#but for internal things about how her audhd works or why she has to live like this the answer has become simple

[bluedalahorse]

Hi hello friend! Is there anything you'd like to tell tumblr about the road trip fic?

Hi friend! Thank you for asking!

There are so many things I want to tell tumblr about road trip fic. I will be vulnerable about this for just a minute. I have to admit, there’s a little part of my brain that is maybe taking this assignment too seriously, because it’s wondering what details I could share that would actually draw in an audience without spoiling them too much. I need to let that part of my brain go—the part that wants to figure out how to draw more people toward my controversial rarepair fic when it’s a little bit more of a niche thing that is never going to draw a lot of people—and remind myself that writing for myself is the most important thing when it comes to fanfic. I will admit I am very very bad at internalizing that, but I will also admit that I am working on it.

Next, I was going to share some bullet points, but then I realized I have an initial list of bullet points here. Which I know you saw!

So, I’m going to share some additional bullet points, mostly dealing with inciting incidents plus a few extra bonus facts:

The fic takes place about 8-10 years after canon, with the characters in their late 20s.

Air travel is suspended due to a volcanic eruption, and Sara and August both happen to be in Antwerp at the same time. They drive back to Sweden so they can get to Wille and Simon’s engagement party in time.

At the beginning of the fic, Sara has been living in either Malmö or Copenhagen (I need to decide) for the past five years or so. Simon and Wilhelm and Felice are all in Stockholm, so she enjoys visiting them, but she’s also a little worried they’ve grown closer without her.

As part of Sara’s backstory, she started up a vlog when she was in university, which then became a place where she talked about doing university and 20something life when you’re a person with AuDHD. She built up her skills and was pretty happy with what she was producing for a while. Then PuzzleChildren (a charity that’s basically that awful one you’re thinking of) hired Sara to vlog for them. They were attempting to rebrand after coming under criticism for not hiring autistic people, and at first things looked promising enough and they were offering Sara enough money that she felt confident about it. Sara’s feelings are changing at the beginning of the fic.

Sara has a neurotypical colleague named Hedda who co-hosts the PuzzleChildren vlog with her. Hedda is… well, she means well, she tries to be nice, but she’s problems for Sara all the same. Hedda also used to be an independent vlogger who made videos about how to be a supportive sibling to a person with autism, since Hedda has a non speaking autistic sibling. (As it happens, Hedda and her sibling are now estranged.) PuzzleChildren sells the story of Sara and Hedda as being sort of like, besties who are just like sisters, and they have to roleplay that relationship on the PuzzleChildren videos. Sara is increasingly frustrated with this.

In the first chapter of the fic, Sara is on a panel at an autism conference, and explains that she and Hedda play their relationship up for the cameras, but that it’s not based on reality. She has a brother and a best friend she loves very much IRL, thank you very much. After confessing this, she moves into a space of anxiety, because she knows it’s going to get her in trouble. She wanders off (her conference center shares space with a zoo, so I imagine her wandering off to the zoo portion) and that’s when she first runs into August.

August has just left the monarchy maybe six weeks before the story starts? He has also refused to talk to the press about why, nor has he put out an official statement about that or anything. The rumors, naturally, are out of control.

Later in the fic though, August has found out a secret about Sara that makes her feel pretty vulnerable. She’s having a tough time. They stop the car, get some strawberries at a roadside stand, and eat them while looking out at the sea. Then August tells Sara he’ll tell her why he left the monarchy, as a sort of evening of the playing field.

I won’t tell you why August left the monarchy, but it has something to do with his dad.

Vincent (now divorced) will briefly show up with his preschool aged daughter, who also has ADHD. I’m sort of interested in the existential crisis Vincent could have if he had an ADHD kid and heard himself saying the same things to her his parents said to him, and wanting to stop. It’s a small part of the story but I want to nod to the idea that even he can break his awful cycles.

Honestly? I might write August and Sara as bi4grayro just to spite the anon haters who call them boring because they’re “just straight.” (I mean do we know either of them is 100% hetero? DO WE? I don’t believe it.)

This fic is on hold until January due to grad school. I hope I’ll feel motivated to write it when I’m done!