#i say as if going nowhere didn't literally just update haha

[steventhusiast]

STWG prompt 2/6/24

prompt: coming out

pairing/character(s): steddie, Dustin, Lucas, Mike

. . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

Eddie fucked up. Big time.

See, he's truly embraced his freak status at Hawkins High. Meaning he doesn't exactly shy away from his queerness. He doesn't confirm it, not for people he's not friends with. It's just useful. Being gay is the kind of 'freak' that makes the popular kids steer clear from him, just in case they, you know, catch the queer from him.

But with his fellow freaks? They know he's gay.

In fact, they know he has a boyfriend.

He never shares who said boyfriend is, or the fact that he used to be nicknamed The Hair, because Steve doesn't want anyone to know. He's.. private about his sexuality, to say the least. And Eddie gets it. Hawkins is in the middle of nowhere, it's not exactly gay-friendly like some parts of bigger cities. So his friends don't know who his boyfriend is.

They won't until well after Steve's come out to his own friends, which he hasn't said he's ready for yet. Eddie's letting him go at his own pace, he doesn't even bring it up to him. He doesn't want Steve to feel pressured. Steve doesn't have a Wayne there to support him through everything, after all.

Anyway, despite him being anonymous, Eddie always gives everyone an update on his boyfriend before they start the session of DnD each week. It's kind of a bit for everyone involved at this point.

And in the first session that Eddie's newest fresh sheep attend, he refuses to shy away from it. Either they'll be bigots (unlikely) or they'll be fine with it! It's a risk he's willing to take for his pride.

So he gives the update.

"How's your boyfriend, Ed?" Gareth asks with a teasing grin, and Eddie's closest friends lean toward him with giggles.

"Well, my sweetheart has had a great week. Remember that job I told you he'd applied for?"

"Assistant basketball coach for a kids team?" Jeff checks, and Eddie points at him like he's just scored a point.

"That's the one! He got the job! It's a bit of a drive but it sure as shit beats the minimum wage bullshit he was doing before. I swear, his manager actually hates his guts for no reason."

The existing Hellfire members all cheer at the news, whilst one of the new recruits, Henderson, makes an inquisitive noise and chuckles.

"That's crazy, because my friend Steve called me yesterday with super similar news! Small world, huh?" He says it so casually, looking down straight after to fiddle with his dice.

But Eddie feels like the world stops, his hands freezing in the middle of unfolding his dungeon master screen. Fuck. Henderson is one of Steve's kids.

Maybe no one has actually caught on yet. A sneaky glance to his friends reveals nothing but confused frowns on their faces.

"You guys might have known Steve, actually. Steve Harrington? Used to be a mega asshole through most of high school." Wheeler says in a way that somehow sounds simultaneously fond and like he despises Steve.

"He's great now, though! Like, totally reformed. Such a mom." Sinclair adds on.

Eddie nods passively at their words, and feels Gareth, Jeff and Paul's eyes on him. Right, he's still frozen in shock. He forces himself to relax, and finally finishes setting up the DM screen.

"Haha, what a coincidence." He manages, clearing his throat in the middle to clear up an unfortunate voice crack.

That voice crack gets all three of the kids to tilt their heads at him, and then their eyes light up like they've just won the lottery.

Shit shit shit. Hopefully they haven't put two and two together.

Somehow, he manages to make it through the session without revealing anything else, but as he draws it to a close his heart starts beating faster. He doesn't know how he didn't put it together before that these kids are Steve's kids. Steve is literally going to be late to their date night because he has to pick them up from an afterschool activitiy.

What other club meets up on a Friday but Hellfire?

He shakes his head and starts speeding through packing up his stuff. He's going through in his head ways to apologise to Steve in case the kids have figured it out, heart beating out of his chest as he zips his backpack up and leaves the room. The group of newbies run out after him, though.

"Eddie, wait up!" Henderson shouts after him, and he winces but stops.

"What's up?" He says with what he hopes is a smile but is probably a grimace.

"It's so funny how you're Steve's secret boyfriend." Henderson says with a giggle after he's checked no one else has left the drama room yet.

Wait, what? Eddie frowns at him, mouth open. Before he can question anything Sinclair nods along in agreement.

"We've been guessing for weeks now. You can't tell him we found out through you, I want to win our bet."

"If we figure out who his boyfriend is by the end of the month he's taking us to that tabletop RPG store in Indy." Wheeler adds on.

Eddie gapes at them for another second.

"Wait, Steve- he came out to you? When?" He manages, and the three boys tilt their heads at him.

"Like, since a month ago?" Sinclair guesses after a moment of thought, and Eddie lets out a quiet 'huh'.

"What, do you guys not talk about that shit?" Henderson asks, and Eddie shakes his head slowly, thinking back on if he had been told and had just forgotten.

Then it clicks. Just under a month ago, Steve had started to bring up the topic of coming out, and Eddie had gently insisted he didn't mind if Steve never came out and that he loves him anyway and he doesn't want him to feel pressured. And Steve had smiled fondly and let it go.

Had Steve been trying to tell him he came out to his kids?

He lets his head drop and takes a few deep breaths, trying to slow his heart rate. Thank fuck. He hasn't just accidentally outed his boyfriend.

"He's actually waiting for us in his car. I would say come with, but..."

"We're serious about this bet."

Eddie nods, and waves his hand in their general direction.

"Yeah, of course. Sure. You- you go win that bet. Jesus christ."

He hears them walk away and lets out an incredulous laugh to himself before he hears the drama room door swing open again, the chatter of Jeff, Gareth and Paul cutting off when they see the state he's in.

"You good, man?" Paul asks, and Eddie just lets out a sigh.

"Totally fine. Just thinking about wooing my sweetheart." He says, like they've walked into a joke he's set up.

They all groan, but continue walking toward the school's exit, and Eddie stays there, recovering from that shitshow.

[recallthename]

Hey, hello! I'm sorry if you've answered this question to others before, but in case you read fanfiction, can you recommend me some? I was reading until recently ''Carry That Weight'' by waveofahand (and then its continuation ''Hello, Goodbye''), and it was long and exciting but I reached its last written chapter and I'm sad. I decided to ask you, because you like Paul, me too, and maybe you'd know some good Paul focused (though they don't have to be entirely) or at least Paul-respecting fics. They can be Mclennon of course. I love them angsty... but I'd be curious to check any recs.

i do read fic! i'm pretty picky about it though, so i don't feel like i have that much. but i'm always happy to rec!  especially cause it seems like we have similar tastes.

first off, there are two wips i'm reading that i am deeply into. which is saying something since i normally stridently avoid wips.  these do both still have chapters regularly coming out, so i feel confident reccing them (which i wouldn’t if they seem abandoned)

Going Nowhere by inspiteallthedanger - When Paul gets the news, he rushes out to New York and ends up bringing an injured John back to England. Once there, they try and figure out how to find their way back to one another. A post-1980 fix-it that includes flashbacks to some major moments in their past and an exploration of where John and Paul might have ended up if John had lived.

(It's Just) Another Day by obstinatrix - Cavendish, 1974; The stars, it seems, have aligned: the rare weekend has arisen upon which both Ringo and the McCartneys will be in London at the same time. This is lucky, because Paul has something to tell Ringo — something nobody’s sure how John would react to if he were ever to find out. Or: they’re lesbians, Harold. Eventual John/Paul with lots of other stuff along the way.

the rest are all completed fics.  i also tried to only include longer ones.  partially because they’re my preference and partially cause i’m more likely to remember them well lol.  maybe some day i’ll make a proper Long Post with every bookmark i have on ao3.

The Wild And Windy Night by tikk - 26k words - After the Beatles split, John and Paul's relationship deteriorates hard and fast. John grows more and more reckless, and Paul doesn't know how to reach him. Until suddenly Paul is broken apart, just as John starts to pull himself together.  if you read nothing else i rec, read this one.  probably my favorite in the fandom, i still think about it all the time even though it was one of the first i read.

Throw The Wine by savageandwise - 51k words - "But you realise that you're in real life, and you don't split up a beautiful thing with a beautiful thing." -Paul McCartney Or do you?

i was a younger man then (now) (post hoc) by fingersfallingupwards - 27k words - John’s twelve when a bloke appears from a flaming pie and says, “From this day forward you are Beatles with an ‘a.’” The bloke is Paul. Or: paul and john meet at all ages and eras and john is the time-traveler’s wife the way only john lennon can be

metered by fingersfallingupwards - 44k words - "The bloke said something just the same as you did, about floating off unless tied down, or maybe it was the other way around, getting tied down to float off, y'know.”- OR: Canon-era John and Paul haphazardly invent BDSM, and learn a few things about power, surrender, pleasure, and themselves along the way

You're a Dream Lover by thisbirdhadflown - 44k words - "John had once mused that reality leaves a lot to the imagination. Christ, don’t they know it. But what you don’t dare do in real life and what you don’t dare imagine leaves what you dream. It’s the closest thing to truth he’s ever had. And then there’s John, reigning above everything. Emperor of Eternity." Paul and John start sharing lucid dreams together in the summer of 1967.

We'll Always Have Paris by bunnoculars - 22k words - John and Paul go to Paris. Part 1 is set during their trip over John's birthday in 1961, and Part 2 is set during their residency at Olympia Theatre in 1964. The last part would've been set during their impromptu visit in 1966, but I have no plans to write it.

if you’re a paul fan and not a strident mclennon, i recommend checking out what (unfortunately little) there is of paul/omc on ao3.  there are a few great ones with robert fraser, downtothelastdrop seems determined to hook him up with everyone and i’m obsessed with it.  also i’m not 100% if my privacy is open (i think so?) but here’s my ao3 bookmarks, which has all of the shorter/incomplete wips i’ve loved that i neglected to list here.  again i will probably actually make a rec list on tumblr eventually, but just for in the mean time.

hope you find some stuff you like!

[evesbeve]

Hey there, you said your ask box was open for Justin Min's whole thing? I guess I just slept through the whole thing, honestly - could you just go over a gist of everything that happened? I get that it seems like a PR team didn't know how to use twitter (which, mood) and f-ed things up for him, but what were they "cleaning up" in the first place, who's Anna what did they do that warranted such a bizarre thread from the PR team, etc...? 😳

Hey! Okay so this is going to be a lot, so buckle up.

Right off the bat, I just want to say that Justin isn’t cancelled. The situation has been mostly resolved right now (more on that later).

So around a week ago, Justin Min started deleting his replies to fans. Depending on whether you’re on Twitter or not, you might know that Justin is one of the most interactive people of the cast. He knows a lot of fans by name, he has inside jokes with us, and he just interacts a lot with his fanbase. So you can imagine why him suddenly starting to delete his replies was a bit upsetting. There was nothing we could do about it though.

And suddenly, two days ago, Justin deactivated his account out of nowhere, which caused all kinds of drama to go down.

People started pointing the finger at specific accounts saying it was their fault that Justin deactivated (don’t even get me started on that logic; why a grown-ass adult deactivate because of a few teenagers is above me, it literally made no sense), even sending death threats. Others suspected that he got suspended because Twitter’s algorithm saw all these tweets get deleted and was like “welp, bot time.” Long story short, lots of misinformation was going around.

And then out of the blue, Justin’s account was reactivated, and he made a thread directed at Anna.

Now, who is Anna? Anna is a stan on twitter, whose @ I won’t be sharing for privacy, but here’s how they’re relevant in this:

Remember when I mentioned the inside jokes? Well, one of them was between a fan called Matt and Justin. Matt kept commenting on Justin’s tweets asking him to say trans rights. On the one year anniversary of Matt asking Justin to say trans rights, Justin finally said it. Then, Matt made a poll asking other stans what he should have Justin say next, and lesbian rights won.

Around a month ago, Matt replied to one of Justin’s tweets, and Justin responded with something along the lines of “haha, i know this is just an attempt to get me to say lesbian rights,” referencing the inside joke. People started commenting that the way he phrased it was a bit :/ so then he replied to his own tweet with something like “well, i’ll delete this before i get cancelled,” and that’s when things spiraled.

[id: Justin Min’s tweet #1: i see that you are trying to butter me up to say lesbian rights, nice try, matt. nice try.

Justin Min’s tweet #2: oh, here we go. this is an inside joke between myself and matt, if you’ve been a part o fthis fandom for more than a few weeks. but alas, i will have to delete this now before i’m cancelled by the end of the day. keep loving, everyone.]

Lesbians get spoken over and looked down upon not only by straight people, but also the LGBT community. So when Justin tweeted that, lesbians were like “this sounds as if you care more about your own self image rather than our community.” Then, non-lesbians got involved and started either a) calling Justin lesbophobic (which lesbians never did) or b) blindly defending Justin and saying he did nothing wrong.

(Side note: I am not a lesbian, and I’m not trying to speak over lesbians in this situation. But I did talk about this to some of my friends who are lesbians, and they told me that what Justin did wasn’t as big of a deal as Twitter made it out to be. These are their words, not mine. All I know is that it was definitely not bad-intentioned, just a huge misunderstanding.)

Anyway, Anna made a thread explaining to Justin why him defending himself came out as harmful towards the lesbian community, and then Justin apologised and that was it.

Which brings us back to yesterday (26/9/2020).

Everyone is freaking out, posting misinformation, panicking. I don’t exactly,,, know how, but the #justinminisoverparty hashtag started being used for actual hate towards Justin for deactivating, and some people (including Anna, though I think their tweet was in the context of a joke? please take this with a grain of salt though. update: it was in the context of a joke) mentioned that Justin is a lesbophobe.

A few hours later, Justin reactivated his account, tagged Anna, and said this (though it was actually his PR team, more on that later):

[id: Justin’s Tweet: @ [redacted] quickly jumping back on here from my twt break because i’m receiving messages that you’re continuing to spread misinformation, so i want to clarify.]

[id: Justin’s Tweets: 1. all of my interactions with you were deleted because of the need to set clear boundaries due to the fact that your incessant messages and replies from multiple accounts over the last several months were veering into stalking/harassment.

2. for someone who appears to pride themselves on reminding their friends/followers on a daily basis to be careful of the language they use on this app, you seem to be fine with flippantly labeling someone as homophobic/lesbophobic as if they’re cute little adjectives to give to someone, not realizing that such labels have real-life consequences.]

[id: Justin’s Tweets: 3. also noting here than in your original thread, you stated that you neither considered me nor my words to actually be lesbophobic, so a bit confused as to why your story has suddenly changed.

4. i realize you’re young, so i’m genuinely hoping you use this opportunity to learn and grow andbe a little more mindful the next time you decide to tweet.]

The next twenty minutes were pure chaos. Justin deactivated again, everyone started freaking out because that was very out of character for him. People were cancelling him because this could have easily been resolved in DMs, or tweeted without the mention of Anna (a minor) from a mainstream Twitter account.

And then, Justin Min DMed another fan on Instagram (her name is Em) about the situation.

Who is Em? For starters, I’d like to say that I personally know Em and that she’s one of my best friends. I’ve known her for more than a year now, and I can personally vouch for her. Everything that she posted is 100% true (if you want the thread where she posts proof of the DMs, please send me a different ask because I’m scared tumblr will not post this in the tag if I include it here).

The reason Justin DMed her out of all people is because he also kinda knows her? As I mentioned, Justin interacts with us on Twitter a lot, and Em is the one person he’s responded to the most, so he knows who she is. (He’s tagged her more times than other cast members, at least before all his tweets were deleted by his PR team.)

Anyway, this is what Em tweeted:

[id: Em’s tweets: please read this !!!

justin dmed me on instagram and basically the gist of it is that he hired a pr team and they tweeted the thread at anna without knowing everyone could see it. all of the tweets being deleted/ him deactivating was also them.]

Below is the image Em attached to the tweet:

[id: Justin’s DM to Em: hey. this is justin. i’m just hearing about what’s happening on twitter right now. for context, i was asked to work with a team of people to “clean up” my twitter in the past few weeks. they’ve taken the liberty of deleting a bunch of my responses and posts in order to safeguard me (whatever that means) as well as deactivating my account to comb through other things.i believe they accidentally sent anna a message and mistakenly believed the function for her to comment only would mean that she would be the only one to see it as well. needless to say, i’m no longer working with this team and want to personally apologize to her. do you know any way i can get into contact with her?]

And then, in a follow-up tweet:

[id: Em’s text at Justin: sorry for dming you again. is there any other way i can help? i just feel really bad about this whole thing and i know how quickly this stuff can spread if it’s not taken care of

Justin’s text: i mean, i guess you can share the information i’ve given you? it’ll take a bit of time for me to take back ownership on everything as i sever ties with that team, so maybe the sooner the better people know.

Em’s text: okay ! is it okay if i tweet a screenshot

Justin’s text: sure.]

Then Justin’s account got reactivated an hour ago (almost 24hs after Em’s tweets), and he tweeted this:

[id: Justin’s tweet: hi. it’s me. thank you for all your messages. this has been an incredibly tough week for me on multiple fronts. some things you might already be aware of; many other things you don’t know about.asking for a bit of privacy as i take sometime to unplug. hoping to be back soon.]

And that’s all, I think? There’s lots we don’t know about what happened yet, so please please please try not to spread misinformation. This is a stressful situation for us on Twitter, and especially for Justin, and misinformation going around is the last thing we need right now.

tl;dr: Justin Min hired a PR Team that started deleting all of his tweets and deactivated his account. Misinformation started spreading, people started cancelling Justin for no reason. The PR Team decided to respond to Anna, made the response public, deactivated again. Justin DMed Em and explained the situation, and an hour ago, he reactivated and said he’s taking a small break to sort things out.

If anyone has any other questions/clarifications, my askbox is open! Hope this shed some light on the situation <3

UPDATE 28/9/2020: Justin has DMed and apologised to Anna for the situation, and Anna has accepted the apology. Anna posted all of it on their account, but again, if you want a link, send me an ask!

[imnotdepressedimbisexual]

Day 3 of brain??

I woke up at 8 which is pretty late one my standards. I had to go to work but I was back before 11. For some reason I had a really short shift.

Now I hadn't told my parents about my boyfriend coming over for dinner (and I wasnt going to say that he was my boyfriend anyways) but my oldest sister came over with her son and had to speak to dad do I took the opportunity to warn her so that she doesn't interrogate the shit outta him. My parents overhead and FLIPPED cuz they thought I was bringing over a (girl) friend. Anyways I told them that I want sure if he was coming and I hung out at the other side of the house for a seasonable amount of time.

After lunch I realised how bored I was and planned to go and sit in that rainwater drain that I spoke about in yesterday's rant, and read. I needed an excuse (and my parents don't know that I have a phone bcuz they took my phone away and my mate have me yet old phone to use) I told my parents I was going to see if he (bf) was coming for dinner or not. I planned on staying out for about two hours but my parents didn't buy it but let me go out anyways on the condition I was back in half an hour. Like wtf

Anyways I chucked on the first top I saw on the ground (which sadly was a very cropped hoodie) and I tell U I RAN MY ASS over there. He wasn't coming which was annoying cuz I miss him like hell rn haha. On the way home me best mate called me and told me that she wanted to come. And so she did.

I don't think my parents were too thrilled. Mum didn't want anyone at all over. Dad was just mad idfk like ok boomer. Dinner was awkward as hell at the beginning but during the last hour or so it got better. She called her mum and asked to get picked up and get mum got kinda lost. My sister pulled out of the driveway and saw her running across the road (to her mum's car) and didn't see her mum's car and FLIPPED. She called dad and dad FREAKED. They thought that some thing was going to happen to her. We called her like 5 times and she didn't answer.

Dad asked me for the address and he left asap to her house to see if she was home. Obviously she was and like as soon as dad got in the car she called back and said she was fine. My straight idiot boomer of a dad still went to her house. Dumbass. She was home. Dad came home. Yelled at me?? And left again. He still isn't home rn pray for me.

Also I texted my boyfriend who is rather shy btw and he just out of nowhere kept calling me hot and I'm just like bro.. we are literally talking about your drunk dad rn. He hasn't texted me back and it has been like 45 minutes and I'm tired and I'm scared. Gunna fall asleep before he answers. If that happens he's Gunna unsend the messages cuz he's shyy

I'm so confused thanks for coming to my tEd tAlK

Update: he answered ONE HOUR LATER in the middle of the night with "please be awake"