#i sharpened up the colors and made it more vibrant but it was already really good tbh

[tvxcue]

BANG YONGGUK - THE THIRD EP

[lastencoregraphics]

BEFORE/AFTER COLORING CHALLENGE

I think I made this voluntarily after last year's giftober, but since I'm one gifset short of finishing this year's set & I got tagged by @elennemigo (with some insane colorings - i think i'll cry if i ever pick up making marvel gifs) here's some before & after coloring* for this year's giftober gifs :)

*these already have blurs & sharpenings to make the base gif look better

This was for day 4: eyes. I wanted to contrast the eye color change along the HF movies, thus I changed the background & sakura's hair more purple from the original blue/gray bg & blue-purple hair. I also removed the soft white color that ufotable slaps on everything.

This was for day 28: change. It was overall a very gray scene, made it brighter & more vibrant. To achieve this result I actually slapped on a whole 18 adjustment layers lol. Boosting the green of the scarf was a challenge of itself really, photoshop was very certain that it was not green.

Day 22 Yellow was easy mode, making the oranges & reds more yellow, brightening the gif, the usual.

Dat 13: clocks. The whole scene was very green, so i boosted the blues and yellows, keeping the green out.

DAY 29: backbags/handbags - I wanted to make the scenes brighter while softly colored, the cyans are a lot more visible after the adjustments. There was a blue/gray filter on the scene, which I removed, bringing more light to the scene.

Day 30: goodbye. This scene is very purple, even Romani/Solomon got some of that, so I toned down the blues in his skin making it more warmly colored. The background sky was turned blue.

Each of these gifsets took hours to create, the blur I use to fade out the background & multiple unnecessary details a bit, then i sharpen twice with different settings to make the characters stand out more against the background.

Make sure to check out the other participants in @giftober this year & remember to support the content creators by reblogging the content that you enjoy! ❤

[kerasines]

GIF Tutorial for Beginners

People keep asking me to teach them how to make gifs and I end up writing them long confusing messages, so I figured maybe it’s time to just write up an actual clean tutorial instead! This is supposed to be for total beginners! (Or people who want to switch to a new process that I���ve curated and streamlined over 8 years of making gifs.) I’ll try to keep this as barebones as possible, and won’t include all the advanced stuff I usually add. I hope it’s easy enough to follow, and I’ll include some links at the end for more stuff. I really do think it’s better to make a few simple gifs before doing more complicated stuff though, just to get used to it!

There will be three sections in this tutorial: #1 Basics - How to make a gif in PS at all #2 Sharpen - How to use sharpen/denoise filters in an easy way #3 Colouring - Just a few very basic adjustment layers

What you need:

A video (most common formats should work, although .mkv doesn’t always)

Photoshop (I use PS CC 2018 - this one because I'm morally opposed to Adobe’s subscription model - but versions aren’t super different from each other)

In the end, you should hopefully be able to make something like this:

This is gonna be so long. Sorry. You can make a gif with just part #1! The rest is just to make it look better.

#1 Basics

If any of the tools/functions aren’t where they should be for you, your best bet is googling it, you might need to change something in your preferences!

Make sure to save your PS file... often. PS has a tendency to crash, especially on laptops.

First, you need to get the video file. I recommend a shorter video, a few minutes long, if it’s longer you might want to cut it into shorter parts beforehand. This is just because PS’s video import tool sucks.

I chose the Butter MV, specifically Jungkook’s body roll at 1:24 because that’s what I want to look at for the duration of this tutorial. No further questions, thanks.

1. Open PS, go to File > Import > Video Frames to Layers

2. In the little pop-up, choose the part of the video that you want to gif. This will import every frame of the video into PS as a layer, so it has to be a relatively short part, or it’ll take ages (and gifs can’t be that big anyway). Now you can also see why it’s almost impossible to select the correct part if the video is too long.

The little controls at the bottom are for trimming, the one in the middle just for the preview. Make sure “Make Frame Animation” is selected! Then click OK.

3. Now you have your layers, and you have a frame animation! On the right are your layers, that’s where we’ll apply the colouring etc. later on. On the bottom, that’s your timeline or frame animation - that’s what the gif will be in the end! So if you delete frames, the layers will still be there, but they won’t show up in the gif. If you click on a frame, you can see the little eye checkmark on the layer that’s currently visible.

4. The timeline controls at the bottom that are relevant right now: set to “forever” so the gif will loop, you can play the animation with the play button, and you can delete the selected frame(s). The number on each frame is the speed of the gif, depending on the video I usually set it to 0.05 or 0.06 (photoshop lies to you when you play the animation, the only way to test this is to open the finished gif, preferably on tumblr or wherever you want to upload it).

5. As you can see, the animation starts a bit before the actual part that I want, so go ahead and delete all the frames in the animation that you don’t want! You can delete the corresponding layers too if you want, to make the PS file smaller, but it has no influence on the gif. (Hold Shift to select multiple frames as usual)

6. Next, we’re gonna crop the gif however we want! You can do this with the crop tool in the left sidebar, but with gifs like this where there’s a lot of moving parts, I sometimes just use the selection tool in the left sidebar, like so:

When you click on different frames, the selection stays, and you can check to make sure Jungkook doesn’t suddenly go out of frame if you crop it like that!

At this point, make sure the selection/crop isn’t smaller than you want the gif to be! For tumblr, what matters is the width (in pixels) of gifs. In the end, the width dimensions on tumblr should be 540px (1 gif per row), 268px (2 gifs per row), or 177/178px (3 gifs per row). Anything else will lead to very shitty resizing!

For this gif I’m going full sized, meaning 540px wide, so I made sure my selection isn’t smaller than that.

Then just go to Image > Crop, and it’s done!

7. Check to see if this is what you want, then resize: go to Image > Image Size to resize the picture. Make sure the little “link” between Width and Height is active (to keep the same aspect ratio), then set the width to 540px or whatever you chose. I always set the resample option to Bicubic.

Once that’s done, set the zoom to 100% right above the timeline, to see what it really looks like.

Almost done! A little note about the sizing: width is the important part for tumblr, but if you want to make a whole gif set (especially with more than 1 gif per row!!!) make sure to make all the gifs the same height, otherwise they won’t line up and tumblr will do whatever it wants.

I ended up making mine 540 x 400 and ended up with this:

8. Time to save the gif!! Go to File > Export > Save for Web (OR just use the shortcut Ctrl + Shift + Alt + S) (or whatever it is on Mac).

In the pop-up, you can change things about the gif, but most things should already be the way you want it (Image size, Looping option forever). Selective should be the default, just like the rest.

You can choose between Pattern and Diffusion, some gif makers swear on one or the other, I go back and forth.

On the bottom left, you can see the size of your gif. Keep an eye on that! I believe Tumblr allows every single gif to be up to 10mb, but I try to keep mine under 5mb or close to it, because I think tumblr adds compression if it gets closer to 10mb?? Anyway back in my day you couldn’t upload anything over 1mb. You’ll never know our struggles.

Then just save it, and that’s it, you made a gif! Well done!! Here’s the end result:

:)

#2 Sharpen

There are countless ways out there to make gifs as smooth and clean as possible! Here I’ll show you the easiest way, but it also provides a good basis for other methods. The main difficulty is that you you need to sharpen the layers, but you don’t want to 100 layers one by one. So what we’re gonna do is convert the layers into a Smart Object, which functions as one layer!

1. Convert the frame animation timeline to a video timeline with the little button right underneath on the left:

It should look like this, and I’m sorry but I can’t explain this one because I’m not an expert here, but you can just ignore it:

2. Select all layers: Select > All Layers, or just manually. 

Then right click on the layers > Convert to Smart Object. Now there’s only one layer left, but don’t worry, the frames are still there!

3. De-noise! It reduces noise, takes away some of that grain. More necessary in some videos. It also makes it less sharp, so I do this one first. Filter > Noise > Reduce Noise

My default settings are, Strength: 6, Preserve Details: 60, Reduce Color Noise: 45, Sharpen Details: 25, Remove JPEG Artifact: No. But you can play around, especially with the strength, and see how the little preview looks. Don’t apply too much of it! Or it will look weirdly smooth with no details in the end.

4. File > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen. 

Settings: I usually have mine at Amount: 500, Reduce Noise: 5, and Radius at either 0.2 or 0.3, depending on the video. I’ll actually do 0.3 here, because I find it a bit blurry otherwise. If you sharpen more, it can quickly get grainy.

The difference isn’t huge, but here’s a little before and after denoise & sharpen:

5. Technically you can just save it as a gif (save for web) as shown above now, or you can convert it back to a frame animation, which I’d recommend especially if you use certain other sharpening methods (I’ll show you how to convert it back at the end of the colouring part), but for now, let’s go straight to the next part:

#3 Colouring

Now, you CAN do this part right after part #1, still in frame animation, without a smart object. I prefer it like this because sometimes PS acts weird, but if you want to skip the smart object stuff: select all frames, and add the adjustment layers at the very top, above all the other layers. (It only affects selected frames; and it only affects the layers under it.)

The adjustment layers should be above the layer tray, and these are the ones we’ll use today: Brightness/Contrast, Curves, Vibrance, Color Balance, Selective Color.

All of these are optional! You can do one, or all, or any combination. This is just the very most basic for me to get a gif to a point that I like. I’d recommend sticking to these for a start, but once you get the hang of it, definitely feel free to play around! It’s fun! Every gif maker has different preferences here, too, so there’s tutorials for everything.

1. Curves: Just click Auto, tbh. You can play around, but Auto works fine for me as a start, just to brighten or darken some parts as a base.

2. Brightness/Contrast: Usually videos are a bit dark, and contrast can help to make it seem sharper AND cut down on gif size, so I usually just up both of them a bit (but not too much! Or it’ll look cheap). Here I put them at B: 19, C: 23

3. Vibrance: I love very vibrant and colourful gifs, so I usually up the vibrance (and sometimes the saturation). This one is already very vibrant, so I only put +5, but if you try to colour, say, a very moody tv show, this can help wonders, especially if you want to work with the colours more later.

If you prefer less vibrant gifs, you can also lower the values here!

4. Color Balance: getting a bit more complicated now. Often, videos will have a slight yellow or green or blue tint, and this is where you can correct that. This video is a bit yellow, so I added +17 Blue. It was still too warm, so i added -11 Cyan as well. This neutralized the yellow tint, but I wanted some of the reddish tone back, so I added -5 Magenta. I usually do a similar process like that, depending on the tone. 

Instead of Midtones, you can also do this for Shadows and Highlights individually.

5. Selective Color: now this is the most complicated, but also the most fun to play around in my opinion! Be careful here, if you do something too extreme it’ll look like shit or make the gif super grainy. I some rough goals in mind here: make the blue hair as blue as possible, make their skin tone a bit less pale, and enhance the black and white (which I always do).

You choose a colour at the top, and then add or subtract cyan/magenta/yellow/black values for that colour.

Skin tone: yellow and red. For this gif, I just added black to both, making them darker. Sometimes, if you change one or both those colours for a different part of the gif (for example, if I wanted to make the background less yellow, I’d subtract yellow from the yellows - but then I’d add yellow to the reds, to make the skin tone natural again.)

Blue hair: Just ramp up the cyan for the blues. Be careful with putting anything to +100, but here it’s already so bright that it should be fine. His roots are more purple, so I changed the magentas by adding cyan and black, and subtracting magenta and yellow. It’s not super clean, but fine for our purposes.

Black/white: depending on the gif, I often either add or subtract black to the whites. Adding makes the highlights less blinding, a bit darker, and flatter (I like to do that if one side of the face is bright white in the sunlight, for example). Subtracting creates contrast, makes it brighter, can wash it out. It can also lessen the gif size, and here it’s mostly just the tracksuit instead of important details, so I subtracted black. For the blacks, I almost always just add a bit of black, to make it more intense. Just like adding contrast, this can make the gif seem sharper and less grainy.

And done! 

6. You could just save it as gif now, but as I said, I prefer to convert it back to frame animation timeline first, if only because I like to let it play through before I save it, and it works better for me there than in the video timeline.

Select all frames, then click the little menu on the top right of the video timeline > Convert Frames > Flatten Frames into Clips

7. When you scroll down to the bottom of the layers now, the old smart object + adjustment layers should be at the bottom, under all the new layers. Delete the old ones, we don’t need them anymore.

8. Convert the timeline back to frame animation, by clicking the little button at the bottom left of the video timeline:

9. Click on the menu top right of the timeline again > Make Frames from Layers

10. Now, just some potential cleaning left to do. Sometimes, there’s a doubled or empty frame or layer at the beginning or end, just delete those as necessary. The timing of the frames is probably off, too, just select all frames and set the delay time to 0.05 (or whatever).

Now your done! Save as gif, and you should get this:

I included some bonus links and tips after this but tumblr ate that whole part so I guess it’s going into a separate post. (Here is is)

Anyway, I tried to make this as easy to follow as possible for beginners, but feel free to send me an ask for clarification anytime. Hope this helps, now go make gifs and have fun!!

[korra-of-the-watertribe]

Hi! Your gifs are always so vibrant and pretty. What's your giffing process if you don't mind me asking?

Thank you for this sweet message!

I don't mind at all anon! This is going to be a pretty basic coloring tutorial, for more advanced stuff I would recommend looking at @clubgif or other photoshop resource blogs.

I do want to say that I am by no means an expert in photoshop, and that there are many different ways to make and edit gifs/photosets. This is the method I've found works best for me :)

Putting this under the cut because it's long:

Here is an explanation of how I make gifs using "import frames to layers." I've tried doing the screencap method but the screencapping programs always give me viruses so I prefer video frames to layers. I use clipconverter.cc to download videos from youtube. And always try to use 1080 videos (720 can work for smaller gifs).

So after I've made my basic gif, the first thing I do is crop. I set the crop ratio to 5:3, but you can play around with the dimensions all you like.

After I've cropped, I recently started using @grimreaper 's hd sharpening action. I've tried a lot of different sharpening methods, but this is the one I've found to be the easiest and highest quality.

Then I use the curves layer to brighten up the gif. I click the white eyedropper and then click the part I want to be brightest, in this case the white sea foam:

Then I make a second curves layer, select the black eyedropper, and click the part I want to be the darkest (the folds of her dress) to give it contrast:

Then I add a levels layer to balance things out: (Usually I just click auto, but if that doesn't look good I'll play around with the arrows until I like the way it looks)

Then I add a brightness/contrast layer, same steps as above:

Then color balance. You don't need to go too crazy with this layer, since most of the coloring happens with selective coloring, CB can help balance out a strong tint. I just adjust until I'm happy with how it looks:

Now for the fun part! This gif has four main colors: Red, yellow, cyan, and blue. It's already got some good base color, so I don't use neutral, white, or black selective color. For murkier scenes (like anything from Vikings), I'll use those three to add some color and dimension. I start with red selective color, and just play around with the settings until I like how it looks:

And repeat for yellow:

For both red and yellow, I decrease the cyan, and increase magenta and yellow to make the warm colors pop.

Repeat for cyan:

and for blue:

I increase cyan and black, and adjust magenta and yellow until I find the shade I like.

After all of this, I resize the image to width of 540 if it's a single gif, or 268 if it's two side-by-side gifs. Personally I like to sharpen and color before resizing, but it's up to you what order you do things. Then save for web and I'm done!

I also highly recommend @inejz-ghafa 's coloring tutorial. It's actually the method I used to color my pride set.

I've also shared some of my psds, so feel free to use them! You'll probably have to adjust the curves and levels layers, but you can try playing around with the other layers as well! I actually got started by using other psds, and then adjusting the layers to fit my style.

That being said, some shows/movies are just easier to color than others! I really enjoy giffing Reign, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Aquaman, Pacific Rim, The Good Place. I struggle with coloring Vikings, Black Panther, and a lot of Bollywood movies. This is my general giffing process, I make adjustments depending on what scene I'm workign with. Hope this helps!

[blackhakumen]

Mini Fanfic #975: Wedding Planner Meeting (Sonic X Crash Bandicoot)

6:34 p.m. at Rabbits/Chaotix's Household's LivingRoom........

Cream: (Stands Beside the Large Paper Pad in Front if Everyone Present While Tapping it With a Pointing Stick) Alright, everyone! Now that we've officially found our marriage officiant and singer, we can finally discuss a very important topic at hand.

Cheese turns the page of the pad from his side, showing off three shaded colors: White, Purple, and Peach

Cream: Which colors do you guys would fit well to the wedding's theme? At first, I chose purple since it's mommy's favorite color, but then, I noticed how pretty looking the color of the peaches are when I ate one a few mornings ago. But then I remembered that color White is what makes weddings....w-weddings, you know!? So....('Sigh Heavily') I'm afraid I'm in a teensy bit of tight spot here.....

'AHEM'

Cream: (Turns to She Cheese Crossing his Arms, Raising an Eyebrow at Her Before Giggling a bit Awkwardly) O-Oh and umm....The fourth color that Cheese picked was Green. I forgot to color it in and sharpen the color pencil at the last minute....

Cheese: Chaoooooo?

Cream: (Sighs Heavily While Rolling her Eyes) And because of that, I owe him three cookies from the cookie jar. (Immediately Turns Back to Her Chao Friend with a Glare) Which I will give to him LATER, by the way!

Cheese: (Rolls his Eyes as Well) Chao Chao Chao.....

Cream: (Starts Wiggling Her Finger at Cheese in a Motherly Fashion) Hey, don't give me that attitude, mister! Be patient. (Sighs Once More) But anyways.....(Smiles Brightly at the Others In Front of Her) Any thoughts?~

Espio: Well....I think the colors you two have chosen are decent enough choices in their own right. But if I must, I suppose I would say......(Points at the First Color on the Left) Purple would be the best option.

Tails: (Grabs his Chin While Thinking) I dunno..... Peach does seem like the most vibrant out of the four....But Green is definitive color for the current season......('Sigh') I already can't decide which of the two I prefer more.....

Coco: (Brushing Tails' Tails While Sitting Next to Him) I'd be fine any of them as long as it isn't white. It's too obvious and generic for my liking.

Charmy: (Looks at the Colors Front of Him Very Closely) Hmmmmmmmmmm........

Coco: (Turns to the Young Bee) Got any favorites on your end, kiddo?

Charmy: I'm not sure......I mean, Purple's pretty, Peach is Fruity, Green is Greenie, and White's pretty much the most boring one. So we just rule that one out easily.

Everyone: Agreed./Chao.

Cream: ('Sighs in Defeat') I suppose that one's settled...But you really couldn't choose out of the three of them, Charmy?

Charmy: Nope. All of them are pretty cool choices in my book. (Suddenly Comes Up With an Idea) Ooh! How about we combined them all together? I call it....Pureench.

Espio: (Raises an Eyebrow at Charmy) Pureench.

Charmy: (Happily Nodded) Yep! Half Purple, Half Green, and Half Peach. Mixed together into one ultra wedding theme color! (Places his Hands on his Hips With a Confident Grin on his Face) Pretty neat, huh?

Tails: (Quickly Looks at Coco Before Turning Back to Charmy) That....is a...pretty neat idea for sure, Charmy. But uhh....Maybe it would be better if we just choose one out of the three colors instead, yeah?

Coco: (Nodded in Agreement with a Bit of an Awkward Smile on her Face)

Charmy: (Sighs While Rolling his Eyes) If you say so.....Wanna play a game of Uno to see who's color is on top? My money's on Green!

Cheese: (Raises his Hand Up) Chao Chao Chao!

Charmy: (Smiles Brightly) All right, Cheese! Up top.

Cheese: (Happily High Fives Charmy) Chao Chao!

Tails and Coco whispers among one another before nodding and turning back to the group.

Tails: Given the thoughts and discussion Coco and I made, we offically decided to be on Peach side. It is a pretty unique color out of the bunch all things considered.

Coco: Not to mention one of tastiest fruit out there. Also, fair warning, buuuuut.....(Starts Smirking a Bit Smugly While Crossing her Arms) I just so happen as the undisputed champion of Uno.

Tails: (Shrugs) It's true. She beaten me in it over fifty times.

Coco: And I never lost a game since!~

Espio: ('Sigh') Then I suppose I'll be on the Purple side then. (Turns to Cream) Care to join with me, Cream?

Cream: Sorry, but...I'm gonna have to go on the White side on this one.

Charmy: Seriously? But it's a boring color though.

Cream: Yeah, but I don't want it to be left out completely. So as such....(Points Up at the Ceiling) I will stand by it's side and fight for it's honor!....Or at least try not to lose too badly.

Tails: Not good with Uno?

Cream: I'm only average at best..... (Immediately Glares at at a Certain Bee Boy and Chao) Because a certain pairs of hooligans wouldn't stop trolling me with their cheap tactics!!

Charmy: (Smirks at his Soon to be Sister with Cheese While Suddenly Wearing Sunglasses) Hey, don't blame the players, bunny girl, blame the game and your lack of skillz.

Cheese: (Nodded in Agreemen) Chao Chao Chao. (HI Fives Charmy Again)

Cream (Has a Very ConfusedLook on her Face): .......Where did those sunglasses came fr-

Charmy: Cool guys don't need to explain random occurrences.

Cheese: Chao.

Cream: (Stares at the Duo For a Few More Seconds Before Sighing in Defeat Again While Pinching her Nose) You know what? Fine. Whatever. Let's just get the fame started already. Meeting dismissed! (Uses her Pointer to Tap on the Coffee Table)

Charmy/Cheese: (Immediately Rushes Towards the Dining Room) GREEN SQUAD RULES!!!!/CHAO CHAO CHAOOOOO!!!!

Coco: (Follows the Duo While Having her Arm Around her Best Friend's Shoulder) You have nothing to worry about here, bud. With my guidance, we'll both be champions in no time flat.

Tails: It would be fun to win Uno for once.

Espio: (Smiles Softly at Cream) I must say, Cream. You're doing a fairly good job planning out the wedding so far.

Cream: (Smiles Brightly at Espio) Thank you~ It's a lot of work, but I'm really having a blast doing thess.

Espio: (Simply Nodded) I do as well. (Points his Finger Up) But it's important not get too invested into them. You could stress yourself out too easily if you're not careful.

Cream: (Happily Hugs Espio Lovingly) Don't you worry about a thing, Espio. I'll be careful. (Puts on a Playful Smirk on her Face) But what you SHOULD be worrying about right now is getting your bottom whopped in Uno.

Espio: (Smirks Back at the Rabbit) Having confidence of winning already? I thought you said you were an average player.

Cream: I did. But who's to say any of you would would actually win this evening? When I have a strategy to do so on my own.

Espio: You haven't thought of one yet, haven't you?

Cream: (Makes her Way to the Dining Room With Espio) While Sighing Yet Again) No. But.....I-It'll definitely be something! (Points at the Ninja Beside Herself) And you're not allowed to know what it is, buster!

Espio: (Chuckles Lightly) Whatever you say, little sister.

@keyenuta

@caleb13frede

@rechicken-and-waffles

@cyber-wildcat

@albion-93

@ma-lemons

[lil-blueee]

Redamancy | Takashi Mitsuya x Reader (Tokyo Revengers)

Redamancy (n.): The act of loving the one who loves you; a love returned in full.

Treasure the time you spend together,

Treasure the ride in the evening time,

Treasure the confession under the night sky.

May you all feel the love and fall in love!

____________________

It is now eventide, the moment when the Sun deliberately goes down, exuding its vibrant red and orange rays that tints the former azure firmament. And here you are, resting on the leather chesterfield sofa while gazing at those skylights above. Broken lines of cumulus, or cotton-like clouds, are stretching for miles in the air, reflecting those fiery shades that intensifies the whole scene's saturation.

"Beautiful." You mumble, eyes lingering at that exquisite sight.

It doesn't take that long for a pitch black color to invade the sky, noticing that dusk is coming to your city. You raise up both arms to stretch that stiff upper body before a small growl grabs your attention. Looking at the clock, it's a quarter past six already.

"Guess he'll come back late tonight. I've to eat alone then."

You place your right hand on your stomach to feel that small rumbling sound - a signal for dinner time. The corners of your lips pull down to reveal a sad but so-be-it face. "Well, time to eat." You reheat the bento box in the microwave and prepare a glass of water before bringing them both to the table. Hands clasp together, you mumble, "Itadakimasu."

After finishing your meal, you sip a cup of warm tea while walking towards the bust mannequin, where the sleeveless white bridal gown is put on. Four different length of layers were sew from the waist line, covering half of the chapel train - the last and longest layer of the dress. To break free from the usual, monotonous gown, that man thoroughly embroidered roses on the left lateral, artfully arranged those small flowers from the shoulder to the side of the waist, and bigger ones when reaching the end of the train.

There's only one more piece left to complete the dress, a wedding veil. And it's also the final task for you - the girl making a messy bun for her wavy silver hair with apparent black highlights. Heading to the table where the folded tulle fabric is laying, you put the tea cup down, left hand slowly grabs your pair of black eyeglasses beside it. Eyes giving a quick glance at those thin lines drawn by tailor's chalk, you take one deep breath, ignoring some strains of hair falling down on the side and hold the sharp piece of scissors. After all, this dress is made for Hinata Tachibana, one of your best friends. I can't screw it.

You slowly cut off the excess length of the tulle until those metal blades return to their starting point, making the cabbage falls down the ground. Your other hand holds the outside edge of the fabric to trim its corners slightly, adding the curve for a graceful look. "Now then," A delighted smile appears on your face. Your sparkling gaze is looking through the edge of the veil again to see any jagged or uneven fabric needs cutting.

Immersing yourself in your work, you don't even recognize the presence of another man at the entrance, crossing his arms on one another. His head leans against the door frame, looking at you with those adoring droopy lavender eyes. "Quite meticulous, aren't you?" The lilac-haired mumbles, giving his compliment before he turns around and walks along the hall.

After that final touch, you sigh in relief, gently using your left hand surface to mop the sweat from your brow. "All we need to do is sew it. I should wait for Taka—" You startle. Whatever touches against your cheek literally makes your heart jump because of the cold sensation.

"What in the—" Like a natural reflex, you turn your head around to search for the source, but that sixth sense of yours can somehow guess the person standing behind this.

"You call for me?" He asks in a soft tone voice. In front of you right now is Takashi Mitsuya, a gentleman in his dark grey suit layered with a black shin length trench coat, projecting his professional image which instantly forms the first impression to anyone he meets. Hand passes you a bottle of water, the lilac-haired chuckles at the face he saw.

You keep staring at him, your eyebrows pull closer together while your lips tighten, making an angry but quite adorable face in his opinion. As you're about to give him a piece of your mind, his genuine smile immediately blows your anger away. That gentleman appearance, combining with his somewhat irresistible face are like a deadly combo suppressing your anger. How can I get mad like this? Placing your palm on the forehead, you ask yourself before telling him,

"You can just give it normal—"

Hold up! You pause when a thought runs through your mind and interrupts your speech. An idea? No, more like a revenge! Lower your face while smirking devilishly, one side of his slit eyebrow lifts up as he wonders what has got into you until...

"Actually, thank you very much, Takashi."

Calling for his name in a mischievous voice, you raise your slender hand not to take that bottle but to gently grab the other big, masculine one. Eyes lock with the others droopy lavender, you smile innocently as a way to express your affection toward him.

It doesn't take that long for the Second Division Captain to realize your intention. Instead of questioning about your rapid change in behavior, the lilac-haired decides to go along with your act. [First name]-chan, you're no match for me. His surprised face soon reveals a smirk, taking his time to respond you.

"My my~ you really mean it, [First name]?" said Mitsuya in a low tone voice.

He takes a few steps toward while you're doing the opposite, walking backward till your body hits the table without noticing. You startle but your attention is still drawn to his hand pulling the tie knot side to side to loosen that black plain necktie. This soon piques your curiosity. Is it because of the heat or he's doing it on purpose? However, judging the look on his face, you have every reason to eliminate the former assumption. Actually, no one will argue once they meet his sharp, yet flirtatious glance trying to lure you in his sweet trap. The gap is now shortened to only a few centimeters apart, Mitsuya rests both of his hands on the table to trap you inside then leans his lips closer to your reddened ear.

"Or you're asking for something else?" He whispers, sending shivers down your spine.

A flush of excitement is rising to your cheek, but you - my friend, show no signal of being dominated. In spite of the wild beating heart in your chest, you naturally grabs his tie and pulls it closer, looking straight into that man's eyes. "Make a guess."

Now you've done it. That confident expression of yours finally pulls the trigger for a massive explosion in his heart. It's not really something unexpected, but the Captain can't help himself whenever he sees you like this. The lilac-haired signs, looking down the ground to hide his defeated face. But, things won't end that easy.

"Alright, you said it. But," Unveiling a devilish smirk, his left hand wraps around your waist and gives a sudden pull, making your eyes widen from his unexpected move, "don't mad at me afterward."

The other hand is gently placing on your cheek before his thumb touches your lips. He's not gonna... There are butterflies in your stomach as you realize his intention, but sadly, it's too late to escape by now. Feeling his head is leaning closer, you place both hands on his chest to try and stop him though his body doesn't move a single bit. Hold up, hold up, hold up!!! Too close!

"Takashi, wait—" Your eyes shut immediately, knowing what he's about to do.  

Mitsuya pauses when his lips are only a few centimeters away. That man is taking a glance at your heavily blushing face and secretly smiling to see this shy and nervous side of yours. Oh my, now I'm the meanie. He signs. Well then...

Soft. Something touches the tip your nose - a light kiss, as light as a feather. As your mind is still trying to comprehend the whole thing, his giggle soon gets you back to your senses.

"I'm just joking! You don't have to worry!" You open your eyes and freeze like a statue. Noticing how tense up you are, his hand gently caresses your cheek where the heat is still lingering around. "Did I scare you, [First name]-chan?"

You know the answer, don't you? Well, he did surprise you in a way but... why not let him guess a little longer? "Who would?" You mumble.

"Really? Shall we try again the—"

Like an instinct, your palm covers his lower face as you know he won't leave you time to answer.

"Not so fast. I won't be tricked again." You smile cheerfully because this time for sure, victory is in your hand. However, life rarely happens according to your plans, and especially when you are with him.

His gaze sharpens and that makes you think twice about your action. Just when you're about to let your hand down, the lavender-eyed holds it in position and gives your palm a kiss. You raise your eyebrows and are completely shocked at his gesture. Mitsuya gently places your hand in his palm, bowing down like a gentleman greets a lady before his lips touch your knuckles. This greeting gesture, hand-kissing, normally indicates courtesy and politeness but not in this case scenario. 

"Are you sure about that, my Muse?" He asks with a mischievous smile.

And the Cupid - the god of love in the Ancient Roman, shots his arrow right through your heart, again. Love and passion are spreading out from your wound, making you fall for this man for... how many times you have lost count to be honest. The only difference is that you sink deeper and deeper every time the Cupid has his decision.

"So now you're into role play just simply because of the suit? And what Muse would wear a white tube top with grey sweatpants like me?" You chortle.

"Well, doing it once in a while isn't so bad though." He answers. "And you're always beautiful no matter what you wear."

That makes your heart skip a beat. He always says what in his mind, even if you're ready for it or not. "You sure are good with words." Whispering softly, you don't know what to do but to smile happily like a child.

"Anyway, how was the meeting with your customers?" You ask.

"The good news is we have a big order coming up. It's for their wedding and they chose the design already. One mermaid wedding dress and a tuxedo. We have to make five dresses for the bridesmaids too, so it's gonna be a busy week."

"Oh no, it's not that much... Lemme fainted a little." Without waiting him to respond, you let your head fall down on his shoulder, creating a big "thump" sound in the ears. The Captain is trying hard not to laugh by now. He gently pats that heavy head of yours.

"But still, I'll try my best to help. Can't let my beloved handle everything, right?" There you go, being mischievous again.

Wish you could see his face at that time. It was the most happiest face in the world. He wraps you in his arms for a full, warm embrace. "And I don't want my Muse to be exhausted too."

"But we'll put that aside for now. Wanna go for a ride? It must be bored to spend your whole day in the workshop."

Your eyes wide open to hear his suggestion. How long has it been since the last ride you guys had with each other? You're obviously happy to hear that but you're quite concerned about his health. "Maybe you should rest for today, you must be tired already."

"It's okay. I need to refresh my mind a bit. Lemme get change real quick." He gives you a light pat on your head.

Standing in front of the garage, you're gazing at Mitsuya, who is wearing an energetic set of cloth, opposite to the formal style earlier. He layers his white tee with a loose black baseball jacket with cream leather sleeves. This jacket was you two first couple cloth, and it was made by you-know-who. For the bottom, he puts on grey sweatpants and a pair of sneakers.

Your man is taking his baby Impulse out. The lavender-eyed is looking for something, your helmet. He slowly puts it on for you to ensure your safety while you sit behind him.

"Hold on tight." No matter how many times he has taken you out, that sentence always comes up first like a habit. Yes, you understand clearly that he cares about you, but seeing him like this somehow makes you want to tease him.  

"Come on! It's not like my first time letting my boyfriend take me for a ride~" Leaning your body closer to his back, you slowly give that muscular body a hug from behind. The lilac-haired sighs, lowers his head before turning around.

"And it's not like my first time saying this to my girlfriend." He responds while gives you a light flick on your forehead. "I just want to make sure you'll feel safe."

You release your hands to touch the spot where he aimed. Knitting your eyebrows, you ask. "Alright, but do you have to give me a flick?"

"Cause I feel like it." Now your nose is being pinched. Right after when you try to react, Mitsuya grabs your hands and puts them around his waist again. "Alright, no more teasing. We'll be back late if we don't leave now."

You actively tighten your arms so that someone won't give a long lecture again. "Fine, baka Taka."

"That's my girl." Closing his eyes, those lips reveal a winsome smile before his black full face helmet covers it. Once everything is set, he starts the engine and drive you both to the main road.

Resting your head on his firm back, your eyes slowly observe the night life in the city, looking at those cars running on the road and how people spend the rest of their night. Every time the winds blow through your hair, they always give a sense of relaxation, relieving all the stress you have during those working hours.

You breathe out bit by bit, tighten your embrace without noticing, which is a good sign for the person sitting in front of you. Glad she's enjoying this. The lilac-haired chuckles in secret, feels glad at your reaction.

Fifteen minutes have passed by, you two leave the city center, driving on a deserted road that leads to an abandon outdoor parking space overlooking the city's view. This is his go-to place whenever he seeks for the tranquility and now, it's yours too. Mitsuya drives right to the spot where you can observe the mesmerizing scene below and parks his Impulse.

Arms in the air, you stand up and stretch your back after spending nearly the whole day in his workshop, helping him to finish the wedding dress on time. Turn your head around to look at the man sitting side saddle, you ask. "Just three days left. We'll finish Hina-chan dress before it, right?"

"Yeah, I only need to sew the veil and adjust the length of the dress a bit." Mitsuya responds before gazing at you with a delighted face. "It all thanks to your help! Your skills have improved a lot after two months."

"Really? Guess I have to thank someone being patient while teaching me too~" Your mind then recalls how many times he sighed and flicked your forehead when you messed up during your practice. Despite of that, your caring teacher always there to explain and demonstrate again and again. Also, you can't forget the times you injured yourself because of your clumsiness, and he was always there to help you. Those are the memories that you're always cherish.

"I'll still be in your care, Sensei~" You giggle.

Sitting beside the man you love, you lean your head on his shoulder while getting lost in thought. 12 years huh... They finally make it. The fact that Hanagaki could travel back in time is always unbelievable because to you, it's something that only appears in sci-fi movies. You're really grateful that he tries to save everyone even if he has to risk his life. Not knowing what the future may hold, every moment staying with Mitsuya just becomes precious and you truly appreciate it.

Hina-chan finally escapes from the Death, now they're about to engage. "I'm glad for them."

Hearing your mumble, his left arm, which wrapped around your waist, moves its way up to pat your head. Those fingers that he uses to design beautiful clothes are now gently stroking your hair.

"What're you thinking about?" He asks out of curiosity.

"I was thinking..." After a few seconds of consideration, you say something out of the blue "when will I become a bride?"

From your unexpected answer, Mitsuya completely freezes. His astonished face with raised eyebrows and wide-opened lavender eyes is fully drawn to you. Looks like someone's heart just skips a beat. You really are...

Not seeing the Captain react, you ask him with concern. "Taka— Wh—what???"

As you're about to lift your head up, his hand quickly covers your eyes, pressing it down to the old position. You're wondering what the heck is going, not knowing Mitsuya is facing the other direction, hands cover his face. He's making time for the blush to fade away but it's impossible when you're struggling like this. 

"Stay still for awhile, will you?" A long sigh escapes from his lips when you're trying to pull his hand off.

After realizing how physically strong he is, you finally surrender. "Fine, I give up."

The atmosphere go into silent, no one has opened up first because you're waiting for him, and your boyfriend? He's still trying to calm himself down. Once Mitsuya gets back to his cool, usual shelf, he removes his hand to reveal your sound sleeping face.

"[First name]-chan?" He whispers.

Oh... She must be exhausted. Caressing your cheek before moving to your ear, his mind suddenly recalls your words. The Captain tries to move his other hand without waking you up, manages to take something out of his pocket. He then remains silent, eyes are focusing that small box lying in the palm of his right hand. "A bride, you said..."

His thumb opens the box, staring at the thing placing in the middle. For some reasons, your man hesitates before taking out the circle object, raising it up to the night sky and gazing deeply.

"You should fall for someone else." He mumbles.

"That's what I said when you confessed your feelings. But you, you still stay around after everything we went through, after knowing my background." Mitsuya pinches your cheek lightly because he doesn't want to interrupt your sleep.

"How stubborn you are."

You can feel something touch your face but only make an annoyed expression like a reflex.

"You always talk to me, run toward me whenever I'm around, and even learn how to sew. And just like that, I get familiar with your presence in my life."

"I used to think if you were in love with someone else, I would be rooting for you and make sure you find a good guy. But right now, I don't think I can let you go—— No, more like I won't let you go this time."

His hand puts something on your right ear. It's his other signature piercing - a black huggie earring with silver crosses.

"One for me, one for my most important person. Hope you won't laugh at my childish thought, I was young and bold." He chuckles at his own thought.

"I'm not ready to be your spouse yet, not when I'm still struggling with financial issues. I don't want my love to struggle it with me."

"Just a little more, will you wait for me, [First name]-chan?"

[cherrynojutsu]

Title: Like Gold

Summary: Sasuke grapples with love and intimacy regarding his developing relationship with Sakura after returning to the village from his journey of redemption. Kind of a character study on Sasuke handling an intimate relationship after dealing with PTSD and survivor’s guilt in solitude for so long. Blank period, canon-compliant, Sasuke-centric, lots of fluff and pining, slowly becomes a smut fest with feelings.

Disclaimer: I did not write Naruto. This is a fan-made piece solely created for entertainment purposes.

Rating: M (eventual nsfw-ness)

AO3 Link - FF.net Link - includes beginning/ending author's notes

Trigger Warning: Implied/Referenced Self-Harm

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Chapter 5/?: Housewarming

Sasuke spars with Naruto for the better portion of the afternoon into evening, until they are both sufficiently exhausted and slightly sunburned, on the condition that he will eat anywhere but Ichiraku’s and anything but ramen for the dinner his friend is trying to goad him into after. Naruto agrees all too quickly, grinning too much for his liking, and saying a little duplicitously, “That so? Happens that I know a place!”

The blond refuses to tell him where he’s leading him after their fight finally concludes in a draw, weaving tiredly through village streets around six at night with bruised ribs. Sasuke begins to suspect it’s an elaborate ruse to lure him to his house to eat. Sure enough, eventually they turn a corner and marigold, cobalt, and fuchsia invade his line of vision.

“You’re so stupid. I’m not eating anything you’ve put your hands on.”

Naruto laughs, evidently not the slightest bit offended. “Don’t worry, Hinata-chan made me a bunch of food for the next few days! There’s more than enough to share, and I haven’t touched any of it.”

Sasuke grumbles, but his friend assures him that at least some of it’s not ramen, so he acquiesces cautiously and follows him through the threshold of his home.

It is pretty nice, as Sakura said, though he’s sure that’s because of the dobe’s wife and not him, and what he’s comparing it to - Naruto’s old apartment, littered with trash and expired food items in the fridge - doesn’t set a very high bar in the first place. The house has wood floors, and a spacious kitchen with plenty of storage, at least from what he discerns when he first walks in. He assumes he’s going to be forced on the tour shortly to view the rest of it.

There is an absolute mountain of pre-prepared food in clear containers when his friend opens the fridge. Sasuke will admit pretty much everything looks good, though he’s not sure what specifically the dobe plans on them eating. He’s not sure Naruto knows, either; he stares at the contents of the fridge for a long minute, squinting as if making a life-changing decision.

“...Does she think you can’t feed yourself or something?” Sasuke deadpans.

Naruto laughs nervously, in a way that gives Sasuke the impression that Hinata Uzumaki might not be as quiet and reserved as most people assume, at least behind closed doors. His friend almost sounds fearful, as if there may be consequences for him if he doesn’t eat what his wife has prepared for him in her absence in its entirety.

“...Or she just knows you’d eat instant ramen the whole time she was gone, otherwise.” This time it’s not a question.

Naruto has the grace to at least feign embarrassment. “Well, uh, you know what they say… Quickest way to a man’s heart is through his food, or whatever!” Sasuke wonders for a short few seconds what kind of repercussion Hinata could possibly be holding over him, but then remembers Kakashi’s warning earlier in the day, and decides abruptly that he doesn’t care to further pursue that train of thought.

Eventually they decide on vegetable and shrimp tempura with plain onigiri, all premade. Sasuke is hungry, and tempura has a high caloric intake. Naruto dumps the tempura in a mysterious device called an air fryer to warm, and while they wait, the blond shows him around.

It’s commodious, with extra bedrooms as Sakura said. Most of the furniture is rich dark wood, accented with slightly vibrant colors, inclusive of the walls, that are perhaps a little intense for his own preferences. It is obvious that Naruto helped pick the paint colors, but he assumes Hinata must like them, too. The Hyuga are an old clan, deeply rooted in tradition as the Uchiha had been; Sasuke imagines that many of the interiors at the Hyuga residences are varying shades of white, gray, or brown, also with darker wood, as many of the Uchiha households had been; a more colorful interior would have been a change for her. He supposes a proclivity for brightness makes sense, given that she’d married Naruto. Their house overall smells vaguely like jasmine blossom and nectarine, though not overbearingly so. Naruto’s apartment had never smelled like that, so it must be Hinata’s doing. Sasuke spies a candle the color of honey that might be the source, perched on a corner table.

It sits next to a framed copy of their original Team Seven group portrait. Sasuke eyes it as they pass through the living room again to the back door.

It opens up to a sizable backyard situated on the north side of the house, framed with a fence for privacy and a number of lush trees, dangling greenery swaying in the breeze. A small garden sits in the far back left corner, the area with the least tree cover; it’s been recently tilled and sowed, small sprouts beginning to poke through the soil.

“We get lots of fireflies back here in the summer. Hinata-chan loves them, so we sit back here all the time! She’s thinking of getting a birdbath, too,” Naruto mentions fondly, a bit more hushed than his usual timbre; he must have some good memories back here already.

“It’s nice.” Sasuke remarks at the end when they go back inside, because it is, and his friend grins from ear to ear, stupidly proud. Then the timer dings from the other room, and they eat.

Hinata’s cooking is good. Sasuke sorts out all of the sweet potato chunks to shove onto Naruto’s plate, but eats the rest: squash, bell peppers, eggplant, broccoli, and shrimp, coated in spiced breading that tastes slightly of rosemary, along with the onigiri, more simple but also filling.

Naruto prattles throughout as always, but chews his food before launching into each new topic; it really must be a habit by now. Sasuke doesn’t hold the scroll over his head just yet; he figures Saturday night will be enough opportunity for that. Instead, he solidifies plans for another spar, this time late Saturday morning, because through the nearly endless chatter he has learned that Naruto’s schedule includes normal weekend days off, unless assigned a mission.

The dobe asks him to go drinking with him afterwards; he declines, but thanks him for dinner. Eventually, he departs, after his best friend reminds him for the fourth time today to meet up at Ichiraku’s on Saturday night at six.

As he walks home, lone hand in his pocket, Sasuke finds himself pondering once again what Sakura’s living space will be like. She doesn’t strike him as someone who would like darker wood, for some reason. It’s an apartment, so it will be smaller than Naruto’s house for sure. He assumes it’s probably one bedroom, like his own.

The cadence of crickets creeps in again as he leaves the more lively area of town, buoyed into something quieter by the swishing of leaves through the trees. It’s a sound he craved on his travels often. There are similar sounds elsewhere - insects and trees are not uncommon - but something about Konoha’s particular lilt sticks out in his memories. A clement wind from the north carries an aroma tinged with flowers and loam. When he turns the corner, the breeze blows just right to shift his hair away from his left eye, and his neck heats as he thinks of Sakura’s words from this morning, not for the first time today.

Once he gets back to his apartment, he strips, then tosses his clothing directly into the washing machine, before enjoying a long, near-boiling shower; after the workout he’s had, he needs it. He thinks as he scrubs that this way he won’t need another one until after he gets back from seeing Sakura tomorrow. He contemplates whether they will eat somewhere, since he’s meeting her at the hospital at four. He’d liked the tea shop; she probably knows of other places worth trying.

He is so exhausted that he saves washing his dishes for tomorrow and falls asleep almost as soon as his head hits the pillow. His last thoughts are of gentle jade eyes and kind words murmured in an exam room.

Sasuke is thankful that he doesn’t have another nightmare, but his brain decides to fill the time in other demiurgic ways involving soft fingertips, and when morning comes, he does need another shower, after all; this time, a cold one.

He pinches his nose guiltily as frigid water engulfs him, until his teeth are near chattering. Once that’s done, he throws on a black shirt and pants before grabbing a book. He huddles up under his comforter to chase away the chill, drowning his thoughts in icy history ripe with distraction rather than lasciviousness.

He finishes it eventually, convinced towards the end that he needs to acquire a small lamp; he doesn't like overhead lighting in general, but he especially doesn’t like it for reading. His teeth have stopped clacking together, so he gets out of bed and spends the first portion of the day washing dishes, sharpening his chokuto, and then making lunch, seared beef with green tea noodles and miso dressing. It’s simple, but good, and filling. His throat hurts less than yesterday, but he has another cough drop after, because it helps.

He washes and dries the dishes from today, putting them away before he leaves his apartment to pick up a few more groceries to fill the time. The market he visits is sold out of loose leaf sencha tea; the one he’d visited the first day in his apartment hadn’t had any, either. He settles for a small box of single-serve packets for the time being, and has a cup upon his return to his apartment. It’s not bad, but it doesn’t taste quite as fresh. He reads more of his other book for a bit, until it’s time to leave to meet Sakura at the hospital.

He leaves a little early again, because he’s eager to see her.

Sakura greets him cheerily, lovely with a tote bag on her shoulder that is starting to become familiar. She tells him that she dropped off his paperwork earlier today, and that his bloodwork has all come back normal. He thanks her, and they spend a nice late afternoon together, roaming around while she points out areas of interest, most of it new development on the more southern part of the village. Wandering with her is much preferable to solivagant ambling on his own, he is coming to find.

He learns that Sunday and Monday are indeed her days off, unless there is an emergency; she mentions that she has a standing date with Ino every Monday morning for training and lunch, but other than that, she keeps her free time pretty open.

“Would you… like to do something on Sunday, then?” He asks carefully, hand twitching a little in his pocket and stomach churning a little in nervousness, though she has given him no reason to be. He hopes he’s not being avaricious by asking for too much of her time. She might prefer to spend some time alone on her days off.

Glittering green eyes beam up at him in response. “Of course,” she answers, and the storm brewing in his belly settles while the vines reach upwards into his chest cavity, because she says it with an inflection that implies there’s nothing she would rather do.

“I think it’s supposed to rain,” Sakura tells him as they walk further southwest; they’re nearing the edge of the village now. “So we probably don’t want to walk around too much. I usually…” Her eyes flick to him, and then away, as if self-conscious. “I usually curl up inside with a book on rainy days. Or... watch documentaries. Sometimes I play go or chess.”

A ghost of a smile overtakes him, because reading on a rainy day is very characteristic of her, but so are the other two things, which he hadn’t known.

Then she’s asking, somewhat shyly, “What do you like to do, on a rainy day?”

It’s a good question; he hasn’t been home for a rainy day in a long time. When he was traveling, he would find shelter - an inn, or the inside of a tree or a cave - and do various tasks that needed doing, like sharpening weapons or writing a letter to her. On those days, he would also often read her old correspondence to him, too, but he’d be embarrassed to admit that to her.

When he was younger, though, he would complete any neglected chores in the morning, and then spend the rest of the day reading, though he did it mainly for productivity to the point of distraction. Sasuke did not like being cooped up in his house for long periods of time, for obvious reasons. Occasionally he would venture to a training ground anyway, if the rain was more light drizzle than downpour, but most of the time he opted not to, because getting sick would delay his progress more than sitting out a day; he could advance in other ways, look into new techniques and practice taijutsu forms inside, if he really focused.

If it rained heavily for more than a day or two consecutively, though, trapping him in the house, he tended to struggle more with it. Sometimes he would stare at a kunai or shuriken left behind in Itachi’s room for too long, and end up sticking his wrist out a back window to watch the water cleanse the wound he’d carved into his skin until it coagulated. It wasn't something he did often, because he knew it was stupid and weak despite the small semblance of control it afforded. It also wasn’t something he only did when it was raining, but being entombed in that house due to inclement weather poured salt into his baser self-destructive tendencies, irritation burning until it was too much and it had to escape his skin to go somewhere. When it rained, it felt like it was an opportunity to rinse it out of him, a tiny increment of relief, rivulets reaching down to turn him over in the grave of dark wood and dull paint colors it felt like he was suffocating in.

Sasuke would go get groceries most of the time, before it got to that point, even if he didn't need them, just to get out of the house for a bit and away from the temptation. He’d come back soaked, tracking water everywhere before curling up in his bed to try to chase away the chill with more distraction, books or scrolls or trying to watch something. Eventually he’d warm up on the outside, but his insides still felt icy for a long time, most days.

He's in an apartment now, though, a long way from what used to be the Uchiha District. He takes a grounding breath that he hopes is subtle, trying to emerge from the glaucous recollection and subsequent smothering feeling lining his lungs. “...I do any chores that need doing, and then I like to read, too,” he finally answers. It's the truth, now. Keen but soft eyes hold his for a moment, and he worries maybe he didn’t fully succeed at the subtlety, but she doesn’t press. He’s thankful for it; he doesn’t want to think about that when he’s with her.

They make plans to have lunch and spend the afternoon reading their respective books at her apartment. He might finish his other book by Sunday’s end; maybe she would go to the library with him again Monday afternoon, if she’s not too busy. He wouldn’t mind playing go or chess, either, if she asks him. It would be a challenge; he hasn’t played either in years. He’ll save it for Sunday, though.

“I can cook,” she offers, looking very pleased, which makes his heart flutter in his chest. “Maybe soup and something to go with it, if it’s chillier? I have a slow cooker I can start it in, the morning of.”

He agrees immediately; he likes soup, and it’s been a while since he’s had a good bowl. Most of the soup he made on the road was limited to whatever ingredients were readily available, with simple water as stock. The result was usually something bland, warming but not hearty by even the barest standards; soup made in a kitchen is much better. He’ll eat any kind, really, especially if it’s cold out. He wonders what Sakura’s cooking is like; she excels at most everything she does, so he imagines it must be good.

By just after five, they’ve ended up at a fairly new and distinctive quadrant of training grounds a little beyond the southwest edge of the village, sharp quartz rock jutting up from uneven ground in several spots and a small creek running down its center. Parts of it sit at a raised elevation, offering a unique vantage point of Konoha. Sasuke realizes as he eyes the surroundings that he would like to train here sometime; the craggy terrain could prove an interesting element to contend with, an exercise of both the mind and body. He’s glad she showed him; he wouldn’t have ventured to this side of town for a long time, on his own.

“Are you hungry?” He asks, thinking he could buy her dinner if she knows any places nearby. It’ll be busier now that it’s dinner time, once they get back into the village, but he doesn’t mind.

Sakura doesn’t answer at first, and instead starts to fiddle inside her bag. His brows knit in confusion, but then she pulls out two bottles of water, two bento boxes, and two pairs of chopsticks.

They’re in reusable containers, not takeout ones, which means she must have made them herself. Sasuke stares at the one she gives him, dumbfounded; it’s filled to the brim with cooked rice topped with black sesame seeds, tonkatsu with sauce, shredded cabbage, green beans goma-ae, and a large number of tomato wedges. Her own has less tomato; a few grapes round it out instead. He also notices the tonkatsu sauce is already poured over hers, but his is in a small sealed container, so he can eat the pork plain if he decides he doesn’t care for the tangy but also slightly sweet dressing.

“I thought we could eat these here... if you want. We could avoid the dinner rush that way. I made the sauce a little less sweet than usual, but I still wasn’t sure, so I thought I’d let you decide,” Sakura offers, soft and kind. He’s too stunned to say anything right away, so she adds somewhat sheepishly, “If... you’d rather get something else, though, that’d be fine, too.”

He thanks her very quietly, then, a little dazed and throat closing up, because he would not rather get something else; he hasn’t had a bento in a long time, let alone one that was prepared specifically for him. The training ground is empty, so they hop up one of the small cliffs and eat it there as she suggests, in view of Hokage Rock framed by trees. It is very good, clearly made with fresh ingredients; the pork is juicy on the inside and texturally crunchy on the outside. The sauce is good, too; not too sweet. He makes sure to eat all of it, as well as to tell her he enjoyed it at the end. She flushes at the compliment; she is very pretty, pink hair and pink cheeks to match.

"How long do you think it'll be before Naruto's up there?" She asks him after they’ve been sitting there for the better part of an hour, food long finished and eerily echoing his thoughts from a few nights ago.

Sasuke regards the mountain, empty space next to Kakashi's likeness. He recalls dinner yesterday at his friend’s home, Naruto sharing food with him made by his wife, and Ichiraku’s the day before that, how he no longer talks with his mouth full, and how he has not pressured him to share about Sakura. Sasuke is sure his rare tact won't last forever, and that he'll be hounded about his relationship with her eventually, but he has appreciated the space gifted to him. For all of their teammate’s fatuousness, he really has grown. If he can get an increment better at deciphering scrolls...

"Not long," he responds eventually. "Five years. Maybe six, with the sculpting."

Sakura nods in agreement, an evocative smile playing at her lips; she must suppose the same.

He speculates, then, tearing his gaze away from her mouth, who else they will see on the mountain in their lifetimes, in the empty space extending to the right. He thinks Naruto is the type to live to be pretty old, especially if Hinata is coercing him into eating balanced nutritional meals now; he might make it to a point where he actually retires from being Hokage, like Tsunade, or Kakashi, eventually.

The next Hokage could be in the village already, maybe in the Academy still, or a Genin. Sasuke remembers a scrawny kid with atrocious camouflage techniques who used to follow Naruto around and challenge him to battles over the position; it may have been the Third's grandson. He hadn’t seemed particularly talented at the time, but then again, neither was Naruto at that age. It’s possible that the kid has progressed since then. It’s also possible, though, that the next Hokage has not even been born yet.

Sasuke walks Sakura home a couple of hours later, dark violet light of dusk cast on her through diamonds on her doorstep. Her expression is the same as the other night, eyes sparking with gold affection, so he kisses her again, hesitantly hoping it’s okay, because he really wants to. Apparently it is, because she rests her hands on his shoulders and kisses him back without an ounce of uncertainty. His hand is free this time, so he rests it on her waist carefully, and enjoys a sweet breath of spring.

XXX

Sasuke arrives at Ichiraku’s at six on the dot to find both of his teammates already there, with an empty seat left between them and three glasses of water on familiar currant red counters. He is unsurprised to see that Kakashi’s not here yet. There’s an empty seat to Naruto’s left that is clearly being saved for their old sensei using one of Naruto’s sandals, off his foot; it’s pretty busy, being a Saturday night. He also notes Sakura’s tote bag situated beneath the counter, underneath the stool she’s sitting on; perhaps her afternoon with Ino went longer than anticipated, and she hasn’t had time to go home yet.

Both of them turn their heads as he approaches, brightening and greeting him in unison beneath fluorescent lighting.

“Teme!”

“Hey, Sasuke-kun.”

It is terribly nostalgic. He takes the place between them, responding, “Sakura. Dobe.” The streets themselves are busy, but within the actual enclosure of Ichiraku’s, it’s not as loud.

“We haven’t ordered yet,” Sakura tells him good-naturedly, smiling and pushing him a menu. His gaze lingers on her for a second before looking down at it. She’s pretty beneath fluorescent lighting, too.

“We’re not fucking waiting for Kakashi-sensei, though. I’m hungry , and who knows when he’ll turn up? He’s probably reading one of his stupid books and lost track of time again,” Naruto grumbles, peckish, from his other side. His friend’s stomach growls, as if on cue.

Sakura laughs, then sighs from his right. “He’s probably lost in a pile of paperwork. At least this time it might be true.”

“...He might be trying to finish breaking the cipher on that scroll you can’t seem to solve,” Sasuke quips smugly towards his left, eyeing the menu, though he doesn’t really need to; he knows his order already.

He is way too satisfied by Naruto’s huff. “Ugh, I’m fucking sick of staring at that thing. It makes me feel like my brain is melting. I wish he’d just give me a mission. I want to fight something.”

“I’m sure you’ll both get one eventually,” Sakura remarks with confidence. “Try to enjoy the peacetime a little. It’s a good thing. Besides, if you really want to, you can just go battle it out at the training grounds...” She eyes them both with a critical and calculating scrutiny now, a single pink brow arched and something in her tone shifting. “...Though by the bruising, I’m sure that’s already happened.”

There is a fist shaped smear of violet he knows is on his forearm, clearly visible from her vantage point. At least his ribs are hidden; there are nasty bruises on three of them from the first spar, and another two developing from this morning. Naruto looks a little scared, when he glances over at him; despite the fact that the blond is laughing nervously, his hand is held awkwardly, obviously trying to shield the bruise he has on his chin, turning purplish-blue by now.

It was another draw. Sasuke expects he’ll be able to beat him, next time. He’s found he’s a bit rusty, not having too many excuses to use his more advanced techniques in a long while.

Sakura rolls her eyes after a tense moment, and the spell is broken. “If either of you break anything, just don’t be stupid; come to the hospital or my place so I can fix it.”

“Sure, sure, anything you say, Sakura-chan!” The dobe responds next to him, hesitant laughter still tinged a little with fear. Sasuke nods, then thinks for about the fifth time today that he’s going to see her apartment tonight.

Once Sasuke slides the menu back, Naruto catches Teuchi’s attention; the blond orders garlic tonkotsu, Sasuke orders hakata tonkotsu, and Sakura orders shoyu ramen. It’s the same as what they used to get when they were kids.

It’s a nice evening for this, he thinks.

“So what’s new at the hospital, Sakura-chan?” Naruto asks conversationally. “Anything exciting?”

Sasuke shifts his gaze to his right, where Sakura looks as if she’s giving it a lot of thought, lips shifted to the side; he forces his eyes upward. “Eh, nothing too exciting, yet. Just appointments and research, for the most part. I’ve got some long-term projects I’m working on, but I’m just kind of waiting to see how the data pans out at this point while I monitor. It’ll be another month or so yet for anything concrete there, I think.” She cocks her head to the side a little. “I’ve got a transplant patient we’re waiting on an organ for, so we’ve been trying to prep her so she’s ready; different medicinal cocktails, testing, and such.” She pauses. “Tsunade-shishou sent over some things that arrived this morning, though, and one of them was a sample of a new poison found in a few Shinobi in Wind. I guess that’s… interesting. She’s going to work on it, too, so hopefully we get an antidote quickly, but I started some tests on it today.”

Sasuke’s lips turn downwards. That doesn’t sound good.

“Ehhh, between you and Granny Tsunade, I’m sure you’ll find an antidote soon!” Naruto chirps positively from his left. Then he quiets, in a manner that suggests he’s cogitative. “How bad?”

“Well, it’s slow enough progression-wise that they’ll live if we find an antidote in time; they’ve got at least a month, we think. Maybe more, if Tsunade-shishou keeps siphoning it out via the Delicate Illness Extraction Technique. It’s not... pleasant for the patient, obviously, but it works. She’s already run most of the preliminary tests; calcium chloride, pyridoxine, sodium bicarbonate, so we at least have some stuff ruled out.,, There might be others eventually, though, so it would be best to nip it in the bud and have an antidote readily available, really.”

“...What do you know about it so far?” Sasuke asks. “In terms of the type of toxin.” Having been dosed numerous times with poisons to build up resistance, he knows he is essentially immune to many of them, but a new one popping up is never something one should disregard in their line of work.

Jade shifts to him. “We suspect it might be a mixture of several venoms, plus a heavy neurotoxin. Epinephrine doesn’t work at all, though; that’s why we’re leaning towards it being a combo. Something has to be continuing the effects while that cycles through the system.”

Neurotoxins are troublesome; a mixture with it is nothing to scoff at. “It causes paralysis?” He questions.

Sakura inclines her head in a nod. “Immediately after Tsunade-shishou uses the Extraction Technique, though, they gain some movement back, so if we can find an antidote, it won’t be permanent.”

There is a contemplative silence.

“So what you’re saying is, you’re gonna kill a lot of rats,” Naruto finally jokes from his left, gauche as ever and clearly trying to lighten the mood.

“They’re mice, not rats,” Sakura responds, rolling her eyes. “But yes. We probably will. Necessary sacrifice, I suppose.”

There is a substantial length of time that feels heavy, even with the distant background noise of people going about their evening.

Sakura is the one to break it. “What about you, Naruto? Anything new? Hinata’s on a mission, I heard. What have you been doing to fill the time?”

Sasuke glances back to his left, where Naruto is grinning suspiciously.

“You mean other than kicking the shit out of teme?”

Sasuke narrows his eyes. “As I recall, both spars were draws, dead last .”

Naruto laughs, unbothered and waving his hand jokingly. “Eh, really I dunno. Mostly just helping Kakashi-sensei at the office. He’s torturing me with homework , since Hinata-chan’s gone.”

Suddenly their food is being placed in front of them. His smells good, charred pork belly swimming in spring onion, nori, mushrooms, noodles, and ginger. Sakura says thank you to Teuchi, and then he hears her break her chopsticks. She doesn’t miss a beat. “Hypothetical mission assemblages again?”

Naruto groans as he snaps his own chopsticks. “Yeah, it’s a nightmare. I know most of the people our age fine enough, but you basically have to memorize everyone’s abilities, strengths, and weaknesses, or you spend hours doing it because you have to refer to The Binder.” The way the dobe articulates The Binder makes it sound ominous.

“Huh. Now that I know it’s a nightmare, I’ll make sure to give you even more of it,” a familiar voice lilts behind them.

The three of them turn, and Kakashi is behind them, clad in simple Jonin dress instead of Hokage robes, for all appearances completely unbothered by the fact that he’s nearly twenty minutes late.

All three of them give him a withering look, slightly tinged with nostalgia, and say nothing.

“Sorry. Got lost in a pile of paperwork.”

Their old sensei removes Naruto’s shoe from his saved seat, and places it directly on the blond’s head. It promptly falls off and nearly lands in the idiot’s bowl of ramen as he splutters to catch it. Kakashi orders hakata tonkotsu without even glancing at the menu, same as Sasuke.

“So. Isn’t this nice,” The Hokage drawls. “How are we all? Enjoying the springtime?”

“It’s good! Hinata-chan planted a garden! We’re gonna have broccoli, and sweet potatoes, and maybe even pumpkin!” Naruto responds as he shoves his shoe unceremoniously back onto his foot before reaching for his chopsticks again.

“The weather has been nice," Sakura pipes up from behind him, though her tone of voice makes it sound as though more than that has been nice. Something in him twists pleasantly.

“...It’s good,” Sasuke comments last, before taking another bite of his food. It’s an understatement.

Kakashi looks content, head nodding in agreement. “Everything’s really greening up. I think it’s going to be a good year. No wars on the horizon, either, at least that I know of; that’s always preferable. Gets one into a reflective headspace.”

“About what, having time to read porn in your office?” Naruto quips sarcastically in between inhaling bites of bean sprouts and noodles, though Kakashi doesn’t seem at all fazed. Sasuke hasn’t seen any orange books in the times he’s visited the Hokage’s office so far, but he’d been sure they were stowed somewhere within easy access.

“Can’t a Hokage take a break to enjoy fine literature once in a while?” Their old sensei asks good-naturedly, but Naruto rolls his eyes as Sasuke, and he assumes Sakura, continue to eat their food at a normal pace.

“Fine literature? As if ! You forget I’ve read all those books. They’re full of good ideas, sure, but they’re still fucking porn ! And anyways, no, you can’t take a break. Not when you’re piling homework on me like I’m in the Academy still. I know , by the way.”

Now Kakashi’s smile turns a little nervous. To most people, the change would be imperceptible, but it’s there for those that know him well. “Know what, exactly?”

The blond’s eyes narrow accusingly. “That you’re actually using my homework to put together squads for real fucking missions! I shouldn’t have to find out from Shikamaru. In the Academy, they expel kids for that shit.”

Judging by the caught expression on Kakashi’s face, there is at least some element of truth to this, which means Naruto must be doing an okay job, at the very least. Interesting .

“So a sensei isn’t allowed to appreciate and value the advice of a cherished student?”

“Whatever. Just keep giving me days off when Hinata-chan’s home and maybe I won’t tattle to the other kages.”

Kakashi smiles. “I can do that.”

There is a beat where everyone besides their sensei is quiet, taking a few bites of their food. Sasuke’s is good; he’s hungry. Going near all out against Naruto has given him a little more of an appetite, the past few days. He’s been trying to eat more, as Sakura suggested.

“Sakura, I received an interesting letter from Tsunade today.” their old sensei drawls after a bit. Sasuke shifts slightly. She’s swallowing a bite, and looking curious.

“About the poison?”

Sasuke glances back to his left in time to see Kakashi nod. “The poison, and also other worthwhile projects. Let me know if you need any funding for such things, and I’ll find a way to take care of it.”

Sasuke wonders what kinds of projects, but assumes it might be rather confidential when Sakura blinks, then nods, answering simply, “Thank you, Kakashi-sensei; it’s greatly appreciated.” Perhaps it has to do with her research.

Naruto finishes off his first bowl, and orders another. Now that he’s not inhaling food, he begins chattering again.

“So anyways, when are you gonna send us all on a mission together again?! I feel like I’ve been trapped in that office with you like an old croney for eighty-four years.”

Suddenly Kakashi appears very tired, eyes narrowing in exhaustion. “If you feel trapped now, I’d hate to see how you feel in five years or so.” He pauses, as Naruto narrows his eyes at him and crosses his arms. “I have a lost cat mission you could complete, I suppose. Or would you rather clean up the river? It’s good weather for it. Water’s warming up.”

Naruto looks at him indignantly. “As if. I want a real mission!! One that suits our strengths.”

The way Kakashi considers Naruto then is fond. Sasuke vaguely recollects a time where Naruto begged the Third for a ‘real’ mission a long time ago; that must be what he’s remembering.

“Well, the problem with that is that Sakura formally outranks you,” he finally retorts. His food shows up a second after he finishes talking.

Naruto groans. “This shit again?” Sasuke assumes this must be a running thing Kakashi likes to hold over his friend’s head. Technically it’s correct; Sakura had told him she’d made Jonin at the exams in Earth Country a while back, in one of her earlier letters. He’s sure she could have made Jonin sooner, but she’d been occupied with things at the hospital, he thinks. Naruto and himself, meanwhile, had never taken the exams, though it hadn’t affected their ability to take A and S-rank missions, given their role in ending the war; they held honorary Jonin positioning in all but the actual title itself, and weren’t held back from missions because of it in any way, but still, Sakura is the only one of their team that has taken them officially and passed. Naruto had told him that Tsunade didn’t want to promote Sakura like that, despite her contribution in ending the war, too; he’d assumed it was because the Fifth didn’t care for Sakura’s promotion to be in any way weighed down by assumptions of nepotism, especially with her taking over the hospital. Kakashi hadn't, either; he'd assumed for the same reason. Naruto and Sasuke getting special treatment regarding what missions they can accept is fine, because currently they hold no official titles, but with Sakura heading the hospital, it’s a different matter.

“How many times are you gonna hold that over my head?! Quit fucking around already. It’s not my fault Granny Tsunade wanted to show Sakura-chan off to all five nations, and besides, I was literally there, so it’s not like I don’t know.”

Sasuke blinks in sudden interest, as Kakashi quips, “If you were there, why didn’t you take the exams yourself? I seem to remember someone getting banned from the Kage’s seating area. That looks great for a future Hokage candidate, by the way, and was fun to try to de-escalate with the elders of Earth Country. Maybe you could have set a better example if you had also been taking the exams… Though I suppose it would have been embarrassing for you when Sakura beat you in three seconds flat.”

Sakura laughs a little to his right as if she is amused as Naruto complains some more, while Sasuke considers that he has never been given a detailed account of her performance at those exams, though he’s sure it was excellent. He’ll have to ask her or Naruto about it.

Naruto’s still whining. “Come ooooon. Just ONE teensy little mission. No bullshit. We’re all back; you basically have to, it’d be illegal NOT to. It can even be a B-rank.”

Kakashi doesn’t miss a beat. “I have a nice C-rank you two could probably handle.” Sasuke twitches a little, because he knows that’s directed at him, too, now. “Simple escort to Sand. Don’t want to take a prestigious Jonin away from her important work at the hospital, though, for such a measly thing.”

Sakura’s laugh twinkles. “Send Shikamaru. I’m sure he’d love to go.”

Kakashi grins, as if he is in on a joke. “Yes, Naruto, Sasuke, and Shikamaru. That would be an interesting team, to say the least, though perhaps a little overpowered. I’ll think it over… If nothing comes up that we desperately need Shikamaru for, that is.”

Naruto grumbles and turns to finish emptying his second bowl of ramen as Sasuke surmises inwardly, finishing off his own, that it would be an interesting team, even if it was just an escort. From what he knows, Nara is a capable leader and excellent strategist. He’s sure Shikamaru doesn’t like him very much, which is more than fair, but watching Naruto annoy someone else for a change would make the heated trek to Sand bearable. He wonders what Sakura’s comment was about, though. Maybe it was sarcasm, regarding most peoples’ general disdain for the sweltering weather there.

Sasuke notices, as he pushes his bowl forward, now empty, that Kakashi still hasn’t touched his food. He makes a mental note to keep an eye on that. When he glances to his right, he sees that Sakura has finished hers, too.

The restaurant is starting to clear out a little, it being closer to seven now. Naruto finally stops mumbling insults towards Kakashi, and instead peers at him as if he’s waiting for something. Maybe he wants to go home; his friend might have plans after this, though he’s not sure what they would be, given his wife is away.

“...Sorry to disappoint you, Sasuke, but we’ve been less than honest about dinner tonight,” Kakashi begins after meeting Naruto’s gaze. Sasuke’s brow furrows in puzzlement, and the dobe starts grinning smugly. When he glances the other way towards Sakura, she smiles, too, and looks a little guilty.

“It is also… a housewarming party.” The Hokage grins. “Though we thought we’d just have it here, and you could take your gifts home with you tonight.”

Sasuke frowns. “You didn’t need to-”

Naruto butts in, indignant and cutting him off accusingly with a pointed finger, “And don’t even TRY to say no, because I got you the best gift.” Sasuke has a brief premonition of his sparse kitchen cabinets suddenly filled with a month’s supply of instant ramen, and it takes everything in him not to roll his eyes. The dobe motions to Teuchi, gesturing towards the inner portion of the ramen stand, just below the counter. Sasuke then recalls the bag beneath Sakura’s chair, and frowns deeper, turning to her; though he’s sure the shoe box was free, she’s already given him the drying rack, which he’s sure was not. She didn’t need to get him anything else.

She just grins at him, eyes flashing with mirth as if she finds this amusing. He’s about to say something - he’s not sure what - when Naruto taps him on the shoulder. He turns, and the most poorly wrapped gift he has ever seen in his life comes into focus, a long thin mess of too much tape and intensely colorful paper, scrunched together haphazardly as if put together by a child with little motor control, and shoved directly into his face.

“...Why did you wrap it?”

His best friend rolls his eyes. “Because it’s a PRESENT, jackass. Besides, you guys wrapped yours too, right?!”

When Naruto looks from their old sensei to their teammate, Kakashi wears a jovial smile that tells him he didn’t, and Sakura doesn’t say anything behind him, but Naruto narrows his eyes, and that’s enough to tell him that she didn’t, either. “What the fuck, you guys are the worst! This is supposed to be a party!!”

Naruto sets the gift down on the counter in front of him, and Sasuke frowns at it stubbornly for a short while. The three of them are staring at him expectantly, though, so he sighs and reluctantly starts to peel the shoddy wrapping job away, curious as to where the idiot got instant ramen that comes in a long skinny box. He’s careful as he peels, so the paper doesn’t fly away in little chunks and litter the restaurant or the ground around them.

His brow creases as he peels away the final bit of paper and tape, because it’s not ramen, after all. Naruto’s gift is a paring board of a unique design, new from the store in an unopened box. The picture shows a maple wood finish, but with small skewers jutting vertically from it on the bottom center, on which one can spear vegetables or fruit to help hold it in place while slicing. It also has a corner guard on the upper left with an edge sealer to help keep other things one wants to slice, like bread or sushi, secure. In addition, it says it has silicone feet, so it doesn’t move around when you use it.

He didn’t know anything like this even existed. It is a surprisingly thoughtful and helpful gift, one that he’s sure comes from a deep understanding of the challenges that come with living with one arm, though Naruto has had the prosthetic, now, for a while.

Sasuke studies it for a long moment, genuinely touched. “...It’s nice. Thank you.” Truth be told, it’s more than nice, and will be incredibly useful. He won’t have to summon a clone anymore to cut things.

Naruto laughs and slaps him on the back, prompting Sasuke to glare at him. “Beat that, losers!” Kakashi smiles and casts his eye towards Sakura behind him, so Sasuke turns, brows furrowed again. She’s pulling a white container out of her bag, now in her lap, and then sliding it on the countertop next to Naruto’s gift.

He can see now that it’s a first aid kit. He looks back to her, meeting green eyes and slightly tinged cheeks. “I thought there might be some things you didn’t have, after traveling for so long.”

This is odd, because all ninja travel with a rudimentary first aid kit at the bare minimum, and Sakura of all people knows this; it’s an occupational hazard and frankly foolish not to. He stares at it as if it is a riddle, trying to figure out what could possibly be inside. Perhaps medicine or painkillers? Even those come in standard first aid kits for ninja, though. A hefty stock of food pills? He supposes he could take those on missions with him, if needed.

He’s sure both Kakashi and Naruto are thinking the same thing, but they don’t comment on it.

Finally, he responds, meeting her eyes, “Thank you.” He’ll open it later, when he’s alone, to see what’s actually in it. She really didn’t need to get him anything.

Her smile grows wider, and her eyes catch the light, gilded fervor that he thinks he could drown in. “You’re welcome.” After a beat, she glances at Kakashi, so Sasuke tears his irises away from flashing jade iridescent with metallic lambency and turns, too. When he does, he sees that Kakashi’s bowl is now empty. He tries to resist an annoyed twitch; he doesn’t know how he keeps pulling this off, after so many years.

Then his old sensei reaches into his vest and pulls out what appears to be a frame; it must have been tucked there this whole time, for safekeeping, out of sight.

When he reaches past Naruto to gift it to him, Sasuke realizes it’s their original Team Seven picture, in the frame he saw sitting on Kakashi’s desk the other day.

His eyes sting as it’s pressed into his hand, thoughts of mask hypervigilance forgotten in an instant in favor of an overwhelming sense of plenary peace and belonging. There is a small inner voice emanating from a house lined with dark wood and darker penchants, gnawing and protesting that he is deeply undeserving, but he extinguishes it for now, just for tonight; the world is not going to end because Kakashi gave him a picture rife with memories. Fighting to remain detached is what got him into trouble in the first place.

Sasuke blinks a few times, and a paper-thin layer of sediment peels away, messy and getting everywhere, like the wrapping paper he tried to collect earlier to avoid a similar problem. Then he utters, “Thank you,” quietly, but loud enough for all three of them to hear.

“No problem. I can get another copy developed from the village archives for my desk,” Kakashi replies, smiling. “It’s good to have you back.”

Time passes somehow both quickly and slowly. The four of them sit there for well over another hour, visiting casually about topics that aren’t as heavy as perplexing poisons. Sasuke moreso listens than genuinely communicates, but he comments every now and then.

Naruto chatters about an elaborate date he’s going to take Hinata on when she gets back to the village, involving feeding ducks at her favorite pond. Sakura mentions that he should bring cinnamon rolls, because that is Hinata’s favorite treat, and Naruto exclaims that he knows, but he also asks Teuchi for a pen to write a reminder on his hand, so he doesn’t forget to pick them up the day after tomorrow when she’s supposed to get back.

Kakashi mentions how he’s supposed to be getting some new mission requests in on Monday morning, so he might have something for Sasuke by then; the dobe is indignant when it doesn’t also include him, and launches into another five minute whining session.

Sakura tells a story about Sai and a misunderstanding involving an order of art supplies that she heard from Ino that morning; apparently, Ino works at the hospital on occasion, both to do some part-time medic duties and to help Sakura, which Sasuke was unaware of. Naruto shudders when Sakura brings up Sai, Ino, and art supplies; Sasuke gets the distinct impression that there is a story there, but doesn’t ask.

It is a little after eight when Kakashi mentions quite astutely that everyone is probably tired and should get going. Naruto laughs mischievously, then, meeting Sasuke’s eyes.

“Teme, what do ya say to all of us going out for a drink or two after this? There’s a fun place just down the road from here.”

Sasuke blinks, because that sounds objectively terrible on any night, let alone a Saturday, and it is not the first time since his return to the village that Naruto has mentioned going to drink; he really wants to get him drunk for some reason. Even though Kakashi has just said they should wrap it up, he looks at Sasuke as if waiting for a response anyways, as though he would actually go with them if they all chose to.

“Can’t. I have plans.”

Naruto huffs and grumbles under his breath about the plans probably involving training or reading or watching his laundry air dry. “Alright, alright. But you can’t escape it forever. Sooner or later, you’re going to have to accept.”

Sasuke smirks, then. “If you can beat me in a spar, I’ll go. Dobe.”

A fire has been lit in blue eyes. “You’re ON.”

Kakashi then sets enough money on the counter for all four of them, at which point they all begin to stand. Sasuke and Sakura both say thank you, but Naruto begins protesting that if he knew he was buying, he would have eaten more. Kakashi smiles cryptically. “Which is why I didn’t tell you. The Hokage position pays lucratively, but I know from experience you’ll eat me out of house and home.”

Naruto and Kakashi wave goodbye and set out to the west, in the general direction of their respective residences. Sasuke and Sakura both watch them go with something like amusement; he can hear Naruto complaining until he’s halfway down the street, which is a feat, because this area of town is still quite busy.

He turns to the gifts and stacks them carefully in preparation to leave, finally; they are all flat, so they’ll be easy enough to carry. They really didn’t need to get him anything... but he is appreciative, gaze lingering on them for a little longer than an instant.

Sakura is smiling at him when he turns to her, weight shifted to the side casually. “Do you want to drop those off first, or bring them with you?”

Sasuke thinks of the time; he still doesn’t know when she usually goes to sleep. “...I can bring them with.”

Her lips quirk upwards more, and she nods. They start walking east, him gripping the gifts carefully.

The moon has risen a bit higher in the sky by now; the streets appear much like a desaturated dreamscape, cloaking everything in a layer of alleviation. They pass under street lights casting flaxen ambiance, as well as other smaller hints of glow from various lit-up signage, tinctorial flashes washing over them both occasionally, only to be rinsed clean as they pass into astronomical dusk again. Sakura’s hair is surprisingly reflectant, brief notes of neons catching atop pale pink: electric blue, candy red, apple green.

“Naruto’s going to hold you to that bet, you know,” Sakura pipes up to his right once they’ve made it a block away, tilting her head upwards, expression soaked with mirth.

“Tch. Don’t remind me.” She laughs a little in response. It’s a lovely sound, dulcet in his ears.

They’re coming up on a bar that appears to be pretty crowded, people spilling out onto the street outside. Wordlessly, they both change course to cross to the other side of the street, avoiding the gathering of people, for which he is appreciative; he’s still not much one for crowds. They’re almost to the main stretch of road where they’ll turn south to go to Sakura’s; just two more blocks and the people should disperse a bit.

As they cross, Sakura informs him, “I’m pretty sure that’s the one he was talking about, by the way.”

“...Great,” He murmurs, frowning. He really doesn’t drink often. A place like that wouldn’t do much to encourage him to.

“It’s not so bad, if you go on a weeknight. Less people.”

He considers, then questions, “...Have you gone drinking with him?”

She averts her eyes, as if she’s a little embarrassed. “A few times... Usually it’s for celebrations, though, not just us. Birthdays, that sort of thing. I’ve gone with Ino more.” She ponders for a bit longer, as if shuffling through memories. “I guess I’ve gone with him and Kakashi-sensei a couple of times, though we don’t always go to that one. Once we went with Tsunade-shishou to that casino.”

Sasuke is pretty sure he knows the answer to his next question, but he asks it anyway. “...Is he any good at gambling?”

A short but rich giggle blooms from her throat that makes his lip twitch upwards. “No. His betting history is just as bad as shishou. He’s worse at baccarat than she is, actually, which is quite an accomplishment. She hadn’t won in a long time, before she beat him.”

It stands to reason that Naruto would be bad at table games, but the fact that he’s bad at arguably one of the easiest ones to learn amuses him more than it should. “...Will probably be awhile before I get dragged with him, then.”

“Probably,” Sakura agrees.

They turn south towards her apartment, and sure enough, the people milling about in the streets begin to thin. Being a Saturday night, there are more lights on than usual around this time, but they’ve arrived into an area of town that doesn’t really cater to a night crowd like bars do; the lit windows here are mostly residential.

Plants are continuing to unfurl everywhere in Konoha, though the rain tomorrow will probably be good for them. It stands to reason that it will get even more lush, after; perennials are starting to bud back to life, soon to join the annuals already adorning most buildings’ exteriors and windowsills. There’s a breeze picking up tonight, too, slightly shuffling leaves and the fabric of awnings attached to the buildings they walk past, a quiescent whispering that seemingly drowns out the usual sound of crickets. It might be cold enough for soup tomorrow; he’s looking forward to it.

Sakura notices, too. “Kakashi was right; everything is greening up. The rain will do some good tomorrow; we haven’t had some in a bit.”

“...Probably,” he echoes her words from earlier. Her hair is fluttering a little in the wind, too, eye-catching and gossamery. Sasuke wonders if it’s still soft like silk. He had accidentally felt it several times, on various missions when they were younger.

They reach her building, and she noiselessly opens the glass door for him. Sasuke steps aside so she can pass after she shuts it behind them. Then he’s following her up the stairway, something like anticipation unfurling in him, much like the greenery he noticed on the way here.

Sakura unlocks her door, glancing back at him for a moment with her hand lingering on the doorknob. Then she turns to push it open, and he trails behind her carefully.

He follows her into a small enclosed area - a dedicated entryway - with a threshold straight ahead leading into the rest of the space. It is dim until Sakura flips on the light of a compact but surprisingly luminous lamp to their right, and he sees that the entryway area itself is painted the color of pale cream. The floor beneath them is aged wood, light in color, that appears to extend into the rest of the dwelling. A single wall-mounted shelf floats to the left that holds several multifarious storage containers: one woven, one white, one that looks like an antiquated rice basket. Out of the top of the last one peeks the well-worn handle of a spade; it must be gardening supplies. Beneath the shelf are hooks studded to the wall; Sakura is stepping towards them to shrug off her bag and hang it from one of them, next to a green jacket and a red and pink coat with fur trim.

There is a console table made of aged wood that near matches the shelf - white oak, he thinks, because it’s not as richly colored as normal oak - to the right. It might be an antique; it is close in color and stain to the flooring, though not an exact match. Her fiction book from the other day sits atop it, a bookmark protruding from around halfway through its pages; he assumes she must keep any non-work-related library books there, when she’s not reading them. Beneath the table is a patterned rug in neutral tones, on which rest a small collection of sandals that are not entirely lined up straight, as well as a pair of green rainboots. It is the only part of the entryway that does not appear overly organized.

Sasuke begins to toe off his sandals as Sakura does, too. She crosses over to the table and opens up one of the drawers, placing her lanyard of keys inside. “You can set your gifts here, if you’d like,” she offers helpfully, gesturing to the table and sounding almost shy, so he does. He turns to grab his sandals and sets them neatly on the rug beneath the table.

She reaches beyond the enclosing wall to the other side, flipping what must be a lightswitch; the rest of the overhead lights in the next area of space flood on. She angles her head back towards him, shifting her weight to the side a little. “I’m afraid it won’t be as long of a tour as Naruto’s.”

It’s small, but cozy. They step into an open space with a wall trailing to the right and openness extending to the left, which houses her living room. The ceilings are high for an apartment this size; it makes it feel bigger. Two towering bookshelves line the west and south walls, and a small dining table sits in front of the window on the north end, over which hangs a simple but worn pendant light, sap green in color; it is reminiscent of the kinds one usually sees at indoor markets. Between the two spaces lies a comfortable-looking sage green couch, classic but also well-worn, placed in front of a small entertainment center. He notices that the furniture pieces are all of slightly different construction, not a matching set, though the colors of everything are very similar to the flooring. On top of the surfaces are various decorative knick knacks: little glass jars in varied colors with dried flowers, another lamp, a candle. The entire open area is painted a pale, pale desaturated viridian; Sasuke likes the color. From what he can see of the room past the expanse of wall to their right, it is painted a different color - linen white.

“Sai and Ino helped me with the paint colors when I moved in.” She pauses. “Well, Sai helped. Ino mostly just helped narrow down color selection. It needed painting anyways; my landlady said I could do pretty much anything as long as it wasn’t black or something.” She walks over to the lamp on the end table by the sofa, and switches it on. Then she wanders over to switch the pendant light over the table on, too.

Sasuke nods, still absorbing. There is an expanse of framed photos to his right, on the space leading up to what must be the kitchen. There are many, leading all the way down the wall, arranged in more of a collage fashion than straight across. He scans them quickly, and is surprised to see that their original Team Seven photo isn't among them. He knows it must be elsewhere in her apartment; she is too sentimental to not have it displayed somewhere. It makes him consider where he’s going to put the one Kakashi has given him.

“The layout is kind of unique,” Sakura continues, walking back towards him through the living room area. “There’s not really room for a dining table in the kitchen, so that table over there-” She motions towards where she just was, in front of the north window, “-is used for that. It’s kind of nice, that way; you can look out the window when you eat.” Sasuke notes upon further inspection that there are a few small plants sitting in the window there, similar coloring to the ones on her doorstep. A thriving jasmine plant is hung higher up, against the glass, fronds twisting downwards. He finds he can picture Sakura eating there easily.

Sakura crosses over into what he assumes is the kitchen; he follows, and notes as he does so that there is a faint aroma of tea, though it is a challenge to place the flavor. It’s simple, but with nice floor to ceiling white cabinetry, aside from a single area in the corner where there is open shelving of the same wood finish, as well as a window on the east wall, over the sink. This one appears to be lined with a small herb garden, more mismatched terracotta pots perched in the windowsill. The countertops here are also wood, in a similar colorway as the rest of the wood he’s seen so far. Most of what’s stored on the open shelving appears to be general dry goods, flour and sugar and oatmeal in clear containers. There is also a fern-colored teapot, decorated with a white floral design, sitting on the end of the shelf for easiest access; she must make tea often. There is a knife set on the counter, as well as a few ceramic containers holding various utensils such as whisks and wooden spoons. Nothing appears out of place, and there are no dishes in the sink; she must keep it pretty tidy. In the only empty corner, there is what he assumes is a pantry door, as well as a small wooden stool. He realizes then that she must not be tall enough to reach the top of the cupboards.

“Sai said keeping it a lighter color would make it look bigger. I think it helps. It’s pretty nice, otherwise.” She glances at him, then away, slightly flushed as if she’s nervous. He realizes, reciprocally, that he is kind of nervous, too, being in her space with her alone.

“Not much left but the hallway,” she adds after a moment, leading him out of the kitchen and further, to a hallway leading east. There are three doors towards the end of it; one to the left, one in the middle, and one to the right. Two of the three are sitting open; the small room straight ahead holds a stacked washer and dryer, as well as cabinets that match the ones in the kitchen. Once he follows her a few more steps, he sees a hamper, as well. The walls appear to be painted a lilac color in the laundry room, slightly darker in hue than the rest of her space thus far. The flooring is different, too, in the laundry room; a white tile, inlaid with a touch of black sparingly in a symmetrical pattern. The style of it is very in tune with the age of the building, reminiscent of an older time.

“Left door is the bedroom.” She gestures towards the closed door, then points to the next one. “Middle is the laundry room; that’s also where I keep any cleaning stuff, like the broom or mop.” She nods then towards the bathroom, so he steps closer to peer inside; it is painted a light sand color, with the same white tile accented with black, only here it also goes halfway up the wall. “And that’s the bathroom.” The same white cabinets appear here, too. It has a tub/shower combination, and a plain white shower curtain. It appears spotlessly clean. A window lies above the sink on the east wall, with another hanging plant dangling in front of it, towards the corner so it’s not in full light all of the time; it looks like a satin pothos. There is also a small wicker stool, on which are folded powder-white towels, and a small glass tabletop lamp, an interesting statement in a bathroom.

He remembers that there are three lamps she’s turned on already. She must not like hard lighting. He tries to resist the urge to smile, because neither does he.

“It’s nice,” he compliments as they make their way back to the living room area. It’s more than nice; he really likes it. Everything about it is as her as he expected it to be, more of a home than an apartment, eclectic combinations painting a picture very indicative of the life she lives here. Sasuke muses that it is especially characteristic of her that she would like different colors throughout the rooms, and that the colors fit their respective spaces well. He finds himself wondering what color she selected for her room, what color she deemed the most calming, though obviously he would never ask.

A deep blush inks it way onto her skin, and she smiles, seeming very pleased. “Thank you, Sasuke-kun.” Her gaze flits away, then back again. “Would you want to maybe watch something? I could make some tea, decaf, if you’d like.”

He nods.

“Okay; I can show you what I have.”

They go back into the kitchen. She opens one of the cabinets, the one nearest the teapot; the entire bottom shelf is filled with packaged tea, labeled jars of loose leaf, sugar, and a container of honey. The shelf above it contains teacups that match the teapot, and more jars of loose leaf, though these ones are labeled caffeine free. There are a few small boxes of packaged tea there, too; she must sort them separately based on caffeine content. The third shelf contains a few miscellaneous mugs and glasses. It’s quite a collection; he understands the mixed aromatics of different tea flavors he noticed earlier. It’s unique, enjoyable without being overwhelming, small hints of sweet spice and citrus drifting into the kitchen space more now that the cabinet door is ajar.

“Most of my packaged teas have more specific flavors, desserts and things like that,” Sakura mentions. “For loose leaf, I’ve got quite a few; caffeine-free ones are oolong, chamomile, lemon ginger, jasmine…” She shifts some of the jars to the side of the middle cabinet to reveal the ones behind it. “Silver needle, white coconut creme, Earl Grey, caramelized pear…”

“...Earl Grey sounds good,” Sasuke murmurs, moving slightly out of the way. She tips her head in acknowledgment before pulling that jar down, then reaching for the teapot.

“I’ll make some; I like Earl Grey at night. Do you want any cream or lemon or anything like that in yours? I have some in the fridge.” She moves to start the water boiling, removing the strainer from the teapot before she fills it. After it’s on the stove, she begins sifting loose leaf from the jar into the strainer so it’s ready.

“...Lemon would be good.” He likes adding lemon to Earl Grey; it makes it more tart. He feels like he should help, so he adds, “I’ll get it. Do you want cream in yours?”

Jade eyes flick to his, and her cheeks color a little. “...Yes. It’s on the top shelf of the door. There’s…” She pauses, as if embarrassed. “There’s normal creamer there too, but I have a coconut milk sweet cream that I like with mine. Just a little bit. It’s… meant for coffee, but…” When he smiles knowingly back, she looks away, back towards the teapot.

He opens the fridge; it’s extremely well-stocked. He doesn’t hover too long before he reaches to grab a lemon and the creamer she mentioned from the door’s upper shelf, but he notes there is a large container of strawberry topping on the top shelf towards the front, as well as a clear container with what may be banana nut muffins. She really does have a sweet tooth, he thinks, amused.

He shuts the door, and she procures a small cutting board from another cupboard and a knife to slice the lemon into wedges. She’s also grabbed two teacups, the ones that match the teapot.

“Thank you.” She’s smiling as he sets down the lemon and the creamer. “I can finish making this, if you want to maybe pick what we watch?”

“...What would you like to watch?”

Sakura blinks. “I’m honestly fine with anything. I’ve got some movies in the cabinet of the entertainment center… Otherwise I have cable to flip through, too.”

She must not go to bed too early, since she mentioned movies. He decides to ask. “...When do you usually go to bed?”

Something in her eyes softens. “Usually ten or eleven. It’s my weekend now, though, so I can stay up late, if you pick something longer.”

He nods, and she turns to slice the lemon halves into quarters, so he pads back to her living room. When he opens the cabinet below the television, he finds it nearly filled to the brim with movies. He settles down to siphon through them, skimming through various synopses. He comes across five or six shoved to the corner of one side haphazardly; those must be the ‘bad’ movies she watches with Ino. The rest of them that he finds sound fairly interesting. He ultimately picks one called A Tale of Archery; the summary makes it sound like a period drama with a twist. As he sits there, he tries to remember the last time he watched a movie; it was probably after he returned to Konoha but before he left for his journey, a rather stupid one with Naruto in his old apartment.

This one should be better. He hopes, brows furrowed, that it’s one she likes; he assumes she must like most of them, given that she owns them.

Sasuke stands with it as Sakura comes out with the tea, cups placed on small plates with dainty teaspoons. “Oh, that’s a good one,” she mentions. His heart flutters, and he feels a little less nervous. He puts it into the player on the next shelf before standing as she sets her plate and cup on her coffee table.

“Thank you,” he says softly when she hands him his, two slices of lemon perched on the side.

She smiles at him, dimple appearing, before grabbing the remote and flicking on the television so it starts setting up. “Do you mind if I shut off the overhead lights? I’m... not much one for hard lighting.”

“Not at all.” The space will be well-lit without it, with the lamps.

He takes a seat on the sofa while she walks over near the entryway. Sasuke realizes now that the couch isn’t terribly big; probably just enough for one person to lie down on, if they wanted to. It’s comfortable, as he’d anticipated. He sets his plate and cup on her coffee table so he can squeeze the lemon wedge into it, grabbing the spoon to stir as the overhead lights go out.

With the lights off, it is very cozy.

Sakura takes a seat next to him, not too close, but not the furthest away she could be, either. She fast forwards through the opening portion of advertisements as he stirs.

By the time he brings the cup to his lips to take a sip, the opening credits are playing. She sets down the remote and stirs her own cup once more, before also taking a sip.

It’s good; flavorful but not too intense, with a hint of bergamot orange rind and maltiness. The lemon gives it a slightly more acidic twist. He’s not much one for creamer, unless he’s in a rare mood on a cold fall or winter day, but he can see how the coconut milk sweet cream would compliment the taste, if one liked sweet things.

“It’s good,” he murmurs, meeting her eyes for a moment.

She glows at the compliment; he can make out a blush in the dim lighting. He feels his own neck heat up.

The movie is pretty good. It tells the story of a bygone feudal era a long time ago, peasants and samurai and daimyos with estates sprawling across countrysides lined with rice paddies. An archer passes away, and his son follows in his footsteps and becomes respected competitively. The twist is that the father actually went into hiding, and returns at the end of the movie.

It’s close to eleven when it’s over. Their teacups sit on her coffee table, long emptied.

Sasuke feels very content, and a little loath to leave, if he’s being honest. She seems slightly tired when she meets his eyes, though, so he slowly stands and reaches for his plate and cup. She does the same, and he trails after her to the kitchen, following her lead; she empties the lemon rinds into the garbage, so he does too. She then rinses her cup clean in the sink, extending her hand for his after.

“...What time should I come over tomorrow?” He asks in a hushed tone, when she turns to him. He’s not sure if the walls are thin or not, and they’re in the kitchen, so it’s not against her neighbors’ unit or anything, but he still somehow feels he should speak quietly; it’s somewhat dark, dimly lit only by cast light from the lamp in the other room.

Her countenance changes to one of consideration. “I was thinking maybe around eleven? I should have lunch ready around then.” Her eyes flicker to his, and her lips curve upwards; he tries not to look at them too long. “If that’s okay.”

He nods. “I’ll be here, then.”

Her lips curve upwards more. “I’ll walk you to the door,” she offers softly. He turns, and she follows.

“Do you like avocado?” She asks him as they shuffle into her entryway, where he stoops to retrieve his shoes. “I was… thinking about making avocado grilled cheese, to go with the soup.”

He glances upwards. “...I do.” He’s never had a grilled cheese sandwich with avocado before, but it sounds like it would taste good. He wonders again what kind of soup she’ll make; she knows his food preferences well, and she hasn’t asked, so it must be something she knows he’ll like. It makes his heart flip behind his ribcage a little.

“Oh, good. I’ll make that, then.” Her eyes drop down to her feet for a second as he rises back to his full height, sandals situated; it’s hard to tell in the lack of light, just the one lamp turned on in here, but he’s pretty sure she’s blushing again.

Her next words are near a whisper. “Thank you for… hanging out.” Multi-faceted jade seeps into him again, seafoam ebbing around dark pupils. He doesn’t think he’ll ever tire of it, after yearning for it for so long. “I had a nice time.”

He takes a quiet step closer to her, heart suddenly twisting in his chest as he tries to swallow his nerves, because she looks so happy, and it’s making his breath get stuck inside his lungs.

“...Me, too,” he whispers, barely audible before his lips brush hers gently.

It feels different, kissing her in the privacy of her apartment rather than on her doorstep. It’s like they can finally take their time, no real chance of interruption. His mind comes up with the word intimate, and his neck warms. Her mouth is all plush affection, bergamot and lemon and a subtle sweetness, stirred, that isn’t too much, accented by berry. It makes him want to try all of the varieties she has in her cabinet, even the sweet ones, just to see what they taste like on her lips in the hours that follow.

Delicate hands brush his shoulders, fingertips skimming the lower part of his neck, subtle beckoning but also gentle, respectful of boundaries, so he decides to corrode, give in and do something that he has wanted to do for a very long time. He cups her cheek with his hand, careful and barely there, gingerly sweeping a thumb over flushed skin, gliding atop a freckle that rests further back on her cheekbone. He’s had it memorized since they were kids.

The strands of pink he inadvertently touches are as soft as he remembers.

Her face is ablaze when they draw back from each other, tender smile and viridescent eyes laced with ardency just for him. Warmth pools in his belly as he studies her, decay long soothed and forgotten as he carefully strokes her cheek once more before he pulls away.

“...Good night, Sakura.”

The dimple makes one last appearance for the evening. “Good night, Sasuke-kun.”

XXX

Sasuke opens the first aid kit upon his return to his apartment, having been curious about what was in it all evening. Vines grasp his heartstrings as he discovers what’s inside.

There are two jars of loose leaf sencha tea that he’s sure came from the tea place they’d visited together a few days ago; one is labeled caffeinated, the other decaffeinated. Along with it is a basic tea infuser, new in its package. There are also three blue packages of cough drops, mentho-lyptus flavor, so they won’t be sweet.

Jade irises, he thinks, are also mollifying, for when the corrosion is done, an aether easily risen into, floating to the top.

Sasuke brews a mug of the jar labeled decaffeinated to enjoy before he goes to bed, a helpful succedaneum with which to conclude an evening well spent. It's not exactly the same shade of green, he thinks, before taking it to his living room so he can look out his window as he savors it, but it's close.

[suibianjie]

#ShowYourProcess, pt 2

Tagged by @inessencedevided​​ for this gifset ❤ (you can see her post here)

From planning to posting, share your process for making creative content!

To continue supporting content makers, this tag game is meant to show the entire process of making creative content: this can be for any creation.

RULES: When your work is tagged, show the process of its creation from planning to posting, then tag 5 people with a specific link to one of their creative works you’d like to see the process of. Use the tag #showyourprocess so we can find yours!

This is a bit long so sticking the rest under the cut.  (^ω~)

1. Planning

This set was actually part of a pair (with this Lan Wangji one) so most of the planning happened when I made that one. Basically, I knew I wanted a static central image surrounded by animation. I tried to pick a variety of scenes to show Wei Wuxian’s range of emotions, and wow was it hard to narrow it down to only 6.

For these kinds of gifsets, there’s actually two stages: creating the photomanip and then making the actual gif.

2. Creating

So here’s what I started off with for the photomanip:

The photo had Wei Wuxian on the right side of the image, so I extended the crop to put him closer to the center. 

I used a layer mask to remove the background. It’s not a super precise mask but I know I can always come back later to refine it. 

This is official (I think?) concept art of Lotus Pier, and I just added some Surface Blur + a hue/saturation adjustment layer to make it look smoother and more vibrant. The Lan Wangji set was very blue/green, so I wanted this one to be heavy on the warm colors.

Obviously the photo of Wei Wuxian didn’t match at all with the background. To change that, I first used to Camera Raw filter to change the overall temperature from cool to warm. A little Surface Blur was added on top to remove some of the film grain. After that I played with some adjustment layers until I was happy with the overall coloring.

Almost done! It didn’t quite have the visual pop I wanted, so I painted in some mist + more golden light to make that sunset really stand out. I also adjusted the shadows/highlighting (a separate layer set to Overlay or Soft Light + brush tool).

Phew, that’s stage 1 done! Now on to the actual gifset.

I always make a separate “planning” file for these types of sets to make sure the overall look is right:

Each segment of the photomanip gets cut and added to the corresponding gif. I often mock up what it looks like to make sure the masking is correct:

After that, I import video clips and create each separate gif. Here’s what gif #1 looks like after it’s been trimmed, cropped, and sharpened:

I wanted the overall gifset color to have those sunset colors, so each gif got a group of adjustment layers to make them more neutral. The section of the photomanip then gets added on top:

Repeat for the other gifs, add in the watermark, and then they’re ready to export!

3. Posting:

As always, I hold posts in drafts for at least a day or two and check for mistakes. I also look at it on both desktop and mobile to make sure any details/text don’t get lost. 

Wow that was a lot. Hopefully it made sense! I already tagged people in my first #showyourprocess, but if anyone else would like to play please feel free to tell me! 

(づ ◕‿◕ )づ

[love4hobi]

i’ve never made gifs before and i have absolutely no idea where to start T-T can you share your process or is that top secret lol? and dw i’m not using you instead of google lol it’s just i’m very picky about what looks good and your gifs have such a nice frame rate and sharpness and stuff so i was wondering how you go about making them (i have photoshop which i’ve heard is what most people use i think? idk) sorry if you get this question all the time feel free to ignore!

hi!! dont worry i had no idea where to start either and it took me a while and looking at several tutorials to figure out what i was doing cus its unfortunately not something u can just google and find all the steps to lol,, but anyway no my process is definitely not top secret!! i think most people use mostly the same process and then things like sharpening + coloring are all about personal preference! but heres some things that might help u out!! 🥺

heres a couple tutorials that could help u get the hang of the actual technical process and steps of converting a video file to a gif which for most people is about the same, kookyjin’s tutorial, sugajimin’s tutorial

you don’t have to use vapoursynth but it does make the process a little easier by cropping and resizing the video for u, and it also has a denoise filter which will make your gifs look smoother, it can be a little tricky to install but heres the link for that

as for my personal way of sharpening i use smart sharpen, and sometimes unsharp mask if i want it just a little bit sharper. the basic sharpening for tumblr gifs is 500% at 0.3px, but u can use more or less depending on the quality of the video. lower quality videos (like youtube videos) usually cant take more sharpening before they start to look oversharpened so u can lower it to 0.2px. but for things like my music video gifsets where the source video file im using is higher quality and hasnt been compressed the way youtube videos are (i get them from other websites where people have access to higher quality versions of the mv), for those i’ll often use 0.4 or even 0.5px, so it really depends! i also sometimes change the opacity of the sharpening filter to fine tune it a bit more. what i like to do lately is start off at an amount thats like obviously too much and oversharpened, and then gradually work my way down until i think it looks ok! i think its just something you have to build up a sense for over time :] but yea those r just some tips

as for coloring, its even more up to personal preference than sharpening is! i personally like a really natural coloring that just brings out the colors that were already in the video. so i cant give tips about other coloring styles but if u like mine id say the most important thing is creating contrast. and the best layers ive found to do so is with levels and curves. i ALWAYS start my coloring with a levels layer and darken the shadows and brighten the highlights as much as i think looks natural. this creates a good base to make the rest of the coloring on, gets rid of the “gray cast” (you’ll notice it if you click the little eye next to the levels layer and turn it on and off and see the difference with and without it), and makes the colors in the gif look more vibrant and saturated without actually using a vibrance saturation layer. i rarely ever use a vibrance saturation layer and if i do its actually to lower the saturation. after a levels layer ive been using (in order) two curves layers (its kinda hard to explain how to use those u just have to mess around with it until it does what u want), a brightness contrast layer, an exposure layer, sometimes a selective color layer (just to darken the blacks a little which is another good way to create contrast), and a gradient layer at about 10% opacity of just the white to black one to add a little bit more contrast :)

for frame rate i also prefer it to look natural and almost as fast as the original video. i will usually do 0.01 seconds above what the frame rate was when i originally imported the frames. so for 25 fps videos i would use 0.05, for 30 fps 0.04, and 60 fps 0.03

i hope all of that made sense and u find at least some of it helpful🥺 if u have any questions please feel free to send me another ask id be happy to answer!! even if u think it might be a dumb question i probably had it too at some point and might be able to help<33 good luck i promise giffing is really fun n worth sticking thru the first little bit of confusion!! ^_^

[ask-the-riders]

Eager Deal Maker

Not all demons enjoy making deals and stealing souls

But most of them thrive off of it

((Gonna add some warnings for implied abuse, implied domestic disturbances, threats, manipulation, threats against animals, and dark themes))

The drama was a frequent occurrence within the household, and frankly, none of it came as a surprise anymore. If anything, the demon found it amusing, and the negative environment fed him well. It began when the dumb brunette harlot moved in with her worthless drunk of a boyfriend. Naturally, her teenage daughter went with her; Not that she was  given a choice on the matter. The woman’s boyfriend also had a daughter of his own, who’d made it clear from the very beginning that she had no interest in befriending the other girl.

Living together wasn’t always the best, but it was doable. Then the family relocated, and a little time passed before the woman’s eldest child moved in with them, absolutely riddled with anxiety and depression. Of course, while Othni relished those emotions, it was the fear and anger that blossomed there that really caught his attention. First it was from the pair of siblings and their overactive imaginations, causing them to fear their new home’s basement. They despised the dirt and cobwebs, the old, musty odor, and the various dark crawl spaces. Their minds painted the image of monsters lingering in the gloom, and more than once, they feared that if they looked into the darkness too long, they’d catch something looking back at them. Othni had been so very tempted to indulge their imagination a little, and he contemplated all the various forms he could take to scare them.

He never got the chance, though. The rage that took hold of the house was located on the second floor, and it was provided by the daughter of the mother’s boyfriend. She was so angry and often carried the stench of jealousy, and Othni was intrigued. She had such an easy life; So he didn’t understand what she had to be angry about. Her parents loved her, she didn’t have to work even a single moment to attain anything she currently owned, she had a loving boyfriend of her own, and she had virtually the entire upstairs of the house to herself. She was bitter and ungrateful, and Othni could hardly believe some of the things that she had the audacity to say to her father. Hell, if he’d even considered saying such things to his father…

Othni shook off those thoughts, refocusing his attention on the present moment. Right now, a fluffy black cat that belonged to the pair of siblings was staring at him from across the small living room, it’s large, green eyes locked on his every move. He paused, stopping in the doorway that connected the living room to the kitchen, and he arched an eyebrow, watching the cat tilt its head and take one tiny, cautious step toward him. Smiling slightly in amusement, the demon slowly lowered himself to the floor and sat down, turning his body a bit and facing away from the cat. As he’d expected, the fluffball continued to very cautiously approach him, stretching its neck and sniffing the air. This was a creature that was pure of heart, and he could tell how timid it was, so he did his best to stay as still as possible. 

Crouched low to the ground, it crept even closer, slowly making its way around him and sniffing at his arms and hands. Looking up at him with wide eyes, its mouth hung open as it tried to process the new scent, and he chuckled, amused by the way that particular expression looked on its face. A door slammed upstairs and the cat immediately bolted for the stairs, likely to go hide in its owners’ room. Othni made a face, pouting as he watched it leave; It was fluffy and timid, and it reminded him of his precious Misfit. It saddened him ever so slightly that the fluffball was gone now, but he shoved the feeling aside. After all, he could always see it some other time. 

The stairs creaked and he vanished into the shadows, quietly watching as the resident home-wrecker descended. Usually she emitted nothing but anger and jealousy, but at the moment, she gave off a sick, twisted sense of joy and satisfaction. Noting the cocky smirk she wore, he frowned; Oh, wonderful. Just what in the hell had she done now?

He waited for her to pass from the room before he warped through the shadows and manifested in the shadows that occupied the guest room. Careful to stay out of sight, he took a deep breath, sensing the anger, frustration, fear, and despair from across the hall. The elder sibling’s anxiety had grown so much that it was almost suffocating, and he furrowed his brows in puzzlement. Again, he warped through the shadows of the house, manifesting a second time within the siblings' closed bedroom closet. Listening in, he caught the sound of sniffling, as if one of them was crying. When they spoke, their voice shook, “If she does anything to him, I swear… I’m gonna throw the bitch down the damn stairs. I’m not letting her get away with this.” As they spoke, he could hear the anger and venom that were laced into their words, and he tilted his head. 

He was all for violence and revenge, but just what was going on? The one that was speaking was usually so reserved and considerate of others. They reeked of kindness and empathy, and this was incredibly out of character for them. Willing to risk being seen, he warped through the small gap beneath the door, quickly finding a new spot just outside one of their windows. Peering inside, his eyes scanned the room before they settled on a piece of paper that laid on the foot end of one of their beds. Squinting a bit, he focused in on it, and then immediately bristled. On it, there was a threat to kill their cat, along with an additional insult. From the brief meeting he’d had with their little black fluffball, he could tell that it was a sweetheart. In such a short amount of time, it reminded him so much of Misfit that he felt his long dead heart give a small pulse in affection, and he found himself already harboring the urge to protect it. This… This wouldn’t fly. If these humans didn’t do something to protect it, then he’d be taking it with him, and that was all there was to it. 

“I can see you out there!” The other siblings' words caught Othni by surprise and he jolted, quickly ducking out of their line of sight. Hiding in the shadows again, he listened as the first sibling questioned them, frowning as they gave their response, “There was a shadow out there. It was all dark, and then I saw it move.” The demon mentally kicked himself for not being more careful and he remained frozen in place, waiting for their conversation to change before he moved again. When it did eventually drift back to the subject from before, he prepared to move, but then abruptly stopped, listening as he caught the tail end of something the first sibling had said, “-I wish demons were real. At this point, I’d willingly give one of them my damn soul if it meant getting rid of that bitch and keeping Bubby safe.”

A lightbulb went off in the demon’s mind, and a wide, sharp toothed grin stretched across his face; An opportunity to make a deal had just presented itself, it seemed. He didn’t even care if he laid claim to their soul or not, all that mattered was protecting their little feline friend. Grinning devilishly to himself in delight, he warped back into their closet and waited. Some time passed before their light shut off and the room became illuminated by nothing more than a small, handheld lamp, and he prepared himself, his tail and claws disappearing, his sharpened teeth becoming dull and human while his eyes faded and turned emerald green. He allowed his greyed skin to shift, becoming a more human looking color before he rapped on the door exactly three times and waited. 

Naturally, a few expletives slipped from their mouths, and he arched a brow. There was the sound of movement before the closet door slowly opened after a moment and the pair of siblings gawked at him. Clearing his throat, he took the most polite tone he could manage, “One of you wished for a demon to solve your recent problems for you, so here I am.” While the elder of the two continued to stare at him, the younger one seemed taken aback, “Uhh, no, we didn’t. Who the hell are you, and why are you in our closet?” The demon  couldn’t help the amused grin that found its way onto his face and he tilted his head, “One of you said they’d willingly give up their soul to get rid of that dunderheaded doxy across the hall and to keep your pet safe.” The younger sibling shot a look at the elder of the two, and the elder seemed to shrink back a bit, offering them a small, guilty smile. 

Shifting his attention to them, he hummed, “I presume it was you?” They sheepishly nodded, not quite meeting his gaze, and he warped through the distance between them, “Luckily for you, I can do that. I can get rid of her, and I can make sure your cat is safe. You caught me on a good day, so I won’t even ask for your soul.” The elder of the two siblings regarded him with a look of clear suspicion, narrowing their eyes, “…What would you be getting out of it? You’re a demon, so I don’t think you’d ever do anything just for the sake of being nice.” He chuckled lowly to himself; Oh, so they were a clever one. How interesting. 

The demon shrugged his shoulders, noting the way their cheeks reddened the slightest bit as he drew even closer to them and leaned down, wrapping an arm around them. Lowering his voice, Othni murmured, “I saw the note she left, where she threatened to kill your cat.” He paused, slowly letting his appearance shift back to normal. As his fair skin became greyed and his teeth sharpened, his eyes began to glow a vibrant shade of blue and his tail appeared, unwinding from around his waist. It curled around the elder sibling’s waist and he dug his clawed fingertips into the fabric of their shorts as he purred, “As you can probably imagine, I happen to love cats. If someone has the audacity to kill a cat, then I kill them. Simple as that.” Registering the change in his appearance, the tail around their waist, and his words, their eyes widened and they froze, unsure what to do.

Sensing this, he lifted his free hand, delicately turning their head so they’d meet his gaze. As their eyes met his, he offered them a sharp, charming grin, “While your soul would be a nice little add-on to this deal, I don’t need it. All I want is the satisfaction of ridding this home of someone who’d dare hurt an innocent animal. All you’d have to do is keep your mouth shut and let me feed off of the growing negativity here.” He stole a glance at the younger sibling, “Both of you. Do you think you could do that?” The siblings shared a look, the younger one nodding first before the elder nodded back. Meeting Othni’s gaze again, the elder sibling made a soft sound in agreement, “Yeah… We could do that.” He seemed to light up, his grin widening, “Wonderful, I’m glad! Since I am still making a deal with you though, I’ll need you to shake my hand.” Offering them a blackened hand, he patiently waited as they internally battled with themselves. 

A few seconds passed before they hesitantly took his hand, and his grin became mischievous. He tightened his grip on their hand and dug his claws into their skin, drawing a small amount of blood as he hissed, “Excellent, I’ll get started immediately, then. I’d suggest putting your headphones on… You might not want to hear the screams.” 

[coredrill]

coredrill’s basic gif coloring tutorial!

hey y’all!! so basically an anon asked for the general steps that i use to color my gifs, and i thought i’d turn it into a mini-tutorial!

i’ll be using a gif from rwby as an example, since it’s got pretty simple coloring but it represents my process well. i use the same steps for all my gifs, including those from other shows. essentially, i’ll be showing you how to get from the gif on the left to the gif on the right:

to the anon who asked for this, or anyone else who happens to see this, if you have any questions or need me to clarify something: please don’t hesitate to ask!! i do not mind at all :)

tutorial below the cut:

okay, so i’ve started with a basic gif of winter, which i’ve already resized, sharpened, and converted to timeline / smart object.

as you can see, this gif is...incredibly blue. it’s also kind of dull-looking, since the scene takes place in a dark location. if i’m sitting down to gif this scene, i’ll want to make it brighter, and i also want to make it so that the entire thing isn’t blue-washed!

there are two steps that i always, always start with when making gifs. it doesn’t matter what show or scene i’m giffing, i always start by adding a selective color adjustment layer, and a vibrance layer on top of it. here are my settings for those:

and here is the gif that it results in:

now, i know this just made winter more blue, which is the opposite of my goal. but that’s okay! it’ll be fixed later. basically, the point of this step was to make the colors in the gif as bright as possible.

the selective color layer helps with that by providing a strong contrast for the other colors to play off of. basically, if you make your blacks as black as possible, other colors will just look more vibrant next to them. here’s a comparison between what i would consider to be a “finished” version of this gif (on the right) and that same gif, but without darkening the blacks (left):

sure, most of the colors are the same, but they look brighter in the gif on the right, because they’re being compared to a true black instead of a dark blue.

this selective color layer is also super important for me when i make gifs because i rely so heavily on making all of my colors ridiculously vibrant! the .gif file format only allows for a maximum of 256 distinct colors--which works fine in this example, because it’s a pretty small gif. but, if you’re making longer gifs, or gifs with a whole bunch of different colors, or gifs with a lot of movement, photoshop will pick what it thinks are the 256 most important colors in your gif and try to replace any excess colors with the closest match. sometimes it looks okay, sometimes it doesn’t. but, if you add this layer, you can help mitigate this problem a little, since all of your dark blues turn into black and all of your dark greys turn into black, etc. etc. that way, you still have 255 colors left over to play with!

the vibrance layer is pretty self explanatory--it makes the colors more vibrant and saturated! it’s different from the hue/saturation layer because vibrance actually adjusts the color in an intelligent way. if you turn up the saturation in a hue/saturation layer too much, you run the risk of your gif’s colors blowing out and getting all grainy (like a deep-fried meme). but using the vibrance layer pretty much prevents that altogether!

occasionally, i will set the saturation slider on my vibrance layer to a lower value. this really only happens if the scene that i’m working with starts out pretty saturated to begin with--95% of the time, i set both sliders all the way to 100.

alright! now that i’ve got those two layers down, i move onto the scene-specific coloring. i always color each scene differently, but i follow a similar set of steps each time.

the first thing to be aware of is that generally, turning the vibrance all the way up will tend to also amplify the color of the lighting. for this scene (and a lot of rwby v7/8), it’s the blue lighting of the atlas military compound. if i’m giffing rwby v5, turning up the vibrance just makes that godawful yellow filter even worse. the early rwby volumes sometimes use a magenta lighting. weird stuff, lol. but these steps are where we fix that!

some things to mention: the layers i use for these steps are color balance and selective color. i also place these layers between the two layers i already have, so that they’re on top of the selective color layer where i darkened the blacks but under the vibrance layer. i’ve found that colors are much easier to adjust when they’re less vibrant, but i like having my vibrance layer in there already so i can see the final product without any surprises! (also, i’ll include a screenshot of the layers i have at the end of this post, so you can see the order i put them in!)

if i find myself going “ugh, why is this scene so *insert color here*” the first thing i add is a color balance layer. i always fix as much as i can by adjusting the midtones first, then i mess with the highlights. i’ve found that if i start with highlights, i end up overcorrecting, and get really weird color combinations. i never touch the shadows, since that tends to mess with the blacks that i’ve already added. here are my settings for this gif:

and here is the gif that it results in:

hooray! winter’s less blue! i will say--in this case, i had to make pretty big adjustments to the red/cyan sliders. normally, the color balance layers are pretty touchy (at least, they are when there’s a vibrance layer on top of them lol), and i don’t have to make either value greater than +/-10. but this scene was really blue, hence the large change lol.

and, i know, it’s still pretty blue! but at this point, you can start to see the distinctions in the colors that are supposed to be there--winter’s skin looks like a blue-tinted yellow, for example, and her sword is actually grey. if i’d made any larger changes with the color balance layer, it would’ve started affecting the more neutral parts of the gif. for example, dragging the sliders to try to get rid of more of the blue in the gif would’ve tinted her sword hilt yellow or red, which isn’t what i was looking for! so, at this point, i added two selective color layers on top of the color balance layer. here are my settings for these layers:

i probably could’ve combined these changes into one selective color layer, but i tend to split up my coloring into a whole bunch of different layers so that it’s easier to fine-tune. for this gif, the first layer i added adjusted the whites in the gif (so winter’s skin, hair, and clothes) by removing cyan. this works because there are no whites in winter’s sword hilt--the neutral colors are left alone, but the lighter ones are adjusted! you can see this adjustment in the gifs below:

the gif on the left shows the effect of just the first selective color layer. you can see how just that small adjustment helped a lot--winter’s skin finally looks like actual human skin, instead of being tinted blue! the gif on the right is a pretty subtle change, and it’s the result of adding the second selective color layer as well. you can see that winter is just the slightest bit brighter--which has the benefit of getting her hair farther from blue and closer to white, lol.

the last thing i do is adjust the brightness of the gif itself. i do this last because, similar to the color adjustment, i don’t want to be surprised by its effect when i add color adjustment layers on top of it! normally, i use the levels, brightness, and exposure layers here, in that order. they all go underneath the very first selective color layer (darkening the blacks). for this gif, i only needed to use levels adjustment. here are my settings for that:

and here is the resulting gif:

and there it is! ta-da! you can see that adding that layer brightened the background just a bit, which is nice so that all the blacks don’t completely blend together. more importantly, it also got her hair to the pretty shade of white it’s supposed to be, and got rid of the residual pesky blues!

as promised here is the order of my layers:

you can see that even though the blacks layer and the vibrance layer are the first things i add, they’re definitely not the first two layers! i’ve found that this general order (brightness/levels/exposure, then selective color to darken the blacks, then fixing the colors with color balance and selective color, then vibrance on top) tends to give the best results for my gif style, even if it doesn’t match the order that i’m adding the layers in!

of course, this exact coloring won’t work on all gifs, but hopefully it gives you an idea of where i start and the general process i use!! a lot of the specifics--like figuring out how much you can move the sliders before it does something wacky to the colors, or how many selective color layers you need to add, or which colors to actually adjust in the selective color layers--comes from practice and experimentation!!

that’s pretty much the end for this post, though--hopefully i was able to make some sense! like i said at the beginning, PLEASE don’t hesitate to send an ask if you have any questions or need me to clarify something!! i’m sure i’m not using proper terminology with a lot of this--i just kind of learned by messing around in ps! if you managed to make it to this point, thank you for reading the whole thing!!

[hiddenblockclub]

Let’s talk about coloring in edit and gifs

I have seen it going around in the AH comunity with whitewashing in art, and I wanted to talk about it in gifs, and show how I do my coloring (basicly the same for edits I have just used a gif for this example).

I excuse any spelling mistakes (I’m both danish and dyslexic) and if you have any qustion for me feel free to send an ask!

I use Photoshop CC 2017

Here is where we start of (it has been cropped and sharpened):

I’m gonna start with a basic coloring where I use some adjustment layers, you find them here in Photoshop:

I use curves, levels, brightness/contrast, selective colors and vibrance:

Curves is used the brigthen up the picture, and levels bring back contrast and color. Be careful with brightnes/contrast cause it can wash out your picture. Selective color just makes the black little blacker. And vibrance is just making the gif more vibrant.

Then we get this:

Then if you are like me you like playing around with the colors of the background and stuff like that, it really depends on the project on what I use, for this I used selective colors, here is a quick overlook at what I used here (I do also just mess around with levels and curves a bit more);

And then I get this:

Here is an exsample of a coloring that works on another set that just dont work here:

Here is a bit more visual explanation on why it’s “just no”:

My biggest tips:

Don’t use that brightness to much. They are other ways to make your gif light and colorful

Look back at the source, cause when you edit and look at it for a long time it can be easy to lighen it too much

I hate to say it but practice makes perfect

Here are some other tutorials that could help and probably explain better that I do:

How to spot and stop whitewashing poc in edits

A guide to coloring poc (including vibrant gifs, pastel gifs, and dark gifs)

Making gifs without whitewashing (inclused a psds - a coloring someone else has already made)

How to avoid whitewashing when coloring your gifs

How to avoid whitewashing a poc tutorial

[daniclaytcn]

How do you color your 911 sets?

hey nonnie! i’ve never done a tutorial before, so i hope my explanation makes sense! putting this under a cut because it gets image heavy:

okay, so i’m gonna go into this assuming you already know how to make a basic gif. i use photoshop cc, but this should work for any version. get your layers, make them into frames, convert the frames and layers into a video timeline and smart object respectively, sharpen the gif as you usually do and we’re good to go!

this is what my gif looks like without coloring:

so what we’re gonna do first is add a curves layer. with curves, you first use the white eyedropper tool on the lighter/white parts of your gif to make them brighter. then do the same with the black eyedropper tool with the dark parts of your image to give it some contrast.

these are the settings i use:

adjust the white curve as seen in the image to add brightness to your image where required, i recommend going with similar settings to this so you don’t end up making the characters look whitewashed. be especially careful while coloring POCs!

adding a curves layer really changes the way your gif looks drastically:

big difference, right? now, we’ll add a selective color layer to bring out the reds of the image, make it look brighter, and darken the black parts so to deepen the shadows and add more contrast.

increasing the values of cyan, magenta and yellow make the reds darker, though the difference is subtle. you can skip out on this step if you want to, but i recommend that you do add a selective color for black at the very least to deepen the shadows like so:

again, it’s a subtle difference, but it makes the gif look much better in my opinion.

next, we add a levels layer to add more brightness to the gif. these are the values i use:

this is what the gif looks like with levels and selective color:

now, this is where you can probably stop, the gif is bright enough and looks quite good! however, i like my gifs to be a touch more vibrant, so i have a few extra steps.

i add a vibrance layer and dial it all the way up. it tends to make the gif look oversaturated with way too much yellow, but there’s a fix for that. this is the vibrance layer, to begin with:

if the lighting is paler, i might take it even higher, but this really depends from gif to gif. when it comes to this part, the method is different for different scenes/shows. it’s pretty much a trial by error method, i just go at it pretty haphazardly lol.

now, to fix the oversaturation, i add another selective color layer, for yellow, this time:

usually, the yellow gets dialed up way too high with the vibrance layer, so i bring it back down to a normal amount with these settings. (you don’t need to adjust the black as much as the yellow, but i did it out of personal preference. it doesn’t actually make much of a difference, its your call.)

and this is the final result:

not much of a difference with the added vibrance, but what can i say, i’m picky about this lol. sometimes it does make a huge difference, but this scene was pretty bright to begin with so.

and there you have it! i hope this made sense, feel free to ask again if you didn’t understand something!

[kadywicker]

detailed giffing + basic coloring tutorial for beginners

so a lot of gif/coloring tutorials are pretty outdated or not that detailed & i wanted to put my own out there! in this:

how to get the screencaps for your gifs

how to make a general gif

basic coloring (no psds here, it just gives you a basic idea for making colors pop and look nice. you can look up how to use psds, but i prefer making my own for every gif as it’s much more personal, gratifying, and creative. there’s nothing wrong with using psds as long as you don’t claim them as your own, it’s just not my personal thing)

how to save a gif

we’ll be going from this:

to this

what you need:

photoshop (cc 2019 is what i’m using, but this works with any version of photoshop really as long as you download a version with the timeline feature) i won’t add download links here since i don’t want this deleted, but you can look some up on tumblr or use the pirate bay (current url is pirateproxy.blue as of 4/29/2020) & follow the instructions there.

for windows: potplayer/kmplayer (both use literally the exact same instructions) this tutorial uses potplayer but kmplayer uses like literally the same instructions, it just doesnt work right on my computer

for mac: mplayer. this tutorial does NOT cover this so find a tutorial on tumblr on how to take screencaps with mplayer & then skip to the “how to make a general gif” section. though, again, i’m on a pc so i have no idea if this is entirely accurate for mac.

if you’re downloading from youtube: clipconverter 

if you’re Definitely Legaly torrenting: utorrent + the pirate bay (again, current url is pirateproxy.blue as of 4/29/2020) or another torrent site + you should really consider getting a VPN when torrenting (i use privateinternetaccess but you can find one that suits you)

note: download an adblock of some kind, disable automatic downloads on your computer, & download an antivirus program if you want because some sites are sketchier than others! this is ESPECIALLY crucial on sites like piratebay. keep your computer safe babes.

1. screencapping

there’s several ways to get screencaps on photoshop, but this is the easiest imo and i’ve never done the whole convert video frames to layers thing. like i said, you’ll need potplayer or kmplayer. i’m using potplayer. important note: don’t accidentally download viruses here! read each screen carefully & make sure you’re not hitting accept to download any secondary programs.

1. download your .mp4/.mkv. you can go to youtube & find a clip/scene/whatever and use clipconverter to download it. just make sure you download it at 720 (or higher) as anything lower than that will give you a poor quality gif. you can also download using somewhere like the pirate bay, but for this you need utorrent & i would HIGHLY recommend using a vpn if you live in a country where torrenting copyrighted content is illegal, as your internet provider may flag your ip address if you don’t & you torrent too often.  

2. download potplayer/kmplayer & get it set up

3. create a screencaps folder. i always put mine on my desktop. in your screencaps folder, make a folder for however many gifs you want in your set. i just have one for mine so:

4. open up your .mp4/.mkv

5. hit ctrl + g to bring up the screen capture pop-up & set your settings to these. click the button w/the three dots next to the storage option & select the folder you created for your first gif

6. navigate to the scene you want to gif. when you’re there, pause it and hit the start button on the consecutive image capture screen, then play the video. how many screencaps you need depends on the size of your gif. for larger gifs (so like 540px wide gifs), you’re probably going to want to keep it below 30 frames. for smaller gifs (268px wide or less) you can maybe stretch it to 60, depending on how much coloring you add. you can always delete screencaps later though in photoshop, so don’t worry about it too much. for this gif, i only had 17 frames because the scene was really short lmao

7. go to your screencap folder you made & delete any unnecessary frames. it’ll look like this:

8. repeat the process for any other gifs, making new folders in your “screencaps” folder, numbered for however many gifs you’re making. make sure to change the folder you’re loading the images into on the image capture pop up though so they don’t all go into folder 1. 

2. making a simple gif (+sharpening)

1. first, you need to load your screencaps. when you open up photoshop, go to file > scripts > load files into stack

2. when the window pops up, switch the “file” option to “folder”

3. click browse and find your screencap folder for your first gif (in my case, desktop > screencaps > 1) once it’s all loaded, click “OK”

4. it’ll take a minute to load all your screencaps into photoshop. when they do, go to the upper bar on photoshop > windows > timeline

5. when the timeline bar shows up, click “create frame animation”

6. hit this button and click “make frames from layers”

7. hit the button again and click “reverse frames”

8. click back onto your first gif. then select the rectangular marquee tool and set it to whatever gif size you want. the width for 2 small gifs next to each other is 268px, the width for full size gifs is 540px. most people use 268x150 px for gifsets of 4+

9. use the marquee tool to select what area you want for your gif, like this. it’s up to you how to crop it! get creative!

10. go to image > crop

11. now that your image is cropped, go to image > image size. change the size to your desired gif size (in this case 268x150). hit “OK”. then make sure it’s zoomed in to 100%

12. now, you COULD just save this gif, but they look way better sharpened. so you need to convert this to a smart object. to do so, first select all your layers in the righthand layer window. to select all the layers, click on your top layer, hold shift, and scroll down to your bottom layer & click on it as well while still holding shift

13. next, you need to select all your frames. go back to the options button from part 6 > select all frames

14. next, we’re going to create an action to make your life 100x easier when it comes to sharpening gifs in the future. to do so, go to the actions icon (may look different on different versions of photoshop, but basically just find the actions window)

15. create a new action with this button. name it something. i named this one “sharpen tutorial” and hit “record”

16. click this button to convert to video timeline

17. go to filter > convert for smart objects

18. go to your single created layer and right click and click duplicate layer. this helps get rid of the transparent border around the gif.

19. go to filter > sharpen > smart sharpen & use these settings

20. go to filter > blur > gaussian blur. set it to these settings.

21. go to your second layer with the filters on it & right click on the gaussian blur filter to select “edit smart filter blending options” and set the opacity to 50%. you can mess around with this for different levels of sharpness. the closer to 0%, the sharper your gif will be.

22. hit the stop recording button on your sharpen action. now you’ll have an action to use next time you make a gif! after you’ve followed all the steps 1-13 you simply go to actions, click on your saved sharpening action, and hit play instead & it’ll do steps 14-21 in a few seconds. here’s a pic of the stop button on the actions window

23. our gif is now sharpened! you can end with this & skip to the saving a gif section, or you can continue to coloring. here’s what we have so far.

3. coloring

now on to coloring. this is pretty basic coloring and it probably won’t work if you follow my numbers exactly, as every single scene is different color + lighting wise. but this is just an example of the kind of thing you could do. basically, if you’re making vibrant gifs, you want to up the brightness + contrast + vibrance and make the colors already present pop. if you want anything more complicated (pale gifs, changing the colors to make, say, quentin’s shirt in these gifs red instead of blue), you’ll have to find other tutorials or experiment on your own. learning how to color & finding your style takes time! you can download psds if you want, but imo those kinda take the fun out of making gifs? that’s just me though. 

after each step, i’ll show you what the gif looks like.

1. i usually start with a curves layer. i usually don’t mess with the color curve options, just this one:

2. next, i do a brightness/contrast layer

3. next, i do a vibrance layer. make sure not to make it TOO saturated or it’ll look bad.

4. next i do a color balance layer. this is where it really starts differing depending on what color you want your gif to be.

5. next we move to the selective color layers, which are arguably the most powerful. here you can make colors pop, change colors, etc. it’ll take lots of practice & messing around with, but here’s what i did with this gif. this one is making yellow + blue pop

6. next, i did two more selective color layers editing the blue tab to make the blue pop even more

7. i still wasn’t quite happy with it, so i added another selective color layer to edit the blacks + neutrals + greens

8. for good measure, i added one more brightness/contrast layer

9. and the gif is done! however, you can play around with various adjustment layers until you’re happy. again, this is just an example of how to do basic coloring. it’s a skill like any other & takes practice. to keep consistent coloring in a gifset, 

9b. you may want to make a psd of this coloring. to do so, you need to put all your adjustment layers in a folder, delete your frame layers, and click file > save as. save it as a .psd. then you can open it and drag it onto any other gifs you make, adjusting the coloring accordingly but still with the same vibes. you don’t have to do this, but it makes life easier. here’s how to use your saved psd, though obviously you’re using your own in this case and not a downloaded one.

4. saving your gif

1. on photoshop cc 2019, you go to file > export > save for web (legacy). for other versions, you can just go to file > save for web. use these settings. the gif size limit is 3mb per gif, so make sure your file size is under that. if it’s not, you’ll need to delete some frames or some adjustment layers.

2. now, photoshop is a bit of a pain & this gif timing will not be right. so you need to open your newly saved gif. then you hit this button + select all frames

3. click this button & select “other”. tumblr gifs are typically .05-.08. my photoshop is glitchy and i have to set mine to .1-.15 or they’re WAY too fast. but usually, go with .05-.08 unless yours ends up glitching too.

4. save it like you did the first time and ta-da! you’ve made a gif!

[britishassistant]

Old Maid

The beautiful images of Cell 6 in Building Three had busy schedules. Even outside of entertaining the attentions of their fanclub, there were photo shoots and promotional materials to pose for, quizzes on beauty and general education to take, ammo ranges to clean, and mechanical projects to help out with.

But whenever the beautiful inmates did have some downtime, they tended to spend it playing card games to sharpen their wits and poker faces.

Well, Inmates 0303 and 0382 did. Inmate 0307 just hoped that he would not lose as badly as he normally did.

His lack of familiarity with the game strongly suggested that these hopes were soon to be dashed.

“So...the Joker is...bad?” Nana asked, staring at his hand of cards like they contained the secrets of the universe.

“For the fortieth time, yes.” Hani groaned. “Have you been listening at all?!”

“I have!” The young inmate flushed. “It’s just—it’s difficult.”

“How?!”

“Be nice, Hani-kun.” Trois laid a concilatory hand on his cellmate’s shoulder. “It is his first time after all. Nana-chan needs a bit of guidance so he can properly gain experience after all.”

“This stuff is basic intuition though!” Hani griped, shaking his cards for emphasis. “Not knowing it is as stupid as not knowing you have five toes!!”

“Jyugo-san has six toes. Nico-san told me he told him he lost one of them to a piranha.”

The two paused and looked at Nana. Trois reached out, carefully keeping his cards hidden, and pressed a hand to the boy’s shoulder. “Nana-chan, do you remember what we talked about the other day?”

Nana’s brow furrowed. “...That Jyugo-san shouldn’t be consulted about anything that isn't jailbreaking?”

“Yes. This is an example of one of those times.”

“Ah, that lockpick is seriously useless. Who the hell doesn’t know the number of toes humans have?! Did he sleep through goddamn school or something?” Hani complained, rolling his shoulders.

“...Did Jyugo-San go to school?” Nana asked, looking up from choosing a card from Hani’s deck.

There was a pause as the trio considered this.

“...Well, he must’ve! It’s not like the emotionless brat was born in jail— even if he was in juvie, he had to have a life before this— goddamn elementary schooling at least.” Hani proclaimed, rubbing the back of his neck doubtfully.

“Although, he and the rest of Cell 13 always say he’s in here for ‘jailbreaking’. There’s no mention of an original crime which lead to that like there is for Uno-kun and the others. And if he even drowns in the bathtub...” Trois mused.

Another, more dour silence as the implications sunk in.

“I-it’s kinda amazing that Jyugo-San functions as well as he does, isn’t it?” Nana asked shakily. “If he really was born in a prison, like Bane...”

“Bane?” Trois asked, raising a perfectly sculpted eyebrow as he placed the pair he’d just made with Nana’s card down.

“American comic book villain.” Hani informed him curtly. “Big guy on steroids, fights Batman. He was part of the inspiration for the bandit boss Yama in Winds and Clouds Chronicle Ninja Kamikaze that—”

“Wow, Hani-kun looks cool even when he’s oversharing about his favorite movie~” Trois steamrolled, leaving Hani to glare mutinously down at his cards.

“I-I’d like to hear more about it, Hani-senpai.” Nana tentatively volunteered, quailing slightly under Trois’ dry stare. “I-if it’s not too much trouble...”

“Hah!” Hani pointed a finger at Trois in smug glee. “Don’t worry Nana, we can do a movie marathon later.”

“Ah, okay! I’ll look forward to it!” The youngest member perked up again, turning back to his cards. The flash of panic on his face made it clear who had the Joker.

The mechanic sighed. “There go my hopes for having any cellmates with taste.”

“TROIS, YOU BAAAASTAAARD!!”

“Trois-senpai is mean!” The youngest inmate stuck out his tongue.

“Sorry, sorry. I’m just joking.” Trois held up a conciliatory hand. “Still, going back to the previous topic at hand, it is amazing that Jyugo-san is able to interact as a fairly stable and compassionate person, even given his...areas for growth.”

“How the hell does anyone get mugged by a grade schooler?” Hani sighed, taking a card from Trois’ deck. “And then get tricked into buying a weird vase in the same day, too?”

“...Jyugo-san was what now?” Nana asked, a look of incredulity crossing his face.

Trois chuckled. “Ah, you weren’t here for that story, were you? You’ll have to ask Uno-kun for the full version later.”

Nana went dark red for some reason, and began fidgeting with his cards. “A-ah, n-no, I’ll, I’ll just ask for i-it from Ni-Nico-san.”

Trois chuckled again, while Hani looked between them in confusion.

“Anyway,” The bespectacled inmate continued serenely, waiting for his cellmates to take their turns. “Maybe someone should provide Jyugo-san with some life advice, so his naïveté is not taken advantage of if he’s ever released.”

Hani scoffed as the smallest inmate’s fingers hovered indecisively over his hand. “As if that’d even help. It’d go in one of the lockpick’s ears and out the other.”

“Be nice, senpai.” Nana admonished gently, finally picking a card and holding his hand out to Trois.

“That’s right Hani-kun.” Trois added. “After all, Jyugo-san is just an unfortunate who couldn’t even guess the brand of underwear a woman wears, let alone the color.”

Hani’s expression became pensive and thoughtful, almost pitying.

By contrast, Nana’s face twisted in exasperation and disgust. “Why. Why do you two always do this?”

Both of the older inmates ignored him.

“Huh...” Hani closed his eyes and crossed his arms, keeping his cards pressed against his chest. “Life advice...like the fact that women who are wearing skirts without anything underneath are more likely to wear sexy or plain panties rather than anything patterned, just in case. And that white pants or bottoms usual mean white or pale pastel underwear, unless the material is thick enough that color wouldn’t show through.”

“How is that life advice?!” Nana squeaked, cheeks a vibrant red.

“That’s right Hani-kun.” Trois nodded seriously. “It’d be much better to advise him that the best laundry lines to get bras from are those on apartment buildings in big cities that are close in proximity to another building or roof. Those don’t tend to have the space inside to hang laundry, and it’s much easier to avoid a trespassing charge if you lean over and swipe it than if you’re caught climbing into someone’s garden, even if those have less security cameras.”

“That’s not any better!!” Nana shrieked. “In fact, it’s kinda worse! That’s seriously sexual harrassment at least! You’re gonna turn Jyugo-san into a deviant with advice like that!!”

“He’s in jail. He’s already a deviant.” Trois pouted.

“What the hell would you say then, if you’re so wise about how the outside world works?” Hani sneered, eyebrow twitching.

“I never said that! But...hm...life advice for Jyugo-san...” Nana pressed a knuckle to his mouth, frowning in concentration while his other hand flopped into his lap and showed off the faces of his cards. “Ah!”

He sat up straighter and gestured with an index finger. “Ryphenol makes your drink taste really salty, and you can fight the effects for about 20 minutes to get attention before the drug makes you pass out. Additionally, if you’re being followed by a scary person, go up to a building and yell ‘fire!’ while banging on the door, because that will make people come out rather than ignore you.”

There was a moment of stunned silence as the two beautiful inmates absorbed this.

“...Do you mean Rohypnol, Nana-chan?” Trois asked with a slightly strained smile.

“Um...Ah, yeah, that’s the one!” The child smiled, looking pleased with himself. “Plus, if you ever get taken somewhere against your will, do whatever you can to escape before you get taken to a second location, because your chances of survival go down drastically once that happens!”

“Why the hell is all your advice an anti-abduction PSA?!” Hani demanded.

“W-Well, Jyugo-san is clearly the type of guy who gets into trouble easily!” Nana countered, puffing out his cheeks. “It’ll be of more use to him to know that the police can find him easier with forsonics if he leaves hair or blood behind than how to guess a woman’s underwear color!”

“You take that back!!” Hani roared. “And what the fuck are forsonics?!”

“Forsonics! Forsonic science! The stuff police use to identify DNA and fingerprints and clothing fibers!” Nana yelled back.

“THAT’S FORENSICS, YOU LITTLE IDIOT!!”

“Is not!”

“IS!”

“Is NOT!”

“Nana-chan, I think Hani-kun is unusually correct about the pronunciation.” Trois intervened, finally finished with examining the content of the arrow head’s deck.

“HAH!” Hani cheered, sticking a finger in Nana’s face. “Wait, thE HELL DO YOU MEAN, ‘UNUSUALLY’?!”

Nana’s cheeks went red and he stared sullenly down at his cards, tears beading at the corners of his eyes.

“Ah, Nana-chan, don’t cry.”

“‘M not.” He rubbed his face on his shoulder.

“Seriously?” Hani quirked an eyebrow. “If that’s enough to start the waterworks, maybe you’re the one who needs life advice.”

Nana dropped his cards, bright red spots high in his puffed cheeks, lips pressed together sharply.

The boy stood, strode back over to his bunk, and crawled underneath it.

“Now you’ve done it.” Trois sighed, picking up the scattered cards and using them to discreetly make pairs

“Oh for fuck’s sake—“ Hani shot a glare towards the bunk. “Come out, brat.”

“Don’t wanna.” Came the stroppy reply.

“Don’t be stupid, Kiji’ll get pissy if you get dust on your clothes again.” Hani barked, fuse rapidly burning short. “Come out from under there already.”

“Take it back.” Nana demanded, the pout audible in his voice.

“Like hell!”

“Ah, I win again.” Trois said, satisfied.

Hani started down at all the “miraculously” formed pairs of cards in front of his innocently-beaming cellmate. Then at his own hand, where the Joker which most certainly hadn’t been there a minute ago was surreptitiously nestled into his grip.

“TROIS, YOU BAAAASTAAARD!!”

(In Cell 13, Inmate 1315 finally gets over his compulsive sneezing fit.)

(“Maybe it was girls talking about you!” Nico volunteers optimistically.)

(“What, him and his pink nipples?” Uno jokes. “Get real, it was probably Hajime complaining again.”)

(Jyugo throws a cushion at the braided asshole.)

(He misses.)

[riickgrimes]

Rules: answer the questions and then tag 10+ other creators to answer the questions!

thank you so much to @askmetostays for mentioning in your post! Your so talented and your gifsets are amazingggg!

I feel like most of my gifs I made this year were for my turkish blog, so they’ll be some of those included!

first creation and most recent creation of 2020: This grease set was my first one, I actually loved this coloring that I did here! My most recent one was this Pacey gifset about Joey in one of my favorite scenes.

one of your favorite creations from 2020: This Marilyn gifset was definitely a favorite of mine, I thought it (and she) looked gorgeous. Also this Pacey one I made from my all-time favorite scene and episode of Dawson’s is a DEFINITE FAV just bc he’s babyyy

a creation you’re really proud of: I’d have to go to my turkish blog for this one. This one I made the other day of Aydan’s relationship growth with Eda took so longggg and I had to remember and sift through like 22 two and a half hour episodes to find the scenes, but it came out so good. And it’s one of the very, very few long, cumulative, “multiple gifs into one big one” gifsets I’ve ever made.

a new style you tried this year and a gifset that uses it: I had a couple of gifsets on my turkish blog that were like pastel-y and had text in it which is something I never do. This one with text from a tweet and this one with text from a song.

your favorite coloring: OOooh I actually have a couple, this Pope one I just loved, this Kie one I loved, and this JJ one too! I liked this Niall one a lot too, so vibrant and pretty. And this Finn Hudson one was a true win bc I always thought glee was so hard to color, and I finally did it and it came out great!! I was like damn girl u really are the shittttt

a creation that took you forever: again the one from my turkish blog with Aydan definitely took forever, between finding the scenes, figuring out translations, piecing them together and just general photoshop annoyances, it took like 12 hrs. This one I made of Eda’s outfits took forever too.

your creation from 2020 that received the most notes: I think this other Marilyn Monroe one had the most notes.

a creation you think deserved more notes: oooh prob my “#same” one about Pacey, idk i guess ppl don’t want to be swept up in joshua jackson’s arms or something, whatever, oh and this Watermelon Sugar one too!

a creation with a favorite scene/quote: Def this one from the shaving scene from Castaways. The fact that I made like 5 gifsets from this one scene aloneeee. I think I still have one in my drafts too lmaooo

a creation you made that breaks your heart: this scene with Jack and Jen FOR SURE

a ‘simple’ creation that you really love: prob this Lara Jean/Lana Condor one. The coloring was great, the sharpening was great, it just looked so pretty!

a creation that was inspired by another one (add both your creation and the one that inspired it!): sad as it is to say, i don’t think i made anything that was inspired by anyone... 

a favorite creation created by someone else: ok but definitely @askmetostays Pacey and Joey every episode one and her Pacey and Joey™ one, because whew the time and effort put into those is incredible. And even though I’m not even in the fandom I had to reblog these Witcher gifsets, this one by @yenvengerberg and this one by @anya-chalotra because they were truly so gorgeous. This Winter in Avonlea by @laurens-german is just beautiful. This one with the Hargreeves Siblings by @seance is truly amazing. And this Shape of Water one by @antoniosbanderas and this Chicago gifset by @madalainepetsch were both so gorgeous and colorful!!!

some of your favorite content creators from the year: @askmetostays is definitely a favorite, since I’ve gotten into Dawson’s Creek, she’s been a definite bright spot on my dash. The fact that she’s running two other Dawson’s blogs on top of her main, and is still gracing us with The Content™ is impressive. I don’t think I follow them, but @livelovecaliforniadreams has been supplying the Pacey/Joey fandom with some quality gifs. The gifsets are so involved and all-encompassing, they must take forever to make, so I have to applauded them for that! @inejghafta has been out here making quality gifs for Anne with an E, Community, New Girl, This Is Us, and this list goes on. She’s gotten experimental with her coloring and her concepts and it’s been great to see! @baharsahins is another great one! She is like single-handedly giving the rping community an unlimited supply of Turkish celebs. Her gifs are always on point, the coloring’s always amazing and her sharpening is so soft and pretty. And @imikhailo has such such such gorgeous gallavich/mickey gifset!

a for good measure, another a couple more creations of yours that you love: oooh ok there’s this Pacey and Joey + Docks one, this Deckerstar one, this one with Kie and Sarah bc 👀, this Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist one, this Lara Jean Valentine’s Day one, and my Sen Cal Kapimi icons from my turkish blog bc i just love making icons sm

I don’t think I’m gonna tag anyone, esp since the new year already started, but anyone was already tagged or anyone that just wants to do it, feel free!!!