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ipuckwithhockey · 4 years ago

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He Doesn’t Hate You - Boone Jenner

A/N: I’ve been in a Columbus mood... Also, I know Seth is a little problematic but it just seemed to flow best with him as the best friend. This is pretty short and sweet. Let me know what y’all think! (I did not edit this so beware of typos)

warnings: nothing really? some swear words, drinking, nothing too crazy, this is pretty soft

——

You met Boone a few months ago when you moved to Columbus for your new job. You grew up down the street from Seth Jones, and so when you got the job offer in Columbus you couldn’t turn it down. You and Seth were close friends growing up, even when him and his family were moving around for his dad’s basketball career. You had older brothers who played sports with Seth, but you were always on their coat tails trying your best to keep up.

By the time you got settled into your new apartment, Seth had returned to the city for training camp. Seth had insisted that as your surrogate big brother he had to show you around town, and so you found yourself hanging out with him whenever you weren’t working. You didn’t know anyone else in Ohio so if you wanted social interaction outside of work, Seth was basically it.

A couple weeks after Seth got back to Columbus, he started mentioning that you needed to meet the guys on the team. He kept saying that they were like his other family and that you would love them too. You didn’t doubt him, but you were busy and tired with work and big social gatherings just didn’t seem appealing to you.

Eventually you caved, just like you knew you would, and that’s how you found yourself in a casual bar meeting the members of the Columbus Blue Jackets.

You really liked most of the team. Seth was right, Josh was a big teddy bear who you really couldn’t see getting into scrums on the ice, and you were definitely going to be good friends. Pierre seemed like a nice kid who was really finding his way in the NHL, and Cam definitely didn’t seem old enough to be a dad. Cam’s wife Natalie had come too, and she was so sweet. You quickly became a part of the CBJ group and everyone was so great and welcoming…

Except Boone. Boone Jenner.

It’s not that he was being rude, he just didn’t seem too interested in anything you had to say. Whenever you were around him he’d stop talking, or just leave. The eye contact? Non-Existent. He would never even look at you. It was like he just didn’t want to be friends with you and you had no idea why.

You brought it up to Seth one day and he just replied with “He’ll come around. He’s just not good around new people.”

You wanted to believe Seth but something about it just didn’t seem right. Boone was pretty cute, and he was always in a great mood with his friends, and he seemed like a really nice guy when he was with them. If he wasn’t so weird around you, you might actually be into him.

——

“Dude. Why are you being so weird?”

“Seth, what the hell are you talking about?” Boone looks over his shoulder to see Seth coming into the locker room to get ready for practice.

“Y/N thinks you hate her. She keeps asking me what she did to make you not want to be her friend.”

“What? I don’t hate her”

“Dude. I know. I also know you’re not good at the whole flirting thing but avoiding her every time she comes into the room isn’t helping your case.”

“Wh-what? I’m not trying to flirt with her.”

“HA. Yeah, ok..”

And that’s the end of the conversation as more guys pile into the room to get ready.

Boone’s a bit nervous now, and thinks that maybe Seth has figured him out. He didn’t hate Y/N. He actually really liked her. When she showed up to the bar that first night he was almost pissed that Seth hadn’t mentioned how beautiful she was. She was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen. And then she starts talking about football and is giving everyone shit about being Browns fans, and reminiscing about growing up playing soccer down the street with Seth. She tried explaining her job, but it was way over Boone’s head. She was funny, and smart, and sure of herself, and he knew he was screwed.

Boone wasn’t known for being the best with the ladies. He did ok for himself, but he was more of the shy type, while Andy and Jonesy were more outgoing player types. So every time she was around he got nervous. It’s like he just couldn’t think of anything to say, and when he did he thought you would think he was an idiot, so he just avoided you.

——

“Seth, I know you guys just won a big game, but I’m tired and I don’t really want to spend the whole night in a bar pretending to be friends with Boone.” You’re complaining over the phone as Seth tries to convince you to come out with them. You hadn’t seen him in almost two weeks since you’ve both been busy with work. A night out honestly seemed fun, but the thought of Boone making the dynamic weird all night had you trying to get out of it.

“Y/N for god’s sake, he doesn’t hate you! He likes you! and i think you just make him nervous because he’s a fucking idiot.”

He likes you… He likes you?

“Seth. What are you talking about. He barely even speaks to me.”

“BECAUSE HE LIKES YOU.”

“That literally doesn’t make any sense.”

“Whatever. I’ll see you at the bar in an hour!” and he hangs up the phone.

Now you’re just left sitting there thinking about what Seth just said. Boone. Boone Jenner. Likes you? But against all better judgement you kind of get it. He does get a little blushy when you accidentally touch his arm or laugh at his jokes… Maybe Seth is right…

——

“Booner, Y/N is coming tonight, do us all a favor and just make a move already. We can’t take anymore of you being an awkward idiot in front of her.” Seth is teasing Boone as they make their way to the bar to get a round of drinks, but now that Boone knows you’re coming out, he’s nervous. Should he make a move? Will you reject him and then make the whole dynamic of the group even weirder? What if you don’t reject him…

He’s lost in thought while everyone has settled into a booth toward the back of the bar when you appear in front of them. You’re wearing tight black jeans, a leather jacket, and a satin tank top that is loosely hanging off your frame. You look good. And Boone definitely noticed.

“Hey guys, big win, eh?” You make sure to put the very Canadian sounding ‘eh’ on the end as you reach over to ruffle Andy’s hair.

“Yeah, you should have been there! It’s like your job is more important to you than coming to our games!”

“Andy, believe it or not, my job IS more important than coming to your all’s games! BUT what’s most important to me right now, is getting a drink.” You laugh and turn away from the boys heading to the bar, but this time noticing that Boone’s eyes are following you. You’d be lying if you said you hadn’t put a little more effort into your makeup and outfit after your conversation with Seth, but that still didn’t change the fact that Boone doesn’t hardly speak to you.

When you make it to the bar, you remember just how busy downtown Columbus can be on a Friday night. It’s packed, and getting a bartender to notice you is going to take some time. You’re almost ready to just give up when you see Boone push through the crowd and grab a bartender’s attention like its the easiest thing he’s ever done. You scoff, knowing that you were still just trying to get up to the bar, let alone trying to get the attention of someone who would take your order.

“Here.” You turn around to see Boone, holding a drink out to you.

“Oh. Thanks! You didn’t have to do that,” you say as you take the drink from him.

“I figured, you’d probably be waiting a while, thought I’d help you out,” he smiles at you and leaves you to walk back to the group. You notice just how long he actually held eye contact with you, and take in his perfect beard and beautiful eyes. Instinctively you raise the glass to your lips as you watch him walk back to your friends, and then you realize he had ordered your favorite drink. How did he even know?

But Boone knew your drink of choice because he was always watching you. He couldn’t take his eyes off of you when you were in the same room.

When you got back to the booth, the seat next to Boone was empty so you sat down and joined in the conversation. The night went on and as more drinks flowed you and Boone started to converse more. He seemed more relaxed and you were actually having a really good time, and every once in a while your legs would touch, sending heat through your bodies.

You and Boone had really done a 180 in the last couple of hours.

The alcohol was probably giving you more confidence than you would normally have, but as you were sitting there laughing at a story that Seth and Andy were trying to tell, you let your hand fall on Boone’s leg. You felt him tense for a second but then relaxed into your touch.

You turn to him and whisper in his ear to thank him for the drink, “you knew it was my favorite didn’t you?”

With your hand on is leg, and your breath hot against his ear, he can barely even focus on what you’re saying, but he manages to nod his head in response to your question.

You let out a little laugh as you lean into Boone’s side and turn back to listen in on the story being told. Seth was right. He was definitely into you.

#boone jenner #boone jenner fic #boone jenner imagine #nhl imagine #nhl fanfiction #nhl fic #columbus blue jackets #hockey imagine #hockey fic #hockey writing #hockey fanfiction #seth jones

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lovelylogans · 5 years ago

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where you lead, i will follow

previous chapter / chapter three / next chapter

start from the beginning!

ao3 | read my other fics | coffee?

warnings: food mentions, complicated parental relationships, mentions of transphobia and homophobia, verbal fighting, top surgery mention, classism,

pairings: moxiety, logince

words: 5,995

notes: you know the first sentence of the chapter? i’m literally still writing this

if this was a full length fic (we’re ignoring that this is chapter three shut up) i would include:

logan does actually try being nice for once and literally everyone in town asks if he's sick, and when logan finally explains it all to roman, roman rolls his eyes and knocks his foot against logan's and says "why on earth should you ever change? you're wonderful" and they both blush and change the subject and logan acts like "you're wonderful" isn't echoing around in his head for the next week

logan having a weird bonding moment with his grandfather when his grandmother makes his grandfather take him to the country club, and they both find themselves hiding in the same corner with all the historical records instead of socializing

virgil finds a stray kitten, patton finds out about it and cries about the cuteness, and then cries harder when the kitten finds a good home, virgil almost has a stroke from the sheer Cute when patton holds it

logan figures out that dee's first name is wiped out of all the school records (???) and that their grandmothers are apparently friends (???) and they have to sit through some kind of brunch together in their newly budding nemesis-ship glowering at each other, emily somehow entirely oblivious to the daggers her grandson and dee are shooting each other

there is a new kid at sideshire who is out and Cute and roman might be swooning over him a little??? his name is (draws from the hat of gilmore girls love interests) jess. oh yeah, like, bad boy jess. i can make that work. anyway hard cut to logan being sulky or jealous in the background every time this comes up

patton goes to a pta meeting, chaos ensues

logan has hit his growth spurt and has shot through a pant size in a month; patton actually cries a little when he realizes logan is taller than him now and he's getting so old he's such an adult!!!

logan studies to the point where patton finds him slumped over his study materials regularly, and at one point he nearly passes out walking to the bus stop and virgil sees and makes him sit down and eat and tells patton, and patton sits him down and has A Talk about taking care of himself

but we're gonna have time jump to the point of... oh, let's say it's october? before logan's birthday. then-ish.

⁂

it's autumn in sideshire! the leaves are all orange and red and brown and crunchy, a chill is in the air, sweaters are busted out, virgil gets more and more influxes of orders for hot cocoa/coffee, etc etc, mood setting, you get it.

logan's settled more and more into the swing of things at chilton: he has an impeccable studying schedule set up, with various allowances for when patton or roman insist he's "working too hard" and break it. he and dee are, that weird brunch aside, mostly circling around each other, waiting for the other to make a move.

patton's mostly gotten into the swing of things, too; he and his parents still bicker at dinners, but he's used to that, he's been used to that for years. he waits for logan to get home at virgil's, he supervises roman and logan sleepovers, he still works for his business degree and oversees the chaos that is the inn.

he's at the inn one day, directing the landscapers on where to put all the leaves the part-timers have raked up and has fallen into a discussion about flowers that'll do well in their cold climate, when a familiar boy races up the lawn, grinning wide, clutching—patton squints, but roman's upon him before he can tell, giggling as he tries to catch his breath, holding onto his shoulder for balance.

"mr. sanders!" he exclaims, and laughs again, letting go of patton to his hand to his mouth. "um, i'm sorry, i know you're working, i just don't have anyone else to tell yet and—" he falls into giggles again.

"that's okay," patton says, very confused as to what's happening. "um, just—handle the leaves, we can keep talking flowers when we have our appointment on...?"

"thursday."

"thursday, right! okay, mr. giggly, let's go inside, you can tell me all about it."

patton has an office! he doesn't use it much, prefers to be out in the scrum of things, but it's very adult-looking and he's fond of it. all dark woods and file cabinets that logan helped organize and a variety of coffee mugs littered around, and patton pats the couch, sitting down himself, sighing a little. it's nice to sit down, he's been on his feet all day.

"okay," patton says. "so, what warranted running up to my inn with a..." patton frowns. "is that a box of cornstarch?"

"oh!" roman says, lifting it to eye-level, as if noticing it for the first time. "oh! i might have shoplifted." he looks worried for a second, before he giggles again, covering his mouth with his hands. "oh my god, i can't believe i just did that."

"i—go back," patton says, shaking himself, because sure, he'd shoplifted in his misguided youth, but not roman. "you shoplifted?!"

"accidentally!" roman defends. "i just—okay, so, you know jess?"

he knows jess from a distance—he's seen him around town on his motorcycle, knows him like he knew the boys he'd gravitated toward, the kind his parents would disapprove of so the kind of boy he'd throw himself at. he also knows jess from logan's grumbles of "what kind of name is jess anyway" and "as suspected! he's a fight club fanboy, i would have thought roman knew better" and "what do you mean, jealous?! i'm not—i'm not jealous! that's ridiculous! jealous, dad *poorly executed scoff that tells patton he's right* honestly."

"i've seen him around," patton says, instead of getting into all that.

"he," roman says, drawing himself up, and giggles, "kissed me."

patton blinks. "he did?!"

"he did!" roman says. "i was in the grocery store and i was trying to act, you know, all chill, like, oh, hey, didn't see you there, like i didn't follow him in from the outside, so i didn't really notice i was staring at corn starch, and he came around a corner and was like so you have a really desperate need for some cornstarch? and i tried to play it really cool, and i just ended up blurting out nice jacket like an idiot, but then he laughed like it was funny and not like he was laughing at me and he was showing me all the pins he had on there and talking about how it was good for riding, and he said i'll have to take you out for a ride sometime and inside i was like, you know, oh my god!! that sounds like a date! because it totally sounds like a date, right?!"

patton's about to agree, but roman plows over him, still babbling excitedly.

"—and he was telling me, like, all about the stuff we might potentially do, and i told him i knew a really nice place for, like, a picnic, or something, and he said so a picnic's one of the only things to do around here? and i was like well, i dunno, i think it'd be a pretty nice date, and oh my GOD i still cannot BELIEVE i said it like that, and then he looked at me and did this cute little smirking thing he does, it makes him look like james dean or marlon brando or something, and he said a date, huh? and i said what, is taking people out for a motorcycle ride something you do with all the boys in town? and HE said only the cute ones and i almost screamed patton i swear and i tried to play it like, oh, yeah, a motorcycle ride, totally something someone asks me to do like every day and this is totally not the first time someone's ever called me cute and asked me on a date, and so i said and what's in it for all these cute boys, then? and he said well, i'm looking at just one cute boy in particular and THEN!!!"

"he kissed you," patton surmises.

"he kissed me," roman said. "and then he said seven? and i said yeah and then he left and then i ran all the way here."

"wow," patton says, because, well. what else can he say?

"yeah," roman sighs happily, and then he chews on his lip, and then he says, "patton, you know things about boys."

that... was not where he was expecting this to go. "i...sure?"

"i mean," roman says, and flaps his hands. "i can't tell my mom about this, she might kill him. what do i—i've never been on a date before, and i've never been on a motorcycle, and you have—"

"how'd you know that?!"

"logan told me his other dad has one, and i mean, you were a rebellious teenager, weren't you?" roman says. "you had to have gone on dates, patton, help me."

"i—"

"i mean, other than your massive crush on virgil—"

"my what?!" patton squeaks, cheeks flaming red.

"oh, patton, please, you know that i've known for years, it's obvious," he says, then, "and you can't tell logan!"

"we're going back to the virgil thing later but, i mean—i figured you'd want to tell him," patton says.

"i can't tell him this!"

"you tell each other everything," patton says, a little blindsided, because they did tell each other everything. patton cannot think of a secret kept between them. from him, maybe. but not between them.

"yeah, but—" roman bites his lip, harder. "he doesn't like jess, and he's—we're—you know."

"he'd still want to hear about it from you than anyone else, you know how fast gossip spreads in this town," patton says.

"he'll get all weird about it," roman says. "and then we won't talk as much anymore, and then he'll start passive-aggressively writing an article for the courant about the dangers of motorcyclists, and then jess will see it, and they'll argue, and then i'll have to figure out how to calm it down without making either of them think i'm preferring the other, and oh my god, you're logan's dad, i can't be telling you about this! i cannot believe i'm asking you for advice for a date!"

"well, who do you usually go to about this kind of thing?" patton says pragmatically. "other than logan or me, i mean, you can advice from them if it's too weird hearing it from me."

roman looks at his shoes and mumbles, "i go see," and then the name tumbles into something indecipherable.

"sorry, who did you say? i couldn't hear—"

"i go see virgil," roman wails, and patton actually laughs, before he blinks.

"wait. you're serious?"

roman hides his face in his hands. "i go to the diner and i tell him about—about whatever's going on with logan, and then he tries giving me advice except he's terrible at it, and then i get to make fun of him for being worse at romance than a teenager, and then he grumbles at me about it, and it's a system, okay?! but i can't tell virgil about jess, are you crazy?!"

"i just—virgil?" patton repeats, trying to wrap his head around it.

"virgil hates jess," roman bursts out. "he told me so."

"oh, i'm sure he doesn't—"

"he told me that," roman says, "to my face. and then he started being, all—" he makes his voice gruff in his best virgil impression. "that boy who walks around town like he's trying to figure out the best windows to break and businesses to vandalize? he's bad news, roman. stay away from him. that kid is trouble, you mark my words. like he's—like he's a criminal, and i'm some kind of innocent damsel that needs protecting!"

"okay, okay, okay," patton says. "no virgil, then."

"but i can't talk to you, me and logan are—" roman waves a hand vaguely. "you know."

"yeah," patton says. "i mean—yeah, actually, what's with all this, since you and logan are all—"

he copies the hand gesture.

"yeah, but i just," roman says, and scuffs his sneaker over patton's carpeted floor. "i dunno. i kind of figured if he wanted to go out, he would have made a move by now, right? i don't wanna... i don't wanna be all hung up on him when there's this guy right here who does want to date me."

patton considers that, and tries to set aside the fact that logan's his son, because roman looks like he needs advice right now.

"look. do you really like this guy?"

roman worries his lip between his teeth, and admits, "i think i could. i think i'm on the way there."

"okay," patton says. "then i'll help."

he holds up a hand.

"i'm only going to give you a little bit of a lecture, but you're smarter than i was when i was your age. stay safe, okay? and if he tries to talk you into anything—seriously anything—that you're uncomfortable with, you call me, okay? or your mom. actually, your mom would be way better at intimidation than me."

"okay."

"okay," patton says. "then it's a first date, not a marriage proposal. go into it with the goal of getting to know him. have fun. if it doesn't work, it doesn't work, no big loss. if it does? then you can go from there."

roman bites his lip some more. "you really think i should tell logan?"

"i think he'd be madder if he found out from someone else."

roman gusts out a sigh. "okay," he says.

patton ends up realizing he should probably get back to work, and suggests that roman go meet logan at the bus stop and walk him back home or to virgil's or wherever, so he can tell him the news.

logan steps off the bus, ready to spend a friday afternoon clearing off his weekend homework so he can have something to discuss at family dinner, and then focus on extra credit and planning his week on sunday, and blinks when roman waves at him from the bench.

"you're here."

"yeah," roman says, standing up.

"you never come to walk me back."

"yeah, well, i wanted to talk to you."

"about what?"

"how was your day?" roman says, dodging the question.

logan's eyes narrow, just a little, before he tells him about his exam in history about the french revolution that he thinks went well, and logan asks "how was yours?"

roman tries to make himself sound as happy as he sounded—as he'd felt—when he was talking to patton. "um, actually, i got asked out."

logan blinks at him. "asked out where?"

"no," roman says. "like, um. like i got asked out on a date. tonight."

logan stares at him, still, face so blank that roman doesn't have a hope of reading it. "a... date."

"yeah," roman says. "like. romantically. a guy thought i was cute and asked me out. a date."

"which guy," he says.

"jess," roman says. "you know. the new guy. the junior with the motorcycle."

"motorcycle," logan repeats.

"we're going to go on a picnic."

"a picnic."

"at seven."

"seven."

"he kissed me," roman says, and there's not a reaction. not at all. "at the grocery store. i might have shoplifted in all my excitement."

"shoplifted."

"logan, are you just going to keep repeating everything i say?!"

logan shakes himself, and says abruptly, "i forgot i told virgil i was going to pick up a book i wanted to borrow from him."

"oh," roman says. "um, okay. do you wanna get a jam tart or—?"

"i'll be in and out," logan says. "i have a lot of homework to do."

"okay," roman repeats, and logan looks at him, because roman's biting his lip the way he does when he's nervous, and he tears his gaze off of his lip. the lip that jess kissed today, apparently.

"you always wanted to go on a date," logan says, robotic. "and now you're going on one. good for you."

roman tries for a smile. "yeah. i'm—i'm really excited."

"good," logan repeats. "that's good."

he almost sounds like he means it. he gestures to the diner. "i'll see you later."

"do you want to do lucy's on saturday?"

"again," logan says. "i have a lot of homework. i'm not sure how free i'll be. midterms."

"oh," roman repeats, and then tries for a smile. "okay."

okay's starting to not sound like a word.

"have fun on your date," logan says, and his tone is just a bit cold, and roman forces out "logan—" right as the door closes behind him.

virgil glances up, and says, "hey, kid, i wasn't sure if you were going to stop in today—"

"i'm not staying for very long," logan says. his tone is still very blank. studiously blank.

"to-go bag, then?" virgil says, already packing up logan's (healthy) after-school snack. "don't study too hard, okay, it's the weekend."

"right."

"and tell your dad to stop by after dinner with your grandparents if they try feeding you, like, caviar or something."

"okay."

virgil narrows his eyes at logan, and says, "you okay?"

"fine."

virgil's eyes narrow further.

"i'm fine," logan repeats.

"right," virgil says, and then, to the nearest worker, "jean, could you handle the register a minute? i've got a book upstairs i want logan to look at."

logan follows along, with none of his signature confidence or arrogance, and virgil unlocks the door to his apartment.

logan's only been up here a few times. most of the time, he just stays in the diner, or virgil comes over to their place. he slept over here a few nights, as a kid. it's a small place, homey like his dad's, but a bit more sparse. logan drops his backpack at the door.

"there's no book, is there."

"nope," virgil says, and logan sits on virgil's couch. "you okay, l?"

logan shrugs, pulls a blanket that virgil has over the back of the couch onto his lap.

this is kind of freaking him out. whenever logan gets upset, he's usually angry, quick to explode or snap, or he sulks. he's never so...

listless.

"roman's going on a date with jess," logan says tonelessly.

"oh, shit," virgil says, "the delinquent?!"

"he has a record?" logan asks, plucking at an imaginary loose thread in the blanket. there's none of the investigative curiosity that would usually be in his voice.

"not that i know of, he just—he has that vibe, you know?" virgil says. "are you sure he said jess?"

"he kissed roman in the grocery store. roman said he accidentally shoplifted. they're going on a motorcycle ride to a picnic."

all of his words are devoid of energy.

"do you need a hug or something?" virgil asks helplessly, because he isn't sure if he's ever seen logan this... defeated before.

"no."

"jam tart? yelling session? anything?"

"no," logan repeats, and sets aside the blanket. "i have a lot of homework to do."

"you can do it here? if you want?"

"i think i'll go home."

"do you need me to walk you there?"

"you're in the after school rush," logan says. "no. i'll be fine."

"are you sure?"

"yes, i'm sure," logan says, and stands, folding the blanket again before setting it on the couch.

"logan—"

"i'm fine," he repeats, goes to get his backpack, and walks out of the apartment, and then out of the diner, as virgil stares after him.

virgil lets out a breath, and gets out his phone.

"virgil, hey!" patton says happily, picking up after the second ring.

"hey," virgil echoes. "um. logan just stopped by, and—"

"was roman with him?"

virgil blinks. "you knew?"

"roman came to the inn to tell me all about the kiss and the date and stuff, and i told him logan would probably take the news better coming from him than from the gossip mill," patton says. "also, why didn't you tell me that you're apparently roman's romantic guru?"

"i am not his romantic guru."

"he made it sound like you are," patton says. "he said it's a system. that he makes fun of you for not knowing anything about romance."

"okay, but that kid bullies me daily."

"he's fifteen."

"doesn't change the fact that he's a little jerk."

"we'll come back to that later," patton says. "why'd you call?"

"oh," virgil says, because right. the not-great news. "right. um, i'm pretty sure roman just broke your son's heart."

there's a moment of silence before virgil shuts his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose.

"i've never seen him so..."

"mad?" patton says, worried. "did he yell at you? you know he doesn't mean any of it, but he'll apologize as soon as—"

"no," virgil says. "no. he wasn't mad at all, that's why i'm worried. he was just... lifeless."

another moment of silence. "oh," patton says, strangled.

"yeah."

"like...?"

"like, i tried talking to him, and he was just. blank. didn't want a hug, didn't want to yell, didn't want a jam tart, didn't want anything. just told me that roman was going on a date, and he said he had a lot of homework to do and that he was going to go home. kept telling me he didn't need me to walk him back and that he was fine."

"oh, no," patton murmurs. "i—oh, no."

"yeah. so. figured you should have a heads-up."

"thanks," patton says, distracted. "i—i'm going to go check on him."

"keep me updated?"

"yeah," he says, and then, "i've gotta go."

"right. okay."

patton ends up calling it an early day at the inn, and drives home. no one answers when he opens the door.

"hey, i'm home," he calls, dropping his keys into the little bowl by the door.

nothing. he frowns.

he was just... lifeless, echoes in his head. he stomps loudly up the stairs, and pauses, before he opens up the door to his son's room.

there's a lump on the bed. curled up under the covers. glasses on the table. head turned away from the door.

"hey," patton says, softer.

no response. patton crosses and sits carefully on the edge of the bed. logan's just staring out the window. his aren't red, or watery, so he hasn't cried. he's just... lying there.

patton reaches out and puts a hand on what he's pretty sure is logan's ankle. he squeezes, gently.

"so, you haven't had the best day," patton prompts gently.

no response.

"i'm sorry," patton offers. "i know that must have been hard to hear."

nothing.

"i have some emergency logan's berry crofter's if you want it, honey."

nada.

"is it okay if i lay down too?"

a long pause. patton's about to ask again, before—

"lie," logan croaks out.

"what?"

"lie down. you're a person, not an object. people lie down, objects lay down."

"oh," patton says. "okay, then, can i lie down too?"

"can you call grandma and grandpa first?" he whispers. "just tell them i'm sick."

"yes," patton says. "yes, of course, i'll call right now, just—"

he fumbles with his phone for a second, before he manages to click on the contact name.

"emily sanders speaking."

"mom, hey," patton says, pitching his voice low. "i'm gonna have to cancel dinner today."

"what?" she demands. "why?!"

"logan's sick."

"he was at school today, wasn't he?"

"he started feeling bad on the bus, mom," he says, and racks his brain for an illness severe enough that it would get them out of it. "puked as soon as he got off."

"don't be crass."

"sorry," patton says. "but he's sick and i don't want to make him take the drive and sit down for dinner when he's going to be too nauseous to handle it."

"let me talk to him."

"he just laid down for a nap, i don't wanna wake him," patton lies. "look, i'm sorry to do this so short notice, but i really have to insist. he's a mess."

a long pause. "we could drive down to look after him."

patton's eyes probably go cartoonishly wide in alarm. "mom, that's a nice gesture, really—"

"great, then we'll—"

"i don't want you catching whatever it is he has," patton finishes, louder. "seriously, we're fine here, we can have a, a, a make-up brunch or something. i'll let you know as soon as he feels better."

a huff. "brunch it is, then. at the club."

patton winces, before he says, "whatever you say, mom. i'm gonna, um. clean some stuff up around here."

"tell me when you're—"

patton hangs up.

"how bad is it," logan says, in that same blank, awful voice.

"brunch at the club, whenever you're feeling better," patton admits, setting his phone aside before he takes off his shoes, and lies down on the bed—well, leans back against the headboard so he can keep an eye on his son, really.

logan nods, and resumes looking out the window.

"i'm really sorry," patton says softly.

logan doesn't say anything.

logan doesn't say anything for the rest of the night.

⁂

"hey."

"hey. how is he?"

"not good. you were right. even when he's sick he's not so quiet. i think he said maybe fifteen words between me getting home and him falling asleep."

"did he...?"

"he was just. lying there. the whole night. he was just lying there, virge. he didn't do anything. he didn't talk, he barely ate—"

"he's going through a growth spurt, not eating is—okay, i'm sure you know all that, should i bring breakfast, tomorrow morning?"

"as long as you aren't too busy."

"i'll make crofter's pancakes, or something. bring you some hot cocoa/coffee."

"thanks."

"um. not to be awkward, or anything, but roman brought by the boy."

"...ah."

"i don't like him."

"roman mentioned that."

"i just—roman deserves better. don't tell him i said that."

"what did they do?"

"they got cake."

"did he treat roman okay? from what you could see, i mean."

"i mean, i was in and out of the kitchen, but roman looked—happy. i guess."

"why 'i guess?'"

"i dunno. i mean, he tried to put a hand on roman a few times, and roman just kind of... laughed uncomfortably and tried to move."

"if he tries to pressure roman into anything, i swear—"

"hey, roman's a headstrong kid. he's a bit too stubborn for his own good. no one's about to make him do anything he wants to do."

"if he presents it like he's sweeping him off his feet—"

"...oh. i see your point."

"i just—sorry. i have a history with those kinds of boys. logan's existence alone as exhibit a. but he's probably a nice boy, right?"

"i still don't like him."

"sweetheart, this is the part where you say, yes, patton, i'm sure he's a nice boy and that roman had a lovely time, but he's going to come to realize that waiting for logan to make a move was the wrong choice and figure out his love life."

"oh. um, all that."

"okay. you know, it's weird for us to be talking on the phone like this."

"yeah. usually, you just barge into the diner, it's weird to be talking to you without fending off requests for hot cocoa/coffee."

"hey, i'm not that bad."

"i'm reminding you of this conversation next time that starts up again, then."

"fine, fine, if you say so. i think i'm gonna go to bed. you still have your spare key, right?"

"right, yeah. i'll text when i'm on the way."

"you know i probably won't wake up with that."

"yeah, but. just the gesture of the thing."

"i know. gosh, what a mess."

"they'll get there eventually."

"we can only hope."

"teenage boys are dumb."

"don't i know it. i'll see you tomorrow?"

"yeah, i'll see you then."

⁂

virgil's used to getting up early, mostly because of opening up the diner but also partially because he has a terrible sleep schedule. patton, who has the sleep schedule of "yes," is less likely to be up at this kind of hour. so virgil unlocks the door with the key patton gave him as soon as he moved in, and goes to the kitchen to start making breakfast, only to come to a stop.

"oh," he says to the blanket-wrapped boy at the kitchen table. "um, hey, logan."

"virgil," logan says, pencil scratching over paper. so that's something.

"i told your dad i might come over to make breakfast. so."

"right," logan says.

"you want pancakes?"

"sure."

okay. one-word responses. better than none, right?

virgil digs around for the bowls and plates and pans he'll need, and sets aside patton's hot cocoa/coffee (in a thermos) and then turns to survey logan some more.

"what are you doing?"

"making a list," he says. "well. a variety of lists, really. it seemed untidy to have one big one when i could categorize."

okay, that sounded more like him. virgil tried not to sigh in relief.

"categorize. like what?"

"chilton, college applications, things we need to do around the house, dad's business plans. plans for the diner too, actually, just there."

virgil picks it up, and blinks. "remodel?"

"at least paint. you're due for it."

"the diner's classic. vintage, even."

"like i said. at least paint."

the house phone rings. logan blinks, swivels around.

"no one calls the house phone," he mutters, and gets to his feet, picking it up.

"logan sanders speaking." a pause. virgil can hear what sounds like a woman responding. "no, he isn't here." a pause. "he wasn't here last night either." another pause. "what do you mean, he didn't come home?"

a longer pause. virgil's missing some kind of puzzle piece, he can feel it.

"no," logan says, voice faraway and cold. "he told me was going on a date. he didn't tell you?"

oh. SHIT.

the woman's voice, louder, and oh no.

"i'm sorry, i don't know where he'd be," logan says, and hangs up.

"logan," virgil manages, after he picks his jaw up off the ground.

"excuse me," logan says, "i'm feeling rather ill. i'm going to lie down."

he sweeps up the stairs. virgil has to reassemble his thoughts before he grabs his phone, scrolling through the contacts, and hissing "pick up pick up pick up you little—"

"you've reached roman prince—"

"fuck," virgil hisses, and clambers up the stairs after patton, before he bursts into patton's shoulder, shaking his shoulder.

"mmph," patton mumbles, and if it was any other day, virgil would be marveling at his bedhead, his sleeping face, but right now—

"patton. patton wake up."

"virgil?" patton mumbles, props himself up on an elbow and rubs his eyes.

"roman didn't come home last night," virgil blurts out, and patton blinks, before sitting upright.

"what?!"

"ms. prince called here because she thought he might have been over here," virgil says, "because roman didn't tell her he had a date and he didn't come home last night."

"oh, god," patton says, wild-eyed, and rolls out of bed, going straight for his closet. "do you think he's—?"

"i don't know," virgil says. "i knew i didn't like that kid, i knew it—"

"i'm sure he's okay," patton says, a little frantic as he searches for a passable shirt. "i mean, this is sideshire we're talking about—"

he stops in his tracks. "who answered the phone?"

"what?"

"you said ms. prince called here, who—?"

"logan did."

"oh, no," patton says, horrified, and shakes himself. "right, okay. you're going to go to ms. prince's and offer to help look for roman, i'm going to stay here and—" he gestures toward logan's bedroom.

"right," virgil says. "right, okay. you have hot cocoa/coffee in a thermos in your kitchen, i'm going to go—" he jerks a thumb toward the door.

"right, yeah," patton says, and they split up.

virgil's on his way to ms. prince's, brain swirling with possibilities, when he sees a familiar pair of red, doodled-over high tops peeking out from a tiny little garden alcove off the main street. virgil's heart practically stops. he feels like the jogger in the intro of a crime show that's about to stumble across a—

but he can't stop himself from barging forward, heart in his throat, and—and he's just lying there. the pair of them are.

the boy is on top of roman. it infuriates him.

"HEY!" virgil shouts, voice deeper and rougher than even he would have anticipated, and he closes his fist around the neck of the leather jacket, yanking him roughly off of roman, tossing him aside.

"get your hands off him!"

he shoves the kid when he tries to get closer to roman again, and he's so incensed that he can't even think.

"what the hell, dude?!" the boy demands.

"don't you dude me," virgil shouts. "do you have any idea what could have happened out here?!"

"virgil, stop!" roman shouts back, tugging sharply at his arm, and virgil swivels. "we just fell asleep—"

virgil says sharply, "there's no just about this, roman!"

"it was an accident, he didn't—"

"your mother called the sanders', she's worried sick," virgil fumes, and roman's face drains of blood. "do you know how terrifying it must have been for her to wake up without her kid in her bed in the morning?! why the hell wouldn't you have told her?!"

"we didn't DO anything!" the other kid shouts.

"oh, you better hope you didn't do anything," virgil snarls, turning to face the kid again, "staying out all night! outside! in october! are you insane?! you are SO lucky you two didn't catch hypothermia, to start with—"

"my mom," roman says, and tugs at virgil's hoodie sleeve. "virgil, my mom—"

"you better sprint back to that dance studio if you don't want to be grounded for all time," virgil snaps.

but roman doesn't. roman turns to the boy, and says breathlessly, "it was really nice—i'm really sorry about all this, um—"

"hey, i've got your number," the boy says, and he looks pleased when roman darts forward to kiss him on the cheek, shouting "bye!" and running for the studio.

there's an awkward silence.

"am i free to go, officer?" the boy sneers. "or do you have to give me a shovel speech, too?"

"i don't like you," virgil says, and gives his best intimidating grin. he's pleased to see a flicker in the boy's attempt at cool confidence. "so i'll leave all that to ms. prince."

he strides away. he turns a corner in the street and waits until the diner is in sight before he digs out his phone.

"hello?" patton answers, breathless, and just like that, all the fight leaves him.

"hey, i found him," virgil says. "he's probably going to get grounded until the end of his natural life, but i found him. he's okay."

"oh, thank god," patton gasps. "he's okay?"

"lucky not to have hypothermia," virgil says darkly. "fell asleep in that little garden off main, the one with the willow tree?"

"they fell asleep?"

"i guess," virgil says. "that's what he said, anyway. i really don't like that boy, patton."

"yeah, well, i think you've got a household joining you on that," patton says wearily.

"is he—?"

"oh, shoot, right," patton says, and virgil hears him shout, "virgil found him, he just fell asleep!"

the response isn't something virgil can hear. "what'd he say?"

"nothing, he just kind of loudly exhaled at me," patton says. "i think he's back to not talking to me again."

virgil sighs, rests his head briefly against his diner. "what a mess."

"what a mess," patton agrees wearily. "i can't bribe you into coming back to making those pancakes, can i?"

virgil snorts. "you know what? why not. you and logan probably need them."

"amen," patton says.

#wyliwf #my fic #sanders sides fanfiction #moxiety #logince

79 notes · View notes

fanforthefics · 6 years ago

Note

tyson/gabe, soulmates au

Gabe comes into the locker room and maybe drops his shit into his stall a little louder than usual.

It doesn’t get much of a reaction. There’s plenty of guys around, getting ready for practice, but apparently their captain coming in isn’t enough to get them to -pay attention. That feels right. Gabe sighs again, and starts getting ready too.

“Okay, I’ll bite.” That’s Mikko, because he has no respect. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong.” Gabe strips off his shirt. That makes him look at the green mark sprawled over his hip--the name bigger and brighter than most people’s. Normally that makes him fond. Right now he doesn’t want to see it, particularly.

Mikko raises his eyebrows. “That seems not true.”

“It’s fine,” Gabe mutters. He is fine. His hand presses down at the mark.

The door to the locker room opens again, then, and Nate and Tyson come in--loudly, of course. Another thing that Gabe would usually be fond of. This time it gets attention, though--Josty immediately snaps to attention.

“Tys! You have more pictures?”

“Of course I have pictures of the baby,” Tyson agrees on a laugh. He glances at Gabe, grins--his usual welcoming, hi how are you sort of check in. Gabe smiles back because he’s found it impossible not to smile at Tyson basically since he met him, but he then he turns back to fiddle with his under armor.

“Well?” JT demands, and Gabe bets that’s Tyson pulling out his phone.

“Everyone, meet Ralphie,” Tyson declares. There’s the usual sound of a bunch of large men cooing over a small dog.

“Gabe!” comes the yell from the scrum. “Have you met your new son?”

Gabe turns around again. Most of the team is crowded around Tyson’s phone, looking at pictures of the puppy. Tyson’s looking up at Gabe though, smiling hopefully. Gabe can see the edges of the mark curling on his collarbone, the one Gabe knows as well as he knows the back of his hand.

“Yes,” Gabe tells them, because he has--because he was there when Tyson brought him home, and it was very sweet, a little curly thing all full of energy and affection. At least there was that. “He’s very cute.”

“Isn’t he?” Tyson agrees proudly, and shows his phone around. “He’s so smart, too.”

“So definitely not your real son,” EJ throws in, and Tyson wrinkles his nose at him.

“Okay, enough gawking,” Gabe decides. “Everyone, time to get out there.”

There’s grumbling, but, “Sir yes sir,” Tyson agrees cheerfully, which gets even more groans and a sock thrown at Tyson. But it gets everyone moving.

Tyson grabs Gabe before he can actually go out onto the ice, though, a hand curling around his forearm. “Hey,” he says, softer. “Morning.”

“Morning.” Gabe has to smile at him again--at Tyson’s face, at the way he looks at Gabe, at just, all of him. He taps his fingers at his hip, at the mark there.

“You okay?” Tyson asks, and his gaze is a little more searching now, his brows furrowed. Quiet, gentle, like he only likes to get when no one can see. Well, no one other than Gabe. “You seemed a little off.”

Gabe shrugs. “I’m fine,” he says, and knocks his forehead lightly against Tyson before he heads out to the ice.

He is fine. He is, except--

“Tyson, want to get lunch?”

“I can’t, I need to get home to the puppy.”

and

“Come over tonight, babe.”

“I can’t leave Ralphie, sorry.”

and

“Can I stay over?”

“No, you need your beauty sleep--well, you don’t, but the idiom stands--and Ralphie’s still up every couple of hours, you should go home so one of us is rested.”

and

“Zoey misses you, come over.”

“I can’t smell like another dog now! What will Ralphie think? We’ll be over soon so he can meet his sister.”

So Gabe is fine. Totally fine. He hasn’t spent more than a couple hours off the ice with his soulmate for what feels like forever, but that’s--fine.

He tells this to Zoey, who looks up at him glumly, like she both doesn’t believe him and also misses Tyson. Gabe traces the lines on his hip. It’s not like they’ve gone away. It’s not like he even doubts that Tyson still loves him, because Tyson’s pretty vocal about that, on ice and off, in bed and out. Or, maybe not vocal, but--he still looks at Gabe like he did since the first time Gabe took off his shirt in the locker room, his eyes big and amazed and happy, like he couldn’t believe how lucky he was to have Gabe as a soulmate. Gabe still sees him doing the same thing Gabe’s doing now, tracing his soulmark idly, like a comfort.

So really, Gabe is fine. He has a soulmate who loves him, the team’s winning, it’s all. Fine. He goes out without Tyson and goes home without Tyson and maybe he’s getting a little snippy sometimes--or enough that he’s getting looks in the locker room--and it’s. Fine.

“Hey,” says Tyson, after practice. He hesitates just outside of Gabe’s stall, keeping out of his space in a way he hasn’t for years. “Want to come over?”

Gabe stares at the bench in front of him so he doesn’t say yes too fast. A part of him wants to say no, just to spite Tyson--that he doesn’t get to just finally decide to spend time with Gabe again and Gabe will jump at it.

“I’ll make us dinner,” Tyson adds, fast. Everyone’s giving them a wide berth.

Gabe’s always known he can’t actually hold out. He doesn’t even want to, really. “Sure,” he agrees. Tyson’s smile flickers, but it’s still somehow--off. Maybe if Gabe was allowed to spend any time wiht him, he’d know why, he thinks bitterly, stripping off his wet pads and throwing them harder than maybe necessary down into his stall.

“Um, good. Nate gave me a ride, so...”

“Sure, Tys,” Gabe agrees again. Of course he was going to give Tyson a ride, did Tyson think he’d forgotten how this works? They’d--fuck, in the first few months after they’d Matched, they’d had some good times like that, keyed up from games or good practices or just each other, when they could barely get home in time to tumble out of the car and into one of their bed. Even recently, after a good game, sometimes Gabe’s rushed them home a little too fast, while Tyson’s hand moved too high up his thigh.

Tyson opens his mouth like he’s going to say something else, then he shakes his head, and goes back to his stall to get ready.

Gabe glances over to find EJ watching. “What?” he demands.

“Trouble in paradise?” EJ asks. Gabe snorts.

“It’s fine.”

It’s not a quiet car ride, but Gabe’s resigned himself to quiet car rides being rare since he Matched. Tyson chatters on about practice, and Ralphie, and Nate, and his family, and Gabe’s family because Bea and Tyson really like to text each other and then make Gabe feel out of the loop. It’s not Tyson’s easy rambling, though. It’s the sort of ramble that he does after a bad game to fill the silence, or after someone gets hurt, or the one time he and Nate got into an honest-to-god fight and he was edgy for days until they made up.

Gabe listens and waits. He’s not sure why Tyson’s on edge. But then again, if they’d actually spent any real time together in the last few weeks, Tyson could have told him.

As soon as they get through the door of Tyson’s, there’s a high-pitched cacophony of barking and a blur of brown as Ralphie comes skidding over the hardwood. He skates a little, misdirects, and almost bashes into Tyson’s legs before he rights himself and starts to jump.

“No, don’t, no, down, Ralph,” Tyson chides him, but he’s laughing as he kneels down so Ralphie can lick his face. Gabe might be annoyed, but it’s adorable--the dog and Tyson’s delighted laughter. Gabe can’t really be mad at anything that makes Tyson laugh like that.

It takes a while for Ralphie to calm down enough to notice someone else is there, but when he does he noses at Gabe’s legs too, because he is as needy for attention as his dad. Gabe kneels down to scratch at his head. He can’t not, that would just be rude.

If Ralphie senses anything, he doesn’t seem to care; he pushes into Gabe’s hand and barks excitedly.

“I should take him out,” Tyson says. Gabe looks up--Tyson’s looking down at him, smiling, but it’s a little off--a little wan. “Do you want to...”

“I can start lunch,” Gabe volunteers. They both need to eat.

“Oh. Yeah. Sure. I--you know where everything is,” Tyson stammers, then he grabs Ralphie’s leash and clips it on. He gives Gabe one more of those smiles before he’s out the door again.

It’s odd. Tyson hasn’t stammered at Gabe for a while, not since he got over the first overwhelming shock and awe of Matching. Maybe this is what happens if they don’t spend time in close proximity, Tyson forgets, Gabe thinks snidely to himself, then he gets up and goes to look through Tyson’s kitchen for something to get Tyson to make for him.

It’s been a while since he’s been in Tyson’s kitchen for any period of time. He drags his hand over the marble of the countertop, opens the fridge. It’s as well-stocked as usual--Tyson likes to pretend he’s incompetent but he’s actually a pretty good cook--and Gabe knows there’ll be ice cream in the freezer, both their favorite flavors.

Fuck, Gabe just misses this. Misses him. His hand is on his hip, somehow, tracing the lines.

“Do you want to break up?”

“What?” Gabe spins. Tyson’s standing in the doorway to the kitchen, Ralphie’s leash in one hand. Gabe can hear claws against wood somewhere down the hall.

Tyson visibly steels himself. “I--you’ve been so weird lately, and like, so bitchy and angry, and you haven’t said anything so I can only think--do you want to break up?”

“What?” It’s so stunning that Gabe can’t think of what to say. “Tyson, we’re soulmates.”

“Soulmates don’t always work. Matched people break up. Or get divorced. Or--”

“No,” Gabe cuts him off, before he can go any farther. He doesn’t want to hear it; the mere thought of it hurts. The expression on Tyson’s face hurts, the way he’s clearly trying to look stoic and resigned but the fear is bleeding through the edges. “No, what the fuck--no.”

He’s entirely too far away. He crosses the kitchen so he can grab Tyson’s hand, uncurling his tensed fist so Gabe can interlock their fingers. He uses the other hand to rest on Tyson’s mark. Tyson’s still got that look on, but he relaxes into Gabe’s touch.

“So that’s a no then?” he says, like he’s trying to make a joke but can’t quite do it. “To the breaking up.”

Gabe doesn’t really have words, to say just how much of a no it is. To tell Tyson how much of an idiot he is for thinking he’d ever let Tyson go if Tyson didn’t want it.

He tugs Tyson in to kiss him instead, to hopefully get that across. Tyson’s hand that isn’t tangled with Gabe’s between them wraps around Gabe’s hip to tug him closer, and he kisses back just as desperate and needy, so Gabe thinks he gets it.

Then there’s barking, and Tyson breaks away to grin at Ralphie, who seems very suspicious of what’s happening.

“Hey, it’s okay, bud,” he says, scratching at Ralphie’s ears. Gabe sighs. Tyson’s eyesbrows go up. “Okay, so you’re not breaking up with me. Want to talk about why you’ve been so bitchy, then?”

“I haven’t been--”

“You’re scaring rookies.” Tyson glances away for a second, then back at Gabe. “You scared me, Gabe. We’ve got to be able to talk about our shit or else we really will end up being one of those Matched couples.”

Gabe looks down at their still intertwined hands. “What, have you grown up now?”

“Gabe.” Tyson tugs at their hands. “Come on. Just talk about it and then we can have lunch.”

“It’s--” God, it feels stupid saying it out loud, knowing how much it did scare Tyson. He’s fine, it’s not a big deal, it’s not--Tyson thought he was going to break up with him. “I just miss you.”

Tyson’s eyebrows go up. “We’re on the same team. We spend like, most of our time together.”

“Not--” Gabe grits his teeth. If he has to do this, he can. For them. “You don’t, though. You’ve been spending all your time with Ralphie, and you haven’t stayed over in like two weeks, and you don’t go out to lunch or out with us or with me.” Tyson’s smiling a little, and Gabe glances away again. “I know it’s stupid.”

“No--I mean, yeah, definitely, but I knew you were ridiculous when we Matched, that’s not a surprise.” Tyson nudges his chin up. “Are you jealous of a dog, Landy?”

“Zoey is,” Gabe mutters. “She’s feeling neglected too.”

“Zoey’s always my best girl.” Despite everything, it feels good to hear Tyson say it like that, like it’s obvious. “I’ve just been--puppies are a lot of work, Gabe.”

“I know that. But you’ve spent all your time on it and you haven’t even asked me to help or be part of it really and I’m your soulmate I’m supposed to be part of it. And you just got a puppy on your own!” It’s pouring out of Gabe now, all the things he claimed he was fine with. “We’re soulmates, didn’t you think you should talk with me?”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know that I had to ask your permission,” Tyson snaps back.

“It’s not about permission, it’s about--I thought we were going to move in together soon! If it’s going to be real we’ve got to make decisions as a unit and that includes big life choices like pets, I--what?” he asks, because Tyson’s got a look on, confused but not in a bad way.

“You thought we were going to move in together soon?”

“Yeah, of course.” They’d been sort of drifting in that direction lately, Gabe had thought. That sort of domesticity. “Did you not?”

“You didn’t say anything about it,” Tyson mutters, his ears going a little red. “I wasn’t sure.”

Gabe rolls his eyes. “What, did you think we were going to spend the rest of our lives with two separate houses within a ten minute drive?”

“You’re a weird dude, Landy, I don’t know what you’re into,” Tyson retorts. Then he looks back down at his hands. “I didn’t--I mean, maybe I should have talked to you about Ralphie. It was just kind of spur of the moment and he was so cute and, I don’t know, I just--we hadn’t said we were at the place where I had to talk with you about it. And then, like. You didn’t choose to have a puppy again, i didn’t want to make you deal with all the stuff that comes with it.”

“We are.” Gabe informs him. “We are at the sort of place where we make decisions together, right?”

“Yeah.” Tyson nods.

“And the sort of place where I deal with your stuff with you,” Gabe goes on. “Even when it’s waking up to deal with a puppy. Right?”

“Right.” Tyson looks up again, meets Gabe’s gaze squarely. “But that means you’ve got to talk to me if I’m messing up, okay? Don’t--I don’t want to have to guess again, I can’t read your mind.”

“The answer isn’t that I want to break up. It never is.”

“Then tell me before my brain goes there, eh?” Tyson squeezes Gabe’s hand.

“Okay.” Gabe agrees.

For a long moment, Tyson just looks at him, and it’s that look again, like he thinks he’s the one who got inexplicably lucky in the soulmate lottery.

Then his lips quirk. “Great, now we’ve talked that out, and think that together, we should make a decision to shut Ralphie out of the bedroom and decide what I should do to make sure you don’t feel neglected anymore,” he announces cheerfully, the tension cracking into a thousand pieces.

Gabe laughs, and it’s--”God, I missed you,” he says again, and means it.

Tyson tugs him in to kiss him again, quick but hard. “I’m sorry,” he mutters, as he breaks away. “I don’t--I love you, you know that.”

“More than Ralphie?”

“Well.” Tyson’s grinning at him, mischief in his gaze, and Gabe has to smile back. “Let’s not go crazy.”

#avs tumblr fic #avs fic #my fic #this sort of got away from me I just wanted to write about Tyson's new puppy #and then Gabe got Dramatic of course #and apparently it became about adult relationships and how to communicate who knew #(Zoey and Ralphie get along great #and definitely rule the household)#Anonymous #izzy answers

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standfortheangels · 5 years ago

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Instructions: Always repost with the rules, answer the 11 random questions left for you, and leave 11 more for the people you tag!

Tagged by: @illicreatxm

This got long so I’m going to stick it under a read more ^^

1. If you could write any canon character, which would it be and why?

Hm. I’m not sure. I have roleplayed a couple of canons before, but I find it harder to keep the muse for them. I could probably do Elsa okay, I could jump between her locked in the castle personality and her open, welcoming character post-film, which might help, but the inconsistencies in her Over-powered Powers annoy me, so I think I’d add a few limitations in there.

2. Favourite Disney movie?

Maybe Aladdin because Robin Williams is of course amazing and so perfect in that role~ Ohh but there’s also Atlantis.. And Dumbo! Aw no... Let’s just call this my top three before I get carried away >w>

3. Least favourite MCU character?

I haven't seen the more recent ones, so, I can't take into account characters like Thanos or Dr. Strange or, whoever else they've been bringing in. So out of what I've seen, I'd have to go with Bruce Banner/The Hulk.

It seemed in the earlier films that they didn't give much attention to Banner. They were all over using the Hulk to make bits interesting, but Bruce was boiled down to "quiet smart guy who CaN TuRN inTo THE HULK" so, yeah.

And the hulk himself later did like a 180° change for me. In his stand-alone film I think Hulk says like 3 words, maximum. Then rarely talks in his appearances in the other avengers brand films. Cool. We had "Puny God" and that was a-okay. One short, memorable, funny quote seems perfect.

But then what was all that when Whedon got his hands on it? (I mean don't get me started on that, I am really reigning myself back here but) They start off needing ways to calm Hulk down enough to get him back inside and give control back to Bruce, fair enough. But then like... He winds up not letting go of Bruce's body even though he isn't enraged anyway? And suddenly he's emotional enough and smart enough to take- what was it a plane? And seperate himself off from everyone and look all solemnly at Natasha before he does it or something?

Obviously my memory of it isn't great, honestly I stopped paying attention after Natasha's "I'm a monster- not because I was raised in a heartless environment full of violence and raised to literally kill people, that bit's whatever- but because they took away my fertility and now I can't have babies." speech. And that's the last MCU film I watched. I didn't want anything to do with them after seeing what Joss Whedon did with the characters and the overarching plotline and... Everything. x') So I might have gotten some of the hulk stuff wrong.

(I did watch Deadpool though, that I enjoyed~)

4. If you had to create any new character, what occupation would they have?

Ooo good question.

I think something proactive, where they could seek other characters out, but.. I'd kinda like a bad guy~ Someone who lies so much for their job, they have a dual personality to work with. They can be your smiling friendly neighbour, wishing you well on your holiday, then turn around and grit his teeth because this poses a major problem for his mission, and he can't lose his target, so now he has to follow, but he can't do that as your happy neighbour, no, you know he isn't going on holiday, certainly not today, not on your flight, not to the same ski lodge you're going to. No, he has to make a new cover- maybe say his neice phoned him with a family emergency and he'll be leaving to go be with her a while. Then shed this identity, find out where his target is going, quickly pose as some other tourist who blends into the background and get to the lodge first, all the while planning out some plausible skiing accident he can set up.

Wow that got more detailed than I expected x'D I think I just reinvented hitman, whoops.

5. Favourite sport?

[Image ID: Kiki from Kiki’s Delivery Service, laughing hysterically.]

My biggest concern when I'm on my feet is not falling over so, obviously sports aren't really my deal. x')

I used to swim a lot when I was a kid, I loved that, but, don't do it now.

And I'm not really into watching sports either tbh. Most of it seems over-hyped. Most football teams (real football, it is not soccer. The hint is in actual football, the ball, is hit, with your feet. Picking it up and running with it and then sometimes kicking it does not qualify as football, come on USA. Your thing is closer to Rugby than Football.)

Anyway most teams aren't much better or worse than any other if you actually watch objectively, which makes it look like they both suck because they're too well matched to score goals more than once in a blue moon.

Rugby I don't really understand the appeal of either. Scrums are weird and it wouldn't be entirely bizarre to see a guy walking away from the game with blood down his face and an ear in his hand. You'd almost expect him to stick the ear on ice and be back in a few minutes with his bandages on.

Really the only sports than interest me are the gymnastic types. Ice skating is good for a while but it can start getting dull if you don't have people willing to break the mould a bit. (Which is why I absolutely love the free skate bit. Where they aren't being scored and they just do whatever the hell they want, omg I live for that)

Floor routines are awesome, the pommel horse and rings are usually a little samey for me but the one with those two bars at different heights, that's fun to watch~ there's a little more variety there.

(And I don't wanna hear anyone in the replies saying these aren't sports, every example there including figure skating is a separate event in the Olympics, so. There.)

6. What’s your dream car?

I don’t really have one. At this point in my life I don’t actually have the option to learn to drive so I haven’t really thought about it. My only criteria is, it has to have a nice face. x)

Since I was tiny I have always seen cars as faces. The headlights would be eyes, and usually the number plate would be the mouth, but some cars have other stuff like a grill that might be the mouth instead. So like...

This would be a grumpy car with a pig-like nose and frown.. Actually those look like jowels either side of the mouth part. It looks kind of like a bulldog. X’)

And this would be a happy car. That black part around the number plate it wide and smile-shaped, and the headlights- rounded on top and straighter on the bottom, like the little creases we get when we scrunch up our eyes laughing~

This car looks like someone just said something really stupid to it, and it is not impressed, and lets the silence hang not knowing what to say.

Happy car

Terminator car

Happy car but in a mean way.. Like it’s on its way to cause mayhem or poking fun at someone. You get the general idea -w-

7. A movie that you think should have a sequel?

Hmm... this is a toughie.

8. A movie sequel that you think should be deleted from existence?

I don’t remember which number it was or even the title, but the Shrek sequel where Shrek like, hates having kids so much he makes a deal to change time? And Fiona winds up as like a vicious warrior leader because no-one ever saved her from the tower, and rumplestiltskin is in it? What even was that...

9. Design your dream outfit using this game ?

I wouldn’t say this really is my dream outfit, but from the options on offer~

(also discounting the enormous hair bun >w>;)

10. Favourite fairytale?

I’m not sure if this actually counts as a fairytale, but I love the story of the jolly roger. That classic skull and crossbones flag has a story behind it that a lot of people don’t know.

In a nutshell, a man (i guess a pirate) develops an intense crush on a young woman, who is about to get married. But just before her wedding, she dies. She is buried, but the man doesn’t take death for an answer. He digs her up and has sex with her body. When he’s done, a disembodied voice speaks to him, telling him that he has basically impregnated this corpse, and to come back in nine months.

For some reason, he does. He digs up the woman again. And sat below her pelvis is a small skull and two bones. The disembodied voice tells him to take these bones with him on his ventures, and they will bring him luck.

It’s bizarre, and kinda gross, and.. I dunno if being rewarded for sexually desicrating a corpse is the best moral? x’) But I was amazed when I heard this story, because I’d had no idea there was this whole tale behind the flag~ and I still love that it exists~

11. Create an avatar of your favourite muse using this creator? ?

First, it’s so cruel to ask me to pick my favourite child how dare you >w> haha

I went with Chester though because he’s the one I’m usually most connected to.

I can’t think of anyone I want to tag right now (at least not anyone who hasn’t probably done this already), but I’ll put the new 11 questions for anyone who does feel like doing this~ :) __

1. What’s one thread/plot you really want to do that you haven’t had chance to yet?

2. What is the reason for, or meaning behind, your blog icon?

3. Do you have any pets? Tell us a bit about them!

4. What is one thing you would never want to change about your appearance?

5. There is an ultra secret spy group, and you’ve just uncovered their existence. Now they say that you must either work for them, or they’ll find a permanent way to keep you quiet. What kind of work would you offer to do for them?

6. If you met your muse in real life, how do you think the two of you would get along? (multi-muse blogs, pick one of your muses at random.)

7. You have been given a huge budget to remake one film in your own vision. You can change anything, add anything, choose the cast, you have no limits. What would you do?

8. What is one skill you wish you could automatically master?

9. A genie offers you a deal. An unlimited lifelong supply of one food of your choice... But, you have to sacrifice your ability to chew. Does any food still tempt you?

10. What do you think is the funniest animal?

11. Share one memory you have that makes you happy to think about~

#literally anyone can do this #and you can tag me in it too if you want #even if we've never interacted #I love reading posts like these #x)#ooc #long post #I loved the game questions on this btw!#I've never seen anyone include something like that before #it was fun!#illicreatxm

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blaperile · 6 years ago

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Homestuck Epilogues - Meat - Page 5

#Homestuck #The Homestuck Epilogues #Meat #reaction #Dave #Dirk #Jake

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kaibutsushidousha · 7 years ago

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DanganRonpa Re:Birth Summary - Chapter 1, part 3

First half of the trial. Sorry for being late, English V3 made me forget I was doing this. Anyways, I’m pretty sure I know who the culprit is and how they did it.

Trial video and script

This trial’s murder trick is completely credited to Nao Shigure (Mitsunari Koga’s voice actor)

Like always, the trial starts with the same explanation we’ve already seen dozens of time. Re:Birth has the V3 rule that you join the execution if you don’t vote for anyone. As all first trials, it begins with everyone not where to start and someone (Todoroki) asking if the game’s Mono is the culprit.

After some derailing flavor text (highlight being Izumo being afraid of death until she realizes that means she will join the chidren), but Yodogawa takes the lead saying they should describe the murder from the start, checking for different interpretations. Although Aisaka would rather skip the more obvious point, Yodogawa insists it’s important to go through everything, so they start from the basic of the basic, the cause of death.

Nonstop debate 1: Mizuta claims the culprit strangled Rokudou with their hands. It turns out she didn’t read the Monodora File, which makes me really believe she was looking her lost contacts during the investigation. No solid indication of that so far though.

Next question is where did the culprit find the rope used as the murder weapon. Option selectin: 1) the warehouse 2) their own room 3) the gym Everyone agrees it was the rope from Monodora’s weapon set. Itsuki searched the school for possible other ropes, but didn’t find anything. People impressed by her physical abilities, as no one expected her to be able to run the whole big school in so little time.

With cause and weapon out of the way, next comes the scene of the crime. It’s the boys’ locker room, so Yodogawa asks Samejima, Koga and Todoroki to discuss, since the 3 of them we’re keeping guard there.

Mitsunari Koga (Horse): Fuck yeah-! You guys should be grateful for the priviledge of listening to me!

Mitsunari Koga (Deer): Horse-kun, whyyy do you always have to act so high-and-mighty?

Mitsunari Koga (Horse): Shut-! The ones are stand high on top are always us mighty carnivores-!!

Narumi Oosone: Pretty sure horses are meat more often than meat-eaters.

Nonstop Debate 2: Samejima claims nothing suspicious was found in the room, but there was the letter addressed to him in the trash can.

Naturally, all accusation fly towards Samejima, but he claims he slept all night long and didn’t go to the locker room as the letter said. It naturally doesn’t stick, as the letter was found in the locker room’s trash. Aisaka is quick to affirm the letter is not enough to suspect Samejima as it could have easily been planted by the culprit to incriminate him. I gotta say I like how Aisaka and Samejima have been handled so far. They were always acting together and coordinated throughout the chapter and Aisaka clearly shows an unwavering trust in him during the trial, but none of this is ever brought into evidence by story, it’s just there for the reader to notice on their own. DanganRonpa “main” pairings are usually much less subtle than that.

Anyways, as Tsuchiya is asleep during the day and wake during the night, Himuro asks if he heard Samejima leaving the room late at night, but Tsuchiya can’t tell due to the room’s soundproofing. Aisaka tells everyone to think of another possibility, as they have no real evidence against Samejima, but Izumo suddenly reveals she saw Samejima during her walk.

Nonstop Debate 3: Samejima says that even if Izumo saw him going to the gym, there’s no proof he went to the locker room. Fujimori offers the broken locker as proof.

Samejima tries to argue anyone could have busted the locker open, but Fujimori replies he is the only one strong enough to open the jammed locker because he is the Option selection: 1) SHSL Karate Fighter 2) SHSL Aikido Fighter 3) SHSL Martial Artist Kagura points out how Samejima is indeed the only one by commenting on how all the other men in the cast are scrawny and weak-looking. Samejima is cornered and Fujimori convinces him to tell everything by repeating Yodogawa’s “If you move towards the truth, the truth will move towards you, too” speech. Samejima finally admits he read the letter and went to the locker room.

When nighttime was announced, Samejima took a bath. Leaving from the bath, he found the letter slipped through his door. He read, assumed it was from Monodora and did as told. Reaching the locker, no one was there, which means Samejima got there before the murder happened. Without knowing what to do, he opened all the lockers.

We don’t know exactly how important the motive video was to Samejima, but we at least know it’s something he doesn’t want anyone to see. If it exists, he has to retrieve and hide it. The group pressures Samejima into revealing what was in his video. It was a video of critics evaluating his performance. That’s apparently embarassing enough to kill him.

Anyways, he had to retrieve his video no matter what and forced the locker open for it. Realizing he was tricked and there was nothing there, he got pissed and threw the letter in the trash.

Naturally, not everyone immediately believes Samejima’s excuse. Koga proposes Rokudou was there and found the motive video first, leading to Samejima killing him and trying to hide the body in the locker. Izumo and her “children” agree. Himuro calls him out for not telling everything from the start. He answers that everyone would call him the culprit if he said he was at the crime scene and he didn’t want anyone to know about the video.

The side that doesn’t trust Samejima is pushing to vote already while the side that trusting insists it’s still too early for that (actually just Aisaka, the rest of the Samejima trusters are not talking for some reason). Then Fujimori performs the most random and obtuse Hangman’s Gambit I’ve ever seen, which makes me glad Re:Birth is not a real game.

Hangman’s Gambit 1: School Regulations. The gameplay seemed quite easy, but this answer came completely out of left field in the conversation.

Fujimori tells everyone not to vote yet. The school regulations part is actually about the Class Trial rules (killer gets executed) and it’s used a very obtuse way to say “I don’t think Samejima-kun would be dumb enough to leave such an obvious clue on the scene with his life at stake”.

Option selection: 1) Letter from the mastermind? 2) Boys’ Locker Room’s Small Window 3) Locker that doesn’t fit the frame

I’m actually surprised no real DanganRonpa ever pulled the “the culprit couldn’t be that dumb” argument before. Anyways, Samejima is half-cleared of suspicion, so what now? The group decides all men are suspects now, as only them could enter the locker room. The guys start saying “not me” in sequence. They decide to just continue the discussion as normal, paying attention to the boys.

Nonstop Debate 4: They talk about the boys’ habits for a while. By the way, Mizuta’s nicknames for Yodogawa, Samejima, Koga and Fujimori are Secchan, Omi-chan, Mittsun and Ayumun. This debate actually wins itself automatically if you do nothing, because the one shooting the bullet is actually Maiko, not Fujimori.

Maiko refutes the claim that there are only 5 suspects by revealing Fujimori’s gender to everyone. She pulled this card way earlier than I expected. She tells the situation and he confirms. They also confirm that Monodora knew Fujimori was a boy all along.

Monodora: Besides, c’mon, there’re people with also of fetishes everywhere... y’know.

Ayumu Fujimori: You really say that knowing it’s not it...

Kazuomi Samejima: You... were into crossdressing?

Misuzu Aisaka: S-stop. As said by Monodora, people’s interents are... individual and multifarious... ...Fujimori-san! We, will not judge-!

Aisaka is a great well-meaning girl, but I think she needs a more convincing “I am not kinkshaming face”.

Fujimori try to say it’s not his own fetish, but Monodora interrupts him with the uniform change scene. He is wearing his male uniform now.

Back to the trial discussion, Fujimori is now not only a suspect, but the most suspect suspect, as he was hiding the truth. Samejima is the first to believe him, since he was the one who saved him from suspicion before. Aisaka, as usual, takes Samejima’s side. The discussion will not continue with Fujimori added to the suspect list. Then we suddenly get Izumo’s Rebuttal Showdown objection line, except with no Rebuttal Showdon.

Kasumi Izumo: You’re cursed!

Izumo raises the very convincing point that Fujimori’s is the one who gets the most advantage out of the murder scene choice, with his gender hidden and all. Fujimori can’t produce a more decent counter-argument than “I would never kill Saiji-kun”, so his tries to calm down and think. Yodogawa is faster and does the objection thing Izumo just did.

Seishi Yodogawa: Your reasoning is really third-rate.

Yodogawa counter-argues that Fujimori already explained why he was hiding his gender and taking that aside, she has nothing else to tie the case to him. Samejima and Aisaka add how Fujimori has been super helpful to solving the case. Koga tries saying this could be an act to earn trust, but Aisawa calls out on how dumb that is since it’s drawing everyone closer to the culprit. Itsuki also takes the right side and tells Fujimori to remember what was said to Samejima before (reveal the truth to clear the suspicions towards you).

Izumo is dumbfounded by this many people taking Fujimori’s side and Yodogawa replies that she is too much of narrow-minded amateur, clinging to only one piece of information instead of trying to think of new possibilities. She replies that there’s no evidence to clear Fujimori’s suspicion yet. Itsuki makes a “Fujimori, do something” speech, he thinks about the people who trust him right now and this starts a Debate Knock.

The Debate is a weird mix of Rebuttal Showdown and Debate Scrum. You have to cut your opponent’s words, but not your ally’s. The Ronpa point here is Todoroki saying no other place is suspicious and Fujimori shooting the girls’ locker room. Fujimori explains the signs that the push car was used and no one confesses to using it, so we conclude this is tied to the case. Now the suspect list is inverted, the girls are the potential culprits.

We’re back to the sequence of “not me”, this time with girls, with the usual sideshow of Himuro and Koga throwing hateful insults at each other. That’s all for this half of the trial. Next is my personal deduction.

Maiko is quite clearly the culprit. She killed Rokudou somewhere with the rope, took the push car, placed the body on it, tied the same rope to the push car, shoved it the locker room without entering, leaving the body half-shoved into the locker she tricked Samejima into opening and pulled the push car back to her with the rope. I’m confident in this theory.

#danganronpa re:birth #ayumu fujimori #misuzu aisaka #nico himuro #mikoto itsuki #kasumi izumo #maiko kagura #mitsunari koga #marin mizuta #narumi oosone #saiji rokudou #keigo sakuma #kazuomi samejima #aruma todoroki #akira tsuchiya #seishi yodogawa

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aloneeedra · 4 years ago

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Dance Academy (2010) S1

Where to watch it: Free on Tubi. Just look up Dance Academy on Google and it should give you the option.

Seasons: there are 3 seasons. I’m going to do something different this time and only focus on one season at a time. So this post will focus on season one of dance academy, which has 26 episodes.

Summary (spoilers): There are six main characters you need to know.

Tara: the main character, cries a lot, wants to fly, comes from a farm.

Kat: her best friend and a rebel; she has a ballerina as a mother and a choreographer as a father and is unhappy at the academy.

Sammy: friends with both of them, has weak ankles, is Jewish, the best character, honestly.

Abigail: Mean, strong-will, hard working, the best dancer, a very good, complex, character.

Christian: Has the best character background tbh, robbed some place so now he is on probation, goes to the school as a punishment, a skater boy.

Ethan: Kat’s older half-brother, basic white rich boy, he like never actually dances, want to be a choreographer like his dad.

So, I will be explaining the season through the characters, rather than episode, because it’s much easier, okay? Lets start with Tara.

Tara comes from a farm, her parents are cool, and she was behind everyone else, whatever the means, so it’s like a miracle that she got into the school. This season for her focuses on two things: her becoming a better dancer and her love life. Let’s start with the dancing. She is the worst dancer and then slowly becomes the best one, being casted as the lead by the end of the season. She has to do a lot of private lessons and breaks her leg at one point, does rehab and ends up becoming stronger. There was also an episode where she was going to go back home because her parents couldn’t afford it but lucky her, she got a scholarship she didn’t even apply for. And then towards the end, she got half a scholarship for the next semester. Okay, now that that’s done, her love life. First, she has a crush on Ethan and then starts dating him. Then she cheats on him with Christian, Ethan breaks up with her, she gets bullied for it, then Christian confesses, she rejects him, then they kiss on a beach, her leg breaks, they date for an episode then they break up. She invites him over to the farm during the holiday and hints that she wants to get back together again, but Christian rejects her. Ethan helps her with rehab, then Ethan helps her get the lead part, then he invites her to stay the holiday with him so they can ~date again~ and she’s like sure. Then Christian says yes to going to the farm during the holidays and we don’t know what she’s going to do ~oooo~.

Okay, next is Kat. Not much happens to her this season. She rebels a lot, misses a lot of class. She ends up having to volunteer at community dance center, lets them down and then helps one of the little girls from that center get into a dancing program. She had a boyfriend who was a total scrum bag and tries to take advantage of her during her own birthday party. She kind of had a crush on Christian, but never says it out loud, kisses him once but then says it was a mistake. She ruined any chance that the hip hop classes remained apart of the academy. She dates a celebrity guy who is like way older then her for an episode and then he comes back towards the end of the season and she tries to run away with him.

Sammy. Yesss. Okay, at the start of the season, Sammy is seen to be weak, but he gets better, not by much, but better. His dance partner is Abigail who he starts having a crush on pretty quickly. They secret date, then date, then almost do the deed, but he said it didn’t feel right so they didn’t do anything. Then he starts acting weird, breaks up with her, hangs out a lot with Christian, invites him over for the holidays, realizes he likes Christian, tries to avoid Christian, tells Christian, Christian is like ‘nothing to be ashamed of’, they have a touching bro moment in a lake, then become friends again. He also has a second plot going on for him, where his dad wants him to be a doctor and disproves of his dancing. So, by the end of the first season, his dad pulls out his financial support and Sammy says he’s going to the dance academy no matter how many jobs he needs to get. Funny how a scholarship he never applied for didn’t suddenly appear on the bulletin board.

Next, Abigail. So, Abigail takes ballet very seriously. She wants to get the scholarship (yes, the one that Tara got magically the first time around, and then she ends up getting half of the scholarship the second time). She’s the best dancer at the start of the show. She has trouble with shoplifting, does not like her body, is seen as the main villain. She’s the one that post Tara’s con and pro list of Ethan. She’s the one that send Kat the photo of Christian and Tara kissing. So, basically, we should be thanking her since she is the only reason Tara even gets a plot. At one point, she passes out. She has to see a therapist for a while, goes back to dancing and gets to be Tara understudy. She dates Sammy for a little bit, but then he breaks up with her. Her parents are getting a divorce. By the end of the season, she is watching Tara perform her solo from backstage and is happy for her, though in my opinion, she got robbed.

Christian. His mom is dead and now he has no one. He gets in trouble for robbing a place and lives at the academy instead of juvie. He’s a skater boy all the way. He’s a bit close off at the beginning. Has brother issues, trust issues, friends issues, and steals Ethan’s wallet early on. So, he’s Tara’s dance partner, calls her training bra cuz ~cute~, but, the first friend he really makes is Ethan. They bond over hip-hop and fighting. They compete over everything too, like running and parts and then later on Tara. He seemed to like Tara from the beginning. He tries to kiss her but she yeets herself out of that situation, then kisses him like one episode later. Then he confesses and she’s like nah. Then he goes to court for the robbery thing and gets off with like a suspension or something, but his childhood friend goes to jail. Then he kisses Tara again at the beach. Then he was running with Tara when she broke her leg by falling down a couple of stairs. And I mean a couple, like four. Very dramatic. He carries her. They date. He gets all butt hurt about her not talking about her knee to him, while she’s willing to talk to Ethan about it. They break up and he very dramatically walks out on her during a dance with fake snow falling upon them. Then that whole thing happens with Sammy. Tara invites him to the farm. He says no and then yes in the last few minutes of the show.

Lastly, Ethan. He’s three years older than everyone and is a player apparently, or at least that’s what everyone keeps saying. Everyone also keeps saying he’s a dancer, but like, I don’t think I have ever seen him dance, like not even once. I pretty sure the actor doesn’t know how to dance and gets paid just to look pretty. Abigail posts the con and pro list that Tara makes of him, where she says he smells like Christmas. He’s weirded out by it, as he should be, cuz that be weird. Tara’s a bit obsessives and it’s not cute. He, however, falls for her after, i don’t know, seeing her dance or something. They date. Tara cheats on him. They don’t date. He gets an offer from the company, but turns it down to follow his dreams of being a choreographer like his dad (but also, cuz, like, he never dances). He invites Tara to stay during the holidays while holding her hands, which I guess means he likes her again.

Rating: 5.7/10

Best Part: I really liked Sammy’s arch and I think Christian’s and Abigail characters are very complex and well written.

Worst Part: I don’t like Tara. Or Ethan. But mainly Tara. She’s just so whine and annoying and like I get that she’s the main character or whatever, but she’s also boring. Like, you would think since she has two guys pinning over her, there must be something amazing about her, but I didn’t pick up on it. Like, the most interesting thing about her is that she likes to dance, but so does everyone else (except maybe Ethan). Sometimes, she says things that, like, you know are suppose to be very inspiring because the music sounds inspiring, but what comes out of her mouth is just not good. She always puts herself in bad situations, which is good, like that’s how you get a character to grow and change, by having them learn from their mistakes, but then an easy solution falls onto her lap, out of nowhere, and it fixes everything for her. She doesn’t change at all. It all just works out for her, each and every single time. For example, her parents can’t afford to keep her in school, so she decides to go back home. Okay. Life's not always fair. She understands that. That’s very mature of her to do. Maybe she’ll go back home and raise some money and- oh, no, wait, she got a scholarship she didn’t even apply for. Wow. Or how about the time when she allows rumors to spread that she’s dating someone that’s in the company and that ruins his career and she faces no punishment at all? Or how about that time when she forgets Kat’s birthday, acts like a horrible friends then later on, when they fight, everything goes back to normal? Or how about the time she cheats on Ethan with Christian? She gets bully, the photos of their kiss is everywhere in school, Kat is mad, Ethan is mad. What she did is awful and she understands that she betrayed someone’s trust and that that’s not okay, oh, but wait, she doesn’t understand and actually she and Kat fight and then they make up and she gets all her friends back and then dates Christian later down the line even though she rejected him and then Ethan starts to care for her too. No harm done. Or how about the time that she gets to be the lead because Ethan fought for her to get it, and does a pretty bad job at it, and kind of doesn’t deserve it, but then she puts on a dress, feels all good inside, then becomes more confidents about herself and does fine without it when it goes missing? Or how about the fact that Abigail works her ass off, more than Tara, I would say, and yet Tara still somehow gets the lead? It’s just so obvious that the writer of the show favor Tara. She gets like no consequences and never changes.

I also didn’t like all these age gaps, they were weird and gross. Ethan is 18 and Tara is 15 when they are dating, which is not too bad, but still gross. Kat is 15 and Miles, the celebrity she tries to run away with, has to be at least in his early 20′s. Like what the hell? No one seemed to find it weird.

Last thing; not really a con. I don’t know much about dancing, so I don’t know if the dancing is actually as good as they make it out to seem or not. Sometimes, I’ll be watching and feel second hand embarrassment for the characters and I just need to know if I just don’t understand dancing, or if it really is bad dancing. The ballet looks okay. The hip-hop makes me cringe.

Should you watch it? Yeah, I mean, it’s pretty fun to watch. You’ll never get bored since so many things happened. Seriously, there where three separate times when I thought I was watching the last episode, because everything was concluded, but then I saw there was still more to go. It’s very long, but entertaining. Dramatic. It was exactly what I remembered whenever I watched it as a teenager. Lots of angst. Lots of relationships that aren’t given enough time to grow. Watch it for Sammy.

#dance academy #what to watch

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hufflepirate · 7 years ago

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Punisher - The Future Starts With Pie

Wow, that’s a terrible title, but in my defense I am very tired. This is a Punisher fanfic, because apparently that’s a thing I do now. I thought a lot of the show’s first season was kind of slow and boring, but then I caught feelings and I just really care about the characters and also about the fact that Frank definitely for sure went over to the Liebermans’ after his meeting at the end and then definitely for sure stayed the night/forever and idk if it’s an ot3 kind of situation or just a platonic whoops-you’ve-been-forcibly-adopted-by-a-family kind of thing, but everyone definitely lived happily ever after, of course. I don’t make the rules.

Possibly some spoilers or whatever. Nothing really major though, probably. It’s just set after the end of the season. I ship Frank Castle with happiness, health, and sleeping well at night for a change.

[This came out longer than I initially intended by a lot, so readmore. It’ll probably go up on AO3 eventually but meh. Too tired.]

It was good sitting with Curtis and not talking. He'd talked enough today, more than enough, and it was a relief to sit in front of the football game and just breathe.

He closed his eyes during the commercials, centering himself. It had been good to talk, to admit to the things he didn't want to say, to work through the things Curtis had been nagging him to deal with for years. It was also tiring, and he was still a little shaky.

When his phone buzzed, he checked it. The number wasn't familiar, but it was pretty obvious who it was. "We all ate 2 much 2 have dessert. Gonna have pie in abt an hr if u wanna come." The skull after the first sentence was a little dramatic, and he didn't see why she couldn't have written out 'pie' instead of using an emoji of one, but Frank half smiled at his phone anyway. He just wasn't quite sure what to say back.

The phone buzzed again. "This is Leo, btw." He smiled for real this time.

"You talking to someone I don't know about?" Curtis asked.

Frank shook his head, still smiling faintly even as he blushed a little. "Nah, just Micro's kid."

"Micro's kid has your phone number?"

"I guess," he answered. He didn't remember giving it to her, but Leo was clever and he didn't really expect any kid of David's to be good about boundaries.

He put his phone away, not sure quite what to do about that. The thought of going over there for pie was not awful, but that didn't mean it was a good idea. Curtis was right about him. He was a shit magnet. If he went over there now, it would be the start of something, and starting something was dangerous.

The phone buzzed again twenty minutes later. An unlisted number, not that that much mattered when he opened the message, either. "Just realized Leo stole my phone. Sorry. Invite still stands though."

Frank's fingers itched to say something. Something about David not being an asshole for once, maybe. Something about his family being good for him. Something about his kids being assholes like him. Something about how he could be there in a few minutes. But he shouldn't. He shouldn't. He put his phone back in his pocket.

After another five minutes, it buzzed again.

"Don't be an asshole. Just get over here." Frank felt the corners of his mouth threatening to creep upward again. A moment later, the phone buzzed again. "Hope your meeting was good."

"Chatty kid," Curtis commented.

"This time it's her dad."

"Chatty family, then."

"I guess."

He shoved his phone back in his pocket again, hoping it would stop Curtis from looking at him like that.

"You gonna answer him?"

"If he wants to know where I am, he can track my phone."

It wasn't really an answer, but he didn't really have an answer. Not one he could give without using more words than he had left after this morning. He wanted to text back. He didn't have the words for that, either.

Curtis laughed. "You guys are a mess."

Frank grunted. That was probably true enough. Just another reason to stay away. Didn't make it easier to tell the Liebermans that.

It was fully 45 minutes later before his phone buzzed again. Sarah, this time. "Need you to help with my asshole kid again. Zach wants pie, but David keeps looking at the door and telling him not yet."

Frank groaned. At this point, it was all starting to look like a setup, but that didn't make it any easier to resist the impulse to fall into the trap anyway.

"Alright, spill," Curtis said. "You look constipated."

"They want me to go eat pie with them."

"So go eat pie. Weren't you just talking about trying to build a life?"

Frank grunted. He was. Had been. Should be.

Curtis rolled his eyes. "Come on, man, what's the worst that could happen?"

“I’m a shit magnet," Frank answered.

"Yeah, well, so's Lieberman. You might as well try to have his back."

Frank grunted back.

"Do you want to go?"

Frank didn't answer right away and Curtis half growled under his breath. "Come on, man. Don't overthink it. I asked what you want."

"Yeah, I guess," Frank admitted.

"You don't guess," Curtis answered, "You're just scared. Go anyway."

"What if they expect me to come over again after that?"

Curtis studied him for a moment. "What makes you think they won't either way?"

Frank grunted again. That was a good point, but it didn't make it less important to take a stand now.

"Frank, you said it yourself. Your war is over. Go home."

"I can't," he said, almost before Curtis had finished.

"Look, I'm not saying it'll be like having Maria and the kids back. It won't. But you've got to build something, and having people in your life who aren't me is a good thing. Go."

His phone buzzed again, and this time he was sure it was a conspiracy. Another number he didn't have programmed in, but the "I'm hungry" with 10 skulls after it had to be Zach.

"See, it's a sign," Curtis said.

"Yeah," he said, turning the phone toward Curtis's chair and pointing at the skulls. "A sign that this is a bad idea."

"Frank, you spray painted a skull onto the front of your tach vest. They might be a sign it's a good idea. Not that the whole Punisher thing was a great idea, actually, but that worked out in the end, at least. Kind of."

Frank grunted again, but Curtis just settled back into his seat, looking pleased. He knew he'd won.

Frank pulled himself to his feet as he started working on his reply text. "20 min."

Zach sent back another skull before Frank had made it all the way out to his truck, but Frank actually felt good about ignoring that one.

As he pulled up outside the Lieberman house, he thought about driving away instead, but then he was parked and he'd set the parking brake and he was here for good, somehow. He got out, eyes locking onto the glow from the windows even as he closed his door.

On the porch, his fingers hovered beside the doorbell for a second before he thought better of it. He knocked with his usual force, but it still wouldn't carry as far as the doorbell. If they didn't hear, they didn't really want him, and he could turn around and leave again. That would be safer, anyway.

The door flew open after only a few seconds and Leo barrelled into him, hugging him around the middle. "I told you!" she said, "I told you he'd come!"

Frank hugged her in return, feeling a little awkward as he patted her on the back. Sarah was laughing at him. "Finally! I thought you might actually be about to ditch us."

"Yeah," David agreed. "'Cause he's an asshole. Good to see you."

"Can we please have pie now?" Zach sounded impatient, but Frank noticed that he'd also stepped toward the door instead of toward the kitchen when he got off the couch.

Frank glanced toward the TV. "Charlie Brown Thanksgiving, huh?"

"Yeah," Leo said, "We watch it every year. But the rest can wait 'til after pie!"

He let himself be dragged into the kitchen, where Leo dropped her grip on his hand just in time for Sarah to guide him toward the counter with a light hand on his shoulder. "David, get over here," she said, "You always cut the most even pieces."

David groaned and rolled his eyes, but the huge smile on his face proved he didn't mean it. "I got it."

Zach squeezed himself into the space between Frank and David, reaching for the first piece of pie almost before David could get it on the plate, but Frank couldn't step back out of his way because Sarah was there, too close, and he had to take a deep breath to steady himself. He felt a little trapped.

David shoved the second plate of pie into his hands harder than necessary and Frank put the pieces together. They were worried he was going to leave, even though he’d just gotten here.

As soon as he'd figured it out, it made sense. He was still a little rattled from the meeting, and he wasn't sure he'd remembered to smile. Not that he was always great at making the attempt anyway. But he might still have enough energy left in the tank to fake one good one, and maybe that would be enough. Enough to convince them he meant to be here. Except he wasn’t sure he did. He just knew there was a part of him that wanted it, and Curtis had told him to listen to that part.

As soon as Leo had her pie he turned toward her, trying not to bump into Sarah in the process, and was surprised at how much easier it was to smile than he'd expected. "Alright, so where should I sit?"

Zach was a few feet behind his sister, out of the scrum and already digging into his piece of pie, right there in the middle of the kitchen. Sarah snorted lightly behind him, amused, but he didn't think Zach could hear. "Zachary Leiberman, you wait for everybody else."

"But mom-" Zach started, mouth full.

"No buts. Your dad's almost done."

"I think we should sit on the couch," Leo said, "So we can finish Charlie Brown. Don't you think, mom?"

Sarah looked at Leo, then at Frank, the table, and Frank again, and then she said, "Sure, sounds good. Just don't spill."

"Pie doesn't spill," Zach said, "It's not a liquid."

"Don't talk back to your mother," David said, the same huge grin wrecking the intensity of it. It was weird to watch him happy like this. It was good, too.

David handed Sarah a piece of pie and started cutting one for himself, and Frank found himself getting dragged off again, Leo's grip surprisingly strong for a little girl. "Anyway," she said, "The dishwasher's been making this weird noise, so I thought we'd take a look at it after the movie, before we try to make it do all the Thanksgiving dishes. Since it's gonna be such a big load, you know?"

He'd known it. He'd known coming here was going to be the start of something he had no right to start, and now here he was, right up at the edge of it.

"I dunno, kid, your dad's home now, so I'm not sure I need to-"

"Fine with me," David interrupted, "It's not like there's anybody we can call to look at it on Thanksgiving anyway."

He could tell from the way David didn't quite meet his eyes that he recognized it as the betrayal it was, but he couldn't exactly get mad about it with Leo still looking up at him with those big little-girl eyes.

"Would you mind?" Sarah asked, "Leo's been bugging me about letting her open it up for a week, and it would be nice if she had some supervision."

Frank grunted. For a moment, Leo looked confused, and he remembered that he'd usually forced himself to be a little more communicative as Pete. And sometimes he hadn't forced it at all. "Alright," he said, clarifying the grunt for her. "Can't hurt to take a look."

It could hurt. It could hurt all of them. Somehow.

He wasn't surprised to be half-shoved into a seat in the middle of the couch, and he wasn't surprised when Leo sat close to him, but he was surprised by how close Zach sat on his other side, close enough that he was a little worried he might accidentally elbow the kid in the ribs when he started eating.

There almost wasn't room for Sarah to join them, but they all scooted over as she jammed herself between Leo and the arm of the couch, Zach sneaking a bite of pie as soon as his mother was distracted with fishing a throw pillow out from under herself.

Frank could swear David was practically laughing at him as he came and took a seat on the opposite arm, beside his son. The longer Frank looked up at him, the more his eyes seemed to twinkle.

Leo reached forward and grabbed for the remote, restarting Charlie Brown, and Frank tried to calm himself down. He wasn't trapped. If he really wanted to leave, they would let him. If someone came charging in and attacked them, they'd get out of the way fast enough for him to defend them. They knew who he was. What he was. They'd get out of his way, if they had to. Everything was fine.

He managed to eat his pie, because he didn't want them to know anything was wrong, but the movie was just noise in front of him, and he couldn't make sense of it. Breathe in. Breathe out. Chew. Swallow. The pie was good, and eating it felt good, and the longer nothing went wrong, the easier it was to focus on balancing whipped cream and pumpkin and pie crust in every bite and to keep breathing. Something tight in his chest started to unknot itself. Nothing was going wrong. That feeling that something was about to was probably wrong. Nothing was wrong.

It was still a relief when the credits rolled and they could all get up off the couch. It was good to have breathing room, and even better to have something to do when Leo dragged him off to fix the washing machine.

They ran the machine empty, so he could listen to the noise, but when he told her he had only half a guess about what was wrong, it didn't deter her at all. She'd read the manual, after all. And she'd googled some diagrams of washing machines. She already knew how to cut power and water to the dishwasher so they could disconnect it. She was sure they could figure it out. He couldn't figure out how to tell her no, especially not with David beaming at her, pride written all over his face.

As he let Leo run across the house to pull the fuse for the kitchen appliances and shut off the water, he couldn't shake the feeling that this was a bad idea. He was getting in too deep. There was no going back from this.

David's eyes locked onto his for a moment, and he wasn't sure what David saw there, but his friend immediately stepped toward the dishwasher with a shrug and said "I guess I'll help, too.”

Frank couldn't decide if David joining them was a chance to escape this, or just another sign that he was in over his head.

When Leo came back, Frank pulled the dishwasher out of its cabinet so that they could get to it better, and it was too late. Whatever this was, he'd started it. It was happening. Leo was halfway underfoot as soon as the back of the dishwasher was visible, and a little nagging part of him couldn't even be upset about it.

Somewhere between realizing they needed to disassemble a large portion of the dishwasher, realizing they weren't sure they could put it back together, and figuring out how to fix it, the feeling of impending doom went away. Frank couldn't explain it, exactly, but as the clock ticked later and later and the day caught up to him more and more, it also got easier to accept that things might not be wrong. They might not be awful. They might be ok.

When it was all back together again, Leo beamed and David helped him slot the appliance back into its cabinet. He'd have turned down the help a few hours ago, but the moment the project was done, he'd felt a wave of exhaustion wash over him, and David was probably the only person in the world he was actually used to letting help him when he felt that way.

Leo yawned as she walked out of the kitchen to turn the water and power back on, and David leaned slightly against him. Frank thought he should probably shove the man over to lean against the counters instead, but then he'd have to lean against the counter himself, instead of letting David counterbalance him, and he wasn't sure it was worth it.

Sarah came in with Leo to listen to the newly fixed dishwasher and took one look at the three of them before declaring, "Alright, that's it for tonight. I'll set up a bed for you on the couch, Pete."

"No, that's not-"

Before he could say 'necessary,' David interrupted, still leaning against his shoulder. "Frank. 'S Frank."

"Pete's fine," Frank said, and then he hadn't said no to the couch, and he was too tired to do anything about it when Leo followed up another yawn with "It's alright, Mom, I can get it. I know you wanted to load the dishwasher now that it's fixed." She moved faster than the yawn had suggested, and then she was gone.

"She's a good kid," David said.

"Yeah," Frank agreed.

"You too tired to help, babe?" Sarah asked.

"Zach can help," David said, the best indication of all that he was feeling just as tired as Frank was. "His sister did all the hard parts."

"Zach's in bed. It's almost 1 in the morning."

"Oh," David said.

"Why are you still up?" Frank asked, "You could have gone to bed."

"I had a few things to get ready for Black Friday tomorrow. It's ok. I'm used to running on three hours of sleep."

Frank stifled a groan at the thought. He functioned perfectly well on little sleep, when he had to. But somehow, for the first time in a long time, he just couldn't convince himself that he had to. He'd been right about this whole pie thing. Something was different now, and he couldn't get his head around it. He just knew he felt something, under the exhaustion, and it was something good instead of something bad, and he didn't know what to do with that. Didn't know how to name that. Wasn't sure he knew how to feel it.

When Leo shuffled into the doorway of the kitchen with an armful of blankets, David started steering both of them toward the door to meet her, and Frank let him lead the way, finally stepping away from the other man so that David stumbled a little without the support of Frank's shoulder against his and Frank had to reach out and steady him.

This was funny. It was like they were drunk. But they weren't. This was something else. Something different. The crash after the adrenaline, but he couldn't remember the last time he'd let go of the fight long enough for that. Frank snorted, amused, and David swiped at him ineffectively. "Asshole. S'not nice to laugh. I'm tired."

"Yeah, but we did it!" Leo said, "I told you we could!" The encouragement was nice, but a little undermined by her third yawn in almost as many minutes.

"You should be getting to bed, too, baby girl," David said.

Leo shook her head. "I'm almost done. I already grabbed a pillow."

Frank hurried forward, half stumbling as he reached for the blankets. "It's alright, Leo," he said, "I can take care of myself."

She tugged the blankets away from him. "Yeah, but we can take care of you, too."

There was something there. Something. He wondered if they'd talked about him after he dropped David off at their door. He wondered what they'd said. They made it to the couch, and he stopped wondering because he needed to focus on helping with the blankets, untangling them and laying them out neatly so Leo would stop worrying about him and go to bed.

David tried to help too, and six hands were too many, and Leo giggled tiredly as they made a mess of it, and Frank felt the edges of his mouth pull up into a smile he was definitely too tired for, because smiling was work and he was done working.

"Stop smiling and go to sleep," David said, "It's late. I can't believe you took apart my dishwasher."

"You're an asshole," he answered, only remembering after it came out soft that he was supposed to at least pretend he meant it.

Once the blankets were good enough, he pulled them back and collapsed onto the couch, a little harder than he might have let himself anywhere else when all he was was tired and not injured. He reached for the blankets before David or Leo could pull them over him, not quite ready to be quite that - something. Whatever. Even this tired, that felt like too much.

David and Leo stood over him for a second, just staring, like they'd run out of gas, but then David broke the silence, sliding an arm around Leo's shoulders. "Alright, help your old man up the stairs." She did, the two of them stepping out toward the staircase. "See you tomorrow, Frank," he said over his shoulder.

Frank grunted back, but then realized that wouldn't do for Leo. "Night."

She turned to look over her shoulder at him before she and David could start climbing the stairs. "Night, Pete."

"Sleep well," he managed.

This time, she didn't answer, she and her father both too focused on the stairs in front of them. That was good. The lights were still on, but Frank didn't much want to get up and turn them off. It wasn't like he couldn't sleep anywhere he set his mind to, anyway.

He was halfway asleep already when Sarah finished up with the dishes and came over to the couch to smooth the blankets over him. He'd heard the dishwasher start, and he'd heard her footsteps moving toward him, and the only surprise was that it didn't bother him having her suddenly close to him, in his space, smoothing down his blankets.

"Shh," she said, before he could say anything, "Go to sleep."

He was too tired to nod, but he managed a grunt and her mouth quirked up at the corner. "I'll get the light on my way past," she said, "You know where the bathroom is. And the glasses in the kitchen." He grunted again. "See you in the morning."

Then she was gone.

The minute the lights switched off, he felt his eyes falling shut. Just when it had become least necessary to keep them closed. Her footsteps on the stairs got farther away, then the tone of them changed as she hit flat ground, then her bedroom door closed. He should open his eyes again. Should keep watch. Should make sure everything was still ok.

He didn’t. There was something missing in the middle of his chest, something that was meant to be telling him everything was wrong and everything was dangerous, something that wasn’t there and wasn’t doing that and everything - everything felt ok.

He drifted off, expecting Maria and the nightmares that so often followed her. Instead his sleep was deep and strong and dreamless, for the first time in a long time.

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aurelliocheek · 5 years ago

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Leveraging Player Motivation Models to Increase App Engagement – Part 1

Paula Neves is a Product Manager at Square Enix and describes herself as a gamer turned psychologist turned marketer working in mobile free-to-play games. Prior to joining Square Enix based in Montreal, Paula was the Chief Mobile Officer at Gazeus Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where she headed up user acquisition and product management. Paula is a proud member of the UA Society and a frequent speaker at industry events and conferences, where she eagerly shares her knowledge and experience from her 10+ years in the mobile app marketing industry.

Learn more about Paula from her Mobile Hero profile.

As an undergraduate in Psychology, a graduate in Marketing and a professional in the gaming industry, I’ve always tried to combine what I learned in college with what I do at work. Psychology and marketing go hand in hand, especially when it comes to designing games, and even more so when they’re Free-to-play.

In Free-to-play games, most systems and mechanics are built on the principles of behavioral psychology and we hear a lot about theories like risk aversion, reciprocity, endowment, and the like. But when it comes to planning your next game, for a long time I felt that our industry was missing a good game design framework that is built on science and psychology. That was until six years ago when I first heard of Scott Rigby and his work at Immersyve, and the guys at Quantic Foundry. I started going down the rabbit hole, coming across several interesting player motivation models that all have a recognizable psychology framework as a foundation, like the work done by Jason Vandenberghe and his Domains of Play and Ethan Levy and his Tower of Want.

This is the first part of a three-part blog series intended to explain what motivates players into picking up a game and continuing to play it. It’s a combination of psychology models transposed into gaming and its characteristics. This blog hopes to educate product managers, marketers and game designers on player psychology and how we can all leverage it to make a game that more people will play. Thankfully, this work is already being done by the people I mentioned earlier, so my intention here is to put it all together so that the knowledge is accessible to others.

Self Determination Theory and Long-term Satisfaction

The Self Determination Theory (SDT) is a psychological theory of human motivation that addresses three basic psychological needs including:

Competence: the need to experience mastery, growth and learning, and to feel successful and effective.

Autonomy: the need to feel that you’re in control of your choices and in harmony with your decision. In games, it translates to choice, customization and agency.

Relatedness: the need to be cared for and to care for, to be connected with others, knowing that you belong and matter.

According to the theory, these needs are innate, universal to everyone, and if met, will lead to self-motivation and growth. The theory also makes a clear distinction between extrinsic and intrinsic motivations: The former being caused by external factors, such as being paid to do your job or being made to feel guilty about not doing something. When said guilt — an external factor — motivates you to do something, that behavior is not self-determined. Intrinsic motivation, on the other hand, is when one feels inwardly motivated to achieve something in order to satisfy things like autonomy and competence.

For quite some time extrinsic motivation was judged as bad and intrinsic as good, but it isn’t so black and white. It’s almost impossible to have something — like a game — that will only motivate players intrinsically. As a game designer you must try to kindle more intrinsic than extrinsic motivations, but some extrinsic motivations, like giving rewards for completing actions, are unavoidable and not always bad. If you have an external goal that you identify with, you’ll feel motivated to complete tasks in order to fulfill said goal. That’s a good type of extrinsic motivation.

Self Determination Theory and Video Games

Scott Rigby and the people of Immersyve used SDT as a foundation for their own model: The Player Experience of Need Satisfaction (PENS). The team studied over 7,500 players and their motivations to continue a game for a prolonged period of time and found that PENS had a strong correlation with what compelled players to not only play a game for months and years on end but to identify as a [insert game name] player. I’m a DOTA player.

The basic needs as described by SDT can translate into gaming as such:

Competence

A game is easy to learn, but difficult to master. First Person Shooters and skill-based games like Super Meat Boy are big on competence need satisfaction.Rigby proposed that in order to satisfy competence, game designers should try to create the optimal level of challenge for the player. He refined this idea through Polish psychologist Csikszentmihalyi’s concept of “Flow” –– a psychological state where one is completely immersed in a task. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi defined “Flow” as:

“…the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it.”

According to Csikszentmihalyi, Flow happens when challenges are appropriately matched to one’s ability. If the task at hand is too simple, people will get bored and not experience Flow. If it’s too challenging, people will get anxious, frustrated, and similarly won’t reach the state of Flow.

Making adjustments to Csikszentmihalyi’s concept of Flow, Rigby believed focusing only on the optimal challenge wasn’t enough. Game designers should concentrate on creating a balanced mastery curve (or difficulty curve) for their games. The curve should be so that challenges presented are slowly more conquerable — because the player is getting better at the game — and provide gamers the possibility to express their mastery. While the optimal challenge was an important element, if the player doesn’t get a chance to progress and convey their mastery in action, then their competence need won’t be satisfied.

In line with player progression, whenever one expresses this mastery, they should receive clear and immediate feedback on their accomplishment. This dictates the importance of over the top animation and feedback design in the user experience.

Autonomy

A game that satisfies players’ needs for autonomy gives them choices, customization and agency. Role-playing games (RPGs) and massively multiplayer online games (MMOs) are usually great at satisfying the autonomy need by maximizing the player’s opportunities for action and giving them an entire open world to explore and character sheets to customize.

Choices that are forced upon us, like invisible walls in a game world, feel weird and are demotivating. Scott Rigby states that it isn’t exactly the act of — for instance — customizing your character that will satisfy autonomy, but rather coming back to your character later and having a feeling that “I created this and it’s awesome.” According to PENS, autonomy is particularly important for titles that achieve a perennial value for players, those that are played for years and define their players’ identities. In his research he found that first-person shooter (FPS) titles — more commonly known for creating competence need satisfaction — also satisfy the need for autonomy.

Relatedness

Satisfying the need for relatedness is possible through features such as social grouping and status feedback systems. MMOs and multiplayer online battle arenas (MOBAs) are big on relatedness need satisfaction because they provide a strong sense of belonging through parties and guilds. In these games, you’re always looking after your party and you are looked after by them.

Relatedness is commonly thought of as “the social need” and often, mistakenly, thought of as pertaining only to multiplayer titles. However, non-player characters (NPCs) can be a big driver of relatedness where, when scripted properly, players end up having an emotional connection to that character. Anyone who played Fallout 4 probably related to Dogmeat, the NPC dog that accompanies you in your travels through the wasteland.

Conclusion

By focusing on the three basic psychological needs that the SDT model proposes, game developers are creating psychological experiences that form the building blocks of fun and not only fun itself. According to the scientists at Immersyve, this is a preferable approach because fun is “only” the outcome of the experience and therefore an intangible construct.

As game designers and product managers we have to ask ourselves: Does this feature promote competence, autonomy, or relatedness? I found out the practical way (read: the hard way), that game mechanics and systems can either promote or, if not done properly, thwart these three basic needs.

Remember that you don’t have to design all three needs into every little microfeature of your game, but when you look at the macro of that feature — the overarching, big feature — it does have to address the three needs. Maybe a couple of micro-features will address relatedness and another five will have both a combination of competence and autonomy, but when you look at the big picture of the (to use scrum language) Epic feature all three needs should be well represented for that Epic to be successful in the long-term.

This framework helps answer how to keep players engaged and create long-term satisfaction, but does it also explain the motivation behind users’ install and purchase decisions? Why did players install your game to begin with? In part two of this series, we’ll dive into Jason Vandenberghe’s framework, the Domains of Play, and how it helps explain what drives users to install or purchase your game.

The post Leveraging Player Motivation Models to Increase App Engagement – Part 1 appeared first on Liftoff.

Leveraging Player Motivation Models to Increase App Engagement – Part 1 published first on https://leolarsonblog.tumblr.com/

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sanctferum · 7 years ago

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First trial part 2!

So last we left off, Shuichi was taking the brunt of everyone’s suspicions, and I will say he is awfully suspicious. But I dunno. From a meta perspective, it’d be weird to have the killer cornered at the halfway point of the trial rather than at the end.

Monokuma (& Cubs) Theater, trial version.

Monokuma says he knows all things, and Monodam speaks for like the second or third time so far.

The line between victim and attacker...? Like, what happened in DR1 chapter 1? Monosuke, please elaborate.

The sensor didn’t go off while Shuichi was in the basement. Hmmm.

Did Shuichi tamper with the sensor he placed?

Or he could’ve just not set it...

No, that isn’t right...the moving bookcase must have had the sensor on it. We got that picture of Rantaro, and we only were able to take that because of the sensor sensing him.

Ryoma thinks Shuichi turned the receiver off...in that case, you’d get a picture, but not the alarm.

Shuichi isn’t saying anything...and I remember what he said earlier. The reason no one accepted the First Blood Perk could have been to kill everyone else. But why would he want that? And wouldn’t the real killer get away if that was the case, and everyone voted for Shuichi?

Time to lie! It’s perjury for the jury!

Wow that was more difficult than I thought it’d be...

Kaede didn’t have the receiver. But the only one who knows that besides herself is currently silent.

Kokichi sees right through us...

...why would a god need nap-time?

Morphenomenal Trial Grounds...?

Scrum debate...let’s see what this is like...

Wow that was...interesting.

Ah, Shuichi’s been quiet because he’s afraid of the truth...afraid of what the truth might be.

The hidden door picture? 3-2?

He tried to remove the camera? Why?

He noticed the camera only after it had taken a picture already...

But...hadn’t Shuichi turned off the camera flash?

Huh. Rantaro’s picture isn’t blurry at all...it’s bright, too.

Shuichi set up the flash to lure whoever moved the bookcase to the camera.

Which means...Shuichi...IS the killer...?

No...but who could it be otherwise?

Who handled the cameras other than, Miu, Shuichi, and...

No, I think we’d know if it was Kaede...we’re playing as her, after all.

*a full supply of influence gauge later* OK, I picked everyone but myself and it was wrong every time, but...if it is us, we would definitely have noticed that we went and killed someone. Right? Also the main character getting executed so early on, or at all, makes no sense at all.

*chooses Kaede* “No doubt about it”? Wh...huh?

And...she’s suddenly in a spotlight in an empty courtroom, lamenting her failure to catch the mastermind...? What the actual fuck is going on.

She’s entrusting her legacy to Shuichi...I am so confused...?

Now Kaede is gone and Shuichi is speaking...Saying he’ll do what Kaede wants him to do, even if it’s cruel.

What the fuck is going oooooooonnnnnnnn???????

Her, her tone of voice changed...

The things she is saying are true...so how can she be the culprit?

Where she used it?

I mean, she could have theoretically rolled it down the vent, but we didn’t see anything like that, so...besides, the vent was on the other side of the library, right?

Are...we playing as Shuichi? Don’t tell me Kaede was a decoy protagonist...

Wait, protagonist...there was all this emphasis on her being the protagonist in the demo...and it was also mentioned once in the prologue. But...

Yeah, Tenko’s right, she...

...she was strangely absorbed in the books on top of the bookcase...no way...

I am in a complete state of shock right now. This game just bamboozled the fuck out of me.

Wait, why wouldn’t Kaede have taken the First Blood Perk?

Fuck. Kaede mentioned loving Rube Goldberg machines...

The noise was masked by the murder music...

So Kaede was a classic unreliable narrator...

Huh...?

Another twist?

But, if Kaede wouldn’t have done it...then how come she did...?

Kaede’s truth...?

Hey it just occured that there were some Kaede specific items from the MonoMono Machine, but not a lot of detective stuff for Shuichi. And I kept saying, what’s with this music stuff, are we gonna give it to ourselves somehow? Oh jesus fuck.

Oh. She was hoping to kill the mastermind. That’s it, isn’t it. And Rantaro...was not the right target.

Oh fuck. Shuichi is blaming himself. He’s the one who thought the mastermind would be in that spot, and the one who told Kaede that speculation...

And Kaede thinks everything is her fault, that she deserves what’s gonna happen to her...

This is...too sad...

End this...?

The closing argument equivalent...which is still called the Closing Argument, it would seem.

And that’s it. The case is over...all everyone can do is believe that Kaede was only trying to protect them.

Kaede’s selflessness...was her downfall. And no doubt that was also why she didn’t take the Perk. Because that would have been a betrayal of her friends, even though they wouldn’t have died...

Voting time...

And the vote went off without a hitch, and then Monokuma confirmed the results.

Up until Rantaro’s belonging didn’t have the card key...up until that point...Kaede truly believed that she was doing the right thing...

Kokichi speaking some hard truths...but there’s a time and place for that. This isn’t it.

Oh. Kokichi is angry, yes, but at himself? Nope, another lie.

Kaede doesn’t want anyone’s sympathy...because she can’t see herself as anything other than a murderer who killed a dear friend. So why should anyone else see her that way?

Yeah. She couldn’t take the Perk because it meant she’d escape alone.

Kaede meant to use the trial to reveal the mastermind’s identity. Even if she was executed at the nd, she’d consider that atonement for Rantaro’s death.

And Shuichi is considering that he may have been wrong. What if...there is no mastermind? No one did anything suspicious when Shuichi was gonna be declared the killer, even though it would mean the death of them all...Shuichi made a mistake. And a friend is dead because of it...and another is about to be.

Kaede set her trap to cover he own tracks because even if she killed the mastermind, she thought that the others wouldn’t want to be friends with someone who killed.

Monokuma is eager for blood...this is gonna be awful.

The Exisals? Are they there to kill Kaede, or to prevent the others from interfering?

The latter, it would seem.

Kaito is gonna do another dumbass move...and Gonta is refusing to stand aside, too. Tenko as well...and Shuichi...

Kaede doesn’t want her friends to die just to try and help her.

Kaede’s final request...that everyone escape together and be friends.

And now. The end.

Der Flowehze. Execution of Ultimate Pianist.

Monokuma strapped her into a noose and played the piano with her until she choked to death...and then, as the piano was collapsing, Monodam pushed Monokid into it and he died too.

Monokuma is fine with Monokid’s destruction. After all, he’s got four other cubs! The Monokubs are less than thrilled about their individual existence meaning so little.

And here it comes. The first mention of the word despair.

Despair entertainment...this isn’t another live broadcast, is it?

Rantaro had a hunch regarding the situation. But now he’s dead, and only the words “Ultimate Hunt” remain.

Monodam claims he killed Monokid for the sake of the Monokubs. Huh?

And that’s a wrap...?

Wait what’s Kaito have against Shuichi...?

He just punched him! What the fuck!

Hey, Shuichi’s in shock. Don’t be so hard on him!

Everyone eventually leaves, except Kaito and Shuichi. Kaito suggests Shuichi go to the Ultimate Pianist Lab, where some sense of Kaede remains.

A song...

Claire de Lune by Debussy. The song Kaede wanted to play for Shuichi...

Shuichi remembers what Kaede kept telling him. Have more confidence, she said. And so, his path is decided. Face the truth...with confidence and hope.

And her ghost appears for a brief moment...

chapter clear. And our chapter trophy is her hairpin...

That’s...that’s all for tonight...See you another time...

*hangs heads in hands* somehow, every time, Dangan Ronpa surpasses my wildest expectations and my worst fears...

#Dangan Ronpa V3 #Danganronpa V3 #Dangan Ronpa

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bybyeblackbird · 8 years ago

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Ok so I've seen PotC5 and for me the whole movie is appalling. Why do you think Johnny made the character so disgusting? His jokes just made me sad bc JD as a person has a great sense of humor so...??? What does that mean? Why is that all about fucking all the ladies who happened to be around? Why is he always so stupid when he was proven to be really intelligent in the original trilogy? Just... bullshit. And why did Johnny like the film???

Sorry it took so long to answer this, I wanted to watch the film before I responded.

WARNING: SPOILERSDOUBLE WARNING: I wasn’t impressed, so if you’re looking for a glowing review please pass by, i’m sorry kids

Basically, I agree with most of this. And to answer your last question: Johnny would have liked this film because this is how Johnny wanted to play Jack.

Guys. I think we’re all trying to ignore that fact and blame his antics in the film on the writer exclusively. But doing that is ignoring that A) Johnny co-wrote the script and B) the MULTIPLE comments we all know Johnny has made, in the past AND on this very press tour, about how he believes Jack has no character arc or depth, and is just there to have fun. The directors ALSO said this.

Here’s the thing: I understand the defence about ‘the character was written that way in this film, he’s supposed to be down and then redeem himself.’ And I’m all for that! I would love to see that! The problem is, I didn’t see that at all. It’s set up perfectly to give Jack a redemption arc. That’s clearly what the script intended.

But it’s not what Johnny intended. And it’s not what the directors intended.

Lottie put it so much better in her review, here. But what it comes down to is this equation:

The main actor and the directors believing Jack has no arc nor depth + the script giving Jack an arc and depth = the mess we ended up with.

As Lottie put it:

I could ultimately see what they were trying to do, and it kind of worked in the first half, but it was so poorly executed because ultimately they created a contradiction for themselves. the directors and Johnny have stated on multiple occasions that Jack is now apparently a character without arc or development, and yet they put him into a narrative where he is supposed to change in some way between the start and end point. I said this before when I remarked last week that it was ironic he had an ‘arc’ in this movie considering those comments: he’s meant to get somewhere, regain his rep, return to a ( mostly ) sober state – but they kept stagnating him in the narrative because he is this weird arc-less character at this point. it just didn’t make any fucking sense. if you’re going to put a static character into a narrative ( as Jack apparently is nowadays ), then you don’t put him in it at a relative low point, changed from the last time we saw him as an audience and apt to change/develop along the course of the narrative as he ‘redeems’ himself. you’re just writing yourself into a brick wall. he should have been FINE the moment the Black Pearl was restored, but they kept returning him to this earlier drunken, idiotic state without reason even after that point and it just made the whole thing really sloppy. you want to paint Jack at his lowest point? well by doing so, you’re giving the audience a stake in seeing Jack redeem himself and return to the character we know and love – and yet there was no obvious sign that had happened, no natural development that saw him slowly but steadily getting his groove back and taking control of his own narrative until the very end, when suddenly he was absolutely fine even though he’d been fighting plot convenient alcoholism for the entire movie.

And that’s the truth of it. And you can’t blame it entirely on the writer or script (though he DOES have some explaining to do about just ignoring the trilogy completely *cough* compass *cough*). It was Johnny’s choice to play Jack with no obvious redemption arc, as the script set him up to do by showing us at what is obviously meant to be his lowest point.

And it’s not bad acting, it’s just Johnny’s character choice. With many movies you can say ‘don’t blame the actor, blame the script!’ But you and I all know that doesn’t apply to Johnny. Johnny doesn’t blindly follow the script. Johnny wants what he wants and Johnny gets what he wants. He WANTED Jack to be the humorous relief. He WANTED Jack to have no depth or arc - leave that to the other characters. It’s his choice and he chose. I’m not here to tell him he *can’t* choose something for a character he created. I don’t like it, but I’m not here to salivate over everything he does and everything he chooses anyways.

He’s made lots of choices I don’t like. We all remember Private Resort. 😜

So anyways, clearly I had a problem with the way Jack was portrayed so I think you can guess my feelings about the content of the jokes he cracked. They were lazy and annoying, and I knew already how he described Elizabeth from all the comments I heard, but I still wasn’t prepared for how sick it made me feel, watching him descend to that level. It was disgusting. Johnny said he ‘really upped the stakes with the humour,’ and in my opinion he completely missed the mark and just made him so off-putting.

AND WHAT THE FUCK WAS WITH ALL THE SEX JOKES???? not even just Jack but like… everyone???? Carina and Henry went on about his hand placement, the horologist thing was funny for about 5 seconds and then became stupid, MARTY JOKED ABOUT FUCKING SCRUM’S MOTHER like honestly i was so put off by seemingly every attempt at humour. The boat undressing scene was somehow even more disgusting in the film than the trailers, and that wedding scene??? fuck off. It added absolutely nothing to the plot, was put in for what I’m assuming was supposed to be comedic effect but wasn’t at all funny (to me), and used the tired old trope of ‘let’s make the leading man have to entertain the presence of this fat chick he refers to as an object so the audience can laugh at how gross she is.’ Johnny’s facial expressions were honestly great in that scene but I couldn’t even appreciate it because I was so repulsed by the whole thing.

THINGS I DID LIKE:

How protective Jack was of Henry, even if he didn’t show it overtly. Which is one of the only three moments where i recognized Old Jack (overtly sassy and pretends not to care about people but through actions shows he deeply does)

Second thing where I glimpsed Old Jack: The smile after the Pearl rose from the water. I saw that grin and I started grinning and Andrea looked over and asked me if I was crying LOL

Third thing where I glimpsed Old Jack: When his crew leaves him. That hurt look on his face tore me up.

CARINA. Seriously, can anyone claim that Carina did not carry this fucking film. I honestly kept thinking ‘Jack can u shut the fuck up so Carina can talk please.’ Carina was great.

Scrum. He fucking kills me, man. When he was trying to save Carina; man I was dying with laughter

Gibbs - there was one moment that for some reason was the funniest and purest moment of the whole movie? And I don’t know if anyone else even caught it and maybe it’s just cause I watched P1,2,3 all this weekend - there was a moment where they were on the Dying Gull while it was still on land and they didn’t know if it would even sail, and Jack bellowed some order like ‘prepare to set sail’ or some shit. and usually whenever Jack gives orders, Gibbs will repeat them and expand on them and give more details of what to do like ‘Prepare to cast off!’ ‘Prepare to fire!’ etc.; he’s the first mate obvs! But this time when Jack gave the order, Gibbs just goes, ‘Prepare to drown!’ AND I WAS DYING i was like the only one laughing but it was just so perfectly timed and delivered and sassed????

Barbossa - Geoffrey did well with what he was given and though i think the reveal of that whole emotional tie was super rushed and not well explained, I think Geoffrey did really well with what he was given to work with, and had my eyes watering in *that* scene

Anyways that was a novel but i started answering your question and then it turned into a full fucking review apparently - feel free to ask about any parts of the movie you want to know how I felt about, but be warned I’m in a very honest and unforgiving mood right now 😈

#Anonymous #lani answers #johnny depp #pirates of the caribbean

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earthconstructs · 5 years ago

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International Women’s Day 2020

Dear Diary (this is your warning about the dear diary-like rants at the end of this post):

I went to a panel yesterday, run by a local innovation group to celebrate International Women’s Day which is on March 8 this year.

It was a good event, but it didn’t quite get me in the feels, and feeling inspired, like I have at previous IWD events. Some possible reasons for this, vibe and set up. I think splitting the panel across either side of the lectern almost created this feeling of us vs them, when really all the panelists were on the same side of the discussion.

The event was introduced in a way that, anyone attending was already on board with feminism, and knew why it is important to have days like IWD to bring everyone together, reflect, and celebration. But because the questions the moderator was asking were questions that were, to me kind of the same questions that are asked over and over again, why are quotas important, do we need allies, I felt that we were having old discussions, about questions we already know the answer to. And that maybe, this is why every year the official IWD decides on a theme. And this year, the theme was #eachforequal. But this theme wasn’t mentioned until the very end, when we all took a photo making the symbol.

Anyway enough criticism. Any opportunity to hear individual women’s story is a good thing. And there were lots of pieces of advice thrown in there, and some which I think I could take on board.

Care less.

Training an open mind is important.

That maybe once people become a mother, they have an extra purpose, or reason for wanting things to be better, and for being active in this space.

And that you are not responsible for everyone’s feeling in the room.

To this last piece of advice, I literally had the reaction “I thought it was just me” which is funnily also the name of one of Brene Brown’s books, that I think I need to read. Book title: I thought it was just me (but it isn’t): Making the journey from “what will people think” to “I am enough”. My reaction: Ahhhhhh..... relevant.....

I thought that it was one of my qualities, that I wanted to make sure no one was offended, everyone was ok, feeling listened to, included etc, but it turns out I’m not special, lots of women are probably like this.

And then, when the floor was opened for questions/comments, things got weird.

One lady addressed the panel saying, I wanted to hear more actionable advice about how you might call out mansplaing and interruptions. The lady working as a Scrum Master at BMW gave great examples about how she took the courage to tell a guy, “OK can I please speak now” (I’m guessing he had already been speaking for a while and it is her job as a scrum master to keep things moving along). To which the guy responded “but I wasn’t done yet.” She felt terrible, that her moment of courage was dismissed like that, but then noticed that once he was done, everyone else in the room was waiting for her to speak. She also gave the tip about how speaking up for someone else in the room who might be finding it hard to get a word in can work well.

Anyway the lady who asked the question seemed happy with her answer, and the mic was passed to a man who was standing at the back of the room. To which people giggled saying A MAN. LET HIM HAVE A VOICE.

And with his voice, he started addressing the lady who had just asked a question. Saying something about NLP, how it seems clear that the lady is trained in NLP... something something if you continue to speak and address people with that voice as you just did, then you WILL be listened to. That’s the short version, he babbled for a bit. And I was already tuning out, turning to my friend on the right saying, is this mansplaining??? She agreed. And then, once the man had finished talking, the moderator said quite quickly “was it just me or did anyone else think that was mansplaining? My hand went up, so did a few others around me. To which the guy (let’s call him guy #1)was like “sorry what? How was that mansplaining??” and the guy next to him (let’s call him guy #2, also I don’t think they knew each other) said “Yeah can someone please explain how that is mansplaining?”

So I piped up turning around to say “I think it was your wording....” but I got interrupted (irony?! I was going to explain it to him!!) as he kept talking and someone gave him back the mic and THEN he started talking about how he used to be just a shy guy from Ireland, but he did his NLP training, and now he blah blah blah and I say this because there are probably people in the audience who are shy and would benefit from me saying this blah blah blah blah.

The mic was offered to me next, but I declined it saying that it wasn’t worth it. So one brave lady in the row in front of me took the mic and she tried to explain to him that he had just assumed what he knew of people, but no we’re not all shy and so he can’t just assume his advice applies to everyone.

Anyway after that someone changed the topic thank goodness, as as the room opened up for more discussion, guy #1 continued to talk to a guy next to him (guy #3) and his low voice was so annoying even from the other side of the room. THE CHEEK.

When the Q&A was finished, I saw guy #2 milling about awkwardly as I was chatting to my friends, in the same kind of way that I do when I’m at a networking event without anyone that I know. And I thought about maybe explaining to him what mansplaining was, since he asked. But at the time I decided I couldn’t be bothered, and prioritised chatting to my friends.

Then when my friend and I were downstairs dropping off our name badges, two ladies came up to us and said, well I totally should have spoken up, and continued what I was saying. But I explained to them how I thought it wasn’t worth it. That I agree that in principle we should speak up at any opportunity, but that I also feel like I’ve done a lot of thinking about this, and that I think it’s something like 40% of a group whose mind you will never be able to change on a topic because they’re just so entrenched, so we shouldn’t worry about them, we just trying to talk to the middle part of the group who don’t really have an opinion either way and can be convinced. And that I felt that guy #1 was part of the group that you were never going to be convinced.

But then I remembered guy #2. And with that in mind, he had asked the question, and I felt like maybe I could have spoken to him, and at least set him on the path a little. So now I feel a little guilty that I’ve lost an opportunity to speak to a possibly receptive person. But hopefully the next time I’m in a situation like this, I’ll remember that I think it IS worth speaking to that middle portion.

I’ve been meaning to dig up the articles that I read when I was trying to figure out whether it was worth it to speak to a friend who had some kind of misogynistic ideas about women, that he posted on his LinkedIn and Facebook. And now I’m reminded how when I saw how he thought about stuff, just based on what I had seen on social media, I decided that I didn’t want to be friends with him anymore, stopped talking to him, and stopping going to bbqs we were invited to.

https://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/how-to-win-arguments-dos-donts-and-sneaky-tactics.html

One about winning arguments on the internet..

These are two that I remember, but I swear there was one that broke down your group into three categories, the people who you will never convince, the people who sit on the fence and don’t have an opinion, and the people who already think what you think.

Anyway this is something I’d like to revisit at some point, I’m sure I have it written down somewhere too.

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thisdaynews · 5 years ago

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England v Ireland: 'No-one argues with a Farrell' as father and son prepare for Twickenham game

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/england-v-ireland-no-one-argues-with-a-farrell-as-father-and-son-prepare-for-twickenham-game/

England v Ireland: 'No-one argues with a Farrell' as father and son prepare for Twickenham game

Media playback is not supported on this device

The Farrell family are unique – Jones

Six Nations Championship: England v Ireland Venue:Twickenham StadiumDate:Sunday, 23 FebruaryKick-off:15:00 GMT Coverage:Listen on BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra; live text commentary on the BBC Sport website and app; highlights online and on BBC Two from 18:00 GMT.

There is an arc in the competitive relationship between most fathers and sons.

Stage one: father teaches son. Stage two: father lets son win. Stage three: equally matched. Stage four: son unrepentantly triumphant. Stage five: son patronises father by throwing him occasional bones.

Andy and Owen Farrell are not most fathers and sons. Which is why, when they come up against each other at the elite level once again this weekend, the dynamic between them will be so perplexing to the majority of those watching.

England v Ireland is always a huge game. With Ireland two games unbeaten and England on the rebound from World Cup final disappointment there is extra weight on this one, but you can find subplots anywhere you care: Farrell senior returning to Twickenham as head coach for the first time; Eddie Jones with a new-look coaching staff containing only a solitary Englishman; both looking to move their teams on as a new World Cup cycle begins.

But it is the Farrell against Farrell narrative that will draw the eye, because each is so integral to everything their side is, and because their characters are reflected in the style and attitude of the teams around them.

Jonathan Joseph on wing for England v Ireland

How is England’s Tom Curry fitting in at number eight?

When Andy was defence coach with England under Jones’ predecessor Stuart Lancaster, players would refer to Big Faz and Little Faz. You had to find that point of difference between them. Everything else was so similar.

“You would hear one of them talk and you would not know which one it was,” former England scrum-half Danny Care told BBC Radio 5 Live’s Rugby Union Weekly.

“The way they talk to a group, how they manage to make you want to go and play a Test match on a Monday or Tuesday morning in a meeting room. They manage to inspire you, and they do it with a massive amount of emotion.

“The main thing is the stuff that takes no talent, that takes hard work – like defending, and kick-chase. It shows your commitment to a team and attitude.

“Owen makes any team better, because you have to get up to his level. He has such high standards that he sets. If you don’t throw Owen the right ball on the training field, he will tell you.

“It’s the same with Andy. If you’re not reaching them, you’re going to be told. On Sunday you are going to see two very similar defences and game plans.”

No rivalry with Willi Heinz – Ben Youngs

Ireland’s Henderson out of England game for family reasons

Owen Farrell celebrated Wigan’s 2002 Challenge Cup victory with his dad Andy (left, holding trophy)

You don’t instinctively think of the Farrells as emotional. The stereotype is of hard northern men playing rugby league and union in an unrelenting, uncompromising fashion.

Andy made his professional debut for Wigan at 16. Owen made his for Saracens 11 days after his 17th birthday. Both have captained England at World Cups.

But the emotion is there, alright. It’s just not on display for the media, or the public, most of the time. It’s kept for the training ground and the dressing room, and it’s used to drag the best out of the mean around them.

You think about Andy’s famous “hurt arena” speech to the British and Irish Lions squad before the third and deciding Test against the Wallabies in 2013. Staring round the room, measured but hypnotic, looking at the finest players from four nations and holding the total respect of every one.

Then you think about Owen before England played the All Blacks in their World Cup semi-final four months ago. Bringing the players around him in the final training session, firing out sentences like stiff right jabs.

“We’re going to punish them with good decisions. Right?

“We��re going to play this game at our pace.

“Our pace. Not how they want to play it. Right?”

Quiz: Test your knowledge of family rivalries

Owen Farrell led England to victory against New Zealand in the 2019 World Cup semi-final

You don’t instinctively think of Farrells as talkative. Northern boys, say the stereotypes, keep it stripped back.

Then watch Owen on Sunday and the running commentary he provides for his team at rucks, or his father as Ireland warm up on the green grass of south-west London. These are not wasted words. They are exhortations, threats, specific instructions.

Everyone listens, nine caps in or ninety. No-one argues with a Farrell, because a Farrell is almost always right.

“Owen is a defensive coach on the pitch,” says Care. “He is like that all week in training and he will be like that for 80 minutes on the park.

“It’s because he knows the game inside out and he knows what it should look like. He’s got all these mental pictures of what an aggressive, physical defence should look like. If you’re not up to speed, he will call you out.”

Subscribe to the Rugby Union Weekly podcast

Andy Farrell was Saracens assistant coach from 2009 to 2012

There is only 16 years between the Farrells. They have played together on the same side. Those around them describe how they sometimes come across as much mates as dad and lad, desperate to get one over each other, seeing the battle as part of the fun, part of a game they both understand.

But there is something else too. Talk to England and Ireland players about the pair and the same words keep coming up. Commitment. Leadership. Standards. Professional.

It’s the last of these that explains how the two deal with a situation that most parents and children would find impossible.

Rugby is the job, the all-consuming passion. The point of it is to win. It doesn’t mean you dispense with the deep personal bonds that will tie you forever.

It means you can separate the two. You can be concurrently opposition captain and coach and father and son. You both understand the lines.

By trying to beat you I am not denigrating who you are. By using everything I know about you to defeat you I am not exploiting the trust between. We are just being honest. We know exactly where we stand.

Owen and Andy Farrell represented opposing teams at the Six Nations launch in January

They have been here before. In opposition for England and Ireland they have two wins apiece. But that was when Andy was Joe Schmidt’s assistant. Never before has head coach come up against captain.

It’s undeniably tough on those around them: mother and wife Colleen, Owen’s sisters Elleshia and Grace, his little brother Gabriel.

For the two men at the centre of it all, it makes sense. And it explains why, when England hooker Luke Cowan-Dickie is talking about one, he could equally be talking about the other.

“He’s one of those guys who is mentally full on. He definitely keeps the boys on track. He drives standards.

“He’s a competitor. His head is switched on every game. He doesn’t just say things for the sake of it. He leads with his actions too.”

For Owen, read Andy. Big Faz and Little Faz, nothing between them but age. Father and son, and happy rivals too.

“I know it’s weird for you guys,” says Andy, “but it’s certainly not weird for us, because it’s never been any different.”

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Andy Farrell denies Six Nations game with son Owen is most challenging week of his career

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