own terms,” he found himself offering her the advice he’d often given less experienced werewolves intent on repressing their more primal impulses. “Though I’d expect yours would be different to mine.” She couldn’t rely on the moon to help her through releasing whatever negative energies were eating her up inside, but she could rely on his support, if she wanted it.

Taking another long drink from her glass, Luce mulled over his words. Part of her wanted to lash out at him-- what did he know about her pain? What did he know about how she felt? How could he even think to understand what she was going though? But, that was just the thing, she realized. He didn’t know. He didn’t know what was happening. All he knew was that she’d been… fucked up. Had been acting out, hadn’t been showing up to work, or had been throwing herself into things harder than she should have. All he knew was that she was spiralling. Fuck. Letting out a sigh, she set the glass down, the alcohol and mixed emotions churning in her stomach. She didn’t want to tell him. She didn’t want to make her burdens his. She didn’t want to show this side of weakness to him. But, another side of Luce wanted to tell him everything. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could do this. How much longer could she hold onto the burden of her sister’s death, the responsibility of her resurrection, the fear and self-doubt that threatened to bring her to her knees. “I…” Luce took in a deep breath. “Yeah, yeah, it might.” She said, digging her fingers into her arm, pressing hard into the floral designs etched into her skin. “Someone killed my sister. Bea.” Saying the words out loud, it felt just like it had the night she’d told Remmy what had happened. A tidal wave of emotion, guilt, sadness, anger, but most of all pain-- it all rushed over her. Luce gripped her fingers tighter, her shoulders tensing. “They were hunting Nell, but Bea… sacrificed herself. Saved her.” And she’d done nothing.

Luce’s confession brought Ulfric back to that night outside the trailer when Ari had returned to finally speak the words out loud and make them real; My sister is dead. His stomach plummeted, and he was briefly overcome by the impulse to find some kind of blanket to wrap her up in like he had the young wolf, despite how pointless that was when she could generate her own warmth. “What is it about sisters and self-sacrifice?” He found himself mumbling into his hands, leaning forward with his elbows braced against the table under the weight of the news. He hadn’t meant to say that, but a confession of his own in return for hers seemed fair. “Ariana’s sister is dead too, for similarly noble, bullshit reasons.” And his own sister was dead for completely arbitrary, bullshit reasons but that was beside the point. “Not that I’m trying to pit your grief against mine. Yours would kick mine’s sorry ass.” He explained. “I just want you to know I have some experience to back me up when I say that I’m sure… Bea was a good person, and the last she would want is to see any of her sisters hurt. Inflict that pain on the world if you need to. Throw something, light something on fire, tell me to get fucked in some creative way,” He suggested, searching for human substitutes for the innate mechanism of releasing pent up negativity that he’d been born with. Luckily, he was fairly certain he could smooth over anything she did short of burning the whole bar down with a sizable tip. “We can even go out back and I’ll let you get a few swings in. I doubt I’d feel it much right now, anyway. Just don’t direct this back on yourself, energy can’t escape a closed circuit like that.”

“Sisters. We’ll fight and bicker like hell, but someone comes for one of us… We’ll go to the ends of the earth to hunt them down.” Luce said quietly, her finger tracing one of the flower petals on her arm, staring at one of the snakes nestled among the flowers. Her mother. Her father. Neither of them knew. They were half a world away, none the wiser to what had happened to their favorite daughter. None the wiser to what their remaining daughters were sacrificing to bring her back. At Ulfric’s next words, Luce felt her stomach lurch. Ariana’s sister-- “Celeste?” She asked, aghast, staring at him. No. No, no, no. She hadn’t messaged the other woman, hadn’t heard from her in weeks. She thought maybe she’d read the signs wrong, that she’d just been a little too pushy, that Celeste was ghosting her. It had happened for. Plenty of women had done it to her. She had never thought that she was dead. “Fuck. Fuck.” Luce said her voice cracking as her jaw clenched. “I… I’m sorry.” She said thickly, sucking in a deep breath to try and keep from crying. Waving a hand, Luce lifted her glass and drained the rest of the beer from the stein. “Don’t. Don’t say that. I’ve already tried that. Tried to kill some monsters. Killed a couple. Scared a few people. Burned down the woods. Didn’t matter. It all just felt… like shit. Nothing helped. Nothing’s helped.” Luce whispered, staring down at the tabletop, unable to meet his eyes.

Despite his dampened senses, it was obvious to Ulfric that Luce was close to tears, but he managed to keep from commenting on it despite his lowered impulse control. As close as they were, she’d never broken down in front of him, and he didn’t want to scare or shame her into restraining her emotions again by acknowledging it. “Alright, I get it, nothing’s helped.” He eventually accepted her response, rising from the booth to head toward the bar. When he sank back into his seat a few minutes later with freshly refilled steins he sighed and picked up where he left off. “Time’s supposed to, right? Let’s just pass the time then.” He nudged the glass towards her and raised his own in a tentative toast. “To sisters?”

When the man stood up to get more drinks, Luce buried her head in her hands, her shoulders shaking slightly as she held back tears. Bea. Celeste. What the fuck. What the fuck. Why were the women around her dying? Who else would be next? And there was nothing that she could do for Celeste. Or for Ariana. Ariana-- fuck. She was just a kid. 18, but a kid. And she’d just lost her sister. Christ. Rubbing her face, Luce did her best to school her expression back to one of relative calm. The pain was still clear on her face, but the increased swaying of the room around them helped ease it away. “To sisters… avenging sisters.” She said, tapping her glass against his before drinking deeply, letting the alcohol wash over her. If she drank enough, maybe then she could just… forget this fresh, brutal news. “You… You said time’s supposed to help.” Luce said, echoing his words, her words running together as she stared at him with bleary eyes. “Did it? When you, when you lost your siblings. Did time help?”

“Did what?” Ulfric asked, her words becoming harder to decipher as they blurred together. “Oh, ...right.” He continued, recognition coming over him slowly. He was surprised she’d remembered. He only mentioned them in passing to explain why he didn’t get many visitors. ‘I’m the middle child of five, but my two older siblings are busy taking care of the family business back home, and the younger ones passed away a long time ago.’ An ocean of time, bigger than the ocean he’d crossed to get where he was now. Had it helped? “It helped somewhat,” He answered softly, after another steadying mouthful of ale. “Not as much as vengeance,” He added honestly, before reclining back into his chair to survey the bustling bar around them. “But I doubt you’ll find much of that at Dell’s. Time and company will have to do for now.”

“Somewhat.” Luce nodded, taking another large gulp of beer. The bar was spinning around her, her emotions hanging by a thread. But, she kept them at bay as best she could. She focused on Ulfric, focused on his words. On the fact that he knew her pain. He’d felt the fresh sting of losing siblings at one time, even if it had been years ago. But… Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, Luce glanced around at Dell’s. No one was around, no one near at least. And it was loud enough that no one would be able to tell who’d said anything, even if they had werewolf ears like Ulf. “Not here in Dell’s. But, vengeance…” She let out a dry chuckle. “Sisters. You don’t fuck with them.” She said, her eyes dull as she leaned back into her chair. Her hand tapped against the top of their table, small sparks of blue flame drifting from her fingertips. “Sisters, they’ll chase you to hell and back again.”

At Luce’s glance around the room, Ulfric vaguely remembered that he wasn't supposed to talk of things like vengeance around mundane company. He generally tried to keep from alluding to things he’d done in the past at all, but he found at that moment the only person whose judgment he feared was hers, and that didn’t come. The acceptance he felt instead was like another layer of intoxication. None of the bar patrons seemed to be listening to them, likely because many of them had come to the bar with the goal of forgetting the things they’d seen and heard that they couldn’t or didn’t want to explain and weren’t looking to add to their burdens. Still, for her sake, he leaned in closer and kept his voice low as he nodded “Sisters can be formidable creatures.” The flames that sparked from her hand were uncomfortably warm in such close proximity to his, but he didn’t back away from them. “I wouldn’t want to stand in the way of one on the path to retribution.” He searched her eyes for some hint of what she was thinking, planning before deciding it didn’t matter. He already knew if she asked for his help with this he’d agree, details be damned. He wouldn’t be able to back down from the chance to help another sister, to do it better this time. “I’d stand by your side though,” The werewolf assured her, doing his best to keep her steady in his vision, to imprint the promise in his mind even after his sobriety returned. “If you needed me to.”

Locking eyes with Ulfric, Luce watched the way he leaned in. “Yeah. Yeah, they can be.” She said, smothering the flames with her palm, choking the blue flames out. She could feel the heat against her palm, but like all fire, it didn't burn. A part of her wondered what it would feel like, to burn like that. But, it never happened. The flames didn’t bite against her skin, they never went against her. At his words, she took another long sip of beer as she mulled over his offer. “Thanks, Ulf. But… I’ve got it covered.” She said, a smile curling on her lips, cold and cruel. “The motherfucker who did this, he’s going to wish he’d never even thought about coming after my family.” August. She’d held him in her hands, threatened to melt the skin from his face, had come so close to killing him… Next time, she wouldn’t hold back. Next time, he would know just how badly he’d fucked up by setting that hunter on her family. Luce let out a long sigh, she looked at him. “Same goes for you. With… Ariana’s situation. If you need help, if she needs help-- just say the word. I’ll do whatever I can to help. No one should lose a sister.” No one should feel the pain she did.

“I don’t doubt it, on both counts,” Ulfric told her, picking up on the determination in her tone, but not the iciness that might have given him pause if he had a clearer head. “You’ve got a deal.” He tapped his knuckles against her shoulder lightly in lieu of shaking her hand that had only recently stopped sparking, before tipping his glass to her and drinking deep to seal the new arrangement. Sinking bonelessly back into his seat he hummed, mulling over their conversation and the unexpected turns it had taken. “Hmm, all this talk of revenge makes me feel…” He searched his addled brain for a way to describe the sense of unfulfilled emptiness that had settled into his gut. “Hungry. Buffalo wings? Yes, buffalo wings.” He asked and answered his own question without pausing for breath, certain that was the solution. “I’m buying.”

#chatzy #luce #untethered #wickedswriting

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theonceoverthinker · 5 years ago

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When Will My Life Begin (Fair Game 4/?)

Summary: Tangled AU. Clover Callows has been confined to a tower for all of his life, and given the threat that his Uncle Tyrian says his semblance poses to his safety, he accepts that fate. It’s the only life he’s ever known, after all. But when he’s offered the opportunity to fulfill his greatest dream after a chance encounter with a thief -- or bandit, as Qrow Branwen insists there’s a difference between the two -- both Clover and Qrow will discover joys that they never knew life could offer them before. AO3

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A/N: Wahoo!!! I managed to get this done on time!!! I hope you all enjoy!

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Clover considered himself pretty knowledgeable when it came to his body.

It shouldn’t have come as a shock to anyone. After all, he spent an awful long time getting to know it without the hassle of constant distractions and a biology book at his disposal since his eleventh birthday that was now in dire need of glue just to keep itself together.

Much of Clover’s life had been spent exploring his physical limits. Exercise was a key part of that, with much of his day used to stretch, work out, climb, pull, and reel. He’d seen the developing muscles across his limbs act as the payoff of that work.

Injuries were another. A child could only be so safe when left alone in a tower for much of a day, and even with the hindsight gained through maturity, injuries as a result of experimentation with what he could and couldn’t do were inevitable. Even when he wasn’t suffering them, he closely studied Raven’s injuries as well as his uncle’s when he could get a peek of or information about their existences.

But all the same, those experiences, both good and bad were fantastic teachers. The human body -- as well as the body of a bird -- was such an interesting thing to Clover. It was frail, yet durable and nuanced in its structure as muscles, bones, nerves and veins all made their homes in an interconnected mass that combined to create a living, breathing, thinking, feeling being. A million things could hurt a body, but a million things could also save it, and that wasn’t even factoring in the effects of semblances, an effect that in all honesty, he only had the vaguest idea about.

Many an hour was spent by Clover studying his book’s diagrams as well as his own growth, thinking about all the possibilities for how that one bodily structure could go about life in such a world as theirs.

So yes, Clover felt he knew the human body -- mostly his -- quite well.

However, despite all of his knowledge about that body, he had no idea how in the world he could possibly slow down the rapid beating of his heart as he approached his uncle.

Well, that wasn’t true. Clover knew plenty of ways to do so, but that rapid beating in his heart made it all the way over to his ears, deafening them to even the thought of any of those methods.

But he didn’t need to hear those methods -- today, he had no problem with letting his anticipation and excitement over asking what he was about to ask fuel the fire in his heart.

He was going to do it.

Oh Gods, he was really going to do it.

“Clover!”

The second time his Uncle Tyrian said his name was noticeably less patient than the first. Clover would be lying if he said it wasn’t just a bit annoying.

To be fair though, that impatience was very much understandable. Uncle Tyrian only had so much time to spend with Clover in the morning before he had to go to work, and he wanted to make sure each and every possible second of it was spent by Clover’s side. The process of getting him up the tower took long enough as it stood, so any further delays on top of it were just an additional hassle, and Clover absolutely felt the same.

Greeting and helping his uncle into the tower was the high point of Clover’s morning, and had been for ages. It not only provided him with the most activity he’d experience until his uncle’s return at sunset, but it gave him a friendly face on top of it all.

“Hello, uncle!” Clover called down to the bottom of the tower. “Looking good today!”

Despite the gentle wind’s efforts, he could hear the light sound of his uncle’s chuckle.

“I’m surprised you can tell one way or the other from all the way up there!” he said. “Bring me up!”

“Of course! Just another second, please!”

Clover quickly grabbed Kingfisher, aiming the weapon with his eyes. Once he was perfectly in place, he held his weapon above his head and behind his left shoulder, and then swung it downward, just as he’d done hundreds and hundreds of times before.

Just as it did everyday, Clover felt the familiar bit of pressure in the reel as Uncle Tyrian clicked Kingfisher’s hook into its usual spot and heard the ever so faint sound of him stepping onto their mechanism’s stone base.

“I’m ready!” Uncle Tyrian called out to him, and with that, Clover started pulling.

Kingfisher’s reel was strong -- it had lifted him plenty of times -- but lifting a person positioned on the heavy stone his uncle stood on was something Clover knew that reel wouldn’t be able to handle. Because of that, for the sake of keeping the reel’s strength and structure intact, Clover elected to regularly pull his uncle up to the tower by reeling in the line with his own two hands, bit by bit.

It was a good thing he had the foresight to take up wearing leather gloves when he pulled.

Whether the thing being pulled was made of the plant stems or metal, rope burn was a pain no one should have to deal with.

Clover lifted his uncle all the way up the tower to its window. As he exited the stone pulley, Clover gently lowered it down again until he was sure he could let it drop without risking cracking the stone itself.

When the task of resetting the pulley was at last done, Clover turned to greet his company.

“Good morning, Uncle Tyrian!” he called out. As Clover approached, Uncle Tyrian took a gentle hold of his head, giving it a kind pat.

“Clover! My boy,” he said through a dramatic, yet goofy sigh, “how you’ve configured that weapon of yours so you can pull me up each and every day, all on your own, I don’t know how you do it.”

“Oh,” Clover waved off as the hug broke, “it’s nothing.”

Uncle Tyrian smiled, almost too sweetly, as he released his hold on Clover. “Then I don’t know why it took so long,” he said, the slightest hint of a sing-song fashion in his voice as his index poked Clover’s nose to a rhythm his uncle developed. Clover frowned, causing Tyrian to laugh. “Oh, boy. I’m just teasing,” he cooed, right before walking himself further into the room.

Clover forced out a chuckle. His uncle had a tendency to joke around with him, no doubt a means of bringing some extra joy to his small and quite lonely world. It wasn’t that Clover didn’t appreciate it...but his uncle’s jokes had a habit of seldom being as funny as Clover imagined his uncle found them -- not to mention, sometimes, it was hard to tell what was a joke and what wasn’t.

Uncle Tyrian was, in a word, opinionated...very, very opinionated. He had something to say about everything, and what he usually said amounted to pointing out what was wrong with or what could be improved about whatever point of discussion came his way.

Of course, he wasn’t without his compliments -- Uncle Tyrian was by no means a cruel man. He appreciated Clover’s meal preparation and how much easier their pulley system made his morning climb than before. Criticisms were just his uncle’s way of trying to make his and Clover’s world better.

And that was a good thing, Clover supposed. Life in a tower or not, there was something to be said for effort and one’s quality of life. If anything, the fact that his uncle gave him critiques showed trust. It was a trust that Clover could improve, do more than he expected to, despite his limitations.

It was inspiring.

Clover just wished the difference between what was supposed to be inspiring and what was supposed to make him laugh was made just a little bit clearer. But perhaps that was a nuance that was more organically recognized in the world outside of the tower.

Uncle Tyrian probably picked it up.

He never would.

No...he would because he was finally going to ask for the chance to see just a glimpse of that world for himself.

It was finally time.

Clover took a deep breath, and finally enacted his plan.

“Uncle Tyrian,” Clover started, following him to the mirror by his closet. “As you know, tomorrow is-”

“Clover,” he interrupted, taking hold of Clover’s shoulder and pulling him beside him in front of the mirror. “Do you know what I see in that mirror? I see a strong, bright, handsome man.” Clover smiled at the unashamed compliment, and let himself lean more into his uncle’s touch.

“Oh look,” he then continued, “you’re there too.” A fit of laughter took over his uncle.

And there was the punchline…

Clover hoped his love for his uncle was something Uncle Tyrian never questioned, but all the same, his uncle really needed to work on his material.

Though he tried his best not to, Clover couldn’t help but drop the fragile smile that he’d built in the span of those few precious seconds before the proverbial other shoe was dropped.

At the sight of that, Uncle Tyrian playfully ruffled his hair. “Oh Clover, I’m just teasing! You really need to work on that oversensitivity of yours.” Uncle Tyrian then stepped away from the mirror and headed towards the breakfast table. “Now, what have you made for us today, boy?”

Before Clover answered, he took a second’s pause for a deep breath, still recovering from his uncle’s joke.

He told himself to relax, reminded himself that today yielded a far bigger prize to focus on, and repeated a sentiment he’d argue many a time in the past -- if his uncle’s questionable taste in comedy was his biggest failing, then Clover would take it with a smile the size of this very tower itself on his face.

Perhaps his uncle was right about his oversensitivity…

Well, if that was the case, then Clover would just have to show him that he could overcome that, too.

Clover smiled, walking over to Uncle Tyrian’s side of the breakfast table and pulling his uncle’s chair out for him.

“I’m so happy you asked,” he said once his uncle was situated, leaning towards the dish. “For today, I’ve prepared for us fresh bread rolls with cinnamon and brown sugar baked into the dough, an apricot spread, and some lemon tea.”

Tyrian hummed, clearly impressed. “Sounds good. And might I add that someone’s feeling confident,” he said, smiling a bit.

“What can I say?” Clover returned. “When I get to make breakfast for the world’s best uncle, I do it well.” He chuckled as he gave his uncle a pat on the shoulder, right before taking off for his own side of the table. As Clover sat down and spread his jam over his roll, he watched his uncle do the same and take his first bite.

He looked pleased.

That was a good sign.

It was now time to try again.

“So Uncle, I-”

Uncle Tyrian moaned in delight. “These are fantastic,” he said through a full mouth, pointing his free hand at the roll in his hand. “Clover, you are a God in the kitchen.”

“Well, you told me my mother was quite the baker. I felt like I owed it to her to try to do the same.”

“You’re a good boy, Clover -- always doing just what your parents wished you to do.”

Clover felt his smile wane.

Yes, he was a good boy.

Yes, he did always do just what his parents wished him to do.

But yes, he was also going to request to defy their dying plea.

It would only be for a single day -- barely a blink of an eye compared to the lifetime he’d dutifully spent in this tower already, and would continue to dutifully spend in this tower once he did it.

All the same though, it was undeniably a defiance he would be suggesting.

What would his parents or his uncle think of that?

Suddenly, Clover found that his heart was quite heavy.

“You know, Clover,” Uncle Tyrian continued, paying Clover no mind. “Your bread is nice, but when’s the last time you cooked up some eggs or sausage? A big, strapping young man needs protein in his diet. ...And so do you!” At that comment, he started laughing again. “I’ll need to pick you up some the next time I go out.”

Clover forced a laugh, trying to regain his metaphorical footing.

What was he thinking, asking to do this?

But then, Clover felt the tiniest bit of heat from behind him.

He had a feeling of its source.

Still, perhaps seeing it with his own eyes would help him make a decision.

Clover grabbed his butter knife and made a move to get some more jam for his roll. However, the knife ‘slipped’ out of his hand just before he could.

Oops.

From across the table, his uncle gave him a wistful shake of the head, one Clover responded to with naught but a shrug of his shoulders, a silly smile, and a chuckle under his breath before ducking under the table to retrieve it.

Once under the table, Clover looked behind him, towards the possible source of the heat he felt on his back.

Sure enough, looking right back at him was Raven.

A bird could only be so expressive. Clover knew that to be true.

However, the look she gave Clover was one that could be nothing else other than pure encouragement.

It did the trick of melting Clover’s anxieties away like honey in a cup of tea.

She was right. He could do this.

‘Thank you,’ he silently mouthed to her just before grabbing the knife and rising back up to the table. Raven gave him a nod from her hiding spot. Clover then grabbed his knife and brought it over to the kitchen area’s sink.

“Uncle,” he said. “Can we talk?”

“It was my belief that we were already talking,” Uncle Tyrian replied, smirking.

Clover returned the smirk with one of his own.

“What was it you always told me about not being a smart ass?” he said, unable to keep the laugh out of his voice.

“I’m not a smart ass,” his uncle returned without so much as a beat passing between them. “I’m just smart.”

Clover had to admit that was actually a good joke.

The two of them shared a laugh. It had been a while since they both did at the same time, and Clover loved the feeling of them unequivocally sharing such a warm moment more than he could ever explain.

And the fact that Uncle Tyrian’s mood had nicely improved as a result of such a moment right before Clover was about to ask him his question didn’t hurt either.

As it turned out, Clover was smart, too.

“So Uncle,” he said when the laughter had at last subsided. “As I’m sure you know, tomorrow is my birthday.”

Uncle Tyrian gave him a look similar to just a bit earlier, confused, but almost sarcastically.

“No, no, no,” he said, shaking his head. “Your birthday was last year. You remember, right?”

Clover gave him a pointed look. “You know birthdays are kind of an annual thing, right?”

“Are they though?”

“Yes, uncle,” he said, half teasing and half tired.

Finally, Clover took a deep breath.

It was time.

“Uncle,” he continued. “I’m turning twenty-one tomorrow, and I wanted to ask.” Clover took a pause to sigh and collect himself.

It was really happening. He almost didn’t know how to process that, let alone ask for it.

All memories of the hours of practice he put into this moment abandoned him.

Oh well, looks like he was gonna wing it.

“What I really want for this birthday,” he said when at last ready. “Actually, what I’ve wanted for quite a few birthdays now…”

Clover could tell that the changes to his voice as a result of his reliance on improvisation pulled down his voice’s pitch and quickened its pace, now sounding like something that resembled a mumble, but he’d hoped Uncle Tyrian wouldn’t call attention to it.

He did.

“Clover, please,” Uncle Tyrian interrupted, dramatically sighing in an unamused tone. “You need to stop with the mumbling. You know how I feel about the mumbling. Everything you’re saying is just ‘Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah.’” he mocked, and in true Uncle Tyrian fashion, as soon as he was done admonishing Clover, Clover knew he was going to go right back to teasing him or praising him or something else, unintentionally deflecting from and further delaying the conversation.

But Clover wasn’t going to let that happen again.

“I want to see the floating lights!”

The words all but flew off of Clover’s lips. If Clover himself didn’t feel himself say them, he wouldn’t have believed that they were actually even said.

However, they were.

For a long moment, everything and everyone in the room basically froze.

He’d said it. There was no taking back the request.

Now, it was a matter of how his uncle would respond.

Clover studied his uncle’s face. It flashed through expressions of shock, confusion, and reluctance over the following few seconds.

He knew he was going to have to argue for his request after he at last vocalized it, so those expressions didn’t surprise him, nor did the single word that followed.

“What?”

It was now on him to elaborate on what he meant, and thankfully, he had the perfect visual representation of that.

Clover swiftly moved over to the curtains, the mask that had shielded a certain painting of his from his uncle for years.

Now though, it was time for that mask to finally be lifted.

Pulling at the curtains, Clover revealed the painting he’d made of himself watching the floating green lights.

“These,” Clover clarified. “I was hoping you could take these floating lights.”

He looked away from his painting and back to Uncle Tyrian, who was now studying it.

However, he did so only for a moment before smiling with recognition.

For the brief moment before his uncle responded, Clover let himself hope.

And then he spoke.

“Oh,” Uncle Tyrian said, nodding as his recognizing smile persisted. “You mean the stars. They are beautiful, but you won’t find a better view of them than you have in your tower.”

“N-no, uncle, please,” Clover said, raising his hand in a stopping motion. He grabbed Kingfisher, unhooking it from the pulley and shot its hook towards the upper part of his tower, where a little door had existed that acted very much like a window. The miniature door not only made for a nice skylight, but also illuminated a sky chart he’d developed.

“I’ve been studying astrology for years now,” he continued, “and whatever these lights are, they aren’t stars. They don’t stay in the sky for weeks or months at a time like stars do. They just appear on my birthday -- only my birthday. And...I just can’t help but feel like these lights and I are connected somehow.”

Clover sighed. He hoped to the Gods that he was making sense.

“Uncle, I need to see these lights, in person, and finally understand what they are.”

He’d never let his passion bleed for anything in his life like how he let it in this moment.

Upon saying those last words, Clover signaled to Uncle Tyrian that he was done speaking as well as thanking him for letting him do so uninterrupted.

Uncle Tyrian took a small pause, and then a deep breath.

“You want to go outside?” Uncle Tyrian clarified, his face and tone neutral.

“Yes.”

“You want to go against your parents’ final wishes for you?” It was said in the exact same way as the previous question.

Clover knew those words were going to come up. He knew his body would take it like ice water down his back, and tried to prepare himself for the feeling.

As it turns out, all the preparation in the world couldn’t make that notion feel any less painful than it did when it was finally out.

However, Clover had also planned out his answer to that inevitable question.

He nodded. “Yes.”

Uncle Tyrian gave him a dark look, filled to the brim with disappointment. “But,” Clover quickly added, “it would only be for a day, and you’d be with me the whole time! I bet you know good places to hide, and quick roads to take if we need to escape! You could keep me safe. So, please? Will you take me?”

Clover prayed that Uncle Tyrian could see the desperation and pure want that coursed through his entire being -- that he could tell that while Clover knew the risks of such a request, he wasn't intending on going through with this plan with naught but a childlike understanding of the world, and that he wouldn’t ask something like this if he didn’t long for it with every fibre of his heart, just like he did now.

Maybe Uncle Tyrian did see that.

He probably did, judging by the look on his face.

That didn’t make his response any easier to hear.

“Oh, Clover,” he said, getting up, approaching Clover, and taking his cheek into his hard, bony hand. “When your poor father -- my brother -- died protecting you, he begged me to watch over his most adored and fragile treasure, and I promised him I’d do everything in my power to ensure your safety for as long as I lived.”

“And, I know, uncle, but-”

“It’s a dangerous world out there, Clover.”

“You’ve told me that, but-”

“So, what else is there to say?” Uncle Tyrian gave him the floor, expectantly looking at him as he waited for a response.

Clover tried desperately to come up with an answer to that...but with every rebuke that came to his mind, he knew exactly what his uncle would say to shoot it down.

His strength? ‘Men out there have four times the strength you do, boy!’

His weapon? ‘That little fishing pole of yours won’t do anything against the weapons those outside the tower have!’

His stealth? ‘What stealth? You’re as subtle as a strike of lightning!’

“I-I just think-,” Clover started, trying once more to argue his point.

And just as some part of him knew it was going to happen, that was as far as he got.

“That’s the thing, Clover,” Uncle Tyrian interrupted, peering straight into his eyes. “You just think, but you don’t know.” With his free hand, Uncle Tyrian placed a hand to his own heart, smiling ever so slightly as he did so. “I do know, and I’m here to keep you safely cocooned from the world.”

Clover’s feelings on the way Uncle Tyrian described the tower they dwelled in was something of a mixed bag. Often, it was fine enough -- a safe place, rustic, unassuming. But when he said things like ‘cocooned,’ it just felt so confining, like a blanket tucked around his too tightly, constricting his arms and chest entirely. It made Clover want to go outside of it more than ever.

In that moment, it served to strengthen Clover’s resolve, however minorly.

“Maybe it doesn’t have to be from all of the world?” Clover suggested, optimistically, yet slowly, in much the same way that one drank a cup of piping hot tea.

Uncle Tyrian laughed.

“Clover, Clover,” he said, patting Clover’s cheek. “You’re such a naive, funny boy, and I love you for that. But the world isn’t so simple to manage -- it never has been. I know you. You’ll let just a little bit of it into your life, thinking it won’t be too much, and then a bit more, and before you know it, the chaos of the world will find its way into this safe haven your father left you, and then you’ll be kidnapped and sold off, or perhaps even worse once they realize that you can’t control your semblance!”

Clover winced, audibly despite his efforts for it not to be.

It wasn’t that he wasn’t aware of the dangers he knew going outside would present. He could never let himself forget, nor would his uncle ever let him forget either. However, being reminded of those very dangers so directly never failed to send shudders down his spine and make his skin feel like it was crawling up it.

...Not to mention, Uncle Tyrian was right about Clover semblance. If anyone knew…

And like his uncle always said, even if they didn’t know...they’d find out, and sooner, rather than later, at that.

“Clover,” Uncle Tyrian continued, “I’m a strong man, but I can only do so much once I’m outnumbered. I couldn’t bear the thought of anything ever happening to you -- not on my watch. And I know you wouldn’t wish to put me in danger, either.”

“O-of course not, uncle,” Clover quickly assured. “I’d never want you to get hurt, especially for me.”

“Nor would I ever want you to be hurt. But don’t worry, Clover. You’re exactly where you belong -- away from danger -- nice, safe, and happy in this tower, and that’s exactly how you’ll stay. Be glad for that, my boy. Not everyone is so lucky.” Uncle Tyrian pinched Clover’s cheek. Clover knew it was meant to be in a joking way, something to lighten the mood between them, but it was just a bit too tight a pinch to do that for his taste. Even still though, Clover forced a chuckle.

“Y-yes, uncle.”

Uncle Tyrian looked at the clock, making a ‘tsk’ noise with his lips and teeth. “Is it eight-forty five already?” he half-groaned.

Clover looked at the clock. Indeed, it was.

That meant it was time for him to leave for work.

“Where does the time even go?”

Unfortunately, Clover had a pretty good idea, and if this conversation solidified anything, it was that that would remain the case for a long time to come.

“No idea, uncle. Let me get the pulley ready for you.” Clover turned away from his uncle as he started to make his way towards the window, trying all the while to desperately eat his frown before his uncle saw it. He succeeded in at least cloaking it behind a neutral expression.

Of course, Clover knew there ran the risk of this plan failing...but experiencing that reality was nowhere near as bad as imagining it had ever been.

He should’ve known it was stupid to try...

“Before you do,” Uncle Tyrian said, his words stopping Clover in his tracks and having him turn back to face him. “I have some good news for you, Clover.”

“Oh?” Clover asked, trying with all his might to simultaneously will his semblance to do something for him and to will his hopes away.

His semblance, as per usual, did nothing of the sort.

“My work is on the lighter side today, so I can come home early. I’ll bring some food, and we’ll have a delicious lunch together. How does that sound?”

On any other day, that would’ve been just about the best news Clover could ever hope to receive.

However, today, in comparison to his wish to see the lights and the clear rejection of that wish by his uncle, it just came off as a consolation prize more than anything.

But how ungrateful was that of him to feel, after all his uncle had done for him?

It wasn’t like Uncle Tyrian was saying no to his request to be mean -- he was just trying to keep Clover safe. And now, here he was, using the little time he had off of work not to treat himself to some alone time, but to instead do nothing more than spend a few extra hours with him.

No, Clover thought to himself, he couldn’t be that cruel, not to a man like that.

He could always just work harder to show his uncle how strong and independent he could be and try again next year.

Quickly, Clover shook all morose feelings away and forced a smile.

“That’s great, uncle,” he said. “I’m really looking forward to it.”

Tyrian placed a hand on Clover’s head.

“I love you,” he said.

Clover felt his smile soften, because it was now completely and utterly genuine.

“I love you too, Uncle Tyrian.” With that, Clover turned around and readied the pulley for his uncle’s trip down.

The good news about the pulley’s reverse trip was that it was a lot less straining on his body and took noticeably less time, too. Within six minutes, Uncle Tyrian was safely on the ground, waving goodbye to Clover as he made his way through the vine-y entrance that shielded the tower from the world, promising Clover before he went too far off to be heard that he’d be back soon. Much like every morning, Clover waved back and watched as he disappeared into the vines.

When he was at last gone, Clover turned, and sat down against the window’s wall.

Right next to him when he landed, Raven stood, placing her uninjured wing on his knee in an act of compassion.

It was an appreciated sentiment, a comforting one...but it also served to remind Clover that he failed in his mission today.

He wouldn’t be seeing the floating lights this year.

In fact, if today’s conversation was anything to go by, he might not see them ever.

At least he still had the view from his window...but that was no longer the comfort that it had been in the years prior.

He’d asked...he’d argued as passionately as he’d ever dared...and had come away with nothing to show for it...

Clover knew a lot about his body.

If only he knew for the life of him how to will the fresh tears he was now shedding away.

#fair game #clover ebi #tyrian callows #rwby #tangled au #lucky charms

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okimargarvez · 5 years ago

Text

ONE IN PARTICULAR

Original title: Uno in particolare.

Prompt: Luke and Ashley Seaver start to dating.

Warning: crossover with CSI: NY and CSI: Las Vegas.

Genre: romantic, tragicomic.

Characters: Luke Alvez, Penelope Garcia, BAU team, Aaron Hotchner, Ashley Seaver, Sara Sidle, Don Flack, Roxy, Lou.

Pairing: Garvez, Luke x Ashley, Penelope x Don, Prendoza.

Note: oneshot 55 in Garvez collection.

Legend: 💏😘🔦🐶🎲🎈.

Song mentioned: 13 anni, Tiziano Ferro.

GARVEZ STORIES

ONE IN PARTICULAR

It was exhausting. This is all that the brain of the special supervisor agent Luke Alvez can think of. Meanwhile he looks at this, tough girl. Yeah, man, like she was twenty years younger than you. You're ridiculous, Alvez. Let your mind rest. Try applying one of those techniques Spencer told you about. -Hey, who's want to take something at O'Keefe?- he's already about to decline the offer of the oldest, when he hears that voice.

-I'm in!- here, perfect. He looks towards the open and contagious smile of his colleague and sighs. Goodbye, bed, we will probably meet again in another life. He feels a hand resting on his shoulder.

-Luke, don't you come?- although he isn't so distracted, he seems so for the other man.

-Yes, yes, I just have to... check that the dog sitter has fed Roxy.- he mumbles, congratulating himself on his quick reflexes. And wishing to pat himself on the head. Strong enough. Judging by the way he's staring at him, Matt thinks the same way. Then, here comes that mischievous smile that so irritates him, ever since Simmons realized that there was a girl who was buzzing in his head.

The sound of high heels in the distance. But Luke doesn't notice. -You know, I didn't think you liked blondes...- here, he starts to provoke him.

-Why shouldn't I like them?- he replies in the same joking tone, hoping to seem less suspicious. The other nods, but it is clear that he is not entirely convinced. Shit. This's what happens when your friends are profilers.

-Especially one in particular, right?- and he winks at him. For a moment Luke fears he was exposed, but is saved by a slight cough. And in that moment, he realizes the presence of a third person. Thanks to her unmistakable scent, which penetrates his nostrils and remains in his head until he can sleep.

-See you later, guys?- Penelope asks, looking only at Simmons, who gives her a friendly caress on her back.

-Go ahead. I'll join you in a moment.- he hopes to get rid of them so easily and for once, he's lucky.

She would only ask for a moment of peace. She would have asked only to listen again to a wisp of his voice, which says: I go away slowly, slowly, slowly, slowly... Take my hand. I'm leaving and I'm not taking you with me. From now on, think only of yourself.

Why is she there too? While he reflects, he feels that slight tingling that he felt even during the first days with Lisa. That pleasant sensation of novelty, future and discovery. No anxiety, no expectations.

-Let's drink to the couple of the day, and above all about the man who performed the miracle of the century: melting the heart of the most fascinating boss that BAU has ever had. No offense, Hotch.- the serious and severe looking man smiles, hugging a dark haired woman to himself and raising his goblet upwards.

-No offense.- he repeats, then, between a burst of laughter. Emily, in a flaming red dress that makes her looks as a stunning, blushes, becoming the same color. If it weren't for the man who shakes her hand, she probably would have already run away. And what would you do in her place? Luke dismisses the thought as if it were a gnat visible only to him.

-To Emily and Andrew.- the eldest announces and they all do the same. Not long after the first couples began to form: the newlyweds, Krystall and Rossi, are the first that start to dance, followed by the others. The singles are the last, including him. Out of the corner of his eye he sees a rather cheerful Tara grabbing a reluctant Reid and forcing him to dance. His hands sweat, but his feet have already begun to walk in the direction of the blonde. How can he forget what he has felt dancing with her at Dave's wedding? By now the ice had broken, it wouldn't have seemed so strange. But a voice stops him.

-Hey.- he turns and here is a very pretty blonde who smiles at him. -Luke, right?- he nods, feeling Garcia's laughter behind him, but forcing himself to pay attention to the woman in front of him. -Even you alone?- he nods. -Would you like to dance?- that tingling again.

-Yes, I'd like.- he has to get used to it, now it's the women who take the initia-tive. Hadn't it been Prentiss pushed Mendoza to get invited out to dinner? Ashley smiles at him again and he can't help but imitate her. At every twirl he realizes he is thinking less and less about the other blonde. She whispers jokes in his ear and it's surprising, because everything she seems, other than a witty person. He knew her past; he knew who her father was and how she liked to spend her holidays: accumulating score in military exercises. Then the music changes and Luke immediately realizes that it’s the time for the slow dance. He hesitates, thinking that maybe there is someone with whom she would like to share more this dance, but she holds him tightly, strong and rests her head on his shoulder. He can feel the woman's heart beating fast and even his own. Was I getting caught up in the atmosphere? Is it just this? He doesn't even notice that the romantic song is already over, until she separates and looks him intently in the eyes. He finds himself looks at her and before he can formulate any hypothesis, he feels Ashley's soft and fresh lips on his and his eyes are closed. When he opens them again, the first thing he sees is again her sweet and cheeky smile; the second is Matt's wink and the third another blonde woman, running towards the inside, probably heading for the bathroom. He can only grasp her expression for a moment, but enough to throw him back into the abyss of his obsession. And to ditch the girl he has just kissed to follow another with a pathetic excuse, that he can't even repeat.

He doesn’t need to hear sobs to deduce what he already knows. It's just that I can't stand to see her sad, nothing else, there's nothing else behind it. He knocks, not too strong and immediately the sobs stop. -Penelope?- he calls her, naturally, automatically choosing to use the name instead of the surname. Steps, then a faucet that is opened. He imagines her rinsing her face trying to erase the traces of crying. As if she were ashamed for being too sensitive. -Penelope, are you in there?- even if he already knows the answer he is forced to carry on the pantomime.

A moment of hesitation. -Yes.- a sigh. She can't adjust her tone of voice; she has never been good at pretending. -But don't enter, please.- once again that pleading tone, which produces the exact opposite effect of what she hoped for. Or maybe, actually, that's what she wants too, but without letting it too obvious. He leans on the door.

-Why? Are you ill?- no response this time. Only silence. -I can't leave you alone, you know.- he's prepared for a long confrontation, so he almost ends up sit on the floor, when she opens it, to let him in or to get out. Despite the funny aspect of the situation, there is not even the shadow of a smile on her face.

-Hey.- he leaves her decide whether to get close or stay where she is. -You cried?- direct approach, certainly not the smartest choice, but all the strategies go to hell, when he is alone with her. He sees her withdraw and cover her face with her hands. Well done, Alvez. -No, you don't need to hide from me, you don't need it.- it is perhaps his delicate tone, calm with some sweet nuances to make her come out of the shell. -We are friends, now, or am I wrong?- he smiles, as he puts his hand on her shoulder.

Penelope stares at it for a few seconds. -No, you're not wrong.- she replies then, raising her eyes to finish in Luke's. That smiles at her more openly. Carefully he starts to move his hand. They go out into the corridor and sit on one of the sofas, quite distant.

-And then you have no reason to be ashamed.- he continues, in a reasonable tone. -What happened?- he asks her, after waiting in vain for a reply. -Why did you run away like this?- she gasps, realizing that she was caught in the act and that how much she can deny, this won't help her to get rid of him.

She then opts to make him feel pity. -I ... I don't want to talk about it, please.- she stares him straight in the eye with her best dramatic expression, not that she has to try very hard. It comes naturally to her. -Don't force me.- the goal is to make him feel like a worm in case he decides to insist. And it seems to work enough.

-I don't want to make you feel worse, so I won't force you.- Luke says, sighing, shaking his head and looking away. -But I can't just doing nothing either.- he adds, blocking the woman's sigh of relief in the bud. For a few seconds they challenge themselves to the game of looks. She wins.

-Go back to the others, Luke.- Penelope folds her arms and walks away, unconsciously or not, even more from him, until she reaches the other side of the sofa. -I can handle it alone.- it's hard not to laugh at that childish pout, which is also so sexy...

He shakes his head. -No. I don't want to leave you here.- with a leap he finds himself at a few centimeters from the female body. -We'll come back from the others together.- he extends his hand, but she pushes him back a little too sharply. If Luke's upset, he doesn't show it.

-Really, there's no need for it.- she talks overlapping words, like when she's agitated. By now he has learned to read most of her nuances. They've known each other for over three years. It’s almost impressive. -Why do you insist so much?- it sounds like a criticism, but he sees us behind more. She is testing me, does she want me to say what I believe? Or am I seeing just what I want to see? For a moment he lives in the illusion of finding the answer in Penelope's dark eyes. But there is a barrier between them, and it's not about the lenses of her glasses.

This time, he doesn't let go the occasion. -Because I care about you, I love you.- she jumps at his words, not even he has gave her shock. She is genuinely surprise. Was it possible that she had not yet understood it? After all the experiences they had lived together as a team.

However, she is able to recover. -Oh. I love you too.- it would be so nice to be able to extrapolate that phrase and imagine a completely different context and a different meaning. She smiles at him and, Dios, all thoughts are confused in his mind, all memories and intentions. Only the present exists. And I was under the illusion that I was out of it. Yes, out of mind. -But I can't go out like this.- he returns to the real world in time to see her pointing with disapproval. -I look like a panda.- it's one of her jokes and at another time he would laugh at it. But he must not lend a push to her insecurity.

-What you say!- he comments instead, taking her hand and making her stand up. -You just need to rinse your face a little.- and again, they are on the bathroom doorway.

-But then all the makeup will go away and I don't have a way to...- she starts to protest, but he silences her by shaking his head.

-Then? Do you want to know a secret?- only her eyes wide open as an answer. -You are much prettier natural.- and he even winks at her, like one of their first times in the elevator. Where he found the courage, he doesn't know either.

Penelope blushes. -If you say so...- she takes a step towards the sink, then stops, continuing to give him her back. -But they will understand that I cried. I don't want to ruin Emily's party.- she doesn't need to open her eyes and look in the mirror to understand that he came in, breaking the taboo of the women's bathroom and placing both hands on her shoulders.

-Come here, otherwise you will start again.- he whispers, bending down to reach her ear. -Come here.- not even finished the sentence that he makes her turn on the opposite side and against his chest. Penelope doesn’t rebel, says nothing, but he notices a significant difference from their first hug, during another engagement party. She is not rigid, she doesn't try to maintain the distances in some way. On the contrary, she totally abandons herself to his hold, even if she doesn’t start crying again. -Sometimes nothing helps more than a hug, don't you think?- he still whispers, feeling her distinctly vibrate, this time he is certain, he hasn’t dreamed it, it was not his imagination that making him believe it.

-Yes.- she says only, diving completely into his arms; anyone would be clearly understand how she would never let him away. But the voice of conscience is stronger than any selfish desire. She backs to being a rigid and cold body. Luke understands and lets her go. -Don't you think Ashley is wondering where you ended up?- then she saw them dance together. And did she also notice...?

-Even the others will have asked themselves the same about you.- he replies, in order not to give way to the other thought to come out.

And finally, here is her smile. -Thank you, Luke.- she touches his arm and with all his cursed profiler experience, the man can't remember if the gesture has a friendly, mischievous, playful, affectionate meaning, or if it is a clear manifestation of that kind of interest.

-For what? I didn't do anything special.- she shakes her head and forces him to promise not to say anything to others. And he certainly can't deny her anything.

As soon as the friend arrives, she drags her to the most isolated corner of the room. Sara says nothing, her chuckle is more than eloquent. Penelope pretends not to have noticed. -I'm also happy to see you.- the brunette woman comments as soon as she finds herself sitting down.

-Did you see them?- the other asks, bouncing on her chair.

-Who?- the blonde scrutinizes her to see if she's making fun of her. -Oh, you mean...- she silences her with a dirty look. -Well, they're not doing anything. They are just sitting close together.- the friend shakes her head, disconsolate.

-It's a disaster.- she comments. -There is no solution. I'm going crazy.- she takes her head in her hands. Sara gives her time to calm down.

-Why don't you tell him the truth?- she asks her then for the umpteenth time.

-What truth?- she replies with another question. The brunette can’t understand if she is really so naive as not to know that whoever answers one question with another one has something to hide.

-That you are in love with him?- she replies.

-I don't...- Penelope understands alone that it's not worth the effort. -Ok, it's true. I can’t explain otherwise what I felt when he hugged me. It was so sweet... you should have seen it.- Sara rolls her eyes. They are no longer of age for certain speeches. -Why does he have to be so great? I hate him!- she punches the table.

-You look like a little girl at her first crush. Damn it, Pen, pull out the ovaries.- she pretends to be scandalized, but she doesn't hold up.

-No! I could never tell him... and then not now that he's happy with Ashley.- here we go again. If this continues, Sara will tell all to Luke. What does it matter that no one has ever introduced them at each other and that he has no idea who she is?

She forces herself to be patient. She thinks back to every night that the blonde woke up to hear her talking about her situation with Grissom. -You were in this phase of denial even when he was with Lisa.- she points out diplomatically.

-Yes, but... I could be happy for them. I'm not saying that I didn't feel bad anyway... I'd be lying in that case. But...- she still looks in the direction of her colleagues' table. Ashley is laughing and her eyes are shining. Even Luke's are no less so. She sighs. -Why can't I do it now?- Sara takes her hand and their fingers intertwine.

-There are only two possibilities: either you no longer have the strength to resist, or you see something different in Ashley.- that's what happens when your friends are all part of the police force. Maybe she should start dating other companies. She has went straight to the point and has hit the target. -Do you think he seems happier with her than with Lisa?- the answer is so easy that she can't even hold it.

-Yes, he is very happy, they are so cute. They're perfect for each other.- sigh. -He is a former soldier, you know, he has that way of doing and thinking a little stiff... and that also makes him more intriguing, but that's another story. And she... she is like that too. She is athletic, sporty. It's perfect for him. Nor is she stupid or light. She has her weight on her shoulders.- another sigh. Sara stands up and joins her from the other side to hug her.

-Do you know why I love you so much? Because despite the deep love you feel, you still put the happiness of others in front of yours.- the friend enjoys the close, but detaches fear that someone could understand that something is at stake.

-What's wrong with that?- the brunette rolls her eyes.

-Leave it. Rather, let's change the subject.- the blonde shakes her head.

-Oh, no. I already know what you're going to say. You want that I go out with one of your crazy friends.- she says.

-Indeed. But before you say no, look at this.- Sara shows her a pic on her phone.

-Mmm. Maybe I could make an effort. But you have to tell him: without obligation. Ok?- she asks.

-Sure.-

***

-Come on, honestly. Tell me. Why are you single?- they are walking along a park near Garcia's apartment. The evening was very pleasant, neither of them felt particularly embarrassed, but that question has been on her mind since she saw his photograph. The subtext is obvious: you're too attractive to be single yet, so where's the catch?

-I could ask you the same question.- Don replies, chuckling and finally laughing at taste when Penelope rolls her eyes. She feels a pleasant tingling in the lower abdomen. -I had an important story, but...- he hesitates and she senses that something really bad must have happened, not a simple rupture.

She barely touches his arm. -You are not forced to tell me about it.- they look each other for a second in the eyes. He nods, sighs, then beckons her to sit on a bench.

-She was killed. I risked to make the same end too. It was hard to accept.- Penelope looks at him sympathetically. -I preferred to throw myself at work and think about it as little as possible.- she looks at her shoes, thinking about how to get out of this sad atmosphere, but it is he who saves her. -And now it's your turn. How does the BAU oracle still be on the market?- Penelope opens her eyes and mouth, really surprised to hear him use that nickname that she herself hadn't used for a long time.

-Well... too little free time certainly doesn't help. I had a boyfriend... three years ago.- she chuckles alone. -But he couldn't understand mine, our work, in short. He was unable to help me psychologically, I mean...- she sighs, for the effort to explain herself without being misunderstood and pass for a madwoman. -I shot a man in the hospital who was about to hurt my injured colleague. He is not dead. But I still felt guilty. They sentenced him to death and I tried to prevent it. He wanted me to witness his execution.- she feels the tears sting her eyes.

-Hey, don't worry, you don't have to hold back with me.- Penelope nods and without understanding the sequence of facts she finds herself with her head resting on his shoulder. And his arm around her hips.

-Would you like to come and meet the team one of these evenings?-

****

Tonight, Ashley couldn’t accompany him and this is enough to throw again him in the memories of his story with Lisa. In fact, if it was over it was because of the incompatibility of their work; it's true, Morgan and Savannah had managed to make it work, or almost, since Derek was no longer a federal. But Ashley is not the only blonde that is missing. Even Penelope. Just when he is about to ask others discreetly if they know why, here she comes in, arm in arm with a man who he must have already seen somewhere else.

-Hey guys! Sorry for the delay.- she smiles, one of her dazzling smiles and Luke feels an invisible punch hit him in the chest and take his breath away. -I want to present you the New York investigator Donald Flack.- the girls are so interested, but the man continues to look only at Penelope and this doesn’t pass unnoticed by anyone. As well as the way Don looks at her: obvious, declared interest.

-What a presentation!- he exclaims, in a pleased tone. -You can simply call me Don.- meanwhile the wheels of the Latin brain have continued to turn until they reach the solution. A decade earlier, during a case in his neighborhood. The Bronx strangler. He had liked him at that time. But there was nothing in the middle... What the hell am I thinking? Does she have not the right to go out with whomever she wants, like me? I'm not jealous. I can't be jealous. Staying on the sidelines is the only way to avoid making fool of himself.

*****

She hears the door open, but doesn’t have the strength for one of her witty sentences. -Garcia, I need...- she immediately recognizes him, but instead of hiding, she continues to work on the computer. Limiting herself to hoping for a sudden blindness. -What's the matter?- but she's not lucky. She feels his gaze on her back, the shadow widening as he approaches.

-Nothing.- she replies anyway, pretending to ignore him.

-Penelope...- the tone of the man sounds like a warning. -You will force me to repeat the speech of the other night?- he places a hand on the backside of her chair to make her turn slowly in his own direction. Penelope instantly crosses her legs, proving to be involuntarily provocative.

-No.- she exclaims then, even looking terrified. A shadow passes before her eyes. -Maybe...- but only for a moment. -Nothing.- she hasn’t tried with much effort and the results are visible. Luke gently takes her by both hands and forces her to rise.

-Maybe you would need this?- he asks her before hugging her. But she struggles, not too forcefully.

-No, no, it's better than no.- to the point that he leaves her free. -Really.- he watches her caressing her arms alone. An attitude that he has seen too many times in a woman. And he knows perfectly the meaning of this gesture. Even if it doesn't seem possible.

-Did something happen with Don?- he is forced to ask. As bad it could be, he must know the truth. -Did he hurt you?- is his low and guttural tone of voice that most frightens Penelope. She can't know, but it's the same as when he asked what happened to Battle and the interrogations with Shaw after seeing her in tears. -Because if was that, I...- Penelope stops him, putting her hand on his arm for a second.

-No, he's a sweetie, he's fantastic, really.- Luke doesn't seem to be a hundred percent convinced. -It has nothing to do with him. My problem is… me.- she finally admitted and now she feels free, light. She breathes a sigh and the same air seems to have a different taste.

-You could never be a problem, Penelope.- the man replies in a gentle tone. But in reality, the thoughts that buzz around his head are quite different. It's a sweetie, it's fantastic. Damn it. So why are you so sad? Why isn't he here to console you? Think about it, he works a lot of miles from here. Yes, but I would have moved for her. What I said? He must definitely stop conducting conversations with himself. The thing is starting to get out of hand.

-Thanks, Luke, you are very sweet.- Penelope rewards him, giving him a small smile. -But there's nothing you can do to help me. I'm sorry.- he shakes his head, annoyed. And for once he says exactly what he thinks.

-I don't believe it, I can't accept it.- she replies nothing, just looks at him. -You're my friend, I love you, it's not possible.- he says again. I love you that it would be so easy to exchange for something else. But no, now he has Ashley. It means nothing.

-Maybe I can accept that hug.- she throws it there, then, hoping to get away with it this way. -But then you tell me what you needed and go back to work like a good guy.- she intimates with a voice that makes her look like the Garcia he fell in love with. Shit. Well, you admitted it now. What are you doing standing there? Hug. At least this is not an ambiguous gesture. Here, so, spread your arms.

-I am forced to accept the compromise.- he sighs. Good, stay above her hips, you don't have to cross certain borders. Try to forget that the prosperous breasts you've been spying on a thousand times are now pressed against your chest. A little sob. But she doesn't seem to have noticed anything. Hey, little Luke, you don't help me like that. What is my fault if you have a sick mind? Try to think of something that is totally anti-sex. But he can't do it, because the scent of Penelope's hair makes his head spin completely. For this he comes off and keeps himself a little too away to forward his request.

******

He is distracted just a second and then an orange spot darted past him and stopped only in front of a gate. -Roxy!- she's waiting for him sitting on the bench with a very intriguing crooked smile. She looks at her watch and shakes her head, her blond hair gathered in a neat braid.

-We gave you two minutes, Alvez.- she caresses the dog, she makes some tickle behind her ears. He lets himself go beside her. -Hey Luke.- he looks at her inquisitive look. She puts her hand on his knee, giving him a slight shiver down his spine. -Are you okay?- he meditates for a moment whether a harmless lie or the raw truth is more convenient. -You're pensive.- he nods and takes her hand, intertwining their fingers. He needs contact and human warmth. He needs to stop thinking.

-Yes, you are right. It's that... I don't know.- he sighs and shakes his head.

-You're confused.- Ashley begins to explain in his place. -You're in love, but not with me.- Luke doesn't deny it and that's enough. -Are you afraid of hurting me and hurting yourself, am I right?- even if he doesn't want to, he finds himself smiling like he was caught. -I can't speak for other people, but as far as I'm concerned... we can continue to see each other and take a little jog every now and then, without necessarily being together. Don't get me wrong, it was nice, well... you kiss well and you're pretty cute. But I noticed it almost immediately that you were almost always with your head elsewhere.- he is about to apologize but she doesn't leave him. -Luke, I really mean, I'm not madly in love with you, not yet, at least.- the subtext is clear. -So, I just ask you to be honest. Do you already have another person in your heart or I’m doing too many paranoia?- he sighs, feeling like a profiteer, because he has done nothing to deal with this situation.

-Yes, you're right.- he admits, forcing himself to look into her eyes as he says it. -It was nice for me too. And I'd like to meet you again and challenge you to run.- she smiles at him giving him an affectionate little push.

-We are better suited to be friends than something more. Think about it: we are too similar. There is complicity, but it lacks... you know, the... the passion.- he nods. -And with the other? I guess it's a woman. With her you have that shock, you feel that shiver in the air?- he hesitates a moment, but not out of uncertainty. -I told you, you don't have to worry about me. Indeed, don't you want to take advantage of another girl's opinion?-

*******

Being alone again, or almost, is not that bad. Roxy gives him a tug. Sorry, girl, I meant a human company. He has now resigned himself to continuing to speak alone. At least he does it only in his head, so nobody can see it. The dog continues to pull, which is quite unusual for her. It is trained to do so only when there is a goal to be achieved. And indeed, even if he has not yet realized, it is so.

-Roxy, slow down, you'll make me fall! Have pity for a lonely man.- but she ignores him and his delirium is interrupted when he sees the reason for so much anxiety: another Belgian shepherd, thin, slender, recently no longer a puppy, whom he knows very well. As well as the woman who takes him on a leash. Blonde and decidedly exhausted by attempts to keep up with Lou. -Penelope!- Roxy meanwhile, as a good older sister, is sniffing the younger one, checking his health. Penelope wears casual clothes and sneakers that make her almost another person.

-Hey!- she greets him, then looks around, so that he suspects she is not alone. For a good minute he lives in terror of seeing the handsome New York detective appear.

-I'm glad to have met you, because I was just thinking of calling you.- it's not about courage, but about inevitability. Ashley threatened him after making him spill the beans. Better that she comes to know it from him and not from others. In any case it will be embarrassing, but in this way, a little less.

-Oh yes? Do you need help with some electronic devices?- she, naive, hasn’t guessed anything. She tries to settle a rebellious strand, but between Lou's shots and the bag that unbalances her, it doesn’t seem a viable undertaking.

-No, nothing like that.- Luke walks over and does it in her place. For a moment they look at each other without practically breathing. Then he breaks the bubble. -So... how's it going with Don?- Penelope sighs and searches for the dog's head to give herself support.

-It’s not going.- she replies, not knowing that she has illuminated all the spies in her colleague's brain. -I stopped seeing him because... I wouldn't want to talk about it, but I'm afraid you'll insist.- he just stares at her. -It's the usual boring and banal thing you see happening in the movies.- she bends down to caress both dogs. No necklines to take advantage of, this time. So, it's easier to focus only on her words. -He was perfect, really, sweet, caring, interesting and interested in me...- again a praise that he doesn’t particularly like to listen -also from the physical point of view...- here, considering that there is worse? -The problem is that unfortunately when I met him... I was already in love with someone else.- What was that Ashley told you about? You felt that vibration now. No, directly an earth-quake. But look, she could even talk about someone else, it doesn't have to be you. Maybe that bar-tender who is always nice... But if he's gay! He forces both voices to keep quiet because she is looking at him strangely. -I tried to go out with him to see if I would have been able to not think at least for a while...- she was going to say the name, but unfortunately for him she stopped on the edge of the ravine -but it didn't work and since he's a good person , I preferred to clarify the situation.- she lifts up and starts walking again. He follows her.

-Oh... I...- Penelope shakes her head.

-No need for you to say it, I know.- unexpectedly she takes his hand and squeezes it. -Thank you for your time.- he opens his eyes wide, but the contact doesn’t last long. - Although I doubt they are things you can understand... because you found the right one.- he freezes, forcing her to do the same and so do the dogs.

-Who, Ashley? I'm sorry to give you a disappointment...- he gets messed up, even blushing. She chuckles. -We broken up, well, it's not like we've ever really been a couple, anyway... I was... too- wrong verb tense -I'm in love with another woman.- it's her turn to be surprised.

-Let me guess: it's blonde.- but she passes the ball again to him. Luke fails to mask the confusion. He thinks she finally understood.

-How did you..?- she doesn't seem very happy though. She lowers again, letting his dog kiss her.

-I heard you say a month ago to Matt that you liked a blonde colleague.- she says, in a low tone, without looking at him even by mistake. -I thought you were referring to Ashley, then you two started dating...- Luke understands how she should close the subject before he gets even more messed up.

-No, I wasn't referring to her.- he takes her from under her shoulders and pulls her up, a gesture that both consider too intimate, strange. The two dogs also stop chasing each other and twist the leads around them.

-But then... who can it be?- he admires her as she tries hard to reach the solution of the enigma. Her furrowed brow, her concentrated expression, her lips slightly bent. God, her mouth. Don't stare at it or it will be the end. -JJ no, because she is married.- luckily she brings out a theory so absurd as to force him to answer her. -It's not JJ, is it?- how can she think he might be in love with a married woman and that has two children?

-Of course not!- he sounds a little too indignant.

-Then, I don't understand.- and her naivety and confusion instead of making him angry, makes her even more attractive in his eyes. Literally irresistible.

-Pen, you're practically omniscient, you can find information in a few seconds, but sometimes you don't get to the solution that you have exactly in front of your nose.- he gradually lowers the tone. He takes Lou's leash from her hand. He doesn't need another one to do what he has in mind.

-You mean...?- she widens her eyes, her pupils dilated. He also frees her right hand from the bag, which he places at their feet. And he puts his hand behind her neck. This was not the original plan, but he will not stop.

-I’m sure that usually you follow the rule of third date, but for me you can do an exception…- Penelope has only time to remember that she and Don have argued a similar argument, then Luke does exactly what he seemed he has decided to do. He kisses her, with passion, love, not able to stop or hold himself. When their lips are in touch, it seems that the whole Sun system has found its right alignment. She doesn’t stay inactive, she kisses him back, despite the sensation of unreality. And then, they can’t leave each other. She leans her head in the crease of his shoulder. Other pieces find their places. No only one voices in Luke head seem to have something to say.

-So it is true that you like blondes?- she asks with her natural tone, full of life, joyful, enthusiastic for any minutia. -You didn't look like the type.- Luke chuckles. -Maybe it was the only thing that made Ashley seem not like the perfect girl for you.- she adds. Luke opens his mouth and changes his mind at the last second.

-Yes, I like blondes, or rather...- dramatic pause. With his free hand from the leash, he lifts her chin up to bring their lips close a few millimeters -one in particular.- Penelope moves her mouth in funny expressions.

-Mmm.- but with eyes she laughs.

-And you?- he provokes her without putting an end to the sweet torture. -Based on your track record, I would say that you prefer dark hair...- she bites her tongue. But then she answers in the same tone.

-Yes, but one in particular.- she whispers, before ending the distance.

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

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recentanimenews · 4 years ago

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Don’t Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro – 02 – Vampire’s Kissu

This second outing’s segments add a more nuance, context, and even turnabout to what was largely a one-sided, antagonistic first episode. For one thing, Nagatoro doesn’t make her senpai cry once! In the stinger, she upsets his zen-like art room calm by hula-hooping in, a veritable Tazmanian devil of energy.

Nagatoro playfully invites him to find the right moment to jump into the hoop with her, but when he actually tries to do so, ends up accidentally catching a glimpse of her underwear. It showed that she’s not always certain or prepared for how her senpai will respond to her teasing…which is clearly part of the fun for her.

When Naoto buys the newest issue of Big Boob Vampires, Nagatoro catches him making a lewd face. I’m not sure what Naoto was thinking even bringing such a book to school, let alone whipping it out in a room Nagatoro frequents, but after a physical stalemate she embarrasses him with dirty talk and snatches it away.

But here’s the twist: while BBV definitely has some pervy bits, it turns out she genuinely loves vampire stuff, and agrees with him that it’s pretty well written! This builds on her harsh but constructive criticism of senpai’s own manga, but also confirms the two have a shared interest.

When the electricity of the school goes out all too conveniently, a tomato juice-sipping Nagatoro starts to ponder what it would be like to be a vampire, showing Naoto her larger-than-average canines and insisting he let her bite his neck. When she mounts him, he says others might get the wrong idea about “things and stuff”, but it’s his post-yakisoba garlic breath that gets her off him.

Within seconds, she pounces on him again, but awkwardly, and her hand lands right on his crotch. For once, Nagatoro is precisely as flustered as Naoto, as she definitely didn’t mean to put her hand there. But she makes lemonade with crotch-grabbing lemons by congratulating Senpai: he got “accidentally lucky”, just like the MC of BBV!

On their walk home (during another lovely sunset) Nagatoro slowly lurks and stews behind Naoto, asks if it was the first time he was “touched”…as it was most likely the first time she touched. She gets in position to grab him again, only to go for his ribs before bidding him goodbye.

As he tries to read the vampire manga at home, his real-life interactions with Nagatoro that day intrude upon his thoughts. She may not have actually bitten his neck or drank his blood, but she’s gotten under his skin for sure…as if he were in thrall to a vampire.

The next day, Nagatoro interrupts his drawing session to play a game to determine if they can guess the precise location of one another’s nipples. There’s a funny cutaway to her in traditional archer’s garb hitting two bullseyes, followed by swirling her fingers around his nipples.

She doesn’t expect Naoto to even try to do the same to her, but he does agree to try, and the closer he gets to her, the more nervous she gets, until she gets a text alert and runs out of there. Naoto can’t see her face as she leaves, but she’s clearly flustered again; her tomfoolery getting her in over her head once more.

The final segment represents the first time since Nagatoro and her three friends were introduced that Naoto was observing her without her being aware, meaning he gets to see a different side of her. This time, she arrives at the same family restaurant he’s working on his manga, joined by one of her girlfriends and two guys. It’s clear her friend is trying to set her up with one or both of them.

Naoto stays hidden, and watches with relish, expecting Nagatoro to tear both guys a new one. But to his shock, she doesn’t tease either of them; rather, she firmly puts each of them in their place: the first guy for being a pretentious musician, and the second guy for bringing up groping a girl’s boobs when they’ve just met.

Nagatoro’s friend is disappointed she scared them off, but as Nagatoro says, “it’s just that those guys are boring.” Meaning she saw no point in messing with them. You could say that just as Naoto is in her thrall, when it comes to having fun with a boy, no one but her thrall will do.

As he walks home, bathed in gorgeous purple and pink light, Nagatoro ponders what looks to be a very distinct possibility Nagatoro toys with no one but him. Right on cue, Nagatoro appears and slaps him on the back, asking what’s up. Thankfully, she never noticed he was at the family restaurant. I wouldn’t have particularly liked that, since there would’ve been no way to tell if she’d adjusted her behavior knowing he was watching.

Instead, Naoto got the real unvarnished Nagatoro. She begins by teasing him for his unique and “creepy” silhouette, then goes on calling him “squiggly”. It seems like he’s about to ask her why she only toys with him, but decides not to, and she just calls him gross over and over as he denies it and tells her to stop.

I thought this was an improvement on the first episode, as some of Nagatoro’s pranks backfire, while she inadvertently demonstrated that the only guy she seems to pay any attention to is him. It may rarely be the kind of attention he wants, but there’s no doubt that their time together is never dull.

By: sesameacrylic

#Anime #News #RABUJOI – An Anime Blog

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aqua-harry · 7 years ago

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She’s Just Not That Into You » Part I (A Harry Styles Miniseries)

Harry wasn’t used to being able to do whatever he wanted.

There was only so much he could do - sometimes he stuck to meandering around his house for a couple of hours in silence, forcing himself to feel the vast quietness he used to crave. He hadn’t yet grasped the idea of having so much time to fill. He couldn’t come to terms with boredom, but he didn’t want to seem like a bother to his friends who also weren’t used to him having so much free time.

But, there was always one friend who was willing to entertain him at the drop of a hat. Nick had been his right-hand man for years now, and Harry could count on him to come through whenever he was going a bit stir-crazy. So when Harry called up Nick to see what he was doing, he was a bit surprised to find his long-time friend in the middle of a relaxed dinner party - a “Thai night” as he called it - and felt a bit weird accepting Nick’s impromptu invitation.

Nevertheless, he did accept, having nothing to do for the rest of the evening after reorganizing his extensive DVD collection for the third time since the band had gone on hiatus. He traded his sweatpants for skinny jeans and tossed on an old white t-shirt, deciding that his usual hoodie was too informal, even for a casual get-together.

When he arrives at Nick’s house, he’s glad he changed, mentally patting himself on the back when he sees you sitting at the far end of the table, a wine glass in your hand and a relaxed smirk established across your mouth as you lean back in your chair.

“Think you know everyone,” Nick gestures vaguely to the rest of his dinner guests, “except this one. She’s the one I’ve been telling you about,” and when he says your name, Harry tests it out for himself, silently mouthing it and loving the way it feels against his lips.

You smile - a full smile instead of the easy smirk he first saw you sport - and stand up to receive Harry’s hand when he offers it. Your palm is warm and much smaller than his, and when you place your left hand on top of the back of his right, clasping the handshake within both of your hands, Harry takes note of the way his heart skips a beat. You hold eye contact with him until Nick’s voice forces you to glance back at him, an easy laugh escaping in reaction to a joke Harry hadn’t caught.

“Harry’s movin’ soon,” Nick places himself between the two of you, slapping a hand on Harry’s shoulder. “Think your tastes are right up ‘is alley. Wouldn’t that be nice, Harold? A cheeky interior design t’ spice up your dreary decor?”

“Sure,” he chuckles, glancing at you nervously.

“Are your services available, love?” Nick pats your shoulder. “Would do wonders f’ your resume to ‘ave the Mister ‘arry Styles as a client. Not that your resume needs any help.”

Harry clears his throat and plucks at his bottom lip nervously, wanting to kill Nick now more than ever. You smile knowingly at your mutual friend, most likely having heard this spiel with more than one man Nick has introduced you to.

“Really am moving, though,” Harry wipes the underside of his nose. “He’s probably right, as much as I hate to admit it. I could use some help when it comes to decor.”

“I’d love to help,” you assure him, taking another small sip from your wine glass.

When he settles into his seat at the opposite end of the table, he keeps track of how many times he looks your way, torn between wanting to stare at you and wanting to play it cool. He remembers Nick mentioning you to him a couple of years ago, but you were simply the interior designer who’d redone Nick’s new house. He couldn’t stop talking about you, going on and on about how funny you were, somewhat distraught over the idea of him not becoming best friends with you once his house was finished. Harry had joked about him falling in love with you, to which Nick earnestly replied, “Think I am, if ‘m honest. You would be too, if you met her.” He’d begged Harry to meet you - to go to a couple events with him in which he knew you would be attending, or to grab a quick coffee with the two of you during a design meeting - but he’d always been too busy.

And that was it. Harry had never actually met you, even though Nick got his wish and became very close with you once the project was complete. Harry was busy - really, really busy - and whenever he had a moment to spare at home, it was spent catching up with old friends, not making new ones. While he toured the world with his band, you built your business and quickly became one of the most successful interior designers in London, all without Harry noticing.

But now, with all the time in the world spanned out in front of him like playing cards on a blackjack table, he was kicking himself. Every time you moved, every time you smiled, every time you spoke, he could feel it on his skin. You’d had his full attention, although he didn’t have yours. He answered questions about the movie, fielded inquiries about his solo career, and spoke vaguely about holiday plans, but the entire time, he was tuned into what you were doing. Quiet as you were, his senses were in overdrive trying to pick up any nuance he could, still completely focused on you, even when he was talking.

“You auditioned, then?” you speak up, placing your glass onto the table. The conversation had turned to what it was like to work with such notable figures in Hollywood, with Harry always being somewhat bashful about his unique experience.

“Yeah,” Harry nods, the hair on the back of his neck standing up. Your voice was smooth - smoother than it had been when you introduced yourself - and it washed over him in the least-calming way imaginable, doing the opposite of what a voice like that should do to him. His stomach flipped and his knees twitched, craving to hear you say quite literally anything else. You could tell him to fuck off and it’d be music to his ears. “Went through the whole process.”

“Nice,” you smile. “Good job.”

He smiles at you, bowing his head in thanks while he catches your eyes.

You don’t say much more after that. Harry wonders if it’s strategic or simply out of necessity. Running in Nick’s circle required a certain level of skill. It was eat-or-be-eaten in the sense that in order to be heard, one had to be louder than the rest or talk fast enough to remain uninterrupted. You didn’t seem interested in keeping up, perfectly content with listening to the general squabble of the group, adding a witty comment whenever it fit. It was a peculiar thing, how funny Harry found you. You saved your jokes for the right moment, your comedic timing unparalleled by anything Nick could come up with, which was interesting to him, considering that he found Nick to be the funniest person he knew.

He observes you in the way he observes most, but he takes special notice, never knowing if or when he’d need to recall this information about you. He notices how your eyes curve upward in the corners when you laugh, your right eye squinting a bit more than your left. He likes how your wrist looks as you hold your wine glass, mesmerized by your movements as your fingertips circle the base of it while you listen to the group pick on one another. He takes note of how comfortable you are just listening, only commenting on something if it feels right, carefully considering your words.

Harry wonders why he didn’t listen to Nick before. Why hadn’t there been any urgency to meet you? Nick, of course, had always talked about you, especially after you continued to hang out with him once his house was done. He knows you became close with the rest of his circle fairly quickly, and now he can see why - your company was peaceful, a presence that was impossible to ignore, although it was entirely gentle. Now that he’s got you in front of him, Harry feels like an absolute dolt for not caring one way or the other when Nick insisted on him meeting you. Nick swore that you were right up his alley, but he tends to boast about the company he keeps, so Harry figured you were no different.

He was terribly, terribly wrong.

When Nick and his dinner guests leave the table to refill their drinks and make their way into the living room, Harry takes the opportunity to strike up a one-on-one conversation with you. You’re lovely - lovelier than most - and he’s never been shy about going after what he wants.

He finds, unsurprisingly, that you’re easy to talk to. Without any effort on his part, he feels wholly comfortable around you, wanting to lean forward and place a hand on your knee as the two of you chat. He stops himself, the inappropriateness of the gesture overtaking his want to touch you.

“Anything fun planned for the holidays?” you ask, swinging one leg on top of the other and nestling your hands in the crook of your bent knee.

“Yeah,” Harry nods, adjusting his rings. “Going home to my mum’s for a couple of weeks. Always a good time, catching up with the family.”

“Where are you from originally? Sound a bit Northern.”

“Holmes Chapel in Cheshire,” he clears his throat, finding it refreshing to have to explain where he’s from. “My sister comes home, too, so it’s nice to have the family back together,” he plucks at his lips again, a habit he’d most likely never rid of. “What about you? Any plans?”

“Going home to Devon,” you run a hand through your hair. “Staying for a week and a half.”

“Devon, huh? Gorgeous place.”

“Yeah,” you smile. “Grew up on the beach. Always nice to go back where you came from, especially when it’s someplace as beautiful as Devon. My family’s really big on Christmas, so it’ll be good to catch up with them. Still have to get them presents, though. A bit behind this year.”

“‘m on my game this year,” Harry grins. “Usually don’t have all that much time to sort out gifts more than a couple of days before, but ‘ve got everyone but m’mum accounted for this year.”

“Mums are always the hardest, though,” you chuckle. “How ‘m I supposed to repay her for not killing me during my formative years?”

“Seriously,” he laughs. “My mum’s a saint for not killing me or my sister for every stupid fight we had growing up.”

“Is your sister older or younger?” you inquire, your eyes flitting up to the doorway behind Harry.

Before he gets a chance to answer your question, Nick’s hands are on his shoulders, patting them aggressively.

“Bit o’ Trivial Pursuit in the living room, friends?” he asks.

Harry’s stomach drops at how quickly your eyes light up, at how excitedly you stand up and adjust your t-shirt, ready to leap into the living room and get started on the game. If he could, he’d sit here and talk to you all night, ignoring the rest of the party so he could speak with you about whatever the conversation turned to. He sighs, standing up and slapping a hand onto Nick’s back, following him into the living room.

Harry sits next to his best friend on the couch, laughing when he wiggles his eyebrows towards him. You walk in from the kitchen, sauntering happily over to the center and plopping down in front of the coffee table, crossing your legs and sipping at your refilled glass of wine before placing it on a coaster in front of you.

“Teams?” Nick asks, setting up the game.

He makes the case to have you on his team, and you wink knowingly at him, causing Harry a flash of jealousy he doesn’t know the source of. Some part of him - a deep, embarrassing part that should never see the light of day until otherwise stated - wants you to wink at him like that, wants to be close enough to you to be winked at and know the meaning behind it. He wants to wink back at you the way Nick does, and he wants you to attempt to hide a smile behind your wine glass as you take another drink.

The game begins, and Harry quickly realizes why Nick wanted you on his team. You dominate, knowing the answer to seven questions in a row, with everyone else on the opposing team grumbling that they weren’t even given a chance. Nick cackles with delight, but you remain level-headed, only grinning when you’re correct, never boasting about your expertise on random bits of trivia.

Harry can’t help but appreciate how your eyes light up whenever you know the answer, quietly confident in your ability to answer each question with ease. When your team jeers at members on the other team who take too long to answer a question, you encourage your teammates to give the other player a break. “‘s not like you’re answering any questions for us, anyway,” you mutter under your breath, laughing when your team turns their heckling towards you.

“Was right of me to want ‘er on my team, yeah?” Nick nudges Harry in his side.

It was almost as if Harry were viewing you in slow motion. The way you tossed your head back when you laughed, the tiny wrinkle in your brow and how you pursed your lips when you were thinking of an answer - it was all floating through his mind the way molasses drips languidly out of the jar after being held captive for so long. He could watch you forever; he could make a career out of the way it felt to watch you whisper into your teammate’s ear, nodding your head in response to whatever she said back to you.

It’s unsurprising when your team ends up crushing Harry’s team with little effort, thanks to your knowledge. You bow gracefully as everyone claps for you, your hair unruly when you pop back up, a large smile plastered on your face while you encourage the cheering, your eyes closed in blissful victory.

“And with that,” you state, readjusting your hair. “I bid you all adieu, for I have a busy day ahead of me tomorrow.”

“You good to drive?” Nick asks.

“Of course,” you nod. “Had a glass and a half of wine over three hours. You know me, Nicholas.”

You go around the room, saying goodbye to everyone with a warm hug and a glowing smile. Harry tries to busy himself with organizing the question cards and placing the game pieces back into the box, glancing up every now and then to see where you are in the room. He clears his throat when you approach him, standing up and wiping his hands on his thighs.

“It was nice meeting you,” you rest a hand on his shoulder, leaning in to hug him.

His heart begins to race when your hair sweeps across his face, although it only touches his cheek for a moment. You smell like something vaguely familiar, maybe a candle he’d brought with him on the road or a baked good he had made so many times, he’d lost count. You squeeze him briefly before letting go, the embrace far too short for Harry’s liking.

“Lovely to meet you, as well,�� he says, a small, genuine smile playing on his lips. As you walk to the entryway and slip on your shoes, he calls out, “Drive safe!” and immediately regrets it when you neglect to hear it, instead laughing and nodding at something Nick says in your ear as you swing your handbag over your shoulder.

When you’re gone from the small party, the headlights of your car flashing through the windows as you drive down the street, a misplaced feeling washes over Harry. His heart was not used to racing because of someone else. He’d experienced his fair share of adrenaline rushes. He made a living performing for thousands of people every night. He was no stranger to the rush of blood to his heart and head, making his vision fuzzy around the edges and his fingertips quiver. But to feel this way because of the presence of another person?

He didn’t know you. He only knew your name and that you decorated Nick’s house. Yet, somehow, you turned his brain into mush and it seemed that he had lost all feeling from the knees down whenever you looked at him.

“Told ye’,” Nick quips, standing in front of Harry. “Shoulda listened to your ole pal Nick, huh?”

---

There were pros and cons to being bored, Harry realized. There was only so much exploring he could do in Holmes Chapel, especially considering most of the area had been scouted during his youth. So, instead, he slept. He slept as much as he could, finding out that there was a limit to how much sleep he could actually get. His mother loved the contentment of her son being asleep in his childhood bedroom, so he hid from her the fact that he was rising far earlier than he would’ve preferred. Although he had always loved sleep and could find it whenever he searched, he’d recently found himself waking in the middle of the night and not being able to fall back into a peaceful slumber.

Instead of getting up and making a cup of tea to ease his restless mind, he sat up in bed and opened his laptop, the light illuminating the puffy features of his tired face. He types in the address to your website, the first three letters enough to prompt his browser to automatically fill in the rest of the URL. He sighs, noticing the time in the upper righthand corner of his screen - 3am. He knew, without a doubt, that if someone looked in his web history, they’d surely gather that he had quite the obsession with you, based on how many times he’d visited your website in the early-morning hours within the past week alone.

Snow falls outside of his window in the way that it tends to do late at night - quietly, yet with enough tenacity to cover the entirety of his world without much effort. Harry never really considered himself to be a lonely person. He had his close circle of friends and he’d always been able to lean on his family if he’d gotten homesick over the years. But, now, with his bed feeling especially empty and his future unsure, he disregards the fact that visiting your website made him feel less alone.

He clicks around, reading once more about your accolades and various awards, his heart racing at the pictures of you sitting on the couches of the rooms you’d designed. How could he have missed you on the Most Influential Brits Under 30 list? He was on it himself, for fuck’s sake. And, as it turned out, you’d redone the interior of one of his favorite bistros, yet he never even knew your name. You’d been named one of Britain’s Most Promising Designers and had made the list of the Top Ten Interior Designers of London that year, a two-page spread in a magazine Harry had never heard of featured on the front page of your website.

There was no denying your talent, either. You had a distinct style - smooth and sleek with refurbished wood and furniture, finding a place for old and new. There was a balance that made every room featured in your portfolio feel warm and welcoming, just as Nick’s home had done for everyone who entered into it. He could see why Nick had first fallen in love with your designs and had subsequently fallen in love with you.

Once he finishes going through every page, he clicks on your store’s website, sifting through the products you offered and studying the pictures of the showrooms you had created within the layout. The items were expensive, but the quality was evident. He appreciated how you paired items with others - throw pillows with armchairs, lamps with side tables, rugs with coffee tables - and he considers each item for his own home.

You were established, and he liked that. No wonder you had to ask him about information that was readily available to anyone and everyone - you didn’t have the time to know that he was from Holmes Chapel or that his sister was older than he is, not younger. You were too busy creating a business, owning a store, and winning awards in your field. He almost felt revitalized, meeting someone who obviously knew who he was, yet didn’t much care about the exact details of his life. You were seemingly unimpressed by his status, only somewhat curious about his holiday plans, and for all he knew, you were just being polite.

He stares at your picture until the outlines of your face become blurred, his eyes watering as he fixes his gaze. What business did he have looking you up on the internet, anyway? It was for research, he’d told himself. Research to see whether or not your design style would fit his before he hired you to decorate his house. He was happy to find out that your tastes aligned with his, knowing within the first couple of glances at your work that you would be a good hire.

But, at what point did research become a compulsion? His entire day felt off if he didn’t wake up and browse through your site, trying to pick up on something he’d missed or - possibly - wanting to convince himself that you weren’t nearly as impeccable as Nick had lead him to believe. In the end, he finds nothing, smacking his laptop shut and burrowing back down into the covers in a feeble attempt at falling back asleep.

---

Harry kicks Nick under the table, his eyes flashing with anger as he chews aggressively on the Sunday roast.

“Oi!” Nick shouts, laughing as he rubs his knee. “No need to get violent, Styles.”

Harry grunts and rolls his eyes, gulping down the water left in his glass. It was a quality in Nick that he never understood, the way he tried to get a rise out of Harry by telling Anne her son had a new girlfriend, even if it couldn’t be further from the truth.

“Not my girlfriend,” the frustrated popstar grumbles. “Not even close.”

“Well, she will be,” Nick chortles, pointing his fork in Anne’s direction. “Just you wait and see, Anne. He’s already fallin’ for ‘er and he’s only met the girl once!”

“Is that right?” Anne plays into Nick’s game, enjoying the way it makes her youngest pout into his dinner plate. “Why didn’t you mention her, Harry?”

“There’s nothin’ to mention,” he sighs, stabbing at a potato. “She’s Nick’s interior designer and I was thinking about hiring her to decorate my new house. That’s all.”

“Thinkin’ about, dreamin’ about, pinin’ after, plannin’ a future with…all the same thing, innit?”

When Harry closes his eyes and leans his head back onto the dining chair, both Nick and Anne erupt with laughter, Anne reaching out and rubbing Harry’s shoulder.

“‘m just takin’ the piss, Harry,” Nick playfully punches his best friend’s shoulder. “Was tryin’ to get lil’ Harold here to meet her for years,” he explains to Anne. “And finally, just before the holidays, he came over to mine and she was there with some others. Thought they hit it off quite nicely, if ye’ ask me.”

“No one asked you,” Harry says under his breath.

“What did you say her name was?” Anne asks, disregarding the comment.

Her eyes light up when Nick further explains who you are, having just been to the holiday party you’d thrown for your company. Harry looks up from his meal at the mention of your party, wanting to ask about it, but knowing better not to. He wonders, briefly, what you looked like and if your laugh was as bubbly as the champagne you drank.

“She was on that list you were on, wasn’t she?” Anne asks her son. “The Brits Under 30 one?”

“Indeed,” Nick smiles and answers for him. “She was on the same list as young ‘arry. And yet, he didn’t feel the urgency to meet her when I told him about ‘er. Can you believe that, Sweet Anne?”

The two of them laugh once more, causing Harry to further sink into his chair. His mother tuts, patting his shoulder lovingly.

“Just a bit of fun, love,” she stands up to kiss his temple gently, smoothing his unruly hair down. “Really think you’ll work with her to decorate your new place?”

“Thought about it,” he nods, still grumpy.

“Better,” Nick points. “Happy I got ‘er when I did. No way ‘d be able to afford her now. Glad I can say I knew her when. Would never be able to afford ‘er now,” he takes a sip of his drink. “Redid me mum’s living room for free. Or, well,” he smiles. “I splurged on the furniture and whatnot, but she chose everything and didn’t charge me a single red cent for the work.”

“How nice!” Anne grins, clapping her hands once. “I read about her on the Under 30 list and then saw her spread for House Beautiful. She really does seem like such a talent. I love her look,” she places a gentle hand on Harry’s wrist as it lays on the table next to her. “Bet your place will look wonderful with her designs.”

“And only time will tell if Harry can charm her just as easily as she’s charmed him,” Nick puts his hand on Harry’s other wrist, squawking when he rips his out from underneath his touch. “My bet is he’ll have to use more than ‘is boyish good looks to nab this one.”

“Don’t even want to ‘nab’ her,” Harry rolls his eyes. His voice is significantly deeper than normal as he speaks into his chest, a furrow in his brow and an annoyance to his words.

“Oh?” Nick questions. “That’s why you couldn’t keep ye’ eyes off her at mine, then?”

“Whatever,” Harry grumbles, backing up in his chair.

He ignores the pleas from his mother and friend, begging him to return to the table. Instead, he makes his way back to his room, raking a frustrated hand through his hair and sighing deeply. He didn’t have much of a leg to stand on, but that was his own fault, wasn’t it?

Nick was right. He couldn’t keep his eyes off of you at his place. But that didn’t mean anything, really. Harry stared at a lot of people. He liked to be aware of the situation - he wanted to know who he was dealing with, who he was keeping company with. But, then again, he didn’t usually look those people up on the internet and memorize their websites at three in the morning, either.

“Fuck!” he spits under his breath as he falls back onto his bed. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

#harry styles #harry styles imagine #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles fanfic #harry styles blurb #harry styles concepts #harry styles x reader #harry styles x you

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arotechno · 4 years ago

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Jughead (2015), Issues 1-6: Discussion and Commentary

"I am like unto a god, Archie Andrews. Respect me as such."

Recently re-typed and ready to go, here is a broad discussion of the first volume of the Jughead reboot comic series. I was originally going to review each issue individually, but given that the first six comprise one story arc, I decided to do the whole volume in one go. That means this is a bit crunched for time and therefore not quite as in-depth as I wanted to go! But I encourage you to read the comics for yourself, if you are able.

This will not be spoiler-free, for the record! The images here are taken from my own copy using my phone, so they're not the best quality! But they also aren't especially crucial to this commentary, so you'll have to bear with me.

I just really like the inside cover art for this volume, alright (it's also the cover of issue 5)? I can't help it, I'm aro, I see heart imagery and something in my brain goes haywire.

When we first meet Jughead at the beginning of Volume 1, he comes off as lazy and apathetic, at least on the surface. After an all-nighter of playing video games, Jughead is dragged to school by Archie. There, they find that Betty has started a new campaign to save Fox Forest, a beloved local greenspace that is being threatened by Veronica’s wealthy father, Mr. Lodge. Jughead is… not very interested in Betty’s cause, to put it politely. It’s not that he doesn’t care about Fox Forest, but he does not believe that Mr. Lodge would be convinced to change his mind by a petition. He tells Betty as such, and she remarks that he lives a very hollow life.

“Man, you’re so cynical,” Archie tells him. “Is there anything you’d actually fight for?”

The answer is yes. What ultimately gets Jughead to fight for something? Food—well, kind of, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

When Archie and Jughead get to class, they learn that the principal of Riverdale High, Mr. Weatherbee, is being replaced out of the blue by a new guy called Stanger. Stanger is a stiff, serious type, and he immediately starts making changes: new uptight teachers, a strict dress code, new bootcamp-esque curriculum, and most importantly, supposedly nutritious slop to replace the food in the cafeteria.

This sends Jughead down a bit of a rebellious path—he’s not a rule-breaker, but he’s perfectly comfortable with bending the rules in his favor while narrowly skirting around getting into trouble. He starts selling burgers in the cafeteria, with the proceeds benefitting Betty’s fundraiser for Fox Forest.

(Hell yeah, Jughead, unionize that student body! Sell those burgers! You have nothing to lose but your chains!)

This stunt gets Jughead on Stanger’s bad side immediately, and a slowly simmering feud between them ultimately boils over when Stanger plants a knife in Jughead’s backpack to get him expelled. Thankfully, his dad is able to talk his sentence down to a week’s suspension, but that doesn’t stop his friends (and his mother) from worrying about him.

As an aside, I’d like to take a moment to appreciate Mr. Jones.

“Something’s off here and I’m not sure what it is, but I am sure Jughead didn’t bring a knife to school. My boy’s weird, but he’s not a criminal.”

I really like this line from him to Betty. He clearly knows his son and is willing to stand up for him, and it’s comforting to me, especially viewing the story through the lens of Jughead being aroace, that Mr. Jones is not at all bothered by his son being a bit on the strange side, as long as he’s still a good kid. Nothing but respect for Forsythe Jones II in this house.

Something fun and unique about this volume in particular is that in every issue, Jughead either falls asleep or passes out, and has an elaborate imaginative dream about the events of the story. In one he’s a pirate, for example, and in another he’s visited by a descendant of Archie’s from the future, who belongs to the time police. But towards the end of the volume, the line between these daydreams and reality seem to blur for Jughead. He comes to the conclusion in one particular nightmare that Stanger is trying to brainwash them all into becoming mindless agents for his evil organization—and then he realizes he may not be that far off from the truth.

Jughead brings this realization—that Stanger is using the school as a sort of training ground for secret agents—up to his friends, and understandably, they aren’t convinced. They worry that the compounded exhaustion of multiple all-nighters playing games and the stress of being suspended has started to get to Jughead, but he vows to prove it to them.

I mean, damn, Betty, that kind of hurts. (Don’t worry, Betty is actually a good friend, as I’m sure we’ll get into later in the series.)

To make a long story short (and to avoid spoiling the entire plot for those who haven’t read it!), Jughead does find proof, and once he does, his friends are immediately on board. They are ultimately able to save the day, and once it’s revealed that Stanger and the new teachers are ex-CIA trying to brainwash the students (no, seriously), Mr. Weatherbee is re-instated as principal and things return to normal.

I’m leaving out a lot of nuanced details, mostly for the sake of time, but there are a lot of surprisingly weighty moments to this first arc, and Zdarsky’s character writing is incredibly endearing and funny, while still hitting the serious moments when it needs to. There’s an interesting underlying commentary in this arc about military recruitment and U.S. propaganda; Stanger says that he specifically chose Riverdale because the students are so average. There’s something to be said here about the way the military industrial complex preys on average or underprivileged teenagers to convince them to serve when they feel they have no better path to take. It’s an almost funnily serious commentary for Zdarsky to make with a seemingly silly and off-beat comic series, and I respect him for that.

(If you recognize this panel, it’s because it appears on the page where Jughead’s asexuality is canonized. What a good page. So good that nobody ever points out this panel.)

By the end of Volume 1, we see that Jughead maybe isn’t as apathetic and careless as he seemed to be. Sure, he got up in arms about food of all things in the beginning, but it stopped being about food very quickly, once he realized that something truly messed up was going on. And it bothers him, deeply—at one point, the gravity of the situation begins to weigh on him so heavily that he nearly gives up entirely, convinced that there is nothing they can do and that they ought to just lie low until they make it out. But he does end up making things right, with the help of his friends, and in the end, he does decide to help Betty out after all. It’s the least he can do, really. You do get the impression that although Jughead’s friends often don’t take him seriously, they’ll always have his back when it counts—and he’ll do the same for them, even if he’ll insist on being a bit snarky about it.

(That slightly cynical attitude is still there, though, and truthfully, Jughead wouldn’t be the same without it.)

To close out, I am just going to share some of my favorite panels/quotes that didn’t fit elsewhere, including some choice Aro Moods. I hope this (admittedly brief) discussion of Volume 1 convinces you to read the comics, and to join me again when I cover the next arc. Until then, cheers to Chip and Erica.

Jughead’s attitude towards Archie’s romantic problems will never not be funny to me. He’s just like “RIP to you but I’m different.”

Kevin. :/ Kevin come on, man. Mr. Zdarsky, sir, this is character assassination. (Jughead’s face in the corner is a reasonable reaction.)

This one’s gone around so many times before (as have a bunch of other aro moments that I don’t think I need to bother re-posting here), but I just think it’s neat. Don’t worry, Betty lets go.

Aaand lastly, I just really like this line from Jughead. “The world is out of our hands, pal. You just gotta make your own weird way in it.” That we do, Jughead. That we do.

#my god the pain i went through to write this #aro #aromantic #aro jughead #ace jughead #aroace jughead #long post #jughead jones #ooohhh i'm gonna make shitterdale stans sooo angry #jughead comics #techno's jughead reread #<- tag for this little series #op

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scoops404 · 7 years ago

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I just wrote a fic

The Bait

Summary: Phil drags Dan into another video, but doesn’t give him the full story.

“Hey guys!” Dan feels that Phil waves at the camera, knowing his eyes would be showing his excitement. Dan’s sat behind a not-so-mysterious square pillow on the colorful duvet next to Phil. The things he does for Phil, honestly. The subscribers are going to see the title of the video, they know the ‘guest’ is Dan. Still, Dan can’t say no to Phil’s pouty face when he insists that Dan hide behind the pillow for a dramatic reveal.

“Since you guys loved my video where I took quizzes about myself so much, and then you loved it when Dan did it, we figured, we’d take some quizzes together,” Phil elbows Dan behind the pillow and then grumpily frowns. He supposes that was his cue.

“Ahh! Stop it,” Dan says, sounding a bit muffled and put out.

Phil starts tickling him when the elbowing doesn’t seem to work, “only guests who reveal themselves on time don’t get tickled to death.”

“You could have said,” Dan whines and then throws the pillow off like he’s a vampire and it’s time to wake up out of his coffin. The pillow lands somewhere off camera and almost knocks a plant over, “it is I, guys, Daniel Howell, here to keep our Philly Willy Ding Dong in checkarooni.”

“What language was that even?”

The whine turns into a pout, “you elbow me, you tickle me, you bully me, why am I even here, Phil Lester?”

Dan’s smiling enough to show both dimples so their audience will know he’s only kidding. Sometimes they don’t quite understand when he’s joking.

“You’re here to help me take quizzes, remember?” Phil says, pulling his ancient Macbook up onto his lap where he’s already pre-loaded a quiz. Dan can’t quite make out what type of quiz this is. He supposes it’ll be something dreadful like “Which ‘90’s Boybander is Your Spirit Animal?’

That actually sounds kind of cool, though. He would totally take that quiz in the middle of the night when he can’t sleep and Wikipedia isn’t cutting it anymore.

“You need help taking the quizzes? Isn’t it supposed to be a personality assessment? I think I’ll just confuse the answers,” Dan says, torn between trying to peek over Phil’s shoulder at the quiz for a better look and staring at the camera.

Phil notices the attempt at cheating and drags the laptop over to the other side, “I figure we’ll make a bit of a game out of it. I’ll read the questions to you first and you answer them, but the catch is, you won’t know what the name of the quiz is until the end.”

Dan’s face morphs into appreciation, Phil left that part of the explanation out when he was asking if Dan wanted to be in his video today, “so it’s kinda like how you know the name of the quiz and you can guess the answers that are going to give you the result you want, it’s like countering that urge.”

There goes Phil’s awesome brain again, Dan thinks. This is not the first time he’s conveniently left something out when asking Dan to film a video with him, and it sure won’t be the last. When you have a relationship like Dan has with Phil, there’s enough trust to know that Phil would never put him in a position where he was made to look like a fool. Well, more than gentle teasing. And if it truly is horrendous, then Phil wouldn’t put it up online. He’s also quite handy on editing.

“Yeah, it’s double blind,” Phil says, pointing at the camera, “Science Phil gave you your fact of the day.”

“I don’t think that’s what ‘double blind’ means, but okay, sounds good. And then do you do a quiz and I don’t tell you the name of it?”

“Yeah, but I haven’t loaded one for that because then it’d be cheating,” Phil adjusts how he’s sitting on the bed and looks over to Dan, “ready for the first question?”

Dan brings a hand in front of his face, grasping his fingers together and then bringing his whole fist down like he’s in a bad kung fu movie and he’s focusing his chi or something. “Yeah,” he says, “hit me with the first questy.”

On camera Phil doesn’t roll his eyes, but Dan knows he wants to. Instead, he pulls up the first question, “Okay, the first question is: ‘What do you look for in a friend?’”

“I’ve only got one and you’re looking at him,” Dan says to the camera.

Phil continues to read the question like Dan hadn’t interrupted, “A) Athletic B) Considerate C) Funny D) Loyal,” he turns to look at Dan, bright blue eyes focusing on reading Dan.

Phil could probably take this quiz for Dan with how well he knows him, and vice-versa. Dan’s never felt as known as he does with Phil and he loves it. He loves knowing the man he is spending his life with truly understands him and appreciates all the nuances that make him up, the good and the bad.

He cherishes the compromising they do—on the book and the tour, everyday life things. With Phil as his business partner, boyfriend, and flat mate, they’ve had to make every decision together and that can be very difficult if neither one is willing to compromise. He’s enjoyed every way in which Phil enriches his life. He loves that when they start a family together one day, he’ll have a new type of partner in Phil and new things to argue about. Knowing that there’s more room to grow with Phil, comforts and excites Dan at the same time. They aren’t stagnant, but they are steady.

“Those are really hard to decide between,” Dan says, “can you read them again?”

Phil reads them again and Dan thinks on it pretty hard. Phil might have to edit some time out here.

“Well athletic is out right off the bat,” Dan says, because he can’t expect a friend to be something that he absolutely doesn’t identify with. Also, athleticism doesn’t speak much about a person’s character, so it’s not that important. Dan doesn’t choose his friends for their aesthetic appeal. His boyfriend of ten years does have a very high aesthetic appeal, though.

“And funny is out. I mean, I like funny people, but that’s not what I need at the core of a friend. Considerate would be nice, but then again, you’ve been leaving socks around and cabinets open since 2012 and I’ve clearly stuck around. So, let’s go with loyalty,” Dan feels confident in his answer.

“Final answer?” Phil asks, looking to Dan then back at the camera.

“Yeah, sure, next question.”

Phil clicks the answer and reads off the next question, “Which of these nights best suits you: A) Clubbing, B) Anime C) Sports D) House Party?”

“Anime,” Dan says with no pause.

Phil laughs a second and when he sees Dan’s questioning look explains, “I already had that one pressed, just needed you to confirm it.”

Dan laughs too, “Yeah, yeah, like that’s not the answer for you too. Go on, read the next one.”

“Which of these YouTubers would you talk to at a party: A) Felix—“

“Let me stop you there,” Dan interrupts, “Is AmazingPhil a choice?”

Phil nods and Dan goes on, “then let’s not kid ourselves. It’ll be you and me in the corner, eating snacks, and talking to a very select few people who are brave enough to approach us with the anti-social vibes I give off.”

“We’re not that bad,” Phil tries to protest, “that usually only happens after we’ve run out of things to talk about with people and we make excuses to go find a drink and then we just don’t return to the conversation, but we’re not quite ready to go home yet.”

Dan concedes, “true. My point still stands. AmazingPhil is my answer.”

Phil doesn’t bother to hide his little smile. After all this time together, he still loves when Dan chooses him above everyone else. Dan’s the same way, he gets a little thrill when Phil sits next to him—at home, in meetings, on the tube, you name it. He loves the validation of Phil making a conscious choice to be close to him.

“Next question, then,” Phil says, “and there are only two questions left.”

“Only five questions? That’s kind of a short quiz.”

“I didn’t want the viewers to get too bored. And this way we can do a couple different quizzes instead of one quiz with forty questions,” Phil says and Dan sees his point. Better to have shorter quizzes for more shenanigans.

“Anyway, the next question is: What reaction do you have when you see a dog: A) What breed is that? B) I want to pet it and I want to pet it right now C) That’s an ugly dog D) I’m allergic, help!”

“Quick answer to that one, obviously, I want to pet the dog. Who could look at any dog and say it’s ugly? What is wrong with humanity,” Dan asks, shaking his head.

Phil looks solemn as well, “Some people need to learn to look beneath the surface and see the true beauty beneath.”

“Besides that being literally the cheesiest thing you’ve ever said, it’s true. I would love my really ugly doggo, and we would play fetch, and do tummy scratches, and cuddles, and give each other kisses. What’s not to love about dogs?”

“There’s everything to love about dogs!” Phil agrees enthusiastically and both of them look at the camera. Phil will probably do some sort of edit here, “Last question, are you ready, Daniel?”

“The last question is am I ready? I mean, yeah?”

Phil gives him his patented I’m sick of your shit look. Dan giggles until Phil can’t hold the face any longer and joins him.

“That was the stupidest joke, Dan.”

“You loved it,” he says, “now give me the real last question.”

“Okay, okay, the last question is,” Dan watches Phil find his spot on the laptop, “What type of partner would you want for long term?”

This is a touchy question, since they aren’t out to their viewers. What type of partner would Dan want? Phil. Always Phil. In every way, Phil.

Someone to spend his day with, who makes him laugh constantly. Someone who understands him, holds him accountable, challenges him and supports him? That’s Phil. Someone who holds the same values as him but thinks just slightly differently? Dan loves the way that Phil’s mind works, it’s how he can be so creative and innovative.

“A) Supportive and Nurturing B) Funny and Loyal C) Challenging and Secure or D) All of the Above,” Phil finishes and, yeah, they’re going to have to re-film this bit because Dan can’t keep from kissing Phil.

“You know you’re all those things, right?” Dan says when they come up for air, “you are literally all those things and more. You’re my best friend, my lover, my partner, my favorite person in the world and I’d do anything to keep you happy and safe and by my side forever.”

Phil blushes like this is the first time they’ve ever kissed and Dan’s said nice things about him. He pecks Dan again quickly, “I love you too. Now, should I start at the answer choices this time?”

Dan lets himself look longingly at Phil for a couple more seconds before he tries to rein it in. He’s not very good at reining it in according to the internet, but he does try.

“The answers will be fine,” he says. Phil reads them off again and this time Dan doesn’t cross the distance and kiss his boyfriend, even though he really wants to. “I’m going to have to go with all of the above. Because why limit myself and why limit my long-term partner, am I right?”

Phil smiles and Dan thinks he’s just on this side of okay for what’s appropriate in a video these days.

“Do you want the answer first, or the name of the quiz first?” Phil asks.

Dan considers the question for a second, “I think it’s funnier if you give me the answer first and then the name of the quiz, but it might not make any sense. So, your choice I guess.”

Phil looks down at his laptop, to look at the answer, “I’m going to give you the name of the quiz first.”

“Okay,” Dan says and he thinks he picks up a hint of nervousness in Phil’s voice. He could be wrong, but just in case, he pushes his knee over so that it’s resting against Phil’s thigh.

“The title of your mystery quiz is ‘Which Youtuber Should You Have a Baby With.”

Dan looks at the camera and shakes his head slowly, a smile forcefully pulled out of him, “Really? Alright then, go on, what’s my result? Who am I having a baby with, Phil?”

He looks over to Phil for the answer and Phil is looking intently at the laptop screen. Phil’s behaving rather odd, Dan thinks, normally this is the part of the video where Phil would be over the top and enthusiastic and speaking quickly and excitedly. Instead, Dan sees that he’s biting his lips and his eyes look uncharacteristically serious for a moment like this.

“The results are in,” Phil eventually says, and turns the laptop screen around to show Dan that the answer, unsurprisingly, says AmazingPhil, “The internet says you should have a baby with AmazingPhil.”

“Of course it would be you,” Dan says, trying to pull it off as a joke for Phil’s video, but their eventual family isn’t really something he wants to joke about. Phil might have to edit this entire quiz out of the video because Dan can’t stand to even entertain the idea of having a family with anyone other than Phil.

“You should have a baby with me,” Phil says again and this time with a tone in his voice that Dan can’t quite place. It’s serious and something in it grabs Dan and forces him to look back at Phil until the strange reverence in Phil’s sharp blue eyes fills Dan to the brim. Phil reaches over and takes Dan’s hand in his, bringing it to his lips and kissing it softly.

“Please,” he says, “have a baby with me. I’m ready to start a family with you.”

“Is this going in the video?” is all Dan can think to ask, his mind strangely blank from happiness.

“No,” Phil says, holding Dan’s hand with both hands now, “there’s no video. I just wanted to ask you dramatically.”

Dan chuckles because of course Phil wanted to be dramatic. This is the man who forces them to open their Christmas presents slowly and one at a time so that they can watch each other’s faces when the present is revealed. This is the man who read his early teenage chats to the internet and dressed up and did voices for everybody. People like to claim Dan is the dramatic one, and sure, he’ll accept that he��s extra as hell, but Phil has a flare for the dramatic too. It’s one of the many things he loves about him.

“Yes,” he reaches over to kiss Phil, “I would love to have a baby with you and start our family.”

Phil’s tongue peeks through his teeth when he smiles and Dan’s heart melts. He throws Phil’s laptop carefully onto the bed and climbs into his lap to hug him. His arms go around Phil’s shoulders and Phil’s arms rest on his waist and they bask in the presence of one another.

“Phil?” he says a couple minutes later.

“Yeah?”

Dan nuzzles into his neck, “We’re going to be dads.”

Phil presses a soft kiss to Dan’s jaw, “We’re going to be great dads. We already have so many internet children who think so.”

Dan sighs, but he can’t keep the smile off his face all day.

#phanfiction #my fic #going to do more of these #hopefully #one shot

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