#i could write a book on this topic tbh

[gingerswagfreckles]

It's become extremely obvious over the past 15 months that the only reason much of the Western world ever basically agreed that the Holocaust was bad and was willing to teach about it is because for a brief period of time, Jews and gentiles in most of Europe + America had a common enemy in the Nazis. But this acknowledgement of Nazi antisemitism was only ever the same kind of acknowledgement of antisemitism that we get right now, where people are only willing to acknowledge the antisemitism of the people they already had a completely separate reason to dislike or fear. Antisemitism in this worldview is just a tool, a secondary accusation one can lodge at someone who is already for different reasons an enemy. It is never acknowledged as a form of bigotry in and of itself, that exists on its own and not as a follow up to another "more serious" form of oppression or bigotry against gentiles.

Obviously any Holocaust education we do get in Europe and the US has very much been the result efforts by Jews and our allies in a practical sense, but it is undeniable that there was a brief 70 or so year period where the white Western consciousness found it valuable (or at least politically convenient) to recognize antisemitism as wrong and the Holocaust as horrific. As true, original-brand Nazism fades, though, we see opposition to antisemitism and the Holocaust becoming less and less valuable to the white Western identity, as actual threat of Nazi occupation fades to historical memory. Newer, rebranded neo-Nazis and leftist Hamas supporters pose little to no threat to white Western gentiles. And thus, we see now not only a growing acceptance of antisemitism, but also a growing hostility towards the idea that we should study or condemn the Holocaust as anything particularly terrible. The Holocaust no longer represents a way for gentiles to additionally condemn an ideology that also threatened them, that also killed their families, that also resulted in their own countries and communities being occupied or destroyed by foreign fascist governments. It no longer represents to them an ideology that is in any way a threat to their own safety or way of life.

This is why we see such a massive rise in Holocaust denial among Gen Z, and, even more broadly than overt Holocaust denial, the rejection of the idea that the Holocaust should be particularly studied or condemned. More and more, we see people "questioning" the "propaganda" of The Jews Crying Victim All The Time, we see young people wondering why they are so cruelly forced to acknowledge on very rare occasion the suffering that the Jewish people went through in their own homes and towns. Often this is framed not only as intellectual bravery but moral bravery, as if this new generation rejecting Holocaust education is somehow fighting back against the unfair valuing of Jewish tragedy above gentile tragedy. What they don't understand, of course, and what many Jews up until now didn't understand either, is that no one ever valued the Holocaust because it WAS a uniquely horrific event in history, because it WAS the first and only industrialized genocide that gassed millions to death on a scale we can only pray the world will never see again, because it WAS only 70 years ago and is still a living part of the history of many Western countries. No. The Holocaust was only ever given the acknowledgement it was because it represented, at one time, an ideological threat that also included gentiles, though less overtly than it targeted Jews.

That ideological threat against Jews has not gone anywhere, and is in fact is seeing a new glory day dawning with the rise of fascism worldwide and the normalization/glorification of antisemitism on the left. But this new form of antisemitic hatred, be it neo-Nazism or support for Hamas, does not represent a threat to white Western gentiles, their way of life, or the integrity of their governments. And so we as we see the decoupling of the Holocaust from something that also incidentally threatens gentiles, we see standing against the Holocaust and antisemitism as a symbol of white Western identity disappearing as fast as it came.

[vagueconfusion]

i need to get my old kindle charged up again, it'd be easier to read music on it tbh

[zmediaoutlet]

(1) Hi Liz, happy WW! I have a random thought-thread I’d love your opinion on, and it kind of goes with this weeks WW theme of americana and american gothic!Usually in incestious stories the siblings don't have romantic/sexual relationships outside of their family. Its interesting that both Sam and Dean have had a good amount of "normal" relationships throughout their lives, yet the fandom can still see incest as a plausible endgame. (Even though, a few of these relationships are contested.)

(2) A big theme of the show is both of the boys longing for a normal apple pie/white picket fence life, and that want being contrasted with their fucked up family and deeper desires. The way I see it, their “normal” relationships throughout the show represent the standard American Dream of wife and 2.5 kids. On the flip side, Sam and Dean’s relationship with each other is the mirror-image of that American Dream: it is the dark, american gothic, forbidden ending. (3) So throughout the show, we see two examples of American ideals/lore playing against each other. My question is: Have you ever thought about this dynamic in SPN in comparison with other incest stories/lore? Or about how their past relationships tangled with Wincest paint a bigger picture of the American-ness of the show? (Could it ever REALLY be set in Canada? Haha!) I’d love to hear your musings, I hope this message made sense!

I apologize for not getting to this on WW proper but I have been a flat fuck this week and so I needed a bit of a running start! Thank you in the first place for such a thinky ask! I think I understand what you're getting at, but you'll have to indulge me as I think out loud --

American Gothic: technically literally just that one painting, because the barn had a gothic-style window for some reason. But gothic incest romance has all those flavors of isolation, and when you combine that with American suspicion of poverty and closed communities becomes -- turning inward, backwoods and a family that looks suspiciously at outsiders and gets up to all kinds of shit. The Benders, basically.

American Dream: committed spouse, a home to build a life inside, children as a legacy, being able to support and sustain yourself and be happy and more-or-less free while nevertheless contributing to society as a whole.

Now, whenever we're thinking about something, there are the bare facts and there's the presentation of those facts. Sam and Dean are outsiders to society, raised in a way that could easily make them cult-members, who fail to have successful external relationships and end up turning inward to live alone in a bunker while having a casual relationship to violence. On bare facts, that sounds pretty American Gothic.

...On presentation and feel, though, it really isn't, and that's because the Sam and Dean we meet are not Benders, nor are they the fic-versions of themselves that we meet in various AO3 stories that try to make sense of those bare facts with an entirely different presentation and vibe to the one in the show. Instead Sam and Dean are... really regular guys, 99% of the time. Despite the being-raised-in-motels and despite the violent job and despite walking midnights full of monsters... they have a really easy time with 'strangers', they do have external relationships (brief or not), they move through the world with confidence and ease. They aren't secret serial killers. They aren't deeply possessive and controlling of each other's thoughts and desires and actions (again, despite some AO3 treatments).

Instead, if we return to our two bullet points -- which one do the Winchesters as of approx. s11 (and certainly by the point of the post-15.19 period where the characterization-story ends) really sound like? Hopefully most would agree that they ended up getting that American Dream version they hoped for, even if the bare facts aren't necessarily the stereotypical ones that people name-drop. This is partly because the "wife" and the "picket fence" don't actually mean a female spouse and a literal boring 3br/2ba in the suburbs. What they mean is stability, comfort, safety, contentment. What do Sam and Dean have together at the end of the show? All of those things. Like, 10/10 on the rubric, guys. And they don't have it in a grimdark 'ah I suck your blood out of your balls every morning' kind of way -- it is presented as an unalloyed good thing. They're happy together, just as they are.

Now: that is fucking STRANGE. But it's wonderful in its strangeness. This is a show where the leads, being as basically normal as they are, 'should' have gone the more traditional wife et al route -- but they didn't need to, and the show didn't force them into that box. (By some miracle.) They have 'normal' relationships, as you say, but (just going off purely canonical ones) Jess and Amelia and Cassie and Lisa were never real options, because the show never presented them that way. There were the 'facts' that Sam or Dean was in a more-or-less committed relationship with an external person, but the feel was that these were offscreen, told-not-shown, and they never really mattered. Every one was only possible when the overarching ur-relationship, that of Brothers (because we don't have a better word for what they really mean to each other), wasn't possible at that moment. The show does gesture at how this is strange -- Lisa tells Dean that his fixation on Sam is bizarre; Sam realizes that he has to literally choose between a girlfriend and his brother -- but the return to the central relationship is always treated as the correct choice by the narrative and, this is crucial, presented as morally sound, inside the framework in which the show operates.

You can imagine another text -- a Crimson Peak or a Borgias or a Game of Thrones or a Flowers in the Attic or a Secret History -- allowing for those external-to-internal shifts and treating them as vile, disturbing, strange. Pale violent children who snap at people who try to help them get on the correct path. Normal people staring in at the freaks and saying, what are they? what happened to them? The only character I can think of in all of Supernatural who comes close to that attitude is Henriksen, and he's a 'villain' by the lights of that season, and is brought into the light (again, inside the moral framework of the show) where he realizes, ah, the Winchesters are the good guys, so it's fine.

That might be the everlasting difference between Supernatural and some of the shows where the incestuous couple falls into the gothic 'dark' side vs the American dream side. Sam and Dean are the good guys. They are literally on the side of light. The literal deity of the new framework of the universe is their little buddy and the world was literally designed with their story in mind. Regardless of what you might think about all those things, or wish they were otherwise, or wish the presentation were otherwise -- they're just true, and the presentation of them is positive. Sam and Dean are not evil and so their strange, fucked up, bizarre relationship must come around to being a good thing, or the show just -- doesn't work. Or it's an entirely different show. But Supernatural On The CW (2005-2020) was never going to have their heroes be secretly gnasty Lannisters, and so -- their reward, after all that trial and hardship, is to live the American Dream after all. Not in a dreamlike wife or picket fence but in the things that matter: security, and comfort, and family. And they really only ever needed one other person to be their family.

(P.S. 'What about Sam?' I hear a complainer complaining. To them I say -- he got the American Dream right the first time around. What he promised to Dean was to live and try out the more traditional version, which he might have always wondered if he'd missed out on. And he had that life! Good for him. Note that it passed in the space of a montage -- returning us to presentation and told-not-shown and the feel being that it didn't matter all that much, in the end, because what happens? He shows up on the bridge in the clothes Dean loved him in, with the face Dean remembered best, and he'd been waiting all those years to say -- I imagine, and I'll let this be fic here at the end instead of meta -- I tried it. I did what you asked. Now, here I am, and I'm never doing that again. I think Dean'll be all right with that.)

[always-a-slut-4-ghouls]

The building I live in was like “we got rid the spider infestation” last fall I think, and now that it’s warm out I am seeing more other bugs in here than I did last year. Like, I wonder why that is 🤨 they asked “how do we get rid of the spiders?” And not “what are the spiders munching on and are they helping?”

[dawneternal]

now my head's splitting at the seams

✴︎ in the labyrinth of my pain, would you find me?

✴︎ Azriel x Valkyrie reader, platonic Cassian x reader

✴︎ Summary: you miss a few days of training, down with a bad migraine. It turns out Cassian has a few misconceptions about your condition and, possibly, about pain itself.

✴︎ Warnings: mentions of nausea and vomiting (no descriptions), pain, toxic positivity and ableism, internalized ableism, Cassian's a jerk in the first half. Also I'm so sorry for the tense changing back and forth 💀 I would definitely not call this one a masterpiece

✴︎ Word Count: 3.4k

AO3 Link / Writing Masterlist

✴︎ Notes: somehow writing out my feelings about having a migraine turned into something pretentious about pain and ableism. I think a lot about John Green's "pain is the opposite of language" and how much that's changed my perception of pain

Also listen I love Cassian and I have no problems with him but I had to pick someone to take my feelings out on I'm sorry 💛 also just want to acknowledge that everyone experiences migraines differently and it's not a topic I'm an expert on so I'm sorry if you don't feel well represented by this.

Tbh I could write several essays about the way pain and disability are handled in the acotar books but that's for another time.

Letting out a frustrated groan, you squeeze your eyes shut tighter and twist your knuckle into the pressure point at the base of your palm, chasing the momentary relief it'll give you from your nausea. It works for a minute, and you're considering making your way to the bathroom before another wave hits you when your bedroom door flies open.

"You're late," Cassian's voice bellows through the room and he doesn't see you wince. He strides into the room, footsteps booming across the floorboards, and he's left the door open behind him, letting a traitorous amount of light into your dark room. What good were black out curtains if your darkness was going to be invaded like this anyways?

"Oh my gods you've got to talk quieter," You curl tighter around yourself, head clutched in your hands.

"So you're hungover?" He stops near your bed, arms crossed as he towers over you.

"No, I have a migraine."

"Isn't that the same thing?"

You squint up at him, scowling, swallowing every bad word threatening to spill off your tongue. Though maybe he deserves it for coming into your room without asking.

"Please leave," You say quietly, all the venom you could usually imbue into your voice completely swallowed by your current condition.

"You've missed three days of training." He says by way of answering, definitely not following your request to lower his volume. "You can't coddle yourself like this."

His words punch the air from your lungs. Coddle? Something terrible is rising in your gut, along with the desperate thought that you can't deal with this right now.

"I'm not - this isn't - I don't think you understand how much it hurts." You scramble for words, cheeks heated from pain and anger.

"You've gotta push through it," He says, no hint of sympathy.

"Cassian please."

"I'm not leaving until you agree to come with me."

You don't have time to respond before you're running to the bathroom and throwing up whatever you'd managed to keep down last night, head throbbing with every movement.

Breathing hard, you lean back from the toilet and clutch your head in your hands. The silence rings in your ears and you aren't sure if Cassian is still there or if he finally took mercy on you and left, until his voice makes it's way to you, with just a hint of remorse in it -

"I'd better see you up there."

⋆✴︎˚｡⋆

Cassian did not see you at training that morning, and you're assuming you've bruised his ego because the next day he doubles down.

The thing is, Rhysand knew of your condition. The other priestesses knew. It's only Cassian being out of the loop and if he understood what a migraine felt like, you're certain he wouldn't be dragging you up there. You were used to dealing with people who didn't understand, had worked hard to learn how to give yourself kindness no matter what other people said. But it's like he knew exactly what things to say, what buttons to press to undo all of that progress.

It was like he'd pulled off your armor, piece by piece, leaving you cold and exposed. Going back to that world where weakness was your given name and it hurt worse than stepping into the ring and fighting the pain. If you could prove him wrong, just make it through a couple of hours, you could return to your sanctuary of darkness. And at least then, you wouldn't hate yourself on top of everything else.

So you followed him up to the training ring, struggling to open your eyes all the way in the morning light, hunched over to make the pain down your shoulders and neck just a bit more bearable. You sway on your feet, but Cassian either doesn't notice or doesn't care.

When he moves aside, revealing your small, huddled frame trailing beside him, Gwyn gasps.

"Cassian!" She cries, her tone scathing, and the hint of smug triumph slips from his face. It disappears completely as Gwyn rushes to your side, folding you into her arms to block your eyes from the light. You groan into her shoulder and go limp in her arms, grateful for the support.

Azriel stands to the side, watching with narrowed eyes. His arms are crossed over his chest like Cassian's, but there is no determination or judgment in his posture or expression. There's angry, crackling flames as he watches the redheaded Valkyrie thread her fingers through your hair and murmur soft comfort.

"She missed training all this week," Cassian says, but he's not barking any more. He's feeling a little bit small underneath the glares that pin him where he stands.

"Yeah, we know," Gwyn says, and it's the closest she's gotten to snapping at him in the whole time they've known each other. She turns to you and her eyes soften. "Let's get you back to bed, love."

"No," You murmur, guilt and shame bringing your resolve to the surface once more. You gently push her away to stand on your own, raising your squinted eyes to meet Cassian's. "I can do it. I'll be fine."

She watches you take shaky steps to the nearest mat and begin stretching, body obviously stiff from a few days in bed. You're conscious of all the eyes on you, far too sympathetic for your liking. This is exactly what you hated.

"Are we starting or not?" You let out a stiff laugh, too aware that your words are lightly slurred. That is absolutely not helping the hangover accusations.

The other priestesses shuffle to get into place, bumping into each other as they move to find their positions. There was still a horrible silence, crackling with fierce anger, all rippling in Cassian's direction. He halfheartedly called a few orders, visibly uncomfortable with the energy in the ring.

And you tried. You tried hard. To move your body through the stretches like normal. But your muscles protested every move, threatening to lock back up, sending stabs of pain through your skull. It didn't take long for the nausea to take over, forcing you to the edge of the ring, doubled over and dry heaving.

"This is ridiculous," Gwyn scoffs before she's at your side again. "You're going to back to bed."

"I will not be weak," You growl at her, panting as you wipe your mouth with the back of your hand, "I am not lazy."

Gwyn's head snaps around to find Cassian, mouth dropped open in fury as she silently dares him to confirm that he may have suggested weakness to you.

"You're not and you know it," She says softly, hauling you up and leading you away from the training ring. “Don't do that to yourself.”

Cassian is feeling like he's surrounded by wolves, all the glares that are being sent his way. He understands by now that he's messed up, and in front of a group that may not be easily inclined to forgive him. He's sure every single one of them has experienced the disbelief that he foolishly shoved your way. For their pain, or for anything else.

He thought you would snap back to your normal self after a bit of warming up, shake off your symptoms with a bit of movement and sunshine. You were strong enough to, if you wanted to. He'd seen it before. He thought you just didn't want to.

A small, firm hand lands on his arm and he finds himself looking down at Nesta. There's sympathy in her expression, but her eyes twinkle with the threat of a nasty bite if he dares to say anything stupid.

"She gets them after particularly bad flashbacks," Nesta says, "Or sometimes they're just random. Madja says there's no fix for the pain but darkness and sleep."

Cassian's stomach twists so terribly he thinks he might puke, too. In the midst of attempting to instill resilience, he's understanding that he knows nothing of this kind of pain. This is something different, something that cannot be conquered in the same way as emotional pain, as every day aches and injuries. You are a soldier in a battle he has no strategy for.

He may understand the concept of emotional resilience, of getting back up and into the training ring when you don't want to. But this is different.

The final blow, the thing that makes him want to cower and hide, is meeting his brother's eyes. Seeing the fire there transports him back in time, sending flashes of a smaller Azriel pushing himself too hard, determined to show the world that he'd never be less because of the damage to his hands. Fighting against words far too similar to the ones his own brother had spouted to you this morning, desperate to become strong enough that no one would ever doubt his pain and live.

⋆✴︎˚｡⋆

It was not a surprise that Cassian found himself in Rhysand's office later, confessing how thoroughly he'd fucked up, desperate for a little direction in how to fix this mess.

"It has to be their choice," Rhysand is saying, eyes meeting Cassian's over his glass.

Cassian's mouth opens and closes as he tries to conjure a response. He knows that. Of course he knows that. But apparently, his brain had not wrapped around how far that concept might go.

Cassian let out a grunt as he sat back in his chair, arms crossed. Rhysand knew he didn't have to push any further, he recognized the conflict in his brother's eyes. So he sat with him, quiet, while he processed.

"Do you want to know what it feels like?" He broke the since after a while, as the idea came to him.

"What?" Cassian blinked, startled from his thoughts.

"A migraine," Rhys explained, "Do you want to know what it feels like?"

Cassian frowned, studying his brother's expression for anything resembling amusement, but there was none. So he nods.

Not even a full second later, his skull is attacked with throbbing pain, deep in the base of his neck. He hadn't even noticed the fae lights before, but now they overwhelm him, causing a dull pain to surface behind his eyes. Nausea curled up his throat, threatening ruthlessly.

"Oh gods," He leaned forward and clutched his head in his hands, finding that his limbs trembled under his own weight.

"Do you push yourself when you feel like this?" Rhysand asked softly, not taunting. Prompting.

"I don't really ever feel like this," Cassian grumbled out.

"Hm," Rhysand mused, his brows drawing together. He'd experienced episodes like these often, under the mountain. He knew that Azriel struggled with them through his teenage years, like his brain still struggled to process his senses outside of a dark cell.

Deep in thought, he only remembered to ease up on Cassian's mind when his brother whimpered.

"Some say pain cannot truly be described with language," Rhys says, gaze somewhere else as Cassian gulps down air. "And that your pain is one of the few things that is truly yours, that you can never share. Even if you manage to describe it, it will never be felt by anyone else."

"I thought she was just hungover," Cassian says, but he's not defending himself. Rhysand knows.

"What if she was, though?" He tilts his head to the side, watching his brother carefully.

And that is the thing that had begun to unfurl within Cassian as he stood surrounded by the priestesses he'd wronged. He understood that having true control of your body meant that dictating how pain is handled had to be yours, too. He understood that pushing someone to deal with pain in his own way was a violation in and of itself. He had stepped into the world that you had carefully balanced and re-built around your condition and dared to tell you that you may have done it wrong.

"Will she get better?" He asks, thinking of the agony he'd just experienced for a few short minutes. The same one that you'd been experiencing for three days, now.

"It's hard to say," Rhysand shrugs, "Madja says she will likely experience these off and on for the rest of her life, but she may have some periods of remission."

He tilts his head at his brother again, "You know that a majority of the priestesses have an invisible disability of similar kinds, right? They won't get better. They will be in pain every day until they die."

Rhysand sighs, thinking of the hundreds - possibly thousands - of tins of salve that Azriel has gone through, numbing the pain of his nerve damage. Trembling hands hidden in black gloves, tucked into his body and away from the world. And that is the reason he's bothering telling Cassian of any of this. Otherwise, he might let him figure it out on his own.

"But the healers-" Cassian begins.

"Are there to help them cope with their emotional pain and trauma," Rhysand nods, "But some of them, a lot of them, were disabled as a result of what they went through and will never get better. Like Clotho.”

Oh.

It clicks in Cassian's mind, then. Who else Rhys meant. Who else Cassian had insulted. He had never barged into Azriel's room, insisting that he still train even when he could not flex his fingers without wincing, without trembling too hard to hold a glass of water. But he'd done it to you, in front of him. And that pinned his disbelief on Azriel all the same.

Azriel's pain, your pain, were enemies that neither of you could defeat. And here he was, shoving a sword into your hands, and insisting that you try.

⋆✴︎˚｡⋆

A soft knock sounds against your door, so quiet you almost don't hear it. You stare at it, wondering if you should pretend that you didn't. But then the knob turns slowly and it opens just a crack, and a soft voice is saying into the darkness,

"Hey, it's Azriel. Can I come in?"

Your breath catches in your throat, and you watch his shadows dancing back and forth through the thin wedge of light he's letting in.

"Sure," You say, moving quickly to smooth your rumpled clothes and tangled hair before he steps in. You're not exactly sure what he thinks of you after this morning.

He steps inside and closes the door behind him. His eyes seem to glow in the darkness, an amber-honey color, and somehow you can still see his shadows, like they're even darker than your room with no light.

"I just wanted to check on you," He says, crouching down beside your bed so you don't have to sit up.

"I'm okay," You say, still getting over the surprise of the Shadowsinger in your space. It's true, though, you suppose. You're used to all of your other symptoms by now, and your heart hurts worse than your head.

"He's an idiot sometimes," Azriel says, basically spits. A smile begins to spread on your face so he continues, “Like, sometimes he's just an asshole, straight up. But this time, believe it or not, I think he actually meant well and was just an idiot.”

“I know,” You give him a sad smile and all of the anger melts from his face.

“I think he went to buy flowers if that makes you feel any better,” He sighs. You know he's just as mad at Cassian as you are, maybe even more mad. But he still can't help vouching for him. It's definitely going to take more than flowers to forgive him, but it's a good start. You also appreciate that Azriel has bothered to warn you ahead of time, in case you wanted to avoid Cassian's apology.

“How are you feeling?” He asks, so quietly. And you wonder who else has earned this tenderness from him.

“It's not too bad right now,” you say truthfully, though you know that sitting up or going outside might be pushing your luck.

“Still hurts?”

“Yeah. Still hurts.”

He nods. “I can try something that helps me, sometimes.”

You search his eyes for a moment, then nod.

“Can I touch your face?” He asks, almost a whisper.

Your heart leaps into your throat and you fight to keep your face neutral as you nod again, no idea what he's planning to do with you.

Slowly, leaving enough time for you to stop him, he reaches out. He's not wearing gloves, like usual, and in the dark you can just barely make out the uneven silhouette of his dimpled, scarred hands.

His fingers land gently on your forehead, and he presses his thumb between your brows. Gently at first, and then harder, circling a tender point under your skin. It makes the pain in your head sharper, and you let out a hiss.

“I know,” He says, “Bear with me a minute.”

You close your eyes, biting back a whimper, but after a moment the pain begins to ease. He keeps going for a few minutes and you feel your whole body relax, pain free for the first time in days.

You don't realize how much you've leaned into his touch until he gently pulls away and you find your head falling forward with him.

“What is that?” You open your eyes and blink at him.

“A pressure point,” He grins, and it almost looks like he's blushing.

“That's magical,” you say. You hesitate for a moment, and then, “you can sit on the bed if you want.”

Azriel smiles and straightens, and you move your pillow to the side to make space for him. He slides off his boots and sits on the bed next to you, legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles. You place your pillow next to his lap and settle back into it.

“Thank you,” You say, your body feeling lighter than it has in days.

“Of course,” he says.

A silence settles, but it's not uncomfortable. There's something in it that you understand. He's just keeping you company. Here to sit with you in your pain.

It's easy to relax in his presence, between his calm aura and the pain relief he's offered you. And you find yourself spilling the question that's been circling though your mind since this morning.

“What if I can't fight, someday? What if I can't be a Valkyrie anymore?”

Azriel stills beside you. It's a long moment before he says anything. You're tense beside him, and it makes you flinch when he brings his hand so gently to rest on your head. Not moving, just resting.

“First,” He says, in the same soft voice, “You'll always be a Valkyrie. Because you cut the ribbon. Because you sisters will never let you go. And because I know for a fact that the Valkyries did not strip their warriors of their title if they became disabled by an illness or an injury.”

“Really?” You breathe.

“Mhm,” He hums in affirmation. You forget sometimes that he knows the Valkyries from more than history books.

“And second,” His voice drops lower, like he's sharing a secret with you. His hand moves, fingers slipping gingerly through your hair. And it makes you realize that he came here with his hands uncovered as an offer of solidarity. Combing his scarred fingers through your hair, he is offering you vulnerability, like recompense for what you bared this morning. A trade. A truce.

“If you cannot fight,” He continues, “Then you will show the world that a formidable woman can be made from more than fighting skills. You will still be - will always be - something incredible.”

Tears prickle at your eyes, form a lump in your throat. You reach up to grasp his hand, the only thank you that you can manage in the moment, and he lets you.

There's another silence, as he holds your hand in the dark.

“Who helps you?” You ask, turning to look up at him. He watches your eyebrows knit together, so serious, and he swallows a smile.

“What do you mean?” He says.

You bring one finger up to tap the space between his own eyebrows.

“With your pain? Who helps you like you helped me?”

“Um,” He shrugs, “Sometimes Rhys if he has time. Otherwise, no one.”

That's what you thought, but it still makes your heart twist in your chest. It takes a deep breath before you have the courage to say the next words out loud.

“You should tell me next time you're in pain. And I'll help.”

Azriel stares back at you, something bewildered in his eyes. Because he sees your suggestion for what it is. The same thing he offered you. A trade. A truce.

A beginning.

“Yes,” He whispers into the dark, and his hand closes around yours. “I will.”

[mingis-orangejuice]

Love and Deepspace Boys with an MC that's good with children Part.1: Zayne

Summary: MC helps cheer up a little girl at Akso Hospital, she then asks Zayne to invite the "Pretty hunter who was super fun" to come back

a/n: these ones were so fun to write. tbh this one is my least favourite of them, but it's still good tho just, idk ... you'll understand once you read the other parts.

Genres/Warnings: just pure teeth rotting fluff

Word count: 908

Other parts: 2, 3, 4

Sitting in the waiting room at Akso Hospital you quietly stare out the window. The nurse walks in and informs you that Dr.Zayne might take a bit longer than usual since he’s currently in the OR and there are some complications. You thank the nurse for informing you and decide to take a little stroll around the hospital while you wait. As you slowly walk down the hall, you pass by an open room and hear a small voice say 

“Miss, can you help me ?” You stop in your tracks and look around to see where the voice is coming from. You see a little girl standing in the doorway of the room you just passed. She was wearing a pink hospital gown with a cast on one of her arms and holding a teddy bear and a picture book in the other.

You turn around and return to the room “Sure, what do you need help with, hun?” You both walk into her room. It looks like any other hospital room with two beds separated by a curtain divider. The little girl’s bed was the one near the window, but there was no one in the other bed.

“Can you read this to me? Mrs Jenkins usually helps me but she’s in surgery right now so I have no friends to help me read” The little girl points to the empty bed “She said when she comes back we’ll read 100 books together!”

“Wow, that sounds like fun,” You say as you take a seat on the little chair next to her bed. The little girl hands you the book and gets under her covers. “Are you and Mrs. Jenkins close?”

“Yeah she always reads to me every day and she’s even teaching me how to read.” the little girl stated happily

“Pretty soon you’ll be reading books to her then” You smiled.

The little girl looked at you with bright eyes “That would be so cool I hope she comes back from surgery soon” she sadly looked over to the empty bed

“I’m sure she’ll come back soon, happy and healthier than ever” you reassure.

Trying to get her mind off of a sad topic you opened the book and started reading. It was a cute picture book about dragons, and you made sure to do all the voices of each character while reading. The little girl loved it she was laughing the whole time. Once that book was finished the little girl got off the bed and picked out another book from her backpack she kept on the floor under her bed. “Can you read this one too?” You smile take the book and start reading. After that book, she kept asking you to read more and more and you kept agreeing to do so. 

You two had been reading for a while now. You had almost completely forgotten about your appointment with Dr. Zayne when you heard a knock on the hospital room door. You both look over to see Zayne wheeling in an elderly lady in a wheelchair. “Mrs. Jenkins!” the little girl excitedly screamed. She got out of her bed ran over to the lady and gave her a big hug.

Zayne looked at you “What are you doing here, shouldn’t you be in the waiting room awaiting your appointment?”

Before you could say anything the little girl chimed in “Dr.Zayne, This lady was helping me read, she’s really nice, please don’t be mad at her.”

Zayne can’t help but smile at the little girl’s words, as annoyed as he was with you he couldn’t deny that seeing you in such a maternal role was too cute. “Ok I won't scold her for almost missing her appointment since you asked so nicely” he ruffled her hair and smiled.

A few days later Zayne gives you a call “Are you busy now, I need you to come to Akso.”

“What's wrong? Did something happen?” you were already fumbling to get your shoes on, thinking that there might be some kind of emergency.

“No, no nothing’s wrong. Remember that young girl you read to a few days ago? Her name is Ramona. She was telling all the other kids in the pediatric ward about the pretty lady who read to her and was super fun, I assume she was talking about you. She asked me if I could invite you again, and I said I'd see what I could do.”

“Wow, I’m flattered. Of course, I'll come. I’ll be there soon” You hang up and start to get ready.

Once you get there Zayne leads you to a room with about 10-15 kids in it. You greet the kids and sit down in the rocking chair Zayne had prepared for you, Ramona hands you a book. It was the story of the 3 little pigs and the big bad wolf.

“This one’s my favourite” Ramona expresses as she sits down on the floor with the other kids

“Hmm it seems like there's a lot of characters in this book, I don’t think I can do all the voices by myself. Maybe we can ask Dr.Zayne to help out.” you look to the children and then to Zayne who had been standing in the doorway. 

“Please Dr.Zayne !” the kids begged

He looked surprised for a moment. He looked at you saw your little mischievous grin and chuckled. He couldn’t say no to you or those kids. He reluctantly walks over to where you’re sitting and takes the book from you. “Alright if we’re going to do this then let's do it right” 

As the day went on, he felt his heart swell watching how sweet you were with the kids. He knew you were the one already, but he was so enamoured by you after this he could have proposed on the spot.

[inlovewithl3vi]

Wait till the boys learn my joints can predict the weather. 😆

(Feel free to ignore this! I just thought of this after reading what you wrote for my last message)

-bad joint anon

ok totally off topic I think that the name "bad joint anon" is hilarious!

also please never expect me to ignore an ask I literally love getting asks!!!!!!!!!!!

I thought about this too tbh lmao. mostly since growing up my grandparents and parents could smell when it was gonna rain and I fear that I have actually developed the ability to do so too.

My mom also can somewhat predict the weather too so I kinda get this (she has arthritis so yk) so I'm just gonna use the fact that her bones start to hurt when its gonna rain or when its getting colder. sorry if that's not how it works for you! anyway I'll shut up and write-

"you can what?!" Asmo looked at you, clearly surprised. "My joints predict the weather." you responded, not looking up from your DDD. you had mentioned only a few minutes before that its probably gonna rain tomorrow, when asked you had to explain that you could quite literally feel it in your bones. "how does that even work? do humans have magic I didn't know about? Solomon never mentioned this to me..."

you set your phone down to explain a little more. "remember how my joints sometimes pop or crack? yeah well sometimes my bones kinda just start to hurt when its gonna rain. I don't know how it works, it just does." Asmo nods as Satan walks in. "Oh! Satan! did you know the humans body predicts the weather?" Satan looks up from the book he was holding and glances over at you. he raises an eyebrow before speaking. "really? how so?"

of course then you have to answer all his questions (and point out every inaccuracy in human anatomy books from the devildom)

The next day, before you head out to RAD you glance out the window and see a nice light rain. you sigh and grab your umbrella from your bag, already prepared. "MC! you were right!" you glance behind you as you start walking to see Asmodeus dragging Solomon with him as he runs up to you. "It is raining!" he laughs slightly as him and Solomon fall into pace with you, continuing to walk to RAD.

Bonus: Diavolo gets really concerned about this when you tell him, more so than the brothers (mostly since the brothers have had some human interaction but Dia was mostly kept only in the castle). He genuinely freaks out when your joints crack or when you tell him its gonna rain or snow and it actually does. He'll get used to it (eventually) but till then he's gonna have a small heart attack anytime your bones make any sort of noise. (even if its normal)

[hp-hcs]

• smut• and lead us nott into temptation — asshole! pureblood! dom bottom! theodore nott x male! muggleborn! catholic! sub top! reader

requested by 🦈 anon! (aka my silly goofy lil guy <3)

WARNING: if you don’t like sacrilegious shit or gay male reader inserts, KEEP SCROLLING

i’ve got enough religious trauma to last me many lifetimes, so writing this one was just like ✍️🥲📿

tws: ⚠️dub-con⚠️, 🔞smut mdni🔞, literally no plot, manipulation, coercion, amab reader, virgin reader, corruption kink, pure blasphemy ngl, inappropriate use of religious prayers, lot of shit talking about the catholic church, gratuitous use of em-dashes, gratuitous use of the pet-name “angel”

you and theo are dormmates or something? idfk man this is literally just 2.2k words of depravity

not edited cause tbh i’m hella embarrassed that i wrote this

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

“…hallowed be thy na— Theo?”

“What are you doing?” your roommate asked as he stepped inside your shared dorm, his eyebrows furrowing as his gaze focused on the rosary in your hand. 

“Praying,” you mumble, cheeks flushing under his heavy stare. 

“You’re religious?” he asked, his eyebrows shooting up in surprise. “You believe in all that Muggle deity bullshit?”

“Yes.” You stiffened, lips twisting in distaste at his choice of words. 

You could physically see his pupils dilate at your affirmative answer. 

“Shit,” he mumbled under his breath. “So you’re…what, celibate, or whatever it’s called?”

You startled at the sudden change of topic. 

“Um…abstinent, yes,” you corrected, taking a step backwards as he moved closer. 

“Shit,” he cursed again. “That’s fuckin’ hot.”

He kept moving forward, crowding you back against the wall. You squeaked when he rested his hand against the wall beside your head, blocking you in on one side. He gently, but firmly, gripped your jaw in his other hand. His gaze raked up and down your body.

You gulped. “Th-Theo, what’re you d—”

He cut you off with a harsh kiss. 

It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t soft or sweet. It was Theo biting your bottom lip hard enough to bleed, tightening his grip on your jaw to wrench it open, and shoving his tongue in your mouth.

You were frozen, the rosary slipping from your fingers and hitting the floor with a loud clatter. After an aggressively…passionate? possessive? minute, Theo pulled back. 

“My sweet little angel,” he cooed, gently stroking the side of your face. “So pretty and pure.”

Your skin prickled under his touch, at the way his eyes darkened with hunger. The way his gentle caress belied the drop of blood running down your chin. 

He looked like sin. The way his hair curled above his ears, his pretty pink lips dotted red with your blood…

He looked like the Devil himself. 

“I want you to fuck me, Y/n,” Theo murmured unabashedly into your ear. 

Your knees trembled. Your heart raced. Your eyes were so wide, it was near painful. “Wh-what?”

“Please, angel? I want you to fuck me,” Theo whispered against your lips, a sensual tone in his voice. 

“Or,” he sighed over-dramatically, really playing it up, “if you want to remain a prude, you can tell me to stop right now and I will; no hard feelings.”

You trembled. What were you doing? Why were you even considering this?

Theo’s hand remained on your waist, and he ran his thumb across your bottommost rib in a steady pattern, back and forth, as he waited for your answer. 

“L-Leviticus 18:22,” you spluttered, doing your damn best to ignore the way the sunlight streaming through your dorm window highlighted and accentuated Theo’s gorgeous bone structure. “Th-thou shalt not lie with m-mankind, as with womankind: it is a-abomination.”

“That’s not a no.”

“That’s not a yes!” you argued. “Besides, lust is a sin of its own!”

“No, this doesn’t count.” He waved a hand dismissively. “It’s an abomination, not sex. Says so right in your little book. So therefore…” his fingers wandered down to the waistband of your trousers, dipping teasingly underneath to ghost over your hip bone before retreating. “Therefore it can’t be lust.”

It was the most backwards logic you’d ever heard. 

But it was hard to think about turning him away when the heel of his hand was suddenly pressing against the front of your trousers. 

“I-it…it isn’t?” you choke out, a confusing new sensation sparking in your stomach. “A-are you sure?”

“Of course,” Theo said, so confidently that you couldn’t help but believe him. 

“I-if you’re sure…” you trailed off, eyes widening as Theo dropped like a rock, his knees hitting the flagstone with a resounding crack that you wished you could record, just so you could listen to it over and over and over again. 

His impatient fingers fumbled with the button of your trousers, yanking them and your boxers down to your mid-thigh in a single smooth motion. 

You flushed bright red at the mere notion of being naked from the waist down in front of another person; let alone Theo, the boy who’d been your roommate for the last eight years. 

He kept his gaze firmly locked with yours, those unnervingly dead eyes framed with sinfully long lashes, as he flattened his tongue against the base of your dick and licked a long, slow stroke up the length of it. 

“Oh, fuck—” you cursed, your head falling backwards and hitting the wall behind you with a solid thunk. 

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you curse before.” He grinned, his thumb swiping over the head of your dick and collecting the dribble of precum that was steadily leaking from the tip before spreading it around. 

You whined pathetically, your thighs shaking as a moan was wrenched from your lips. Theo grinned wickedly at how debauched you already looked. 

Without a speck of hesitation, he closed his mouth around your dick, his clever tongue teasing the underside. He hollowed his cheeks around you and you gasped out a choked-off moan. 

Theo’s hand snaked up and found your wrist, guiding your hand to the mess of curls on the top of his head. Your fingers tightened in his hair, gripping onto a handful of it for dear life just to keep yourself from passing out from the overwhelming pleasure. Honestly, the only thing keeping you from falling over was Theo’s tight grip on your hips. 

“Shit shit shit shit—”

He pulled off of your dick with a sinful pop. 

“Keep reciting,” Theo rasped, his voice already rough and breathless. 

“Wh-what?”

“I interrupted your prayer when I walked in here. Keep reciting.”

You gulped, licking your lips nervously as you tried to remember where you’d left off before fully giving up and just starting the Our Father over. “O-Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name. Th-thy kingdom come, thy w-will be done, on Earth as it— hah~”

Your head fell back against the wall again as Theo sucked furiously on the tip of your dick, all of your thoughts going out the window. 

Theodore, that bastard, pulled off again.

You whined at the loss. “No- d-don’t—”

“Ah ah ah,” Theo chided, patting your thigh. “You stop, I stop. Keep going.”

You hissed out a displeased grumble before returning to your prayer as he returned to his S-tier dick sucking. “O-on Earth as it is in H-Heaven. G-give us this d-day our— Theo— daily b-bread—”

His fingers slipped down from your hip to brush against the sensitive skin behind your balls. 

Your hips jerked forward on instinct, and Theo moaned like a cheap whore around your cock as it was shoved down his throat, his nose suddenly buried in your pubes. 

“And f-forgive us our tre-trespasses…” you panted, fingers tightening their grip on his hair as your eyes squeezed shut. 

There was an odd sensation, like a coil tightening, behind your belly button. It was strange, although not unpleasant. 

“…as we f-forgive those who— who trespass aga-against us.”

Theo pulled away again. You opened your mouth to curse him out—Heaven knows he deserved it, the damn tease—when he got to his feet and promptly shucked off his shirt and trousers, dropping his boxers without a hint of modesty or insecurity. 

You stared, mouth agape, as Theo wandered over to his bed, seemingly in no hurry. He slowly splayed himself out on his bed for you, casting a wandless lubrication charm with a sly grin and an easy, relaxed posture that was belied by his achingly hard cock practically touching his stomach. 

“Close your mouth, angel,” he purred, beckoning you closer with two fingers. “You might catch flies.”

You took a small step forward, entranced by the sight in front of you.

“Keep praying, angel,” Theo murmured, running a hand through his already-disheveled curls—which only served in making his just-fucked hairstyle even more pronounced. 

“A-and lead us n-not into temptation,”—Theodore Nott was nothing if not temptation in its purest form—“but deliver us from evil.”

 You took another step closer, then another, until you were by his bedside. “Amen.”

“Amen,” Theo echoed, reaching for you with one hand. His fingers knotted themselves in your shirt, yanking you down on top of him. 

He grabbed the back of your neck and smashed his lips against yours. You wiggled, kicking your trousers and boxers off from where they were still stuck around your knees before pulling back to gasp for air. 

Theo grabbed the front of your shirt again, yanking on it. “Off.”

You complied without a second thought, tugging your shirt off over your head in one fluid motion. 

Theo groaned at the sight of your body as you tossed your shirt God-knows-where. He grabbed the back of your neck again and tugged you into another passionate kiss. 

“One day, ‘m gonna ride you,” he mumbled against your lips, running a possessive hand over your stomach. “My fuckin’ gorgeous boy. But today, you’re gonna fuck me.”

He pulled you fully on top of him, your knees between his, your forearms flat against the mattress on either side of the boy underneath you. 

“Y’know, I never told you to stop praying,” Theo murmured, reaching downwards. His fingers tightened around your cock, stroking it a few times before guiding it closer to his ass and pushing his body down against it. 

You swallowed nervously as you took the not-so-subtle hint, taking a deep breath before slowly pressing the tip in and continuing your Rosary. “H-Hail Mary, f-full of Gr—ah!—ace—”

You had to pause then to bury your head in the crook of his neck, your breathing coming in shaky gasps. Your body zinged with pleasure, your toes curling. 

“That’s it, baby,” Theo cooed, petting your hair gently. “Doing so good. Keep going. Makin’ me feel so good.”

“Th-the Lord is with thee. Blessed art th-thou amongst women—” you whispered breathlessly against his sweaty skin, pausing again for another second to compose yourself before you very slowly and hesitantly pressed in further. 

Theo’s knees tightened around your hips as he dug his heels into the backs of your thighs, urging you closer. “Sh-shit— angel, I need you to go in all the way. C-can you do that for me, pretty boy?”

You nodded and took a deep breath, and slowly and carefully pushed yourself all the way in, bottoming out inside of him after an agonizingly long moment. 

Theo gasped sharply as soon as you were fully seated inside of him. His fingers tightened their grip on your shoulders until his nails managed to break the skin. You leaned down to press your lips against his—much more gently than he had—and moaned into his mouth at the slight sting from his nails. 

Theo sighed in pleasure against your lips and returned the kiss. “M-move, angel. Need you t-to move.”

You slowly pulled nearly all the way out, your eyes fixed on his face. You wanted to document every facial expression, every muscle twitch, everything that Theo did while underneath you. 

Watching his lower lip tremble as a moan spilled out of him had to be your breaking point. Your hips snapped forward of their own accord, quickly filling him back up. “A-and blessed- is- the- fruit- fuck- of thy w-oh!-mb, Jesus.”

His head fell backwards with a loud cry, his nails raking up your back as he scrambled for anything to cling onto. “Yes! Fuck— harder!”

“H-Holy Mar— shit! M-Mary, Mother of G-God…”

You sped up, driving into him faster and harder with every frantic demand that left his lips. You let out a high whine as Theo leaned up to suck on the tender flesh under your jaw with a feral-like possessiveness. Red and purple marks had already begun to bloom along your neck and jaw. 

The coil in your stomach tightened even further.

“Th-Theo, I don’t— wh-what’s—?” you stuttered, panicking at the unfamiliar sensation. 

“Y-you about to cum, angel?” he panted. He stroked a gentle hand over your lower abdomen. “You feel s-something funny right here?”

You whimpered and nodded frantically. “P-please— I’m gonna—”

“No. Hold it, angel.”

“Wh-what?”

“You don’t get to finish until you finish your prayer, baby boy.”

You hissed in discomfort. “P-pray for us sinners—”

Your words were interrupted by a high-pitched moan from Theo as his back arched off the bed. He started chanting your name, over and over again, like a prayer of his own. 

His fingers scrabbled for a hold on your shoulders as he tightened around you. “Shit shit shit— ‘m not g-gonna last— fuck! Cum for me, angel,” Theo pleaded, his nails digging further into your back and leaving long marks that quickly blossomed into a rich pink color. 

“Nowandatthehourofourdeath!” you rushed the last line with a near-shriek as the coil in your abdomen exploded, your toes curling again and your vision going white. Your arms buckled and you collapsed on top of Theo, who was experiencing the exact same thing as you.

You both just laid there in a sweaty heap, limp and boneless from your respective mind-blowing orgasms. 

“Amen,” Theo said softly, finishing your prayer. He casted a wandless cleaning spell on the both of you before gently wrapping his arms around you and stroking your scratched-up back as you both came down from your highs. You let out a pleased purr at the feeling of his soft touch gently brushing over your stinging scratches, a wordless spell from Theo methodically coating the marks with a numbing topical ointment. 

You echoed the sentiment after a moment of catching your breath, content to just cuddle with him in this moment. You pressed a kiss to the side of Theo’s throat and whispered a singular word against his skin, “Amen.”

[bravevulnerability]

I’m not sure if you still take prompts but tbh, I don’t even care, can you write anything you want? Doesn’t have to be long! Just craving some good caskett 😭

A/N: I was either reading a book or watching a tv show, I can't recall, but the simple words of "I'll leave early" got stuck in my brain and shot this idea into my head. Set during 4x19, ‘47 Seconds’, initially before any confessions unknowingly occur on the other side of an interrogation room window. 

-

The knock on the door startles him, has him jerking out of his chair and bumping his hip on the edge of the desk. 

Castle curses under his breath, winces, but carries on into the living room, to the front door. 

It’s late, after midnight, and he hasn’t been able to calm his mind. All he can think about is the victims of the bombing, their loss of life, of opportunity, and how it has selfishly caused him to reflect on those areas of his own life. On Kate. 

He’s going to tell her tomorrow. He has to. What if - god forbid - the world were to end for him the way it did for all of those people today, and it would do so without Kate Beckett knowing he loved her? What if the time they had was so much shorter than they could imagine? What if-

Castle feels the color drain from his face, all of the bravado leaving him, as he swings the door open.

“Beckett,” he greets softly, self-consciously smoothing down the tortured strands of hair that have flown this way and that from the restless push of his fingers. 

She’s in his hallway with her hair falling in those gentle waves around her shoulders, her face devoid of makeup and an NYPD sweatshirt engulfing her slim frame. Kate offers him a weak twitch of her mouth.

“Hey, Castle.” Her voice is soft but gruff, as if it hasn’t been used in hours. “Did I wake you?”

“No, no,” he assures her, stepping back and gesturing for her to come in. Her eyes flicker around the darkened space, as if ensuring his daughter isn’t at the counter, or his mother on the couch. “I was up, trying to write, but after today… I just couldn’t get out of my head.”

The door clicks quietly behind them and he steps up to her side, catches the haunted glimpse of her eyes gravitating back to him. The warm glow of his office beckons them forward, offering privacy and familiarity. She's never said as much, but he thinks she favors his office, the comforting walls of books and the sofa she often curls up on when she stays late to theorize over cases or plot points for his novels.

“Yeah.” She nods, twisting her fingers together in front of her as she follows him inside. He eases the office door closed. Just in case. The last thing he needs is Alexis's scrutinizing gaze peering in. His daughter means well, he knows, but on the topic of Kate, he hopes to maintain some distance. “I know the feeling.”

“Couldn’t sleep?” he tries, sensing there is more to her visit than she is letting on. 

“No,” she admits. “I just - it’s this case. I kept seeing their faces, the crime scene, the senselessness of it. I keep thinking of the victims’ loved ones, what it’s going to do to them.” 

Castle tilts his head, understanding but still curious. Her eyes fall to her feet, the worn toes of her sneakers peeking out from her jeans. 

“It’s selfish, but it - it made me think of what my shooting did to the people I care about, that I love.” She purses her lips and exhales a breath that quivers. “I don’t think I ever apologized to you. Well, beyond the first time I saw you again after your book signing in the fall,” she murmurs, tentatively lifting her gaze to meet his. “For what I put you through.”

“Kate,” he huffs, but she catches the hand he tries to use to wave her off. He stares down at the slim curl of her fingers around his, the kiss of her thumb to the heart of his palm. “You didn’t put me through anything, you were shot. Besides, I’m one of the lucky ones. You’re here.”

“You know what I mean.” Her eyes harden, a fierce hazel, emboldened. “The summer, and… this. The missed opportunities and lost time. The waiting.”

His brow hitches, surprise rippling through his senses. Sure, they’ve talked around his unspoken vow to wait for her, their conversations always edging on everything shy of committing to one another without saying any actual truths. He’s not used to blatant honesty between them.

His hand relaxes within the grasp of hers, their loosely knotted fingers dangling in the space between them.

“I just - I know it’s not necessarily what you signed up for-”

“Beckett, it’s exactly what I signed up for,” he chuckles, tugging gently on their hands and drawing her a step closer. She has to lift her eyes to him without her heels, her vulnerability alive and shimmering in her gaze just a few inches below. “From the first day we met, I signed up for you.”

“We were different then,” she huffs, shaking her head, but he squeezes her hand.

“Yeah, but maybe we’ve been changing for the better.” He shrugs, watching a sliver of hope slice through her pupils. “Maybe the last four years were necessary, to prove we were capable of growing together. Seems worth waiting for to me.”

Kate’s lips quirk, white teeth appearing to contain the smile. 

“You always know how to say something reassuring,” she sighs, but her eyes are dancing with light for him. 

“Plus, you’re only the hottest detective in existence, so I’d be stupid to give up so easily-”

She smacks him with her free hand, her laughter quiet and mingling with his. He catches the other hand at his chest, coats her knuckles with his palm, and feels hers come to a cool rest over his heart. Kate’s laugh gentles into a sigh, her body swaying towards his, and then she’s releasing the hand that was holding his. Her arm snakes around his waist instead, her embrace tentative.

Rick's arms automatically wind around her, the movement as natural as breathing. He feels the sink of her body into his, the exhale of tension against his collarbone as she tucks her forehead against his neck. 

“I love you, Kate,” he whispers, feeling the terror and exhilaration commingling within his chest as the words escape. He expects her to tense, to draw away, but she remains against him. Still, unspeaking, and possibly not breathing, but in his arms with her fingers curled into the t-shirt at his back. “I don’t need you to be ready to say it back, but I don’t want you to forget, to doubt. I’m here.”

Her arm tightens around him, her fingers curling at his chest, as if she could hold fast to the heart beneath her hand. They remain like that for a long moment and he takes the time to appreciate the shape of her in his arms, the scent of her shampoo in his nose, and her nuzzled cheek against his clavicle.

"I don't want you to doubt either," she murmurs, the heat of her breath rushing over the flesh of his throat.

Kate gingerly lifts her head, dark lashes rising and eyes finding his. Her hand splays at the small of back, her fingertips brushing his spine. He swallows hard, begging his heart to steady before she feels the gallop of it between their bodies.

"You're not alone in this, Rick." A tender smile graces her lips, encouraging yet shy. Her eyes fall to his mouth, linger for a moment too long before fluttering back to his gaze. "And I don't think the wait is for much longer."

"N-no?" He clears his throat, watches her smile grow, and he can't help it. He touches a hand to her jaw, unfurling fingers along her cheek, and watches in amazement as she leans into the cup of his palm.

"No," she confirms, covering the back of his hand with one of hers, holding it there as she turns her head and brushes a kiss to his palm that sends a jolt of electricity up his arm.

"Kate," he sighs, giving into the compromise of pressing his forehead to hers.

"Sorry," she mumbles, abandoning his hand to dust her fingers to his chin. He feels the tips of her fingers trail along his jaw, his eyes fluttering closed as her thumb skims his cheek. "I think I should go."

"It's late," he argues, eyes flickering open to find hers watching closely, bottom lip pinned beneath her teeth again. "Just stay. The guest room-"

"Castle, Alexis and your mom-"

"Something tells me Alexis won't even notice since she leaves for classes at the crack of dawn and my mother won't be up until the clock is flashing double digits."

She's considering it, he can tell.

"Stay," he murmurs, forcing himself to draw back and stealing the hand from his face.

"Castle," she huffs when he begins to drag her towards his bedroom.

"Here," he tells her, letting her go to dig through his dresser, retrieving a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt. "These should be comfortable, but you're welcome to raid my closet and drawers for other options if-"

She swipes the clothes from him and glowers as she brushes past, heading for his bathroom.

He nervously rearranges his pillows while he waits for her, trying not to pay attention to the sound of running water or the click of the doorknob.

She still looks uncertain when she drops her clothes in the chair beside his bed, her sweater landing on top of his robe, making him stupidly delighted.

"Come on," he says, climbing onto his side of the bed and cutting the lamp lights. He feels the darkness will seal the deal, allow her the courage to crawl under the covers to innocently lie beside him.

He doesn't know when they decided on his room instead of the guest room, but she makes no move to leave now.

He looks anywhere but at her while he slides his legs beneath the comforter, the sheets, and settles onto his back. But his body, his senses, are attuned to her, and he can hear the quiet rustling of her doing the same. When he risks a glance, he can make out the dark mass of her body curled beneath the blankets a few inches away.

"I'll leave early," she breathes into the shadows between them, as if making a promise to them both.

"Kate."

A moment of silence passes and then the mattress is shifting, her body warm and lithe and nestling beside him. He eases his arm around her, feels the welcome weight of her head on his shoulder, the contented sigh of her breath against his neck.

"I'll leave early," she repeats, adamant but soft.

"Go to sleep, Kate," he whispers, resting his cheek against her hair and feeling the restlessness of her quieting.

Her arms curl between them, her cold hands against his ribs, her knees against his thighs. He drifts to sleep savoring the points of contact.

-

When he wakes, Kate is gone. Later, he finds that the shirt he lent her the night before is as well.

-

The next night, when he receives a late knock on his door, he's aware of who will be on the other side and he opens it with anger roiling through his insides.

"You stormed out before I had the chance to explain," she begins immediately, coming into his loft as if she were a storm herself. "I know why you're upset with me, but-"

"Kate, I really think you've said enough today," he cuts her off, keeping his voice low.

It's late, hours since he knows her shift ended. He knows she planned this purposely to avoid his family, to corner him while he was alone.

"What I said to Bobby-"

"Yeah, I already heard it once. I'll pass on a second time," he mutters, locking his front door and leaving her in the entryway.

"Rick." But she follows, of course, chasing him with soft steps to the sanctuary of his office. "It was an interrogation tactic. You're just assuming I was being honest with a suspect," she hisses, easing the office door shut behind her.

Castle crosses his arms and leans back against his desk.

"Fine," he concedes, bitterly. He already knows the answer to his next question, he feels it in his gut, his bones. The horrible truth he's always known. "Do you remember every second of that day? Of being shot?"

Her throat ripples with a swallow, but she exhales steadily, steels herself before she says a word.

"Yes," she confesses, holding his gaze. "I've always remembered."

"Every. Second," he clarifies. Not a question.

Her lips part, the bottom one threatening to quiver ever so slightly. She squares her jaw to stop it.

"Every second," she confirms, her fingers in fists at her sides. "I remember you tackling me, trying to stop the blood, to - to save me."

He casts his eyes away from her, not wanting to remember it, not wanting to recall the feeling of hot blood on his hands, the wide surprise of her eyes, the panicked sound of her gasping for breath beneath him.

"I remember you telling me you love me," she whispers, the words soft but measured. "That was the last thing."

"All this time," he manages, blinking away the horror of those images. "You lied."

"I know," she whispers, exhaling a shaking breath into the silence between them. "I didn't - I didn't know how to face it then. How to be - how to be what I wanted to be for myself, for you. I just... god, Castle. I panicked and if I hadn't been in therapy for the last few months, I'd probably still be lying to you."

He spares a look at her then, the crescents of purple beneath her eyes, the glimmer of moisture making them sparkle in the darkness of the room.

"When I woke up in that hospital room, I didn't feel like a person anymore. The only purpose I've ever felt I had was solving my mother's murder and after the shooting, I didn't think I could survive making room for anything else," she attempts to explain, but he can hear the hitch threatening her throat, the choked sound of her trying not to cry. "I didn't feel worth much else."

Argument bubbles unbidden on his tongue at that, but she speaks first.

"I - I wanted you," she declares, meeting his eyes with a desperation he's never seen in hers. Not for him. "But I didn't feel like I could give what you deserve. I needed to be better first, to heal, to make the room. To acknowledge how important you are to me."

The unshed tears spill over, creating rivulets down her cheeks.

"I love you," she says, but her voice has changed, strengthening with resolve. "I love you, but I wasn't going to screw it up, so I was trying to put in the work. To be more."

Castle doesn't stop her when she takes a step toward him, another.

"I'm sorry." She doesn't touch him, but stands before him, palms up and bare, as if begging. "I should have gone about it all differently, but I - god, I never wanted to hurt you, Rick."

Without thinking, he touches the tear stains on her cheeks, brushing them away with his thumb.

"You don't have to forgive me tonight," she adds softly, staring up at him with tired eyes. "You can stay angry for a while. Just don't - don't give up on me yet."

Shit, she was breaking his heart, siphoning all his resolve.

His fingers slide into her hair, cradling the back of her skull.

"I would never." Her eyes flutter in what looks like relief. "I get it, I do. I just..."

"Hate it," she mumbles, the corner of her mouth twitching ever so slightly.

He shrugs. "I wish we could have done it a little differently, yeah. But I'm not going to hold it against you, Kate, I just need time to process it all."

She nods, her lips pursing resolutely. "Of course."

Her head turns toward the door, but he snags her fingers. She looks to him in askance.

"Will you stay?"

She hesitates. "What about time and space?"

"I didn't say anything about space."

She is not nearly as anxious to crawl into bed with him this time, her body settling beside him without preamble and her arms twining around his torso.

"We're okay, Kate," he promises her, burying the words in her hair as her nose touches his throat and one of her ankles hooks around his.

He rubs her back, tracing the line of her spine through another one of his t-shirts. Eventually, the taut arrangement of bones begins to relax beneath his ministrations and her breathing evens out, her body slack in his arms.

He tries to sleep, but despite all she said, all that has happened over the course of the last few hours, he can't tear his thoughts away from the fact that she loves him. And she said it out loud.

-

Most of the following nights are spent with her appearing on his doorstep or his on hers, the hour often late, but her smile is always worth it. The first time she opened her door to him, after a night of being dressed up for a stint with Colin Hunt - he hated that guy - she was beaming.

"I thought you'd be at home brooding," she'd chuckled, locking the door behind him, pleasing him with her intent to keep him there. "I was about to come to you."

"No, I couldn't wait that long," he admitted, hanging his coat on one of the empty hooks. "I was kinda hoping you'd still be in that dress."

Kate had huffed a laugh, already dressed down in one of the t-shirts she had stolen from him. He had yet to call her out on it because he didn't want to give her a reason to stop.

"Don't worry, Castle," she teased, lifting her hand to his cheek. "I'll save it for another time."

His brow arced at that. "That statement is heavy with implication."

"It was intended to be," she grinned, sauntering to her bedroom.

He had to bring up the case to keep himself occupied after that, but the way she looked at him every time he insulted Mr. Scotland Yard almost made it worse.

Oh yeah, Kate Beckett definitely wanted him. But until she made the next move, he would wait. He wasn't taking any risk of moving too fast when it came to her. Not when he knew this time would be for keeps.

-

The evening they solve the zombie case, she vows to appear at his loft, teasing him that he'll never get that makeup off without her help. He has a laser tag game planned with Alexis that turns into the icing on the cake of his day, with his daughter announcing she will be attending Columbia for college.

Most of his makeup has been scrubbed off, the costume gone, when Kate knocks on the front door.

Alexis glances up from washing the dishes, her brow furrowed. "Were we expecting anyone this late?"

"Just Kate." He tries for nonchalance, but Alexis eyes him with both intrigue and wariness as he starts for the door.

When Castle opens it, she's on the other side as promised. She's changed from her leather jacket and jeans to a soft sweater and yoga pants, looking warm and inviting at his doorstep.

"Oh look, you did a pretty good job," she chuckles, reaching for his nearly cleansed cheek, stroking the bone there.

"I don't know if you'll have better luck," he admits. "Prosthetics and stage makeup leave quite the mark."

"Well," she grins, tapping the bag on her arm. "I brought an extra strength cleanser, so we'll give it a shot."

The water from the kitchen sink is still running, catching her attention. Alexis's presence is likely visible from the doorway, the clinking of dishes going into the dishwasher pointedly loud. He feels nervous but hopeful as he watches Kate determine what to do next.

She lowers her hand from his cheek and bites her bottom lip. "Am I too early?"

"No, not at all." He extends his hand for hers and she slips her fingers into the cove of his, allowing him to guide her inside.

-

"I think she hates me a little less," Kate murmurs, her eyes following the work of the cotton pad she swipes along his skin.

She and Alexis spoke briefly before his daughter went up to bed. Kate had lingered before following him to his en suite bathroom, watching the stairs his daughter had disappeared up with worry lining her face.

"She never hated you," he grunts, wincing when she has to scrub at a spot on his forehead with a little too much vigor. She's been wiping makeup from his skin for the last twenty minutes, standing in front of him while he perched on the edge of his bathtub in his pajamas. "She was upset with me."

"And she's a protective daughter. Trust me, I get it," she assures him gently. Her thumb skims the curve of his eyebrow and he opens his eyes to find her studying him. "I think I should go home tonight, Rick."

He eases his hands onto her hips, watching her brow arch in response.

"I don't want to rush things with Alexis," she elaborates, tossing the cotton pad into the trash and reaching for a clean hand towel.

She dries his face with tender brushes.

"She is unaware you've stayed here at all," he reasons. "I doubt tonight would be any different. Besides, it's late."

"Castle, it's ten," she chuckles, but she hasn't shoved his hands from the resting place of her hipbones. "There's no reason for me to stay."

"No?" He rises slowly from the edge of the tub, holding her gaze the entire time. "What if I need you?"

Her nostrils flare ever so subtly, a tell he's picked up on. She's struggling to ignore him.

"Cuddling is part of our healing journey, Beckett."

She rolls her eyes and shoves on his chest, but doesn't fight the tug of his hand on her arm, the offering of his clothes, his bed.

-

Castle's eyes flutter open. It's barely light out and it's early, he can tell that much upon waking. But something has woken him, the featherlight dance of a touch to his cheek.

As his vision focuses, he sees Kate lying beside him, her fingers migrating from his face to comb through his hair.

He hums and shifts closer to her, burrowing into the warmth of her body.

Her arms wrap around his neck while his band around her spine. Their legs are tangled and her lips are moving against his ear.

"I gotta go," she whispers, turning her head to graze a kiss to his temple.

He sighs and loosens his grip on her, allows her to untangle their limbs.

"See you in a few hours?" she murmurs, one of her hands still reluctant to leave him, draped along his jaw.

"Of course," he yawns, gazing up at her from his pillow.

She bites her bottom lip for a second before leaning forward, lingering there before tilting her head, dusting her mouth to his. Instantly, his senses come alive under the electricity of her lips.

Castle's arms stall in their retreat from her body, reclaiming their hold on her again.

A smile blooms on her mouth before she's kissing him with more confidence, fitting the curve of her lips to his. He hums in response, kisses her back, and feels her body canting into his.

"Mm, Beckett, you make it hard to let you go," he grumbles, feeling more than hearing the rumble of her laughter.

She stains another kiss to his mouth, mumbling a last farewell against the corner of his mouth before regretfully pulling her body from the bed.

-

The storm batters against his windows, lightning illuminating his office as he deletes the murder board on his screen, Kate's face disappearing with the tap of his fingers.

They fought last night in her apartment, his love for her used like a bargaining chip for her life, and it wasn't enough.

He's done. He loves her with a fierce strength and softness, in ways he's never loved anyone else, but he can't watch her throw her life away.

It'll just hurt more.

No, he would rather try and gain as much distance as he can before he gets the call that Kate has become the latest to fall victim to the Dragon's wrath.

The knocking on his door begins with vigor.

He pauses, unsure. His first thought is that it must be Kate and the last thing he wants is another argument. But, it could also be Alexis. He turned his phone off after the third consistent ring with Kate's number flashing across the screen. What if his daughter needed him?

Shit.

He curses himself for his ignorance, vowing to turn the phone back on as soon as he checks the door.

Rick composes his expression, ensuring he doesn't look as hassled as he feels, not wanting to alarm his daughter on her special night if it is her.

He unlocks the door, tugs it open, and feels all of that hard work immediately fall, frown returning instantly at the sight of Kate Beckett.

She's soaked to the skin, dripping rain all over the carpeted hall of the building and the entryway to his loft.

"Beckett," he sighs, his fingers already clenching around the door's edge. "What do you want?"

"You," she whispers, breaching the slim space the door allows and reaching for him.

His body betrays him, moving too slowly to block the ascent of her hands to his face, the rise of her body into his, the adamant press of her mouth.

"You had that," he grunts into her kiss before prying her hands from his cheeks. But he doesn't let her go, he can't. So he holds her captured wrists to his chest, studies the desperate features lining her face, the trembling form of her body. "What happened?"

"He got away," she rasps, eyes shimmering with unshed tears. "And I didn't care."

Traitorous hope seeps through the cracks of his heart.

"I almost died and all I could think about was you," she breathes, her head shaking as her gaze roams his face, taking him in as if seeing for the first time. Seeing him clearly. "I'm so sorry, Castle. You were right and I'm - I'm sorry."

Her wrists rotate in his loosened grasp, fingers climbing to bridge at the back of his neck. Her toes arch, lifting her body to meet his, allowing her lips to ghost over his.

"I love you." The words sound sacred falling from her mouth onto his. "I'm sorry I didn't treat you like it."

He suffers only a split moment of indecision - he loves her back, he always will, even though she scares the shit out of him.

Castle layers his mouth over hers, swallows the moan she exhales at the bruise of his kiss, the surge of his body using hers to shut the door. Kate cradles his head in her hands as he kisses her, the tenderness of all the nights before, of the last kiss she graced him with, gone in favor of the brutal fall of his mouth upon hers, the needful crush of his bones into hers.

She doesn't seem to mind, every scrape of his teeth, press of his palm, and grip of his fingers being returned with fervor.

His hands tangle in her hair, wet and dripping down his bare forearms, tilting her face upwards. She gasps when his tongue slides past her parted lips, swiping along hers and exploring the cove of her mouth like he's always wanted to. They've kissed like this before, frenzied and frantic in a darkened parking lot under the ruse of saving Ryan and Esposito, but there was still an ounce of restraint alive then. She had a boyfriend and he was desperate to show her how good they could be together, but they were allowed so little time, so much uncertainty.

Not tonight.

Her head drops back against the door as he skates lips and teeth along her jaw, down her neck. Her arms are clinging to him, her hips clashing with his, as if she can't keep him close enough.

He slows, though, when he reaches the bared flesh of her chest, the scarred skin between her breasts. His thumb skims the spot with reverence, his lips dust there next, feeling her shudder beneath him.

She whimpers as he travels his mouth up her skin, teeth nipping at her collarbone, tongue slicking along the rain coated flesh of her exposed shoulder, her throat.

"Rick," she breathes, the fingers of one hand fisting in his hair, the other slipping between them to yank at the buttons of his shirt.

Castle slides his hands down her sides, her hips, and curls them around her thighs. She's ready when he lifts her, using her toes to hop into his arms.

He chuckles as her arms wrap around his neck and she flips her hair to one side, angling her head to kiss him again.

"Eager, Beckett?" he smirks into her mouth, digging his fingers into her ass as she takes his bottom lip between her teeth.

"Yes," she admits without hesitation, letting him go for a split second to shrug the sopping leather jacket from her shoulders.

It hits the floor with a wet slap, but he can't be bothered to care. She smiles into the next kiss she lays upon his mouth, her happiness tasting like champagne bubbles on his tongue.

"You really love cuddling with me, huh?"

She laughs, tightening her thighs around his waist as they start for his bedroom.

"I plan to do more than cuddle with you tonight, Castle." Her thumb traces the bone of his cheek. "Think you can handle it?"

Her eyes are sparkling, gold flashing excitement rippling through her irises.

Castle kicks the door of his office shut with his foot and carries her into the bedroom.

"The real question is, can you? If you're planning to be up with the sun-"

"No," she cuts him off, kissing him quickly before he can lower them to the bed. He bends to lay her across the mattress, the bracket of her thighs drawing down him into the cradle of her hips. "I don't plan to leave early."

"Oh?" he muses, brushing back the damp strands of hair from her cheeks.

Her fingers thread through his hair, trickle down his neck, and trail along his spine, sending a shiver through him. Her eyes wander across his face, as if studying every feature, lips settling into a soft smile.

"I want to stay," she whispers, like it's a secret.

"Then please," he murmurs, resting his forehead to hers for a moment, breathing into the thin space between them. "Stay."

[natt-writes]

~5 Writing tips that actually help~

(These tips are meant for fiction books, especially fantasy. so if you’re writing nonfiction a decent amount of these won’t apply to you. Sorry!)

Find your writing voice.

one of the biggest issues I find in things written by beginners is a lack of emotional connection with the narration. Sure the story can be great, but without personality, without looks into the characters minds, without little quips here and there, it really isn’t all that interesting. Something that really helped me to realize this was a book called the tragical tale of birdie bloom. It’s a kids book but it honestly has such a good narrator (and storyline tbh) that you can look past the little kiddy-ness. I recommend you check the book out if you’re looking for some inspiration. I will be making a post about how to develop your writing and character voices soon so if you want some extra help with that, stay tuned!

2. Get to know your characters.

I know that you all probably already know this, but characters are one of, if not the most important part of a book. Readers don’t want to read about a flat, boring character who just feels like a vessel for the horrifying amount of trauma you add to your story. They want to read about people that feel real, people with flaws and feelings and hobbies and backstories. When I wanted to develop my characters I started going through the drafts, the plot outlines, everything and seeing what the characters did, said, felt. Then I took their basic backstory and started lining things up. Like if a character decided to get into a fight with another character, I would see what had happened to them that might have caused this. Maybe they had been abused as a child and thought that any disagreement meant they had to fight for their life. Maybe this person reminded them of a former enemy. After you start to figure out what connects the characters to the big plot points, you can then start to develop subtle things. You could start writing something, realize this situation would have triggered a character, and then drop subtle hints towards them feeling uncomfortable. Go nuts with it, after all you can never over-analyze a character.

3. Describe things uniquely.

Descriptions are what help us to understand what’s going on in a scene. They can tell us about the tasty drink a character is enjoying, the slick dress that someone is wearing or the way a characters muscles tense when a certain someone enters the room. But sometimes descriptions a fall a bit flat and that can ruin the experience for the reader. Something I always try to remember is to try and come up with new words describe something, for example; “her eyes were a beautiful shade of brown.” Is a very basic and over used description, instead you could try; “her eyes sparkled as she sat across from me, gleaming a rich chocolate shade as the light from the candles reflected off of them”. This is a much stronger sentence as it gives both environment hits and a description of the eyes, all while staying away from overused terms. I often see this theme in stories written by beginners, things being described in a very straight forward manner. And of course this is ok once in a while, especially if this isn’t a very important topic, but it still sounds better when you branch away from that basic sentence structure. I always like to use descriptive sentences to push things forward. Here is another example; “she was wearing a fluffy green dress with lots of lace. She walked over to the door and opened it.” Vs “the lacy trim of her green dress dragged on the floor as she walked towards the door. She smiled wide as she held it open, inviting her guests into the building.” Making strong sentences is very important, so please toy around with different words, structures, etc, until the sentence fits the type of book you’re trying to write.

4. Make trauma realistic.

Yes, even if you’re writing a fantasy book, characters experiences have to be realistic. Something that always gets on my nerves is when writers come up with a good idea for some trauma, so they just give to a character, even when it doesn’t suit them at all. if you are going to give a character trauma you need to explain it, set it up so it actually fits into their character arc, then have the character actually be affected by it. They can’t just randomly be like “I got shot by a dude.” And that’s it if there is no way that character could have gotten shot given their life experiences. Also if you want a character to be relatively unaffected after an extremely traumatic event you have to plan it out so that they have a specific and consistent trauma response that makes them not react shortly after an event like that. Characters are supposed to be like people, and no two people react to trauma the same way, so you do have some leeway if necessary, but people also don’t just stay the same after something horrible happens, they are affected by it and that has to be accurately portrayed. This does get easier the more you get to know the characters though, as soon you will know how they react to things and how to plan trauma that suits them.

5. Make a plot outline.

I cannot stress this enough, make a plot outline. Making a plot outline literally saved my book, and they are really easy to make! I recommend you download a spreadsheet app like XL spreadsheets or Apple numbers but you could even use google docs if you want. You want to put in all the chapters and then give each chapter at least six spots to write scenes. Add a spot for adding the main event of the chapter/a summery of what you have to write. This will help you to understand what you have to write for that chapter and how it fits into the next chapter. After that you start to fill all the scene boxes in with your plot information. Having a plot outline is great as it can be super vague and messy, but still hold all your ideas. It also helps to prevent unnecessary rewrites later, as you can just edit the plot outline before you start writing the first draft. You can even make a plot outline after you’ve started writing your book. That’s what I did and I promise, it still is very helpful. (Example of a plot outline below.)

[etherealyoungk]

hello skye!! i love your writing, its so sweet :] coukd i req svt with an s/o that maybe is non verbal or doesnt talk that much when theyre anxious? or just minghao, woozi, and seungkwan if ot13 is too much! if u havent eaten yet, eat something even if its small when u see this!!

hello! i love your username btw! and thank you, im happy to hear you enjoy my writing <3 i hope you like this! you take care as well :) i wrote this with ot13 btw

seungcheol: he knows when you're anxious when you start being a bit more quiet than usual and he slowly approaches you on the topic. he'd sit down next to you and ask you what was wrong as he gently brushes your cheek with the back of his hand. you didn't have to tell him immediately, but he just would want you to know that he's here for you and that you don't have to bottle up your feelings.

jeonghan: he'd notice after a while that you'd get rather quiet and closed off if you got anxious. he'd try his best to make you feel safe and comfortable and you'd slowly learn to open up to him about your anxiousness and feelings.

joshua: similar to seungcheol, he'd be the type to notice the change in you immediately and try to figure out what might be triggering your anxiousness. would cuddle you and distract you by watching a movie or reading out a book to you, until you slowly open up to him.

junhui: a little cluless tbh. he'd think you were just tired whenever you'd become closed off and quiet. it was later that he learned it was because you were anxious and not tired.

hoshi: he's not really sure what to do. he thinks that maybe you're upset, that's why you're suddenly so quiet and not talking to him as much. "are you mad at me?", he asks you softly with a pout. "hoshi..no im not mad at you. shit im sorry im just...i don't know..anxious.." you explain to him. later he would make sure to be alert of when you might be anxious and would gently squeeze your hand to let you know that he was here for you.

wonwoo: i think wonwoo would understand how you kinda shut off and become quiet when you get anixous and he'd leave you alone, giving you your space. but he'd also make sure to be there for you and tell gently ask you what was wrong if he was really worried and you seemed a bit too anxious. he'd gently talk to you and try to understand what was making you feel anxious.

woozi: he'd understand and would give you space and time if you needed it. but if he saw you were getting a bit too worked up and anxious, he'd help you calm down, telling you to breathe and that he was here and was not going anywhere. you could tell him anything, at anytime and he'd be here for you.

minghao: whenever you got anxious and found yourself curled up under the blankets, minghao made you tea. he'd make you a warm cup of tea and sit beside you as you slowly sipped the tea, grateful to minghao for being by you. you'd slowly open up to him about how you were feeling and he'd hug you afterwards, telling you how proud he was of you.

mingyu: he's very worried. he would not understand it at first and he'd just think you were maybe mad or upset at him because of the sudden quietness from you. but he later understands that it's because of your anxiety he feels a bit :\ he'd then try his best to notice when you'd kinda space out and close off and try to get you to speak to him. again, he won't force you, just would cuddle you and tell you that he was here and you could tell him anything, no matter how serious or silly it was.

dokyeom: the moment he sees you a bit more closed off and quieter than usual, whether it be replying to his texts later than usual or leaving him on seen, he's running over to you. he'd bring a few of your favorite foods, snacks, or your favorite ice cream and sit down with you, engulfing you in a big warm hug and telling you that he was always on your side and you didn't have to worry. he'd gently reassure you and once you open up to him about your feelings, he'd hug you again and give you a sweet kiss on the cheek.

seungkwan: he'd understand and he'd kind of get it and understand how you were feeling and not prod at you to tell him. he'd give you your space but also make sure he was there for you and he'd cook for you or take you out and maybe even buy you flowers because he wanted to make you smile and help you feel better. he would check up on your throughout the day and make sure you were okay.

vernon: he'd be a little clueless but once he learns and understands, he'd be with you and try his best to comfort and talk to you about how you were feeling.

dino: he would be a little confused too as you why you had suddenly gotten so quiet or weren't talking to him like you usually would. qhen you finally pluck the courage to speak to him, you tell him he'd hug you and tell you how great you were doing. he'd make it a point to notice when you got anxious and shower you with extra love and affection as well, hoping to distract you until you were ready to speak or voice it out to him.

taglist: @joshuaahong @naaaaafla @daisycheols

[dollishmehrayan]

GET TO KNOW ME Q & A BY DOLLISH ── .✦

a/n: this is just mundane facts about me for hitting 500 followers under ONE MONTH!? So yeah this is a post! <3

Hii! So tysm for 500 followers so let me greet myself to you!, my name is rayan/rayaan (pronounced ri-yaan) and you can call me riri or dollish and my pronouns are she/her (I’m biologically a girl so it’s she and her for me always please don’t misgender me) so here are some fun questions I thought to answer!!! (I’ll be editing in questions you guys ask <3) ── .✦

ᥫ᭡ ASKED QUESTIONS ── .✦

1. ‘How did you get the name dollish’ - I got the name dollish actually when I was about 2-3 years old because i was slightly chubby and my neighbors always called me a “porcelain doll” and how I acted doll-like until they named me “dollish” because it was childish + doll combined and 80% of the ppl irl call me dollish

2. ‘Where have you learned writing? Like where have you learned writing.’ - I learned writing like as in being a writer because originally I wanted to be a actual author and illustrator (still do) and I had a BIG passion for writing ever since I was a kid and was learning sight words even though English is not my first language!

3. ‘Why do you not write smut or n$fw?? I see other writers doing it fine.’ - I personally when it comes to topics such as smut I don’t feel comfortable with in general because personally it’s very hard for me to get romantically attached and smut makes me uncomfortable and I also somewhat despise it so much because I hate reducing a character to sexual appeal and etc.

4. ‘how do you easily write like headcannons so fast and release like 3-2 headcannons a day?’ - I actually just type fast secondly I’m a very creative person tbh and I always eat a lot before I write and I also have like posts on like the queue thing too! Matter of fact I’m not that active on tumblr tbh but yeah

5. ‘What socials do you have??’ - I only have tiktok for now (I also have other a lot of socials but those are personal for now) but I’m thinking of making a twitter to like promote this tumblr account but twitter Lowkey scares me so I’d rather not have that audience.

ᥫ᭡ COMMON QUESTIONS ── .✦

What's your favorite way to spend a weekend? - I personally love going out with my friends to restaurants and very cool places I also love traveling I already have been to (excluding us states because I’ve been to a lot), Japan, South Korea, bali, Portugal, nederlands, france, Belgium, uk, china, india, Norway (like 5 times) and Spain, Egypt, Germany, Maldives, Mauritius, and etc

What's a book that you'd recommend? - the book is almost TOO good I might have to gatekeep for now😞 (jk tbh I don’t read much but I can answer this but with comics!)

Are you a morning person or a night owl? - night owl defo

What's your dream job? - either a fashion designer or author or a actress

Do you have any pets? - yes! Two cats, both are Siamese cats named ren and irene!

What's your favorite type of cuisine? - too hard to choose, I’d take any food tbh I’m not a picky eater

Do you have any siblings? - yes!

there anything you dislike in your writing life? - yes! I don’t like people who copy my work or write off a lot and secondly I think as in pet peeves about becoming a fan fic writer is when you get complex requests like “write what if batboys and they’re s/o were (really long and complex and so fanon blah blah)!” Like genuinely I love it but I can’t be doing all that.

Do you have any pet peeves? - I don’t like being told off or put on the spot + plus I really hate attention seekers and narcissists too and I think also like for some reason someone watching something with me pisses me off for no reason especially if they lean over to watch my phone when it’s really no problem 😭

What was your dream job as a child? - I wanted to be an author + illustrator too so bad but also I wanted to become a pediatrician because my parents tried to force me as that too

If you could have dinner with anyone, who's one person you'd go with? - for some reason chlöe Bailey no questions asked, SHE’S FUNNY OMG or maybe like you know one of my moots 💕

Do you have a favorite childhood memory? - I sadly for some reason don’t remember my childhood that much (I think it’s best that way) but I remember watching the Wonder Woman movie as a child and like BECOMING THE BIGGEST fan girl of dc comics and also like omg I loved it so much too and maybe also like hyperfixating on themyscira as a child and trying to find out about amazons and themyscira

What's your love language? - okay so like when I give I love to give like words of affirmation and when like I receive I LOVEEE gifts like generally I love gifts so muchhh

What are two things still on your bucket list? - I think sky diving, I had the chance once in LA but I couldn’t literally because of my like fear of heights too!

What’s your biggest fear - um definitely like spiders or like secretly being hated too but also I have. DEADLY fear of spiders I feel like I can’t breath looking at them I just hate them so muchh

Do you currently live in the same place where you were born? - nope!

[rockybloo]

Getting people interested in your OCs takes a LOT of time. So creating OCs for the sole purpose of getting people interested in them is def draining af and I get why people get frustrated and sometimes just give up completely.

I have been drawing original characters since I could hold a pencil because I love making my own beings I can just do whatever I want with. And I've been posting my OCs since the early 2010s (I had been drawing original characters earlier but it wasn't until I got into middle school that I began posting my art online).

The biggest reason I've been going so long just drawing them, with only sprinkles of fan art in between ever blue moon, is because I genuinely enjoy my characters. I've had an active imagination since forever so I enjoyed imagining them in scenarios and sometimes drawing said things.

I would say, with my full chest, that I didn't really reach any flavor of "popularity" until 2022 which is when I came up with Glitter and Guilt. And I am fairly certain that is where a GOOD chunk of people came from since...I mean who can resist magical girls?

I had been drawing my number 1 favorite baby, Beanstalked, since highschool but, unfortunately, I spent most of that time posting it on a sperate blog from this one and only am I recently sharing art for it here.

I think the only other big source of other people discovering me is from my Red Beans art (Jack x Nana) because prior to 2022, that was like...85% of my art I would make. And while that was on a separate blog as well, I'd at least sometimes reblog it to over here.

Bondwidth also helped a wee bit with getting a couple people interested in me since before Glitter and Guilt showed up, Bondwidth became an active thing I'd post on this blog that kept it alive since, like I said, I had a separate blog for Beanstalked and Red Beans so there was a time long ago where this blog was basically crickets.

I WAS LUCKY TO GET ONE ASK A MONTH TBH

So 2022 was def when I got put on a wider radar thanks to Sweetheart and Bitterbat.

SO YEAH--Getting people to be interested in you OCs is def a time consuming process which is why I say to just keep having fun and blabbering about your characters because in the end, that's the only thing that matters. That you enjoy them.

I couldn't predict when people would flood me because I had been blabbering about my characters for practically 2 decades and I had been a relatively small artist working on a small lil webcomic that I eventually had to reboot because I had a better vision of it.

And then one day I just happened to have designed some OCs people REALLY liked and here we are.

I do get curious about how things would play out if I never made Glitter and Guilt and just kept trucking along with Beanstalked. I would have probably made it to where I am now, given like....an additional 10 years maybe? I dunno how to gauge fairy tale interest--I AM BIASED THO SINCE I LOVE THEM (I get so happy watching walk throughs of little story book forests and Eftling y'all have no idea).

But now I am getting off topic

THE POINT IS

LOVE YOUR OCS AND KEEP DRAWING/WRITING/TALKING ABOUT THEM AND PEOPLE WILL NATURALLY ARRIVE

[thesehandsfic]

Hi! You do not have to answer this question if you don't want to, but I was curious why you chose to portray Niall as an abuser in Tenebroso. There is no CSA in canon, so I wonder how you came to that? No pressure to reply :)

hi sure complicated question but definitely worth answering.

it's my opinion there is actually subtext in canon to support this (this being: ronan as a victim of csa). other people have talked about this, i know i'm not the first to think this and i won't be the last. i don't remember specifically which authors/bloggers have discussed it, but it's an interpretation of canon that i've definitely seen before.

when i first read the books as they were released, that's what i thought ronan's Deal was going to be; like i remember genuinely thinking that's where the author was going with it, and i turned out to be wrong, but the subtext is there.

this portrayal isn't based on things we know about niall (since we don't really know that much about niall tbh), but instead, it's based on things we know about ronan. some examples:

- something bad happens to ronan at night that he's not allowed to talk about

- ronan's father refuses to explain or educate him regarding what is happening to him at night

- he is isolated from the outside world by virtue of his "secret" and by nature of his upbringing

- he has fraught relationships with his siblings, particularly the older sibling, who "knew" about "the secret" and was not as understanding/helpful as ronan might have liked/needed regarding "the secret"

- he's weirdly attached to his father and holds him in strangely reverent regard

- he's an alcoholic, has a tendency to self-harm, he acts out for attention, is depressed, misanthropic, and "othered" from his peers

- nightmares/sleep related trauma/sleep paralysis/kills himself in his dreams/monsters appear to him in his dreams and hurt him

- he has a pretty notable reaction to adam's choice of material for the greenmantle plot; csa is the absolute worst thing adam could think to pin on this guy, and ronan is (in my opinion) triggered by it

- he hates himself/sees himself as "wrong" or "alien"

- he is destructive towards his personal property and is triggered when he returns to his childhood home/is reminded of specific things that took place in his house

- he has a deep seated compulsion/desire to please/conform/succeed

- unable to attach/bond in a healthy/regulated manner

- strange relationship with his brother, particularly interesting is that he often refers to them as a married set of parents; he refers to himself as "daddy" and himself and his brother as "mommy and daddy"

- he has a problem with authority, specifically with male figures of authority, especially those who try to "parent" or "teach" him

all of these things are not necessarily ironclad, but i spent a lot of time discussing this with @neurosses at the time of writing, trying to decide if this was a path i wanted to take or an interpretation of ronan & niall that i felt was correct, so possibly she will have something to add since this is a topic we discussed/hashed out/worked to ground in canon.

i have said before that it's my belief if you are taking away ronan's magic, you have to give him something else; there must be a wound of some sort. this doesn't HAVE to be child abuse, but if you remove the aspect of magic from the things i listed above, you have a pretty solid foundation for an alternative interpretation of his canonical trauma.

specifically regarding tenebroso, i chose not to give declan that shared experience, but there is some basis for it regarding declan as well:

- niall turned him into his "work wife" when his own wife left/his dream wife wasn't designed to be smart/useful/a true equal

- he is parentified, almost by force (assigned guardian in the will)

- strained relationship with his siblings, particularly the one that still genuinely loves their father/doesn't see father's faults

- bears resentment towards younger sibling that he perceives was "preferred" or the favorite based on the attention paid to him by their father

i don't expect everyone to agree with me and i don't expect this interpretation to become widely accepted, but i do believe there is basis for it in canon (the entire lynch clan has serious Gothic Family vibes but that's a whole 'nother essay), and i really am not sure i have anything else to say about it; it is easier for me to explore these things in fiction/character study than it is for me to sit and expound upon it through meta. so i hope this is a satisfactory answer for you!

[cyn-if]

Wow when I read it for the first time I shuddered. From the first scene I could already imagine how it's painful. Wow. My poor poor MC 😭 nah, no ROs can have them. This poor little meowmeow did nothing wrong. Nuhuh. Never-ever. Gonna kill everyone that participated into shackling them or stayed aside and didn't help (looking at you, best friend) 🥰

*ok maybe I'll reconsider it about no-romance route... but MC gonna be super feral >:0

But fr your description of what torturous life (existence even, not a life tbh) MC had led is soo detailed. My jaw hurt while l read about all spikes and things.

Hmm if it's okay could you give us ROs reaction at MC that flinches every time they try to pat/hug/or just move their hand towards MC (maybe to hold MCs hand or just touch them). In the crushing stage 👀

I'm glad you found the writing compelling. I really was anxious about the tone/description of more darker themes because I find that I write a little too sarcastically sometimes. But I'm glad the darker themes are shining through that.

As for the reactions of the ROs at a flinch on first touch: (I've actually got a pretty good scene in mind for a really similar situation coming up in the book, so look forward to that as well as my little explanations!)

Everix would get so concerned about the MC's flinching. They'd instantly accept that the MC might need a lot more time to be comfortable with touch then a normal person, and do their best to respect that. In that moment, they'd probably (somewhat alarmingly) politely apologize and try to comfort the MC with words instead. Everix would, depending on how private the location the first time this occurs, try to play a little therapy with the MC, seeing if there is anything they could do to help the MC feel more at ease.

Hayes would be a little confused, being someone who enjoys touch greatly. The moment would probably linger a little awkwardly, with Hayes thinking over what happened before brushing it off. They wouldn't try to comfort the MC, but would apologize and drop the topic. Restraining themselves from trying to touch the MC, unless the MC initiates or asks. And probably failing at that as well, eventually they'd (in private) want to talk about what they can do to help the MC.

Sam would get irrationally angry, in their head at least. The MC and Sam had been very close (even in a platonic relationship) during their childhood and so seeing the MC flinch at their touch would piss Sam off, most likely being pissed at themself mainly. Sam would apologize, not try and pry or address the topic. But they'd then relentlessly "guard" the MC, if anyone tried to touch them Sam would warn them off. Not (just) because of possessiveness, but to protect them.

Quinn would try to gracefully pivot the situation to give the MC an out, if they didn't want to talk about it. However, if the MC is willing to talk about the topic, Quinn would be obviously curious about why the MC flinches, and would want to try to work with the MC to overcome their tocuhaverseness or at least address it. Depending on just how much Quinn likes the MC, she may even try to think of potential remedies for anxiety (think alchemical solutions to calm the MC down). She would tell the MC about her thoughts, very much trying to "solve" a problem.

Maverick is a unique case, because unless absolutely needed, at the crushing stage of a relationship, he would never dare touch the MC. In his case, I seem him observing someone else try to touch the Mc and noticing the flinch. He'd do his best in the moment to tell that person off, not angrily or violently mind you, but he would be there. Afterwards, depending on if the MC talks to him like friends would and not like a sovereign to a subject, he'd bring up the incident and try to better understand the MC.

[olderthannetfic]

I recently came across an anti ao3 blog and the pinned post was an essay about how being exposed to sexual content as a teenager gave them ptsd and an older user “groomed” them. And like the screenshots they showed were maybe a little inappropriate but not anything near grooming.

They also claimed they were traumatized by a thorki fic that they claimed had a graphic rape scene so of course I looked it up and it was like mildly kinky with the characters giving full consent. The fic was tagged with the ship and rated E.

Like, it’s not possible to be traumatized by a fic. I’ve read books and seen movies I thought were disturbing or emotionally difficult that lingered in my mind. I’ve read books that gave me nightmares (my meds make me more susceptible to vivid dreams). None of that is trauma. When I was 14 I came across the story Guts by chuck palahnuik bc someone in the redwall forum I was on posted it and this was before tws or cws were prevalent. And guess what I lived lmao

Genuinely if you can’t handle your emotions about fic you either shouldn’t read it or get mommy or daddy to preview it for you

--

TBH, I have no idea what all can cause lingering trauma. Brains are weird.

But I too have seen such blogs including probably that exact one, and it's tragic how much they don't get what actually happened to them. Typically (and definitely for that one if I'm thinking of the same one), they were a dumb 14-year-old who wanted attention, and they kept doing more and more things that made them uncomfortable, like writing more sexual fic than they wanted to or staying in conversations about dark or sexual topics or consuming some media because someone dared them to.

If they'd had a decent adult around to talk to, maybe they'd have learned the ability to say "no" or maybe they wouldn't have been so desperate for attention and validation from randos or maybe they could at least have processed the experience in a useful way. But they didn't.