#i always heard a british accent in my head when writing out his dialogue

[the-admin-behind-the-slaughter]

contemplating whether or not i should hc afton as part asian

[hopefulobjectmiracle]

A quick analysis of the puppy scene in 3x15, because my OTP is perfect.

This is honestly just a whole lot of gushing and flailing, tbh. Because Kurt and Blaine and their relationship are wonderful and I love them so, so much. So much so that I can write paragraphs on a scene that is barely one minute long. 

This somehow ended up being much longer than I intended, oops. Hope you enjoy it :)

We start off this scene with Blaine alone at his locker, presumably putting away his belongings from his last class, and you can still see Kurt’s ‘Gay-diddy-gay-gay-gay’ class council election poster on the inside of Blaine’s locker, even months after Kurt lost the election. But Blaine still keeps it up, because he loves Kurt, and if he had it his way, Kurt would win everything. Awww. He appears to be deep in thought, and when Kurt hides behind Blaine’s locker, speaking in the world’s most adorably terrible British accent, it startles Blaine for a second.

And man, does that make me sad. This is a kid that has been bullied, undoubtedly shoved into lockers and pushed here and there just like Kurt was. He hears an unfamiliar voice and immediately flinches back in fear, expecting the worst. 

But it isn’t the worst - it’s the best. Because it’s Kurt, the person Blaine loves more than anything, hiding behind the locker, and it’s Kurt speaking in that cute-ass accent holding a stuffed puppy in front of his face. 

(Side note - I once read that Chris Colfer improvised the dialogue and accent of this scene, as well as coming up with the name for the puppy, which totally checks out since Chris is a huge Anglophile.)

And as soon as Blaine recognizes his boyfriend, his face breaks out into the sunniest smile, and he does his signature “Kurt-made-me-laugh” move, the blushy head-duck (see here for reference). 

Kurt also looks similarly delighted to see Blaine, because Blaine is lovely and Kurt loves him so, so much, and because he’s also excited to show Blaine the gift he got him and help Blaine out with his problems. Kurt really loves Blaine, y’all. He looks so damn proud of the stuffed animal he got for him and equally proud of his own ability to make Blaine laugh with his clever puns. 

Kurt goes on to explain that Finn won the stuffed puppy while out at the amusement park for Senior Skip Day, along with thirteen others for Rachel, and as soon as he says this, Blaine nods along as if to say - oh, of course, that Rachel - because Blaine is considerate as hell and knows his friends very well. And in honest-to-god Kurt fashion, bb stole the puppy from his brother, because Kurt is the definition of Be Gay, Do Crime, and he also recognizes that Rachel does not need 14 different stuffed animals. 

He pouts a little right then, telling Blaine that he wanted to give it to him so that Blaine would have something, since Kurt wasn’t able to convince Blaine to go with them on the field trip. I wonder how that conversation went. 

Also, pouty Kurt is fucking adorable. Protect him at all costs.

Blaine is melancholy again, telling Kurt that he would have just brought the mood down for the group. And when Blaine says this? Kurt stops beating around the bush and gets straight to the point. 

Sweetly stroking the stuffed puppy, Kurt tells Blaine that he understands him. That he gets that family problems are hard, because they’re hard for him too. He uses himself as an example to try and get his point across to Blaine more effectively, and mentions that he and Finn disagree on nearly everything, but at the end of the day, they love one another and are always there for one another despite their differences. 

I’m also getting so many brotherly Furt feelings from Kurt referring to Finn as “the big lug” and talking about how much he loves him. Ugh. I also cry at the line where Kurt tells Blaine that he only has one brother and shouldn’t give up on that, given what happens to Finn. I wish we’d gotten more of that relationship in canon before Cory’s untimely passing, because they clearly had so much love for one another, both on-screen and off.

Anyway, Kurt sees the love he has with his brother and wants Blaine to be able to experience the same thing, because he loves Blaine so, so much and he thinks that Blaine deserves everything great in this world. He also brings back the cute-ass accent, and upon seeing Blaine look upset, bumps Margaret Thatcher Dog against Blaine’s cheek to get him to smile again - which Blaine absolutely does; his face is bright and sunny again because of Kurt’s silliness. Awww. 

Kurt tells Blaine never to give up, and Blaine indignantly responds that Cooper is the one who is leaving for a big audition. Kurt pauses, and tells Blaine that Cooper hasn’t actually left him yet. He says that Cooper is waiting in the auditorium, hoping that Blaine will come and talk to him and make things right. This line very strongly implies that Kurt and Cooper coordinated this, and that Kurt made an effort of talking to Cooper to try and arrange a meeting with Blaine - because in a matter of mere days, Kurt was able to glean how important their relationship was to Blaine and wanted to do everything he could to fix it. Give him all the boyfriend awards, folks.

I’m kidding. Please don’t start the Better Boyfriend Olympics again, lol.

Blaine huffs out that talking doesn’t actually work with Cooper, and that he’s tried it to no avail. And Kurt just nods knowingly, as if he was aware that Blaine would say that. And though it isn’t explicitly mentioned, I bet he did know. He then goes on to say that perhaps talking isn’t the best answer for Blaine. Maybe there’s something else, a better method of communicating his feelings that would work more for Blaine. 

Okay. You know what this reminds me of? Flash back a year, to Silly Love Songs. This is (perhaps unintentionally) a direct callback to 2x12. Back when Blaine was still crushing on someone who is not Kurt, he said this to the Warblers about his idea to serenade Jeremiah. 

Blaine (2011): I'm not really good at talking about my feelings. I'm much better at singing them.

And here are Kurt’s words, from more than a year later. 

Kurt (2012): Maybe talking is not the answer. Maybe you need to show him how you really feel in the best, most honest way you know how. 

Can I just stop right here and squeal a little bit? Because Kurt knows his boyfriend so, so well. He remembers the things that Blaine tells him, even things from over a year ago. He holds onto this key piece of information about Blaine, because Blaine is important to him and the things he tells Kurt are worth remembering. And here, in this scene, he puts his memory to good use to try and remind Blaine of his most effective and heartfelt form of communication so that he can help Blaine mend fences with his brother. 

GIVE HIM THE BOYFRIEND AWARDS, FOLKS!

Kurt is so, supportive of Blaine and just wants the best for him, and it just boggles my mind when people claim that Kurt didn’t love Blaine as much as Blaine loved him, because from even short simple scenes like this one, anyone can tell that it isn’t true. 

After listening to Kurt, Blaine stops, and for the first time, genuinely considers it. Prior to this, all of Cooper’s attempts at talking couldn’t get through to him. Blaine still felt the jealousy and resentment from all those years growing up. But after hearing Kurt’s advice, he puts that aside and realizes that some things, like family, are more important, and so he makes that decision to go see his brother and try and express his feelings in a different way. 

Blaine turns to go meet Cooper, and Kurt watches him go, looking so damn proud of his boyfriend and so, so hopeful...

Y’all know what happens next. Blaine and Cooper, a pair of brothers, sing a breakup song. Yet somehow, it works. Singing manages to communicate all of those emotions that were suppressed before, and opens the doors for real conversation between the two of them. They do successfully patch things up, with Cooper finally recognizing Blaine’s talent and Blaine trying to support Cooper in future endeavors. They are on a path to a close relationship, which is all both of them had ever really wanted in the first place. 

And if not for Kurt’s advice, this may not have happened. Y’all heard that right - Kurt Hummel helped Blaine patch things up with a member of his family because he knew how important it was to Blaine, and he knew how badly Blaine wanted this even if Blaine didn’t let it show. From all the bits and pieces of information we’ve gathered over the years about Blaine’s family, they don’t appear to be all that close, which is why it’s even more important for Blaine that he is able to reconcile with his brother.

(For more of my thoughts on Blaine’s family, feel free to check out this analysis of mine. Yeah, this is a shameless self promo. Deal with it.)

So...what was the point of this analysis? I’m not quite sure. I suppose I just had a lot of feelings about Blaine, Klaine, family, and the way that Kurt shows love. Like I’ve said millions of times, just because Kurt is more subtle in the way that he shows love to Blaine, doesn’t mean that it’s any less powerful. Scenes like this, in which he handpicks Blaine’s own words and uses them to push Blaine towards something he was too afraid to admit he really wanted? Kurt helping reconcile Blaine with his family? This is Klaine at its best, and scenes like this are why I will always, always ship this couple. 

Kurt and Blaine are incredible, y’all. 

Peace. 

[mercurygray]

Making Of Featurette - Build An OC

Some of you may have seen my post yesterday about how to introduce an OC  and met my new gal, Phyl, who seems to have broken a land speed record on acquiring fans.

The challenge posed yesterday - or more, the question - was how to introduce an original character, but it was also sort of a fun exercise for me to take a look at my process for creating a character from scratch at the same time.

There was some discussion about whether including the Toccoa training sequence was necessary, and while that applies to a large number of BoB OCs, many of whom find themselves included in the unit for various and sundry reasons, it doesn't apply to all of them, so part of the spec was also to create someone to whom that rule wouldn’t apply.

But why ask that question? The opening scenes at Toccoa serve a specific storytelling purpose - they establish the relationship between Sobel and his men, paint a picture of a difficult training program, and create an environment to explain why these men bonded like they did. 

The larger issue here, then, isn't about whether training was important, but rather 'Have your given your character believable context and backstory and set them up for success within the narrative?' For some original characters who are being included in the unit, that context and their integration is essential to the story. For others, that context will need to come from somewhere else.

We also talked about a character's 'purpose' within the narrative. For most of my fics, I start with a specific romantic purpose in mind, but I didn't have one of those here, so I started with a wartime service - the WAAF - and a name. I used common 1920s UK name lists and a random name generator to assemble some possibilities. Having a name to roll around with helps a little, sometimes and can change, too!

The Women's Auxiliary Air Force fills a wide variety of roles within the RAF, but a great number of jobs for women are in technical positions, learning new technologies like radar and range-finding. Assignments at stations closer to the channel would be much busier than those further inland, which solves two problems. One, it means my OC is closer to Aldbourne, which is in Wiltshire, well out of the way, and two, a sleepy station allows for much less technical knowledge because I don't have to describe people actually using the equipment they're seated next to.

So - Air Aux, very technical, (so she's smart) slow assignment (so she's either not good at her job or she asked to be here?). People get bored all the time at work, so they bring stuff to do. My OC needed some stuff. I had a thought that the British Intelligence Services solved a recruitment problem by putting out an advertisement for people who enjoyed solving crosswords. This was a covert way to get in people who were interested in language and could see patterns and think critically. They're cheap, they're published in a lot of newspapers, they're a good way to pass time on a long shift.

Puzzles are always better with a freind, so I started writing some dialogue between unnamed OFC #1 and OFC #2, later Phyllis and Bernice.

Unkempt women, nine letters.

Us.

I think that leaves us a bit short, I said nine letters. Slatterns! Right, thirty five down, a sticker that doesn't know it's been licked - oh, a stamp.

Why do you bother asking?

Because I'm trying to be sociable, and it's helping keep me awake.

Starting in conversation is helpful to me only because people don’t exist in a vacuum - you can find out more about them, I have found, in group settings, than trying to build them away from all human contact.

As I started writing this dialogue, it came out that Phyl (reading the clues) was really good at puzzles (smart again), and Bernice, her friend, wasn't. Bernice asked why Phyl hadn't done something with that, and that question got me thinking - maybe the reason Phyl didn't go into codebreaking was because they didn't want her - because she's of a slightly lower social class. One of the books about codebreakers is called The Debs of Bletchley Park for the simple reason that a lot of upper class debutantes ended up getting posts there because they knew someone.

I fiddled around with some backstory and dropped some references in for flavor, though I'm still not sure where she's from - in my head, Phyl still speaks with an RP accent. I thought about making her from Yorkshire (thank you, All Creatures Great and Small) but McCray is a Scottish name, so her father or grandfather might have immigrated, probably for work, so I considered Hull (boat-building) Sheffield (mining) and Manchester (manufacturing) as possible cities. National Service could be and often was a great mixer of classes in the UK, and allowed women to do and see things that wouldn't have been possible before the war, so a young woman from a working class background could make something of herself with hard work.

Though this didn't make it into the sketch, the magazine I used for the crossword, MacCleans, is a periodical from Canada. I thought about putting in a reference to one or more of the pilots on their base being from Canada, but in the end it didn't work, so the reference got cut. There's actually a story in that particular issue (April 1943) about Bomber Command. A reference to other pilots or officers on base would give me some more characters to play with in later scenes, and possibly set up a romantic entanglement, if the Canadian officer gave her the magazine as a gift, knowing she liked puzzles.

I didn't do too much with this in specific, but as the scene played out, I got the sense that Phyl is older than Bernie by a few years, and has also been in the services longer - she's seen more, heard more, and done more, and is used to this life. And we sort of see that in the scene - she's prepared for the night shift with her crossword and her cup of tea, whereas Bernie is fidgeting.

In a cursory look through tumblr, I found a quote from Sergeant Anne Lowe, talking about the Battle of Britain, saying "You always knew when they were dead when they took their names off the board. (…) There were so many. They mourned each other so simply and with no fuss and went off rushing into the air again. Now at last, we began to know and understand a little and now we knew war. Always there was a sound of weeping. Every day some girl was weeping."

So, someone who had been longer in the service, who had lived through life at one of those busier coastal installations, had lived through the Battle of Britain, had watched a lot of men she'd danced with come back changed or not come back at all, would have a very different perspective than a young woman who just joined and comes with none of that baggage, and is anxious about being on a slow assignment when she could be doing something much more exciting.

The ending line of the scene - "She would learn. They all did, eventually" was supposed to be a hat tip to the fact that something has happened to Phyllis in the past, regarding boyfriends or making new friends, which would hopefully pay out when she meets the promised Americans in the next scene.

So. Started with some dialogue, let the two characters in the scene feel each other out a bit and learned more about them in the process, tried to come up with some backstory that would support them and a story going forward, tried to give them some context within the story and the larger picture of the war, hopefully gave the reader some reasons to come back for the next chapter.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

More on that Anne Lowe quote:>> http://spitfiresite.com/2010/09/battle-of-britain-1940-losses.html

[gentlemen-of-lies]

Gentlemen of Lies, chapter 4

Who needs to follow the Law(son)?

————

(Beginning)

(Next chapter)

(Previous chapter)

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“So how did it go?” Asked Owen, the following morning. Curt was sitting with him in a sandwich shop near the hostel. Terrible place, with terrible sandwiches. But the coffee was decent, and it was weirdly full most of the time, which made for a good spot to swap notes.

“I found out which café he goes to after work, so following him will be a piece of cake. We’re already on friendly terms.” Curt took a bite out of a ham and cheese sandwich, a combination so simple he couldn’t believe anyone could screw it up, yet somehow the shop had. And this was their profession. He didn’t take another bite.

“Not bad. Any information?”

“On the first meeting? All I found out was where he worked, and I already knew that.”

“That’s it? How long did you stay with him?” Curt didn’t know how to tell Owen that he’d only stuck around for about ten minutes before rushing off to trail Lawson, so he didn’t.

“Nearly two hours, but the guy’s not a talker, and he was starting to get pissed at me. What did you want me to do, make him suspicious?” Owen scoffed, a usual occurrence when he was around Curt, even when nothing seemed to call for it. He hadn’t ordered anything either, which inexplicably made Curt even more infuriated at him.

“So what’s the plan for the day?” Prompted Curt. Owen leant back in his seat, and pondered for a moment.

“That’s up to you,” he concluded.

“Huh?”

“We’re supposed to be partners. Not teacher and student. You figure it out. If you screw it up, it’s your problem. I’m heading into the agency today for more files on the suspects. You can do whatever you think is best.”

“Oh well... okay then.” This was perfect! Curt now had the free rain to investigate Lawson. He’d been thinking about it all last night, in between sips of stale whiskey. He needed to find away to make proper contact with Lawson, and he couldn’t count on the guy being as talkative as Hayes, because what were the odds of that? So sitting down in front of him in a café may not be his best option. He needed a guaranteed plan to strike up a conversation- maybe even some semblance of a friendship with Lawson.

But for that, he needed more information. So for now, tailing him was all he had.

Lawson had already left for work by the time Curt arrived at his apartment building, which meant he had a good few hours to investigate, and perhaps he could find a way to talk to one of the neighbours, find out any information from them. Either they knew something useful, or they knew nothing- which would add even more suspicion to his growing case.

Curt didn’t want to hang around outside making a plan, in case any residents spotted him, so he ducked into the alleyway to try and figure out how to make contact with the neighbours. He supposed he could pretend to be a police officer, asking around for a case, trying to find witnesses. He didn’t look like a police officer, nor did he have a badge. But if he found someone gullible enough, and told them he was undercover, or off-duty, he might be able to find something out at least. He just had to be careful. No loitering, or messing around. If none of the neighbours accepted his claims of being an officer, he’d have to just walk away without a fuss. If he blew this case while investigating someone he wasn’t supposed to, he’d never hear the end of it.

He neatened himself up, and exited the alleyway, making his way up the front steps of the apartment building. He looked at the little metal plaques on the side of the building, trying to work out from name which neighbour might help him. On the first floor lived a couple, the plaque simply said “The Davidsons”. Couples were usually helpful. Even if one wasn’t, the other tended to be. Better if they had a child; if they thought a crime had been committed they’d be eager to help for their own safety. Curt rang the doorbell next to their name, and waited for a few moments. The front door of the building soon clicked open, and a young woman appeared, a baby sitting sitting on her lap, looking up at Curt curiously.

“Hello?” She said.

“Morning. Sorry to bother you,” began Curt, reverting to his British accent. “I’m from the police force, investigating a crime, and I just wanted to ask around the area for any witnesses or evidence. Standard procedure, nothing to worry about ma’am.” By this point, Curt was winging it with his dialogue. But he wasn’t bad at bluffing his way through acts.

“You don’t look like a police officer,” observed the woman, rather predictably.

“No, I’m technically off-duty. But the sooner this case gets solved the better.”

“What’s the case?”

“Just a burglary, up the street from here. I wanted to know if you’ve seen anyone or anything suspicious.”

“No, nothing. I haven’t heard of any burglary...” Shit. Maybe burglary wasn’t a good option. People talked, neighbours talked. Of course this lady would know about a burglary in the area.

“Well, oddly enough nothing was taken. Just a broken window. It may not even have been a burglary. I expect the owners didn’t feel the need to say anything. They’re in the building four doors down from the alleyway. Flat 1?”

“Oh, right. Mr Harris. He’s old. Reclusive. No wonder he didn’t say anything.” Curt silently breathed a sigh of relief, disbelieving of his own luck.

“Yes, exactly. And you definitely didn’t see anything?”

“Not that I remember. When was the incident?”

“Late evening last Tuesday. Around nine thirty?”

“No, my husband and I were out at a show, we left the kids with a babysitter. I can always call her if you want, she might have seen something.” Ah jeez... it’d be weird for him to say no, but Curt was starting to dig himself into a hole.

“Of course, why don’t you write down her contact details, I can reach her later.”

“I’ll go and grab a pen, if you give me five minutes-”

“Actually, before you do that,” interjected Curt, really not wanting to stand outside for five minutes with no more information than he had started with. “Would any of your other neighbours know anything do you think?”

“I mean, you can certainly ask, but I know Gerald was away on Tuesday, he lives in flat 2A just upstairs.” Flat 2A? Well this was perfect. Not only did he have the name of Lawson’s direct neighbour, but he also had an opportunity to bring up Lawson in the first place.

“What about flat 2B? I noticed it wasn’t listed on the building?”

“Oh, no one really knows the man who lives there. His name’s John I think. Forgot his surname. Lives alone. He doesn’t talk to us much, smiles on his way out to work though, so I suppose he’s a nice bloke.”

“Was he out on Tuesday?”

“Lord knows, probably. He’s out a lot. He’s out right now actually, but then so is most people, come back later and you can talk to him.” Curt didn’t want Lawson seeing him, at least not yet. It was too risky. But he’d definitely be back, perhaps to talk with Gerald, whoever that was. But he still had to deal with his duty of tailing Hayes, and hopefully shaking off Owen for long enough as well.

Curt waited out the rest of the hours in the café that Hayes went to after work, since it was fairly near to Lawson’s building. And the sandwiches here were much better, with bread that didn’t taste like a sponge, and ham and cheese that didn’t share a concerning likeness to plastic.

The sun grew higher in the sky, and Curt wondered what Owen was doing right now. The man didn’t seem to be very involved in the case, leaving everything up to him. Perhaps he’d been instructed to stay out of it as much as possible, so Curt could gain “experience”. But whether the explanation was a mark on his competence or not, Curt didn’t care, since he was certain the case would go much quicker without Owen telling him what he could and couldn’t do.

The bell near the door tinkled and Curt looked up absent-mindedly. Hayes had just walked in, which was a surprise. Curt glanced at his watch. It was already going on five...? He’d barely noticed.

He waved Hayes over.

“Howdy,” he greeted. Howdy? Going too far, Curt, you’re not a cowboy.

“Hello. I wasn’t expecting to see you so soon.” Hayes sat down opposite, depositing his briefcase on the floor.

“Well, I was just passing, thought I’d stop in for a coffee.” Curt was already itching to go back to Lawson’s building. If he made an excuse now, he could easily leave. Say he had a deadline to meet, writing stuff. Really musn’t stay.

“This is great, you can tell me all about America. You know I really am interested, i’ve only ever been around Europe, never to the States, at least not yet. So I don’t know much-” jeez this guy really was a talker. He actually wanted to know about America? That was just something Curt had said to be polite, to say when he had nothing else to say. He wasn’t a teacher and this wasn’t a lesson.

But Hayes was still a suspect. Which meant Curt couldn’t blow him off, leave him disappointed and risk him not opening up again. Besides, he suddenly thought. This guy worked in the same building as Lawson. Perhaps the two knew each other. Of course, Curt couldn’t bring Lawson up; he was supposed to be a travel writer from America. How would he know Lawson? But it was still in his best interest to keep Hayes on good terms.

So Curt ended up sitting in that damn café, getting through two cups of coffees and a bagel, talking all about his life in America, to a guy who simply would not lose any sign of his curiosity.

He supposed it was nice in a way, almost like a break from work and just talking about life before he became a spy. But Lawson was on the back of his mind the entire time, so he couldn’t help but feel very restless, and by the end of the conversation, he was almost exhausted from talking. Along with being chatty, Hayes also asked question after question. It was like dealing with a toddler. A balding toddler with a suit and briefcase.

By the time the clock reached six, Curt decided that he simply couldn’t stick around. He’d said enough. Excusing himself would no longer be impolite.

“This has been great, but I really have to get back to my hostel. It has a curfew you see.” Technically the curfew was at ten, which still gave Curt plenty of time, but Hayes didn’t need to know that.

“Oh of course! I’m sorry if I’ve been so persistent.” Curt brushed his apology off with a wave of his hand.

“Not at all, it was nice.”

“It was! I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me.” Hayes was a sweet guy. If he did turn out to be the mole, Curt would genuinely be disappointed. But then maybe that was a red flag. Perhaps he was too nice.

“Sure thing. I’ll be seeing you.” Curt stood up, placed a handful of coins on the table for the waiter, and finally left the shop, the sun already starting to set.

Now for Lawson. If Owen wasn’t so stubborn, surely Curt should be praised for his dedication. Two suspects in one day. Not bad.

[thenafics]

Evil Author Day -- 2020

I saw this going around and I both wanted to feel included and have several WIPs that are probably not going to see the light of day for a long time. Most of these have titles already because I am incapable of writing a fic without having a title first~~~

1. Trouble in the Henhouse- AKA Red Hood joins the Suicide Squad

       Amanda Waller thinks she might have made a mistake with the newest member to her team. She’s let the fox into the hen house, except her hens are insane criminals and her fox is a bat who also happens to be an insane criminal. The metaphor starts to deteriorate quickly, but the point remains, this choice might have been the worst one she’s made in a good long while. He is an accident waiting to happen and one of the most deadly assets she has ever managed to get her hands on. He doesn’t kill for money, like Deadshot, or hunger, like Croc, or even some deranged showmanship, like Harley does or Joker’s Daughter did. He kills when he thinks it’s right, because he thinks the target deserves it and that is the most terrifying thing to find in a highly trained killer she’s putting onto a team with a lot of the same type of people he has a habit of offing. Whoops.

2. Ghosts of our Better Natures 

       Tim can tell the instant that Scarecrow’s formula really starts to kick in. He sees the way Jason’s body language shifts, his muscles pulling his limbs in tighter, in spite of the restraints holding him down. Judging from the smirk just visible on Scarecrow’s sack-cloth face, he notices too. “Is my new formula finally kicking in?” His high, grating voice overlays over the sounds of Jason’s harsh breathing. “Looks like the big, bad drug lord has a bit of a tolerance. I doubt I’ll even need to use half as much on your little friend over there.” Scarecrow gestures broadly at Tim where he’s tied up against the wall and then claps his hands with fake glee. “I know what we’ll do! We’ll use all of the extra I’m saving on him for you!”        Jason wrenches at his restraints, eyes wild behind his domino mask, but he remains uncharacteristically silent. He looks over at Tim and another wave of panic seems to crash over him. His struggles increase in strength to the point where Tim can hear the groaning of the rusty bolts holding Jason down.

3. Rafters for Roustabouts- JayRoy based on a piece of fanart I saw and can no longer find

       Roy remembers when Jason was just a skinny little twig of a thing trailing after  Nightwing with his spindly limbs and closed off smiles. The first time they’d met, Jason had looked up at him and blushed so hard that Roy was a little worried he might pass out from all the blood rushing to his head. Jason was in the Tower pretty infrequently, but any time he was there, Roy could be sure to find him either abandoning Dick for Donna (who he had immediately latched onto, like a baby bird imprinting on what it thinks is its mother) or acting as Roy’s shadow. Roy could often tell when Jason was visiting well before Dick told him because of the glimpses of inky black hair he would catch out of the corner of his eye. Eventually Roy got tired of waiting for Jason to stop being so shy. “Hey, Jason, I know you’ve got that whole stealth thing going for you, but it’s much easier to make friends if you just talk to people.”        There was a muted thump and a little yelp as Jason fell down from the rafter he’d been perched on. Roy made his way over to him and crouched down to look more closely at Jason. The younger boy was blushing furiously and had his hands pressed firmly over his eyes, almost as if he thought if he couldn’t see Roy, Roy might not see him. Roy let out a little huff of laughter. “You’re just a little shy, aren’t you Jaybird?”        Jason just burrowed further into his hands and seemed ready to just wait until Roy left so that he could tend to his bruised pride and tailbone.

4.   Chapter 2 of Release of Liability- My very self indulgent Dresden Files fusion au that nobody asked for or wanted. *Knowledge of the Dresden Files universe up to like, book one/two is v. helpful*

Wayne manor is steeped in the type of magic that can make a place a living thing. This is the home of one of the most powerful wizards in America and has been the home of an incredibly powerful magical family for centuries. There’s history in these walls beyond what the outside world will ever know. All of the wall fixtures are old fashioned gas lamps retrofitted with lightbulbs. It’s a darker paint job and some cobwebs away from being the house from the Addam’s family.

Bruce Wayne himself leads me further into the house and to what I assume must be his office. An older man appears almost the exact moment we sit down and offers tea in a clipped British accent. He disappears as silently as he appeared and rematerializes just moments later carrying a tray laden with tea and those fancy little sandwiches they always show on the BBC. Wayne thanks him and dismisses him with a soft “Thank you,” before the man is gone again.

“So, Mr.Dresden, I hear you’re good at finding lost things.”

“I tend to be. Though I have to wonder what use a practitioner of your caliber could have for my services. With all of Gotham at your disposal.”

“The situation requires a somewhat delicate approach.” I can’t help but snort in response. Delicate and I go together like oil and water. I am not who anyone should call for delicate, subtle, or any synonyms of that ilk. Wayne gives a wry smile and little laugh of his own.

“I misspoke. Not delicate, detached. I am well known to Gotham. You are not. I’ve heard wildcard is somewhat your area of expertise.”

“I’m not going to take offense at that because it’s true. What’s missing?”

Bruce Wayne fixes me with a paralyzing gaze and speaks two words that let me know this is going to be one of those cases that sticks with me.

“My son.”

Bruce Wayne is famous for several things in the magical community. His childhood trauma of witnessing his parents’ murder would make a YA author weep and left him the sole heir to one of America’s most notable magical lineages. That alone made him a Name, capital letter intended, in the world of the mystical. He also worked hard to actually become one of the most influential wizards in America and run Gotham with an iron fist. The most notable thing about Bruce Wayne however, is not either of those. It is his incredible and almost suspicious number of extremely powerful adopted children. A disturbing number of which share his jet black hair and blue eyes. I hope it’s just a weird narcissistic rich person thing.

He is well known to be very protective of his bevy of apprentices. To the point where he’d actually knocked out another wizard with a vicious right hook for making an untoward comment about his eldest son. It was a glorious day and I am thankful to have been within enough distance of the scene to see it go down. I am also thankful to have been far enough away that his fury didn’t turn to me. If something has happened to one of his beloved children, I have no doubts that Mr. Wayne will do whatever is necessary to save them. After the death of his second apprentice he’d practically torn apart the world at its seams in his grief.

5.  Windows for Bricks-  

“I’m here to pick up Damian. I guess I’m one of his emergency contacts and the lady on the phone said to sign in here before I could take him home.” Jason says to the nurse by the front of the sterile smelling room.

“Oh, are you,” she looks down at her computer screen “Jason Head?”

“Yeah, that’s me.” Jason shifts uncomfortably.

“And you are his … “

“Brother. Same mom.”

“I see. We get Damian in here a lot so I see the resemblance. You have the same eyes”

6. Dialogue Snippet- Dick and Steph on the topic of ass envy

“He’s just jealous of my ass.”

“Yeah, no.”

“What do you mean no?” Dick sounds affronted.

“Have you seen his ass?,” Steph gestures expansively in the shape of an ass. A woman at the next table over glares. “Jay has no reason to be jealous Dick.”

“What.”

“And those thighs… unf.” The lady the next table over glares harder at the noise Steph makes.

“Ohmygod,” Dick buries his head in his hands. “Please stop.”

“What? I'm just saying, he's got no reason to be jealous when the dude is bammin slammin bootylicious”

“I'm pretending I don't know you. Can Tim take you back already?”

“Fine. But take a peek next time you and your ass feel so high and mighty”

7. Innocence for Sinners- JayDick prawn. I wrote this at the request of a friend. Very much not what I usually write, kind of nervous about posting it

*warning for Mature rating*

When he thinks about it, of course it makes sense to Dick that Jason is a virgin. He died before he’d even turned eighteen and spent a few years after that being either brain dead or criminally insane. It was really only in the past three or so years that Jason could be counted among the semi-rational members of the population and he had been so busy during that time span that there was no earthly way he had done anything. Still, Dick couldn’t help but be a little surprised when Jason pushes away from their kiss, while Dick’s hand rubs gentle circles over his crotch, and gasps out “No one’s ever touched me like that before.” 

Dick pauses and pulls back fully, his weight between Jason’s spread legs still pinning the younger man to the bed.

“What do you mean Jason?,” he asks, seeking verbal confirmation for his suspicions. Jason blushes prettily and turns his head to one side, as if to escape the weight of Dick’s eyes. Dick reaches out and turns Jason’s face back towards him. His eyes trace the delicate flush that brings out the freckles across the bridge of Jason’s nose and blown out pupils in sea green eyes.

 “Jason, are you a virgin?Am I going to be your first?” Jason blushes even further at the questions and nods mutely. Dick feels a rush of possessiveness pass through him at the idea of brash, rebellious, Jason being his. It only makes sense, after all, Jason had spent years wearing Dick’s colors and a month or so trying on the Nightwing suit for size. Of course Jason should be his in some other way. Dick leans back forward and kisses up Jason’s neck, ending up right by his ear.

“I’m going to ruin you for anybody else, little wing.” Jason shudders and lets out a soft moan as Dick scrapes his teeth against his neck in punctuation.

 “Please,” Jason breathes out. Dick growls quietly and surges up to kiss Jason. He weaves his fingers through the curls of Jason’s hair and pulls slightly. Immediately, Jason gasps into Dick’s mouth and arches his back up off the bed. Dick chuckles and pulls harder. He is rewarded with a moan and a shudder from Jason.

“You like that Jaybird? When I pull your hair?” Dick laughs against Jason’s mouth when Jason nods with downcast eyes. “Let’s find out what else you like.”

Dick leaves one hand in Jason’s hair and worms the other up under Jason’s shirt, brushing over the hard lines of muscle and scar tissue. He thumbs over one of Jason’s nipples gently and feels a slight shudder run through Jason’s body. Taking that as a positive sign, he rolls it between his index finger and thumb. Jason gasps and tosses his head back, breaking the kiss. 

“Dick,” he gasps out, “That feels so, ah, good.” Dick smirks and rolls the nipple again “Aaaaaaah.” Dick pulls his other hand from Jason’s hair and starts using it to push Jason’s shirt up while he brings his mouth down to Jason’s stomach, kissing over the places where his hands had traced over.

“Wait, Dick!,” Jason calls out, panting for breath. Dick looks up at Jason’s flushed face. “I… I have a lot of scars there. Some of them might not be ones that you want to see…” Jason trails off towards the end of his sentence and avoids eye contact with Dick until Dick uses his free hand to gently pull Jason to face him. Dick can see in this flustered and blushing Jason the same boy who had been so shyly admiring of him all those years ago. This shy virginal Jason is far more little red riding hood than the big bad wolf that the Red Hood pretends to be.

“I want all of you Jason. All of you.” Dick says softly. He gently pulls the shirt all the way off of Jason, manipulating the younger man’s arms so that he can remove it. Once the shirt is off, he kisses up Jason’s chest to the top of the Y-shaped scar that stretches from collarbone to collarbone and bisects his body from mid-chest to belly button. Dick mouths gently across the raised tissue and grinds his hips down against Jason’s. Jason can only gasp wordlessly in response as Dick uses his right hand to trace down and past the long tail of the scar to the top of Jason’s jeans. He pops the button and undoes the fly with one hand. When he starts to shimmy Jason’s jeans and boxers down, Jason lifts his hips and practically whines. Dick slides down Jason’s body and sits up in order to pull the pants off all the way before settling himself back between his legs. 

“Your thighs are gorgeous.” Dick doesn’t even try to hold back a moan at all the exposed skin before him, some spots criss-crossed with thin lines left from slashes and stab wounds or spotted with starbursts from gunshots. He takes a moment to appreciate the way Jason’s waist cuts in and then flares out to almost feminine hips and thick, muscular thighs. Dick slides his hands under the small of Jason’s back and inches them down to the top of Jason’s ass.

“Really? You like them?” Jason asks, blushing.

“Babe, I love them. It should be against the law for you to wear pants. It’s practically a crime to keep all this hidden under your jeans.” Dick kneads at the soft flesh of Jason’s ass.

“Says the one who’s all covered up,” Jason gasps out. There’s Dick’s Jason, blushing and innocent, but still talking back. 

“Let’s fix that then,” Dick chuckles and slowly removes his hands, giving one last squeeze on his way. Dick peels off his t-shirt, deliberately twisting his body and putting on a show for Jason who watches with rapt attention. Dick smiles softly at the awestruck look on Jason’s face before making quick work of the clasps on his pants and shimmying out of them completely. Dick bends down and starts to kiss up Jason’s left leg, starting at his calves and working up to his thighs. Once he gets to the sensitive skin on Jason’s inner thighs, he takes his time pressing open mouthed kisses to the skin there. Dick scrapes his teeth against the skin as he pulls away from a kiss about halfway up Jason’s thigh and feels the strong muscles underneath tremble. Smirking, he repeats the action and looks up to watch Jason. The younger vigilante is struggling to hold his composure, but Dick wants to watch him fall apart completely. So he lowers his mouth back down to Jason’s thighs and bites down. At that, Jason arches off the bed hard and lets out the loudest moan Dick has heard from him so far.

8. Runneth Over and all that Jazz- incomplete work for day 7 of Omega Jason Todd Week -Lactation kink au heavily inspired by  @whumpbby and @daemoninwhiteround2 and all their stuff. A little R rated

If it weren’t for his chest, Jason would be nearly impossible to recognise as an omega. He’s taller and more muscular than most omegas so with his deep voice, no one would ever guess. If it weren’t for his body’s absolute betrayal. Jason, like pretty much all adult omegas, produces milk. It’s meant to help reinforce pack bonds and keep pups adopted into a pack fed. That’s not the problem, that part of it is manageable with absorbent pads in shirts and semi-regular use of a breast pump. It sucks, but it’s not the problem. The problem is that Jason’s pack bonds are weak, so his body will let down and start producing milk on a hair trigger. He’s peak fertile age and tangentially part of a mostly alpha pack, but not bonded well enough to balance his hormones, so his body has decided to try and tempt his pack into bonds with milk.

It’s a nuisance. He hears Bruce’s voice on the radio and a little dribble of milk escapes. Dick and Tim get into an argument and he can feel his breasts swelling with more milk. Cass gets injured and he ends up having to sneak off to change his shirt when she cuddles up to him for comfort. He saw Damian cry once and that was enough to get him leaking like a fountain and avoiding the bats for a few days. He knows at least one of them can probably smell the milk on him, but they have the good graces not to mention it so long as he doesn’t. 

So Jason distances himself from the pack. He figures if he doesn’t see them, his body won’t decide to go into hormone overdrive. Except it just ends up compounding the problem. More time away from the pack means even weaker pack bonds, which ends up kicking his hormones into even higher gear than they would have been. Soon, Jason’s having to empty his milk every day, then twice a day, then eventually he has to break in the middle of patrol to empty his breasts so they aren’t incredibly sore as he’s flipping around rooftops. He switches from plain absorbent undershirts to nursing undershirts in all black so that if he leaks it won’t show. It’s gotten way out of hand but the only way to fix it is to either break his pack bonds entirely, which might make it worse, or go to the pack and suffer through some potentially very embarrassing bonding.

He shudders at the thought of his pack finally drinking from him. The vulnerability it would bring stirs up something like panic in his stomach mixed equally with want. Letting them know that he can be manipulated just because of a biological response would put him at a huge disadvantage. If they knew he could be made to let down and go into a pheromone drenched haze with some carefully chosen vocalizations they could use it to their advantage when Jason inevitably pisses one of them off. Still, something has to be done, his chest hurts so much that when he got hit there on patrol, he almost blacked out.

He decides to go to Tim first. The slightly younger man is the easiest for Jason to get along with, and despite his tendency for general sneakery, he has enough respect for what Jason does that he probably won’t use it against him too much. It’s a risk, but the potential for relief from the pain of his swollen nipples and frequent breast pump use are enough to take it. Tim is practical and doesn’t seem like the type to get physically aggressive. Even if he does, his small stature means that Jason should be able to escape. Hopefully he won’t be weird about it. Fingers crossed.

Jason knocks on the door of Tim’s apartment, about an hour before patrol typically starts. Tim answers the door looking sleep deprived as always with a mug of coffee in one hand. Jason gives him a sheepish smile and a half hearted wave, after which Tim gestures him into the apartment, one eyebrow raised in question. He shuts and locks the door behind him.

“Hi Jason. It’s been awhile. What are you doing here?” Just the sound of Tim’s voice is making his chest swell a little.

“Can’t I just come visit?”

“Of course you can, you know I like your company. You just usually … don’t. So… ”

Tim pins Jason in place with his calculating stare as he waits for a response. The silence is incredibly awkward for Jason because every second that passes he can feel the slight swelling inch closer and closer to potential leakage. He finally breaks when he feels a small dribble of milk start to leak from one nipple.

“I need your help.”

“A case?”

“No… “ Jason trails off, still unsure.

“Are you okay Jason?” Tim sets his coffee down and sits next to Jason on the couch. Their arms brush and Jason fucking gushes. If Tim couldn’t smell the milk on him before, he sure as hell can now if the way he sniffs the air is any indication.

“What’s wrong Jay? Why are you, umm, … “

“Leaking?”

Tim nods, nostrils flaring as a blush steals across his face.

“I’m letting down at the drop of a hat right now. I’m overproducing so much that I have to stop in the middle of patrols to pump. It hurts real bad.” Jason couldn't stop the whine from leaking into his tone if he tried. Tim unconsciously responds with a swell of alpha scent. The pheromones set Jason off again and he gasps as he involuntarily lets even more milk escape.

“Jason,” Tim’s voice is practically a whisper. “How can I help?” Jason takes a moment to steady himself under the force of Tim’s gaze, closing his eyes so he doesn’t have to see his reaction to the answer.

“ I need you to drink enough to solidify our pack bond.” 

Tim makes an interested little noise in the back of his throat and places one delicate hand over Jason’s on his lap. He gives a gentle squeeze

“Are you making enough to do it in one go?”

“Were you even paying attention? Yes. I’m producing enough for the whole pack.”

“Why me? If you go off pack hierarchy aren’t you supposed to go to Bruce? Even if you don’t trust Bruce, you could have gone to Dick or Barbara.”

“If you’re not willing, I won’t pressure you.” Jason’s voice is flat as he starts to stand, but he’s stopped by Tim’s suddenly much stronger grip pulling him back to the couch.

“I never said that. I just want to know why you chose me before I potentially upset pack structure.”

“ ‘M more comfortable,” Jason mumbles, avoiding eye contact. “Dick’s too clingy and Babs still thinks I’m crazy most of the time. You’re … nice to me. Helpful.”

“You’re nice to me too Jason. We take care of each other.”

An unfamiliar throaty purr starts up in the back of Jason’s throat as Tim gently presses his shoulders back into the couch. He pushes up Jason’s shirt, making sure to be extra careful right around the chest area. An accidental brush from the back of his hand as he pulls the shirt off causes a whimper to interrupt Jason’s purring. Tim shushes him gently as he sets the shirt to the side in a crumpled ball. Jason glares at him until Tim sighs and folds the shirt semi-neatly. He rearranges himself until he’s draped halfway over Jason’s lap, face centimeters from touching Jason’s chest. Tim stares unashamedly at the plump flesh where he can see the wetness where milk has already escaped. 

[sixcastappreciation]

sixcago gave me my gay rights

alternative title: review of the evening sixcago show on july third

this is like almost 4k and its mostly just rambling but i need to express how much i love sixcago

like at least half of this is just me being gay so i bolded some of the things that i found really interesting and isnt just me like, freaking out

so to start off: holy shit. the energy of the entire show was amazing, it was really funny and fun and the acting/dancing/singing was on point like i cant think of a single complaint on the part of any of them.

so to get into the actual show

ex wives

when the curtain came up and the smoke started pouring out i actually felt my soul leave my body it was such a good moment

less than thirty seconds in brittney mack made eye contact with me and i swear to god my heart stopped and i honestly had trouble focusing on the rest of the song

i am not exaggerating that is the whole truth and nothing but the truth

shes............. literally so good im still shaking as i write this like three hours later

the third repetition of the rhyme where they all sound kinda pissed off? they nailed that

adrianna was so cute when she said “you wont try that again”

andrea holy shit. thats really a wrap on that

abby got that like, kinda head in the clouds thing that i feel like is janes Brand during this part

when he saw my portrait he was like JaaAAaaa

i love brittney mack

courtney knew what she was doing with that prick line. get it girl

anna has the most angelic voice i swear to god

the six of them work really well together on stage???? like i know its all choreo and stuff but you could Feel the energy that they had together it was good

oh man the choreo for the end. im so gay

intro thingy:

adrianna with that riff!!!!! we stan

annas face after “herstory” was iconic. she knew what she had done wrong

you couldnt hear the intro for maggie bc people were cheering so loud

the way adrianna says maria made me gay

abby also knows what she had to say. she knows how cursed janes sense of humor is and she was really playing it up

protestent............ protestant

“we’ll tell you what you want what you really really want” this made me laugh so hard i dont rly remember the next like thirty seconds because i was dying

“the biggest.... the firmest......... the fullest..............” im. i cant

no way

“maria” AGAIN adrianna please. please i cant handle it

“OH muy bien aHHah” not to be Lesbian On Main but fuck this was so cute

her emotion during the monologue was SO funny

it was peak, it was so good

she really gets it. i dont totally know what it is but this aragon monologue gets it

when she said “really trying” she did like, a motion. i cant go into more detail but Fuck

so after “move me into a convent” everyone like, gathered around aragon and adrianna did a

well idk what youd call it but a like

her entire torso swung around in a huge circle right before “i dont think i’d look that good in a wimple”

and idk what it was but that part just made me Lose It

adrianna had this way of making it all a little funnier?

like catherine is usually pretty Serious, i think but it felt like adrianna knew she was playing a character who was Like That, if you will, and was kinda leaning into breaking the fourth wall a little

i can probably elaborate if that doesnt make sense

you say its a pity cos quoting leviticus ill end up kiddiless all my life

she said that with such conviction goddamn

oh, he doesnt remember

this was so good

the “sh-”s were really funny

the fucking. i dont know what it is but the *ting*

holy shit

i cant put into words

how much i loved that part

the pause after “i’ll go” was............ expansive

i just checked it was 10 whole seconds

that doesnt sound long but it felt like forever

she went high on “end of my life” and thank u for mine adrianna hicks

the amount of no’s was impressive and im heart eyes for it

adrianna just had really good stage presence

like i caught myself looking at her during the dance breaks of all the songs when i wasnt looking at brittney

it was just so fun to watch her go!

dluh

during the intro of like “yeah, you know, the really important one” andrea was doing some Dumb Shit in the background

like i dont know exactly what it was but she was just like

idk like noodling around in the back

and i caught her eye and she like, smiled a little

the gasps the rest of them did were....... cute

then andrea busted out a full on fucking witches cackle

then she stuck her tongue out and looked like she was taking a selfie and it was so cute

like, her tongue was OUT

“not my thing” had the BIGGEST uwu energy of anything ive ever heard

i thought people were kidding when they said andrea boleyn had uwu energy

they were not

pret a manger barely came across as a real line it was more like, an experience

the sorry not sorry choreo. its so funny and cute and simultaneously cursed

the way andrea delivered her lines here was just

it was like, cutesy and fun but also kind of cursed

uwu

when she said “are you blind” andrea like, gestured to herself, in a like “look how hot i am” kinda way

which might be the standard? either way it made me laugh a lot

don’t be bitter/cos im fitter was the only line in the entire production said with a british accent and it fucking slayed me on sight one hit ko

i actually like that they changed “mate, what was i meant to do” to “wait, what was i meant to do” because

it implies that anne had no other train of thought than the one she was on and thats very funny to me

i think it fits w andreas portrayal too

everyone was like, fake crying when anne fake walked down the aisle and it was really funny imo

and as soon as she got to the end anne like, turned, yk?

bro just shut up

the entire audience gasped after that

andrea had actual like, panic on her face

then she led into “i guess he just really liked my head”

and there was a beat after that, where everyone laughed

it was long enough that everyone got the joke

then she mimed the blow job

her riff on “hell”? iconic

“wait, didnt you actually die” no jane she was beheaded but she was fine

abby seymour said dumbass rights she has the Dumbest Bitch energy god

“catherine of aragon had tragically died” catch adrianna looking like, yeah it was so sad for me, how terrible, right?

then boleyn goes off

the. fury, passion, anger, zest, contained in andreas “MASSIVE-”

“over my dead body” andrea gave her this look like, youre damn right it will be

heart of stone

oof

okay so the monologue

oof

“i was lucky. okay, i was really lucky” o o f

“edwina” is still cursed tho

i dont know what it was about this. i dont know if it was abby, or the dialogue, or just it being live but

this made it clear that jane had been Through It

like, this monologue came across (to me at least) as unquestionably a “woman who was abused trying to justify it to herself” kind of situation

“and that’s not because i was scared,” she said, wearing an absolutely terrified expression

this is where she started tearing up i think

okay i gotta take a moment here because

abby was fully crying before the song even started

like somewhere about halfway through her monologue she started tearing up

i was looking for it specifically

i wrote this before the last part so see above

so by the first fucking like of hos you could hear her voice breaking

holy shit ms meuller what the fuck

im not kidding who gave her the right

at the stagedoor she said that after this she was like, “well thats it for my makeup” when someone complimented her song

she is crying. the first chorus and she is actively crying. in the breaks between her lyrics you can hear her crying

abby went high on a couple of notes in here

she riffed on “truthfully” and it was, wow

she didnt go for the whistle tones which was, honestly? the most relatable thing in this entire show

but a couple of the other notes she went high on and they were so killer

there was a second or two of pause after the end where everyone just, absorbed things before the applause

i have some questions for abby about this actually because i dont know if its just because the monologue was different than im used to but

i just want to know if abby meant to have everything come off like That but god

the mental gymnastics jane is doing here are so intense

this performance genuinely changed how i listen to hos forever

i dont think i can ever peacefully listen to this song again

this song gave me so many layered emotions thank u abby mueller

haus of holbein

hans................................. *holbein*

the chaos

i honestly barely remember most of it it was

i had no idea who to be looking at

but i remember it being beautiful

i dont have the words to express how

fucking funny it was

the accents were hilarious

like they werent great german accents, but that made it far better

they were leaning into the ridiculousness of it all

the way abby said “but we cannot guarantee that you’ll still walk at forty” had me on the ground

ive spent the last 24 hrs trying to figure out exactly why it was so funny and i think i got it

she dropped the german accent

and she straight up sounded like she was reading off the side effects of a pharmaceutical ad on tv

the freeze frame? legendary

anna and courtney (im pretty sure?) managed to look so genuinely offended that henry swiped left on them

your highness your highness your highness

god adrianna please

actually every h sound that came out of their mouths

but adrianna Got It

get down

oh god i gotta talk about “didnt live up to his expectations”

brittney like, half took off her jacket and gestured to her body and like, body rolled a bit and honestly? i was fucking dead

the sarcasm really jumped out here. brittney went off in the best way possible

she was fully fake sobbing right before “tragic”

fucking legend

brING me some pheasant!

the woof line is always a good moment but their facial expressions really made it work here

this song has the most outwardly complex choreo (ofc i cant speak to its actual difficulty) and every single one of them crushed it

brittney made eye contact w me again on “looking cute” and im deceased

oh god after “take my fur” she whispered “thank you. honestly” and gestured to herself again and like, i was dying

iirc brittney was like, skipping across the stage or something on “i look more rad” and snapped into position for “lutheranism”

we gotta take a moment to appreciate the operatic talent of that one “get down you dirty rascal” instead of the slo mo

like, ofc the slo mo is a good moment but

brittney went full opera and it was,

wow

shes got a voice on her holy shit

so much talent in such a tiny body

aCHYEAH

she picked the person sitting next to me to dance w her and

they did their cute little dance thing and then brittney gestured like, go sit down, and the person did, then stood back up and started dancing again

not like, in a bad way i dont think

it was super fuckin funny and after the song brittney was like “oh that was cute you think youre funny”

but i heard them talking at the stagedoor and like, brittney was chill it wasnt like a violation of anything

im not explaining it very well but it was really funny in person

everything about her on stage was just, so enrapturing

i dont have too many specific notes about this song because it would probably turn into just, me being gay, which is enough of this already

anyway! get down was good brittney mack is a stellar cleves

her fake crying is next level tho

the confrontation

boleyn, unprompted: i lost my head!

the beheaded cousins high fived after “nice neck” and like, stuck out their necks a bit it was so funny

seymours “i died”

we all know abby is gonna kill her line delivery

but GOD

and then after, she like, realized what she had said and struck a pose like, shit please still think im regal

the line itself was actually pretty, uhhhh, sad

theres something about boleyn roasting khoward in andreas voice

courtney with that “and your songs” had perfect timing

also “when will justice be SERVED” had such good punch to it

after she did that she like

rubbed her hand on janes face

and abby looked SO offended

theres something so, sincere about courtneys delivery of her roasts that i hadnt been getting and its SO much funnier to me

i forget exactly where but at some point boleyn aragon and howard were arguing

and in the background it really looked like seymour and cleves were having a normal conversation and i lost it like. they were just chattin

there were a couple moments of like, cleves and seymour interacting and it was interesting

aywd

courtney! mack! took! no! prisoners!

jesus christ

okay so i dont know if other howards do this or if it was just because i was seeing it live and up close and that made the difference but

for me the most compelling part of this howard was the fear

like yes there was the sadness/anger/etc like there was good emotion but

from the “he says we have a connection” re: henry, and then on, everything about courtneys body language just screamed that she was afraid

idk i might expand on this in a separate post because its a darker topic but yeah. holy shit that was emotional

not a single person clapped after the last line. they all waited until after “yeah, and then i was beheaded” before clapping

like the theater was dead silent. DEAD silent

it was like, so haunting because it was just courtney on stage at that point, with just the white spotlight on her, it was a Moment

im not sure i have the heart right now to get too deep into this

if it would be particularly interesting to anyone feel free to ask, im happy to get more into it but idk its just Emotional

actually this is already so long ima go for it

so on each “we have a connection” it was uhhhh parr and aragon (i think) who each put a hand on like, her clavicle

and for the first two verses she grabbed one of the hands and was like, flirty? ig

but on the one about henry seymour also put a hand around her waist and she like

she freaked out

and listening back to the audio i can

unpopular opinion perhaps but the actual emotion of her on stage didnt come thru in the audio

because it was so physical

like you could see how scared she was

which made it more relateable to me honestly

like she looked so so scared

it was heartbreaking

the confrontation part ii

oh BOOH OO MISTERESSES

“okay catherine, babes” is CUTE fight me

anna looked like, progressively more concerned as that beat went on, and then she just kinda like, deflated? it was really funny tbh

idk her parr feels Different than the parr im used to

during “oh im catherine parr i draw the line in arbitrary places” courtney was playing with her hair it was hashtag cute

BACKING VOCALS RIP CATHY PARR

idnyl

a cute little b flat major 7

yeah anna parr seems

hmm

she seems like she’s just, over henry

like from the start she just has no time for him

idk im Conceptualizing

anna uzele is

her voice is next level

she put survived in the “got married to the king became the one who survived” in air quotes which i think is an interesting note

anna got really physically into the “remember that...” bit of it and everyone in the back was also having a good time with it it was Good

andrea. she stuck her pointer finger between two of her other fingers on her other hand for the “my sixth finger” line and it was SO funny

khoward keeping aragon in line was

not the hot take i was expecting but nevertheless the one we deserved

both for “dissolution of the monasteries” and “well actually”

idk it was a cute character moment

one of *unsure, disgusted, vaguely annoyed* siiiIIIiix

abby was right in front of me and she looked SO uncomf

yeah, i read

iconique

andrea like, threw her head back for this line

the pause after “theres not much we can do about it now” is

painfully long and so so so funny

i was only really looking at brittney but she was like, arms down head up no body language it was SO funny

also her “yeah?” ended my life

she raised the mic up to her mouth while not moving an inch of the rest of her body

the part where they get all meta. has me dead

it was about halfway through this second part that i realized cleves had her coat back. i dont know when that happened. if anyone else knows when exactly anna of cleves gets her coat back after it gets taken off in get down please tell me. i genuinely want to know

this actually distracted me

i got vibes that they genuinely hated henry during this part

first off, mood

secondly, good

annas riffing. god.

she is so talented

dsfjksdf they all straight up left

six

the opening moment is really sweet and kinda funny

abby again killing it with janes cursed lines

courtney howard is actually so cute

when shes not being heartbreakingly sad that is

like her “bye!” was so cute

theyre all so supportive of each other its very cute

megasix

adrianna and abby both looked into my camera and like, i died

at the end anna and brittney were doing some dumb shit as they walked off stage and it was SO cute

after the show

i went to the stagedoor and it was a really fun experience! ive never done that before

it seemed like everyone was being pretty respectful and stuff, thank u six fans for being sane

i got four signatures on my program dklfjsldfjds

abby was such a sweetheart, we actually talked a tiny bit

i told her i loved her line delivery (because uhhhhhh i do) and she said that she tries to get in that comedic timing when she has Those Lines and like yeah

she was seriously the nicest

the ladies in waiting came out as well and everyone cheered for them and lets be real they DESERVE it

lemme sidebar here actually and talk about the ladies in waiting because

they killed it

bessie on the bass was living her best life at literally all times

brittney was also super sweet! i told her she had good energy (because uhhhhhh she does) and she was very nice about it!!!

i didnt really talk to anna or andrea but i got their signatures!

also speaking of my program im still losing my mind over “remembered for: headlessness” and “remembered for: staying alive”

thank u sixcago program

in conclusion! this was such a great+special experience!!! all of the actors were incredible, it was so wonderful

im also not claiming any of this stuff was unique to this performance or to sixcago in general this was just the stuff i noticed as i was watching it. if you clown on this post ill end u

[avengerofyourheart]

Leave This Town Pt 12 (Mechanic!Bucky AU)

Characters: reader, Bucky, Tony Stark, Steve, others mentioned. 

Summary: After leaving the small town life behind, you’ve worked hard to make your dreams come true. When something unexpected brings you home, you’re brought back to the place where everything changed. Timing is everything and now there just might be a second chance with the man you left behind.

Song Inspiration: Angela by The Lumineers

Warnings: Tiny bit of angst, mostly fluff.

Word Count: 3.6k

Tags are at bottom (TAG LIST IS CLOSED I’M SORRY)

**This fic is for @bionic-buckyb ‘s 5K AU Writing Challenge**

A/N: Whoo, boy, you guys. It was a little odd writing Steve and Bucky meeting. Even as an AU. haha. :D Hope you like their interaction, though! I really thought this would be the end, but surprise! An epilogue is coming. I do love a good epilogue. Hope you do, too! And I also hope you like this part! Please let me know your thoughts!! All feedback is welcome. I love you guys. 

<<<Part 11   Part 12   Epilogue (End)>>>

Leave This Town Masterlist

Full Masterlist

____________________________________________________

Previously:

Your eyes flew wide and within seconds, you discovered the man’s perfectly styled dirty-blond hair and a pair of bright blue eyes met yours from across the room. He smiled and raised a hand in greeting before making his way toward you.

“Is that Steve Rogers?” Bucky asked with a tone of admiration in his voice. “Looks like he’s headed this way. Are you two close friends?”

“Um…” you hesitated, watching Steve’s progress across the room as he continued to shake hands and greet people along the way. “About that. There’s something I should probably tell you…”

_________________

“What is it?”

You shifted nervously, glancing at the approaching Steve before returning your gaze to Bucky. “Remember how I was seeing someone and broke it off just before I came back into town?” you asked quietly, then hesitating.

“Uh...I guess so, why…” Bucky began, then pausing as the light came on and his eyes grew wide. “You and…he…you were dating Steve Rogers before me?” he hissed at a whisper.

You nodded slowly. “Yes.”

“But he’s…I…how could you not tell me?” he replied, a look of hurt passing over his features.

“I’m sorry, but at what point do you mention that your last boyfriend was literally a famous movie star? Would you have responded any differently, even back then?” you asked as he chewed on his lip in consideration.

“Maybe not…”

“Look,” you began, looping your arms around Bucky’s waist and leaning close, “the point is, I chose you. Okay? I broke up with him before I left L.A., not knowing if there was still a chance for us. I hoped, but either way I still chose you even if I wasn’t sure you would feel the same. I want you. Only you.”

Bucky finally met your gaze and took a deep breath, then nodding. “Okay.”

You exhaled in relief. “Okay. I love you.”

He let out half a smile and pulled you closer. “I love you, too,” Bucky declared, then pressing a chaste kiss to your lips before resting his forehead against yours a short moment.

You released your grip on him and turned around just in time to see Steve merely feet away, his million dollar smile on full display. He wore an expertly cut tuxedo over his muscular frame, his hair perfectly quaffed and chiseled jaw clean-shaven. Eyeing the two of you, Steve offered a soft gaze and came to a stop before you.

“Y/N, it’s so good to see you,” he grinned, leaning forward for a light hug and kiss on the cheek.

“Hi, Steve. It’s been a while. Great to see you, too,” you replied, then returning your focus to Bucky, who was fidgeting with his tie. “Steve Rogers, this is Bucky Barnes, my boyfriend. Bucky, this is Steve Rogers,” you spoke, gesturing between the two men as Steve offered his hand.

“Wow, so this is the infamous Bucky?” Steve asked as Bucky accepted his hand and gave it a shake, the brunet seeming a bit starstruck. “I’m really glad that things worked out for you two. It’s nice to finally meet you, Bucky,” the blond finished with a nod.

Bucky took a moment to respond, “Um…I, uh…it’s really great to meet you, Mr. Rogers. I’m a big fan,” he finally replied with a nervous smile.

“Please, just Steve is fine. And I’m a big fan of yours. I hear you were a big influence on Y/N’s work. I guess it was all meant to be, then, huh?” he smiled at you with a wink.

Bucky looked your way in confusion, but you just grinned at him and mouthed the words “You’ll see”.

Steve opened his mouth to speak again, but was interrupted when his name was called by a gorgeous brunette with kind eyes, painted lips, and soft curls just past her shoulder. “Steve, darling, can you come here a moment?” she called out in a posh British accent.

“I’ll be right there,” he replied to her before turning back to you.

Your eyes flew wide, then speaking in a whisper. “Is that Margaret Carter? You did one of your first films with her, right? I didn’t know you were still in touch…wait…Peggy?” you asked with an excited grin as the pieces fell together in your mind.

Steve ducked his head as he nodded slightly, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yup. Some things just take a little bit more time, right?” he shrugged.

“I’m really happy for you,” you told Steve sincerely, holding his gaze.

“Thank you, Y/N. I’m happy for you, too. It was great to meet you, Bucky. I better get back,” he said to you both with a raise of his hand before he walked back to his date.

“Well, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” you asked, turning back toward Bucky whose gaze was still off in the distance. “Buck?”

“He was so nice and…normal,” Bucky replied, still in awe. “And he knew about me? How?”

You slipped your hand back into his and gave it a squeeze. “I told him the truth about why I wanted to break up before I left town and shared the story of how you and I met. He could tell there was still something there, for me at least, and he even encouraged me to find out if there was a true possibility for us. He really is a good man. Just not the man for me,” you ended, brushing a hand across Bucky’s stubbled cheek. He grasped it and pressed a kiss to your palm before releasing it.

“I guess I have him to thank, then?” he asked with a shake of his head. “Wow. I met Steve Rogers,” he grinned.

Letting out a burst of laughter, you pulled Bucky further into the room and introduced him to a few more people before the doors to the theater opened and everyone filed in to take their seats. You grasped Bucky’s hand as the opening credits began to roll. Now it was your turn to be nervous. You had seen some rough cuts and spent a few days on set, but this was the big production. The moment of truth where you found out if all the pieces came together just as you had hoped.

The first scene opened with a girl pulling an empty bag from the closet and stuffing it with clothes in a hurry. The sound of a zipper closing and she’s down the stairs, feeling her way toward the door in the dark before she stepped out into the cricket-filled air. Adding the bag to her already packed car, she gave one last look at the dark house before climbing into the driver’s seat and starting the engine.

The scene then cut to the car racing down the highway as voiceover was heard of the girl reading a note that is shown left behind on her bed. Her mother would find it in the morning, explaining how she was finally leaving town how she always wanted to and that she just had to chase her dreams. Next the camera panned up from the road, showing steam rising out from underneath the hood of her car which was parked on the dusty shoulder. The girl was spotted sitting on the car’s trunk while the sun rose behind her.

As a tow truck appeared on the horizon on screen, you felt Bucky grip your thigh and you glanced his way to see a teary smile upon his face. You felt happy tears threatening as well, pulling Bucky down by his tie for a kiss before you both settled in to watch a fictionalized version of your love story play out on the screen.

You wrote the screenplay almost a year ago and had changed names to protect the innocent, but anyone who was there would know that it was you and Bucky. The two leads were unknowns, their previous works including commercials and supporting roles on tv shows. Thankfully, they had great chemistry and portrayed their parts exceptionally well. Some of those acting as townspeople were more well-known and were able to help draw attention to the film.

Even though parts of the script were cut during editing and different inflection was used for dialogue, it gave you chills to hear not only the words you wrote but the words you also had spoken yourself. It wasn’t exact, but close, especially during the fight in the hotel room. You still felt a flash of shame that you had acted so selfishly back then. Bucky slipped an arm around you and pressed a kiss to your temple, bringing a smile to your face.

Apologies were shared at the fictional auto shop and tears were shed, which then lead to the scene you were most anxious about. You had debated whether or not to include the car sex scene, but in the end decided it was crucial to their story arc and an important part of the eventual goodbye. A different type of classic car was used, as you had written, but the scene was emotional and tasteful. It still brought some heat to your face, though, as you conjured memories from that moment years ago.

She was back on the road then, wind whipping through her hair until she decided to pull over to the side and got out of the car. The girl stood in the middle of the abandoned road, looked one direction, and then the other with a look of indecision upon her face. She got back into her car and glanced at the map spread across the passenger’s seat before digging through her purse for her phone.

The last shot showed a wide smile upon her face followed by her thumb hovering over the green call button and then the screen went black. Credits began to roll and the sound of applause was heard as you finally came back to the present. You took a deep breath, blinking a few times before you registered that Bucky was speaking to you.

“It’s…it’s amazing, doll. Wow. And you said romance wasn’t your forte,” he grinned, giving you a tight squeeze as much as the theater seats would allow.

Chuckling thickly, you sniffled and met his eye. “Well, I had the right kind of inspiration,” you admitted, brushing a finger under your eye to remove any black smudges from your tears. It had been an emotional experience to witness this particular project come to fruition. “Truthfully, I was a little nervous about how you would react to my using our story for a film.”

“Really? I admit, I was surprised and I’d be more apprehensive if it was exactly the same, but you tweaked it just enough. I loved it. Brought up wonderful memories of that time,” he said with a smile. “So…what happens to the girl?” he asked in a low voice as people continued to mill around and leave the theater.

You shrugged with a smile. “I’m not sure. I left that open to the audience and honestly, I didn’t even know when I wrote it.”

“You wrote it before we—“

“Yup. I had just finished the script a few weeks before I came back into town. I was actually supposed to be working on a different project, but something kept nudging me to finish the one story that I couldn’t leave alone. Inspiration is a fickle thing, so I just let it flow. You were never far from my mind that whole time we were apart,” you confessed, placing a hand on Bucky’s thigh.

He stood then, pulling you up as well before wrapping his arms around your waist. “I think those two kids can make it,” he said knowingly, then pressing a slow, lingering kiss to your lips.

“I hope so,” you whispered as you broke apart.

His brow furrowed then. “Wait…so how did Steve Rogers know I was inspiration for this film?” Bucky inquired.

“Tony mentioned that Steve was sent the script when they were looking for the leads, but casting ultimately decided to go with unknowns, which I’m actually grateful for. He must have seen my name as the writer and connected the dots with what I had told him about you and me,” you answered with a shrug.

“Huh,” he replied quizzically. “He said he was a fan of mine. I’m not gonna get over that,” he declared with stars in his eyes.

You laughed as Bucky led you out the double doors and into the foyer that was packed with people, many of whom were now vying for your attention.

“We don’t have to stay, Buck. It’s okay,” you stated with a soft hand against his chest.

Bucky just shook his head and hugged you tight before releasing you. “This is your night. You deserve recognition. Like you said, it’s a celebration. For you,” he smiled, joining in the applause that had erupted around you.

You brought a hand up to your face in mild embarrassment, finding yourself the center of attention. Tony came to your side and said he “never doubted you for a minute about the ending”, to which you rolled your eyes but thanked him. The two young stars said hello to you along with the producers and director. Some time had passed before you looked around to see that Bucky was standing off to the side with a drink in his hand. He gave you a smile and a thumbs up to say that he was okay, so you turned back to the conversation.

Thirty minutes later, you came to Bucky’s side and stole a drink from his glass. “I’m ready to go,” you declared.

“Are you sure?” he asked. “I overheard that director wanting to talk to you about another future project. That’s great, Y/N. You should go for it,” he encouraged you.

“Not tonight. I have their contact info and they have mine. The talk can wait. I’m all talked out,” you confessed, pulling Bucky into a hug and tucking your head under his chin. “I’m ready to go home.”

Bucky rubbed a hand against your back and sighed. “Okay. Let’s call the chauffeur guy.”

“I already texted him. He’ll be here in five,” you said with a yawn. The adrenaline had kept you going most of the night, but it now began to dissipate.

“Okay, then,” he chuckled.

A few last goodbyes and you two slipped out the back entrance and into the car where you collapsed into your seat. The city lights streaked past through the tinted windows making you drowsy, and in no time, you were awakened by Bucky. He helped you up the walk to your condo and you slipped off your heels first thing, carefully setting them in the box provided by the wardrobe team.

Reaching for the zipper on our dress, you found it difficult to manage so you turned to ask Bucky for help only to see him standing in the dining room near the floor to ceiling windows that looked out over the city. He had his back to you as you approached. Coming to his side, you saw that he had loosened his tie and undone the top buttons of his shirt. You opened your mouth to speak but thought against it upon seeing his faraway expression.

He stood with hands buried in his suit pockets, his gorgeous profile on full display from your vantage point as he began to speak.

“So, this is your life now. Kinda hard to compete,” he said with a sad smile, then looking your way.

“No, this,” you began, gesturing to the elaborate wardrobes and jewels around your neck, “this is not my normal life. The fancy dresses and parties, that happens maybe twice a year and I’m always glad to get it over with by the end of the night. And there’s no competition, Bucky. It’s not small town life versus big city life. I don’t want you to think that I’m asking you to choose, either. L.A. has offered me wonderful opportunities and connections, but it still doesn’t feel like home. Not without you,” you said, gathering both of his hands in yours.

Bucky glanced down at your joined hands and replied softly, “So what does it all mean for us? You are so incredibly talented, Y/N. You deserve this life and you fit in here. I could never forgive myself if I became the reason you walked away.”

You shook your head firmly. “That’s exactly what I’m saying, why does it have to be one or the other? I go months on end where I barely leave the house, so technically, I can work wherever there’s WiFi. You have that now, right?” you asked with a coy smile.

He chuckled. “As I recall, it was installed without my knowledge, but yeah. It’s there. So, what…you’d stay with me for part of the year?”

You cocked your head with a shrug. “If you’ll have me. You’d get to see me in full-immersion-crazy-writer-mode. That’d be fun,” you grinned.

Bucky threw his head back in laughter. “I can’t wait. And I’ll take you any way I can get you. I love you, Y/N,” he confessed, using a finger under your chin to tilt your head up.

“I love you, too, Bucky. So much,” you replied with a slight crack in your voice, then clearing it. “I know it still seems hard, but we can make it happen. There will be compromises and struggles, but every relationship has those. I know you talked about meeting me half-way, but relationships aren’t 50/50. It’s about two people who try to give 100% every single day. We choose each other every day without fail. Sometimes one has to be willing to carry a little more of the weight, but as long as we’re on the same path headed in the same direction with goals in common, we can do it. Are you with me?” you asked, touching your forehead to his.

He let out a sniffle followed by a chuckle. “God, you’re amazing. And once again, very convincing with your fancy words. Yes, I am with you. And for the record, I chose you, too, all those years ago. I didn’t know how or when, but I knew it had to be you,” he stated, pressing his lips to yours that quickly escalated into a passionate kiss that was headed for more, but you were now hindered by those fancy clothes.

Chest heaving, you pulled away reluctantly. “Okay, so we gotta get out of these designer threads so we can shower off the goop in our hair and feel more human before we can get down and dirty,” you proposed with a wiggle of your eyebrows.

He laughed at that and agreed with a nod as he followed you into the living room where you stripped off the expensive clothing and packed it away carefully. You really didn’t want to have to pay full price for any of that. Racing up the stairs only in your underthings, Bucky was right behind you heading for the shower.

___________

You woke up chilly the next morning, pulling the sheet around your bare body before noticing that Bucky wasn’t in sight. The balcony door was wide open, hence the cool breeze, so you slipped out of bed and donned your terrycloth robe before stepping out into the morning sunlight.

The sight before you nearly took your breath away, stopping you in the balcony doorway. The ocean was quite the view, but more notably, Bucky was clad only in those sweats you loved on him, the material tied low on his hips. His torso was bare and his hair wild, giving you the urge to caress every single inch of him. Not that you hadn’t done that already last night.

Glancing back into the room, you spotted evidence of your late night escapades. The down comforter and pillows were strewn about the room along with what little clothing you managed to slip on after a shower. Bucky’s guitar case was open revealing the 6-stringed Flamed Maple acoustic instrument that he had serenaded you with sometime during the night. Once again, he played without a stitch of clothing but this time the song choice was “Rhythm & Blues” by The Head and the Heart, a new favorite of yours. You had practically tackled him after singing that last line of “Won’t you let me turn you on”.  

Snapping back to the present, you turned back toward Bucky and stepped out onto the wooden balcony to wrap your arms around the handsome, muscular man. He broke your grip and pulled you around to face him, wide grin upon his face.

“Good morning, gorgeous,” he greeted you with a coffee-flavored kiss. He had a mug in his hand and another resting on the railing for you.

“Mmm. I’d sure call this a good morning,” you replied with a light swat to Bucky’s shapely behind.

He yelped slightly at that, then setting down his mug to retaliate by tickling your sides. You finally cried “uncle” and he released you. Stepping up to the railing, you grasped the mug in both hands while Bucky embraced you from behind. You both stood in comfortable silence for a moment.

“I wouldn’t mind seeing this view more often. With you,” Bucky said with a tone of finality.

Your heart leapt in your throat, hoping that it meant what you thought it did. While you had promised you could work from his home, you had hoped he would be willing to visit you out here more often.

“Yeah?” you replied casually. “Like how often?”

“As often as possible. Every few months, at least,” he stated, then allowing you to turn inside his arms to face him so you could see he was serious.

A wide grin spread across your face. “I’ll take it. 100%?” you asked.

“You and me. 100%,” he replied, sealing the deal with a kiss in the early California sunlight.

______________

Epilogue (End)>>> 

______________________________________________________

EEEeeee!!! Yup. So that was supposed to be the end, but of course I’m too curious about what happens next so I hope you are too. Epilogue will be the end! For sure this time! I’ve so loved writing this story. It’s close to my heart and I appreciate all of you who’ve been on this journey with me. Any feedback is appreciated. I love you all!! 

Permanent Tag List and LTT tag list are CLOSED. I’M SORRY. 

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[thesinglesjukebox]

TAYLOR SWIFT - BEAUTIFUL GHOSTS

[3.50]

Taylor takes a chonce...

Thomas Inskeep: Where we learn that Swift has ambitions of writing relentlessly overblown, ridiculously florid Broadway songs just like her co-writer, Andrew Lloyd Webber. And god, her keening vocal on this makes me want to punch someone. [0]

Alfred Soto: Her voice is not her strongest element, a fact this farrago overlooks. By comparison her accent on "London Boys" is a Meryl Streep Oscar stroke. [2]

Katherine St Asaph: I don't mind Taylor Swift being on this, in theory (in voice is a somewhat different proposition); Sarah Brightman was a dancer in Hot Gossip. Nor do I want to reassign this piece to Andrew Lloyd Webber's cat. I could even, begrudgingly, stop minding that Nile Rodgers worked on this, or that there's a gratuitous Phantom reference, or that the whole thing is a worse version of Jekyll and Hyde's "A New Life," when Cats already had the blueprint for "A New Life." But I do mind there being no structure, melodic, emotional, or otherwise. [3]

Katie Gill: The idea of adding in a song to CATS kind of misunderstands the structure of the musical. You see, CATS already has a big awards bait song, "Memory," which is musically is integrated into the show via a prelude at the end of act 1, other cats singing the tune at various point, and the prelude ending with a leitmotif often heard throughout the show. HOWEVER, now "Beautiful Ghosts" exists. It's positioned as a direct response to "Memory" and ALW loves his goddamn leitmotifs so logically it should sound like a response to "Memory", but it doesn't! It just sounds like a Taylor Swift song! Likewise, if this song is a direct response to "Memory" then one would think it would come AFTER "Memory" or the "Memory" prelude. However, "Memory" is the emotional climax of the show and the prelude is the Act 1 finisher, neither of which are a good time to add in a pop song to kill the plot. "Beautiful Ghosts" should really be positioned as a response to "Grizabella the Glamour Cat" because the transition between that song and the next one is an awkward spot in the musical that the pop song + a bit of dialogue could help smooth over. HOWEVER, if you position "Ghosts" as a response to "Grizabella" then it'll occur way too early in the film and also rob "Memory" of its lyrical impact. Part of the big impact of "Memory" is that you've had two goddamn hours of fiddle-dee-dee Jennyanydots whimsical nonsense and then WHAM, we go right into "touch me / it's so easy to leave me" which gives us the big, giant, emotional impact that "Memory" deserves and dammit, I don't have anywhere else to write about how this addition means that ALW fundamentally misunderstands his own musical so y'all are going to have to put up with me here. [4]

Jackie Powell: What makes this recording so charming is how practically imperfect it is. And I mean that as a compliment. The attempt at a British accent aside, Taylor Swift did her homework. And I'm not talking about T.S. Elliot, which I'll return to. This performance reminded me of Roland Barthes' "The Grain of the Voice," an essay that discusses how perfect vocals aren't what always sell a performance. The French philosopher and critic pontificates that a singer who is compelling has what he refers to as a "grain" or the "body in the voice." In other words, when Swift embraces her weaker while spectral head voice on the verses, cracks on the last line of the bridge and forces her belt on the last note of the entire song, she embraces Barthes' "Grain of the Voice" almost to a tee. Her belting is far from bodacious and like Jackson McHenry of Vulture, I question if this Andrew Lloyd Webber penned melody was really meant for Swift. But ALW did, in fact, need her. "If you can't get T.S. Eliot, get TS," she said while in the studio with Webber. "I'm here for you." And TS does study up on T.S. In "Beautiful Ghosts," Swift penned a lot of gerunds and descriptive nouns that have shapeshifted into gerunds. Or sometimes she just uses the suffix -ing more than twice the amount that Elliot employed it in his 1915 poem "Hysteria." In between all the "Chonces" being "Bawn into Noothing" and being "let intou," it's endearing to get a sense of Swift's acting chops via listening to her inflection, diction and even her ability to weld some dynamics that we don't often hear in her own catalog. But Swift was in between too many decisions. Was this supposed to be a pop version of a Broadway-style song? Was this supposed to be akin to Demi Lovato on "Let It Go?" (Maybe not, as we all know which version of the song is sung at karaoke.) But with all else being equal, Swift shalt have made a commitment to one of these two worlds: she's now clinging to pop but Broadway is now calling? She's straddling between these two islands and it doesn't work as well as she might have "waaanteed." [7]

Isabel Cole: Is it weird that I think I would like this better if it were more awful? Taylor Swift and Andrew Lloyd Webber are not similar artists, but they are two people who have between them made [checks spreadsheet] a million bajillion dollars by being wildly extra and unafraid of leaning the fuck in. Many of my favorite Taylorisms are fun because of their hyper-earnest theater kid melodrama (just think of the tremor with which she sings another girl in "Style"); many of my childhood memories involve belting "Memory" in my bedroom. But this is just so... dull. TS + ALW 4 CATS sounds like a nightmare of unhinged excess, but this could be any generic Best Song Oscar also-ran; the most interesting part is that she reuses the best line from "Fifteen." Worse, these artists who can write a hook that will be stuck in your head until the end of time somehow came together to write a melody so sprawlingly uninspiring I cannot hum it after several listens. There's nothing here even to make fun of beyond (objectively funny) Taylor's sporadic British affectations. Like, come on, guys: I'm not sure you can do better than this, but I know you have it in you to do worse. [2]

Alex Clifton: Cats didn't really need a new song (nor, frankly, did we need the new nightmare adaptation) and I'm mixed on Andrew Lloyd Webber at best, but this still hits my heart somewhere, especially with Swift's breathy delivery for the first half of the track. I am both surprised and annoyed to relate to a song sung by a cat. Points deducted for chooooooooooonces. [6]

Natasha Genet Avery: Let's dispense with the obvious: 1. That newfangled British accent is...something. 2. Playing into her favorite victimhood narrative, Swift's contribution to Cats *had* to one-up Grizabella ("At least you have something!". 3. This is blatant Oscar bait. Now onto the meat: Cats is a corny and embarrassing head-scratcher. Cats is why people don't trust musicals. I love Cats. To me, to anyone who has been in a musical, musicals are about unreasonable, outsized commitment--you peel off your self-protective shield of irony and spend dozens, if not hundreds of hours donning clown-school makeup and spandex, somersaulting across the stage and belting the praises of storybook animals. If you're entrusted with a big number, you practice and practice until your delivery is technically masterful, if not heavy-handed. Beat me to death with that vibrato. Fuck me up with those dynamics. Leave it allll on the stage. And so, when Taylor set out to out-emote "Memory", she agreed to take on 30 years of mockery, three key changes, Elaine Paige, 600+ professionally recorded covers, and countless school productions and karaoke renditions. A lot of people fault Taylor for being a try-hard (I've always found it sort of endearing), but here, she simply didn't try hard enough. Swift admitted that she wrote most of "Beautiful Ghosts" "immediately after hearing the song for the first time." Without T.S. Eliot's hand, Beautiful Ghosts" is empty, untouched by whimsy. Oh, and the singing: Swift is sorely out of her depth, and mostly opts for limp falsetto, culminating in a strained, awkward belt. We'll see what Francesca Hayward does with it, but for now "Beautiful Ghosts" should get booted from the clowder. [3]

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: I consume music of all genres voraciously -- with the exception of musical soundtracks. This is for a number of reasons: 1) I haven't seen a lot of musicals, 2) for the ones I have seen, I tend to find the music and lyricism overwrought and boring, and 3) I would prefer to just listen to artists' original music outside the parameters set by some make believe world. I was worried that I would have a tough time trying to check my own bias in reviewing this song, but am now relieved and confident in asserting that "Beautiful Ghosts" is objectively bad. In an alternate reality, this could be a compelling country-lite track on Fearless or Red, or even a synth heavy ballad on 1989, but here, Taylor just sounds drowsy with a weird British accent, selling a metaphor that makes about as much sense as the utterly bizarre Cats movie trailer. [3]

Andy Hutchins: One tweet that has stuck with me is the one that correctly called Reputation — before its release, even! — the final boss of 2017. I think Cats might play a similar role for the final days of 2019 and the first month or so of 2020, even if its pitch is obviously to a smaller segment of the population than pre-Crisis Taylor reached. So how convenient it is that we have Taylor here, indulging her theater kid impulses with none other than Andrew fucking Lloyd fucking Webber co-writing, singing her heart out in the ingenue role she's clung to throughout her 20s for better and worse (which is, hilariously, not her role in the film itself!), pining for something wild for what feels like the 20th time. "Beautiful Ghosts" is as subtle as a hurricane, and churns powerfully, and Taylor almost hits that note at the end — the strings wouldn't swell if she'd hit it perfect, of course. It's good. Fine. Whatever. This sort of hopeful schmaltz is so safe, though, that it mostly makes me wish that Taylor were still willing to take excursions from beaten paths: That way lies "Style," even if you might have to double back from the doorsteps of "Look What You Made Me Do" or "End Game" on occasion. [5]

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