#first being their difference in eloquence/formality

[tired-gay-wreck9]

dude, what if karkat didn't help rose's alcoholism in game over because of gamzee?

I think there's also the alien aspect of it, that he doesn't get human culture, but

rose just got into consuming a substance that makes her happier and more lighthearted instead of the serious godtier great fighter she normally is

gamzee got into consuming a substance that made him happier and more lighthearted instead of the angry highblood great fighter he is during murderstuck

when gamzee stopped consuming the substance he killed two people, because of that past experience I doubt karkat would be jumping at the bit to have rose stop consuming the substance

I doubt he was 100% convinced that rose would turn into gamzee without alcohol, but gamzee probably played a factor

also, rose / gamzee parallels? both struggled with addiction, had absent parents, both have extensive knowledge of stuff, were upper class, purple

[avelera]

idk how to explain this but jayvik is giving the same vibes as dreamling. i just can't prove it.

Serious answer, they do match some of the Red Oni/Blue Oni tropes that are very popular with a lot of slash ships, including Hob/Dream, Jayce/Viktor, Newt/Hermann, and Kirk/Spock, where one is more passionate and governed by emotion and one is more remote and intellectual.

It's also very common for such ships to have physical characteristics that match these personality characteristics, like the "Red" Oni figure being physically larger, broader, and more imposing with a body that runs hot, with the "Blue" Oni figure being lean, pale, and cerebral with a body that runs cold (as we have seen over and over and over with these style of ships where one is presumed to "run hot" and the other is always cold, yes I am guilty of writing this too, it's a fun trope).

(Fandoms often tend to exaggerate these differences even further, make the height differences even more pronounced, the Red figure bigger, the Blue figure even more waifish, and often throw in a Masculine/Feminine angle to the differences which further remove the characters from their canon selves, but that is a raging pet peeve of mine for another day.)

But I would say, unique to Jayvik and Dreamling's similarities are things like Viktor ascending to become an Endless, Dream-like figure, able to touch the consciousnesses of uncountable lives, and in doing so becoming a solitary figure that only one person seems to be able to reach in his loneliness. And there is a similarity between Hob and Jayce with them being the more passionate, loud person of the two, who seems more grounded in the "physical" world and its pleasures.

Certainly when I write Jayce and Viktor I have to be careful not to dip too much into mannerisms and tropes I've been writing recently for Hob and Dream. For example, Jayce speaks informally about 80% of the time (and with poetic eloquence about 5-10% of the time, usually when talking about magic or higher concepts like morality), but he doesn't use the bloke-y British slang terms I ascribe to Hob. And Viktor speaks informally about 60% of the time, but he's not nearly so rigidly formal in his diction as Dream often is, and he sometimes uses English as a second language grammar, rather than purely formal grammar.

(I also borrow elements for writing them from my time writing Newt and Hermann for Pacific Rim, but that's mostly things like awareness around Viktor's disability, first practiced while writing Hermann, and the analytical way Newt and Hermann both talk applies to Jayce and Viktor as scientists first and foremost, but Jayvik lacks the Newmann bickering and they are actually very affectionate and in sync with each other from the start. It's been very rewarding to pull from some other ships I have more experience with to write Jayce and Viktor, and this ask gave me the chance to ramble about it a bit lol so sorry about the tangent).

But yeah I do think there's similarities, you're not imagining things. But personally I find the places where they are different from other Red Oni/Blue Oni style ships to be the most interesting parts about them.

[thornfield13713]

There is something really interesting in the way that Jyn and Cassian are...they are at once parallels to each other's experiences, and they are their own role-reversal AU.

Like- we first met them as an apparently-apolitical rogue and a dedicated member of Rebel Intelligence. This is quickly complicated on Jyn's side, when we find out about her past with the Partisans, that line of Saw's about her being the most devoted member of his cadre, a true believer, before she was abandoned, allegedly to protect her from those who would use her as a bargaining chip against the Empire (apparently under the impression that Galen Erso had a lot more influence than he did.) Which- That sounds a heck of a lot like the sort of thing Luthen Rael would do to me, and we see him visiting Saw in S1 of Andor, which would be...roughly around the time Jyn was abandoned. Either it's going to happen very soon or it's already happened, and I'd lay money that it happened because Luthen found out that Saw had Galen Erso's daughter among his partisans. Cassian's narrative remains fairly straightforward throughout Rogue One, but is then complicated in Andor.

Jyn had a childhood on the run from the Empire, but not actively fighting it, until she was taken from her home by Saw. Cassian had a childhood fighting the Republic (which, as this show and others have made clear, was not so different from the Empire from the perspective of the outlying worlds) until he was taken from his home by the Andors. Even the circumstances of how they were taken are opposites - Saw was entrusted with Jyn by her parents, Cassian was abducted from his community by the Andors who...while well-meaning, still never gave him a choice and certainly never stopped to consider that he might have a family and community that they were tearing him away from. Saw encouraged Jyn to fight the Empire, trained her to do so, whereas what we see of Clem Andor is him urging Cassian and others not to make trouble. To keep his head down and not protest, because those who do will be killed.

In the same year, 5 BBY, Jyn is cut loose from the Partisans and becomes a much more self-interested criminal in order to survive, and Cassian joins up with the Rebellion, abandoning self-interest in order to dedicate himself to the cause. Notably, even during their more self-interested period, both of them are still fighting the Empire in smaller and more self-interested ways - Jyn's list of charges at the start of Rogue One makes that clear enough, and Cassian is, even before he is formally a rebel, still apparently stealing principally from the Empire. They've just both given up on any way of making any sort of large-scale difference. And, if my theory about who it was that wanted to use Jyn is correct, these decisions have a lot to do with one man, who indirectly brought one of them into the rebellion and drove the other away from it.

I just- This is the least of the ways in which Andor is fascinating, I know. But a lot of people have written a lot more eloquently and knowledgably than I could about the ways in which this show is very smart politically, and says a lot about the nature of fascism, radicalisation, police states, the prison industrial complex and the workings of colonialism. Much has also been written about where the show falls short (challenge: can we have a reasonably prominent black character who survives more than a couple of episodes, please?). I'm just bringing this one forward because it's an aspect I haven't seen discussed as much, and because character development and parallels are always interesting to poke at, particularly with two characters whose final fates are so closely intertwined. Their stories spiral around each other, never quite touching until the very end, but they've been on parallel roads this whole time even if neither of them can see it.

[altocat]

Love your First soldier trio au. Imagine adult seph being a big baby around them

Sephiroth is in the middle of giving a formal speech to his men, completely eloquent and composed like usual, totally controlled and stoic.

......only to catch sight of Glenn from across the room and instantly barrelling over half the cadets trying to get to him. He doesn't even notice that he's trampled like eight different people, grinning like an idiot, towering over Glenn looking pleased as punch just to see him again.

[angrennufuin]

Elflinguistics Part 2: Ravnica

For the currently-paused Ravnica campaign, I'm playing Sûl the elven bard-warlock, currently a courtesan but formerly a noble. Mainly I wanted my Ravnica names to sound different from my Eberron names; these are different settings and vastly different people-groups. Let's, once again, get into it.

Rules for myself

Ravnica is a planet that is all one giant city, but some parts of it are currently less-inhabited and more ruined than others. Sûl's family hails from part of this Rubblebelt; while Linmir's clan is a diaspora of middle-class tradesmen and occasionally warriors, Sûl comes from a stuffy, dissipated high-elf aristocracy clinging onto their former glory.

So the idea here is still poetic eloquence, but where Eberron elves make portmanteaus with layered meaning, Ravnica elves go big or go home. Long names are in vogue, and often include hyphens and/or prepositions. They also have multiple names/forms of names for different levels of connection!

Long, formal name used by strangers + acquaintances

A shortened (usually single-word) form of that name used by friends and family

An entirely different "private name" known only to parents and really serious lovers

Formal names

These are used by strangers and acquaintances, in formal settings (which are most settings, for Sûl's family). Elves have long lives and long memories, and it's considered slightly disrespectful/kind of bad luck to name your child entirely after someone else, whether deceased or living. They can get away with this because there are not, historically, that many elves, period, in Ravnica. There are even less in the Rubblebelt, the sparsely-inhabited area of ruins and urban decay that is home to this branch of crumbling elf aristocracy.

We're not using Sûl as the case study for any of these, for reasons I'll explain later. Instead, let's go with her oldest sister. Her long-form name is Elen-atto-vomentië (=meeting of two stars); short form would likely be Elen, as the first word in the name is most likely to be picked for casual usage. Elen (stars) is an extremely common Elvish name; other possibilities could have been Tië (path) or Vomen (to gather together).

Generally, children are allowed to choose the casual form of their name whenever they want to. Like being named Alexander and going by Alex, for example. Not a particularly weighty decision, and subject to change! The "don't name your kid after someone else" social norm only applies to the full formal name, but if you have like six people in your immediate family tree who shorten their name to Elen, it's considered quite gauche.

Intimate names:

The intimate name is a much bigger deal. Generally only a child and their parents know it & parents would never use it except alone with their kid in a moment of great emotion. Traditionally you'd tell your spouse at your wedding, but modern elves might tell it to a non-marital life partner or even a VERY best friend, if their bond is close enough. It's supposed to be something of a horoscope/prophecy/wish from the parent to the child. Elen's intimate name is Asya-Mekte (=to ease [one's] heart); her parents hoped she would be a kind and empathetic soul.

I cannot stress enough that you Do Not say this name except in private! Think like the True Name of a fairytale creature. There's a superstition that where you give your private name, you give your heart -- with the proper spells, some believe it can be used to control you. Is it true? Who knows! But certainly it would be extremely rude, having been given the honor of an elf’s intimate name, to use it where anyone not so chosen could hear.

[I think I was using an older form of Elvish for these? But I've forgotten entirely.]

Surnames:

Surnames are a lot easier to deal with, because they're just place names. This brand of elves is pretty traditional and keen on long history, so they generally go by whatever region/estate/geographical feature they consider their ancestral home. Sûl's family comes from a region and its corresponding manor called Haudh-en-Calen (= Green Hills/Green Barrows), so that's their last name. In the most formal settings you would stick a possessive from in there: Elen-atto-vomentië Haudh-en-Calenva. If one were inclined to make one's introduction more accessible to non-Elvish speakers (Elen is NOT inclined), one could call oneself Elen of the Green Hills. Or Two-Stars of the Green Hills, but that would be just too assimilationist.

This got long and has been languishing in my drafts for months, so you'll have to hear about Sûl's name another day.

[ray-the-ginger-queen]

(Original) De Rolo Family headcanons

(disclaimer: I’m basing the ages/birth order on tlovm. I realize particularly for Cass they got switched around from Critical Role)

Julius is, at first glance, everything you would expect from the first born of a noble family. He’s charming, athletic, and speaks with all the Confidence of a leader and eloquence of a Noble. He’s physically imposing to boot, already tall and stocky as a teenager and 6’3 by the time he’s a man. His family knows him for his rebellious streak though. He sneaks out at night to meet up with local girls, loves to irritate his younger siblings, and tends to be a bit of a hothead. Loves his family and his parents but is sometimes resentful of the freedom his younger siblings get without the burden of rulership.

Vesper, born 3 years after Julius. Typically regarded as the quiet one of the bunch. She gets some of the same lessons on rulership and duty as Julius, and she understands that likely she’ll still have a leadership role in Whitestone. But she’s not as weighed down by it as Julius. She likes to read and paint and garden. She’s very good at conducting herself in formal spaces, so much so you almost wouldn’t notice the insecurity and anxious tendencies her family is so familiar with. She’s still the calmest of them all and as such is often the one to settle disputes between her younger siblings.

Percy, born 2 years after Vesper. He’s the first to really be distant from the future of running Whitestone. He devotes his time to tinkering and science instead. Tends to be a little shy and awkward, although not quite as much as Vesper but he’s not as skilled at hiding it. He’s still snarky and mischievous, especially when Archie is around. Other than Archie he tends to spend the most time with Vesper or on his own. He gets annoyed the fastest, although he does enjoy making toys or other small gadgets for his family. His family has come to expect his very particular interests- clocks, or the feywilds, even teaching himself Celestial.

Cassandra, born 3 years after Percy. She’s loud and rambunctious and full of antics. She’s not as good at all the formalities of nobility but much more naturally confident than Percy or Vesper. Loves to explore the castle and play tag or hide and seek with her younger siblings. Despite the age difference, she and Julius have a special bond due to their similar personalities.

Whitney and Oliver, born 1 1/2 years after Cassandra. Known by their family as the terrible two. They get into trouble constantly. Tracking mud inside, getting into sweets, breaking fragile decor, etc. they’re seemingly always either in cahoots or bickering. Also very active, they play with Cassandra a lot.

Ludwig, born 4 1/2 years after the twins. An accidental but not unwelcome surprise addition to the family. He’s shy around new people, but a chatterbox and a goofball around people he knows. Doesn’t like being alone and will often sleep in one of his siblings or parents room as opposed to his own.

[maiega]

Understanding Arabic Cases الإعراب

Arabic grammar is rich and complex, and one of its defining features is the system of Arabic cases الإعراب. This system is essential for understanding how words interact in sentences, determining their roles, and maintaining clarity in meaning. Unlike English, where word order often dictates grammatical roles, Arabic relies heavily on changes in word endings to signal these functions.

What Are Arabic Cases الإعراب?

In Arabic, الإعراب refers to the grammatical case endings of nouns, adjectives, and sometimes verbs. These endings indicate a word’s syntactic role, such as whether it is the subject, object, or part of a prepositional phrase. The concept might seem daunting at first, but it plays a critical role in maintaining Arabic's flexibility and poetic elegance.

The system has three primary cases:

Nominative (مرفوع): Typically used for subjects and predicates.

Accusative (منصوب): Often marks direct objects or complements.

Genitive (مجرور): Associated with possession or when following a preposition.

How Do Case Endings Work?

Case endings appear as vowel marks at the ends of words, known as "harakat" (حركات). For instance:

In the nominative case, the word "kitab" (book) would end with a "dhamma" (ـُ): كتابُ

In the accusative case, it would take a "fatha" (ـَ): كتابَ

In the genitive case, it would have a "kasra" (ـِ): كتابِ

If the noun is definite (preceded by "al-" (الـ), the endings remain consistent with the case. However, when the noun is indefinite, a "tanween" (double vowel mark) is added, creating subtle distinctions.

Why Are Arabic Cases الإعراب Important?

Imagine trying to read a sentence in Arabic without knowing which word is the subject or object. Without الإعراب, meaning can become ambiguous, especially in complex sentences. For example:

كتبَ محمدٌ الرسالةَ

محمدُ كتبَ الرسالةَ

Both sentences involve "Muhammad" and "the letter," but switching the case endings shifts the meaning dramatically. In the first, "Muhammad" is the subject writing the letter, while in the second, he becomes the object being written about.

Common Scenarios for Each Case

Nominative Case (مرفوع):

Used for subjects: الطالبُ يدرسُ (The student studies).

For predicates: الجوُّ جميلٌ (The weather is beautiful).

Accusative Case (منصوب):

For direct objects: قرأتُ الكتابَ (I read the book).

After certain particles: لن أذهبَ (I will not go).

Genitive Case (مجرور):

After prepositions: في البيتِ (In the house).

To indicate possession: كتابُ المعلمِ (The teacher’s book).

Tips for Mastering Arabic Cases الإعراب

Read Aloud: Pay attention to case endings in Quranic verses or classical Arabic poetry, where الإعراب is pronounced explicitly.

Practice with Simple Sentences: Start with basic examples like “The boy wrote the book” and explore how the cases apply to different words.

Listen to Native Speakers: Formal settings like news broadcasts or lectures often highlight correct الإعراب.

Final Thoughts

While the idea of mastering Arabic cases الإعراب might seem overwhelming at first, understanding these grammatical details will deepen your connection to the language. Over time, recognizing and applying case endings becomes second nature, allowing you to appreciate Arabic’s richness and precision in its full glory. Whether you’re reading classical texts or composing sentences, this foundation is indispensable for clarity and eloquence.

[botanicadens]

 {OC template}

  [By- @thanathecreator ]

//This is so long but I have no regrets

               •Basic Information•

🔴Name- Wruth Edgar Den

🔴Age- 187 (October 13, 1837)

🔴Sexuality- Gay

🔴Gender- Cis Man

🔴Species- Human (Sorta Undead)

🔴From a Fandom?- DCU (Primarily Vertigo Comics)

🔴Zodiac sign- Libra

  •Physical appearance and traits •

🟠Hair color- Black

🟠Hair type and length- Shoulder Length, Wavy

🟠Eye color- Originally Blue, now a pale blue-gray

🟠Skin tone- Very Pale, Pallid

🟠Face shape- Sharp, Angular

🟠Body type- Thin, Practically a twig, Almost Malnourished Appearing, Almost Skeletal

🟠Scars- Surprisingly No

🟠Predominant features- High Cheekbones, Bluish tint to his lips, lack of color on his skin

🟠Height- 6’1”

🟠Dominant hand- Right Handed

🟠Hair Style- Scraggly, Slightly Unkempt

🟠Jewelry/ Accessories- Red Ascot (Fancy little bastard)

🟠Are they healthy or not? Reason why- Can an undead man be Healthy? No.

🟠Allergies- Not Really an Allergy but hates the smell of Lavender (Same dude)

🟠Glasses?- Yep, Square Framed Ones

🟠What do they wear when they are home alone?- Loose fitting shirt, Wide flared pants. He keeps fancy even in private.

🟠Tattoos- Does the sigil on his hand count? Kinda a scar, Kinda a tattoo.

                  •Mannerisms•

🟡Speech Style- Eloquent, Formal, British

🟡Quirks- Eccentric as hell, Only wears vintage clothing, Bounces his legs while sitting, Drinks tea religiously.

🟡Positive traits- Sly, Smart, Savvy, Articulate, Organized, Focused, Persuasive, Witty

🟡Negative traits- Misanthropic, Snarky, Cynical, Calculating, Fatalistic, Grim, Often Insincere

🟡Drives/Motivation- Wants to protect people from making stupid deals with demons, protect people from demons in general.

🟡Sense of Humor- Deadpan/Dry Humor

🟡Private or Public?- Very Private

🟡Leader or Follower?- Follower

🟡Daredevil or cautious?- Cautious

🟡Optimistic/ Pessimistic/ realistic?- Pessimistic

🟡Speaker or Listener?- Listener but can very well be a speaker.

🟡Accent- British (Point and Laugh at him)

🟡Voice Claims- Prince Lotor from Voltron Legendary Defenders (A.J. LoCascio)

🟡Theme Song(s)- 9 to 5 (Dolly Parton), No Children (The Mountain Goats), Under My Skin (Jukebox the Ghost)

🟡Temperament- Melancholic

🟡Talents- Can read books fairly fast, a great organizer, amazing at remembering

🟡Flaws- Perfectionist, A little too nosy, Cynical and Misanthropic

🟡Loud or quiet?- Quiet

🟡messy or organized?- Organized

🟡solo or team player?- Solo

🟡introvert or extrovert?- Ambivert

🟡relaxed or serious?- Serious with Work, Relaxed around Friends

🟡What will always make them cry?- Cats. He will cry if he sees them hurt even if it's minor.

🟡Do they celebrate their birthday?- He hasn't celebrated one since he turned 22. He finds them awkward nowadays.

🟡What will make them Smile?- Once again Cats. He loves them so much, it's the easiest way to make him smile. Making him Tea or asking about historical texts will also make him happy and get him to smile.

                  •Background•

🟢Hometown- Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England

🟢Social Class- Middle almost Lower Class

🟢Education- Man was born in the 1800s to an almost lower class family. He has no formal education

🟢First memory- ~3, Seeing his baby brother for the first time.

🟢Worst memory- 22, Sitting in his bed for days on end and barely being able to sit up to see his mother.

🟢Best memory- ~8, Helping his elder brother and mother cook. It reminds him of a simpler time in his life.

🟢Most important childhood event, why?- His older brother taking a young him through the forest and teaching him about different plants. It inspired Wruth’s love of plants and knowledge on different herbs and plants.

🟢Most influenced by- His Mother, Clara. He loved her with all his heart.

🟢Role models- His mother and Elder brother, Felix

🟢Where does the character live? And with who if they live with someone- He lives above his shop Botánica Den’s in London. He only lives with his pet cat Bastet.

🟢Do they want to move and where?- If he had to move, He'd probably go to live in Los Angeles, but he’s happy living in London

🟢Type of childhood- Decent, he definitely has some issues because of it, But it was mostly good.

🟢Upbringing- It was a long time ago so things have definitely changed in regards to parenting in modern day. His father was never really involved in his upbringing, it was entirely his brother and mother. He eventually was also expected to care for his younger brother too. He and his brothers were allowed to do almost anything and get away scot free.

🟢Best Qualification- Organization. He’s a little psycho about being organized,

🟢Most important person in their life and why?- His Mother or his younger brother, Alexander. He loves Felix, but he could handle himself. He’d protect Clara or Alexander with his life.

🟢House environment- His home is perfect for him. Tons of books, Places to lounge, He even has a small indoor garden.

🟢Childhood crush- His childhood friend, Percival. He lived a little ways away, but they'd often run off into the woods for the entire day just to hang out.

                        •Family•

🔵Mother- Clara Den, an absolute saint in his eyes. She loved him and cared for him dearly.

🔵Father- Robert Den, they had a strained relationship. Wruth didn’t see him often as his dad wasn’t very involved in raising him or his siblings.

🔵Siblings- His elder brother Felix and his younger brother Alexander. He cared for both of them and helped raise Alexander. He wished he was there longer for them.

🔵Relationship with family?- He tries to visit their graves at least once a year to bring flowers. He also speaks to the graves to tell them what he’d done since last visiting. He hopes they can hear what he’s saying.

🔵Any children? Do they want any?- Can he even have kids? Idk, but no. He doesn’t want them nor have any.

🔵Pets- His skeletal cat, Bastet

🔵Extended Family- He doesn’t know if any descendants of his family exist. He'd be scared to interact with them if he did find any.

🔵Close to family?- Was close to his brothers and mother, not very close to his father.

   •Favorites and Least Favorites•

🟣Favorite Movie- M (A 1931 Black and White Thriller)

🟣Least Favorite Movie- Literally any Twilight Movie (He watched one on accident and hated it.)

🟣Favorite Book- House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

🟣Least Favorite Book- Not a specific book, but Romance books in general. (They’re just not his cup of tea

🟣Favorite Holiday- Halloween! He can go outside and be perceived as completely normal. People even compliment him on the day for how dead he looks.

🟣Least Favorite Holiday- Christmas. It's not bad in his opinion, just awkward for a man who was born right before it started being commercialized.

🟣Favorite Mythological creature- Vampires. In his experience they’re the least awful to deal with. They’re actually fairly chill (Probably because this man’s blood hasn’t been flowing since the 1860s)

🟣Least Favorite Mythological creature- Demons. Period. He wants to throw himself off the tallest building he can find after dealing with one.

              •Abilities and Bias’•

⚪️Affiliation- None. He works for himself, by himself.

⚪️Powers- Think of Rui from Demon Slayer. He can use string to cut people but he can also use it to control others like puppets. He also can’t die, but can still be injured and feel pain.

⚪️Powers limitations- It takes a lot of energy to control others and it can leave him incredibly exhausted.

⚪️Weaknesses- Physically Weak as hell. Bones would probably shatter if he tried to punch someone. He can feel his bones shifting back into place and healing when he’s injured. He feels all the pain associated with it and it can be brutal.

⚪️Allies- Most Magical People.

⚪️How well known are they?- Only really known with Magical Circles, he’s happy with it though.

⚪️Weapons- He only uses magic. (He’s a wet noodle, give him a break :[)

⚪️ Gadgets/ tech- He hates most modern technology. He only just got a smartphone. He still has his old antique phone too though.

⚪️Physical Weaknesses- Wet Noodle. He is skinny and weak. You could probably break his back by hugging him too hard.

⚪️Fears- Nosophobia (Illness/Disease), Autophobia (Alone/Abandoned)

⚪️Why do they do what they do?- He feels that if he doesn’t work, then him being alive for so long is pointless. He’s trying to outweigh his bad by his good.

⚪️Mental/Emotional weaknesses- His thoughts sometimes drown him. He lives with a lot of regrets so bringing any of them up is an emotional gut punch.

⚪️Rivals- Himself lmao

⚪️Romantic interest? Who if yes- Nope, Not yet!

                 •Miscellaneous•

⚫️If I could put them in a different universe or Fandom, which one?- Supernatural or Marvel.

⚫️What was there first kiss like? Have they have it yet?- It was with his childhood friend and crush. They were both teens and it was super awkward. He was nervous then, but looks back on it fondly.

⚫️Have they ever lost somebody they loved and who was it? How did it impact them?- His entire family and his childhood friend are dead. He isn’t surprised by death anymore but it still stings when it happens.

⚫️What would happen if they were granted 3 wishes?- 1) Reverse time back to when he was 22 2) Wish his family be happy and live long lives 3) Money for his family (He's so innocent about this OMG)

⚫️what quote do they feel portrays them?- “Why this is hell, nor am I out of it. Think'st thou that I, who saw the face of God and tasted the eternal joy of heaven, am not tormented with ten thousand hells in being deprived of everlasting bliss?” - Mephistopheles

⚫️Most prized possession and why is it prized?- A painting of his family that’s hidden away in his storage room. It’s one of the few things he has from his childhood and while he doesn’t enjoy looking at it constantly, it's still important to him.

⚫️Have they ever stolen anything? We’re they caught? Do they feel guilty or prideful?- He’s stolen before (probably when he was still mortal).He doesn't go out much anymore though, and doesn’t really need anything. Besides, he owns his own shop, he definitely has at least some money. He’d been caught a few times and always acted super guilty about it, but internally he was more annoyed at being caught or guilty.

⚫️What textures do they absolutely hate to feel?- Velvet. He physically recoils after touching it. It's a personal Hell for him.

⚫️How long can they go without showering? When do they feel dirty?- There’s always a slight smell of death on him, regardless of how much he showers. He does shower fairly consistently though, just for a sense of normality and routine for him.

⚫️Where do they put there clothes when there dirty?- He’s a bit of a neatfreak so they get folded and placed in a pile for cleaning.

⚫️Do they sleep with the bedroom door open or closed and why?- Closed. Always closed. He does not trust sleeping with his door open. (So real for that)

⚫️If they woke up with animalistic features such as ears and a tail( that were different from the ones they already had if they had any at all)how would they react?- Concern, first and foremost. After the shock wears off, he’d dive into research and try to figure out how it happened and how to reverse it.

⚫️If they could only eat one thing for 20 days, what would they eat?- Does Tea count? He doesn’t really eat, so tea would be his preferable option. Maybe macaroons or cinnamon cake if he had to pick an actual food.

⚫️do they re read books they already have?- Constantly, he’s the type to annotate his books in the margins, even during rereads. 

⚫️if they had the option to know when they would die, exact date, would they want to know or would they want to stay oblivious to it?- I mean, he already knows the answer. December 21, 1859.

⚫️What song would they listen to on repeat?- Piano Sonata No. 8 in C minor, Op 13 ("Pathétique"), 3rd Movement, Rondo: Allegro (He’s a classical music fan)

⚫️Do they believe in a form of a afterlife?- I mean, he’s dealt with demons before, so yeah.

⚫️Do they crack their joints?- He constantly cracks them, knuckles, elbows, neck, all of it.

⚫️Spicy, Savory, Sweet, Bitter, or Sour?- Bitter and Sweet. He likes bitter teas, but loves sweet foods to go along with it.

⚫️Do they adopt stray animals?- He doesn’t adopt any but if he finds an injured stray, he’ll take care of them before letting them go.

⚫️Do they procrastinate or do they get it done asap?- Depends on the thing. He procrastinates with social things but if it's solo he gets it done as soon as possible.

⚫️What is the temperature when they shower? Hot. Any normal person would probably be burnt because of it, but Wruth likes it (It’s a rare time when his body isn’t ice cold)

⚫️Do they daydream?- He isn’t the type to daydream, he prefers thinking about the present (or maybe the past)

⚫️ do they work best in messy or clean environment?- Clean Environment

⚫️ do they keep personal photos? Why?- Nope. He’s a tad insecure about his body and doesn’t enjoy being reminded of it. (He thinks worse of himself than he actually is.)

⚫️Do they indulge in anything?- Tea, once again. He’s an addict.

⚫️ would they do the exact opposite that someone says to them just to spite them?- Yes. cough cough His Benefactor cough cough

⚫️ if they’re alone and they hear a noise would they go check it out or would they hide? Why?- He can’t really die so he'd investigate it. (He also knows enough people who’d probably break through his window if they really needed help)

⚫️ if they’re lost what is the first thing they do?- Panic. Panic first, then think.

⚫️ what is a dream they had that was terrifying and made no sense too them? Any dream about his Benefactor scares him. (He won’t admit it, but it absolutely does)

⚫️ what is the stupidest thing they have ever done because someone said not to do it?- He once threw a book into his fireplace to spite a certain someone. (Once again, his benefactor.)

⚫️ are they stoic or melodramatic about being injured?- The only real problem about being injured for him is the pain. He’s melodramatic about the pain (he likes screwing with people about it) but relatively stoic about the injury itself.

————————————————————

Short run down of their storyline-

When Wruth was 21, he contracted an illness and became deathly ill. Slowly, he barely became able to get out of bed or even walk. During the time, he spent every waking moment he had researching a way to heal himself with little luck. He eventually found books involving the supernatural during his studying.

So uhhh, the dumbass decided to summon a demon. (He was desperate, sound judgment isn’t made when desperate). The demon told him it would “cure” him in return for his loyalty. In his naïvete, he accepted. The problem was that the demon sort of lied about the deal. The demon’s idea of a cure was keeping Wruth trapped in time making it so he could never die and permanently remain loyal to him. If Wruth were to break his deal, he would proceed to become untrapped in time and shortly after die due to his illness (His illness was never cured, just paused)

He started his shop to help out others who deal with the supernatural (and possibly prevent others from making the same mistake he did) He sees it as a redemption from the things he’s done under his benefactor’s (as he calls him) orders. He’s still under contract and occasionally is forced to provide his end to the deal as ordered. Wruth hates that part of his life and tries to keep it as underwraps as possible. (He’ll deny its existence if ever brought up. You’d have to fight him to admit it.)

[m00nj3w3l]

Felt like coming back to this ask cus I felt like giving an actual answer (also thanks I appreciate you being genuinely curious about it even if you aren't super into Clear as I am). The megapost will, most likely, not even exist atp because I feel like I wouldn't say anything new in regards to his character that hasn't been touched on already by other fans in 13 years of the game being around and I'm busy irl, so I feel like I should dive more into why I myself latched onto Clear so hard.

Granted this will be a VERY long and personal (as in I do deep dive into my mental health) word salad that was way more eloquent in my head but you know how it is. Many beautiful thoughts and the second you voice them you're just saying things lmao. I'll keep it under the cut to not make a wall of text and you'll be free to read it whenever you want really.

To me, Clear's arc is all about acceptance: coming to terms with your past and what you are, and obviously this spoke to me as an autistic girl with not the brightest of pasts.

I spent a long, long time being uncomfortable with myself: I'd spend entire days crying about how much I hated myself and how I wished I could become someone else entirely. Even if my conscience was the same, the thought of having a new body that didn't look like me at least seemed comforting in the sense of "I could start again". That, or planning to kill myself. I have been suicidal ever since I can remember, but the start of 2024 was particularly bad. I was telling myself that if things didn't get better I would have committed by the end of the year.

Then in May 2024 I got into DMMD and, believe it or not, it fucking helped me cope.

I actually didn't like Clear at first!!! I was dead set on Koujaku as well (still love him my pathetic wet cat of a man) and my first thought of Clear was "God he's so annoying what the hell." And then. And then I played this route and idk, something about how he's constantly reminiscing of the times with his Grandpa, how scared he is of being vulnerable even with the person he chose to follow by not showing his face if not after like, ~2 hours into his route, how; like the post I reblogged some days ago says; he's treated like a trophy child by Toue who both violently rejects him AND obsesses over him by making insane amount of copies of him both in physical aspects and in concept (the mind control is basically an all encompassing subplot of DMMD as a whole), and how despite being mistreated time and time again by life itself he fucking chooses to be happy. Idk, it got to me, y'know? (Plus, which is kinda minor admist all these aspects to me, but felt like mentioning: having an heavily autistic coded character in an eroge who downright expresses his desire for sex is really nice, given how often we as autistic people are deemed as sexless beings and that often reflects in fiction too)

There's this one detail that I actually planned to point out sooner or later, but have you noticed that his way of speaking in RE:connect is way different than in the main game? I mean, he's still extremely formal and uses honorifics on Aoba even if the nature of their relationship could allow him to drop that, but he's not as high pitched and shrill as he is as we first meet him. Even as he gets excited ("Ren-san, such a long time no see!!" "Did you like the mirror???") he screams a lot less. Hell if anything his voice even gets a bit deeper!! That is also when the mask has been long dropped and at this point we, and him, know what he's like. He doesn't have to prove anything to anyone anymore, he doesn't need to scream and be loud to be listened to, he's comfortable with himself to the point of even poking fun at Aoba and showing him a part of his past that no one would've seen otherwise.

The fact that he refuses to be put in an Alpha body when he malfunctions again in his Drama CD; as tragic as it is that him and Aoba have a time limit on their time as a couple; to me is also a sign of this: it's ok if my body isn't perfect, if I myself am not at my core, I don't have to be. I'm done trying to be. I'll just be myself and whatever comes my way will be dealt with.

Idk how to properly word why all of this spoke to me, but it did: maybe also cause I am extremely loud irl, am very bad at masking, and as I mentioned some other time, a lot of Clear's character reminds me of myself when I was younger (which, sometimes, is kinda painful, but that's how deeply he speaks to me). Idk, there's a lot of things, y'know.

To add onto this I'm gonna add a fun fact:

My real name obviously isn't Moon (although I do sometimes tell people irl I use that, but it's kinda more like an artist name I chose for myself). Actually, my real name means the same thing as Clear's: if you'd translate it, he'd have the masculine version of my name; and that one scene in RE:connect where Aoba is like "your heart is like glass, you're always earnest and giving it your all, which is why I think he named you Clear" reminded me a lot of something my mom told me when I was a kid: that people would come up to her to praise her for the choice because I was a very honest and open child, which is why my name suits me. And God if that didn't make me cry, lol. I spent a long time hating it because of the negative connotations I felt like I had with it, but finding a character that I love that is so similar to me and has the same name as me really helps, y'know?

It's. Definitely veeery silly to be this viscerally attached to a character from Cursed Gay Sex Game, and maybe in a couple years I'll find another one who speaks to me just as much, but yeah. This is how I feel rn, so I guess there's little I can do about it, lol.

psst you should ramble about Clear and how cool and interesting you think he is in great detail

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not since talking about him in great detail is my whole shtick and it makes me extremely predictable but LOOK MAN I HAD FUCKING NOTES WRITTEN DOWN TO LOOK AT WHEN I PLANNED TO MAKE THAT FUCKASS BIG POST I TALKED ABOUT BUT Iiiii am not so sure anymore :( I love making analysis posts and stuff but uaaaah I feel like I'd spam the tag and annoy everyone thumbs up emoji

[gothicgaycowboy]

yuck

Word count: 4.4k 

Summary: Eddie agrees to entering a purely physical relationship with his long time crush you. The is is how you liked it, no connections, no romance, no strings. But what if Eddie was different?

Warnings: 18+ no minors, smut, fingering, afab reader, angst, talks of parents with marital issues, drug use, swearing, fluff, unrequited pinning, dual pov. 

A/N: this is my first time actually posting my writing so please be gentle and feel free to let me know of any mistakes I might have missed! Happy reading! (P.S. this whole fic and title was inspired by Yuck by Charli XCX) 

Eddie had a crush on you since the first moment he met you, so when you asked him oh so eloquently; “Wanna fuck?” how could he refuse?

You had built up quite the reputation since freshman year at Hawkins High. Some called you a slut but Eddie didn’t see it that way, he preferred the term “relationship picky”. It wasn’t like you put out for any guy that asked, you just weren't a fan of formal romantics. He knew what he was getting into from the beginning. You had laid down the ground rules pretty plainly: no non-sexual pet names, no after sex cuddling, and most importantly no kissing on the mouth. It hurt him deep down knowing that his feelings for you meant little because of this, but whatever attention he could get from you he would gladly take.

“Fuck,” you moaned as you succumbed to the pleasure Eddie was giving you.

He could feel your hot breath against his neck as you pulled his long locks. The sound of his now erratic thrusts overtook the room. He was so close.

“Please Eddie,” your voice hoarse from overuse.

“Whaddaya want sweetheart?” his hands grabbing your hips harder pulling you impossibly close.

This was the fifth time you had invited Eddie over to hook up– not that he was counting or anything. If he was lucky enough sometimes you would let him hangout afterwards. You guys would smoke, or watch a movie on opposite ends of the couch, and sometimes you would just talk. Don’t get him wrong, he really really liked the sex but sometimes he just wanted to be around you. Jesus he sounds like such a pussy.

“Come for me, please,” you gasped, your chest pressed so close to his he felt like he was crushing you.

“Shit,” he groaned, that was all it took for him to break, giving you one last thrust before finishing into the condom.

He leaned his head forward, collapsing into the pillow behind you trying to catch his breath. No matter if you let him stay around for a while or not this was a moment he always counted on. Where you were both so exhausted it allowed for some of your outer layers to shed away. So caught up on remembering how to adjust you allowed him to surround you. He could rest his head into the crook of your neck, or you would fall into his tattooed chest. And for just a few meaningless seconds he forgot what this agreement was.

You ran your hands down the sides of his torso. God he was so much broader than you remembered him being. Would this count as cuddling? You quickly let your hands fall back onto the mattress. Can't take any chances.

You had chosen Eddie as one of your “victims”--as you heard your peers so lovingly call them– because he was quiet about personal shit. When he wasn't walking on cafeteria tables or loudly imitating the sounds of a guitar, he was surprisingly normal, if that was even the right word for Eddie. And quite frankly you were tired of hearing the details of your latest fuck spread around school like a wildfire. Plus he was hot, obviously.

“You know you fucked up this time right?” you tried to sound self assured despite your still heavy breathing.

Every muscle in Eddie's body froze. Shit, he didn’t remember doing anything out of the ordinary. “Hey, I’m pretty sure you came unless you're faking it now.” he joked as he lowered his face to look down at you. “Which I would be deeply wounded by,” Eddie forced a faux dramatic frown on his face despite his internal panic. Did he kiss you and not remember? No, he definitely would have remembered that.

“No,” You pushed yourself up on your elbows, moving Eddie off you and forcing him to pull out. You winced at the feeling. He made quick work of removing the condom and tossing it into the small garbage can. Almost running back to your bed so you could finish your sentence.

“You called me sweetheart, that falls under non-sexual pet names,” your voice was calm as you corrected him like a small child.

“Oh… sorry, force of habit I guess,” The only other person Eddie had sex with was an ex girlfriend who broke up with him once it was clear he wasn’t gonna graduate the first time around. He was never the type for a one night stand.

“It’s fine, just don’t let it happen again.” you patted his thigh before moving past him to search the room for your clothes.

Eddie started to cover himself with your sheets, suddenly very aware of his nakedness. “Promise,” he said, it was barely a whisper. He pretended to be preoccupied with his rings so you wouldn’t notice him watching you get dressed out of the corner of his eyeline.

You pulled your shirt over your head with a sigh, moving your hair from blocking your vision. Turning to sit in front of your bedroom mirror you picked at the small details of your face. This was routine since your mother pointed out your disheveled looks after your first get together with Eddie. Smudged mascara? Check. Out of control hair? Check. Hickies covering your neck? Check. He made you feel out of control sometimes and you were still unsure if you liked it or not.

Noticing Eddie hadn’t moved in a while you spoke up, “You wanna get dressed Eddie?”

“Oh yeah, right sorry,” he said like he was just shaken out of a deep sleep. So he wasn’t allowed to hang around this time, that was fine with him.

He dressed as swiftly as possible as you watched from the view in your mirror.

Once he put on his jean vest he found himself unsure of what to do. This wasn’t the first time he had to leave after you guys hooked up but it was always a challenge. He never knew what you wanted him to do after. Did you want him to say goodbye, just leave? One time he gave you what must have been the world's most awkward handshake.

You turned to look in his direction after fixing your appearance.

“Well…” he rocked back and forth on the heels of his boots, swinging his hand into each other. “Always a pleasure.”  “Always a pleasure”!? What was wrong with him?

You awkwardly rubbed your lips together as you slowly nodded your head. Why did you have to pick this poor boy? “Yep.”

He made his way towards your window, giving you a small wave before disappearing from your view. You couldn’t contain the small smile from creeping it way onto your face. As you looked back towards yourself in the vanity your expression dropped. This wasn’t happening.

–

Besides the occasional call he received from you, Eddie's day-to-day life didn't really change.

If he decided to, he would show up to school, work on a new campaign for the Hellfire Club, deal to his usual list of clients, go home, play guitar ‘til someone made a noise complaint and smoke.

You wouldn’t acknowledge his existence at school, which he didn’t take personally. He knew you didn’t think you were too good to be seen around him, you weren’t that type of person. You were just acutely aware that people talked, and you hoped Eddie wouldn’t end up on your seemingly endless list of rumoured hookups. Eddie hadn’t told anyone about what you guys were doing besides his diary– which no one will ever find out about– he hated those types of guys.

The ones who felt it necessary to tell everyone within earshot of their latest conquest. Most of them were fucking lying to begin with. And they loved talking about how easy it was for them to get with whichever girl it was they were bragging about that day. Like they weren't as eager participants as the chick was in the whole thing. It was bullshit.

Eddie knew that being with you was a privilege and he looked forward to every call.

He walked into the cafeteria with his usual carefree attitude looking for the rest of the Hellfire Club. While scanning the room he was surprised to find you sitting alone at a smaller table in the back of the cafeteria. You rarely ate lunch at school, usually walking to your friends house for the break. He then noticed the defeated expression on your face as you moved your food around with the plastic fork. Something was definitely wrong. He knew better than to go over to you, it would be suspicious that Eddie the freak who had never even been seen speaking to you was suddenly so concerned for your well being. But he wanted nothing more than to make sure you were okay.

Just when he was about to say screw it and walk over to you he heard Dustin calling his name across the room and turned in his direction.

“What are you doing?” Dustin asked with a confused look on his face.

Eddie turned back in your direction just to see you walking out of the cafeteria at a speed he had never seen you leave before.

Eddie moved his head slowly back in Dustin's direction, still keeping his eyes locked on your spot, “Nothing man, just looking for you.” He made his way to his usual group of friends thinking of you.

–

He spent the entirety of lunch worrying about you. Once he got to fourth period he noticed you were absent from chemistry. You never missed a day of class unless it was an emergency. As soon as the period break bell rang he grabbed his shit and ditched the rest of the day, he wouldn’t have been able to focus anyway. He didn’t remember how he ended up standing on the front steps of your house but he was sure to receive a speeding ticket for how fast he ended up here.

He frantically rang your doorbell ‘til you answered. Your eyes were glassy and red, like you'd been crying.

“Eddie, what the hell are you doing here? I didn’t call,”

“I know, it’s just I saw you run out of the cafeteria and you weren’t in chemistry so I just thought I would come check on you.” He tried his best to sound casual, looking down at his boots.

“Jesus Eddie, you're not my boyfriend ya know,” He didn’t need to be looking at you to tell you were pissed.

clearly his “casual” wasn’t working.

“I know,” as much as I want to be. “You just seemed so stressed and seeing as I’m kind of an expert in the art of destressing medicines, I came bearing gifts.” He got the courage to look back up at your face and he held out his special metal lunch box.

You let out a chuckle, a smile forming on your lips. “Now you're speaking my language Munson, get in here!” you pulled him through the front door by the collar of his jacket.

–

A lot of people didn’t know that weed could sometimes act like a truth serum for Eddie. In the haze of a high he tended to be bolder, he was by no means shy but put a girl he's had a crush on forever in front of him and a joint and oh boy, he’ll sing like a canary. So in this moment he finally had the guts to ask;

“Why do you hate relationships so much?”

You made eye contact with him, you definitely weren't expecting that question.

“When did you get so nosey Eddie?” you let the joint hang from your fingers.

“Come on, don't try to avoid the question,” he rolled his eyes. “I never questioned you before, in fact I admired your hatred towards relationships because I thought it was some feminist shit, But now I don’t think thats true.”

“Oh yeah?” you questioned, you never told anyone why you hated romance and you didn't think you ever would. But you're intrigued to see where this goes.

“Yeah, so tell me, what is it,” he spoke so plainly it shocked you. Eddie, the same guy who was too afraid to tell you what he wanted when you first started having sex– and now suddenly it’s like he’s asking for a piece of your soul. “And you know I won’t tell anyone so don’t make up excuses.”

You let out a dry laugh in surprise. It was as if Eddie had been suddenly replaced by this journalist looking for the scoop.

“Fine, you wanna know the truth?” you said defensively,  Eddie lifted his head with intrigue. “I think love and romance are all great made up scams to trick people into thinking it’s ok to use others for their own selfish needs.” you finished your rant off by taking a puff of the joint in your hand.

Eddie slumped back down and let out a noise of disbelief, “I don’t buy that for a second.”

“Oh come on Eddie you can’t be that naive!” You spoke with an annoyed tone while blowing the smoke from his joint out of your lungs, filling your bedroom.  “It’s just a fact of life that guys view relationships as a drag they have to deal with in order to get laid.” You extend your arm from your horizontal position and  pass the joint back to him, slouching back into the mattress. “I get the key benefit of a relationship without feeling like a burden and the guys obviously get what they wanted from the start, it's a win-win situation.” A cocky grin crept its way onto your face as you finished your little speech.

Eddie scoffed, “God you're such a pessimist.” The tip of the joint lit a bright orange as he inhaled with little effort.

“No, no, my dear boy I’m just saying what everyone is too afraid to admit.”

“Maybe you can speak for the other guys you’ve been with but I’m not like that.” he put the now nub of a joint out into an empty soda can. “When I’m with somebody it’s because I care about them and want to be around them no matter what that means– if it’s sex, hey great– but there’s so much more than that to a relationship.” he finally stopped to let the air fill his lungs again.

Your mouth had fallen open in the process of Eddie's raving. “Am I hearing this right? Is this a confession from Eddie Munson himself to being a romantic?”

You had known of Eddie's little crush on you since you started this whole arrangement–  but that's all you thought it was, just a simple crush. Maybe he had just been thinking about fucking you for a while and you answered his prayer by letting him, and that would be the end of that. You didn’t picture him as the hopelessly in love type.

“You know what, yeah, yeah I am.” he gracelessly stood up on your bed with dramatic flair. He put both hands to mimic a megaphone around his mouth. “I EDDIE MUNSON AM A PROUD ROMANTIC!” he shouted.

It might have been the large amount of weed you just smoked but you swear you have never laughed that hard before in your life.

“Alright cupid, get down before you fall on your ass,”

He sank to his knees back on your bed. “So, what do you say?” he asked with the biggest smile you’ve ever seen.

“To what?” you responded confused, moving back into an upright position.

“Can I romance you?” he begged, giving you his best puppy dog eyes. “I’m not asking you to fall madly in love with me, but I just have this compulsive need to prove you wrong about your very depressing theory.”

“You can try I guess, but I’m telling you it’s not gonna work.” you told him with a look of sympathy.

We’ll see about that,” you could tell by the look on his face he was already cooking up what was bound to be a terrible scheme.

Leaning your head to flop back into the pillows you already found yourself questioning: Why did I agree to this?

–

“Eddie, where the hell are you taking me?” you frustratedly sigh, Eddie woke you up in the middle of a school night, almost shoved you into his van, just to have you walk for the past five minutes blindfolded, guided by Eddie’s hand on your lower back.

“Just a few more steps I promise,” you could practically hear the smirk on his face.

Eddie moved behind you to untie the blindfold– he’d been giddy ever since the moment you let him put it on you. He tried not to get his hopes up, but he had already put you through many “trials” (or “dates'' as normal people often referred to them) and he had noticed slight changes in your demeanor. At first you would spend the majority of your “dates” making fun of them; “wow a movie date, how original Munson”, “Flowers? You spent your hard earned drug money on something that's gonna die in a week?”, “I’m surprised they even let us into this restaurant” etc. You still made those jokes but far less now, and in the moments where you thought he wasn’t watching you he could see a faint smile on your face.

But most importantly to Eddie, you opened up to him in these moments, he learned the reason you gave up on love in the first place was watching your parents marriage turn into what it is today. “I haven't seen them kiss since I was six years old, but at least now they’re finally admitting to each other what they were in this for from the start right?” “They don’t even fucking talk to each other anymore unless it’s about money problems.”

“So, what do you think?” Eddie was clearly filled with anticipation for your response.

“Oh my god,” that was all you could say, taking in the sight in front of you.

Eddie had set up a candlelit picnic at his usual dealing bench. White candles lined the rotting wood of the table and a small pile of pillows and blankets littered the ground– with a picnic basket in the middle of course.

“Eddie it’s so…” beautiful thank you is what you should have said. You just couldn’t bring yourself to give in like that Eddie is just trying to prove a point, you of all people should know deep down all guys are the same. “Cheesey.” you forced out a laugh to make the insult more genuine.

There was a long pause of silence.

Eddie cleared his throat. “Yeah you’re right this was a dumb idea,” he came up from behind you and started blowing out one of the many candles.

“Wait Eddie I’m sorry,” you muttered in apology, seeing the saddened look on his face as he passed you.

“No, you are right.” he turned quickly to look at you, you could see tears pooling in his big brown eyes.

“Always are,” he got progressively louder. “I thought since you chose me it was some sort of sign ya know? That maybe my stupid feelings for you ment something, and maybe I wasn’t just gonna sit around pinning you you like the loser that I am, but hey you proved me wrong, you win right?”

At this point you could now feel the tears building up in your own eyes as your vision became blurred.

“Eddie no, pleas–  just listen to me… I’m scared alright,” you admitted. Eddie's eyes had a hard time meeting yours right now. “I didn’t want to be in relationships not because of some big philosophical ideology, but because I was afraid of being unlovable.” you could feel the tightness in your throat start to grow.

You’re unsure of what sudden confidence overtook you but you gently grabbed Eddie's face, making him look at you. “And when I’m with you I don’t feel that way and it terrifies me that when you inevitably leave me I’m gonna end up feeling that way all over again.” you were crying at this point.

“Who said I would ever leave you?” You could feel the cool of his metal rings across your face as caressed away your tears.

“Eddie it’s not logical to think whatever we have going on here is gonna last forever,” you sniffled.

“And we would never know that unless you just give this a chance.” Eddie’s hands extended dramatically to your surroundings. “If you give me the chance to show you how much I care about you, I swear I will not let you regret it for a moment.” you could feel the gentle touch of his hands make their way onto the curve of your waist. “Please,” he wished.

The words were sitting on the tip of your tongue but they just refused to come out.

“Can I at least kiss you goodbye?” Eddie knew you hadn’t had your first kiss yet. Too afraid to give it to the wrong guy. “I don’t want to have my first kiss with somebody who just thinks of me as a hookup”

You nodded, still finding yourself unable to speak.

Eddie slowly brought his thumb up over your bottom lip, delicately brushing against it like a flower petal before leaning in. The kiss is soft and slow, nothing like you would have usually suspected from Eddie. You felt yourself falling into it as if you had done it before. Everything with Eddie was so natural and you couldn’t explain why. As you were about to pull him closer he broke away.

You had yet to open your eyes when you spoke. “Stay,” it was so quiet you're sure he didn’t hear you.

“What?”

“I said stay, please I want thi–” you were cut off by Eddie pulling you back up to his lips. God finally he thought.

You both clumsily made your way onto the blanket pile on the forest floor, kicking off your shoes as you went.

Eddie had fucked you many times but he knew this time was going to be different, he neede it to be perfect. You had laid down first, grabbing Eddie’s shirt collar and bringing him down with you. He smiled against your lips.

“Do you know how long I’ve been waiting for you to say that, sweetheart?” hsi hips began moving against yours, he could feel the heat of you over your sleep shorts.

“Fuck,” you gasped at the sensation of his tight jeans over your clothed clit.

“You like that baby?” he teased, grasping your cheeks between his fingers to look at you.

“Eddie please don– mmm, tease,”

He didn’t need you to tell him again. Letting go of your face he reached down to the waistband of your shorts pulling them down along with your panties. You shivered as the cold night air hit you.

“Aw, princess, you get this wet just from a couple kisses?” he giggled, running the tips of his fingers through your folds. You had lost control of your movement, rocking against his hand with a vigorous pace.

You tried to hold back your moans but god he had to make everything so difficult for you. “I can’t help it,” did you always sound this pathetic with Eddie?

“I know baby, I know.” you didn’t even have the time to process his words before his thick fingers made their way inside you.

“Oh god, Eddie!” his lips came crashing down to yours, muffling your moans as his thumb made small circles over your clit. No matter how many times you’d done this you always forgot how good it felt the next time around. You would never tell him this out loud– he already had a bit of an ego, but this was another reason you had chosen Eddie as your newest hookup, guitar players always had a way with their fingers.

His ring and pointer finger making a curling motion inside you, you grabbed his arm digging your nails into his biceps. Your whines broke free as he removed his lips from yours coming up for air.

“You’re so beautiful,” he breathed, eyes glazed over like he was stoned.

“Keep saying stuff like that and this will be over before it even started,” your laugh cut off by another moan.

“You’re the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen in my entire life. I have never wanted anyone else the way I want you and I don’t think I ever will.” you could feel yourself getting closer. “And right now what I need more than anything is for you to come for me baby, please.” He babbled, his head snapped forward leaving soft open mouthed kisses across the space of your neck and jaw.

Jesus this boy was trying to kill you.

“Yes, yes Eddie, ‘mmgonna come.” you grabbed the back of his neck forcing his mouth back to yours.

Your orgasm hits you like a wave, rolling from your lower belly through the rest of your body. Eddie held you close to him, fingers helping you come down from you high.

“There you go sweetheart, such a good girl for me,” he spoke against your lips.

His fingers were still grazing across your over-sensitive clit. You tried clamping your thighs shut as you grabbed his hand to stop his movement.

“Hey, what's wrong?” he moved back quickly, clearly panicked by your actions.

“N-nothing,” you huffed through labored breaths. “Just sensitive, you did…really good.”

He smiled at that. “Have I ever disappointed you before?”

“You know you haven’t,”

He grabbed your discarded shorts pushing them back up your legs before moving to lay down beside you. What did you ever do to deserve someone like him? You clung to him, pusing your face into the Hellfire Club t-shirt he never seemed to take off.

Sitting in silence for what felt like hours, your mind wondered. What does this mean? Are we together officially now, or have I somehow disappointed him already? No, you’re just benign ridiculous, if he just wanted sex he wouln’t have gone through this whole stupid romancing in the first place.

“So, does this mean you wanna…” you could hear the heartbeat in his chest grow louder with anxiety.

“Be– ya know, my girlfriend or whatever,” his voice cracked with almost every word despite being well over the pubescent awkward voice phase.

“Eddie Munson,” you lifted yourself up with your elbow crawling on top of him. “It would be my honour to be your girlfriend or whatever.” you said through a smile, leaning down to kiss him.

What did he ever do to deserve someone like you?

[daniclaytcn]

hustling for the good life (never thought i’d meet you here)

Summary: “Erm,” Buck says eloquently and when the stranger’s lips twitch, he wonders if it’s possible to die of embarrassment. After a moment’s struggle, he manages to pull himself together and says, “Hi. I’m Buck.”

“Eddie,” the man replies, raking his gaze over Buck in a way that makes him feel ready to combust. “I don’t recall seeing you at the wedding. Are you on the bride’s side, or the groom’s?”

Shit.

or, a different first meeting, where buck accidentally crashes eddie's sister's wedding reception. just normal stuff.

(read on ao3)

thank you, @tawaifeddiediaz for all your help with this!

Buck slips through the glass doors separating the two party halls, stumbles through a throng of excited little ladies speaking rapid-fire Spanish and slumps against a wall in a dark corner, taking in a huge breath of relief.

He knows fully well that he should be back in the other hall, suffering through alongside Maddie, the fancy business event their parents had roped them into attending. After years of stony silence, of Buck going from one place to the next in a desperate attempt to find a home; of Maddie trapped in an abusive marriage; they’re both finally in a stable situation. Buck has settled down in LA for the past year and had just begun his time as a probationary firefighter with the LAFD when Maddie found him six months ago.

When she’d settled into her job as a dispatcher, it had been Maddie's idea to reach out to their parents. Buck had been reluctant at first, but after the ill-advised, fleeting high that was his relationship with Abby before she’d left him, he’d started to think that maybe it would be a good idea to mend some bridges, to at least try to have a relationship with their parents now.

Wrong.

Philip and Margaret Buckley had been in Texas on account of Philip’s work, and they’d invited Buck and Maddie to come directly to El Paso. Buck and Maddie had barely said hello to them in the hotel before they were asked to attend Philip’s event—no talk of the last ten years, no acknowledgement of how the Buckleys had essentially disowned their children. Buck wanted to tell Maddie that he told her so, but he wants to support her more than he wants to have the last word, so he bit his tongue and attended the party with her. And, it has been a trainwreck for the past hour—Philip’s smarmy colleagues turning up their noses at Buck being a firefighter and his lack of a college degree, Maddie’s pinched smile as their parents delicately danced around her abusive marriage and all the ‘terrible choices’ she had made—Buck has had to restrain himself from throwing a drink or two in his parents’ faces.

Buck only feels slightly bad about leaving Maddie on her own when he makes his escape, but he’d lost sight of her for a few minutes and couldn’t bear to stand his parents any longer. He does feel bad about crashing—what looks to be a wedding reception, by the sight of it, but hey, the place is so packed that he doubts anyone will notice him.

…it’s just a bonus that some of the snacks he grabbed from a serving tray are better than any of the ridiculously expensive food his parents have been serving all night.

As he makes himself comfortable in his corner, taking a moment to look around the venue, Buck can already feel the rage and discomfort that has simmered under his skin since they landed in Texas begin to dissipate. It might be crowded and loud, but the atmosphere is so different, feels so warm and inviting in comparison to the cold, formal mess Buck just escaped, that he lets his guard down for a minute, pushes up against the wall and enjoys the snack in his hand. And of course, that’s when—

“Hello,” says a smooth voice, so suddenly and so close to Buck’s ear that he jumps violently, spilling crumbs all over himself as he turns to face the owner of the voice. A momentary fear of being caught out vanishes when he sees the drop-dead gorgeous man standing next to him, with thick hair slicked back and amused brown eyes, wearing a navy-blue suit that frankly looks obscene with how well it’s tailored to fit his form.

“Erm,” Buck says eloquently and when the stranger’s lips twitch, he wonders if it’s possible to die of embarrassment. After a moment’s struggle, he manages to pull himself together and says, “Hi. I’m Buck.”

“Eddie,” the man replies, raking his gaze over Buck in a way that makes him feel ready to combust. “I don’t recall seeing you at the wedding. Are you on the bride’s side, or the groom’s?”

Shit shit shit. Buck puts a pause on objectifying the unfairly hot guy in front of him to try and make his answer sound believable. “Oh, I was there,” he says, trying for casual. “I’m er,” Buck chances a glance at the banner hung above the stage, Congratulations, Adriana and Ruben! “I’m on the bride’s side,” He finishes and gives a weak laugh, waving a hand. “Great party, huh?”

Eddie hums. “That’s interesting,” he says slowly, and Buck goes a little cold at his knowing tone, having a distinct feeling that he’s been caught out. “I don’t think my sister’s ever mentioned you. Don’t think I’ve ever seen you around, either.”

“That’s strange,” Buck says, hoping he sounds cool and unaffected. He’s not sure he succeeds. “I can’t imagine why she wouldn’t have.” He’s sweating now, uncomfortable under the stiff suit he’d dug out for the occasion. Not for the first time that night, Buck inwardly curses his parents.

Eddie only gazes back at him, his sharp stare betraying his smiling lips. Buck’s resolve crumbles like wet paper.

“Okay, fine,” he says in a rush, and Eddie looks satisfied. Dick, Buck thinks, hating how attracted he is to him. “I’m not supposed to be here. I don’t even know your sister. But I swear, I’m not trying to, like, crash this wedding, or score free food.”

Eddie pointedly lowers his gaze to the half-eaten pastry in Buck’s hand. Buck can feel himself go bright red, and promptly tucks it out of sight.

“…aside from that,” he amends. “Look, I’m from the other hall. It’s a party being hosted by my parents, and I didn’t even want to come, but I didn’t want to leave my sister alone. It just got to be a lot, and I needed to breathe, and coming in here seemed less conspicuous than sneaking out through the front entrance.”

He’s not sure why he’s even telling a complete stranger all this. His story sounds ridiculous when said out loud and there’s no reason for Eddie to believe him. Against all odds, though, Buck sees Eddie’s eyes soften a little, and he visibly relaxes.

“I take it you don’t get along with your parents?” Eddie asks.

Buck laughs. “What gave it away?” he asks, dryly; then, feeling sheepish, he adds, “Look, I’m really sorry I came in here. I promise you; I don’t have a habit of crashing the wedding receptions of random strangers.” Eddie laughs at that, and not to sound cheesy, but it’s a fucking beautiful sound.

“I certainly hope so,” Eddie says, amused. “You’re not very good at being sneaky.”

Buck’s mouth falls open with mock outrage, but Eddie goes on. “Look, do you wanna get out of here?”

Buck only blinks at him and Eddie rolls his eyes. “There’s a door in the back that leads out into the hallway. It’s technically staff-only but…” He shrugs. “I could use some air, too.”

“And you’re inviting a stranger who just crashed your sister’s wedding to come with you?” Buck asks, baffled.

Eddie smirks. “Well, it’s either that or you stay here and get caught by my parents, who are a lot less nice than I am.” Buck follows his gaze to an older couple who seem stern and no-nonsense, even through their joy for their daughter, and cringes. “On second thought…”

They escape into the darkened corridor outside the party hall a few minutes later. Eddie’s snagged a bottle of wine from the open bar and Buck blinks at it, wondering when he had the time to do that. He sits down cross-legged on the floor and after a moment’s hesitation, Buck joins him.

“So, is there a particular reason you’re escaping your own sister’s wedding?” Buck asks curiously, accepting the bottle when Eddie passes it to him. Eddie visibly grimaces, looking a bit guilty. It’s such a sharp contrast to the rest of him; the polished, picture-perfect image he cuts in his crisp suit and styled hair and handsome face.

Buck likes it.

“I, erm,” Eddie pauses, considering, and then sighs. “My wife divorced me,” he admits and Buck twists his head around to look at him in surprise. He glances down surreptitiously, and sure enough, he thinks he can make out a tan line on Eddie’s ring finger.

“I love my family,” Eddie continues, “But they’ve been a little, well. Judgemental. About all of this. And they never really liked her, so now it’s all thinly veiled ‘I told you so’s from most of them. I love my sister and I want to support her, but I also need a break from being under their attention.”

“Is that why you bought my story so easily?” Buck asks, Eddie chuckles.

“I guess. I can understand complicated families,” He casts up his eyes at Buck. “What’s the story with yours?”

Buck sighs. How does he explain his parents’ cold, painful indifference; the years of silence, and the fact that his big sister had to practically raise him when she was a kid herself? How does he dump all of that on a stranger? Even for the kindness in Eddie’s eyes, and the understanding he feels from the other man; it’s all too much. Buck is too much. It’s been made pretty clear to him all of his life.

Taking a savage swig from the bottle, Buck sighs and thumps his head against the wall.

Eddie seems to sense his reluctance to open up, and starts quietly talking instead, about his sisters. Adriana, the one who’s gotten married and has begun working in a big law firm. Sophia, who’s just started college, loves pop music and the colour pink and endlessly mocking her big brother. “Sounds like Maddie,” Buck interjects, and Eddie laughs.

“Sisters,” he says, fondly, and Buck starts telling him about Maddie, about what a badass she is, how she definitely has a crush on his co-worker but is too stubborn to admit it, how she used to be a nurse, and what an amazing dispatcher she makes these days. The bottle of wine sits forgotten between them as they’re suddenly talking like they’ve known each other all their lives. Eddie has a dry, wicked sense of humour that makes Buck laugh until his stomach hurts. He continues to listen attentively even when Buck diverges in the middle of a story to follow a different train of thought, and that makes his heart hurt in a funny way.

He thinks he understands why Eddie invited him out here. Maybe Eddie recognized another kindred spirit, just like Buck did.

Buck has just mentioned that he’s a firefighter when Eddie lets out a low sound of surprise.

“No shit?” He says. “I just applied to the Fire Academy.”

“You’re kidding,” Buck says, amazed. Eddie shakes his head and tells him how he’s been working three jobs since his wife left, and how firefighting seemed like a good choice.

“My parents say I’m practically killing myself, and they’re probably right,” a shadow crosses over Eddie’s face like he’s remembering something unpleasant. “Most of all, I hate not being able to spend enough time with my son.”

Buck jolts. “Whoa, you got a kid?”

Eddie tenses, and looks at him carefully, but whatever he sees in Buck’s face must reassure him, so he pulls out his phone and shows him the lock screen—a picture of an adorable curly-haired boy on crutches with the biggest grin on his face. Buck’s heart melts. “He’s super adorable.”

“He’s seven,” Eddie says, tucking his phone back into his pocket. “I, uh, I’ve either been working or being at home with him, so this is the first night in ages I haven’t done either. Feels a bit weird, to be honest.”

“Well, your entire life can’t revolve around being a dad,” Buck points out, reasonably, but Eddie sighs and looks away. Sensing that this is a potentially explosive topic, he decides not to push.

“If this is your first night out in a while, I’m surprised you chose to spend it with me,” Buck jokes, trying to lighten the mood. Eddie smiles.

“Well, you were being quite conspicuous in a wedding reception you weren’t supposed to be at,” Eddie teases. “I figured it would be interesting if nothing else?”

“I was not,” Buck protests. “That party is packed, Eddie. I didn’t think I was noticeable.”

Eddie shrugs. “Well, maybe I was just paying attention,” he replies, and Buck knows, he knows Eddie doesn’t mean anything deeper, but the words still make his heart do a pathetic flip in his chest. Spending all this time with his parents had made him feel like he was back there in his childhood home, unseen and unheard, tiny and invisible. And to be seen—to be listened to—by someone he’s just met…

Well.

It feels a lot like hope, Buck thinks and turns to look at Eddie, only to find his face inches away from his.

When did we get so close, Buck thinks dazedly, seconds before Eddie’s lips are on his.

Eddie tastes like the wine they’ve been drinking, is the first thing Buck registers. He turns, trying to get closer, and grabs the curve of Eddie’s shoulder, relishing the noise he makes into his mouth in response. Eddie buries his hands in Buck’s hair as the kiss turns filthy, tugging slightly, smiling into the kiss at the groan Buck lets out. Buck’s blood feels like it’s on fire. He shifts his hands to Eddie’s hips, pulling him closer, but knocks over the abandoned wine bottle in the process.

The sound of the bottle hitting the floor is loud in the silent hallway and they spring apart in surprise, panting. Eddie’s eyes are blown black and his cheeks are flushed. He looks wrecked. God, the things Buck wants to do to him—

A buzzing noise from his pocket breaks the spell. Swallowing, Buck puts some space between himself and Eddie, fishing his phone out of his pocket. He winces when he sees the caller ID.

“Mads—” he tries, but she interrupts him, sounding furious, “Where are you?”

Buck checks the time on his phone and his eyes go wide when he realizes that he’s been out here with Eddie for over an hour. “I’m so sorry,” he gets out. “I was—I’ll be right back, oh my God.” He scrambles to his feet, as he ends the call, and stops, suddenly unsure, when Eddie imitates him.

Eddie tries for a smile but he still looks a little stunned. Buck can relate.

“So,” Eddie runs a hand through his hair, flustered, and that really should not be as hot as it is, what the fuck. “I’m guessing that was your sister?”

Buck nods. “She’s pissed. I have to, uh…”

“Yeah, no, I get it,” Eddie seems at a loss for words for the first time all night and it sparks a kind of pride in Buck’s chest, he was the one to do that. “Well, I guess—”

Buck’s phone buzzes again, with a series of frenzied texts from Maddie. “I really have to go,” he says quickly. Before he has a chance to second-guess himself, he’s darting forward and pressing a kiss to Eddie’s cheek.

He hurries back through the door they came through, leaving Eddie in the hallway with the wine bottle at his feet in a pool of the dregs.

It’s not well after the scolding he gets from Maddie and another confrontation with his parents that he realizes he never got Eddie’s number.

Hours later, after reaching home and thanking the sitter and looking in on Chris, Eddie is still feeling dazed.

Did he really just do that? Did he make out with a stranger—a guy—at Adriana’s wedding reception, did he almost hook up with him right then and there and…let him leave without even getting his fucking number?

Eddie collapses down onto his bed and buries his head in his hands. He needs to work tomorrow, and he should be taking advantage of what little sleep he can get. But he can’t get his mind to quiet, can’t stop thinking about Buck, the way he’d felt alive this evening for the first time in months. He can’t squash the guilt he feels about kissing someone that wasn’t his (ex) wife. Can’t help but feel awful that he spent the majority of this night just…enjoying himself, and not thinking about Christopher every other minute. Can’t run from the fear that what he’s known about himself for a very long time might actually be true now.

He needs to be focused on Chris, on becoming a firefighter, and on potentially moving out of El Paso. He can’t be thinking about Buck, or the way he smiled, or the way he kissed.

He just needs to compartmentalize this, like he does everything else.

Besides, it’s not like he’s ever gonna see the guy again.

Seven months after El Paso, Buck is coming into the firehouse along with Chimney, for the beginning of their shift.

“Look, I’m glad that you and Maddie are finally dating,” Buck is saying to him. “I’d rather just not hear the details.”

Chim looks at him in disbelief. “You think I’m eager to discuss them with you, Buck?”

“I’m just saying! I had to hear every detail of your date from Maddie last night, I’d rather not have a repeat of it!” Despite himself, Buck is grinning, genuinely happy for his sister and his friend. He can’t help but feel envious whenever he sees what they have, though—that ease, that comfort, that familiarity. He wants that for himself.

“You do realize that your protesting is just gonna make me want to talk about it just to mess with you, right?” Chimney asks, dryly. He says something else, but Buck isn’t listening anymore, frowning when he sees someone unfamiliar standing in the bay, his back to them.

“Hey, who’s that?”

Chimney pauses mid-sentence and squints. “Must be the new recruit. Bobby said we were getting a probie this week.”

Buck’s hackles instantly rise. “What new—”

The words die on his lips when the man turns around, smiling as Bobby approaches from his office.

It’s been months, but Buck still recognizes him. That face consumed his thoughts for weeks after he came back to LA.

He’s still as gorgeous as Buck remembers.

Eddie turns to look at them as they approach, and his eyes go wide for a split second when they land on Buck, the smile slipping off his face briefly. So he does remember, Buck thinks. He’s not sure what to do—does he try to confront him? Is that even a good idea, here in the firehouse, with all their colleagues around them? How would they even explain this?

Eddie collects himself remarkably quickly and they breeze through the introductions, and Buck is certain that no one but him has noticed the way their gazes linger on each other for a little too long; how they take a moment to let go when they shake hands.

Buck is an awkward mess around Eddie for the rest of the shift, though, and Bobby pulls him aside, though not for the reason Buck expects.

“Look, I know it’s difficult having a new guy on the team,” Bobby tells him. “But you’ve gotta play nice, all right? Eddie’s one of us, now.”

Buck just blinks at him. He has no idea what Bobby is going on about.

Buck does learn that Eddie was in the army, and…wow, that explains a lot about him, actually. He’d been pretty tight-lipped about his ex-wife, the circumstances around their split, and what he used to do for work, and Buck can start putting the pieces together. It makes him—goddamn—it makes him like the guy even more.

They end their shift by disarming a fucking grenade together, and Buck is amazed by how seamlessly he and Eddie work together, like they share a mind. They work side by side like they’ve been doing it for years, not even needing to verbally communicate to know what the other needs. And, when they get out of the ambulance and Eddie grins at him and tells Buck that he can have his back any day, Buck knows that he can’t pretend the night they spent together didn’t happen.

Buck lingers by his truck in the parking lot after the shift ends, twisting his keys in his hands nervously as he waits for Eddie to come out. When Eddie does, he makes a beeline straight for him, much to Buck’s relief.

“Hey,” Eddie says, a little awkwardly. “So, um. Insane coincidence, right?”

Buck laughs, feeling some of the weight lift off his shoulders. “I wasn’t even sure you remembered me, for a moment there,” he admits. Eddie looks surprised.

“How could I forget?” And Eddie really needs to stop saying stuff like that, or Buck will—he doesn’t know. Get down on one knee, maybe.

“When did you move to LA?” Buck asks, mostly to stop himself from lurching forward and kissing him. “I mean—were you already planning it when we met, or…?”

Eddie shakes his head. “I was considering leaving El Paso, but I wasn’t sure where, yet. And once I came here—I mean, I remembered you saying you’re from Los Angeles, but it’s a big city, I didn’t even imagine we would run into each other, let alone that I would be assigned to the same firehouse as you.”

Buck swallows. “That’s—that’s not a problem for you, is it?”

Eddie tilts his head, looking at him consideringly. “As long as it’s not a problem for you.”

“Hell no.”

Eddie laughs but looks slightly relieved at Buck’s words. If he’d been just as nervous as Buck felt, he’s done a damn good job of hiding it. “So.” Eddie fiddles with the strap of his bag. Buck takes a moment to appreciate how good he looks even in casual clothes; a red flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up and jeans that look like they’re painted on. He drags his eyes away when he realizes he’s been caught and a smirk appears on Eddie’s face. “What now?”

Buck takes a step closer to him. “Well…I could take you out for coffee?” he offers. “And maybe I could meet Christopher sometime?”

Eddie looks incredulous. “You remember Chris?” he asks in a quiet, disbelieving voice.

“I mean, of course—” but Buck doesn’t get to finish the rest of his sentence as Eddie shoves him up against the side of his truck and kisses him with the same precision and intensity Buck dreamed about for weeks, and oh, okay. Buck grabs onto Eddie’s waist, pulling him closer and deepening the kiss. Talking is overrated, anyway.

Eddie pulls away all too soon, breathing hard, but he’s smiling as his hands come up to cradle Buck’s face. “Coffee sounds good,” he says and looks a little smug when Buck takes a beat too long to respond, the kiss having fried his brain.

Buck’s initial assessment of Eddie was right. He is a dick.

And Buck’s already a little in love.

“We should probably take this somewhere else before our co-workers find us and start asking some uncomfortable questions,” Buck says, but makes no effort to let go of Eddie.

Eddie grins delightedly. “Yeah, it’ll be pretty hard to explain to them that we know each other because you crashed my sister’s wedding reception.”

Buck shakes uncontrollably with laughter and lets his head fall into the crook of Eddie’s neck. “Eddie, oh my God.”

“What? I am never gonna let that go, you know.”

Buck pulls back, his cheeks flushed and his eyes sparkling. “I’ll hold you to that.”

Eddie only laughs and kisses him again.

[youjustwaitsunshine]

ok so I’mma ask a really dumb question. What do you mean when you say that you can tell that German wasn’t a good subject for Seb in school? I’m assuming it’s something in -how- he’s speaking? Is that a big deal in school? For me as a usamerican, public speaking or formal speaking isn’t much taught unless it’s for a particular vocation, so people usually don’t speak in that way.

not a dumb question at all! also esp other germans, feel free to discuss/add your point of view

so first off the education system in germany is a ~huge~ mess because our federal states all manage education separately which leads to really big discrepancies in the value of your final exams (it's way easier to get full marks in some states than others etc and unis then have to accommodate to that, it's among other things something that adds to the rift between former East and West Germany) and not only that, it even varies within the federal states because the schools are funded by the idk the english equivalent, i guess you could say counties? so i can only truly speak about my experiences (but the subjects are still more or less centralized and vary mostly in the depth theyre gone into with)

In Seb's case, he often struggles to express himself clearly in German, uses examples and often repeats sentences/sentence fragments that he seems comfortable with. He often leaves thoughts unfinished and although he's quite eloquent when he knows what he wants to say his words get more 'simple' when he gets stuck explaining himself and talks in what a German teacher would consider 'bad style'. Funnily enough, he's more eloquent (/consistent in his level of eloquence) in English, probably both due to it being his second language and that he uses it a lot more in a professional context where it's extremely important to report back to the team clearly. It's important to note though that the people interviewing Seb are excellent at German (or English) and often studied journalism so it's very noticeable while it probably would be less so in a discussion with people whose profession isn't tied to eloquence.

That said, i do feel like there's a lot of value placed on properly expressing yourself throughout all subjects. In German class (and also second and third languages, in my case English and French) you write a lot of argumentative essays and have mock debates and class discussions. There's of course a lot of literary analysis but that still comes around to expressing yourself concisely and clearly. We don't explicitly have public speaking in German class but the mock discussions are (or at least were at my school) held not only in German class but also in Politics class, Geography and Economics class, Religion/Ethics class (the subject differs depending on if you're protestant or catholic or a different confession/religion/not religious but the topics are largely the same, ethics, morality, the world religions) and to an extent in History class. Also a lot of schools have project weeks where you have a model parliament debate, be it model UN or EU or whatever which is pretty cool.

To get back to German class though, it's one of the core subjects in the education system for most of your school career (when i finished school even more so than now because the education system ~in my federal state~ changed right after i graduated) together with the languages you learn and math and a lot of the skills from german class transfer over to subjects that get less hours/week.

Tl;dr: German class is definitely (among other things) putting a focus on teaching students how to be effectively argumentative both in written and spoken word and Seb often speaks German a bit clumsily and in simple(r) terms (than those around him).

[rainbowcarousels]

I used prompts for some emergency fluff and some slightly spicy drabbles - I hope that's ok!

#01 - Ring

There was no formal announcement upon the ignition of Lestat and Armand’s romantic endeavour, no decree nor mention in passing in the records that were being meticulously kept by people who cared about that sort of thing. They were not suddenly all over one another in public, nor did they stop sniping at each other. The only sign that something had shifted so monumentally was the addition of another ring to Armand’s growing collection, devoted to lovers, loved ones and held closed fisted next to his heart as a reminder of their love.

#02 - Hero

“You’re a vampire!” Daniel’s shoulders are shaking with laughter as he lets the large, furry spider crawl over his hand and away from Lestat’s hair. One of the younger lot, one who’d clearly seen a lot of television and wanted to commit to the bit of what it meant to be a spooky vampire, had brought it along and thought it was a good idea to let it run loose.  “How are you this much of a baby about a spider?”

“It was tangling my hair,” Lestat hissed at him, giving the spider a look of utter contempt. “My hair is a work of art and if I’m going to have a peculiar little creature tangle it all up, it’s going to be your maker. At least he brushes it out after!”

#03 - Memory

The more the blood flows, the more nicks and slices and tears in the skin as it’s drunk down, the more the memories flow: falling into each other ice skating at Rockerfeller, Armand’s hand down his pants at the BBC proms, the way he’d pressed his face into Daniel’s neck the first time they’d shared a coffin and breathed so deeply that it had been the best thing to fall asleep to. Every touch feels imprinted on his skin, a living – albeit undead – memory written into him and every kiss is a reminder of a thousand kisses before it and yet completely different.

This is reunion, mind and body and their very history becoming one.    

#04 - Box

“It needs to be wider or you’re going to end up squashed!” Daniel hops out of the new coffin, still ridiculously enthusiastic about having his own made. It’s the most demanding Armand has ever seen him.

“This one is for you,” Armand reminded him. “We have one for home for us, this is just for you.”

“Exactly,” Daniel said. “If I’m there, why wouldn’t you be?”

#05 - Run

“Daniel,” Armand was on top of his chest, barely visible in the moonlight. It had been weeks since he’d seen his shadow, running on the idea that he was there but unseen so he had to keep moving. “What is the purpose of a ‘slinky’ and why must it be in pairs?”

#06 - Hurricane

The noise turns out to be one of Armand’s vases, laying strewn on the floor where Lestat – having barely made it through the door – has Louis pressed up against the wall with his head cradled at his neck. Armand does try to chew him out for showing any respect for his property or given the noises he’s making, proper decency in a home he shares with other people but it doesn’t take long to pull him into an embrace, gasping and flushed and forgetting about the broken fragments on the floor.

#07 - Wings

“You’re not funny!” Armand declares, tearing the pillows to smithereens in the hallway.

Ever since Lestat found an app that allows you to put an image on anything from cushions to phone cases, a certain famous painting has become a motif in what he sends and Armand is probably going to beat him bloody with one of those phone cases when he shows up.

#08 - Cold

 “Gyah!” You could never believe someone who considered themselves an eloquent writer could come out with such a nonsensical word instead of just saying what the problem is. “Your hands are freezing is what the problem is! When did you last eat? You do look thinner, and I didn’t hear you go out, why are you starving yourself  – oh fuck me, I’m turning into Marius.”  

#09 - Red

With four of them, the bed is a lost cause – they buy dark sheets and hope for the best. It’s not as if Lestat has ever known the meaning of self control, Armand has a feral beast inside of him that seems to take control at a moments notice and on more than one occasion, they’ve both literally slid from the satin sheets from overshooting their mark and looked at the rest of the bed like it’s their mortal enemy.

#10 - Drink

There are only three things that Daniel misses about his own mortality: the first being the ability to hear Armand in his mind, which is less about mortality and more about the cruelty of silence between maker and fledgling. Another being that he can’t drink or smoke anything to the same effect so the world is an overstimulation nightmare some nights and there’s nothing that takes the edge off in the way it would if he were human. Finally, that ‘I’m only human, can’t we stay in tonight’ is not a valid excuse for getting out of Armand’s endless engagements – but there’s other ways around that too, mostly involving blood, nudity and adult situations.

#11 - Breathe

Armand finds himself counting each breath in and out again like a mantra every time he starts to worry. The amulet is around his neck, clutched tight even in his rest and he likes to think that Daniel is dreaming of him and that it makes him happy. From here, he can hear the pumping blood, feel the slight puff of air from his mouth and the desire to possess him is overwhelming - sated only by the knowledge that even these breaths belong to him now.

#12 - Lock

"Whining is not going to get you out of this." Louis has been teaching Daniel the knots so this could be done simultanously, binding the naked bodies of their lovers comfortably close and firmly tying their hands behind them so they can't touch each other. "We have a mission and an agreement and you can be freed when we're done - hand me the padlock, will you Daniel?"

#13 - Temptation

"It's a good thing you were never so easily tempted," Daniel whispers to Armand as Bianca, still pacing and more talking to herself than either of them, tries to logic out the merits of making her current mortal lover a more immortal standing arrangement. "It's been less than a year."

"If you think I wasn't tempted by then," Armand tells him plainly. "Then you're a fool. I didn't want to condemn you to hell."

"I'd have been a lot less worried about going to hell as a child if I'd known it looked like a New York townhouse with priceless artifacts and everyone I love inside it," Daniel muttered.

#14 - Lies

"It's not that spicy." Daniel's voice is hoarse, tears leaking from his eyes and he's not so subtly grabbing for the milk. "It's barely affecting me."

#15 - Wait

Eventually, Lestat is brought along on one of Armand's family Disneyland holidays. He practically chases after the light parade, attempts to issue a duel to Armand with a toy lightsaber and chooses to get every picture possible. Their family has changed a lot in the last few years, but everyone can agree, it has been worth the wait.

hey hi hello how about some of you people send me some Emergency Fluff

[astroaquarium]

signs on the house cusps: part 2

Libra-Pisces

Libra on the 1st: you come across as very agreeable, level-headed, fair, and charasmatic. you veiw the world in a very balanced way, and like to take in every account and point of view and keep all parties happy.

Libra on the 2nd: you value the finer things in life, however you tend to have a great knack for balancing spending and saving, and dont go overboard.

libra on the 3rd: your relationship with siblings is likely very amicable, peaceful, you rarely fight or have disagreements. your primary schooling was a good experience for you.

libra on the 4th: you had a very venusian upbringing and/or homelife. you liked to keep the peace between family members.

libra on the 5th: you might like to engage in debate and/or humanitarian or charity based projects/initiatives in your spare time, or as a sode hustle. in your dating life, you are super flirty, and fun and dont take it too seriously.

libra on the 6th: you have generally very good health, however may have some lowerback issues here and there or possible kidney issues. your daily routine is very balanced, you like getting shit done.

libra on the 7th: you attract partners who are very charasmatic, people pleasers, who will always go with what you want and cant make a decision to save themselves. your partnerships with others will have limited conflict.

libra on the 8th: you likely have very aesthtically pleasing genitalia. you may benefit from inheritnace.

libra on the 9th: you might enjoy studying law, criminology, or sociology at a tertiary level. you might like to explore different philosophies and religions.

libra on the 10th: you might have a career in the legal field, or be attracted to professions of this nature. You are likely seen as very attractive and charasmatic in the public eye.

libra on the 11th: you are a fair and devoted friend, who will always remain neutral in frienship drama.

libra on the 12th: behind closed doors you are a very kind, gentle soul. you may struggle with balance in this lifetime.

scorpio on the 1st: you come across as intense, people are either intensely attracted to or repulsed by you, you cause a strong reaction in people when they first meet you. Your apperance is ever changing.

Scorpio on the 2nd: your possessions and values may undergo transformation regularly, meaning you may contsantly be revaluating what is important to you.

scorpio on the 3rd: you might have a sharp, intense voice. your relationship with siblings could be a bit full on, maybe you guys keep a lot of secrets from eachother.

scorpio on the 4th: homelife for you was unstable and rocky, maybe a lot of skeltons in yoru families closet, maybe you were the blacksheep in the family.

scorpio on the 5th: you might love reading self-help, psychology books for fun. in your dating life you might find it hard to date casually as you tend to lock onto people hard.

scorpio in the 6th: you may have health issues concerning UTI’s STD’s and other sexual or urinary diseases or infections. your daily routine is often not very set in stone and always undergoing change.

scorpio in the 7th: you attract intense, passionate and possessive partners, who may be prone to jealousy and trust issues. your partnerships with others can be transformative for you, whilst also running the risk if being quite toxic.

scorpio in the 8th: you love the occult and taboo, and thrive on delving deeper into people. probably hate small talk. always horny!!

scorpio on the 9th: you might be interested in studying the occult, astrology, psychology, or anything a little taboo.

scorpio in the 10th: might have or want a career in psychology, social science, criminology, law enforcement, post-mortum or forensics. Seen as shady, withdrawn, intense in your workspace.

scorpio in the 11th: an emotionally supportive and in depth friend!! you dont like superficial frienships and are great at keeping your friends secrets.

scorpio in the 12th: when you are alone, you are inquistive, have deeply penetrating thoughts and question everything!! you may struggle with openning up in this lifetime.

sagittarius in the 1st: come across as super jovial, free spitited, a little earthy, and a jokster. people think of you as the life of the party.

sagittarius in the 2nd: you may be very lucky when it comes to money, always seemingly falling on your feet and coming into money when you need it. you might be a bit reckless when it comes to spending!

sagittarius on the 3rd: might have a loud voice. likely has a very fun-loving not overly serious relationship with siblings, maybe they are loud and over the top types.

sagittarius on the 4th: might have a very big family, might have a very loud, and overly open family. might have moved around a lot as a kid (international perhaps).

sagittarius on the 5th: could have a lot of creative talents!! kids might be rowdy or have a lot of masculine energy. could enjoy casual dating quite a bit.

sagittarius on the 6th: doesnt like routine, always on the go, and likes to keep active. might have weak thighs and get sprains and strains in these areas often.

sagittarius on the 7th: attracts free spritied partners, who are flightly and not wanting to stay in one place at a time. may have a lot of luck in partnerships.

sagittarius on the 8th: might have a very experimental and active sex life. could enjoy other cultures taboos.

sagittarius on the 9th: a true intellectual, thrives in tertiary education environemt, could be a professor or full time academic or asprie to be.

sagittarius on the 10th: seen as a happy go lucky, larger than life type by the public at large. probably has or wants a career in; travel, philosophy, higher education, anthropology, sociology or similar.

sagittarius on the 11th: biggest cheerleader kind of friend, always goes above and beyond for others, has many friends. big goals and aspriations in life.

sagittarius on the 12th: has a rich intrapersonal existence, loves alone time, in fact where they thrive. can struggle with recklessness in this lifetime.

capricorn on the 1st: stern, firm, and professional outward look to the world. they can come across as ridgid to some, but nevertheless have intensely sharp bone structure and facial features which people find striking. age really well!!

capricorn on the 2nd: great with money!! knows how to save. values old school traditional values.

capricorn on the 3rd: clear, eloquent speach, extensive vocab. might have strained or very formal relationship with siblings.

capricorn on the 4th: traditinal upbringing, might have recieved little affection from parents, perhaps was more so encouraged to be seen and not heard.

capricorn on the 5th: takes dating very seriously, might literally interview potential romantic dates. kids may be very responsible and mature for their age.

capricorn on the 6th: very logical and structured daily routine, which rarely changes. might be prone to issues with bones (broken bones, osteoporosis etc.)

capricorn on the 7th: attracts partners who are classic romantics and very old school romantics, people who are very stuck in their ways, married to their work, and like being right. partnerships are very strcuted and reliable.

capricorn on the 8th: may undergo challenges with sexuality or sexual idenity which will take a long time to work through. may keep a lot of secrets.

capricorn on the 9th: might study business, entreprenurship, marketing, sales psychology, or medicine at a tertairy level or be interested in these areas.

capricorn on the 10th: seen as disciplinned, serious, and determined by the public. might be or want to be a business exec, CEO, start a small business, work in comerce or ecommerce, be a doctor or similar. might be slow to climb to corporate ladder.

capricorn in the 11th: might be slow to make friends, have a very small trusted circle. very determined at setting and achieveing their goals.

capricorn in the 12th: are strong on their own, and can keep a very logical level-headed mindset when left to their own devices. may struggle with overworking themselves in thsi lifetime.

aquarius in the 1st: seen as unusal, unique, and radical by peopke who first meet you. people might not know quite how to think of you, you might shock them.

aquarius in the 2nd: you hace strong values that closely allign with unpopular belifes, you might have very abstract world views, others dont agree with.

aquarius in the 3rd: your voice might be peircing, or strange to some. you and your siblings might have a very unusal relationship, you may not know them very well kr be quite distant.

aquarius in the 4th: homelife was out of the ordinary, definitely wasnt apart of a regualr neuclear family. may have moved around a lot, or had a very unsettling and unstable vibe. might have been thr odd one out.

aquarius on the 5th: may have unique talents. kids may be ostrascied for being weird or not like the other kids. you have a unique appraoch to dating.

aquarius in the 6th: you hate routine, and like to keep people guessing. may have ankle or calf problems, with lots of sprains, strains and breakages in these areas.

aquarius in the 7th: attract partners who are out of the ordinary or are free thinking radical extremeists. you partnerships can abruptly start and end.

aquarius in the 8th: unusal fetishes. bug interest in the taboo, you like to bring up topics that make others uncomfortable and shock.

aquarius in the 9th: might like to study engineering, information technology, digital art/design, computer programming, maths, science at a tertiary levl.

aquarius in the 10th: seen as weird, radical, or strange by the public. might be or want to be a scientist, an actor, a humanitarian, mathamatician, engineer or simialr.

aquarius on the 11th: massive people person, kind and inclusive to all, has many friends and social connections. understands society at a deep level.

aquarius in the 12th: allows themself to be weird and themsleves when they are alone. may struggle with imposter syndrome.

pisces on the 1st: come across a dreamy, idealistic, sensitive and out of this world. you are an illusion to others, and are quite the chameleon. always changing and morphing.

pisces on the 2nd: may not be very good with money or tangible possessions, may find it hard to ground themselves in the phsycial realm.

pisces on the 3rd: dreamy, soft, melodic voice. siblings were sesnitive, or you had a very emotionally connected relationshil with them.

pisces on the 4th: family life was a bit of a dream, you might not have always been aware of what was going on for you at home, what was real and what was not, parents might have been neglectful or dellusional.

pisces in the 5th: very spiritual and creatively inclined. datinf life might be a bit all over the place, might find it hard to tell when people are into you or not.

pisces in the 6th: very disorganised in temrs of dailr routine, always in a daze, finds it hard to complete necessary daily tasks, sometims lazy. might have feet aches or lymphatic system issues.

pisces in the 7th: attracts dellusional partners, who are not very realistic or grounded. may put up with bad behaviour from partners because they only see the good in others.

pisces in the 8th: very fluid sexuality and open to pretty much anything and everything. sex can be a spiritual experince for them.

pisces in the 9th: might study arts, interior design, medicine, or literature at a higher level.

pisces in the 10th: seen as lazy, day dreamy, and hard to out your finger on by colleuges and the public. might be or want to be an artist, designer, alternative therapist, chiropractor, psychic, psychologist or counsellor.

pisces in the 11th: friendhips might be very dellusional, may have less true quality friends than they realise because they are too forgiving and good at overlooking friends bad qualities.

pisces in the 12th: thrive by themsleves. have psychic tendnacies, and have the ability to absorb the undercurrents of emotional enegry of others. they can struggle with escapism in this life.

[pumpkinpaix]

hello there, hope you're having a nice day <3

so i've been reading a lot of fics lately, uk for sanity's sake, and i've noticed that in most of them, lwj doesn't use contractions (eg., says do not instead of don't)?? and i think he doesn't in the novel either but i don't remember lol so i can't be sure but anyway that made me curious - does chinese have contractions as well? does he not use it bc it's informal?

hello there! I’m doing all right, i started to answer this ask while waiting for a jingyeast loaf to come out of the oven 😊 many thanks to @bookofstars for helping me look over/edit/correct this post!! :D

anyways! the answer to your questions are complicated (of course it is when is anything simple with me), so let’s see if I can break it down--you’re asking a) whether chinese has contractions, b) if it does, how does they change the tone of the sentence--is it similar to english or no?, and c) how does this all end up with lan wangji pretty much never using contractions in english fic/translation?

I’m gonna start by talking about how formality is (generally) expressed in each language, and hopefully, by the end of this post, all the questions will have been answered in one way or another. so: chinese and english express variations in formality/register differently, oftentimes in ways that run contrary to one another. I am, as always, neither a linguist nor an expert in chinese and english uhhh sociological grammar? for lack of a better word. I’m speaking from my own experience and knowledge :D

so with a character like lan wangji, it makes perfect sense in english to write his dialogue without contractions, as contractions are considered informal or colloquial. I don’t know if this has changed in recent years, but I was always taught in school to never use contractions in my academic papers.

However! not using contractions necessarily extends the length of the sentence: “do not” takes longer to say than “don’t”, “cannot” is longer than “can’t” etc. in english, formality is often correlated with sentence length: the longest way you can say something ends up sounding the most formal. for a very simplified example, take this progression from least formal to absurdly formal:

whatcha doin’?

what’re you doing?

what are you doing? [standard colloquial]

may I ask what you are doing?

might I inquire as to what you are doing?

excuse me, but might I inquire as to what you are doing?

pardon my intrusion, but might I inquire as to what you are doing?

please pardon my intrusion, but might inquire as to the nature of your current actions?

this is obviously a somewhat overwrought example, but you get the point. oftentimes, the longer, more complex, more indirect sentence constructions indicate a greater formality, often because there is a simultaneous decreasing of certainty. downplaying the speaker’s certainty can show deference (or weakness) in english, while certainty tends to show authority/confidence (or aggression/rudeness).

different words also carry different implications of formality—in the example, I switched “excuse me” to “pardon me” during one of the step ups. pardon (to me at least) feels like a more formal word than “excuse”. Similarly, “inquire” is more formal than “ask” etc. I suspect that at least some of what makes one word seem more formal than one of its synonyms has to do with etymology. many of english’s most formal/academic words come from latin (which also tends to have longer words generally!), while our personal/colloquial words tend to have germanic origins (inquire [latin] vs ask [germanic]).

you’ll also notice that changing a more direct sentence structure (“may I ask what”) to a more indirect one (“might I inquire as to”) also jumps a register. a lot of english is like this — you can complicate simple direct sentences by switching the way you use the verbs/how many auxiliaries you use etc.

THE POINT IS: with regards to english, more formal sentence structures are often (not always) longer and more indirect than informal ones. this leads us to a problem with a character like lan wangji.

lan wangji is canonically very taciturn. if he can express his meaning in two words rather than three, then he will. and chinese allows for this—in extreme ways. if you haven’t already read @hunxi-guilai’s post on linguistic register (in CQL only, but it’s applicable across the board), I would start there because haha! I certainly do Not have a degree in Classical Chinese lit and she does a great job. :D

you can see from the examples that hunxi chose that often, longer sentences tend to be more informal in chinese (not always, which I’ll circle back to at the end lol). Colloquial chinese makes use of helping particles to indicate tone and meaning, as is shown in wei wuxian’s dialogue. and, as hunxi explained, those particles are largely absent from lan wangji’s speech pattern. chinese isn’t built of “words” in the way English is—each character is less a word and more a morpheme—and the language allows for a lot of information to be encoded in one character. a single character can often stand for a phrase within a sentence without sacrificing either meaning or formality. lan wangji makes ample use of this in order to express himself in the fewest syllables possible.

so this obviously leads to an incongruity when trying to translate his dialogue or capture his voice in English: shorter sentences are usually more direct by nature, and directness/certainty is often construed as rudeness -- but it might seem strange to see lan wangji’s dialogue full of longer sentences while the narration explicitly says that he uses very short sentences. so what happens is that many english fic writers extrapolated this into creating an english speech pattern for lan wangji that reads oddly. they’ll have lan wangji speak in grammatically incoherent fragments that distill his intended thought because they’re trying to recreate his succinctness. unfortunately, English doesn’t have as much freedom as Chinese does in this way, and it results in lan wangji sounding as if he has some kind of linguistic impediment and/or as if he’s being unspeakably rude in certain situations. In reality, lan wangji’s speech is perfectly polite for a young member of the gentry (though he’s still terribly rude in other ways lol). he speaks in full, and honestly, quite eloquent sentences.

hunxi’s post already has a lot of examples, but I figure I’ll do one as well focused on the specifics of this post.

I’m going to use this exchange from chapter 63 between the twin jades because I think it’s a pretty simple way to illustrate what I’m talking about:

蓝曦臣道：“你亲眼所见？”

蓝忘机道：“他亲眼所见。”

蓝曦臣道：“你相信他？”

蓝忘机道：“信。”

[...] 蓝曦臣道：“那么金光瑶呢？”

蓝忘机道：“不可信。”

my translation:

Lan Xichen said, “You saw it with your own eyes?”

Lan Wangji said, “He saw it with his own eyes.”

Lan Xichen said, “You believe him?”

Lan Wangji said, “I believe him.”

[...] Lan Xichen said, “Then what about Jin Guangyao?”

Lan Wangji said, “He cannot be believed.”

you can see how much longer the (pretty literal) english translations are! every single line of dialogue is expanded because things that can be omitted in chinese cannot be omitted in english without losing grammatical coherency. i‘ll break a few of them down:

Lan Xichen’s first line:

你 (you) 亲眼 (with one’s own eyes) 所 (literary auxiliary) 见 (met/saw)？

idk but i love this line a lot lmao. it just has such an elegant feel to me, probably because I am an uncultured rube. anyways, you see here that he expressed his full thought in five characters.

if I were to rewrite this sentence into something much less formal/much more modern, I might have it become something like this:

你是自己看见的吗？

你 (you) 是 (to be) 自己 (oneself) 看见 (see) 的 (auxiliary) 吗 (interrogative particle)？

i suspect that this construction might even be somewhat childish? I’ve replaced every single formal part of the sentence with a more colloquial one. instead of 亲眼 i’ve used 自己, instead of 所见 i’ve used 看见的 and then also added an interrogative particle at the end for good measure (吗). To translate this, I would probably go with “Did you see it yourself?”

contained in this is also an example of how one character can represent a whole concept that can also be represented with two characters: 见 vs 看见. in this example, both mean “to see”. we’ll see it again in the next example as well:

in response to lan xichen’s, “you believe him?” --> 你 (you) 相信 (believe) 他 (him)? lan wangji answers with, “信” (believe).

chinese does not do yes or no questions in the same way that english does. there is no catch-all for yes or no, though there are general affirmative (是／有) and negative (不／没) characters. there are other affirmative/negative characters, but these are the ones that I believe are the most common and also the ones that you may see in response to yes or no questions on their own. (don’t quote me on that lol)

regardless, the way you respond to a yes or no question is often by repeating the verb phrase either in affirmative or negative. so here, when lan xichen asks if lan wangji believes wei wuxian, lan wangji responds “believe”. once again, you can see that one character can stand in for a concept that may also be expressed in two characters: 信 takes the place of 相信. lan wangji could have responded with “相信” just as well, but, true to his character, he didn’t because he didn’t need to. this is still a complete sentence. lan wangji has discarded the subject (I), the object (him), and also half the verb (相), and lost no meaning whatsoever. you can’t do this in english!

and onto the last exchange:

lan xichen: 那么 (then) 金光瑶 (jin guangyao) 呢 (what about)？

lan wangji: 不可 (cannot) 信 (believe)

you can actually see the contrast between the two brothers’ speech patterns even in this. lan xichen’s question is not quite as pared down as it could be. if it were wangji’s line instead, I would expect it to read simply “金光瑶呢？” which would just be “what about jin guangyao?” 那么 isn’t necessary to convey the core thought -- it’s just as how “then what about” is different than “what about”, but “then” is not necessary to the central question. if we wanted to keep the “then” aspect, you could still cut out 么 and it would be the same meaning as well.

a FINAL example of how something can be cut down just because I think examples are helpful:

“I don’t know” is usually given as 我不知道. (this is what nie huaisang says lol) It contains subject (我) and full verb (知道). you can pare this straight down to just 不知 and it would mean the same thing in the correct context. i think most of the characters do this at least once? it sounds more literary -- i don’t know that i would ever use it in everyday speech, but the fact remains that it’s a possibility. both could be translated as “I do not know” and it would be accurate.

ANYWAYS, getting all the way back to one of your original questions: does chinese have contractions? and the answer is like... kind of...?? but not really. there’s certainly slang/dialect variants that can be used in ways that are reminiscent of english contractions. the example I’m thinking of is the character 啥 (sha2) which can be used as slang in place of 什么 (shen2 me). (which means “what”)

so for a standard sentence of, 你在做什么? (what are you doing), you could shorten down to just 做啥? and the second construction is less formal than the first, but they mean the same thing.

other slang i can think of off the top of my head: 干嘛 (gan4 ma2) is also informal slang for “what are you doing”. and i think this is a regional thing, but you can also use 搞 (gao3) and 整 (zheng3) to mean “do” as well.

so in the same way that you can replace 什么 with 啥, you can replace 做 as well to get constructions like 搞啥 (gao3 sha2) and 整啥 (zheng3 sha2).

these are all different ways to say “what are you doing” lmao, and in this case, shorter is not, in fact, more formal.

woo! we made it to the end! I hope it was informative and helpful to you anon. :D

this is where I would normally throw my ko-fi, but instead, I’m actually going to link you to this fundraising post for an old fandom friend of mine. her house burned down mid-september and they could still use help if anyone can spare it! if this post would have moved you to buy me a ko-fi, please send that money to her family instead. :) rbs are also appreciated on the post itself. (* ´▽` *)

anyways, here’s the loaf jingyeast made :3 it was very tasty.