#once again this fanfic totally has the right to exist

[necrotic-nephilim]

For the ask game! 3 and 21 please ✨

for the choose violence ask game!

3. screenshot or description of the worst take you've seen on tumblr

i won't screenshot bc i'm not thinking of one post specifically but a couple i've seen- the idea that Tim should be from Crime Alley, not Bristol. which firstly: i need people to understand Tim isn't Bristol rich. Tim is a millionaire and not nearly as high a tax bracket as Bruce is. his family goes *bankrupt* at one point and it's his stepmother supporting them with a job as a physical therapist. like he's not as rich as some ppl thing he is. but that said, he *is* still upper middle class and it's very important to who he is and how his history as Robin is shaped. it shapes how he interactions with other characters. you just... can't make him from Crime Alley? like why would you want to when we *have* a Crime Alley Robin. it changes so much about Tim that he's no longer then same character. and the idea he could just lie about being from an affluent family with a seven-figure company is? i do not get it. like the entire mess of "Tim pretends to be a Drake" is a headcanon that is so bad to me and just tries too hard to make Tim' backstory more interesting to make him the main character. the entire point of Tim Drake was for him to be a *normal kid* becoming Robin. and all that is ruined when you add all these weird things to him. i'm begging fanon to just enjoy Janet and Jack Drake. please <3

21. part of canon you think is overhyped

oooh, i already talked about Joker: Last Laugh and Deat In The Family. is it... bad if i say the entirety of Wayne Family Adventures?

i think i'll be nice and narrow it down actually: the Wayne Family Adventures episode where Jason has a panic attack because a noise reminds him of the crowbar and he runs and hides until Bruce finds him. that episode... oh it haunts me. i think it really fucked up how most of this fandom understands Jason's relationship to his trauma. and the fact that it's *so* popular makes it even worse bc it can often be the only "canon" content some fans have consumed about him. it makes Jason feel incompetent and it misunderstands what his trauma around his death actually is. it paints him as afraid of the Joker and not full of such a violent rage. i just. oh i can usually understand the merits to WFA even if it's not For Me, but that episode i just... don't get it. i don't get how someone can honestly enjoy Jason's character and still think that episode does him favors and is in character. i'm baffled and angry and rolling my eyes all at once.

[opinated-user]

friendly reminder that LO has faked to have cancer "coincidentally" right after her sibling Courtney came out alleging that LO essentially molested her when they were kids

we know that LO faked it for the following reasons: -first she claimed that it was skin cancer on the first stage and the only treatment she ever had was chemotherapy. first stage skin cancer is going to be treated normally with a minor surgery. -when more people started questioning her about it, suddenly LO claimed she never said what cancer that it was. -despite being in chemotherapy, LO claims that the expenses were "minimal", which is hard to believe even living in Canada. people go into debt paying for their treatment while still living on the exact same province as LO. -a normal chemotherapy treatment would last at least 6 months. we're talking about half a year of someone's lives in which your body basically is being destroyed in order to hopefully kill the cancer. not only LO hasn't shown literally no symptom related to chemotherapy during the entire period in which she should have it, but she also never told anyone about it during this process. including her own wife and her immediate family. not a single one of her closest friends ever knew or suspected she was going through this experience. she only mentioned some mild symptoms after some of her critics (including this blog) pointed them out at all. -not really proof, but the way that LO decided to announce she ever went through any of this was through a comic page on pokemadhouse to announce she was in "complete remission" already. to give an idea of how truly evil this is, her wife would have received the news that her wife had been lying to her for six months right before being asked to draw for free a comic to announce it to everyone else. regardless if you even believe that LO is lying or not, i think it's pretty clear we should be able to agree that this is just vile behavior and a total show of disrespect towards her own spouse. -complete and total lack of any real evidence. never a mention of visit to the doctor (only some "asks" teasing about getting "funny results" and nothing else), never a word about the kind of meds that she was taking, never saying a word even about what kind of chemotherapy she went through. this is not to say that she or anyone should owe it to the world to reveal every details of their lives in order to be believed, but we're talking about a experienced liar that has lied about so many things so many times before despite the clear and obvious evidence that still exist so the skepticism, plus the absolute lack of any evidence at all, is completely warranted in this case. to this day LO still claims that Stockholm does not exist. there's both audio, video and text evidence that she was the author and she fully intended to include every disgusting thing on it, that she wanted them there. lie about a fanfic and lie about cancer are two completely different things, but not to a liar who is used to lie for attention. -once again, this narrative of "i had cancer the whole time, but i was also in therapy and now i'm better so i don't really have to talk about any details about it ever again" started out really only shortly after Courtney came out speaking out. when you talk about youtuber or other influencers lying about having cancer for any nefarious reason possible, do not forget to include LO.

[the-100-days-of-junkan]

Day 20

Another Milestone everybody you know what that means! Time for another instance of me trying to be a little extra! 

And today we have a very special piece, cause this ones based directly on a previously mentioned fanfic by Val! Which I will now link!

Chapter 1 of Everything You’ve Ever Dreamed (Give it a read!)

I tried to be a bit more meticulous with this one, for example, I made sure to put the two in their school blazers rather than the outfits featured in the games. Mostly thanks to an offhand mention in the early chapter that Mikan was putting on that outfit. And since this takes place in a Non-Despair AU the two are just attending highschool as normal, so no need to have them wearing their Killing Game attire during school hours. This being a Non-Despair AU is also why Junko’s wearing the hair accessories more commonly associated with Mukuro’s Disguise. As while Monokuma has been talked about in the timeline of Val’s Junkan stories, as far as my memory will allow there’s never been a noted instance of Junko wearing her Monokuma Clips.

Is this me reading into it too much? Was none of that even remotely the intention? No clue! Never thought to ask Val about it, bit late for it too!

(Future Jem Typing) With a lot of hindsight now I realize I might not have been as accurate to Junko's uniform design? (Future Jem No longer Typing) Honestly once the event is further underway I wouldn’t be surprised if I went in and did some cleanup and full linework, color, etc (possibly a full remake if I'm crazy) for this one. I would have done so now but as mentioned in the previous post, burnout for this project is kinda crazy right now. But as my first proper gift to Val as thanks for her work with this ship, I’m still pretty happy with it! Tried to be as close as possible to the original text as I could.

There is a part of me that feels bad letting my bias bleed through a lot in this project, because this is not going to be the last time I draw something either directly based on or inspired by one of her fics. But also given that this entire event would not exist without the amount of work she’s put into writing these two, or the motivation she gave me early on in the project, I think it is mildly warranted in this instance. 

And don’t worry, I do have a few days lined up that are influenced by other authors, moreso in the latter half. Hopefully that’ll be a good counterbalance. 

Once again, go read that fic, it’s one of my favorite reads among Fanfic, and both it and the rest of Val’s work deserves your attention! . . . in my totally unbiased opinion. adsjfjlsdjfhsa

[princehendir]

I am so desperate to hear you say more abt Varric because you're right

Do you mind if I kinda babble here for a bit.

Okay so, Like the obvious counterpoint to what I'm speculating here, just to get it out of the way, is "actually Varric is just unfuckable because he has a wretched personality and politics", which I would say is fair except for the fact that has literally never stopped dragon age fans before so why would that stop them now? Clearly there's some other factor or factors at work here, even if they aren't the ones that I'm getting at.

But anyways. I really do think that what makes it most obvious that the State of Varric fanfic has a lot to do with attractiveness and body type standards and the baggage people have in regards to them is just, like, reading any of the Varric fic that actually does exist. Or fic for any dwarven character really.

It's hard to be specific about what I'm talking about here because I'm like, allergic to the idea of directly quoting or even just vagueing other people's fanfiction, even when it's bad. So I'll just say dude. Duuuuude I've read some crazy things, ranging from "This is awkwardly written because the author has never described a man that isn't a hunk or a twink." to "wow. Jesus Christ. Oh my god. You cannot describe a person's body like that what's wrong with you". Like often there's this kind of, thin film of disgust over all the physical descriptions. Or there's a vibe of "you find this strangely attractive even though it shouldn't be. This is attractive but it's objectively strange and weird" in the narration that I'm usually used to finding in monsterfucker fic? But it's layered over descriptions of just totally normal traits that humans irl also have instead of like, you know, tentacles. Which obviously feels pretty bad.

And this is honestly a much bigger thing because the source material is also weird about dwarves & attractiveness. Between word of god comments from writers, to in-game ambient dialogue in the Rose, codex/war table text, and just the fact that while it's not too terrible and there's some other stuff going on there, the idea of women being attracted to Varric is largely treated as a joke, the general vibe you get from most of the da series is that if you aren't dwarven yourself, being attracted to dwarves makes you at best kind of a harmless fetishist and at worst, a huge pervert, derogatory.

So there's a lot to unpack there already but it's still really sad that once again fandom can't collectively manage to be any better than the source material, even when the source material is like, dragon age. Famous bad game dragon age. Like fandom is sooo progressive but cannot manage to be collectively better than dave gaider. Okay.

[sincerely-sofie]

Chapter 7 of Sofie Plays "Slay the Princess": The Stranger

STRANGER DANGER STRANGER DANGER STRANGER DANGER STR---

[ Beginning ] - [ Previous Part ] - [ Next Part ]

The Narrator is a doofus (derogatory) and Ultra Princess (whose name I can't recall--- did she even give one?) lightly chastised me when I tried to sit in the woods forever to have a tantrum over it. >:(

I can't truly express this to all you folks watching at home, but the parallax / scrolling effect that has been ever-present throughout the game is entirely cattywampus in this cabin.

One day, mirror... *clenches fist* one day...

I left the blade behind again. I probably should take it with me one of these days. That doesn't really matter right now, though, because I'm too unsettled by the combination of my fear of heights and these stairs lacking any form of guardrails.

This brick joke is slowly growing on me. Used to hate it and use it as a means of fueling my distrust of the Narrator, but now it's a little comforting whenever I see it. I need to write a fanfic of this game once I'm done and use it in some kind of funny way.

Oh dear. It's an arbitrary choice that will likely have a significant impact on how this run goes... Split the difference, I guess? We'll take the center staircase.

This 100% symbolizes the various Princesses, doesn't it? Oh goodie! I'll wait to trigger the dialogue advancing so I can examine it and---

GEE THANKS PRINCESS. NOW I'M COMING DOWN FROM A HEART ATTACK AND I DIDN'T GET TO ANALYZE THAT SCREEN BECAUSE OF YOU ADVANCING THE TEXT FOR ME.

Okay the contrarian is growing on me. "Wow, what an utterly indescribable and fundamentally unsettling, eldritch experience. Time to be a rascally rogue once more!"

(Lego Movie Robot Background Character Voice) Her face is so generic it matches every other face in our database!

*deep, deep sigh* CONTRARIAN.

Okay I succumbed to the shoulder devil that is the Contrarian and...

... Those shouldn't be highlighted all at once. Sad that there's such a glaring issue in a published game. I'll select the option to leave her in the basement and OH SHOOT IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE THAT WAY.

Welp. At least we can match, right?

I DO NOT LIKE MATCHING ANYMORE.

Contrarian pls I need a joke save me

Phenomenal voice acting here! I hate it.

Dangit, I wanted to see if I could even help her! You have horrible timing, Ultra Princess.

Alright besties, time to check on how the glow-up's coming along!!!!!!!!! :DDDD

I think we might need to switch up our skincare routine.

Absolutely fascinating dialogue option that is giving me emotions and I need to sit and ponder all of it for a bit.

I finally asked the Narrator if there's some sort of reward I'll receive for slaying the princess--- he answered in the affirmative. Is the reward just a continued existence? Riches? Power? Immortality?

Okay yeah no I pressed him on the subject and he's totally pulling this out of his rear. There's no reward.

This time I'm going to manage to free her--- or try as best I can, at least. Hopefully without any dismemberment this time.

(Continuing this in the next post!)

[thebigpalooka]

Sonic 3 Sonic 3

I've now seen Sonic 3! Welcome back, 2/3s of my dash that I had blocked lol

Spoiler-free impressions, but still behind a cut for those who don't want to draw inferences lol:

TL;DR, Sonic 3 is wonderful and tons of fun, but Sonic 2 was probably peak for my personal taste.

As others have said, Sonic 1 was very different from the games and each movie has now shifted a bit closer in terms of action and pacing. I adored the first movie but I totally get why a lot of folks who thought it was just okay are delighted with the direction things are going. Personally, I just found things a bit rushed on a character level, which was the element that was so charming in the first, admittedly un-Sonic-gamey movie. They hit every note you would want and expect, they just hit them VERY VERY FAST and it does feel like a game where you see an emotional cutscene, the screen fades, and then you begin an action level immediately after lol. Nothing is precisely missing, but quite a lot is kind of just ... told, not really shown.

I adored Shadow, as expected, and was very happy with how they adapted SA2's story generally, but I felt he suffered some of the same problems Tails did in the previous movie, which is that there was too much ground to cover to really develop his emotional arc. It exists, but there's no meat to it, nothing to chew at all, it's a meal replacement shake, one gulp just to get a taste, second gulp, gone. Sonic, too, has a perfunctory character arc in the movie, but it's very shallow: we're told what it is, it occupies a very few minutes of screentime and then resolves in the only way it possibly could. The previous two films felt like we were really seeing things through Sonic's eyes, for the most part; that's really not the case here, and I struggle to describe whose eyes we ARE really looking through, other than Dr. Robotnik.

And that brings me to probably the aspect of the movie I enjoyed the least, even though that's going to be entirely YMMV for people on an individual basis: there was too much Jim Carrey for me, lol. Way, way too much. For obvious reasons, there's a lot of Robotnik in this movie, but it isn't just an issue of lots of screentime: this story is honestly Robotnik's story more than it is anyone else's, and that was ... kind of a bummer to me? Again, a lot of folks disliked how much the previous two movies focused on the human characters, and here, that has been drastically scaled back for everyone else, but seemingly every moment of that screentime is now occupied by Jim Carrey. And he's very good, and very funny, and I'm not even mad about it, but I do wish some of that time had gone to Shadow instead, or indeed, Sonic himself. Creating an emotional journey for a character who didn't really need one and is arguably better without it felt like a shame when it came at the expense of Shadow's story, and I found myself honestly sort of hoping for a new villain in the next movie. It feels like we're running out of juice to squeeze here.

But, end of the day, I AM still completely looking forward to another movie, now more than ever, and truthfully, I'm not sure I've ever wanted to see a Sonic movie MORE than I want to see Sonic 4, lol.

So TL;DR 2: go see Sonic 3 at once and draw lots of fanarts and write lots of fanfics. It hits pretty much all the right notes, it just hits a few of them too loud and misses a few of the spaces between.

[anulithots]

So I found this on bird app :

"i only like ge/go when it’s doomed and they have no longterm future

same with go/ge. they’re about the same to me but i think gojo bottomed more and was a total pillow princess about it in their teens. as adults they probably switched equally. i can see gojo developing his experience more with topping as an adult

either way they’re better as exes. gojo deserves more from a partner than someone who would leave him to start a cult "

Can I ask your thoughts, please?

………… I don't ship them sexually. Because I'm not comfortable with it.

(I have aroace spectrum satosugu headcannons I'm quite fond of. So basically I ship them queer platonically and semi-romantically and flip flop between the two.)

Sorry about that!

But in terms of are they better off being okay with being apart, or if they should stay together regardless…

Complex answer. Depends on the context really.

They loved each other a lot. And I disagree with 'Gojo deserves a better partner than someone who left him to start a cult'. Like… he does but also… that's not the entirety of the situation?

If Geto loved Gojo, why didn't he try to recruit him? by @ellionwrites

How much Geto canonically loved Gojo by @ellionwrites

These two analysis's explain it very well. Also there's a fanfic called Carry me home that is just 100/10. Character analysis interwoven and it perfectly explains this part of Geto's motivations.

Geto COULD NOT go on for much longer without coming to a breaking point. His cursed teqnique requires him to go through painful experiences over and over and over again. The very coping mechanism he prided himself on ('I do this to protect non-sorcerers') has fallen to pieces and Gojo isn't there (for his own reasons). He's grappling with his entire sense of self and it's been repeating in his head for A YEAR.

And Geto did not want to confront Gojo during the whole 'kfc breakup scene'. (Again, analysis above explains it really well.)

Shoko called him there. For good reason. I don't think either Shoko or Gojo had a good idea of just how bad it was getting because Geto (a) didn't tell anyone (b) Gojo was doing 'okay' (he wasn't) and (c) Geto's strong in morals and in resolve. He'll be okay.

(Gojo especially believes this. Strong sorcerers stay safe. Especially Geto. I have… a lot of posts talking about how Gojo depends on Geto to be around him when interacting and just… existing in general.

Gojo gets so fixated on being stronger so he wouldn't make the same mistakes like with Riko. He isolates himself to do so. ~~~ Backstory ~~ explains this.

The Gojo clan isolated Gojo, told him he's the strongest, and gave him rules and responsibilities for that - along with safety and confidence. So - in Gojo's mind - the only way to get stronger is to double down on these things. More responsibility. More isolation. He'll be able to take care of things once he gets stronger. )

LONG STORY SHORT -

Geto's ideal was fixing the world - partially for Gojo as the strongest, partially for himself because he was struggling and didn't have any foothold.

And… listen… sometimes you have to take priority over your partner. I don't think the way Geto went about it was right, by any means, but… at least he did something, he had to.

At the end of the day, the system is to blame. It's the system that drove them both to this and it's the system that let it perpetuate.

But let's say they met right before JJK0-ish and decided to forget the world for a little while and escape from it all together.

It would be… strained to say the least.

Because they are canonically soulmates. A pair. Do not separate. But they have and it's been going on for ten years despite the fact that they both very much still love each other.

Gojo just couldn't leave the society that gave him meaning (other reasons too), Geto couldn't leave the thing that gave him meaning.

Does that indicate that they do not love each other/shouldn't be together because they both value their respective ideologies? No.

(We're going to ignore Geto's whole 'kill the monkeys' thing for a second and pretend like it's just an opposing idealogology for the sake of the argument <3)

The circumstances, their respective coping mechanisms, and the system, very much the system, makes it so they went their separate ways. Just because their ideals got caught up in this thing and they went for their own paths does not mean they don't love each other and wouldn't jump at the chance to have a 'perfect world' with the other in it.

(the sunset scene, Geto's death scene… need I say more?)

If the society decided that "… maybbeee we shouldn't put all this traumatic pressure on children and say that the only answer is isolation and acceptance and instead give them the help and support they need" then Geto and Gojo would've stayed together.

But it wouldn't have been JJK then, would it? Without the friendship that haunts the narrative?

Sorry if I'm rambling, what I'm trying to say is - it's complicated. The story itself drove them apart and canonically they never got back together while mourning their separation the entire time.

And Gojo never moved on, never let go. If you wanted to - and this is something I played around with in my head - and if JJK miraculously got rewritten as a slice-of-life post hidden inventory, then part of GOjo's arc could be about letting go of Geto, as painful as that may be.

But honestly? Comfort people are hard to find. Geto and Gojo were specifically created to be a pair. Gojo was so detatched from the world that Geto tethered him to it. After Geto left, Gojo went on to be a teacher and do what the Suguru he remembers would've wanted him to do, and he 'doesn't feel lonely anymore'…

Gojo loves his students dearly, but he can't ask his students to understand him. And more than anything, Gojo wants to be understood and loved for it. The only one who fit that criteria was Geto.

(Gojo's whole sentiment about 'not as a human, but as a living creature' is Gojo saying that he (a) didn't feel human without Geto there (b) didn't let himself feel human and instead made himself a tool, gave himself the role of the strongest.

Because otherwise Riko happens all over again.

ANNNDDD I'm going off on a ramble.

Last point!

Narratively, should Gojo and Geto be a tradegy, where they never get back together? (AKA, as it is in cannon)

Yes. That is a huge part of their characters, along with being a huge draw to JJK in general. There's something about the separation exemplifying how much SatoSugu loved each other that gives it nuance and the possibility for lots of fix it fics.

So I can understand why the bird poster thought that SatoSugu works a lot as a tragedy, it does. But if SatoSugu had a well-written redemption arc, that would also be extremely compelling I think.

But alas, this is JJK we're talking about.

Thank you for the ask! This was fun to ramble about at 2am.

[lorkonsghost]

I'm sad today for a few reasons work, and the soon to be three year anniversary of a friends death I will now tell you why I prefer bad mother Talia and why his favorite Robin was Damian Wayne. My friend was raised from birth to 14 years old not knowing who his dad was and mildly abusive mother I don't want talk about all thing she did because she's going to take up most of story and the sole reason my friend dead so fuck her. But when my friend was 14 because his mom got fired from her job and she didn't want to actually go looking for a job she dropped my friend off at his bio dads told him he was his son and left. Now like Damian he looked just like his dad and his dad had no clue he had a kid and unlike Damian he had no siblings and his mom 100% had no good relationship with his dad and definitely took advantage of drunk college kid who 16 years younger than her. So imagine your 35 year old man and the woman who he had sex with once almost 15 years ago tells you have kid and he looks like you but dose that even matter she just abandon her kid at his door step and like Bruce Wayne he doesn't kick the kid out or blame the kid but has DNA test done to prove he his well you know what happened he was his kid. So know he goes to court to get parental rights so he doesn't have to go back with his mom. Now some more Damian Wayne similarities he was angry who had undiagnosed autism who was neglected by his mother was desperately touched starved but his dad was a saint and tried to help him the best ways he could. Let me tell you I wish this story had happy ending but he got good few years after that we met up read comics together at my place since me and my family have decent comic collection I can't remember the run name on top of my head but we read the run Damian was introduced he was so happy a kid who had same shit hand dealt I remember my first time reading hating how Talia was depicted but now it my favorite Talia because everytime I read it I remember my friend and his shit hand and how his dad tried to help his son. Now I should explain why it's his mom fault my friend dead he was diagnosed with something I don't feel totally ok with sharing since you could find out who was with it but safe to say he was told he needed to be in assisted living situation shortly after his mom tried to force the court to put him under her care again since she would be given tax exemption from him just living their and she hired a really good lawyer and my friend saw his and his father's hand in the case and their was a good chance she could take him back so instead of even chance with living with her again he killed himself the trail never even made it to court. This is why I like bad mother Talia because every time I write something she deserves her getting her just deserts I feel a little better it's or anything bad happening to her I know it was the creator being islamophobic I don't care if can write legally distinct fanfic about a person who I hate and getting beaten up I'll take it.

I feel like you guys are owed some more facts about him he used to call his dad his Batman when he talked about him. He eventually had a step mother who actually tried to be a mom but sadly she only knew him for a few months I remember her crying the hardest at his funeral how it wasn't fair she couldn't hold him longer apparently she couldn't have children so when she learned her boyfriend at the time had a kid although he was adult she was happy. He liked Godzilla a lot he had some of black and white movies. He was the only person I ever met who liked the batman and Robin movie the one bat suit nipples and Mr freeze. He had hated when people ignored him he would start to hit your arm until you at least acknowledged his existence he tried this once with a teacher and he got detention so fast. He wanted to work in 3d animation. He owned but never read the homestuck epilogue books. I only got one thing from him sadly his 3d model folder I would show you guys his work but I can't look at his art without crying so I rather not.

Goodbye my friend my Damian Wayne from your Jon Kent

[floralcyanide]

Last Chance to Lose Your Keys

Austin Butler x Reader

request: Can you write a fanfic we’re Austin is so madly in love with the reader and wants to be more then friends they start dating and have the time of their life while together. And the reader can be whatever you want and the story can also be who ever you want. But can the two have a kiss I the fanfic at times. by @austinstyles

warnings: from Austin's POV, gender neutral reader, fluff.

summary: Austin has some trouble with how he feels about you, but what he doesn't know is that you feel the same.

word count:1063

author’s note: hello hello! here's the 4th request for my 2k celebration! I hope everyone enjoys (:

masterlist | add yourself to the taglist here | 2k celebration prompts here | request a prompt here or in my asks.

"I've been thinking about you and me girl, and we've got something going on.”

You’ve got this. You’ve totally got this.

I brush off my button-up for the tenth time, trying my best to get rid of the non-existent wrinkles. I tousle my freshly cut hair a little again, studying my reflection in the mirror timidly. Shaking myself out, I take a few deep breaths before forcing myself away from the mirror and out of my bedroom. I quickly grab my keys and head out of the front door, trying to convince myself that my plan will go exactly how I keep imagining it. Today was going to be the day.

Trying to keep myself pumped up, I played some Elvis on the way to Y/N’s house. We were having a movie night like we always do every weekend, but this time it was different. This time, I’m telling them how I feel about them. Usually, I’m cool and collected, but whenever I’m around them, that facade just melts away. I find myself stuttering and struggling to find the right words to say. I get this fluttery feeling in my stomach, and my heart races every time we hang out. We’ve been friends for so long, and a part of me is afraid they don’t feel the same about me. But I guess we’re about to find out. 

When I pull up to Y/N’s place, my heart begins to thump wildly in my chest, and my palms start feeling clammy. I remind myself to take deep breaths, so I don’t get too overwhelmed. I force myself out of my car and make my way toward their front door. I stand there awkwardly for a moment, wondering if I should knock on the door and go through with this. What if they don’t feel the same? What if they laugh in my face? What if-

“Hey, Aus! You okay?” they open the door, their face falling in concern at my visible nervousness.

“Oh, yeah, of course! Just had too much coffee, is all,” I lie, smiling to cover it up.

Y/N steps aside for me to walk through the doorway, and I enter their place. They go to sit on the couch and motion for me to join them. There are snacks all over the coffee table, ranging from popcorn to sweets. I sit down on the couch but not directly next to them. They furrow their eyebrows at me for a moment but then focus their attention on the tv.

“So, what are we watching tonight?” they ask me, scrolling through the various streaming apps.

“I haven’t had time to think about that,” I say, “Maybe we can finish watching that show we started a few weeks ago?”

“Good idea,” Y/N says, opening Netflix.

I try to focus on the show, but my mind wanders anxiously. How do I bring up that I need to talk to them without worrying them? What do I even say? I can’t just blurt out, “Hey! I am lowkey in love with you!” I try to push away the thoughts, turning my attention back on the show. But still, my imagination keeps getting the best of me. For a while, everything seems fine. Well, to me, anyway. We’re into our second episode of the night when Y/N suddenly pauses the show.

“Are you okay? You’re acting weird,” they frown, studying my face for any giveaways.

“Of course I’m okay, and why do you say that?” I scratch my head.

“Because you have hardly said a word so far, you haven’t dug into any snacks, and this show always makes you laugh, and you haven’t laughed once.”

I sigh, running a hand through my hair, “I’ve been thinking about you and I. A lot.”

“What about you and I?” they ask, a concerned expression still etched on their face.

“I have feelings for you,” I gulp.

A look of realization crosses their face, and then a big smile.

“So you’re telling me the Austin Butler has a crush on me?” Y/N jokes.

“Yes,” I say, nervously looking them in the eye, searching for any hint of rejection.

“I have feelings for you too, I’m not gonna lie,” they confess, scratching the back of their neck, “I figured I’d have to hide it forever, but I’m glad I don’t have to anymore.”

“Really?” I ask, raising my eyebrows in surprise. They like me back?

“Yes, really,” they chuckle, “But the thing is, what are we gonna do about it?”

“I have a few ideas,” I say, feeling bold.

“And what are they?”

“This,” I say, moving closer to Y/N and grabbing the back of their neck, pulling them into a kiss.

They kiss back, and I try not to smile into the embrace. Finally.

The rest of the evening is spent watching the show and cuddling on the couch. We decided to take things slow and plan a first date, nothing too serious. A coffee date that following Monday is the final decision. We sit in the back of the coffeehouse, where it’s somewhat private, and we often sneak kisses when there’s no one around. 

“I like kissing you,” Y/N smiles when she pulls away from yet another kiss.

“I like kissing you, too,” I smile back, and it feels like there are hearts where my eyes should be.

That Friday, we went out to dinner and had a great time. When we leave, I sneak my hand into theirs as we walk to the car. They beam at me, their face bashful at the gesture. We arrive at their home, and I walk them to their door, our hands still grasping each other. 

“I had fun,” Y/N says, and I nod in agreement.

“We should definitely do it again sometime,” I say, looking into their eyes.

They lean into me, connecting our lips for the first time tonight. I let go of their hand, running my now free hand around the back of their head and through their hair. After a few minutes, we both reluctantly pulled away.

“See you later,” they say, smiling at me before heading inside.

I stand there momentarily, wondering how I should surprise them with another date. As I walk back to the car, I keep mentally pinching myself because I can’t believe this is real and they like me back. I never thought I’d be so lucky.

taglist:

@anangelwhodidntfall @butlersluvbot @austinbutler17 @misspygmypie @mamaspresley @mirandastuckinthe80s @sodonebruh @lizzymizzy-blogg @defnotreadingfanfics12 @izzvoid @homebodybirkin2003 @thatonemoviefan @sarachacha @kittenlittle24 @alltheflowerstomav @tubble-wubble @annamarie16 @adoreyouusugar @amiets2 @mrs-butler @ari-nicole @austin-butlers-gf @feral4austinbutler @inlovewithchrisevans @shynovelist @mommy-maia @karamelcoveredolicity @thtguyovrthere @starry-night-20 @coldonexx @hangmanswhorey @mavericksicybabe @coco-bitch @bobthefishiesworld @emmymaehereeeeee @myguiltypleasures21 @rainydayz101 @finelineskies @cryingabtab @kaitaesupremacy @ash-omalley @latenighttalking13 @tom-whore-dleston @cece05 @poppet05 @every-dayiwakeup  @whore-for-hewitt @butlerslut @rosepresley @fangirl125reader

[flock-of-cassowaries]

I’m having a deep think right now about the overlaps and the differences between the appeal of fascism, and that of libertarianism.

On one level, this is because I am writing a Sucession fanfic, and trying to get into Roman’s head.

But on another level only reason I’m even writing Succession fanfiction is that I identify with Roman, and that is in large part because he is a queer person who is philosophically in the thrall of his terrifying conservative father, whose love he desperately craves.

And once upon a time, that used to be me. And I feel deep and abiding shame about that.

(Not the sexy kind of shame. The devastating kind.)

But as I delve into philosophical discussions of fascism and conservatism (and honestly, I have not yet delved the deeply), I’m starting to realize that maybe I have less in common with Roman, and more with Connor (if we leave out his weird S3 white-nationalism dog whistles about the evils of onanism).

I’m basing a lot of this on the first chapter – which is all I have read so far - of “The Reactionary Mind” by Corey Robin; which I came upon via the source list for the linked YouTube video.

[link to “Endnote 2: White Fascism” by Innuendo Studios, on YouTube.]

Robin (if I’m understanding him correctly) posits that the end goal of conservatism is fundamentally Fishstick fascistic, and that the real animus driving political conservative movements is always the desire of the privileged to remain above those the existing social order oppresses.

I have certainly voted for, and carried water for, conservatives (a fact of which I am, again, deeply ashamed), but I don’t think that was ever the real appeal for me.

I’m not saying I didn’t internalize beliefs that were (I now realize) racist, classist, ableist, and elitist; but I don’t think that was ever the main draw, so much as a side effect of reading the goddamn National Post every fucking day

But for me, I think the main appeal of conservatism was the illusory promise of total self-sufficiency, and of being impossible to further hurt. It was the libertarian lie, bound up in the same nihilistic appeal as the Nine Inch Nails song whose hook is “Nothing can stop me now, cause I don’t care anymore.” (‘Piggy’ is the song.)

In this respect, I think I had more in common with Connor; I was also the discarded child who grew up to think of themself as “a flower that grows on rocks and feeds on the insect that land inside of it.”

Honestly, that soliloquy (from S4E2) could’ve been me at thirteen.

I felt rejected and shunned by the world, but I was also rapidly becoming aware that I could use my looks and intelligence as currency (just a Connor uses his literal currency as currency).

It was only when I was 21, and ended a long relationship, and found myself with no one to turn to, and no idea who I was, that my father swooped in to be my new best friend; and that’s when I became more Roman-like in my fawning attempts to appeal to him.

But I think Roman truly believes that his father is better than him, whereas a much more significant part of me always knew my own dad was a false prophet.

I think the world reaffirmed this belief in Roman, because his father has been so successful, and I think his father, concerned with legacy, has been much more active in fostering this mythology than my own father was.

(My dad would tend to just willfully ignore that l existed for several years at a stretch, if I was acting too cringe [i.e. not stereotypically conservative-lady feminine enough] for his conservative sensibilities; something I am assuming that Shiv could probably relate to.

The scene where Logan tells her he wants her back in the fold was very similar to what my father did with me when I was 21, and I glowed just the same way she did.)

But yeah, I think an internalized belief on Roman’s part that his father truly is better than him, and a desire to “be as good” as his father in order to redeem himself and overcome this inadequacy in his person, really feeds into Roman’s affinity for fascism / conservatism.

And I think that belief structure is with him in that bathroom with Mencken, unacknowledged and subconscious, and even more insidious than his conscious priorities of wanting to win points with Logan, and maaaaaybe wanting to be pushed to his knees and have a fascist phallus (a fascllus? I’m going to hell) thrust upon him.

Anyway, if anyone ever reads this, feel free to suggest some books / essays / videos to my reading list.

So far, in addition to the above-mentioned Cory Robbins tome, I am planning to actually finish “The Ur-Fascist” by Umberto Ecco, and to at least dip into “The Dialectic of Enlightenment” by Horkheimer and Adorno, and “The Authoritarian Personality” by Adorno.

[bottledfool]

Imma be real with you, Nomura is writing this, so I don't think he's trying to push some message about the value of remakes versus the value of fanfiction. I think he just can't help but turn everything he writes into Kingdom Hearts.

Near the end of the first game, the evil plot ghosts eventually merge together to make this thing:

It's a big spooky monster that throws black holes of magic at people in a place where the world appears to be ending and oh hey look at this totally unrelated recurring Kingdom Hearts boss fight

What's especially funny is that, until like the 95% mark, Remake follows the plot of the original almost completely, with only slight deviations being added for the purposes of expanding upon events. When Remake first came out, the common fan reaction was "Oh, this is the part Nomura worked on," since everything that happens in the final hour and a half of the game was basically just Kingdom Hearts again.

Rebirth is the same way. In order to make that fight with the evil plot ghosts happen in Remake, two of your party members are blessed with meta-knowledge of the events of the original game, so they know exactly what's supposed to happen.

The problem with this is that this makes it very difficult to write a story that in any way resembles the original, and the trailers made it very clear that Rebirth is, much like Remake, almost 100% faithful to the original story, with a few deviations in places where things are expanded. So off-screen, the plot ghosts just take away the characters' meta-knowledge, so the story is allowed to play out the way it did before. I don't know if this was course-correction, but it sure felt like it was.

It's only in the final couple of hours when Nomura, the creeping chaos, the lurking specter haunting this franchise, makes his return that you have to fight Hyperdimensional Fanfic Sephiroth with Zack and Aerith from another dimension.

Obviously, all art has some sort of intention behind it, but in Nomura's case, I sincerely doubt it's to make commentary on the value of remakes and fan content. I think he's got a style of story he likes to create, and while it doesn't fit at all with the original game's story, by god, he's going to fit that square peg into that round hole.

What I imagine - and this is purely based off what I think would be funny, rather than any evidence - is that Nomura was allowed to do basically whatever he wanted with the endings, but the rest of the games had to at least mostly adhere Final Fantasy 7's story. That's why, until right before the end, both Remake and Rebirth are mostly pretty normal and recognizable as the story of the original game.

It wouldn't surprise me if the third game - no doubt titled Final Fantasy 7 Revengeance - also dials things back for a bit, like making it so the Aerith that Cloud can see fades away for a while, or maybe something happens to make the cast forget that alternate dimensions exist, or something like that, because once you introduce that as a plot element that the characters know about, it's difficult to have a normal story after that.

Okay, so: the premise of the Final Fantasy VII remake is that the audience's demand for the remake to follow exactly the same plot as the original has manifested as a horde of evil ghosts who intervene in order to keep the story on the expected rails, with a particular emphasis on ensuring that characters in the remake die at the same times and under the same circumstances as their original counterparts. At the end of the remake's first instalment, Cloud and friends fight and defeat the king of the Evil Plot Ghosts, an act which breaks time and creates a multiverse where everybody's fanfic is real. Sephiroth subsequently merges with all the fanfic versions of himself and becomes some sort of fucked up metanarrative god. Later, Cloud simultaneously succeeds and fails in preventing Aerith's death, which partially dislocates him from the prime narrative reality, and he begins perceiving an adjacent fixit-fic universe where Zack never died. The Aerith of that universe then teams up with Cloud to fight Hyperdimensional Meta Bullshit Sephiroth, a battle that ends inconclusively when Sephiroth flees, stranding Zack-lives-universe Aerith in the prime narrative reality, though only Cloud can see her. The game closes with the revelation that, unbeknownst to everyone else, Sephiroth slipped the Black Materia into Cloud's pocket during their fight, setting in motion the events of the unpublished third instalment. Have I got all that straight?

[redbayly]

Hey, guys. I normally try to live free of drama, but drama sometimes just catches up to me. In the last 24 hours, someone started leaving some really rude reviews on one of my most popular fanfics on Fanfiction.net. Now, this is not something new. Despite how well-liked this particular fic is and how many wonderful, kind, and thoughtful reviews I’ve gotten, the nasty ones stand out.

These latest reviews were, by no means, the worst I’ve ever gotten. I once had someone spam me with some of the vilest, most disgusting insults and threats I have ever seen. What set these reviews apart is that they wrote them under their own account. Normally, these guys like to post their nastiness under the anon/guest heading, so it’s fairly simple to just delete them. Not so when posted under an account.

The messages, as I said, were initially just rude. Insulting my OCs (who were basically just background extras) and just generally not contributing any critique of substance on this roughly ten-year-old fanfic. They then left one neutral comment and then one actually kind of nice comment, but then completely shifted into saying I was making “stupid decisions” and that I was “going to destroy everyone’s character” before saying they were dropping the fic. 

They then wrapped it up by telling me to kill myself.

This is the first time I have ever had to report abuse. Again, I normally just delete anything hateful or rude because it’s usually anonymous, but I couldn’t do that here.

What’s more, no one ever, EVER, has any business telling someone to kill themselves. Not only is it incomprehensibly cruel, it is actually illegal to do online. I told my father (a retired lawyer) about what had happened and he said, “Yeah, no, they can’t do that, it’s a federal crime. If Fanfiction doesn’t do anything about it, that is a liability to them.” So I’m fairly confident that there will be some consequences for this person’s atrocious behavior.

Thing is, though, I’m not even angry about it. I’m just really disappointed that someone feels that it is acceptable to say such things to a stranger online. I had sent a couple PMs to them before I reported them, but got no response. I really do wonder what is so messed up in their life that they didn’t see what they were doing as wrong. The gentler, more nurturing side of me really wants to sit down with this person and ask if they are okay. 

I recently applied for a teaching job (English) and one of the things I’d like to do, if I get it, is teach my students about how to give good critique. I’ve seen too much toxic stuff online and I feel the best way to combat it is by teaching young people how to express their opinions on other people’s work in ways that are constructive and healthy. Part of the problem with reviewers like the one I dealt with, I think, is that they weren’t taught that disliking something doesn’t give you the right to be abusive. And that is something that needs to be learned as soon as possible.

All in all, though, despite how that person treated me, I just feel sorry for them. It doesn’t matter to me that they hated my fic. If I’m totally honest, I’ve fallen out of love with that fic, myself. But the amount of anger that has to exist inside of someone for them to tell another human being to kill themselves (over a crappy, old crackfic at that) speaks volumes about what kind of a place they are at in their life. I only hope they find better outlets for that anger than leaving comments like those. I have had some problems with mental health and suicidal thoughts in the past, so telling me to kill myself really strikes at a sore spot. However, I was able to take it in stride and, while it will definitely linger for a while, I will be able to move on.

What worries me most is that they might say something like that to someone who can’t move on. And that could have far more serious consequences.

[jakesimfromstatefarm]

notoriously yours | jay park

✰ summary: jay park is a rich kid. it’s safe to say he has everything every broke college student on his campus could dream of and more. but the one thing he doesn’t have, which money definitely can’t buy, is a girlfriend. and his friends won’t see of it. literally.

so what happens when his friends bet him to date someone for more than three months? what happens when jay decides that fake-dating someone would be easier than actual dating (because god forbid Jay–the campus’ notoriously known fuckboy–decides to commit to something once in his life)?

and what happens when that someone is you, his childhood best friend he hasn’t spoken to in years..who has absolutely no interest in being in his life anymore?

✰ pairing: jay park x y/n [ft. members of enha]

✰ genre: fluff, comedy, angst | fakedating!au, college!au, childhoodbestfriends!au, (kinda) e2l!au

✰ warnings: cursing, nothing suggestive but jay's a fuckboy so slightly suggestive themes, mentions of parental neglect/leaving, it's hella long (and i thought my last fic was long)

✰ wc: 14.7k (how did i get it this long oh lord)

✰ author's note: picture creds go to original owners/editors! peep that edit of jay that lowkey inspired this entire fic 👀also this took me so, so long bc i lost motivation half way thru and bc college is a thing,,,so i honestly don't know how to feel abt it so pls bare with me :')))) ALSO the dividers are weird bc idk how to add more than 10 pics for the dividers so pls excuse those ٩(× ×)۶i hope u guys enjoy!! <333

⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺

Jay Park is a rich kid.

Jay Park has enough to buy every textbook he needs for his courses without having to look up the free versions online. Jay Park has enough to bribe his professors to let him pass every class with a perfect 4.0 GPA (but because the boy has morals, he doesn't). Jay Park has enough to afford a car to drive to his furthest class from his dorm building instead of walk or bike like every other college student, meaning he also has enough to afford a parking spot on campus (those things aren't cheap!).

Jay Park walks around your school's campus like he owns the place (and considering the amount of money his family has donated to the school, he practically does), looking like he just walked out of your local coffee shop's newest fashion magazine. His blonde hair is never seen untouched, his attire usually consisting of an undoubtedly high-end all-black fit, accessorized with multiple earrings and rings that probably cost more than all the overpriced textbooks you had to rent out this semester. It's safe to say that everyone knows Jay Park.

Bottom line is, Jay Park has everything.

Well, his friends beg to differ.

In their eyes, Jay Park has everything but a simple factor in the equation of love (or whatever love is to the minds of a couple of 19 year olds): commitment.

So yes, it's safe to say that everyone knows Jay Park. Because everyone knows he's the campus' rich fuckboy. (What's a college fanfic campus without one anyways?)

Jay doesn't go unreminded of this by his friends, to the boy's annoyance.

Jay is aware of this on a Sunday afternoon, in his dorm building's first floor lounge, where he and his said friends are having a study session.

They're doing anything but studying.

In fact, no one has any books out or anything. Not a single laptop in site.

"You don't think it's the slightly bit concerning?" Jake's words are muffled as he continues munching on the fried chicken that he spent majority of this study session debating if he should have it delivered through UberEats or not.

"I really don't, no," Jay shrugs as he continues mindlessly scrolling through his Instagram feed. They're having the same argument conversation that they've revisited multiple times over the course of their friendship, one that Jay has been lectured on too many times for his own good. He thinks his friends could become his new parents if they really tried.

"Look at it this way, okay. You're about to graduate college in a couple of years, into the big world. Like the actual, adult world. And that means you'll have to settle down. Which you can't do when you. have. no. commitment!" Jake punctuates each word with a single clap of his hands, desperate to get his point across.

Jay simply rolls his eyes. He looks over to Sunghoon, who's minding his own business, not bothered by the same topic he's heard over and over again. His eyes tell Jay you're on your own, in response to his blonde-haired friend's look of despair.

Jay thinks that maybe he should get new friends. Yes, that's the only solution here.

"My love life," Jay reaches across the table for a drumstick from the greasy tub seated in Jake's lap until Jake swats his hand away, "is none of your business. Also, ouch."

"Uh, it kinda is. Because of you and your reputation around campus, it kinda affects us, your best friends. How do you think we look, hanging out with the guy who's known to ghost every girl in existence after one night with them? No offense to you," Jake deadpans to him. Jay mentally reconsiders the term best friends.

Tough love. Jay tells himself it's tough love.

"Yes, because every girl totally hates Jake Sim, the teacher assistant of a physics class who volunteers at the pet shelter every Sunday and brings their pet golden retriever to campus every two weeks," Jay rolls his eyes at his Australian friend.

Jake sighs. "Okay, then I'm coming from a place of worry for you."

Jay groans. "Again, none of your business!" This doesn't stop Jake. He comes from good intentions, really, but Jay wants nothing more than to stuff the kid's mouth with some of that chicken to shut him up.

"What are you gonna do if one day you meet someone you like, genuinely like, and you screw yourself over because you've never been in an actual relationship before? A real, committed one. Like one that lasts at least three months."

"You don't think I can last three months in a relationship?" Jay questions the boy currently taunting him.

"Honestly? No. What's the longest relationship you've been in?" Jake cocks an eyebrow at his friend across from him.

One month and two weeks. But Jay's smart enough to not say that out loud.

"I can so last over three months," Jay mutters more to himself than Jake.

Jake laughs at that, pausing to take another bite of the drumstick in his hand. "Jay, I am willing to actually bet you. Bet that you wouldn't be able to." He leans back on the couch, the ball now in Jay's court.

Jay freezes, looking up from his phone, narrowing his eyes at Jake.

"Forget it, Jake. He's not gonna agree even if you offered him money," Sunghoon finally perches from beside him. Well he's not wrong. It's not like Jay is exactly in need of more money, per say.

"What kind of bet are we talking here?"

Sunghoon's right. Jay doesn't need the money, but he does hate being wrong. Even if it's over something as stupid as this matter.

Caught off guard by the blonde's answer, Jake blinks blankly at him and takes a second to think.

"Hmm..what about...what about if you can date someone for at least three months, and I mean an actual, committed relationship, then I'll do all of your physics homework next semester."

Jay's eyes sparkle at that. If there's anything he despises more than commitment, it's physics.

"And if I win, you have to buy all of my textbooks," Jake sits back from the edge of his seat with a smirk lying on his face.

Jay pauses to think about it. I mean, what does he have to lose? A couple hundred dollars over college textbooks? No. Because he just simply won't lose.

And maybe he'll learn what it'll be like to actually be in a committed relationship for once. Maybe he'll finally learn what it's like to actually devote yourself to someone, open up to them. He shivers at the thought. Never mind. He'll warm up to it. Baby steps.

Nonetheless, what could go wrong? Even if he does lose, at least his money would be going somewhere productive––towards his friend's education. Jay was probably gonna use that money on something useless like a blanket that resembles a tortilla (a burrito blanket, he calls it)––something he doesn't necessarily need, but must have, he would argue.

"Fine. Whatever, okay. Deal," he grabs Jake's extended hand in front of him and shakes on it.

Jake's impressively smiling at the boy as Sunghoon lets out a sigh, in disbelief with the two guys he calls his best friends.

Jay concludes that this will be easier than his Introduction to Photography 101 course he took his freshman year. How hard is it to find someone to date the Jay Park? Surely, everyone will be lining up once Jay switches his FaceBook relationship status from "it's complicated" to "single".

Turns out, it's not as easy as his class where all Jay had to do was take pictures of a pretty sunset, slap a VSCO filter on, and call it a day.

He comes to this realization on a Wednesday evening, as he's seated at one of the many study tables lined in the middle of the campus' library, staring down at his phone's dry iMessage app, with his laptop and blank sheets of scratch paper scrambled across the entire table, as an attempt to look half as studious as the other students studying in the facility.

Turns out, being known as the campus' fuckboy who ghosts every girl on campus isn't a good thing when it comes to wanting to find a real relationship.

He comes to this realization after failing to receive a single text back to the many ones he sent out throughout the first half of his day. The ghoster gets ghosted. Oh how the turn tables.

Jay groans dramatically as he tosses his phone on the hard surface of the table, earning himself a harsh shush from the librarian filing books in the aisle beside him.

He sheepishly smiles back as an apology, directing his attention back to his open laptop screen, where his untouched calculus homework stares back at him––his mind preoccupied with the looming threat of Jake's bet. Not that it was threatening in any way, per say, but Jay just hates losing. And from the looks of things, it's safe to say that Jay won't be celebrating any victories anytime soon.

Jay thinks he should just change his identity and just transfer to some boarding school in Switzerland. Yes, that's a much better solution than admitting defeat to Jake.

Jay sighs as he lies his head on the table, figuring he might as well just write the check for Jake's textbooks now. He wonders how he got here in the first place. Not how he got into the bet, and definitely not how he's sitting in the middle of the library, having yet to start his calculus homework due at 11:59PM tonight (he should really start that).

But no, he wonders how he gained the reputation as the campus' playboy. To be fair, his friends (mainly Jake), are constantly reminding him of his notorious habits. But how did they come a habit in the first place?

The idea of being in a relationship is nice, sure, but the commitment that comes with it? The idea of being dependent on someone? It's scary, vulnerable, and one that Jay can't picture for himself.

Maybe some people just aren't meant to be paired. Maybe some people, like Jay, like being independent and are meant to stay that way.

But Jay also likes affection. He likes the fleeting, warm feeling he gets every time he finds himself under someone's sheets. He likes the short-lived comfort he receives from someone else's touch, even though he knows it's going to cease to exist the second he steps out of those bedroom's doors. He just likes affection, simple as that.

That and he's a 19 year old teenage boy with needs, what did you expect?

And so what if he likes the idea of affection minus commitment? Is that so bad? Apparently it is, to people like his friends and the entirety of his school's campus, at least.

At this rate, he might as well pay someone to date him.

Wait. Jay lifts his head off the table's surface in realization.

He might as well pay someone to date him.

There's no harm in that, is there?

He wouldn't have to endure through an endless amount of dates to find someone he clicks with, then continue going on dates with said clicked person, all while trying to develop an actual, serious relationship.

He'll win the bet, get his physics homework done for an entire semester, and some lucky girl out there will be making profit for the small price of hanging out with Jay Park for three months.

And lucky for him, Jay knows the perfect candidate for this scheme.

Simple as that.

Just as long as said perfect candidate says yes.

And as long as Jake and Sunghoon don't find out. Or else Jay might really have to move to Switzerland after all.

You love your friends, you do.

Hana and Heeseung have been there for you when others haven't––they were by your side when you knew no one entering high school, and they were still by your side when you were all graduating said high school. Needless to say, you're eternally grateful for friends like them.

But right now, in this moment––with you seated in the middle of the campus' library, trying to write your essay, as your two friends blabber on and on about the most recent gossip across from you––your two friends could be your villain origin story.

But again, you love your friends, you do. So you don't have the heart to tell them to leave. You've managed to naturally tune out most of the conversation, anyways, for this––your friends coming to hang out while you're trying to study––is no rare occurrence by any means.

"Oh yeah, Jay Park texted me last night."

You hate how your brain's filter suddenly turns off at Hana's words.

You hate how your ears catch the sudden mention of Jay Park's name.

You hate how the thought of Jay Park gets to even occupy a single brain cell of yours.

You hate how you even know who Jay Park is. Well, knew.

Past tense. Because up until eighth grade––when Jay decided to just suddenly pretend you didn't exist––he was attached to you like a koala to a eucalyptus tree.

And if you had asked past Y/N, ideally, Jay would've never left your side. Ideally, he would've never left you to fend for yourself when entering high school. Ideally, he would've stayed your best friend through out all four years of high school and ideally, you would've eventually told him how you really felt about him after growing up with him all your life. And maybe it would've lead to a completely different story. But for the sake of this fic, we don't live in an ideal world.

So yes, if it wasn't for his attendance at the very same university as you, you would've forgotten about the boy who brought you the painful memories of your childhood.

And since the universe clearly doesn't work in your favor, avoiding Jay Park's existence like he's the plague would have to suffice. And it works.

For the most part.

Until some people, bring him up uninvited into your conversation. Like now, for example.

"When was the last time you guys talked anyways?" Heeseung mindlessly asks as he reaches across the table to grab one of the many snacks you usually bring to your study sessions.

"Uh..like a few weeks ago. Give or take. Whenever you threw your house party. Can't say there was much talking involved however," she teasingly says with a giggle and wiggle of her brows.

Heeseung's rolling his eyes as you scoff and chuck a nearby crumpled piece of paper that was once one of your many essay drafts at her.

She bats it away right as it's about to hit her face as she laughs. "Doesn't matter anyways. He ghosted me the next morning, as he does with everyone else. Telling you this now," she extends a finger right at you, "stay away from Jay Park. That kid's just bad news."

You nod in response, mentally telling her she has nothing to worry about.

Been there, done that.

College. Ah yes, the very concept of spending four years of your life imprisoned on a campus where you'll be tearing your hair out from stress and spending all your life's savings just for a laminated sheet of paper with a golden stamp at the end of it all. We live in a society.

Because of said college, and all the weight that comes along with it, you had adapted a strict daily schedule in order to not completely lose your mind. It's a simple schedule really, one of a typical college student who's just trying to get by everyday with as little mental breakdowns as possible.

Wake up, get ready, go to class, go to the library to do your homework, walk all the way across campus to get back to your dorm, shower, then sleep. Oh and eat, of course. And maybe if time permits, be an actual social being and socialize.

It's gotten you this far into the college life without dropping out so, you conclude, you must be doing something right.

Sometimes, if you're feeling nice to yourself, you'll tweak the schedule a bit to fit in some exceptions. Maybe squeeze in a little trip to the bubble tea shop that's on the other side of campus, or maybe get dinner at that one dining hall that you don't usually go to because of the unncessarily long lines (but because they serve ice cream, you go anyways). It doesn't matter what the exception is, you still plan it out to fit into your schedule somehow. Everything is planned out.

Sometimes, however, the universe disagrees with your schedule, to your demise. Such as today, for example.

Because what you didn't expect for today was for a particular blonde-haired boy who you haven't spoken to in almost six years (but who's counting?) to approach your table in the library––a table you were sure no one could find you at, as it was quietly tucked away in the back corner, right next to the Astrophysics shelves. Because who browses the Astrophysics aisle for fun? Actually, maybe Jake Sim would. Anyways.

You definitely didn't anticipate a visit from the boy you've been actively avoiding, so you definitely didn't expect the first words coming out of his mouth when he sees you for the first time in six years to be:

"Fake date me."

You blink up at him.

Yeah, definitely not expected.

But you only let it phase you for a split second, until you feel a slight annoyance beginning to bubble up deep inside of you.

"Wow, hello to you too Jay! It's been what––half a decade? Yeah I've been pretty good, thanks for asking!" The sarcasm is practically dripping off your tongue.

You don't know what runs through Jay's mind, but apparently it isn't common sense––or the ability to read the room. Because next thing you know, he's sliding the chair across from you out from underneath the table and making himself at home.

And he's smiling right at you.

Curse him and his smile.

But no, you're not giving into it.

Not yet, at least.

"What do you want?" You deadpan at him when he makes no sign of making the next move.

"A girlfriend," he deadpans right back at you, as if he was casually telling you what he wanted for dinner. As if you two were close-knit friends that could approach one another without any proper greeting. As if you two had kept your friendship all these years. As if you two even had a role in each other's lives.

"Can't help you there," you scoff, deciding to not even question his lack of manners on top of his uninvited presence.

"Aren't you gonna ask me why?"

"Well gee, seeing that the first few words you decided to say to my face for the first time in forever were a demand, a demand to date you no less, then....no," your monotone voice says as you keep your eyes focused on your laptop screen, not daring to look at the boy across from you.

In the Introduction to Sociology course you took your freshmen year, you had learned of one important term: interactional vandalism. Textbook definition being: "ignoring signals of disinterest in a conversation, leading it to an offense."

Your definition being: "are you oblivious or just plan dumb, read the room!"

This was interactional vandalism, alright. Whether Jay's truly oblivious or just trying to annoy you until your head explodes (it's really the former, but you're convinced it's the latter), he takes your signals of disinterest and tosses it right out of his head to continue the conversation.

"I'm stuck in this stupid bet with Jake--do you remember him? He bet me that I couldn't date someone for more than three months and I figured having someone fake date me would be easier than actually dating someone, right? That's where you come into the equation," he proposes as he leans back in his chair, as if he had just finished a sales pitch to a prospective customer looking to buy a car.

You couldn't believe this. You're 98% sure this has got to be a prank. You're mentally preparing for a camera crew to jump out from in-between the library's aisles any moment now and scream into your ears that you've just been punk'd!

The remaining 2% of you, however, wouldn't put it past the two boys to get themselves in such a situation. The last memory you had of Jay and his friends were pretty much their childish selves back in middle school. And by looking at the current scene unfolding in front of you...it's needless to say they haven't changed much.

"Again, can't help you there. Ask one of the many girlfriends I thought you had." Ouch.

"But Y/N, you've known me all your life--"

"Up until you dropped me a few years ago but sure, let's call it that."

"--and convincing other people is gonna make me look--"

"--desperate? Yeah."

"C'mon, Y/N. What do you have to lose anyways?"

"Uh..my dignity? Pride? Self-respect? Sorry Jay, not happening," you turn your attention back to your unwritten essay in front of you, mentally checking out of this conversation. This would be a good time for that camera crew to jump out now.

"Look, no one else is gonna do it, Y/N." Jay has always been stubborn, you suppose. But so are you.

"Yeah, because you've managed to push every being of the opposite gender away from you. You gave yourself this reputation in the first place," you give it to him straight. It's not like you had a relationship with him to uphold anyways––Jay himself broke that friendship years ago.

Jay hates that you're right.

You're always right. He remembers how he used to always go to you for advice and clarity on the world's biggest problems. Granted, the world's biggest problems to him at the time equated to what he should dress up as for the fifth grade Halloween party, but still. A tough decision, for the mind of a ten-year-old.

You abruptly stop typing and begin putting your laptop and textbooks away as you huff in frustration. There's no point in trying to get your work done now. The longer you stay arguing with Jay, the bigger your headache gets. The longer he continues to occupy any part of your brain, the bigger your headache gets.

Getting up from your seat, packed and ready to slam your head into your pillow, you turn to the blonde one last time.

"Look Jay. We went on our separate ways years ago. If you weren't so notoriously known around campus and my friends would stop talking about you, I would've long forgotten you. I'm sorry you're in this situation, really. If I were you, I'd just tell Jake I can't do it. Or don't, I can't tell you what to do. Just don't get some innocent girl involved in whatever stunt of yours this is."

Jay stares at you, mouth agape, as you find your way out of the library and through the main doors. By the time he comes back to his senses, he realizes how he looks plain stupid––standing in the middle of the library, the look on his face screaming befuddlement, to say the least. Jay quickly makes his way out of the building, in hopes of convincing you one last time.

Jay catches sight of your figure already half-way down the walkway that connects the library to the main quad of your school's campus. Geez, you walk fast.

Not fast enough to outrun Jay's legs, however. If Jay running after you through the middle of campus in order to convince you to fake date him doesn't show how desperate he is to win this bet, I don't know what will.

"Wait, Y/N!"

You groan to yourself before turning to face the boy who can't seem to take a hint and leave you alone. You stare at his out-of-breath state as he heaves up and down from the slight jog he had to endure to get to where you are. If you're humored by him chasing after you, you do a good job of hiding it.

He meets your unimpressed state before stating his final proposition: "I'll pay you. Five hundred dollars."

You nearly stop breathing.

Now this catches your attention––after all, you're but a broke college student who's just trying to survive. And preferably not by feeding yourself instant ramen cups every night.

And so, naturally, you begin rethinking about the opportunity presented in front of you. You narrow your eyes at the boy as you weigh your options.

The first problem being, it's Jay Park––the bane of your very existence. You spent the last few years of your life pretending he didn't exist...for good reason. Not only did he do you dirty when you were merely a couple of 13-year-olds, but you just didn't want to be involved with someone like him. Someone known for his nature, someone who left your own current best friend ghosted. And not that Hana herself would care, for she has called herself the "female Jay Park", but you're sure this would be breaking some rule in the girl code handbook. Plus, if you agree to this, you'd be betraying 13-year-old Y/N, the one who decided to never speak to nor think of Jay Park again––which by now you've failed, but you get the gist.

Second problem being, three months is a long time. Three months is practically the rest of this semester, and did you really want to spend the rest of the semester tied down to the label of being Jay Park's girlfriend? There would have to be some negative connotations that came along with that title, right? No offense to Jay, but being his first girlfriend since, what, high school could make you come off as..naive, for lack of a better term. As if the only person you could settle for was Jay Park. As if you barely had any standards for yourself. Again, no offense to Jay.

Needless to say, if your school's debate club had to argue on why you shouldn't be doing this, you're sure the negating side could win with these two reasons alone.

But before you're rejecting the boy currently standing in front of you one last time, you find yourself mentally listing rebuttals.

First of all, you'd be getting paid. And again, you're merely but a college student living the stereotypical broke college student life––burdened by the costs of tuition, textbooks, and midnight McDonalds runs for when you're out of aforementioned instant ramen cups. Five hundred dollars could provide you with more than enough chicken McNuggets to last you the semester, and maybe some more to treat yourself to an online shopping spree.

Second of all, it's not like you were going to do anything better with your next three months anyways. It's safe to say you were too busy being a diligent student to actually look for anyone to date, per say. And if anything, having a fake boyfriend might actually be helpful in your case. Your mom would be off your ass about how you're still single, for one. And two, your friends (though it's really just Heeseung) would stop trying to hook you up on blind dates with guys that you would choose Jay Park over any day (and that really says something).

Third of all, it's Jay Park. As much as you despise the kid, you still know him. He's not a complete stranger to you, no matter how much you try to deny it. It could be worse, it could be a complete rando asking you to date him. At least you two have some sort of history, which would take care of the typical small talk and getting to know each other bit of this equation. And truth be told, you'd be lying to yourself if you said you weren't a tad bit satisfied by the fact that Jay chose you, of all people, to pull off this stunt with him. You don't know if it's the nostalgia of your childhood memories rushing back to you, but it reminds you of the endless schemes you two used to plan behind your parents' backs all the time. Granted, your childhood schemes––such as the both of you faking sickness so you could skip school together––don't even fall close to being in a fake relationship with one another, but still. It's the thought that counts.

All of those reasons plus, Jay isn't the worst to look at. He may have a spoiled reputation, but at least he has his looks going for him, you'll give him that (you're still secretly wondering when and how did he get his glow up, but don't tell him that).

And so by the guidelines of a college student's logic that states the pros outweigh the cons, you come to the overarching conclusion that maybe, this won't be so awful after all.

"Five hundred?" You ask, just for clarification. Jay's immediately nodding at your words. You continue to ponder on your thoughts as he stares at you hopefully.

The silent atmosphere of your campus heightens the tension so much, you swear you're in one of those overdramatic pausing scenes that occur too many times in k-dramas.

You sigh, then nod.

"Okay," you're internally praying that you won't regret this decision. "I'm in."

The next time you see Jay is at 12:17PM on a Friday afternoon, as you're exiting the doors of the lecture building that's home to your awfully long Capitalism in the Western World class.

You're going down the steps of the building, mentally deciding where and what you're going to treat yourself to for lunch––as the three hour lecture you had just attended drained all the life and energy out of you––when you hear the slight call of your name.

Turning to the source, you're met with a waving Jay, leaning against the passenger's side of his car, parked in front of the lecture hall building you were currently leaving.

Great.

You walk over to where he's casually waiting––he's unaware of all the stares he's attracted from fellow students leaving the same lecture as you. Can you blame them? It's not everyday you see a sleek, black BMW that probably cost more than your tuition pull up in front of your Friday afternoon lecture. It's not everyday you see Jay Park waiting for anyone outside of his said sleek, black BMW that probably cost more than your tuition.

"Hi," you simply let out as you plant yourself in front of him, not sure whether or not to question him why are you here? Surely, he wasn't waiting for you?

"Hi," he smiles down at you. There's a beat of silence. "I was waiting for you."

Bingo.

"Oh. What are you, my chauffeur?" You raise an eyebrow, unimpressed.

"Maybe. I am your boyfriend, after all," he says into the air, loud and clear, as if he wanted people to hear. Well that is the point, you suppose.

But still, all you want to do is smack the smirk right off his face.

Before you have time to put your next question into words, he answers it for you.

"I'm taking you out for lunch," he declares as if you have nothing else planned for the day. Well, to be fair, you didn't have anything else planned for the day. Except for your usual library run. But you figure the library could wait.

"Oh, like on a date?" You raise your eyebrows teasingly at him as you get into the car, Jay holding the door wide open for you. "Is Jay Park treating me to lunch as a date?"

Jay fights the scowl (or is that a smile?) growing on his face as he bends down to meet your eye level from inside the car. "Don't flatter yourself, princess. We've got fake lives to live."

"Call me princess one more time and you won't have a real life to live," you flash him a sarcastic smile and slam the door in his face.

Jay meets his own shocked reflection on the passenger's side window.

Cute.

"When you said you were taking me out to lunch, I expected like...I don't know...the diner on campus. Not whatever this is," you mutter to Jay as the two of you are brought to your table by a waitress at an upscale sushi restaurant, one that is undoubtedly out of your usual budget, but for sure an upgrade from your dining hall's pizza you were planning to have. You should've figured as much, the drive here was a little more than out of the way from campus, and who are you kidding, it's Jay Park you're eating with.

You stare down at your current outfit, which consisted of a hoodie you've owned since your junior year of high school and leggings that you threw on without second thought this morning––because you didn't exactly wake up and decide I'm going to go to a fancy sushi bar for lunch today!

"Why are we here anyways?" You ask him when you're both settled in your seats and the waitress walks away after listing the chef's specials for the day.

"Oh, they have killer dragon rolls here, you have to try it," Jay tells you nonchalantly as his eyes rake the menu in front of him, blocking your view of him.

How dense can one be? Your hand snatches his menu as you stare into his unamused eyes.

"No, Jay. I mean, why are we here? It's not like anyone's around to see us put on a show anyways."

"Oh. I figured," Jay's quick to grab the menu back from out of your hands as he continues, "that we should sit down and establish how exactly we're going to deliver this performance. After all, you're stuck with me for the next three months."

Again, smacking the smirk currently resting on his face would satisfy you beyond relief. Just once.

"If I drop out halfway through, do I still get $250?" You tease, leaning back.

"Ha ha. Funny. No," he narrows his eyes at you from across the table. "It's all or nothing."

You dramatically huff to make a show just for his annoyance.

"Worth a try. But sure, let's solidify this. What's the game plan?" You sit up in your seat, leaning over the table as if the two of you were hosting a secret meeting.

"It's simple really," Jay mirrors your actions, face leaning in close to where yours is hovering over the table. "Just pretend to be deeply in love with me for three months, and try not to actually be charmed by my cunning looks."

If someone gave you five dollars for every time you've already rolled your eyes at him today, you wouldn't even need to be in this deal for the five hundred dollars.

"Wow, smooth. Can I just remind you you're the one paying a girl to be in a fake relationship with you because you're just not competent enough to find an actual girlfriend?" You lean back, arms crossing over your figure.

Jay, unfazed, laughs, tongue briefly hitting the inside of his cheek. "Touché."

Your eyes go back to the menu in front of you as a silence falls over the table. Because you're not a loaded trust fund baby who comes to fancy five-star sushi restaurants for lunch on a daily, you don't recognize half of the entree names on the menu. You spot the dragon roll Jay suggested, but seeing that a basic California roll is less expensive, your natural broke-college-student-instincts figure the California roll shall do.

"Okay, in all seriousness," Jay begins as he puts his menu down. "It's simple really. We'll just go on weekly dates and post cute pictures of each other once in a while and a little after three months, I'll just say it didn't work out. I'll give you the five hundo and boom, we move on with our lives."

It's clear Jay's put some thought into this. Safe to say he's put more effort planning this out than the amount of work he's been putting into his classes. Someone's got their priorities straight.

You're impressed to say the least––you figured Jay would just be the kind to go with the flow and wait for the situation to unfold on its own and maybe blow up into flames. But seeing as he was just as serious about winning this bet as you were with making five hundred dollars, your doubts about this entire situation were slowly withering away.

Don't get it wrong, though, you still despise him. To an extent, at least.

"And don't worry about the dates. I'll pay on your behalf, as the loving, doting boyfriend I am," Jay finishes with a wide, cheesy smile you can't help but return a growing smile back at.

"Well then, as the loving, doting girlfriend I am, I shall gift you coffee, breakfast, all that fun couple stuff, whenever you please. Or maybe unannounced, if I'm feeling nice," you figure you should pitch in as much if he's paying for all your dates. And deep down, you find the idea kinda cute. But don't tell anyone that.

"Wow, look at us. We should become Dispatch's couple of the year already!" Jay exclaims, earning himself a small giggle from you, which pleases him to say the least. He thinks that maybe when this is all over, he'll hopefully make a good friend (well, for the second time) out of it.

And you're thinking that maybe the next three months won't be as bad as you initially had thought.

As the two of you delve deep into a debate about who would be the better significant other to each other, the waitress comes over to take your orders.

And because you're laughing and Jay's brightly smiling at you from across the table, you order the dragon roll.

The second time Jay takes you out––this time he gives you a heads up to get ready––it's at a, once again, high-class steakhouse.

The third time, you insist on the on-campus diner that's popular amongst the student population. Partially because you feel bad for the amount of money he's spent on you (even though he couldn't care less), but mostly because if you have to put on another fancy dress to just eat an overpriced meal that doesn't even fully satisfy your hunger, you might lose your mind.

And by this third time, Jake is aware of this newly blossomed relationship.

"Three dates! I didn't know you had it in you, going on three dates with the same girl!" Jake excitedly exclaims as he jumps into the empty spot on Jay's dorm bed and shoves his phone's screen into Jay's face.

The smaller screen displays Jay's most recent Instagram post: an image of you sitting behind your too-small-to-be-this-expensive-steak and smiling right into Jay's camera––a memory that brings a smile to his face:

~ ~ ~

"C'mon! We said Instagram posts would be a part of the deal! How else can we convince people we're dating?" A pout rests on Jay's face as he stares at you from across the table in the middle of the extravagantly decorated restaurant he picked out for your second date. You remember your eyes bulging out of their own sockets when you saw the "$$$$$" rating Yelp gave the place when you searched it up earlier.

"Okay, okay! One picture," you give in, already slightly annoyed that you were here instead of the comfort of your own bed, where you could be rewatching your favorite Netflix show for the third time. But because you made a deal and because you're desperate for money, you had to follow through––so here you were.

You flash an unconvincing smile to Jay's camera, which doesn't satisfy him, to say the least. "At least pretend you're somewhat enjoying this date," he frowns at you.

You sigh, until a thought crosses your mind and a smile grows on your face. "Only if you get me boba afterwards."

He narrows his eyes at you, but then meets your smile. "Sure, whatever you want. But only because I've been craving some mango milk tea lately."

"You're a fruit milk tea kind of guy? Sorry, but I might have to fake break-up with you," you tease as you take a sip of your overpriced drink to go with your overpriced meal.

Jay scoffs, feigning hurt by placing his hand over his heart. "Ouch. But before you break up with me, let me get this Instagram post in."

"Wow. Your priorities are so straight," you roll your eyes at him, eliciting a cheeky smile from him as he watches you through his held up phone screen.

"3,2,1."

"Hey, I wasn't ready! That was like mid-laugh!" You reach over the table to grab the phone, but not quick enough for him to put his phone back into his pants' pocket.

"Nope, nuh uh," he laughs as you quickly sit back down into your seat, not wanting to cause a scene in an establishment as proper as this one.

"It's fine. It's a good picture, you look cute," he casually lets out, unaware of the blush rising to the surface of your cheeks, thanks to the fact that you were suddenly interested in playing with the left-over food on your plate.

"Jay! Delete it, I'll let you take another one," you whine from your seat, imagining just how bad a candid picture of you could be.

"Ugh, fine. Ever so picky." He playfully rolls his eyes at you as he takes his phone out and opens the camera app as you prepare yourself.

"Okay, how's this?" Jay turns the phone screen to you after he takes a few snaps on his phone.

"I approve," you grin at him as he goes through the pictures himself, unaware of the smile growing on his face.

"Okay now delete the first one," you point your finger at him, narrowing your eyes at him.

"Okay, okay! Bossy," he laughs as he raises in hands in surrender.

When Jay gets home that night, he recovers the image from his Recently Deleted folder, telling himself it's for the sake of the memory.

Obviously.

~ ~ ~

"It's not that big of a deal," Jay mutters from his spot as his eyes go from the Instagram post to his Exile and Belonging in Modern Literature reading that's due tomorrow, bright yellow highlighter in hand. Typically, you'd find the reading buried deep at the bottom of his school backpack. But because Jay ran into you this morning and because he complained to you about the amount of work he's fallen behind on and because you had threatened him to do his work or else you're not going on another date––a fake date that is––with him, he figured he should at least get one reading done and annotated, despite his strong dislike for highlighters (they hurt his eyes, okay?)

What he doesn't know, however, is how your threat was completely full of bluff––but don't tell him that.

"It is so a big deal, for you at least!" Jake hops off the bed and lands on the wooden floors of Jay's dorm room so hard, Jay winces and sends a mental apology to the poor person who lives below him.

Jake suddenly gasps. "I have to meet her, Jay! As your best friend, it's practically mandatory that I meet her."

Jay opens his mouth to protest, but not before Jake interrupts him once again. "Oh! We can bring Sunghoon too, it'll be so fun! The best friends meet the girlfriend."

Jay can't think of anything worst. Jay imagines that bringing you to meet his best friends would just intimidate you out of dating him––fake dating him, that is. Obviously.

He stares at his friend in agony then back at the reading in front of him––the one Jake said he'd come over to help annotate, but the intention completely left Jake's head the second he heard about Jay's recent dating life.

"You don't have to meet her," Jay says pointedly. "Plus, you already know her."

Jake frowns at his friend's excuse. "Yeah, but that was in middle school! This is different."

Jay's hands shuffle through the reading's pages in front of him as he realizes there's no way the two of them are going to finish the assignment at this point. He supposes he'll have to save death by blindness from highlighters for another day and hope you still agree to go out with him.

Jake suddenly gasps in realization.

"Oh my gosh! Childhood best friends turned college sweethearts," Jake says so dreamily, he might as well plaster heart eyes on. Hopeless romantic, this one.

Before Jay can argue, the piercing sound of three loud knocks echo through the small room, followed with a:

"Jay, are you in? It's me!"

Jay stills at the sound of your sweet voice. He whips his head to Jake, who is also frozen in place.

But the widened-eye boy is quick to come to his senses––unfortunately quicker than Jay himself––because the next thing Jay knows, Jake's eyes are lighting up and he's running to the door, ignoring Jay's screaming whispers through this seething teeth that were somewhere along the lines of Jake––stop, I swear to god if you open that door I'm gonna fucking--

"Y/N!" Jake swings the door wide open, revealing an overly excited him and a frozen Jay half-way to the door, as if he was about to grab the very boy welcoming you in. It's as if we're living in a Sims game and the player clicked pause on this very moment.

Jake's eyes are wildly going back and forth between you and your supposed boyfriend, as if he was waiting for Jay to run over and smother you in hugs and kisses...or something couple-y like that. Jay wouldn't know.

"Uh––hi," you're awkwardly standing inside the room now, a relatively large paper brown bag resting in your palms as you look around for a surface to place it on. Jay makes his way to you without a second thought, quickly taking the bag out of your hold.

"You seemed stressed out earlier, so I figured I could bring you some food as a little pick me up. I didn't know what you liked, so I kinda just got a little of everything from the dining hall. Nothing fancy," you're rambling, but smiling so excitedly at him, Jay doesn't know what to say.

Instead, his mouth slightly drops open as he stares at you in awe, mostly because he's not used to being on the receiving end of such spontaneously generous actions––all while Jake's still excitedly looking back and forth between the two of you, as if he was expecting a marriage proposal to come next.

"Oh wow. Thank you. Really," Jay, still touched by your simple act of kindness, softly says as he places the bag on the limited amount of empty space on his desk surface––the rest of it is covered with his untouched textbooks and unfinished assignments. He wonders if you did this out of playing your role or just because you wanted to. He internally hopes it's the latter. "Seriously, you didn't have to do."

"Nah, don't worry. I wanted to," you shrug with such a genuine smile that Jay realizes he actually missed your smile.

Despite having seen you during your brief run-in this morning when you were fetching your morning coffee, Jay realizes he missed you. The two of you haven't been seeing each other recently because of your busy schedule and if Jay didn't realize it before, he's now sure he missed your company and presence around.

Weird.

"Well, you two have fun! Sunghoon needs me for something," Jake suddenly chirps from his place near the front door, halfway through with putting his shoes on already, breaking the comforting silence that fell between the two of you.

Jay frowns. "But you said you were free all da––"

"SUNGHOON IS CALLING BYE!" And before Jay can even register what's happening, Jake's out the door without another word.

"Er..sorry about him, he's...weird," Jay scratches the back of his neck as he returns to his spot on his bed, mentally setting a reminder to yell at Jake later for leaving the two of you alone. Jay doesn't know exactly why, but he's nervous at the fact that you're here in his room. It's not like you two are complete strangers––or whatever you guys were before––anymore. "Good job on your part, though. How'd you know Jake was here?"

"Oh uh, I didn't"," you let out an awkward laugh. "I just felt like doing it."

Heat rushes to Jay's cheeks and he's not sure 1) what this newfound feeling is and 2) how to respond, yet again.

Having expecting you to leave after dropping the food off, Jay's taken by surprise when you take your shoes off and come over to his bed to look at the pile of work he's spread out.

"Is this everything you have to do?" You question the stressed-out boy as you flip through the various assignments, readings, and essays he put off in the past week.

"More or less," he groans. This is no rare occurrence by any means––Jay being behind in his work––but this time, Jay realizes he may actually be in deep shit, considering he has no idea where to begin.

Right as Jay's expecting a scolding from you, he looks up to meet a look of sympathy on your face. "Well, I mean, I'm pretty much done with my day. I can try to help, I recognize some of these readings from last semester."

Jay thinks to himself that the universe has sent him an angel through the form of you.

"Really? Wow, you were't kidding when you said you'd be a good girlfriend," he sends you a surprised look.

"I'm just being nice, Jay. A concept I'm sure you're not familiar with," you remark back at him, causing his forming smile to grow into a laugh.

"I can too be nice! Need I remind you of who's paying you $500, covering all of our dates AND giving you rides to class everyday?" He remarks pointedly at you, a teasing look resting in his eyes as you're reminded of the first of many times he's come to pick you up before class:

~ ~ ~

You're late.

This never happens.

But then again, your life's been a series of unexpected occurrences lately. Such as the fact that you're currently known as Jay Park's girlfriend, for one.

You're scrambling out of bed once you take one look at your phone and realize shit, you're already late for class. Throwing on whatever articles of clothing your eyes land on first, you're already mentally groaning at the fact that you'll have to skip breakfast and run across your campus to get to said class.

Curse your professor for hosting her lecture at the furthest possible building away from your dorm. Curse the architect who decided to make your campus so large.

You're running down the steps outside of your dorm building's doors when you're abruptly stopped by a familiar sounding cough. You look up from trying to gather all your belongings together at once to meet the gaze of the source of the sound––Jay.

"Wow, you're a mess," he smirks as he gets up from the spot on his car he was leaning against to make his way over to you.

"Gee, thanks! Good morning to you too," you flash him a sarcastic smile before your default frown quickly makes it way back onto your face.

"Aren't you gonna ask me why I'm here?" He grins as he grabs hold of your backpack to sling it across his own back as the two of you walk towards his car.

"Why are you here, Jay?" you sigh, your sarcastic tone hard to miss.

"To give you a ride to class, of course!" He's beaming at you, as if he's a pre-pubescent teen who just won their first girlfriend a prize from the arcade's claw machine.

Oh. That explains the car, you figure. Deep down inside, you're relieved that you'll no longer be bursting through the lecture hall's doors as a sweaty mess––a result of having to run across campus to get to class.

Determined to not let your satisfaction completely show, you resort with a little smile directed towards Jay as he opens the passenger door for you.

The second your enter Jay's car, the strong scent of coffee hits you, and your attention is targeted at the two small cups of coffee sitting in the cupholders of the car.

"Breakfast?" Jay asks as he enters through the driver's side and reaches into the backseat to whip out a small pastry bag. A small, deliciously smelling, pastry bag.

Okay, well. You suppose you could drop the annoyed act now.

Your eyes widen with joy as you grab the bag from him and open it to reveal your favorite breakfast sandwich. He's been taking notes, you'll give him that point.

"Okay, you win. Thank you," you grace him with a soft smile before taking a bite into the glorious gift in your hands.

"Of course, I was just feeling nice," he grins at you as he starts his car. "But don't get used to it." His tone is serious, but his smile directed towards you says differently.

And the fact that he still showed up to drive you to class the next morning.

And the next.

~ ~ ~

"And need I remind you who has to date your dumb ass for the $500 in question?" Your eyes narrow at the boy who can't seem to get that damn smile off his face.

Jay sticks his tongue out at you, ending the conversation. Really Jay? What are you, five? Well, mentally––probably.

You're looking around his minuscule dorm room for a place to sit down, and Jay can't help but feel embarrassed now that you're here, in his messy single studio room that pretty much reflects how Jay treats every other responsibility of his oh so hard life: neglected.

"Uh...here, you can sit on my bed," Jay immediately offers as he moves to the side to make room for your presence––and it isn't much, considering the university only provided him a twin XL bed which is definitely not built for two grown college-aged kids.

If you told yourself a few weeks ago that you'd be shoulder to shoulder on a bed belonging to the guy you cringed at the very thought of, you wouldn't have believed yourself. You wouldn't have believed yourself if you said you were actually glad Jay let you stay instead of kicking you out after delivering the food. Huh.

Weird.

"You know, this kinda reminds me of when we were kids. I always carried us through those horrible multiplication tests in the fifth grade," you wink at him as you settle in the spot next to him, hands grabbing hold of the papers in his lap.

Jay let out a laugh, nudging your shoulder with his. "Hey! The twelve times table is hard, okay?"

You roll your eyes at him––a habit of yours he's noticed whenever the two of you are together, but more recently, he thinks it's been more out of fun than annoyance.

He wonders why.

When Jay had first brought up the idea of bringing you as his date to his father's company dinner, you had expected a fairly fancy five-star restaurant with a formal dress code––for you've become accustomed to Jay's lifestyle. Turns out, your expectations can continue to be exceeded. Because what you had expected to be a simple dinner with a few other business men and women turned out to be an entire party, hosted in a hotel whose interior resembled something close to a castle (Or what you assume a castle looks like, as you've never personally been into a castle yourself, but this hotel is close enough).

Your eyes sparkle at the extravagant columns and diamond chandeliers hanging high above you, and Jay smiles at the expression on your face; like a little girl being brought to the amusement park for the first time ever.

"Wow, this is...wow," you mutter as you drink in the scene in front of you: people dressed in formal attire likewise to yours and Jay's, mingling and drinking what you imagine to be beverages that cost more than your entire life's worth.

Jay laughs from behind you, "Yeah the company goes a little...extra when it comes to these company dinners."

You scoff as you look up at him. "Oh really, you don't say?" You look around and you're suddenly aware of the many people surrounding the two of you and the attention you've acquired ever since entering the building.

"Jay, people are staring." You shuffle closer to him, your voice lowering down to a whisper.

"Well, it's not everyday the son of the company's CEO brings his girlfriend with him, so...looks like we'll be the talk of the party tonight. Smiles on," he winks at you, and you just know he's loving the attention the two of you are receiving right now.

"Jay Park? Is that you?" You hear a warm voice call out from behind the two of you.

The two of you turn around to meet the owner of the voice, a middle-aged woman dressed in an evening gown that matches the pattern of high-end brands you've been recognizing ever since arriving.

"Mrs. Lee! It's so nice seeing you again," Jay cheerily addresses the woman as the two of you bow in greeting.

You internally giggle at the thought of your Jay being so picture-perfect in the eyes of his father's co-workers.

"This is Y/N," he continues, his hand finding its way to your back, protectively resting it there as you go to introduce yourself. "My girlfriend."

You swear you feel goosebumps rise from where he's lightly touching you, and more so when he introduces you as his girlfriend.

You tell yourself it's just your nerves. Yes, that's it, you're just nervous. I mean, you're in a room filled with people who could easily pay off all your college loans with just a snap of their fingers, who wouldn't be nervous? Right? Right.

"Y/N! It's a pleasure to finally meet you, I've heard so much about you!" Mrs. Lee excitedly exclaims as you turn to Jay with a slightly confused look plastered on your face. He mirrors your expression as he shrugs, moving to stand behind you completely, bringing his hands to rest lowly at your hips.

His hands feel like feathers on the thin fabric of your evening gown, so light, so delicate, as if he's unsure if he's crossing a line. It leaves you wanting more, wanting to naturally lean against him and his warmth. You quick to shake the thought of your head as Mrs. Lee chirps up again.

"Jay's father is always talking about how you've been keeping Jay pleasantly busy nowadays! Good thing too, about time this poor boy settle down for someone as beautiful as you," the woman rambles on as you feel a blush creep up on your cheeks at the thought of Jay talking about you to his dad. If only they knew.

"We should probably go find our seats, I think the dinner is beginning soon," Jay says from behind you, saving the two of you from having to listen to Mrs. Lee's story of how she's known Jay ever since he was five years old and seeing him grow into this mature, loving, young man is so amazing. Oh look! I have baby pictures.

Yeah, he was more so saving himself from embarrassment.

The two of you bid your goodbyes before Jay gently uses the hand on your back to maneuver you through the crowd of socializing business moguls.

"She's not wrong, you know," you feel Jay dip his head so he's speaking near your ear, his warm breath tickling your earlobe, as the two of you make your way through the large foyer room.

"Hm?" You hum in question, turning your head up just enough to be able to make eye contact with him as he responds to your look of confusion.

"You look beautiful tonight," he says, eye contact not breaking once. You freeze in your steps.

You stare back at him in silence. Oh.

Your mind is panicking as it flips through your mental book of responses, unsure of what to say back. But because your mind is cloudy from staring at a put-together Jay in a dark navy suit to match your dress (mixed with the nervous butterflies in your stomach––have they always been there?), the only sound that's able to leave your lips is the small stutter of a:

"Huh?"

Wow Y/N, you had one job. A simple "thank you" could've sufficed! And you went with "Huh"?

You felt like a fifth grader who just learned from a friend of a friend of a friend that their crush likes them back.

"U-um. Mrs. Lee. What she said about you. You look good, really," somehow your nervousness made its way over to Jay now––his eyes flickering from yours to anywhere, anything, else in the room––the awkward tension growing tenfold each second.

Goddamnit Y/N, this is just Jay you're talking to, get a grip.

You're knocked back into reality when he slightly nudges your back to continue making your way to the main ball room, where the dinner is being held.

"Is that a compliment from the Jay Park?" Your smirk can't be seen by Jay, since he's still trailing behind you, but he can definitely hear it through your tone.

"Don't make me take it back," he chuckles, his words felt against your neck, leaving behind a tingly sensation you're not sure why you're feeling. You're glad he's behind you, so he isn't able to see the blush creeping onto your face for the second time tonight.

Jay gives a small nod to the people behind the check-in desk stationed at the entrance as the two of you waltz right into a large ball room lined with countless circular dining tables. So much for a small business dinner.

As the two of you approach one of the tables placed at the front of the room, you notice a familiar figure seated next to the seats reserved for you and Jay.

"Y/N!" Jake exclaims as he gets up from his seat to greet the both of you. "I'm so glad you made it, Jay was so excited to bring you tonight. Deadass would not stop talking about it."

Jay lets out a noise that falls somewhere between a cough and a goose being strangled, his widened eyes warning his talkative friend to just shut up. He's silently cursing the company for always seating his and Jake's family at the same table for these events.

"Aw, is that so? He's lucky he's cute or else I wouldn't have agreed," you grin, winking at your assumed boyfriend sitting next to you.

"Hey, YOU were the one excited to come! I recall a certain someone's face lighting up when I suggested we go shopping for tonight," Jay immediately retorts.

"Only because you were buying," you giggle, causing Jake to laugh as well.

"Damn, Jay. Tough," Jake jokingly adds as you laugh alongside him. The scowl sitting on Jay's face expresses the opposite of what he's feeling right now: warmth filling him up from the sound of your laughter and the image of you getting along so well with his best friend.

"I'm gonna get us some drinks, you two have fun making fun of me," Jay narrows his eyes at the two of you as he gets up from his seat. You bid him off with a smile before turning back to Jake.

"No but really though, this boy would not stop talking about you coming tonight. Then again, he doesn't really ever stop talking about you," Jake nonchalantly says, not knowing how much he was exposing his friend to you right now.

You raise an eyebrow up in response, "Oh really?"

"Seriously! I don't know what you did to him, Y/N, but this Jay I've been seeing recently is new. He complains a lot less about life nowadays, especially on the days he sees you," he leans back in his chair as his comment brings a smile to your face. Little does he know.

You stretch your neck up to find the boy in question and spot him right as he's returning to your shared table, two drinks in hand. You lock eyes with him from across the room and without a second thought, you're giving him a genuine smile that he's immediately returning.

Your heart beats faster at the view.

You wonder why.

It's 3:07AM when you hear the first ding.

You're not 100% sure as of why you're awake at this hour on a Tuesday night––perhaps a combination of your restless thoughts and feelings not letting you sleep plus the typical stress that comes hand-in-hand with the life of a college student.

It's 3:09AM when you hear the second ding, and you brush it off, assuming it was just Heeseung spamming you with memes again––something he does often when he also can't sleep (you found this out the hard way).

It's still 3:09AM when you hear the third ding, and at 3:10AM , you finally reach over and decide to acknowledge the being who's bothering you at this godforsaken hour.

Jay [3:07AM]: Y/N

Jay [3:09AM]: hi

Jay [3:09AM]: r u awake rn

Y/N [3:10AM]: unfortunately so

Y/N [3:11AM]: why are you up

Jay [3:11AM]: come outside

Y/N [3:13AM: jay it's 3am

Jay [3:13AM]: ye and? don't tell me ur a college student with a curfew

Jay [3:14AM]: plus im alrdy waiting for u outside so u have no choice

Jay [3:15AM]: :)

You groan at your bright phone screen currently illuminating your dark dorm room.

You ponder the consequences you may have to suffer tomorrow if you stay up any later than you already have. But considering the fact that you're probably just going to stay awake lying in bed for god knows how long anyways, why not?

(And you would like to point out that this decision has nothing to do with the fact that you haven't seen Jay in a few days and that maybe a tiny, tiny, tiny, part of you may have missed his presence. Nothing.)

And since that logic is obviously valid (you really gotta work on justifying your life choices), you're suddenly grabbing a hoodie from your closet and hoping it'll be enough to keep you, who's merely in an old band t-shirt from high-school and pajama shorts, warm.

The breeze hits your skin the second you open the doors to your dorm's building, and you're met with the view of Jay's sleek, black BMW that probably costs more than your tuition. He waves at you from the driver's seat, motioning for you to get in.

"To what do I owe you the pleasure at this hour," you deadpan at him with a stone-cold voice as you enter through the passenger's side door, hoping your tone was enough to hide the fact that you're giddy at the fact he invited you out at 3AM in the morning. Like a high-school girl sneaking out of her house to meet up with her bad-boy boyfriend that her parents dislike.

The second you enter his car, you're instantly comforted by the warm air blasting through his vents and his playlist softly playing in the background. Jay's pajama pants and messy hair give you more than enough information to know that he probably just rolled out of his own bed as well. You don't know why, but your view: Jay in his oversized hoodie with his unkept hair in front of your dorm building at 3AM on a Tuesday night, gives you comfort in weird ways you can't explain even if you tried.

But it's obviously just your cloudy, 3AM mind not thinking straight. Obviously.

"When I can't sleep, I go on drives around campus. It helps clear my mind," he says, looking over at you to give you a quick smile before starting his car. "Plus, SnapMap said you were still awake, so...figured you'd wanna join."

"Oh so what, you're my stalker now? You're not driving to the woods to kill me now, are you?" You tease, an eyebrow brought up. Jay lets out a laugh from beside you as he begins to drive further into your campus.

"Guess you'll just have to wait and see," he throws you a wink before reverting his gaze back to the road, mindlessly driving to wherever the road decides to take him.

A comfortable silence falls in between the two of you as Jay continues to drive endless routes around your campus. You look over to the boy driving next to you and take in his features––you don't know what changed, but you no longer feel the same anger or annoyance bubbling within you when you're around him. You're not sure when this changed, but you figure it's just the effect of desensitization. After all, you've been spending so much time with him, you're bound to get used to it. Right?

"Why were you up?" Jay finally asks after a few minutes of just the two of you silently basking in each other's presences.

"Ah, you know. The usual. Endless thoughts running through my mind, stress from school, nothing new," you sign, giving him a soft smile followed with a shrug.

"Penny for your thoughts?"

You answer him with silence as you search your head for the answer.

"I don't know. This is kinda weird, isn't it?" You don't know why you get a sudden surge of confidence, but before you can stop yourself, you find yourself rambling on. "If you had told me a month ago that I'd be here driving around with you when it's nearly 4AM, I would've laughed in your face."

Jay doesn't know whether to laugh or scoff. "Is the idea of hanging out with me that unappealing to you?"

You give him a serious look back. "I mean, up until a month ago when you needed me for whatever this game is, you literally pretended I didn't exist."

Oh. Awkward.

You freeze at your own words, mentally screaming at yourself for letting the words leave your mouth. Why, why, why.

"Y/N..." Jay says after clearing his throat after a few seconds of silence.

"No it's fine, it was a joke," you awkwardly cough and direct your attention to anything else around you right now. The view of your campus' buildings zooming by. The clicking of Jay's blinker when he switches lanes. The quiet roaring of his car's engine. The nervous tapping of his fingers against the steering wheel.

The rest of the ride is excruciatingly silent as he exits the main road and into an empty parking lot of some administration building made out of glass that has too many floors for you to count.

You don't know why you feel your heart beating in your throat as Jay puts the car into park––why you feel uneasy. You slightly turn towards him in your seat, hoping to pick up any sign of well...anything from him.

You don't know why you feel a twinge of guilt––it's not like what you said was necessarily wrong. If you were being honest, you were slightly bothered by how the two of you seemed to silently agree not to mention your past all this time. You were always one to seek answers, to seek closure. You couldn't help but bring it up––Jay was your best friend during those years. For him to just wake up one day and pretend you were nothing to him hurt you, and you couldn't help but still wonder what in the world you did to initiate his actions.

"I'm sor–" You're interrupted with his timid voice, as if he was almost afraid to speak.

"I'm not good with people." He's nibbling on his bottom lip, fingers nervously picking at a spot on the steering wheel.

You're opening and closing your mouth, unsure how to respond. You're 100% positive you look like a fish right now. Good for you.

"I don't know why. Jake calls it commitment issues but in order to have commitment, people have to stay in my life. And people just...don't. They're all bound to leave at some point. So what's the point of putting in effort into relationships if they're just going to leave you at the end?"

You're stunned by his sudden confession, not having been prepared for such a heavy topic to arise between the two of you. Up until tonight, your interactions had always been light-hearted and easy––you guys got along well. You didn't know this is how he felt all along.

But you knew where he was coming from.

You knew what Jay had gone through as a child––his mother having left him and his dad when he was young. You remember when your parents had told you the news at the young age of 13, and you remember the pain and sorrow you felt for your then friend. All you wanted to do was go to him and comfort him, but he had already cut you out from his life by then.

"Or maybe I'm the problem. My dad barely acknowledges my existence because he thinks giving me an allowance is all the parenting I need, my friends probably only stick around because they feel bad for me, you wouldn't even be here if it weren't for the bet, and, fuck, I'm literally known as the campus' fuckboy," Jay continues, falling deeper and deeper into the hole he dug himself.

He hates this, he hates opening up and feeling vulnerable, so he doesn't know why he's doing it now. He doesn't know why he feels comfortable voicing out his fears and worries when he's around you. But he does know it's a new feeling––one he doesn't know how to deal with.

"Jay," you lace your voice with as much comfort as you can provide. None of this is his fault, you want to tell him. "I'm sorry."

"Why are you sorry? You didn't do anything," he says with a hint of bitterness and you can't tell if it's directed towards you or the topic at hand.

You're completely turned in your seat now to face him––despite the fact that he refuses to meet your gaze, afraid that looking at you is gonna bring out the most vulnerable in him. "You can talk to me. Talking about it makes it a lot easier. I'll always be here for you, as a friend."

Jay doesn't know what it is or why, but something in him snaps at the sound of a certain word falling out of your lips. Friend. Friend.

Friends don't make his heart beat nervously whenever he's around them. Friends don't keep him up at 3AM in the morning, pondering about his feelings for them. Friends don't provide him with this new, warm comfort he's become accustomed to whenever he's around you.

Deep down, Jay knows you didn't mean to add fuel to the fire. But because he's strong-headed, stubborn, and hates how vulnerable he feels next to you, he unleashes his emotions without thinking about the destruction coming along.

"It's none of your business, Y/N. Forget I said anything. You're just a toy for this stupid game and when it's all over we can go back to our own lives and forget this ever happened."

His sudden words cut deep, but they hurt him more than you. The second the words tumble out of his mouth, he's hit with the feeling of instant regret washing over him, and the lump forming in his throat restricts him from finding the right words to take them back.

The silence that falls between the two of you this time is different. It's a cold silence. A loud silence.

Jay feels his walls coming back up around him––the ones you managed to get through––and all he wants to do is apologize but he's terrified. Terrified of seeing your reaction, terrified of losing you again. For the second time.

You tell yourself he doesn't mean it. You tell yourself that he's just enduring more pain that one should ever receive.

But you also tell yourself that this wouldn't be the first time Jay leaves you in the dust.

You tell yourself that you're foolish for ever believing a friendship, or more, could come out of this act at the end. That you're so naive for feeling those stupid, stupid butterflies you've started to notice in your stomach whenever you see, or even think of, him.

"Okay," you begin with a firm tone. You're hurt, but you refuse to show it. You won't let him hurt you for a second time. Not again.

"Just...find me when you need me. As your fake girlfriend or just...me. I'm still here for you," is the last thing you say before un-clicking your seatbelt and leaving his car, beginning your walk back to your dorm hall.

Jay is unsure about many things in life. He's unsure about what he wants to do in the future, he's unsure of where he's going to settle in life, heck, he's unsure about what to have for lunch tomorrow. But he's sure about one thing.

That he's wearing his heart on his sleeve right now, and it's all because of you.

That you've become this new lifeline and he has to choose between holding onto you or drowning.

When Jay wakes up the next morning, his first gut instinct is to get ready to pick you up for class. But today's different. Jay doesn't know where the two of you stand now, especially after last night.

Jay doesn't know how to deal with this combination of unknown emotions he's been feeling lately. They didn't come out of no where, by any means, he realizes. They've been slowly growing over the past month of seeing you so often––like a plant he's been watering overtime, not expecting it to bloom into a flower so suddenly––but he figured it was nothing more than just enjoying the company of a friend.

Until he realizes that the term friend just doesn't suite you anymore––not to him, at least. And that scares him. It scares him that you've made him genuinely smile more in this past month than he ever has in his 19 years of living. It scares him that when he's around you he can't comprehend his own thoughts, his feelings. It scares him that you make him vulnerable, that you've changed him. That you've managed to make the walls that he's spent so long building and polishing to crumble with a simple tap of your finger.

In a perfect world, Jay would have already told you all this––he would be unafraid of how you would react, unafraid of your rejection, unafraid of losing this growing relationship with you. But alas, we don't live in a perfect world. And so when Jay drives to class that day, he drives right past your dorm building.

"Where's Y/N?" is the first thing Jake questions when he enters Jay's car that morning, confused by your absence, having been used to you being in the front seat every morning when Jay goes to give Jake rides to class as well.

"I don't know," Jay mutters, unemotional eyes focused on the road in front of him, not interested in continuing a conversation that involves thinking about you.

Jake hesitates as curiosity gets the best of him. "Did you guys get into a fight or something?"

Jay's hands tighten around the steering wheel of his car. "Or something. Let's just leave it at that."

There are a few beats of silence before Jake speaks up again.

"Well, I guess this works out because I wanted to talk to you about something."

Jay continues to stare straight ahead of him, focusing on just trying to get by without mentally beating himself up at the simple thought of you.

The simple thought of you and your smile. Your witty remarks. Your stupid eye rolls. Your laughter. Your kindness. So much for not thinking about you.

"I'm calling it off," Jake's words catch Jay off guard.

"Huh? Calling what off?"

"The bet. I'm calling it off. I don't care about the textbook fees I'll have to pay next semester. Look, fight or not, you and Y/N are good for each other, everyone can see it. And I really don't want this to end up being one of those messed up teen TV shows where the girlfriend finds out the entire relationship was based off of a stupid game and then they break up and the boyfriend falls into eternal sadness and regret. And I don't wanna see you sad, dude. So yeah! Congrats," although he's admitting defeat, Jake's beaming widely, just content with the fact that his best friend has finally found happiness through the form of you. "You win."

But Jay feels like the opposite of a winner. Because even though his only intention coming into this was simply winning the bet, his life isn't as simple as it was a month ago. Because he discovered something much more valuable than some stupid textbook fees or five hundred dollars or getting his physics homework done for an entire semester.

Something he's scared he's already lost.

You.

⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺

The next time you see Jay is at the same time and place as when he first ever appeared to pick you up––at 12:17PM on a Friday afternoon, as you're exiting the doors of the lecture building home to your awfully long Capitalism in World History class. This time, however it's different.

Because this time, it's one month later, and Jay Park is no longer a forgotten side character in the story of your life. This time, you're frustrated because it's been three days since you've last heard from Jay. And because it's been three days since you've last heard from him, you can't focus on anything else, and because you can't focus on anything else, you're falling behind on every other aspect in your life. Jay's somehow managed to become the center of your life without even having to be present.

Well, up until now. Up until you go down the steps of your lecture hall's entrance and look up to be met with a figure leaning on a car you're far too familiar with. You freeze in your steps as you make eye contact with the boy you've been thinking about non-stop for the past month three days.

Your mind tells you to walk away, to just follow your flight instinct instead of fight, to just go back to your normal life. But here's the thing. Ever since Jay's made his way back to your life, it's been far from normal.

And if you're being honest, you had no interest in going back to your normal life. Normal's overrated anyways. You find your legs bringing yourself over to him, your heart leading the way.

"Hi," you simply say, planting yourself right in front of him.

"Hi."

"What are you doing here?" You already know the answer, but you want to hear him say it.

"Waiting for you," Jay doesn't hesitate in answering you. This time will be different, he tells himself.

"I can walk myself home, thanks," you state, but your actions tell differently, as you make no sign of moving from your spot in front of him.

Jay's mind contemplates telling you everything. About how he regrets that friendship-breaking decision he made that one fateful day in the eighth grade, about his true feelings, about how he first suspected these feelings when he was 11 years old and saw you in your fancy get-up for the sixth grade dance but put it off as a little crush, and about how the same feelings grew into something so, so much more in the present. But seeing that putting all these thoughts into words would involve more than one functioning brain cell (which is all he's convinced he has in the moment, for the view of you staring up at him, looking like that, has his brain short-circuiting), he settles with:

"He called it off. It's over. The bet."

"Oh."

Silence.

Okay, Jay. This is your chance. Say it.

"Is that it?" You lift an eyebrow, awaiting for more explanation. When it doesn't come, you slightly nod and start backing away. "I'll see you around then."

Is that it? Do the two of you just go back to your respective lives now? How can Jay do that, when he doesn't even recall what his life was like before you entered it––and especially when he has absolutely no interest in going back to that life?

Fuck it.

"Y/N!" He stands up straight, a newfound confidence taking over. This time will be different, he tells himself. Because now, he knows what he wants. For sure.

You turn towards him, to see him already making his way towards you, stopping in his steps when he finds himself close enough to you that he can't concentrate anymore.

"I'm sorry for ditching you in the eighth grade. I'm sorry for ignoring you since then. I'm sorry for dragging you into this stupid mess and for pushing you away and I'm sorry for calling you a toy. Because it's far from truth. I like you. A lot. And––and I'm scared. I'm scared of what this means for us, because I just keep messing things up and all I know is that I don't wanna wake up tomorrow and realize you're not in my life anymore and––"

"Woah, woah, Jay. Slow down," you look up at him, the corners of your lips threatening to curve up into a smile. "You're an idiot, you know."

Jay's never really confessed his feelings to anyone before, per say, so he doesn't really know what to expect. But he's watched enough Netflix rom-coms in this lifetime (which is still not that many) to know that hearing the words "you're an idiot" isn't what you're supposed to hear after pouring your heart and soul out. Surely not, right?

"I––I'm not sure how to respond to that," he quietly says, searching your eyes for a sign, for anything. You giggle at his sudden shyness as you grab both his arms and look at him right in the eyes.

"It's okay. I get it, if anything, I'm also scared. But you somehow got me wrapped around your stupid finger, and I hate it," you smirk at him, your hands slowly making their way up his arms to circle around his neck.

Jay's hands naturally fall at your waist as he lets out a breathe he didn't even know he was holding as he returns your smirk. "Well, I could say the same about you. And I also hate it, for your information."

"Hmm, is that so? I guess it cancels out then, right?" You smile at him as he's pulling you in so close, your head turns cloudy.

Jay grins at you, his eyes holding so much joy and endearment as they quickly flicker down to your lips before returning to your own eyes. "I guess this only means one thing then."

"Mm, and what's that?"

And before Jay can answer––and because your life's been anything but normal lately––you make the first move this time, moving your head up to close the small gap between the two of you.

His arms instinctively tighten around you as you capture his lips with your very own, and Jay swears he's about to lift off into space right now. He's on cloud nine, and he makes no plans to touch the ground ever again.

The kiss quickly becomes fervent, all the pent-up tension that the two of you had for one another finally finding its way out, all the words that were previously left unsaid finally expressing themselves. You don't even care if you're being judged by the conservative faculty members of your school right now, or by the looks of fellow students walking past the two of you.

You try your best to keep yourself from smiling as he continues to press his lips against yours, his hand moving to hold your chin, guiding your mouth with his.

Before you find yourself getting carried away, you step back to take a breath, resting your forehead against his chest as his hands rest against your back. He smiles at the sound of you giggling against him.

Jay takes a step back to take one look at you and realizes, in this moment, that change can be good. And he's willing to undergo this change. As long as it's with you.

⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺ ⸺

The next morning, you bounce down the steps of your dorm building's entrance to meet the wide, bright smile of your ex-childhood-bestfriend-turned-fake-boyfriend-turned-real-boyfriend waiting for you in front of his car, small pastry bag in hand. You smile back at him.

Jay drives you to class that day.

And everyday after that.

. ⋅ ˚̣- : ✧ : – ⭒ ⊹ ⭒ – : ✧ : -˚̣⋅ .. ⋅ ˚̣- : ✧ : – ⭒ ⊹ ⭒ – : ✧ :

✰ let me know what you think! if u made it til the end, mwah :') <3

[r95irth]

Thank you for tagging me @evilhasnever !! And sorry to answer so late, I was on a trip and couldn't copy-paste things easily

(and also happy birthday again!!)

This is a bit complicated because some of my last 10 works are more collections of story ideas / snippets of my main serie that don't make sense taken out of it. And two are dropped work (sorry u-u). So I will avoid those (not that I don't like them, but it doesn't feel right to advertise them xD) So...uh instead I will put my 10 most representative works? Okay? Okay! (yes I answered to myself and gave me the right)

1- "Todoroki Shouto was the number 2 hero of his generation, like his father before him, and he couldn’t care less." Todomomo fanfic set in a future settings and also my first work in English. (Better care)

2- "So U ready for tomorrow?" Sequel to Better care, it is on hiatus currently but it can be read if you stop at chapter 11. (Take care)

3- "Mrs Jokes, also known as Emi Fukada, came back home, one evening, smiling about her students’ latest silly mistake, when she received a message on her phone." A One Shot (I can do some!!!) about Mrs Joke's sexuality and what asexuality struggle a woman who wants a family could face. It was written when we didn't know where Eri would end up yet. (Mrs Joke's dilemma)

4- "Hunger had always been part of her life ; a close relative she couldn’t run away from." A one shot (OMG AGAIN) sets in the Demon slayer universes but honestly was more of an excuse to explore the question : what if someone with ARFID (eating disorder) was turned into a demon? (Hunger)

5- "The last time Jiang Fengmian had seen Cangse Sanren, she was smiling." My biggest work...Written during pandemic, and now have completely taken over my life. It goes from the "What if WWX's parents survived?" and then add a tiny bit of horror story and time-travel to the mix. (Building a home)

6- "Wei Wuxian!!" The sequel to Building a home, with less babies and more teenage drama and also well, the actual fix-it part of the canon because Building a home focused on fixing the parents U-U° (Burning roofs)

7-"Jin Guangyao’s plans were going smoothly. " My first crackship fic that ended up not so cracked up xD Mostly Xiyao with a tiny bit of 3zun (romance) at the end. It basically goes with the moral "everyone should have gotten wasted and that would have fixed canon" for people who knows me and my hatred for alcohol that's a very surprising take xD (Just a drop)

8-"Cloud Recesses, after the war, is nowhere as solemn as it once has been." Total shameless Xiyao fic, with NMJ being ace (and sometimes an ass, no offense to ace people, like myself, I just like the joke) expects more work like this in the future. (Jiaoren)

And for those who can read French, my best works in French are :

9- "Il existe en ce monde de nombreuses choses que l'on ne peut expliquer." Destins liés - or Destins liés (i posted it on two sites, though i lost my password on those two sites so huh...) Pokemon fandom.

10 - As for the rest huh this is basically lot of story OS based on those AU or collections for events etc. etc. But if you are interested in my WIP (aka my current to write list) it's here : collections of story ideas

Oki doki, now I'm going to tag 3 people. HM let's see...

@thefrogwitch my bestie, I know you don't have lot of fics currently but shows your amazing original work then!! >3< @chibichan449show me your work :P @hudginyi don't know if you write bt if you do :eyes:

Rules: Share the first line of ten of your most recent fanfics and then tag ten people. Don't have ten? Not to worry, just share what you have. Tagged by @lansplaining

SUPRISE they're all xiyao <3 Jump to n.7 if you've already seen all of the tumblr drabbles!

They say people know only one color in their life until they meet the One that opens their eyes. (soulmate AU drabble)

“I’ve been thinking we should pick up a new hobby. Something we can do together.” (swing dancing drabble)

Meng Yao was thirteen when the first bleeding came. (Fallow Fields backstory drabble)

“Do you come here often?” (strangers roleplay drabble)

When Meng Yao found the snake, the mother-of-pearl luster of its scales was largely concealed by mud and caked blood, but Meng Yao had always had an eye for treasure. (noodle Lan drabble)

“What is that?” Wen Ruohan asks, pointing at Meng Yao’s glittering necklace. (Wen Yao & dragons drabble)

Since he was a child, Lan Xichen could see ghosts before he ever began his cultivational training, which, he later came to understand, was not the norm. ("Sweet dreams (are made of this)" - 12k oneshot, canonverse, ghost!meng yao changes the story.)

It is in Jin Guangyao’s nature to never resign himself to death no matter how dire the circumstances, to fight against inevitability even if it means garnering pity and scorn. ("Fallow Fields", multichapter/ complete, guanyin temple canon divergence, trans jgy)

Lan Xichen has known about the painting for a long time. ("Apocryphal", modern AU oneshot, that "meeting in front of a painting depicting you in a past life" prompt)

Lan Xichen had always thought himself simply too busy for romantic entanglement. ("Fish Husbandry", meryao egg sequel, romcom and horny!!!)

not the rec-list I'd come up with for my own work but you know what... it works.

tagging @fox-fic-and-ink, @r95irth, @threephasebird if you'd like to do it!

[gaysimpsstuff]

Could I get a Hawks in his rut headcanon?

No problem, Anon! I’m sorry this took so long, I wanted it to be perfect since I really like thinking about Hawks’ avian traits, and I know people really like it too. I hope it’s good! 

Hawks Rut Headcannons

Genre: fluff, smut

Type: headcannons (so... many... headcannons)

Warnings: animal traits, Keigo being possessive af, the commission being assholes, sickness, food, breeding kink, lots of horny times

Other: most of this is based off of real research, but some of it also comes from personal preference. @keilemlucent and their fic Best Nest very much inspired many other headcannons, check them outI They’re one of my favorite creators, and the linked fanfic is one of my favorites! Hope it’s okay I tagged you here lmao

NSFW Taglist: @smolchildfangirl @combat-wombatus @mandalorian-baby-bird @waffleareniceandfluffy (Lemme know if you wanna be added to or removed from the Taglist)

Remember to check if requests are open before sending in a request. This was made while requests were still open.

Pre-Rut Behaviors

Grooming and Preening

Before his rut, Keigo starts to feel dirty. He just seems to accumulate more dust and dirt during hero work than usual. He’ll come back home grumbling about blood in his hair and little bits of concrete in/on his skin.

He will insist you clean him off. So you get to brush his hair, put creams on his face, and wash him off in the shower.

Finally, there’s the preening. If he lets you preen his wings, then you know he’s in it for life. He loves and trusts you with everything he has. 

Expect him to press his nose against yours a lot.

Possessiveness and Protection

You’ll notice he gets more clingy, more possessive of you. He gets really controlling in the days leading up to his rut, so you’ll be annoyed a  l o t.

Just text all your friends and family that you’ve been swamped at work, it’d be a little weird to say “hey guys, sorry I can’t hang out, my boyfriend’s horomones are crazy right now and he gets really insecure if I so much as exist near anyone but him.”

You would come home from work and he’s already on you, sniffing your body to see who you’ve been around, and to see if any of them were attracted to you at all.

If he had any kind of sneaking suspicion that anyone posed a threat, he’s literally laying on you and rolling on top of you to try and get his scent on you. Even if no one will smell it except him, he’s gonna do it.

He’s so protective of you, and if something tiny hurts you or makes you upset...

He.

Is.

Angry.

Someone was rude to you? He’s screaming at them.

Someone tries to hurt or touch you? You’ve got to hold him back to stop him from ripping that person apart limb from limb.

All that x100 when he’s approaching his rut.

One person accidentally bumps into you? He takes it as passive aggressiveness even if they’re very apologetic about it.

You stub your toe on a table? He’s smashed the table and burnt it then thrown the ashes in the ocean. 

If you’re sad about something he can’t beat up, he feels horrible. He’s not the best at comforting people, so he’s just grabbing onto you and not letting go, telling you how much he loves and cares for you, and just how amazing you make his life feel.

If you don’t give him enough attention, he gets really huffy, and it gets worse leading up to his rut. 

You lifted your hands from his head to reach for your buzzing phone? He’s already whining and pouting and begging you to give him more head-pats again.

Nesting

He’ll leave hints asking for you to make a nest, usually saying things like “Our bed needs some changing, don’t you think?” “Don’t you wish our space was more personalized?” 

If you don’t get the hint, he’ll be very sad, and he thinks you’re rejecting him. So you’d better be good at reading into things and realizing he’s approaching mating season and wants you to build a nest.

He comes home one day and sees you piled blankets, pillows, and dirty clothes in the living room, sprayed with his cologne and you’re cologne and/or perfume. He pulls you into his arms and spins around with you, giggling and laughing.

He’s so happy you made a nest for the two of you. 

He starts putting pretty shiny things he likes around the nest. Your toothbrush went missing and you found it in the mountain that was your nest.

Once, you were in desperate need of a clean shirt, and the only clean shirt you could find was in the nest. So you picked it up to put it on, and two seconds later, Keigo was in front of you, hands in your shirt, staring at you with such a fierce intensity, you felt almost like a villain.

He was very mad at you for taking things from your shared nest.

He leaves feathers all around the penthouse, but they’re all piled mostly around the nest, they’re for your protection so don’t try and throw them away.

Noises

He also gets really noisy, so he’ll be ‘singing’ and squawking and cooing constantly. He feels really bad about it so he might get you some noise-blocking headphones for when he’s screeching into the sky in the dead of night about how “THIS IS MY FUCKING TERRITORY Y’ALL MOTHERFUCKERS STAY AWAYYYY!”

You really think bird’s springtime songs are about love? Nah he’s mostly screaming about how he’s gonna fuck his partner and how the neighborhood  practically belongs to him.

Someone called the police once, tired of all the shouting, but the officers backed off when they saw who was doing all the shouting. Most of your neighbors are used to the screaming during early spring.

Rut End-game

On the third and second to last day before his rut, he gets a sudden burst of energy and an increased appetite. He refuses to eat anything unless you’ve made it though, so let’s best hope you can cook at least a little.

When he was younger, his hungry times before his rut were spent either eating anything and everything he can get his hands on. The commission broke that behavior very quickly though, so he’d starve himself before his rut, which would result in him getting very sick from a lack of energy and sustenance. That plus the extreme arousal was a recipe for pain and suffering.

So when you noticed he suddenly stopped eating, you insisted on making food for him, telling him that you wouldn’t let him go hungry ever. That was the first rut in years that didn’t feel like torture.

You’re cooking almost all the time, and he’s constantly eating everything you give him, running around from room to room while he waits for his next meal. He’s basically a hobbit.

In the last day or two before his rut, he suddenly has no energy, and starts getting hot and cold flashes. He’s sniffling, curled up in your shared nest, dirty tissues surrounding him. He comes in and out of consciosness, and when he’s awake, he’s whining and complaining about exhaustion and aches.

Physical Changes

Most of these happen in the last few days leading up to his rut, so it’ll be very sudden. These physical changes is what causes the extreme hunger and sickness.

His feathers darken several shades, and they become super sensitive. They also seem to grow in size, so when you cuddle, you’re smothered by them more than usual.

He also gains an extra couple inches in height, so expect some teasing now that he’s just that little bit taller. His hair also gets thicker and stronger, that’s so you can pull on it when he fucks you.

His nails get longer and darker, and they’re impossible to file or cut. So when he holds you and touches you, he often scratches you on accident. He’s really apologetic about it, but honestly you could totally paint his nails and pretend they’re acrylics if you’re into that.

His teeth get sharper, and he starts biting you just for fun. Bites your finger, hand, wrist, neck, even your nose. He underestimated just how strong his teeth are, and he made you bleed first time he bit you.

His whole body is very sensitive, so head-pats, back rubs, wings, and even his touching his feet can get him to the verge of cumming.

his tongue is longer, and it’s a whole lot stronger. He could probably carry a full plastic water bottle with his tongue (which isn’t a lot, but for a tongue it’s very much a lot).

His voice drops a whole octave and a half- mans is sounding almost like Corpse now. Maybe Markiplier? Anyways, if you’ve got a voice kink, you’re in luck

His dick changes too, it gets bigger, and he grows a lump at the base of it, between his shaft and balls. His balls get smaller until they’re barely noticable beneath what he calls him ‘knot.’

His eyes become sharper too, so don’t try and hide anything from him. 

Rut (MAJOR NSFW)

Everyone already knows Keigo has a breeding kink, but he hasn’t brought it up with you until now. It just kind of- happens. As he’s drilling into you, he suddenly starts blabbering about fucking a kid into you, and how hot you’d look all round with his kids. Might be a little weird for those of you who physically cannot give birth to children (my lovely AMABS and infertile AFABS). 

He can’t control it, so it’s especially weird if you don’t even want kids. If you can get pregnant, you’d better double check that you’re taking your birth control. And get to know some good clinics just in case.

However, if you do want kids, if you want to start a biological family woth Keigo, fuck. You will not be able to handle his happiness and horniness in that moment when you beg him to get you pregnant.

He is going to mark you up. Hickies, bruises, hand prints, bite marks, plus his scent. He needs everyone to know that you are his. He wants to claim you, make sure you know you belong to him. No one else can have you but him.

Halfway through your fuckfest, he starts making animalistic noises. He’s growling, roaring, whining, chirping, etc. This is around the time when he stops thinking about you, so he’ll really rough you up during this phase.

This man was a virgin before you, so this is also the first rut he’s ever going to have with another person, so he’ll hold himself back a lot. He needs you to reassure him at every step, tell him how good you feel, how you want him to fuck you, how not only are you okay with him going all out, you want him too.

Did he just cum? You think you’re finished? HA! No way in fucking hell is he finished after one, two, five, ten... so many rounds. He just keeps going and going and going and how the fuck is he still hard? He cums so fucking quickly, so much, and then keeps going.

When he finally does go soft, his whole personality changes. it’s like he didn’t just fuck you stupid. He immediately goes into ‘protect’ mode, which includes cuddles, him spoon-feeding you, petting you like a dog, and singing to you.

He puts the nest near a window so he can keep an eye out for possible threats. Just like “gotta keep mate safe. Is that the mailman? NO FUCK NO GET OUT OF HEREEEE!” 

One moment, he’s fucking you, and the next he’s leaning halfway out the window, screaming at some poor dude walking his dog. Remember, he’s still naked. You learned your lesson after that and kept the windows locked, and warned the neighbors to stay out of sight of the window, at least for the time being.

You’re going to feel very dirty, because he does not want you cleaning off the sweat, cum, and tears from your body. He likes that you smell like him, and you washing it off makes him feel rejected. 

He’s going to break a lot of things, so move pictures and vases into another room and lock the fuck out of that room. Or else he will break all of it.

He thinks any clothes you’re wearing are mocking him, so wear clothes you hate when his rut starts, then get used to being naked for a couple days. 

Oh yeah, his whole rut lasts one to five days. He’s fucking you for about three days on average.

He fucks you until you faint, and then keeps going until he’s out of ‘fuck’ mode and into ‘protect’ mode. A few times, he fucked you unconscious in the middle of the afternoon and then kept fucking you until the sun rose. 

Yeah, he’s got that much energy.

Don’t worry, during the whole time, he lets out pheromones with a strong vanilla-chocolaty scent that keeps your body and mind relaxed. 

There’ve been times when he’s just fucking into you and your water bottle is just out of reach.

During his rut, he has no shame. Let’s hope your walls are soundproofed, or else your neighbors will all know how he fucks you. 

He will not restrain you or hurt you in any way during his rut. So no degredation, no collars or chains, the only thing keeping you in the nest is his weight on top of you.

He gets upset if you try to touch yourself, things it’s you trying to tell him that he’s not satisfying you enough. 

He wants you to cum as many times as him, which is difficult because of his increased sensitivity, so he’s using every skill he knows to get you cumming again and again and again.

Most of the time, he’s going hard, rough, and spilling absolute filth from his cock and mouth, but in the last few hours of his rut, he suddenly gets emotional.

He’s rocking up against you, holding you close to his body and blabbering about you

How much he loves you

How good you make him feel

How he wouldn’t want anyone else by his side for his rut

How you’re his mate for life

How he’ll protect you and keep you safe.

Please be gentle with him, he’s very vulnerable near the end of his rut, and he’ll cry very easily.

When he’s nearing his last load, he makes out with you sloppily, trying to talk as he shoves his tongue down your throat.

He finishes off by  pushing his knot all the way inside you, and stays there for an hour.

This is the softest moment, and he’s covering your body in kisses. 

His knot pushes these small eggs inside you, and you have the lovely job of pushing them all out the next day. 

Post Rut

When his knot deflates, he finally pulls out and starts cleaning you off. 

He’ll carry you around and finally gives you a bath, constantly making sure you’re okay.

He’ll give you lots of massages and he’ll cook for you. He’s constantly thanking you for helping him, telling you he didn’t deserve it.

Just kiss him on the cheek, tell him you had fun, and that you love him so very very much.

He needs the most reassurance now than ever before.

He’s also very tired, so you’ll be taking care of each other.

Then his ‘post-rut’ resets, and he sleeps for hours.

Then he gets super hungry, and the two of you make huge meals and just kinda binge eat for a day or two.

Then his physical changes go back to normal, and you have a happy lil bird boy who simps for you so hard

[serendipitous-magic]

What is your writing advice for young people who want to write fanfiction and original stories in the near future?

If this is just Way Too Much, skip to the end (#16). My most important piece of advice is there. I also happen to think #5 is pretty good.

-_-_-_-

1) Literally just write. Write whatever you want, and do a lot of it.

_-_

2) You don’t have to post everything. In fact you don’t have to post anything. You can, don’t get me wrong, but it can be intimidating to sit down and think “I will now write something that other people will see and read and judge with their eyeballs.” Because that’s probably gonna lead to nerves and writer's block. Just write down the ideas that you have, the things you want to write, whatever’s in your brain that you want to explore and expand upon and make into something. And then if you want to, share it. Or don’t share it. I have plenty of half-baked ideas and documents and random story chapters and shit hidden away on my Google Drive that will never see the light of day, for a whole number of reasons. I wanted to write it but it wasn’t ~Spicy~ enough to warrant posting, or it’s only like an eighth of a good idea, or it’s like one scene with no story around it, or it’s just something incredibly self-indulgent I just wanted to write for my own enjoyment.

Point being, don’t write for other people. Don’t write so that other people can read it; write what you want, write for yourself, and then if you want to share it, do.

_-_

3) You can pretty much ignore any and all of these for fanfiction. In fact, you can ignore pretty much any rules or guidelines you want for fanfiction. Fanfic is a sandbox. You don’t have to be a “professional writer” to post fic. No one expects you to be Stephen King or Margaret Atwood. Fanfic is just for playing in a fandom and having fun. If you wanna write a 50 chapter slow burn with very little plot aside from the OTP slowly getting to know each other, and no real stakes or central conflict, I guarantee people would read that. Really, fanfiction is the Old West of writing: lawless, wild, unpredictable, and free.

However, here are the rules you must follow:

-Separate your paragraphs. (I’m sure you know this already, but I’m gonna say it anyway just in case.) Do not post one big block of text. Make a paragraph break when someone new is talking, when the characters are in a new place, when a new event occurs that changes the scene, when a chunk of time has passed, and when there’s a major change in subject.

-I know it’s obvious, but... grammar, punctuation, and capitalization. They exist to make writing easy for readers to read, and more people will read your stuff if they don’t have to stop and try to figure out what you meant.

-Use tags and labels, as is possible with whatever site you’re using. Especially if you include possibly triggering content in your story. Again, I know it’s obvious, but it’s common courtesy. Bonus: tagging the themes and content of your story helps readers find it and read it :)

-If possible, limit the use of all-caps and exclamation marks / question marks. 99% of the time, one ! or one ? will do. If you overload the page with a lot of all-caps and long rows of exclamation marks or question marks, it hampers readability.

... That’s literally all I can think of. And, like I said, it’s all pretty basic stuff. You were probably rolling your eyes like, “Uh, yeah, Gwen, I know.” But that’s literally it. You can pretty much do whatever you want in fanfic.

That being said, here’s my advice for both fanfiction and original work...

_-_

4) A quick and dirty rule for coming up with a plot, starting a story, keeping up pacing, or maintaining tension: figure out what dreams, desires, and goals are nearest and dearest to your main character’s heart (see #16). Then set up the main conflict to be directly in opposition to that goal. It doesn’t have to be in a tangible way, though it could be. But, if your main character wants more than anything to reach the ships on the southern coast of your world and sail to a new life, make sure the main conflict immediately prevents them from doing that - in fact, make sure to send them north. If your main character just wants to keep their loved ones safe, kidnap the loved ones. If your main character just wants to date their best-friend-turned-crush, make sure they think they have no chance - or, make them cocky about it, and make sure it makes Person B determined not to ever like them. You get it. Figure out what your character most wants, and then keep them from having that. Boom - your conflict now ties in with your character's motivation. It's like instant yeast for plots.

_-_

5) If you’re anything like me, you want your first draft to be Good, despite all that advice about how the first draft doesn’t have to be good and it’s just to get words on the page, yadda yadda. And if you’re somewhat of a perfectionist (like myself), it’s easy to get stuck looking at a blank page because you don’t have The Perfect Words, and you want what you write to be Good the first time.

Here’s how I cheat that:

Instead of trying to write a Good First Draft from a blank page, hit the enter key a few times, skip a little down on the page, change your ink to red (or blue, or whatever - just something immediately identifiable as Not Black) and just thought vomit. Write whatever the hell you’re thinking, exactly as you think it. Don’t worry about it being readable, don’t worry about narrative flow for now, don’t worry about covering all the details, don’t worry about anything except either a) getting all the details of your idea out onto the page, whether that’s a lot or whether it’s just a sentence or two, or b) if you don’t have an idea yet, finding your way there.

Because this method is also very good for finding your way to ideas when you’re stuck in writer’s block.

Because of how human brains work, getting this stuff out onto the page - in all its messy, stream-of-consciousness glory - will likely spark more thoughts. As you write your original idea about the scene, it’ll likely spark more ideas. Creation begets creation. If you just start thought-vomiting your ideas onto the page, chances are you’ll think of more things as you go, and you’ll start filling out description or dialogue or tone or action or whatever, and pretty soon the scene starts writing itself.

Not sure where you’re going with the scene or which ideas you wanna use? Use a lot of ambivalent language in your “thought-vomit draft.” My pre-writing notes are chock-full of the words “maybe,” “perhaps,” and the phrases, “At some point...” and “...or something like that.” In this way, I don’t tie myself down to one idea; it’s just an idea, and I’m keeping it on the page in case I use it, but I might chuck it in the trash or change it or whatever.

And then, once your ideas for the scene (or story, or chapter, or whatever) are on the page, then go back to the top and start translating them into a “real” first draft. Use black ink, and start copy-pasting chunks of the thought-vomit up into the top part of the document and translating them into Draft 1. Separate out paragraphs where paragraph breaks should be. Add the correct punctuation and whatnot. Change “describe the lobby here - include potted plants, fancy carpet, blood stain, etc.” into an actual description of the lobby. Flesh it out, or condense, or whatever it needs. And if you’re still stuck, change back to red ink and ramble some more until you find a path that feels right, then plug that in. This keeps you from looking at a blank page, and it allows you to generate a kind of Draft 0.5, somewhere between a plan and a first draft.

You don’t have to use every idea. Like I said, jot down whatever comes to mind, put a “maybe” before or after it, and keep working. If the idea grabs you and you wanna keep expanding on it and exploring it, cool. If you just wanna jot it down so you don’t forget it and then move on, also cool. Red-ink draft / “thought-vomit draft” is your time to jump around in the timeline, add or finesse details at whatever point your brain moves to, etc. Don’t try to do it exactly in story order, because you will get tangential thoughts and ideas, and you will not remember to write them down five pages later when you finally get to taking notes on that scene. Trust me. On that note...

_-_

6) Write everything down the moment you think of it. Seriously.

“I’ll remember it when I get around to writing that scene in a couple days / weeks / months (/years).”

You won’t.

Write it down.

Phone, journal, google docs - hell, my family regularly laughs at me for grabbing a napkin during dinner and scribbling thoughts down alongside pasta sauce stains.

And then, once you have it written down somewhere...

_-_

7) Consolidate your writing ideas in one place.

Maybe this isn’t really your style, and that’s totally chill.

Buuuut, if you’re Type-A like me - or if you tend to be somewhat unorganized and you know you’ll lose track of your writing notes if they’re scattered across multiple notebooks, journals, napkins, phone notes, etc. - having one consolidated document of notes is a life saver. I keep mine on Google Docs so I can access it, add to it, and look through it for inspiration anywhere at any time. When I have one of those Shower Thoughts that I jot down on my phone or on a napkin during dinner, I set myself a reminder on my phone to type it up in my Story Ideas document later.

(Or, if the idea I had was for a story of mine that I’ve already started planning / drafting / whatever, I put it in the document for that story instead of the Big Random Story Ideas doc. You get it.)

_-_

8) Have other ways to collect and save writing ideas, besides just writing stuff down. If you like Pinterest, make pinterest boards of your characters or stories or settings or whatever. If you’re big into playlists, make a playlist for your character / setting / story / etc. Or both. Or something else. I’m not good at drawing, but maybe you are, and maybe you like to draw your ideas. Whatever form it takes, having another way to save ideas and think about your stories is invaluable.

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9) Some writers can just start writing with no idea where the story is going, and they just kind of figure it out as they go. I envy those writers. And I do that sometimes for fanfiction, where the stakes are somewhat lower and the audience is reading more for scene-to-scene enjoyment (and to see their OTP kiss) than for a Driving And Compelling Narrative.

But here’s the thing: especially if you’re just kind of starting out, writing without some sort of plan is really, really hard, and will likely lead you into a slow, meandering narrative that will likely frustrate you.

Even if you think you’re someone that just can’t write with a plan (and again, I have the highest respect for pansters out there - I don’t know how you do it, you crazy bastards, but you keep doing you) - even if you think “I can’t work with plans, they’re too prescriptive, I just want to write and see what happens -”

Try at least making the most skeletal of plans.

Even if you have no clue what 90% of the story is, yet. That’s fine. But you need to have some idea of what you’re building to, even if that’s nothing more specific than a feeling, or a turning point for your character. Even if your entire plan for everything beyond Chapter 1 is, “At some point, Charlie needs to realize that Ed was lying to her.”

This is where those Draft 0.5 notes come in handy. Because, more than likely, working on your current scene that way will spark ideas for later scenes, which you can put down at the bottom of the document and save for when they become relevant. In my experience, the line between planning ahead and making a Draft 0.5 is exceptionally thin. One can quickly turn into the other.

If you’re really, really resistant to the idea of planning ahead, that’s okay. It’s not everybody’s style. But for the love of all that is holy, write down your ideas for future scenes, even if you’re a person that doesn’t like to plan and writes only in story order, because you will not remember that idea once you get to that scene.

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10) You don’t have to write in order.

Here’s the thing: I’m a person that can only do my Draft 1 in story order (meaning, chronological order). I just have to be in that flow; I need to write in story order for me to best channel where the character is at from scene to scene, both narratively and emotionally.

But my Thought Vomit Draft is another thing entirely. By using the brain hack of putting my notes in red (or another color, it doesn’t matter) and going down to the bottom of the document / page and taking notes there, and then integrating them into whatever plan I have, and then translating them into Draft 1 once I get there in the story - by doing that, I can get my good ideas onto the page (and expound upon them and let my muse carry me and ride that momentum while I’m in the moment of inspiration) without writing out of order.

Maybe that’s just me. But if you’re a person who really prefers to write in story order, that could be hugely helpful to you. It is to me.

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11) Emotion and motivation will do more for your story than technicalities of plot.

If your characters really care about something, and their journey through the (shaky or weak) plot is emotionally engaging, it will be a much more compelling story than a story with a “perfect” plot and unrelatable or unmotivated characters.

If your characters care about what they’re doing, and it means something to them, and their goals and actions are driven by dreams or fears or emotions that are integral to who they are, your audience will care too. If you have a perfectly crafted plot that hits all the right beats and has high stakes and fast pacing and drama - but your characters don’t connect with what’s happening in a way that’s deeply meaningful or emotional for them? You’re gonna have a hard time engaging readers.

When in doubt, prioritize character emotion and motivation over plot. Emotion is what drives story.

This power is highly exploitable. (Just look at pulp novels and shitty but entertaining movies.) You can even use it to glaze over plot holes or reinvigorate a limp narrative. Use it that way sparingly, though. It’s a band-aid, not a surgery. 

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12) Evil villains are hard to write - mostly because there are very few truly evil people in the world. (There are a few. Billionaires and several big name politicians come to mind.) But by and large, there aren’t that many evil people. There are plenty of bad people, but bad people have some good in them, somewhere in there. Trying to write an evil villain is hard, because they often turn very cartoony.

Here’s a tip: it’s much easier to write antagonists who aren’t evil. Even if they’re bad people. Of course, there’s no reason you can’t write a villain that’s just truly evil - a serial killer, or an abuser, or a billionaire, or someone who legit just wants to hurt people or blow up the earth or stay in control of an oppressed population, or whatever. But chances are, it’s gonna be really hard to make them feel real, and even harder to create a plot around them that doesn’t feel forced or contrived.

Instead, try writing an antagonist / villain whose motivations and goals directly clash with your protagonist’s - but not because they want to take over the world or see people suffer. Write an antagonist who’s chaotic good, but whose perception of the situation is completely opposite from your hero’s. Write an antagonist whose only desire is to save people, and who will do anything to achieve that goal - anything. Write an antagonist who believes in the letter of the law, and will hinder and oppose the hero’s methods even if they agree with the hero’s motivation. Write an antagonist who got in way over their head and did some things they regret, and now they don’t know how to get out, and they’re doing their best but whatever they set in motion is too powerful for them to stop now.

Write villains who are human. Write a killer who thought they were doing the right thing by taking their victim out of the equation, who vomits at the sight of the body and sobs over the grave they dig. Write a government leader who truly believes she’s doing what’s best for her people in the long-term, even if it might hurt them in the short term, and is willing to endure the hatred and belligerence of the masses if it means securing what she thinks is a better future for her people. Write a teenage bully that thinks they’re the one being picked on by the world, and they’re just fighting back, standing their ground. Write a scientist who will break any code of ethics and hurt anyone he needs to - in order to bring back his baby sister from the grave, because he promised her he’d protect her and he failed. Write an antagonist who is selfish and self-centered and capricious - because in order to survive they had to look out for Number One, and that habit ain’t about to break anytime soon.

Write villains who aren’t even villains. Write antagonists who oppose the hero because of moral differences. Write antagonists who are trying to do the right thing. Write antagonists who treat the heroes with kindness and dignity and respect and gentleness.

They don’t have to be good. They don’t have to be Misunderstood Sweethearts who “deserve” a redemption arc. They can be cruel and nasty and dismissive and callous and violent and etc. etc.

Just hesitate before you make them Evil-with-a-capital-E. Because evil is hard to write, and honestly, boring to read. Flawed human beings with goals and motivations that directly oppose the main characters’ are much easier to write and much more interesting to read.

Ask why. Why is your villain trying to take over the world? What does that even mean? Are they trying to create a Star-Trek-like post-capitalism utopia, but they know that won’t happen in a million lifetimes, so they’re trying to do it by force? Are they actually super in favor of human rights, but they got very impatient waiting for the world to do anything about poverty and war, so they decided to take it into their own hands? Are they determined to fix the world - no matter the cost? Are they terrified and overwhelmed, but committed to see it through to the end? Or - maybe they’re just doing it on a dare. Maybe they don’t really give a shit about world domination, they were just a mediocre rich white guy who decided to fuck around and find out, and now he’s kind of curious how far he can take this thing. And now he’s kind of an internationally-wanted criminal, so he’s kind of stuck living on his hidden private island in his multi-billion dollar secret base, strapping lasers to sharks’ heads for the hell of it. Gross, selfish, uncaring, and dangerous? For sure. Evil? Depends on your definition. See, now we’re getting somewhere.

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13) It’s tempting to let the plot control the characters. It’s easy to drop your characters into a situation and see how they react. But here’s the thing: that doesn’t drive plot. In fact, it bogs down pacing. Instead, try to build you plot off of your characters’ actions and decisions. Let your character build their own situation. Not to say it should go they way they wanted it to go; in fact, usually, their grand plans should go to hell very quickly. But having the characters take action and make decisions, and letting the plot develop based on that, is much easier to make compelling than making a rigid series of events and then trying to herd your characters into them.

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14) Having trouble justifying a character’s actions? Consider having them make the opposite decision, or having them approach the situation in a different way. For example: you need your character to go meet the bad guy, for plot reasons, even though there’s no way it’s not a trap. If the character goes, readers are gonna be groaning with their head in their hands, because c’mon man, that was really fucking stupid. But he’s gotta go, because the plot needs that. Two ways you might handle this: a) He knows it’s probably a trap. He decides not to go. The plot conspires to get him near the villain anyway. Or, b) He knows it’s a trap. But he needs to go, for (insert reasons here). So, he approaches it in an unexpected way. He brings backup, recruiting a side character we met earlier in the story. Or he arrives on the back of a dragon, because ain’t nobody gonna fuck with a dude on a dragon. Or he goes - early, and ambushes the villain. It may work, it may not. He may get himself kidnapped anyway. But it moves the plot along without having Stupid Hero Syndrome.

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15) This is a legit piece of advice: if all of this sounds overwhelming, literally just ignore it and write what you want. For real. Writing should be fun, and every single writer operates differently. If you’re sitting here like “I’m getting stressed just reading this,” just flip me a good-natured bird and get on with your life. I promise I won’t take it personally. Same goes for literally any other writing advice you see. Lots of rules and guidelines can very quickly make anything thoroughly un-fun. Just write. If you’re passionate about it and you do it for long enough, you’ll start figuring out the tips and tricks on your own.

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16) Here’s the best piece of advice I can give you: know your characters. More importantly, know what’s important to them. Build their personality and decisions off of that, and build your plot off of their decisions.

I see a lot of character building sheets that ask a shit-ton of questions like “What’s their most prized possession?” “Do they like their family?” “What’s their favorite food?”

And while these are good questions, my problem with this type of character building is that if you start there, with the little stuff, you’re building on nothing. IMO, to make a truly strong character (not strong like Inner Strength, strong like effective), you need a strong foundation.

Here are the things you must know about your character:

a) What are their greatest fears / deepest insecurities? And I don’t mean “wasps” or “heights.” I mean the deep shit. I mean fears like “living a meaningless life,” or “turning out just like their parents,” or “that no one will ever love them,” or “being powerless.” You may say, “But they’re really scared of wasps! They fall into a wasp nest when they were little and got stung so much they almost died!” Great! That’s a fantastic bit of backstory. They should absolutely be afraid of wasps, and that should absolutely be an impediment later in the story. But dig deeper. What about that event actually scarred them? Was it the helplessness? Stumbling around, swatting at the air, not being able to do a single thing to stop what was happening to them? Was it that they were alone, and no matter how loud they screamed, no one was coming? Was it the bodily horror of feeling themself turn into an inhuman creature as they swelled up from the stings, unable to move their fingers or face normally anymore?

And don’t forget insecurities, because those factor in, too. Are they deeply insecure about their identity? Do they believe, deep down, that they’re ugly? Did they grow up poor and they’ve always been really touchy about that? Why? Dig deep. Figure out what really, really bothers them.

b) What are their hopes and dreams? What do they truly want out of life? What do they consider the most valuable to their experience here in this thing called life? Is it the freedom to forge their own path and be independent? Is it the approval of their family or peers? Is it a home? Is it knowledge, or understanding? Spiritual fulfillment? Is it deeply important to them that they contribute to their community, or protect those they love? What do they need in order to feel truly and deeply fulfilled in life?

Figure out those two things (each one encompasses several things, btw, you don’t have to stop at just one for each), and then use that to inform how they behave and the types of decisions they make within the story. 

It also informs character behavior and personality. 

Let’s say we have a character who’s afraid of helplessness. They’re probably gonna be the person that always wants to do something, try something, no matter how hopeless the situation seems. They’d despise just sitting and waiting, probably, because it makes them feel powerless. They might even be the person that makes rash decisions and acts impulsively and puts themself in danger unnecessarily, because in their mind it’s better than being at the mercy of fate. This is one way you could use a character’s personality to inform their decisions, which in turn helps to inform plot.

Or, let’s say we have a character whose greatest fear is being left behind or forgotten. We may have a chatterbox on our hands. They might be obnoxious. They might love the spotlight, constantly vying for attention no matter the situation, because deep down they’re so afraid that they’d be forgotten otherwise. Or, it may go the opposite way. They may be so afraid of people leaving them that they’re terrified of bothering people. They don’t want to do anything that could annoy people, anything that might give people a reason to leave them. They might be exceedingly polite, quiet, accommodating. A push-over, really.

These are two nearly opposite types of personalities, both stemming from the same core fear/insecurity. You can go a lot of different ways with it. But if you build on that strong foundation, you’ll have a strong character, and a stronger plot.

Likewise, the structure of your story can and should inform the design of these character traits. If you need your characters to team up near the end, it may be impactful if you give your main character a deep fear of commitment, an insecurity about being unwanted or left behind, and make them highly value independence and freedom. That could make their team-up for the final battle very meaningful. Conversely, you can use your character’s deepest fears and desires to help design the plot. Is your character deeply insecure about voicing their opinions or taking a stand, because of trauma they faced in the past? Make them face that. Build that into the climactic third act. Give them the big inspirational speech where they stand up and talk about what they believe to be important, what they think the group should do. And then design that character arc to run through the story, giving you more handholds and stepping stones, more pieces of foundation on which to design the plot.

In this way, character should inform story as much as story informs character. It’s a feedback loop.

Bonus: if you build your character and your plot off of each other in this way, it automatically starts to build in the foundations of that emotional investment I mentioned earlier. If your character’s decisions are based on what they most want and do not want in life, you basically have your character motivation and stakes pre-built.

Note: you need to know these things about your villain, too.

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I’m genuinely sorry about the length of this, lmao. But you did ask.

Best of luck!

Edit: I forgot an important one:

17) Start when the scene starts and end when the scene ends.

What do I mean by that?

If your notes say “Danny asks Nicole out after school and majorly flubs it,” start the scene when Danny approaches Nicole after school. Better yet, cold-open the scene on “I was wondering if, you know, you’d wanna. You know. Hang out some time?”

Don’t start that morning when Danny goes to school, unless you’re gonna cover the school day in like one or two sentences. Don’t spend whole paragraphs going through the school day, unless it’s to cover other plot points first (in which case apply these same guidelines there), or if the paragraphs are there for a specific reason, like to illustrate how stressed he is and how it seems like every little thing is going wrong. Even then, trim the fat as much as possible. Expounding and describing everything Moment-to-moment is for the meat of the scenes, not the leading-up-to and coming-away-from.

Here’s my rule of thumb: study how and when movies cut from scene to scene. Movies have exceptionally strict, limited time for storytelling; they’re excellent examples of starting a scene when the plot point starts and ending when it’s over. If you can’t picture a movie showing everything you showed, start the scene later and end it earlier.