#i shouldn't even be writing this i should be finishing my assignments but i'm proscratinating by writing something else instead

[normal-thoughts-official]

i need mal to have a mental breakdown so bad it makes me look stupid

this is the part where i beg you to hear me out. listen. mal's been a bit more like himself these last few chapters but his route still feels stilted. i know you know what i'm talking about. every time there is one of those "one of the LIs reacts to you getting hurt or something of the surt" things, mal's is always the most lukewarm, if not outright cold. the passion and personality only really comes out when we kiss. and like, listen, i romance almost exclusively women and POC (usually Black or brown POC) in this app (I'm pretty sure Aerin is the only white male LI I've ever had anything with? lol), so i'm very very used to my LIs of choice having obviously had a lot less thought when their routes were written. but this is different. it feels almost intentional. and his book 1 route wasn't like this, either

and what calls my attention the most is that mal almost never smiles lately. in book 1 smiling was pretty much mal's default sprite. i think mal was smiling, like, 50% of the time he was on screen, if not more, and the other expressions had to share the rest among each other. but in book 2 we go entire chapters without mal smiling once. and if you pay attention he almost never looks angry or sad, either (he never looked sad a lot but he did look angry often enough, i know because i always laugh at his angry face. rip king ily but calm down). he is in his neutral expression sprite 90% of the fucking time. he looks neutral more often than tyril does (although tyril obviously smiles a lot more in book 2 than he did in book 1, it's noticeable. still, though, he's tyril)

and we know that mal used humor and an untouchable persona as a defense mechanism in book 1, it's been said. so it makes sense that mal was smiling all the time; i remember mal felt more real when his face turned neutral, at least to me. and mal keeps making the same jokes as before, so - why is he not smiling?

and like we know that mal is not okay. it's been shown. the self sacrificial tendencies, the overworking himself, the self doubt. it's been said in text. but i think the neutral sprite is the biggest clue here. because a lot of the time, mal is being objectively funny, but his neutral sprite makes his jokes feel flat. mal feels flat. and i think it's because he's trying to cling to his old coping mechanisms - charming, funny personality - but he doesn't have the energy to anymore, because he's changed, because he's exhausted. and he's said that he felt like he was trying to keep the group together on his own, and we know that mal, for all his damn posturing, takes his responsibilities seriously when he accepts them. he learned how to patch a roof at age 6 so wren could sleep better. he paid off her debt before he paid his. he built a fucking orphanage, for fuck's sake. when mal decides that he's gonna do something, he gives it his all, and he refuses to be stopped. he's going to the goddamn thieves guild to help MC. he's been on the run from the guild for fucking years and they never found him despite him being in whitetower. this mf is dedicated

all of that is to say: during this last year, mal wouldn't stop. he refused to stop. going to the garden every day. building the orphanage. keeping tabs on imtura (i'll never shut up about it HE KEPT TABS ON IMTURA). trying to keep the friend group together. taking care of and feeding a bunch of fucking orphans. the only way to keep yourself going with this much responsibility at once is by repressing every fucking feeling hard and not thinking about anything else. which explains the constant neutral face. mal can't feel anything, because he barricaded everything inside himself so he could keep going. the only way he can ever express himself is physically, when he kisses MC, and that's about it. and so he never quite expresses any feeling, even concern for MC, or smiling, or anything, because he's too busy not stopping, because if he stops he'll crumble

so like. for this to have any closure at all. mal has to crumble. i think he's past the point where he can talk about this healthily and avoid a major breakdown. there's too much threatening to burst, and he's too tired. i genuinely cannot see any way for this to be resolved that doesn't involve mal fucking breaking down, and finally acknowledging how much he's hurting. he's gonna have to stop and look at this, and clearly this will only happen once it comes bursting out of him

and i want it, god damn it! i want mal to fucking lose it. i want that catharsis and i want the angst and i want the drama. fuck!!!!

but if there was ever a time for mal to lose his shit, it was chapter 13. i even wrote about it at the time. i mean, he had just been talking with MC about how much he was hurting when they were gone. fixing the roof and talking about how he feels like he's dragging the group down and he's the least important one. and then MC disappeared. again. in the shadow realm. with valax. and he had no idea where they were. and... nothing. nada. "don't do that to me again 😐". so i struggle to imagine what could possibly be worse than that to trigger a breakdown. MC full on dying and ressurrecting nia style? i mean, seriously

and so i'm climbing the walls because if mal has a breakdown? then everything up to this point will have been good writing. the way every scene felt stilted, most jokes fell flat, everyone felt that distance between mal and MC, that shitass "reunion", it will all have been part of his arc and i'll love it and hold it dearly because oh yeah, i fucking love emotional repression for the sake of self sacrifice, sign me the fuck up. but if not then i don't see how any of this can be part of a coherent arc, and so it'll just have. sucked. after his route in book 1 being so good and satisfying they just, what, gave up? lost their groove the first few chapters and then regained it later but never really addressed it? i don't know, man. i really hope whatever's coming is good but i'm used to choices letting me down, so

this post doesn't have a beautiful conclusion or anything i'm just kinda anxious and frustrated. this is why i hate reading things that aren't finished. god damn it