#debut could maybe have the chicks as well but shes already done that

[bybyefromurgirlodam]

speaking of 1989 tv Taylor really needs to squeeze all of the collabs on that one

[littlemissidontcare]

Yeah that’s definitely not true. They met in 2019 when he went to Ibiza for his friends wedding. Their mutual friend Jon introduced them. Then they met up a few times in between before lockdown happened - not long visits but they defo had met in person. / I’m so fucking sorry to ruin your fantasy but Alejandra wasn’t even in Spain at the time of E&M’s wedding. There’s no in person run-ins that could’ve happened before he showed up in Ibiza in 2020. And how do we know that you ask? Well see, Alejandra had and still has to a degree this little habit of posting EVERY LITTLE THING she does and every place she goes to and she used to document pretty much everything with geo tags and time stamps. She still has plenty of that saved in her story highlights. The fandom FBI already done their research and the only place they were at at the same time was Greece in 2018, and even then they were in two whole different sides of the country and never met up with each other. They weren’t anywhere near each other in 2019. And in the first few months of 2020 she was vacationing with her cousin in Mexico and then with Jon in Costa Rica while Seb was in Atlanta, then Europe and then back to NYC. You don’t think that if they were a couple by then she would’ve gone to Europe with him? They obviously didn’t know each other before April-May of 2020, so the “meeting” part could’ve only happened online or via text, hence your “over a year” note considering they publicly debuted on a yacht in July and by her birthday in June it was 1 or 2 months. So “over a year ago” is a year and 1-2 months. Here you go. P.S. I have to laugh at the “mutual friend Jon”. I believe it’s true for Alejandra who’s actually friends with Jon. Seb met Jon only a handful of times (3 or 4) and all times were at fashion events, so there weren’t even any friendly hangouts. They met for the first time at that Hugo Boss show in winter of 2018 and in 2 years of “knowing” each other they haven’t spent in sum even a week in each other’s presence. How is this friends for you? The whole thing is such a load of bs. That’s why I’m personally still skeptical about this Jon matchmaker thing. These are two people who don’t even spend any time with each other and never hang out, but only met 3 or 4 times in 2 years at fashion events, basically in passing, and last time being in Milan in 2019 where Seb spent less than 3 hours, and then one calls the other to introduce some chick and suddenly there’s a romance made in 5 seconds? Sounds more like a business arrangement to me. Maybe it would’ve been more believable, had Jon and him met up sometime in 2020, or at least were in the same place, so there’d at least be a chance to say that they chatted and the topic got brought up and Jon suggested he could introduce this girl to him. I’m sorry but I don’t buy either Jon or Seb randomly calling or texting each other about some girl. I’m 100% sure that outside of ig likes and Jon’s comments on Seb’s posts there was never any type of not-in-person interaction between them. Do you ever just call someone you met in passing 3 or 4 times to introduce some girl you know or to ask them to introduce some girl to you? Sounds totally real. Jon was just an easy link to throw in there to make it more believable because without him there’s absolutely no connection and the whole thing seems random and suspicious.

Damn anon, go off. But yes, I agree with this 1000%.

[one-sad-human]

•Sweet Confessions• Izzy Stradlin

Pairing: Izzy Stradlin x Reader

Requested? Nope! But they are open so send them in!

Theme: Fluff

Warnings: Language, alcohol references, and sexual references

Word Count: 1.5k

A/N: It’s Izzy birthday!! This fic isn’t birthday related, I finished it last week and decided to post it for his birthday. Enjoy!

The band dragged you out for a night at the bar. Just for a couple drinks to celebrate their successful debut album. But with Guns m Roses, it was never just a few drinks, it had already been two hours.

The band had been your friends since they all got together. You grew up in Indiana with Axl and Izzy, and when they left for LA you weren't too far behind. You had been there for everything. Every lineup change, every argument, and every borrowed— stolen— instrument.

You were their best friend, someone that was valuable to all of them. However, you and Izzy always had a special bond. You and him always clicked, one was never far from the other. Like partners in crime.

Like now, Izzy sat next to you in the booth. His lanky arm was resting around your shoulders, an action that wasn't at all rare. Axl is next to him, watching some blond that's barely dressed near the bar.

     You and Izzy are the only somewhat sober ones here. Izzy just wasn't in the mood to get wasted, and you had work in the morning and didn't feel like having a huge hangover. However, that doesn't mean you can't have a few drinks.

"I'm going to go grab another drink," you say after tapping Izzy's arm to gain his attention. He nods and lifts his arm off of your shoulders.

Axl takes his eyes off of the busty blonde he had been gawking at to look at his friend. Axl notices how Izzy's eyes follow your every movement.

"You're being a creep," he tells him. Izzy spares a glance at him and shakes his head.

"I'm just makin' sure she's alright." Axl grabs his beer bottle, his rings clinking on the glass.

"You're watching her like a goddamn hawk." He takes a sip of his drink. "She's a tough girl, she'll be ok if someone hits on her."

"Well maybe I don't want anyone hitting on her," Izzy says. He finally takes his eyes from you to glare at his red headed friend. Axl takes a moment to stare at Izzy.

"You need to just tell her you're in fucking love with her. Seriously, it's getting hard to watch." Izzy rolls his eyes again and takes a sip of his drink. He hates how Axl can always see right through him.

"I'm not in love with her," Izzy says. Axl just stares at him, giving him a very unconvinced look. Izzy pretends to not see him, staring at the bottom of his glass.

     "I don't believe you. You love her, and she's obviously in love with you, too, so just fucking tell her." Izzy continues to stare at the bottom of his glass, but he questions if you really could feel the same about him.

"What are you two talking about?" You ask as you take your spot next to Izzy, now nursing another drink.

"Nothing, Axl's just being a dick."

     "What else is new?" You ask teasingly. Axl flips you the bird and you shrug in response.

     "I was just telling Izzy that he should just man up and tell this chick that he likes her," Axl says, sending Izzy a discreet pointed look. You cover up the hurt you felt in your chest and put on a fake smile.

     "You like a girl? Who?" You ask Izzy.

     "It's nothing, Y/N. Drop it," Izzy says with irritation. You narrow your eyes at the sudden aggression, but don't push.

     "Fine, damn." Axl shakes his head. How he got stuck with such an idiot friend he doesn't know. Steven groans and lifts his head from the table.

"Have a nice nap, popcorn?" Axl asks Steven with a smirk. Steven groans again and places his head back down on the wooden table.

     Duff and Slash both walk out of the women's bathroom, a woman following closely behind. She looks disheveled, her hair is messy and her dress strap is hanging off her shoulder but she has a satisfied smirk on her face.

     "I'm beat, I'm going home," Duff says while still trying to put his belt on properly. Slash grabs his leather jacket and follows Duff out of the bar, throwing a wave and smile over to you before he leaves.

     "So that's where they've been," you say. The images of Slash and Duff going at the same girl was enough to make you shiver in disgust.

     "Lucky bastards," Axl says with jealousy. "I'm done sitting around, catch you later." Axl pushes through you and Izzy and makes his way to the girl he's been eyeing all night.

     "I'm tired, too," you say and finish off your drink. "You want to walk me home?"

     Izzy nods and you both stand. Izzy follows you out the door without a word. After a few minutes of walking in silence, you finally look over at him.

     "Are you ok?" Izzy glances at you for a split second.

     "I'm fine." You aren't convinced. You knew Izzy for practically all his life, you know when something is on his mind.

     "You know you can't lie to me, what's wrong?" Izzy sighs and shakes his head.

     "Nothing, I promise. I'm just thinking," he says without sparing a glance at you.

     "About what? That girl you like?" It hurt to just spit out the words.

     Izzy wants to just tell you 'yes,' he is thinking about the girl but that it's you, and how he doesn't like her he loves her. But he has no clue how you'd react, so he just stays quiet.

     "Well, whatever you want to say I'm here to listen," you say and send him a smile. Izzy grabs your hand and gives it a small squeeze.

     "I know you are. I'm fine though, really." You sigh and nod your head. He doesn't let go of your hand until you reach the door to your house.

     "You want to stay over tonight? It's pretty late and your house is kind of far," you ask. Izzy nods and you both walk into your small home.

     Izzy makes himself comfortable in your living room while you make yourself a cup of tea. He takes a moment to look at the pictures of you and him on the walls.

     Some were old, the picture frames barely concealing the rips and tears in the corners. Those were from back in Indiana, riding dirt bikes and getting high near the train tracks. But some were new, with the whole band out drinking or photos you took while they were on stage.

     "Day dreaming?" You ask as you sit next to him on your old, worn out couch, now with a cup of tea.

     "I was looking at all the pictures." Izzy points to one of the newer ones, It was of you and him after one of his first shows with Guns. You were hanging onto him and giving him a huge grin, one he matched. "I don't remember that one."

     "Axl took that one, he gave it to me because he said he's never seen you so happy." You say, smiling at the memory. "It's my favorite of you."

     Axl's earlier words replay in Izzy's head. Friends don't look at each other like that, do they? You most certainly don't look at Axl or Duff like that, he would know.

     "Speaking of Axl," Izzy starts, clearing his throat awkwardly. "He mentioned something to me earlier..." Izzy stops short, nervous to mention it.

"Well, what did he say?" You ask, nodding so he continues.

"He said you're in love with me, is it true?" Izzy asks, but it sounds much more interrogatory than he meant.

You stay silent for a while, your mouth parting before snapping shut again. You look like a gaping fish of some sort.

"He blabbed?" Is all you could muster out. "I'm sorry, I know you probably don't feel the same and that's fine, that's why I never said anything and—"

     "Hey, hey, relax, I'm asking because I do feel the same." Your jaw snaps shut, your face feels hot and your hands are sweaty.

     "Seriously? I’m the girl you like?” You mumble.

     "Yes, you are," Izzy replies, feeling relief that Axl was right flood through his veins. You and Izzy both sit and silence for a moment longer.

     "So are you going to kiss me or what?" You say teasingly, although it's accompanied by a nervous waver in your voice. Izzy doesn't acknowledge it, instead leaning in to smash his lips to yours.

     The kiss is full of passion and built up emotions. You can't help but think about how long you've dreamed of this moment.

     Izzy pulls away moments later, his brown staring deeply into yours. His eyes silently asking if this was ok. You answer with a small smile and lean in to peck his cheek softly. Izzy smiles back, bringing up his hand to gently caress your face.

     "I love you," you say quietly.

     "I love you, too." You pull him in for another kiss, and Izzy begins to think about how he loves the thought of waking up next to you and how every other sappy domestic thing he used to roll he eyes at seem much nicer.

     More time passes and you and Izzy have both laid down on the couch, cuddling into earth other lovingly. Your cup of tea is abandoned as you fall asleep to the feeling of Izzy's chest rising and falling under your head and his soft caresses.

[baseballbitch116]

Off Limits

Pairing: Eminem x reader

Request: “Can you do one with Eminem? Where the reader is like his intern/protege or something and he’s super protective of her” 

Word Count: 955

Warnings: Strong language(of course, it’s Eminem)

Masterlist

Prompt List | Submit A Request

Marshall’s entourage certainly was not the classiest group of people you had met. You found yourself hanging around them more and more often, due to being Eminem’s protege. You had known him for a few years, originally having been the receptionist at his record label. He eventually found out about your goal to be a rapper and took you under his wing.

That was about six months ago. You had become a lot closer to him than you ever expected to. However, hanging around him came at a price. All of the tabloids began following you around, labeling you as “his new girl.” It couldn’t be further from the truth - could it? 

Marshall was on stage performing at the moment, something he hadn’t done in a while - but you would never have guessed. The crowd was loving him, and he even debuted one of his songs off of his new album. The night started off well. You sat backstage with everyone else, watching him on the TV taping his performance. His entourage included three men and a woman, none of which you could remember their names. You didn’t care enough to, truth be told.

He was finishing up his last song of the night - Lose Yourself - and you were excited to get out of here. He’s not into the whole party scene, given his troubles with sobriety, but tonight he said he wanted to go to a bar to celebrate. You had been out with him, sure, but this was more casual than normal. The woman - Cassie, Kacy... Whatever her name was, certainly did not like you. She was constantly giving you dirty looks - like right now. She gave you a once over and scoffed, returning her attention back to Marshall saying goodnight to the crowd. She very obviously wanted to fuck him - although you suspected she just wanted to get in his pants for the publicity - and she found you to be a threat, although she would never admit that in a million years.

You ignored her more often than not, but for some unknown reason, one of the guys decided to start shit tonight. “So, Y/N, what’re you doing later?” The tall guy asks. You glance over at him and shrug.

“Just going to get drinks with Marshall.” You respond casually, not missing whats-her-face roll her eyes.

“Gonna go back to his room tonight?” He presses, giving a little dramatic hip thrust into the air and laughing grossly. Before you can reply the chick speaks up, saying “Yeah, right. Em’s got standards, Andre.” Oh yeah, that was his name. You don’t miss her shooting you another look. You cock your head at her and smirk, knowing your presence alone bothers her.

“Yeah, that’s why he’s never tapped your ass.” Andre jokes, which makes you laugh. She stands up and glares at Andre, then takes a step toward you.

“What’s so funny, bitch?” She asks. You had already seen in the corner of your eye that Marshall left the stage, meaning he would be in this very room any second - and you had every intention of letting him walk in on her threatening you.

“The fuck you just call her?” Marshall shouts, making his presence known as he steps into the room. You smirk at her and she looks like she would strangle you had he not walked in. She turns to face him and puts on a fake smile, walking over and trying to place her hand on his chest, which he smacks away. “Get her outta here. Don’t ever disrespect Y/N or anyone around me.” He says, waving his hand at her. You watch security drag her away as she tries to change his mind.

“You didn’t have to do that.” You say to Marshall as he takes a seat beside you.

“I’ll get you when the car is ready.” The second security guard announces before exiting the room. He glances over at you and raises a brow.

“Yeah, I did. Didn’t like that bitch anyway.” He mutters, pulling out a cigarette from his pack on the table and lighting it. He takes a puff then offers it to you, which you gladly accept. Andre wiggles his eyebrows at you not so subtly as you take a long puff and Marshall catches it.

“The fuck are you doing, Dre?” He questions, taking his cigarette back when you hand it to him. You shoot him a look, but he sees that too. “What?” He repeats.

“Andre was just asking earlier if I would be going back to your room with you tonight.” You state, rolling your eyes as you say it, hoping that he doesn’t mistake the stupid comment as you implying that you want to. Which you do... But you would never admit. Marshall looks between you and Andre, then throws an arm on the sofa behind you, taking another puff.

“Well Andre I don’t think that’s much of your business, but if I have my way...” He trails off, a smirk tugging at his lips. You are shocked by his comment but try to play it off, letting out a little chuckle and shaking your head.

“We’ll see about that.” You joke, turning your head to “casually” look out the door, hoping he won’t see your blush.

Marshall kept you close the whole way to the bar, not allowing any fans near you. He sat beside you, an arm over the back of your seat, and actually told a man to fuck off when he came over to say that you looked nice. You were caught off guard by his protectiveness, but you didn’t mind it either. Maybe there was something more to your relationship than you had realized... 

[mgkconfessions]

AMAs 2020 2/2

The tattoo

Actually she got the gunman as a tattoo, because the gunna or gunner would be el artillero. I guess that didn’t sound as nice so she went with el pistolero, but it isn’t really his nickname and with everything that she pretends to know about Kells, it makes me laugh that this is what she wanted on her body to honor him! Says a lot about who she is as a person and what version of Kells she cares about in this relationship. She got a nickname of his stage name, not his real name. She’s all about MGK and doesn’t give a fuck about Colson. Even Col would have been better for a love tattoo and would have been a lot more personal and shown him that she accepts and loves Colson too and not just MGK. But el pistolero only makes her look like a groupie who is excited to date her favourite singer and she’s obviously living out her bad boy fantasy with him. It’s even more tacky, because she’s supposed to be his real first love and serious girlfriend, but all she cares about is his public fame side and she only needs Colson to make MGK depending on her.

It’s embarrassing and she should get it removed as quickly as possible! Maybe she can get Brian’s tattoo removed together with Kells’ then :). Don’t feel bad for her, first time it’s a mistake, but second time it’s a choice. She or they want to be stupid, let them be stupid. They have to live with the tattoos and public humiliation.

No, she said that she got his nickname, but we only ever heard her call him Buddha and Lamby, so we joked around which one she would choose and for her own sake she should have gone with Buddha, because that would have been the one that people would associate the least with Kells.

We talked about the tattoos and Banyan Tree before, but absolutely not planned at all Megan properly revealed the tattoo for the first time on her red carpet debut with Kells to get more attention for it. And even less calculated she started rumours about it only shortly before with the fan pictures. I assume that Kells is next with a public love declaration, maybe we will see his M.F. tattoo for her that I will forever read as mother fucker ^^! I assume it’s somewhere near his crotch or hip or on his butt cheeks. If it’s on a body part that we have seen then it’s very unnoticeable. The tattoos are real, but I believe that they didn’t show them on purpose to reveal them at the best time for the most media coverage. Imagine that’s how your relationship is like. Everything is planned to fit into your PR strategy! Sorry to say this, but Kells isn’t smarter than this. He does and says stupid things all the time and whatever you thought about Kells doesn’t apply to his 2020 Megan Fox version. This isn’t Kells anymore, this is Richard! Old Kells would have never done that, but Richard surely does these things and calls the paparazzi to become more famous. Kells has a tattoo for Casie and got it quite early on. It’s right under his nipple, close to his heart :)! I don’t think that Megan has any tattoos for her kids tho, she seriously got a tattoo for Kells before she got one for her own children!

Apparently neither of them learned anything from the past tattoos and relationships. Megan got the second time a tattoo for a man who she knew around 3 or 4 months at that time although her last relationship and marriage didn’t last either despite having a tattoo of Brian’s name. An anon said that the woman on Kells’ side is about a comic figure, but I couldn’t find a picture of that comic figure with a mole on her face which Kells’ woman has and Hedi has one too. Then with the caution band around it, I still believe that it means that he should be careful with women like Hedi and still with that tattoo on his body he’s dating someone even worse than her now. Neither of them learned anything from their past mistakes, we can only hope that they will do it now when their relationship ends. I don’t think that the fang tattoo has anything to do with Megan, because his Instagram caption was “take me away from all this death” and I think that it’s more about how he has lost so many friends and important people in the years that he wants to be taken away from it and vampires are also dead but still alive.

It’s so many things this year that made him incredibly unattractive! I honestly can’t even imagine them having a normal conversation with each other, so I don’t think that there was any discussion about their tattoos for their exes. I don’t see them bringing up topics that might be a sensitive spot for the other one so that they will never fight.

She did this the second time now. I don’t know why after Brian she didn’t realize that tattoos for your boyfriends aren’t a good idea and especially not for guys who majority of people believe to still be capable of cheating, because they’ve done it in the past all the time.

They were already doomed when Megan decided that he was her twin flame on the second day, but the tattoo is an amazing symbol for a relationship that will fail too. :)

It’s just Megan trying to be edgy and cool. From all of his nicknames and symbols she could have got for him as a tattoo, the wrong version of the gunna just shows that she’s obviously living out her bad boy fantasy and she wants to be the hot chick at the side of this bad boy MGK LMAO! ^^ It doesn’t fit to her caring about his well being tho and that he calmed down, which I doubt he has, and since she’s pouring him Tequila and emotionally manipulated him from the beginning, I don’t think that she truly cares about him either. She’s dating his image and his celebrity, but not the real Colson. Kells struggled so much with accepting that there’s Colson too and his own girlfriend gets his “nickname” as a tattoo, but even she only cares about MGK. Megan hasn’t seen Kells’ party and wild side yet when he’s on tour and on stage performing. Would she still want to date him if he was sucking on girls’ boobs on stage, hip thrusting them into the crowd and have sex inside the tour bus with multiple girls? I don’t think so, because remember Megan was the one who got him out of the fast lane and Colson Baker doesn’t need more women anymore or that whole party lifestyle. No, he’s an obedient lamby to Megan now :)!

Pregnancy rumours

Megan isn’t pregnant. At the AMAs she had a little belly, but she’s a mother of three and even skinny people can have a small belly. The shiny fabric only emphasized it. Last year in December she had a little belly too and wasn’t pregnant. It’s probably just her figure or she was bloated. Also it doesn’t seem like Kells got any other girl pregnant since Casie’s mum and he has been smoking a lot of weed every day for years too. I think he takes children quite seriously and I don’t really see him accidentally get a girl pregnant, not even Megan. And Megan didn’t sound like her body could take another pregnancy either or like she wanted more.

Kells’ post

I honestly think that her finger was the only thing that he could grab of her lmao! ^^ With all the other pictures from that day and the way Megan announced him, it looked like she didn’t even want to take one of their couple mirror selfies with him that day. Kells was ready to take the picture and trying to get her in front of the mirror too, but she didn’t want to. Even her smile isn’t really a smile. It’s like she was awkwardly saying “yeeeaah” to appear like she wanted to take a picture and was having fun too, although she hated being there or maybe she wanted to give us a different facial expression, because they always look so serious in their mirror selfies and now she wanted to show how much fun she can be in a not very convincing way tho. It looks awkward and they seem off in that picture too.

I think that he did sleep with a gun right next to him, however not all the time, because Casie has been sleeping in that bed too and who took the gun away then? Not Megan! Because she wasn’t even around that time! He needed an Instagram caption that again would make everyone believe how real and deep their love is and how much she changed him into a new man :’). I can’t take anything seriously that he says about them, because he’s always doing too much and it’s always the same old story just with different words. Also what does it matter if she made him put the gun away when she’s enabling him in his alcohol excesses. For the boys sharing their pictures, I don’t believe that anyone of them cares a lot about Megan and is very interested in getting to know her, because she’s dating their friend. Kells went to the AMAs with Megan of course they will choose their couple pictures to post about it.

Watching AMAs

I believe that Megan only came to watch the show and then left, because her signature water bottle left the table eventually and Megan wasn’t on any of those pictures anymore either and when Kells was in the kitchen with many others too, Megan wasn’t there and she’s usually where Kells is. I assume that the food wasn’t organic and sushi enough for her and instead of bringing something as well that she and others could eat from too, she didn’t eat there and left early. I believe that she really only came to watch it. She doesn’t seem to like his friends anyway. It must have been embarrassing for her to see her announcing Kells and Travis on television in front of everyone! It’s funny how nobody filmed that part of their performance to put it on Instagram ^^.

Twitter Trends

You know what’s sad? When Megan Fox and Sydney Sweeney were both trending on the day of the AMAs, but Kells the guy and reason for them to even have the opportunity to be trending on Twitter, wasn’t. Kells’ performance wasn’t amazing and one time he even sang the wrong lyrics and overall he seemed quite out of breath too, but it’s obvious that whenever Megan will be there, everyone focuses on Megan and not him. Regardless of that I don’t think he needs Megan, because he’s the one who is getting all these opportunities to be seen and heard and not her. So yes, she has to insert herself into everything to get her 5 minutes of fame and Kells allows it, because her name gets him more attention and he can show everyone that he’s dating her for his own ego.

[medea10]

My Review of To Heart

How did I get into this anime? I have been curious about this anime for a straight-up decade now and the randomizer decided to bless me with something not incest. Thank you Arceus!

Since she was young, Akari Kamigishi has been best friends with Hiroyuki Fujita. Because of kind acts he did for her as a child, Akari has stayed by Hiroyuki’s side. Now that they’re both in high school, something has changed in Akari and it feels more like she’s falling for her childhood friend. Will Akari find happiness with her best friend or will she end up friend-zoned?

And because this is a harem, there are quite a few girls hanging around Hiroyuki throughout the two seasons. Just to name a few, we have the brash friend, Shiho. Then there’s the tomboy type, Aoi. The very silent type, Serika! And then there’s the robotic maid, Multi. Yes, you read right. A robot! This is Japan after all! Oh yeah, there’s also the class rep, an actual American girl, and a quiet girl with supernatural powers.

Akari, girl, you need to step up your game if you’re up against all these chicks!

BETWEEN THE SUB AND THE DUB: Before I discuss all that, let’s go down the ugly story about To Heart for fans in the U.S. The first season (and only the first season) was dubbed by RightStuf (at least I’m certain about that). Everything else wound up undubbed and even unlicensed. To Heart was kind of left in the dust due to what happened when the first season was supposed to release in the U.S. A lot of damaged material was the culprit and this came during the time when animation was transitioning from animating using cells to going digital. So to sum that up, the anime debuted in Japan around 1999, Rightstuf licensed To Heart in 2004 with a release in 2005, and the actual release was delayed to 2007. And in back-in-those-days times, that’s pretty fucking long. I can see why they didn’t want to bother with this series after it took all that trouble to remaster a series many were calling only “OKAY”.

Now then, on with the good stuff! I went in thinking that this was a Geneon reject, but was blown out of my ass to hear voices from New York! Lisa Ortiz, Jessica Calvello, Veronica Taylor, Wayne Grayson, and my personal favorite (not who you’re thinking), Carol Jacobanis! Yeah, surprisingly I didn’t hear Ted Lewis here. But Jacobanis is my second favorite in the NYAV group. I am in nostalgia heaven! Yes folks, these were the same people to give life to many characters from Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, Berserk, His and Her Circumstances, Bakuman, Gravitation…OH, gambled and lost! Well, you get my meaning! Thankfully this dub wasn’t as horrific as Gravitation (despite Hiroyuki’s voice actor is well-known for something from that particular anime). Here’s what you might recognize these folks from!

JAPANESE CAST: *Akari is played by Ayako Kawasumi (known for Ursula on Pokemon DP, Saber on Fate/Zero, Izumi on Beyond the Boundary, Aoki on Bakuman, Laura on Index, Yoshida on Shakugan no Shana, and Nodame on Nodame Cantabile)

*Hiroyuki is played by Kazuya Ichijo (known for Hoteye on Fairy Tail and Zafila on Nanoha)

*Shiho is played by Chieko Higuchi (known for Tomo on Azumanga Daioh)

*Multi is played by Yui Horie (known for Hanekawa on Monogatari, Tohru on Fruits Basket, Hanyuu on Higurashi, Minorin on Toradora, Charla on Fairy Tail, Chie on Persona 4, Maria on Umineko, and Riki on Little Busters)

ENGLISH CAST: *Akari is played by Debora Rabbai (known for Mika from Gravitation, Rika on His and Her Circumstances, Leina on Queen’s Blade, and Boogiepop [original])

*Hiroyuki is played by Rich McNanna (known for Jack Walker on Pokemon Movie 9 and Shuuichi on Gravitation)

*Shiho is played by Jessica Calvello (known for Prima on Pokemon, Hange on Attack on Titan, Excel on Excel Saga, Kanako on Maria Holic, Tsukino on His and Her Circumstances, and Aika on Aria the Animation)

*Multi is played by Tara Sands (known for Richie on Pokemon, Soujirou on Rurouni Kenshin, Mokuba on YGO, Badiane on Sailor Moon SuperS movie, Tori on Pokemon Movie ~ Deoxys, and Filia on Slayers Try)

SHIPPING: So remind me what genre this anime is!

HAREM!

We’re watching a harem! But it’s more slice of life than anything romantic. There are a lot of love interests for Hiroyuki throughout the series. It’s just that it doesn’t develop as much as one might think (except for maybe Akari) in season one.

And it’s so easy to think that Hiroyuki is the object of every one of these ladies’ desire. Serika waits for him to come to the club room. Aoi finds him helpful, as does Tomoko and Lemmy. Multi got attached to Hiroyuki’s headpats. As for Akari, she’s got quite the teddy bear collection because of Hiroyuki. After watching all of season one where Hiroyuki is hanging with all of these ladies individually, I thought there would be a moment of jealousy from one or more of these girls. Much to my surprise, that was not the case. It didn’t go down any of those bad-end routes you’d see with things like Kanon, Clannad, or God-forbid, School Days!

But then season two happened…

Ooh boy! First of all, Hiroyuki ended up getting his first confession of love from the most unlikely person ever. Kotone wasn’t even a contender in the first season as she had other issues. In fact, didn’t she have feelings for Masashi in season one? But halfway in the season, she gets ballsy and confesses to Hiroyuki. He rejects her and thankfully it didn’t get ugly (except Akari heard it and got jealous). Lemmy, I also thought wasn’t in play, but here we are! She was apparently childhood friends with Hiroyuki and brought it up when confessing her feelings. That unfortunately came at a bad time as he’s in a quarrel with Akari so he dismisses her.

And then there’s Akari! She’s been able to put on a smile and kind of be a wall-flower whenever Hiroyuki is doing something with one of the other girls. And most of the season, we see him mostly with Aoi and Multi. Thankfully, Aoi never showed romantic interests in Hiroyuki. I much prefer Aoi x Kotone if you want to know the truth. But halfway into season two, jealousy came in like a drunkard in a bar. Akari was definitely pissed when she saw Kotone confess to Hiroyuki and would get jealous seeing Hiroyuki and Multi together so much.

Oh yeah, good old Multi! Yes Multi loves Hiroyuki. Now does Hiroyuki love Multi back? It’s complicated! Because of Multi, Hiroyuki ends up pursuing a career in robotics and as a result spends quite a bit of time with her (pissing Akari off in the process). But because Multi is kind of a malfunctioning robot, who the hell knows if she’ll even remember being with Hiroyuki.

Now are there other boys interested in any of these other girls? The only other boy that has any prominent screen time is Masashi. It’s just that after season one, he’s only seen every so often because he’s busy with soccer. But in season one, it almost felt like Kotone was admiring him from the distance. Don’t get excited because that was just a one-and-done sort of thing before Kotone set eyes on Hiroyuki. Actually, Masashi does reveal his fondness for Akari (at literally the worst possible time). But it seems like Masashi ends up with Shiho in the end. So…whatever!

Hiroyuki DOES end up with someone. Just go down to the end of season two to get that answer.

ENDING TO SEASON ONE: The last two episodes of this season consist around Shiho deciding that she wants to throw a Christmas party at an old hangout from her middle school days! But this isn’t the only nostalgic kick she feels. Shiho ends up remembering the first day she met Hiroyuki and after he took care of a wound she got, Shiho starts seeing Hiroyuki in a new light. Yeah, up until this point, Shiho and Hiroyuki’s relationship could be summed up by saying they both give each other shit every day. Then you have Akari, who is also feeling a little nostalgic with trying to see if Hiroyuki is able to remember things from their past. During the finale however, Akari does develop a cold and has to bail on the party planning.

When Shiho came to visit Akari, it kinda comes out that both girls do care for Hiroyuki. But because this isn’t one of those kinds of romance animes, it really doesn’t get ugly. It’s more of an “I acknowledge your feelings for the boy I like and good luck to you”. Shiho really didn’t do any confessing and we get a cute moment with Hiroyuki and Akari out in the snow.

Let’s see how Season Two holds up!

OMAKE: Nozomi Entertainment also released the six Omake specials that came with releases of the first season. Not dubbed! Just a couple of minute-long specials that range from cute to wildly absurd.

There were also Omake specials in season two that mostly consisted of all the girls fighting each other in almost a Street Fighter or Dragon Ball style.

REMEMBER MY MEMORIES: Five years after the first season aired, To Heart returns with a bit of a time-leap from where we left off last and some slightly improved(?) animation. And if you’re wondering why this season isn’t called “To Heart 2”, there is a series named that already. To Heart 2 is a spin-off of To Heart. It’s just that none of the characters from To Heart are in To Heart 2. ANYWAYS…

It has been a year or so from where we left off. Hiroyuki, Akari and the others are now in their senior year of high school and a lot has changed. Minor character, Kotone who mostly kept to herself in the first season, has found another role in hanging out with Aoi (the chick who’s into martial arts). Serika is still silent, but that blue hue to her hair is definitely not silent. What the hell is with this new animation? And finally, Multi apparently left a year ago and came back in the first episode of season two. Only now Multi has amnesia. A lot has changed since season one, especially when it comes to romance. Buckle up!

ENDING TO REMEMBER MY MEMORIES: Yeah, this season layed on the melodrama really thick compared to the previous season. All the ladies love Hiroyuki and at least half of them expressed those feelings to him. Akari had some conflicted feelings when it came to Hiroyuki. She loves him, but feels like he doesn’t return the feeling due to him hanging around a lot of other girls (especially Aoi and Multi).

Speaking of Multi, this girl has had such the rotunda of computer issues. My stroked-out Dell PC from 2005 had more working power than this girl! For starters, her memories are in danger of being wiped away at several points of the series. We even begin season two where Multi returns after over a year with full-blown amnesia. And since then, Multi had some sort of malfunction issue arise every other episode. This was showcased in the finale, where Multi gets so upset and runs away to the amusement park!

So, Hiroyuki and all of his friends come together to look for Multi. They thankfully found her at the amusement park (during closed hours) and broke into the main-frame to the Ferris wheel. And did I mention these people almost committed assault on police officers? Yeah, these kids are about to have a rap sheet the size of Texas by the end of the episode. Anyways, Hiroyuki, Akari, and Multi ride the ferris wheel and have a nice talk before Multi falls asleep for…

…Let’s say a long time…

Fast-forward to high school graduation! Hiroyuki and Akari seem to be doing a lot better. They’re both going to attend the same college and are pretty much on better terms than when Akari was having a jealousy, bitch-fit. At graduation, they both decided to give each other the Christmas gifts they never gave each other. Because Multi was having another malfunction, they never got to give the gifts. Hiroyuki got a hand-knit sweater. And Akari got a ring!

Hiroyuki wanted it and so he put a ring on it!

During the ED credits, we see the characters we’ve seen throughout these two seasons and what they ended up doing after high school. Lemmy is back in San Francisco. Aoi and Kotone are still doing the fighting matches. Rio is a primary school teacher. Serica is still into the occult. Tomoko is working for her father’s business. Masashi is becoming a big soccer star with Shiho working on journalism (and I think Shiho ends up romantically involved with Masashi).

And we close with Hiroyuki and Akari working with the HMX robots and surprise, surprise, Multi wakes up.

And before you ask, I did NOT watch To Heart 2. And I don’t intend to…at least not yet. I’m saving it for another day and putting it back on the randomizer list.

This anime was…just okay. Yeah, a lot of things were predictable, especially when it came to who the main male lead was going to end up with. Come on, we all know Akari was going to end up with Hiroyuki in the end. If this were the visual novel, I’m sure there were infinite numbers of routes Hiroyuki could take and there’d be a good end to all of the girls. But I’m mostly anime only here! In terms of recommendations, ehh…I feel like there were other better harems you could watch.

Only season one of To Heart got an official release in the U.S., but you might have to search around for any DVD copies as I’m pretty sure it’s currently out of print. Anything else from the series, you’ll have to do some heavy searching to watch all the way through.

Okay, next licensed limbo/unlicensed classics!

What’s that one play everyone and their mother has seen, but you haven’t?

*sighs* Hamilton.

No, the other one.

Les Miserable? Wait, this never got licensed?!

Okay! I guess I’m watching that. I hope I can do well at this review considering I never watched the play, read the book, or watched that film where Russell Crowe can’t sing.

[laughing-with-god]

What are some of the worst movies you have ever watched?

The Greatest Showman;

Musicals are already facing a higher standard from me bc if not done right they are complete train wrecks and painful to watch. This is one of those examples. Listen, the cast was talented but oh dear was the mark off here. Pop music shouldn’t be in musicals unless it’s a modern day story. If you’re going to have a story based in a different time period, then it’s best to have music that at least sounds like it’s from that era. (Case and point; les meserables.) Also, I’m not cool with actors just randomly going from speaking lines to suddenly bursting into song. There should be a good transition from story to music and the story shouldn’t stop for the music and the music shouldn’t stop for the story. I think La La Land and Moulin Rouge did this well. But yeah, this whole movie had me cringing

Five Feet Apart

Srry sprouse fans but um....nah. I think I would’ve liked this story if the two main characters weren’t such “omg no one understands me” teens and the cancer trope wasn’t depended on so heavily. I get that just bc you have cancer it doesn’t mean you can’t find love, but like it became very obvious to me that other than their sicknesses, the relationship didn’t really have any solid ground. Idk, maybe I need to rewatch it or something but good love stories make you walk away and wish you were in them (The Notebook, The Titanic, ect) but I was just ‘whatever’ about it when I walked out of the theatre. I also found the main girl to be very annoying. Personal bc I don’t like type A personalities and her control freak tendencies really pissed me off but that’s just me lol. I do however think Cole Sprouse has the chance to be this generations’ Ryan Gosling or Leonardo but HE NEEDS GOOD MATERIAL TO WORK WITH DAMMIT

The Nun

I love horror movies and when the nun came out in the conjuring movies, I had nightmares about that hoe so when I saw she was getting her own movie?! Bitch was hyped. But omg did this flop so hard. Jump scares every 2 mins does not equal a good horror movie. The plot was shitty, the twist in the end had no effect bc the audience wouldn’t give a shit about it and all in all it was the worst cash grab. I also hated Insidious last key but I’m just really picky about my horror movies so srry if you don’t care lmao

Suicide Squad

I’m sorry but it wasn’t a good movie. The editing was such a bad stylistic choice, the characters made no fucking sense (Harley Quinn would have not been like ‘dont mess with my friends lmao stab’ and the Aussie dude wouldn’t have came back after running away) and the ending was soooo trash and cringey. Also the witch monster chick looked worse than will Smith’s genie and THATS saying something.

A Quiet Place

Listen....I wanted Jim from the office to have a good movie debut as much as the next guy but....unfortunately that’s not how the cookie crumbled for me. The acting was good and so was the execution but the plot was fundamentally flawed for me. The secret to killing the monsters was laughable to me (like come on, was I supposed to believe that everyone was wiped out before people realized their weakness?) and that just wasn’t something I could get over tbh. As a writer I tend to solely look at the story behind the movie so a plot hole that big really puts me off. I thought the fam dynamic was gold tho (particularly between the dad and daughter)

[someone-elses-star]

The 100 6x10: Matryoshka Personal Narrative

Here we go again! I hope this week went by as quick for you as it did for me! I’m super excited to see this episode--but nervous because I heard that there might be a major character death? I mean....we just lost Kane next week? Why would they do that to us again?! Any speculations? I’ve been hearing that it might be Raven (though that seems off-plot from this season) and I’ve also been hearing Octavia (but she’s in the next episode so maybe later this season, but definitely not tonight). Also, BOB DIRECTS NEXT EPISODE!!! I’m so jazzed for that! 

Love you Eliza! They can’t kill you off if you’re the only one who introduces the upcoming episodes! Lmao

Haha the reminders showing us yesterday about Bellamy being super in love with Clarke and her return. Like we need that reminder. We have been replaying that scene all week!

Love Clarke on the motorcycle.

Uh oh! Who’s on the other motorcycles?

Our head? Our head? 

You tell her Clarke! 

Damn Josephine knows her away around no matter how many years she’s been gone.

Anybody reminded of the bunker on Earth from season 1 to this one? You know the one where we all started shipping Bellarke? Lol

Ohhh....bringing up the Josephine/Gabriel relationship.

Wow. Josephine actually seems human when talking about him.

Damn.....Clarke is seizing. Damn, she is sorta worried about Clarke, but....still mostly worried about saving her own ass. Not surprised.

Ope! Here is where Raven and Abby find out Clarke is “dead.”

Russell is out for their heads. His own doing, really. 

Yeah, Raven. Look guilty and mournful for Clarke!

So Simone said that to hurt them for hurting her?

Yes, Russell, you’re fault. But not for letting them in. For trying to kill Clarke.

Awwww....calling Madi Clarke’s daughter always gets to me!

Wow. Simone is out for BLOOD!

Just like them? You are worse than them! 

Oh god?! Who are they going to kill?!?!

Oh. Telling people the truth! Good for him!

Do I hear the sounds of rebellion?

Gaia and Echo teamwork! We are getting almost all the spoiler scenes in the first ten minutes, are we? Damn.

REBELLION! REBELLION! 

Rebellion is never really peaceful, though, is it?

You tell him Echo! Haha

Wow. Make them choose who dies? Extra cruel. 

Plan B. Always have a Plan B.

I love Echo. I do. I may not like her and Bellamy together romantically, but I really, really LOVE her!

Wow Gaia. Put on the pressure. 

That’s easy....Murphy. Yup.

You tell him Madi!

Ohh....The truth is coming out!

Abby is going to kill him!

Eventually.....lol. Emori.

Abby totally giving him the slap.

You tell him, Abby!

Commercial Break #1 Thoughts: Honestly, I haven’t liked Abby this season, or most seasons, but it’s nice to see her acting like a real mother again. And also, I love Murphy, but he gets off wayyyyy too easy most time. Do I want him dead? NO! Do I agree that he would be the one to choose....don’t hate me!....but probably so. He did betray them and all. He did the right thing in the end. Sure. But mostly through a lot of outside pressure, and he probably would have gone through with it if Josephine didn’t stab him in the leg and shit. He’s very into saving his own ass. 

Is Josephine really singing....that song? Lol

Ohhh....back in the mind stuff! And it is MESSY and falling apart!

Ohhh their memories are mixing now! That is definitely not good! Way to really push the point that Clarke’s brain is deteriorating. 

Not much. Yes, I would definitely concur.

Ohhh. Her second body really didn’t want to be taken!

Josephine is actually scared. Good.

I love Clarke with a plan!

Hmmm....I hope those memories aren’t important....

Our brain, now Clarke? This is scaring me that she keeps saying “our.”

Leave it to Raven to put Clarke through hell and then give Murphy an easy talk.

So did Gaia purposely get taken?

Madi is ANGRY! 

The only person dying tonight is Russell. How come I don’t agree?

Wow. Very tense lunchtime. 

Is Ty good....or bad? 

Ohhhhh is Ty going to get himself killed because he can’t wait for the rebellion?

OH....is Simone going to die? Good riddance? I suppose....? Yup. Dead. 

No wonder Russell is going to be out for blood this episode. His poor choices are leading to his whole family’s demise. 

Commercial Break #2 Thoughts: Is anyone actually feeling bad for the Primes? I mean, I’m not, but I want to know if there is anyone out there still thinking they are good when their whole brainwashing shit is coming out. Bring on the rebellion! And seriously, already halfway through the episode? I feel, like usual, that we’ve got a lot, but still not enough. I really hope the last few episodes are not rushed because of this. That would suck. I know we’ll get a cliffhanger-ish thing like we usually do, but I hope it is after some real plot growth. Also, so we are probs not going to see Bellamy this episode? Is that what’s happening? Because next to episodes descriptions are all Bellamy/Octavia descriptions which makes me worry also about Clarke’s health. I see Eliza’s name in the cast section of both, but....still worried.

Ope. Josephine and Gabriel memories in different bodies!

Aww.....that’s so cute. I still hate her. And this is so the start of Gabriel’s hate for the Prime system.

Clarke is so sympathizing. She needs to stop being so nice.

Wow. They’re bonding. Damn. Fuck. Fine. Save them both, but give Clarke back her body. And let her live, of course. 

And here is Josephine with an ax. That’s not good. Definitely can’t not trust the psychopath.

And....there goes Josephine. But...Clarke is still inside? How? Is Josephine gone completely now? Or is she awake in Clarke’s body?

And uh oh! Killer vines!

Commercial Break #3 Thoughts: Don’t have many thoughts because that was not a lot before the next set of commercials. But I think we’re somehow seeing Josephine awake somehow? Like, why was it her who regained control when her memories were wiped? And what does this mean for Clarke’s survival? Especially when I’m convinced Josephine was going to use that ax against Clarke? Meaning she can STILL definitely NOT be trusted to keep any sort of deal in keeping them both alive. Josephine is definitely the female Murphy--a little more psycho, yes, but still valid.

At least those commercials didn’t last.

And here is the body being choked! And Gabriel and Octavia to the rescue! 

Nope....Josephine. Not Clarke.

Oh. He does still love her.  That’s not good.

Yeah, Octavia. Ask about Clarke! Save Clarke!

Wow. This is such a mess!

Damn. You guys didn’t honestly think that she was to be trusted. 

You go Bellamy!

“Because of course it is!” What sass!

Blake reunion!

You tell her Bellamy! Protect Clarke, Octavia, and your people. In that order if you don’t mind!

Gaia and Madi confrontation!

Wow Madi is really going bad! Save her!

Yes! Abby is talking sense!

That’s what you get for letting a child become Heda! 

Damn. Shedheda was horrible!

Wow Abby is really going full on mother hen now!

Raven asking the right questions! Good girl!

And this is where we are going to get Madi’s exorcism scene next week!

Ohh....the child is spared, but all the others are burned?

Very witch trials.

Commercial Break #4 Thoughts: Madi is fully gone now. Gotta get that exorcism done. Which is totally next week in Bob’s directorial debut episode next week! SO EXCITED! Which from the behind the scenes pics seems to have Jackson in it, so if he survives the burning at the stake thing, I’m thinking everyone else will, too. Just a theory, but Echo has got to come through in some aspect. And also, with some help from the rebellious people who have already been told the truth? Well. here comes the last fifteen minutes. The last five minutes of all this season’s episodes have been intense, so I wonder what the last five will bring this episode. I’m nervous. And excited. But mostly nervous as always. This show is totally going to make me go prematurely grey! 

Russell giving his dictatorship speech. Gotta have it. 

Echo is totally ready. 

You tell them Emori! 

Very witch trials. 

Damn it, Riker! What the hell?!? Can’t trust any of these bastards.

The chick on the motorcycle is going to save them last moment. Calling it.

Or.....Murphy will save them?

Hmmmm....he’s considering it.

And....now they’re safe? Again?

Ohhh....and Raven is going to use the computer to erase Madi’s bad side.

But they are still going to burn the guy who killed Simone. Typical.

I could see that coming a mile away. Gotta keep everyone in fear of the Primes.

Commercial Break #5 Thoughts: Fear is what keeps the people under control. Biggest sign of a dictatorship. And further proof that the Primes are the real bad guys here. Even Russell in his best moments has always been a brainwashing dictator playing himself off as a god. Also, last five minutes are coming up! Always the most intense! Does anyone else believe this is when we will find if Clarke is going to live or die. I really would stop watching if she died. She’s the show for me.

SAVE CLARKE Gabriel! 

Stop with the heart eyes! Only Bellamy and Clarke can have heart eyes!

She was right to depend on you. 

Gabriel making hard decisions. 

He better still save Clarke!

Either that, or the Blake’s will probably kill him.

Bellamy is seriously pissed. Save his Clarke!

Damn right, Gabriel! The only one who can be trusted I think. Maybe.

Death is life. Very poetic.

And Clarke is now seeing her mind breaking apart. 

Okay. Save her! Save her now! I’m scared! Restart her heart! 

Why is she still here!?

WHAT?!?!?!?! 

IS she really killing Clarke?

Oh God. 

Heart and the head. Hear and the head!

Save her Bellamy! This is love! 

Is that the only kiss we are only ever going to see?

Damn....are we really losing Clarke?

Oh my god. My heart seriously was stopping and racing!

The head and the heart! This is so a love confession!

THAT WAS A LOVE CONFESSION!!!!!

My hands are still shaking from thinking that they were really killing off Clarke!

[trashforhockeyguys]

For The Rest of Time// Auston Matthews

Requested by anon: Can you do one where she’s Mitch’s little sister and is dating/ planning to marry Auston?

A/N: Okay I literally wrote this in like 2 hours because I really loved this request and thought it was adorable, so sorry if it’s all over the place and awful. But anyway, thanks to whoever sent this in to me, I hope you like it, and I hope you start feeling better soon!

There was almost no one that you loved more than your big brother. Mitch, who was two years older than you, was literally your favorite person in the entire world. The two of you were thick as thieves and did practically everything together growing up.

He held your hand as you walked into your first day of school, a tradition that you continued until he left to play hockey elsewhere. He not so secretly stalked you on every date you went on, just to make sure you were being treated right. Mitch also loved to threaten any possible boyfriends, which always made you laugh because Mitch was so scrawny. Not to mention he wasn’t that intimidating with his mullet.

You assumed that Mitch had told his teammates on the Leafs all about his little sister. Since the goof never stopped talking about you when he was away. However, you couldn’t have been more wrong.

“Hey! This is a closed practice!” One of Mitch’s teammates yelled.

“Yeah, I know,” You replied, “But, Mitchy told me I had to wait on his ass.”

The player, that you soon recognized as the great Auston Matthews, huffed. You were honestly a little pissed off at him due to the look he shot you. But if you weren’t mad, you probably would’ve been freaking out. You were talking to, and standing not far away from, Auston fucking Matthews. He hadn’t even made his NHL debut yet and he was already the Wonder Boy of the NHL.

“Hey Marner!” Auston called,” You know this chick?”

You could see Mitch mumble a quick curse and skated over to the open door. He quickly made his way over to where Auston was standing. You almost wanted to laugh. Mitch looked like he’d been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

“Yeah, that’s my little sister.”

“Fuck man! I didn’t know you had a sister!” Auston all but yelled.

“Wow Bitchell,” You narrowed your eyes, “You didn’t tell them about your favorite person, eh?”

“I’m not going to hear the end of this am I?” Mitch groaned.

“Absolutely not,” You promised,” Now get your ass on the ice, Bitchell. I really don’t want to stay late because you got in trouble.”

“Can you stop calling me that?” He asked.

You looked at him and laughed, very loudly, “Absolutely not. Now GO!”

He tapped Auston’s shoulder and walked back towards the ice. Auston winked before he turned to follow Mitch. That’s how it all started. That stupid wink.

Not long after the season started, you were hanging out in Mitch’s apartment, Auston was there too. Mitch randomly had to go to the store. That left you and Auston awkwardly sitting on the couch together, watching The Mighty Ducks.

You slowly noticed Auston’s hand moving closer to yours. You probably would’ve called him out on it, if you weren’t craving his touch. You wanted to blame it on the fact that you’d just broken up with your boyfriend not long before, and he was Auston Matthews. You could try and blame it on the fact that he was always looking at you, or winking, or smiling. You tried to play it off, after all, you were two years younger than the nineteen-year-old rookie, and you were his teammates little sister.

However, that way of thinking was thrown out the window a few weeks later. You’d been spending more and more time with Mitch, mainly because you knew you’d get to see Auston. The two of you had gotten closer, you texted just about every single day and snapchatted almost nonstop. There was some flirting for sure, but you were still trying to brush it off.

That was, until Auston pulled you away from everyone at dinner one night, and kissed you. You’d been shocked to say the least, but after that it was like full speed ahead. You’d never imagined that you’d ever date an NHL player, much less one as high profile as Auston.

The two of you caught a lot of flack for your relationship too, seeing as you were only sixteen when you started dating. The only major issue of your relationship, was having to tell Mitch about it. But somehow, your big brother was okay with you and Auston.

So, four long years later, you were still happily dating Auston. After graduating high school, you started at U of T and went to every home game. You always had on Auston’s jersey and most days you were in his shirts and sweatpants.

The two of you often drove Mitch crazy, because you were almost always cuddling or holding hands. If you ever kissed in front of your brother, he was almost guaranteed to make some sort of gagging noise. But when you’d look over at your big brother, he’d always have the biggest smile on his face. He knew you were undeniably happy, and that was good enough for him.

Currently, you were at Matt Martian’s wedding. You watched as Matt and Sydney shared their first dance. Auston had his hand on your thigh, which is where it had been since the ceremony ended and the reception had started. You felt Auston squeeze your thigh, causing you to smile.

“I can’t wait to marry you,” He whispered in your ear.

You looked over at him and raised your eyebrows, “Well, that requires you to put a ring on it first, bub.”

“I tried, someone wouldn’t take it,” He reminded you.

You leaned into him, “You know that’s not what happened. I told you that you needed to talk to Mitchy first.”

“I told you I’d talk to him after, I already got your dad on board.”

Auston had proposed to you nearly two weeks ago. You’d said yes of course, with one condition, he had to get Mitch’s approval before you’d actually accept the ring. He knew how important it was for you to have your brother’s approval, especially since Auston was Mitch’s teammate. The last thing you wanted to do was make anything weird or awkward, not when the team had done so well last season.

“I can’t wait to marry you,” Auston whispered in your ear, “ I wanna call you my wife. I can’t wait to start a family with you either.”

“Oh really?”

“Mmm, I want to be able to look up during a game, and know that you’re up there with our kids,” He admitted.

“Oh? More than one?” You questioned.

“I was hoping more than one, if you’d let me,” He shrugged.

The two of you seemed to forget that you were at a wedding, around his entire team. You were in your own little world. Lost in your conversation with Auston. You were practically sitting on his lap at this point. But neither of you cared.

“Oh bub, you know I want a big family,” You grinned,” At least two or three, maybe more depending on how they turn out. We’ll get them all little baby Matthews jerseys. They can run around the rink, and play mini sticks together. They’d probably have the entire team wrapped around their little fingers too.”

“Really?” Auston’s smile was big and bright,” You’ve thought about it.”

“Yeah, I think about it all the damn time, actually,” You said sheepishly.

“You sure you don’t want that ring right now?” He questioned,” Because I have it in my pocket.”

“What the fuck man!” Mitch exclaimed,” You bought an engagement ring for my baby sister, and didn’t even talk to me about it.”

“Mitchy, we were going to talk to you about it-“

“Whatever,” He mumbled, “Excuse me.”

You sighed and stood from your chair, “I’ll be right back.”

You made your way towards the door that Mitch walked out of. You knew he probably wasn’t mad, more like just upset that he hadn’t been told sooner. Mitch was always the first person to know about something going on in your life. This would be one of the first times that you hadn’t told him about something almost as soon as it happened.

“You really love him, huh?” Mitch said once you were out on the patio.

“I wouldn’t still be dating him if I didn’t,” You admitted,” I know you probably aren’t overly thrilled. But I can’t help it, I plan on loving him for the rest of my life.”

He let out a deep breath and shoved his hands in his pockets. He glanced back inside the building, towards where Auston was watching you and your brother, clearly waiting to see what happened.

“He better treat you right,” Mitch finally said, “I’ll kick his ass if he doesn’t.”

“So, you’re okay with this?” You questioned cautiously.

“I’ve always been okay with it, Y/N,” He promised you, “I just want you to be happy, and if Auston makes you happy than who am I to stand in the way.”

You hugged Mitch as tightly as you possibly could. Truthfully, you probably wouldn’t have said yes to Auston if Mitch hadn’t approved. But you also knew there was almost no way that Mitch would say no. He loved Auston, and although he often gave you two shit, he loved how happy Auston made you.

“C’mon, let’s go,” Mitch said nudging you towards the door.

You slid back into your seat and leaned over to kiss Auston. He didn’t have to ask, because he could tell by the unbridled smile on your face. You were grinning so hard it hurt, but you couldn’t stop either. Auston at Mitch, who was smiling just as big as he nodded at Auston.

“I think you have something you want to give her,” Mitch told him.

Auston glanced around the room, almost everyone was dancing now. So, all of this would go unnoticed, which was fine by you. You didn’t want to take away from Matt and Sydney, this was their day after all. But as Auston laughed slightly and reached into his pocket, you couldn’t help but start to tear up.

“Alright, I already gave the big speech once,” He said, flicking open the velvet box, “ Y/N Marner, will you please marry me?”

“Of course, I will,” You nodded, a few tears falling down your cheeks.

Auston seemed to breathe a sigh of relief. You watched through blurry eyes as he slipped the ring on your finger. The medal was cold, but you liked the weight of it on your finger. You admired it for a second before kissing Auston again.

The both of you laughed as Mitch pulled you in for a big group hug. Before you could react, the other Leafs joined in, seemingly understanding what had just happened. Matt pulled you in for an almost bone crushing hug, stating that you were like his daughter, and how proud he was of the woman you’d become.

As the rest of your hockey family gathered around to congratulate you two, you reached for Auston’s hand. He grinned at you and squeezed it. You realized that you wouldn’t want any other life, because all was as it should be. 

[bellatrixobsessed1]

Wrought Iron Machine

This fic is a remake of https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10927451/1/Iron-Lotus I published that one about 5 years ago. I was going to simply update it but I kind of didn't like what I had started. This fic will be the same exact principal and theme but with a more solid direction and (imo) better writing.

I'd also like to note that this is a somewhat AU setting in that it takes place at the time of LoK but with the Avatar characters (Azula, Zuko, etc.) still in their teen years.

Summary: Wrought Iron Machine is in an 80′s style metal band. With rival band, Fire Of Agni on the rise, Kuvira begins to far that her band is past its prime and fading out of popularity. Between an in-band rivalry and a rocky engagement, she fears for how they will fare in battle of the bands. 

Kuvira nears a sleeping Gazhan, scowling to herself as she nearly trips over an empty beer bottle. The man is a mess. A hungover mess, it’s not the kind of image she wants for Wrought Iron Machine. She doesn’t want to be even in the same realm as Fire Of Agni with their trashy and shallow lyrics. All that those kids do is get drunk or high and make a mess of whatever venue is cursed with hosting their show. And that isn’t even factoring in the controversy they had most recently stirred and continue to stir. She nudges Gazhan awake. “Get yourself together, we have another show tonight.” It takes some furious willpower to not ask him what the hell he was thinking, why the hell he thought it would be a good idea to drink so heavily the night before a show.

She knows the answer anyways. They had just finished their first show of the Fire Nation stretch of their world tour. She admits that it is reason enough to celebrate. But some restraint on his behalf would have been nice.

“Come on, Gazhan.” She hisses, giving him another nudge.

“Eh, leave ‘im.” Ming mutters sleepily. “Just let ‘im be.”

Kuvira could swear that Ming is at least slightly hungover, herself. The two usually drink together, she won’t be surprised to find that last night had been any different. “I’ll let him be when I know he won’t make us late for our own show. We’ve been in this industry for nearly two decades now, and we haven’t cancelled or been late yet.”

Ming rolls her eyes. “When are you gonna pull that stick out of your asshole? This is rock ‘n roll, not some high-class business conference.”

Kuvira pinches her nose. She doesn’t have time to butt heads with Ming again. “Just make sure he gets up.” She still has to fix herself a cup of tea. Raava knows that her throat would soon depend on those. She sits herself down, staring at the memorabilia hung on the wall; golden record won during the height of their fame, a silver one from when they had first began, a cluster of medals and ribbons, and an even bigger slew of magazine pages and covers they had been featured on.

Those are becoming fewer and fewer and she is beginning to wonder if their time in the spotlight is over. Maybe it has been for a while. People are moving onto the next big thing. Unfortunately, the next big thing seems to be Fire Of Agni. Kuvira doesn’t understand, it is just noise. Senseless noise and so much screaming. Screaming to the point where one could barely discern any of the lyrics--perhaps that is a mercy.

Kuvira finishes her tea and lights up a cigarette.

“What’s the point in having tea if you’re just gonna do that?” Baatar takes a seat across the table. There is an undertone of chiding about his words.

She gives her fiance a pointed sigh.

Hearing it he state, “you said that you were done with that.”

“Not now Baatar…” She brings the cigarette to her lips.

“Then when?” He asks. “After your lungs are black and…”

She holds up a hand.

“How are you going to sing if you burn your lungs up?”

It takes a deal of self-control to keep from slamming her hand on the table. She is tired of the well-meaning lectures. “Does it really matter?” She asked. “How much longer do you think Wrought Iron Machine is going to last? Do you remember when we played in Shu Jing, ten years ago? We sold out, the venue was overflowing. Now we just barely get it half-full.”

“We sold out in Republic City, Zaofu, Omashu, and...”

“Of course we sold out in Zaofu, that’s our home city! We sell out in the Earth Kingdom all the time, it’s our home land.”

“What about Repub--”

“Do you know who else sells out in the Earth Kingdom?”

Baatar frowns and, with a roll of his eyes, says it as she does, “Fire Of Agni.”

“And they just debuted, what? A month ago? Yet we can’t even sell out one Fire Nation show anymore. We don’t even sell half of our tickets in the Tribes.”

“Does anyone sell out in the Tribes?” Baatar asks.

“We used to…” She trails off. Her anger subsiding with it.

Baatar takes her hand and plucks the cigarette from between her fingers and puts it out on the table. He squeezes her hand. She stares at the cigarette, still convinced that it truly didn’t matter. She is under the impression that she can’t sing like she used to no matter what she does. Many years of harsher vocal styles, a few instances of laryngitis, and a phonomicrosurgery later her vocal cords aren’t what they used to be. And she is only in her early forties.

She can’t help but wonder if there was anything she could have done to prevent her case of polyps.

Perhaps she should have listened when her doctors had cautioned her to take more breaks and write a few more ballads.

Oh Raava, she could only imagine the abuse the Fire Of Agni girl’s throat and vocal cords were taking. At least Kuvira has some smooth vocals in her songs. From the sound of it, the girl does all of the screaming and her brother takes the clean vocals.

“What are you thinking about?” Baatar asks.

She doesn’t have time to answer when she hears a, “get your lazy, hungover ass out of bed, raavadammit!”

It is much too loud to be Ming. She hears a grumble and a snort and the shifting of blankets against a mattress.

“Get the fuck up!” There comes the sound of something being thrown and then footsteps coming towards she and Baatar. P’Li yanks a chair out.

“Morning P’Li.” Baatar greets.

“He’s so fucking lazy. I swear.” She turns to Kuvira. “Got a light?” Every time a new stressor arose, so would the woman’s lighter. Not that Kuvira blamed her anymore.

“Baatar just took my last.”

“Of course.” P’Li grumbles. “Ya know, this is why we’re falling behind. Gazhan can’t even roll his lazy ass outta bed.”

Kuvira rolls her eyes. Perhaps that is one of many reasons. “When are the two of you going to end this feud of yours? We can’t afford in-band fights when we have Fire Of Agni to rival.”

“It’ll end when Ghazan stops picking up groupie chicks and starts picking up his bass.” She pauses. “Fuck, you would think he’d notice how Ming looks at ‘im.”

A fair point. “As long as he’s ready by tonight, I suppose that it doesn’t matter.” And it doesn’t. It matters as little as she resuming her smoking habit. They are falling behind so she might as well do what she will. Her voice has already taken some damage, what is one more cigarette? She stares out the window as Yon Rha’s village comes into view. Is she even having fun anymore? Once upon a time, back when she was in her early twenties, back when they had only a few months under their belts, she approached every show with a sense of eagerness and giddy anticipation. Now she can’t even muster a shred of enthusiasm. Does she even like this anymore? Does she even want to do it? Is Fire Of Agni really destroying the metal scene for her that much?

When had things become less about the music and more about the fame?

[legrandepapillon]

Put On A Show (mardrienne)

Summary: Adrienne was a powerhouse, a captivating light in a sea of black. And Martha wanted her.  Prompt: “While I was looking away my kid went up to you and said ‘My mom thinks you’re cute’ and I was really hoping I could tell you that myself but whoops” Author’s Notes: ‘Lights’ is the name of the fashion line Hercules had on the runway. It was called this because all of the outfits contained either small LED lights or glitter.Also, listen to the song Mine by Bazzi (the slowed version). That shit is a mfn bop and I’ve had it on repeat ever since I started this

Martha claps enthusiastically with the rest of the crowd as the line of models complete their final sashay down the runway, all of them somehow managing to look glistening under the deep maroon spotlight under the stage as the evening gown twirled lightly around her ankles. This particular fashion line was so far one of her favorites that Hercules had done, and she was glad that his line had been allowed to be featured in the New York Fashion Week main event. The burlesque style dresses and well cut tuxedos had looked fantastic on the models, and he himself seemed to be glowing under the praise he was probably already receiving from critics.

Though… if the woman was going to confess, she wasn’t there for Hercules at all. She felt a tad guilty and selfish for admitting this to herself, especially since Herc had been designing for her fashion company since the thing was nothing but a little pop-up show on the corner of some rundown neighborhood. However, she simply couldn’t lie to herself as well as everyone else. Though no one had even seen the models Hercules had chosen for the Lights debut─he’d wanted it to be a surprise, who he was going to have in those spectacular dresses that Martha had only glimpsed once before this─Martha had known he wouldn’t be able to resist having either of the Lafayette twins in the show. And she’d been right.

The two famous French models that had immigrated to America had gained quite the cult following. Whether it be for the boys taste for always finding himself in some sort of celebrity scandal─the latest escapade in his long list of lovers and debauchery was getting caught sleeping with Martha’s own ex-husband, George Washington─or the fact that the nobody really knew anything about his sister. Adrienne de Lafayette was a mystery that the American public was desperate to solve… Martha included. She never was seen outside of a runway, and she had a squeaky clean record. No vindictive exes, no shady past, certainly none of the scandal that shrouded her brother’s reputation like the plague.

And ever since Martha had seen her in someone else’s line the previous year at Fashion Week, the older woman had had the slightest bit of a crush on her.

This was Martha’s niche, you see? She fell in love with mysteries, with things she couldn’t have, with things always just out of her grasp. George had been that. An… enigma. A giant question mark, just begging to be turned into a statement. She’d spent ten years as the Democratic congressman’s wife, attempting to do just that. Solve who he was, knock down those walls he so loved to build. The only thing she managed to find out was that he’d been cheating on her for five of those ten years with his hot young secretary. His hot young boy secretary.

(The kid got married too quickly after that scandal and married some poor soul that probably didn’t even have the slightest clue of his inclination to carry on affairs.)

She knew it got her hurt. She knew that mysteries were mysteries for a reason and not everything could be deciphered… but she couldn’t help herself. Adrienne was… beautiful. Her daughter had called it a minor obsession─the way she practically hoarded all the magazines the woman was featured in. Lovely hooded green eyes that seemed to say nothing and everything at all. A slender frame with a walk that always made her seem like she wasn’t quiet floating… more like floating. A bright smile─though, it was very rarely seen in her shows─that dazzled anyone with half a brain and a pair of eyes.

And it wasn’t just the looks. It was… the allure. She had a demeanor that called for… no, demanded attention. It was… stunning.

“Mom?” Patsy says, and Martha realizes she’d been staring at the space where Adrienne’s retreating back had once been. She blinks herself out of her mind and turns to look around the room. Those that were invited were slowly making their way to the rooftop venue for the afterparty, filtering out of the room. In the corner of her eye, she can see Hercules giving an interview for some magazine so she decided to catch up with him later.

“Yes, let’s go. I want to get there before him.”

Adrienne can’t help but feel considerably more relaxed when she find Gilbert’s face in the crowd of the after party, flirting with that politician he’s been fucking and looking positively electric. She is beginning to think that this George guy isn’t just another one of his fucks but having quite the effect on him, seeing as he hasn’t looked so positively electric in a long time. She wishes she could say the same for herself, but she probably looks half a mess right now. Her heels are killing her, her eyes and cheeks hurt from smiling into the flashes of cameras, and she’s so tired of playing nice with the A-list sleazebags that felt simply because she didn’t have a ‘boyfriend’, they were owed her attention. She just wants to go home with Gil, put in a copy of White Chicks and drink some nice warm tea.

Though, judging by the two men’s flitting glances and the way they keep inching near the exit, she’ll be partaking in the Wayans comedy classic alone.

Before she can finish parting her way through the crowd to get a confirmation on that, however, a hand relaxes onto her forearm and gives a gentle tug. She’s about to turn and snap─once and for all, she was done with this shit─but instead of some creep, she finds the slightly cherubic face of a young girl. The child can’t be much older than fifteen or sixteen, which meant she certainly had no business at the late hours afterparty. Didn’t she have school in the morning, or something?

“Hi, Miss de Lafayette, yes?” the young girl asks, in surprisingly eloquent French. Adrienne has to school her expression in order not to seem so excited. The only time she’d ever really spoken much of her native tongue since leaving her home in France was when she was alone with her brother─well, it was the only time she could at least get a challenge out of a conversation. America, surprisingly, did not have a ton of French-speaking models or fashion designers─which meant she’d been deprived of good conversation for awhile.

Mood admittedly a little better, but not by much, Adrienne responds with, “Yeah, that’s me. What do you need, little one?”

“I… I have something to ask you. But I’m afraid that if anyone hears it in English, it could get my mother in a lot of trouble.” The girl is fidgeting with her hands─wringing them out as she glances around. Maybe she’s trying to make sure said mother is out of earshot, or maybe she’s trying to keep something far more serious under wraps.

Whatever it is, Adrienne is immediately suspicious of it. A faint call to mind of how much of a mess Gilbert had been when he’d gotten mixed up with drugs for all those years sends a chill down her spine, and she takes a cautious away from the younger lady. “Uh… if you’re trying to get me into some sort of drug thing, I’m not interested.”

“What? No! I just wanted to tell you that my mom is pansexual, and she’s very… very interested in you. Martha? You know, the owner of the company that the guy that did this line helps design for?”

“Mart─oh! Martha Washington?” Adri knows her. The woman was a powerhouse in the industry. She had a fairly expensive line that sold millions everyday, and was so influential in the fashion community, she helped the young designers that worked under her get their upstart with their own companies. She created competition for herself, if only to have a challenge. Martha Washington’s reputation preceded her─which was saying a lot, because she started as some little nobody congressman’s wife and worked her way up by playing the field. Adrienne was pretty sure she was in love with that woman─or at least, in love with her cunning.

She’d nearly slapped the shit out of her brother when she found out she was fucking Martha Washington’s cheating-ass ex-husband.

“That would be her. Her reputation is already consistently tarnished by my step-father’s scandals, so she can’t afford to come out of the closet. But she’s got the biggest crush on you. I just want her to be happy, you see? So. I figured if she wouldn’t tell you, then I will.”

Once again, Adrienne finds herself having to rush to school her features into something professional, make sure this little sweet girl didn’t see the internal fangirl she was having. Martha had a crush on her? Her?! She was just some model, she didn’t even have half the attention her brother got. How could Martha even know about her?

“Ha, you’re a sweet kid,” she says, instead of asking all those questions. If this was true─which, she couldn’t see the child’s motives for lying─then she wanted to make a good impression. She didn’t want to be a giggling, blushing mess should Martha find her daughter and join their conversation.

And just Adri’s luck, that’s the exact thing that happens.

“Patsy? What are you doing bothering Miss de Lafayette?” a voice asks, and both girls eyes flit up. For a moment, Adrienne thinks the woman looks out of place. No, that’s not it… she looks significantly less important than she actually is. Weaker, even. She looks like she’d been dragged to this by her rich, connected husband─not that she was the one that fronted most of the money to make it happen. The dress she wears is less evening party and more housewife─even having soft pastel blues and pinks─, and her hair isn’t in any favor elegant updo but hanging loosely around her shoulders. Her eyes are warm and brown, and there’s a look of nervous concern on her face.

“She’s not bothering me. Simply telling me about… your eagerness to meet me. I don’t believe we’ve been properly introduced,” Adrienne tries, using all her efforts to be as smooth as humanly possible. Don’t fuck this up. Don’t fuck this up. Don’t. Fuck. This. Up.

“Well, I was hoping to tell you that myself,” Martha says, aiming a careful glare to her daughter─who had been trying to inconspicuously sneak away from the conversation the moment she heard her mother’s voice. She mouths an apology before running off to join her step-father and Gilbert, probably much preferring to be around the two laughing men than her mother’s impending wrath. “But… yes. I actually, erm… I─”

“It’s okay, Martha. I know,” Adrienne comforts, placing a light hand on the other woman’s bicep─checking her expression to make sure the touch is welcome. When all she receives in response is a light blush and wide eyes, she gives a cheeky grin. Was this woman was actually… cute? “I have some ideas for some of your merchandise. Here’s my number. Maybe we can talk some time?”

Once the card is in her hand, Martha manages to find her words─digging her own card out of her clutch to pass it to Adrienne. “I’d like that. This is my number. You can contact me here.”

Figuring now is a good time to leave before things get awkward, Adrienne lowers her hand and takes a careful step back─jerking her thumb over her shoulder as she begins moving towards the man. “Well… I’ve got to go get my brother. He’s trouble if left alone too long, y’know? I’ll call you, though!”

Later that night, when Gilbert is snuggled up to George in bed and Patsy is thoroughly grounded in her room, both women pick up their phones and are especially delighted to find their notifications blowing up with headlines.

ADRIENNE DE LAFAYETTE SEEN FLIRTING WITH CEO OF FASHION       COMPANY: HAS THE MYSTERIOUS WOMAN FINALLY BEEN SOLVED?

[fictionalarsonist]

「 exo_chanyeol | Deceptionist 」

pairing: chanyeol ⨯ reader feat. exo’s junmyeon ++kyungsoo, baekhyun and jongdae genre: angst, some fluff, idol reader!au, guitarrist pcy!au (plotwise) rating: PG-13 (slight cursing) type: drabble word count: 4.5K

… As it has been said in a song _Drabble Series 11. “I’ve got slicked back hair Skin tight jeans Cadillac car And a teenage dream" - Rocker by AC/DC

a/n: the story’s not edited, so there might be mistakes.

「 MASTERLIST | REQUEST 」

A stable boring but well-paying office job with a leash around his neck, drinking some trendy caffeine filled poison every morning and meeting his colleagues every night to lose the leash for a few hours, but only enough because the next day there’d be more of the same. Such a predictable future where he’d come over to his parents’ house during every weekend before seeing some chick playing hard to get while looking down on him until he’s making enough money to buy his upgraded version of anything she wants to live in that’s better than any of her nosy friends’, next thing a baby and he’d go to some of the back in the day’s routine with his old friends looking for an easy to get younger catch that’d last a night if he’s not too tired.

If life’s a train track, carefully planned and set by his well-off parents, then Chanyeol’s a train wreck, not the least sorry for destroying all this utopia and get on his own way, decided to be the worst disappointment of everyone lives. He doesn’t mind walking out of his house when his father told him to after going through a crazy range and breaking Chanyeol’s beloved guitar in pieces with bloodshot eyes, Chanyeol can’t really believe his mother tears are for him, it just seems like she’s crying for the now deconstructed image she has of him, Chanyeol can’t help but cry too, he’s not sure for what reason, but he cries as well. The dirty, small house doesn’t even have a proper door, let alone a locker, is much different from the house he came from, but it’s better than living in the streets and is far better than living a lie. There’s this guy, older than him, who lives a life he doesn’t know well but has no choice but share the small house with, his incomes are too short to pay for it alone and since he takes most of his times to dedicate to his dream, going for auditions and whatever he can get as long as he keeps playing his guitar.

Confined in a very small bedroom where his bed is a dirty comforter on the floor, Chanyeol’s past the time where he’d tell himself he made the right choice, he hears when the front door is slammed shut, a tell-tale that his roommate arrived, he doesn’t mind the sound of things falling on the floor echoing the background, nor the mumbled, incomprehensible talking, muffled not by the almost paper-thin walls but probably from the alcohol, at most, Chanyeol knows, Junmyeon probably brought someone in and he reaches out for his headphones.

Holding the pencil with his teeth, Chanyeol keeps his eyes narrowed at the music sheet in front of him while his fingers are drawn back to play with the well-known chords with a heartfelt familiarity, he stops every once to write down the new outcomes, to correct something, to write down a side-note, too distracted into his music and eager to ignore any other sound aside from his guitar to notice anything else.

It’s not a sound but a smell that makes Chanyeol stop everything he’s doing, it’s different than the smell of old sweat and dirty laundry that lingers around the house, not him nor Junmyeon are the cleanest people in the world, as long as he’s comfortable, he doesn’t mind wearing the same clothes as much as possible, it means he doesn’t have to deal with that confusing machine too much. But, again, it’s none of those smells, it smells like food and Chanyeol doesn’t stop to notice that it smells delicious and appetizing, he simply places his guitar and headphones down, jolting up towards the kitchen as fast as he can, the remembrance of Junmyeon almost setting the house on fire the last time he tried cooking while drunk almost causing him to panic.

The sight of Junmyeon passed out on the small sofa in the room between the two bedrooms, the even smaller bathroom and the insignificant kitchen makes Chanyeol doesn’t help.

“Do you want to kill everyone?”, he doesn’t want to look at whoever you are, instead, occupies himself with turning off the stove and whatever else he can find.

“What are you doing?”, you turn away from the vegetable you’re cutting to push Chanyeol away and he looks at you outraged.

He watches as you turn it all on again and checks on everything, his mouth agape and a dumbstruck look on his face.

“Me?”, he points at himself with a tasteless side-smile, “you’re the stranger cooking in my house!”, he protests, looking up and down at you.

Maybe at first, Chanyeol’s in doubt, but at a second glance he’s more convinced that he’s not seeing things and knows exactly who you are, the casual, training clothing and your bare face don’t really hide you as much as you’d want to.

It’d be hard to find a single person who wouldn’t recognize you, your face is everywhere, the newest girl group from one of the top three entertainment company, trending number one in every chart right after debut and though Chanyeol admits the music’s good, he’s already sick and tired of listening his friend and band member Baekhyun sing the chorus over and over again, whenever there’s a break in the rehearsal earlier the night before, Kyungsoo’s the one who spoke what went through Chanyeol’s mind.

“There must be some talent in the middle of this brainwashing bullshit”, the guy sounded much colder than he would, but still they shared the same thought.

No one in the band, not even Baekhyun who couldn’t stop talking about how hot you are, was very fond of mainstream artists when they work so hard with so little opportunities, so every now and then a discussion like this comes out. Now, looking at you up close there are two things Chanyeol can say for sure, the first is that, indeed, Baekhyun was unfair by saying you’re hot because seeing you up close like this and using no makeup, saying that you’re hot doesn’t even get close to how good you look and he tries to think about how’d be to have you wearing one of those revealing clothes he saw on that poster he passed the day before, and, the second thing— What are you doing in his house?

“What the fuck are you even doing here?”, his words mixed with frustrations and irritation went a little higher than he thought he could go, much like a teenager in the embarrassing beginning of puberty.

A small and amused side smirk plays on the corner of your lips, eyebrows tilting up beautifully, Chanyeol observes against his will, just the slightest, mocking him, Chanyeol gulps down not as subtle as he wishes, trying to keep a straight face despite the creeping blush on his cheek, not to say that you find it adorable, but the moment where you could say something passes when the sound of the food shimmering loudly makes you step away to turn off the stove.

“I’m here just to take care of my brother”, your stern tone sounds nothing like the sweet talker you are on the TV, “I’ll leave when I’m done”, you tell him over your shoulder while keeping your attention on the food once again.

“Brother?”, Chanyeol frowns and glance at the passed-out image of Junmyeon on the couch before looking back at you in disbelief, “you mean him?”, Junmyeon snores loudly as if to make Chanyeol’s outraged point even clearer.

“Yeah”, you reply giving little to no importance to his question even though your nerves are sky-rocketing, no one supposed to see you, no one!

“Kim Junmyeon”, Chanyeol tries again with insistence, “that Kim Junmyeon”, he points at the older guy as he walks to your side, “That guy’s your brother?!”

“I already said he is!”, you reply with impatience and try pushing him again, but this time he doesn’t let you, so you draw your hand back, “get away, can’t you see I’m cooking?”

Stubbornly Chanyeol crosses his arms over his chest and looks at you up and down before glancing back at Junmyeon again and just now he can see the similarities.

“That hard to believe, huh?”

“Almost impossible”, he mumbles, looking at you up and down.

You try turning away from you to focus on the food again, but his grip on your arm makes you stop, you look at where his hand holds you before looking at him, there’s already a lot in your head.

“You’re y/n, right? I mean… I already know it’s you, but—”, he licks his lips, tilting his head.

“y/n”, you see Junmyeon walking in the kitchen, rubbing his forehead, “why’re you here?”, he seems confused.

Junmyeon comes closer and when sees Chanyeol’s grip on your arm, he stops where he is and glares at his roommate.

“What are you doing? Let her go”, the threatening tone is obvious and Chanyeol draws his hand back, Junmyeon looks at you again, “y/n, you have to go back”, his voice is tender again and you’re not sure if he’s still drunk or not, but you can tell he’s hurt.

The stylish finishes the last few touches in a hurry and you run after the other members, the youngest grips on your arm with nervousness.

“I’m worried”, you smile, offering a hug in return.

“Don’t worry, it’ll be alright”, you tell her even though you’re worried and nervous just as much.

There’s a group of seniors and you greet them, bowing and smiling as you walk in, there’s the typical exchange of introductions and some of their curiosity fade in the next moment, focusing on themselves, you and your group do the same.

Instead of worrying about the performance there are other things swimming in your mind, you wonder if your brother went home safely after walking you back to the dorm, you wonder how things ended up when he went back home and more importantly, why didn’t say anything about how bad everything’s going for him sooner? You’d try to help him. He always posed as if he was doing just fine and has money enough to send you and maintain himself in Seoul, but maybe you’re too stupid to notice.

“You saw it wrong”, Junmyeon claims, stuffing his mouth with the food you left that morning.

Chanyeol scoffs, shaking his head and tries stealing some of the food just to annoy the other and gets his hand slapped hard with the chopsticks.

“Ouch!”, Chanyeol draws back his hand, two clear red marks from the chopsticks on the back of his hand.

“I didn’t say you could eat it”, Chanyeol shrugs, “don’t go around saying anything stupid”, the younger of the two clicks his tongue and leans back against the strangely clean balcony behind him.

“Hyung”, he starts leisurely, “if you want me to keep the secret”, Chanyeol gestures his hand calmly, closing his eyes and enjoying his moment, “all you have to you is ask me”

Opening his eyes with a small smile, Chanyeol leans his upper body closer, seeing the irritated and wide-eyed expression on Junmyeon’s face and enjoying every second of the older guy’s torture.

“Just ask nicely”, your smug expression could make Junmyeon puke, “You don’t need to lie to me.”

It’s obvious just how Junmyeon wants nothing but to strike a punch Chanyeol’s face, but he won’t, the older holds back the best he can, knuckles white from how tight he grips on the chopsticks and the edge of the table.

“Park Chanyeol, I swear—”, Junmyeon a low tone makes his threat even more valid, “if you try to screw up my sister’s career–”, the unapologetic expression on Chanyeol’s face makes him angrier.

“If I were you, I’d be nice to me”, Chanyeol does his best version of the ever so shameless Baekhyun. 

Looking at the time in his watch, Junmyeon sighs, jumping from his seat.

“All right!”, the older hisses at him grabbing his jacket thrown across the table, “What’ll take you to not say a word about it?”

And that’s where Chanyeol wanted to get at, he licked his lips parted to form a content smile. Maybe this was him being the worst version of himself, but this was a rare opportunity, a precious golden ticket he wants to grip with all his might and never let go. 

“Nothing”, he shrugs.

“Is your brother here?”, one of the girls asks, seeing you scan the people crowd holding merchants displaying the group’s logo, you’ll be up next.

“No!”, your voice quivers with nervousness and you bite your lip, feeling her massage your shoulder, an attempt to calm you down.

“He’d never miss our second single debut, y/n. Don’t worry, he’ll come!”

It’s only when you taking the position on the stage that you finally see him sitting on a corner holding a banner with a cheering message and your name on it and you smile, Junmyeon smiles back at you. That guy’s there too, almost hidden in a shadow, hoodie pulled over his head as he almost lay down on the chair with his feet over the backrest of the chair in front of him, not caring about the angry glares of the girl who’s sitting there, you wonder why since Junmyeon never brings anyone along with him when he comes to see you, but you have to brush the thoughts away, smile and the song starts.

You have to perform again and again to guarantee a good content, then stage changes and you have to go again, but this is your dream, so you do it gladly, smiling brightly, a little too much when you glance at your brother whenever you have the chance, only to see him standing and dancing along with the choreography, the exchanged looks between you and your members tell you that the girls are amused by your brother’s antics as well.

The song ends for the last time - for this program’s recording at least - and the group stays in position until told otherwise, breathing in relief when it’s done, you follow the others out of the stage and wave at the crowd, waving at your brother and the grumpy guy beside him as well.

As usual, the group rushes back to the waiting room, your smile becomes a frown when you think about the state you saw your brother the day before and you wonder if he remembers calling you in the first place.

“y/n!”, you hear his voice when you’re sipping on an ice-cold water and smile instantly, behind him, that guy and the door closes behind them quickly.

Junmyeon isn’t subtle about how he stands protectively between you and the other guy who, you notice, is wearing something different than the day before and you hope that is clean, now that you know that house you wonder if there’s anything remotely clean in there.

“I think you already met Chanyeol, he’s my roommate”, Chanyeol nods at your direction.

“We met last nigh–”, Chanyeol’s words are cut by a pointed punch on his stomach, Junmyeon seems to be very much satisfied with it while Chanyeol winces in pain.

From all the times your manager offers Junmyeon to join the team, this is the first time he does, you recall how he’d say that he’d never hurt his pride working for the same guy he used to fight the most at school but, this time, he doesn’t only joins in but let Chanyeol tag along.

Setting his foot in that industry’s backstage is Chanyeol’s golden ticket and he knows it and all he needs to do is keep quiet about the fact that you sneak out the dorm at night.

“He’s not a bad person”, Junmyeon tried to explain.

“Then why can’t I talk to him?”, you asked Junmyeon once when he pulled you away from a nice talk with Chanyeol.

“I’m your brother, you just need to trust me"

And by now you’re already fed up with just doing whatever people tell you without question, pretty much just nodding and agreeing pathetically.

“You expect me to just say ‘amen’ to whatever you say?”, you half-yells at him.

Part of you know this is wrong, you acknowledge the hurt in his eyes when you just snap at him like that, but this irrational and frustrated part of yourself is overpowering your thoughts as you push past your brother, just wanting to get away from all the oppressive feeling that seems to crush you from inside, but there’s nowhere you can go, no one you can talk to that would understand you except for your brother, the other members wouldn’t understand either.

“Hey, hey! Wait! Where you going?”, you look up in anger to see Chanyeol holding you by your shoulders and you haven’t noticed you began crying, through blurry eyes you see him frowning and take a hesitating step closer, “what happened?”, his voice is softer.

You hear your brother’s voice in your head, telling you that Chanyeol’s not someone you can’t trust and you know you should listen to him, but you let Chanyeol place his arms over your shoulder and pull you close, you grip on his jacket when and hides your face on his shoulder and he lets you cry there. You don’t notice he’s not alone until he speaks again and obviously is not with you.

“Kyungsoo’s our vocalist and manager, so he’s usually better at this kind of things.”

“Of course”, your grip on his jacket tightens when you listen to the unknown male’s voice, “don’t worry about it”

Next thing you know, Chanyeol’s taken you to the group’s van, it’s the only place you can be alone and away from everyone, he lets you cry on his shoulder, he lets you talk about what’s in your head and he listens to you, he understands and comforts you until you’re feeling better again. Chanyeol manages to lift your mood with silly stories about your brother you never thought you’d hear about, it’s the first time you listen him laugh wholeheartedly, clapping his hand loudly as you tell him about something that happened when you were a trainee in the company. The grumpy Chanyeol you knew at first is someone you barely see, except when he seems like he needs some sleep, but except for that, from then on, he’s always there when you need it, always making you smile with silly jokes and antics.

Chanyeol helps you sneak out of the dorm with his friends and band members even your brother wouldn’t know about it, you meet the guy you heard the name that day, Kyungsoo and also, Baekhyun who seems to have too much unnecessary stories to tell, all of them funny, but makes you blush in embarrassment, there’s also Jongdae and along with Baekhyun, he makes lots of jokes about your “relationship” with Chanyeol and at that you gladly notice that Chanyeol blushes a deep shade of red just like you and not from the alcohol.

You don’t mind the fact that they don’t take you to an expensive restaurant as other people would do, you simply enjoy their company, somewhere in the back of your head you hear your brother’s advice, but this makes you smile so genuinely that you don’t mind them. Chanyeol takes you back to the dorm, without the other and if you thought the night couldn’t be any better, it’s because you didn’t expect him to press his lips on yours, testing the waters at first and smiling when you kiss him back, feeling butterflies in your stomach when you feel one of his hands cupping your cheek and the other intertwining his fingers on yours.

You are most definitely in love with Park Chanyeol and the best part is that he’s with you whenever he can, he helps you sneak out of the dorm every now and then to see his rehearsal or a presentation somewhere and he always sneak away from his members to spend time with you afterwards, always being caring and considerate, listening to you and cheering you up when things aren’t quite as they should, the more popular you become, the more overseas schedules you have and that’s when you have to say goodbye to him and that hurts, but he always guarantee you that everything’s fine, that’d he’d be there when you’re back and he always is there for you.

Junmyeon’s not stupid and even though you and Chanyeol try not to be so close or affectionate when you’re brother’s around, still he manages to catch on it and one day, he follows you and Chanyeol on one of your attempts to escape from the crowds to be alone for a moment, needless to say he’s mad about it.

“Didn’t I told you to keep away from him?”, it’s the first time Junmyeon raise his voice at you.

“Wait, Junmyeon--”, Chanyeol tries to step between you and Junmyeon only to be pushed away harshly.

“You stay out of this and stay away from my sister, you hear me?”, with his finger pointing threatening at Chanyeol’s face, Junmyeon yanks you away from your boyfriend’s side.

“You’re not my father, Junmyeon!”, you pull yourself away, closer to Chanyeol, “stop being so overprotective, Chanyeol’s not a bad guy”

“What do you know about him, huh?”, your brother steps closer, glancing between you and Chanyeol, “have you met his friends yet?”

“Yes! I did! They’re not bad people either.”

“Don’t you think this is a little too weird, y/n? Are you blind?”, Junmyeon tries to get close to you and you step away, “did he ever told you anything about himself? I live with him for the past four years and all I know is his last name and his age, what do you know about him?”, he points at Chanyeol.

It is true that Chanyeol never talks about himself, he listens to your stories but never tells his, at least not something that tells you anything about his past.

“y/n, I’m your brother and I only want you to be happy”, Junmyeon’s voice is softer, but you can still hear his anger, you can see it in his eyes when he glances at Chanyeol, “I know just how hard you worked to be where you are right now and I don’t want some stupid guy to come in and ruin it for you, it’s not fair”

Maybe the worst part is that Chanyeol didn’t say anything to defend himself the whole time, he didn’t try to say anything back, he stood there, listening to Junmyeon and only interfering when things started to get too hurtful for you.

The group is global trending and you hardly have time to breathe properly, of course, you’re glad that your hard work’s paying off, Junmyeon gets a position as your personal assistant as soon as the fans push for a solo debut and he’s always with you, you find out that it’s not bad as you thought it’d be, he’s always protective but not as much as before, it’s good to see your brother goofing around your and the girls and is nice to tease him when he gather fans for being good looking just before you expose his dorky self on social media.

Something changes, Chanyeol almost disappears from your life after that day saying little to nothing, just like you met him and never explains himself and when you ask him, it’s when you don’t see him again. You miss him, you miss how sweet he’s always been with you, how he’d take the weight off your shoulders and act as if you’re just another normal person that doesn’t need to be perfect to be loved, you miss the way he kissed you and the way you’d feel so at peace when Chanyeol had his arms around you, how he’d make you laugh and blush, you miss the way he looked in your eyes sometimes and say it’s nothing when you’d ask him, kissing you instead.

Chanyeol’s not there when you come back from overseas anymore, he doesn’t reply your messages, doesn’t call you and you try not to feel hurt because there must be a reason, you just wish you had a reason to think that way, Junmyeon doesn’t mention Chanyeol anymore as if he never happened, he does try to introduce you to other people you end up being friends with, you meet other guys Junmyeon assures they’re nice and they are, but your heart’s with somewhere else.

“y/n! Come see this!”, one of the members calls you from across the dance studio.

You push yourself off the floor against your will to sit beside her on the couch, she’s smiling at the video playing on her phone and turns the volume up so you both can hear the interview 

“Isn’t that Chanyeol Did you know he had a rock band?”

Indeed, it’s him, makeup and all, along with his band members that you met and two others you never met, they introduce themselves as EXO and Chanyeol’s introduce himself as PCY, your eyes are eager taking everything in the interview, Chanyeol’s charming but shy and Baekhyun does most of the talking, strangely enough, Kyungsoo looks even more introverted than he already is.

That’d explain everything, if he’s been a trainee, then you understand why he couldn’t be with you as much. You look up when an agitated Junmyeon walks in.

“y/n, come on!”, he goes around gathering your things, not carrying about shoving them inside your backpack, you know something’s wrong, “we have to go, the general manager’s waiting in the car”

You stand up, watching him going around the room and making sure he got everything.

“What happened?”

“You didn’t bring a hoodie? A cap?”, you shake your head and he takes off his jacket to give you this hoodie, with the corner of your eyes you can see the girls getting their phones and you start to panic.

Junmyeon reaches inside his backpack for a cap and a mask.

“There are too many people outside, the security will drive my car so they’ll follow him and we’ll leave in the van, alright?”, you nod, but grab his wrist when he tries to pull you along with him.

“But why?”, you watch him tense and shot a side glance at the other girls before stepping closer so just you’d hear, he takes his phone out of his pocket and unlocks, the browser already filled with news about yours and Chanyeol’s affair, pictures of the secret dates coloring the screen.

“I told you to not trust him”, you can feel the wild loop your heart goes through before dropping on your stomach, “come on”, he grabs your hand, “the CEO’s waiting for us, y/n. We really have to go.”

[bibliophileiz]

Celebrating the Life of Asa Fox

Yockey knocks it out of the park with this debut -- ‘Asa Fox’ may be in my top five favorite SPN episodes. Directed by John Badham,featuring one of the best musical montages in the recent seasons before the title card and featuring the always perfect Sam Smith as Mary, Kim Rhodes as Jody and Lisa Berry as Billie, it is criminal that this one only has an 8.5 rating on IMDb. (I mean, Billie’s presence alone makes it at least a 9.) 

Anyhoo, let’s dive in.

In this opening scene, we meet baby Asa Fox racing through the woods running from a werewolf. And may I just say I am pissed that we didn’t get an AU Resistance Leader Asa Fox in Season 13 (one of my many disappointments from that plot thread.) Mary is the perfect blend of badass hunter and typical mom (cleaning Asa’s face). Also, her braids are super cute.

“Since the last time we saw you, I killed Hitler.” “Thank you?” Dean is a rom com chick, pass it on. Ellen and Asa were bros, it’s cannon. “We’re going to salt and burn the body tomorrow. I can’t believe I just said that like it’s something normal.” God, Dean is distractingly hot this scene.

How did the Winchesters get into Canada? Are you telling me they have fake passports?!?!

The actress playing Asa’s mom does not get the credit she deserves for this episode.(I looked her up, and she is Laurie Paton. She’s also in The X-Files.)

There should be more episodes that feature a shit ton of hunters getting wasted. “Nobody can take out five Wendigos in a night.” I want that episode.  THE BANES TWINS!  “She was, like, a good witch. Very Enya. It was the ‘90s.” “What did she teach you?” “Mostly how to seduce men.” Max. Buddy. I need you to give Dean a nudge. In other news, I want the Banes twins to be my best friends.

“It’s not like we’re in the live-till-you’re-90, die-in-your-sleep business.” That line has a lot of weight, especially now going into the final season.

Rollerskating ghouls!!! I want that episode too. Sam and Dean walking in just in time to hear that Asa and Jody banged is so awkward. 

Jody fangirling over Mary is still the cutest thing that has ever happened.  Mary’s short hair this season is the other cutest thing. Also, unrelated, but I love Sam Smith’s voice. My best friend once described my mom’s voice as sounding like a hug, and while I knew what she meant -- because she’s my mom and I’ve always gotten the same feeling hearing her talk (unless she’s mad) that I get when she gives me a hug, but I didn’t think other people would feel that way -- but that’s how Sam Smith’s voice sounds. Like a hug.

Big Sister Jody coming to Dean’s rescue, as usual.

How come Lorraine heard the name “Mary Winchester” and didn’t immediately assume Mary is Mary Winchester’s daughter who just has the same name? Maybe she just assumes all hunters are childless loners. “You’re the reason my son didn’t become an astronaut.” Also the reason he didn’t become a werewolf, Lorraine, keep up. I do think this scene is wonderful, because as Lorraine says, “Hunting was his whole life. He never married, never had kids--” Mary’s hearing the story of her own sons.  And the next scene is the same: Sam telling her Asa chose to be a hunter will later parallel him telling her he chose to be a hunter in “The Raid” (another criminally underrated episode. God, I love Season 12.) “Everywhere I go and everything I do, it just feels wrong.” Maaaaaarrrrryyyyy!!!! When Sam says Mary was still hunting in 1980, after Dean was born and “everyone” thought she had quit, Mary gets this guilty look on her face that is not really explored to its full potential. And I just want to say that in a perfect world where Jeffrey Dean Morgan was able to come back for a length of episodes and could have a fully developed arc (and not the delightful but kind of fan servicy one he had in the 300th) that THIS is the plot I would have wanted -- John being resentful of Mary for keeping her hunting life secret from him and, arguably, putting their sons in danger for it. 

You guys, this episode is already so good, and we haven’t even really gotten to the Agatha Christie-style murder spree yet. 8.5 my ass.

Also, Jared Padalecki is killing it this episode. I love his scenes with Sam Smith.

Is the blood dripping on Asa’s forehead supposed to parallel the show’s first scene? I mean, I’m sure it is, but I need some meta writer to explain to me why that is.

And here’s where the plot picks up. Also, we need more crossroads demons in our life. (Where’s my Bela Talbot Crossroads demon???)

“Go away.” “You’re not the boss of me.”  Billie and Dean is one of my favorite dynamics in the entire show. “You can huff and puff, but that house is on supernatural lockdown.”

Jael kills both a First Nations girl and then later Marlene and her kid to create angst for Asa. Does it count as fridging if it’s in dialogue? Turning off the water is so smart! I love me some smart villains! I love how Jody immediately takes command of the situation -- before Sam, even. I kind of always wanted her to be like Sam’s lieutenant.

“It’s a one-way ticket.” Billie is like me, and wants to watch the Agatha Cristie-style murder spree, which would be totally ruined if everybody could get out of the house.

Did Jael say, “Elvis has left the building”? That motherfucker ....

This is the first time we see Mary grab an angel blade, which means the angel blade Mary carries the entirety of this season is Asa’s.

Kim Rhodes makes a delightfully evil demon, and seems to have had a blast doing so. “I so hoped you’d kill your mom! Wouldn’t that be a riot?”

(also, my brother’s dog is named bucky, so every time a character says bucky’s name i just get really distracted.)

I like the hunters all saying different parts of the exorcism.

“That sucked.” Poor Jody!

You guys, Bucky sucks. Also, hanging the person you actually killed from a tree so that no one would suspect you actually killed him is like ... so opposite of what the demon-dealing-happy Winchetsters would do in this scenario that they can’t even comprehend how to handle it.

I just realized this ep even has an Agatha Christie-style reveal, with the murderer confessing all at the end after being revealed. (And everyone else’s identities/crimes/motivations being revealed FIRST.)

“I was wrong. Asa did have a family. I’ve even got grandchildren.” Wow, it’s almost like hunters can have families too.

“Mom to mom....” Why, oh why did Jody and Mary not hang out more?? (It’s because those fuckers at the CW cancelled Wayward Sisters before it could get filmed.)

Also, this scene between Billie and Mary is so. good. “She’s not alone.” Dean. Buddy. I love you forever. “Then I guess you’re just going to have to wait.” “Winchesters.” This scene is just *kisses fingers like an Italian chef* “So does this mean you’re coming home?” “Well, not yet, see I’m only contracted for like 10 episodes this season ....”

And scene.

I mean. This episode, man. Everything about it is criminally underrated. It’s not very flashy in terms of mytharc plot, but it contains so much rich worldbuilding, such great writing and acting, and a healthy dose of ominous foreshadowing the likes of which only Yockey can pull off.

Yockey knows the perfect characters to mix and match. (And I think the scenes between Lisa Berry and Jensen Ackles this episode became the inspiration for their even better scene in “Advanced Thanatology.”) This is the only episode we ever get that has Mary AND Jody AND Billie, three of the best characters. He also creates delightful original characters (which we’ll see again with Tasha Banes, Lily Sunder, Noah the eyeball-eating monster). I know this is the casting director, and not Yockey, but each of the actors playing those original characters were on point.

I also am a total fan of the Agatha Christie tropes -- to my knowledge, that had never been done with Supernatural before, but this episode was just the perfect combination of the two.

I can’t think of any major problems with this one, or even really minor ones. (I mean, the scene with Sam and Dean talking about Jody’s sex life is pretty awkward....) Keep ‘em coming, Steve Yockey. I will watch everything you ever write forever. 

[fifthhorsewoman-blog]

Bra and Panties to Ms. Money in the Bank.

Anyone who knows me knows how much all of the women of WWE and women’s wrestling in general, mean to me. Ever since I was five years old, I have had an emotional connection to them as I’ve grown and they all inspire me in such ways that I have a hard time explaining. The sole reason I was drawn to wrestling at a young age was all due to a lovely lady by the name of Trish Stratus. I specifically remember Trish’s debut on Sunday Night Heat in 2000. It wasn’t until she began valeting for Test & Albert, that I had decided that she was my favorite. I admired her style and her beauty, and although it wasn’t until Fully Loaded 2000 that she had her first match, I always wondered why she was barely on television. Granted, her first match wasn’t her best but something in my six year old self told me to keep watching and keep believing in her and maybe, just maybe, I’d be seeing more of her.

I grew up with Trish from her debut in 2000 to her retirement in 2006 and her Hall of Fame induction in 2013. Although Trish was my favorite and most of what I remember from watching wrestling as a kid was her feud with Lita, it wasn’t long after that I began to love and respect every woman on WWE programming.

As a female wrestling fan, I had no interest in the lingerie pillow fights, or the bikini contests, but instead, all I wanted was to see my favorite wrestlers fight, and that included the women. I remember Wrestlemania 19; Trish Stratus vs Victoria vs Jazz for the WWF Women’s championship. At the time, Trish had been feuding with Victoria who was always escorted to the ring by Steven Richards. During that specific match, Steven Richards got involved which resorted in Trish delivering Stratusfaction to him. That instantly became my favorite part of the match simply because she was standing up for herself against the man.

It’s one of the things I miss most nowadays, especially apart of the Women’s Evolution. I miss the days of intergender tag team matches and Lita delivering a hurricanrana to any man in sight. Granted I couldn’t tell you every last detail of every match because I was so young but going back and watching some of my favorite moments as an adult, the crowd loved and cared about what Trish and Lita were doing and it still brings tears to my eyes til this day. Those were my heroes growing up and I wouldn’t have had it any other way. Although Trish and Lita made their mark and have always been given credit where credit is due, it wasn’t until not shortly after where things began to change in a negative way.

The year was 2006 and things like the Diva Search, Extreme Exposè, and Vince’s Devils existed. Remember Candice Michelle’s GoDaddy dance? Despite how over sexualized and pointless most women’s segments became, I still kept true to all of them whether or not they were the next Trish or Lita of the future. This was a strange time to be a women’s wrestling fan because I didn’t quite understand any of it. It was as if what Mae Young, the Fabulous Moolah, Alundra Blaze, Chyna, Sable, Trish and Lita had worked for didn’t matter anymore.

Women such as Michelle McCool, Natalya, Melina, Mickie James, Victoria, and WWE Hall of Famer Beth Phoenix were giving everything they had all for a four minute segment on the show. Then, WWE decides to retire the Women’s Championship in 2010 and keep the Divas championship instead, just to make matters worse.

Things started to become a little more hopeful for me as a fan with the addition of AJ Lee. Say what you will, but AJ made fans begin to care about women’s wrestling again. She was just your average crazy chick who loved wrestling and well, stealing your man. All jokes aside, AJ was a great performer and her character made fans love to hate her. I was personally a fan due to her passion for wrestling growing up because it was very relatable. Her own version of a pipebomb that she dropped in 2013 added to her already impressive repertoire. Her match against Kaitlyn at Payback 2013 to win her first Divas championship reign is one of my favorites and the fact that she got the date tattooed on the back of her neck made me give her even more respect. Despite the credit WWE doesn’t like to give her, I believe that she was the integral start to the “Divas Revolution.”

2013 was also the time of NXT and it’s journey to ongoing success. Women were more notably being acknowledged and given chances unlike those on the main roster. Paige vs Emma at NXT Arrival in February 2014 was what drew me to see what exactly NXT was bringing to the table. Despite not knowing a thing about either woman, those two made me love women’s wrestling even more and I was happy to see Paige win the inaugural NXT Women’s Championship. This also caused me to root for her in excitement when making her debut on RAW the night after Wrestlemania 30 to go on and beat AJ Lee for the WWE Divas championship.

And then there was the Four Horsewomen of NXT. Charlotte, Becky, Bayley, and Sasha. The first time I saw Charlotte in a match was at 2014’s NXT Takeover match against Natalya for Paige’s relinquished NXT Women’s championship. This match had me emotional from start to finish simply due to the passion and storytelling behind it. I had already loved Natalya from watching her on the main roster but I could sense that there was something special about Charlotte, far beyond just being Ric Flair’s daughter. I never kept up with NXT very often, as ashamed as I am to admit that, but I always tuned in to see what the women were up to. In February 2015, I decided to catch Sasha vs Becky vs Bayley vs Charlotte in a Fatal Four Way at NXT Takeover Rival and that was the day everything changed. I had fallen harder than ever before. I tend to cry through most women’s matches but when you can physically feel a rumble, you know things are about to change. In July 2015, Stephanie McMahon came out on WWE Monday Night RAW announcing that “there is a revolution happening within women in sports right now,” this leading into the debut of Sasha Banks, Charlotte, and Becky Lynch to Monday Night RAW. That same year, my sister, my friend Heather, and I had been in Brooklyn solely for the Summerslam meet and greets that weekend and last minute decided to buy resale tickets to NXT Takeover: Brooklyn. And with Brooklyn comes Sasha Banks vs Bayley for the NXT Women’s championship match. A match that I was so honored to be in attendance for. A match that was quickly labeled “Match of the Year” in 2015. Two women did that in a male dominated business and by the end of the bout, my heart was so full of pride. Charlotte and Becky joined Bayley and Sasha in the ring for a group hug and to stand and hold up those four fingers. I remember mumbling to my sister over choked up tears, “I love them so much.” Those four women are the reason I fell in love with wrestling all over again and reminded me why I stayed hopeful through the hard times. 2016 brought the comeback of the WWE Women’s Championship, two women’s matches at Wrestlemania 32, a women’s Hell in a Cell match that main evented the PPV for the first time ever, and Sasha Banks and Charlotte main eventing RAW, something only ever done once before by Trish Stratus and Lita. And this year, the first ever Ms. Money in the Bank was crowned in Carmella. The women of the WWE are my constant source of inspiration and have been since I was a young girl. It has always been important to me to see them given equal opportunity as the men and it is truly only up from here. They are pioneers paving the way for better days within pro wrestling and it has been a bumpy road but an amazing journey nonetheless.

[jafreitag]

Jazz Is… #9: Keith Jarrett

Yes. Keith Jarrett was that cool. (He still is, fwiw.) The hair, the stache, the shades, the suede, the denim, and the je ne sais quoi. It looks like he was walking along a cold beach and struck a casual pose, which ended up as a behind the scenes promo pic from a lost Scorsese premake of Louis Malle’s Atlantic City, for someone who saw him a few weeks before at Köln.

Köln. Sigh. Jarrett’s The Köln Concert was a soundtrack (there were many, ohai every Pavement album) of my 20s. I didn’t finish law school until I was 25, but the whole weird deal was just a more challenging – academically, sure, but also socially, whoa – version of college. So when I was done with being student, I was still a punk-ass kid. (And a licensed attorney. Snap!) Those three years, I’m convinced, paused/stunted my mental age. I still feel a very spry 26 – or a not so much 49. It varies.

After three years and a bar exam, some people do crazy shit, like skydive. Or travel the world. Or join a firm. I wasn’t ready for that prime time. I wasn’t ready for much because I wasn’t good at much, except studying and learning. So I reupped for another year in the shit. (Fun fact: There’s such a thing as graduate law school.) I figured that academia is insular, thinking is cool, and matriculating again is a solid fake for ambition. Tbh, I just hoped that eventually I’d have enough frequent blue-booker miles that they’d just let me stick around and teach something harmless like Civil Procedure. They didn’t. Those jobs go to Ph.D.’s, and I had other letters.

A year with the best view in the best place, and my landing point was my parents’ basement. I played too much Tetris, sent cover letters and resumés for positions that I didn’t want, and swept floors at a print shop. That was a great job, thanks to a family friend. I could make my car payment (GEO Tracker, r.i.p.), but not my student loan payments. So it was dodge near-constant lender phone calls, defer defer defer, and apply apply apply. Finally, I got a hit. Trial court law clerk. Let’s go.

I moved to Chicago in August 1996. Freedom from my folk’s often fraught, but ultimately supportive, house. Curiosity in a metropolis. Anxiety about work. Riding the el downtown every day, and experiencing, for the first time, the often messy and always improvisational possibilities of grown-up life. LIFE. You know?

Keith Jarrett knew, seemed like, in my Walkman headphones. He was humming along to his own melodies. Just make it up, man. Be confident in your own abilities, and express yourself. If nobody pays attention, they’re square. And it doesn’t matter, anyway, because this is your trip. The Köln Concert is nostalgic for me because I first heard it back then. It’s also sad for me because the guy who told me to listen to it isn’t here.

MRH was my best friend. We talked almost every day, before and after we both jumped into the city. Tied up in revisiting this record is some grief and, even more than that, a nauseating sense of wasted potential. His, and mine. The world was big to us – globally and locally. A multi-continental place of art and music, and ideas. He never got to explore it, as much as he probably wanted, and I never tried.

I thought that I was experiencing stuff? Mostly, I sat on a futon couch in a third floor apartment on Chicago’s northwest side (Lincoln Square/Ravenswood – my stop/street was Rockwell), petted my then-gf’s eternally cool lap cat (Winchester), read difficult modern (Faulkner, Joyce) and postmodern (Pynchon, Barth) fiction, and pretended to be a serious large-format photographer. Basically, I kept doing what I knew how to do – I fed my brain. Then I got on the train the next day. And over and over and over.

It was all a cool coast, until I had a cancer scare, got married, moved to the ‘burbs, had kids, and got divorced. (Talk about the often messy and always improvisational possibilities of grown-up life.) At that point, I truly learned to riff. Hence, in a way, LN. And then Matt died.

I digress. Just context. This is about Keith Jarrett, not Matt or me.

Keith Jarrett was something of a wünderkind (three umlauts in this post already, yo). He was born on May 8, 1945 in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Apparently, he displayed perfect pitch, which Wiki defines as “a rare auditory phenomenon characterized by the ability of a person to identify or re-create a given musical note without the benefit of a reference tone,” as a youngster. He started piano lessons at age three, and at age five appeared on a local tv talent show. At age seven, his first recital included works by Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven. He attended public high school and then the Berklee College of Music in Boston.  After a year, he moved to New York City and began gigging.

His first big job was with Art Blakey, and his first recording was the Jazz Messengers’ 1966 live album Buttercorn Lady. At a show, he met drummer Jack DeJohnette (more on him later), who played in Charles Lloyd’s Quartet. DeJohnette recommended Jarrett to Lloyd, and Jarrett joined the band. He appeared on Lloyd’s well-regarded 1966 live album Forest Flower (from the Monterrey Jazz Festival), as well as several subsequent albums. By 1967, he had recorded his debut as a leader – Life Between the Exit Signs.

Lloyd’s group dissolved in 1968, and Jarrett was invited to join the Miles Davis group. There are disputing accounts of when/how they met. Miles was beginning his fusion phase, and Jarrett switched from acoustic to electric – specifically, the Fender Contempo electric organ and the Fender Rhodes electric piano. With Davis, he shared keyboard duties with Chick Corea, and they played side-by-side on the 1970 classic At Fillmore and both the studio and live parts of that year’s Teo Macero-produced pastiche Live-Evil, which also featured LN fave Herbie Hancock. The live parts of that album were recorded in D.C. on December 16-19, 1970 with just Jarrett on keys. (Eventually, all four nights became The Cellar Door Sessions box set – highly recommended.)

Jarrett left Davis’ group around that time. For much of the ’70s, he helmed two parallel ensembles, the so-called American Quartet with saxophonist Dewey Redman, Charlie Haden, and Paul Motian, and the European Quartet with saxophonist Jan Garbarek, bassist Palle Danielsson, and drummer Jon Christensen. Both played a distinct blend of post-bop and free jazz, and released several albums. (I’m not super familiar with that body of work, but I sampled some of it on Spotify – it’s good.) Jarrett’s legacy endures, however, because of other recordings from that era, in which he took a turn from loud to quiet.

The Jarrett wiki, a primary source here, explains that he became strongly opposed to electronic music and instruments, waging what he called “an anti-electric music crusade” because “[e]lectricity goes through all of us and is not to relegated to wires.” The initial salvo in that crusade came in 1973 with the release of the triple album (whut), Solo Concerts: Bremen/Lausanne, Time magazine’s “Jazz Album of the Year.”

A guy named Mikal Gilmore in his book Night Beat said, “with Bremen-Lausanne and the subsequent Köln Concert, Jarrett found his niche, freely mixing gospel, impressionist, and atonal flights into a consonant whole.” Guys, this is solo piano like you’ve never heard. It’s not Bill Evans by himself playing chestnuts, and maybe a medley of a few that lasts ten minutes. It’s Keith Jarrett by himself playing whatever comes into his head for a serious while. Bremen is two tracks – they clock at 18:03 and 45:09. Lausanne is a single track – 64:54. Quick math: The latter is more than an hour of straight-up improv.

Then, two years later, there was The Köln Concert, reportedly the best-selling solo piano album ever. (Weird fact, and I saw it alot while researching this post. I’m guessing it’s more like best-selling solo jazz piano album ever, but I can’t be bothered to confirm that.)

In 1971, Jarrett and DeJohnette released a duo record called Ruta and Daitya on ECM (Edition of Contemporary Music), a label founded by a German guy named Manfred Eicher in 1969. In ’75, Eicher convinced Jarrett to do a “driving tour” of solo concerts across Europe. A seventeen year-old named Vera Brandes organized a concert in Köln, or Cologne, as we say. Here’s Brandes in a contemporary pic – I couldn’t find anything from back then. She looks cool and determined. She obviously was back then.

Jarrett requested, and Brandes promised, a Bösendorfer 290 Imperial grand piano.  The Cologne Opera House backstage staff found another Bösendorfer, a baby grand, and put it onstage. The baby was out of tune, and worse, according to Wiki, “tinny and thin in the upper registers and weak in the bass register.” And the pedals didn’t work. Nobody was the wiser, until Jarrett showed up late after a five-hour, 350-mile drive in a Renault 5 from Zurich, where he had played a few nights earlier.

Jarrett was hungry and suffering from back pain, which required a brace. According to his account of the evening, which is part of the Grammy Hall of Fame’s site about the album, some of the tour was scheduled to be recorded, and some was not. Here’s Jarrett himself:

“[T]he Cologne concert was one that was definitely scheduled to be recorded. However, for a 24-hour period before we got to Cologne, we had not slept at all. When we arrived at the hotel, I tried to take a nap. But it was impossible to do so.

The producer of the concert came to take us to the venue in his Rolls-Royce, a car that was so over the top that we could have eaten dinner in it, on the perfectly made wood panels. But we didn’t really learn the problems we were facing, until we arrived at the hall. I went onstage and realized, ‘Hey, I have a Bösendorfer, here and it’s not the right size and it sounds like a modified electric harpsichord.’ And then we found out that they couldn’t get the right piano, even though it existed, because their rental truck was gone.

At that point, we probably said all kinds of curse words. And we started to tell the engineers, ‘Maybe you can just pack up.’ But then Manfred and I both sort of thought that was crazy. The recording equipment was already set up. So we decided to just make a tape of the performance, even it if was just for ourselves. So we went to dinner. It was already late, I was due to go onstage soon, we’d had so many hassles, and the piano was such a terrible instrument. And I hadn’t slept anyway. So I was in almost hell. Then we went to this Italian restaurant where, for some perfectly symmetrical reason, we were served way last. Everyone else was eating, I was the one who was going to play in an hour, and I still didn’t have any food. And then when they finally brought the food, I was still hungry, because I wasn’t happy with the food they served.

All I remember after the restaurant fiasco is taking a peek at the engineers sitting, waiting with their equipment. They had everything ready. And I started thinking, ‘I’m going to do this.’ I remember putting my fist up in the air on the way out from backstage. I just looked at Manfred and said, ‘Power!’ or something.”

After several hours of tuning and adjustment, the piano was some semblance of playable. Jarrett took the stage at 11:30 p.m., following an opera performance – the only time slot that a teenage booker could arrange, apparently. Still, the show was sold out – 1,400 people at $1.72 per. Jarrett made do with his instrument, concentrating his notes in the middle of the keyboard. Again, per his account to the Grammys:

“It just seemed like everybody in the audience was there for a tremendous experience, and that made my job easy. What happened with this piano was that I was forced to play in what was — at the time — a new way. Somehow I felt I had to bring out whatever qualities this instrument had.

And that was it. My sense was, ‘I have to do this. I’m doing it. I don’t care what the fuck the piano sounds like. I’m doing it.’ And I did.”

The entire record is about an hour long, but the performance was three pieces – 26: 02, 33:13 (broken into two parts, even on the digital version), and a 6:57 “encore.” Hear it yourself.

In 1990, for the first time, Jarrett agreed to publish an authorized transcription of his performance. (That’s for the music geeks, who might happen across this blogpost. The Wiki of the album talks about vamping, chords, and a rubato feel. I don’t understand, but whatever.)

In 1977, Jarrett, DeJohnette, and bassist Gary Peacock recorded together on the latter’s record Tales of Another. In 1983, Eicher proposed that the three of them perform together for an album on ECM. Jarrett suggested that they do standards, and the “Standards Trio” was born. The initial sessions are now a box set, titled Setting Standards. 

Everything by that group is great, and there’s alot, including another acclaimed box set that documents three nights at NYC’s Blue Note in 1994. They released an album last year.

Jarrett continues to perform solo piano concerts, too. I’ve listened to alot of them. And they’re all special.

Köln will always be special-er. The encore that night was not wholly improvised, but based on a “Real Book” compilation tune known as “Memories of Tomorrow.” Prescient, I guess. In 1975, Jarrett was playing a song that forty-some years later would spark my memories of yesterday. Miss you, dude.

More soon.

JF

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ATBT: Harry Styles Album Review

ATBT Tuesdays: Harry Styles Album Review!

Hello! Today’s review will be on Harry Styles’ new self-titled album. I’ve always loved Harry tbh and I was excited yet skeptical of how this album would fare, especially since Zayn has already proven that his solo sound is a worthy one. But this album is already breaking barriers, making waves, and soaring on the charts.

Harry’s debut album shows his old soul for sure. I got heavy 60s and 70s classic rock vibes. His inspirations - like Elton John, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones, for example - are channeled through this album with a modern twist. This is an era of rock that many people haven’t replicated in today’s popular music because it is so unique and might come off as inauthentic if not done carefully. But I believe Harry respectfully draws inspiration while still making the music his own. 

I’ll go through my thoughts on each song, highlighting my favorites, things he did well, and things he should improve on:

1) Meet Me in the Hallway

This one has such an eerie vibe to it that I love. It definitely reminds me of the The Beatles, especially with the warped bass guitar. The guitar is definitely the highlight of this one from a musical standpoint. From the lyrics, I like how he’s characterized his feeling for this person as an addiction, because it’s something that people - especially teenagers - can relate to. But this is not the teeny-bopper Harry Styles that we’re getting. This is a mature voice, one that’s really expressing a longing for someone. I love that the song doesn’t follow a strict structure, similar to the ones they were bound to in One Direction. This one just flows and changes with each emotion and action he describes. This is a solid opener to me. It shows his style and it showed his ability to convey emotion lyrically.

2) Sign of the Times

I’ll be honest, when I heard this was his debut single, I was not impressed. I liked the vibe of the song and even his vocals at the end. But should it have been the debut single? Not in my opinion. I do love the instrumentation. There are so many layers and it sounds like a classic rock song. I loved the addition of the choir accompanying his emotional belting toward the end. But you have to listen to the song for like 3 and half minutes to get to any sort of climax. The objective of the song is kind of cloudy too. At first listen, it sounds like he’s talking about the end of the world or some kind of ending that affects a multitude of people. But in an interview, he says the song is from the point of view of a mother that is in labor but was told that she’s going to die from complications from birth? So yeah, lyrically this one is not strong on conveying whatever message he’s trying to send. I love the Bowie and Queen inspo on this one but it just isn’t a strong one for me.

3) Carolina

This one is a fun one. I love the funky run in the background and the melody is not a typical one, but very reminiscent of  late 60s rock. Out of all of the songs, this one is the cute one about the “girl next door.” The closest thing to a One Direction song if there was a trace on the album. I saw the Behind The Music video, and when they recorded this song, they used actual pots and pans, so I thought that was cool. Musically, this one is very rich and I especially love the chord progressions in this one because they are not typical. The music meshes very well with the lyrics and creates an easy going song that is nice to listen to honestly. This is a good one!

4) Two Ghosts

Ugh. This one is definitely one of my top, if not the top, favorite songs from this album. The lyrics are emotional, believable, and relatable. This one reminds me of something John Mayer would make. Especially with the guitar riff during the chorus. It kind of has a country twang to it and the catchy hook makes it memorable. This one has been the one that sticks in my head. In my opinion, I’m glad this is one of the singles on the album, but I could have seen this one being the debut, easier than “Sign of the Times.” He said in his Behind the Music video that this one was an easy one to write and that it was a song that just unraveled. And it really shows.

5) Sweet Creature

This would have been such a strong debut single, which again just makes me upset that it wasn’t. The vocals and lyrics are impressive to me. This one is lyrically and vocally believable to me, compared to some of the other songs on this album. Even though it’s pretty much just an acoustic guitar and vocals, it doesn’t feel this stripped down. It still feels so full. This song is definitely a powerhouse.

6) Only Angel

This one gives me serious classic rock vibes and I’m into it. Lyrically, he’s talking about a girl that he believes is an angel even though she tends to have “devilish” tendencies - being crazy in bed and wearing short skirts, for example. It’s rumored to be talking about Kendall Jenner, maybe indirectly referencing her as a Victoria’s Secret “Angel.” But I don’t really care about that. I love the guitar chord progressions in the chorus as well. This song was lower on the list for me personally, but I really appreciate it at the same time.

7) Kiwi

If Harry ever did a collab with the Artic Monkeys, this would be their baby. I’m sure any of their fans probably jumped on this one hardcore. The “I’m having your baby, it’s none of your business” refrain during the chorus is obviously cheeky, so it definitely helps his edgy “bad boy” vibe that he’s trying to encompass. I vibe with the groove in the bridge and I love how the tempo kind of slows down. Otherwise, this song doesn’t do much for me aside from letting me know that Harry is into bossy chicks lol.

8) Ever Since New York

I attached to this one as soon as I heard it. I love the melody in the chorus and the verses and how it bounces right with the instrumentation and the soft drumming pattern of the song. It is a very comfortable, calming song that you kind of listen to during a long drive or when you’re just in your own thoughts. However, after listening to this one after a while, I noticed that it’s a pretty weak one lyrically. I think that maybe when he wrote it, he was trying to just convey a feeling he had in that moment, but it doesn’t come across well to the listener, and they can’t really piece together the message of the song and relate it to themselves because of it. 

9) Woman

I get heavy Elton John vibes from this one. Musically, this one impressed me a lot. I loved the woozy bass during the pre-chorus and the weird “uh” sound that recurs in every measure. The chord progressions are so boomin’ and the vocals are nice. I kind of cringed at the opening Netflix reference though. However, this song lacks in a lot of things. Because of the music, you almost assume it’s going to go somewhere big, but the song is pretty anti-climactic. The chorus is not creative and it doesn’t make sense to me in the context of the song honestly. The song just kind of fades out and leaves me feeling like nothing is resolved as far as what he’s feeling. I loved the lyrics in the verses, but everything else was just not given the same effort. There’s so much that he could have done with this one. But I love the music and the vocals so much that I just try to ignore it. In the future, he definitely needs to master bringing out a song’s full potential.

10) From the Dining Table

I absolutely love the lyrics on this one. They feel the most personal, emotional, raw, and real. You can feel his frustration and he translated it so matter-of-factly that it almost feels cut and dry (in a good way). His vocals are so close and soft. Compared to Sweet Creature, which pretty much has the same amount of instruments, he successfully made this one sound stripped down. Which is ironic, because the girl he’s talking about seems and feels far away. Additionally, I love the strings because they fit with the vibe of the song and help it grow to a climax. This one contrasts with Meet Me in the Hallway nicely because it seems that he’s in withdrawal. So it’s kind of cool that it ended this way. But in the same token, I feel like this shouldn’t haven’t been the ending because nothing seems resolved. But this one is definitely a fave.

So what’s my conclusion?

If you get to the end of this novel, thank you lol. In conclusion, I really like this album. I love that he didn’t just sell out and make a bunch of structured pop hits that would guarantee him album sales. He went for the sound he wanted. He crafted each song differently. He’s one of the first artists in a while that have embraced rock and have now brought its sacred sound to a popular audience. The instrumentation was great on this album and it clearly embodied his influences while still creating a fresh take on them. Lyrically, there were some good spots and there were some bad ones. Hopefully in his next album, he’ll really make sure he’s driving each and every song to their full potential.

My rating for this album is a 6/10. I’m proud of Harry for jumping into the industry on his own and I think his future is bright and full of potential.