#if y’all have been wondering I’ve been doing Bad™️

[theshadowrealmitself]

The Chosen One™️ being pushed to make their entire life about defeating one person while the person on the revenge trip is demonized for making their life all about defeating one person and they both end up with the same future as they accomplished their goal and don’t know what to do with themselves now

[sagesolsticewrites]

In My Arms

Sometimes your husband just needs to be held. (lots and lots of fluff)

Cowritten with @winniemaywebber! Also shoutout to Winnie for making yet another incredible playlist for this fic!

Warnings: mentions of cheating (but not really bc there was a war on come on y’all), definitely some historical inaccuracies in here, and plenty of tooth-rotting fluff with a touch of Emotions™️

Word count: 1k (short n sweet!)

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction based off the portrayal by the actors in the Apple TV+ series. I hold nothing but respect for the real life individuals referenced within.

Masterlist

In the months since Harry Crosby had returned home, your husband hadn’t been able to keep his hands off you.

He’d always been like that in your more… private moments, of course, but now it seemed to be seeping into your daily lives.

You’d be walking past him to the kitchen and he’d trail his fingers along your arm, inhaling the sweet scent of your perfume as it lingered in the air.

He’d wrap his arms around you, hugging you from behind as you were bustling around on a cleaning day.

He’d pepper kisses over every bit of skin he could reach every chance he got.

It wasn’t that you minded— on the contrary, you loved it. But you were curious as to where the behavior had come from.

“Honey?” You ask softly one rainy afternoon as Harry has you tucked under his arm, his fingers trailing over every inch of you he can reach.

“Hm?” He hums contentedly, “What is it, love bug?”

“I’ve noticed that… well, since you’ve been home..” You fumble over your words, trying to find the right thing to say, “You’ve been… touching me, a lot? More than you used to before you left, at least. Not that it’s a bad thing,” you scramble to add, “It’s wonderful, and I’ve missed it so, so much, but… is there a reason for it?”

Harry sighs deeply, seemingly collecting his thoughts before he answers.

“When I was… away…” he begins carefully, “there were lots of things the men used to distract themselves from the anxiety and… well, our day to day lives over there. Physical affection was one of them.” He glances at you nervously, ensuring you understand his meaning before he continues, “I did partake in that once or twice, when it got really bad, but truly aside from that, all of my thoughts and wants were directed towards you.”

“I know, honey, I understand,” you assure him, eyes soft, “There was a war on, you— you did what you had to do to keep yourself sane.”

He relaxes, a weight you hadn’t noticed he’d been carrying since he’d returned suddenly lifted off his shoulders.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” he breathes, brushing a kiss to your forehead before continuing.

“There wasn’t a lot of… softness, on the base. We took affection where we could find it on weekend passes, but if you didn’t do that, then it was just a bunch of claps on the back from your fellow airmen, maybe a dance or two with a WAC girl at the Officer’s Club, and not much else.”

You reach up to stroke through his soft curls as he speaks, and he unconsciously leans into your touch as he continues.

“So being home, being with you again…” he sighs, continuing softly “Having someone to touch me again… it’s almost like I have to make up for everything I missed out on. Everything that war made me miss.”

“Oh, my love,” you breathe, hyperaware of every inch of his skin touching yours.

It made sense. Surrounded by other men— soldiers, no less— of course they wouldn’t get the amount of physical affection they were used to, especially if they had wives or sweethearts, and to be stuck there for a year as your Bing had…

Harry lets out a soft sound of surprise as you move into his lap, wrapping your arms around him. You nuzzle into his neck, pressing every inch of your body against him as your fingertips return to raking through his hair.

He melts, his head nosing at the crook of your neck, eyes closed, even as he asks, “Darling?”

“Shhh,” you breathe, “Just let me hold you.”

You feel him sigh against your neck as his hands come up to squeeze you closer, even as he protests, “But didn’t we have things to do—”

“That can wait,” you assure him softly.

The only sound for several long moments is the soft sighs of your heavy breathing, until you speak up again.

“When you got back,” you whisper, “I was so, so happy. So ready for things to go back to normal, to be us again, that I skipped the part where I just let it sink in that you were home, and here.” You lift your head to press a kiss to his temple, “And I’m sorry, my love. I promise I’ll do better.”

You feel your husband shake his head against you, lifting his face to meet your gaze as his hand comes up to cup your face, thumb gently stroking along your cheek.

“You didn’t do anything wrong, sweet girl,” he murmurs, ��I’ve got all the time in the world to hold you, now.”

He pulls you in for a sweet kiss as the two of you melt into each other, a soft bubble of sunlight amidst a dark and gloomy day.

You keep holding him for what feels like an eternity. You start to hear him whimper into you, his whole body tense and shaking. You feel wetness from his eyes drop on to your shoulder and you pull away, concern all over your face. 

“My love,” you say, your voice slightly strained. “What is it? What's wrong?”

“Oh, darling,” he sniffs, wiping the tears as quickly as they come, obviously embarrassed at showing this emotion. “I'm just–just so happy to be home with you.” You reach a hand out to touch his face, your eyes also filling with the same emotion. You swipe your thumb under his darling puppy eyes, your heart beginning to swell. 

“I'm so–” You struggle to formulate the words, your throat closing around all the swallowed emotion. “I'm so happy to have you home, too. I don't want us to ever be apart again, honey.”

“We won't be,” he replies, holding you close and kissing your temple, clinging to one another until your tears are spent. 

“I love you, Bing,” you breathe into his ear, fingers toying with the soft curls at the nape of his neck.

“I love you too, darling,” is his soft response, mumbled against your neck as he squeezes you tighter, and you know that you won’t let each other go again for a long while.

[dulcewrites]

Yeah…..

I didn’t want to make this a thing™️ bc I feel like it can come off ungrateful and bitchy, which I never want. I love talking with you guys on things outside of my writing too. Characterizations, hotd/f&b, modern au etc. and just life in general. I feel very fortunate to have people in my inbox bc interactions/support can feel few and far especially for content makers on here

But there are times where I almost feel like people are like ??? Idk the word for it other than goad me into things even after I’ve made my opinions (imo) quite clear. Just certain questions that clearly want me to say something negative.

I don’t want to view it as malicious. I do think the questions/comments are being made in earnest. But if I give my opinion on something, then someone comes back with an ‘well actually - 🤓’ ask… it just makes me wonder what the point of giving my first opinion was. Bc I’ve made my opinion clear and it’s not gonna change. If it does, I will go back and edit said ask.

Does this make sense? I feel like I’m being whiny but I’ve been in a weird mood lately. Part of the reason is some of the asks that i have gotten over past couple of weeks. I try to answer things as honestly and kindly as possible. But sometimes I get asks and I’m just like ‘you’ve clearly made up your mind already that you don’t like this character or want them to have bad traits, so what is the point of this’

In particular, I’ve gotten these types of asks (that I have deleted) about Aemond (a lot of these) and alicent. Idk if it is the writing I have put out, though I like to think I’ve been pretty fair about a complex characters like Aemond and Alicent. I’ve made it clear that Aemond and Alicent are characters I like, my favs on the show so far, so the asks alluding to how horrible they are/could be is little odd to me. Bc I’m sure there are a plethora of places to shit on both characters if that is the prerogative (that goes for all team green characters… people who enjoy team green are kind of the minority lol)

I know there are hotd blogs out there that enjoy breaking down the show/f&b and characters at nausea, and that’s great for them. Same for the blogs that are filled with ‘theories’ made from Reddit. That’s not necessarily what my blog is. I appreciate y’all care about my opinions but I’m also of the belief not every person needs to give their opinions on everything.

My writing blog is something I consider cathartic and fun. I don’t want to get worked up talking about a theory/‘leak’ that hasn’t been confirmed by anyone other than people who apparently hate hotd… but still keep talking about it??? To the point of checking out what is happening on set??? I also don’t want to constantly being talking about people who enjoys ships I don’t care for (daemyra or helaemond or whatever else). Or constantly shitting on characters I do like.

It’s like I get it you think Aemond would be a horrible father, why does that have to do with me 😭. You think he’d be a terrible partner I GET IT!

If I write a character a certain way, I’d like to discuss that (positive or negative - show or book) or even just what happens in the show. I feel like interpretations for characters can be different for everyone and that’s the interesting part. But regurgitating answers isn’t really my cup of tea. I feel like people in the asoiaf fandom, but now more so in the hotd one, have gotten so use to arguing people down over stuff that it has sucked some of fun out of analysis. Idk it just feels like there can be bad faith questions/scenarios being bandied about

I just want to write my stuff, chat with you guys in a fun and open way, and make the occasional post about things on the show.

Ngl some of the asks y’all send me about hotd or even f&b just have me staring at my screen like ‘…. What am I supposed to say’ lmao

[iampikachuhearmeroar]

to the younger people on this Webbed Site (affectionate)™️, please don’t feel bad blocking people or feel bad when you lose a follower on sites like tumblr/tiktok/insta etc.

as someone whose basically grown up on social media (i’ve been on it since the the dying days of myspace in 2007/2008 and the switch to facebook being the dominant social media site in 2009/2010); i know the feeling of hating yourself or beating yourself up when people delete you or unfollow you. for example when i was in my early days on tumblr from 2011 to 2014…. when i lost a follower, i would beat myself up and wonder why the hell someone would unfollow me. what was i doing wrong??? what was the last stick to make them unfollow me??? please don’t hate me and i’ve got to rebuild the 10+ followers i’ve just lost. how long will it take???

back on facebook in my final years of high school in 2012 and 2013, i was setting multiple statuses a day, all in an “experiment” to see if i could get 50 likes in a day over several statuses; since i could never get 20-50 likes on statuses at once, like all the so called “popular kids” at school did all the time. hell i remember one of the popular girls from the catholic school i went to posting bikini pics back then and getting literally like 400+ likes and i was SUPER bitter.

i also heavily beat myself up when people deleted me. i got angry, so i would stalk and stalk and stalk and stay up until 4 am wondering why the fuck people were purging me out their friends list like wildfire….. when like…. literally 90% of my statuses over my last two years of high school were me giving off Major Depression Vibes™️….. which i now realise in my late 20s that it wasn’t healthy posting a bunch of “im such a failure and everyone knows it” and other statuses like that, super frequently. by deleting me, people were preserving their mental health. and you know what??? good for them. because, after all, your newsfeed is not your therapist (or your diary), and nor are your friends.

and yes i know that i was Edgy Girl As Hell On Main™️ back then, and using that as my excuse to post those posts and to avoid therapy (although the main reason i’m not in therapy right now is obvs the cost and every therapist around in my area closing their books bc of the pandemic etc). bc hell, now in my late 20s, and over the last few years, i have actually started deleting some of these said statuses. and especially when i was feeling low. because i realised reading them back years later in facebook memories just made my anxiety/depression exponentially worse than it needed to be. actively culling your own Edgy Emo Tumblr Sad Girl Posts™️ from years ago makes you healthier as well.

but y’all. there has to come a time when you stop fretting about whose deleted/unfollowed you and why. and there also comes a time when you have purge your own friends/follow list anyway, when you realise that there’s some people you cannot stand to have in your newsfeed. one particular case in point, for me, is my old friend from public school in 2012 & 2013, let’s call her taya (not her real name). taya was (can't say is really when i barely ever talk to her now) the type of friend who constantly belittles your problems and makes her problems seem super more pressing than yours- basically she pits her suffering etc in competition with yours. she makes out that her mental health is far more important than yours and posted about it all the time. she straight up laughs at your shit and tells you yours doesn’t matter. 99% of her statuses at the time were about her being the “black sheep” of her family etc etc etc. hell, she even laugh reacted to a status that you intended to be important and urgent (it when i was in hospital in 2020 and maybe i shouldn’t’ve posted this. but still.) while anyone and everyone else who reacted to the status reacted with the sad react/the care react/heart react, or just liked it. anyway. you know this type of friend.

there comes a time when YOU can’t (and quite frankly shouldn’t) tolerate this anymore, no matter how close you are or close they/you think you are with them. i ended up deleting taya for a few years, a while ago now, because her statuses and shared posts were actively making my mental health worse. and it always seemed when i was feeling at my worst, she would post stupid shit on my timeline like “we all have that friend who acts like their (when it should be they’re) dead” or some other rude/snarky internet shit and be all like “haha get up you sack of shit 🙄😂” as the caption…. as if i wasn’t already telling myself that on the daily at the time. whereas 90% of her profile was all those stupid “only real people who REALLY CARE about mental health will share this status! be the BRAVE 10 who care!!!” or whatever the fuck else posts. and depressing shit about being a “lone wolf” and “being a strong scorpio woman who’ll never find love bc no one can handle my insanity and constant empathy for everyone” and “being a brutally honest bitch is tough when it doesn’t win you friends. but at least my true friends stick with me!” etc etc. just overall toxic friend stuff.

and y’know what??? when i deleted her, i guilted myself. good god i guilted myself. “why would i do something so mean by deleting taya when i’ve known her for so long???” and “it shows just how disloyal i am as a friend by deleting her” i asked and told myself on a loop until i literally THREW UP out of guilt for deleting her. but girl. sometimes a bitch needs to really protect her mental health from people like taya over here who thinks she’s the centre of the universe and EVERYONE must care about HER PROBLEMS AND TRAUMA ONLY 24/7/365 bc apparently they’re the most urgent things in the world bc “why can’t you understand my empath mind???”. like yes taya, i care, to a point. but i am NOT your licensed motherfucking therapist. for fucks sake. and no taya. you are NOT an empath when you can’t read a room for goddamn fucking shit and can’t understand why people are constantly tired and worn down around you.

and girl (back to myself), you are NOT being selfish or disloyal by deleting and/or blocking this energy sucking friend. and no, if you paint yourself/other people paint you as a “nice person”, blocking these types of people from your feeds etc isn’t you being mean to THEM. it’s YOU being actively nice to Y O U R S E L F, which is a hard and almost alien thing to learn when you always put everyone else’s needs and perceptions of you before yours. (and trust me, it’s something i’ve just realised RIGHT NOW while coming back to constantly re-edit this post lmao 😂).

like yes don’t get me wrong. i did listen to taya’s rants and stuff, as a friend does. but my god. the way she ALWAYS belittled my shit and laughed in my face (or it felt like laughing in my face on fb messenger) at the lowest points of my mental health was fucking awful. her depression posts made it even worse. but my fucking god. i could only take so much. i had to delete her. she did eventually find me and add me again after a couple of years. when this happened, i immediately got rid of her from my feed. i just clicked “don’t show me taya’s posts” and that stopped her constant stream of negative posts on my feed. however, it didn’t stop some of her dumbass comments like “hahaha as IF you’d get weight loss ads on your feed when YOU aren’t fat like ME!” on my posts; which i learnt to ignore or vaguely respond to before her comments got out of hand. like taya everyone gets weight loss ads apparently; bc fb ad filters don’t discriminate when you don’t tell them to.

tbh most of her insensitive behaviour shit towards me was from her instant labelling of me as the “funny friend” and the “doesn’t take shit from anyone friend”. which then meant to her that i could never be sad or never feel anything negative and could always take whatever bullshit people chucked at me….. and especially when someone says something hurtful etc bc it’s apparently all meant to slide off me like…. - i can’t think of a good metaphor- but you know what i mean. it also meant to her that i was NEVER being serious about anything EVER bc funny people don’t have the capacity to be serious, ever. apparently.

but anyway. there comes a point when you have to care about yourself more than keeping people on your friend/followers list out of obligation because you’ve known them for so long. if you can’t tolerate what they post or can’t have a civilised convo with them about what they post (mostly bc i never bothered with this girl bc i knew she’d NEVER listen to me bc haha funny friend can’t be sad or angry or argumentative!!!! say something funny. for thee is mine own personal fool)… just delete them. or if you feel like you can’t delete them, just take them out of your feed so that you can no longer see their triggering posts. same with sites like twitter with following.

and this goes for other toxic people in your life too. because my high school stalker/creeper tried to re-add me again a while ago now…… and i instantly blocked him; bc i’d seen from going through his profile that he hadn’t changed at all…. and that i knew he’d start harassing me to fuck him (he’s a massive incel type guy) etc like he always does. i knew after all my time in hospital and stuff over the last couple of years, that i have NO TIME AND ENERGY to deal with his manipulative bullshit anymore (and i never really did in the first place anyway tbh). so before he could even start a convo with me, i just straight up blocked him. i’m never letting him in again to hijack my mental health and my self-esteem.

and even though, yes when you get older, it’s still fun to try to sniff out the person who has deleted you all of a sudden (bc tbh here, i still do this for funsies)… in reality, you know deep down that you’ve lost connection with them. or let’s be real, you never liked them in the first place in school or wherever else you met them (could be work etc)…. that yeah. you were just waiting for them to delete/unfollow you anyway and you don’t care that they finally have.

and the weird social obligation where you feel like you have to keep this person on social media because you’ve known them for X amount of years is fucked up and dumb. because if amanda or victor is constantly belittling you or constantly posting upsetting shit and they do nothing about fixing their feed after you’ve told them that it bothers you (if you’ve done this), maybe it’s time to just straight up delete/block them anyway so you can hopefully no longer see or engage with the upsetting stuff that they keep posting. and i’m obvs deflecting the fact that i actually did engage with posts that made my mental health worse (hello 2011-2015 tumblr era black & white depression blogs) on here back in the day, but i no longer do that.

moreover, follower counts and friend counts mean fuck all. they’re arbitrary. and the fact that social media makes you feel like an asshole for deleting/unfollowing/blocking people from your feed/dash etc….. it’s ultimately important if their posts are fucking with your mental health and/or you can’t have decent convos with this person about anything because they make it wholly about themselves; or have labelled you as a certain friend role which means you can never X, when they can….. it’s better to dump them out with the trash where they belong by deleting/blocking them. these stupid as fuck numbers have nothing to fucking do with loyalty and other traits for irl friends. the idea of loyalty in a follower only matters when it becomes your career. because without “loyal fans/followers”, you don’t make a mark (or y’know you don’t get brand deals/sponsors etc).

and also overall, this post is a big fuck you for growing up on social media. it really does especially hurt people with high anxiety etc. it’s utterly exhausting and it’s exactly why i haven’t made the supposedly necessary 1000+ different social media accounts: from insta to tiktok to twitter to whatever the fuck the next one is going to be. i just have no energy to invest in having to spread myself thin over several SM accounts to see the following stats and the for you page on TT for example, feeding me videos that could inevitably make me feel worse. i actually actively have to cull the videos on my facebook watch feed, which i talk about every so often.

i did all this shit 10+ years ago, beating up myself over losing followers when i was only at like 500 or something and it also hurt when i was in my obsessive tumblr cleaning out phase, at just how many of my old followers, and sometimes mutuals, On This Here Hellsite (affectionate)™️ had deactivated over the years. it really shooketh me to my core, if the kids are still saying that. i don’t want to do that on other social media platforms, though.

and as i’ve stated in the past on here, it’s also exactly one of the reasons why i dropped out of the comms and media studies (triple major in marketing comms/PR/advertising) degree that i originally started undergrad uni with in 2015. i had no energy to expend to “professional” social media account follower counts- which we were being marked on as part of the course. i had no desire for engagement and the study of social media engagement in a professional space like i thought i did from using tumblr, at that point in time, for 4 years. but systematically and critically studying it seemed like a nightmare because why should i give a shit that people on my course aren’t engaging with my tweets and wordpress posts??? (like i know why but still).

BUT ANYWAY. this post went in so many different directions…. and i hope that if i have any younger followers, that they know that the younger millennials/older gen z (idek what the fuck i am) know the struggle of growing up online and that blocking/deleting etc people on the internet is good. and also that losing followers/friends etc is okay esp when you get older. unless of course you made this shit your career…. on this front, i have no idea how to help you on that tbh