#it seems more insane in person when you can see how many dates and numbers i wrote down

[quaranmine]

i just went to bed, then 15 minutes later got out of bed and turned the lights on, grabbed a pencil and sticky note, and began frantically calculating my total possible annual leave between now and December 2025. Again.

just in case anyone is wondering just how meticulous and obsessive i am over future travel and time off

[bunny-jpeg]

https://www.tumblr.com/bunnys-kisses/768349619894861824/im-holding-your-hand-when-im-saying-this-as-a?source=share

people started asking crane (Max’s friend) on stream if Lestappen (Charles and max) is real. I think he was like “I shouldn’t be furthering/entertaining this” (I forgot what he said word for word). People took it as something to be excited about, that the drivers are aware of the ships and all, but idk. I think fandoms are getting too bold for my liking. I have no problem with shipping, but this parasocial behaviour is out of hand. I saw this when 1D was still a group (with Harry x Louis shippers harassing Louis to the point where he got so upset when the ship was referenced in the popular show Euphoria), I’ve seen it with Kpop in which idols have stopped hanging out publicly because fandoms get out of hand (a girl in the group Aespa had a boyfriend earlier this year and fans got very upset because they shipped her and another member and they broke up. A few years ago, 2 members of two different kpop groups (SNSD and EXO) dated and the girl got harassed at the airport even). And now this.

Fandoms get so parasocial so quickly, it’s insane. It’s not new behaviour, but it’s strange.

exactly, this isn't new behavior. but i feel like it's become more emboldened with how much more "online" both fans and companies/groups are.

more under the cut, because this is a long one....

i also think it ties into this notion that i've been seeing online about how fans have this feeling to be "right" both with rpf and fiction as well. that their theories, opinions and whatever else is "correct". i've seen this with like pieces of media like steven universe and even star wars. like fandom isn't fun anymore, it has become this weird one up over each other. i honestly don't know when this changed, my guess is around the pandemic when it seemed like people were more logged into the internet. but, i could be wildly off with that. (if you have an idea, i'd love to know). it just feels stupid in so many ways how fandoms are structured. even if you're not the "best" artist or writer, people can't have FUN in fandom - of course that doesn't mean it has to be absolved criticism. you can have fun and still call out hate within spaces. the issue with formula one (along with k-pop like you mentioned, anon), is that these aren't characters. this isn't arguing in the tags over is finnpoe or reylo is more valid or legitimate within the narrative. these are REAL people, with REAL friends, families and partners.

it's this weird push to have someone's theory - and while i have a soft spot for lestappen, it is at the end of the day nothing more than fan theory - be confirmed. also personally, if hattie (oscar's sister) or crane (max's friend) "outed" them, i would be horribly fucking offended on oscar/max's behalf. to have someone you TRUST just out you like that. it's sick. maybe it's because i worked in queer spaces from high school all the way through uni, and the number one rule no matter WHAT, is you never out someone. even if the question is harmless and the person asking has no ill intention. you never out another person, because it's not YOUR coming out. so the fact that fans are near begging these people to OUT their loved ones, is not only a level of delusion that i can't ever comprehend. but, also it could honestly, ruin that interpersonal relationship.

so like even if a driver is queer, whoever it may be. could be a driver from the 90s, could be a driver today, it could be a driver in five years, i don't want someone else in their life outing them. because that's THEIR story. and fans need to realize that. bothering crane or hattie or alexandra (i've seen that too) - isn't helping anyone and it makes you look unhinged and weirdly alienates not only the driver but their loved ones. YES, they knew it exists, it is EVERYWHERE. but shoving it in their faces doesn't help. and you're never going to get the confirmation because there is a high chance that their not even queer to begin with. and if they are, NOT OUR CONCERN

i don't have a problem writing or consuming rpf, it is not a crime nor do i think it should be stopped. like HAVE FUN. but you have to realize that it's not like debating star wars or marvel or whatever other piece of fictional media. formula one is REAL, they are not actors. they are athletes, and unless you want all rpf to be shut down some how. i suggest the likes of some of ya'll need to understand that there are different boundaries. and respect them.

i know they're all millionaires, but they still breathe and bleed as a friend of mine once said. it's fun to put them in little scenarios in fanworks, but just keep it out of their direct attention. there are unspoken boundaries, that some of ya'll need have said to you apparently.

asking oscar issac if he THINKS that finnpoe is real is VERY different than asking someone's sister if she thinks her REAL LIFE BROTHER is fucking his REAL LIFE TEAMMATE. - people's relationships have turned to ash over insistent rpf in their faces all the time.

my advice at the end of the day is: have fun, don't write or draw it because you want confirmation that it's a real relationship. write or draw it because you're having fun. fandom is about making friends and shipping in whatever context is about finding a slice of community on the vast internet, not cracking the code of if it is a real relationship. - bunny.

[starlightkyeom]

take my hands (we can fall together) | lee chan | pt 3

(where you and chan are friends, but he's your brother's best friend. and you've always been just a little out of reach. until one season changes everything.) pairing: brother's best friend!chan (dino) x f!reader genre: friends to ??, pining, slow burn | fluff, angst, smut rating: explicit warnings/notes: mentions of unhealthy relationships (reader x boyfriend), mentions of food, mentions of drinking/alcohol, friendsgiving, chan is having a crisis, explicit smut in this part, kissing, body appreciation, fingering (f. receiving), oral sex (f. receiving), face sitting, multiple orgasms, overstimulation, protected sex (p in v), aftercare, chan is a tease, chan calls reader baby one time, i think that's it but let me know if it's not word count: ~9.2k (full fic is roughly 23.5k) notes on the characters: anyone used as a background character is meant to be an OC, i'm just lazy with coming up with names a/n: SHE'S DONE! i cannot believe that (not me sticking to a timeline). huge thanks to @svthub for hosting this fall collab. check out the full list of fics here. make sure you go back and read parts 1 & 2 for context. this is the last one 😭 (unless i return for a drabble/timestamp). also thank you to my bby indi for creating an amazing banner @classicscreations.

tagging: @christinewithluv @aaniag @dejavernon @tbzhub @bitchlessdino @seungkwansphd

part 2 | masterlist

Even though he feels a bit weird about it, Chan makes good on his promise to Carla and they reschedule. Instead of going out to a too-loud bar, Chan suggests a favorite restaurant of his. Some place with good food and a better atmosphere. The perfect place to try and get to know his date on a real level. Not only is she beautiful and genuinely interested in him, she’s kind, easy to talk to, and surprisingly funny. The perfect person to finally move onto a healthier, strictly friendly relationship with you.

Everything about the date goes even more smoothly than he expects. Despite how open she is while texting, Chan’s surprised to find how engaged she is in person. It’s like nothing and nobody else exists apart from the two of them. She talks openly about liking him, too, because she says she doesn’t see the point of dancing around things, playing some kind of game. Life is too short not to tell someone how she feels. There’s a warmth in hearing that, like something dormant being awoken. It’s not like his other feelings completely disappear, but it’s nice to have that kind of connection.

At the end of the date, they walk out together and Chan grabs her hand without thinking twice about it. She stops him just outside the restaurant to pull him towards her for a kiss. Maybe it doesn’t make him see stars or anything insane like in the movies, but it’s nice. Her lips are soft against his and seem to just kiss away any worries. It really has been the best date he’s been on in a long time. So much so that he considers coming up for a drink when Carla invites him. There’s just a little something in the back of his mind holding him back and so he politely declines. He reasons it away that he’s got Friendsgiving the next day. It’s been a great date, but he’s definitely not ready to bring Carla to meet his friends. It’s only been one actual date. Even if they have been texting a lot.

Chan is up a little early the next day because he needs to run to the store to get some drinks before making his way to Seokmin’s house. That’s been their go-to place for bigger gatherings like this since he bought it because it’s got the most space. Last he heard, there were fifteen people coming for Friendsgiving. He’s also got to pick up Jay and Vernon on the way there so there aren’t too many cars. Jay should’ve been helping him pick up drinks. But, no. He crashed at Vernon’s. Which isn’t entirely surprising since Vernon’s new game is at the beta-testing stage and Jay’s always been the number one tester. It’s more than mildly concerning to see his two friends smirking when they get in the car, though.

“What?” Chan prompts.

“How was your date last night?” Vernon asks.

“Yeah, are we going to have to set an extra place at the table?” Jay adds on. 

“What are you talking about?” Chan questions.

“You went on a date last night, right?” Jay presses. 

“You know I did,” Chan confirms. “We live together.”

“And you took her to that restaurant we love,” Jay carries on.

“Yeah,” Chan says slowly, drawing the word out.

“Oh, cut him some slack. I guess you were so caught up in the date that you entirely missed that some of our friends were there too,” Vernon says and laughs at Chan’s face. “Yeah Jiyeon texted me laughing about how she tried to get your attention and you didn’t even notice.”

“Oh shit, I’ll have to apologize to her,” Chan says. 

“She was with Mina, Lisa, and my sister too,” Jay adds on. 

“They were all there?” Chan worries. 

“Yeah, I think it was my sister’s idea. A little bit of a girl’s night for whoever was free,” Jay says. “Rude of them not to invite us. But clearly you were busy.”

“So are we going to be seeing her today?” Vernon asks. 

“It was one date,” Chan deflects.

“One date that you kissed and then left with,” Jay adds on. Chan whips his head over to look at his best friend.

“Sorry, Ji had a lot to say about it. You know how she is,” Vernon shrugs. “And Jay wasn’t sharing the game so I had a lot of time to text her.”

“Great,” Chan says. 

“Hey, that’s a compliment! I stayed up playing a game and crashed on a couch, for you,” Jay complains.

The two of them carry on bickering while Chan’s head is a million miles away. Not exactly what he’s prepared for or expecting walking into Seokmin’s house. At least he knows ahead of time. For all the times Jay’s a pain in the ass, which is basically any time he’s breathing, he’s a loyal friend. He might be ribbing Chan for being so oblivious now, but he’s also giving him time to prepare before he walks in because Jiyeon is going to give it way worse. So, Chan takes the rest of the drive to figure out how he’s going to say. 

It’s hard, though, because entirely too much of his brain focuses on the fact that you were there, too. Something Jay kind of glosses over, probably trying to take the focus off. He’s never called Chan on it, but he’s known how his friend feels for a long time. You were there and you saw his whole date. Saw the way he was caught up. Saw the way he left with Carla. Saw the kiss. Saw everything. Because you were with Jiyeon and she would have been doing a live commentary. That’s just who she is. Not in a malicious way, she just hates being ignored. It’s stupid to be caught up on what you thought. He’s moving on. That’s what the date with Carla was supposed to do and he knows he can’t just live in this perpetual state of caring about you. Not when you’re in the middle of putting your heart back together. Not when you haven’t shown any interest. Not when you straight up said Chan was just a friend. 

He’s barely through the door before Jiyeon is harassing him. “So, what, you go on a date with someone you barely know and you just forget we’ve been friends for literal years?”

“Easy, Ji, I didn’t see you,” Chan repeats. 

“Well obviously,” she retorts.

“Did you call my name? Or send me a text to be like hey, over here?” Chan fires back. Fighting fire with fire is the only thing she responds to.

“No, you were too wrapped up in your little date,” Jiyeon answers like it’s obvious.

“Maybe you didn’t really want to get my attention. Maybe you just wanted to bitch today. Maybe you woke up and chose violence,” Chan says, earning an immediate eye roll. 

“Did you just call me a bitch?” Jiyeon asks with faux outrage.

“I said you wanted to bitch, I’d never call you a bitch,” he answers anyway.

“Well, where is she then?” Jiyeon asks as she makes a show of looking behind Chan.

“Carla? She’s not here. Obviously,” Chan says.

“Oooooh do you like her enough to use her name? Not just the girl you’re dating?” Jiyeon teases. 

“I hate you,” Chan utters without any bite.

“I know,” she sing-songs.

Almost involuntarily, Chan’s eyes find their way to you, looking for some kind of reaction to the whole scene. But, you’re sitting with Seokmin, like you aren’t paying attention at all. Like maybe you don’t even care. Which is good, right? Chan wanted you to leave Seungsik so that you could be happy and heal, not so that he could have a chance. Which is exactly what happened. It should be a good thing, seeing you happy. It’s just that he can’t help but feel like you don’t seem as happy as you did the day after leaving Seungsik at his aunt’s house. 

It starts as Chan thinking he’s overreacting. Throughout dinner, it becomes crystal clear that something is off. You stick close to Seokmin and Lisa, don’t even really mingle with people in the same way you do any other time everyone is together. Even with the friends you don’t get to see as often. There’s something a little dull about you, like the dimmer switch isn’t all the way on. And Chan never sees you without a drink in your hand, which is a little odd, too. Almost everyone drinks too much at Friendsgiving and then naps or sobers up before leaving. Drinking is normal. This isn’t that, though. 

The thing that hurts Chan the most is that you hardly speak to him at all. Several times, he tries to start a conversation, only to have you give short answers before excusing yourself to do something else. Or talk to someone else. Or be anywhere that Chan isn’t. That hurts on a much deeper level than any feelings he has or had for you. Over the past two months, it’s felt like you were coming to depend on him more as a genuine friend. Someone that you could turn to or be vulnerable around. More than just another person in a decent sized friend group or your younger brother’s best friend. There were even times when he wondered if he was in your inner circle. Things definitely shifted. But, whatever it was seems to have been short lived. The two of you are further apart than where you started. 

It’s not until Chan is back home at his apartment, leftovers from the meal tucked away in his fridge, and getting ready for bed that he gets answers. He’s not tired and he doesn’t want to go to sleep. All he wants is to get comfortable and watch something mindless. Jay seems to sense that something’s off and doesn’t even give him a hard time. Just lets him go off into his room and shut the door. His phone dinging catches his attention, though. 

You: today ws wierd and i hted it You: i mis m y channie 

The text catches him off guard for a lot of reasons. The first is that you’re clearly a little drunk, or maybe a little buzzed. You’re not usually such a sloppy texter. But, the much bigger reason is that you called him your Channie. You’ve called him Channie but never yours before. 

Chan: are you drunk? Chan: are you okay? You: ‘m fine You: not drunk Chan: are you home? You: no stayed at seoks Chan: good i’m glad You: do you like me

Chan stares at that message for a good minute like the words will somehow change. Does he like you? Are you asking as a friend or something more? Can he really try to get over you when you’re texting him like this?

Chan: course i do, we’re friends You: that’s not what i mean

Of all the ways the night could have gone, this was not one Chan considered. Things were definitely weird during Friendsgiving. He’s not sure how many people noticed. Jay definitely had, if him giving Chan space when they got home is any indicator. Seokmin probably noticed too, since you’re currently staying there. Before he can answer your text, his phone is going off with an incoming FaceTime. He answers without thinking.

“You answered,” you say like it’s some kind of surprise.

“Of course I did,” Chan breathes out. “What’s wrong?” 

“Do you like me, Chan?” you repeat. It’s so different watching you say it than seeing it typed. He’s trying not to focus on you sitting in bed just like he is. 

“I told you…” Chan starts and you’re shaking your head. 

“I know we’re friends, but do friends do everything you’ve done for me? Do friends go on train rides and apple picking and photoshoots and to pumpkin patches? Do friends spend an entire party not even bothering to talk to anyone else? Do friends support each other the way you’ve supported me?” You’re rambling, Definitely a little drunker than you want to admit, especially with some of your words slurring together.

“I don’t know,” Chan admits. 

You turn back and look straight into the camera. “Why didn’t you even see me last night, Chan?” 

“Well, I guess I was just…” Chan starts.

“What? Distracted? So distracted by your date that you didn’t even see me?” you ask. His heart breaks for how hurt you look. That’s the last thing he wants. 

“I’d already kinda blown her off once, over you, kind of,” Chan admits. Too honest.

“Over me?” you ask. Your eyes are wide like it’s not what you were expecting.

“I was, well I was with her when I saw Seungsik,” Chan says. “I made an excuse and left, but said I’d see her again another time.”

“Oh,” is all you say.

“Yeah, so I didn’t really want to do that to her again. She doesn’t deserve that,” Chan says quietly. 

“What about what I deserve?” you wonder.

“You know I think you deserve the entire world,” Chan insists. 

You pull your bottom lip between your teeth like you’re at war with yourself over something. “Do you think you could love her?” 

Before Chan can answer, he hears a door open and watches you turn to the side. Somewhere in the room, he hears Seokmin.

“I thought we said no drunk texting or calling or anything?” Seokmin reminds you, sounding very sober. 

“I thought you meant Seungsik,” you shrug, unashamed. Seokmin comes into the frame and sees Chan.

“Oh, hey, Chan,” Seokmin says, smile not quite as bright as Chan is used to. It’s clear that Seokmin didn’t just mean your ex.

“Hey, Seok,” Chan answers.

“I’m gonna take this and put her to bed,” Seokmin says.

“Good idea,” Chan agrees. 

Seokmin turns the camera to you. “Say goodnight to Chan.”

“Night Channie,” you call out.

“Night,” Chan answers. 

“Goodnight, Chan,” Seokmin says.

“Wait,” Chan says and watches as Seokmin’s face turns to him. “Delete the last few texts in our thread. That’s probably a better conversation to have when we’re both sober.”

Seokmin’s face relaxes and he nods, like he understands more than Chan does at the moment. Maybe he does. The entire conversation is weird and it’s leaving Chan with way more questions than answers. Why are you so curious about his feelings now? Why do his feelings for Carla matter to you? Why are you drinking like that? Did something happen with Seungsik? Are you finally processing and this is part of the grief? Why does it hurt to feel like an outsider to it all again?

The next time Chan sees you, there’s no mention of the brief FaceTime call or the texts. Things with you are somewhere between the total comfort of the party at his aunt’s house and how you were before all the Fall activities. It’s this weird limbo that he doesn’t really know how to process. It seems like nobody else really knows how to process it, either, and unfortunately, some of them are picking up on it. 

Then, there’s the issue of Carla. She hasn’t done anything wrong, but Chan also isn’t sure how he feels. On one hand, he really does think it’s best to just move on from his feelings for you because it’s all just been too much. On the other hand, it feels dishonest to keep going out with Carla when his head isn’t totally in it. But, she really is kind and she seems to understand some of his hesitation and even suggests that they do something a little more lowkey, like lunch during the work day, and that seems fine, right? Everyone has to eat lunch.

Wrong. 

Well, not about the lunch part. She picks a place that’s close by where they work, since they don’t work far apart, and Chan appreciates the slightly longer lunch. It’s a welcome break in his day and the perfect way to end the week. Carla is sweet, doesn’t push him to talk about anything he’s not ready to, though she can obviously tell there’s something. There’s a subtlety to the way she lets him know that he can talk to her about anything, no matter how awkward. And a grace when he says that he’s just not ready. She keeps all the conversation light, easy. There’s even something about it that feels a little more friendly than like a date. It’s really just an incredibly pleasant lunch.

And then comes the text. The text from you. Why on Earth did you need to send Chan a text saying you heard he went on a lunch date with the same girl from the other day? Why did you need to say that you hoped he had a good time? Why did it matter if he was spending time with someone else? It’s just kind of confusing because you’re definitely friends, but not the kind of friends that text like this. Not when it’s the first text you’ve sent to Chan since the ones he asked Seokmin to delete for you. 

So he doesn’t answer, doesn’t really know what to say. Instead he tries to make plans with Vernon to go for drinks after work. But, Vernon has other plans and Chan settles on just asking Jay. Although Jay is truly his best friend, he’s not Chan’s first choice when it’s you on his mind. Chan’s feelings for you, whatever they are, aren’t a secret to Jay, even if they’ve never talked about them. If he’s going drinking now, though, it might be too hard to keep avoiding talking about whatever he’s thinking. 

It seems initially like Jay might let Chan get away with just wanting to drink. They talk about work, about the holidays coming up, about upcoming plans. Jay mentions the big family Thanksgiving, which they’ll both be at. Chan talks about how he already feels behind on holiday shopping. They both talk about how crazy it is that Vernon’s so close to finishing one of his games. It’s just normal roommate shit. Much like lunch with Carla, everything is light and unserious. At least through the first drink. Everything changes when the bartender sets the second drink down in front of them. 

“We’ve gotta talk about it, man,” Jay finally says. 

“Talk about what?” Chan feigns ignorance.

“Whatever your feelings for my sister are,” Jay presses on, unwilling to let his best friend continue to ignore a problem. 

“Is this where you tell me that she’s fresh out of a relationship and give me some sort of speech about protecting her?” Chan asks.

“No,” Jay says simply. “She’s an adult and I’d never tell her who to date as long as she’s happy. Besides, you’re friends with her too.” 

“I really don’t know if we’re friends right now, things are weird,” Chan admits.

“Yeah, I can tell,” Jay says with a bit of a snort. 

“I went out to lunch with Carla today and then I got a text from her saying she’d heard about my lunch and hoped it was good. What am I supposed to do with that?” Chan asks, louder than he meant to.

“I don’t know,” Jay admits. “I don’t think she knows, to be honest.” 

“What do you mean?” Chan asks.

“Well, I’ll admit that I told her that you went to lunch with Carla because she’s been really weird about you since she broke it off with Seungsik. Probably before that, honestly, but it’s definitely been weird since then. I know she went to your aunt’s house the day after you told her and she confronted that asshole,” Jay says.

“Yeah, my aunt was thrilled,” Chan remembers.

“So was my sister, she said it’s one of the best times she’s had in awhile,” Jay shares.

“What did she say to you when you told her I was out to lunch?” Chan wonders.

“She just said oh good for him,” Jay says, “which I assumed meant she didn’t want me to know what she was thinking so I wouldn’t have to lie to you. I figured she was going to text you, too. Sorry about that.”

“It’s fine,” Chan brushes off. 

“Do you like her? Like actually like her?” Jay asks. 

“I don’t…I’m not sure, honestly,” Chan admits. 

“You were sure, though,” Jay presses. “I could see it in the way you looked at her. I remember thinking anyone would be lucky to have someone look at them that way.” 

“Yeah, I guess I wasn’t that subtle to anyone but her,” Chan jokes. 

“I think even she stopped being oblivious,” Jay laughs. “So what changed?” 

“I don’t know,” Chan shares. “I guess, I don’t know, it just felt like it’s been all this time and I was doing all these things with her when Seungsik didn’t want to. And I had this moment where I thought I could do things like that with her the rest of my life and be happy. But, then we were talking about him after I saw him out and she said something about how he always thought I liked her but she brushed it off. So I just kinda realized I needed to move on.” 

“Can you do that if she never knew for sure how you felt?” Jay asks. “Is it fair to either of you?”

“Is it fair to her when she’s only just gotten out of a relationship?” Chan challenges. 

“Like I said, Chan, she’s an adult. Just telling her that you have feelings for her isn’t the same as expecting her to jump right into something new,” Jay reasons. “If you love her, like I think you do, then she deserves to know that she isn’t crazy. Even if nothing happens. The only way to move forward is by being honest.”

“Love her…wait, why would she think she’s crazy?” Chan worries. 

“Because you’ve been weird too, bro. It isn’t just her,” Jay laughs. “She is going to absolutely kill me for this, but she remembers texting you and then FaceTiming you after Friendsgiving. She knows you asked Seokmin to delete the chat and dodged her question about how you felt. So, I think she thinks that she imagined you liking her.” 

“Shit,” Chan breathes out. “I was just trying to do what I thought was best.”

“I know that, but I’m not sure she does,” Jay shares. 

“Fuck it, I need shots,” Chan declares. 

He’s definitely not sober when he shows up at your apartment a few hours later. Despite Jay’s insistence that they eat something, he’s still very buzzed, bordering on the world having some blurry edges. Although Jay insisted this could wait until tomorrow, he’s still here at your doorstep. Doesn’t even look back at the Uber after he gets out. His fingers dance over the keypad to the building on autopilot because he’s been there enough times before. There’s no thought about if you’re home or what time it is. No thoughts about if you have company. All he can think is that he’s sick of this weird limbo. 

You answer the door with your hair piled on top of your head, oversized t-shirt hanging off your frame, and a look of complete surprise on your face. Whatever you see on Chan’s face makes you step aside and let him in without a word. It’s not until he feels the couch dip as you sit next to him that he really meets your eyes.

“What are you doing here, Chan?” you ask. 

“I’m sorry,” Chan whispers.

“For what?” you prompt.

“For so many things,” Chan answers. “For Seungsik, for not being a better friend, for not seeing you that night at the restaurant, for telling Seokmin to delete your texts, for not giving you a straight answer, for going on dates with someone. But mostly for falling for you when it’s the worst possible timing.”

“You’re drunk,” you say after a moment.

“A little, maybe, but that doesn’t make any of it less true,” Chan argues. 

“I want to hear all of this from you in the morning, when you’re sober,” you say. 

“Please, I don’t know if…” Chan starts.

“Come on, Channie, let’s get you to bed and we can talk in the morning,” you say. 

You stand and reach a hand to him. He’s not sure if it’s the thought behind the gesture or hearing you say Channie, but he takes your hand without questioning it. Before he knows it, he’s tucked into bed and his eyes are closing. It may be the most comfortable bed he’s ever slept in. 

The next morning, sun through the cracks in the blinds wakes Chan up and it takes him more than a moment to remember where he is. It’s only when he looks around and sees your familiar decorations everywhere that it dawns on him. Not only is he in your apartment, he’s in your bedroom. He slept in your bed last night. Somehow that realization has him feeling even worse than the slight hangover. Since life is really unfair, you walk in a minute later, looking far better than anyone should in the morning. You hand over a cup of coffee. Fighting his embarrassment, Chan sits up so he can accept it and take a sip. Of course it’s perfect. It feels like the reverse of the morning after the Halloween party.

“How are you feeling?” you ask.

“Terrible,” Chan admits ambiguously. 

“Yeah, well, that’s what you get for drinking so much. Jay said he wasn’t sure where you were putting it,” you chuckle out. You pick up your own coffee mug to take a sip.

“When did you talk to Jay?” Chan wonders.

“He was blowing up your phone and I don’t know your password so I figured he was worried about you. I texted him to say you were here and passed out and you’d text him today,” you answer. “He didn’t seem concerned once I said you were here.” 

“Yeah, well it’s not really the hangover that’s making me feel terrible,” Chan mumbles and you raise an eyebrow at him. 

“I hope I’m not making you feel terrible,” you throw out.

“No, I’m just embarrassed, really,” Chan says. 

“You don’t need to be,” you assure him, voice gentle. 

“I am so sorry for telling Seokmin to delete those messages, I thought it was the right thing to do,” Chan begins. 

“It’s fine. I’m not surprised my darling brother told you about that, though,” you say. 

“It’s not fine. I just, I don’t know, I didn’t really know what was going on and it felt a little overwhelming,” Chan says. 

“Yeah I can see that. To be fair, I’m not really sure what I was even trying to accomplish that night,” you say quietly.

“Can I try to say the things I wanted to say last night?” Chan asks. “Jay actually helped me realize some things.”

“He’s got his moments,” you laugh. “And yeah, I think I’d like to hear what you wanted to say, now that it’s morning and you’re sober.” 

“I could repeat what I said, but it really comes down to this. I like you. A lot, way more than I should and I know that it’s, like, the worst timing in the world because of Seungsik and the break up,” Chan rushes out. “I know it’s probably not fair to you to tell you now, but Jay also pointed out that I can’t really try to move on when I haven’t told you how I feel. I just, I got kinda freaked out to tell you when you said the thing about your ex thinking I liked you, but you brushing it off.” 

“Chan,” you try to interrupt.

“And, fuck, I was trying so hard to date someone and get my mind off you that I didn’t even think about it,” Chan carries on. “But the reality is that all the things we did all season long have been some of the best times of my life. I’m sorry, I know that I’m rambling.”

“Can I speak now?” you ask and Chan’s cheeks burn red. 

“Sorry,” Chan whispers.

“I like you, too,” you admit. “I’m not really sure when it happened. Maybe somewhere along the way of you just constantly being there.”

“Yeah, we’ve spent a lot of time together the last like two months,” Chan agrees. “Wait, did you say you like me, too?”

“I did and, like, we have definitely spent a lot of time together doing all the things I love to do, which maybe helped me realize, but I think it’s been there a lot longer. All this did was make me realize how you’ve been there for me for years and I didn’t see that it was more than just a friendly thing,” you say. “You probably don’t remember but back in college, that idiot broke my heart and you and Jay spent the whole weekend cheering me up. I get why Jay did it, he’s my brother, but you didn’t have to.”

“Of course I remember, that’s when I realized I had a crush on you,” Chan says softly. 

“Chan, that was like 6 years ago,” you say, nearly choking. 

“Pushing seven,” Chan admits.

“You’ve liked me all that time and I didn’t realize?” you wonder.

“Maybe not all that time, it’s not like I haven’t dated,” Chan points out. 

“Oh yes, because you’ve dated such winners,” you scoff. 

“Are you, were you jealous?” Chan teases. “You started acting weird when I went on the date with Carla and didn’t notice you or our friends.”

“I wasn’t acting weird,” you protest. 

“Yes you were, even Jay said so,” Chan counters.

“Oh whatever, you’ve liked me for seven years,” you tease with a roll of your eyes. 

“And you’ve probably liked me just as long but you’re stubborn,” Chan says.

He’s not sure where the confidence comes from now, but hearing that you like him too just makes it feel lighter. Even though there’s no telling what happens from here, it feels good to have it all out in the open. You’ve both abandoned your coffees at this point and are just sitting on the bed like it’s the most natural thing in the world. 

“I am not stubborn,” you protest. 

“Oh, I’m sorry, I must be thinking of someone else,” Chan teases. 

“Must be,” you agree.

“Hey,” Chan says, more serious. “I don’t know what happens next and I know you just got out of a relationship, so there’s no pressure or…”

Chan can’t finish what he’s saying when you press your lips to his. It takes him several seconds to get over the shock, though. It doesn’t matter that you admitted to liking him, too. That’s still a big step to go from that to kissing. You’re pulling away when his brain finally connects and he kisses you back. Makes him pull you back into him so that he doesn’t miss another second of the way your lips feel against his. Makes him dig his fingers into your hips when he pulls you on top of him. You pull away to gasp and catch your breath. Let yourself get situated with a knee pressed into the mattress on either side of him. All you can do is just look at him, pupils a little blown and chest rising with each breath. Loosening his grip on you, he looks down and watches his hands slide over your thighs and back up to your hips. When he looks back at you, he finds you’re watching the movement. 

“You don’t have to be so careful, Chan, I’m not that fragile,” you utter.

“I know you’re not,” he confirms. “But, are you sure?”

“About this?” you ask and he nods. “The most sure I’ve been about anything in a long time.”

He’s about to ask you again but you just shake your head before leaning in to kiss him. You’re giving him confirmation and permission all at once. Confirmation that you want this and permission to not treat you so gently. It’s all he needs to start running his hands up across your hips and then under your shirt and up your back. Your hands move from the sides of his face to fling your arms around his neck when he presses you tighter against his body. Kissing you isn’t anything like he imagined. It’s not soft and tender. It’s a little desperate and needy, but still completely full of affection. As if testing what you said about not needing to be careful, he nips at your lower lip. The light moan shoots straight to his dick and his hands travel back down your back to your hips. Gripping you tight but also making you slightly rock against him. 

It’s not enough contact, though. Now that he’s got you like this, he just wants more. It’s almost too much when he pulls your t-shirt off and he realizes you aren’t wearing a bra. Maybe this was in your plan all along. Chan pulls back and plants a light kiss on your lips, currently pouting and a little puffy from the kisses. When he kisses across your jaw and down to your neck, you arch into it. He wants to savor this, to take his time taking you apart. Wants to coax every noise out of you. Wants to be the reason you’re completely ruined. Doesn’t know that he’s already well on the way there. 

He kisses across the top of your chest, from one collarbone to the other and you let out a small please. Probably that you need more. That’s definitely going to take time, though. When he places a feather light kiss between your breasts, you whimper again, rock your hips forward over him again. It’s everything he can do to not get too turned on too fast. It doesn’t matter if you have a million more times after this. This is the first time and he wants to savor it. Slowly, he moves his lips over to one of your breasts, flicks his tongue across your nipple a couple of times. Nips a mark into your sensitive skin and laves his tongue over to soothe the sting. Your hands are tangled in the ends of his hair that’s longer than you remember it being before. Even if you won’t admit it, he can tell you like it by the way your hands keep finding it. 

As he kisses his way back up to your lips, he moves you a little further back on his lap. Misses the confusion cross your face. But, he’s got a plan. Once he’s kissing you again, one hand slides down your inner thigh and plays with the edge of your shorts. You squirm when you realize just what he’s doing. He can’t fight the groan when he realizes you don’t have any underwear on under your shorts, either. Jesus. He has to pull back for a steadying breath. This is about you and making you feel good. He can’t get too turned on too fast. His lips find yours again and his thumb runs along your slit, inside your shorts. Collects the wetness already between your legs. You try to pull away from the kiss to moan and he uses his free hand to anchor you to him. Lightly, he spreads your lips apart so that his thumb can brush over your clit. That’s when he finally let’s you pull back. 

“Fuck,” you utter immediately.

“Is this still okay?” Chan whispers against your skin before kissing the spot just below your ear. 

“Yes,” you hiss out as his thumb continues to caress your clit. 

“You can stop it if you want,” he tells you. 

“I will kill you if you stop,” you threaten, lust heavy in your tone. 

“Wouldn’t want that now, would we?” he teases.

“Stop being such a - fuck,” you gasp out when Chan slides a finger inside you. 

“Such a what?” he prompts. 

“A tease,” you finish. “Please, Channie, you’re moving so slow.” 

Instead of answering right away, he leans in to kiss you again. Captures your moans, but doesn’t increase the slow, almost lazy speed that his finger enters you. “You in a hurry?” 

“No,” you whine, “but I need more. Please. Please just give me a little more.”

The way words fall out of your mouth, begging him to carry on, makes his dick twitch. He’s thankful you don’t seem to notice because he likes having the control like this. Likes watching you squirm on top of him and knowing it’s all for him. Gives you at least a little of what you want when he slides a second finger in. Doesn’t tell you that it’s still just warming you up for something more. Something he’s been thinking about for weeks. 

“I want to feel you, please,” you beg when Chan pulls his lips away from yours again. 

“Not yet,” he tells you.

“Why?” you whine out.

“I want to taste you first,” Chan says, fingers stilled inside of you, but thumb still lightly circling your clit. 

“Can’t we just…” you start.

“Are you gonna make me beg, baby?” Chan wonders. Your eyes widen at that, both out of surprise and desire. “I will, I have all the time in the world.” 

“N-no, you don’t need to,” you stutter out. “How do you…”

“I want you to sit on my face,” he says simply.

“What?” you nearly gasp.

“I want you to sit on my face,” he repeats. “Just straddle my face and let me show you how good I can be for you.” 

“I’ve, um, well I’ve never…” you start, turning a little shy. 

Chan takes his free hand and tilts your chin up, so gentle that he doesn’t realize the act almost breaks you. “Never had someone eat you out like that?” 

You shake your head. “I, um, haven’t actually been eaten out much.” 

“Can I admit something too, then?” he asks, wanting to make you comfortable. You nod. “I’ve been thinking about what it would feel like to be under you since you got on my shoulders at the orchard and your thighs squeezed my face.”

It’s clear that’s not what you’re expecting. It’s something so honest that it’s all you can focus on. Where Chan would usually feel too exposed, he only feels comfortable with you. Like he can expose everything about him and he’ll still be safe with you. He wants you to feel that too. Doesn’t realize that you’ve never had someone take their time with you like this. 

“Well it was kinda hot, the way you picked me up like that,” you finally admit. 

“So trust me again, I won’t let you fall,” he urges. 

You mumble something under your breath that sounds suspiciously like too late. He’s trying not to focus too much on that, too much on what happens after this. All he wants is this moment to last forever. To be able to show you just how much he cares for you.

“So how do we…” you start.

“Here, get up for a second,” he directs you, gently moving you off his lap. 

In one quick motion, he pulls his shirt off and watches the way your eyes drink him in. His muscles contract as you reach out to run a hand along his stomach. Doesn’t realize he’s holding his breath and waiting for your verdict.

“Fuck me, you’re hot. I’ve seen you swimming, have you always looked like this?” you say, sounding annoyed and making him laugh. 

“Let’s get you out of these,” Chan says instead of answering and helps you pull off your shorts. 

He leans back and makes sure that he’s comfortable. Then, he directs you to straddle his face. Urges you to trust him, Promises you that you’re not going to hurt him. Reminds you that this is about you, but it’s about him, too. He’s wondered what it would feel like to have your thighs boxing his head in. To be so caught up in you. Just as you’re about to protest, he licks a strip up your core and you gasp. He continues to run his tongue up your entrance, sliding his tongue deeper into you as he goes. You start to squirm almost immediately and he reaches up to anchor your legs on either side of his head. 

It’s honestly far better than Chan was imagining. The noises coming from you were only encouraging him to keep going. Not that he really needed any encouragement. He could drown between your legs and be the happiest he’d ever been. It was unthinkable that nobody wanted to take care of you like this before. Your arousal coated his tongue as he pressed it deeper inside you between his licks. His nose bumped against your clit and he had to grip you harder again to keep you from arching off his mouth. As if sensing that he needed you closer, you leaned forward, gripping onto the headboard. He squeezed your legs and fucked his tongue faster into your pussy. 

“Chan, fuck, oh my god, your tongue, I just - fuck,” you curse out. 

He’s good with his tongue, he knows that. Knows he’s good at a lot of things. This is different, though. Every noise sounds so much better, every body spasm is that much more rewarding, every curse sounds perfect. It’s not until your body starts quivering hard that he realizes he’s never wanted to make someone come on his tongue more than this. You must be close because you start to get more incoherent, start to try and pull yourself off him. Instead, Chan holds onto you harder.

“Please, I’m gonna come,” you whine. 

Chan pulls away from your pussy just long enough to utter a single phrase. “Then, come for me.” 

And then he’s back to burying his tongue inside you, licking faster, reaching a hand around your leg to circle your clit with his thumb again. It’s nothing but a string of curses that you utter. Clench your walls around his tongue. There’s nothing hotter than how fully you trust him as you let go, coming on his face. He times the strokes of his tongue to guide you through the high before helping you off of his face so that you can lie back on the bed and catch your breath. He wipes his mouth on the back of his hand, fully aware that he hasn’t gotten it all, and repositions to lay next to you on his side. Your eyes are closed and he can’t help but brush a piece of stray hair off your face. The tenderness at odds with the previous moments. 

“Whoa,” you finally say when you open your eyes to look at him. 

“Yeah,” he agrees.

“That was…fuck, that was good,” you admit. “I don’t want to give you a big head or anything but damn.” 

“It’s a bit late for that,” Chan jokes. “I could feel how much you enjoyed it.”

You swat at him. “Fuck off.” 

He catches your hand and presses a light kiss to your knuckles. “Not before I fuck you.”

The contrast between the kiss and the statement nearly gives you whiplash. It’s plain on your face that you’re wondering where this version of him came from. 

“Unless you changed your mind or you’re too tired,” he offers. “I just remember you saying you wanted to feel me.”

“Oh no, I definitely still want that. I seem to remember you promising to show me how good you could be for me,” you say, regaining the confidence. 

“My pleasure,” he says and gets up from the bed. 

You’re about to ask what he’s doing when he pulls his briefs and shorts down in one motion, dick springing free. There’s a satisfaction to watching the way you take in the sight of him fully naked. He’s confident in his size, definitely confident he can make you feel good, but it’s still nice to see the way your eyes go big. Nice to see the way you swallow while watching his hand move lazy along his shaft. 

“Condoms?” he asks.

“That drawer,” you indicate. 

He reaches in to get one and rips the package with his teeth. He’s watching you as he slides the latex over his dick. Watching for any signs of second thoughts. There aren’t any, but he wants to check anyway.

“You’re still sure?” he asks.

“Yes,” you confirm, meeting his eyes. “And if something changes, I’ll stop you.”

“Good, because I still wanna make you come at least two more times before I do,” he tells you.

You shudder. “You sure you can do that?” 

“Positive,” he says with a smile that’s entirely too confident. 

Except he knows he can deliver. Knows that he can show you just how good he can be. Knows that he can make you feel amazing. He directs you to lay back on the bed and spreads your legs. Instead of sliding right in, he uses a finger to make sure you’re still ready for him. To make sure he’s not rushing it. You squirm against his finger and he can tell you’re getting impatient again. But, he wasn’t kidding. He’s going to take his time with you. 

You’re still so sensitive that he brings you almost to the edge just with his fingers. Delights in the way you arch into him. In the way his name falls from your lips like a prayer. In the way your fingers dig into the sheets at first before you grip one of his arms. Before you leave scratch marks along that same arm. Before you’re begging him just to let you feel him inside of you. It’s enough to finally make him give into your begging. He lines himself up at your entrance and presses his dick in slowly. Much slower than his finger was pumping into you. He wants to let you adjust to the stretch, though. Your hands make their way to his back and your fingers run down his muscles there. Gently at first, like you’re just exploring his body. When your fingers run down his back again, this time scratching along the way, he buries himself in you and pulls back to snap once, quick. The resulting gasp is music to his ears. 

He sets a varying pace. Mixing slow with fast. Shallow pumps with deep ones. Tries to find out just what you like the best and what pulls the best sounds out of you. He leans back so he can throw one of your legs over his shoulder and hit a different angle. That seems to be the one you enjoy the most and it’s only moments before you’re coming undone around him again. He pulls out when you start to clench around him because he’s not sure that he’s strong enough to hold back through that. And he really does want to make you come more before he does. 

It carries on like that, Chan constantly changing your positions, doing more than his fair share of the work, studying every inch of your body. It’s clear that your brain is going a little mushy and that you’re insanely overstimulated. In the end, he makes you come two more times, in addition to the two previous orgasms, before he finally lets go. It’s honestly the best release he’s ever experienced. The best high and the best sex. Everything feels magnified and also like the most natural thing in the world. He finds it’s really easy to figure out the things you like and they seem to line up with things he enjoys as well. 

He lies back on the bed and you curl into him after you take a minute to recover. Actually tuck yourself right into his side and nestle in with his arm underneath your neck. He wouldn’t ever move if he didn’t have to. But, you both definitely need to get cleaned up. 

“Where are you going?” you ask when he starts to move. Your eyes look a little worried. That kind of breaks his heart because why do you look so nervous?

He leans back onto the bed and presses the softest, most gentle kiss he’s ever given anyone on your forehead. “To get a towel to clean up a bit. And I was gonna start a bath for you, I know your tub is crazy nice.”

“A bath actually sounds really amazing,” you admit.

“Just stay here then and let me take care of you,” he insists. 

You nod and lay back onto the bed, closing your eyes and smiling. It makes his heart swell at the level of comfort you seem to feel. He also knows that you and him need to talk, to figure out what’s going on and where this is heading. Knows that he’s already in way deeper than he should be. But, all he focuses on now is cleaning himself up a bit. It’s a little hard to do, so he just hops in the shower to rinse off as quickly as possible. Once he’s done with that, he focuses on getting the bath running for you. 

When he feels like the temperature is right, that the bath bomb has dissolved enough, and that it’s all completely perfect for you, he walks back into the bedroom. He expects to find you asleep. Instead, you’re sitting up with some fresh clothes next to you. 

“I heard you in the shower,” you say and offer him the clothes when you get up. You wince just slightly. 

“Sorry,” he says sheepishly. 

“I’m not,” you disagree. Chan helps you to the bathtub and helps you in. He blushes a little when you return the favor and kiss him softly on the lips. He turns around when your voice stops him. “Where are you going?”

“I was going to let you enjoy the bath,” he answers.

“I’d like it better if you stayed here,” you admit and his heart feels like it really will explode. 

“Let me just put on some clothes,” he requests.

“You could also just get in with me,” you offer. “Not in a sexual way, just in a closeness way.”

How can he argue with that, really? Your tub is plenty big enough, a sticking point for you even if the rest of the apartment was on the smaller size. The main bathroom was massive, comparatively. So he gets in carefully across from you and settles into the water. It does actually feel really nice. His eyes fall on you moving gingerly to wash yourself off. 

“C’mere,” he says, “turn around.” 

You do as he asks and settle in between his legs, with your back leaning against his chest. He picks up your loofah and takes over rubbing it carefully across your skin. You relax further against him almost immediately, which he takes as a good sign that he’s doing something right. There’s a lot he’s done or tried, but this is new territory for him. And he wants to be good at it, too. 

Once he’s finished cleaning you off, the two of you just stay like that, you leaning against his chest. It’s a comfortable silence that neither of you feels the need to break. It’s not until the water starts to feel cold that you both admit you need to get out. This time, you actually let Chan put his clothes on and you put something comfortable on as well. He helps you pull the sheets off the bed to throw them in the wash. 

The two of you check your phones when you plop down onto the living room couch and Chan grimaces. He’s got a whole bunch of texts and missed calls from Jay. Some are from last night, like you said, but some are from today, too. He shows them to you and you show him a string of notifications that look similar. 

“Time to break the bubble?” Chan asks. 

“At least for long enough that he stops having a heart attack,” you agree. 

So, Chan dials and isn’t surprised when Jay picks up on the second ring.

“What the fuck, Chan, where are you? And why isn’t my sister answering either?” Jay asks instead of a hello.

“Uh, you’re on speaker,” Chan answers. 

“Hey,” you chime in.

“You’re still over there?” Jay asks incredulously. “How much could you possibly have to talk about?” 

“Worried I’m going to steal your best friend?” you tease.

“Or are you worried I’m going to steal your sister?” Chan asks and you laugh.

“No, you’re better than literally any person she’s dated ever. By a lot,” Jay acknowledges. 

“Oh my god, you really are just missing your best friend,” you groan. 

“And my roommate, he’s my roommate too,” Jay protests.

“We have things to talk about,” you say.

“How much do you have to talk about?” Jay wonders. “He likes you, you obviously like him. What else do you need to know?” 

“That’s between us,” you say as Chan starts to talk.

“We also didn’t talk last night because I was drunk,” he adds.

“Yeah and it’s late afternoon now, so what have you been…oh my god, that’s fucking gross, that’s my sister,” Jay sputters out.

“I didn’t even say anything!” Chan protests. 

“You didn’t have to. We’re roommates, remember?” Jay answers.

“If you miss me, just say that and go,” Chan teases.

“I do miss you, I made Vernon come over earlier and it’s not the same,” Jay says.

“Hey,” they hear Vernon say in the background.

“I think I hate this already,” you say and scrunch your face.

“Sick of him already?” Jay jokes.

“No, I don’t like you liking someone I’m dating,” you disagree. 

“Dating?” Jay and Chan ask at the same time.

“Oh, well, I just figured…” you start.

“I’m hanging up on you, bro, we have things to talk about,” Chan says. 

“Fine, but just be good to her, she deserves that,” Jay says.

“Yeah, she does,” Chan agrees, eyes on you. 

He hangs up the phone and just looks at you, unsure of what to say. Unsure of how to start figuring out what this is. You just got out of something that was really unhealthy and he’s not trying to rush you into something new or risk it being unhealthy because you didn’t heal. Couldn’t stand to be a rebound. He’s never thought this far.

“I didn’t meant to assume, I just…” you start.

“Of course I want to date you. It’s just, you just got out of a relationship and I want to give you time to get over that,” he says.

“I think I’ve been over it since the train ride, to be honest,” you say. “Maybe it took me a while to realize. But you showed me, time and time again, what it means to show up for someone you love.”

“I love you, too,” Chan says softly.

“So we figure it out together?” you ask, so hopeful.

Chan leans in and presses a kiss to your lips. “Yeah, we figure it out together.”

i'm sad this is over, but it was so much fun to write! i hope you enjoyed them as much as i did. and there's a very real chance i'll return to this with future timestamps/drabbles. but who knows when because of who i am as a person!

[bachissidehoe]

the introduction

chapter 1 of it's classy not classic. [bachisagi]

Though it’s already been a day, the buzzed feeling of scoring yet another game winning goal still sits fresh in Isagi Yoichi’s mind. It’s not a new feeling, but it’s one he can’t live without. The sound of the ball hitting the back of the net is his white noise that helps him sleep at night, his alarm that wakes him up in the morning, his motivation for living this life. Nothing can even compare to it, and time and time again he’s been shown that very few people understand what that’s like. He’s only met a few people like him in his lifetime, many of them from Blue Lock over 5 years ago.

Being the current number 1 striker in the world comes with its fair share of responsibilities that don’t involve constant focus on the game, which is honestly insane to Isagi. He recalls his coach, Noel Noa, talking with him before about the expectations society has for famous people. Interviews, charities, parties, way too many things that aren’t simply being on the field. Isagi would much prefer not to do any of this stuff. 

But today is one of those days where an interview is required. Though he hates it, he’s made sure to put substantial effort into maintaining positivity. The last thing he wants is unneeded negative attention that distracts from the game itself. When Isagi solidified his dream of becoming the number 1 striker, he did not expect it would come with all of this garbage. 

Regardless, he’s learned to be fine with it, even though it is fairly confusing to someone like him. 

“So Isagi Yoichi, what do you tend to do to wind down after a big game like the one yesterday?” The interviewer asks, staring at him with a fake smile and perhaps the brightest pair of blue eyes he’s ever seen. She does look like someone who should be a TV personality, he understands why she became a successful sports journalist. 

“Well, I usually just go back to my apartment and review the match, then try to get plenty of sleep.” He answers. The bland truth. 

“Hm. No celebratory food or drink? Hanging out with anyone?” 

“I mean, sometimes.” He adds a fake chuckle. He’s practiced that one for a while.

“Ah, so do you have anyone special in your life, a girlfriend perhaps?” The interviewer continues.

Isagi rakes his fingers through his slicked back raven hair, shifting a bit in his seat. This question again huh? It’s asked constantly, it makes him wonder if people care about the game or they just want some drama. According to Itoshi Rin, who also gets asked the same thing quite a lot, it’s something society assumes when someone decently attractive reaches a certain age. At age 22 and apparently of above average attractiveness (though Isagi can’t see it), the world expects that he’d have someone he’s dating or interested in. It doesn’t make much sense to Isagi.

Plus, he’s answered the question probably a thousand times (an exaggeration, but it certainly feels like a thousand), how many different answers should he give until they stop asking?

“Oh, I don’t really, like-” He pauses, realizing he’s probably flushed. It’s an embarrassing question. “Girls. Or anything like that.” He finishes with a sigh, flashing a light smile afterward. 

The entire interview process has always been something stressful for Isagi. He feels his heart race in a bad way, he hates sitting backstage in a fancy suit and tie with makeup on his face that just makes him feel heavy. But he’s been lucky enough to never have said anything in an interview that turned out to be harmful or provoke a negative response from anyone. He’d like to keep it that way. 

He assumes he completed this interview easily as well, since the interviewer didn’t seem to react negatively to anything he said. The exhaustion from the interview is enough to make him more tired than any physically grueling game he’s ever played, enough to force his tired body directly into his bed the minute he gets home. Somehow, Isagi finds that talking to unfamiliar people is way more exhausting than physically exerting himself for hours of intense gameplay. 

It’s over though, the interview thing. At least until Noa sets him up for another one. 

Or. 

That’s what he thought happened. 

Isagi sees the light of day through his tired blue eyes, waking up to the sounds of the repeated vibration of his phone invading his dreamy state. He groggily reaches over, his heavy hand collapsing on his bedside table to rummage for his phone. Within seconds, he’s wide awake, his pupils expanding further by the second as he processes the hundreds of posts, mentions, and calls he’s received in the last twelve hours. 

The first thing he does is open a message from Noa, mumbling it to himself as he reads, purely out of shock for what it contains. 

Noel Noa: Isagi, I’m proud to hear about your wholesome coming out story in yesterday’s interview. Though I wish we discussed this before the interview itself, I want you to know that I’m happy for you. 

Fuck.

What the fuck is he talking about?

Isagi rolls out of bed, pacing back and forth as he reads some of his Twitter mentions.

Bravepurple: not @isagiyoichi coming out yesterday omg. I mean we all figured but…

Puffinxconcretex: WAHT this is HUGE FOR JAPAN LGBT!!!! @isagiyoichi

Darksnowy67: look at him aakahihighih he’s so cute ab it too i would diE FOR HIM @isagiyoichi 

Um_actually_: no but fr, having a gay soccer player is big for us @isagiyoichi 

Holy shit. 

Holy shit. Holy shit. HOLY SHIT. 

Isagi paces, his shaky hands scrolling endlessly through mentions and posts of support and congratulations. They’re all quote tweeting one single clip from his interview. The one where he didn’t even realize exactly what he said. 

He opens the short clip, the sound of his own voice blaring through his phone’s speakers.

“Oh, I don’t really like girls, or anything like that.” 

“Really? That’s nice to hear! Good for you!” 

“Thanks. Yeah, all that stuff can be stressful, but I’m happy where I’m at now.” 

Isagi Yoichi- had no idea he was coming across that way. Now, hearing it back, he totally came out as gay to that interviewer. 

Fuck, bro. 

He runs his fingers through his hair, still sticky with gel from yesterday. He really should take a shower. Maybe it’ll help him calm down. 

At least everyone’s overwhelmingly supportive right? There are way more comments expressing happiness and support for his bravery than people against it. Thinking about it broadly, if Isagi were to make any mistake, he’s glad it’s one where society is in support of him. He should just post something and clear it up, express gratitude for the support but he didn’t mean it that way, what he meant to express was that he’s not looking for a relationship, not that he’s gay. 

As he steps out of his hot shower, beads of water dripping from his soppy hair, he fully realizes the gravity of the situation he’s caused. In his approximately 10 minute shower, his notifications have nearly doubled, an article has been released, and this fake coming out story has gone viral beyond his belief. 

He can’t help but read the article, which forces him to completely disregard the idea of being honest about it. The article in question, published by a popular pop culture magazine, details the importance of sports maintaining representation of LGBTQ+ members. With Isagi’s story, they’re slowly breaking down the walls of sports being a “straights only” activity. The article warns, however, that queer baiting is a harmful practice, and cautions organizations from trying to appeal to different communities using this tactic. 

Queer baiting. 

Huh. 

Isagi’s never heard of that term, but upon looking it up, yeah. That’s exactly what he’d be accused of doing if he were to come clean. Turns out that relaxing shower just put him right back where he began. 

He should head out, go for a walk, maybe go practice. Anything but doom scroll through supportive messages that are based on a complete miscommunication. 

He sighs to himself, moving to check Instagram instead. Maybe the news hasn’t made it over there yet. 

Upon opening the app, the first picture he sees is that of a familiar face. It’s Bachira Meguru, an old friend of Isagi’s from Blue Lock, at the game from the other day. He didn’t even realize Bachira was there, he should have reached out. It would have been nice to catch up. Bachira was always fun to be around during their time at Blue Lock, they played great together and enjoyed each other’s company. He was one of the few people Isagi ever met that shared his love for soccer so intensely. One of the only ones to ever understand.

The two of them still talk occasionally, but not enough for Isagi to know anything about what Bachira’s doing now. Maybe it would be helpful to get some advice from him, Bachira would probably understand the situation Isagi’s gotten himself into. He really can’t go to his coach or his teammates- asking someone on the outside might be his best option.

He takes a breath and decides to go for it. 

Isagi Yoichi: Hey man! You were at the game the other day?

Within seconds, Bachira replies. That guy surely doesn’t miss a beat.

Bachira Meguru: Hiiii, yeah I was there. Great game!

Isagi Yoichi: I didn’t even realize you were in Tokyo, you should have told me lol

Bachira Meguru: yea im here for work for a while

Isagi Yoichi: damn no way! Where are you staying?

Bachira Meguru: IMG602.heic

Bachira Meguru: not far from the stadium actually, im exploring today

It’s a selfie of Bachira holding up a peace sign in front of a cafe. It looks like he quickly snapped the picture, it’s even a little blurry. But he wears a wide smile, the same silly smile he always had on his face back in the Blue Lock days. Isagi can’t help but smile himself, Bachira’s attitude always brightened him up. As Isagi looks at the picture more, he realizes that he’s actually quite familiar with the cafe Bachira currently stands in front of. In fact, it’s about a block away from his apartment. 

Isagi Yoichi: no way you’re at Honeybee? I live right down the street from there

Bachira Meguru: ayyy! Come meet me!

Honestly, this is perfect. This will help Isagi talk this out with someone who isn’t connected to the situation, and also connect with an old friend. Out of all the surprises he’s experienced so early in the morning, this one is at least positive. 

“Isagi!” Bachira calls out, noticing him first. 

He looks…stylish? Much better with his sense of style than Isagi remembers. He wears a fitted beanie with a pair of baggy slacks and an oversized sweater with a collared shirt underneath. He still has those same yellow highlights, he’s had them for so long Isagi’s starting to wonder if they’re natural. 

“Hi Bachira!” He jogs up to his old friend, going for a handshake but getting an excited hug instead. He should have expected that much, Bachira really hasn’t changed a bit. 

“Great to see ya, I figured you’re busy, so I didn’t let you know I was around or anything.” His golden eyes are bright and cheerful, same old Bachira Meguru. Just a ray of chaotic sunshine.

“Nah, I would have loved to see you, I’m so glad you made it to the game.” 

“It was a great one. Made me wish I was out there.” He smiles, much softer this time. 

Isagi sighs. “Yeah, me too. I bet you could still out dribble me any day.” He chuckles.

“You sure about that, egoist?” 

“Oh stop, I escaped that prison, it’s everything in me not to shake in fear every time I think about it.” Isagi jokes, sitting down across from Bachira at a little table outside the cafe. 

This is one of Isagi’s favorite cafes, he often grabs smoothies and snacks from here after practice.

“You’ll never escape it, MWAH HAHA!” Bachira exclaims, dramatic as ever. 

“So what are you doing now?” Isagi changes the topic, scanning the menu while speaking as if he doesn’t already have the thing memorized.

“I’m an artist, carried on the family business in a sense.” He explains. “What should I get?” He asks, referring to the menu.

“I always get the strawberry kiwi delight, I’m not too big on coffee.” Isagi points to his selection on the menu.

“Ah, I don’t drink caffeine either, I’ve been told it would make me overpowered.” He jokes. “I was between the strawberry kiwi one or the passionfruit?” 

“That one’s great too.” 

“Okay, I’ll get that if you let me have a sip of yours.” 

“Yeah, of course.” Isagi says, walking to the counter to place the orders for the both of them, only to return a few minutes later with the drinks, Bachira waiting eagerly to chug the fruit smoothie. “So how’d you even get into art? I know your mom’s also an artist, but you never seemed interested in it.” He takes his seat once again, sipping on his drink. 

“I was so bored without soccer, I had to do something.” Bachira laughs, reaching for Isagi’s drink. 

Isagi hands it over, watching as Bachira takes a short sip. 

“I like yours better.” He sighs. 

“You can have more if you want.” Isagi chuckles. Somehow, he’s always felt like he’s babysitting Bachira in a way, and even six years later, it hasn’t changed at all. He still acts like a glorified elementary schooler, but this time with money. Apparently, being a famous artist pays damn well. 

“Yippee!” He snatches Isagi’s strawberry kiwi drink, trading him for the passionfruit smoothie. Isagi doesn’t mind, he’d rather Bachira be happy. “Oh, by the way, I heard you’re gay?” 

Isagi almost spits out his drink.

“I, uh-” 

“Hah! It’s fine!” Bachira giggles.

“No, I actually kinda wanted to bring that up, because I’m actually not gay.” Isagi blurts out, rushing through the sentence before Bachira can congratulate him too much. 

“Uh, what? I saw that clip-” 

“No see that’s the thing. I didn’t mean that. I meant to say I don’t want a relationship, I didn’t realize it was coming out like that.” 

“Hm, “coming out” like that.” Bachira chuckles.

Isagi sighs. He’s never been able to tell if Bachira has a serious bone in his entire body. 

“Sorry, sorry.” Bachira takes another sip of Isagi’s drink. “I believe you, why didn’t you just say you didn’t mean it?” 

“I was going to, then I realized people might get upset about queer baiting- or whatever it’s called- and I don’t want negative drama…” He trails off.

“I see your predicament.” 

The two fall into a silence. It leads Isagi to wonder what exactly has gone on in Bachira’s life since Blue Lock. Clearly he’s doing very well for himself, but it almost makes him feel bad that he wouldn’t keep in touch. And here they are, just picking right up where they left off. 

“I feel like maybe the best thing to do is wait it out. People will get over it eventually. Then you can bring it back up later if you do ever want to get into a relationship and need to clear it up, that way the drama has already died down.” Bachira suggests. 

“Hm. Yeah.” Isagi ponders. It does make sense just to wait it out. It feels disingenuous, but the entire thing is already just a lie anyway. Waiting until things die down may be his best bet. Maybe later he can “realize” he’s bisexual instead, in case he ever does get with a girl. But that’s so far down the road that he feels like that’s a bridge he doesn’t have to worry about crossing right now. “That’s actually a lot simpler than I thought.” 

“You can count on me to have the best ideas about everything.” Bachira giggles, taking another long swig of his- well Isagi’s- drink.

++++++

Isagi feels much better about his situation by the time he goes to sleep that night- talking things out with Bachira was definitely helpful for his mental state. 

But waking up the next morning feels like a repeat of the day before, notifications buzzing in his ear over and over before he can even realize it’s morning. It feels like he’s traveled back in time to yesterday. 

But this time, perhaps it’s worse. 

As he opens his phone, he realizes it definitely just got worse. 

LATEST: #1 Striker Isagi Yoichi is dating Pop Culture Artist Bachira Meguru

[mini-jiminie]

Just some thoughts:

Daeun - I'm on the fence. Look I know she seems crazy as hell, but crazy as hell doesn't deny the possibility of dating. To me there are three possible scenarios

She doesn't know jimin and was never involved with him in anyway and is just doing it for clout

they were friends, so she was actually in his apartment, but she's now trying to make it seem like it was more for clout

they dated but it ended bitterly and she's now releasing all this stuff while he's away from the public eye to be petty

I think its interesting that any of the stuff she posts that tries to tie to jimin is from 2019/2020. To me, there is a possible timeline that they dated, it ended badly and that would correlate with negative feelings jimin was having at the time plus the music he was making (like face-off, MUSE being about the idea of thinking you're in love and realizing its not real, etc.). She could very well just be a clout chaser, but I just also don't think its impossible that she's just a nasty ex who is being petty to rile up his fans now that he is away in the military. Kind of indifferent either way, because whatever it was or wasn't is very in the past, even from the stuff she tries to hint at.

Jungkook video - I've seen a couple theories on this

most common is that the girl in the video is a model friend of j*nnie's. I can't confirm this and some people say it was just started by chinese netizens

recently I saw an anon on a jikook blog say that the girl was actually an englsih translator working for bighit who jungkook had been friends with for a long time and she was helping before releasing Golden/doing schedules abroad and that she had supposedly come and left in a couple hours. Liek I said, I only recently saw this theory, so I can't confirm anything details to that.

I could actually see #1 because we actually see an uptick in tkk hanging out during that time. No offense to their bond, they just don't normally hang out much outside of work, so if they both happened to be involved with girls who were friends, it'd make sense why they randomly starting hanging out more. A tumblr jikooker actually found photos very similar between what tae posted in hawaii (where jungkook was present) and photos j*nnie had posted. If true, do we really think jungkook was just thirdwheeling his bandmate? Or was he maybe there because her friend, a girl he was chatting up, was also there?

Not sure about the translator, but definitely not impossible. Does that mean it wasn't romantic? Of course not, but it would beg the question about jungkook and female friends. Like if we think about mijoo (the tattoo artist), he also did the backhug thing. If we believe them, that there was nothing romantic there (which I will give them benefit of the doubt since it was denied by all sides and she supposedly even had a rather public relationship at the time anyway, so it would've been kind of insane for jungkook to be acting like that in public in front of a whole group of friends if it was meant romantically), then this is a thing he feels comfortable doing with female friends and they feel comfortable doing with him. Which for me, would naturally lead to the question of why? Most straight women aren't letting their straight male friends go around back-hugging them. I think you see where I'm going here.

But then that also rolls up into a whole other can of worms when analyzing jikook, which is how many people would even know if they were in a relationship or even just if they were non-straight individually? I think for jungkook, the number of people he would open up to (obviously within reason, he's a celebrity in a homophobic country) would be higher then jimin would, just based on personality. I mean if you saw jungkook's messy insta posts today, you know he's not really afraid of laying it out there, whereas jimin is very private and holds private details very close to his chest. Tying it all back, I don't really think it would be crazy for longtime translator friend who works in-house for BH (assuming that's who the girl was for the sake of the argument) and for a tattooist (which is still a very alternative, counterculter in korea and was probably the first time as an adult jungkook got to experience a more open nonconforming culture friend group) might be in the know IF he was non-straight/dating a man. I will say I don't think jungkook was lying when he he didn't have a gf, just because with his personality I think he's the type who would rather not speak on it or lie by omission than straight up be dishonest about something (not saying there is a right or wrong way for a celeb to handle keeping stuff private, just the vibe I get from jungkook). Either way, it doesn't really give a clear answer because that could mean he just had something casual going on with a girl that wasn't labeled or it could mean he had nothing going on romantically with a woman during that time at all.

Whew, hopefully I didn't lose you with all that speculation upon speculation. That's just the different considerations I've had about the whole thing, none of it really denies or confirms anything related to jikook tbh, just thoughts I've had about the recent possible dating(?) stuff surrounding the two of them. At the end of the day, daeun could be a clout chaser, the jungkook video could be fake or he's secretly hosting gal-pal sleepover parties with all the girlies, and him and jimin are secretly married. Who the hell know with them LOL

Anon, I don’t agree with some of these speculations but, I can see where you’re coming from with some of these.

Let’s hope you don’t piss my anon girlies off too much with this one. They can get quite catty when everyone doesn’t adhere to their borderline cult mentality :)

[cocogrrrl]

rendezvous

Chapter 5: After Hours / I Think We Have the Guy

during the few hours after the meetup, kyle gets a troubled tip from a mysterious text and yn gets a name.

wc: 1753 cw: implied alcohol + drug use, mental health stuff, details about the murders (graphic, but not totally detailed) check the series masterlist here! previous chapter

Kyle’s body sunk into his bed, the cold sheets enveloping his dazed state. Only the light from the moon illuminated his room as it gently hit his face. His gaze was pointed to the ceiling, mind full of worry. He didn’t even bother to change out of his clothes yet. He was too preoccupied and exhausted to do that.

At least today’s over with, right? He couldn’t help it, though, many conflicting sets of emotions washing over him.

He couldn’t sleep over the fact that he, like, almost attacked someone. It goes against what he even stands for. What the hell was that even that for? He knew he was going to deal with someone sick when he approached YN, but he didn’t think that he’d already get looped into the sick shit they did already.

Fuck. Does that mean that only worse was to come for him? He hoped not, but so far this mission seemed to not guarantee anything for him. Would he have to make the first move on YN once more? Is he going to see the borrower again? Would he have to do worse? It hasn’t even been six hours, yet he feels like things are only going to go for the worse.

It’s okay, though. This is all going to be worth it. This is all for the better good. Peace will be restored once he gets his evidence, and he might even get transferred to a better position if all goes well.

…Right?

All of a sudden, sweeping his thoughts off for a split moment, a ping from his phone could be heard. He checked to see what it was—a notification.

April 1, 1:11 AM

??? hi kyle. i’m sure you’re looking for the killer on the letter case, yes? well, you’ve actually already found your guy. it’s me. 

Just because this person messaged you at a time and date that involves angel numbers, does not mean this is your guy.

The letter case is the string of murders Kyle has been solving for the past few weeks. That’s what it was called by locals because each victim had a love letter (unsure if for them) placed somewhere at the crime scene. It makes it seem rather lighthearted when the actual murders were grisly and simply not for the faint of heart.

He was shocked, to say the least. He had to sit there for a few moments. This guy must be insane. He could technically track their location. At least in the morning. Yeah, that’s the first thing he’ll do once he gets to work.

Maybe he was a fake anyway. I mean, there are definitely some sick people out there who’d come out and say that they’re the murderer when they really aren’t—perhaps this guy was just one of them.

??? don’t just leave me on read!!! i know you’re reading this, you were just out a while ago you’re gonna make me reaaall sad if you don’t reply :(

How the hell does this kid know where Kyle’s been? Could it be YN? Maybe it was some who just really lucky at guessing things.

He rolled his eyes and sighed. I guess he had to reply. What would happen if he didn’t? Would another body show up tomorrow? There hasn’t been any indication that the timing of the murders seemed to be patterned. For all he knew, the killer may tend to strike whenever they’re upset.

I mean, it wouldn’t hurt to know whatever was happening anyway. This might just be some kid, but by the off chance that this is his guy, then score for him.

kyle how can i even confirm that you are the killer anyways?

??? i know things that most people don’t like i know that you’re the guy in charge of the case

kyle i’ve given statements to the news about the status of the culprit multiple times

??? the first victim is a bakery owner the second was her mentee/cousin the next one is a local idol lastly the most recent one is a seamstress

kyle i believe those details have been disclosed as well

??? stop being mean!!! hmph :<

kyle i’m not? i’m just simply stating that the information you’ve provided me with so far is all accessible by the public

??? you leave me with no choice then! i have photos of the bodies

The next thing Kyle received were photos of the bodies, some of them dissimilar to those recorded by the department. Maybe it was one of those journalists? He wasn’t sure.

A few photos seemed to stand out, though. Some of them were photos of the victims  unconcious in the places where their bodies were found. They hadn’t been mutilated yet, though. They were just knocked out.

Kyle didn’t want to put his trust in that person yet. Maybe it was edited? You’re gonna need one hell of an editor to do that, though.

 

kyle i’m gonna need more than that

??? so mean! i didn’t!!!

kyle  okay? look, if you’re some kid trying to be cool, please stop it it’s really disrespectful

??? i’m not a kid dipshit i do have proof clyde donovan is the son of the seamstress he said that he was likely targeted by the killer a few days before his death he was held at gunpoint by me and he said that i wanted to sew a football in his face he thought it was funny at first but after seeing how the dress his mother made was sewn onto her he didn’t find it that comedic anymore

The urge to throw his phone across the room out of fear was tense, almost palpable. Chills crawled up his spine. Why? It’s because the guy was correct.

Kyle had conducted a few interviews with people close to Betsy Donovan when her body was found at the local park. It was a place that she and her family frequented growing up.

Clyde, as mentioned, revealed exactly what the anonymous texter told Kyle. Honestly, if anything, this person seemed to know this situation better than Clyde did himself. The detail about the football thing wasn’t mentioned at all when he interviewed him, or at least he doesn’t remember anything like that. He might have to recheck the tapes later.

This information wasn’t released to the public at all for the sake of the family’s privacy. This fact, combined with the photos, likely meant one thing: he was actually talking to the culprit.

Who was this person exactly? Immediately his first thought is YN. I mean, he is pretty sure that it is her, and she did get his number earlier. Plus, he was just with her and this person just referenced knowing that he was out. Maybe she’s just messaging him through a burner phone. Knowing how much she gets from her borrowers, it doesn’t really seem like it would put a dent in her wallet to buy a few backup phones.

kyle why are you messaging me

??? i want to help you solve find out who i am

kyle aren’t you just endangering yourself then?

??? don’t you want some extra help on your case? i know how bad you wanna take me down

kyle yeah but not like this

??? that’s why i’ve devised a plan for you, detective you receive information from me about the murders and my identity if you follow my requests

kyle i’m not doing that

??? i’m not gonna have you rob a bank dude jeez i’m just gonna ask for small favors

kyle like what?

??? you’ll see do we have a deal though?

⋆｡˚ ✧ ˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚

The blinds were closed, and so your whole room was just barely lit up by your night light. Your body was drowning in the stiff cushions of your couch. Your senses were tingly, probably even hazy. You might’ve had an extra bottle of some cheap liquor to relax your senses.

You were tired, to say the least. Your body was absolutely drained, but your mind still ran endlessly—no matter how much you wanted it to stop. You just wanted to sleep, nothing more, nothing less. Dear, God.

You didn’t like your mind during hours like these. It’s when everything would hit you at once, the surge of emotions sending you to a wave of nothingness. You’d wish it’d be noisier sometimes, but you knew that you couldn’t handle loud things as well. Maybe the quiet is for you. It sounds funny, considering the type of life you find yourself living in, but it’s true.

Scratch that. You were lying to yourself. You’re pretty sure you had about two bottles and a shot in the thigh earlier. 

Your mind drifted off to places you didn’t want to, namely in the house of sympathy. Now that you were thinking about it, you kind of felt bad for Brad. I mean, maybe this is his first serious case, and you might’ve completely traumatized him already. The only “serious” problems this town had were probably as easy to solve as it is making your bed or something. 

Are you right for wanting to toy around with him? Definitely not. Is there anything good that is to be expected from you anyways? You’re not a good person at all. You’re the furthest thing from. You still can’t help but feel a little remorse after seeing the mortified look on his face earlier, though.

In retrospect, when you had to put him through the actual act of taunting the guy with a knife, you just felt awfully mean. You felt like those mean girls who force their “weirdo pet” friends to bully their friends just to see them suffer. How low of you.

What can you do now, though? The plan’s set in place, and whatever damage you have planned out has already been done. There’s no going back now.

You checked your phone idly, hoping to see something, anything to take your mind off of the barren hellscape that is your mind. A text from Bebe sent about two hours ago caught your eye.

April 1, 1:41 AM

bebe hey yn? i think we have the guy if anything i think we have heaps of information

You saw the message and smiled. It’s not that you’re going through this with this plan. It’s that you’re going through with this plan while enjoying it. You piece of shit.

bebe his name is kyle broflovski

next chapter.

[rifleseye]

gimme 1-10, i wanna know it all!

This got long as hell. Thank you.

1. Canon I outright reject

I kinda. Like. Don't understand why he would EVER be okay Or down for fuckin Getaway of all people to lead and also kicking out "Team Megatron" (WHO HAD LIKE??? MOST OF HIS SCIENTISTS???????? AND FRIENDS???????????????) like that always genuinely baffled me. He Would Not Do That. I can see him having qualms with Rodimus' decisions but like... Hmm... how do I put it... He's not the kind to let his criticisms fester (he called out Megatron, he criticized Prowl, etc etc) So I simply close my eyes about that decision and live in a beautiful world where he didn't know what was going on and helped organize an attempt at a second mutiny against Getaway. (I have a beautiful brain canon but I don't bring it here because there's some sweeping changes I'd make personally and don't wanna make anyone feel obligated to adhere to ygwim)

Basically I close my eyes through most of Lost Light and ignore it.

2. A canon or headcanon hill I will die on

I think that Perceptor and Nautica became fast friends, she is on par with Perceptor's intelligence and she's a bit more sensitive than him so I think they'd be good friends :)

3. Obscure headcanon

He's an outlier! He keeps it to himself most of the time, and generally doesn't use it much, but he's got a Universal Emulator (lifted from G1.) Basically it allows him Emulate whatever is necessary irt tech. Like he can act as a password, a key, a simulation engine, but he only tends to use it for accessing data. It's kinda like he has a second brain. And even then that use is few and far between, as the housing to his Emulator is basically below his spark and the cooling systems in his body don't account for it as well so he tends to overheat when he uses it.

4. Favorite line

From More than meets the Eye Issue #38.

Perceptor is the only fucker in the Lost Light who has enough balls to tell Megatron of all people to shut the fuck up and honestly Respect. It is within my personal opinion that Megatron should have been told off more in mtmte rather than experience countless agonizing chapters of jro kissing the ground he walked upon (SORRY I FEEL REALLY STRONGLY ABT THAT.)

5. Best personality trait

His genuine love and joy over science and learning and sharing what he learns. I think this is one of the aspects about Perceptor that really drove me to him. He's very sincere and doesn't hide behind sarcasm or exaggeration or what have you. He's a pleasant person when you take the time to get to know him I think :)

6. Worst personality trait

His coldness. Honestly he became really emotionally closed off following his near death experience and while that is a product of trauma he very much doesn't seem intent on changing that any time soon. It can lead to lots of misunderstandings with his peers, I think, many thinking him being standoffish when really he's just uninterested in them.

7. Age/height/weight headcanon

Age is a little complicated for Perceptor. As far as he remembers he's at least 4.9 million years old. However, the reality is that he's 5.9 million years old, several million years having been wiped from his memory from himself. So he might say he's 4.9 million years but if anyone were to carbon date him or check the age of his spark he'd be pushing 6 million.

So I have a few headcanons about Cybertronians' heights in IDW1. Generally I stick to the average size of say a speedster is about 34-36ft tall (don't ask where I got these numbers I don't remember.) and Perceptor seems to be genuinely tall (when compared to speedsters) so I set him at an even 37.

I had to to some insane math to get his weight. Using a Hagglünd as reference because that's about the size he is anyways and then some guesstimates on how heavy his scope is + additional weight added with his modifications and it comes to around 20.506 tons.

Without his scope he'd be only 13 tons (going by the prior modification weight). Guesstimating how much his scope weighs based upon the weight of observation telescopes that adds an extra 3 tons so he would've been ~16 tons prior to Any modifications (including his treads). Treads + the mechanisms inside would've added only 1 ton (going with rubber) (counting both legs. each leg gets 5000lbs). With the treads he was 17 tons and then with the additional modifications (changes to his scope, broader shoulder armor, stronger coolant systems, stability mods, chestplate, back plates, all sorts of additional stuff supporting his internal structures) adds 3 extra tons making him ~20. (Also just for kicks I figured that the total length of his treads when not rolled up on their tracks is ~22 ft.)

8. Unpopular opinion about them

Closes my eyes forever. I have so many because I genuinely hate what fanon's done to him. But anyways I guess my biggest most unpopular opinion about Perceptor is that I don't think he has ever been or will ever be in love with Brainstorm. They've only had two actual conversations in MTMTE/LL and one of them was Brainstorm rudely interrupting him while the other was he, Brainstorm, AND NAUTICA (who everyone forgets about!!!) that were talking about science stuff. I think it's POSSIBLE Brainstorm had a crush on him, but it's always felt so clear to me that it was only ever one way. That and Brainstorm tended to exaggerate whatever encounter he had with Perceptor or straight up lied about what he might've said.

9. Scene that first made me love (or hate) the character

Well. It was kinda instant for me. @rustrage actually got me to start watching Cyberverse a couple years back and I, (clueless), was like "hey do you think Perceptor is me shaped." And then we got to season 3 and it was So Fucking Over for me. This scene in specific. I also think Jeremy Levi does a FANTASTIC job as Perceptor and is genuinely how I imagine his voice for everything.

10. Best moment in the comic

Ohhh honestly this is a hard one to decide on. I have two for two different reasons. The first one I'll talk about is when he was a badass wrecker because even I am not immune to Cool Robot With Gun and while Perceptor hanging upside down out of a crashing ship is so fucking awesome I keep thinking about this scene from All Hail Megatron issue #6

I needn't say more I just think this scene is neat and well um 😳

And now the second and my most favorite scene is this one. It's from MTMTE Issue #38 (which honestly had a lot of bangers from Perceptor)

It's such an innocuous thing but it's something about his portrayal in this conversation with Rung I really adore. There's subtle nuances that I feel a lot of people miss and the main one is that Perceptor can, in fact, admit when he messes up. I see a lot of fanon portrayals making him needlessly a jackass to people who know less than him but that's not the case at all!

He was originally written to be a teacher in G1 and I think this scene really paints that teacher vibe he gives off really clearly!

[dracox-serdriel]

There are a number of things that are kind of insane going on here:

"Traditional Broadcasting Structure" was a hellscape. Perhaps you've forgotten, but things were broadcast at a set time on a single channel. If you didn't have the channel? You didn't see it. If you had the channel but you missed it, you effing missed it. Maybe you could catch the re-run if you were lucky enough to encounter it. But those were also scheduled at a set time on a set channel. Oddly enough, shows still had social function, even though Real Life could - and often did - EASILY prevent people in your workplace or school from watching that last episode. Seems to me like Traditional Broadcasting Structure had more hurdles to the social aspect than Binge Structure.

Outside of set channels/times, shows that drop weekly aren't magic fairies that grant everybody their run time in free time to watch them when they're available. Lots of people haven't watched the latest drop and/or haven't watched the most recent season. This is especially true for shows that drop during weekdays.

I feel silly for having to write this, but here it is: Spoilers were a thing before binge watching. So why would spoilers trip up the social aspect now but not then? (Again, remember how easy it was to miss the latest episode.)

To the best of my knowledge, it's just as easy to ask, "Did you see the episode last night?" as it is to ask, "Wait, what was the last episode you watched?" So, this idea of "oh well someone might've binged it and you only saw the first episode" isn't the barbed wire gate of fan conversation it's being framed as being.

Binging can absolutely be conducive to analysis and enjoyment, especially if the show has complex world building elements, complex plot, and tons of crap going on in general. Not having a whole week of Real Life Crap getting in the way can make the story more engrossing and even easier to follow.

Perhaps this is just a personal peeve of mine, but those "previously on..." recaps that run at the top of episodes often bang out major effing spoilers (like, ohhh gee golly gosh, a clip of character-we-haven't-seen-in-a-whole-season? perchance they appear in this episode?!), which can ruin it for some people. Also, they are cut for brevity, which can leave them echoing partial information or straight up misleading information because of how the cut is done.

Fun fact: Nothing is actually stopping anyone from opening a show that dropped an entire season one episode at a time with a week in between. Yes, indeed, you can recreate the "traditional" release style of episodic TV shows!

This idea that binging is killing fandoms is kind of insane for a number of reasons. Why blame binging when there's a far more obvious culprit? The sheer volume of new content available to fans.

All humans have limited time, and most of us have pretty limited free time. So, how many people are up-to-date on a show AND active in the fandom at the same time? That was already a limited number of people before streaming services and binge watching. But two decades ago, in 2002, there were 182 original scripted series avaialble. In 2021, there were over 550 original scripted series released/dropped/broadcast. [source] Oh, and wait - this count doesn't include a lot of stuff - for example, outside of a few (including PBS shows) kid's shows aren't counted nor are non-English shows. [source]

Want some other numbers to work with, like maybe some indication of stuff before 2002 when FX started counting? Maybe include kids shows and non-English shows? Try IMDB's handy search!

TV Series, Released between 1950-01-01 and 1950-12-31 - 280 titles

TV Series, Released between 1960-01-01 and 1960-12-31 - 557 titles

TV Series, Released between 1970-01-01 and 1970-12-31 - 716 titles

TV Series, Released between 1980-01-01 and 1980-12-31 - 945 titles

TV Series, Released between 1990-01-01 and 1990-12-31 - 1,502 titles

TV Series, Released between 2001-01-01 and 2001-12-31 - 3,181 titles

TV Series, Released between 2021-01-01 and 2021-12-31 - 10,783 titles

Now look at this by decades:

1950-1959 - 3,988 titles

1960-1969 - 6,655 titles

1970-1979 - 8,023 titles

1980-1989 - 11,284 titles

1990-1999 - 19,780 titles

2000-2009 - 42,797 titles

2010-2019 - 96,172 titles

2020-2023 - 35,066 titles (as of August 8, 2023)

There is more content being created now than ever before, and a lot of us have access to content created from 30-50+ years ago on top of all the new content out there!

People are blaming binge watching for reducing fandom discussions, when the logical reason for the reduction is that you are participating in smaller and smaller fandoms. It's not that there is a lack of passion, a lack of creativity, or a lack of interest - all that's lacking is the size of the fandom that's up-to-date on recent material. We all have so much content (even new content) to choose from, and we all only have so much time.

The only valid point I read in this thread was about Netflix canceling shows that didn't meet ridiculous standards. That being said, Netflix has consistently refused to report actual numbers related to production performance. They'll say it "underperformed" and cancel it, but they don't bother reporting the numbers. Why would they? Right now, they hold all the cards - nobody but Netflix can see how well a show is performing on their platform; nobody knows how Netflix actually measures that performance; nobody knows WTF Netflix actually thinks of as a show with good performance. So they can say "oh well it didn't perform well" and cancel it. Spoiler alert: Netflix cancels shows after Season 2 because by Season 3, their labor force FINALLY has means to negotiate for better compensation. Netflix will cancel shows that perform incredibly because they'll make more money on shows on season one or two because they're stiffing their labor force and pocketing that money as revenue.

Before, broadcasting network viewership could be measured by outside forces. Now, these streaming platforms are monopolizing that information. The only audience they'll care to share such numbers with are advertisers, who are likely forced to sign confidentiality agreements just to see those numbers. These streaming platforms can now obfuscate show performance/viewership to meet their own ends and pad their bottom line. So this idea that Netflix canceled a show because not enough people binged it the first week is complete BS propaganda. Netflix likely planned on canceling that show before they even dropped the newest episodes, especially if the newest episodes were season 2 or beyond, regardless of viewership, turnout, or acclaim. They've already calculated their numbers, and actually paying their laborers cuts too far into their profits, so they cut the show. Please don't buy this idea that bingewatching (or a lack there of) is actually involved here. And keep on rejecting this idea until these effing companies pony up the effing numbers and methodology behind their "performance" requirements. They won't, of course, because that kind of transparency will result in a loss of control that will become losses in revenue.

One more point: someone mentioned House of the Dragon fandom content after all episodes were released (after 2.5 months of content being released), but they've not bothered to mention what they were comparing that to. In theory, the only way to know if more fandom content is produced by binge drops vs. weekly drops is to compare fandoms of roughly the same size at roughly the same duration of content consumption/processing. So, you can't compare the content produced by the fandom 1-2 weeks after a binge drop to the 1-2 weeks after the last episode of a weekly-dropped show. That doesn't make sense. The latter fandom has had 3 months of time to produce content, while the former only had 2 weeks. You need to compare them both after 3 months of the last episode drop. And even that could be a crap-shoot, because fandoms that are released at different times of year may have more/less content due to time constraints of the humans paricipating in that fandom.

TL;DR -

Binge watching is not destroying fandom. There are simply fewer people active in each individual fandom now because there is so much more new content being produced.

Binge watching has not mucked up the social aspect of shows. You are simply much less likely to watch the same shows as people you know IRL, even when it comes to "popular" shows -- because there really are that many shows available.

Binge watching (or lack there of) is not why Netflix canceled that awesome show. Netflix cancels shows after season 2 to avoid paying its workers (they finally get leverage by season 3). Don't believe their reasons until they pony up the numbers and are transparent on their performance expectations.

Traditional Broadcast Television was a hellscape, stop acting like you're pining for the good old days. It was NOT better back when you could miss an episode because you had to take the dog out for a walk. And it certainly wasn't better when there were only like 5 shows to choose from and if you didn't like them - oh well.

"binge-worthy show" man fuck that

i want my shows one episode followed by a whole ass week of going a little insane over it with the people on my phone, writing fics theorizing and going over every single scene through amazing gifs and meta, before the next ep drops and the cicle begins anew

[qqtxt]

[🐯] 1:11am wish (you’ll stay) [m]

✿ pairing: beomgyu x you / female reader / angst to fluff, smut / 8,120 words / reader calls him ‘gyu’/’gyu-yah’ / mentions and descriptions of unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it babes) and explicit scenes and language ✿ in which you try giving him one last “planned” date before you try to make an exit in his life... only for it to backfire when he knows it from the start. ✿ a/n: um... this... this was supposed to be a short one but my hand, slipped, and it somehow became smut, lol. anyway, enjoy! ✿ 🎧: ghosting by txt (lofi version) / 📍 @kflixnet​ [masterlist 🌸] / there’s rated m content so minors please dni!

additional note: this... gets very filthy in the end, and i haven’t written smut in a while so please be kind :”)

today would be one of the perfect days beomgyu would add to his list of never ending days he’d have with you. i’ve got something planned for us, gyu-yah. just bring yourself. he brought his undivided attention; spending every second thinking about you despite being next to you, holding your hand, kissing your cheek, laughing when you laugh. it couldn’t get anymore perfect than this.

but he’s no fool, either. beomgyu knows you like the back of his hand, notices how you get affected differently when he says we’ll come back here next time or it’ll be my treat when i’m back–because he’s leaving, he won’t be around for months and months on end and it drives you insane... but there’s something more than him just leaving.

this wasn’t a date to remember, it was a date to say goodbye.

beomgyu tries not to break your facade, not when he knows how much thought you’ve put into the whole thing. he sees you almost cracking but he doesn’t call you out on it. he doesn’t know if he doesn’t call you out for your sake or his. he doesn’t know if he can handle it now. t-minus two days before he’s leaving for a tour and he’s unsure if he’s prepared for the heartbreak now... or later. whether he should rip the bandaid out or let it hopelessly fall on its own.

though, he’s able to live in his fantasy through the start of the day. swallowing the bites you give him with an open heart, downing the pain. smiling when you–augh, what a messy boy i have–reaching to brush the smudge of sauce at the corner of his mouth. feeling your hand in his as you swing it back and forth, walking down the sidewalk with a smile on your face; a radiant sun, his personal sun that felt like it was going to set and he’d never see the light again. how... cruel could you be to do that without breaking down?

morning, afternoon, evening, night, midnight. every minute passes by so quickly, yet not fast enough. he wants to savour each second, but he wants to reach to the end to find out how it ends. the anxiety bites his nerves, but the euphoria to pretend numbs the pain. yet... it has to be now, no other than time than now, beomgyu thinks. 

the night ended with having drinks with the boys at the dorm and turning in early for the night before it could end in regrets and mistakes too many to count (the boys said that beomgyu has found someone to match his energy a bit too well, being able to ramp him up twice as much or tone it down when they needed it–a blessing and a curse, as it seems).

beomgyu feels you shifting from your side of the bed, and his eyes peel open to stare at the clock ahead of him: 1:06AM. the numbers glare at him, taunt him, almost provoking him to say something. he gives you sixty seconds as he prepares himself, well-aware of what’s to come... or maybe he doesn’t. 

honestly, nothing could prepare him for what’s about to come. he takes in a deep breath and speaks to the dimly-lit room, well-aware it would reach you wherever you stand in his room: “so this is it?”

you softly gasp as your hand shakes the doorknob in your hands, unable to hide the fact that–”gyu-yah...”

when beomgyu sits up from his spot on the bed, he searches for your eyes and sees that you’re... you’re already crying. silently, trying not to let the sounds out but it already echoes loudly in his head. ringing, stinging, hurting. beomgyu hates that the first thing he wants to do is comfort you, when he should be comforting himself.

he’s going through the pain here, isn’t he? why does he want to protect you more than himself? you watch as his expression changes under the glow of the moonlight; silently staring at one another without anything being said but everything at once.

“this is the final step of the plan, isn’t it?” beomgyu clenches his hands on the bed, refusing to let the tears fall despite them pooling in his eyes. he watches as you try to stammer a response, clearly, you hadn’t think you’d make it this far without cracking. 

“i know,” he says, sniffing a little, “i know that today is the day you were going to leave,” he uses the back of his hand to wipe his nose, “i know, even if you didn’t say anything.”

he finally hears your voice when you croak a soft: “then...?” 

why the fuck did you go along with it?

your heart aches when he allows for a couple of tears to fall, dripping onto the bedsheets as he whispers: “i just wanted to be with you.”

beomgyu watches as his words sink in your bones, making you drop your bag by your side and soon your knees grow weak. you can’t pretend anymore, and your walls crumble as you slide to the floor with your back against the door. he bites down on his tongue, stubbornly staying where he’s at because he feels like if he makes any sudden movements, he’ll scare you away.

he doesn’t want that. doesn’t know what he’ll do if you do that. he wants... he wants you to–the clock beeps, it must be–beomgyu glances to the clock, noticing the numbers 1:11am now glowing in pink; his eyes must be playing tricks on him, but surely, that’s what it is.

he doesn’t know if this is a joke, or if it’s a chance, but he asks anyway.

“what do you wish for?” his voice is shaky, even if he’s trying to put up a strong front. he’s quietly crying now, breathing slowly getting heavier and harder to breathe but he knows he’ll have to pull through. he looks at you, despite the dark enveloping the pair of you in, he can still see everything clearly.

he can see the tears in your eyes, the tears in his eyes. he sees how your lips tremble, your hands shaking as you hug yourself to anchor to the floor. it takes every nerve in his being not to lunge at you; hold you, keep you close, make you stay. instead, he watches. he watches as your emotions surface and... and...

you scoff a laugh as your head leans back against the door; how pathetic. this was your idea. this was your doing, but now it’s all blowing up in your face. at beomgyu’s question, to something being a cute ritual of asking each other what they wish for when the clock strikes 1:11 or 11:11, it’s making your heart break. as you loosely hug your knees, you turn the cheek to spare him a glance, “you can’t be serious.”

he’s quick with his reply, as if he–“answer me,” he says, clearing his throat, swallowing the lump in his throat, “i deserve that much.”

beomgyu feels his legs shaking as he anxiously waits. his heart is beating so fast, he thinks it’s only a matter of time before it stops completely when he hears you–“i wish i knew what i was doing.”

he doesn’t know if he wants to scream at you, or cry with you. his mind only has one thought appears. it slips past his lips before he can stop himself. a broken whisper, a desperate plea.

“i wish you would stay.”

his voice, so soft, but his words, rings loud. he sees what his words do to you. and it’s festering in your heart, spreading like poison that it forces you to try to get up from where you are that... fuck it. he’s quicker than you are, hurrying onto his feet before you can find your footing to stand properly. he sees you flinching when he’s right in front of you, hands holding you up by the waist and your eyes snap shut.

“look at me,” beomgyu murmurs, squeezing your waist. he hates how you don’t respond, tightly closing your eyes as your hands stubbornly remain by your sides. 

“hold me,” he tries again, leaning in closer as he rests his forehead against yours. “please.”

“i...” you rasp, hands forming into balls of fists, “i can’t.”

“why not?” he eggs on, you know what he’s doing, you fucking know, don’t let him–”because you don’t love me anymore?”

beomgyu knows this is cruel, but he has to do it. he has to. he needs to hear you say it. he needs to hear it come from your mouth. that reaffirmation. your eyes snap open, tears still rolling down your cheeks, nose getting stuffy from the crying but the fiery spirit in you ignites at his words.

“don’t you fucking dare say that,” your voice trembles through the syllables, and your emotions overtake you as you feebly get through: “i... i love you so much that i–”beomgyu doesn’t wait for the rest of your words to come out, already pulling you in his embrace as you cry. he doesn’t know where his anger dissolves to, but it’s gone the second he hears you love him.

this was what he knew was coming. the frustrations, the pain, the difficulties of maintaining a relationship through long distance and time apart. not being there physically for one another when things are tough, masking the pain with smiles as if nothing would go wrong. beomgyu hates the thought of you going through the grief alone, as if you couldn’t go to him to try to work things out. it pained him, it made him wonder how it was like trying to plan the entire day today well-aware of what would happen at the end of it.

would you be crying alone when you reach your apartment? would you start to ignore his messages, block him, pretend like you never knew him and turn into a ghost that was once in his life? the more beomgyu thinks about it, the tighter he holds onto you to reassure himself–no, you’re here. you’re here with me now. now and forever, you’ll be with me even if we’re not physically together.

beomgyu feels his heart at ease, relieved of the pain when you hug him back and sink in his arms. one of his arms secure you around the waist to keep you close, the other starts to stroke the back of your head down to your back; over and over again as he draws out all the cries from you. he finds his release as he cries silently with you, resting the side of his head against yours and lets go.

this was what you two needed. 

to break down together, to find a way to seal things together.

maybe it’s a couple of minutes, maybe it’s twenty minutes, it could be an hour. one thing’s for sure is he knows your emotions are stabilising, and he can lean you back to get a good look at you. both of your eyes are puffy and slightly red, but when they meet his, there’s a different feeling to it.

acceptance. calm. clarity. hope... love. there’s love. 

love was always there.

“please don’t go,” beomgyu breaks the silence, his words echoing in your ears.

“you’re the one leaving,” you thought your words would hurt him, but it only makes him smile.

“my heart’s with you, though.”

he smiles wider when you crack a smile and use a hand to nudge him by the shoulder, “gross.”

he takes this opportunity to catch your hand, luring you to the bed with him. he makes you sit on his lap, straddling him as he leans his back against the headrest and stretches his legs out. the familiarity of the position makes your heart pinch; at the thought that this was what you would miss and reminisce on your time alone... but now it’s being replayed in front of you; live, right now.

beomgyu places your hands to rest on his shoulder, then one of his hands rest on your waist while the other cups your cheek to make you look at him.

“do you love me?”

the question took everything in beomgyu’s being to ask... because whatever your answer was, he would accept it. if it was no, he would let you walk out of his life. he loves you that much to want you to find your own happiness. but if it was yes... if it was the answer he had been hoping for, he wants you to know he’ll work for it. for you, with you.

beomgyu watches as you take in a deep breath, a shaky exhale after. your hands squeeze his shoulders. your eyes avoid his, looking at everywhere but him. he knows this moment is the most crucial. it’ll make or break your relationship. he can only wait. because he knows where his heart is, where his intentions lie. he’s made that very clear from the moment you two started dating; that immaterial of how hard things got, he wanted to work through it all with you as long as you were the same.

so if that had wavered. if that changed for you... he was ready, even if he actually wasn’t.

the silence is almost deafening despite the night sleeping away. there’s still light sounds of the city muffled from the windows and sounds from the dorm because the members get up to use the bathroom in the middle of the night but relatively, it’s quiet. too quiet. the kind of quiet that beomgyu is certain his heart might take over with the sounds and–your lips parting makes beomgyu gape, anticipating for whatever’s to come–“so much...” your voice is gentle, soft, so fragile it sounds like it’s going to fade away that he has to hear it properly.

he searches for the answer in your eyes when you will the strength to lock gazes. he feels this rich warmth spreading in his chest; addictive wildfire when your voice kisses his ears, “i love you so much, gyu-yah.”

you’ve got him in a trance, swaying at your fingertips as your words sink in his system. he manages to nod as he smiles at you, stroking your cheek as if to say thank you for being honest with me. but then he needs to push on for answers. he needs to know: “then why are you leaving me?”

the answer comes faster than he had imagined.

“because it hurts.”

beomgyu frowns when your eyes flutter shut and you lean into his touch as your lips tremble, he can tell you’re about to cry again but you want to be able to explain yourself. so he encourages you, silently, holding you, keeping you still to stop yourself from crumbling.

“it hurts whenever you leave and i know you won’t be back until months later. i feel like my heart longs for you whenever you’re gone, even when you’re with me, i still miss you because i know you’ll leave again. i keep thinking,” you take a deep breath in and he breathes along with you. you find support by squeezing his shoulders and he strokes your cheek tenderly, patient, giving you all the time you need. the small pause allows you to stop yourself from crying.

“e-every time i’m with you, every time you leave, i keep thinking when would be the next time i’ll see you. there’s a timer that keeps ticking; how many days i have left with you, how many hours until you’re gone again?” your eyes open, only to realise the hotness that stings your eyes have been the tears; tears that beomgyu had been wiping away as they roll down your cheek. his throat feels numb, unable to speak as he presses his lips together. “i wait... i wait for a call, i stay up for the live streams, to see your face, to hear your voice. i get lonely, i get so lonely and i miss you. and it hurts.”

he nods a little, to show you that he’s listening, but it’s to reaffirm himself that yes, yes he’s listening. he carefully caresses your face, and squeezes your waist to give you any sort of comfort for braving up to tell him.

“it hurts but... i know this is what comes to being with you. and i want to stay–god, i want to stay–you’re all i want to be with but it’s hard... i feel so alone.”

at your own confession, you had expected beomgyu to counter you. to tell you that he’s having it worse, that he’s dealing with things, too. the things he’s dealt with to get to where he is today is a list upon a list of struggles he had to pull through. the last thing you’d want to insinuate was that you were having a tougher time but this isn’t a room for competition. you’re well-prepared for what he might say but nothing can prepare you for the way he shifts a little higher so he can look into your eyes.

you blink the tears away until you see him clearly.

he’s... he’s upset... but not for reasons you had expected.

“why didn’t you tell me?” his voice cracks, and you feel a new batch of tears about to fall but you hold them in, pressing your lips together, keeping yourself shut as his voice makes your heart ache. “i–if... if only you told me,” he whispers, “you–why did you go through all of that alone? why did you suffer all by yourself?”

you shake your head as your eyes close, feeling the few stray tears fall and against the pad of his thumb on your cheek, “i-i don’t know.” you feel yourself falling backwards, but beomgyu lures you forward with his hand on your cheek, so you can lean your forehead on his. slowly, your eyes open and he’s still looking at you intently.

“...i didn’t know how to bring it up, i wasn’t sure if it was just me. i didn’t know what to expect when it came to doing long distance and i...” you sniff a little, looking back into his eyes, “i’m sorry, gyu-yah.”

initially, beomgyu thought that’s what he needed to hear, but now, it wasn’t. all he needed to hear was how you felt, the reasons why, not the apology itself. hearing the apology, it makes him shake his head, “that’s not important. what’s important is you tell me whenever you feel these things. that way, i can know what to do or how to help, and most importantly,” your eyes widen in anticipation, breath hitching when his hand rests on your neck, “you’re not going through this alone. we’re going through every step of the way together. but i’m gonna need you to talk to me...” he gently squeezes your waist, “okay?”

you nod, a couple of times until it’s clear as day.

beomgyu smirks, the playfulness already rising in his veins.

“you still gonna leave me?”

you use a hand to hit his shoulder, huffing. that’s when he laughs, head leaning back on the headrest as you pout. when you try to shift from his lap, he tightens his grip to keep you on him, shaking his head, “oh no,” he grins, that shit-eating-grin appears that makes your heart swoon with the way he’s looking at you, “you’re not going anywhere.”

his laugh laces over with your squeal when he lunges forward, making you fall back on the bed as he switches up the position. you sigh when you feel the softness of his mattress welcoming you, then it’s the warmth of his body on top of you as he cages you in, settling between your legs. he lets you lay on one of his arms with his other hand now pushing the hair back from your face, then settling against your cheek. one of your hands remain on his shoulder, while your other wanders to gently go through his hair and his eyes flutter shut with a sigh of bliss. 

then, as your hand slides down to his face, he nuzzles into your touch.

after a couple of beats, his eyes opens and you shift your gaze to align with his. you watch as his eyes travel from your eyes down to your lips, slightly parted. so tempting, so inviting–beomgyu leans in without realising and kisses you. he groans into your mouth when your legs start to wrap around his waist, trying to get him closer.

kissing him felt different; the good kind of different. throughout the whole day it was a reminder that it was the last, but now, now it was with a newfound significance. it was a promise; over and over again that you would commit to him. it was trust, it was love, love, love, it was love. beomgyu smirks when you feel him getting hard as he presses against your stomach, his body sliding down to brush against your core.

you whimper, softly, into his ears, already shaking him to his bones at the thought of the sounds he’ll be able to hear as this progresses.

“to think that you were going to leave and not let me hear this anymore,” he murmurs over your lips, past the lust-filled eyes, sparking with anticipation. you breathe deep and heavy, shaking your head, “wanna be with you.” 

your words etch to his memory, making his heart swell in his chest at your confession.

always wanna be with you.

beomgyu takes his time with you, savouring each sound you make that realistically is soft, barely anyone can hear but him. the members were still around, after all, but beomgyu wanted to hear you regardless. 

it resorts to you two being as careful as you can be, occasionally kissing one another to shut the other up when things got too hot and loaded to bear. clothes come off, one after another, piling and scattering the floor of his bedroom until you’re bare; naked and all in your beauty as beomgyu rakes your figure with his eyes and soon his hands and mouth to get a taste of you all over. he enjoys every touch you leave on his skin, from his face, to his hair, down his back and as you stroke his cock slowly hardening in your grasp, growing full and hot. he lays you back and takes over.

the night transcends to beomgyu sliding into you slowly, then filling you to the brim as the stars burn the back of your eyes. slow, slow, slower, i got you, i got you, you’re doing so good for me. he kisses you, giving you the time you need. he kisses you more, deeper as he stills inside of you. 

then the initial sting numbs; this euphoric pleasure making you feel warm. he pulls away from kissing you when he feels you squeezing his pulsing cock in you; your legs locking him in, your lips parting to tell him to m-move, please. the feeling of your hard nipples brushing against his chest with each stroke of his cock pushing in and out. 

fast, fast, faster–please, please, please, gyu–please, gonna come–beomgyu kisses you to silence you, but whines into your mouth when he feels it. your nails pressing to the bare of his back, keeping him close. the airy whines that blesses his ears, the way your thighs trembles with each thrust back home, muffled noises of skin slapping. sweat, making his locks stick to his forehead that he resorts to shake it aside to press his forehead on yours, forcing you to look at me, wanna see you look at me when you come. wanna see those pretty eyes on me.

the coil tightening, tight; you feel so good, love you, love you so much. your hands flatten on his back, snaking your arms hug him closer, pulling him down until your chests meet. beomgyu picks up the pace when your eyes barely stays open, giving into the pleasure as you start to tremble and he’s trying his best not to falter. he succumbs to the way you swallow him in, squeezing him sinfully, legs locking him in, driving him deeper that he gapes at the feeling.

then it hits. 

he sinks into you and you feel the warmth filling you up; hot, familiar, gonna stay in you, wanna be close to you. beomgyu rests his face in your neck, trying to catch his breath as you do the same. his thrusts slows down after a while and then he stills inside of you. there’s this bloom in his chest as you hold him close. the soft sighs you make as the shocks of pleasure stimulates your body; his body, both intertwined in post-bliss, in shared mutual silence.

you feel light-headed and satiated, playing with beomgyu’s hair as he occasionally kisses your neck. there’s a moment of tranquil just staying like that; heavy breathing, soft sighs, being connected, emotionally and physically, at ease, in each other’s arms.

you involuntarily whine when he pulls out after his initial promise. you’re about to question where he’s going when he lifts himself up from laying down on top of you. as your eyes peel open, you start to tense up when you feel him crawling down on your body. he doesn’t give you time to process what’s happening until you feel him pulling you down so your legs dangle off the end of the bed and he’s kneeling on the floor, body bent forward as he kisses his way towards your center.

you sit up on your elbows, watching as beomgyu disappears between your legs. he shows mercy, starting with kissing your inner thigh and stroking your quivering thighs. then, he makes you beg for it. makes you want the way he’s able to kiss your sweet flesh and juices that heavenly lures him in. he makes sure you’re anticipating each swipe of his tongue, every lap he makes from your slit up to your clit. he moans against you, making you feel the vibrations that initially hurt from the overstimulation; then it’s everything you want.

ask for it, let me hear you ask for it. he kisses your skin, teasing. his fingers, brushing lightly, slipping in and curling; you arch your back and quietly moan, shaking your head as your toes curl. please, gyu, please, please.

he chuckles when he pulls away, crawling back up, hovering over you until he reaches your face. he gives you a soft kiss, and it surprises you because the next thing he says makes your stomach clench at the thought.

“i’ll only let you come if you sit on my face.”

you gape, a hand pushing his bare chest, “w-what?”

“that’s the only way you’re getting it, y/n,” he says lowly, leaning down to peck your lips, then he raises a brow at you for your response, “hm?”

no way, no way, no way–oh my god.

“i... what if i suffocate you?” you can’t believe this is happening, but with the way he looks beneath you, pleading eyes just begging to please you, it’s hard to say no to. he strokes your thighs approvingly, adoring the way he’s able to see the gorgeous curvature of your body from beneath you. “that would be the best way to go.”

you’re about to hit him, or get off him, you don’t know which, but he doesn’t give you much time to ponder when he easily pulls you down until you’re seated on his face. you can’t believe out of all the times he decides to give into one of your suggestions a while ago, it’s now he decides to act upon it. the new angle is foreign, but soon the familiarity of pleasure starts to wash over. hesitant at first, you have a hand on the head rest for support, the other lightly tangled in his hair.

soon, he has you riding his face as you try to muffle your sounds. your body curls forward just a little and beomgyu watches as your chest heaves in deep breaths of air from the pleasure he’s giving you. it makes his cock twitch against his stomach, pre-come soon starts to leak and he’s a whining mess against your folds, lapping you up faster, his tongue digging into the right spots, nose grinding against your clit, eager to chase your high with just his tongue and fingers.

he holds out until you start to tremble again, the familiar build up coming undone. his heart is ramming in his chest at the sight, at the feeling of your thighs quivering by his ears and how you’re restraining yourself to not clench your thighs to his head. the way he groans seeing you come that it adds to your heightened pleasure, making you start shaking from the overstimulation when he doesn’t let up his fingers in you, his lips sucking on your clit before his tongue swirls around it. you catch yourself against the headrest, shaking your head to get him to stop but he–his arms tighten his hold on you, keeping you to his face as he starts to dig his tongue against your clit harder, a shaky plea escaping your lips to get him to s-stop, gyu! please, please, please!

he only lets you go when you start to hit the headrest. you manage to squirm away from him, trying your best not to knee him in the face as you fall beside him with a huff. the sight is endearing to him. he starts cackling against the pillows, arm over his eyes. he hadn’t realised the movements from the bed until he finds himself in warm, wet heat.

his hips jut forward as he sits up, gasping when he feels the tip of his cock hitting the back of your throat and you swallow around him. oh fuck–fuck–feels good. he can’t seem to speak when you pull him out of your mouth and start to stroke him lightly. it makes him open his eyes, half-lidded, half-way meeting his peak and it was evident. you grin up to him as he sits up, looking at you on your knees between his legs, his cock in your hands; a sinful sight that makes him throb. “already?” you chuckle, “did eating me out make you that hard?”

he scoffs and pushes the hair from your face, his hand cupping your cheek as he supports himself with his other hand on the bed, “as if you needed to ask. we’re doing that again by the way, you looked so–fuck!” beomgyu throws his head back in a gasp when you take him in after lightly brushing your thumb over the tip of his cock. use me, use me as you want, however you want. beomgyu feels like he’s on fire, body hot all over and his thighs quiver.

he doesn’t hesitate, thrusting into your mouth and harder, faster, gonna come, fuck–fuck–ah, shit!

you feel the familiar heat that strokes the walls of your mouth. a twitch, a tremble, and soon, the warmth starts to spurt and goes down your throat as he trembles in your grasp, body curled forward until his forehead leans atop of your head with shaky breaths. he’s breathless, trying to find the strength to breathe as you ride out his high with a couple more bobs up and down his cock, milking him completely. 

as your movements slow down, that’s when he guides himself out of your mouth so he can cup your chin. you blink up to him, a small knowing smile on your lips that makes him narrow his eyes at you. how can someone as innocent looking as you commit to some of the most sinful acts and still look like this? he gently nudges you to lean up so he can kiss you; taste you on his lips, let you taste yourself from his lips.

he lets you feel the smile he has against your lips; tongues brush lightly and hands; hands finding wherever they can to hold leverage. beomgyu pulls you up more, higher, breaking the kiss momentarily. then, joining him back on the bed. you lay atop of him with one leg between his own, the other cased by his side as he holds you; kissing you, wanting to prolong this moment as much as he can is making your heart grow fuller and fuller. you soften in his hold, gasping when he pulls away from kissing you to find his way to your neck.

you’re well-aware of his drive and how far he can go but today is different. emotions were still running high, and it’s always the case whenever either of you were emotional; be it makeup sex or i’m feeling extra loving tonight. you feel it when he has a hand by your neck, the other crawling up along the side of your thigh before he smoothens his palm over the curve of your ass and then he grips onto one cheek in his fingers, earning himself a soft moan that makes you feel his cock slowly growing hard again.

your leg between his shifts ever so lightly, feeling the brush of your skin against his cock makes him grunt against your neck. your hands flatten on his chest, pushing him back a little so you can get a good look at him. he cranes up to you, blinking at you sleepily, but you can tell he wants more. he won’t rest until he has more to fill his cup.

he tries to lean in for a kiss but you stop him with your hands on his chest, placing him down with a chuckle, “gyu-yah... are you not tired?”

he nods lightly, “i am,” you’re already trying to move off him but he stills you with his hand now hooking around your waist, keeping you on him, “but i wanna feel you again. wanna be close to you.”

you instinctively lean down to rest your forehead on his, hearing his sigh of relief when you’re near him.

“but if you’re tired, we can wash up and head to bed,” his hand moves to hold the side of your face, and he feels his heart skipping a beat when your eyes gaze into his with a small smile itching at your lips, “i wanna feel you too.”

he grins, sitting up a little, “one more?”

you nod, giving in to him, “one more.”

the rhythm begins and beomgyu kisses you. slowly, tenderly, this one’s more mellow than before, more drawn out, more emotional as he sits you up along with him. you follow his motion, his pace, as he moves you to sit on his lap and your legs fold by his side as you rise up and he pumps himself a couple of times with your hand lapping over his.

your other hand rakes through his hair, shifting closer towards his scalp and he groans when you lightly tug on his strands. the jolts from his head sends the tingles down his spine and you feel him hardening between your fingers, his fingers, and then he gives you a couple of nods to rise your hips up to slowly start sinking down on him.

you hide your face in his neck, whining quietly at the stretch that deliciously fills you up. your hands clasp behind his neck, finding an anchor to hold on to and beomgyu’s got you by the waist, groaning softly when you’re fully seated on him as you welcome him into your heat. he starts peppering the side of your face with kisses, down to your neck where he makes you squirm on him as you adjust to the feeling of having him inside you again.

then, the pace starts to quicken as he instinctively rolls his hips and you feel him moving in you. it’s a domino effect of having you return the gesture, hips grinding down on him and him continuously going back and forth. hitting the spots that makes the colours burn in your eyes, but getting lost in beomgyu’s eyes when he gets you to look at me, look at me when i fuck you like this.

and you comply. shyly, then allowing him to occasionally muffle your whines when it’s starting to f-feels good, gyu–so good. his breathing starts to get heavy when he feels the same as you do, tilting his head forward until it meets yours. his hands grip tighter on your waist, almost digging into the flesh as he rocks you over his cock, harder, deeper, until the sounds you make nearly pitch up an octave with your head falling backwards and away from him.

he springs forward and pushes you back onto the bed, plunging deeper at the force and change of position. you wince and clutch onto him, clenching him tight and he groans, finding his footing with a hand on your waist, the other reaching up to hold the side of your neck as your arms loosely hug his neck and your legs naturally wrap around his waist.

his thrusts grow powerful with each slap of his thighs hitting your skin, his cock plunging out and back in; all the way home that it makes your back arch towards him. he pins you down, forehead meeting yours again, lips brushing over yours as the addictive build up starts to form in your belly; unravelling through each stroke that goes in, every roll of his hips.

he squeezes the side of your neck, and you force your eyes open to meet with his lustful gaze; that washes away to reveal the admiration he has for you, how hopelessly in love he was with you, and it falls from his lips with a soft i love you, i love you, love you, baby, so much. you feel the tears forming in your eyes, and the sight alone is what makes him start to get emotional; quickening his pace with sharp and deep thrusts.

i love you, so so much.

he kisses you, and it’s messy. it’s sloppy but he wants to kiss you, wants to taste you in the midst of havoc happening; the chase for one more high, wanting to please you, pleasure you, feel you come undone with him deep in you one more time. lucky to have you, lucky to be in you. feel so good, gonna come.

you fervently kiss him back, your fingers lightly pulling on a couple of strands of hair you can manage from the pleasure overtaking your body; eyelids growing heavy but you force them to stay open. to lock your eyes on him. watch him as he feels good; as he reaches–come with me, come now, baby–his mouth gawks open at his cock pulsing in you with the following thrusts, with your walls clenching on him erratically as you quiver and come undone for the third time. his hips stutter as he starts to spill inside you, warm ropes of his release filling your insides as he slowly starts to stop, riding out your highs quietly.

the heavy breathing fills the room as he presses his chest down on yours, head over your shoulder as he lies down for a moment. his body jolts a little as he relaxes, and you carefully run your fingers through his hair and start to play with the strands, one of the things he’s told you he loves whenever. as you two bask in the moment of post-bliss, you feel him pulling out and–”fuck, you look so hot like this.”

you find the strength to open your eyes, past your half-lidded eyes to see beomgyu sit on his heels and admire your legs spread out, fucked out, his come leaking out of you. you can tell what he’s about to do when he threatens to crawl down, tongue darting out but you stop him by sitting up with your thighs closed, “this time i will actually crush your skull with my thighs, gyu.”

he laughs and shakes his head, hands on your kneecaps as he bends forward, “ah, i’d die happy.”

you scoff a laugh and roll your eyes, even with the way he’s wiggling his brows at you. just as you try to nudge him by the shoulder, he grabs onto your hand and kisses your knuckles, smiling against your skin after. as the moonlight starts to fade into the night and it grows darker than before with the city lights turning off one by one, you’re about to–”hey, c’mere, we have to wash up first.”

you whine and refuse to move, stubbornly curling up on the bed as you shake your head, “’m too tired, don’t wanna move,” you close your eyes and turn away from him, “it’s all your fault.”

“my fault?” he has a hand on his chest, scoffing at you. then you feel a light smack to your bum, “i had to do something so you can’t leave.”

you use your hands to cover your ears and childishly remain on the bed, to which beomgyu sighs and kisses the side of your head, “okay, okay. wait for me.” you don’t remember if you respond, because you’re a goner the second beomgyu allows you to close your eyes.

he returns to the bed to see that you’re already dozing off as you curl up into a fetal position. he tries not to make any sounds that could wake you up but his heart just feels... full. so full. the kind of happy he hasn’t felt in a while. sure, it’s been a rollercoaster of emotions throughout the whole day but it’s... it’s in the quiet moments that beomgyu truly remembers feeling at ease with you. 

safe and collected. at ease and being able to embrace himself.

he carefully wipes you down and cleans you up with a wet cloth, rinsing it a few times and wiping you a few more times after that. when he’s done that, he quietly tries to change the sheets from one side, rolling you over and doing the other; all while you’re still asleep (don’t worry, it astonishes him as much as it does yourself).

he manages to dress you up in one of his hoodies, and slipping on a pair of your panties from his drawer (don’t ask), and he watches as you purr in delight when he puts the blanket over you. then it’s his turn to take a quick rinse in the shower and when he’s done patting himself dry, he slips on a pair of boxers and a white tank before he joins you in bed.

almost naturally, as he dips down on the bed, you start to move towards him that he chuckles softly at the sight of you. he lightly lifts your head up so you can lay on his arm and he curls it to pull you close as you press your face to his chest, snuggling against him with your hands between your bodies. he tugs the blanket up with his free hand, covering you and him in the process. he continues to gaze at you as you sleep peacefully, his hand stroking the side of your head as you slept and soon, his eyes grow heavy with each time his hand meets the top of your head, down to the side, and all over again.

his eyes flutter shut and soon, beomgyu succumbs to sleep, hopeful that in some way, some how, he’ll see you in his dreams, too.

((morning comes, and it’s quiet. somehow, the boys had given up in trying to wake you and beomgyu up, deciding to grab breakfast while some remained at home. the soft and muffled chit chat comes from the living room; probably taehyun and kai, or was that soobin? ah, it doesn’t matter.

beomgyu comes to when the sunlight hits his eyes and he groans, stretching his body a little. he notices you two have untangled from one another in the middle of the night, and he rolls closer so he can look at you as you start to wake up, a soft whine leaving your lips as you search for warmth and he grins when you curl up against him, eyes peeling open.

you tilt your chin and meet his gaze, but you’re still tired so your eyes close after that.

“how do you feel?” he asks, so gentle, so loving with his hand pushing your hair back, then his hand rests against your cheek. you lean into his touch, smiling a little, “tired...”

“you just woke up,” he chuckles, welcoming you in when you scoot closer towards him, until you have your cheek to his chest. you ignore him and resort to putting your arms around him to hug him loosely, relishing in his warmth as your legs tangle under the blanket.

“what do you wanna do today?” he murmurs into your ear as he kisses the side of your head, turning his body to face you properly as he plays with your hair.

“just wanna be with you. doesn’t matter,” you answer softly, and beomgyu nods, “okay.”

even with the havoc that soon transpires from the dorm room takes over, with seemingly taehyun and kai screaming at the television because they’re playing mario kart, to yeonjun yelling at them to keep it down but then joining them with soobin trying to pull the leader card for some peace and quiet, it all doesn’t matter. 

beomgyu gazes down to you in his arms, and he smiles when you peek up and your eyes meet. both your eyes soften at the sight of one another, and he knows, you know. that the days ahead, coming to separation won’t be easy. it’ll be hard, and there will be difficult days... but with the way you’re looking at him like this, hand slowly reaching up to cup his face, stroking the under of his eye tenderly, his eyes flutter shut and he leans into your touch. relishing the way your finger pads his skin; gentle, tender, loving.

you sigh when he leans down to rest his forehead on yours, slipping your hand from his face but this time, he has his hand up to pillow his palm to the side of your face, gently rubbing circles against your temple. your eyes close, the same time beomgyu’s open to see you at ease, peaceful, calm.

he lifts his head up and presses a kiss to your forehead. that grants you to snuggle closer to him and then he feels your lips pressing to his clothed chest. he chuckles and wraps his arms around you, cocooning you in and being as close to you as possible for however long he can.

in beomgyu’s arms, everything seems to be okay. even if in a couple of days he won’t be here anymore, in some way, since yesterday, your relationship with him has changed. for the better, towards growth, and leaning towards learning something new about each other. having more patience, being more understanding, and learning to trust each other as you go through this together.))

//

(((beomgyu’s freshened up for the day and he enters his bedroom to see that you’ve managed to sit up with your feet on the floor, but when you look up to him, there’s this frown on your face that he finds adorable.

“what’s with that look?” he snorts, stepping in and closing the door behind him. he tosses his towel onto the rack as he stands in front of you, more so when you reach for his hands, “i... i can’t walk on my own. help me get to the bathroom.”

his eyes widen at you with his head bobbing backwards, “what?”

“don’t what me, help me.” you whine a little, but even as you try to shake your body as a way to convince him, it makes you wince from the soreness between your legs. he tries not to look proud (even though you know for a fucking chance he is) as he relents with a okay, come here you big baby.

as you emerge from the bedroom with beomgyu holding you up with an arm around your waist, the other keeping your arm around his shoulder as he walks you slowly to the bathroom, the boys seem to quiet down when kai innocently asks: “yo, are you okay? you were fine yesterday, what happened?”

yeonjun is the first to grow wide-eyed, and immediately pushes kai’s head to–”just ignore it, kai-yah. ignore it and never ask why again.” then yeonjun snaps his head to glare at beomgyu who pokes his tongue at him, “you filthy monsters!”)))

[we-all-have-magic-inside-us]

Hi, this is very random but I'm actually writing a dissertation on Harry Potter Fanfiction and I'm looking for the 'big' fics, i.e. fics that lots of people in the fandom read - the most popular/famous ones that might even have their own sub-fandom (All The Young Dudes for example). Do you know of any Drarry ones like this? Thanks in advance!

What a wonderful topic for a dissertation @realistic-but-optimistic - I would LOVE to read it if you ever publish/want to share. And I definitely have some recs for fics that have their own mini fandom and/or are ‘The Drarry Classics’

What We Pretend We Can't See by @gyzym [131k words]

Seven years out from the war, Harry learns the hard truth of old history: it’s never quite as far behind you as you thought

This is THE fandom classic almost everyone has read and talks about. It features a redeemed, slightly obsessive, charming Draco. Grimmauld Place plays a huge role in the fic and Ron/Hermione are wonderful. Overall 10/10.

Running on Air by @tinyhistory [75k]

Draco Malfoy has been missing for three years. Harry is assigned the cold case and finds himself slowly falling in love with the memories he collects.

I genuinely do not know if any fic rec can do justice to this masterpiece. It’s so beautiful and poignant and somehow nostalgic. The language, the plot, the pining and the mystery are all breathtaking. You have to read this one yourself to believe me. This is definitely a major fandom classic.

Tea and No Sympathy [70k] by who_la_hoop

It's Potter's fault, of course, that Draco finds himself trapped in the same twenty-four-hour period, repeating itself over and over again. It's been nearly a year since the unpleasant business at Hogwarts, and Draco's getting on with his life quite nicely, thank you, until Harry sodding Potter steps in and ruins it all, just like always. At first, though, the time loop seems liberating. For the first time in his life, he can do anything, say anything, be anything, without consequence. But the more Draco repeats the day, the more he realises the uncomfortable truth: he's falling head over heels for the speccy git. And suddenly, the time loop feels like a trap. For how can he ever get Harry to love him back when time is, quite literally, against him?

If you like Groundhog Day style fics, this is the winner! It has over 32k kudos on AO3 which is INSANE! It’s super well written and keeps you hooked until the very end. And it’s not just this one, every fic by this author is a classic in its own right. Especially ‘written on the heart.’

Right Hand Red [73k] by @lqtraintracks​

Harry felt Malfoy's breath on his lips as they came together over the bottle, hands firmly planted on the floor as though they each needed their familiar soil, refusing to cross into enemy territory.

Except that Malfoy no longer felt like his enemy.

Malfoy felt inevitable.

No rec list can be complete without an eighth year fic. The fandom is FULL of eighth year fics and they’re perfect for anyone craving a Harry Potter continuation but with Drarry. This is one of my absolute favourite ones. It features a lot of party games and it’s really nice to see Harry and Draco have a chance at a normal school year for once, something they’ve been robbed of for so many years. There’s a lot of pining and healing in this one and I felt all the feels when I read it. 

Away Childish Things [151k] by @letteredlettered

Harry gets de-aged. Malfoy has to help him.

This one. This one. THERE ARE NO WORDS BUT I WILL VALIANTLY ATTEMPT. I love it. It explores Harry’s childhood in a way very few fics have managed to and it really really tugs at the heartstrings. It’s gorgeously written and evokes so many emotions. Please read this one.

Stop All the Clocks (This Is the Last Time I’m Leaving Without You) [44k] by @firethesound

Living with Draco was difficult; living without him is unbearable. But if there’s one thing Harry learned from the war, it’s that even when one life ends, the rest of the world goes right on living.

Full disclosure- I haven’t read this and I don’t know if I ever can. It features MCD (main character death) and I really struggle with reading fics that don’t have a happy ending. Having said that, it is a fandom classic and everyone who has read it, RAVES about it. They say it’s gorgeous and beautiful and devastating. What I can confirm is that firethesound is an amazing author and I have read several other fics by them which could also be considered fandom classics. Especially ‘All Our Secrets Laid Bare’ which is the ultimate Auror partners fic and ‘A Convenient Impracticality’ which is the ultimate fake dating/friends-with-benefits fic. 

Dwelling [83k] by aideomai

Curses, James and Lily Potter ride again, several Ministry balls, a teenage Summer of Love, a grim young adult dystopian winter, a few different Draco Malfoys, secrets and the problems re: not having any, alternate lives, impossible lives, real lives, allusions to Dirty Dancing, and just because it's not called the Mirror of Erised doesn't mean you shouldn't know better.

Oh my goodness, this fic ruined me. In the best possible way. If you want a glimpse into how Harry’s life could have been if his parents had been alive and if Harry and Draco had been friends from the start, this is the one. There's a huge twist which makes the fic EVEN better. I don’t want to spoil too much but this one is worth a read. Another fic by the same author, ‘Far From The Tree’ is also gorgeous. It’s a newer fic so I wouldn’t say it’s a classic yet but the plot is SO unique. It features Harry’s grown up kids coming back into the past and how that could affect Harry/Draco’s relationship. All the characters are super well written and it’s one of my personal favourites!

Other notes:

I made a Drarry rec list when I first got into the fandom. I would say almost all the fics on this list are also classics/very well liked. 

Another great way to find classics are through this link. They are Drarry fics on Ao3 (30k+ words) sorted by the number of kudos they’ve received. I would say all fics on the first five pages can be considered classics. 

Here are three other SUPER adored authors in the Ao3 fandom: Bixgirl, Saras_Girl and GallaPlacidia

All works by Bix and Saras_Girl are considered classics. GallaPlacidia started writing for the fandom only a couple of years back but she has such a knack for writing both these boys, it’s absolutely insane. I’m 100% confident her fics will be considered classics in a few years! Especially ‘The Bucket List’ and ‘Ship of Theseus.’

Enjoy and hope this helps!!

[missmentelle]

Why Smart People Believe Stupid Things

If you’ve been paying attention for the last couple of years, you might have noticed that the world has a bit of a misinformation problem. 

The problem isn’t just with the recent election conspiracies, either. The last couple of years has brought us the rise (and occasionally fall) of misinformation-based movements like:

Sandy Hook conspiracies

Gamergate

Pizzagate

The MRA/incel/MGTOW movements

anti-vaxxers

flat-earthers

the birther movement

the Illuminati 

climate change denial

Spygate

Holocaust denial 

COVID-19 denial 

5G panic 

QAnon 

But why do people believe this stuff?

It would be easy - too easy - to say that people fall for this stuff because they’re stupid. We all want to believe that smart people like us are immune from being taken in by deranged conspiracies. But it’s just not that simple. People from all walks of life are going down these rabbit holes - people with degrees and professional careers and rich lives have fallen for these theories, leaving their loved ones baffled. Decades-long relationships have splintered this year, as the number of people flocking to these conspiracies out of nowhere reaches a fever pitch. 

So why do smart people start believing some incredibly stupid things? It’s because:

Our brains are built to identify patterns. 

Our brains fucking love puzzles and patterns. This is a well-known phenomenon called apophenia, and at one point, it was probably helpful for our survival - the prehistoric human who noticed patterns in things like animal migration, plant life cycles and the movement of the stars was probably a lot more likely to survive than the human who couldn’t figure out how to use natural clues to navigate or find food. 

The problem, though, is that we can’t really turn this off. Even when we’re presented with completely random data, we’ll see patterns. We see patterns in everything, even when there’s no pattern there. This is why people see Jesus in a burnt piece of toast or get superstitious about hockey playoffs or insist on always playing at a certain slot machine - our brains look for patterns in the constant barrage of random information in our daily lives, and insist that those patterns are really there, even when they’re completely imagined. 

A lot of conspiracy theories have their roots in people making connections between things that aren’t really connected. The belief that “vaccines cause autism” was bolstered by the fact that the first recognizable symptoms of autism happen to appear at roughly the same time that children receive one of their rounds of childhood immunizations - the two things are completely unconnected, but our brains have a hard time letting go of the pattern they see there. Likewise, many people were quick to latch on to the fact that early maps of COVID infections were extremely similar to maps of 5G coverage -  the fact that there’s a reasonable explanation for this (major cities are more likely to have both high COVID cases AND 5G networks) doesn’t change the fact that our brains just really, really want to see a connection there. 

Our brains love proportionality. 

Specifically, our brains like effects to be directly proportional to their causes - in other words, we like it when big events have big causes, and small causes only lead to small events. It’s uncomfortable for us when the reverse is true. And so anytime we feel like a “big” event (celebrity death, global pandemic, your precious child is diagnosed with autism) has a small or unsatisfying cause (car accident, pandemics just sort of happen every few decades, people just get autism sometimes), we sometimes feel the need to start looking around for the bigger, more sinister, “true” cause of that event. 

Consider, for instance, the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II. In 1981, Pope John Paul II was shot four times by a Turkish member of a known Italian paramilitary secret society who’d recently escaped from prison - on the surface, it seems like the sort of thing conspiracy theorists salivate over, seeing how it was an actual multinational conspiracy. But they never had much interest in the assassination attempt. Why? Because the Pope didn’t die. He recovered from his injuries and went right back to Pope-ing. The event didn’t have a serious outcome, and so people are content with the idea that one extremist carried it out. The death of Princess Diana, however, has been fertile ground for conspiracy theories; even though a woman dying in a car accident is less weird than a man being shot four times by a paid political assassin, her death has attracted more conspiracy theories because it had a bigger outcome. A princess dying in a car accident doesn’t feel big enough. It’s unsatisfying. We want such a monumentous moment in history to have a bigger, more interesting cause. 

These theories prey on pre-existing fear and anger. 

Are you a terrified new parent who wants the best for their child and feels anxious about having them injected with a substance you don’t totally understand? Congrats, you’re a prime target for the anti-vaccine movement. Are you a young white male who doesn’t like seeing more and more games aimed at women and minorities, and is worried that “your” gaming culture is being stolen from you? You might have been very interested in something called Gamergate. Are you a right-wing white person who worries that “your” country and way of life is being stolen by immigrants, non-Christians and coastal liberals? You’re going to love the “all left-wingers are Satantic pedo baby-eaters” messaging of QAnon. 

Misinformation and conspiracy theories are often aimed strategically at the anxieties and fears that people are already experiencing. No one likes being told that their fears are insane or irrational; it’s not hard to see why people gravitate towards communities that say “yes, you were right all along, and everyone who told you that you were nuts to be worried about this is just a dumb sheep. We believe you, and we have evidence that you were right along, right here.” Fear is a powerful motivator, and you can make people believe and do some pretty extreme things if you just keep telling them “yes, that thing you’re afraid of is true, but also it’s way worse than you could have ever imagined.”

Real information is often complicated, hard to understand, and inherently unsatisfying. 

The information that comes from the scientific community is often very frustrating for a layperson; we want science to have hard-and-fast answers, but it doesn’t. The closest you get to a straight answer is often “it depends” or “we don’t know, but we think X might be likely”. Understanding the results of a scientific study with any confidence requires knowing about sampling practices, error types, effect sizes, confidence intervals and publishing biases. Even asking a simple question like “is X bad for my child” will usually get you a complicated, uncertain answer - in most cases, it really just depends. Not understanding complex topics makes people afraid - it makes it hard to trust that they’re being given the right information, and that they’re making the right choices. 

Conspiracy theories and misinformation, on the other hand, are often simple, and they are certain. Vaccines bad. Natural things good. 5G bad. Organic food good. The reason girls won’t date you isn’t a complex combination of your social skills, hygiene, appearance, projected values, personal circumstances, degree of extroversion, luck and life phase - girls won’t date you because feminism is bad, and if we got rid of feminism you’d have a girlfriend. The reason Donald Trump was an unpopular president wasn’t a complex combination of his public bigotry, lack of decorum, lack of qualifications, open incompetence, nepotism, corruption, loss of soft power, refusal to uphold the basic responsibilities of his position or his constant lying - they hated him because he was fighting a secret sex cult and they’re all in it. 

Instead of making you feel stupid because you’re overwhelmed with complex information, expert opinions and uncertain advice, conspiracy theories make you feel smart - smarter, in fact, than everyone who doesn’t believe in them. And that’s a powerful thing for people living in a credential-heavy world. 

Many conspiracy theories are unfalsifiable. 

It is very difficult to prove a negative. If I tell you, for instance, that there’s no such thing as a purple swan, it would be very difficult for me to actually prove that to you - I could spend the rest of my life photographing swans and looking for swans and talking to people who know a lot about swans, and yet the slim possibility would still exist that there was a purple swan out there somewhere that I just hadn’t found yet. That’s why, in most circumstances, the burden of proof lies with the person making the extraordinary claim - if you tell me that purple swans exist, we should continue to assume that they don’t until you actually produce a purple swan. 

Conspiracy theories, however, are built so that it’s nearly impossible to “prove” them wrong. Is there any proof that the world’s top-ranking politicians and celebrities are all in a giant child sex trafficking cult? No. But can you prove that they aren’t in a child sex-trafficking cult? No, not really. Even if I, again, spent the rest of my life investigating celebrities and following celebrities and talking to people who know celebrities, I still couldn’t definitely prove that this cult doesn’t exist - there’s always a chance that the specific celebrities I’ve investigated just aren’t in the cult (but other ones are!) or that they’re hiding evidence of the cult even better than we think. Lack of evidence for a conspiracy theory is always treated as more evidence for the theory - we can’t find anything because this goes even higher up than we think! They’re even more sophisticated at hiding this than we thought! People deeply entrenched in these theories don’t even realize that they are stuck in a circular loop where everything seems to prove their theory right - they just see a mountain of “evidence” for their side. 

Our brains are very attached to information that we “learned” by ourselves.

Learning accurate information is not a particularly interactive or exciting experience. An expert or reliable source just presents the information to you in its entirety, you read or watch the information, and that’s the end of it. You can look for more information or look for clarification of something, but it’s a one-way street - the information is just laid out for you, you take what you need, end of story. 

Conspiracy theories, on the other hand, almost never show their hand all at once. They drop little breadcrumbs of information that slowly lead you where they want you to go. This is why conspiracy theorists are forever telling you to “do your research” - they know that if they tell you everything at once, you won’t believe them. Instead, they want you to indoctrinate yourself slowly over time, by taking the little hints they give you and running off to find or invent evidence that matches that clue. If I tell you that celebrities often wear symbols that identify them as part of a cult and that you should “do your research” about it, you can absolutely find evidence that substantiates my claim - there are literally millions of photos of celebrities out there, and anyone who looks hard enough is guaranteed to find common shapes, poses and themes that might just mean something (they don’t - eyes and triangles are incredibly common design elements, and if I took enough pictures of you, I could also “prove” that you also clearly display symbols that signal you’re in the cult). 

The fact that you “found” the evidence on your own, however, makes it more meaningful to you. We trust ourselves, and we trust that the patterns we uncover by ourselves are true. It doesn’t feel like you’re being fed misinformation - it feels like you’ve discovered an important truth that “they” didn’t want you to find, and you’ll hang onto that for dear life. 

Older people have not learned to be media-literate in a digital world. 

Fifty years ago, not just anyone could access popular media. All of this stuff had a huge barrier to entry - if you wanted to be on TV or be in the papers or have a radio show, you had to be a professional affiliated with a major media brand. Consumers didn’t have easy access to niche communities or alternative information - your sources of information were basically your local paper, the nightly news, and your morning radio show, and they all more or less agreed on the same set of facts. For decades, if it looked official and it appeared in print, you could probably trust that it was true. 

Of course, we live in a very different world today - today, any asshole can accumulate an audience of millions, even if they have no credentials and nothing they say is actually true (like “The Food Babe”, a blogger with no credentials in medicine, nutrition, health sciences, biology or chemistry who peddles health misinformation to the 3 million people who visit her blog every month). It’s very tough for older people (and some younger people) to get their heads around the fact that it’s very easy to create an “official-looking” news source, and that they can’t necessarily trust everything they find on the internet. When you combine that with a tendency toward “clickbait headlines” that often misrepresent the information in the article, you have a generation struggling to determine who they can trust in a media landscape that doesn’t at all resemble the media landscape they once knew. 

These beliefs become a part of someone’s identity. 

A person doesn’t tell you that they believe in anti-vaxx information - they tell you that they ARE an anti-vaxxer. Likewise, people will tell you that they ARE a flat-earther, a birther, or a Gamergater. By design, these beliefs are not meant to be something you have a casual relationship with, like your opinion of pizza toppings or how much you trust local weather forecasts - they are meant to form a core part of your identity. 

And once something becomes a core part of your identity, trying to make you stop believing it becomes almost impossible. Once we’ve formed an initial impression of something, facts just don’t change our minds. If you identify as an antivaxxer and I present evidence that disproves your beliefs, in your mind, I’m not correcting inaccurate information - I am launching a very personal attack against a core part of who you are. In fact, the more evidence I present, the more you will burrow down into your antivaxx beliefs, more confident than ever that you are right. Admitting that you are wrong about something that is important to you is painful, and your brain would prefer to simply deflect conflicting information rather than subject you to that pain.

We can see this at work with something called the confirmation bias. Simply put, once we believe something, our brains hold on to all evidence that that belief is true, and ignore evidence that it’s false. If I show you 100 articles that disprove your pet theory and 3 articles that confirm it, you’ll cling to those 3 articles and forget about the rest. Even if I show you nothing but articles that disprove your theory, you’ll likely go through them and pick out any ambiguous or conflicting information as evidence for “your side”, even if the conclusion of the article shows that you are wrong - our brains simply care about feeling right more than they care about what is actually true.  

There is a strong community aspect to these theories. 

There is no one quite as supportive or as understanding as a conspiracy theorist - provided, of course, that you believe in the same conspiracy theories that they do. People who start looking into these conspiracy theories are told that they aren’t crazy, and that their fears are totally valid. They’re told that the people in their lives who doubted them were just brainwashed sheep, but that they’ve finally found a community of people who get where they’re coming from. Whenever they report back to the group with the “evidence” they’ve found or the new elaborations on the conspiracy theory that they’ve been thinking of (“what if it’s even worse than we thought??”), they are given praise for their valuable contributions. These conspiracy groups often become important parts of people’s social networks - they can spend hours every day talking with like-minded people from these communities and sharing their ideas. 

Of course, the flipside of this is that anyone who starts to doubt or move away from the conspiracy immediately loses that community and social support. People who have broken away from antivaxx and QAnon often say that the hardest part of leaving was losing the community and friendships they’d built - not necessarily giving up on the theory itself. Many people are rejected by their real-life friends and family once they start to get entrenched in conspiracy theories; the friendships they build online in the course of researching these theories often become the only social supports they have left, and losing those supports means having no one to turn to at all. This is by design - the threat of losing your community has kept people trapped in abusive religious sects and cults for as long as those things have existed. 

[improbably-luminescent]

Oh I have SO MANY THOUGHTS about that package, and about Danny accidentally losing Jason’s number during the exact wrong handful of weeks. About how feeling like he’d lost his friend, too, and having no idea why, would have made everything worse for Jason at that time.

I’m thinking about Danny reading about Jason’s death in the news, while knowing that he was Robin, and having some inkling what actually happened and what kind of fight might have brought his friend to an exploding warehouse halfway around the world. About the knowledge of his friend’s death hanging over Danny as he came to terms with his own. About Danny thinking specifically of Jason as he crafted his Phantom persona into a quick, quippy teen hero.

Having some thoughts about Danny always keeping an eye out for the ghost of his childhood friend, in and out of the Ghost Zone. About Danny always keeping a stash of candy on hand, just hoping he might need it again some day. About Danny getting to know and explore the Zone better and better, and how it gets less and less likely that Jason is around and they haven’t met again yet. I’m imagining the hope of seeing his friend fading further and further into the realm of impossible dreams, over time, but Danny still carrying sweets around constantly, anyway, because by now it’s a habit. And a bit of a tribute, too.

Thinking about Jason finally reconciling with the batfamily enough to visit his old room, and finding this old package dated just weeks before he left. About Jason pulling out this brittle, expired old pack of skittles and getting hit by just a wave of memories of the kid who moved away when they were 12, and who he realizes he had, until now, counted among the people who weren’t there for him a couple years later. The candies are a bit hardened and faded with age by now, but he eats them anyway as he reads the letter. He reads what little bit his 14 year old friend had written about the lab accident that fried his phone, and about the “weird stuff happening since then. I’ll tell you more when you call.”

Obviously, Jason hadn’t called.

I’m thinking about Jason looking Danny up, and finding that Daniel Fenton disappeared a year or two ago, just after graduating high school. About Jason wondering how things might have been different for them both if he’d gotten this package sooner; if they’d stayed in touch; if he’d been able to talk to Danny before running off; if Danny had had someone else outside that tiny town in Illinois to talk to about what definitely sounds like a meta power activation story if Jason’s ever heard one.

So Jason adds Danny Fenton to both his list of missing persons cases, and his list of Reasons to Brood, but beyond that there’s not much he can do but experience Feelings about it. Even if Danny didn’t seem to have just completely disappeared from this dimension, Jason’s not sure he’d want to meet again anyway.

And THEN, Danny comes to Gotham to help Lady Gotham with some problem, and Jason and Danny both ping each others’ “another dead guy” radars. They proceed to play an insane game of rooftop tag/cat-and-mouse for a full couple of hours that evening, until Danny finally decides to just ghost up behind Jason and go “boo”. Just to try and get The Red Hood to startle.

He succeeded.

But the thing is, Danny’s only ever known one person besides Mr. Lancer who swears in literary references. The helmet may have a voice modulator, but that’s a pretty distinctive turn of phrase. So, instead of cackling over the way he made Hood jump almost a foot in the air, Phantom just hovers there, staring a moment before muttering, “Jason?”

This is, of course, when Jason actually gets a good look at Phantom’s face. No bat is gonna be as easily fooled by a simple color change as Amity was. Jason’s “Danny?” is confirmation enough, in itself, that Danny is immediately reaching into his impossible pocket space. Jason is just bracing for… something, when he gets a family sized pack of skittles chucked directly at his chest.

“Asshole,” Danny growls at him, trying desperately to maintain a glare through the grin that’s slowly overtaking his face. “You will be buying the Pop Tarts for this, boy menace, it’s your turn.”

DPXDC prompt: Dead on main. No trick only treat.

~~Сhildhood friends and deals~~

The Justice League has to summon a ghost from another dimension to address the threat. They don’t know what price the Ghost King will take but there’s little time to bargain. Another spirit threatening them has already seized all the computers on their base. John doesn’t know what else to offer. A summoned ghost starts to look bored. Gold, jewelry? A favor from a member of the League? Like the Ruler of All Dead needs it. No one dares to make another offer, and the King is in no hurry to set out his demands. Maybe try to pull off a soul sale scam?

Suddenly, Red Hood breaks into the hall, walks up to Phantom and shakes his shoulder vigorously. Red Hood: You, get Technus out of here right now. I need access to the files and fast. Phantom: That’s rude, dude. Where did you grow up? in the cave? No "hello, no how are you, Danny", really? Red Hood: I’ll pay the usual price. Phantom: Deal.

What is the price? John sees Batman and gets in his way. The usual price, his guy said. Means Jay was already out of the deal alive and well. This hyperprotective bat would only piss off the ruler if he interfered.

The King quickly deals with his subordinate using a thermos and remains to watch working Hood. Red Hood: What do you want? I’m busy. Danny: You and I have a contract~ Red Hood: All right, all right. Jay throws M&Ms right in the face of the ghost. But king doesn’t look angry. He opens the package and starts sorting the candies by color. Phantom quickly eats up all the green ones and passes the red ones to Hood. Jason takes them without any questions.

Strange. John has never seen a summoned creature share its reward with a human. And the son of a bat looks too comfortable with it. Wait, since when do super-powered beings think that candy is a decent wage?John makes one of the most likely deductions using his experience. Constantine: Batsy, how long has your son been sleeping with the King of Ghosts? Batman: He…what?!

~~~~~~~

Dick *knocking at the door*: Little Wing, you hate ectoplasm and everything what is neon green, so why? He’s dangerous! Jason who turned on the music to not listen to his crazy family: ~He’s poison but tasty~

Dick: NoOOoo

~~~~~~

Jason: And now everyone thinks that I sold my virginity to you for a bargain or something, because interdimensional creatures like you aren’t supposed to help for nothing. Like you’re playing favorites. I’m gonna fucking kill John. Danny: Well, I wouldn’t say no to that. Jason: What? Danny: I mean, to k-kill John, yeah. How dare he.. Jason: Omg, you’re still so terrible liar, Fenton.

Danny: Sorry :(

Jason: No. Say it again.

~~~~Twelve years ago~~~~ Maddie wasn’t thrilled to learn that Danny was trying to make friends with Todd’s son. Their neighbor was terrible. And his son was definitely a street rat and probably a juvenile delinquent. Maddie: Danny, honey, there’s got to be a reason this boy is talking to you. Even kids from the crime alley are always looking for a bargain they can make or a fool they can fool. Danny: But Jason is so cool! He knows so much about books and alleys and.. Maddie: But you don’t want to be a fool, do you? Danny: Okay, Mom, I get it.

So, if Danny wants a cool friend, he’s got to offer a bargain.

He didn’t have a lot of pocket money for every month but Jason needed it more anyway. And his lunch that Jack was picking for him was big enough for two and only bitten on Tuesdays. Nice. Jason: Do I understand correctly? You will pay me and give me food, and I, what? Protect you from bullies? Danny: No! I’m not weak, I don’t need to be protected. Just..maybe we could sit together at lunch and walk each other home sometimes? Jason: Nay Danny: But why? You want something else? Jason: Money’s fine but your homemade food is…strange. Danny: I can bring sweets if you want. Jason: Deal. 3 pop tarts for a joint lunch, a party size bag of M&Ms if you waste my time out of school.

~~~~

Sometimes they share sweets when they hang out but more often Jayson takes them home to save in case his parents have money problems. Sweets have a long shelf life stored and he may not be afraid to poison himself. Over time, candy becomes their currency and a secret language for all occasions. Need help without unnecessary questions? M&Ms. Problems with learning? Skittles. The question is about family? Snickers. There will be a serious conversation? Pop Tarts.

Jason: One snickers and a pack of gum. Danny: Yeah, Jason? What do you want? Jason: My mom wants to meet my friend. Come to lunch on Sunday. Danny: Okay, you managed to pay for my expensive services. Jason:…and you just lost the gum from the deal.

~~~~~~

Jason threw a package at Danny: Three pop tarts. We need to talk. Danny: All right? Jason: Why are you avoiding me all week?! Danny: Well, it’s just..you’re Wayne now. Jason. Still Todd. And what about that? Danny: You can hang out with the cooler guys now, I didn’t want to embarrass you. Jason: Bullshit! I’m still the street rat, and you’re trying to avoid our contract. me. And I don’t even need money from you anymore. What the hell? I thought you are my friend. Danny: And I am!

~~~~~~

Robin: What’s a schoolboy doing in an alley at night? Danny: Um, I…nothing? Don’t tell my parents, Mr. Robin sir. Robin: It will cost you so many Chunky Bars, you have no idea. Danny:...Jason? Jason: N-no. Danny: Damn yes. What are you doing in green shorts on the street at night?! Jason: Cosplay. Danny: Oh yeah? Then I’m just your hallucination. Don’t hesitate to ghost me. I’m going home, Disgrace In Pixie Boots, bye. Jason: fu%&c$#u

[raccoonhearteyes]

Part I  | Part II  | Part III

July 16th 2018. 

Lexa knows how her curse works. It has been long enough that she knows no one will remember her. But every so often she’ll meet someone that makes her think Maybe this time will be different. It never is, but that didn’t stop her from waiting at Noodles on 28th for an hour, lighting up every time she saw a flash of blonde hair, thinking Maybe, just maybe, she remembers. 

Lexa tries to shove the disappointment down. Tries to will the stinging in her eyes to disappear. Tries to bite the lip that quivers before anyone sees. 

She’s about to walk away when she hears a voice say “Lexa,” and for a brief moment she thinks it might be Clarke. But the silky smoothness of the voice isn’t quite right. And the patronizing lilt of her name sends shivers down her spine.

“You,” she says, steeling herself for an unpleasant conversation. 

“Did you forget that you will always be forgotten?” 

Lexa shoves her shoulder into his chest to make her way down the street. 

“Oh, Lexa,” he sneers, and Lexa has never hated the sound of her own name so much. She wants to rip it out of his mouth. If she can’t say it, neither can he. 

“Have you given up yet?” 

“Not today. Come claim your soul another time,” she says sternly, fists clenched by her sides, brows furrowed in anger. 

“She’ll never remember you. Why are you wasting your time hoping for it.” 

“One day with anyone else is better than eternity damned with you.” 

He smirks then dissolves into the darkness of the nearby alley.

------------------

Lexa hasn’t been able to stop thinking about Clarke in days, but as her tormenter so lovingly reminded her, she’ll never remember her. There’s no future with Clarke, but she has the present. She has an infinite number of presents

Lexa has been to her apartment. Her place of work. She can create a meeting. A small lie won’t hurt…It’s not like Clarke will remember her.

It’s been over a week since they were supposed to get dumplings on a date, so Lexa decides to make the date happen. She picks up three orders of dumplings, a six-pack of beer, and walks to Clarke’s apartment. 

Palms sweaty, heart racing, she works up the courage to knock on Clarke’s door.

No answer. 

She’s not home. Lexa holds her breath, then knocks again. 

This time, after some shuffling inside the apartment, the door swings open. Clarke’s wearing a tank top and jean shorts. Her hair is pulled into a messy bun, and her cheek is streaked in a blur of navy blue paint. She looks beautiful and Lexa is momentarily too stunned to speak. 

“Uh, hi?”

“Right, I knocked on your door. Hi. I’m Sam. I just moved in across the hall, I don't know anyone in the city, and the landlord mentioned that you were also a young professional, so I figured I'd introduce myself, offer some dumplings and beer, and maybe know one person here?” She lifts the respective dumplings and beer as she rambles, and questions how insane she must sound. This is New York City, no one is friends with their neighbors. Wow, she did not think this through. 

Clarke on the other hand, doesn’t seem too affronted and instead asks, “Are those from Noodles on 28th?” 

“Yes?” 

“I have been craving those since last week and haven’t had a chance to go. They’re my favorite.” 

I know. “Seems like fate,” Lexa offers a weak smile and lifts up the bag once more. 

Lexa watches as Clarke swings the door open wider and invites her in, “I’m Clarke. Welcome to my home” 

I know. “Nice to meet you, Clarke.” 

Clarke walks backwards through the apartment, pointing out the kitchen and bathroom. She gestures to the left to show her bedroom is thataway, and Lexa thinks back to the last time she was here, stumbling backwards with Clarke’s hands tugging at the buttons on her shirt. 

“I’m sorry about the mess. It’s usually much more organized than this, I wasn't expecting company.” 

Liar, Lexa thinks. There are just as many paintings strewn around as there were last time. Perhaps even more. There’s still an array of colorful mugs on the counter and piles of mail. Last time she was here, Clarke mentioned that her work tends to bleed from one room to the next, that she likes to rearrange the furniture often to feng shui the space to help her creative juices flow.

Lexa is left in the living room while Clarke goes to grab them some plates. She takes the time to look more closely at the paintings scattered around the apartment. 

“So you’re an artist?”

“Aspiring,” Clarke calls from the other room. “Which basically means I work full time as an executive assistant at a gallery and then try to paint in my limited free time, and yell at a blank canvas because I have been so uninspired from the burnout of working that I can’t paint anything.” 

“Frustrating day?”

“Try career. I haven’t made a sale in over a year. I can’t get where I want, and I can’t figure out why.” 

Lexa likes this about Clarke. Most people on a first meeting would answer the way they think the person wants to hear. Clarke is always incredibly honest. She’s unafraid to talk to a complete stranger as if she’s her best friend. 

“What got you into art in the first place?” 

“Aside from the paint stains and inconsistent flow of income?” Clarke jokes on her way back into the living room. She hands Lexa a plate and has a seat on the floor near the coffee table. Lexa sits next to her and they start scooping dumplings onto their plates. 

“There has to be something you still enjoy about it.”

Lexa watches as Clarke’s expression softens. “I like capturing people.”

“You do portraits?” Lexa feigns surprise. 

“Yeah. Some abstract. Some realistic. But I like being able to encapsulate someone’s essence on a canvas.”

“Who was your first portrait of?”

“My dad. It was actually not too soon after that he passed” 

Clarke’s lip quivers, and Lexa jumps to stop it, “Oh, Clarke, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay. Really. It’s been over a decade. I’ve dealt with it. I’m actually really glad he was my first series of portraits. I have so many extra memories of him from them. To me, it’s the best way to understand someone, to capture them exactly as they were in that moment. To make it unforgettable. You can’t forget someone you’ve made a portrait of. A piece of them is always with you.” 

Clarke keeps rambling, “It’s nice to remember him as he was. Before he got sick. So that part of him can’t be forgotten”

“We’re all forgotten eventually,” Lexa lets the words slip before she can think to filter them. 

“How so?” Clarke asks. 

“We see hundreds of faces a day, and never think about most of them ever again.”

“That’s why I like the intimacy of a portrait,” Clarke counters. 

“We’re all still forgotten eventually. Some just quicker than others.” Lexa’s voice breaks when she says this last sentence, and Clarke places a hand on her thigh to comfort. Lexa shovels another dumpling into her mouth to prevent herself from ruining this date and insulting everything Clarke is working on.

“Even in a museum where the portraits are preserved forever, the details of that person are forgotten, that’s true. But even a piece of them is better than being entirely forgotten.”

Lexa shrugs, the conversation hitting a bit too close to the heart. Being forgotten is her entire life. Clarke’s effort to immortalize the people she cares about seems like an unfair taunt for her to have to confront. 

“Sometimes being forgotten is a gift. My foster family won’t find me if they barely care enough to remember my name.” It’s an admission Lexa hasn’t vocalized to anyone. As much as being forgotten pains her when she meets someone kind, it has also been her one tether to safety. 

Lexa can see something shift in Clarke’s eyes, and while she didn’t think it was possible, Clarke somehow becomes even softer. It’s not pity, for once. It just seems like an understanding of hurt, and a genuine desire to show her the world isn’t all bad. 

The conversation shifts from portraits to the city itself. Clarke gives Lexa a whole list of destinations to visit, and Lexa pretends she’s never heard of them, as if she hadn’t been living there for the past twenty years. She concedes to Clarke’s insistence that the Guggenheim is the best museum in the city. 

Throughout the evening, Lexa feels Clarke shifting closer to her, becoming more tactile whenever she can find an opportunity. She’s so unbelievably soft in her gestures, picking up on Lexa’s melancholic thoughts. Lexa can’t help but be drawn right back to her, unconsciously shifting closer to her as well as they continue to talk. 

By the time the dumpling trays are empty, the two have shifted shoulder to shoulder in the sticky apartment heat. There’s a mindless buzz of the TV in the background. But Lexa barely registers any of that because right now, Clarke is looking into her eyes, and then glancing down at her lips, a constant pull towards both of them all at once, and she’s leaning in ever so slightly. 

“Is this okay?” 

“This is a bad idea,” Lexa whispers to the shrinking space between them. 

“I’m full of bad ideas,” and Clarke drags the tip of her nose over Lexa’s to change her angle. There’s barely an inch separating their mouths.

“What if you decide you don’t like me in the morning?”

“What if I decide I do like you.”

Lexa’s running out of arguments. “We’re neighbors. It could be messy.” 

“It could be beautiful,” and with that, Lexa lets her kiss her. 

It started off sweet and urgent, Clarke climbing her way to straddle Lexa’s lap while Lexa cups her jaw and pulls her close. Lexa dips her head to kiss Clarke’s neck and works on tugging her tank top off until she’s shirtless and on top of her. 

Lexa’s hands move to her hips, slide into the waistband of her shorts, and tug, popping the button and sliding her hand into her pants. Lexa hates how fast it’s all happening, wants hours to touch her and hear those noises she had been thinking about for weeks. The first time had been magic, had been long, deep, and good. 

Clarke’s already unraveling above her, hips jerking, someone else’s name spilling out of her mouth. Too fast. Lexa’s losing too much time with her, but can’t stop the feverish pace she pumps her fingers, not when Clarke is making sounds like that. 

“Come for me, Clarke,” she whispers into her neck. 

Clarke arches, taut like a string, and then slumps into Lexa’s shoulder, out of breath and covered in a sheen of sweat. 

“Jesus…” she kisses her way up Lexa’s neck, “that was not how I expected this night to go.” 

Lexa blushes in lieu of an answer, extricating her hand from Clarke's shorts. 

Clarke looks into Lexa’s eyes and a warm grin spreads across her face, her eyes soften when she catches Lexa’s gaze again. Lexa feels her stomach swoop at the look, and rather than confront those feelings, leans in to kiss Clarke again. 

Lexa’s head is cradled in Clarke’s hands as she abandons her lips to kiss a trail down Lexa’s neck. She’s so gentle with her, and Lexa tries to forget that this is Clarke’s first time with her. Lexa feels Clarke’s hands tug at her shirt, but she wraps her arms around Clarke and pulls her closer for a deeper kiss instead of granting that permission. Hands are wandering, but this time it’s happening too slow for Lexa. One night stands aren’t supposed to be this tender. Lexa longs for the sudden, passionate fuck of ten minutes ago. Receiving a soft slow kiss and wandering hands suddenly feels too real. It feels too much like making love instead of what this will always have to be-- a brief passionate affair. Clarke’s nips at the nape of Lexa’s neck, before she pulls back to a full halt. 

“Why’d you stop?”

“Because you’re shaking like a leaf and there are tears streaming down your face.” Clarke cups her face in her hands, swipes a tear away with her thumb, then pulls Lexa tight against her chest in a hug. 

No one has hugged Lexa in three years. Hugs are usually reserved for a greeting of a friend you haven’t seen in a while. A reassurance from a partner who can tell something is wrong. A snuggled evening on the couch. Lexa doesn’t get to have those relationships. She gets a never ending series of firsts.

But Clarke’s arms are wrapped around her tight and she’s playing with the hairs at the nape of her neck so gently that Lexa can’t help more tears from springing to her eyes as she hugs back. Arms wrapped around someone else in a non-sexual way for the first time in so long. 

Lexa tries to steady her own breathing, taking in a shaky breath, and Clarke just stays content in her lap, rubbing her back and holding her. When her breathing evens out, Clarke doesn’t pry, but simply offers, “We don’t have to do anything you’re not ready for,” and Lexa nods, suddenly embarrassed of her emotional outburst. 

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Lexa shakes her head in answer. Her head is pillowed on Clarke’s chest, and Clarke’s cheek is rested on her head. 

“That’s okay,” she responds, not stopping the soothing head scratches for a second. 

Clarke is so tender with her. This doesn’t feel like a first date, and it’s not for her. But she knows it is for Clarke, and once she leaves to pee, any tenderness in her would be replaced by fear or confusion at a stranger in her apartment. 

“I’m sorry.”

“You don’t need to be,” Clarke reassures. 

Again, so comforting and steady, and soon to be gone. But for now, this feels like a mid-relationship kind of comfort, and the thought almost brings Lexa to tears again. 

They sit in snuggled silence on the floor for a bit longer before Lexa finally convinces herself to speak. 

“I should get going,” Lexa admits, “I have some boxes to unpack.”

Clarke holds her hand as she walks her to her front door.

“I’m sorry for being a bit of a mess tonight,” Lexa apologizes again. 

“It’s your first night in the city. You somehow managed to move in and accidentally fuck your neighbor on the first night. I can see how overwhelming it'd be.” She offers Lexa a lingering kiss before she steps out, and adds “See you around, neighbor!” 

No you won’t. 

[chill-pills-yandere-haven]

Can you do the Yandere idol au with 4nemo. Cause they’re all beauties nothing can change my mind😤

Wooh! First ask! Here is a little drabble I made for you, enjoy! (Might also make headcanons for the group)

Tw: Yandere, mention of violence

Disclaimer: Yanderes are abusive, this is not a healthy crush.

Made, finished, and posted same day.

A Dream of Coffee and K-pop

(Not my art)

Sunlight shone through the window, the smell of freshly ground coffee beans wafted through the air, it was truly beautiful. You and your best friend had decided to stop for a drink break and found yourselves here. Honestly, you were thinking about becoming a regular here, the atmosphere has heavenly and the food and drink were delicious. Then you heard camera clicks and squealing. You let out a slight sound of confusion and irritation. Forced out of your state of serenity, you looked back at your friend to see what happened. Their face was red and they seemed to be holding back an almost terrifying grin. It didn't make sense to you, all that happened was that four men and a bunch of other people entered the cafe. "Holy archon of idol groups! It's 4NEMO!" Your friend was now shaking you, making you look even closer at the four men who had just entered. Even on further inspection they only looked like rich people with hair dye, you didn't see anything special. "Who?" You blinked, just annoyed that your peaceful coffee break had been interrupted. "I swear to God, you uncultured swine. That's 4NEMO, the hottest new K-pop group. I sent you a link to their newest album, you know, the one I've been going crazy over because they had a collab with DCKZ and Lumine from ABYSS?" They facepalm at your obliviousness to the literal celebrities that are in the same place as you. "Sorry, I forgot to check it out yesterday, I was studying." You apologize for not at least trying to see what was so good about these K-pop bands that were your best friend's newest obsession. But you did have a life of your own, you were studying to become a surgeon so you never really had much free time. "Hello, there! I was wondering if you two could share some space? seems that there's nowhere else for us to sit in this place." Out of nowhere, a young man with braided hair that faded from dark brown to teal and emerald eyes that almost made you want to trust him, was at your table, asking if he and his three friends could sit with you all. "Oh my lord, 4NEMO is asking to sit with us! Squee! Please say yes, my dear best friend who has brought us both insane luck, please?" Resistance was futile when your best friend was almost begging you to let them sit with you two, trying to do the best puppy dog eyes they could. "Yeah sure, you all can sit with us, just squeeze in." You relented and moved further into the booth to create space. The one with the braids and a guy with mostly white hair that had part of it dyed red sat on your side of the booth while a blonde with golden eyes and a man with an edgy vibe to him sat with your friend. The before almost empty cafe was now bustling with people and you swore you could feel a couple of people glaring at you. You gave a close-eyed smile and a small sigh, this could've been worse. The six of you ended up getting along quickly, talking the day away. Your friend was malfunctioning most of the time from being in the same room as their idols so you tried to calm them down from the shock but it didn't work. You found that the 4NEMO boys were actually quite sweet and easy to talk to, maybe excluding Xiao who wasn't one for small talk, or any talk. All of you exchanged numbers before you had to leave and even gave your super fan best friend some signatures. Kazuha then handed you both VIP tickets and backstage passes for their next concert saying that you could be his plus twos. But only because all the boys were allowed to give out two free tickets to whomever they chose. You all said goodbye and you made a mental note to check out their music once you got to the comfort of your apartment. But as you left, you just couldn't shake the feeling that something was off with your new friends no matter how many times you tried to brush it off. (On the other side.) Kazuha was the one to first notice you. A serene being in the middle of the cafe, face illuminated by the evening light. On your face was a beautiful smile more genuine than anything he had ever seen. You were the only one whose head didn't turn as they

entered, even ignoring the obvious adoring look on the person beside you's face. He confidentially alerted the other members of his group to your presence. All with some variation of curiosity and something that he could only describe as a breath of fresh air on their faces when they completely took you in. "I don't think they even know about our band." Aether supplied, you had a true expression of complete cluelessness even when he heard your friend explaining who they were just loud enough for him to hear. You were much too enticing and adorable, especially for someone who he just saw. "Why does it matter, we're here for public appearances, coffee and desserts, not some random person," Xiao mumbled, loud enough for the rest of them to hear. He didn't understand what was so special about them, just another attractive stranger. Though, part of him did understand why his group mates felt this way. "Who cares, I'm making a move," The lead singer of the group, Venti announced, making his way over to their table after looking around for anything they could use as an excuse. Ah, of course, because of their appearance, the little cafe was now packed. He brought himself and the others up to your table, acting charismatic in hopes you would let them stay. Though the idol group didn't even need an excuse as your best friend would have convinced you either way. Surprisingly, everyone in the group almost immediately warmed up to you, even Xiao. Kazuha was the one to give you his plus two tickets mainly because everyone else had already invited other people but luckily, Kazuha hadn't used his yet. The 4NEMO boys were a good distance away from the cafe and we're finally able to freely talk. "So, we're sharing them?" Aether asked, getting a nod or a yup from everyone in return. "We should do more research on them. What if they're already dating someone?" The composer of the group, Kazuha supplied. Noticing how the other boys' expressions got just a bit more malicious at that. Xiao looked around, being sure that they were completely isolated. "Then I'll give them a threat or a concussion." Xiao threatened, the other members were mostly in agreement with the statement. Any of them would already do appalling things for their new friend and future lover. "I'm sure as long as we don't scare them away they'll fall head over heels in love with at least one of us. We just need more time with them." Venti assured, not the fondest of using violence to settle his disputes. "Well one thing's for sure, they will learn to love us and will be ours." Aether voiced the idea on everyone's mind as they stepped into their shared studio apartment that could comfortably house about eight people. Leaving them all to individually plan how they would make you theirs.

[duz-machines-87]

I get the premise of what you are saying, but I don't think this is the hill to die on.

87: Time has likely passed since they were actually 15, given the length of the show and when exactly Mona Lisa appears. Donnie has been to college, but he's also canonically a genius, so I feel as though we could discount any usually-age-specific-milestones as just Donnie being a super genius. Though you also have to keep in mind this: They were mutated as teenagers. So any sort of calculations or assumptions made about their age have to be considered through that lens. It's hard to measure something empirically when the thing you're measuring doesn't follow those units.

12: Mona Lisa is an alien, and we therefore can't actually determine her age for certain. Maybe she's like 10,000 in human years, but she's literally an alien with alien cultural norms and alien biology. So any sort of way of determining her age is moot, we would just have to ask, and if she says she's a teen, that's the best we've got. Not to mention, the timeline for the 2012 show is fucking insane anyway. What the fuck does it matter? Casey already canonically mentioned that by the end of season 2, a year has passed since the end of season 1. So Raph's 16? Plus, the three months Leo spent in a coma, then the rest of season 3, and given that all the seasons are roughly the same length... you see what I'm getting at. So Raph's probably an adult by this point, because remember, 15(canonical age at the start of the series) + 3(seasons and one could assume years) = 18 year old turtles. And this isn't even including the fact that going back in time six months takes them back to season 2. The timeline is madness to decode.

IDW: I don't see why this is any different. Yes they have age estimates, from one person working on it. The series is written by a mosaic of writers and artists who don't necessarily agree on even important details about the tmnt. Have you even seen how each issue differs from the next? One thing that stuck out to me specifically was (IDW spoilers) Donnie in one of his dedicated comics mentions that he thought of ways to find Raph years earlier when talking about obsessing over past mistakes. However, Raph was only missing for a year. (IDW spoilers over) So we can see that they don't agree on things like timeline all the time. And finally, just like in the 1987 show, they were all mutated into teenagers!!! How do you determine their age from there?? And yes, they had past lives that they seem to somewhat remember, but that doesn't clear things up, that makes it more complicated. Like, did they die in their past lives at 20? Did they die as teens? Children?? How much do they even remember? Leo seems to remember the most, so does that make him stuck the age that he died at in a past life? Does he start from that age? How many years have they even been kicking around in turtle form?? Since the first issue was released? That would be 12 years ago, so are they all actually 27? Would Alopex be 24? Is it another number of years entirely? Ok then, how many? Alopex was also mutated into a teen/pre-teen, so how do we determine that she was exactly 12 and not 13? Or 14? Was she an adult fox before mutation? If she was an adult fox, would that make her the same age as Old Hob? We know the turtles were baby turtles... you see where I'm going with this.

It's the same as the rest. We could only exactly determine that the turtles were dating someone of their exact same age is if that person was mutated in the exact same way on the exact same day.

I understand that what you're trying to say is that if someone ships Raph and Alopex then they shouldn't be opposed to any of the Raph and Mona Lisa ships, but even that is a straw-man argument. Someone could just, oh I don't know, not ship any of the turtles with any love interests at all? This is the same as me saying, "well, we know that 1987 Mona Lisa was too old for Raph because she was in college. So if you're ok with that ship you have to be ok with the 2012 version of the ship regardless!"

You're just hurting your initial argument by condemning a ship with the exact same faults for no reason. Someone who does ship/not ship that very specific collection of ships would be a hypocrite, but the point is mostly that people are against all of those, for the same reasons. Or maybe they were just unaware of the skeletons in the closet of those other ships when they made the choice to ship them, and if they did know, then they wouldn't.

The turtles are inherently difficult to ship with anybody because of their fucky ages. You have to keep in mind animals, which are usually adults in a couple of years, crossed with humans who are usually adults in almost two decades. You have to think about all the time travel they do, all the nuances of mutagen/ooze and how it works, the differences in mutated species, the differences in a human-based or animal-based mutant, and the list goes on.

Since we don't ever have a definitive answer for any of these things, we can only guess, and yes headcanon, about the ages of characters compared to others.

Some person: 87 Mona Lisa is a gr00mer! She's in college! 87 RaMona is p3dophila!! Absolutely degusting!!

IDW Raph: I met my girlfriend Alopex when she was 12 and I was 15-16. We immediately started flirting with each other, despite her still being a literal child, then we (possibly) started dating when I was 18-19 and she was 15-16. I'm now 20 and she's 17 and we're still dating.

That same person: AWW! OTP!! Raph and Alopex from IDW are so cute! I ship them! <333

[therealvinelle]

Ok I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I'm just now copying your Norwegian Bella AU into a text translator, and if you don't already have 50 people in your inbox demanding a translation then shame on ALL OF US because this is glorious! And while Google Translate does have a certain charm (it translated "piper hun ut" as "she beeps") I'm curious to see how you'd put it in English.

Troquantary is referring to this post. In which Bella doesn't speak English.

Fun fact, you're the only one who's gone into my inbox to request this. I was so sad, had the translation half-written and everything, but I was too proud to beg. So thank you, Troquantary, for popping this ask.

As for the dictionary fuckups, sounds about right. I made a few typos, too, that made Google Translate suffer even more. (Such as managing to mix up "henne" (her) and "hendene" (hands), resulting in Aro patting Bella instead of clapping his hands. Poor Google.)

Also, there are a few cultural references and language things that would be lost in the translation, in an attempt to keep them I included notes clarifying things.

Some things, like Aro and Carlisle's very old man way of speaking, are easier said than done to translate, you'll have to bear with me there.

Additional notes are that I added a few things to this version, many of them because translating is hard, but a few because while translating I thought "oh you know what would be much funnier-" and then wrote that.

Alright, without further ado:

When Renée left Charlie she did not go to Florida, she went to Oslo. And she went all in to make her daughter a true Norwegian, hiring Norwegian nannies and making sure never to speak English around the child. Since transatlantic flights are expensive, little Bella Swan rarely got to visit her father, and as such she never did learn what should have been her native language.

She quickly forgot what English she did have in favor of Norwegian, with the exception of words like “Yes”, “No”, and “I’m Bella”.

The few trips she took to visit her father were all the more awkward than in canon since she couldn’t play with the Black kids. Let not the blame fall upon Charlie: he took Norwegian classes and speaks conversational Norwegian. He can’t speak to Renée, because her Norwenglish is incomprehensible even to Norwegians, but he can communicate with Bella.

Not that he’s had a lot of chances to do so.

Bella makes it to seventeen years old, she’s in second grade at Handels* and is a major outsider among the preps there, and then Renée marries a handsome skier**. Together they shall travel the continent all winter to participate in as many skiing races as they can, and in the summer they’ll take gigs at Hurtigruta to see the coast.

*“Handels” is the nickname for an Oslo high school infamous for its pupils being rich and beautiful blonds who are going to be CEOs when they grow up.

**Skiing as a sport is huge in Norway

***Hurtigruta is a famous ferry that travels across the Norwegian West coast

Bella, who sucks at skiing and is too young to work at Hurtigruten, takes the hint.

With dread in her stomach and dictionary in hand she goes to her father in America.

Where she doesn’t speak the language.

Faen.

Charlie gives her a car, and I wish this meta was set in the present because I could have joked about electric cars and the automat only driver’s license*, but Twilight is set in 2005 so I can’t. The car part proceeds without drama.

*An increasing number of Norwegian youth take the driver’s license for automatic cars only, and we’re the country in the world with the highest percentage of electric car purchases.

School is worse than in canon, because she is now a thousand times more sensational than if she was merely the new student. She is from another country! All of Forks keels over with excitement.

To make matters even worse, our girl doesn’t understand a word of what people are saying.

She is too awkward to let them know she doesn’t know English. It’d become a thing, and they might think she’s dumb. To be fair, it’s not good that she’s been through primary, secondary, and now a year and a half of high school and still sucks at English.

So she nods, smiles, mumbles “Hi, I’m Bella” to the new faces, and blushes heavily when anybody says anything.

People assume she’s shy. That’s a bit boring, but oh well.

She has her biology class with the redhead hottie she noticed during lunch. She watched him and his family, they were fascinatingly pretty, but she doesn’t know anything more about them. Sure would have been great if she could have asked the tiny girl (was it Jess?) about them.

Biology proceeds as in canon - Edward badly wants to eat the delicious girl, but fortunately doesn’t.

She runs into him in the office when he tries to switch to another biology lesson, but she has no idea what he’s saying so she only has the suspicion that this somehow concerns her. Which is still uncomfortable, but Bella is probably the problem here. The hottie surely can’t be.

He’s missing from school for a week, Bella finds that weird.

He returns, and to her great horror he starts talking to her.

“Hello”, he says.

Bella dies inside. He’s too handsome!

"I'm Edward Cullen," he continues, and ok, she got that. The hottie is called Edward, that’s good to know. She’s not sure she caught that last name, though, Köln?

He says something else, it’s gibberish to Bella even though she’s concentrating, and at the end there he says “Bella Swan”.

She gulps.

"I'm Bella Swan," she confirms and nods. That should be correct. God, she hopes it’s correct.

He smiles a crooked, boyish smile. She’s awed. She didn’t think it was possible to be so beautiful.

He says something else.

Bella didn’t catch it.

She blushes even harder, she hasn’t been more embarrassed in her life. Here he is, the most handsome guy in all the world, and she has nothing to say to him. Literally, they don’t speak the same language.

She should tell him.

It’s one thing to chicken out of telling the town she doesn’t speak English, but there’s something different about Edward Cullen. He deserves the truth.

But...

He’s the most beautiful person she has seen in her life. He is American, too, so the odds of him knowing Norwegian are microscopical. If he finds out she doesn’t understand a word he says he’ll stop talking to her, and selfish as she is she doesn’t want that.

So with a slightly guilty conscience (but not enough to fess up) she contributes to the conversation with enough words and smiles to pull through. "Yes", "No", "Thank you", and "That's nice".

He is surprised by several of these answers, but instead of giving her odd looks and losing interest he grows more invested in the conversation.

Class ends.

The next day the near accident happens, and he saves her. She is stunned - dear god, did he just pick up a whole car? After teleporting across the parking lot..?

Soon she’s in the ER, and more than a little bit stressed about that fact since she knows the Americans have a terrible healthcare system.

She hopes Charlie has an insurance.

An insanely beautiful man walks into the ER, and Bella is shocked. He is just as handsome as Edward and Edward’s lunch friends!

He introduces himself as Carlisle Cullen, and Bella can only assume this is someone’s older brother. Possibly related to the blonde girl.

He smiles at her, says something, and she answers, "I'm Bella Swan."

He frowns.

That must have been the wrong answer, then.

His hands return to investigating her scalp, and to her great surprise he switches to perfect Norwegian, "kjenner De* noe ubehag når jeg holder her?" Do you feel any discomfort when I touch here?

*De is the Norwegian polite pronoun for “you”. Du = thou = the French tu, and De = you = the French vous. These polite pronouns went out of use in the 1980’s, save for when addressing royal persons, and would be considered antiquated in 2005.

He hurries to add, "Norsk lærte jeg i... fjor sommer. Det var et nettkurs." I learned Norwegian… last year. Online class.

"Hvilket da?" Which one? Bella asks, because Charlie needs to hear about this. The doctor has beautiful, if slightly outdated, pronunciation.

The doctor’s smile turns uncertain. She gets the feeling there’s something he doesn’t want to say. "Husker ikke," I don’t remember, sier han etter en litt vel lang pause.

That’s a shame. And weird.

"De hadde hellet med Dem i dag, som ikke ble truffet av den bilen." You were lucky today, not getting hit by that car. he then says, noticeably changing the subject.

"Det var ikke hell, det var Edward," It wasn’t luck, it was Edward, she replies sharply.

The doctor definitely looks uncomfortable.

She continues, "Han krysset skolegården på et blunk, og plukket opp hele bilen. Jeg så det," He crossed the schoolyard in a moment, and picked up the whole car. I saw it,

The doctor laughs. "Om han kunne det hadde nok gymkarakteren hans vært meget bedre. Nei, frøken Swan*, jeg beklager å si at det høres ut som at De er litt omtåket. Det er helt normalt ved hjernerystelse." If he could do that, his PE grade would be a lot better. No, Miss Swan, I’m sorry to say you seem confused. That’s normal with concussions.

*Addressing a young woman as “frøken” is even more outdated than using polite pronouns.

Why does Bella get the feeling he’s lying?

She’s discharged.

We’ll jump ahead to her trip to La Push - that trip uneventful, since Jacob knows she doesn’t speak English. They stick their hands in their pockets and stare at the sea.

The next day she’s shanghaied to Port Angeles, because apparently she said “Yes” at the wrong time when talking to Jessica (Turns out Jess’s name was Jessica!) and accidentally said yes to a day trip to Port Angeles.

Like in canon she wanders away from the others, and as in canon she is nearly gang raped. And again as in canon she is saved at the last moment by Edward.

He buys her dinner, and she can’t believe her own luck- and misfortune. A date with the most handsome guy on the planet (hence the luck) and she can’t say a word to him (hence the misfortune)!

He says things to her, lends her his jacket, and really this is it for Bella, she’s peaked, life can’t get better than this.

(That’s a lie, it would be better if she spoke English.)

He’s so amazing.

She’s gotten pretty good at navigating conversations with him, so she nods and aha’s her way through.

In his car on the way home the tone takes a more serious turn.

He asks her about something, and it’s a serious question, that much she’s gathered. She answers in the confirmative.

He is silent.

Did she say anything wrong?

(Edward, on his end, just asked if she knows what he is. She said yes, so calmly, not even a trace of fear in her.)

A few days later he takes her out on a walk in the woods.

He shows her a meadow in the woods, and when he steps into it he lights up in the sunlight.

Bella is in shock.

She knew there was something different about him, but- holy cow. This guy isn’t human.

Is she dating a god?

She stumbles into the clearing after him, and they spend a day together where he says things, and she can barely hear any of it (nevermind understand it) because she’s so distracted by how pretty he is.

The next day he takes her to a house in the middle of nowhere. She doesn’t want to guess that this can be where he lives. Surely gods don’t live in houses?

He shows her inside the house, and introduces her for Dr. Cullen and a lady with a name she doesn’t catch.

Bit weird that these two are acting like a couple of parents, they’re far too young and divine for that.

Edward shows her around in an old-fashioned office, and she doesn’t know what to make of i when she sees a painting of Carlisle. Edward launches into a long story when he sees her watching it, unfortunately she doesn’t catch any dates or artist names. At one point she heard the word “suicide”, though, and that’s not good.

She doesn’t get much out of the story.

The baseball game doesn’t happen because Bella didn’t pick up on what Edward wanted and didn’t realize she was being invited to a thing. They spend the afternoon watching a movie instead.

The relationship continues, impeded slightly by communication problems, but she’s mostly able to cover those up.

Until her birthday comes around.

She gets a papercut.

Jasper lunges at her. Edward throws her into a glass table, and then everyone is leaving.

Carlisle is kind enough to switch to Norwegian when he’s stitching up her arm, perhaps remembering the last time she was his patient. "Jasper har ikke vært på dietten vår så veldig lenge." Jasper hasn’t been on our diet for very long.

"Diett?"she asks. She’s never seen Edward eat anything. She wasn’t clear on what the Cullens ate, honestly she thought they were above such things. She was thinking maybe photosynthesis. The knowledge that they apparently eat food astounds her, but diets?

"Dyreblod istedenfor menneskeblod," Animal blood in stead of human blood, Carlisle clarifies.

Whachasay?

Carlisle gives a slight smile. “Jaspers liv som vampyr fikk en brutal start." Jasper’s life as a vampire got off to a brutal start.

...

Vampire?!

Bella’s missed something here.

Oh dear lord, oh fy faen, she has missed something.

“Åja”, uh huh, is all she can say, and suddenly she’s very aware of the fact that she’s sitting there with a bleeding arm.

And Carlisle.

Who is a vampire.

Over the course of the following conversation Bella makes a host of discoveries.

Edward has been a vampire this whole time, and he’s a telepathic vampire. Whether Bella should be a vampire too or not has been a matter of hot debate, but due to religious reasons Edward doesn’t want that.

Carlisle also brings up how Edward died of the Spanish flu.

"Jeg var under den oppfatning at Edward fortalte deg bakhistorien min?" I was under the impression Edward told you my back story? Carlisle asks at one point, and Bella just has to ask very nicely if he’d be so kind as to repeat it.

Turns out the guy is nearly four hundred years old.

Jaha.

Jahahaha jaa ha.

That’s… a lot.

She wanders out of the house in shock, and hardly notices Edward’s strange behavior over the next couple of days.

One day he picks her up at school, and takes her behind the house.

That works out.

He’s a vampire, but he never hurt her. He is endlessly beautiful, perhaps easier to love now that she knows he’s not a god. He’s her Edward, and that’s suddenly easier now that she knows.

They can still be together.

But now that she knows this about him, it’s about time he knows something about her as well.

It’s time to finally be honest with him.

So when he opens his mouth, she opens her mouth as well, but she doesn’t get any further than to “Edward-” before he launches into a monologue.

She’ll have to wait until he’s done before saying her piece. It’s a bit embarrassing, but it doesn’t seem like he intends to stop talking anyway.

And what he’s saying seems to be serious, so it’s probably best to let him finish.

Edward concludes his monologue by kissing her forehead. Then he disappears.

Where did he go?

A big unsure, Bella goes back to the house. She’ll just have to wait until he gets back.

She doesn’t know what to think when Charlie returns from work and tells her the Cullens have all left.

Oh, god.

Edward must have found out she doesn’t speak English.

She made a mockery of him.

He has every right to leave.

Knowing this doesn’t make it any easier to live with.

Bella sinks into a depression.

The hallucinations begin, as in canon, though Hallusinward speaks Norwegian. Thank god for small mercies.

The friendship with Jacob (dictionary in hand) blooms, as someone has to help her see those hallucinations.

The cliff diving happens, and Alice shows up. Bella’s not sure what this is about, but she has gotten good enough at English to know that something bad happened, and Alice wants them to do something.

She’s a bit surprised to find herself on a plane to Italy, though.

Alice tells her to “Run to Edward” and ok, she got that, actually.

So she saves Edward.

After that she’s taken into the sewer, which turns out to house dozens of vampires.

Bella, Edward, and Alice are received in some kind of hall, where an unusual vampire has quite a bit to say. She understands some of what he’s saying, at least the part about “la tua cantante”. She knows a bit about Italian, see, so she knows that he’s talking about a song now.

She wishes she knew the context.

At one point he takes her hand, and appears fascinated by it. She wonders if he’s a palmreader. Not very vampirey, but what does she know.

He asks her a question.

"Yes," she says.

Saying yes has gotten her this far, after all.

But when he lights up and claps his hands together, and Edward and Alice stare at her in shock and betrayal, she knows she must have said the wrong thing.

The two are dismissed from the room before Bella can do or say anything, she’s just listening to Edward make a racket outside in the hallway.

Not good.

The unusual vampire brings her further down in his sewer palace to a basement, and she is given comfortable clothes to wear.

This is getting terrifying.

The vampire leans towards her - and she chickens out.

"Jeg snakker ikke engelsk!" she squeaks. "Non habla ingles!" I don’t speak English.

Han stanser, og ser forvirret ut. "Que- Hva behager*?" I beg your pardon? spør han etter et øyeblikk.

*A very formal, and slightly outdated (you can use it, but people will think you’re putting on airs. And they will be right) way of saying “excuse me?”

Sobbing, Bella tells him the whole story, from how she didn’t want to be the weird kid in school to how she’s now somehow in Italy without knowing why nor what she just agreed to.

When she’s done the vampire starts laughing.

"Dette forklarer jo en hel del," This explains quite a bit, ler han. "Men, kjære Bella, jeg er redd det ikke endrer noe." But, my dear Bella, I’m afraid it changes nothing.

He tells her that she has agreed to serve him and his army of undead warriors into eternity.

Well fuck.

"Du skal få slippe det, når du ikke visste hva du samtykket til - men skjebnen din forblir den samme. Loven er loven." You’re released from that promise, as you didn’t know what you agreed to - but your fate remains the same. The law is the law.

After a moment of silence, during which she looks terrified, he hurries to add, "Vi har en lov. Du må bli en av oss." We have a law. You must become one of us.

A law that Bella Swan has to become a vampire?

People are finally speaking Norwegian, and Bella is still lost. And it’s too embarrassing to keep pestering this poor, polite man with questions.

So she nods.

He gives her a glittering smile, and bites her.

When she wakes, Aro offers her an English course. A language course that, naturally, leads to her staying in Volterra. Why not learn a few more languages while we’re at it, dearest Bella?

Some time later Edward breaks into Volterra to save his Rapunzel, only to barely recognize her now that she’s a vampire who says things. Lots of things, she talks all the time now. WHAT DID ARO DO TO HER.

Too mortified to admit that she never spoke English, Bella claims she’s been brainwashed.

Aro is having too much fun to correct her, and the whole sad affair sets off a regrettable flood of rumors.