#is this like. an insane concept. you can be real with me.

[gooobraghhh]

I should not be publicly admitting this but it has been making me insane for a bit. Basically I have a very easily recreatable trigger that forcibly puts me in a state of like deep relaxation almost? I go essentially limp and start moving very slowly and weakly while my brain gets super groggy. It’s like I can feel my heart slow down and I just melt into whoever’s hands I’m in. Don’t really have an explanation as to why it happens but the steps towards it are:

1 - Pin me down. Doesn’t have to be a perfect hold, I just need to feel stuck and not able to move much at all until the other steps happen.

2 - Place my ear between your teeth. Just gently keep it there so the threat of it being bitten when I struggle is present. I absolutely hate when my ears are bitten and that in combination with being pinned makes me complacent and still. I think the mental part of accepting I’m trapped is important to this working.

3 - Do something physically pleasurable to me. You can just play with my tits, maybe my clit or if you want to make me crazy you can start fingering me. (My muscles relax which makes me basically unable to resist being penetrated)

4 - Dirty talk. I won’t say what specifically works well on me but In general I’m super sensitive to people talking in my ear and need some kind of dirty talk for this to work.

If all goes well you should feel me go limp as my words start to trail off. Found it out for the first time recently by accident during sex and convinced myself I was doing it on purpose but it just kept happening. It’s really surreal and hard to describe from my perspective. It kind of feels like that therapy exercise where you tense all your muscles and then release or like the really strong feeling of bodily relief you get when you leave a high stress situation. Either way it leaves me super out of it with all I can focus on being your voice and touch. Even when I’m trying to fight back my maximum effort is basically nothing but weak pushes.

My boyfriend has taken to doing it to me anytime I get too arrogant or annoying, usually when I try to dom him and he feels like “showing me my place”. It’s really hot but also really frustrating since there is actually nothing I can do when he does it to me besides get “no no no…. Dont” out of my mouth and then going limp. We stress tested it recently (I kept pissing him off) and I learned the like mental fog gets worse the more he does it. I literally had to ask him if he drugged me because I felt like I was gonna pass out and couldn’t talk without it being a bit slurred. It feels like some hypno concept post I wouldn’t think is real but this has been my life recently and it’s really wild. I can’t think of any reason why a random person couldn’t successfully do it to me which has been making me crazy as a concept.

[d3lly1000]

I finally watched Sonic 3!!!!! (IT WAS ONE OF THE BEST EXPERIENCES OF MY LIFE)

I had been holding back so I could talk without worrying about spoilers, but I think I can now comment on my general opinion of the movie.

There will be spoilers, so you have been warned!

I’ll admit that I found the first act a bit rushed. I understand that they had a lot of characters to “reintroduce” and new ones to add (especially Shadow), but I felt a bit lost with what was happening—it was really convenient how the script handled a lot of things just to get to the point.

For example: Shadow attacking in Japan with no real explanation, Rockwell quickly finding Sonic and the others. Even Commander Walters showed up just to explain what happened in the past, only to die unexpectedly right after. Even though he's not a particularly memorable character, I felt like his death didn’t carry the weight it should have, even for Team Sonic who witnessed it.

There was also the fact that a lot of what happened in the first act had already been revealed in the trailers and TV spots, which kind of deflated my excitement, knowing what was going to happen. But as I said, things were happening so fast that I couldn’t process all the information right away! XD

I have to say, I absolutely love the interactions between all the characters. The relationships and how they were developed felt so unique to me. I’ve always had the headcanon that Knuckles, Tails, and Sonic acted like siblings, and in the movies, I got to witness that in a meaningful and very loving way (shoutout to Tails saving Sonic and Knuckles protecting them, my boys <3).

One of my favorite scenes is definitely the argument between Knuckles and Sonic, as it really shows their maturity. It shows how much they are changing with each movie, which is so valuable to me because it demonstrates that the characters are really learning from their experiences. In a franchise, this deepens their moral journey and enriches who they are — it’s truly wonderful.

Speaking of siblings, I can’t not talk about Maria and Shadow. Right from the beginning, I could already feel the heartache hearing Live and Learn in an acoustic version. I think for fans who know how iconic this song is for the franchise, the idea that MARIA COULD HAVE BEEN THE ORIGINAL COMPOSER of it (at least in the SCU) hits so hard.

The narrative of Shadow talking about Maria always moved me, and the film managed to emphasize what she meant to Shadow in such a sweet way. Seeing the scene where Shadow recalls the day of the accident and then carrying the Eclipse Cannon gave me chills.

The parallels between Sonic/Shadow and Tom/Maria were something I was really looking forward to! The franchise often makes these types of comparisons between characters, not just in the games but also in the movies. As I mentioned before, I think this makes everything richer — it gives you a new perspective and helps you understand the complexity of characters by revisiting the "same memory" through a different person. I love when they do that!

ABOUT THE FIGHT SCENES, ALL OF THEM. I was breathless! I have to confess I was cursing A LOT during the third act. It was so epic, something you wouldn’t even think you'd see! Super Form battles were such a great concept for the situation, seeing Sonic get so angry really fed my fan dream of seeing him want to destroy everything XDD. Shadow literally crushed him, both physically and mentally. He REALLY IS THE STAR of this movie. The whole year was his. And he delivered in every possible media!

((I screamed so much when they did the pose, Live and Learn, it was so epic.))

Jim Carrey’s performance is always amazing. I’m still stunned at how naturally Gerald and Eggman felt together. It really seemed like a completely different actor, and that’s insane! I think the only thing I wish we’d seen more of was scenes between Gerald and Maria in the past, but who knows, maybe they’re planning something for a "Shadow solo spin-off."

The light shines, even when the star dies. – I was already emotionally losing it inside, there were just so many things to process.

AND THE POST-CREDITS SCENE HAUSFHSAIFHGVSNUHGUSAHGUSAH

OK OK I’M >TOTALLY< NORMAL ABOUT MY BABIES

Literally my two FAVORITES showed up. METAL WILL BE THE MAIN VILLAIN, I have so many theories and DEFINITELY it will be an adaptation of Heroes and CD. I CAN'T WAIT to see him in action, the whole Artificial vs. Natural thing is something that really resonates with me in the rivalry between him and Sonic.

AND HAUSHFUASFHUASFH AMY MY GIRL!!!

She’s so cool, she appeared in SUCH A UNIQUE way, the cracked moon in the background, revealing herself by taking off the hood... I can’t wait to see her in 2027... I need it so much aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

I definitely loved the movie a lot. I still want to rewatch it in English since I saw it dubbed in my language, but I think I’d give it an 8.5/10 or 9/10! YOU HAVE TO SEE THIS MOVIE!! I’m still shaking remembering the action scene sahufzahghaghs

[zhongrin]

i'm buzzing from coffee so here we go. sorry if i missed anyone, my memory is akin to the invertebrates sometimes. also i'm tagging people who may not even know i exist in this, so if you don't want to be tagged, no hard feelings, lmk and i can remove it ᰔᩚ

ps. this is all /pos, /lh, and /genuine with some /silly sprinkled in

@queen-belial i have 0 idea who astarion or durge is, and i have never played baldur's gate in my life. but nevertheless, know that i am always so utterly enamored at the rare crumbs of art and fics you post.

@abyssmal-skies you're one of the few people who are still into traditional art and i think it's amazing!!!

@harmonysanreads with her crazy deep in-depth character analysis proficient brain writes banger after bangers of yandere works that will make you shiver in a good way.

@brynn-lear is yet another lv.999 yandere writer, with her plot twists, unique ideas, signature art, → !!!GAMES!!! <-, and cannibalism tendencies.

@mochinon-yah with her amazing amazing art and personality as sweet as her name.

@euniveve with her series and worldbuilding and amazing arts like girl how does your brain work i need to study it.

@pranabefall who cuts open my heart and stabs far too many needles in it before sewing it back up (wow thanks, doctor) with her beautifully painful fics.

@jessamine-rose the concept of playing with dollhouses as a blog 'theme' itself is already so unique, but the worldbuilding and character building jess is doing in every fic of hers is INSANE!!!

@naraven alon oh alon.... your music. you're the toby fox in our squad in my head and i really hope one day your music will be heard by all.

and if we're speaking about beautiful proses being written to mesmerize your senses, @chryseis-lxve aka cherry does it like no other!!!!

@teabutmakeitazure serves quality dark tea for your aventurine, childe, and chrollo fixations ☕️

@dottiro is THE canon dottore writer in my head but their pantalone fics especially are so 🫶🏻🔥🩸 (interpret those emojis as you will)

@stickyspeckledlight may use whimsy and silly words in their fics but you'll look up from their works at the end of the day and go 'what the fuck /pos'.

@crystalflygeo writes delicious smut (and will occasionally break your heart *sideeyes LoHK*) and will beckon you to visit her blog more for more delicious food (perhaps pet the local deer in the process too).

@floraldresvi may not be your 'typical writer' where she posts drabbles under the 'x reader' tag, but she drops a bouquet of happiness into her friends' inbox and i respect that so much ᰔᩚ

@silentmoth if the utterly adorable moth persona didn't bait you into looking into moth's blog then you're a monster let me just say i binged moth's masterlist. it was very worth it. 20/10 would do it again.

@pawpiefawn's calming, quaint vibe doesn't deceive - it's a cozy space for wriothesley and al haitham enjoyers, but let's be real here. i think the main charm here is miss ying's personality!!!

@silkjade has a way of writing that will leave you wondering what beautiful truly means because her aesthetics sense is top-tier and it flows into the way she writes her fics ✨

@pearlywritings has super comforting and fluffy fics that makes my day and some spicy stuff that makes me go 👀 → 🤔 → 🤤... i don't even kiss diluc but i want to root for familyau!diluc and reader, they're SO LOVABLE.

@the-travelling-witch has a plethora of magical potions you can select from, but just be careful because the poisons are as potent as the love potions ;)

@risustravelogue may be on hiatus but will still forever be one of my favorites because time means nothing to the kinship i have over fellow devs doing art and writing ;w;

the combination of @persicipen's pastel colors and the way she writes always leaves me feel like i've just watched a grand performance at a local classical concert at the end of every fic ✨

@lovegasmic if mila's theme(s) isn't pulling you in then i am silently questioning your aesthetic sense her yummy drool-worthy smut fics will. the o■■p■s fic.... the kn■■■■■g fic.... mmm.... yes.....

no big sis? no problem! @grimmweepers is THE big sister figure and THE al haitham writer for your al haitham fixations.

@unriding if evie's personality hasn't pulled you in then you're a monster her moze musings and fics will; i don't even kiss him but she makes him look so squishy (/pos).

@euthymiya with her quality writing pumps content after content of quality dishes (and side dishes of personal rambles which i find endearing) all over my dash, it's amazing.

@saetiate if their url didn't clue you in their wit then let me ー you'll find banger genshin and hsr smutfics that will blow your mind like it did mine.

i used to associate @catcze with pink but now i just associate her with being one of the aesthetic queens bc every theme is SO pretty ー delve into her wriothesley tag, you will not be disappointed.

@xeraeus with the amazing amazing art that i always somehow miss because timezone is a bitch (jun, i still think you're secretly a wizard or something bc how do you finish commissions that fast!!!).

@danijaci needs no introduction, we all know they're an absolute madlad in drawing (/pos) and those comics + blushing series + biker series will alwasy live in our head rent-free.

i personally think a good artist can relay a story or depict an object with a few lines because it shows that they fully understand the essence of things - which is what @erabu-san does splendidly.

idk if this is allowed but can we make this ask into a post where everyone tags their favorite content creators/artists/fic writers in the fandom so that they get the recognition and love they deserve!!

let's do it!! 💖💖💖

@jojaxcola @crispyanonart @eemamminy-art @itsmeglycine @nicoleknives thank you for all your wonderful sdv art <3

[kingofthering]

november-december 2024

(With a little delay because of you-know-what but here we go. Big thank you to all the authors who used their time in 2024 to produce things that made me have a good time, you're the best.)

ao3

rosquez

you look like someone I remember by @vanillow

I'm of the opinion that you can rarely go wrong with a time travel fic (and the options are endless) and of course Maddie didn't disappoint with that one. For a fic that's like, 50% Explicit, it sure still managed to give me feelings.

postscript by @kingofthecotas

Sometimes all you need is something soft and sweet and very domestic.

Lex Ferenda by @tartquez

I know I technically already recced the Bicameral series last time but we got a bunch of beautiful additions since then, so. Go binge it all is my advice.

learning to fly by @moonshynecybin

Go tell Callie that this is great and that we all need the rest 🫶 One good argument to read this? The enigma that Valentino is but in a good way, not a mean way (for once). And never fucked pre divorce Rosquez insane concept, come on.

#FF0000 by @le-chevalier-au-lion

First of all, the title of this fic is brilliant. Second of all, jealous Valentino in this context is a thing of beauty. Valentino's sensations (and how his feelings translate in his body) were so beautifully described and the vibe in this made me feel like I was with them at the club, ready to cut the tension emanating from Valentino's body with scissors.

the flight of a one-winger dove by @vanillow

Soulmates AU. Dialogue that just hit like that. Another Maddie masterpiece, if you will.

the laughter, the plunge by @yekoc

Fun fact : my reblog of the tumblr post of this fic was the last post I was able to reblog before my account had to take a forced holiday. But what matters here is how this fic made me feel : proud of Marc, hot, with a squeezed heart at the end (in a good way).

dovquez

here and now, undaunted by @le-chevalier-au-lion

It's Dovquez and it's soft and domestic and the banter works so well and is very them. 10/10.

nearly, nearly, nearly by @le-chevalier-au-lion

!!! This had me deceased. I was right there with them all along and the tension is so delicious.

others

the greatest thing we've lost (santi/marc) by @le-chevalier-au-lion

You know when you have to pause every 2 sentences to process everything being written because it's a lot but in a good way? Yeah.

Coterie (casey/dovi) by @tartquez

That moment when you fall in love with a side pairing even more than the main pairing of a universe (me with Casey & Dovi in Bicameral). It's just, they work so well together and I adore being in Casey's head in this and his internal monologue is interesting and the dialogues between Casey & Dovi always make me wanna scream. And they're obviously hot together but that's a detail at this point.

somewhat so outlandish (pecco/enea) by @vanillow

Swear to god the writers of this fandom turn me into a real empath because you can't imagine how much I was feeling for Pecco by the end of this. The dialogue is, as usual, chef's kiss.

these are the games of weekend (santi/vale) by @lestelledreams

Underexploited pairing as evidenced by Elle. Young Vale is always a delight and this works beautifully.

cannot dream of returning to dust (marcnaia) by @le-chevalier-au-lion

My tags on the tumblr post said "#‘oh’ in italics#like!!!!#‘They’re both very good at miserable. In opposite directions.´ !!!!#oh so much more" so, I will leave you with that.

get quiet (casey/vale) by @vanillow

I feel like I could enjoy any fic involving Casey right now but also, this was a very needed and mandatory fic after Casey's ranch visit. Their dialogue in this, the scenes on the porch, the way Valentino is written, the progression of their physical proximity, yes baby.

tumblr

rosquez

time travel au by @tartquez

black widow marc + agent vale by @tartquez

lies by @astronicht

eternal sunshine of the spotless mind au thoughts by @moonshynecybin

gladiator marc by @vanillow

on vale re: marc's diplopia by @yekoc

dovquez

I wonder what's it's like to be so beautiful by @lastlatebraker

forehead kiss by @lestelledreams

model marc / designer dovi by @lastlatebraker

[lorephobic]

need to assemble a high council of saltburn scholars who get together for a saltburn watch thru where we pause after every scene and discuss plot & production details that we’ve picked up thru our scholarship so that we can take notes and combine all of our knowledge. it would take like four hours but it would be so beautiful.

[dykedvonte]

you make really good points, I think I used the term karmic wrong sorry. I think of it more as not how I personally think he deserved all that happened to him (which thinking back os exactly what karma means, I messed up sorry), but as his fate being directly tied/parallel to anyas. I handnt noticed the toxicity of jimmy and curlys relationship, from the first playthrough I watched and the first interactions I had w fandom I saw so many ppl just. dismiss the terror Anya went through and focus too much on him as the "ultimate victim" and that just didn't sit well w me. I really dislike seeing ppl go "oh well nothing could've been done" I think it's much more complex than that. also I forgot to mention in the last ask that I really appreciate you bringing the point that this game isn't just about the harm of patriarchy but also very very critical to capitalism, I haven't seen too many ppl touch on this. I hadn't thought too deeply about how it makes "he deserved to become disabled as punishment" come up and I agree that's really messed up. I'll try watching a playthrough again with all of this in mind. but either way thanks! I really appreciate your answer 🫶🏼

I guess this is just part of being in a fandom like this. I've noticed a lot of people don't actually see posts outside of their curated view. So some people only get like anya posting or jimmy or curly and it can make it seem like that is what is saturating the conversation.

I mainly just follow the general tags and look for anything new because I'm like obsessed but I know some are only looking for what they want or believe to be the case and can get weird about other ideas.

Sorry if I came off mean its just a last few of the asks have been like circular conversations like this and its not draining per say but seeing all the nuance and details get overlooked to fit a straightforward and basic narrative really sucks cause there's a lot to explore character and theme wise.

[ruvviks]

toying with the idea of making yancey's friends not real. would that be too evil

[0809sysblings]

idk why I'm posting this here but it's fine because I can do whatever I want. sorry I think I'm having an enneagram type 1 moment. it's not mental illness, it's because of my enneagram type! can't help being a Gemini Enneagram Type 1

also I keep using the amulet's powers so I've been being hit with the after effects. such power deranges a man /ref

[kimasousparky]

me making a list of some vocaloid songs that either suit tokrev characters or have a similar vibe for future doodles instead of writing either of the tokrev fic wips i have [crying noises]

[deadrlngers]

OC DUALITY + TRAGEDY ROLE

i was tagged by @risingsh0t @morvaris @devilbrakers to take this quiz and by @indorilnerevarine and @girlbosselrond to take this other quiz for my ocs. thank you all soso much!!!

i'm super late to this and i'm sure these already made rounds so i'm tagging whoever wants to do this <3

— oc duality:

god-hungry scientist and their abominable child

you stitched something together inside of yourself and gave it life with light from the sky and now it won't die it and you can't kill it because part of you loves it and you're not quite right in the head or the person you used to be but at the end of the day it's simply a beast of sadness. you crave the mercy you didn't get from your creators and so i'm telling you please forgive yourself. please hold the monster by the hand.

bandmates with firecracker sexual chemistry

you are like shooting stars. you are misguided and magnetic and drawn to your loves without hesitation. something about you gulps down anything it finds. and you're fun, and you stick your tongue out to anyone, and we love you for it with kisses and pulls of the hair. you will be remembered in fascination and jealousy. you are unforgettable.

— tragedy role:

misunderstood villain

prepare for an onslaught of both the most dehumanizing and hateful takes, and flood of thirst comments. you are chronically misunderstood. whether or not you're actually evil is debatable. you may be acting out for revenge, to defend someone you love, or even just to protect yourself. you're a pretty jaded person. you don't trust or even really like most people. maybe you did at one point. but that part of you is gone, and you don't go a single day without grieving it. you think a lot about what your life could have been. you're stuck in the past. you're angry and maybe you don't even want to be, but this is the only way you can see to survive. you're open, but less in a trusting way and more like a wound. you don't like to let people see you, but the hurt spills out of you before you can stop it. you're impulsive, even as you try hard to plan and prepare. maybe someday your side of the story will finally be heard. until then, you can convince yourself that being hated is safer anyway.

tortured love interest

you're so hot. sorry about the horrors. you're the kind of person people immediately notice. whether you have a distinct style, are more outgoing, or are just plain beautiful, you make an impression. people usually feel the need to protect you, which probably frustrates you to no end. you're not weak! you're not fragile! you're not helpless! but the people in your life tend to disagree. maybe it's your lover, the protagonist, trying to keep you out of their own turmoil. maybe it's someone responsible for you in some way, keeping you away from your lover, while they head down an increasingly dark path. regardless, all you really want is a sense of autonomy! unfortunately, you're very likely to die before that happens. the audience will be so caught up in the grief your death causes the protagonist that they forget to grieve you as a person. you deserved better, but unfortunately this is not your story. maybe it should have been.

[butchhansolo]

when i say i like anything in star wars you can probably just assume theres an addendum about it being the star wars ive concocted in my mind. star wars could be so good if it was good

[unboundwanderers]

Someone: I want to do a time war plot with you. Me, with excitement: I'm going to fucking kill you.

[mcmansionhell]

on neuschwanstein castle (part 1)

This is an essay in two parts.

Neuschwanstein Concept Drawing by the stage designer (!!) Christian Jank (1869).

There exist in architecture clear precedents to the McMansion that have nothing to do with suburban real estate. This is because “McMansionry” (let’s say) has many transferable properties. Among them can be included: 1) a diabolical amount of wealth that must be communicated architecturally in the most frivolous way possible, 2) a penchant for historical LARPing primarily informed by media (e.g. the American “Tuscan kitchen”) and 3) the execution of historical styles using contemporary building materials resulting in an aesthetic affect that can be described as uncanny or cheap-looking. By these metrics, we can absolutely call Neuschwanstein Castle, built by the architect Eduard Riedel for King Ludwig II of Bavaria, a McMansion.

Constructed from 1869 through 1886 – the year of Ludwig’s alleged suicide after having been ousted and declared insane – the castle cost the coffers of the Bavarian state and Ludwig himself no fewer than 6.2 million German gold marks. (That's an estimated 47 million euros today.) The castle's story is rife with well-known scandal. I'm sure any passing Swan Enthusiast is already familiar with Ludwig’s financial capriciousness, his called-off marriage and repressed homosexuality, his parasocial obsession with Richard Wagner, his complete and total inability to run his country, and his alleged "madness," as they used to call it. All of these combine to make Neuschwanstein inescapable from the man who commissioned it -- and the artist who inspired it. Say what you like about Ludwig and his building projects, but he is definitely remembered because of them, which is what most monarchs want. Be careful what you wish for.

Neuschwanstein gatehouse.

How should one describe Neuschwanstein architecturally? You’d need an additional blog. Its interiors alone (the subject of the next essay) range from Neo-Baroque to Neo-Byzantine to Neo-Gothic. There are many terms that can loosely define the palace's overall style: eclecticism, medieval revivalism, historicism, chateauesque, sclerotic monarchycore, etc. However, the the most specific would be what was called "castle Romanticism" (Burgenromantik). The Germans are nothing if not literal. Whatever word you want to use, Neuschwanstein is such a Sistine Chapel of pure sentimentality and sugary kitsch that theme park architecture – most famously, Disney's Cinderella’s castle itself – owes many of its medieval iterations to the palace's towering silhouette.

There is some truth to the term Burgenromantik. Neuschwanstein's exterior is a completely fabricated 19th century storybook fantasy of the Middle Ages whose precedents lie more truthfully in art for the stage. As a castle without fortification and a palace with no space for governance, Neuschwanstein's own program is indecisive about what it should be, which makes it a pretty good reflection of Ludwig II himself. To me, however, it is the last gasp of a monarchy whose power will be totally extinguished by that same industrial modernity responsible for the materials and techniques of Neuschwanstein's own, ironic construction.

In order to understand Neuschwanstein, however, we must go into two subjects that are equally a great time for me: 19th century medievalism - the subject of this essay - and the opera Lohengrin by Richard Wagner, the subject of the next. (1)

Part I: Medievalisms Progressive and Reactionary

The Middle Ages were inescapable in 19th century Europe. Design, music, visual art, theater, literature, and yes, architecture were all besotted with the stuff of knights and castles, old sagas, and courtly literature. From arch-conservative nationalism to pro-labor socialism, medievalism's popularity spanned the entire political spectrum. This is because it owes its existence to a number of developments that affected the whole of society.

In Ludwig’s time, the world was changing in profound, almost inconceivable ways. The first and second industrial revolutions with their socioeconomic upheavals and new technologies of transport, manufacturing, and mass communication, all completely unmade and remade how people lived and worked. This was as true of the average person as it was of the princes and nobles who were beginning to be undermined by something called “the petit bourgeoisie.”

Sustenance farming dwindled and wage labor eclipsed all other forms of working. Millions of people no longer able to make a living on piecemeal and agricultural work flocked to the cities and into the great Molochs of factories, mills, stockyards, and mines. Families and other kinship bonds were eroded or severed by the acceleration of capitalist production, large wars, and new means of transportation, especially the railroad. People became not only alienated from each other and from their labor in the classical Marxist sense but also from the results of that labor, too. No longer were chairs made by craftsmen or clothes by the single tailor -- unless you could afford the bespoke. Everything from shirtwaists to wrought iron lamps was increasingly mass produced - under wretched conditions, too. Things – including buildings – that were once built to last a lifetime became cheap, disposable, and subject to the whimsy of fashion, sold via this new thing called “the catalog.”

William Morris' painting Le Belle Iseult (1868).

Unsurprisingly, this new way of living and working caused not a little discontent. This was the climate in which Karl Marx wrote Capital and Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol. More specific to our interests, however, is a different dissenter and one of the most interesting practitioners of medievalism, the English polymath William Morris.

A lover of Arthurian legend and an admirer of the architect and design reformer John Ruskin, Morris was first trained in the office of architect G. E. Street, himself a die-hard Gothic Revivalist. From the very beginning, the Middle Ages can be found everywhere in Morris' work, from the rough-hewn qualities of the furniture he helped design to the floral elements and compositions of the art nouveau textiles and graphics he's most famous for -- which, it should be said, are reminiscent of 15th century English tapestries. In addition to his design endeavors, Morris was also a gifted writer and poet. His was a profound love for medieval literature, especially Norse sagas from Iceland. Some of these he even translated including the Volsunga Saga -- also a preoccupation of Wagner's. Few among us earn the title of polymath, but Morris' claim to it is undeniable. Aside from music, there really wasn't any area of creative life he didn't touch.

However, Morris' predilection for the medieval was not just a personal and aesthetic fascination. It was also an expression of his political rejection of the capitalist mode of production. As one of the founders of the English Arts & Crafts Movement, Morris called for a rejection of piecemeal machine labor, a return to handicraft, and overall to things made well and made with dignity. While this was and remains a largely middle class argument, one that usually leads down the road of ethical consumption, Morris was right that capitalism's failing of design and architecture did not just lie with the depreciated quality of goods, but the depreciated quality of life. His was the utopian call to respect both the object and the laborer who produced it. To quote from his 1888 essay called "The Revival of Architecture," Morris dreamed of a society that "will produce to live and not live to produce, as we do." Indeed, in our current era of AI Slop, there remains much to like about the Factory Slop-era call to take back time from the foreman's clock and once more make labor an act of enjoyable and unalienated creativity. Only now it's about things like writing an essay.

I bother to describe Morris at length here for a number of reasons. The first is to reiterate that medievalism's popularity was largely a response to socioeconomic changes. Additionally, since traditionalism - in Ludwig's time and in ours - still gets weaponized by right-wing losers, it's worth pointing out that not all practitioners of medievalism were politically reactionary in nature. However – and I will return to this later – medievalism, reactionary or not, remains inescapably nostalgic. Morris is no exception. While a total rejection of mass produced goods may seem quixotic to us now, when Morris was working, the era before mass industrialization remained at the fringes of living memory. Hence the nostalgia is perhaps to be expected. Unfortunately for him and for us, the only way out of capitalism is through it.

To return again to the big picture: whether one liked it or not, the old feudal world was done. Only its necrotic leftovers, namely a hereditary nobility whose power would run out of road in WWI, remained. For Ludwig purposes, it was a fraught political time in Bavaria as well. Bavaria, weird duck that it was, remained relatively autonomous within the new German Reich. Despite the title of king, Ludwig, much to his chagrin - hence the pathetic Middle Ages fantasizing - did not rule absolutely. His was a constitutional monarchy, and an embattled one at that. During the building of Neuschwanstein, the king found himself wedged between the Franco-Prussian War and the political coup masterminded by Otto von Bismarck that would put Europe on the fast track to a global conflict many saw as the atavistic culmination of all that already violent modernity. No wonder he wanted to hide with his Schwans up in the hills of Schwangau.

The very notion of a unified German Reich (or an independent Kingdom of Bavaria) was itself indicative of another development. Regardless if one was liberal or conservative, a king, an artist or a shoe peddler, the 19th century was plagued by the rise of modern nationalism. Bolstered by new ideas in "medical" “science,” this was also a racialized nationalism. A lot of emotional, political, and artistic investment was put into the idea that there existed a fundamentally German volk, a German soil, a German soul. This, however, was a universalizing statement in need of a citation, with lots of political power on the line. Hence, in order to add historical credence to these new conceptions of one’s heritage, people turned to the old sources.

Within the hallowed halls of Europe's universities, newly minted historians and philologists scoured medieval texts for traces of a people united by a common geography and ethnicity as well as the foundations for a historically continuous state. We now know that this is a problematic and incorrect way of looking at the medieval world, a world that was so very different from our own. A great deal of subsequent medieval scholarship still devotes itself to correcting for these errors. But back then, such scholarly ethics were not to be found and people did what they liked with the sources. A lot of assumptions were made in order to make whatever point one wanted, often about one's superiority over another. Hell, anyone who's been on Trad Guy Deus Vult Twitter knows that a lot of assumptions are still made, and for the same purposes.(2)

Meanwhile, outside of the academy, mass print media meant more people were exposed to medieval content than ever before. Translations of chivalric romances such as Wolfgang von Eschenbach’s Parzival and sagas like the Poetic Edda inspired a century’s worth of artists to incorporate these characters and themes into their work. This work was often but of course not always nationalistic in character. Such adaptations for political purposes could get very granular in nature. We all like to point to the greats like William Morris or Richard Wagner (who was really a master of a larger syncretism.) But there were many lesser attempts made by weaker artists that today have an unfortunate bootlicking je nais se quoi to them.

I love a minor tangent related to my interests, so here's one: a good example of this nationalist granularity comes from Franz Grillparzer’s 1823 pro-Hapsburg play König Ottokars Glück und Ende, which took for its source a deep cut 14th century manuscript called the Styrian Rhyming Chronicle, written by Ottokar Aus Der Gaul. The play concerns the political intrigue around King Ottokar II of Bohemia and his subsequent 1278 defeat at the hands of Grillparzer’s very swagged out Rudolf of Habsburg. Present are some truly fascinating but extremely obscure characters from 13th Holy Roman Empire lore including a long-time personal obsession of mine, the Styrian ministerial and three-time traitor of the Great Interregnum, Frederick V of Pettau. But I’m getting off-topic here. Let's get back to the castle.

The Throne Room at Neuschwanstein

For architecture, perhaps the most important development in spreading medievalism was this new institution called the "big public museum." Through a professionalizing field of archaeology and the sickness that was colonialist expansion, bits and bobs of buildings were stolen from places like North Africa, Egypt, the Middle East, and Byzantium, all of which had an enormous impact on latter 19th century architecture. (They were also picked up by early 20th century American architects from H. H. Richardson to Louis Sullivan.) These orientalized fragments were further disseminated through new books, monographs, and later photography.

Meanwhile, developments in fabrication (standardized building materials), construction (namely iron, then steel) and mass production sped things up and reduced costs considerably. Soon, castles and churches in the image of those that once took decades if not a century to build were erected on countless hillsides or in little town squares across the continent. These changes in the material production of architecture are key for understanding "why Neuschwanstein castle looks so weird."

Part of what gives medieval architecture its character is the sheer embodiment of labor embedded in all those heavy stones, stones that were chiseled, hauled, and set by hand. The Gothic cathedral was a precarious endeavor whose appearance of lightness was not earned easily, which is why, when writing about their sublimity, Edmund Burke invoked not only the play of light and shadow, but the sheer slowness and human toil involved.

This is, of course, not true of our present estate. Neuschwanstein not only eschews the role of a castle as a “fortress to be used in war” (an inherently stereotomic program) but was erected using contemporary materials and techniques that are simply not imbued with the same age or gravitas. Built via a typical brick construction but clad in more impressive sandstone, it's all far too clean. Neuschwanstein's proportions seem not only chaotic - towers and windows are strewn about seemingly on a whim - they are also totally irreconcilable with the castle's alleged typology, in part because we know what a genuine medieval castle looks like.

Ludwig's palace was a technological marvel of the industrial revolution. Not only did Neuschwanstein have indoor plumbing and central heat, it also used the largest glass windows then in manufacture. It's not even an Iron Age building. The throne room, seen earlier in this post, required the use of structural steel. None of this is to say that 19th century construction labor was easy. It wasn't and many people still died, including 30 at Neuschwanstein. It was, however, simply different in character than medieval labor. For all the waxing poetic about handiwork, I’m sure medieval stonemasons would have loved the use of a steam crane.

It's true that architectural eclecticism (the use of many styles at once) has a knack for undermining the presumed authenticity or fidelity of each style employed. But this somewhat misunderstands the crime. The thing about Neuschwanstein is that its goal was not to be historically authentic at all. Its target realm was that of fantasy. Not only that, a fantasy informed primarily by a contemporary media source. In this, it could be said to be more architecturally successful.

The fantasy of medievalism is very different than the truth of the Middle Ages. As I hinted at before, more than anything else, medievalism was an inherently nostalgic movement, and not only because it was a bedrock of so much children's literature. People loved it because it promised a bygone past that never existed. The visual and written languages of feudalism, despite it being a terrible socioeconomic system, came into vogue in part because it wasn't capitalism. We must remember that the 19th century saw industrial capitalism at its newest and rawest. Unregulated, it destroyed every natural resource in sight and subjected people, including children, to horrific labor conditions. It still does, and will probably get worse, but the difference is, we're somewhat used to it by now. The shock's worn off.

All that upheaval I talked about earlier made people long for a simplicity they felt was missing. This took many different forms. The rapid advances of secular society and the incursion of science into belief made many crave a greater religiosity. At a time when the effects of wage labor on the family had made womanhood a contested territory, many appeals were made to a divine and innocent feminine a la Lady Guinevere. Urbanization made many wish for a quieter world with less hustle and bustle and better air. These sentiments are not without their reasons. Technological and socioeconomic changes still make us feel alienated and destabilized, hence why there are so many medieval revivals even in our own time. (Chappell Roan of Arc anyone?) Hell, our own rich people aren't so different from Ludwig either. Mark Zuckerburg owns a Hawaiian island and basically controls the fates of the people who live there lord-in-the-castle-style.

Given all this, it's not surprising that of the products of the Middle Ages, perhaps chivalric romance was and remains the most popular. While never a real depiction of medieval life (no, all those knights were not dying on the behalf of pretty ladies), such stories of good men and women and their grand adventures still capture the imaginations of children and adults alike. (You will find no greater fan of Parzival than yours truly.) It's also no wonder the nature of the romance, with its paternalistic patriarchy, its Christianity, its sentimentality around courtly love, and most of all its depiction of the ruling class as noble and benevolent – appealed to someone like Ludwig, both as a quirked-up individual and a member of his class.

It follows, then, that any artist capable of synthesizing all these elements, fears, and desires into an aesthetically transcendent package would've had a great effect on such a man. One did, of course. His name was Richard Wagner.

In our next essay, we will witness one of the most astonishing cases of kitsch imitating art. But before there could be Neuschwanstein Castle, there had to be this pretty little opera called Lohengrin.

---

(1) If you want to get a head start on the Wagner stuff, I've been writing about the Ring cycle lately on my Substack: https://www.late-review.com/p/essays-on-wagners-ring-part-1-believing

(2) My favorite insane nationalist claim comes from the 1960s, when the Slovene-American historian Joseph Felicijan claimed that the US's democracy was based off the 13th century ritual of enthronement practiced by the Dukes of Carinthia because Thomas Jefferson owned a copy of Jean Bodin's Les six livres de la Republique (1576) in which the rite was mentioned. For more information, see Peter Štih's book The Middle Ages Between the Alps and the Northern Adriatic (p. 56 for the curious.)

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[cup-o-stars]

Relativity Falls!

Design Concepts (and my unnecessary thoughts):

Excuse the the colors, ig my apps are fighting.

I see Mabel finding success no matter what happens to her, but I really like the thought of her running an insane arts and crafts business in GF. Alternatively, if she fell in the portal, she'd come out acting confident as always, but she probably wouldn't realize how much the constant change and lack of family/stability wore her out until she settled back in. In either case, she's a bit cracked.

Dipper is investigative, but cracks easiest under stress and is not as inherently adventurous as Mabel or Ford- so the portal wouldn't treat him well. If he's not the one in the portal, he'd be into stargazing and real magic to share with people, while also warding tourists away from the dangerous stuff. In general, he'd be an unhappy adult if left to his own devices, lol.

Between Dipper and Mabel, I like Dipper being in the portal more. He's a great protagonist, but as a supporting cast member, he needs to be more insane to match the draw that is 'Mabel taking care of children,' ha. I also love the idea of there being no portal / some other looming threat for these two to struggle with (at least because Hirsche has made it clear that Dipper and Mabel are equally smart, and to me it seems like the portal would reopen way quicker with them), but I didn't plan on posting these and I don't know how my followers feel about me posting lore.

Stanford and Stanley:

Pretty much how they are in canon, but now they're in a setting where they can get over themselves, ha. They aren't quite as mature as Dipper and Mabel were at their age, but after coming to GF, they finally found other people to look out for them. Dipper could be a more emotionally available and level-headed role model (I think having people to take care of is calming for him in turn), and they'd both look up to Mabel as the peak of somebody who knows how to socialize.

Fiddleford:

He's a sweet, southern, farm-raised mechanical engineer just like in canon.

Idk why Fiddleford is in GF (visiting an unnamed grandparent?), but I really like his relationship with Ford in the journal. Following that thought, in this AU, he starts out more of Ford's friend than Stan's, and it's kind of a big deal. Unlike Dipper's arc on learning to be a kid, Stan and Ford clearly struggled a lot with interpersonal relationships / finding security outside of eachother, and that's what I think this AU could be about (it's great they realized they need each other in canon, but the part where they had no one else to turn to is also kinda crazy if you ask me).

Ford gets to meet another smart kid in a weird town, which helps him feel more normal. He has a better idea of what friendship is because of it, but also, since I can't imagine Dipper wanting an apprentice so young/vulnerable/impressionable or Mabel asking only one of the twins to stay- he'd have to come to terms with the fact that he can't live in his dream world forever. (Or maybe the apprenticeship comes from somewhere else, just because the conflict around going back to Glass Shard Beach at all, or sending Stan alone could be pretty good.)

On the flipside, I think Stan's initial jealousy of Ford and Fiddleford's friendship would force him to try finding his own friends / hobbies. I like the idea that he fails at first- and a lot- but Mabel notices his mounting frustration (which he is very keen on hiding), and her consistent and unorthodox support makes him realize he wasn't alone to begin with. He can be more open around her, which makes it easier to open up to others, and then he can make friends without having to pull any tricks. He probably starts with some animals, and then at least gets closer to Fiddleford anyways (I feel like they're both more practical than Ford and value human company more, so they'd bond easier once Stan gets over his personal hurdle).

Anyways- because that was way too much- Mabel's exes are a constant source of antagonists and Dipper is stressed about setting a good example.

(I was more of a Monster Falls fan back in the day, but I can't draw animals, lol)

[rindreamery]

like a fever, i ache for you.

how intensely the blue lock men yearn for you. featuring: itoshi rin, itoshi sae, nagi seishiro, mikage reo, michael kaiser 𝜗𝜚 content: suggestive

note. drove myself insane while writing this actually 🧍🏻‍♀️WHEN WILL IT BE MY TURN

itoshi rin sees you in every daydream.

every time rin closes his eyes, you’re there— it’s as if the image of you is permanently burned into the space behind his eyelids, like a never ending dream. (yet, he never wants to wake up from it.) the mere sight of you makes his heart burn and his head spin, and that desperate feeling of wanting you bleeds into his fingertips that makes him reach for you in his sleep. you trap him in his own mind. it feels as if you consume his every thought and occupy the space of every moment he’s awake. you’re a distraction, but one he can’t seem to get enough of.

when he blinks, you’re there, and everything blurs together. he starts to lose sense of where you end and he begins— you’ve become a part of him.

the concept of you even begins to seep into his passions, into his goals. rin thinks of you when he’s on the field, and he can’t deny the rush of adrenaline that shoots through his body at the thought of you cheering for him. he’s hooked to the feeling, he needs more. the thought that you’re only thinking of him too at that exact moment— watching him, holding his dreams close to your heart— that you’re both thinking of each other. connected. it’s a dream that drives him to try even harder.

because you’re not just a distraction anymore; you’ve become his sole focus.

during his next game, he plays with the image of you patiently waiting for him at the entrance of the tunnel. so when he catches his breath after a hard match, his body on the brink of collapsing and covered in sweat, it’s not the sweet taste of victory that revives him. it’s not the cheers of the crowd, praises of his name falling from their lips, that brings him back to life. no— it’s the thought of you. close and real, hand pressed against his chest as you lean in, with your warm skin pressing against his own as you whisper into his ear, “i knew you could do it.”

he knows he'll dream of that feeling from now on too, of your breath against his ear. he can’t escape you— but he doesn’t think he’ll ever want to.

itoshi sae searches for you in the crowd.

without fail, sae’s eyes will always gravitate towards you— even in the chaos of the stadium, even when you think you’re lost in the blur of the people surrounding you. his eyes always seem to find yours. when he finally catches sight of you in his jersey, it’s hard to miss the way his gaze sharpens with intensity, his eyes darkening in a way you’ve never seen before. it’s electric; the only word that could describe the feeling he gets when he sees that you’re staring back at him with the same intensity.

something about you— the way you proudly wear his jersey, and the look of pride that swims in your eyes as you look at him— awakens something deep in him.

sae feels a satisfaction he's never quite felt before you. it’s a possessive and all-consuming feeling. like his ego is inflated to its limits and makes him uncharacteristically greedy for you. his thoughts become filled with the need to become the center of your world, to stake some sort of claim on you so no one else can. (he wants his teammates to see what he comes home to every night.) this feeling that makes him want to throw away all rationale, and before he realizes it, it's this feeling that has him walking over to you before the match even begins.

he doesn't care for the alarmed look on your face as he rips your (his) ring off your finger. around the two of you, shocked gasps fill the stadium, as he loops your ring into his necklace. but they become lost in the background, and his focus is on you. "look at me," and when he brings his necklace up to his lips, your ring now dangling by the string, his eyes never leave yours. there’s an almost dangerous edge to it now— his eyes gleaming possessively at you.

he wants you to think of this moment, to embed it in your thoughts, and crave for him the same way he craves for you.

nagi seishiro can't stop staring at your lips.

light pink lip gloss looks the best on you. it’s a thought that clouds nagi’s mind every time he sees them. the way its glossiness catches the light, making the soft pink of your lips stand out and give it a subtle, irresistible fullness. they’re so plump, inviting, that it becomes dangerously intoxicating. (it must be on purpose, he often thinks, because you smile every time you're applying it on.) he doesn’t care if you notice the fact that he’s unable to fight the urge when his eyes flicker towards them— like it’s impossible to tear his eyes away from them— he wants you to notice.

they’re just so alluring, yet troubling, the way it gets his heart pumping in excitement.

the jealous part of him wants to be the only one to see you like this. because there’s just something about the way you react to him, something about the look in your eyes when you catch on to his wandering gaze. he’s entirely drawn to the way your breath hitches just a little when his eyes flick down to your lips, and then back to your eyes. and the way the corner of your lips pulls into a little smirk at this, eyes focused on his, as your tongue teasingly drags across the gloss to get a taste. his mind becomes overcome with thoughts of you— what would they taste like? would it be something fruity, like strawberry? or maybe something even sweeter, like birthday cake?

but you never give him the satisfaction of knowing, and it pulls him in even deeper. you push away from him, every time, and it’s maddening. it’s always with the same sweet smile and playful glint in your eyes, that you tell him, “it was nice talking to you.” then you’re turning around, leaving him behind.

nagi’s left wondering what it would be like, to see if that sweetness on your lips tastes as inviting as it looks.

mikage reo thinks of you in every song.

with every beat, every lyric, with every tune that floods reo’s ears— there you are, vivid in his mind, as if you were woven deep into the addicting melody. it’s as if the lyrics were written with you in mind, and he’s forever stuck thinking of you. his heart burns for you in the songs that you send, and he clings to every playlist you share. he imagines you in these lovesick songs— having you in his arms, intertwining his fingers with yours as you dance slowly to the tune— like his mind is desperately trying to tell him something he’s still too afraid to say out loud. it’s a silent confession, words he can never bring himself to say out loud, spilling from the speakers instead.

he plays the same song on repeat; he wants to keep hearing your name in the lyrics, and to feel the ghost of your presence as if you’re right there with him.

but as silent as his affections are, reo doesn’t want his desperate longing to be one-sided. he wants to worm his way into your every thought, invade your mind, the same exact way you had done with his. he wants you to see flashes of him when you hear a familiar tune, to smile to yourself whenever you realize it’s his favorite song playing in the background of a random store.

so reo pours his heart into a playlist for you. "these songs remind me of you," and to him, it’s enough. he hopes you can hear everything he feels in the space between the lyrics, to read between the lines of the words as they dance across your screen. every song is a dedication to his love for you. to him, it’s a love letter he can never bring himself to write but can’t help and send. he doesn’t want to speak it out loud— this playlist, with a strange mix of soft longing and quiet desire, does the work for him.

it’s a playlist of his soul’s quietest confessions, and he hopes you can hear how much his heart longs for you.

michael kaiser is haunted by thoughts of your touch.

kaiser doesn’t know when it started— the obsession, the craving for you, the fervent need to feel your skin on his. maybe it was when your fingertips grazed his hand as you passed him a water bottle, lasting for a second at most, but sending sparks flying across his skin where you touched. or maybe it was when you put your hand against his back, palms pressed firmly into the planes of his muscles, as you guided him out of the way (because he was blocking you, but he chooses to ignore that detail.) you’re his manager; you’re simply doing your job.

but he’s started to find himself stuck in the fantasy of your touch— imagining the way your fingers would trace over his tattoos, or having them run through his hair as you brush it out of his face.

and his breath always catches in his throat as he imagines the sensation, having to swallow at how dry and constricted his throat becomes. he thinks of the warmth of your hands, the way your fingers would subtly dance on his skin, and he shivers. he imagines that you wouldn’t rush—no, you’d take it slow. you would let it linger, and maybe he would press his hands over yours to trap it there. just to savor the feeling.

his fantasies of you could never compare to the real thing, though, he realizes one day.

he’s sat on the bench in front of you, tense with heightened sensitivity. the surface of his skin feels like it's on flames from your words, “your tattoos are so pretty,” and from the way your index finger trace over the inked vines that wrap around his arms. his stomach starts to form tight coils as your fingers travel up and up— at the feeling of your thumbs grazing his jaw as you brush his hair out of the way to look at the blue rose — and he’s sucking in a harsh breath as he tries to keep himself grounded. to keep himself from losing his mind. and when you pull away, he can't ignore the emptiness the washes over him.

his heart is greedy and insatiable; he's never satisfied. now that he’s gotten a taste of what it feels like, he finds himself wanting even more of you.

© rindreamery, 2024

[pathologicalreid]

for the fear of falling apart | part one

after hearing her gunpoint confession, your sister pressures you into airing your grievances at Rossi's wedding

part one | part two | part three | part four | part five | epilogue

series masterlist

who? spencer reid x jareau!reader category: angst content warnings: takes place following/during 14x15 "truth or dare", fem!reader, established relationship, mentions roslyn, unresolved conflict, a lot of insecurity, cm violence, i think everyone has a fault in this word count: 2.47k a/n: so this idea popped into my head. i think the concept of spencer dating jj's younger sister is insane and i love it. i hope you like it as well. (i want to write a part two so bad i hate leaving things unresolved). also this is not jj hate that's my girl i loved her even before i loved spencer!!!!

“Please, can you just hear me out?” Your sister pleaded, keeping her voice low so you didn’t take any attention off of the bride and groom.

Bringing your glass to your lips, you shrugged, “I’m not sure this is the right place, Jennifer,” you murmured, looking across the room at your brother-in-law, “I think Will’s looking for you.”

She brushed off your dismissal, “I’ll go over once we figure this out. Let’s go out to the courtyard and talk.”

JJ reached out and gently gripped your elbow, trying to guide you through the French doors of the wedding venue, but you yanked your arm away, crossing your arms in front of your stomach. “It’s rude to leave now, this is a wedding, we’re guests here,” you scolded her, focusing your eyes forward. The ceremony was over, and everyone was mingling, but you refused to be the first to leave. Besides, going home would mean needing to face Spencer – another discussion you didn’t have the energy for.

You knew she hated leaving things unfinished. The both of you could feel the rift between you growing as if the earth was physically shifting beneath your feet. “It would just be for a second,” she urged.

Swallowing thickly, you shook your head, “It’s fifteen years of dirty laundry, Jayg. It’s going to take more than a second to air it out.” You frowned into your newly emptied glass before hauling yourself over to the bar, grateful that she didn’t follow, “Can you make me one of the pink glittery drinks?”

Penelope, the honorary bartender for the evening, nodded reassuringly, taking an already-made beverage from the counter and sliding it over to you, “You look like you could use it,” she observed.

You sighed in concurrence, “You have no idea,” you mumbled as you brought the glass to your lips. The drink itself was a bit of an abomination, so strong that it burnt your nostrils as it went down, “God, that’s strong.”

The technical analyst just laughed, making her way back to the dance floor to meet up with Luke and Matt. Your gaze flickered over other members of the team until you were met with familiar brown eyes.

There had been a ball of dread forming in your stomach ever since you returned from Los Angeles. From where you were standing now, the cut on your boyfriend’s hand that you had preoccupied yourself with seemed inconsequential. You watched him now, in real-time as he glanced between you and your sister, picking up on the tension as you avoided her.

Someone was bound to snap.

Walking away from the bar, you went out into the hallway, finding the nearest door and practically throwing yourself outside. Pulling your hair off the back of your neck with your free hand, you sat down on a moss-covered bench in the courtyard and waited for the cold night air to cool you off.

As expected, you heard the door behind you click. You couldn’t be bothered to look at who it was, if it was important to them, they’d come to you. Sure enough, you remained focused on your drink as Spencer took a seat on the bench next to you, “Aren’t you cold?”

“Alcohol,” you mumbled, “Keeps me warm.”

Not exactly the answer he was going for, but he took it at face value. He was probably more comfortable in his suit than you were in your dress. “Are you feeling alright?”

You thought about lying to him. Telling him that you were just tired, it had been a long week of watching your sister and boyfriend being held hostage in a pawn shop and hunting Everett Lynch on top of your normal caseload, but the thought of holding up that lie just made you feel worse. Taking a large sip of your drink, you took a deep breath before speaking, “Garcia recovered the audio from the CCTV footage inside of the pawn shop. Emily asked me to review the tapes and let her know if I thought there was anything pertinent that should be added to the case files.”

He didn’t respond for a while, knowing exactly what you were getting at but not sure how to further the conversation, “And did you?”

You lifted your glass again, “There wasn’t anything in the tapes that was necessary for the case. I buried the audio files and transcripts and sealed the file.”

“Thank you,” he said, relief evident in his tone.

You, however, frowned at his response, “’Thank you’?” You repeated, an accusation in your voice, “I was scared shitless while the two of you were in there, and all the while my sister was confessing her love for you.”

Spencer was quiet again, rendered speechless by your words. Your description was accurate, if not blunt.

You sniffled, setting your glass down and wrapping your arms around yourself, “I have never felt more humiliated, and no one else can ever know why.” You traced the cobblestones on the ground with your eyes as thoughts continued racing through your head. “God, is this why she pushed us together?”

The door behind you clicked again and you stiffened, closing your eyes when you heard JJ coming out into the courtyard, “Ducky, we need to talk.”

“Don’t fucking call me that,” you snapped at her, standing up and glaring at her. Your childhood nickname rang through your ears. A term of endearment given to you by your oldest sister now grated on your heart, shredding through each chamber. “I do not need to do anything,” you told her, narrowing your gaze.

Tears pricked your eyes, Please, JJ, just give me time to think. I just need a minute. Not everything has to be solved right away.

You were too proud to say the words aloud, but you thought it. You wanted to beg her for time. You wanted to plead with your sister for just a little bit of time to think things through.

She held her hands up in surrender, “I needed to tell Pinkner something that would satisfy him. You know the profile; you know what would’ve happened if I didn’t.”

Yes, and the image of both of them being held at gunpoint would haunt you for years to come, but that still didn’t justify any of it, not to you. Finishing off your drink, you set the crystal glass on the cobblestone bench and faced your sister, “Jennifer,” you said sharply, “Truth or dare?”

Her blue eyes widened as she looked between you and Spencer, who was wisely keeping his mouth shut, “Truth,” she answered, her voice so quiet you could barely hear it.

“Did you mean it?” You asked, the first of your tears finally flooding over your lash line.

You gripped the fabric of your dress in your hands as you waited for her answer, “Yes,” she told you.

Covering your face with your hands, you sighed deeply into them, “Fuck,” you cried. “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” you echoed. None of this made sense to you, JJ was married. JJ and Will were the kind of couple that you could look at and you would know that they belonged together, but now she was saying she had been in love with Spencer this whole time.

White hot tears stung the cold skin on your cheeks as you looked back up at your sister, waiting for her to say something else. “We went on an almost date years ago and nothing else ever came of it. Life just went on moving and we…” Her voice trailed off, either unable to finish her thought or unwilling to share.

“You’re married, JJ,” you said desperately, looking at her and wondering if she had told Will where she was going. “Does Will know? Did you tell him you’ve been stringing him along? Thirteen years in and two kids later?”

She faltered for a moment, and you knew you had hit your mark – it made you sick to your stomach. “No, I love him. I love my boys, you know that.”

You nodded numbly, “Yeah, I do, but I can’t keep going if you’re always going to be longing for what might’ve been.”

“You’re drunk and you don’t know what you’re talking about,” she accused, tapping her right foot anxiously.

JJ might’ve grown up in Roslyn’s shadow, but you grew up in hers. Captain of the varsity soccer team, full-ride athletic scholarship at Pitt, and grad school at Georgetown. All leading up to her joining the bureau at twenty-three. You followed her, believing anywhere was better than Pennsylvania, and this is what it had gotten you. It was exhausting, being the one pushing the boulder up the hill, your hands were scraped, and she couldn’t see it.

Deftly, you wiped at the tears beneath your eyes, “I know exactly what I’m saying. Please, can you try and just look at this from my point of view? My big sister, who I’ve looked up to for my whole life, confessed her feelings for my boyfriend. My boyfriend who she set me up with.” Realization dawned on you, turning to face Spencer, “You were in love with her, and… I’m…” your voice trailed off.

Matching your train of thought, Spencer shook his head, reaching a hand out for yours, but you pulled away from him, “No, honey, please. It’s not like that.”

“You couldn’t have her, and I’m just the next best thing,” you told him miserably. “She met Will and got pregnant and got married and you were so in love with her that you took the off-brand version just to have something.”

Spencer shushed you, watching as tears fell from your cheeks, “I’m with you because I love you, not because of anything else.”

Your chest ached, it felt like someone had thrust their hand in the cavity and was squeezing as tightly as they could. You wanted to believe him. You so, so badly wanted to believe him. “Tell me,” you prompted, “tell me I’m not your second choice.”

“You are not my second choice,” he told you, and you watched. You watched for his tells, any sign at all that he was lying.

You shook your head at him, “Why did you lie to me? About the football game,” you asked him, a semi-permanent frown staying on your face.

He furrowed his brows and stood up in front of you, rubbing your arms up and down to keep you warm, “I didn’t lie to you.”

“You didn’t tell me. Neither of you did. That’s lying by omission, and you both know it,” you said, stepping away from him hesitantly. You didn’t know what to trust; you didn’t know what was real.

Spencer looked back at your sister, but she looked frozen, “It wasn’t a date,” he said simply. “I… I intended for it to be a date, but JJ invited Penelope and that was the end of it. I took it as her not being interested and that’s the truth. Nothing else ever happened between the two of us.”

You watched your sister, her mouth opening and closing as she scrounged for the right thing to say. “I said what I had to in order to survive,” she defended.

Sucking on your back molars, you shrugged helplessly in response, “I know,” you admitted. “I know that you probably planned on taking your truth to the grave with you, but… it’s out, Jayg.”

“I can explain everything to you,” she offered, “Please let me explain, Ducky.”

The desperation in her voice chiseled at your resolve, but it wasn’t enough. “I don’t have it in me,” you admitted. “I’m fresh out of fight and I just wanna go home,” you told her, looking at Spencer who nodded, heading back inside to gather your things.

You sat back down on the bench, propping your chin up on your hand.

“I couldn’t think of anything else to say,” she tried again, her voice gruff from holding back tears.

Shaking your head, you closed your eyes and breathed in the cold winter air, “I don’t really care, JJ. You said it, I heard it, and now you have to deal with it.”

She cleared her throat, “I would deal with it now, but you’re being petulant.”

Looking up at her, you frowned, “I told you inside that I didn’t want to talk about this here. You came outside. You sought me out to talk. Now you’re mad that I’m not being nice about it?” Something new bubbled in your stomach, the pit that had been forming there quickly evolved into anger.

“I was trying to save lives,” she tried again, insisting she was right.

You could live with her being right on that front. She was saving lives, and she needed a truth potent enough to sway the UnSub, but in all of her explanations, she never once apologized about this curveball. “I live with Spencer. I… when I give gifts, they’re signed from the both of us,” you told her. “Sometimes when we can’t sleep at night, we come up with baby names, and you’re in love with him. I asked for time, and you couldn’t give it to me. So, this is what you get.”

With Spencer reappearing at the door, you made your way out of the courtyard, he draped your coat over your shoulders, and you wrapped the wool around yourself as you made your way out. “I told Rossi and Krystall that you were tired, but I think they might have taken it as you had too much to drink,” he explained, opening the passenger side door for the car for you to get in.

A small smile tugged at your throat, “I don’t really care.” Maybe if you had gotten that drunk, your chest wouldn’t hurt so much.

The rest of the ride home was silent, small flurries started floating from the sky, and you watched the way they danced in the streetlights. Once you were home, you got ready for bed, grabbing a pillow off of your bed, and turning to the door, “Where are you going?” Spencer asked, returning from brushing his teeth.

“I’m gonna sleep on the couch,” you told him softly, looking at the pillow that you were clutching in your arms.

He faltered for a moment, obviously taken aback by your decision, “Can we talk tomorrow?”

You frowned, letting your eyes lift to his, when it was dark, his eyes took on a certain kind of melancholia. It hurt to look at tonight. “Sure,” you offered weakly, turning around and heading for the couch.

“Are we gonna be okay?” He asked, fear creeping into his voice. Fear of losing you.

Glancing back at him as you lobbed the pillow on the couch, you gave him a gentle smile, “Yeah, Spence, we’ll figure it out. Just not tonight, okay?”