#but it's just not realistic to expect everyone to be as well-read or even articulate as the people deep in the discussions

[llycaons]

kind of wild how rude that random person was to my mutual during a critique of a book and then they were like 'oh sorry I turn off my brain on here' like if you know you're just on here for fun why butt into a serious conversation acting like a dick when you don't know what's being talked about? know your limitations ffs

[sassypantsjaxon]

feel free to ignore this message but I was curious about what is it in katara (or rather her grief) that makes you hate her?

Basically, it boils down to a lot of katara's behavior being triggering to me for various reasons. So if you want to know more about that, you know the drill, if not, keep scrolling and thanks for checking in

Let me just forewarn you that this probably won't be well articulated because this is a very personal topic to me and I'm just trying to answer it without thinking about it too hard

First of all, if you are a katara fan, good for you, I'm not trying to change your mind either, these are just my feelings based on my lived experiences, and I don't expect anyone else to conform to them.

Okay. For starters, please don't think I'm saying that katara is a bad character by saying I don't like her. She's not. She's a very good character. She's a very human character. And I find her grief as a twelve year old girl to be realistic, which I can say, because my sister was also twelve when we were experiencing grief for the first time, so I can definitely relate to sokka there.

There are a lot a posts out there saying that katara comes across as if she thinks her grief is greater than everyone around her. And... I've gotta say, I would have to agree with that. And that's because, even almost two decades later, I still have relatives who want to act like their grief is greater than the rest of the families. But again, that is part of what makes katara a realistic, human character. But it's also part of what makes her triggering to me.

So that brings me to the southern raiders. I have only watched this episode in its entirety once, and I doubt I'll ever be able to watch it again. It is that triggering to me. I've seen people frame her argument with sokka as if one of them has to be right or wrong, and... despite knowing that's not how grief works, I can't help but side with sokka.

I was 10 when my sister accused me of not caring about our dying grandmother because I was not emotionally capable of processing my grief in the same way she was. In 17 years, I have never spoken with her about this, I have no idea if she remembers saying this to me, and I have no intention of ever asking.

But hearing katara accuse sokka of not caring about their mother, simply because he reacts differently than she does just throws me back to being ten and having no idea what's going on.

Sorry to like. Trauma dump all this, but to honest, I think I needed to say it. So there's the full answer. Thanks if you read it all, I guess.

[luveline]

i’m so sorry for that anon! a bit off topic for a sec but i love how well worded you are😭😭 your thoughts and feelings (even in your blurbs) seem articulated so perfectly, and then in your writing for fics it’s so realistic ? if that makes any sense LOL it’s been inspiring me to be more thoughtful with what i choose to say. especially with your vocabulary which always feels so extensive and fitting🥹 also not to come off rude to that anon or anyone else that it may apply to, but if you can’t relate and don’t enjoy it don’t read!! i love your writing but if i see a fic like (idk let’s say pregnant reader) and since i’m not pregnant and can’t relate i’m not normally interested in fics like that, but i can appreciate you as a writer, that this may be something you enjoy creating and there’s so many other people reading your blog that may love that fic! like the fact you’re taking time out of your day to write and answer requests is just above and beyond already- not everyone will relate to a character and that’s okay, ITS A CHARACTER😭 tumblr is a big space and i’m sure you can find another blog that writes characters more relatable to you. especially as a writer i feel like you couldve been more empathetic, you can’t expect jade to just write everyone’s request like it’s no big deal😭 i just wish people were a bit kinder or at least try wording their messages a bit better bc i felt like that message was a bit hostile too ): anyways sending love🤍

I would not say I was well worded but I appreciate it! I just desperately want people to understand where I'm coming from, like, not just that I'm oh so annoyed how dare you but its a bummer to get sent stuff like that when I don't have the power to meet this goal they are asking of me, but also that i personally don't think it's fair to expect me to answer every request I recieve with a reason why I won't be writing it or an acknowledgement that it was received, that would take a lot of time! I'm not good with like, detecting tone but I really agree that I felt it was a bit of a gripe at me

[blindbeta]

I just saw someone asked about making a character blind in their novel and you responded about ways to avoid it being portrayed poorly. I wanted to ask, could it also help if part of the arc is the character accepting becoming blind?

Like, even if it happens in some kind of accident, or like them becoming blinded as a sacrifice for the team, would it be a bad portrayal for part of the character's story to be realizing it's not the end of the world, that being disabled doesn't make them completely useless, etc?

Or is that sort of arc also ableist?

[Note: I used the words non-disabled and abled interchangeably here. Both refer to people with no disabilities. After a conversation with some of my followers, I decided to make an effort to be clearer about who I referred to when I used words like able-bodied, because able-bodied may, for some people, refer to people without physical disabilities or without any disabilities at all. There are times when the distinction matters, even when people said they can usually tell based on context whether or not able-bodied is meant to include them.]

Writing About A Character Accepting Being Blind After Going Blind - When You Aren’t Blind Yourself

An arc about a character accepting becoming blind doesn’t feel good to me and I’ll try to explain why.

I’d rather read a story about a character who happens to be blind, in whatever way that happened, than read a story where a writer who isn’t blind tries to write about a blind character accepting being blind. I just finished a similar book and it did not go well. There are some things that research cannot teach you. There are some stories that aren’t yours to tell.

I don’t want to read about a non-blind author, especially a non-disabled author, writing negative things about my disability.

A character starting out feeling overly negative toward their blindness already feels bad to me. Why? Because the author has to write negative, sometimes completely wrong things about being blind. When I read stories like this, I am bombarded with stereotypes or myths which are rarely corrected by the narrator, who is usually traumatized and somewhat isolated as they heal. Many of the things they think or say are not checked or revisited. Mean things other characters say or think about them are often internalized by the narrator. Things that, in real life, are said to blind and otherwise disabled people as truths. As tough-love. As part of the supposed -Real World-. As bullying. As ignorant, innocent questions. As rude comments.

All of these things are not even coming from a personal place. The author writing these things- while they probably don’t agree with them, of course- is still not blind at the end of the day.

Readers who aren’t blind may not understand the nuance of why some of the things they read were ableist if it isn’t called out in the narrative in some way, which can sometimes happen when the narrator says something negative about their new disability. This isn’t to say readers shouldn’t do their own research or examine the story more closely. This isn’t to say the author is at fault for the interpretations of readers who refuse to think beyond what is laid out for them. When I say this, I am being realistic. Not all readers are going to be proactive. Not all readers are going to approach a book about a person going blind from a good place.

Most of the time, this is just something the author needs to accept. It is impossible to anticipate the strange interpretations of every reader. However, this narrative can be dangerous to a reader who has never met a blind person. Keep in mind, most people aren’t doing what you all are doing. They just read what is given to them. And if what is given to them is a helpless or self-loathing blind person, they might believe in that image. That book may be the only expirience they have with a blind person and they may not read any other books with blind characters.

Another thing I thought of was that non-blind authors sometimes don’t understand how hobbies and skills translate to blind people. For example, in a story I read once, a character who was going blind practiced playing piano and typing on a keyboard blindfolded so they could learn how to do without sight. However, blind people can already play instruments even if they were born blind. Blind people can also easily type on regular keyboards and, technically, correct keyboard technique means typing without needing to look at the keyboard.

Authors who don’t understand what it is like to go blind often don’t get the nuances of what that person is losing and not losing. And it often shows. They also don’t often include the aspects of blindness that are actually challenging. Why focus your worry on typing on a keyboard when you can learn how to use assistive devices in the kitchen or learn to cope with anxiety you anticipate will get worse after losing vision? Why not try to find accessible copies of books you have or scan or Braille sentimental letters? Why not organize your closet so you can find things more easily?

Obviously this is related to characters who know they’re going blind, though.

It favors non-disabled readers, which is ableist.

Another reason this type of story bothers me is because it is so common. Or at least people expect it. This type of story is one abled / non-disabled people can swallow and feel inspired by. Showing the blind person accepting their blindness also favors non-disabled readers in ways I may not be able to articulate well.

Accepting disability is an arc non-disabled people are comfortable with. It is a feel-good type of story that usually doesn’t challenge people too much, other than to remind them not to bully people. Already, this story is not even for disabled people, or in this case, blind people. It exists to introduce people who aren’t blind to the idea of becoming blind, to blind technology, to inspirational ideas about how blind people actually can do things. Stories like this guide abled people along and prioritize their ideas about blindness. Because the narrator is almost always previously abled, the story is about adjusting to blindness in a way that caters to non-disabled people.

How does a story with this angle benefit blind readers? Even if a blind person has also recently gone blind and wants to see a character who on that journey with them, what can a writer who isn’t blind say that blind writer couldn’t say? Or say better? Or say with more power? With more nuancel? With more personal experience?

And it may seem like saying this arc is ableist is too much. Keep in mind, ableism isn’t just about being rude to or excluding disabled people. Ableism favors those who are able-bodied or neurotypical over those who are not. It favors those who are not disabled over those who are. This story is just another way of doing that. Often, people are ableist through what they consider kindnes. Authors are not exempt from that.

Disabled authors should tell their own stories

This is where I will get some pushback. (I already received some here if you think it will be helpful to know what this is like.)

There are a few parts to this.

First, I want everyone to know I am not telling you what not to write or that this type of story, at least with elements of this narrative, can never be done well. However, the more care you take when writing it and the more you know about why it can be ableist, the better you will be able to write it. I’m still not sure I would want to read a book that is dedicated to this topic of accepting blindness, but who knows?

I also might feel more open to this narrative from a writer who experienced becoming disabled in some other way and was open about it. While they would still need to research blindness, some of the issues I named here could be avoided through having prior personal experience that non-disabled people simply don’t have.

If, however, you find yourself upset or feeling excluded by this post, consider what I wrote again. Consider why you think you are the best person to tell such a story with this particular arc.

I am also not saying that non-disabled writers could never write this topic well. I just question, again, what they can add to the topic of accepting blindness that blind people can’t already add. This is also assuming they were able to avoid some of the issues I listed above that might come up. Which would be difficult on top of doing all the other research they need to do in order to write a book. Why make it harder for themselves?

Now that I’m done with the disclaimers, accepting blindness should be something mostly left up to blind writers. This narrative is so closely tied to the trauma-based / incident-based blindness that it can be hard to separate them, but I feel like the readers of the blog have thought hard to suggest ways to improve or subvert that trope and the problems that go with it. Maybe they can do the same here. Maybe not.

Anyway, the reason I think it should be left to blind writers is because of the personal experience I mentioned previously. Acceptance will come from a more authentic place. Anything that comes before the acceptance will also come from an authentic place and blind writers will know how to deal these issues a little better.

Blind writers will know how to write this topic well. They can center blind readers in a way that many arcs like this don’t.

As a side note, blind writers also need more recognition and attention. This arc is specifically about or mostly about accepting blindness, which blind writers are intimately familiar with. Their stories should be prioritized in this area, at the very least.

If a non-disabled writer decided to do this topic, I think it would help to read and public ally promote books and other works by blind people.

Thank you for asking this question.

This was a really great question and I want to thank the anon for asking. I really appreciate the chance to discuss this topic. If anyone wants to expand on this question or figure out ways to subvert this arc, feel free to ask. Also, remember that I am not authority on stories about blind people, but I feel this opinion in shared by many of us and it should be known so writers can be aware.

Suggestions for alternatives.

1. Include only brief instances of acceptance and / or make it only related to blindness instead of accepting blindness as a character arc.

It will depend on how you do it, but brief, less direct instances of acceptance could be done well. One thing I’m thinking of is Toph challenging her father in The Blind Bandit. This could be seen as a form of self-acceptance for Toph, one which is related to her blindness without being the entirety of her need to accept part of herself, which gives her the courage to disrupt the view her parents have of her. Toph doesn’t struggle with being blind. She struggles with something related to being blind, which her parents being over-protective, limiting her freedom and expression, and putting her a gender role box.

The rest of Toph’s story wasn’t completely about being blind either. The writers, who weren’t blind as far as I can gather, handled this part well, and so I wanted to include it as an example.

Obviously, this can also be done badly, but that’s what beta readers are for. I personally would prefer the acceptance arc only be tangentially related to blindness, especially when combined with the trope about going blind through trauma / incidents / accidents.

2. Start in a different place.

You could start the story or character arc in a different place, rather than starting directly after going blind. This could be years later. After they already adjusted to the bigger parts of being blind. This saves you the need to figure out how to get around it.

Some parts of this ask might help.

3. Focus mostly on the practical stuff rather than the emotional side.

Focus on things like cane skills, adjusting to using screen-readers or needing to increase font sizes to read. Focus on learning to cook. Make the arc less about emotional stuff and more achieving goals. While I can understand how this might bother some blind people, I think it can work if blind readers are consulted, especially readers who went blind later in life. I wanted to include this as an option just in case people are determined to include going blind in the story. I think, if the author is careful, it could go well. A few narrative justifications for not writing the typical acceptance arc include:

-the character was already blind in some way first

-the character has a blind sibling, parent, or friend they grew up with

-the character got counseling or the story mentions they are getting counseling

Alternatively, you could also focus emotional difficulties on the traumatic incident, if there is one, and not the resulting blindness.

4. Write different stories - expand what stories about blind characters look like.

Writers have so many opportunities! I don’t see why they would feel the need to write a story primarily about going blind and learning you aren’t useless now after all, when they could be writing about a blind mermaid challenging the Mer Queen and falling in love with her instead. When they could be writing about blind space pirates creating new technology for other blind people. When they could be writing about a blind witch reclaiming their sexuality and also learning to dance to make their coven less worried about their social life after going blind.

See this post for more ideas about expanding the typical stories.

If you are creative enough, none of my claims that certain topics being best left to blind writers should stop you. If you feel limited, you might be trapped in the idea that blind people only have one narrative: trauma, sadness, helplessness, and just maybe, acceptance. If you don’t feel limited, you are in a good place.

Blind readers want other types of stories, too.

I hope this helps some of my followers. Thanks for the interesting question, anon. If anyone has any questions or would like me to clarify something, feel free to ask. I wrote this at night when I was tired. I have missed some things.

-BlindBeta

P.S. The ideas I pitched at the end are free to use if you feel inspired by any of them.

[winterscaptain]

immovable object.

Aaron Hotchner x Fem!Reader a joyful future fic

a/n: happy birthday aaron hotchner!! here’s a little something i cooked up, just for y’all who wanted to see something from aaron’s point of view. i figured a birthday would be as good a time as any to share a little bit of aaron’s head, even if it’s not his (actual) age this year. as always, i love to hear what you think! takes place au!november 2018

words: 2.3k warnings: language, implication of sex, light drinking/alcohol use

summary: “the years between fifty and seventy are the hardest. you are always being asked to do things, and yet you are not decrepit enough to turn them down.” - t.s. elliot

masterlist | a joyful future masterlist | ajf faq | requests closed!

Fifty. 

Aaron wasn’t sure where he’d be by fifty. He’d only had loose examples over the course of his life, as his father kicked it before he got to that point. But then again…

His father never appreciated what he had. Two sons, different to the point of extremity, a wife who loved him even through all his (many) shortcomings, and a big house in northern Virginia that he could afford with his very plush salary working on The Hill as a prosecutor. Nevertheless, he drank himself to death at forty-seven. 

So…

Where am I at fifty? 

He looks down into his lap, finding Caroline tucked into the crook of his elbow with a hand in her mouth while they sit in his armchair. She’s teething now, but she isn’t half as unbearable about it as Isaac. 

Isaac. 

Aaron scans the room, finding his son with Spencer and Hank at the formal dining room table. Spence has them both in his lap and reads aloud from whatever Russian novel he’s flying through. As Aaron listens closer, he realizes Spencer is translating as he goes, reading the book in English. 

Tolstoy should be fine for toddlers...right?

Another scan sends him to you, sitting on the floor with a bottle and a spit-up rag, Sophia snarfing down her afternoon snack like it’s her job. 

You find his eyes, double-taking a little. What?

Nothing. Aaron’s mouth presses into an amused little line. 

With a fond roll of your eyes, you turn back into the conversation with Sean and Derek. 

And that’s another thing. 

Aaron never expected to really have his brother in his life as an adult. To his surprise, it's a rather pleasant change of circumstance. Once he moved out of New York and back to Virginia, Sean really got his act together. The arrival of his second nephew didn’t hurt. At your behest, Aaron called him in Isaac’s first weeks, inviting him over to meet the new addition. He feels silly now, for starting a spat with you about it in the moment. It’s not easy, but it’s good. 

He’s the first one to admit that you did most of the heavy lifting, leveraging your similar age and propensity to draw flocks of the struggling and confused. 

Your Honor, I’d like to present Exhibit A in regard to struggling and confused - Aaron Benjamin Hotchner - before the court. 

He laughs down his nose at his own train of thought. Caroline fusses, but once she’s sitting up in his lap, one of his hands across the entirety of her chest and little belly, she’s happy. 

Will she continue to insist on seeing everything? Will she always be so quiet? 

There’s something about Caroline’s eyes, even as they continue to settle into their permanent color, that is inherently wise. He knows, logically, that Caroline and Sophia are near-identical, but neither of you have ever had any trouble telling them apart. 

If someone asked, he wouldn’t be able to articulate the differences. He just knows. 

Aaron almost startles when you appear at his side, Sophia freshly burped and smooshed against your shoulder. 

“You look pensive.” It’s a gentle accusation. 

Aaron snorts. “It’s my birthday. I’m allowed to be pensive.” He holds Caroline up for a minute and you accept the invitation, planting yourself in his lap. Sophia’s still in your arms, so it’s a bit crowded, but nevertheless, you swing your legs over the arm of the chair and melt against Aaron’s chest. 

The girls, of course, are delighted to see each other and make a happy, babbling pair sitting on your abdomen and thighs, watching all the action in the living room. 

Aaron presses a kiss to your head and just for another second wonders how he got so lucky. 

“Hey. Quit.”

He looks down, meeting your eyes. “What?”

You look at him, soft and affectionate. “You’ll never stop, will you?” 

“Probably not.” He adjusts again so he can cradle you in his arm while he keeps the girls stable with his free hand. “But that’s why I’ve got you.” 

“Unstoppable force meets immovable object?”

Aaron squints, making play at thinking. “Wasn’t that on our wedding announcements?” 

You huff a laugh and pat his chest twice. “Maybe it should have been.” 

Realistically, he knows he should be out socializing with everyone there to celebrate him and the fifty years he’s lived (only a couple of them in dog years), but he can’t bring himself to care. His cheek rests against your head, his fingers tracing patterns on your arm. Caroline has the other one of his hands, playing with his fingers (and putting those in her mouth, too) while Sophia sits back against him, threatening sleep. 

But really, nobody minds. They’re all having too much fun off the clock, with children of their own. Derek and Savannah lounge in the rec room, watching Tara, Sean, Will, Jack, and Henry play Mario Kart. Not far off is Kristy, wiping illicit frosting off her oldest son’s cheek before he rejoins the boys on the makeshift tournament arena. 

Matt, Dave, and Emily are gathered around the kitchen island, their wine glasses never far from their hands. JJ flits between the groups, her puttering instincts inescapable even outside of her domain. 

Luke and Penelope pretend they aren’t following each other from room to room, activity to activity. They are horrible actors, and Aaron wonders if the kid will ever pluck up the guts to do something about it. 

You didn’t. 

That doesn’t count. 

Yes, it does. 

JJ finally comes to rest beside Emily, propping herself up by her elbows as she sits backward on one of the barstools. “I’d never thought I’d see Hotch so happy.” 

Emily looks over her shoulder. What does she see?

She sees a man she’s known her entire career at the bureau, a man who hand-picked her to replace him when it was time for him to leave his post as unit chief, a man who lost almost everything and somehow found it again. 

She watches as Aaron says something to you, a wicked kind of humorous glint in his eye. She watches as you let out a loud laugh, accidentally startling your daughters in your lap. She watches as the girls process and pick up on their mother’s joy and start to shriek and clap. 

She watches Aaron live. 

“I dunno,” Emily says, finally. “I always thought those two might make it if they faced themselves.”

JJ humphs in the irony of it. “That’s a lot to ask.” 

“And yet -”

“- Somehow, they’ve managed.” JJ looks to her own family just in time to see Will taking advantage of the high ceiling, throwing Michael into the air and catching him. “It’s kind of funny, how things work out.” 

“I can’t believe he’s fifty.” Emily’s non-sequitur drops into JJ’s thoughts, which were rapidly devolving into the abstract. “It doesn’t seem right.” 

Dave taps Emily on the shoulder, reminding her he’s been there the whole time. “You’re in your late forties, I might remind you.” 

A kind of dissatisfied noise leaves her throat. “Thanks.” She turns, looking at him with a glare that could cut glass, but all in play. “Thanks for that.” 

“Just doing my civic duty.” 

Emily rolls her eyes and stands, wandering farther into the kitchen to pilfer a bag of animal crackers from the snack drawer. 

“Alright!” Penelope calls from the kitchen archway. “It’s time for cake!” 

That gets the attention of all the children in the vicinity who have experienced the unadulterated joy of Aunt Penelope’s buttercream frosting. 

Aaron tolerates the attention as you and the girls get shuffled (or in your case, shuffle yourself) off his lap. Emily takes Caroline while Savannah has Sophia. A quick glance finds Isaac on Dave's hip. With a little bit of a start, he realizes just how big his family is. They’re all here. 

For each other. 

For him. 

Soon enough, Penelope brings the cake - candles all lit (and no, there are not fifty of them - that was a hard no from the birthday boy) and places it in front of Aaron at the head of the dining room table. 

You kiss him on the cheek, distracting him while you put a ridiculous party hat on his head. You can almost feel his eye roll and you hear a few phone cameras click. Of course, shortly after, everyone starts singing at him - horrifically out of pace and key, but it’s perfect. 

He’s confronted with the back of a few more phones as parents and friends snap pictures out of habit. He reaches out to snag you around the waist and you end up half-sitting on the arm of his chair. 

You loop your arms around his neck, leaning into his side. “Make a wish.”

After one slow blink and a deep breath, he blows out the candles to whoops and hollers and baby shrieks. 

Your eyes snap up out of instinct, finding Isaac covering his ears and looking more and more alarmed by the minute. You toss another kiss onto Aaron’s forehead and quickly take Isaac from Dave, traveling down the hall with practiced haste. 

If he’s honest, Aaron forgot. He should have grabbed Isaac’s headphones from your office, but he didn’t. He should have warned his son about the loud noises and all the people before they overwhelmed him, but he didn’t. He should have remembered that his son needed more thought and attention than the others, but he didn’t. 

He hides his self-directed frustration well, but it doesn’t take long for him to make a quick and subtle escape. He knows the girls are just fine. Emily has Caro well in-hand and Savannah is always looking for an excuse to practice with the girls. She’s due in February, looking radiant and lovely. 

In a near-whisper, he calls for you and Isaac as he tracks down the hall on light feet. He hears you murmur, then Isaac’s voice: “Here, Dad,” guides him into your office, where you’re stationed on the floor under your desk. 

Isaac’s playing with the soft carpet chosen especially for him, his little fingers getting lost in the plush fabric. Aaron kneels down and rests his forearms on the ground, searching for Isaac’s eyes. 

“Hey, little man.” 

He hums. 

That’s a good thing. 

Aaron puts his hand on the carpet, about three inches away from Isaac’s. He can see it, but it’s not touching him, communicating his presence without sensation. 

You meet Aaron’s eyes over Isaac’s head. Not your fault. 

He shoots you a withering look. 

I’m serious, Aaron. You raise your eyebrows and shake your head. Not your fault. We’re okay. Your eyes flicker to Isaac before returning to Aaron. He’s okay. 

Aaron watches as you arc your body around him, getting close but not too close, running your fingers through the carpet on either side of him. Aaron wiggles his own fingers, sinking deeper into the blue shag. To his surprise, it calms him a little. 

Little Man might be onto something here. 

Eventually, Isaac leans back into you, and you slowly bring your hands to his hair, massaging his scalp with the tips of your fingers. You look at Aaron and nod once. 

He takes his cue. As always, he’s in awe of your command over Isaac’s needs. With a breath, and very quietly, he asks. “Are you feeling better, little man?”

His eyes still on the carpet, he nods. “Just loud.” 

“Yeah. It was pretty loud.” He looks up to the bookshelf, spotting his headphones on their charger. “Do you want to go back to the living room, maybe with your ears on? Or do you want to stay in here?”

The boy stills, thinking. In the two years he’s known his son, the turning of gears in Isaac’s little head enamors and amazes him. He can almost see their spokes behind his eyes. After a minute or so - 

“Living room, but only for a little while.” 

You kiss him lightly on the top of his head, where the band of the headphones rests. “Do you want your ears?”

He nods and Aaron rises, bringing the headphones back down. Isaac puts them on and wiggles a little where he sits. Aaron likes to imagine it’s his way of settling back into his body. 

Much to the surprise of everyone present, Isaac reaches out to Aaron. With soft eyes, he takes his son in his arms, letting him wrap like a koala around his neck and chest. 

The three of you return, finding everyone still milling about, eating cake, and sharing space together. Jack, catching sight of you, jogs over. “Is Isaac okay?”

You nod, brushing the hair off Jack’s forehead. “Yeah, bud. It just got a little overwhelming for a minute.”

It’s been eleven years of you and Jack, but it never gets old for Aaron. The way you are with each other - somehow balancing a parent-child relationship with a steadfast best-friendship - constantly surprises and warms him. 

Jack nods, circling around so he can get into Isaac’s eye line. He waves a little, and Isaac waves back, lifting his hand briefly from Aaron’s collar. Jack offers a fist, and Isaac reaches out to tap it with three of his fingers. 

Aaron closes his eyes, taking it in. 

+++

“So,” you say, tucking into bed beside him. “Fifty.” 

“So,” He doesn’t pull his eyes from his book. “Thirty-six.” He throws you a side-eye, immediately noticing the playful glint in your eye. “Don’t start.” 

You raise your eyebrows, the picture of innocence. “Start what? I’m just appreciating my loving and handsome and thoughtful and distinguished husband on his birthday.” You scoot and shift, straddling him. “Are you gonna let me?”

That gets his attention. Keeping his eyes on you, he markes his place and sets the book on his bedside table. “I might.” 

You lean down, pressing your lips to his, speaking quietly against his mouth, like a secret. “Happy Birthday, my love.” 

If anyone asked, Aaron loved his present. 

+++

tagging: @arganfics @quillvine @stxrryspencer @agenthotchner @wandaswitxh @hurricanejjareau @ughitsbaby @rousethemouse @criminalsmarts @shrimpyblog @genevievedarcygranger @ssaic-jareau @good-heavens-chris-evans @angelsbabey @writefasttalkevenfaster @venusbarnes @hotchsflower @ogmilkis @marvels-agents100 @hotchslatte @risenfox @mrs-dr-reid @captain-christopher-pike @dwellingsofrosie @pan-pride-12 @sunshine-em @jdougl-love @sageellsworth05 @dreila03 @forgottenword @aaronhotchnerr @ssa-morgan @buckybau @tegggeeee @abschaffer2 @ssacandice-ray @ellyhotchner @lotties-journey-abroad @mrs-joel-pimentel-23-25 @laneygthememequeen @violentvulgarvolatile @mooneylupinblack @ssareidbby @violet-amxthyst @zizzlekwum @lcvischmitt @qvid-pro-qvo @mandylove1000 @simsiddy @jeor @synonymforlame @roses-and-grasses @bwbatta @capricorngf @missdowntonabbey @averyhotchner @cevanswhre @joanofarkansass @infinity1321 @popped-weasels @evee87 @nuvoleincielo @spencerelds @ssahotchnerr @this-broken-band-girl @winqhster @reidtomestyles @hotch-meeeeeuppppp @the-falling-in-the-danger @nattylite49 @crazyshannonigans @softbibxtch @iconicc @mangoberry43 @andreasworlsboring101

[itcamefromthetoybox]

Laser Blades: A More Elegant Weapon

Join me now, won’t you, in a far-gone decade known as the 90’s. The first “Toy Story” movie had just come out in theaters, introducing the world to a colorful cast of beloved characters and flooding the shelves with merchandise. And at the top of every kid’s “Want” list, to the point that it was the best-selling toy of Christmas 1996, was Buzz Lightyear, as faithful a recreation of the toy from the movie as 90’s engineering was capable of. I, of course, was no exception to this, and was delighted when I got a Buzz Lightyear with silver and black armor. From there, I was thrilled to play as Buzz in the surprisingly fantastic “Toy Story 2” video game for the Nintendo 64 and was ecstatic to watch the show “Buzz Lightyear of Star Command” after school. So when I found out about the upcoming “Lightyear” movie, you can imagine the shrill, dog-upsetting, noise I made. I had been waiting eagerly for the toys to pop up on shelves, and at last they have! And so, because I have no impulse control, I grabbed and want to talk about “Laser Blade Buzz Lightyear!”

We all know who Buzz Lightyear is. Almost everyone who would be reading this has seen at least one “Toy Story” movie in their lives. So instead, let’s talk about the “Lightyear” movie. The idea is that this movie came out in the “Toy Story” universe, inspiring the toy that Andy gets in the first movie and the cartoon that was later aired in real life and was shown to also exist in the “Toy Story” universe. The movie comes out in about a month at this point, so, of course, the tie in movie merchandise is now out on the shelves.

Laser Blade Buzz looks fantastic. His entire design is a more realistic-looking version of the original Buzz Lightyear design, with a decent amount of detailing sculpted on, showing armor plating and suit features, even ones the toy doesn’t actually have, like a laser mounted on his wrist. His paint job uses more muted colors than the original, which does bug me a bit, but is true to the film. For some reason, people have decided “realistic” means “darker colors.” He doesn’t have his helmet up, but he does have his purple headpiece, which a lot of the Buzz figures in this line lack so far, and his right hand has an attached sword, which has the laser part of the blade painted a different color from the rest of the weapon to make it stand out even when it’s not lighting up. Honestly, I like his look a lot.

Star Command employee of the month.

Buzz is also surprisingly articulated. When I got this figure, I knew he was going to be very focused on the gimmick, which, in a lot of cases, means less articulation. Much to my surprise and delight, though, Buzz is very well articulated. His legs, feet, and left arm are very posable, and even his right arm can turn at the elbow. Considering his gimmick of swinging his sword is triggered by squeezing his legs together, I expected his legs would be a bit more stationary, but they’re in fact very posable. His right leg’s got a little less articulation where it meets the hip, but it’s not really an issue.

“Buzz Lightyear Mission Log. I am beginning to regret bringing a sword to a laser fight.”

The gimmick’s also really great. Like I said earlier, he swings his sword when you squeeze his legs together. Doing so causes him to turn his waist, swing his light-up sword upwards, and play one of thirty sound effects, including speech clips. The sound for the blade activating is also the sound of, or at least similar to, a lightsaber, so that’s pretty cool. And with all his articulation, the gimmick doesn’t really detract from the toy. It limits what you can do with the right arm, and that’s about it.

The only real complaint I have is that he doesn’t do more. His sculpted buttons on his chest don’t trigger anything and are there because they’re just a part of his design. I know, that complaint sounds like I’m stretching, and that’s because I am. He’s just a really great toy. He’s also massive. Buzz comes in at about 12 inches, but feels even bigger, which is both good and bad. It’s good because he’s a massive, fun, sturdy toy, and holding him makes me feel like a kid getting a Buzz Lightyear toy again. It’s bad, though, because there aren’t any other figures in the line so far that really capture that same feeling of “large and in charge,” which means there’s no Zurg or Zurg’s robots that feel like a comparable challenge for Buzz, though hopefully that changes as we get closer to the movie.

“BY THE POWER OF GREYSKULL!”

Would I recommend this figure? Absolutely. Honestly, every figure I’ve gotten from the line so far (Zurg, one of Zurg’s robot Zyclopses, Mission Equipped Buzz Lightyear, and this Buzz) have been just so great, and this Buzz is no exception. So far in my experience, no figure in the line loses anything to their gimmicks, and they’re all great toys. This figure’s great for kids and just a ton of fun. Hell, the one reason I’m not constantly playing with him is because I’m pretty sure his sound effect would drive my fiancee to murder me in my sleep. Buzz is currently available at mass retail for about $30. This is JL, signing off and wishing you Happy Toy Hunting!

[sobdasha]

I can’t wait for the day

when Momiji is revisiting The Most Foolish Traveler, the story that has always best embodied his life ideology, and just flips a table while yelling “this is bullshit!” in German.

(it’s probably about the same time that he and Momo decide to sue their parents for custody of each other)

He spends all of one evening on this (because he is really fired up and manages to get it out all in one go without any editing), commissions Rin for illustrations, and then mails off a copy to Tohru and Kyou in a fit of righteous anger.

It’s called The Most Idiotic Traveler in the World (with Corrected Ending) or something like that and the story diverges when the naked traveler is wandering through the woods. This time, early in her journey in the forest, the traveler meets a new monster not in the original story.

The monster tells the traveler that he’s been watching her since she first entered the woods. And, the monster tells her, she really is an idiot.

The traveler is confused and, to tell the truth, a bit hurt by that. It’s a different hurt than walking through the forest barefoot, with no clothes to protect her from scratches, and hobbling on a crutch of a fallen branch because she gave away one of her legs to a demon she met earlier.

“Look,” the monster says, “I’m not saying it’s not good to be grateful. Spending your life being worried about everything you could lose is a rotten way to live. But it’s okay to ask for something in return, you know. What are you going to do, keep giving away parts of your body to the demons in the forest? I know you just want to be kind, but how are you going to keep helping people if there’s nothing left of you but a head?”

(“Does that monster look kind of...familiar, to you?” Tohru asks Kyou.)

Oh, the traveler thinks. That’s what kind of hurt it is. Like the hurt of wanting to keep traveling through towns, wanting to keep being helpful, wanting to keep offering freely to the people around her. But being told instead that she’s not wanted because she’s naked, and shouldn’t she be ashamed and go where no one will see her.

(About a week ago Momiji called the house and asked, “Heeeeey Kyou, what’d your true form look like?” Kyou contemplated that for a little while, and then simply hung up on him. Rin then suggested they ask Shigure instead, as Shigure’s a bastard who knows everyone’s business.)

The traveler doesn’t know what to say to the monster. What if people think she’s greedy when she asks for a trade? What if people think that means she isn’t interested in helping really? And it’s scary to think about asking and then being told no.

(“Kyou, do you think it’s supposed to be a...a cat monster?”)

But somehow, the monster knows what she’s thinking, because he says that he didn’t mean to make her feel bad. He says, he just thought she should think about what would make her happy. He wanted her to hear that it was okay, to think like that. She can still be generous and grateful without having to lie to herself that she’s happy giving until there’s nothing left and never receiving anything new to give.

(Okay, I know I’m stupidly in love with Tohru and the whole family thinks it’s hilarious, Kyou thinks, but does Momiji seriously have to keep giving me shit about it all the time?)

“Oh,” says the traveler, starting to cry. “That’s actually very kind of you. No one has ever given me a gift like that before. I want to give you something in return for your kindness. Would you—would you like to have my arm?”

“No! I just—maybe you could let me travel with you. For a little bit. It’s kinda lonely in these woods.”

The monster is startled to find the traveler crying even harder now. I’m so sorry, the traveler tells him. It’s not that she’s upset or that she doesn’t want to travel with him—it’s just that that’s what she’s secretly always hoped for. Traveling, and meeting new people, and seeing new towns and forests, are all very lovely. But leaving people and places so soon after she’s met them is so very lonely. She’s given and given away everything she has, and she doesn’t begrudge it at all, but the only thing she would have wanted in return was for someone to travel with her for a while and keep her company.

“I can never repay your generosity!” the traveler wails.

“Hey now,” says the monster, “I thought this was a gift you were giving to me.”

Though you really shouldn’t give up any more of your body parts if you want to keep traveling and helping people, the monster scolds her. But, he says, if the time comes when she really must give up her other leg to help someone...he’ll be there to carry her, so they can keep traveling, together.

And the traveler and the monster did continue to journey together for a long time, and they lived very happily and generously but with reasonable boundaries for their well being and had so many beautiful monster babies and grandbabies THE END.

(“This is the most beautiful story I’ve ever read,” Tohru sobs into Kyou. Kyou decides he’ll forgive Momiji after all for rewriting that weird story, now blatantly starring him and Tohru and wtf even prompted that brat to do this anyway.)

The moral that Momiji took from the original story, that you should just be a beautiful person and not worry about loss and be kind, and it’s okay to die telling yourself you’re happy when all you’ve been is abused, is a garbage moral. (He also took away that he wanted to make kind people like that happy. But he accurately sees himself and Tohru as being very similar people, and he has told himself he’s okay with being walked over the same way Tohru does.) Being grateful for what you have does have its merits, but. You can be kind and have boundaries. You can be generous and not force yourself to smile and be grateful when people use you.

Momiji has no regrets about trying to empathize with his parents and keeping his distance for his mother’s mental health and his father’s happiness. But I expect there’s a point where he realizes it was awful of his dad to frame Momiji getting literally disowned as a “gift” Momiji gave her when actually Momiji didn’t have a choice to say that he didn’t want to be forgotten. I expect he builds up a lot of righteous indignation about being kept away from Momo, especially as Momo gets older and clearly wants a relationship because she’s actively seeking it out. After all, by the time his curse breaks, he’s self-aware enough to articulate that no one else can dictate for him “you should be grateful for X” or “you’ll never be happy if you do Y.” He’s made peace with the things he can’t have but he has realistic expectations for potentially getting other things in the future. Momiji refuses to accept that he’ll get nothing in return for his kindness.

(I’m also thinking about how very cold they play Momiji at the hospital with Akito in the anime, and how Momiji doesn’t warm up and offer Akito comfort via The Most Foolish Traveler until it’s clear that Akito isn’t thinking “isn’t it great how I played all these suckers” but could instead be receptive to the idea of “I want to give something kind to these dumbasses in return even though they won’t ask me for it” if nudged in the right direction.)

Momiji said his initially reaction to The Most Idiotic Traveler in the World was to want for the traveler to be happy for real, which says that Momiji is aware that the traveler was not actually happy, dying alone in the forest crying about how happy and grateful she was. And he is Right and He Should Say It and also rewrite the story with a correct ending.

[rosegirl1994]

Why Dean is still the most awesome character that has ever existed on TV (and a realistic one)

Jeez, after having come to tumblr after a great episode with the intention to enjoy our favorite show with other passionate viewers I have to say I am really disappointed with the hate for the episode, the hate for the kid actors (which were really really awesome, especially Paxton Singleton), but most of all for my favorite character Dean Winchester.

Since the very first moment I have been a Dean girl through and through, so be warned, maybe my view is clouded (which makes it even more important for me to hear about other peoples (well-articulated) opinions). The characters have changed and developed soo much over the years and, even if it was not always for the better, especially the worse character traits they have developed are realistic given the trauma they have experienced over the seasons (because let’s be real – even if their upbringing was complicated as Chuck put it their real nightmares started from season 2 on and their lives haven’t gotten any better since then with multiple deaths from family members, friends and themselves to endure). Lately though, all I take from the comments over here is hate for Dean.

From 15x16 I took that many (hopefully not all) fans are unhappy with Dean’s attitude towards Jack’s planned sacrifice. I have read that people are pissed that Dean is supposedly okay with Jack dying which in my opinion is not established in canon, quite the contrary to be honest. Last finale Dean headed out to kill Jack but didn’t/couldn’t do so even though Jack had killed his mom (and Dean had been raised by his dad to revenge Mary’s (first) death since he was a very small child and hunted that damn demon for more than two decades), yet he couldn’t do it when he was faced with Jack. The, in 15x14 Dean was really really happy to have Mrs Butters carrying for him and Sam, yet the very second (okay, he did let a millisecond pass mourning his sandwich 😉) she wanted to murder Jack, Dean defended him and could have gotten killed himself for it even. Dean did not want Jack to get killed then. He told Jack that he does not want him to die even if he is still a bit angry (which is completely understandable imo), he is trying his best to forgive Jack (I read that as if he wants to forgive but is just not able to at the moment, yet again, completely understandable for me as anger/grief is not an emotion I can turn off completely just because I want to).

Another issue I have with the whole hate being projected onto Dean by (some?) fans is that Jack said he wants to sacrifice himself, it is Jack’s (or respectively Billie’s idea), it was not Dean who said that Jack had to do so in order to be forgiven. Yes, Jack is a toddler but it is still his decision to make and would Dean tell him (in any other situation) to do or to not do something people would go crazy over that again and claim that Dean is maniplulative/abusive/controlling, …. (read that in other contexts already). It is very hypocritical, imo. Yes, it would be great if Dean would mourn more, yet to him, as he said in 15x02 nothing seems real at the moment. He wants to be free (and sees his only chance in Chuck being taken down) and not, even more important than that, Chuck wants to annihilate all existence. He needs to be stopped and he needs to be stopped soon! There are 7.8 billion people on this planet, Billie told Dean last episode that Chuck will be on earth very very soon so there is not a lot of time to come up with another plan, so what is it people expect him to do? Sacrifice 7.8 billion so that Jack can live (which he cannot to either if Chuck decides to nuke the planet?). Remember 2x20 where Dean is visiting Au!John’s grave: “Your happiness, for all those peoples' lives? No contest.”, that is what he has been taught from early on by his dad. Even if Dean wants Jack to live because he considers him family and loves him (which he does and has been shown in many occasions – even lately with him baking Jack a cake), one life is nothing in comparison to 7.8 billion lives.

In season 5 Dean was willing to let Sammy die in order to have the world saved (let’s be real about that – the very Sam that is the very most important person in the universe for Dean that Dean would have spent forever for in hell and who is loved infinitely by Dean). Moreover, – and I wonder how that hasn’t come up yet in any other post – in season 11 everyone else (being Sam, Cas, …) was okay with Dean being the bomb that would destroy Amara and Chuck which is the very same thing Jack is supposed to do now! No one went crazy saying that Sam or Cas hated Dean, did not love him, … At the same time in season 9 when Dean didn’t want to let Sam go (or couldn’t let him go) people got mad at Dean for not having been able to let Sam die, calling him selfish, etc.. It seems as if Dean can’t win no matter what he does.

Right now (and time isn’t on their side) this (being Jack’s sacrifice) is their best shot at defeating Chuck and saving the world. I think if it was Sam or Castiel the only thing different would be Dean mourning that decision more but he would go along with the plan eventually, too (as proven several times in the past). Yes, it would be great to see more of Dean’s doubts about the plan (which he has! Otherwise he wouldn’t have told Sam he kept the news from him because of the possibility of ethical questions being raised by Sam (remember 14x11: “Sam, you’re the last person I could tell, the last person I could be around, ‘cause you’re the only one that could’ve talked me out of it” – Sam is Dean’s consciousness!). Dean has doubts about it but right now there is not a lot to do about it. Cas is on it already but at the same time time is running out and the world is ending so Dean really shouldn’t be sitting in a corner crying about things he cannot change and which are not his decisions to make.

I am really interested in hearing (other) opinions but to me it feels really unfair and hypocritical that Dean is yet again the person to blame. Dean gave Sam the information like a day or two after he has received them (which should have been Cas or Jack’s job, not Deans by the way and hey Cas, Jack even asked you not to spill the news so where is the hate for Cas for being too chatty with Dean 😉), Dean implied heavily that he is not okay with it (even the given circumstances of Jack being the reason is mom is dead yet again) and right now – real talk – Jack’s sacrifice is the only option available to save the planet (a decision Dean had made in season 11 himself, too and Dean supported as Sam’s decision in season 5). 

[inumaqi]

top ten tagged by @linkspooky 🍊 explanations under the cut! sorry for rambling xo → rules: name your top ten favourite characters from ten different fandoms, and then tag ten people - @osomanga @kara-suno @anonimarevolts @zeninmaki @wildbishonen @shysheeperz @tkmewthyou @kaldurlenn @joxterism @marshmallowdonutsprinkles

snufkin okay so he’s the only one not from an anime or manga but i had to put him on bc he’s the most important fictional character to me, ever. i grew up watching the moomin cartoons in the 90s and thinking about it instantly calms me down - they used to air the episodes early in the morning when it would still be dark outside: the landscapes were moody and cosy, the characters were so softly spoken and articulate... it’s just peak nostalgia. anyway, snufkin is moomin’s best friend; he returns to moominvalley every year to be with his friends during the spring and says his goodbyes to go adventure again come winter. it upsets moomin when he leaves but snufkin is adamant that quiet and solitude are important and healthy, and it’s not fair to expect him to compromise on his independence - that made a really big impact on me as a kid, especially as someone who never really had their ‘own’ space (twinsies). relationships aren’t weakened by physical distance or time, they’re about communication and understanding. that was important too. i don’t think i realised just how influential it had been until i was an adult but snufkin is an anarchist. he first shows up in the comics when moomin and sniff are talking about opening a bank - he tells them they should plant fruit trees instead. he destroys private property and rescues orphans, he refuses to participate in things that don’t bring him joy. when he’s asked where home is, he replies, “nowhere. or everywhere! it depends how you look at it” - the whole world belongs to him, and the whole world belongs to everyone else too.

yomo renji in general, i like characters that trudge along in the background and do the nitty-gritty work that supports the main story. i like people like that irl too. more than anything else, yomo is desperate to form human connections, even though he’s shackled by self-doubt and self-loathing. he just wants to positively contribute to a community, thinking he’s most useful keeping a quiet eye on people who might need protection/guidance (while still giving them space to grow and act themselves) or foraging for human corpses so that others aren’t in danger or moral anguish doing it for themselves.

bird boy is a total weapon - “the perfect ghoul” - and you’re reminded over and over again but a lot of his growth is about rejecting violence and repurposing his power as something productive that he can use to help the people around him instead of hurting people (the yang to uta’s yin). in the first few chapters, he says he kills humans (he’s a ghoul, humans are food, it’s natural) and yet he’s consistently framed as a scavenger who seeks out ‘roadkill’ [suicide victims] for sustenance, even before coming to anteiku, and implements a system so other people can do the same.

suguru getou i was originally gonna say meg bc i love him but, having just finished The Flashback Arc, i can’t stop thinking about getou and i’m beyond impressed with how akutami has managed to ground him so well, so sympathetically. getou is the sick, warped darkness to the hopeful light that gojou commands but... in an uncomfortable twist, the reverse is true, kind of.

actually, gojou is arrogant and confrontational and hyper individualistic. he’s a dissident. getou is obedient, compassionate, self-aware... he has a sense of social responsibility and passionately believes that his skills should be used to protect those who can’t protect themselves - non-jujutsu sorcerers - and all of the suffering he endures as a result is worth that. idk if others are reading his downfall differently but, from where i’m standing, that overwhelming responsibility never goes away, he doesn’t give up on it - he just starts to view the social landscape differently and begins to see how jujutsu sorcerers are vilified and mistreated in spite of all the good that they do. the ‘weak’ aren’t really weak when they’re able to organise and assert collective power over a minority, and so his sympathies shift.

the nail in the coffin for getou is learning that the hurt and pain could be eradicted from the world by cutting the head of the proverbial snake: non-jujutsu users generate cursed energy, so get rid of non-jujutsu users and cursed energy won’t be generated. it’s all horribly, weirdly rooted in good intentions that weigh him down and misdirect him.  shinazugawa genya i feel like the bond that slowly starts to develop betwen tanjirou, and zenitsu and inosuke (in particular) is nicely foiled by genya’s lonely journey towards becoming a pillar. after losing almost all of his family and having sanemi walk away, genya is angry, antisocial, rude, violent, evasive...

he’s characterised as competitive, as if he hates his peers and wants to leave them in the dust as an act of self-satisfaction, a power fantasy or whenever, but this is a deliberate misdirection to cover for the fact that he’s scrambling to be a pillar so that he can reconnect with his brother and prove to him that he can protect himself; that sanemi doesn’t need to shoulder everything alone like he used to. his entire goal is an act of apology.

and in a story where so many characters are able to hone these exceptional skills, genya is uniquely disadvantaged as the only one who can’t master breathing techniques. rather than having a hero moment and powering up, his need to reconnect with sanemi is so strong that he essentially decides to compromise his humanity and become a kind of monster by ingesting the demons he’s pledged to annihilate. amajiki tamaki i wish i had a a longer explanation for this one but it’s actually super simple: tamaki is a really, really, really good portrayal of a person burdened with severe anxiety. the way he physically carries himself, the way he hides his face, his manner of speaking, his dependency on his mirio, how he interprets compliments as trickery, how he needs to be pushed and pushed and pushed before he’s finally able to release his potential... every single scene with tamaki felt deeply personal when i was reading bnha and i knew exactly what he was supposed to be feeling. shinmon benimaru sometimes good, nice people don’t fit a little friendly mould and i like that benimaru is hostile and rough and antisocial, even with people he cares about. he doesn’t expect anything of people, he doesn’t want them interfering with him, and he wants to help and support them all the same because he believes in community. he’s completely oppositional to the special fire force because he thinks it’s a tool to pursue an ideology rather than to protect people, which is why it’s so important when the eighth are finally able to win his approval - they become the only company the seventh consider allies, and it’s proof that their objectives are righteous. despite his reputation as... kind of a nuisance, his skill is acknowledged by everyone and he’s universally regarded as the strongest fire soldier there is. in spite of his antisocial attitude, he agrees that it’s important to share that with younger fire soldiers - he’s incredibly patient and understanding with them, helps them to individually adapt. the way he (and others in company seven) operate in contrast to the other companies when fighting infernals is really cool to me for two reasons: (1) it provides a commentary on how cultures and traditions often struggle to survive when they’re systematically (forcefully) replaced through power and wealth - although the subtext is a little troubling because it’s unclear whether ōkubo is conflating multiculturalism with globalisation which, uh, big nope; and (2) philosophically speaking, the approach to death is interesting. where the other companies essentially perform last rites and offer absolution to the deceased, benimaru personally takes responsibility - at the request of the people in his district - for sending them off in huge public display, kind of like a festival intending to celebrate their life. i think it speaks to how profoundly he values life. akihiko kaji i liked akihiko from the beginning because he’s stoic and introspective and also excitable and dumb. he’s a people watcher and waits for opportunities to softly guide uenoyama and mafuyu when they’re quietly crying out for help but doesn’t interfere any more than he thinks is necessary because he knows they can make their own way to where they need to go. i liked akihiko even more when he got really fucking messy. his relationship with ugetsu is sweet and it’s incredibly ugly and unhealthy because they both fail utterly to communicate with one another - they’re both to blame for avoiding and hurting each other, and i think that’s a really normal issue that people find difficult to overcome. i’m super interested (and really nervous) to see how his relationship with haruki develops. he’s done some horrible things to haruki and i want him to be accountable for those things and have them affect their relationship in a realistic way.

tanigaki genjirou one thing i really, really love about golden kamuy is the way noda satoru incorporates the importance of minority cultures into the story, and tanigaki’s apparent abandonment of his matagi heritage is really beautifully written. matagi hunting traditions shaped his life as a young man, it’s how he was able to really assimilate to the people around him and form relationships and - without getting too spoilery - he divorces himself from it all when he’s overcome by grief and hatches a plan for revenge against the person responsible. so, by allowing himself to surrender to negative feelings and thoughts instead of seeking support and learning to heal from what happened, he becomes a total shadow of himself. 

makimura takeshi i know i’ve gushed about it before but i can’t properly explain just how incredible it felt seeing an asexual character in manga dialogue about being asexual, and devils’ line does it twice. the reason i’m so attached to makimura in particular is because he doesn’t seem to have fully figured it out - and he’s kinda... comfortable with that. he wants to be with someone and he wants to be monogamous but he can’t understand why he doesn’t feel sexual desire towards her; he knows his feelings aren’t platonic but doesn’t know whether they can really be called romantic either.

not to go dark mode but i very vividly remember just how lonely and horrifying it was battling with those uncertainties when i was a teenager, thinking i was broken because i didn’t have Normal Human Feelings and needed to be fixed. i was so worried about it that i thought about all the boys i knew, picked the one i thought was the nicest and actively tried to develop a crush on him. it was dumb as fuck but, ten years later, i realise it was really desperate and sad too. i forced myself to have ~my first kiss~ (it was horrible) because i felt like i was getting left behind and i think i would’ve put myself in worse situations as i got older if i hadn’t suffered with such bad social anxiety.

i hadn’t really thought too much about a lot of this stuff for yeaaars but it all came flooding back when i was reading devils’ line. it was bittersweet bc i was remembering all of those shitty feelings but also watching this character grapple with those same questions and go: i don’t know yet and that’s not weird, let’s just grow with it. i still don’t totally know whether i’m ace or aro or bi, or whatever, but i’m trying to be okay with just... not knowing.

misora shuuji anyway, devils’ line isn’t actually a manga with a specific focus on sexuality and gender but shimanami tasogare is and all of the characters are written beautifully. if you haven’t read it yet... then why haven’t you read it yet? misora is only about twelve years old and watching them battle with their growing pains is really compelling - they’re closeted but, through the lounge, they have somewhere to explore their gender and all the questions they have about it. they’re amab and present as traditionally feminine wrt clothes, wigs, makeup, etc. but can’t quite tell if they see themselves as a girl, a boy or non-binary.

with the onset of puberty and anxieties about physical changes to their body, misora’s story puts a lot of emphasis on the pressure they face to just ‘make up their mind’ about something that’s actually incredibly complex and doesn’t have any easy answers. they snap and shout and get upset, especially when tasuku (the protag) tries to push them into a corner because he wants a concrete label or identity he can attach to misora, even though space is exactly what misora needs.

[stutterfly]

Ok so...

I have things to say - Good things! - About Love Bytes

I debated just reblogging and throwing my thoughts into the mess that are my tags but somehow this feels more appropriate, so forgive me for loading this off in your inbox.

First of all your writing is amazing and I love it and clearly I need to dive deeper into your masterlist later today, but I love the way you describe things and especially how you manage to give the reader/character so much depth without actually attributing any description. I often struggle with the y/n reader insert concept because I so enjoy getting lost in the fantasy world someone is creating, including the original characters that come with it, but you really pulled it off.

Second, and maybe most importantly and why I'm writing your right now is how soft I am for your Namjoon. Like... I usually am if you couldn't tell by my posts but this one is amazing, even putting aside the association with BTS-Namjoon. He's kind and sweet and caring and probably a little dumb and clumsy both physically and emotionally but that's ok and just emphasizes the sweetness. But most importantly, he is eternally respectful and knows how CONSENT AND CONDOMS work. Thank you for that!

I often get agitated by how these things play out, especially the contraception part, and I loved that not only did he 'agree' to using a condom but he actually brought it up and insisted when he caught a hint of non-consent. I know glossing over that part is so much easier to write because it can very easily break the moment (both in writing and real life I guess) but your dialogue with it was really cute and it still flowed well and so much more realistically to me.

We need more of this even just to advocate and make this *normal* and something everyone can feel is what they should be able to expect from a partner, so thank you. Again. I've been on the receiving end of a different reaction and even knowing you are fully within your rights it still sucks so bad in the moment and I hope this can be a little reassurance to anyone that this is the way things should be and empower them to speak up for themselves.

Lastly, maybe on a lighter note, I absolutely loved your IT references littered all over the story. They never failed to make me smile, always fitting but never too complicated for people with no IT background to grasp (I hope), and providing so much character to your... Well, character. Maybe I'm a little biased because of my own professional background, but I genuinely really enjoyed them.

Uh... Yeah. That was a lot of word vomit, I apologize. I just wanted to somehow articulate that I really really enjoyed reading it ❤️

OH WOW THANK YOU KDHFKJSDHFJKHK I kept rereading your ask because it was so delightful and it mad me feel really good :) I used to struggle writing Y/N centered fics honestly, 2nd person centered writing is definitely a switch in the brain I needed to get used to, so reading that you were able to immerse yourself in the world is so amazing to me I could cry! 😭

The condom part was important for me bc like I’ve been there. Like do I want him to nut like a billion different ways after fucking her raw? HELLL YEAH BJHGJHDKSHF 🤪🤪 But I controlled my thirst because Love Bytes wasn’t straight up porn all the time lmao, it was about the natural evolution of their friendship to relationship and about the softness and weirdness that comes with embracing that kind of affection. And I get stuck on details for days sometimes.

I was like heavy in thought about it like I bet he’s been agonizing over buying a tiny box of condoms for weeks. Because they’ve almost had things happen so he’s like well maybe I should get it in case because we could end up crossing a line and if we do, I should be prepared. But also, he’s soft AF and he’s pined for so long that he’s like okay don’t get crazy just bc you want it doesn’t mean she does. And he just keeps talking himself in and out of buying anything: picking up the box, bringing it to a self-checkout station, and then panicking and going to put it back because there’s no way he’ll need it. Thinking ‘oh fuck what if I’m unprepared and I miss my chance’, and ‘like that will ever happen’, ‘but WHAT IF.’ I’m sure someone was watching him do that like ‘wow is that guy ok. just buy it bro.’ I feel bad for giving them both anxiety spirals, but at least they can bond over it and have each others’ backs! 🥰

I’m sorry to hear that you’ve been on the other spectrum of that conversation. I’ve also been pressured in situations to forgo protection, and I know how shitty a feeling it is for someone to tell you how you must not trust or love them bc you wanna use protection. But. That’s BS! It’s really important to reinforce the view that using protection isn’t a bad thing. It’s super normal. Some people prefer always using a condom and there’s no shame in that! Some people like to build up a relationship before not using a condom for the first time too, and that’s how I see Y/N and Joon’s relationship. It comes with trust, time, and consent on both sides. In their case, things are so new. Like both of them knowing that birth control can never be 100% effective and going down the anxiety hole of “wow what if this sucks. what if this doesn’t work out. what if things are weird after this.” It totally makes sense for them! The IT references will be continued throughout the different stories!

ANYWAY NO APOLOGIES I LOVe YOUR WORD VOMIT I ANSWERED WITH  EQUAL WORD VOMIT 💜

[unfortunatelysirius]

NURSE LUPIN // REMUS LUPIN [MARAUDERS ERA]

「 ❁ 」PROMPT 「 ❁ 」

It’s a regular day of classes, and you’re sick. Remus is going to get you healed, one way or another!

「 ❁ 」AUTHOR’S NOTE 「 ❁ 」

Over two thousand followers? What the fuck? That’s crazy. Please accept this one-shot as a token of my gratitude, and get ready… FOR A STRING OF IMAGINES! Will Chocolate Frogs / Love Notes be updated? How about Not Your Girlfriend? Stay tuned and send me positive messages in my inbox pls! I feel like my writing is garbage and sometimes I really don’t know if I should continue troubling you all with my garbage :’)

        WHEN YOU CAME INTO BREAKFAST THAT MORNING, Remus Lupin knew something was wrong. Your face was pale, nearly white as a sheet, and Merlin, your eyes. Red and puffy, the space beneath them deeply purpled. The way you walked, all lethargic and clumsy, screamed I’m not feeling well. But when Remus asked…

       “Oh, I’m fine.” And it might have taken all your energy, but just for Remus, you put on your most dazzling smile. So bright and happy, it felt like the sun had finally come to graze the Earth, gleaming at him all ablaze. For half a moment, Remus believed you.

       But you didn’t eat your food. You didn’t join the banter, or attempt anymore smiles. You sat glumly, shoulders tucked inward. It was so bloody obvious, yet only to Remus, who knew all your ticks and mannerisms by heart. Just by watching you, he felt foolish for even momentarily thinking you were fine. That you didn’t need a visit to the Hospital Wing.

       You were lying. This whole I’m alright act was just a farce.

       Remus wanted to demand you go back to your dorm. Right in front of all your friends, ignoring the way you’d blush and fidget under their scrutiny. He didn’t like the way you kept coughing and sneezing, the way you looked a moment away from passing out. The redness in your nose, like all the red in your cheeks had been suctioned away, made it obvious to Remus that you had a cold, at the very least, but…

       But…

       There was a part, a very annoying part, of Remus that doubted. That was uncertain. Even after seeing it all for himself, he didn’t want to be suddenly, hopelessly wrong. He didn’t want to embarrass you all for nothing. This part, the part that made his Gryffindor pride squint in mortification, made Remus’s mouth stay shut.

       And the group of you sat and laughed and ate, all until it was time for Potions.

       On the walk there, you seemed fine. Your smile was less forced, and your legs functioned perfectly. You talked with Remus, telling him about the recent essay grade you got in History of Magic; boy, were you happy. Remus forgot all about his suspicions, caught in the way his heart swelled anytime he was around you.

       Then, the inevitable happened.

       When you and Remus reached the classroom and sat at your assigned seats beside one another, you fell into one of the longest, hardest coughing fits Remus had ever seen. It lasted several seconds, made everyone in the room twist and turn to see whoever it was that was hacking, and when it finally stopped, you looked even worse for the wear.

       Your face was sweaty and ashen. The redness in your nose was gone, replaced by a ghostly sheen. And Merlin, you had to feel miserable. The sorry attempt for a smile you sent Remus afterward, to assure him you were fine, would even make a goblin wince.

       “Y/N,” said Remus. His shoulder twitched, like he wanted to reach out a hand but rethought the action at the very last second—and all he could do was stare at you, anxious and worried. “Are you alright?”

       “I’m fine,” you croaked. “Something in the air, I guess.” A laugh bubbled out of your mouth. You obviously did it to convince Remus you were fine, thinking it would sound normal and not painful, but it did the opposite. Like your voice before, the laugh was nothing more than a croak, cracked with ripples and grated with gravel.

       Remus’s brows drooped, cinching into a frown that spanned his entire face. And your own smile fell.

       Why are you so set on lying? Remus wondered. This all made no visible sense to him; your actions were so unlike you. There’s nothing to be ashamed of in being sick.

       “Y/N, what—”

       Professor Slughorn walked out of his office, cutting off whatever it was that Remus was about to say. The man, a jolly smile beneath his whiskers, threw out an arm; he said, “We’ll be continuing our lesson on Draught of Peace. Take out your quills, make notes—there won’t be any brewing today!”

       The room came alive with the sounds of students taking out their supplies. Maybe the same should have been said for Remus, but he was too preoccupied with looking in your direction, watching for any sudden changes in your mannerisms. It occurred to him, then; how could he be an attentive student when all that mattered to him was the way you were slumped over the tabletop, sniffling with your eyes droopy?

       Trick question. He couldn’t.

       Remus raised his hand. Professor Slughorn was turned, talking to another student, and damn it! The man wasn’t paying attention to this side of the room. Remus grew frustrated, and he opened his mouth to verbalize said frustration—

       There was a loud screech, then a plopping sound as something hit the floor. Everyone flinched.

       “What was that?” said the professor, glancing from one innocent face to the next. While searching for a source he caught Remus’s high-flying hand. “Oh, Mr. Lupin—what did you need?”

       “Uh,” was all Remus could articulate. He glanced beside himself, wanting to get a good read on your face to know what amount of anger to expect later—but. Wait. Where did you go? Your seat was empty. “Y/N?”

       Then Remus saw it. At first he was confused, wondering where you’d gone, assuming the worst, all before he’d glanced down and he saw the start of a human body. Oh Merlin, thought the boy, feeling his heart stumble and sputter. His eyes flickered from your Y/H/C hair to your soft, pallid skin, trailing until he found your eyes. Those beautiful Y/E/C eyes, the very ones that he loved so much, weren’t open. They were closed.

       “Y/N L/N’s in the floor!” said Eric McLaggen. He hit Remus’s shoulder as he jet upwards, for a better angle, and damn if it didn’t take all of Remus’s will-power not to growl. “Is she dead?”

       Remus glared at him. How daft could one person be? “She’s not dead!” he snapped. His inner wolf wanted to bear its fangs, evoke visible fear from the idiot, but… Y/N needed medical attention, now. “Professor, she needs to be taken to Madam Pomfrey.”

       Professor Slughorn’s eyes were wide, like two eggs. He waved a hand. “O-Oh, of course,” said the man, looking relieved to have the problem immediately resolved. “The two of you are excused from today’s lessons, Mr. Lupin.”

       “Thank you,” said Remus quickly. And another screech echoed throughout the room, as he pushed out of his seat. He dropped to his knees beside you. A nimble hand went to your hair-part, tracing its way down your temple then to your jaw, stopping at your chin. His eyes were now on your lips. They were a shade paler than usual, like the moisture had been sucked out of them completely. And there wasn’t a proper term for how pale your face had gone. Pale as a ghost? Ashen like a witch? No. Nothing compared.

       Remus didn’t know the best way to pick you up. He was afraid he’d hit your head on the table, and then he’d have to wallow in self-pity for the rest of his sorry existence. She feels cold, thought Remus, as a hand went to cup the back of your head, another limb slithering around your backside. The rest of your body felt just as cold. What sort of ailment caused such a reaction—going hot, then cold? Going from red to white?  

       He shook his head. He helped your unconscious body up from the hard ground, ignoring the penetrating eyes of his classmates, their burning stares. They didn’t matter, not with you in his arms. Even as Slughorn watched from his position at his desk, as Eric McLaggen’s eyes drilled into the side of your slacken face, all Remus could think—all he could care about—was what Madam Pomfrey would say. What she’d diagnose you with. What she’d give you to help with the effects.

       And Remus left.

       -

       It was hours later, when the sky had turned the color of nightshade, that you awoke.

       You were confused. The room was alight with fluorescence, polka-dotted in different hues of white, brown, black, and blue, and beside you, a familiar sandy-haired bloke was slumped in a chair. This situation, it was strange. You couldn’t think of a reason for being here, unless you’d been knocked in the head by a Death Eater wannabe. Now that you thought about it, that didn’t seem so far from realistic…

       “Y/N?” groaned from the chair. You jumped.

       “Remus!” was your sorry excuse of a response. Like a squeak, really, and if the lights were dimmed, you surely could have been mistaken for a chipmunk. “I didn’t know you were awake.”  

       “You shouldn’t be awake.” Remus looked at you pointedly. He’d finally grasped consciousness, and the fatigue that normally plagued him had vanished. His concern for you made him more alert than usual. “Madam Pomfrey gave you something to help you sleep.”

       You smiled sheepishly. “Oops?” When his expression remained deadpan, void of any amusement, you dropped the smile. Now you could be interrogative without guilt. “What exactly happened? Why am I in the Hospital Wing?”

       “You don’t remember?” Remus looked surprised. “You were sick all morning before you fainted in Potions.”

       The memories rushed back rapidly, faster than you could count them. Regardless, that tiny sliver of information was enough to make you blush in embarrassment. It was shameful you tried to hide your sickness, especially when you ended up making the situation much bigger than being truthful ever would have.

       “I’m sorry,” you said. You didn’t even bother trying to keep the shame out of your voice. “I should have just come out and said I was sick… Merlin, how will I ever face Professor Slughorn? Or McLaggen?”

       Remus, almost unknowingly, put his hand over yours. Your heart went aflutter with nerves, and the worst part of it all was how utterly calm Remus looked. Did he know the effect he had on you? Judging by that smug (read: unreadable) look on his face, he totally did. “I’ll be there. You won’t be alone,” he told you.

       You hugged him. Nerves be damned, you hugged him! “You should be a nurse.” You giggled. Now that your ailment was miraculously (read, again: magically) cured, the rush of redness in your face could only be termed as a blush.

       “A—nurse?” Remus blushed—not that you could see it. “No…”

       “Nurse Lupin,” you said in a sing-song voice, squeezing him real tight. “Has a nice ring to it, huh?”

       “Sh-Shut up, Y/N!”

       Who wouldn’t want Remus Lupin as their designated medic?

[mikeshanlon]

iwwv anon and PHEW OK. I def did not expect that essay and now I feel bad cause I KNOW my thots r not gonna be articulate or right. nonetheless! i think Oliver does qualify as an unreliable narrator cause hes. very oblivious but not like... Richard papen (who is a whole ass clown don't get me started on tsh) but not like addy from dare me(I will support till the day I die that dare me is da like I WILL die on this hill) who sees what she wants to see. 1/?

i think he just... thinks that his friends r diff ppl than they actually r? that doesnt rly make sense but yea. what I mean is that everything the characters do is coated in that empathetic view Oliver has which is usually wrong? so we don't get an objective look into the characters. meredith is my girl like I love the hot popular girl trope deconstruction but at the end of the book she's not at a great place like she's w someone that doesn't love her like she needs to be loved... 2/

I guess the most probable ending is that James never meets Oliver again and that everyone is kinda stuck on what happened but that's soo sad and I really don't want to think abt it. ngl iwwv wasn't like my fave book ever and I really don't understand why people are so obsessed with dark academia sometimes but what i rly liked abt the book is that despite how fucked up everyone is and how toxic they r to each other they do at heart care abt one another...3/

like I rly liked that esp cause at that point the only other da book (other than dare me!) that I had read was tsh and godd every character is so fuckinh annoying and they all hate each other. i was super confused by it till I saw someone saying that it's satire and I felt my mind explode. I feel like this is so long but I didnt rly properly answer all you wrote sorry! I think its a pretty good book tho it has some crazy quotes like hold awn Im gonna look at the highlighted stuff on my copy.. 4/

Were you in love with him?” “Yes,” [...]Yes, I was.” It’s not the whole truth. The whole truth is, I’m in love with him still. LIKEEE PHEWW OK OK OK. WE OUT HERE. that line literally made me go crazy. I'm so sorry for any spelling mistakes or like general mistakes I made here English isn't my first language, it's 1am and I wrote this in the notes app w/o looking it over. so like.. NOT a professional review lemme tell you. 5/5

 Ahh im so sorry I did not see this before I yeeted for a month!!!

Oooh okay first of all dare me as a DA… I’ve only watched the show but like yeah I see the Elements for sure.

Also yeah I can understand what you mean abt Oliver being an unreliable narrator now… Ig my view of unreliable was more like they are purposefully twisting the truth or omitting facts or just literally don’t know shit but I get how personal bias can make the narrator unreliable. I do think the assertion that Oliver thinks his friends are different than they actually are makes sense. He sees James in a very positive light and though I like James a lot and think he is better than, like, Richard, he definitely has darker moments and manipulates Oliver at times (again I’d like to think it’s not the most nefarious thing in the world but like him just being shitty bc he’s in a dark place and he one, wants to do anything he can so Oliver doesn’t figure out he fought Richard so Oliver still thinks of him the same way/bc he knows Oliver would do something stupid like get himself arrested for James; and two, is very jealous that Oliver is with Meredith after Richard dies and has sort of a somewhat positive outcome from Richard’s death versus James being riddled with guilt and anger). And yeah, the probable ending is they never meet but I refuse to acknowledge that so LGNRG. Also that line makes me go CRAZZZZZZZZZZY!!! There are so many great lines, both using Shakespeare and on their own and its like okay give me a moment im going bonkers…

Personally, I haven’t read that many dark academia novels yet (bc for some reason i can barely finish a book rn sigh) but the concept interests me. I think what’s compelling is the setting/atmosphere of like ~mysterious college vibes~, and the idea of a sort of niche, obsessive bond and pursuit of knowledge with a tight knit group of friends (and the like inherent homoeroticism in every single DA elrngenrg). Like Dead Poet’s Society (the film I haven’t read the book) isn’t Dark in the same way most other dark academia is by like, obsession and death and manipulation (though of course there are dark elements with Neil’s storyline), but I think the other building blocks of academia are present there in a more wholesome way and you can see why people are drawn to that idea. As for the more Dark aspects I think it’s interesting to analyze things like group psyche, obsession, manipulation, etc, like what went wrong for everything to take such a dark turn???

 But, like everything else, it really has to be done well or else its just like okay….… I’ve tried to read TSH twice and I may try again but from the 100+ ish pages I read I totally get what you mean. IWWV is so interesting to me bc the characters are all very compelling and multifaceted and I like that they are a close friendship, we come in after 4 years of them spending all the time together and to me that is apparent. Like you said, we can see fissures and problems especially as the novel continues but there is care there between them. That also makes the decision to let Richard die much more interesting and sinister imo, as well as how all of them interact with each other after he dies, and how the roles of the group change without their “leader” so to speak. Also, maybe it’s just bc I like Shakespeare, but I think the academia part of IWWV is so much more accessible compared to TSH. Like I don’t know every Shakespeare play or anything so I didn’t understand every nuance or was like immediately like oh this is from Cymbeline or whatever the fuck, but you could understand the gist of things and it made sense that they spoke in Shakespeare lines bc that’s all they’ve been doing for four years and also theatre kids are Like That. Their pretention also provided any Layers to the story, like the parallels between the characters they play and their own arcs, how some of the lines echoed their own thots, foreshadowed, or they were able to say things through Shakespeare (I’m thinking of like, Oliver realized he loved James during Romeo and Juliet, the foreshadowing that James was going to ruin Richard’s life and that he dislikes Meredith/Richard when he quotes Mercutio at the start “A plague o’ both your houses”, the exchange Oliver and James had onstage and had that kiss during King Lear before Oliver was arrested,etc.) (Also I think the structure of some of the dialogue being formatted like a play really helped make it feel more realistic and immersive). Versus TSH which is just so pedantic and dense and hard to follow at times im like I get they are smart but what??? And maybe that’s part of the satire aspect (or maybe im dumb) but like donna I read TGF I know you are pretentious and info dump abt random obscure shit anyways so erglknerg. Like to me there was a Point to all of the academic Shakespeare stuff in IWWV and it was the soul of the book, and M.L. Rio made it very interesting—like the way that the directors reimagined the plays and had Julius Caesar be like a modern political play, the cool mirror shit in King Lear, the Macbeth and Romeo and Juliet performances where they did them at events and interacted with their environments (which were one of my favorite parts of the books bc I just think that concept is so interesting), etc. For TSH the shit they did literally just felt like “okay look at them they’re smart see you can’t even keep up!” like okay… I felt lost a lot and only like snapped into reality whenever Henry (?) was like oh… murder….. and even then I was like idk what this dude is saying but like he’s being darksided LMAO. And I also agree that it’s just like… Richard being thrown in the middle of this group could lend itself to some cool ideas but its hard to believe that he fits into the friendship group and hes just like hell yeah I love Greek so much and lets go kill this guy other than like okay ur gay and stupid and just want to impress Henry or whatever his name was (which he was but I digress). It’s just not as impactful to me as this close friend group falling apart. Ik TSH fans might be angry if they see this (and of course I haven’t finished the book so my perception may be warped but I also kno many ppl felt that way u did) bc I’ve seen ppl say IWWV is just like TSH but “lackluster” or whatever and while I can see some parallels (mostly b/w Richard and Henry and Alexander and Francis), I really think M.L. Rio expanded upon common DA tropes and the interesting parts of TSH but made it her own and interesting and oh yeah there are actually multiple compelling female characters and LGBT characters (and no incest)!!!

[rruno-blog]

12 tips to sell real estate for the first time

Give your customers the tools to handle the buying and selling process before starting

For those who sell their home for the first time, the process can generate many doubts. Whether your clients sell their property at will or because blue group of companies they change cities , the decision to leave your current home can be filled with fears or false ideas about the process. And although most of the media talk or write about how to buy a house, it is also necessary to talk about how to sell a house for the first time.

Will people be able to see the house whenever they want? How long should a visit last ? What to do when someone makes an offer? And how soon will I have to move? In addition to the most common real estate sales tips, here are 12 tips for selling a home for the first time.

Do it yourself, or not

At the time we live, we can find tips for real estate sales and almost anything, online. From how to decorate our house, remodel it or cook gourmet dishes. With the proliferation of online content , sellers may feel inclined to sell their home on their own.

But selling your home is not as easy as following a YouTube tutorial . First-time sellers don't know what they don't know. And a little information without the right context, can be risky. Putting up the possession in which you have invested the most money could make you lose money and also make very expensive mistakes, not to mention your own safety as well.

There are some things that are best left to professionals, such as legal matters, medical problems and selling your home.

Inform

This is where working with a real estate agent becomes invaluable. To be more comfortable with the sale process, sellers must have a complete perspective of the market situation and how similar properties are being sold, so they will have more realistic expectations about the place of their home in the market. It is also important that they understand what they are competing in terms of re-sales and new construction or real estate projects.

Know the costs

Just like when they bought your home, sellers will have to incur costs related to the sale. A real estate consultant like you can give them tips to sell real estate, explain better and review all the costs that will be deducted from the sale price, which is always specific to each property, according to their legal status and conditions. However, it is better to familiarize yourself with all these costs before, and not when you receive an offer and you have to make decisions.

Make a plan

Ask the sellers: Do they know where they will move when their house is sold? Have you spent time considering your options? Will they need to rent until they find something, or are there many options for them to buy a new house? Understanding the options they have available will help them avoid hasty decisions when they receive an offer.

Put it on display

Selling a house is a process of putting your house in view of everyone. Announcing your property on the internet, in essence, you are giving access to your “virtual” door to the general public 24 hours a day.

The first visits, now, happen online. And the second happens in person. Now more than ever, there are tips to buy and sell real estate online, as well as information about a property, to which buyers and their agents can access

Thanks to Google it is now easy to know how the house looks from the street, and from above. What is behind, what is on the sides and in many cases information about when the property was purchased, the taxes paid, etc.

Remember that it is not personal, it is a business

Personal visits are coordinated between agents, and confirmed by vendors according to agreed times. The reality is that buyers and their agents will want to attend according to their schedules, so visits should be accommodated as well as possible, even last-minute visits, which can become frequent.

The more difficult it is to schedule a visit, the less a real estate agent will want to show it. Although the process works well most of the time, there may be seasons without visits or with many cancellations, sometimes just before the visits happen.

Although this is frustrating, it happens to many vendors, and it is just one of those things that are unfortunately part of the process.

How many visits do you need to sell the house?

Regardless of the tips to sell real estate that you read, the truth is that there is no magic or minimum number of visits needed, to sell a house or receive an offer. It can vary a lot and in many cases they can be few, in some others they can reach 10 or 20, or more. Much of this will depend on the price of the property and what it offers in relation to the competition. If you compete with many other options, it could take more visits before any buyer makes an offer.

The tastes are relative

No one will see the property with the same eyes as your clients. No matter how much they have invested to fix it, prepare it for sale and make it look good. Buyers always see the properties from a different glass.

What one person likes, another does not like. And the feedback of some visits will make more sense to your clients, than others, because not everyone knows how to articulate well what they like and what they prefer. They often don't know exactly what they want in a house, until they see it.

One of the best tips to sell real estate that your customers may know, is not to take the comments of potential buyers personally. Many will be focused on things that can be changed, such as the price or how the house looks, but it is important not to conflict with a potential client because of personal appreciations.

Feedback about the location, the colony, the facade, are things you can't really change. Buyers choose based on comparisons, a buyer can visit the house today and discard it, but see it again in two months and decide that "it is the one." Buyers are often as confused and nervous as sellers.

Greed can be counterproductive

No matter how many visits a property has, it is easy for so much activity to come to your customers' head and think that it will mean that they will receive many offers . But buyers and their agents have all information on sales of similar properties, and your customers will find that all offers are within a similar range.

Everyone is buying and selling with a budget in mind, your customers should not think that buyers are going to be irrational and overpay just because, so they should consider keeping the price of the property in an acceptable range.

Offers

Speaking of offers, when sellers receive one, they should try to work with it as well as they can. It is not the time to play hard, because buyers are easy to scare. An important tip for real estate sales is that they take the time to respond, instead of making a counter offer that insulates the buyer. Becoming difficult and inflexible is a way in which, surely, things will go wrong . Sometimes the phrase "your first offer is your best offer" turns out to be true.

Repairs

If your customers still do not make all the repairs they know they have to do, problems and costs will arise sooner or later in an appraisal, or an inspection by buyers. It is a good idea to simply take care of all the things that you know need maintenance and attention, before entering the market. If there are things that cannot be resolved, it is necessary that they speak directly with the buyers.

Cleaning

When sellers leave the property, they will have to dispose of all undesirable objects, including trash, before the new owner moves out. This may be something excusable for an ex-owner who will never return, but as an agent University town Islamabad  it is important that you take care of your reputation by leaving the house in a habitable state for the clients of your counterpart. The reality is that your clients probably don't have the time, so consider hiring someone to do a professional cleaning.

[smol-scully]

dark grace and frankie (aka dead to me) thoughts

which i will tuck behind a read more for anyone who is avoiding spoilers. this sucker’s gonna cover the whole season so settle in. 

SO SO MUCH can be said about this show on the macro and the micro levels.

we’re all head over heels for the “what” of the story-- realistic depictions of grief!!!! female friendships!!! murky morality!! -- and I’ve seen a lot of love in posts for it so i won’t go into that much. (even though, again, the pilot has such a strange and wonderful queer energy / intimacy, one that resurfaces later especially while Judy may be pregnant, and i am torn between loving this as a gorgeous depiction of female friendship and shipping the hell out of these two disasters. but i don’t have the braincells for that right now.) 

but as much as the “what” is so fucking compelling, I’m finding myself especially gobsmacked by the “how” of this story.

the methods of storytelling, the attention to detail has literally left me bowled over. and there are still details I haven’t been able to figure out; be it what they mean as a symbol, or where they land in the grand scheme of the story. but I see them and I know they were meaningful choices, and I can’t help but be in awe.

1- costuming thing: stripes. in every episode, judy wears stripes — horizontal stripes — at some point. more than most people tend to own in their wardrobe. does it mean anything? maybe not. it’s probably just a style move to have her style be distinct from jen’s, a little more vibrant, a little more carefree. but could it be a nod to the old school striped prison jumpsuits? maybe.

2. story telling thing: everyone’s a liar! we haven’t had a single reliable narrator. which is amazing and reflective of life, but so cool to see reflected to the degree of real life in a story. obviously lying is a huge part of the plot, but it feels like the characters lie outside of the major plot driven ones. 

a. Judy. such an obvious character to note as being unreliable but the most brilliant piece of show writing/story telling for me was Judy’s first scene. Jen warns her off of the coffee, and Judy looks at her with her big sad eyes and says “I made it,” and confesses to the joke after Jen squirms for a second. The first thing she ever says is 1- a lie 2- to break the ice with Jen / make her laugh (!!!!!!!!!). it’s the perfect foreshadowing. we’ve been warned!!!!!! 

b. Jen!!!! obvious example is a lie that we’re in on, or at least let in on pretty easily -- jen tells nick, “ted hates running shoes; he always ran in vans.” no way in hell was a guy who ran in 5ks and 10ks for charity running in skate shoes. (and then this lie is revealed quickly thereafter in that episode.) but the next one, really did throw me, because it felt like a lie we weren’t in on. a lie jen told to us, rather than to another character. it’s in the middle of a TON of shit hitting the fan, but the gun????? charlie wants it, but “oh it’s in your dad’s safe, but I don’t even know the combination.” and maybe it’s because the [chekov’s] revolver doesn’t come around until a couple episodes later, but Judy tells her the truth and she immediately goes for that safe, and starts keeping that gun on her. I knew the gun would come back up, but the knowledge that she was going to be choosing for it to reappear really threw me. Jen’s our main character, and the majority of the plot centers around her being lied to -- but here we get the knowledge that she’s keeping things from us as well. wow. just so impactful. we cannot trust a single bitch. (and i love it) 

c. oh holy shit back to judy -- the follow up that the flashback to her in the hospital was actually her in the hospital after the miscarriage was BRILLIANT on so many levels. especially as a way to make our relationship with her more complex. first of all i got so incredibly sympathetic. FIVE miscarriages? how utterly overwhelming. secondly, it develops judy’s character in two amazing ways. one that acts as foreshadowing, and one that’s just heartbreaking-- 1- she is so bad at being bad, and this sucker (that she killed ted) is gonna bust wide open. why? she sought jen out at this grief group, and faked that her fiance was dead, when she could have instead used the grief over her VERY REAL miscarriages. she added another layer of lying and deceit and jeopardized the whole ordeal early. but if I had to guess, and here comes the  heartbreaking part-- 2- she’s put herself down and been put down so much throughout her relationship with steve and probably because of the accident as well, that she literally just didn’t consider her miscarriages as a valid and real loss to grieve about. 

3. LOVE abe piecing together that Judy did it, AND that he forgave her for it. it was so fucking compelling to see that sweet, kind old man decide that he didn’t care that judy committed manslaughter. such a strange morally gray thing that i wasn’t expecting to see. 

4. the dialogue!!!!!!!!! i fucking LOVE the dialogue in this show. it does such a great job of bringing us above the tempestuous waves of the drama -- and trauma -- buoying us for some laughs amidst the chaos. I also specifically love how natural it feels -- every funny line isn’t necessarily a perfectly articulated joke (the way that many multicam sitcoms get) but rather something you’re laughing at because you could have said it. charlie: bet you didn’t know you let a stalker come and live with us. jen: well, actually i did, so ... (charlie leaves) fuck!!!!! // like what a funny moment that also feels like how i’d react to the fucking chaos. we’re literally just scrambling to fucking hold it together. also i love the amount of profanity, it feels true to the degree of absolute calamity. there’s more to be said about why the dialogue feels so real and good but i just can’t put my finger on it in this moment. 

5. the music!!!! i love the opening credits, there’s some beautiful symbolism behind the letters being the only ‘see through’ part, about how we’re only viewing part of the story / everything is obscured currently. but i also love the balance of music in the show. the [creepy music](?) i think as netflix close captioned it, which is usually behind the credits, contrasted with the peggy lee tunes of the 40′s and 50′s, and then some girl rock at various points too... it’s such a strong factor in how the ambience of the show pivots and changes so thoroughly. at some points we’re just straight up watching grace and frankie (just gals bein pals), sometimes we’re watching bad moms (we smash a cake! we smash a car!!!!!), and sometimes we’re watching big little lies or gone girl (flash backs! dramatic tension!) it’s actually kind of disorienting and surreal but i’ve absolutely loved every minute of it. it felt like three movies wrapped into one. I think i dissociated a little. I literally cannot wait for season 2. 

6. okay fine on the topic of jen/judy i literally cannot believe how softly and tenderly they looked at each other on the bed in the studio when they were waiting for the pregnancy test results, and the forehead touch, and the “we’ll be a three child mothering team” i am *clenches fist* so full of emotion 

[sheusedtobesassier]

Day 10,158

Mm, it’s the final evening of the year and I think this may turn out to be a particularly sad one. New Year’s Eve is my favorite holiday, you know? Well maybe you don’t know actually. I cannot help but love the mix of being wildly sentimental and anxious/hopeful, feeling extra aware of the year that has gone and the anticipation of what could happen in the one beginning. Glitter and tiny dresses and sparkling grape juice and a big countdown chant and Midnight Kisses and feeling included in something huge almost the whole world is celebrating. Mm and it’s really such a soft celebration with no required fuss. You just gather with anybody you want to gather with and together enjoy the annual grand finale of the years passing by. It’s meaningful and meaningless, lol. A simple and sweet thing that can also be very sparkly. We do it over and over and over and over our whole lives long. Young and old. Mm. How could I resist?

Tonight’s will be sad but that’s okay. That’s another reason I’m fond of this one. It doesn’t deny sadness. It doesn’t expect or demand the way other holidays on the calendar do. It leaves room for being lonely and solemn, for regrets and grief. Mm and tonight I will get very comfortable in that space. I will wallow a little, not too deep, but far enough in that I can write honestly, get some of it out of me so it can be read in nice straight lines, in a way that’ll feel less chaotic, less tangled up. I decided I would let me do it tonight for two reasons. First, because of the magical way NYE makes me feel which I’ve already described to you. Second, because this morning I woke up from a painfully vivid dream that was so convincing it somehow dislodged whatever has been preventing me from being able to articulate these things. I let dreams get to me, maybe more than other people do and this one did the trick. I’ll tell you about it and I’ll tell you about two other ones that might help you understand even better.

There was a pile of us. Maybe eight or ten people sprawled all around on a white couch. The room we were in was white on white on white and one of the walls was just giant windows, like as if we were in a skyscraper. Everybody was wearing jewel tones and color blocking. There wasn’t anybody specific there, but there was the sense they were our friends and we were all getting snug for the sake of a group photo that was going to be taken. Cuddling in and little laughing at one another, you know what it’s like. Omar was further away than I thought he should be so I kind of tugged him in closer when I realized he was miserable crying. Like red eyes, in tears but clearly had been trying to keep it low key. I asked what was wrong and he didn’t want to say. Others noticed and it got quiet. Mm, I can’t quite remember this part but like, I started to get upset and said that we could go if he wanted to go. Ally was suddenly there and was saying she could give us a ride and buy him a ticket? I was angry and Omar was quietly resisting saying, “It’s fine. Let’s stay. You’re gonna be mad.” or something along those lines. I growl snapped back loud enough for everyone to hear. “No, I’ll be fine, because I actually have some control over how I feel!” I was so furious though. I do not remember anything past that.

Towards the beginning of the summer Omar came to camp, he was serving breakfast and I came through the line. He stopped me before I walked out and told me he’d had a nightmare about me the night before. We weren’t really buddies yet, so the comment caught me off guard, his admission in this public space that he dreamed about me. A very sudden intimacy. He said that in the dream I’d been extremely angry and refused to talk to him, how he kept begging me to tell him what was wrong or what he had done and I wouldn’t even look at him. While he told me he seemed so earnest, like it had really bothered him. I laughed and started walking away. I think I tried to say something charming about wondering what he could have possibly done. He stood there shaking his head and shrugging his shoulders, looking concerned.

One of the first times Omar went home after we knew we were into each other, I had one of the wildest/most specific dreams ever. It began with just me standing in the foyer of the Platteville church. I knew I was at a wedding. As I walked into the empty sanctuary I realized it was my own wedding. I promptly started to panic and, in the dream, had this feeling of like, “Wait? How did this happen so quickly? I don’t remember planning this or even deciding to do this? How do I stop this?” I went through a doorway which in real life leads into a very short hallway, but instead it was a large room full of all the women on both sides of our families. My mom and my aunts and a whole heck of a lot of Hispanic women I do not know. I got this sense that all these women had put the wedding together, not me, and that I needed to clear things up now because otherwise I was going to be stuck with a wedding I had nothing to do with. So I started explaining and trying to convince them I didn’t want it to be like that. Saying I was so grateful but this was not at all what I had imagined. I honestly do not remember the speech but do remember feeling like it wasn’t clicking. They were misunderstanding. I felt like I was freaking these people out AND like I was possibly still going to get bulldozed into this anyways. The women (both the white ladies and the Mexican ladies) were all yelling at each other, not ugly fighting, really just trying to organize a wedding. So I went over to a corner where (hahaha this is just accurate okay) Mama Coco was silently sitting in her wheelchair. Like, the animated great grandmother from Coco, more realistic looking but still very much that sweet old lady. I sat down in her lap and watched the discussion carry on without me, feeling like a child. Sat there tracing and picking at the beaded details on my wedding gown’s skirt while the women shouted. I looked up and discovered that from where we were sitting, I could see out onto the stage of the church. Omar and the pastor (I don’t know who the pastor was) were standing there in their suits chatting, looked like they were kidding around and having a nice time. I remember feeling just the BIGGEST sense of relief and thinking, “Omar won’t care that I don’t want to marry him today. Everybody else is gonna be upset at me, but he’s gonna be so nice to me about it.”

Three dreams that would be doozies for almost anybody but wham bam, y’all, lol, for a girl like me these seem an awful lot like prophecies. Oof. Can you see it in there? All the significance? Holy shmoly. It hits and then you get back up and then it hits again. Yikes.

Look. I want things from Omar that he could give me, but when he had to make that decision he chose not to. What I want does not seem like too much to me, but it is more than he is willing to give me. That which he did give me (he is still giving some) he gave soooo sincerely. He gives in the most honest way, which turns out is the only way I can receive anything. And so I’m soooo thankful for what he’s given, but it is not enough. He tried and he still tries and I am heavy with gratitude for the effort he made because I know it wasn’t easy, But It Is Not Enough. I wish it was, but deep down I know it isn’t.

I can remember a night we filled up my whole apartment with an explosion of tension that had gone unspoken. I lost my temper and began angrily expressing how painful it was to feel such deep uncertainty about us staying together. He calmly refuted parts of my attack, but I think was pretty disturbed by my escalating rage. He wasn’t leaving no matter how harsh I got. At one point I coldly told him there was no reason for him to stay and he stayed anyways. After what felt like hours, we were sitting far across the room from each other and I was staring at him waiting for him to finally fucking say something useful. I was so furious and he was so silent. I had stubbornly backed into my corner and decided I wasn’t going to come out of it until he gave me a reason to. He looked helpless. Staring at the floor. Every once in a while he would seem like he had something to say but then nothing would come out. I don’t know how long it took, but my heart softened. I realized I’d been cruel and took notice of how resilient he was being, so I crossed the room to be gentle with him, hoping that it would help him speak. He started crying which I could not have anticipated. I rubbed his back and kept prompting him, softly asking “What?” and “Tell me.” Finally, he choked something like this out. “I’m trying. I’m trying to sit here right now and just choose to be here and give you what you want. I’m trying to make the decision, to tell you I can give you what you’re asking for. But I can’t do it. I can’t make me do it. I’m sorry.” He said it so strained, so in pain. I tried to be comforting and made a few small speeches about how I never wanted him to force himself and I didn’t expect him to make the final decision that night and how even if he wanted to he probably couldn’t because life is so different than what we decide it should be. I apologized for the horrible things I’d said earlier. We both became more rational and began to have a reasonable discussion. We calmed each other down. We snuggled in. The anger and confusion passed so we could get so so close again.***

He tried so damn hard to be my someone. He was my someone for as long as he could be, before the whole rest of it became too unbearable for him. During the last real conversation we had about what him leaving would look like, he told me, “We’ve said all along that if you are the only reason I’m here then I shouldn’t be here.” And he’s right. We did say that. Fuck, I’m the one that said that first. I should have told him that no longer applied though. I should have stopped him and said, “Yeah but that was before we were in love. It’s all different now that we’re in love.” I didn’t say that though. I don’t think I said anything because I think he was still talking and it’s rude to interrupt. I didn’t think about how it’s all different until way later, until after he had already left. If I’d thought about it sooner than that, maybe we could have had another conversation, a better Last Real Conversation with an alternate ending, a better ending. But. I didn’t think about it sooner. We can’t really have a conversation about what him leaving would look like when he’s already left.

One of the most startling parts of breaking up has been being unable to escape the INCREDIBLY PERVASIVE MESSAGE that like, hm, how to put it, the message that IF YOU LOVE SOMEBODY NOTHING ELSE MATTERS. Lol. Yeah that’s how to put it. That if you love somebody and they love you too than that it is the Purest, the Goodest, the Highest Endeavor in the known universe (hell in the unknown universe too). That love is STRONG AS FUCK and will make it through EVERY BAD THING. You cannot get rid of love even if you try. Love never ever gives up, no way, it won’t do it, just lasts and lasts. Oh and the relentless warning that if you give up on love then that is the Biggest Mistake Of Your Life. Like. Whew. Y’all. Look. Frankly, the widespread love gospel is working on me. I am not giving into my fearfulness that tells me to protect myself from him now that we’ve broken up. I do believe I should still keep my heart open to Omar and I do not fight the frequent urges to hold onto what’s left of us. I softly reach out. I don’t let the fire flicker out. (Wow. Damn. Getting campfires going together was kind of one of our things actually.) But if it turns out I’m being told a big fancy romantic lie that prevents me from participating in some reasonable big girl independent healing process that I should be seeking out, THAT’S PRETTY BOGUS OF Y’ALL. If I sort out that I need to fall out of love, will I be able to do so without being consumed by the worry that I’m turning off all the lights in my heart and might not ever be able to turn them back on again?

I need to talk to more people who loved somebody who loved them too and they didn’t pick each other forever and it didn’t ruin their lives. Because. I mean I’m not talking to anybody who’s life was actually ruined because of something like that. No, I’m talking to deeply married people who seem to believe that if they hadn’t married each other it would have ruined their lives. (Now I say this with a heart full of appreciation for the married people who have been attempting to take care of me by using the context of their love stories to provide advice regarding mine. Bunch of sweet baby angels. Thankful.) The overwhelming narrative, at least within my realm, is that I have lost something I should try to get back. That’s what it seems like to me at least. I’ll confess, maybe that’s what my own heart is drawn to so I’m perceiving it more than it’s actually out there. Maybe.

Either way though, the current strongest pulls I feel are to continue to amuse him and to secretly long for us to get back together. There are of course other pulls, to pour myself entirely into ministry, to push him away a little and see if he will fight for me, to cut him out completely and focus on healing, to flirt with the creeps on Tinder and Bumble, to tell my friends either the most hopeful version or the weepy saddest version or angry accusation version of how the last two years went, to disappear into my bed as frequently as possible and not let any part of anything touch me, to write him paragraphs every morning admitting everything, to squash the whole thing, to completely succumb to the horrible ways heartbreak feels and allow the loss to fuck up my life completely. And those are just what’s pulling at me tonight, lol. There are dozens of pulls to this. Hundreds. So many that it rips me up and won’t let me listen to music because none of it means anything to me and won’t let me eat or sleep (seriously, my appetite has dried up and this has pulverized my god given talent for being asleep) and has me googling words like “anesthetize” so I can accurately describe that which I currently crave. Yeah it’s fucked with my vocabulary.

Mm, today though. Today I couldn’t help but notice how much easier it is for me to be kind. I think I lost that with Omar for a while. Inadvertently. He’s so cool and so particular. I think I mimicked that some, toned down my enthusiasm or maybe more so I directed it mostly towards him. I think every kitchen shift was for flirting with him, whispering around corners and knocking into each other. Every afternoon break was for kissing or taking a nap together which of course turned into kissing. I’ve been a starry eyed girl for years, but I think I let him become the whole moon and forgot about the stars in everybody else’s eyes too. I can see them again and they can see mine. It’s nice to look at the stars again. Beautiful sight.

I miss how the sky mattered to him. The colors or the way the light would pass through trees. Oh it would thrill him. He’d call me up and tell me to come see. We’d both shriek on sunset drives. Cheering the spectacle on. Mm, we were the same in that. It mattered to him like it matters to me. We were suckers for the ways we reminded each other of ourselves. Reflection. It wasn’t even imitation. We were both so true, dammit. We had carefully cultivated who we were and what we cared about. I think we recognized that in each other. Mm. God, I love him and I miss him in a hungry way.

I wish I had been a good enough reason to stay, even if I was the only reason and it was stupid and it ended up being a huge mistake. I wish I had been. I was good enough until I wasn’t.

God, I miss him.

“Are you being fearful or loving?”

***Last minute addition. Thinking about how some might read that part and think, “Wait so why didn’t you just break up then? He couldn’t give you what you wanted.” I get how that could be your takeaway. It wasn’t mine. Nah. From then on, I felt like Omar truly wanted to give me what I wanted, but that he wasn’t going to do that until he was sure that it was the right thing. So. That’s the sincerity I mentioned. I love that Omar really really means the things he says and the things he does. He’s not interested in faking anything. I knew that I was waiting around for him to decide to be with me and stay OR to break up with me and go. And I was okay with that waiting, okay with either outcome, because I believed whatever he decided he’d do with resolution. His head AND his heart would be involved, two things I trusted more than almost anything. I didn’t trust them to automatically choose me. I trusted that they would get him to do what he thoroughly believed was right. Mm. So. That’s what hurts. That his head AND his heart told him the right thing was something other than the two of us together. (My own head and heart told me otherwise and I trust them a heck of a lot too, so the three of us are having a tough time.)

[hollys-eve]

Holly-Eve Knights

@murderclubhq

NAME.

FULL NAME: Holly-Eve Knights PREFERRED NAME/NICKNAMES: Holly-Eve, Holly GENERALLY REFERRED TO AS: Holly, Sometimes her mother Maggie calls her Evie

APPEARANCE.

FACECLAIM: Abigail Cowen SEX: Female HEIGHT: 5′10 WEIGHT: 150 lbs. BUILD: Reedy, but hidden muscles from carrying the weight of the newspaper on her shoulders. HAIR: Red and naturally wavy. Is too lazy to straighten it so she’s just got long loose curls. Long, down to the small of her back. The kind of hair that when you roll down the windows actively attempts to suffocate you but she doesn’t want to cut it or pull it into a ponytail. So it’s either braided, in a bun, or down. Mostly down. HANDS: Delicate hands, but long fingers, like she should have been a piano player. Callouses on her fingers from years of playing by herself outside and going ghost hunting with her parents. SCARS: A small scar across her eyebrow. She doesn’t know how she got it, but her parents say it happened while she was living at one of the Florida orphanages. CLOTHES: Tennis shoes and converse, clothes that are comfortable, hoodies to sink into, and like 800 bracelets. If it’s oversized, she’ll wear it with no pants, or shorts that look like no pants. Lots hats and sunglasses. Bracelets and hair ties all the way up both of her arms. A few of them were made by her parents, a few are ones she has collected from various little shops. Likes loose and comfortable button ups during the summer. If the situation does not force her to wear shoes, she is not wearing them. OTHER FEATURES: Wouldn’t call them uncommon but she’s covered in freckles. Plus she has a birthmark on her back called a stork bite.

SPEECH.

ACCENT: Barely there Southern/Carolina, only noticeable in certain words. LANGUAGE: English, some latin from books that her parents having laying around, but not fluent. More so can pick up certain words. ARTICULATION: Being a journalist she is extremely articulate and good at explaining her points.  EDUCATION: Prefers direct language, but is at least vaguely aware of internet culture and uses memes. When texting refuses to use things like “u” or “ur” and will correct other people’s grammar and spelling. Has two extremely educated parents and it shows in her speech. LAUGHTER: Does not laugh often, mostly because she’s never had a reason to laugh, and is cautious of people. Her laugh is almost silent. BREATHING: Sighs. So much. All the time. When frustrated, confused, unsure of what to do with her breath she just lets it out in a sigh.

MANNERISMS.

FACE: Has very expressive facial features and an absolutely terrible poker face. Unfortunately blessed with Resting Bitch Face. HANDS: Does not usually talk with her hands, keeps them close by her unless she is really trying to make a point.  EMOTIONAL OUTBURSTS: Tends to be a bit emotionally reserved unless under extreme circumstances. Sleep deprivation makes her more likely to snip at people, and alcohol makes her extremely honest and affectionate. As a baseline she’s very good at hiding complex emotions. HABITS: Crackles her joints. Specifically her knuckles and her back. POSTURE: Posture depends on the mood. The more tired she gets, the less she holds her posture upright. PERSONAL SPACE: Has a very important personal space bubble, and likes to give people their space. Only breaks it when it feels appropriate. She isn’t used to having people in her space but if she trusts the person she doesn’t hate it.

HEALTH:

DIET: Both her parents like to try to eat extraordinarily healthy. They grow plants on their balcony. But they free range eat with no set meals so often Holly will either forget to eat or she will eat at Marie’s. Eats the leftover pastries at All Ground Up. SLEEP: Has not been sleeping well lately at all. Even before the nightmares started up she didn’t sleep very well, but now it’s gotten worse. The usual is 2 hours of sleep a night if she is lucky. EXERCISE: Spends most of her life slumped over the table typing but walks around on her feet during work. Is carrying Edwina around considered exercise? Because if so, she lifts. ACTIVITY: When she becomes dedicated to something she will exhaust herself doing it. CLEANLINESS: Showers every other day, keeps herself well groomed, and likes to have her life organized and put together. Most of the things in her desk are filed to a particular order even if that order makes no sense to anyone else. ODOR: Always kind of smells like essential oils because that’s what her house smells like. Specifically peppermint. MEDICINAL DRUGS: Attempted to take melatonin to help the sleep and nightmares but it is not doing much. ADDICTIONS: Caffeine ILLNESS: Insomnia, Night Terrors, Anxiety. Allergic to roses and some other flowers. INJURIES: The scar on her eyebrow hurts occasionally, but not much.

PERSONAL.

INTROVERT/EXTROVERT?: Introvert. She doesn’t mind having a voice in being in charge of the room, but she values her quiet independent time. She needs it to recharge. OPTIMIST/PESSIMIST: Realist, practical, assumes what’s going to happen is the most likely scenario that is going to happen and tries to look at it that way. GENDER: Female. Gender identity matches sex. SEXUALITY: ??? Possible Demisexual or somewhere on the ace spectrum. Holly views her sexuality as a bunch of question marks. It’s difficult for her to develop attraction for someone simply because she’s has a difficult time letting her guard down. ROMANTIC: Biromantic. See above in reference to difficulty letting her guard down enough to let people in. Would not mind a little bit of romance but much prefer something quiet, genuine, doesn’t even need to be public. There has to be wit and intelligence there. MEMORY: Has a memory like a steal trap. If she focuses on something she’s able to remember it relatively well. PLANNING: Probably plans too much about everything. There has to be a good throughout plan or she doesn’t want to follow through with anything. Extremely organized. INTUITION: Likes to think of herself as a sleuth when it comes to mysteries but can be rather ignorant when the truth does not meet her expectations. PROBLEM SOLVING: Loves puzzles and mysteries and uncovering the truth. Can become too focused on a problem when she thinks there is one to be solved. GOALS: To get out of Normal. Holly wants to find a way to leave this place and escape to a situation where no one knows who she is and she has the chance of starting over. Another goal would be to find a place where she feels like she fits in. INSECURITIES: Insecure about a lot, despite how much she hides. She’s always felt incredibly lonely her entire life, alienated, so she’s insecure about her place, especially amongst the murder club. Her writing (the poetry, not her journalism) she is insecure about as well because it is something that matters to her. ACHIEVEMENTS: Her newspaper. Every issues fills her with pride even if not everyone respects what they read. Won a lot of science fairs as a middle and grade schooler because of her parents. ANXIETY: So, so much. Her night terrors/dreams, the relationship she has with her parents, opening up and feeling human connection. SELF-HELP: Has seen a doctor for nightmares but the melatonin is not helping. COMFORTS: Warm blankets, fires, hot tea or hot coffee. Feeling warm and safe. And her stuffed dog Max which she tends to keep hidden from most people out of embarrassment. BAD HABITS: Drinking all the energy drinks and coffee she can, chewing on her pencils, erasures, and pens. PHILOSOPHY: Atheist, but understands the importance of religion in providing comfort to people, however she doesn’t think there is any proof of the existence of a God. TRIGGERS: Tight spaces. Neither of her parents ever explained why, but being in claustrophobic environments can cause her to panic. It likely has something to do with trauma she experienced growing up in the orphanages before she was adopted. She also can’t be crowded by too many things or people.

THE PAST.

PARENTS/GUARDIANS: Has no idea who her birth mother is, or where she was from, other than the fact that she was a young mother who felt she would be unable to raise a child appropriately. She was adopted by Maggie and Lizzie and taken to Normal when she was 3 years old. Holly loves both of her parents immensely and is fiercely protective of them, but ever since she became more skeptical of their beliefs their relationship has been somewhat strained. They are free range parents and there has never been much structure or rules in their household. In a lot of ways she raised herself. Lizzie is stricter than Maggie is but they both still don’t set rules like curfew. LIFE EVENTS: Once gave Norman Normal a love poem in Middle School and he read it in front of all of his friends. She was mortified and hasn’t really had a “crush” on anyone since then, at least not one she’s acknowledged. Growing up and having no friends also shaped her life because she doesn’t really know how to interact with people she wants to be affectionate towards. She also vividly remembers going hunting for ghosts in an old abandoned house with her parents. Maggie gave her the flashlight and told her to count how many times she saw flickers of light, because those were ghosts saying hello. WORST DAY OF THEIR LIFE: The day she realized the nightmares weren’t going away. They make her sick and scared and on edge, so nervous she sometimes lashes out. Realizing that there was no way to cure these and they would be happening for a long time to come crushed her. BEST DAY OF THEIR LIFE: The day the murder club showed up and started getting in her hair. Her first memory of walking into Marie’s with her moms and them telling her she could have whatever she wanted. She wasn’t used to that so she got three milkshakes and didn’t even finish one of them, got carried home and tucked into a bed that was hers and fell asleep around a brand new stuffed animal (Max). LOOKING BACK: Holly isn’t sure she would want to do anything different, because she feels like nothing in her life has ever been in her control. She didn’t get to choose to be given up at birth, or who she was adopted by. She feels like she’s never been in charge of her life.

RELATIONSHIPS.

FAMILY: Holly’s only family she knows are her moms. They are not particularly close with either of their parents. Maggie’s parents are both dead and Lizzie has a strained relationship she doesn’t discuss after they attempted to put her in conversion therapy growing up. She loves her moms, and they love her, but the more skeptic Holly has become the more strained that relationship is. More and more there’s a disconnect from them. They’ve always been a bit absentee. When she turned 13 they could finally leave her alone at home for extended ghost hunting weekend trips. FRIENDSHIPS: Growing up, with a name like Holly-Eve Knights, it’s not hard to imagine why she wouldn’t have friends. Most people labeled her the same as they did her parents and wrote her off as someone to be ignored or bullied. She has a hard time making connections but when she does they are ride or die. Holly is affectionate with her friends, albeit awkward as she fumbles her way through proper etiquette. She knows her parents probably hugged her way too much growing up so she has to fight that primal urge to hug a friend even if it makes her just as uncomfortable as it makes them. FRIENDS IN NEED: Holly’s new to this friend thing and she’s trying her best to figure out what’s the proper way to do anything. She offers her friend brute honesty regarding the situation and then offers for the two of them to figure it out together. Possibly with color coordinated highlighters. NEEDING A FRIEND: Tries to deal with her problems on her own because she isn’t used to relying on other people. She won’t outright reject other people’s help but she is very cautious in accepting of it unless she trusts the person explicitly. ANNOYANCES: She’s always been a bit too quick on her feet or to go on the offensive when it comes to retorts, but lately she’s been getting snippier and cattier than even she is comfortable with because of her exhaustion. ROMANCE: Relationship-curious would be a good word for it. She’s open to the idea of being in a relationship but it also scares her after the last brush with romantic affection left her humiliated. Supportive, but honest, would always make sure the person feels like they are wanted, heard, and acknowledged. However, has absolutely no idea how to woo anyone and is terrified to try. ADVERSARIES: Despite having a general distrust of other humans, you have to put in a lot of work for Holly to waste the energy into hating you. You would have to do something pretty heinous. ENEMIES: Anything to hurt her parents or her friends. Be a ghost and make her realize all her fears are a reality. STRANGERS: Respectful and quiet. Very reserved around strangers unless they say or do something she finds to be moderately offensive. FUN STUFF: Watching all the movies she never got to watch growing up, staying up for hours talking, would love a slumber party but would never vocalize that out loud DATING: Nothing too over the top. Flowers aren’t appreciated (she’s allergic to roses) and there’s no need for overt affections. She wants someone she can have an intellectual conversation with or go and watch a b-rated horror movie to make fun of the bad acting.

BEST FRIEND: TBD  WORST ENEMY: The entire state of Florida

INTERACTIONS.

MINGLING: Is incredibly inept at making new friends and being around people as a general. Does not know what small talk is or is too aggressive in using it. COMFORT LEVELS: Feels okay talking to new people if there is a reason for it. She can socialize in class or work settings, even enjoys some of the people at the coffee shop she works at, but she’s almost always on edge around people. PHYSICAL: Is occasionally affectionate and even likes touch from other people under the right circumstances. Was comforted with physical affection growing up. GROUPS: As comfortable in a group as she is in any social situation. Awkwardly accepting of this. OPENNESS: Takes an incredibly long time to open up to someone about the aspects of her life she deems to be more relevant than others. GENEROSITY: Is incredibly generous to the best of her ability. She likes buying her friends food, bringing them drinks, and seeing them smile. JEALOUSY: Jealousy is a strange emotion and one she is not usually prepared to handle. Most of the time growing up she felt jealous about people who lived relatively normal lives, not having to go on ghost hunts with her parents or man the crystal and oil shop they have downstairs and pretend like everything was haunted just to get people to buy. She’s jealous of people who are good at making connections and opening themselves up. TEMPER: There are certain buttons you can press that are an immediate flare, but otherwise she tends to be pretty level headed if not unnecessarily sarcastic. EMPATHY: Awkwardly empathetic. Holly understands people emotions but has a difficult time knowing what to do with that empathy and how to place it properly. AFFECTION: Gentle things. Occasional gifts without thought, gentle touches, generally making that person feel important and needed. Once she opens up Holly is an incredibly kind person, it just takes some time for her to open up. Like a cherry pit to a cherry blossom if you will. DISTASTE: Arguments, biting words, purposefully hitting places that she knows are inappropriate. ETIQUETTE: Her borderline hippie parents didn’t teach her much about etiquette so she has no idea what spoon goes where. If she’s not wearing sneakers she just doesn’t wear shoes, even if the situation likely calls for shoes. RESPONSIBILITY: Doesn’t like being wrong, but is willing to admit when she was the one who made the mistake. Will make others take ownership for their contribution in the mistake as well. SELF ESTEEM: Has incredibly low self-esteem but does her best to mask it. Being so socially and emotionally isolated she always lingered onto the feeling that the must be something wrong with her. CONFIDENCE: As much as she hates to admit it, Holly still cares what people think about her. HONESTY: Brutally and perhaps inappropriately honest sometimes. LEADER OR FOLLOWER: Leader. Has a difficult time taking orders. Would do well in a second in command position, but she’s the editor of the newspaper so she’s used to being in charge. PRAISE: Is incredibly awkward when it comes to accepting compliments. Does not know what to do with the compliment and might assume there is an ulterior motive to it. FAILURES: Probably a lot. The unwavering skepticism, a barbed tongue, the lack of filter as a general. She also loves to be right which can rub people the wrong way. CRITICISM: Takes criticism okay. Open to growing as a person but does initially find it difficult to swallow. INSULTS: Quick to bite back with something equally as insulting and then regret it a few hours down the road. EMBARRASSMENT: Fluttered, not embarrassed. There are very few things that can make Holly feel like she is embarrassed but once you unlock them she’s about as red as her hair. FLIRTING: Does not know how to flirt. Does not know if someone was flirting with her. ATTENTION SPAN: Used to have an easy time concentrating but with the nightmares it’s been harder and harder lately. SITUATIONS: Depends on the context of the social situation if she’s good at it or not. In tense situations often is able to keep a level head but if someone is asking if their outfit looks good Holly might implode.

LIFE.

DUTY: Runs the newspaper, works at All Ground Up, and whenever her parents are out of town is obligated to help run their shop as well.  TECH: Decent at modern day technology, mostly out of necessity though, since neither of her parents own a computer. POLITICS: Incredibly strong convictions when it comes to human rights and people. Please don’t read her article from election season. or maybe do if you’re into some light masochism. COMBAT SKILLS: Probably very scrappy in a fight. Has never had the reason to fight but is very fast on her feet when it comes to running. HOME: Her room is more organized than the entire household she lives in. The little space is full of bins that she has carefully labeled in her own head. DAILY LIFE: Lately has felt very out of her depth. The nightmares are starting to consume her entire entity and purpose and it’s starting to frighten her. INDEPENDENCE: Very independent thanks to incredibly flaky (albeit well meaning) moms. COOKING: Is better with drinks than cooking, but being a barista gives her certain talents. Good at following recipes and a quick learner, but it isn’t a passion. BUILDING: Absolutely cannot put shit together. Is hilariously bad at it but thinks  she would be great. CLEANING: There aren’t any chores in the Knights household, but she’s the one cleaning up most of the messes her parents make. Someone has to clean the pig’s blood up off the dining room floor. SHOPPING: Does not usually go shopping, but when she does she likes thrift store finds because they can be repurposed and used in a variety of different ways. DRIVING: Yes she can drive and her broken old as dirt minivans name is Velma. FINANCES: Both her mother’s are incredibly talented Doctors of differing sciences with a few books written each, however outside of that they don’t get much money coming their way. She lives comfortably enough, but doesn’t like to talk about her money and is uncomfortable taking it from her parents when she feels at any moment their ghost hunting business could go tits up. So she works to help pay for the things she wants. PETS: Was given a pet rosy boa named Lilith for a birthday one year. She loves her long danger noodle. TRAVELING: Would nothing more than to get out of Normal and go as far as the west coast. Has gone with her parents on a few crazy ghost hunts and visited “haunted” places. Fell in love with the West because of those visits. MEDICAL: Has become a frequent visitor of the doctor given her need for any form of sleep aid. ILLNESS: Night terrors and anxiety. Panic attacks when confronted with claustrophobia WORRIES: Everything keeps her awake at night. Literally. The demonic nightmares are the biggest part though. She worries that she is going crazy and doesn’t understand if there is something in her family that would make this happen, her biological family. She doesn’t know anything about them so she sits and worries a lot about how they might affect her one day. PEACE: Appreciates the silence immensely because that’s what she’s used to. PARTYING: Has never once in her entire life been to a party. HOBBIES: Enjoys writing poetry in her spare time, when she’s not writing papers. Occasionally volunteers at the animal shelter to pet the kitties and the doggies.