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wandaromanova · 2 years ago

Text

obvious

Pairing: Wednesday Addams x Fem!Reader

Warnings: Wednesday-level threats, that’s about it

A/N: hello! this is bad but it was fun to write. as always, not proofread cause i’m lazy. happy reading <3

anon requested: Reader and Wednesday are dating and reader is super affectionate; always kissing Wednesday’s cheeks, holding her hands, and just generally being physical like that. Reader doesn’t really think much about it until Enid mentions one day how surprised she is Wednesday let’s reader perform so much pda. Which makes reader suddenly stop. (Wednesday notices this ofc and is like “wtf???? Why did you stop?”)

Summary: Things aren’t as obvious as they seem, for both you and your girlfriend, Wednesday Addams.

Word Count: 2.1K words | wednesday masterlist

please do not repost or try and take ownership of my work. reblogs, likes, and comments are always welcome. <3

The entire student body was shocked when word of your relationship with Wednesday Addams spread across Nevermore.

You were outgoing and friendly while the Addams was intimidating and unapproachable. The two of you were an unlikely duo, the epitome of opposites attract.

It was remarkable to those around you, how the goth girl who hated being touched would let you hug her and live to see the next day.

The sight of Wednesday visibly relaxing in your hold was a stark contrast to the tenseness that permeated throughout her body whenever someone brushed their shoulder against hers in passing.

Although the affectionate gestures were offputting to others, it was second nature for you.

Not once had you considered the fact that Wednesday loved to keep people at arms-length and then some.

In your mind, she was just your other half, and with touch being your love language, it only made sense.

That was until Enid brought it to your attention.

───────── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──────────

It was an average day in the quad, your boisterous classmates scattered throughout the open area when you walked up to the table that you always sat at.

Wednesday’s back was toward you, so you took the opportunity to sneak up on her.

Wrapping your arms around her waist, you kissed her cheek quickly before settling in the seat beside her, as your backpack hit the floor.

The Addams turned her head toward you, staring at you impassively. You failed to notice the tiniest hint of a blush that graced her cheeks. Wednesday was grateful for your obliviousness.

“Do you have a death wish?” She questioned monotonously as you gave her a wide smile.

“Yeah, only by your hands though,” you responded easily, sending her a wink before turning your attention to the bubbly blonde sitting across from you.

“Hey Y/N, how’s your day been so far?” Enid smiled at you widely as she awaited your response, taking a bite of her sandwich which she chewed lazily.

“It’s been alright, but it's even better now that I’m here with my favorite girl… and Wednesday,” you laughed with Enid at your own joke before cringing as the girl beside you jabbed her elbow into your side.

The werewolf found the action even more amusing, her giggles increasing tenfold.

Your eyes met Wednesday’s as she glared at you, silently warning you to retract your statement.

“Aw Wens, you know I’m kidding. You’re my favorite person in the whole world,” you interlocked your fingers with hers under the table, bringing your conjoined hands up to your lips, placing gentle kisses on each of her pale knuckles.

Her eyes raked over your features in thought, before abruptly standing up.

“Where are you going? Did I upset you?” You worriedly looked up at her as she let go of your hand, scared that you offended her.

“It’s foolish of you to think inane words would disrupt my psyche. I have a Hummer meeting to attend,” Wednesday said, shrugging her backpack on.

“Come to my dorm tonight,” the raven-haired girl stared down at you, adjusting her blazer that crinkled slightly from her movements.

“Okay, but why?” You asked curiously, head tilting to the side. The action made Wednesday’s heart flutter, but she would never say that out loud.

“Enid needs help with her psychology homework,” she nonchalantly replied, so caught up in observing you that she forgot the werewolf was even present.

Wednesday was quickly reminded when you turned your attention to the blonde.

“You do? I thought you said the class was easy,” your eyebrows furrowed together, further evidence of your cluelessness.

You missed the threatening glare your partner sent Enid’s way.

“Uh… yeah I lied. I’m actually really struggling and need your help, pretty please,” Enid’s eyes fluttered back and forth between you and Wednesday, a nervous smile on her lips.

Luckily, you didn’t question it and agreed to assist her.

And with that, Wednesday left without another word, your eyes glued to her retreating form with a small smile on your face.

God, you loved her.

“You two are so cute it’s actually disgusting,” Enid dramatically grimaced at the lovestruck look on your face. You smirked at her, a teasing glint in your eyes.

“Please, like you and Ajax don’t act all lovey-dovey when you’re together,” you wiggled your eyebrows at the wolf, taking the tray of food Wednesday had left on the table and eating it yourself.

“Yeah, but with Ajax and I, it’s not unusual for us to show some PDA. You and my roomie on the other hand, it’s shocking but in a good way,” she clarified before taking another bite of her sandwich as you processed what she said.

“Why is our PDA shocking?” Confusion was plastered across your features, Enid staring at you like you’d asked the stupidest question to ever be spoken.

“Wednesday hates being touched. It took me forever to get a hug from her, and I live with her! It’s a miracle she lets you touch her at all, let alone in public.”

Silence took over as you sat in thought, mindlessly picking at the food you no longer had an interest in eating. Enid was right.

Wednesday always made it clear that affection was something she despised. Perhaps you got excited by the euphoria of being with the girl you love, letting it cloud your judgment.

Surely your girlfriend would have mentioned if your advances made her uncomfortable, right?

Your mind was swimming as the bell rang, indicating the end of the lunch period.

In a trance, you stood up, said goodbye to Enid, and walked to class. Before you even made it through the door to botany, you’d come to your conclusion.

You’ll give Wednesday the space she didn’t ask for.

───────── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──────────

Wednesday was completely and utterly flabbergasted. For the past week, you’ve been different. Your personality around her was intact, but there was something severely lacking; physical contact.

For the first time in her life, Wednesday was at a loss.

The goth girl recalled every interaction she had with you prior to the sudden change, but her efforts to rationalize your behavior were fruitless.

Wednesday detested how the circumstance got under her skin like parasites.

Her thoughts were plagued with you, even more so than usual. Writing became an insurmountable feat that she failed to overcome.

She felt pathetic, not finishing the chapter of her novel that she was so close to completing.

The raven-haired girl cursed her father in these fleeting moments. She simply must have inherited this pitiful need for her lover from the man. It was his fault that now, she resembled a lovesick buffoon.

It was agonizing to be so close to you, but feel so far.

Wednesday normally found your obliviousness endearing, but now she wants to commit every single degree of murder because of it.

Each lunch period, she would sit beside you, hoping for some semblance of comfort she so desperately craved, but to no avail. Even when she put her pride aside, she was literally left empty-handed.

How did you not notice her hand resting on her thigh, wide open for the taking? How did you not notice the astronomical distance between your bodies?

How could you ignore her ice-cold cheeks, desperate for the warmth of your lips to paint them with color?

The old Wednesday would ridicule this newfound version of herself. However, you changed her.

Whether it was for better or for worse, well that was a debate the goth girl had during times like this.

She shamefully reduced herself to obvious pining for the sake of having you close.

So… why weren’t you taking any of her hints?

───────── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──────────

It was obvious Wednesday didn’t want you near her.

Ever since you decided to give your girlfriend space, all she has done is look at you. She made no moves to initiate contact, just staring at you with emotions you couldn’t quite decipher.

Admittedly, your mission was not an easy one. It took every fiber of your being to keep from holding your girlfriend’s hand or brushing away strands of hair that managed to escape her tight braids.

You felt as though you were punishing yourself, positive that you were the only one suffering.

However, your outlook changed the day Wednesday came knocking at your door.

───────── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──────────

You were sat at your desk, back hunched over as you scribbled some notes down. You’d been in your dorm all day, declining the offers of your friends to head into Jericho.

It was a Saturday and while everyone was hoping the day would never end, you wanted it to end faster.

Your study session came to a halt when three resounding knocks came from your door.

You smiled to yourself, knowing who was on the other side waiting for you. You stood up from your chair, groaning as you stretched your arms out.

When you swung the door open, you were met with Wednesday glaring daggers at you.

The Addams pushed her way into your room, not giving you the chance to greet her.

Bewildered, you shut the door and turned to face your storm-cloud of a girlfriend.

She was standing in the middle of your room, dawning her checkered sweater that was slightly oversized and some black sweatpants.

She was so adorable even though she looked like she was gonna kill you right now.

“Well, hello to you too Wens,” you said sarcastically, accompanied by a playful roll of your eyes.

“What is wrong with you?” Wednesday probed, blunt and to the point as always.

If looks could kill, you would be decomposed.

“The real question is; what isn’t wrong with me? Yanno what I mean?” you rubbed the back of your neck, giggling out of fear for your well-being.

“Did I do something to offend you?” The raven-haired girl’s tone was firm, a trace of concern mixed in.

“Of course, not. You did nothing wrong. Why would you think that?” You took a few steps closer to the girl but made sure to leave room between the two of you.

Wednesday’s eyes focused on everything but you as she let out a deep sigh. Despite being a writer, she struggled to put her thoughts into words.

Oh, the irony.

“You have not been close to me all week. I demand to know why,” the Addams tried to keep her composure, but the little shake in her voice was a dead giveaway to her nervousness.

You were taken aback by her words, shock evident on your face before it was quickly replaced by a look of utter confusion.

Honestly, when were you not confused?

“I know you don’t like to be touched, so I thought space was what you wanted,” you said, sincerity dripping from your tone like honey.

Wednesday blankly stared as you shuffled in place, an indication of your anxiousness.

“You’re correct. I hate being touched by other people, but you’re not other people, mon cher,” her gaze softened, taking two steps closer to you.

Her hand cupped your cheek and your eyes fluttered shut, the coolness of her skin sending electricity throughout your body.

”You’re the exception,” Wednesday whispered quietly, like she didn’t want anyone but you to hear. She was so close you could feel her breath on your lips.

There was no time for you to respond before the girl pressed her lips to your own.

You reveled in the feeling of her soft lips, your breath taken away at the tenderness of it all. Your arms wrapped around her waist, pulling her as close as you possibly could.

When air became an issue, you reluctantly pulled away.

Your forehead connected to hers, basking in the silence and Wednesday’s presence. A beat passed before you opened your eyes, reluctantly pulling back to stare at the girl.

“I’m sorry, Wens. I won’t distance myself ever again,” you mumbled, head still in the clouds from the most passionate kiss you and the Addams ever shared.

“It was idiotic of you to do so in the first place,” she tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, the ghost of a smile on her lips.

“Yeah… well, Enid reminded me you aren’t the affectionate type. So, I-,” your sentence was cut short as your girlfriend interrupted you.

“She will die a slow and painful death,” Wednesday spoke apathetically, pecking your cheek before moving out of your grasp, much to your dismay.

“Where are you going?” You whined, already missing your girlfriend’s touch.

“To kill Enid,” she responded casually, twisting the doorknob and walking out.

You laughed to yourself, knowing her threat was an empty one.

The werewolf was one of the few people your girlfriend tolerated. Wednesday would never hurt Enid…right?

Your eyes widened, bolting out of your dorm to save your best friend from your murderous other half.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ

───────── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──────────

#wednesday addams x reader #wednesday x reader #wednesday addams x you #wednesday addams imagines #wednesday addams x reader fluff

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pygmi-cygni · 4 months ago

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Deal With It

Nathan Bateman x reader, fluff no smut, bickering, Nathan being an ass but cute about it, cuddles

genderless reader, no description

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

All day, you'd been pestering.

In the morning, after you'd dragged yourself out of bed a comfortable 2 hours after your alarm, you'd immediately gone to find him. Asking inane questions about the newest project, peeking over his shoulder at his newest website. He gruffly told you to fuck off, read the email I sent, but you preferred to listen to his voice.

After milking that opportunity dry, you lingered around his doorway or found excuses to enter his office. The first couple of times, he raised his eyebrows over the rims of his glasses, but now he merely sighed irritably.

You knew you were pissing him off, but you couldn't help it. Knowing that if you were lucky, he might give you a half-smile or a kiss on the cheek was enough for you to keep pushing for attention.

You caught the hint when he placed an extra desk in front of his door so you couldn't enter.

Instead, you wandered down the halls surrounding his office, laptop in hand. He caught glimpses of your quick pace out of the corner of his eye. He liked knowing where you were, always. Which wall you leaned against, how often you peeked through the glass to watch him work.

He understood your blind devotion. Few people get to witness a god at work, why wouldn't you take every opportunity?

Eventually you settled in the Pollock lounge. Bothering your favorite person had gotten tiring, and you'd become absorbed in your coding. It was soothing, poring over scads of green code and figuring out the puzzle, getting the little aha! rush of adrenaline when you cracked it. It was 'busy work', Nathan called it, easy for him, but too tedious to warrant his effort. So he shoved it all to you.

You didn't mind. Probably because your usefulness was the only thing stopping him from abandoning you in the woods.

Realizing you hadn't scampered past his windows in a while, Nathan's jaw ticked. He didn't like you poking and prodding him while he was in the zone, but he liked knowing you were there. You couldn't disappear that way.

He grunted and flicked through his camera feed, trying to find you in his maze of hallways and secret rooms. Rembrandt? nope. Bedrooms empty, kitchen empty...gym locked. Pollock...also no.

Had you gone outside?

Huffing, Nathan pushed away his tinkering and stalked out, shoving aside the desk he'd put up to block your efforts. He hated when you played these games. Why couldn't you pick an office and stay there, so he could watch you when he got bored? Pesky, pesky, pesky.

You were enjoying this. Of course you hadn't gone outside, it was raining like a bitch and you were dressed in a t-shirt. You'd curled behind the grey couch in the Pollock lounge, one of the few dead spots where the camera couldn't see. It was cozy; you'd pulled a decorative afghan around your shoulders and your music was playing gently. Still, it was fun to watch your genius get outmaneuvered by a camera placement.

Nathan was jogging in circles. This is stupid, just go back to work. He had hours of backlog to work through, a result of the last time you got under his skin. Can't say he didn't enjoy that, though.

But the game was starting to lose its fun. His eyebrows were pulled low and bushy over his glasses, his pace determined and strong. Where the fuck did you wander off to? You couldn't have left him cold turkey, he had way too much fun with you.

"Hey," he barked to the cold, fluorescent silence, "come on out now, it's not fucking funny."

Nothing.

Seething, Nathan scrubbed his hand over his scalp. Were you mad at him? Nah. Couldn't be. You weren't a snowflake, him rejecting your attention wouldn't drive you to isolation. He was too enigmatic, too intriguing for you to ignore.

Right?

Fuck, this was making him insecure.

"Fucking bullshit," he muttered, stomping back to his office. He wouldn't give you the satisfaction of giving in. He wasn't a lovesick pussy, he could go an afternoon without seeing you.

So he went back to his glass emporium and sat. And sat. His brain whirred, but your absence was heavy in his mind. Focus. But he'd had found a new thought to toy with; all the reasons you'd be ignoring him.

He was too mean. Did he yell at you? Maybe he'd forgotten to make you a snack in the fridge.

Hunching lower in his seat, Nathan glared at his reflection in the front window. Insecurity was for losers, idiots without the brainpower to thing about anything better. He was above this.

you were probably so mad at him.

He growled in annoyance and flung his coffee cup across the floor. It shattered, and he pursed his lips. That was one of the mugs you'd bought him.

Fuck.

☆☆☆☆

Still in your cozy cave, you'd begun to nod off. The repetitive clicking of your keys, soothing classical and the softest blanket ever was a lethal combination. a distant crash! made you stir, but you giggled quietly, imagining whatever tech Nathan got pissed at on the floor in a heap.

You closed your laptop and curled into your blanket. You'd crunched a good day's worth of code in an hour, you deserved a nap.

Apparently God Nathan had other plans.

Your slumber was rudely interrupted at a sharp tug, your drowsy mind spinning as you were hoisted into the air.

"Found you," a gravelly voice growled in your ear. You blinked, irritated that your nap had been stolen.

"Go 'way, I'm sleepin," you grumbled, pushing away his bushy face.

He held you tighter, forearms braced like a cage around you. You squirmed, feet tucked too tight under his biceps.

"Yeah? Does my attention bother you?" His sneer was audible. "Funny, you didn't have the same courtesy when I was actually trying to work-"

"I was working-"

"Shut up." He strode out of the lounge, your cheek bouncing gently on his shoulder. The way you were grasped to his chest was crushing your hands, and you fought to get away. He didn't budge.

"You want down? Is that it? Wanna break? Too fucking bad, you wanted attention, now deal with it." His grip did loosen a little, allowing you to comfortably nestle against him.

He meandered around the kitchen, grabbing another coffee mug and humming Beethoven while the espresso poured. Shifting you to his hip, he mindlessly rocked you as he waited. You nudged your nose into his sternum and he begrudgingly allowed you a sip, but not too much, because he needed to be in top performing condition.

Which, apparently included carrying you back to his office and sitting down for the next three hours, clutching you tight. You weren't complaining, you dozed right off.

☆☆☆☆☆

"Nathan."

"Hush."

You poked his cheek, wriggling away from where you'd been napping against his shoulder. He pulled you right back, smushing your cheek onto his rough beard.

"I need to piss, Nathan, lemme up."

He was quiet for a minute, and you were preparing to jab him in the groin, but he finally stood, still carrying you like a baby. The working out was paying off, evidently, because he showed now sign of weariness. You weren't the smallest person ever.

You rolled your eyes. "Nathan, I can walk myself to the bathroom, chrissakes-"

"Shut. It."

Dropping you in the restroom, he shut the door and waited outside, foot tapping impatiently. His chest was cold without you bundled up tight, and he told himself he didn't miss it. As soon as you peeked out of the stall, he swept you back into his arms and made his way back to his office.

"Nate-"

"Deal with it, baby."

#ficlet #nathan bateman #oscar isaac #ex machina #nathan is an asshole #we love him anyway #grumpy #cuddles #nathan bateman x reader #x reader #fluff #fanfic #fanfiction #fic writing #writing #reader insert

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abiiors · 1 year ago

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three's a party 🍸// george daniel x reader x ross macdonald

a/n: hi. thank you so much to my darlings @bookish-strawberry and @ughgoaway for helping me with some of the scenes!!! this is quite tame compared to some of the others i read for "research" but it is still quite...porny. this note is so long, but i'm just rambling because i'm nervous!!! anyway, here, have this unholy piece of writing with barely any plot

cw: threesome (obv), "good girl" and other feminine words/pronouns, uhhhh...yeah, just. general nastiness.

wc: 3.6k

the pub lights are dim, ambient. people chatter around you in low volume, a friendly humdrum of couples out on date nights and old friends catching up, it’s nice—this place. the food is good, the alcohol is even better; the playlist is just the right mix of sensual and exciting. absolutely perfect for a casual first date.

except for the man in front of you who drones on and on and on about one thing or the other—none of which you have given two shits about in your entire existence. but now you have to sit there and pretend that the local football team—the bulls or the foxes or some other inane animal—are the most riveting conversation you’ve ever had.

you also have to pretend like you haven’t been checking out other people sitting at the bar, laughing and joking and having way more fun than you in general—the group of drunk girls out on a friday night, couples on dates, two men sat at the edge of the bar who haven't stopped glancing your way since you first walked in.

a blond and a brunet, one with a sharp, clean-shaven face, the other with a softer face and a thick, dark beard. one with close-cropped and buzzed hair, the other with long hair tied up. two ends of the spectrum, yet they both have the same aura of je ne sais quoi about them. it’s tempting, distracting. and certainly a million times better than whatever’s happening in front of you.

every time one of them looks over at you, you lower your eyes coyly, pretend to be engrossed in a conversation with your date—nodding along to whatever he’s saying and laughing when he pauses expectantly. it’s truly a testament to his intelligence that he hasn’t caught up to your little game yet.

the blond man looks at you again, intense eyes and a full pink mouth. his eyes linger, lazily staring you from head to toe in your tight black first-date dress. then out the corner of your eye, you watch him mumble something to his friend.

he’s a bit subtle, turning only slightly and checking you out from the corner of his eyes, making sure he doesn’t get caught every time you look over in their general direction.

your date clears his throat.

“so i was thinking we could get one more drink and…take this back to my place?”

well… shit

“i had a lot of fun…” you begin, trying to hide the wince in your words but your date’s face falls as realisation finally dawns. “but i don’t—”

“so you’ve wasted my time then,” he cuts you off, nostrils flaring in anger as he clutches his beer pint harder than necessary.

“excuse me?”

“bitch,” he spits under his breath yet you hear it clearly.

all you can do is roll your eyes at his petulance. the glasses clatter as he stands up abruptly, gathering the attention of a few people nearby. you’re beyond feeling any sort of embarrassment; and why should you? it’s not you making a scene.

“classy,” you mutter, taking a leisurely sip of your aperol spritz.

it’s great, no reason for you to ruin a perfectly good evening for a little bitch baby. in your peripheral vision, the two men snicker. the rational part of your brain knows they’re laughing at an inside joke; nothing to do with you. but your delusional brain can’t stop imagining the two of them listening in on your conversation, smirking at your date’s little temper tantrum. you take your own sweet time finishing your drink after he leaves. he’s already out of your mind before he’s even halfway across the pub. you can finally indulge in your other pursuits after all.

“well, that was a pathetic date."

it's after fifteen minutes when you've sought solace in the first floor balcony of the pub. a few people loiter in the nooks and corners, making out and sneaking quick puffs of cigarettes, some wait for their turn to use the loo. some linger in search of peace.

you focus your attention on the stranger.

his voice is deep, deeper than you would have imagined. there’s a gravelly and rough edge to it that makes his words skitter down your bones. even just the way he walks towards you, slow and leisurely, has you hypnotised and transfixed on him. but you won’t be swayed so easily.

“are you always this straightforward with strangers?”

he comes to a stop a few inches away from you and leans against the railing; his body mirroring yours. his spicy cologne permeates the air around you. it's a struggle to not inhale sharply and get a lungful of it. even in your heels, you’re a good few inches shorter than him.

“no,” he shrugs and the movement makes his arm brush against yours ever so slightly, “i guess you caught my eye.”

you attribute the goosebumps on your arms to the chilly night air even as a small voice in your head reminds you that it’s august.

“george,” he extends a hand. it’s big, rough-looking with callouses all over his palms. either he’s a gym rat with pretty show muscles, or… you can’t exactly place the or. but it leads to quite a few interesting theories.

“your…friend didn’t come out with you?”

the man—george—raises an eyebrow, either at the way you leave his hand hanging in mid-air or at the mention of his friend but he does a rather good job of hiding his surprise. if he even felt any, to begin with.

“why? you’re more interested in my friend?”

a small part of you almost purrs in delight at the tinge of jealousy in his tone. good, possessive men know how to make nights like these into memorable ones. his fingers curl slightly, ready to put the extended hand down. the nicotine stains on them should have put you off a long time ago. instead, you find yourself looking at those fingers; imagining things you really shouldn’t.

“you always answer questions with more questions?” you bite your bottom lip, letting just the hint of a smile ghost over your mouth. let him work to figure out your tone. your intentions.

george chuckles deeply, sucking air between his teeth, and about to say something when you hear the second set of footsteps. these are imperceptibly heavier, almost like you know who it is…

a smirk curls up your mouth as george turns around to look at—

“ross…” he says quietly.

possessive men know how to have wild nights.

possessive men are also…incredibly easy to predict.

george is behind you, pressed up against your naked ass, hard and thick. the only thing that separates you are his cotton brief. it only took you fifteen minutes to decide to take both the men home with you. and judging from the minimum resistance you got from either of them, one thing is clear—this isn’t their first rodeo.

“you feel this, darling?,” george whispers, mouth brushing over the shell of your ear while rolling your nipple softly between his fingers.

it’s a lot of stimulation. it’s the good kind of stimulation, the kind that has your toes curling and your thighs shaking. and if it weren’t for the other man kneeling between your legs, holding you up with his hand on your hips, you would have fallen to your knees a long time ago.

“mm–yes, fuck, it feels good,” you moan, head rolling back to rest against george’s chest. your fingers are tangled up in ross’ hair, long graceful fingers twisting and turning traces of his soft hair between them, guiding him as he licks and sucks your clit until you’re nothing but a wet trembling mess.

ross won’t be outdone so easily. he hums against you, sending vibrations that shoot through your entire body at lightning speed. “is he making you feel better than i am, baby?” he pouts, stopping entirely.

his beard glistens in the ambient lights of the room as he stares at you with intense, blown-out eyes. a whine escapes you, your fingers tighten in his hair—tugging at it harshly and making him groan. it’s so close to your cunt, enough for you feel it but not close enough. you writhe against george, trying to thrust your hips back into ross’ face, trying to get him to continue. but george tsks.

“not before you answer him, baby.” his fingers are back to pinching your nipples; pain and pleasure blending in together in a heady mix. “don’t we deserve to know?”

his voice is gruffer than before, barely restrained—a man so used to commanding people that it rolls off his tongue effortlessly.

ross smirks when you mumble something incoherently, ready to finish what he started but george is not satisfied. “use your words, darling.”

it sends a spark of desperate annoyance through you, clearing the fog in your brain. “ross is better,” you grit out, guiding the man back between your legs smirking at the way george tenses behind you.

for someone who seems so calm and composed he certainly has a competitive streak…

ross grazes his teeth against you, licking it after—almost like a reward for declaring him the winner. you throw a leg over his shoulder, hissing at the way his tongue has better access now, crying out when he swipes his fingers against your folds almost lazily.

you suck in a sharp breath, ready to cry out again but the scream dies in your throat. rather, it’s strangled—literally—by george wrapping his free hand around it, applying pressure to the sides.

“you want to be a brat?” he tsks again, “she wants to be a brat, ross.”

ross laughs breathlessly, letting go of you for just a second, “you’re just a sore loser.” he smirks, eyes alight with mirth. there’s a hint of danger in them, not the kind you sense in george—one that comes with a touch of sadism. ross’ brand of danger feels more arrogant. someone who knows what effect he has on people, on women. he’s not a taker. he’s a giver. and right now, he looks at you like he’d give anything to watch you fall apart with his name on your lips.

the almost lack of oxygen has your head spinning, combined with the knot pulled taut in your stomach—it’s almost impossible to stand up, to make your legs hold you up. but that’s what george is here for.

his fingers adapt a rougher pace, pinching and flicking your nipples, matching ross’s movements. your mind feels like it’s torn both ways, fighting hard to keep track of two sensations, two feelings. it’s too much.

a string of curses fall from your lips. “gonna cum,” you plead, struggling against ross, desperately trying to get more and more and so much more. “can i cum, please. please–fuck.”

“what should we do, george?” ross hums, ignoring you entirely. his nails dig into your ass, feeling up the curves and the firm muscles. you are nothing but a toy in his hands, for him to use and control. all your bossiness from before melts away as soon as george snakes a hand around your waist, stroking ross’ head and guiding it the way he wants to.

ross doesn’t resist, he only chuckles, making you cry out pleas once again.

“have you earned it, sweetheart?” george asks, whispery rough voice burrowing on the insides of your skull.

have you?

you nod, or try to at least. it’s hard when your head rests limply on his chest, throat gripped between his hands.

“please, yes. i’ll do what you want, pl–fuck, fuck.”

“whatever we want?”

“whatever yo–you want.”

“go on then,” george pinches your nipple, twisting it between his fingers, “give him a taste.”

he’s barely halfway through the sentence when you scream out incoherently, falling apart as waves after waves of pleasure hit you all at once. everything goes white for a split second, all that remains is intoxicating pleasure. you have no sense of time, of self. only that one man holds you up as the other laps at your folds greedily, licking away every last drop of what you have to offer.

“want a taste?” ross smirks. his voice sounds like it’s coming from somewhere under water. you’re unsure if you can stand up on your own just yet. vestiges of the orgasm course through you, heady and hot. “she’s fucking sweet, george, like honey.”

ross stands up, right in front of you, tall and imposing. and for the first time, you’re between both of them, feeling their sweaty skin on yours, inhaling them greedily.

“open your mouth,” he commands, fingers taking hold of your chin and roughly tilting it up. you know what’s coming as you watch the sinister half-smile on his face. and oh how delightlfully right you are.

the moment you open your mouth for him, ross spits in it; saliva mixed with your slick still coating his tongue.

“good girl,” he whispers, turning your face to george who captures your mouth in a rough kiss. his tongue flicks on the insides of your mouth, searching, tasting you and ross together. he moans, satisfied. “now about that promise…”

“be a good girl and get on all fours”

it’s a shock to you how ross takes charge when he wants to. george doesn’t contradict him, he only watches with vague amusement as you try holding yourself up on shaking arms and legs, drenched in sweat and thighs sticky with your own slick.

your entire body buzzes with adrenaline, shivers racking down your spine, still needy for more and more, still wanting to please the men who have been pleasing you for… what feels like hours now.

“now,” george says, walking up to you and stopping just in front of you, “you can take both of us, can’t you?”

you peer up at george, tall and imposing george who looks at you with such blatant lust that it makes a tiny moan slip out of you. you can, you have been dying to do just that. now you look at him through your eyelashes and through the sweaty hair sticking to your forehead, falling in your eyes.

“yes,” you nod eagerly, “please, yes.”

the men smile, all teeth and hardness and intensity—it’s intoxicating. almost hypnotising, you get on your knees, hand drifting between your legs one more time just to feel the friction again but ross is quicker.

“ah–ah!” he quickly catches your wrist, before it’s even reached past your navel. “that’s our job, darling. all you need to do is get on all fours and look pretty.”

“but she already is so pretty,” george tsks, palming himself through his briefs. his cock is a stark, thick outline that stands out, making you drool. if he already looks so big and delicious then how good would it be to feel him on your tongue and stretching out your mouth?

the moment stretches on—you on all fours, on trembling, shaky limbs, waiting there like a good little slut for either one of these men to fill you up.

george continues to play with himself, fingers dipping in and out of the waistband of his underwear, touching and teasing. until finally he pulls his boxers down. you watch, transfixed as george shamelessly pumps himself in front of you, head thrown back, throaty moans echoing in the room as he slides his fist around his cock. you stare, eager and waiting, almost leaning forward.

behind you, ross is silent. you can almost imagine him staring at the scene in front of him in awe and lust. you try to imagine it from his perspective. your dripping swollen cunt right in front of him growing wetter still the more you watch george.

“don’t tease,” you almost whine, unable to take more of this. you need to know what he tastes like. and you need it now.

“eager, are we?” george asks, walking up to you. “are you not pleasing her enough, ross?” he tuts and ross chuckles; throaty and distracted.

you get little warning before you feel ross sliding a finger up your slit, lazily collecting your wetness and then the tell-tale sound of his tongue lapping it up from his fingers. it’s filthy and disgusting, it makes you arch your back and drives you almost crazy with want.

“i could do better than your hand.” your grin matches george’s who comes to a stop in front of you.

“guess she likes me better, ross.”

ross huffs, “we’ll see.”

before you have the chance to respond, ross draws a hiss of pleasure out of you. his length drags against your cunt, almost between your ass cheeks, sliding just the tip in. no further. red, hot need spears through you. if the men are determined to tease and taunt you then it’s for you to take matters into your own hands.

before george can registers it, you cup a hand around his ass, pulling him forward until his cock practically rests on your face.

a thick vein runs along the side, pulsating, practically inviting you to trace it with your sharp fingernail. you let your tongue swirl over his slit, humming at the salty taste of his precum. george moans as the vibrations of your hum hit. ross moves his hips slowly, almost pulling out before slamming into you fully. the force of it has you choking on george, gagging around him, drooling messily.

“breathe,” he commands softly, stroking your hair. you do as he tells you, relaxing your throat more and letting his weight rest on your tongue.

the sides of your mouth burn from the stretch, black, glittery mascara tears stain your face. and yet all you care about is this, here, now. it’s fullness like you’ve never experienced before, delicious and thick, drawing out gasps and moans from you that mix with his grunts.

“such a perfect girl,” he coos, “isn’t she ross? doesn’t she feel fucking great?”

ross hums behind you, thrusting into you again at a steady pace. shameless need and lust pools in your belly, bleeds through your veins as you trace along george’s cock with your tongue. his fingers remain tangled in your hair, guiding you, commanding you to please him as he wishes.

you hollow our your cheeks, licking and sucking until his hips move in much the same pace as ross’ do.

ross’ hand snakes up your waist, between your legs again, finding your clit again to rub and pinch, to make you whine. each one of his flicks makes you moan around george, sending small hums of pleasure right up his spine. he looks blissed out, head rolling and eyes half-lidded. a surge of pride runs through you at the sight.

ross’ fingers dig into your hips, bruising the soft flesh. twinges of pain intertwine with sparks of pleasure as he pushes in, stretching you out and filling you in.

“taking me so well, sweetheart,” he praises. the term of endearment from his mouth makes your knees weak and your legs tremble but ross holds you up, slamming into you until he bottoms out again and again.

flesh slaps against flesh—rhythmic sounds punctuated by guttural grunts. the position you’re in allows ross to thrust deeper each time, hitting your g-spot repeatedly. if your mouth weren’t otherwise occupied, he would have had you mewling by now. but that doesn’t mean you don’t let out the occasional whimpers as you continue to bob your head up and down george’s dick.

the man is close, you can tell. his cock twitches and spasms in your mouth. he has lost some of his rhythm, hips bucking wildly as he chases his pleasure. you can’t help but caress the base of his cock with your hand, moving it lower to softly squeeze his balls.

“shit–shit,” he curses loudly, “do that again.”

so you oblige, letting your nails graze on the sensitive skin. within seconds, you feel his hold tightening in your hair. george fucks your mouth with wild abandon, careless thrusts—he couldn't care less about the drool dribbling down your chin, about your tear-stained face. the burn around your lips.

“gonna cum, darling, doing so well,” he grounds out. your own body mirrors the feelings as ross continues to thrust faster and faster.

the knot in your stomach tightens, blood pumps through your veins, infused with lightning until the bitter-salty taste of cum fills your mouth. george cums, groaning loudly and shooting spurts of his release down your throat that you lap up hungrily. some of it dribbles down the side of your chin but you don’t swallow just yet. instead, you open your mouth wide open for him to have a look.

“you’re killing me,” he swears, trying to get a grip on himself. only then do you swallow, whining loudly when ross pinches your clit, kneading the bundle of nerves in rough circles.

“go on,” he commands, “cum for us. wanna feel you around me before i fill you up.”

it only takes one more thrust from ross before you’re almost falling down face first from the force of the orgasm that hits you. vaguely you’re aware of ross cumming inside you, of it spilling down your thighs, mixing with your own release. vaguely you’re aware of george falling to his knees in front of you, legs still spasming as he watches you fall apart again and again.

you cry out something unintelligent—perhaps their names, perhaps something else. the world blacks out, until slow, blurred images creep back into your line of sight.

the beginning of the night, the pathetic date is long gone from your mind. right now all you can think of is ecstacy.

and then perhaps a round two.

lemme know what you think <3

taglist: @scooby-doodoo, @partoftheairforce, @beachesgetpeaches, @justgoatsbreakinghearts0855

add yourself to the taglist

#RIGHT. GOODBYE.#ross macdonald #george daniel #ross macdonald x reader #ross macdonald x you #george daniel x reader #george daniel x you #ross macdonald smut #george daniel smut #the 1975 #the 1975 smut #matty healy #adam hann #smut writing #smut fic #minors do not interact #female reader #the 1975 fic #three/some

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the-kingshound · 6 months ago

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Warning inane ramble incoming, it’ll probably be annoying I apologize. (*_ _)人 I spent the last several days reading every post here. I managed to convince myself to start liking some (sorry about that I’m sure it was annoying to get all those notifications) I have this weird thing where I get nervous about liking older posts cuz I mean it’s been a long time and it’s unprompted so that’s weird right? It feels weird like I’m doing something wrong or I’m being annoying, I considered reblogging too but somehow that felt worse? Sorry I am not good with social rules they confuse me both on and offline Idk my brain is wrong and I’m just a nervous socially anxious snail. (＞﹏＜)

Anyways just wanted to gush about how much I love it here and I’m never leaving (´꒳`) ♡ First and foremost Yniol has a special place in my heart they will forever be my favorite bestie (*＾ω＾)人(＾ω＾*), yes I am biased as my partner is grey and though they don’t play IFs they were thrilled to learn about your character! Also your writing is just phenomenal, your fans are fun and creative, your characters give such warm and positive energy I love them so much they’re perfect, the inclusivity is such chefs kiss ( ´ з `) 🤌🏻✨, the angst is delicious, the fluff is so sweet and comforting, the spice is ... very blush-worthy (⁄ ⁄>⁄ ▽ ⁄<⁄ ⁄). This has been a journey I laughed, I cried, I giggled, and I blushed and I have enjoyed every bit of it from pasta discourse to Moldien cult wars to Arthur bunnies, I’ve had the most wonderful time. Now my mind is gonna be filled with Arthurian stuff for months my maladaptive daydreaming is having the time of its life I have a road trip next week and I’m so looking forward to just staring out a window for 6+hours while my Hound's just alternating daydream adventures with the cast o(≧▽≦)o. Also speaking of your amazingly wonderful, sweet, and supportive cast I have decided my (though I love them all) favorite poly pairings are Arthur/Morien and whole crew polycule I’d sell my soul for those but I 100% understand why you can’t really do that. I don’t think I have the endurance in me to code a single poly no matter how much I wish it so the fact you’re doing any let alone several is just god tier you are awe inspiring.

Alas I have rambled far far to much I wish I could be more eloquent in expressing just how much I enjoyed experiencing all of this but for now this is the best I can do (╥ω╥). Thank you for sharing your wonderful work it’s truly a gift to experience. ଘ(੭ˊ꒳ˋ)੭✧ I wish you wealth, health, and all the best in all your creative endeavors. -🐌

No, please please do not apologize. You made my entire week <3 This ask is straight up going into the folder where i keep my motivation to write and to be just a little proud of my work, thank you so so much for sending it.

For anyone having the same thoughts about liking or reblogging old posts: please do it. When I see the notifications, get very giddy and pleased, and I hope you are enjoying the food. Liking, and especially reblogging things, even more so if you add tags and reactons, not only fills me with glee but it also reminds me of old asks that I want to reblog again for new followers. So yeah, I love it, please feel free to go on a liking/reblogging spree!

You are so relatable for the maladaptive daydreaming (this game was absolutely born out of my own mental movies), I wish I could speed up the writing and editing for the next update so you can read it while you travel but I'm afraid it's a lost cause (I have been working on things, even now, but I am currently rewriting like half of it and while it is way better it takes sooo much time and energy). Knowing my characters and story are in someone's thoughts it the best kind of reward I need. I will never likely monetise this game, so this is the thing I wish to leave people with, and I hope the characters can be comforting and keep you company <3

You have no idea how much I would love to write the full polycule... maybe one day :,) But don't lose hope for the Arthur/Morien poly yet, as I decided to cancel the Gwyar/Morien poly and now I have a potentially free slot. In any case, awww, please know that this ask made me so happy today and will be in my thoughts as tkh is in yours.

Please have a lovely day and a lovely week and also a very lovely trip! Thank you again so so much!!

#lovely adorable anons #also never apologize for sening asks in anon i understand #i do the same #(anxiety)#love you!!#anon love

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books · 1 year ago

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Writing Workshop Week 1: Show & Tell

Hello, writers of tumblr! It’s @bettsfic again with this week’s generative workshop.

Today we’re doing what might be my favorite class activity: Show & Tell.

You might be thinking, do you teach kindergarten or something? No, I teach college. But my students are often weary, downtrodden 20 year olds who are more than happy to go back to basics. Tumblr—being a website of people who care deeply about things and share that passion with others—seems like a great place to host Show & Tell.

Speaking of basics, let’s first talk a bit about…

The Writing Identity

The goal of many writers is to become better at writing. While I think this is an admirable goal it’s also a complicated one, because good writing is entirely subjective. Everyone has their own definition of what good writing looks like based on their knowledge base, history, and personal tastes. And so I often encourage my students, before they begin their journey of becoming a better writer, to step back and ask themselves, “What does good writing look like to me?”

And that’s the thing: you can’t really become a better writer. You can become a more patient writer, with the ability to write and revise multiple drafts of a work. You can become a more ambitious writer, with the ability to write longer stories and deeper themes. You can become a more detailed writer, with the ability to render images and the small details of living that maybe other people don’t notice. Writing is a skill that requires practice, but it also requires joy. You have to enjoy the work more than you fear the potential for failure. And to enjoy the work, you need to honor yourself, your interests, and your ideals. In other words, to become a better writer, you have to become more you.

I remember when I first started writing, I frantically sought out writing advice. I clung to simple adages and rules: active verbs are stronger than passive verbs; remove words like “think” and “realize” and other indicators of your characters’ interior experiences; take out adjectives and adverbs. If you were to adhere to all this advice, your writing wouldn’t become stronger, it would become colder. You would write like Hemingway. There’s nothing wrong with Hemingway, but Hemingway already did Hemingway, and that means you’re free not to be Hemingway.

Don’t we read to feel closer to people, to experience that which we couldn’t otherwise experience? The beautiful thing about prose is that it’s the only medium that conveys consciousness, because language is the way we contain our thoughts, and writing them down offers others the chance to understand them. E.M. Forster in his book Aspects of the Novel says that the only difference between a character and a person is that a character’s secret inner life can be known, but a person’s can only be understood in observed behavior. Novels are stories of consciousness; biographies are stories of deeds.

In my early days as a writer, those inane adages of “good writing” began to weigh on me, and I found myself frequently opening a blank document and telling myself, “I’m just going to write something for fun, for me, and so I don’t have to follow any rules.” Every time, that lawless thing I wrote would become better than anything I’d written when I followed the rules. And in this case, “better” means I was proud of it; in writing as close to myself as I could, I was able to help my technical skill reach the level of my personal taste.

Good writing advice doesn’t spout shallow adages of what should be, it tells you all the things that could be; it opens your mind to possibilities and techniques. “Should” restrains creativity; the entire point of writing is to be creative. To be creative means to make something that has never existed before. And so one of the first things I tell my students is: You already know everything you need to know about your own writing. You already have good and important stories in you. You just have to sit down and write them.

“Show, Don’t Tell”

One such adage that still really gets to me is “show, don’t tell,” which a lot of writers believe. Many people take it to mean that you should describe the exterior circumstances of your narrator in order to allow the reader to interpret meaning. Instead of describing how your narrator feels, these people would rather have you describe their facial expression. But if you’re so interested in rendering the exterior rather than the interior, you’re better off becoming a director.

Others take it less literally: you show your story instead of tell your story, which, sure, is a valid personal belief for your own work but it’s ambiguous and impractical, and also denies the nature of people to tell stories. Fairy tales and fables are stories that are told. Telling stories came long before showing them.

In some ways, “show, don’t tell,” can be useful. If you spend a thousand words of character A lovingly and carefully describing every detail of character B, you don’t then need to say something like, “She was pining for him,” because you’ve allowed your description to do that work for you. So no, you don’t need to say it, but maybe you want to. Maybe you want to make it inarguable that character A is pining for character B; you don’t want a reader to say, “I think she’s paying that much attention because she wants to kill him and she’s looking for his weak points.”

And so that’s what it comes down to—choice. Ultimately, writing is about making decisions, and those decisions are stronger when you understand all your options.

Behind the adage is a more difficult truth to swallow: prose is both infinite in its potential and also frustratingly limited, because you have no control over your audience. You can lovingly describe every snowflake that falls in a blizzard, and your reader will be taking their own meaning from it—for people who can mentally visualize things, it’s the images their mind conjures; for those who can’t, it’s a mass of facts. And there are also those who are sleepy and missing details, or who are skimming to get to the bits they’re most interested in, or who accidentally dropped their book in the bath and now the bottom half of every page is warped and unreadable.

Or you can say, “It snowed.”

No matter what your beliefs are on “show, don’t tell,” the truth is that it’s a false dichotomy. The very nature of prose is to navigate this divide. Some stories call for more showing, for example when your narrator is at a distance, when we don’t have much access to their thoughts or feelings. Other stories will ask you to tell, especially if we’re deep in your narrator’s head and they’re giving us everything. Showing lends itself to setting, imagery, and plot. Telling lends itself to character, voice, and style. One is not inherently better than the other, in the same way that a screwdriver isn’t better than a hammer—the tool you use depends on the task at hand.

Any time you encounter a trite rule in writing, it’s usually pointing to something much greater and more fun to think about. In this case, showing and telling are two integral tools in meaning-making. For this week’s activity, we’re going to use both show and tell to make meaning.

Prompt time!

In Donald Barthelme's essay “Not-Knowing,” he calls objects magical. “What is magical about the object is that it at once invites and resists interpretation. Its artistic worth is measurable by the degree to which it remains, after interpretation, vital.”

So what does that mean? Although this essay is a hot mess (lovingly), part of its intended work is to be a mess. In fact Barthelme describes the mess of his desk and allows it to define him. It’s covered in coffee cups, cigarette ash, unpaid bills, and unwritten novels. In reality, those objects are just objects, but when rendered in prose, they give us an impression of this particular world and the character within it. The writer renders; the reader interprets. The things we own, that mean something to us, are also things that can define us. Who is the person who carries a leather wallet embossed with their initials, with the inside holding credit cards and a stack of neat bills? Who is the person who carries a canvas wallet with a faded Punisher logo on it, attached to a chain, and the only thing inside it is a Subway rewards card?

Objects are important. Especially in this world we live in where so many things have become virtual, tangibility will always be integral to us. We are a species that reaches out and touches. We like to hold things in our hands. We love things which cannot love us back.

For this week’s prompt fill, I want you to find a magical object for Show & Tell. Ideally, it’s something with a long personal history that’s important to you. Maybe it’s the object you would save in the event of a fire, or maybe it’s something you lost long ago.

First, I’d like you to show us the object by describing it. Then, tell us the story of it.

You can write about how you acquired it and the memories it conjures. Allow yourself to link and associate memories and feelings. Don’t box yourself in too much—just see where it takes you.

But you can also put a spin on it. Here are some ways you can do that:

If you want to try fiction, you can write the same story about your favorite character’s beloved object, or you could completely make up an object and its history.

If you want to try something experimental, you can write a story from the perspective of the object, and maybe its beloved thing is you.

If you want to try poetry, write a poem of your object. This is a separate lesson, but T.S. Eliot’s concept of an objective correlative may be illuminating to consider.

The purpose of this activity is to dig through your memories and/or observations, connect them, and use something external to conjure meaning from them. You begin with what your object is and it will eventually lead you to what it means.

Questions? Ask ‘em here before EOD Tuesday so @bettsfic can answer them on Wednesday. And remember to tag your work #tumblr writing workshop with betts if you want her to read your work and possibly feature it on Friday!

And, for those just joining us: @bettsfic is running a writing workshop on @books this month. Want to know more? Start here.

#tumblr writing workshop with betts #writers’ room #writeblr #writing advice #show and tell #long post #long text post

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orangedodge · 3 months ago

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What's going on with the X-Men relaunch?

When they first used the Infinity Comic to reset Charles and Alex to their pre-Fall of X versions, I didn't think it was that big of a problem. Charles isn't appearing in comics at the moment, and the fact is that no one really cares about Alex Summers anyway. But Magneto is core cast of the flagship title. Fundamental alterations to his status quo need to be covered in that publication, not preempted by however many months in advance with digital only content that most readers will never even know exists. Even leaving aside inherent scumminess of paywalling required supplementary content, there's no indication anywhere in X-Men that you need to go open Marvel Unlimited if you want the full backstory.

This isn't the only mess they've gotten into with digital content since July. Previously, they spent two months inserting blank pages into the print and kindle editions of all of their comics, that could only be redeemed for a final page on the Marvel app. Before finally backtracking they spent two months fighting their fans on social media, and insisting that these pages were only fun bonus that you didn't have to worry about. Yet several titles used them to introduce their respective villains, and the X-Force relaunch chose to simply redact the actual final page of the issue, for phone readers only.

It's just not a fun way to read things. No one wants to have to put down a physical comic, or close out kindle, and then go open a separate app on their Apple/Android device to finish the story. Or to have to remember to check Marvel Unlimited every Tuesday for weekly backup strips to find out what's going on with the co-lead of the comic they're already paying for. I've seen it suggested that these amount to schemes by the publisher to get more people to install Marvel's various phone apps, and that's probably true, but whatever inanity is going on behind the scenes there is at least some measure of obligation on the part of the editors to not make the rollout so intrusive. The actual comics need to at least be readable.

#x-men #x men from the ashes #comics #comic books #marvel #erik lehnsherr #max eisenhardt

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synthshenanigans · 11 months ago

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I'm curious as to peoples idea for what he'd do for the next power hour so

[These all being popular ideas or ppl he's mentioned]

This was all just a ploy to get you to read my info dump theory on the concept of a Chonny Jash Power Hour loser HAHAHA

Im joking tho. Not about my CJPH theory, that is very much real but I'm not forcing you to read it lol

However if you're curious, my inane rambles are further down :}

[Long Rant Post Below]

Okay so I'm gonna start with the basic idea I got it from; that being Nerd. Nerd already foreshadowed the THDPH & the WWPH [Even down to the last song for each of them] Not only that, but he references the stuff hes done in the past as well with a break/pause inbetween.

[This is what I mean]

The first three being all stuff he already did. BDG with Pocket, Tally Hall with Vol.1 & then Cage by Tim Minchin being the start the power hours.

The next two being the power hours he would do after this song [Memento Mori & Charlie's Inferno-Will Wood & That Handsome Devil]. But those are the only songs he would reference in Nerd, leaving no more clues as to what the last one would be. The only thing left in it is the video game references & Stairway to Heaven in the ending. [Which oddly enough also fit the pattern in a way. StH being about dying and the afterlife like Memento Mori & Chonny's Inferno and the video game references being all covers he made on his old channel]

While the VG refs could be a hint at a Videogame or Toby Fox Power Hour, I think at most, if its a clue at all, hinting at the next thing he does is recovering old songs.

----

Next, a couple of his songs reference his past stuff. Fine, I'm Fine has a good amount of lines that vaguely refer back to songs from the before [heres a post that goes more into it that's pretty cool!!]. And more importantly Dear Machine references Pocket, Dream (Outro from Calamity) & wings of wax. Pocket being later used in Nerd & the mention of Icarus coming back in Art. Not only that, but the voice in the very end Thermodynamic Lawyer is the exact same [if not very close to] voice filter/effect he uses in Dear Machine. Even down to the British accent he does in it. [Tho it is fairly normal for a music artist to reference their older songs in their music so it could be nothing]

Speaking of Dear Machine tho, quick thing to add about it is that it shows he not against covering his own songs. While yea technically its just a different version of Ode of the Cog, DM,HtC in a way counts as a cover of OotC. Same goes for bargaining/compromise & The Ballad of Dr. Jekyll.

----

Another idea with a CJPH is that in the CJFS discord theres a "Question of the Day" Channel. Where, as the name says, a Mod or Helper will ask a CJ related question & everyone can give their idea/imput on it. For Day 100, as a special fun lil thing, they asked Chonny if he wanted to give a question for that day. His question being:

And yes he does say that he doesnt plan on doing anything like that in future [if he even were to do it]. I fully believe he wasn't lying there & honestly I never saw him redoing any song ever until I had the idea of a CJPH [aside from stuff like Spring and a Storm & Storm and a Spring obviously]. But this is the best idea I could ever see him doing that. Also that question was from early August so a fair amount of time has passed. Whether thats enough time to equal "at least in the near future at all" I have no clue, but it is a thought.

----

One of my last points [that I remember atm lol] is on how he would end the power hours. Cos like, while yea he does whatever he wants & doesn't rlly follow what anyone says or asks [which I 100% agree with & is completely valid btw], I'd imagine he'd still want to end the PHs with a bang. Which is why I originally didnt think the recent one would be Will Wood.

He's stated a couple of time that hes one of his favorite artist & he definitely knows that a huge chunk of his fan base listen to WW as well. So why not end with that? Why not end with one of the most requested artist people wanted him to cover? Why wouldn't he end with a power hour of the artist that was his #1 on his Spotify Wrapped? What else could he do after that? Well maybe he'd go with his #2 artist? WHICH IS JUST HIMSELF BBYYYY

Plus, the name Power Hour already comes from this:

So it's very likely he's had himself play multiple times in a row & had a "Chonny Jash Power Hour".

Of course theories are just theories so there's always the chance I'm wrong & just insane. And again he does whatever he wants whenever he wants so who knows what it'll be. I just think id be an interesting idea for him to do.

As for how a Chonny Jash Power Hour would look? Maybe each song being a cover of a song from a past album or single? I'd imagine one from the before. & Covered in Discontent [maybe Gothic Whore?]. Like remake Pocket since its been referenced so much, tho that's still just a BDG cover so who knows. the before. would be interesting just to see how his perspective has changed since he originally wrote those songs. Gothic Whore he already has 2 songs that have a story version & a him version so I can see him doing another.

I HIGHLY doubt he'd do anything related to Vol.1 as its his completely separate thing & he doesn't rlly wanna touch any song that's TH/HMS related until whenever he feels like starting Vol.2 [which is valid lol]. If anything I could maybe see like TWWAY, Special or maybe Greener? Or go a different route with the og I'm Gonna Win or like a more outta the box one with like Just a Friend [only cos be did a 20 second "cover" of it in Mucka Blucka]. Again, I do not see him touching anything Vol.1 related but still something to entertain ig? [4th TME cover; The Chonny Electric when/j]

Tho maybe he'd just remake songs that he he fully made [like the before. or Gothic Whore], since those are more of actual Chonny Jash songs rather than the others just being covers. Would be very cool to maybe see a remake of some of his Majora's Mask song tho [no this isn't me coping over HEAL not being on spotify shush]. Or maybe he'd do songs from his old stuff like Don't Take it Personally? [also not me coping over wanting that song on Spotify too]

Idk these are just my thoughts on the idea of a CJPH [or even a Can of Soup Power Hour/j]. Either way I am gonna say idc what he'd do, BDG or Streetlight Manifesto are my other guesses, but anything he makes is always rll good & fun so I'll be interested to see whatever it is.

But ya know considering I typed all this out in the span of an hour & a half I kinda hope im not wrong PFFT

#apologies if there's any grammar or spelling mistakes lol #i just typed a lotta insane ramblings so im bound to mess up somewhere. also i am dyslexic #if you actually managed to read all that. Congrats & thank you :D! Also why tho! you're insane for listening to me being insane/j #I hope I made sense at least #And if you spent any time even glancing at my text thank you a lot but I hope you aren't bored lol #also its still gonna be a bit since he does a power hour but still curious as to ppls ideas of it #at least it BETTER be awhile. bro better take that damn br8k #chonny jash #moss post #KJ is going insane again

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kiefbowl · 2 years ago

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job interview advice pls!

Research the company before hand via their website. Try to mirror the language they use publicly. If they have a section about company culture, talk up company culture. If they have their mission statement on their website, try to appear to align with their values. You don't want this to feel too rehearsed or fake, so don't practice too much and don't try to memorize things off their website. Just read it up and get a sense of their vibe and the words they like to use, and keep it in the back of your mind. If it flows with the conversation, you could casually mention you saw something on the website you had a question about, thus proving you did your research (which is good!)

Have questions at the ready, and don't have zero questions. In fact have a lot of questions. Have questions about the job and company (and benefits!!!!!), but also have questions about career growth and the next step process. I always ask "how many other candidates are you considering?" because this will give you a sense of where you stand. For example, they might tell you "we have several more we're interviewing this week" or they might say "we've interviewed about five and will be discussing our decision tomorrow." Or they might be so vague you can assume they're not going to consider you past this point. Other great questions are "What are the next steps" and "How soon will you be making the decision" so that you aren't walking out unsure of when, how, or if you'll hear from them again. Be your own best advocate. Another thing to ask is questions about the company from the interviewer's perspective - "How long have you worked here? What's your career path looked like?" People love talking about themselves and this also demonstrates you're looking to fit into the whole infrastructure, not just trying to land a job.

Try to treat it like a conversation. It can be intimidating if you're just starting out, but if you try to come off as a pleasing yes man so excited to answer the questions they come up with, that's not going to be very memorable. Also if while answering a question, you volley back a question at them, you have now done a little exchange of power where you are now in control of the conversation a bit, because they will answer and then you get to say the next thing. Once they're talking about something, instead of being in the position where you have to come up with interesting things to talk about on the fly and hope they're relevant, they might remind you of something worthwhile to talk about. Is it more comfortable being asked "What sort of difficult choices have you had to make" or having a conversation with a person who might say "I remember when I was first starting out such and such thing happened" which might genuinely remind you of a relatable experience you had totally forgotten about. See the interviewer as a resource of knowledge, not just gatekeeper to what you want.

You have to seem like a fun and nice person, and you should be honest. "I'm a little nervous, I'm really excited about this opportunity" is not cringy, it's relatable and an ice breaker, and you've turned your negative "I'm nervous" into a positive "I'm eager." Things like "I'm looking for something that has flexible hours" might cost you an offer at a job you'd be miserable at, which can be frustrating at first but good in the long run. You obviously want to be selectively honest and present things in a professional way, but people don't want to work with wet blankets and ego maniacs. Cracking a joke, laughing, talking up hobbies, these are good things. Finding some common ground with the interviewer is fun too, because sometimes you knock them off track and you guys are just shooting the shit, and then they recommend you because they just remember liking you.

Treat the interview like a reasonable and good process, even if you hate it. Yeah, you're on the back foot. Yeah, it can feel inane sometimes. If you go into an interview with a sour attitude about how it should work differently, it doesn't matter how good of an actor you are, it'll come across. You won't be prepared to treat it like it's worth the time for both of you. The interviewer is there to find someone capable, worth the effort, with some potential, so treat it like talking to you is worth it when they probably have 100 other things they need to get back to. You're there to show you can do the job, you're fun to work with, and you want to fit into the company culture and infrastructure, so treat it like you're marketing yourself. You have to sell yourself not as the best person for the job, but the best person for the company, and you're happy to talk about it for the sake of the interviewer giving you a portion of their day!

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basilone · 8 months ago

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Sometimes, war is the province of women. An alternate take on the battle for air dominance over the skies of Europe during World War Two, as told through the stories of an American all-female bomber crew and the people around them.

This is a collection of standalone works that all interlock to form one big patchwork quilt of stories. It will see new additions every so often, especially because a lot of it is written to prompts. The collection on AO3 is my best attempt at organizing it in chronological order.

[click here for the WIP story collection!]

Want to know a little more about the OCs featured in this collection? Please click the readmore below!

Charlotte “Lottie” Rivers-Mayhew Fighter pilot turned bomber pilot Can fly anything, will try anything. Big mouth, little heart. Lives in the land of innuendo and crude jokes. Loud about her whole existence. Very smart, but downplays that like whoa. Julie “Jules” Langdon Bomber pilot Runs this gig and everyone else just needs to get with her program. Great at reading people the riot act. Comically unimpressed by everything that lands in her path. Nosewrinkles at any and all delays. Known for slipping people an extra bite to eat. Christina “Tiny” Heartfield Bomber co-pilot Needs five hours to get ready for any kind of social event. Silver spoon baby. Knows all the gossip and all the good songs. Gets a little bit stressed about flying in warzones. Loves a good ghost story. Eleanor “Nora” Graham Navigator The Mom Friend. Prone to giving hugs and peptalks. Bossy and quite rude when things don’t go her way. Cannot flirt her way out of anything. If you see her running, that’s just standard procedure. Valerie “Val” Hodges Radio operator Absolute poker-faced ballsy liar. Most innocent face in the whole crew. Smokes more than her job should allow. Will try to wiggle out of any lectures by offering the most inane excuses. There’s not a puzzle she can’t solve. Genevieve “Two” Hodgson Tail gunner Shows up late to everything except the war. Always chewing gum. Queen of half-hearted salutes and vague politeness. Keeps saying she’s too poor for this level of bullshit. Has a mean right hook. Madeleine “Push” Perrault Flight engineer Making lists calms her down. Can and will call you stupid in four different languages. Thinks planes are better than people. Voice like a foghorn with the attitude to match. Believes she can fix anything. Evelyn “One-Eye” Carter Ball turret gunner Happy-go-lucky baby of the group, rolling with life’s punches. Will talk your ear off. Could probably get away with murder. Best gunner in the crew. Can be painfully naïve. Dorothy “Dee” Llewellyn Waist gunner Born a pessimist. Genuinely thinks no man should ever sport a mustache. Has a limitless supply of stories about her family. Very protective. Would inspire a riot if anyone ever let her talk long enough without interruptions. Maxine “Max” Morrison Waist gunner Bold and brash and crackling with energy. Cracks more bad jokes than anyone alive. Has developed some rather complicated handshakes. Will interrupt any event or conversation. If you see her running, something’s probably chasing her. Stella “Frosty” Lombardi Bombardier Icy calm in any crisis. Can calculate any bomb drop. Complains about the food. Is a true girl’s girl and refuses to so much as speak to most men. Never wants to miss out on the fun.

Lucille Dorrance-Jones, goes by Lucy Jones Nurse The singlemost stubborn person on the planet. Thinks some injuries are fascinating. Harbors a healthy distrust of bureaucracy and paperwork. Can probably drink you under the table. Encourages anyone to sing. Cressida Dorrance-Jones Interrogator Sharp as a tack. Does not forgive, does not forget. Secretly more big-hearted than people would give her credit for. Really wants to fly a plane. Has an ongoing one-sided vendetta with Meatball. Darlene Mayfair Mechanic Cheerful and spirited. Very gifted storyteller. Turns shy when complimented. Ride or die for people and sticks with them longer than they might deserve. Marches to the beat of her own drum. Georgina “George” Campbell Mechanic Has a soft spot for strays. Suffers no fools. Is here to win a war, not ogle cute men. Perpetually fighting a losing battle against the grease stains on her uniform. The best co-conspirator you could ask for. Imogene “Genie” Chapman Clubmobile girl Very outgoing people-person. Better at giving advice than at taking it. Designated hair-cutter. Loves movies and dancing. Knows just about anybody by name. Jack Ellis OSS Doesn’t miss a beat. No-nonsense natural leader. Very determined to do what he believes is the right thing. Talks about the war in terms of “the game”. Warm and caring once he lets his guard down.

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iwanthermidnightz · 1 year ago

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Just a few excerpts below, but please read the full article, it’s really good!

In their live shows and on The Record, the group take turns singing lead vocals, meaning they regularly get to stand a couple of feet away from the spotlight – which I sense is a more natural position for each of them. “[Touring is] way more fun together, and easy together,” says Dacus, addressing her bandmates. “It’s cute watching y’all have your little bit during ‘Cool About It’, and when you look at each other in ‘Anti-Curse’, I have no choice but to stan.” As a band, they share the weight of responsibility that they usually have to shoulder alone.

The crowds are so deeply engaged, not just because of the emotionally devastating content of the songs, but because of what Boygenius represents. They are a queer-identifying, all-female rock group in 2023, triumphantly landing themselves in spaces that used to be dominated entirely by straight men, such as their Rolling Stone cover earlier this year, in which they playfully replicated a classic 1994 photoshoot of Nirvana in business suits. And it’s not just that: they are rock stars in a very traditional sense – as their bombastic, thrashy live show, replete with stage diving et al, goes to show – who also sing songs every night about how much they love and appreciate one another. “We talk to each other about our feelings and process emotions as adults,” Baker says. “Instead of screaming at each other and throwing handles of vodka backstage.”

The band’s willingness to step up and wade into political issues has further solidified the bond they’ve formed with their fans. Earlier this summer, they performed in drag in Tennessee to protest against the state’s anti-LGBTQ+ and anti-drag laws. In May last year, when it was leaked that Roe v Wade would be overturned by the US Supreme Court, Bridgers shared on Twitter that she had undergone an abortion the previous year, alongside a link to a donation page. Young, vulnerable people are seeing their favourite rock band stand up for them – it’s powerful, and the love and appreciation the fans feel for that is clear during the live shows. At concerts throughout the year so far, there have been reports of people throwing things at artists – phones, wheels of brie, their dead mother’s ashes – but at Boygenius gigs, fans throw pink carnations, in reference to a line that Dacus sings in “We’re in Love” (“I’ll be the boy with the pink carnation pinned to my lapel”). “We’ve given a lot of who we are as people in our art, through interviews and social media,” Dacus says. “I think that’s maybe the silver lining of the parasocial relationship; they might want to treat us the way they treat their friends, instead of a mysterious, untouchable, unfazeable, unhurtable thing.”

Boygenius know that they’re speaking to – and at times, for – an underrepresented group, and it’s a point of great pride, a driving force in their work. “Being into our band is a dog whistle for the kind of kid that has similar interests,” says Baker.

“Like a sensitive gay baby,” adds Dacus.

“That is what makes [the job] meaningful to me,” says Baker. “To be away from my family when they need me to be there, to be doing things that I find inane or self-serving. I’m like, ‘Dang, look at all those kids’. Like, actually, there’s 25,000 little gay kids out there who’ve heard us talk about things like: be inside of your life. Pay attention to your friends. It’s worth it to live.”

The group have become the role models they wished they had themselves when they were growing up. “I think that if I had more queer and trans idols when I was younger, it would have felt more normal to me to engage with those things,” Dacus says. “And it’s gotten to the point of silliness, all of our stage antics and kissing at most of the shows, but I wish I had seen playful, joyful depictions of queerness.”

#boygenius #phoebe bridgers #lucy dacus #julien baker

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astrowaffles · 4 months ago

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excuse me (you look like you love me)

Teen audiences | banter | ambiguous ending | for @makkisucks

When you are 27 years old and you are about to make what feels like a life-changing decision, there is only one person you call.

Your best friend.

“What the fuck do you want?” Kaoru rasped through Kojiro’s phone speaker. “It’s 10am, I don’t want to speak to you.”

“But Kaoru! I still don’t know what to do about this wedding!”

“I told you. Lie. Now stop being annoying and let me go back to sleep.”

“Hey! Pay attention! I need to find a girlfriend, stat!”

Kaoru sighed heavily. “That’s never going to happen. Girls hate you. You’re a brute and you��re annoying. Now shut the fuck up.” He hung up.

Well. So much for that plan. The call didn’t even last five minutes.

Wait.

Girls hate him?

“WHAT could you possibly want,” Kaoru snapped as soon as he picked up.

“You’re not a girl!”

“….What.”

“You’re not a girl and you know me really well!”

“Um. I suppose so? Where is this going?”

“You can come with me to Ayame’s wedding!”

OR: after an invite to an ex's wedding puts Kojiro on the spot, he panics and asks Kaoru to help him out. After all, what harm could it do? They'd never *really* be a couple...

Kojiro got the invite in the post two days before he needed to RSVP, which was terrible planning by the mailman and even worse planning by the bride & groom. He didn’t even know who the happy couple were, just two mystery people inviting him to their all-out rich-people wedding with gold invitations and calligraphy signatures. He would think it had come to the wrong address, except that his name was printed neatly on the envelope.

“I got invited to a wedding,” he told Kaoru, as soon as the other man stepped through the door of Kojiro’s apartment.

“Oh? Whose?” Kaoru asked, with the practiced disinterest of someone who hears at least ten inane things a day, most of them coming from Kojiro. He swapped his shoes for his house slippers that were waiting under the coat stand.

“I don’t know,” Kojiro admitted. He jerked this thumb towards the opened envelope on the coffee table.

“You must do,” Kaoru said, confused. “Otherwise why would they invite you?”

“I don’t know,” Kojiro repeated. “They just have.”

“Give me the invitation, numbskull,” Kaoru demanded, sweeping past Kojiro before he could be handed the invite. He quickly pulled it from its envelope and scanned the names. “Oh, you actually are a moron. You do know them. It’s Aya.”

“Aya…?”

“Aya Suzuki. You know, like it says. On the invitation. Which you read.”

“It says Ayame on the invitation.”

“Ayame Suzuki. You didn’t make the connection?”

“I don’t know who Aya Suzuki is either!”

Kaoru sighed and muttered something that sounded a lot like ‘idiot’, and then tapped his wristband. “Carla. Search for photographs from August, 2010.”

Kojiro raised an eyebrow while Carla did her best to trawl through Kaoru’s atrocious camera roll - which he knew from experience mainly consisted of screenshots of emails, which then got sent to him so they could make fun of silly corporate people together. The rest of it was probably memes Reki sent that saved automatically, and maybe some group photos from years ago.

Eventually, one of those group photos was projected from Kaoru’s wristband: Kojiro, Kaoru, and some random girl.

Kojiro peered closer. “Ohhhh, that Aya Suzuki,” he realised. His ex-girlfriend. Of course it was.

“Yes, you gorilla, that Aya Suzuki. Are you going to attend?”

“Hell no.”

“Oh? Why not? I thought you’d like to show off a little.”

“I don’t have anything to show off, do I? She’s getting married, and I’m still single – oh, and I skateboard for a hobby, like a twelve year old.”

“Twelve year olds don’t skate like we do,” Kaoru sniffed. “I think you should go. Free food, and I get a day or two of peace and quiet.”

“You wish you could get rid of me that easily,” Kojiro snorted. “You know I’d be texting the whole time anyway.”

“Mm, but I wouldn’t have to reply.”

Kojiro contemplated this for a minute. Free food, probably free alcohol, plus he had a hotel room. He re-checked the invite. Yup, open bar, and – what was that? A check box?

RSVP plus one, it read tauntingly.

Kojiro groaned. “I can’t do it. They’ve given me a plus one.”

“You don’t have to use it, you know.”

“But then they’ll know I’m single!”

“They don’t care, idiot.”

“But I do!! I’ve been invited to my ex’s wedding and I don’t even have a girlfriend!”

“Just lie and say she couldn’t come,” Kaoru shrugged. “Now, can I have my dinner – if you’ve finished caterwauling?”

Kojiro huffed. “Yeah, I’ve finished. Let’s eat.”

But despite the fact that he’d apparently reached a satisfying compromise for Ayame’s wedding, Kojiro found himself thinking it over again, hours later as he was just drifting off to sleep. Kaoru had long gone home, laden with Tupperware full of leftovers and a promise to host next time (he wouldn’t), and Kojiro missed the distraction of their bickering.

My ex is getting married and I’m single, he thought.

They don’t need to know that, an eviller thought - that sounded a lot like Kaoru -interjected. You can just lie, you know.

I don’t want to lie, he argued. I want to show off something concrete.

Then get a girlfriend, came Kaoru’s voice impatiently. Or don’t. Just RSVP and leave me alone.

“Why is Kaoru in my head?” he wondered aloud. “Get out.” But the advice stuck with him. Get a girlfriend.

Where would he get one from? One of the girls from S would probably oblige, but she’d come across as more of a fan than a partner. No, Kojiro needed someone who’d seem like his equal, someone he was comfortable with and who was comfortable with him. Someone Ayame & Husband would accept as legit.

Did someone like that even exist?

This is too much thinking, his braincells protested, and finally sunk him into unconsciousness.

Waking up the next morning was nothing more than being plunged back into a pit of stress and panic. He didn’t have much time left to RSVP. He wanted to RSVP a plus one. He didn’t have a plus one. He didn’t know where to find a plus one.

When you are 27 years old and you are about to make what feels like a life-changing decision, there is only one person you call. There is only one person who will tell you what they really think you should do.

Your best friend.

“What the fuck do you want?” Kaoru rasped through Kojiro’s phone speaker. “It’s 10am, I don’t want to speak to you.”

“But Kaoru! I still don’t know what to do about this wedding!”

“I told you. Lie. Now stop being annoying and let me go back to sleep.”

“Hey! Pay attention! I need to find a girlfriend, stat!”

Kaoru sighed heavily. “That’s never going to happen. Girls hate you. You’re a brute and you’re annoying. Now shut the fuck up.” He hung up.

Well. So much for that plan. The call didn’t even last five minutes.

Wait.

Girls hate him?

“WHAT could you possibly want,” Kaoru snapped as soon as he picked up.

“You’re not a girl!”

“….What.”

“You’re not a girl and you know me really well!”

“Um. I suppose so? Where is this going?”

“You can come with me to Ayame’s wedding!”

“I can what?”

“Be my fake boyfriend!”

Kaoru hung up.

A minute later, he called back.

“You’re buying me a suit.”

“What?”

“For the wedding. You’re buying me a suit, paying for everything, we’re leaving as soon as I get bored-“

“So you’ll do it?!”

“…I guess so.”

A pause. That had been surprisingly easy, which made Kojiro all the more panicked. “What’s the catch?”

“Hm? You mean besides the huge amount of money you’ll have to shell out?”

“Yeah. You wouldn’t do something like this for free. What else am I gonna owe you at the end of this, you conniving-“

“Oh, you know that word? Wow, Kojiro, you’re getting smarter-“

“Shut up and tell me what you want.”

“I can’t do both,” said Kaoru patronisingly.

Kojiro hoped he could feel his glare at the other end of the line.

Kaoru snorted. “I’m never hosting our dinners ever again.”

Kojiro huffed. “You never do anyway. It’s a deal.”

“Great. Now RSVP. I’m going back to sleep. Bye.”

Realising what was about to happen, Kojiro jammed his finger down on the hang up button; as always, Kaoru got there first. Kojiro sighed.

How on earth was he going to afford all this?

Asking Kaoru to pretend to be his boyfriend was potentially the best idea of Kojiro’s life, he thought, watching Kaoru go through his room like a hurricane, packing with an efficiency that only came with an organised mind and a lot of work trips.

“Why do you still have this?” Kaoru asked, holding up a ratty Hawaiian print shirt.

“I like it.”

“You shouldn’t.”

“Just because you have no fashion sense-“

Kaoru threw the shirt decisively into the back of the closet and continued rustling through Kojiro’s clothes. “You have the taste of an overgrown toddler.” He threw neon flip-flops over his shoulder; Kojiro dodged them and looked into the suitcase Kaoru was putting together.

“I think you’ve packed enough,” he said, eyeing the growing pile of folded clothes. “This is like what I’d wear in a week, not two days.”

“I haven’t even added the clothes for the actual wedding yet,” Kaoru tutted, removing Kojiro’s dry-cleaned suit from the closet and carefully rolling it up. “What shoes are you wearing with this?”

“Um, my formal ones?” Kojiro put them in the suitcase.

“You only have one pair. Of course.” Kaoru rolled his eyes, tucked the suit into the luggage, and zipped the case shut. “There. Now we can go.”

“We still have another hour!” Kojiro complained, lifting the suitcase and testing its weight. “Jeez, Kaoru, what’ve you put in here, bricks?”

“No, moron. You watched me pack it.”

“Yeah, watched you pack bricks.”

“The way you pronounce ‘bricks’ irritates me.”

“Your face irritates me.”

“And here was I, thinking you wanted me to do you a favour-“

“No no no I’m sorry Kaoru please go to this wedding with me-“

“That’s what I thought. Let’s load up the car.”

“You driving?”

Kaoru stared at him. Kojiro sighed. “Of course not. Let’s go.”

Kaoru was generous enough to carry his own suitcase to the car, but left it for Kojiro to put in the trunk while he made himself comfortable inside the car, rigging up Carla to the radio system (a simple task, since he did it every time they went anywhere in Kojiro’s car. It annoyed Kojiro to have his friend’s robot girlfriend in the car with them but he put up with it because Carla was much better at directions than any sat nav he’d ever met.

The drive to the venue was short enough, punctuated by Carla’s robotic voice and Kaoru’s sharp comments on Kojiro’s driving – which inevitably lead to an argument where Kaoru insisted he was not even remotely like a princess, hadn’t he just finished putting up Kojiro’s shelves a week ago, no it didn’t matter that he never drove anywhere, yes he was still entitled to comment on Kojiro’s skills, and would Kojiro please close his huge hairy mouth before he got something in it. Something shaped a lot like Kaoru’s fist.

“Kinky,” Kojiro noted, wiggling his eyebrows.

Kaoru pinched him and threatened to tape his mouth shut.

“Kin-“

“Shut the fuck UP!”

The town was nice. The hotel was nice. Their room was nice. Their bed was nice – they had long given up caring about having to share. 20 years is too long a friendship to care about being in each other’s space. Most importantly, their shower was nice, with water pressure Kojiro had long lost from his own shower at home. Kaoru might have felt differently. He had enough money to get fifty new water-pressured showers, probably, which was why he was already out and dressed by the time Kojiro finished towelling off.

“Imagine if we actually were dating,” Kojiro mused, eyeing the fairy lights above the bed as he pulled his shirt on. “This place’d have us stuck in bed for-“

“Enough,” Kaoru interrupted. “We’re here for free food, not dramatics.”

“You’re more dramatic than me,” Kojiro argued. “Why didn’t you let me finish my sentence?!”

“Because I do not want to hear about what you plan to do with your girlfriend.”

“Whyyy, are you jealouss~?”

Kaoru stared at him.

Kojiro stared back.

“Do we need rules?” Kaoru asked, hunting in his suitcase for a hair tie.

“For what?”

“I don’t know, maybe pretending to be in love?”

“Oh, are we in love already? Damn, this relationship is moving fast.”

“Can you take anything seriously? At all?”

“Nope.”

Kaoru rolled his eyes. “Don’t kiss me, don’t call me any pet names. Don’t do anything stupid.”

Kojiro nodded. “Can I make up our love story?”

“Don’t make it ridiculous.”

“What do you mean?! I wanted to have you ride in on a unicorn and sweep me off my feet, and then-“

Kaoru sighed and finished tying his hair up. “Are you ready for the rehearsal dinner?”

Kojiro pulled his sock on and nearly fell over trying to follow it up with his shoe. “Yep.”

“You’re not.” Kaoru reached over to settle the curls that had flung themselves every way they shouldn’t have on Kojiro’s head. “Now you are. Well, as much as a gorilla like you can be.”

“Gee, thanks,” Kojiro snarked, and tightened Kaoru’s tie a little. “You won’t strangle yourself, y’know.”

“I might, if I have to spend any more time alone with you.”

“Wowwwww..”

Kaoru grabbed Kojiro’s hand and took a deep breath. “I don’t want to do this. At all. With you.”

“So you’d do it with someone else?”

“I’d rather do it with Ayame in front of her new husband.”

“And yet, here you are.” Kojiro squeezed their hands. “Can you manage being affectionate or will it kill you?”

“It’ll kill me,” said Kaoru decisively.

“Then I might finally get some peace and quiet,” Kojiro said gleefully, and they walked out of the room.

“’Jiro!” Ayame greeted enthusiastically when she saw the pair come into the hall. “So nice to see you again!”

“Aya!” Kojiro smiled back; no-one would ever guess he’d been staring at her name in total confusion just a few months ago. “Marriage, huh?”

“Marriage,” Ayame agreed. “And- is that you, Sakurayashiki?”

“Hi,” Kaoru said, only just avoiding sounding bored out of his mind.

“Don’t tell me you’re Jiro’s-“ her eyes flicked down to their joined hands. “Oh! Silly me, of course, I should’ve guessed…”

Kojiro tensed a little, trying to analyse Ayame’s face. He hadn’t thought this far ahead: what if she thought two men holding hands was wrong?

“It’s about time!” Ayame laughed, and grabbed Kojiro’s free wrist to drag him over to meet her fiancé. Kojiro kept his grip on Kaoru to make sure he got pulled along too.

“Why are you pulling me,” Kaoru hissed.

“I’m not going alone,” Kojiro whispered back. “’Sides, what would you do by yourself? Talk to people?” He snorted, causing Ayame to look back in confusion. He shot her a smile and strengthened his grip on Kaoru’s hand.

“That hurts, you stupid gorilla!”

“Sorry, but I need to make sure-“

“This is Izumi!” Ayame said excitedly. She’d let go of Kojiro’s wrist in order to hang off of Izumi’s arm, and was looking at them expectantly. “My husband-to-be!”

“Oh,” said Kojiro, realising he and Kaoru must have been whispering to each other suspiciously right in front of the happy couple. “Nice to meet you.”

“You too,” Izumi said, eyes moving between Kojiro and Kaoru like he was watching a tennis match. “You’re Kojiro, yeah? Knew Aya in highschool?”

“That’s me,” Kojiro agreed, trying to follow the other man’s eye movements. “She was absolute chaos, I can tell you.”

“Don’t embarrass me!” Ayame scolded, slapping Kojiro lightly on the shoulder. “I’ve got some stories about you too, you know.”

“Ah, but you couldn’t embarrass me in front of Kaoru!”

“It’s true, I know everything,” Kaoru nodded.

“So you’re together?” Izumi asked.

“Yep,” said Kojiro, praying Izumi was as cool with it as Ayame had been.

“Oh. How long have you…?”

“They’ve been together since college, surely!” Ayame chirped.

Kojiro stared at her. “What makes you think that?”

Ayame stared back. “Are you joking?”

“He’s always joking,” Kaoru interrupted, rolling his eyes and elbowing Kojiro. “Don’t tease her, dear, she’s right.”

“Dear? I thought you said no petnames?” Kojiro questioned under his breath, then continued at a normal volume, “Sorry, Aya, I couldn’t resist..”

“I said *you* couldn’t call *me* a petname,” Kaoru reminded him.

Ayame laughed. “Silly me, I always fall for your jokes! What kind of idiots would you be if you hadn’t acted on your feelings by college? Of course you got together then.”

“Ah, were we that obvious…?” Kojiro laughed nervously, exchanging a confused glance with Kaoru.

“You really were! You know, darling-“ she turned to Izumi – “They had a secret handshake, and every time they did it I was sure they were going to kiss. Really makes me wonder what I saw in you at all, Jiro – no offence, no offence meant! You were just so obviously into Sakurayashiki…”

“I was?”

“I guess I was just so happy to be picked by someone I didn’t mind if he was actually in love with a man…”

“Was I??”

“Don’t get me wrong, Sakurayashiki was just as bad, he just didn’t have a girlfriend to notice these things…”

“I was not,” said Kaoru decisively. Kojiro inched away slightly in case his friend decided to take his anger out on him.

“You were,” Ayame insisted. “You think I didn’t notice your heart eyes whenever Jiro managed a good trick? I’m not blind, you know.”

“HEART EYES?” Kojiro turned to Kaoru, mirth already dancing in his eyes. “You hear that? You had heart eyes, Kaoru!”

“Of course I didn’t.”

“She says you did!”

“She also says you were in love with me, idiot.”

“You are in love, aren’t you?” Ayame asked, confused.

“Oh- yes, we are,” Kaoru recovered quickly. “I just meant I didn’t think it started in high school.”

“Good save,” Kojiro whispered. Then, at a normal volume, “I think we’d better find our seats before your rehearsal dinner starts. Thanks for the invite!”

“Of course! See you later!” Ayame waved them off with a smile, already turning back to her fiancé to ramble more about her highschool days.

“WhatdidshemeanIwasinlovewithyou?” Kojiro garbled as soon as they were out of earshot.

“I have no idea,” said Kaoru grimly. “But it makes our job easier because she already thinks we’re together. We don’t have to pretend quite so hard.” He dropped Kojiro’s hand. “Drink?”

“Please.” He didn’t say his order; he knew Kaoru knew. Instead, Kojiro sat down at their assigned table and started absently folding origami swans. The table’s other inhabitants didn’t attempt to start a conversation. He watched Kaoru order their drinks at the bar and listened in to the gossip happening at the neighbouring table – someone was getting divorced because the wife had an affair, someone had moved back into their parents’ house after losing their office job, someone had been caught posting on Instagram while at a private christening…

“Here,” said Kaoru, practically shoving the drink into Kojiro’s hands. “What’s got you in such a mess?”

“I’m not a mess!” Kojiro said indignantly, letting his fifth napkin swan fall to the ground as he wrapped both hands around his tall glass. Kaoru pulled a face, probably thinking of the fingerprints Kojiro was leaving.

“You’re a total mess,” Kaoru told him, and swept the swans off the table. “Not that that’s not normal for you.”

“Well, whatever,” Kojiro huffed. “It didn’t concern you at all? That she thought we were in love at 17?”

“What? No. It’s not real, anyway,” Kaoru shrugged, taking a sip of his own drink. “Now, when’s dinner arriving?”

Getting back to the hotel room was significantly harder than leaving. For one thing, Kojiro was a lightweight and could already feel the fuzz overtaking his brain by the second drink. Kaoru had cut him off early, but had kept drinking himself, meaning they were both struggling to walk in a straight line as they attempted to return to their room. Neither of them were so bad they couldn’t speak, but Kojiro was bad enough that he couldn’t stop speaking, rambling on about nothing much as Kaoru shuffled through his pockets for a keycard.

“I should’ve just kept hold of it,” Kaoru muttered, finally finding the plastic card in Kojiro’s jacket.

“But you didn’t,” Kojiro pointed out.

Kaoru rolled his eyes. “Thanks, genius. Go inside.”

Kojiro obediently went inside, only to turn back around at a loud thunk coming from behind him; it was Kaoru, walking into the doorframe.

“Careful,” said Kojiro.

“Don’t be irritating,” said Kaoru.

Kojiro shed his shirt, tie, shoes, socks, and eventually pants; Kaoru didn’t force him into the shower and he didn’t feel like being clean so many times in one day (he’d showered this morning AND before the dinner, alright?!) so he simply clambered into bed and watched Kaoru attempt to remove the ten hair ties holding his hair up.

“Is it weird that we’re sharing a bed?” Kojiro pondered.

“No? We’ve done that since we were five?”

“Well, yeah, but we’re not dating or anything…”

“And? What does that have to do with it?” Kaoru swapped his shirt for a pyjama t-shirt and started stepping out of his pants.

Kojiro thought about it. “Isn’t this all couple stuff?”

“No, because we’re doing it and we aren’t a couple.” Kaoru added something under his breath that sounded a lot like ‘yet’.

“Hm. Alright.”

Kaoru slid into bed and reached out to turn the lights off from the switches by the nightstand.

“…Kaoru?”

“Hm?”

“Can we cuddle?”

For a minute, it genuinely seemed that Kaoru would say no, freaked out by all the ‘couple stuff’ they’d been accused of that day. But then, a few seconds later, Kojiro heard a soft huff, the sound of Kaoru expelling a fond sigh through his nose.

“Of course we can. Come on, idiot – but if you roll across me again I swear to god I’ll-“

“Yeah, yeah,” Kojiro said flippantly, and dragged Kaoru closer. “G’night.”

“Night, Kojiro.”

A03 | Exclusives | Tip Me | Commissions

#astro speaks wonders #sk8 #sk8 the infinity #matchablossom

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oubliettecomic · 6 months ago

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Launch!

Today I am launching my webcomic, OUBLIETTE. I've been thinking about this story for at least a decade and actually doing something about it since 2022, so fair to say it's been a while coming! I've been wanting to do my own webcomic ever since I first stumbled across them in the old dialup days, when nobody used their real name online, most webcomic could draw and pages would take actual minutes to load. But I hadn't seen much of life then and didn't have much to say, whereas now I've got all sorts of fun ideas (that I'm more comfortable talking about dressed up in fiction.)

I've never been much cop at drawing, so when I first really got excited about the project I originally planned to pay an artist, but that sadly fell through. I had enough momentum (and scripts) to want to still make a go of it, I bought myself a cheap drawing tablet and a copy of Clip Studio Paint and tried various teach-yourself courses online for most of 2023. I am far from an accomplished (or even competent) artist, but I can get the comic to look how I want it and that will do for now. The best way to improve is to practice and the best way to motivate myself to practice is to have a project.

One big inspiration for the comic has been watching the Internet change; thinking about how people relate to data and truth. Another is wandering around post-socialist places like VDNKh, Pripyat and Chiatura, seeing the entropy-haunted bones of yesterday's utopias gradually crumbling. Much is about cities and tunnels and hot wide open spaces. I hope it's interesting enough that other people like it. I know how the story begins, and how it ends, and I have a lot of ideas for the middle that will be realised depending on how much fun I have writing and drawing. It's probably going to be at least a five-year project, which is quite a commitment.

The first chapter is now online and free to read at https://oubliettecomic.com. New pages will come out every Monday. I'm also creating update sites here on Tumblr, and on Bluesky (Twitter may take some time. I created a new account, and on logging on ti it the first thing I saw was an inane tweet from Musk. I don't want that in my life, so I blocked him, and found my account *immediately* suspended. Draw your own conclusions.)

#oubliette

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blackjackkent · 8 months ago

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Stopped for a long rest and got a chat with Gale:

He's humming to himself and examining his own "reflection" in a magically created replica. Rakha stands there for quite a while before he notices she's there.

"Be with you in a moment!"

"What are you doing?" Rakha asks, blunt and questioning as ever.

"Indulging in a spot of vanity," he answers cheerfully. "Handsome devil, aren't I?"

Rakha says nothing. She isn't sure if he's serious. She isn't sure she would notice if he was handsome. People are all a bit strange to her in general at present, and he is one of the stranger ones. And she is certainly not adept enough at conversation yet to offer an inane pleasantry in response.

So she waits in silence, and eventually he clears his throat awkwardly and dismisses the illusion. "Be that as it may..."

He turns to face her. "Ceremorphosis," he says, matching her usual matter-of-fact declarative tone. "What does it make you think of?"

That word again. By far the most elaborate of those she's managed to accumulate so far. It represents death. Failure. Consumption by the illithid hivemind.

"Until recently," she says, in a deadpan with the solidity of titanium, "nothing at all."

It is, astonishingly enough, a joke. Until recently, nothing meant anything at all; the world could have begun two days ago for all she knows. He squints at her for a moment before smiling ruefully.

"Ah yes. The good old days." He lounges back on his heels and begins to tick items off on his fingers. "Day one - fever and memory loss. Day two - hallucinations and greying skin. Day three - hair loss and blood leaking from all orifices. Need I go on?"

(A/N: This is honestly one of the things that I fucking love about liveblogging games like this, and specifically what I'm finding/remembering I love about doing so with the same game multiple times, which I haven't done since Dragon Age Inquisition. It can be really fun to listen even to lines like this, which are the same on any given playthrough, and interpret them through a completely different lens based on the particular OC in question.

With Hector, this line was comedic - fuck no, he did not want Gale to go on. He did not want to know the horrific and gruesome details of the transformation; he was having a hard enough time as it was!

But with Rakha this reads completely differently. This is how I've already established Rakha herself talks - short clipped sentences. Accumulation of facts. Bringing together of details into a picture. And Gale already knows that she wants as many of those details as she can possibly accumulate (and even, potentially, that the reason he is not dead is because he can provide them). This is him offering her exactly what she wants in the way she is best equipped to process it.

And she is all over it. She wants him to go on, absolutely.)

Nod.

"Day four - excruciating pain as the skeleton and organs reform and reposition. Day five - the host's personality has disappeared. Fingers toes and limbs elongate. I take it you get the picture?"

"I do. But you might as well finish the picture."

"Day six - the flesh around the mouth splits to make way for tentacles. Day seven - a mind flayer is born," he finishes with some dramatic relish. Spreading his hands as if to say, you see?, he watches, waiting for her interpretation.

Her eyebrows knit together thoughtfully. It's been two days, as of this evening's rest. She thinks back through what he has just told her. "We should be having a fever by now," she says curtly. "Greying skin even."

He smiles. It's an expression she can't quite interpret, but almost looks impressed, or proud, like a teacher with his student who has solved a difficult problem - and to her surprise, she feels oddly gratified to have answered correctly. "Exactly," he says, pointing a finger at her chest. "Our orifices remain blissfully unbloodied, our heads remain clear, and our blood temperature normal. Any expert will agree - this is abnormal."

She squints at him intently. "Can you explain why the symptoms aren't showing?" she demands.

His smile fades and he shakes his head. "That, alas, is where my knowledge fails me," he admits. "A rogue might call it luck, a priest might call it fate. As for myself, I'm a pragmatic; I see the silence before the storm."

She considers this in silence. Luck, fate... perhaps. Perhaps there is comfort at the idea that this is simply random, or the act of some unseen god.

But she doubts it. She sees neither luck nor fate nor storm. Her companions have all said that the worm is likely not the cause of her memory loss; therefore there was some other player involved, something that put her on that ship with no memory of herself. Something that has seen to it that the worm in her head is shackled, and that the beast has free reign.

That is not fate. That is orchestration. And there is yet someone out there who must pay.

Gale watches her thoughtfully, clearly trying to read what is going on behind her eyes. What conclusion he comes to is equally hidden, though; he just smiles again, unreadably this time. "Something to sleep on," he says. "We should get some rest."

She nods, turns away, trudges towards her bedroll. But she has little expectation of sleep. Not after last night. Not after the sea of nightmares and the litany in her head.

Blood... blood... blood... blood... blood.

#bjk plays bg3 durge #rakha the dark urge #well that was a surprisingly informative little moment #i can never tell which conversations are going to be the ones that hit me in the head with the characterization stick XD

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