#one of the judges came up to me and literally said i would have won if the judges were younger

[nattousan]

literally stumbled into a chalk drawing competition while volunteering at another booth, design was freestyled the first day, went home, polished it up in procreate, went back the next day and banged it out!! my spine feels like a crumpled up CVS receipt but i'm pretty happy with how it came out!

this is what 4th place out of 4 looks like babeyy B) 💪💪

[fdelopera]

Hi curious anon here. You mentioned in one of your posts (I think the sennek one? If I’m spelling it right) that the exodus from Egypt was metaphorical as the enslavement in Egypt didn’t happen, but I thought it did? Can you explain? (If you’re happy to of course)

Hi Anon! Thanks for your question. My response is looong lol (you got me going about a special interest), so buckle up!

Sooo I’m going to make a few guesses here, based on the way you’ve phrased your question. Judging from the fact that you’ve written Sukkot as “sennek” (I've looked through recent posts, and I think this is the post you're referring to), I’m going to guess that you’re not Jewish.

And judging from the fact that you think that Shemot, or “Names” (commonly written in Christian bibles as Exodus), is a literal historical account of Jewish history, I’m guessing that you have a Christian background.

You’re not alone in this. And I’m not saying this to pick on you. Many Christians have a literalist interpretation of the Bible, and most have zero knowledge of Jewish history (aside from maybe knowing some facts about the Holocaust). And so, what knowledge of Jewish history you have mostly comes from the Tanakh (what you call the Old Testament).

Tanakh is an acronym. It stands for Torah (the Five Books of Moses), Nevi’im (Prophets), Ketuvim (Writings). Also, the Tanakh and the “Old Testament” are not the same. The Tanakh has its own internal organization that makes sense for Jewish practice. The various Christian movements took the Tanakh, cut it up, reordered it, and then often mistranslated it as a way to justify the persecution of various groups of people — I’m looking at you, King James Bible.

But back to Shemot, the “Exodus” story. The story of Moshe leading the Israelites out of Egypt is more of a Canaanite cultural memory of the Late Bronze Age Collapse between around 1200 – 1150 BCE, which was preserved in oral history and passed down through the ages until it was written down in the form that we know it in the 6th century BCE by Jewish leaders from the Southern Kingdom of Judah.

Since the text is influenced by Babylonian culture and mythology, just as Bereshit is (which you know as Genesis), it is likely that some of the writing and editing of Shemot took place during and after the Babylonian exile in the 500s BCE.

Now, I’m guessing that what I’ve just written in these two paragraphs above sounds very strange to you.

Wait, you might say, didn’t the Israelites conquer the land of Canaan?

Wasn’t the "Exodus" written by Moses’s own hand during the 13th century BCE?

And wasn’t the Pharaoh in the Exodus Ramesses II (aka Ramesses the Great), who ruled in the 13th century BCE?

Actually, no. None of that happened.

The Israelites didn’t conquer Canaan. The Israelites were the same people as the Canaanites, and these are the same peoples as who later became the Jews, as I will explain. The Semitic peoples who would become the Jewish people have been in this area of the Levant since the Bronze Age.

Moshe was not a historical figure and did not write the Torah.

The “Pharaoh” in Exodus is not any specific Egyptian ruler (Ramesses the Great as the “Pharaoh” is mostly a pop culture theory from the 20th century).

Okay, now that I’ve said all that, let’s dive in.

The first ever mention of Israel was inscribed in the Merneptah Stele, somewhere between 1213 to 1203 BCE. Pharaoh Merneptah, who was the Pharaoh after Ramesses the Great, describes a campaign in Canaan to subdue a people called Israel. But there is no mention of plagues or an exodus because those things didn’t happen. The Canaanites were not slaves in Egypt. Canaan was a vassal state of Egypt.

In fact, the events that occurred during the reign of a later Pharaoh, Ramesses III, relate more to Jewish history. Ramesses III won a pyrrhic victory over the Peleset and other “Sea Peoples” who came to Egypt fighting for resources during a time of famine, earthquakes, and extreme societal turmoil. And Ramesses III would witness the beginning of the end of the Bronze Age.

The Canaanites, who were a Semitic people in the Levant, gradually evolved into the people who would become the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah (i.e., Jewish people), but during the 13th Century BCE, they were Canaanites, not Jews.

The Canaanites were polytheistic, worshiping a complex pantheon of gods; they didn’t follow the later Jewish dietary laws (i.e., they ate pork); and their religious practice bore little to no resemblance to the Jewish people of the Second Temple Period.

So, to reiterate, the people in Canaan who called themselves Israel during the Bronze Age were a Semitic people, but they were not recognizably Jewish, at least not to us Jews today. Canaan was a vassal state of Egypt, just as Ugarit and the Hittite Empire were.

Canaan was part of the vast trading alliance that allowed the Bronze Age to produce the metal that historians have named it for: bronze.

Bronze is a mixture of copper and tin (about 90% copper and 10% tin), and in order to make it, the kingdoms of the Bronze Age had to coordinate the mining, transportation, and smelting of these metals from all over the known world. This trading network allowed for the exchange of all sorts of goods, from grain to textiles to gold. Canaan was just one of these trading partners.

Well, between 1200 BCE and 1150 BCE, this entire trading alliance that allowed Bronze Age society to function went (pardon the expression) completely tits up. This is likely due to a large array of events, including famine and earthquakes, which led to an overall societal disarray.

Some of the people who were hardest hit by the famine, people from Sardinia and Sicily to Mycenae and Crete, came together in a loose organization of peoples, looking for greener pastures. These were all peoples who were known to Egypt, and many of them had either served Egypt directly or had traded with Egypt during better days. According to ancient records, this loose grouping of peoples would arrive at various cities, consume resources there, and then leave for the next city (sacking the city in the process).

Just to be clear, these people were just as much the victims of famine as the cities they sacked. There were no “good guys” or “bad guys” in this equation, just people trying as best as they could to survive in a world that was going to shit.

Well, these “Sea Peoples” (as they were much later dubbed in the 19th century CE) eventually made their way to Egypt, but Ramesses III defeated them in battle around 1175 BCE. He had the battle immortalized on his mortuary temple at Medinet Habu.

We don’t know much about these Sea Peoples, but we do know what the Egyptians called them. And from those names, we can figure out some of their origins. Peoples such as the Ekwesh and the Denyen. These were likely the Achaeans and the Danaans.

If you’re familiar with Homer’s Iliad, you’ll recognize these as some of the names that Homer gives to the Greek tribes. Many of the Sea Peoples were from city states that are now part of Greece and Italy.

Yes, the Late Bronze Age Collapse of the 12th Century BCE didn’t just get handed down as a cultural memory of the “Exodus” to the people who would centuries later become the Jews. That cataclysm also inspired the stories that “Homer” would later canonize as the Trojan War in the Iliad and the Odyssey. The Exodus and the Trojan War are both ancient cultural memories of the same societal collapse.

And neither the Trojan War nor the Exodus are factual. However, despite having little to no historicity, they both capture a similar feeling of the world being turned upside down.

Well, back to the Sea Peoples. Remember the Peleset that I mentioned a few paragraphs ago? They were one of these “Sea Peoples” that Ramesses III defeated. They were likely Mycenaean in origin, and possibly originated from Crete. After Ramesses III defeated them, he needed a place to relocate them along with several other tribes, including the Denyen and Tjeker. It was a “you don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here” situation.

So, Egypt rounded up the surviving Peleset and sent them north to settle — to the land of Canaan.

Now, if you have some Biblical background, let me ask you this. What does “Peleset” sound like? What if we start it with an aspirated consonant, more of a “Ph” instead of a “P”?

That’s right. The Peleset settled in Canaan and became the Philistines.

This is where the real story of the people who would become the Jews begins.

As the Mycenaean (aka Greek) Peleset settled in their new home, they clashed with the Semitic Israelite people of Canaan. Some of these Canaanites fought back. These Canaanites also organized themselves into different groups, or “tribes.” (See where this is going?) Some of these tribes were in the Northern area of Canaan, and some were in the South, but there was a delineation between North and South — aka they did not start out as one people and then split in two. They started as two separate groups.

If you’re following me so far, you’ll know that I’m now talking about what would in time become the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah.

Well, backtracking a bit. The Bronze Age was ending, and the Iron Age was about to begin. The Peleset/Philistines were experts at smelting iron, which was harder to work with than bronze due to it having a much higher smelting temperature. When the Peleset settled in Canaan, they brought this iron smelting knowledge with them, and they used it to make weapons to subdue the local Canaanite peoples. The Canaanites therefore had to fight back “with sticks and stones.”

Hmm. Does that sound familiar? Who is one of the most famous Philistines you can think of from the Tanakh (the Old Testament)? I’ll give you a guess. It’s in the Book of Samuel (in the Tanakh, that’s in the Nevi’im — The Prophets).

That’s right. Goliath.

The story of “David and Goliath” is likely a Jewish cultural memory that was transmitted orally from the time of the Canaanite struggles against the Peleset.

The man who would become King David used a well-slinged stone to fell the much greater Goliath, and then he used Goliath’s own iron sword to cut off Goliath’s head.

In this metaphor, we can see the struggle between the Canaanite tribes and the Peleset, as the Canaanites fought to hold off the Peleset’s greater military might.

Historically, the Peleset eventually intermarried with the Canaanites, and within several generations, they were all one people. Likewise, the Mycenaean Denyen tribe may have settled in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, intermarried with the Canaanites, and become the Tribe of Dan.

The Book of Samuel, containing the story of David and Goliath, was written down in the form we would recognize today in the 500s BCE during the Babylonian Exile. It is a cultural memory of the time that the Canaanites were unable to wield iron weapons against a much more technologically advanced society, and it would have resonated with the Jews held captive in Babylon.

And with this mention of the Babylonian Exile, I come to the question that remains. And I think the question that you are asking. Where did the story of Shemot, the “Exodus,” the “Going Out,” come from?

And more importantly, why was that story so important to canonize in the Torah — the Jewish people’s “Instruction”?

The Shemot was likely written down and edited in a form that we would recognize today during and after the Babylonian Exile.

So, what was the Babylonian Exile? And what was its impact on Judaism?

To answer that, I need to start this part of the story about 130 years before the Babylonian Exile, in around 730 BCE. We’re now about 450 years after the Late Bronze Age Collapse, when the Canaanites were fighting the Peleset tribe.

Between about 730 and 720 BCE, the Neo-Assyrian Empire conquered the Northern Kingdom of Israel.

Now, you may know this as the time when the “Ten Tribes of Israel were lost.”

In reality, the Assyrians didn’t capture the entire population of Israel. They did capture the Israelite elite and force them to relocate to Mesopotamia, but there were many people from the Israelite tribes left behind. The Ten Tribes were never “lost” because many of the remaining people in the Northern Kingdom migrated south to the Kingdom of Judah.

One such group of people from the Northern Kingdom of Israel maintained their distinct identity and still exist today: the Samaritans. These are the people who today are the Samaritan Israelites. They have their own Torah and their own Temple on Mount Gerizim, where they continue the tradition of animal sacrifice, as the Jews did in Jerusalem before the Romans destroyed the Second Temple in 70 CE. The Samaritans keep the Sabbath, they observe Kashrut laws (i.e., they keep kosher), and they hold sacrifices on Yom Kippur and Pesach. In short, they have maintained religious practices that are similar to Judaism during the Second Temple period.

This mass migration into the Kingdom of Judah in the late 700s and early 600s BCE is where Judaism as we know it today really started to take shape.

At that time, the people of the Northern Kingdom of Israel were polytheistic. They ate pork. They did many of the things that the writers of the Torah tell the Jews not to do.

This is where many of these commandments began, when the priests of Judah needed to define what it was to be a Jew (a member of the Tribe of Judah), in the face of this mass migration from the Kingdom of Israel.

You see, the Ancient Jews didn’t know about germ theory or recognize that trichinosis was caused by eating undercooked pork. That’s not why pigs are treyf. Pigs are treyf because eating pork began as a societal taboo. In short, pigs take a lot of resources to care for, and they eat people food, not grass (i.e. they don’t chew a cud). So if you kept pigs, you would be taking away resources from other people. When you are living in a precarious society that is constantly being raided and conquered by outsiders, you have to make sure that your people are fed, and if you’re competing with a particular livestock over food, that livestock has to be outlawed.

This time period is also likely when the Kingdom of Judah started to practice monolatry (worshiping one God without explicitly denying the existence of other Gods). The people of Judah worshiped YHWH (Adonai) as their God, and the Northern Kingdom of Israel worshiped El as the head of their polytheistic pantheon. The Jews put both of them together as the same G-d. That is why the Bereshit (Genesis) begins:

When Elohim (G-d) began to shape heaven and earth, and the earth then was welter and waste, and darkness over Tehom (the Deep), and the breath of Elohim (G-d) hovering over the waters

NOTE: This is a modification to Robert Alter’s translation of the first two lines of Bereshit (Genesis) in the Tanakh. In a few paragraphs, I will explain the modification I’ve made of transliterating the Hebrew word “Tehom,” instead of (mis)translating this word as “the Deep” as in nearly every translation of Genesis.

Then over the next two hundred years, monolatry would gradually become monotheism. One of the Northern Kingdom’s gods, Baal, was especially popular, so the Judean leadership had to expressly forbid the worship of this god during the writing of the Tanakh.

The message was clear: If we’re going to be one people, we need to worship one G-d. And the importance of the Babylonian Exile cannot be overstated in this shift from monolatry to monotheism. The period during and after the Babylonian Exile is when most of the Tanakh was edited into a form that we would recognize today.

So, I come back to the question, what was the Babylonian Exile? It began, as many wars do, as a conflict over monetary tribute.

Around 598 BCE, the Judean King Jehoiakim refused to continue paying tribute to the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II. And so in around 597 BCE, Nebuchadnezzar II’s troops besieged Jerusalem, killed King Jehoiakim, and captured much of the Judean leadership, holding them captive in Babylon. Over the next ten years, Nebuchadnezzar II continued his siege of Jerusalem, and in 587, he destroyed the First Temple, looted it for its treasures, and took more of the Jews captive. The deportation of the Jewish people to Babylon continued throughout the 580s BCE.

So, by the 570s BCE, the majority of the Jews were captives in a strange land. They were second-class citizens with few rights. The Jews feared that their people would start to assimilate into Babylonian society, intermarry so that they could secure greater freedom for their descendants, and then ultimately disappear as a unique people.

The Jewish leadership knew that this assimilation would begin by the Jews worshiping Babylonian gods.

So the Jewish leadership had a brilliant idea. They said, “We are not in danger of our people drifting into polytheism, assimilation, and cultural death, because we declare that the Babylonian gods do not exist. There is only one G-d, Adonai.”

Now we have left monolatry, and we are fully in monotheism.

And so, the Jews in captivity took Babylonian stories that their children heard around them, and they made these stories Jewish.

That is why the opening lines of Genesis sound so much like the opening lines of the Babylonian creation story, the Enuma Elish.

And remember when I mentioned that I had transliterated “Tehom” in the first two lines of Bereshit (Genesis) above, instead of using the standard translation of “the Deep”? That is because Tehom is a Hebrew cognate for the Babylonian sea goddess Tiamat, who the Babylonian god Marduk defeated and used to shape the heavens and the earth, just as Elohim shaped the heavens and the earth.

When you read the Enuma Elish, you can see the parallels to Genesis:

When the heavens above did not exist, And earth beneath had not come into being — There was Apsû, the first in order, their begetter, And demiurge Tiamat, who gave birth to them all; They had mingled their waters together Before meadow-land had coalesced and reed-bed was to be found — When not one of the gods had been formed Or had come into being, when no destinies had been decreed, The gods were created within them

That is also why the flood story of Noah and the Ark sounds so much like the flood story from the Epic of Gilgamesh.

That is why the story of Moshe’s mother saving him by placing him in a basket on the Nile River parallels the story of King Sargon of Akkad’s mother saving him by placing him in a basket on the Euphrates River.

In order to survive as a people, the Jews consolidated all gods into one G-d. Adonai. Shema Yisrael Adonai eloheinu Adonai ehad. "Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One."

The Jews said, yes, we acknowledge that we are hearing these polytheistic Babylonian stories in our captivity, but we will make them our own so that we can continue to exist as a people.

But back to your question. What about the story told in Shemot, the “Exodus” from the Land of Egypt?

I think by now you can see the parallels between the Jewish people held as captives in Babylon and the story that they told, of the Israelites held as slaves in Egypt.

And so, the Exodus story, which had been told and retold in various ways as a means to process the cataclysmic trauma of the Late Bronze Age Collapse (similar to the oral retellings of the Trojan War epic before they were written down by “Homer”), now took on a new meaning.

The Exodus story now represented the Jewish people’s hope for escape from Babylon. It represented the Jewish people’s desire to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem that Nebuchadnezzar II had destroyed. It represented the acceptance that it would take at least a generation before the Jews would be able to return to Jerusalem.

And it represented a cautionary tale about leaders who become too powerful, no matter how beloved they may be.

At a Torah study this Sukkot, the Rabbi discussed why the writers of Devarim (Deuteronomy) said that Moshe couldn’t enter Canaan, even though he'd led the Israelites out of Egypt (which, again, didn't literally happen). And one interpretation is because the Jewish leaders were writing and editing the Exodus during and shortly after the Babylonian Exile, and after seeing the Kingdom of Judah fall because of bad leadership. And they were saying, “It doesn't matter how beloved a leader is. If they start becoming a demagogue, and start behaving as someone who is drunk on their own power, you can't trust them as a leader. And you need to find new leadership.” And damn if that isn't a lesson that we could all stand to learn from!

So, was the Exodus story historically true? No. But does it matter that the Exodus story isn’t historically true? No, it does not. It was and is and will continue to be deeply meaningful to the Jewish people. The Shemot, the Exodus, the breaking of chains, the escape from the “Pharaohs” that enslave us — these are still deeply meaningful to us as Jews.

Was Moshe a historical figure? No, he was not. Is he one of the most fascinating, inspiring, and deeply human figures in Jewish tradition, and in literature in general? Yes, he is. Moshe was an emergent leader, an everyman, a stutterer, and yet he was chosen to lead and speak for his people. He was chosen to write the Torah, the “Instruction,” that has guided us for thousands of years. It doesn't matter that he was not a historical person. What matters is what he stands for. He is the one who directed us in what it is to be Jewish.

Now, fast forward to 538 BCE, around 60 years after the Jews were first taken as captives to Babylon. The Jewish people’s prayers were answered when Persian King Cyrus the Great defeated Babylon in battle, and allowed the Jews to return to Jerusalem, where they began construction on the Second Temple, which was completed around 515 BCE.

The Persian Zoroastrians were henotheistic (they worshiped one God, Ahura Mazda, but they recognized other gods as well). They also had a chief adversarial deity, Angra Mainyu, who was in direct opposition to Ahura Mazda.

Just as the Jews had incorporated Babylonian stories into their texts as a way to preserve their identity as a Jewish people, the Jews now incorporated this idea of “good versus evil” (i.e., It’s better to assimilate the foreign god to us, than to assimilate us to the foreign god).

This shift can be seen in the later story of the Book of Job, which is in the Ketuvim (Writings). Jews have no devil and no hell. There is no “eternal afterlife damnation," and there is no “original sin.” Jews believe in living a good life, right here on earth, and being buried in Jewish soil. Some Jews believe that we go to Sheol when we die, which is a shadowy place of peaceful rest, similar to the Greek realm of Hades. In the Book of Job, the Hebrew word “hassatan” (which Christians transliterate as “Satan”) is just a lawyerly adversary, like a “devil’s advocate” who debates for the other side of the argument. It’s certainly not anything akin to a Christian “devil.”

However, throughout the Second Temple period, various apocalyptic Jewish sects would arise in response to Greek and then Roman persecution, inspired by the Zoroastrian idea of a battle between “the light and the dark.”

In the 1st and 2nd centuries CE, this would lead to a search for the Moshiach: a human leader (not divine) who was descended from the line of King David, and who would restore Jerusalem. And that would not culminate in Jesus (Jews don’t recognize Jesus as Moshiach — for us, he's a really cool dude who said some very profound things, but he's not That Guy).

Rather, the search for Moshiach would stem from the events leading up to the Jewish War, which concluded in 70 CE with the Romans destroying the Second Temple and sacking Jerusalem, and it would culminate in the Bar Kochba revolt between 132 and 135 CE. The Bar Kochba revolt resulted in a Roman campaign of systematic Jewish slaughter and “ethnic cleansing” that nearly destroyed the Jewish people a second time. But that’s a story for another day!

In closing, I encourage you to learn more about Jewish history. And don’t just learn about us from the Holocaust, our darkest hour. Learn about our full history. I highly recommend Sam Aronow’s excellent series on YouTube, which is an ongoing Jewish history project. The YouTube channel Useful Charts also provides excellent overviews of Jewish history.

[littlemuoi]

The tiny woman with dazzling blue eyes who turned me from a republican to a royalist by Louis de Bernières (September 2nd 2023)

Somewhere in my possession I have a snotty letter I wrote to my mother from university about not being interested in the Queen's 1977 anniversary. I was a young philosophy student at the time and being enthusiastic about the Monarchy was definitely not cool, especially as there was some kudos to be accrued from pretending to be Leftist.

I found myself puzzled and irritated by all the street parties and general celebrations, as if it was nothing to do with me. A few years earlier I had 'enjoyed' five months of officer training at Sandhurst where I had to swear allegiance to the Queen, her heirs and successors and I remember protesting inwardly that if one were to fight, it should be for a cause and not for a person.

However, in the 1990s I won the Commonwealth Writers Prize in three of its iterations. It meant that I had had my books chosen not by the usual London literati, with whom I have never been in favour, but by judges from all over Africa, Asia and indeed the world.

As I found out, the Queen's great passion was for the Commonwealth rather than Great Britain. It had been the means whereby the British Empire had miraculously and almost seamlessly transformed itself into a cultural and diplomatic club, so successfully that by the end of the Queen's reign there were countries in it that had never been in the Empire at all.

As the head of it, the Queen had, let's face the truth, literally charmed a succession of heads of state out of any post-colonial resentment that may have been niggling away inside of them.

She treated them with love and respect and had her love and respect returned. Julius Nyerere [Tanzania's leader] and Nelson Mandela are examples of two people who became close to her.

One of the perks of winning that writers prize was that the winners in all the categories were invited to Buckingham Palace to meet the Queen. You were advised about steps to be taken, how to bow and so on, and then you went in.

Some people are apparently tongue-tied and terrified but I found myself face-to-face with a tiny woman in sparkly clothes, with dazzlingly blue eyes, perfect complexion and a smile that seemed to break her face in half.

If you said anything boring or inane, she would say: 'How fascinating.' She made a joke about somebody important and self-important she had just met, which I am honour-bound not to repeat.

Her voice and turns of phrase were just like my mother's, they being of the same vintage. My problem was not that I was terrified or tongue-tied but that I felt warmly enough, relaxed enough, to want to be over-familiar. As the cliché goes, I went in a republican and came out a royalist.

I remembered how I had adored her as a little boy because she was so outstandingly pretty, and now I reflected that perhaps my previous resentment of her had been nothing more than the pique of somebody who had no hope of ever entering such a charmed circle.

Now that I had entered it for a few minutes, all the pique and sullenness suddenly evaporated.

If you had met the Queen, you assumed that she really wanted to know you and would become a little sad when no more invitations ever arrived. I was relatively lucky in winning that prize three times because I automatically got to see her three years running. Somebody told me she'd read my book Captain Corelli's Mandolin on a long flight to New Zealand but I have no idea if that is true or who told me; perhaps it was a lady-in-waiting.

There was one present on one occasion with a fag in her hand and I remember thinking: 'The Queen must be very tolerant to put up with that.' I bent down to pat the dogs when I should have been talking to her but she seemed unperturbed, as she was when I trod on one and made it squeal.

She had recently invented the Dorgi and was pleased about it.

I can no longer remember the order of things. As I drove (and still do) a Morris Minor, and had even worked as a mechanic in a Morris Minor garage for a year, I had been able to rescue a young woman in a broken down Morris near Richmond Park, who worked for the Royal Academy.

Thereafter I received free invitations to everything as long as she worked there. There was a do where I found myself in the company of the likes of Paul McCartney and Brian May, who are both outstandingly tall, but no one was talking to me until the Queen spotted me and made a beeline.

She was ever conscious of the number of people she had to talk to and would end her conversations very suddenly, even a very entertaining one, by suddenly turning her head to one side. Then the rest of her body would swivel sideways and she was off, like someone in a hurry to catch a train. It should have been very rude but it was both comical and endearing.

She had a party for poets at Buckingham Palace, which struck me as a dangerous and peculiar idea. I was standing with another poet when the Master of the Household approached me and said: 'Don't move, the Queen wants to have a chat with you.'

There was another beeline, another brief conversation, another swivel of the head, another charging away. I got on so well with the Master of the Household that we are still friends years later.

She had a party at Windsor Castle that was, I believe, the first after its restoration. She looked out across the courtyard at my Morris Minor Traveller and said: 'Goodness, we haven't had one of those here for years.'

The dinner party was a kind of glamorous sleepover. My luggage was unpacked for me by a valet who was very unimpressed that I was going to wear the same white shirt to dinner as the one in which I had arrived. 'Economising on effort I see,' he said drily.

The dinner was on silver plates. I hope I have not made that up. I was sitting next to Prince Andrew to begin with and we chatted about golf. I liked him and had no reason not to.

I eavesdropped on the German Ambassador talking to Tony Blair and I was impressed. When the latter stood up to leave with the ladies, the laughing Queen ushered him back into the room with her hand in the middle of his back.

I was struck by how frugal her appetite was; she was no trencherwoman. In her position and with such good cooks, I would have been the most massively globular monarchical flumper that the world has ever known, considerably larger than Edward IV and Henry VIII and Edward VII combined.

I spent the next morning in her library. She had many genealogy books and I found one with an inscription by Winston Churchill, so flowery, elaborate and humble that I felt guilty and embarrassed about the cheery informality of my own exploits on the flyleaf.

There was another party at Windsor for people 'in the Arts'. The Irish poet Seamus Heaney was there, surrounded by admiring young poets. 'Your passport may be green,' I thought, 'but you're as much a sucker for all this as anyone else is, aren't you?' The last time I saw the Queen was when she invited me to lunch at the palace. I think she had had a notion to invite a few people from each county one after the other, so as to work her way around the entire country. One of the guests was a fireman.

On the way, the sole of my shoe came off and I had to buy a new pair from a shop in Oxford Street.

At the gathering beforehand I had a conversation with the Duke of Edinburgh, about death. He said that the older one got, the more one was forced to contemplate it.

I liked him. He was intelligent and humorous, a man who clearly saw the absurdity of pretty much everything. He once teased me about being a novelist and a poet, as if it were altogether unnecessarily too much to do two such fatuous things in the same lifetime.

The Queen had a system for making things happen, which was that she would make a sudden move. When I was talking to the Duke, he suddenly stiffened and looked up because the Queen had made her 'action stations' move, just as I was asking him if he spoke Greek. She said: 'Well, do you speak French?'

I found myself sitting at her right hand side and during my half of her attention (she would switch halfway through a meal) we talked, among other things, about speaking French. We talked about Norfolk and I entertained a brief fantasy of being invited to Sandringham.

I think I may have disgraced myself by taking two quail breasts from the dish. She had only taken one but they are terribly small.

Afterwards I was standing at the gate of the palace when she whizzed out on her next mission, without even the slightest break or smidgen of a snooze. I was standing next to an armed policeman in all the gear and he suddenly looked down at me and asked: 'Ere, do you live in Denton?' I said, 'Yes, how did you know?' He relied: 'I beat you in the Father's Race.' I said: 'It was my sandals. I'd have won if I hadn't tripped up on the finishing line.'

While the Queen was hurtling off to her next appointment, I fell asleep on a bench in Hyde Park to recover from lunch.

That was the last time I saw her, waving from her car.

Thereafter I sent her books via my friend the Master. Books from their authors are just about the only gifts the Royal Family are allowed to receive. We have a large room in my house that we call 'The Queen's Room' because I used to tell my children that that's where we'd put her if she came to stay.

One day my little daughter wrote her a letter inviting her to stay, telling her that we had a very glamorous bathroom, and received a reply about being too busy. I don't think Sophie ever forgave her, and might even still be a republican.

I don't think it is possible to make a friend of anyone in the Royal Family, or make any assumptions if they are kind to you or seem interested in you. All that can happen is the occasional flash of communication or warmth that gives you a glimpse of the person within.

Princess Anne is intelligent and direct, the Duke of Edinburgh had a philosophical turn. The question is, what do they get from us?

I think the Queen mostly enjoyed herself because her enjoyment coincided with her duty. There was an eagerness in her manner as she suddenly looked away and shot off to talk to somebody else.

It's her heirs and successors I worry about. We, their subjects, are just going to try to make them as miserable as we can, aren't we? We are too chippy to speak generously of them and we are piqued about not being royalty ourselves. I found that having encountered the Queen, I was unable to be impressed by anyone else. Madonna invited me to lunch once and I still don't know why. I said no because I had a commitment in Northern Ireland. Sting wanted me to fly to Milan to interview him and I don't know why I said no to that either.

I've met many of my heroes, I've shaken hands with Nicolas Cage and President Clinton and been kissed on the cheek by Penelope Cruz. Only being kissed on the cheek by Penelope comes anywhere close to meeting the Queen.

[ink-and-dagger]

Hey Silco would you still love Astrid if she was a worm? What about you Astrid?

That entirely depends.

On what?!?! You already said once before that you’d still love me even if I were a fish.

A worm is not a fish.

I assumed the sentiment would carry over to other animals??!

As a general rule of thumb, you should never assume anything in life, dear. Worms are significantly less appealing than fish.

Ooooh I see. So your love for me is based on how appealing you find my form?

No, that is an entirely—

Never thought of you as being so shallow—

—If I might be allowed an opportunity to defend myself?

Sure sure. Go ahead. Be my guest… 🧐

...As I was attempting to explain, if you were to transform into a worm right this second then of course I would still love and care for you. As I assume you would for me?

wELL as A geNErAl RuLe oF THumb yOu sHOuld neveR aSsUME aNYtHinG—

—Yes alright, you’ve made your point.

Well yeah ‘course I would. I’d put you in a little worm house and feed you garbage everyday.

That’s very kind. However, if you were a worm when we first met, then I’m not entirely sure our relationship would have developed as it has.

How do you know that?

…I am fairly certain—

You can’t possibly know that we wouldn’t still have ended up together if one of us was a worm.

Are you honestly insinuating that had you found a worm on my chair the first time you walked into my office you would—

Was it wearing a tie?

I— what?

A neck tie? Like yours?

I don’t see how that makes a dif—

Because if I walked into a room and saw a worm wearing a neck tie then actually yeah I’d have definitely made conversation with it.

…?!

Well wouldn’t you?? It isn’t every day you see a worm in people’s clothing.

I fear we’re getting off topic.

Nonono, no we aren’t. This is all very relevant. Are you saying that if a literal worm knocked on your office door — opened said door by itself — and then came in carrying a bottle of bourbon, you wouldn’t be a little curious about that worm and it’s life story?

I— Quite frankly I think I’d be horrifically disturbed.

Well sure, it’s a nightmarish mental image, but you’d engage with the worm, yeah? You wouldn’t just ignore it.

Well I— I suppose—

And therefore if you had engaged with worm-Astrid, she would have eventually won your friendship with her sparkling conversation and winning personality. Right?

…You’re taking an awful lot of liberties with this imaginary scenario.

It’s still me. I am the worm. It has my personality and charm. Unless of course you’re so superficial that you won’t even engage platonically with someone you found physically unappealing—

Fine. Very well. I would still have befriended you had you been a worm. But it wouldn’t have evolved into anything romantic—

Yeah but how do you know though?

For Gods’ sake now you’re just being ridiculous

Am I though? Did you know you were going to fall in love with me when you met me?

Well… no…

It happened over time, right? The more you got to know me, the more you loved me. How do you know that you wouldn’t also fall in love with worm-me given the time to do so?

…

…

Darling one. Love of my life. Treasure of my heart. Would you be so kind as to tell me exactly what I need to do to end this conversation as swiftly as possible and have you leave me be?

Admit that it’s entirely feasible that you could have fallen in love with me even if I was a worm all along.

It is entirely feasible that I could have fallen in love with you had you been a worm all along.

Thank you. Now let’s talk about the fact that none of these issues came up when I was a hypothetical fish—Gods above and below his woman was sent by Vander to finish the job—Does this mean that you’re totally cool with the idea of romancing a fish?

I’m not going to justify—

Have you attempted to romance a fish in the past?

I’m getting a migraine—

Been on down to the aquarium looking for a hot date?

Do you ever tire of being so insufferable?

No need to get defensive. I’m not here to judge your sexuality.

If you think I won’t physically evict you from this office then you are sorely mistaken.

Hey here’s a fun fact — did you know that sharks have two dicks? What am I saying, of course you knowhey! If you’re gonna manhandle me at least make it kinky—

[smol-blue-bird]

anyway, here's another fun Girl Scout memory nobody asked for: one time my mom built the Challenger Disaster out of waffles and oranges in a weird, failed attempt to earn me a badge

Basically, my girl scout troop (inexplicably) went on this trip to a fancy resort in the Poconos (I have absolutely no idea how we afforded this in hindsight), and this place had an activity called "Breakfast Wars" where you had to make a breakfast to fit a specific theme, and at the end, all the breakfasts would be judged and the winner would get a prize. I don't know why, but we were told that the winners would also get a patch for their vests at the end (I have no idea if this was a real thing Girl Scouts did or if we were just allowed to stitch random patches onto our vests--we never really followed the rules anyway). The theme of the weekend was "80s," so everyone was making big chunky cell phones, and scenes from movies, and girls with wild hair and neon makeup and shoulder pads. But our moms were like "we can't do that, that's too stereotypical. We have to pick a theme nobody else will do."

So they picked the CHALLENGER DISASTER.

Us kids, obviously, barely knew what the Challenger Disaster was. So we just kind of sat there and quietly helped while our mothers assembled an assortment of waffles, pancakes, and fruit into an exploding space shuttle like it was no big deal. They got, like, really into it. I remember them literally peeling a tangerine and using the peel for the fire, which, in hindsight, is absolutely nuts. I have no idea why any of these grown adults thought this was a good idea.

Regardless, the end product came out looking very cool (I wish I could find a picture, it was insane), although it was probably also extremely tasteless, BECAUSE IT WAS THE FUCKING CHALLENGER DISASTER MADE OUT OF WAFFLES. And we were so proud of it, too, because we didn't know what it was! We were like, ten, we were not alive for the Challenger Disaster!

Anyway, eventually the competition ended and the judges came around, and the kids were supposed to be the ones doing the talking, so the judge was like "what's your breakfast about?" and my poor friend just said "THE CHALLENGER SPACE SHUTTLE." And I wish I could have saved the look on that judge's face, because it was incredible. Imagine being that employee. Imagine hosting a fun little cooking competition at your cute bougie family resort and making it 80s themed, and then walking around to look at the entries and having a group of elementary schoolers proudly present their waffle recreation of a tragedy that killed 7 people. Why did our mothers put us up to this? Why did they not tell us what we were making?? Were they so desperate to create a truly innovative 80s breakfast that thought the Challenger was a good subject for this competition? Why did they think waffle art was a good medium for depicting this???? It has been over ten years and I'm still baffled.

Needless to say, we lost the competition, and we didn't get the patch. But—and here's the best part!—our moms were surprised by this! They were like "we obviously had the best and most innovative design," and it's like, yeah, maybe, but obviously they're going to give the prize to the kids with the giant waffle cell phone and not the kids with the fucking waffle CHALLENGER DISASTER???? My mom was like "that was rigged, we should have won," which, ?????????? WHAT MADE YOU THINK ANYTHING ABOUT THE WAFFLE CHALLENGER DISASTER WAS APPROPRIATE

[invisibleraven]

Person A winning a costume contest with a costume that Person B handmade for them for literally anyone because it gave me FEELS.

Also for @jmrothwell who sent me the same prompt for Flynn/Anyone, because my first thought upon receiving this was immediately Flynn.

"You sure I look okay?" Julie asked, worrying her bottom lip.

"For the millionth time, yes," Flynn sighed, laying a gentle hand on her jaw. "Now stop stressing and let me finish your look."

"Thanks again for doing this for me," Julie said, "I know it's not exactly your scene."

"No," Flynn admitted. "But it's yours, and you're important to me, so this is important to me. Plus it gave me a chance to work with different materials."

Julie smiled and Flynn leaned in to give her a small kiss-enough to know she meant it, not enough to mar her lipstick. "For luck," Flynn whispered. "Now go kill that costume contest."

"I love you!" Julie called as she raced off towards the stage.

Flynn beamed, leaning back against a pillar. "I know babe." Even though Julie couldn't hear it, she knew her girlfriend felt it. She watched as the line of hopeful nerds went up to show off their outfits. Flynn barely recognized any of them, though she did clap for the well made cosplays and the few characters she knew.

Off to the side she saw the contest photographer take snaps of each entry, making sure to compliment them over little details, or just to make them smile. Flynn snickered as she noticed he was dressed in a Han Solo costume, a tiny stuffed Chewbacca doll peeking out of his bag, something he pulled out to make a small child in a very well made Leia costume.

It also didn't hurt that the guy was unfairly cute, his smile lighting up at every new photo he had to take. Flynn wondered if she could hit him up for a copy of Julie's outfit for her portfolio-and maybe a pic of the two of them. Because even if this wasn't Flynn's thing, she had gone all out on her own costume-the new live action Little Mermaid, turning the tail into a fashionable skirt.

Finally it was Julie's turn, and Flynn hooted as she came onto the stage in he Scarlet Scarab outfit, unfurling the wings and striking a pose as the crowd went crazy. Including the photographer who stared at Julie for a hot second, his jaw a little unhinged until finally he shook himself into attention, lifting his camera once more.

Julie rushed into Flynn's arms as she came off the stage, beaming. "Oh, did you hear the crowd? They loved it!"

"Told you not to stress," Flynn replied, resting their foreheads together. "You got first place in the bag."

"Excuse me?"

Both girls turned, seeing the photographer there, smiling shyly. "Hi, I just wanted to know if you wanted any of the pictures I got of you?" He then blushed an enticing pink colour as he rubbed the back of his neck. "I also got one of the two of you just now, it was such a lovely moment I had to capture it."

"I would love that," Julie replied.

"I was going to ask you to take a few of us anyways," Flynn added. "So this works out amazingly."

He handed over his card. "I'm Reggie, message me any time and I'll send over the photos, or arrange a photo shoot for you out of costume." He then stopped, paling, as if realizing what he had implied. "I don't mean like nudes or anything. Not that I judge you if you take those! I've done the odd boudoir shoot so I can't say anything!"

Julie giggled, then whispered to Flynn "He's adorable, even if he has a terrible case of foot in mouth disease."

"Luckily I like that in a guy," Flynn whispered back, then turned to Reggie. "We'll make sure to call you and we can figure out what kind of shot we want you to take then."

"O-okay," Reggie replied, blushing bright red again.

In the end, Julie was pretty hyped to have won the contest, and whooped at the gift card to her favourite restaurant that came with the cash prize. But she was more happy with the attention her costume got Flynn for future clients and the cute guy they were both intending on taking to that free dinner.

But next year? She was sure they would have to find a good group costume for the three of them.

[projectbluearcadia]

Forgive? Forget? Haha, I Wish.

[ Trigger Warning - Severe overreaction to dark humor

Reader Discretion Advised ]

Mammon: This pipsqueak is the human we’re supposed to be protecting?

Lizzy: Hol’ up. Pipsqueak? Seriously?

Annelie: Well, you are shorter than me. 

Lizzy: Hushshsh. We don’t talk about that.   

Annelie: That said, Mammary, her name is Elizabeth, so please use it. 

Mammon: I’m going to call her Zabeth ‘cause that sounds cooler.

Lizzy: Uh... haven’t heard that one before. 

Annelie: Well, it’s better than his nickname for me. Levi, Satan, pay attention. 

Levi: But she’s a normie. 

Satan: Do I have to?

Lucifer: Honestly, you’re all acting like children... Belphie, I know you just got back, but stop sleeping. 

Belphie: Zzzzmnghs... 

Beel: He says he’ll be back in ten minutes. 

Annelie: You could understand that?

Lizzy: Isn’t the bigger question why he’s on the floor in a maid costume? I mean no judging anyways, but it smells fruity up in dis house. 

Lucifer: What? Fruity?

Annelie: Punishment I guess? Dia was trying to be creative, but after a while, I think Belphie just got used to it and was too lazy to take it off when he came home yesterday. 

Lizzy: Punishment?

Annelie: Non-sexual, to clarify. 

Lizzy: That didn’t even cross my mind. Pervert. 

Annelie: Well, anyway, the oldest here is Lucifer. He’s stressed 24/7, so please don’t bother him.  Second-born is Mammon. Don’t leave your money near him. Leviathan, will only talk about games, anime, manga, TSL, etcetera. Satan, will help you with your math homework if you ask really nicely. Asmodeus, who is currently in a bath towel why?

Asmo: Well, I would have dried off and did my hair and nails and skin if someone hadn’t rushed me out!

Asmo glares at Lucifer.

Annelie: Well, anyway, ask him about anything beauty-related. Beelzebub, very sweet and can be bribed with food for pretty much anything. Belphegor, basically sleeping beauty, wouldn’t ask him for anything unless you’ve got no one else to turn to. 

Belphie flips Annelie off in his sleep. 

Annelie: You’re such a brat, you know that?

Belphie smirks. 

Lucifer: I can smack him for you. 

Annelie: Why? That’s just how he normally is around me. One day he’ll be using my feet as pillows and the next he’ll be hitting me with backhanded compliments. I swear to Diavolo he’s a damn cat. 

Lucifer: And yet you like cats. 

Annelie: Actual cats preferably. Although Satan is a very cute cat. 

Satan flushes. 

Lucifer: He’s only cute when he’s sleeping. 

Satan: Oi!

Lizzy: Are we just ignoring the fact that half of Lucifer and Satan and Beelzebub are literally the same person? And what’s with the nameless—no offense, Simeon—angel? 

Lizzy points to Simeon even as Annelie bustles over to Satan to calm him down. 

Lizzy: Where’s Michael and Samael and all those guys? Also, what happened to the spinning wheels and masses of eyes? I really wanted to see those.

Simeon softly chuckles.

Simeon: It’s a lot less fun that way though. As far as Michael goes... he’s a bit busy right now, and I’m not too sure about who Samael is supposed to be, but I’m sure he’s a lovely person. 

Lucifer: Well, in any case, since Annelie’s has taken my job from me, I’ll take hers. She’s the head of the Human-Demon Relations Agency, and Solomon, whom you will be sharing a dorm with, will be monitoring the school according to her regulations. 

Lizzy: OOF imma die. 

Lucifer: Why? 

Lizzy: I mean Anne doesn’t really care about me, soooo~ 

Annelie stops in place as LIzzy makes a flippant head-cutting motion and sticks out her tongue pretending to be dead. 

I don’t care? Are you fucking kidding me right now? No, you never are, because you never thought I cared through all of those years. 

The brothers stir. 

Lucifer: Elizabeth, if you choose to make comments like that, please make it absolutely clear that you’re joking. 

Lizzy: Wow, look at you being all threatening. Way to reinforce that male dominance thing. 

Lucifer glances at her, and she steps backwards. 

Lucifer: I won’t say it a second time. 

Lizzy: ...jesus, I was joking! Excuse me! 

You weren’t joking. Unfortunately, I know you way too well. 

Simeon: Lizzy, I don’t think Annelie thought it was a joke.  

Annelie: It’s fine. Did you have any questions?

Lizzy: ...

Lizzy steps backward further. 

Annelie: What? 

Lizzy: Why are you... all glaring at me? What’d I do?

Annelie: Nothing. Guys, knock it off. 

The brothers begin to settle with the exception of Lucifer, who knocks a pencil off of the mantlepiece. 

Annelie: Lucifer, I didn’t mean that literally. 

Lucifer: Be more specific then. 

I have a feeling he’s going to make me spill my guts on me and LIzzy the second we’re alone together... 

Lucifer: Do you have any questions for us? If not, then join us for dinner.

He’s just going to brute force it, isn’t he?

Annelie: We’re not going to cook you, before you ask. 

[lovelyfanatical]

I Get a Sugar Rush Whenever I’m With You - Chapter 4.2

Good evening fellow Drukkari stans, or whatever time it is for you! I come bearing the next installment! If you missed the last one, you can find it here, or start over from the beginning here. Sidenote: Should I make a post with all the mini-chapters? I don't know if that's helpful, but let me know. Anyway, 'without further ado, here's '70s week continues! What new surprises await our competitors? Find out now in the next installment of Drukkari in the Great British Bake Off, with special guest star, Darcy Lewis!

Despite his best efforts, Druig hadn’t gotten much better at technicals. It certainly didn’t help that this week, the challenge involved making ice cream, something he hadn’t had a chance to do prior to the competition. While the process itself wasn’t too difficult, the judges had declared his peppermint ice cream too minty. Even at his worst, Druig usually nailed flavors. He may not have been in last place, but the entire challenge had been quite stressful, and the feedback had hit him right where it hurt. Needless to say, he was in no mood to be interviewed, another skill he hadn’t improved much over the last few weeks. But the show must go on, proverbially and literally, and as always, he found himself standing in front of a large camera crew about to talk about his most recent failure.

To say that it wasn’t going so well would be the understatement of the year. Druig was often terse, but today, it was all he could do to resist the urge to just glare directly into the camera. It wasn’t long before Darcy hesitantly uttered, “Why don’t we take a two-minute pause?”

“Right, sure,” he replied, trying and failing to not sound annoyed. At this, she sped off somewhere while he turned to look at the scenery. He tried to get his brooding out before the camera started rolling again. Two minutes went by in an instant, and Druig braced himself as he turned back around. Much to his surprise, Darcy was returning with Makkari and Kingo in tow. At his questioning expression, she quickly signed, I don’t know what’s happening either, before they came to a stop in front of him.

“Okay, we’re going to try something different, so just go with me here,” Darcy began. “Instead of me interviewing you, Makkari’s going to stand behind the camera and ask the questions, and you’ll answer her like you’re just having a regular conversation between friends.”

“Should I sign my answers?” he asked.

“Well, for continuity’s sake, I’d say no. But if it makes you feel more comfortable, go for it.”

After a brief conversation with Makkari and Kingo, the cameras were rolling once again. They started over from the beginning, with Makkari asking the questions and Druig speaking and signing his answers. Darcy and Kingo hung back, watching the monitor. Interviews had been a painfully awkward process for Druig, turning minutes into what felt like ages. But with Makkari, the minutes flew by. Before he knew it, they were out of talking points, and Darcy was calling out, “I think we got it! Thanks!”

As they walked away, Druig bumped Makkari’s shoulder in a silent “thanks.” She returned the gesture, and even before turning his head to look at her, Druig knew she was smiling. Of course, the moment was interrupted by Kingo, who had been trailing after them but jogged in front of Makkari to say, “You know, I suggested having you interview him as a joke. I didn’t think they’d actually do it!”

Wow, exploiting our friendship to get in with the higher-ups? Makkari said, her smile turning into a mocking smirk.

“I just said it was a joke!” he responded. But after a moment, he continued, “Do you think Darcy will promote me if I keep giving her ideas?”

“Don’t you have a marketing job to get back to?” Druig interjected.

“Yeah, but—”

I thought you were an aspiring actor, Makkari cut in.

“I’ll have you know I was a featured extra in an episode of Doctor Who, so I’m not aspiring to be an actor; I am an actor! And second, I won’t need a day job if I get a big break here!” The teasing this statement prompted lasted all the way back to the shuttle.

-

Their unusual interview had not gone unnoticed by the others. At dinner, they demanded an explanation, and with the sign competition still going as well, Druig let Makkari tell the story. She did so with plenty of enthusiasm, though he filled in when all three of their friends started to look confused.

So Kingo and I follow Darcy over to where the cameras are set up, and Druig’s standing there moping—

While it may have been true, he had to object to this description. “I was not moping. That’s how I always look.”

You were definitely moping, which is why Darcy turned around and said that I would be the one interviewing Druig, she explained to the group.

“Wow, they’re really putting you and Kingo to work,” Dane responded, signing clumsily where he could.

“Yeah, I feel like you should be getting paid for that,” Sersi added with a grin.

“So why were you moping, Druig? You didn’t do that bad,” Ajak asked.

“No reason, really,” he replied with a shrug. When the others stayed silent and Makkari watched him carefully, he sighed and continued. “I’m just usually good with my flavors, but today, they said my ice cream tasted like bland toothpaste.”

“That was pretty harsh,” Dane conceded.

“I wouldn’t worry about it too much. They loved your mango upside down cake this morning,” Ajak said.

“Thanks, but that would mean more coming from someone who didn’t win the technical,” Druig responded cheekily, causing her to roll her eyes and wave him off in mock exasperation.

“I’m with Ajak. You shouldn’t beat yourself up about it. Mint is always tricky to balance,” Sersi interjected.

“Thank you, Sersi.”

“Speaking of winners, did you pick one for the other competition? I’m assuming it’s not me,” Dane asked.

Oh yes, a winner was chosen hours ago, Makkari replied with a smirk.

“Well, who is it?” Ajak demanded.

“After much deliberation, the winner is… Karun!” Druig joked, which elicited groans from Ajak and Sersi and giggles from Makkari. Once she had gathered herself again, Makkari announced, The winner is Sersi!

Sersi seemed genuinely surprised, even as Dane and Druig offered their congratulations. Ajak, however, was not readily accepting of this outcome.

“I demand a redo! Do I not know more signs than Sersi?” she asked.

“Yeah, I’m confused,” Sersi agreed.

The rules were whoever learns the most sign language in a week wins. Ajak may know more, but she had a head start. Sersi has come much further in a week, Makkari explained. Besides, Ajak’s definitely going to get Star Baker this week, so she doesn’t need the win.

While it still took some convincing, Ajak eventually conceded victory to Sersi.

-

Congrats to Sersi! 🎉🎉🎉Hm, our group is getting a bit small, though, isn't it? Hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Part 13

[snwusberry]

warning(s): none

prev | masterlist | next

THIS IS FICTION AND DOESN'T DEPICT THE ACTUAL PEOPLE IRL

beomgyu's point of view

poor kaya is absolutely clueless of everything. she came back from her parents' house talking about some 'yeosang is going to vagas with the boys'

the boys being san, wooyoung and seonghwa. at least one sane one is there but judging how he is around them... i still have zero faith in this little sting operation.

"no offense but your brother is an idiot." taehyun tells me from his seat next to kai.

"please say that to his face with all the offense possible." i sigh. no i'm still not over this. "i mean, i would've been engaged by now, hmm? kaya would be wearing her customised ring and all would be fine but here i am thinking of ways to get her another ring. it won't have as much meaning but as long ad i propose to the woman i love most right?" haha... right?

"gyu are you crying?" kai loudly asks.

"don't be ridiculous."

"you're totally crying."

"i'm not. the dust level in here is high." i tell him, brushing him off.

"oh my apologies..."

we turn to the owner of the voice, not really expecting anyone else to be here other the three of us and there stands soobin with a feather duster in hand.

"mom was talking about this vase and how no one cleans it so, you know, i decided to, well, clean it." he sheepishly smiles.

"don't fucking lie, you wanted to listen in!" jongho shouts from the other room and we turn back to soobin.

"i'll go."

"wait. i need another opinion and i can't ask yeonjun because he's out with minji and i cant ask jongho because he's... jongho, you know."

"i heard that asshole!"

"i'm glad to be your third choice." he says walking in to sit down.

"it's a pleasure. i'm going through the motions for real."

"the ring?" he asks and i nod.

"san is going back to vagas to go look for the man who won the ring."

"and if he's not in the city?" he questions.

that's what i said...

"then he'll search the country."

"if he fled?" that's literally what i said...

"he'll scour around."

"and what if he's dead?" HE'S IN MY HEAD because i said the exact same thing.

"i don't know man. i'm tired of being mad at him, you know."

"then don't." taehyun interjects and i throw a cushion at him.

"stay out of it."

"it's his family's heirloom..." kai tells me and i pause.

"it is, isn't it?" taehyun raises his hands in surrender. "look i'm sorry about... lashing out. i won't use stress as an excuse so, i'm sorry. and also for the whole ring situation. i know saying that won't bring it back or anything but i feel terrible about it being lost because of my brother's carelessness. i don't even think he'll find the man, it's been two-three days and he probably knows he won't find it but he'll still go out there because he feels bad. i just... wanted this to be a special christmas for kaya and here i am with a lost ring and no back bone to tell your parents about everything. yeosang was probably right-"

i'm cut off with a loud yawn coming from soobin. way to ruin my pity party.

" i was having an emotional monolog here..." i tell him, turning to him with a raised eyebrow.

"beomgyu, yeosang wasn't saying all that shit because he meant it, granted, he wasn't wrong-" taehyun cuts in.

"hey!!"

"bottom line is, he knows you're gonna take care of kaya. he's known that from the start. he, just like me, was just keeping kaya's best interest in mind. we're her brothers, of course we'd have a lot to say. what i'm saying is, don't beat yourself up over this. you can still make this christmas special for her." taehyun adds, putting a hand on my shoulder.

they gave me a hard time when i first revealed my feelings for kaya to them. i mean, they had a field day not only teasing me about it but also talking shit about me to her. it was all in good fun, of course.

"group hug!!" kai yells out of nowhere and before i can even get a word out they've all come enveloping me in a group hug.

"thanks guys." i tell them, voice muffled and everything.

"it's a pleasure."

"i love you guys." we all pull apart, turning to the intruder in confusion. "what? a man can't love his brethren anymore? jeez." jongho says, walking away.

"is he okay?" kai asks and we just shrug.

who knows what goes on in his head.

"guess who's back family!!"

well hayoon and yeonjun are back. happily married couple with their happy little family.

"we brought gifts!!" yeonjun who had his perfect little engagemen-

"what did you bring us?" kai asks and yeonjun scans him up and down.

"no one told me we had extra mouths to feed. what a surprise."

" no need to be petty, we were on our way anyway." taehyun says, dragging kai along with him.

"okay first of all, not cool." hayoon tells yeonjun and he shrugs. "where's kaya?" she asks at not seeing her in the room with us.

"running errands with mom." i tell her and she nods.

"she's never here." she wipes a fake tear from her face.

"yeah seems like every december we never get to spend time with our partners!" yeonjun says out loud and earns a knock on the head from hayoon. "i mean, of course you'd all wanna catch up with each other and all that fun stuff right?"

i roll my eyes.

kaya's point of view

so like... we weren't supposed to get this much stuff. like at all but we got carried away shopping for this whole secret santa thing. i ain't forget.

so we're sitting in a café to warm up amd refuel, charge our phones eat...

"ma."

"hmm?"

"is it just me or is beomgyu avoiding me?" i ask her and she looks up from her phone to look at me in confusion.

"what do you mean?"

"we got here this week, everything was fine the day we arrived but then two days ago, he started acting different."

"different how my dear?"

"you know, like, distant, avoidant just overall different..." i trail off but then gasp almost a second later. "did he see bis childhood crush while i was out with the girls?"

"don't be ridiculous kaya. even if he did, he's long over her." she explains and i shrink in my seat. "as for how he's acting, you should really tell him this. you know, like what if he's not doing it on purpose? if that doesn't work then i'll drag him by the washing-"

"ma..." i cut her off, laughing at the image of her dragging a grown man by the sweater. "that won't be necessary. i'll talk to him." i reassure her.

it can't be anything too serious right? he wouldn't bring me here if he was planning on ending it so i don't have to worry about that...

"hmm washing, remember." she says, probably sensing my distant behavior.

"yes washing." i laugh.

[nateberry]

I saw the GBBO s’mores episode before I knew there was a whole thing here about it and I don’t understand why people are mad at eachother over this but let me try to clear up some things as someone who was very much unhappy about it (in a ‘wtf is that’ way and not a ‘I’m genuinely pissed’ way) I’m gonna preface this by saying that I’m a Latino American, I know what digestives are, and I know how it is to have people completely misrepresent or interpret things that are culturally relevant to me. (Disclaimer I know I’m literally gonna talk about the misspellings from the op’s rant but if this post itself has typos I apologize, it’s ten to 5am right now and I’m actively choosing not to sleep and instead to write this thing. So essentially if there are typos, I usually know better and if you see them no you don’t <3)

Anyways, the main things I keep seeing are about the digestives, the misspellings in that one post, and the judging criteria. This isn’t going to be organized because it’s 4 am, but I’m gonna just briefly talk about that last one first: they absolutely DID knock of points for messy and gooey s’mores. They absolutely should NOT have, that was weird. The mallow to cracker and chocolate ratio was fucked, too. OH AND ANOTHER THING…THEY KNOCKED OFF POINTS FOR BURNED MALLOWS? WRONG. INCORRECT.

As for the digestives, yes, you’re so right about Graham crackers not being a thing over in the UK - but this is a baking show! They could have either made the crackers or not outright said they were American s’mores. Digestives aren’t right for American s’mores and the insinuation that they are makes me want to eat concrete they taste NOTHING alike. Even them making cookie with the same ingredients or shape would have been better than what they ended up doing.

The misspellings part isn’t that big of a deal, a lot of knock-off brands use -mellow instead of -mallow, and same goes for weird spellings of Graham (including gram). But even if that wasn’t the case, who cares. I’m sure there are so many spelling issues in this post because I’m writing this instead of getting the sleep I probably need, and I refuse to think anyone on this site is completely functional when they’re tying a post.

But my BIGGEST issue with all this? I came on this silly site to see if anyone else was pissed about this and see stupid people making the lamest takes. Yeah, the Mexican week sucked ass! Yeah, the British aren’t gonna have the right pre-made ingredients for American s’mores! But why does that translate to a genuine dunk on the US or those not-so-seriously upset about the whole s’mores thing? Like that’s lame as hell, have you seen those definitely Not S’mores? You gotta admit they look goofy as shit and were made specifically to look more classy than they were. The dude’s whose s’mores were all messed up and melting everywhere should have won because it WAS the closest to the real thing.

Ok that’s all enough about these weird s’mores I’m going to bed bye bye

[tutuandscoot]

i was thinking back to when they won the Olympics in 2010 in Vancouver…i still cant believe what they did and how they skated so beautifully ❤️

It gets even harder to believe when you think how much T was in pain and how much rehabilitation she was still doing every day for her legs… The thing that makes me extremely angry is that she has undergone the anti-doping procedure (which obviously turned out to be negative!!!!), while lately it seems that no one cared about this aspect even in situations where the athlete is not suffering the same excruciating pains she had, but taking drugs only to improve performance.

I believe that the fact that she has refused any drug that could even be minimally suspicious, the tenacity and trained conquest, the strength and constancy with which she has done all the rehabilitation and physiotherapy, are witnesses of what a terrific athlete she was and she will be in the following years!

THIS TAKE!

Yes!!!

They would’ve undergone several anti-doping tests in their careers and on no planet would they ever consider PEDs to get an advantage-let alone pain relief. They’ve always believed in clean sport and the ethics of fair play. When they were beat they acknowledged that they weren’t the best on that day and when they won it’s because they were the best and they worked harder than anyone for it. Even when there was obvious judging ‘incidents’ they decided not to focus on it and only focus on themselves. They could’ve fought for an investigation into the sochi saga (there was certainly grounds for it considering what came out later about the doping) but they didn’t. They came back to competition with a team behind them pushing them holistically and scientifically to be their best and they blew the competition out of the water even with two years off. The people they are, the values they hold true means they do not need to and would not ‘cheat’ to win. That should be the same for every athlete but as we all know it’s not. Whether it’s a personal decision to dope or forced by coaches or even a federation of a country.. this does not make for formidable, champion athletes in the way TS are through pure determination and togetherness.

Tessa Virtue deserves literally every wonderful thing that happens to her in this life. She has had one of the hardest journeys any athlete could have and through it ALL she smiled and entertained us and was the most caring and loving friend to her partner- lifting him up when he was struggling, skating and training through pain for the sake of not her own, but her partner’s career. He stuck by her side though all of it and every negative she or someone said or thought about her, he lifted her even higher up on a pedestal for her to shine brighter than the sun. The idea of her starving herself of pain relief so as not to inadvertently trigger an accidental positive test from a drug she thought was safe but wasn’t, surgeries that didn’t work, hours of physio.. all of that, anything just to get enough relief to get her through a day, a session, a gold medal- historic performance on the biggest stage in the world. Risking destroying not her own career, but Scott’s.. it’s something she couldn’t live with, depriving herself of potential, even brief relief at the risk of his career.. no effing way.

I can’t think of two people more inspirational in the simple fact of just being good, kind humans striving for a goal, no matter how personal or world-altering, maintaining their moral compass and being ambassadors for their country, who had nothing but love and admiration for eachother since the moment they first held hands.

[allinmycorner]

It was the semi-finals on Dancing With the Stars! We're now just one show away from crowning a winner! It's amazing how fast the time passes, isn't it?

Each of our semi-finalists had to dance twice during the show. They had to perform one unlearned ballroom dance and one unlearned Latin dance. It was just each couple both times - no relays, no marathons, no teams. Just them doing everything they could to make it into the finals.

We got two big announcements this week! The first is that Witney is pregnant with baby number two! Congratulations to her and her family!

The other announcement is that Len will be leaving Dancing With the Stars after this season, so the finale will be his last show. He said he wanted to spend more time with his grandchildren and family. I can also imagine the trips back and forth between the UK and the US are starting to take its toll. This is a bit sad as the core group of judges on this show has been the same for its run so far so it will be weird to not see Len on the show - they still incorporated him even when COVID restrictions kept him away back in 2020. We will miss Len and will never forget him. Thank you, Len, for everything and I wish you the best in your next chapter.

So outside those two announcements, how did the rest of the show go? Let's take a look!

Trevor and Emma: I'm going to miss seeing Trevor on my screen week in and week out. If I'm grateful for anything this season, it's that I was introduced to him. He did his best in both his cha-cha and Viennese waltz but his scores and the votes just weren't there. But if you told me the actor who said he had a literal phobia of dance would make it to the semifinals, I would've thought you were crazy. I've enjoyed watching his journey and know there are great things in his future as well.

Daniel and Britt: I wondered if maybe Daniel would get into the finals. He's also had an incredible journey but Shangela just had a smoother upward trajectory. But Daniel's Viennese waltz and samba were two great routines and he can look back on his entire DWTS journey with pride. His routine last week will be one people will talk about for years to come. So thank you for being you, Daniel. I can't wait to see what you do next.

Charli and Mark: Charli was a lock for the finals. She's been consistent throughout the series and has gotten better as Mark pushed her with more challenging routines. Her Viennese waltz and paso doble were no different. One of the judges even said she looked like a professional ballroom dancer. Maybe Charli will have a second career as a ballroom dancer. Who knows? But she could be hoisting the mirrorball trophy by the end of the finals so that could be a big help if so.

Gabby and Val: Gabby addressed the end of her engagement and relationship. She said she and her ex-fiancé were just not in step like she thought they were and that she was still holding out hope to find her right partner. It led perfectly into her waltz. And then she also slayed with her paso doble, managing to look very serious despite being a rather fun-loving person. She was another lock for the finals and could also be holding the mirrorball trophy. Bachelorettes have won before and we should never underestimate the power of Bachelor Nation. It may come down to them over Charli's fanbase. We'll see.

Shangela and Gleb: There was a moment during the judges' deliberation where I worried that Shangela wouldn't get into the finals as she was up against Daniel. But her overall performance this season got her into the finals as much as her elegant Viennese waltz and fiery paso doble. Shangela, to me, is the epitome of this contest. She came in and was good but not great. And so she kept working until she pulled away from the pack and became great. While I don't think she'll hoist the mirrorball trophy, she will always be my Season 31 champion.

Wayne and Witney: Wayne didn't get perfect scores tonight but he still some high scores, though he tied with Shangela. Even still, I knew he was a lock for the finals. He had a few missteps during both his paso and his Viennese waltz. But I think he will knock his freestyle out of the park and that could boost him to the win.

So our final four are set. I really can't guess who will hoist the mirrorball trophy beyond my gut feeling that it won't be Shangela. We'll just have to see what the finale has in store for us.

See you then!

[avoutput]

The One That Surprises You || How High We Go In The Dark

I read in spurts. I will do 10 or 15 books in a year for a few years, then none for a few years. I have been in a slump post college. I tend to think of “reading books” as reading Fiction. In the world of Non-Fiction, I mostly read about the American experience, with a focus on Economics and, independent of that, Black and minority lives. Reading Non-Fiction is study, reading fiction is a mixture of all facets of life, of various levels of pleasure and analysis, of the subject and ourselves. When I read Fiction, a film plays in my head. I even read the book as if narrated by a disconnected voice of authority, the characters slowly coming to life as amalgamations of my favorite actors, their voices ranging from classic characters like Sam Malone, Marge Simpson, Darth Vadar, Wednesday Adams, and Spock. The fog in my brain clears and light hits a silver screen, projecting the words of the author turn for turn. That being said, this is my very first book review. I experimented once with music review with The Weeknd’s “Starboy'' and I felt horribly inept at truly understanding what music was trying to accomplish. I fear that this outing might be the same by the end, but in the spirit of the subject of this review, I will tread foriegn ground for, if no one else, myself. “How High We Go In The Dark'' by Sequoia Nagamatsu took hold of me in a way that I have never found in modern literature, and I want to warn you that it isn’t for the faint of heart, but that it is also for people whom’s heart is weakened and needs to grow three sizes.

I am a man that loves nothing more than an introduction. I think context is important, and as such, I want my readers to understand how I came across this literary find. In an effort to help a friend, my group of do gooders started a book club. We decided that each person would submit a book and we would vote on the winner. It should come as no surprise that the person who this was supposed to help never actually won the vote, which is to say, we did our best. Despite that, on our third book this year, the winner ended up not liking their own choice, “Age of Cage: Four Decades of Hollywood Through One Singular Career” by Keith Phillips, and vetoed the book half way, which started a whole new round of voting. In turn, she offered up the subject of our review. Now, I voted for this book knowing only the cover of the book, the author’s name, and its title. I literally judged a book by its cover and little else. I had decided, despite all reason, that my friends were worthy candidates of my entire trust and simply have not read the synopsis to any book I have voted on thus far, which is the “American Way”, for never better and always worse. The exception being in trivial matters like book clubs. Personally, I chose this book because the writer’s name shared reference to a grand tree. Little did I know I would be walking into one of the fastest page turners I had read in years. It may have well read itself.

You can put down your aperitif, it's time for the main course. To continue to write this book’s praises, I should first give you a brief outline. The story revolves around a pandemic that initially attacks the lives of children predominantly, but evolves in waves that ripple out into the entire population of Earth, leading to a change that affects the course of humanity for millenia to come. Uncharacteristically for science fiction, this story is driven entirely by the humans that are actually living (and dying) in this world. The narrative structure is entirely in the perspective of the people experiencing it. It is a first-person perspective of the ingenuity and tenacity of the human spirit during the darkest hours. Reading what I just wrote, I am not sure that I would have read this book knowing what it was about, but I hope you will look past my inability to describe this book from a bird’s eye view any better than this. It's possible I have betrayed the very thing that made this book stand out for me personally, the sheer surprise of it. There is much more in its pages, but it begs to be read to be understood. 

I hate to say that I have more concrete examples of what I don’t like about the book than what I do, but to tell you more would be to ruin the experience it provides. Nagamatsu has a style in this book that is so tender, raw, and visceral, you will wonder how someone can speak so universally about the human experience, but be so pointed as to tell a singular experience that is likely completely foreign to the reader. You feel like a spy in a life not your own, but come out the other end calling them your family; reminding you of your mom, dad, uncle, aunt, brother, or sister. Nagamatsu’s strength is in disarming you, alarming you, disturbing you, and comforting you. You will grow by the end of this book, and it's not even “Self-Help”.

Before we get to my general criticisms of the story, I do have one more major praise. I am not Asian or Asian-American, but I really appreciated that many of the characters expressed their disdain when considering living up to stereotypes or their parents expectations. The story focuses on how we pass the torch from generation to generation and how we are often burned by the passing of the baton. I am mixed race, but specifically appear Black (or really any version of Brown and have been mistaken for Egyptian, Iranian, and Puerto Rican in the same day), and living up to both White and Black expectations has always been somewhat of a burden, easier to handle as I have gotten older and more sure of myself, but I still feel pangs of what Nagamatsu’s characters express. To be clear, this isn’t done in a heavy handed way, it’s woven into the story along with all sorts of other aspects to their characters, and it feels done rather deftly. 

Now for our dish best served cold, the critique. Truthfully, I have very few bad things to say that aren’t simply personal taste. As I said, the book was easy to swallow and had me coming back for more. However, what had me coming back was something that ultimately went unsatisfied. Chapter after chapter, there is this lingering sense that you are about to stumble into a true adventure, something that will dazzle you; that the characters are one step away from taking on challenges like Indiana Jones or John-Luc Picard. This may be where going into the book blind led me, rapidly lapping up everything in the book, only to be left thirsty afterwards. Is that the mark of a good book? I can only say that its final pages left me without wanting, happy that I found the bottom of the glass. Because at the end, I realized I wasn’t reading the book I always thought it would become, no matter how close to the end I would get. It was like I was under a spell that was removed only when I finished the book. I am not unhappy, but I still wish the book had turned down those adventurous alleys. For instance, the opening chapter shares a very similar tone to John Carpenter’s “The Thing”, and when the chapter was over, and I returned the following day to read the next, I was shocked that we were going a different way. And this continues to happen, over and over, but I still wanted more.

My final thoughts you may want to skip, as I fear it might give away too much, but personally, this did annoy me. Each chapter leads into the next, often indirectly, but leaving behind breadcrumbs for past or future characters to come. It is almost a series of short stories all told in the same universe. However, because the book is largely in first-person, the characters begin chapters using “I” statements and often takes several pages to even learn who is talking, and thus obscures the connective thread from characters in previous chapters until it almost feels silly that you didn’t see it. I wanted the chapter title to simply say who is talking, right beneath it. I just wanted to escape this nagging feeling like I was missing something in plain sight, or that should be in plain sight.

I apologize for being vague, but I do think that this book is best read to be understood. It feels like a monumental feat somehow, like I hadn’t experienced literature in a long time, or at the very least, in my time. All the great books seemed to have come out before I existed, and the ones that have come out since then, maybe I have never fully trusted. In being surprised by “How High We Go In The Dark'', I feel like I can open up to more modern literature, maybe take the practice of “reading books” seriously again. I either have always read for fun or to be moved; reading something superfluous or reading something serious. I haven’t taken Fiction books seriously because the ones I tend to read aren’t trying to move the reader in any obvious way. I have always left that work up to Non-Fiction. Sequoia Nagamatsu may not be the first or the best in this genre or with this type of literature, but he is the first to make me feel this way, and it never would have happened unless I had been willing to be surprised. To go where I hadn’t gone before. It also wouldn’t have happened if he was any less of a writer, so to that end, I would like to thank him. Do yourself a favor, reader, and challenge yourself to this book. It is often sad, heartbreaking, and scary, but more than anything, it is boundlessly hopeful.  

[icanseethefuture333]

your tarot reading for olivia and taylor was honestly disappointing to read, it's very obvious that you are biased negatively towards olivia... i mean, she was 17 when it happened after years of idolising her favourite singer... you're not a reliable reader, you let your bias show so strongly. really disappointing and low

If y'all don't get out my damn inbox with this shit. IDGAF! I've been nice and I clarified the first time, but now I am pissed off. If you wanna be bold and slander my character, then come off anon and do it. I have been doing readings since I was 17. That's 5 years of practice!!! The anon asked a question and I did the reading, plain and simple. If you have such a problem with it then take it up with them. It is so convenient for people to attack tarot readers when they are literally bending over backwards everyday to entertain your ungrateful asses with little to no pay. From PACs to personal free readings to celebrity readings, etc, but you think that these two people, out of multiple other celebrities that I have asks for, that I still need to do - You think I have time to be "biased"??? The fucking audacity. I'm gonna say this one time and one time only. I am not a fan of Taylor or Olivia. I don't care what they do and I don't follow them. Check my tags. Check my blog. Neither of them, are going to be present here. Even if I am not their supporter, does not mean I would slander their character. In the reading I did not take sides. If anyone had something stolen from their art and received justice, I am obviously going to say "good for them", regardless of who it is. I didn't even listen to either of the songs till recently! My opinion or your opinion doesn't matter. Taylor won the court case and got credited on "Deja Vu". This isn't just a fued, it's legality. Some people think they sound similar, others do not, but at the end of the day there are people who work in that industry that can tell what sample, beat, or melody that needs to be given credit for. You can also be mad at the judge for being in favor of Taylor, idk maybe they were a swiftie 🤷🏽‍♀️.

Also anon, you're literally a liar and got your facts wrong. "Deja Vu" came out April 2021 and Olivia was 18 years old, not 17. Her birthday is in February, so that made the release 2 months after her 18th birthday. When you are in business and you sign a contract, also writing music, that is your responsibility to make sure things are credited. I even said that it was sad what Olivia and Taylor went through in the reading, so unless you lack reading comprehension, that is not my issue. Even though I felt bad, I am also going to criticize her on lack of ability to give credit because she's an adult! She is not a child. (Also I am two years older than her... so what was the goal of you bringing up her age anyways? 💀)

What comes out in the cards, is what fucking comes out. Period. Even if I am asked about celebrities I don't care for, that I have no interest in, or strongly dislike, I answer the question with grace but I also will not sugarcoat things for anybody. Every reading I do is purely for entertainment and if you are not being entertained, then you don't have to like it. It doesn't resonate with you and that is fine. My job is to interpret the messages that come through. It's literally nothing set in stone, but if you're gonna be this butt hurt at people - when these people don't even know your existence, then I got news for you, your life is gonna be really hard for you out in the real world. Get out your feelings and stop disrespecting people in defense of your celebrities who wouldn't even bat an eyelash at any this, GROW UP! Fans and their parasocial relationships with celebrities is so toxic its ridiculous. I am not a perfect person but don't treat me like shit and accuse me of being biased or say I am "unreliable", when there are awful tarot readers out there who don't show what cards they use, don't even shuffle on camera, invasively dive into people's traumas, sexualize minors, and more, but you're pressed about a reading of a court case that happened this year. Whatever, anon, go find peace and stop disturbing mine.

[drewexe]

Tulips and Lilac

Pairing: hyunjin x fem!reader

Genre: fluff, smut

Word Count: 7300ish

Includes: a coffee date with hyunjin; cameo by barista!felix; mc being less stuck up but kinda petty; hyunjin painting; flower language (worry not, the meanings intended are explained); smut includes: handjob, fingering, riding, some sprinkled in praise kink, choking but not of the mc this time, face sitting; unprotected sex; experimental bottom hyunjin because i said so, plus it has already been set up in pt.1 so you cannot judge me; overall, they’re in love, your honor

Summary: the fateful party is already in the past, but you and hyunjin have a new game to play; and he's dead set on winning this one, even though he's perhaps already won; pt. 2 to Fairy Lights

Author's note: the day has come! disclaimer: this part is a lot softer and more sentimental (hence included fluff as a genre) but i hope that it won't stop you from loving it as much as you did the first one; to anyone stumbling here for the first time, i do recommend reading fairy lights first; but enough stalling, this one is already long past overdue so enjoy <3 ps. i am kinda in love w the barista!felix concept so i might write a lil spin-off w it

It had been over two weeks since the infamous party. You’d left Hyunjin’s house that night, your number saved in his phone and a promise that he’ll call you as soon as he can to set up a date with you. But there had been no word from him. In all honesty, you were starting to think that he had just been talking shit the last time to make you like him more so that he could stroke his own ego and didn’t intend on ever calling you again.

And so you were getting angry at him again. It’s not like you would die without him in your life, even though if you had to be honest (which you didn’t think was the case) you did want to see him again. But he didn’t owe you anything, he had already achieved what he wanted last time. He didn’t have to go off his way to mislead you.

And you’d seen him a few times on campus. Obviously always surrounded by people, but if he wanted to, he could always find a second to say hi, right? Even a wave in your direction would have been fine. But he had pretended not to see you… You were offended, and a little bit hurt.

You’d basically stopped expecting that call to come so when your phone rang this afternoon, you didn’t think it would be him as you hit pause on the youtube video you were watching and picked up.

“Hey, princess,” Hyunjin’s voice came from the tiny speaker.

“Well shit, you do remember I exist,” you said, raising your eyebrows in surprise.

“Aww, were you impatient to hear from me again so soon?” he teased and if you weren’t upset with him, you probably would have made a joke.

“No, it’s just that someone seemed pretty insistent that I give him a chance and then literally ghosted me,” you rolled your eyes instead, your annoyance slipping in your voice.

“So what I’m getting is that you were looking forward to seeing me.” You could hear the grin in his voice. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you waiting like this,” he added, perhaps realizing that your silence meant that you weren’t having fun. He did sound genuine on that one, surprisingly.

“So what do you want?” you asked.

“Well- I thought it was- obvious…” he stumbled a bit over his words. “Unless you’ve changed your mind…” You hadn’t, but the hesitation in his voice made a smile crack on your face.

“I’m really not sure at the moment,” you hummed, as if in deep thought. “Go ahead and I’ll tell you whether I agree after that.”

“So I know it’s a bit last moment, but if you’re free tomorrow afternoon,” he started and you hummed to confirm you’re listening. “I would like to take you on that date we talked about.”

“I need more details, Hyunjin,” you rolled your eyes. “I don’t like not being prepared for stuff.”

“What’s your opinion on coffee shop dates?” he asked, his voice almost shy. As if he was afraid that the wrong step would make you hang up or something. Or maybe that you’d find the idea dumb.

“Fine by me,” you shrugged to yourself. Yet you were smiling, you wouldn’t have guessed that a guy notorious for hookups and no dating would offer something as sweet and innocent as a coffee shop. Plus, in all honesty, you loved the idea. “Where and when?”

“What about 5? And I’ll text you the address,” he offered and you hummed.

“Yeah, sure, that works.” You had to force your voice to not give out your smile.

“Okay, so… see you tomorrow then,” you heard Hyunjin respond and unlike you, he didn’t seem to try to hide his excitement. The thought made your heart flutter a bit.

Yet you couldn’t break your cold mask so quickly, so with one last hum, you hung up. But this time, you didn’t have to wait that long to hear from him again. The promised text message, containing an address not too far away from you, arrived within just a couple of minutes. Your smile couldn’t help but grow as you saved Hyunjin’s number in your contacts list.

-

You’d arrived at the coffee shop 5 minutes too early and you’d almost walked in but then through the glass window, you saw Hyunjin sitting in one of the small booths, looking around in what looked like an anxious manner. So you decided that if you could wait two weeks, he could wait a few more minutes. And so you took a large stroll around until you were sure you were at least 10 minutes late and only then did you head back to the coffee shop. Yeah, okay, you didn’t have a problem admitting that you were a little bit petty.

Hyunjin’s eyes shot up to the door the moment you walked in and relief washed over his face in a soft smile. In the back of your head, you wondered how long he’d been actually waiting there for and if he looked up every time the door opened. You had to push back your smile at the idea of how cute that was actually (and maybe a little bit of guilt over making him wait for you).

“Hey,” he said softly when you walked over to him. “You came.”

“Of course I came,” you rolled your eyes as you took the seat across from him. “Unlike some people, when I say I’ll do something, I don’t make others wait half a month.”

Okay, maybe more than a little petty.

Hyunjin’s soft expression dropped to make way for an eye roll and a scoff.

“You’re still hung up on that? I called you, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, but it’s just kinda weird when you were the one that asked me on a date in the first place,” you crossed your arms as well, raising your chin in a gesture of stubbornness.

“I- I had my reasons, you know,” he muttered, looking away as if suddenly embarrassed.

“Oh really? And what are they?” you narrowed your eyes at him.

“I’ll show you later,” he huffed defensively and you rolled your eyes. “Listen, we’re here so that I can prove to you that I’m not a bad guy, if you’re gonna be prejudiced against me, it’s just not fair.”

You wanted to point out that he had brought this on himself and that you had been prejudiced to begin with, that this was supposed to be a challenge for him, but you decided to let it slide this time.

“Fine, we start clear,” you relaxed your arms and expression. A smile immediately curved his pretty lips and you couldn’t help but mirror it.

“Okay, do you have in mind anything that you want to order or will you trust me with your drink?” he asked and you raised your eyebrows.

“Should I be concerned about the way you worded this question?”

“No, just tell me what to order for you.”

“Uh…” you took a moment just observing him while you thought about it. “I guess I’ll leave it to you, just let me know how much-”

“No, no,” he interrupted you and chuckled. “It’s on me, don’t worry. It’s me that asked you out, wasn’t it? You just sit here on your pretty ass, I’ll be back in a moment.”

You didn’t even get a word about his comment before he was up and headed over to the counter. You watched him as he struck a conversation with the boy at the cash register and raised your eyebrows in question when you saw the barista glance your way and smile widely. He looked away as soon as he realized you were watching.

They spoke for a little more while the boy prepared your drinks and then Hyunjin finally returned.

“So is that guy in any way the reason you decided to bring me here?” you asked the obvious question.

“Who, Felix? He’s one of my best friends, he was just really excited to see you in person, sorry about that,” he chuckled.

“Do you talk to your friends about me?” you asked to tease him, but his direct honest answer caught you off-guard.

“Yes, all the time. They won’t let me see the light of day if I end up screwing this up,” he said as he finally set down in front of you a small paper bag and a cup that looked extremely galaxy-themed, purples and blues mixing with golden flakes and a ton of whipped cream on top. You eyed the drink suspiciously.

“What’s in this?” you asked, glancing at Hyunjin, who’d taken his seat again with a cup of iced coffee in hand.

“No clue," he shrugged. "But trust me, Lix knows what he’s doing, you’ll love it. Plus you get all that magic at discount,” he grinned and you scoffed.

“You live in a fucking four-story house but you take a girl on a date somewhere you can get a discount?”

“Come on, don’t look at it that way,” he whined and a pout curved his lips. “Think of it as… I took you to a date somewhere where I can flex my connections and get us a discount.”

You rolled your eyes, yet a chuckle left your lips despite yourself. You eyed the drink a little longer until you finally felt brave enough to reach over, pick it up and take a sip of it. It was sweet, that was your first thought. Very sweet. But it wasn’t unpleasant. And it left a nice raspberry taste in your mouth. You hummed in approval.

“See? Told you Felix knows,” he grinned. “Try the brownies,” he added, nodding towards the paper bag.

Obediently, you picked up the bag and took out a brownie. And you had to admit, those were some of the most amazing brownies you’d ever had.

“Listen, if your idea of proving to me you’re a good guy is feeding me this, you literally don’t need to say anything else,” you said after finishing the dessert and Hyunjin laughed.

“It was only the first step actually, but I guess you don’t wanna see the rest anymore.”

“Oh, no, of course I do,” you assured him quickly, the corners of your mouth twitching up.

“Okay, well... now that Felix’s brownies have shifted your perspective,” he started, “ready to see why I delayed our date?”

“Please enlighten me,” you hummed. “It better be good.”

“Well, I sure hope you’ll think that it is.” He tried to sound cocky as usual, yet you could see the anxiousness poking through as he reached into the pocket of his coat.

He pulled out his hand a little later, holding a rectangle object about the size of his hand. He set it on the table in front of you and you looked at the pink ribbon, tied around white wrapping paper with small pink dots. You glanced up at Hyunjin again and found him looking at you, bottom lip trapped between his teeth as he sucked on it anxiously.

You picked up the small gift and carefully undid the ribbon. Whatever it was, it was wrapped so carefully you almost felt bad tearing the wrapping paper off. Yet when you saw what was under it, your eyes widened a bit.

“Did you…” you started, warmth bubbling up somewhere deep inside your chest. “Was it you who painted this?”

“Yes,” he exhaled, almost sounding scared to admit it.

You looked at the small acrylic canvas in your hands. On it, in beautiful lilac were painted three roses, interrupted by a few darker spots of purple, violets, you realized. Tiny lilies of the valley lightened the picture here and there. The more you looked at it, the more the painting reminded you of an actual bouquet, a beautiful mix of the different shades of purple, interrupted with white and it took you a moment to find words to speak.

You couldn’t figure out what to say, so you picked up your drink and took a sip of it to stall a little bit. You almost choked on it when he spoke up again.

“I picked the flowers for a reason,” he said softly, a strain in his voice as he looked at you for a sign of recognition.

You could pretend to be oblivious. But the truth is you had always had an interest in flower language and, well… you knew perfectly clear what the bouquet meant as soon as you saw it. It was a love confession - love at first sight was what the lilac roses claimed, the violets told you he was thinking about you affectionately, the lilies of the valley spoke of happiness. It seemed ridiculous given the fact that you’d only met each other once before this. Yet the attention he’d put into it made the words catch in your throat.

“It’s really beautiful,” you whispered, finally looking up at him fully. You didn’t directly acknowledge the meaning behind it. You were a little bit scared. “Thank you.”

Relief seemed to wash over him as you said that, a smile growing on his lips immediately. His shoulders relaxed a bit and he took a sip of his coffee.

“I’m happy you think so.” He didn’t push about the significance either.

“I didn’t know you’re into painting,” you pointed out, fingers gliding gently over the rose petals. “Also, why go through all of this? Flower shops exist, you know.”

“This one’s a little bit more long-lasting than an actual bouquet,” he responded, humming a bit. “And… Well, I actually picked up art as a way to destress from school and everything, but it grew on me quite a lot. I can express myself more freely through it.”

“I see,” you nodded in acknowledgment. “You’re quite good at it.”

A proud grin grew on his face and he leaned back in his seat, licking his lips. He did look smug from your compliment but for once, you were happy to see him so - and you weren’t cruel or petty enough to lie to him about something that clearly meant a lot to him.

“That’s not all of it, you know? I have one more painting for you,” he said, his tone a bit cockier now that you’d shown approval. “But… you’d have to come back to my place for it. It was a little too big for me to bring.”

“Are you serious?” you rolled your eyes, your endearment melting off a little. “If this is just another scheme to get me in your bed-”

“I swear, it’s not,” he rushed to say. You raised your eyebrow at him in doubt. “I’m serious, I have another one to show you, no tricks or anything.”

You smiled. Your statement had been more of a joke but it was still cute how quickly he'd jump to reassure you for the slightest sign of displeasure on your side. You nodded with a sip of your drink.

“You are aware that there are other ways to win a girl over though, right?” you teased him. “As much as I love gifts and free food, you could just help me get to know you better.”

“Well, what do you wanna know then, princess?”

“I don’t know, who is Hyunjin?” you shrugged, gesturing vaguely in his direction. “Who are you besides the pretty face and infuriating smirks? I wouldn’t wanna date a cutout of a human being.”

“I already gave you something,” he chuckled. “Art. Giving you the painting was as much of a gift as it was me letting you into a part of my inner world. It’s your turn now, relationships are a shared effort.”

“You say it as if you’ve already won the game,” you retorted and he rolled his eyes in response. He looked like he didn’t believe for a second there was a chance he’d lose and you hated how right he was about it. You sighed and gave in. “Okay, well, about me… I don’t know, my big passion is flowers, actually” you shot out the first thing that came to your mind, probably because your mind was still stuck on the canvas your fingers were still stroking gently.

“Flowers?” he repeated the word, the corners of his mouth twitching up.

“Yes, flowers,” you huffed, looking away from him. “I like growing pretty colorful flowers in my dorm room, they brighten up the atmosphere and help me distract myself when studying gets too hard or when I am too stressed from life. I like how some of them are easy to grow and some are a challenge to take care of, I like how I can talk to them and they won’t judge me, and I think it’s beautiful that each of them can mean something unique.”

“So did you know what I was trying to say with those then?” he asked, his voice a hint more serious, and your eyes shot back at him. You’d let it slip your mind and mouth for a second there. You could try to lie that just because you appreciated that flowers had meanings, didn’t mean that you knew what they were.

But that would mean lying to him. It was one thing to keep quiet about knowing and entirely different to straight out deny it.

“Yes, I did,” you admitted. “But you and I both know that it’s…”

“It’s what?” he asked. “I don’t believe that you would think it’s stupid; it’s not like we’re having a forbidden affair, so it can’t be wrong. And if you try to tell me that it’s too soon…” Apparently, he saw on your face a sign that this was precisely what you meant. “So what if it is? Why does that matter so much? I know that I like you, that thinking of you this past couple of weeks made me happy, that creating something for you and planning this date made me happy. If you like me too, I literally don’t see the problem. No one says that you’ll be stuck with me forever if you decide you don’t really like me anymore. What are you scared of? Be with me, in the here and now. Let me be yours.”

You stared at him for a short while.

“Gosh, you’re so dramatic,” you rolled your eyes jokingly in the end, an attempt to hide how much his little monologue had stirred your emotions. “Fine! Fine, you win! Happy?”

Your annoyed tone was, obviously, just a mask, hiding how nervous you were from the prospect of jumping headfirst into a relationship with him, so quickly. But... In the end, you figured that being reckless once in your life wouldn’t be the end of the world. Hopefully, you wouldn’t come to regret it.

The smile on his face was enough to make your worry dissipate a little as he reached over to take your hand and intertwined his fingers with yours over the table. You looked away, taking a long sip of your sweet drink. When you looked back at him a second later, he was still watching you.

“What is it? Am I that enchanting now?” you asked, raising your eyebrows. The intensity of his gaze was overwhelming.

“No need to sound so condescending,” he chuckled. “Let a man in love be a man in love.”

You rolled your eyes at him but didn’t pull your hand away from his. But after his little ‘outburst’, your conversation started going smoother. He seemed to be more at ease now that you had officially accepted him and, well, it was making you more at ease as well.

You had probably overstayed your welcome in the coffee shop since the sun was already setting down and both your cups had been visibly empty for a while before either of you mentioned leaving, but perhaps the Felix kid had insisted that no one interrupts you. In the end, it was Hyunjin who brought up the idea of leaving.

“So, you remember how I said there’s one more thing I’d like to show you?” he asked and you nodded. “If you’d like, I can, like, take you now?”

It was a suggestion more than anything, you could say no and leave it for another day. But your interest had been piqued and so you nodded in confirmation. Hyunjin smiled at that, quickly discarding your empty cups before offering you his hand. You placed your hand in his and once again, he intertwined your fingers as he led you out of the coffee shop.

You took a taxi over to his house. It hadn’t been that long since you were last here, but in the late afternoon sun, no party or loud music, and no large crowd of people taking up most of the space, it felt different. It felt lonely.

“How do you live here alone all the time?” you asked him. You couldn’t imagine having to share all this space with nothing but silence.

“I like being alone but it does get a bit hard sometimes,” he admitted, but his smile didn’t falter as he looked at you. “I wanted to get a small apartment or something, but my parents insisted that I should go as big as possible. But that’s the reason I throw my parties, honestly - at least I am using up the space here.”

“Well, I’m just one person and I wouldn’t take up nearly as much space as a party but,” you hummed, “I don’t mind dropping by to entertain you from time to time.”

“To entertain me, huh?” he smirked and you rolled your eyes, hitting his arm.

“Get your head out of the gutter, I’m trying to say something sweet to you. Plus, I'm still waiting to see that other painting you mentioned.”

“Yes, yes,” he sighed and shook his head. “Right this way.” As he led you, he added quietly “And just to be clear, I’d easily never throw a party again if I could just see you every day instead.” You felt your stomach twist and you squeezed his hand in yours.

You already knew where his room was, but once again, it felt different. There were no people watching you, the only person whose attention was on you was Hyunjin. He opened the door of his room for you and you walked in.

This time the place was tidied up. Your eyes scanned over the room before you threw him a teasing glance, earning a roll of his eyes in response. Then you took a second look and noticed the easel stand in one of the corners. There was a large canvas placed on it, covered with a white sheet.

“Is this it?” you asked curiously as you walked closer.

“Yeah,” he hummed, following you. All of a sudden you could see the anxiety from earlier making an appearance again. You tilted your head in question. He took a deep breath before speaking up again, “Okay, so… Thinking back, I should have probably asked if you’re okay with it before making this, but…”

“You… should have asked?” you furrowed your eyebrows in confusion.

“Yeah, uh… you’ll see what I mean, but… promise me you won’t get mad at me, please.”

“I mean, the worst that could happen is me walking out of here as soon as I see it and never speaking to you again,” you joked but the smile on his face was not nearly as amused as it was anxious.

“See, that’s exactly what I don’t want to happen,” he forced a laugh. “I barely convinced you that you should give me a chance, I don’t wanna blow it five minutes later.”

“Hyunjin, it’s fine,” you sighed, stepping closer to him as you looked into his eyes. It would take honesty out of you to reassure him, it seemed. “Even if what I see under that sheet upsets me, you’ll still get the chance to explain it and apologize, okay? Even if I don’t seem like it, I want this to work out as much as you do. So quit stalling and show me what you created, mkay?” He still seemed hesitant so you leaned up a bit to peck his lips. He looked at you in surprise. “Here’s your promise,” you said. “Now get moving.”

And finally, he did. He walked over to the stand and pulled the sheet away. It took you a while to fully realize what you were seeing. The painting represented the upper naked body of a woman, curved sexually. Taking a closer look at the face, you realized that it was you on that canvas. Your mouth was open and your expression twisted in what you assumed was how you looked when you moaned. No, actually, it was how you looked. Hyunjin had made sure that you knew it. Your hair was messed up. Around your waist were scattered red tulips. The background was a shade of red a little bit darker than the tulips, contrasting against your body. And on the top of the painting, little yellow dots brightened everything with a soft glow. The fairy lights, you realized, your eyes jumping over to the real ones for a second.

It took you a while to find your words again. The painting was beautiful. As promiscuous as it was, it was beautiful. It depicted you as something divine in your pleasure. It was like every stroke of his brush had meant to worship you. The red tulips both deepened the impression of lust and somehow softened it.

“Well I don’t know what I was expecting but it wasn’t this for sure,” you said finally.

“You hate it,” he mumbled, sounding almost defeated. You turned to look at him immediately.

“No, no!” you rushed to say. He obviously didn’t believe you so you sighed and moved to stand in front of him. “Hyunjin, look at me,” you insisted, cupping his cheeks in your hands so he wouldn’t avoid your eyes. “It is beautiful. You drew me naked without asking, yeah-”

“I’m so sorry, I really am,” he interrupted you and you shushed him.

“Accepted. But let me finish,” you chuckled. “If that painting shows how you see me… how can I stay mad at you for it?”

He looked like he didn’t believe what you were saying. You shook your head and wrapped your arms around his neck. His hands were hot as they wrapped around your waist and you hummed.

“So… you don’t hate it?” A shy smile dared to curve the corners of his lips. You shook your head.

“No, of course, I don’t hate it. And the fact that you drew it by memory…” you bit your lips. “Just ask me next time you wanna do that, okay?”

“Oh? I’m allowed to do it again?” he smirked teasingly. He was still hesitant, yet it seemed like he was starting to believe that he wasn’t in trouble.

You rolled your eyes instead of replying. You pushed him back so he’d sit on his bed and climbed in his lap, gently pushing your hand in his hair. He raised his eyebrows and looked at you expectantly, tongue darting over his lips.

“Tell me something,” you started, “how needy were you exactly when you decided to paint that?”

“Very,” he exhaled and his breath hit your lips. You chuckled. “I’ve been thinking about you so much, you have no idea…”

“Then why did you take so long to call me, hm?” your tone was teasing as your hand moved down from his hair to the side of his neck. Last time, he’d claimed it was all about you. This time, you wanted to see how far you could push him.

“I wanted-” he took a moment to form his sentence. “I wanted to be able to show it to you, but… I kept losing focus every time I started working on it. But calling you just to hook up didn’t feel right…”

“Poor thing,” you hummed, smiling a bit. “You deserve a reward for the hard work, don’t you?”

“Princess, I didn’t-” he started but you pecked his lips to shush him.

“I know you didn’t. And if you say that we don’t have to, I know that too,” you chuckled. “But I’ve been waiting, you know? I want to. So tell me what you want, hm?”

“Anything you’re willing to give,” he smiled softly.

You rolled your hips as you leaned down and crashed your lips against his. He let out a quiet groan and you deepened the kiss, pressing as close to him as you could. Your body was already heating up as you realized how much you’d missed his kisses. Judging by the way his hands grasped you frantically, he’d been impatient too. It wasn’t long until a bulge pressing against your thigh proved it as well.

You smirked against his lips and your hand slowly made its way down his body. You shifted slightly as you squeezed him through the pants and he pulled away from you to let out a moan. It was exhilarating how easily vocal he was, but you shushed him and kissed him again.

Somehow you managed to unbutton his pants with one hand and then sneak the hand inside his underwear, stroking his length slowly. You could feel how much effort it took for him to keep kissing you as he felt your touch on his bare skin and you couldn’t help but pull away to praise him.

“You’re so pretty like this, Jinnie,” you mumbled and he whimpered in response. “Is it hard to keep quiet?” He nodded vigorously at that.

“I’ve been- I’ve imagined this so many times in the past two weeks, I can’t- I’m sorry-” He was almost rambling, breathless and strained, and if it wasn’t so hot seeing him messed up so easily, it would have been endearing. You remembered how he’d tried to hold his reactions last time and the thought made you chuckle.

“It’s okay, baby, don’t hold back. I wanna hear all of it.”

It was like you flipped a switch in him as the next second he was already moaning. You sped up the movement of your hand as your other one took hold of the hair at the back of his neck and pulled, making him lean his head back. The whine that your action got you made your hips twitch and you leaned down, kissing his neck. You sucked gently on his skin, not enough to leave marks, but apparently more than enough to make him buck up into your touch, as a curse fell from his lips.

You weren’t sure how long it’d been, but it couldn’t have been much. Yet his moans were getting more desperate, he could barely hold still and his grip on your waist was so harsh you felt he’d leave marks even through your clothes.

“Princess, I’m close,” he gasped out and you pulled away from his neck to look at him.

“Where’s that cursed mirror of yours now?” you chuckled softly, yet you couldn’t help the rasp in your own voice. You were already dripping wet from his moaning and the sight of his wrecked state was intoxicating.

“You’re awfully petty, you know that?” he managed to laugh a little despite being out of breath and you rolled your eyes pulling your hand out of his pants. “No, no, wait-” he whined out but you tsked.

“That’s what you get for calling me petty. Now take these off, I need you,” you said, gesturing at his clothes.

It took him a moment to catch up, which you used to get off him and undress. He wasn’t far behind though, and a blink later, you were on the bed, with Hyunjin hovering over you.

“Can I tell you how beautiful you are now? Without you freaking out this time, I mean,” he asked and you huffed in annoyance.

“I didn’t freak out!” you tried to defend yourself, but even you weren’t convinced by the statement. “I was just caught aback.”

“Of course, how could I ever think otherwise.” You didn’t like how smug he sounded. You opened your mouth to retort something, but his lips were on yours again before you could make a sound. “You are gorgeous, princess. More beautiful than any piece of art ever made,” he whispered against your lips when you pulled away.

“Shut up,” you muttered, feeling warmth spread all over you.

“Why?” he grinned. “Does it make your heart flutter? Does it make you fall for me more? Or does it make you need me more?”

He wasn’t mocking you, no. He was stating facts and he was well aware of it. And you wanted to regret being so easy to read, but when his fingers found their way between your legs, that thought slipped away from your mind.

“You’re awful, you know that?” you muttered, but there was no real bite in your words, you were too far gone in the feeling of his fingers rubbing against your clit.

“You like it,” he chuckled as his fingers dragged along your slit, the tips pushing in teasingly just for a second, then he returned them to their previous spot. You practically hissed at him. “Oh, so you can leave me hanging right as it’s getting good, but I’m not allowed to have some fun?”

“Precisely,” you rolled your eyes. “Didn’t you, like, have enough fun last time?”

“As far as I remember, last time was all about me making you feel good,” he raised his eyebrow, smirking slightly, though two of his fingers pushed inside you carefully.

“And you were a smug little asshole the whole time,” you hissed through clenched teeth, breaking off into a moan a second later as he started moving his fingers in and out of you.

He hummed as if he was thinking about it. Yet his fingers started pumping inside you faster, curling to press against your walls and spreading you open. Moans and curses chased after each other as a third finger joined in and you gripped Hyunjin’s arm, legs squeezing together involuntarily. His fingers stilled inside you.

“Relax, princess,” he cooed softly, pecking your lips. “You alright?” You nodded quickly, whimpering as you let your legs relax again. “Should I go on?”

“No,” you licked your lips as you exhaled slowly. “No, I’m good.”

He slowly pulled his fingers out of you and you pushed him, surprising him enough to switch your positions. You sat up in his lap, knees on both sides of his thighs. His eyebrows shot up in surprise as his hands immediately took hold of your hips.

“I’m rewarding you for your effort, remember,” you chuckled, leaning down to kiss his neck. “It’s your turn to lie down and look pretty, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he smiled, tongue darting over his lips. “Please, be my guest.”

Once again, but a touch of your fingers around his cock was enough to get him gasping and whimpering.

“Poor thing, you’ve been having a hard time, haven’t you?” you mumbled, brushing your fingers through his hair. “You were doing your best for me, hm?”

“I just want you to feel good, princess,” he whined out, eyes closing as he leaned into your touch. It was amazing how quickly all his teasing disappeared because of the tiniest of praises. You smiled to yourself.

“Such a good boy you are,” you pushed further and were rewarded with a low whimper as his hips bucked up in your hand.

You pulled your hand away and lifted yourself up a bit to position yourself over his length. His eyes opened with a hazy gaze at you and he swallowed heavily. With a slow movement, you lowered yourself on him, choking on a moan at the stretch. It took an effort of you to keep your eyes on Hyunjin but it was worth it as you watched his face scrunch in pleasure, a groan falling from his lips.

You didn’t take more than a second to catch your breath before you started moving your hips slowly. In all fairness, he did try to meet your movements and help you, but his grip on your sides was more of an attempt to hold onto something than it was of any aid at balancing to you. Perhaps not having to be in charge made him let go of himself a little more, and you loved to see him like that.

As your movements sped up, your grip in his hair tightened and you realized that you might be tugging on it a bit too harshly when a loud whine slipped his lips and he twitched as if trying to pull away. You let go immediately, halting your movements as well.

“I’m sorry, baby,” you said softly, out of breath, but he shook his head.

“It’s fine, you just-” he whimpered out. “No, you’re- you’re doing amazing… it’s just… a lot”

You smiled a little. Right, he liked the pain. You remembered that there was also something else he liked. The hand you’d kept in his hair was currently resting on his chest but you moved it slowly up to the base of his throat. His eyes met yours as he bit his lips.

“Would it be okay with you if I try?” you asked quietly. He took a moment to respond, sucking on his lower lip as he considered your question.

“Yes,” he said finally, dragging his fingers in circles on your sides slowly. “But don’t move… while you’re at it.” You tilted your head a bit in confusion and he chuckled awkwardly. “I’m bad with self-control when I’m out of breath.”

You chuckled and rolled your eyes, yet nodded in agreement and he leaned his head back a bit, closing his eyes. It was overwhelming how easily he trusted you with something like that. You took one of his hands from your waist and put it on the arm that you were holding him with.

“Tap three times if you need me to stop, okay?” you said. The corners of his mouth twitched in a smile, yet he didn’t even open his eyes as he nodded, tapping your arm twice with his finger.

You took a deep breath and pressed gently your fingers on the sides of his throat. His breath hitched immediately even though you were not squeezing enough to trouble his breathing. You tried tightening your grip a little more and his hips bucked up, making you gasp and relax your hold.

“I’m sorry, I-” he whimpered. “I’ll try to hold back.”

“It’s okay, Jinnie,” you assured him softly, “you don’t have to hold back, okay?”

He hummed and nodded quickly. Now that he’d reacted positively, you felt a little more confident to squeeze your fingers around his throat. You paid attention to not do it too hard or for too long though, and you were rewarded with pretty moans. Every now and then his hips would thrust up involuntarily into you when you squeezed harder.

“Princess, wait-” he spoke up suddenly, voice strained, and you immediately relaxed your hand, scared you’d done something wrong.

Far from it, it seemed, though, as with a sharp thrust up, he came inside you. You couldn’t help but gasp a little, but you rolled your hips slowly to help him through it. Eventually, his breathing calmed down and he opened his eyes to look at you.

“I’m really sorry, I tried,” he pouted, a soft blush covering his cheeks. You chuckled.

“You really don’t have to apologize, you know,” you said, gently brushing your fingers through his hair in a reassuring gesture. “I’m just glad you enjoyed yourself.”

“But you didn’t get to-” you shushed him and leaned down to peck his lips. He still didn’t look convinced. He nibbled on his lower lip for a moment and then seemed to make up his mind. “Come up here.”

You narrowed your eyebrows in confusion and he chuckled, gesturing at his face. You blinked at him - you understood what he meant but the thought still seemed foreign to your brain.

“Come on, humor me this once, please?” he chuckled. “I promise I’ll make it good.”

“I don’t doubt that,” you hummed as you carefully raised your hips to move off his lap. His hands were still on your sides so he pulled you forward and you nearly lost your balance. “Are you sure?”

“Don’t ask dumb questions and just come here,” he rolled his eyes.

“You’re getting awfully cocky again,” you muttered to yourself but he caught it.

“I mean, I am confident that I can have you just as wrecked as I was just now so…”

You let out an exaggerated sign and finally let him pull you over until you were hovering right over his lips. You hesitated for a second longer but when he tugged you down, you lowered yourself. The next second, his tongue was already rubbing against your clit as he sucked on it and you couldn’t help but moan out. You leaned forward, hands grasping the headboard of his bed and you literally felt him smirking against you.

Then his tongue moved to your slit, pushing teasingly inside you then pulling out almost immediately. You hissed and rolled your hips down on instinct to chase the feeling. You nearly apologized but just then you felt a soft moan against your core. The next time his tongue brushed against your slit, you rolled your hips again.

You looked down at Hyunjin and found him looking directly where his tongue was working on you. Either noting your impatience or just deciding that you’d waited long enough, he brought his lips to your clit again, focusing on it with a newfound intensity. Occasionally, he’d switch up to lick at your slit and you were a moaning mess almost right away. You were already worked up and it didn’t take much longer for you to reach your high, a whine of Hyunjin’s name slipping your lips as you came.

Slowly, when you came back to your senses, you moved away and laid down next to him. Not even a blink later, he had you in his arms, holding you close to himself as his lips gently pressed against your forehead. You could have been grossed out by the fact that they were still sticky with your wetness, but you couldn’t really bring yourself to care. You’d just have to drag him in the shower with you later. For now, you focused on snuggling closer to him, burrowing your face in his chest.

“So I’m dating Hwang Hyunjin now, huh?” you said after a while, chuckling to yourself softly.

“Seems like you are, yes,” he chuckled too, fingers playing with your hair.

“Oh, what a time to be alive,” you sighed dramatically and he laughed, tilting your chin up to press a short gentle kiss on your lips. You couldn’t help but smile and peck him back. “You know, I have a flower for you too, I think.”

“Yes, princess, I’m listening?”

“Lilac,” you said, biting your lips. His eyes widened a bit.

“Wait, for real?!” he exclaimed, likely in disbelief. You nodded.

“For the first time like this,” you added. He didn’t say anything at first, instead hugged you even tighter.

“Okay,” he exhaled after a long moment, “I will give my all to make it worth it.” You didn’t have a doubt about that as he pressed his lips against the top of your head. If you weren’t focused all on him, you could have missed it. The moment when he repeated the name of the flower into your hair. “Lilac.”

The first time one feels love.

[yandere-daze]

Horrortober Day 11

Hnghhh today it´s time for a very special boy! So happy to write for Riddle again, he was my first favorite when I got into twst and I still really really love him! *gestures at my profile picture and header* ndkda

Also apologies for the longer wait for this one, last night I finished up Taisho x Alice Episode 1 with a friend and I was way too tired to keep writing after that 4 hour long session

Prompt and challenge by @pastelbirb and @yandere-sins!

Link to my Horrortober masterlist here!

Day 11: Punish --> “I don’t want to do this! But you leave me no choice.”

tw yandere, tw toxic relationship, tw possessiveness

„How many times have I told you this, y/n? You have to follow the rules I have given you. Just because I love you doesn´t mean you are exempt from them”, the Heartslabyul dorm leader said with a disappointed scowl on his face as he stood there right in front of you with his arms crossed. You just sighed and rolled your eyes, having already heard this rant many times before had made you immune to the stern tune he liked to use when scolding you. But your nonchalant attitude just made the redhead angrier.

He stomped his foot on the ground and his voice increased in volume. “Don´t roll your eyes at me! This is serious! Breaking the rules shall not be forgiven, rule breakers must always be judged! So what do you have to say for yourself?” Riddle looked quite impatient so you elected to just speak up now, not wanting to anger him any further.

“I´m really sorry Riddle but I really don´t understand what I did wrong. What rule could I have possibly broken just in the 10 minutes I was away from you?”

And you were being honest right now, you really had no idea why you were suddenly in trouble. There were just so many ridiculous rules, how were you supposed to keep track of all of them? It was a feat of sheer impossibility! And most of them were stupid anyway but you were smart enough to not inform Riddle of that.

Riddle sighed and with a disappointed look went on to tell you of your supposed wrongdoings.

“It won´t do for a fellow dorm leader to not know the rules but I suppose I will be merciful this time and explain it to you once more. Really, it is quite simple. It´s not just one rule you have broken, which would have been bad enough already, no, you had to go and break several in such a short amount of time! I´m quite disappointed in you, y/n”, he shook his head as if to emphasize that particular fact.

Internally you raised an eyebrow at that. How could that be? Literally all you did was walk over to Ace and Deuce for a bit to talk and then immediately came back. How could that have broken more than one rule?? But for the moment you thought it would be best to just let Riddle tell you what was wrong.

Satisfied at your lack of an outburst in an attempt to disturb him, Riddle continued.

“Now where should I begin? Let´s start with the gravest mistake of all. You left my side to talk to someone else even though we were having a fine day with just the two of us.”

Your eyes widened in disbelief. “That´s it? That isn´t even a rule to begin with! I can talk to whoever I want!”

You couldn´t help your outburst. You were just irritated that this was what he would consider a grave affront to the rules. This was ridiculous!

The redhead just clicked his tongue, now clearly dissatisfied with your response if the way his frown deepened was anything to go off of. “But don´t you remember? When I confessed my undying love to you, you promised that you would always stay by my side! You said we would always be together! It was a rule you brought forward and I have never even considered breaking it once! And now you will just deny it ever happened and trample all over it?!” He was noticeably getting angrier and angrier the more time passed in which there was total silence on your end. You were just at a loss for words. Had he really taken that so seriously? You would have though it to be cute if he wasn´t throwing such a fit over it now.

“Riddle, please calm down. Of course I´m at your side but that doesn´t mean I´m forbidden from talking to anyone else! You have it all wrong.”

It didn´t look like he was going to calm down anytime soon. “A rule is a rule, you can´t go breaking them just because you want to! You know I love but it´s not something I can just let go unpunished. And that wasn´t even the only rule you broke!”

Oh boy, you could only imagine the next supposed rule would be just as ridiculous as this one.

Riddle huffed and stomped his foot one more time as he glared right into your eyes. “Now moving on, the second rule you broke was laughing with someone other than me, your boyfriend! We are meant to be together and the very thought of you smiling with someone else, especially these unruly boys makes my heart flare up in rage! How dare you show them what is supposed to be for my eyes only?! They don´t deserve to even be in the vicinity of your radiant smile!”

“You mean to say”, you deadpanned, “me smiling was somehow breaking a rule? Are you serious?” You huffed in disbelief. This was going way too far.

“Indeed”, his face softened a tiny fraction as he grasped your face with his slender fingers. You squirmed away from his touch but he held you firmly. Then he brought two his fingers to the corners of your mouth to force a strained smile out of you. He swooned and sighed dreamily at that.

“Your lovely smile, your radiance! It all belongs to me and me alone! It´s a promise you made when we got into a relationship together, you can´t escape from your responsibilities now”, he frowned again and removed his fingers from your face, allowing your muscles to relax again. “You have to keep what you promised me and I´m sorry to say but I´m very disappointed in you. It breaks my heart to think you would ever even consider betraying me like this!” Near the end of his sentence he was raising his voice again and his hands started shaking as he once more became enraged.

“And you know what´s the worst thing?! You did all of this behind my back! You said you had some business to deal with and left me standing there! I trusted you and yet you lied! You spoke with other men without telling me! I only found out because I followed you out of a sense of wanting to see that you were safe! Imagine my shock and despair when I found out what you were really doing!” His face flushed an angry red like you have never seen before, Riddle´s voice shook the entire room and you wouldn´t be surprised if the entire school could hear the screaming door leader.

“Riddle, I´m sorry for not telling you but I just really didn´t think it was all that serious. You´re taking it too much to heart and acting like I´m only ever allowed to be with you! That´s not a very healthy thing to think and I´m sorry but I won´t apologize for what I did. I see no need to.” You decidedly had enough of this. You just hoped Riddle would calm down again if you left him for a while so you started turning your back on him, ready to leave.

“NO Y/N YOU`RE STAYING HERE!” Riddle´s grip on your wrist was painfully tight as he pulled you closer to him. You struggled to break free but he was surprisingly strong for someone so tiny when he wanted to.

“Y/n, I really don´t want to do this, but you leave me no choice. These troublemakers seem to have gotten to your head and made you think that you could just break the rules like this whenever you please. You don´t show any remorse but I´ll make you understand. You´ll soon come to realize that I´m only wanting what´s best for you.”

He raised his magic pen and held you firmly with his other hand so you couldn´t get away.

“Off with your head!”

The all too familiar words echoed in your head as you felt your throat squeeze up and for a moment you felt like you were running out of breath. Then the sensation stopped and as you hesitantly looked down, you saw the heart shaped collar around your neck.

“But I can´t use magi-“, you wanted to protest but Riddle promptly silenced you.

“I know but this is to serve as a reminder that rule breakers and liars will always get punished. Even my lovely darling”, he sighed again and gently ran his finger over the heart shaped collar he had just forced you to wear. Hah it was almost like he had just claimed you for himself! Everyone who would see you now would immediately recognize that it was his doing and he rejoiced at the mere thought of it.

“Things are going to change from now on until you understand. You will devote every single second of your day to me, just like I´ve always done for you. It´s important for both partners to put in the same amount of effort for a healthy and balanced relationship, isn´t that right?”