#i feel like such an amorphous blob sometimes

[lykoian]

undefined

“it’s so easy--” dies

[laciere]

Bo Ruberg: We Know The Devil is, as you say, about women who love other women, yet you've written online about being "against representation" in video games. What does that mean and how do you reconcile those approaches? Aevee Bee: That article was a little manifesto. When I say that I'm "against representation," I mean that representation can't just be a list of identity categories. It's not really representation unless you're creating complexity; without complexity, characters feel insincere and incomplete. The dumbed-down version of a queer person, or the queer person that never expresses their sexuality--these characters don't actually require you to empathize with queer people, because these characters have no sexuality. When you erase that, you erase their anchor, their passion, their frustrations, or their flaws even, especially their flaws. You're not doing empathy work if you're not engaging with these things, because these are the stumbling blocks for empathy. Sometimes people are like, "I like gay people who don't act gay." You know? Those are the people you're catering to when you make those sorts of characters. Identity is so important to talk about, yet it can be so limiting. I've been having a lot of discussions with queer activists and queer scholars about this desire to all call ourselves "queer," like we're this amorphous blob. That can actually be incredibly unhelpful because it doesn't acknowledge the very real differences that often exist between queer people. Our experiences are specific to our lives. Focusing only on identity, especially identity without experience, reduces everyone to an abstraction. Ruberg: Given how much you value the specifics of individual queer experience, how would you describe the complexities, as you call them, of your own queer identity? Bee: Being a woman is really important to me. Transness is also really important to me. In terms of sexuality, I tend to talk about how sexuality is practiced and understood rather than talking about specific attractions. What's the point of trying to say, "Oh, I have this very specific sexual identity" when sexuality is really hard to separate from gender identity and expression? Sexuality is more complicated than we often give it credit for. For example, I'm less interested in saying "I identify as bisexual," than I am in thinking about the ways that I love women and the ways that I love men and how those are unfortunately incredibly different because of all these social pressures, my own histories, and my internalized baggage. How do we navigate that together with another person? What does a relationship with someone like me look like? it's one thing to be like, "We have this list of labels," but we have so few models for what those labels are supposed to look like.

"Aevee Bee: On Designing for Queer Players and Remaking Autobiographical Truth", in The Queer Games Avant-Garde: How LGBTQ Game Makers are Reimagining The Medium of Video Games (2020, Duke University Press)

[gasolinerainbowpuddles]

Jizz Fingers║ ⓞⓝⓔⓢⓗⓞⓣⓢ

|| ꂵꍏꀤꈤ ꂵꍏꌗ꓄ꍟꋪ꒒ꀤꌗ꓄ || | PAIRING(s): alien!Joel x reader

| RATING: explicit material | 18+ | WORD COUNT: 3.2k | CONTENT: This is a crackfic. Joel is not Joel. He’s an alien that can shapeshift and isn’t into the splorgimums on their own planet. He wants to nut in you with his creampie fingers. It’s not supposed to make sense. It’s not supposed to be anything but fun and sexy and silly. It’s meta. It’s tongue-in-cheek. It’s self-indulgent. If you’re not into that kinda thing then idk what to tell ya, bud. 

| SYNOPSIS: u get creampied by a dick finger alien Joel Miller.

The sonorous silver ship glided above you before descending gently into a large clearing in the field ahead. Bright light flooded your vision as a hidden door pushed away from the spacecraft and revealed an occupant.

It appeared to have an amorphous, fluid corporeal form, but no matter the shape it always remained an off-white greenish gray color. Six large onyx orbs were situated near the top of the form. You assumed they must be eyes or some other sort of organ. When the greenish grey flaps snapped together and apart a few times in quick succession, you realized they were in fact lidded eyes.

A warbled voice sounded inside your mind. “Do not be afraid. I come in peace, and I stand before you with no intention of harming you.”

You realize the creature is speaking to you through your own mind.

You should be afraid, but instead you’re just fascinated and exhilarated. You aren’t sure why they’d say the same thing twice, though, just in a slightly different way. You also aren’t sure if you should respond in your head, out loud, or at all.

“That’s kinda a weird thing to say. Like, you said it twice,” you point out, speaking loudly and clearly enough that the creature can hear you.

At least, you think they can hear you. You don’t see any ears. Then again, they possess the capability of telepathic speech, and there must be some equivalent to hearing for that. You try to think what that is called or what that might be called when the creature shifts back and forth but still doesn’t approach.

“Those were two separate statements,” the voice in your mind contends firmly.

“Huh?” you ask. You’re sure you sound dumb, but you were never really going to be a match for a higher level intelligent being anyways.

“When I bust, it is peaceful for every being involved. I also greet you with good intentions,” the voice patiently clarifies.

Suddenly you are standing no more than arm’s length away from the being. “I saved your achilles the trouble,” the voice in your mind said, as if it was some huge favor.

“My achilles is fine,” you grumble awkwardly. “I know I should hit leg day more, but sometimes it’s just so–”

“Our sex organs are complimentary,” the voice interrupts. “We could perform the Divine Dance, if you’d like.”

You wanted to ask why they had to come all the way to Earth just to get laid, but you think better of it.

“The splorgimums on my planet just don’t get me,” the voice explains. You realize you said your thought aloud.

“Oh. Uh, okay. S-Sorry about that. I, uh, didn’t mean to offen–”

The creature waves a gelatinous blob arm dismissively. “No offense taken. You’re not like other splorgimums. I can tell. You’re different,” it assures you.

You feel a blush creep onto your cheeks. “Oh. Well, uh–” an awkward giggle “—thank you. But I’m not really that special, here on Earth I mean. There are other women who are wayyyyyy more attractive. Oh! I know! You should try driving by Doja Cat’s house because oh my god she is so. fucking. fine. Like, if I had her in that I’m A Cow Bitch Moo costume for 5 minutes I’d—”

“No. No Doja Kitties. Only you.”

You shrug and accept their obsession with you.

“Okay. So now what? I don’t know where your Divine Dance hole is, and your floating blobs are sort of freaking me out,” you admit.

You keep tabs on the hovering goops that orbit the creature. They remind you of the time you tried to make Key Lime Jello Shots for your uncle’s cousin’s dog’s recital but added too much vodka.

“I can take the form of something pleasing to you. An earth male, perhaps? The female of your species is more difficult to capture as they are far superior.”

“So fuckin’ true,” you agree. “But, hhmmmm, a male specimen? I mean, I hate all men, but Pedro Pascal seems pretty decent. Maybe you could turn into Joel Miller? You know, from The Last of Us?”

The creature nods — you think it’s a nod — and transforms into Joel. Game Joel.

“Oh, uh, look, Pixel Daddy is fine as hell, especially in part 2, but I meant the HBO adaptation of the game. Please,” you correct.

“How’s this?” Pedro’s version of Joel’s voice asks aloud.

Your pussy bottoms out. “Oh, fuck yeah.”

You disrobe completely as you enter the spacecraft.

“I set it to 72º Fahrenheit. Is that a suitable climate for your meat suit?” Joel asks.

“Yeah, that’s perfect. Mr. Alien, could you, like, put more of the twang into his voice? And use words like he does?  Like, how he sounds on the show? You know what, let’s watch a few clips to get it right.”

You pull up your account on your phone, but it takes you a minute to find it because you forgot they changed it from HBO Max Go to just Max. “So fuckin’ stupid. Purple is a better color than blue anyway,” you mumble to yourself as you pull up an episode.

The galactic creature uses some magical time skip thing to binge the entire series and gets a yucky smudge of goop on your phone screen when it attempts to find season 2.

“There’s just one season? Please tell me there’s another one,” Joel implores.

“Yeah, there’s a second season, but it’s not out yet,” you inform him.

“Damn. But you said there’s two games already? So what happens in the second game?” he asks.

“You know what, we super don’t need to get into that right now. Let’s see what you’re working with,” you quickly change the subject and grab at his crotch.

He grunts in approval. “Needy lil thing, aren’t’cha? You want my cock, baby?”

Your eyes narrow suspiciously. “Did you use a time jump thing to read a whole bunch of Joel Miller smutfic on Tumblr?”

Joel blushes and scratches the back of his neck. “Eh, mighta read a few.”

“Oh my god, you’re gonna be super nasty and dominant, aren’t you?” you sigh.

“Only if that’s what you want, baby. I’m a consent king,” he assures you.

“Well, alright then. I want you to rawdog me and slap my ass, okay?”

He smirks and pulls you close. “I’ll give ya what I give ya, and you just gotta take it,” he grunts into your neck as he nibbles and sucks downward.

You gasp at the sensation and grind your hips into him. “Oh fuck, Joel,” you whine. “I want you to wreck me, please!”

“Gonna fill that cunt up,” he says gruffly as he gropes your ass and breasts.

“Yes, Daddy, please!” you beg.

He pauses for a moment and looks confused.

“Oh, uh, you must not have got to those kind of fics–” you cough awkwardly “–uh, anyway. Sorry. Joel. Yes, Joel, please.”

“I can sense the vibrations of your inner sex organ when you call me that. If it is sexually gratifying to you, I wholly welcome the use of it,” the original voice says inside your mind.

“Oh wow. I love that you’re not kink shaming me. Glad you didn’t make it to that side of Tumblr,” you huff in a laugh.

Joel suddenly pins you against the wall and presses his hard, clothed cock against your bare skin. Even through the denim you can tell he’s huge. Apparently all those fic writers were right all along.

“Who’s gonna fill up that pretty cunt uh’yours, huh?” he demands as he grabs the back of your neck for leverage.

“Y-You, Daddy,” you say in an aroused tremble.

“That’s fuckin’ right. When my fat cock is inside you, I better hear you singin’ some thank you’s to Daddy for fillin’ you up so good,” he warns.

“Yes, Daddy, I’ll be your good girl,” you promise. 

He flips you around without warning and pushes your chest flush against the wall. 

“Even good girls need to be reminded every once in a while what happens if they don’t listen to Daddy,” he says in a low gruff.

His clothes have magically disappeared with the help of his alien outerspace boi powers. You feel him firm against your backside before a harsh slap of his palm replaces it. You jump and yelp in pain at the surprise spanking.

“Mmmm, pretendin’ you don’t want it, but I feel you pushin’ your ass back for more,” he taunts. 

You whine because he’s right. You can only imagine the derisive comments he’d make if he felt how wet you are. 

He lands another three harsh swats on the same patch of skin. Tears prickle up in your eyes. “D-Daddy,” you moan. 

“You gonna thank Daddy for keepin’ you in line, baby?” Another swat. It stings so much you know there must be an imprint of his hand clearly outlined by your welting red flesh.

“Thank you, Daddy!” you choke out. “Th-Thank you for k-keeping me your good girl and not letting me b-be bad, Daddy. I only wanna be good for you, Daddy!” you wail.

“That’s what I like’tuh hear, baby,” he grunts into your ear. “Ask Daddy to make you into his own little cocksleeve. Ask Daddy to give you this big, fat cock.”

You whimper as he slips his length between your folds and rubs back and forth in teasing passes. 

“Daddy, I want you to use my pussy. I need it so bad. Please. I just wanna be your cocksleeve. Use my holes, Daddy,” you whimper.

You barely finish your sentence when he flips you around again and lines himself up with your entrance. Apparently the alien creature was just as into this as you are because their altered form reverted back to the amorphous gray green blob. You’re way too horny to be picky about it right now, so you squeeze your eyes shut. You forgot to charge your vibrator, anyway.

Their penis was more like fingers that kinda moved around randomly. You don’t know. You’re not an astrophysicist or whoever it is that would best be knowledgeable about alien wieners.   

Its spongy gray appendage felt firm and slimy as it entered you. There was some sort of phantom connection to your mouth and throat as well, the sensation of its finger-penis dragging back and forth, able to be felt in both your pussy and your mouth. It was weird, but you knew if it was Joel Miller doing it then it would somehow become totally fine and very hot. 

“You’re getting too lost in the sauce,” you whine. “You’re in your true form again. Change back.”

“Mmmmm, sorry, baby,” came the familiar gravelly voice once more.

When you felt brave enough to open your eyes again, you saw those familiar Wreck-It-Ralph sausage fingers and sighed in relief. The alien had changed back to your preferred form of Joel Miller as portrayed  by José Pedro Balmaceda Pascal.

As much as you wanted to stare at his face, you also wanted him to dick you down through the floorboards of the ship. You wiggle to sink down onto your hands and knees. “Wanna be wide open for you, Daddy,” you pout.

He makes an approving growling noise and scrambles behind you, shoving you downward between your shoulder blades until your face is smushed into the floor. He makes no effort to warn you before slamming his entire length into you. The impact of his wide tip against your cervix is so forceful it punches the air out of your lungs. You let out a panicked, strangled moan, suddenly unsure if you were going to be able to take this dick like a champ.

Joel grabs your hips for leverage and starts pistoning rough, deep strokes into your drenched pussy. “Gaahh–Goddamn! Fuckin’ chokin’ it, honey,” he rasps in a labored voice. “Feel so fuckin’ tight for me.”

“It’s s-so big, Daddy. I dunno if I can take it,” you cry.

“You can take it. You can take it for Daddy. Be a good girl or m'gonna hafta punish you,” he cautions. As a reminder of what that might entail, he strikes your backside so hard your entire body jerks as you let out a sob.

A high pitched moan gathers in Joel’s throat as you start to accommodate his size. “Yeah, fuckin’ like that, huh? Like when Daddy spanks you? Makes ya listen?”

“You’re so good to me, Daddy!” you sob. Your arousal is practically dripping down your thighs. You listen to the hum of the engines mixing with the sounds of your drooling cunt being fed Joel’s massive cock over and over again. He grabs your wrists and pulls you upward, using your limbs like reins on a horse. You have no control over the depth of penetration in these positions, and Joel is opting for nothing less than utterly devastating your pussy.

“M’gonna give you these fingers, too, baby. Know you can take it,” he pants.

He releases your arms and lets you scramble to catch yourself before faceplanting.

“Hey! You could’ve at least–”

“Shut your fuckin’ mouth and take what Daddy gives you,” he snarls.

You whine and clench around him. You feel a boogery churro type object prodding at your asshole. You turn your head quickly enough to see the creature has let Joel’s arm halfway revert back into the wiggly blobby thing.

“Did I say you could turn around?” he barks. He spanks you again with his 100% Joel hand, hard enough that you know there are pinpricks of blood beginning to seep through.

“I’m sorry, Daddy!” you scream.

You feel him now inside both holes. It’s overwhelming and amazing. The phantom throat thing is back again, and you like how you gag even with an “empty” mouth.

“Got enough for every hole you got and then some, sweetheart,” he practically slurs. He sounds completely wrecked.

You feel your lower belly heating up and quickly tightening.

“Oh my fucking god, Joel. I’m getting so close,” you gasp.

“THAT AIN’T MY FUCKIN’ NAME WHEN I’M STUFFIN’ YOU WITH MY COCK, SWEETHEART,” he grits out as he wraps his hand around the front of your throat and squeezes.

When your breaths quickly become hard to take, you know you’re going to come soon.

“I want your space juice inside me, Daddy!” you cry out, not caring if you’re breaking the illusion. You still needed to be clear and consensual in your approach to this intimate exchange, and you needed to address the weird topic of whether or not your birth control could do effective hand to hand combat with spaceboi cum. 

“Our sexual organs are compatible, but our reproductive hormones and liquids are not,” the voice explained in your mind.

The Jim Carrey baby grinch was kinda cute, but you still felt better knowing you weren’t going to birth a little green gremlin alien baby. (Although you did think Victor or Clementine would be nice names.)

“Put a baby in me, Daddy! Fuck your baby into me!” you beg now that you know you can’t actually get pregnant. 

“Uh, I mean, there’s just so much pregnancy fic out there,” Joel hedges carefully, still maintaining his merciless thrusts. “You don’t really wanna make this into a whole thing do you? Ya know, with the pregnancy storyline and stuff? Some users have actually said they prefer—”

“No, Joel, I’m not actually—” you interrupt in a huff “—I’m just saying it to be sexy. It sounds sexy. Besides, there’s some fic writers who basically only write creampies but none of their characters ever seem to get pregnant. It’s kinda wild. There’s a fic writer I can think  of right now, actually. She loves creampies so much.”

“So she’s just really into pussy gettin’ drenched but nobody’s gotta deal with babies? Sounds like a pretty sweet deal if ya ask me,” he approves.

“Yeah, I think the only pregnancy fic she has is, like, this really nasty oneshot where the reader is already pregnant and she gets double teamed by Tommy and you at the same time. Oh and she lactates. I wasn’t into it at first, but it was kinda hot. Maybe you’ve read it? The author calls herself Puddles?”

“Oh, her? That Gasoline Rainbow lady? I thought she just made memes?” He sounds surprised and impressed. He’s hitting your cervix repeatedly with such force that you feel like your vagina is going to look like somebody dropped a tray of lasagna on a pubic hair linoleum floor.

“No, she actually has, like, legit fic on there, too. She’s, like, really talented. I can’t believe she doesn’t have more followers,” you laugh incredulously. 

You’re glad he doesn’t ask how you would know how many followers she has since that isn’t publicly available information. You hate it when plot holes have to be smoothed out nicely and still fit in with the story. It’s so boring and way too much work sometimes.

“Maybe stuff like alien jizz fingers is a little too much for people to–”

“Okay, this is getting too meta. Let’s just get back to you fucking me so rough I can’t walk right for an entire week, okay?”

“Hnngg, fuck yeah. Daddy’s gonna wreck this cunt,” he hisses as his thrusts pick up pace.

“DADDY, I’M GONNA COME,” you cry as you start clenching and seizing around the massive circumference of his cock.

Joel lets out a guttural, choked moan as he empties inside you. You can feel it from his weird creampie fingertips, too — even the invisible one in your mouth and throat. You’re trembling, trying to keep yourself upright as Joel fucks into you through his orgasm. You lick your lips. There’s a flavor there. Is that….?

“You like Daddy’s brisket cum, sweetheart?” he grunts as his thrusts slow to a sloppy grind.

“I thought I tasted barbecue,” you muse. It was bewildering, but mostly satisfying.

“Yeah, tastes just like those Fourth of July backyard get-togethers you love in that Texas heat,” he breathes. "You runnin' around in barely anything, makin' me hafta adjust myself so your dad don't catch his best friend ogling his precious daughter."

“I’m starting to think you read more fic than you admitted to earlier,” you assert.

“I like it, darlin’,” he shrugs.

“Are you gonna follow Puddles now? Oh! Can you do a mind link thing with her and see what she’s working on next?” you implore.

Joel appears to zone out for a minute, and you take the opportunity to stare at his naked body. He looked perfect. His eyes focused again as he looked at you.

“Her waveforms are erratic and very concerning, but once I subdued a Brain Goblin inside her mind I was able to discern she is likely to be releasing some Ezra from Prospect centered fictional stories,” the voice inside your head revealed. "They are very sexually aggressive."

“Nice,” you say under your breath.

“So you gonna let me have that sweet pussy again, sweetheart?” Joel drawls.

“Yes. But I’m going to need you to familiarize yourself with Pedro’s extensive works. I’m thinking we could do some really great Mando roleplay in this spaceship,” you say with a big smile as you gesture around.

Joel smirks at you. “Don’t matter what form I take. You’re still gonna be callin’ me Daddy.”

“Yes, Daddy,” you agree with a big grin.

I hope those splorgimums understand what they lost bc that's our man now! Special thanks to Multiversed Daydreamer (Fuzz) for inspiring part of the title and @xdaddysprincessxx for the shared derangement over That Old Man™.

Undying thanks to @psychedelic-ink and @bonezone44 for writing some of my fave ~aLtErNaTiVe KiNk CoNtEnT~ and inspiring me to let my brain run wild with this crackfic.

Art in graphic includes transformed works of the Mucinex booger man.

catch ya later, ♥Puddles♥

P.S. - I counted how many times "Daddy" appears in this, and it's 29.

tagging: @wannab-urs, @gracieispunk, @milla-frenchy, @patti7dc. @lumoverheaven, @not-a-unique-snowflake-blog, @toxicanonymity, @rubyfruitjungle, @huffle-punk, @jupiter-soups, @swiftispunk, @theywhowriteandknowthings

[littleguyconnor]

May I request something with Ted? It may be a bit too specific, so feel free to ignore this if it is!

I did read your fic, and man I would love to see Ted actually finding a partner after everything AM put him through. Even as a giant slug thing, with all but the tiniest shreds of his former self stripped away, someone still loves him, tries their best to understand and find a way to communicate with him, and still sees him as a person.

(I love for hurt/comfort lol, and DAMN does Ted need some comfort)

Absolutely, not too specific at all!! In fact I really loved this idea hehe

It took time, at first. Things always did. 

For Ted time was the only thing he had for the majority of his life, or rather, his existence. The state he was in now, well, that could hardly be considered a life. Being this amorphous blob was AM’s way of giving him an ultimate punishment, making him experience even a fraction of the misery the computer dealt with for its entire existent non-existence. He’d been happy about that for a time. About making it angry enough to reduce him to this state. But now… there wasn’t much of anything left for him to feel. 

Ted felt tired, but he’d been like that for so long it’d turned into a default way of being for him, not an emotion anymore. 

Sometimes, if he was lucky, he’d grow tired physically. Moving took a lot of energy. Energy he didn’t have, at that. 

Recently, though, something had changed. 

You. 

After its tantrum AM realized its mistake, destroying the only creatures it had for company on the entire planet, and grew panicked. Ted was essentially just a thing it threw around sometimes, but it wasn’t fun anymore because he couldn’t respond to the abuse. So AM created life.

Using leftover DNA from the survivors, the computer artificially grew you, in a sense, speeding up the aging process until you were an adult because it couldn’t deal with a child. It’d have likely killed you, although unintentional this time. 

And like the garden of Eden, AM set you down in the world it had crafted and watched with renewed interest as you lived. 

Ted knew of your existence, because the computer had bragged about its abilities and about creating you all by itself, but he avoided you purposely. He didn’t like you because he wouldn’t let himself. Things like getting attached and relearning love were concepts he couldn’t afford to have, now more than ever. AM would let him get a taste of kindness and friendship, enough to make him used to it, and then rip it all away again. Ted couldn’t bear it. He knew he wouldn’t. 

But god, you just kept coming back. 

He couldn’t help it. He became utterly and hopelessly attached to you. 

You were just so wonderful to him. So kind and understanding, so warm. You’d talk to him like he was still a human being, even ripping off one of the computer monitors from AM’s complex and making it into something he could communicate with. Even when it took him minutes to write only a few sentences, you were so patient with him. And you’d listen. You’d listen to every single thing he had to say, for hours, because god did he have a lot to talk about. 

He’d never realized the value of communication until that point, of being able to express your thoughts. The feeling had been… indescribable. Euphoric, maybe, but even then he didn’t feel anything could accurately describe what he felt upon being able to just say hi. He found it almost funny, in a way. Before this, before AM, never, never had he been a talkative person. The fewer words he said the more likely his lies and charms would be believed. But now he couldn’t shut up. He had something to say about everything, even things as stupid and mundane as a slight change in temperature because it just felt so good to express it. Suddenly everything he said had meaning to it. Every word had value. Every sentence. He hated computers but god did he love keyboards. That was his outlet. His freedom. His ability to live again. 

And you had given it to him. 

You had given him everything. 

But most importantly, you gave him love. 

On especially bad days you’d hold and comfort him, telling him that everything would be okay, that he wasn’t alone anymore, that he was safe now. He believed everything you said because, to him, you were an angel. You loved him, and he knew because you had told him. You’d made it a point to tell him every day at least once, and soon, feeling loved became natural again. Right. 

But you expressed your love physically, too, and he found your touch addicting. The first time you pet him he nearly lost his mind completely. Ted had leaned into your touch so hard he’d knocked you to the ground, and after ensuring you were alright, proceeded to crawl on top of your chest and didn’t move for hours. The idea of kind touch had become so foreign he’d almost forgotten it was possible at all. 

Oh, but you. You hadn’t. 

He was sure the earth was only around still to inhabit you. Nothing else mattered. His angel was the only good thing left in the entire universe. In this galaxy, and any other. Nothing would ever compare to your kindness. And so, for once, time was useful again. Meant something again. 

Because he got to spend his forever time, with you. 

[miguelinileugim]

Sometimes I feel like I don't have that much of a personality but rather am an amorphous blob that mimics whatever I feel people want out of m-Senshi with a sailor outfit using Chilchuck as an improvised surfboard (yaoi).

[wannab-urs]

The Spreadsheet Digest - Vol 22

Good lord y'all I am never doing a 2 week edition of the Spreadsheet ever again this is actually insane. Like this is the longest post I have ever made. There's like 35 fics on here :)

Anyway as always you can find the spreadsheet here and the masterlist of my recs (that is currently unupdated lol oops) here.

Recs below the Pedro!

Joel

Mothman Fever a one shot by @beskarandblasters

You meet a really hot guy at the Mothman Festival and almost hook up with him, then you meet him again at the Mothman Stakeout except this time he's not just Joel... he's MOTHMAN!!! This fic is so good. It's funny and hot and amazing. Lil element of sex pollen in there and ya know, my favorite, monsterfucking. Also the shirts reader wears had me hollerin'.

Deliver Me From Nowhere a series by @atinylittlepain

Joel got his sheep ranch in a sleepy Colorado town and decided to slow his life down finally. Delores comes speeding into it, literally, in desperate need of help. As of right now there's a prologue and chapter one out, but I've got a little insight into the full story, and just trust me. This fic is worth your time. It's soft, gentle, and sweet, but do not forget that Joel Miller is capable of so much violence. And he's a protector, a caretaker. I love the way the town feels like a character and the way Joel can't help but help her, and AGH. This fic, man.

No closer could I be to god a one shot by @proxima-writes

Okay so this is set in Jackson... you're the town preacher's wife and you are hooking up with Joel Miller. This fic is super hot. I fucking love infidelity fics and I love when there's a lil blaspemy and sacrilege in a fic and this is just such a good fucking example of that. And the ending is so good.

Guard Dog a one shot by @romana-after-dark

TW Dub con, but it's Joel not reader. Raider!Joel fucks with the wrong girl. Reader fucks Joel at gun point and like there's a gun blow job in there and he's so submissive and he's also obviously pretty into it? And then he's obviously very into it. This is was so unreasonably hot. Just like... oh my god? Joel on his knees and whimpering and begging to cum? Good dog…

Jizz Fingers a Joel (and others) series by @gasolinerainbowpuddles

This is probably my favorite crackfic ever. A splorgimum (alien boy) from another planet can shape shift into anything you want and has various other special space boi powers that make hooking up with him a really good time. This so funny, like you will probably cackle out loud and have to find a way to explain what you're laughing at, but ummmm it's also pretty hot. And I refuse to be ashamed of wanting to fuck amorphous blob boy turned HBO Joel Miller. I mean have you seen what those Jizz Fingers can do?

Not so tough now, is she a one shot by @walkintotheriveranddisappear

Your cute lil raider group gets taken over by Joel's much scarier one. He needs to show your group that you are no longer in charge, and he chooses to ruin any authority you could possibly have by fucking you in front of them. TW NONCON. This is depraved and hot and terrifying. I loved the different ways the men in the group reacted too, from boldly participating to obvious disgust. Really shines a light on the spectrum of human depravity oof.

Oblivion a one shot by @thesummerpetrichor

Your boyfriend's dad is a sweet older man who you go visit sometimes, bake him things, talk about photography... Your boyfriend cheats on you. So you cheat back and let the guy take pictures. He sends those pictures to your boyfriend's dad... and suddenly sweet old man Mr. Miller is not so sweet anymore. TW Dub con, you totally wanted Joel but this is not how you wanted him. This is really hot and a little scary and just FUCK Yes. This is so fucking good

Pillow Queen a one shot by @beskarandblasters

You watch a porn video while Joel is sleeping beside you. He wakes up while you’re watching it. You tell him you want to try that position and he calls you a pillow queen. You prove him wrong. One thing I love more than almost anything else is proving a man wrong lmao. This is so fucking hot it's unreal. That got rode within an inch of his life lmao

All I did was what I had to do a series by @corazondebeskar-reads

I'm not 100% sure why I read this because if someone pissed even in my general direction in real life I'd literally cut their dick off and feed it to them... anyway that is not how I feel about it in fic apparently. Your raider!Joel's little pet or whatever and a new recruit thinks he can make a pass at you. Joel pisses in your mouth right in front of him and then shoots the fucker in the dick. Then he makes it up to you with some overstimulation :)

truth or dare a one shot by @joelscruff

Mean scary neighbor Joel, fuck yes!!! Your friends dare you to "see how far you can get" with your neighbor Joel during a game of truth or dare. You go over there and end up locked in his garage. There's elements of TW DUBCON here, but also he does give you a brief opportunity to leave. This is brutal. He's rough and a little gross about it and it is so hoooottttttttt!!!! And then there's this bit with a flashlight.... anyway I also would ditch these friends since you literally disappear for god knows how long and they don't even bat an eyelash like???

Something wretched about this a series by @covetyou

This is gonna be a series, but so far I've only seen chapter one,,,, Wherein Joel is a drug dealer and you need pain meds for your dad who is very ill. He can't work so you don't have ration cards, but you need ration cards to buy pain meds so he can work to get ration cards. Viscious cycle. Thankfully, Joel is accepting other methods of payment. The main kink in this one is pussy spanking and is so delicious oh my god. Reader is shocked by how much she likes it, honestly I think Joel is shocked by how much she likes it.

Joel + Veracruz

A Lesson in Blackmailing a one shot by @gasolinerainbowpuddles  

No reader in this one! Just Joel domming comandante Veracruz and Veracruz liking it way more than he probably should. Joel is so fucking mean and Veracruz is a brat but he ends up just being a pathetic mess jacking himself off in an alley and I love every second of this.

Dave

Notes on Tutoring a series by @honestly-shite

Dave is your new music tutor and you are down real bad for him even though he's a major fucking asshole. You end up fucking him and then a lot of shit goes down and literally any other summary I can think of is full of spoilers. But this fic, y'all. Oh my god. The way Dave is characterized is so frustrating and so so good. It's perfect. Every detail that is slowly revealed about him is so perfect. The instrument(s) he plays, the music he likes, his background, where he's from, what went down before you met, all of it, is so perfect. The ending may possibly make you mad? But I liked it. I thought it made perfect sense for these two characters.

The Princess and the Duke a series by @theywhowriteandknowthings

Originally just Murder Daddy Kinktober Day 3 prompt "Daddy please" and then followed up with Kintober Day 4 prompt "Risk of getting caught," this is now a series so I'm reccing it as such. And FUCK it is hot. Dave is very much still Murder Daddy but he's so soft and sweet for reader... I mean he's still a scary and dominate motherfucker, but it's hot and the fucking tenderness and vulnerability he shows with reader has me fucking reeling dude.

Din

Taungsdays, am I right? a one shot by @theywhowriteandknowthings

You and Din get attacked by some sort of horny tentacle monster alien thing and it gives you both the fuck of your life, basically. The horny tentacle monster basically wants to fuck you both but also wants to you and Din to fuck. If you like tentacles and/or sex pollen and a lil m!receiving assplay, this fic is so for you. Also even though you didn't exactly consent to getting railed by a tentacle monster, you and Din love each other and are pretty sexually adventurous so it's a good time for everyone involved lol.

Bleed for me a series by @saradika

Din is the mand'alor and a vampire and you are his chosen one, the one he will keep to feed and fuck and whatever else... but you have a secret reason for even volunteering to be chosen in the first place... I'm obsessed with the world building, with the suspense, with the characterization. I'm in love with this fic UGH. It's so fucking good. Din is so hot and scary and perfect in every way. Reader is such a badass too like... girl that is a terrifying situation you have put yourself in. The plot twist is everything. I love thissss

A Place of Safety a series by The_InvisibleWoman (AO3)

Okay so you're a bounty and Din picks you up and he goes to take you in, actually does take you in, but something is just fucking off about the whole thing. And then there's a lil grogu situation, reclaiming the bounty and all that. He decides to try to find her somewhere safe to live and in the process he falls for you and you fall for him and it is so fucking sweet and beautiful and perfect and I love it so much. There are currently 34 chapters and it's ongoing and I am ravenous for this fic fr.

Whispers in the Dark a series by @kewwrites

TW NONCON!!! This is the darkest Din fic I've ever read. It's fucked up on so many levels, man. Read the warnings and be fucking careful because it's got probably 99% of all the triggers possible. Kew, baby, are you okay? That being said, I loved it. It didn't feel like it was glorifying Din's behavior or justifying it or anything. It was just a beautiful and painful representation of what a broken man is capable of and what it can mean for a person to be wrapped up in that with him. If you can handle it, you should read it. This one will stick with you

Frankie

A Fond Farewell a series by @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin

Angela has written something so beautiful and so painful. It's real, raw, and it fucking hurts. If you're looking for angst this is the fic for you lol. I really loved Frankie in this. I also really really adored Santi's character. This fic is gorgeous. It's one of those things where shit keeps getting in the way of something that should be easy and it makes you want to scream and cry and throw shit. It's also largely based on real events, which just makes it hurt a little more because Ang is my soul mate :')

Slumber a one shot by @write-and-buried

A filthy, lovely, consensual somno fic with a bit of squirting. Frankie is feral and he is so hot in this oh my god. I loved every single second of this fic. Frankie is so in love with you it's adorable and maybe a little gross. Which is just very Frankie. I've read this three times in 2 weeks.

Frankie + Tommy

Group Therapy a one shot by @beskarandblasters

we're pretending therapists don't have a code of ethics because holy shit this is hot. Frankie goes to therapy for his trauma and meets Tommy Miller (who says he looks just like his brother Joel). Frankie and Tommy both have their eyes set on one of the group's therapists. They ask you to go for a drink at the American Legion next door and it's not long at all before you've found a back room and then you fuck them both... Frankie is so soft and adorable through almost the whole thing and then he's fucking you and goes feral and it is so hot dude

Javi P

Drenched a one shot by @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin

Me and Ang had some brainrot about Javi P wherein we discussed the fact that we would let this man do things we have never let any man do before. This resulted in a beautifully wet fic where you get covered in spit and cum. And it is so hot.

Carmen: Darlin' Darlin' a series by @thesummerpetrichor

You're the ambassador's daughter and you get dragged to this weekend get away thing for the DEA and Javier Peña is there. What follows is flirting and teasing and getting fucked in public and it is amazing. I love the reader character so much. Fiesty little mean ass bitch that she is, she's just like me. This whole thing reeks of daddy issues, and again I say, she's just like me. This fic is so hot.

Video Games a one shot by @thesummerpetrichor

Yes, I did in fact read the whole masterlist, don't look at me. DADS BEST FRIEND JAVI P???? I have never read a dbf!javi, I'm pretty sure. This is so angsty and hot and perfect. The way they dance around each other for literal years (yeah I'm pretty sure that's grooming, but I don't think it was intentional... moving on) and then finally they just crash together and it is so hot. The way he talks you through it and he's so tender and soft and perfect fuck. It's like the Javi from those scenes with Helena or Elisa where that asshole exterior is gone and that overwhelming tenderness you know he has in him comes out and just UGH. Perfection.

Off to the races a one shot by @thesummerpetrichor

I told you. The whole masterlist. Anyway. In this one, you're a sociology student doing research at the embassy and you're relegated to the DEA offices where you go about making Javier's life a living hell. Eventually he caves and fucks you over his desk. And then it becomes a whole toxic thing that is just so perfectly Javi and I love it so much and also the smut is ungodly hot.

Murder Daddy Kinktober Day 5: Who Does This Belong To? a one shot by @theywhowriteandknowthings

dude... Javi kissed another girl and you want to remind him who he belongs to so you tie him up, get him all worked up, make him confess his sins, and then untie him and leave the apartment, where he is left to pathetically jack himself off and be ashamed of himself. FUCK this is so hot. I love bratty whimpering pathetic Javi.

Dieter

Candy a one shot by @secretelephanttattoo

Dieter takes you to a closed down carnival and you suck his dick in the house of mirrors and it is delicious. I'd like to go on random adventures with Dieter... *sigh*

Crumbs, sloppy seconds, and backwash a one shot by @chloeangelic

Dieter is not so great at the whole monogamy thing, and you know this. You're actually into this, which means you've gotten yourself into a toxic cycle of encouraging the behavior and then regretting it. I love how desperately they need each other and how much you can tell they care for each other. I really fucking love the ending. I love how it’s a bit toxic, but there’s little hints in there that Dieter is trying to be what she wants. AHHH I can't believe this is her first Dieter. 

Unwind a one shot by @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin

You have a terrible day and you start your period and it's just awful. Dieter takes care of you and it is the sweetest most lovely thing. So fluffy and perfect and wonderful ughhhh I love him so much.

Ghost in the sheets a one shot by @proxima-writes

As a lover of shitty paranormal investigation shows, this was fucking incredible. Dieter is such an annoying little shit in his somehow endearing way and I love him. I loved all the ghosty bits and the flirting and the bickering and AGH. I don't think I'd be down to fuck in a haunted attic irl, but maybe Dieter could convince me lol.

Max Phillips

Lust for a vampire a one shot by @idolatrybarbie

You're a bartender at a vampire themed strip club and after your shift the whole vampire thing gets a little too real. Max is so hot and he fucking turns you and it's so good FUCK. I love the freakiness of the location he takes you to also, really adds to the vibe.

A Real Challenge a one shot by @gasolinerainbowpuddles

Oh my god? Max making you wear a plug to work and then making you push it out and then fucking you in a conference room and then making you fucking leave the office in a very embarrassing way that I won't spoil. I'm panting.

Oberyn AND Max Phillips

a court of fangs and foxgloves a one shot by @psychedelic-ink

Oberyn is the lord of a vampire court and you were turned in order to serve him, but you left, uncomfortable with the bond formed when a vampire lord turns you. You regret this decision and come crawling back and Oberyn makes your life hell about it. He isn't exactly ready to forgive you, but instead of killing you for being an insolent little shit he fucks you and his other little pet Max about it. Well actually he fucks Max and Max fucks you... semantics. This is hot.

Maxwell Lord

Working Overtime a oneshot by @gasolinerainbowpuddles 

Dismantling internalized homophobia one rim job at a time! Maxwell doesn't think he'll like getting his lil ass ate out but oh boy is he wrong. And his jizz covered desk is pretty clear evidence of that.

---------------

I'm not even gonna rec my own fics because this is unreasonably long lmao.

[ididntsignupforthiscrap]

The more I read about ghost cores in DP fics the more mixed feelings I get. I guess it depends on the interpretation.

When a ghost’s core is PHYSICAL, like an organ or something, it seems so stupid. Ghosts turn into shapless amorphous blobs all the time in the show. Sometimes they even become vapor or gas. The way a lot of fics describe it is like a heart you can aim for. So what happens to the core in these cases when they are not solid but not intangible

When the core is treated more like a metaphor or like a psychic landscape I honestly think it works better

[phantomarine]

Hi 💙 Been following Phantomarine since I found it a few months back.

I'm really curious about where Phantomarine "started" for you? You've said it feels like your magnum opus story, and from some of the comments you've left under the pages if sounds like you have a lot of it planned well ahead (if not fully plotted out). Do you feel like it was a case of being struck by a specific character/visual/world-concept/theme that demanded to be brought to life, or was it more of a collection of artistic/story goals that coalesced to form Phantomarine over time?

I adore how distinctive the visual style and worldbuilding has been so far, so I'd love to learn more about the story-behind-the-story.

It started as an amorphous blob of things I love to draw - ocean stuff, boats, ghosts. I knew I wanted to create something, but I didn't know what its core plot was. There was a rough central theme around Phaedra being her own worst enemy and needing to improve, but there was no reason for it other than 'it would be interesting to write.'

Then Cheth came into the picture, and suddenly she had both an internal and external enemy. But what was his deal? Because he had to have a deal too. Both of them needed motivations, a reason to clash, and maybe a reason to find common ground.

One day at work it hit me what that common ground would be, and I sobbed openly at my desk. And it was all basically set at that point.

Some details have been added over the years for flavor, but the core theme/plot/conflict came from that one singular realization. Sometimes that's all it takes.

[spanishskulduggery]

Does El and Lo bring different contexts between el peor vs lo peor? Or do they both mean "the worst thing"?

Kind of, but it's a little talked about grammar issue

In Spanish there are technically three genders - masculine, feminine, and neuter/neutral

Neuter gender is sometimes called agender meaning "lack of gender", and that's the lo but you wouldn't know it exists since the adjectives that are "genderless" end in -o typically

Essentially, el is masculine, la is feminine, and lo is used in the idea of an "abstract noun" as a place holder for a noun

...

In other words, el peor "the worst one" / "the worst" [or like es el peor "he's the worst" possibly] implies a masculine noun of some kind

lo peor "the worst (thing)" has no noun directly stated. It isn't technically a "thing" but it's like trying to talk about an amorphous blob or something that lacks form... it can be a concept, an abstract idea, but it's not technically a "noun" in the typical sense

This might help a bit to explain the idea:

el asunto importante = the important matter la cosa importante = the important thing lo importante = "what's important" / "the important thing" el problema complicado = the complicated problem la idea complicada = the complicated idea lo complicado = "what's complicated" / "the complicated thing" el peor partido = the worst match [a sports match/game] la peor final = the worst finale [or "the worst final match" in a sports context] lo peor = "what's worse" / "the worst thing"

If you're saying es el peor de todos "it's the worst of all" or "he's the worst of all", you're implying a noun

If you say lo peor de todo "the worst (thing) of all" is often an abstract thing or concept, used to sort of put a name to a formless idea or concept, like you're trying to put a name to a whole concept that doesn't necessarily have a name... or in general Spanish, it can be used to speak about things as a whole, or a big sequence of events, or trying to conceptualize or contextualize an overall feeling

If you're trying to talk about sports, you can say es el peor partido "it's the worst match" or es la peor final "it's the worst championship/final match"... but if you're trying to talk generally like "the worst thing about it" or "worst of all" or "it's the worst" (generally) you'd use lo peor

I hope that maybe made sense; you usually just have to ask yourself is there an actual noun - a person, place, or thing - or is it a vibe, a mood, an idea etc that hasn't been stated somehow

[mas-o-kissed]

I’ve realized that I have experienced a lot of brain altering/opening/unblocking things in somewhat quick succession (hysterectomy ((which almost immediately eliminated a lifelong fear of sex and pregnancy)), having my trauma acknowledged in therapy, being able to open up about my sexuality in kink spaces and with my partner, among other things) and it’s pretty much all really good things!!! But it’s also making me feel internally tumultuous because we are trying to reconcile all of the pieces of our shifting identities.

In therapy I described it as like. If stability is a sphere, I am right now a blob, wobbling and amorphous and ever-changing. Which is not a bad shape to be! But it is somewhat unstable and feels sometimes very strange.

I explain because this blog is a big outlet for these feelings. If I behave oddly or seem inconsistent I am sorry. I am doing well!! But I am also getting weirder and unmasking and responding to things in ways which are unexpected even for myself

[aspenwritesstuff]

Part Two

prev | masterlist | next

warnings: ptsd/nightmares after an accident, general depression, ANGST, self-imposed isolation, themes of guilt/self doubt, swearing

wc: 8.99k

“You sure know a lot about color theory…” he mused as he added thin spokes between sections of the wheel, tilting his head at the canvas. “Mhm,” you said simply, chest already feeling heavy as you predicted what he’d say next. "You don’t just know it for fun, though, right?” he continued, still carefully adding the finest of lines to his piece, “You paint.” Your prediction was correct. “No,” you said quickly, any hint of softness you’d forced into your voice expelled the moment that question left his lips. Your lips were set in a hard line, though your heart thumped furiously against your ribs, “I don’t.”

a/n: hello, lovely readers. I'd like to start by apologizing profusely for how long updating this has taken me. I won't bore you with the details of my health - physical or otherwise - and will simply leave it at this; life is ROUGH sometimes. Thank you to those who have patiently waited for this release. I hope that it was worth the wait. I'm doing my best to get back into writing, and I assure you that updates will start coming for my other fics soon, too. I hope you enjoy this second installment of Desderium.

with love and forehead smooches (if you consent),

-Aspen

taglist: @findingjieunn @hyynee @hyunverse @dreamstarsandskz @linaliann permanent taglist: @svintsandghosts

“Mother knows best.”

You’d never quite understood why that particular phrase had become so popularized. You’d assumed up until now that it was simply a scare-tactic that adults tried to drill into pliable, adolescent minds. A way to remind them to listen, even if they didn’t understand, even if they didn’t like it. 

Standing in front of the mirror dressed in clean clothes, hair still damp from a shower, you began to understand. 

Though you never would have chosen to pass along your knowledge of your own volition - and as much as you hated to admit it - teaching Hyunjin had forced you to take better care of yourself. 

You had no desire to impress him, by any means. If anything, it was the opposite. You’d found yourself beginning to hope that he’d grow weary of trying to communicate with you, as your company was far from being considered anything close to pleasant, and that he simply would not show up for the next session. 

Yet, here you were, brushing your teeth and tying back your hair. Not ‘just in case,’ or out of anything close to it, but simply because you knew better now. 

You knew better than to hope.

The day was a stark contrast to your permanent melancholia. It was beautiful, uncharacteristically warm for mid-May, with a breeze just cool enough to soothe any discomfort from the sun. Clouds straight out of a children’s book, fluffy and broad, were sparsely littered across the expanse of blue. Birdsong accompanied the scent of the nearby blossoming trees, filling the air with a whimsy you could imagine being a work of fiction.

However, you weren’t that lucky. 

The day, despite how perfect it seemed, still carried with it its own share of hardships. Flowers could bloom all they wanted, and the sun could continue to shine, but what did that really change? 

Nothing, because this was not a work of fiction.

You still had to go to the art school, you still had to teach Hyunjin, and you still had an angry pink scar atop your hand. Indeed, today was real - and, you’d go as far as to say it really wasn’t that beautiful at all. 

If you looked at the sky for long enough, those fluffy clouds would dissipate into amorphous blobs. If you listened harder, past the birdsong, you were sure to hear a couple fighting or a parent scolding their child. If you sat beneath the warmth of the sun for too long, you would burn. 

Today really wasn’t all that beautiful. Not at all. 

You watched the world move around you as you took a seat on the bench, waiting for the bus to take you to your choice of hell. The sun had lured more people than usual from their homes, the park across the street filled with more life than you’d seen in a while. 

Two children chased after each other, giggling and shouting in excited voices under their parents’ watchful eyes. You wished you had as easy of a time as they did, playing make believe. If you could, then maybe today could be beautiful. 

But you couldn’t. And it wasn’t. 

The scent of diesel in the air foreshadowed the bus’ arrival, urging you to your feet just as it appeared atop the hill. The bus driver, a man in his fifties whose name you’d never learned, gave you a curt nod as he opened the doors. He grumbled something resembling a greeting as you stepped up the two steps to the aisle, earning a tight-lipped smile in response. 

The bus was packed today - you blamed the day’s masquerade as lovely for this, too - and you found yourself having to choose which patron to sit next to for the next ten minutes. You quickly crossed off the snoring man with his head against the window and the heavily pregnant woman across from him - you didn’t want to end up a pillow for the former, your hesitance for the latter stemming only from good manners. 

You scanned the remaining seats, contemplating if it would be too terrible to sit next to a woman in business attire chattering away on the phone, until a gentle voice called out to you. 

“You can sit here if you want.” 

Your eyes darted to the source of the invitation, a man around your age with a comforting smile and welcoming aura. He held an earbud between his thumb and forefinger, pulling it out likely to hear your reply should you have one. 

He didn’t seem like a terrible companion for the ride, likely returning to his music as soon as you answered. That was ideal, truth be told, not having to engage in conversation. Your decision was rushed, though, by the driver clearing his throat impatiently. 

“Yeah, sure,” you nodded, sliding into the seat before sitting, “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” he urged with that same gentle grin, “Wouldn’t want you to end up drooled on,” he jutted his chin towards the man you’d decided against before, earning a scoff and a smirk from you as you settled into the leather.

He seemed disappointed that you hadn’t laughed, but that was likely because he hadn’t the slightest clue that he’d gotten closer than anyone else had in months. 

This kind-faced stranger must not have been too terribly broken up over it, though, putting his headphones back in properly and tapping play against the cracked screen of his phone. You found yourself strangely comforted that you could hear bits and pieces of the song - it gave you something to focus on without having a window to stare out of. 

You shut your eyes, then, as you tried to recognize what he was listening to based solely on the thumping of bass obscured by his ears. The man with the reassuring smile was humming along now, but you couldn’t find it within yourself to be bothered. You instead listened, not particularly invested though you welcomed the occupation of your mind. 

Squealing tires brought you to full attention, though you couldn’t open your eyes. Horns blared over the sound of crunching glass, screams overtaking the crunching of glass. The whooshing of your pulse in your own ears left the distinct groan of bending metal as nothing more than background noise. 

Your heart began to race, bringing an all-too-familiar panic to the forefront of your mind. You wanted to call out as the sound of sirens drew nearer, but you couldn’t speak. 

It was as though you were frozen in time whilst the world spun out of control around you. You wanted to call out, to tell someone that you were there, to beg someone to find you and pull you from the dark. 

“Can you hear me?” you could feel pressure against your shoulder, though the ability to form a response was nonexistent. 

You wanted to respond, to tell them that you could. To tell them that you were in there. To tell them not to leave you in the chaos - in the dark. 

You hadn’t realized the stranger next to you had stopped humming, nor that you’d dozed off, until you realized that it was his cautious hand patting your shoulder. 

You felt your eyelids shoot open, a pair of concerned eyes and furrowed brows staring down at you bringing you quickly back to the surface of consciousness. You felt sick, a thin sheen of sweat rising to your face quickly cooling the burn of the embarrassed heat that had crept up your cheeks. 

“You okay?” he asked then, the fear in your features registering with him the longer he looked at you.

You nodded, blinking hard as the look he wore pierced through your chest.

You had seen that look before - it was the same look your mother wore when she’d run out of tears to shed at your bedside. The same look Felix and Changbin would send your way when they dropped off their weekly bouquet - after they’d given up on trying to get any conversation out of you. The same look Ms. Park had as the nurse escorted her out as you screamed and cried.

The pity only felt worse coming from a stranger. 

You cleared your throat, finding your voice to be much smaller than you remembered it being, “I’m fine,” you assured him quickly, “Sorry if I bothered you.”

“Hey, no worries,” he spoke quickly, as though the thought of you feeling like a bother were something of importance to him, “Are you sure you’re okay, though? You look like you’ve seen a ghost…” he wore that same carefree smile, though his eyes carried something akin to worry. 

Why did he care? He was nothing more than a stranger you’d met on the bus, someone who shared his seat with you out of courtesy. 

You swallowed the lump in your throat, hoping your voice would come out with a more believable strength this time, “I’m really okay.”

Not quite as confident as you’d hoped, but it would have to do. Less lioness, more housecat - but at least you weren’t a mouse. 

“If you say so,” his eyes darted to the driver, then back to you, “This is my stop.”

Your mouth formed an ‘o’ as it finally clicked in your brain that he’d been standing this entire time. You looked out the window, noticing that you were outside of the campus, “Mine, too, actually.” 

His brows shot up before he chuckled, gesturing grandly with the hand not holding his spare headphone towards the aisle, “Well, then, ladies first I s’pose!” 

You gave him your best attempt at a smile, though a grimace would be a much more accurate descriptor, before rising to your feet and walking towards the door. You mumbled a thank you and waved to the driver, who simply grumbled under his breath in reply. 

You didn’t blame him for that, though. You’d managed to hold up the bus twice in one day, effectively lengthening his workload. If you weren’t in such a haze from what you now knew was nothing more than a dream, you may have felt the need to call him out for his rudeness.

You ignored the irony of having such a dream, seeing as you’d wished your reality were just that - an unfortunate nightmare. You ignored the way your heart sank when you caught a glimpse of your hand when you waved to the grumpy driver, plunging deep into your stomach at the sight of your scar. You ignored the clamminess of your palms and how cold the once pleasant breeze felt against the moistness of your skin.

“You sure you’re alright? You really are a little pale,” your kindhearted seatmate spoke again from behind.

You wished you could justify ignoring him, too. 

“Yeah,” your voice quavered as you answered, turning around to witness that look - the look you hated, the one everyone seemed to send your way.

You weren’t surprised at the disbelief on his face, certain that you couldn’t have sounded less okay if you tried. You expected him to press the issue, forcing you into either running away or losing your temper - fight or flight, one could say. You expected him to act entitled to your story - your trauma. You expected him to push. 

“You in a hurry?”

You hadn’t expected that. You pulled your phone from your pocket, brows wrinkled in confusion as you noted the time - 9:30 - before shaking your head.

“C’mon, there’s a cafe on campus,” you knew that, of course, being alumni. The kind stranger, however, did not - and you were still too shocked to burst his bubble, “Want a coffee? Or tea? Whichever you prefer,” he rubbed the back of his head, visibly stiffening at his own awkwardness, “My treat, of course!” 

You hesitated, considering the possibilities. On the one hand, he was a complete stranger. Someone who you’d only just met moments ago, someone who could see how vulnerable you were right now. Someone who looked at you with that look you hated. On the other, he’d shown compassion and left you alone until he’d needed to wake you to get off of the bus. He seemed genuine in his concerns, though you wished he’d not noticed your distress in the first place. 

“You’re paying?” you reiterated, finally coming to the conclusion that one cup of tea wouldn’t hurt. 

He threw his head back then, a bellowing laugh coming from deep within his stomach before he got a hold of himself. He wiped a tear from his eye, still grinning from ear to ear, “Yeah, I’m paying. C’mon.” He tilted his head in the direction of the cafe, waiting until you started towards that direction to fall into step next to you. 

Hyunjin had taken extra precautions to ensure he would not be late today.

He hadn’t predicted just how annoyed he’d become with his past self, however, until he found himself reaching out of the shower to snooze an alarm - the third of five he’d set - interrupting his playlist. His irritation was short lived, fizzling out nearly as soon as it started. After all, how could he possibly stay upset by something so small? 

Today was a beautiful day. 

Hyunjin turned down the volume of the song that played, content to allow the trilling call of the sparrows outside to overwhelm the gentle melodies he’d chosen. Despite his earlier frustration, he found himself oddly at peace with the replacement.

As he packed his bag of supplies, his thoughts began to drown out the symphony coming in through the windows. His mind was on you - just as it had been ever since the two of you parted ways last week. Hyunjin wasn’t obsessed, at least not in a way worth any concern, but he did have questions. 

Why was someone who’d volunteered as a mentor so visibly discontent with their pupil? Was it because of Hyunjin himself? Had he done something to bother you? To accidentally offended you somehow? Why did you all but run from the art room? Why weren’t you painting alongside him to show him the way? Did you even paint? You had to, seeing as you were capable of fixing an issue Hyunjin had been dealing with for weeks in a matter of minutes. Right? 

Hyunjin shook his head, damp blonde strands tickling the apples of his cheeks. After his first alarm, he’d debated on whether or not he should even attend the session today. If he made you that uncomfortable, was learning a few pointers really worth it? Your pursed lips and glossed-over gaze were burnt into his memory and - after the initial joy of fixing the issue with his painting had worn off - he couldn’t shake the mounting curiosity they brought with them. 

In the end he’d decided that he couldn’t pass on whatever advice hid behind your icy exterior, though. He couldn’t pass on scratching that itch, the one your venom-laced words had given him. The one that could only be relieved by answers - answers which his intuition told him would not come easily.

He zipped up his bag, considering the routes he could take to get you to open up. His ideas weren’t terrible; asking the standard questions about family and friends, debating favorite artists, bringing up his own interests in passing…but all of these ideas held one thing in common that made Hyunjin feel very, very small.

They required you to actually want to speak to him. 

He glanced at the clock, then - it was only 9:45 - noting that he had enough time to swing by the cafe for an americano. Caffeine was, for all intents and purposes, a great way to sharpen his focus and lift his spirits. He could definitely use the boost. 

His mind was swimming with thoughts, worries even, about today’s session - about you - and for a moment Hyunjin wondered if you felt just as unsure about today as he did. 

Sliding a black cap over his slicked-back hair, Hyunjin slung his supplies over his shoulder and made his way out of the dorm building. He barely registered the waves and smiles his classmates sent his way as he walked across campus, responding to them in kind with a slight delay. His mind was too busy trying to unravel the tangled enigma that was you.

The birdsong was louder without his walls as a buffer, lightening the weight he’d been carrying by a little. He looked up to the sky, a soft smile tugging at his features at the way the clouds bloomed against the sky. 

The sight made his heart feel light, forgetting for a moment about his concerns regarding his new mentor. The sky felt like the joy he’d feel at the fair as a child, and he found himself comparing the clouds to cotton candy as they melted against the brilliant sky. 

Hyunjin knew what he would paint today. Before he could paint, though - coffee. In a matter of minutes, he was walking through the heavy mahogany door of the campus’ coffee shop. Passing through those doors always felt like an entirely different world to Hyunjin; the warm-toned lights mounted in metal, industrial-style brick with exposed pipes, and the scent of cinnamon and coffee grounds immediately seemed to cancel out the surrounding environment. The choir of birds was replaced by the clattering of ceramic and overlapping chatter, the gentle breeze now thick bursts of warm air from the kitchen door swinging on its hinges. Though this was definitely more man-made than the beautiful spring day he’d left outside, Hyunjin quite liked it here.

Stepping forward on the worn-down wood floors, he stopped at the counter and ordered his typical iced americano. He paid, leaving a tip before scooting to the side to allow others to place their orders as he waited for his own. He’d started to zone out slightly when he heard a familiar name called from an employee’s mouth.

Your name, followed by another that he recognized.

His head snapped up, scanning the room so suddenly that it was a wonder he hadn’t managed to give himself whiplash. His eyes landed on the carefree smile of Han Jisung approaching the counter from a booth in the corner - at which you were seated.

Hyunjin felt a pang of something akin to jealousy in his chest as he watched Han accept the drinks, surprised to see a soft smile on your face as the boy carried the drinks back to the table. His mind raced, out of his own control, as his eyes fell to the floor.

Up until now, Hyunjin had assumed that you simply just…didn’t like people, as a general consensus. Though seeing your calm smile as Han handed you a tea, he felt himself shrink. It wasn’t that you hated people as a whole, you just for some reason hated him. What had he done? Had he accidentally offended you in some way? Was his art not good enough? Were his aspirations annoying you? Was it just…him, as a person? The insecurity ran rampant as he peeked back up at the two of you, his chest aching. He’d truthfully been hopeful, hearing he’d have a mentor that had survived the same art program he was a part of now. He’d even spoken to his friends about how cool it would be to have a friend who could fully comprehend the pressure he was under.

It wasn’t that he had any problems with his current friends, it was the simple fact that all of them had majored in a different department. None of them were artists in the same sense as Hyunjin was, opting for theater or music rather than traditional art methods.

He was so excited to meet someone like-minded and artistically inclined. Beyond excited, even, his friends having called him out on how annoying he’d gotten as he counted down the days to meeting his new mentor. And, now, he felt stupid.

As he watched you sip your tea, your eyes alight with inaudible laughter at something undoubtedly stupid Jisung had said, he felt stupid. As he realized that, despite having so much in common, you’d so easily warm up to his friend; that this may actually be the first time he’d seen a ghost of a smile on your face, he felt stupid.

If he had to feel this way, the very least he owed his bruised ego would be the privilege to act the same way he felt.

Without a second thought, Hyunjin left his position against the countertop and strode with false confidence over to your table, plastering a grin on his face that he hoped would hide his distress, before sliding in next to Jisung. “Jisung,” he greeted warmly before casting his eyes towards you, watching as the light slowly left your eyes, “I see you’ve met my mentor.”

You imagined this is what crashing through thin ice during a leisurely skate would feel like. One moment, you were focusing on the offhanded quips coming from your new companion, the now-unfamiliar sensation of contentedness lulling you into a sense of security. You’d stopped thinking about what happened to you, not even noticing the slight tremble in your scarred hand when you’d lifted your tea. 

You’d been about to laugh, though perhaps out of pity for the awkward jokes Jisung had been spouting, but still…for the first time since the incident that had stripped away your joy, you were about to laugh just as you would before. Until your blood ran cold, nearly knocking the wind out of you. Before you now sat Hyunjin, staring straight into your eyes with a nearly imperceptible curiosity. Along with Hyunjin came the memories. Along with Hyunjin came the pain. Along with Hyunjin came the truth. You would never be the same. You felt your features fall into absolute blankness as you held his gaze, eyes darting to Jisung briefly before returning to Hyunjin. “I didn’t realize you two knew each other,” Hyunjin continued, casually tucking a strand of hair behind his ear. His statement seemed to pull Jisung out of his shock at his sudden arrival, the clueless grin he often wore finding its way back to his face. “Ah, we just met today!” He said cheerfully, pulling your attention away from Hyunjin momentarily, “On the bus.” You nodded, the air having not quite returned to your lungs enough to provide an auditory response. Hyunjin was looking at Han now, which helped greatly in your quest to find your breath, but your chest still ached.

Hyunjin looked puzzled as he turned to Jisung, a brow raised as he cocked his head to the side. He wore his disbelief plainly enough that the other man had no trouble understanding what the look meant. “She had time before a meeting,” Jisung looked between the two of you now, his expression shifting back into one of comfortability as he put together the pieces in real time, “With you, I’m guessing?” Hyunjin nodded, his brows still knitted together despite the small smile he wore whilst listening. You could tell, despite your short time knowing him, that the wheels were turning behind his calm facade. About what, you were unsure, but something about the neutral position of his features felt completely fabricated.

That alone was enough to keep your voice at bay.

“Small world, huh?” Jisung continued, his cheerfulness a welcome - though temporary -  distraction from the tension you felt radiating from Hyunjin. “Yeah, very,” Hyunjin replied, turning to face you once more. As his dark eyes met your own, it felt as though you were shrinking. If you could dissolve into the plush booth seat, you’re sure you would have. 

You should say something, right? Certainly, you knew that you should. Of course, engaging in conversation with him was something a normal person would do in this moment.

You, however, simply could not.

Despite the way Hyunjin looked at you expectantly, not much differently than a child waiting for instruction, you couldn’t even bring yourself to say hello. You felt smaller and smaller as your mouth ran dry, clutching your cup of tea tightly enough to indent the thin plastic cup.

You were saved as the barista called Hyunjin’s name, watching helplessly as he slid out of the booth. 

“Lesson’s in five minutes, we can walk together.”

Though you were sure he meant it innocently, the way he phrased it as a certainty rather than an offer nearly sprang you into a panic. Had Jisung not been present, you’d be searching your mind for any believable excuse - not wanting to spend more time alone with Hyunjin than was required of you. But Jisung was there, and Jisung was far from able to understand why, exactly, you had an aversion to spending time with his friend.

“Sure,” you managed, barely a whisper as you pulled yourself to your feet. You still held your tea, now in both hands, as you turned to Jisung. “Thank you, for the tea. And the bus.”

The man grinned up at you again, “Yeah, no problem. Have fun!”  You felt guilty at the fact that, despite his genuine encouragement, you knew you would be doing anything but. Regardless, you gave him your best attempt at a smile - though you wouldn’t be surprised if it came across as more of a grimace - before turning towards Hyunjin.

“Ready?” Hyunjin asked, his expression still pleasant - if he’d sensed your mood shift along with his presence, he wasn’t showing it.

You simply nodded, casting one last glance to Jisung before following Hyunjin out of the building. He didn’t look back at you, not even once, as his long legs carried him effortlessly towards the studio. You quickened your pace to keep up, though it didn’t seem that Hyunjin noticed. The last thing you wanted to do was thicken the already awkward air - it was much easier to just half-jog behind him.

Even as he held the door open, his gaze still wouldn’t meet yours. It was impossible not to feel a bit grated by his sudden attitude. He’d interrupted your prior conversation, pulling you to the lesson alongside him, just to all but pretend you weren’t there.

Not that you were really complaining, seeing as you hadn’t the slightest intention of being buddy-buddy with the stark reminder of your own misery, but his sudden shift from the vibrant persona he’d exuded at your previous lesson still left an odd taste in your mouth.

Perhaps he’d finally gotten the message? Maybe, after your less-than welcoming attitude on day one, Hyunjin had given up on trying to weasel his way into your life aside from lessons? It didn’t seem as though that would be the case, though. Despite your sharpness, he’d still chosen to attend the lesson today…

Then, why? Why was his face lacking the blissfully ignorant smile he’d worn last time, even as you’d made it clear that you had no desire to befriend him? Why was the silence he’d once found absolutely necessary to fill left alone?

You hadn’t expected your questions to be answered so quickly, but as  you approached the door to the studio, pulling it open and stepping inside, Hyunjin finally spoke.

“Did I do something?”

It was such a simple question. Four words that, on their own, didn’t hold much weight - but spoken in such a small, genuine voice from your once-enthusiastic pupil felt like a punch in the gut.

Is that what this was about? You were teaching him, weren’t you? What else did he expect?

“What are you talking about?” you asked him, voice sounding filled with more disinterest than you’d intended as you set down your bag, having a seat on an empty stool.

“Did I do something to offend you?” He repeated again, remaining frozen in the doorway. He still wouldn’t look at you, studying his own shoes against the floor as though they were the biggest point of interest in the room.

It was painfully obvious that Hyunjin truly believed there was something he’d done to warrant your offputting behavior; from the way his shoulders hunched up to his ears to the way he shuffled in place. He looked like a child that had been scolded in front of his friends as he awaited your answer, chewing on his bottom lip nervously.

“No.” Your response held much less weight at first glance than his initial question had. A single word, simple enough for an infant to claim as their first. Though, paired with the way it cut through the air - terse, leaving no room for debate - you didn’t doubt that Hyunjin had felt a sting. Hyunjin nodded, flinching at the word as if it were something much less innocuous. He swallowed hard before stepping forward, sitting on the stool opposite of you and pulling a blank canvas from his messenger bag. He set it on the easel with delayed movements, his eyes appearing glazed over - as if he were in a trance. “If I didn’t do anything,” he started, pulling out his paints and setting them up on a small table, “Then it must just be me in general, hm?” You raised a brow, ignoring the pang of jealousy you felt to the best of your abilities as he pulled out his brushes, twirling one around his finger delicately as he stared at all of his color options. How were you supposed to answer? It wasn’t as though you could tell him that your innate dislike for him came from his ability to do what was taken from you. It wasn’t as though you could simply say that you were sure he was a great guy, and that your quiet rage came from a place of envy. You simply couldn’t. Hyunjin already made it real enough, speaking aloud what had happened would only serve to twist the knife. He must have taken your silence as an affirmation, a laugh escaping his lips in the form of a whisper as he shook his head. He lifted a tube of vermillion before pulling out his palette, filling one of the divots with the rich shade before setting the tube down - letting it clatter noisily amongst the others. His foot tapped against the floor as though he were physically holding himself back from speaking, dipping the brush into the paint carefully. His body language was screaming anything but calm yet, despite this, his hand was steady as he raised the red-tinged bristles to his canvas. You watched as the single line he painted was joined by another, forming haphazard, angry angles. Scarlet against white. The heartache watching him create with such effortless movements was different than any you’d felt before. You averted your gaze as the dull ache grew into something bigger - something quietly furious, intimidating in its sheer density as it took up each crevice of your mind. Your attention seemed much less volatile as you focused in on your own hands, guiding your vision from your fingertips to your palm before turning your hand over. Your heart plunged into your stomach before you glanced back at Hyunjin’s canvas - now blended with different shades of orange and pink alongside the aforementioned red. You looked back down at your own angry, red line. 

Unlike Hyunjin’s canvas, there weren’t any complimentary colors that could be added to lessen its impact. There was no gentle pink to soften it, no comforting orange glow.  Unlike Hyunjin’s canvas, the angry red you’d been cursed with could not be changed into a sunset. The mood could not shift into something inspirational, it could not become something soothing on the eyes. It could not, and would never be a sunset.

Unlike Hyunjin’s canvas, you could not blend out the rough edges. You couldn’t simply feather out the red until it looked like it belonged. You couldn’t add or take away anything, there was no camouflaging the puckered evidence of loss that you were forced to wear.

Hyunjin’s words rang in your mind once more; it must just be me in general. It wasn’t that you necessarily felt bad about your feelings - those were your right, the only thing you’d earned from your tragedy. You did, however, feel a bit guilty about the collateral damage sitting alongside you, moving his brush along the canvas wordlessly.

You were right before. You couldn’t tell him why you felt this way, he definitely wouldn’t understand. Nobody would, after all, unless they’d been forced through what you had endured. There was, however, one thing you knew you could do.

“It’s not you.”

Hyunjin paused, moving his brush away from the canvas as his back stiffened. Your words weren’t soft, weren’t sweet, weren’t meant to be reassuring whatsoever. You’d stated them plainly, as if they were simply a fact you’d decided to share. As dark irises flitted over to you, curiosity filling their chocolate depths, you held your breath.

“No?” he asked before looking away, resuming his work after the initial shock of your voice had worn off.

“No,” you echoed, looking anywhere but his palette as he squeezed a bit of yellow into an empty space.

“Then what?” he asked, still focusing on his work. Though you weren’t looking, you could hear the whisper of bristles against vinyl. It was a beautiful sound, or at least it was before.

“I…can’t tell you that,” you mumbled, looking out the window at the students wandering campus. Two girls running into an embrace that nearly convinced you they could be lovers, a couple of boys doing that odd, handshake hug that men had somehow decided unanimously meant they weren’t in love, a girl beneath the shade of the old ginkgo tree sketching away.

Even absolute strangers held the power to remind you of loss, it seemed.

You looked back towards Hyunjin as he blended daffodil yellow into the sky he’d created, wondering if you’d be better off watching the girl outside.

“You can’t?” he hummed, setting his brush aside before grabbing one with thinner bristles, tucking it behind his ear as he reached for a tube of black paint.

“No,” you reiterated.

Hyunjin simply hummed in response, supposedly deciding against pressing further as he dipped the thin brush into the inky black.

He was bringing it towards the canvas when you sucked in a sharp breath, coming to a realization about what he may be about to do.

“Don’t,” you said quickly, causing Hyunjin to stiffen once more before turning his head towards you.

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t make a black silhouette,” you said simply, still shocked that you’d corrected him at all. It was almost funny that you’d startled yourself - you were supposed to teach him, after all.

Hyunjin slowly set the brush down, a single brow raised as he waited for you to explain.

“It’ll contrast too heavily with the backdrop, and it won’t look natural,” you mumbled, looking away from his expectant gaze as though you feared he’d read your mind otherwise, “Blend black into one of the shades you used for the sunset until it’s dark enough to mimic a silhouette.”

Hyunjin nodded, finally peeling his eyes off of you long enough to slowly add a bit of black to the purple tone he’d used before. He seemed almost scared as he held the palette out towards you, tentatively speaking in a voice so soft it was a miracle you heard him.

“Like this?”

You took a glance and nodded, looking away again right after. Hyunjin pulled the stained palette away slowly, setting it down before dipping the brush into the handmade indigo and beginning to add a shape against the glowing backdrop.

You looked up as he worked, fighting against your instincts as you watched him carefully craft a circle, the shape of a ferris wheel slowly coming alive against his beautiful skyline.

Hyunjin continued to work, and you continued to watch, the sounds of breath and brushstrokes filling the otherwise empty air of the studio. The discomfort was still there, still pushing against your lungs with every inhale, but it was no longer suffocating as you watched Hyunjin focus in on his work.

He looked so absorbed that you were a bit taken aback to hear him speak.

“You sure know a lot about color theory…” he mused as he added thin spokes between sections of the wheel, tilting his head at the canvas.

“Mhm,” you said simply, chest already feeling heavy as you predicted what he’d say next.

“You don’t just know it for fun, though, right?” he continued, still carefully adding the finest of lines to his piece, “You paint.”

Your prediction was correct.

“No,” you said quickly, any hint of softness you’d forced into your voice expelled the moment that question left his lips. Your lips were set in a hard line, though your heart thumped furiously against your ribs, “I don’t.” The words felt like poison in your mouth, sour enough to burn your throat.

How did Hyunjin manage to endlessly remind you that things were not the same?

You wouldn’t pick up a brush with a joyful smile again, creating to your heart’s content. The images and ideas that flew around your mind now destined to wither away there, never to be given life against a stretched canvas.

“But,” Hyunjin continued, painfully oblivious to the rising levels of envy and rage radiating from you, “There’s no way you’d know this otherwise,” his almond eyes stayed focused on his work as he spoke, never leaving the canvas even when he dipped his brush back into the deep purple shade.

You would no longer lose track of yourself - of time - as you became absorbed in manifesting images from your mind’s eye. Unique sights were no longer subject materials. Flowers were simply flowers, sunsets simply sunsets, ferris wheels simply ferris wheels.

“I said no,” you repeated, clenching your fists at your side as if you could physically hold the facade of being calm in place, “I don’t.”

And you meant it. 

You did not paint, not anymore. 

You would never again need to brush off complaints that you smelled of paint at parties, and your mother would not tut disapprovingly at the colors caked beneath your nails. You would not fill a mug with water to clean brushes. Coffee cups were just coffee cups, glasses just glasses, and jars just jars. “And last week,” Hyunjin added, almost as though you hadn’t said anything at all, “With the oil paints, that wasn’t common knowledge.” Your nails dug painfully into your palms now, sure to leave an indent when you let go. Your balled up fists trembled slightly with the sheer force you’d squeezed, your lips parting to reiterate your point until it happened. The white-hot sting, sudden and overwhelming, radiating from the marred flesh atop your hand. You hissed, pulling it quickly to your chest and covering it with its unsullied counterpart while you opened and closed your fingers quickly, chasing relief desperately. Hyunjin turned to face you now, his eyes widening as he caught a glimpse of your scrunched up features. He set his palette down hurriedly, not bothering with grace as it clattered against the table - a tube of paint falling to the floor in the process. “Are you okay?” You hated how genuinely he’d asked this, concern written across all of his features as he reached towards you carefully - as though you were a cornered rabbit he’d decided to help, despite its skittishness. Considering the evasiveness you’d insisted on keeping behind every word you’d said to Hyunjin thus far, you supposed that would be an accurate assessment. Teeth metaphorically bared at every opportunity, subliminally warning him to stay back - letting him know that you wanted him gone. Hyunjin didn’t seem to care, though, as his brows creased together - his eyes shooting to the hand you were cradling. He took a sudden step back when you jerked your head up, meeting his eyes with a ferocious mixture of rage and shame.

“I’m fine,” you snapped before grinding your teeth together, pulse whooshing in your ears as the adrenaline pumped through your veins. You didn’t want to discuss this with Hyunjin. You didn’t want to explain to anyone ever again what had happened to you. In that moment, you truly were the injured animal Hyunjin had approached you as - hissing as you were slowly backed further into a corner. Your only hope being that he would simply drop the matter - leaving you to lick your wounds alone. Of course, Hyunjin did no such thing. “Are you sure?” he asked, taking a single step back after registering the harshness of your tone. His widened eyes, brimming with genuine compassion and worriedness, quickly faded into nothing as you zoned in on a splash of red against his cheek. Red paint - cracking as it dried - against his pale skin. He’d likely wash it off later, perhaps even laughing about how clumsy he’d been to manage staining his skin in the first place. The red paint - blended beautifully with concise brushstrokes and complimentary shades - against white canvas. A gentle yellow that radiated warmth, peeking between periwinkle clouds to illuminate a perfectly captured carnival ride.

An angry, red scar - cradled desperately against your chest as it throbbed incessantly, ensuring that you would always remember your loss. Always remember your pain.

Your red couldn’t be cleaned off, washed down the drain and forgotten. Your anger could not be softened by colors more delicate, could not be blended into something beautiful. This line would not turn into a sunset, would not become the backdrop for nostalgia, would never become pretty.

“I said I’m fine!” you snapped, causing Hyunjin’s face to pale. He backpedaled once more, only stopping when his thigh brushed the stool he’d been sitting on. Without uttering so much as another syllable, Hyunjin simply picked up his brush - continuing to paint.

The air was heavy with a wounded silence as Hyunjin worked on his piece. Your pain had dulled from a scream to a soft hum, searing heat turning into more of a prickle. You found yourself wishing your internalized wounds would settle as quickly as your hand. Certain broken things, it seemed, couldn’t be reset to heal accordingly.

It wasn’t until Hyunjin broke the silence, barely above a whisper, that you’d realized how much time had passed. “You’d be good at it, I think,” he’d said, setting down his brush as he eyed his work carefully, “Painting.”

You didn’t respond, not trusting your tongue at his sudden proclamation. 

You were good at painting once. You were really good. He couldn’t know that, enough people were aware of your loss. You often found yourself wishing that you’d simply stayed asleep, comatose after the accident. At least that way you wouldn’t have to deal with the pity-stained faces of those who loved you. It was strange, now that you thought about it. 

You weren’t sure you remembered what their eyes looked like before. Before you were broken. Before they felt sorry for something far beyond the reach of their own doing.

Before everything had changed.

“I actually didn’t start painting until recently,” Hyunjin continued, almost as though talking to himself, “I switched majors at the start of this year.”

You listened to his monologue, though you weren’t looking at him. You were watching out the window once more. The girl was no longer beneath the gingko tree sketching, and the groups of friends were nowhere to be seen. The campus was quiet as the sky melted into a replica of Hyunjin’s canvas - warm and soft, casting a golden glow on everything it touched.

It bothered you - it bothered you a lot - that Hyunjin hadn’t been serious about painting for longer than a few months. He didn’t realize how lucky he was, to be allowed to dream. To be allowed to pursue something you’d loved with your whole heart on a whim. 

You bit your tongue, not wanting to end up saying something you’d regret - something you couldn’t take back. You couldn’t control your past, of course, but you could make an effort to control your effect on the present.

Hyunjin continued on despite your lack of input - you were nearly convinced he’d have continued talking even if you’d left the room. 

“I’ve always liked art, though,” he insisted, adding a few highlights to bits of the wheel before chewing his lip in thought. He added a dash of a muted turquoise to the indigo silhouette as he continued on.

“I guess I was just inspired recently,” he mused, seemingly unbothered by your silence, “I actually tagged along to a gallery exhibit with my aunt. There was a piece there…” he took a deep breath as he painted, his lips parting into a fond smile as he recalled what must be a precious memory for him.

“It was so delicate,” he said quietly, setting his brush down to examine his piece, tilting his head at nearly a ninety-degree angle, “A hand holding onto a flower so loosely that I truly wouldn’t have been surprised if I watched it fall down the canvas.”

Your heart stopped before jumping into your throat to race uncomfortably.

No.

“The flower matched the pink of the knuckles and palm so perfectly,” he hummed, tilting his head in the other direction, “Everything was so muted, yet so…believable.”

You knew the exact pink he was referring to. You knew that the flower was a carnation, and you knew that the petals alone had taken ten painstaking hours to complete.

No, no, no, no.

“It wasn’t inherently happy,” Hyunjin’s voice stayed level as he rambled on, “It wasn’t inherently sad, either…” he grabbed his brush again, adding bits of a golden highlight to the cool clouds.

You knew exactly what he meant, the loose grip on the stem chosen specifically to depict apathy - uncaring of whether or not the delicate bloom fell to the ground.

This cannot be happening.

“But, for some reason, it made me feel lonely to look at,” his brows furrowed then as he focused harder on his application, ensuring he wouldn’t muddle the colors as he added contrast, “I decided to switch majors so I could do that, too.”

You felt a knot in your stomach, the air becoming increasingly more difficult to pull into your lungs.

What the fuck?

Hyunjin stood from his spot then, taking a few steps back to look at the canvas from afar, “So I could tell an entire story without words or gestures. So I could make people feel.”

Even if you’d wanted to reply at this point, your mouth had gone dry long ago. Your hands began to tremble at your sides as he spoke.

What the actual fuck?

“I was kind of disappointed that the artist wasn’t there,” his lips were pulled into a frown now, his reminiscing cut short by visible displeasure, “I had so many questions…” he trailed off as he stared at his canvas, searching for anything he could alter to give it the exact feeling he’d sought after during its creation.

You already knew that the artist hadn’t been there. That the artist had been in a hospital bed, hooked up to machinery, with their hand wrapped in a bright white cast. You knew that the artist was surrounded by people who loved them, yet had never felt so empty and alone in their life.

How is this happening?

“Apparently, they go by Eclipse, so I’ve asked the gallery owner to contact me if another piece is put on display,” he approached the painting again now, sitting in front of it with a studious expression on his face, “Even if they wouldn’t answer my questions, I want to thank them,” Hyunjin picked up his brushes, one by one, and made his way over to the sink to wash the acrylic from their bristles.

This is actually insane.

Your breathing became ragged as you struggled to maintain your composure. It was your art that had inspired the very person you envied to begin to chase after your dream. It was because of your art that he’d even chosen to take painting seriously. How fucking ironic was it, that the event that had changed everything for you had done the same for another? 

You had lost, he had found.

“It’s thanks to them that I’ve discovered something I love so much, after all,” he mused, setting his brushes on a towel to dry neatly. He turned to face you, then, his eyes alight from his recollection. It wasn’t until his face dropped that you realized there was something hot running down your face.

Your vision had blurred the moment he’d mentioned the pink in the hands you’d painted, though you hadn’t noticed until just now. There were no tears falling, no - that would indicate singular, controlled drops. Emotion poured from your eyes in streaks, unending as they dripped down the edges of your jaw.

Hyunjin appeared panicked as he hurriedly dried his hands off, though he didn’t approach - not that you’d expect him to after your earlier outburst.

“Shit, did I say something wrong?” he asked, brows furrowing together as he recognized the trembling of your breath. 

Words evaded you as your throat began to close, your shaky hands gripping the sides of the stool as if that could somehow steady you. You shook your head, hoping that the dark bits of his outline you stared into were his eyes.

How could you blame him for being confused? “We don’t have to talk about it anymore,” he said softly, his voice shifting from the calm and enraptured way he revealed his inspiration to a quiet, almost guilty tone.

“Okay,” you exhaled more than actually spoke, but Hyunjin seemed to hear you clearly as he nodded his head.

“I’m sorry,” he started, “I didn’t think you’d –” he cut himself off as you held up your hand, signaling for him to stop.

“Don’t,” you managed between uneven breaths.

“But –”

“Don’t,” you repeated, finally releasing your vicegrip on the stool to wipe your eyes with your sleeves.

“I’m sorry, I just thought maybe…I dunno, I really thought you’d wanna give painting a shot…”

You shook your head, giving him a barely audible, “I’m not a painter,” before turning your head away, still wiping helplessly at the wetness on your cheeks.

“I–” he cut himself off, simply to nod once more. The atmosphere felt heavy as you sniffled quietly, doing your best to regain composure - hoping to at least be able to look him in the eye and speak clearly.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated himself, voice still laced with regret, “I won’t bring it up again, okay?”

You pulled your bag up onto your shoulder, stepping towards the door as Hyunjin watched, the frown remaining etched between his brows giving away just how taken aback he’d been by your reaction. To anyone else, it would’ve been a nice, heartwarming story about a boy who fell in love with painting.

But you were not anyone else.

You were an inspiration to the boy who’d picked up your dream, claiming it as his own and thanking you for it with the same breath.

You were Eclipse, the one who’d painted the noncommittal hand and the carnation dangling from its fingers.

With your broken pieces Hyunjin had become whole. 

In any other circumstance, you’d have told him that you’d created that piece. You’d have asked him what questions he had with a smile on your face. You’d have felt honored to have inspired someone else to pick up a brush and create.

But this wasn’t any other circumstance.

And you did not feel happy, or honored.

You felt hollow.

You looked at Hyunjin then, his face not too different from how you’d imagine a deer caught in the headlights to appear. His full lips were parted, as if he wanted to speak but couldn’t find the words he’d been searching for. 

You stopped with your hand on the doorknob, shifting your focus from Hyunjin to his canvas. Collecting yourself enough to give him critique was the least you could do - unwilling or not, you were supposed to be teaching him. You did your best to push back the pain, at least for long enough to do your job.

Nostalgia hit you in waves as you studied his piece, a comforting and child-like wonder encouraging your eyes to stop their leaking. The canvas as a whole felt warm like summer. You could swear you could hear children’s laughter and the crashing of waves in the distance the longer you looked. 

He’d done exactly as he said he wanted to. His work made you feel something, even amidst the confusing swirl of emotions you were experiencing. His work, because of you had stopped the flow of tears, at least for now. You pulled your still-watery eyes away, meeting Hyunjin’s. The clarity and calm your voice now held was a surprise - to you and Hyunjin both.

“It’s a beautiful piece, Hyunjin,” you said truthfully, casting a glance over your shoulder at the shell-shocked boy still stood by the sink, “Really beautiful.”

You meant it, too - his piece was beautiful.

A part of you had wanted to say more - to tell him in detail how it had made you feel.

But that part of you was gone.

That part of you had been broken off, picked up by Hyunjin himself.

And despite your desire to pretend it was still there, to thank him for the warmth of his work, you couldn’t.

Because it wasn’t there, it belonged to him now.

With one last glance at his unchanged, startled expression, you stepped out into the hallway. You didn't know if he could hear you as you spoke your parting words - and you honestly weren't trying to be heard.

Yet, the words left your lips with an unlikely conviction - softened only by the thickness your tears had left in their wake.

"I'll see you next week, Hyunjin."

[karizard-ao3]

My reactions to Evangelion episode 25: Do you love me?

Just the title of this episode alone is making me feel emotional. What is going to happen to these babies?

I'm going to try to fit these last two episodes in before I finish cleaning up for my friends who are visiting this weekend. I want to be an emptionally destroyed zombie for the whole time they're here.

Jk. I'm hoping I can withstand this and at least fake that I'm still functional after. I might have to take a break between episodes to run to Target, but fingers crossed I will have this finished tonight and then be able to watch End of Evangelion on Sunday!

Enough about me. Let's begin!

Shinji is either having a mental breakdown or he's got some Angel in his head. This reminds me of the Dirac (?) Sea and what he was going through then.

Is he being interrogated?

Asuka is the blunt voice in his subconscious lol

I do find it interesting how similar Asuka and Shinji's motives for piloting the Evas are.

It's interesting because it seems Rei is connected to all the different versions of herself that exist in other people's perceptions. And, it seems like that is entirely what she has based her current sense of herself on.

Her similarities to Kaworu (is that right?) are really interesting. They both were really disconnected from themselves and the world. Very different from humans, who cling to life. Instead, they are eager to die.

"You existed for today, Rei." And Kaworu said he believes he was born just to meet Shinji and was happy to die having done that. How to put this? All the Angels thus far have seemed to be created for one purpose. They always appear, do one thing, and then are killed. There's an essence of the mayfly about them. The fights don't even last long in the show, and sometimes we even miss them. They've never really felt like a real enemy because of that. They're just so unrecognizable, if that makes sense.

Shinji is maybe remembering when he disappeared into the quantum plane?

The instrumentality begins. Oh no.

Misato was shot?

They're gonna glomp everyone altogether into an amorphous blob of heart?

I heard the author was depressed. I get it.

Misato is tired of being clean and pretty for everyone else, and her apartment before the kids moved in was a pig sty. It was like her one little concession to herself. She has to put on the mask outside but at home she could be dirty and ugly.

Hmmmm Misato. Using sex to hide from the pain and disappoint your dead father, huh? I am uneasy. I've been trying to ignore certain vibes I was getting and I'm still trying to. I dont want to talk about it.

Why would they talk about Asuka like that right in front of her?

This is really something. Can't quite articulate it right now, but you know when you're just walking along and suddenly you become hyper aware of the fact that you are you and other people are in their own heads being themselves and having thoughts and sensations just like you but you will never know what it is like in their heads or how it feels to be them? That's what this is like.

"You wished for a closed off world that was comfortable for you and only you." Damn.

In Conclusion

When they say Shinji wished for the end of his world, is that because he wanted to connect with other people and end his loneliness or is it just because he hates himself and wants to die? Or, something else?

My head is doing contortions trying to figure all this out. But I was warned it was confusing, so I don't have high expectations from myself.

Dear Shinji, please stay safe. I love you.

[straycalamities]

Just to know, what are the canon pairings between your ocs at the moment? :3

cANON? UHHHH uhh what is canon uhhh

well mainverse entre is with 12 they've been dating since......2012? 2013? oh god. (maybe they're married at this point who knows)

trufflu entre isss ummmmmmm hard to answer :) he's With swag obv but its Complicated and Unlabeled (til its not, but that's......a story for another time)

weehawken entre is kinda? flirting? interested? in vin not official yet but they had their Moments

man..entre is my bicycle ill be honest. and there's more aus and iterations of entre all usually with their own boo (or the same boo just different situation) i just like to have fun

but anyways enough about him

eboy is canonly with EDU HIMSELF. uwu

mronceler is canonly. divorced :)

andrew and ace are usually canonly planned to get together. i literally made ace FOR andrew. so i guess they're technically canon? i just haven't officially done any stories yet where they get to that point. but they're supposed to. especially in their main universes (there's like two now..maybe three..oh no)

andrew canonly has feelings for ji-hoon but they're not reciprocated. he also has a thing for julian, but its uh. awful. its bad. i wont go into it here

i think thats about it for him? uh :( same for ace err...yeah they pretty much just have each other rn even in different universes (i'd be down to play around with hooking them up with other ocs if anyone's interested tho wink)

kian is canonly with dev uwu they are in LOVE and sometimes eventually have a dotter named sid (sidney (because of scream yes))

i also have like four more oc pairings with edu, but i think i havent ever posted about them here...uh...seiki, will, aoife, and sean. well i HAVE posted about aoife and will but i dont think edu has anything posted of taelim or dean...so...

erendriel, daisy, and spook as of now are all canonly single and ready to mingle... idk do they even have ""canons"" right now ?? they kinda just exist in my head as amorphous blobs of vibes and vague traits (except spook who's got more than that but not rly anywhere to belong yet. it's just out here.) so if someone wanted to..make smth happen. my ocs. y'all's ocs. fingerguns. i know spook has one interested party rn. and has done stuff with another treasured friend's oc in the past

there's also danny, apollo, beleth, callisto, leah, mary, brady, nayasha, toni, and zenathrael. i have so many ocs dude...umm nayasha has a gf in canon but i havent designed her yet. brady has a...Thing going on with their basically-boss but...:) and the rest are all canonly single. i have even more but idk this is already getting out of hand.

[alvinmichaelmurphyseville]

“I feel like I’m an amorphous blob that sometimes forms himself into a square for days on end, but eventually he has to return to his natural state of just…wibbly wobbly little brain goop blob.”

“Science brain is totally checked out today. I feel relaxed, I want to cause “trouble” for people and be my old annoying self. I’ll revert back to the uptight geeky genius eventually. Don’t worry.”

“I just want to enjoy summer without worrying about my reputation/behavior so much. There’s not much summer left.”

“I guess I just gotta trust that whatever Jeanette taught me has stuck enough to keep me out of the worst trouble. Keep that self-preservation instinct, my niceness and helpfulness, my ability to still do what I’m told to an extent, and my uhhh…wisdom? I think that’s the last thing.”

“The reason I’m doing this is simple. If I stay stuck in full 2.0 mode too long, I get bored with it. I DON’T wanna get bored of being him. I love being him! So, I gotta switch it up. I apologize in advance for the inconsistency you are about to experience!”

[hongism]

mists of celeste ➻ 47.5

➻ pairing: yeosang, wooyoung ➻ genre: space au, pirate au, space pirate!ateez, angst, smut ➻ word count: 6.1k ➻ rating: M ➻ warnings: language, mxm content ➻ pre a/n: as always, interims are completely optional and made in a way to where you won’t miss out on significant plot if you choose not to read!

⇐ previous | next ⇒ | masterlist

✧✧✧ act six ➻ part 6.5

​​​​

Hand clasped tight in Wooyoung’s, Yeosang knows fairly well how this will play out. It never changes much no matter how many times it happens; in fact, it’s become more of a ritual than a genuine attempt to fix whatever went wrong between them this time, a way of showboating that they can communicate and make up to some odd degree. He lets himself be dragged along almost the way a petulant child would be pulled away by their angered parent, except the circumstances are so vastly different for him and Wooyoung.

They step into Wooyoung’s room, and Yeosang takes a deep inhale of air as soon as he crosses the threshold simply because it has been so long since he had permission to even set foot inside. It’s not as though it has changed at all — still has all the simple decorations and little knick-knacks strewn about with no particular order — and the smell is still warm and comforting as always. Sometimes he wonders if he has been trained like Pavlov’s dog to find peace in everything Wooyoung does, because of all they’ve been through together, but in the same vein, he does not wish to reduce what they are and who they are to something so cruel.

Wooyoung seats himself on the edge of his bed, letting go of Yeosang’s hand to rest both between his slightly spread legs, and the loss of contact leaves the older of the two feeling hopelessly weak.

“Do you feel better?” he asks without blinking.

Yeosang swallows around nothing. Words won’t come out as intended, and his head is so void of an explanation that he truly does feel like a child again. All he knows is that no, he does not feel better at all.

“Are you satisfied?” Again, Wooyoung remains so still that he looks more like a statue than a person.

No, I’m not.

“Did it hurt?”

I had hoped to hurt you, but it backfired. I hurt myself instead.

“It didn’t hurt me. It doesn’t hurt me anymore, Yeosang.” It’s not that Wooyoung gets off on making him miserable but part of Yeosang wonders if he doesn’t feel remorse at all over it.

The apology sits heavy on his tongue but rather than saying it out loud to the air between them, all he can do is let his chin fall to his chest.

“You were cruel,” he whispers as a final line of defense.

“And you were heartless.”

When Yeosang was younger, he cried because the Steward found the small porcelain knight figurine that he had kept hidden underneath his mattress. It had been promptly confiscated and thrown out, the little semblance of childhood he had ripped away without a care in the world from the adults around him, while Yeosang was left to be given a book in place of the toy. Elitists don’t have toys, Elitists don’t play with the other children, Elitists are meant to be strong and intelligent. Being told such a thing while still so young should have been wrong, but Yeosang understood his duties well enough by then.

Until Wooyoung came to him that night with a half-smile and a bright, rambunctious laugh that implied he was up to no good.

He had pulled a poorly-carved wooden figurine out of his pocket and displayed it to Yeosang like it was the most precious gem in the universe. In Yeosang’s eyes, it was. The semblance could barely be distinguished between a human being and an oddly amorphous blob, but it was a gift, a treasure, one meant for Yeosang and Yeosang alone.

“We’ll hide this one better than the last one!” Wooyoung had told him, still smiling and laughing through it all.

Yeosang cried again that night simply because no one had ever bothered to be so kind to him before.

The Wooyoung back then had been so kind and gentle — lively, bright, loving, a brief moment of respite amidst all the horrors they lived day in and day out. What kinds of crimes has Yeosang committed to make the man who sits before him now so starkly different?

Wooyoung does not laugh, does not smile, does not reach for his hand, and when Yeosang desperately stretches his own out to seek some sort of contact, what he gets in response is a scoff.

Again, like a child, his lip quivers, and Yeosang has to bite his cheek to keep the emotion from spilling out.

“But you always are.”

Wooyoung sits back on his hands, pushing his weight onto his wrists and propping himself up to stare up at Yeosang with a pinched stare. His lip is curled into a sneer still, nose crinkled from the effort.

He doesn’t often feel pitiful or inadequate, but Wooyoung has an odd way of drawing out every emotion imaginable. Yeosang sinks to his knees between Wooyoung’s legs like a man possessed, nothing but the desire to please in his bones because he can’t stand the thought of the younger man hating him so much that he looks down at him with true disgust.

“Keep your dirty mouth away from me. You think I want something that’s been used on other people near me?”

It takes every ounce of his willpower not to deny the words in a flash, teeth sinking into his lower lip as his fingers begin to shake.

“Wooyoung, please.”

The man hisses through his teeth like Yeosang has spoken some unreasonable request despite not detailing what he wants in the slightest.

“We keep running in circles, Yeosang. Push and pull, push and pull — one of these days you’re gonna push me over an edge that I can’t pull myself back from.” It feels unfair, in Yeosang’s mind, to have the blame weighed solely on his shoulders, but Wooyoung says the words with such conviction that he finds himself believing that it is indeed all his fault. With a defeated sigh, Yeosang draws back from the man and stands on steady feet again, fists balled at his sides. Quiet conviction shouldn’t go unnoticed either, he thinks. Even if Wooyoung denies it with every breath he has left in his body, this is complete and utter fairness.

“You wish for me to be selfish, yet the moment I am, you tell me that I am being too much. You ask me to be realistic about what we are and what our future holds, and I do as much for the sake of both of us but you call that being pessimistic and hateful. With one breath you tell me that my love for you is something only you’re meant to understand, but then the next you’re asking me to push that love in other people’s faces without thinking of how comfortable I am with such a thing. You say I’ve done nothing more than pretend to be your lover, faking my emotions for your sake because I’m nothing more than a dirty Elitist who isn’t capable of feeling a thing. I ask you, Wooyoung, how many times have I sat at your feet with my heart torn from my chest and laid bare before you — no one else but you? How many more times must I do such a thing for you to understand? One moment fate is on our side, then the next you’re broadcasting to the universe that nothing in this life wants us to be together. Not once have put blind faith into that old crone’s words. It has always been you, and your blind faith, with your reckless ambitions to do something greater than yourself. All I have done in these years is be realistic and honest with you. It shouldn’t matter if that’s the bare minimum if I love you just the same.”

It’s hard to see Wooyoung past the curtain of tears over his eyes, but that doesn’t stop him from pursuing the conversation further. Yeosang’s heart is shaking and trembling in the confines of his chest even if the steadiness of his voice doesn’t show that, even if his expression isn’t contorted with the pain he’s feeling yet.

“How can you sit there and say that I’m not capable of loving you? I have dedicated everything in my life to you, and no matter how many times you shove and kick at me to push me away, no matter how many hurtful words you sling at me or how many times you hit me, I won’t do the same. Is it to hurt you? It is what you ask of me, it is what you tell me to do. You ask me to hurt you over and over, painting new colorful ways every time, and all the while you know that I can’t deny you a thing in this life. It’s my way of coping with the hurt you dealt unto me. Where’s the line? You can tell me to go fuck myself fifteen, twenty times but the moment I seek a bit of pleasure, I’ve become the villain? My class isn’t your excuse to treat me like shit, Wooyoung. My class doesn’t mean that I don’t feel things at all. It doesn’t mean that I can hurt you mindlessly without feeling something myself. If you know that I’m incapable of feeling things as strongly as you do, then I would hope you never have to feel the kind of pain I’m in when I stand before you a broken man reduced to tears and agony at your hands!”

The low jab does make Wooyoung wince, but that wasn’t at all what Yeosang had intended in saying such a thing. Understanding, however, can only come at the cost of pain in some situations. Yeosang imagines that this is one of those moments.

“Do I feel better? Am I satisfied? Did it hurt? Yet I would do it all regardless of the lack of satisfaction or pleasure that comes out of it, regardless of the pain it leaves me with, because it means I don’t come back to you with hatred in my heart. I don’t do it because I want other people, not because I don’t love you and certainly not because wanting to hurt you is the first goal on my mind. If I can hate that and hate myself for doing that, being someone so despicable and debase, then I can come back to you on my hands and knees begging for forgiveness because it means that I don’t hate you and that I don’t love you any less. There is so much fear in my heart, Wooyoung, but amongst my worst nightmares, I fear becoming blind to the pain I may cause you. Even if you hate me, I hope to feel it all.” When he drops to his knees this time, it is with the same amount of pleading as before. “Hate me, if that’s all you think I deserve. I think asking for that alone is a selfish want. But as much as you want me to hurt you… there is only so much I can do, only so much I can take. Pain to you is nothing more than a passing breeze, and even though I hate that that is what is has become to you, I will stand back and let you do what’s best in your eyes. What I ask for in return is that you spare me the same respect and understand that seeing you in any sort of pain is the greatest weight on my heart. Please stop asking me to hurt you. You’re pushing me to an edge as I’m desperately trying to pull you closer, and it’s going to kill us both.”

Wooyoung cries before him, as the shroud of nonchalance and disgust falls away to reveal something more raw than Yeosang can hardly bear to see. His hands curl around his knees, and Yeosang reaches out to cover them with his own. The touch is light, but Wooyoung allows it, and just that much is progress enough.

“Don’t ask me to h-hate you. I can’t hate you, not really, you have — you have to know that.”

“Let me love you in a way that’s beautiful, not this ugly distortion of love that we’ve deluded ourselves into thinking is good for us.”

“All the love I’ve ever seen is like this though. It’s all ugly and full of hate. Only works if something goes wrong, only lasts if pain is interwoven throughout it. If we didn’t fight, would it even still be love?” Wooyoung’s hands shake beneath his, matching the quiver in his tone as he chokes out his words in fragmented sniffles and sobs. “How can you love me if we don’t fight?”

There’s an admission in the almost innocent question, one that Yeosang has tried ignoring for so many years at this point. In Wooyoung’s eyes, their love can’t exist without there being a struggle because that’s all they’ve ever had to suffer over the years. Now, while things are not nearly perfect, they have a chance to love each other peacefully. Of course Wooyoung would view that through the lens of fear because it’s something unknown and undetermined compared to what they’ve grown accustomed to.

“But if we keep this up, Wooyoung, there won’t be any love left between us, can’t you see that?”

“Don’t say that. I can’t bear to hear you say that.”

Something has to give, Yeosang thinks as he squeezes the man in front of him tighter still. We can’t keep repeating the same mistakes expecting a different outcome every time.

“We’ve been at this for so long, Yeo. Isn’t this how our lives are meant to be lived?” Why Wooyoung wishes so adamantly to cling to the way things are should be more concerning, more confusing perhaps, but Yeosang imagines he’s lived at Wooyoung’s side long enough to understand as well as he can. “It’s not gone too far… we still love each other. Right? We still have that?”

Wooyoung needs it to hurt to know that it’s real and not a figment of his imagination, not a paradise that he’s constructed for himself to rest in when his life crumbles down around him.

“We have that so long as we don’t destroy it.”

“But… what if we don’t destroy it? What if things stay the same?”

Yeosang isn’t sure how much clearer he can be when the issue is laid bare before the both of them — that things staying the same is the issue needing to be addressed.

Wooyoung, a man who wishes to change the inner workings of the universe, cannot bear the idea of things changing.

What an odd twist of fate that has turned out to be. Clinging to the words of an old fortune telling who spewed words he didn’t even care about, Wooyoung has constructed this idea of fate around the two of them and trapped them within a steel prison.

Change, and yet he clings to the dead collar around his neck like a lifeline, unable to release the chains he has long since been freed from. Perhaps it would be easier to drag him to a new fortune teller, but Yeosang himself will be first to admit that he fears bad news.

Wooyoung’s hands start to scramble, digging their way into Yeosang’s collar and gripping so tight that the older of the two can feel the strain on the other’s knuckles.

“We always overcome it.”

“So we can learn and grow from it too,” he reasons although he suspects that isn’t what Wooyoung wishes to hear right now.

When he was a teenager, Yeosang found himself in a dark alleyway with rain pouring down around him. Above him stood a savior, crowned in pale lavender with a white halo of artificial lights framing his head. But before that moment, he had been a child lonely and afraid, trapped in a golden palace that did not let him want for anything. As is customary, there was always something more he wanted. A child given everything in the universe, cruelly wanting the one thing he could not have in totality. In a city full of falling darkness, dancing lights, and empty eyes, Yeosang begged for one thing: the chance to feel alive.

It was then that Yeosang realized he could have all he wanted, but the cost would be everything else in his life.

Beaten down and chained in iron, dragged out of a holding cell and through the halls of a musty jail, and finally pulled into the night air with iridescent rain pelting down on him from every angle — the first moment he felt that spark in his chest, the one of freedom and the one of life.

“I would do anything for you,” he had told Wooyoung back then with tears joining the streaks of rain on his cheeks. Now, so many years later that time begins to blur, those words manifest again.

“I would do anything for you,” but it comes from Wooyoung’s lips now. A softly spoken promise that hangs in the blanket of tension around them.

“Make me feel,” Yeosang requests in return. “That is all I could ever ask of you.”

Wooyoung holds him the way a member of the church would grasp something holy, with a sort of reverence that can’t be put to words. Even as his hands move up to clasp around Yeosang’s cheeks, it is so outwardly intimate that Yeosang feels utterly exposed in the room that houses just the two of them.

“Change can be slow,” he murmurs to Wooyoung moments before air is taken from his lungs and lips caress his. Yeosang lets himself be lulled into Wooyoung’s space, cradling the man awkwardly on the edge of the mattress without dropping all of his weight atop the other, and strong hands tug him closer still. They tip over together, like dominos at the end of a line. Wooyoung pulls him down to lay against him, and their legs manage to tangle together within seconds of resituating to be on their sides. The kiss ends, but the touches persist. First with Wooyoung’s fingers tracing the edge of his jaw, then a hand moving down to catch on the neckline of his shirt, and the Elitist finds himself responding in full to the touches. Wooyoung tilts his head back with a sigh, just long enough for Yeosang to take advantage of it and drag a finger over the firm lines of his neck, skating over the firm bop of his adam’s apple.

“Don’t wanna lose you.” Wooyoung rolls into him. “Can’t.” Hands drift lower to catch on fabric, and Yeosang feels his breath stall as the cloth is stirpped off his chest and thrown elsewhere in the room.

When he’s pushed onto his back and laid out over the mattress, firm thighs straddle his hips and Wooyoung’s weight settles atop him like an anchor. Yeosang wishes to drown completely in the man’s touch and embrace, to fill his senses like an ocean and lose himself altogether in everything that Wooyoung encompasses.

“Change doesn’t mean loss,” Yeosang whispers while he’s still fully lucid and attentive to the conversation at hand.

“I don’t wanna lose any part of you,” Wooyoung admits after a brief stint of silence that leaves the air tingling. “Good, bad, ugly, beautiful — every piece of you is precious to me. I wish to have it all.”

“All that I have is in your hands, Wo—ah!” The touch that starts feather-like over his bare torso takes a sharp turn as Wooyoung bares his nails to Yeosang’s skin and drags down with more passion. The blunt crescents scrape over firmly built muscle that stays tucked away from view, leaving little red streaks in their wake as he goes lower and lower with clear intent.

Yeosang is the larger of the two — taller, bulkier in terms of musculature, stockier even compared to Wooyoung’s lean form and toned muscles. But the moment Wooyoung gets his hands around the older’s hips, he lifts Yeosang with such ease that it’s dizzying in a delightful and heady way. Yeosang scrambles to grip the comforter underneath him as his legs are lifted off the bed, taking both hips and lower back with them, and he clings to the fabric for dear life and a searing heat of arousal rampaging through his veins. Wooyoung takes his pants off with some struggle, unable to keep the fabric from catching in some places, and his impatience is so hasty that by the time he has the pants disposed of, Yeosang is dropped back to the mattress like little more than a ragdoll. He pushes himself up to his elbows, legs drawn up awkwardly with nothing more than a cheap pair of socks and boxers keeping him from being nude before Wooyoung. Even that does not last long with Wooyoung nudging between his bent knees and pinning his hips to the bed with a firm, intoxicating grip.

Two fingers dig underneath the band of his underwear on either side of his hips, but the man makes no effort to strip Yeosang of the cloth entirely. He merely tugs down far enough to let the tip of Yeosang’s cock peek out over the fabric. The content little hum that he lets out as his hungry gaze consumes the man beneath him has Yeosang burning with embarrassment. Wooyoung dips his head lower and takes Yeosang’s semi-hard length between his lips without an ounce of hesitation. Yeosang feels his balance falter the second he jerks a hand up to cover his mouth. It’s too late to keep the strangled whine from slipping out, and Wooyoung acts on that sound with a burning passion as he tucks the entire length of Yeosang’s cock into his mouth.

“Y-You…” Yeosang can’t even finish the thought without turning incoherent without a few seconds of having his dick between Wooyoung’s lips. He’s filling out so quickly that it ought to be humiliating, but Wooyoung takes it in stride without any amount of the usual teasing. A groan overtakes him, the feeling of Wooyoung’s throat constricting bit by bit around the head of his cock falling into the territory of overwhelming pleasure with record speed. The touches still feel like worship in a way with how each flick of his tongue feels more deliberate than the last, and the tight swallows take more of his cock in with each passing second. And despite knowing that Wooyoung has done this sort of thing for reasons that are not his own pleasure in the past, Yeosang can’t help but to feel privileged in the fact that the younger man seems to be enjoying himself entirely.

He twists a leg inward, snaking through the gap between Wooyoung’s torso and the bed, and lets his foot settle atop the bulge of fabric at Wooyoung’s crotch. He’s painfully hard through the pants and his underwear, tenting both articles of clothing so hard that it must hurt. When Yeosang angles his heel into that bulge of fabric, Wooyoung sings. The groan carries through Yeosang’s whole body in a vibration so strong that he straightens his leg a little more out of sheer instinct and shoves his foot hard into Wooyoung’s erection. Rather than giving off a moan, Wooyoung gags around the cock in his mouth, and Yeosang gets a pretty eyeful of the man’s fluttering lashes moments before his eyes roll to the back of his head. The sight of Wooyoung overtaken by pleasure is always one to behold, so much so that Yeosang grinds down harder into his erection as the man is pulling off his length. The sound of a full-bodied moan choked by saliva and cock is sweet music on his ears.

But Wooyoung doesn’t seem to want to waste time right now, not quite pushed into the thrill of foreplay that could come, and instead he presses up into Yeosang’s space and overtakes his lips with a wet and messy kiss. Yeosang trembles under him, drawing both hands up to clasp around Wooyoung’s toned biceps before pinching and tugging at the obtrusive fabric stretched around the skin there.

His lover leans back with a huff and presses two fingers to Yeosang’s chest, knocking him back to lay flat on the bed gently. He then draws himself into a kneeling position overtop and makes a show of the way he pulls shirt from body and throws it to the side.

“Do you wish for me to show you all the ways in which I adore you, my angel?” Wooyoung inquires, breathless but oh so adoring even with the lust flaming through his eyes. Yeosang reaches a hand between their bodies just to feel the sweet curves along Wooyoung’s chest and waist.

“Please.”

He doesn’t bat an eye when Wooyoung climbs down from the bed and resituates his position on the mattress; Yeosang simply allows himself to be turned and twisted like a puppet until Wooyoung is satisfied with him being on hands and knees atop the bed with feet dangling over the edge. He remains stock-still in that position as Wooyoung moves about the room. First his pants get discarded then he’s moving for the bedside table before returning to stand at the foot of the bed right behind where Yeosang waits. The tell-tale click of a bottle cap snapping open has Yeosang’s lashes fluttering before the cool sensation of lube dripping down his skin even hits.

Wooyoung skates a single finger through the liquid, bringing it down the line of his ass and circling his rim without delay. Yeosang’s body tenses at the first intrusion even though he’s expecting the contact, and his partner presses his free hand against his curving spine moments later to ease the automatic discomfort. The tension is a little higher than usual as they having partaken in this kind of pleasure in some time, but his body comes to recognize the feeling of the man behind him within the first minute of having Wooyoung’s finger press deeper inside his hole.

When a second digit slides in alongside the first, Yeosang keens against the bed and presses into the touch with a kind of fervor that only Wooyoung draws out of him. The words that are exchanged are far from dirty, which is also a rarity when it comes to Wooyoung since his mouth is usually so filthy that it’s the source of much embarrassment later on once reality comes back to Yeosang. To be told ‘I need you‘, ‘I don’t want to lose you’, ‘I can’t do this without you’ while in the throes of passion with fingers working him open from behind is a surreal experience of its own that Yeosang can’t define well. By the third finger, however, he is well and truly on his way to having an out of body experience as Wooyoung pulls his free hand forward to circle around the base of Yeosang’s dangling cock and squeezes in time with the steady thrusts of his fingers. No amount of clenching at the bed provides any sort of relief from the consuming feeling, and his cock leans strings of precum like that’s all it’s good for.

Bringing an arm forward, he turns his head to bury his face in the crook of his elbow and conceal the flush painting his cheeks as Wooyoung’s ministrations causes more lewd noises to fill the room. There’s no room in his frazzled brain to think of the way an orgasm creeps up on him time and time again only for the coil to unravel with Wooyoung’s fingers squeezing the base of his cock and pulling him down from tasting that high.

The deprivation almost tastes sweet as it comes from Wooyoung’s hands, but the lack of relief hits in full when his lover pulls away entirely and leaves him void of touch altogether.

“Woo…”

“Shh, angel, shh, I’ll take care of you.”

Yeosang peeks over the edge of his arm to look at what Wooyoung is doing, finding the man with the bottle of lube back in his grasp. His cheeks find their heat again when the sound of the squirting emits from the bottle, and the moment he goes to bury his face away, Wooyoung lets out a low chuckle. The moment he has a hand free, he’s running it down Yeosang’s spine with great care.

“My sweet angel, still so shy over these things, hm?” Wooyoung’s body curls overtop his, and light hits Yeosang’s eyes as his arm is pulled away from his face. “Even after all the things we’ve done together?” Yeosang grits his teeth but manages to stare his lover down without wavering in that moment. The blunt tip of Wooyoung’s cock presses into his hole, teasing his rim with little thrusts that aren’t enough to breach his walls. “After I had you atop our captain’s chair, bouncing in my lap so recklessly?”

Wooyoung pins his wrists to the bed to keep him from hiding further. When their hands overlap, the younger of the two presses his fingers between Yeosang’s and wraps them down into his palms. Wooyoung sinks his cock deep into him in the same movement, offering a wholly intimate embrace for arguably the most intimate act two people can join in, and he’s grateful for the added touch because it grounds him through the unholy stretch his body has to make to accommodate his partner’s size.

“I don’t recall you being so virginly when I had you like that, or when I had you bent over in the kitchen while the others were eating in the next room… should I continue, dear? Hm?” Wooyoung’s taunts continue, none carrying heat or spite to their tone, and the humiliation that burns deep in Yeosang’s gut holds more desire than anything else.

“You — you run your mouth too d-damn much,” Yeosang grits out as the member inside him twitches with interest.

“That’s why I use it on you so much. Keeps me nice and docile for you.” Wooyoung leans back a bit as he laughs, but his hold on Yeosang remains firm even as he rolls his cock in and out of the man.

The sensation amplifies to new heights when Wooyoung continues that motion and builds up a steady rhythm to his thrusts. His hold on Yeosang’s wrists shifts only to bring both arms up over the Elitist’s head so he can pin them there. Using the new angle, Wooyoung seeks out his sweet spot, knocking his hips into Yeosang’s ass with such strength that it knocks him further forward on the mattress. He finds what he was after in that same moment, and it sends stars into Yeosang’s vision with the first rub over his prostate. When the feeling continues with this new angle, Yeosang has no choice but to curl his head inwards just to muffle the cries escaping him. Wooyoung himself is loud enough to alert everyone in the general vicinity of their activities; his grunts and growls paint the canvas of their joint pleasure into something almost carnal.

The more it persists, the more Yeosang loses his mind.

“I have never not loved you,” comes Wooyoung’s breathless murmur broken apart by moans. Yeosang wishes to reply but the rocking motion of hips snapping against his ass and Wooyoung’s cock rubbing over his prostate without relent has his brain turned to utter mush. The only noise that leaves his mouth when he opens it is a slurred moan that contains no intelligible words whatsoever. “And there will never be a day where I do not love you.”

With fingers threaded through his, Yeosang clings to Wooyoung tighter and hopes that his emotions can be conveyed with such a simple touch. It isn’t enough, but it likely never will be, and Yeosang is fairly certain that mere words can’t fully encapsulate the feeling well enough either.

Wooyoung fucks into him until they’re both hurdling over the edge of an orgasm together, and it drags a wet sob from Yeosang’s lips as tears color the comforter beneath his head. Wooyoung stays locked inside him, hips laying flush with his ass as he paints his walls white. They don’t part for quite some time either, both because Wooyoung keeps him pressed to the bed with their position and Yeosang feels so emotionally and physically exhausted that he doesn’t want to budge even an inch.

Yeosang cries the whole trip down from his high, for reasons that he can’t even place, but Wooyoung takes care of him all the same like he does when they’ve done much more intense scenes than this one. He realizes what has been bothering him in the heat of those aftershocks

Love is no easy matter, but loving Wooyoung may be the easiest thing Yeosang has ever chosen to do in his life.

…

“I love you.”

Wooyoung jerks at the softly spoken proclamation, head still buried in the box of knick-knacks he’s currently going through when Yeosang speaks at first.

“Yeo…?” His full lips fold into a delicate pout that accentuates the beauty mark sitting atop his lower lip, and Yeosang finds himself too enamored to say anything for several passing seconds. Wooyoung saves him from having to repeat himself, the words already feeling too far away and foreign to be uttered a second time. He breaks into a small bout of laughter that makes him fold in half over the cardboard box in front of him and grins from ear to ear while showering Yeosang with the warmest gaze he’s seen in a long time from the man.

Yeosang trudges over on heavy feet when he’s waved over to join Wooyoung at his side.

“I’m not sure who Hongjoong is friends with or how he managed to do this, but he got this box of collectibles from Eros so that I can decorate my room comfortably.” Wooyoung’s head falls to the side, bumping harshly against Yeosang’s shoulder. They both seem to move in sync as one contorts to fit to the other’s space until Yeosang has a hand wrapped around Wooyoung’s back to rest on his opposite hip while Wooyoung lets his head fall more comfortably into the older’s space. “Lots of this stuff looks like the things we would smuggle into your room. Not exact replicas of course, but… still nostalgic enough.”

Yeosang hums as his gaze falls over the box. He settles on a small figurine, this one made of black metal that is sleek and shiny all over. Not quite as delicate as the first one he owned, but not nearly as precious as the one he received from Wooyoung in the past.

“Ah, that reminds me!” Wooyoung snaps his index finger and thumb together and hurriedly pulls out of the other’s grasp to move off to a different area of the room. Yeosang nearly pursues him but he’s kept firmly in place by Wooyoung lifting a hand and making a stopping motion as he flits around in search of whatever he’s after. “Here it is, I found it!”

The triumphant little cheer Wooyoung lets out when he’s retrieved the item has Yeosang biting at the inside of his lip to keep from smiling too much. He returns to Yeosang in the blink of an eye, still giggling and smiling so hard that his nose scrunches upwards and his eyes crinkle from the effort.

“Here!”

The item that gets passed into Yeosang’s hand just about fits in his palm, something small and nondescript upon first glance, and he almost looks right over it without much care. In the fleeting glance he passes over it on his way to look at Wooyoung’s face though, he’s left to do a double take and blink down at what sits in his hand with nothing but shock filling his veins. That feeling twists and turns as his heart does.

A small figurine, almost like the one sitting in the box right now that is shiny and new and made of high quality material but starkly different in that it is made of cheap wood and poorly carved. Etched into the base lies two sets of initials side by side with nothing more than a diagonal line separating them.

When he manages to look at Wooyoung again, the man rests a hand overtop the one that holds the gift and clasps it tight between their shared grips.

“I love you too, Yeosang.”

✧✧✧

a/n: hello and welcome. now i know i havent answered all the asks about 47 yet... but i have plans to do some things on the weekend so i wanted to get this out first LSKJFL i will consolidate asks soon but in the meantime i decided CHAOS WAS ON THE MENU BABY! but also these two are so near and dear to me i’ve actually had this written since before i finished 47 and was waiting for this chance to post it so im very excited to post it TT i hope you guys enjoy as much as i do <33 hugs n kisses <33

Mists of Celeste is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

[ginkgo-gremlin]

Lesbians/WLW of tumblr, I have a question.

tw for slurs, discussion of slur reclamation, specifically the d-word in reference to wlw/lesbians. If that would be triggering for you or if you don't believe in slur reclamation, this is not the post for you.

Background: I'm gender fluid and my sexuality is kind of this amorphous blob? I'm demi-sexual to a certain extent but I'm attracted to most genders and I'm currently dating a bisexual woman. Before I came out as non-binary I identified as a lesbian (but now I realize I'm attracted to men just not in a straight way if that makes sense? not the point of this post).

Anyway, on my more feminine days (which honestly aren't super common) I'll sometimes refer to me and my partner as lesbians, like 'damn a plant lesbian moment for real' or something similar. I realize it would be more accurate to use sapphic or wlw but I have a tendency to use 'gay' and 'lesbian' as filler words when I'm around people who already understand the nuance (like my partner, my friends and I know that we're not actually lesbians and sapphic would be more accurate but realize lesbian being said for convenience/the phrase is 'plant lesbian' not 'plant wlw') All that being said sometimes my gender identity is best described as 'extremely butch lesbian' (edit: I mean this as in I feel like a woman in the same way an extremely butch lesbian is a woman, not that I'm actually an extremely butch lesbian because the lesbian part speaks more to sexuality, not gender) if that makes sense at all lmao (sexuality and gender can be so fluid and it just kind of gets confusing I'm sorry T-T)

I've had pretty much every homophobic/transphobic slur used to refer to me, dyke being included in that (especially because I identified as strictly a lesbian for a while). And sometimes I want to reclaim it, especially when I'm dressed in a very stereotypically 'lesbian' way. Like 'this outfit is giving home Depot Dyke' but I don't want to use a word that doesn't 'belong' to me if that makes sense.

TLDR: gender fluid person (who on more feminine days is in a sort of wlw relationship if you squint and tilt your head) is wondering if dyke is an okay slur for them to reclaim as they have been referred to as that in the past.