#overall an interesting experience and the worst part was figuring out where and how to buy it because that's fucking stupid.

[torchickentacos]

UPDATE, just finished part one of dissecting my bookstore pig. I was able to buy it and I had to have a nice little brisk autumn walk all the way across campus with a pig in a bag, so that was really something ✌️

................is it normal for your bio lab class to require you to byofp (bring your own fetal pig)????? Where do they expect me to buy one?????

[isabelpsaroslunnen]

My best friend and I have been watching Star Trek: The Original Series for months, mostly because we're both sometimes busy and can't coordinate, but he does adore Star Trek (it is hard to overstate how much, except with regard to Picard) and even though I'm a TNG kid, I am almost always having a great time with it.

Overall: I love the stage-y Pepto-Bismol meets bisexual flag aesthetic of so much of the show, the actual bisexual vibes of so many characters (unintentionally? allegedly? I guess?), the effects that have aged remarkably well almost as much as the ones that have aged terribly, but are part of its charm, and of course, many of the characters. And I definitely have enjoyed the mixture of cheesy silliness with deeply earnest aspirations towards transcending its own era, even though it falls short (I'm an early modernist; I have a high tolerance for works that are ultimately of their times, but visibly trying to cut through the miasma of their eras' norms).

Anyway, some thoughts on each episode I've seen thus far!

[It's every episode up to "Metamorphosis", so there are a lot.]

1— "Where No Man Has Gone Before" - a pretty solid way to start the experience for me, and I see the religious skepticism has been baked in from very early, even though it's obviously still finding its footing at this point. I actually enjoyed seeing the wobbly character dynamics and world-building as it's figuring itself out.

2— "The Man Trap" - I really enjoyed this one! Despite some fundamental silliness, there's an interesting mix of horror and pathos (I support the salt vampire!).

3— "Charlie X" - a mixture of "oh God, poor Janice" (an impression that will repeat often) and an interesting take on the interaction of power and youthful masculinity. Charlie's outrage at his desires being stymied by literally anything or anyone at any time feels unfortunately timely, as does his petty vindictiveness against ... um, every woman ever, and Kirk's entirely correct lecture about it. I also found something particularly intriguing in the contrast between Charlie's admiration of Kirk's form of masculinity and how viscerally threatened he is by Spock.

4— "The Naked Time" - I adored this episode with zero irony. I particularly loved the revelation that Spock is ashamed of his feelings for Kirk (......) and the guilt he feels over his emotional distance from his mother combined with his understanding of how isolated she must feel in Vulcan culture. But I also laughed through the entire rest of the episode. Just a great time.

5— "The Enemy Within" - oh, hella yikes take on, uh, the inherent need for a good leader to have an anxious, violent, rapist side to his personality kept under control by a fearless, but vacillating and cerebral other side. (The premise seems even more egregious after "The Galileo Seven" makes a whole episode out of the idea that Spock's intellectual discipline and reserve undermine his leadership capabilities unless he behaves in a way that can be seen as fitting into human emotional norms.) I did cackle over the space dog fluffy alien creature and its evil twin, but poor Janice x100 :(

6— "Mudd's Women" - easily the worst episode to date, good God. Quite apart from "I guess sometimes you just have to be complicit in sex trafficking carried out by a lovable scamp who definitely hasn't gotten the post-capitalism newsletter" and the godawful ending, I am baffled by everyone on the Enterprise acting like they've never seen a beautiful woman. None of Mudd's women can hold a candle to Uhura (who I think isn't even in this episode?) and women getting obsessed by eternal beauty and devoting themselves to unappealing men is a tiresome aspect of ST that I wish had stopped here. Or never shown up at all.

7— "What Are Little Girls Made Of" - ah, the iconic phallic stalagmite! Nice to have context. I appreciate how smart and resourceful Kirk ends up being here. I liked Shatner's performance as the Kirk clone (he's actually been good in all the various Evil Kirk performances I've seen thus far), too. But I also really liked Spock's entirely justified annoyance at Kirk using racial slurs to communicate IT'S NOT ME.

8— "Miri" - this one is unfortunately dragged down by Kirk using his femme fatale allure with a girl framed as barely pubescent even if the actress was technically an adult. He's clearly not remotely attracted to her and working to save his crew, but it's still really unpleasant to watch, especially with a very young-looking actress. That said, the disease is creepy as hell, and it's a great McCoy episode. I was pretty fascinated as well by the concept of a drastically protracted childhood where the horror is not being trapped in the body of a child, but of actually remaining a child for enormous lengths of time.

9— "Dagger of the Mind" - this one would have been pretty mediocre, in all honesty, if not for the existence of Helen Noel. Helen is staggeringly beautiful, yes, but she is also better than everyone else in this episode, even my usual fave Spock. I like Kirk a lot and I still don't know what she sees in him.

10— "The Corbomite Maneuver" - it's a fun episode with some very good lines, but a bit like cotton candy.

11— "The Menagerie" - I had heard about this one, but didn't know all the details! The show-within-the-show only slightly strains credulity, and the plot is certainly more compelling than SNW (sorry to SNW fans; I watched a few episodes and it was fine, but too polished and heterosexual to feel like a true prequel to the boundary-pushing Candyland of TOS).

12— "The Conscience of the King" - this one was a bit over-theatrical in the most literal way, but I still really enjoyed it. The episode provides a genuinely fascinating backstory for Kirk, revealing that in his youth, he was a survivor of a terrible atrocity (and from what else we've heard, it seems he was moved elsewhere and became a bullied nerd for awhile before finding his true calling in space). The "real" villain of the episode doesn't really work for me, but doesn't need to, because her villainy is vastly and rightly overshadowed by the atrocity.

13— "Balance of Terror" - I can't describe this episode any other way: it fucking rules. This is maybe my favorite Star Trek episode that I can remember ever seeing. The revelation of the Vulcan-Romulan kinship is super compelling, and the intensity to this episode's take on the frequent Spock vs the Microaggressions subplot feels entirely organic and believable.

14— "Shore Leave" - fine, but rather a letdown after the glory of the previous one. The back rub early in the episode is as hilariously unsubtle as reported, and Spock's emphatic indifference to the sexbot ladies is, hmm, interesting. Otherwise, it is silly, entertaining-enough ST ephemera for me. I like these episodes existing as part of ST as a whole, but also don't feel especially invested in most individual cases of it. And God, Kirk's youthful nemesis Finnegan is so incredibly obnoxious and his little jig motif is so awful that (given "The Naked Time") I'm starting to wonder what gripe Star Trek has with Irish people.

15— "The Galileo Seven" - you know how I said that Spock vs the Microaggressions is a frequent subplot in these episodes? This one is "what if that was just the whole episode?" It's not terrible, but it's not terribly interesting, either, and the implications are pretty gross if you think about them.

16— "The Squire of Gothos" - I guessed the reveal a bit early in this one, but not in a way that made me feel like it was super obvious. The hints were there if you were paying attention, so it was rewarding to figure it out, but not obvious. Spock's speech about intellectual discipline and power really speaks to me right now, by the way.

17— "Arena" - the Gorn finally appear! Or a Gorn, anyway, and it's kind of wild that the 1967 episode's twist is that the real villain is colonialism, not the Gorn at all. Yet in 2020s Star Trek ... well, anyway, it's a good episode despite the incredibly dated monster effects.

18— "Tomorrow is Yesterday" - time travelllllll hell yeah, and it's quite a decent plot.

19— "Court Martial" - this one was tense and interesting, though I don't have much to say about it apart from really liking the lawyers.

20— "The Return of the Archons" - this was actually very effective, quiet terror for me (maybe extra for me as a queer person raised Mormon, lol). I think it also has one of the better instances of Kirk Fries A Machine With Logic.

21— "Space Seed" - an absolutely fascinating villain alongside absolutely dire gender politics. I did like seeing Khan for the first time.

22— "A Taste of Armageddon" - this had a very interesting war game concept, but I don't remember much about the episode beyond the concept tbh. It was fine.

23— "This Side of Paradise" - this one was interesting, especially given the allure of the "paradise" for Spock specifically (also for everyone else, but there's something especially bitter about whatshername's total indifference to his consent, and yet how complicated his feelings end up being about the whole thing). Kirk's fixation on his authority!!!!! in this episode feels unappealing and rather strange, but I didn't think it was really all about authority and The Human Need For Struggle(TM) that ST will keep returning to (don't like that aspect, though!).

24— "The Devil in the Dark" - an excellent episode IMO, including the incredibly dated rock alien special effects. Wouldn't have it any other way! I honestly appreciate how often the reveal in TOS has been that a scary "monster" is just some innocent person from another species getting screwed over by human ignorance and colonizing.

25— "Errand of Mercy" - Kirk is a patronizing asshole in this episode, can't lie, but given that he's being very obviously paralleled with the Klingon officer, it serves a function that's at least interesting. I'd like if that aspect of his personality went somewhere a bit more cohesively, but I'd rather have the episodic yet forwards propulsion of TOS as a whole, so it's okay.

26— "The Alternative Factor" - this has an interesting concept, but I remember thinking that it was forcing a bunch of usually competent people to make some very stupid decisions (though, tangentially, the fact that this is a change from the norm is at least something: I really enjoy that TOS in general avoids my beloathèd "our protagonists are the protagonists of the entire setting and every other character is an NPC who lacks moral vision and competence independent of the protagonists' influence"). I will say that the repetition of the alternate-universe effect is honestly pretty bad even when I'm grading on a 60s curve.

27— "The City on the Edge of Forever" - this is a very compelling, tightly-written episode that does good character work for Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, even if its underlying premise is a bit challenging to buy at points. I always enjoy getting to see McCoy's medical ethos at play, as we do here. Spock's jealousy is also amusingly transparent against all the high drama.

28— "Operation -- Annihilate!" - this is a hilarious title for a pretty good episode, actually. I enjoyed it and especially enjoyed Leonard Nimoy's performance as Spock here. It's not like I ever don't, but it did some substantial heavy lifting.

29— "Amok Time" - so it turns out, the Spock/Kirk fans have not been exaggerating all these years. I didn't think it was likely they had, just given what I've seen this far, but damn. This is a fantastic episode, it's got interesting world-building for Vulcan, it's incredibly homoerotic even by TOS standards, and despite my fondness for Spock and Kirk, goodforher.jpeg with respect to T'Pring. If Vulcan men don't want their childhood brides plotting their deaths, maybe they should legalize divorce! Just a thought.

30— "Who Mourns for Adonais" - so this episode relies on "actually, every broadly appropriated cultural detail from an exotic distant land was just given to its people by ancient aliens," only this time, it's targeting Greeks! It does get details about ancient Greek culture and religion very wrong, if anyone was wondering. In any case, I guess Star Trek's weird issues with "ethnic whites" is not only with the Irish, though given that my father's background is specifically Greco-Irish, it feels like a weird personal attack. That aside, while "ancient aliens did it all!!!" was not as much of a thing at the time as now, Greek people were definitely more racialized in the USA then, so the use of the trope here was not as trivial as I think it can "read" to modern audiences, esp in the USA.

Apollo's actor does a good job with some hard dialogue, I will say, but I really wish Carolyn had just been playing along and biding her time rather than obviously being a silly female swayed by flattery of her beauty and delusions of vicarious power. Kirk's speech to her is good, but really dragged down by how bad the writing for her is. I did like Kirk's "actually, I'm a strict monotheist" retort to Apollo, though. I know Kirk's characterization eventually goes down a different route, but given the heavy involvement of Jewish people including Shatner in Star Trek (despite Roddenberry's antisemitism), and the historical use of the Greek and Roman pantheons in the oppression of Jewish communities, Kirk's indignation at the idea of worshipping any other god feels apropos.

31— "The Changeling" - Jim Kirk DESTROYS another implacable machine foe with LOGIC!!!! I can just imagine the YouTube series now. Seriously, though, it's fine and a drastic improvement from the previous episode, and I always enjoy a solid ST:TOS episode while I'm watching it. But it was not exceptional IMO.

32— "Mirror, Mirror" - YESSSSS I TOO GET TO EXPERIENCE THE MIRROR UNIVERSE. I loved this episode, honestly. The Mirror Universe is terrible, but super fun both in concept and execution. I love the competence of the prime universe team in the brief cut to them immediately clocking Mirror Kirk's group as imposters (though I did want more from Mirror Uhura who is just kind of there, though...). I love Mirror Spock being this warped but recognizable version of the character. I love the concept of Mirror Kirk being the perpetrator of war crimes exactly like Kirk's formative trauma back in "The Conscience of the King." I love the evil cutthroat BDSM space Byzantines vibes of the Terran Empire (is there an unimaginably decadent and deadly Byzantine Empire in the history of the Mirror Universe? I hope so. We deserve it after "Who Mourns for Adonais" tbh).

33— "The Apple" - this is a pretty fun one. The protagonists as the sort of serpent of this "Edenic" garden, coupled with the awful god creature is super entertaining, and it works well enough despite the show's erratic approach to religion.

34— "The Doomsday Machine" - damn, the commander in this episode is such an asshole. He's clearly meant to be, though, and his Ahab campaign turning out to not be entirely in vain at least makes it seem like there's a point to spending so much time on him being the worst.

35— "The Catspaw" - by coincidence, my best friend and I ended up watching this not far into November, just a few days after Halloween. About five minutes in, I said to him, "Is it just me, or is that castle clearly just Spirit Halloween?" He delightedly said, "This planet is Spirit Halloween!"

There's a bit of racial essentialism about ALL HUMANS that would be uncomfortable if it were not so patently ridiculous. The idea is that human beings have a basic racial fear of cats that the tiny aliens exploit—yes, "cats" in this episode refers mainly to the human fear of the house cat, aka the most successful and beloved domestic species on Earth, not lions or even cougars. The alien terrorizes the cast by taking the shape of a fluffy black house cat of varying sizes, but never any other kind of cat. This concept is hilarious, just to be clear. I enjoyed every moment. Even a super-large house cat is just even more friend-shaped floof to your basic human, let's be real, so the deadly threat is impossible to take seriously even before the giant house cat is revealed to be an incredibly horny alien lady with illusion powers (this persona is also an illusion, but the horniness is real). But are not all cats at some level horny alien ladies with illusion powers? I feel pretty sure that Star Trek thinks so.

36— "I, Mudd" - and the award for Most Improved Character has got to go to Harry Mudd. My bff and I actually had a great time with this episode, in part because the entire cast seem to be having a great time with it. I especially loved the twist with Uhura seeming to fall to the womanly weakness of desiring eternal beauty and the easy life only for it to be a trick. Mudd is still a sleaze, but a much funner one to watch this time, and we've just started quoting Spock's "He didn't pay the royalties" at random moments. The stereotypical nagging wife is what it is, but I'm grading Mudd episodes on an extra curve.

37— "Metamorphosis" - and at least, we've reached the most recent episode I've seen, so my impressions of this one are much more fresh. Somehow, I had no idea we first met Zefram Cochrane in TOS and not in First Contact. Also, wow, the actors for him and for the Commissioner are really attractive—not quirky 60s attractive, either. Cochrane reminds me vaguely of Henry Cavill and the Commissioner is simply gorgeous despite the blinding color scheme of her costume.

The gender essentialism sure is something at this point, I've got to say, when the characters are blandly agreeing that of course a sentient electric cloud must have a fundamental gender that you can kind of tell by the color scheme. Uh huh, but it is genuinely interesting that Cochrane clearly cares about the cloud and tries to protect her from our heroes until he realizes she loves him, but is so affronted at the idea of the cloud being in love with him and his (very obviously sexualized) communion and companionship with her being part of that.

He projects his revulsion primarily onto Spock (Spock vs the Microaggressions strikes again!), but literally everyone finds his attitude narrow-minded and weird. The feeling is kind of like if you met an idolized long-dead relative only for them to use a homophobic slur you've never even heard of.

The resolution of this little drama comes from the cloud bodysnatching the dying Commissioner, a young woman who longs to be loved by anyone at all after a life of being a loveless career woman. She is, to be clear, a career woman whose job is all about preventing warfare and who is deeply stressed about it, which seems a kind of love to me. But she is mostly framed just as this super abrasive, loveless career woman because it's TOS (and they eventually conclude that any woman could do her job and they'll just find a different one to stop the war).

Anyway, all this results in the somehow-female cloud fusing with what remains of the Commissioner's consciousness, curing her body of some fatal disease. Now that the cloud is fused with an actual (hot) human woman, Cochrane is totally chill with her love for him, and decides he can have a very strange threesome love her after all, and they'll live out these bodies' natural lives together until they both die (since she lost her electric cloud powers of healing and immortality when she bodysnatched the Commissioner, I gather). It feels weird and low-grade shitty on his part, although I like his actor's performance, because it makes it so clear that his aversion was only about appearances.

I think the cloud should have moved onto someone who would appreciate her devotion and restorative powers, like, say, the dying Commissioner lady who actually has this whole speech about how badly she longs to be loved and how she doesn't get why Cochrane is being such a baby about the adoration of a cloud. Look, I'm just saying the cloud could be bi and deserves someone who would appreciate her.

I know this was never going to happen on a nationally syndicated show in 1967, but I think it would make more narrative sense and be much more satisfying! Cochrane would love space adventures 150 years in the future—he was thrilled and excited about the idea of seeing the reality of the Federation and alliances with other species! And the Commissioner would appreciate a cloud girlfriend and immortality so much more than him. Hire me, Paramount.

[fox-quills]

Do have any additional thoughts/ideas you’d be willing to share about Mobius?

OKAY FIRST AN APOLOGY BECAUSE THIS HAS BEEN SITTING SINCE???? NOVEMBER????? I'm so so sorry anon I'm on mobile 99.9% of the time and I don't know where that stupid app hides asks but I'm like the t-rex from Jurassic Park I can only perceive movement 😭

Second thank you so much for taking the time to ask about my mostest favorite topic in the whole wide world! Unfortunately there's not a lot I can say about the fic story-wise without spoilers, although I have SO MANY post-fic thoughts I'm dying to share. Unless someone really wants my thoughts on how gender works in this particular omegaverse variant?? I spent so much time thinking about something that's only tangentially mentioned lol BUT, I can talk a bit about the process of writing Mobius! Because it has been an experience. I started Mobius just over a year ago (april or so), but didn't really knuckle down and and get cracking until June/July. It started as aideku, because I thought it was an interesting ship idea, but the few fics I'd come across hadn't really scratched the itch. I didn't even plan on writing it, but my beta at the time kept nudging me, and before I knew it I had a wholeass plot. And then a first chapter, at which point I was done for. In the original iteration of the fic, Hizashi was only meant to be the supportive BFF, but something in the original idea run (I forget what exactly) made my beta go.... hey how come this isn't a poly ship? And the answer was, I'd never written one before and didn't think of it, BUT IT IS NOW. (If you've read any of my other fic you may have noticed that this has become A Problem, and also led to a stealth love of dekumic, because apparently I wish to languish in rarepair hell) The fic has gone through about four major version changes. Aideku -> aidekumic (which came with some major detail pivots even though the overall plot hadn't changed) -> suffering reduction (it was gonna be so bad) -> suffering reintroduction, but different. It's gonna punch everyone right in the heart but I don't think I'm sorry about it. I'm also going to have to sneak back to the first chapter and retcon a detail once I get the actual logistics sorted. OH WAIT I DO HAVE A DETAIL I CAN SHARE THAT'S NOT A SPOILER ANYMORE. Although maybe skip it if you haven't read the latest chapter. Hizashi was, originally, not going to get together with them this early (not until near the end of the fic, actually). They still had the bond, and Izuku did eventually figure it out, but for [redacted] he decided not to act on it. So they both thought they had a one-sided bond, and just... never did anything about it. For a long while. Which eventually culminated in Shouta being away, Hizashi having an untimely heat, and him and Izuku sleeping together because mash an unfulfilled bond together with overwrought pining in a hormone cocktail and you get bad choices. Which resulted in a lot of immediate guilt in the aftermath, even though Shouta had clocked them ages ago and wasn't all that upset about it. Then something immediately happened to make things worse, but I can't disclose that part because it's still going to happen. ;)

That continued to be the plan until chapter 11 happened, with all the snuggling and purring, and @fondofeveryprickle read it and was like, "...if you wanna keep this I think you need to reevaluate The Suffering because these things do not mesh." Which resulted in a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth because that was a HUGE upset to the back half of the fic, and not something I was excited to re-jig. But she was right. And the new way was better. And then @scratchxiii said, "Hey what if we added Different Suffering?"

To which I replied, "Ouch my heart, that's absolutely devastating let's do it."

The blorbos uh, tend to get the worst of it when we're left unsupervised. BUT fresh suffering aside, the happy ending tag still applies, I'm just gonna make them earn it. :)

[meelkiewee]

EXQUISITE CORPSE SHENANIGANS

Hello!

The other night me and my friends @hoodyknight and @mellowmango were playing Gartic Phone and I wanted to share the characters that came out! We specifically played "Exquisite Corpse". For those who are not familar with it: each person makes one part of the body, having only a tiny hint of what was previously made.

We were very surprised, to say the least, when we put together many actually interesting ones.

Since it's fun to rate things, I'll do a personal chart starting from worst to best. For each one I will say the drawing order, my rating and a personal thought.

Drawing Order (DO) : Michael-Gabriele-Sole

rate: 4/10

We had a nice start with the girlypop bull but even tho I like that and the arm tattoos very much I think I did a mid job with the legs. Overall It's not even colored so meh.

DO: Gabriele-Michael-Sole

rate: 4/10

The face is interesting and the shirt is kinda cute, then i ruined everything with that nonsense foot and the colored background. Tbh the background wasn't really my fault but a bug sob...

DO: Michael-Gabriele-Sole

rate: 5/10

Nice palette, nice face. The rest: I probably see something like this running after me in my nightmares, luckily I never remember anything when I wake up.

DO: Gabriele-Sole-Michael

rate: 5/10

Head and torso look good together but I think we achieved the AI vibe with this one soooo.....

DO: Sole-Gabriele-Michael

rate: 6/10

I didn't put much effort in the monster heads but I didn't really expect my friend to draw yet another head below so that's funny. What's even more funny is if you know where the three animal heads come from, you'll probably understand why the cutlery is so unexpectedly fitting lol. Rat feet are cute.

DO: Sole-Michael-Gabriele

rate: 6/10

My most failed attempt at drawing Husk by heart, I should never do that again. Tho this is the first drawing that tells a story uwu and shouts trans rights even for the fellow femboys out there <3 feat a very disrespectful ant checking what's under the skirt for good measure. Little accident happened with the colors so meh.

DO: Gabriele-Michael-Sole

rate: 6/10

Those are the most realistic eyes ever, they spook me asf I feel like it's staring in my soul ;; I am also not a big fan of the fact that the drawing goes out of the canvas. Funny points for the mom tattoo and the implications of cannibalism though.

DO: Gabriele-Sole-Michael

rate: 6/10

Body and legs(?) are kinda meh and it's totally my fault for messing it up on purpose but I wanted to experiment a bit. I'm sorry to my friend who was responsible for the marvellous face :'c Points for the bad-boi jacket.

rate: 6/10

DO: Michael-Sole-Gabriele

This turned out kind of intimidating in a funny way and has some bitchy vibes.

DO: Gabriele-Sole-Michael

rate: 6/10

I liked how my friend used the space for the heads and they came out nice as well.

DO: Sole-Michael-Gabriele

rate: 6/10

What the hell is this. And she's a dragon too now. She's clearly typing the news in the chat with the ToudensSibs and receiving some compliments about it. Look at that blushieblush and the tail wag. She's def getting attentions.

DO: Gabriele-Michael-Sole

rate: 6/10

This looks like everyone's typical first OC back in middle school, that one OC you pray no one will ever remember again. Love this vibe for it.

DO: Michael-Sole-Gabriele

rate: 7/10

Don't get me rong this tiger is magnifique, the head belongs to a character Michael's has been working on lately. It just doesn't get extra point cause we all figured out where the drawing was going while we were completing it so yeah it came out really good to no-one's surprise.

DO: Michael-Gabriele-Sole

rate: 7/10

Came out nicely but nothing really catches my attention.

DO: Sole-Gabriele-Michael

rate: 8/10

It looks soooo polite, so well behaved, so into art and crafts, so passionate about country tip-tap. It's just the kinda guy I wanna date frfr AND GIIIIRLLLL THAT MUSTACHE SLAYSSS! Look at the details too! we have a butterfly bowtie and not one but two pair of shiny boots. I mean c'mon ladies, get in line!

DO: Michael-Sole-Gabriele

rate: 9/10

This is our water best boi, it's marvellous cause it's yellow and collecting shoes it's his hobby! We still don't know what method he uses to acquire these many spare shoes but we felt shy asking such a personal question.

DO: Sole-Michael-Gabriele

rate: 9/10

Miss Marbles! Yall can tell she's quite the refined lady, she occasionally gets really grumpy but I forgive her, after all who doesn't get upset hearing a mechanical racket following you all day while you do your office job? Guys let's all have some patience.

DO: Sole-Gabriele-Michael

rate: 10/10

I don't know if my friends agree with my chart up until now, but I'm sure they agree this one is absolutely the best one out of all of them. We are actually discussing turning this into a proper poster cause the perfection left us all speechless. Well not really speechless, we actually proceeded to compliment this drawing for a good half an hour lol. We are still unsure how to call this beautiful creature but if you read untill here and are invested, you can totally suggest names for it!

Have a nice day/night everyone!

[alto-tenure]

Congrats on finishing ZTD! What did you think of it?

The tag for when I start talking about ZTD negatively as of right now is "my feelings on ztd are as complex as delta's motives", which I think is the tl;dr of it all.

For a not "too long; didn't read" version...

(CWs: discussions of suicide, crude language used for canon behavior)

I had fun playing it, to start with. I enjoyed most of my experience playing ZTD. Going through the Execution fragments multiple times to make sure all the teams got executed was a slog, and once the novelty of the fragment format wore off it felt as though the game took forever to really kick into gear. Triangle was one of the last fragments I did before embarking on Carlos's Wacky Shifting Adventure via Ambidex, but I think had I done it earlier I would have found the pacing worse. The fragment format does kind of shoot the game's pacing in the foot at times. And I despise this game's lock system. It's really hard to tell when you're being locked out of the rest of a fragment vs the fragment being over. Also sometimes the locks are more generally nonsensical, which worked in my favor during my playthrough but in C-End you can get there without having confronted the FCFS decision at all, meaning you won't have the context to where Carlos went. You can get Q-1 straight away, without any of the foreshadowing from other Q-Team fragments of Mira's background. The nonlinearity of ZTD can work for it, but after enough time with the game and enough looking at the global flowchart (the good one, not the one with the video thumbnails) you start figuring out the patterns in advance. Some fragments take away suspense from others, too, like how doing Poison first takes away from the suspense of Fire in the decision to drink the antidote or not.

The graphics I'm okay with letting go because the fact that ZTD exists at all is frankly a miracle. But I will note that sometimes they made it difficult to take certain scenes seriously when I know they wanted those scenes to be. The shock-value-gore is whatever, I don't really care either way, and the worst parts were that I couldn't look when the HF showers went off & when Diana and Carlos committed their respective suicides. Sometimes the read on the game as "camp" is fine, and other times I feel like the game really wanted me to take it seriously and it just didn't land for me as something serious. I wanted to laugh.

Akane in this game...I think in some ways the people writing her dialogue were taking her personality as "June" at face value without considering the facade that it is (versus the parts of it that aren't; it isn't all an act), but I don't agree with the criticism of "it feels like Akane was replaced by a clone in ZTD". There were definitely portions in the game where I thought she was being too altruistic, but I don't think it's so OOC as to be written off as "not her". It definitely isn't perfect writing, but I think people in some ways were expecting too much of it.

Delta came out of nowhere for me, and even seeing the evidence it still feels cheap. Can't get over my initial reactions, I guess.

I actually don't hate Eric. He's kinda interesting. Admittedly, the most interesting thing about him is never really discussed again, but holy shit am I invested in his fucked up family.

I also really like the plot device of the ambiguity of whether Carlos killed Delta or not, but had I been playing without contact with the community I'm not sure I would have...known about the post-game epilogue files at all. Maybe a more traditional VN style sequence over the credits would have been suited for it, or something? Or more like a normal movie, as opposed to little scenes in prose.

All in all, I'm grateful this game exists, and I'm glad I played it, and I had fun with it overall. It was a net positive experience, even though I'm not without my criticisms of it.

[honshew]

thoughts on bg3

overall, i had a lot of fun and would recommend to anyone interested! very ambitious game, and i'm amazed it exists tbh. there are so many really, really great aspects of it. however, i'm also glad to be done with it, bc i started to have less and less fun with it at the last part. which is an unfortunate place to have the worst part of the game. i really wish it wrapped up in a more satisfying way, because i became really attached to the characters and the incredibly detailed world. a shame it had to be rushed toward the end of development. it's incredible, though could have been more still.

i'm spending some time trying to figure out what i liked about the game, so this may or may not be updated as thoughts come to me. there will be spoilers all the way thru the end of the game so here's your spoiler warning

i think while people unfamiliar with dnd can play and still have a good time, it probably will feel overwhelming and there will likely be things you won't understand unless someone explains it to you. i can't even really call the tutorial a bad one as much as it's barely there. but i do know plenty of people with zero dnd experience still having fun and simply enjoying learning on the go!

on the other hand, being someone who plays dnd, once you figure out the interface it's a pretty smooth experience. there are some things that are a little different to accommodate how the game works (e.g. second-story work reduces your fall dmg rather than increasing your climbing speed, since the game doesn't really count climbing as distance), but those are pretty quick to learn. seems to me that the devs thought people who didn't play dnd wouldn't be all that intersted in bg3, but a ci'd be curious to see how many bg3 players will look for a dnd group to join from here.

act 1 was solid and was paced well. i really liked how many characters ended up showing up later in the game, as opposed to characters you save once and never see again. i think what was most fun was getting to know what i could get away with LOL not just an exploration of the world, but an exploration of the game itself. i have video of me talking to auntie ethel while my friends set up and set off a circle of flame barrels, so i got a front row seat of her being blown to smithereens.

act 2, also solid. i really enjoy quests that involve impacting a place in a really tangible way, like in okami, so the shadow-cursed lands were pretty cool. unfortunately, the game doesn't really show you this happening except a liiiiittle bit at the end, so it doesn't feel as good as it could. still, i liked exploring the area a lot. all of the mini-bosses of the area were unsettling, but we got past literally all of them via high charisma rolls. actually aside from the exploring, a lot of the fun was seeing how we could cheese boss fights, which carried into act 3

act 3 felt way more all over the place and buggy, which significantly lowered my enjoyment. ofc a game this massive will have issues, but i'm still sad that the last part of the game where everything crescendos is where i enjoyed the game the least. small things not working the way they're supposed to (e.g. certain npcs not running or climbing up a ladder when they are fleeing I'M TALKING TO YOU ZUMBO PUMBO AND FEATHERWEIGHT FALSON, astarion falling sleep to a spell even tho he's an elf during his end-of-quest fight). what sucks about things being so frustrating too was that the main quests had really great setups or concepts, but the execution was messy. still, we had a lot of fun messing with bosses. cazador couldn't do anything bc he was forced to dance while we killed him, orin was disintegrated, gortash turned to stone. kinda wild having a bard with 100% spell hit rate....!

i do wish we got to explore baldur's gate more. i totally get that would be a huge undertaking tho. i had a thought that maybe act 3 should've been its own game, but then i guess you couldn't call it baldur's gate 3 if you never get to baldur's gate. i didn't play the previous bg games, but i liked how they wove in the story from the previous installments and ttrpg modules without leaving newcomers to the series out of the loop too much.

i liked shadowheart's, astarion's, and wyll's quests a lot. the ansur part of wyll's was really cool. i adore trials to test character as a setup, especially ones administrated by some major figure. but also? fuck balduran for what he did to ansur and later to me. he's the city's hero, but he only really looks out for himself. which is cool for me as a viewer, not cool for the character i play as LOL

i have more thoughts but i will type them up here later maybe this has gotten long enoguh

[whythehellnaut]

Why's The Fall Guy review

I got to see the Fall Guy and was rather disappointed overall. I think the concept is novel: it's a love letter to Hollywood stunt performers that has a stuntman becoming a real action hero because of his physical abilities. The fact that it was directed by a former stuntman himself is a great sign, as it shows there will be honesty and passion put into it. Unfortunately I don't think anything quite lives up to the idea, and it becomes a rather standard action flick with mediocre humor that's never above chuckle-worthy, that will quickly be forgotten.

To its credit, the handful of scenes that showed real stunt performing were fun, and were the most unique aspect of the film. I was thinking that it would be interesting if, due to the director's experience, they would explain how the stunts are performed and what machinery would be involved. Instead, it's mostly just quick shots of wires being attached to belts via clamps, and lets the viewer figure the rest out. I feel this is a huge missed opportunity, because if I could actually learn about how stunts are done, I would remember the movie as a teaching tool about Hollywood, but instead it shows us things that most people already assumed about stunts and becomes forgettable.

The action picks up in the second half and becomes much more enjoyable, but even then, it suffers from poor story writing. Without spoiling, I will say that it suffers too much from "idiot plot" cliches, where the conflicts would be easily solved if every character wasn't an idiot. For example, the key item to the story is a phone with important data on it, but when the heroes find it, they make no attempt to transfer the data to another phone or email to back it up, or even to verbally inform someone about it, even when they're already on the phone talking about it. I'm seeing this plot thread way too much in movies lately. There are times where I rolled my eyes about them not calling the police when conflict escalated, and the resolution was contrived and obvious. These are all writing problems I've been seeing for decades. See why I feel this movie is basic?

The worst aspect is Emily Blunt's character. She plays Ryan Gosling's stuntman character's ex flame, for whom he's working on a movie production. At first it seems they might have good chemistry, but nearly every single scene where she appears, she does nothing but talk for minutes at a time about their relationship. It's a downright archaic archetype that the main female character, despite her high-end career and talent, is still nothing more than a love interest who talks about nothing but her role as the male character's personal goal. They try to be clever by having her describe her relationship woes by reciting the plot of her movie as a contrived metaphor, or by having the cinematography of the film match what she's describing as ideas for the movie she's making, i.e. showing a split screen between characters as she's asking if a split screen shot would work for her movie. It's a tiny bit funny for the first 20 seconds that she does these things, but they constantly drag it on longer than necessary. It becomes annoying very quickly and makes me beg for the action to continue. Honestly, I feel they could have cut at least twenty minutes from the runtime if they dropped the relationship subplot.

And that amalgamates to poor pacing throughout most of the movie. It would be more fun if they figured out how to spread out (or preferably eliminate) the bland relationship story between the action scenes, but I often found myself waiting for the good parts to show up. The real plot about the stuntman becoming a hero doesn't even come up until about half an hour in, at least, and that's largely due to Blunt's character's ramblings holding it up. I enjoyed the movie for its fun action, but I feel it's skippable, and is the type to show up in a couple of years on FX channel.

[businessorzozen]

 How a Mortgage Calculator for a $300,000 Loan Shapes Investment Strategies

In the realm of real estate, making informed investment decisions can mean the difference between a profitable portfolio and a financial misstep. Particularly for first-time home buyers, real estate investors, and financial planners, understanding the implications of a mortgage is crucial. This is where mortgage calculator for loan amount 300000 become invaluable tools.

Understanding Mortgage Calculators

Mortgage calculators are designed to break down the daunting numbers behind home loans into manageable, understandable metrics. By inputting key details such as loan amount, interest rate, and loan term, users can get detailed projections of their monthly payments, total interest paid, and even the total payment over the life of the loan.

The significance of these calculators in planning real estate investments cannot be overstated. They provide a clear picture of potential financial commitments and help investors plan for the future, taking the guesswork out of financial forecasting.

The $300,000 Loan Scenario

Consider a $300,000 loan – a common figure in the housing market. Using a mortgage calculator, one can explore various scenarios that this loan amount could entail. For instance, at an interest rate of 3.5% over a 30-year term, the calculator will reveal not only your monthly payment but also how much of that goes toward interest versus principal over time.

Adjusting the parameters, such as reducing the term to 15 years or changing the interest rate, can dramatically alter the repayment landscape. This exercise provides valuable insights into how different loan conditions can affect cash flow, total interest paid, and ultimately, the overall cost of the investment.

Impact on Investment Strategies

The insights gained from using a mortgage loan calculator for amount 300000 loan can significantly shape investment strategies. For example, the difference in interest paid over 15 versus 30 years can inform whether an investor should aim for shorter-term loans with higher payments but lower total cost, or longer-term loans that free up cash flow at the expense of higher total interest.

Understanding these dynamics is crucial for both short-term and long-term strategy planning. It can guide decisions around flipping properties quickly vs. holding them for rental income, or even affect how one might allocate extra funds—be it towards additional principal payments, other investment opportunities, or reserves for maintenance and vacancy periods.

Tips for Using Mortgage Calculators Effectively

To maximize the benefits of mortgage calculators, consider the following tips:

Experiment with Different Scenarios: Don’t just calculate your ideal situation. Consider worst-case and best-case scenarios to understand a range of possibilities.

Look Beyond Monthly Payments: Focus on the total cost of the loan, including total interest paid, to assess the true cost of your mortgage.

Factor in Additional Costs: Remember to include taxes, insurance, and maintenance expenses in your overall budget.

Use Calculators as Part of a Broader Strategy: Combine insights from mortgage calculators with other financial planning tools and consultations with financial advisors to make well-rounded investment decisions.

The use of mortgage calculators, particularly for significant loan amounts like $300,000, is more than just a matter of convenience. It's about empowering investors, first-time buyers, and financial planners with the knowledge to make strategic, informed decisions. By understanding the mechanics behind mortgage payments, the impact of interest rates, and the benefits of different loan terms, you can devise investment strategies that align with your financial goals and the realities of the real estate market.

In the constantly fluctuating domain of real estate, tools like mortgage calculators aren't just helpful—they're essential for anyone looking to invest smart and secure their financial future.

[watchmegetobsessed]

Tastes Like Strawberries - Harry Styles

a/n: oh this one is a long boi and might not be the end??? i’ve been working on this fic for days and i have an idea for a possible second part, but i wrote this one so it has a fulfilling ending so it can stand as a oneshot as well! i barely just started working on the sequel, we’ll se how it’ll turn out, maybe it goes to shit lmao but whatever, it’s still a nice and whole story without a second part! this is my V-day gift to you all, have this nice professor!harry fic as if it was a box of chocolate! 🍓 🍫 🍬

special thanks to @pastequeharry​ who put up with my constant rambling and whining while i was writing this, you are a hero, his is dedicated to you!!

pairing: professor!Harry x Reader

warning: sexual content, abusing relationship, it’s got smut, angst, lot’s of banter and all that jazz!

word count: 21.4k

masterlist

There’s just a handful of things to know about Professor Harry Styles and that’s because of one of those very few known facts, the first one being that he is a highly private person. He rarely talks about himself or any aspects of his life, he always makes sure to keep it as professional as possible whenever he is teaching.

Second, he is easily the smartest professor to ever walk on campus, but he doesn’t like to brag about it. You never catch him showing off how much he knows, how big of a genius he is, you’ll just start to realize from the way he teaches and approaches certain topics, how he interacts with others and tries to pass his knowledge down to his students. He is brilliant and he should have all the credits for it, yet he still chooses to keep it to himself.

Third, and it’s the most well-known fact because to see this you just need to have a pair of eyes, he is undeniably the most handsome man to ever teach or if you’re being more precise, walk the hallways of the university. No football crazy, alcoholic fratboy or dreamy looking indie guy from the library can live up to what Professor Harry Styles is. With a face clearly carved by the angels, a nicely built but not too muscular frame, and occasionally displayed tattooed arm that makes you wonder what other artworks his stylish outfits are hiding, there’s no man like him and every female on campus agrees with that.

His lectures and courses are jampacked with sighing and heart-eyed college girls, daydreaming about the man who is solemnly just trying to teach the things he is so passionate about. But it’s not just the students, Professor Styles has managed to charm the female professors of all faculties, you can see them wander by his office way too often, they take any opportunity to talk to the man and try to seduce him. It’s unknown if he is oblivious to the effect he has on women or he chooses to ignore every and any attempts, but this is what leads us to the fourth fact.

Despite all the effort and energy that’s been put into his case by every single woman on campus to break the walls the professor has built around himself, he never let any of his students or colleagues to even think they could be romantically linked for real. Professor Styles keeps his distance and turns down any offer that could be mistaken to anything that doesn’t fit in the professional boundaries.

Anytime a student puts on the slightest flirtatious act towards the professor, he either rejects it straight away or ignores it completely and blatantly, making it his clear answer that he is not interested and then he goes back to teaching. You’ve seen it yourself, having him as one of your professors first year of uni, you fell for him just like every other girl in the lecture hall, dreaming about him in ways you probably shouldn’t think of a teacher while he was just casually talking about his grading system and how he is going to build up the lectures throughout the semester. Some brave girls who you assume were highly celebrated by boys in high school took the courage to openly flirt with him, but he didn’t even flinch before shutting all attempts down, not even a blush appeared on his perfectly cut cheekbones.

You thought of ways you’d try to seduce him yourself, but you never actually tried. You never had the balls to actually give it a go and then suffer from the worst embarrassment of your life when he rejects you. So you kept it all to yourself, only entertaining yourself with your elaborate plans about the seduction of your professor.

Second year passed without any classes with Professor Styles, you had only occasionally seen him come and go, rushing down the hallways holding his notebooks to his chest, a steaming cup of coffee in his other hand as he was heading to his lecture hall that you just knew was filled with girls. You always took a moment to yourself to admire his outfit. He has a tendency to pair odd items and make them look like the most put together fit ever that only he can pull off. However, you and your girlfriends always loved to tease him between each other for his grandpa-like sweaters and vests he seemed to love dearly.

“He confuses me, because I want him to fuck me on his desk but also, I feel like he is about to ask me what periodt means because he is too old to understand slang these days,” your friend, Nat said once when your little group was lounging under the huge oak tree between classes and the professor rushed past you, disappearing in the building without paying any of you a look. He wore a pair of beige slacks and a striped sweater, a wrinkly grey shirt peeking from under it at the bottom. The colors and the style overall once again gave you that old people feeling, but then you looked at his handsome face and couldn’t care any less about whatever he was wearing.

The most intimate way you ever saw him was a few days after your twenty-first birthday the summer before your last year of uni started. You just got back from your hometown, the first person to arrive back to your shared flat with Nat and Eden, so you had a few days on your own. You decided to redecorate your room so you took a trip to IKEA, taking your time looking through the set up rooms, just wandering around as you try to figure out what you really want to buy. Walking through the living room section you spotted the professor and first, you didn’t even recognize him.

He was wearing a pair of bright yellow shorts and a short sleeved shirt with floral prints on it, a pair of white framed sunglass on top of his head, keeping his unruly strands out of his face as he was eyeing a couch, seemingly deep in his thoughts. You stopped in your tracks, seeing him in such a casual and everyday setting. For some reason, he seemed like a completely different person.

A woman was there with him and as you walked closer you could hear a fraction of their discussion.

“I don’t know, Gems. Do I need a couch this big?”

“Looks comfy and I like the color. It would also fit in the space just right, I think you should get the bigger one if you have the space for it,” the woman put her two cents in and you wondered who she could be. Girlfriend? Just a casual friend? Maybe fiancé? She did have a ring that could easily go as an engagement ring so you couldn’t tell for sure.

As you were about to walk past you suddenly took the courage to say hi.

“Hello, Professor Styles!” you greeted him with a warm smile and his eyes flickered over to you from the couch in question. One thing you always admired about him is that he never forgot the faces of his students and as he looked at you, you knew he recognized you even if he didn’t know your name specifically.

“Oh, hello,” he nodded in your way.

“I like the couch,” you commented before slowly moving on. “Have a nice rest of your summer!”

“You too, Y/N,” he called after you and it took you by surprise that he remembered your name. Your lecture he taught had almost over a hundred students in it and you weren’t the most active one to stand out that easily, yet he still remembered you more than you were expecting.

That small encounter kept you thinking about him for way longer than you probably should have, especially because you knew you’d have a lecture with him again in the upcoming semester. Your daydreams about him made their way back into your mind as you spent the last days of your summer mostly with your friends. It got you thinking that if you managed to get him to remember your name, maybe you would give one of your plans a go and shoot your shot. He wouldn’t be teaching you in your last semester so you wouldn’t have to face him after he rejects you.

And this is how you came up with your little scheme.

On your last Sunday evening before school starts, you, Nat and Eden sit in the floor of your living room, drinking some white wine as a way of saying goodbye to the carefree summer moments and getting back to the working days of being a senior at uni. Professor Styles came up completely randomly and you let it slip that you’ve just seen him recently at IKEA with a woman and it all led to you admitting that you’ll finally shoot your shot at the professor. Nat and Eden both did the same already, however their attempts were completely ignored and they always bugged you to give it a try yourself, being the only one in your group who hasn’t tried to seduce the professor yet.

“I’ll tell you, but you can’t tell me it’s stupid because I actually think it’ll be funny and a little bit genius,” you tell them before you start sharing the details on your plan.

“Just spill the beans already!” Eden pokes you before she reaches for the bottle and refills her glass.

“Okay, so you both know I took this psychology class last semester for extra credits, right?” The nod and you continue. “The teacher told us about this thing called classical conditioning or they call it pavlovian response too. The guy, Pavlov, did an experiment where he paired the feeding of dogs with a bell ring and after a certain amount of time the dogs started salivating at just the sound of the bell, because they remembered that it’s connected to food. The teacher said this is literally one of the easiest tricks to pull on people.”

“Oh, isn’t this one of the things Jim did on Dwight in The Office?” Nat asks furrowing her eyebrows.

“It is!” you nod, glad that they are understanding the base of your plan. “So, I’ve heard that Professor Styles loves strawberry flavored candies. I thought that I would bring some every day when I see him and offer him some. Slowly, he’ll pair the candy with the thought of me and he’ll get excited when he sees me because he’ll think I have candy for him and it will hopefully work the other way around and he’ll think of me when he is eating strawberry flavored candy that’s not from me.”

Your friends blink at you for a moment, processing what you just shared with them before Eden takes a huge sip of her drink.

“This is the most ridiculous but also the most genius thing I’ve ever heard,” she nods holding her glass up towards you.

“I can’t believe you will pull a psychological experiment on Professor Styles,” Nat shakes her head with a soft chuckle.

“It’s not a blunt way to get closer to him and if he accuses me of trying to flirt I can just say that I’ve been only sharing candy with him, I literally did nothing,” you point out, pretty proud of your solution to your deep fear of having to take his rejection publicly.

“If you get a Noble for this shit, make sure to thank us in your speech,” Eden laughs and you promise to do so when the big moment comes.

Monday morning you make a quick trip to Target and buy a big bag of strawberry flavored candies, probably enough to last for the whole semester, and then you make your way to campus. Following your first lecture you meet up with Eden who also signed up for Professor Styles’ lecture this semester, so the two of you make your way towards the lecture hall together.

“I really can’t believe you are doing this,” she chuckles when you get the candy ready as you near the room. The professor is always the first one in the lecture hall so you know you’ll find him there already.

“You can’t tell me it’s not a funny plan,” you smirk at her. And just as you walk in, you immediately spot the professor sitting at the desk at the front, going over the syllabus before the start. “Save a seat for me,” you tell Eden who just laughs and makes her way up the stairs along the desks.

Grabbing the pack of sweets from your bag you walk up to the professor, feeling confident with your plan. He lifts his head up when he notices your arrival and your eyes meet with his green ones.

“Hello, professor. Would you like some candy?” you simply ask with an innocent smile.

Professor Styles stares at you for a moment before his eyes move down to the candy in your hand, the opening of the bag facing him in a welcoming manner.

“I, uhh… what flavor?” he curiously asks and you can barely push down your smirk.

“Strawberry.”

“Oh. I’ll… take one, thank you,” he nods, hand reaching into the bag as he grabs just one single candy, unwrapping the package before he pops it into his mouth. “Thank you,” he nods again with a delightful smile.

“Of course. Did you buy the couch?” you ask, taking slow steps away from the desk as he keeps his eyes on you.

“I… did not. Bought another one,” he admits shortly and you know you’ve reached the limit. If you ask more, he’ll get suspicious, so you just nod smiling before walking up to the spot Eden has reserved for you. When you sit down, you catch the professor paying you one last glance before he returns to what he was previously doing.

“You are a genius, because now we can watch him suck on a fucking candy for the next few minutes,” Eden mumbles quietly, making you laugh.

“I knew this would be a good plan,” you sigh, satisfied with the work you’ve done. Now it’s just a matter of time.

Every Monday and Wednesday, you arrive with the same bag of candy to the lecture hall, walk up to Professor Styles and offer him one. And he always takes one. The first few times he seems hesitant when he spots you approaching him, but he slowly grows used to your tiny act of kindness that occurs every time you see him. On week three you expand the plan. You usually have lunch with Nat on Thursdays since you both have a break between one and two pm. The two of you try to take advantage of the warm early autumn days and sit under the pergola that’s near the building where Professor Styles’ office is as well. It’s mere coincidence, you only like that place because it’s close to the lecture hall you have to go to after lunch, but you notice that the professor emerges from Building C around one thirty, walking back to his office probably after one of his classes. The sidewalk runs directly next to the pergola so it gives you a chance to bring the candy out one more time every week. You nicely greet him when he is nearing the two of you and then hold out the bag, asking if he wants some. He always takes one and thanks you with a sweet smile that leaves you a tad bit blushed.

“I can’t fucking believe your plan is working,” Nat chuckles in disbelief on one occasion when the professor just disappeared in the building, probably happily unwrapping his candy of the day.

“It’s funny, innit?” you grin at her proudly.

Frankly, this is just a fun experiment for you. You don’t actually think that the professor will think of you differently even the slightest. You might be able to plant the thought of you in his head, but that doesn’t instantly mean that he’ll start fancying you and actually do something about it. It would be ridiculously naïve to think it’s going to be you who breaks through the wall that hundreds of women had already tried to knock down.

Week six is what brings the breakthrough. After long consideration and discussion with Nat and Eden, you decide to test if the experiment has been successful. You offer one last candy on Monday, but Wednesday brings the change. You go to lecture without candy. Well, you have it on you, but you decide not to ask him if he wants some.

Walking into the lecture hall, as always, he is already sitting at his desk, flipping through the pages of a book when you walk up to him with the intention of asking him a question on the paper that’s due next week.

“Professor Styles?” you softly speak up, catching his attention. “Can I have a question about the paper?”

“Of course,” he nods and you can’t tell just yet if he was expecting the candy or not.

“I was wondering if I can use a diagram to visualize my results at the end. I have a brilliant idea to summarize the data with one.”

“Sure, just make sure to give credit wherever it’s due, if you are using someone else’s work for the diagram.”

“Definitely,” you smile at him and wait a moment. That’s where you see the anticipation in his eyes.

His gaze flickers down to your hands and then to your bag where you always carry the candy and when his eyes meet yours again, you see him swallow hard.

He was expecting the candy. Not only expecting, but he started salivating when he saw you, thinking that he would get the candy from you as always.

“Is… that all?” he asks, the slightest hint of hope appearing in his tone, probably waiting for you to pull the bag of candy out of your bag and offer him one. But it’s not happening today.

“Yes, thank you very much,” you nod smiling widely before you turn around and walk away, a shocked and triumphant look appearing on your face once he can’t see it anymore and when Eden sees you, she gasps.

“He fucking expected the candy, didn’t he?!” she whispers at you in shock and you nod frantically, still not believing your plan worked.

“You should have seen the anticipation in his eyes, he really thought I was gonna offer him some!”

“Oh my God, this is hilarious!” Eden laughs covering her mouth as the lecture hall starts to fill up slowly.

Turning forward, you see that the professor is sitting behind his desk, the book that had his attention before your arrival is long forgotten in front of him, now he is staring ahead of him with slightly furrowed eyebrows, deep in his thoughts.

Is he thinking about you? Or why he was expecting candy from you?

You see him reach for his water bottle and he takes two big gulps probably to wash away his need for the candy before he narrows his eyes and at last they find you in the auditorium. You tilt your head to the side innocently smiling, as if you know absolutely nothing about anything. You keep eye-contact, forcing you not to be the one who breaks it and he is intimidating. You feel like he can read your mind as he stares at you and when he finally turns his gaze back at the book, you exhale sharply.

The lecture goes down just as usual and when the professor dismisses the class you decide to put the cherry to the top. Walking down between the desks you grab a candy from your bag and while the professor is talking to a girl who also had a question about the paper, you place the candy to his desk next to his book. He doesn’t see you walk out and you don’t see him when he finds it, but something is telling you he figured you out. No way a man as smart as him doesn’t realize what game you’ve been playing with him.

Sitting under the pergola on Thursday you are deep in discussion with Nat, helping her with a task sheet she has to turn in after lunch but she completely forgot about it. As the two of you are trying to do the seemingly endless sheet, you don’t even notice the professor walking from Building C, as always, but he spots you.

“No, I don’t think that’s even a thing, you can’t write that,” you tell Nat, but she shakes her head.

“I don’t care if it’s a thing, I just want to fill in the whole thing so the teacher doesn’t think I finished it in twenty minutes before class,” she mumbles, scribbling down her answer as you just chuckle at her.

Suddenly, you see a pair of dusty Vans appear in your sight and as your eyes move up, you are facing none other than Professor Styles, standing right in front of you, holding out his hand with his hand turned upwards, a cheeky smile tugging on his lips. His appearance takes you by surprise and for a moment you just dumbly stare down at his palm, then up at his eyes.

“Very smart. Pulling a pavlovian on me with my favorite candy,” he speaks up, dropping his hand as he cocks his head to the side. Nat looks up from her sheet with wide eyes as you stare at the professor with blushing cheeks.

“I have no idea what you are talking about, professor,” you tell him with a knowing smirk.

“Of course. You know, it took me a moment to realize yesterday, but I wanted to let you know that… I think it was clever.”

“If I knew anything about what you’re talking about… I would say thank you. But I stand up for my innocence.”

“Surely,” he chuckles softy. “Have a great rest of your week,” he then nods before turning around to walk away, but you quickly reach into your bag and grab a candy.

“Professor Styles!” you call out and he turns back just in time to catch the candy you throw in his way. He glances at it in his palm before his eyes snap up to you again, smirking at you shortly before he disappears in the building.

“Okay, call me stupid, but I could feel the sexual tension between the two of you,” Nat says as soon as the professor is out of sight.

“Don’t be silly, it was just… a joke and he liked it.”

“He called you clever, Y/N!”

“No, he called my trick clever.”

“But you came up with it so you’re clever too. Say whatever you want, but I actually think you have a shot at him.”

“I definitely don’t,” you laugh shaking your head and you genuinely believe it. Nat scoffs before she gets back to her sheet, but not without having one last thought about the situation.

“We’ll be laughing at how you brainwashed him into liking you when you’ll be dating for years, living together and all that shit.”

You’ve made some very questionable choices in your dating life prior. Like when you dated a boy in high school and let him take your virginity at the back of his mom’s minivan just to break up with your right after that, or when you briefly dated the guy you met at the mall, but it later turned out he was gay and he used you as his cover up in front of his family. But the worst decision of all was dating an egoistic forty years old loser who just freshly got divorced and went after you at some tacky bar you were at with your friends.

The time you spent dating Victor is way less than the time he has been bothering you, trying to make you go back to him when you’ve actually told him you don’t want anything to do with him anymore. You broke up with him just before you went home for the summer and he didn’t take it well, even drove up to your hometown and showed up at your parents’ house drunk, begging for you to take him back. He never stood a chance, not after that one time he slapped you across the face during a fight the two of you had. You tolerate a lot of things but not violence and you don’t believe him when he says it was just a onetime thing. There’s no guarantee he won’t hit you ever again and you are definitely not waiting around to see if he told you the truth.

On this particular late October evening you are searching through your whole room looking for a book you know you have, but can’t seem to find anywhere. It’s your holy bible about research methodology and you need it for your thesis work, but it seems like the small apartment has completely swallowed it.

“Didn’t you leave it at Victor’s? You were working on that long essay when you were dating him, saw you use the book all the time,” Eden tells you when you ask her if she’s seen it anywhere and then it clicks.

She is right, now you remember leaving the book at his once and you completely forgot to pick it up after things got nasty between the two of you.

“Damn it,” you growl in annoyance.

Not feeling like calling him, you send him a quick text, hoping he still has it and hasn’t burned it after one of your fights.

Y/N: Hey, I think I left my research methodology book at yours. You still have it?

Victor: I do.

Y/N: Cool, can I drop by to pick it up?

Victor: I’m leaving for work, you can come to the bar if you want it.

You sigh in defeat. Victor is a bartender at a place that’s all the way across town, takes almost an entire hour to get there, but you are left with no other choice.

Y/N: Okay, I’ll see you there.

The raining has finally stopped this morning so you feel better leaving the house than you would have if it was still pouring. You take the bus and travel across town, feeling anxious to see Victor again. Last time you met him he cursed you out and threw his phone at you, barely missing your head. You promised yourself you wouldn’t go near him again after that, but it seems like you can never get completely rid of him.

Students rarely come to this part of the town, it’s way too far from campus and has nothing to offer that can’t be found closer to the dormitories or the school’s buildings. It’s not entirely your scene either, the bars around here are liked by older generations, not by people your age, this is another reason why you don’t like coming around here.

The bar where Victor works is a place where they have different local bands perform every Friday and Saturday. It’s not a tacky nook with creepy dudes, they actually have prices on the higher end, not something you can necessarily afford with your part time job’s paycheck from the small accounting office near your apartment where you work as an assistant on your free afternoons.

Walking into the place you immediately spot Victor behind the bar and you take a deep breath before you walk up to him.

“Hey,” you call out for him, taking one of the stools along the bar.

“Hey. Long time no see.”

“Happens when you break up with someone,” you respond with a little spice and he frowns at your words. “Can you give me the book?”

“I’ll have a break in ten, can you wait for that or you have something extra urgent shit to do, as always?” You can tell he is still bitter from how things ended between the two of you, but you’ve learned not to care about it. His way of dealing with the breakup is not your responsibility, no matter how hard he is trying to prove it wrong.

You roll your eyes but nod, knowing well there’s no use to fight him. Ten minutes is not the end of the world. Busying yourself on your phone, you try to stay unnoticed and luckily, Victor can’t keep chatting with you, because customers keep coming up to him and ordering drinks. When he finally has his break he tells you to follow him to the back.

“So how have you been?” he asks as you walk down the hallway that leads to the small break room, there’s an office at the end and some kind of changing room you guess for the bands, along with a storage.

“Fine.”

“You really gonna be a bitter bitch and not talk to me?” he asks you, giving you a disgusted look, but you know it’s just the anger talking from him.

“Victor, I didn’t come here to talk, I just need my book!”

“That doesn’t mean you can’t answer my question.”

“I answered it! I’ve been fine, now give me the damn book!” you growl, losing your patience with him, but he is seemingly in the same shoes.

“When will you stop being a bitch and just drop this ridiculous act, Y/N? I’ve been after you for months yet you keep ignoring me!”

“Did it ever occur to you that I’m ignoring you because I don’t want anything to do with you? Victor, it’s been months, just… move the fuck on! Go cry to your ex-wife or something, I don’t care!”

You didn’t mean to snap, but he always brings the worst out of you. From the corner of your eyes you can see movement at the other end of the hallway where the changing room is, but you don’t get to pay much attention to it, because the next moment Victor grabs you by your arm and yanks you towards him.

“Don’t fucking talk to me like that! You ungrateful slut, I swear��”

There’s little you can do, he is twice as big as you are, his grip on your arm so strong there’s no doubt it will leave a mark. Your heart is racing as you try to pull yourself out of his hold, but he doesn’t even bat an eye at your attempt.

However, before he could drag you into the empty breakroom to do god knows what, he is stopped by a voice.

“Hey! Let her go!”

If you weren’t shocked enough at his violent reaction, now you are definitely think you’re going nuts, because it’s none other than Professor Styles who is now nearing you with a hard expression on his face, two other guys following right behind him and though none of them are bigger than Victor, he knows he can’t just start a fight with three men.

Your chest is heaving when the professor finally reaches you and Victor’s hold lets go of you, making you fall back a little.

“You perform here twice and think you’re some kind of rockstar?” Victor spats at the professor, but you’re a little lost in what’s really going on. Professor Styles gently grabs your wrist and pulls you behind him, eyes never leaving Victor’s burning gaze.

“You alright?” one of the other two men asks and you nod, not finding your voice to actually speak.

“Get the hell out of my sight before I call the police on you,” the professor answers in a calm yet threatening voice

Victor takes a second to himself, thinking about the choices he has before he turns around and disappears in the breakroom, slamming the door behind him, leaving you in complete shock about what just happened.

Professor Styles then turns around, his eyes soften at seeing how shaken you are and quite frankly, you feel like you are in a bad and quite weird dream.

“Are you okay? Did he hurt you?” he asks, clearly worried about you and you just shake your head no.

“I-I’m fine, I think,” you mumble out of breath.

“Come on, let’s get out of here,” the guy who asked if you’re alright suggests and you nod in agreement, following them kind of blindly, the three of them keeping you in their little circle as you walk out to the bar and they don’t stop until you are out of the place in the cold night air. You slowly come back to reality and process that Professor Styles just saved you out of fucking nowhere from your abusive asshole ex. That’s what you call a plot twist.

You finally take a moment to look at the other two guys, they both look the same age as the professor, or maybe a little older, both of them are rocking some facial hair, the one that asked you seems a little more open while the other one quite reserved but friendly looking.

“What… What were you doing back there?” you ask, turning to face the professor. He clearly seems upset, but you’re not sure if it’s entirely because of what happened with Victor back then or because you are standing outside some random bar on a Saturday night, definitely crossing his personal boundaries he keeps so high at school.

“We played here tonight, was just about to leave when I saw you.”

“You have a band?” you ask, shocked at the detail.

“A pretty good one,” the talkative guy chuckles. “I’m Adam, nice to meet you. This is Mitch.”

You shake hands with them introducing yourself as well.

“Y/N is… my student,” the professor adds as if he is clearing the air for his bandmates, a kind of warning for them.

From the direction of the parking lot two women emerge, laughing on something as they walk up to the four of you, both of them eyeing you curiously.

“Hey boys, who is this pretty girl?”

“Sarah, Charlotte, this is Y/N, she is my student. Y/N, these are my other band mates, Sarah and Charlotte,” the professor introduces you as you shake hands with them quickly.

“I-I’m sorry I interrupted your time with your friends, professor,” you shyly apologize, feeling like a complete intruder all of a sudden with all his bandmates around you.

“Interrupt? Sweetheart, that dude was about to do some unforgivable things to you, don’t apologize for needing help,” Adam snorts. “You’re lucky we were there.”

“What? What happened?” Sarah asks in confusion.

“Just… my asshole ex got a little too violent when I didn’t want to chit-chat with him,” you admit with a defeated sigh.

“Oh shit, but are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” you smile faintly, though you still can feel his grip on your upper arm. “I, um… I better get going, I guess. Thank you for… the saving,” you say, a little lost about what should be said in this situation.

“You’re leaving? We were just about to go to a much better place, why don’t you come with us, forget about your ex a little?” Charlotte offers and you catch the professor’s panicked look for a split second.

“I, um… I don’t think I should, but thank you.”

“Why shouldn’t you?” Sarah questions.

“Because I know how Professor Styles hates to mingle with students outside of lectures and I don’t want to cross any lines,” you truthfully admit. The professor furrows his eyebrows.

“I don’t hate mingling with students,” he states.

“Well, you are surely not the most reachable professor on campus,” you chuckle lightly. “But it’s fine, I understand it. So I’ll just head home.”

“Come on, Harry. Let her tag along for just one drink!” Sarah begs and seemingly everyone would be happy to have you join for a little. The professor’s eyes meet yours, as if he is contemplating whether he should say yes or let you go home. When he finally speaks up you’re more surprised than when you realized it was him saving you from Victor.

“I guess you could use a drink after what happened in there,” he says, the tiniest smirk showing on his lips as your eyes shoot up.

“You sure?”

“Yeah, come on,” he nods and your little group heads down the street.

Turns out the place they were heading to was just two corners down, so they left all their stuff at the minivan at the parking lot for the time being. You slide into an empty booth, Adam and Mitch go to get the first round, so it’s just the three of you girls and the professor.

“So you’re in one of Harry’s lectures?” Charlotte asks with a warm smile.

“Yeah, for the second time, actually. Had him in first year, now it’s my fifth semester and I had no doubt I have to take his class if I have the chance.” You pay a glance at him, but he is staring at his hands on his lap, you can’t tell if it’s because he is uncomfortable with you there or if it’s something else.

“It’s so funny, because we’ve heard that he is known to be a good teacher but we never actually heard it from one of his students,” Sarah chuckles. “What’s he like?”

“Sarah, you enjoy talking about me when I’m very much present?” he scoffs, giving her a look, but she just shrugs innocently.

“Come on, I bet even you’re curious about what your students think of you. Now is your time to find it out!”

“I think Professor Styles knows very well that he is one of the best, if not the actual best,” you truthfully say and see him raise his eyebrows a little.

“What makes him so good?” Charlotte questions.

You glance at him again, as a way of asking for permission if you can answer. You definitely don’t want to make him even more uncomfortable by talking about him when he is right next to you. He looks into your eyes, and his expression tells you that he wants to hear your answer as well, but he quickly adds:

“You don’t have to answer, Y/N.”

“It’s not a secret,” you admit it with a smile. “Professor Styles’ lectures always leave you with a question to think about until next week, he is great at getting into your head without you even noticing. He explains the most complicated things in so simple ways, it should be taught,” you say with a soft chuckle. “I think his enormous knowledge about many different fields in science and just life in general is amusing, anyone can learn something from him, it’s guaranteed.”

“Wow, where is this academic genius side of yours when you’re around us, or we only get to see the dad joke version of you?” Sarah teases him and you can’t push down a laugh, imagining him cracking dad jokes feels so alien but still kind of fitting for him.

“That’s what you get when you’re a nosy little thing,” he retorts with a small smirk. He then turns to you, and as Sarah and Charlotte are laughing on something, he lowly tells you: “You can call me Harry outside of school. Feels weird that you call me professor when my friends are around.”

“You sure?”

He nods and you spot a small smile on his lips. He must be getting used to the feel of you being there, but you still don’t want to push his limits too much.

“Can I ask you something?” he questions, leaning back in his seat.

“Of course.”

“If your ex is this aggressive, why were you there with him?”

His question is surprising, you didn’t think he would ask you something personal, but you guess it’s a valid question after he just saved you from Victor.

“I wanted to get a book back that I left at his place. Didn’t even get to the point where he could have given it back,” you mumble under your breath.

“What book?”

“Just this… research methodology book, wanted it back for my thesis work, but I guess I’ll have to buy a new one,” you huff bitterly.

“Is it the one written by William Scott?”

“Y-Yeah, it is. You know it?” you ask, but then realize it’s a bit of a dumb question. He probably knows every academically important book you will ever come across.

“I actually have it myself,” he nods. Just then, Mitch and Adam return with the drinks and you thank them for the beer, already reaching for your money to pay, but Adam shakes his head.

“It’s on me, don’t worry.”

You watch as Mitch sits beside Sarah, curling an arm around her shoulders and though you couldn’t have guessed that they are a couple, seeing them like this it actually makes sense, they look cute together.

You take a sip from your beer, trying to join the conversation Sarah and Charlotte are having, when your attention is pulled back by Harry.

“I can… lend you the book, if you want.”

“Oh, you don’t have to. I’ll just get a new one.”

“No, really. I think I even have two copies, I can give one to you.”

“I couldn’t ask you that, prof—I mean Harry.”

“You’re not asking,” he smiles at you softly. “I probably won’t need both, so why not put the extra into use?”

“Okay, but I’ll pay for it,” you insist, but Harry shakes his head.

“No need, one of them was a gift so I didn’t pay for it either.”

“Well… if you’re sure about it, I would love to have that extra copy, thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“So Y/N, what do you study exactly?” Adam questions, pulling you out of your little discussion with Harry.

“I’m majoring in anthropology, but I’ve been taking some psychology classes on the side just because I’m interested in the topics.”

“And what is Harry teaching you?”

“Had him for intro Sociology lecture first year, now I’m in his Methodology of Cultural Anthropology class.”

“All these subjects with their GY endings, I don’t know how you two put up with science on this level,” Sarah huffs in amusement.

“The names sometimes sound fancier than the subject itself,” you tell her smiling.

“But I bet you need to be quite smart to study these stuff on this level you are at.”

“Oh, it’s just a bachelorette degree, I wouldn’t say I’m that smart,” you chuckle shyly.

“She is totally toning it down,” Harry speaks up, catching everyone’s attention. “I know students tend to take my into Sociology class for just some extra credits so I always give them two options for the semester. They can either write a two pages long review of any article related to the topics talked about at lecture and get their strong C with the bare minimum, or actually participate and do a research of their own and turn in an at least seven pages long essay about their chosen topic. Y/N turned in an eleven pages long paper on the history of death sentences in the U.S. in the last fifty years and how society is thinking about it nowadays. It was easily one of the best works I’ve ever read and it was just an intro class.”

“You remember my essay?” you ask in complete shock.

“Of course. As I said, one of the bests I’ve read,” he nods confidently.

“So you’re like… on Harry’s smart level, actually?” Sarah asks, tilting her head to the side and you can feel yourself blushing.

You’ve always been said to be the smart kid at school, but you never thought it to be true yourself. In your book, you were just doing your absolute best, soaking in whatever knowledge was thrown in your way. You never actually understood how someone could just not study for an exam or not do an assignment, because you always felt like it was your duty to do the best you can. You thought yourself to be more of a hard-working student rather than a smart one.

“She is definitely a bright one,” Harry agrees, his eyes meeting yours as a small smile appears on his lips and you think that this is the biggest compliment you’ve ever gotten. “She actually tricked me with a psychological experiment and I didn’t even realize it,” he laughs and you can’t hold your smirk back.

“What? What did you do?” Charlotte asks, dying to know how you played Harry.

“Have you heard of the Pavlovian response?” you ask looking around and you can tell it rings a bell for all of them.

“The one with the dogs and the bell?” Mitch asks and you nod.

“Wait you did that on Harry?” Adam laughs with wide eyes and you just nod with a sly smile.

“I just offered him strawberry flavored candies every time I saw him. Took me six weeks to build up the response but he actually started expecting it whenever he saw me,” you tell them chuckling to yourself.

“And I only realized it when she stopped with the candy and I felt this massive feeling that something was missing,” Harry adds shaking his head with a soft laugh.

“Okay, that’s hilarious,” Sarah snorts clapping her hands together. “Y/N, I adore you, you’re brilliant!”

“It was just… an experiment,” you shrug shyly.

The night carries much faster than you realize. One drink turns into three and before you could realize, it’s already past midnight. Eden texts you, asking where you are since you said you’d just get the book and go home right away, but it’s been hours.

Y/N: Don’t freak out, but I’m at a bar with Prof. Styles and his friends. I’ll tell you everything tomorrow!

Eden: HOW DO YOU EXPECT ME NOT TO FREAK OUT AFTER READING THIS???!?!

Y/N: Lol, chill. Nothing extra is happening.

Eden: It’s already extra that you’re out with him.

Realizing how late it is, you decide you better get going, since it’s a long way back home. When you tell the little group that you’re about to head out, they all agree that it’s time to part ways and leave, so you all slowly make your way back to the parking lot.

“Do you know where the bus stop is back?” you ask, narrowing your eyes, trying to spot where you should be heading.

“You want to go home by bus at this time?” Harry asks.

“Well, I surely won’t pay for a ride, I live almost an hour away from here.”

“An hour?” he frowns. “I’ll take you home, come on,” he tells you, heading towards the minivan.

“What? No need. The bus is fine,” you protest, but he shakes his head.

“You are not taking the bus at this hour, not under my watch,” he simply states and you raise your eyebrows at him.

“Didn’t realize I was under your watch,” you tease him and it seems like your comment caught him off-guard. “Don’t piss your pants, I was just joking,” you tell him, and thought for a second you feel like you are being way too comfortable around him, his smile quickly smashes your doubts.

Sarah, Mitch and Charlotte all take an Uber since they live near each other and Adam is picked up by his wife, so when everyone is off to their own way, you and Harry get in the van and head to your place.

“How long have you had the band?” you ask, in need to break the silence that’s been weighing down on the two of you. “If you don’t mind me asking,” you add quickly when you see him.

“About four years. Used to have another one, but we parted ways.”

“And what do you do in the band?”

“I, uhh… Well I mostly sing but I also play the guitar.”

“You know, I’m not that surprised you can sing,” you chuckle to yourself sinking further down in your seat.

“How come?”

“You have a voice that’s great to listen to at lectures, makes sense that you can sing as well.”

You take a moment to look at his hand that’s gripping the steering wheel, he is the kind that drives with one hand on the wheel, the other one on the shifting gear. He makes it look so easy as he steers the wheel whenever he is turning a corner while his other one easily moves around the shifting gear, his tattoos are peeking from under his rolled up shirt sleeve. He catches you staring and you feel a blush burning on your cheeks as you turn your head to the other side. Maybe you shouldn’t have drunk that third beer…

“Am I really seen that rigid by the students?” he speaks up after a while and you turn back to face him.

“What do you mean?”

“You said I’m known about not mingling with students.”

“Well, you don’t mingle, do you? But it doesn’t mean you come off as rigid. More like… closed-off. Private.”

“I know I should be a little friendlier, but I just…”

“You don’t have to explain yourself, I think everyone gets it why you’re like that.”

“Do they?” he arches an eyebrow.

“Well, you’re obviously a ladies’ favorite, but it doesn’t sit well with you being a person of some sort of power. It’s clear that you don’t want anyone to get the wrong picture about you. I’ve seen how bluntly girls are flirting with you, some of them are quite scandalous if you ask me,” you huff to yourself. “I totally get it that you don’t want even just a rumor to spread about you.”

“Didn’t think I was that obvious,” he admits, running his tongue over his lips.

“Don’t worry about it, you’re still a highly fancied professor, in all means,” you tell him with a warm smile.

“Does this mean you also fancy me?” he suddenly questions and your lips part at his words. He quickly realizes how ambiguous he just sounded. “I mean, am I one of your favorites? Where do I stand in your chart of professors?”

You can’t tell for sure because of the lack of lighting, but you could have sworn there’s a light blush on his cheeks as he corrects himself. Because of this, you don’t know for sure if he really meant it academically. Either way, the answer is the same.

“You’re my favorite,” you confidently state and your eyes meet for a moment before he turns back to face the road.

The rest of the ride is pretty quiet, you keep giving him directions to your place until you finally arrive a little before one am.

“Well, thank you for the ride,” you smile at him, grabbing the door handle.

“See you on Monday,” he nods shortly and watches as you get out of the can.

“Yeah, see you, professor,” you smirk before shutting the door and walking up the stairs and disappearing in your building.

“Was that Professor Styles in the fucking minivan?!” Nat throws the question at you the moment you open the front door.

“Jesus, why are you still up?” you sigh, shutting the door and shimmying yourself out of your coat.

“Because we were waiting for you!” Eden rolls her eyes. “So, care to tell us what the fuck just happened?” The three of you get comfortable on the couch and you give them a quick rundown of your evening from meeting Victor through being saved by Harry right to him offering to drive you home and they listen to you with wide eyes in complete shock that you just spent your entire evening with the most handsome professor on campus who also happens to be the most private as well.

“If I didn’t see him sitting in that van with my own eyes I would straight up think you’re lying, but I saw his tattooed hand over the windshield,” Nat gasps, processing the story.

“I know, I still feel like it didn’t happen, but it did.”

“And what is he like around his friends? What are his friends like?” Eden questions, hugging her knees to her chest.

“He is pretty much just like in lecture, just jokes a little more and he has a looser vocab. His friends are hilarious, I really got along with Sarah.”

“I know you still think it won’t happen, but I actually think you have a shot at him, Y/N,” Eden points it out and you just chuckle.

“Why, because he saved me from my douche ex?”

“No, because he let you stay for the night with him and his friends. This is literally the first ever time a student hung out with him.”

“It’s not that big of a deal, Harry is a reserved and private person—“

“Harry?!” they gasp at the same time.

“You are now just casually calling him Harry?” Nat asks with ogling eyes.

“Well, yes, he asked me to, because it felt weird that I was calling him Professor Styles with his friends around.”

“Okay, I’m giving it… let’s say, he seems to be moving pretty slow, but y’all will be fucking in about six months,” Nat bluntly tells you and it makes you laugh.

“Oh, sure, whatever. I’m gonna shower and head to bed, you two don’t get too crazy with your fairytales,” you wave at them before disappearing in the bathroom.

The rest of the weekend goes by uneventfully, outside of the pathetic attempt from Victor to get you to talk to him, but you’ve had enough of him for a life so you finally block his number and hope you won’t ever see him again.

Both you and Eden oversleep on Monday morning, skipping your early morning lecture and already being late for Harry’s class as well, so you barely make it to Harry’s class in time, just sprinting up the rows, flopping down to your usual seats when Harry starts the lecture. It all goes as usual as if nothing really happened during the weekend, Harry doesn’t seem to be bothered by it at all. Glancing over at his desk you spot the book he promised you and you can’t hold your smile back. Still grinning, your eyes accidentally meet with his gaze and he stops for a heartbeat as if he is questioning why you are so smiley, but you just shake your head and he carries on before anyone could suspect a thing.

“I gotta run, my favorite TA is having his office hours now and I have a few questions for him. See you at home?” Eden asks once the lecture is over and you are getting ready to leave.

“Sure, have a good day!” you call after her and she sings a ‘you too!’ before running out of the room.

You pack up and head down between the rows, Harry spotting you right away and you go up to him without him even asking you to.

“Hey, sorry we were a little late to class this morning,” you tell him and he just shakes his head kindly.

“No worries. How… is your arm?” He furrows his eyebrows, his gaze wandering down to your forearm where Victor grabbed you on Saturday.

“Oh, it’s fine. I just have a little bruise,” you shrug, because it really isn’t that big deal, but you can tell Harry is still outraged by what happened.

“M’sorry about that.”

“It’s fine. Would be worse if you weren’t there,” you smile at him kindly and he nods to himself before turning to his desk.

“I, uhh, I brought the book we talked about,” he shyly says grabbing it from the desk. As people are exiting the room you can feel the glares on yourself, most of them are probably trying to figure out why Harry is talking to you for so long, but you don’t pay much attention to them as you take the book he hands you.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to pay for it?”

“No need, keep it, it’s yours,” he shakes his head with a small smile.

“Thank you then.” You slide the book into your bag before looking back up at him. “Well, I’ll see you on Wednesday, professor,” you smile warmly before heading out.

“See you!” he calls after you before you close the door behind you.

The week carries on as usual, you are working on papers that needs to be turned in before the fall break so you spend some extra time at the library, using every bit of free time you have so you finish everything on time.

Things go back to kind of normal with Harry, he greets you in the mornings when you walk into the lecture hall and other than the warm smile he occasionally gives you, nothing has changed.

Friday however brings a surprise, but not from Harry. You’re sitting at work in the afternoon, typing away on your computer, filling in some sheets when you get a notification on your phone from Instagram.

Sarah Jones is now following you!

You tap on her profile but see that it’s private so without a second thought you request following. Luckily, she approves you only a few seconds later and you gain access to her posts, quite a few of them featuring Harry on them.

Photos of birthdays, weekend getaways, band practices and performances, Harry makes a lot of appearances on her feed and you find yourself scrolling all the way down until you reach the first few posts from 2016. Just as you are about to leave her profile you get a message from her.

Sarah: Hey Y/N! Charlotte and I’ve been talking about you recently, loved having you with us last Saturday! Want to grab a drink with the two of us this weekend?

Y/N: Would love to, but I’m not sure Harry would like the idea…

Sarah: He won’t be there and besides, who is he to tell you who you can and can’t hang out with?

She is right. You enjoyed spending time with them as well and Harry has little to no word in if you want to meet up with his friends or not. This invitation has no connection to him being your professor.

Y/N: Alright, I’m down!

 This is how your friendship with Sarah and Charlotte starts. You meet up with them on Saturday and have an amazing time, they are definitely fun people to spend time with and though at first you feel hesitant to get closer to them, you soon forget about your doubts and just enjoy your time with them.

Your little girls night goes so well that they invite you out for dinner on Wednesday with Mitch joining the little trio. You learn that he is a quiet but hilarious guy, he and Sarah make a great couple, you think.

“We have a gig this Saturday at Green Light, want to come?” Charlotte asks at the end of the dinner.

“Okay, I really don’t think Harry would be a fan of that idea,” you point out, feeling like it’s surely over the lines. He still doesn’t know about you meeting some of his friends without him and you’re not sure how he would react if he did.

“Harry can fuck off, not everything is about him. We are inviting you as our friends, he just happens to be in the band as well,” Sarah rolls her eyes, clearly not as bothered by the situation as you are.

“I just don’t want to make him uncomfortable.”

“He is a big boy, he’ll get himself over it, don’t worry. So, are you coming?”

“I guess, alright,” you nod with a soft chuckle.

 Next week you contemplate telling Harry that Sarah invited you out for their gig, but at last you decide against it, something is telling you he would try to talk you down and now you’re pretty hyped to see them perform. So you keep quiet and just brace yourself for the worst when Saturday comes.

You don’t overdress for the occasion, decide to wear some light washed mom jeans and a simple sweater tucked into it, a casual look for a night out.

Even when you’re on your way to the place you are having second guesses whether it’s a good idea or not, but you tell yourself it’s not that big of a deal and if Harry flips, you’ll just tell him you came for Sarah and Charlotte.

As you get off the bus and walk towards the place, you immediately spot the little group of three next to Harry’s minivan, Sarah waving in your way as you become visible in the streetlights.

“There she is!” she beams happily and you just chuckle at her.

Harry is standing with his back facing your way but seeing Sarah’s reaction he turns around and you swear for a moment you think he is about to faint when he spots you.

“Hey everyone,” you smile as Sarah pulls you into a hug and Charlotte does the same.

“Hey, if it isn’t our little trouble seeker!” Adam teases you and you just roll your eyes at him before shyly glancing at Harry who is standing on your left, awfully quiet and deep in his thoughts since your arrival. He feels your eyes on him and his gaze meets yours and just by one look you can tell he is pissed.

Just as you thought.

The group chats a little longer outside before Adam suggests they head inside and get ready for their start and you are just about to follow them, but Harry keeps you back.

“Y/N, can we have a word?”

Staying back you nod, hiding your hands in your coat’s pockets as you look at him, lips curled into your mouth.

“What are you doing here?” he questions, eyebrows knitted together and he looks so damn intimidating, the neon lights from the front of the building tinting part of his face green, but you think red would suit him better with this look.

“I… came to see the band playing, what do you mean?”

“Is this your sneaky way of trying to come after me? Because I thought we had a very clear discussion about my thoughts regarding situations like this and you seemed to understand it.”

He comes off way angrier than you think he should be. Yes, it might be uncomfortable for him to see you here, but the tone he just hit is way too harsh for your liking and professor or not, you are not letting anyone talk to you like that when it’s completely not relevant.

“Okay, calm down. First of all, I was invited here.”

“By who?” he spats.

“Sarah and Charlotte, we met last weekend and had dinner this week as well. Had a great time and they asked me to come tonight as well, so get off of your high horse, I’m not here for you.” You can see the change on his face as the information sinks in and he realizes he accused you wrongly, but you’re not quite done with him. “But if I was here to see you, why does that bother you so much? You can’t avoid meeting students every minute when you’re off-campus. If I came here because of you, it shouldn’t affect you this much if you weren’t worried about something else than me just being here,” you point out and he furrows his eyebrows at you. “If I didn’t know better I would think you’re afraid to be around me because you actually like me, huh!” you tell him with an innocent yet suggesting look. His eyes widen and the confidence in himself quickly vanishes from him, replaced by anxiety and nervous looks as he realizes the meaning behind your words.

“I-I, that’s not—I’m not—“

“Take a breath before you pass out, Harry,” you sigh, dropping the hard act. “I didn’t come here for you and if you want to know I actually thought a lot about canceling because of you. But I genuinely like spending time with Sarah and Charlotte so I’m here as their friend.”

Harry stares back at you, completely defeated, regret filling his green eyes. You feel a little guilty for snapping so hard at him, after all you do understand his point of view, but you genuinely don’t think it’s as big of a deal as he makes it to be.

“I-I’m…”

“It’s fine, okay? Let’s just… move past it, alright?” you suggest and he nods as the two of you head inside, joining the rest of the group.

You stay behind while they are waiting for their time to perform, keeping some distance from Harry so he can’t accuse you again, but you occasionally look his way, catching him already looking at you, but you just can’t tell what could be possibly going on in his head. When it’s time for them to go on stage, you go out to the actual bar area and sit by the counter, not too much at the front but close enough to see everything that happens on the stage.

When they start playing you can’t take your eyes off Harry. His energy behind the microphone just knocks you off the stool and you watch him completely mesmerized as if he has put a spell on you. It feels like he turns into an entirely different person on stage, nothing like the man you see at lectures every Monday and Wednesday. He sings perfectly on key, putting some extra charm into the songs with his little additional tunes whenever he is not singing a line.

But what makes it absolutely impossible to look away from him is because he keeps staring at you, eyes locking with yours for way too long every time he catches your gaze. You try to ignore it, but it’s quite hard when his eyes are basically burning into you, it leaves you breathless.

Once the concert is over you order yourself two tequila shots quickly, because something is telling you that you’ll need the boosting if you want to face Harry after his little performance.

But for your surprise, when you join the band again and get near him, nothing really happens. It seems like Harry has come to peace with your presence in his little group of friends and he actually treats you like you’re part of the circle.

The six of you occupy a table at the back of the bar to spend there the rest of the evening and it’s all good, it seems. A harmless night out with a bunch of friends, nothing extra. Harry actually strikes up conversations with you involved and you feel like you’ve overcome a banter finally.

“Do you need a ride home?” Harry asks at the end of the night when everyone is about to head home.

“Only if it’s fine by you.”

“Wouldn’t offer it if it wasn’t,” he smiles shortly before the two of you say goodbye to the rest of the group and head to his van that was previously loaded with their stuff.

The ride back to your place is now much shorter, it takes less than ten minutes to arrive and you are just about to say goodbye when he speaks up.

“I want to apologize for the way I reacted to your arrival earlier tonight. It was… unnecessary.”

“It’s fine, I’m sorry for what I said after that too.”

“You shouldn’t be,” he shakes his head, staring down at his hands in his lap.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that you shouldn’t be sorry for saying something that’s true.”

It feels like all air is knocked out of you as his words process and you stare at him with parted lips and raised eyebrows. When he finally looks up at you, he looks so lost and tortured, you feel the urge to hug him, but you stay still as he continues talking.

“I got mad because I do like you and seeing you outside of school is very… confusing for me. And this is why I’m gonna be very straightforward with you now. I can tell Sarah and Charlotte like you a lot and they are stubborn, they won’t see the situation from my point of view and I’m no one to tell you if you can hang out with us or not. But what I can most certainly tell you is that nothing will happen between us. I’m very serious about this, Y/N. You are very much welcomed to spend more time with us, but I want you to know that it won’t go further than this.”

For a couple of moments you’re only able to stare back at him, blinking completely frozen at his sudden confession. You could tell tonight has been a turning point of some kind, but you were not expecting this speech from him at all and now you are at a complete loss of words. It takes some time before you actually find your voice.

“Okay,” is all you can breathe out, nothing more, but it’s pretty much all you have to tell him. You won’t go against his will and force him to do something he doesn’t want. He deserves the respect.

He nods shortly, seemingly still very torn about the situation and you figure it’s better if you just leave now.

“Thank you for the ride,” you quietly tell him opening the door. “Good night.”

“Good night, Y/N,” you hear him before you shut the door and walk into your building, feeling like you’ve been just hit by a pile of bricks.

Unlike the last time when Harry brought you home, Nat and Eden are not waiting for you in the living room. Nat is probably already asleep and Eden went out for a date earlier and she hasn’t been back. You don’t bother to turn the lights on as you walk inside, just kick your boots off and hang your coat before collapsing onto the couch, just staring into the darkness, Harry’s words repeating in your head again and again.

“… I do like you and seeing you outside of school is very confusing for me.”

“… nothing will happen between us. I’m very serious about this, Y/N.”

“… but I want you to know that it won’t go further than this.”

Harry, your professor, The Harry Styles admitted that he likes you but also told you pretty forward that nothing is ever going to happen between the two of you. It still feels like a fever dream and you’re not sure how you are feeling about it just yet. Hanging out with him was already quite overwhelming, but you were not expecting this confession from him at all.

What are you supposed to do with this information? If he is so set on not taking any further steps, why did he even share it with you? He could have just easily keep his thoughts and feelings to himself and get away with it without you ever figuring it out. It doesn’t make sense.

For the first time in your life, something Harry Styles said doesn’t make sense. That’s new.

Following Harry’s confession you truly have no idea what to do, so you just go with the flow. He seemingly stays the same when it comes to you, friendly, but still keeping his distance. Nothing changes in the lecture hall, he just occasionally asks if you’re alright and you are guessing he only wants to know if you are having any trouble with Victor, but you haven’t even heard from him since you’ve blocked his number and you hope it’s going to stay like that.

You meet up with him and the band a few times outside of school and it’s not necessarily awkward, but you can tell he is keeping his distance from you, he never sits next to you or has one-on-one conversations with you, only if it’s necessary. The only time he dares to be alone with you is when he sometimes offers you to drive you home. You usually say no at first, but he insists, so you end up sitting in silence in the car until you arrive home, say goodbye and end of story.

No one in school even suspects that you’ve made your way into Harry’s group of friends, only Nat and Eden knows about it but they swore to keep it a secret, but you didn’t tell them about Harry’s confession. Whatever it is that’s happening between you and Harry, you would never put him into a situation he is trying to avoid so badly. You sit in his classes like everyone else, but while all the other girls are drooling over him, trying to get just slightly closer to him in any way possible, you sit in silence and think about the precious times when you get to see him outside of school.

Even with him being so distant towards you, you can’t help but slowly start falling for him. He doesn’t have to talk to you or be direct to you, it’s enough that you see him as himself, you see him with his friends, how he acts whenever he is not teaching, standing on the podium. And he is an amazing person, there’s no doubt about that.

The semester is gradually moving forward, once you get back from fall break, you basically move into the library, studying for your exams and finishing up all your papers. December arrives pretty fast and before you realize, the whole town is decorated with lights and Christmas trees everywhere, the shops are trying to lure customers in with all the sales and the Christmas shopping officially starts.

One weekend, when there’s only two weeks left of school before everyone heads home for the holidays, you and Nat go for a shopping trip, trying to buy every gift in time so you don’t have to worry about that at least last minute.

Wandering around the mall you naturally take a trip to the bookstore, always ready to buy something new to read. Nat dives into the cooking books wanting to get one for her mother while you’re just aimlessly looking through the shelves. As your eyes are running through the titles in the psychology department, you stop at one particular book, pulling it off the shelf as you can’t help but smile to yourself.

The secrets of Classical Conditioning.

You flip through the pages and though it doesn’t seem to be a groundbreaking work, it’s just explaining Pavlov’s experiment and further uses of it, you still decide to buy it.

That evening you sit at your desk, the book open in front of you, a pen next to it as you try to think of something to write into it. At first you just wanted to give it to Harry as it is, but you figured it would be a nice gesture to write a few words into it he could always read when he opens the book. After some consideration, you finally grab the pen and start writing.

-

Dear Harry,

I will always think of you whenever I hear of Mr. Ivan Petrovics Pavlov or Classical Conditioning. Thank you for another amazing semester and I’m happy I got to see you without standing on a podium. You are an amazing man, never change.

Happy holidays,

Y/N

-

Last week of school, you go to the Wednesday lecture, the last one of the semester with the book sitting in your bag. All through the 90 minutes class as Harry is having an open discussion about the lecture with the students, you keep debating whether you should give him the book or not. When the lecture is over and Harry wishes everyone happy holidays, you grab it from your bag and holding it to your chest you wait until there’s only a few people in the room. Eden has already left to hand in a paper so you walk down the rows on your own, eyes on the man behind his desk who is now packing up his papers and notes, getting ready to leave.

“Harry?” you faintly speak his name, grabbing his attention as he looks up at you from behind the desk. You glance down at the book in your hands and before you could change your mind, you place it down in front of him. “This is… for you.”

His gaze wanders down to the book, then back at you as he stares at you in awe, obviously surprised by the gesture.

“What’s this for?”

“Christmas gift?” you answer unsurely with a nervous chuckle. “I just saw it at the store and… thought of you.”

“Y/N, I can’t—“

“Yes you can and you will,” you roll your eyes at him, tired of hearing all these negations from him. He can’t, he won’t, he shouldn’t… for once, he definitely will if it’s on you. “Take it as my payment for the book you gave me.”

His eyes soften at you before he looks down at the book again, reading the title before he chuckles to himself.

“Thank you, Y/N,” he then finally says, accepting that you won’t let him return the gift under any circumstances.

“Have a nice Christmas, Harry,” you smile at him shyly, hands holding onto the strap of your bag as you start walking away.

“You too,” he faintly says and turning around you start walking, but then he stops you. “Y/N, wait!”

You stop in your track and face him curiously. He seems hesitant, stepping away from the desk, walking closer to you but still keeping some distance between the two of you.

“Do you… have plans for New Year’s Eve?”

“I, uhh—No, not yet.”

“If you happen to be back in town by then… Sarah is having this little get together. I have a feeling she already invited you, but if you said no because of me, I want you to know that it’s fine by me. Would be nice if you could come.”

He is right, Sarah did invite you over, but you kindly declined thinking Harry wouldn’t appreciate if you spent it with them. You wanted to give him a breather, have a night with his friends without having to avoid you all the time, but it seems like the situation has changed for him.

“You don’t have to invite me just because I gave you a gift, Harry.”

“It’s not about that,” he shakes his head softly. “I can tell you are getting along well with Sarah and all the others. I want you to know that I would never stand in the way and you are very much welcomed at any and all events.”

He seems and sounds genuine, you don’t see any sign of him just saying it because Sarah asked him to or something. No, this definitely came from him.

“Okay, I’ll… think about it,” you tell him with a warm smile. “See you around,” you wave at him before walking out of the room.

You don’t get to see his reaction to the words you wrote into the book and for a while, you’re not even sure he saw it. Maybe he took it home and put it on his shelf without even having a look into it, but two days later, when you’re already packing, getting ready to go home for Christmas, you get a notification that at first confuses you.

Breakfast is now following you!

You open Instagram with furrowed eyebrows as you go to the profile that just followed you. It’s a small account and private, of course and you almost close it thinking it’s just someone random when you see that it’s followed by both Sarah and Charlotte.

Could this be Harry’s profile?

The username is colazione8, it doesn’t give away much but now that you are thinking about it, it’s perfect if he wanted to stay unnoticed by his students that surely can use Instagram way better than him.

You tap on the follow request button and anxiously wait for an approval, hoping that the person behind the account is still online. You wait and wait, slowly losing hope but then the notification finally arrives. Your request has been approved.

You tap on the profile vigorously and three pictures appear in front of you. One is a picture of some random building, the first ever posted is a plate of nicely served breakfast of some sort and then there’s one that features the person you were desperately hoping to see.

It’s a picture of Harry sitting at a big dining table, a glass of wine in front of him as he is squinting his eyes towards the camera. You zoom into the picture just to make sure it’s him, but his features are clearer than daylight, it really is Harry that just followed you.

You’re still stalking his very private and not too eventful profile when you get a message from him, making your heart skip a beat.

Harry: Hey! Just wanted to thank you again for the gift, it’s really thoughtful. Read what you wrote in it… thank you, Y/N.

Y/N: I meant every word. Thank you for everything you did this semester!

It takes a few minutes for a response to arrive from him.

Harry: Are you already on your way home?

Y/N: Not yet, leaving tomorrow morning.

Harry: If I drop by your place in 20, can you come down for a sec?

Y/N: Sure!

Though your response seemed totally cool, you started panicking right away. What does this mean? Why is he coming here? Are you in trouble? You couldn’t be, you didn’t do anything wrong.

You quickly change out of your worn-out sweats and stained shirt, putting on a pair of jeans and a black hoodie, not wanting to see him looking like a total wreck. You sit on your bed, anxiously checking your phone every ten seconds to see if he has messaged you and those twenty minutes never seem to pass.

Then your phone finally chimes again.

Harry: I’m here.

Y/N: Be there in a sec.

You jump into a pair of trainers and grabbing your keys from the little sidetable you have in the hallway you storm out of the apartment, running down the stairs. As you walk out you stop in your track for a second, for some reason you were expecting the minivan, but this time, it’s a black Range Rover that’s parked in front of your building and Harry emerges from it the moment you step outside.

“Hey!” he smiles at you, shutting the door before he jogs around and you notice the little gift bag in his hands.

“Harry, is this what I think it is? Because you shouldn’t have, really,” you tell him right away as he stands in front of you, glancing down at the little bag in his hands.

“What? So you are allowed to give me a gift, but I’m not allowed to do the same?” he asks with a cheeky smile.

“But you already gave me one!”

“That wasn’t a real gift, so no,” he shakes his head, too stubborn to let it go. So instead, he nervously glances down at the little bag before handing it to you. “Here. Happy Christmas. But you can only open it when I’m gone, alright?”

“Why?”

“Just… please,” he breathes out and you not, keeping your curious hands to yourself.

“Alright. Well, thank you, Harry.”

“Sure. Um, have a great winter break and… I’ll see you around,” he smiles, walking around the car back to the side of the driving seat.

“You too, Harry. See you!”

You see him drive away as you walk back into the building, basically running up the stairs to your apartment, dying to see what’s in the little bag. Once you are locked in the safe haven of your room, you throw yourself to the bed and reach into the bag, finding a small box. One that’s usually used for jewelry. You pull it out with shaky fingers and take a deep breath before opening it.

Inside sits the cutest little silver ring you’ve literally ever seen. It’s thin and very detailed, tiny little strawberries lining next to each other and that’s the whole ring. Just the little strawberries, but it’s still the cutest you’ve ever seen. You put it on and it fits perfectly on your ring finger, holding up your hand you take a good look at how it sits on your finger. You’re in love with it.

Rolling to your back on the bed you stare up at the ceiling with a heavy heart aching for a man you know will never be yours, but you just can’t help it. The heart wants what it wants, right?

Reaching for your phone you type him a quick message

Y/N: Harry, thank you so much! It’s beautiful! But you shouldn’t have bought me anything!

Harry: I’m glad you like it :)

Y/N: I love it.

He doesn’t respond, just likes your message.

Christmas is always the same, especially because your family just never had those juicy dramas that could ruin any family events. Holidays have always been quiet and loving, pretty predictable. It’s good to be home again and spend quality time with your loved one, though your mind keeps wandering to a particular someone.

Sarah mentioned that Harry has traveled home to his mom and sister and from time to time you catch yourself thinking about what he could be possibly doing at the moment.

The only interaction between the two of you is when you post a photo with your sister and brother at Christmas dinner and he likes the photo, but nothing more. He doesn’t post or add to his story so you are left with your own elaborate fantasies of what he could possiblybe doing at home.

Sarah convinces you to spend the New Year’s Eve at hers and you are accepting the invitation a lot easier now that Harry has told you he is fine with you joining.

Just one day before the 31st you get back to your apartment and spend the second to last night of the year spiraling about the whole situation with Harry. Where are you two standing as of right now? Was his gift a gesture with a deeper meaning behind it?

You can’t step over the fact that you are not his student anymore. He has officially graded you and you’ve received your credits for his class, the ties are off, but he situation might still be risky and you doubt Harry is willing to change his mind about what he told you earlier. He made it clear that nothing will ever happen between the two of you, however you can’t help but feel a little hopeful that the new semester might bring a change into that.

After two hours spent in front of your closet and at least three mental breakdowns you finally decide to wear a black turtleneck dress which is just the perfect mixture of modest and sexy at the same time. You feel anxious to see Harry again, not sure how to act around him following your little gift exchange. There’s a chance he’ll just shut himself off once again and avoid you all night, you can’t tell.

Sarah’s place is already buzzing by the time you arrive, several guests are lounging in the living room and kitchen, some soft music is playing and it appears that everyone is enjoying the evening so far, judging from the laughter you hear from time to time.

“I’m so glad you came!” Sarah envelopes in a tight hug when you arrive.

“Thank you for inviting me. Here, brought some snacks,” you hand her the grocery bag you picked up on your way, not wanting to arrive empty-handed.

“Oh, you are an angel, some on in, make yourself home, take whatever you want to eat or drink!” she gestures around before bringing the bag into the kitchen.

The cozy home is already filled with a lot of people you don’t know, but you also spot Charlotte and Mitch right away so you take the safe spot in their little circle. You try your best to stay present in the conversation but you keep glancing around, looking for one particular person.

And then you finally see him. Harry emerges from the little hallway that leads to the bedroom and bathroom with Adam, seemingly deep in conversation as he nurses a beer in his hand. His checkered slacks and vintage printed t-shirt makes him appear so casual, if you didn’t know him you wouldn’t even guess that he is actually a professor.

Harry laughs at something Adam just told him and his eyes glide around the room until they find you standing near the kitchen. He stops in his track, gaze running down your figure before it returns to your eyes and he seems to be in awe, like he doesn’t entirely believe it’s you he is seeing even though he knew you’d be coming. There’s nothing you want more than to run across the room and throw yourself into his arms. You spent way too much time thinking about him during Christmas and seeing him in the flesh now is a mixture of feelings you can’t really describe just now.

Neither of you leaves the conversation you are in the middle, but you keep glancing towards each other. You’re nervously moving the strawberry ring around your finger, feeling his burning gaze on your figure all the time. You haven’t taken it down since he has given it to you, it partially made it harder for you to stop thinking about him, because the jewelry was quite a loud reminder every time you glanced down at your hands.

Two drinks later your sister calls you, as always she wants to say happy new year before the lines get hectic at midnight, so you move out to the small balcony facing the street as you talk to your sister. The spicy night air feels amazing on your heated up skin, the turtleneck dress was a good choice, but it’s definitely getting hotter with each drink, especially with Harry’s lingering eyes as well. When you end the call you decide to stay outside a little longer, take a few moments to yourself.

You jump a little when you hear the sliding door open and you’re surprised to see Harry walk out.

“Hey, thought you might need this,” he smiles softly, holding a blanket in his hands.

“Oh, thank you,” you mumble and let him wrap it around your shoulders. It provides just enough heat that your lips are not shaking anymore from the cold.

“What are you doing out here alone? Not enjoying the evening?”

“I am, I was just on the phone with my sister.”

“She’s older than you, right?” he asks and you tilt your head a little looking at him.

“How do you know that?”

“I, uhh… You have a lot of pictures with her on your Instagram,” he admits with a nervous chuckle.

“Have you been stalking my profile?” you tease him, but he clearly takes it way more serious than you intended it to be.

“No, I swear it’s not like that, I just—“ he stammers but you cut him off placing a hand on his arms that are crossed over his chest.

“Harry, I was just teasing you. It’s fine,” you assure him, giving him a gentle squeeze before you are about to pull your hand back, but his hold stops you. He takes your hand in his, gently bringing it closer to his face as he examines the ring sitting on your finger.

“You’re wearing it,” he breathes out, a small cloud emitting from his pink lips as his thumb softly runs over the ring.

“Of course. I told you I love it.”

You can’t ignore the shiver that runs down your spine at the feeling of his warm palm against yours, his thumb delicately running over not just the ring, but down your finger as well before he lets go of your hand. You already miss his touch.

“So, how was Christmas?” he asks clearing his throat.

“Good, nothing extra. What about yours?”

“Same, went home to the family.”

“Do you often visit them?”

“Not as often as I would want to, but I’m trying to go every couple of months.” Harry turns towards the street, eyes running along the not too busy road that stretches past Sarah’s building. His hand comes up to the railing, fingers slightly drumming on it. “How come you didn’t bring anyone tonight?”

“Well, my roommates are still home and I also didn’t think you’d like the idea to have another student of yours around.”

“Right, yeah,” he nods, but you can tell something else is still on his mind. “So… no boyfriend to bring?”

You give him a puzzled look. Is this his way of asking if you are seeing anyone at the moment? Because if it is, it’s kind of ridiculous.

“No, not really. I guess you can say I’m not looking for one actively.”

“How come?” he asks with raised eyebrows, his body turning towards you as he leans against the railing. You give him a ‘really?’ look. You think about getting a little sassy and teasing with him, but then decide to just be straightforward instead.

“Because I’m kind of into my Methodology of Cultural Anthropology professor.”

Harry’s lips part as his eyes pierce into yours and for a moment you really think that he is about to flip, tell me how dare you say such thing to him and curse you out, but a second passes and his gaze softens as he lets out a shaky breath.

“Y/N…”

“What? I just answered your question,” you innocently shrug, looking away from him. Despite this long and weird game the two of have been playing these past months, this is the first time you openly admitted that you have a thing for him.

“You know how complicated it is and I told you that nothing can happen.” He shakes his head in defeat, a hint of disappointment in his tone, but it just grinds your gears.

“What, so you can ask about my dating life but I can’t say that I’m into you? How is that fair?”

“That’s not the same.”

“Well I think it is. Both are highly inappropriate to bring up in our situation, don’t you think? Yet you’re trying to put all the blame on me.”

“Alright, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked. Let’s just… forget about it. I really don’t want to fight with you.”

“Because you’re afraid I might actually win?” you sassily reply, crossing your arms on your chest.

“I’m just trying to do the right thing, okay? Would you… let me?”

“If you haven’t realized it yet, I’m trying really hard to stay in my lane, but you’re not making it any easier.”

“I’m trying too, okay?” he growls, clearly losing his calmness at this point. “I’m really fucking trying, Y/N, but it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do!”

“You’re the one making it hard!”

“It’s not my fucking fault I can’t stop thinking about you!”

“Well it’s not my fault either!” you snap at him, both of you raising your voice, the rest of the party oblivious about the screaming match the two of you are having on the balcony. “If you’re so set on not letting anything happen, why do you come to me and act the opposite?”

“The opposite?!”

“Yes! It’s not quite appropriate to gift your student with a ring or ask them about their dating life. Or is it all new information to you?”

“You started with the gifting!”

“So what? You could have just left it there, but you didn’t. It’s not that it didn’t make me happy, but don’t try to put all the blame on me for saying something when you’re already crossing the lines.”

Harry stares at you with a hard look and you’d pay great amounts to actually read his thoughts at this moment. His jaw clenches as he exhales sharply, eyes turning away from you, as if he couldn’t even bear to look at you.

“Make up your fucking mind,” you growl under your breath as you push your way past him and walk inside before he could get a word out.

For a well-respected, educated and smart man, Harry can act pretty fucking stupid, you think. He is not being fair and you will not apologize for anything you’ve said. If he doesn’t want anything to do with you, he needs to stay in his lane and not dance on the line, poking the sleeping lion. He doesn’t get to fuck around and then put all the blame on you, that’s just not how it works and he needs to learn that.

In the last hour that’s left until midnight you mingle with the guests and try to keep your thoughts of Harry at bay, though it’s quite the challenge since he lingers around you, keeping his eyes on you all the time, as if he is trying to piss you off or something, but you’re determined to be a mature adult and keep your composure.

You’re getting tired of this game and you’re not sure anymore if you are willing to wait around until Harry makes his mind up. Not when he doesn’t keep his own rules at least.

“Come on,” you mumble to yourself as you’re trying to open up a new bottle of wine, but the screw just wouldn’t move, no matter what you do. A hand reaches forward and wraps around the neck of the bottle, interrupting your pathetic misery.

“Let me help you.”

You let Harry take the bottle, biting into your bottom lip as you turn around and watch him easily open the bottle you’ve been fighting with the past ten minutes, he grabs your empty glass from the counter and fills it.

“Thank you,” you mumble when he hands it back and you take a sip right away. He places the bottle to the counter, fingers strumming on the surface before he takes a deep breath and speaks up.

“Y/N, I’m sorry.”

“For what exactly?”

“For the way I acted. You were totally right, I called you out for things that I did myself too, that was unfair of me.” He clears his throat, leaning against the counter with his back side as he crosses his arms on his chest. It brings out how toned his arms really are and you give yourself half a second to drool over that before you take another sip from your drink, forcing yourself to keep your thoughts under control.

“Thanks for acknowledging it,” you mumble, not sure what to say exactly. The two of you stand like that in silence, eyes roaming the guests, something clearly weighing down on both of you, but it’s hard to name and address it.

You can tell he is overthinking, the gears are almost visible, turning in that smart head of his, but you don’t want him to go into depths he shouldn’t. He really is making a bigger deal out of the situation that it already is, but it’s going to wreck him.

“Okay, I want to know, what was the worst way someone tried to flirt with you?”

Harry turns to you with a puzzled look, but you just sip on your wine, waiting for his answer.

“Um, I don’t… really keep track of it.”

“Oh come on,” you give him a look. “I know you have a story. I wanna hear it!”

Your eyes meet and he is searching in yours, trying to figure out what’s the sudden change in your mood when an hour ago you were ready to throw him off the balcony. Truth is you are just frustrated, because the situation feels so impossible. You never had to deal with such an amazing man, knowing he is into you as well, but you just can’t have him. The struggle is hard for the both of you but you can’t blame him entirely. Hating on him because he is not willing to take a risk that could easily ruin his entire life but at least his academic career is just not fair and you won’t put him through that.

Harry sees where you’re coming from and he shoots you a thankful smile before it turns into a smirk as he looks down at his hands.

“Professor Davids from the department of linguistics asked me to be her date for her ex-husband’s wedding.”

“What?” you gasp with wide eyes. “For real?”

“Yeah,” he chuckles. “She started swinging by my office all the time, trying to chat me up and then one day she asked if I wanted to go with her, that we would be staying at this nice hotel and all… she really thought it was a good idea.”

“That’s very awkward,” you laugh, entertained by the thought that Professor Davids would go so low when it came to dating. “I assume, you declined the invitation.”

“Faster than ever,” he chuckles making you laugh even louder. “Okay, your turn.”

“What?”

“I told you an awkward story, now it’s your turn.”

“Um, the worst was probably a promposal I got.”

“A promposal?” he asks with a puzzled look, his forehead creasing as he pulls his eyebrows together.

“Yeah, when they ask you out to go to prom.” “Oh, yeah. Didn’t know it had a specific name.”

“Because you are way too British,” you tease him and he just gives you a narrow-eyed look, but you can see the smirk hiding on his lips. “Well, anyway, I was dating a guy senior year, but this other one was convinced he could win me over and take me to prom. He brought a fucking mariachi band to school and gave me a serenade in the middle of the hallway while my boyfriend was standing next to me. He asked me to prom so confidently at the end of the song, like he actually had a shot but it was so painfully awkward,” you laugh at the memory shaking your head and Harry joins, finding it quite entertaining.

“He really did that to himself.”

“He did, I felt bad a little, but what was I supposed to do?”

You slip into telling more and more awkward stories, staying in the kitchen you create a little bubble, the rest of the guests don’t seem to exist as you enjoy yourself with Harry. This is the most carefree and loosest you’ve ever seen him around you and you quite like this version of him. So easy to talk to and even funnier than his usual self.

A little before midnight Sarah runs around with champagne, filling everyone’s glass, getting ready for the countdown. You and Harry join Charlotte, Adam and his wife in the corner of the living room as everyone is slowly getting excited for the last moments of the year.

Looking around you see a lot of couples, holding hands, hugging, clearly planning to snog the moment the clock hits midnight and when you glance at Harry on your right you’re convinced he is thinking about the same thing.

You’re not naïve, you don’t think he is going to kiss you, but you still allow yourself to play with the thought just a little. He is standing so close to you, just the tiniest move and you’d be touching him, skin to skin again, feel him under your—

The thought is abruptly interrupted when you feel his warm palm wrap around your hand, your whole body freezing and for a split second you think it’s just an accident, that his touch will disappear before you could even blink, but it stays there. Harry maneuvers his fingers until they are laced together with yours and he keeps a firm hold of your hand, hanging between the two of you, staying hidden because you’re standing close to each other. Your breath catches in your throat and you’re afraid if you dare to move he’ll let go of your hand.

Another version of yourself would laugh hysterically at how worked up you are right now just because he is holding your hand, but the you that’s actually in the moment is about to burst just by this small touch. You have absolutely no idea what it means or why he chose to do it, but you don’t really care about it. You just want to absorb all the heat you feel coming from him where his palm meets yours, fingers braided together tightly, as if he is trying to keep you next to him, like he thinks you are about to disappear and it’s way of anchoring you to him, but truth is you don’t want to go anywhere.

“One minute, everyone!” Sarah sings in excitement as she turns on the TV and puts a huge clock on the screen that’s counting the seconds as well. You shyly glance to the side, finding Harry standing motionless next to you and when he notices you looking, his eyes meet yours. He looks terrified, like a lost little boy and you can’t tell if he is afraid of your reaction or because of what his actions might bring on him. But you want him to know that you are completely okay with where it’s heading.

“Ten! Nine! Eight!” The countdown begins and you inch closer to Harry so you’re pressed against his side, his body heat radiating into your skin even through the layers of clothes you two are wearing.

Harry leans down the moment you lift your head, his face is so close, it wouldn’t take much for you to finally kiss him, do the one thing you haven’t stopped thinking about for months.

“Y/N…” he breathes out and it’s a tortured plea, he is begging you to stop him from doing something he might regret, but you are dying for him to finally sin. You want him to give it up already, you have absolutely no desire to be the burden that keeps him in his lane. You need him to cross the line and stay there.

“I’m not stopping you, Harry,” you tell him quietly, the urge to close the distance between the two of you is burning inside you.

“Seven! Six! Five!” the countdown continues, but it all tones out, you can only see, hear and feel Harry.

“We can’t,” he whines, closing his eyes as he exhales shakily.

“We can, we just shouldn’t,” you correct him, his eyes snap open and meet yours again. You can tell he is so close to finally giving in and let his feelings and desires take control and you will not try to stop him.

His face inches the tiniest bit closer and his forehead is almost touching yours now, you can see every curly eyelash that frames his gorgeous green eyes that are now filled with fear and nerves.

“Four! Three! Two! One! Happy New Year!” Everyone screams together as the clock finally hits midnight while you just stare at Harry holding your breath, praying that he is finally ballsy enough to take this step.

“Harry, please,” you beg, not too proud of it, but you just can’t take it any longer. His hand is gripping yours tightly as he closes his eyes again and for a second you think that it’s gonna happen. He is going to give up the act and finally kiss you.

But right when the moment is burning the most… he pulls back and your heart sinks.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, his hand lets go of yours and it feels like your arm is ripped off, tears are welling in your eyes.

“Yeah, me too,” you mumble under your breath, chugging down the champagne before making your way through the living room, determined to leave as soon as possible.

“Y/N, wait, where are you going?” you hear him calling after you, but you don’t stop. You get rid of the empty champagne glass and grab your coat from the rack, storming out of the apartment as if you had somewhere to be.

Tears are streaming down your cheeks as you run down the stairs, almost tripping over your own feet. You hear the other pair of feet running behind you and Harry calling after you, but it’s not stopping you.

You push the front door of the building open, but it’s heavy, so it slows you down just enough that Harry can grab your wrist when you are about to start running down the street.

“Y/N, don’t go, let me explain!”

“No!” you snap at him. “I don’t fucking want to hear your explanation! I’m done, Harry! I’m fucking done! I was trying to be patient and respectful, I didn’t want to make it worse for you and let you do your thing, but you kept dancing back and forth and I can’t keep doing this, so I guess I’m sorry too.”

You’re choking on your own words that echo from the walls, the street is almost entirely empty, the world is still celebrating the new year while you’re at your breaking point. Harry stands in front of you, defeated and panic all over his face as he listens to you.

“I will not sit around and let you play your little games any longer, because you can’t make up your mind whether you want me or not.”

“Y/N I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life!” he snaps, throwing his hands into the air. “That’s the problem! This shouldn’t be happening, but I can’t fucking stop thinking about you, I can’t stop wanting you!”

“Then do something about it!” you beg through your tears.

“I can’t!”

“Yes you can!” you scream at him. “You can but you probably just don’t want me enough to actually do it! And it’s fine, but—“

You don’t get to finish your rant because Harry firmly grabs your arm, yanks you towards him and with one swift movement, his lips are crashing against yours.

It all happens so fast but your body reacts before your mind could process what’s really happening, fists bunching a handful of his sweater as you pull him against you, his hands flying up to your face, cupping them confidently as he kisses you hard and demandingly.

It’s like a fucking dam that’s been broken, everything you both kept bottled up and under control just breaks loose and it’s a kind of a wild fight for trying to devour each other now that all lines has been crossed an blurred into nothingness.

He is the dominant one, but you do some pushing and pulling on your own as well. You’re forced to take a few steps backwards, back arching at how forcefully he is pushing forward, lips smacking against each other over and over again, his tongue meeting yours, swirling and dancing around with yours, a shameless moan escaping your mouth.

His hands roam down your sides and you jumps when they reach the back of your thighs, legs wrapping around his waist. He keeps you up easily, fingers digging into your flesh where your butt meets your thighs and this angle allows you to be completely pressed up against him and feel every single inch of his body that burns for you.

It’s beyond anything you’ve ever imagined, you’re not sure it’s because of the build-up that led to this point or simply the chemistry you two got, but it blows your mind, making you question how you could go this long without ever kissing him.

“Harry, I want you,” you moan when his lips move down to your jawline, kissing and biting on the soft skin, tasting you wherever he can reach.

“I want you too, Y/N,” he breathes out resting his forehead against yours before kissing you again.

“Take me home then.”

“Are you sure?” he pants as you run your fingers through his hair and tug on his gently, earning a whimper from his perfectly pink and swollen lips. You love this satisfied dew on his face, especially because you know it’s because of you.

“Never been more sure about anything in my life.”

You unwrap your legs from around his waist and return to the ground, but not without him leaning down to kiss you once more before he grabs your hand and starts pulling you down the street. You spot his Rover right away and start sprinting, Harry following you right behind with a carefree laugh.

Settled in your seats he starts driving, but you can’t keep yourself away from him. His hand that’s not on the steering wheel is gripping your thigh as you lean over the console and start kissing his cheek, jawline and the corner of his mouth as one of your hands runs down his chest until it reaches his pants.

“Love, if you move further down we’re gonna crash,” he warns you with a shaky breath. “I drank a little too and I’m already fucking gone from kissing you, if you touch me I’m gonna lose it.”

You giggle, pressing one last kiss to his lips before sitting back in your seat. You need every bit of your patience and self-control to stay modest on the way back to his place. Hands gripping his you bring it up to your lips, kissing his knuckles gently as he speeds down the empty streets. It’s still barely over midnight, everyone is still celebrating, oblivious to how important this moment is to the two of you.

You really thought this would be the end. When he pulled away at midnight all hope was lost for you and it broke your heart to know that he will never choose you over his better judgment.

It’s your first time at Harry’s but you don’t really care to look around as the two of you make your way inside the townhouse, lips already melted together as you stumble through the dark hallway, not wanting to let go of each other. You successfully make it into his bedroom and Harry turns on the bedside lamp while you’re already eagerly getting rid of your coat and shoes. He does the same, clothes start to litter the hardwood flooring hastily, but neither of you is thinking about them. Harry scoops you into his arms once again, kissing your lips passionately as he bunches your dress up at your hips until he can finally grip the end of it and pull it over your head.

“Oh shit!” you giggle, the turtleneck getting stuck on your head for a moment before you’re free from it.

“That big head of yours,” he chuckles kissing your forehead.

“Shut up,” you smack his chest gently, pushing him down to the bed so you can straddle him, knees on his sides as you sit on his lap, lips meeting again.

He throws his hands up when you start pulling his t-shirt up and once the fabric is off of his body, his arms wrap around you, pulling you close to his chest. Your skin meets his and it feels heavenly, only little clothing separating the two of you at this point.

Harry scoots backwards and then throws you to the mattress, getting on top of you without your lips ever parting. His hips are pushed against yours and you can feel everything through the thin material of his slacks. Without even knowing you grind your hips, your core meeting his erection in the movement and he moans uncontrollably at the sensation.

“Fuck, Y/N,” he breathes against your lips and you can’t push your smirk down at his reaction.

“Yeah, fuck me, Harry,” you tease him before your lips get occupied once again.

His hands work fast. He unclasps your bra without you even noticing, the straps falling from your shoulders before he gets rid of it, throwing it across the room as if it did something against him. When his hungry eyes fall down on your naked chest you see the same kind of torture in his eyes that was there when he was fighting with himself before.

“Harry, stop thinking,” you tell him, fingers massaging his scalp as you lace them through his hair. “It’s fine, we’re fine.”

“Are you sure you want to do this?” he questions again and you pull him down for a reassuring kiss.

“One hundred percent. I want this. I want you.”

“Oh God, I want you so bad,” he whines again, lips kissing down your jawline, neck and collarbone before they attack your breasts.

He cups them, licks and bites them, making you a whimpering mess underneath him every time his tongue meets your hot skin. This man will be the death of you. As he moves down your body, his fingers hook into the waistband of your panties and he glances up at your for reassurance once again, you nod eagerly, lifting your hips so he can easily glide the fabric down and off of your body. Harry sits up, eyes burning down on your naked body lying in front of him as he undoes his own pants, pushing them down his long legs until they join the rest on the floor. You push yourself up when his hands move to his boxers, you want to be the one to take them off. He gladly backs his hands off when you reach out and start tugging them down. He kneels on the bed as you pull the fabric down and his erection finally becomes free, making you ache for him immediately. Once the boxers are out of the way completely you want to reach out to touch him, but he stops you, hands wrapping around your wrist before they could reach him.

Your eyes snap up to meet his darkened gaze, questioning why he stopped you.

“Y/N, I… If we do this, there’s no going back,” he breathes out with a pained look. You push yourself up to your knees so you meet his height, hands cupping his cheeks as you pull him into a sweet kiss that he hesitantly but returns.

“I know what you think about us, Harry, but I assure you, that I’m completely fine with it. But if you don’t want it to happen, we can just… lie here. I’m fine with that too. Kissing you was already such a gift for me,” you smile at him, gently pecking his lips.

“I just don’t want you to wake up and regret it. I’m not pushing you, right?”

“If anyone, it’s me pushing you,” you chuckle softly, a small smile tugging on his lips as well. “You didn’t push anything on me, alright? We are both adults and it’s completely fine. We’ll figure out the rest, I just want to focus on you now. Can I do that?”

Harry nods, still looking a little unsure, but you can tell he is starting to settle in his mindset. It’s not just him that worries about the other regretting something. You know how torn up he is about anything that’s about you and though you want him more than anything, you still don’t want to push him into doing something he is not entirely comfortable with.

“Do you want this?” you softly ask, pressing a chaste kiss to the corner of his mouth.

“I do. I’m just—“

“Then it’s all good, Harry. We both want it, nothing else matters for now,” you tell him, wanting nothing else than to finally see him enjoy himself entirely. “Lay down for me,” you tell him, feeling like you taking the lead is a good idea now.

He does as you asked him to, lying down on the mattress, head sinking into his pillow as he blinks up at you, watching you swing a leg over him before settling to sit on his thighs.

“Can I touch you?” you ask, wanting to make sure he feels completely comfortable with you. Pleasing him is your number one priority right now. He nods, lips parting as he watches your hand reach out and wrap around the base of his erected length. He whimpers under your touch, his eyes fall closed when you gently pump him a few times, his cock fits so well in your palms, like pieces of a puzzle.

Leaning down you kiss his fern tattoos on each sides of his hips before placing one to his leaking tip, sliding your hands to the base before you slowly and gradually take him into your mouth.

You’re not planning to make him cum with your mouth, but you’ve been dying to taste him and it’s just as good as you imagined. The way his body reacts to your touch, the noises that leave his kissable lips, this man is completely out of this world and you want to explore every inch of his body.

You bob your head a couple of times, just enough to wet his length and work him up for what’s coming next. When you let him go of your mouth and you move a little up on his body so that his cock can be lined up with your hole, you look at him to see if he is still down to continue. One hand holding his cock, the other one flat on his naked chest, you ask him a question with your eyes that he answers with his hands squeezing your hips.

“I have the implant. Do you want to put on a condom?” you ask him at last.

“I trust you,” he breathes out. “Do you want me to put one on?”

“I want to feel you,” you tell him shaking your head.

“Okay,” he nods so it’s settled.

Leaning down you peck his lips one last time before you push the head inside and then slowly ease yourself down on his throbbing length.

“Oh fuck!”

“Harry, oh my God!” you both moan at the sensation of him finally entering you. You’ve had your fair share of sexual intercourses throughout your life, but none of them felt this good. None of them pleasured you this good so fast and easily, just the feel of him being inside you is making you lose your mind.  

You start off slow, wanting to feel him just right, get used to his size, but as soon as you feel more comfortable, you pick up a faster pace. His fingers are digging into your flesh at your hips as he holds onto you for dear life, panting and moaning at your motions. He glides in and out of you perfectly, setting your senses on fire practically.

“Harry, you feel so good,” you gasp, getting lost in the feeling. Sex has always been a good experience for you, but with Harry it’s a whole different story. As if he just opened a completely new world you never even knew about before.

“Yeah? You’re gonna cum for me?”

“Yes! Oh fuck!”

Harry pushes himself up, an arm coming around your back as he easily flips the two of you over, your back gently hitting the soft mattress. He holds himself up above you, lips crashing with yours as he starts to do the work this time, thrusting in and out of you, his hips smacking against yours forcefully as you both nearing the end.

“You’re making me lose my fucking mind, Y/N,” he cries out, head falling to the crook of your neck and you wrap your arms around him as a shield, holding him tight against you.

It doesn’t take long after that. He is hitting just the right spots, making you moan his name over and over again as your orgasm slowly devours you and washes over your whole body while he is still relentlessly moving.

“Harry! Oh… Fuck!” you gasp, legs and hands shaking and you clench your muscles around him, throwing him over the edge with you. He falls out of his rhythm, his cock twitching inside you as he moans against the hot skin of your neck, coming undone in your arms.

Nothing has ever felt this intense and mind-blowing and you’re now sure you’re addicted to him, there’s no turning back, not that you want that.

He collapses on top of you, still inside you, his body weighing down on you heavily, but it feels just fine. You run your arms up and down his sides, kissing the side of his head as you are both trying to catch your breath. It takes a few minutes for him to come back to reality with you, he lifts his head and moves to the side so he is not crushing you anymore, but an arm remains thrown over your abdomen. His vibrant green eyes are shining like never before when they meet your tired gaze and cupping his face in your palm you pull him in for a slow kiss where you finally have the time to actually taste him without the rushing of your own needs and urges.

“How are you feeling?” you softly asking, knowing well how major this was for him. You wouldn’t want him to spiral and start to self-destruct because of what just happened.

“I’m feeling fine,” he murmurs lowly, his fingers dancing on your naked side. “Just still a little torn if I did the right thing.”

“You worry too much. We did nothing wrong.”

“Not sure everyone would agree with that.”

“Fuck everyone else,” you chuckle and a smile tugs on his lips as well. “I will not feel bad for having the best sex of my life with a hot as fuck man I’m really into,” you bluntly tell him, earning a smug grin.

“Best sex of your life, huh?”

“Not even ashamed to admit,” you nod into the pillow. “How… was it for you?” you shyly ask, afraid his answer might disappoint you. But Harry pulls you closer until you’re pressed up against his chest, his lips capture yours, kissing you fiercely, making your heart skip a few beats for sure.

“Fucking amazing, baby. Probably the best I ever had too,” he admits, lips brushing against yours as he speaks. A satisfied sigh leaves your lips as you nuzzle against his chest once he has rolled to his back.

Silence comes over the two of you, you’re listening to his steady heartbeat, mindlessly drawing patterns over his chest. Lifting your head your eyes meet his and you can tell he has been thinking hard about what this all means for the future now.

“I’m in,” you simply tell him.

“Huh?”

“If you are thinking that I might not want to do this with you, that I just wanted a good fuck, that’s not what I think of this. If you want to give us a chance, I’m totally in.”

“You think we can make it work?” he quietly asks, his voice barely more than just a whisper.

“Of course,” you smile at him warmly. “You don’t?”

“I do, I’m just… there are so many things that can go wrong.”

“Then… we’ll make them right.”

Harry breathes out through his nose, clearly having a hard time to take it as easy as you do and you wish you could magically make all his doubts go away.

Sitting up you put your hands on each of his sides, looking down at him determined to bring out his confidence in the two of you.

“We just have to be patient and careful until I finish. Then we are basically free. That’s just one more semester. It could be way worse, we can make it work for a couple of months before we can finally do whatever we want. That doesn’t sound that bad, does it?” Harry shakes his head, reaching up he tugs your hair behind your ear before running his fingers down the side of your face.

“So we are really doing this?” he breathes out, a small smile on his sweet, pink lips.

“Well, I’m surely not giving up on this, we came a long way to be here,” you chuckle. “Question is, are you gonna give up on us? On… me?”

“Hell no,” he chuckles softly as he shakes his head. You smile down at him and leaning down you peck his lips tenderly.

“Then… we really are doing this.”

SEQUEL: 🌊 AN OCEAN AWAY 🌊

-

Thank you for reading, please like and reblog if you enjoyed it!

[endobiologist]

Trans Guy Tips #4; Socially Transitioning

Now this one is a tricky one, and it's a situation almost every trans person has to go through at some point in their life, unless they stay in the closet for life, but if you're planning to come out, and you don't know how to approach the situation and don't know how to judge if it's safe, I hope I can be a reliable guide for you on this journey.

This is usually the first step in any trans person's journey, before they physically transition, (which some don't as well). However here we're talking specifically about trans men.

So while some of the things I say could apply to trans women, always remember I'm writing about trans men from a trans man's point of view, so that's the targeted demographic here.

Once I learn more about trans women's struggles and things they go through, since I don't have the personal experience of it, I will definitely write trans women articles as well, and as well non-binary people.

So let's begin, with a list of important things to keep in mind whilst coming out to the world or at least to your family and close friends.

1. Safety is everything.

Always no matter what.

A good way to test if someone is going to be safe to come out to, is to casually bring it up in in a conversation topic, something like "What are your thoughts on lgbtq people, or specifically what are your thoughts on trans people?"

If they become aggressive and violent about it, and start being transphobic or defensive or any of the signs of bigotry, do not and I mean do not come out to them yet.

If it's a parent, I'd suggest at least wait until you're of age to move out, or have moved out, to come out to them. Sometimes people will get verbally and physically violent towards you if you come out to them and they're not accepting of it, so the most important thing is to always judge the reactions of people, and if they react well, then you can come out to them.

2. Always choose trustworthy people to keep your secret whilst you're in the closet.

There's been a lot of people who trusted idiots who they thought were their friends and they ended up outing them to the whole school they were in, etc. etc. But there was a lot of stories about this happening multiple times.

Make sure the people you tell would take the secret to their grave, especially if you're in an abusive household and can't come out for fear of violence.

3. If you're in a very abusive household, especially one that's openly homophobic and transphobic, as hard it is, please wait to come out as long as you possibly can until you have a place of your own and you're safe for sure.

A lot of people have been known to kick out their own children on to the streets because of them being LGBT, or do much worse...

Now of course these are some of the worst case scenarios, but being LGBT you always have to think about every bad thing that could occur so that you can prevent it.

4. When it comes to actually coming out, I would always recommend bringing a good friend or close family member who supports you, so that you have backup, not only for them to chime in and tell their piece and defend you, but just them being there makes the other person not want to be as violent towards you, because they fear what others will think of them.

If you're coming out to an extended family member or anyone, don't trust to do it alone, always bring a good friend.

5. One of the best ways to come out that I've seen are ways that are jokey and hilarious!

It seems to smooth over and make it a much more pleasant transition for everyone, and usually even homophobic people won't get too mad, they might even laugh!

I've seen people bake cakes with the words "Surprise I'm gay!" on it, things like that.

Just little cute things that are nice to do for your parents or people you're coming out to, but make it a surprise and that you're actually lgbt!

Now remember though, always follow the first rule and make sure safety is priority, but if you know you're safe, but you're just not sure they understand, starting out with jokes helps a lot.

6. The second step you should do after coming out is always try to explain your side of the story.

If there are people who don't let you get a word in, let them know that you have important things to say and that they need to listen to you and then they can say whatever they need.

Explain how it feels to be trans, explain why you know you're trans, of course you shouldn't have to ideally, but unfortunately a lot of people won't understand unless they're given more information, as the subject is completely foreign to them.

I know my grandma specifically reacted so well, all she did was ask me questions about it, and once I answered all her questions, she hummed in satisfaction and she never questioned it again and completely accepted me.

And a lot of times you'll get people who are pretty neutral, people who will call you by your chosen name and gender but don't really totally care as much as you want them to, but they still go along with it and just kind of assume you know what's best for you, which is a really kind thing really.

I've had a few people react neutrally and it's actually relaxing, there's no pressure put on for being gay, either over positive or over negative. but I have to say as a trans person and gay person, and grey-ace person, I love the people who ask questions the most.

I don't mind answering, and it means they're trying to learn more about something they don't understand, which means they have a huge heart and huge open mind.

Some people may get annoyed at the constant questions, but I absolutely adore them.

To me, every time someone asks about me, they're showing interest in my life and my feelings.

7. Next the scientific method.

Look up on any scientific article anywhere, and you'll find studies done on trans men and women's brains.

It was shown factually multiple times, over and over, whenever they repeated it it did it again, that trans men have the same brain structure as cis men, and trans women have the same brain structure as cis women, and non-binary people have somewhere in the middle. This was factually proven, you can look it up, so if they try to use science to defend against you, educate that that science is actually for LGBT rights and has explained how it works even.

8. Try to be gentle when it comes to pronouns.

For a lot of people, especially people of foreign languages where some languages don't have genders, or will have different genders, or other things like that, or even just English speakers that aren't used to saying 'they', or your family not being used to your pronouns yet.

It can take a while, and I know it's frustrating, it could take even a few years for them to finally get it right every time.

It's not supposed to be an attack towards you, it's genuinely hard to reprogram yourself when you think someone is one thing your whole life and then it turns out they're the other thing! So be sure to be gentle with them while they're practising, remind them every time they make a mistake, but remind them gently, as they are trying to do the right thing, they're just slipping up due to habit.

In general, be patient with non-lgbt folks, if we're mad at them, it just drives them away, rather than driving them toward us to help and assist us.

We should be grateful for our allies.

9. Once you've come out and your parents probably still have questions, I would recommend sitting down and having family night where you read together some good articles about transgenderism, and LGBT+ in general.

If they're not familiar with it, this type of education can help them a lot to understand the terminology and how to address you, and basic respect for trans & lgbtq+ people.

Overall it's a learning experience for both of you, and it would be amazing to do if they're willing to learn.

Remember that it's a journey for all of us, and everyone has a lot to learn.

10. When selecting your name, I have one piece of advice/a question for you; "Does it spark joy?"

The most important thing, it doesn't matter how odd sounding it is, or differently spelled it is, or whatever your name is, if you enjoy your name, that's what matters.

Always pick the one that calls out to you.

And it's okay to change it from time to time, people need time to figure out who they are!

And with that, I conclude my fourth part!

I hope you were helped by this in any way, and thanks for reading.

[animeyanderelover]

I left out Killua since I only accept 4 characters, just as you wanted. I feel like I don’t write that much about HunterxHunter like I should, but I got enough requests now😉.

Tw: Yandere themes, unhealthy mindset, unhealthy relationship, possessiveness, obsessiveness, controlling behavior, sadism, masochism, manipulation, gaslighting, threatening, kidnapping, killing

Yandere Alphabet

Hisoka Morow

Mask-Do they change their behavior after falling in love with their darling? Do they act differently around them than around other people?

🃏Not at the beginning at least. Hisoka is...confused to say the least about this sudden change of events where he feels for the first time something that goes beyond amusement and something to get excited over. He knows that as well, but he has no clue on how to act on his feelings and given the fact that he is still pretty selfish, he ignores it initially and goes out of his way to toy with the s/o. All that really is for you to see is a perverted creep who keeps his tabs on you and shows up whenever he feels like it only to agitate you. In my opinion Hisoka is this kind of Yandere who becomes softer once his darling starts loving him as well or develops Stockholm syndrome. Using the world thrilled when this does happen would be a light way to describe his emotions.

🃏Really few people are able to really figure out Hisoka since that guy is quite the riddle to solve and what people do notice is that as of now you have seemed to catch his interest. People who know him a bit might just brush it off as normal, him seeking a new opponent he deems as worthy. For others it really doesn't look like he acts differently around you if we take out the fact that he kind of makes sure no one else gets to destroy you before he can. In reality he does change a bit due to his newly discovered love for the s/o that leads him to loathing if others hurt the darling or they hurt them which just increases the amount of bodies he leaves behind. It's his possessiveness getting the better of him and if people look close enough, they might be able to notice that the clown has sincere feelings for you.

Nightmare-What would be the worst experience for their darling? Would they break?

🃏Overall it is most likely the fact that Hisoka views his darling at the beginning as his own plaything which he can pull on and toy with all he wants. In short, he definitely wants to know which buttons to push so his darling can lose it and snap at him for him to have his fun. It's exhausting, knowing that screaming at him or going violently against him is just one way to make him exhilarated. Coming additionally with him being a masochist, Hisoka still is a sadist in not only an emotional sense. As much as he likes his darling spunky, there are some things which they shouldn't do in which case he'll teach them how to behave. With pleasure. But insulting his darling, making fun of them and rubbing the death of his victims under their nose is also entertaining, the faces they make are adorable in his mind.

🃏Here comes the weird part. Hisoka wouldn't want his darling to break. He's settled with the belief that he'll never find anyone like them again, no one he can love like this. This is why he kind of backs off the moment he senses that he gets too close to pushing his darling over the edge and gives them a bit of time to recover. It might even be a shock for him, but knowing that he broke his darling or seeing them for the first time really devastated over something he did and more gloomy and depressed for the following days afterwards...pulls in a painful way at his heartstrings. The first time this happened Hisoka found himself after inital complaining that you had gotten so boring trying to somehow lift your spirit up. After the first time it happened, he becomes more observant and careful.

Oppression-How many rights would they take away from their darling? Do they go against their s/o's will a lot?

🃏It might come with a small surprise, but Hisoka gives his darling more freedom than the darling might expect themselves. There was certainly a point where he abducted his darling after he became more annoyed than excited with them potentially ignoring him and seeing them being rude to other people and even hurting them physically. Or the other way around. He's the only person who really is allowed to do that, at least he feels this way. But letting you be for the rest of your life a caged bird becomes at one point boring as well for him and as soon as his darling has gained his more genuine love and trust, he lets them out again. It's still not entire freedom since he expects them to come back again. The right to freely communicate with others is still strongly restricted because Hisoka only hates sharing his priced darling with others and even if it is strange for his darling, he doesn't want them to get mad and violent either. If there is someone who got on his darling's bad side, he'll take care of them.

🃏Mostly yes for the exact reason to make you angry and get a reaction out of you. It is just the way Hisoka works and getting to see how your face scrunches up when you're annoyed and frustrated or straightforward furious with him really does brighten up his day a lot. You want to be alone? He won't let you. You're working on something really important and don't want to be disturbed? He might just ruin what you've been working on for hours in the process. But I said mostly because Hisoka has his limits as well which he orientates after your condition. If his darling feels down, hasn't felt good for a longer time now or has already started falling in love with him he grows more nice and softer, though he'll never fully stop annoying the darling. It just becomes a bit more bearable.

Chrollo Lucilfer

Mask-Do they change their behavior after falling in love with their darling? Do they act differently around them than around other people?

📖Yes. Chrollo changes his behavior after it has been made clear to him how much they really mean to him. Differently from Hisoka, Chrollo actually tries to charm his darling the normal way at first and he kind of designes his new personality after what he knows you are into. It might not be anything new for him to pretend to be someone else for the sake of information and power, but this time the reason is a completely new one. The interests of his darling, the type of guy they're into, the way Chrollo wants them to see him forms over time an entirely new person which he uses as a disguise to get closer to you. Chrollo wants his darling to love the real him, but for now this will have to do and even after they know which led to him kidnapping s/o, he keeps this act up so you don't stop loving him.

📖Once again a yes. Even if Chrollo doesn't appear to be that way, he acts differently around others. He has a very dignified aura around him and he never gets hotheaded and that's why it's difficult to notice, but the small dehumanizing glances he sends, the short moments where his eyes have a dead and empty shine and how he already starts deducting every possible information he can get from the first meeting shows that he already works on plans how to make this person vanish into thin air. Chrollo is a removal type of Yandere so it's written down for him to murder pretty much everyone who seems to stay on your mind or who seems to have caught interest in you. It's just so incredibly subtle that no one really realizes that they're doomed unless for this very short moment where they look him in his eyes and see this cold look on his face that tells them that this man is a walking menace.

Nightmare-What would be the worst experience for their darling? Would they break?

📖The discovery who he really is would be something you might just never get over, especially if you two were before that a normal couple. Finding out that the man you saw as a gentleman and who always appeared so polite and respectful is in reality a criminal who steals and kills without hesitation hits differently. Connecting the dots afterwards with all the mysterious deaths of people in your surroundings isn't all that hard as well. Worst has to be that the next time you confront him about this, he won't deny it. He'll openly admit that he's a bandit and mass murderer who removed every significant and unsignificant person from your life because he got possessive and viewed them as a nuisance for you two. After this there really is only kidnapping needed to completely ruin everything because that's the time where you'll be stuck in the clutches of a demon guarded from all the other members.

📖Imagining that other people might target you when finding out your connection with the Troupe is risky as well because let's just say not everyone would be keen on being good and saving you. Using you as a bait is much more better and if you have to get hurt in the process so be it. And Chrollo wants you to break in a way. This man wants his darling to love him even after they know what he really is and he wouldn't really mind if he has to tear his darling down in order to get to that point. As long as they start being affectionate and give him their love this small sacrifice doesn't matter to him. As long as they don't start being depressed and shut themselves up completely, he'll pay the price for you developing possible paranoia of people and dependence on him.

Oppression-How many rights would they take away from their darling? Do they go against their s/o's will a lot?

📖Chrollo is someone who definitely is in a bigger need of control and always having a solid grip around you than the clown does so with him there come a lot of restrictions. He would never allow you to even really think of someone in a longing way because he always has his ways of finding out and if the person is still alive, they'll be gone soon. What he desires is that he is the only person that consumes your mind and that you really need. Your freedom is very limited as well because Chrollo never leaves you out of his sight unless he really has to do so and even then you'll never be left alone. Someone is always watching you which goes against our privacy a lot. It's suffocating to be with him because he never really seems to trust you to do things on your own and it is rare he lets you handle something alone.

📖He does, even if he doesn't attend to annoy his darling in the same way Hisoka does. It's just that Chrollo is a very nasty type of 'sit down and let me just do it for you' kind of person which should already tell anything. He'll strip you off your independence and force you to rely on him more and more. Not only the right to do things alone, even the right to decide for yourself will be taken from you since he calls all the shots. It escalates even to the extent where Chrollo will remove your right to think for yourself because alongside with his manipulations the way you used to think will be heavily influenced to the point where you'll really just play alongside with his wants or let him make all the decisions for you.

Pakunoda

Mask-Do they change their behavior after falling in love with their darling? Do they act differently around them than around other people?

💘It's only natural that Pakunoda keeps her distance to the people around her since she knows it would be dangerous for them. She is part of the Phantom Troupe and for that others who are after her and would use people close to her against her. So she is overly cautious and conflicted when she notices her growing affection for her darling, she might even come over as somewhat cold, but in a polite way. It stays like this for a while where she tries to comprehend all of this and tries to find a solution for her sweet problem. Once she's through with her first initial conflict and has worked her feelings somehow out, she starts getting in contact with you and starts opening up more. Pakunoda opens up more and more and she's a lot more warm.

💘One of the more respectful Yandere to have from the Phantom Troupe because even under other people Pakunoda always remains polite. It's still slightly visible that she is more distant when with strangers who aren't Phantom Troupe members, she's always observant and careful if the person should turn out to be a possible threat for her darling. Eve if she isn't overly protective, she has her fair share of it and has to constantly worry in the back of her mind that someone might find out just who she is and then goes after you. It isn't really hard to differ harmless people from dangerous people with her ability, but even if she has identified someone as no threat, the somewhat coldly and more emotionless behavior is always there, even if hidden under her politeness. She only really cares about her darling and the Phantom Troupe after all.

Nightmare-What would be the worst experience for their darling? Would they break?

💘The scenario would be similar to the one of Chrollo. Having to discover the the shocking truth that the gentle and lovely woman who you thought of as your lover is in reality a highly dangerous and wanted criminal. Paku wouldn't really deny it either the moment she knows that by now you just know too much and that she can't just make you forget what you've heard and/or seen. So she'll just admit it, keeping a straight face. But she feels guilty for letting you know like this, though it was probably bound to happen sooner or later. There is really only one way for her to guarantee you will continue to live which is getting you to a more isolated place and having you live there. She as well as you are presented with only two choices from Chrollo himself.

💘As soon as he knows about her darling and that by now they know who she is, he forces her to make a decision. It's either that someone will have to kill her s/o so it's ensured they won't tell what they know or that Pakunoda has to make sure you'll never get the chance to spill the tea by keeping you somewhere. Obviously Paku wouldn't want to kill you and she confesses that both of you are stuck in a tight spot now with her either having to kill you or kidnapping you and you either dying or being locked away. She wouldn't want her darling to break because of this though and since she is a mature and responsible person, she would make sure that the s/o doesn't get overwhelmed with this whole situation. Even if the circumstances are more messed up, Pakunoda really still tries to make everything work out as normal as humanly possible.

Oppression-How many rights would they take away from their darling? Do they go against their s/o's will a lot?

💘The only real right she would ever really take away from her darling is the right of limitless freedom once everything has been found out by them. It's really forced on her because she knows the Troupe will go after her s/o and kill them if they tell anything important. There's no real choice and your life would be in danger as well because you'll be targeted by others for being someone she cares about if they find out. But besides that she wouldn't really take anything else away from you and it isn't like she isolates you either, she takes you out from time to time. Of course only if she knows you won't try anything and one touch is all she needs to know. If we're talking about a time where you weren't aware of her dark life, there wouldn't be any sort of rights taken away from you since then it wouldn't be needed.

💘Not really unless they stop looking for themselves, don't feel very good or try something that might have them potentially killed. Even if Paku tries to be understanding and nice and doesn't want to appear like someone very controlling and stern, she has no real choice if you try to warn others or run away because you're literally her responsibility by now. She wants neither the Troupe nor you in trobles so she has to go against your will and even punish you if she thinks you need time to calm down. If you stop caring for yourself she has to be more forceful as well if she wants to keep you alive and healthy. Overall she lets you do your own things as long as you don't break her trust and don't endanger the Troupe or yourself.

Machi Komacine

Mask-Do they change their behavior after falling in love with their darling? Do they act differently around them than around other people?

🪡Not very visibly, but there is a slight shift in the way she behaves around her darling. Very similar to Pakunoda, Machi probably naturally doesn't try to get very close to others since her life is nothing others should know about or should be involved, she isn't really interested in making friends either. She has tsunderish tendencies and as soon as she senses her growing affection for her darling, she pushes her darling away as a first impulse. It isn't what you deserve, but Machi does this because not only is she slightly irritated, but also a bit scared. Scared of starting to love you only to risk getting you killed, maybe even through her own hands. She goes through a time where she has to collect herself again, but after she's calmed down she will seek to get to know her darling better as well. And even if it isn't too obvious at first, she has not too rarely moments where she shows her softer side.

🪡At first glance probably not, she is still not holding back with her words nor will she really accept excuses when you did something stupid and tries to put the blame on someone else. She's harsh in a realistic sense and always tells you her own opinion, even if it hurts you in the process. But she's always on a silent alarm around other persons whilst around you she is able to relax a bit more. Machi can't just know what the other person is thinking, though she has good intuitions. The woman doesn't trust other persons around her to say the least and her protective tendencies are made clear through her actions as well. I wouldn't say she is very overprotective, just more warily around other people, much more when with you. Around others she tends to expose the true potential of her cruel and mean language.

Nightmare-What would be the worst experience for their darling? Would they break?

🪡It isn't even the harshness she gives her darling multiple tastes of, it is the knowledge who she is, part of a group of thieves who have killed many, many people already. Her rudeness is something a person might be able to get over with enough time and the awareness that she cares deep down. It isn't like Machi is plainly rude for no reason, she just isn't someone who cockers her darling and awakes the impression that she wraps them up in a blanket of cotton candy. She's just realistic and very direct with it and also isn't someone to baby you as soon as something goes wrong in your life. She grew up under hard circumstances and for that has just developed the mindset that you should learn not to sulk over everything that goes wrong. But the worst is still her being suddenly exposed because then it's literally the same predicament as with Paku.

🪡I don't believe that Machi would break her darling, she takes despite everything good care of them even after she was forced to abduct them. Of course she has sharper edges than Pakunoda does and isn't as easy-going, but it isn't like she is needlessly cruel either. She lectures when she has to do so and thinks of a according punishment when she is presented with no other choice. Machi can see where you come from and why you would rebel and try to escape, but she also makes it on multiple occassions clear that you'll get yourself killed like this and probably even people you care about. Not to mention that she doesn't want you dead. Machi doesn't push her darling with her words that far like Hisoka either, she stops when she realizes it might become too much for you to handle. She's a Tsundere, no sadist.

Oppression-How many rights would they take away from their darling? Do they go against their s/o's will a lot?

🪡She is more stern with you than Paku is, yet she isn't as controlling as Chrollo is either. Machi surely won't close her eyes when you're clearly at fault for something or did something that was obviously uncalled for with possible consequences you knew about. No, she will rebuke you for it thoroughly and it is a lesson that will be stuck in your mind for a while. There are really only slightly higher expectations than Pakunoda has, but Machi isn't quite as forgiving and that makes the greatest difference. Besides some parts of her darling's freedom that have to be removed, she still wouldn't take any other rights away unless she has to bring her point over and take another right away so her s/o hopefully learns their lesson the next time. But just like Pakunoda she wouldn't really take any rights at all away as long as you don't know about her occupation.

🪡If she does then only because she believes that it'll be on the longer run the best for you. Machi wouldn't want to interfere too much in the things her darling does so they don't start to count too heavily on her and for that become dependent, she wants them to keep enough independence so they can take care of themselves. The only times she does something you don't like is when it is necessary, when you refuse to do something that would be good for your own health or being too stubborn to think clearly would be some good examples where she has to step in. She obviously has to stop escape attempts as well and drag you back since this will go against your will as well. Otherwise she'll let you mind your own business.

[the-insomniac-emporium]

Mia Deserved Better: An Analysis of RE8's Themes/Symbolism

Foreword: I would like to thank @lepusrufus for posting about both Mia and Miranda, and at one point directly saying that Mia deserved better, which is a large part of what caused me to start examining her role in the canon story. Now, I will say that this post, like some of my previous explorations of Village (such as my attempt to determine Donna's age), will not be the best organized. My ADHD makes such things rather difficult for me. However, I have tried more than usual, and have broken up this "essay" into several distinct sections. Still, I am worried that my thoughts will not be as concise or coherent as they were inside my head.

Under read-more for length and spoilers for RE8: Village.

Introduction:

Village is, inarguably, about parenthood. Is it a horror game? Yes. Is it also science fiction? Also yes. But is it still, at its core, a story, and therefore contains imagery, symbolism, and themes? Yes. Now, you may be wondering what this has to do with Mia deserving better. My proposal is as follows: While Village is overall about parenthood, it is more about motherhood than fatherhood. Furthermore, Mia's background + actions from the previous game tie her story directly with Mother Miranda's, making their potential interactions massively important to the story... and could have served the theme beautifully. The missed potential in her involvement in the story is honestly a little bit absurd.

Now, let's examine each of the Four Lords + their sections, as the beginning of analyzing the game's theme.

Lady Dimitrescu + Castle:

Ah, perhaps the clearest (albeit unimportant) bits of theme within the whole game. We are immediately presented with another parent, with three daughters she loves very, very much. Initially they work as a team to capture Ethan, easily overpowering him. When they do split up, each still has dialogue regarding their family members. Each of the daughters expresses a desire to be like their mother/make their mother proud. Lady Dimitrescu herself gets very upset every time one of her daughters perishes, and delivers some important dialogue about this in her final confrontation with Ethan.

To paraphrase, Lady D says that Ethan has done something unforgiveable, caused damage that can never heal, and deserves to die before his daughter. That last part is interesting, in the sense that Lady D seems to believe that outlasting your own child is a fate so terrible that she would not wish it upon anyone, including the person who killed her daughters.

Throughout her dialogue and actions, Lady D serves as an important figure of a living mother. What do I mean by that? Well, the only other mothers we see in game are Mia and Miranda. The former doesn't show up until almost the end of the game (seeing as the "Mia" at the start is not actually the real Mia), while the latter does not have a living child, and her behavior has (presumably) changed quite a bit since that loss. As Ethan goes through Castle Dimitrescu, he watches (he causes) Lady D to go through what Miranda did all those decades ago. When we see her loss, when we experience her loss, it is something we connect with, even comparing it (as Lady D does) to Ethan's loss of Rose.

For the more visual side of symbolism, we can turn to Lady Dimitrescu herself. She is very tall, is visibly older than the majority of the Village cast, and has a fairly classic (old-school) motherly look. Everything about her reinforces her position as an example of a mother, especially when she's with her daughters and becomes such a strong figure of protection. Her height allows her to seem the caretaker for her children, even though they are scary/intimidating in their own right.

Donna Beneviento + Waterfall House:

Yes, the baby/fetus/monstrosity is part of this. No, it is not the only bit of thematic work in this section of the game.

To begin, you can find out that Donna is officially the adopted daughter of Mother Miranda. Her birth parents are dead, implied to be from especially tragic causes (more than is the norm when it comes to "orphan making"), and she has suffered greatly from it. We see that she has been seemingly neglected by Miranda, and is incredibly isolated. The tragedy of her loss, along with the consequences presented by it, are something to keep in mind further down the road, when we inevitably deal with Ethan's own death.

One of the consequences of the environment Donna was raised in is, arguably, her reliance on Angie. While interpretations of their exact relationship (aka how much control Donna actually has at any given point) vary, the two very clearly have something akin to a mother/daughter vibe. Alternatively an older sister/younger sister sort of thing. This shows in the way that Donna holds/carries Angie, as well as the contrast in their demeanors. Moreso, the fact that Donna gave a part of herself to create Angie is almost enough to make the symbolism nonnegotiable.

We also see that Donna has a strong understanding of family/family dynamics, through the way that she uses her powers to manipulate Ethan. She dissects his connections to Mia and Rose, taunts him with the lengths he's willing to go to save his child, then shows him a grotesque version of parenthood: The aforementioned fetus monster. Does the monster represent Ethan's fears, or Donna's?

What if the monster is how Donna sees herself, in some way, perhaps thinking that it's her fault her parents died? Bit of a stretch, but it's not a keystone of my theory, so I'm just throwing it out there. We could, however, go a step further and ask ourselves if Donna has noticed the way Miranda neglects her, and the fetus monster is how Donna thinks Miranda sees her. A baby, true, but grotesque, so terribly imperfect compared to her "real daughter" (Eva, obvs).

Regardless, the monster presents an ugly side of parenthood. It shows us the blood, the hunger (with the way it repeatedly attempts to swallow Ethan whole), the wailing. If Lady D shows us the love of parenthood, the bond, Donna in turn shows us the hate, the misery. Everything that one must endure to reap the rewards of family.

Lastly, we get one last bit of symbolism with Donna's death: We play a game with Angie. A childhood classic, hide and seek. Ethan chases her down repeatedly, stabbing away, seemingly only hurting the doll. But what happens when he kills Angie? It turns out that he killed Donna. You kill the child, you kill the parent. A reinforcement of the connection that comes with parenthood, along with another notch in Ethan's family-murdering belt (not saying that he's the "true antagonist" or anything, just keeping track for one of my later points).

Moreau + The Reservoir

Let's get the worst possibility out of the way: Moreau, weakest and sickest of the four lords, lives in a reservoir, where he is relatively safe. To defeat him, you have to drain the water, forcing him onto dry(ish) land. Paired with the main ideas of his section (which I will detail after this nightmare), one could theorize that he's meant to represent birth itself. Again, he's safe in his ("womb") water, and becomes vulnerable when he leaves (like a fragile newborn). Kinda gross, in my opinion, and also not a strong enough connection for me to care much about. It was merely an interesting (albeit horrifying) enough thought that I felt it warranted sharing.

Moving on to the big stuff with Moreau: He's a baby. Evidence: Whiny, has difficulty moving around, struggles to adapt to his growth, throws up a bunch, loves his mother very much, cries for his mother when he's in trouble, etc. Although Mother Miranda does not care for him, he clearly cares for her, and plays yet another role of an abandoned child (like Donna). Without Miranda there to protect him, he perishes terribly, crying out for someone who does not care to answer.

Hearing him cry out for Miranda, over and over, only for her to continue ignoring him is a key piece in the build-up to our confrontation between Ethan and Miranda. The game, in many ways, centers around the comparison between the two. In my humble opinion, Mia should have been involved in this comparison, as opposed to supplying the solution to the result of said comparison. Yes, I know that was a lot of words that don't mean much yet, but trust me, I'm getting there.

Heisenberg + The Factory

Ironically, of the four lords, Heisenberg is the most similar to Mother Miranda. In his massive factory, he is alone except for his numerous experiments, the results of decades of playing God. In comparison to Ethan + Mia, Heisenberg represents artificial parentage, or more accurately, the artificial creation of "life". While the others Lords also performed experiments, they used living subjects. Heisenberg instead chose to use corpses, which he then "brought back to life" with cybernetics + his powers, a somewhat futuristic version of Dr. Frankenstein.

Together, Miranda and him show a rotten side of parenthood (whereas Donna + Moreau showed us the uglier side of the children themselves). To put it simply, they are bad parents. They throw their "children"/experiments into the fray, uncaring, using them as pawns for their own greater gain. The most important part of this is that Heisenberg offers to "help" Ethan: By using Rose as a weapon. In his act of refusal, Ethan demonstrates one of several important distinctions between himself and Mother Miranda. Where she is willing to use her "children" (read: lives that she is responsible for) as tools, he is not.

Miscellaneous Symbolism/Imagery:

The old hag is one of my favorite parts of Village. She's seemingly nuts, has a crazy old lady laugh, wears bones that make soothing bone noises when she moves, and she draws lots of symbols in the dirt. If you look closely (I can provide screenshots if anyone desires, but it will take a bit of work to get them onto my computer), she's drawing one of the most iconic images in the titular village: The winged unborn. This symbol acts as the key you build up after every fight with a Lord, understandably called the Unborn Key (which turns into the Winged Unborn Key). Whether this counts as foreshadowing towards the hag's identity reveal is technically irrelevant, but I like to think it does.

In essence, you build up the key, this depiction of an infant, to progress in the game. The more wings it gains, the closer you are to your goal of rescuing your child.

The cadou itself is very clearly fetus-shaped. Furthermore, the only place within the human body that we know it ever gets implanted is in the "tummy" (thanks Moreau), aka roughly where someone's womb is/would be. Every infected person we see presumably had the Cadou implanted there (though I think it would be interesting if implanting it in different spots caused different mutations. of course, that is a discussion for another day). To become immortal, you have to "bear" a "child". Does it get more direct than that?

Mother Miranda gained her immortality in part for her grief at the loss of her child. She embodied the despair that Lady D spoke of, becoming an eternal source of anguish. Just as the loss of a child is a wound that lasts forever, so too would Miranda last forever (well, until Ethan comes along).

Mia is a loving mother, who puts up with the BSAA making her move across the world, deals with the complications of having a mold husband and mold baby, and has proved herself (see her section in RE7) to be an immense badass. Previously I had forgotten that, and even embarrassed myself in the comments of another person's post by implying she wasn't a tough, ass-kicking machine. Y'all remember feral Mia? People talk about "poor Ethan's arms", but sometimes we forget that Mia was one of the people who did a number on them. Furthermore, she's one of the only living people (from outside the village) to have any connections (pun intended) to Mother Miranda. They worked together, although possibly not directly, on Evelyn. If anyone in Village has a chance of really understanding Miranda's plight, or knowing the truth behind it, it would be Mia. Yet we don't see them interact a single time. Which leads me to the next section...

Conclusion On Theme + Missed Potential:

Okay, okay, so it's pretty obvious at this point that, as previously stated, the game's theme is parenthood. Every section has its symbolism, the story is very obviously about a man trying to rescue his daughter, etc, etc, but what's the point? Is there a lesson, or a more focused interpretation of the central theme? Let's take one last step back, and focus on something I've mentioned a few times now: The comparison between Ethan and Mother Miranda.

Recurring dialogue from Ethan, Alcina, and Mother Miranda all point towards the developers acknowledging that the characters are similar, but there's nowhere near as much conversation about it as I would like. Several times we have the antagonists ask Ethan how he's so willing to kill someone else's child, or prevent them from (essentially) doing what he's doing (aka saving his daughter). While Ethan responds with a mix of "well you started it" and "aghhh fuck-a-you, bitch", there's a much more solid, unspoken difference: Mother Miranda sends her underlings to kill, so that she may revive her daughter. Ethan kills (read: does the work himself) to get his daughter. The difference is much bigger, and more important, at the end of the game, when we realize just how far it goes. Ethan dies to save his daughter. Time and time again Mother Miranda has killed others for her work, but in the end she is stopped when someone willingly dies to stop her.

Where does Mia come in? Mia, the badass mother, the one who once worked alongside Mother Miranda, should have been the nail in the coffin. She is the one who survives, who lives on to raise Rose, she is the silent solution to Ethan's sacrifice. Miranda, you fool, what could you have accomplished if you had held onto your makeshift family? Through Mia (and Chris, to a lesser degree), his "loss" becomes a victory. There's a certain poetic justice that comes with Rose's full family being instrumental in saving her, when Miranda so readily spurned her own family.

Mia could have had an actual conversation with Miranda, their history giving the latter a reason to actually listen. I'm not saying that Miranda would have changed her mind/plans, but the conversation would have been a well-needed contrast to Ethan's "arggg what the fuck is happening, I only have two reactions to things. agg fuck you". Additionally, I feel that Mia (who was captured and had to endure who-knows-what) deserves the opportunity to be the one who points out Miranda's mistakes, who delivers the final "fuck you" to her. More than that, she's the one at the end who can say that hey, maybe she can understand some of what Miranda did. Was there anything her and Ethan wouldn't have done to save Rose? As much as Ethan is a foil to Miranda, Mia could (and should) have played a similar role.

When so much of the story and symbolism revolves around Miranda's experience as a mother, it only would have been fair to shine a light on her equivalent. Her better.

There's more I wanted to say/feel like I didn't properly get across, and I might add more to this at some point, but it's 5:40 AM right now, and I'm starting to feel like my brain is slowing down, so... Feel free to reblog/comment and add your own thoughts!

[thebeautysurrounds]

THIS CONTAINS SLIGHT SPOILERS FOR NEVER HAVE I EVER S2 READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.

This is quite long I had a lot to unpack.

Since watching the 2nd season of Never Have I Ever a few things have been bothering me about the way people are reacting to Devi, and the show overall but mostly Devi. First of all she’s what a sophomore in high school? and she’s doing this all while being the only brown girl (up until kinda the middle of S2) and still dealing with grief and having absolutely no idea who she is yet. To me outside of being an honor roll student she is not doing things FOR HER she is doing this to appease her mother. Who while she means well pushing Devi to succeed to certain extremes which if Devi shows the slightest behavior of fucking up her mother makes harsh comments instead of understanding Devi is a literal teenager and needs room for fucking up.

Is Devi hella unreasonable at times? YES does she often times act strictly on impulse without a second thought…YES. But as a girl who virtually has no one outside of her friends who also are staring to drift from her and get into their first relationships themselves and have their own activities she essentially is left to navigate the world and her teenage angst alone. While I will give Nalini credit for all the work and time she has put in to not only being a single mother and navigating her own grief but also being a working mother who is a doctor and quite possibly has her own struggles with being a brown women in that filed. My problem lies with her not being able to balance or even let go of a strong arm parenting style that mostly focuses on Devi’s fuck up more than her accomplishments and makes comments on how her fuck ups that haven’t even happened yet. I’m not sure Nalini even realizes Devi is at the very very top of her class because I truly believe (after S1) even though Nalini apologized to Devi Nalini has a ‘hoping for the best but expecting the worst’ attitude when it comes to Devi and that’s in the for front of her mind so much she doesn’t realize Devi goes above and beyond not only for herself but to make her mother proud of her all for her mother to just not acknowledge that.

Now with Devi’s characterization I get where some people are coming from on saying Devi shouldn’t have been “boy crazy” or that they “ruined her character development” but here’s my problem those critiques while valid and your allowed to have those opinions…It’s just not really realistic and let me tell you why like I stated Devi is what a sophomore in high school and she has made it a abundantly clear her parents forbid her to date cause it’s school and extra curriculars only. Which will lead to a good college which thus will turn into a good career. While that’s all well and good. I don’t think y’all realize the FOMO of being in high school and growing up with very strict parents, and wanting to have your first relationship. Wanting to be an actual teenager and not wanting to think about 3-4 years down the line which most teenagers don’t/can’t visualize cause it’s not the right now. Devi wants to have those experiences and there’s nothing wrong with that does she go about it the right way…not exactly but y’all act like YOU have never been a teenager and said and done awful things out of anger or just pure immature stupidity. For the boy crazy part Devi is literally having her first feelings and experiences with boys she has 0 clue what she is doing outside of probably books, tv, movies and what her friends assume they know (even though they mean well) the only person Devi would remotely trusts is gone, and she can’t ask her mother cause her mother would honestly probably shut her down and make her feel guilty for even wanting to start having her first experiences with boys. Y’all have such a warped view of not only real teenagers and high school aged kids but also fictional ones. Y’all are so use to shows having protagonist being awful or starting off kinda okay but then their character turns awful and remains that way. What some of you fail to realize is actual teenagers and “teenagers” in shows can/are VERY morally grey. 

Should Devi have been honest and possibly communicated to both Ben and Paxton that she has some sort of feelings for them both..possibly but Devi is a teenager do you think she is having a in depth analysis and talk with herself (outside of a pros and cons list) about what infatuation versus lust versus genuine connection versus romantic attraction looks like probably not. Let’s also analyze how she literally goes from being in her eyes forgettable to being noticed and even though it’s not talked about in the show explicitly she honestly probably struggles with self esteem/self image issues. To go from being a girl who to her no one cares about/notices to one who is getting the attention of two boys who are in Devi’s eyes attractive in their own right. She is so consumed with two guys ACTUALLY being interested in her that she fails to realize she is/and will hurt them both, Do I think Paxton is genuinely attracted to Devi…maybe. But I’m still on the fence about their relationship to me in the beginning I felt Paxton felt Devi is just another meaningless high school fling that he will forget about once he gets to college but to Devi here’s this guy who is “popular” very attractive and he pays attention to her is she looking at the semantics of the situation and how Paxton is more than likely just using her and is only engaging with Devi to get a passing grade and to basically give her the superficial experience of a “high school boyfriend” no she’s not she’s looking at it like here’s this guy who is attractive and he wants to be with someone like me. But do I also believe Devi in S1 was using Paxton and then fell for him DEFINITELY but I will give credit to Paxton for trying at a real relationship with Devi and I hope he will try to be more open and honest.

Do I think Ben likes Devi I honestly do, While the insensitive jokes (exchanged between both) should be discussed I think Ben over time started to see Devi as a girl who finally saw him not the rich, annoying, know it all. But in his view Devi and him are on equal playing fields because they are both overly driven smart individuals and when she said yes to going out with him it was probably the first time he felt like a girl saw the real him. While Ben too more than likely struggles with abandonment issues him dating Devi in a way made him feel like this was the first time he could actual be happy about something cause it was something he actually wanted and not something he just did to earn points in others books and impress people he genuinely got something on his own and that he was actually happy not a front he put on. To me Ben’s abandonment issues come out even more than in S1 when he tells Devi why he’s so hurt and it’s the night of the party when she runs after Paxton (who he sees has it all) and Devi doesn’t “choose him” Do I think Ben and Devi should date cause they share some form of the same trauma no. But again Devi is not use and doesn’t even know what to do with the attention of two people. Again is Devi looking at the semantics of her relationship with Ben…No. I don’t think Devi even realizes she’s quite literally hurting two people cause we could also discuss how Ben and Paxton probably have had other flings and relationships without a second thought while Devi having no relationship experiences and this is territory for her and she has no idea what she is doing or how to properly navigate this situation.

I’m almost done with this long ass rant I promise but it’s two more things I want to make light of/point out I don’t think anyone really gives Devi credit for still going to therapy, loosing a parent is unbearable especially loosing one as young as Devi did, especially when you feel the only parent that truly understood and supported you is gone. Devi doing things that are impulsive and unreasonable because she quite literally has no guidance her mother is only consumed with Devi not making the family “look bad” Devi’s grief is so heavy and she feels she’s going at it alone because her mother doesn’t take genuine time to talk to her. Now was Devi “stalking” her mother extremely inappropriate yes for sure but do Nalini and her need to communicate better for Devi to understand that her mother wasn’t dating sure even if Nalini was on a date their should have been communication there. Devi will probably never stop grieving her father hell he literally came to her in a dream to tell her she deserves better when it came to “dating” Paxton and Nalini will probably never stop grieving her husband but she deserves happiness too and I believe if Devi and Nalini were both honest with each other her slowly dating again wouldn’t have been a problem. Another point I wanna make connecting Devi, Paxton, and Ben is they all have this view that the grass is greener on the other side and that’s just not the case. Ben is jealous of Paxton cause he feels he has the “Perfect life” but in actuality Paxton is extremely flawed and honestly insecure his own family doesn’t believe in him and he knows people only like him because he is attractive, while Paxton looks at Ben like this, while annoying Ben is smart, rich, and no one ever questions Ben’s intelligence but in actuality Ben is very lonely and has spent most of his life alone or being raised by other people which has caused him to put on a huge front to people and often times overcompensate in his social life, and Devi looks at other girls like they have it all and have 0 struggles or problems (I.e her views on Anissa) but Devi fails to realize thy also struggle, are insecure, is struggling with mental illness, and don’t have themselves figured out, and Devi is looking at this man her mom is “dating” as if he’s taking something away but In actuality he is experiencing his own losses. All in all Never Have I Ever gets teenage angst and messy problematic morally grey teenagers right and the fact that y’all beg for more “flawed or problematic” characters and when you get them you don’t like that they are just that it’s odd to me it seems like y’all only want problematic characters if it’s how you see fit.

TL;DR: Y’all need to stop acting like y’all weren’t gross annoying and had fuck ups as teenagers y’all should really stop pretending like teenagers in real and some of us as teens didn’t have/engage in relationships that weren’t good but we learned from it while this show isn’t real it shows y’all will scream let people fuck up and let them grow but you don’t actually mean it. Devi is a teenager and requires room to grow she even admits she acts out and is impulsive but y’all act like she’s supposed to have the self awareness of a 60 year old.

[rachelbethhines]

Tangled Salt Marathon - “Rapunzel Knows Best!” ( A first half of S3 Recap)

So I decided to place the recap after Be Very Afraid for several reasons. For starters it’s where the season three hiatus took place. It’s also framed like a cliffhanger episode the same as The Great Tree and Queen for a Day; so while Cassandra’s Revenge is technically the midseason finale, Be Very Afraid functionally servers this narrative purpose better. Finally I want to keep the Cassandra heavy stuff contained in it’s own recap later same as I did for Varian’s arc in season one. 

Also keep in mind, everything I discussed in previous recaps still apply here. Nothings changed and you could argue that the issues I bring up now could have also apply to past seasons; they just happen to be at their worst here. 

Here are the past recaps 

To Filler or Not to Filler

Hey, What Ever Happened to That Varitas, Guy?

What Is the Point?

‘Whatta Twist’

And here are the episodes that’s covered in this recap

Rapunzel’s Return Part 1

Rapunzel’s Return Part 2

Return of the King 

Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf

The Lost Treasure of Herz Der Sonne

No Time Like the Past

Beginnings 

The King and Queen of Hearts

Day of the Animals 

Be Very Afraid 

Poorly Defined Conflicts 

I’m not just talking about Cassandra’s lack of goals here either, though that is a part of it. I mean in several episodes the central conflict isn’t laid out clearly enough before being resolved.  We flip from one set up to the next without ever resolving the first; like in Rapunzel’s Return when Cass and Varian fight for screen time or whenever Rapunzel is suppose to learn one lesson only for someone else to learn a completely different lesson in every other episode. And to this day I don’t know what Rapunzel and Feldspar’s subplot in Lost Treasure was suppose to be about. 

There’s also of course the ill-defined overall conflict; which at this point has become convoluted and nonsensical to the extreme, and will only grow more aggravatingly stupid as the season progresses. The main villains lack clear goals, their motivations don’t align with previously stated facts, and the actual interesting conflict involving the threat of the rocks and their destruction of people’s lives and homes is just shoved under the rug and forgotten about.  

There is no story without conflict. Having the conflict be all over the place is not only confusing but makes it harder for the audience to invest in what’s going on. 

Failed Narrative Promises 

Tying in with the above statement regarding conflicts, we have failed narrative promises. Rapunzel is repeatedly told to that she needs to learn something in several episodes only for her not to learn it at all. She either learns some unrelated ‘lesson’ that wasn’t established, (like in Rapunzel’s Return with her pervious goal about ‘opening up to others’ being switched out for a generic ‘responsibility’ lesson that at the last minute, where she doesn’t even do anything responsible,) or she winds up ‘teaching’ the opposite lesson to a different character thereby rewarding her for her bad behavior.   

And that’s just within the induvial episodes themselves; there’s also broken narrative promises through out the overall story arc; like...

no justice/redemption for Lady Caine, 

no acknowledgment that the Saporians are the victims of colonization

no conclusion regarding Corona’s murky past

no satisfying ending to Varian’s plot that sees everyone in involve grow

a poor copout of an explanation for Cassandra’s face/heel turn

The Dark Prince reveal going nowhere 

The Brotherhood being put on a bus 

King Frederic, or any royal, not being held accountable for their past actions 

Lance’s new found responsibilities just being thrown away for the tenth time 

The Disciples plot being being dropped 

next to nothing in season two winds up being relevant 

And Rapunzel, the protagonist of a coming of age story, fails to learn anything at all 

I could probably go on but you get the gist. Tangled is incredibly frustrating show to watch because doesn’t deliver what it promises. You’re not being clever by ‘subverting audiences expectations’ unless you can justify your narrative decisions with previous set up. Tangled is too lazy to build proper set ups so it’s ‘twists’ leave you wanting to punch things rather then impressing you. 

Character Assassinations 

Every single character in Tangled the Series gets thrown under a bus, driven off a cliff, and then allowed to drown in the ocean of their completely unaware self-congratulatory smugness.  

Rapunzel is turned into a bully

Cassandra is given the idiot ball to hold permanently 

The King and Queen are lobotomized

Quinin gets replaced by a robot  

The rest of the Brotherhood are pale shadows of what they could have been 

Edmund is transformed from tragic complex figure into a dumb jerkoff who abuses his kid for a laugh 

Zhan Tiri, once an ancient demon warlock, is reduced to a floating impotent ghost girl 

The Saporians become poor hipster parodies

Cap is put on a bus

Any villain who isn’t Cass is gets ignored

Lance is infantilized to the point of absurdity

Eugene becomes a doormat 

and poor Varian is forced to become a complacent victim to his abusers as oppose to being allowed to keeping his dignity 

I think the only person who escapes this mass murder of characterization is freaking Calliope, and she’s hasn’t even appeared yet! (Well okay her and Trevor, maybe) 

This all ties back into the poorly defined conflict and failed narrative promises. Rather than let the characters drive the story, they’ve become puppets to the plot, and plot is really stupid and forced, and circles back in on itself and is full of contradictions. 

Manipulating the Audience’s Empathy to Do the Work for the Writers  

The reason why the creators believe they can get away with such poor characterization and lazy writing is because they expect the audience to do all the heavy lifting for them.  

Cass isn’t given an on screen reason for what she does because they’re hoping her fans will just automatically excuse her because they like her/relate to her and not, you know, get mad at the writers for dumbing her down. And after all who doesn’t love the creator’s pet? Meanies! That’s who! 

No one calls out Rapunzel’s bullshit on screen, because if everyone likes her, then you, viewing audience, should too. Because if you have any sort of independent critical thinking abilities and a sense of right and wrong then clearly you’re ‘just a hater’. 

Everyone should just shut up and be satisfied that Varian is even on screen now and be grateful for the scraps that they get cause he’s not the real point of the show and according to Chris ‘Varian fans aren’t real fans’. Even though they make up most of his viewing audience. 

I could go on, but it’s just variations of the above. The writing in this series is very fond of gaslighting the audience and trying to trick them into justifying the absolute worst behaviors while desperately hoping they doesn’t noticed the continued downgrading and dismissal of characters they do like or once liked.  

And the sad thing is, it’s worked. There are people to this day that still try to justify this show’s shitty morals and bend over backwards to excuse the likes of Rapunzel, Frederic, Cassandra, and Edmund.  Worst, there are loud sections of the fandom, (usually on twitter) who think bullying is okay and follow in Chris and his characters footsteps. Most of them young impressionable girls who are now ripe for TREFS to indoctrinate because they use the same bullying tactics and excuses for authoritarianism. 

Media does effect reality, but not in the way purists and antis would have you believe. No one is going to become a violent manic from playing a video game nor a sex offender because they read a smut fic. But they very much will conform to toxic beliefs if it’s repeated enough at them by authorities they ‘trust’; like say the world wide leading company known for family entertainment and children’s media, and the ‘friends’ they find within the fandom for said company... 

I’m not saying you can’t enjoy Tangled the series or that you’re some how wrong for liking it’s characters, nor do you have to engage with every or any criticism thrown it’s way. But yes you need to think about the media you consume on some level and valid criticism is very much important to the fandom experience for precisely the above reasons. 

Conclusion    

This isn’t even the tip of the iceberg of what’s wrong with this show, but it is most of its biggest problems laid bare. Anything that haven’t covered here or in the past recaps will be explored in the final recap. Cause this is it folks; the last leg of the journey for this retrospective. When come back, hopefully next week, we’ll tackle Pascal’s Dragon.  

[kikuism]

here are the books i've read lately that i want to talk about!! all of them are debuts too.

the witch's heart: a story about the giantess angrboda, whose union with loki produces three unnatural children: the wolf who will swallow the sun and moon, fenrir; the world serpent, jormungandr; and the keeper of the realm of the dead, hel. they live their life at the edge of the world, away from prying eyes, in domestic idyll bliss...until angrboda’s visions plague her, and she sees her children responsible for a large part of the destruction that ragnarok—the end of times—will bring about. are her children monsters? how far does a mother's love go to protect her unnatural children destined for destruction? these are the questions at the heart of the book and they really truly tugged at my heartstrings. i wasn't prepared for how emotional this book made me feel. at its heart it is a story about family, about motherhood most of all. my budding interest in norse mythology also greatly upped my enjoyment of this book. i'm definitely going to keep an eye out for more books by this author in the future. i can't believe this is her debut!

these feathered flames: inspired by russian folklore, twins asya and izaveta are thrust apart by two separate destinies: asya trains to become the firebird that keeps magic in check in the realm, and izaveta trains to be the next queen. however, tragedy brings them back together: the death of the queen. suddenly izaveta is crowned the new queen, and asya prematurely must take on the role of the firebird. tensions rise between the sisters, who not only have not seen each other in years, but whose new positions have never really worked in tandem with each other before. the sisters must navigate growing political tensions as well as try to figure out what—or who—killed their mother.

in my personal opinion this book promised more than it delivered, and i think if the execution were a little sharper I'd have enjoyed it more. i wanted to get more of a feel for the characters. it was there, but i wanted more. i admit i enjoyed izaveta's parts more than asya's—i think i have a thing for ice queens trying to navigate their new roles (god....not to bring up frozen, but i was so excited for elsa's character and....they just didn't do anything with her). izaveta reminds me of what elsa would be like. also, i'm sorry, but...the f/f enemies to lovers romance that was a big part of this book’s hype absolutely failed to do anything for me. i so wanted to like it, but unfortunately i couldn't care for it. and i know it's because i didn't care enough about the characters that i couldn't get invested in their romance. if i can't care about them as individuals, how can i care about them together? also, the pacing of their relationship was just not it. i also expected this book to be steeped in russian folklore and culture the way the bear and the nightingale was—with that book, i felt like i had truly stepped in medieval russia; it was dripping with culture. but with these feathered flames, it felt like just a little dip into what should have been a richer world. yes, there is russian food and clothing and names, but i still felt the impression i was reading about some vague european setting rather than a fully established russian one. all in all, it wasn't terrible, but it didn't really do much for me. i give it a generous 3.5/5. i might pick up the sequel.

ariadne: ariadne and her sister phaedra are princesses of crete, who have grown up hearing the thunderous bellows of their brother, the minotaur, in the massive labyrinth underneath the palace. every year fourteen tributes are brought over from athens to be sacrificed to the beast. until one year, one of the tributes turns out to be the legendary theseus, who vows to defeat the minotaur and end this cycle of violence and bloodshed (yes! suzanne collins was inspired by the myth of theseus and the minotaur). ariadne falls in love with theseus and aids him in killing her brother. but what does this mean for her—is this betrayal worth it?

i enjoyed this book. i think by now i have a soft spot for mythology retellings (thank you madeline miller 🤍), and the writing in these kinds of books is close to my own style, so i love that. i had originally thought the entire book was going to be about the maze and the minotaur, but it's just the first part! i won't say what happens, but...things happen. like all mythology retellings, this story too takes place over the course of the subject's life, so there's a sense of the passing of time. i must say that the writing is gorgeous and so expressive. it was a real treat to read. i think the overall reason i don't Love this book though is because 1) the ending was rather abrupt, and 2) the main theme, to me, really just boiled down to 'men ain't shit'. which....yeah, valid, but also i sort of wish it was a little more substantial than that. i wish it had something more to say too. i remember sometime around the middle of the book i just paused and was like, ‘okay but what's the point? what is this book trying to say?’ but regardless, i really and truly sympathized with the women in these book, mortal and immortal alike. they had it rough....we still have it rough....the universal timeless experience of being a woman.

the poppy war: *shrieks* i'm so glad i gave this book another chance. i could not put this down. it's the better 'orphan goes to boarding school' story. in fact, the first part tricks you into thinking it's going to be cutesy boarding school antics. but holy shit....no. no. this is a horrific story about war.

the poppy war is a historical military epic inspired by the second sino-japanese war and overall china’s bloody twentieth century. knowing a bit about east asian history myself i could actually recognize some of what was going on in this book. main character rin aces the keju, a nationwide exam that seeks to root out only the most talented youth—and is accepted into the most prestigious military academy, sinegard. however, tensions are fraught just across the sea as the federation prepares to make its move against nikan, her home. rin soon realizes she has an affinity for shamanism, a mythical power that calls upon the gods, and which might just be the key for winning this war and saving her people. but is this great power worth the even greater cost?

the best way i can describe the writing in the poppy war: it's a shounen anime come to life. the action is so amazingly written and explosive, from the swords to the magic, especially the way it's interspersed with the emotional moments. the way everything is written, i can see everything happening so clearly in my mind's eye. it's such a visceral experience. the writing just flows.

but this book is about war, first and foremost, and all the horrors that come with it, down to every last garish detail. it takes a lot for a book to unnerve me, but this one did and more. it made me uncomfortable and disturbed and horrified. this book delves into war intimately, not a small dip but rather a full submersion. there's a section detailing carnage in a city that's just going to stay with me forver. it's like that scene in mulan where they abruptly fall silent as they reach the massacred village, except every inch of that carnage is described in full intimate detail. it's not for the faint of heart. at one time i clapped my hand over my mouth because i couldn't believe what i was reading.

and it asks questions about war, too. who's right, who's wrong? is any of this justified? is vengeance the way to go? and the thing is....it's not. duh. venegance is Not the way to go. we all know this. but oh my god the way r. f. kuang writes, you want Nothing more than pain and death for rin's enemies. you want to see them suffer in the worst way possible. like rin, you want to get back at them in the worst possible way. and it's like...yes venegance is not the answer but you want her enemies to hurt So Badly. you start thinking, maybe it's okay, because they're so horrible and vile and inhumane, retaliation is the only possibly course. vengeance Must be served. but then.....what does that make you? what is the cost of vengeance? can you pay it? can you ever? is it worth it?

this book is insane and epic in the best way possible. i'm so glad i gave it another chance. the world building is so rich and lavish and the cast of characters is huge and i care for each and every one of them and i'm just. So Invested in what's going to happen next. SO MUCH happened in this first book, i'm still reeling, i feel like i've read two books in one sitting. i can't even predict what's waiting for me in the next book, which is a whopping 650 pages....i'm going to be fed so well.

also, here is a list of triggers. please exercise caution going into this book as it deals with some very dark themes:

[kiisaes]

Kii hiiii!!!! I want to start doing commissions soon but I have no idea how and where to start. I mean yeah I'll make a comission sheet and specify stuff I know those basics. But like how do I kinda know that people would actually comission me for stuff? How did you know when to start and like what was your whole process like? Don't mind me I'm just trying to ask about this to some artists I admire and who do commissions what their experiences were like so don't feel too pressured to answer this lol

hi anon!!! that's a really good question that i unfortunately feel like i'm unqualified to properly answer, because my commission work experience was also ... how you say ... less than desirable LOL. i didn't even make a commission sheet and my overall process was super wonky so you're already doing better than me!

honestly i don't think there's any real way you can gage if you even will get commissioners. the shitty thing about any freelance work is that opportunities aren't guaranteed, and you just have to put your foot out there and hope for the best. which is scary and overwhelming, i know! especially if you're down on yourself and your abilities, because your brain will always try conjuring up reasons as to why you shouldn't. i'm pretty sure almost every artist out there has felt like their art isn't good enough so people won't commission them — trust me, i've totally been there and i'm still there LOL — but those nagging voices in your head telling you that you're full of shit ... are full of shit and you should just ignore them. or at the very least, live unbothered by them.

because the fact is, you are your worst critic! you'll always spot mistakes and flaws in your work that others literally won't even notice. so in regards to when to start, i'd honestly say whenever you feel ready to, you should! there's always art appreciators out there who i'm sure would love to give artists a shot, whether beginner or master, a rookie or wholly experienced. i can't guarantee that you'll have customers, but not trying at all already bars you from any customers in the first place. if you try and you fail, take comfort in the fact that you tried!!! that's already amazing!!!

that being said, i think probably the "easiest" way to get commissioners is to understand your audience. know what your viewers like to see from you, and perfect that! and honestly i feel quite hypocritical saying this because i go to art school and the overall vibe here is "draw for yourself and don't sell out" but the truth hurts and that truth is, if you're looking to grow a client base and make money off of your art, it doesn't hurt to draw stuff you know your audience eats up. it leads to more interest in your art, and more potential people who are willing to pay you for that art. it also might make you seem more credible as someone who draws distinct things and people follow you for those things! i hope some of this makes sense because i am so bad at wording sentences that i end up going on long rambles LOL

personally, i'm very spontaneous and i just do things without even thinking twice, so i opened ko-fi commissions last year literally because i was bored and i wanted to avoid my other trillion responsibilities. i figured if i could get some money off of my art, why not give it a shot? i did NOT expect people to commission me actually, but it was a pleasant surprise that people found my art interesting enough to pay for :) i didn't make a sheet (which i probably should ... heh) but i have drawn enough uncolored line work art + flat color work where i think my audience knew what they were getting into (uncolored line art and flat color were the initial two options i provided btw).

i also think pricing plays a huge part into whether people will commission you, which is honestly so ass because i'm a firm believer that the majority of artists, myself included, undersell their work. like, reeeaaallly undersell it. i'm talking "this artist should charge $100 or more for what they're offering but they're only charging $40?!" kind of deal. art is a product of both time and energy, and is a direct antithesis to capitalist work demands. you can't force an artist to churn out art like a machine would, and an artist's efforts towards making a personalized art piece should also be taken into consideration regarding pricing ... but unfortunately people don't want to pay a lot for commissions. and it's understandable because not everyone has enough money to throw around whenever they feel like it, so oh well. anyway my point is if you charge lower, you're probably more likely to get people willing to pay :( it sucks i know, but that's just how it is. i'm sure your prices can raise exponentially once you have credibility as a reliable commission artist though!

i hope some of this helps ?? i'm not like a seasoned commission artist or anything but this is just from my own experiences ... your experiences might be completely different! so take my advice with a grain of salt as well but uhh yea B)