#but also too.. i often have dreams with public figure and celebrities for some reason

[koicrimes]

i had a dream that i was friends with this insanely gorgeous woman, and she was always wanting to hangout with me. so, i let her. and one day, she visited me wearing quite possibly the best outfit I've ever seen in my life. it was elegant but sexy and suited her soooo well. and i told her how nice her fit was and i was just hyping her up in general and then she got really confused and looked at me and gently reminded me that I was the one who designed the outfit. and i just sorta had this conscious epiphany like 'oh shit imma designer in this dream? ok work.' and so, we're about to have lunch and i excuse myself to the restroom and she tells me that she'll wait on me with the prettiest of smiles omg. and as I'm headed there, i was just thinking about how cool it is that something i designed found it's way onto someone so beautiful, right? and i was like, 'she could probably pull off anything... actually she reminds me of someone.' and im just there for a while and then my heart leaps at the realization: MY FRIEND IS MARGOT FUCKING ROBBIE!!!!!!!

And when I thought, 'YO, BARBIE IS WEARING MY CLOTHES??!?!!' i woke up 🥹

[hualianff]

Ice Skating AU

The road to the Olympics was quite lonely for figure skater XL. XL’s parents supported his dreams at the expense of his health and mental wellbeing. XL’s coach, JW, purposefully isolated XL from other competitors, which further distanced XL from the peers who were envious of his talent and achievements.

After the Olympics–XL winning silver, much to the public’s pride–he suffered from detrimental injuries as a result of being overworked and malnourished; JW had put him on a strict diet and training schedule that was ultimately unsustainable. It took over a year for XL to successfully settle a lawsuit with minimal media coverage and monetary consequences. 

Three years have passed since he retired. XL currently owns his own rink, teaching kids and adult skating classes on the side.

When XL competed, everything was so stiff and uptight. It got to the point where he wasn’t enjoying it and came to resent the sport in the end. When XL teaches, however, he gets to laugh with his students. He happily lends them a hand when they need it (unlike JW, who was harsh and trained him as if he were a machine). He celebrates with a student every time they land an improving pirouette, relishes in the pure joy in their eyes. 

That’s how ice skating should be. Challenging but always fun. 

Now, XL truly loves the managing and teaching aspect of the new role ice skating plays in his life. Owning a rink also allows XL to occasionally indulge in his old skills and routines. With no pressure to perform for anybody but himself, XL is free.

HC, a film grad school student, is forced to take a skating class after losing a bet with HX. HX’s partner, who had come up with the consequence on HX’s behalf, suggested a place called Wings, claiming they are “just trying to promote a fellow friend’s business.”

HC almost didn’t follow through with the penalty. He already knew how to skate. (His natural ability to quickly pick up any athletic activity is envied by all his friends.) Upon seeing just who the teacher was, however, HC reconsidered.

After all, losing a bet is no joke.

HC attends the evening class. He wears tight-fitting jeans and a maroon, long-sleeved shirt with the sleeves rolled up to expose his forearms. The film student asks for extra help on his form despite knowing there’s not much to fix. 

Understandably, XL is a bit baffled how this one tall, handsome stranger keeps asking to be guided into the correct position and spotted while skating across the rink when it seems he’s capable of balancing on his own. But XL is in no way complaining! And if XL happens to stare directly at HC’s small yet perky ass as he skates behind the taller man in case HC crashes, no one has to know. 

One week passes. Then another. And another. 

One month later, HC keeps coming back for classes.

“San Lang, you don’t have to pay for any more classes. You already skate well enough on your own!” XL informed his newest regular with a knowing smile. 

“But then I won’t get to see Gege as often,” HC insisted with that charismatic smirk of his. XL hoped his face didn’t give away how flustered he was on the inside.

“W-well, the rink is not very busy one hour till closing time. You could always come in to practice. And I can watch you from the side!” XL said, looking off to the side. “Free of charge,” he added.

HC tilted his head, pondering. “Hmm, that sounds lovely. You’ll skate with me too?”

“Haha, sure! If there’s no one else on the rink,” XL laughs. 

HC nodded. “Fair enough. However, I will be paying the amount I owe Gege. You cannot convince me otherwise.”

“San Lang-“ 

“No exceptions, Gege!”

They’re so close, XL realized. HC leaned forward on the counter which is the only barrier separating them from touching chests. XL allowed himself a couple glances at the muscled pec straining against the fabric of HC’s shirt.

“Well, San Lang can pay me back in a different way, m-maybe?” the former Olympian suggested. HC quirked an elegant eyebrow. He really was too pretty for XL’s poor heart to handle. 

“Oh? What does Gege have in mind?”

Ignoring how suggestive HC sounded just then, XL built up the courage to utter one word: “Dinner?” 

Much to XL’s surprise, HC visibly malfunctions by choking on his own spit, as if he hadn’t expected XL to be so forward. HC clears his throat right after, sputtering a measly, “O-oh?”  😳

XL doesn’t say anything else. He stands motionless while waiting for the younger man’s answer. 🥺

Luckily, XL doesn’t have to wait more than ten seconds before HC composes himself, standing back and placing his palms on the counter, satisfied.

“Dinner is perfect.”

XL: 🥰

HC: ��

Things only got better when HC came around. Suddenly, XL wasn’t alone every night he closed. HC diligently visited every night he could when school and work permitted. They skate together as promised, HC commenting how generous XL is for offering special “private lessons.” XL is positive HC makes these innuendos on purpose and selfishly hopes HC doesn’t say them to anyone else but XL. 

Funnily enough, XL has made his own fair share of innuendos–though completely unintentional. 

(XL while skating with HC: “You’re doing so well, San Lang. Go faster!”

HC, raising an eyebrow: “Gege likes things faster?”

XL: 😳😳 “EEEK, I mean the speed you’re going at. I-it’s too slow-“

HC: *nods* “Whatever Gege wishes.” *winks at XL before zooming away*

XL, chasing HC: “Wait, how are you moving so quickly!?”)

(HC falls ill on a Friday when he would normally visit the rink. With no meds and a killer headache, HC texts XL to cancel their lesson. 

XL: “San Lang, do you need medicine? I’ll come for you”

HC: “Gege 😳😳😳”

XL: “TO***** My finger slipped 😅”

HC: “Gege is getting quite bold now, isn’t he?”

XL: “San Lang!”)

***

It all boils down to a game of tag that got a little too competitive. It’s HC’s turn to tag XL. They’re zipping around the rink like flashes of light, the sound of their laughter echoing throughout the open space. Where XL is elegant yet sharp as he evades his pursuer, HC is aggressive and heavy as his skates dig into the ice in his haste catch XL. 

“Gege is too fast for this poor San Lang. It’s too unfair,” HC complains, though he has no reason to as he gains up on XL for the third time.

“Ahhh, no no noooo!” XL shrieks as he’s chased into a corner by a sneaky HC. In his attempt to turn around to escape, XL is crowded against the clear divider between the rink and the lounge space by a smirking HC. One last duck is countered by HC rushing forward to lightly secure his hands around XL’s waist. 

XL’s breath quickens as HC slowly leans down, a certain tenderness behind his eye that makes XL positively melt inside. 

“Caught you,” HC mutters, his long braid falling haphazardly down his right shoulder. XL shyly looks down, pinned by HC’s inquisitive stare. A large hand comes to gently grip his chin, lifting his head to meet HC’s face. “Do I get a reward?”

“What does San Lang desire?”

HC’s eye flickers down to XL’s lips. XL’s eyelids lower in understanding. And relief. Then, under some unknown source of confidence, XL lifts his chin invitingly. 

“It's your reward to claim,” he whispers. HC’s face splits in shock before morphing into an awed expression. He cautiously nudges XL’s nose with his own, making XL instinctually smile. 

“Gege has indeed become bolder,” HC utters.

He promptly seals their lips, which curiously meld together before separating. A tentative peck. XL is the one to slant their mouths together again, pulling HC down by the lapels of his jacket. They experiment as they press together, pull apart, then meet once more in delicious bliss.

XL hums as HC takes control of the pace. The taller man holds XL close, caressing his waist as they languidly make out against the divider. XL whimpers as HC cups his cheek lovingly. There’s a warm brush against the seam of XL’s mouth. He gladly parts his lips, welcoming the sensual slide of HC’s tongue inside. HC doesn’t let up, eagerly licking along every hollow and crevice of XL’s mouth.

When XL playfully nips at HC’s upper lip, HC firmly presses XL against the divide, grunting as he’s provoked. Another cheeky nibble has HC pulling away, raising a challenging eyebrow at XL. Using the diversion to his advantage, XL surges up to wrap his arms around HC’s shoulder, running the flat of his tongue over HC’s lower lip before coaxing him into another sweet kiss. HC smiles approvingly, allowing XL to lead. 

HC gradually shifts their weight so he skates backward, guiding them around the rink as they unhurriedly explore each other’s mouths. The scuffling of their skates paired with the slick sounds of their kissing serves as their own music and rhythm. XL surrenders to HC’s movements by resting most of his weight against the taller man. 

“I knew you knew how to skate this whole time,” XL murmurs against HC’s lips. HC chuckles as he traces XL’s cupid’s bow, then places a chaste kiss to XL’s cheek.

“Always so perceptive, gege.”

“Hmm, it’s hot,” XL says without thinking. HC smiles in amusement as he switches to skating in circles, gaze never leaving XL. 

“What is?”

“You skate with the confidence of a pro,” XL answers. He steals another kiss to HC’s lips, eyes crinkling as he smiles happily.

“Good thing I had the best teacher.”

“Oh, stop it, San Lang-“

“Make me.”

XL puffs his cheeks out in faux annoyance. But he can’t hold back a beaming grin as HC mimics his expression, over-exaggerating the pout that makes him look like a child whose candy was snatched out of his hands.

“If you insist,” XL sighs. He gives no other warning as he pounces, winding his legs around HC’s waist. HC effortlessly catches XL by underneath his thighs, pliant as XL crashes their lips together, hungry for much more. 

(Brainchild with @no-one-says-hi)

[linawritesocs]

rsa halloween headcanons!

so. this is what happens when twst team refuses to give us any rsa crumbs. i just make everything myself.

YES MAYBE I AM A LITTLE TOO OBSESSED WITH THIS STUPID RIVAL SCHOOL. but hey, it's their fault for mentioning it so often, but not giving us any actual rsa lore >:(

also i'm just tired of having so many rsa ocs that i want to use for nrc events, i have to come up with something for them djskslsl

as i said, these are just my headcanons and ideas that i'm going to use for my rsa characters. feel free to use them too if you want!

so, how do rsa students usually celebrate halloween? well, the thing is.. they're actually not as passionate about it as nrc students. if nrc students go all out and their halloween turns out to be so good that everyone on magicam is talking about it, rsa halloween isn't actually that interesting. well, they gotta have at least one weakness!

the reason why rsa students don't find halloween that interesting is because rsa is all about ✨perfection ✨, they're too pure for something like halloween. it's just not their style, you know? also they don't worry about it that much because they're already better than other schools at literally everything! why should they worry about something like halloween?

but deep inside, rsa students actually want to celebrate halloween more. they're just too scared that it will ruin their perfect image, like, wouldn't people think it's too weird for those royals who are so perfect at everything to celebrate a holiday like this? especially considering the costumes and the halloween aesthetic..

but then, something happens. rsa students see nrc halloween trending on magicam, they are shocked and they can't believe that their rival school is so popular right now. okay, okay, maybe they should just ignore it? they shouldn't act like nrc students who always want to prove that they're better than anyone from rsa, they shouldn't fall to their level!.. but they gotta admit, they are feeling a bit jealous. sure, they could let nrc students have their victory and celebrate, but it just feels wrong to see them having fun while it's just an ordinary day for rsa students.

.. so what if they actually do celebrate halloween this time? they don't have to invite anyone to school and make it public, if they're not confident enough yet, but what if it could be their own personal celebration? throwing a secret halloween party and coming up with costumes sounds so fun..

nrc students did have more time though. but whatever, they'll figure it out, it doesn't have to be perfect.. who are they kidding, they WILL make it perfect.

now, here comes the fun part: the costumes! it's kinda hard for these students to come up with costumes because some of them have never celebrated halloween before.. hm, maybe they should ask someone for help?

.. wait, most of them have a surprisingly good relationship with the ramshackle prefect even though he's not from rsa. and this guy is VERY good at designing costumes and his sewing skills are even better.

what if they ask him for help? nrc students have made everything already, he must feel super bored.

(dorm names are by @/waiting-on-a-dream!)

speculum (alice dorm): angel was SO EXCITED to finally celebrate halloween with everyone! now, they have a lot of costume ideas, but if they have to choose something that will fit their dorm perfectly.. what if they make something circus-themed? they can just make it more creepy, hehe. unless some students are already scared of circus-related things and sure, they could all dress up as scary clowns, but that doesn't sound fun! they gotta come up with something more interesting and creative! and angel makes sure every student's outfit is unique and shows their personality, they give everyone as much freedom as they want! do they simply want a cute and colorful outfit with some fake blood on it? sure, go ahead, angel is sure it's gonna look great! do they want something much scarier and darker with dark woods circus vibes? ooh, sounds interesting, angel can't wait to see it! so yes, bunny has an official permission to say "you're not clowns, you're the entire circus" now.

ujasiri (simba dorm): it was a bit difficult for them to think of a costume idea, but seth managed to help them. so, they will dress up as zombies! and when ujasiri students asked if they can make their costumes more original and interesting, seth remembered that they have a strong connection with nature (fake!jay is actually an ujasiri student! and avery was one too!) and suggested adding a flower theme. so yes, those students will be zombies, but they will still have flowers in their hair, flower crowns and other nature-themed accessories!

enaskota (ariel dorm): seth and arietta wanted to create something together for a long time and they knew that ari's dorm deserves something truly beautiful. while talking about their costume ideas, seth told arietta about what happened on that day when idia was forced to marry eliza and when arietta heard about how allen looked, they realized something. they absolutely have to go with the creepy wedding theme. wedding dresses and suits that look beautiful but scary at the same time because of how bloody and torn (but in a cool way) they are. they look very detailed thanks to arietta, enaskota costumes also have seashells on them and other sea-themed accessories which make their outfits look extremely unique.

tigrabah (aladdin dorm): they really could just dress up as actual gremlins, because it would fit their personalities, but seth said that he won't be able to make them look stylish then. so, how about demons? they could run around while having cute little horns and laughing like pranksters that they are. like with speculum students, each student gets a unique outfit that shows their personality: it could be more classy and elegant or it could be more revealing and fanservice-y. it also fits the red and purple color theme of the dorm!

wisbene (snow white dorm): wisbene students are known for being kind, reliable and responsible, just like the fairest one was. so why not give them a theme that looks innocent at first but you can totally make it look more scary? what about something like.. a scary hospital? just for today, these students will still play the role as everyone's helper, but they will look more bloody, creepy and dangerous. like, are they here to heal you or make you feel even worse? you can also see them walking around with syringes, scalpels and other "medical-themed weapons" also seth was sure that this concept would fit neige and he wanted to see him wearing something like that

viules (hercules dorm): seth did need some time to come up with something for a dorm that's full of cute jocks and then.. what if they dressed up as a frankenstein's monster? seth doesn't know how to explain it, but it fits their vibe! though he does have to explain the difference between frankenstein and his monster to them. and no, he won't allow them to dress up as frankenstein himself, the "mad scientist" concept doesn't fit them! but he has to admit that their idea of everyone dressing up as centaurs sounds funny. he even allows two students to still go with this idea, he just really wants to see it.

spheara (aurora dorm): seth knew that this dorm needs something more simple and comfortable, considering how much these students like to chill, lie around and sleep. also they don't worry about their costumes as much as other dorms do. so.. maybe they can try dressing up as ghosts? but seth won't allow them to simply make their outfits out of bedsheets, they should go for clothes that they can easily move in and their costumes should have this "ghost-like" vibe. he knows that these students don't have that much energy, so he's okay with making their costumes himself, it won't take too much time.

[amygdalagustd]

Kim Namjoon on Identity

Namjoon explores the concept of identity time and time again in his life and in his music. He tends to focus on how different parts of himself might be in conflict with each other, and the tensions and confusion that goes with that experience. People are filled with duality, sometimes to the point that it tears us apart. The question of “who am I?” seems a simple one, but underneath it lies a lot of complexity. Who do I want to be? Who do other people want me to be? How much of my identity is formed by my past? Can I change who I am? Can I be multiple things at the same time? Who is the real me? What does it even mean to be the real me?

The question of “who am I?” seems to both fascinate and terrify Namjoon. In this essay we will tackle the question together as I explore all the different ways that Namjoon contemplates identity in lyrics and interviews.

From his decision to become a rapper in the first place to the struggle of taking care of himself as a world famous idol to the questioning of what having an identity actually means, we will travel through Namjoon’s career and highlight all the moments that he asks himself:

“Who the hell am I?”

It’s no secret that Namjoon was a very intelligent and driven student who got good grades in school. In his earlier lyrics he often writes about the pressure that was put on him to succeed and follow a certain path in life. As someone who was good at studying it was expected of him to prioritize his education above all else. Namjoon fit into that role well, but behind the scenes his heart was longing for music. He discovered rap and decided that he wanted a different path for his life. BTS’s early work is filled with messages of following your dreams and not letting other people decide what type of life you want to live. Namjoon often talked about the struggles of living in between the expectations of those around him and his own desires for his future. Some of those conflicting feelings are expressed in Voice, the intro song to his 2015 mixtape RM:

Straight A student and underground rapper

I occupied myself all day with being graded with meaningless numbers like beef gets graded

I just wanted to succeed

because that’s the only thing I was told by others so much that I almost got sick of it

The mirage called happiness- I thought it would be held there

But, sitting at my desk, I was never happy, not for a single moment

I secretly hid a blank sheet of paper between the pages of my study book without my mom’s knowing

My identity that I wrote down along the sound of drums and bass

The feeling of breathing that is different from that of receiving grade reports

Even when I was the top of my class, my mind was never at ease

Is it absolutely necessary to want something that others want?

I secretly raise the volume of my voice

so that you can know, so that it can reach you

I again raise the volume of my voice

so that you can know, so that it can reach you

He also touches on the subject in Born Singer, which was released in 2013:

To be honest, I was scared that I was to prove myself after talking big

that I, who used to know only pen and book, was then to surprise the world

I dunno, that I and the world’s expectations are too asymmetric,

I was scared that I might betray everyone who trusted me

I stretch my burdened shoulders and step onto the very first stage

BTS and Namjoon will continue to talk about the pressure of society's expectations and the difficulty of following your own path in songs like No More Dream, N.O and School of Tears. Fighting back against the oppressive school system is a huge part of their message and mission in their early career. They ask their fans and themselves to look at the person that they are expected to become and question if that image is in line with their own dreams and desires. Namjoon wrestled with this question himself, and therefore has the experience and passion to guide others who might be struggling with their identity and the identity that is put on them.

Idol and artist

The concept of being an idol vs being an artist is one that comes back often in BTS lyrics. Namjoon is an underground rapper who ended up in a boyband, and the identity of being an idol is one that he has wrestled with quite a bit. Can you be both an idol and an artist? Does becoming an idol mean that you have to give up on being an artist? Does it matter if you call yourself an idol or an artist? Does it matter what other people say about it?

Namjoon mentions this conflicting identity in Awakening on his 2015 mixtape RM:

Every night I fight myself inside me

My heart pounds, and my colleagues stab me in the back

saying I became a cripple after going into a company

Yeah fuck you I’m an idol, yeah yeah i’m an idol

I hated it at one time but now I love to get that title

Unlike some keep denying [their identity] to the end on television,

I now fully accept myself, and I just do me

Whether I’m an idol or an artist- it actually never mattered

The way you guys look at me was what defined me

I was obsessed over titles and hung up on how people described me

Listen to the rap of the guy who became a bit smarter as time passed

Namjoon gets shit for being an idol from the underground rap scene and gets shit for being an artist from the idol scene. He is hovering in between, writing his rap lyrics with the power and authenticity of a hip hop artist while simultaneously dancing and looking like a full fledged boyband member. He responds to this dilemma with unwavering pride, the drive to prove himself and a fuck you attitude. This energy dominates a lot of early BTS music. They are still trying to find their place in the industry while not really knowing where exactly they belong. Songs like the Cyphers and Mic Drop highlight the anger they feel about the mistreatment they face from both sides of the industry while boasting about their accomplishments and pride in who they are. Just like Namjoon in Awakening, Yoongi also often mentions his struggles with the identity of being an idol in his solo work. In Idol, the title track of the 2018 album Love Yourself: Answer, BTS face the subject head on:

You can call me artist

You can call me idol

Or you can call me anything else

I don’t care

I’m proud of it

I’m free

No more irony

Because I’ve been me all the time

You can point your fingers at me, I don’t care at all

Whatever reason you have to denigrate me,

I know what I am

I know what I want

I never gon’ change

I never gon’ trade

Why do you talk loud “blah blah”

I do what I do, so mind your own business

You can’t stop me loving’ myself

Idol is a proud, joyful, wonderfully weird and confident self love anthem. It’s a celebration of who BTS are at their core. In the song, they have accepted all the different aspects of their identity and they don’t feel the need to fit in with just one label. In the future, they will go on to say that BTS’s genre is just BTS, and they see no point in categorizing themselves.

RM and Namjoon

In 2018, BTS released a documentary series called Burn The Stage. The series followed them throughout the Wings tour and was supposed to show a more raw version of them.

In episode 6, Namjoon said:

Being an idol star, you don’t have a choice but to have two identities. I invested a lot in my identity as BTS and RM, and this is really a dilemma. We need to find ways to overcome this, and I’m trying different things. I study, I read books. I need time to be wholly me, the original me that I know.

Everyone in BTS has a stage name, a person they become when they present themselves in front of their fans. On stage Namjoon is RM, a fierce and confident rapper, a powerful and charming performer, a dependable leader and someone who lives a fiery and intense life.

Behind the scenes, Namjoon is Namjoon, a man in his twenties who is trying to figure out how to be an adult just like everyone else. He likes to go on bike rides, take care of plants, go to museums, read books and spend time in nature. He gets lazy and reads webtunes for 5 hours straight and sometimes argues with the people around him because they annoy him.

Namjoon spends the years of his youth as part of BTS, in the public eye, and sometimes that causes tension between these different parts of himself; the stage persona and the private person. In Break The Silence: The Movie which came out in 2020, there was a lot of talk about identity. During one of Namjoon’s segments he said:

There is also the fear of how well I’m taking care of myself, the Kim Namjoon as a person. Aside from money, fame, and a sense of calling, what do I really have? When you have those things all other things start to feel really valuable. Those who don’t have them would find them really special. I think it’s a repetition of that, so for me, there is a fear about whether I’m faithfully living the story of my life to the fullest.

He also mentions this dilemma in Airplane pt.2 on the 2018 album Love Yourself: Tear where the lyrics go:

Who should I live as today, Kim Namjoon or RM?

25, I still don’t know how to live well

For Namjoon and anyone in BTS, there is no simple answer to this question, as the nature of their job puts them in a position that makes it hard for them to develop a sense of self outside of the work they are doing. Even though Namjoon is part of an incredibly successful band, that doesn't mean he got it all figured out. As he has poured his youth and his energy into becoming the best performer he can be, he now feels like the Kim Namjoon behind the scenes deserves some energy and space to exist too.

Rap Monster and RM

Before Namjoon was RM, Namjoon was Rap Monster, a stage name that he used until November of 2017. The name Rap Monster fits the fierce and somewhat angst-ridden style of music that Namjoon was making in the beginning of his career. He decided to move on from the name in 2017 because it was no longer representative of him and the music that he was making.

In an interview with Entertainment Tonight Namjoon said that RM could stand for many things. He mentioned Real Me as one of the possibilities, but seems to prefer not to pin one specific meaning to the name.

In another interview with J-14 Magazine when asked what kind of advice he would give to himself in 2013, he said:

Hey Namjoon, Don’t name yourself Rap Monster. You’re a human. You’re not a monster. You’re a beautiful human.

Namjoon has often said that one of his missions in life is to love himself. This struggle to love himself often reflects in his lyrics, and now also in his decision to change his stage name, as the old one had some negative connotations to it. Perhaps Namjoons struggle with self acceptance, self worth and self love is one of the reasons that identity is such a big theme for him, as he is trying to figure out how to be a Namjoon that he can love. RM is a stage name that is more aligned with that goal as it leaves more room for flexibility and change.

Map of the Soul

The subject of identity is explored to the fullest in the Map of the Soul era that started with Map of the Soul: Persona in 2019, followed up by Map of the Soul: 7 in 2020.

Map of the Soul is inspired by the ideas of psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung. The words persona, shadow and ego that are used in Map of the Soul come directly from his theory. BTS uses these concepts to examine different parts of themselves and their career over time. A lot of this era feels like a final examination of the question that Namjoon has been asking himself in different ways throughout his entire career: Who am I?

In Intro: Persona, the opener to both albums, Namjoon writes about his journey with identity in the first few lines of the song:

“Who am I,” a question that I’ve been asking myself for my whole life

A question that I will probably never be able to find the right answer for

If I were answerable with only a few words,

God wouldn’t have created all those many beauties

Namjoon realizes that he will probably never have a clear answer to the question of “who am I?” and he accepts that. He recognizes that his identity can’t be summed up by a few words or traits and that this isn’t a bad thing. Sometimes it can feel more secure to build our entire sense of identity around one aspect of ourselves (I am a straight A student, I am an underground rapper) but that puts us in a position without flexibility and without space for growth. As different parts of ourselves clash with each other we end up feeling scattered, unsure of who we are, and angry at ourselves. It’s only when those different parts of ourselves are allowed to co-exist that we can find peace and a true sense of self.

BTS will talk about this idea in other songs too, like in Idol, where Taehyung sings:

There are tens and hundreds of myself within me

Today, I greet my another self

They are all me after all,

so I just run rather than worrying

The notion also comes back in the speech that BTS held for the United Nations in 2018. The final message of that speech was to find your name and find your voice by speaking yourself. There was a lot of talk about losing your identity as a young child in favor of fitting in, and Namjoon encouraged everyone to be their own person and to find their own voice back. Throughout the speech he mentions how he is both an idol and artist, Kim Namjoon and RM, and also just an ordinary 24 year old guy. He is saying that he can be many things at once and strives to love all those different parts of himself at the same time.

In the final verses of Intro: Persona, Namjoon boldly and confidently claims that he is no longer ashamed of the different parts inside of him, writing:

Yeah my name is R

The ‘me’ who I remember and who people know

The ‘me’ who I created by myself to speak my mind

Yeah, I might have been deceiving myself, I might have been lying

But, I’m not ashamed of it, this is the map of my soul

The lyrics continue, focusing on duality, complexity and balance within his identity, accepting the different parts of himself that coexist together even if they clash:

Dear myself

You must never lose your temperature

because you don’t need to be warm or cold

Though I might sometimes pretend I’m good and sometimes pretend I’m evil,

this is the barometer of my direction that I want to set

The ‘me’ who I want to be

The ‘me’ who people want

The ‘me’ who you love

And the ‘me’ who I craft

The ‘me’ who’s smiling

The ‘me’ who’s crying sometimes

Living and breathing every second, every moment, even now

Within these lyrics there is a tone of direction and intent rather than one of being lost and questioning. This tone is very strong throughout the entire Map of the Soul concept, especially in ON, suggesting that maybe “finding” your identity isn’t about anxiously defining every single part of your personality, it’s more about choosing who you want to be and boldly pursuing the world as an incomplete human being. In the end, there is no simple answer to the question of “who am I?” and that’s okay.

All lyrics translations come from Doolset. Visit the website for additional notes and interpretations of BTS lyrics.

[tarteausuga]

Home for Christmas

CW: just pure fluff, really. As fluffy and as soft as snow but not as cold. Idol! Mark Lee x reader. Johnny's there too but just as support.

WC: 3.3K

Summary: in which you're alone for Christmas and Mark tries to give you a gift to make you feel less sad.

A/N: Merry Christmas, everyone. Happy holidays if you don't celebrate Christmas. I hope you're all happy, healthy and safe. I'll also be taking a break from TBTC next week and posting something for New year's ✌️

Long distance relationships were hard but they had their good sides as well as bad. One good thing is that you had a lot of time for yourself but on the bad side, you often felt lonely whenever you're out and see people with their significant others. You never really had to spend money on dates but conversely, you never had a chance to go out and show off your boyfriend in public. The time difference often made it hard for you to talk but neither of you ever missed out on your calls.

Mark would call you first thing in the morning when you woke up. It would be midnight to him but luckily, he was a night owl and didn't mind keeping you company while you got ready for your day. Then, you would go about your day before calling him at 5pm, 9am his time, to do the same for him. He often spent his mornings at home before heading to the studio for practice or to write so it was ample time to catch up and just talk about random things. He liked to watch you cook and he often would watch something in Netflix with you. Sometimes you were lucky enough to have him talk you to sleep, or sing you a song he's been working on to send you off into your dream world.

It sounds perfect in a way. You're both able to focus on your lives during the day because the other is safely asleep but you craved the physical aspects. You wanted to be held, you wanted to hold his hand, hell you just wanted to eat a meal with him sitting across from you at the table instead of on a little screen.

The past year and a half has been spent like this. You were childhood friends, growing up together before he moved overseas. You often spent recess running around together and sharing snacks. He wasn't necessarily your best friend, but he was one of the few friends you had growing up and even to this day. It's not that you weren't social but you just preferred being by yourself a lot. You kept in touch with the few friends you did have and that was all you really needed.

It was a surprise to run into him given the circumstances on both ends. He was an incredibly talented and relatively famous Idol in another country; and you moved across the country for school but ended up staying there after landing a good job. You were aware that he would be performing with his group but it wasn't your scene. And you couldn't get tickets anyway since they sold out almost instantly.

Out on your lunch break, you were grabbing a midday iced coffee. But you were trying to juggle setting up meetings and calls with a few important people so you weren't really paying attention when you went to grab the coffee, thinking it was yours.

"Oh I'm sorry." Both you and the owner of that drink said.

Finally, you looked up from your phone at the man and for some reason, you had a feeling of familiarity with him. After squinting your eyes and trying to go through your roledex of people you've encountered in your life, your brain finally figured it out. "Mark?" You say with bewilderment.

"Oh my god! It is you!" He pulled you into an extremely tight hug. "I saw you but I couldn't really tell and I didn't want to go up to a random stranger." He laughed and you couldn't help but do the same. Mark always had that effect on people, he would laugh or smile and no matter who he was with, they would do the same.

"What are you doing here?" You ask, somehow completely forgetting that he was due to perform the next day, which he reminded you of. "Oh! That's really exciting." If you were honest, you were distracted by how he's grown up. He used to be this cute boy that you would trade your fruit snacks for cookies with. But now he was incredibly handsome but still had those captivating eyes that could make you melt.

"This is amazing, I can't believe we ran into each other like this." He pulled you into another hug that brought a blush across your face. You were in a daze as he introduced you to the 2 other guys with him but you didn't really catch their names. You just noticed that they were also incredibly handsome. "But hey, if you're free tonight, we should catch up!" You agreed, thankfully.

And you could say the rest was history but beyond that one fateful day/night, you haven't seen Mark. A full year and a half later, you were entering your second Christmas without him but unfortunately, you weren't able to go home to your family to distract yourself from the boy you wanted to be with during the holidays. Not usually the type to be into overly romantic gestures, you uncharacteristically were craving the experiences that couples usually had in the movies. Your sisters told you countless times to stop watching Hallmark Christmas movies but you really couldn't help it when there was nothing else to watch on TV.

December 23rd. You were staring at your miniature Christmas tree that you had bought for your small apartment. The rest of your apartment was fully decorated in an effort to fill the emptiness you felt but it didn't seem to help much beyond wishing that Mark were there to experience it with you.

It was a perfect Christmas, the snow was falling outside and you reminisced about that rare snow day you had in your West coast town. That day was incredible. It was Christmas Eve and the whole city shut down due to the influx of white that they rarely had to deal with. Mark had banged on your door and begged your parents to let you go out and play despite it being Christmas Eve. That day was spent building snowmen, having snowball fights and everything before everyone went home and passed out to wake up to a white Christmas.

Mark had expressed to you that he missed that the most. Those snow days where everything shut down and you could just go out and be free to run around and have fun. You wished to be able to send some snow to him. But instead, you called him.

"Hi baby, how are you?" He said in a gravely voice as he had just woken up.

"I'm okay, just miss you a lot." You pouted and he copied your expression. "But look!" You showed him the view outside your window, including the snow capped trees and pillows of white on any surface it could cling on.

"Oh my god, that's beautiful." He sighed. "I wish I could be there to see it with you. I hate that you're alone this year for Christmas."

"It's okay." You flash a weak smile. "My coworker is going to drop off some food for me from her parents. I'll just have a Harry Potter marathon."

"Okay. I'll join you for that." He smiles. "My present for you should be showing up soon. I hope it gets there before the 25th."

"Hard to say. Doesn't matter if it does or not, I'm just happy to get something from you." You ease him of his worries. He often got worked up over the smallest things and you found it cute the way he would furrow his eyebrows in frustration only to breathe a sigh of relief when you told him to do so. You were his comfort and he was yours. Even if you were thousands of miles apart.

"I have to get going, love. I'll talk to you later okay?" He says and you are confused as he usually never has nice to do before noon. But you shrugged it off and assumed he just had some year end things to work on.

"Yeah I'll talk to you later. I love you." You blew him a kiss and he did the same before hanging up.

To be honest with yourself, you were starting to hate saying goodbye. Your heart would feel so heavy whenever a call ended and recently, that feeling got worse and worse with every call. Things were starting to feel like they were all for nothing. You trusted Mark and knew him well enough to know you were the only one that would be on his mind but that physical aspect was something you were craving. The simplest things like just being in the same room while you were both quietly working on your own things, exchanging loving glances every so often.

You dozed off watching The Nightmare Before Christmas and was woken up on Christmas Eve by the blinding white of the snow capped exteriors. Confused, you searched for your phone to check the time: 9:27. Mark has never failed to call you at 8AM every single day. It was your routine. It was your ritual. You send him a message but his phone doesn't even receive it. Is his phone off? You ask yourself. He did sound a bit off yesterday… Or was he just tired and groggy? Maybe he's having a late night in the studio. He said he didn't have anything scheduled for a few days though. In an effort to mitigate your panic, you throw your phone to the other side of your bed.

Forcing yourself to roll out of bed and make some coffee to try to dull some of the panic you were feeling. He wouldn't just ice me out on Christmas Eve. He's probably just tired and fell asleep before he could call, you convinced yourself.

It was nearing lunch time and you still didn't hear from your boyfriend. You had spent the morning curled up on the couch watching Disney Channel Original Christmas Movies, trying to distract yourself but every time something romantic happened, you sighed and wished for Mark. His phone still wasn't receiving your messages. Had his phone died?

In desperation, you text the only other person you knew who was close with him: Johnny. You had met Johnny that day that you ran into Mark but never processed it until you began watching their performances on YouTube. Mark had given you Johnny's number so you could apologize for ignoring him but you would occasionally ask him for favours. Usually asking him to get something for Mark from you. He often said, "I only do this because I love Mark and you love Mark."

You [11:34AM]: Hey Johnny? Are you awake?

You [11:34AM]: Merry Christmas, by the way!

It was almost 4AM so you would be surprised if he was still awake but he often stayed up late with Haechan so you figured it was worth a shot.

Johnny [11:39AM]: what's up?

Johnny [11:38AM]: Merry Christmas to you too :)

You [11:40AM]: is Mark okay? I haven't heard from him since last night. I'm getting worried.

You watched as Johnny's message bubble appeared and disappeared a few times. He was hesitating…

Johnny [11:42AM]: he's fine. You'll probably hear from him soon ;)

You [11:42AM]: ?? What's that supposed to mean?

Johnny simply replied with a shrug emoji and you wished you could send a punch through a text message. But you sighed and continued sipping on your hot apple cider as you pressed play on another movie. Johnny doesn't lie so I'll believe him for now.

You had somehow fallen asleep and you only realized when you felt your phone buzzing next to you. Without even checking the caller ID, you press the green answer button and put it on speaker as you tried to pull yourself out of the afternoon nap haze.

"Hello?" You say, barely above a whisper.

"Hey baby, sorry I've missed your messages. Johnny said you were worried about me?" Mark's voice shook you awake. You scrambled to sit up before picking up your phone and taking it off speaker to hear him more clearly.

"Mark? Are you okay?"

He simply laughed, "I'm okay babe. I'm sorry for worrying you." He apologized again.

"No, it's okay. I was just worrying over nothing. What were you doing?"

"I was at the airport." He said and you could tell there was something up by the tone of his voice. Mark could never lie to you even if he tried.

"And?"

"And I need you to come pick me up." He teased and you became even more confused which made you a bit upset as you didn't like being led on.

"Mark I can't, you're in another country." You roll your eyes even though he can't see.

"Baby, I'm not. I'm here." And it finally clicked in your head.

"Wait! You're here? Like here? Like in the same city?" You try not to scream.

"Yes, exactly. I wanted to surprise you better but the snow delayed things…"

"It's okay I'll come now!" You practically yell into the phone.

"Drive carefully!" He warned you before hanging up.

Like a tornado, you tried to clean up your apartment so your boyfriend didn't think you were a complete slob. At the same time, you were trying to pick out a cute outfit and do your hair in an effort to make yourself look somewhat presentable.

With your best effort, you shrugged when you checked yourself in the mirror before pulling on your parka and heading out the door. As your car warmed up, you reminded yourself that Mark had seen you at your literal worst. From the late night mental breakdowns to a hungover morning from having a few too many drinks with your coworkers, Mark had seen it all and always assured you that you looked amazing. Maybe he was lying a few times during those moments but he never made you feel like you were anything less than perfect for him.

You did your best to drive calmly to the airport. There wasn't much of a choice as the other cars on the road were also trying to get to their destinations safely so traffic was moving at a slower pace. After what seemed like the longest car ride you've ever taken, you pulled into a parking stall at the airport and checked your phone to see that Mark had sent you the gate he was at, waiting for his luggage. You practically sprinted across the parking lot and road, having a few close calls with other pedestrians and a few cars. But you couldn't help yourself. You were finally getting to see him.

Arriving at his gate, you tried to catch your breath as you scanned the crowd around the baggage carousel looking for Mark. When the two of you finally made eye contact, you burst through the crowd and jumped into his arms. You thought you would tackle him down but he was surprisingly strong and not only caught you but picked you up, allowing your legs to wrap around him like a koala baby. People aw'd and some even clapped while others pulled out their phones to candidly capture your reunion.

"You're here." You choked back tears, breathing in his scent and making sure you locked it up in your memory for future use.

"I'm here." He breathed into your ear which triggered the tears to start falling. He placed you back on your feet but steadied you in the warmth and safety of his arms. He chuckled while he wiped your tears away, "why are you crying?"

"I don't know, I just missed you so much." You sniffled while looking up at him with wet eyes. It's been so long that you had forgotten that he was taller than you by more than a few centimeters. So when he leaned down to kiss you, you were surprised but also extremely comforted as a wave of warmth filled up the emptiness in your heart.

"My little crybaby." He placed another kiss on your forehead.

You clung on to each other until his suitcase dropped down from the chute. Hand-in-hand, you led him to your car. Amazingly, you navigated the whole way there while beaming up at Mark the whole time. He reciprocated but occasionally pulled you to the side to avoid running into someone else.

The car ride back to your apartment was just full of you two talking about anything and everything. From when he planned all of this and how he managed to get out of his activities to Johnny almost ruining the surprise when he struggled to say something that would both ease your worries but not let you in on the secret. The whole time, Mark's hand was on your thigh as you needed both hands to properly manoeuvre your car through the snow. You sometimes caught Mark looking outside with pure wonder and amazement as he took in the image of the city blanketed by the snow. The smile on your face never left as you tried to process every moment with him to keep in your memories.

"So how long are you staying?" You say as you take the elevator up to your apartment. His arm was wrapped around your shoulders and you had a feeling that your boyfriend who was usually uncomfortable with physical attraction, wouldn't keep a hand off of you the whole time he was there.

"I have to leave the day after Christmas." He says quietly.

Trying not to be upset by the short time together, you reminded yourself that it was better than nothing. "We'll make it work." You say simply to him while learning up to plant a kiss on his cheek.

Mark felt overwhelmed by your apartment. The moment he stepped in, he was greeted by the sweet scent of vanilla and oranges. He tried to take as many mental notes as he could while walking around and taking in every single detail of your place. This was your home and he felt like every little knick-knack strategically placed by you was a piece of you.

"Here." You handed him a cup of apple cider to warm up.

"Thank you." He added a kiss to your temple. Suddenly remembering something, he let out a little gasp before placing his cup down on the coffee table and going to his backpack. He pulled out a box wrapped in red paper and a golden bow that was slightly flattened from its journey to the other side of the world to you.

"What's this?" You ask when he places it in your hands, taking a seat next to you.

"Just open it." He smiles. The excitement was practically bursting from him as he anticipated you opening the box.

"Your gift is probably on the doorstep of your mom's place right now." You sighed.

"It's okay baby, I can't wait to open it but just open yours now." He said.

The lid lifted to reveal a necklace with a delicate golden chain and a little purple gem dangling from it. "Mark…" you coo, your eyes welling up with tears again.

"Are you going to cry again?" He laughs and you playfully poke his side. "I know purple is your favourite colour… It's not much but I thought you'd like it." He said softly while he fixed it around your neck. You smiled up at him before you situated yourself in his lap, straddling his thighs.

"It's perfect." You kiss him, "what else did you get me?" You pull back when he tries to deepen the kiss.

"What do you mean?" He stared blankly at you.

"You said it's not much so where's the rest of my present?" You say mischievously.

"You said it's perfect but you want more?" He cocks an eyebrow up.

"Well… I haven't seen you in a year and a half, there has to be more." You tease.

"I'm your present aren't I?" He smirks, grabbing the bow from the box and sticking it onto his head.

"I guess…" you laugh while leaning in to kiss him again. "You're lucky you're cute." You say as he stands up, making sure to wrap your legs around him before turning towards your bedroom.

[timextoxhajima]

Grounded: Level 3

Level 2 | Level 4

Member: Minho (Lee Know)

Genre: idol minho x idol trainee reader

Taglist: @jaehyvnsvalentine​​ @licorice526 @lolwhatameme @felixn-recs​​

[D E C E M B E R 2 0 1 8]

“Do you need me to g-”

“No, please stay.”

Yeonjun turns to look at you, eyebrows furrowing because he can hear the fear in your voice. By now, he’s probably figured out how one-sided you’re feeling about your friendship with Minho. He knows you’re suppressing a backhanded anger for Minho - as much as you’re aware he cannot consistently keep up with your life, it wouldn’t have been difficult for him to drop you a text every now and then. 

“Are you sure?” Yeonjun looks up at the person you’re staring at, the distance slowly shrinking as Minho makes up his mind to walk towards the two of you. “I don’t want to be interrupting something important.”

“But he’s not the one who’s been helping me in a time I really need someone,” The thought being verbalised after such a long time leaves a disgusting linger on your tongue. 

“Wait, y/n, what does that mean-”

“It means I want him to choose.”

Yeonjun’s frown is now deeper into his forehead. Minho is about twenty metres from you. 

“Choose? You can’t expect him to choose between you and his career-”

“Why can’t I?” You are just a few notes lower than actually shouting. He’s about ten metres away now. “It’s been a year and it’s like he doesn’t remember I exist anymore.”

Yeonjun’s dark orbs are faltering as Minho closes in. Then he chooses to say something that deals a last blow to your logic. 

“If he’s forgotten about your existence then he wouldn’t be walking here right now.”

The whiplash in your neck shoots bolts into your skull when you suddenly turn to Yeonjun, your breathing becoming labored as Minho stops just about a metre away from you. 

“Can we talk?”

The way his voice manages to overwhelm the noise from the crowd is stunning. Then again, you haven’t heard him actually speak to you in about a year; it makes your heart want to stick itself through your chest like the Alien. 

“I’m surprised you’re even allowed to walk around in public without bodyguards.”

From the corner of your eye, you note Yeonjun turning his head away in slight frustration or disapproval. Minho shuts his eyes for a moment, like he’s guilty and he’s mustering up the courage to continue. 

“Contrary to popular belief, Stray Kids has a long way to go.”

The awkwardness in the air stings your nerves like water through dry, cracked skin. 

“Can we please... talk? I just... I know that I haven’t been around, especially when you needed help with training.”

“There’s nothing to worry about. I have Yeonjun to help me.”

Using Yeonjun as a shield doesn’t make you feel any better though. Instead, it hurts you more when you notice the hurt that’s beginning to brew in Minho’s face, despite half his face being covered by his mask. 

“And I’m happy for you,” Minho glances at Yeonjun, whose face was slightly contorted with a mixture of frustration and disapproval. He’s going to kill you when you get back to BigHit, but not in front of a debuted idol; not in front of a crowd. “But... I just wish we could go back to the way we were-”

Minho’s voice falters, and it’s a heavy blow on your angry stance in his presence. Starting to hear your heart in your left eye socket, the eyelid starts to twitch, and you can feel your nerves beginning to pull you backwards - away from Minho. 

The conflict within you crushes you faster than you expected - if you were even prepared for it at all. 

I hate it that I was the one who pushed you for it. I hate it that I was the one who told you to keep going. I hate it that I was the one who got so happy when you finally reached your dream. I hate it that I was the one who got mad when you prioritised your career. I hate it that I was the one who understood why you did it. I hate it that I was the one who chose to press and pull and pinch this friendship until it’s hurting me. 

I hate it that it looks like it’s hurting you... more than it’s hurting me.

“I won’t be where I am without you. I wouldn’t be standing here, worried about people figuring out who I am... Had you not given me the strength to go back.”

But you’ve always been the one who’s given me strength, not me to you. 

“I just wish we had more time,” He’s shaking his head ever so slightly, eyes finally travelling down when he realises he cannot maintain his disintegrating pride. “Please... I can’t- I can’t lose you. You’re one my best friends and I just... I can’t meet up with you as often as I do with my male friends because we’d both be screwed by the public-”

“And so... You forget that texting is a thing? Calling, maybe?”

Yeonjun sucks in a deep breath and intervenes, unable to contain his discontent with the way the conversation was developing. “y/n, he’s busy. He’s got a bunch of schedules to handle when he’s not vlogging his own private life. Give him a break.”

“A break?” It hurts on your heart because you were no longer sure where this anger was coming from. “Yeah, damn right he got a big break.”

“y/n!” Yeonjun snaps angrily, finally grabbing on your arm and nearly manhandling you backwards, away from Minho, like you were a feral dog. 

Minho’s eyes are set on the way Yeonjun’s staring at you, while your tear-glazed eyes are flitting from Yeonjun to your best friend - or at least, who was once your best friend. 

You don’t realise it until Yeonjun’s grip on your arm is holding you still - your arm was already trembling from the sheer amount of emotions ripping through you in the face of Minho. 

“If you have nothing better to say, then have this conversation another day. Right now, you’re being an ass and I would’ve slapped you if we were related.”

Aggressively yanking your arm out of Yeonjun’s hold, you shift backwards and glare at Minho. Angry that he’s not spared the minimum effort to reach out to you, you turn before he can see the first tear fall from your eyes. 

From afar, you can hear Minho say something to Yeonjun, but his voice is washed out by the swarming crowd as you rush through it in a bid to run back to your safe haven - right back to somewhere you’ve been emotionally condemning Minho for going to. 

How ironic. 

Once out along the streets and a safe distance away from the night market, the cold, almost-freezing air is threatening to solidify your tears on your cheeks. The bus stop is desolate, one of those stops that nobody waits at: that was how far you had run from where the night market was. 

The familiar pattern of shoes rustling and shuffling against the floor rushes nearby, then finally slows down to a stop next to you. Your gloves are stained with the tears had stained your face when you recklessly wipe them away, not bothering about how people probably already recognise you as a BigHit trainee. 

Yeonjun’s breathing calms from running after you, and you can feel his gaze tear through you, though in a different way than what Minho did.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

A sniffle clogs your nose. “No.”

“He cares, you know,” A pause. The tears run. “But what you said to him back there...”

Out of the corner of your eye, you see him look down at his feet and shake his head, his slightly tousled hair from the rushing bobbing up and down. 

“It wasn’t fair to him.”

Yeonjun’s comment weighed a billion tons your heart, for you know in the deepest crevices in your chest that it, in fact, was not fair.

A wince prowls over your face as you provide some kind of effort into hiding the sudden contortion when the need to cry overwhelms you. It takes you awhile to notice that the gleams in your eyes were no longer just the tears but also the snow that’s landing on the floor around your feet. 

Eyebrows furrowed and eyes finally clenched shut, your lips part to suck in the deepest, coldest breath you’ve ever taken. It feels like you’ve single-handedly destroyed the most important friendship in your life and there’s nothing you could do about it.

The breath exhaled is a thick, almost cotton-like cloud as your head hangs lower and lower until you feel a heavy scarf come around your neck. Yeonjun’s questionable boots come before yours as he wraps his scarf around you, gently patting you on the crown of your head.

“I know you have feelings for him. It’s the only reason why you’re reacting like this.”

In attempt to hide your frustration, you shove your hands into your pockets and clench your fists under the thick layer of the gloves. 

“But like I said before, y/n... If you’re doing this for him and not for yourself, then this isn’t an option,” He finally releases the scarf and takes a small step back. “You sign that contract and you’ll need to go through Hell just to get out of it.”

Relentless now, the tears. The snot’s that’s running down your philtrum’s staining his scarf too but- he probably can’t care less. You can’t care less. He’s seen right through you like glass and Minho- of all people- can’t see through you the same way Yeonjun does. 

The sound of cars whizzing past and people walking by was strangely comforting, albeit the storms and thunder claps in your head and heart. You’ve just flushed your friendship with Minho down the toilet bowl, and there was probably nothing that could atone for it. 

“Come on,” He starts, just loud enough for you to hear. “Let’s head back. The members are around, your trainees too- Hey, I heard the Bangtan hyungs are coming back tonight to celebrate the New Year with us.”

Great, another reminder. 

“Right,” You sniffle loudly and carelessly wipe away your mucus and tears, forcing a smile out through all that tainted happiness. “Haven’t seen them in awhile.”

Yeonjun looks back at you with eyes that know how you’re feeling, and he offers you one of his arms for you to slide under so he could protect you from all the ache in your chest.

[F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 9]

스트레이키즈 현진 졸업식, '막내 아이엔이랑 왔어요'(Stray Kids, SOPA Graduation)

A scoff runs dry your lips, eyes travelling from the pixelated screen to the boy sitting next to you, swinging his legs childishly while sitting atop the railings. 

It’s fascinating, the way the school structured it’s pick up system. Idols or idol trainees could wait in a designated area for their respective vehicles or cars to come pick them up from the pick-up point - you were just lucky enough to know enough of these people to wait with them. 

“What?” Hyunjin whines, lips twisted downwards like those ‘colon and bracket’ sad faces. “It’s not my fault you watch so much Stray Kids’ content.”

Jeongin was fiddling with his sleeve when he finally looks up at you, and the boy decides to slap you across the face with words that you would’ve otherwise slapped him for.

“But don’t you only watch Lee Know hyung’s stuff?”

Hyunjin’s eyes dart to the younger, sucking his lips between in his teeth in a bid to hide his cheeky smirk. 

“Man’s got a point.”

“You two have a death wish.”

“Bye, Stray Kids!” You turn to see Daehwi and Woojin rushing for a black van. “Bye, y/n! I hope to see you on stage soon!”

“I’ll think about it!” Waving back aggressively, Daehwi giggles as he gets into the car after Woojin. 

Hyunjin, Jeongin and you wave at the passengers of the van as they drive off. Hyunjin was holding a bag full of bouquets whilst you were holding just two, one that Yeonjun and TXT had delivered and another from your fellow trainees. 

“You’re still thinking about that contract?”

“You make it sound like I’m thinking of buying a piece of clothing.”

“It’s just... you’ve gone so far. You’ve been training for- what? 2 years now? Stopping now would render your two years of training useless.”

“Look, I just need more time to... decide.”

Both boys turn to look at you, one obviously more aware of the situation than the other. Hyunjin’s brows are slightly furrowed when he can hear the weight in your voice.

His lips are parted just before he can say something, but a honk beeps him out of his train of thought.

“Oh! He’s here!” Jeongin hops off the railings and rushes to the side of the pavement. 

Hyunjin jumps off and turns to you first, eyes calming scanning your face that’s struggling to hide any hint of emotion.

“I think you should talk to him. He’s as upset and bothered about it as you are.”

Their pick-up stops right before Jeongin, who pulls open the door and climbs in first. 

Unable to set down your pride, you choose to look away, not noticing Hyunjin leaning into the car to get something before he climbs in himself.

“This,” He holds out a bouquet of roses and baby breaths wrapped in white and blue. 

For me?

“This is his apology. I think you have a part to play in this too.”

“Hyunjin-ah, time to go,” The manager calls out from inside, greeting you with a small wave from the drivers’ seat. Your smile is weak with the flowers in your hands, and Hyunjin gives you a gentle pat on the shoulder before he gets in the car again. 

Waving to Jeongin who was waving to you through the back window of the car, you can feel the weight of the flowers in your arm. After the car is out of sight, you look down and inspect the gift, picking out a small card with Minho’s handwriting on it. 

Happy Graduation! I hope you’re doing alright, and that you’re taking care of yourself well. I heard you’re still training at BigHit, and Yeonjun told Changbin that he’s debuting soon... which means he’s not around much to help you so, if you ever need help, you know who to look for.

Love, Minho 

Another horn blares you out of your raging calm - it’s your pick-up. Clutching the flowers tightly, there’s a growing desire to get to the point where he inspired you to work towards. 

[M A R C H 2 0 1 9]

Surprise 모두 기립 박수

Suicide squad 현실판에

Frightening Let’s get burning now

The adrenaline is rushing through you a thousand miles per hour, any more and you could probably phase through a wall or something. It looks satisfying in the mirror, probably later when you monitor your progress but right now, all you were worried about were your arm angles and how your head isn’t moving according to the be--

Click

Two familiar heads of brown locks strut into the practise room, completely not fazing your lonesome performance in the sickening room. 

“Wow, ATEEZ?” Soobin chuckles as he walks in after Yeonjun. 

“I- It’s a- It’s a good song to practise my- stamina-” This last San bit is a pain in the ass.

“But an ATEEZ song?” Yeonjun winces at you through the reflection in the mirror as he watches you thud to the floor at the end of the performance. The music comes to a halt, slightly echoing in the studio. “It’s like you’re practising for a marathon.”

 “Well,” There is an apparent struggle to catch your breath while you remain on the floor, eyes looking up at the two boys. “Let’s just say if it’s one thing I’m getting an A for tomorrow at my evaluation, it’s going to be dancing, so...”

“That sounds like you,” Soobin nudges Yeonjun as he stretches a palm out for you to take. 

“Whoa,” Strutting over to your bottle by the mirror, you pull the cap off and raise a teasing brow at Soobin. “I don’t think you can ever compare me with the top trainee of BigHit.”

Soobin giggles at Yeonjun rolling his eyes in the mirror, just short of hurling something at you before he tackles you over and messes up your sweaty hair. But TXT was so well-received in their debut, it almost hurt to believe that you could be debuting as their first sister group. 

“How are your vocals and rapping? Didn’t you say they’ll only make you do monthly evaluations after you sign the contract?” The plastic bag that you didn’t notice from before gets taken away by Soobin, and he fishes out some bottles of energy drinks and some sandwiches.

“I could be better at singing... I assume... Yeah, no- I... I asked for the monthly evaluations.”

“What?” Soobin’s eyes are adorably enlarged, twice their original size. “Are you nuts? Just what have you gotten yourself into? My God, you’re even dumber than I thought.”

“I would second that,” Yeonjun points to you after pointing to Soobin with his thumb over his shoulder. “But, it’s a great way to maintain your progress.”

Then he goes over to sit down next to Soobin near the sound system. “Got anything you need help with?”

“Uh...” Running your fingers through your greasy hair, you rest your free hand on your hip, running the songs through your head like an archive. 

“Are you performing 3 songs for each category or- You’re not singing, rapping and dancing to ATEEZ, are you?!”

“The Hell- No!” You chuckle and wave the nonsensical conclusion off. 

“Oh, thank God,” Yeonjun clutches his chest. “Else, you could probably pack up and move out of your dorms by tomorrow evening.”

“If it’s one thing I’m getting that A for, it’s dancing. So... I could get all the help I could get.”

Yeonjun strolls towards the sound system where the player was, scrolling through the list of songs that were most commonly played. 

And so, Yeonjun and Soobin watch you slide across the floor while performing an EXO song, sing a song from HONNE, and completely forgo the rap section. Soobin’s tears of laughter stained the floorboards as Yeonjun rushes after you in a bid to tackle you and ruffle your already messy hair, because how dare you forget that rapping is a thing!

When they leave for their own training, the coolness of the studio finally sinks in after another long day. Your earbuds are finally useful now, after hours and hours of nothing but loud blasting so you can deafen and annoy yourself with the same songs over and over. 

난 알고 있어도 날 볼 수가 없어

답답해 제발 딱 한 번만

The studio lights are still finding some way to seep through your lids despite them being shut, and his voice feels like you’ve been pulled through Hell just to reach Heaven. But the lyrics have etched itself into your brain like carvings into stone, and it keeps you awake at night. 

Maybe you were overthinking, feeling all his emotions in those two lines he got in that song. But you heard something, even if it was just in your head, it was something.

He looks different now. The way he’s on stage, the way his nerves shift along with the beat, the way his voice comes out louder but still quieter than his heart and the thoughts in his head. He was never one to actually vocalise his feelings until he hits his tipping point... so, it’s a new kind of sour or bitter or all the tastes you dislike that lingers on your tongue. 

Lee Minho, you are one of a kind. 

Tiredness gets the better of you when you are aware you’re slowly drifting off to sleep. Your muscles have ached to the point where you no longer feel the pain; they just feel numb. The world starts to feel lighter, even if its the tiniest bit, as the exhausting slumber claims you...

Thus, it’s a startling surprise when you are jolted out of your sleep by someone tapping on your shoulders, and you are sure your eyes are bloodshot. 

“Oh, y/n!” It’s Jung Hoseok, J-Hope of BTS. “My God, did you sleepover?!” 

“Oh- I-” You pull your phone out of your pocket, realising it’s dead. “I guess I did... What time is it?” 

Hoseok immediately helps you up to your feet when he sees you struggling to get up, hair messy and smelling disgusting, probably. “Um, it’s 11am.”

“WHAT-” Hoseok hops back in surprise when you nearly yell in his face, and you fumble around to collect your things to return to the dorms to wash up, only for you to come back and continue before you were royally screwed over by the judging panel. “11?! I have an evaluation at 2pm!” 

“Wait, y/n! Didn’t you ask for this evaluation yourself? There isn’t a need to worry if you can’t make it for an unofficial one-”

“No, but I- I worked hard for this-” Grabbing your speaker and phone and charger and earpiece and earbuds and clothes and knee guards, you can feel the stress building up like Jenga in your stomach. “I can’t not get that A for dance at least-”

Then you are one feet out of the studio before you abruptly run into someone, nearly smashing your shoulder into the unknown stranger. 

That is, until you look up in a bid to apologise out of politeness.

But then there it is again, those dark brown feline eyes. It’s like you’ll never escape them; it’s like you’d always run into them when you least expect to. 

“Minho.”

He blinks, obviously surprised.

“y/n,” He glances above your head, possibly looking at J-Hope, before looking back down at you. “Are you... okay? You look like-”

“Shit?”

Minho purses his lips, unable to contain the little smirk that surfaces in the corner of his mouth before he panics and covers the bottom half of his face. Even you weren’t sure if you were making a joke about yourself, or that you were genuinely trying to rub it in his face that your friendship was as good as gone. 

“I was... going to say exhausted. But I assume you already know that?”

Tired, you run your hand through your slightly greasy hair, your bag slung messily over your shoulder. “Yes, I’m aware. And I have an evaluation to worry about in three hours so... I gotta bolt.”

It feels like you’re trying to shift mountains, looking at him in the eye. He isn’t that much taller but there’s definitely something different about him. Not to say that he was looking down on you, but he now walks with confidence on his shoulders and pride in his heart, and no matter how much you detested him for forgetting that you existed, you were happy for him. 

But of course, you’re prideful yourself, so you choose to look down and walk away from him. 

It’s time to worry about myself. 

[fantasticwolfpenguin]

Short and Sweet: An Introduction/Letter

Getty/Kevin Mazur. Sag awards 2018

This is a letter I wrote and posted on LinkedIn (on October 21, 2020) of all things just to see if anything happened. Nothing much happened so I'm reposting it here. I am techinically working on two papers related to this, one on his stage plays and the other one which this is suppose to be an intro to.

A short letter putting into context my thoughts about Chadwick Boseman. This is also a sample introduction to a larger paper I am working on. (~5 min read)

On September 1st, 2020, Michael B. Jordan’s Instagram posted some messages as well as photos about Chadwick Boseman’s death. One of the quotes that was repeated was “I wish I had more time”. Prompting to remember these lines in the Disney’s “Hamilton”, in “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story” and I also distinctly remember one of the important lines of the musical: “Legacy. What is legacy? It’s planting seeds in a garden you never get to see” from “The World Was Wide Enough”. Other than being devout Christians, I think the similarities between Hamilton and Chadwick Boseman ends in this musical written by Lin Manuel Miranda or does it? I do have some nice pictures in my mind of Black Panther standing on the rotating stage and Killmonger reading those lines though.

As my last year of undergraduate courses, I have spent the beginning of the semester planning to write more. I decided to write this in an attempt to dodge the heavy responsibilities of knowing I have a Physics discussion worksheet due in a couple hours. I am an entomology undergraduate student, writing biographies is not my forte. I just wanted to see how long I could go with research about a Christian man I don’t even know. That’s enough about me.

It’s only been about a week and a half since his shocking death on August 28th, 2020 and I have been up some nights just trying to figure out how to start this. Do we start from when he was a major success and became a household name? Or do we start from his first role which subsequently got replaced because he was a teenager that complained about the lack of diversity in Hollywood? I thought about late 2019 to the beginning of 2020, where the cancer became visual. The posts and videos of people mocking him for his looks.

“The internet is forever” (as is Wakanda) as they say especially for a celebrity who is not entitled to let you know everything in their private lives. I did not have an Instagram, but I remember some snippets of news, and maybe I did agree back then he did look unfamiliar and thinner. What people don’t often remember was the context of the video, which has since been reuploaded onto YouTube. It was a message about supporting frontline workers, but ultimately. His second to last public appearance was after the death of Kobe Bryant as a guest star of The Shop presumably filmed some time in February 2020. What happens between those appearances is too striking. It makes me wonder further those following months that led to the end of August must have been heartbreaking. Yet instead of focusing on his message, the internet decided to talk about how frail he looked and presumably how he would continue his role as a Marvel superhero. This resulted in some cyberbullying and which leads me to my next point because of these reactions, what happens between April - August are a direct result of this. Barely anything is known and cutting a man’s pride resulted in people like me wondering things.

As nobody except a few people on this planet could even answer my questions, my curiosity continues to grow. What essentially, I want to answer is things the dear reader cannot like, what or if he ever wrote before his passing. I think we do not deserve those parting words and maybe that’s why I am writing this. It haunts me deeply that the actions of others lead to a selfless man to close off. I would say this is more of a work of faith wondering more about and what this journey would take me. It seems like his Instagram was the main source of things showing strong support of BLM and frontline workers. This makes the impact of the post made August 28th more shocking. If I am lucky, I want to actually ask questions and record answers to those who knew him, but this is truly a blind pursuit. Though when it is now socially acceptable to conduct everything through technology, who knows what happens.

I will try to summarize some main points known about Chadwick’s life and career. The other parts of this biographical essay will be about choices he made in characters seem more death oriented after assumed diagnosis in 2016. This paper was to look deeper into some feelings I had about the importance of a select number of his roles. In my hopes that there would be more aspiring young people who could look further past the check and into the impact they give to others.

-Sept. 7th, 2020

As someone that countless people look up to, his death came as a shock to millions. This is because Chadwick Boseman tried to give as much as himself to others every day. What you have just read were my feelings put into words, about a week after his death. I am currently planning to put something larger together, but it is akin to having a puzzle dipped in hues of purple, gold, and black, but the backing is missing in a sense. Although some of the backing may be missing, but I understand that the people who have it need it at the moment. They should keep it as long as they like, but if I had the backing it would certainly satiate my curiosity. I imagine the backing is not made of cheap cardboard, but careful layers of silk, warming the minds and hearts on whoever gleams upon it. I would say the backing is in less pieces than I initially thought and is held by the few people. This is mostly because in life, he kept to his tight knit circle. My hope in writing this is that one day, I could see the other things he was capable of: the writing, the singing, and the art more profound than we already have. In a way, my start is having to stay with what others have written such as the recent articles written after his death.

Afterall, he was an important part of the black community whether or not people knew him personally. Even if unable to see it in his lifetime, the dream of a society where spirituality, diversity, and technology fulfilled the needs of disenfranchised people. That dream is important to me as well and adds to the reasoning of me writing other than catharsis. The choices in roles he made, and career were also a direct result of this worldview that connects to the possible goals of this country. This hypothetical paper will be the big shiny puzzle put together as well as I could. The reader is to find some pieces missing, it may be entirely of my fault, yet there is so much, maybe it is worth searching for.  If anyone would like to help me with this endeavor or would like to talk to me about this, let me know, I still am collecting my thoughts and have many notes and thank you for taking your time to read this.

Sources

Jordan, Michael B. “I’ve been trying to find the words…” Sept. 1st. 2020. Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/p/CEkpoYcgi43/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link Accessed Oct. 17th. 2020.

[elizabeth-mitchells]

the only touchstone of truth - I Care A Lot (2021) - Fran/Marla

Chapters: 4/? Fandom: I Care A Lot (2020) Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Fran/Marla Grayson Characters: Marla Grayson, Fran (I Care A Lot) Additional Tags: Canon Compliant, Canon Lesbian Relationship, Origin Story, Canon Backstory, First Meetings, First Kiss, First Dates, Getting Together, Morally Ambiguous Character, Illegal Activities, Eventual Smut, Flirting, Partners in Crime, crime wives

Chapter 4:

Ever since that first day, when Fran caught her destroying her own shop in order to incriminate the enemy, she always found Marla to be a completely breathtaking woman. But this was a whole different level. When the big day finally arrived, Marla showed up to court ready to kill. She was wearing what Fran would’ve bet was a brand new suit that, much like the restaurant she visited, Marla probably could only afford out of sheer confidence in the fact that she knew she deserved luxury. Her striking blue eyes looked as brilliant as ever, mischievous when she met the other woman’s gaze, but ready to turn innocent and falsely vulnerable in front of the judge. However, this time Fran couldn’t tear her attention away from one very specific thing about Marla: her new haircut. Gone were the soft waves that fell lovingly over her shoulders. The short bob haircut was all about sharp edges, not a single blonde hair out of place, and it perfectly complemented Marla. Fran thought the new style was so on point that soon enough it would be difficult to even remember the way Marla looked before. And, like maybe things about Marla, Fran thought it was like an extremely sophisticated and gorgeous piece of armor that no anybody could completely decipher.

“Marla,” she greeted her outside of court with a grin on her lips to disguise the way her mouth suddenly felt dry at the sight of the blonde woman, “you look good.”

Not one for fake humility, Marla returned the smile, “Right?” she shook her blonde hair off her face, “Dress for winning, it’s a thing.”

“I already feel like a winner,” Fran couldn’t hold back her smile as she followed Marla inside the building.

“Will you behave ,” Marla retorted, looking at her over her shoulder with a teasing look, “at least until the trial is over?”

“I can’t make such promises,” the brunette laughed, walking just a little too close to Marla, just for the pleasure of hearing Marla’s chuckle in response and, yes, maybe also for the pleasure of standing so close to her. If Fran was being honest, she was more than a little excited to witness the trial. It was Marla’s first time in court but she could already tell it would be, not only a great success, but incredibly entertaining, exciting, even fascinating, considering Fran would be aware of Marla’s lies, tricks, manipulation of the facts, and frighteningly good acting.

They were ready for the show.

---

The thing is, judging by the way Marla walked away from the court that day, hardly anybody would have guessed that she just lost her case. Marla lost. She lost the case against the massive company that put her lawful little shop out of business in the blink of an eye. It wasn’t even for honest reasons, like discovering that she incriminated them, no. She lost because there was money in between, hanging from a thread in front of the judge’s head like a carrot taunting him to go for the best bidder. She lost, not because she played dirty, but because the game was already rigged, and there were better, or worse depending on where you stand, players ahead of her. Not for long , she bitterly told herself, walking the long hallways with her head held high, jaw clenched, demeanor perfectly controlled, blond hair swaying only slightly.

“Marla.”

And then there was the voice that made her feel perfectly uncontrolled by simply calling out her name.

“Not now, Fran,” she whispered, aware that she could only keep her strong and unaffected facade for so long.

“ Marla ,” Fran repeated her name, somehow managing to sound firm and gentle at the same time. This time she caught up with her, and added a tentative touch to the other woman’s elbow.

Marla gritted her teeth. She couldn’t afford to lose her cool in public. She highly doubted she’d cry for this misstep. She didn’t think she’d lose her temper either, not exactly. But a breakdown was just waiting to happen. All she needed was an escape and, luckily, she knew the right spot for it. She couldn’t believe that there, out of all places, she could think of a safe place to land. Though, then again, maybe it wasn’t about the secluded hallway where she’d first kissed Fran. Maybe it was all about Fran’s company. Either way, silently, the two women made their way to that secret spot once more, even if this time their spirits were the entire opposite to those of the previous occasion.

This time Marla was the one to lean her back against the wall. She didn’t look completely defeated, not even when there was Fran in front of her, with worried eyes staring at her. But she did look exhausted. It was a look that didn’t exactly fit with the image Fran had of Marla Grayson in her mind.

“Are you okay?” Fran asked first. As an answer, she received a particular look from the blonde that she wasn’t all capable of deciphering just yet, but at least she understood two things. One, she wouldn’t get much more of an answer. Two, she desperately wanted to get to that place where she would be beyond capable of reading Marla’s silents looks effortlessly. “I’m sorry,” she blurted out next, “I should have… I should have warned you, I guess. This happens all the time, it’s never fair, really. Justice is bullshit, Marla, really. I just thought, I really thought-”

“I’m sorry about your money, Fran,” Marla stopped the younger woman in her tracks with her words and the movement of her hand toward Fran’s cheek. It was obvious that neither of them would get any money out of this failed plan.

“Don’t worry about that,” Fran’s frown deepened and she shook her head just lightly but still Marla dropped her hand and she instantly missed the contact. There was a heavy silence between them. No money. No celebration. No case to prepare for. This couldn’t be an ending for them, could it? “What are you going to do now?” Fran asked carefully. Marla had been clear on the fact that she’d have to close her shop either way.

“Now?” Marla took a deep breath and straightened in place. Wearing her high heels she was just slightly taller than Fran, so she could lean down and leave a heart-stoppingly intimate kiss on the corner of the other woman’s lips. “I need to leave,” she whispered, finally a hint of pain cracked its way to the tone of her voice, and she immediately started taking the steps that would take her away from there, alone.

“Wait,” Fran said, turning around quickly and reaching out to hold Marla’s hand. She had to think, and quickly.

The two of them were almost complete opposites in some ways, but they also shared a great deal of things in common. Neither of them was sure if this was a blessing or a curse, if it made their interaction perfect or impossible. Fran knew that for nobody else she would have offered her hand this way, so soon, so easily. But in this situation, one of them had to.

“I still care about you, okay?” Fran confessed, squeezed Marla’s hand once, then let her go.

---

There was a lot of driving. That’s how Fran would describe the couple of days immediately after the failure at the court. She had quite a few errands to run and things to take care of, but she also simply enjoyed the driving around. When she drove her bike it was easier to quiet down her racing thoughts. Half of her mind on the road, and half of it on one issue at a time. There were plenty of issues though. Most of them had the indelible mark of one Marla Grayson. That might have been the reason that on so many of those long bike rides to clear her thoughts, the only thing Fran really achieved was failing to fool herself into thinking it was an accident how often she drove past Marla’s shop.

Three days later, she finally had a reason to stop by.

They were clearly emptying the store. It was mostly just Marla and Curtis with a truck waiting outside. By the time Fran parked, Marla noticed, and stood still outside the shop, observing the process, the death of her American dream. At first sight, Fran thought Marla still was the most beautiful woman she’d ever met. She was wearing comfortable clothes, her short hair held back in a little ponytail, and she’d clearly been working for a while. Fran wouldn’t say Marla looked like she was back to herself, back to the person she was before the fiasco at the court. That wouldn’t have been truthful. There was a significant change in Marla Grayson, Fran just had to figure it out. However, she did look strong and brilliant as ever, so she took that as a good sign as she approached her.

“Moving out?” Fran blurted out. She slowly walked closer, tilted her head, and squinted her eyes, the sun was unforgiving that day.

“I couldn’t have run a vape shop my whole life I guess,” Marla gave a half-hearted shrug in response. This wasn’t their best way to greet each other, they weren’t at their best, and the uneasiness around them was suffocating.

“Some you win, some you lose,” the brunette mumbled. It was nothing, a mindless repetitive phrase, but she should have seen the answer coming. Either way, she was glad to hear it.

“I don’t lose, Fran,” the other woman turned to look at her. “I won’t lose,” Marla added, looking back at the front of her dead store.

Fran nodded, holding back a smile, “Alright.”

This moment wasn’t entirely different from that first day. Attraction, chemistry, magnetism, something had pulled them to each other. Something had told them that if they could have easily gone to bed together that first night, maybe all could have ended the next morning. Something had clicked in their minds on that first conversation that convinced them that the other one was worth more than that. So they held back, and held on to each other, but how much longer could they wait before either giving up or crossing a line. Because their desire was obvious, but at this point, the risks were just as unavoidable. There was too much on the line, they were each getting too close to hearts that had chosen not to let anyone else in. One peek past the curtains they each held over the parts of themselves that weren’t carefully crafted weapons to face the world on that personal battle they each had picked, and it could all come crumbling down. How could they dare to try vulnerability? What if they liked it? How could they let each other in? How could they trust, and care? What if it worked? Going after something that could be perfect was too much of a risk. It would be easier to let go.

The problem, or rather salvation, was the fact that every time the idea of giving up popped in her mind, Marla was fiercely reminded of the fact that she simply doesn’t give up. She doesn’t lose. She’s determined to be successful. She’s confident in her ability to go for what she wants, but this one situation is way beyond that, isn’t it? Can she keep something, someone , and care for her as fiercely as she knows she could if only she wanted to? Could Fran be the one success she wants and needs more than she even realizes? Would Fran even want that?

This time it was Marla who reached out and caught Fran’s hand in hers and turned to look at her with unusual sincerity lighting up her blue eyes. “Thank you for everything, Fran,” she said.

The smile that Fran sent her way then was enough to make every risk worth it. “Don’t need to thank me,” Fran squeezed her hand once and started to pull away, seemingly satisfied with this interaction. It looked like both of them had reached a new understanding of what they wanted. “I’ll let you get back to work,” Fran added, not overjoyed to let go of the other woman’s hand.

“Oh, you’re not staying to help?” Marla called after her, a smile appearing on her lips.

Fran sent a playful grimace in the way of the shop. “Maybe next time,” she replied. They both laughed. Assuming Marla would have another business go bankrupt or not, either way, Fran would consider herself lucky to return and help her. “Call me,” she added, just a little more seriously, even if they were both still wearing matching smiles, “ when you’ll get in trouble again.” No need to pretend this was an “if”  kind of situation.

---

The clothes were convenient. Marla just happened to have black pants and a black sweatshirt. The plan though, the plan was perfect, she knew that from the start. Of course, she hadn’t played fair from the beginning, but no one could know just how far she would go to come out as a winner. However, the fire behind her might be a good sign.

Marla simply couldn’t hold back her grin as she sneaked away from the big building. It had been surprisingly easy to set fire to the company that had ruined her business, now it was just a matter of finding out just how flammable vaping products were. She’d crafted a perfect plan, so she could pull it off only with Curtis’ help. The only trick was walking away separately, in opposite directions.

The fire, smoke, and the alarms behind her were a perfect backdrop and Marla had almost made it out and away from the crime scene when on the last alleyway she was thrown down to the ground.

“Fuck,” Marla cursed, ignoring the questions that the man, likely a security guard that was way too late to do his job, was trying to ask her. The fall wasn’t too bad, but he was raising his fist, and if he started to punch or kick her there on the ground, it couldn’t end well.

That’s when they were both blinded by sudden bright lights. There was an instant of panic in Marla’s heart, fearing she’d been too slow, she’d failed, the police had arrived first. Did they catch Curtis too? Was this her end?

“Hey, step away from her!” Fran yelled as she pushed the man away from Marla.

The man stumbled, but now that he was provoked he decided it was an excuse enough to hit two women. But he had no idea of the darkest tricks that Fran carried on her sleeve though. She was agile, clever, stronger than she looked like, and knowledgeable in exactly the right ways to leave a man unconscious in a matter of seconds without causing much damage.

There was a bit of silence after the stranger’s body hit the ground. Then Marla exclaimed, “Fran!” She sounded delighted, a little out of breath, completely marveled.

Marla was still on the ground, she’d observed the struggle with wide eyes, a glowing smile and, at first, a pang of fear for the other woman’s safety that later she would realize was a sign of how deep in trouble she truly was.

“Did you call for a ride?” Fran said to her, offering a hand to help her get up, “Couldn’t get you a getaway car, I hope my bike will be enough.”

She barely had time to finish her sentence. As soon as Marla was on her feet and eye to eye with the brunette she pulled her in into a long-overdue kiss. Her lips latched onto Fran’s eagerly, mindless of trying to mask how badly she wanted this. It was incredible the way relief and excitement sparked up like fireworks when their lips touched, again and again.

“Thank you,” Marla sighed, pulling back for a moment to stare in awe at the woman in her arms, gently brushing Fran’s wild hair off her face.

Fran tilted her head, held Marla closer, and said, “Arson, huh? Didn’t think that was your style.”

“I’m full of surprises.”

“I see,” Fran mumbled, their lips already meeting again. She couldn’t get enough of Marla, her lips moved instinctively, without holding back at all. Almost at the same time, they started to hear police sirens in the distance. “ Someone ,” Fran stole another kiss and pulled away, “should arrest you right now.”

Marla demanded another kiss, and when she slowly pulled away, her teeth teasingly pulled on Fran’s bottom lip. “You,” Marla whispered. She got somewhat distracted by moving to kiss down Fran’s jaw, then focusing on her neck, losing her mind over the sigh that escaped the woman’s lips, which in Marla’s mind sounded perfect coupled with the police sirens in the background. “Did you forget your handcuffs, officer?” Marla added in a playful tone, her hands desperately pulling Fran closer to her.

“I quit the police, Marla,” Fran announced with a breathy laugh prompted by a particular bite on her neck.

The news forced Marla to pull away, and this time she looked at Fran without even the slightest effort at disguising her desire. “Take me home right now,” Marla said very slowly, the sirens were getting closer.

Fran leaned in again and kissed her, much slower, not any less passionately. Her hand rested on Marla’s cheek, her nails grazed her gently. When she pulled back she was wearing that perfect smirk that drove the blonde crazy. She held Marla’s hand and pulled her toward the bike waiting behind them.

“It’s a better alibi for you if we go to my house instead,” Fran winked.

They drove away just as the police pulled over on the other street, completely oblivious to the couple of women that would get away that night with one of many little crimes they would commit together in their lifetime.

[stuckinapatriarchalbullshitland]

🕊 Melville and Hawthorne

I remember when one of our mutuals received submission from an anonymous named Dove. I remember that insider mentioned many things about the girls but he also spoke about a particular character whose life caught my attention. Herman Melville. Melville was a New York poet who fell madly in love with another writer named Nathaniel Hawthorne. They had a very intense love affair, but it had to be hidden because it was the 19th century and homosexual love was forbidden. But it was not forbidden to write about it. This is an article from the page:

https://www.brainpickings.org/2019/02/13/herman-melville-nathaniel-hawthorne-love-letters/

Herman Melville’s Passionate, Beautiful, Heartbreaking Love Letters to Nathaniel Hawthorne:

“Your heart beat in my ribs and mine in yours, and both in God’s… The divine magnet is in you, and my magnet responds.”

BY MARIA POPOVA The summer when nineteen-year-old Emily Dickinson met the love of her life — the orphaned mathematician-in-training Susan Gilbert, who would come to be the poet’s greatest muse, her mentor, her primary reader and editor, her fiercest lifelong attachment, her “Only Woman in the World” — another intense, label-defying love was igniting in the heart of another literary titan-to-be some fifty miles westward. That other love unfolds alongside Dickinson’s in Figuring — a book I wrote to explore, among other existential perplexities, the bittersweet beauty of asymmetrical and half-requited loves. (This essay is adapted from the book.)

On August 5, 1850, Herman Melville met Nathaniel Hawthorne at a literary gathering in the Berkshires. Hawthorne was forty-six. The achingly shy, brooding writer, once celebrated as “handsomer than Lord Byron,” had risen to celebrity a decade earlier, much thanks to a glowing endorsement by Margaret Fuller. Melville — whose debut novel had rendered him a literary star in his twenties — had just turned thirty-one.

Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne A potent intellectual infatuation ignited between the two men — one that, at least for Melville, seems to have grown from the cerebral to the corporeal. Within days, the young author reviewed Hawthorne’s short story collection Mosses from an Old Manse in Literary World under the impersonal byline “a Virginian Spending July in Vermont.” No claim of this intentional ambiguity was true — Melville was a New Yorker, the month was August, and he was spending it in Massachusetts.

The review, nearing seven thousand words, was nothing less than an editorial serenade. “A man of a deep and noble nature has seized me in this seclusion… His wild, witch voice rings through me,” Melville wrote of reading Hawthorne’s stories in a remote farmhouse nestled in the summer foliage of the New England countryside. “The soft ravishments of the man spun me round in a web of dreams.” Melville couldn’t have known that his allusions to witchcraft, intended as compliment, had disquieting connotations for Hawthorne. Born Nathaniel Hathorne, he had added a w to the family name in order to distance himself from his ancestor John Hathorne — a leading judge involved in the Salem witch trials, who, unlike the other culpable judges, never repented of his role in the murders. Unwitting of the dark family history, Melville found himself under “this Hawthorne’s spell” — a spell cast first by his writing, then by the constellation of personal qualities from which the writing radiated. Who hasn’t fallen in love with an author in the pages of a beautiful book? And if that author, when befriended in the real world, proves to be endowed with the splendor of personhood that the writing intimates, who could resist falling in love with the whole person? Melville presaged as much:

No man can read a fine author, and relish him to his very bones, while he reads, without subsequently fancying to himself some ideal image of the man and his mind… There is no man in whom humor and love are developed in that high form called genius; no such man can exist without also possessing, as the indispensable complement of these, a great, deep intellect, which drops down into the universe like a plummet. Or, love and humor are only the eyes, through which such an intellect views this world. The great beauty in such a mind is but the product of its strength.

After comparing Hawthorne to Shakespeare, he writes:

In this world of lies, Truth is forced to fly like a scared white doe in the woodlands; and only by cunning glimpses will she reveal herself, as in Shakespeare and other masters of the great Art of Telling the Truth, — even though it be covertly, and by snatches./// This words came from the original 🕊 wrote

“I am Posterity speaking by proxy,” Melville bellows from the page, “when I declare — that the American, who up to the present day, has evinced, in Literature, the largest brain with the largest heart, that man is Nathaniel Hawthorne.” In an aside on the process of composing his review, he notes that twenty-four hours into writing, he found himself “charged more and more with love and admiration of Hawthorne.” Quoting an especially beguiling line of Hawthorne’s, he insists that “such touches… can not proceed from any common heart.” No, they bespeak “such a depth of tenderness, such a boundless sympathy with all forms of being, such an omnipresent love” that they render their author singular in his generation — as singular as the place he would come to occupy in Melville’s heart.

Hawthorne’s home, Old Manse. Concord, Massachusetts. (Boston Public Library.) Fervid correspondence and frequent visits followed over the next few months. Only ten of Melville’s letters to Hawthorne survive, but their houses were just six miles apart and they saw each other quite often — “discussing the Universe with a bottle of brandy & cigars,” as Melville put it in one invitation, and talking deep into the night about “time and eternity, things of this world and of the next, and books, and publishers, and all possible and impossible matters,” as Hawthorne recounted in his diary. Punctuating the invisible log of all that was written but destroyed is all that was spoken but unwritten, all that was felt but unspoken.

Melville’s ardor was most acute during the period of writing Moby-Dick, which he dedicated to Hawthorne. Printed immediately after the title page was “In Token of My Admiration for his Genius, This Book is Inscribed to Nathaniel [sic] Hawthorne.”

(The two lovers lived very close to each other, isn’t sounds familiar folks?)

Art by Matt Kish from Moby-Dick in Pictures: One Drawing for Every Page One November evening over dinner, a restlessly excited Herman presented Nathaniel with a lovingly inscribed copy of the novel whose now-legendary protagonist sails from Nantucket into the existential unknown. I can picture the brooding Hawthorne turning the leaf and suppressing a beam of delight upon discovering the printed dedication. In the following century, Virginia Woolf would perform a similar gesture with her groundbreaking, gender-bending novel Orlando, inspired by her lover Vita Sackville-West and later described by Vita’s son as “the longest and most charming love letter in literature.” On the day of Orlando’s publication, Vita would receive a package containing not only the printed book, but also Virginia’s original manuscript, bound specially for her in Niger leather and stamped with her initials on the spine.

But after the elated private presentation, a very different public fate awaited Moby-Dick. Its 1851 publication was met with a damning review in New York’s Literary World, which set the tone for its American reception and precipitated its decades-long plunge into obscurity. The reviewer’s chief complaint was that the novel “violated and defaced” “the most sacred associations of life”—an indictment aimed at the homoeroticism of Melville’s choice to depict Ishmael and Queequeg as sharing a “marriage bed” in which they awaken with their arms around each other.

Queequeg’s favorite dish, cooked and photographed by artist Dinah Fried for her project Fictitious Dishes: An Album of Literature’s Most Memorable Meals. Ten days later, Hawthorne lamented the obtuseness of the review and praised Moby-Dick as Melville’s best work yet. Touched to the point of delirium by this “exultation-breeding letter,” Melville hastened to reply:

Your heart beat in my ribs and mine in yours, and both in God’s… It is a strange feeling — no hopefulness is in it, no despair. Content — that is it; and irresponsibility; but without licentious inclination. I speak now of my profoundest sense of being, not of an incidental feeling.

Whence come you, Hawthorne? By what right do you drink from my flagon of life? And when I put it to my lips — lo, they are yours and not mine. I feel that the Godhead is broken up like the bread at the Supper, and that we are the pieces.

Aware of how his intemperate fervor might incinerate his relationship with the cooler-tempered Hawthorne, Melville reasons with himself for a moment, then chooses to abandon reason:

My dear Hawthorne, the atmospheric skepticisms steal into me now, and make me doubtful of my sanity in writing you thus. But, believe me, I am not mad, most noble Festus! But truth is ever incoherent, and when the big hearts strike together, the concussion is a little stunning.

After signing, he adds a feverish postscript:

I can’t stop yet. If the world was entirely made up of [magicians], I’ll tell you what I should do. I should have a paper-mill established at one end of the house, and so have an endless riband of foolscap rolling in upon my desk; and upon that endless riband I should write a thousand — a million — billion thoughts, all under the form of a letter to you. The divine magnet is in you, and my magnet responds. Which is the biggest? A foolish question — they are One.

The intensity proved too concussing for Hawthorne — he pulled away from the divine magnet. Melville seems to have presaged the eclipse of their relationship in the review in which the magnetism had begun:

It is that blackness in Hawthorne… that so fixes and fascinates me. It may be, nevertheless, that it is too largely developed in him. Perhaps he does not give us a ray of his light for every shade of his dark.

As Hawthorne retreated into his cool darkness, Melville suffered with the singular anguish of unreturned ardor—anguish that stayed with him for the remaining four decades of his life, for he eulogized it in one of his last poems, “Monody,” penned in his final year:

To have known him, to have loved him, After loneness long; And then to be estranged in life, And neither in the wrong; And now for death to set his seal — Ease me, a little ease, my song!

By wintry hills his hermit-mound The sheeted snow-drifts drape, And houseless there the snow-bird flits Beneath the fir-tree’s crape: Glazed now with ice the cloistral vine That hid the shyest grape.

Herman Melville in his final years. Meanwhile, the gaps of the invisible and the unspoken are filled with posterity’s questions about specifics that vibrate with the universal: What happened between Melville and Hawthorne in the unrecorded hours? Why did Nathaniel ultimately repel the divine magnet of Herman’s love? Most probably, we’ll never know. Possibly, they themselves never fully did. It is almost banal to say, yet it needs to be said: No one ever knows, nor therefore has grounds to judge, what goes on between two people, often not even the people themselves, half-opaque as we are to ourselves. One thing is certain: The quotient of intimacy cannot be contained in a label. The human heart is an ancient beast that roars and purrs with the same passions, whatever labels we may give them. We are so anxious to classify and categorize, both nature and human nature. It is a beautiful impulse — to contain the infinite in the finite, to wrest order from the chaos, to construct a foothold so we may climb toward higher truth. It is also a limiting one, for in naming things we often come to mistake the names for the things themselves. The labels we give to the loves of which we are capable — varied and vigorously transfigured from one kind into another and back again — cannot begin to contain the complexity of feeling that can flow between two hearts and the bodies that contain them.

_____

I don't think I can add anything to what Maria described that doesn't remind me of Camren. Or Camila. Sometimes I feel that Lauren and Camila are two reincarnated souls of former lovers who could never live their love in freedom, even these days. Where the love between homosexual couples will always be condemned and criticized and hated and will have to continue living in the shadows having only freedom in song lyrics, in poetry, literature, cinema. How much more time will it take for those ancient reincarnated lovers to live in freedom? In how many more generations can they really be free? I do not know. I only know that I hope I don't die before I get to see it Thanks Dove, whoever you were for showing us that story. If you read this, we are still here supporting the girls and that hidden love.

[kpop-zone]

Red Velvet reaction to meeting their s/o at their debut after they broke up

Irene

Irene was still not over the breakup even though it had been months already. You had broken up with her because she couldn’t stop worrying about you and treated you more like she was your leader than your girlfriend. You had been right, but it didn’t mean that Irene could get over you that easily.

Therefore, she knew that she had to put her cold mask on today. Red Velvet was attending the music show that your group would debut on. Irene wanted to be the friend that you needed. Debuting was nerve-wracking and she wished, she could be strong enough to support you despite your breakup. But she wasn’t. She needed to ignore you until her own performance was over because she didn’t know if she could go through with it when getting close to you.

Although her plan hurt her, Irene followed through with it. When she arrived at the venue, she made sure to hide behind her members or managers to not accidently make eye contact with you. And aside from her performance, she stayed in Red Velvet’s dressing room. Only when their performance was over, she dared to turn on the screen in the room to be able to watch yours. As soon as she saw your figure, her breath hitched in her throat and tears sprung to her eyes. You looked as beautiful as ever and Irene could feel her heart swelling in pride. You made it. You managed to live your dream.

Her excitement had lowered all her inhibitions, so she leaped to her feet and rushed out the dressing room to the immediate backstage area. Nervously she waited until your performance was over. Your members were the first ones to appear and they were hugging and thanking each other in relief. You followed them close behind and joined in on the celebration, not even realizing Irene at first. But when you wanted to go to your dressing room, your eyes fell on her and you stared at her in surprise. Irene was afraid that you might still be mad at her, but the euphoria about your debut was apparently strong enough to eliminate all negative feelings, because you happily waved at her before walking into her direction.

For a second, Irene regretted her decision to have come here, but when you wrapped your arms around her, all her worries were gone. Automatically, she hugged you back, burying her head in the crook of your neck. She wished that you could stay like this forever, so when you pulled away, a small pout formed on her lips and you laughed when you saw her expression, causing courage to shoot through Irene’s body. Your laugh had always been one of her favorite sounds on this planet.

“What are you doing after the show?”

She suddenly blurted out, catching you off guard. You looked at her with wide eyes, making Irene nervously avoid your gaze, but then she could see that a soft smile was tugging on your lips from the corner of her eye.

Seulgi

As soon as Seulgi read the lineup for the music show, she froze in shock and stared at the paper blankly. Her members were looking at her in concern until Seungwan ripped the paper out of her hand to check what was shocking her friend that much. She scanned the list and soon found the reason for Seulgi’s changed demeanor, quickly showing it to the others. Seungwan immediately made her way to Seulgi and pulled her closer, trying to console her, because they all knew that she wasn’t over you yet. You had broken up with her, because you had to neglect your relationship because of your strict training plan. Your intentions had been good, but you still had left a gaping wound in Seulgi’s heart.

“Do you think, I can contact Y/N beforehand?”

She asked her members insecurely, because she didn’t know where her boundaries were yet.

The others agreed that it would probably be for the best for both of you, therefore, Seulgi decided to send you a text message.

Hey Y/N. We’re going to be on M COUNTDOWN together and I wanted to know if it would be okay if I wished you good luck before your performance. If you don’t want to see me that’s ok too. I’d understand.

Seulgi had to suppress her urge to send ‘I love you’ like she used to do. Instead she just signed with her name and pressed send. Anxiously she threw her phone to the other end of the bed, because she was afraid that you wouldn’t allow her to see you.

As soon as her phone rang though, she leaped to it and checked your answer.

Of course that’s ok!

Seulgi read and a bright smile spread on her face. She could finally see you.

But on the day of the actual performance, her excitement was replaced by agonizing nervousness. How should she behave around you? Could she even focus on her own performance with you around? Questions over questions flooded her head and shortly before her meetup with you, she felt like running away. But her group members kept reasoning with her until she was calm enough to meet you in front of your dressing room.

She saw you before you noticed her, and her heart almost jumped out of her chest. Her feelings for you definitely were unchanged. Finally, you turned around and a smile formed on your lips when you saw her causing Seulgi’s knees to feel like jelly.

“H-hey.”

She stuttered nervously while giving you an awkward wave because she didn’t know if she was allowed to hug you.

“I’m glad to see you. I’m really nervous.”

You sighted in relief before pulling her closer.

Seulgi was so in shock for a second that she couldn’t move, but then she wrapped her arms around your body in attempt to calm you down.

“You’ve got this, Y/N. You’re an amazing dancer and singer. You’ve trained so long for this. No one can take your dream away from you now anymore.”

She whispered into your ear and when you pulled back, you looked deeply into her eyes. In reflex, Seulgi softly put her hand on your cheek, stroking it with her thumb, before realizing that this wasn’t her place anymore.

Abruptly she jumped away from you and apologized sheepishly.

But you reached out to grab her hand, making Seulgi look at you again.

“We’re going to celebrate after the performance. Don’t you and the other girls want to come too?”

You asked her while a little nervousness was resonating in your voice and a wide smile occupied Seulgi’s face. Maybe you would give her another chance.

Wendy

Seungwan had thought that your breakup would be easier on her. You had both decided that you were too busy to date right now and parted amicably. But she had been wrong. She was heartbroken. She missed you so much that she felt like she couldn’t breathe sometimes and most nights she cried herself to sleep.

Nevertheless, her schedule continued. She was running from one promotional event to the next and despite feeling a little overwhelmed sometimes, she was glad for the distraction.

But this time, the purpose of distraction of the event failed, because as soon as Seungwan walked into the backstage area, a few of your group members ran into her. She was completely shocked. She had tried so hard to ignore you that she didn’t even hear that your group would debut today.

Despite wanting nothing more than to follow your members and beg you to take her back, Seungwan continued to walk into the other directions. It had been the best for the two of you to break up and she really didn’t want to upset you before your important performance. Therefore, she opted to watch your debut on the screen in Red Velvet’s dressing room.

Seungwan was absolutely blown away. You were perfect. Although this was your first performance, she felt like you were already better than her. Now she wanted to talk with you more than ever. She wanted to congratulate you and tell you how proud she was, but she didn’t have the heart to do so. You were thriving. Your journey had only just begun, and she didn’t want to be an obstacle in your way. Therefore, she decided to keep avoiding you the rest of the show.

Red Velvet was already on their way to leave the building when your group suddenly left their dressing room the same time. Seungwan looked at you in shock and when your eyes met hers, she could see disappointment in them. Knowing that the two of you needed some space now, the other members left and soon Seungwan and you were the only ones left in the hallway.

“You were perfect.”

Seungwan stated shyly after a while of silence and your eyes lit up for a second before sadness returned to them again.

“Thank you. Your comeback is really catchy too.”

You responded and awkward silence spread between the two of you again.

“Did you really want to leave without talking to me?”

You eventually asked and Seungwan’s heart ached because of the hurt in your voice.

“I didn’t know if you wanted me to.”

She admitted honestly while avoiding your gaze.

“This is an important step in my life. Of course I wanted to talk to you.”

You answered and Seungwan snapped her eyes up. Were you feeling the same as her? Had the two of you made a mistake?

Gathering all her courage, Seungwan decided to start one last try. Maybe you could find back to each other again.

“I’m having a few weeks off after promotions. Maybe we could catch up?”

She searched for your eyes nervously while her heart pounded so loudly that she was afraid that she couldn’t hear your answer.

“I’d love to.”

Joy

Sooyoung wasn’t the same since you broke up with her. She was quieter and more reserved as usual, causing not only her members but also the fans to worry. And there didn’t seem to be a solution to all of this. She should let you go, but she couldn’t. She knew that she wasn’t allowed to contact you anymore, but that didn’t stop her from stalking your group. She fed on the breadcrumbs that your company fed the public and couldn’t wait for the day that you would finally debut, and she could see your face more often. Even if it was just on TV.

The moment she read that you would debut on the same show that Red Velvet would have their comeback, the idea to win you back, started to form in her head. Sooyoung didn’t know how and if it was the right timing, but she felt like this was the last chance. A subtle anxiety was her constant companion, but the day of the show, she was surprisingly calm. The certainty of having nothing to lose made her determined, so she walked into the building with a clear goal in her mind. At the end of the day, you needed to be by her side.

Halfheartedly she performed during the practice beforehand, already thinking about meeting you later. When she was finally back in the dressing room, she couldn’t wait any longer. Although her members told her not to cause a scene before your debut, Sooyoung couldn’t resist the draw that was pulling her to you.

With a determined look on her face she made her way to your dressing room, barging into it without knocking. Her action caused a lot of heads to whip around, yours being one of them. With shock and confusion in your eyes you looked at her and Sooyoung started to slowly regret her decision.

What was she doing? You had your debut today. Your nerves must be raw right now. This wasn’t the time to upset you even more. But it was too late. You already made your way over to her, pushing her softly out of the room. You guided her around a corner where a little less staff was running around and looked at her expectantly.

“I-I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have come.”

Sooyoung stuttered and you crossed your arms causing her to gulp nervously.

“But you did. So what is it?”

You asked sternly and Sooyoung’s anxiety returned all at once.

“I wanted to win you back. But I guess my selfishness just ruined that, huh?”

She chuckled sadly, feeling her last chance just slipping out of her hand.

“You’re a lot of things, but you’re not selfish, Sooyoung. Stop beating yourself up for things that aren’t true.”

Your voice was suddenly softer and Sooyoung could feel tears pooling in her eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

She whispered, trying to wipe away her tears quickly, but you stopped her, gently pulling her head against your body instead.

“What for?”

You wanted to know while running your hand through her hair, making her sob even more.

“Everything. Causing us to break up, barging in, being the one that needs cheering up, although it should be the other way around.”

All her confidence was gone now, and she left her tears run freely.

After a while, you pushed her back a little to be able to look into her eyes, but just when you opened your mouth to say something, your manager appeared, telling you to come back.

Sooyoung quickly untangled her body from yours, but you calmly held her back, asking your manager for one more minute.

“I’m sorry, but I have to go. But I want you to know that our breakup wasn’t your fault. Meet me here when the show is over.”

You demanded before kissing her cheek and rushing off.

Dumbfounded, Sooyoung kept standing there for another minute until her brain could process what had happened just now.

She had squandered the first chance that the universe had given her to win you back today, she would definitely not give away the second one though.

Yeri

Yeri was just scrolling through her Instagram when she learned the most important news in a while.

The date of your debut was finally published.

You had broken up not long ago, but Yeri was still too ecstatic to contain her excitement.

You’re debuting!!

She sent you a text without thinking about it too much. Just because you had broken up, didn’t mean that she didn’t care about you anymore. Yeri had been with you throughout most of your trainee days. Therefore, she knew what troubles you had to go through. Seeing you being able to debut now, made her heart swell and she wished, she was still your girlfriend to be able to squeeze you in a tight hug.

Yes! I’m so excited

You answered after a while and Yeri wished you good luck, before your conversation ended again.

The time until your performance was pure torture for Yeri. She wanted to be by your side. More than once, she had typed in a message for you or pulled up your contact on her phone, but every time, she remembered that you weren’t dating anymore in the last moment. She definitely wasn’t over you yet.

Therefore, she squealed in excitement when she learned that she would be performing on the same show that you would debut on. First of all, she could be part of your debuting experience even if she couldn’t hold your hand and kiss you before your performance like she wanted to. But at least, she would be able to talk with you. And secondly, she hoped that she could convince you to give your relationship another shot. Your argument had been stupid and Yeri would agree to everything if you’d let her into your life again.

As soon as she entered the venue the day of the show, she started looking for you. Irene had to actually remind her that Red Velvet would be performing too that day and that she needed to focus, because Yeri was completely distracted. The time slot of your performance was inching closer and closer and she hadn’t had the luck to meet you yet. She was getting nervous. She needed to see you before you went on stage.

Although her own performance wasn’t too far away either, Yeri tried one last time to catch you with the allowance of her leader. Nervously she entered your group’s dressing room, only to find it empty already. Therefore, she ran to the immediate backstage area where she saw you waiting next to your members.

“Y/N!”

She yelled over all the noise and you whipped your head around.

Both of you sighted in relief simultaneously and started to meet halfway.

“I’m really glad I caught you before your performance.”

Yeri said as soon as she was finally standing in front of you.

“I’m really glad too.”

You smiled shyly and Yeri couldn’t hold back her urge anymore to hug you.

“I’m so proud of you Y/N.”

She whispered into your ear and you squeezed her in response.

“Thank you for being by my side throughout all my ups and downs.”

You responded and when Yeri pulled away, she realized that both of you had teary eyes.

“Don’t cry Y/N. Your makeup!”

She exclaimed worriedly and you chuckled.

“I’ve missed you.”

That was the cue that Yeri had been waiting for all this time.

Without hesitation, she grabbed your neck and pulled you closer to be able to press her lips on yours.

“Good luck.”

Yeri stated smugly once she had pushed you away again, just in time with the staff member telling your group to go on stage. Just before you were out of sight, you turned your head again, smiling at Yeri widely.

After all she had gotten everything that she had wanted today.

[bisluthq]

Okay so I’ve been meaning to ask for a while now but I was far too nervous and didn’t want to offend anyone. But, that being said, can I ask why you choose to indulge in RPF? I personally find it super strange, invasive and (maybe this is a stretch) but also low-key dehumanising?

Idk what word to use here and how to eloquently word this but definitely feels like RPF plays into the fetishisation and the ‘disconnect’ of celebrities from people who indulge in it. Like, by writing RPF you’re writing your own version of that person (some people try and stay accurate whilst others invent whole new personalities after) but you don’t know them, not entirely, and for writers to (understandably) fill in the gaps with whatever they like and create fics seems a little disrespectful and voyeuristic, esp because you’re using very real people to fill in the majority of the sexy (or just generally desired) ‘character bar’ whilst headcanoning the rest and publishing it.

Idk, I personally find it kinda disrespectful as to how real human beings are just used almost as props to serve and fulfill a handful of people’s fantasies/desires. At least with fictional characters, it’s not that big a deal if you headcanon, fill in the personality gaps or go ooc because they are fictional. But for RPF, the real people are often treated as jumping off points for whatever build-a-bearfantasy writers have in mind (younger writers/readers are far more likely to do this but I believe it’s a widespread phenomenon amongst everyone who indulges in it)

And I know the people involved are likely never going to read it but it still doesn’t mean they haven’t been disregarded/disrespected as a person already. I’ve personally never liked RPF, writing or reading, but I know some people like it - I just don’t know why?? I know one argument I’ve heard is that celebs are in the public eye and so, they can rightfully be objectified/sexualised by their fanbase, which yes kinda makes sense but idk if it merits/justifies using the shell of the celebrity to fulfill the kinks of everyone in their fanbase.

I’m not sure how much sense I’ve made here. I’m pretty sure I’ve repeated myself the entire time lol but I am curious to what your answer would be. Full disclaimer - it is not my intention to shame you or anyone else - I just want to understand your thought process because it is wildly different to mine and for the most part I like/vibe with this blog a lot because your attitude towards celebs and celeb gossip is so refreshing. When I saw all the joshlie/swiftwyn fics I was a bit lost and further lost when people started actively thirsting, hence the reason behind this ask. Sorry this was so long ✌🏼

Okay so I have a lot of Thoughts™️ on this tbh. Now backstory: I was SUPER pearl clutchy about RPF for like actual years. I somehow missed the After phenomenon in terms of the books, but when the film deal came through I was properly scandalized. I was like, “Good grief imagine being Harry and you’re the basis for a whole ass abusive boyfriend character like what the actual fuck is wrong with these people!?” And then I did more thinking about it especially as I watched the sheer commercial success of this shitshow. 

Now I’m very like theoretically anti capitalism but I’m also a very pragmatic person whose primary love is and always has been and always will be the entertainment industry so we do have to look at what makes money because this shit’s not charity. And what the runaway success of After taught me is... RPF makes money. Like BIG money.

So then I had to relax on the pearl clutching and start asking myself why that is. Why are people into this shit? Well, celebs market themselves as 1) a brand and 2) sexual beings. You’re supposed to want them. That’s how they’re being sold to you. Harry’s not posing fucking stark naked in the Fine Line insert art for his health. Taylor’s not posting National Sock Appreciation Day for you to appreciate her socks. Like these are sexual beings and they’re being marketed to us as sexual fantasy. That’s part of why we’re buying their shit.

Let’s go back to the ‘celebs market themselves as a brand’ - if you look at people inspiring RPF it’s hardly ever people who are like... freaky private. Nobody’s putting out Saoirse Ronan RPF because tbh the average person, even an average fan of hers, doesn’t really know anything about her. She avoids socials and she doesn’t take too much press and she sorta just does her thing. People like Harry and Taylor and tbh Karlie market their personalities. They’re selling a whole package - not just a talented professional, not just a hot person, but a whole ass person who you’re supposed to buy into while also being y’know turned on by them per my previous points. 

So here we get into the RPF of it all. Realistically, these people are going to inspire fantasies. They’re trying to do that. And they’re also selling and marketing their relationships and personalities. Again, this is not an accident, this is a purposeful commercial push.

With that in mind, what’s so wrong about imagining scenarios that they’re kinda like... trying to concoct for us already? Taylor’s been singing about her sex life non stop since 2017. She’s told us these songs are about Joe. Joe’s a public figure who also takes interviews and markets his personality. Is it, therefore, wrong to imagine what that sex is like if they’re both hot and making money off of us? Is she not lowkey trying to get us to do that when she’s, like I say, singing about sex with him on main since 2017?

Now with RPF what we need to remember is this is purely fantasy. It isn’t real, and it’s not like... canon. I’m also not into like AU RPF personally like I don’t really have much imagination for like RPF crackships lmao but I’m also not going to get all huffy over it. For me, if celebrities sell shit using their relationship - as Taylor absolutely fucking does - and sell themselves as sexual and desirable - as Taylor absolutely fucking does - there’s nothing that wrong with fantasizing about what that is like.

It’s obviously not real. It shouldn’t be treated as real. But as an exercise in imagination, I don’t see what’s so wrong with it.

Also many of us have fantasies all the time even if we don’t write and publish them. We have sex dreams and weird fantasies about people we know/crushes and of course we fantasize about celebs. I think putting that down in formal words isn’t worth getting all up in arms about. I think it’s just having a bit of fun.

Finally, back to After: this is a HUGE commercial market. We can see that. And like I don’t see it as that unethical when I examine it closely because these people are also making money off of it. It’s like we can say “oh celeb gossip is so terrible” but it makes the people involved huge money. And considering at the end of the day entertainment shit does come down to the bottom line... ehhhh I’m okay with it.

Hope this kinda gives my take and it’s a conversation I’m very interested in so if y’all would like to keep having with takes and countertakes I’m all for it.

[ruminativerabbi]

What To Read This Fall

As I embark on this, my seventeenth year of writing weekly on matters close to my heart (and, I hope, also to yours), I’d like to talk about three books I’ve read over the holiday season that affected me in different ways.

The first is David Baddiel’s Jews Don’t Count, a remarkable volume published earlier this year by TLS Books in London. The author, whose name was unknown to me before reading the book, is apparently a well-known British comedian. (He was actually born in Troy, New York, in 1964, but has basically lived his entire life in the U.K.) But this book is not at all funny. Just the opposite, actually: it is 123 pages of very angry prose directed at a world that simply refuses to take anti-Semitism seriously as a form of pernicious racism. Mostly, his fire is aimed at progressives and liberals. But although there is more than enough ammunition left over for him also to take aim at right-of-center groups and conservatives, he’s particularly enraged at people on the left for whom the slightly hint of racism or bigotry is intolerable, yet who seem more than able to tolerate even overtly-stated, ham-fisted anti-Semitic remarks without reacting even slightly negatively, let alone with real revulsion or even feigned outrage.

Even though the book itself is really just an extended (a very extended) essay on the topic, the author has more than enough ammunition at the ready to buttress his point. Over and over he cites instances of public figures, including A-list celebrities, making overt or allusive anti-Semitic comments without facing any sort of public censure, let alone being “cancelled” in the way people who make openly disparaging remarks about other minority groups become personae non gratae overnight and are, at least in some cases, never heard from again. Some of the people he quotes will be familiar to American readers, but others will not be. Nonetheless, his analysis of the reason the comments those personalities are cited as having made are more than tolerated by the liberal public—for the most part because speaking negatively about Jewish people, Jewishness, or Judaism is somehow legitimized with reference to some specific ethnos-wide character trait that people can legitimately use as a rational basis for hate—will be familiar to any Jewish reader who lives out there in the world, who reads a daily newspaper, or who spends time wandering around in the blogosphere.

The author draws an interesting portrait of himself. He declares himself not to be a Zionist, which I take to mean that he has neither any specific interest in the fate of the State of Israel or sense of a personal stake in its wellbeing. So that puts him outside the camp in which an overwhelming majority of Jewish people I know live. And the author also self-defines as an atheist with no specific allegiance to Jewish ritual or belief, thus putting him even further outside the ranks of the kind of Jewish people who occupy the world I personally inhabit. In many ways, his prose made me think of him as the latter-day version of those German Jews in the 1930s who were so busy being German that they were amazed that the Nazis considered them to be part of the Jewish problem at all. (There’s a certain irony in that thought too, given that Baddiel’s grandparents fled Nazi Germany.) Perhaps that lack of connection to traditional Jewish values or beliefs and his disconnection from Israel is what fuels his rage—he (and so many like him) see themselves as having done nothing to offend, as holding no beliefs that set them apart from the British mainstream, as being as properly ill at ease regarding Israel’s vigorous efforts to defend itself—so how dare the world refuse to censure, or let alone to cancel, people who are overtly anti-Semitic in the way those very same people would never dream of tolerating homophobic or anti-Black racist comments!

I recommend the book strongly, despite all of the above comments. It is a short read, but a forceful, dynamic statement that readers on this side of the Atlantic will have no trouble translating into local terms. It is upsetting, and in a dozen different ways. But that only makes it more, not less, important and worth your time to find and read.

The second book I’d like to write about today is Dara Horn’s People Love Dead Jews, published this summer by W.W. Norton. The author, born in New Jersey in 1977, has taught at Sara Lawrence and at CUNY. Some of my readers will know her work from essays published in The Atlantic and the New York Times. And she has written five novels, mostly recently A Guide for the Perplexed in 2013 and Eternal Life in 2018. People Love Dead Jews is her first book-length work of non-fiction.

The book itself, about 100 pages longer than Baddiel’s, is also about anti-Semitism, but is written in an entirely different key—one given away subtly by the book’s subtitle, Reports from a Haunted Present. And, indeed, the book’s twelve chapters, while all discrete essays that can be read separately and without reference to each other, are also all rooted in the same soil: the author’s slow, eventual understanding and coming to terms with the fact that most of the way the world thinks about Jews—and, even more to the point, the way Jews think about the way the world thinks about Jews—are floating along somewhere between dishonest and disingenuous. Her opening chapter, for example, about Anne Frank points out that the great success of her diary rests to a great extent on the endlessly cited passage in which Anne, still hiding in the Achterhuis and hoping to live to adulthood in a liberated Holland, writes that she still believes, “in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart.” She surely changed her mind when she got first to Auschwitz and then to Bergen-Belsen, where she and her sister Margot died in the spring of 1945. But that detail, unpalatable to those who wish to see Anne not as a murdered Jewish child but as an apostle of universalist optimism, is generally ignored. And so, to address that issue specifically, Horn provides an obituary for an imaginary Anne who survived the camps and lived into her 90s, and who definitely did not end up thinking that all people, presumably including the guards at Auschwitz, are truly good at heart. It’s that kind of writing that will grab readers from the very beginning and keep them engaged to the end.

The three chapters devoted to the rising level of anti-Semitism in the United States should be required reading for all Americans, but particularly for Jewish Americans still living in their grandparents’ fantasy world regarding the impossibility of America ever engendering its own violent version of “real” anti-Semitism, the kind that moves quickly past quotas and sneers to actual violence, including the lethal kind that cost those poor people in Pittsburgh their lives one Shabbat morning in 2018. Yes, the book is uneven. The admittedly fascinating chapter about her trip to Harbin, China, is at least twice as long as it needed to be. The chapter about the recent Auschwitz exhibition at the Museum of Jewish Heritage is unfocused, the author’s point (at least to me) unclear. The chapter about The Merchant of Venice will leave most readers without university degrees in Shakespeare at least slightly confused. But the book itself is wonderful—thoughtful, intelligent, challenging, and stimulating. I recommend it to all without hesitation.

And the third book I want to recommend for my readers’ reading pleasure this fall is Noam Zion’s Sanctified Sex: The Two-Thousand-Year Jewish Debate on Marital Intimacy, published earlier this year by the Jewish Publication Society in Philadelphia. The other two books were short, perhaps even too short, but no one will say that about Zion’s book, which weighs in at almost 550 pages. But potential readers who allow themselves to be put off by the book’s size would be making a huge error of judgment—the book is long and complicated because its subject is complicated and the sources he cites, often at length, are many and complex. But the book itself is a true tour-de-force and deserves to be considered in that context.

Most readers, used to thinking of sex as something antithetical (or at least unrelated) to religious philosophy, will be amazed to learn how seriously rabbis writing over the last two millennia have taken the very same topics that engage moderns when the talk turns to intimate matters: the limits and boundaries of marital fidelity, the relationship of fantasy to reality in the healthy sexual context, the possibility of legitimate sexual liaisons outside of marriage, the relationship of homosexuality to heterosexuality (and, by extension, of gay people to straight people with respect to the legitimacy of their coupling), the precise nature of the obligation spouses bear to provide sexual satisfaction to each other, and the relationship of reproductive possibility to ongoing sexual activity in the absence of such possibility.

The book is organized chronologically with respect to the sources the author cites, but most readers will be far more impressed by the breadth and depth of the sources than by their relationship to each other chronologically. Many of the authors cited, particularly from the Haredi world, will be unknown to almost all readers. Only a tiny percentage of them wrote in any language other than Hebrew or Yiddish. An even smaller percentage have had their books or essays translated into other languages. As a result, reading Zion’s book is something like being ushered into an art gallery featuring works of great creativity and depth by painters you’re slightly amazed never to have heard of. (I include myself in that category, by the way: almost all the books, essays, and pamphlets cited in the 150-odd pages on Haredi authors were unknown to me.) But the breadth and depth of Noam Zion’s reading of these books, and his willingness—given the riven nature of the Jewish world, his truly remarkable willingness—to consider these men (all of them are men) and their writings in light of writing on the topic by my own colleagues in the Rabbinical Assembly, by authors affiliated with various Reform Jewish institutions, and (even more impressively) with feminist authors of various sorts, that is truly what makes of this book something that my own readers should think twice about not reading.

Noam Zion is a friend. His home in Jerusalem is just a few blocks from our apartment. His wife taught the Lamaze course Joan and I took when we were anticipating the birth of our first child. I mention all that merely to be fully transparent, but also so that I can also say that I would recommend his book this highly even if he and I were not acquainted personally. It is a magisterial work on a complex topic that all readers interested in Jewish thought and its relationship to practice will find fascinating.

And those are the three books I would like to recommend to you all as autumn reading you’ll enjoy and find stimulating and very interesting.

[blu-joons]

DATING BTS HEADCANON A⇴Z ⇴ Kim Namjoon

A ⇴ AFFECTION

Whenever Namjoon is affectionate, he always becomes incredibly shy. He loves to cuddle you and kiss you, but when he sees your smile appear, his cheeks turn a deep shade of red as you wrap your arms around him, hiding his blush in the crook of your neck.

B ⇴ BEFORE DATING

The two of you had always been close, a lot of the time he confided in you when he was having trouble. As time passed, he began to realise that maybe there was something between the two of you, no one could make him laugh like you, or make him feel at ease. The boys knew it too, all they wanted was for their leader to be happy, and they knew that it was you who made him smile.

C ⇴ CONFESSION

There was no reason to rush to confess, life was busy, and he wanted to be able to spend a lot of time with you. So, as he came back from a month on the road, his first thought was you. He was at your flat just a couple of hours after his plane landed, telling you how he felt and how much he missed you. It was a little overwhelming for you, but of course, you felt it too. He was charming, and kind-hearted, everything you wanted in a man.

D ⇴ DATES

He loved to arrange dates for the two of you and treat you whenever he could. It was hard sometimes with the fans and the attention he got, but he’d try his hardest to make them peaceful, either at a restaurant, or taking long walks in the beach or at the park. If he couldn’t take you out, he’d try and cook (although takeout was usually a handy back up) and set up the living room with blankets and duvets so the two of you could have a movie marathon. Regardless of where you were, he wanted to make every date night special, and remind you just how much he loves you, and how thankful he is for you.

E ⇴ EXPERIENCE

After a couple of relationships in school, you were Namjoon’s first adult relationship, for so long his focus had been on the band, but he couldn’t let you go like he had the rest. It was hard for him trying to maintain a relationship, but you were worth it. Being the leader, he knew there was an extra pressure on him to make a relationship work in amongst all the chaos, and with previous experiences he would have given up, there was no way he was ever going to give up on you. Whatever the problem, he would work through it, because he needed you.

F ⇴ FIGHTING

The two of you very rarely had an argument, and even then, it was probably only a bicker. He was used to keeping the boys in line, so he’d use those tips to make sure the two of you didn’t fall out. Rather than ever raise his voice at you, he’d just talk. He hated the fact that he could ever make you angry, so he’d always try to right his wrongs. If it meant taking some time at the studio, or going for a walk, he’d do it, and then once you’d had some space, he’d come back and talk to you. Fighting broke his heart, it didn’t matter who it was between, he’d always do anything to make things right and remove any tension between you both.

G ⇴ GETTING TO KNOW HIS FAMILY

You felt quite confident to meet Namjoon’s family because you knew that you’d be able to interact with them and communicate. Having told them so many good things about you, Namjoon knew it would be impossible for them not to like you, and as you met them for the first time, you knew that you were already treated as if you were part of the family.

H ⇴ HOME

Namjoon was very reluctant to move into a house just the two of you, naturally he was worried about leaving the boys. Which is why, as a compromise, you were able to move into the dorms for a short while, the two of you got your own space, which you liked, and also got to be with the boys, who you adored. Plus, all six of them refused to give the two of you up, they needed you at the dorm to keep them all in order.

I ⇴ “I LOVE YOU”

The first ‘I love you,’ came from Namjoon when he came home from tour. After yet another month away from you, he realised just how much you meant to him, and how much he needed you in his life. As his arms wrapped around you as he walked into the dorm, those three little words escaped, as you quickly replied with the same three words, pressing a soft kiss to his cheek, welcoming him home.

J ⇴ JEALOUSY

He handled his jealousy quite well, most of the time, but when his confidence is low, he can find himself getting a bit jealous. He never made a big thing about it, he’d usually just stay a bit closer towards you, or keep his arm around you. Confrontation wasn’t his style, but when his arm was around you for most of the night, you knew how he was feeling, so you’d make an even bigger effort to be around him and to put his mind at ease. Jealousy was only natural, and if anything, it made you like him just that little bit more, knowing how much he cared and how protective he was of you.

K ⇴ KIDS

Everyone knows Namjoon wants to be a father, it’s the one thing he’s dreamed of all his life. Being with you was the first time in his life he thought he’d found the one to settle down with. Seeing you around your friend’s children, he knew how much of an amazing mum you’d be, and how perfect your family could be. He’d often find himself falling asleep at night imagining your family as you got older and how your kids would be.

L ⇴ LAUGHTER

Most of the time he didn’t even realise he was making you laugh, with a little giggle or a random action, you’d be left in hysterics. The two of you knew exactly how to make the other laugh, he would usually make you laugh just by how embarrassed he got when he laughed, covering his mouth with his hand. He was incredible at making you laugh even on the toughest of days, messing around until he put the smile back on your face. Seeing you laugh always made him smile, knowing you were happy was the thing that always made him the happiest, as the two of you would giggle away to each other.

M ⇴ MISSING

At times, Namjoon really struggled on tour, being away from you, especially if they were abroad. You knew how hard he found it, and the pressure he felt, and you always felt guilty not being able to make him feel better. Still, you’d text him every day with messages of love and reassurance which would pick him up, and he’d always reply straight away, desperate to know you were doing alright at home and taking care of yourself. There was a lot he missed being away from you, your laugh, your cuddles, date nights, it took its toll on him being apart, but it always made coming home that little bit sweeter when you were finally reunited.

N ⇴ NICKNAMES

You always remembered one time how he said he liked to be called, ‘darling,’ so that was often the nickname that you’d use for him, whilst he would come up with anything random: flower, cupcake, sweetie, were just a few of the nicknames he’d used for you.

O ⇴ OBSESSION

He was obsessed with your figure, he loved how sexy you looked, being able to place his hands around your body, and admire every inch of your skin was what made him the happiest man in the world.

P ⇴ PDA

PDA wasn’t always his thing, sometimes he’d feel a bit too shy to be affectionate with you in public, but one thing he always did, was hold your hand. There was always a worry that something might happen, so if he felt your skin against his, he knew you were safe. It didn’t stop him gushing about you in interviews however, and you were always the first person he thanked when he was giving a speech.

Q ⇴ QUESTIONS

Usually he’d ask a question to start a debate between you both. At times it felt like you were dating an encyclopaedia of knowledge, he loved to find out about you, and the world, talking about anything that came to mind.

R ⇴ RANDOM FACTS

When it came to your relationship, Namjoon loves celebrating anniversaries, it always makes him incredibly emotional. He’s usually good at holding himself together, but around you, he always finds himself getting upset and teary. Anniversaries are when he spills his feelings to you, and he often finds himself in touch with his emotions, when you gift him presents or you go out on a date, he tries hard to keep himself together.

S ⇴ SEX

He likes to dominate sex when he can, but when he’s feeling fragile and vulnerable, he can often be submissive and allow you to make him feel good. Regardless of what mood either of you are in, sex is always about love. The two of you would often be in some sort of embrace together, usually with dim lighting and a candle lit. Namjoon liked to be as cute as possible, and would always give you a cuddle afterwards, whispering sweet nothings into your ear.

T ⇴ TEXTS

He always texts you, mainly just to make sure you were doing alright. He wanted to make sure you were happy and doing well, and if you text him first, he replies straight away, desperate to hold a conversation with you whilst you both have free time.

U ⇴ UNIVERSE

Everything started and finished with you. He came to you whenever he first got an opportunity for something, and when it came to an end, you were the first person he celebrated with. His whole universe revolved around you, everything else was in between.

V ⇴ VACATION

He loved to travel the world, anywhere in the world he was with you, he’d be happy. Whenever the two of you had the time, you’d head out and explore. Road trips were a favourite between you both, exploring as many different places as you could, you never liked to be in one place for more than a few days when you knew there was another city waiting to be explored just a few miles down the road.

W ⇴ WHINING

He didn’t tend to moan often, he was usually quiet, or if he wanted something, he’d say it. Most of the time though, he was good at making you happy and doing what you wanted.

X ⇴ XXXXX

He loved to kiss you when you least expected it, but when you kissed him, you could guarantee he’d always turn coy and blush. Kisses were always meaningful with Namjoon, he always used them to tell you how he felt and how much he loved you. His hands would always be on your hips, pulling you closer, whilst you often reached up on your tiptoes to wrap your arms around his neck and kiss him back.

Y ⇴ YOU

You were everything, he wouldn’t be able to carry on sometimes without you.

Z ⇴ ZZZ

Watching him fall asleep was one of your favourite things, when you’d look up with his arms wrapped around you, seeing his head thrown back and mouth wide open, you couldn’t help but chuckle at how sweet he looked.

---

Masterlist

[jane-fucking-seymour]

Legend of the Six has now been updated!

Chapter 23: Daughter of Shadow

Words: 5032 

AO3 Link

When we are little, we are taught that the darkness is scary.

Children hide from it under the comforts of pillows and blankets, men shield themselves from it with torches and lanterns, and the general public escape it through dreams and sleep. From the day we are born to the day we die, we are told to fear the Dark, and the creatures that live amongst it. It’s personified as the unknown, as the wicked, as the evil. The Dark, many claim, cannot be trusted, nor can it be utilized without misfortune.

The many, to Anne Boleyn, are considered fools.

Ever since she was a little girl - even with the scary stories of the Darkness being evil and Light being good - Anne Boleyn constantly sought for a second opinion. It’s not that she didn’t trust the stories; far from it, as she had seen what the dark could do. But she’s also seen it do wonders: it hides her from an ambush when she’s younger, it reveals foolish enemies positions that don’t know how to control their shadows, and it is a comfort, still, when late at night. After all, Anne argues, the darkness is the reason why we are in awe of the stars. That’s got to count for something, right?

As she continued down this path of Darkness, she came to befriend it in a unique way. Shadows would race to her to say hello, like old friends. The Darkness often wrapped around her like a cloak, a better shield than the ones the finest blacksmiths of the Realm could make. She extended a hand to the dark and found that it not only accepted, but embraced her as their own. And she was happier for it.

Of course, her friendship didn’t go unnoticed; it’s what started the rumors in court to begin with. Many in the court would talk ill of her friends, of the comforts she held that were so unique and against the grain that people thought it scary. She was shunned by many in the courts - all afraid of this girl that could control the darkness, calling her a Servant to it, a thrall. To many, Anne was cursed, and her regency should never had seen the light of day.

Unluckily for them (and, eventually, for her), Henry wasn’t afraid of the dark either.

Anne came to understand this as she was on the run from a particularly unyielding suitor. She hid in the shadows, in the garden, waiting for the man to pass. He hadn’t seen her, and in his drunken stupor, had started calling for her quite loudly. This resulted in unwanted attention. Anne had chuckled as the man was immediately yelled at by the King himself, thoroughly embarrassed and berated in the middle of the night by such an important figure in the Realm. She expected the guy to turn tail and run, which he did.

What she DIDNT expect was for the King himself to suddenly turn and face her. Her, hidden by the darkness that she knew so well.

He looked curious, as if struggling to see her, but seeing her all the same. He called for her to appear, to not be afraid. He wasn’t afraid of the dark either, he said. He knew she wasn’t either. Perhaps they could make a habit of finding each other in the shadows in the night, perhaps they could chat about their experiences with the Dark, perhaps they could be friends.

It didn’t take too long for Anne to realize he meant something a little more than just friends.

The marriage between Catherine of Aragon and Henry VIII was going rather swimmingly, at least according to anyone that looked: Catherine had just saved the world from evildoers in the South, and Henry had applauded his wife’s work. The Realm rejoiced in such a decisive victory over the enemy that day, and had even strengthened their allyship with Holbein in the process; a two for one victory that the history books were to celebrate for centuries, if all had gone to plan.

But, as Anne would later find out in their midnight rendezvous, he thought he could do more. His wife was, of course, a formidable person in battle, but the Darkness isn’t that scary. It got a bad reputation because of the Blessed that defeated the enemies in the South, he said. Why couldn’t his wife see that the darkness wasn’t something to banish, but to wield? 

To Anne, this made perfect sense because of the darkness that she knew, the darkness she assumed they were talking about. It resulted in resentment towards the (at the time, current) queen, especially when Henry finally gave her the chance to be the Blessed Aragon’s lady in waiting not too long afterwards. Anne didn’t see then that it was a way to groom her for the throne; instead, she simply thought he wanted someone in his corner, someone that understood the Dark for what it really was.

And she played right into his hands perfectly.

At least, for a while.

It was later, when Catherine was “killed,” when she saw Jane Seymour enter the picture, that Anne realized that maybe he wasn’t a friend of the dark like she thought he was.

For one, he never was able to hide well, not from anyone. The darkness that was easy to sink into when she was alone or with Maggie or even with Catherine and Maria was not as such when he was around; it was like the Darkness rebuked him, didn’t want him near it. Didn’t claim him as their own the way that they had claimed Anne all those years ago. In her want to be queen and in her want to have someone that understood her, she ignored it; there was just something about Henry that made her want to ignore what she thought she knew. He had that way about him, a way that made her want to believe in what he said.

So when he told her to go on the road that fateful day, she had no idea what was coming.

Maria hadn’t been acting any different than usual, for example, and it was in the middle of the day when it happened. Anne was completely unsuspecting until just before the ambush occurred; at that point, her shadow gave her away. For a while, it was the shadows that was her most trusted ally as she hid, refusing to be found until she absolutely had to. 

She survived because of the Shadows. They had given her so much. But now, it seems, they were asking something of her.

Who was she to refuse?

So she sits, in front of the woman, head bowed respectfully. The woman smiles softly at the girl in front of her, as if greeting an old friend. Anne suspects she knows more about Anne than she lets on, but it’s disrespectful to ask.

“I see that you’re ready now,” she says. “To become my champion.” She nods, standing up. “It’ll be a tough road ahead of you, if you choose to embrace my gifts.”

“You have given me so much, my lady,” Anne says quietly, respectfully. “I am but an agent of your will.”

The woman looks over at Maggie, who is still bowing with her head down. She gently lifts the girl’s head up with a soft grin.

“You won’t be needed here,” the woman says, “but I won’t deny you the opportunity to observe the trial. No, you’ve done just as much as her, and I like you almost as much, but she is the Champion for a reason.”

Maggie doesnt dare look the woman in the eye, instead nodding respectfully. “I am in awe of your graciousness, my lady,” she says, a bit of a tremble in her voice. She’s a bit nervous. 

The woman smiles and offers Maggie her hand. Maggie takes it. “You may look me in the eye, you know,” the woman says. “We’re all friends here.”

Maggie does so after a moment, and she’s a bit calmer now. This doesn’t feel as formal as she thought it was going to be, but then again, the Shadows have always been somewhat misleading. 

The woman turns back to Anne, who hasn’t moved from her spot. “My Champion,” she says, sitting down in front of Anne. “You will start your Trial immediately. Should you pass, you shall become my Keeper. Should you fail… well, the outcome depends on how you do that.” She shrugs, a hand wistfully circling in the air, forming some sort of bowl with smoking black substance in it. “Drink. And you shall begin.”

Anne nods, looking back at Maggie with a smile. “I’ll be back.”

Maggie nods, still a bit nervous. “I know you will.”

And with that, Anne takes the bowl and drinks it down.

It doesn’t taste like a lot of anything, but the texture of it is vile to say the least; it feels like something is fighting to go down into her stomach, as if it had a mind of its own. She winces at the feeling, squeezing her eyes shut as the bowl, too, dissolves into the substance and enters her.

She steadies herself, feeling how the substance affects her. Her hands, now empty, fall to her sides, and she focuses. She can feel everything else falling away, can feel herself sinking deeper and deeper and deeper…

… until she’s nowhere at all.

She’s floating in nothing.

It’s dark, and it’s comfortable. She opens her eyes and sees nothing. She floats aimlessly, like in a calm river of sorts, and smiles softly; this was nice. Not really what she expected, if she was being honest, but she’ll take what she can get.

Just as she thinks that, however, she immediately feels herself drop. Now, she’s freefalling into nothing. It’s nothing too terrible, but there seems to be something… darker… just below her now. She yelps, tenses, gets ready for the impact-

-but it never comes. Instead, she’s standing still, on the darker darkness.

She looks around, curious about what’s  happening.

“Hello?” she asks. She doesn’t hear anything - no echo, no voice returning her call. It’s getting a bit cold, too, as she walks further and further into this new darkness. The shadows from before, when she was floating, were what she was comfortable with. This… was not.

Not bad, just different, and incredibly unsettling when she wasn’t used to it. 

She continues through, unseeing, and she wonders if she’s missed something, if she’s already lost the trial. There’s no real purpose to this at the moment, she realizes, and she thinks maybe she needs to do something. Maybe she’s waiting on herself.

With a deep breath, she stops walking, extending a hand above her. She closes her eyes, takes another big breath, and summons the darkness she knows so well.

Usually, it would result in the room getting darker… but that’s not the case. Not now. Her darkness is brighter than this darkness, and the comfort she’s felt for over two decades returns to her. And now, with a smile, she listens to her goddess:

“Your trial begins now, oh contested Champion. I hope you are prepared.”

Anne nods, feeling herself being tugged away and pulled impossibly fast to an impossibly far distance in the shadows - lightyears away from where she was, but also right next door. She eventually stops where she is, and her eyes adjust to the light in front of her.

She’s got solid ground below her. She’s in a hallway. It’s dark and cold and wet. It’s clear that the only light in this area has been the blue torches that dimly illuminate the area. She’s not sure where she is, but she knows she needs to continue. 

She moves forward steadily, but as she does, she starts to hear things - a voice?

“Hello?”

Not her goddess’, either.

Her hand goes to her side, where her trusted daggers would be, but they are not there now. She instead moves to the side, using her shadows to protect and cloak herself as she pushes forward. She hears the voice again, this time coming from the end of the hallway.

Someone’s here. Someone that’s definitely real.

She turns into the room, warily at first, but then she realizes who it is and raises and eyebrow.

“Catherine?!?”

Catherine is indeed there, looking around, very confused. When she spots Anne, though, she instantly rushes over to her.

“What’s going on?” Catherine asks, frowning. “I was just headed into the town we were headed into before you left and… and now I’m here.”

“You were Claimed for a time,” says a voice, one that isn’t either of theirs. “You have been Unclaimed. But now you’re Claimed again.”

Catherine seems to recognize the voice, narrowing her eyes suspiciously. “In what way?”

“The Light knows what is happening,” says the voice, reassuring in tone. “And they know why you’re here. They know I won’t keep you any longer than necessary, and they know you won’t be harmed.”

Catherine seems to relax a bit then, but she’s still a bit confused. “I don’t know why I’m here, though.”

“You’re… well, I can’t believe I’m about to say this,” Anne mumbles, a bit embarrassed. “But you’re my guide.”

Catherine blinks. “Your what?”

“In the Trials of the Shadows,” Anne explains, “we get a person that can’t be seen by the Trial, but the Chosen can see and interact with them. Someone that we have a strong connection with. Someone that’s important in our life story. Someone that the Woman chooses.”

“And… she chose me?” Catherine asks, tilting her head.

“We both did, it’s kind of a mutual agreement decision sort of thing,” Anne replies. “Well, most of the time. It’s my soul choosing who it is, and the Woman consenting to manifest it- it’s a long story. Not enough time, if we want to get out of here before the Festival in a few weeks.” Anne sighs, a hand running through her hair. “What you need to know is that I need someone to guide me, to help me through the tough road ahead.” She doesn’t dare look Catherine in the eye for the next part. “It seems that both myself and my mistress are in agreement that if anyone can get me through this, it’s you.”

Catherine smiles. “Well, seeing as I’ve nothing better to do-”

But the jokes stop, suddenly, as the room around them changes.

They’re suddenly in a chamber, one that’s familiar and not at the same time. It’s clearly night, but the moon is not the moon; it’s moreso a ball of energy, as if it was made of arcanic magick rather than a celestial body.

Anne moves into the room a bit more, observing quietly.

“Isn’t this the castle?” Catherine asks quietly, looking out the nearby window. It’s a town made of shadows, but a familiar town nonetheless. “This is Henry’s castle in the Capitol… but I don’t know this room.”

Anne frowns. “Me either, at least, not yet,” she looks around and tilts her head, looking down at the nearby desk. She looks at the papers, picking some up and looking through them, just in time for Catherine to meet her there.

“Anything?” Catherine asks, tilting her head.

“Just notes about certain military movements and plans,” Anne says, continuing to look through. “These look to be from my time as queen, or at least near that time-”

They both look up, however, when they hear someone unlocking the door.

“They can’t see me, but-” Catherine starts, though Anne is already ahead of her. She instantly moves to the shadows, hiding herself. Catherine simply watches as the door opens. She cringes a bit - the person is covered with shadow, their true form unable to be seen. 

They walk towards the desk, looking through papers before eventually picking up a blank one and writing on it. They continue to write, and Anne gets a better look at the paper. She narrows her eyes and, while avoiding detection, moves towards the back of the room, farthest from the door. 

Just as she does, another person enters the room - this time, Catherine gasps.

“Maria!”

Maria can’t hear her, of course, and the scene continues without interruption. 

Maria stands in front of the shadowed figure, bowing slightly.

Both Anne and Catherine wince when the shadowed figure starts talking - their voice is cloaked in a thousand others, distorted and underwater and barely even hearable yet blaring all at once. 

Maria, however, doesn’t seem to have an issue hearing them, resulting in a one-way conversation that Catherine and Anne can hear.

“Of course, I understand,” Maria says with a nod. She looks down at the paper that is handed to her, studying it carefully. Maria sets her jaw a bit before she nods slowly. There’s a moment before she tenses, looking up at the shadowy figure, clearly angry.

“I have not forgotten the promise I made,” Maria growls. “Not to her. Catherine shall not have died in vain.”

The confliction on Maria’s face makes Catherine’s heart break. 

Maria nods, salutes, and leaves the room. As soon as the door closes, the shadowy figure suddenly snaps their attention straight to Anne.

Anne’s gasp is only for a moment, as the figure rushes her, and suddenly she’s consumed by it.

“Anne!” Catherine yells, but the world is turning again, and despite her concern, another scene is playing out.

Anne, barely on her feet, moves to hide again, but… something’s changed. Something’s starting. Anne is more tense as the next scene happens, this time with the shadowy figure and a eerie green light.

Another person arrives - a magick practitioner in the castle, Catherine assumes - and speaks:

“Once we have someone to accept the terms, necromancy will be firmly in our war arsenal,” he says, looking down at a paper. “We’ve managed to connect the dots on this fairly quickly, thanks to the research at the Heart. And because of that, we may be able to control corrupted Light and Shadows easily enough in a few years.”

“They what-?” Catherine asks, but suddenly Anne is once again attacked by a shadow, once again forced to absorb it. “Anne!” Catherine yells, moving over to the girl as she falls to her knees.

Anne is gasping for air, but is clearly furious. “I can feel it,” she growls out. “The frustration, the anger, the power… it’s all here.” She holds up her hand. “This is how it would feel. To go unchecked. To be consumed… by the rage… of the past…”

Catherine frowns. “But that’s not what the Darkness is, is it? It’s not rage, it’s not power. It’s something else, isn’t it?” It’s something Catherine doesn’t totally understand, but she gets this much; it’s very similar to her own understanding of the Light.

Anne growls out, looking down at her hands as they burn with darkness. She feels it crawling around her skin, no longer the comfortable calm that she’s used to, but with newfound purpose. Anger. Betrayal. All of it. It’s feeding into her emotions, into her magicks.

Catherine sees the trial for what it really is, just in time for the scene to change again.

They’re in a room, and now Maria is back. Catherine ignores her feelings for the time being as she hears the conversation.

“It’s done,” Maria says bitterly. “She’s dead.”

The shadowed figure turns around, says things they don’t understand, and Maria nods.

“I’ll be sure to keep this in mind,” she says quietly. “For the Realm.”

Again, the shadow figure snaps her attention to Anne… but this time, Catherine steps in, quickly shielding Anne from the figure.

Catherine yelps as she absorbs it instead… but now, her Light seems to overpower it.

For now.

“Anne,” Catherine says, a bit winded by the event. Anne, for her part, is glaring at Maria, but Catherine breaks the line of sight. “Anne. Remember. This is a trial. What are all of these things doing to you?”

“They’re…” Anne growls a bit. “They’re making me angry. Angrier than I’ve ever felt.”

“Okay, and why would they want to do that? What is happening with the Darkness you’re feeling?”

Anne focuses on it, only for a moment, before her thoughts immediately go to the Maria in front of her. She’s right there, for the taking, easily killed at this angle…

“Anne, answer me.”

She looks back at Catherine. “It’s not actually Darkness,” Anne growls out. “It’s not comforting. This energy, it enhances your darkest thoughts. Your fears. Your anger-”

Anne tries to pulse towards Maria, but Catherine quickly stops it.

“Anne, focus.” Catherine says. “You can’t let this overtake you. Focus on me: why are they showing you these things? What’s the goal?”

“To make me angry,” Anne growls, struggling in Catherine’s grasp. Maria’s so close, she could almost touch her.

“Is that all?” Catherine asks, raising an eyebrow. She’s struggling to keep Anne at bay, but she’ll do it for as long as it takes to help her.

“What the fuck do you mean, is that all, it’s-!” she starts, but then her eyes go wide. “Oh. Oh, shit, oh-”

“What?” Catherine asks, clearly confused, but then the shadowed figure appears again. Anne immediately turns her attention to it, quick to suddenly pull Catherine behind her with some unseen shadows, and instantly moves to grab the shadowed figure.

Anne narrows her eyes as the shadowed figure whips their head around to face Anne, but Anne shakes her head.

“Not this time,” she says, smirking. “It was a distraction. You were always good at those. And you’re here, because you’re my weakness. You’re the reason I can’t move on, you’re the reason I can’t grow. You, and what you stand for to me.”

She grabs a torch nearby, and this time throws it at the shadowed figure.

The shadows retreated from the form, and the true terror appeared. 

Her hair as blonde as before, blue piercing eyes now tinted with green energy as the new staff she wielded resulted in a pulsing energy that made Anne want to run. She looks on with wide eyes as the woman, over and over again, summons monstrosities, clearly attempting to overrun Anne right then and there.

Anne practically growls.

“Jane fucking Seymour.”

The figure in question certainly looked like the Keeper of Necromancy, but with one distinct difference - her eyes were not normal, but instead pulsing with darkness, with eerie energy that Anne had to look away from at the moment. She shivers at the coldness that’s so apparent she can feel it, but then a warm hand holds on her shoulder and she looks up at Catherine.

“This is the trial, then.” Catherine says, so matter-of-factly that it helps calm Anne somewhat. Anne looks up, managing to overcome her own fear of the corruption before her, and nods. Catherine nods back. “Go on, then.”

Anne moves away, towards the corruption, taking a deep breath as she does so. She suddenly pulses forward, moving past the shadowy monstrosities and immediately to Jane, but the girl dodges so fast that Anne can’t react to the counterattack. Suddenly, Anne has a knife through her stomach, though it quickly dissolves into shadows as she’s released. She falls to the floor, huffing in pain, as she practically growls at Jane, who backs up and readies herself for another onslaught.

“Direct attacks won’t work,” Catherine says.

“You think I don’t know that?” Anne asks, right as she pulses forward again. This time, instead of straight on attack Jane, she uses the shadows to dissolve into cover…

… or at least, she thought she did, right before Jane plucks her out of the darkness and once again stabs her with a dagger that fades into shadows.

Anne yelps again, and this time, she falls to her knees. She holds her abdomen, coughing up blood, before she looks down at the wound. It’s festering with corrupted darkness.

And that gives her an idea.

“What else do you have?” Catherine asks, at the woman’s side as Anne shakily stands up. Anne seems to be focused, so Catherine steps aside. “I hope you know what you’re doing. I don’t think you can take another one of those stabs.”

“Don’t worry,” Anne says. “I won’t need another chance.”

She pulses forward, straight on. Catherine’s heart drops; did Anne suddenly forget this was what she did at first?

Jane readies her dagger, and just as she thrusts it into Anne… it suddenly stops. It all stops. All the monsters, all the magicks Jane conjured. They all just… stop.

Catherine looks over to find that Anne’s eyes are not her own - they’re filled with darkness. At first, Catherine thought the girl had lost, that she was corrupted like Jane’s magicks, but when Anne suddenly thrust her hand into the sky and Jane immediately did the same thing, Catherine realized what was happening.

Of course, Catherine thought, feeling a little stupid for not realizing it before. She can control shadows!

Indeed, Anne was now controlling Jane’s movements, Jane’s actions, all of it. The darkness around them was no long being passive in the fight; Anne was forcing it to move with her, at her command, and Jane was powerless to stop it.

This, Catherine realized, was the true power of a Keeper of the Shadows. This was the potential of the Queen of Shadows.

Anne immediately pulses backwards, but Jane still can’t move. Anne lifts her hands - Jane doesn't follow this time, Anne’s holding her in place - and Anne suddenly has chains connected to Jane’s wrists. The end of the chains are in Anne’s hands, and she smirks as she suddenly slams them into the ground, making Jane fall as well. Keeping the chains in one hand, Anne uses her other one to command the shadows to clear out the monsters around them, wiping them into oblivion, before focusing back on the Jane in front of her.

With a final wince, Anne takes the energy that she could feel around the wound and harnesses it herself. Instead of it infecting her body, she now controlled it as she formed it into a spear and threw it back at Jane, cracking her heart and thrusting them all into pale moonlight that blinded the area for a second.

The corrupted dark gives way to pale moonlight, and that Jane is on her knees. She looks up and her eyes are her own. 

Anne’s blade pulses with the warm type of darkness that Anne is familiar with.

Anne looks down at the girl, and Jane looks up. She’s crying, eyes wide at the blade. She doesn’t say anything, however, as she bows her head.

“What is this?” Anne asks, but she keeps her gaze on Jane.

Catherine looks around. “Looks like the forests near the castle in the Capitol, honestly,” Catherine says. “I recognize this clearing. The bridge to the courtyard is only a few yards away.”

“And why is she giving herself over to me?” Anne asks, her hand tightening on her blade as her body stiffens.

Silence. Then, Catherine:

“I think you’ve a choice to make, Keeper of the Shadows.”

Anne continues her focus on the neck. She continues to remember. She continues to feel.

And she raises the blade and thrusts it down, hitting her mark. 

Instead of a scream, or a head rolling, the figure immediately bursts into darkness, fading into the darkness around it. There’s suddenly a stronger darkness - a Void of sorts - and Catherine and Anne are pulled into it. The darkness is suffocating for Catherine, whose light suddenly is snuffed out, but Anne seems to revel in it, like it’s a cool refreshing drink. 

When she opens her eyes again, however, she finds the Woman and Maggie standing over her.

Maggie smiles, but she’s clearly scared. “Annie?”

Anne takes a deep breath, then smiles. “I’m ok. We’re all ok.” She looks up at the Woman. “Was that satisfactory, my lady?”

“Just about what I expected,” the Woman replies. “But I think you’re ready regardless.”

Anne stands and, just as she goes to bow again, the Woman puts her hand on Anne’s heart and mind. Suddenly, Anne can feel a cool yet warm sensation coming from the hands that pressed against her, and her eyes faded into darkness for a moment before they returned to normal. She takes a deep breath and, suddenly, she feels more alive than ever.

When the Woman steps back, Anne instinctually puts a hand on her heart and head, just before she summons a shadow dagger in her hands.

“Oh, that’s cool,” Anne says. She then takes a deep breath and focuses on the energy; it forms into a darkened fireball of sorts, then a gauntlet, then an arrow. She smirks as she then puts the energy into her other hand, back into the dagger, and takes a step back into the shadows. She completely disappears then; not even Maggie could sense her.

She ends up behind the Woman, who doesn’t seem surprised to see her, but smiles. “I trust your new arsenal is to your satisfaction, my champion and my Keeper of Shadows?”

Anne’s eyes go wide at the title and she smiles widely, but she immediately shows respect, bowing deeply. “Thank you, Mistress.”

The Woman nods. “Pray you continue to do my will, though you are not bound to it. That’s not how I operate, unlike some others.”

That got Anne thinking. “Where did Catherine go?”

“The Blessed? She’s back in her body. She had some issues with a Fae, but I saved her.” The Woman smiles. “She helped my Champion in her trial, I saved her from being stolen away by the Fae. I consider us even - well, myself and her Goddess.”

Anne nods. “I’ll be sure to tell them to be careful moving forward. Thank you, my Mistress.” She looks back over at Maggie, who nods. “We need to go. The place where they are, it’s a Fae Lands. They’re going to need all the help they can get.”

Maggie nods. “After you.”

They rush off.

[lastwagontrainhopper]

The tapestry of their skin

Written (late) for Royai Week 2020, prompt : Old wounds.

Summary: One day, when all this mess is behind them, Roy and Riza will have to explain to a curious kid how they managed to get so many scars.

Read it on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24674746 (French version - the original one - also available on AO3)

--------

The Mustang’s house, with its two floors and its front garden, was surprisingly small considering the position Roy had held, but neither he nor Riza wanted to display their new fortune ostentatiously. They both knew the way Amestris had acquired its wealth, and using that blood money to buy something as superfluous as a mansion wouldn’t have sat well with them. Besides, what was the point of having a huge villa if it was for only two people?

They had moved in together as soon as they had been married, and had married as soon as they could; Roy had made sure of that. On the last day they had descended HQ’s main staircase, both ordinary citizens for the first time since their teenage years, he had got down on one knee and proposed, amidst the flow of working officers and traffic noise of the street close by.

Riza had raised an eyebrow, amused by the situation.

“Isn’t it a bit rushed?”

He had shrugged his shoulders with a grin.

“Maybe”, he had admitted sheepishly. “But I figured we’ve waited long enough.”

Riza had let out a chuckle. “Yes, that’s for sure.” Her eyes were shining. “And yes.”

They had kissed and embraced, enjoying the pleasure of doing it in public, and especially of doing so before the symbol of what had kept them apart for so long. And, just like that, they were gone, one arm wrapped around the other’s waist, before any officer passing by could realize that something incredible had just happened.

Their marriage had been equally modest, celebrated a few weeks later in a small country church. The event had not been kept secret, of course – they had had their fill of secrecy – but Riza loathed the idea of an official ceremony with great pomp and circumstance, and Roy had had enough of playing the public figure.

The newspapers had made mention of the event, but only the people on the short guest list had been able to attend the ceremony. For them, the wedding was no surprise – everyone who mattered to Roy and Riza already knew about their relationship – but it was rather a way to make it official, and mostly to celebrate their long years of work and patience. Weddings are usually the beginning of a journey ; this one felt more like the end of a story.

A perfectly happy ending, if it wasn’t for one detail.

They wouldn’t have dared to dream of it at the beginning of their relationship, following the Promised Day – even getting married seemed impossible back then – but as their lives progressed toward something almost normal, the idea of having children came up more and more in their minds. Of course, it would have to wait: a pregnancy would force Riza to withdraw from the military at least for a time, and it could lead to some troublesome questions if the baby turned out to look like a certain colonel. But above all, their careers were demanding and dangerous, and both had suffered too much from absent parents to risk inflicting this on their child. Therefore, they had agreed that if it were to happen, it would be at the reasonable moment, after Roy’s Führer reign.

Unfortunately, not all things in life can patiently wait for the right time.

By the time Riza reached her thirty-fifth anniversary as Roy was still only general, they realized that the reasonable moment might come too late.

Nonetheless, they kept hanging on to the small hope that it could happen. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time they would see something impossible happen before their eyes. Besides, they told themselves, some of the problems could be overcome – the Elric had offered to take care of one more kid, if necessary – and others would be worth it. If Riza ever got pregnant, they finally decided, they would make the decision at that time.

But that moment never came.

Maybe it was because of Riza, maybe it was because of Roy, or maybe they were just incompatible; neither of them bothered to find out. They saw a sort of poetic justice in the idea that their couple, which together had taken so many human lives, was not able to create one. Of course, they didn’t share that thought with anyone, not even with each other – but if there was one thing they shared, it was their love of mystical punishments.

So by the time they moved in their little house not far from Central, they had long given up on their dream of amber-eyed and black-haired children.

But after a few years spent tending to their wounds as best as they could, what they had thought impossible finally happened, though in a vastly different way than they expected. It took the form of a six-year-old boy whose mother, an Investigation officer, had died from a bomb in her apartment, and whose father had never been in the picture. No one from his maternal family had come forward to take him in, and his chances of adoption were slim : he was already too old for the taste of most couples, and the explosion that killed his mother had left a nasty scar on his face and arm.

A scarred child, orphaned by military service, with an absent father : the symbolism was so strong it seemed made on purpose, and Roy and Riza didn’t fail to notice it when they read the notice sent by HQ. They did not trust themselves enough to be good parents to have voluntarily tried adoption; but no one, no one, would want this child, they were told. Surely, they would be better than nothing?

And so Adrian – the boy’s name – came to live in their house not far from Central, which suddenly seemed even smaller.

When he first arrived, the child was silent and withdrawn, undoubtedly still in shock at the brutal way he had lost his mother. But Roy and Riza were better with kids than they gave themselves credit for : after all, they came to see Edward Elric’s children so often that they were seen as aunt and uncle – which had always had a bittersweet feeling to it. But above all, they understood the boy’s wounds better than anyone else. And so, over the course of the next months, thanks to the patient and attentive care of Roy and Riza, the kid started to open up.

His parents taught him many things. He learned that not all wounds were worn on the skin ; he also learned that none of them, visible or not, defined who he was. And he was surprised to discover that his parents had even more scars than he did.

One day where Riza was carrying him to bed, when he was eight years old, Adrian put a finger on the long white line that ran across her neck.

“Mom, how did you got that?” he asked curiously.

Riza simply smiled.

“Oh, that’s just an injury I got when I was in the military. It happened when I was fighting along with your dad.”

Adrian frowned, no satisfied. “Yes, but hooow?”

She sat him on the bed and crouched to be at his level.

“Adrian”, she started softly, “it’s not very polite to insist like that. Some people don’t want to say how they got their scars; that’s personal. “She tapped the lumpy mark that stretched across his left cheek with affection. “I’m sure you can understand that.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “But I don’t mind talking about it. You and Dad always say I should be proud of it and proud of what Mama was doing. And I prefer the people who ask.” He frowned, looking grouchy. “The people who don’t ask just stare at it, and I can tell that they want to know, but they don’t ask. That’s even more annoying.”

Riza tilted her head to the side, her expression softening.

“Ah, but you know that not everyone is as wise of you are, sweetheart.”

She kissed his forehead, put him to bed, and wished him good night. He never asked about it again.

But as Adrian was growing up, he began to realize that his parents had way more scars than the norm, even for people who had been in the military. Riza had her white mark across the neck, but there was also her right hand, with its stiff fingers who couldn’t properly bend and its painful joints. Roy’s hands weren’t much better, with their identical wound in the middle of the palm; and when he went bare-chested, the large burn on his left flank was impossible to miss.

But the worst one was the thin vertical gash he had on the right side of his torso: it was the worse, because it was the most painful one – preventing him from running and jumping comfortably – but also because every time it caused Roy to flinch in pain, Riza couldn’t hide her guilty expression. The remorse on her face was so powerful that Adrian almost started to believe that she was the one who stabbed him (could she be the one who stabbed him? His parents fought from time to time, but never to that extent…or so he thought).

And then, there was Riza’s back. Adrian had never seen it, and that was the strange part. Even when they went to the beach, she always kept a shawl or a sweater to cover it. Knowing his parent’s history, he couldn’t think of any other reason to hide it than the presence of yet another scar, surely a particularly repulsive one.

Despite his curiosity, he never asked about any of their wounds, and they never brought up the subject. He had a vague idea of what his parents had lived through, like everyone in the country – Ishval’s civil war, the Promised Day, the Aerugo Invasion. And his parents liked to reminisce about their time in the military, but it was always about the mundane moments : the discussion with their squad, the Elric brothers’ visits, the mountain of paperwork Riza had to threaten Roy into signing.

But Adrian knew his parents hadn’t received all their injuries by filling out paperwork.

And yes, he knew that Roy and Riza were more than just their scars, but those injuries were still part of them, part of their lives ; not knowing where they came from, or not being trusted to even see them sometimes made him feel like he didn’t know his own parents.

And he couldn’t stop himself from wondering if Roy and Riza would have been more open about their past had he been their real son.

When he was 14, Adrian touched on the topic with Edward, during one of their visits to the Elric. Even though his children were about his age, Edward was much younger than his parents, and often acted like an old cousin rather than an uncle. More importantly, he loved telling the stories he and his brother had lived, even though Adrian suspected him of omitting certain details.

Edward didn’t have much to say at the time ; but a few weeks later, his parents called him in the living room with a serious look on their face, and Adrian suspected that Ed must have had something to do with it.

They had a heart-to-heart discussion like they rarely had in their family – Adrian had certainly inherited their tendency to keep his real emotions far below the surface – and when they were finished, the three of them with tight throats and slightly watery eyes, Roy coughed a few times and finally put his joints hand on the table.

“So…which story do you want to hear today?”

“We would probably point out,” Riza added while attempting a smile, “that we’re certainly not as good at storytelling than Edward.”

Adrian thought about it for a moment. He knew his father would be more willing to share than his mother, and wanted to start out with something light. His hands’ wounds had always unsettled him – a scar could be accidental, but two of them, exactly at the same place, had something more sinister, more…deliberate. He wouldn’t dare to ask about the gash on his torso: he could guess it was related to a particularly painful memory for the both of them.

“Your burn, on the ribs,” he finally chose.

To his relief, Roy grinned.

“Well, I must say that you, my son, have a taste for the spectacular.” (Riza looked up at the sky : “I wonder where he got that from”.) Roy glanced at her mischievously. “This story is also the first time your mother shed tears for me.”

“And certainly, the last one”, she completed in a neutral tone. “Come on now, start, or we’ll be here all day.”

[sciencespies]

What the Pandemic Christmas of 1918 Looked Like

https://sciencespies.com/history/what-the-pandemic-christmas-of-1918-looked-like/

What the Pandemic Christmas of 1918 Looked Like

On December 21, 1918, the Ohio State Journal published a warning about the lingering flu pandemic from the state’s acting health commissioner: “Beware the mistletoe.” Not only should readers resist the temptation of a holiday kiss, but they shouldn’t even be at a social gathering where it might come up.

“You will show your love for dad and mother, brother, sister and the rest of ‘em best this year by sticking to your own home instead of paying annual Christmas visits, holding family reunions, and parties generally,” the commissioner said.

Christmas 1918 was not Christmas 2020. The pandemic had already peaked in the U.S. in the fall of 1918 as part of the disease’s second wave. Meanwhile, this week the deaths attributed to Covid-19 in the U.S. are the highest they’ve ever been, showing no signs of waning as the holiday approaches. But the flu also killed far more people (675,000) than Covid-19 has to date, in a country that was much smaller, population-wise, at the time. And it wasn’t over by any means. In some cities, a third wave was already starting as Christmas approached, says Kenneth C. Davis, author of More Deadly than War, a history of the pandemic and World War I aimed at young readers.

“There was an uptick, and it was a serious uptick in some,” he says.

A century ago, the federal government held much less authority and power than it does today; the CDC, for instance, wouldn’t get its start until 1946. Decisions about how seriously to take the disease fell to states and, especially, municipalities.

Davis says San Francisco took it quite seriously, implementing a strong mask mandate in the fall as well as measures that’d be described today as social distancing. After cases rose sharply in mid-October, the city locked down harshly; the measures worked to keep the flu at bay and, a month later, the city reopened and dropped the mask mandate. But the flu was not done with the city yet. Come Christmastime, Davis says, the cases were again on the rise, and residents, having finally escaped from the pandemic shutdown, were not eager to go back.

“San Francisco wanted to institute the mask rule again but people resisted,” he says.

Davis said some anti-maskers of the day felt their rights were infringed on. Some Christian Scientists cited religious objections. And other people simply found masks too much trouble. It didn’t help that masks at the time were generally homemade, using several layers of cheesecloth and were supposed to be boiled for ten minutes every day to keep them clean.

While it’s hard to tease out whether Christmas gatherings or shopping contributed, influenza case numbers did indeed rise again in San Francisco in early January.

Lendol Calder, a historian at Augustana College in Illinois and author of Financing the American Dream: A Cultural History of Consumer Credit, says it wasn’t just the debate over masks that seems familiar today. In some places, residents complained that officials shut down churches but left saloons open. The closing of churches was a major issue in Milwaukee, a city that took the pandemic especially seriously—and that was also home to deeply observant German and Norwegian immigrant communities.

“To have churches closed during the Advent-Christmas season was huge,” Calder says. “That was people’s social media, to go to church.”

But, Calder adds, even Milwaukee allowed churches to hold services on Christmas Day.

Of course, Christmas is also a shopping season, and that was already true in 1918. The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade wouldn’t start until 1924, and Black Friday mania was decades away, but retailers were beginning to realize that the holiday shopping season could make or break their year.

“They pushed hard in November and December with advertising to get people to come shop,” Calder says. He says retailers were concerned about potential supply chain issues and urged shoppers to come in early in case items ran out. They also made sure to let potential customers know that they could deliver goods to those who were afraid to go out in public.

Davis says store-owners’ desire for a strong Christmas season also figured in anti-mask sentiment.

“They don’t want people to wear masks in the stores because they thought it was frightening,” he says.

Despite the anti-maskers, Howard Markel, director of the Center for the History of Medicine at the University of Michigan Medical School, says the question of how to guard against the flu was not politicized in the way that anti-Covid measures are today.

“Most people did comply because they had greater faith in their public officials, and they had greater faith in the science of medicine, even though it was much more rudimentary than today,” he says.

Markel notes that epidemic disease was very familiar to the early 20th century public. Families, many of which had lost a child to diphtheria or watched a loved one suffer from polio, were generally willing to comply with some limitations on their activities. Most public health departments wore badges and had police powers, and this was generally uncontroversial.

“They could forcibly quarantine you or put you on a quarantine station on an island,” Markel says.

As municipalities determined what public activities should or shouldn’t be permitted, Calder says people were puzzling through their own choices about how to celebrate the holidays.

“When you’re reading people’s diaries, they are fatigued obviously but also measured,” he says. “You don’t find people freaking out about this. They mourn the loss of traditional ways of celebrating the holidays, and they want to see relatives and are wondering whether they can or not.”

Markel, who is also editor of the Influenza Encyclopedia, a digital archive of materials from the pandemic, says one advantage people of 1918 had in terms of making holiday plans is that family gatherings were generally not the treasured once- or twice-a-year events they are for many people now.

“Extended families often lived together or right near each other, next door or upstairs,” he says. “Getting together for a holiday meal was much less of an event than it is today, when many people don’t live in their hometown.”

At the same time, Americans longed to see each other during the holiday season of 1918 for a reasons beyond the Christmas spirit: Young men were returning from the battlefields of Europe and military bases following the official end of the First World War on November 11.

“Many people had the sense that they had just lived through one of the most historic years in history,” Calder says. “[The war was a] victory for democracy over authoritarianism. Just 11 months earlier, it hadn’t looked so good. It was just a huge shock and relief to see the Armistice signed.”

For the families of more than 100,000 men lost in the war, many dying from the flu, in the course of less than a year—and for those who had lost someone to the flu at home—it must have been a somber Christmas. But, for many others, the relief of the war’s end and the apparent decline of the pandemic encouraged many Americans to come together.

“The mood was absolutely euphoric for most of the country,” Davis says. “There’s a pent-up desire to get out—that existed back then as well. The mood of the country was, ‘We’ve come through something terrible. We have something to be thankful for.’”

To whatever extent that joy encouraged people to gather in public or hold Christmas parties at home, it certainly contributed to some of the infections and deaths in the third wave of the flu. In light of the current high rate of infections, that’s something worth taking seriously today. Much like Ohio’s health commissioner in 1918, Markel says we must go against the instincts that drive us to gather together in order to protect the people we love.

“It goes against everything we love to do to not celebrate the holiday season,” he says. “And we must nevertheless not do it. It makes me sad to say it.”

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