#like... otherwise i loved the episode and it was brilliant

[detective-pigeon]

the true horror was that fucking loud high-pitched noise along the way

[fckeddiemunson]

Blurred Lines

Part Two Here:

Summary: Rusty takes a liking to his personal assistant.

Warnings: cheating, so much cheating, smut, coercive sex, maybe dub con elements. fem reader.18+ NO MINORS

Words: 3657

Notes: Omg i've had this idea ever since i saw the first episode. Kind of proofread

You weren’t quite sure of the exact moment the lines were crossed. You couldn’t place your finger on when things changed. Of when the lines became so blurred between a lawyer and his personal assistant that you were on your knees for him, mouth open and waiting eagerly for him. You’re not sure if it was his intense charismatic persona, or his incredible manipulation techniques that made him such a successful lawyer. But here you were, all concerns of repercussions thrown to the wind.

Rusty had hired you because as brilliant as a lawyer he was, he needed somebody to keep track of all the cases and his personal life and keep him in line. And you were an overachiever in every sense of the word. Keeping him on time for meetings and all familial appointments etc etc. In a way, you were like his minder, making sure he didn’t get too carried away and in time he wasn’t late to a single meeting, doctors’ appointment or baseball game thanks to you. You worked hard and often worked late into the nights, on big cases you and Rusty would often eat dinner together in the office. It didn’t seem to bother your fiancé as he was a police officer who worked the night shift regularly. He was going through the cases, and you were keeping on top of his calendar and emails etc. In all honesty, you could’ve done this from home, but you secretly think Rusty was thankful for some kind of company to bounce his ideas off. Or at least so he didn’t feel he was speaking to an empty room all the time.

You kept his life so together, in fact his wife, Barbara, had invited you and your fiancé, Dom, over for lunch on the weekend. At this point you had been working for Rusty for several months and were keen to make some more friends in the city, even if it was your boss who was 10-15 years your senior.

That first lunch could’ve been the first broken line, the first toe into the grey area your life had become. Everything went lovely, you got along with Barbara, or B as she asked you to call her. You two were throwing back cocktails at speeds you shouldn’t have for a midday barbecue.

“You’ve got to tell me how you managed to keep Rusty in line all these months?” B said as she mixed your next cocktail, throwing in sweet fruits and ice before shaking it. Dom and Rusty were out supervising the barbecue and playing catch with the kids.

“Honestly, it’s a lot but I’m very good at organizing and I think I’m very stern with him. Seems to be working otherwise he would’ve fired me.” You shrugged and giggled.

“It’s a very demanding job though, what he does and then of course how you manage it all” B slid your cocktail across the bench.

“It is, I guess my social life has suffered a bit, so I’m thankful for this.” You gestured to the cocktails and B smiled and nodded.

After lunch you and B ended up in the pool, very drunk and giggling like high school girls. It was like hanging out with a cool older sister. Something you didn’t have growing up.

“Dom, baby why don’t you get in? It’s so lovely.” You said to your fiancé as he walked up to your pool.

“No, I can’t. We’ve got to go; I’ve been called in for an emergency.” You pouted at him and swam over to the edge about to get out.

“No, please stay I have so much to gossip about – we haven’t gotten to the juicy work stuff yet.” B called out behind you, and you got out of the pool to be met with a very shirtless Rusty.

“I can drop you home later if that’s okay?” Rusty who was much more sober than you were asked, and you nodded vigorously and told Dom to go and not to worry.

The rest of the afternoon was spent trying to sober up but then being coxed into drinking more with B when she popped open a bottle of red. You hadn’t been able to take your eyes off Rusty since the pool. You knew he worked out but had no idea a man in his forties could be so toned and look so eye wateringly good. You knew it was all the drinks going to your head and the fact that you and Dom had barely had any time to be intimate lately. You pushed the feelings deep down inside of you.

“Looks like you and my wife got on like a house on fire, sweetheart.” Rusty broke the silence on the way home, sometimes it was hard to not talk about work so silence was all there was.

“She’s great, my new best friend in fact. And don’t call me sweetheart its sexist of my boss to do that.” You giggled, looking over to him, smirking.

“Please, we are off the clock. I’ve never seen you like you were today. Sweetheart.” His tone mocked the last word and you giggled again, still drunk.

“I don’t have much of a chance to let loose like that, almost never. So thank you I had a lot of fun.” You reached over and grabbed Rusty’s right hand and held it briefly. It was like little shocks of electricity went through your body; you never had much physical contact with him. Rusty sighed and squeezed your hand back before placing it back on the wheel. A warm fuzzy feeling settled in the bottom of your stomach. Rusty pulled into your driveway, Dom was still out, and the house was dark. Something took over you and you leaned across the centre console and kissed Rusty on the cheek. He was warm and you could smell his cologne being this close.

“Sorry, just wanted to thank you for today.” You whispered when he looked at you. You didn’t move away, his eyes staring at you bewildered. Rusty sighed a smirk and looked down briefly seeing you fiddle with your keys, “you’re so drunk, I better help you get in the door”.

Rusty helped you out of the car, his arm linked with yours as you went up the porch steps to your door. You managed to get the key in the lock, “yep, got it I’ll manage from here.” You turned back to Rusty standing with his arms crossed, seemingly amused.

“Do I get one more for the road?” Rusty pointed to his left cheek, and you rolled your eyes, taking a shaky drunk step towards him. You looked up into his gleaming eyes before closing your eyes and peaking your head around left to meet his cheek. Your eyes sprung wide open as his soft lips connected with yours. His arm slung around your lower waist as he backed you up against the front door. You broke away from the kiss, “Ohmygod I’m sosorry I’m so drunk. Fuck” spilled out of you in a hurry, you opened your scrunched eyes to see Rusty smirking. He kissed you again, breathing you in, his tongue teased at your bottom lip, teeth softly nipping as you let out a small whimper his tongue slid in, feeling your bottom lip and mouth. He pulled away, releasing you and taking a step back. You didn’t give him a chance to speak, you turned around and unlocked the door and shouted, “I’m drunk its fine it was an accident ohmygod don’t fire me I’ll see you Monday.” You slammed the door behind you and ran through your dark house to the bathroom.

You laid in the bath half an hour later, feeling mournfully sober and replaying the kiss in your head again and again. “Yeah, I absolutely keep him in line, you fucking idiot. This is all my fault.” you murmured to yourself and slid under the water and screamed.

Yeah, that was when the lines were first crossed.

*

That Monday, Rusty treated you as normal, the kiss wasn’t even mentioned. Everything seemed to go back to normal. Except, a few weeks after that, Rusty suggested that the two of you work at his house instead of the office on late nights.

“Why not?” He had said, “You and my wife get along so well, and I know she would love you over more even if we are working a bit.” And how could you say no? You had to push down that crushing guilt from that night and chalk it up to pure drunkenness and that it wouldn’t happen again. Despite the shame you felt, you were excited to see B more. From then you were over at his house, several times a week in fact. If B was angry about it, she didn’t say anything, and you felt welcomed as almost part of the family after a few times over. You often helped the kids with their homework when you had a spare moment away from Rusty’s home office. That was where you mostly worked, you deliberately made sure you were on opposite sides of the room. There was always an air around the two of you now when you were alone. It was palpable, made you nervous and you thought Rusty had to have noticed it as well. But if he did, he remained nothing but professional. Professional apart from the fact he was bringing you to work in his home almost every night. You had become more than a PA and had started helping him also prepare for cases, doing more legal work than you were probably allowed to. That’s how Rusty justified it to get you to work with him at home.

You sat at home, alone one night with a glass of wine, enjoying a crime show on TV. It was one of the rare nights Rusty didn’t ask you to work late and you decided to not even look at your work emails until the morning. Dom was already at work, not that his presence these days added much to your life, you had drifted drastically with your busy schedules. You knew it was a rough patch and you would work past it. That fact didn’t make you feel less alone though. There was a soft knock at the door shortly after nine that startled you. You got up from the couch slowly, deep down you knew it was Rusty. The thought somewhat thrilled you of being alone with him and the other part terrified you.

“Hi sweetheart. Are-are you alone? Or busy?” Rusty had a small stack of files in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other. You suddenly felt very naked in your shirt dress when he was still in suit pants and dress top.

“No. Thought this was my night off?” You gestured to the stack of files in his hand and he shrugged and chuckled.

“That’s why I brought wine? I have a couple of things I’d like to run past you” You opened the door for him and walked back to turn off the tv. You got Rusty a wine glass and sat down on your couch again. The court date for this trial was a few days away. It was the murder of a woman; she was found dumped behind the bar she worked at. Most of the evidence was circumstantial for the main suspect but you continued to bounce theories off one another.

A couple of glasses down, you both seemed to have edged closer to each other. Your knees knocked together, and hands brushed over one another as you gestured to photos and pieces of evidence. Something clicked in your brain, you grabbed a couple of photos and looked at him. “Rusty! I’ve got it! This is how you’re going to nail him.” you were excited and shuffled even close to him, any closer and you would be sitting in his lap. Your eyes beamed as you explained your theory and he got more and more thrilled and scribbled notes down on a pad on his knee.

“You’re fucking brilliant! This is it!” Rusty grabbed your hand and squeezed it. The wine seemed to hit your head all at once. The edges of the room became fuzzy, and everything felt too warm and too close. You stood up and took the bottle of wine back to the kitchen, Rusty followed you silently. You felt his presence behind you, his large frame looming. Rusty’s hand reached out and rubbed it from your shoulder to your hand. You shivered and leaned into it subconsciously and Rusty grabbed your hand and spun you around to face him.

Your eyes met his, his eyes had darkened, and a wanton look had filled them. His warm hand ran back up your arm, his knuckles brushed up your neck and put a lock of hair behind your ear. Your eyes fluttered shut, you enjoyed his touch and you hated yourself for it. His hand lingered and held your face, tilting it up again, forcing you to look at him. Rusty’s thumb ran along your jawline to your bottom lip and pulled, caressing it lightly. Your breath was caught in your throat, you felt frozen in place. You were both dancing on the line, daring the other to jump off. You felt yourself reach out to him, allowed your hand to run through his hair, slightly tugging as you did. A soft growl like sound escaped him and, in an instant, he crushed the distance between you two and his lips were on yours. You bit his lip first, in an attempt to gain more control. He smirked against you and lifted you up onto the benchtop. You bit his lip again, harder and his mouth opened in a soft deep moan was swallowed by your mouth as you pulled him closer, he settled between your legs, his tight jeans pressed up against you. His spare hand ran up your thigh, up past your waist and cupped the underside of your boob. He squeezed lightly, you leaned into his touch, and he squeezed harder, coaxing a moan from you, the first one of the night.

Your hands landed on his belt buckle as your fiddled and struggled to undo it and he chucked against your lips, pulling away to look at you.

“You’re so beautiful.” He said it so quietly, if he didn’t repeat it again more firmly, ‘you’re so fucking beautiful” you may have hallucinated it. His hand ran slowly up your thigh, squeezing and scratching as he went. It made you feel weak. His kissed soft pecks at first at a spot beneath your ear, then his teeth grazed your neck right as he pulled down your panties roughly. You shivered, a hand caressing his head, hand buried in his hair again.

“Rusty, this is so wrong.” A moment of clarity. Your mind cleared for a moment, you pulled his head away from your neck.

“Yes, it is.” His hand pressed against your clit, he rubbed small, taught circles and your eyes fluttered shut again.

“We shouldn’t be doing this, Rusty.” Your voice came out in nothing more than a mewl, Rusty chuckled as his fingers moved down to your cunt, you gasped as he slid two fingers inside of you, curling them immediately. He shifted his hand, his fingers going deeper inside of you as you let out a breathy sigh.

“If you think we should stop, then why are you so wet for me?” Rusty curled his fingers again, caressing that spot you can never seem to reach and started fucking his fingers into you slowly but deeply. It knocked the breath out of you, you hadn’t felt this good in a long time. The kitchen was silent except from the small whimpers escaping your mouth, the sound of your utterly wet cunt and the satisfied chuckle from Rusty as he licked and nibbled at your neck. Rusty picked up the pace and you were rendered useless on the counter, a slave to his touch. You felt your stomach pinch, a low rumbling, tingling feeling took over you.

“Rusty, I’m-I’m going to cum.” You whimpered, his thumb found your clit and rubbed firm tight circles, sending you over the edge. You moaned out loudly, unable to keep quiet, the pleasure vibrating through you, taking you by surprise.

“That’s it sweetheart.” Rusty whispered, his hand working you through it. Every nerve ending exploded, writhed in pleasure as he pulled the orgasm from you. He pulled away and your clit pulsed, and cunt twitched from the lack of touch.

Well, that’s how you ended up on the knees, eagerly awaiting your boss’s cock.

You slid to the ground, looking him in the eyes the entire time as you finished unbuckling his belt and slid his pants down his legs. You pulled his cock out of his pants; he was painfully hard. The veins protruding and the tip was red and smeared with pre-cum. You looked back up at him his breath caught in his throat, as if he was trying to maintain unfazed by the interaction. He let out a sigh of relief when you gripped him firmly, bringing your hand back and forth a few times. He felt heavy in your hand, your eyes flashed between his dick and his eyes.

“Open up for me.” Rusty grabbed the base of your neck and pulled you even closer to him. you opened your mouth, stuck your tongue out and narrowed your eyes up at him. He gripped his hand on the back of your head tighter and brought your lips to the tip of his cock. You licked the tip before eagerly sucking down on it. He released his hand, and a moan escaped his lips, it was low and sweet. You sucked in a breath before reaching his base, your nose almost touching his stomach. His hand went back to your head, almost steadying himself from the pleasure. Rusty started moving your mouth back and forth over his dick, making you take it all the way in and then out again. Your eyes watered and you blinked it away, your vision blurred of the man above you. Rusty pulled you off his dick, you looked up at him again with glassy eyes, he looked down with lust filled ones and bent down to help you up. Before giving you time to breathe, he kissed you again, his tugged your waist toward him.

You started walking backwards to your bedroom, a flicker of thought went to your fiancé but it dissipated as Rusty’s hand snaked down and grabbed at your ass, pulling and spanking as you entered your bedroom. You let him push you back on your bed, standing over you as he stripped down to his underwear. You watched through lusty eyes, unable to stop yourself from biting your lip as you saw his abs. You sat up and tore off your shirt, you weren’t wearing a bra, so you covered yourself out of self-consciousness as Rusty crawled to you on the bed and grabbed your thighs, pulling you closer to him. He pinned your hands above your head and admired your boobs, kissing down your chest, to your belly and kissed once on your cunt.

“Do you have a condom?” You asked in a rush, like this wasn’t your place.

Rusty shook his head as he hooked your legs over his shoulder and lined himself up anyway. You had stopped taking birth control a while ago, not that it mattered as you and Dom hadn’t been intimate in more than a month or two. You sucked in a deep breath as Rusty pushed in slowly, a gasp was knocked from you as he bottomed out, moaning as he did. At the angle he was at, he only had to thrust slightly, and he was so deep inside of you. His dick brushed your g-spot easily and you moaned out, urging him to thrust deeper and harder. You moaned, pulling his closer to you as he thrusted faster into you.

“I’m not going to last long.” He groaned in your ear, you only moaned back, not caring, he felt too good you just wanted as much as he would give. He sat back on his calves and grabbed your hips, lifting and them towards him as he thrusted into you. You moved your hips back against his, meeting his thrusts with your own. You swore when he crushed his body back against yours, he thrusted harder into you. It took you by surprise, you didn’t expect him to be gentle, but his brutal thrusts knocked the wind out of you, all you could do is lie there and take it. His hand slithered down to your clit again and you tensed, feeling the coil in your stomach getting ready to snap again, you whined, spurring him on.

“Come on honey, I know you’ve got another one for me.” He was so sure of himself, it made you believe him. And how could you not when he felt so good inside of you, he rubbed once more before pinching your clit and you whimpered. He did it again and you almost screamed, the elastic snapped, and your orgasm washed over you. It was more powerful than the first and your cunt throbbed as Rusty thrusted into you for the final time before he groaned, lazily thrusting as his seed spilled into you. He stayed inside of you for a minute, catching his breath.

Everything dawned on you at once. Tonight had to be a one-time thing. But you knew with Rusty it was never going to be that way. You weren’t even sure if the lines existed anymore.  

[piratecaptainscaptainpirates]

Rewatching a few episodes of OFMD tonight, and I'm always struck by how these incredibly talented actors manage to deliver some of their lines in such interesting ways to tell us more about where their characters are.

The way Rhys Darby delivers "and what makes Ed happy?" in s1e9 is a perfect example. Another actor probably would've chosen to go with a more direct or even flirtatious approach with that line; it would've been so easy to make it sound cocky. But it's clearly just a genuine, earnest question. Stede is really struggling, he hasn't yet realized Ed loves him, but he genuinely just cares about helping Ed do what makes Ed happy.

"Do you wanna do something weird?" is just...brilliant. Again, that's a line that could've been really cocky, or just played for laughs, or otherwise unremarkable. But it's delivered with vulnerability. It's a sincere expression of longing, you can tell Ed's not sure how his idea is going to be received.

Both "you wear fine things well" deliveries are fucking perfect. They're sweet, earnest, tender - lovely without being overly flirtatious in a way that could've detracted from the genuine, natural romance of the moment.

And, in a twist, a moment that never fails to make me laugh is how Nat Faxon plays the Swede's line "on the day I was born, the rain looked just like blood" with a very flirtatious cadence. Perfect, 10/10, no notes.

[ak4e7a]

sweet disposition – psh

notes: high school au, slice of life, scifi, jay lives to torment sunghoon, angst, hurt, comfort, i learned quantum mechanics to write this, also the first draft of this got me into grad school so #slay i guess

wc: 10.7k

cw: mentions of violence, SA, su1c1de attempt (not actually, it's a metaphor), parent trauma

trailer: you were always stuck in your ways. what happens when you decide to change out of love for someone else?

starring: park sunghoon, lee heeseung, park jongseong, sim jaeyun, and aespa karina (yu jimin)

₊˚ ‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿୨୧ · · ♡ · · ୨୧‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿˚₊

“just desserts” arc — episodes 1-4

You never liked your name. You thought it didn’t suit you. 

After all, it was supposed to mean something like “sound of the heavens”, and you hadn’t spoken in three years. It wasn’t like you were mute or anything. You just didn’t have anything to say to anyone. Like, ever.

Yu Jimin was the closest thing you had to a friend, often acting as a translator between you and the rest of your classmates. You got along well with Jimin because most things she asked would be in the form of a yes or no question, and if she wanted more, it only took one look into your eyes to get an elaborate answer. And you were glad Jimin wasn’t pushy when it came to the subject of your intentional silence.

“I heard they’re playing ‘Silent Penalty’ next week! Those boys are crazy, don’t you think so? Especially Jaeyun and Jongseong,” Jimin cried, clutching her textbooks to her chest with her free arm. You were on your way to your family's cafe, where you worked part-time—Jimin as a waitress, you in the kitchen (where you wouldn’t be bothered).

The month of April tinted the otherwise muted color palette of the outskirts of Shibuya in blushed hues. You always walked home together; the stories of the Hello Kitty murder and the Setagaya Family and the Junko Furuta case so deeply ingrained into their memories that neither of you would allow the other to go anywhere alone. You and Jimin even carried dainty pocket knives in their bags; these were mostly used to open boxes at work or cut slits into the packaging of snacks from the convenience store by your school. But it never hurt to be too safe, especially as teenage girls in a big city.

You nodded, the wind blowing through your high ponytail, tousling several strands out of place. Sometimes you took pity on your friend, wishing you could be better company to the girl who had not left your side since you first moved to Shibuya. You often wondered if you should just tell Jimin how much you appreciated her, and how you wouldn’t leave her unless Jimin explicitly told you to do so. 

Tamago to chikai wa kudake-yasui, you thought to yourself as you continued to walk hand-in-hand. Why not just show her?

It wasn’t like you were a “bad” friend. You often helped Jimin with homework (you did it for her) and you were the one who taught her how to ride a bike. You prepared the best bentos, often shaping the onigiri to resemble the cats from Sailor Moon, and always brought an extra fruit jelly stick for Jimin, who would never fail to still be hungry after lunch.

You wondered if that was enough for Jimin. You supposed it was, since Jimin had never once complained… at least, to your face. But you also wondered how long that would last.

“But, I mean, their leader… he’s kinda cute,” Jimin trailed off. The boy in question was Heeseung, the quiet half of the Fox Club twins. Said “club” was known around Kokusai High School as a sometimes-rowdy, always-mischievous gang, whose members were all brilliant in their own right. “And I heard they’re looking for new members! We should try joining them! Even though… even though we’d be the only girls.”

You exhaled sharply, forcefully — your way of laughing with as little effort as possible. Sometimes, if you felt up to it, you would even treat Jimin to a smile. You followed the pebble you’d been kicking since you left Kokusai before stopping to pick it up and rub it clean with the hem of your sweater. Then you handed the polished stone to Jimin, who took it happily, saying she’d add it to her jar at home.

“I think joining them would be a good idea, even if we’d be the only girls… Maybe they’ll find a way to get you to talk again,” Jimin mumbled as you walked ahead of her. 

Sometimes, you mused, Jimin would say things and forget that you weren’t deaf, just quiet. Extremely, deafeningly quiet.

“Oh! Did you see that new experiment on TV last night?” Jimin asked, catching up to you. “The one about the snails getting their memories erased.”

You raised your eyebrows, and Jimin continued recounting the details from the news report she watched with her dad.

“I bet they taste gross. Don’t know why people have tried eating them. But you could probably find some way to fix that, huh?” she chirped, opening the back door of the cafe. “Since you’re so good at cooking.

You looked up, turning to Jimin with a playful gleam dancing along the outer corners of your normally blunted affect. You shrugged, as if to say, maybe, but it’s anyone’s guess, and helped Jimin tie her pink apron up.

It was a slow afternoon, the usual customers trickling in one at a time like the dregs of a coffee machine after it’s finished brewing. You noticed that Jimin was especially chatty at the register today, and sighed to yourself as you refilled the almond flour jar slower than your grandmother would have liked. How you wished you could join in the conversation.

It was a shame you were still convinced they’d hear you, but no one would truly listen.

When you finished every random task you could think of doing, you peeked out of the little window between the kitchen and the front counter. Its position was perfect for you to watch the television above the customers’ seating area without being caught by whoever happened to be working the cashier shift.

The program on the television that afternoon was a replay of Yuzuru Hanyu’s record-breaking short routine in figure skating at the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia. Yuzuru had since become one of Japan’s permanent darlings, on and off the ice.

You frowned. That could have been you, had you not torn your right Achilles tendon right before high school started; had you not disappointed your entire family in front of a national audience; had you not landed on your ankle on purpose, because you didn’t know how else to tell your mother that your coach had been touching you in the locker room ever since you put your first pair of skates on. It’s not like your mother would have believed you. She was dating him, after all.

Maybe you would have been an Olympian had you not done any of those things, because no one gave medals out for lying and saying everything was fine.

“Y/N-ie,” Jimin called. “Where’s the milk bread?”

There was no answer, but that was a given. Jimin turned around to find your attention fixed to the television, eyes following Yuzuru’s every movement. If you still spoke, you would have been excitedly calling out each triple Axel and Lutz jump as you saw them.

But no sound came out of you, aside from the slow, deep breaths you took.

Jimin immediately grabbed the remote and changed the channel.

You snapped out of your maladaptive daydreaming, picturing yourself on that podium, and went back into the kitchen without any hesitation, and the milk bread was out of the oven several minutes later.

“Hello!” Jimin said. That was odd, you thought. You were about to close for the night. Usually, in the time you’d been working there, this part of your shift went interrupted.

“Oh… Is halmeoni not here?” went the soft, low voice.

Why are they looking for Grandma?

“No, not today. She hasn’t been feeling well lately. Can I get you anything?”

You crept toward the little window again, peeking behind the vase of lavender flowers that sat on the left side of the shelf that ran along the bottom. You recognized the person speaking. He was wearing the Kosukai boys’ uniform: navy blue blazer, a white shirt, burgundy and mauve necktie, and navy trousers. He was quite tall, with full, messy, dark-brown-almost-black hair parted down the middle, framing his tired, upturned eyes.

He was one of the Fox boys—but not one of high ranking, to your knowledge.

“Oh… um��”

“I’ll give you a moment to decide what you want. Pardon me,” Jimin said sweetly, before walking into the kitchen. The sound of the door swinging open startled you, causing you to nearly knock an open sack of flour over. You ducked down under the window before the boy could spot you. Jimin laughed. “What are you doing? Are you spying?” 

Pause. 

“Do you know who he is?”

No, said your pursed lips. You grabbed a sheet of scrap paper and a pen from the pocket of your frilly black apron and scrawled something down quickly. Jimin took it from you. 

I think that’s the boy Grandma told me about. The one she gives the unsold pastries to at the end of the day.

Jimin giggled. “Oh, no shit. He’s cute! But not as cute as Heeseung.”

You rolled your eyes at a specific tempo that Jimin perfectly recognized to mean shut up, he can probably hear you.

“Well, I’ll clean up here. You go give him the bread.” 

And with that, she pushed you through the swinging door as if she were moving a stack of heavy crates.

It was times like these that you wished she still had the will to speak, so that you could scream at your friend in disbelief. Jimin sometimes liked to take advantage of the fact that you would only physically protest if she thought it was worth fighting about. 

Your eyes softened when you looked at the boy, whose complexion had suddenly tinted the color of pickled plums. It was an uncanny look for someone who was seemingly so reserved and collected, from the times you’d seen him in passing.

“Oh. you ’re the granddaughter, right? Y/N? you ’re in class 3-A, right?” he said, his hands behind his back as he bowed. You nodded.

“I’m in 3-B… So it’s true, huh?” 

Pause. 

“You don’t talk?” 

Another nod.

“You can call me Sunghoon. Nice to meet you,” he said, to which he received a decidedly polite nod. “Oh, yeah. I forgot. I guess you can call me that in your head. Are you the one who does all the baking? If you are, it’s really good.”

You smiled like your muscles weren’t used to the strain before heading to the display case, a brown paper bag in hand. You slid the metal door open and used a pair of tongs to transfer the baked goods into the bag, deftly maneuvering each piece so as to not crush anything. You tied the bag closed with a piece of white ribbon and handed it to him, not allowing yourself to linger on how his cheeks had not let up on their rosy hue.

Sunghoon offered to walk you and Jimin home, out of politeness (and genuine concern for your safety, he said). Jimin accepted before you could even so much as blink a strong no, thanks, and so he waited as the two of you finished closing the cafe before heading in the direction of your apartment building. You tried your best not to panic. Being around the opposite sex was not high up on your very short list of favorite situations.

“I’ve never had a conversation so one-sided and yet only mildly uncomfortable,” Sunghoon said, having since regaled you with some of the more tame stories about the Fox Club. He told you about the time the twins came to school dressed in the girls’ uniforms, when he and three other boys (Park Jonseong, Yang Jungwon, and Nishimura Riki) got into a fight on the train after catching someone nonconsensually taking an upskirt picture, and the famous incident in which more than half of the Foxes ended up in the swimming pool, still fully clothed. “Y/N could hate me for all I know.”

You scowled. He adjusted the strap of your bookbag on his shoulder, clearing his throat. “No, wait, that’s not what you think it means. I meant that because you don’t say anything, you can spend more time judging me.”

You gave him a variation of the same exhaled laugh you only reserved for Jimin, shaking your head. You could already tell Sunghoon was kind by the way he walked on the side closest to the road, and never pushed you to speak the way others tended to do.

“You aren’t?”

I am, but I don’t think poorly of you. It’s the opposite, really.

Jimin chuckled. “She has other things to do besides complain. Like be my best friend. Right, Y/N?”

You nodded.

Of course. you’re pretty much all I have left, and that makes me more pathetic than ever.

—

The next Friday, you took the challenger’s seat at the Fox Den’s lunch table, on an otherwise bleak, foggy afternoon.

The entire cafeteria was in shock. The aforementioned seat was more of a symbolic gesture than anything; the Foxes rarely, if ever, gained new members because of how rough their games could get. The reward, however, was respect, notoriety, and the unyielding loyalty of seven teenage boys.

“Alright, hold on,” Jaeyun, the outgoing one of the twins and de-facto second in command, interrupted as the other boys cheered and swooned over you. He ran a hand through his dyed pastel pink hair cooly, eyeing you in front of him; your posture indicated that you were not scared in the slightest. 

You were everyone’s hallway crush, despite your cold exterior and refusal to even consider any confessions of their affection. Not one day could go by without you hearing usually-innocent comments about how pretty you were, garnering comparisons to different shoujo protagonists.

And to exacerbate those remarks, that week, you’d heard the boys giving Sunghoon shit after finding out he walked you and Jimin home; it was all they talked about in their free time since Monday morning, bombarding him with questions about what your voice sounded like and if there were really scars on your ankle and how you smelled. 

Everyone froze, waiting for the next words. Jaeyun looked at you as if you were a particularly difficult sudoku puzzle. “You sure you want to do this? I won’t go easy on you just because you’re a girl.”

You nodded metronomically.

Jimin cried out a sharp “No!” before covering her mouth in what you thought was a mix of devastation and realization, tears pooling in her eyes like spring dewdrops on blades of grass. When her eyes locked with yours, the universe was put on hold for a moment. You wished you could hold her hand and say it out loud.

I’m doing this for you.

Beside Jaeyun, Park  Jongseong, another one of your fellow third-years, brandished two long needles, previously wrapped in his white handkerchief. He towered in front of you like the Tokyo Skytree, his long black hair covering one eye, the other glinting playfully under the fluorescent lights of the cafeteria. He’d abandoned his blazer over the back of the empty chair in front of her, the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up, exposing the prominent veins along his inner forearms. “Who’s going today?”

“I’ll do it,” Sunghoon said over the voices of the other club members, easing his way through the slowly-growing crowd of students. “Let’s make it quick.”

“Who has the stuff?” Jongseong asked, spraying something onto the needles that made the club’s seating area instantly smell like a hospital. You grimaced only for a second, pushing back the memories of being in the emergency room.

There was an exchange between two closed fists, and before any more objections, Heeseung was announcing the rules to Silent Penalty, tossing a pair of dice in the air as he spoke.

“A roll of eight means you take a penalty mission. If both parties have eight at the end of the same round, both will face penalty. We’ll do two penalties. Keep a straight face through both, and you win. Back out, and you forfeit the whole game. Consequences will be decided later on.” He shot a glance at Y/N. “If you win, you will be the first girl in the club. Do you accept?”

You shook your head slowly. The boys whispered furiously behind you. You pointed at Jimin.

“Oh… She means that I get to come, too,” Jimin piped up, half-hidden behind Yang Jungwon’s broad back.

The dark-haired twin snickered. “Fine. That doesn’t bother me. Anyone against it? No? Then let’s start. Good luck, Y/N. Sunghoonie is our best Penalty player.”

“I wouldn’t say ‘best’,” Jongseong argued. “Luckiest, sure.”

Round one: you , 7; Sunghoon, 4.

Round two: you , 9; Sunghoon, 7.

Round three: you , 5; Sunghoon, 11.

“Shit, Seung,” Jongseong murmured to Heeseung as they stood behind Sunghoon. “Maybe you should have picked a different penalty number.”

Heeseung grinned, patting his friend on the back with a heavy hand. “It’s a thirteen-point-eighty-nine percent chance of rolling an eight. Not zero. Just be patient.”

Tensions mounted in the tenth round, but neither Sunghoon nor you were fazed. Not even when both of you rolled your first eight.

Jaeyun clapped, earning him a glare from his twin brother. “Oh, finally.”

“First penalty,” Heeseung announced, nudging Jaeyun aside. “Jongseong, the needles, please.”

Jimin gasped. “No, wait, what are you doing?”

“Ear piercings,” Jongseong answered with a grin as he began to sanitize two silver studs in his handkerchief. With his free hand, he held Jimin firmly in her spot by the cuff of her blazer. “Don’t worry, Heeseung is good at it.” Still clutching her, he used their joined hands to point to his right ear, a diamond earring in the center of his lobe. “Got this one last year.”

“Ready?” Heeseung asked, taking the alcohol-soaked handkerchief from Jongseong, hands already gloved up.

Everyone watched in silence as Sunghoon allowed Heeseung to confidently push the needle into his cartilage. Sunghoon blinked once, twice, then licked his lips all while the earring was inserted and the backing locked into place.

Taking the other needle, Heeseung sauntered over to you. You looked at him before turning to Sunghoon, brushing your hair away from your face.

“You already have a piercing,” he frowned, gingerly pinching your right ear between his pointer finger and thumb. “I’ll just pick another spot… is this okay?”

You nodded, feeling him graze over the protrusion covering the opening of your ear. You inhaled what could have been construed as the last breath of a dying woman, then exhaled as Heeseung pushed the needle through the thick cartilage of her tragus. He screwed the earring into place, smirking.

“Brave girl.” He turned to his brother. “Did she flinch?”

“Didn’t even blink,” Jaeyun praised. “Fucking sick.”

Sunghoon bit his lip, taking the dice out of your cold hand.

Round fifteen: you , 8; Sunghoon, 8.

“Damn, again?” Jongseong remarked. “That’s either very lucky or very unlucky.”

“The special lunch, Sunghoon,” Heeseung commanded. The boy ducked under the table to retrieve a bento box, blowing his bangs out of his face as he came back up. He looked like he was going to throw up. You thought the pain in his ear couldn’t have been that bad for him.

“Do we have to?” he asked. “Can’t we do something else?”

You answered on Heeseung’s behalf, leaning forward, propping your chin up with your hand, elbow resting on the tabletop as you looked into his eyes. Whatever it is, let’s just get it over with. Unless you’re too scared.

“No.” Jaeyun opened the box, revealing two snails and a small clear container filled with white crystalline grains. Sugar, you hoped, although it was most likely salt. “Here. We’re running out of time.”

You each reached for a snail, Sunghoon opting for the larger of the two.

“Wait,” Heeseung ordered, eyes narrowing to the point where he resembled the nickname he was often called—snake. You and Sunghoon waited, still clutching their own snails. “Sunghoonie, give yours to Y/N. She’s the challenger, not you.”

You resisted the urge to squirm as you felt a jolt run up your arm, like you’d accidentally touched the prongs of a plug that was halfway out of an electrical socket.

Sunghoon scowled. “This isn’t going to be pretty, regardless.”

Amane put her free hand over his, with an expression she hoped he would understand as  don’t worry, it’ll be fine, and they switched snails.

“Put some sugar and eat it,” Jaeyun chimed in.

Amane let go of his hand as he glared at the shock of pink hair sticking out in the crowd. “The shells, too?” he drawled.

“Don’t be a smartass, Hoon,” Jongseong laughed.

It was slimy and bitter, even with the sugar. You kept your focus on Sunghoon as your lips wrapped around the opening of the shell, sucking on the body until it slid into your mouth. you r first mistake was chewing, the snail guts oozing onto your palate. you r vision blackened around the edges, and in the span of several milliseconds the Sunghoon that sat in front of you was replaced by the image of a younger boy, with the same dark black-brown hair and dark eyes, albeit thinner, almost haggard-looking.

All you could do while you were frozen in place was swallow, watching the boy as he was pushed out of the front door of an unfamiliar house by someone who could have only been his father, a silver second-place trophy thrown after him. It clattered to the ground, smashing into several pieces that the boy gathered up into the hem of his black sweater. He ran through the old, worn-down neighborhood until he reached another apartment, knocking on the glossy red door until a dark-haired woman with glasses answered, letting the crying boy inside.

You felt the unwelcome but familiar sinking feeling of parental disappointment gather in the pit of your stomach, its endless tentacles swirling and wrapping themselves around the chunks of snail entrails that slid down your esophagus.

You guessed that Sunghoon was experiencing something similar, which meant that he saw the memory of a young girl gliding across a sheet of ice in a skintight jeweled red leotard and matching skirt with all the elegance and grace of a koi fish in water. Out of the corner of the girl’s periphery, a group of people gathered at a section of the plexiglass that framed the entire ice rink; one man smiled, and he saw you skate into a jump before landing with a resounding crack that caused every spectator in the stadium to get on their feet for a closer look.

He would have then seen that man run onto the ice and pick you up, cradling you too close to his body even if he were your father. His hands were in the wrong places, and Sunghoon would have to have wondered why no one was saying anything. Perhaps their focus was all on the blood that began to seep through your nude-colored tights.

“Congratulations, Y/N,” went one of the twins—your focus was too far elsewhere to distinguish or care about who it was. “Welcome to the Fox Club.” 

You ran out of the school building as soon as the dismissal bell rang, Jimin and Sunghoon calling out after you.

— 

“Umiushi,” Sunghoon said, pointing to the creatures at the bottom of the metal basin. You were in the kitchen of the apartment he shared with his aunt, who just so happened to be a marine biologist studying these so-called “memory snails”. “That’s what we ate. But it’s a special type. Jimin said she told you about them.”

You watched the sea snails in a curious disgust, afraid that they would somehow leap out of the water and down your throat. You nodded to affirm him.

“Yeah. Basically, they have some sort of molecule that can be blocked so that their memories can be blocked, too. There’s not much else we know about them… and I asked Aunt Mina—don’t worry, I didn’t tell her what I saw or anything, it was a hypothetical question—I asked her if it’s possible to transfer memories, and she said it’s impossible right now. Something like that would be magic.”

You grimaced. Magic was for children.  

It had been two months since that Friday afternoon that changed everything. Since that day, Sunghoon had followed you home, knowing full well what you’d seen from the snail he’d first touched, the one you ended up eating. He told you how his Aunt Mina took him in after his father disowned him for losing the chess tournament, and how they hadn’t spoken since. 

The next morning, you showed up at their house and handed him an origami crane with Why the bread, then? scrawled inside.

Sunghoon explained to you that he was saving all his pocket money to one day pay for a chess “tutor” to whip him into shape, so he could win enough matches for him to go home—the promise his father had made to him the last time they’d spoken, almost a decade ago. You appreciated the honesty of a mere acquaintance so much so that you returned to school after that weekend with a photocopy of several diary entries that pertained to the memory he’d intercepted.

Inside, you confirmed his suspicions. The man was your coach, and, incidentally, your mother’s boyfriend. No one believed what was going on, and your furious mother sent you to live with your estranged father’s mother in Shibuya. It was almost five hours away from Sendai, where you had grown up and trained with one of Japan’s future Olympic figure skaters, Yuzuru himself. Before the incident, it was pretty much guaranteed that you would reach that level, too, since everyone said you were blessed by the gods with such talent. But as your mother said, it was you who ruined everything. Not the gods, not the universe, not fate.

You stopped speaking, Sunghoon learned in your handwriting, because you felt as though no one would listen if you did. You said it was easier that way, less effort on your part. It was harder for you to make promises that you didn’t even want to consider keeping. It forced people to be direct, otherwise they’d get nowhere with you. You didn’t like talking, anyway. It was worth less than acting upon things.

The final page of the diary entries was a single line, a proverb you lived by. 

Tamago to chikai wa kudake-yasui.

Eggs and vows are easily broken.

— 

You stood on the rooftop, the frigid night air whipping your cheeks the color of the sakura trees below. You and Sunghoon had snuck to the top of one of the Tokyo skyscrapers way past midnight, on a whim. Now, as one of the Foxes, you would agree that life was a bit more fun with some trouble.

You were more than happy Jimin had finally confessed her feelings to Heeseung, and he’d reciprocated, even if it meant you and your best friend spent less time alone together. While Sunghoon could never take Jimin’s place exactly, he fit into your life just fine. Maybe it was because you made space for him to be there.

He loved fruit jelly sticks just as much as Jimin, so you started bringing an extra one for him as well. You noticed that when he took the leftovers from your grandmother’s cafe, the taiyaki in the bag excited him the most. He told you that they were called something else back home in Korea, but he thought yours tasted better. After that, you would always “accidentally” make too many, and give him the rest when you thought no one was looking. You once found him in the library playing chess against himself, and the next day you sat in front of him and played until the lunch bell rang, having learned the rules the night before.

You found out Sunghoon spoke the same language as you. Acts of service. He carried around a pack of Salonpas because you were prone to muscle cramps and the occasional shooting pain in your ankle. you ’d always blush and look away when he’d hand you a clip to keep your hair out of your face, ignoring how his fingers lingered on yours just a split second too long to be platonic. When the boys would tease the two of you about being constantly together, you would text your snarky comeback to Sunghoon, and he would say it out loud for you. And everyone would laugh.

You truly were practically inseparable, though. You couldn’t bring yourself to shut him out, not when he’d already seen what you considered to be the worst part of you and why you were the way you were, and still chosen to think the best of you. On Friday nights, when Jimin and Heeseung were out on yet another city expedition, the two of you would sit on the plastic-covered couch in your grandmother’s living room and watch Yuri On Ice, the anime about a competitive figure skater’s return to the sport. And Sunghoon wouldn’t make you feel embarrassed about crying, only comforting you after making sure it was okay to touch you.

You liked him. He could doze off at times, but he never made a big deal about it. You admired that. And you also appreciated that he never said he felt sorry for you and what happened when you were thirteen. It was unnecessary, you thought. The important thing was that he was there.

The Foxes always traveled in packs. For the boys, it was a sign of friendship. To you, it was protection. Being one of the two girls in the club meant they were extra protective over you, and Sunghoon was no exception. In fact, he was the rule. Every day, without fail, he and Heeseung would walk you and Jimin to school, then to work, then back home.

The world felt a little less lonely to you. And maybe, just maybe, you could stop running from it with one good leg to stand on. Maybe you could find it in yourself to forgive a world that took, since that world had Sunghoon in it. Almost as if it were trying to make it up to you.

His black scarf was wrapped around your neck, flooding your nose with the scent of clean laundry and musk. He’d let you wear it on the train ride over to Shinjuku, and you wondered if he was falling in love with you, too. You hoped that he knew you weren’t scared of being so close to him. Not when he was everything you needed from yourself.

“It’s time we started living for ourselves, don’t you think?” you asked, staring down at the city lights in all their neon glory. Every single speck represented another disappointment, another broken heart, another fruitless wish. None of it mattered. But it still did. “Maybe start chasing a different dream. Maybe the same one. But be in control this time. It’s more fun that way, isn’t it?”

The wind blew your pleated uniform skirt upward, and when you turned to see if Sunghoon was looking, he was. At your face. You had just mustered the courage to speak again, voice raspy from years of unuse. You leaned ever so slightly over the edge, arms spread out wide, feeling the strong breeze catch your body in the current. The tickle of the urge to free-fall played around in your mind.

“Y/N!” Sunghoon yelled before grabbing your wrist at the last possible moment and pulling you back hard enough for you to fall on top of him. You clambered off after a moment’s hesitation, sitting beside him and smoothing out the hem of your skirt.

You looked down, almost ashamed of your impulse. “You….”

“Y/N,” he wheezed, pushing his bangs out of his face as he tried to collect himself. “Are you crazy?”

Your brow furrowed as you examined the worried expression that painted his delicate, sculpted face. “What… What’s wrong, Sunghoon?” The roll of your tongue felt nice in your mouth; yes, you could get used to saying his name out loud. “Are you okay?”

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” Sunghoon retorted, to which you answered with your usual breathy laugh.

“I don’t think killing yourself is that funny—did I miss a joke or something?”

You smiled at him, taking his hand into yours. His was much bigger, and warmer, but felt right all the same. “I wasn’t going to kill myself at all,” you said. “At least, not literally.”

Goodbye, silent Y/N.

–––

“under the moon” arc — episodes 5-8

It had been four months since the snail incident. And while you certainly would have not preferred to have someone who was a stranger at the time witness the worst thing that had ever happened to you, you didn’t regret having the sticky ooze of entrails coagulate in your body.

Because you would have never guessed you would gain a whole new family out of it.

The boys could get rowdy at times, but they meant well—for the most part. Those occasional instances when they didn’t were usually because someone had decided to bother you  and force you to speak for them. You didn’t mind talking most of the time now; all that mattered was that you got to decide when you’d open your  mouth and to whom you’d speak to.

Being one of the two girls in the group certainly had its drawbacks, but you liked to think you balanced them out just fine. After all, their detention rate had gone down in the past couple of months thanks to you insisting they stop throwing water balloons off the gym’s roof and they stop sneaking into the basketball team’s gym to deflate all the balls.

“Y/N-ie,” Jongseong chirped as he sauntered over to the Foxes’ table with his bento in hand. He was the only one besides Jimin who used that particular honorific, and you only allowed him to do so because of how stupidly tall he was compared to you. “Where’s Hoon?”

You looked up from your food, stony eyes glancing at the other boys—and Jimin, who sat beside Heeseung—and everyone shrugged. You blinked slowly at Jongseong before answering, “He’s going to enter the cafeteria in… five seconds.”

“You’re just bullshitting at this point,” Jaeyun laughed, mouth full of rice. While he was certainly more in-your-face than his twin brother, the Foxes’ vice president was surprisingly still pleasant to be around. You would never say it to his ridiculous pink hair, though, because he’d never shut up about it if you did. “Damn, you eat one snail and suddenly you’re Yuuji Itadori or something.”

“She’s not making it up, Yunie,” Jimin chimed in from where Heeseung’s arm was around her shoulder. She pointed in the direction of the double doors. “Look, there he is.”

You lifted your bag out of the chair next to you without even looking to see if Sunghoon had already reached the table. It was like you had a radar for him and him only, and you’d spent the last few days staying up late thinking about how that was possible.

You both seemed to be able to sense what the other person was feeling, which meant that neither of you were ever hungry, tired, or in a bad mood for long. You often would run into each other during times you normally weren’t supposed to be together, the rare occasions where you would spend your weekends alone always seemed to change the moment the both of you left your houses. At one point, you two discovered that not only did Sunghoon have an insane talent for drawing, but he could accurately guess what you were wearing and how your hair was styled without having seen you prior to his sketches.

Thankfully, however, you couldn’t totally read each other’s minds. You would be embarrassed for Sunghoon to find out you’d come to love him if he could hear your thoughts.

It couldn’t have been the snails that did this to you, right?

“Sorry, Hiroto-sensei was chewing my ass out,” Sunghoon said as he shrugged off his uniform blazer and sat down. He placed a carton of mango juice beside your hand, the straw already punctured through the foil seal.

“You were sleeping in class again, weren’t you?” you asked, handing Sunghoon the bento you spent the morning preparing for him. It had all his favorites—pork curry, rice, natto, a soft boiled egg, and the taiyaki from your family’s cafe.

“At this point, I don’t know why he even tries,” he laughed. You smiled at him softly. You were glad you found it in yourself to speak, because your new family actually paid attention to you. They didn’t possess Sunghoon’s attuned nature towards you, but you appreciated them all the same. “I need my nine hours one way or the other.”

“You had nine hours last night.” You paused, chopsticks in midair. “Jongseong, why are you staring?”

The black-haired boy looked at you as if you should have known the answer. “It’s like you two have powers or something.”

“Why would you say that?” Sunghoon asked.

“You two are so connected, it’s romantic.”

You tried to hide the blush spreading across your face. “Shut up.”

You and Sunghoon both agreed that God—at least, the one from Christianity—wasn’t real. Something from a World War II history documentary they’d watched together said it best—a line carved into the walls of a jail in the Mauthausen concentration camp.

“If there is a God, then He will have to beg for my forgiveness.”

Certainly, that God was all sorts of fucked up to grant free will. To allow your figure skating coach to violate your body for years. To be unable to stop Sunghoon’s father from beating him for every game of chess he lost. To give the worst pain to the least deserving.

That is the problem of evil. That if there were such suffering in the world, and yet God could not prevent it, then He is not omnipotent. Maybe He didn’t even come close to the power that Izanami and Izanagi or any of the other Shinto deities held, and they were far from perfect.

Sunghoon once told you that he would destroy the whole world for you if he could, to which you simply rolled your eyes and said that that would be no fun. This was, incidentally, after he’d gifted you a painting he’d done of the ancient lotus garden in Kumamoto. Making art was his new hobby that you made him pick up so he wouldn’t be so burnt out playing chess all the time.

“And why not?”

“Because our suffering helps us delight in everything else that much more,” you answered, resting your cheek on his shoulder. You knew you wouldn’t have said that two months ago, that you would have instead told him that humans are put on Earth to suffer and nothing else, but after being around friends who didn’t take life so seriously (if they ever did at all), you’d learned to have fun with your finite existence as it was.

Of course, you appreciated Sunghoon’s sentiment all the same. It held you close and told you everything would be alright, that the way your life had turned out was not your fault like you’d believed it was, but rather a consequence of things you could not control. In your physics class, Hiroto-sensei had quoted Albert Einstein during a lecture on quantum mechanics.

“God does not play dice with the universe.”

That was to say, Einstein never believed in the idea that atoms were governed by randomness. He turned his nose up at the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, which itself stated that there was no way to accurately predetermine the speed and position of a particle at any moment. He asserted that there was no way that anything could be certain, that it wasn’t possible to describe things in terms of probabilities. He thought that the course of all events was fixed, that God formulated and prescribed a certain set of laws and sat back to watch the universe evolve in accordance with those laws.

You would have to disagree with him.

After all, what kind of vindictive God would— 

— 

“Sunghoon,” you said as you laid on the floor of your living room, listening to music in English because you promised each other that one day you would get out of the country together. On this particular night, your album of choice was Radiohead’s Pablo Honey. 

He had mentioned that the band, at one point, refused to play “Creep” live because it was the one song the audience came to hear. You knew what that felt like. 

Sunghoon turned his gaze away from the ceiling to look at you, his eyes softening. “Hm?”

“Do… do you still like chess?”

You knew that he would understand what you meant by that. In the past few weeks, you’d had to practice with him after it turned out that you were a better opponent than anyone in Kokusai’s chess club. Sunghoon was still dead-set on going back to playing competitively, all in the name of being allowed to return to his childhood home, to his father, one day. At least, that’s what you thought.

Something about that made you uneasy, but you knew you were in no place to cast stones. After all, you had your own share of disappointing your parents. Your own mother had not come to see you in Shibuya since the day she abandoned you there, effectively handing over any parenting duties to your grandmother. The phone works two ways, and she’d never acknowledged that fact of the universe. And, unlike Sunghoon, you had never been offered the opportunity to go back “home” to Sendai. As if that place had ever been your home to begin with.

The nuances between your circumstances were only sparing, to say the least.

“You’re worried about me,” he declared. “You think I want to win a tournament so I can go home.”

You hummed in agreement.

“Well, yeah. I want to go home. But only to drop that stupid trophy off at my father’s door and be the one who never speaks to him again. Besides, why should I return to that place when I’m completely fine here?”

Maybe Jongseong had a point, you thought. Maybe you two did share something more than a lunch box of snails. Maybe it’s romantic, after all.

“Are you really okay here?”

He returned his gaze to the ceiling, avoiding your eyes. “Yeah. Because it’s where you are.”

— 

Sunghoon knelt down at your feet, lacing up your ice skates.

However, your legs were bouncing uncontrollably, and it wasn’t because of how cold the indoor rink was. Part of you wished that your Achilles tendon didn’t heal completely.

“Look, you made it this far,” Sunghoon said quietly, brushing his fingers against your supposed bad ankle. The doctors had said you’d be fine to skate on it, that it was your mind that wasn’t allowing you to try again. “We can come back another time.”

You shook your head. How you’d longed to be back, pining for a time where you would be free from the prison of invisible hands gripping her limbs, pinning you down on the ground. “No. I promised you we’d do it today. I need to do this for myself, too.”

“If you can’t—”

“Don’t tell me you doubt me, because I’ve already got that covered,” you snapped, the words flying out faster than you could control them. Your hand came up to cover your mouth. “I’m sorry, Hoonie. I didn’t mean—”

He shook his head, a slight smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “Don’t worry. It’s nice to finally hear what you think. But I disagree. You are so much more than you realize. I’m proud of you.”

Your eyes closed gently before you allowed herself to momentarily soak up those four words.

Then you shrugged off your coat and took his hand, letting him guide you to the rink. The frigid air tried to seep through your fleece-lined stockings but it was nothing to you as you began to wobble on the ice. You scolded herself internally and forced her muscles to relax. It was unbecoming of you to say you should have been an Olympian before the accident and then proceed to look like you needed a walker. 

It took several moments before you began to glide carefully, the blades of your skates just an extension of your body.

You didn’t need to go back to Sendai anymore. You could stand on both legs now, head held high.

For the next few minutes, you took your time getting used to the feeling again, silently willing all of your faith in yourself to return. You were different now. You could trust yourself. Protect yourself.  Being a Fox brought that out of you—your bravery, determination, the unabashed desire to take what the universe threw at you and spit it back in its face.

Of course, you had to thank Sunghoon for showing up when he did. Before then, you were what some people would call just waiting to die. Waiting for the possible day in which you would stop being who you were.

He never forced you to do anything you didn’t want to do. He never forced himself on you. The first time you ever held hands, it was you who reached for him in your sleep as you napped on the floor next to him, the space heater keeping the two of you warm.

Don’t be scared. Don’t be scared.

You didn’t need to, anymore. You glanced over your shoulder to find Sunghoon watching you intently, head propped up with his hand as he leaned on the railing.

One, two… three… jump.

You closed your eyes and leapt, spinning three hundred and sixty degrees before landing with only minimal strain, the skirt of your dress fluttering. You could hear Sunghoon’s overjoyed cries faintly as you continued to swim through the air, feeling the rush that used to overcome you when you were younger, although this time, there was nothing looming over you like the shadow of the Grim Reaper. Your entire body vibrated, all of your electrons dancing along with you.

Sunghoon didn’t hesitate when you came to him, pulling you in for a tight hug.

It was short-lived, though, because as soon as you came into contact,

you passed right through him.

“What… what the fuck?” he whispered, turning his head around to see you standing behind him. You were staring at your own hands, wondering what the hell just happened. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. It didn’t hurt.” You looked at him with a mirrored wide-eyed expression. “I think we need to call Jongseong.”

“I knew it,” Park Jongseong said smugly, strolling into the lobby of the ice rink with his hands in his pockets and an unlit Seven Stars dangling from his lips. You and Sunghoon sat one seat apart, in fear that it would happen again.

“Don’t be crazy,” you muttered as you crossed your arms. You uncrossed them when you considered the possibility that your hands could go inside your body if you weren’t careful. “There’s no such thing as having powers.”

“Sure,” Sunghoon added. “But there has to be some sort of explanation for this.”

Jongseong grinned, pushing his black hair out of his face. “Yeah. You’ve heard of quantum theory, right? Atomic principles? Hoon, you weren’t asleep during that lecture, were you?”

“Maybe I was. What do atoms have to do with any of this?” Sunghoon asked, rolling his eyes.

“Well, basically… how can I explain this easily… uh… your atoms and Y/N’s were so perfectly aligned that you… y’know… passed through each other.”

You frowned. “But Einstein said—”

“He was wrong. People can be wrong. Shit, even the gods were wrong sometimes. Damn, do you sleep in class, too?”

“I—”

“Nothing,” Jongseong said, “is a guarantee. Except death.”

Take that, Einstein.

— 

“You’re beautiful. I wish I could draw you right now,” he said.

You let out a soft, nervous laugh. “Cameras exist. You could just take a picture.”

“That’s not nearly enough.”

Your hands trailed shakily along the lapels of Sunghoon’s blue blazer, fingertips grazing the hem as he edged closer to you. You wondered if the accident would happen again.

“H-hoon…” you whispered as you attempted to sink your head deeper into his scarf wrapped around your neck. “I’m scared.”

They were on the rooftop you’d killed herself on—in the metaphorical sense—all those months ago. Since then, everything as you knew it was different, from your voice to the way you presented yourself all the way down to how you felt. 

“Nonsense,” he quipped in the same hushed tone. Your eyes were locked on your shoes, feet pointed toward one another. “You’re damn well the bravest person I know. It’s contagious, actually.”

“This is different,” you replied. You rubbed the fabric of his blazer feebly. “I…”

“I love you,” he said, tucking his index and middle fingers beneath her chin to tilt your head up to look at him. “I really love you.”

I love you. I love you a lot.

“No! you  can’t just… you can’t just say it like that!” you protested, hands flattening against his broad chest and attempting to push him away from you. It was no use. Despite how lanky he appeared to be, he was built like an iron wall.

Sunghoon chuckled, wrapping his fingers around yours. “How would you rather I say it?”

You froze as heat rose to your face. They’d just discussed this in class; the story went that Souseki Natsume, a famous writer who once taught English, said that because the Japanese did not declare their love so loosely the way Westerners did, the most appropriate equivalent of the expression would be “the moon is beautiful, isn’t it?”.

And the most appropriate “literary” response to that came out of your mouth smoothly, like melted ice cream. “Shindemo ii wa.”

I would die happy.

–––

season finale: i know the end — episodes 9-12

When observed under a microscope, two particles both affected by one experience will no longer exist as individuals thereafter, but as two halves of one whole. This phenomenon is known as quantum entanglement, and had been used by several of your closest friends to describe the way in which your life had flipped itself over its axis on one April afternoon in your third and final year of high school.

Five years had passed since you’d graduated. Since the day you grew a spine and ate a snail with Park Sunghoon, the day you stopped living on autopilot. Since you’d fallen in love with him and regained the mastery of your own voice, both of these things you’d done over and over again, day after day. And it had been three years since you finally returned to competitive figure skating to prove that you could do more than just fine on your own, without your mother and certainly without a coach who would violate your physical existence.

But in those years, Sunghoon still hadn’t made it out of Japan like he said you both would someday. At least, you hoped, not yet. Not yet, but soon. You knew it had to be soon.

You sat in your small apartment in the Fairfax district of Los Angeles, an expensive neighborhood you were only able to afford because of the amount of endorsements you’d taken on. Your little black cat, Tai, as in taiyaki, as in the dessert Sunghoon loved so much, purred contentedly in your lap as you stared out of the window and into the street below. 

You’d agreed to adopt a cat together one day. You wondered if he already had one of his own by now. You assumed he did; on several occasions you could sense his presence, encouraging you, making you push forward and keep fighting against the universe, against Izanami and Izanagi, against God Himself.

This was what you did in your free time. Miss your life back home. You didn’t want to make any new friends. It was useless. No one could take or come anywhere remotely near Sunghoon’s place—or Jimin’s, or Heeseung’s, or Jaeyun’s, or Jongseong’s, for that matter. 

Soon, you promised yourself, you could show Sunghoon all that he’d missed out on. In your second year in America, you finally mastered the quadruple lutz after several doctors quelled your anxieties and confirmed your ankle really had healed miraculously. 

You decided you would also take Sunghoon to Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, where you’d go every time you felt like getting on a Boeing 747 to give up on this dream once and for all and go back to him, your other dream—if he’d still have you, that is. You didn’t know for sure.

You played with your phone in your hand, turning it over in your palm. You knew he was only a call away, but you were starting to go back to your old self, unsure of whether or not he’d even pick up. There was also a newfound sense of pride you had, not wanting to be the first one to cave in. If he was the one who pushed you forward, why should you be like Eurydice and turn around to look back?

But Sunghoon was the one who put it best, every single time you asked him why he gave up on playing chess in favor of going to art school after graduation—even though his victory in the championships would win back the respect of his father: “I don’t need to go home when you’re right beside me.”

Liar. Where are you?

That night, like many other nights spent lonely, you could feel him beside you, when everything was still except your own chest, aching for some sort of reprieve from the constant gravitational pull of your personal sun and moon, and the monotonous whirr of the electric fan that sat watch beside yoiur bed. You felt the ghost of his fingertips along your spine, and since you happened to be super lucky and lying extra quietly this time—you heard his voice, soft and low and warm like whiskey down your throat. It played on a loop until it lulled you to sleep.

“We’ll go together. I promise.”

He’d said that the night he admitted he loved you.

You also knew that he always knew where you stood on things as flimsy as words:

Tamago to chikai wa kudake-yasui.

Eggs and vows are easily broken.

And since he knew, why would he say that—when he was the one who could read you without even so much as a perfunctory glance? Why would he stand with you in Terminal 1 of Tokyo Narita without his own boarding pass? Why would he tell you to break up with him right before you got on that plane to California?

Stupid plane. Stupid distance. Stupid Y/N. Stupid, stupid, stupid. You had no patience for idiots. You weren’t excluded from your own disdain.

The only thing that kept you sane was the fact that somewhere deep inside you, in a place whose existence you were reluctant to acknowledge, you knew that one day, you’d see him again.

You had to.

You just hoped you’d still be able to recognize each other.

— 

To change the polarity of an electromagnet, two people are required. They use one snail for each person. Their most repressed memory will transfer over to the snail once it’s been touched. In order for the magnetic fields to switch, the parties must switch their snails and consume them.

The result should not end in repulsion.

The day Sunghoon’s atoms had lined up with yours so perfectly that you passed right through him was an indicator that some things weren’t just theories that could be disproved with a fallacy or two. That much was true.

You sighed, trudging through the farmer’s market in search of your favorite stand, which was run by a group of friends who reminded you so much of your beloved Fox Club back home. They sold baked goods that your trainer would frown upon if she saw them, but you believed that you deserved to eat them every Sunday.

And without fail, Sunghoon’s voice popped up in your head, reassuring you that you could eat them every day if you wanted to, just as long as you did it in moderation.

“Thank you,” you whispered quietly, still unsure as ever if he could hear your reply.

You paid for the decadent salted chocolate chip cookies and walked the four blocks home, debating for the millionth time over why you and him had to be forced apart. Did it mean you had to grow alone first? Would you be able to ever feel whole again?

You were able, however, to feel him missing you. So it wasn’t as completely one-sided as it seemed to be sometimes. It was always there, a slight tug in your heartstrings like a thread on its last life. It sat in your chest right beside where you missed him. On this particular day, it was strong. Stronger than any of the other days that came before, so overwhelming that you had to stop halfway home and sit on a bench to catch your breath.

Could quantum theory explain how he could feel whatever you were thinking? Or how you knew, back when you two were still together, what he wanted for dinner before you even asked? Or how your anxieties would disappear just as fast as they came, replaced by a flood of reassurances?

You had had a feeling that he failed his Visa interview on purpose, six months before you were slated to go to America. In the embassy’s lobby, he’d told you that the interviewer said he would have passed if you were his wife and not just his girlfriend.

Liar.

He’d assured you that he did want to go with you. He could find a job working for Pixar or Illumination or anywhere that would hire him for his talent. So why was the universe making it so hard for you to be together now, when the first two years of your entanglement were so easy?

Nothing, you learned, was supposed to make sense. You could spend hours asking “But why?” to every answer and there would be nothing to shut you up. In fleeting moments you would reconsider your decision to speak again, because the one person you spoke for was a little more than five thousand miles away.

So how am I able to be happy when he isn’t right next to me?

Not as happy as you knew you could be, but happy nonetheless. You were running after your first dream, after all.

Your phone rang when you got home.

“Jimin?” you asked, squinting at the screen. You were met with the image of your best friend, bouncing her seven-month-old baby on her lap, a little girl named after you. “Are you okay? Did something happen?”

“Hey, Y/N,” Jimin’s husband, Heeseung, called, waving to the camera. It was so surreal for you to think that Jimin ended up with her high school boyfriend while you were twenty-three and still pining over yours.

“Have you seen it?” Jimin squealed over the sound of the baby’s giggling. A TV in the background could be heard, the voices speaking Japanese. “The first episode just came out!”

“Seen what? What are you talking about? It’s literally only ten in the morning here.”

“Sunghoon’s anime! It’s so good!”

Your heart stopped pumping for a split second as you heard the double saccharine syllables of his name. The little communication you had with him while you were gone were only simple, fond exchanges over congratulations. The last you’d heard from him, he’d gotten a job at a big animation studio. Of course he was too humble to tell you everything. “What… What's it about?”

“It’s a romance. Everyone in the world is assigned a soulmate and the main characters experience a lot of crazy shit the closer they get to each other. Sorry the summary’s so bad, I promise it’s way better than I just made it sound.”

Soulmates, huh?

— 

It has been said that the atoms of the universe have been rearranged to create the world as it is known now. Should that be true, two people can be born of the same star and not realize it until the moment presents itself.

You knew Sunghoon was there before you even saw him in the crowd. The air suddenly felt different, like you’d just dragged your bare feet through carpet and was just millimeters away from touching a brass doorknob.

On normal competition days you would have attributed the charged atmosphere to nerves or the ten-thousand volt energy of the spectators cheering on their favorite skater. But it wasn’t a normal competition day, unless the winter Olympics in Seattle was just some regular thing. 

You knew it: Sunghoon had made it out of Japan this time.

“Ladies and gentlemen, in third place, USA: Allison Steadmeyer!”

Cue music. Polite wave. Applause.

“In second place, Russia: Irina Khodorkhovsky!”

Music. Wave. Applause.

“In first place, Japan: Y/N!”

The single cheer of one person drowned out the rest.

“Why did you walk away from me?” you asked quietly; anyone around would have chalked up your tears as those of victory, of making a comeback worthy of an Oscar-nominated film. That was because they couldn’t feel the way you instinctively latched onto Sunghoon like an oxygen atom receiving its electron pairing. “Why didn’t you go with me?”

“I didn’t want to get in the way of your dreams,” Sunghoon said into the apple scent of your hairspray. You trembled in his arms, the dazzling Swarovski crystals of your midnight blue spandex dress digging through the wool of his coat. “I knew I would only be a bother to you in the end.”

“Liar.” Tears swam in your vision, blurring his face until he was only the galaxy of vanilla and cinnamon you saw every night behind your eyelids. “Didn’t you know? Didn’t you know that you were a part of them?”

“No.”

You were even stronger by then. The first time you ever tried to physically push him away, he was confessing his love for you. This time, he stumbled backward, albeit only by one step. “Liar!”

“I’m sorry. You know I love you and that hasn’t changed. I just wanted you to be free, I didn’t want to be a burden on you. But it seems as though we’re really meant to be together. I didn’t do what I did to hurt you. I tried so hard to make it not hurt. ”

“What do you mean?”

“As long as I tried to be happy, I figured that you would feel it, too. You know, like what Jongseong said when we were younger. We’re connected. But it was difficult. Every day, I felt you missing me as much as I missed you.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“That even if we were across the entire fucking universe, we’d still be tied together. And nothing could come between that. I know it now, and I’m sorry.”

“I never want to hear you apologize to me ever again,” you mumbled.

— 

“Y/N?” 

You were lying on your hotel bed, one of his arms wrapped around your shoulder as his hand aimlessly played with your hair that was still wavy from being knotted in a tight bun for your performance that day.

One side of your face was pressed against where his heart beat in synchronization with yours. “Yes?”

“Did you ever feel… alone?”

You shook your head. “No. Just lonely.”

“Do you still feel it now?”

“Well, you’re here, aren’t you?”

He pressed a kiss to the bony ridges of your knuckles. “And I’m never leaving unless it’s with you.”

a/n: surprise surprise! y'all thought SSV was gonna be my debut on here? well i lied. here's arguably one of the saddest things i've written so far besides that one angst i wrote in stella's dms last week. i hope you love it as much as i loved writing it. thank you to nia for encouraging me to post this :D taglist: @karinasbaby @enha-stars @intromortal @heeslomll @venomhee @heeheeswifey

[ace-sher-bi-john]

While I absolutely love both BBC Sherlock and Sherlock & Co, Sherlock & Co definitely depicts a more healthy relationship between Sherlock and John.

For starters, on BBC Sherlock, Sherlock and John are both co-dependent on each other. John was implied to be suicidal before he met Sherlock. Sherlock relapses without John by his side. Even with Mary to substitute the void in his heart and help him find purpose again, John would never move on from Sherlock. If anything happened to John, it wouldn't end well for anyone, especially Sherlock.

On Sherlock & Co, one of John's only problems after returning home from Ukraine was that he couldn't afford a flat on his own. He seemed to be very excited about life, going on dates, couldn't wait to start his podcast. He was genuinely happy to see Mike.

Sherlock could easily manage on his own without John. He doesn't need to be reminded to eat, he doesn't need an assistant for cases, he doesn't need someone to take care of him. His only problem is that he needs a flatmate.

Although John and Sherlock both need each other to afford rent, they don't need each other for anything else. They want each other's company, they don't need it. They aren't two halves of a whole, they are two wholes coming together. That's how it should be with all healthy relationships, platonic, romantic, queerplatonic, or otherwise.

It also helps a lot that Sherlock isn't a complete jerk on Sherlock & Co. He genuinely treats John and everyone else with a kindness that while I believe BBC Sherlock is capable of it, he rarely showed it. When John's PTSD is triggered, Sherlock asks John if he'd rather sit out that case. He then asks John if he wants to hold hands and discuss his feelings. In part one of the Blue Carbuncle, Sherlock complimented, actually complimented John. That kind of scene just never happened on BBC Sherlock. John was doing his "That was fantastic! You're amazing!" and Sherlock said, "You flatter me, Watson. But you did awesome too! You should have seen the way you did that! It was brilliant!"

John seems like a much more well rounded happy person in general. Just listen to any of his viewer discretion warnings. "Greetings you handsome devil! This episode will contain a bit of the old swearing, a bit of violence, some drug use. Oh and a bit of duck poo!" I hate to make this comparison, due to how much it will sound like an insult. But he acts like the quirky Disney Princess personality that every Disney Princess from the 2010s has and I mean that in the best possible way. It's my favorite thing about him. He's so adorable.

In the Blue Carbuncle, John has a moment similar to ones that you've seen many times before on BBC Sherlock. John has plans that mean he won't be able to help with the case. He is going to Berlin to spend Christmas with his old army friends. It's going to be his first boys' trip in years. But then he gets so sucked into the case that he's almost late for his plane and decides to just stay with Sherlock anyway because the case is just so fascinating he can't leave. On BBC Sherlock, John has abandoned his plans, his job, his girlfriends, for a case because he couldn't stand to be without Sherlock for so long. Also because Sherlock would often crash is dates, ruin his relationships, just so that John could assist him on cases. On Sherlock & Co, Sherlock was happy for John that he was going out with friends, even though it would mean spending the holidays alone. And Sherlock LOVES Christmas, so it's sad to think that he would have to spend it alone.

Where BBC Sherlock would manipulate or guilt John into staying, Sherlock & Co Sherlock let John go and was genuinely fine with going it alone for a week or two, even if it meant being all alone on Christmas.

I love BBC Sherlock, toxic co-dependent relationships and all, and I always will. But Sherlock & Co gives a little something different and I am happy that my boys are happier.

SH: *laughing* What's so funny Watson? JW: *laughing* It's just hearing you say "bell end" SH: Lovely and jubbly

[vladdyissues]

I wonder if Danny could bribe Technus into doing something about the nano bots in Jazz’s bloodstream.

Seriously, I love this so much. You could build an entire episode around it. Nano My Business or something like that, and takes place after Masters of All Time but before Kindred Spirits. (Episode pitch below cut)

Danny notices Jazz has been behaving a bit weird lately. He puts it down to her working too hard studying for her college entrance exams, but when she passes through some kind of electromagnetic field (perhaps generated by the latest malfunctioning Fenton ghost device), she collapses and goes into a coma.

At the hospital, the doctors can't find anything wrong with her. Danny just knows it's something ghost-related (insert macguffin here?) but he can't talk to his parents about it because it'd mean revealing his secret identity. (He considers it seriously, though, because he's so worried about Jazz.) But he knows who might be able to help him.

Danny, Sam and Tucker steal the Specter Speeder and crash a Superbowl party being held at Vlad's Wisconsin castle. Vlad isn't pleased, but Danny doesn't care.

"You owe me and my parents for finding the cure to your ecto-acne," he reminds him, and Vlad grudgingly agrees to visit Jazz in the hospital and covertly scan her with some of his own ghost gadgets or maybe the macguffin mentioned previously.

Eventually they discover that the nanobots, without any programming to guide them, have gone rogue and are attacking Jazz's body. She's going to die if they don't do something.

"Unfortunately, you destroyed my controller, Daniel," Vlad tells him bluntly, "otherwise I would have been able to initiate the self-destruct sequence and dissolve them. I'm afraid there's nothing we can do for her now. Pity. She was a brilliant girl, so much like your mother."

Danny's eyes go green. Cue the first onscreen, purely human fistfight between Danny Fenton and Vlad Masters, though really it's just Danny leaping on Vlad in a blind rage and punching him repeatedly while Vlad tries to shield himself. Tucker and Sam manage to drag Danny off of him and restrain him.

"This is all your fault!" Danny screams through his tears, but he knows in his heart Vlad is right. If he hadn't destroyed the controller, they wouldn't be here watching his sister get slowly poisoned by nanobots.

Tucker is the one who poses the million-dollar hypothesis: "Wait, these nanobots just need a new program to overwrite them, right? Something that'll take control of them?"

Three pairs of eyes stare him.

"Don't we know a ghost who regularly takes over technology and reprogams it to do what he wants?"

All four of them start at each other for a beat, then start scrambling for the Specter Speeder.

Once more, Danny and Vlad are forced to team up and work toward a common goal. It's a race against time to find Technus in the Ghost Zone and convince/bribe/threaten him into doing what they want—if it can even be done.

But of course they succeed. At the last minute, Technus removes the nanobots (maybe they all flock to him like a trillion little baby chicks and, charmed, he absorbs them), and Jazz is now safe. Danny traps Technus in a Fenton Flash Drive™ per their arrangement but promises to let him out to have fun in a little while. Jazz wakes up, hugs ensue, Maddie runs to her daughter weeping with joy, Jack tackles Vlad, thanking him for his unwavering support during this difficult time, and Vlad wiggles his way out of Jack's embrace and flees the hospital as fast as he can. Danny, Jazz, Sam and Tucker share a few closing words, then iris out.

Psych!

Back in Wisconsin, Vlad returns to his Superbowl party but finds a strange flash drive in his pocket. Curiosity wins over common sense, and he plugs it into his laptop.

"Holy hectobytes!" Technus shrieks in his Gilbert Gottfried voice. "The ghost boy wasn't kidding! Just look at this spiffy new playground!"

Technus is unleashed through the WiFi, to Vlad's abject horror, and takes over every TV screen, radio, and electronic device in his castle—including his home network and private server. The party descends into screaming chaos, champagne pyramids crashing over, cheese logs going airborne, just million-dollar mayhem. Green and gold pandemonium.

The camera settles on Vlad's tired face. "I should have seen that one coming."

The end!

[mikkaeus]

house md hilson fic rec - medium to long fics (10k+)

Other house rec lists: short fics | episode tags | postcanon | infidelity trope (all of these are mutually exclusive apart from the infidelity one) // Edit: I added the longer postcanon fics to this reclist as well because this one got the most traction!

These are all House/Wilson unless otherwise stated. Before we get into the fics, here are some of my fave authors that have written several house fics.

fourteencandles: im literally in love with them . 10/10 writing no notes. also long fics?? hello???

ictus: this author has the range! from emotional to fluff to funny. very smooth writing. all of their fics have different vibes which was fun to read. they’re all very good. 

Transformatron: fics that are transcendent and porny, all featuring a d/s undertone or theme (wilson as the dom)

Namaste (livejournal / ff.net): Some short fics, some much longer ones. Mostly gen focussing on H&W friendship, with some fics on canon pairings. Interesting character studies and discerning prose.

In order of length. *faves, ***underrated faves

*Brain Damage by fourteencandles (8k) (Ok I know this isn’t over 10k but I wanted all of their fics on one post and it’s close enough so.) This was brilliant. Like a real episode of House, with Wilson as the unfortunate patient-of-the-week, with bonus House/Wilson. Characterisation was bang on, and the plot was original and engaging and had a satisfying conclusion. Love to see House taking care of Wilson.

Down to the Water + Bound for Home by blackmare (~10k) Aftermath of season 4. House and Wilson go on a road trip. Quiet and sad and fragile, with excellent writing. This fic appears to have been fairly well known in lj days but I don't think a lot of newer people know about it.

*A Smaller World by fourteencandles (10k) The thing between them works, if Wilson doesn't push for more. God I’m so soft. I have so many feelings!!! In love with this established relationship hilson, still a little precarious, but with Wilson adapting, and House willing to put in effort.

*What's Past by fourteencandles (10k) The guy who used to have Wilson's job comes back for a visit, and it turns out they have more in common than Wilson ever knew.

*Touch Therapy by nomad (10k) It's not that House needs the human contact. It's just that when you're sharing an apartment, these things happen sometimes. Light hearted and funny, canon divergence from when Wilson’s staying on House's couch in s2. This is pretty much the homosexual waters have started flowing in House's direction post. Excellent dialogue.

***not another medical drama series (10k) by captainharkness Retelling of season 1 with House and Wilson as an established relationship. Great slice of life stories! Ongoing. The first is H/W POV, the second is Cameron, and the third is Chase. My favourite is definitely the second one (someone else’s story). I adore seeing H/W through the ducklings’ eyes. 

Synchronicity by copperbadge (10k) Dead patients, car wrecks, drug overdoses, journalists, Comatose Charlie, and orange chicken. Must be love.

systemic by ictus (10k) Ever since Wilson moved in, House has presented with some inexplicable symptoms. Fortunately, he has a team of talented doctors to aid him with his diagnosis. Season 2 fic! This one is funny and sweet and overall a great read.

Rush Down Darkness by Starlingthefool (10k) House MD/World War Z crossover. Told mainly through interview dialogue from house’s pov. Engaging story. House/Wilson definitely takes a backseat to the plot — there’s no grand getting together or anything. That's not to say it's not about them though, because there were still lots of good moments (good in the sense that my heart hurts). More succinctly, it has the vibes of an established relationship fic., although it isn't technically one.

Defensive Strategies by Milkshake Butterfly (~10k) (lj) In which Wilson is tired of being asked out by women when he's not ready to date again, and naturally House proposes a simple solution: pretend to be together. An enjoyable read.

******Commonplace and True by celestialskiff (11k) It would be a simple story--House and Wilson meet at a medical conference, have sex, and enjoy each other's company--but nothing is ever easy, or simple. Explores Wilson's relationship with House, with women, and with himself. House and Wilson throughout the years — with the version of canon where Wilson has cheated on every wife and girlfriend with House. When I tell you I am FROTHING!!! Pining while fucking?? The way it’s never the right time?? The greed of wanting to have your cake and eat it too? (That one’s specifically for Wilson, our beloved three-wives guy.) The vibes are immaculate. The prose is elegant verging on poetic. I’m eating this fic whole and it will be on my mind always. It is THE hilson fic for me. It is criminal that this fic has been up since 2012 and it only has 200 kudos. Go read it immediately & give the author some love.

***Declarations of Independence by Namaste (ff.net, also on livejournal) (11k) House and winter, throughout the years. I really enjoyed this. Excellent writing. Copy pasting a part of a comment by bedawyn which articulates why this fic is unique better than I can: “So far, I've seen a lot of focus in the fanfic (and the eps) on the pain and the Vicodin, but very little awareness of the practical aspects of limited mobility and the emotional impact of those even apart from the pain. So this was a very nice change.”

***Rule of Three by Transformatron (11k) (House/Wilson/Foreman) Foreman sees something he shouldn't have. And, maybe, wants something he shouldn't have, too. This was well written and super hot, with fun dialogue and descriptions that do justice to the excellent writing of the show itself. Foreman is faithfully characterised in a way that made me sympathetic. Also H/W outsider perspective as a third is such a treat to read. Lower me into my grave!!!!

*Warning Signs by out_there (12k) Excerpt: House looked to the left, staring down at the open box. Wilson knew that expression on his face: House was torn between denying it all and gleefully acknowledging his schemes. Normally, his ego won out and, like a comic super villain, he'd explain all. Wilson just needed to stay quiet and wait. This fic was fantastic. I am disgustingly fond. Superb characterisation. Light hearted and funny.

The Oncologist Trap by zulu (13k) (2007) House subtly seduces Wilson. Somehow.

The Line of Thought by tevinterimperium (13k) House and Wilson pretend to be together to play a prank on the ducklings, which is an extremely plausible scenario. From the perspective of the ducklings. Set sometime after 3x15: Half-Wit.

hail mary by ictus (13k) A post-canon fix it! In the weeks since finishing the show and reading this fic there are times I forgot that this wasn’t canon. It’s such a believable (and well-researched) alternate ending that feels like an actual episode.

Son of Mine by simoneallen (14k) Sherlock is House’s long-lost kid. Usually I’m not a fan of cross-over fics but I enjoyed this one. Established relationship on the johnlock side, getting together on the hilson side.

***hearts turn red by ictus (14k) In my head this is the counterpoint to Commonplace and True. When I found it after reading that one it really was a holy shit two fucking cakes?? moment. The delicious infidelity vibes are similar, but the vibes of the writing are pretty different -- whereas the above fic has a more quiet, subdued atmosphere, this one has more snappy prose and it’s more light-hearted with funny moments as well as emotional ones. It’s not just the infidelity theme that makes me crazy about both of them though; it’s how they play on the great tragedy of House and Wilson. In the author’s own words: In a way they do feel a little bit doomed to never quite be on the same page with each other until the very end of the series and by then it's too late. Of course, in these fics, they’re rescued earlier than the end, but the wretched vibes remain. Also, I’m obsessed with this line: By Wilson’s read, House is somehow simultaneously joking and sincere: Schrödinger’s sexual advance. That is the entire fucking show.

An Inconvenient Truth by annathaema (15k) Wilson helps out Cuddy and reveals something about himself in the process. House freaks out accordingly. Also features banana-colored babies, the men's room, and Skee-Ball.

*at the rind by ShanaStoryteller (19k) An AU where Wilson experiences all the near death moments House has in the show as a series of nightmares. Set between 1.19 and 2.05, but spoilers for the whole show. Protective Wilson!! We love to see it. I also like Wilson’s characterisation here - you can very much see how not-normal he is. We love unhealthy co-dependency.

***Esopus Creek by shaycat (24k) An eighty-year-old widower by the name of Eugene Skinner ventures out one September day in upstate New York for his usual morning activity - fly fishing. His leisurely hobby is interrupted by a bickering pair nearby in the river. That chance encounter with Greg House and James Wilson changes the course of his life. Told from the perspective of the last friend the boys make on their final road trip. This was the perfect post season 8, Wilson-still-dies fic. A sad fic but not a depressing one. It’s quiet and heartwarming, in a bittersweet way. Highly recommend. It has great use of outsider POV — I’m always a sucker for it but it worked particularly well in this case to have the angst but not be drowning in it. Also I just really liked the OC.

***Howler Tone by baffledbear (25k) The calls always happen late at night, and they're extremely sporadic, with weeks, sometimes months bridging between them. They talk on the phone otherwise, of course; about patients, or dinner plans, or carpooling. Typical stuff. But the calls that always end a certain way always start a certain way. Wilson is so repressed but so attracted to House. House is taking as much as he can get while still remaining in relative safety. Together they push a platonic relationship to the absolute limits of plausible deniability. Overall totally realistic within the canon of the show — the natural step up from the gay chicken already depicted. It’s just such a perfect scenario for them! That combined with silky smooth prose, faithful characterisation and accurate dialogue makes this fic is a definite hilson favourite and also a hilson-thesis fic.

*The Open Road by Pun (25k) A fandom classic. Road trip fic set in the earlier seasons. It's good; read it.

*He Won't Tell You That He Loves You by hellshandbasket (25k) [In which Nolan pulls at the Wilson thread, and House can't stop it all from unraveling. Repression is a hell of a drug.] Early s6. Another fandom classic that is worth its salt.

no need to worry (making up your mind) by scribespirare (25k) House makes the mistake of telling his mother he can't join her for Christmas because of his new boyfriend. Somehow, this becomes Wilson's problem. Cute and fun. I put off reading fake-dating fics because I was worried about them being OOC but this one definitely wasn’t!

***Sticks and Stones by Transformatron (25k) (WIP) House has an innovative new idea for managing his chronic pain. Wilson’s not sure he approves - but when has House ever asked for permission? This is such a great concept I am climbing the walls!!! D/s with House as the sub. The story is currently still at pre-relationship stage, with House experimenting with BDSM and Wilson being unhappy with the proceedings (for some unknown reason /s). Also the writing is nice and snappy with some great figurative language that manages to incorporate medical themes impressively well. 

Fresh Feeling by justkeeptrekkin (30k) House is tricked into going on a team-building trip with his colleagues. He does far more bonding with Wilson than anyone else. Funny and well written. The team interactions are very cute.

***Tracking Time by Namaste (37k) (ff.net) A look at House and Wilson's friendship over the years and how it has changed from their meeting through the end of the first season. I don’t usually read long genfics but this one was exceptional. I like Namaste’s take on House and Wilson’s characters. And they are a very good storyteller — one thing that you don’t tend to see as much of in fanfiction is the old adage of ‘show not tell’. The writing in this fic is careful and subtle, and lets you read between the lines, making it so that no part of the 37k words is a drag to read.

*The Body Found by fourteencandles (46k) Wilson's missing. When I tell you I cried... Premium angst & hurt/comfort. Excellent dialogue with some alternating POV (House mainly, but you also get the three ducklings & Cuddy).

You Already Know How This Will End by fourteencandles (46k) What if House had gone to rehab right after/around "Merry Little Christmas"? (3.10) This fic was interesting. It’s told in a series of short vignettes with a variety of different perspectives. It’s not really a hilson fic (or a fic for any ship). It just explores the characters. I did wish for more hilson but it’s a good read (I mean, it’s fourteencandles). The one hilson scene near the end where they hire a hooker in Atlantic City lives in my head rent free. Warning that the ending is rather abrupt and I didn’t find it satisfying, but I think it works for this kind of story, in a way. Messy people and their complicated relationships, with a lot of loose ends left untied, because that’s just what life is. 

***For Every Closed Door by starlingthefool (around 50k?) (lj) Overview of the chapters (14 with 4 interludes and an epilogue) is on the author’s lj (scroll down).  House MD/Dead Like Me crossover.  I love this fic a lot! It’s canon divergence from Season 3. House gets killed in a freak accident and becomes a reaper, remaining in the mortal world to harvest souls, able to interact with people but not be recognisable to those that know him. As the author says, this is an Afterlife!Fic and therefore a deathfic. They also said it’s not depressing — which is true, because it’s more plotty than an angstfest, and there are lots of light-hearted parts, but it is definitely heartbreaking at points. I literally cried all the way through the last chapter. Happy ending though!!! Don’t worry about the cross-over aspects. I haven’t seen Dead Like Me, and as far as I can tell, it just takes the premise of the show. I’m glad I found this fic whilst trawling 2000s livejournal because it’s really a hidden gem. Great plot, dialogue, compelling OCs — the whole package! I got so emotionally invested in the story. I think there were maybe a few parts that were a little unpolished but just keep reading. It’s really worth it. 

*A Modest Proposal and Involuntary Commitment series by ignaz (98k) The one where House and Wilson get married so Wilson can’t testify against House in the Tritter arc.  I have an unfortunate habit of downloading fics and then forgetting to bookmark & comment once I’m done, so I don’t have anything detailed to say about this one, but it’s a classic and a favourite of mine.

Twenty Years of Stealing My Food by hwshipper (100k) A backstory taking place over twenty years, from how House and Wilson met all the way to canon. A reimagining of their fucked up, magnetic relationship, with a straightforward writing style. They get together nearly as soon as they meet and maintain a steady open relationship whilst cheating on their various girlfriends and wives throughout the years. 

[another-day]

time for another lovely EPISODE IN REVIEW!!! and boy, do we have a lot to discuss for this one

!!!SPOILERS FOR II EPISODE 16!!!

oh my gosh

that episode was insane, i’m still reeling from it, but let’s start from the beginning

i remember seeing a post somewhere where someone was saying 3gs would most likely have a very ‘army general’ type personality, and i think that still holds, just not to the degree i intially thought

he’s someone who focuses on motivation and praise to not only please but get people to follow through. this is not in the way of manipulation, just in order to get what needs to be done, done. expanding on his personality like this was so interesting, especially interspersing his moments of fear with his moments of joy because he hadn’t seen other people in years. it really goes to show how cobs can negatively affect other characters than mephone 4.

trophy has really grown as a character in the sense that he can now see the fundamental flaws in the persona of knife, though i do feel he’s still heavily guided in this by his own values. he has this firm belief that knife is similar if not the exact same as him; angry and violent. he breaks down all of the cracks in knife’s facade, but incorrectly so, which was interesting.

alongside this, knife is shown to still be perceived incorrectly to how wishes to be by many of the contestants. considering he’s trying to make such an effort to change and become a good person only for trophy to treat him like this is clearly dishesrtening to him. as much as he likes to build up his whole tough guy persona, in this episode and the last, we’ve seen that the words of others, especially those he considers allies, can really affect him. granted, trophy is no ally of his, but it still has an impact on him to be so shamelessly called out, even if a lot of it is assumption.

i love that they make everyone’s attempts to comfort suitcase feel so condescending in order to emphasise her confusion and disarray in terms of the situation. this feels like a circus, where suitcase is realising she’s a clown for being fooled. i love her reaction to realising nickel and balloon are friends because she has that underlying anger, yes, but more than anything else she’s confused and upset. soooo cool.

i nearly screamed but it was two in the morning when i was watching this so i did not.

but oh my gosh, the idea of “deleting” a character is horrifying. as taco put it, seeing “the life drain out of him” must’ve been horrifying for her. this, oj’s, and nickel’s deletion are only amped up by this prospect of having people around to see the life drain out of someone they were once friends with.

also why did it have to be pickle. literally what did he do.

also also, now we know what happened to toilet i guess.

forshadowing cobs being able to see wherever they go, alongside how everything of theirs in under control, even if not by cobs.

cobs is meant to parallel mephone 4 in this scene. his advertisment is very “brainwash”-y, and it emphasises what a hold he used to have on people and the control he once held through his creations. similarly so, through the reveal at the end, WHICH I’LL GET TO, we see that mephone similarly has control over all of the contestants, whether direct or otherwise. so very peculiar really.

depicting the death scenes like this was brilliant. a persuing entity, sounded by alarms that only the person who is to be killed can hear is a horrifying concept, and something so horrifying from an outsider perspective.

imagine this from paper’s perspective: you’re arguing with your best friend about the amount of tasks you’ve been given for so little credit, and you finally admit everything that’s been bothering you. instead of the reassurance you usually receive, your friend stands there in shock before asking “do you hear that?” you hear nothing. the fear on his face grows and he backs against the door, crying for something you can’t see to ‘stop’. you’re confused, but before you can question it, he’s dead, spilled. any semblance of life in him as disappeared, and everyone is terrified.

this was so masterfully executed all the times it happened; taco’s incoherency when she was found with pickle, the hotel’s reaction when oj spills, and baseball’s silence and shock as he re-enters after nickel’s death. it sets up a tone of horror, and shows just how unaware everyone truly is. soooooo very cool.

it was so cool seeing the purgatory crew again because i really missed these goofy guys. but it really gets you thinking about what role they’re going to play.

unlike bow, all of the “deleted” contestants have had their melife icons completely removed, so that begs the question; will they be turned into ghosts at purgatory mansion? bow states in the episode that it took her a while to appear in the mansion, so it gets you thinking if deletion counts as a perma-death, and those killed will be turned to ghosts.

knife’s very impersonal handling of this situation versus suitcase’s gentle assurance and questioning really brings out the difference between these two.

this scene is meant to make knife seem foolish for wanting to rush by all this, but that’s not what knife intends to look like, again bringing back this idea of misunderstanding his actions. knife doesn’t like focusing on what’s around him when he’s been given a clear objective, getting information to find cobs in this case. alongside this, he doesn’t have the same understanding of what 3gs has been through as suitcase, yet he tries, to a degree, to understand this individual. when knife isn’t given the information he needs, he looks for his own means of finding it, and moves ahead.

suitcase on the other hand is shown to want to take it slower. unlike knife, she’s more invested in the story than the lesson or outcome. this is something normally detrimental to someone in a finale, but due to their working together, knife doesn’t really get too far ahead of her. she wants to understand motivations for actions so that she can figure out how to respond, whereas knife just wants to, for lack of a better phrase, cut to the the chase. very interesting.

now, the titular reveal of the episode, “the reality of the situation”, if you will.

despite how of guard i was caught, this makes perfect sense.

though i don’t really like season three, cabby has a scene where she freaks out when questioned about her parents. i initially thought this had something to do with her memory issues, but this explanation makes much more sense. bot knew about theur parents because their parents actually exist, cabby’s did not.

no character ever talks about their past, nor their parents, nor their motivation to join the show. it all quite literally starts from the first episode, and picks up from there. that is why mephone can regenerate them. that is why when mephone dies they can’t be regenerated, because as their creator, he was the only one capable of REcreating them. its an incredible reveal, and a very well working one.

all in all, this episode was phenomenal. the chracter work and development and storyline were all so well done and i totally adore it. episode 15 was very character focused and took a step away from the plot. this episode on the other hand took the plot and bolted with it, scattering all slrts of bombshells on the way.

i love this episode because it shows unity and disharmony and everything really feels like its coming together and i’m so excited for the next episode.

till next time lovelies!!!

[waitmyturtles]

Love In The Big City: Reflections on the Novel, and Episodes 1 and 2 of the Television Series

(Writing this with big ups to the LITBC Book Club, led by @lurkingshan and @bengiyo -- I only wish my mom life allowed me to have participated in real time in that project! I am taking the LITBC club's lead and watching two episodes a week of this series. SPOILERS from the novel that may make their way into the series are below -- read at your peril if you're pacing yourself on the series.)

In the midst of my reading the novel version of Love In The Big City over the last two weeks, I've been posting news updates (here, here, and here) about South Korean conservatives, many of them (maybe all of them) Christian, trying to censor and prevent the airing of the subsequent drama series, which dropped this week on TVING and Viki.

I want to note how important and ironic it is, macro-systemically, to note that Christianity has such a looming presence outside of the story itself, with "protestors" (bigots) leveraging "Christian values" as a means of trying to keep this already-brilliant show from being aired.

And if you're pacing on the series like I am, and you *haven't* read the novel, then you've only gotten a little taste for how Christian zealotry, among other issues, has and will affect Go Young throughout this story.

But I'm getting ahead of myself: when I picked up the novel, I was more familiar with the noise and drama associated with the television series than I was with the story itself. I'm going to talk a little about my reactions to the novel, and then offer thoughts on the first two episodes.

I read Proust's In Search of Lost Time (yep, all of it) in my freshman year of college, and Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises two years after. I felt the power of both of these stories strongly in Park Sang-young's novel, from the impact that memories and depression can have on a young man, to the permanence of medical conditions that can drive a young man's life towards otherwise unexplored cliffs of grief and pain.

Even reading a synopsis of In Search of Lost Time is a monumental feat, so let me just say that I felt Proust's madeleine-driven devices of memory, within the novel, from Young's frozen blueberries to the chill of the Marlboro Reds in the freezer. The impact of Young being really, really alone, as connected to the empty freezer and the dwindling blueberries after Jaehee's (Mi-ae in the series) wedding, caught me in a hole of loneliness that I felt for Young -- well before I knew enough of his backstory to be truly devastated.

I'm jumping ahead of myself vis à vis the series, but I also felt Proust even more heavily as I was reading about Philosopher Hipster Doofus Hyung, and I threw back to @lurkingshan as I was reading the book, "goddamn it, we are in yet another circle of hipster doom, huh," well before I learned about the medical turning point this story hinges on. Young's incessant attraction to that POS had me thinking about Proust's narrator's simultaneous incessant attraction and disdain for his companion, Albertine, who is a lesbian in early 20th-century France. While the story between the narrator and Albertine is ultimately a devastating one, Proust's narrator winds through the devastation with an equally devastating arm's-length distance, continually avoiding the true depth of pain that his obsessions would have otherwise rendered.

For me, it's such an apropos comparison to think about as we see Young, time and time again, rationalize the avoidance he has to commitment, all while throwing his energy into the relationships he's able to find himself in, ones that he essentially stumbled upon and never instigated.

The pain of his loneliness only grows as he grows into adulthood, and that, paired with his medical reveal, left me with a boulder in my stomach by the time I finished the novel.

Because I'm me (intergenerational trauma auntie), as soon as I finished the book, I couldn't help but think about Young's own boulders that he silently shouldered -- the thought that Young's medical Kylie would rear its head as a means of aiding Young in rationalizing his own assumptions about wanting vs. deserving long-lasting love, and his habit of taking commitment too lightly, even in the context of an already-established relationship with Gyu-ho.

But I also consider the lifelong trauma he suffered vis à vis his mother as an equally heavy boulder: the fact that Young absolutely internalized his mother's disdain for him as a gay man, his mother trying to "correct" his sexuality through conversion therapy, and then seemingly seeing past her son's reality, horrifically ignoring the emotional development of her son. Besides physical abuse, you couldn't do better than Young's mother in permanently psychologically traumatizing a young man who will already face obstacles as a queer individual in a highly conservative society.

All of this combined rendered me unsurprised -- but, of course, still equally devastated -- by Young's eventually pinball-style life, jumping from menial job to increasingly flippant flings.

What we are treated to in the novel are the thoughts that Young can put together as he steps back and assesses his life, especially at the crushing end of the novel. On the surface, someone on the street could absolutely write off Young as another aloof and aging hipster, disconnected with the world; but we know that that's not the case as Young assesses his dashed hopes for the kind of permanent love that he had once pooh-poohed.

Both Proust's narrator, and Hemingway's Jake Barnes in The Sun Also Rises, could join Young in that aloofness, and our own misreads of these men, to an extent. Not only is Barnes held back in life by a previous wartime injury (to me, this is screaming of inspiration to Park Sang Young's novel and the timing of Young's medical condition, but I'll never know if Park was directly inspired by Hemingway's book), but Barnes and Proust's narrator are also both young men growing into their adulthood, within circles of friends in impactful societies that seem to be full of intelligence and engagement, but are ultimately larded with loneliness and the pain of static ambition and conformity.

The last takeaway from the novel that I'll think about for now, one that I think is already leading beautifully into the television series, is the fallacy that we all have or had as young adults: that our youth would last forever. Young says, at the end of episode two,

"As I looked down at those blueberries, I realized that a time I had thought would last forever had come to an end."

Young has to reckon with the fact that his life, as it stands still in his early 30s, hasn't moved forward. It's only gone backwards, into deep habits of disconnection, despair, and loss. That youth itself could serve as a modality of movement for a young person to hopefully grow into a person with more potential is both heartening and brutal to consider -- especially as Young clearly could not take time in his life to take care of himself, as busy with his mother as he ends up being.

There's a lot more I'll likely say about the novel as the series unwinds, but I'm honestly still internally processing it. I'm also amazed to think that both In Search of Lost Time and The Sun Also Rises have significant connections to queer sexuality in both novels, and I just couldn't help going down this comparative literature brainrot cycle for a few minutes.

As to the first episodes of the series: what can I say? No one does it like South Korea. The acting, the cinematography, what Nam Yoon-su is bringing by way of his mere presence, let alone how he bodily channels Young's sexuality and personality. We're in prestige drama territory -- and already by episode 2, we've been taking into multiple facets of Young's internal strife, and his soon-to-be-revealed lifelong aloofness to commitment, while he still yearns for infinite love.

God, those internal contradictions, huh? In our real life, with our friends who are like that -- those friends drive us INSANE, RIGHT? Proust's narrator is SO THIS. A guy who sits in a chair and whines about what he wants, and complains even more when he HAS what he wants, because it's not perfect? He HAS Albertine at so many times, but he can't make her fully love him, because guess what, she's a lesbian, womp womp? Pick a battle, homey.

And yet. We're still devastated by Proust's narrator. Because one of his ultimate flaws is that he'll never remain still, he'll never be truly satisfied, and that conflict DOES keep him from being able to attain permanent happiness. At least we get to see him age, while we're left to wonder with Young and Jake Barnes.

I'm just too excited to see how Nam Yoon-su renders Young's own conflicts, as they simply grow, throughout his life in the series.

*****

I want to make one quick, totally unrelated note, about the airing of this series. At least to me, maybe only to me, the opening animated title cards of LITBC are really close to the imagery and symbolism of the title cards of Netflix Japan's The Boyfriend, a recent dating reality show featuring gay men in Japan trying to find permanent love. The ultimate pairing of DaiShun has been HUGE in Asia this year, with DaiShun doing fan meets across Asia, including in South Korea.

As @lurkingshan and others have emphasized: Love in the Big City is NOT a BL, it is NOT a romance. It is a deep exploration of the life of a gay man in the city of Seoul.

Inspired in part by Sex And The City? Probably. But LITBC is not nearly as flippant as SATC regarding social obstacles that its main characters face. LITBC delves painfully into the various obstacles that queer men face in Seoul, from social to medical discrimination.

The Boyfriend actually touched a lot on these obstacles as well. Some of the participants were out, but not all of them; one participant, Tae-heon, used the show itself as a means of coming out to his parents.

While some of us have seen the majority of queer content in Thailand turn very primarily towards BL romances, I still believe that Thailand can and will produce high-caliber media about queer life aside from romance, as it did in 2022's The Miracle of Teddy Bear (which I just finished this week, I'm fine, thanks for asking, devastated actually) and in other cinematic pieces. But I also want to note how incredibly refreshing it is to see Japan and South Korea also pick up this thread through The Boyfriend and LITBC, respectfully, producing content out of the usual romance loops that we've come to expect from BL media.

Anyway. If there's a connection between LITBC and The Boyfriend, with both entities talking MUCH more about holistic queer life in society, then I celebrate it, and I want more, more, more of it.

[1000sunnygo]

One Piece 1093

//long post, manga spoilers ahead

Congratulations to Law for his second time trending as "Law's female form" and congrats to Kamiya Hiroshi too for trending alongside him!! (her?)

I have no doubt that Law's role would always be special to Kamiya. The way he strained his voice to raise his pitch to a new high made my throat sore on his behalf..... But I liked it more than I expected! I could feel in my bones that it was an uncomfortable transformation Law wanted to free himself from as soon as possible bwahahah

I like the anime original dialogue とにかく、ヤベぇ！(tonikaku, yabee!) Even with my crap japanese it was as hilarious as hearing him say "Anyway, I'm cooked!" I don't think Law uses the term "Yabee" a lot so that felt refreshing lol

It seems the more controversial quote was this one, the speech in Japanese would be literally translated to "my strength isn't coming out as usual". Personally, I didn't immediately associate it to weakness due to being woman but moreso as an additional side affect that came with it, after all, it's dubbed as a disease. I like to think Doc Q didn't only come up with it as a deranged fantasy but to impose a real handicap for the victim to have their body modified in a way that limits their ability to fight and use their usual powers, either due to magic or just out of discomfort. Unlike Ivankov's fruit that alters hormones, it's just a physical change, it makes sense why it's more unnatural and uncomfortable.

The female Law scene was animated by Yuu Yoshiyama, he also did Hancock's scene from Amazon Lilly invasion episode. The scene was fanservicey but thankfully not as over the top as the Bonney scene from few episode prior to this one. The episode didn't drag on even during the slower parts, the screentime was well spent. The obnoxious, repetitive closed up reaction shots weren't there.

Moving on to B part, nothing much to speak of Ishizuka's brilliant storyboard that hasn't been said. My favorite observation was this:

Some parts where characters didn't immediately follow up with a second attack was frustrating until I remembered Blackbeard and Law both put their lives on line when they use their fruit and so can't take risks. Cheaper trick shots and silly gimmicks that people blame Law for not using more frequently were probably never the best option. That said, unfortunately, Law lost the moment he used both his strongest attacks onscreen and failed. I don't think the fight was longer than what we saw here. The anime just made it more obvious.

Another anime original dialogue I liked is Blackbeard saying "what a handy ability you've got!" right before their final clash. He was using Tremor fruit until that point and then he switched to his OG attacks, it was unsettling how he's not only fighting but looking at Law's abilities as something that he'll soon take away from him. Unlike Doflamingo, Teach had no pre-decided plan involving Law's fruit and considered selling the fruit as appealing alternate as using it for its abilities. Honestly, we can't underestimate Doflamingo's knowledge. There's no way he stays in prison during the final arc.

And finally the Kuzan scene,,

rightfully the most praised section and probably my favorite part of the episode too. According to his tweet, Henry Thurlow animated the Kuzan scene traditionally on paper. Let's give Toei credit where it's due; they let their animators take time, be creative and love their work. Otherwise we wouldn't get scenes like this.

And that's it! The first (and the last?) time we see Heart pirates in proper action. Ch. 1081 is only ~17 chapters away. Hopefully we'll see it animated around the middle of this year. Hopefully Law's current condition in the manga is updated by then, otherwise it'll be very painful.

Twice already. Petition to let Pandaman become an official member of heart pirates.

[piracytheorist]

There was a subtly brilliant way with which the animators handled the adaptation of these manga panels:

Manga and graphic stories in general have the advantage over film in the manner that the details of the page are all there to be seen. Everyone reads such stories at their own pace, and they can pause at any moment to notice all the little details, reactions, expressions, etc.

So in those panels, it's easy to see what Anya is imagining, and how she reacts to those scenarios possibly coming true, exactly because the panels "stay" there for as long as the reader needs them to.

But anime and film have to work around a limited amount of time to show all the notable details. They have to use tricks to cause our attention to focus on what they want us to see, because otherwise the scenes would become way too long and lose fluidity. Film and animation is not meant to be watched by having the viewer pause every few seconds. It's an art and a skill to show everything that needs to be shown in a set amount of time.

And in this episode, the directors/animators achieved having our attention go from Anya's imaginings to her reactions by using two methods:

Unlike the manga, in her first reaction she's still holding up her sunglasses. Then she drops her hand, and because the imagination figures don't actually make separate movements, Anya's arm catches our attention so we can see she goes from scared to relieved (and just a bit excited!). Then right as the imagination changes, Anya gasps loudly, once again catching our attention enough to see she's now terrified.

Of course, it may not work with every viewer. It's very likely some didn't catch that at all. But I really like noticing the way they used to practically manipulate our attention from one corner of the screen to the other.

Also, it was hilarious. I loved it <3

[lesbians4armand]

oooookay i need to talk iwtv finale again so spoilers below

i was going through all five stages of grief last night i cant lie. i do like the episode i think it was really really well done and incredibly well performed and a brilliant setup for an already confirmed third season.

the part i got upset about was the revelation that lestat saved louis, not armand, that felt very destructive and out of character at first but the more i think on it the more it makes sense.

I do believe armand loved louis, i think he fell in love with him in paris and has been trying to cling to that since, however i think during that time he saw it as unrequited- louis not loving him back, refusing to accept that they were companions, still being hung up about lestat.

One of the most important things about armand is how deeply lonely he is and how afraid he is of that loneliness. I think he knew that when presented with this choice by the coven, it was to stay with them, let louis die in the trial and have security and companionship even if he hated himself for it and was miserable, or to save louis and have only him, who he viewed as not even loving him back anyway, despite all his attempts. it was 13 or 1, with no guarantee and even very little likelihood that that 1 would stay.

It wasn’t until madeleine tells armand that she can tell louis loves him that he realised that he was wrong, but it was too late. he had a chance for a genuine love and relationship with louis, but he couldn’t bear the risk of losing him that he completely sabotaged it anyway before it could truly begin.

Then lestat, the trial, claudia’s death. If he had saved louis, louis still would have loved lestat more, never be satisfied, and be forever changed by the loss of claudia which he would forever blame armand for not stopping it. which is what we see in dubai (and san francisco) when louis does believe armand saved him.

But then lestat saves louis, again proving to armand that it would forever be them who love each other, he can never have either.

With louis in the crypts and not dead, it was either let him die then, which by that point was meaningless as the coven already thought he saved louis, and he had lost his security and relationship with them, again facing loneliness he couldn’t bear, or save him now and take credit for it, letting louis kill the coven and go on to be with him even because of a lie, because otherwise he would have nothing else, no one else.

Armand cannot be alone, he doesn’t know how to be, he needs to serve someone somehow, its his only way of knowing love and staying alive, even if it becomes controlling, manipulative and abusive. he doesn’t know or remember anything more than those behaviours.

All in all, armand loved louis, the love was never fully reciprocated, armand couldn’t bear this and the threat of losing everything to it, agreed to kill louis alongside claudia, but when the plan backfired and lestat saved him, he could only lie and say he did instead to prevent himself for being entirely alone. even if louis would never truly love him back and would always want lestat, his true saviour.

it’s horrible and tragic and heartbreaking and a cycle of broken ideas of love and abuse. and unfortunately very in character, despite what i said yesterday. it is very in character for armand to have an all or nothing approach. and its a learned behaviour.

(not to mention armand actually did give up his entire coven for lestat a century prior which did leave him entirely alone when lestat did not want him, he was not going to do that again, even if it meant self sabotage and losing someone he loved)

[visualtaehyun]

Disclaimer: not a native Thai speaker, still learning 🙏 ...also, not an expert on tarot and astrology btw djsdhsj

Fortune favors the bold

- XXI The World (-> Earth/Ongsa) = accomplishment, seizing opportunities the universe presents, confidence in one's place in the world - XIX The Sun (-> Sun) = joy, positivity, enlightenment, light illuminating the truth - X Wheel of Fortune = destiny, soulmates, change, growth, the wheel turning in one's favor

ก็เหมือนกับโลกที่มันต้องมีแสงสว่างจากพระอาทิตย์ไง /gaaw meuuan gap lohk thee man dtawng mee saaeng sa waang jaak phra aa thit ngai/ -> โลก /lohk/ = Earth, the world -> แสงสว่าง /saaeng sa waang/ = (bright/brilliant) light

And that's what she's been doing all episode 🥺♥ Sun's brightness and warmth give her confidence!

ชอบสิ /chaawp si/

AAAAAAAAHHHHH this can be read as both 'They/That person does like you' and 'I do like you'

ถึงดวงอาทิตย์ของเรา จากโลกของเธอ /theung duaang aa thit khaawng rao, jaak lohk khaawng ter/

Sun's horoscope

How is Sun a Gemini, you may ask? It's me, I asked, so I went and researched it for everyone lol

In astrology, there's two ways to divide the ecliptic into the 12 signs - tropical and sidereal.

(source)

Western astrology generally follows the tropical zodiac which is based on the Northern hemisphere's seasonal cycle, lining up the equinoxes and solstices with the ecliptic. Vedic/Hindu astrology follows the sidereal zodiac which is based on the observable sky and thus accounts for the Earth's axial precession and the seemingly backwards movement of fixed stars over time, caused by the Earth's axial tilt of ✨ 23.5 degrees ✨

All of this to say- Sun is a Gemini in sidereal astrology!

First contact

Aylin's coming out of her shell!! I loved her this episode, trying to make friends, expressing herself more and being genuinely funny.

มนุษย์พี่นี่โคตรไร้สาระ /ma noot phi nee khoht rai saa ra/ เมื่อกี้น้องว่าไงนะ /meuua gee nong waa ngai na/

-> ไร้สาระ /rai saa ra/ = nonsensical, lacking meaning/substance, which got subbed as "That's bull." earlier in the same scene??, combined with โคตร /khoht/ here, which is an impolite colloquial intensifier, sounds like "You're full of crap, senior human." lmao

1) ฉันกับยัยเจริญพรจะคอยช่วยแกแล้วกัน /chan gap yai Charoenporn ja khaawy chuuay gae laaeo gan/ 2) เจริญพร /ja reern phaawn/ = Yes.

2) Charoen's full first name is เจริญพร /ja reern phaawn/: เจริญ /ja reern/ = to prosper, prosperous, to pray/chant; พร /phaawn/ = blessing, benediction เจริญพร /ja reern phaawn/ is a word used by Buddhist monks for 'yes'/assent/response, just like ครับ /khrap/ or ค่ะ /kha/ are used, for example. There's a whole set of vocabulary/register that's specifically used by and with monks and in the context of Buddhism. 1) Tin calls Charoen ยัยเจริญพร /yai Charoenporn/ several times this episode lmao - ยัย /yai/ stems from ยาย /yaai/ = grandma, and can be used in a friendly way to call a woman or derogatorily (kinda like 'hag', I guess?) It's all in the context but that can be said about a lot of things in Thai language djsdhsjh It's comparable to colloquial ไอ้ /ai/, a prefix for mostly male names, e.g. ไอ้ติณห์ Ai'Tin, to call someone in a friendly or- cursing way:

ไอ้มนุษย์บุลลี่ /ai ma noot bully/

Obligatory 1st person pronoun moments because there's only the two three*, she doesn't use any otherwise:

1) เรา /rao/, 2) calls herself alien again, 3) ข้า /khaa/, which sounds old timey *edited to add her fortune teller shtick

Quick translation of the preview texts

Well... I like [the roses?] That's nice You liking [?] makes me happy Thank you so much, Earth Earth, it'll be my birthday in a few days. If I asked you for one thing, would you give it to me? What is it? Can we meet?

[alphadogmp3]

at episode 14 of a crown of candy rn and i am just dumbfounded and kinda disappointed by how little they bring up caramelinda, aka theee most tragic and important and fun character PC or otherwise. like she is present for most of the events for a big chunk of time and we never ever get any reactions from her AT ALL. like she is the ex-wife of the motherfucking archmage, she is such a powerful sorcerer and yet she never gets any say in anything that happens. we hear more from the fucking gingerbread maniac than we do from caramelinda!!! the party keeps asking shit about lazuli to randos and i just wanna scream at the screen like LAZULI'S BELOVED IS RIGHT THERE!!!!!! AND SHES ALSO A POWERFUL MAGE!!!!! ASK HER!!! like if i was caramelinda i'd straight up become evil wdymmmmm she is wed to the self-professed idiot little brother of the love of her life who tragically died in battle (who we later learn was actually assassinated by someone she trusts), she was betrayed by the aforementioned idiot little brother who just straight up had another wife who he never told her about, which doubly hurt her bc her beloved at the time knew and didnt tell her, one of her daughters is dead and her other daughter hates her for things that her father is also guilty of, the new queen of candia is the product of her shitty husband's actual church-recognized marriage, AND she is a brilliant ruler and politician and did aaallll the fucking ruling in candia for 20 years while amethar goofed about BUT no one even consults her on ANY military or tactical move ever?? i feel like im going crazy every time some plot thickening happens and then the PCs, instead of turning to caramelinda who is arguably the only competent person with experience in the room turn to like. mantaray jack. and then they joke about piss for 15 minutes. i just cannot believe how brennan would give us the most interesting character you could come up in a GoT setting and never ever utilize her. wild.

[ninadove]

Top 5 Miraculous Episodes?

I’m going to be supremely original with this one.

1. Emotion

Everything about it is perfect. The Diamonds’ Dance. The confirmation that Felix is a mythology nerd. How similar it is to Professor Layton and the Unwound Future, because I have not forgotten my roots. Red Moon. Amelie. Snap of my fingers. The colours and the composition of the shots. Felix being absolutely terrifying. Felix being just a child. Felix being the Lucky Charm’s solution. Felix being so lonely and scared yet so willing to break the cycle of abuse once he recognises it for what it is.

It’s the episode that A. made me insane about Feligami and B. made me insane about the cousins, so you could call it my origin story. If I could change one tiny detail, it would be to give Argos a full transformation sequence — but that’s just me being obsessed!

2. Strikeback & Representation

I really can’t choose between these two.

Strikeback is so!!! Everything!!! I liked Miraculous beforehand, otherwise I wouldn’t have watched four seasons of it, but this is where the insanity began (even though the creative drive only came later). Everything happened so fast and my boy was so smart and resilient and proud of himself! That was all I needed to fall in love. And the Ladynoir of it all! This episode alone made it my favourite side of the Love Square! What an absolute game changer in every way!

But oh, Representation… I’d never felt so much anticipation for an episode before, and it definitely lived up to the hype. Felix as a less innocent, sharper, self-preserving child abuse survivor is very close to my heart, and he gets treated with the utmost compassion by the plot. The play itself was brilliant, of course, the Feligami of it all exquisite, and the construction of the episode — with Felix’s successful quest for freedom contrasting Chat Noir’s defeat against Nightormentor — is free brainworm real estate.

3. Gabriel Agreste & Pretension

Strikeback may be the moment I became insane about Felix, but Gabriel Agreste is the moment I suspected I might eventually become insane about Felix. I came into the study scene having already accepted that he couldn’t figure out Shadow Moth’s identity, that Senti-Gabriel would successfully make him doubt himself and that his akumatised form would be a massive problem for the heroes. So imagine my surprise when he said “Fuck you, actually”, pulled the cleverest stunt on a literal super villain and came out of this little misadventure even more confident in his discovery!!! All while introducing the themes of rebellion and freedom that made me go “Oh??? You’re not afraid of his threats??? You don’t need his powers??? Now you’re speaking my language.”

And Pretension! It has my favourite scene ever — Felix returning Kagami’s amok in the movie theatre, Kagami immediately using her newfound freedom to choose him, you know the drill — and the little speech about how you really shouldn’t abuse your kids, people, which lives in my mind rent-free. I think if I were to get a PhD in one episode, it would be this one… At the end of the day, Pretension all about unlearning unhealthy behaviours and loving your partner in the way they need to be loved. And isn’t it beautiful? ❤️💜

Thanks for the ask! 💜🦚

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

my favorite scully moments from s2

after the x-files are shut down, she gets moved to teach at the academy, and in episode 1 she does a little monologue on how a person’s body is a physical manifestation of a lifetime, which one of the students describes as “spooky”

when mulder sneaks off to puerto rico in the same episode, she goes into his place to try and figure where tf he went, and prevents his sneaking about being caught by the investigators who broke into his home with the power of feeding his fish

lecturing about the dangers of eating raw steak in episode 2, then getting lost down a rabbit hole of worm science

when no one was answering the door in episode 3, she just walks in. this made me laugh hysterically, i cannot explain. both of these guys WILL enter your home.

every single time she is a bit of a medical nerd, like when she learns about the surgery that allowed people to survive without sleep in episode 4, which she describes as “incredible”

(and the freckles + flower earrings combo were also a fave)

when she scans the piece of metal that came from duane barry in a grocery store in episode 6, and the cash register goes crazy. and she denies involvement and just walks away LMAOOO <- honestly i'd do the same!!

she wakes up from her coma in episode 8 and wants to write a thank you note to the nurse that took such good care of her, only to learn no such nurse ever existed. scully got to witness the paranormal for once!!!!

in episode 9, someone brings up a volcano scientist in conversation, and she says she had heard he was brilliant, which means that somehow she is keeping up with volcano news. she is a woman of many layers.

being deeply worried about this scared looking grad student she just met, and once again not waiting for an answer to enter her room and figure out if she is okay

(and when said grad student is being consumed by a fungus, scully thinks quickly enough to get herself locked behind a door, keeping herself safe, despite being handcuffed and otherwise looking death by fungus in the face)

in episode 11, mulder walks into his office, only to learn she has been there and has been going through his stuff since 6 in the morning. queen of getting results!

in the same episode, an old man overdoses on mushroom pills, and she shifts into Doctor Mode, yelling about “ventricular fibrillation” and “milligrams of lidocaine” and it was, like every other time she goes Doctor Mode, so deeply satisfying to watch

when she meets the two cops in episode 12, and can immediately tell they are having an affair and that the detective is pregnant, and despite the detective pleading with her not to tell a soul, the absolute MILLISECOND she is reunited with mulder, she spills the tea. and he is SHOCKED! <- arguably my favorite moment in the entire series so far

(and, to make the woman feel more comfortable, she confesses to also having had feelings for coworkers before which. elaborate on that, please)

but she really does care; when the detective ends up in the hospital, scully brings her a change of clothing <3

when she is so shaken by what she sees in episode 13 that she goes to the FBI’s onsite therapist; she’s too scared to tell mulder how she feels because “i don’t want him to feel like he has to protect me”

(as if there was ever going to be a choice; he is the protector and he Will protect, it's just his nature)

((and then later sobbing into his arms, realizing she doesn’t have to always put on a front))

toads start falling from the sky in episode 14, so she rationalizes that they likely came from a nearby tornado. this is a scully-approved theory.

they’re investigating a murder in the same episode, and a teenager starts pouring her absolutely horrific trauma out to both of them, scully holds her while she sobs into her jacket

honestly any time either of them know weird information, i love it. she says that it would take hours for a snake to eat a man and then weeks for it to digest in episode 14, and mulder makes some funny remark but it’s sooo endearing to me. she knows her snake facts.

then in episode 15, she notes poison in someone’s blood, but specifically that the poison comes from pufferfish eaten in Japan… girl i’m crying, she just knows stuff!

during that same case, they get rooms near each other like always, and she knocks on a door thinking it’s mulder’s. he doesn’t answer. she walks in and hears water running, so she just talks to him through the door to the bathroom. and i love this so much. i love that they are close enough to just walk into each other’s rooms and talk from behind the door while the other showers. it’s such married behavior.

working on the case in episode 16, we see her at home wearing a flannel, checking her computer, still serving looks but now giving casual

(and seeing the art she keeps on her walls- little postcards of beach scenes <3)

in the same episode, she knows mulder left to go get himself in trouble, so she bursts into skinner’s office to ask for help. but she feels bad for barging in on skinner, so she apologizes to him. which was very sweet.

when mulder is gone, she goes to his apartment to look for clues, and falls asleep on his couch

(and when X knocks on the door, she knows he is hiding something, and screams at him to tell her where he is)

this whole monologue from episode 17, which i loved more than life itself:

“several aspects of this case remain unexplained, suggesting the possibility of paranormal phenomena. but i am convinced that to accept such conclusions is to abandon all hope of understanding the scientific events behind them. many of the things i have seen have challenged my faith and my belief in an ordered universe, but this uncertainty has only strengthened my need to know, to understand, and to apply reason, to those things which seem to defy it”

(and that is just Her, isn't it? the need to understand, to rationalize. the worldview shaped on science- if she doesn't understand something, it's because a key piece is missing, and she'll find it. because the world Has to work that way, has to be bound by a greater logic, even if it is yet to be understood. to imagine otherwise would be impossible, to imagine otherwise would be to abandon hope in everything, and she cannot abandon hope)

((and maybe the idea that the world being something she cannot perfectly comprehend is a failing of her own understanding makes me a little emotional. but still))

she says that the whole loaves and fishes deal was a parable in episode 21; she is not a biblical literalist

(she then makes some sassy remark about things generating spontaneously, and mulder laughs in the corner. good to know he thinks she is funny)

every single time she answers the phone, she says “mulder, it’s me”, and idk i just think it’s so endearing

she thinks she might have been infected with a killer disease in episode 22, but mulder calls, so she tells him she’s okay and to take care of himself out there.... those are the last words she chooses, just in case they never talk again </3

and every time she says unsettling things, like “could be the residue of burnt human flesh” or “darkness covers a multitude of sins”, both in episode 23, i eat that up

reassuring her student who has just become a detective that she is doing just fine!!!

and then going to said student's funeral when things do not turn out fine... she loves her students that she taught for like 3 months so much :(

getting pulled aside by skinner and her bosses after mulder just acted wild in episode 25, and denying that she had seen any top secret files even though they say they will fire her if she lies lmaooo <- she is a ride or die!!!

but also going to his place, demanding assurance that she is doing the right thing by assisting him, and i love that. i love a character who will break all of the rules as long as they believe they are doing the thing that is morally Right, and that definition is so deeply her own, but she is committed to it, and she'll do anything to stick by it. and he just says something about getting the code that he wants broken, and despite how awful he's being, she goes through with it anyway because it's the Right thing to do.

later, her being the one to realize that mulder should not leave the house after his father was killed because he will be the prime suspect (he does not listen to this sound advice)

he stumbles into her place with a million degree fever, and she carefully lays him down in her own bed, despite the fact that he is soaked in his dead father's blood. and she takes care of him.

this one honestly deserves its own post because it is so incredible, but: shooting mulder with enough precision to get him to knock off his wild behavior that was going to make him look like he killed his dad, but not actually HURT him, then finding out krychek was putting LSD in his water, knocking him out, and driving 2 days to New Mexico to get him where he needed to be. AFTER he had been acting wild because he was inadvertently drugged, and had accused her of spying on him and being a traitor. that level of love is deep. very very deep. she is a Lover.