#imagine learning how to be normal about bi people. what a concept

[astromechs]

see, by the logic of these internet fools, i magically become straight every time i match with a guy on a dating app, isn't it funny how magic works, silly me that i didn't realize that

[talenlee]

What Disgusts Jod?

Hey, you know, in the Locked Tomb, is Jod an ally?

SPOILER WARNING: If you’ve read the books you know this question is deliberately stupid and if you don’t see that sentence and know why it’s funny I asked it, you probably will learn something about the books you didn’t already know. I figure if you’re say, halfway through Harrow the Ninth, you may want to hold off on this question.

CONTENT WARNING: We’re talking about queerness in the universe of the Locked Tomb, which means talking about some of the genocide stuff there.

Okay, so straight up, Jod has sex with two people in the series who have different genders to one another. At the same time. Like, dude makes out with a dude and a girl and then a threesome ensues and it’s just part of the story, because this is a normal book series. Asking if he’s queer is a non-starter, he absolutely is. That’s a given fact.

The thing is, there are plenty of people who aren’t allies. Ally is a term we throw around a lot these days like it’s a category of Near Queer But Not Actually, which I guess it needs because there needed to be a term for people who didn’t want to put on some colours while still flying the flag. You know, a straight person who wants to make it clear they’re not an asshole so they dedicate themselves to the task of Being An Ally or declaring themselves an Ally. It’s a complicated term to relate to because in my opinion, Allyship is not about things you know and do but a position you’re willing to take. ‘Cos like, if you’re an Ally, if you’re in the alliance, then you need to be part of that alliance, and that allliance?

There are a lot of gay guys who aren’t allies. There are a lot of bi guys who aren’t allies, ‘cos allyship is about more than being included in the list of acronyms. Famously, there have been a lot of guys in positions of power in the history of the world who have in fact worked against the alliance because they prefer the power and hate their peer group. Check out Roy Cohn’s story sometime.

The origin point for all this was that I got thinking about models of morality that care about matters of principle versus matters of disgust. Most people make moral judgments off disgust, not because they’re bad people but because it’s a powerful default and our society does a lot to code things it considers unethical as disgusting, and things that aren’t disgusting as not unethical. Employers stealing money from their workers is just a mistake or a misfiling or an oopsie, but workers stealing from their employees are slimy or sneaky or greasy or dirty. They’re probably going to use it to make drug pregnancies or something. From there I thought about the things in the universe of The Locked Tomb that might reflect on what we could deduce that Jod thinks of as disgusting, and it turns out it’s a short list. Jod thinks defying Jod is disgusting and everything else is… y’know, tolerable. We’ll get around to it.

I think it’s interesting to consider then the morality of this necromantic universe is a man shaped by our society, given freedom to operate how he wants, and yet still a creature shaped by his experiences in our world. I think it’s very reasonable to imagine that, originally, Jod wasn’t particularly queer, and that his queerness transpired over time as he faced down an eternal reality stretching out in front of him.

It’s a kind of question about what you think human minds do when confronted with infinity. It’s not uncommon for religious perspectives I’m familiar with to think that there’s a sort of perfected, absolute mind in the core of how your mind functions, and that version of who you are is kind of fundamentally capable of existing timelessly. That’s a vision of the mind that also sees it as disconnected from the material considerations of the meat that makes up our bodies: the idea that in heaven, for example, people aren’t autistic or disabled any more, which is one of those ideas that betrays a concept at the heart of faith where there are certain people and ways people exist that are wrong, and disordered, and need to be cleaned up.

In some cases, this is a thing that works out okay because, y’know, I don’t imagine people who lose legs wouldn’t like to have a leg back, but the idea of a perfectly ordered person that we’re all paperjam prints of is both very Modern Christian, and also, kinda deeply messed up. It’s something that The Locked Tomb even interrogates, with the conception of the soul (a thing that carries a sort of fundamental you-ness that doesn’t even necessarily care about your body), and yet the way that the soul is influenced by the the physical and material elements of the brain (such as the distortions in Harrow’s brain that speak to her schizophrenia, which is connected to the body and not necessarily the soul). I’ve talked about this before, in the way that The Locked Tomb considers dualism. It’s this idea of the soul as a non-bodied version of the person that comes to bear in the conception of how Jod handles being eternal.

How much of Jod is the way he was brought up?

Jod is ten thousand years old, he is ancient beyond human conception, but he is still recognisably and familiarly Just A Dude. Jod is a dude who is endowed by nature with immense importance but by social expectation the role of Guy Who Sucks. By watching Jod in the story, especially how he tries to explain himself and justify the way he did, you know, genocides, it’s clear that there is an attempt to at least project a vision of being An Actual Person, that the eternity of him was still marked in places that may result in being, oh, say, pretty reasonably a 40 year old in the 2020s who maybe at some point was really heavily into Homestuck.

If we assume Jod’s a person and Jod’s able to maintain some sense of continuity of being a person like we’re familiar with them over that lengthy a period of time, then, if there’s an eternity to him, then it’s reasonable to expect that whatever we see of Jod’s sexuality, it’s something that he was always at least a little bit built on there, built on what he was and always thought. Not saying he was always all over the place like that, indeed the only vision we get of his prior life is a bit low on the hot sexy times. Then again, counterpoint, most people who run sex cults don’t describe them as sex cults, because they want to play down the sex cult angle.

Does Jod feel shame like that?

The world Jod runs is pretty creepy and horrifying. It has, functionally, feudalism and lorded monarchy. It’s a place where a replication of the Catholic church stands by to safeguard a monument to his sins, where the greatest force in the universe is all turned on the task of killing the descendents of people he’s mad at, and in the context of the society he shapes and rules, the idea that the Blood of Eden don’t deserve genocide because they’re descended from people, some of whom definitely deserved some murders. The moral framework of Jod’s world is a great example of a fascist state, or what Plato considered as an ideal society overseen by a philosopher-king. The whole of power is filtered up to one person, who considers their job to be the task of being the ruler, and therefore, the whole of the society’s best behaviour is a reflection of that Philosopher King.

And of course, as with anyone else who contemplates this model outside of Plato’s ideal of hey, just always get a good Philosopher king, the whole of The Locked Tomb is about what if you get an eternal Philosopher King who’s a guy who sucks?

This is a world built out of this man’s disgusts. Its hatred of beaurocracy, its distrust of failsafes, its demand of rituals – you know, if people would just do things the way they’re supposed to be done and all of it through an impenetrable fog of what satisfies his emotional perspective. And he wants to fuck people of all sorts of genders, so the world shaped by his wants, his personal reactions to right and wrong, and what power permits him to do and demand. He is allowed to do the things he can do because he has the power to do it and in his society, that attitude of power flows downhill. It’s fascism, even though he’s queer.

Which, you know, this all works out like oh, hey, diversity win, this tyrannical Catholic abomination against all life is a pansexual man of colour! We love, as it were, to see it.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

[catharsis-in-a-bottle]

A very long post about romantic attraction, social situations, sexual orientation, etc.

In short, a slightly organized brain dump involving some of my personal experiences and hopefully some takeaways. 

There are many things I’ve learned, both in general and about myself, simply by investigating online resources about the acespec and arospec communities.

Some of these were things that I think I already knew internally, but that I had never voiced before because I didn’t have the words or the terms to describe them. 

I’ve learned about different types of attraction, and I’ve realized that I can categorize them internally. For example, I’ve definitely mistaken platonic attraction with romantic attraction in the past. The term ‘squish’ - basically a sort of friend crush - can be applied to several of my experiences, and honestly, it really explains my conscious disconnect towards romance. I’ve realized that wanting to get to know someone better does not equate wanting to date them.

I’ve learned about other arospec identities, like greyromantic and demiromantic, and how they might apply to me. I’ve realized that my romantic attraction has essentially been limited to one person, and that otherwise my desires have been platonic - again, wanting to get to know someone better because I find them interesting, or else having a deep admiration/respect for them. None of these things are romantic attraction, and it’s been very relieving to discover this. It makes sense. 

I think I’ve always had a weird feeling towards all the societal cues and expectations associated with romance. Why are certain things associated with wanting to form a romantic relationship? As a child, I thought I was a girl and I knew, just from the social code of school life, that becoming friends with boys would be seen as some romantic advance (despite the fact that we were all literally elementary schoolers.) In first grade, everyone thought I had a crush on this kid I was friends with, and I always laughed at them. I was just looking for friends. Friends isn’t a freaking gender-specific term. I think I’ve always kind of tried to “play it cool” with the boys, especially in middle school, simply because I didn’t really want anyone to think “haha, so-and-so is dating so-and-so” just because I had a conversation with another person. And what sucked is that when I thought I might be bi, I kind of consciously did the same thing around girls as well - I tried to be socially adept and “cool” and not too overly open, just because of all of these social codes that indicate romantic intent. 

One of these strange codes that confused me was this: “if so-and-so has a crush on you, you should totally date them!” What if I didn’t like so-and-so back? Why the hell would I date them? But something that I witnessed happening quite often in middle school was kids finding out someone ‘liked’ them and then wanting to ‘like’ that person back, despite not having formed attraction in the first place. It felt like a puzzle. It was something that I observed and maybe sort of over-analyzed, because dissecting social situations and laying out pieces of the puzzles on the floor is something I just do. I reckon that kids were not only beginning to experience romantic/sexual attraction individually, but that they were also recognizing the social standards that were beginning to form. The first batch of kids wanted to form relationships (if not long-lasting ones), and so they did; other kids who were experiencing attraction subsequently felt a little bit of pressure to get with someone fast. The complaints of “I’m so sad I don’t have a boyfriend” and similar phrases rang free throughout the hallways. In short, allo- and heteronormativity seems to have influenced a lot of people. Which is fine for many, but also restricting for those in the lgbtq+ community (but of course, the jungle of school life does not intend to cater to the minorities) It was simply a thing that happened, and a thing I’m seeing a bit more clearly now. 

[Also, the concept of using the word ‘like’ to describe adolescent romantic interest in another person always confused me. I never got why ‘like’ had romantic intent - I liked people that I’d formed friendships with. No one ever outright said “I have a crush on this person.” They just said like.]

There’s only one occasion on which I’ve known how to react emotionally to someone telling me that he had romantic interest in me, and that’s only because I personally ‘liked’ them back. I had already imagined that situation, and I welcomed it. [Amusingly enough, we both kind of ignored our confessions for a while, but eventually we formed an actual relationship. Ah, the joys of social situations.] But in terms of other people admitting their interest, which hasn’t happened all that much but has still happened, I’ve had very mixed reactions. One time a couple of years ago, it was my friend whom I cared very deeply about. I didn’t really know how she knew that I didn’t have interest in dating her, but somehow she did, and she told me so. This made my reaction less clouded and more simple, and it wasn’t really an uncomfortable situation; I confirmed easily enough that I didn’t have any interest in dating her and the situation resolved nicely. Basically, although it wasn’t an ideal occurrence, it didn’t affect our friendship in any way.

But there have been other times where it’s been extremely uncomfortable. Once, I joined an after-school club in which I barely knew anyone. During one of our meetings, we took a walk to a local coffee shop to just sort of hang out. And this girl - I’ll call her ‘C’ for online purposes - sat down and started talking to me. This was fine - why not have a bit of conversation? She talked about K-pop a lot (which eventually got very annoying lol) and just seemed like she wanted to be my friend, and internally I told myself well, I don’t really know her and she doesn’t seem like the kind of person I want to hang out with but we’re at a coffee shop and I’m bored. At the end of our coffee shop trip, C asked for my phone number. I didn’t take this to mean anything beyond the fact that she wanted to talk to me more, and though I felt inclined to decline her offer, I really didn’t want to hurt her feelings (again, the joys of social situations.) So now she had my phone number. Here’s where things got weird. For one thing, she sent me a bunch of random pictures of K-pop singers, saying things such as “omg he’s so hot” which was already uncomfortable in itself. Me, being a bit of an idiot, didn’t stand up for myself, or even block her number. Then, she came out to me as pansexual and told me she had a crush on me. When she told me this, she did not imply in any way that she didn’t have an intent of dating me or something, so I was very, very uncomfortable for several reasons. Firstly, I didn’t know her that well - I didn’t really even consider her a friend. Secondly, I definitely did not want to date her because I didn’t really know her. And thirdly, I didn’t know how to react. I think I said something along the lines of “Oh, well, um, okay, I don’t have a crush on you” and left it at that. For the final puncher, she started finding me in the hallways after school as she left for the bus and giving me hugs. I am typically not a physically affectionate person, so this was just weird as hell for me. Again, like an idiot, I didn’t stand up for myself, and so I just kind of stood there... all of this took place right before my school shut down because of the pandemic, so I was literally saved by everyone getting kicked out of school. Thankfully, I did not see her anymore, and finally I blocked her number as I should have done much, much earlier. [I didn’t intend to make that story so long, but there it is anyway.]

The point is, I found it extremely strange that someone I barely knew had a crush on me. This feeling was amplified when, a couple months ago, something else happened: someone on Instagram, who I didn’t know at all, expressed interest in dating me. I was extremely confused. Apparently they sort of knew me because we were in the same school system, but I’d still never met them.

I simply mean to say that romantic attraction drives people to lengths that I personally find strange and inconceivable. Looking into the aromantic community has taught me that essentially all of what we deem ‘romance’ is socially constructed. The rules, the implications, the things you’re supposed to do. You’re supposed to flirt with the person you ‘like’. You’re supposed to get all nervous around them. You’re supposed to only form a relationship with one person or else you’re considered weird and even perverted. Flirting seems like a ritual, nervousness seems like a prison - why can we not do away with the expectations and simply do what feels comfortable to us individually? I have learned about the term relationship anarchy, which means doing away with and rebelling against all of these expectations. The expectation of monogamy, of ritualistic performances, of a certain type of romance, of what actions are deemed romantic or sexual, of having to have a romantic and/or sexual relationship, etc. I find that relationship anarchy is a very appealing concept. People should have whatever relationships or lack thereof that they wish. Queerplatonic relationships should be normalized. Loveless aromanticism should be understood and not demonized. Polyamorous people should not be alienated. In short, these societal expectations that we’ve established have no purpose beyond defining what a “real relationship” is, and by ensuring that romantically loving one other person is what “makes us human” and deems us “normal” in society. Platonic and familial love should not be put below romantic love, yet we’ve created a hierarchy. Me platonically loving my true friends should not be “less than” me romantically loving my boyfriend. And people who just don’t want any sort of relationships or attachments to other people should be respected, because they are not negatively affecting anyone in any way. Except by hurting the feelings of bigots, and I’d pay anyone to do that any day if I had the money. 

Though I love my friends and my boyfriend in different ways, I realize that I have extremely similar criteria for a friend versus a partner. Beyond my general confusion regarding romance as a concept, this is another thing that has led me to believe I am arospec. It’s always been very difficult for me to imagine romantically loving someone who I couldn’t consider a friend - how, then, would my relationship even work? One thing about society’s ideas of romance that I do resonate with is the fact that your partner should be your best friend. [For me personally. I’m not just making a general claim.]  It’s hard to see myself dating someone who I hadn’t known before, who I hadn’t befriended, who I hadn’t considered a best friend because we knew each other and had come to form an actual bond. I would be happy spending my life with someone who I considered both a best friend and a romantic partner. I don’t think this is something that is of absolute necessity to me - I could see myself without a romantic partner, which is another major reason I’m beginning to consider myself arospec [maybe greyromantic or demiromantic.] And of course, I have conflated romantic and platonic attraction in the past; upon reflection, I think I’ve only experienced genuine romantic attraction once, which of course also prompts me towards arospec. 

Many resources - tumblr accounts dedicated to aspec experiences and questions, online stories, even just bare definitions of terms I didn’t know - have been extremely helpful in not only my understanding of myself, but also of the variety of experiences that lie with others. There is a beautiful array of diversity out there in the ways people think and feel, and it feels as if I have discovered a gold mine. [Hehe - do we place value on gold in the same way we place value on romance?] Simply learning about the multitudes of people out there with so many different experiences has been wonderful.

Upon reflection, I’ve also begun to wonder if I am acespec. Society is at it again - placing inherent value in certain concepts, associating expectations between categories. Specifically, the categories of romance and sexual attraction. In most movies with romantic subplots - which is a shit ton - sex seems to always be attached to the development of a romantic relationship. Here’s the thing - most people don’t think about the Split Attraction Model (SAM), which separates romantic and sexual attraction. It’s either you’re attracted to someone, or you aren’t. But for those who do use the SAM for whatever reason, romantic and sexual attraction are separate terms [though they can of course be intertwined.] I find it strange that romance sort of necessarily leads to sex - why? You don’t need sex to have a healthy relationship - but of course, many people want it and so it happens. And because sexual attraction is often tied to peoples’ romantic partners, sex is just associated with romance. [And also apparently sexual attraction can happen towards random people, which I didn’t know lmao.] The SAM is useful for many [not necessarily all] aspecs, as it creates this differentiation between wanting to date someone and wanting to, well, do the do with them. Through investigating common terms used by aspec people, I also find the terms aesthetic and sensual attraction useful, because I believe I have conflated aesthetic and sensual attraction with sexual attraction. [Also, in the past, for some reason I didn’t really know that sexual orientation referred to people that you literally wanted to have sex with. I thought it was just the people that you ‘liked’.] These specific terms have been quite useful to me personally, as I’ve realized that I really can tell the difference between the types of attraction that I experience. The issue is, I’m just not sure about my sexual attraction - have I actually experienced it, and if so, in what ways? It does get frustrating to question so much, but it’s an interesting exploration all the same. 

Am I actually acespec? Maybe not. But even if I’m not, I’ve still learned a lot about acespec people, and again it’s wonderful to read about how many different experiences exist in this world. Looking back on my past has been interesting. Thinking about my present and my future is intriguing. Wondering what I am and where I’ll go is a mixed bag of emotions, but it’s here and I’m stuck with it. I think I’m probably arospec, and that discovery is honestly relieving. It feels like a weight lifted. It clicks into place. I’m just going to keep living and figuring out what the hell my sexual orientation is, and I’ll vibe with it, I guess. The general, whole, main point is: learning about these communities is an enlightening experience, and it has perhaps reshaped part of my view of society. And also, I write too much. 

If you read this whole thing, I commend you for making it through my massive overshare. I hope you gained something from it, whether that be entertainment or knowledge or simple resonance with an idea. 

[homespork-review]

HOMESPORK ACT 5 ACT 1: Mobius Double Plusungood, Part 3

TW: """funny""" sexual and physical assault of a child by another child, extreme bullying, extreme ableism, a very brief discussion of shipping characters outside their canon sexuality.

CHEL: We get some implications of the part of troll culture we ended on last time when a slightly baffled-looking Nepeta, watching through the viewport, updates her SHIPPING WALL. Instead of hearts, some of the hypothetical pairings she’s painted are marked with diamonds. What this means will be explained shortly.

I can’t help but feel it’s slightly creepy to hypothetically matchmake your own friends, but I’m pretty sure the other trolls know at least that the shipping wall exists if not exactly which ships they’re in, and they do live in a society in which it’s stated later that mating is mandatory, so it would indeed be helpful to have at least emergency-doable matchmaking done well in advance and they might appreciate the help.

I’d like to take a moment to note a ship at the bottom row, left of centre; GA/Tavros. Hussie, on his Formspring, later said that GA was “obviously” a lesbian, or anyway was only interested in women, which doesn’t have a specific term for it in troll culture. It’s actually hard to tell going by what’s shown in canon, because she only displays specific interest in girls except for in a complicated case we’ll discuss later, but trolls are supposed to be bi-normative, plus it’s not like the male selection here is particularly inspiring, so, yeah, the evidence we actually see isn't conclusively "obvious". The fandom, knowing this, systematically harass anyone who even muses vaguely about the possibility of shipping her with a boy, even if they don't know about that Word of God. This is why I’m wondering whether the trolls knew about the shipping wall, because if they did, we can presume GA didn’t care. For the record, I’m sex-repulsed ace and have in fact written about.my own imaginary persona fucking (admittedly fucking an opposite sex clone of herself, it was a complicated injoke) and my reaction to someone else writing it would depend on context and reason, so I can imagine her reacting similarly, but not everyone would. A similar thing with a canonically gay male character explicitly on-screen not caring about hypothetical shipping of himself with girls comes up much later; he’s not a troll, but his upbringing was troll-influenced (long story).

BRIGHT: Harassing people over the ships they make content for always baffles me. It’s not like fanart/fanfic for a ship which contradicts canon has any effect on the canon, and playing around with character dynamics (often in a pornographic manner) is a major part of fanfic.

CHEL: On top of all this, gender and sexuality are really shaky concepts to even try to apply to a species which reproduces hermaphroditically. On this side of the fourth wall it’s obviously because Hussie is a not-very-reflective cisgender heterosexual man, and didn’t think about it any further than “girls wear skirts, right?” Plenty of people fanwank up possibilities for how it could happen on the other side. I think we may have to make a “What The Fuck Is Alternian Biology And Sociology” post or two separate from the sporking at the very end.

Discourse discussion over! Next page, we see some of the relevant terminology used in troll culture, though we still don’t get any explanation of what any of the words actually mean, which is a tad annoying for new readers. The context is a discussion between Karkat and Vriska about getting her into the game.

BRIGHT: Specifically, Karkat wants Vriska to get Tavros into the game, leading to this exchange…

CG: WHY DO YOU EVEN HATE HIM, IT'S FUCKING RIDICULOUS. CG: IF ANYTHING YOU SHOULD PITY HIM. CG: ESPECIALLY SINCE YOU WERE THE ONE WHO PARALYZED HIM. AG: I know. I don't really understand it. AG: It's just a really special kind of h8! It never goes away and it doesn't make a lot of sense. CG: THIS IS KIND OF A WEIRD TIME TO BE CONFIDING IN ME ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS OF BLACK ROMANCE BUT OK. AG: Oh god, what? CG: I MEAN IF YOU'RE REALLY IMPLYING TAVROS IS YOUR KISMESIS I THINK YOU'RE BRAYING UP THE WRONG FROND NUB. CG: BOTH PARTIES HAVE TO HATE EACH OTHER EQUALLY, I MEAN LIKE TRUE HATE. CG: MAYBE YOUR FEELINGS COME SOMEWHAT CLOSE TO FITTING THE BILL BUT I DON'T THINK HE CAN HATE ANYONE, IT'S WEIRD, HE'S KIND OF BROKEN IN THE HEAD.

Finally, our long-awaited introduction to troll romance!

And the introduction is an effective one. We now know that there’s something called ‘black romance’, that it concerns hate, and that one’s black-romantic partner is a ‘kismesis’. The conversation also flows naturally and fits the characters having it, rather than being an awkward as-you-know infodump, although brace yourselves, there’s one of those coming up. Thirteen is about right for kids starting to have romantic feelings and being confused about it, not wanting to talk about it is pretty normal, and Karkat lecturing people at a good opportunity is absolutely in character.

Karkat goes on to lecture Vriska about the emotions involved in different sorts of romantic relationships, and wow, it really says a lot about troll culture…

CG: OK, MOST PEOPLE WHO HAVEN'T HAD THEIR LOBE STEM CAUTERIZED ARE CAPABLE OF FEELING THE TWO PRIMARY EMOTIONS, HATE AND PITY. CG: PITY IS OF COURSE JUST THE TONED DOWN VERSION OF THE CENTRAL EMOTION, HATE. CG: AND ALL THE NUANCES OF PITY MANIFEST AS VARIOUS OTHER KINDS OF FEELINGS LIKE WHATEVER CHEMICAL REACTIONS TRIGGER MATING FONDNESS OR THE MYSTERIOUS FORCES THAT ARE BEHIND MOIRALLEGIANCE.

CHEL: It’s never really clear if this is just Karkat’s idea of it or if this is how trolls actually work biologically. Trolls do use the word “love” later on, so I always interpreted it as “pity” being a euphemistic term because “love” in such a warlike and oppressive culture could be exploited as a weakness. Fandom has played it with their love actually being based on a weird form of sympathy/seeing the other as needing protection, which is also plausible.

FAILURE ARTIST: I have played with the pity thing before but in retrospect Karkat is the only one who seems to see it that way. Maybe this is all his fake deep teenager view of romance.

BRIGHT: Vriska makes a performance of how bored she is, but Karkat’s on a roll.

CG: A WELL BALANCED PERSON IS IS GOING TO HAVE A GOOD DISTRIBUTION BETWEEN HATE AND THE VARIOUS PITY HUMORS. CG: HAVING A GOOD BALANCE KEEPS ALL THE EMOTIONS SHARPER, SEE I THINK THAT'S YOUR PROBLEM. AG: Oh???????? AG: I hope you know I already wore out some good note-taking pens today. All the pens. AG: All of them. CG: SEE, MY HATE IS LIKE A FINELY TUNED INSTRUMENT BECAUSE I'M AWARE OF THESE PRINCIPLES. CG: I COULD HATE A HOLE IN PARADOX SPACE ITSELF, STRAIGHT THROUGH TO A NEW REALITY FRESH FOR THE HATING. AG: Hahahahahahahaha, you don't even know how much I'm laughing at this. CG: BUT SEE, YOU'RE TOO HEAVY ON THE HATE SIDE, OR AT LEAST YOU PRETEND TO BE WHICH IS MAYBE WORSE. AG: You aren't reading anything I say are you? You just want to talk and talk and talk. CG: AND YOU THINK YOU'RE HATING UP EVERYONE HARD WHEN YOU'RE REALLY JUST BURNING OUT THAT ENTIRE EMOTIONAL HEMISPHERE. CG: IT'S LIKE LUKEWARM HATE. PRETENDER'S HATE, WITH NO COUNTERPOINT AT ALL. CG: AS SUCH THERE'S NO REAL SUBSTANCE TO YOUR HATE, IT'S LIKE A CARDBOARD MOVIE PROP. CG: WHICH IS WHY YOUR BRAIN IS BROKEN, KIND OF LIKE TAVROS'S BUT ON THE OPPOSITE HEMISPHERE I GUESS. CG: OR MAYBE YOUR BROKEN BRAIN LED TO THE IMBALANCE IN THE FIRST PLACE, I DON'T KNOW. CG: WHATEVER THE CASE IS, YOU'RE KIND OF EMOTIONALLY SCREWED, SORRY TO SAY. CG: YOUR HATE'S TOO DULL FOR A PROPER KISMESIS, IN MY OPINION. CG: AND I DON'T SEE ANYONE CHOMPING AT THE BIT TO BE YOUR MOIRAIL HONESTLY, UNLESS THERE'S SOMEONE OUT THERE WHO WOULD ACTUALLY BOTHER PITYING YOU. CG: AND LANDING A MATESPRIT? HAHAHAHA! CG: SERIOUSLY, LIKE THAT WOULD EVEN INTEREST YOU. CG: BASICALLY ANY FEATURE OF YOUR EMOTIONAL PROFILE THAT USUALLY MAKES SOMEONE VIABLE IN THE REDROM DEPARTMENT MUST BE TOTALLY FRIED. CG: YOUR BLACKROM POTENTIAL'S PROBABLY TOAST TOO.

Whew.

So now we have ‘kismesis’, ‘moirail’, and ‘matesprit’ as terms for romantic partners, as well as the concepts of black romance, red romance, and ‘moirallegiance’ as the relationship one has with a moirail. Troll romance is not going to get any less confusing for a while.

If Karkat’s grasp of psychology strikes you as amateurish, there’s a reason for that: He gets all his knowledge from romance movies.

AG: Hey asshole, stop watching movies for girls.

I think that’s another strike against the ‘girls are the dangerous ones on Alternia’ argument. Romance movies, per this exchange, are both female-coded and seen as inferior -- Karkat defends his viewing choices by saying they’re INTRIGUING SOCIOLOGICALLY, but Vriska isn’t buying it.

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 42 WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 33

CHEL: I’m not sure an interest in the workings of romance should be a socially gendered thing in a society where, as it turns out, you have to have an acceptable romantic partner by a certain time or die. You’d think most kids would be trying as hard as they could to learn and put into practice everything they could about it, and you’d also think there’d be better information for them than romcoms.

BRIGHT: Has the mate-or-die part come up yet? I’m not sure when Hussie thought of it.

CHEL: I don’t know if he’d thought of it yet, but it does come up very soon.

BRIGHT: Karkat then moves on to the original reason he contacted Vriska -- he needs her and her mind powers in the game, because he’s just run into a double agent called Jack.

Over on the next panel, Karkat is still talking to Vriska, but he’s glancing back over his shoulder at Jack Noir. His hand is covered in blood, which keeps cycling through a range of colours. The blood, it transpires, is because Jack stabbed him. Karkat is amazingly calm about this.

CG: HE'S COOL, IT'S FINE I DON'T REALLY MIND THE STABBING, IT WAS ALL A MISUNDERSTANDING. CG: WELL OK I'M PRETTY SURE HE MEANT TO STAB ME. CG: BUT I KIND OF THINK THAT'S LIKE CG: THE WAY HE GREETS PEOPLE? AG: This game is so stupid. CG: IN ANY CASE I THINK HE'S PROBABLY ALL STABBED OUT.

This would be ridiculously chill even from someone who isn’t extremely cagey about his blood colour -- and it’s not that Karkat suddenly doesn’t care any more, because as soon as Vriska says she’ll ask Terezi or Jack what colour he’s bleeding, he tells her that he’s out of Terezi’s range, Jack is sworn to secrecy, and Sollux (who’s incommunicado) is the only one who knows how to make Trollian’s viewport feature work. (Given we saw how easy it is to use earlier, I’m surprised Vriska doesn’t try to figure it out herself.)

Over on the next panel, the viewer is now Jack, a few minutes prior to this conversation. Contrary to Karkat’s protestations, Jack stabs him because He's got a pretty sharp tongue and can't seem to keep it sheathed. He is curious when Karkat cares less about the wound and more about Jack seeing his blood colour, which is apparently some freakish mutation. Jack looks at his knife…

CHEL: While it’s not a realistic depiction of the colour, recall that this is the shade of red used in-comic to depict human blood. This reveal probably isn’t a surprise to anyone by now, if you’ve encountered fanart, and honestly it wasn’t a huge mindblowing revelation on my first read before I knew, but I do think it’s a clever little “aha, THAT’S why!” moment. Skilfully done.

It seems he's the only one of his kind with this mutant candy-red blood. An outcast. He thinks he was put on this planet covered in an ocean of his own blood to be taunted. Punished for something. Saddest story you ever heard. Got to do something to shut him up.

BRIGHT: Awww. That’s kind of sweet.

This little interchange gave rise to the ‘Stabdads’ fandom phenomenon, where Spades Slick is envisaged as Karkat’s father-figure. In Homestuck canon, it’s dubious how much affection Slick has for Karkat. He seems more irritated by him than anything else, but that’s about on par for how he treats the rest of the Midnight Crew. On the other hand, it clearly makes a massive impact on Karkat. We’ve seen how important blood colour is on Alternia and how insecure he is about his own; his sudden rush of fellow-feeling towards Jack is understandable, even if it does make him way too forgiving about having been stabbed.

CHEL: Karkat and Jack shake hands, and proceed to be in cahoots. Cahoooooooots. Doodling on the defaced parking ticket from earlier, they draft OPERATION REGISURP.

Your whole team executes the plan along the course of its journey, employing espionage, mind control tactics, political sabotage, vicious interrogations and cold blooded assassinations. Everyone does their part and you begin to learn the true meaning of teamwork, as well as this troll disease called friendship.

Yeah, it actually happening is skipped over with one paragraph, but that’s probably a good thing with all the complexity already going on, and we do hear more details about it. First, we’re reminded of the existence and functions of the Queens’ Rings, the magic rings the queens of Derse and Prospit have which give them traits and powers from whatever the players put in their sprites. The trolls have put their lusii in their sprites, except for Aradia, whose lusus died long ago, so she got in the sprite herself. The Queen could put up with getting bits and pieces from eleven hideous monsters (well, ten hideous monsters and one adowable little fairybull thing oh my gosh it’s cuuuute) tacked onto her, but what she absolutely won’t stand for is the other thing Aradia put in her sprite…

She could not stand bearing the visage of the most loathsome creature known to existence. So vile is its appearance, so contemptible its purpose, all depictions of the creature let alone members of its population are permanently banned from any jurisdiction in the reach of her agents. Those of its kind go by many names, and so does the reviled patron god they herald - THE GREAT DETESTATION, KING PONDSQUATTER, SPEAKER OF THE VAST JOKE, or most commonly, BILIOUS SLICK.

Recall that AR thought of the hieroglyphs in the Frog Temple as “illegal pictography”. We’ll find out later why the Black Queen has such a revulsion for frogs, it’s important. But the important part right now is that she took the ring off. At the time of planning it’s in the ROYAL VAULT.

We briefly see a moment in the future of the Black Queen wrapped in rags, just like the human sessions’ White Queen, wandering the desert as the BANISHED QUASIROYAL, and the caption notes the plan was a success.

However, Doc Scratch appears in the desert in front of her, and it’s noted she was given a new purpose. This, it seems, is the origin of Snowman.

FAILURE ARTIST: I would like if there was some canon Homestuck material expanding on this REGISURP plot.

BRIGHT: Same! It sounds really interesting. One example of Homestuck’s idiosyncratic pacing, I suppose -- we spend pages and pages on trivial alchimeter nonsense, but skip over something more meaty.

CHEL: The Red Team work on that, while the Blue Team battle their own session… or so they think. Yeah, I’m sure you’ve all already figured it out, but the trolls hadn’t just yet. They note that their prototypes are affecting the opposite team’s underlings, and the readers are shown Alternia’s two Frog Temples, one near Aradia’s home and the other near Kanaya’s, each with six pillars outside (one seems to have five, but the sixth is hidden behind the building). Superimposed on each other, the pillars make a full ring of twelve.

The truth was it had always been the same session all along. That your teams were not competing, but cooperating toward a common goal. In the more drawn out form of this adventure's narrative, figuring this out would have been a huge deal. We would have been completely blown away by this stunning revelation. Wow. Same session all along. Really? Huh.

This is what Aradia’s been so mysterious about. She knew. We’re provided with a handy diagram, in case we haven’t been able to keep up.

After watching the phrases MOBIUS DOUBLE and REACH AROUND toggle for a few minutes while in a sort of stupor, you finally snap out of it.

(I just noticed, the Blue Team are the Derse dreamers and the Red Team are the Prospit dreamers. Neat!)

The reader’s attention is drawn instead to the Aquarius and Pisces symbols in the top left, belonging to characters we haven’t met yet, and the narration promises we’ll learn about them soon. Drawing attention again to GA’s Virgo symbol, the narration muses about her.

It will probably be quite some time before you get to be her. It could very well be pages and pages and pages.

Naturally, we jump right back to her.

GA’s intro is long, so we’ll take it piece by piece.

Your name is KANAYA MARYAM.

The Sanskrit name for Virgo is “Kanya”, and it’s also the name of a town in Japan. “Maryam” is the Arabic version of “Mary”, as in Jesus’ mother. It may also be a reference to Marya Zaleska, the title character of the movie “Dracula’s Daughter”.

You are one of the few of your kind who can withstand the BLISTERING ALTERNIAN SUN, and perhaps the only who enjoys the feel of its rays. As such, you are one of the few of your kind who has taken a shining to LANDSCAPING. You have cultivated a lush oasis around your hive, and in particular, you have honed your craft through the art of TOPIARY, sculpting your trees to match the PUFFY ORACLES from your dreams. You have embraced the tool of this trade, which conveniently is the weapon of choice for those who would hunt the HEINOUS BROODS OF THE UNDEAD which crawl from the sand at sunrise to feast on the light and the living.

Couple things established here; trolls are not only nocturnal but actively harmed by their planet’s sun, and undead beings other than ghosts exist. Said traditional weapon for hunting them is a chainsaw, which we can see lying against her bookshelf, a reference to the Evil Dead movies.

It would be convenient if you actually hunted them, but it is of course far too dangerous, every bit as suicidal as attempting to poach the terrible MUSCLEBEASTS who roam at night. So you indulge in your bright fascination with the grim through literature. Just before the sun goes down and you join your flora in rest, you immerse yourself in tales of RAINBOW DRINKERS and SHADOW DROPPERS and FORBIDDEN PASSION.

Rainbow drinkers are, as discussed later on, troll vampires. I don’t think shadow droppers are ever expanded on, but they might be zombies or werebeasts. Troll goths, apparently, are the reverse of human goths, dressing in bright colours and staying up in the daytime, which makes sense for a species who can only safely go out at night.

You are one of the few of your kind with JADE GREEN BLOOD. As such you are one of the few who could be selected and raised by a VIRGIN MOTHER GRUB, an event so rare as to elude documented precedent. She would defend you from desert threats, and though her life would be short, in time you would assure her of progeny.

Recall that the Mother Grub is required for troll reproduction.

You are a SEAMSTRESS or a RAGRIPPER or a TREETRIMMER or a LUMBERJACK, whichever you care to be, and your unique hive is equipped with a great supply of advanced technology to accommodate your interests. The technology and indeed the hive itself were all recovered from the ruins nearby when you were very young. The seed of your hive was deployed on the volcanic rocks beneath the sand with the assistance of your lusus and her remarkable burrowing skills, and you have lived there happily together since. You know the ruins and the hive and everything here that is not sand and rock originated from the world of your dreams. You also know that one day you will visit this world while you are awake. That day is today.

Like Jade, Kanaya has been awake on Prospit for years, and the technology in question is Skaian in origin, so that’s how she knows what’s going on with the game.

Kanaya is prompted to equip her chainsaw, which promptly turns into a lipstick in a Problem Sleuth reference. Like Jade, she has a Wardrobifier, set to randomise, which suddenly turns her black shirt and red skirt into a red leaf-print dress. She takes out the lipstick.

You can choose between your trademark jade or black. Even though a troll's lips are naturally black. But they can always be blacker, and a lady with a true sense of style knows this.

She goes with green, her dress turns into a blue kimono, and she’s messaged by someone with a fuschia Pisces symbol. This person, named cuttlefishCuller, turns out to be rather excitable, greeting her in all caps and following it up with Glub glub glub glub glub!

BRIGHT: This conversation is pretty sweet, with some friendly joking about CC’s quirk (they stick hyphens in front of their capital Es) and mention of their Collapsing And Expanding Bladder Based Aquatic Vascular System. There’s another mention of moirails, with CC saying they’ll have to join the game late to keep an eye on theirs.

It also turns out both CC and Kanaya are having some premonitions of what’s to come! Kanaya is seeing visions in the clouds of Skaia, the same way Jade does, but CC hears whispers from a mysterious ‘she’ who needs her voice keeping down. It’s implied to be CC’s lusus, as both Kanaya and CC are aware their lusii are going to die soon.

Kanaya hopes to be with her lusus as she dies, but looks out of the window to find the Virgin Mother Grub has already passed away, apparently of natural causes.

CHEL: The Mother Grub was seen briefly before; it’s a moth-like creature with a huge fat body the size of a bus, with wings too small to ever lift it, horns the same shape as Kanaya’s, and a skull-like head with big lips. The skull on Terezi’s Doomsday Scale was, we can tell now, a Mother Grub, except quite a lot bigger - presumably a breeding Grub.

BRIGHT: Kanaya changes back into her original outfit, and goes down to live up to her end of the bargain… which entails slicing a hole in her lusus with her chainsaw and pulling out a round object covered in spikes the colour of trolls’ horns, called a Matriorb. Kanaya stores it in her sylladex; she’s using a CHASTITY MODUS, which locks each card away, and the key will serendipitously be discovered when it’s time for the card to be unlocked. These modii are getting more and more esoteric.

Kanaya proceeds to have a conversation with her own moirail, Vriska, which we already read earlier.

You then proceed to have the rest of this conversation we already read, bugging and fussing and meddling through the special and magical union one can only describe as being in moirallegiance with another. At least, you guess that's how you would describe it. Maybe. Troll romance sure is confusing!

Yes, yes it is. (Spoiler: It’s not that confusing once it’s explained.)

Kanaya doesn’t have long to dwell on the conversation, as she’s contacted by caligulasAquarium, someone with a violet Aquarius symbol who she doesn’t seem to think highly of. It rapidly becomes apparent why.

CA: kan make her talk to me do somethin GA: Who CA: your no good connivvin fuckin backstabbin girl crush thats wwho

CHEL: Trolls are supposed to come bi/pan as standard, so why does he need to specify “girl crush”? I wonder if Hussie hadn’t decided that yet when he wrote this part, but I’m not sure.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 34

CA’s gender hasn’t been revealed, but let’s not kid ourselves, we know from how he’s talking that he’s a dude. Nice Girls certainly exist but they don’t tend to get portrayed as so whiny in fiction, plus CC comes off as very girly, and that leaves us with six boy and six girl trolls. Balance and opposites and counterparts are a running theme throughout Homestuck. Not that there can’t be nonbinary characters, as some show up in Hiveswap; just that there would most likely have to be an even number of them, split evenly between the groups of players. Fine by me as a nonbinary person with a thing for balance and even numbers of my own.

Also, note that we’ve seen this guy, or at least his hand and foot, before. This is the litter-hater in the bowling shoes.

GA: Overstating Our Relationship Wont Make Me Feel Very Cooperative GA: Its Paler Red Than That Ok CA: pshhhhhh that is a fuckin laugh and you knoww it evveryone does CA: so help me out tell her to talk to me i think she blocked me you got to GA: Why Do I Got To GA: I Dont Got To And Every Time You Take My Help For Granted I Feel Like I Got To A Little Less CA: wwhatEVVER you are so the vvillage twwo wwheel devvice wwhen it comes to auspisticing CA: you cant let a grudge go by you wwont stick your busy stem betwwixt so get wwith the program fussyfangs

BRIGHT: Oh hey, another troll romance term! ‘Auspisticing’ is the last of the lot, don’t worry.

CA: wwho givves a shit wwhy she blocked me or about my fuckin manners come on youvve got a wway wwith her CA: i figure if youre going to auspisticize any twwo brinesuckers wwho sneer at each other a funny wway you might as wwell make it official and be ours right GA: Your Black Solicitation Just Seems Really Indecent

Funny words aside, Hussie does a good job at laying down context for what auspisticism is here; we now know that it involves mediating between two parties who dislike each other and that it’s a form of black romance. Meshing worldbuilding naturally into the dialogue is something Homestuck does really well at times.

Anyway, CA is trying to get in contact with Vriska because he asked her to make something for him and now she’s blowing him off.

GA: What Is It CA: kan stupid wwhat do you think its a fuckin gizmo to bloww up the wworld or somethin CA: ok wwell not that obvviously CA: but somethin thatll kill all land dwwellers wwhat else wwould i be after GA: Can You Just For A Moment Entertain The Thoughts Of One Untouched By Megalomaniacal Derangement And Tell Me Why Id Want To Assist You With That CA: wwell CA: im not goin to vvery wwell kill you am i that wwould be fuckin unconscionable CA: wwhat kind of friend wwould i be

While CA is obviously a douche, there’s something funny about how over-the-top he is about it and how utterly oblivious he is to the idea that Kanaya might have a problem with a device that would kill all landdwellers, although the humour is inversely proportionate to how likely he is to pull it off.

CHEL: Maybe I’m strange, but I think he’s adorable. I get the impression of a small kid trying to puff himself up to adult size.

BRIGHT: There’s also more romance talk, and this next bit is one I find interesting:

CA: you could either play along as our auspistice and do a little mediating like you wwere fuckin hatched to CA: or wwatch she and me devvolvve into fuckin full fledged kismesisses the kind like you dont get once in ten thousand swweeps CA: you knoww thats wwhat it wwould be there wwould be rainboww rivvers runnin through star systems and all nebulizin like liquid firewworks CA: it wwill be beautiful and heartbreaking all at once CA: you should read up on your history instead of poring through that godawwfull sunny rubbish

I’m going to take a step back from Homestuck itself for a moment and talk about kismessitude as it’s portrayed in fandom. People tend to envision it in a variety of ways -- some see it as a BDSM relationship, some as a way of pushing a rival to be better, some as just straight-up hate-sex -- but most depictions show it as something that only affects the two people involved.

Here, though? CA’s talking about kismessitude as something that’s potentially really damn dangerous, to other people besides those involved, and cites history as a backup -- implying it can really be that dangerous, and it’s not just a teenager’s flight of fancy. (Although, that said, CA is clearly using this to try and get Kanaya in a relationship with him, so how sincere he is is questionable.)

CHEL: Later on we do see a little bit of one of the historical cases he might have been citing. We’ll discuss it more then. Also, I do like him saying “sunny” instead of “gloomy”. Makes sense!

Kanaya tells CA none of this matters, and he sneers about the “purity of the bloodline”. That’s an… uncomfortable turn of phrase, especially since he’s speaking to someone not covered by the “purity” standard, but since it applies to aliens and it’s in a society where that’s hammered into its inhabitants it’s not a Problematykks issue. Kanaya tells him it still won’t matter because their race will be wiped out entirely, and his reaction is remarkably understated:

CA: huh CA: wwell ok HURRY UP AND DO NOTHING: 11

CA says he knows Kanaya doesn’t lie except to herself, surprisingly perceptive for one so puffed-up otherwise. CA might be smarter than he’s letting on? He asks if her clouds told her that; that was the reader’s assumption too, but she says no, she has a different source. Uh-oh. We know what the last source of information was, and it cost Vriska an arm and an eye-sevenfold. CA’s own clouds “hide nothin but misfortune and monstrosities”, so we can guess she’s Prospit and he’s Derse. He goes back to nagging her to tell Vriska to talk to him, and when she continues to refuse he poutily steps off.

CA: you dont wwant to be our auspistice cause you dont wwant to get locked into that sort of relation wwith her i can respect that

Kanaya denies this, and CA says everyone knows, including Karkat.

GA: Its Unbelievable GA: Her Patience CA: wwhat CA: wwhoa wwait wwho GA: Never Mind CA: ok wwait did she talk to you today CA: wwhat did she say CA: or glub or wwhatevver

They’re talking about CC, if it wasn’t clear. Kanaya, in a callback to John’s comment to Terezi, facetiously tells him that she talked about Longing To Touch You Indiscretely and That Shes Basically In The Scarlet Throes For You. CA, flustered, picks up that she’s teasing him, and she tells him the truth, that CC’s just concerned as a moirail.

CA: if youre not savvvvy about howw you define yourself to people CA: you can just splash into the moirail zone before you knoww wwhich wways upwward

I’m going to comment on this attitude in a bit more detail when we get a clearer explanation of what moirallegiance actually is. CA leaves her with some arc words.

CA: being a kid and growwing up CA: its hard and nobody understands

Kanaya heads back to her room, planning to emphatically not meddle but help her friends, and consults her source; it’s fortunately not a Doc Scratch-related one at all. It is, in fact, Rose’s long-forgotten GameFAQ, saved on a server floating in the Furthest Ring, to which Prospit’s clouds directed her. I have to show you the panel for a moment though…

I’m sure there was a way we could see the screen without having it facing away from Kanaya who’s supposed to be reading it.

You can only assume this took place a long time ago. This race is likely ancient, preceding yours by millions of sweeps. Maybe billions! You like to try to imagine the adventures of these players. Were they successful in repopulating their race? Did they manage to protect their matriorb and hatch a new mother grub? Could they hold it together, or were they torn apart by the complex social dynamics, the matespritships and moirallegiences and auspisticisms and kismesissitudes that will surely plague your group along the way? You have little doubt they succeeded with flying colors.

Oh dear, dramatic irony. Kanaya fantasises about a troll version of Rose, thinking she must have been the leader of this supposedly long-ago group.

And yet they appear to have been the only of their kind to have risen to the challenge in a session stacked heavily against them.

Huh. So is this just because Kanaya can’t find more information, or are the four kids in fact the only humans who successfully got into the game? Picking four specifically white-coded kids to be the last of the human race due to supposedly their own competence is… not a good choice. And why the hell couldn’t other people succeed? This strikes me as more of the whole theme of “nobody matters except the people we’re focusing on”. A good lampshading of video game tropes, but in a literary story, that’s the opposite message to everything I’ve ever read, and it’s a creepy one.

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 43 HURRY UP AND DO NOTHING: 12 WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 35

BRIGHT: I thiiiiiiiink it’s at least implied later on that there are other sessions going, it’s just that each session is a closed loop of players so we don’t see the others...although if that’s the case, does that mean Earth’s getting hit with meteors from multiple Skaias?

CHEL: That over with for the moment, we cut to Tavros’ house as you take your place as the PAGE OF BREATH in the LAND OF SAND AND ZEPHYR. Vriska, his server player, gets down to the business of building up his house towards the Gate…

… entirely out of staircases.

AT: i THINK THIS, iS, AT: pROBABLY MEANT TO ANTAGONIZE ME,

Okay, this probably makes me a bad person, but I’m crying with laughter at his expression and that line.

It’s more disability slapstick, but here the point of the joke comes off as being more that Vriska is a jerk and Tavros’ reaction is really understated than any reasonable person being supposed to assume Tavros is wrong for not being able to climb stairs. Emphasis on “comes off as”, unfortunately. I’m still gonna give a Problematykks point, and further experience with Hussie’s attitude to disability has soured the joke somewhat, even in just the next couple of pages.

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 44

BRIGHT: Vriska tries to get Tavros to crawl up the stairs, first by telling him that he promised not to be boring anymore and then by saying that she’s trying to help him get stronger. She caps off the rant by demanding that he apologise.

AT: oKAY, AT: tHANKS, i GUESS, AT: bUT, AT: sORRY FOR WHAT, AG: For 8eing crippled, you ass! AT: yOU WANT ME TO APOLOGIZE, AT: fOR BEING PARALYZED, AG: Yes. AG: Say you're sorry. AT: i DON'T MEAN TO BE RUDE, oR bORING, AT: bUT THAT'S RIDICULOUS, gIVEN, AT: uH, tHE CIRCUMSTANCES, AG: 8ullshit! AG: It's something called 8asic decency and civility you fudge8looded 8oor. AG: Now get down on your useless wo88ly knees and apologize. AT: nO, i DON'T WANT TO, AG: >::::O

Vriska, what the fuck.

Tavros is really great here. He’s obviously not comfortable fighting with Vriska, and repeatedly tries to redirect her into building him ramps instead of engaging. But, at the same time, he holds his ground and doesn’t let her push him around, and won’t let go of solid hard reality in the face of Vriska trying to emotionally manipulate him.

FAILURE ARTIST: And yet people still call him a wimp.

BRIGHT: Vriska retaliates, because of course she does, by grabbing his wheelchair with her cursor and shaking it about. If Hussie left it at that, everything would be unobjectionable, at least in terms of narrative voice. Instead, well…

Now she's done it. She has awoken the mighty inner fury that is... RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUFIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

CHEL: It just occurred to me to mention that the name Rufio comes from a character in the movie Hook, the leader of the Lost Boys after Peter Pan left, played by Dante Basco. Tavros’ mental image of him is a reference to that character.

FAILURE ARTIST: Dante Basco did read Homestuck, with hilarious results as we will see.

But unfortunately, Rufio is not real. He's imaginary. A fake. Like a made up friend, the way fairies are. You continue to be sad and alone.

BRIGHT: Eurgh.

Let me be clear: Tavros having no further recourse to deal with Vriska’s abuse beyond his visualised self-esteem is a problem for the character, but it’s not necessarily a narrative problem per se. Escapism is a thing. You could get a decent character arc out of Tavros learning better ways to deal with harassment he can’t escape. It is a narrative problem when the narrator mocks it and makes him out to be pathetic for even trying it.

CHEL: I’d consider this to be just Tavros’ own thought process, but, sadly, this kind of narrative sneering at him carries on throughout Tavros’ presence in the comic and the fandom seems to buy into it. Tavros gets a lot of hate for reasons which mostly boil down to him being a male abuse victim; there’s a feeling that he should “try harder” to fight back, despite him being physically disabled and a member of a caste out of sight beneath her on the social ladder and legally permitted to be killed by her on a whim. Might that count as a point for WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM, for Huss and the fandom not taking the social dynamics into account for why Tavros can’t defend himself?

BRIGHT: I don’t know if it’s fair to count against the fandom when we’re reviewing Homestuck proper, but we can definitely count against Hussie!

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 36

CHEL: It’s also notable that the common fandom interpretation of Tavros is as Hispanic-coded, at least partly due to his Spanish username, and of Vriska as white-coded. That’s probably not helping.

Since Hussie appears to expect us to agree with Vriska that this is funny, I’m adding another to these as well.

ALL THE LUCK: 2 CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 45 IN HATE WITH MY CREATION: 3

BRIGHT: What’s weird about this whole mess is that Hussie doesn’t — yet — try to say that Tavros should be trying to get stronger; his disability is fully acknowledged. I feel like this kind of mockery is usually accompanied by the attitude that disabled people should just get over their disability, but Hussie’s clear that Tavros can’t. Which means he should do...what, exactly?

CHEL: Not have let Vriska disable him in the first place, presumably. Never mind that, you know, she has mind control powers so he didn’t really have a choice in that either. That is, however, an argument Vriska fans actually make. Apparently some of them actually blame him for not flying when she threw him off the cliff, which… well, unpowered flight is a thing that can happen in the comic but he certainly couldn’t do it then.

BRIGHT: ...Apparently I retain the capacity for surprise at how awful people can be. The fuck?

Back in the comic, Tavros fortunately does have one other means of recourse. Back in her hive, Vriska is suddenly prodded in the back with a flying toilet, courtesy of Kanaya.

GA: Just Presenting A Floating Reminder That Tavros Will Need Plenty Of Inclined Surfaces For His Ascent AG: That's silly. I made so many ramps, you wouldn't even 8elieve it. AG: I specifically decided I wanted to 8uild something ugly and 8oring. It is now the land of ramps and yawns. GA: Hes Reported Otherwise AG: That lousy snitch! May8e I should take his computer away so he can't go crying to fussyfangs anymore. GA: Maybe I Should Upend This Load Gaper Over Your Head AG: No, don't! GA: Im Still Learning The Interface GA: It Could Happen Accidentally At Any Moment AG: I'm only trying to help him. ::::( GA: Think Of Another Way To Help

CHEL: Did I mention Kanaya is my zodiac troll? I can only long to reach her heights of awesome. Of course the ability to levitate toilets would kinda help.

BRIGHT: Vriska heads down to her treasure vault and retrieves a pair of ROCKET SHOES. The captchalogue code for these is ‘PSHOOOES’, which amuses me greatly. Vriska sends the code to Tavros, who combines it with the code for his wheelchair to create a flying wheelchair. Now that is a good use of alchemising!

CHEL: Awww!

Tavros flies up to the Gate, and we cut back to him later on, leading an entourage of communed-with imps and ogres to move obstacles and help him solve puzzles. Using his skills well, I see! In another set of ruins the imps load jigsaw pieces of rock into a frog-shaped alcove,

Things, however, don’t continue to go so well, because Hussie hates this poor kid. I do not mean that facetiously. Statements he’s made elsewhere imply he has a hell of a lot of contempt for several of the characters he created, which I don’t understand at all. We’ll go into this after Act 7, but I get the sensation that the characters are merely tools to show off the complexity and meta references, which are the parts he really cares about.

BRIGHT: It’s not unknown for authors to dislike characters they wrote; the great Terry Pratchett reputedly hated his character Rincewind. The key difference is that in Pratchett’s case, the audience couldn’t tell. Hussie, on the other hand, tends to make his disdain pretty obvious, to the detriment of the story.

CHEL: That’s a point. Conan Doyle grew to hate Sherlock Holmes, too. He didn’t, however, set up situations solely to shit on Holmes in his books.

BRIGHT: I think that’s the key. I’ll forgive a multitude of failings as long as the author seems to be treating the characters fairly. That doesn’t mean that good things have to happen to them — plenty of bad things can happen and I’ll enjoy it — it just means that the author has to...respect how the character feels and would behave, I guess.

Of course, respect is Hussie’s antithesis, so.

Also, nothing so far has shown Vriska to be anything other than a (granted, entertaining) bully. I wasn’t around while Homestuck was updating, so I’m not sure when her fandom took off, but it has to be later than this, surely?

CHEL: I don’t know. I wasn’t around till about mid-Act 6.

What was I on about? Oh yes. Tavros is interrupted by Vriska again, who bitches him out for doing things the boring way and seeking the boring lore.

AG: The minds of your consorts are very soft and impressiona8le. AG: As easily manipul8ed as all those imps you've 8een 8ossing around. AG: I have picked apart their tiny little lizard 8rains and seen through all the smoke and mirrors of their riddles. AG: I have gotten to the truth they are guarding. The great 8ig mystery 8ehind this planet. And you know what it is, Tavros? AT: nO, AG: It's 8ullshit! AG: Meaningless, 8oring, fanciful 8ullshit wrapped in flowery poems to keep you guessing. AG: It all leads to one thing anyway, and that's what we should put our attention on. AG: Real gamers cut to the chase. They power through all the nonsense and go for the gold. AG: They cheat, Tavros. AG: It is time you learned to start cheating.

Interesting theory. Tavros thinks befriending his monsters instead of killing them is cheating, and Vriska grudgingly agrees but is annoyed he isn’t killing anything. She claims to have designed a better and more challenging quest for him; he asks after her own quest, and she says she has time because Kanaya’s busy.

AG: Which is just as well 8ecause I was starting to get nannied HARD. WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 37

Strange word choice for a species raised by animals, but okay. Vriska sends Tavros a map to the next Gate, and he sets off in his little rocket chair. Little does he know.

You proceed through what seems to be your second gate, into the LAND OF MAPS AND TREASURE. The THIEF OF LIGHT lies in wait.

In a callback to our last meeting of Breath and Light players, Tavros crashes through Vriska’s wall and is left hanging upside-down in the rocket chair from the large cobwebs across the room, while Vriska sleeps on a pile of broken eight-balls. Doesn’t look comfortable, but trolls rest in worse places later. Vriska wakes, and Tavros falls head-first onto the floor.

Here is where it gets incredibly uncomfortable, and we have to show it in detail to assign points properly and so that there’s no ambiguity about what’s happening, so if you have any sexual assault, ableism, underage, mind control, or victim-blaming triggers you may want to skip this part. No clothing is removed but it’s very unpleasant to read and the attitude toward it is worse. Seriously, this is Taklamakan Zoo levels of bad.

(This heading below’s not part of the comic, I just put it there so you can skip. The sequence ends with the piece of fanart of Kanaya looking at the sideways screen.)

~*THE ASSAULT STARTS HERE*~

Vriska sits up. She’s wearing a very short strappy white Tinkerbell dress with her sign on it, and what look like over-the-knee socks, a commonly fetishised style of clothing. I remind you these characters are supposed to be thirteen years old. The dress is also the same as the one worn by the fairy in the artwork on Tavros’ desktop background. I don’t know if Vriska had seen that or not.

FAILURE ARTIST:

To be fair she’s just in an actually-more-modest version of what Peter Pan’s sidekick/love interest wears and the socks come off as more dorky than sexy.

Oh my! It appears Pupa Pan himself has flown through your window while you were asleep. How exciting! Surely he is here to take you away on the adventure of a lifetime. He is more dreamy and heroic than you ever imagined. But what's this?? It seems the legendary Boy-Skylark has misplaced his shadow. He is looking EVERYWHERE for it, to no avail. He is having a devil of a time, what with being paralyzed from the waist down and all. He clearly needs your help.

CHEL: Vriska is prompted to Help Pupa find shadow, and approaches Tavros with a nasty-looking grin on her face, while he lies on the floor, gritting his teeth in noticeable pain.

Pupa! You truly are a silly goose. Your shadow has been trapped underneath your useless torso the whole time! Honestly, where else would it be you stupid sack of shit?

Charming. Vriska proceeds to kick him in the head, or at least nudge him with her foot, while he lies unresponsive.

Of course, the secret to reuniting with your shadow is to get up and walk around. And play and dance and frolic! Your shadow will surely join in your gaiety. But it appears Pupa has lost the use of his legs. There will be no frolicking in this young man's future. ::::( Unless...

Everyone knows that just a pinch of SPECIAL STARDUST along with a happy thought will allow any boy to get up and walk again. Everyone knows this because it is in the classic tale, PUPA PAN. Young Pupa flies through the window of a fairy girl's respiteblock, falls on the floor, and has trouble getting up like an enormous pansy. The fairy girl then helps him walk again, and in return, he teaches her to fly, even though she probably already knows how to fly. Because she's a fairy. They fly out of her window together, and have magical adventures for many sweeps thereafter. To be honest, you hardly know a damn thing about Pupa Pan. But you do not care.

Pupa remains as pathetic and useless as ever.

FAILURE ARTIST: The story just keeps mocking Tavros for being disabled.

CHEL: Not to mention for being interested in fairies. Because how dare a boy have a gender-nonstandard interest, or a young teenager enjoy whimsical escapism from an increasingly horrible and guaranteed-to-be-short life.

WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM: 39

I might be projecting because the fandom has made me loathe her, but it honestly comes off like Vriska dressed up like this in the first place less to seduce Tavros and more to make sure she thoroughly ruined his favourite thing to hurt him further, especially if the narration is supposed to be things she’s actually saying to him.

The stardust did nothing! Probably because it is just glittery powder with no magical properties whatsoever and is basically bullshit. Because in case it wasn't clear, magic isn't real, and neither are miracles. OR It could just be that Pupa has failed to have a happy thought! Your duty is clear. You will have to MAKE him have happy thoughts. Vriska: Make Pupa have happy thoughts.

He certainly doesn’t seem to be having happy thoughts now. Notice his expression, what we can see of it, looks terrified, he’s trembling, and let’s recall that he’s paralysed from the waist down. Even if he wasn’t, she’s of a far, far higher caste than him, legally permitted to do whatever she wants to him, including killing him if he tries to resist. It’s kind of gone back and forth on, but higher bloods are a few times stated to be a lot stronger than lower bloods, and if they work like humans, they’re in puberty right now, a time at which human girls tend to get taller and stronger sooner than boys. Again, it’s gone back and forth on, but a common interpretation is that female trolls are stronger than male trolls in general and/or have the social power advantage. Let’s also remember that, even if none of those factors apply, Vriska has mind control powers. There is no point here at which Tavros has the advantage, nothing he can use as leverage on her. She can do whatever the hell she wants, and she does.

BRIGHT: We’ve also been explicitly shown that Vriska has little to no respect for anyone else’s autonomy if she finds it inconvenient, and that Tavros is her favourite punching bag, and that his ability to stand up for himself when she gets going is extremely limited.

CHEL: Despite the odds stacked against him, Tavros struggles against the kiss forced on him, and when Vriska pushes him back, doesn’t respond with anything but a look of horror, though she appears to expect him to, as a flickering heart-spade with a question mark over it appears between them. I’m not sure whether that’s supposed to be the thought process of him or her or both.

Vriska hurls him onto the floor with some force...

… and activates her mind control, causing little hearts to light up in Tavros’ eyes.

BRIGHT: Vriska has used her mind-control powers on Tavros before, and when it happened she walked him off a cliff. There is basically no way that her doing it again isn’t going to be a traumatic experience for him, above and beyond the inherent horror of losing control over one’s body.

I’m inclined to think that forcibly altering his emotions is worse, though. Being paralysed was bad enough, but Tavros knows what happened and he knows how he feels about it. Making him fall in love with her is just…on one level, it’s a horrible assault on his autonomy as a person, and on another level, it’s tailor-made to make him doubt himself and believe the encounter was something he wanted.

FAILURE ARTIST: I hadn’t thought that he might now consider the encounter as consensual, which would explain his later reaction.

CHEL: Tavros paws at her legs, making kissy faces, and she looks vaguely concerned. Note the background still depicts wavy blue rays coming off her, showing her power is still active.

Looking defeated, she drops the control and dumps him on the floor again.

I’m not sure what she’s supposed to be thinking in this last panel. Is she feeling guilty? Is she disappointed that he didn’t like her under his own power? Has she just decided he’s too useless to be worth the effort? Any could be true.

BRIGHT: I read that as disappointment that even when he ‘liked’ her, he didn’t act the way she wanted. (And the way Tavros acted is kind of disturbing. ‘Mindlessly pawing at someone’ is not what I’d expect from him if he was legitimately attracted to someone.)

FAILURE ARTIST: The common interpretation these days was she was realizing she wasn’t into boys which okay that’s good for her but she should feel more bad about molesting him.

CHEL: That also makes no sense, because she shows interest in multiple boys later.

I’m also not entirely sure if Vriska had the intention of actually raping Tavros here (in the standard way, I mean, as one could argue that mind control is a form of rape), or just making out with him. The fact that she dressed up in vaguely fetishy clothing isn’t making it look good, though. Yes, she’s very young, but traumatised kids in particular have been known to lash out sexually like that. It’s a way of reasserting personal power, and I imagine it would be more prevalent in a society with no sapient adult supervision. While there are mitigating circumstances involved in their social situation and Vriska not really having ever had a chance to learn better, that doesn’t make this not a horrible thing to do, or not traumatising for Tavros.

BRIGHT: The clothing could potentially be down to Vriska wanting to look ‘adult’ without fully understanding why it looks adult. That does come up sometimes with teens — they want to experiment with clothing because that’s how adults dress, not because they want to look sexy, or they might dress a certain way for dates because that’s the social model they have for How Dates Work.

And if I read it like that, this basically looks like Vriska having the date equivalent of a dolls’ tea party. Which says volumes about how she views Tavros’s autonomy.

CHEL: Good point. Though honestly it would say volumes about same either way!

BRIGHT: I said earlier that Vriska is better than Equius at recognising when other people’s desires conflict with hers, and she is, but that doesn’t mean she respects those differences. She just recognises that they’re there, and overrides them. This is a prime example of Vriska viewing Tavros as something between a chew-toy and a prop. First she kicks him around and terrifies him, then she expects him to be able to get over those emotions at the drop of a hat and respond to her advances — and, moreover, she wants him to respond in a certain way, which Tavros has zero way of knowing. This is the first time she’s shown that sort of interest in him, unless her earlier behaviour was the Alternian equivalent of pigtail-pulling.

...I think maybe that was in fact Alternian pigtail-pulling. Or at least Vriska’s version of pigtail-pulling.

CHEL: That’ll actually make more sense, once we explain what the spade symbol means.

Okay, how many counts does this cover?

ALL THE LUCK: 12 ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 31 CALL CPA PLEASE: 26 CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 55 IN HATE WITH MY CREATION: 13

It also occurred to me during this sequence to think again about how Karkat contemptuously swears at and hangs up the phone on the injured Tavros. This, at first glance, seems to be very much at odds with the “cranky but caring” impression we’re supposed to have of Karkat… but it fits precisely with Hussie’s opinion of Tavros and how pathetic he is for allowing a much more powerful person to permanently disable him. I know at the moment it looks like I’m not separating the character from the author, but it’ll become clear as we go that that is what he thinks.

IN HATE WITH MY CREATION: 14

Why didn’t we start a FUCK YOU, HUSSIE count?

BRIGHT: It would have ended up longer than all the other counts combined.

CHEL: The actual assault is over now, but there’s one more picture of it. The ramifications must continue to be discussed, so tread cautiously. The actual act is over now, though.

Said ramifications come pretty quickly. Kanaya, having dealt with getting herself into the game and prototyped her own lususprite, decides to check on Vriska.

Ideally she has not gotten herself into too much trouble. And ideally the dramatic irony has not gotten so thick you could draw a dotted line on it with a tube of lipstick and cut it in half with a chainsaw.

Of course, she sees the exact moment Vriska kisses Tavros.

(Fanart source has now been deleted, sadly.)

~*THE ASSAULT ENDS HERE*~

Humorous art aside over, let’s watch Kanaya’s reaction in more detail. She angrily looks at a copy of the Tinkerbell dress, which she presumably sent the alchemiter code for rather than the actual item to Vriska, hence why she still has it.

So THAT'S why she had you make this dress for her??? And you just went along with it like a sucker. Argh, you are such an IDIOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Like Karkat, Kanaya is presented as the caring one, the protective one. The “mom friend” of the group. And yet, she looks at this, in which Tavros is clearly frightened and struggling, and her reaction is to be mad that Vriska didn’t want to wear the dress for a date with her. I’m not sure whether this says more about Hussie’s opinion of Tavros or the social system of Alternia or both, but it certainly says a lot.

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 56 HURRY UP AND DO NOTHING: 13 IN HATE WITH MY CREATION: 15

BRIGHT: Kanaya has had to corral Vriska on Tavros’s behalf already! Possibly more than once! She has all the information to realise that this is abusive, even leaving aside Tavros’s reaction! Sure, teens can be self-centred, but even so this is egregious.

CHEL: Kanaya’s Grubsprite comforts her and she throws the dress out the window.

Being a kid and growing up. It's hard and nobody understands.

Yes, I’m sure Tavros thinks so too.

Charles: "I know Sir can be prickly, but you have to understand he had a very terrible childhood."

Klaus: "I understand. I'm having a very terrible childhood right now."

-A Series of Unfortunate Events

[nerdygaymormon]

So I’m a Mormon asexual but it feels weird because the church has nothing on asexuality (at least that I could find). I just don’t understand how I can explain how I feel to people that think sex and children are everything.

The website “Mormon and Gay” is an example that gays & lesbians get far more attention from church leadership. Transgender topics don’t come up often in church, but still it’s more frequent than mentions of people being bi. But aro and ace are virtually ignored and not even acknowledged in this church. 

I know the phrase that every single ace member has heard is “you just haven’t met the right person yet.” They view you as a regular straight person, they don’t see the difference. 

To fit in with church expectations, it probably feels like you’re being asked to compromise how you understand yourself. There is just this one mold that we all must fit within, so get married and ignore this part of who you are.

———————————————————————  

Okay, so on to your question. I have a friend, @latter-ace-saint who wrote a post in 2016 that I thought was really informative. He shared how it was quite a process to understand that he’s ace. I think this is because 1) recognizing the absence of something hard to do and 2) the idea of asexuality isn’t often talked about.

—————————  

Here’s some ideas on how to explain your feelings. Perhaps these words will fit, or you can adjust them to how you experience the world. And if I’m way off, hopefully they’ll spark ideas of how you can describe yourself. 

Love and sex don’t always coexist. Imagine a person you would NEVER be attracted to, you feel disgusted by them, and then being told you must have sex with them. Take that feeling except it’s not towards someone who disgusts you but it’s directed towards people you love. This is the experience of many sex-repulsed aces. 

Homosexuality is same-sex attraction. Heterosexuality is other-sex attraction. Bisexuality is same-and-other-sex attraction. Asexuality is no-sex attraction. Zero. Nada. And in a sex-normalized society, that’s hard to come to terms with. 

When I was a teenager, chastity lessons never made sense to me, why not just wait? It’s not like it’s hard? You realize that isn’t the norm. But how do I make sense of the teachings that such feelings are God given if I don’t have them?  

People who don’t understand the concept of being ace will think that you can take a pill for that, or you just need to loosen up, or when you meet the right person things will change. But that’s because they assume I am like them. 

Our church emphasizes marriage and family, but that doesn’t feel like a fit for me. I have friends and get a lot of satisfaction from those relationships, but no way do I ever think or hope our friendship evolves into something more. If I do get married, what would seem most ideal is to live with an ace friend, nothing would change between us other than a deepening of our friendship, no sex. 

In church we often speak of a woman as a wife or mother, this is how we talk of her value. I’m not saying those roles aren’t important in people’s lives, but there are other roles that can be important in a person’s life. You can be an aunt, a friend, a student. You can learn a trade. You can develop talents. You can serve and help others. You can move in with roommates, or alone, or with your family. You can travel. You can have a meaningful life as a single person.

———————————————————————  

Good luck to you! 

[aesthetic-survivor-of-twd]

Congratss on coming out! I was just wondering if you could talk about how you knew you were bi (from someone who is still figuring things out haha)

Ah thank you (it wasn't even intentional so it was kinda weird lol).(I might go a bit off topic at first but I'll get there - it's a discovering asexuality/bisexuality combo post)It starts off talking about Asexuality but later leads into Bisexuality/Biromantic.Apologies in advance if I'm not much help ^_^;-Okay, so the first time I started properly questioning my sexuality was in High School. But surprisingly it wasn't to do with me also liking females (bisexual). It was because I realized that unlike a lot of my peers around me I wasn't finding myself sexually attracted to ANYONE and I had an identity crisis moment of "what the fuck is wrong me" for a while.I was always told by teachers in my school who taught sex ed that everyone my age eventually becomes sexually attracted to someone - and that if you didn't, you were just a late bloomer or "hadn't met the right person yet".I accepted this belief for a few years (until I was 17) when I started to doubt it since I still seemed to lack that particular area of interest in people (and I used to feel uncomfortable whenever my family would talk to me about having kids and shit).Eventually I was on Tumblr and came across someone else's blog who had "Asexual" in the description. I was curious since I had never heard of this label before and decided to Google it.SUDDENLY IT ALL MADE SENSE. I knew right away I was asexual. Like an instinctive knowing.However, I also became confused because I was like, "Okay I'm Asexual...but I also like men. Doesn't that make me heterosexual? Can I be BOTH? Is that even THING?!" As it turns out, that was indeed a thing!And then I discovered the shit ton of Asexual variations and became even more confused with myself! :DIt got to a point where I was like "Okay so I am either heteromantic, demisexual, ect,ect" and before you know it I had like 5 possibilities I could be and I was like "well shit..."One of them was "Biromantic" and that was the moment where I first properly considered the possibility of liking women as well.You see, much like how I was clueless to asexuality and the numerous variations of it. I was also clueless to the concept that being Bisexual didn't always mean liking both genders equally. There is a bit more fluidity to it than you would expect.I always thought that in order to be bisexual you had to like men and women about 50% each, evenly.But I learned that it's perfectly normal to have a particular preference or leaning towards a specific gender and still like the other one even if not as prominent as the other. In fact, I'm pretty sure it's common.I never considered myself Bi because growing up I always seemed to have crushes on boys and would only occassionally have crushes on girls (which due to my upbringing I didn't acknowledge as attraction because, "you're either gay or straight")Being asexual also made this difficult for me because I didn't have that "sexual attraction" aspect that helped me to figure this stuff out easily.But I always imagined myself with a boy or girl romantically, doing cute stuff like going to places together or being affectionate. It just so happens that 80% of the time it was a boy. So it turned out that I AM in fact Bisexual. I just have more of a leaning towards males than females.And this is the belief I've held for 4 years now and it's definitely the most accurate for me.____I guess what I'm trying to say amongst all my nonsensical rambling is...Sexuality is confusing.There are people who know early on who they are and what they like.And then you get other people who don't figure things out till wayyy later in life.And both of those things are totally okay! It's perfectly normal to not know your sexuality and to figure things out. And sometimes figuring out your sexuality can take a really bizarre road you never expected to take - but you'll still get there eventually in the end.Hell, sometimes you can identify as something for a long time before realizing you are actually something else (like a bisexual realizing they are actually pansexual, for example)Apologies if none of this helps you. This is just my personal self discovery story.But I do think it's worth acknowledging the fact that you can be bisexual even if you prefer one gender over the other.Because I feel like it's often that element that confuses Bisexuals into identifying as Bi. If you like the opposite gender and have no interest in the same gender then you are most likely straight.If there is a part of you that feels otherwise however, then maybe it's worth investigating that side further and seeing what will come of it.I don't know what struggles you are having with your sexuality, but you'll get there eventually I promise. :) i believe in you ❤

[0poole]

LGBTQABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

 Gee, I hate being the first one to say this, but it’s Pride month. Wow. How could no one be talking about this? Crazy.

Okay but like, it’s impossible to avoid this stuff, and it probably won’t stop till the end of next month, so might as well dish out some thoughts on everything here. Just thoughts, with no agenda behind them. Gotta make that clear because people tend to go ham with stuff otherwise.

First of all, I’m bi, and basically on the edge of being trans as well. Basically, here’s where I am on that spectrum:

I want to become a girl for fetish purposes. Maybe not entirely that, but it’s close enough to say it. Or, you know, maybe just wanting to get fucked by a dude in a different hole is just what every male-to-female transsexual wants? Apart from that, the only thing stopping me from going through with that is the technology. Basically, what they’ll be doing is giving me a vagina, and that’s pretty much it, unless I want to slap some plastic on my face. It’s not satisfying enough, and considering I’m totally okay with being male, It’s extremely not worth it for me. But, if I woke up one day and by chance I had magically turned into a girl overnight, then I am IN THE MONEY. Sounds dope. Why fondle other peoples’ tits when I can fondle my own?

As for bisexual-ism, I’d have to go far as to say that I’m not just ignoring the concept of pansexuality in lieu of something more familiar (even though that’s kinda-sorta also the reason but not really). I’m actually just not attracted to trans people for some reason. I’m obviously okay with it on a moral standpoint, but like... I just don’t feel it. Maybe it’s just something deep in the back of my mind going like “ehhhh.... something ain’t right here.” What’s weird is that I would DIE for futa girls. Maybe I just like dick and also every womanly part. Who knows.

And, if you’re asking yourself, “why’s this guy bringing up his porn tastes all of a sudden?” then literally WHAT DO YOU THINK SEXUALITY IS? Also thank you kind strawman, for letting me tie this into my main point of how I hope all sexuality will eventually become as pointless and irrelevant to a person’s being as their hair color.

Seriously, sexuality is a sex thing. And as far as I understand it, romantic interest is a different field from sexuality? That’s fair. Some people just want to fuck, others don’t want to fuck. Makes sense, but it kind of ties into one thing I hate about this whole movement: everything’s gotta be a title. Every slight iteration from another thing has it’s own entire label to it. How do you expect people to care about your movement if they have to learn a whole new language to understand what’s going on? It’s kinda the same thing with politics. Instead of saying I’m a “democrat” or whatever, all I want to do is tell you what I believe and go from there, no preconceived notions about things other people with the same title did or said or whatever. Instead of being a “aromantic pansexual,” you could just say “Everyone’s on the table, but I’m not much into dating and all that” and suddenly you as a being become a lot more tangible to other people. Obviously there are worse things people are doing for the cause, but even I’m getting annoyed at some of these extremely specific titles people are using. (I was about to type “demisexual” into that stereotypical example, but I looked it up, and it turns out it’s more on the romantic side of things, I guess? Look it up, it’s literally a “””sexuality””” that applies to most of the population, and yet it needs a label too)

And if you want to make things super specific, you know, to clarify that you’re into literally EVERYONE and not just “”everyone,”” then just realize it doesn’t actually matter to anyone who you’re not considering as a significant other. Like I said, sexuality is a sex thing. You wouldn’t want someone going around saying “Man, I really wish someone would tie me to a table and fuck me with a giant horsecock dildo right about now!” because that’s sex stuff, and we keep that on the DL, as the kids say. Although, I’d have to imagine that people bring it up out of the political-ness of it all, since that’s just how things are nowadays. 

And obviously you got the people who make their sexuality a major part of their person. Everyone knows they suck at this point, no need to beat a dead horse.

Here’s another thing I hate: People who make assumptions on a fictional characters sexuality/gender based on their personality. Like, “Oh, she’s a tomboy? Must be a lesbian.” sort of thing. Believe me, I’m a-go on lesbo porn 100%, but actually seriously assuming a character is gay or something just because of their personality? Isn’t that one of the things we’re trying to avoid? Stereotyping? No? Maybe? It’s even worse when people get angry about other people saying they’re something else, but that ties into my next thing:

When someone sees one person saying/doing something stupid on the internet, and assuming that a tangible amount of people actually do stuff like that. There’s probably a term for it. Like, if you see someone on r/Tumblrinaction or whatever going “It’s okay to rape boys but not girls.” a good number of people would instantly assume even a vaguely noticeable number of people believe that, just because they saw a meme of it online. Then, you get an actually tangible number of people getting angry about the original thing, even though, proportionally speaking, so many more people are angry about it then there are people actually saying/doing the thing. 

Where does it apply here? Well, last I checked there’s like 90K tweets about a so-called “Straight Pride Parade” going on somewhere on planet Earth. Checked the tab, everyone’s exclusively complaining about the concept. No actual news, only people reacting to other people reacting to other people reacting, etc. No, actually, guess what, here’s the news, from good ol’ Twitter Moments themselves: “THREE men in Boston...” THREE. It’s literally a tiny friend group of mindless white guys going “Hey, we should have a pride parade too!” and suddenly the entire internet folds upon them. And now, guess what? Now all the worse straight guys know about it, and feel vindicated to advocate for it, so guess what? You played yoselves.

But, there’s the tie-in to the next thought: What about these “Straight Pride,” “It’s okay to be White,” “It’s okay to be Male” types? You know, people at the top of the charts trying to start the same movements as the people below them. To be honest, I really don’t think these people are worth getting so goddamn uppity about. I mean, assholes aren’t worth getting uppity about in any case, but specifically in this case. The thing about those ideas is that they’re “”””””literally””””””” true and fair, but the thing is that that’s not the issue here. Yes, it’s okay to be white, straight, and male, but like... That’s not the discussion. The whole point of what’s going on is people trying to rise up in the rankings. Some idiots on the internet may want to put the top people below them, but as mentioned 2 ideas ago, that’s not the majority. Reasonable people would only want to put the straight, white, male people below them if they, specifically, individually, are being an asshole about everything. Then, that’s about you as a person, not what you are. 

Back to the Straight Pride Parade specifically, aren’t these “pride parades” supposed to exist to make you feel better about your body and whatnot? If some jackasses feel better about themselves, and do so in a fashion that isn’t harmful to other people, then who cares? I’m assuming it’s not in the spirit of things to go to a normal pride parade and be like “FUCK STRAIGHT PEOPLE” so as long as the straight people don’t do the opposite either, who cares? It’s a net increase of happiness in the world. Sure, they haven’t gone through as many hardships throughout history, but should you really need to go through hardship to get together with other people to feel better about themselves? I hope the answer is no. You know, just because the idea I mentioned 3 ideas ago is bullshit doesn’t mean it doesn’t actually affect people.

Frankly, why can’t we just have a Sexuality Pride Parade, where literally everyone, no matter what, can join in? If unity’s the goal, why not actually be all-inclusive? I mean, like I said, I want to live my life around the idea that sexuality/gender matters as much to any random person as their hair color, but until that becomes the norm at least try and make it fit for everyone to join in. You can’t exactly fix anything if you just keep it all to the people who’d support you anyway because they’re in the same boat. 

Oh and expect me to gush about Pokemon tomorrow, because I most certainly will.

[madforskating]

Out of the darkness and into the sun: my coming-out story

On Thursday, October 11, I decided to share a little secret. Yep, I like both boys and girls! That’s all! Thanks for coming! I wish it was that simple for everyone. Growing up homeschooled in the middle of nowhere, I didn’t know many other kids, other than my baby cousins. I watched plenty of sappy romantic comedy movies with my mom to understand the concept of straight romantic love: it was something beautiful that I would probably want when I was older. I learned about the birds and the bees when I was 11, reading one of those big fancy science books, and was, to be honest, a little disappointed to find out that was how it all worked. I understood it was necessary for the world to go round, but it just didn’t seem romantic to me, and my mom told me it’d make sense when I was 30. My first crush happened at 12, on a 20-year-old male figure skater – mostly because of his beaming personality and warm smile, which I interpreted as “cute”. It was an innocent, normal case of childish sheep’s eyes. But things got very complicated soon after. I started to notice the very beautiful female skaters. At first I called them my “girl crushes” – the word straight girls use for pretty females they admire, even though they don’t intend on dating them. But as I grew older and hormones kicked in, I definitely knew something was up. I knew that there were gay people in the world, but I couldn’t call myself a lesbian if I still liked guys, right? I had never even heard the word bisexual until I was 13, and at the time I thought it meant someone who dressed as both genders 🙈 When I discovered its correct meaning, I thought, “Wait, is that me?” But I didn’t know for sure. First of all, I am not strongly attracted to men. I definitely think some men are handsome, sweet husband material, but I don’t have that overwhelming sexual attraction to them. On the other hand, there are a few ladies I definitely see as sexy, but I’ve never dated a girl before and I’m not sure how far I would go. A bi friend of mine recently explained that bisexual just means you’re attracted to both males and females, and at this age it’s perfectly normal (and advisable!) not to be interested in “the facts of life” yet. I might grow into it, like Mama always said, or I might be biromantic – attracted to both sexes and craving a close relationship like a marriage, but not necessarily a sexual relationship. As of now, I honestly don’t know, and I’m okay with that. I’m just going to take this one day at a time. I started strongly suspecting I was bi in March of this year, and I admitted it to myself during the summer. One of my sweet Twitter friends, who has been openly gay for many years, called it “coming out to yourself”. It was a bit of a shock to me; I had always seen LGBT people as a group I accepted, but didn’t belong to. But once I had figured out where I stood, I could start my journey of telling others. A huge factor in my coming out story is a Twitter friend I met several months ago. She was in her early 20s, but she was finally starting to accept she was bi. I told her something like, “it’s something I’ve wondered about myself tbh” and after a while I started to tell her my story. After I had told her, I decided I would tell my straight friends soon. I was sitting on it for a while, trying to come up with the best time to casually bring it up. But then I saw that National Coming Out Day was coming up and I thought on a whim, “No better time than the present!” Was I scared? YES! But I reminded myself of all the people who inspired me – Eric Radford, my first LGBT role model; Adam Rippon, who represented both the Stars and Stripes and the rainbow with style this Olympics; Karina Manta, a Team USA ice dancer who came out as bisexual less than two weeks ago; and all the people – heterosexual or otherwise – who are just fearlessly themselves. And I want to be one of those people who share their whole self with the world. In the words of John Legend, “I give you all of me.” My mom has always been my biggest supporter. She has practically raised me on her own, homeschooled me for over a decade, and been there through every problem I’ve ever had in my life. Since she knows literally everything about me and we talk all the time, it really wasn’t the big scary conversation I imagined it would be. She said she guessed there had been something going on for a while, and I’d tell her when I was ready. I’m still trying to explain all the details, but so far so good. After we talked, I logged onto Twitter to come out to my online friends. Many of them were utterly shocked because I had never even hinted at being bi. I hadn’t even told my very closest friends – girls I chat with on a daily basis about literally EVERYTHING. It wasn’t that I was afraid to tell them; I just wanted to make sure I was 100% bi before I shouted it from the rooftops. They all accepted me so warmly, I cannot even describe it. Twitter people I know only casually were quick to give me a “good for you!” or “you’re so brave to share your story, of course we will support you!”. One of the most beautiful things about the figure skating community is how LGBT-friendly they are. This is how the rest of the world should be. I was a bit worried that one of my friends, who is a devout Christian, wouldn’t understand. I even sent her a long dm trying to explain what it all meant. And she replied, “I’m not gonna lie…I am a little shocked. But this doesn’t change how I feel about you. I still love you like a sister and I’ll always be one of your best friends!” That was one of the most satisfying moments in this little journey. So far, I’ve gotten nothing but positive feedback. I know there will be haters – there always are – but I am proud of who I am, and I have an army of people who support me. The truth is, many young LGBT people can’t just tell their parents without fear or disapproval or even disownment, and the public is another story altogether. I feel so blessed to have a mom who understands that a person is so much more than a sexual orientation. To all of you who are not in a position where you can come out yet, hold on. I don’t know if y’all are religious, but I believe God made us exactly the way He wanted us to be for a reason. I’m also thankful I can’t say I ever experienced the “long years in the closet” most people describe. I’ve heard so many people who know they are LGBT from as young as 5 years old, and don’t come out until adulthood. Since I didn’t even know I was bi until I was a teen and didn’t confirm it until earlier this year, there were honestly only a few months where I felt like I couldn’t share that part of me, as well as about two years where I was just plain confused. It’s pretty hard to hide something in a closet when you don’t even know what you’re trying to put in there. For me, it’s not really “coming out”, it’s “making a discovery and sharing it with the world”. I haven’t told my whole family, like my more traditional grandparents. And that’s okay with me. I’m not in a rush to tell everyone. If I’m in a serious relationship with a woman and I’m bringing her to meet the in-laws, then of course I’ll tell them. But while I’m young and single, I don’t see why they need to know about it. It’s not because I’m ashamed of who I am; it’s because it’s really none of their business 😉 Right now, telling my mom is enough. And that’s it. I’m out, I’m proud, I’m happy. This is not the only thing that makes me who I am. I am a writer, a student, a crazy figure skating fan, an artist, and just a girl who is about to celebrate her 16th birthday next month. I’m just glad I will be able to start my dating life knowing exactly where I stand, and I hope to eventually meet that special someone who takes my breath away. This was a long and probably very confusing post, so feel free to ask questions if you’re unclear on anything! Love you guys! 😘

[multiple-fandomimagines]

Billy Hargrove Masterlist *updated 2/15/21*

NONE OF THESE ARE MINE!!! I did NOT write any of these! I believe they are amazing fanfics, written by insanely talented people, and deserve to be shared. ALL CREDIT GOES TO THE AUTHORS!!!

Billy x Steve

Bad by flippyspoon (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Billy Hargrove & Eleven)(Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield) Billy hates the cold but he takes walks in the snowy woods anyway. Never know who you'll meet there.

Pain, Will You Return It? by shocked_into_shame (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) When Billy gets beaten to a literal pulp by his dad, the police get involved. Billy has to come to terms with what he has done to those around him. He doesn't want to be like his dad. Especially when he sees Steve Harrington. When he sees Steve, he wants to be good.

Marquee Moons by flippyspoon (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) Billy helps out with some demodog bustin'.

The Moon-Birds by flippyspoon (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Billy Hargrove & Eleven) Where Billy goes on Friday afternoons.

Holiday’s at the Henderson’s by ohmbgosh (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) For some reason Steve really wants Dustin to get along with Billy. Since it's almost Christmas, Dustin reluctantly gives it a shot.

To Build a Home by inkyreveries (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) In which Neil Hargrove dies and Billy and Steve go back to Hawkins.

Runaway by ohmbgosh (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Billy Hargrove & Jim Hopper)(Billy Hargrove & Eleven) Jim Hopper just wants to find a Christmas present for his telepathic daughter. He didn't ask for all these extra teenagers in his home.

Saint Anger by maikurosaki(Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)Hopper sighed and scratched his beard. “Look, kid, the reason why I’m offering you a second chance is because you need it. You don’t deserve it, but you need it. So I got your back.” Or how, on his harrowing road to redemption (because second chances don’t come easy), Billy Hargrove loses a good-for-nothing father, but gains a tough little sister, a giant older brother, a preppy boyfriend, and an obnoxious pack of nerds, not necessarily in this particular order.

Angels Come To Us Disguised by AuthorsBane (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Protective Parent Jim Hopper)It’s a quiet night in Hawkins. That is, until Chief Hopper receives news he would have been able to live without. What follows is the worst night on call he can imagine once Billy Hargrove and Steve Harrington get involved.

"It's like the Body Snatchers!" by ChangeTheCircumstances (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) Max wonders if her life will ever be normal again, if anything can be normal in a place like Hawkins. She doubts it but there's at least one thing she's sure of: the last person to ever realize what's really going on in this crazy place will be Billy. No way would anything supernatural ever happen to him.

Don't Tell Me There's No Hope At All/ Together We Stand, Divided We Fall by Straight_Outta_Hobbiton (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) Billy's used to being afraid of his father, and he knows he's not the only one scared. But it's one thing to know your stepmother gets smacked around every once in a while and another thing completely to find her body on the bathroom floor.He's a mess, Max is even more of a mess, and Joyce Byers is a queen among mothers, she really is.

Hargrove by petersnotkingyet (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) “Chief?” “Yeah?” Hopper responded. It was barely eight o’clock; he’d just made it to the office. “Principal Wallace needs you down at the high school. The Hargrove kid’s sleeping in his car again, and they can’t get him to wake up.”

stand (in the place where you live) by Boardingschooled (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) After the gate is closed, Billy Hargrove has to face the consequences of what he's done, and it's all thanks to Hopper and his habit of taking in strays. Alternatively: Billy becomes a good big brother, learns how to apologize, and makes some very gay mixtapes, not in that order.

Holding Out For A Hero by TumbleTree Billy had never cared for the kids Steve called his own. He had already started tolerating them for Max’s sake and not because she almost busted his nuts that one time with the baseball bat. But when Steve had looked at him with those big brown eyes, begging him to keep an eye on the kids while he was on some ‘vacation’ with his asshole parents Billy couldn’t say no.So fuck Steve for putting him in all the situations that followed that conversation. He owed him a ton of blow jobs for all the shit he had to put up with now.—Five times Billy protected their kids and the one time they protected him...sort of.

We Slip And Slide by CallieB It came from the Discord, y'all.Pure indulgent post-S3 fluff, including but not limited to the discussed concepts of: - Billy moving in with Joyce - The Jonathan/Billy friendship we all need - Grouchy Hopper - Jonathan and Billy smoking weed together and arguing about music. Because punk and metal are two different things. BUT they unite against Steve’s taste - Robin and Jonathan being excellent wing-persons - Hop and Billy teaming up against Mike to protect El - Shovel talks all round - Robin being clever and eating popcorn - The you rule/you suck board

the greatest adventure is the family you've searched for coming alive by ThePackWantstheD Billy spends a night fighting monsters with a crowbar in his hand after Harrington knocks him into the Byers' fridge.In the aftermath, he and Max call a ceasefire.or: Billy Hargrove gets the family he deserves in the form of three children taking up the seats of the camaro, in the form of Billy teaching Max that she can be as badass as she wants without being less of a girl because Billy taking care of himself doesn't make him less of a man, in the form of the blood and bruises and broken bones that Eleven and Billy share, in the form of Will Byers learning that he's not the only boy in Hawkins who wants to kiss other boys.

The Great Escape by flippyspoon  Hopper's been in a cell in Kamchatka for three months. He's got a routine and he takes it one day at a time. And then a certain blonde bad boy from Hawkins shows up.

Limits by That_Is_Americas_Ass Everyone has their limits.Max has just finally hit hers.She's done with hiding behind closed doors listening to her step-father Neil hurt her brother, his own flesh and blood son, beyond reason and without remorse. She's done watching her own mother cower in ignorance behind a mask of indifference. She's done hiding in the dark while Billy takes the abuse to try and save her from the heartless man who dared call himself their father.Of all the monsters lurking in Hawkins, who would have guessed the worst of them all was living in Max's own home?

Shovel Talk(s) by Invaderdumbass Max wasn’t a great sister, hell she wasn’t even a decent sister until recently. It took her brother dying, El spilling the secrets that lurk in her home, then him coming back to life for her to shape up.Or a bit of a Max Mayfield character study and everyones got an opinion on Billy and Steve getting together.

Billy & Max

Fleetwood Max by ohmbgosh (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Protective Billy Hargrove)(Protective Max Mayfield)(Protective Siblings) One time Max stands up for Billy, and one time he returns the favor

Bad by flippyspoon (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Billy Hargrove & Eleven)(Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield) Billy hates the cold but he takes walks in the snowy woods anyway. Never know who you'll meet there.

Still Water by Major (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield) The Hargrove household is not a happy home. Billy and Max find a way to get through it together.

"It's like the Body Snatchers!" by ChangeTheCircumstances (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) Max wonders if her life will ever be normal again, if anything can be normal in a place like Hawkins. She doubts it but there's at least one thing she's sure of: the last person to ever realize what's really going on in this crazy place will be Billy. No way would anything supernatural ever happen to him.

Still Water by Major (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield) The Hargrove household is not a happy home. Billy and Max find a way to get through it together. 

Don't Tell Me There's No Hope At All/ Together We Stand, Divided We Fall by Straight_Outta_Hobbiton (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) Billy's used to being afraid of his father, and he knows he's not the only one scared. But it's one thing to know your stepmother gets smacked around every once in a while and another thing completely to find her body on the bathroom floor.He's a mess, Max is even more of a mess, and Joyce Byers is a queen among mothers, she really is.

stand (in the place where you live) by Boardingschooled (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington) After the gate is closed, Billy Hargrove has to face the consequences of what he's done, and it's all thanks to Hopper and his habit of taking in strays. Alternatively: Billy becomes a good big brother, learns how to apologize, and makes some very gay mixtapes, not in that order.

proud by mercytio (scundtrack) (Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield)(Steve Harrington & Max Mayfield) max graduates and steve tells her exactly what she needed to hear

Little Boy Blue by AfterGlow13 "Billy would never admit this to anyone, least of all himself, but he still felt like a child. A little boy, barely coming up to his Dad's elbows. Like that kid, Adam, whom he and Heather had brought to the monster. It had almost been too easy. His parents were split, and when it was his father's turn to pick him up from swim lessons he was guaranteed to be 45 minutes late. Billy had scooped him up, one hand over his mouth, and Heather had waited with the trunk of the car open.These were the thoughts Billy was sweating with in the July heat. He'd never liked the cold, and found he liked it even less now. The fan sat in the corner, unplugged."The story of how Billy gets a radio, too.

the greatest adventure is the family you've searched for coming alive by ThePackWantstheD Billy spends a night fighting monsters with a crowbar in his hand after Harrington knocks him into the Byers' fridge.In the aftermath, he and Max call a ceasefire.or: Billy Hargrove gets the family he deserves in the form of three children taking up the seats of the camaro, in the form of Billy teaching Max that she can be as badass as she wants without being less of a girl because Billy taking care of himself doesn't make him less of a man, in the form of the blood and bruises and broken bones that Eleven and Billy share, in the form of Will Byers learning that he's not the only boy in Hawkins who wants to kiss other boys.

Selfish little girl by Multifandom_damnation  Susan always said that she loved her daughter and that nothing would ever change that, but Max soon finds out that the only thing that could change it very quickly is pointing out how much of a prick her new step-father is, and taking Billy's side over Neil's. Susan doesn't deal with this very well, but thankfully, Billy will always be there to pick up the pieces and fix what his father broke.

I Dump Your Ass by That_Is_Americas_Ass After a misunderstanding between Max and Lucas, Max dumps him. Lucas has no idea how to get back on Max's good side after she gets mad at him. He messed up good this time. It wasn't just him though, the guys all screwed up and unknowingly pushed Max away, making her feel like she was an outsider rather than a member of the party.To make things right, they will need help.In a last act of desperation, Lucas goes to the last person he wants to to ask for help.Billy Hargrove.

Limits by That_Is_Americas_Ass Everyone has their limits.Max has just finally hit hers.She's done with hiding behind closed doors listening to her step-father Neil hurt her brother, his own flesh and blood son, beyond reason and without remorse. She's done watching her own mother cower in ignorance behind a mask of indifference. She's done hiding in the dark while Billy takes the abuse to try and save her from the heartless man who dared call himself their father.Of all the monsters lurking in Hawkins, who would have guessed the worst of them all was living in Max's own home?

Shovel Talk(s) by Invaderdumbass Max wasn’t a great sister, hell she wasn’t even a decent sister until recently. It took her brother dying, El spilling the secrets that lurk in her home, then him coming back to life for her to shape up.Or a bit of a Max Mayfield character study and everyones got an opinion on Billy and Steve getting together.

You always were the one to wear the pants by Multifandom_damnation  Susan wants her daughter to be more feminine and to change the way she looks under the superstition that she'll never fall in love looking like a man, but Billy thinks that's a load of bullshit, and knows exactly what to do to fix it.

Sink or Swim by That_Is_Americas_Ass It was supposed to be a relaxing day at the pool.Nancy had agreed to take the kids swimming so they could have a change of scenery. Sure, Hawkins Public Pool was a little crowded but the brats all agreed to stay away from the deep end.What could possibly go wrong?Let's hope nothing does go wrong, because it's Billy's day off and that new lifeguard sure as hell isn't paying attention.

Billy & Eleven

Runaway by ohmbgosh (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Billy Hargrove & Jim Hopper)(Billy Hargrove & Eleven) Jim Hopper just wants to find a Christmas present for his telepathic daughter. He didn't ask for all these extra teenagers in his home.

The Moon-Birds by flippyspoon (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Billy Hargrove & Eleven) Where Billy goes on Friday afternoons.

Bad by flippyspoon (Billy Hargrove x Steve Harrington)(Billy Hargrove & Eleven)(Billy Hargrove & Max Mayfield) Billy hates the cold but he takes walks in the snowy woods anyway. Never know who you'll meet there.

the moments that words don't reach by writerblender (Billy Hargrove & Eleven) The girl swallows hard before she speaks again. "Like Papa?" Billy's heart just about stops in his chest [or how billy hargrove befriended a quiet, curled-haired superhero]

the greatest adventure is the family you've searched for coming alive by ThePackWantstheD Billy spends a night fighting monsters with a crowbar in his hand after Harrington knocks him into the Byers' fridge.In the aftermath, he and Max call a ceasefire.or: Billy Hargrove gets the family he deserves in the form of three children taking up the seats of the camaro, in the form of Billy teaching Max that she can be as badass as she wants without being less of a girl because Billy taking care of himself doesn't make him less of a man, in the form of the blood and bruises and broken bones that Eleven and Billy share, in the form of Will Byers learning that he's not the only boy in Hawkins who wants to kiss other boys.

Day 348 by HashtagLEH El is certain she's dying. She's bleeding and in pain and Hopper isn't picking up on the radio, so she runs out of the cabin to find him.Billy came out to be alone one day before he would have to join the kids of Hawkins High. El stumbles upon his car.*Or, El gets her period for the first time, panics, and then causes Billy to panic because he too thinks she's dying before he realizes he's going to have to explain women's bodies to a twelve-year-old he doesn't even know the name of. Somehow, despite not knowing why he even bothers, it turns out okay.

Billy & Will Byers

Along Deserted Avenues by PuddingsWithProblems (Billy Hargrove & Will Byers) Billy was just trying to get to his car he didn't exactly plan to play knight in shining armour to a 12 year old.

the greatest adventure is the family you've searched for coming alive by ThePackWantstheD Billy spends a night fighting monsters with a crowbar in his hand after Harrington knocks him into the Byers' fridge.In the aftermath, he and Max call a ceasefire.or: Billy Hargrove gets the family he deserves in the form of three children taking up the seats of the camaro, in the form of Billy teaching Max that she can be as badass as she wants without being less of a girl because Billy taking care of himself doesn't make him less of a man, in the form of the blood and bruises and broken bones that Eleven and Billy share, in the form of Will Byers learning that he's not the only boy in Hawkins who wants to kiss other boys.

Billy & The Party 

Holding Out For A Hero by TumbleTree Billy had never cared for the kids Steve called his own. He had already started tolerating them for Max’s sake and not because she almost busted his nuts that one time with the baseball bat. But when Steve had looked at him with those big brown eyes, begging him to keep an eye on the kids while he was on some ‘vacation’ with his asshole parents Billy couldn’t say no.So fuck Steve for putting him in all the situations that followed that conversation. He owed him a ton of blow jobs for all the shit he had to put up with now.—Five times Billy protected their kids and the one time they protected him...sort of.

I Dump Your Ass by That_Is_Americas_Ass After a misunderstanding between Max and Lucas, Max dumps him. Lucas has no idea how to get back on Max's good side after she gets mad at him. He messed up good this time. It wasn't just him though, the guys all screwed up and unknowingly pushed Max away, making her feel like she was an outsider rather than a member of the party.To make things right, they will need help.In a last act of desperation, Lucas goes to the last person he wants to to ask for help.Billy Hargrove.

[wit-craft]

sorry if this is weird and random but do u know any good books with lesbian characters? u just seem like the type of person who would

First of all, can I just say I’m thrilled that i give off that impression? Clearly, I’m doing something right. Second, yes! I do! Not as many as I’d like, but still (also, I’m including bi girls because it does widen the the selection a little.)

Adaption by Malinda Lo

Reese can’t remember anything from the time between the accident and the day she woke up almost a month later. She only knows one thing: She’s different now.

Across North America, flocks of birds hurl themselves into airplanes, causing at least a dozen to crash. Thousands of people die. Fearing terrorism, the United States government grounds all flights, and millions of travelers are stranded.

Reese and her debate team partner and longtime crush David are in Arizona when it happens. Everyone knows the world will never be the same. On their drive home to San Francisco, along a stretch of empty highway at night in the middle of Nevada, a bird flies into their headlights. The car flips over. When they wake up in a military hospital, the doctor won’t tell them what happened, where they are—or how they’ve been miraculously healed.

Things become even stranger when Reese returns home. San Francisco feels like a different place with police enforcing curfew, hazmat teams collecting dead birds, and a strange presence that seems to be following her. When Reese unexpectedly collides with the beautiful Amber Gray, her search for the truth is forced in an entirely new direction—and threatens to expose a vast global conspiracy that the government has worked for decades to keep secret.

they’re sci-fi YA novels with a bi main character and they’re really fun!! There is a love triangle, but it’s resolved super well in the sequel, Inheritance. I promise even if you hate love triangles (I do) just stick it. I don’t want to spoil anything but like… trust me.

The Summer I Wasn’t Me by Jessica Verdi

She never meant for her mom to find out. And now she’s afraid that what’s left of her family is going to fall apart for good.

Lexi knows she can fix everything. She can change. She can learn to like boys. New Horizons summer camp has promised to transform her life, and there’s nothing she wants more than to start over.

But sometimes love has its own path…

This is just about the only realistic fiction/coming out story on here— I’m usually not a huge fan. But I read this when I was younger and first coming to terms with my sexuality so it gets a spot.

Ash by Malinda Lo

In the wake of her father’s death, Ash is left at the mercy of her cruel stepmother. Consumed with grief, her only joy comes by the light of the dying hearth fire, rereading the fairy tales her mother once told her. In her dreams, someday the fairies will steal her away, as they are said to do. When she meets the dark and dangerous fairy Sidhean, she believes that her wish may be granted.

The day that Ash meets Kaisa, the King’s Huntress, her heart begins to change. Instead of chasing fairies, Ash learns to hunt with Kaisa. Though their friendship is as delicate as a new bloom, it reawakens Ash’s capacity for love-and her desire to live. But Sidhean has already claimed Ash for his own, and she must make a choice between fairy tale dreams and true love.

Entrancing, empowering, and romantic, Ash is about the connection between life and love, and solitude and death, where transformation can come from even the deepest grief.

Have you ever wondered what Cinderella would be like if it were gay and had proper faeries? Wonder no more; Ash is the book for you! Seriously though, Lo is a godsend when it comes to queer si-fi/fantasy YA fiction. She has a couple more books that I haven’t read yet but look just as good.

And I Darken by Kiersten White

No one expects a princess to be brutal. And Lada Dragwlya likes it that way. Ever since she and her gentle younger brother, Radu, were wrenched from their homeland of Wallachia and abandoned by their father to be raised in the Ottoman courts, Lada has known that being ruthless is the key to survival. She and Radu are doomed to act as pawns in a vicious game, an unseen sword hovering over their every move. For the lineage that makes them special also makes them targets.

Lada despises the Ottomans and bides her time, planning her vengeance for the day when she can return to Wallachia and claim her birthright. Radu longs only for a place where he feels safe. And when they meet Mehmed, the defiant and lonely son of the sultan, Radu feels that he’s made a true friend—and Lada wonders if she’s finally found someone worthy of her passion.

But Mehmed is heir to the very empire that Lada has sworn to fight against—and that Radu now considers home. Together, Lada, Radu, and Mehmed form a toxic triangle that strains the bonds of love and loyalty to the breaking point.

Okay so… technically, this one probably doesn’t really belong on this list but like. Guys. It’s so good. And there are lesbians, they’re just not quite main characters, and there’s other queer characters who have larger parts. It’s based on the stories of Vlad the Impaler, re-imagined if he were a woman. The pov characters are Lada (Vlad) and her brother Radu, and I love them, and their messy ass relationship, both so much. It’s all set in the royal court of the ottoman empire, in the midst of the crusades, and there’s so much about fascinating political-religious tensions, and it’s historical fiction (queer historical fiction!!! (queer historical fiction not set in Western Europe!!!)). The sequel is Now I Rise, and features the lesbians more heavily.

The Dark Wife by Sarah Diemer

Three thousand years ago, a god told a lie. Now, only a goddess can tell the truth. Persephone has everything a daughter of Zeus could want–except for freedom. She lives on the green earth with her mother, Demeter, growing up beneath the ever-watchful eyes of the gods and goddesses on Mount Olympus. But when Persephone meets the enigmatic Hades, she experiences something new: choice. Zeus calls Hades “lord” of the dead as a joke. In truth, Hades is the goddess of the underworld, and no friend of Zeus. She offers Persephone sanctuary in her land of the dead, so the young goddess may escape her Olympian destiny. But Persephone finds more than freedom in the underworld. She finds love, and herself.

Have you ever thought Ancient Greek Myths were too heterosexual? Probably not, but now they’re even gayer! A re-imagining of Hades and Persephone where Hades is a woman. It’s a really quick read with a great love story and I highly recommend it.

Girls Made of Snow and Glass by Melissa Bashardoust

At sixteen, Mina’s mother is dead, her magician father is vicious, and her silent heart has never beat with love for anyone—has never beat at all, in fact, but she’d always thought that fact normal. She never guessed that her father cut out her heart and replaced it with one of glass. When she moves to Whitespring Castle and sees its king for the first time, Mina forms a plan: win the king’s heart with her beauty, become queen, and finally know love. The only catch is that she’ll have to become a stepmother.Fifteen-year-old Lynet looks just like her late mother, and one day she discovers why: a magician created her out of snow in the dead queen’s image, at her father’s order. But despite being the dead queen made flesh, Lynet would rather be like her fierce and regal stepmother, Mina. She gets her wish when her father makes Lynet queen of the southern territories, displacing Mina. Now Mina is starting to look at Lynet with something like hatred, and Lynet must decide what to do—and who to be—to win back the only mother she’s ever known…or else defeat her once and for all.Entwining the stories of both Lynet and Mina in the past and present, Girls Made of Snow and Glass traces the relationship of two young women doomed to be rivals from the start. Only one can win all, while the other must lose everything—unless both can find a way to reshape themselves and their story. 

I am a sucker for a good adaption of myths and fairy tales, and this is probably my favorite. The plot, the concept… it’s so original and just absolutely delicious. The writing was good, if not the best I’ve ever read, but the characters were wonderful. Also, I picked it up without knowing it was gay, so I was very pleasantly surprised. Oh, but don’t worry– Mina and Lynet aren’t together, there’s no weird stepmother/daughter shit going on. They have separate love stories.

Fingersmith by Sarah Waters

Sue Trinder is an orphan, left as an infant in the care of Mrs. Sucksby, a “baby farmer,” who raised her with unusual tenderness, as if Sue were her own. Mrs. Sucksby’s household, with its fussy babies calmed with doses of gin, also hosts a transient family of petty thieves—fingersmiths—for whom this house in the heart of a mean London slum is home.

One day, the most beloved thief of all arrives—Gentleman, an elegant con man, who carries with him an enticing proposition for Sue: If she wins a position as the maid to Maud Lilly, a naïve gentlewoman, and aids Gentleman in her seduction, then they will all share in Maud’s vast inheritance. Once the inheritance is secured, Maud will be disposed of—passed off as mad, and made to live out the rest of her days in a lunatic asylum.

With dreams of paying back the kindness of her adopted family, Sue agrees to the plan. Once in, however, Sue begins to pity her helpless mark and care for Maud Lilly in unexpected ways…But no one and nothing is as it seems in this Dickensian novel of thrills and reversals.

Betrayal! Unbetrayal! Mutual betrayal! Mutual unbetrayal! It’s a wild fucking ride y'all. It also gets pretty fucking dark, but there’s a happy… enough ending, because I don’t do shit without happy endings.

Every Day, David Levithan

Every day a different body. Every day a different life. Every day in love with the same girl.There’s never any warning about where it will be or who it will be. A has made peace with that, even established guidelines by which to live: Never get too attached. Avoid being noticed. Do not interfere.It’s all fine until the morning that A wakes up in the body of Justin and meets Justin’s girlfriend, Rhiannon. From that moment, the rules by which A has been living no longer apply. Because finally A has found someone he wants to be with—day in, day out, day after day.

Eh, I debated whether to put this on here. As you can see, it’s about a kid who wakes up in a different body every day– be it guy or girl. From what I recall, “A” themself doesn’t every assign a gender to themself, and the book is in first person from their perspective, but the Goodreads description does use he/him pronouns. I read it as a non-binary/genderfluid person who falls in love with a girl, and it’s a really good book, so. Take it or leave it, it’s up to you. On an unrelated note, I think there’s a movie coming out soon.

That’s all I can think of at the moment! Hope you find something you like.

[h-styles-babes]

No Control | Chapter Eight

Summary: 

Micky Bennett: college student, loyal friend, aspiring nurse, One Direction fan, Harry Styles enthusiast. Her best friend, Trevor, wins tickets to a show in New Jersey with meet and greet passes. Micky expects a quick photo op with the boys and a great night at the concert with her best friend. What she gets a whole lot more than she bargained for.

*Please feel free to reblog and send feedback. It’s much appreciated :)*

To read previous chapters, you can go here.

*Gif is not mine.*

EIGHT

Trevor comes back to the condo just after six, bearing the gift of Thai takeout. Not knowing what Harry likes, he just picked up two orders of curry and two orders of chicken pad thai for us all to share. Harry gets excited over the curry like a kid in a candy shop, claiming it’s his favourite, which is just as well. We sit around the dining table with the TV on in the background, Trevor telling us about his day.

“You didn’t sleep with him?” I ask in slight shock. Not that Trevor is a slag or anything, but he’s only ever had hookups with this Chris guy and has never shown interest in it being anything but sex.

“No. We went to Times Square and window shopped, which turned into me actually shopping. And we went to lunch and actually talked and had a good time. Then we went to Central Park and walked and talked more. I found out that he’s actually really funny and he’s a pretty good guy.” Trev seems a little surprised by the turn of events of his afternoon, too, which is pretty funny to watch.

“All the times you hooked up with this guy, and you never had a real conversation with him?” Harry asks, a little astounded. Like the notion of not at least knowing a little bit about your sexual partner is a foreign concept to him. Maybe it is. 

Trev shakes his head. “I met this guy at a frat party the second week of the school year. I thought he was straight, since he was hanging out with all his frat brothers, making lewd comments about girls there. Came onto me later that night by kissing me and pushing me into his room. It never went beyond booty calls for us. I just assumed he was closeted gay or bi.”

“You should know better than to assume, Trev,” I point out. People assume he’s straight all the time, which makes for awkward situations for the girls who try to come on to him. 

He rolls his eyes and clicks his chopsticks at me. “Yeah, yeah, I know, mother.”

“So are you gonna see him again, beyond a hookup?” Harry asks, mixing more of his curry with the white rice on his plate.

“We agreed to go out next weekend,” he admits, his cheeks tinging slightly pink. I smirk at him as he pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose to try to hide it. 

“Aw, Trevor has a crush!” I gush, genuinely excited. I’ve only ever seen Trevor actually interested in someone else once in our whole friendship, and the guy was very much straight. “Chris is really cute, too. Good job on that one.” I nod appreciatively at his selection. He has that typical frat boy look going, with the light brown hair, baby blue eyes, and snapbacks, but his broad shoulders, pretty smile, and constant scruff more than make up for it.

“Thank you, thank you.” He pretends to take a bow at the table.

Harry’s phone rings from his jeans pocket, interrupting our conversation. He sighs when he sees the name, but promptly answers it. He’s mostly quiet during the call, except for the occasional affirmation or hum. When he hangs up he sighs again.

“That was Paul. Lads wanna go out tonight.”

“And you don’t want to go with them?” I ask, slightly surprised. Harry seems like the type of guy that likes to take opportunities as they’re presented. A night out in NYC or even Jersey seems like something a twenty-one year old guy would jump at. Though, Harry isn’t a normal twenty-one year old guy.

“It’s not that. They’re all going out, so that means Paul needs to be there, which means I have to go.” He takes the last few bites of his food before moving to take it into the kitchen.

“Leave it, I’ve got it,” I assure, placing a hand on his arm to stop him. I’m sad that he’s got to go, considering how amazing the day has been. I’m also not sure that I’ll ever actually see him again, considering the two different worlds we come from. It’s bitter sweet, having had such an amazing day with this man who was little more than fantasy in my head for years. He’s so much more than I could ever had imagined, and I’m so hesitant to give that up. “C’mon, I’ll walk you out.”

Harry grabs onto my hand and presses a sweet kiss to my knuckles, lingering there for a few moments before letting me pull him up with me. 

“It was good meeting you, Trevor,” he says, flashing my friend a smile. “I hope your date with Chris goes well.”

Trevor grins and nods. “It was nice meeting you too, Styles. And thanks. I’ll Tweet at you  and let you know how it goes.” He winks at Harry, which makes me giggle.

Harry chuckles and nods. “I’m looking forward to it. On the edge of my seat.”

“Later, loser,” Trevor calls as I pull Harry out the door. Harry chuckles as he wraps his hands around my hips, pulling me to his chest. 

“I like him,” Harry nods decisively.

“Me, too. That’s why I’ve kept him around so long. Plus, he’s loaded. Who doesn’t want a rich best friend?” I say sarcastically.

Harry’s smile is wide before it softens as he looks over my face. “I’m gonna try to make it back out here tomorrow. We don’t leave for Ohio until the day after. You’ll be around?”

I nod. “I’ll be here,” I assure.

Harry reaches into his back pocket and hands me his phone. “Give me your number so I can get ahold of you.”

I bite my lip and put my number in his contacts list. When I look up to hand it back, Harry’s hand is out in front of me, palm up, one of his rings in the center. It’s black and silver in a braided pattern.

“Yes, Harry?” I ask.

“Just in case I don’t see you again while I’m in America. I want you to have something to remember me by.” He seems a little shy, a light pink tinge spreading across his cheeks. 

“Harry, I could never forget you. Besides the whole ‘A list celebrity’ thing, you’re a pretty unforgettable person.”

He bites his bottom lip as he grabs my left hand and slips the ring onto my thumb, the only one of my fingers that it’ll fit. It’s still warm from his skin.

“Still, I want you to have it.” I hear his phone ding in my hand, and we both look down to see there’s a new text from Paul, most likely urging Harry to get back to the car. Harry takes it from me and puts it back in his pocket. “I will try my best to be here tomorrow.”

He reaches up and cradles my head in his hands, his thumbs softly stroking the apples of my cheeks. I wrap my hands around his wrists just to feel his skin on mine. Harry leans in and very tenderly presses our lips together in a slow kiss. I can taste the spice of the curry on his lips, but there’s also his natural taste lingering underneath. It’s intoxicating in the best way possible, making my lips tingle and my heart rate to accelerate. 

When he pulls back, I feel his breath puff against my face. I open my eyes to him licking his lips.

“I have to go,” he whispers. He tucks a piece of my hair behind my ear.

I rub my lips together and nod. “I know. Have a good night with the others.” 

He smirks and shakes his head. “I’ll text you. I still have more to learn about you.”

True to his word, only half an hour after I watch him walk out of the building, my phone buzzes with a message from an unknown number.

Lads want to go clubbing. Don’t make me go!! Don’t pretend you’re not going to love it. Go get pissed and dance with pretty girls. But ur not with me. Ur the only pretty girl I wanna dance with. Ur full of it, Styles. Actually, I think u were full of it earlier ;) I was…I already miss u inside me :( Fuck, don’t do this right now. Don’t make me hard in public, pet. U started it! Well, now I’m ending it. No dirty talk tonight. But I thought daddy liked dirty talk. Micky… Yes, sir? Don’t make daddy have to tell you again. I’m sorry, daddy.

There’s a lull in the conversation like there hadn’t been before. I figure that he’s probably getting to a club and chatting with his bandmates, so I shrug and set my phone on the armrest beside me. Trevor and I are watching an episode of Jeopardy on the couch, so I pay a little more attention to the game. It’s the beginning of Final Jeopardy when I get a text back.

Ooh, ‘daddy’, eh? Never realized H was so kinky.

My heart seizes a little at the message, realizing one of his bandmates got ahold of his phone. I don’t know how much the other boys know about Harry’s sex life, but they just learned a whole lot more about it, now. From what little I know about them, I know this information isn’t going to be kept to just whoever is texting me from Harry’s phone.

Oh dear. Who is this? Niall. Who is this? The name Micky is familiar. Wait…ur the bird from m&g yesterday. Oh shit. H scored last night. Holy shit. H GOT LAID THERE’S A GOD JESUS Niall, give the phone back to H pls. He’s in the loo. And we’re not done here. How old are u? I remember you being fit. Lads teased H about it after you left. Um…i don’t think i should answer anything w/o H. But, thank you, i think? C’mon, love. H would tell us anyway. Us?? I thought i was talking to Niall. Tommo and Li are reading over me shoulder. You 3 are the worst. TELL US! -Tommo Please -Liam I’m 21. Nearly 22 Oh thank god. -Liam Did you fuck him? -Tommo Ignore Louis -Niall

The messages stop for a moment, and I’m left staring at my phone screen in a sort of horror. Trev’s too absorbed in the episode of Wheel of Fortune now playing on the telly to notice my dilemma. My phone buzzes again, and I expect more slightly inappropriate text from Harry’s bandmates, but it’s ringing an incoming call from Harry instead.

I answer and walk down the hall to my bedroom. 

“Harry?” I answer, wanting to make sure I’m talking to the owner of the phone instead of his probably drunk and nosey mates. 

“Hiiii,” he draws out. I can hear music in the background. “I’m sorry about them. They were pre-gaming before I even left yours.”

“I’m sorry they saw our messages,” I laugh. “Hope you don’t mind them knowing you have a daddy kink.”

He groans, and I can just imagine him pinching the bridge of his nose. “I mean, it probably would have come out eventually. I’m just gonna get mocked about it for a few weeks.”

I grimace. “I’m sorry.”

“Not your fault. Shouldn’t have left my phone on the table unattended.” I can hear other voices, yelling to be heard over the loud music, then Harry’s deep sigh. “And it’s begun. It’s only gonna get worse the more drunk they get. Especially Liam. Can’t handle his drink yet.”

“Maybe just get drunk so you won’t remember any of this in the morning,” I suggest jokingly.

“Be expecting some naughty texts around midnight, then. I’m a flirty drunk.”

“You’re always a flirt, Styles.”

“True. But now that I’ve had you, I can be more explicit. Have a good night, princess.”

“Goodnight, daddy.”

I fall asleep by eleven that night, despite my nap, having not had a whole lot of sleep the night before and a long day. I vaguely hear my phone buzzing on my bedside table at some point long after I’ve fallen asleep, but I’m too tired to check it. I have a pretty good feeling it’s Harry, but the messages will still be there in the morning.

I never get a chance to read them, however, because I’m woken by the buzzing of the intercom, someone requesting to be let up into the building. I check the clock with bleary eyes and see that it’s only nine in the morning. My first thought is maybe that Trevor forgot a key, or his mum is back from her trip and forgot a key. So, I quickly throw on the first shirt my fingers touch on my floor and trudge into the living area. The buzzer is still going incessantly when I reach it. I press the button to speak into the intercom.

“Trevor, I swear to God, if you forgot your key again, I’m just gonna leave your ass out there. This is the third time this month. And it’s only the tenth.”

“Not Trevor,” the voice comes back, crackly over the shoddy speaker. “But I come bearing breakfast and coffee and a day planned of sightseeing, so if you could be so kind to let me in anyway.”

“Harry?” I question. Last I had heard from him, he wasn’t sure if he was gonna be able to come into NYC today.

“Yeah, love. Let me up, I’m attracting a crowd. It’s like an episode of The Walking Dead out here.” There’s an urgency in his voice that I’ve only heard just now, so I quickly buzz him in, hoping he gets in without letting a crazy fan into the building. I unlock the door to the condo and wait for the knock on the door. I open in quickly to Harry, a drink carrier in one hand and a bag of delicious smelling food in the other.

“Jesus, Harry. You could’ve called or something,” I tell him, pulling him inside. He sets the food down on the counter and turns to pull me into a hug.

“I did, love. And sent texts.”

I look up at him and grimace. “I haven’t checked my phone. And I sleep like the dead.”

He chuckles, “I’ve realized. It’s alright, just telling you I wiggled my way into coming here today. There were conditions, though.” This time he grimaces.

I raise an eyebrow. “What conditions?”

There’s another knock at my door just as soon as the words are out of my mouth. Harry gives me a smile that says, ‘Please still love me after this.’ I glare at him suspiciously as I turn to open the door again.

“Ah, the famous Micky,” an Irish voice greets. And the voice definitely doesn’t belong to Paul. 

Liam, Niall and Louis stand in the doorway, each with different smiles adorning their faces. Liam’s is a genuine smile, though he looks a little worse for wear. Probably drank too much the night before. Louis is giving me that cheeky closed mouth grin that alerts me that he has something to say, but he’s trying his best to keep it in. And Niall looks absolutely giddy, eyeing me up and down in appraisal.

“Security said we had to all go out today. Publicity something or other,” Harry supplies as an explanation for why the entirety of One Direction is now entering the condo.

“Hello, boys,” I greet as I close the door. The four of them in here makes the space look uncannily small, like even this extravagant condo in Upper Manhattan pales in comparison to these four men.

“Morning, Micky,” Niall greets enthusiastically. 

Liam mumbles a good morning with a small smile, squinting. He’s very obviously hungover, though he’s trying his best. Louis grins and wraps an arm around my shoulder in a greeting hug. 

“I brought coffee and food as a peace offering,” Harry admits, wrapping an arm around my waist. He seems to look down at me for the first time and grins. “You look good in my clothes.”

I look down at myself and realize I’m wearing the shirt he gave me yesterday in order to leave the hotel. I blush. “I wasn’t wearing a shirt when you rang. Had to throw something on real quick.”

“Who’s the third coffee for, H?” Louis asks, taking a seat at one of the barstools lined up at the counter. “Thought we were just grabbing Micky.”

“That would be for me,” Trevor says, coming down the hallway from his bedroom, only in a pair of trackies and his glasses, his hair a little bit of a mess from sleeping. He nods at Harry in greeting before picking a coffee cup out of the drink carrier. “Thanks, man.”

“Figured she’d be more forgiving if I buttered you up, too,” Harry admits.

“Good move,” Trev nods. He takes a sip of the coffee and sighs. “So damn good.” He finally looks at me. “Might want to put some pants on, girl. You’ve got four attractive men looking at your pretty legs. And your ass hangs out of the bottom.”

“I’m wearing pants!” I object, appalled he thinks I’d come out of my bedroom without them on.  

He rolls his eyes. “I meant shorts or something. Jesus. Either way, they’re all still staring at you.”

“I’m in a committed relationship, mate,” Liam interjects. “I don’t look at other women like that.”

Trevor snorts unattractively. “Yeah, and I’m totally not gay. You’re full of shit, Payne.”

Niall cackles at Trevor’s casual call out of his friend and lightly punches Liam in the arm. Liam scowls at the Irishman and rubs at his arm, looking like a put out child.

I roll my eyes and extricate myself from Harry’s grasp. “You five behave. I’ll be back in a mo’.” 

“It’s a bit warm outside,” Harry calls. “And we’ll be doing some walking.” I throw him a thumbs up over my shoulder, thankful for the heads up about what to wear. I pretty much already have an outfit picked out in my mind, but the shoe choice now has to change. 

When I get to my room, I take off my t-shirt and go to my closet to pick out the appropriate items. I find the green crop top I had in mind and head to my dresser to find the black skirt with a thing white plaid pattern. I contemplate whether I should wear a bra, but figure the hot weather and the tight material of the shirt is reason enough not to wear one. I find a pair of no-show socks to wear with the maroon Converse I plan to put on later. 

I quickly change into my clothes and go to the bathroom to run some product through my hair to tame it a bit. If it’s warm, that means it’s most likely humid, and my hair doesn’t take too kindly to the moisture. I do what I can with it and then add a minimal amount of makeup just so I don’t look like a troll while out with the boys today. I can only imagine there may be some photos taken by some fans, and god forbid I be caught in one by accident looking like I just rolled out of bed. I don’t plan on being in any of them, but people can be sneaky. 

“All set, love?” Harry asks as I reemerge. I nod and smile as I sit on a side table to slip my shoes on. The coffee he brought is really calling my name, but I go for the food first, knowing I can take the coffee with me while we walk. 

“What are you all doing today?” Trev asks, still just standing, eating his breakfast sandwich and coffee in nothing but his trousers. 

Harry is sipping on his coffee, so Louis answers. “Bit o’ sightseeing. Hoping we can get away with goin’ some bigger places. People think we’re already on the road, so no one will be looking out for us.”

“Wanna go to the MoMA,” Harry says, passing me a sandwich. I thank him with a smile.

“You’re in New York, and yeh wanna go to a damn museum?” Niall asks with a crinkle of his nose in distaste.

“I’ll go with you, Harry,” I offer. “Lads can go do something else while we go there. Probably better if you split up for a bit, anyway.”

The boys nod and Harry looks at me, his fingers pulling at his bottom lip in a sign of contemplation.

“There’s a chance there’ll be paps today,” he warns slowly, his brow furrowed. “If you don’t wanna come, you don’t have to. I don’t want you to get overwhelmed.”

I reach over and put my hand over his with a smile. “I’m okay, Harry. I’ve got thick skin. We’re only friends hanging out while you’re in NYC.”

Trevor clears his throat and I see Louis’s eyebrows raise quickly on his forehead before settling back down, that same smirk I saw during the meet and greet taking up residence on his face again. I don’t know what garnered that reaction, but I ignore it. 

Harry’s eyebrows furrow further in what I perceive as worry, but then he nods. “Right. Still, just let me know if you need to tap out and come back here.”

I smile. “I will. Now come on. There’s a lot to see in New York.”

NINE

[adorablegorilla]

Random Things I Thought About Today

●"Fritos are like the chips version of the pretty ex-boyfriend you keep coming back to" -You see them at the store and get all these memories of how amazing they are and wonder why you ever disliked them -But then once you get into them you remember how they’re stale, bland and rough and question why you ever thought they were good in the first place

●The personality and appearance of a non-fandom oc I came up who was just a super-nice normal person bc I was tired of trying to sort out my weird half-finished oc concepts of fallen g-ds and interdimensional magicians -I then proceeded to use her in an HxH rp bc I have no hxh OCs, and now she might be about to learn Nen from a Phantom Troupe member, which Im torn abt bc on one hand she’s making a new friend and learning Nen, but on the other I don’t want my daughter to be associating with such dangerous people -Btw her name is Kate and she’s short and stocky and slightly chubby and has a round face with a beautiful smile and is my perfect daughter who I love more than anything in the world -I might post more about her some other time

●"Which male HunterxHunter characters would I be willing to have sex with?“ -This lead to me thinking about the characters I WOULD have sex with and their behavior in bed and how they’d treat their partner; the things they’d say, how they’d move, what their attitude would be like, how they’d interact afterwards, etc. After about 15 minutes I realized I was creating an HxH-Imagine blog in my head -Also made me once again realize how much I love Kurapika and Leorio -I might make an actual post on this topic btw, if I can be bothered -Eventually lead to the next bullet point

●"Am I Gay*?” (*technically an incorrect use of the term, bisexual would be more accurate) -I’ve never found any real men sexually attractive, but fictional characters are a different story. I first noticed this with Nagisa from Assassination Classroom, but at the time I thought it was just him specifically. Then it was other male characters who looked like women, and I thought it was only traps (characters who are both biologically and mentally male but look like women. Pls don’t call transgender women traps, as they are mentally female, so it’s offensive to refer to them as traps). I then started to become more aware of the sexual appeal of male characters, like I could like at them and unironically think, “dang he’s sexy,” but at the time I thought I was just comfortable enough with my sexuality to point out when a guy was good-looking. Then I started to unconsciously expiriment with my fantasies, and by now I’ve had full-on fantasies about male characters who look completely masculine -I tried to create a mental timeline of when the gay weeb thoughts first started and realized it could go back as long as 4 or 5 years -I remember that one of my friends who’s completely straight told me they enjoyed watching gay porn, but I feel like there’s a solid line between watching and imaging yourself as part of it. Plus, some stuff does nothing for me while other stuff convinces me I’m definitely not straight, and I have no idea what the pattern is, though I’ve noticed that characters I think are attractive sometimes won’t do anything bc I have trouble picturing them being “sexy” with me due to their personality -I suppose you can count this as me coming out as questioning or bi-curious, I’m not sure which -Tbh I never said anything about this before bc I was afraid I would sound silly and dumb like, “Oh I’m questioning my sexuality bc I think this moving picture looks attractive, durhurhur,” but luckily I don’t particularly care if I look dumb rn (as you can tell)

●"What if sexualities actually don’t exist, and people just have really strong kinks for either female and/or male body parts?“ -Only slightly related to the last bullet point (would certainly answer a lot of my questions) -Even though it’s just a joke, part of me really does wonder…

And finally, my most unusual thought today: ●An actually well thought-out theory about the nature of the growing divide between the political left and right, the loss of communication and understanding between the two, and the increasing radicalism on both sides, as well as the root causes of the problem, it’s relation to social media and news, and some feasible solutions -I’m actually gonna talk about this tomorrow, if I can be bothered

[gabbalot]

Another ask meme 👀

So I was tagged by the one and only @merriemelodie who has a knack for making me feel valid on the worst of days, and also who I NEED TO COME UP WITH A SWEET NICKNAME FOR???❤️

The rules are: Post the rules, answer 11 questions, make up 11 new questions, and tag 11 people.

(Or just break the rules like I do. I tag the same people every time I do these so I’ll give everyone a break. If you want to, but don’t feel obligated: @plsetski, @zestyfiretruck, @stregina, @dednout, @vityanikiforova. For everyone else, I’m just being shy but if you see this and want to do it, CONSIDER YOURSELF TAGGED BY ME! And @ me in your response.)

My questions for people are:

If you could, would you choose to download your consciousness into an artificial simulation of life, where nothing really bad ever happens, and all the good things that you want from life happen in a believable way? Or would you rather live your life as it is now? Why?

If you could pick anything to do for your career, without having to worry about money, what would you do?

If you had to describe yourself with a Wikipedia article, or an article from The Onion, what would it be? 

What is your favorite gif/meme??

If you could say anything to your younger self, what would you say? Would you say anything at all?

If humanoid androids became normalized and easily-accessible in the future, would you choose one as a companion? If no, why not? If yes, who would you like them to be based on?

What is the weirdest thing someone has every told you they like about you?

Which would you choose, and why: Bring your favorite character(s) to life? Or transport yourself into their world?

If you had to become immortal, what age would you choose to “die” and remain forever, and why?

What are your thoughts on Pluto? Is it a planet? or just a rock?

What is one thing you wouldn’t trade for $1,000,000 (or equivalent in your currency)?

And here are my long-ass answers for Melodieee:

Q1. Have any unpopular opinions? Now’s the time to say them. It doesn’t matter what they’re about; whether or not you think people will care about them, or if it’ll change people’s perceptions of you. Just let ‘em fly.

a:- Okay so…I don’t…really like Autumn…and it might…MAYBE..be my least favorite season…?? ? (I’m sorry, I know). I feel like this is particularly offensive coming from me, since I’m currently living in New England, which is well-known for having the most beautiful foliage during Autumn. But there’s only so much pumpkin spice and scarves I can indulge in before I have to face the reality that The Darkness™ is coming. Funny enough, I don’t have much of an aversion to Winter. (That’s a lie.) (I can’t manage during late February - March). (I barely make it to the end of Winter every year). All in all, this article pretty much summarizes my exacts feelings towards Autumn. Beware though, ~* 🚫 Autumn-lovers DON’T Interact! 🚫 *~, you will be enraged. ☕️🐸

Q2. Do you cling to summer, or are you typically more than excited for autumn? (Or do you not have a strong opinion either way?)

a:- Wellll I guess I sorta addressed this in the first answer? Hahaha. Aha. H a. (I still feel bad about it). But I suppose I don’t really cling to summer, because I have this icky tendency to…spoil good things before they are ready to be ruined??? Like “Ahhh, well am I going to feel bad eventually? Might as well get started on that right now!!”. Feeling Bad is the only thing I don’t procrastinate, lmao. But yeah, I don’t cling to summer (I mourn its death prematurely), and I don’t get excited for Autumn, I just do my best not to feel Too bad overall. I definitely don’t cry, because I Am A Big Kid Now.

Q3. What’s something that you’ve been wanting to tell somebody, but haven’t been able/felt ready to? (Of course, if you’re still not comfortable saying it in a public post, then you definitely shouldn’t feel obligated to do it. This is just for fun. ♥)

a:- The funniest thing is that a lot of the things that leave my mouth nowadays are things that I haven’t been ready to say. But I’ve been lucky enough not to word-vomit anything that’s been truly detrimental to my mental well-being. I’m also lucky to have a few amazing people in my life that I’m able to be quite vulnerable with. 

Q4. What would the soundtrack for the film of your life look like? (FOR THOSE WILLING TO TAKE IT UP A NOTCH: if you were to write a Broadway musical about your life, what would some of the songs be titled/be about?)

a:- Let’s see if I can be as dramatic as possible. In terms of a movie soundtrack, I definitely think that the opening scene would be to Tame Impala’s Let It Happen. Once things calm down and fall back into the natural rhythym of grey, expect to enjoy tunes from Radiohead, in particular their track Daydreaming, which plays on repeat in my dissociative head on a regular. When things get desolate, we enjoy The Postal Service’s This Place Is a Prison. When they’re comedic (see: manic), we’re jamming to some Manfred Mann’s Earth Band!! If I could be selfish, I would find my Big Love and/or purpose, and the soundtrack would lighten up with sounds from Coldplay and Active Child. Also, because I am quietly just as dramatic as our favorite witch Georgi Popovich, a few of my Broadway musical song titles include “Sometimes Fireworks Are Silent”, “I’m Sorry For A LOT Of Things, But This Isn’t One Of Them”, “Some Of Us Taste Colors”, “Tequila (TEQUILA)”, and of course “2D Drawings Are As Strong A Medicine As Any”, which has a b-track “Music Is Morphine (Which is Also a Poison)”.

Q5. What’s a poem, story, or song lyric that you think about often? What about it captivates you?

a:- I’ll give you an entire song full of lyrics: The song Bloodstream, which is so aptly named for how deeply I feel it whenever I listen to it. It epitomizes the concept of soulmates for me, which I don’t believe is always a “happy-go-lucky” scenario, sometimes soulmates are just that - a split of your soul, a piece of you in another body, no sparkles and lovehearts, just another self in another form whose destiny is entwined with your own. As someone who isn’t sure they believe in soulmates irl, here’s why the song strikes me - The vocals are a bit eerie, and ever-so-slightly tired. It must be exhausting searching for a missing half. The recurring piano chords in the verses of the song make it feel a little bit like a memory. I imagine that’s what Deja Vu sounds like, which I find to be fitting when you think about all the subtle instances that have connected your life with someone else’s without you even noticing, but sometimes you just feel it. Then comes the chorus, more profound in its intensity, and all of a sudden it’s the realization hitting you like “Ahh, yes. This is the one I can’t live without. I see it now”. And then there’s the bridge, the melody changing again, acting as a flashlight as you wade through the murkiness of Doubt and Uncertainty, and leading you finally to the door of Acceptance. And once you’ve accepted it, and really digested the fact that you aren’t alone, you just float along - adrift but comfortable, because you realize that you aren’t drowning like you thought you would, or like you’ve been all this time. (That was cryptic AF, what does All That even mean??). Idk. I just feel the song deeply and I’m not really sure how to express why. 🎭

Q6. If you had to epitomize yourself with a Wikipedia article title, what would it be?

a:-I think may be Learned Helplessness.

Q7. What do you daydream about?

a:- I have two persistent daydreams lately. One is to lay in a meadow and just rest in a shady spot with the sun’s warmth peeking through the foliage, probably for the rest of my life. I wouldn’t mind being stuck in a time loop if it meant existing somewhere like this or this. I actually have this one saved as my desktop wallpaper at work. I stare at it throughout the day and it brings me peace. The second daydream is imagining what it would be like to go out and get roaring drunk with Yuuri and Pichit. Like…can you imagine the shenanigans??

Q8. What’s your go-to character/kart/track in Mario Kart? (ANY ITERATION)

a:-Toad…..and raiNBOW ROAD BINCH!!! FIGHT ME. #ChaoticEvil

Q9. What’s something people would be surprised to learn about you?

a:- IRL? People would be shocked that I’m pan/bi. Literally no one knows. Friends and family respect that I consider myself asexual, or at least non-sexual, but no one actually knows that I’m not straight. I have hinted on occasion, but growing up in one of the most homophobic and heteronormative societies means that if people haven’t seen you date anything but cis-gendered men (even if it was only for 6 months when you were 14 years old??) then it means you’re straight. Straight until proven otherwise (and simultaneously shunned by extended family for being The Gay Cousin™ ).

Q10. If you could name a crayon/nail polish color, what would it be, and what would the color be?

a:- Tbh, I’m the least creative when it comes to these things, so most likely it would be some sort of holographic sparkly fluorescent pink color, and the name would be “Trophy Husband” (because it reminds me of Victor).

Q11. What’s a question you wish I would’ve asked? ASK/ANSWER IT HERE.

a:- AHHHH THE PRESSURE idk IDK. Ummmmm how about “What do you like most about following me?”. And the answer would be that your tags and writing in general just hit me right in the feels, every. damn. time. Your sense of humor is also A+, it’s never mean-spirited, and you just generally provide a safe space for me to exist comfortably at the end of each day. You’re also incredibly observant, and I feel like I’m a slightly bigger and more important speck in this universe because of you. Thank you for being here ❤️.

THE END.

[putris-et-mulier]

I had a hard time growing up with my father cause he does what we'd call tough love I guess, but I'm pretty sure a lot of it was abuse. But I always wanted to have kids and I am really good with em, people always point it out cause theres this idea guys arent supposed to be good with kids, that is ridiculous. But I think I just wanna prove I'd be a better father than him... All the discussion here about abortion and reasons to be a parent and wanting to be kinda savior to your kids it really 1/2

it really made me reconsider why I want to have kids. I don’t think proving I’d be a good dad is enough reason and also seems like a burden to put on the kid… idk if this makes sense. I wouldn’t ask a girl to abort cause thats her decision and I’m bi so I also think a lot about adoption. If I happen to have kids I will try my best to be a good dad but now I think I will wait and try to work out my issues first… that I don’t anything to my father and I dont have to live to prove him wrong.

Firstly, you definitely need to work on those issues before you have children in any fashion, especially adoption, because not wanting disability doesn’t protect your children from becoming disabled

Secondly, you might want to consider adopting older NTAB children because so many don’t get adopted and if they do become disabled they will still have NTAB conditioning so it won’t be like raising a child from a foreign culture but even then you have to make sure it’s the right choice for you

Thirdly, you don’t have to prove anything.

As someone who has always been in and out of hospitals and doctors offices for 30 years I can tell you that male nurses are by far the best and most any female nurse that has worked with one will tell you the same.

There is this misconception that men can’t be carrying or compassion or safe but men who go into that line of work or just sincerely want to be fathers like mine are the absolute best. I know it takes a unique person to be like this, male or female, but in this case I think masculine conditioning is actually beneficial.

Cis women are expected to bear pain better than cis men despite what the social rhetoric says and because they are conditioned to hide pain so often they have less empathy for other people in pain. They are also expected to be in those positions so they tend to be there because it’s expected, not because they actually care.

For anyone out there male or non-binary who is interested in becoming a nurse or caretaker or aides in classrooms and at disabled camps or special ed teacher, or anything involving disabled kids, please pursue this interest!

I have MD and it’s very rare in females so when I went to MDA camp there were just a few of us girls in a cabin but many other ones for the male children. Before McDonald’s bought it and used it as a way to make money off of experimenting on disabled children (I haven’t mentioned that in a while so a lot of you may not know the story) anyway, before that the counselors were all teenagers. There was an adult staff but they were there to supervise all of us, having teenage NTAB counselors be the only ones that took care of us or live with us was absolutely amazing.

We didn’t feel like we were being monitored constantly because everyone was a teenager which meant they were young and cool, everybody wants to be a teenager when you’re a kid. They also treated us like we were just kids, not disabled kids. We were cute and we were just there to have fun around our own people so they were there primarily as counselors, no one had formal training or anything so they hadn’t been taught not to listen to us yet. They all knew first-aid and were told about the conditions but they didn’t know what to do to take care of us so they asked and they listened. It was like this magical place until McDonald’s House™ bought us but things weren’t quite as good for my male peers. But let me put my epiphany in context.

Every single night the teenagers had a huge party. They took shifts on who would stay with us at night so everyone spent at least half their nights getting absolutely wasted and having casual sex in the woods.

There was always one night when the campers all had a “dance” and the counselors were always excited to give us a good time because we were so adorably excited to have our own party with them. And the counselors off nighttime shift those nights partied heavier than ever and those who didn’t want to were more than happy to just sleep with us. They weren’t buzz skills, they were helping people party.

It was the closest thing to a utopia I’ve ever experienced.

None of this would be allowed to go on anymore and it wouldn’t have been at that time either if the adults knew what was going on but we were all in it together, we were all technically kids. Even though our counselors were also kids we were always the safest when they were running things. The type of person who is going to even be interested in doing something like this let alone doing it to that extent is still that type of person even if they are away from home. They partied hard, really hard, and since they had the freedom to do so they took responsibility. Everyone had equal time at the parties and none of them resented us because we weren’t a responsibility, we were just too young to party so everyone who actually wanted some sleep was happy to be there in the cabins with us at night, it was especially fun for us in the girls cabin because each night we had different counselors telling us all the gossip so we ended up knowing everyone’s dirty laundry.

There were a very few teenage campers but they were “allowed” to go to the parties because they weren’t crippled kids, they were other teenagers. This also encouraged the older kids with MD to feel like capable human beings and so they would help look after all of us kids which is an experience every disabled child should have. They were cool because they were teenagers but they were also one of us, they weren’t one of them.

None of them did this because anyone was trying to socialize them or “make them feel important” by giving them “responsibilities” they did it because they wanted to. Everyone was in on it together and everyone wanted to have the best time possible so they chipped in during so they could party harder at night. It probably goes without saying that it was an amazing example for those of us who were younger.

We were observant so we always knew when someone was being forced or “assigned” to look after us but these guys weren’t, they treated us like little brothers and sisters because our bond came organically. We actually had role models that were one of us, going to the camp was one of the first times that a lot of kids realized that they could have the chance to be actual teenagers.

It’s kind of funny, they were young enough that they didn’t have a hard time bouncing back from a night of drinking or going without sleep but it made mornings easier for us children because a lot of them were waking up with something that felt like a bit of chronic illness themselves so they couldn’t have forced us to use all of our spoons first thing in the morning even if they wanted to.

But one night a party had gotten too hardy and so there was a shortage of capable counselors the next morning and the shortage was in the male cabins, the girls could always hang. Our counselors split up to go help get all the kids up which took a lot of time. The counselors that were best taking care of us physically split up amongst all of the cabins and that morning we had some of the female counselors from the male cabins come to help us instead of all of our usual ones.

I got a girl I eventually got an innocent childhood crush on, she was always “one of the boys” but she was so confident that no one would have described her like that, she was just herself and that made her a badass. She was also beautiful but I did have legitimate non-shallow reasons!

I was a lot stronger then so I was taking off all of my pajamas as quickly as I could because we all knew about the situation so I was trying to get undressed as quickly as possible so she could help one of the younger kids but she stopped me from taking my shirt off.

She said that I could keep it on while she was helping me into my pants so I wouldn’t be completely naked. I laughed to let her know it was no big deal and told her that I didn’t mind. That’s what I learned to say to the nurses throughout my life to make them a little less resentful about me but it didn’t work on her.

She looked extremely frustrated and I realized years later she wasn’t frustrated with me, per se, she was frustrated with what I had said. She said, “there’s no reason you have to be completely naked in front of everyone, most people don’t do that.”  I didn’t know what to do because I only learned to make “normal” people feel as comfortable as possible so I tried to tell her it was fine but she cut me off and said, “You know that I work in one of the boys cabins even though I’m a girl? It’s because there aren’t a lot of guy counselors so none of the boys get any modesty. I only help change one thing at a time so the boys don’t feel completely embarrassed and they still get to feel like boys.”

That was language I understood even if the concept blew me away and it’s something that comes to mind quite often.

I suddenly noticed that there were usually only people around us that had vaginas. That had to be weird for the guys. I then noticed that that they were treated like girls, not like NTAB boys. I’ve always wondered if it was any different for the boys who like other boys, because I figured that must make them more uncomfortable.

Disabled people are conditioned to be asexual but a heteronormative asexual. We are expected to get “crushes” and it’s completely safe because we can’t have sex. Why medical professionals think you can’t have sex because you sit down a lot I have no idea.

Imagine how little representation or participation socially that  gender and sexual minority children get, it’s a million times worse when they are disabled. There has been and always will be a huge need for people to work in caretaking positions that aren’t cis women.

[commodorecliche]

This is out of the blue, but I could use some advice. I'm pretty sure I'm straight(girl), but whenever I see couples on tv, I cheer for basically every queer couple, and with het couples I'm like meh. I also really like looking at girls pics on tumblr but usually I'm comparing myself to them (I'm terribly insecure) or admiring how pretty they are. I feel like I could be bi, but coming from a hella conservative family, that scares the shit outta me.

Hey hun! I totally just saw this so I hope I didn’t keep you waiting for long. 

I’ll be honest with you, friend, you sound a lot like how I was when I was younger and still figuring out my sexuality. I don’t want to generalize your sexuality, because everyone is different and everyone experiences their sexuality differently. But the things you’ve mentioned really do sound a lot like me before I realized I was bi. 

(As far as cheering for queer couples on TV goes, that doesn’t necessarily mean anything other than that you’re supportive of positive queer couple representation and that you’re aware enough to be bored of the constant barrage of generic, forced het couples that are on TV. IMO that isn’t necessarily an indicator of your personal sexuality.)

But I mean, I’m 26 now - I lived about 17-18 years of my life thinking I was straight (just with a whole bunch of girl crushes). I liked looking at pictures of attractive guys and girls (and like you, when I would look at pictures of girls, I would find them beautiful but would also compare myself to them, because I’m also very insecure about how I look - I remember reading a post on here that basically said that growing up being attracted to women, but not registering that it was attraction can be weird because you wind up fixated on women, enjoying looking at them, but at the same time feeling insecure and competitive with them), I had tonnnnnns of instances of “I’d go gay for this female celebrity”, I enjoyed porn of both m/f and f/f, I would even sometimes have dreams about kissing other girls (with a similar frequency that I would have them about kissing boys too). 

It was only when I was 19, and in college, and started to develop a crush on one of my female friends that I started to realize I might not be as 100% straight as I thought I was. But at the same time, I was sure that this was something everybody went through - that it was normal for straight girls to have crushes on other girls, to experience attraction to other girls, and that it didn’t necessarily mean anything or make me any less straight. 

It was only once I got a little more involved here on tumblr - and thus got more exposure to the actual concepts of bisexuality and got exposure to actual bisexuals - that I began to understand bisexuality better and to actually see myself more in those concepts. You’ll notice that IRL, bisexuality is made out to be either ridiculously sexual (like being an excuse for threeways), made out to be just girls looking for attention from guys (this goes hand in hand with the sexualization of bisexuality), or made out to be just a halfway point to “picking a side” (”oh he says he’s bi, but he’s really just gay.” or “she says she’s bi, but we all know she just wants to get guys’ attention, she’s really just straight”). Being on this site helped me to actually understand bisexuality, to understand that girls who identify as straight don’t typically get crushes on other girls or imagine other girls sexually. It helped me understand too that bisexuality isn’t a clear cut line between “I 50% like guys and I 50% like girls” - that degrees of attraction to genders can vary from person to person (for example, I’m bisexual with a bit greater preference for men)

I was lucky in that I didn’t grow up with conservative parents. (A lot of my extended family is conservative and closed minded, but I don’t really have to deal with them, and they didn’t raise me.) I was lucky in that regard. But I did grow up in the south, and I still live in the south, where bisexuality is seen as either slutty/attention whorish or is seen as being sinful, so I’m not really out to many people in my day to day life. And I understand your anxiety about even the possibility of being bisexual. 

However, what’s important is just understanding yourself. It isn’t your family’s business if you don’t want it to be. Keep it from them if you feel that will be best, but give yourself time to figure yourself out and better understand who you are. It’s your business and not theirs; it isn’t their business until YOU decide that they should be involved. It’s 100% okay to be unsure, to not have it figured out, to still be in the process of learning who you are and your sexuality. 

Look at me. I didn’t “formally” realize I was bisexual (and label myself as such) until I was 25 years old. That was just one (1) year ago. I spent 17-18ish years of my life thinking I was 100% straight, I spent another 5-7 years just questioning and figuring myself out. 

I reblog a good bit about bisexuality and such and always tag it as either “#bisexuality” or “#bi bi bi” (because shut up I love nsync), so please feel free to browse through those tags. I know that a lot of the information I reblog and talk about was stuff that really helped me learn who I am and understand my sexuality much better. 

This got super long, I’m sorry, and I think I kind of rambled a lot. But I hope some of this was helpful… Take care, nonnie. And remember that it’s okay to not have things figured out, and it’s okay to not advertise your sexuality to your family if you don’t feel safe/comfortable doing so. 

Message me any time, you know I’m always here to chat. 

[elizabethrobertajones]

I can't wait for Dean to enter the amnesia phase! Dean and Cas formed a strangely intense relationship from the beginning and I wonder how Sam's gonna describe Cas.

Aaaah it’s now almost certain that that line from the last Shaving People Punting Things promo was from 12x11 - the “my name is Dean Winchester, blah blah Sam and Mary, a-and Cas- Castiel is my *wibble* best friend” line that nearly killed us all even completely out of context. Since there was 2 episodes between us and it I was trying not to get too excited I was trying not to pin my hopes on it being exactly what it sounded, but without rewatching the promo I think 12x11 may be the only episode left in it that we’ve yet to see stuff from. It’s also always kinda been the logical episode to have Dean reminding himself of who his nearest and dearest are but there you go, this is my 3rd year of watching with fandom, I’ve learned not to trust promos as far as I can throw them :P

There’s this post from last night squeeing about the line here:

http://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/156999800760/nerdylittleshit-ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh-i-just

And now I’m just enjoying the detail that Sam will almost certainly be responsible both times for using the word “friend” to describe Benjamin & his vessel and Cas and Dean… Like, in 12x10 there was one of those weighty pauses where everyone immediately thinks “…oh. They were in love” and then someone goes and uses “friend” - we’re not exactly unfamiliar with that sort of pause when it comes to Dean n Cas stuff, either… 

I do think Sam’s maybe a bit more certain about misdiagnosing Dean and Cas as BFFs because he’s had way more time to think about it than trying to work out the correct word for - well, *I’m* not sure about the correct relationship description for an angel and its vessel and I’ve been thinking about it all week :P - so it will seem more natural to him to call Cas that. So I won’t be too bummed if Sam is really chill about the concept, because as much as we talk about shipper!Sam, and he’s used as the punchline of a LOT of jokes about Dean n Cas’s behaviour throughout the years to sell it that they’re old-married-couple arguing, that is kind of a trick for the viewers at home to be in on, not necessarily a comment that Sam ACTUALLY thinks that. I mean, he probably still thinks Dean is STRAIGHT can you IMAGINE. 

I don’t think this episode is gonna expose Bi!Dean but like with 10x12, going back with Dean into his past was used as the most overt exploration of Dean vs repression and how the whole performing!Dean thing worked, and gave us the cipher of the cake which got way more mileage than we expected, because season 10 actually was fairly good at breaking Dean down for us, though I think the way season 11 and 12 have been putting him back together is far more enjoyable watching… Anyway, this is a great second chance to take a crack at what 10x12 started, and to make Dean well and truly vulnerable. They were comparing the episode to Yellow Fever, of which I have written a whole bunch as part of my wide-ranging “Still not over the Siren Episode” series of metas: 

http://elizabethrobertajones.tumblr.com/post/151056070938/shower-thoughts-harping-on-season-4-because-being

The main point I guess being the one about how it intentionally turned Dean inside out in front of Sam to make him look extremely vulnerable. In front of season 4 Sam, whose entire arc was built around feeling strong - and specifically stronger than Dean - and falling down the rabbit hole based on those feelings - those 2 episodes are really bad for Sam’s perception of Dean in that immediate moment because they’re stepping stones to make Sam think Dean’s not just lost his edge but is completely incapable of stopping the apocalypse and Sam is the only one strong enough to do it. Aka, Sam is in the worst place in the world to benefit with positive lessons from watching Dean get turned inside out in front of him. In 10x12, again Sam is all caught up in saving Dean, even so far as wondering if abruptly having to deal with having an extremely mouthy little brother until he grows back up into an extremely mouthy adult at the normal speed these things happen, was actually preferable to Dean with the Mark. Again, he’s on a descent arc that again plays off him being, well, the responsible adult, because that episode wasn’t a metaphor for the wider picture or anything :P - the burden of saving Dean from the Mark is a distraction and a weight on him and the whole Taylor Swift moment at the end shows how he’s not learned anything about Dean from the experience, and in the wider picture, carries on down his path and trying to save Dean his way (when Dean seems to have given up shortly after), so Sam is basically left to make the decision about how to save Dean on his own (and his isolated thinking is highlighted by deliberately leaving Cas out of the decision making process even though they’d seemed to be on the same page for a while). 

Anyway! In season 12 guess what we have another Winchester off making the bad decisions! Sam and Dean are freeeeeee (and, uh, should probably be concerned about what their mom is doing but that’s a problem for another episode :P) - since the middle of season 11 Sam hasn’t had the sort of burden on him that he’s carried on and off for most of the show (seriously, like, the last quarter of season 7 is the only other time I can think of Sam didn’t have a Thing outside of just being along for the ride with the main plot) - Sam can be concerned about Dean, but since the start of season 12 he ALSO doesn’t have anything wrong with him, internally or externally, and so they’re kind of in a healing and growth stage (this has been also achieved by letting Cas have all the awful happen to him >.>) Anyway, all that means that now we get one of those episodes that emotionally eviscerates Dean, in front of Sam, and Sam doesn’t have any roadblock to understanding and learning about Dean except for all the emotional walls Dean’s put up to keep him out that will baffle Sam with their absence (the sneak peek scene shows Sam missing a ton of really huge neon flags that we can see from miles off because we know Dean from this outside perspective Sam has not got the luxury of) or reasons Sam will be too distracted or take developments completely the wrong way to actually genuinely understand what Dean is going through and what these things mean… 

He’s going from a standing start though, so I expect he’s going to catch maybe like 1/10th or less of all the things we might be able to explain about Dean, but even so :P 

… Anyway all’s that to say is that Sam is going to probably write down a list of everyone Dean absolutely has to remember: Himself - brother, Mary - mom, Castiel - best friend, and leave Dean with it. And then we get DEAN’S delivery on that line which we have very hopefully already heard for ourselves (or we have wasted a lot of ink on this :P) and Deana stumbles over the concept of “Castiel - best friend” with all that stammering and wobbling voice that we’ve heard. And there’s going to be the difference in how Sam describes Cas and how Dean thinks of him, or is confused about how he’s supposed to apparently think of him :’D