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ultimatebethylficlist · 4 years ago

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Veteran Author of The Month: June 2021

The featured veteran author for June is also a co-admin right here at UBFL: SquishyCool (or @im-immortal )!

SquishyCool can be found on AO3 and FFN under the same penname.

When asked what got her into Bethyl and what the fandom means to her, she said:

I’ve been a hardcore TWD fan since the show began airing, but that’s because of my love for zombies. In all honesty, I didn’t really ship anyone for the first 3-4 seasons. I kind of shipped Daryl with Carol, but then it became clear that it was a platonic relationship and in all honesty, I just wanted to see them both get some action lmao. Then the prison fell... and in those first moments of “Still,” when we see Beth and Daryl running and running and finally collapsing on the ground, breathless and exhausted... the butterflies started. Something clicked and I immediately thought, “uh oh.” The rest is history, especially considering how “Still” and “Alone” played out. I can’t explain how or why I’m still so heavily invested, especially considering my last 2 fandoms only kept my attention for about 2-3 years each, but here I am. And I love it! I am so incredibly grateful for the Bethyl fandom because not only has it helped me improve my writing so much more than I ever could have imagined, but it has also introduced me to some of the most amazing people, including someone who I now consider one of my very best friends! It’s my happy place :)

For her personal fic rec list, she recommends:

In The Maw by ronsparkyspeirs

Way Down We Go by LeathernLaces

Surfacing by lindentree

Wild Things (The Moonshine Poet) by Abelina

The Gift by Feliz

The Man Who Can't Be Moved by burningupasun

New Experiences Series by wallflow3r

Whisper Softly to Me by taylorcatherine

Interstice by leftmywingshome

To Love Like a Man by Seraphique

Death, Death (i defy thee) by alamorn

In My Blood by Courtneyshortney82

Let the Good Times Roll by gutsforgarters

Resolved by Allatariel

the weight of these wings by peachthorns

all my spaces are filled with you by annabeth_writes

A Little Jailbreak with the Little Jailbait by wandering_gypsy_feet

between the beginning and the end by sheriffandsteel

SquishyCool’s Works & Personal Thoughts:

Dirty Fingernails and Dried Blood Summary: What happened during the months between "Still" and "Alone"? Beth uses the last pages of her diary to write down every detail of surviving with Daryl. Thoughts: My first Bethyl fanfic. It holds a special place in my heart for that reason, though it is pretty rough. If I could go back, I never would’ve done it entirely in first-person. But I do plan to finish it one day. There are some scenes I’m particularly proud of, and I still have a long note full of ideas and plot points.

Most Wanted Summary: After Beth’s mother and half-brother are murdered in a drug war, the godly veil on the Greene Family operation is lifted, and law enforcement comes down hard. In an effort to protect her family, Beth commits a heinous crime that could mean life in prison alongside them. Now everyone she’s ever trusted is in police custody and her only chance at freedom is to get as far away from Atlanta as she can... Thoughts: Well, this is a must-read if you like my writing. I hope to one day convert this into an original fiction and maybe get it published, but I need to finish it first LOL. I got the idea from ONE scene of “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” and from there, it exploded into a huge mystery thriller (with lots of romance and smut). I’m really really proud of it, and I’m scared I’ll fuck it up tbh, so I keep putting off continuing it. But I really need to get back to it because I really want people to see what I have planned! (Also, this fic is the reason @courtneyshortney82 started talking to me, so that alone is pretty historic lmao)

The Crow’s Song Summary: Beth and Daryl spend a few more days together in the funeral home and come to terms with all they've lost along the way. But soon, they must decide what comes next. Thoughts: This fic... this fucking fic. It took me a full year to write. I made numerous edits. I even got a little depressed while I was writing the last two chapters, and my bf didn’t know why until he read what I’d been writing lol. It’s honestly the Bethyl fic I’ve always wanted to write but just didn’t know how. I’m still really really proud of how it turned out.

Carnival Games Summary: Daryl is a traveling carnival worker and Beth is a barely legal farmer's daughter looking for a night of fun when the carnival comes to town. Thoughts: Omg this fic is so fun!! One of my first Bethyl fics, and one of my first Bethyl smut fics. Short, sweet, a little funny, and a lot hot. I am still impressed with myself on this one, especially considering how much my writing has improved since lol

Breathe. Please. Summary: Beth shows up at the Hilltop. Alive. Daryl can hardly believe his eyes. Until she's lying in his bed, an arm's reach away. And he can hear her inhaling... exhaling... inhaling... Thoughts: Another “fix-it” that I’m proud of. Tbh I didn’t think it was anything all that special, but a lot of readers have said it’s one of their favorites, and some say they reread it regularly, and nothing makes me happier than hearing that, so I am extremely proud.

picking @ scabs Summary: Sometimes, no matter how much you love someone, being with them just isn't right. But what wouldn't you give for it to be right? Can someone like Daryl learn how to swallow his pride and stop repeating the same mistakes over and over? Can someone like Beth learn to fight off her demons and allow him to get close enough to hurt her again? How can they stay away from each other when it's all too easy to fall back into one another? Picking a scab will leave a scar, but they both have so many scars already... what's a few more? Thoughts: This fic is very, very personal for me. It’s like my “therapy” fic. I have poured some of my deepest feelings and struggles into its chapters, and the whole idea that got me to start it was that I wanted to find a way to navigate and cope with ending my 3-year long relationship with my emotionally/mentally/sometimes physically abusive ex. I still have a lot of fond memories from that relationship, but even more so, I have painful memories. Not to mention, going through your early 20s as a woman in the modern day is a fuckin’ trip, so this kind of explores that. It’s really self-indulgent, I think, but I’m really proud of the smut in it. And more than that, I’m proud of the response. I’ve had a few people message me or comment to say that they’ve felt all those things, or have experienced similar things, and it’s really just... relieving. I put my heart and soul out there, and what I got back was “you’re not alone.” So yeah, this fic is special. I wanna finish it soon, but I have to be in A Mood to do so.

In Toto Corde Summary: Despite a million reasons not to, Beth and Daryl fell in love. Then he made the ultimate sacrifice in order to keep all of his promises. Now, facing unimaginable consequences at the hands of witch hunters, Beth has no choice but to use her powers to bring Daryl back from the dead. "He won't be the same..." Thoughts: I LOVE THIS FIC. I love it so much that I had to rewrite it after like 4 or 5 years. And I already started on a sequel that I really hope I’m able to finish. Though it doesn’t have many hits, and I don’t think many people have read it at all, which I understand since it basically is entirely focused around Daryl being killed. But damn, I’m proud of this one, and it was really fucking fun to write because witch!Beth is just... the best.

risk it all (part 1 of in for a penny, in for a pound) Summary: Daryl Dixon has a pretty decent life, all things considered. He's got his own place. A good dog. A few friends. Even a girlfriend. He keeps himself out of trouble. Until he starts texting Beth Greene. And hell, if he ain't about to risk it all for this damn girl. Thoughts: This was supposed to be one short multichapter fic focused entirely on smut and social media. Then I got on a roll and it ended up being the beginning of a series! This fic is purely fun. Nothing too serious or heavy. I write it when I’m in a Good Mood because it’s my little happy place. I have plans for about 4 more fics before the series will be finished!

Don’t Make Me Haunt You Summary: So here's the thing: Merle Dixon is dead as fuck. And as it turns out, Beth Greene is the only one who can see or hear him. Which is weird considering she's never met or even heard of this guy, let alone anyone with the last name Dixon. That's her first problem... Thoughts: The reception to this fic has absolutely blown me away. I had no idea anyone would want to read about ghost!Merle haunting Beth and forcing her to solve his murder with the help of his grumpy brother. And it was all inspired by an episode of South Park lmao then I started really getting into it and now it’s just like, my super fun fic where I explore a range of emotions and all kinds of religious beliefs and different mythologies and I can build the world however I want and goddamn I just love writing this fic. Plus there’s a podfic for it! I can’t even begin to explain how much I love this fic and how proud I am of it :)

#bethyl fanfiction #veteran author of the month

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forthisone · 4 years ago

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Thoughts on Handmaid’s Tale Season 4 so far Spoilers up to S4E8, the episode I’ve just watched.

Fair warning: This kind of went from me trying to explain why the show feels wrong for me now in a measured way, to a full on rant wall of text. This is maybe something that should be a diary entry more than something that should exist publicly, but fuck it.

This is all just my opinion. I know some people have problems with S4 (like me) and some people are finding it an improvement on S3. Everyone finds their own things to connect with on this show, different people have different experiences--it’s a very hard-hitting show and it affects people in different ways--and my perception of the show will be different to others. I just wanted to get my thoughts down before I read too much other analysis of what other people think. This season I’ve felt myself in a cycle of feeling uncomfortable about most of the content, and then reading what other people think, feeling like I’m wrong to be feeling how I’m feeling, and somehow giving it all another chance, finding the caveats that allow me to keep watching. There’s like... one scene in twenty that I find satisfying, and the clown in me keeps watching. But I’m finding myself feeling more and more disconnected from this show that I used to love. Especially now that I’m heavily invested in another show that I actually find satisfying.

Trigger warnings for all the topics that come with watching this show, including sexual assault. Also lots of angry language from me!

When I watched Seasons 1 and 2, I really valued the show. It was painful to watch, of course. But I thought the story was important and there were elements of hope and love and goodness amongst the bad that were ‘worth’ the pain of watching it for me.

Now I just roll my eyes all. the. damn. time. All I can imagine when I watch is the writers wanking themselves off creating new situations of torture for the characters, turning these human characters into caricatures to play out their images. I don’t really feel like they actually care about the arcs anymore, they just want the same cycle on repeat. I don’t know what I expected for Janine but to see her back at Eye HQ, probably about to become a Handmaid again, and for the scene to somehow feel like it’s focusing on Lydia’s pain? Makes me feel sick.

Also seeing the Waterfords being applauded... making that the legacy of June’s testimony...ugh. I understand maybe why they did it, they’re shining a light on all the misguided right-wing bs that exists in society today. How there are people in the world who find ways and reasons to support these kinds of monsters. I just... it was such a climactic moment, right? For June to finally testify against Fred? For him to face his charges? And it ends up being a victorious moment for him and Serena? Fuuuuck that. I hope it’s temporary and karma comes around for them but I’m so almost done with this show that I don’t really care any more.

side rant: How fucking unrealistic was it that they even let Fred speak to June in the courtroom. And let him go on. Give me a fucking break. And also that they just let her walk away...?

I feel weird criticising anything June does because who am I to judge how she deals with pain for what she’s been through, right? But again I just feel like... it’s a fictional story. It should have a purpose, right? I don’t understand what the writer’s intentions are. Are we meant to be disturbed by her actions (with Emily? with Luke?) I think so? I don’t understand what the end goal is with how they are writing her? Am I just a perfectionist that wants happy endings for everyone and people to heal in unrealistic ways? Maybe. I didn’t expect it all to be plain sailing once she got to Canada... of course not, but I don’t like how she’s dictating how other people deal with their own trauma, like she’s some kind of therapist. I want people sitting in a room and crying and going through shit together and connecting. I don’t want endless shots of people staring into space and talking about ways they’d like to kill people. I totally get that they are all dealing with trauma, that they are not perfect people, but I just don’t like how they are painting what June does to be the right thing and not just the actions of someone who is hugely traumatised and needing help herself (and seemingly not receiving it currently)? Again, I repeat: it’s not what June is doing that I have an issue with, but the way it’s framed in the show as some kind of victory, or the “right thing”. I don’t get what they’re trying to do.

The fucking PINNACLE of this for me was the ending of S4E1 where they have June hand Mrs Keyes a murder weapon in front of her rapist and say “make me proud” and there’s never a question, there’s not even a NOTE, that maybe this isn’t how this situation should be dealt with. That maybe having a minor kill her rapist and then climb in to bed with June covered in his blood and tell her “I love you” (iirc) as the ending note of the episode isn’t healthy. This is the sick feeling that has been in my mouth since the beginning of S4 and I think it began with this scene.

Lydia. What the fuck even is Lydia’s storyline, beyond just wanting to keep Ann Dowd on our screens? She feels unworthy or like she has to prove herself or something. We get it. I don’t give a shit. She’s a monster who didn’t even have a backstory that made me understand on some level why she is the way she is. Why are we focusing on her pain over Janine? WHY.

Moira. To be honest Moira is the best thing about this show for me currently. She’s making me able to cope with it, because she keeps saying the things that I’m thinking in her scenes, and I’m so grateful for it, because it makes me feel like I’m not going crazy to be hating some of the things I’m seeing. Samira Wiley is a delight to have on the show.

Luke. I feel like... he’s a character that, in my opinion, they are getting right. His scenes don’t feel jarring to me (in terms of what the character is doing). That’s not to say that I don’t find some of his behaviour jarring, but I feel like... he’s not a caricature, he’s still a human character that has flaws and redeeming qualities. I think OT is playing the scenes really well. Of course it’s fucked up that he went to the trial without June’s permission. But I feel like Luke would do that. Especially when June isn’t talking to him about any of it, and he feels like he needs to understand it to make sense of the impact it’s having. Of course he’s ludicrous to suggest they can just “move on”. But he’s a human who desperately wants June back, the way he remembers her, the memory he’s been clinging on to her for 7? years and is in denial that that can’t be any more. I don’t have to think the character himself is perfect to still find the scenes interesting and content that I appreciate because it’s scenes that explore the complexities of human relationships. Societal expectations of husbands and wives. Exploring that. The pressure on women to feel like they have to produce children or they are a disappointment. Representation that you can be sexually assaulted by someone who is your girlfriend/boyfriend/wife/husband and not only by dangerous strangers in dark alleyways. That that could happen (to a man, too) and that they could choose to stay with her/him. That they couldn’t feel like they could talk about it (because who is there to talk about it with?)

Lawrence. Again it just feels like he’s on our screen for no purpose other than to include Bradley Whitford in the show. I don’t understand what his root motivation is, or what his goals are in what he is doing (does he want Gilead to continue? does he secretly want to bring it down? I’ve got no idea). I really have no interest in his character other than the fact that Bradley is a good actor and I think it’s interesting to watch him.

Rita. I’ve enjoyed her scenes too. I don’t really have much to say about them because I haven’t had a problem with them, only that I wish she was in it more, perhaps to bring out June’s human side a bit more. Their reunion in hug in the last episode was one of my favourite moments this season, because they can relate to each other on a level the others can’t. They lived in the same house.

Emily. Again, I feel the same way about her as I feel about Rita really. I feel like they just dip into her character on an occasional episode and go “tick. we’ve focused on Emily this episode. let’s move on.”

Nick. As you may or may not know reading this, my involvement in the THT fandom has largely been as a Nick/June shipper (you can go back in my nick x june tag to see this). When I talk about “elements of hope and love and goodness amongst the bad that were ‘worth’ the pain of watching it for me”, I’m really talking about N/J. So I have a lot of feelings about Nick. I could go on a whole rant here (narrator: she ended up going on a whole rant here) about how I wish Nick was acknowledged more, how I feel like his writing (when it actually exists) this season has been weird, how I feel like he’s no longer the character that I loved from Seasons 1 & 2. I think what it boils down to is, that they fucked Nick up for me (personally) when he went from “just a driver” to a Commander. I didn’t find it realistic and I don’t think it’s what they had planned for him, I think they’re just making it up from season to season and this is NEVER more apparent than with Nick. How he’s gone from washing Waterford’s car and an Eye for Pryce to apparently “leading the battle in Chicago”. And I’ve gone through weeks, months, years, of discussions with other Nick fans about this, some of whom feel the new backstory is still valid for him and makes sense, some who don’t. Some who can justify his scenes this season, others who find it jarring like me. Again, it’s a personal thing and I want so badly to love this character but honestly I feel like he’s either just neglected (most of the time) or he’s a character they just use to create storylines for other people with no real care or consistency for his own arc (edited to add: also I think they just use him to create this false sense of tension: “is he good??? is he bad???”, when anyone who paid even an iota of attention to him in the past knows he has THE SOFTEST HEART IN THE WORLD and would never betray June). He hasn’t even mentioned his daughter in two seasons (only in a discussion prompted by June in 3.06). THAT is not the Nick I know from Season 2 who cried as he held his daughter for the first and only time. I WANT THIS CHARACTER BACK. I don’t trust the writers with his story any more and it makes me sad and it makes me less invested. And I’ve felt like this since the beginning of Season 3. That’s not to say I’ve hated all his scenes but... there’s just not enough good content for me to still be invested at this point. Scenes like the bridge scene in Season 4... the display of emotion in that scene was clear but in the context of the rest of the show, I didn’t buy it. If you want me to believe that June still feels strongly enough about him that she’s going to run romantically across a bridge to him into his arms like a scene out of The Notebook or The Bodyguard, then maybe have her speak about him to ANY CHARACTER, or any voice over, once she gets to Canada (and I don’t really include the one line mentioning him to Nichole). Because otherwise, that bridge scene just feels like pandering to me, again it just feels like boxticking (”let’s keep the Nick/June fans happy”) and it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I’m still grieving for the Nick/June scenes from Seasons 1 and 2 that felt so much more authentic to me than the bridge kiss, because they had context and they weren’t a sidenote, because Nick actually appeared more than once every 3 episodes.

Am I done with my rant? I think I’m done with my rant.

#the handmaid's tale

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geekkatsblog · 4 years ago

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Grey's Season 17x8 review

I'm kinda late but I haven't been sleeping lately so I finally managed to catch up with the episode today.

I'm still in shock from last weeks episode honestly but let's go. First I'm expressing my disappointment on the lack of Carina, she's a series regular on Grey's but all her scenes were on Station 19, I wish they would have brought Maya to Grey's just so I could feel good about seeing them cash in their regulars card. Then Deluca was laid to rest, another heart breaker seeing that they had just opened the realms of possibility for him and storylines but they just killed him off instead.

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Teddy

Teddy the biggest storyline at this point besides the funeral. At last we get to see what's really going on. Teddy hasn't been looking herself for a long time and it seems like Deluca's death was the breaking point for her, she was so scarred she didn't even want to wean Meredith off of the vent and when things are affecting your decisions as a doctor and not for the better, it's not a good sign. We'll get to see more of the storyline next week which honestly I'm excited to see. She managed to make me feel for her because despite everything she's done she's still the same old attachment barbie under there. I'm just glad Owen was able to put aside their differences and pick her up bridal side to take her home. The only thing I'm hoping is that it actually happens to be what the trailer was suggesting and not another Denny and Izzie situation because enough of the Grey Sloan doctors have had cancer and I'm definitely hoping that hey end the love triangle between her Owen and Tom or the better scenario in my opinion is let her get some space to breath and deal with healing without the pressures of relationship added to it.

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Meredith

Meredith honey, I'm gonna need you to take several feet away from Mc Dreamy, your kids and the hospital need you and you're getting a little too close to him for comfort. On that note I was once again glad to see Patrick Dempsey bless my screen as Derek Shepherd and it was as always a treat. When he talked about the kids, I'm so glad he knows about Ellis and they got to have several deep chats, so much so that I almost fell into the trap of wanting them to touch. She took a breath on her own which makes it seem as though she's improving but I don't want to get my hopes up and then have them trampled again like in the situation with Deluca waking up after surgery and then Meredith waking up only to end up on a vent in the same day.

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Bailey

I'm so glad that she's taking some time off. She's been running on empty since her mother died and she was beginning to remind me of the time with when she tested herself over and over again for staph with how obsessed she was about Deluca's autopsy, however with the amount of her fellow doctors she's lost its understandable plus Meredith the only one of her residents left is still on life support. If it wasn't for Richard she would have done some serious damage especially to Teddy who already was on edge. She definitely doesn't handle trauma well but besides Richard and Meredith she has experienced the most trauma. She's been through a lot and sometimes I think I tend to forget that.

And at least we got to see that small scene between her and Ben at the end so that was a plus.

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Richard

Is still holding up the walls of the hospital. It must be so hard for him to keep his faith with all he has been through, like I said before him, Meredith and Bailey have been through hell and back so I can definitely understand him feeling a little lost and losing his faith. However he didn't let that affect his keeping the Grey Sloan family together. I'm glad him and Catherine managed to make up because both of his support people are going through things of their own (Meredith and Bailey) so I was glads that she was able to be there for him and he didn't have to consider the thought of alchohol because that would just be too much at this point.

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Amelia and Link

Are doing really well right now as a couple, which scares me because whenever something seems to be going too well for a couple they throw a storm at them and I'm not ready to see their happy bubble burst just yet.

And Amelia has grown a lot her talking to Zola, she just said the right things. Mother hood as really changed her for the better. And does anyone else really want to see the letters that Zola wrote for Derek?

Link however felt the pressures of taking care of 4 kids constantly and I can understand I help out with my niece sometimes and by the end I want to pull my hair out and sleep in a corner for a week, farless 3 kids and a baby, I'm surprised he lasted so long.

Link headed to Jo's house in the middle of whatever agreement Jackson and Jo have going and got drunk. What I really liked about it though was that he went home afterwards and when he did Amelia didn't judge or yell she just talked to him and then hugged him which was amazing. They have a level of communication on the show that most of the other couples lack and it just works so well for them.

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Jo and Jackson

Jackson discovered just how much of a close friendship Link and Jo have and at some point he almost seemed as if he was jealous. Let the complications begin ladies and gentlemen. Plus there is the apparent potential of Dr Haynes turning it into a triangle. I guess one triangle dies to form another 🙄 and let's just say I'm not too excited for it.

Jo allowed herself to get drunk and vent which in my opinion was a step forward atleast. She hasn't really gotten the time to grieve over Alex because suddenly Covid happened and she was swamped with work. I'm just hoping that she does so that she won't accidentally sabotage any upcoming happiness she may have with someone else she needs to heal.

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Maggie and Winston

Poor Winston, he really doesn't know what he's signing up for by joining Grey Sloan does he 😭? Although I noticed last week he seemed to be getting the picture when Link was talking about Meredith and Derek. On the other hand seeing him with the kids was adorable, and he managed to give everyone some time to themselves without the kids which was a very big contribution. He's reminding me of a Ben which in no way is a bad thing. Go on Maggie get it.

Maggie was also devastated and shocked by Deluca as we all were and I'm so sad how their slowly but surely introducing her to the traumas of Grey's. She literally is the only pure one left and now she has to go through all the trials of the hospital until she's dark and twisty. I hope not though she's the only cheerful non broken one left on the show.

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Owen

Is about to have his hands full by next episode. He really is beginning to redeem himself after all Teddy did to him the whole episode he spent trying to make her feel better about Deluca and then picked her up to carry her home which confirmed my theory of it was always going to be Owen for Teddy, it was always Owen and Teddy even when she was married to ....... Henry 😭. I hope this will be the end of the over worked love triangle and they'll finally be able to move on especially Tom who deserves it.

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Haynes

Is utterly smitten with Meredith's children and was begging her to wake up and fight and surprise, surprise she took her first breath on her own. Honestly out of all the potential suitors for her which really isn't much considering one of them has now joined Derek as a permanent member of the beach, Haynes isn't a bad choice, I'm beginning to actually ship them. But then Krista said she was sensing a potential triangle with Jo, Jackson and Haynes and I hope not. I'm tired of the triangular pyramid of Grey Sloan love triangles. Just once I would like a relationship to be straight forward. They killed Deluca and the Teddy one is coming to an end, no need for another.

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Tom

Is still recovering from Covid and he seems to be going to live, a plus in the series so far.

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Levi and Nico

Are slowly getting closer, but I'm not rooting for anyone until Nico apologizes and they have an actual conversation about what happened without their clothes ending on the floor.

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Helm

Also was having a hard time coping and dealing with a bit of guilt about her over ambitious surgery hungry self. She actually reminds me of Cristina in a way, which is why I want Tom to be her teacher I really think their personalities will bounce well off of each other, especially in the episode where she had to check on Tom when he had Covid.

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Questions

• What's going on with Teddy? Owen said in the trailer he sees it in soldiers a lot but Grey's has a knack for reusing plots and her seeing Deluca is giving major Denny Izzie vibes, plus there's the chance that if it really is a brain tumor they'll pin all her recent choices on the tumor.

• Will someone tell Meredith they're are beaches in the real world as well, sure Derek won't be there and it probably wont be as peaceful but all I know is she needs to wake to hell up.

• What's going on between Jo and Jackson will they become more? Will they add Haynes to the mix?

• And most importantly when will Carina finally be seen in the Grey Sloan hospital? I need more Dr Carina.

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alexandrablake · 4 years ago

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love, jj

Prompts: 88. “I never meant to fall in love with you, I just did” from this prompt list! Pairing: Jemily, technically Word Count: 2,456 Warnings: Mentions of death. A/n: Red (@hurricanejjareau) picked this prompt. thank you, ily. that is all.

April 29, 2011 Emily,

Hey. It’s me. I’m sure you can tell by my handwriting. I’ve had you look over enough of my reports that I’d honestly be kind of disappointed if you didn’t. And before you say anything, yes, I know we play Scrabble, but that doesn’t count. I need to talk to you. God, Emily, I just need to talk to you. To see that you are alive, that you are well, and, honestly, to see that you are real.

These past few weeks without you have been awful. Everything is different. I’m spending more and more time around the office. The way we all skirt around your name like you never even existed is just painful. For a while there, I almost started to believe you weren’t real. And that’s a big fear of mine- to wake up one morning not worrying about you, because I know that’s all you have right now. You have Hotch and I thinking about you, and that’s it.

Depressing. And nothing I need to tell you, but it’s not like you’ll read these anyways. It’s nearing two months since you “died.” I don’t think Rossi has processed it yet. Penelope is a shell of her former self coping. Even Ashley seems distraught. Spence has dealt with far too much trauma, and yet, I’ve never seen him like this. He’s been at my house everyday this week, crying and then sleeping on the couch. It’s heart wrenching, and it takes everything in me to not tell him you’re okay. That you’re alive. But I can’t, not with Doyle still out there, always being a danger to you.

But, my God, is Morgan the worst to be around right now. Second to only Penelope Garcia, you were Derek’s favorite person in the team. No point hiding it, you’re all profilers and I spend way too much time around you guys.. He’s gutted. Honestly, I think he’s the one person here who has really “accepted” that you’re gone. Even Hotch is off. But not Morgan. And that’s the horrifying part. He’s the exact same person that he was before you left, but now his smiles are a little too wide and his gestures are a little too exaggerated. It’s terrifying to be around.

I guess that leaves me. I’m doing okay. Miss you everyday, but I feel bad every time I do because I know the truth. I know where you are (kind of) and I know that you are alive. They buried you. They know where you are, too, but for them, that’s six feet under.

Love, JJ

March 1st, 2011 Emily,

Me again. Today was better, I think. I know we like to say that the serial killers never take a vacation, but they seem to be on one right now. It’s just a bunch of consulting on relatively low level cases. Thank God, because I don’t think any of them could handle a case right now. Reid didn’t sleep at my house last night, which is improvement, I think. He definitely didn’t sleep, but I’ll take what I can get. Derek is almost worse.

It’s lonely here without you. Penelope isn’t herself, and I find her sitting at your desk all the time. She’s stopped staring at your photo constantly and now avoids the hallway with all the memorials so she doesn’t have to walk by you. She’s in her office even more than she normally would be. There’s boxes of cupcakes being brought in all the time. She’s an absolute and utter wreck.

You remember that feeling we all felt when Haley was killed? When we all stood around her casket and watched with teary eyes as Hotch and Jack said their final goodbyes? The feeling that nothing would be okay again? Yeah. That’s about what’s happening now, but now it’s not just Hotch feeling like his life is over. It’s all of us.

And God, you must be so lonely.

Love, JJ

April 10th, 2011 Emily,

Today was an all-time low. Everywhere I looked, there you were. Oh, there you were grabbing coffee after an all-nighter spent at my house. Oh, there you are, legs dangling over the side of the chair you’re lounging in because you don’t know how to sit properly. Oh, there you are, smiling at Hotch as you talk animatedly in his office about God knows what. Oh, there you are, downing shots with Rossi.

Your ghost was everywhere over this office, over my life. You were this office, you were everything. I can’t go anywhere to escape you. How can you have a ghost when you aren’t even dead?

April 11th, 2011 Emily,

Another crying Spencer night. They’re off on their second case, a spree killing in Tampa. I don’t know. At this point, I’m kind of lost. I’m spending far too much time at that office even though I don’t work there because it’s one of my last connections to you. I just… miss you, I guess. No, I know I miss you.

I just can’t stop feeling guilty. I’m causing all this pain in the team and in all your loved ones. I was the one who told Hotch you survived, I was the one who suggested you “die.” This is all my fault.

Hotch told me he was doing assessments of the team. That shouldn’t be happening. You should be there. I’m not going to ask for the results, and I don’t think I would be allowed to if I asked. I just don’t want to face the reality of what I’ve done.

Love, JJ

May 15th, 2011 Emily,

Hey, it’s been a while. Not much has changed. I haven’t been to the BAU since my last letter. I can’t face them anymore. I can’t sit within those walls that seep of you. I can’t face you.

God damnit, Prentiss! Why did you go after Doyle? You knew we could have helped! This could have all been avoided if you would have trusted us!

May 15th, 2011 Emily,

I’m sorry. It’s not your fault. I just miss you. A lot.

May 22nd, 2011 Emily,

With you being gone, I’m starting to realize how much I depended on you. You were my person. If I had a problem, I came to you. If I wanted to get drunk, I came to you. If I wanted to get a break from the overwhelmingness of the testerone of our workplaces, I came to you. If I just wanted to escape, I came to you.

I’m still avoiding the BAU as best as I can. Even Hotch and I haven’t been talking. Spence is still coming to my house, though. Still crying. He misses you so much, Prentiss. We all do.

When Elle left, I didn’t think any of us would recover. She hadn’t been there for the longest time, but she was an integral part of the team. But we recovered. Then, when Gideon left, some of us were fine, but Reid? I genuinely thought he would never be the same. And I guess he isn’t, but he still recovered. And now you left. So if the pattern continues, we’ll recover.

But I don’t think I will. Because every waking minute of every day (and even some of the sleeping ones), the thought that we will never catch Doyle haunts me. The thought that I will never see your beautiful face again. The thought that I will never actually get to talk to you again.

They don’t have those thoughts. To them, you are dead, under the ground, declared dead on the table. To them, there’s no chance they’ll ever see you again. So, for them, if we don’t catch Doyle, yes they’ll be irrationally angry because the son of a bitch who killed you is still out there, but catching him never had any more reward than revenge and putting another bad guy in prison where he belongs. They won’t realize that not catching him means they’ll never see you again because they don’t even know that’s an option.

I love you, JJ

June 1st, 2011 Emily,

The worst part of all this is that I know you’re out there, lonely. I would say afraid, but I know you. Emily Prentiss doesn’t get scared, I know. But you’re alone, in a place that isn’t here. All I want to do is help you. And I can’t because if I do, there’s the possibility that I’ll make everything worse.

So, I’m trying to focus on positives: happy memories and good things to happen. Like, the other day, I walked through a market and, when I passed a flower stall, all I smelled was that expensive perfume you used to wear. The stuff you stopped using because it made Reid sneeze? The stuff you still use when we would go out on the town? Smelling it made me want to go out and buy a drink and dance the night away.

And when I was shopping for new shoes for Henry, I saw a pair of boots that I knew you would buy the instant you saw them. They were lace-up, black with a bit of heel (I know your never-ending goal is to get taller), and there was a slight rose decal on the top. I could hear you shouting, “These are men squashing boots!” because you’re never embarrassed in public. I could see the smile you give me, a flash of blinding white teeth. And I knew the smile I would shoot back because happy Emily is my favorite Emily.

I love you, JJ

June 18th, 2011 Emily,

You missed Morgan’s birthday. 38! It was a pretty somber occasion because we all knew that something was missing. And it was the day before your 3 month anniversary of being dead. Garcia tried as best as she could to fill the gap, decorating the bar that Rossi rented out very extravagantly. Material items could never make up the lack of you. We all just ended up getting drunk.

I think it’s really starting to hit Hotch. When I take Henry to hang out with Jack, Aaron’s quiet. Granted, he’s always quiet. (Not around you, though. You always bring out the best in people) This is a different quiet, though. He’s almost silent. I think he’s beating himself up. You know Hotch, anniversaries hit him hard. I think he hoped you would be home now, Doyle staying in the maximum security he belongs in.

But the rest of them are moving on. Spencer isn’t having the breakdowns he used to have. Penelope and I can go out for coffee without there being this heavy weight sitting on us. Ashley even joined us once, and it didn’t feel like she was replacing anyone. Rossi is smiling much more. Morgan is still acting a little fake, and he pulls sleepless nights every now and then, obsessing over the case. But he’s better. He can focus on cases, and Penelope tells me that they can go hang out without him being too absent-minded.

Hotch is the one I’m really worried about. We both remember the aftermath of Haley’s death. The grieving, the silence, the sleepless nights, the constant fidgeting so he could keep his mind of it. That’s what’s happening now. He’s just as worried about you as I am. We both know the possibility of never seeing you again.

That leaves me. Three months later and I wouldn’t say I’m much better than I used to be. I still have trouble hanging around them. I still find myself grabbing my phone to text you something before remembering that I would never get an answer. I still find myself longing for you, for your smile, for your touch.

I love you, JJ

July 17th, 2011 Emily,

I think this will be my last letter. I’ve come to a few realizations, and, even though I still desperately need to talk to you, writing these are one of them.

One: This isn’t healthy for me- nothing about this is. 5 stages of grief. We both know them, they have to do with the unsubs all the time. These letters are classified as denial. And I need to get through all five. Yes, you aren’t dead, but you may as well be. I can’t see you, I can’t talk to you, I can’t know where you are. There’s a death certificate. You were “buried.” And I need to get to acceptance. I need to accept that I may never see you again. I can’t just exist in this state of limbo forever.

Two: You are okay, and you can care for yourself. I guess this goes under the first one, but I don’t really care. You don’t get as close as we did are and not have an ever present worry of “what if she’s not okay? What if I’m not there to protect her? What if she needs my help?” But that’s where the denial thing comes in. I think that I’ve been doing that to myself because it keeps you near to me. It keeps you alive. Because if I can worry about you, there is still a you to worry about. Therein lies the issue. There is no you to worry over. To the world, you are dead. And I need to accept that. Because the you that does exist is perfectly capable and doesn’t need my help.

Three: Not having you here is the worst part of this all. Technically, you were gone before you left because I left, but we still talked and hung out. We still went to bars on alternating Saturdays. But we can’t have any of that anymore. And I think that’s what made me realize the last thing.

I am completely, utterly in love with you. And that’s terrifying. Unrequited love stories are the worst to read, but here I am, writing one. I loved how hot you looked when you tied your hair up. I love the way you carried yourself. I love the way you smiled at me when Reid went on one of his tangents. I love the way you looked at me when I delivered the profile. I love our hushed talks on the plane when everyone else is asleep, talking about everything and nothing.

The worst part? You are the missing piece in this puzzle. You, Emily, were the one thing I never took into account when planning my life out. I didn’t mean to fall in love with you, I just did. Yet, here we are- me, writing crappy letters admitting my feelings, and you, halfway across the world, completely unaware of the havoc you’ve wreaked on me.

I love you, JJ

#if this is the second time you saw this #no it isn't #jemily #jennifer jareau #emily prentiss #jj x emily #criminal minds #criminal minds fic #eva's 25 days of christmas #advent calendar of fics (ACoF)#eva writes occasionally

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heartmeadows · 3 years ago

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So, uhh hi. I’m sorry about my last post. I do think I overshared, not by much but still by enough that I’ve felt ashamed ever since. And avoided posting anything else or responding to anyone. I’ve needed time to figure things out and I have actually finally overcome some big obstacles that have been in the way of my healing, recovery, whatever you wanna call it. I’m unfortunately gonna ramble so it’s gonna be under a read more

It’s taken over 6 months for me to even be able to truly feel and be present, and stop isolating myself, pushing people away, and avoiding facing my fears and troubles.... among other effects, symptoms, etc. of trauma. Trauma fucks you up. I think by now most people know that. But I’m ready to stop wallowing in self pity and hate, and letting my C-PTSD run the show. I can do better, I can be brave. I know I have more in me. It’s just that whenever I take steps back and/or I get hurt I need time to recover my strength to get back up and keep going on. With survival, recovery, all that. I do things my way no matter what. And it’s a mess most of the time. But there’s also the other side of it all. I don’t have a word for it. I suppose what I mean is that despite it all the pain me and the people I love, and even strangers and any of us, have experienced and keep experiencing there’s still hope. There’s hope, joy, light and beauty in life even during the darkest times. Sometimes the pain just blinds me too much. I could keep going on about... a lot. Pretty words. Wise words. Things I’ve learned and things I’m learning. But I have a tendency to write or talk too much, or not at all. I really find it hard to be in the middle, I always will be bipolar. Not in a quirky way, not in an ableist way some people tend to use words without understanding their meaning. I mean that I have bipolar disorder, among other issues or qualities. I guess I’m not exactly making sense fully or making any definitive point. But it’s not like I can currently can. I’m still figuring things out. I just mean that I’m me. I don’t know how to be anything else, nor do I want to ever pretend again to fit in. I learnt some dark but needed lessons the hard way. I won’t ever allow my loneliness to be a way for people to hurt me because in my desperation to feel like I belong I turn to the wrong people and trust the kind of people no one should. Anyway, I digress. It’s one step and one day at a time. And it’s ok. And I’m ok. And I’m also not ok. I’m a lot of things. A collection of paradoxes. Always liked that sentence and still find it something I could pretty much get tattooed because I relate to it on a deep level no matter how pretentious it might sound to some people. But yeah, I’m rambling. It’s well past midnight, I just had a cigarette and a cup of coffee earlier in my garden in the lovely summer air. The nights are already getting darker but I enjoy that. I don’t mind that my sleeping schedule keeps changing constantly and that I am living both a life of night owl and an early bird. Guess I’m a versatile bird lmao. Honestly, I’m going through that whole “sudden” moment of clarity at the most inconvenient time ‘cause it’s not like I can get my shit together right now. I’ve just found the positivity and hope I’ve been searching for. I’ve found solutions to a lot of problems. It’s that same old “I know all the answers to the questions I’ve had lately” but not really that hyperbolic. I’m thankfully not manic. I know what I need to do in order to start getting better again. I also know that it’s gonna take a lot of courage to do most of the things that will help me get forward. It’s not gonna be easy. But it’s time to stop waiting for things to change without actually working to change things. I’m just... over the past. I’m ready to let go of the pain and of the person I was that I’ve been longing to be again, and also of the regret and shame of the person that I became at times that I never wanted to be. I thought that I had to cling onto the past in order not to lose myself after going through trauma that made me truly feel like I’d lost everything to the point I went too far and attempted suicide four fucking times. After years of not even so much as cutting myself. You know, not my first attempts but my worst ones because it’s a miracle after miracle surviving these overdoses. It’s hard to understand I guess. I really thought I’d lost everything. That they took everything from me. But I was wrong. I understand now that after everything I’ve finally come to a point where I can re-invent myself. To choose where I want my life to head towards and who I truly want to be. I’ve already come so far, for example I’ve finally overcome my addiction to hard drugs. And I never thought I could do that. But I kept trying. I kept going. I relapsed last year and that lead to all the misery that has followed me. But I got through it. I still have my other, physical addiction to meds that are for now the only way I can cope with my physical issues and also numb myself to a point. But I know I’ll find a way out of this one too. I won’t let anything or anyone destroy me anymore. I’ve made mistakes and I’ve learnt lessons the hard way. I’ve paid the price of asking too many questions in life and wanting to find the answers by being stupid, reckless, too trusting, too lonely, too self destructive. I guess I still have to figure out how to stop rambling too much, especially when I’m pretty sure without all the context a lot of this doesn’t make sense. So, I’ll just try my best to finish this post with saying that I’m ready to let go, move on and re-invent myself again. Like I said. But not fully, like I have done before. I’m not changing my name again (and people have stopped calling me by my deadname, if it’s ok to use that word to describe my birthname that isn’t my name at all, not in any way, and I changed it legally a long time ago too) or dying or cutting my hair, nah. I’m not fully happy with the surface level of my identity and life right now because I’ve gained weight, gotten more ill and started to age in a way I know is caused by being unhealthy (stupid to keep smoking still even after being in a coma and a breathing machine way too many times by now because of the overdoses)... It’s hard to make this short, sorry. What I mean is that I’m disappointed and hurt with where my choices and the consequences of not only my acts but others have lead me to. But it’s not over. Because I’m alive, I survived and I still have a chance to change things for the better. And to truly be myself and get back on track on my journey of self improvement and recovery, healing. It’s not too late like I thought. I can still be Lena and for that to mean that I can become someone I can truly be proud of. To be someone the people in my life can look up to. And to keep following the path I create for myself, to pursue my freedom and my passions. To let go of the self destruction. To walk the path of light and accept the dark but not let it control me. I can find balance, mentally, physically and spiritually. I can heal. Everything’s gonna be ok. So I’ll just stop here. I’m gonna go sim, to be honest, and I’ll hope to post sims stuff again soon enough. If anyone actually read this annoyingly long post I thank you for your patience and for listening to me, so to speak. It’s important for me to post this so that I can come back to this in those moments I feel low again. To have a reminder that will give me strength to keep going on.

#personal

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boringlibrarianthoughts · 4 years ago

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Spn Series Finale - and How It’s Still Destiel Endgame

I’ve been thinking more about the finale and have finally assembled my thoughts on it.

While I understand many fans hold to “the finale wasn’t real/canon,” to me, it was because that’s what was shown on tv, so I’m attempting to come to terms with it. You don’t have to feel that way and that’s totally fine. That’s just how I feel. So, here are my very lengthy thoughts:

*keep reading below*

I’m gonna be honest and say that I have always felt 100% sure that Dean would die at the end of the show. I started watching during like season 3, and I’ve believed that from more or less the start, so I went into the finale expecting him to die. Dean’s self loathing resulted in risky behavior on his part that was definitely indicative of someone who would never reach old age. That doesn’t mean I wanted Dean to die. Quite the opposite. His character deserved a chance to break out of the vicious cycle that had damaged his entire life; I wanted to see an arc of redemption and coming to love yourself (this would have been huge given Dean’s self-hatred). I wanted to see Dean move beyond the life his father trapped him in. As far as character development goes, it actually made more sense at the end of the series for Dean to get out of hunting and live a quiet life (with Cas) and Sam to continue the hunting lifestyle (with Eileen). This is what I hoped for, but given that for some reason showrunners and writers seem to hate their audiences and want to punish them for enjoying their shows, I figured this was unlikely.

So yes, I wasn’t shocked when Dean died. As soon as I saw that friggin piece of rebar on the screen, I knew that was it. So my main issue wasn’t that Dean died (again, I didn’t want that at all, but I knew it was coming), but what happened during the death scene. Like, I get that now without Chuck keeping them alive to entertain himself and Jack deciding to be totally hands off, the odds of Dean or Sam dying accidentally would increase exponentially. So yes, I could even cope with the rebar death (I know, I know).

What actually bothered me about the death scene was how Dean’s death is made completely about Sam. Wtf? Like, it seems the indication is that Dean’s death is a noble sacrifice for Sam to be happy.

I don’t like that.

While the first few years of the show focus on the tension between Sam and Dean and the struggles of family, it eventually moves past this (thank goodness, too). Their relationship becomes more or less settled and they are comfortable with their brotherly bond and no longer feel angry or bitter about it for the most part. That was satisfying to see. Instead, the focus shifted to other relationships. Sam would have girlfriends, a fun relationship with Rowena, and learn to trust himself more and grow into a leadership role. Dean would struggle with himself rather than his brother, but he would learn to develop friendships and grow closer to Castiel. The brothers were no longer codependent.

Dean’s death did a complete 180 and shifted back to the pathetic codependency of the early seasons. Dean saying his life was always about Sam blah blah blah was gross and a mean thing for the showrunners to make Ackles perform. Dean and Sam had outgrown this period of their lives. Reverting to it was out of character for Dean.

Now, I am certain this was done to “bookend” the show. Have the relationship between Sam and Dean go back to the way it was in the beginning - and this could be done since every other character was written out of the finale. There was no one left for them to care about anymore except each other. I think that if the show had ended like this around like season 5, it would have fit fine. Dean and Sam’s relationship was sadly like this, and Dean felt he had no worth beyond what he could do for Sam.

HOWEVER - the show has been on for 15 freakin seasons. A lot will change during that time. During the last 3 seasons of the show (at least) the main relationship in Dean’s life was that with Cas, not with Sam. Whether you believe the relationship between Dean and Cas was platonic or romantic, you can’t deny that Dean valued Cas very, very highly and loved him in some way. To me, it seems pretty straightforward that Dean had been actively trying to repress romantic feelings for Castiel for the last couple years of the show but whatever.

Dean’s speech during his death was out of character. And yes, as others have pointed out, Sam definitely could have done SOMETHING to keep Dean alive.

Here’s where I think his feelings for Cas were suggested in the episode (as an aside, I genuinely think that the COVID delay allowed for some... nervousness on the part of showrunners or whoever regarding Dean and Castiel’s relationship being explicitly romantic, and the tonal shift of the last two episodes is the result of that). Dean wanted to give up and die. He didn’t fight. Sam had been trained by the best witch around (Rowena) and surely could have come up with something. Call the friggin ambulance. Do the vampire reversal thing y’all have mentioned. DEAN DIDN’T WANT ANY OF IT. Now, we’ve seen before that Dean becomes suicidal when Cas is dead. I think this is a continuation of that theme. By killing Cas and then not bringing him back, the writers created a situation where Dean had literally nothing to live for anymore. And that’s really sad. I know, I know, I shouldn’t be so attached to fictional characters (whatever), but I really care about Sam, Dean, and Cas. I wanted them all to be happy after all the crap they’ve been through.

Dean’s closest companion was taken from him in a really, really awful way that would doubtless be traumatizing for Dean. He would likely feel intensely guilty about Castiel’s death and that he didn’t tell Cas how he felt (however, it’s clear Dean’s actual response to Cas’ love declaration was cut, so who knows what happened there - I wrote another lengthy post about that, actually).

I think Dean’s death happened a couple years after they defeated Chuck - the montage in the beginning of 15x20 represents that. Dean didn’t literally die on the very next hunt. However, a couple years still is not a long time, and doubtless Dean would have spent that time struggling with the idea that he couldn’t save Cas no matter what he did. That’s terrible. Who knows what he might have tried during that time to bring him back from The Empty, and the thought of him fruitlessly working toward that before finally giving up and having to live with the finality of Castiel’s death is really depressing. Of course, he wouldn’t know that Cas wasn’t even in the frickin Empty anymore because Jack pulled him out, which makes it even more sad. Now, I’ve seen some people wondering why Cas wouldn’t come back to Dean... it seems pretty clear to me that when Jack said he would be hands off, he meant the forces of heaven in general. That means Cas would be in heaven working to improve it and not be able to leave or communicate with Dean and Sam.

So Dean dies, alone in life and likely still feeling like he’s a failure. Not cool, Spn writers. The best we can assume is that he took Cas’ speech to heart and was trying to be a better version of himself (as shown by being merciful to Chuck).

Then he ends up in heaven where he’s greeted by Bobby (and not Cas - remember Becky’s little Funko POPs display of Dean and Castiel together in front of The Roadhouse? I think that was the initial plan before someone got cold feet). Anyway, I really think someone involved with this show was honestly trying to throw us a bone with the Dean/Bobby conversation.

Bobby points out that Heaven is basically like living a normal life again and not just reliving your memories because Jack rebuilt it.

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Bobby says Heaven is now “What it always should’ve been. Everyone happy, everyone together,” then mentions some side characters (no one too important so we wouldn’t ask why the actor wasn’t in the episode) and Dean’s parents being nearby.

Now, I totally get the John Winchester hate (he’s abusive, no way around it), but I think Dean had always dreamed of getting to know his parents in a good way and not the way life on earth had been. This is giving him that chance.

Then, this is the big line to me.

Bobby: “It ain’t just heaven, Dean. It’s the heaven you deserve. And we’ve been waiting for ya.”

This is everyone’s shared heaven now, not just Dean reliving some memory. This is everyone’s heaven. And yet, Bobby emphasizes that Dean is the focus of this. Dean. Dean was the motivation for this new heaven - the kind of heaven that Dean deserves and ought to have and everyone has been waiting for Dean to be there to enjoy it. Why? Frickin why? “Why,” I asked myself upon watching this episode live. Sure, Jack loved Dean and wanted Dean to love him back, but that seems weird for Jack to do this for Dean.

And then Bobby explains what actually went down.

Dean: “So Jack did all that?”

Bobby pauses and says meaningfully: “Well, Cas helped.” He looks meaningfully over at Dean and then raises his eyebrows suggestively. This is a hella weird response if you take it as anything other than an indication of a (future) romantic relationship between Dean and Cas. Castiel, as Jack’s adoptive father, would have helped, guided, and advised Jack on what to do, and Cas’ motivation for all of this would be to prepare a heaven for Dean that would make him happy. That’s an incredibly loving gesture. Like, Cas is really into Dean.

Likely, Bobby has learned things he didn’t know during his mortal life. He doubtless has either learned or inferred that Castiel and Dean love each other. If Dean didn’t love Cas back, Bobby would not have mentioned his being in Heaven so suggestively. If someone wiggled their eyebrows about my bestie being nearby, I’d be weirded out because I’m not into my bestie in that way lol. I’m into my husband, who is my romantic partner. Seeing Cas busily working to improve Heaven with Dean in mind would be a dead giveaway to Bobby about what was going on between the two of them.

Dean’s smile in response to hearing this is honestly how I smile when I think about something that makes me happy but I don’t want anyone else to know about. And that’s how I think Dean is reacting.

Next, Dean drives around. I don’t know if it’s supposed to be a montage of time passing for him and he doesn’t literally just drive nonstop or if it’s really just a little while in Heaven time before Sam shows up.

Now why wouldn’t Cas appear? Well, couple reasons. Firstly, it would’ve been “too gay” for the higher ups involved in the finale. There really wasn’t a non-gay way to reunite them. I think this is ultimately why Collins wasn’t in the episode.

As far as the in-show story, I think it makes sense for Castiel to be a little shy of Dean. I mean, he did confess his undying love for the man assuming he would never have to face Dean again. Castiel didn’t know Jack would resurrect him. He was literally like “ok, I love you, sorry, gotta go die now.” Now he’s got Dean in Heaven with him for eternity. There’s no rush for them to meet up again. I think Dean would want the resolution of knowing his whole family is in Heaven again, and it makes sense that Castiel would be bashfully hiding in a corner until Dean called him. Then once they met up, it’d probably be some messy making out and pure joy at being together again (sorry not sorry lol). I really think that was supposed to be our takeaway from this finale regarding Dean and Cas’ relationship. Was it ideal? No, but I do think there was something.

Some other thoughts: Eileen was perfect for Sam and not explicitly showing them together was a major cop-out. I think that because Padalecki had a new show coming out on the same network, they didn’t want to show Sam settled with a specific woman thinking “oh we want the fangirls to imagine they could be with Sam” which is dumb but probably their line of thinking. This also explains Sam’s totally random and unnecessary shirtless shot in the finale. I’ve known these characters for so long and care about them and that shot was like seeing your brother naked. No thanks.

I think this also explains the choice to revert to Sam being the main character and Dean’s only focus in the end. That’s how the show started out, and it makes sense from a marketing standpoint to emphasize Padalecki’s performance.

Anyway, I’ve probably left something out that I planned on including, but this is already crazy long lol. So there you have it - I finally wrote down my thoughts on a finale that aired 3 months ago. I’m clearly on top of everything.

Plus, I feel pretty confident they will do a mini reunion series within a few years, so hopefully some of these issues will be corrected before too long lol.

#spn #supernatural #spn finale #15x20 #spn 15x20 #castiel #dean winchester #sam winchester #destiel #deancas #dean and cas #ugh my heart #why do showrunners hate their own audiences #spn meta #original post

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mkstrigidae · 4 years ago

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Okay so I'm making my way through your masterlist and I'm in love?? Like let's start off with Winter's Child- a masterpiece. You make Sansa a loving and relatable character and interweave the powers into cannon in a way that actually makes cannon make more sense (preconceived biases and such). Jon and Sansa's relationship is SO SWEET and they way they bonded was absolutely adorable (and the backstory with the houses and the powers they have make so much sense) 1/3

(2/3) Neon Rain literally the best Cyberpunk AU! I've ever read. Like what you did with the world building?? The stark class differences (haha see what I did there?), the choices in SOUND, and I could FEEL myself there! I love the family dynamics between the Starks and I'm loving the little details you're dropping with the Greyjoy's , Jon's parentage, and all of the medical procedures. Jon is dramatic af and I love it and Sansa is a bamf AS SHE SHOULD. Nothing but love for this

(3/3) A Past Worth Having has a special place in my heart. You build up this setting like a tapestry, just seeing more richness and depth the longer you look. I'm proud of Sansa for holding her composure, just FEELING in the angst that the older Starks feel at her return, and loving the relationships with Robin and the rest of the Starks + Jon Arryn. The detail that you're putting into the investigation/Oberyn is awe inspiring and I can't wait to see what you do next with the trial + Jonsa

Haha thank you so much!!! This is such a sweet ask to get! My response is under a cut, because this might get kind of long! (lots of my own meta below, bc i accidentally had a lot to say, haha)

With ‘Winter’s Child’ I’ve really enjoyed weaving in fantasy elements to the world because I like to look at stories and pick at loose threads until they unravel and asking ‘what if?’. I thought it would be a super interesting concept to take a character like Sansa, who in ASOIAF is exactly what she is supposed to be as a noblewoman of her class and conforms very well in that role, and put her in a position where she was essentially a societal outcast in a lot of ways! In WC, Sansa has a lot of similar coping mechanisms to ASOIAF Sansa, in that she sort of romanticizes society to avoid thinking about how absolutely awful it is. In ASOIAF, Sansa holds tight to the notion of knights and chivalry and courtly love to cope with the fact that she essentially has no control over her future and, as a woman, is basically property. In WC, I have her really struggling to make herself into that perfect lady and using that as a sort of shield to the fact that, without a gift, there isn’t anything she can do to improve her lot in life. Sansa has these ideas about becoming a perfect lady and hoping that being perfect in other areas will ‘make up’ for what society perceives as deficient about her, but is more jaded than ASOIAF Sansa due to her age and her earlier exposure to the ills of society. So you get a Sansa who gets along better with Arya and Jon as a result, in part because she’s had that exposure to what it’s like to be an outcast in society. I think that the best fantasy has a really strong emotional backdrop (a really great example is ‘Fruits Basket’ which starts by hooking you with this wacky, fun premise about people in a family turning into animals when hugged by a member of the opposite sex, and slowly builds into a point where you can see that the family ‘curse’ is a representation of generational and familial abuse- of bonds that should be broken, and of bonds that may kill us even as we cling to them- it’s extremely complex and rich and if you haven’t read or watched it, I can’t recommend it highly enough), and so while I really love writing about the fantasy aspects, and writing scenes where Sansa does really cool things with her ice powers, the core of the story is really about Sansa coming into her own, and learning that she was a person who was worth something even without any sort of gift. Sort of overcoming societal stigma and realizing your worth and forcing others to see it. It’s so much fun to write, but i’m stuck at the moment, because i need to reread the books, and my roommate is borrowing them right now haha!

God, APWH is like, indulging my inner world-building suspense-narrative loving writer persona. It’s literally my all time favorite trope- which is of someone growing up to find out that they’re a long-lost somebody or have family they never knew about- combined with a lot of research on trauma (which i’ve been doing for academic and other reasons for a while) and a lot of slowly growing psychological horror courtesy of Petyr Baelish (trust me, it’s going to get WAY more intense). There are so many pieces of media that I love, but I think that GRRM has so many characters and such a well fleshed out world that it’s very fun to dive into his worlds and create something there. Inherently, I love a slowly unraveling mystery and morally gray characters, and this is allowing me to indulge in both!!! World-building is my favorite, because i tend to be fairly detail oriented, and i’ve been laying bread crumbs in so many places throughout the story to hopefully build up to a decent conclusion! I know sort of how it ends, and I think people are going to absolutely lose their minds if I execute it correctly. We have a few chapters to go until we get to anything in the semblance of a trial- there’s some more emotional aspects that I think need to get addressed first, and so I’m so grateful that people are so supportive of being willing to wait for the Jonsa, because they really start spending a lot of time with each other during the trial and prior to the trial (i’m a big believer in bonding via long car rides and so there’s a lot of that!). I’m just so humbled and awed by the response to it- I never dreamed that people would enjoy the story this much- when I started it, I was writing a light-hearted family piece that wouldn’t be too long, and, uh, it kind of evolved from there. Clearly, I am not good at keeping things concise haha.

I left Neon Rain for last, because your comments on this one really made me smile! Of all of my stories, oddly enough, Neon Rain is actually the most deeply personal for me, and I’m just so flattered at your kind words! I spend a lot of my time thinking about the flaws inherent in our society, and without getting too detailed, Sansa’s experience with a family member struggling in the medical system is not unfamiliar to me. There’s a weight that comes with the realization that a system that is supposed to care for people is based on capitalistic ideals of profit maximization, and as someone who has experience working in the healthcare system- no matter how bad you think it is in the US, I can promise you it’s actually worse.

Neon Rain actually just started out as a series of mental images from listening to music that I had to get down on paper, and evolved from there. I actually really love the ‘soulmates’ and ‘class differences’ and ‘mastermind art thief’ tropes, but am incapable of writing fun stories without thinking about the reality of those tropes (see APWH for another extreme example of this haha), and so as I was writing and trying to capture this mental image, the rest of the world began unfolding around me. Jon is different because of a different upbringing here, and so is Sansa, and to see the formerly idealistic Sansa become so jaded by the time she meets her soulmate is just catnip for me. You have this interesting dynamic between them, because Jon wants nothing more than to have Sansa in his life, and give her everything she wants and needs, but where the old Sansa (who was arguably middle-class and somewhat naive, as financially secure teenagers understandably tend to be) would have swooned over that, the Sansa who meets Jon when the story begins is seeing the world and all the unfair and unequal systems in it. She can’t just live happily ever after with him right away- there’s a sense of guilt there, of sansa not feeling like she deserves nice things, and there’s also Sansa’s deep sense of compassion and kindness that won’t allow her to just live life as the well taken-care-of girlfriend of a wealthy man, because she isn’t able to just put on blinders and pretend that all the injustice in the world around her doesn’t exist, simply because it wouldn’t affect her that way anymore.

I think that the core to writing Sansa, for me, in any universe, is that she is a kind and compassionate person who is capable of feeling sympathy towards even the people who have done horrific things to her and her family- that emotional awareness and empathy is a harsh thing to have in a world like Neon Rain, and in our own world, honestly. I’m so glad that you appreciate Sansa’s BAMF-ness in the story- I think that her chapters demonstrate that she is capable of doing extraordinary things when she’s doing them for people she cares for, to be kind (The scene where Alayne helps Robin down from the eyrie is most indicative of this I think), and so in this world, I just love having Sansa be a complete badass out of necessity. Also, it’s fanfiction, and I really wanted to give Sansa a cool motorcyle, because no one else was gonna do it!!!

Also, my characters like to run away with me, and before I knew it, Rodrik Greyjoy had a huge adorable crush on Sansa in the story that I immensely enjoy writing. The Greyjoys are fun because they’re all absolutely insane, and i’m a total sucker for ‘gruff dangerous character is completely a sucker for the kind sunshine-y character’ trope.

God, this accidentally got really long??? I’m sorry- thank you so much for such a kind ask!!! I love hearing what people think of my stories, and this was so sweet :)

#my writing #joanofarkansass #ask answers

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codynaomiswire · 5 years ago

Note

I would love to read your interpretation of Quirin's reaction to Varian getting kidnapped! Feel free to ignore if you don't feel like it, though.😊

Part 1

Inspiration has struck, Anon! Will take a while getting to the specific part you requested, but I hope you like it!

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

“Ahem, um, Quirin?”

At the sound of his name being called, Quirin looked up from his field work to see one of the last persons he was expecting to see that day.

“Oh! Captain!” Quirin greeted with surprise, shaking the other man’s hand firmly in his own. “You’re back! Oh, I’m sure his majesty is relieved. How are you? Were you able to...?”

Quirin’s voice trailed off before he could finish the question, the Captain’s expression telling him everything he needed to know.

“Erm, no,” the Captain replied with a small shake of his head. “I...I didn’t...”

“Oh...I’m sorry,” Quirin said solemnly.

“Listen, Quirin,” the Captain began again after an awkward silence. “That’s...actually part of why I’m here. Do you...have a minute to talk?”

“Yes, of course,” said Quirin, motioning for the two of them to make their way to his home. For judging by the Captain’s expression - one of dismay that Quirin had never seen on him before - he knew the Captain needed to talk to him in private about some deep matters, even if the man was too proud to say so himself.

“Please, sit down,” Quirin bid the Captain as they came into the castle’s parlor.

“Thank you,” said the Captain as he took off his helmet and set it beside him on the sofa. Quirin then pulled up his own chair, and then proceeded to begin the conversation.

“So, what is it you need to talk about old friend?”

The Captain sighed through his nose, running a hand through his hair, and for once looking hesitant to speak. Quirin had never seen him like this before.

“Captain,” Quirin tried coaxing again. “It’s all right. Just tell me what’s wrong.”

Finally giving in with a punctured breath, the Captain said, “Well, I...I wanted to talk to you about...about Cassandra.”

Quirin blinked, confused, but holding all sincere attention as he gave a sympathetic smile and a nod for his friend to continue.

“Well, not just about Cassandra, actually.” The Captain furrowed his brow. “It’s about Varian as well.”

Quirin raised his eyebrows. “Oh? What about him?”

The Captain sighed. “How do you do it, Quirin?”

Quirin frowned, now feeling at a loss for the thread of this conversation. “Sorry?”

“I mean, how do you cope with...?” The Captain cleared his throat. “I mean, look, I’m not trying to offend Quirin. Really. But honestly, I need to know. Just, how do you...well, how do you come to terms with...with everything he’s done?”

Quirin’s expression remained still for a moment, and then softened. “Ah,” he thought to himself. “I get it now.”

“I mean,” the Captain quickly interjected, and now that the trickle had begun, his thoughts began to pour out more and more as he allowed himself to open up. “I know it was different for you. You...you never actually saw what he did. You never witnessed it. By the time you came back he was different. But still, I thought maybe...Maybe if there was anyone around here who could understand, perhaps it...well, perhaps it would be you.”

There was another moment of silence.

“Please, Quirin,” the Captain said, looking like a lost child as he looked into his friend’s face. “I...I need to know. I thought after all that happened on the island- oh, but of course you wouldn’t know about that. Just...let’s just say that I have had time to think some things over, and I know I can’t change the past. I want my daughter back. The real her. But...but she’s so far away now, in more ways than one. And I don’t know how to reach her. And in the meantime, I’m not sure how to just...how to just go back to it all. She’s not there when I go to the barracks for the night. She’s not in the mess hall for breakfast. She’s not there when the princess walks by in the halls. She’s not out on the sparring green training with the guards she knew since she was six. She’s not taking Fidella out for a run or on a hunt. She’s out there somewhere. Alone, and angry. She betrayed her friends, her kingdom, and me. She’s...she’s done some bad things. And-and I can’t...”

The Captain swallowed. “I was so proud of her Quirin,” the Captain whispered. “She was my everything. She is my everything. And now...”

The only sound to be heard was the ticking of the clock on the wall as the Captain pinched the bridge of his nose between his eyes, struggling against the grief and guilt Quirin knew he was feeling inside.

“I know, Captain,” Quirin finally said, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. The Captain looked up at his words.

“I know,” Quirin repeated. “It’s ok. You’re right. Our experiences aren’t exactly the same. But I do know what it’s like to see the effects of what your child has done, and wondering where you may have gone wrong in guiding them; wondering if you’ve somehow let them down, and that things could’ve been different if only you’d done x, y or z. I didn’t see how Varian had lashed out at the world around him, but I do...” Now it was Quirin’s turn to hesitate. “I do remember seeing the anger and fear in his eyes during that day, and wondering if that was how things were going to end for us - in heated words and a moment of terror. Would I ever get the chance again to tell him I loved him? That I was so proud of him? Was this going to be where it would end? What could I have done differently to stop this?”

Again, Quirin paused.

“But then,” Quirin said, “I realized...Well, to be honest, my memory is a little bit muddled towards the end of the encasement. But I do recall having one thought cross my mind about how yes, there is a way I could’ve prevented all of this from happening, but it was something I could not do. Yes, I had told Varian to stay away from the rocks. And yes, he disobeyed me. But I had given him a warning. I let him make his choices. Yes, I could’ve prevented it if I took away that ability for him to make a choice...but that’s something I could not do. I wasn’t about to keep him behind a locked door. There’s no way I could keep him near me at all times. He was young, but he wasn’t a little kid. He was his own person, and the risk of doing wrong comes with the territory of having the power to make decisions to influence our own destiny. Varian learned that the hard way. Do I still wish I could’ve done things differently? Absolutely. Do I still have doubts over whether or not I did everything right? I’ve lain awake...oh, I don’t know how many times wondering about that. I may not have seen it, but I do know...” Quirin swallowed. “I...know Varian went through a lot of pain after that day. He was also in a dark and angry place. With all my heart, I wish I could’ve been there for him. But I wasn’t able to be.”

Another long silence followed, with both Quirin and the Captain looking at each other with mutual expressions of, “Where did we go wrong?”

Finally, the Captain broke the silence. “Yet, you’ve been able to cope with it.”

Quirin sighed. “Well, again, my situation is a bit different. Varian’s already come through to the other side and is working to make a change for the better.” Here, Quirin smiled. “He really has made me so proud.”

The Captain nodded, though felt an invisible dart hit his heart at Quirin’s joy for having his son come back to him, while he was still without his daughter.

“But it has not been easy. Even now, I still find an old gear or spring or hunk of metal out in the fields from the automatons he created, or I think of the remains of the amber casing that are still down in the basement, or I’ve even had to deal with tirades from others who are infuriated with him and how I let him get so out of control. In one sense, all of this isn’t going away any time soon. But I am determined to move on from it. I must keep going. For myself, and for Varian. He’s also had his moments of doubt of course, and I know I need to be ready to be there when he needs me to be. And if I can’t move on, how am I supposed to help him to do the same?”

The Captain gave a sad smile. “It does sound like there’s some logic to that. It’s just...It feels so heavy, and I’m not sure I can carry this.”

Here, Quirin set a comforting hand on the Captain’s shoulder. “Then let us help carry it with you, old friend. You’ve helped carry so many of our burdens as Captain of the Guard. Let us help you now, too. You’ve suffered a wound to the heart, Captain. That will take time to heal. Things will never be quite the same again, whatever happens. But there is still hope, and there is a way to keep going. You need to let yourself grieve, and also be able to forgive - both yourself and Cassandra. I know from experience that forgiveness doesn’t mean that you approve of what they’ve done, but it does mean that you never forget who they really are, and that you’re always holding out hope for the best for them; to keep on loving them, and be ready to be there whenever they need you to be. That may not feel like much, and perhaps we may never fully understand why things happen the way they do. But we can’t let our fears and doubts prevent us from being the people we need to be for one another. It’s not over yet, Captain. There may still be a chance. Varian and I had ours. Perhaps you and Cassandra can as well.”

The Captain smiled again, with a confusing mixture of both pain and relief as Quirin finished his statement.

“Thank you, Quirin,” the Captain replied, also exchanging a firm shoulder hold of camaraderie with the village leader. “I...I really needed to hear all that. Thank you.”

Quirin gave a reassuring nod.

“Ahem, well then,” the Captain said, tucking his helmet smartly underneath his arm as he rose to leave, once again doing his best to put on his usual professional manner. “I’ve kept you long enough, Quirin. Thank you for your hospitality. And...I do hope things continue to improve for you and Varian.”

“Thank you Captain,” Quirin said, giving him another handshake in farewell.

“I’ll be heading back to the palace then,” the Captain said with a salute. “And...be sure to let us know if you see any sign of Cassandra, ok?”

“Of course,” said Quirin, seeing the Captain to the door.

...That was when they felt it.

As the Captain’s hand reached forward to grab the handle of the front door, a loud rumbling sounded in the distance, and the wood and stone beneath the men’s feet trembled at the sound. For a moment, neither one dared to move as the tremors shook the ground, and all of the wall hangings on the castle walls clattered and clinked about them. About a minute later, and the quaking finally subsided.

“What on earth was that?” Quirin began to ask, but the Captain had already thrust the door open, and both he and Quirin stood out on the front stoop, looking about them as more villagers began venturing out of their homes, looking as confused as Quirin and the Captain were.

“Captain?” Quirin then said urgently as he pointed far off into the horizon to where a great dark tower stood, looking black and jagged against the sky. There was no doubt about it.

Cassandra had returned.

#tts #rta #tts spoilers #rta spoilers #spoilers #cassandra's revenge #quirin #captain of the guard #cassandra's father #cassandra's dad #fan fiction

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ba-mi-soro-orisha · 5 years ago

Note

when youre done recovering id love to hear your thoughts on the book(even if the post ends up being almost as long lmao)

Buckle up, y’all, cause this is going DEEP INTO SPOILERS. This is my no-holds-barred take on Children of Virtue and Vengeance!

SPOILER WARNING

If you read any further past this, CoVaV is gonna be majorly spoiled for you. This is your last warning.

Okay, I gotta open with a minor - but really the only - critique I had about CVV: we know Tomi was rushed in finishing the book in time for the third pushed back date, and the book kinda reads like it. Book 1, I felt like we got a lot more detail and getting to know characters and buildup of the plot. Book 2, it felt like we were just rushing to get through all the action planned. There wasn’t very much in between downtime, which resulted in not only a kinda rushed book with way more plot than pages, but also a very emotionally devastating book.

Which leads me to: I feel like the central theme of CoBaB was more “hope”, while in CoVaV it was straight up “conflict”. And there was no recovery time. Even the precious few hopeful times that were in the book, I didn’t really have time to process or chill or cope. I always knew something worse was coming, which is what made this such a raw read. I do think the book could have benefited from giving us a little more hope. Like three-quarters of the way through, I had to keep thinking back to CBB and how I felt reading it and hoping there would be more hopeful and optimistic feelings in book 3. I couldn’t put the book down, but as a result, I pretty much just sobbed through the last fourth (at least) of the book, finished the book, sat in shock, and then went to bed. This book literally exhausted me. What a godsdamned ride.

I completely get why the book was like this, even if it wasn’t as a result of being rushed, but I feel a little more for the readers to balance it out helps us survive, lol.

That aside, there was SO MUCH in this book, I have SO MANY feelings!!!

Firstly, the worldbuilding was GREAT. I loved the new insight we got on magic. I totally didn’t realize frm book 1 that tîtans and maji were different and used magic differently for the most part.

With the direction of the ending, I’m not sure Tomi will go in this direction, but I’d like to know more about these differences. Why is it that chants can work for tîtans but maji can only use magic through chants? Is it just most effective? Will we discover they can use raw magic in book 3? I HAVE QUESTIONS.

Learning about the maji clan setups was also really interesting, but I have to admit it threw me for a bit of a loop referring to the leaders as elders and then they were all children. xP

Also, I’m really glad Tomi listened and gave us queer characters. I love Nâo and Khani. Powerful leader girlfriends? HELL YEAH.

I think this book made it really clear that Zélie x Amari is not end game and will not happen. I know a lot of people were/still are hopeful for that, but I think there’s just too much set up that says otherwise. They love each other, but imo they firmly think of each other as family. I’m going to put my stock in our canon queer couple and support them 10,000%.

Next big one: FUCKING HELL INAN STILL BEING ALIVE, I AM REALLY NOT HAPPY. I didn’t check out the chapters in the table of contents, so I didn’t have the forewaring to see that Inan was getting perspective chapters again, so it took my by quite a bit of surprise. A lot of you called that Inan would still be alive, but I honestly so prefer “dead means dead” in stories (otherwise, I find deaths are used too much for shock value and it just devalues the overall story and plot) that I had myself convinced he really was dead. He got a convincing death scene. Listen, if you kill off a character, I am going to grieve them. It is not going to be the same if you bring them back. I will have completely detached feelings for them and have to form a whole new relationship and perspective on them, and I am always going to keep them at a distanced because they were dead, I saw it happen, and there is no going back.

But no. BAM! He’s not only alive but Zélie is the one to wake him from his connector coma. Not happy. I really feel that Inan’s story played out in CoBaB. It’s interesting that I’ve seen some real anti-Inan folk feeling more sympathy for Inan in this book, while I’ve talked about feeling that Inan was a really compelling villain in book 1, but I’ve got much more negative feelings towards him throughout book 2. (And also why the hell should Inan get to come back but all these little maji kids - Zulaikha and Mazeli, c’mon - die and die for real??? It feels very cheap and very shock value to me. I don’t know if it was like some statement on privilege or Tomi just didn’t want to be done with Inan, but yeah.)

Honestly, the way Inan and Amari think in this book is so similar, and I found it so fucking conceited and narrow-minded. My view on both of them went down in this book. They just kept talking about how they have to be so selfish and they’re the only ones who can see things for how they are and how damn much they sacrifice and how tired they are because it’s up to them to sacrifice everything. Like!!! GUYS. No.

From the beginning when the CVV summary was released, I was wary of the plot focusing on Amari leading the people. It’s one of those things like: the system is not broken. It’s functioning exactly as it intends to. The monarchy has evolved to uphold a class system where diviners and maji are at the bottom. That’s what it wants to be doing. Can you really effectively change the system by accepting the system as your basis for change? Maybe it’s time to deconstruct the system and build something better. Not just put a royal back on the throne and think that’s gonna go smoothly.

And that’s exactly what happened here. They tried to use the system to buck the system and everything collapsed around them.

But I’m getting a little off topic - fixing a system of bigotry and oppression that your people built is not a sacrifice. You are still in the position of power here.

And Inan’s little bit where he thinks he’s so good and pure and better than his father because he offers the maji a place in society if they bend to his rules and follow him when the other option is that he will murder them had me wanting to tear my hair out. “Follow me or perish” is not a compromise. It’s not improvement. It’s literally a threat. And then when the maji don’t take this offer, Inan takes this as a sign that his mother was right and they can’t trust the maji to make the right decisions!?!?

Ugh. I was just done. I know all the factors of why I originally had sympathy for Inan are still there, and they largely control how he acts and thinks in CVV. (What he really needs for character growth and development is to be away from toxic influences and given time to grieve and work on figuring himself out. Not thrust into a position of power with his mother holding all the strings.) So, for me, Inan’s character really hit a wall, always getting stuck in the same patterns. And so now I feel less sympathy for him and find his story less compelling.

I honestly found Inan’s cousin, Ojore, really interesting. I think it could have been a really compelling story if somehow Ojore was allowed to take up the throne. WIth his background, being there in the burner attack that killed Saran’s father, he had a lot of backstory that we could have explored. And Tomi still could have revealed that it was Nehanda that manipulated things and let the burners in to encourage the war and the genocide against maji. Without Inan, we could have really gotten to explore how Ojore would react to that while on the throne. He could have potentially gone through the character development that Inan will never really get to see. Instead of him being killed pretty much immediately after he learns the truth behind his family’s death and the attack on him.

That being said, I do respect Inan’s decision to give up his position in the end. I think the whole “I’ll let your murder me” and Zélie apparently going to go through this was a little… contrived. But at least Inan did pull it out in the end. It will be interesting to see how these last moments between Inan and Zélie come into play in the next book. I’m assuming either Inan has been taken with the rest or will mount a rescue to go after them, so you know we’re going to get more on how this relationship develops.

(I think with Tzain done with Amari right now, Amari and Inan trying to navigate a new siblingship with each other will be a more interesting relationship than Inan x Zélie, and I would look forward to getting to see these sibs talk and get to actually be there for each other like they never have before.)

And since I just went through Inan, let’s go ahead and talk about Amari.

Oh, Amari.

Amari, Amari, Amari.

GIRL. Why did it take you this entire book to realize that making decisions based off of what your father would have done was the wrong damn thing to do!?!?!? Omg, we all knew that was gonna crash and burn on you. The entire purpose of overthrowing your father’s rule was to not do things his way because his way was cruel and malicious. smdh

I was still rooting for Amari throughout the book. I am still rooting for Amari, but damn. She sure did try to make it hard doing things like going back on promises right after she made them (forcing Zélie to teach her chants that didn’t belong to her and then immediately using them on a maji) and acting like she new better than all the maji (I agree that just wanting to kill all the nobles and other peoples wasn’t a feasible plan, but GIRL. These are a traumatized, hunted people. They’re going to be angry, especially right in the thick of a war. Strongarming your way into a position of power over them is not going to make them feel any better about you or bring about peace. It’s just going to show them that they cannot trust you). And her move at the end? Sacrificing Zélie and all those people in that village? Being willing to murder them all? … If killing her father fucked her up, what’s this going to do? I still have faith in her. I want her to come back from this. But she’s going to have to majorly confront her own feelings and actions and work very hard to come back from this. Though, I have a feeling that she’ll mostly get forgiven in the next book because bigger and worse things will happen and they’ll have to come together, regardless of how they feel about each other.

Amari’s realization in the end when she decides she doesn’t have to kill her mother (uh… was I the only one expecting some sort of Avatar moment like when Aang took away Ozai’s bending? Like… Nehanda is still a threat… this part of the story can’t just be over) and that killing her father just fucked her up kinda made me feel ashamed for feeling so proud of her when she did kill Saran in CBB. Like, it was just such a powerful moment, and I think too many (simple “good vs evil”) stories fall prey to poor and simplistic messages like “killing in self-defense is evil and makes the good people as bad as the villains”. But it’s just been weighing on Amari this whole time and fucking her up, and now I feel bad. =(

Speaking of Amari feeling bad, though: Ramaya. The connector Amari beat for connector elder.

I hope either Inan was taken with everybody else or Amari will connect with him via their connector-sibling connection. It seems incredibly likely that Ramaya is stuck in her dreamscape similarly to how Inan was stuck in his before Zélie somehow entered it and woke him. Considering they were constantly saying Ramaya was their best soldier, it seems like it would also come in handy to wake Ramaya and be able to utilize her skills to help rescue the kidnapped crew. Like, this HAS to come up at some point, doesn’t it? She can’t just be forgotten in a coma. Did anybody stay behind to take care of her when they marched on the capitol? D|

Other relationships!

Fuck, I fell so hard for Roën in this book. He’s just so endearing. And it seems like it was really only Roën that was able to keep Zélie grounded and moving forward in this book. I didn’t really support Roën and Zélie getting together in book 1, but book 2 absolutely made me support the ship.

However, I think Roën’s actions at the end of the book are a very good insight into the types of things that Roën is capable of. I don’t know if this is endgame for Tomi, but after Zélie’s constant struggle of just wanting to leave and be free and start over in this book and how her rage towards Inan consumed her and caused her to make some short-sighted mistakes (promising she’d protect Mazeli at the temple, then Ojore almost killing him while she tussled with Inan), I just don’t know that this is a particularly healthy relationship. The bit where Roën takes her out to see and they get a ride from a whale? Absolutely adorable. Just what Zélie (and I suspect Roën) needed. But long-term? I have a feeling that Roën is going to have to let more of that mercenary self of his out, and it’s going to scare and wear on Zélie, and erode their relationship. I think this is one of those relationships that is good in the short-term but isn’t long-term sustainable.

Speaking of long-term - I know Tzain is absolutely done with Amari right now, but I think he’s overall shown a great capacity for forgiveness, and I do think Tzain and Amari are endgame for Tomi. I don’t think this break between them is permanent.

But you know who we really need to talk about?

MAMA AGBA

What a heartbreaking arc. You know she had to sever the tie between Mazeli and Zélie to save Zélie’s life. I so wish she had gotten more time with Zélie for them to reform their trust and love for one another. I absolutely wouldn’t have been able to survive the maji elders sacrificing Amari to complete the linking ritual, but I can’t believe they really did sacrifice Mama Agba like that. She was really the only guidance these poor kids had. I can’t believe they really sacrificed her.

RIP Mama Agba. I hope you’re helping to look after Mazeli. 3

Now, for that damn epilogue.

I don’t know if I can take the next book. I don’t know how Tomi’s gonna make it through the next book.

Getting gassed and waking up on an eerie ship with the other elders? Anybody else get the feeling that Tomi is going to dive into a trans atlantic slave trade parallel? I hope I’m just being paranoid here (hey, the book seriously played with my emotions; I have no idea where I’m at anymore). What were y’alls takeaways from that part?

Predictions!

- Harum obviously has something to do with all the elders being taken and them being on a boat now, right? Tomi was totally setting him up as an antagonist and he got very little antag action in this book. He’s got to have something to do with this.

- This was always intended to be a trilogy, but I have to wonder if this isn’t going to end up turning into a couple more books than intended. There was so much to go over in book 2 and then the twist of an epilogue. They’re not even getting to rebuild yet. It just feels like Tomi has so much more planned it can’t possibly be wrapped up in just one more book.

- I feel like something’s gotta happen to sever or dampen the connection the elders (and Roën and Tzain) have with each other. After how powerful they were in the end, Tomi’s gotta counter that somehow. I just don’t know if she’s gonna dampen the powers or pull out an even BIGGER bad than Nehanda was.

- Obviously “Children of Gods” has to do with the title of book 3. If it’s not just Children of Gods, I predict: Children of Gods and Ghosts.

Ending Thoughts

CVV was well worth the wait and lived up to the hype, but if we don’t get some hope and optimism in the next book, I don’t know what I’m going to do. I need these poor kids to get some semblance of a happy ending. They’ve been through so much.

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thoughtsofa20somethingyearold · 4 years ago

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How to be happy Happier: 6 Habits to Adopt for a Happier You!

Over the last few days, I’ve really been thinking about how much my mindset has changed for the better since the start of this year and how much happier it has made me! This in turn has inspired me to write about it, and while I’m no expert on these things, I think it can be useful to know that you’re not alone in how you feel and there are ways to help make it better! Obviously, if you feel that you may have a mental illness or something similar, it is definitely best to seek professional care.

Before my “big change”, I almost constantly felt stressed, anxious and was pretty much always putting myself down for my looks, how much work I did (or didn’t do), what other people thought of me etc etc etc especially since going to university. I think I fell into a bit of a rut, particularly in my first year, going through the ordeals of living in a new city where I didn’t know anyone, trying to cope with the seemingly endless deadlines and trying to balance work and studying whilst still maintaining a social life…Honestly it’s all harder than it looks!

So, on New Year’s Eve, I made myself a resolution to start focusing more on myself and improve the way I dealt with things that came my way.

Here are the 6 ways I went about helping myself live a happier life…

Be grateful

Now this isn’t the kind of “Get over it, there are kids starving in the world” grateful that some people tend to force on you when talking about your problems. I’m talking about being grateful for the things that personally affect you.

By focusing on what is going well in your life and savouring those moments, even for just a minute, it can really put things into perspective. I’ve found keeping a log of things I’m grateful for every time I feel sad or anxious has really settled my moods… it could be something as simple as a comfy bed or being able to spending time with your pet but it just goes to show that more often than not, the good outweighs the bad that’s going on.

Meditation- particularly self-love courses and positive affirmations

While meditation may not be for everyone, it’s definitely worth a try! Over the last 7 months, I’ve followed many meditation courses but the one that struck home the most was the self-love courses.

I feel like self-love is something everyone has struggled with at some point in their lives. I’ve been really trying to change the way I see myself and how I talk to myself (I promise I’m not a crazy woman) and by following these mediations, I’ve really noticed a huge difference in my self-esteem. Granted, there are still off days, it wouldn’t be human to feel amazing all the time! But it’s about learning that we are more than just our clothes, our looks and our thoughts and learning how to put distance between those negative thoughts and ourselves in order to have a more rested and confident mind state.

In my opinion, changing that little voice in our heads from “I’m so ugly” to “Everyone is beautiful in their own way” or “I’m not as smart as them” to “I might not understand X , but I know a lot about Y” is such a life changing skill and allows you to accept those “flaws” as new strengths.

Acknowledging bad moods

A bad mood isn’t like a cut or scrape that you can just cover up temporarily with a plaster, it’s more than that. You have to address these emotions! Of course, the only reasonable solution seems to be avoiding negative emotions because well they don’t feel good but in the long term it only makes these problems much bigger.

Now, what I’m about to say may shock you but in my experience, feeling bad can actually be a good thing! Once you come to terms with what triggers these feelings and understanding what your coping mechanisms are, it becomes much easier to learn how to control your moods and change up how you cope if it’s something that could be more damaging than helpful.

One of the ways I’ve learned to do this, is by visualising my problems as a different person. By giving it an identity that wasn’t my own, I’ve been able to distance myself from it and make better judgements on how to deal with said problem as well as being able to comfort and give advice to myself as I would if it were one of my friends.

Music – make happy playlists

When I was feeling sad, I would instinctively put on a sad playlist and just wallow in it. Unsurprisingly, this never made me feel better. Even on the average day I listen to music 24/7 and never really stopped to notice how it made me feel until one day when boredom struck me and I decided to organise my one giant “songs I like” playlist into separate mood-themed playlists. Who knew that upbeat music stimulates your brain to release those feel-good hormones? (Just common sense that passed me by? Okay then…)

Whether you’re into pop, rock, EDM or alternative genres, you can rely on your favourite song to make you feel happier, even if you’ve had the worst day.

Here’s some links to my personal favourites for feeling good, getting motivated and even having a little boogie in the shower:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0ZykvqL8a4j3V5BjRCBXLG?si=A8Ky8BxAS3GgyhhSf3uDWg

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/11CAEqfxaFicMCEMI6uW1v?si=hJDPu7BNTg-2RIQhEkh-6w

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2IccZrgTOrWYFiWDhF3zah?si=FGcZXlZMRwWSTxsI6nvDVw

They are collaborative so if you feel like I’ve missed something significant from them, add them on!

Get into nature

I’ve always loved going for walks and more recently running. Just being outside in the fresh air and exploring the world around us. This has only grown over the course of lockdown as I’ve found myself going out much more frequently and for much longer periods of time in order to combat anxieties about the uncertainty of the world right now.

I find that going with friends/family, is a real mood-booster as you get to spend quality time together and really focus on what matters to you but sometimes you just need that all important alone time, and there’s nothing better than taking a stroll alone!

When everything is quiet you can just take in what is surrounding you and your mind goes blank, completely at ease. It becomes hard to focus on those problems that were buzzing around in your head 5 minutes ago.

However, from time to time, these thoughts might not go away so easily, and that’s okay! Even in this situation, going for a walk/run or whatever allows you more space (literally and mentally) to think about how to deal with the issue and come up with more rational solutions.

Self-care routines

Who would you say you spend the most time with? Your parents? Friends? Well you’d be wrong…it’s yourself! Day in, day out you are the one who experiences your life, your attitudes, your feelings, and everything else so it’s super important to keep yourself healthy!

In case you’ve been living under a rock, self-care is anything we do deliberately to take care of our mental, emotional, and physical health. Pretty vague huh? This could be anything from a bit of exercise to knitting yourself a jumper.

In my opinion, self-care is such a simple concept, yet I believe it can be harder to put into practice than it seems. Sometimes I feel like I’m wasting my time trying to follow my self-care routine, as it’s time I could be spending working or studying and I don't doubt that many other people feel the same. However, it is so important to understand that self-care is an UNSELFISH act that we all need in order to look after ourselves and avoid burning out.

I think many people do want to focus on their self-care, but find it difficult to know how, so these are some of the ways I have found that effectively allow me to practice self-care. Although, this doesn’t necessarily mean they are right for everyone, but just because something doesn’t work doesn’t mean you should give up! It’s a total trial and error to find what personally helps you!

My top self-care strategies:

Luxurious bubble baths with relaxing music and maybe even some candles if I’m feeling in an extra “treat yourself mood”

Yoga classes – My friend had got me into this around November time and I haven’t looked back! It was such a relaxing way to destress for an hour.

Mindfulness meditation – My words of advice, don’t give up if you still feel your mind races rather than settles… it takes time and practice to be able to meditate!

Mindful colouring – This is one of my absolute favourites, it’s such a satisfying activity! Stick on some instrumental music and get the mood lighting going for optimal relaxation…

Watching a sitcom – Something that is light, funny, and doesn’t require too much attention is perfect for quick mood improvements!

If you still don't know what to do, I hugely recommend following BlessingManifesting on instagram/twitter whatever social media platform you have or go to her website! It's full of info/challenges you can follow for example this nice and easy one here:

I’ve tried to keep this as short and sweet as possible as I know how overwhelming it can be to read pages and pages of info that ultimately just falls out of your head and this is one of those topics I could probably talk about for days because of its importance.

I hope this has inspired you a bit to reflect on your current state of mind.

Maybe you’re already on your pursuit of further happiness or you’re just starting, but I’d love to hear about your journey! What’s been working best for you?

𝒰𝓃𝓉𝒾𝓁 𝒩𝑒𝓍𝓉 𝒯𝒾𝓂𝑒

Bethany x

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ghostlyscene · 5 years ago

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17 things I learned before turning 17

According to my birth certificate, I turn 17 this year. It's weird because part of me still feels 4 and part of me feels 113, but the actual age I currently am is 16. I thought I'd share some lessons I've learned. I honestly don’t know what I’m writing and looking back, this post is literally just me rambling and talking about my life and ideas that maybe are cliche. But I wanted to make this post about things I’ve learned so far in life and who knows, maybe these thoughts will evolve as I grow.

1. Crying is not a weakness - I used to always think crying was a sign of weakness or losing to someone or giving in. But as I’ve grown and experienced more things that make me want to cry, I’ve come to understand that crying is therapeutic and it helps me move on. I have to move past hardships somehow and crying is my form of coping and healing.

2. I love traveling - my family has always loved traveling ever since I was really little. I used to always be the one in daycare and elementary going to Mexico or China during breaks and later on, London, Paris, Vienna, Singapore. All these wonderful places, some I can’t even remember. Now that I’m older, I’ve fallen in love with traveling and I enjoy seeing the culture, architecture, art, way of life, and everything a country has to offer. I’ve been to 45 countries and I’m almost 17. That’s crazy and I’m so grateful for every experience and I can’t wait for more.

3. sweatshirts, sweaters, and tights are the best thing to wear - I’ve basically given up on looking nice most of the time. Comfort is always first and soft sweatshirts and hoodies and sweaters are the best for napping in and watching shows and cramming studying sessions and homework. also tights are the best thing ever cause they basically look nice with everything I wear.

4. stationery is obsessive - I love love love stationery and it’s honestly not a healthy obsession but I just can’t help myself. Every colored pen, marker, highlighter, little stickers and everything you can think of, I will probably have or want to buy when I’m in stores. I’ve recently been obsessed with zebra sarasa pens and mild liners (the pastel colors!!!)

5. Taylor Swift concerts are the happiest place to be - I’ve always imagined what Taylor concerts would be like and it was at the top of my bucket list forever because I had never been able to convince my mom to take me. My mom was always worried about safety which is understandable, but I convinced her to take me to the reputation tour. It was such a worthwhile experience and my mom and I enjoyed every moment. Taylor has such a way of making you feel at home and connected with her. I was so genuinely happy that night, singing my heart out and forgetting all my worries and insecurities for a night. I can’t wait to go to another show (hopefully soon) and I hope all of y’all will get to go to one eventually.

6. Italian food is the best food around.- pasta, gelato, pizza and omg Italian food is just amazing. That’s it. There’s nothing else to say really.

7. I’m addicted to coffee, fairy lights, and aesthetics. - Coffee is something i always need and it just tastes so good. I usually get a iced caramel macchiato but I’ve also been loving stronger coffee tastes recently. Also I don’t get any sleep during school so basically I live off caffeine. The fairy lights in my room make me so happy and warm and are a great stress reliever. Definitely recommend. Aesthetics!!! Literally love scrolling through tumblr and Pinterest for hours to look at aesthetic photos and edits and I love seeing my friend’s edits and discovering new editors and ahh!!!! definitely check them out and give them the love they deserve. Editors work so hard.

8. Art is a form of therapy - I love doing art whenever I’m stressed because it helps me forget everything. And I don’t think you have to be really talented or draw anything complex because whenever I draw stuff for competition, I always feel stressed. It’s the small doodles and careless sketches that make me feel the happiest.

9. true friends are it replaceable - I’ve realized how important a good friend is and having a person that is always there to talk to and share your worst and best moments with is something that will make your life infinitely better. You don’t need a bunch to feel happy. One true, honest one is all that one ever needs but that doesn’t mean that you should stop meeting new people cause you never know who will become your best friend or who needs you. Never stop making friends but eliminate the toxic ones.

10. having scars is not a bad thing - I’ve learned that having a history and a part of your life that is bad doesn’t make you a bad person or shameful. It is what makes you the person you are today and you should embrace it and use it to better yourself or help other.

11. Music has always been there for me - listening to music and making playlists and discovering songs is such a huge part of my life. There’s a song for every emotion and music can be so healing. So go listen to some nice songs and discover just how nice music can make one feel.

12. Put yourself first- it’s not selfish - I used to always think that thinking of myself and my feelings first was selfish. So I put others first and forgot to take care of myself. But I’ve realized that you can’t love others and help others to the full potential until you are happy with yourself and you feel content with your life and are at a good place yourself. So if you need to take care of your mental health or whatever is important to you, do it. The people who truly love you will understand and be there the whole time.

13. Don’t let your anxiety take over - anxiety can be difficult and uncontrollable and sometimes it is necessary to take care of yourself. But learning how to cope is part of the healing process and you should not let your anxiety ruin your day and should push to experience new things and go out of your comfort zone.

14. Society has unnecessary standards for woman - ok tell me why we are obligated to shave, to have nice hair, to have perfect makeup and perfect skin, and to fit a mold. I’ve found that women’s dress code can be so strict and unnecessary compared to men’s. Women are expected to do more and to fight more for what they want and to be caring, model-like, and many other “traditionally woman” things but that isn’t every women and I don’t think everyone has to adhere to those standards.

15. It is vital to become educated and know your values - this world is so complex and there’s so much out there to learn and become educated on. I think it is important to know about history and current events and become educated enough to have your own values and know why you stand by them. To me, this is part of growing up and becoming your own person and I’m always working on that. I’ve yet to achieve it but I’ve made progress.

16. “may your heart remain breakable but never by the same hands twice”.-I want to be able to put down the thick wall around my heart and to let myself love and feel again. I want to let people into my life more that make me smile and feel safe, even if it means getting hurt again. I want to allow myself to trust others and to build more relationships with people. I think it’s hard because I’ve felt abandoned and hurt so much but some tiny part of me hoped that one day, I’ll be ready to accept someone. And I think this is important for everyone to do or work towards.

17. Step into the daylight and let it go. - something I have definitely learned and am still working on doing daily is learning to let go. I’ve realized that it’s not easy, and some part of me always wants to nitpick on every tiny mistake in my life. I don’t think I’ll ever be fully satisfied with myself and I will always value improvement. But I’ve realized that the amount of stress I have over uncontrollable aspects of life is too much. So I think that sometimes it’s best to just take a deep breath and move on. you only have so long to live so instead of dwelling on the past, you have to move on and work on improving the future.

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chiserendipity · 4 years ago

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Why 2020 has Changed Me Forever - and Why I'm Grateful for That

*Warning, this deals with emotional and physical abuse, trauma and just is really long. Please do not reblog or repost this post.*

I'm just gonna say it. 2020 as a year has been terrible on a global scale with the pandemic, and the oppression of many people across the world. However, 2020 has allowed us to both reflect personally and on the world around us and demand change. I think that makes 2020 a great year for growth and shouldn't be merely dismissed because we couldn't go to concerts, have large parties, or the hot girl summer we hoped for. Real change is happening before our eyes, a movement for equal rights and to end the the endless cycle of oppression and suffering for not only the black community, but minority groups whether that be race, ethnicity, sexuality, gender, religion, those with mental or physical disability, the poor, and so many more. Yes the world is seemingly in shambles. But guess what? We have nothing but time to try and fix it now. To demand better. Both for our communities and ourselves.

Personally, I feel 2020 really pushed pause on my life and asked me "what are doing?" "why are you doing this to yourself?" and "what do you want from life?" I began looking at what I had become and I was disgusted with myself and how I decided to try and cope with past trauma. Before corona, I found myself in a very dark place mentally with seemingly no way out. I would have panic attacks repeatedly and just cry myself to sleep many nights (despite not getting very much). My endometriosis was continually getting worse with every flare up (probably from all my stress). I had no direction and very little motivation to continue.

Then, the virus hit. Once I was sent home and online classes began, I had time to stop and catch my breath. To look around at my life and really ask what I was doing wrong. As young people we tend to give ourselves a pass for poor behavior and bad decisions, or even encourage it. I realized I was falling victim to my own anger, bitterness, anxiety, and depression that had haunted me for years and it was finally rearing its ugly head. I had been suffering from depression and anxiety for years but that spring semester while still on campus was different. My moods began to swing from a hyperactive anxious state to a haunting and chilling depression that made me want to stay in my room and hide. I didn't really get much sleep in either state. But, now back home all alone and with nowhere to go. No class to dive head first into. No parties to dance the night away. No kickbacks to chill at. Just me and my monstrous thoughts. At first my overwhelming thoughts were suffocating. I would question "what is wrong with me? Why can't I get my moods under control? Why must every facet of my being so overwhelmingly broken?" Then as classes began to finish, and with the help of antidepressants, I finally started to feel a shift. I started unpacking my compartmentalized trauma I had shoved away for years in a desperate attempt to leave it the past. People always say the past is the past, but the past will never not be apart of your journey. Without properly dealing with the past, it'll always show up again in your present reeking havoc in your day to day life.

With meditation, therapy, medication, and a lot of self reflection through videos about helping your inner child, I realized I didn't know me. My life had always in some way shape or form been controlled by others. I was assigned the role "golden child" by a narcissistic father who demanded I perform that role perfectly. Even as a child, I was taught to ignore my pain and sadness and push through, because my feelings didn't matter. I was fed, lived in a nice house and had nice clothes and whatever I asked for. That was enough to prove my father’s love for me; in his eyes. I lived merely to please. As I aged this mentality seeped into my romantic life as well. My feelings always came last so I began to simply just turn them off until I became an emotionless shell. Acting as a robot, I went to school and grinded myself to the bone in all my AP and IB classes. Joined all the community based clubs and took leadership roles. At 16 I even got started working 20+ hour weeks. Meanwhile, I had to surgeries courtesy of endometriosis. The first was a emergency surgery due to a ruptured ovarian cyst and the second to dislodge my right ovary from my abdominal wall since the endometrial lining cemented the two together.

I remember complaining about cramps and my father punched me saying, "Toughen up”. My father said things like that all the time and didn't want to discuss my chronic illness or mental health. When I was 16 I admitted to having suicidal thoughts and a previous attempt a few years back and he responded that was "white girl bullshit". Another time,my father cussed me out in a pizza shop for wanting a margarita pizza calling me a stupid bitch in front of everyone in the restaurant. He constantly mocked my choice for my major and university, saying that majoring in marine science was idiotic and I'd do better in political science and studying at Vanderbilt. Pain wasn't allowed. Feelings wasn't allowed. Choice wasn't allowed. Only thing that was allowed was to do the work expected. To be "perfect".

Finally I was beginning to understand that after being told my entire life that I was nothing more than robot with marching orders, the lack of orders now that I had cut my father out of my life was causing me to feel that I had no purpose at all. I had never known freedom, and it was was now suffocating me. Now knowing this, I was able to start retraining by brain and discover who I wanted to be. My feelings were valid. I wasn't just my report card or my ACT score or my medals and academic awards. My body while it doesn't function like it should, it is still worthy of love and respect. I wasn't insane for my moods fluctuating and I just needed help to get where I needed mentally to function. And that's okay. I had to start being me and living for me, not for the approval of others. Savannah the person, not the robot, matters. I matter.

This was when I had a spiritual awakening of my soul and ego, truly deep diving on how to heal from my past. I spent hours watching videos and discovering how to dismantle the false self I had created to appease those around me and stop acting as a emotional crutch for others whilst ignoring my own emotions. I began to recognize the trauma bonds I formed with exes and current friends. I choose to associate with those who encouraged these negative social responses and bad coping mechanisms. I was merely re-entering patterns that begun in my childhood.

From our earliest years, the ego is formed. Our deepest need is to gain love + approval from our parents + caregivers. The ego, in an attempt to protect creates a concept of self identity in alignment with what we believe will give us this love.We begin to say "I am smart" or "I am strong" or "I am bad at x." We internalize the beliefs of our parents about who we are + who other people are + how the world is. All of this ego identity unconscious. Because we are not taught about our egos, we are unaware they exist. So we operate as if we ARE the ego. This brings us a ton of our own suffering + shame. It makes us feel "stuck" + unable to escape our learned patterns. That's what ego does: keeps us repeating the past. Ego work is the process of questioning the ego stories that are just thoughts + not "reality." Becoming conscious to this allows us to access CHOICE in how we respond.

- @the.holistic.psychologist

Now aware of my ego and really getting to the heart of why I'm bad at sharing my feelings and why in past relationships I was described as "distant" and "inattentive" but also “good listener but won’t open up”. Today, I can honestly say I'm no longer in that dark place I was before. I'm beginning to relearn the things I loved and truly appreciate them. I'm being the true goofy, silly, marine scientist I always wanted to be. I have friends who do care about me and I've tried to open up more emotionally. Of course I have a long way to go and constant improvement is necessary. 2020 allowed me to return to myself, not the burnt out, bitter and depressed woman I had become. I'm happy 2020 happened and for the first time in years, I'm excited for what the future brings.

#self reflection #2020 #my 2020 #short narrative #black writer #female writer #writeblr #black writers #black female writers #new writer #new writing #tw suicide #tw abuse #tw depression

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hardlyfatal · 6 years ago

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gary’s writing workshop: lesson 1: kintsugi, or how to make all criticism constructive

The tough thing about writing is that you have to be bold enough to think your work is worth reading by the public, and also have the humility to accept criticism so that you can improve and be better. You need to be strong enough not to crumple like a used tissue when you receive negative feedback.

The primary, inescapable truth about writing: you won't get better until you acknowledge and accept that you need to get better. That's it. If you think your writing is flawless, you're wrong. If you think you've done a perfect job, you're wrong. If you think there's no way it can possibly be improved, you're wrong.

That's not to say it's bad. Just that it's not perfect, that there is always going to be more you can do to tweak it closer to the ideal. To get there, you have to think critically about your work, instead of through a veil of trembling sensitivity and frail ego. You can't be defensive, but approach it with the knowledge that, despite the discomfort or even pain, the process will make you stronger and better. Kintsugi!

There are two kinds of negative feedback, and two classes of people you’ll get it from. The first kind is when something is factually, empirically wrong. Problems with your SPAG1, anachronisms, and continuity fall into this category – there’s no arguing with “you spelled something wrong” and “people in the Middle Ages didn’t say ‘okay’ “ and “in chapter 1 you said X but in chapter 2 you said Y”. Either it happened or it didn’t.

These are valid criticisms and must be considered and addressed. Yes, even if the person saying them is a complete dick and puts it in the cruelest possible terms. Just because they're a cruel dick doesn't mean they're a WRONG cruel dick. The only thing you can do is correct it. I personally tend to thank them, because even if they’ve been dicks, they still did me a favor in pointing out an error. I improved because of them. That’s worthy of thanks. Kintsugi!

The second kind of feedback is subjective, because you’ve failed to satisfy the reviewer’s expectations in some way. Maybe the story’s premise doesn't do it for them. Maybe they hate the trope you've modeled the plot around, or how you're presenting the characters. They think your pacing is too slow and things need to be snappier. Your dialogue is stilted. Maybe they simply don't like your style.

Where things are matters of opinion – and choices of trope, issues of awful dialogue, and dragging plots are opinion – you need to really, honestly look hard at them, without a veil of ego and self-protection keeping you from seeing what's going on. Why would the reviewer say the dialogue is awful, or that the plot drags?2

It could be that what they consider a lagging pace is merely their impatience to get to the payload; they want to see the fight/smut/revelation scene and all the world-building or slow burn romance is no more than dawdling on the way to the fun stuff. OR it could be that you’re rehashing the same shit three times and need a kick in the pants to see that it only needs saying once.3

Regardless of what conclusion you arrive at, you’re going to have aha! moments, bursts of clarity for issues that you couldn’t perceive on your own but needed someone else to present them, or different wording or metaphors or whatever, in order to see what the problem is. These epiphanies can be hard to cope with. You might feel chagrin, disappointment, irritation, even anger. They’re all valid emotions, and you’re allowed to feel them. Just don’t drown in them. Give them a few minutes to run their course, and then move on to address the situation. You don’t have time to mope forever, you’ve got more chapters and stories to write.

On to the classes of reviewers you’ll have. One class is that of your readers. It can be frustrating to receive valuable feedback after you publish. If it’s a SPAG issue or something likewise easily dealt with, it’s NBD – you just make your correction and hope no one else noticed. If it’s something stylistic, you shrug and move on, as not everyone will appreciate your writing ‘personality’.

If it’s structural, however, it can be devastating, because the entire story can hinge on something you have now learned is problematic. It can even kill your inspiration and motivation to continue the story. That happened to me about eight years ago-- someone pointed out a major issue that I had somehow just… missed. I was over 70,000 words into that story and I just couldn’t manage another word of it, after that. Talk about disheartening.

This type of thing is what makes the second class of reviewer, the beta, so incredibly valuable. You should always take seriously any feedback and advice provided by a beta. If you’re lucky, you’ve found someone who isn’t afraid to really give you the business. You want to root out as many problems as possible before you publish. A good beta is worth their weight in smut.

But it’s one thing to cope with the embarrassment you might feel to have a reader point out an error, and coping with that from someone with whom you’ll be having an ongoing relationship. With a reader, you can just take their criticism and apply it and move on; your contact with them will always be somewhat limited so your discomfort is fleeting.

A beta, however, is someone you have to speak to again, at length, after they’re pointed out what a dolt you are (though probably in far nicer language). It can be daunting to continue dealing with someone who has caught you with your pants down, so to speak. Writing can be very self-revelatory, and when we put it out there and it gets pooped on, we can feel vulnerable and rejected.

But… we are not our writing! We are not our plot holes, or our wonky grasp of SPAG, or our tendency to tell rather than show, or our aversion to ‘said’ as a speech tag, or any of the other million problems we can have as writers. When our betas tell us something is wrong with any of these, fortunately, it’s not a statement on our quality as people.

And, just like who we are as people, nothing we write is over and done forever. Everything can be fixed, tweaked, improved. In this digital age, even after publishing, the story isn’t set in stone. We can always nip in there after the fact and tidy up, twitch it into position, repair what isn’t working. Kintsugi! So what is Kintsugi, anyway? And why does it pertain to us? It’s the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum. Philosophically used, it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object instead of a method of disguising it. The cracks and dings become beauty marks instead of flaws, because of the story they tell.

In terms that mean something to us in particular, it’s Jaime’s stump and/or gold hand. As people who love him in a particular pairing, and are fans of his character in particular, we see the stump and/or prosthesis as a symbol of the agonizing redemption process he has undergone, and how he had to break before he could be fixed.

Similarly, we can approach our flaws with an open heart, as opportunities for growth. We can be eager to find them, because we know we’re going to conquer them and improve because of it. We can breathe through the discomfort and embarrassment knowing we’ll come through it stronger, both as writers and as people.

Example:

Just today, one of my betas, the unsinkable Mikki, came at me with a contention that I was writing Brienne OOC.

(Note: She was her usual lovely self, not hostile at all – this is just a timely example of dealing with subjective criticism and how to consider and absorb it. But do keep in mind the “sometimes even assholes are right” thing from above.)

At first, I thought, “She’s expecting Brienne to be different, but I’m choosing to adapt her for a modern setting, so of course the character won’t be identical to her canonical self.” So I replied that I was writing her differently because, in the modern AU I’m writing, Brienne hasn’t had the same life experiences that, in canon, resulted in her being far more humorless, touchy, self-ashamed, etc.

Mikki replied with a very insightful analysis of how Brienne’s personality was formed, and how those core characteristics can come through in modern-day!Brienne, albeit in a softened format according to the gentler treatment she’s had in my story. I saw immediately that, put this way, Mikki was entirely correct, and that I’d been going about it without enough depth and consistency.

I don’t need to revamp anything drastically, but to add details here and there – mostly just introspective bits that will add to the characterization in the end, and make her feel more Briennelike. These bits won’t be obvious or attention-grabbing, they won’t change the story significantly, but they’ll contribute to the overall quality.

The upshot of this is that Mikki knows she can tell me when she perceives a problem because I'll take her seriously and won't freak out on her. And I feel comfortable not only receiving her critique but also entering into a discussion about it instead of just blindly accepting her advice and accepting when I'm shown the error of my ways.

Homework:

Think about past incidents of negative feedback. If you’ve had criticism given, even in a hostile way, consider that at length. Are you able to brush off the dross and see the gem hidden beneath? Can you discard the rudeness and find the message hidden within it? Focus on the message, not the delivery.

Once you find it, examine it. Is it pointing out a factual error, or is it subjective? If it’s subjective, is it just because you’ve disappointed their expectations, or because there is valid criticism? Write your response out, if you feel that will be helpful to clarifying your thoughts.

Endnotes:

1 - SPAG = Spelling, Grammar, And Punctuation.

2 - In future lessons, we’ll be going over many topics – among them natural-feeling dialogue and the matter of pacing – in hopes that you’ll have something to compare their criticism to, gaining the ability to discern whether or not you do have problems with these issues or the reviewer is just a crackpot.

3 - Academic writing is nothing like fiction. Many nonfiction writers have problems with this transition, because they’re used to writing an intro to the premise of their article/paper, then describing the subject at length, then summarizing it all into a tidy package. If you’re coming from academic writing, and someone is telling you your pacing needs work, there’s a strong chance the reason is because you’re trying to write persuasively, when your focus as a fiction writer is to write descriptively. You don’t have to persuade the reader of anything, here, just paint a word-picture for them.

#gary's writing workshop #writing #writing tips #writing reference #writing resources

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9uk · 6 years ago

Text

Let Me Stay Close To You : part 6

⌲ summary : you were finally free from the worst nightmare of your life in high school. the doors of college welcomed you with open arms, you were set on living your best life in here, away from the toxicity back at home. that shimmer of hope in restoring your life, was somehow effortlessly crushed by a tap on your shoulder. “Hey Y/N, why don’t you say we catch up for a moment?”

⌲ pairing : bully!jungkook x reader

⌲ word count : 5.6k

⌲ genre: angst

⌲ warnings : mentions of abuse, snakes

⌲ a/n : i’m so so sorry this is unedited and written at 4 am & i just wanna thank you guys for waiting and please give me all the feedback i need to improve so bad. idk sometimes i think my writing is little draggy but it is lacking lots of info as well, or maybe i don’t like to read long descriptions or something idk lol just tell me ur opinion.

part five > part six > epilogue

It is a feeling long gone but never forgotten.

It must be the most cruel joke of the year—Jeon Jungkook in the arms of Y/N.

He feels breathless, like the infinite darkness has consumed all the oxygen in his lungs, sucking every last bit of him out of his body like the blackhole. He hated it. He absolutely detested it.

The dark. It was something that reminded him of the times he hid in the corner of his bedroom, praying with bleeding lips —that he had bitten down onto so hard out of fear—and trembling hands, as he awaited the lashing he was going to receive.

He started to think that it was happening on a daily basis now, how at any point in time at night he father would bust into the room with a cane, his dark figure looming by his door and Jungkook would shudder away as the tears involuntarily slip from his eyes.

At 3 am, he would sit by his window and watch the moon with much resentment, silently as he sinks into the abyss of the night.

The deep cuts and harsh bruises on his body was painful. But nothing could compare to the betrayal he felt when he sees his mother happily chatting over tea with a friend—all this while, when he was locked up in a random room—almost getting beaten to death with a thick rod away in the late hours of the night.

Jungkook doesn’t care if he gets caught loitering in the open hallway like that, he had nothing to lose and was ready to risk it all if he was granted just one look of his loving mother.

He missed her a lot.

The quiet times he spent in the suffocating room made him think about how much he took her love for granted.

Was love supposed to be earned?

He didn’t know that love—something he thought was the warm embrace of his birth giver, the extra marshmallows she would pop into his hot chocolate, the peonies she picked and tucked into his hair, the voice as smooth as silk aiding him into a deep slumber—would too, consist of a unimaginable amount of lies after lies, betrayal at its finest, and the revelation of the ugly side of it all.

Her eyes fall onto his frail figure, one that has been tortured physically to a point of plain damage.

He was a hundred percent sure it was his mom—from the way she habitually blinks with her right eye a couple of times between normal blinks, from the way her fingers wrap around the entire teacup rather than the mini handle. Yet, instead of her eyes widening and growing with worry for her child being abused beyond the line of humanity—she furrows her brow, and her gaze turns into a glare, one he always faced when he picks on his vegetables, and she storms to him, grabbing him by the sleeve of his shirt, dragging him back to the room where he’d belonged.

She aggressively shoved at his shoulder, “You’d better dare not come out of here again. If father sees you, I don’t know what he will do to you. And I won’t be able to help you.” She wipes at her skirt, as if she had just laid her hands on a piece of garbage.

“Mommy!” He can’t help but cry out at her entire change in attitude towards him,

before her face contorts in disgust, slamming the wooden door in his face followed by a locking noise at the keyhole.

Jungkook refuses to believe what had just happened, so he screams as loud as he could, not caring about how piercing the shrills of his voice were—hoping that she would hear his expression of his misery through the seperation and feel at least a tinge of pity for him.

He sucks in a deep breath, tears successfully rolling down his face a waterfall, and he screams even louder if that was possible—he wants her to have his yells of plea engraved in the back of her head, appearing every so often to haunt her in her sleep and taint her with guilt. He wants his mother to snap back to her old self, the one who would be carefully placing bandaids over the tears on his skin.

Unfortunately, her footsteps fades into the distance, and she returns to teatime with her acquaintance, shredding all of her last bit of conscience for her son.

A piece of garbage he was.

Freedom shined like a butterfly crawling out if its cocoon bathing in fresh sunlight for the very first time.

Jungkook was released from his room like a convict when the grim news of the passing of his brother arrived to the household. He wasn’t even allowed to attend his biological brother’s funeral, like he was a bad omen or something of the sort.

During this period of time, he was frequently left alone in his room with his usual three meals and toys he grew bored of. The monster didn’t visit at night, for the grieving over his brother was too much to bear apparently. It gave him enough time for his injuries to heal, a skin forming over them barely covering anything except to provide protection against infections honestly.

However, after a several days pass the door unlocks and he trembles in pure terror. Was this his fate?

That there would be no end to the treatment his own family gave him, that he would have to spend all his birthdays along with his Ironman plushie as he sang himself to being an age older.

He prayed, for it was all he could do.

To his surprise, he never knew the bedroom door opening this time, was to a whole new world for him. Jungkook begin going to school, being able to eat meals at the main dining table, put his foot up on the couch if he wished, enjoy hot showers and roam freely—even out of the estate.

A unfamiliar yet eye-opening concept of life.

He wasn’t complaining.

His father remained cold as ice towards him and he couldn’t bother much about his mother, after seeing the way she left him to drown on his own in a pool of misery and despair. He was no longer desperate for parental love or attention, they ignored him but kept him in check when needed and he enjoyed life more than he could have ever imagined.

‘Study hard’ and ‘Take over the company’ were two phrases he heard a lot coming from both freaks and he just did as told, knowing how his grades would get him whatever he wanted now.

He didn’t even have to ask, and the poshest car or the latest limited edition pair of shoes would arrive at his doorstep.

His life seemed almost perfect now, except that he still hasn’t learnt how to sleep with the lights off.

And that is because he simply can’t. The absence of light would bring him back to those days where he tossed and turned with nightmares swirling in his mind, worries overtaking his pounding heart and his father showing up with a potential weapon in hand.

He doesn’t see his father often, assuming he is coped up at the office with work and his mother still endlessly mourning over the loss of his brother, finger tracing over his smiling features in his middle school portrait. The boy was long gone but never erased from his mother’s heart.

While he was at the brink of death and she did not even bat an eye.

He was smart—he just had to be obedient and he would get whatever he wanted, no more bad treatments anymore—he was now treated like a king. Sometimes he thinks that he owes his life to his brother.

It was like a sacrifice made to save him from his predicament.

A really, depressing and tragic sacrifice.

One that switched the initial plan of the Jeon Family and their business—one that his parents decided to use and groom Jungkook to become the heir.

One that made the girl stop visiting ever since.

One that changed the destinies of the two children who met at the company dinner.

Jungkook has never fallen asleep with the lights switched off before.

That is, until he did exactly so in your bedroom.

He is unable to comprehend how he actually managed to do just so, fall asleep peacefully in complete darkness. Nonetheless, he did wake up after a couple of hours breaking out in cold sweat with his arms clutched around your stiffening form.

Jungkook hates how the feeling of holding and pulling you close to him is so comforting in an unexplainable manner, and how you felt nothing less than home. Jungkook is beginning to doubt why the hell he started these petty grudges with you—when you were a fibre away from the woman he used to love wholeheartedly. Keyword : used to. However, it was a tad too late for regrets.

He was only left with two choices of compensation and reconciliation. They were undeniably difficult to carry out, especially having hurt someone to an extent that far it’s almost outrageous. He thinks what he has done in the past to you is absolutely unforgivable.

Because if he was asked to do the same for his father’s mistakes, there would be only one option.

“You’re back early today. No dates or parties to attend tonight?” You cheekily tease as Sooyoung walks through the front door.

A few moments later, she doesn’t reply as she settles her bag down onto the couch and toss the car keys onto the table.

There was resentment written all over her face, she looked annoyed and in an extremely bad mood. You decided to keep quiet, considering that it isn’t the best time to speak when she felt this way over god knows what.

Sooyoung fumbles around some clothes, before she is heading for the door again, completely ignoring your existence.

No, please just Jungkook ignoring me would suffice.

You couldn’t let this slide and worry about what you had done to offend her for the whole night.

Just as she slings her bag over her shoulders, you open your mouth again.

“Sooyoung-ah, where are you going?”

She barely even looks over her shoulder to face you, before replying, “To meet Seulgi and Wendy.”

She was brushing you off so casually.

You felt like this more than the number of fingers on both hands could count, when people offered you help after Jungkook threw your pencil case in the bin or poured your lunch over your papers, you would think there would be a chance in making proper friends with them and escape this cruel torment. It wasn’t until you tried to sit with them in lunch and the whole group of students suddenly went quiet, the feeling uncomfortable to beyond. It’s like your presence made them stop discussing about anything, they awkwardly scratched the back of their necks before hurriedly placing the food trays back and scurrying off to class, leaving you alone at the table.

It was silly of you to think that people have begun to accept you just because they offered you a piece of tissue paper.

That day, you looked at your food and watched the tear drops fall into the gravy.

And from then on, you never went down for lunch ever again.

You’re thinking about why you weren’t invited, especially when it was always the four of you, no more or less. You didn’t want to lose this precious bunch of friends, and you surely weren’t overthinking when you felt that they were leaving you out on purpose.

“Uh, I’m not invited?”

The words came out way more obnoxious than you had intended, it had an aftertaste of bitterness and spite. You regret it immediately as you witness her face fall even more, into an irritated frown.

“You want to be invited after what you did at the party?”

Kiss Taehyung? Scold Jungkook? What was it?

“What... I did at the party?” You genuinely question, scanning every small action or word you had done or said back then.

“Oh c’mon. Let’s quit playing dumb. You clearly knew how much Seulgi liked Taehyung and you had the audacity to make out with him?”

Your lips parted in shock. Sooyoung was clearly the one who suggested to go over and converse with Taehyung, as well as the one who left you alone with him.

Why was she being so pretentious about the whole situation?

Did she like him?

But you had to admit Seulgi totally slipped your mind when Taehyung wrapped his hand around the back of your neck and kissed you hard.

“I just-“ You try to explain yourself. Only to face a dead end.

It was your fault, and all the fingers were pointed at you right now. You exhaled, “My mind wasn’t in a clear state when that happened, and I just went with the flow, I really did not mean to hurt Seulgi or anything-“

Wow, you sounded even more pretentious than Sooyoung.

“Do you know how upset Seulgi got, when Taehyung was filling her up with details of how you practically threw yourself at him like a whore?” ‘And disappointed’ She mumbled softly to herself, but it wasn’t missed by your ear.

“I never knew behind this facade of obedience and innocence lied someone who was so sly and disloyal.”

Your friends felt betrayed.

You had no words to retaliate or argue with what Sooyoung had just said—because you think it’s true, you see yourself as that kind of a person too.

You ignored the fact that Sooyoung kept complimenting Taehyung right in your face, that nothing really happened between the both of you that night thanks to a certain someone, and that Taehyung deviously lied about you throwing yourself at him. It happened because of both parties’ consents and desires.

And despite all these facts that they never went to consider before labelling you as a whore, the damage has been done.

The true colours have been revealed.

She swipes her car keys off the countertop when you’re left speechless and guilty, heading out once more.

You felt like crying, but for some reason you couldn’t.

It was something you should have expected from the very start.

Losing the people you hold close to your heart was something you were beginning to get so used to. This felt worse, because you chose to hurt them.

People would comfort you by saying that it is unintentional and that you didn’t have the need to feel bad or upset, but you’re starting to feel like a monster yourself. You are rather thankful for your first ever friends after so long to leave your side, because it’s what an asshole like you deserves.

A new chance had already been granted to you, and yet just so easily and quickly—you screwed everything up. Maybe a person like you did not deserve to live a normal life.

You were meant to be alone, you always have been and you always will.

The loud slam of the wooden door is a finger snap to your face, and you realise why all those years you had shut yourself off from people—you don’t think you are able to handle the kind of pain that squeezes tightly at your heart and constricts your chest when they leave.

If people come and go so easily, you had might as well not let them enter at all. You think it saves a few more heartbreaks and opportunities of getting hurt.

Your whole body is stinging with numbness as your mind is nothing but a blank, you walk over to the coffee table—one which you and Sooyoung had shared the local pastries over a season of Friends for one too many a times—and ur heart clenches at that.

Sly and disloyal.

You don’t think you are able to forget those words that callously shot like daggers at you—for it was done by someone you loved and cherished a lot since you offered to share that damn kettle.

Picking up your wallet, you flip it open only to be met with the genuine smiles—something that the both of you often shared when you were younger.

The old photograph was taken in the middle of summer, when two carefree kids hung out at the beach with silly floats and fancy swimsuits, rainbow popsicles in their hands. The glaring sun light as seen in the picture reminded you of how your childhood was filled with nothing but fragrant flowers and fresh sunshine, that made one feel young, wild and free.

You never saw that sunlight again.

Instead, you choose to view the moon in the darkest shade of night now, admiring how celestial and full it looked—to replace the emptiness you felt in your heart. Junghyun is someone you would rarely forget, for the round shining whiteness in the sea of black was always there as a constant reminder of the boy who played a major part in your younger years.

“Look at the moon, if you ever feel sad. Then think about me,” Your best friend nudges your elbow with a playful quirk of his brow, he turns to look at your tear stained face with something close to adoration. “And always remember that no matter where I will be,”

“…I will always love you.”

You chuckle at how stupid you must sound, reciting something as small as a foolish promise between two kids to comfort yourself. You’re laughing and yet, the tears never seem to stop falling from your eyes.

The memories of that fateful day was sewn into your mind—the two of you were kicking water in the shallow pool, only for you to carelessly drop the Tamagotchi you have in hand into the water. Junghyun immediately dives in forgetting about any form of hesitation, fishing out your sinking device like a lifeguard. ‘It’s okay’ he says, ‘I’ll get you something even better.’ When your pet is glitched out and doesn’t respond to your commands anymore, you began wailing like the little brat you are. After he wipes your tears causing an unbearably cute pout is formed on your tiny features, he said those words you’d never thought you would cling onto for life. That night, it was the first time he ever asked for something from his parents.

Both adults were initially confused by the sudden request, but compiled to it anyway without further questions. And when Junghyun woke up to a brand new Nintendo DS placed on his study desk, his face gleamed with satisfaction.

There’s a knot forming in your throat and your lungs are deprived of air as you attempt to cease the relentless sobbing.

The illumination of the moon—for some reason—seems extraordinarily fluorescent tonight.

The anatomy project has long been finalised and submitted. The grades of it would even be released by the end of this week. It’s been over weeks since Jungkook and you have ever spoken a word to each other. Since the complicated yet warm hug had taken place between the both of you, you detached yourself from his body after your breath steadied and your mind clear of the drunken, built-up frustration—only muttering an excuse to hurriedly leave before he could say anything else to you.

You left him standing there feeling more peculiar than ever.

The hug, the party. You words slap him across the face once more as he recalls the exact thing you had said to him.

You were never more right.

He was this horrible, sick-minded and sadistic piece of trash—was he any better than the man who beat him to death on a daily basis?

Taehyung wasn’t the best for you, but he had no right to interrupt whatever was going on at that point in time between the both of you.

Simply because he wasn’t any better.

In fact, he feels like he’s much worse than his friend—who sticks his dick in every living thing—Jungkook is a dick himself.

At least Taehyung was nice without trying and he knew the correct things to say or do, even more so he knew how to control his emotions and temper. Maybe that’s how he gets all the girls hung up on him even after he uses them like rags of clothes.

Jungkook wasn’t good at any of that.

Properly communicating and interacting with people just wasn’t his forté.

If he’s angry, he lifts his hand. If he’s happy, he says things that cross the line. If he’s sad, he converts that to anger and resort to violence to shield that one bit of vulnerability from anyone, not wanting to seem weak at all.

That is why his circle of friends is small, and he feels like he doesn’t even truly know and understand any of them. But you? Damn, you knew his temper like the back of your hand, you’ve seen him in his angriest form, you’ve witnessed fear overcome every cell of him and undergo a panic attack, you’ve watched him on the brink of tears as he ventured through another nightmare—and yet, he knew nothing about you.

You would forever remain as this mysterious and unpredictable person to him—and that, never failed to make him feel exasperated by the overpowering need to explore every millimetre of you, inside out.

He was unable to identify your soft spots or pick on your weaknesses—you were typically unreactive to anything that he does.

The time he spent in college with you was nothing but an emotional rollercoaster, an absolute train-wreck.

In class, he wouldn’t even notice your presence for you snuck in five minutes late in a dark hoodie and black jeans, lurking in the corner of the lecture hall, before hastily leaving the second the lecturer ended the lesson.

He realises that you were becoming similar to the girl in high school, he notices that your group of friends at the cafeteria had one person missing and it was always you. He wonders if you have “left the squad” or aren’t on talking terms anymore. He wonders what had happened to cause the falling out between you and your friends. Or maybe you were just being yourself, avoiding contact with humans in general. Like a shadow, you loomed in the secret spaces, disappearing and reappearing as and when you wished.

It wasn’t until that day he roamed the streets around town, exploring the people and places a little with his giant camera. He felt like a tourist in a foreign country when he was actually studying and living on this land.

For him, everywhere felt foreign, even the posh villa (and many other more estates) he owned didn’t even feel like home. Nothing was close to the feeling of his mother’s fingers intertwined with his own—aforementioned lady long gone and burnt to ashes in the back of his mind.

Home—a feeling he cannot grasp despite the fountains of cash and power coming his way, the throne at the very top of JEON entertainment hungrily waiting for him to take over—Jungkook only felt it again after what seemed like decades, in your fucking bed, hugging you to sleep.

The thoughts of you are shaken away violently when he—whether by fate or luck— decides to enter a fast food restaurant wanting to grab some fries. Not only did he get the strips of potatoes he craved for, he also managed to spot you just behind the counter, eyes wide and brows raised. It was adorable to see how you acted like you didn’t notice him at all, clearing your throat and blindly meddling with the smoothie machine.

Jungkook simply snickers at your obvious reaction.

It was almost as if the sight of you effortlessly stuck a smile to his face.

The joint only had customers leaving one by one after dinner time, the queue to the cashier nonexistent and he made good use of that matter of fact.

He confidently strides up to you—acting like he didn’t recently get yelled at by you, then hugged you, and at the very same time get ditched by you—and you quickly whisper to one of your colleague’s ear, begging him to take Jungkook’s order for you. Judging by how you were speedily undoing your apron, he takes the hint and waits for a while before backtracking and joining you in the bathroom with a smirk plastered on his face.

He had you trapped and not even your shadow wouldn’t be able to escape this time.

“Hello.” He greets lowly with his palm of the wall and his legs crossed, taking up the whole doorway when you emerge from the cubicle.

“Oh my fuck-“ You jump and his heart does little somersaults.

“Long time no-“

“Is there something you need?” He is cut off short in the speed of light, your dumbass face looking unbothered to the point where it’s scary.

Your tone is dead and dull, lacking any sort of energy and emotion, but the prompt sounds snarky coming out of you.

Your gaze was in all directions other than in his, you seemed uninterested and distant.

He shrugs it away, before answering, “Yes actually. I will wait till you knock off.”

You want to argue and tell him that it’s a bad idea, and that he was the last person you want to see—but he spins to leave leaving you no choice.

Jungkook emitted a stench that leaks of a strong sense of dread and burning infuriation inside of you. The whole restaurant smells of Jungkook and you want to shun away from his incessant staring at your working form.

“Is that handsome dude your boyfriend?” Kihyun points to the culprit of your everlasting dread and the persistent sighs coming out of you with his chin and he pokes your side with a side of his lips curling upwards.

You squeak and smack his hand away, “Is not.”

He scoffs at the firm denying of yours and continues, since number of customers were at minimum and there was nothing much to do left with a quarter to closing.

“As if. Why the hell is waiting for you then?” You roll your eyes.

When he obtains silence, he proceeds to press at your buttons.

“To hold hands and smooch on the way home together!” He purposefully sings aloud for Jungkook to hear and you kick his butt trying to shut him up.

It’s a pity Kihyun is a young father of twins and the most fun and easygoing manager you could ever have. To tell the truth, he’s part of the reason why you’d stay working at this shitty place. You’d think he would make a great bestfriend if not for his age and family responsibilities. His personality also sadly resembled your late bestfriend a lot—funny, selfless and wise.

It was the first time you couldn’t even bear to clock out, because that would mean it was time to deal with Jungkook.

He excitedly leapt up from his seat, making his way to your side as you hooked your bag over your shoulder. It had been a long day of school and work, and Jungkook was there to extend it even more. Your shoulders visibly slouch at the thought.

Stepping out of the restaurant, Jungkook stood beside you with a takeaway in hand, looking like he’s been dying to ask you stuff. You didn’t feel like interacting with anybody though, just wanted to be on your bed as soon as possible after standing for what seemed like ages past the clock.

“Are you hungry?” He is looking at you with those big round eyes again, and you shift your gaze to the floor, afraid to meet his brown orbs.

What the fuck.

“I bought this for you.”

Your head shoot up, then flicked to the plastic bag he’s carrying with one hand.

No fucking way. Wasn’t that his supper or something?

“W-What.. you didn’t have to-“ He throws the bag of burger and fries into your hands without blinking and you struggle to catch it.

“It’s actually okay.” You couldn’t accept his kind gesture or some reverse psychology effect he was trying to make you feel.

The grumble in your stomach comes on cue, roaring louder than thunder.

You nervously laugh before helplessly stealing a fry from the bag, contradicting your earlier sentence.

“Great. Now you’ve accepted my offer, you have to answer three of my questions.” He shoots you a winning grin. You were already shoving the fifth fry into your mouth, munching away without any care in the world.

Fuck it, three questions it is. The fries tasted too damn good for you to give it back or run away from the golden crispy and fluffy treat.

Jungkook bites on his lips and contemplates for quite a while. Like the question was a hard one to raise. You tap at your feet in a bit of anticipation. Just a bit.

“Why does it seem like you’re avoiding me?” He finally gets it out.

It wasn’t just him, you had practically cut off all contact with any ape that was intelligent enough to speak and alienated yourself from this world. You wouldn’t even greet the birds in the morning like you always do, you just suffocated in the haze of self-pity and hatred.

“I’m just busy working.” You kept your words to minimal, not wanting Jungkook prying into your personal thoughts and feelings about yourself.

Lame excuse, that’s what Jungkook thinks of your short answer. But he is popping out his second question mark.

“Hmm, seems fair.” He fakes and cocks a brow up.

“Then what happened to you and Sooyoung or something,”

The fact that he remembers your friend’s name almost lets a chortle slip from your lips. Your expression remains stoic—you were a professional at concealing the display of your real emotions—and even though you’re pretty upset at how the topic of the friends you once had was raised after so long, you reply from the bottom of your heart, “I don’t want to be associated with anyone right now.”

It was the truth, and it wouldn’t hurt Sooyoung or you in any way.

He hums in understanding before, “Then... are you alright?”

You want to cry.

Why does Jungkook, number one asshat and jerk towards you your whole life, have to act so sweet and caring when you’re at your lowest? It makes your heart want to give in and succumb to him completely. You had rather die.

The affection and concern Jeon Jungkook is showing you is too much for you to handle, and you don’t know what to make that of.

Why does he even fucking care if you were okay or not?

You instantly turn on your heel—a copy of your actions back then when you first met Jungkook again—ready to escape the conversation and rush home—like you should have done ever since he stepped foot into your workplace. Jungkook has been recently making you feel things and all sorts of things—from the first time you bumped into him at a party, or when he laid over you and fell asleep like a baby, and embracing you after he made you cry— the last thing you want is to even feel anything.

It doesn’t take longer than a second before Jungkook is stomping towards your leaving form. He wasn’t going to be left hanging off a cliff by you, twice.

Being asked about your wellbeing was like mishandling an unpinned grenade, causing a spark in a room filled with methane and running through a minefield.

A wrong move and instead of exploding, you would vanish into thin air in a snap.

“What the fuck is up with you?” Jungkook grabs your arm in time to halt you and narrows his eyes sternly at you.

“One moment you’re cuddling with me, and then you’re scolding me, and another you’re hugging me back, and now you’re trying to run away from me.” The confrontation sounds like something that would happen within a couple and an inevitable blush grows on his cheeks as he tries to stay as fierce as ever.

You look surprised upon his rant, but there was no response.

You were at a loss of words until, “If you can answer this, then I won’t distance myself anymore.”

You’ve had enough, and closure is what you both needed most.

“What are we? We’re not friends, nor are we acting like enemies, and we’re not together either.”

You put the truth out in the open like a glass ball handled with butter fingers , exposed and fragile to touch.

“Maybe this is what it feels like when you go against, to try and change something that’s meant to be, what we’re meant to be forever–” His features softened and his grip loosens as the realisation dawns upon the two of you, allowing your hand to fall by your side.

You huff in a deep breath, sparing a brief moment to collect every thought and reach your conclusion.

“Bully and victim.”

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