#enough progress to live ur life for u and be content and happy

[kn-1013]

saw ur post about the slowburn fic ur writing. just letting u know. ur fucked up and eveil. im with it tho. reigen fucking roshuto is the funniest thing ever and not enough people explore how funky a circumstance hate fucking can be

the fic is actually about serizawa finding out that reigen isn't psychic, and he leaves spirits & such for a while. it takes place about a year or two after canon. reigen self destructs while serizawa thrives away from him, working at a cafe and soon dating his manager, a woman named nana (name subject to change, i'm only like barely 3 chapters into this fic). it's similar to the separation arc in canon. then, serizawa realizes he wants to help people with his powers, and comes back to spirits & such, now ready to mend their relationship, and it gets complicated.

putting everything else under a cut because there's just so much to this fic i'm writing and i HAVE to talk about it or i will go insane, but also it's spoilers. it's all incoherent down there, so be warned, everything is out of order, i'm just talking about it as it comes to mind.

content warnings for general homophobia, (including the use of slurs and homophobic attacks), as well as predatory boss/employee relationships (not between reigen and serizawa, between serizawa and someone else)

roshuto is kind of a rebound/coping mechanism in a way for reigen, and what's even better is during the relationship, reigen is more of the asshole in the relationship than roshuto is, and roshuto is the one who ends up dumping him. it's fucking great. it hurts so much.

this fic is a whole lot of reigen getting deeply caught up trying to untangle the web of lies he'd been weaving for like 6 years straight while serizawa tries to unravel his trust issues and his negative view of himself, all the while the both of them are trying to figure out who they really are, because at the end of the day, they both don't know who they are.

reigen has spent so long lying about pretty much everything about himself that he doesn't know where to begin with what about himself is true or just part of the mask.

on the other hand, serizawa just doesn't have the life experience necessary to have a solid grasp on who he is as a person. he's only been out of solidarity for about six years, he hasn't even made it to the halfway point of the amount of time he spent in isolation.

reigen also has a huge complex with his internalized homophobia that he struggles to work through as a part of figuring out who he is. he struggles to be gay without shame and guilt, and for many years, he repressed his feelings toward men very intensely out of disgust for himself and fear of what other people would do to him if they found out, and he struggles to accept that part of himself. happy trails, the bar he goes to, became a safe haven for him to go to, and even if he didn't outright say anything about being gay or ever have a hookup there, it was a place where he didn't have to worry about getting attacked because everyone there was just like him, living their own lives with the same fears, and understanding him.

for years, he went to this bar and felt safe, like he could completely unmask and it would be okay. however, one night, he gets attacked by a group of drunk, homophobic men looking to take the frustrations of their jobs out on him, and it completely undoes any progress he had initially made with accepting himself.

serizawa's arc and the big things he works through on the other hand, are his issues with going along with what other people want, even if it's something he hates, because he doesn't know how to say no. he gets too anxious to, like he's going to ruin everything. he never said no to toichiro, he rarely said no to reigen, and thus far, he's the same with nana. he ends up struggling really badly trying to figure out if he actually loves nana or if he's just too nervous to say no to her on anything, especially because at one point she was his manager at the cafe they met at.

he can't tell if he's attracted to people more dominant than him, who take charge, or if it's because he's only ever really been around people like that, who have been in literal positions of authority over him, and he's just become afraid to say no, like he's not allowed to, feeling that his place is to be used and to do whatever other people want him to.

it's reigen's internalized homophobia that eventually destroys their relationship because he goes hot and cold; one day he wants roshuto, the next he dumps him and wants nothing to do with him.

i have this one quote from roshuto in the fic that's just really painful and it's really sticking with me so far:

"I know you have a whole complex about being gay. I know that you can barely even admit to yourself that you like men. I know you hate yourself for being a faggot, but I don't! I worked too hard for that!"

it hurts, man.

i haven't written it yet, but at some point i want there to be a conflict between nana, serizawa and reigen, where reigen finds out that nana was his manager at the cafe, and reigen loses it at how unprofessional and predatory it was for that relationship to happen like that. there's dating between coworkers, and then there's the manager predating on an impressionable guy without a lot of life experience who struggles to stand up for himself and say no, who she is also in a huge position of power over.

serizawa gets upset, first trying to say that he doesn't need to be treated like a little kid and that he can handle himself, but eventually thinks on the situation, and he realizes that reigen was right. he couldn't tell if he actually liked nana or if he was just happy to be in a relationship at all, feeling like he's not allowed to say no to anything she wants.

eventually, they break up and it devastates reigen to see serizawa so torn up over it, but in the end they both know it's better for him to get some more life experience and to learn how to better stand up for himself and say no than it is for him to be in a relationship with the mindset that he's not even allowed to say no.

so far, i'm calling this fic "psych" because reigen is pretending to be psychic, and is using his jack-of-all-trade skills to bullshit his way into having other people believe that he's actually psychic, and that is very similar to a murder-mystery cop show from the early 2000s called "psych", where a guy called shawn spencer pretends to be psychic to help the santa barbara police department in california solve crimes, and his best friend, burton guster, enables his lie.

eventually, shawn starts dating the junior detective, juliet o'hara, and they have a great relationship until she finds out that he's not psychic, and it destroys everything.

it's a really entertaining show, and it's nothing like other cop shows. highly recommend if anyone reading this enjoys murder mysteries, 90s and 2000s rock, constant movie references, an easter egg hunt involving pineapples that happens in every single episode, and general silliness and hilarity. honestly, brooklyn-99 has nothing on psych. the parallels between shawn spencer's ADHD ass and reigen's ADHD ass are fascinating.

that's where i got the inspiration for this fic. i'm not sure if this is going to be the actual title for it, especially because this fic is nothing even remotely close to silly, it's like all angst, but for now that's what i'm calling it until further notice and i'll be using the tag 'psych' to talk about this fic if anyone wants to block it.

anyway, that's my ramble. i hope you enjoyed it. that's far from everything that happens in the fic because no way in hell i could put it all in here, but here's a lot of it.

[harrysweasleys]

are you ticklish? // c.d

summary: can i request cedric diggory baking with the reader? i just need a lil fluff in my life 🥺 i LOVE U AND UR WRITING SO MUCH I HOPE U KNOW THAT! THANKS!

warnings: there’s no plot. its just fluff, my friends.

word count: 1.6k

a/n: sorry this is so late! i have been having writer’s block for like two weeks now so production has been slow here lol. thank you all for being patient! (also i’m sorry this doesn’t involve baking per say, but i hope you enjoy anyways!)

——————

The smell of warm, gooey cookies filled your shared home with Cedric as you sat yourself in front of the oven, impatiently staring into the little window and counting down the fifteen minutes until they would be ready. It was hard to stay away from them, you thought. The smell was just teasing you — taunting you, as if saying ‘the cookies are in progress, but you can’t touch them just yet.’

Cedric, leaning against the counter and taking a sip of his tea, fought the urge to chuckle as he watched you, seated comfortably on the floor with a blanket wrapped around you and a silly grin on your face.

Oh, how he adored you. Every little thing about you. From you desire to crack jokes only to see people laugh, to the way small things — like baking — would render you utterly happy. He had fallen for you all those years ago at Hogwarts, and never regretted a moment of it. You captured his attention as much now as you did all those years ago.

He watched, content as ever, while you eyed the timer above the stove.

“Come sit with me,” you reached out to him, giving him a soft smile that he knew he couldn’t say no to even if he wanted to.

He placed his mug down on the counter and leaned down, sitting on the cold floor and scooting as close to you as he could. His heart did a little flip as you lifted your arm and wrapped your blanket around him — he could smell you and feel the heat radiating off of your body. He really did love it.

“It smells nice in here,” you said, leaning your head against his shoulder.

He nodded softly before leaning his head against yours, lifting his hand and placing it atop your knee, “It does. Bet they’ll taste better than they smell.”

“Well, of course they will,” you scoffed, poking him in the side and causing him to jump slightly at the ticklish sensation, “Cookies always taste better than they smell. Besides, smelling them doesn’t put them in my belly.”

Cedric couldn’t fight the laughter that bubbled within him, the vibrations from his body causing you to let out your own laughter. He found your laughter infectious — unique in its own adorable way — so your laughter only egged him on to laugh harder.

The two of you were just sitting on the floor, wrapped in a blanket and staring at an oven, giggling away while the clock on the wall flashed 2:34am.

“Reckon we’ll have any left tomorrow?” Cedric found himself asking after a few moments of silence, the comfortable air in the room not previously needing to be broken by conversation.

“Nope,” you replied rather quickly, lifting your head off of his shoulder and giving him a toothy grin, “I’ll eat them all while we go watch telly in bed.”

Cedric had recently introduced you to a Muggle service called Netflix — which you had to admit, you really liked. It was hard to go to sleep without watching a few episodes. The two of you had recently started a new series and were up late binging it — only, you had had no snacks. 

That’s how the two of you ended up in the kitchen at this hour of the morning, the smell of chocolate cookies wafting through the quiet apartment and the low rumble of your stomach signalling your impatience.

Beep!

Cedric stumbled over as you jumped up, picking your wand up off of the counter and opening the oven. He was eye-level with the blast of heat that emerged, causing him to grimace and stand up hastily, waving his hands in front of his face.

“Oh, the smell of joy,” you grinned, eyeing the cookies as you lifted your wand, lifting the tray out of the oven and placing it atop the stove. The smell was now ten times stronger that they were out of the oven, and even Cedric couldn’t fight the hungry grumble in his belly.

He came up behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist and resting his chin on your shoulder, “They don’t smell as good as you, though.”

He grinned to himself as a blush rose on your cheeks, the corners of your lips curving up. You always became rather flustered at his compliments — one of the many reasons he loved showering you with them any chance he could get. The way that your cheeks and ears turned pink as the shy smile grew on your face — it was one of Cedric’s favourite things.

“Oh, such a smooth talker, Ced,” you giggled, turning around and wrapping your arms around his neck, his still wrapped comfortably around your waist. You could feel the heat coming off of him, surrounding your flushed body comfortably and making the dingy tile floor feel less freezing against your bare feet.

“You know it,” he smirked, leaning forwards and pressing a light kiss against your nose, “Theres no one else I’d want to make cookies with at 2am.”

You nodded your head, “Same here.” And it was true — there was no one else you’d want to do this with. Cedric was it for you, no one else would ever come close. 

He leaned down and pressed his lips against yours. They were familiar and warm, but they didn’t fail to make sparks fly in your belly no matter how many times you kissed. The feeling of kissing him was intoxicating — intoxicating enough you nearly forgot about the baked goods sitting on a tray behind you.

Cedric, however, couldn’t care less about the cookies at this point. He was utterly lost in your touch, in your kiss, in your smell. He didn’t want to stop and there was nothing in the world that could change his mind.

“They’re gonna get cold,” you pulled away from him slightly, mumbling against his lips.

“I’m afraid I don’t care,” he replied, wanting to pull you closer and continue kissing you until the sun came up and brightened the dim kitchen. 

You giggled, lowering your hands down from his neck to his waist, poking him in the sides and causing him to jump back. He screeched slightly at the ticklish sensation, pulling his lips away from yours and glaring you down.

“Well,” he brushed his shaggy brown hair out of his eyes, “That’s not fair.”

You raised and eyebrow, winking at him, before turning around to face the cookies, “They’re gonna get cold!”

Without waiting for him to retaliate, you picked up a cookie off of the tray, the softness and heat of it causing it to crumble slightly in your hand before you shoved the whole thing in your mouth.

You had been utterly wrong about them getting cold, however, because the second the cookie hit your tongue, it felt like it was on fire. The chocolate was scalding and your tongue felt fuzzy immediately. You let out a small cough and opened your mouth.

“I’m going to guess by your expression that they’re not cold?” Cedric smirked, placing his hands on his hips.

You gave him a glare, eating the cookie with your mouth open to cool it down, “I have made a terrible mistake.”

He nodded slowly, pursing his lips, “Karma for the tickling.”

You continued awkwardly chewing your cookie, glaring him down with narrowed eyes. His smirk never faltered, however, and the second that you swallowed your burning cookie, he lunged forwards with his arms out and his hands went straight to your sides.

You let out a loud yelp at the feeling, the ground beneath your feet disappearing as he lifted you up, wrapped you in his arms, and tickled you like there was no tomorrow. His laughter was bouncing off of the small kitchen walls as you began kicking and pushing him, hoping to get some sort of relief from the ticklish torture.

“Ced! Stop!” you gasped for breath through your laughter and shouting, hoping your neighbours down below wouldn’t hate you too much for causing such a ruckus at this early hour. Your laughter echoed through the small apartment as you struggled to breathe properly.

“Stop!”

“Fine, fine,” Cedric sighed dramatically, placing you down on the ground and standing above you. You finally touched the floor with your feet and let out a sigh of relief, the ghosting feeling of his hands on your waist making a shiver run down your spine. Cedric had always loved tickling you every chance he could get — but you, on the other hand, enjoyed it a little less.

You looked up at him, his eyes bright and his smile practically radiant. You couldn’t even bring yourself to pretend to be mad at him with that look on his face. He looked like a giddy child — a giddy child that had just received the exact gift he wanted on Christmas morning. And for some cruel reason, tickling you had been the gift he had longed for.

“Tickling should be a form of torture, you know,” you pulled down the hem of your shirt from where it had ridden up moments before, “I’d spill all of my deepest darkest secrets.”

His eyebrow cocked up and a glint of playfulness was evident in his eyes, “Oh, deepest darkest secrets, you say?”

Immediately regretting how close you were standing to him, you dodged his hands and took off towards the living room, Cedric’s loud footsteps letting you know he was chasing after you.

He was a rather quick runner, this you knew, but luckily he was in a playful mood and therefore was letting you outrun him as you darted down the hallway to your shared bedroom, continuously avoiding his grabby hands and the mischief in his eyes.

Unfortunately for you, the cookies had now long been forgotten.

——

taglist

@grierpilots​

@hxfflxpxffs​

@mikumana​

@msmimimerton​

@pit-and-the-pen​

@diary-of-an-onliner​

@theweirdsideofstuff​

@thoseofgreatambition​

@theweasleysredhair​

@haphazardhufflepuff​

(message me to be added!)

[twogyus]

taeyong x reader (side yuwin)

friends to lovers/ roommates au pt 1/2

genre: fluff, angst

Disclaimer: this is a bulleted version of an in progress fic. I will update with the fic link[PART 1] when it is complete. this is a jumbled mess, but i felt compelled to make a bulleted whatever u call those shits that I HATE reading because it was a good clear way for me to organize my thoughts on an upcoming project, enjoy xoxo

Sicheng is your first friend at Uni

he sees you struggling and takes you under his wing

at first you two just sit together in shared classes and study every once in a while

 eventually he wants you to have more  of a social life

he takes u to meet ALL of his friends and there are A LOT

at first u only pay attention to Yuta bc u notice something between him and your bestie

yuta is very flirty, especially with Sicheng, who he looks at so sincerely

Sicheng just can’t seem to openly reciprocate

you devise a plan to get them together

once you make sure your bestie is set up with the man of his dreams you begin to focus on getting to know the other members of the crew

you get close with a few, and learn one is abroad for a few terms

you,Yuta and Sicheng become the three musketeers

they hold u close to them since you helped them become a couple

When they get tired of living in a dorm with no privacy they decide to get an apartment off campus

ofc they invite you to be their roommate

the three of you live happily

they occasionally have people over to hang out

but most nights its just the three of you cuddled up on the couch, watching a movie or doing school work

they soak up the affection you rarely give so freely

most of the time u even ditch your bed for theirs for the good company

they call u their little hermit

which u resent

but wcyd

one day they say they’re having a party, and want u to participate for once

you don’t wanna but they say their friend is coming back after having been gone a year and you’re intrigued

they tell you he’s worth knowing, a sweet and talented guy

“A hot guy” *insert obnoxious winks*

you will yourself to not take any naps throughout the day so you have an excuse to ditch everyone later

You find yourself wanting to stay up all night, however, when you set ur sights on the missing piece of the puzzle that was Sicheng and Yuta's eclectic friend group

Taeyong? A synonym for god-like? 

That’s your first thought after he introduces himself

You’re immediately smitten

his good looks and shy demeanor are more than enough to pave the way to infatuation lane

u quickly learn he is a lot more complex than he lets on

also that he needs a place to stay

Yuta has to be drunk when he says Taeyong can room with the three of you

it's only a two-bedroom apartment, you whisper

he repeats you loudly, tacking on, “But you fall asleep on the couch or in our bed anyway” before patting your shoulder

that earns you all a few looks but you agree that he can stay after he mentions he doesn’t have enough to get his own place yet and was having complications getting into the classes he needs to finish his degree because of his time abroad and he can’t stay in the dorms unless he’s enrolled

that same night Taeyong stays over, all he owns is in a bag

drunk as a skunk, when you try to go to your bed and see him curled up in your sheets you stare for a long time before going to pass out on the couch

you only realize he was awake the next day when he won’t make eye contact with you

the awkwardness takes forever to blow over

Yuta and Sicheng’s hermit is not good at communication

he tries to talk to you but you usually freeze up and he thinks you hate him

you don’t hate him

you think he’s cute and so nice and you’re not sure you can talk to him without saying something weird

so when he tells you he’s sorry for taking your bed and you say

‘i wouldn’t want anyone else to have it’

the ice is broken

he giggles cutely and you nearly choke at how adorable he is

you two become fast friends

he’s very agreeable

everything is going smoothly until he sees you go into Yuta and Sicheng’s room for the first time

the next morning he asks you if the three of you ‘you ..know?”

he immediately apologizes, says its rude

you tell him the truth and he seems content with ur answer

thinks are good 

you listen to music together and cook dinner for everyone, and he helps you study when Sicheng isn’t around

you even start to participate with the group more in order to spend more time with him

you  learn its okay to let people in, that it can be refreshing sometimes

you stop clinging so much to your best friends and start to cling to Taeyong

it gets worse when the two of you drink

you’re both very touchy

you lay all over each other, hold hands, stroke each other’s hair

you’re happy because Taeyong is kind of a germophobe and sometimes doesn’t like to be touched

but he doesn’t seem to mind as much with u

but maybe that’s the alcohol

you don’t touch a lot when ur sober

otherwise, the occasional brushing of fingers when you’re cooking together is enough to keep you happy for a few solid hours 

you feel yourself getting attached after a couple of months

you find yourself lying in bed with him after nights of drinking

its all platonic hand holding and hed petting but you cherish it the same

it becomes hard when you realize you’re falling hard and fast

because every day with him is better than the last

he’s the sweetest guy, always checking up on you and offering his help

when he get’s his classes figured out you spend less time together

he makes friends outside of the group

you stop hanging out with..well..everyone

things seem less fun without him around

Yuta points out your crush but you ignore him

its at the next house party you admit to yourself Yuta's right

you’re jealous of the lone girl at the party, aside from yourself

she’s next to Taeyong on the couch, her hand on his arm his on her knee

you go to Yuta and Sicheng’s room to sleep away your sadness

the next morning you wake up to the smell of what could only be Taeyong’s home cooking

you’re excited to ask what he’s prepared until you hear giggling

not his 

a girl’s

you retreat away

you’re in shock

she stayed the night

first, they flirt on the couch, your BED btw

and then they...IN WHAT USED TO BE YOUR BED?

you calm down, try to act like nothing has changed

because nothing has

besides Taeyong having slept with someone he’s still the same towards you

when he’s gone, he’s gone and you miss his companionship

but when he’s around you still hang out, joke, cook, study

sadly it hurts all the same as the morning u woke up to see a girl in the kitchen, Taeyong’s arm around her waist

you try to suck it up, you really do, but you settle on the fact that you aren’t adult enough to get over it 100%

your last straw is when he says he can’t catch a movie with you because he has other plans

you were being paranoid and selfish, but you decide then and there that you can’t be around him

you have places you can go, you know, but dorms were full by the time Taeyong was able to enroll again

he has nowhere else to go

so you pack a bag and are the first to leave

You can’t handle that he’s not into you

or worse

that he was at one point and the two of you missed your chances

those drunken nights of holding each other were friendly at first

but you were sure he could feel the underlying emotions

couldn’t he?

tbc

[lyaress]

hi i read ur post about touka/kaneki as a ship ending unless the tragedy is taken to the extreme, and i was wondering if u don't mind answering why is that. i mean what do you think indicates touka/kaneki splitting up? i am just asking because in my mind kaneki will either die (like, i haven't re-read :re but didn't some doctor or something tell him that his health is deteriorating?) or tou//ken will sail... what do you think?

I believe Kaneki x Touka as a romantic pairing was never supposed to be viewed as a positive thing. The reasoning here is that I have some faith in Ishida’s writing capabilities and I don’t think he is dumb enough to write an abusive relationship and not realise that that’s what he has done. This gets very long so I’m putting it behind a read more.

Disclaimer: yes, I ship hidekane but not because I hate tou/ken. This post does not devolve into why hidekane > tou/ken like my posts normally do :P This posts only tries to establish why Touka and Kaneki are each others “bad ending.”

Touka

Since the very beginning, Touka is established as an attractive but troubled girl with anger management issues. She acts out and will ALWAYS resort to physical and verbal abuse to get her feelings of anger and frustration across. Touka is not an emotionally mature person. She is a mirror of Kaneki in this situation; Kaneki takes all the pain on himself, Touka inflicts all her pain on other people. Just as a foundation, this is not a good basis for a friendship let alone a romance. 

Due to circumstance and a mutual benefit from working together, they are able to enter a somewhat unstable friendship. Even in this fragile alliance between them, she is needlessly violent for no reason at all:

He is an abuse victim, don’t forget. It is especially bad for someone like Kaneki to be victim to this.

But by now, Touka recognises that Kaneki is a person who was much like her father, and a person who is at risk of leaving her behind, too.

This is the point where Touka’s abandonment issues really start to shine through. It is no coincidence that we have Touka’s background reveal right before Kaneki decides to leave ainteku. Touka’s father is established to be a personality very similar to original Kaneki’s, even their looks are almost identical. That section ends with Touka curled up on her bed thinking about her father and how everyone always leaves her. So this section tells us the following things:

Touka loved her father

Kaneki is very much like Touka’s father

Touka’s father and brother left her and she feels abandoned

Kaneki made the choice to abandon her, too

Touka suffers abandonment twice

Ishida knows this, and keeps coming back to this. He repeatedly has Touka suffering from abandonment in regards to Kaneki especially. And she reacts to abandonment violently, when she isn’t crying about it.

Now, from a shippers perspective, they probably think its cute that Touka needs Kaneki to function. They are so caught up in their little romantic fantasy that they forget this is a tragedy where Ishida is out to make Kaneki’s life as ironic and miserable as possible.They don’t acknowledge that Touka’s attachment issues and violent behaviour as a result of trauma are even unhealthy.

Now, let’s be a little bit productive about this. I’m going to link some sources that identify and explain Touka’s character and then I’m going to establish how her life led to her becoming an abuser. Please note that I do believe Touka has some deeper issues than simply abandonment, but because I’m not a psychologist I won’t try to diagnose her.

A general source about abandonment to establish some of what abandonment is and some of the symptoms that a person with abandonment issues might display.

Another source on abandonment

This source tells you about how abandonment rage is a thing. I don’t think it requires much contemplation to figure out how this relates back to Touka.

Here is list of possible traits that abusers can have , please be aware that not every trait will apply to any one person. In particular, I would like you to consider traits numbered 7, 9, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 23, and 24. Honorable mentions are numbers 4, 10 and 25.

Here is another source on abuse

If anyone could provide me with a counter to this and explain how Touka is not actually abusive, that would be both wonderful and very impressive. In addition, we can acknowledge that the only relationships Touka is functional in involve an over-protective big sister who is the sole provider for that person. She even gets offended when her perceived dependent (Hinami) chooses to study with Kaneki instead of her. 

So, so far we have concluded that Touka’s abandonment issues led to her becoming an abusive adult, and that Kaneki is one of her victims. And that she she only knows how to be in one kind of relationship. I haven’t even covered how Touka uses physical intimacy as a last resort to manipulate Kaneki into not leaving her. 

Now, let’s identify what a “bad ending” for Touka would look like.

She stays in a relationship where she feels the need to desperately search for any way to make her father her lover stay with her.

She raises a child while emotionally explosive and insecure. Her “this is how I was raised/grew up/was trained mentality is used on her kid, who then becomes another clone of her basically what happened when she was raising Ayato. Her child then becomes like her, another abuser born of their environment.

She is never given room to emotionally recover from her childhood trauma. She never gets therapy. She never changes.

She keeps being enabled to use violence to convey her emotions.

Now, let’s identify what a good ending would look like:

Touka gets therapy and no longer has to rely on her father a lover to feel validated.

Touka is no longer explosive. She learns how to communicate with words,

Touka is happy with who she is, as she is. No longer uses her body as a tool.

Touka raises a child with the help of someone who is emotionally mature and was raised in a stable environment and who knows what good parenting looks like. Hint: this person isn’t Kaneki.

Touka gets more relationships like Yoriko in her life that are genuine and without strings attached.

Touka finds a partner who she could actually sit around and chat with in their old age about their similarities instead of someone who she would never consider even talking to in a perfect world.

Kaneki

Oh boy, here we go. I’m not going to even attempt to get into Kaneki’s psychology, But I will point to some important things.

We know that Kaneki is used to violence from the people he loved. Wouldn’t you agree that Ishida is smart enough to draw these parallels in Kaneki’s love life in the same way that he did for Touka regarding her father?

He paired up the woman who uses violence as her way of communication with the man who is used to violence from people he loves. This is a recipe for disaster.

For a while, Kaneki was happy with Hide. Kaneki was content as a human living his life with Hide and casually dating people. Here is what Kaneki says about his life with Hide at the beginning before he starts excluding Hide and feeling lonely.

and

So, at this point, Kaneki was happy. He had some issues regarding his family but he wasn’t aggressive. He was self-sacrificing but his issues could be fixed with some therapy over time. He had a place he belonged, he wasn’t lonely, and he was studying to progress his life.

It wasn’t until Kaneki started realising that he needed to lose contact with Hide because ghouls were dangerous, and that he no longer had a place he fully belonged to, that Kaneki started talking about how lonely he is. 

Even when Touka is doing everything she can to give Kaneki a home:

Kaneki is still lonely.

We know that Kaneki just wants a source of comfort:

It isn’t until Kaneki believes that Hide is dead that Touka is able to seduce him and become a source of comfort:

Hook, line and sinker, Kaneki how relies on her for comfort instead of clinging to a person he assumes is now dead:

And she still puts in all the effort to make sure Kaneki can’t forget her. 

She gives him something he can’t leave behind:

And Kaneki believes that he is happy with her. But, we know this isn’t a good ending:

As Kaneki says:

So, Ishida is telling us that Kaneki’s current state of “happiness,” born from the desire only to feel love, is what eventually caused the current most devastating event in all of Tokyo Ghoul.

So now Kaneki has to actually deal with his underlying problems:

For Kaneki, what he needs is:

Obviously, therapy

A place where he can feel at home and not still be loney

A cure to his selfish desire to feel any kind of love he can get

To not associate violence with love

To learn what love is

To find a lover that loves him for who he is and not because of their daddy abandonment issues

To develop emotional control

An interesting note is that Touka’s “happy ending” does not have room for her relationship with Kaneki continuing like this. So, it is impossible for them to fix all of their issues AND be happy together. It just doesn’t work in the end because the glue that holds them together is born of their own insecurities and issues, if you remove those issues they no longer have anything to keep them together other than a difficult history.

Yeah, I really feel sorry for that tou/ken child…

But to answer the question: Tou/ken sticking together is a part of a tragedy ending because it is not what either of those characters really needs, especially when you take away their emotional scars. They represent each other’s weaknesses too exactly for this to be anything other than perfect planning by Ishida. I am also interested in seeing what happens when Kaneki’s original support foundation (Hide) is brought back into the picture. What reason does he have to cling to Touka anymore?

I see four possible endings:

1. Touken stay together. Neither can recover from their histories. Neither get a chance to recover. They keep up the tragic cycles of their past and cling to each other for comfort without healing.

2. Touka recovers from her issues. She no longer needs Kaneki to feel secure in herself. She has no reason to retain interest in Kaneki and can find a more suitable partner for herself.

3. Kaneki is able to find comfort in someone else (probably Hide) like he did at the start. He no longer has to cling to Touka to avoid feeling lonely and he can soundly begin his path to recovery like he should have at the start of the series.

4. One or both die. The other has a chance to move on.

I can’t give you a definite answer of how I think it will go down because Ishida can do a lot in the remaining chapters.

TLDR:

Kaneki and Touka are almost tailor-made representations of each other’s weaknesses. To heal, they cannot continue their relationship. If Ishida is trying to make the most tragic and ironic ending possible, it would include Kaneki and Touka staying together.