#i was genuinely laughing it was actually funny

[panlight]

I Gotta say Stephenie Meyer isn't the best writer but,"happiness and misery in the world? Was my joy overthrowing the balance? Was four months all I could have?" is a raw ass paragraph

There are some passages that are genuinely really, really good. There are some lines that are actually very funny or profound! Sometimes she's really on her game.

And then other times it's: Aro laughed. "Ha ha ha," he giggled. Or the (unpopular opinion) really clunky title drop in Midnight Sun. I get what she was doing there! Just think it could be done better!

Was this the limit, then? I’d had more happiness than most people ever experienced. Was there some natural law that demanded equal shares of happiness and misery in the world? Was my joy overthrowing the balance? Was four months all I could have?

It goes pretty hard! There's still an element of 'show' vs 'tell' here, with Bella just telling us how deleriously happy she is, but this is partly because for the first time in the series really SM does a jump of a few months (that aren't just the names of the months on a page) so we're getting stuff about how there isn't enough time in the day to get her fill of adoring Renesmee, not enough time at night to get her fill of adoring her husband, etc, rather than a series of vignettes about what they are doing together so much. But the underlying sentiment of "I've used up the allotted happiness available and now it all must end after only four months" does make you stop.

One I genuinely like is the 'time passes' bit in New Moon. EXCEPT for the "even for me" she adds at the end. I think it would be so much better without that. Because Bella is describing a universal thing that most people experience at some point in their life when they are struggling or suffering. But then throws in that "even for me" like what she's going through is worse than anything anyone else has ever suffered and maybe that's a Very Teenager thing to do, but I was like, oh honey no. The passage was better without it.

Time passes. Even when it seems impossible. Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does. Even for me.

I think something like, "I know that now" or "Trust me, I know" or whatever might even be better here if we really have to make it about her. Participate in the universal experience rather than elevate herself and her own suffering above it. Again, it's teenager-ish. I get it. But she's also supposed to be ~mature and ~unselfish and I just think the passage is stronger with this bit left unsaid. We already know she's Going Through It.

[zepskies]

Watching Ben struggle on his attempts at making a meal on his own, after an argument, would be so funny. Like I could imagine him taking out a box of pasta then saying fuck it after reading the instructions Not even getting past step 2.

LOL that's for sure how it would go. 🤣

I have an ongoing headcanon that despite Soldier Boy/Ben's macho "I'm a real man" attitude, he hasn't had to cook for himself pretty much ever in life, so he'd be completely inept in the kitchen, save for maybe making coffee.

(Actual live footage of Ben fucking up):

That's why I wrote that scene at the end of Break Me Down Part 6, where the reader realizes this about him and finesses him into helping her cook spaghetti -- one of the most basic forms of pasta there is. 😝

Seriously, the man can't even chop an onion. It's both sad and hilarious, at least to me lol. (It's also meant to be their first genuine Beauty & the Beast moment of, "there's something there that wasn't there before.")

But even though she's laughing at him, she still helps him with grace:

As Ben was peeling the stubborn hide off the vegetable, it slipped out of his frustrated hands and rolled away. Thankfully it stopped just shy of falling off the counter. 

You couldn’t help a small giggle at his expense. He had the strength of twenty men or whatever, but he couldn’t chop an onion to save his life. 

Ben shot you a wryly amused look. “Oh, you better not be fucking laughing at me.”

That just made you laugh in earnest, even though you covered your mouth with your hand. His grin deepened at the sound, despite the embarrassment making his face and neck warm up. 

He grabbed the hateful head of veg and looked anywhere but you as he got ready to try again. There was no way he was letting you, or this fucking onion, make a fool out of him. 

But your soft hand soon covered over his. You offered him a genuine smile, your eyes gleaming.

“Want me to show you a trick I learned?” you asked. 

He hesitated, but he eventually moved over and let you in on the action. You took up the knife, held down the onion, and cut the ends off first. Then you were able to more easily peel off the rest of the outer layer. 

“You can do this part any way you want, really. But I like to cut it down the middle first, then chop up one half at a time like this,” you explained.

And you felt Ben move in closer behind you to watch your methodical work. 

The heat from his proximity actually made you start to blush like a damn school girl. You tried to stamp it down, but heat flared into your cheeks when his hand covered yours and took back the knife.

“All right, all right, I got it. Move over,” he said.

You huffed, but you grinned and let him continue…

By the way his eyes later lit up when he tasted the meal, you knew he really did like your cooking. Now, you didn’t want to feed his outdated views on gender roles…but you could admit, seeing him enjoy something so simple as your grandma’s spaghetti recipe was gratifying. 

It wasn’t the first time you’d shared a decent moment with Ben. But it was the first time that it hadn’t felt like an act. You didn’t know what to do with that—or the conflicted feeling making your heart ache. 

And you certainly didn’t want to find anything about him endearing. 

Break Me Down Masterlist

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[schattenmagier]

" Oh! I see... Uh, sounds really unpleasant... I uh... hope you get vell soon? "

It sounded so weird for her to say this, but she also meant it in a genuine way. Leofric also didn't seemed to tell what exactly had happened, so Lilli decided to not ask about it. Didn't matter anyway as long as he was fine and getting better.

The mage then takes away her hands from her face again, when she hears Bill laugh, and pushes back her glasses on her face, before she looks at the vampire with a raised brow.

" Yeah. You are. But it's actually very funny to see you like zhis for once, Bill~ Not so flirty, and confident now, eh~? "

Lilli teases the vampire, and nudged him again with her elbow, while smirking at the man.

" And yeah. Could have been worse indeed, heh... "

Like if Leofric walked in on them doing... something else than just flirting with each other, and kissing a bit. The woman then looks at the black shuck again.

" So you uh... You are going to leave, Leo? "

Leofric awkwardly looked back at the two of them again. That's right, he hadn't mentioned to Lilli that he could walk through walls, could he? Well, she would have found out sooner or later.

He then turned fully towards them. It would be easier to read his face or body language that way. It didn't appear that he was going to elaborate much on what had happened to him though.

"I won't burden you with the details," Leofric just said to Lilli, "It was an unpleasant experience and also a rather long story. It even reached over 100 notes in the end."

Bill couldn't help but chuckle a little bit at Leofric giving the fourth wall a small nudge.

But then he heard Lilli start laughing and then he started as well. It was oddly contagious and well, the situation was pretty funny.

"I am, aren't?" Bill said with a grin then, "It could be worse though."

[elle-smells]

anyway. rw&rb movie was not good. but I can't say I didn't have a good time slay

[inkskinned]

she's singing in another room and my dog is asleep at my feet. my grandma asked me why i haven't found a man yet and i laughed. oh, you know. i like my house clean.

my girlfriend is also my man is also "my partner" if i'm in a professional setting. yesterday we went to a ren faire and a man mimed at me - you're together? and at my delighted nod, his baffled, you're gay? made me laugh. a woman with rainbow hair said i love the two of you together. you're both so beautiful it's absurd.

my dad introduced my partner as my "..... friend. or whatever" the other day. he knows we're dating. in the same way, i was never able to get my sister's husband to stop saying that's gay like it's 2008. he still uses the word fa***t, and my sister's defense of him has always been well, he's just kidding.

my lover and i dance to old music in a tiny kitchen. we judge new music together and take food critique very seriously. we watch love is blind before we fall asleep and agree that if they had a queer season, it would be bloody but also make for excellent tv. of fucking course queer people would know someone for only 2 weeks and agree to get married. what are you saying.

at a bar with friends, a man puts his hand on my wrist. got a boyfriend? and yes, i do have a boyfriend, she's amazing. i am texting her while i wander around a gas station named after geese. i am visiting a swing state for a wedding. in the candy aisle i overhear: she's actually like a lesbian it's disgusting. two teenage girls with packaged sandwiches in their hands, giggling. no literally, like. i'm not, like. okay with her being there while we're all, like, naked and changing.

my girlfriend and i tailgate, drink gin and cider out of cups. from the frat group beside us, a man corrects himself with one of his friends: bro, i mean, nonbinary entity, and it makes everyone around him laugh, myself included. he razzes his friend the same way i would have killed for at 19 years old - like nothing happened, he continues: you apply sunscreen like an alien. he does a little sassy (and fairly accurate) dance interpretation of the motion. his friend is laughing so hard they're crying.

i am lucky, i live in a safe neighborhood in a safe state. my masc passenger princess comes up from DC. i drive her for an hour to where all the leaves are a violent arrangement of color. we walk along the trails, letting autumn into our blood. in this part of the state, there's a lot of pickup trucks and trump signs. when we chastely kiss before getting into the car, i accidentally make eye contact with a woman holding her child's wrist. she looks disgusted. she looks fucking pissed.

two hours later my girl and i are eating dinner on a patio, soaking in the last warmth of new england sun before the chill of winter sets in. we are giggling and trying to talk through plastic vampire teeth. at another table, i see a young woman sit up straighter. i watch her watch us. she blushes and takes her partner's hand from across the table. shy, like the taste of evening has just become something deeper.

it's worth it for this moment, i think. my lover is still humming the same song she's been singing for four days straight and i don't want to kill her for it. her guitar is beside my bed. her toothbrush is in my bathroom. in a few moments i will make us lunch. we are lucky enough to have found each other. it is lucky enough to be in love.

[rambles-about-minecraft-ocs]

one of my favorite things about zedaph is that on a server full of people that find strange and oft-overlooked minecraft mechanics or rare events and then see just how far they can push them in the name of spectacle or efficiency or world-breaking, zed is over here finding these mechanics in order to do the weirdest things he can think of in as entertaining a manner as possible

like i 100% have faith in zedaph's theoretical ability to be just as efficient or spectacular or world-breaking. if he wanted to do that stuff, i trust that he absolutely could. but thats so far from being his priority. instead, hes going to spend around a week of irl time focused entirely on eventually having the good luck to spawn in something insanely rare so that he can convert it into something even rarer, the result of which being something that 99% of the server reacts with complete and utter shock that it even exists in the first place, just because its zany and funny and he wanted to. and i love that

[flyingbuddiies]

i hope taco permadies in the finale. i hope she’s a victim of circumstance. i hope she dies convincing herself its for the better. that it’s her final punishment. that there was no other ending than this. that if her attempts to apologize for all the hurt she’s done didn’t work, she’s fully irredeemable. that there is no other fate best-suited for her other than death, and that in life there is no further point for her. i hope she dies believing she deserves it.

i hope she never gets the chance to tell microphone she loves her. i hope microphone is eternally left in the dark. i hope she never discovers the true extent of tacos remorse. her guilt. i hope she is left in silence to only ponder about how taco felt, hoping and praying that she meant anything to her. even a tiny bit. clinging onto any fraction of hope that taco could possibly feel the same way she does.

i hope microphone never finds out she’s dead. i hope she is led to believe that taco moved on from her. that she never meant anything to her. that she wasn’t enough again.

[essektheylyss]

I am now thinking about Essek as, essentially, Anna Ripley for the Ruby Vanguard, and it's genuinely horrific to imagine but it's not a real timeline so it's hilarious. It is so funny in concept. He's a glorified postdoc with no mandatory ethics trainings, no future, and nothing to lose. Also he just got handed the power of a thousand suns with absolutely no oversight and a mandate to "do your worst".

This has such extreme "horse loose in a hospital" energy. No one knows what Essek will do next, least of all Essek! He's never been in control of the power of a thousand suns before! He's as confused as you are!

[kagoutiss]

green beetle black beetle

[czaneavecg]

this is rather stupid but what it the vessel frm greenpath n Broken didn't die and actually get to watch Hornet try to beat up Ghost

[daydreamerwonderkid]

Shout out to my girl Cass and my boy Terry for being the only two motherfuckers (out of 21 other candidates) to actually wanna be Batman.

I could never relate, but cheers regardless.

[metanarrates]

the tropes and structures of power fantasy webnovels becoming bureaucratized and systematized leads to some absolutely delightful stuff in orv. here's an Isekai Protagonist Waiting Room, for all the isekai protagonists who have completed their stupid journeys and now have to get sent back to earth. these kirito fuckers are a dime a dozen these days

[spinnysocks]

i don't know how else to say this but we as a society need to stop seeing small pet death as funny. in fact, we need to stop normalising putting them in danger for our entertainment. i have owned hamsters all my life; they are such beautiful little creatures. they are so fragile that it made me so anxious for them because i cared for them. yet, movies or tv shows present hamster death as a joke somehow. this must have had a knock-on effect on people's views because i have seen so many people making fun of a dead pet on social media. i have seen so many people laugh because somebody's pet hamster died/because someone is grieving it. is it funny because you see them as small and insignificant? because a hamster is seen as a stupid, tiny creature that holds no worth? so you laugh at its death? i genuinely cannot understand it. where is the joke. i feel genuine grief for hamsters who have been put in danger or died because of neglect, just to be recorded and laughed at by the same species who domesticated them. the same species who made them pets and are supposed to look after them. yeah maybe i'm sensitive but i think i should be. how could the death of a tiny, innocent, unknowing little animal we made our pets, an animal so fragile and reliant on us, be funny.

[buildoblivion]

also really REALLY could have done without the possession sex stuff actually - like did we learn nothing from season two?????

[mossy-aro]

huh

[gio-cosmo]

Reload? Like the hit game Persona 3 Reload? Omg…persona reference…