#i am ready to hate this homophobic baby so much in the name of gay rights

[sunflowerdigs]

Episode 7x04 Expectations -> Buck: I'm in love with Eddie

Episode 7x04 Reality -> Buck: who left this baby behind in a lifeboat? Better adopt it!

[kittylaboo]

HC: Peter Parker didn’t know he was Bi until Harley Keener

So this took a turn I wasn’t expecting, also it’s a lot longer than I was expecting I’m sorry also Idk how to do the cut thing so my bad  

 TW: Mentions of Rape

Okay so Peter Parker is *Straight*

He likes girls, really likes girls

He literally went on a date with Liz (it may have ended with her moving away bc he put her dad in jail but that’s besides the point)

And he may have had a brief crush on MJ 

So Peter Parker is *Straight*

Boys are gross, and trust Peter he knows

He doesn’t ever want to think of men in a sexual matter

He 10/10 supports anyone who comes out to him 

But anytime he thinks about how boys could possibly be into him, his brain immediately goes to Skip Wescott 

And how Peter was 9 when it started and that he never wants to be in a position like that again

It was horrible and scary, and Peter Parker likes women and only women, and he will never be anyone’s Skip. And he will never put himself in a position where there can be another Skip.

So Peter Parker thinks men suck. 

(Obviously beside Ned and Mr Stark, they’re cool, but Peter has known Ned forever and Mr Stark is literally a super hero, and Peter only became such a huge fan of Iron Man and Tony Stark because of what happened)

His therapist tells him it was his way of coping with what happened 

Then one day Happy picks Peter up at school on an non-lab day because Mr. Stark has someone that he wants Peter to meet

Peter really hopes its the Black Widow (because they’re both spider themed heroes !! how cool !!!)

Peter meets Mr Stark and this mystery person in the living room

Mr Stark introduces Peter Parker to Harley Keener

Harley Keener looks hot good, hes tall and wears a leather jacket and cowboy boots with skinny jeans. He looks so out of place, but he doesn’t look bothered by it either

Peters heart skips a beat, but Peter chalks it up to be anxiety 

“Hey there Peter, I’m Harley”

Oh my god he has an accent, an actual southern accent

And doesn’t that just make Peters heart race 

“Tony here tells me you’re a real Einstein” He laughed

Harley laughed. Peter is not laughing

Peter hears his blood rushing, and feels himself go cold. His spidey-sense is just going off

Peter looks to Mr Stark whose smile falters at the look of pure-fear on Peters face

Mr Stark doesn’t know. Peter never told him. Any files about what happened never include Peters name, or any family members name, so Mr Stark wouldn’t have stumbled on it, unless he went into Peter’s Therapists notes, which he hasn’t because he may be nosy but he isn’t invasive 

Peter knows what this is, he knows he’s going into a panic attack. He was triggered and he needs to get out. Out out out before anything can happen

“So-sorry, I’ve gotta, I gotta go, something came up wi-with May. It was um, it was nice meeting you Harley.”

Peter left, and made it back home, though he doesn’t remember how he made it from Manhattan to Queens and into his apartment.

He’s home and it’s not the safest place, can’t go into his bedroom but it’s better than there

Tony beat him to the apartment (without Harley), already sitting with May when Peter walks in

May is quick to give Peter his favourite over-sized sweater (it makes him feel safe) sitting him down in the living room, putting a knit blanket over him, and giving a bottle of water. 

“Pete, you okay kid?” Mr Stark asks 

And Peter is fine, he always has been, so he nods 

“Do you want to talk about why you were triggered into a panic attack” His voice is soft as he speaks to Peter, like Peter would break

May sits next to Peter, pulling him into her 

“Adrian Toomes was not the first person Spider-Man sent to jail” Peter started the story like this because it was easier to tell it, his therapist may not be happy with it but she’ll be happy he’s making progress by telling some

“Spider-Man was 11 when he sent his first person to jail. It was a year long trial, one kid versus one 18 year old. He used to call Spider-Man, Einstein”

Peter seemed to be done with his explanation after this, deeming it enough information for Tony to understand what happened

It wasn’t 

But May sending a text that said “Search Skip Wescott” gave Tony the opportunity to find out what happened later 

(Tony is really pissed when he reads what happens, and makes sure Skip get transferred to worst prison and that he can never leave)

“Okay, Pete, I’ll talk to Harley about not calling you that. But Harley will be going to the same school as you, okay? That’s why I wanted you two to meet.”

After that first night Peter goes back to being his usual chipper self

And Harley starts at Midtown 

Peter was just rounding the corner outside of the school to see Harley getting dropped off by Happy

After a moment of hesitation Peter went up to Harley and offered to help him on his first day (because Peter will not let his overwhelming fear take over and he will be friendly for the sake of Mr Stark and that is all)

Despite Peter’s uneasiness and distrust Peter and Harley get on like a house on fire

Peter started to feel really close to Harley, and Harley would often throw his arm around Peter’s shoulder and call him things like sugar, or sweet thing or darling

And Peter liked that a lot, except he didn’t because it was weird (but he really did)

And Peter would always go tomato red whenever Harley was around

Even Ned and MJ recognized the crush Peter had on Harley and vice versa

“Dude when are you going to make a move on him?”

“What the fuck, Ned? I’m straight, Harley and I are friends”

“Peter are you being serious right now? You both obviously have a crush on each other. Harley knows you like him too.”

“The fuck MJ, I expected you to be more understanding about this. We are friends. Maybe I come off as gay to you because I choose to respect people and am not the exact definition of a ‘toxic male,’ but I don’t fucking like you guy assuming that I like men. Men ain’t shit and I’m not going to find myself in another situation like I used too. I like women”

“What’s your issue Peter? You homophobic now? Didn’t peg you as that.”

“Fuck MJ, this isn’t your business. I’m an ally, people love who they love, but I don’t like men, and you need to stop pushing that on me. I have my reasons, you have yours.”

“Peter, the way you’re going off on MJ isn’t really helping your point much-”

“Would the two of you just shut up about this. I don’t like other guys. Women are it for me. I will not be stuck under another man. Fuck, I’m straight and you need to stop pushing the idea that I’m into Harley just because you want me to live out your little fantasies of what my life should be like.”

Peter didn’t talk to them the rest of the day. Not because he was angry but because he was embarrassed that he said too much 

At the tower Peter and Harley were cuddled together sitting next to each other watching Brooklyn Nine-Nine and talking

Peter really loved Harley’s Blue eyes

And his accent

And his face

And Harley in general

But totally only in a friends way

They’re bros

“I want to try something real quick, you can tell me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am” 

And then Harley kisses Peter

Harley Kisses him

And Peter freaks out

Without even thinking about it, Peter pushes Harley off of him and bolts, leaving the tower without his phone, shoes or bag, Peter just leaves

Once Peter gets outside he throws up, before his anxiety takes over again and he just runs and runs and runs

Harley is left now sitting on the ground, tears in his eyes, confused and hurt about what just happened

Tony makes it to Harley in record time thanks to Friday, and without a question Harley explains what happened

“I thought he liked me too, Tony, I really did. I don’t know how I messed up this bad.”

“I’m sorry Harls, Peter has been hurt a lot and I just don’t think he was ready yet emotionally for a relationship.”

Tony knows that Peter has probably just been triggered. He’s only heard Peter talk about girls romantically, never boys, but he was sure that Peter and Harley were going to be together at some point

Once Harley finally calms down enough and goes to his room Tony calls May

“May, is Peter with you, he left all his stuff here.”

“No, I thought he was staying with you tonight. what happened?”

“Harley kissed Pete, and he freaked out and ran out without any of his stuff, I was hoping he was with you. His phone is here too.”

“I think I know where he is, College Point Park. Ben and I used to take him there after any court date.”

“I’ll meet you there.”

“What about Harley?”

“He’s already asleep, I’ll meet you there.”

Tony and May get there in record time, finding Peter sitting on the rocks facing the East River.

“Peter?” May called out.

Peter turned around, his face clearly red, tears streaming down his face.

“I don’t understand” Peter finally said as May and Tony got close enough

“What don’t you understand?” Tony asked

“Harley kissed me. He kissed me. I expected to hate it. But I didn’t. I liked it when he kissed me. I should hate it though. He’s a boy. I shouldn’t have liked it.”

“Peter it’s okay if you liked Harley Kissing you, and it’s okay if you like him romantically too” May tried to comfort

“But it’s not May, because if I like Harley, and I like him kissing me then that means that I liked it when Skip kissed me. And I didn’t like anything he did to me.”

“Peter, I like when Pepper and I kiss, but that doesn’t mean that if May were to kiss me that I’d like it. Same thing goes for you kiddo.”

“I like girls though. I can’t like Harley.”

“You can like both boys and girls. You could be Bisexual or maybe not. No matter what it’s okay.” May said again.

“I need time. I can’t- I need Dr Rosenburg and I need to not be Spider-Man and I need to not see Harley or Ned or MJ. I need time.”

“Okay baby, you can have as much time as you need.” 

Peter ends up taking a week off of school, with daily appointments with his therapist. He went completely ghost mode. Wasn’t active as Spider-Man, wasn’t active on social media. Didn’t read or respond to anyone’s messages. Only talking to May or Tony and only if they were at the apartment.

After his week off, Peter finally reappeared at school, still having not responded to anyone’s messages, preferring to just deal with things in person.

“Peter oh my god you’re alive we all thought you died.” Ned shouted from down the hall going to greet his friend, MJ and Harley in tow.

“I’m fine guys, I just had some stuff from the past come back up that needed to be dealt with before I did anything that would hurt other people.”

“What are you talking about Parker, you wouldn’t hurt a fly let alone anyone else.” MJ said confused

“I’ll tell you when I’m ready too but I’m not there yet. My therapist thinks I made good progress this week though.”

“Your therapist?” Ned asked.

“Uh yeah, sorry. MJ, Ned, I really messed up with how I treated you guys the other day, regarding my sexuality, turns out I may of been wrong and you guys were right, I just repressed any of those emotions due to trauma. So, I’m sorry you didn’t deserve that.”

Ned and MJ obviously forgive Peter bc duh they’re friends

“I would like to talk to Harley privately though, so you guys wouldn’t mind?”

So Peter pulls Harley to the side finally getting the chance to talk to him, and wanted to say his words before he lost his nerves.

“Peter I’m sorry-”

“I liked when you kissed me. That’s why I freaked out. I didn’t think it was possible for me to like that, or men. I’m sorry for pushing you away. I wasn’t prepared and my brain automatically went to a dark place. I like you Harley Keener, but I have problems and I want you to be aware of that before we do anything.”

“Okay.”

“If we are going to try this I need you to be aware of my limits. I have a lot of them apparently, and I’m not sure if more will come up or not, but my therapist said that I should talk to you about this stuff before we do anything. If you still like me, that is.”

“Peter Parker you are too precious, of course I still like you, I don’t plan on not liking you for a while yet.”

And then Peter smiles and he feels relieved, because getting to this point took a lot of work and now he’s here and he likes a boy who likes him back who won’t hurt him

[zeleniafic]

6-13 salty asks for HP.

6 - Has fandom ever made you enjoy a pairing you previously hated?

Not that I can think of tbfh! I am a stubborn bitch lmfao

7 - Is there anything you used to like but can't stand now?

Dumbledore. DUMBLEDORE. I could write an entire essay on his manipulating ass oh my god. Also kinda Seamus Finnigan's whole pyrotechnic shtick, that always made me laugh a lot as a kid who was also prone to such ridiculous accidents, but someone pointed out how shit it was for The Hag That Must Not Be Named to make literally the only prominent Irish character known almost exclusively for causing explosions, within the context of British-Irish political tension at the time HP was written and I'm not in the know enough to convey all of it properly but anyway it just makes me sad now :)))))

8 - Have you received anon hate? What about?

Oh countless things but my FAVORITE was posting Regulus/f!oc content and then stumbling across several responses calling it and similar works homophobic bc apparently it's popular on ao3 that he's gay?? or at least it is within a specific circle??? Idk. Being a teenager on the internet is wild and I have chosen to simply forget that I ever saw that bc I know for a fact that I was also that dumb and self-righteous along the hellish journey of growing up

9 - Most disliked character(s)? Why?

Snape. Being abused does not excuse never dealing with your trauma and perpetuating the cycle with the children in YOUR care, not to mention overtly threatening their pets, and that's not even getting into the way he was okay with letting the woman he was infatuated with's husband and literal baby die as long as she was spared for him to swoop in on :))))) similar to Dumbledore I think he's interesting as a CHARACTER but if I met him in real life I would swing on sight

10 - Most disliked arc? Why?

I... honestly can't think of one??? I truly enjoyed every arc, as far as I can remember. Although if I had to nail one down I'd prob say the whole time period where Ron leaves in DH, but it's not so much that I dislike the way it was written, it's just that I personally hold grudges like my life depends on it and child me was not ready to forgive him when Harry was LMFAO I was mad salty as a kid

11 - Is there an unpopular character you like that the fandom doesn’t? Why?

Once upon a time I would have said Regulus but there's been a renaissance of love for him so I kinda feel like "unpopular" doesn't apply anymore. Although that's in the writing/editing sphere, so maybe still in the greater fandom as a whole?? Idk I don't interact with HP in the wild anymore so I can't say tbfh. Fleur and Ginny both, once upon a time, bc I remember when fandom fuckin hated both of them but thankfully that seems to have gone away!

12 - Is there an unpopular arc that you like that the fandom doesn’t? Why?

The only thing that comes to mind is the way 7th year went, I guess? I think I remember being really disappointed at first as a kid, but then I got swept on that journey and idk. I like the way DH makes the war feel REAL by literally putting everything about Harry's life on hold, right down to not getting to finish school properly.

13 - Unpopular opinion about XXX character?

Oh I've got two fun ones. A) Hermione actually is fucking obnoxious sometimes, and that's okay. Acknowledging it doesn't reduce her character or something. B) Fred and George are actually fucking MEAN sometimes, similar to how the Marauders took things too far at times. I love all of them (**except Wormtail, he can eat shit and die xx) but sometimes people kind of... woobify?? their shitty behavior and I don't like that. You can love them all without excusing or ignoring that they made dumb shitty decisions as teenagers. We literally all do, the difference is that they grew up and matured, unlike certain Potions professo—

[derivativealigner]

I rewatched the second season of South Park and took so many notes that I had to split them into two parts. Like seriously, I took so. many. notes. And pictures this time. I started rewatching just in case I’d find some cool little facts to sprinkle into my fanfic but I went way too far and now there’s a million facts under this cut (including gay stan, a domestic violence psa, and craig fucking dying)

Stan doesn’t like hospitals, he finds them gross and he gets sick 🤮. Also the hospital in South Park is called Hell’s Pass hospital. Early seasons have the name as Hells Pass but it gets fixed later

Cartman has to sing all of Come Sailing Away by Styx if he hears a part of it. After he says this, Kyle sings the first part and Cartman has to sing the rest. Kyle does it again later, which is kinda mean

Cartman’s mom tries to abort Cartman, who is an eight-year-old child and thus cannot be legally aborted. Later, after she slept with Bill Clinton to change the law and make 40th trimester abortions legal, it turns out she meant adoption

Kenny sacrifices himself to turn on the generator to the hospital and save Dr. Mephesto’s life along with others. He says “I’ll fucking do it” then does it and dies, absolute legend

Cartman gets way too into his deputy role. He goes undercover, pretends to be a prostitute, says “Respect my authoritah!” a lot and beats people up with his police stick

Kenny’s brother first appears when Cartman responds to a call about a disturbance at Kenny’s house. Apparently there are like 10 adult family members in the house at that time. Kenny’s dad has a black eye because Kenny’s mom punched him. She says he can’t hold a job

Token sits in the classroom in season 2

Cartman starts hating hippies in this season, like a lot

Chef tells the boys that the right time to do drugs is in college

Ike’s name is Ike Moisha Broflovski and he was born in 1996, making him 2 years old in 1998 when this season aired

This is probably obvious but yeah Kyle and Ike are circumcised

Kyle says family isn’t just blood, it’s who you care about, and he says “That’s why you guys are more than just friends, you’re my family. Except for Cartman.”

Craig’s finally sitting in the classroom in S02E04

None of the boys like dodgeball

Clyde gets a dodgeball to the face and he cries :( and he’s the only one who cries by the way

Pip throws a dodgeball in Kyle’s face and breaks Kyle’s nose

When Kyle’s mom tells the boys about conjoined twin myslexia (which isn’t a real term) and says anyone might’ve absorbed their dead twin in the womb, Stan and Cartman run away screaming but Kenny and Kyle stay to listen. Kenny even leans in to look at the book “Freaks A-Z!” that Mrs. Broflovski is reading from, and when she leaves, Kyle grimaces and Kenny laughs

Stan’s mom (Sharon) calls Kyle’s mom (Sheila) when Stan is all freaked out and trying to put an icepick through his brain, and Sharon tells Sheila to get run over by a truck. Sharon is pretty mean in these early episodes

Mr. Broflovski doesn’t really listen to what Mrs. Broflovski is saying, bad husband >:(

South Park’s team is always called South Park Cows no matter the sport

The school nurse, Nurse Gollum, went to Colorado State University

I just realized Butters exists. I think he appeared before S02E05 but I didn’t notice but yeah he’s there with the dodgeball team, injured

Here’s a picture to make up for my disgusting anti-Butters bias

Kenny’s dodgeball uniform number is 69 obviously. Kyle is 7, Stan is 4, Cartman is 325

Sheila smacks Gerald in the face so hard he falls off his chair, lots of violence perpetrated by women in this show. Remember, don’t do domestic violence no matter your gender, it’s not cool

I realized after this whole Butters thing that I should’ve made more notes about Pip, so I’ll make a note about his anger issues now. When people call him French, he gets angry and throws dodgeballs at them

The boys launch a jelly roll at Ms. Crabtree and make her crash the bus. They do it just for fun

The kids somehow go to China in the school bus

Cartman references Moby Dick, but he probably doesn’t know what he’s talking about

Kevin Stoley gets named in S02E05 and has his first speaking role when he says he has Chinese parents and after Cartman hears it he immediately says something racist. smh cartman, what a problematic fave

Cartman says “I love you guys 😊” but Stan and Kyle just stare at him and he goes 😐 “Eh, screw you guys 😠”

If Jimbo and Ned really fought in Vietnam, they youngest they could’ve been in 1998 is early forties, which means in the latest seasons they would be early sixties. Btw they met in Vietman

Jesus and Pals is a recurring TV show in seasons 1 and 2. Jesus just kind of lives in South Park

I just remembered that Terrance and Phillip are really old in canon, it’s so weird, like how can South Park canon still be changing, it’s been 20 years

Also the early seasons are casually racist who knew

Kenny flashes his ass on a tape the boys send to Jimbo and Ned’s TV show, which airs and at least 12 people see Kenny’s bare naked ass

Cartman really doesn’t like hippies in these early seasons. He throws a chair at Ned and yells, “Take that, hippie!” (Ned is in a catatonic state and did nothing to provoke this)

Jimbo and Ned live together I guess. Jimbo’s gonna take Ned home and show him some hardcore porn to snap him out of his catatonic state, good husband unlike Gerald Broflovski

Saddam Hussein is in hell and has a Canadian accent and is Satan’s lover in S02E06, I guess he died in Canada in the first episode this season but I wasn’t paying much attention since that’s the Terrance and Phillip episode that pissed a bunch of people off in 1998 because the audience wanted to know who Cartman’s dad is instead. It was kind of a boring episode so I understand why everyone was pissed, but it is funny that Matt and Trey did that so I’m not mad about it

Aww look at them!!! We’ve got background Style, the vaguest inkling of Crenny, and Cartman/Cake

I’d take more screenshots but it’s a pain since I’m watching legally and stupid legal websites block screenshots so I have to find youtube videos instead ughhhh piracy is the answer kids

Apparently there’s a huge waterfall and canyon somewhere close to South Park, maybe? At least in Stan’s dream

Mary Kay Bergman was an incredible voice actor. How the hell did she voice all the moms, Wendy, Shelly, principle Victoria, the mayor, Nurse Gollum, and fucking Ms. Crabtree??? Holy shit what a queen

Kenny has some feelings about death. He reimagines the episode where death boops him to death and in his version, he beats death the fuck up, then has ice cream and is happy 😊 But again, this is in Stan’s dream

S02E07 kind of establishes that nobody remembers Kenny dying because when Cartman tells a story where Kenny dies, Kyle questions how Kenny could’ve died then when he also died just a few hours ago when a giant monster took him

rip craig, he falls out the bus and into a canyon

But it’s okay because it was all Stan’s dream so everything in the episode is questionable. Everything after this is no longer a dream

Pip’s parents are dead and he has to go to summer school while everyone else is having a nice summer break

Officer Barbrady and the mayor are having sexual relations, I’m sure this is the most interesting note I’ve made so far. Idk I’m just writing everything down, this is how I enjoy things, I have no off switch

Ew summer bus stop, cursed

Kyle casually sings little tunes every once in a while, how cute

This is pretty obvious but Kenny likes dirty jokes, he laughs when Cartman innocently says he loves Chef’s salty chocolate balls (which are chocolate candy). Nobody else laughs

Cartman says “Screw you guys, I’m going home” or variations of it a lot in this season

So Stan throws up when he likes someone, right? Well, he’s watching an indie movie about two gay cowboys who start making out and he throws up, which is either a terrible homophobic joke or confirmation that Stan’s a little gay. I know which one I prefer

Kyle says Mr. Hankey is his best friend after Stan. Like I know it’s definitely canon that Stan and Kyle are best friends but it’s still nice to see confirmation, it’s very precious. Also Kyle is best friends with literal shit, so cute 😊

Kenny deaths:

S02E02 Kenny sacrifices himself by connecting a generator wire, which electrocutes him but brings power back to a hospital

S02E03 A tree falls on Kenny and crushes him

S02E04 Kenny falls in a grave and the gravestone falls on him

S02E05 The Chinese dodgeball team throws a ball at Kenny and he gets splattered against a wall

S02E06 Two guys pull on Kenny and tear him in half, as in one has the head and one has the legs

S02E07 A big scary monster plucks Kenny out of the school bus and carries him away. Also in Cartman’s fake memory of Fonzi jumping over cars, the motorcycle hits Kenny and crushes him against a brick wall. Kenny gets smashed against walls a lot, doesn’t he?

S02E08 Flashback: Baby Kenny has a firecracker and it explodes, sprinkling little baby Kenny parts everywhere. Later in the episode, current day Kenny dies when a giant firework snake bumps him off a stage and under a fence, which then crushes him.

S02E09 Kenny is playing with a yoyo outside a movie theatre when a bunch of people come outside and trample him to death. They say “Oh my God, I found a penny!” and “You bastard!”

I’ll post part 2 of season 2 in a couple days. I’m having way more fun writing these stupid notes than I thought I would (also gnomes is coming up soon and i am fucking ready for tweek)

[ilovemygaydad]

title: a craigslist love story

summary: patton needs a fake date to his brother’s wedding, so he enlists the help of a stranger

pairing: moceit

warnings: snake mention, kissing, homophobic parents, remus mention, and possibly something else

consider commissioning me! 

Patton Sanders wasn’t one to lie. Like, at all. However, some situations just called for it. One such situation was his brother’s wedding, where he knew that his homophobic parents were going to ask where his date was since apparently all gay people had to prove their gayness.

Naturally, Patton asked all of his friends that his parents didn’t know to be his date to the wedding, but none of them were willing to help him out on this one. So he turned to craigslist to find a date.

Fake Date Needed For Wedding (18+)

Hi! My name is Patton (21), and I’m looking for a male date to my brother’s wedding on May 28. If you are willing to come, I will pay you $20, and there will be free food! Please email me if interested!

Patton waited... and waited... and waited. Until it was only a week before the wedding, and he still didn’t have anyone willing to go. He was about to give up and delete his post when his inbox pinged, and a new email showed up.

From: Janus Thompson (j.thompson72@gmail.com)

Subject: Fake Date

Dear Patton,

My name is Janus. I am also twenty-one years old, and wanted to help you with your date. I can only assume that you are desperate since you went to craigslist of all places to find a fake date, and I would hate for you to have to go to the wedding alone. I would be free to talk on May 25 if you would like to get to know each other.

- Janus Thompson

A grateful squeal rose up in Patton’s throat as he read through the message, glad that he wouldn’t have to endure his parent’s disapproving glances alone. He wrote back a short email confirming the time and location of the meet-up. After he was done, he went about his day like he normally would but with a little more pep in his step.

---

Patton stepped into his local Starbucks at two o’clock dull, ready to find his fake date. The shop was rather packed, which was a bit surprising, but he supposed that people needed to get their coffee fix from somewhere. He ordered his usual drink and looked around the coffee shop for anyone sitting alone. After about a minute of searching, he locked eyes with a very handsome man with large vitiligo marks on his face. The man smiled and waved him over, so Patton went.

“You must be Patton,” the man said in a honey-smooth voice. “I’m Janus.”

“How did you know it was me?” Patton asked incredulously. 

Janus smiled. “You were the only one who came in around two. I figured it was you.”

“Oh.” Patton sat down, placing his drink on the table. “Where would you like to begin?”

“Let’s talk about you.”

“Okay, well, I’m an interior design major, and I have an older brother named Wesley. My parents’ names are Erica and Todd, and they are... massively against me being gay. They’re both lawyers, as is Wes. Um, I also have a dog named River who is a schnoodle.”

Janus nodded and said, “Alright. I’m a pre-vet major, and I have three younger brothers: Remus, Roman, and Virgil. Remus and Roman are twins, and they’re the biggest pains in the ass ever, and Virgil is only ten. My dad’s name is Michael... He’s an accountant at some really important business, so I mostly take care of my brothers. I have three snakes named Spooky, Noodle, Death Ramen, all courtesy of my brothers.”

“Your brothers sound like quite the characters,” laughed Patton.

Janus snorted in agreement. “Yeah, they’re all very different people. Roman is very loud and eccentric in a theatre gay sort of way, Remus is like the human embodiment of a horror movie, and Virgil is a baby emo. I love them all, but... Damn, are they weird.”

“My family is, like, so white suburban that it’s almost offensive. They’re the most boring people I’ve met, but I’m still somewhat financially depended on them, so I can’t cut myself off.”

“Ah.” Janus said. “That sucks.”

“Yep. So, about your snakes!”

---

The date had been going so well. They’d arrived just in time for the ceremony and gotten a seat in the far back so that they didn’t have to interact with anyone else, and they’d made it through dinner with only a minimal amount of small-talk from other guests. 

And then the reception started. And everything went to shit.

Patton’s parents had practically made a bee-line right to him and Janus as soon as the first dance had finished, forcing the two to socialize with them.

“Patton,” greeted his mother, “Who is this?”

“Mom, this is my boyfriend, Janus!”

“Janus. What an... interesting name.”

Janus smiled as genuinely as possible in the situation. “Thank you, I was named after the Roman god, Janus.”

“That’s fascinating, young man. Say, where did your parents come up with that?” Patton’s father asked in faux interest.

“My mom was an anthropologist who had a fascination for ancient Rome, so all of her kids’ names were Roman-themed.”

Patton nodded with a smile. “Janus’ brothers are Roman, Remus, and Virgil. Isn’t that neat?”

“Indeed.” Mrs. Sanders said plainly. “Now, I’ve noticed that the two of you haven’t been very touchy-feely today. Are you going through a rough spot?”

“Mom!”

“Mrs. Sanders, I can assure you that Patton and I are very much in love. We don’t see the need for excessive PDA, and would rather not be performative at a place where the spotlight isn’t on us. Right, dear?”

“Absolutely,” Patton agreed quickly.

“I just thought that since you were in a relationship, you’d be all over each other.”

Janus slapped a sickeningly sweet grin on his face and turned to Patton. “Well, since you asked so nicely...”

Suddenly, Patton was kissing Janus. He tasted like chocolate, which was probably from the cake, and the smell of cologne was almost overpowering in Patton’s nose. In that moment, he realized that he would very much like to continue kissing Janus the second that the wedding ended.

After a few seconds, they separated and were met with the surprised looks on Patton’s parents’ faces.

“Good day, Mr. and Mrs. Sanders,” Janus said as he dragged the speechless Patton out of the venue.

“Can we keep doing that?” Patton asked as soon as they were in the car.

“Oh, definitely.”

[giftofshewbread]

HERE IT COMES !

 By Daymond DuckPublished on: January 30, 2021

It is my desire to stop writing about the election and direct more of my time to the fulfillment of Bible prophecy, but the election has major prophetic implications, and the two issues cannot be separated.

Pres. Trump promised a peaceful transition of power, and he and Melania left the White House with grace and humility.

Here are some quotes that may interest you:

“The purpose of the New World Order is to bring the world into a world government” (Winston Churchill).

“Out of these troubled times [out of the Persian Gulf War], our [America’s] fifth objective—a new world order—can emerge” (Geo. H. W. Bush, 1990).

“I learned to love the New World Order” (Joe Biden, Apr. 23, 1992).

“The hierarchy [of the U.N.], among other things, had called for world government to be achieved in STAGES through the forming of world administrative REGIONS. This was in accordance with the U.N. charter, which encourages the implementation and administration of world government on a REGIONAL basis” (Edmund J. Osmanneczyk, 1995).

“What I am trying to do [to build a global system] is to promote a process of reorganization of the world” (Bill Clinton, 1997).

“Within four years, we will see the beginning of a new international order” (Henry Kissinger 2008).

“The burdens of global citizenship bind us together” (Barack Obama, July 24, 2008).

“To bring about the New World Order, we have to have a new consciousness” [a new spiritual ethic, or new world religion] (Henry Kissinger, Jan. 12, 2009).

Concerning who will head up the New World Order, “We’re trusting that he will be President Obama” (Henry Kissinger, 2009).

“The affirmative task we have now is to actually create a new world order” (Then Vice-Pres. Joe Biden, Apr. 5, 2013).

“I believe we and mainly you [the U.S. Air Force Academy graduating class] have an incredible opportunity to lead in shaping a new world order for the 21st century…” (Joe Biden, May 28, 2014).

“You are about to graduate into a complex and borderless world” (Biden’s new Climate Change Czar, John Kerry, May 6, 2016).

Globalists have big plans, but they are not in control; they just think they are.

The more they reject God; and the more they turn against His people; and the closer they move toward world government; the more they stir His wrath, and the closer God’s people are to the Rapture.

Here are some of my thoughts on current events:

On Jan. 20, 2021, the “America First” president was replaced with a “Fundamentally Transform America” president.

This “fundamental transformation” of America involves the submission of America to a godless world government (the New World Order, The Great Reset, the U.N. 2030 Sustainable Development goals, etc.).

Biden has already announced his intent to undo Trump’s America First policies, rejoin the Paris Climate Accords, rejoin the World Health Organization, halt America’s departure from the World Trade Organization, halt construction on the Keystone Pipeline and border wall, review and reverse more than 100 Trump policies on the environment, stop immigration enforcement in the U.S., and more.

Biden announced support for things (other than world government) that go against the Scriptures: taxpayer-funded abortions for everyone up to the moment of birth (murder of babies), nominate judges that support abortion, allow gays to serve openly in the military, reinstate Title IX that lets transgenders use bathrooms according to their gender identity (men use women’s bathrooms, etc.), etc. Think about this. Through a Political Action Committee (PAC), Planned Parenthood gave more than 27 million dollars to Biden’s election, and now Biden is going to give Planned Parenthood millions and millions of taxpayer dollars to kill babies.

Biden has already cut America’s defense budget, cut the Space Force budget, transformed money budgeted for America’s nuclear arsenal to FEMA, and threatened to fire at least two Generals (one in the Army and another in the Air Force) that questioned these cuts. There is speculation that a military purge is coming to replace patriot-minded officers with officers that will pledge allegiance to the U.N. Here is a link to an article about this: https://beforeitsnews.com/blogging-citizen-journalism/2021/01/generals-tell-trump-we-got-your-back-2649650.html

Biden dissolved the 1776 Commission designed to teach patriotism in public schools and replaced it with a group “to assist agencies in assessing equity with respect to race, ethnicity, religion, income, geography, gender identity, sexual orientation, and disability.”

Simply put, “Here It Comes” means that I believe the Biden administration intends to support policies that will lead to the rise of the Ten Kings, world government, the Antichrist, the False Prophet, tracking everyone, godlessness, the Tribulation Period, etc.

The shadow government controls every branch of the U.S. government, and, as I see it, there will be a surge forward with no going back. In his first six days in office, Biden signed more executive orders than the last four presidents combined (and one of his officials said there are more to come).

How long it will take to bring in the world government is unknown, but I expect the shadow government to push Biden to accomplish as much as he can before the next election two years from now.

No one knows the day or hour of the Rapture, but whenever it happens, the Restrainer will be removed, and godless world government will go into overdrive.

Here are several stories that made the news:

One, Biden asked a “Christian” preacher friend to offer the benediction at his inauguration, and the preacher closed his prayer, not in the name of Jesus, but “in the strong name of our collective faith.”

Praying in “the strong name of our collective faith” is the kind of reprobate thinking that left God out of the Democrat Party Platform.

Their total one-party control of the U.S. government will cause them to fully support a godless one-world religion and government.

The Bible clearly teaches that God will put up with this godless world government nonsense for 7 years, but if He did not bring it to an end, no flesh would be saved.

The pastor’s prayer is also evidence of a sick, lukewarm Church that tickles people’s ears instead of proclaiming the truth.

Two, on Jan. 23, 2021, a bomb exploded at First Works Baptist Church in El Monte, Cal.

Hate messages were painted on the inside walls of the church.

Several news organizations ignored the bombing and blamed the church for preaching against same-sex marriage.

These people appear to believe it is okay to blow up a church if the preacher preaches the Scriptures.

Three, on Jan. 20, 2021, an unidentified person in the U.S. State Dept. decided that the U.S. Ambassador to Israel will now be called the U.S. Ambassador to Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza.

The person that made that decision posted it on the State Dept. website, and it appears that whoever did it does not believe that the West Bank and Gaza should be part of Israel.

Some say the Biden administration also plans to change the U.S. recognition of the Golan Heights as part of Israel.

Two weeks ago, I wrote that God had a reason for putting Trump in office, He has a reason for removing Trump, and He has a reason for putting Biden in office.

I tend to believe God is ready to let world government advance, and He removed Trump because Trump would have been in the way.

I also tend to believe that God put Biden in office because He wants Israel to trust Him, not Trump or the U.S., for protection.

Unfortunately, most Christians do not know enough Bible prophecy to recognize the danger that dividing Israel poses to America.

According to the Bible, those that try to cut Israel into pieces at the end of the age will be cut into pieces.

(Note: Before this article was sent to the editor, the State Dept. reversed itself on the issue and went back to calling the U.S. Ambassador the Ambassador to Israel.)

Four, concerning pestilences, my last week’s article noted that a group of U.S. doctors believe Ivermectin is safe and effective for preventing Covid in most people.

The article also noted that India has developed an inexpensive, effective, and safe Covid Ivermectin treatment kit.

On Jan. 19, 2021, it was reported that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has upgraded Ivermectin from “against the drug” to “not for or against the drug.”

According to the article, this opens the door for doctors to feel safe in prescribing it and for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to approve it for emergency use if they choose to do so.

I found Ivermectin searching “Ivermectin for humans” at amazon.com.

There is also an apple-flavored paste, and a reader told me about a nurse that puts it in peanut butter.

I am just passing this information on for people to make their own decision.

Five, concerning persecution, much of the hatred that has been dumped on Trump over the last 4 years is now being directed toward those that voted for him.

Since Jan. 15, 2021, more than 22,000 people have signed a petition to have Franklin Graham fired from Samaritan’s Purse and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Assoc. for supporting Pres. Trump.

On Jan. 20, 2021, the Daily Beast published an article calling for a new “secret police” force to spy on Trump supporters because the FBI and NSA will not sufficiently punish these Americans.

Many Christians and conservatives are expressing concern that Biden’s support for the LGBTQ agenda (biological males in women’s bathrooms, etc.), and Pelosi’s rule that people in Congress are not allowed to say man, woman, etc., will lead to people being denounced as homophobes, etc. One reader e-mailed me to say there will be a tremendous effort to pervert the children that are not killed by abortion.

It has been reported that Katie Couric is calling for Trump supporters to be deprogrammed in re-education camps and for members of Congress that question the accuracy of the election to be punished. This could pit brother against brother just like Jesus said because the left wants to silence and shame those that disagree with them.

On Jan. 20, 2021, it was reported that former FBI Director James Comey said the Republican Party “needs to be burned down or changed.” He asked, “Who would want to be part of an organization that at its core is built on lies and racism and know-nothingism?” Comey is a proven liar, and there is evidence that he used false evidence to protect Hillary Clinton when she destroyed thousands of e-mails.

On Jan. 21, 2021, it was reported that a columnist for the Washington Post is calling for Fox News to be kicked off the air for “radicalizing people and setting them on the path of violence and sedition.”

I pray that Jesus will Rapture the Church off the earth before the persecution gets too bad, but judgment must begin at the house of God (I Pet. 4:17).

It falls on believers first, and it falls harder on unbelievers second (persecution of the Church signifies a greater persecution is coming on the lost).

Six, after constantly condemning Trump’s handling of Covid and claiming that he (Biden) will vaccinate a million people a day, concerning Covid, on Jan. 23, 2021, Biden said there is “nothing we can do about the trajectory.”

He added, “In the next few months, masks, not vaccinations, are the single best defense against Covid.”

Seven, concerning the Battle of Gog and Magog in the latter years and latter days, on Jan. 20 it was reported that a senior Israeli official said if Biden returns to the same terms of Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran, Israel will have nothing to discuss with him.

Biden is clearly interested in returning to the deal but said Iran must start complying first.

To summarize this article, concerning world government, I am not like Chicken Little, who claimed the sky is falling (world government indicates many good things such as the approaching rapture; reign of Jesus; peace, justice, and righteousness on earth; etc.), but I am saying get prepared because here it comes.

Some are saying a police state and persecution are coming.

U.S. Josh Hawley recently said, “You can go to church now, but you may not be allowed to go to the church of your choice in two years.”

As far as many of you are concerned, your pastor will never tell you about these things, so I suggest that a good place to get started is hischannel.com.

Finally, if you want to go to heaven, you must be born again (John 3:3). God loves you, and if you have not done so, sincerely admit that you are a sinner; believe that Jesus is the virgin-born, sinless Son of God who died for the sins of the world, was buried, and raised from the dead; ask Him to forgive your sins, cleanse you, come into your heart and be your Saviour; then tell someone that you have done this.

[nerdygaymormon]

Maybe you've answered this before, but why don't you just leave your church? Doesn't it bother you being part of something that rejects you? Don't you want love? I don't understand why gay people ever stay in that church.

I get these questions from time to time. Never sure what to make of them. I get that it’s unusual for a gay guy my age to still be part of church. I hope part of this is they like me and want me to be happier. But it also feels like they are looking down on me, idk.

I don’t have a short, simple answer, so strap in, it’s going to be a long ride.

1)   I was a teenager in the 1980’s. It is hard to be gay now, but it was so bad back then. Being gay was shameful. The 80′s was the AIDS crisis, so mostly what I heard about being gay was death. There were no legal protections, society was against us. Actively hostile, bigoted statements were common. My own dad told homophobic jokes to big laughs. Coming out looked like I’d be condemning myself to a terrible life and strip all the good things from me.

Also, with no role models, I was having to work through what it means to be gay. I also did manage to get ahold of a gay porn magazine (this is long before internet was a thing). I was crazy to think I could hide it. I shared a room with three brothers so no privacy. Despite my denials, my parents knew this was mine and they were so upset. My dad now tells me he wishes he sent me to conversion therapy once he learned I had this magazine. Can you imagine?

2)   I grew up believing in this church, which included the terrible things taught about me as a gay person. At age 19 when my bishop challenged me to pray about going on a mission, I instead prayed to know if God could possibly love me (which is really sad that a kid could grow up in church and not know that). I felt love radiate across my body as a voice in my ear said “You are not broken.” That experience sustained me for a long time

3)   I went on a mission in the 1990’s. If you haven’t been on a mission, it’s probably a surprise that it can be a relief. There’s no pressure to date. I could form close bonds with other men, and even though these are non-romantic relationships, they are intensely close.

4)   I was still in the closet when I went to the church schools in Rexburg & Provo. At the end of my first semester, my roommate came on to me and let me feel him up and stuff. I went to sleep thinking maybe the two of us could leave the church, transfer to a different school, say goodbye to my family and we could have a life together. It would be a huge sacrifice for both of us and I thought he felt the same, but the next morning he turned me in to our bishop. I thought I was going to get kicked out of school, be sent home in disgrace, maybe disciplined out of the church, but instead I was put on probation and had to stay the summer in Rexburg. I was heartbroken and swore off love and focused on school. At the end of the summer, to my surprise the bishop made me the elders quorum president.  

That first roommate, we were best friends. He is Bi and decided a life with a woman would be easier, and considering it was the 1990′s, he was correct. He left school a few days later, met a woman and got married. I hate how he ended things, but I don’t blame him for the future he chose for his life.

5)   BYU in Provo was my backup school, and reluctantly it’s where I transferred to. It turned out that I genuinely liked BYU with 2 exceptions, the severe restrictions the Honor Code placed on LGBT students (which was the same as at the Rexburg campus), and the fierceness with which the Honor Code Office sought to enforce those restrictions. Occasionally I’d hear rumors of sting operations they had done to catch gay students. There was this low-level fear always of getting caught whilst a student in Provo. My roommates also expressed their dislike of anything remotely gay. Even though I kept the rules, I didn’t dare tell anyone that I’m gay because the potential cost was high.

While at BYU I had a major faith crisis. I no longer believed a lot of the truth claims of the church, but I wasn’t about to lose all that tuition money. I stuck it out. So not only was I pretending to be straight, I also had to act as though nothing about church bothered me.

6)   The same voice that told me I am not broken would occasionally tell me that it’s okay to pursue relationships. It gave me great hope. I still get that message. Being a good Mormon, I thought this meant that somehow God was going to change the church. In the temple I’d hear that it’s not good for man to be alone and the law of chastity was presented in a way that could include me if I was married to a husband (the temple says no sex except “with your husband or wife to whom you’re legally and lawfully wedded”).

7)   After BYU, I should have come out and gotten on with life, but I didn’t. My first job was working for a Mormon boss. A landlord who is LDS gave me a deal on rent. Coming out seemed like it would disrupt my life in really negative ways. Plus YSA Wards were a source of friends and support network.

8)   In my 30’s I was no longer in YSA wards, and the world was getting better for gay people. The fight for gay marriage was in full swing, and so many of the people in my life were very opposed to it. It bothered me that the church was so opposed and fought gay marriage because in my head, it was a way for me to follow God’s promptings and pursue a relationship.

Being a Mormon is very much an identity. It’s hard to peel off. It’s my social network, it’s what much of family life revolves around, It’s a belief system and way of viewing the world. it’s a map of what one’s goals in life should be, and so on. Staying in the closet kept the rest of my world intact.

I know you’re thinking wtf, you’re a grown man, own your life!!! I grew up in an unstable family situation (we had many financial troubles and moved frequently), so I crave stability. Remaining in the closet and in the church were keys to maintaining that stability.

9)   Squashing all my romantic and sexual feelings also shuts down most other feelings. I spent most of my 20’s & 30’s feeling numb, like I was watching life but not a part of it. I spent those years wishing I was dead, that a bus would hit me or a major disease would strike. Those kinds of deaths would end my misery and also be okay for my family because they wouldn’t have to know I’m gay. I recognize now how messed up that is.

10)   The great source of happiness in those years was being an uncle. I’m the oldest of 7 children, my siblings had lots of babies born in those years. The joys of being an uncle only increased the pressure to stay in the closet and in the church because if I didn’t, my only source of happiness might be taken away.

11)   I finally reached the point where I was tired of going through the motions of having a life. I was ready to come out. Rather than make some grand announcement, I decided to be honest with anyone who asked about my life. When someone tried to set me up with their friend, I would ask if she had a brother. As these sorts of situations came up, I was coming out to people one by one.

I didn’t exactly “come out” to my family. I figured since my parents had found the gay porn mag when I was a teen, and then gay porn malware on the computer when I was college student, they probably already knew (and they did, but were in denial). Also, I thought coming out would be saying I’m not trustworthy and an awful person for having pretended to be something I wasn’t for so long (not true, but that’s how I thought of it).

12)   I’m such a late bloomer that I sometimes am embarrassed about it, especially now that so many people come out in their 20′s and even as teenagers. At the first Pride parade I attended, someone told me that we all come out when it’s right for us, and this was my time. I think that’s true.

13)   Most of my adult life in church was being pianist in Primary. Shortly after I started telling people I’m gay is when I was called to be in the stake young men presidency. My stake president says he looked over at me playing piano one day and thought, “that man has much more to offer.” I wonder if it’s because I was more confident, my identities were less in conflict than they’d been in the past, I wasn’t afraid and hiding.

As stake young men president, I made sure I knew by name and something about every youth in the stake. I wanted them to know they were seen, they were heard, they were loved. Teens go through such hard things and I wanted to be a kind, supportive person in their life. Most youth don’t know who the stake youth leaders are, but they all knew me. Several told me about hard things in their life and some even came out to me. Parents of gay teens would come speak to me and I’d let them know life in church is hard and unfair, ways they could help support their teen, and prepared them that their child’s likely path would be out of the church. I felt like I bloomed in this calling and made a difference.

14)   In 2015 marriage became legal for same-sex couples across the USA due to a Supreme Court ruling. I thought that finally the church would have to come to terms with it and accept it. But then came the November policy banning the children of gay couples from being members. It felt like a punch in the gut and I nearly walked away. I was still stake young men president and weighed whether the difference I made in this calling was worth putting up with how church clearly didn’t want me. 

15)   To help my parents buy a house, I had a bunch of their debt put into my name and I lived in the house with them. At the time it seemed a good way to avoid the loneliness of being on my own. But living with them also made walking away from the church tricky.

16)   A month later I hit the 3-year mark of serving in the stake young men’s program, I was released from that and called to be stake executive secretary. My stake president told me that anyone can make appointments, but he wanted my unique viewpoint in all the highest councils of the stake. In this calling I occasionally meet general authorities and I speak with them about being gay in the church. My stake President recently joked that he has twice been a counselor in a stake presidency and now is a stake president, and in those years he’s met many general authorities, yet I have way more impact on them than he ever has.

17)   Shortly after getting this new calling, in 2016 I started my tumblr blog. Eventually I used the blog as a way to examine, explore and record what it’s like to be gay in the LDS church. In some ways this blog is one giant pep talk to myself.

18)   In 2017 my blog exploded, one of my posts went viral. It’s almost like God got tired of waiting on me, now I was out to everyone who knows me, and many more.

All of a sudden I had so many hurting Mormon LGBT people contacting me, most were teens and twenty-something’s. I’ve tried to help them, to affirm them. In many ways it feels like the years as stake young men president working with teens, the years I spent developing a spiritual independence, the studying & thinking about how being gay can work with the gospel, the fears & worries that are part of being in the closet, all of that prepared me for this.

19)   Later in 2017 my mental health dived. I became suicidal. I started therapy. I finally had to face how harmed I’ve been by my time in church. I also had to admit I will never be enough in this church, I can never reach the goals & purpose of life as laid out by the church,. My therapist helped me see that I need another framework for what a successful life looks like and what would make for a joyful life.

In 2018 I was still in therapy and was diagnosed with social anxiety disorder, which partly explains why coming out and leaving the church were so difficult. The major driving motivation of this disorder is wanting to not disappoint people.

20)   My therapist says I feel things more deeply than most people, but because I’d pushed down my feelings so long, it’s actually a bit scary to feel so much. I also started dating and trying to get gay friends. These sorts of big changes were hard for me. The psychologist said, in an amused tone, that I fully examine a path before I’m willing to take a step down it, meaning I’m cautious and slow to get going, but am certain when I begin of where I’m going.

21)   Some of my family openly embraces me as gay and loves me no matter what. Some make their love and access to their children conditional on my being in church.

22)   I thought 2018 would be the year I leave the church. There’s a personal reason I haven’t; I feel there’s one more thing to do, a friend whom I can help. That I came ahead to pave the way for this friend.

I know this all sounds crazy, talking about a voice telling me it’s okay to have gay relationships or that I have some missions in life to accomplish. That’s part of faith, I guess.

23)   It’s unfair to say I’m still attending church for my friend. First, I don’t want him to feel any pressure. Second, it’s my decision, not his. I also am working on paying off debt so I can more easily live on my own, I’ve joined Affirmation and met a lot of LGBT Mormons/post-Mormons and feel like there’s something of a potential support group/friendships there. I’m thinking of changing jobs, even moving to a different university. In other words, I’m laying the groundwork to make any shift more smooth. Whether I take a breather from church or not, these are good things to do.

24)   I’m in my 40′s and can see that in some important ways I’ve lived a stunted life. But I’m also able to use my voice to speak up for LGBT individuals inside the church, to try to make this little corner of church kinder and more receptive.

25)   I can’t even imagine what you’re thinking of me. A hypocrite, someone who stays with an organization that contributed to my own mental health crisis. Someone too afraid to live. I can’t undo my past and all that lost time. I’ve made a lot of progress and am moving forward. I also believe and hope that things I share on this blog and things I say in my local church help LGBT members.

Maybe you can understand, maybe you can’t, why my life went so differently from yours. I’m certain you won’t agree with a number of decisions I made, but they were mine to make and they explain where I’m at now.

[mavrustheunskooled]

Why is Bare: A Pop Opera not as super popular as Dear Evan Hansen or Be More Chill? The fandom loves LGBT rep (which Bare has) and the songs are amazing and I think B:APO is actually superior to both of those. Thoughts? I mean the musical fandom tends to try to find LGBT characters even when they aren't stated, so why do you think Bare is not as popular?

this is a very interesting question and I am hopefully going to do it justice by analyzing Fandom, Musical Writing, and Many Other Things I’m Super Passionate About

the short: many factors and a lot of luck

the unnecessarily long: 

(opening disclaimer: I love dear evan hansen and be more chill, and I’m not upset that they’re popular musicals because I feel that they’re popular for a reason. anything that sounds like an insult in the following response isn’t such because I truly enjoy both of those musicals a lot) 

(another disclaimer: spoilers for bare, DEH, and BMC, also mentions of homophobia) 

on paper, bare seems like the exact sort of musical that would be popular. bare the musical (cursed as it is) has a cast of super popular actors like Barrett Wilbert Weed, Gerard Canonico, Taylor Trensch, Alice Lee, Alex Wyse, a high quality bootleg exists of the 2013 LA cast, it’s got LGBT+ rep, complex women characters… and yet it’s got a tiny fan base. Why? 

first let’s look at why dear evan hansen and be more chill are popular. I’m more well versed in bmc, so let’s look at its history (disclaimer: I’m estimating dates but this is roughly the timeline) 

the original bmc run was in 2015 I believe. they recorded a soundtrack, everything was fine, and they closed. in 2017, people began discovering the soundtrack in hoards. specifically, they were discovering one song: Michael in the bathroom. that’s even how I learned about the show- I heard that song and had to look up the rest of the soundtrack. and in February of 2019, they’ll start previews on broadway because the fandom was revived 

why this song? I think a ton of fame comes from talent, yes, but also from luck. I think bmc was lucky that Michael in the bathroom, a great song, was discovered as the great song that it is. I also think the fame came because that song is super relatable. as someone with pretty bad anxiety, that song really touched me because I’ve definitely spent parties hiding in the bathroom and avoiding everyone and wishing I was dead because I’m so overwhelmed with anxiety. it’s relatable, so people flocked to it. 

this made me pause to think “what is bare’s hook song” my first thought was a quiet night at home if we want a song in the same vein as MITB, but that song isn’t as hype as MITB (and fandoms don’t care about fem characters as much as it cares about masc characters). my next thought was are you there because I think it’s a bop and a relatable “pls someone help” kind of song, but I don’t know which song everyone could relate to as much as everyone could relate to MITB 

and speaking of relatable content- that’s where the DEH connection comes in. dear evan hansen is similarly relatable, although it takes that to an extreme given what Evan does as a result of his anxiety. Michael and Evan are relatable characters, even if you don’t condone everything they do (and if you condone everything Evan does, we have much to talk about)

but doesn’t bare have relatable characters?? absolutely !! there’s Peter, a closeted gay kid who wants to come out, and Jason, someone who acts tough but is secretly very insecure, and Nadia, with her body image issues, and Ivy, who people won’t take seriously because they’ve decided they already know her, and so many other complex characters. so why are they left behind? 

let’s look at bare’s history: 

bare was originally written in the 90s (I want to say 1999, but I could be wrong) the performance most people consider the quintessential bare performance was in 2004 with Michael Arden, John Hill, Jenna Leigh Green, etc. 

if you compare this to DEH and BMC, the first issue is clear. DEH was hugely popular around 2016. BMC began to grow in popularity in 2017. these are very, very new shows. 20 years doesn’t sound like a lot, but in our current age where time seems to pass so quickly which each new fad, bare seems like an older musical, and a lot of people aren’t the biggest fan of older musicals. and they don’t have to be !! but it’s a personal preference of some people that could affect how they view bare as a potential musical to be a fan of 

in terms of the music of bare, it’s definitely catchy, but it’s not like a pop song. (again, no shade at DEH and BMC because those aren’t jukebox musicals or anything). bare is simply not as easy to listen to as DEH and BMC are in my opinion (and it’s not the most complicated thing ever either, but holy cow its lyrics are smart and I have to throw that in here) 

now let’s look at reasons why people may not want to watch bare. while it is great that it has canon gay characters, compelling women characters, and is very cleverly written it also has issues that can be turn-offs to people. this includes: 

-bury your gays

-gay-guy-cheats-on-boyfriend-with-girl trope 

-gay-guy-gets-outed trope 

-and potentially other homophobic tropes

I’m not shaming bare for perpetuating these tropes because it was written 20 years ago, and lgbt+ people are allowed to enjoy media in spite of its perpetuation of negative tropes, but for some people these things are enough to turn them away. and I don’t blame them! I watched bare the musical before I watched bare a pop opera, and when Jason I died I closed out of YouTube without finishing the show because I was so Sick of bury your gays. 

I am aware that there are reasons Jason died at the end of bare (they’re making a statement about how homophobia kills, particularly how homophobic religious people can have an awful affect on young religious gay people), but there comes a time when “reasons for a gay character to die” is just too much. sometimes, you just want the gay character to live, and I completely respect that notion because I felt the exact same way when I watched bare the musical. I remember when I first watched bare the musical I wrote a thread about how as a Romeo and Juliet adaptation, bare follows some things closely (like death at the end) while avoiding other extremes (Romeo running off to another country) and I thus felt the death was unnecessary. if someone else feels similarly about being sick of gay characters dying, they have every right to not want to watch bare 

that’s enough on why someone might not want to watch bare. let’s get back to bare vs DEH and BMC 

I also think a big aspect of fandoms is shipping. the fetishization of MLM (and consequently ignoring fem characters completely, along with focusing solely on white men for their shipping and ignoring men of color) is a huge problem in fandoms that I could talk about forever, but for the sake of this response, I’ll keep it a bit shorter 

DEH and BMC profit heavily off of shipping in terms of gaining popularity. people love Evan x Connor (and other ships but that’s the main one I see), and people love Jeremy x Michael (and others). so why then do people not care about bare, a show with a canon relationship between 2 basic white men, which is their ultimate goal? 

I think people like the idea of these mlm ships more than canon content. if there’s canon, it’s harder for them to make a variety of ships because it feels like everything else has to rotate around the canon without touching it (which is where the bare fandom gets Matt x Lucas because they’re the closest they have to 2 basic men- I can write my criticism of them another time though) 

I’ve also seen posts saying that things with canon lgbt+ characters sometimes have smaller fandoms because there is no need for lgbt+ theorizing- it’s right there, and if you want lgbt+ content, watch the thing. I don’t necessarily agree with this for myself (I’ll reblog every pilgrim’s hands gifset I see) but I can definitely see how other people might think this way 

failing to hype up stuff with lgbt+ characters can have a negative impact. BMC is the prime example of how a show can be revived by its passionate fan base. if people aren’t talking about bare, it’s not going to spread like other shows do 

this is kind of all over the place but anyway- I want to talk about characters more. one thing DEH and BMC have are great, complex characters that are very easy to boil down to a fandom’s favorite stereotypes. I am absolutely not saying DEH and BMC have simple characters because I think all of them have layers; however, fandoms do love to go “this is precious cinnamon roll who can do no wrong and this is evil awful terrible irredeemable person” and it’s a bit difficult to do that with bare. 

you can say Peter is your perfect son, but he does try to force Jason out before he’s ready. you can say Ivy is the evil seductress trying to tear apart your gay babies, but I will physically fight you. there aren’t any black-and-white good or bad bare characters (except Father Flynn- hate him), which doesn’t fit in line with the way fandoms function. sweeping generalizations about the current state of society based on the internet are exhausting and bad, but we do live in an age where everything must either be perfect or evil, and you can’t do that with bare. no one “did nothing wrong uwu” and that’s what fandoms Want 

(note: they will excuse wrong actions, such as everything wrong Connor Murphy has ever done, if the character is played by a mildly attractive guy they want to ship with another mildly attractive guy) 

another point that I don’t have fully fleshed out thoughts on enough to devote too much time to is the integration of parents into the shows. in both DEH and BMC, the parents get redemption arcs. in bare, Claire does say she love Peter at the end, but she’s much less of a sympathetic character than Mr. Heere or Heidi (that’s her name right- Evan’s mom) or the Murphys. when I was younger, I wasn’t allowed to watch anything that painted parents, or adults in general, in a negative light, but maybe that’s not a universal experience 

this is getting way too long and it probably has more thought put into it than what was necessary, so I’ll try to close this quickly 

I think, first off, that DEH and BMC completely deserve the hype that they have received. they’ve got compelling stories, interesting characters, and fantastic soundtracks. I also think that luck factors heavily into them getting what they deserve. there are plenty of great shows, like bare and the boy who danced on air and spies are forever and probably more that I’m not thinking of, that have great music and characters and story that, out of sheer chance, don’t get the chance they should have been given. there is no bulleted list someone can follow and at the end they’ll be on broadway with an armful of tonys; is the luck of the draw, and bare has not been afforded that chance 

I’ll end with some reasons why anyone who happened to read this but might not be a bare fan should listen to or watch bare: 

- it is an amazingly clever show; every time I watch it or listen to it, I realize another moment of foreshadowing or a line I originally brushed off was actually very significant or there’s another recurring motif/theme in the music 

- it’s full of bops (go listen to you and I or are you there or portrait of a girl) 

- canon gay characters in a canon gay relationship 

- 3 dimensional fem characters that actively criticize stereotypes 

- it’s about a religious gay boy who grapples with his religion and his sexuality and how those two things can coexist 

- it is Very Very Good

in conclusion: bare is very good and deserves attention xx

[go-diane-winchester]

How Misha ruined slash fiction

THIS IS AN EDITED REPOST.

I first got into fandom slash fiction because of Lord of the Rings.  Before that I had no idea there were others like me.  The Ringers, as I prefer to call them, were the nicest slash fans and gave me the erroneous impression that slashers are really lovely girls.  How wrong I was.  But almost twenty years ago, I [and my generational demographic] had the semblance of mind to differentiate between fact and fantasy.  I came across the definition of slash fiction, way back then.  Its was generically defined as fanwork done by women for women.  Of course one would argue that men like slash fiction too.  Correction.  Straight and Bi women like slash fiction.  Gay or bisexual men like Bara.  That is something that they indulge in because it is attractive to them.  How trans people fit into this dynamic, would be an interesting study for the future and I have already done a post on that subject. 

Straight women are completely different.  How straight women show their attraction and what they are attracted to, is completely different to what gay or bi men like.  Even bisexual women are still women and still writing from a female perspective.  For decades, and I am counting the pre-star trek era, that was how things were.  Women, for decades, had no other platform for sexual expression except slash fiction.  The phenomenon started in the East, and spread all over the world.  But Eastern and Western slash are completely different from one another.  Why don't women just write something with a man and a woman?  This is where we notice that slashers and other women are completely different.  Slashers don't like to watch another woman’s love story.  Its not satisfying for us.  We can write ourselves as the other half of a pairing, like a Mary Sue scenario, but to be honest, its not the most popular genre because the only woman truly satisfied with the story is the writer herself.  Women, very seldom, bond over Mary Sues.  But slash stories are discussed as a way of bonding over a common interest.    

Classic slash was hidden.  It was underground, which was good because the uncultured riff raff stayed away.  It was the ultimate girl talk.  It surprised us, how similar our desires were and what we found attractive.  Remember the faulty character Becky Rosen?  Even though she is problematic, the moment Sam licked his thumb and wiped the ink stain off her nose, many of us turned into embarrassing swoony puddles.  Why?  He was cleaning her nose, for goodness sake.  What’s so cute about that?  I don’t know.  We all just gushed at him.  Remember Dean spinning the Impala in the episode “Baby”.  I played that bit again and again.  It had nothing to with sex.  Dean was handling a car but I remember having a flushed face over it.   

I read somewhere that foreplay starts in the kitchen.  This applies to women anyway.  So warming your girl up starts way before you even get her to the bedroom.  So you start with a candle lit dinner and soft music and slow dancing.  While he may be ready when he walks in through the door, she will need wining, dining, dancing and lovey dovey talk to get interested.  Usually.  Sometimes, she will appear suddenly turned on, but no, she just saw her husband helping an old man cross the street, and she thought ’‘why is he so stinking cute?  Wait till I get my hands on him’’.  But that is once in a while.  We don’t switch on and off like men.  We are, by nature, cautious creatures.  Getting us in the mood is as important as the act of lovemaking itself.  That is why art that is geared to women, generally, is over-the-top and melodramatic, indulging the foreplay more than the sex. 

Ryan Gosling with a boom box [or whatever you call that thing] standing on top a car, confessing his undying love = foreplay.  Jack Dawson making Rose stand at the head of the ship [or whatever you call it], making her imagine she’s flying = foreplay. Is it necessary to the story?  Nope.  Will the Titanic stay buoyant because Jack didn’t make Rose fly?  Nah, its will still sink.  Do we like it, nonetheless?  Oooh, yeah.  

For the past 80 or so years, we have kept slash fiction solely to ourselves because:

men wont appreciate it because its not their “thing”

men will misunderstand it [case in point: Misha Collins]

because it was sexual fantasy and some of us would prefer not to share that openly. 

Did male actors speak about it when they did find out?  Yes, in passing, especially if they were the subject of the story.  A reporter or crew member would always tell them.  In the case of J2, Kim Manners apparently told them what he had found on the internet.  The Lord of the Rings cast found out because of Peter Jackson.  What was their reaction?  The same as all the other actor’s reactions: They would smirk/laugh about it, make a joke and move on.  Then Misha Collins came along.  The first time he had spoken about slash fiction, I had winced.  Apparently, judging from the audience reaction, so had they.  We really didn’t want this spoken about, openly, for two reason. 

1]  He was speaking to a general audience during his panel.  Some of them don’t care for slash fiction and no, homophobia has nothing to do with it.  If it doesn’t float your boat, it just doesn’t.  Keep throwing the word homophobia around, unnecessarily, and its going to eventually lose its effectiveness because it is frequently being used to bully people into doing what you want, rather than for equality.  So no, Jensen Ackles is not a homophobe because he doesn’t want to be up close and personal with Misha Collins.  Grow up. 

2]  The sane slashers of those days, [and it was a decade ago] didn’t want their personal naughty little secrets spoken about so candidly in a public setting.  Why?  Let me illustrate.  If you tell your friends, in a personal setting, how you like when a man runs his hands all over your body, it will illicit some “oohs” and giggles followed by their own contributions to the discussion.  If you are sitting with that same gaggle of friends at a crowded restaurant and you say the same thing loudly for the whole room to hear, what will they think of you, especially if they have children with them. 

Slash used to be one of those things a lady never spoke about in public, no matter how empowered she thought she was.  Personally, I don’t think a lady has to relinquish her femininity and decency in order to feel empowered.  That’s why I don’t like women, like Kim and Briana, who call themselves bitches to show how tough they are.  Sure, I will break a man's face, if he puts his hands on me, but that doesn’t mean that I have no feminine qualities, and I won't exhibit this aggressive side of myself with a loving and caring man.  I guess things have changed since the early days, and women are different now.  But this is just my opinion and not relevant to the subject at hand.

If Misha knew how to gauge the audience, he would have understood there and then, that this is not a suitable topic to indulge in, where the audience was mixed and included some younger people, i.e., teens and children.  What he did, was to keep running his mouth off about something he didn’t know.  And its shows in the way he refers to Destiel as pseudo-porn.  His fans were very angry about it, because it lessened their artistic efforts to pornography and nothing else.  He said he went on Wikipedia to learn more about slash fiction.  For a man who went to university, he is not very smart.  If you have ever done any academic research report at university level, you will know that any report that includes citations from Wikipedia are immediately rejected. 

Wikipedia is an unreliable source of convoluted, opinionated information that is sometimes not quantifiable and therefore cannot act as an academic resource.  Plus anyone can edit those pages, no matter what agenda they have or how stupid they are.  This fool didn’t know that.  So he started to “educate” the still fixated younger batch [who have now grown into the hellers we loathe with gusto] in the audience and on YouTube as to what slash fiction was and that is why they like him so much.  While other actors speak a line about it and move onto another topic, Professor Knowitall esq. will give his rather young audience a lecture on a subject he knows nothing about, thereby conditioning them to think that slash fiction is something that it isn’t.  Is he that stupid or that arrogant?

If you look through Wikipedia, it will give you the impression that slash is homosexual in nature, and that it is an expression of gay love.  The fact that those stories and artwork originated with straight women and are powered by the artistic efforts of straight women, is ignored.  There are topics about queer recognition and LGBT relevance on that page.  The page isn’t telling you what slash fiction is.  It is telling you what other groups feel about it.  I can tell you, almost a century ago, slash fans were not indulging this art form for those reasons.  They were doing it for their own satisfaction.  If other people like it too, that’s fine and dandy, but it is not about them.  And what Misha has done with this fandom, which is bleeding into other fandoms via intrusive destiel fans, is to make slash about the LGBT. 

That is why gay men are now getting angry because young impressionable girls are listening to him and turning a straight/bi female art form into an inaccurate gay platform.  They are using things like closetedness, gay bashings, bigotry and even AIDS as a gay “trope” or theme for their stories.  Gay men fought to change the name ''Gay Cancer'' to AIDS, because it was erroneously being considered a homosexual disease, and yet years later, we have a ''fake'' inclusive generation celebrating a story like ''Twist and Shout".  No wonder gay men hate teen slash girls.  If you write about a subject you know nothing of, you will write it wrong.  These children [because they behave like that] are writing about some very sensitive and serious topics and they are romanticizing them.  What person wont get angry? 

In the old days, the two people who made up a pairing, were differentiated, by using two words:  Seme and Uke.  While slash was a straight female art form, gay men didn’t give two hoots about these words.  They didn’t read the stuff.  They didn’t care.  They had bara.  When “woke and non-bigoted, inclusive” slash fans started speaking for gay men through their stories despite the fact that these men have a voice of their own, the guys got angry because they don’t have a seme and uke role type in their relationships.  Well, of course they don’t.  Slash is not about gay men.  Its about straight women and their sexual expression.  And in their fantasies, there are seme’s and uke’s. 

That is another problem with the Wikipedia page.  When you look at the history, it starts with Kirk and Spock.  The dunderhead who wrote that page, didn’t know that slash started in the east, probably Japan, although Hong Kong might dispute that.  When it became animated in the 1970’s, the anime version was called Yaoi.  The Japanese were actually making money from slash fiction way back when, by making comic type books, essentially novels with pictures.  And it was those translated stories, which were almost always set in another world, that gave birth to Kirk/Spock slash fiction.  Star Trek is also set in another world so to speak.  The westerners got hold of these books when the Asians immigrated.  The first slash stories were actually distributed in conventions, because the internet didn't exist back then. 

There is only one other person who over-indulged his slash fan base.  Harry Styles.  He regretted it, because it ruined his friendship.  So he stopped.  But he had a good excuse.  He was between the ages of 15 and 19 whilst in 1 Direction.  He was a baby and didn’t know any better.  Harry learned his lesson within five years and stopped.  Misha has been on the show for ten years. He was in his mid thirties when he started on Supernatural.  He was already a grown man who has no excuse, because he is not stupid.  With the amount of damage the militant destiel fans have done, you would think that he would stop.  He doesn’t.  Because it gives him staying power. 

The one thing I have noticed is, overindulging a slash fan [not necessary a heller - any slash fan] is like feeding a Mogwai after midnight.  It turns into an uncontrollable gremlin.  That is exactly what Misha’s militant fanbase is: a hideous collection of gremlins that he overfed and now they are attacking any mogwai that doesn’t show gremlin traits, even if they are mild-mannered destiel fans who don't like the leads beings threatened.  What Misha’s dumb section have now done, is that they have taken slash fiction itself, and turned it into an increasingly hateful and problematic concept.  Because, the general public, which includes J2 [because they have nothing to do with slash fiction], now have the impression that slash is a means of bullying and putting your indulgences before other peoples’ opinions and dignity, in the name of representation. 

It also give the impression, to unknowing people, that homosexuals are boisterous and demanding people and you have to please them or else.  The general public don’t know that predominantly female, heterosexual, entitled princesses are writing this crap.  They think that gays are pushing slash fiction because words like gay, queer and LGBT keep popping up in a pro-destiel argument.  Any gay man reading this, take heed, because these children are damaging your collective reputations.  And if you don’t deal with it now, the PR headache you are going to have to deal with, in the future, as a group, is going to be immense. And it won’t even be your fault, but you will be blamed for it.  How do you go about doing that?  Speak directly to Misha.  Shut up the master Gremlin-Troll himself.  Tell him he is doing you a great disservice.  After all, the mostly straight heller girls are speaking for you and he is pushing the microphones into their hands. 

I always liked slash because not only was it a means of female sexual expression, but it was also a means of female creativity.  Sure, we all like Cinderella, but it was lukewarm for some of us because, she was difficult to emulate.  And growing up, we didn’t know she was a character to enjoy, not to emulate.  Children always emulate what they see on screen.  She was thin, pretty, a good singer with nice hair and small feet.  I am club footed, bipolar and fat, with a lion’s mane that brushes broke on.  I felt sorry for her because she was abused.  I felt sorry for her because she was crying at one point.  Then I remembered what I look like when I cry.  Soft tears don't roll gently down my pink cheeks.  Snot rolls down my nose, careening to the inside of my mouth.  Not pretty.  Not delicate.  The story was nice but it left me feeling inadequate.  Some women love it.  Others, like myself, are “meh” about it. 

When I read a bemusing slash version with actors in place of the fictional cast, I read the whole story smirking.  I didn’t begrudge the beautiful lead [I think it might have been Jensen] because I was as besotted with him as Prince Charming was [presumably Jared].  I didn’t want to be him.  I wanted him.  I wanted the prince too, just FYI.  I could be a fly on the wall in the story, without actually picturing how my insignificant self would fit into the story.  That is what slash fiction meant to me.  It was an escapist art form into a fantasy 'verse, that is custom made to put a smile on my face. 

Now, Prince Charming is fighting for gay rights against his bigoted father, the king, and Cinderella is beaten by his ugly step siblings because he is a homo.  And I look at it and blink.  I am not the audience for this story.  Empathy is one thing, but replacing your sexuality with someone else’s, is something else all together.  Especially since every slash story now, seems to be about gay characters and gay rights and homophobia.  Slash has turned into a one trick pony.  How much could you write about gay rights?  Slash’s creativity is running on autopilot.  Take your ship, make them gay, make one closeted and unhappy, make the other out and happy, throw in a gay oriented trope, even AIDS [no decency threshold] and boom!  You've got a story.  

They’ve been writing in this way for the last ten years and they’ve ruined the whole genre.  So much so, that destiel and cockles stories aren’t enjoyed by anyone except destiel fans, because Misha and Cas are in those stories.  And he is always written as a precious smol bean.  At this juncture, I have to point out that, to be fair, other ships on Supernatural and other fandoms are doing the same thing, because destiel fans bend the will of others to their own.  I heard they are actually tagging destiel into posts about other shows.  Other bloggers noticed that destiel and Misha are in Mother Nature tag.  They don't even leave Mother Nature alone.  Why?  Because Misha has turned a harmless indulgence into an addiction.  He is their only dealer and pursuing canon gives them their fix.  They are gremlins on crack with stunted creativity. 

Of course, the children argue that they can't read an unrealistic story which is why slash characters have to instead be gay.  Oh yeah, then how come in Cockles stories, Misha is something pregnant.  Sometimes, he is a pregnant wolf.  So you can take your “realism” and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine.  When you write a totes realistic story, with gay characters rather than slash characters, you are disrespecting three groups of people:   

the actors, who are your, sometimes, unwilling muses 

the homosexual community, that you have absolutely no right to speak for

the earlier  slash fans who nurtured this art form, before you ''woke'' idiots came barreling in, with your inclusiveness, and flushed their efforts down the toilet, all at the behest on one selfish man. 

Decent slashers say:  This is a work of fiction and has no bearings on reality.  Then they go out of their way to not include themes that are synonymous with the gay community.  The characters in a properly written story are never explicitly gay.  They just like some guy, even though last week they were with a girl.  And no, that doesn’t make them bisexual either.  Remember, slash is a  platform with a large percentage of straight females and bisexuals don’t want you speaking for them, either.  Otherwise, nobody will dispute the hellers for saying that Dean is bi because he wore a purple shirt, once.  The fed up bisexuals reading insulting meta on how Dean is bisexual, because of his food and clothing choices, are a case in point.  So the character are fantasy slash characters.  If I were to coin a word, then they are slashsexual.  

They are just muses for the woman’s sexual expression.  We don’t need to tell them what we are doing, thereby putting them in an uncomfortable position to amend or dispute our opinion about the subject.  That is plain rude and borderline sexual harassment.  Even if we are women and they are men.  Treat them with the same dignity that you demand for yourself.  Its got nothing to do with them.  Don’t ask them.  Misha, on the other hand, has no shame and will therefore never turn down a question.  He will answer the question in a way that his gullible fangirls like, inflating his ego and giving him permanence in the show.  Has Misha caused irreparable damage?  I am afraid so.  Older women, in the SPN fandoms, get caught up in life so they don’t indulge in slash as much.  And so the brats are running this art form to the ground, teaching nonsense to those that are younger than them, parroting whatever crap Misha spews about slash fiction, in the name of sexual equality, representation and the LGBT. I am not even counting their online behaviour, just pointing out their horrible handling of slash fiction at the behest of Misha Collins.  They still listen to him and its going to get worse and worse, until slash fiction becomes THE most hateful thing about fan culture.   

Please note:

The analysis of slash fiction does not include tinhatting.  Tinhats do not believe that the people they are writing about are mere muses.  Cockles fans and J2 Tinhats believe that they people they are writing about, really are gay, but closeted due to public shame and ostracization.  Tinhats, at least the ones that I came across, do not like to be seen as shippers.  They are a separate entity altogether.  That would be a fascinating topic for the future.  Thank you to the tinhat who reminded me of this, because I completely forgot. 

[matchacitrus]

Shit I’ve heard college students say

Long overdue quotes of stuff I’ve heard from people during my first year

I hate myself enough, you guys don’t have to hate me

I sold my soul to the devil this summer and went to Planet Fitness

This is college, where kids don’t live with their mom and dad anymore

Can we turn this cube into a circle

GRITTED TEETH I AM NOT, SQUIDWARD.

I’m watching engineering students use a tape measure as a yo-yo

Babysitter you say? Did you realize you just referred yourselves as babies?

Look at all these lab coat motherfuckers

“How do you find the other gays on campus outside this club?” “They roll their sleeves”

“You have to fight those homophobes hand to hand combat now”

“Ariana Grande is that bitch, isn’t she?” everyone cheers

“We stan Helena”

When I came to this club, I was “cis”

and I was standing there, three people dead around me

I lost my virginity on Saturday, just thought you should know

Dude I’m high as fuck right now. Like I ate edibles and smoked a lot last night and the day before. Probably still high right now (this was at the start of a 9 AM class and she was really grateful for the bag of powdered doughnuts I offered since that hunger hits)

Our class is really stupid

I can eat a match

I’m gonna sleep in this pillow fort, comfy, and with all my stuffed animals, and you’re not allowed to look at me

Let’s get these tendies hustlers! chorus of dude bros yelling YEAH

What’s better than this? Guys being dudes

The food tastes better because I’m fucking cute

If you ain’t shaking ass, we throwing you out 

YOU CANT!! DEADFISH!! THIS HANDSHAKE!!

remember when I was little and used to sleep in beds?

IM A VIRGIN AND IM READY TO LOSE IT. WANNA HELP ME?

(Italian hand gesture) You gotta read the classics, like Curious George

I’m holding a bunch of skittles up my sleeves

Is this something that will instantly, painlessly, kill me? (this was some guy talking to his DM privately during a dnd session)

I’m gonna pee, can someone hold my vape?

Death Culture

Every tiktok is cringy

I never heard Drake but I like his name

Cannibalism is not an option

do you know how hard it is being me? Having everyone blaming their problems on me when it comes to the test?

Yeah, I be sucking toes

Proposal: Let’s take laxatives for fun

We should cash in our free pizza tomorrow

That’s why they call it a dream, they’re not real

No, I’m never okay

as a customer is yelling at them over chicken nuggets We’re fry or die out here

Why is your name so stupid

Breakfast is served opens a box of Girl Scout cookies

Bruh why don’t glasses have windshield wipers on them?

I’m gonna have to walk to Cane’s in this

“Oh I killed everyone already.” “That fast?”

Y’all want Pepto?? No Pepto?

I’m a FIEND for extra credit

I went to a party once and saw some white powder so I left. I’m still nervous about that to this day

Happy international women’s day! All ladies can go home

First thing needed to do when we’re drunk, go:

I’m gonna staple a leaf to a canvas and art people will find a meaning to it

Come to my house! I’m brown

If it’s your time, it’s time

“Want me to play some music or something?” “I got the music right here man starts jamming on guitar”

“Y’all ready for spring break?” “Yeah man, I’ve been rolling joints all day”

Along with this presentation, we have a kahoot

We know that much...and that’s all we know

Normal water is gross

When you’re a grad student there is no such thing as breaks. Just pity me for a minute

“Pub quiz! Get in groups.” “Pub?” “Yes.” “Wait pub????” “Just get in groups”

SHAME ON YOUR SKIN!

“Do you want me to beat him up for you?” “It’s up to you!”

I shoulda brought my tweezers with me so you could pluck my eyebrows!

drops pen on the way out I hate this class.

“Okay pick anyone you want to respond next.” “I choose glasses at the end there” “I’M YOUR T.A.”

I don’t even know how to pay my taxes! I just hand them to my dad.

They’re not all white girls but they definitely act like white girls

When was the Quran written?

I don’t know shit about fuck

What’s a waifu????

Someone FARTED in the elevator. No joke. At least wait a lil bit

Oh hey what’s up, yeah I’m gonna have to study for an exam that’s in 30 minutes

Traders Joe slaps

I’m proud of you all being here today. It’s the end end of week 13 and I just wanna lay down and die.

We’re out of chocolate chips, I can’t find them

Man this shit’s thick

Woah woah, you’ve had your last sneeze three sneezes ago!

Fuck your clitoris

Anyways that was fun and I honestly live for writing down the dumb stuff people say

[dangerliesbeforeyou]

dan made me do it

(lol jk, but like i have Feelings(tm) about my sexuality and everything & figure this is the best time and place to do it...)

So I figured out I was bisexual a little over 5 years ago, after discovering it was a legitimate thing I could call myself whilst being on tumblr (2014 was a big time for lgbt discourse, especially in terms of the various terms and labels, most of which I hadn’t been familiar with...)... but tbh, I’d been trying to come to terms with who I was in terms of my sexuality for a long time

I grew up in a religious house (my parents were jehovah’s witnesses), but I never really remember anything vaguely homophobic being thrown around? And even if it did exist, I wouldn’t have been aware of it since I never had any question or doubt in my mind about the fact I was attracted to boys (I’d had a rly intense crush on this one boy for about 5 years through primary and secondary school... I still sometimes see his pics on facebook & u know what? I still would lol anyway...) my early days in school were mostly taken up by trying to get friends not be a total recluse (I’ve always had trouble making friends and connecting to people it’s no biggie it’ ss fineee........ ok carry on>>)

So going into secondary school I never felt that I was anything other than straight? But one thing I vividly remember was the way people in my year treated girls that were suspected to be gay... in short? they were seen as ‘dirty’... it was something perverted, and highly sexualised... (as in: being a lesbian meant masturbating a lot... (i mean: this says something about wider misogyny & demonising of female pleasure but like.. another time, another time) & also making out loads with other girls)...  like no one ever came up and said ‘being gay is wrong’, but whenever rumours spread about a girl being suspected as gay and they didn’t deny them, people would suddenly start whispering about them... & it’s super strange to me that this was the same culture that if two female friends were really close and got labelled as gay, but came out and were like ��oh no we’re straight ha ha we just kiss at parties and touch each others boobs’ or whatever, people would be completely ok with it?

So I never really gave myself the opportunity to go into this... I was never comfortable enough to be super ‘close’ to any of my female friends (intimacy issues: we don’t have to to get into all THAT right now though lol ahahaha....ha...) & I knew I wasn’t so called ‘skanky’ like all the girls who were labelled as being actually gay...

& this was all happening as I found myself actually being interested in looking at girls... (like what can I say? boobs are friggin nice to look at lol...) But i always saw it as innocent intrigue, since I was only 11/12 at the time so hadn’t grown into my own at the time... and the fact I felt more comfortable being touched by or talking to or like literally doing anything with girls? it’s just cos boys are gross there’s no other reason behind it!!.... right?

I think a big thing is that a lot of girls are so open with each other... like they’ll compliment each other’s boobs or asses, or comment on how pretty they are or their makeup skills or whatever.. you’ll be hard pressed to find a girl that goes all ‘no homo’ on her friend except.... I feel like that was me lol? I remember getting compliments from other girls about my appearance (didn’t happen often though pffft) or anything really and feeling all mushy inside, and giving the compliments back felt like a big deal to me? idk I suppose all the warning signs were there that hidden under layers of introverted awkwardness was a lil bi demon just waiting to come out lol!

So yadyyada, 2014 happens and I finally realise I’m bi... I just remember reading something on here about bisexuality and being like ‘oh damn yeh... dat me??’... like it felt amazing to be able to finally accept that I actually like girls too?? & one of the first people I told was this guy I became friends with when I first went to college... & he told me he was also bi and I remember thinking ‘wow!!!!! so it’s actually real?! it’s not just something you see on tumblr from random strangers, it’s an actual thing people I know irl experience wowwowowow’... I also came out to another online friend who I was close to, and it felt really amazing... but I could never translate that into actually coming out in real life (not to mention life was kinda shit at this time and I had like 0 friends but hEY, that’s not for now kiddos lol)...

So yeh, I’ve never actually come out to anyone... not properly anyway... I’ve always been very open about my sexuality online, but in real life I’ve never really discussed it with ... anyone? & it’s not because I’m ashamed in anyway, and it’s not even as if I’m that scared I just... I’ve never felt the need to? But after seeing Dan’s video, plus it’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently, this is something I really wanna do... see; I was so ready to live life just being ‘straight until I maybe get a girlfriend one day’, so ready to only tell people if they ask me but I just realised... isn’t that partly living a lie? who I’m with doesn’t change my sexuality, so why is it something I’m seemingly so scared of declaring to the world??

I vividly have this memory, before I realised I was bi, and I have no idea of why or when or any of the details, but me and my mum were watching something, and bisexuality was mentioned, and either my mum agreed with, or she said something along the lines of ‘bisexuals are more likely to cheat’, and that’s really stuck with me.... it’s something that’s always nagging in the back of my mind, and it... really fucking hurts lol... I know for a fact my mum will love my regardless of who I end up sleeping with or whatever, she may be pretty conservative in her mindset of things but she’s always willing to be open minded which I really love about her... but knowing this inbuilt stereotype of bisexuality is something she both acknowledges and somewhat agrees with is really... sad...

I’m 21 years old, I’ve been in one relationship in my life which only last a few months and involved no kissing and only occasional hand holding because I was too terrified to do any more (again: subject for aNOTHER day lol), and I know for a goddamn FACT that my sexuality would never make me more likely to be unfaithful to someone I claim to love...I really hate that this is associated with the label, but it’s something I know that I am...  why on earth would I change that or try to be something else when I know that /this/ is me!

I think one of the biggest things putting me off ‘coming out’ is having to explain yourself... like dan howell made a 45 minute long video discussing his own sexuality and experiences cos he knew people wouldn’t just accept it if he just tweeted ‘yo dawgs imma queer lol #swag’ one day, and it feels kinda annoying that queer people/lgbtq+ people feel like we can’t just...... be ourselves without having to justify or explain it?! (even me making this post is solidifying that factor lol... it’s a mess lol)... like I just wanna live my life being bi, is that so much to ask for lol?

I am so so SO grateful we have so much more bi, and lgbtq+ in general, representation in media these days.... it’s goddamn beautiful to see our stories, and the stories of our community being told and cherished by millions, and that’s really gotta be something to rejoice in this pride month!!!

(side note: dan also talks about gender identity & I have literally never related to anything more lol... like 90% of the time I don’t feel like what people classify as ‘womanly’ things... but also I am a woman? idk man lol just call me a formless blob or whatever it was he said lol as a baby no one really knew if I was a girl or boy since my mum mainly dressed me in yellow & I had like 2 strands of hairs on my head lol... damn I miss those days lol)

In conclusion (or tl;dr as I’ve seen the Cool people write on their long posts (yes I had to google what it meant shhhh)):

Hi, my name is Xanthe, my username is ‘dangerliesbeforeyou’ here on tumblr because I made it 7 years ago and I wanted to use a cool sounding harry potter quote so I could come across as sophisticated but also nerdy, I’m a 21 year old female (mostly?) and I am a proud Bisexual...

I’m also single and very ready to mingle if anyone is interested ;;;;;;;;;)

(that’s only half a joke lol... plz romance me I’m v lonely)

[sofreakinmanyfandoms]

November 14 - We’re Gonna Go Flirt with Superheroes

Some important notes:

1. Thank you to my amazing friend Dean for letting me use their delightful self as a character in this fic. You may all be jealous that I actually know this person.

2. Because Dean does not have the cleanest of language, this fic has significantly more swearing than anything else I've posted here. I still only put half as much language as normally spews from their mouth. Love you, babe.

3. I've never actually been to a hipster bar and it's been years since I've been to Portland. Please forgive me for any obvious errors.

4. I normally shy away from describing the reader too much, but honestly? I needed this. I needed to explore a bit what it's like being straight but looking gay, because while it's nothing compared to what the LGBT+ community goes through, it's something I get a lot of grief for from my conservative Christian extended family. I needed a fic where the main girl has short hair, okay? Okay.

Thanks for letting me vent myself in this fic.

Word count: 2416

Warnings: Language, mentions of cheating, if you’re homophobic you’ll hate this one so go suck an egg

Pairing: Bucky Barnes X short haired!hipster!Reader

“Ah, Portland,” Sam said with a sigh, looking around at the bar that was definitely owned by someone very hipster. “Remind me again why we’re here?”

“It was the closest city with the material Stark needs to fix the jet,” Steve reminded him. “He’ll have it ready by morning and we’ll be on our way back to the compound.”

“Friends,” Thor declared cheerily, throwing his arms around their shoulders, “despite our transport’s destruction, we have won a great victory this day! Let us celebrate, even if your Midgardian drinks are weaker than mother’s milk.”

Bucky followed behind them, feeling out of place as he took in the décor. The floor and ceiling were concrete, but the walls had been coated in what looked like disassembled pallets with wooden booths build out of the walls. The free-standing tables were giant spools and he was pretty sure no two chairs in the whole building matched. Whoever had been in charge of decorating had even taken the chalkboard menu trope to the extreme, making the whole wall behind the bar a blackboard instead of just hanging one up. Everything was decked out in old – sorry, “recycled” – netting and buoys, presumably ones that had seen actual use based on their condition. Also, Bucky had never seen so much flannel in his life.

He settled into a booth with Sam as Steve and Thor went to get their drinks. The other man was looking around, a determined expression on his face.

“Here’s where we get to the hard part,” Sam whispered to him. “Now we’ve gotta figure out which women are gay and which are just fashionable.

Bucky furrowed his eyebrows at his friend. “I don’t understand.”

Sam leaned back and nodded to the bar. “Well, normally you see a woman in skinny jeans, a plaid flannel, and a beanie? She’s a lesbian. But we’re in Portland, where that’s everyone’s style, so it gets harder. Like the chick on the end of the bar? Pixie cut, slouchy beanie, band tee that’s probably for some local group her friend is in under her open flannel, black jeans that look painted on, and totally ignoring the prime male specimens currently ordering our drinks in favor of her cell phone? Definitely gay. But that chick over there,” he subtly pointed to a nearly identically-dressed girl, shorter and with longer hair, who had definitely noticed Steve and Thor’s presence, “is either straight or bi. I can work with either of those.”

Snorting at his friend’s explanation, Bucky flashed a quick look back at the woman at the end of the bar. Sam was probably right. Too bad; she was beautiful, and he wouldn’t have minded getting to know her better.

----------

You sighed at your phone and shifted on your seat at the end of the bar. Your friend was late again; they were always late. According to the text chain you were receiving nearly non-stop, they were also probably already drunk, not that that was surprising anymore.

“Come on, Dean,” you muttered under your breath. “I need you here before he shows up.”

Five minutes later, your friend stumbled through the door, giggling madly at, well, you didn’t want to know what. They stumbled their way over to you and collapsed onto a stool.

“Why are we here?” Dean immediately began complaining. “I stick out like a sore thumb. I’m more goth than hipster, you know that.”

“We’re here because I nanny for the owner part-time so the drinks are free,” you pointed out, rolling your eyes. “You know fully well that any place becomes your scene when you don’t have to pay for alcohol.”

“True,” Dean replied with another giggle. “I didn’t have to pay at the last place either, because I’m fucking hot. Three guys and two girls bought me drinks.”

“Aaand, that’s it, you’re cut off for the night,” you sighed, asking the bartender for a coffee for your definitely drunk friend. “You did kill your makeup tonight, though. It looks great.”

“Damn right it does,” they slurred. “Hey, how come you didn’t tell me? I’d have gotten here a hell of a lot sooner if you’d told me there were Avengers in the building.”

You followed your friend’s line of sight to where there were in fact four members of the Avengers seated in a booth.

“Oh… I didn’t notice them.”

Dean scoffed and gave you that knowing look that you really hated. “You got lost in your phone again, didn’t you? Just in case he showed up.” The blush on your face was enough of an answer. “Damn it, woman, he’s a fucking asshole who never deserved you and I’d have killed him already if you weren’t so fucking concerned with whether or not things are legal.” They downed the rest of their coffee with a grimace and pushed themselves off the bar, grabbing for your hand. “Come on. We’re gonna go flirt with superheroes.”

Your eyes widened in horror. “Oh no. I am not going to talk to the Avengers with you while you’re drunk.”

Dean’s eyes narrowed as they looked at you. “Then you have to promise me you’ll sing karaoke tonight. You haven’t done it since that bastard criticized your voice, and I miss hearing it. You’re fucking good, and you let that fucking moron rob us all of your beautiful songbird-ness.”

“I hope you realize how drunk you sound.”

“Do we have a deal or not? Because if I’m going to give up a shot at fucking Thor, it had better be for a good reason.”

You sighed. Your friend was always stubborn like this. “Fine, we have a deal.”

“Awesome! I get to pick your song.”

“Aw, hell, no…”

----------

Your ex showed up right before karaoke started as he always did.

“Look at the smug asshole,” Dean muttered into the drink they’d somehow managed to get despite your best efforts. They put on a comically feminine voice and mimicked, “I must sing every chance I get, for my voice is God’s gift to mankind and to deprive people of the joy of listening to it would be blasphemy of the highest fucking order!”

“Dean,” you sighed, “please behave. You’ve already gotten me to agree to singing again. You don’t need to start a scene with him, too.”

“I should cut off his fucking dick for cheating on you.”

Because you knew Dean, you were concerned they meant it. “Don’t. He did me a favor, helping me realize he wasn’t worth it. Now, did you sign me up for karaoke already, or do I need to do it?”

The grin they flashed you was even more concerning when paired with how much they’d had to drink. “I signed us both up. After you sing your mystery song – yes, you’ll have enough of an intro to figure out what it is and come in on time, they put the lyrics up anyway, you’ll be fine – I’ll blow your performance out of the water with a spectacular rendition of ‘Bang, Bang.’ Your ex won’t know what hit him.”

“I’m sure he won’t,” you said dryly, only to be horrified when your name was called first as karaoke started.

Dean laughed at the glare you threw them. “Go blow them all away with your magical voice, darling!”

“Y/N,” the bar’s owner said into his mic when you stepped up on stage. “It’s been far too long, m’lady! Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time in a few months, it’s the lovely Y/N singing ‘Shake It Off’!”

“Really, Dean?” you asked, picking up your mic. “All the songs in the world to choose from and that’s the one you picked for me?” The regulars laughed at your teasing as Dean raised their beer in salute. Almost before you had a moment to collect yourself, the music was off and you could feel your ex studying you from his seat near the back with his new woman draped across him. You shut him out of your mind and focus and launched yourself into the song, determined to have fun even if you weren’t really drunk enough to do a Taylor Swift song for karaoke.

----------

Bucky hadn’t been paying attention to much other than his beer until the karaoke started. Their booth was set up at the perfect spot for watching the stage, and he chided himself for the way his heart jumped when you stepped on stage.

“Really, Dean?” you joked, shooting a look at your friend who did not look like – he? She? Bucky couldn’t tell which – would be interested in hanging out in a bar like this. Then you took a deep breath and wow, your whole demeanor changed as you started singing. It was like the song took over you and you had an entirely different energy about you.

“I go on too many dates, but I can’t make ‘em stay,” you sang, and Bucky watched you work the stage, using the mic stand to your theatrical advantage even as you held the mic in your hand. He’d say you were hamming it up for the crowd, but there was something about your performance that said maybe some of the words were hitting a little too close to home for you to be too flippant with them.

“My ex man brought his new girlfriend,” and he didn’t miss the way your eyes flickered to a couple in the back. “And to the fella over there with the hella good hair, why don’t you come on over baby? We can shake, shake, shake.”

He almost choked on his beer, because he could swear that during that last line you had looked over and winked at him in a very “I’m not a lesbian and I want to climb you like a tree” type way. Bucky’s eyes quickly flickered to Sam to see if the other man caught it, but if he had, he wasn’t giving any indication of it.

It had to have been the performance, right? You were just working the audience. When the song ended, he made sure to applaud, and soon your friend (Dean, the announcer called them) was on stage singing like they were, well, as hammered as they looked.

----------

“Come ooooonnnn,” Dean whined, tugging on your sleeve. “Y/N, they’re in town and they’re in this bar and Thor’s so hot I’m surprised I don’t have a sunburn yet. I can’t talk to them alone. Come flirt with me.”

Your friend wasn’t going to give up anytime soon, so you slammed back the rest of your drink and stood.

“Fine,” you said, “but if you look like you’re going to puke on an Avenger at any point I’m dragging you home.”

“Yay!” they cheered, immediately pulling you over to their table and sliding into the booth next to Thor. “Hello, gentlemen of the Avengers. My name is Dean, I’m genderfluid and pansexual and would gladly climb any of you. This is Y/N and she’s a straight prude but if you give her enough alcohol you might be able to get a nice make-out session with her.”

You groaned and rubbed your face with your hand. “Sorry for my friend here. They passed merely being drunk an hour before karaoke started.”

“Pleasure to meet you both,” Captain America (YOU WERE TALKING TO CAPTAIN AMERICA?!?) said. “I’m Steve, and this is Bucky, Sam, and Thor.”

“Hi, Thor.” Dean batted their eyelashes and you choked back a snerk.

Bucky pushed at Sam and the two slid a little further back in the booth, making space for you to sit next to the soldier. He motioned to the seat and you slid next to him hesitantly.

“Sorry for interrupting your evening,” you apologized quietly, although Dean had long since tuned you out in favor of attempting to seduce the god of thunder. “Dean gets an idea their head and I’m basically stuck along for the ride.”

“It’s no problem,” Sam said smoothly. “I do have one question, though. Are you really straight?”

You couldn’t help but laugh, and Bucky thought that might be the nicest sound he’d ever heard. “Yes, I’m really straight. Most people are surprised, but my sense of style wasn’t enough to keep jerks from hitting on me so I got a haircut and fell in love with the style. It’s let me fly under the radar a lot more frequently, which is nice.”

“I can’t imagine how,” Bucky said, a blush creeping up his cheeks. “You’re beautiful.”

Before you could thank him, a voice to your left made you freeze.

“Y/N.”

Dean’s attention was snapped away from Thor and they stared down your ex. “Listen, asshole –”

“Dean.” You held up a finger to stop your friend before they made too much of a scene before entirely turning to your ex. “What do you want, Daniel?”

“It’s free karaoke time,” he crooned, ignoring how unwanted he obviously was. “I thought maybe we could do a duet together, for old time’s sake?”

You affixed him with a glare that would whither a plant. “Why on earth would I want to be reminded of our time together?”

That seemed to shake his confidence a bit. “I’m just being friendly,” he snapped.

“You don’t know how to just be friendly. We’re over, Daniel, so get over it already. If you really wanted me, you wouldn’t have cheated.”

“I believe you heard the lady,” Thor cut in before Daniel could reply. “She wishes for you to leave her alone, and I suggest you abide by her wishes.

For the first time he seemed to notice who you were sitting with, and he sulked off back to his date.

“Well,” Sam broke the silence that had fallen over the table, “I’m guessing that relationship being over is a good thing?”

You nodded. “Thank you,” you told Thor. “I appreciate the support.”

“Anytime, m’lady.”

----------

“Do you want to talk about it?” Bucky asked you softly a few minutes later when you had yet to join the table’s renewed conversation.

You shook your head. “He was a jerk who cheated on me so I got out. It was a long time ago.”

“How could anyone throw away someone like you?”

The earnest way he said it made you blush.

“His loss,” you whispered shyly.

Bucky only paused a moment before asking, “Could I make his loss my gain?”

“I’d like that,” you said with a smile. “I’d like that very much.”

[startofamoment]

B99 Hiatus Writing Challenge

In the immortal words of Captain Raymond Jacob Holt, “EVERYTHING IS GARBAGE.” – The finale left our favorite squad in pain, we have to wait months for new content, and Dianetti still isn’t canon.

Even Terry knows what we need most in these trying times: fanfiction. 

Under the cut is a list of 30 prompts/summaries put together with a ton of help from @stardustsantiago, @peraltiagoisland, @scullysthumbtacks, @three-drink-amy​, and @dogworldchampion. Feel free to run away with any (or many) of these plot bunnies!! Let’s make this hiatus as gr99 as possible. ★

1. He’s still chuckling at her screaming sheep prank as he walks out of the break room. He’s four paces away when he turns back, ready to stick his tongue out at her and yell one last comeback. Except that’s when he sees it: the Double Tuck.

2. An emergency at the precinct calls Raymond away from home, leaving Kevin alone to babysit little Marcus for the rest of the day. Everything’s all well and good until pre-nap story time, when Kevin realizes he’s never met another child so emotional over Humpty Dumpty falling off a wall. He manages to calm little Marcus down by suggesting they make french toast with bacon smiles for dinner, but the child ends up sobbing at the sight of the refrigerator. (Alternatively: 4-year-old Marcus bonds with his Uncle Ray-Ray’s boyfriend.)

3. “GET THAT LITTLE DEMON AWAY FROM ME.” “Jake, he’s just a baby. Also, weren’t you the one who rented this fur ball for the night?” “I DIDN’T REALIZE I WAS PAYING FOR SHERE KHAN JUNIOR.”

The relief team takes over. Jake and Amy don’t catch the bad guys. The night still ends up on their good dates list.

4. Five hours. No texts or calls or selfies or anything from him for five hours. Amy should have realized it sooner. She should have believed he was being sabotaged. She shouldn’t have driven off after he said, “See you never.” 

5. “Which bird is that?” “It’s the shut the hell up or leave me alone bird.” “Is that its Latin name?”

Rosa Diaz is a graduate student at Cornell looking into going on sabbatical to study birds at the University of Buenos Aires. She’s pretty set in her plans, until she meets novice bird watcher Gina Linetti.

6. Jake is a disgruntled bookshop worker, just trying to save up to pay off his crushing debt. His life is a monotonous cycle of shipment unpacking, shelf restocking, and cashier manning until Amy comes in with a rare old book request, and they spend an entire afternoon searching the store for it. (Truthfully, he knows exactly where to find it, but he maybe doesn’t want his time with her to end.)

7. “Hey, it’s me. Please open the door... Come on, let’s talk. I’m sorry.” “Can I help you?” “Oh, no, you’re not Amy.”

After the most disastrous double date in history, Jake knocks on Amy’s door instead of Sophia’s.

8. Jake Peralta is one of the best wedding planners in Brooklyn. He can handle any wedding with his usual pizzazz and charm. Except for Amy Santiago’s.

9. “All aboard the Terryliner. Next stop, Holtsovania.” “Wait! Can we drop by the farmers market first?”

A perp Charles has been chasing for months surfaces out of the blue. Nikolaj is left at the precinct, and the rest of the squad take turns watching him.

10. He’d hated this song since his bar mitzvah ages ago, but suddenly, he couldn’t bring himself to keep hating it. Not when Amy’s hand was clasped in his. Not when she was close enough for him to see the lighter flecks in her eyes. Not when her smile had him falling deeper and deeper in love.

11. “Geez, Santiago, you didn’t have to pay $950 just for a second date with me! I didn’t realize you were so bummed our date last month was cut short by that case.”

The NYPD Men’s Charity Date Auction is coming up, and it’s Jake’s first time participating in the event. He’s been boasting about how excited he is to get free dinner and help out the local children’s hospital, but truthfully he’s scared out of his mind. (Rumor has it that the crazy 2nd floor receptionist from the Seven-Three was gonna drop at least $500 for a night with him.) He’s as stunned as the entire audience when Amy pulls through with a winning bid at the very last second.

12. Gina Linetti is stuck as assistant manager at the worst sunglass kiosk this side of Brooklyn. Her life changes when Rosa Diaz walks up and demands the darkest and shadiest pair they've got.

13. “Are you hearing that? What the hell is that noise?” “Do you mean all that thumping, yelling, and plates crashing?” “That plus the endless loop of Beyonce songs.” “Yeah, that’s Rosa and Gina having sex.” “WHAT? EW.” “Oh my god. Am I neighbors with a homophobe?”

Apartment neighbors Jake and Amy bond over the loud, crazy people on their floor.

14. I made a deal to save your life, and we can never be with each other ever again or else the person I made the deal with is going to kill one of us and make the other watch... I’m so sorry, it was the only way.

15. “So if I transferred anywhere else, you wouldn’t care at all?” “No, of course not. Do whatever you want, you know, it’s your life.”

He should have said something. Because now she’s gone to work for the Special Victims Unit, and he’s pretty sure she took a part of his soul with her.

16. Amy Santiago is about to have a traditional summer with her family, including her close friend Rosa, at Kellerman’s, a summer lodge she goes to every year. But then, she meets Jake Peralta, a talented dance instructor from the wrong side of the tracks. Will she have the time of her life? (Dirty Dancing!AU)

17. “Peralta, I swear to god, if you get blue soda in my car, I’ll kill you.” “Okay, but can I still eat my pocket donut, though?”

Jake and Amy go on a road trip, minus the complicated relationships but still with the poorly disguised feelings.

18. Midnight motorcycle races weren’t exactly Gina’s style, but the girl in the black leather jacket riding the supercharged R1 has her intrigued. She’s even more impressed when this rider turns up as a classical ballerina in their local dance competition.

19. “Ugh, Dad, The Enigma won’t leave me alone! Today she followed me around the entire playground.” “Now, Nikolaj, be nice to your cousin. She just loves you so much!”  

20. We’re partners for an essay project in History of Magic, and we need to get a book from the restricted section, but I’m not sure how the books are organized in this section, and you won’t stop trying to find weird sex books, like, no I don’t think they keep the wizard’s kama sutra in the restricted section, what is wrong with you? (Hogwarts!AU)

21. “Remember when you got arrested and had to go to jail for three months?” “Yeah, good times.”

The squad and their kids get together for a barbeque, now that they’re all happy.

22. Lieutenant Melanie Hawkins is the best cop in the NYPD for a reason. As they’re being transferred to Rikers, Jake and Rosa find out they’re actually being sent to further infiltrate a notorious drug cartel. And thus begins one of the biggest, most dangerous undercover operations in history.

23. “Detective David Majors is already on this case. I need someone to partner up with him.” “Sir, with all due respect, I’m the obvious choice. I mean, look at me.” “I’m not sure you’re right for this, Peralta. The marshal says the detectives have to go undercover as a couple, and I’m not sure the group to be infiltrated is quite so progressive… I think I’ll send in Santiago.”

Amy gets assigned to date Blotter Dynamite Dave Majors for an indefinite amount of time. Jake considers ruining the operation in the name of love. (Fake Dating!AU - except not with Jake)

24. She’s pale yet covered in bruises, and her movements are slower and more guarded. There’s nothing he wants to do more than just hold her, but from behind the glass separating the two of them, all he can do is ask, “What happened?” (Alternatively: Amy gets injured in the field while Jake is in jail.)

25. “Sir, how did you and Kevin get engaged?” “I don’t think this is much of a proposal story, Jacob. We heard gay marriage had been legalized and then headed straight for City Hall.”

It’s only half an hour into this stakeout, but to Jake it feels like it’s been an eternity. There’s a ring box burning a hole in his pocket, and a jumbled mess of ideas in his head. He knows Amy wouldn’t want him turning to anyone for approval, but the longer they sit in this car, the more inclined he is to ask Holt for advice.

26. I am Head Girl, and I’ve been asked to give a presentation on safe sexual practices, and you will not stop asking me uncomfortable questions to embarrass me. Please stop, I know you know the answer to that, we did it last night. (Hogwarts!AU)

27.  “What the hell, Gina! I thought this was supposed to be a Hip Hop class?” “Rosa, Rosa, Rosa. Did you seriously think I wanted a Step Up-esque number for the first dance out our wedding?” “Uhm. Yes?”

Gina tricks Rosa into taking a couples ballroom dance class with her.

28. A tragic car crash kills Terry and Sharon, leaving their baby daughter Ava to their mutual friends Jake and Amy, who don’t get along at all. (Life As We Know It!AU)

29. Jake and Amy manage to keep their relationship a secret, but that means Dozerman stays captain of the precinct.

30. “Just you and me, and Baby makes three.”

There’s a binder full of color coded information on the shelf, and a Die Hard-themed onesie in the dresser. Jake and Amy’s baby is on the way.

[punkscowardschampions]

Ali & Marlene

Ali: Hey babe, sorry I missed rehearsal, know you rocked it regardless  💋 Marlene: Kind of need our lead singer to do that. Instrumental wasn't the vision for the track, babygirl Marlene: Where did you have to be? We could've rescheduled Ali: I know, I know, my bad! Make it up to you Ali: Ugh, got detention, didn't I Ali: don't even get me started on that Marlene: Make it up to me alone or me and the band? Marlene: Little rebel Marlene: Can't have you getting in more trouble by ditching, can we? Marlene: I'll add in another rehearsal, the girls won't mind Ali: Why not both? Ali: Come over and I'll record the vocals for you Ali: You know it boo 👩🏼‍🎤 Ali: Exactly, even though I'm fully staging a protest tomorrow Marlene: That's my girl Marlene: I'll be there front and centre, lending my voice to the movement Ali: Aww, so supportive Ali: cute 😉 Ali: I've rallied all the usual suspects so it shouldn't be a flop Ali: we have the allotted hours, like, if they fail to control us in 'em, why add more, yeah? pointless, where's the logic Marlene: Making me so proud to have you on my arm Ali: As you should be Ali: Though that arms not bad 💪 Marlene: I wouldn't be the best bassist in this shithole if it was Ali: One track mind 😏 SUCH a bassist Ali: don't you ever break that focus? Marlene: It has been known Marlene: For the right girl Ali: Introduce me to her some time, yeah? Ali: Get some tips Marlene: You know her pretty well Marlene: The name's Alison, like the song Ali: So soft Ali: Still say we do a Elvis Costello and Dolly mashup Ali: idc what you say, Jolene is a bop and you need to own it Marlene: If I can hear you do an original Elvis cover, I'll think about it Ali: Fine, I'll happily sing about myself all day Ali: can even get the accent down, thanks Ma Marlene: I'll be waiting for that Marlene: The girls are asking if you need posters or anything else for the protest? Anything to stick around and drink more Ali: Patience, babe Ali: Gotta save these pipes for the protest Ali: Feel free to go for their lives, like Ali: Bear in mind if they use too many expletives, the School ain't gonna listen tho Ali: creative language, not colourful, ladies Marlene: No promises on getting them to dial back the reclaimed slurs Marlene: But we'll leave off calling the teachers the cunts they are Marlene: For you, our glorious leader Ali: 🙇 down Ali: I'll take it, they're not going to go anywhere near hate speech vibes, too risky Marlene: Tempting offer Marlene: I'll take you up on it when we're alone Ali: Yeah? Gonna skip rehearsal more often then Marlene: For revolution and no less, babe Marlene: But I have missed you Ali: The revolution's always rolling, babe Ali: I can't stop the wheels of change, you know Marlene: I know you want me to make a rock and roll pun Marlene: But I refuse Ali: Boooooo 👎 Ali: too punk for me now? Marlene: Not gonna quote a dead white man either, not even Lennon Marlene: You're still my little punk princess, you know Ali: Throw some Yoko craziness at me Ali: 👑 Marlene: Keeping it back so the protest won't flop. Can't let it Ali: Sure, you just don't wanna get on the rooftop with your mates Ali: someone'd fall, or get pushed 😂 Marlene: Not me or you Marlene: With these arms we're safe Ali: 🔫 pew pew Ali: they wanna try me, bitch Marlene: We should fill up supersoakers for those who are anti our message Marlene: Piss on their negativity in a literal sense Ali: not with actual piss, right? Marlene: You have to start thinking punk rock, babe Ali: I am not pissing into a supersoaker Ali: not dying to prove my aim is as good as a man's like Ali: you do you, babe but I'll leave it at good old fashioned water Marlene: Now who's deserving the boos and jeers Marlene: So regal of you Ali: what can i say? my idea of a good time isn't pissing on my own hands Ali: crazy, i know 😉 Marlene: How true my love is Marlene: Any time's a good time with my baby Ali: 💙 Ali: forreal tho, what are we doing this weekend Marlene: There are a few parties Ali: where Ali: i wanna go as far away as poss Marlene: They're local, usual suspects Marlene: We can do something else Ali: Think of something better, yeah Ali: I'm sick of the locals at the mo Marlene: I'll come back to you with a plan Ali: 💋 Ali: that's my girl Marlene: What am I good for if I can't take you away from this shithole? Marlene: Not like it's that hard Ali: You got your license, 'til I got mine I'm at your beck and call, like Ali: Your Ma will be cool, yeah? Doesn't need to be long, just long enough to breathe Marlene: I'll make a deal with her Marlene: Name drop you since she's a fan Ali: Such a parent pleaser 😇 Marlene: If you sang it she'd do anything you say Marlene: Thinks you've got the voice of an angel for sure Ali: Aww, what a babe Ali: like mother like daughter 😏 Marlene: She had her moments of hell raising Marlene: Would to this day if it was possible Ali: Imma ask her all about it when I see her Ali: fo'sho Marlene: That'd make her happy Ali: Who doesn't love being scandalous? Marlene: Whoever gave you detention Ali: Give you three guesses 😑 Marlene: I don't need them Marlene: Most are in your fan club too Ali: Exactly Ali: Don't teach R.S. if you can't handle healthy debate Marlene: Yeah. We live in Dublin not a dictatorship Ali: Honestly Ali: Some people really wanna take it back to the troubles Ali: Shouldn't have said as much but chill, dude Marlene: Freedom of speech, babe Marlene: I've lost count of how many teachers I've called homophobes Marlene: Gotta speak up Ali: True Ali: you are a bit quick on the draw sometimes, like Marlene: I'm not letting them get away with it Ali: Just sayin', plenty of reasons to give you dirty looks, babe, not all of 'em that you're gay 😜 Marlene: I'm a perfect gentleman and you know it Ali: True Ali: You don't look it tho Marlene: You don't look like a rebel queen Marlene: And yet Ali: I know looks are deceiving, tell it to the homophobes, babe 😏 Ali: also you gotta stop with the compliments 😾 Marlene: But everyone's clearing out. It's the perfect time to shower you with them Marlene: Where do you wanna be? Here or there Ali: When bae only sweet talks you when their mates aren't about Ali: SUCH a fuckboy, darling 💋 Marlene: You know what I was getting at, darling Marlene: We can be alone finally Marlene: But only if you're in the mood Ali: I'll come over Ali: as much as my Ma is also a fan, just yours like, not so much mine Marlene: Let me pick you up Marlene: It's too dark for that shit Ali: Nah, I wanna walk Ali: gotta burn off the energy I didn't get to rock out Marlene: Hold your keys since you won't take my knife off me Ali: Don't worry Ali: My Da beat you to the self-defense lesson, like Ali: I'm sweet Marlene: If I'm not there to protect you, I'm bound to worry Ali: You worry too much, baby Ali: Good thing I'm coming to take all your cares away Ali: and I've got bud, naturally 🚬 Marlene: And I hid some drinks from the vultures Ali: Party of two 😘 Marlene: When you get here. Until you do I'm sitting on the floor alone writing shitty songs about you Ali: Try and write a good one, will ya? Not having it bandied about that I'm a shit muse 😉 Ali: you could never Ali: gonna play for me when I get there? Marlene: Been trying since I met you, babygirl Marlene: It's not you, it's me Ali: Nah Ali: there's a hit in there, I just gotta try harder Ali: as you're so anti-establishment, your brain is noping on writing a bop that everyone will love Marlene: I want you to love it Marlene: You're the one it's for Ali: I'm excited to hear Ali: assuming I don't get shanked on the way by the big bad wolf Marlene: Your tragic early death isn't the inspiration I want or need Ali: Tell it to the TV writers, hun Ali: angry protest song #765 Marlene: I'll sing you my shitty song and you can die laughing Ali: Never Ali: cross my heart Marlene: And fingers that I can patch together a chorus that doesn't make me wanna die before you get here Ali: 🤞 Ali: I have faith enough for two Marlene: As an angel, you kind of have to bring it Ali: No pressure 😓 Marlene: I'm more than okay with you lacking it, stick it to your detention giver over again Marlene: And I love you, so forgiven most sins Ali: A benevolent Goddess you are Marlene: Modeled on the original lesbian in the sky Ali: Debated theology enough today to live and let live on that one babe Marlene: Promise I'll save the angry lesbian god essay recital for another night Ali: You're a doll 💋 Ali: Oh, hold up, I see my ex Ali: ready for this awkward convo in 3 2 Ali: brb Marlene: Bet you want me to pick you up now, don't you? Ali: [15 mins later] Ali: That was wild Marlene: What the fuck, Ali Marlene: I was about to start searching for you Ali: Soz, more chatty than I remember Ali: only gone at got someone pregnant hasn't he Marlene: Dodged a bullet Ali: Tell me about it Ali: Still out on the town tryna get some though Ali: is that the new come on? I'm fertile! Marlene: In this town, likely Marlene: Which ex is it? Ali: #4 good drugs, bad teeth Ali: the one who lowkey stalked me after and my brother had to smack him one Ali: good times, unexpected detour down memory lane there but got us some freebies so Marlene: It took 15 mins to get what you're owed, how long does he take over customers who aren't his stalked exes Marlene: bad business is what you should've called him Marlene: Or manners Ali: names are definitely open to workshopping Ali: he had to show me the scan pics, duh Marlene: Had to do the whole come on Marlene: fucking pig Ali: Bless Ali: have your fun whilst you still can, kid Marlene: not with my girlfriend Ali: don't worry babe, got the drugs for free free Ali: not suck my dick free Marlene: Are you gonna be here soon Marlene: I can still bring the car Ali: Yeah, I'll get a wriggle on Ali: 5 minutes if I run Marlene: If you don't run into any more exes first Ali: cities littered with 'em Marlene: If you didn't date men you could stay friends with them Ali: why would I wanna do that? Ali: I've seen your dyke drama, a no thank you Marlene: I don't have dyke drama Marlene: You're the one trying to avoid the awkward Ali: 😏 Ali: I don't care, its funny Ali: he wasn't that bad, really Ali: don't need to add every ex to my inner circle though, that's a madness Marlene: He stalked you Marlene: He's an asshole Ali: Not properly Ali: Just had issue letting go as fast as I did, who can blame him 😘 Marlene: It's not funny, Ali, it's fucked Ali: So serious 😾 Ali: It ain't like he locked me in his basement, I get to decide how fucked it was or wasn't Marlene: You get to brush it under the carpet too, doesn't make it right Ali: 🙄 you're as bad as my mother Marlene: maybe she's got a point Ali: Ugh, don't need to point score, she already likes ya, babe Ali: he's just a stupid kid, not fucking Bundy, yeah, let's chill Marlene: He doesn't have to be Bundy to be held accountable, babe Marlene: He's gonna be someone's dad Marlene: What the fuck Ali: for what? being a bit of a prick at 16 Ali: s'not a crime, last time I checked Marlene: it doesn't have to be Marlene: Lads think they can do whatever they want Marlene: They can't and shouldn't Ali: Nah, this isn't a soap box moment, babe Ali: we all do things we know are wrong, and ain't proud of Ali: 'cos of how we're feeling Ali: Honestly, not a big deal Ali: and not an exclusively male thing, that's a crock of shit Marlene: If I was heavy handed with one of my exes I'd get so much shit Marlene: He gets boys will be boys Marlene: It's not a big deal because you're making excuses for him Ali: From who? The lesbian mafia? Ali: Straight girls are INSANE Ali: way worse than #4 was ever Ali: I'm not gonna burn him at the stake for something I don't believe in Marlene: Straight girls are a whole other subject Marlene: Last I checked you didn't have any of them as exes so no really the point Ali: That you know of Marlene: I know about every one of your exes Ali: Okay, Liam Neeson Ali: can't be calling out stalkers when you're breathing down the phone like that 😂 Marlene: You're not funny Ali: I am though Ali: but I ain't coming over if you're gonna be such a downer Marlene: Are you serious? Marlene: Your jokes are so bad I can't tell Ali: Duh Ali: Killing my vibe, babe Marlene: You're basically here Ali: So? Ali: I can keep walking into this dark night Marlene: So come in Marlene: I'm sorry, baby Ali: You promise you're gonna stop being lame? Marlene: Cross my heart Ali: Okay, lemme in then

[captainjackfuckingbarakat-blog]

So I’m working on an Ian/Mickey fic, but refuse to post it, until I’ve got a rough draft completed. Now, I’m not very far in it right now, but with college right now, motivation dwindles. So, I thought I’d post a snippet (ok, not exactly a snippet, it’s a few thousand words long...), and hopefully get some feedback on it.

Enjoy!

Felicia’s hand was flung in front of her, the diamond on her finger glinting with the sunlight beaming through the window and reflecting off it. Ian dug into the depths of his memory, for any recollection of a boyfriend, but he found none. He’d known the fiery auburn haired girl for three years – their first meeting definitely left them a story to tell. Despite the length of their friendship, Ian could only remember Felicia single, even last night she’d been eagerly grinding against some guy. “Oi, don’t be thinking too hard there.” She spoke with a thick British accent; she’d only moved to the states three years ago, shortly before meeting Ian, and she did nothing to cover her origins.

           “You’re just telling me about this now!” Ian seized her left hand, eyes glazing over the rock that took up half of her finger. Felicia had been a mysterious woman from the beginning, and had no problem constantly throwing him for a loop – like the ex-boyfriend she’d left behind with their infant daughter when she was 18.

           “He only proposed this morning. Sorry I decided to have celebratory sex with my fiancé to tell your sorry ass.” Felicia yanked back her hand, flashing one more adoring smile at her ring finger before shoving it into the pocket of her black romper. “Oh come on, I’ve told you about Mickey, dark and handsome. Haven’t I?” Felicia threw a gob smacked hand to her forehead and her face flushed. “Ey Ian, forgot to tell you, there’s this bloke I’ve been seein.”

           “Well jeez Felicia, surprised you didn’t wait until I was walking you down the aisle.” Ian had always been one to tell her about his latest fling, however he’s pretty sure she stopped paying attention at guy number 5, and that had only been a month in. He used to believe every guy would be the one, but after a harsh break up with a guy he’d dated for a year, he jumped off that train.

           “Who says you’re givin me away?” She put on a serious face, arms crossing across her chest in dismay, but they both knew that unless she was having the wedding in London, Ian was the only one that fit the job. Felicia’s mom had passed years ago, and her dad was barely hanging on since then, cancer eating away at his lungs. Her only brother stuck around to care for their father, while she’d run away at 16, and only went back for her mother’s funeral – he hated her. “I wanted to wait till it got serious. It got serious, then I forgot.”

           “Probably a few too many lines of coke. I told you that shit isn’t good for you.” Ian tutted his best friend – she was a party girl, but Ian figured out how to maneuver around it. He always let her do her thing, and did a good job at standing up to peer pressure. He had a lot more restraint than his older brother Lip, who was 24 and already a raging alcoholic. Ian was past his party days, and had enough on his plate these days without the booze and drugs plaguing him.

           “Good thing my fiancé don’t care how dumb I am. He loves me regardless.” Felicia flashed her ring again, if only so she could stare longingly at it, as if the man who’d given it to her would appear upon her wishes. “Tomorrow,” she pointed adamantly at Ian. “You’re taking me out for a celebratory drink.”

           “It’ll have to be an early drink. I go in at five, won’t be off until well after midnight.” Ian’s work hours were shit, and the job mundane. He crossed his arms all night as he worked as an intimidation technique at the fairytale, a gay club in Boys town. That’s how he’d met Felicia, a rowdy patron who was way too drunk, and he hadn’t taken a single step up the latter in three years. At least he still have a steady flow of cock, his one remaining vice – he’d even given up cigarettes along the way, allowing his lungs a break from nicotine and weed.

           “Pick me up at two for an afternoon cocktail.” Felicia shook his hand as if that were normal behavior – what, were they setting up some sort of business deal – the two friends had been more of huggers. “Tonight, it’s back to my fiancé, so you’ll have to party hard without me.” For Ian, that meant one beer in the privacy of his crappy apartment in the heart of Chicago, streaming Netflix through the night.

~

           “So, you have got to tell me about this guy.” They had been at the bar for all but ten minutes, with Felicia trying to distract him with crazy coworker stories – she worked reception at a law firm. The girl was already sipping her way through her second glass of whiskey, while Ian had taken a few sips from his Coca-Cola. The bartender had given him a dirty look when he turned down even a beer with minimal alcohol content. He was ready to find it a maddening bar like in the movie Coyote Ugly that would spray him down with water for his choice. “Come on, what’s his name again?”

           “Mickey,” Felicia said with a slap on his shoulder. “He’s the one.” She had always claimed not to believe in love, always cynical about the future, which likely explained why she’d kept this quiet. Boyfriends had only fucked her over in the past. “He’s fucking short, only an inch taller than me, but he never complains when I wear heals. He’s got these stupid tattoos on his knuckles, but somehow I find them endearing.” She went on, and Ian admired the look of love glowing from his best friend. He used to dream about something like that for himself, before he learned that no one would really care about a lunatic. He thought he’s had it with Jacob, but a year into their relationships, and Ian’s meds went haywire, and he was committed for a week. He returned to an empty apartment.

           “I think I’ll ask his sister Mandy to be my Maid of Honor. She’s a kickin girl. Maybe you can be a bridesmaid! We’ll deck you out in a pink frilly dress.” Ian rolled his eyes, because no matter how gay he was, he wouldn’t be caught dead in a dress. “We’ll make you look so good, Mickey might even take his eyes off me and find you so attractive he leaves me at the altar.”

           Ian waved his hands in refusal. “I don’t want your straight fiancés affection.” There were enough guys that wanted to fuck him not dressed as a girl. He didn’t need to dress in drag to attract men’s attention – oddly enough, gay guys still seemed to dig that.

           “Whatever. You don’t know what you’re missing. He’s got a great cock. He’d tear your ass apart.”

           “Oh come on, I don’t need to hear about your sex life. Now I’ll be staring at his dick when I meet him.” They both knew that Ian was a top, not gold star, he’d fucked around more than he wanted to admit sometimes, but straight cock in his ass was repulsive. For all the guys Felicia never told him about, Ian told her in gory detail about the guys he’d fucked – she was the only person he ran to when he bottomed for the first time without getting paid for it. She always drowned him out with alcohol.

           “Who ways you’re meetin him? You ain’t even invited to the wedding Ian Gallagher.” Felicia waved to the bartender for a refill on both of their drinks, even though he wasn’t quite halfway through his soda. “Fine!” She cried as if Ian had been begging her for the last second of silence. “You can meet him. But no acting all high and mighty just cause you can attract classier guys than me.” This fiancé of hers was Southside, one of the few things he managed to catch while absently watching her lips move. Ian had been born and raised in the Southside of Chicago, but ran and didn’t look back much after he joined the military at 18 – even if that hadn’t worked out for him.

           “Oh come on. That’s a low blow. Just because I hate my family doesn’t mean everyone from the neighborhood is like them.” Ian was 23, not some baby that didn’t understand how the world worked. He had his qualms with his family, but kept it between them. Felicia knew as little as he could get away with telling her about the other five Gallagher kids, and the only thing she knew about the deadbeat parents, was that Monica was dead. “I’m sure he’s a great guy.” He better have been good to Felicia, because she never deserved an asshole for a husband.

           “I’ll set something up when he ain’t working. He works construction; it’s fucking shitty, but as least he makes money.” Ian understood; before he’d gotten the job as a bouncer, he’d sifted through some pathetic jobs that paid the bills, and allowed him to live as far away from his siblings as he could. He hadn’t wanted to chance running into them after he’d left for good when he was 19, upon his diagnosis of bipolar disorder. They looked at him the way they looked at their mom – he was fucking insane.

           “Mickey will hate you. He thinks straight edge guys like you are pussies. Guess he’s not exactly wrong, with you at least.” Felicia knew better than that. Ian had a lot of demons that followed him, but mostly his mental illness; it made him weak in too many ways. It stopped him from partying along with his best friend, and left him home most nights. “We’ll have to get you to help with the wedding, god knows I don’t know shit.”

           “And I do?”

           “Duh, you’re gay.” Ian had never been a stereotypical gay man, but that didn’t make him any less of a fag. He’d never fucking paint his nails, or where make up. Ian would rather spend a day bulking up at the gym; all this after hiding his sexuality for a good chunk of his life. In the Southside, with all the uneducated bigots, racists, and homophobes, it was a death sentence for a gay man to even walk down the street.

           “Hey, shut your face. You’re on your own with the wedding. I’m just showing up to make sure you don’t trip on your dress. Wouldn’t want to make a fool of yourself on your wedding day, in front of your husband to be.” Ian finally managed to finish off his coke and put down money for both of their drinks. “Good talk. Can’t wait to meet the guy that puts that smile on your face.” He hugged her tightly as a formal goodbye, and headed out into the burning Chicago cold, and his beat up red Ford that barely ran anymore.

~

~

~

           Felicia and Ian hid together in a dimly lit corner booth, both drinking a beer, albeit Ian was a lot more cautious with his beverage. The brit had insisted they go to a steakhouse, and fill up on a twenty-five ounce steak, and one of each of the deserts for the three of them to split. The best friends saved eating out for special occasions, so that when they did, their bill was well over one hundred dollars, accompanied with a twenty dollar tip. It was just like when he was a kid, and Fiona would run into a bit of extra cash – usually they stuck with buffets. The restaurant was far from fancy, but it was their go-to place, and a couple waitresses recognized them – they only went about four times a year, but they’d been doing so for three years now, and the staff seemed pretty consistent. The booth they sat in was busting apart at the seams, and Ian pressed himself to the wall to avoid sitting on the slash across the middle of his side.

           “So, is Mickey just imaginary?” Ian pointed to the empty spot beside Felicia, and the third, unmoved menu. They’d waited an hour, and his best friend insisted they wait to order, because he promised he’d come, and Felicia still had faith in him. So Ian filled up on the bread the waitress kept bringing buy, and finally ordered himself something other than water. He’d done his best at attempting to not point out Mickey’s obvious tardiness, how bad of an impression Ian was getting of the guy.

           “He’s jus’ runnin’ late. He’ll come!” She was adamant about it, and Ian had no choice but to shut up and sit back with his nearly wasted friend. Felicia was moping, but refused to lose hope on her fiancé, and ordered herself another drink every time the waitress came back. There was a full glass of beer at the seat beside her that she’d ordered along with her first drink, but she left it, because he was fucking coming. Felicia pulled out her phone as her mope broke out into a fattening grin. “He’s jus’ parked. I told ya ‘e was comin’.” He was glad to be wrong.

           Ian hadn’t even seen a picture of the guy, so he hadn’t realized it was Mickey headed their way, until he slid in beside Felicia. His arm fell over her shoulder, and Ian recognized the knuckle tattoos, the only physical attribute she’d given him – this hand read fuck. Their lips slotted together in a brief greeting, and Felicia followed it with a hard punch to the shoulder. “That’s for bein’ late dickhead.”

           “Fucking bitch.” There was a small amount of scruff on Mickey’s chin, and his mop of hair was black, with a hint of something lighter there, and those eyes were a stunning shade of blue – Felicia’s dreamy talk hadn’t done them justice. “I’m sorry,” he spoke softly and ran his thumb over her cheek. He spared a glance across the table to Ian, directing his apology to the both of them. Mickey kept his right arm securely around Felicia’s shoulders, but reached his left out for Ian to shake. U-Up was scrawled across the four fingers in the same unsteady spray of unprofessional ink. “You must be Ian. This one talks about you a lot.”

           The handshake was strong, but not threatening, like he’d gotten from other guys when he’d befriended their girlfriends – if Ian was straight, he wouldn’t have a hard time stealing someone’s girl, the amount of times he’d gotten punched assure that. “You’re Mickey,” the redhead pointed out. “Can’t say I knew much about you before, but she’s talked non-stop these last few weeks.”

           “I wasn’t sure she’d ever let me meet you. So, what is it? You don’t seem like someone she should be hiding.” Mickey didn’t say a word when he picked up the lukewarm beer, and finished it in a few long gulps, slamming it harshly back to the table and motioning his finger at someone walking by for another. Pothole duty must have really done a number on him. “I thought my family was crazy, but this girl’s just as batshit insane.”

           They put their orders in five minutes later, and another round of bread was brought around to their table. Ian laid off this time, but Mickey was quick to slather butter on a slice and shoved it down. “This bitch packed me an apple for lunch, can you believe that. How is that supposed to stop my stomach rumbling while I pour concrete into holes? I’d get it if she was a health nut, but an apple is like two fucking calories and no protein.”

           “If you wanted a cook, you shouldn’t be marrying her.” Felicia had tried to make Ian a can of soup one time when he was low – she hadn’t realized that it was a lot different than the flu at the time. She got him moving pretty quickly when his microwave exploded, and she’d tried to heat it up, can and all. “She’s also a slob. Glad it’s you she’d marrying and not me.”

           “Doesn’t sound like you swing that way anyways.” Felicia had always mouthed off about how much a fag Ian was, which usually led to her attempting to set Ian up on dates. He wondered if Mickey had almost been the culprit of the setup, before she realized he was straight and falling head over heels for her. “Must’ve been hard. Southside ain’t the breeding ground for pride parades.” Ian wondered what had been done right for someone that was so obviously dragged deeply into the drugs and violence of that neighborhood, to turn into a guy that could casually sit across from Ian. He still didn’t feel safe walking in his own neighborhood without a knife in his pocket – everyone knew that the redheaded Gallagher was batshit crazy and gay, because the drunks liked to talk.

           “Did you get out?” Ian wasn’t doing much better than his siblings, but he could at least say he managed to move a few blocks away, and officially out of the Southside, even if his roots were still bred in his bones. He avoided that old rickety house on North Wallace, and the memories that dragged with it. The last time he’d gone home was when their mom died, otherwise he made everyone come to him.

           “Kind of. Spend a lot of time back there. My sister’s still there, with our older brother, but I don’t really live there.” Ian recognized the pain their upbringing instilled on everyone, and they could easily swap war stories. They could decide whose parents were worse – he knew Frank and Monica were tame compared to others, even with both of them fucking off all the time, the drugs, and the bruises Frank occasionally gave Ian. “Of course, this girl had her life set with a rich daddy in London.”

           “My father’s money doesn’t say shit about me,” Felicia quipped – she’d never gotten a penny. Each person at the booth was equally broke, despite her background. Felicia had ran off at sixteen, and had only seen her father a handful of times since. “In fact, thing we might have to dine and dash.” They’d done it once, but Ian had felt so guilty, that he’d gone back and left a hundred dollar bill on the hosts’ podium, because he’d had the money to pay. It was a lot different from when he was ten, and Frank and Monica took the five kids they had at the time to some fancy restaurant. Their mom had just come back, after she’d left five years ago, and the group of them obviously didn’t belong – should’ve been kicked out right away for their appearance, because they were definitely too poor to afford it. Frank had ushered him, Lip, and their five year old brother Carl through a window in the men’s restroom.

           “Need I remind you, the cops hate me enough,” Mickey announced, easily dismissing Felicia’s possibly serious idea. “Southside, man. The Milkovich name is akin for trouble.” The last named sparked familiarity in Ian, not that he remember any of them, except maybe the father.

           “Any relation to, uh…Jerry?”

           “Terry,” Mickey nodded. “Afraid to say I’m his blood. I’m his son.” Ian didn’t remember much about the guy, but Ian had seen him hanging around the Alibi, and Frank slurred about plenty of their fights, Monica might have fucked him too. Kev told horror stories about the different shenanigans the Milkovich patrons had gotten into, none of them the innocent childish type.

           “Seem like a handful,” Ian nodded in sympathy, but didn’t spill into the dramatics about their asshole fathers. Frank was a pathetic drunk that left his oldest daughter to raise five kids, and Ian would never forgive him. Even if Ian had found out that his biological father was one of Frank’s brothers, rich and everything, the real dream for anyone that grew up like them. Ian had learned of this when he was fifteen, and much to Lip’s dismay, he refused to confront his father, because he already had his family. Ian Gallagher was never one to take the easy way out. “So, you were unlucky enough to fall for Felicia,” Ian commented with a breathy chuckle. “Are you sure you know what you’re getting yourself into?”

           “Couldn’t ask for a better girl to spend my life with.” Mickey’s right arm had still been comfortably around Felicia’s shoulders, and he squeezed her close as he gushed about her. “I’ve lived with a girl like this one all my life. Guess it was just a test run, so I was ready for the real thing.” Mickey seemed genuinely happy, and it shown in the way his smile sparkled in those ocean blue eyes, and his face split as he let out gentle laughs. Everything told Ian that that was the kind of relationship he’d been dreaming of since he’d understood what it meant to be in love. He was glad Felicia was getting her fairytale ending.

           The arrival of the food halted conversation, as the couple seemed starved. Ian had made the mistake of filling up on the complimentary bread, and instead pushed his food around while participating in the conversation between bites. He laughed along with the jokes, and hung off Mickey’s childhood stories, sharing some stupid comments of his own. Nothing was really serious at the table. Ian knew as soon as Mickey stepped in, the dynamic between them would be changed, and they’d now be a trio. It wasn’t something he was ready to give up.

Ok, if you made it through that, please shoot me a message, or reply to this post. I’m just looking for either reassurance that it’s good, or ways to improve.

[oeuvrelydramatic]

Not A Dirty Word (Part 1)

‘I’m not a lesbian’ I declared, offended in a skort too big for my year 7 thighs or lack thereof. ‘Just because I go to a girl’s school, they all think I’m going to be a lesbian. But I’m not.’ I don’t think she wanted my input really. She was making the point that she’d been made fun of for going to a girls’ school because they thought she’d end up gay. I never got any of that. But still I pretended to, just so I could clarify that I, 100%, definitely would not end up being a lesbian.

I don’t think I knew then that I’d end up being gay. I’m not trying to say that I’d had feelings for girls all the way through primary school, that I always knew that I was different. Because I didn’t. And I’m not, really.

I was one of the first people in my class to learn what a lesbian was. I remember Annabel Lloyd pointing out to me some graffiti on a sign that read ‘lesbian sex’ on the way back from a school trip at about 10 years old. I remember being very confused about anyone’s motive for writing such vulgar things on a road sign and very confused about why she’d point it out to me. But I was also extremely confused about what it actually meant. I remember getting out my kindle late at night, turning on the reading light clipped to the headboard of my bed, positioning it under my covers so that my mum wouldn’t see the light from under my door, and somehow finding my way to urban dictionary. Of course, I read the definition of ‘lesbian’ and learned what it meant but then I fell down the rabbit hole, learning about various things that 10 year old me shouldn’t have been learning.

And so it began. Being ‘lesbian’ meant that you liked girls, but it was an under-the-covers thing. It was something vulgar that stupid kids graffiti-ed onto road signs. It wasn’t anything I’d ever experienced, it wasn’t anything I’d ever be able to talk about. It was just another word I knew that I felt that I shouldn’t.

I don’t remember the first time I was exposed to lesbian relationships in media. I don’t even think I can remember the last time I was exposed to a lesbian relationship in media. It wasn’t really real to me. It was never anything I’d have to deal with.

Now I never really said I liked boys. My ideas about love were rather mixed up from the very beginning, from years of having confusing feelings about Holly Palmer that just crossed the line past friendship and into something a little bit more and the years and years of being told by the church that I would get married to a man, have lots of children and be a good wife and mother. So, when it came to boys this seemed easy: I’d pick a boy that I was really good friends with (because that’s just what Holly was, obviously) and then just marry him and have his kids because then I could go to heaven.

It didn’t bother me much. I never really spoke to anyone at all about crushes or romance or anything. My mum wasn’t interested, my dad would rather just play games than talk about that kind of stuff, so it was never important to me.

Until year 7. The first time that I’d ever had a discussion about lesbianism. And that’s where we come to my vast and sweeping statement ‘I am not a lesbian’. I pronounced it ‘lezz-bee-uuuuuun’, in the same way that you’d say ‘ommmmmmmmmmm’ when someone was doing something naughty in front of a teacher. And I felt the same. We were in the dance studio at school, ready for PE and we were discussing lesbians so, naturally I felt the need to clarify.

So my life was simple: I wasn’t a lesbian. I didn’t like boys. I didn’t like anyone. One day I’d end up with someone but it wasn’t a big deal. The only things on my list of life plans were to go to Australia and to go to university in America, (neither of which I want to do anymore).

I was in the school play. I’d been in the school play in year 7 and my passion and enthusiasm for my role of an unnamed chorus member coupled with my mediocre-at-best acting and singing skills earned me a callback for a main part in next year’s production. I met a girl called Seren in the callbacks. She was nice and pretty, talented and had an amazing mane of blonde curly hair. We talked a little, me being the only year 7 in the callbacks and, when neither of us got the parts we wanted, we ended up together in the (named!) chorus member chorus. So, here I was mixed up in a chorus full of girls who felt much much older than me and I fell in with Seren and her friends. And I met Alice. Seren’s friend, both of them a year older than me so had a far greater understanding of the world, as your worldly knowledge does seem to increase exponentially in between the ages of 13 and 14. So when Alice pointed to the logo on a flip chart which said something containing the word ‘bi’ and declared ‘haha me!’ they seemed rather confused at my confusion and must have thought it rather odd that they had to explain bisexuality to me.

From there I was exposed to a world of queer culture. When I was friends with them I learned about everything (or what I thought was everything at the time) and I really thought I knew what was what. After a couple of odd ‘slightly more than best friends’ crushes on other girls I made another proud declaration in regards to my sexuality.

‘I’m bisexual.’ I knew it would be fine because I’d end up with a man anyway eventually, I could marry him and then go to heaven no matter what I felt about girls.

I was telling my stepmum about all my friends in the top level car park of House of Fraser. I told her about how all my friends were some form of not-straight and she replied with a question that sent my brain into a meltdown ‘so, what are you then?’ I replied with a rather hesitant, cautious ‘I’m bisexual.’

She said it was no big deal. She said that she felt ‘that way’ about girls sometimes, and that she knew that I wasn’t straight as soon as I said that Jensen Ackles wasn’t that attractive. And so it was out in the open, in the closed bond of trust between the two of us. It was okay.

And I was okay.

At the start of the year I had been put (to my displeasure) in a new class. Instead of being taught in form groups, like the school used to do up until GCSE level, now we were all mixed up and I was in ‘8M’. I wasn’t very happy with my class. I didn’t really like anyone in it. I didn’t really like anyone who was in my year group for most of year 8, but there were a few people I did. And none of them were in 8M. So, I was forced to socialise and quickly learned that the girl I thought I’d recognised was ‘Mol’. I followed her on Instagram because she was friends with a scary girl from my form, who had tagged her in a post. From there I saw all the ‘aesthetical’ posts (as she used to call them) that she was so proud of and instantly deemed her much too cool for me to socialise with. So I knew who she was. I pointed her out to Hollie Bowker in the courtyard.

‘Oh I know her. That’s Mol’

I didn’t know her. I knew of her. But it was more impressive that way so I just went with it. So we never really talked in the first few weeks, for the first term at all really until history. We were sat together in history, at the point when we were learning about the suffragettes. I, being witty, hilarious and knowledgeable about queer culture as ever, made a joke about how the suffragettes were just a society of secret lesbians, who’s meetings were like safe spaces to just be gay.

She laughed. Like, a lot. I didn’t think she’d find it all that funny, nobody else really ever found me funny, let alone my annoyingly frequent and stereotypically out-of-Place references to queer culture. So, before I knew it we were friends.

Now, dear reader, knowing what we know about my complicated history with friendships and the lines between romantic and platonic relationships, what are we to expect for my relationship with the pretty girl who was way out of my league (me being the nerdy nerd and her being the more popular ‘tumblr’ nerd) ?

So we talked. A lot. I’m not sure we really discussed her sexuality for a while but I knew she was comfortable making jokes about it. Before I knew it she was planning our wedding. We’d have Vera Wang wedding dresses and get married in spring. And me, being the hopeless romantic I am, fell hopelessly in love with her.

I waited a few months in silence, trying to gauge what she felt but it got to a point where I couldn’t wait any longer.

So, by September 17th, 2015 I was in my first relationship. And it was with a girl.

So. I wasn’t really okay anymore. How could I get married in my Vera Wang wedding dress to another person wearing a Vera Wang wedding dress and still go to heaven? Did I care about heaven anymore? It was still probably just going to be a stupid tween romance. Just a girl crush. Probably just two super best friends who didn’t know any better.

We went on our first date sometime in October, where we saw the movie Suffragette. We held hands all the way through, and I really wanted to kiss her but I could feel the glare of the old couple in the back row. Plus, how do you even do that?! How do you kiss someone? Is it weird to kiss people in public? I’d seen plenty of straight couples do it at bus stops and in restaurants so why not do it at the cinema? But no, the gaze of probable homophobia scared me off and I waited a good two months before I made the first move.

I never kissed her in public when we were dating, we never really went further than holding hands in front of everyone else. We outwardly appeared to be super duper best friends.

It was during this time that I experienced my first and only real degree of homophobia from a stranger.

Molly and I were holding hands, just walking out of the park, when a woman with a baby in her push chair shouted rather loudly:

‘Dykes’.

I hated that word. I hated it so very much. I hated that she had had a child. That she, unlike me, had the chance to have a biological child with someone she presumably loved only to poison it with toxic, homophobic bullshit like this.

But we moved on.

It didn’t really change how we interacted in public, it just made me a lot more cautious and self conscious. At any sign of a glaring eye we both knew when to widen the space between us and un-entwine our hands. We both knew that we’d never be able to kiss at bus stops like the other girls could with their boyfriends, but it was okay.

We were still happy.

It was December 17th at my house when I finally made a move. It was the last time I was going to see Molly before the Christmas holidays. I’d drawn her some fanart and bought us matching necklaces, the epitome of romance.

My mum, being very very Mormon, had absolutely no idea about any of this. I was certain I could tell my dad, he wouldn’t mind, but I wasn’t certain that he wouldn’t accidentally let it slip to her and ruin everything.

So I waited until it was past midnight. We were in the middle of watching Phantom of the Opera when it started to buffer, and didn’t seem like it would work. I had been thinking about it for months. How would I do it? What was it like to kiss someone?

Now, my experience of lesbians getting -physical- came from 3 seasons of Orange Is The New Black. Everything I saw was scandalous. For a start, I was watching under the covers in incognito mode on my browser and clearing my Netflix watch history promptly afterwards, but also it was portrayed as something sexual. Something women did because they were confined to just a pool of other women, as a way to release pent up sexuality that would usually have been exhibited to a man at home.

So I did it. Expecting to feel like it was wrong, like it was scandalous or dirty. But I was so wrong. Nothing in the world felt more natural to me than pressing my lips against hers and telling her that I loved her in between breaths.

I’m sure I was an awful kisser. I bet we both were. Neither of us had any experience, but it was amazing. It was like I’d found the piece of the jigsaw puzzle that fit into place and made me feel like I was finally what I was meant to be. I was gay. I was in a relationship with another girl. I was in love.

Fuck.

So now I was convinced. There was no way out. No easy loophole to just say ‘oh yeah but I still want to be with a man’ because I didn’t. That didn’t stop me lying to everyone around me and trying to convince myself to be bisexual. I wanted to be with her, heaven wasn’t on the cards anymore.

We broke up a month later, the result of the absolute stupidity of my year 9 self, but we after a while we managed to still be friends.

Friends.

Lesbian relationships have always had such a distinct tie to friendship in my mind. Everything I saw on TV presented lesbian couples as either hyper-sexual beings, only doing it for men’s attention, or just what could easily be perceived as being super duper best friend gal pals.

Our relationship didn’t change much. Sure, I never got the chance to kiss her after that one night but we were still friends. We still got to laugh at each other’s jokes and give each other hugs.

I wasn’t friends with Alice and Seren anymore. Again, my stupid year 9 self managed to ruin all my relationships with everyone around me so I can’t blame them for hating me. They did hate me for a while, I’m sure but I never blamed them. About a week after we fell out they ended up dating. I had seen it ever since I met them, I knew there was something more than just friendship.

It was hard, being in an all-girls school. There were lots of friends that were more than friends but there were also lots of friends that were just super best friends. I thought, at first, that it was like Orange Is The New Black. That girls would just be with other girls because there were no boys around. I know now that I was very wrong but that’s how I thought at the time.

So Alice and Seren were dating and Molly and I were not. Even though I didn’t speak to them anymore I now finally had an example of what a lesbian relationship looked like. I know, I know, I’d already been in one, but I had no clue what I was doing. I really wished that I could just have some non-fictional frame of reference for the whole time we were dating. Now, though a little late, I finally saw an example of what lesbian love looked like. Like normal people, doing normal things, being normal and in love.

It was after around 6 months of not dating that things started to go back, even more, to the way they had been before. We held hands, we made jokes about getting married and we hugged. Tighter and longer than I ever did with anyone else. And after a couple more weird friend-crushes I told myself would help me get over her, I admitted to myself that I was still in love.

My friends all saw that there was still something there. Our stupid year 9 romance had meant so much to me, and it still rang through every echo of our ‘friendship’. We weren’t ‘just friends’ but we were just ‘friends’. There are wasn’t any real commitment or full expression of feelings, but we both knew that there was something there.