#idk if this format is weird or not because I’ve never done it like this before

[vinylmango]

On our own terms

Nicholas Alexander Chavez x famous!black!reader

Description: Rumors begin to swirl about whatever is going on between Nicholas and (y/n). The pair share mutual friends, but that doesn’t have to mean anything…

Warnings: none that I can think of right now

Sorry if the formatting is weird, I wrote this on my phone 😅

PARTS: ONE two three four five

masterlist

———

(y/n)

tagged: sofcruz

Liked by sofcruz, zendaya, taylorzakharperez, and 1,532,421 others

(y/n) love an impromptu friends trip

sofcruz I’m already organizing the next one 👩🏼‍💻

> (y/n) yes pls hopefully Z and Tom can come next time

> zendaya yes pls 🙏🏽

user1 so are we just not acknowledging the soft launch…or…

user2 “friends trip”…yeah…ok 👀 we see that last slide girl

zendaya so happy for you 🥺

> (y/n) 🥺💗

user3 God I see what you have done for others…WHEN WILL IT BE MY TURN

> user4 real 🫠

user5 idk who I’m more jealous of (y/n) because he looks hot or him because it’s (y/n) and she is everything 😭

> user6 welcome to bi panic

(y/n)loml Face card is deadly. Digging my grave as i type this

(y/n)loml just fallen to my knees in the middle of walmart

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nicholasalexanderchavez

tagged: cooperkoch, nicholasgalitzine, taylorzahkarperez

Liked by nicholasgalitzine, nicchavezismine, and 500,000 others

nicholasalexanderchavez much needed filming break

nicholasgalitzine still not over that football defeat are you?

> nicholasalexanderchavez it was a tie and you know it

taylorzakharperez unfortunately back to the grind 😔

nicchavezismine the first slide is my new lockscreen 😍😍😍

user1 are we going to ignore the legs that are obviously not his in the last pic?

user2 she’s so lucky but I know she’s probably hot so he’s lucky too 😭

user3 that should be me holding your hand 😭 THAT SHOULD BE ME MA-

lexiloo6 hi (louder than everyone else)

> user4 GET IN LINE

lexiloo6 BODY-ODY-ODY 🤤

lexiloo6 just say the word i am yours any time any place

lexiloo6 i am so down bad for this man it’s not even funny

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(y/n)

Liked by sofcruz, jazzsinclair, nicholasalexanderchavez, and 1,602,120 others

(y/n) I love nature…almost as much as I love you

sofcruz ugh this is so cute. I could never wake up that early

> (y/n) it was worth it

> sofcruz literally meant for each other

nicholasalexanderchavez nature girl 🌺🌿

> liked by (y/n)

jazzsinclair love this

user1 his back is hot…is that weird to say?

> user2 no girl. We get it

itswes aren’t you directionally challenged?

> (y/n) you get lost twice and your brother will never let it go 🙄

> itswes praying for him to make it back. he’s way cooler than you are

> (y/n) love you too 😃

nicchavezismine simply here bc he liked. Although I don’t really see much to like…

> goddess(y/n) prime example of joblessness kids

(y/n)loml how are you real?! I’m so in love with you

(Y/n)loml just one chance (y/n) I just need one chance

(Y/n)loml marry me. If you could just sign the license I’ve already done the rest

> user3 real

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nicholasalexanderchavez

Liked by (y/n), timotheechalamet, and 800,000 others

nicholasalexanderchavez another item off the bucket list ⛰️ and I’m so happy I got to do it with you

nicholasgalitzine Sick photo dude. How long did the hike take?

> nicholasalexanderchavez like almost 3 hours but it was worth it for the pic

nicchavezismine he’s so fit 😍 I’d hike with you any day 💗

> user1 um…anyways…

(y/n) nature boy 🌿✨

> liked by nicholasalexanderchavez

sofcruz jeez you’re high up 😬

> nicholasalexanderchavez lol you know there’s a path right?

> sofcruz I am NOT outdoorsy

>> (y/n) but I love you anyways 💗 we balance each other out

>> sofcruz we do 🥺💗 love you. The yin to my yang

>>user2 lol not the sof and (y/n) love fest in his comments 😂 thats so random. Love them

lexiloo6 God you are hot

lexiloo6 so thankful I get to breathe the same air as you

lexiloo6 I’m flexible!

> user3 LMAOOO real

lexiloo6 the shirt is white next question

> user4 you are so delulu but so real girl

View more comments…

[babiebom]

apologies for my absence- holiday periods are tiring lmao how were they for you? unfortunately we have yet to watch the fnaf movie, as our group is one that is exceedingly difficult to make plans around because we're all busy 💀 but then there's the one guy who doesn't want to leave his house lmao luckily, iv'e been pretty good at staying away from spoilers, so i've got that going for me. on the other hand, i'm planning to go see Trolls 3, and my mother and sister recently went to see the new Wonka movie. Though from what i've heard from a friend, Wonka's no good :// Yeahhh, if i actually commit to the mod, i'd have to learn pixel art and reteach myself code and programming 😭... i used to be somewhat decent at it. oooo yes i love a good choose your own adventure! they're so much fun and i've actually coded 1 of my own :,) it was through Visual Basics though, so the formatting was a bit weird for me lmao if you're going for a visual novel type of look and playability, I'd probably recommend Unity or itch.io? in my experience, Unity is probably easier to use.. theres another website/app i used but i can't recall the name sadly :( if i do i'll get back to you though! i don't have that much of a detailed request this time, but perhaps some fluff and love languages between rasmodius and the reader? or like hcs of rasmodius's evolving interest/thoughts arund the reader before finally getting together? i'd perhaps request nsfw/smut stuff too but tbh i just don't have any ideas 💛 tysmm :D -🔮

A/N: I’m glad you’re okay!! Honestly I’ve been sick these past couple of weeks (I caught pneumonia and had it for a month before going to the hospital. I thought it was a cold oopsies) I haven’t watched anything new recently but I am watching the third season of singles inferno with some friends. And I guess until I can figure out how to make a visual novel I have to write the fic out lmao sucks for me because I think a game would be better but oh well. What can I do? And like always I’ll try to do both!! Check back for the second one!!

Tw: cursing, slight nsfw but no full on smut. Let me know if there’s something I missed!!

Wc: I have no idea! But these are headcanons so 10+ is the goal!!

Sdv Masterlist

Okay so there are five main types of love languages.

Physical touch, Words of Affirmation, Receiving Gifts, Acts of Service, and Quality Time.

I would also like anyone reading this to remember that these love languages are how you want to be loved/receive love not how you show love to others.

I do think that Rasmodius is very connected to himself

And by that I mean I think he knows himself very well, or at least he thinks he knows himself very well.

And for a long time I think he probably thought that Quality Time and Physical Touch were his main two love languages.

I mean idk if it’s canon but in my opinion I do think he cheated on the witch with Caroline

And I’m not gonna go into it here because this isn’t about them, but I think it might’ve had to do with that and his own struggles with temptations.

And I also think gift giving is canon for literally every single character in stardew because that’s the main way to befriend someone.

But I think that after marrying you/beginning to date you he realizes that his actual love language is words of affirmation.

While Physical touch and quality time are still very important to him, being with you makes him see that he really does like being praised.

Like whenever you say that he has done something well, or that you like something he has done his heart flutters as if he were a teenager again.

Especially when it comes to his magic

Like I feel like the townspeople aren’t really fond of him

And they never thank him for the things that he does whenever they actually need him for stuff

Like the haunted maze

Like they’re just talking about how weird he is and how he got it done

But they never stop and say anything that’s positive like WTF

So I think he would appreciate whenever you thank him or praise him and it would go straight to his head (which one idk 👀)

With quality time I feel like you get a lot of it after he moves to the farm

Like unless he’s working in his tower, or you’re off somewhere like in the mines

That you’re like together even if it’s spent in silence

And he loves that

Like he was super lonely before even if he doesn’t want to admit it

So just being in the same room as you counts as quality time for him.

And if you’re doing an activity that’s particularly domestic

He’s in heaven like he doesn’t wanna make it a big deal

But baking and helping you around the farm makes his heart soar.

I think in terms of how he shows love i think he would show it in acts of service and gift giving

Like oh you don’t feel well?

Don’t bother going to the clinic he’s just going to create a potion that stops you from getting sick

You’re afab and you’re having bad cramps during your period?

Consider them gone

Look at this thing he got for you

And while yeah this might seem like either a lot of insincere

In his mind and heart this is how he shows that he appreciates you and wants you to live a good and easy life.

If he can make things easier and less stressful for you

That’s exactly what he’s going to do

He loves you and while he loves receiving attention and love he’s kinda crap at giving it in the same way because he just doesn’t really know how

So this is how he does

He’s VERY romantic sometimes and shows it through gifts and services.

Very cute and a good significant other when you get past his rough exterior.

[corgiss]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let's spread the self-love 💞

I’ve been agonizing over this for days tbh but I THINK I have a proper answer now, so here’s my five favorite fics I’ve written, in no particular order!

1) devils don’t fly

Hazbin Hotel, Radioapple, 50k+ words

There’s bits and pieces of this fic that I wish I’d done differently looking back on it, but I’m honestly just so proud that I was able to write and FINISH a 50k+ fic, in just about a month. That has NEVER happened to me before. So I’m pretty stoked about that one.

2) trouble comes in threes

Trigun, canon divergence, Tesla Lives, 5k+ words

This one I haven’t finished, and idk that I ever will, but I’m very happy with the alternate world building I’ve done and the dynamic between Vash, Tesla, and Knives that I’ve established. Kind of an unintentional fix-it fic. Had a lot of fun with it; maybe once trigun comes back around to being The Thing, I’ll keep working on it.

3) when the heart would cease

The Amazing Spider-Man, canon divergence, Peter/Gwen, 2k+ words

The plot of TASM 1 & 2 but if Gwen was the one bitten by the spider. This is actually a rewrite of a fic that I wrote back in 2015, during the height of my TASM obsession and when Ghost Spider was first announced as a canon character. It’s written in kind of a weird format, at least compared to my usual writing, but I think it’s a very fun approach.

4) a taste of the divine

Trigun, vashwood, modern AU, 5k+ words

I. Wrote this fic based on a tumblr post I saw about someone at a metal concert telling OP to open his mouth. OP thought they were going to spit in his mouth and opened his mouth anyways. Turned out the other person suspected he was dehydrated and wanted to see his tongue to confirm. I saw the post and was immediately like “this is giving vashwood” and I HAD to write it. I also spent like 3 paragraphs describing Vash’s battle jacket and I think those 3 paragraphs slap.

5) something’s wrong (don’t pity me for long)

Trigun, mashwood, Vash whump, 9k+ words

How can I make a favorite fics list without listing at least one of my whump fics, which is what I’m mostly known for (at least in the Trigun fandom). I’m proud of this one because, as someone with chronic pain myself, I think I did a pretty good job describing the extra agony that comes with being sick. I’m just happy with the emotions described in this one lol, one of those ones that rly hits you in the feels.

Anyways this was fun to figure out!! Thanks for sending me this, esht!! ❤️

[three--rings]

2022 Video Game Wrapup

Video games are a very important part of my life and I felt like doing a year summary.  Feel free to copy the format if you want.

Games I Actually FINISHED This Year

Red Dead Redemption II - First playthough. I started it before the new year but spent almost six months on this.  Didn’t quite 100% it because some of the challenges were too damn hard for me.  But otherwise it was a very completionist run.  This immediately moved into one of my all-time top games, like IDK one of the top three spots.  So glad I gave it a shot after not thinking it was my thing.

AI: The Somnian Files - A game by Uchikoshi that I hadn’t played yet?   Yeah I devoured it.  What can I say, despite it’s weirdness and Uchikoshi quirks, I love it.

AI: The Somnian Files - The Nirvana Initiative - The sequel obviously.  Even more twisty than the first one, if not quite as full of loveable characters. 

80 Days - It’s sorta a game you can play as many times as you want, but I played it three-four times through and felt satisfied. 

Games I’m currently Playing:

Pokémon Violet - I’m trying to keep myself from stalling on this.  I need to go fight the Elite Four but I’m scared.  So I’m running around looking for missing low-level dudes.

Pentiment - Bought in the Steam Winter sale, started on Xmas eve.  I’m two acts in and really want to restart cause I’ve done everything wrong but I persist.  This game is very strange.  But medieval monk murder mystery how could I NOT play it?

Games I’m still playing, more or less:

Life Sims:

Stardew Valley - The eternal, basically.  I started a brand new game with Stardew Valley Extended and a light selection of about 30 mods when I had Covid and played it obsessively to get farther than I ever had before.  Got 100 golden walnuts, and basically was just working on making money to get True Perfection when I got tired and haven’t touched it for months.

Traveller’s Rest - A really great game in which you run a tavern.  I played it intensely when it first released, before they redid the whole thing.  Then didn’t touch it for a long time, played it a little around Halloween cause they did seasonal stuff and thought real hard about playing the Christmas content but didn’t. 

Dinkum: A fantastic one-man game that’s combo animal crossing and stardew in Australia.  Played it INTENSELY for a couple weeks before running out of stuff to do that compelled me.  I think there���s been several updates but nothing that had tempted me back.

Coral Island - I backed this on Kickstarter and so played this on early access release.  Really compelling and fun but I ran through the content quickly.  There’s been some major updates recently so I’ll get back to it soon.

The Planet Crafter - Played this intensely for a few days and after 10 hours ran out of new places to go and got bored.  I’ve tried to play it again a few times since then and last time I wanted to go further with it but the controls hurt my arthritis hands now.  So until they allow remapping controls, I think I’m out.

Wildermyth - A really fun little game where you follow characters through their adventuring careers.  Fun to make your own blorbo characters and see what happens to them.  Played it a LOT at the beginning of the year and nearly forgot to include it.  Could always pick it up again to return to my MXTX verse.

Games I’m MOSTLY done with but can’t make myself finish:

Bear and Breakfast - A weird game about inn management that starts chill but gets really annoying.  I got almost done with this game, but got to a point I needed to just make a lot of money to fully upgrade all my hotels to achieve things so the endgame would happen and by then I was annoyed.  I hear the ending is wild though so I kinda want to actually finish it since I went so far with it.  But I can’t work up the desire to get back.  

Persona 4 Golden - I’d never played a Persona game even though they are totally My Kinda Thing because I’m just not a playstation person.  Went through it quickly but then uh got stuck on one of the last bosses, maybe THE last, IDK I am still trying to avoid spoiling myself.  Even lowered the difficulty one notch and couldn’t beat it so either I needed to grind or lower it all the way.  And then I didn’t.

Disco Elysium - Yeah uh got to a point where either I need to move on to like the end of the story (ish?) or finish all these sidequests I’m stuck on and didn’t know what to do with.  And then I just didn’t go back.  Yes this is a problem for me.

Pokémon Legends: Arceus - I started this when Scarlet and Violet came out and I found it uh, conveniently online...and then I got stuck on the stupid Arcanine boss and then I found a Violet repack and yeah, that’s the story of that.  Not sure if I’ll go back to it or not at this point. 

Games I really need to make myself get back to but it’s been so long it’s embarrassing aka did I even play these this year, IDK?:

Great Ace Attorney Chronicles II - Uh, yeah, I need to finish this considering how long I waited for it.  Scheduled to travel with me in January.

Fire Emblem Three Houses - I finished it once and am like halfway through my second playthrough but got distracted.  Again, traveling with my Switch is my plan to make me finish this.

Danganronpa V3 - This I definitely haven’t touched in like a year and a half, so much that I have to restart from the beginning because I remember almost nothing.  I just finished rewatching the anime specifically to get me back to it.  I’m like 40 hours in and remember nothing if that tells you anything about me.

Elder Scrolls: Oblivion - Again, pretty sure this wasn’t this year but I got really far in a play of this on my Xbox, but like Skyrim how do you know when you’re FINISHED.  I want to play it on my laptop with mods next time.

Games I played but gave up on:

Interrogation: You Will Be Deceived - I actually bought this accidentally, thinking it was a different game about interrogation and detecting lies that I’d been recced.  This game ended up being just Police Brutality Simulator.  It’s just “illegally abuse this witness to get Vital Info that will Save the Day” the game.  I  think I lasted 20 minutes.

Strange Horticulture - I thought there would be more story to this game but it’s mostly just identifying plants and then trying to guess the right ingredients of potions.  Okay for a while but not compelling enough to keep me interested. 

[superfluouskeys]

Stormchaser Update

So I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately—for those who remember Stormchaser, I think I’d like to reimagine it as just a straight-through story (SURPRISE lol *I* choose your adventure).  I really like a lot of the ideas I have for it, but because of my other life commitments I think the coding and multiple paths would be too much and it would simply never get done.  My current idea is that I can eventually make shorter companion pieces based on what would have been some of the major decision points and how that would have affected the overall story.

The story as I envisioned it is extremely centered on building relationships with the characters, and on those relationships having the potential to become romantic. Although I tend to be an “otp” type of writer, I do really enjoy love triangle type tropes LOL, so although I do have an idea of how I want the “endgame” to go, this reimagined story will not be free of jealousy or messy feelings.  In fact, I’d like to take this opportunity to challenge myself to make character interactions messier than I usually would.

Main character will still be a lesbian (currently feeling her name will be Emily but not set on that), one of the main cast is bi (Nolan), 2 lesbian (Frances, Raya), 2 idk yet (Aislynn and Asher--Asher’s sexuality isn’t particularly relevant but regardless idk what his deal is yet LOL). I’m pretty set on the design and basic traits for most of the main cast except for Frances, I might want to rework her a little since atm I feel like I like her in theory more than in practice you know.  She just needs to be a little more unhinged.

Looking into ways to publish the story in a serialized format since idk posting original works on AO3 feels a bit weird.  If anyone has experience or suggestions for this I am open to them!  Hoping to be ready to start posting a small chunk of this before the summer ends.  I really miss working on something long and involved, and I think this will be a very fun and rewarding project!  If you want to get an idea of the setup for the story, you can still play the little demo game here!

[inkofamethyst]

April 16, 2023

I can be described as a bit of a control freak.  In the way that I like to have control over every bit of my life as humanly possible.  I feel most stressed when I feel that I lack considerable amounts of control.  I wonder what my personal intersection of control and insecurity is?  Those two must derive from some specific fears, some specific formative moments.

Jennifer Morrison’s character in House is so different from Emma Swan in Once Upon A Time.  Emma Swan had that toughness, that red leather jacket.  Dr Carmody comes off as so much more bright-eyed (and she wears vests lol).  Actors man.  The thing is though, I straight-up dislike boss-subordinate romance thing in most cases, this one being no exception.  Idk, it’s just weird to me.

Also as entertaining as it is to watch a doctor with no bedside manner who ends up being correct about everything and saving the day in the end, I would hate to have him as a doctor or mentor tbh.  I am way too sensitive to go through that kind of nonsense.  But it is interesting--something I learned in a writing workshop is that people will follow a character (I’d even stretch to say this applies to celebrities who almost seem like characters with the way “we” fictionalize them) who is good at what they do even if they are unlikeable.  Don’t remember the reason though.

I got my grade back for stats and did significantly better than the first midterm which is wild because the content was a lot more difficult and I studied significantly less :/  I’m (obviously) not upset about the grade, I am learning things (and enjoying it a lot!  I’m actually looking forward to graduate level stats), I just think it’s funny.  Continues to validate my bad habits, though.

I once again feel compelled to complain about my status as an emotional booty call with my saxophone-... friend.  Literally the relationships/friendships that I dislike the most have to be the ones where the other person only calls/texts me when they’re sad or upset.  It’s not even that I don’t want to be there when my friends feel down.  It’s not even that I expect “50-50″ in a friendship at all times.  I fully recognize that friends will need more support through difficult times and that a person’s life has high and low points for varying lengths of time.  But friends are there for each other.  If someone doesn’t reciprocate an interest in my life, I check out.  I lose interest when they only reach out to me to complain about their own lives and almost never when they just want to hang out, no story attached.  And I feel bad for passively accepting the role of an emotional booty call wen I have minimized my investment in the person, but I also don’t put any effort to continue the relationship, so that person fully has an out if they ever decide that me not ever texting them first isn’t something they can put up with in a friend.  But until then, I open my ears, reassure them that their feelings are valid, smiling the whole way through, then come here to huff and haw.  

Anyway.  I’ve gotta get back to “writing” (more like formatting (and finishing!!)) what is essentially an undergraduate thesis but due to the circumstances of my research it cannot be officially deemed to be such a thing.  Good thing is, it’s a relatively simple project.  Another good thing, after the two presentations I’ve got coming up for it in a week and a half, I should be completely done with it.  Thankful for that.  Lowkey wish I didn’t have to travel again this week.  I feel extremely thankful for the opportunity, but I’m also incredibly exhausted.  Much more than I thought I’d be toward the end of my “easy” last semester.

Today I’m thankful... that there’s only a month left.  Less than a month, really.

Goal of being in bed by 2 am.

[halflingkima]

Most Surprising Books of 2022

Finally we’re on the upswing! These weren’t necessarily the best books I read this year, but they were certainly the ones that blew me away the most, which I think also deserves the recognition. There’s really no consistency in these picks except they met my expectations and then pleasantly pushed past them.

Here we go! My ten ranked most surprising books of 2022 (again, read this past year, not necessarily published in the year)

10. Chocolat (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Joanne Harris When the mysterious Viane moves to a quiet French village, she reinvigorates the residents, much to the dismay of the local clergy.

Starting off lightly, this one didn’t exactly blow my expectations out of the water, but I was thoroughly impressed with how well it met them. This is one of my favorite movies and I was unsure how the whimsy would translate in the original text, but it did so well that it deepened my love of the film. The book allows a much deeper dive into characters’ inner lives while keeping the same magic of the film alive.

9. Ella Minnow Pea (⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Mark Dunn The island of Nollop reveres the pangram, but when letters begin to drop off of the pangram monument, leaders decide no one may use the fallen letters, leading to dire consequences.

This book is mostly a gimmick, given that it’s written in letters to residents of an island that must by law begin restricting their use of letters of the alphabet (i.e. as letters become illegal to use, they must communicate more and more creatively). Beyond that, I was incredibly impressed by the plot the book managed to pull off. Being that capital punishment is introduced so it gets quite a bit darker than I expected, and the ending was quite hopeful. Given the constraint of the text I was. impressed. not sure what else to say about it lol

8. The Fiction Class (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Susan Breen Arabella Hicks teaches a fiction writing class while navigating her relationship with her ailing mother.

This was a reread that I first read at far too young, and loved it despite that. In my mind it was an Adult Romance, but it’s actually an adult contemporary. Ultimately I was surprised at how well it held up. The romance was as iffy as I remember, but the writing class insets were even better than i remembered. Additionally, I could now appreciate the focus of the mother/daughter relationship that the whole story sits upon that went over my head before. I’m also now aware of ensemble casts and why I like them and this did fully hit those marks.

7. Sky in the Deep (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Adrienne Young When captured in battle by a rival clan, Eelyn learns her brother is alive and living with the enemy; she must grapple with her definition of family and decide who she fights for.

This was an impulse read that I had next-to-no expectations for because I’d never heard of it before. I figured if it was well done and unique, I would’ve seen reviews or even just mentions. Which meant it was quite easy for it to surpass those expectations. This might’ve been my barbarian main taking over but I really enjoyed the cultural worldbuilding and also like. the violence :). and the romance! and the found family. Lotta trope buttons hit and hit well when I didn’t expect them at all.

6. Ex Libris (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Matt Madden A meta exploration of the graphic novel format and what it can do for its readers.

This weird shaped book was the bane of my existence at work this year because it didn’t fit on the shelf nicely and I finally snapped and checked it out myself. idk if I’ve made it clear but meta narratives are my shit. And this was a great one. It also really uses the format to its fullest while also exemplifying what it can do and why its an important art & story form. It’s a simple story but it did give me a stab of existential fear. Loved it!

5. Glitterland (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Alexis Hall A pretentious, bipolar writer meets a boy who glitters and can’t seem to stay away.

This one I had middling expectations for because it’s by my current favorite author, but it’s one of his indie published backlist. And I found it just as good if not better than his traditionally published stuff (so far). It has the unique, often maudlin, magic of an (good) indie gay romance with the magic of Hall’s unique writing style. I do think it even made me cry.

4. All My Broken Pieces (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Hollis Shiloh During re-certification for his job at the police precinct, Tim, a disabled wolf shifter, is paired with Levi, a human who helps Tim discover and define what he actually wants in life.

This is the most surprising list, not a list of quality, and thus this beat out Glitterland. This is not what I would call a good book. Mainly, it’s a self-published indie that needed a heavy editing hand; the plot was meandering and circuitous, the world building was shallow, and it was far too long and long-winded. Despite all that, I found the premise interesting, I was invested in the romance, and the heat level was just about perfect for my taste. But above all, the representation of disability and like, the mental comorbidities that result – severe depression, anxiety, loneliness, exhaustion – really spoke to me, I guess. I found it heartwarming when others finally began to reach out to the MC, to empathize and help him better his life by just providing information and options, and Tim doing the work (mainly emotional) to allow himself to heal in so many areas. Basically, the book was far more intensive than I expected, and I became far more invested in the main character than I had planned.

3. Follow Me to Ground (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Sue Rainsford Ada, a more-than-human, un-aging healer of sorts, uncovers secrets about herself and her father when she tries to strike out on her own.

This was the first book I read of the year and it absolutely blew me away. I had heard of it and picked it up simply bc I needed an audiobook for a drive. The full cast was an exceptional experience and really layered on the southern gothic that I don’t think I would’ve interpreted myself, which I think was a huge part of my enjoyment. I also didn’t know it was a sort of light horror, and the creep factor was perfectly to my taste. I was so shocked by this that when I finished it, I rewound and started listening again lol.

2. The Subtweet (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Vivek Shraya Two trans desi musicians befriend, idolize, and ruin each other.

This was my first Vivek Shraya (mainly because I’m a little afraid of the emotional pain in her other works) and it left me slack jawed. I think I’d describe it as a modern story in the tradition of a greek tragedy. It focuses very narrowly on the experience of brown trans women indie musicians in canada but does not feel narrow in the slightest. It’s a heartbreaking tragedy of female friendship that feels inevitable in the culture in which it’s set. I was also impressed with how deftly social media was handled in the work – there’s no thread inserts, no breaking of narrative walls, all we get is the characters interpretations of certain “posts,” and it drives the narrative while avoiding the reader feeling like they’re doom scrolling. Very artfully done.

1. The Wonder Spot (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️) by Melissa Bank A sort of non-linear memoir, Sophie recounts moments in her life that shaped and taught her.

This was by far the most surprising read of the year. It was a general women’s fiction sitting on my bookshelf since I was in elementary school. I had no clue what it was about and the internet provided very few answers. When I picked it up, I found a poignant story that I wish I’d read in college or nearer to graduating. I think this book flawlessly executes what that millennial ennui genre tries too hard at – or at least, executes what I want when I dare to pick up millennial ennui stories. I’ve taken to calling this gen x ennui because it’s a realist narrative, but also has that hint of hope that I need from my escapism. Fully expected to unhaul this book and it is now in a place of pride on my keeper shelf.

[redraspberryleaf]

More info from my paramedic best friend who has had every injury and every illness ever!!

(Everything below this is a direct quote)

In my experience as someone who has done exactly this, more than once. Anyone stubborn enough to keep doing extreme physical activity is probably just going to “ignore the problem until it disappears”/“pretend everything is fine” and just deal with being in pain all the time. Crutches and leg braces aren’t required. I’ve never used crutches for any of my breaks. Occasionally, tape can be helpful for surrounding soft tissue that is angry about what you’ve done to it, or the trusty Velcro ankle brace for the associated joint pain caused by messing up the surrounding bones. I generally don’t use those if I’m somewhere people are going to comment on it. Ice, and stretching are the MVP’s. NSAIDS can also be a good (taking ibuprofen and acetaminophen has been proven to be effective as taking codeine for pain relief in fractures), however I can’t take them due to anaphylaxis so I just simply try to avoid thinking about the pain by doing other things, or more physical activity, because that’s good pain that is distracting and I am in control of.

Use of braces and crutches can be okay for splinting purposes or reducing weight bearing but if the bone has already healed incorrectly then there is no point. Immobilizing the injury also causes loss of muscle, as well as weakness and stiffness in the surrounding joints which frustrating and inconvenient, so I tend to avoid that at all costs.

Topical pain relief in the form of diclofinc (also an nsaid I can’t use) is reported to be very good for chronic pain caused by fractures and this character would likely benefit from that if he could access it.

Mainly the character is just going to have chronic pain indefinitely, perhaps so weird muscle imbalances from guarding the injury as it healed, and some stiffness in the surrounding joints. May also have some visual asymmetry between the two limbs depending on the degree of fractures and type.

Not getting treatment or stopping activity for your broken bones will also cause them to take forever to heal. Simple fractures usually take between 6-8weeks to heal and go through the 4 stages of healing they need to to heal. Not stopping physical activity means that stage 2 of healing (soft callus formation and granulation tissue formation) is going to take way longer than it should because it’s not immobilized so it can’t effectively form that “scaffolding” where it stabilizes the fracture, and can’t move to the next stage of healing’s hard callus and ossification process.

Depending on the fracture type, you’re much more likely to end up with nonunion, delayed union, or malunited fractures without having the fracture treated. But if the character is physically able to do physical activity during healing, it’s not super likely, because it would impact balance and stability while weight bearing and somewhat inhibit this

Not sure if this was helpful at all?

Idk, I’ve definitely got chronic pain, and some associated joint problems, and asymmetry, but I’d say I turned out fine. Nothing that isn’t managed

I saw that you had a post saying fic writers could ask you for advice writing medical stuff for fic. I was wondering if someone who has had multiple leg breaks that healed improperly would need crutches/leg braces (if so, which would be better and for how long). By healed improperly, I mean the bone wasn't set and he would've kept doing extreme physical activity while the bone was broken. (He had no choice to ignore the pain, if you even wondering why he would do that.) Thank you in advance, and it's okay if you can't get an answer

Answer from a doctor:

The bone would likely would heal in an abnormal shape and length with the muscles and tendons at the incorrect length to accomodate. There would probably be bone spurs that would inflame the muscles and tendons passing over them, especially when doing a lot of moving.

Your character would have limited range of motion, chronic pain, and likely need mobility aids for life. These aids would probably differ day-to-day and depend on the setting, as well as how stubborn and proud they are.

The specifics would all depend on the type of break, which bone, the type of activity that's being done on the break, etc.

Answer from me (based on experience):

Ad a teen I rolled my ankle at the start of a 3000m, completely ignored the injury, and won the race still. Only after that did I realize what happened (apperently the muscles had gotten fucked up and actually shifted my fibula out of place). I didn't break a bone but it was a fibula injury that I ignored and continued training on for months, even going to a week long track camp where I was doing about 20km of high impact on asphalt and hills per day. I ended up with a wicked limp, chronic pain, shin splints, plantar faciatis, and a lateral muscle imbalance across every part of my body but my arms from trying to compensate. Youd look at me from behind and see my hips, my shoulders, my neck, everything was at an angle. Eventually I did enough physio that I was mostly okay again but if I was ever lady and didn't do my stretches, warm up properly, and build up training properly I would get issues coming back. I stopped running in uni and decided to pick it back up again one day and instant plantar faciatis.

The second part to this is experience with an actual broken bone. A couple years ago I broke my fibula. It was a spiral fracture to my left fibula about a third or so of the way up the bone. I crashed on a downhill while skateskiing and because I was in race skis those bindings don't typically have a safety release, so when my ski spun around in a full circle so did my foot. This broke my fibula in a spiral shape.

~side note: if your character is fighting and moving on a broken leg it's probably a fibula since that's not the weight baring bone. This is the one you hear about athletes finishing a game on a broken leg. It's possible with adrenaline but it's still hell and will cause you issues in the long run. A tibia is weight baring so you shouldn't really be able to stand on that, and a femur break usually will get you air lifted to the hospital because you're about to die.~

Anyway, with all the issues of the last injury I'd had, I really stayed off of my broken leg and actually atrophied.

Now with this one, I can say it healed wrong. According to an mri and xrays they don't see any issues but I was treated in a tiny town er during a massive covid spike before the vaccine was available so I never got a second cast after the swelling went down.

After healing, I have always had an aching pain deep in the bone that doesn't go away. It throbs worse with impact activity or if I spend a lot of time on my feet on hard floors. I am a huge sucker for standing on grass these days. That ankle is actually a lot thicker now and is a lot more unstable. I have pain in the bone from the break but on bad days when I'm really hurting the worst of it in in the muscles and tendons of my ankle, the top outside of my calf, and my hip and glute. I never expected this but my ass is SO TIGHT ALL THE TIME and it hurts like a bitch. Massage helps, but it's not the sexy kind. It's the full body weight on an elbow jabbed into my ass cheek or hip flexor kind. This is all because with my ankle being really unstable from the tendons and muscles getting inflamed from popping over small bone spurs all the time, the hip has to work overtime to try to compensate and stabilize more than it normally would. I also experience not quite muscle weakness on that side, so much as muscle fatigue. Basically, everything on that side is working over time and is always tired. For the first three years after I had a wicked limp, was in a lot more pain than I am now, and could only run if I absolutely had to. After doing a lot of physio I can run again but certainly am limping after a 10k. I also have a lot of scars from my bad side making me trip over roots and become impaled on sticks.

I had the opportunity to heal fairly well overall and access physio but I'd I didn't I know I'd be using a cane and taping my ankle constantly. Before I did physio when I lifeguarded I also needed a chair because walking around on tile barefoot for hours would have me in tears even with my hugh pain tolerance. Repeated breaks over time with bad healing and limited access to care would def require mobility aids and would lead to life-long chronic pain.

I'll be back with responses from the rest of the team soon.

Bonus! Where my bone broke starts aching really bad the second I start to get dehydrated. Everything also hurts most at night and the second I stop moving.

[uselesslesbiab]

How about hcs for the Phantom Thieves finding out Ren's been found out as their leader by like 9 people (one of which is an elementary schooler). I imagine they'd be cool with Sojiro knowing cause he's the group dad (no I will not accept otherwise) but they would not be cool about some of the others (especially if they find out some of the shit he's had to do for them).

Ooh I’ve had ideas about this for a long time and I wanted to write a full fic about it but I probably won’t any time soon. The idea was gonna be post interrogation scene Ren is forcibly put on bed rest so all his confidants come over to help him and the other phantom thieves out instead of Ren having to go see them. This might be a longer post so I guess I’ll separate the bullet points based on each phantom thief?? Just so I don’t forget anyone.

Morgana doesn’t get reactions for obvious reasons. Also this kinda turned into which confidants they would get along with the most oops. Mishima is also not mentioned since they all know that he knows and runs the Phan-site

Ryuji

His “For real?!” gets louder every time someone new walks in the door

He doesn’t really think it’s a big deal that these people know. If Ren trusts them, then he trusts them.

He’s super impressed by Shinya and they actually get along really well since Ryuji’s still a kid at heart. Shinya thinks his dyed hair and attitude is cool. (CEOs of cuffing their pants so high it looks ridiculous).

Chihaya scams him out of his money so fast it makes his head spin. Ren makes her give it back but his ego takes a beating.

Politics bore him to tears, but he likes the sound of Yoshida’s voice and the way he really listens to young people. “It’s like he totally gets us ya know? You’re alright old man!”

He has a nice talk with Kawakami where she apologizes for treating him like a troublemaker just because of what the other teachers said about him.

Ann

She’s extremely surprised and a little embarrassed that all these people know about them. “Ugh you’re worse at keeping this a secret than Ryuji!”

She starts complimenting Takemi’s goth fashion immediately and is totally in love with her style

She gets along well with Ohya too. The worlds of modeling and journalism are far from strangers, so they have a lot to talk about.

She gets along surprisingly well with Hifumi considering they’re almost polar opposites. Hifumi briefly mentions that she likes sweets and Ann invites her out for crepes on the spot.

Yusuke

Yusuke is disappointed in Ren of course and tells him as much, but he gets distracted before he can finish scolding him.

He’s absolutely fascinated by Chihaya and her fortune telling. He doesn’t have any money for her to take but she gives him a free reading anyway because he just looked so excited she couldn’t say no.

Yusuke and Hifumi really hit it off once they start talking about the phantom thieves and end up becoming good friends. She’s his first friend he’s ever made at school.

He calls Iwai a true artist when he sees his skill at making model guns. He demands to witness the entire crafting and detail process from start to finish. Iwai sees another kid with no parents and immediately goes into dad mode.

Makoto

Makoto isn’t angry, but she sure as hell isn’t happy either. As the strategist, she immediately recognizes and connects the confidants with the mementos targets that were troubling them.

She turns to Ren immediately and just goes “What in the hell is wrong with you”

After she gets over scolding him for being so reckless, she actually finds herself enjoying the company of Yoshida and Ohya especially

She talks to Yoshida and Ohya about her father and the injustice in the political system.

Makoto is really great with kids and Shinya kinda flocks over to her at some point and asks a bunch of questions about her role in the phantom thieves. Shooter arcade games are actually the only games she’s ever played, so they talk about Gun About strategy a lot.

Futaba

“Okay I got given so much much shit for letting Sojiro find out and Ren was doing this the whole time?!! You guys suck!”

She brags about her gaming skills to Shinya of course and challenges him to a Gun About competition.

Takemi sees her and immediately starts ranting off about how she needs to take care of her health and how her vitamin D is deficient and how she should get tested for this this and this and-

Futaba zones out but the feeling of having an adult female figure care about her well-being makes her smile.

Kawakami hears about her shut in nature and commits to tutoring her on the exact subjects she’ll need to know for the high school entrance exam. (Futaba may be incredibly smart but we all know the bullshit high school asks us to learn about. She doesn’t learn stuff she doesn’t have an interest in.)

Haru

Like Ryuji, she puts her faith in Ren and decides to trust these people.

She absolutely ADORES Iwai and his model guns. She fawns over their design and tries to pick up all the heaviest ones. He’s extremely flustered and thrown off at first because she’s this 5’2 tiny girl wearing a fluffy pink sweater and is rambling off facts she knows about all these guns.

Even so, Iwai is a dad at heart. The second he finds out she’s an orphan he practically adopts her on the spot. Haru is happy to finally have a male figure in her life that she can feel safe with and look up to.

She’s too smart to fall for Chihaya’s traps but she indulges in the fortune telling anyway. Only as a subtle way to give her some money.

[procrastinatingsapphictrash]

I came back for you

Word count: 2123

Genre: Angst but happy end

Pairing: Natasha x gn!reader

Warnings: Abusive prison/government (let me know if I need to add any)

Request: Hey, so this is kind of a weird request, but could you do a Nattie x Powered! Reader during Civil War, where Nat, of course, is on Tony's team, and the Reader is trying to keep the peace between the two teams. Maybe the government takes (Y/n) and puts her in a shock collar like Wanda's because they think she was on Steve's team? Sorry this is so weird . . .

Summary: You are neutral in the fight, or so you think before you are told you can't be and are taken away with the rest of Cap's team.

A/n: Thanks @thewidowsghost for requesting this! Honestly I didn't plan on writing anything or posting anything today but I saw that I had a little bit of this done and to be honest my day has sucked so I needed a distraction and this worked perfectly. Also I could someone tell me how the formatting looks? I'm trying the new beta editor and I think I'm doing things right but idk. Anyways I hope you all enjoy!

As you take in the scene that surrounds you you can’t believe that you once considered everybody to be a big weird family. Certainly none of them are acting like it now. It breaks your heart to see them on opposite sides, throwing themselves at each other because apparently their personal beliefs are more important than their friends.

Neither of them are right or wrong in your opinion. There’s too many factors and both options suck, it’s the government’s fault for placing the team in this situation. However you are not happy with the way anyone is handling it, especially Steve, Tony and Natasha. Both Tony and Steve are acting based on what they think is right without considering the other sides to the story, although you can’t say that’s surprising coming from them. You do know that they genuinely do care for others but they can be very hard headed and neither of them like to be wrong.

It’s Natasha who you’re most disappointed in though, you thought that she would be a better negotiation, helping ease the tension but she’s out there fighting like the rest of the idiots. You thought that she would agree with you and try to bring together the two sides.

You narrow your eyes and zoom in your vision to the far side of the airport where you see Spiderman. You have no idea who he is but you can tell just by looking at him that he’s only a kid and it was irresponsible of everyone to let him be here and to fight him. You use your superspeed to get to him quickly and take him out of the way of flying cars and leave him by the side where it should be relatively safe.

“Stay here.” you tell him.

“But-”

You glare. “Stay here.”

You rush off before you can make sure he listens because you can hear a grunt of pain from Rhodney. He’s lying on the ground with Tony standing over him and Sam a few meters back. The fight seems to be ending now, you see the plane leaving and the rest of the avengers start to gather but it doesn’t matter because the damage is already done. You don’t know exactly what happened but it looks like a freak accident, somehow nobody’s fault and yet everybody’s fault for getting into this situation in the first place.

The mood is weird, as if everybody is holding their breath and taking in what they’ve done. In the background you can hear trucks pulling up and footsteps follow soon after. The first man grabs Wanda and she blasts him back lightly so he falls down. Immediately a circle forms around her, everyone pointing their guns. Clint takes a step in, raising his arms and trying to calm the situation down but the guns shift to him and one agent steps forward and roughly grabs him, forcing his wrists into cuffs.

They go for Sam next and he looks pissed but lets them cuff him without comment. Scott looks completely confused and out of his depth. You don’t know him but it’s obvious that he is not trained for these types of situations and is in over his head.

It’s Wanda that makes your heart break the most though. She’s like a little sister to you so seeing the tears in her eyes and the terror on her face as the agents move in to cuff her makes you want to wrap your arms around her and promise it will all be okay. But you can’t, that would be a lie because everything is not okay and trying to hug her would only make things worse.

The agents start to move away, leading Cap's team to their trucks to be taken away. One of them turns back and notices you, murmuring something to the agents beside them. Before you can even understand what is happening they are right back and grabbing at your arms roughly. Naturally you try to pull away but they are strong and once you realize what is happening you stop struggling.

“I didn’t pick a side,” you try to explain, “I was just trying to make sure everyone was okay.”

“You didn’t sign the accords and therefore have no right to be here.” one of the men tells you. You look towards Tony’s team for help but they all seem to be busy. Tony and Vision are trying to make sure Rhodney is okay and the kid is luckily back where you left him. T’challa is shaking hands with one of the agents and although it makes you sick because of the way they are treating some of the others you understand, he does have a country to run and his people must come first after all.

Natasha is the only one not doing anything and she meets your eyes. You silently beg her to do something, anything against what is happening. She stares you straight in the eye and shakes her head. You actually shiver at how cold her look is because you never thought that would be directed at you, you thought that the two of you were close.

“I’m not going to help you Y/n, you made your own choice and I made mine.” Is all she says before turning away. You watch her back as long as you can as you are led into the trucks, wondering how everything went wrong so quickly.

---

Nobody talks. You aren’t even sure if you’re allowed to. There is no way what they are doing is legal but who is going to argue with the government. A secret prison built just for enhanced individuals and imprisoning people without trial isn’t right. You were neutral before but the more you see of how the government operates the more you start to lean towards supporting Steve and the rest of his “team”.

You shift slightly because the shock collar is getting even more uncomfortable. Wanda is wearing one too, probably since the two of you are the only ones that have powers unrelated to technology and suits. She looks smaller than ever in her cell and you close your eyes because if you continue to look at her you know you’ll end up crying.

Nothing changes throughout the day until you hear the door creak open. Everyone glares when they see it’s Tony and he and Clint share a few words before Tony practically begs Sam for information. Sam’s reluctant but gives in, seeing that Tony is sincere and knowing that although he disagrees with Tony it’s not really his fault that you’re all here, it’s the government’s.

When Tony leaves things go silent again for a few hours. You haven’t been fed since you’ve gotten here, you realize, but you aren’t hungry anyways, your mind can’t stop picturing the fight, being arrested and most of all Natasha’s attitude towards you. It hurts even more than you would like to admit. You considered her your best friend but you also had feelings for her and you were dumb enough to think that just maybe she felt the same things about you. Obviously that is completely untrue and you wonder if even your friendship was a lie.

“How long do you think we’ll be stuck here for?” Wanda asks finally and although her voice is quiet you wince at how it breaks the silence.

“I don’t know kid.” Clint responds. “Too long. My wife is going to kill me and my kids-”

He stops himself, getting a little choked up which surprises you. You’ve never seen him this emotional before.

“I already miss my daughter.” Scott adds on and there is a moment of understanding that passes between the two of them.

“I don’t have my own family but I’m going to miss my sister.” Sam says. “She probably won’t even find out what’s happening until it’s on the news, if the news even covers it.”

“I miss the team.” you add. “Before this fight, we weren’t perfect but I considered everyone family.”

“So did I.” Wanda says and you all take a moment to miss what used to be.

“I miss pizza.” Sam jokes, trying to lighten the mood. It works and soon everyone is adding on ridiculous things they miss and things they want to do when you get out (you can’t even think about the fact that the “when” might actually be “if”).

Your eyes snap to the door when it opens and everyone shuts up immediately. You look warily at Natasha, unsure of why she’s here. Maybe the government sent her in to interrogate, god knows she is amazing at that and you honestly wouldn’t be able to not talk to her, as much as you’re mad at her right now.

She doesn’t speak, going straight towards Sam’s door and kneeling down, fiddling with the lock. After a few seconds it clicks and the door swings open.

“When did you switch sides?” He asks, raising his eyebrows, impressed.

“I don’t pick sides, I do what makes the most sense and right now breaking you out is the right thing to do. Besides I’m wanted now too, apparently the government doesn’t like it when you aid fugitives in escaping.” she responds smoothly, moving onto Wanda’s cell and repeating her actions until it opens.

“Do you know how to take the collar off?” she asks and Sam nods. He gets to work while Natasha moves on. Both Clint and Scott pass at her offer of freeing them. They both look like they’re itching to escape but you respect that they’re putting their families first.

You’re surprised by how emotional you get when she unlocks your cell. You thought she didn’t care about you so to have her here now is amazing and makes you feel bad you ever doubted that she would do the right thing.

“Y/n, it’s okay, I’ve got you.” she tells you as she undoes your shock collar carefully, doing her best to not hurt you.

“I-I thought you didn’t care about me anymore.” you admit, a single tear dripping down your face.

She wipes it away with her thumb. “Oh sweetheart I care about you so much, more than you could ever know and I want you to always remember that, promise me.”

You nod, sniffing. “I promise Tasha.”

“Good because I came back for you and I will always come back for you.” she says, leaning in closer. You look down at her lips as she continues to lean in because she is so close and it seems like she’s going to kiss you.

“Glad to know Y/n was the only reason you came back.” Sam says, smirking. You love him but you also want to strangle him right now, that bastard could totally see what was happening and ruined the moment on purpose.

Natasha flips him the finger but otherwise ignores him. “Steve and Bucky are waiting in the jet outside, I was able to dismantle alarms and cameras but we only have a few minutes left so follow me and be quiet.”

She grabs your hand as she moves out of your cell and you walk with her, the others trailing behind slightly. The halls are clear and it’s only a few turns before she ushers everyone into a vent. It’s a tight squeeze but you make it through and you pop out to find sturdy wires attached to the side of the raft coming from a nearby jet. Wanda and Sam each take one and their wires retract, pulling them into the jet. You gulp nervously, heights are definitely not one of your favourite things.

“We have to go Y/n.” Natasha whispers just as alarms start to sound, the noises loud with flashing lights.

You take a deep breath and grab the remaining wire and once you’re secure Natasha grabs it too. Closing your eyes tightly so you don’t look down you feel a strange whooshing sensation before it disappears and your feet touch down on the jet floor.

“So what next?” Sam asks once you’ve all collected yourselves, directing his question at Steve.

“We lie low and try to help as best we can.” he responds, sighing heavily. “We’ll figure out the details as we go, what matters is that everybody is safe.”

Natasha holds your hand again and squeezes it tightly. “And that we are together.” she whispers into your ear so only you hear.

You squeeze her hand tightly back. Your relationship with her has gone through a rollercoaster of a day and is mostly undefined but she’s right, all that matters is that you’re together now and you wouldn’t rather be with anyone else.

---

Taglist: @fayhar @xxxtwilightaxelxxx @acertainredhead @madamevirgo @megaqueenmaeve @cherryblossomskye @aaron-despair @chickenhavewisdom @emril-osvigne @nyankitty987 @agathaharkness-simp @thewidowsghost @nyx-aira @stephanieromanoff @satxnsupreme @likefirenrain @wlwlovesreading @stop-drop-and-drumroll @peggycarter-steverogers @casperlikej @redswing @mochamoff @king-star @blackbat2020

[secretsandwriting]

Damian headcanon for a girl who shows up no reason to his gang and confess of her likes to him, later then continue few more times before he and his gang finds out she's escaping from bullies, and he'd for once finally took her in and never let her go since?

I'm assuming by gang you mean friends? So that's how I wrote it. Also, idk what this format is, I just went with the flow. If this isn't what you wanted please tell me and I'll make another one for you!

I'm not sure where Jon and Billy would go to high school so I stuck them all in Gotham Academy. Also, NO ONE can convince me that Damian absolutely hates bullies and loves fucking them over casually.

Also, sorry this took!

First off, Damian's no stranger to girls confessing to him. With his own looks and the reputation of his family, a lot of girls like him.

So when you confessed the first time, it wasn't unusual.

The second time was a little weird, everyone agreed on that. It wasn't often someone confessed twice within the same week.

The third time, Jon caught sight of something on your wrist. You moved too fast for him to get enough of a glance to know what it was.

The fourth time they decided to investigate. It wasn't that hard.

"I can't believe you've confessed 4 times!" A shrill voice Damian recognized as one of the "popular girls" rang out from behind the school. "It's pathetic. I honestly thought you wouldn't have the nerve to do it once, let alone 4 times. He must think you're desperate!"

"Please, just let me go home." They could hear the tears through your voice, "I have homewo-" The next thing they hear was a dull thud and then the clatter of things falling and rolling on the blacktop. A pen somehow managed to roll by the building to where they stood.

"If you can get Damian Wayne to date you, we'll leave you alone. Anything we told you to do you don't have to. We wouldn't have any control over you anymore... That's probably the best bet I've ever made. Not only do I get to make you life a living hell but I get to watch as your rejected again and again by your only hope of getting out of this! Oh, and don't forget to do our homework." The boys heard the sound of footsteps coming towards them so they left.

They had thought about waiting until you came to confess again but after seeing the bruise on your arm when you grabbed some books from your locker changed that.

So he went to you.

After lunch while you were grabbing something from your locker he came over.

"Y/n." The flash of terror he caught on your face made his chest tighten up. It was one he saw on many people right before they died or almost died. "My apologies, I didn't mean to scare you."

"It's ok, I scare easy. Do you need something?" He caught a glimpse of you pulling down your sleeve where they had seen the bruise.

"Yeah, are you free after school today?" He watched as you glanced back at to three girls they had heard bullying you. "I was wondering if you would go get coffee with me."

"Oh... Um, I have to tutor someone for an hour after school." He nodded, expecting you to add more but you didn't.

"What door should I pick you up from?"

He could feel the stares on him as he messed around with Billy and Jon. He hates staying later at school and yet he was still there.

When it was finally about the time you would be done he left the boys to go pick you up.

Before he got there, he saw your bullies waiting around the door. Thankfully they didn't stop you from going by, really only because they were shocked to see him.

So then the two of you went to go get coffee. Turns out, you weren't as bad as he thought. In fact, you were interesting.

He offered to take you home after that and pick you up for school if you were ok with it.

So he started taking you too and from school as well as additional dates.

It didn't take long for Billy and Jon to become friends with you as well.

It was only a month after he had first asked you out that he realized he really liked you and this could be serious if both of you put in effort.

So he decided to put in effort and hoped you would too.

You did.

It was obvious to everyone around that the two of you had clicked.

It was one of those types of loves where it worked out, while it was still hard and required the normal things needed in a relationship. It didn't seem hard.

After 6 months, it was clear that the two of you adored each other.

To think it all started from a bet.

BONUS

"When we get married we should invite them to the wedding." Damian snorted. "After all, if it wasn't for their bet, I wouldn't have ever confessed once, let alone four times and then we probably wouldn't be together." Damian rubbed your back.

"It would be interesting to see their faces, but it's 2:38. We should be sleeping."

[jungk0oksthighs]

OMG BABE! OK, this is gonna sound weird but two or three days ago I was thinking about OTO and ATO, and thought: damn, this girl could actually make it as big as the Fifty Shades of Grey writer! And I know people view that book as cheesy and subpar, BUT I read it while she was writing it as a fanfic, like on ffnet and the title was actually Master of the Universe. And it was AMAZING as a ff. The drama, the SMUT, even the goddess thing wasn’t weird in that format. And OTO has it all. Well done!!

i’ll be honest i’ve never read the fifty shades books or ff, but i have watched the first two movies! it’s not really my thing as i think there’s a lot of ✨interesting storylines✨ (like he made a file of her? before they met? this gets skipped over quite a bit but it’s very stalkery if u take away his money he’s a real creep idk man idk i guess i can’t comment on that properly because i’ve not actually read them) that being said THIS IS STILL A HUGE COMPLIMENT WTF 😩😩😩 thank you so much! even if just one person buys the book and enjoys it i’ll label that a success!!!!!! ofc EL JAMES and other ff turned published writers like ANNA TODD were a lot older than me when they first published, had more writing experience and skills etc so it’s pretty daunting but the editors i’ve been lucky enough to speak with have read OTO as the ff and they’re currently reading OTO’s first draft n i’ve had so much positive feedback 😭😭 so fingers crossed! maybe not 50 shades big but hopefully OTO will do well!!! thank you so much for these compliments and kind words angel 💜💜💜

[razorsadness]

Life has been kinda rough, lately. Things were hard last week, got better for a few days, then Sunday everything went to shit, again. Long story short: I injured myself, was in intense physical pain for several days, got so stressed out about feeling like shit/not being able to get as much done as I wanted to that the stress caused further physical issues, which in turn made me more stressed…ugh.

I haven’t been sleeping well. I lay awake listening to the freight trains—which are so loud that sometimes they sound like they’re running right through our backyard—and wishing I were on one of them. When I do sleep, I have fucked-up dreams. Elephants with half their skulls missing, piles of maggots, talking cats. Old friends getting deathly ill and not telling me.

Despite all that, I managed to finish my chapbook manuscript and get it in to the publisher, and to finish the editing/proofreading and graphic design jobs I was doing for $$. I worked from bed as much as possible, but I worked. I’m really excited about the chapbook, like I think it is really really good, and that’s kinda huge cuz normally when I finish a project I’ve been working on for a while my first instinct is to burn it and throw the ashes into a dumpster. And I got paid for the big editing/proofreading job this morning, and it is such a relief to actually be able to put a little bit of money in my fucking savings account again.

I’m working on a radio show (podcast) to go along with the chapbook, sort of an audio annotation or ‘liner notes’ if you will. It has made me realize how fucking much I missed being a DJ, whether live on air or in a pre-recorded podcast format, and now I’m thinking I might actually start up a regular podcast again. Maybe start out every other month, so I don’t get burnt out or have it become yet another thing I’m stressed about.

I did have one weird-but-good dream the night before last: I dreamt I met Tommy Stinson and we started a ska band together. Yeah, IDK either. Probably just because I’ve had the ‘Mats on the brain, and I’ve been listening to a lot of ska lately, too. But at least it was a fun dream, and not a creepy or scary one, for once.

I have a crush. I think it’s mutual. Nothing overt has been said by either one of us, but I can generally tell. Fortunately, they live far away and I doubt we’ll ever meet IRL, so I can keep this crush safely in the realm of fantasy.

Sometimes I think about old friends and lovers, people I’m not in frequent (or any) contact with, and think: “They could be ill, or otherwise in trouble, or even dead, and I’d never know.” Both things have happened to me before—old friends being seriously ill or otherwise in trouble and not telling me until months or years later, and finding out that people I hadn’t spoken to in months or years had, in fact, died. Since that dream about one of my best/longest-known friends being sick and not telling me, I felt the need to let certain friends know that they’re on my mind, and I’ve been reaching out.

There are small good things, as always: iced coffee, music, finally working on finishing up RC 26 now that the chapbook and dayjob stuff has calmed down. And on Tuesday, P. and I are taking the kiddos on a day trip. We’re gonna drive to a town about an hour and a half away to have lunch at a burger joint we’ve heard great things about, then hit a state park on the way home.

[gatoplanet]

i’m stealing this from @impishtubist because i’m at work and i don’t want to be SO:

1. which fic are you most proud of and why?

there are a few i’m genuinely really proud of!! i think the long way home is some of the best, like, mood-setting i’ve ever done in any of my writing ever, fanfic or otherwise, so i’m fond of it. same with both-and tbh, idk how i’ll feel about it a year from now but i feel like i got the vibe i wanted. also single-trailer set, because it was super out of my comfort zone and i was nervous i wasn’t going to be able to pull it off, but i like how it turned out. thank you for being terrifying ali i love u <3

honorable mention to make the record skip because my irl friend told me it was really good and i thought he was saying that because he knew i wrote it but when i said oh thanks he was like wait was that you???? and i have never known such a high before, and i daresay i shall never know its like again

2. which fic did you have the most fun writing and why?

i’ve loved writing there is no right way because it’s sex and feelings talk in its purest most undiluted form, but also i get to sneak some lore in there. i love any fic with lila in it because she is so fun to write bants for, but especially deep tissue massage by appointment only. and it’s not done yet, but be kind rewind is a fuckin blast to work on, because i love doing Weird Shit With Formatting (see also klaus’s footnotes that make fics from his pov take me a million years to finish)

3. which fic left you emotionally tapped and why?

i absolutely feel corny for it but i’ve made myself cry writing a few things ToT afterparty was the worst, followed by half and half two sugars. most recently i got myself going over this umbrellasnip and hey perhaps u are beginning to notice a pattern in the themes addressed!! i am many things but when it comes to not writing an uncomplicatedly happy ending i am a weak little baby

[granolabird]

I realized I never posted my Peter x Reader fic on here so I thought I might as well do it even though everyone and their grandma has probably already read it on Ao3 oops.

(Also idk how to do all this fanfic fancy tumblr formatting stuff I apologize I'm an old woman)

Late Nights With Peter

Notes: I wrote this at 1AM during a mental breakdown a few weeks back :) University is a bitch.

It’s late, and I’m half asleep. The tv drones on, displaying some horror movie I can’t recognise past sleep-bleary eyes. Beside me sits Peter, my head resting lightly on his side as I slowly pass out. He doesn’t notice, or if he does, he doesn’t seem to care, only focused on watching the movie and seeing how many marshmallows he can fit in his mouth at once. From what I can tell, it’s at least ten. I adjust myself slightly, snuggling closer to him, and he looks over eyes wide. “Hey, are you still awake?” He speed-chews the marshmallows before he asks, giving me a small nudge. “Barely.” I huff and he gives a small chuckle. “You need me to run you upstairs?” He offers and I shake my head as well as I can from the position I’m in, curled up on the couch. “I’m too comfy. You make a good pillow.” He smiles and presses a soft kiss to the top of my head. “As much as I appreciate the compliment, I think it’s time we get you to bed. I don’t know how long I could stay still, even as your honorary pillow.” He reaches over and presses a button on the converter to turn the tv off, before scooping me up, bridal-style. “Fiiine.” I lament knowing it’s too late to try and stay on the couch, seeing as I’m already in his arms. He grins, before running us up to the bedroom and placing me swiftly under the covers, then following suit.

He snuggles close to me, laying one arm over my side as I press into his warm chest. “How did I get so lucky to find someone like you?” I ask, my words muffled in his baggy sleep-shirt. “I could say the same about you.” He sighs, running a hand through my hair. We’re quiet for a moment, but he doesn’t stop moving his hand through my hair slowly. “Hey, I know it’s late but can… can I ask you something?” His words are uncharacteristically quiet and I look up from his chest, searching his face to figure out what he’s thinking. Peter is notorious for late-night pondering of the worst kind. After everything he’s been through, I can’t blame him. “Anything.” I offer in response, but he doesn’t smile this time, he just keeps petting my head lightly. “This is kind of weird, but do you think the guys back at the school care about me?” He questions, and I lift my head to meet his eyes. “What?” I shake my head, a little confused and still sleepy, and he takes a moment to ponder. “It’s just that, I go on all these missions, I do all this work to help them, and they just… keep going. They don’t thank me, they don’t pay me any mind, and then they go off for drinks after the mission and half the time they don’t even ask me to join them. I’m just a comic relief to them, I think. What if they leave me? My dad left me, Logan left all of us, I’ve never had anyone stay as long as you have really, so who’s to say you won’t leave too? Shit, I don’t know, maybe I just need to go to sleep.” His anxiety seems to grow with every word he says, and his eyes are staring off into somewhere far away. His hand has stopped moving across my hair now and it falls softly onto the bed.

“Peter.” I say, lifting a hand to his cheek to snap him out of his daze. “I do think you need to go to sleep, your mind goes much too fast.” I huff out, before continuing. “But they care about you, I can promise you that. Scott told me the other day that you’re one of his best friends. Did you know that?” I offer, and Peter tips his head slightly, leaning into my hand. “He did?” “Yeah, he did. And you know why they don’t invite you to drink with them. You can’t-” “Get drunk.” He finishes my sentence for me, a gleam shining in his eyes. “But it was pretty funny when I got the video of Kurt drunk off his ass, wailing ABBA on karaoke night.” His sense of humor is returning, and I grin up at him. “He’s never going to forgive you for that one.” I chuckle, moving my hand from his cheek so that it can grip his free hand. He chuckles too, and I feel warmth light up my chest. “And Peter, you know I’d never leave you.” “I know.” He responds almost immediately, pressing his face into the top of my head. “I know, I just get worried sometimes. I’ve lost so many people. Been through so much shit that it just...” He trails off, his words muffled against my hair. “The others on the team care about you Peter, everyone does. You’re basically a son to Charles, and your dad? Who gives two shits about him, the dickhead is a mass murderer. He doesn’t deserve you.” I tell him, and he lifts his face to look at me again.

“Hey! That's my father you’re talking about!” He exclaims quietly, but the light in his eyes tells me he’s joking. “He may be your father, but he’s still an asshole. The only good thing he’s ever done is bring you into this world.” I say sternly. “I don’t know, that time he killed the president was pretty awesome.” He offers, and I force myself to put on the most fed-up face my exhausted brain can create. He laughs fully now, and I feel his chest rumbling as he goes. “Why are you laughing.” I huff, trying my best to sound annoyed despite the smile pressing at my lips. “Because you look so damn cute when you try to look mad at me.” He whispers, and I sigh letting my smile come through and shaking my head. “You’re such a ladies man.” I say mockingly, and he grins at me. “I know, right?” Peter lets another chuckle escape him, before he leans himself down to kiss me. It’s not intense but rather light, soft and subtle, as he uses the one arm he has thrown around me to somehow pull me even closer. I lean into him, and we rest against each other's lips for a long while, just enjoying the presence of one another.

I feel him smiling against my mouth, before he pulls back and looks over me, eyes tracing my face. “I love you.” He says, and I laugh and bury my head in his shirt again. It smells like marshmallows and faint cologne that reminds me of an autumn breeze. It reminds me of home. Peter, my love, my sweet, my everything. You are my home. I don’t voice any of this though, and instead opt for “You smell like marshmallows.” He responds by half-heartedly kicking me under the blanket. “Wow, thanks. I feel so loved right now.” He grumbles, and I look back up to him. “I love you too you big goof. I’d probably love you a lot more if you just let me sleep.” I tell him, and he sighs, letting his head flop on his pillow. “Right sorry, I forgot you’re little miss sleeping beauty. Remind me to wake you up in the morning with a kiss?” He jokes, and I press my face back against his chest. “I know you won’t need the reminder.” I tell him as I settle myself into a comfortable position to sleep in. “You’re right.” He mumbles, and I can tell he’s getting tired too. He adjusts himself, his one arm still flung around me and trying, to no avail, to bring me even closer. Then, Peter settles my head in the crook of his neck, and sighs, clearly feeling comfortable. “Goodnight.” He says, and I smile into his chest. “Goodnight Peter, I’ll see you in the morning.” I tell him, before fading into the lull of sleep. I’m not sure what I dream about, but somewhere running through my dreams I know there is a handsome silver-haired man, who owns my heart, and I know I am loved.

[clumsyclifford]

2021 Writing Self-Evaluation

thank youuu @allsassnoclass​ i fucking LOVE this idea i am going to say SO many things rn i am so excited. 

prefacing this by saying i’m only counting the stuff i posted to bellawritess because i do have a different ao3 account where i post All My Other Fic Writing but (1) i don’t use it nearly as much now that i’m so focused on the rpf stuff and (2) don’t wanna doxx myself lol. so yeah! onward.

edit after finishing this: to absolutely no one’s surprise, i was about as long-winded as humanly possible on every single question i could. so i’ll put a cut and you can read my silly little musings underneath it if you like.

1. Number of stories posted to AO3: 88 fics, apparently!! that’s everything i wrote in 2021, both prompt fics and... normal fics? idk what you would call those.

2. Word count posted for the year: clocking in at a whopping 351,552 words for the year. yeesh. get a life woman.

3. Fandoms I wrote for: 5sos, all time low, and one direction. 

4. Pairings: oh boy. from most to least according to ao3: jalex, malum, lashton, cake, merrikat, rilex, cashton, muke, mashton, 5sos ot4, and 1d ot5, plus also a handful of friendship fics.

5. Story with the most Kudos/Bookmarks/Comments: i really appreciate that these are all questions i can use ao3 features to find the answers for. thank you to whoever made this ask game. ANYWAY.

 for kudos, unsurprisingly, you seem so damn familiar takes top spot. that one also has the most comments (quelle surprise) and the 2nd most bookmarks. most bookmarks actually goes to and it all makes sense to me, the ot5 fic!! that’s so fun i love that. also, simply because it makes me happy, i’m sharing that the 2nd most comments/comment threads i guess goes to fever dream high in the quiet of the night, aka cruel summer fic. 

6. Work I’m most proud of (and why): i mean, it’s hard not to say you seem so damn familiar. that’s the obvious answer, but i am hella proud of it. i mean, 40k in ten days, and look how fucking good it is!!!!!! also i did kind of forget about the ot5 fic but i’m proud of that one too because i wrote it for @mastasof-ravenkroft​ for his birthday but i did the stupid thing where i forgot to start writing it til like. the day before. or NIGHT before. and so i essentially just binge wrote the whole thing, but it was a fic i had wanted to write for a long time and i actually wrote it exactly how i wanted it to be, PLUS it’s a 5+1 which is maybe my favorite fic format, AND it’s an ot5 fic, which i’ve never done. and it turned out really really nice actually. so yes, very proud of that one. i don’t know if i should stop because this question only asks for one or if i should keep listing them because honestly i deserve it. 

i’m really proud of the friendship fics i wrote, but probably most proud of the first one, dearly depressed and brokenhearted (i’d like to let you know that boys cry too). that was a bit of a breakthrough moment for me and adri’s review of it lives rent free in my brain. so many songfics i finally managed to get out of my brain and into words, i’m proud of all of those. omg godlight fic? the good grace of that godlight, the weird ass luke hemmings time travel thing?? that was such a strange writing undertaking, and it ended up exactly how i wanted it. basically every time i finally got words down for an idea i’d been having and they were exactly the right words to make the exact fic i wanted, i count those as the biggest victories. ahhh the jewish cake kitchen fic i wrote for meg’s birthday, it’s so simple, was another example of that, plus i LOVED getting to write more jewish cake, and i feel like i absolutely captured my love of kitchens in that fic. also i NEED to include cruel summer fic here because. to date still one of the best fics ive ever written.

wait i thought of one more jesus christ im so sorry can you tell i love my own writing?? no but seriously, taylor @squishmichael asked me for a fic based on therapy and so i wrote keeping this up could be dangerous and i really AM proud of that one, because when they asked me for that fic i thought to myself jesus christ how am i going to capture the feeling of the song therapy. and then i started writing and like. i think i actually captured it so well. and some of the metaphors in that fic are just...mmmmmmmmmm. 

7. Work I’m least proud of (and why): LMAO okay fine ill do this. but it’s not that i’m not proud of these just that i think if i wrote them now i would do a better job. the fic i wrote based on taxi, two punch-drunk souls all tangled in the wind, i would change a lot of that dialogue. i was really concerned with making it sound as close to what john the maine says in the song, but in retrospect that was a dumb thing to try and do, considering no one fuckin talks the way john the maine says people talk. also crazy is what i like, the one based on all my friends by tss, because...i don’t know it was just a very interesting choice of song to try and make a fic. like it has such a vivid story but i don’t think it was exactly the kind of story that should have been written by me. like i think for example anna could have probably done a more loyal job of it. and i don’t know. i sat on that fic for a while because i thought it was kind of strange. so yeah. i love both of those fics very much but yknow. asked and answered.

8. Share or describe a favorite review you received: the comment adri left me on dearly depressed and brokenhearted. i think about it all the fucking time. it drives me to write more friendship fics. genuinely. honestly this is an embarrassing thing to admit but i forget the majority of the comments i receive once i’ve replied to them. it’s nice to go through comments on my fics and reread them though, because i don’t remember getting them!! hmm team @4thbrighteststar has said several times on multiple fics of mine that she would sometimes read a scene that made her want to act it out, and that landed really well with me. that always makes me happy. also every time she’d comment PSYCHHH MAJORRRR on yssdf, because yes i am.

and taylor had a really cool response to the godlight fic which maybe i’m not allowed to exactly explain what it was, but it was awesome.

9. A time when writing was really, really hard: SPRING FIC EXCHANGE. YEEEEEEEEEEEEESH. so first of all i was juggling first schoolwork and then working at camp, and second of all, noah i say this with love but your fic preferences form thing was VERY contradictory and made it so hard to settle on a fic plot. or even to come up with one. essentially i was trying to write a fic that had all of the tropes of a fluffy fic, but make it angst. and also, i was not in a headspace for writing angst, cos you know how that kinda thing comes and goes, so it was twice as hard!!! and when i got to camp i’d be exhausted and working all day and then be done at like. eleven or midnight and then. have to somehow find time to write fic exchange fic. it was. difficult. i did finish it a week late and i am still sorry about that but honestly i’m surprised it was only a week. that somehow feels like a win to me considering what that fic put me through lmao

10. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you: oh hell i feel like this happens to me so often but for some reason now that you’ve asked i am blanking on every single instance. oh! well i wrote this fic, who knew we were lightning? (i saw a spark before we heard any sound), and it was supposed to be a jack-centric fic based on jack and his relationship with guitars throughout the years or whatever. but then out of absolutely nowhere it became a jalex fic, which i guess shouldn’t surprise me but did. i didn’t hate it but it did blindside me. also, godlight fic completely surprised me mostly because it was one of those times where i thought “hey, hypothetically this song would be such an interesting fic” and then thought “nah but i’ll never actually write that” and then i wrote it that same day. another time that happened was with i can’t focus when you’re with me (i can’t sleep when i’m alone), the one that happened as a result of me having the chorus of XO stuck in my head. AND last answer: give me the worst of you (worst of you songfic). fic about a very unhealthy relationship, featuring jack barakat the toxic boyfriend. very unexpected writing venture on my part. although i’m more surprised that i posted it, tbh, because it was supposed to just be an exercise to see if i could write something like that, and i didn’t plan to post it, and then now here we are.

11. A favorite excerpt of your writing: okay so realistically i would just paste all 88 fics i posted in 2021 here, but obviously im. not doing that. so i’m gonna go with a piece of and it feels like i’m losing you twice, the sex (with my ex) songfic, because i got distracted in the middle of answering these questions just to reread that fic and MAN it slaps. here:

If they’ve both misunderstood the assignment then maybe they got the wrong assignment. Maybe they were never supposed to be friends. Maybe Jack’s hand on Alex’s knee and Alex’s gaze caught on Jack’s mouth is a spark that lights fireworks rather than land mines. Something beautiful rather than something destructive.

If they’re gonna explode either way, they may as well make it art.

i’m just gonna say it: that land mine metaphor KICKED ASS. i don’t know when i got to be so good at metaphors i’m pretty sure it was a super intentional effort in this fic but it paid off.

12. How did you grow as a writer this year: oh man! well as previously mentioned i think i became a lot better at like...intentional metaphors and trying to vary the ones i make. also i learned the importance of a little bit of conflict in a plot and i did a lot of exploring different kinds of relationships between people, rather than just happy easy romance. that was really good for me to do. i think it helped me to write more realistic relationships than i had been. and maybe circling back to the plot thing but i sort of realized that there’s only so much you can do without conflict, cos then you just have a bunch of scenes, basically. and when there’s a driving thing in a story it means that the scenes are all leading up to something and that helps to guide the story and honestly makes writing easier a lot of the time. so those are some things!

13. How do you hope to grow next year: see #12! no actually i think i want to be better at showing and not telling. right now i’m kind of in the middle, i think i do a lot of showing AND telling, and i want to be able to trust my audience more. meghna is really good at this. i am still working on it. 

14. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc): @tirednotflirting and @reveriesofawriter sam and meghna were easily my main audience for the majority of my fics. i don’t foresee that changing. i love you guys. also of course megs @igarbagecannoteven who had to literally put up with my melodramatic bitching and complaining about every single tiny problem i had with anything i ever wrote. megs you are my favorite rubber duck. yknow i was thinking earlier about how much i agonized over the title for, what was it. oh!! the title for situation overload (do it for baltimore)!!! and then in the end all the agonizing was worth it because it caused me to land on what i think is actually a perfect title for it. so thank you for dealing with my insanity so that the rest of the world can reap the benefits i guess. everyone who ever listens to me talk about my writing in any capacity, whether gushing about how good i am at it (which i do often) or complaining about how hard and annoying it is (which i also do often) has positively influenced my writing experience.

15. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year: many things, no conceivable way i can list them all. speaking of situation overload (do it for baltimore), that fic has a lot of pieces of my relationship with megs in it, specifically involving me getting her into baseball as best i could. i think ive mentioned this before but this jalex prompt fic you need a pick-me-up? (i’ll be there in twenty-five) has jack in a situation that is directly taken from something that happened to me, and yes it was absolutely fucking terrifying then. i projected my homesickness onto cashton in this prompt fic i’m a little kid and so are you (don’t you go and grow up before i do), and also the thing about lauren’s gerbils from this lashton fic for jess, you should know i’ll be there for you, is based on what happened to my younger sister’s gerbils. luke’s insecurities about his friends liking his siblings better in maybe this is just as good as it gets is straight out of a younger bella’s headspace (fortunately not something i worry about anymore now that we, yknow, go to different schools and are super different people and both adults, but ya know). to name a few.

16. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers: i am going to be brief because i got asked for writing advice earlier this year and wrote an essay basically, but it boils down to this: like what you write. if you don’t like what you’re writing, write it differently! write something new! write something no one else will read, so you don’t feel like you have to cater to anyone else! but seriously, write something that you can enjoy, because if even you don’t like the art you’re creating, you can’t expect anyone else to. if you can’t stand in front of a council and say “you will enjoy reading this because [x]” (if you can’t even say “because i liked reading it”).......you’re losing your most reliable audience member. be proud of what you create! don’t compare your successes to the successes of other writers! everyone has different goals, writes at different rates, prioritizes differently, prefers different tropes and types of fics. actually yeah i feel strongly about this. don’t compare yourself to other writers. you are your own writer doing your own thing. ask for help, take inspiration, set goals for yourself that are valuable to you, but don’t compare. if you try to become a writer that already exists, no one wins. you know that cheesy but very true oscar wilde quote? if it is even him? be yourself, everyone else is already taken? yeah. write your own stories, everyone else is already writing theirs. or something. you know what i mean. it was funny when i said i was going to be brief here. okay getting off my soapbox now. thanks for having me on tedx.

17. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year: oh!! yes!!! many!!!!!! oh what a fun question!!!!! i am still working on summer camp au but i recently picked it back up and wrote an important section of it so i’m cautiously optimistic that i can finish that sometime soon-ish and then can start posting it which would be very nice because i already miss having a chapter fic to update, and i think people are going to really like it. also there is the [redacted] fic which is SO funny and which will be finished and posted soon and i literally cannot fucking wait, i have kept this silly crack pairing a secret for so long and the fic has some of my funniest most entertaining writing but i can’t SHARE any of it without SPOILING it so i’m really looking forward to putting that into the world at long last.

beyond that there’s a jalex 5+1 that i’m hoping to finish (it is currently about halfway done), and i’m planning to write the long awaited (by me) elevator fic at some point, once i...decide what i’m going to write for it. i’ve got one more installment of tshirt jalex in the works, involving middle school band teacher alex gaskarth, and i think that one is going to be really fun once i finish it. oh oh also! this one fic from a prompt fiancee sent me (do you have time to hold on with me), it’s a lashton fic but i wrote jalex into it for funsies and i made alex nonbinary and ever since then i have just been thinking about he/they alex gaskarth forever and ever. i want to write more of them so bad. so like. maybe we will see some nb alex content sooner or later, hopefully.

and i know paige and meghna want me to write ocallakarth and ill admit im letting it sit in the back of my mind but i make no promises considering the existence of the [redacted] fic and other various factors. but it could be a fun exercise.

18. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read. okay!! yes!! @tirednotflirting @reveriesofawriter @cringeycal @kaleidoscopeminds @igarbagecannoteven and also anyone else who sees this and wants to! if you read all the way to the bottom of this post then i feel like you deserve a tag so consider yourself tagged lmao. love you all, happy new year <3