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catxsnow · 4 years ago

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MY MISTAKES J.C.

Request: Could I request a oneshot for John Constantine with a protege/child figure where they get hurt during one of the many shenanigans they've gotten up to? Reader is in their middle to late teens. Either gender neutral or female reade. Please and thank you! P.s I love ur writings.

Warning: canon-violence, swears

A/N: Did - Did I just post a fic in the middle of the day?? Yes. Yes I did. You know why? Because I’m posting a SECOND one tonight to make up for last night :)

Alright look, I’m not gonna start writing for Constantine but this was cute so I couldn’t say no.

Word Count: 2k

John Constantine was insane.

You had been saying it since the start of your adventures with him and the more that you were with him, the more you kept saying it. He was a crazy old fool who kept putting himself in situations what always came back to bite him in the ass.

When Zatanna dropped you off at his front door, he had no desire to take care of you. What the hell would he want with some saucy teen that would only get in his way and stop him from doing what he enjoyed most - liquor and sex. Unfortunately, he couldn't exactly say no to Zatanna, and when he saw just how powerful you were, he didn't have much of a choice.

You were young, and if that power within you wasn't controlled early, god knows what would happen. Constantine had fucked up a lot in his life, but maybe helping you was something that would make up for some of it.

So, he taught you everything that he knew - at least the not so dark aspects of it. The last thing he wanted to do was ruin the rest of your life with tainted magic that would haunt you forever. Life with you as his side wasn't all bad. He had someone to watch his back, keep him company, even boost his mood when he was down.

John faced a lot of hardships with you. A lot of the time he had no idea what the hell do to with you - comfort you, give you advice - he wasn't good at any of that. He had to help you get through your first heartbreak, the doubt within yourself, hell he even struggled with looking you in the eyes and telling you everything was going to be okay.

He lied a lot.

You liked to consider John as more than just a mentor to you - he was your best friend. Even though there was a considerable age gap between the two of you, you were on the same level of humor and wit. A lot of the time you felt as if you were meant to be at his side. Zatanna finding you was pure accident, but being under John's protection almost seemed too good to be true.

Sure, he was fucked up in almost every way possible. He pissed everybody off, drank too much, his past was horrifying. Somehow, none of it scared you off, and in some ways, you made John a better person. To be responsible for just a kid - a 'I'm only a year and a half away from being an adult go fuck yourself' - made him get his act together.

Between making fun of his clothes, the way he talked, even his rudimentary way of living, the bond you formed was unbreakable. You would never admit it, but you looked to him as a parental figure. A fucked up parent who didn't ask to be or know what he was doing, but a parent nonetheless.

Your little 'missions' would usually leave some scrapes and bruises - most times blood of whatever victim you were killing off. For the most part, the most severe pain you had to put up with was John's hangover's. He had a lot of those. After being in this line of work for only a few years, you couldn't blame him.

Then there was the time that it was more than just a cut that could be magically healed. It was supposed to be an easy exorcism. You and John had done dozens of those which meant you went in there confident. Your guard was down and you weren't prepared for things to go sideways.

Things went bad, really bad.

John was left to make the tough call of saving the little girl that had been possessed, or saving you. He couldn't do both, he wished he could do both. However, he knew if he had saved you and not the innocent kid, you'd rip his head off. So, he had to bite the bullet and watch as you fell to the ground screaming and he saved the girl.

Sitting in this hospital with you unconscious on the bed, wires hooked up to you that weren't really doing anything against the magic coursing through you, he wished he made the other choice. Throughout all his years he had sacrificed lives to save his own skin, why did he start now with saving you?

"Shoulda never let Z to convince me to take you," John scoffed to himself. He wasn't strong enough to heal you, not by himself. His energy was already drained from taking care of the demon from earlier, he wasn't sure if he could do any magic at that point. "Can't tell if it was me or you that was the dumb one, huh?"

He felt like a fool talking to you. Obviously you couldn't hear a word he was saying, but part of him was just hoping you did. Maybe it brought him comfort, maybe he was just an old coot who didn't know how to accept this worry running through him. Either way, grabbing onto your cold hand sent chills up his spine.

"I'm sorry," John's eyes sealed shut. His fists gripped the edge of your bed as he tried to keep himself level headed. The demon that did this to you faced a fate worth than death for what it did. "I shouldn't have dragged you along, you deserve a better life. Not one with me leading you. I've made a fuck ton o' mistakes and I guess now you're one of 'em."

When his eyes peeled back open, a few stray tears slipped down his cheeks. John had faced a lot of evil in his life, he was so used to death and destruction that it no longer fazed him. Guess you made a little weak spot in his heart. For the first time in a long time, John felt grief for someone who wasn't even dead yet. He was scared.

"Never thought I'd see the day that John Constantine cries over someone." John looked up in the reflection of the window. He hastily wiped away his wet cheeks and scrambled up to his feet to see his visitor. Zatanna looked between him and you. "How are they?" Concern filled her voice.

"Needs help," John stared down at you. Zatanna stood on the opposite side of the bed. She placed her hand over yours, the unfamiliar lack of power caught her off guard. "Your help, I'm too drained to do any magic, at least by myself. I can't let them suffer like this, not for my mistakes."

"I know, John," Zatanna assured. Constantine wasn't sure how she knew that the two of you had gotten in trouble or exactly which hospital you were in. At that moment, he didn't care. He was more happy to see her than he ever had in his entire life. Zatanna could save you, if there was anyone out there that could, it was her.

"Let's get to work."

"I'm fine John, would you fuck off?"

John never thought he'd see the day where he was happy to hear you lip him off. In all your time together the second that you retorted any snide comment towards him, he would scowl. Now, he couldn't hold back a smile. He had been worried about you, more worried than he was for anyone.

Zatanna was the one to really save you. She had overworked herself to bring you back to the land of the living. It was worth it, she saw a lot of greatness within you. You rubbed off on John, he was becoming a different man than she knew a lot of her life. He was better with you at his side. Zatanna feared what he would become if he lost you - especially when it was his fault.

When you finally made it back home, John hovered over you like a mother bear. He didn't let you leave the house and he certainly didn't allow you to join him for any missions until you were 100% again. It was beyond frustrating for you, but you had to admit you were glad to see that someone cared about you this much.

You were bed ridden for a few days. Too weak to get up unless necessary but strong enough to get yourself out of the damned hospital. John became your 'bitch boy' for those days and you made sure to take well good advantage of it. By the time that you were up and walking, you had gotten annoyed of his hovering.

"'scuse me for being worried," John rolled his eyes. "Don't happen to often you know, you should be considered lucky."

"Lucky?" You scoffed. You hadn't tested your magic yet, your whole body still felt weak and you weren't about to put yourself back into a comma just to see if you could light John's cigarette with the snap of your fingers. "Anything involving you is far from lucky. I should be considered dead is what I should be."

He pulled a smoke out of his pocket, he forgot how peaceful it was without your comebacks. You narrowed your eyes as he lit it up and took a drag. Constantine knew that you hated when he smoked inside and yet he continuously did it anyways.

So, to test out how strong you were getting, you tried to disintegrate his cigarette. Your eyes narrowed with concentration and somehow, it had worked. John cried out as his cigarette suddenly burst into flames and fell to dust on the floor. You felt fatigued by the small spell, but at least you were getting back to normal.

Constantine glared at you. He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out another one. Without breaking eye contact, he lit it up and took another breath of the nicotine.

"Twat," you muttered. The petty side of him was something that would never go away - no matter how close to death either of you were. It was who he was. John missed seeing your smiling face in the few days that you were out. He never realized the comfort that it brought him.

Without another word, you sluggishly walked back to your bedroom. You needed rest, as much as you tried to deny it. Zatanna had done a good job of fixing you up but you still had a long way to go. It was going to take time, but you knew damn well that John was going to be at your side through it all -whether you wanted him to be or not.

"Berk!" Constantine yelled after you. A smile toyed at his lips. As much as you did fight and bicker with him, he couldn't imagine what his life would be like without you in it now. Never in his life did he imagine he'd be some sort of father figure, with you... he enjoyed it. He was proud of you.

The thought of losing you to some stupid mistake that he made nearly destroyed him. He took you in to make his wrongs right and he would have lost all of that alongside with you. But, it was more than that. Constantine cared for you, losing you meant he would be losing a piece of himself.

There was already so much of him tainted by the evil of the world, he couldn't bare the thought of losing the little good part of his soul. As much as he hated to admit it, John needed you far more than you ever needed him.

#john constantine #constantine #john constantine imagine #john constantine one shot #dc imagine #dc one shot #dc #zatana

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rpbetter · 4 years ago

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Traditional Writing Advice & RP

I see a lot of people reblogging writing advice posts, and while it pleases me to see people trying to appreciate RP as writing, those pieces of advice don’t always translate from traditional writing to RP writing.

Following the advice for writing a traditional book manuscript you want to have published, you are going to run into some issues if you follow every point of it faithfully in an RP setting.

For one thing, this isn’t just your story, you’re telling it with another writer. In RP, our reading audience and our writing partners are the same. We have to create well-written, engaging stories that are also meant to be picked up by someone else and furthered. For another, even among the most writing proficient RPers, this is a more relaxed style of writing for a reason; we’re writing neither a paper to be graded nor a work to be published, we’re expressing creativity with other people. It can fall flat quickly, to your writing partners and to yourself, if you are writing in an extremely formal manner in RP.

Writing is one of the creative pursuits that has lent itself heavily to what I’m going to politely call snobbery, and that is part of the problem here. The RPC is rather filled with muns who are self-concious, devalue themselves and their work, and can be desperate for the approval of being A Real Writer. If you love writing and you do write, you’re a writer. No, that definitely doesn’t make you a good writer, but following rules not meant for you isn’t going to make you one either.

There is a wrong way to write, actually, there are hundreds of wrong ways to write that make me want to rip my own face off on the regular. The thing is, there is no one-size-fits-all correct way to write any more than there is such a standard in visual art. There are principles that one should know and follow, but your style might be neoclassical or modern or impressionist. Saying that, in my personal opinion, things falling under the heading of modern-style art is horrid, thus inherently wrong and not art, I’d be imposing my personal aesthetics instead of encouraging people to follow appropriate principles, run with their passion and skill, and make art that moves people who are not me. That’s important, in general, but it’s even more important when we’re talking about creative art as a hobby-as a legitimate passion project one isn’t obliged to devote themselves to.

That’s the way we need to be looking at writing as well. Not as an academic and absolute Right Way, but as an art form that has principles, and indeed, literal form. By insisting otherwise, we’ve damaged writing as a hobby and a profession, and it really shows in the RPC where you have a rather stark division of muns who, on the one side, are so ate up with bizarre concepts their professor threw out about never using “said,” forcing the ideology of their personal academic experience on others, and using traditional writing advice as Word of God to shame others and elevate themselves. On the other side, you have a ton of muns who just won’t even bother anymore, and why should they? They’re genuinely not up to par, but working on it means both a process of shaming and killing their own creative experience.

In saying all this, I want to be really clear here: I am in no way saying that shitty writing, an inability to follow basic grammatical principles, being unwilling to use the damn spellcheck that is standard everywhere, and having no concept of things like storytelling, characterization, and word flow is excusable or ideal.

It isn’t. It’s a terribly destructive force in the RPC, and I’m not in the camp of excusing disinterest in learning, improving, and perfecting one’s hobby because it is an unpaid hobby. In my opinion, it’s part of the blight of the current RPC. However, the snobbery and inability to recognize that there is nuance to learning and writing situations has done nothing but worsen this issue.

So, that being said, some items that are 100% good to use traditionally and in RP include:

Grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

We’re not all native English speakers, and grammar is difficult anyway. It can also turn a story bland with expedience when too properly adhered to. Know the basic principles, but also, be asking yourself about both popular works of fiction and your own favorite works. Chances are, they do not strictly adhere to the rules. Experienced, naturally gifted, and learned writers all manipulate those rules to work for their stories, characters, world-building, and so on. It becomes a personalized writing style, and it’s alright if it takes you some practice to find yours.

Just remember, grammar exists for a reason. Removing or mutating too much will leave you with a difficult to read and understand mess that isn’t a style, just a fucking mess.

If you struggle with grammar, the best way to help yourself is to practice. Additionally, seeing what errors you are making can be quite helpful; Grammarly offers a free add on for both Google Chrome and FireFox that will show you spelling and grammar mistakes. It also explains the mistake, while offering you a suggested fix. This way, you can see the mistakes you’re making in action. {Presumably, there are other such resources, but since I have no experience with them, I’m not the one to recommend them.}

As I said above, spellcheckers are standard now, in fucking 2021. This has been standard on devices and browsers for so long that I highly doubt most people on tumblr even remember a time when you had to use additional software to have them.

You make a mistake or misspell, and if it isn’t corrected for you, it’s underlined very obviously for you to tap/click/float over to correct. If the word is so terribly misspelled that no suggestion comes up {not all spellcheckers are created equality; some do not recognize slang or relaxed spellings, archaic word use, myriad, particularly specialized jargon-legal, medical, technical-and so on}, we also live in a time period where we can highlight the word, right-click that bitch, and select from the menu the option to search for the word. If the word was so weirdly misspelled that your checker couldn’t figure it out, it is incredibly rare that Google doesn’t throw out the correct spelling when you search it. If the spelling was correct, but the word-use is slang, jargon, or archaic, Google is also going to tell you that-you’ve confirmed it is correct, and can now decide if you want to use it or pick a possible synonym for it instead.

There is no fucking excuse for egregiously misspelled words anymore. None. I mean...listen, I spell quite terribly myself, but no one reading my RP replies is ever going to know that fact. Having difficulty with spelling is not, and has not been for a very long time now, an impediment to writing.

Furthermore, we all miss a typo here and there, especially if we write lengthy novella. Those aren’t always going to be caught by spellcheck, and we might edit the reply five times without seeing it. That happens, it’s alright when it’s minimal! Anything other than that, though, it’s just a combination of rushing and laziness. You really couldn’t be assed to take your time with that reply, read it over at least once before posting, and/or to click the underlined word.

There. Is. No. Excuse.

Again, not all spellcheckers are the same. If you feel like yours is lacking, try an extension for your browser. Since I said it above, I obviously have Grammarly on my mine. My replies effectively go through three different checkers, actually. I write all drafts outside of my browser where it is initially checked by Pages, then, when I paste it into tumblr, it’s being checked natively and by Grammarly. It wasn’t my intention, I just wanted to be positive I was never losing a draft or cooking my ancient laptop with Google Docs. However, it’s been nice as hell to get the perspective of multiple checkers, and as such, I definitely recommend it. It isn’t like I’m putting any extra effort into this, and I’m not paying for Grammarly, either.

When you refuse to behoove yourselves of the spellchecker natively available to you, at least, you’re seriously telling your writing partners that they were not important enough for you to click a fucking word. It’s inexcusable.

Punctuation being nonexistent isn’t a writing style or aesthetic, neither is a refusal to capitalize anything. If never using a comma is part of your Aesthetic™, please, rethink your fucking life and the hobby you’ve chosen.

Punctuation is a part of grammar, and I understand that there can be complexities present that might be confusing. That is one of the reasons why you should bother to know the basics as regards when and how to use punctuation. It’s also another way in which telling people that they should adhere to advice meant for traditional and academic writing can be a shit idea. Especially in an RPC known to misunderstand shit and go overboard.

When you tell the RPC that writers use too many commas, the RPC stops using them all around. Especially, when you also attach this to the idea of evil “wordiness.” That’s something that the RPC is desperate to avoid anyway, as the majority of people here are allergic to reading and writing; anything you advise that lessens the word count for them is going to be grabbed and erroneously applied. Someone implies that wordiness and commas equals run-on sentences, and the RPC gets not only believes it, it gets this message, “if I take out the commas, it isn’t a run-on sentence.”

You have all fundamentally misunderstood what a god damned run-on sentence is. It’s not a long sentence, it isn’t a proliferation of commas. A run-on sentence is when two, or more, sentences that should be individual are conjoined without proper punctuation {a fucking comma, for example} or a coordinating conjunction.

Run-ons can be surprisingly short, in fact. As in the example I lifted from here, “I love to write papers I would write one every day if I had the time.“

That should be written with a comma, separated into two sentences, or broken with a comma and the conjunction “and.” It’s also what I see incessantly on my dash from this bizarre idea that we shouldn’t be using commas. That a run-on sentence is a very long one separated only by commas. That is literally not what a run-on sentence is.

You absolutely can use too many commas {if you want to read some examples of how to use commas, go here}, but I rarely see anyone doing so to such an extreme. The extreme being that a sentence becomes a nonsensical string of conjoined thoughts, ideas, and descriptions that could have been written better broken up into fully formed sentences. I sometimes see muns who go a little nuts with commas by putting them in wildly incorrect places in this way.

What I see constantly is either muns berating themselves for perfectly normal, readable sentence structure or muns reactively using no punctuation at all.

It is all legitimate run-on sentences or those made so short and blunt that they become nonsensical, change the tone of the writing, or have no flow together.

Which brings me to...

Sentence flow is a thing, and you should be doing it.

Unfortunately, this good writing advice tends to throw people. We’re not talking about the flow that needs to be present in academic sentence structure, or exactly the flow that is present in poetry. Though it may require practice to understand and apply well, it’s an incredibly simple concept.

You want to balance out shorter, blunter sentences with those that are longer and more flowing. It gives the text a pleasant, natural rhythm. However, it isn’t just about length, a thing that the RPC is weirdly fixated on. Rather, it’s about word use within those sentences as well.

It’s always important to write with a tone that works with your scene and, overall, with your muse. For example, in a tense, aggressive scene, or with a muse who is generally this way, it gets the message across to use short sentences and clipped words. We can feel the tension, annoyance, and threat.

Furthermore, the way your muse thinks about and uses words is relevant. A well-educated muse from the 1800′s isn’t going to have the same approach to words that a modern-day high school student does. You should be making that clear in the way they speak, but also, in the way you express their thoughts and actions. If you are only writing your muse’s personality and emotional tone when your muse is speaking, you’re not giving me the tone all the way through. It can feel like a marked delineation in flow.

However, you should be considering the overall flow of your writing as well. Did you just lay down back-to-back eloquently verbose sentences? If so, you may want to either follow them up or space them with a shorter sentence comprised of simpler words.

This is legitimately good writing advice for any manner of writing.

So is...

Show, don’t tell.

Which is another piece of advice that throws people when they try to make it more complex than necessary. That, and it grates up against the RPC’s need for short, quick writing. The idea that anything a mun gives you that your muse cannot react to verbally or with action is filler to be avoided. That idea comes from some principle advice that translates badly to RP; essentially, don’t wax poetic for three pages when it has nothing to do with the plot, characters, scene-setting elements, action, and so on. Don’t be Tolkien describing every tree and rock in excruciating detail on the way to destroy the One Ring, basically.

That isn’t fully appropriate advice in RP, where we’re having to write tiny chapters to each other to add onto. While it still has some merit, the RPC definitely has taken it to mean that you shouldn’t show anything. My muse’s private thoughts, emotions expressed and unexpressed, stirred-up memories, things they planned to say/do, but that were naturally interrupted by the flow of the thread all become Unnecessary. With...no mind to what they are showing and creating.

This particularly erodes writing muses as legitimate feeling people. As in the last example of what my muse intended to say or do that was interrupted. That’s a normal, human experience. It would be difficult and not enjoyable to read every instance of a muse’s broken thoughts and impulses or intentions, but giving one every so many replies in a natural feeling way keeps my muse presenting as a real person having a real person’s experience. Simple things like this go a long way toward your muse being “believable,” and by ignoring them or refusing to do them, you’re not making your muse very realistic. So much of the human experience is private, unknowable to outside parties.

Look...if you only knew me based upon a sterilized version of what I was saying to you or doing purely within the context of single interaction at a time, you wouldn’t know me at all. You’d have no idea what sort of nuance there is in my words, how I am expressing or withholding an opinion or emotion. I may not have any opinions, emotions, or other experiences that you are not contributing to. That’s very unrealistic, I’m not actually a person anymore. I haven’t any personality, I didn’t exist before you interacted with me.

That is the way it is with muses too. By stripping them of their internal experiences, we’re stripping them of more realistic feeling characterization. {It becomes, or adds to, a disastrous domino-effect of projected, cardboard stand-in style muses that are in no way a joy to interact with.} This is bad writing, makes for bad reading and interacting.

No one seems to understand show, don’t tell. Let me put it in a simple example: don’t tell me your muse is a good person, show me. Don’t tell me your muse is upset right now, show me.

Your muse has character traits you feel makes them A Good Person. They are compassionate, selfless, and genuinely interested in others. Don’t just leave that in the muse’s bio, or relegate it to statement-style lines like, “she cared deeply about others.” Show me these traits in action and thought. You don’t require anything dramatic to it, either. A muse like this should be a good listener, proceed with their love language in a way reflects personal involvement and a desire to comfort, be willing to sacrifice time and personal interests {don’t keep it to dramatic and literal self-sacrifice to show “selfless”}, legitimately doesn’t think of themselves first and foremost and may need reminding to care for themselves, and will be troubled by unfairness and cruelty in the world.

Your muse has been in a disagreement with a loved one, they’re not just “upset,” they are sad, angry, disappointed, and maybe even confused or surprised. While those are more descriptive and defining of the type of complex “upset” going on here, don’t leave it at these words. Don’t tell me that she said, angrily. Show me that she is having thoughts based on these emotions, actual emotional turmoil at her expectations of a loved one being devastated. Paint me a picture of the sadness in her features, the anger in her walk, how her words come out unpolished and jumbled in her surprise and turmoil.

This is what it means to show me, not tell me.

It also extends to scenes and recollections.

If your muse is happy sitting in her garden, don’t just tell me this. Show me why she is happy there, and define the sort of happiness in her thoughts, body language, voice, and expressions. Describe the aspects of the garden in tones of the happiness they bring, draw comparisons between this and her outward expression of joy with similar word use. It ties together both seamlessly in a way that we can relate to and feel, even if we hate the outdoors.

If this muse had a traumatic incident in her past, this is going to inconveniently come up, even if only in her mind. Don’t play coy about it and drop shit on your partners like, “she was thinking of things and stuff that was bad again.” No. Even if you are alluding or otherwise keeping the actual event secretive, you need to be describing how the muse is feeling, how she is experiencing the world around her through an overlay of upsetting reminders. Show me how she is having a visceral reaction to triggering stimuli while having to keep working or talking.

Additionally, even when your muse isn’t experiencing the scene you have set directly, you should show me instead of telling me about it.

Since my actual least favorite PSA on how it’s better to just tell people because no one wants to read “all that” deals with rain, we’re going to as well. Because it doesn’t have to be excessively descriptive to fucking show me it’s raining or has rained instead of just stating the fact.

Not, “it was raining.” Not, “it was wet outside.”

“In between her words, the distant, wall-dampened splash of cars driving through puddles.”

“He passed by windows beaded with moisture on his way to the kitchen.”

Wow, that was so complex, really a lot to read to get the idea that it is, or has been, raining outside without me directly telling you this!

There isn’t anything wrong with being more descriptive than this {nor is there anything wrong with using the word “rain,” so long as you’re backing it up with a description}, some of us do like to read and write about things like oil-slicked puddles in the street if our muse is seeing them or it is otherwise relevant. It’s just that you don’t have to do this, or have to do it at all times, to show instead of tell. This is yet another serious misunderstanding.

It isn’t that the description is often really that excessive, it’s more often that it is irrelevant to the extreme of sticking out weirdly. In the puddle thing, if my muse isn’t seeing it and/or I am not using that description to further experience, their mindset, personality, or tying it to an analogy later in the reply, it feels weird.

Some superfluous shit isn’t bad either, and superfluous can be purely subjective. It is, again, when it is to such an extreme as to leave your writing partner feeling oddly about a point in the text that seemed to ring with importance, but then held none. That isn’t an act of showing or telling, and neither is it your partner trying to show off as a gifted writer. For whatever reason, they just saw or felt that moment with such passionate clarity they had to include it immediately instead of waiting until a better moment for it. That’s literally it, there’s no need to project your insecurity in weird ass ways.

There are definitely other pieces of traditional-based writing advice that are great and either do transfer to RP perfectly or can with small amendments, but these are the most basic, commonly seen, and important combinations. They are also easy to better understand and apply!

When reading writing advice posts, please, ask yourself how they fit into RP. If they do at all. Many times, when it comes to the absolute basics of writing coherently and enjoyably, or developing characters, they’re great. It’s when they get into topics of some nuance that they don’t cross over so well and are outright damaging.

These pieces of advice are often being misunderstood or misapplied already, then are being passed around to a community notorious for its lacking application of critical thinking. Severe misunderstanding will happen, and terrible writing “rules” within the RPC develop from them.

Do be interested in writing, don’t separate traditional writing and RP writing into categories like “real writing and RP,” be invested in learning and improving. Just ask yourself how it applies to cooperative storytelling that is often thematic in nature, and proceed with caution and the mindset that writing is an art.

If you have the principles down and both yourself and others are enjoying your writing, you’re not doing it in an inherently wrong way because it wouldn’t be published. You’re not writing RP to have it published, and that’s not a bad thing. It’s just a difference to keep in mind when reading PSA’s about the Rules of Writing Whatever.

#tumblr rp #rp help #rp advice #rph #tumblr rpc #rpbetter #rpb #roleplay better #tumblr rp advice #traditional writing advice and rp #queue

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alittlebitgoofy · 4 years ago

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Glass wings - chapter five (lemonjuice)

i'm back back back again with more gay fairies and this time we have a gay elf and another gay pixie, very fun!! i'm excited to finally get jan and rock into the mix >:)

thanks to my dearest @dollalpaca for betaing and putting up with my lack of commas. it's a lot to deal with

ao3 link

Time felt like it was floating; maybe it was the hazy morning air, or the warmth that was enveloping her, but Lemon had never felt so comfortable. She was somewhat aware of the body intertwined with her’s. Cracking her eyes open, she saw Juice still pressed into her side. Soft breaths tickled her collarbone, Juice’s head having not left her shoulder the entire time they’d been sleeping.

Lemon couldn’t bring herself to move and risk disturbing her friend, she had a feeling Juice wasn’t the best at letting herself sleep, always opting to do things than give herself time to rest. It was an issue she couldn’t press for fear of making things awkward, only try to subtly influence. She looked calm, peaceful for once; the blonde showed no signs of waking up any time soon. Even when she was relaxed, Juice had a natural frown, her face never seeming fully happy apart from the rare, softer moments that happened. The night before was one of those, something where the air around them was different, things came out easier and it felt as if nothing in the world mattered, only their company.

It surprised Lemon how easily she fell into the grasp of another person��she’d spent so long pent up, alone by her own choice but regretting it more day by day, powerless to stop the torment she put herself through.

Then Juice came around, giving her someone to really connect with. Finally, a friend.

Juice woke up some time while Lemon was busy in her own thoughts. She stayed still at first, melted into Lemon, not wanting to move from the comfort she offered. Her half-asleep brain could only process that the warm thing next to her was good and needed to be kept around.

After pulling Lemon slightly closer than before, Juice didn’t budge. She set her claim, curled up in bed with Lemon, and refused to leave or even slightly mess up the current situation. Lemon was brought back to reality by Juice shuffling as much closer as she could physically manage, her affection not going anywhere any time soon.

“Morning, Juicy,” Lemon spoke softly, not yet ready for the day, still fighting off the sleep. The response she got was a soft hum, not having processed the greeting, however wanting to appear as if she had.

“G’morning, Lem.” Juice’s tone was rough with tiredness, her words muffled by her head still burrowed into the pixie’s shoulder. Her speech was less annunciated, just about not slurring together in fatigue.

It didn’t take too long for them both to fully wake up. Lemon, having already been fairly alert choosing to stay in the blissful state of Juice’s affection. (but enjoying Juice’s endless affection) The latter needed a few more minutes to wake up, before engaging in a conversation. Within a few more minutes, Juice moved her arms from Lemon, startling the pixie. She sat up, eyes still heavy with tiredness, though a lot more alert than before.

Eventually, Lemon followed suit, the pair quietly preparing for the day ahead of them, a morning routine made easier with the company of another person. Juice stared at Lemon quizzically as she only ran a hand through her hair and shrugged.

“Do you not brush your hair a lot? Are you one of those people who don’t need to? Or is it just something you dislike.” Lemon paused, how did she explain that she despised brushing it until she had to, for no real reason? It just made her uncharacteristically angry.

“I don’t like it, I have too much hair and it’s a pain to brush it all out, so I don’t if I can get away with it, which I could have before you pointed it out.” She childishly stuck her tongue out for emphasis, while Juice struggled to hold back the laughter at her usual dramatics.

Lemon wanted nothing more than to run when she saw Juice pick up her comb, glancing between it and her hair curiously. The fairy made her way to her side, nudging Lemon to see if she was allowed to do so. Lemon wanted to say no, but something about Juice’s soft expression melted her into accepting with no fuss.

It didn’t take long before Lemon grunted at the pulling of her hair with the comb to detangle it. It was a horrible feeling, all the more reason she despised that thing. Juice tried to be as gentle as she could, but she had to be more forceful to get out any knots. Lemon became more docile as they went along, her hair becoming a lot less messy, though still as fluffy as ever. Lemon found herself enjoying the soft contact of Juice, steadying her head with a hand leant against her neck, or running her hands through the hair to check she hadn’t missed anything. It made her body warm in an unfamiliar way, but something she would crave again all the same.

Juice smiled proudly at the finished product and Lemon hummed in satisfaction. Running a hand through her hair, the pixie flashed a grin, happy with the result. The blonde took the opportunity to fluff up her hair like how it usually was, running her hands through it to check the neatness all over.

That was the only reason, not that she enjoyed being in such close proximity with Lemon or anything.

---

Although it had gotten easier, flying with Lemon was never a good idea—she would zoom off at a speed that Juice could hardly keep up with. Thankfully, the pixie had decided to rest on her shoulder, making herself comfortable as the fairy flew them further on.

“There’s something over there!” Lemon jolted, gesturing to the right, sounding uncharacteristically serious. Juice shot her a confused look, not sure what caused the sudden outburst or why her eyes were so trained on the direction she had pointed to.

“I can feel something, I don’t know what it is, but I need to go check it out,” Lemon said quickly, flying off of Juice’s shoulder and deeper into the surrounding forest.

“Lemon! You aren’t going alone, slow down,” Juice sighed, following Lemon as fast as she could and hoping the pixie didn’t fly into anything in her sudden burst of energy. The pixie paused, fluttering her way back to the shoulder and directing Juice from there.

They flew decently far out, to the outskirts of the village where a few people lived, who didn’t like living in the main town area for whatever reason. Upon spotting a house in the distance, Lemon’s eyes lit up. That was it! That was the thing she could feel. There was something inside that house that was drawing her to it, and she needed to find out.

---

Jan sprung back to consciousness at an alarming rate. No grogginess, only a sudden burst of energy that startled the person leaning over her.

Before her brain could catch up as to why there was a concerned elf in a cloak staring at her, something pulled at her. The sensation was willing her to leave the little cottage and venture into the surrounding woods, though that seemed like a bad idea.

“Hey! Don’t just leave! You’re not really in the state to—!” The elf threw herself to grab the pixie as she jumped off of the bed, before stumbling to the floor atop the other girl, her voice failing as they collided with the ground.

“Are you alright? I know you fell quite hard, but you just jolted up all of a sudden and it was terrifying,” the other girl spoke slower, a lot quieter that time. She struggled to hold eye contact, seemingly scared of Jan. It was a lot to realise someone may be intimidated by her, but the pixie tried to keep herself as small and harmless as possible in response.

“I’m okay, everything hurts, though. I’m not quite sure what happened.”

“Well, you see. I accidentally shot you down from the sky with my bow, because I saw you and got scared, I thought you were a predator and defended myself before properly looking,” meekly, the elf mumbled out an explanation.

Jan felt herself stifling a giggle at how adorable the person in front of her was. She looked too nervous for Jan to want to poke fun at her, but the way she blushed, the tips of her pointy ears turning pink, was too cute. Although the situation wasn’t good, the pixie couldn’t help but stare, taking in every aspect of the pretty girl.

Oh no. She couldn’t be—

Jan blinked a few times, shaking the thought from her head before it could finish. The idea of emotionally bonding with some random person who accidentally injured her was ridiculous. She was cute, it didn’t go any deeper than that. She also was the reason Jan couldn’t keep her balance right now, yet that seemed the furthest worry from her mind.

“It’s fine, I’m not that hurt.” A skeptical look made Jan laugh, although being hit by an arrow was painful, she hadn’t had too many bad injuries. Minus the pain all over her body, but that wasn’t a problem when her attention was focused on something; or rather, someone else.

Before their conversation could continue, a loud bang startled the pair. Jan felt the pulling sensation even stronger now.

Something was demanding her attention.

She had to follow it; her body decided that for her. She walked out of the house with the panicked elf quickly pacing after her. Jan idly wondered if she was always so panicky, or if this was something far too out of her comfort zone, leaving her almost unable to function.

“Wait, it’s here! Her!” A high pitched squeak of a voice spoke far too loudly for someone of her size. In a flash of yellow, Lemon fluttered in front of Jan.

Their expressions mirrored each other, shock and confusion soon morphing into excitement, upon realising their shared species. It was one of the first times Lemon had truly been left speechless.

“So you’re the one who gave me that feeling? You’re a strong little thing.” Jan inspected the small creature in front of her. Lemon only shrugged in response, not too aware of exactly what was happening, intrigued nonetheless. There was something about the soft lilac eyes and hair of the girl in front of her, that made her feel comfortable.

Lemon shifted into her human form, staring Jan down much in the same way she had just done. She couldn’t figure it out, but the woman had a comforting energy. It reminded her of something she hadn’t felt in a long time, but she couldn’t let herself linger on that thought.

----

“So, you’ve never met another pixie?” Jan stared at Lemon in shock, the raw energy emanating from her being completely untrained was almost inconceivable. Lemon shrugged, not seeing it as a huge deal, despite her excitement to meet another pixie.

“Yeah, I mean, I grew up around fairies, so it’s kind of similar, but I don’t know much about pixies.”

“Well, we need to make up for lost time! I bet you barely know how to use your powers. You can teleport and levitate things, but can you feel emotions, or sense energy? You’re close enough with Juice to connect with her if you tried. I’m not sure how it would work between a pixie and a fairy, rather than two pixies, but it’s definitely possible.”

“Connect? How so?”

“It’s just a thing pixies do; we get close enough to someone and a link develops. It can be trained to sense general energies, but you’re tied to the energy of another person. So, you could be able to feel Juice’s feelings, and reach a deeper understanding of each other.”

“That sounds so cool! How do I do it? What else can I do? Can you teach me?” Lemon’s eyes sparkled with so much excitement, that Jan felt herself soften; Lemon was so earnestly energetic and eager to learn that saying no wasn’t an option.

Juice watched on with a smile—Lemon finding another pixie was something she’d mentioned wanting to do in a passing conversation, since she knew so little about herself. There was something about seeing her so happy that made her heart squeeze, Lemon deserved so much more than what she got.

Lemon was incredible, although Juice couldn’t find the words to communicate it. She wouldn’t admit how much she adored the little troublemaker, but she would never stop being thankful she met that idiot.

Rock nervously approached Juice, feeling they had similar energies. The fairy jolted in shock at a soft greeting, but they soon got into a conversation about the pixies. Juice was happy to share what it was like to be close to one, as Rock realised that Jan was likely to stick around. She would find it hard to leave for the time being due to her injuries; the elf quietly hoped to herself that she would stay.

Juice quickly found a kinship with the elf based on their shared awkwardness when it came to social interactions; her anxieties settled as she realised the elf had the same issues. Their discussions flowed surprisingly easily, as they waited for the two pixies to calm down their enthusiasm.

“So, is the intense energy just a pixie thing?” Rock cocked her head, curiously glancing between the pair and Juice.

“It must be, Lemon doesn’t know how to sit still—he’s always got to be doing something, or she’ll complain about being bored. It’s kind of fun, though; she keeps things exciting.” Juice’s eyes fell back onto an excited Lemon, her face growing into an involuntary soft smile.

Rock noticed something in the way the smaller girl looked at her, but decided not to mention it. It wasn’t her place to comment.

“Juice! Jan’s gonna teach me how to use my powers, isn’t that cool?” Lemon giddily bounced back to her friend, eyes gleaming with such excitement, Juice felt her heart warm with how happy she seemed.

Lemon deserved so much more than she got, and Juice was going to do everything she could to make sure that happened.

#rpdr fanfiction #glass wings fic #fantasy au #lemonjuice #jock #sportkura #Jan sport #rock m sakura #lemon x juice

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badbookreviewclub · 5 years ago

Text

Compete Review - Stones to Abbigale, by Onision

Disclaimer: This review will contain spoilers… if you haven’t already watched the seven billion book reviews there are for Stones to Abbigale. I won’t be linking to where you can buy this book because I don’t want to support Greg… James… whatever the fuck he’s going by now. If you look hard enough, you can find it for free online.

Stones to Abbigale is the first book published by Onision. I’m sure we already all know about Onision and how horrible he is, if not I highly recommend going to Youtube and watching The Right Opinion’s videos on him. They’re very enlightening as to the kind of person that Greg is. Anyways, this review isn’t about Onision (kind of), it’s about his book. I couldn’t figure out where the book was published, aside from a small stamp at the very last page just saying it was published via Amazon.

The Summary: There isn’t one. Fuck. The Characters: James - Simp who likes to act like he’s the hero, but also the victim. Definitely Onision’s self-insert.

Abbigale (Abbi) - A very traumatized person who is written very poorly

Jason - The jock who’s there to make James look like the victim but also the hero

Davis - a character who has no impact on the story and could be completely written out. His presence affects nothing.

Ms. Robertson - The school counselor who could never actually be a school counselor Mr. Hanson - The history teacher

The Problems: Aside from a multitude of grammatical errors and some spelling errors, this book is just a mess. The characters are incredibly inconsistent to the point of being unrealistic (e.g. one moment Jason is the bad guy and the next he’s James’s best friend). Actually, in general, none of these characters are realistic. It’s really easy to read this story in Greg’s voice because it all sounds just like him. They speak with the same mannerisms that he does and like they all read a psychology book in fifth grade and now they think that they know everything about people and how they work. It’s annoying and incredibly frustrating, actually.

Another big problem that this book faces is that everything is written in big blocks of text, without regard for needing commas or periods. This makes reading dialogue incredibly difficult and at times can make it really hard to decipher just who is talking. I’m convinced after reading Stones to Abbigale that Onision doesn’t know what the enter bar is. Take this for example, “As we got closer to the gym Abbi was giving me a funny look, as I normally didn’t walk her that far, I said, ‘Don’t worry, I’m not stalking you, we have the same class now.’ She replied, ‘Manipulating your schedule to be with someone sounds like stalking Mr. Patrick.’ I said, ‘Not if you drop Mrs. Stanley.’ She pushed me playfully saying ‘Jealous!’” Let’s split the dialogue up now (and add in proper punctuation.

As we got closer to the gym Abbi was giving me a funny look; I normally didn’t walk her this far. “Don’t worry, I’m not stalking you. We have the same class now,” I said. “Manipulating your schedule to be with someone sounds like stalking Mr. Patrick,” she replied. “Not if you drop Mrs. Stanely,” I said. She pushed me playfully, “Jealous!”

This is a lot easier to read and aside from word choice, it’s not terrible. It could paint a picture a lot easier with better word choice, but this is Onision’s first book so I guess I can cut him a tiny tiny tiny bit of slack on that. Actually, no. This could use better word choice to paint a better picture and make them seem less like cardboard cutouts.

Another problem is the plot itself. The ‘climax’ of the book, if you will, happens almost at the beginning of the book, which is fucking absurd. It makes the rest of the book feel pointless and like it’s dragging on.

The Book:

Chapter 1

We meet our main character, James. Except we don’t know his name is James yet. We do know that he paints his walls, his ceiling, and even his bedframe a startling white however because he “likes to inflict mental torture” on himself. Not sure why he does this, but he does. I think I’ll be the first to say that in any white suburban neighborhood, you could walk into just about most children’s rooms and find white as the standard (at least, that’s how it is in my neighborhood). Why? Fuck if I know. White just looks nice with most furniture, I guess.

Anyways, our main character is late to school and rushes out the doors with a note he scribbled for an excuse as to why he was late. Yay, we finally get James’s name from Mr. Hanson, who couldn’t give less of a shit that James was late. He just wants to talk to him after class. James starts people watching to an almost creepy extent, trying to get into people’s heads and assuming what they were thinking. If you haven’t read any of my other reviews, you should know, I am not overly fond of when someone tries to assume someone else’s thoughts in this way. Where they psychoanalyze them without have a single hint of qualification. It’s annoying in storytelling. That’s not to say I’m not guilty of having a character do that at times, but I’m trying to be more aware of it and to stop writing like that. With how James is written, however, it’s clearly intentionally and gives off r/im14andthisisdeep vibes.

Anyways, James rushes off to art class so he can see Abbi. He has never talked to Abbi a day in his life but spends a lot of his time thinking about her and wanting to be with her and basically, just being a simp. He puts too much value on Abbi without ever having talked to her and having no reason to do it, his world revolves around Abbi and she has never so much as shared a word with him.

But he’s basically staring at Abbi, waiting to say something to her when his hand brushes up against some chewed up gum under the desk and he yells ‘EW’. This doesn’t stop Abbi from wanting to pair up with him however when the teacher gives them an assignment they need partners for. Abbi was originally paired up with Jason, who I guess makes Abbi uncomfortable. That’s understandable that Abbi would want to switch if that was the case, but Onision doesn’t lay it out like that. Instead, it’s laid out that Abbi wants to be paired with James just because.

Abbi has shown no care for James at the beginning of the book and seemingly before this even started she never seemed to care for or about James. Suddenly though, as soon as the story starts, she cares. She wants to, needs to be with and around him. Why? Because the main character always has to get the girl.

Anyways, Abbi gives James a piece of paper with ‘NISEONE’ written on it. Apparently, this is her phone number because, on a number pad (the ones with the letters), it is 647-3663. It doesn’t state this outright, so it took me looking at some other reviews before I figured this out.

We also learn in this chapter that the school is practically falling apart and is dripping with sludge or mold, or something, so I don’t know what kind of school James goes to, but it’s not a good one.

Chapter 2

James goes and talks to Mr. Hanson and it turns out that Mr. Hanson wants James for a TA position. Because ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? I guess James shows a lot of potential, even though he’s late like… all the time. Anyways, the night before Abbi and James decided to make, not a Frankenstein(‘s monster) teddy bear by combining two of their stuffed animals, rather, they’re making a zombie stuffed animal. And it turns out that Abbi wasn’t at class. For what reason? I don’t fucking know. The next day Jason comes to bug the class for some fucking reason because he got kicked out of his own class. There’s absolutely no reason for Jason to be there aside for James to stand up to him because Jason was ‘bullying’ Mr. Hanson. Anyways, Jason gets pissed off because of this and while James is on his way to the art class, Jason beats James up. I’m pretty sure this was only done to make James look like the victim (wonderful :P). James gets suspended for two days because he pushed Jason and Jason is suspended for nine days.

Before he can leave to go home, James sees Abbi and Seth having what I can only assume is a one-sided fight. Seth is yelling and being very aggressive towards Abbi, and Abbi is just taking it. So James walks her home after Seth gets pissed and leaves. I guess it was raining this entire time, so as they’re walking home, Abbi’s makeup runs and James sees the bruises on her face. When Abbi asks if James sees them, he says “I see a beautiful girl, who I very much enjoy walking with in the rain” (pg 31) (by the way I HAD TO NUMBER ALL THESE PAGES MYSELF). Anyways, cheesy romance, it’s clear Greg doesn’t read his lines out loud and I don’t think James does a single thing to try and help Abbi get out of her abusive situation. He just tells her that she’s beautiful. James is also absurdly upset about the suspension at this point. Like, ridiculously upset. Like you love school so much and the thought of not being able to go feels like the end of the world upset (I was that person in school). But… James has shown absolutely no reason for why he is as upset as he is? Like he genuinely is about to cry over this but he has shown absolutely no care about school before, so it’s just confusing.

Chapter 3

James has a dream that Abbi is being eaten by the ground. He wakes up and writes her a kind of creepy letter about how, despite having only had three conversations with her, he loves her and lives to be with her. He emails it to her and a few minutes later Abbi calls him. She wasn’t aware of the email but invites him to meet her at the Quick Shop. She says that she’ll read the email before she meets him there. She never meets him there (shocker). Chapter 4

James finally goes back to school and sees that Abbi isn’t in the art trailer still. But the mishmash stuffed animal bear thing is there. Under it is a note from Abbi asking James to meet her behind the church. Rather than stay for the class or anything like that, James bursts away to go to Abbi’s side.

Abbi tells James that the note weirded her out a little bit, but she was just nervous. She tells him that she has been absurd by Seth and that her mother abandoned her and that her father doesn’t care about her. The only comfort James is able to offer her is that every time he sees her, she’s more beautiful to him than she was before.

Chapter 5

James’ Mom has a boyfriend who comes out of fucking nowhere named Rick.

At school, James has his schedule rearranged so he can be Mr. Hanson’s TA and so he can still have a class with Abbi. Now he has gym with her. We meet Mr. Mack, who I guess is Jason’s uncle. He’s also the only teacher that James bonds with, I guess. Ms. Robertson, while reorganizing James’ schedule gives him an ominous warning that Abbi is no good and that he should stay away from her.

Abbi and James spend the rest of the night on the phone, talking to each other.

Chapter 6

A few days have passed. Rick and James’ mom announce that they want to move in together. James thinks his life is over and that he’ll never get to see Abbi again. Later that night James suggests to his mom that she just let him live in the house by himself with Abbi and she just agrees to it. Supposedly his mom doesn’t even have enough money to get him a shitty cell phone either, so I guess Rick must be fucking loaded.

Chapter 7

It’s the infamous school shooting. After figuring out that the school is being shot up by Seth, the bus driver does as any rational human being would do and drives away to get everyone to safety. Then he does something that nobody would do and lets James off the bus after James threatens to jump off (despite there being no way that he could?). James rollerblades to the school through the blur of his tears and bursts in. He sits in the puddle of blood in front of the school to get his rollerblades off before rushing in through his tears to find Abbi. He finds Seth first, but rather than being the one to save the day, it’s Jason who saves the day and beats the shit out of Seth. James finds Abbi after this and the two of them sit together while the paramedic patches up James’ feet because he ran through glass while looking for Abbi. Chapter 8

They’re back at school and a spokesman for the president gives a speech. They see Mr. Mack on a projector and he tells them in gruesome detail about how he tried to take down Seth and how Seth shot him. Definitely what a bunch of traumatized teenagers needed to hear and see. Chapter 9 James and Abbi go to her house, where Abbi’s father drunkenly stumbles out and starts threatening Abbi. A policeman who James claims probably sees too much of this on a daily basis stands to the side (because he just so happened to be nearby with is K-9 partner) and waits for something to happen. Something happens with Abbi’s father smashes James over the head with a beer bottle. The K-9 rushes forward and latches on to him and James claims that the officer is sadistic and likes to see people suffer. He then claims not even two paragraphs later that the cop is numb to what’s going on. Which is it? Is he sadistic or is he a dead-beat cop who sees too much of this shit?

Abbi’s father is arrested and James decides to press charges. This is how Abbi ends up staying with James.

Chapter 10

The president shows up and nothing comes of it. He promised that he would answer everyone’s questions and talk to everyone. He only talks to two people, James and another kid, named Chris. Chris just asked why the president was such a D-Bag and the president just says “that’s President D-Bag to you.” James asked what the president thought of what people said about him and the president goes on this long diatribe about freedom of speech.

Chapter 11

Abbi wants to talk to James but insists that they do it in the shower. For some reason, James agrees to this and Abbi comes out of the shower to show all of her self-harm scars. Once again, James does nothing than tell her she’s beautiful and that’s about it. They almost fuck after this, but don’t because James’s mom is home.

Chapter 12

James and Abbi stay home to help his mom pack. Later they go to the park to stargaze and affirm to each other that they want kids.

Chapter 13

Abbi leaves James a big long note for him to read in class about how she was raped by some boys. Mrs. Roberston helped to get those boys in jail, but after finding out that Abbi was pregnant, she insisted that Abbi keep the baby because she is very pro-life. Seth found out about the baby and punched Abbi in the stomach until she miscarried. James’ response to the note is to go straight to Abbi’s classroom and make out with her in front of everyone and on the desk. He goes back to history class and Mr. Hanson basically high-five’s him for doing this, despite the fact that he walked out in the middle of class to do it.

Chapter 14

It’s Christmas break. They fuck.

Chapter 15

James beats the shit out of Jason because Jason was groping Abbi. For some reason, when the principle comes out to confront everyone about this, Jason doesn’t rat on James.

Chapter 16

While driving somewhere with James and Abbi, Davis rushes out of the car into the middle of the freeway because he sees a man hanging from a rope from an overpass. Davis is killed. This is the only purpose that Davis serves in the entire story. It’s to die so James can be the victim once more because apparently if he was never born so he could never be in Davis’ life then this would have never happened. Survivor’s guilt is a thing, don’t get me wrong. But what Onision is using here isn’t survivor’s guilt. It’s James twisting the situation so he’s the victim still.

Chapter 17

Davis’s funeral. Nothing happens besides James playing the victim some more.

Chapter 18

Mr. Hanson and Mrs. Roberston confront James and they want him to become Class President. James doesn’t want to but it doesn’t seem like they’ll take no for an answer. A little while later Abbi, while walking with James, is pulled into the front office for some questioning by police. Mrs. Roberston shouts in front of everyone that Abbi was responsible for the school shooting. Because… you know… that’s a reasonable thing to do…

Abbi confronts James later that night and tells him that she wrote in a note to Seth, when she was in a really bad place, that she just wished everyone would disappear (not unreasonable and something I’ve done before). James, being the little bitchy drama-queen that he is, storms off to take a dramatic shower. While sitting in the shower though he realizes that Abbi did nothing wrong and comes back. Abbi immediately accepts him again and isn’t upset that he suddenly stormed off after she told him something rather hard for her to do. They make out (and probably fuck).

Chapter 19

Abbi gets a bucket of paint thrown on her while she’s coming into the school and James punches the kid who did it. The principle shows up and both intimidates and threatens the kid who threw the bucket of paint. He also calls Mrs. Roberston into his office after James tells him that she told everyone that Abbi was responsible for the shooting.

Chapter 20

Mrs. Roberstson was fired and burned down the entire school in retaliation. All the students get passing grades for the rest of the year (which is about 6 months of school left by the way). James ends off the book by saying “Well, I guess this means I won’t be running for President.”

The book drags and has a lot of pointless info in it. At one point it genuinely made me feel sick how he was using Abbi’s trauma throughout the book to write a very, very poorly conceived hero fantasy. All the characters are unrealistic and nobody means anything to the story other than Abbi and James. I’m just glad it was a fast read. There are huge info dumps in the beginning, but as you can see, the rest of the chapters can be summed up in less than a fucking paragraph. The climax of the book comes way too early (the school shooting) and in general, it’s just a poorly written plot. It feels like a first draft that should have been taken back to the drawing board to be reworked until the shooting could become the ultimate climax of the book. It was rushed, and because it was rushed, the rest of the book dragged on. 1/10 stars. I didn’t hate it as much as I’ve hated other books, but it wasn’t good by any stretch of the imagination.

#bad book #bad book reviews #stones to abbigale #onision #i'm numb #previous book reviews have numbed me to this pain #review #reviewblr #bookblr #complete review

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zenonaa · 6 years ago

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Read here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18444209

Comments: Commissioned by @matrioshka a while back. Thank you for your patience!

***

Aloysius Pennyworth came from a family of butlers. His father had been a butler, and his father’s father had been a butler, and so on, back through generations upon generations. Though Aloysius had admittedly been somewhat unruly in his early years, mixing with the wrong crowds and at one point getting acquitted of a double murder, he didn’t regret returning to his roots and dedicating the rest of his life to assisting others as a butler.

In any case, being a butler could be just as eventful as being a gang member, especially when one was the head butler of a fourteen year old billionaire.

The door to Byakuya Togami’s bedroom opened, leading into a space that could fit a bungalow inside of it. Such a large room was necessary, after all, as Byakuya required a place that could accommodate all of his possessions, like his piano, violin, pool table, king-sized bed, computers and books upon books upon books, just as a few examples. Everything was neatly arranged on a dark wood laminate flooring bordered by off-white walls. Byakuya’s mother had instructed that the room be furnished with warm hues and wooden accents, but the potted plant in one corner had been Aloysius’s idea. A nice splash of green.

On the other side of the room, Byakuya sat at his desk, and on hearing the door, he turned around on his swivel chair with his hands steepled. Aloysius approached, revealing his withered face to the other, and strode forward with his pale blue eyes fixed on Byakuya.

He stopped a short distance away.

“You wanted me?” asked Aloysius, holding his hands down in front of himself.

Byakuya gave a nod and turned his chair back around so he faced his computer again.

“I need you to sign up for an eBay account so I can buy something from it,” Byakuya told him.

Here lay a pause.

“e...Bay?” repeated Aloysius slowly, drawing his face into a frown that added more wrinkles. “I think I’ve heard of that. It’s a dating website, is it not?”

“What? No. It’s not.” Byakuya’s brow creased, and talking matter-of-factly, he explained, “It’s a website that deals with auctions and consumer to consumer sales. I wish to purchase something on the website that someone is selling.”

Aloysius raised his eyebrows a little.

“What is stopping you?” he asked.

Byakuya pursed his lips.

“Age,” he replied.

At his young age, barely in his teens, Byakuya had amassed a vast amount of money, not just from his family but from his own ventures too. It couldn’t, however, buy some things, such as years that he could add to his age right now so he could legally sign up to an American multinational corporation.

Aloysius studied Byakuya’s earnest face.

“This sounds important,” said Aloysius seriously. “What is it that you wish to buy?”

Byakuya didn’t hesitate for even a second.

“Genocider Syo’s scissors,” said Byakuya.

Ah, yes. That unidentified serial killer murdering all those men. Their scissors. Aloysius stooped down and pulled out his reading glasses from his shirt pocket. He put them on and squinted at the screen.

“You may need to assist me in signing up,” said Aloysius, resting a hand on the back of Byakuya’s chair.

“Fine. Let’s do it now, before someone else buys it,” Byakuya demanded, and Aloysius watched him open up the necessary tabs on his internet browser.

Now, Aloysius wasn’t the most tech-savvy person but he could work a computer, and he had an email address, though he let Byakuya fill in a form using Aloysius’s personal details. Besides, Byakuya could type faster anyway, and Byakuya only paused when he came to a box asking for a password for the account.

“You choose something,” said Aloysius. “I don’t think I will be using the site for myself, so it’s not important that I remember it.”

Byakuya flexed his fingers. A multitude of passwords were available, yet that abundance of choice made it harder to choose just one. He scraped his teeth against his lips in thought and after some deliberation, he typed in a certain star from a constellation, with various symbols and numbers thrown in that would only mean something to him... and Aloysius.

With a final click on the mouse, the page on the screen changed, now showing a lot less text, and Byakuya straightened up.

“You will have a confirmation email in your inbox,” Byakuya informed him. “You need to click a link in it. Then I can start using the account to shop.”

“I shall open it swiftly,” said Aloysius. He stepped back and asked, “Would you like a snack?”

“Coffee and kołacz,” said Byakuya, still facing his computer.

“As you wish.”

Aloysius bowed then left the room. Byakuya opened the tab with the auction page again and stared at the photograph of the scissors. There had been a few bids placed on it, but he planned to forego that tedious process and purchase them at a certain high price. After he bought them, all he had to do was wait for them to arrive.

And that he did.

They took four weeks to be delivered to this mansion. Not ‘his’. ‘This’. The Togami Conglomerate owned several around the world, of course, and the mansion he currently lived at was the one closest to his private school. While he waited for it, Byakuya went about his usual things. Attending classes, participating in extra lessons at home, reading through cold cases, playing on the stock market, attending meetings with other billionaires and listening to aspiring businessmen pitch him possible investments... the usual sort of thing.

Hearing someone rap on his door, Byakuya uttered a curt, “enter,” and the door to his room opened. Aloysius came in with a box. It was paper brown with a sticker slapped onto it.

“I assume that this is your order,” said Aloysius, walking over. “For the past week, I have had emails from the eBay website telling me to leave feedback. It has been quite persistent.”

Aloysius handed the package to Byakuya, who picked away at it until he got it open. He extracted the contents slowly. Swathed in thin layers of foam paper were the scissors, presumably, though he could only feel the general shape of them for now, and he pried the wrapping apart to get to what was inside.

His eyes widened a bit. They looked like scissors. Custom-made scissors, to be precise, with large, curved finger rests. At some point, they must have been cleaned, because there weren’t any blood stains on them. None that he could see, at least.

While Byakuya examined the scissors, Aloysius spoke again.

“I know I said that I doubted I would be using the website for myself, but I was looking at it today and there is a seller who stocks doilies enmasse that have taken my fancy,” confessed Aloysius.

Byakuya didn’t reply, still inspecting the scissors. Aloysius tilted his head to one side.

“Young master?” he said curiously.

“Capital P, Polaris, exclamation mark, hash, lower case B.T. comma, the number thirteen,” said Byakuya in monotone without lifting his gaze. He heard Aloyisus’s footfalls gradually recede until the door shut as Aloysius made his exit.

As for Byakuya, he leaned back in his chair and turned the scissors over in his hands.

Somewhere, in the world, was the original owner. A serial killer who eluded authorities, time and time again. Even the prestigious Kirigiri family of detectives failed to identify who Genocider was. Byakuya thought, if he had access to all the information that the police had about that killer, he would have been able to solve the mystery. Yet, despite being heir to the Togami family, he had been denied access, and when he made a request to his father, his father sent a message demanding that ‘the heir’ not waste time on such matters.

He stroked the scissors with his thumb gently, having only seen them before now in the photo on the seller’s page and in grainy images that he managed to obtain of the crime scene from the dark web.

G.S. was engraved into the upper blade of the scissors.

“Genocider Syo,” he said to himself quietly, and he promised himself that he would be the one to unmask the killer.

It would start with these scissors.

***

The scissors remained in his possession for the next several years. Most of the time, they stayed in a sliding drawer storage box with a matte laminate surface, black and sleek, which Aloysius bought him for one of his birthdays. When he pulled the scissors out, he would study them for a while, trying to imagine their owner. Some internet sleuths theorised that the killer was a ‘he’ and either a high school student or a college student, and they would post photographs of people they thought Syo could possibly be, some dead, some not.

All of them turned out to be wrong.

Byakuya found that out personally.

“Those ain’t mine!”

He flinched. The girl standing opposite him, a head shorter, pierced him with her bright eyes. She grinned as she waved the scissors bought all those years ago that turned out to be fake. Fraudulent. Counterfeit. Never having once belonged to Genocider Syo, or even a lesser known serial killer.

And this girl would know... after all, she was Genocider Syo.

Keeping to his word, and though it took him years, Byakuya learned the identity of the murderer dubbed Genocider Syo. However, the discovery had not turned out like he anticipated. He hadn’t expected to be locked up in a school with fourteen other students, and he hadn’t expected a visitor, a stuttering girl with owl-eye glasses, a shifty gaze and a hunched posture, to come into his room and tell him that she had an alter who was the person who had captured Byakuya’s attention for many, many, many hours.

Her coming to his room? Understandable. That girl followed him around everywhere. But to tell him that she shared a body with a serial killer? Even he felt like she wrenched a rug from beneath him.

The aforementioned alter stood in front of him and flicked her long tongue that always seemed to hang out of her mouth. She tossed the fake scissors that he presented to her over her shoulder. They landed on her bed.

Syo had shown off her actual scissors earlier, during the last trial orchestrated by their captor, an anthropomorphic bear, and she did so again now, taking a set from the leather pouch affixed to her thigh. Her eyes gleamed as she brandished the scissors, her scissors, a thumb and a finger tucked through the metal rings.

“I told you, but in case you don’t want to look up the exact quote, to summarise, all my scissors are handmade,” said Syo. She tipped her head to one side, leaving a beat of silence, and furrowed her brow. “Except the first set. I stole those from a store the same night I murdered that bit character in Shikoku, only for Gloomy to hide them. So I had to make my own from then on, right?”

Byakuya let her continue uninterrupted.

“I didn’t want to keep stealing them,” Syo explained, and she folded her arms over her chest, suddenly sombre. “I’d be like Bobby Leach, doing all that crazy shit and then slipping on an orange peel and dying. If I’m gonna hit the big house, it’ll be for murder, not for stealing, so I made my own, yeah? Like Akina Nakamori has her huskiness, I have my cute trademark too!”

A wide grin lit up her face and obnoxious laughter burst out of her. Byakuya’s eardrums twinged and he shot a glare at her. The first person she mentioned was a British stunt artist from the early twentieth century and the latter person, Byakuya didn’t know, but he assumed she was a celebrity. An idol or an actress. That kind of person.

He slowly pushed up his glasses, not breaking eye contact. After so long, he had Genocider Syo in front of him, and this opportunity to talk to her wouldn’t last. In this mutual killings scenario, there would only be one winner, and so she would perish along with the rest of their supposed classmates. Either she would be killed, or she would kill.

With this in mind, he had come to her room. She wouldn’t be able to get away with murdering him if he was killed here, where she would be the first suspect.

Well, she could still kill him, but he liked a little danger sometimes.

Byakuya just wished she would stop getting sidetracked.

“They’re fake, but those scissors you got are initialled... That’s real corny!” Syo threw her head back and laughed again, clutching her sides. When she flushed that out of her system, she fixed her eyes on him, smirking. “I didn’t come up with the name. Saw it in the papers first and it struck a chord. Until then, I didn’t have a name and had to use Gloomy’s.”

“The police were under the assumption that you were male,” Byakuya told her, watching as Syo swayed restlessly.

He wished she would keep still too. Everything about her gave him a headache.

“That’s because the police are morons, but can you blame them?” she said. “My parents and even the doctor who held me up like I was a cartoon lion when I was shit out of someone’s vagina thought I was a boy.”

She stopped rocking from side to side and eyed him.

“But Gloomy’s a girl, wouldn’t you say?” she added.

“Undeniably,” said Byakuya without having to think.

Syo studied him some more.

“Seems like you’re a real big fan of me,” she said. She raised her scissors, opened them, then shut them again. Her grin broadened, full of teeth. “I can imagine you bent over your desk, pictures of my work all around you, one of your hands on the edge of your desk and your other hand underneath it, blanking your blank!”

Byakuya felt a jolt. His chest clenched. This woman had no filter at all. He glowered and spoke through his teeth. “Whatever you’re insinuating is incorrect.”

“Never said it happened! Just that I can imagine it,” she chirped as she wiggled her chin at him. She smacked her hands onto her cheeks. “Gloomy’s not the only one with a boundless imagination! How about instead of this stuffy interview, we get to the chase! You want to know about my crimes? How about we reenact it? You would look so cute on my wall! I don’t normally do this, but I could even give you a BJ! It’s the stuff of fanfictions!”

His face grew hotter. “We will not do that at all,” he said, his voice cracking as he raised it despite his efforts to not show any heightened emotion around her.

Only she could get under his skin like that. Not even the mastermind managed it like Syo did. And oh how he hated it. The difference between Touko and Syo was stark. While Touko mumbled and fidgetted and had a passion for novels, romance and classics in particular, Syo squawked and danced about and seemed like the sort of person who spurned novels and drooled over trashy yaoi.

“Saving yourself for marriage?” she said, simpering, and she flumped back onto the bed. “Or did no one ever teach you how to get dirty? I guess because your dad’s seed got planted up your lady in a lab, he never learned. Bet he was a virgin.”

Byakuya hesitated. It was true that his mother had been artificially inseminated with his father’s sperm in a private Togami-owned clinic. This was something that he didn’t go around telling anyone, even her, as if that would have deterred her from her advances.

But she also used past tense, like he stopped being a virgin, or he died.

He pinched his lips together. Whatever. Most could have come to the same conclusion as her.

“You’re so hot even when you’re pulling faces!” she crowed in delight, and she drummed her heels against her bed. “Argh, do me do me do me, Byakuya-sama!”

Syo hugged herself, shuddering. He refused to dignify any of that. She settled down a bit. Her eyes flitted to him.

“You got any other questions for me, Byakuya-sama?” she asked.

“Why did you start killing people?” he said, peering over at her and not approaching the bed. “Your victims are all men. You said they were attractive, but is that really it?”

“Eh? Why does an artist paint? Why does a singer perform?” she retorted, like talking about the weather or something equally mundane. “Why does a sister dedicate herself to her twin sister even if she’ll get stabbed in the back or skewered by spears in the end? It’s a feeling. Passion.”

Byakuya tried to speak, to request her to elaborate, but Syo sat up and talked over him.

“Hey, hey. You’re an interviewer. A sexy interviewer, but an interviewer all the same, not a freaking psychiatrist,” she said firmly. “It’s who I am, okay? Some people are born with red hair, and some are like me, killers.”

Syo motioned toward herself. He stared at her.

“There is no one like you,” he told her plainly.

She didn’t react at first. Then she snorted and flailed happily.

“Aw, you’re making me blush! You’re overthinking it, Darling.” Syo steadied herself, and while she still grinned, there was an edge to it. “Listen, if I wanted to tell my life story, I’d go to that sister of yours, Shinaboo-boo the bear.”

He inhaled through his nose but otherwise betrayed nothing. To name his half-sister like that... a half-sister that he didn’t make public knowledge... how could she...?

“Though, she’d probably change some facts, right?” remarked Syo thoughtfully, tapping herself on the chin. “It’s not beneath her. Whatever it takes to uphold the family name. Skip over all the killing, and maybe not mention you being Polaris. Some people would get real mad, trust me.”

Byakuya widened his eyes and let slip a small gasp.

“How do you know that?” he asked. He never told anyone about that. He never would. Especially not someone he had only read about, otherwise a near stranger. A serial killer.

She laughed.

“Tell me!” he demanded, louder.

Syo laughed more, shaking, then tipped her head forward with that same, same grin.

“You think I’m in a glass case on display,” she said. It could have been a question, but he doubted she meant it to be one. “Maybe I am. And you can see in, but I can see out, y’know?”

“What?” he said heatedly, raising his fists. “I don’t have time for your inane metaphors. How do you know this about me?”

“You don’t remember?” she asked, and he really did not. She resumed her laughter and realising he wouldn’t get anything more out of her, he left her room, feeling like he knew less than he did before.

***

How she knew about what she said to him became clear within the next few weeks. Painfully clear. The whole Togami Conglomerate... had been wiped out. Murdered. Byakuya didn’t feel emotional loss from that. Never had. For people with families, he supposed, they might feel saddened, and while the conglomerate had his surname and people he shared DNA with, like his father, he didn’t consider any of them family. Just business associates. People would call him heartless for only being concerned that a group he considered strong, the strongest, had been annihilated, and not because his father begged for his life on live television before being shot by an imposter dressed as his biological son.

Byakuya’s fiancée put it best when the conversation once came up during lunch and Aoi Asahina asked him about his lack of emotion. He wasn’t the one who was heartless - everyone around him while he grew up had been.

At that point, Byakuya and his now soon-to-be wife hadn’t been dating. Back then, Byakuya wouldn’t have believed that he would plan to marry someone not chosen for him by someone else, like his mother had been chosen to marry his father because of Byakuya’s accomplishments. Had someone told him years ago that he would have chosen his own wife because he cared for her in a way that he, at the time, mocked and scoffed and considered to be a weakness beneath him, he would have blanked out their existence for the rest of his life as they clearly had nothing of worth to say.

How things changed.

He adjusted his tie, staring at his full length mirror, and heard the door open.

“There you are! I knew if I followed the scent of sex, I’d find you!” came a voice behind him.

His reflection grimaced.

And how some things didn’t change. He held in a sigh and looked over his shoulder. Just as expected, there was Syo, dressed in a satin purple nightdress. She sat down heavily on their bed, one leg crossed over the other, vibrating with energy.

Byakuya regarded her coolly.

“Is the stove on?” he asked.

“Dunno!” she said with a shrug. “Didn’t check. I think Gloomy was adding pepper to breakfast and got a whiff of it, or something. So here I am! Da, da, da!”

She threw out her arms, beaming.

It had probably been switched off then. Syo focused on him.

“What’s with the suit? It’s even sexier than usual,” she said playfully as she stretched out her legs.

He frowned and turned around completely to face her.

“Did you think to check the calendar? It’s the day of the wedding,” he said.

The amused glow on Syo’s face dimmed. Surely, she must have known. In the past, Syo and Touko hadn’t shared memories, but with support and therapy, they had learned to do something called co-fronting, or they could be aware of what was going on while the other fronted at the least.

“That thing,” she stated in monotone, and Byakuya had a suspicion that she had known the whole time. She forced herself to perk up, but it was like she had two lights in her and only one was turned on. “Why don’t we bail on that stuffy show and have some fun? Just you and me... and maybe Hiro-kun. God, you need to get hotter friends.”

His expression didn’t soften.

“I’m not skipping the wedding,” said Byakuya. “You know that.”

Syo groaned and flung her head back.

“Bor-ring!” she said loudly. “Weddings are boring!”

“I’m aware of your feelings, but you’re not getting married,” he said. “I’m marrying Touko.”

She kept her head angled back and pouted.

“You’re going to want me to switch out, aren’t you?” she asked, and he didn’t answer. Her head snapped forward and she beckoned to him with her hand, her lips twisted tightly. It could have been a smile, but Byakuya doubted it. “Well, if you give me a good fuck, I might consider it!”

He narrowed his eyes. “Syo.”

Her face sobered. She clicked her tongue and hunched her shoulders, turning her head away.

“I can see you’re not gonna be swayed,” she grumbled, and she slouched even more. “Ugh, you’re lucky that Gloomy loves you so much, because I’d have killed you by now otherwise.”

Byakuya inclined his head to one side. Syo’s eyes were averted away from him.

“You have claimed that you and her share feelings,” he noted. “But... I wonder, if that’s really it?”

She tensed, still not looking. “Eh?”

He cupped his chin.

“I’m wondering if you have come to care about Touko,” he said. Syo twitched and shot him a cold look.

“Care? Listen, I’ve never hated Gloomy, even though she barely tolerates me. Most of the time, she hated my guts...” She slapped a hand against her cheek, pretending to swoon, but she spoke harshly. “Oh, Genocider has killed my crush, oh woe, woe... Can I really be blamed though? I’m a ruthless stone cold killer! It’s like telling a baby not to cry!”

“You’ll probably find that a lot of people blame you,” he deadpanned.

Her brow quirked.

“You’re arguing back?” she said. His face didn’t quiver.

“I’m just saying,” he told her, and she lowered her gaze.

The room fell silent. Syo twiddled her thumbs, kicking her legs gently over the side of the bed. Seeing her like this, contemplative and reserved, reminded him more of Touko than of Syo, though Touko’s confidence had improved a lot since they first met. She hadn’t styled her hair this morning and it was unruly around her, not yet tamed into one or two braids, but her signature glasses sat on her nose.

Usually, Syo wasn’t hard to read, blurting any and all thoughts as they entered her head, but right now, Byakuya could only guess what thoughts passed through her mind as she stared intently into space.

“Tell me,” said Byakuya, watching her closely, “did you hate yourself?”

Syo blinked. Wavered. Looked at him. “What?”

“If you share emotions, such as your love for me, then when she hated you, did that mean you hated yourself?” asked Byakuya.

She looked away again. “It doesn’t work like that.”

“Why not?”

“It just doesn’t!” Syo snarled, stomping a foot. Byakuya’s features gave a calm tremble like someone blew gently on his face. “I love being me! Why wouldn’t I?”

Her eyes blazed with an inner fire.

“Anyway, I thought I was the cute ditz!” Syo hissed, thrusting out her chin. “You’re getting sidetracked. I said I was going to let you get married. That’s what’s convenient, right? I’m sticking around for plot points, and then - ”

She trailed off. Some of her fervour ebbed away, and she balled her hands into fists.

Byakuya frowned.

“You know, you don’t have to be ashamed of caring for someone,” said Byakuya quietly.

Syo went slack, then cringed. Obviously, she heard what he said, but she abstained from answering him. That didn’t stop him from talking though.

“I was of a similar mind to you,” he told her. “I thought caring for someone was a weakness to be exploited...”

Byakuya walked over to her. He tucked his fingers under her chin and pushed up. Syo’s brow puckered as their eyes met.

“... but thanks to your alter, I know it doesn’t have to be that way,” he finished. “And I can’t say that you don’t get some strength from your feelings either. I heard that it gave you strength to back down from your chase of Monaka Towa, not just your love for me but your friendship with Naegi’s sister too.”

The tension in her face didn’t subside. Byakuya lowered his hand and stepped back. She touched her chin, feeling where he had held her. A faint blush dusted her cheeks.

“Tch,” clucked Syo, and she dropped her hand from her face. Very pointedly, she trained her eyes on her lap. “You’ve lost your edge, Darling.”

“Judging by your sudden meekness, I think I’ve still got it,” he said, feeling a smirk rise to his face.

“I should kill you,” she said in a light tone, still not making eye contact.

His eyes widened a bit.

“Do it,” he said, just as hushed.

With lightning reflexes, she whipped out a pair of scissors from the holster she still wore on her thigh. Before he could apprehend what was happening, she had him pinned to a wall and she held the blades of her scissors to his neck.

Byakuya breathed slowly, staring, and she stared back. With a tiny bit more pressure, she could nick him. Get him to bleed a little. Squirm.

Time crawled by. The scissors declined and eventually fell to her side without making a single mark on him. Syo aimed her gaze at his chest. Not at his eyes.

“Do you want to see the dress?” he asked casually, like she hadn’t tried to kill him. Because she hadn’t. They both knew that.

Syo gave a stiff nod and shrugged. He stepped past her and crossed over to the wardrobe, feeling her eyes burn into the back of his neck as opened it and revealed the dress. The white textured bodice had a sweetheart neckline with ruffled off-shoulder sleeves and a lace cape decorated with silhouettes of butterflies, and the same fabric as the cape was used for the outer layers of the skirts, reaching far enough to end at the feet.

“Western, eh...?” said Syo, craning her neck a little. “Just like in movies. I knew it. Gloomy’s so predictable.”

“Do you want to try it on?” he asked.

She recoiled. Hard. Jerked her head back.

“W-What?” she barked, and she couldn’t even pretend to laugh. Her shoulders shook like she was laughing though. “Aren’t you worried I’ll get blood on it? Though, it could do with a bit of colour, don’t you think?”

Syo ended her question with a grin. He didn’t reply, waiting for her to answer his offer properly, and she noticed. Her smile slid off.

“I told you, marriage ain’t my thing!” she huffed. “It’s Gloomy’s!”

Byakuya didn’t respond still. She rolled her eyes and exhaled loudly.

“Alright, I’ll humour you,” she groused. “Geez.”

Neither laughed though. He helped her into the dress and once it was on her, he stepped back and let her examine herself in the mirror. Syo didn’t speak, barely moving save for pushing back a bit of hair, adjusting her glasses, wringing her hands. Little restless fidgets like that. They shared the same body, but for the first time, Syo’s mannerisms were like that of Touko. For the first time, Syo looked like Touko.

“It’s girly...” Syo muttered.

“That’s your gender, isn’t it?” he said, unable to take his eyes off her.

“Hell if I know.”

Syo scrutinised her reflection for a while longer, strangely quiet, until finally she turned to Byakuya and hiked up her skirts. He knew what she was searching for, and indeed, she found the leather pouch of scissors like he expected, but then she fiddled and removed the pouch completely.

Then, stranger still, she held it out to him, as if she wanted him to -

“ - take them,” she said.

Byakuya peered at the pouch, at a loss for words.

“Listen,” said Syo, strengthening her grip. The pouch creaked in her hand. “A long time ago, I made a promise to Naegi. I said that I wouldn’t kill again if I could be with you. You’ve always been different, Darling. Gloomy has had her fair share of crushes on boys and girls, but you... her feelings go deep.”

Therefore, Syo’s ran deep.

“Like the chocolate coating at the bottom of a glass that held ice cream milkshake,” she added, whatever that meant, but Byakuya thought he understood.

She jiggled the pouch, as if reminding him to take them from her, but he didn’t budge.

“I mean, who can blame her?” said Syo, trying not to smile but failing. A thin one oozed out. “You’re fit. Hot. You’re really smart, but other times, you’re really dumb but it’s always in a cute way. You’re fun to tease, especially when you scowl, and...”

He grabbed her shoulder suddenly. Syo tensed, and before she had chance to process what was happening, he leaned in.

Her breathing suspended as he pecked her lips. Their glasses clacked together.

“If you just shared feelings with Touko, you wouldn’t have been able to say that,” he said as he straightened, feeling his face burn.

Unlike when she said lewd things, however, it wasn’t so bad this time. Syo had her own unique charm that excited him like no other, unpredictable and captivating even now. His heart skipped as he gazed at her.

“Also... thank you for taking care of Touko, all this time,” he said, hollowing his cheeks as he tried not to smile. He failed, much like she had.

She blinked, then laughed that grating laugh of hers and rubbed her knuckles against her eyes.

“Wow, you worried about stinking or something?” she said. “You’ve put on enough deodorant for both of us. It’s making my eyes sting.”

A snort escaped her.

“Yep, I definitely hate weddings. Too mushy. I think I’ll let Gloomy take over,” she said, almost babbling. “You shouldn’t see the bride in her dress before the wedding, you know. I better go take it off.”

Before he could reply, Syo hurried into the bathroom and shut the door behind herself. Byakuya stayed where he was.

There was a sneeze from inside.

“W-What’s going on?” asked Touko, rustling. “Why am I crying?”

Apparently, Syo had chosen to front by herself.

“You’re getting changed. Our friends should be here soon to do your makeup and hair,” he said calmly, used to having to fill in blanks for them.

“Oh, okay,” she said, faltering a bit, still confused. “Thank you, Darling.”

He smiled, adjusted his glasses and left the bedroom. Once through the door, he gave his eyes a quick wipe and headed for the stairs.

They had a wedding to prepare for, after all.

#syogami #togafuka #danganronpa #byakuya togami #genocider syo #syotogafuka #sfw #fanfiction #touko fukawa #aloysius pennyworth #one shot #i actually had most of this written some time ago #but i took a break to focus on tofu week

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whydoifeelsoold · 6 years ago

Text

Seeing iKON live for the first time: a reflection

So last Thursday and Saturday I saw iKON live for the first time, in Sydney and Melbourne respectively. Here are my thoughts.

Random thoughts:

- Before the Sydney show I was nervous af. Honestly, I couldn’t eat, couldn’t concentrate on shit, I was trembling, I was alternating between rambling like a madwoman and sitting in silence staring into space. My poor sister thought I was losing it. Think Hanbin in On Hiatus when Bobby texts him he’s outside his house and wants to speak to him in chapter 4. I was THAT.

- I was so nervous because I felt like there was SO much at stake. I’ve written sooo much about these boys (over 337,000 words?!), I’ve spent so much time (enjoyable time lol) wondering about them, hypothesising how they’d respond to different situations, basically doing full on character studies. I was so scared that I’d go to the concert and what if....I’d gotten them wrong, I’d totally misunderstood them...what if they weren’t quite like what I imagined. What would happen then?? Would I be disappointed in myself?? Disappointed by them?? That wouldn’t be fair to them at all because they are PEOPLE not CHARACTERS!! And I would be disappointed in myself about that too!! So anyway, long story short, I was terrified some kind of disappointment would be inevitable.

- So of course I was nervous (bats aggressively swooping in my stomach) right up till when they finally appeared. However, I was amazed that instead of feeling awe, or surprise, or disbelief, when I saw them lined up about to begin Bling Bling, I just felt insanely happy. Like childishly, innocently, joyously happy.

- I was so thrilled by how good the vocal line sounded live. Their voices sound SO clear, strong and full of colour. It was amazing to FEEL their voices echo and project in the room. The sound was better in Sydney however, for some reason their voices were more muffled in Melbourne, not sure why. May have been to do with my location in Festival Hall.

- I wish Sydney iKONICS were a bit more friendly to one another. I felt like a village idiot when I smiled at some people and they just looked at me with confused, dead eyes. Like come one guys, can’t we all bond over this incredible experience?! Can’t we kill time in the massive-ass queue by getting excited together (But Sydney is a catty city, so that didn’t surprise me too much tbh) ?!?!

- They were all SO so So sweet and very endearing. They were just...adorable. I felt so affectionate and proud of them.

Now, about the Boys themselves:

- They were all INCREDIBLY handsome in real life. Even more handsome than on tv or in photoshoots. Like, I dunno what it is about seeing them in real life, but they were just really stunning.

- In Sydney especially they were tired (but did a very noble job of pushing through). In particular Hanbin, and I felt a wave of concern for him when he was bent over puffed at one stage. Bobby and Donghyuk were up there hyping up the crowd with “WHO WANTS ANOTHER SONG” and poor Bin was just shaking his head laughing, trying to catch his breath. You could really tell he was ready for a good 15 hours of sleep.

- In Melbourne they all seemed to be more rested, except maybe Bobby. He did his very best not to let on he was tired, (and don’t get me wrong, he still had plenty of energy) but he was a bit more reserved in Melbourne than in Sydney and struggled to get his words out more when speaking english. Every now and again he seemed a bit distracted in Melbourne, like maybe his concentration was off.

- The one thing that DID blow my mind, was that ALL of them - but especially double b - were exactly as I had imagined and written them to be. As a writer, I’ve tried my best to interpret them as accurately as possible from the sources given to us: tv shows, performance recordings, the music, the survival shows, the interviews, the radio appearances, etc. etc. How this whole time I’ve also been acutely aware, that no matter how hard I try, how can I truly get a “vibe” from someone when I haven’t seen them in person. Seeing them live made everything make sense.

- Bobby had this gorgeous, outward energy, just the way I imagined him to be. He was so sweet towards the boys, but also devilishly cheeky and when he got the chance. As for his interaction with the audience, you could really tell he wanted to give us a good performance, it was like he really wanted to give us a gift and for us to love it. You could really feel how lucky he felt to have us there screaming and singing along, how appreciative he was (like dude, no, thank YOU!! NOT US!!). In Melbourne a small smile he shared with Hanbin suggested that special connection which made my heart soar. They clearly have a very deep connection, whatever that may be. Overall I would describe him in real life as Generous and uplifting.

- Han Fucking Bin, my ultimate bias. Oh god. I was blown away by how similar he is in real life to how I have imagined. He had this incredibly complex, fascinating energy riddled with paradoxes. He was eccentric yet very in tune with the crowd, dorky yet intimidating, reserved/shy but very sweet, rather dreamy and in his own world, yet always very in control, unassuming yet also proud and a bit aloof. Maybe aloof isn’t the right word...maybe detached? But I guess what I’m trying to say is that I think he has a very good poker face, it’s his professional/leader face. He takes his responsibility to deliver a good concert very seriously and so he doesn’t always look like he can “let himself go.” But at the same time, I really got a sense that underneath the poker face he was feeling a lot, thinking a lot. He was doing a lot of work, but keeping that to himself.. Finally, he struck me as someone who has made the brave commitment to be himself unapologetically, but he’s still learning who exactly he is. I’m really excited to how he turns out, but if my gut feeling is right, he will only continue developing as a person, he won’t just find himself and stop there. He is like a pokemon, there are going to be many evolutions for him and that’s EXACTLY why I love him so much. I would sum him up in real life as Sensitive and Inquiring.

- Jinhwan was just as feisty, cheeky and cute coy as I imagined. He was in high spirits, and I think he’d impressed himself with his english skills so he was very confident on stage, he really knew how to work the crowd. I really got a sense of his love of attention. He was so charming, cute and willing to indulge the crowd. I didn’t see his mum-side but I’m glad about that because I feel like he doesn’t need to be in that mode when all the boys are having fun on stage, he can just focus on being his naughty, sexy self. I would summarise him as Playful and Engaging.

- Donghyuk was a total darling and omg he looks soooo handsome in real life. I really got a sense of his attentiveness towards the fans, he really did his best to engage with us, asking questions, complimenting the city he was in, joking around, singing other songs whenever he got the chance. Diligent and Caring, that’s DK in a nutshell.

- June!!! So June was like Chanwoo and Yun, they kinda let the other boys take the floor and lead the show. Totally fair enough. I can’t begin to imagine how vulnerable one must feel when you have no idea wtf the being said and you’re up there on stage with everyone watching. Two things with June. One, I could NOT believe how dramatically handsome he was in real life. Like, his raven-black “comma-styled” hair, the way it contrasted so boldly with his pale skin, his muscular tallness, the way his white t-shirt hung off his frame so casually yet perfectly, his striking brows, strong profile and chiseled jawline...like, he was GODLY. Out of this world. From another universe. He was stunning. In terms of the vibe he gave me in real life: Cool and eccentric.

- Yun!!! Bless him!!! I really just wanted to hear more from him...although i totally get why he didn’t have the means to express himself more. But what he couldn’t communicate through words he really poured into his singing and interaction with the fans. I was really impressed by his voice live, he has such a nice warm tone. And he really put heart into his lines and high notes. His showmanship was very impressive. I would summarise him as heartfelt and emotive.

- Chanwoo was SO SO gorgeous in real life. Even from where I stood at the back his eyes stood out so well. He was reserved but not lacking in confidence, he was shy but also very sincere and sweet. His vocals were brief but his husky tone is awesome. I would summarise him as observant and alert.

- Overall Seeing them was really amazing, it was such a positive experience. All I feel now is the bittersweetness of it all. Before I didn’t know what it was like to miss them, that wasn’t something I had to deal with being a distant aussie fan. But now I’ve seen them twice in three days, I now know what that is like to be in their presence. And honestly, I miss them so much already. my heart feels bruised. Laaaaaaaame.

p.s. @mvssmallow I hope you have regained hearing in your left ear. I’m sorry I yelled so loud and so consistently throughout the ENTIRE show. You’re a legend for putting up with my drunken nerves.

@notsolonelyinthisworld @drinkyourjuicejinhwan @jennicullen @gurrchoo @runsoftbin

#reflections #ikon #ikon live #kpop #kim hanbin #kim jiwon #Kim Donghyuk #kim jinhwan #ikon fanfics #koo junhoe #jung chanwoo #song yunhyeong

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yunsdreamworld · 7 years ago

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IDOLiSH7 3.9.3

This one might have some sentences that sound a bit weird as I’m still trying to get the hang of Japanese sentence structure --> English sentence structure. More of my translations here.

Chapter 9 - Scrupulous Malice

Story 3 - Line of Sight

Yaotome Gaku: Ah....... Takanashi Tsumugi: Gaku-san....... Good morning. Yaotome Gaku: …………. Do you have a minute? I need to talk with you. Takanashi Tsumugi: Eh? Yaotome Gaku: The shop…… is unwise. My car……. Not good. My place is even worse……. (1) Yaotome Gaku: Let’s borrow that meeting room. It would be best if it weren’t just us two. Anyone……. Nanase Riku: Manager! Yaotome-san! Yaotome Gaku: Nanase? Just the right timing, come along. Nanase Riku: …………? OK!

Nanase Riku: What’s the matter? Talking in such a place……. Yaotome Gaku: …………. Recently, there are a lot of people trying to gossip about Tsumugi and me. Nanase Riku: Eh!? Takanashi Tsumugi: I experienced it as well. Nanase Riku: Eeh!? Yaotome Gaku: …… It’s my fault. I even got scolded by Ten, but I’m the type whose feelings show on the face without meaning to. (@) Yaotome Gaku: I think I like you. (3) Takanashi Tsumugi: ............. Nanase Riku: Eeh……!? Yaotome Gaku: Nanase, sorry. Could you be quiet for a bit? Nanase Riku: I……, I can’t keep quiet! What’s that about liking? About Manager…….? Yaotome Gaku: Be quiet. Nanase Riku: Even though it’s our manager!? Yaotome Gaku: …… I see. Yaotome Gaku: Sorry. Takanashi Tsumugi: …………. Yaotome Gaku: I’ll refrain from contacting you for the time being to avoid causing you trouble. Even if we meet outside, I’ll try not to talk with you. Yaotome Gaku: I’m sorry for pushing my circumstances on you. Takanashi Tsumugi: ...... please don’t apologise. I was the one, who was insufficiently careful. Takanashi Tsumugi: I’m glad we could be close……. Even though I’m a person from an agency, I’m a big idiot, who causes trouble to a star. Nanase Riku: ……Manager……. Takanashi Tsumugi: I will continue to cheer TRIGGER on from here on as well. Takanashi Tsumugi: On the occasion of working together, nothing will change, please take care of IDOLiSH7. Yaotome Gaku: Sure. Yaotome Gaku: …… That’s all I needed to talk about. Sorry for taking your time as well, Nanase. Nanase Riku: …………. No……. SFX: Shut.

Takanashi Tsumugi: …………. Takanashi Tsumugi: …… I’m sorry, Riku-san. Nanase Riku: No……. Are you all right? Takanashi Tsumugi: I’m fine. Ah……. We should hurry outside. Since it would be bad if Riku-san was misunderstood as well. Nanase Riku: …………. Takanashi Tsumugi: ……. If…… I was a man, it would be fine.

Blond Youth: I’m pleased to meet you. I’m Rokuya Nagi-san’s Otaku friend, Solvaldo. Solvaldo: While studying regarding Magical☆Kokona with Nagi-san, I will ascertain the residence’s safety. Izumi Mitsuki: The residence’s safety……? Is that necessary for the study of anime……? Rokuya Nagi: Since one Magical☆Kokona character lives in a dormitory, he seems to want to experience the atmosphere. Rokuya Nagi: Since we’ll leave as soon as the Otaku meeting is over, I apologise for the inconvenience……. (4) Izumi Mitsuki: Never mind that. It’s only Yamato-san and me, so take your time! Na? Nikaidō Yamato: Ah. While we’re at it, will you eat dinner? Rokuya Nagi: No. That won’t be neces…….. Solvaldo: Certainly! I’ll partake!

Izumi Mitsuki: Ah, I failed to ask whether a Japanese-style meal or Western-style meal would be all right. (5) Nikaidō Yamato: O-nī-san would like a Japanese-style meal. Won’t our guest be pleased with that as well? (6) Izumi Mitsuki: Then I’ll make Miso sou……. …………!? Nikaidō Yamato: …… That’s a terribly angry voice. What’s that language? Northmarean? Izumi Mitsuki: Otaku meetings is more extreme than we thought. Izumi Mitsuki: If it’s his friend from Northmare, it looks like we can hear more about Nagi in Northmare during dinner. I look forward……. SFX: Click. Solvaldo: Excuse me for having interrupted you. Izumi Mitsuki: Eh!? Are going home? Solvaldo: No. I’ll return shortly to prove this building’s low security. Izumi Mitsuki: He? Solvaldo: Well then, until later on. SFX: Shut. Nikaidō Yamato: What is that person saying……? Rokuya Nagi: ……, where did he go? Nikaidō Yamato: He left through the entryway. Said he would be back immediately. Rokuya Nagi: ……Jesus……. You two, don’t leave my side. Nikaidō Yamato: Huh?

Izumi Mitsuki: Wah! A blackout!? SFX: Crash. Nikaidō Yamato: Uwah!? What……!? Was a window smashed somewhere!? SFX: Thump. Nikaidō Yamato: Eh!? Rokuya Nagi: Mitsuki! Yamato! SFX: Thump. Rokuya Nagi: …………!? Solvaldo: OK. Thank you for your cooperation. I’ll use a torch. (7) Izumi Mitsuki: ……, blinding…….! …………!? Izumi Mitsuki: Nagi, are you all right!? Nikaidō Yamato: …… Just when were you mounted by your Otaku friend? (8) Rokuya Nagi: …… No problem. Solvaldo: In this manner, the security of this residence is very low. Did you get it? Nikaidō Yamato: If you’re doing survival games, do it outside……! What are you going to do about the smashed window……!?

Yotsuba Tamaki: We’re home. What happened to that window? Did So-chan do anything? Ōsaka Sōgo: Can I ask why you pinpointed my name? (9) Izumi Mitsuki: Nagi’s Otaku friend came and suddenly started a survival game. The security company came, and it was serious. Izumi Iori: Is the friend from Northmare in his room now? Nikaidō Yamato: That’s right. It’s getting heated talking about anime. The language of Nagi’s country is scary when getting angry, right? Riku. Nanase Riku: …………. Nikaidō Yamato: Riku? Are you all right? Nanase Riku: Ah, yes……. Nanase Riku: Come to think of it, didn’t Nagi say he had a stalker in Northmare? Nikaidō Yamato: Stalker……? Yotsuba Tamaki: Yeah. That’s why he upped the security. He changed the window, didn’t he? Nikaidō Yamato: Stalker, you say……. Why didn’t you mention something that important? Nagi and you guys as well! Yotsuba Tamaki: Haaa!? Even though we couldn’t say anything because someone fought and left!? Nanase Riku: That’s right! If you two hadn’t fought we could have talked together at the dormitory!? Yotsuba Tamaki, Nanase Riku: Apologise!! Nikaidō Yamato, Izumi Mitsuki: We’re sorry……. Izumi Iori: Eh……. Then, isn’t the person, who’s here now, the stalker? Izumi Mitsuki: Eh....... Nikaidō Yamato: No way……. A stalker wouldn’t be doing such things as eating meals with us, would they? (10) SFX: Click. Solvaldo: Good evening. Thank you for the meal. However, I have a suggestion for everyone. (11) Solvaldo: May I set up a surveillance camera in this room?

To continue….

TN: I should mention that I’m translating this as I go, meaning I haven’t played any of the chapters beyond of what I have translated. So I don’t know what happens after this.

(1) He uses まずい three times, but it has several meanings so I went with this to make it flow better.

(2) 顔に出る can mean «It shows on your face» in the sense of being an open book, being easy to read etc. The verb form used here is the more casual form of しまう, which indicates that an action was done or happened unintentionally.

(3) I was unsure at first if that’s what he’s actually saying because of the comma placement, but yeah. He just low-key confessed, I think.

(4) This one gave me trouble. Considering what follows, Nagi’s probably apologising for intruding with his friend and plans to leave as soon as they are done. This is the best way of wording it I could come up with.

(5) ⁓そびる is a suffix meaning «to fail (to do)». It’s JLPT N1 grammar. (Fun fact about myself. I took the JLPT the last time in December 2011 for N4 and passed. Might be about time to take the one for N3.)

(6) Since Yamato is referring to himself and I can’t remember how the other translators handled this, I left it as O-nī-san. In case someone reading doesn’t what it means, it means “older brother”.

(7) Of flashlight for Americans.

(8) I considered using a synonym, but since Yamato says it in Katakana, I figured I would leave it. There you have your daily dose of innuendos.

(9) I’m not sure if this makes sense.

(10) The «with us» isn’t mentioned in Japanese, but I’m assuming that’s what he wants to say because Japanese tends to leave out some things and you have to figure stuff out by context. Leaving “with us” out would make it a bit of a weird sentence.

(11) While すみません is generally used as an apology, it can also be used to say thank you when someone has gone to the trouble of doing something for you, such as pouring tea, or in this case, making a meal.

#IDOLiSH7 #Ainana #Story Translation #TRIGGER #Main Story: Part 3 #IDOLiSH7 (Series)

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floraone · 7 years ago

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1, 19

Yay!! Hellloooooo love ♡♡♡

1. Where do I typically get my ideas.

It’s the one thing I don’t struggle with at all: ideas. I have them. I may not always know how to all fit them it place, but I do have ideas, and love to share them. They come from anywhere really; discussions, classes, movies that excited me OR annoyed me and made me rumminate my thoughts on its what-ifs… Like, if I take Yugen for an example it obviously was playing with the theme of “what was missing in canon that I want to add, and what do I want to keep.” So I started chucking everything I found either problematic OR so perfect I couldn’t really add to it, and then I still had room to play with every headcanon I ever had or assimilated via fandom. Second in came the current political climate. I wrote a story where the world is being saved from hate itself - so I was allowed to factor in what I found is going horribly in the world as of now. It made writing it more impactful to myself.Then the details; what are they doing, what are they talking about - this draws heavily from my own experience. And while it is VERY important me that I don’t write “myself” but stay in character, it’s always easy to imagine what they would do in my place, and branch off from there. So, anything gets recycled that I experience, I mostly even don’t notice it - I read a LOT, daily. Anything from the daily online newspaper fix and other fanfiction to science fiction and lots and lots of non-fiction. I go through books like other people go through… I don’t even know. My apartment is a library. I have custom made selfmade shelfs to fit them all, even when I DO throw stuff out regularly that wasn’t a 100% to my taste. And added to that - I WATCH a lot. Mostly series that I watch together with my husband, and documentaries on anything cool. Add to that my experiences as a regular jane and a rather specific education, and I can honestly say that some or most of my ideas are probably a jumbled mess of inspiration drawn from any of these outlets without me even really realising it.

Most important, though: I KEEP all my ideas. I write lists on my phone memo pad, and if they come up elsewhere on the internet as I talk to people and bounce ideas around (brainstorming or simply being asked specifics about my plot is also SO helpful to me personally, especially to fit all my ideas into the right places), for instance, I will make screenshots. And if I talk to friends and colleagues I am known to whip out my phone as well- people are never offended when I tell them I need a minute to write down what we just talked about cause it’s so impactful to me that I don’t want to forget about it. Ideas are fleeting, and however we think we will definitely remember this stroke of genius (however idiotic it turns out to be in the end), it’ll definitely be gone if I don’t preserve it.

Now, what I’m definitely lacking tho is the TIME to put all these ideas into action. I currently have a “master-list” of fic ideas where I collect a sort of database for ideas for fics. Some of those are little more than prompts, others have 20 page scripts already. It currently spans 22 fic ideas, and most of these will most likely never see the light of day. I simply don’t have that kind of time and sadly I do need to go and earn a living, lol.

19. What’s my best advice for writing action scenes.

Again with the word “advice” - I don’t feel like this is an area where anyone can or should give “advice” - writing is highly individual, and what works for me doesn’t neccessarily have to work for anyone else. So, again, here’s simply my personal opinion and experience on what worked out for me.

Action scenes are maybe THE most difficult thing to write imo. Especially in an overall romance genre where people are here for the relationships and characters and not so much for the action. Which means, for me, that the action scenes need to be on point, and not too long, but even more impactful. So, these are steps I follow in my head, more or less consciously.

1) Cinematographic imagery. I like to go at these scenes from a ‘what would this LOOK LIKE" angle. These are superheroes, so, I go big. Energy pulses that push them soaring through skies, shattering glass, cement and asphalt breaking apart, buildings tumbling. Especially with using Rei, I tend to go big on the fire descriptions. The fire needs to cackle and crack and lick, objects she sets it to go ablaze, she can fire it like wildfire and occationally things explode. Which brings me to point two.

2. The stakes are high, the effects are big, so it wouldn’t be realistic if there weren’t injuries and casualties involved. I’m very much against glorifying violence, so it’s very important to me to also point out the costs. And those costs tend to be very graphic in my writing. Huge bloody gashes, skin sizzling away under acid, bone showing through burned and mangled skin. Which is why, when I use a big and giant epic battle scene, the aftermath will always be painful and bloody. Who turns to violence pays a price, even if it wasn’t their choice and it was always in defence. So any huge battle will always include injuries on ALL the parties. And they stick around in their healing phases in follow up scenes if they were gigantic. Even if it’s just in flinches and a hissed breath through clenched teeth as they have to move around the healing residues of it. Though luckily, Manga!Mamoru has healing powers, of course. (Tho I try use that sparsely, of course. The guy is no god. He has his limits.)

3. I tend to use a very fast paced language in action scenes. Short sentences. TRYING to refrain from my kilometer long, relative clause heavy comma sentences. Action scenes are a very reactive, sudden thing. Things happen fast and they need to react fast. No time to think or plan and just to act, and the language should reflect that. Both the aspect that describes what is actually happening and the emotive reactions to it. Which brings me to point four.

4. They are fucking scared. Even if they manage to swallow that fear and let instinct take over to go badass, underneath, I try to never forget that these are teenagers fighting monsters, risking their lifes. There will be adrenaline, and panic, and no room for very much rational thought. It all happens too fast and they are going on fight or flight auto-pilot. And this will at least partly be the case however routine or everyday the encounter has become. There will always be that moment where they could have misstepped and died a bloody death in someone’s fangs or tentacles.

Brings me to five:5. Creative monsters. In Ikigai especially I tried to write monsters that I find interresting. I used pop-culture references by using Godzilla and Mothra-like enemies, monsters from Video-games, and sometimes some from canon that I found especially interresting to tie back to canon. By using monsters that I liked, I knew what they could do. And I had fun while writing it.

6. I choose fighting styles. Usagi gets Jujutsu from me, sometimes even Aikido elements. A fighting style that uses speed instead of strength, that needs to be clever to use their opponent’s strength against them. And then I watch Youtube tutorials on these styles’ basic moves. Plus, these tutorial instructions come with very useful vocabulary for how to implement these moves into writing!And then sometimes, like in Yugen, I move from combat to magic. I had a very fun time turning those twirly 90s dance sequences into powerful fighting in Yugen. Making something so obviously “girly” the biggest asset in a battle, the biggest weapon, more powerful than any martial arts move I could give them. Girl power and all.

And, last,7. I get myself in the mood. I listen to very fast paced dramatic, epic music. Mostly the score from action movies even (like, I find the wonder woman theme song from the new films to work like MAGIC) and imagine my fast paced action sequences to it. Go through them in my head one by one. And then put that song on repeat as I write. It helps me write clipped and fast-paced, and keeps me in the dramatic tone.

So there, three cents on action ♡ Would be curious to know what YOU think works best!

#on writing #fanfic asks #my mustard #my fic

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xyalovegood · 8 years ago

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anon, I don’t know if you’re still out there considering it’s been nearly two weeks (smh @ myself), but here’s the first prompt! (”this is why no one wants to hang out with us“) I wove it into chapter three of this fic I’ve been meaning to continue for ages; hope you don’t mind! you don’t have to read the first few chapters for context I don’t think. title from “she” by dodie.

chapter one | chapter two

read this chapter on ao3 here.

Chapter 3: Oh it aches, but it feels oddly good to hurt

“Finn.” Someone was shaking his shoulder gently. “We’re here.”

Finn opened his eyes hesitantly, still very much caught in the bliss of sleep. He couldn’t remember what he’d been dreaming about, but he thinks it was a nice dream. It was a shame to leave it for the cold harshness of reality. Poe was grinning down at him, looking slightly amused. Finn had the odd feeling of déjà vu, the kind you sometimes get after a dream that you can't remember, until something jump starts your memory and you recall a snippet or two. He felt his cheeks heat up a bit. Though it hadn't been a... smutty dream, he always felt weird dreaming about his friend in a romantic way. If only he could undream it, unthink it, unwish it, unfeel it. But, then again... would he really want to?

Poe half-dragged him out of the car. "'M tired," Finn mumbled. Poe laughed.

"I'd noticed. You're such an early bird." Finn might have rolled his eyes if he'd had the energy. However, seeing as he was 70% asleep at the moment, he let the teasing slide.

Finn leaned heavily on Poe as they walked up to his apartment, but Poe didn’t complain. Once they were inside the apartment, Poe let Finn flop onto the couch and immediately started bustling about, gathering up everything Finn would need to spend the night. “I could just go home, you know,” Finn said unconvincingly, through a barely-suppressed yawn. Poe’s head poked out from behind a cupboard door.

“Don’t be ridiculous. Your place is 30 minutes away and you’ll be asleep in five. You’re staying. End of discussion.” Finn smiled to himself. He figured Poe would say something like that. That’s just the kind of person he was.

“Thanks for always taking care of me,” Finn said (because he felt, suddenly, that he needed to say it), as Poe dropped a blanket and pillow onto the couch next to where he sat.

“We take care of each other,” he responded with a soft smile. For a second they seemed to be frozen, just staring into each other’s eyes and smiling. Finn wondered if Poe was also feeling warm and fuzzy and all kinds of cheesy shit inside. But then Poe abruptly looked away, and added, “Besides, what are friends for?” and, not to be dramatic or anything, but it felt like Finn’s heart fell out of his chest and turned into dust and then got swept away by a breeze and he didn’t know when or if he’d ever get it back.

Poe cleared his throat. “You haven’t left any clothes here recently so you’ll have to borrow some of mine. Be right back.” And then he was gone, leaving Finn alone to his thoughts. He might’ve fallen asleep if he wasn’t feeling so much more awake now, mind still obsessively going over their conversation again and again, as though searching for something. Or maybe his brain just liked to torture him.

When Poe returned, he was carrying some flannel pants and an old tee shirt. Poe handed them to him, and after reading the words on the tee, Finn couldn’t help but laugh out loud. “I remember this shirt! You used to wear it all the time!”

“Yup, right up until the Great Stain Incident of 2015. It hasn’t been the same since.” Poe looked mournfully down at the shirt, which read, “Let’s eat Grandma,” with “Let’s eat, Grandma,” underneath it. Naturally, it was followed by, “Commas save lives!”

“Now that I’ve said that out loud, I feel ridiculous. I’ll go get you an unstained shirt.” Poe said, seeming embarrassed.

“No!” Finn objected, instinctively clutching the shirt to his chest. “I mean… don’t worry about it. I like this shirt.”

“This is why no one wants to hang out with us,” Poe joked, “Our terrible senses of humor.”

“Hey, if someone can’t appreciate a good punctuation joke, then quite frankly, I’d rather not hang out with them.”

“Good point. So, you can take my bed, and I’ll sleep out here. You look like you need it more than I do.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You drove. And you’re letting me stay here. You should sleep in your own bed, at least!” They had this conversation every time he stayed here. Finn hadn’t given up fighting yet, but he hadn’t won either. Poe always made up some lame excuse or another, but Finn knew it was just his selfless and caring nature. Sometimes he worried that Poe put others before himself too often, so he did what he could to take care of him in return. It could be really difficult sometimes. Poe was stubborn to no end.

"No, really. I'll be awake for a while longer anyway.”

Not wanting to miss this opportunity, Finn retorted, "You're such a night owl," before shaking his head and going into the bathroom to change.

He popped his head out a few minutes later, all changed and with a toothbrush in hand. (He wouldn't admit it, but wearing Poe's shirt allowed him to give into the fantasy--if only for a few moments--that they were together and casually shared clothes like this all the time.) “Please?"

"Nope." Poe didn't even look up from the book he was reading, as though determined to prove that he really was going to stay up for a while longer; after all, he was very into the book he was reading. He couldn't put it down, obviously. Finn could see this with his own eyes.

Resisting the urge to groan in frustration, Finn disappeared back into the bathroom to finish getting ready for bed couch.

The next time he came out of the bathroom, he went straight to the couch and sat down, pointedly, next to Poe, who was still reading (supposedly). When Poe didn't react, he lay down, putting his feet in Poe's lap. With a sigh, Poe finally set the book down to look at Finn, seeming amused. "Just what do you think you're doing?”

"Me?" Finn asked, feigning ignorance. "I'm not doing anything. Just trying to sleep." At this point, he was struggling to keep a straight face. This was ridiculous. Poe was ridiculous. It wasn't a total lie, though. He was feeling sleepier by the minute.

He could see the glint of an idea forming in Poe's eyes. Uh-oh. Before Finn had time to react, Poe had gotten up off the couch and scooped him up in his arms, carrying him, undoubtedly, to the bedroom. "Seriously?" an exasperated Finn questioned. Poe just smiled smugly and shrugged.

A small part of Finn felt like he must be dreaming; this was what he imagined domestic bliss to be like. The larger, more rational part, however, knew that this was just a couple of friends acting silly together. But being in his tee shirt—in his arms... It was impossible not to imagine this might be what it's like to be Poe's boyfriend.

Despite his inner turmoil, Poe’s laugh was—for lack of a better word—contagious, and for a moment, the combination of sudden overwhelming tiredness and Poe allowed him to forget about his troubles and just be with his friend.

After an unfairly short amount of time, Poe was gently setting him down on the bed. “You’re already 90% asleep. Please just sleep here tonight.”

At this point, Finn was having a hard time trying to remember why he had fought so hard against this in the first place. Why would he turn down such a comfy bed? So he found himself nodding in agreement. Or trying to. It was hard to tell whether he’d actually moved at all. Who even knew what he was capable of doing moments before he fell asleep, anyway?

He must have given some sign of affirmation, however, because in the next moment, Poe was whispering good night and kissing his forehead.

Finn looked up at him through half-closed eyes, and Poe’s expression was soft, his eyes crinkled in the corners in a combination of amusement and fondness, and then he was turning away to leave, and no, Finn didn’t want that, and then he heard himself say, “Wait. Stay with me?”

#my fanfics #stormpilot #poe dameron #finn #stormpilot fanfiction #au #fanfiction

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believepeyton · 8 years ago

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Let me prerequisite this with an apology to the folks who (for some reason or another) follow me on this shit. If I can be frank. Forgetting the last time we saw each other. I've always thought that our break up was a mistake. Bad communication on top of more bad communication on my part. I just literally needed space. Easy to say now, right? I feel like saying all what I'm about to say will give you some type of joy or satisfaction and I don't really give a fuck about that anymore. at this point things have gotten pretty unfortunate for the two of us. But I am going to go on a latte induced rant while this is on my mind and because there is a good chance I will never physically see you again. However I will remember all physical aspects of you probably for a very long time. Your walk and stride The way you plump down on bar stools when you've had a stressful day at all the jobs/school you've dealt with and I can tell you've been wanting to relax. The way you just plump down on any seat when your exhausted really. I've always admired your work ethic. You deserve to always take a load off While you would take sips of Diet Coke I knew in my mind exactly when you take the can/bottle away from your mouth. Let it sit, usually way too long. Then give it a few bigger sips until it's done. I hate Diet Coke but got off on mimicking your sip and stealing some of your coveted dc. You never noticed that. Not sure how anyone would. So much non verbal or touch communication where I just knew what you were saying. Which I suppose becomes a thing of any couple/pair/team. But damnit I know yours so well. Sorry. Anyways. Obviously I've recapped a lot of memories we've had. From the beginning at brixx up until the bitter end. And I used to disagree with you about our best times being when I lived on meridian. Until I stumbled upon a picture of you putting up the bed above my bed. Those times were obviously infatuation stage but they were great. Mark it down. I've almost told you this a million times and always bit my tongue. I didn't really want to date you. I had all of my friends telling me you were awesome and that I should but i was afraid to. Especially after just getting the bartending job at a young age thinking I'd be some type of stud at Holland (lol right). I had feelings for you but wasn't sure what was right. I've always been indecisive. I felt somewhat compelled to be with you after getting you to dump your then boyfriend. Please don't take this the wrong way. I've ALWAYS had feelings for you but was afraid of commitment. But then 😎 and your mother came to the back bar. I had never met them. Your mom asks for a drink. Smiling the whole time. Then asks "do you have a girlfriend" This was probably a week, no more than 2 weeks after we pretty much became a thing The shitty old me initially wanted to say no. But I said "yes I do actually" And your mom said "I'm her mother" I was pleased to meet her (she got a vodka grapefruit) and pleased with myself for not being a young shit head and saying no for the sake of seeming attainable in front of female bar guests and over all just feeling excited that I would see you when I got done and tell you I ran into your mother. Which I did tell you. And you showed me a text of her saying i was cute or handsome or something like that (please tell me I'm not making that up). All in all, cool night. I sincerely hope you don't take that anecdote the wrong way. I'm so happy to have been a part of an important time period in your life and very thankful to have had you during that same time I mine. Without you I'd hate to think about what I'd be like. I know we've done this "good luck to you love you talk to me every now and then" shit more times than anyone. But I seriously want the best for you. I want you to do something that uses your creativity, wit, strange/lovely/sometimes morbid humor. I want you to be with another person that makes you happy and supports you, not just someone who people say will "take good care of you" because I know you're able to take care of yourself. And fuck it maybe don't find anyone else ever again. Be a vagabond rolling around doing art and off jobs and maybe write a cool novel about it.. Just an idea. (Please list me in some type of foreword if you decide to actually write that novel.working title "big mama: a tale of travels without a comma"). I'll end this stupid rant I will probably end up deleting in 4 hours with a list of memories and whatnot. Us dancing. In the porter house specifically. Listening room night. EVERY taco night. Recently was asked to cook tacos with someone else and couldn't bring myself to. Did mention that meatless crumbles are good as hell. Words out. Meridian porch Our porch Your porch My porch So much music. Almost can't listen to anything Anymore. You have an open ear and great taste. Always a hard quality to find in anyone. Reading memoirs by comedians in your bed. One laugh always followed by "read this" or she/he wrote this. While on this subject. The infamous it's always sunny laugh. Never felt a more pleasurable pain Late night talks that had substance. Lazy mornings. And I'm sorry I was the cause of so many unproductive days. But I will say I enjoyed many of them. All the stupidly (amazing) night time snacks and netflixin Don't get me started on game of thrones Trying new foods You showing me so much art You making so much art. (You really are gifted) I wish you'd stop being so hard on yourself with it. All of our travels. Even Montreal. It was so bad it's funny to me now. Good brunch tho. I feel like these are all just skimming the surface. And I could keep going. But I think we both know. Attached is a gif of my face when I press post to all this nonsense.

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lesliepump · 5 years ago

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Reflections on Being Fired as a 60-Year Old Lawyer

One

“I’m sorry, I have to let you go.”

The head of the firm managed to look sad. I had started working for the firm less than a year before. I had been brought in at 60 years old because the firm wanted an older, experienced attorney to mentor the younger employees in the firm.

I flattered myself in believing I had done this, sharing my trial experience, my voir dire questions, my knowledge of search and seizure case law, and my real-world understanding of what made clients tick.

“Can you tell me why?” I asked.

He shook his head.

“My lawyer told me not to say anything,” he said. The old dodge: Blame the lawyers.

“For what it’s worth,” he said, giving me a tiny sheepish smile, “I think you’re a good guy.”

I felt as if the floor underneath me had disappeared. I saw myself falling and falling and falling with no end in sight.

“I don’t like doing this,” the boss said. “You’re the first lawyer in ten years I’ve had to terminate.”

“Why does that not make me feel better?” I asked sickly.

I was 61 now. What the hell was I going to do?

My son would be getting married in two months. Fortunately, I had already purchased my airline tickets to the wedding in Indiana. The firm gave me enough in severance to get me through to then. But what would happen when I returned?

I half-jokingly told myself that maybe I would get lucky and the plane would crash on the way back. Financial problem solved.

I could look for another job, but I couldn’t indulge in the fantasy that I would find one. At my age, no one would seriously consider me, though they would all make a great show of doing so to avoid a discrimination claim.

Falling, falling, falling…

“What do you think I should do?” I said to my boss. He shook his head.

“Could you at least give me a recommendation letter?” I asked, grasping at the last tiny shred of dignity.

“My lawyer recommends we stay out of that,” he said.

When a lawyer loses a job, it’s different from when a real person loses a job. Most lawyers go through their lives with one or two firms, rarely facing the prospect of unemployment. To be fired would be an eternal black mark on my career.

I staggered out the door, boxes of my personal accouterment awkwardly in my hands. I was surprised there was still solid ground beneath my feet.

Two of my colleagues helped me get the boxes into the car and then stood outside with me telling me how much this sucked. I knew what they were thinking: What if this was me?

Finally, I drove off. I tried to pay attention to the road even though I was having an out of body experience.

I was untethered. It felt like my career was in my rear view mirror.

The silence after you are fired is earthquake-like: eerie and foreboding.

I drove home dazed, worrying I may not capably focus on the pavement unfurling in front of my empty eyes. I thought briefly about stopping for a late breakfast but quickly reminded myself that every penny would now be husbanded toward my survival for the next few months. Or years. Or forever.

Before I slid from the firm’s office, I had agreed to sign a liability release in exchange for two weeks’ pay. They seemed surprised I would agree to it so readily. But I was an at-will employee. Unless a firm insider went rogue and revealed some illegal reason for my termination—that I was too old and too expensive, for example—I would have no case. Better to squirrel away a few thousand now and extend my resources, right?

My final check and my severance paycheck sat on the passenger seat like unwilling children. They seemed to brood with every glance I stole at them. They totaled $5,000. About a month’s wages at the firm.

I walked into my apartment and slumped into the couch. At $1,400 per month, the rent would be crippling for an unemployed lawyer. I’d need to plot my exit before Halloween.

I looked around at my books, my television, the pictures on the walls. They were so frivolous, weren’t they? How much would they fetch in a yard sale?

It was strange sitting on that dark green couch I bought when I first arrived in Sacramento for the job. The couch and my Queen-sized bed set me back a cool $2,500 when I’d first moved in. I paid them off in three payments, sure that money was no issue for a gainfully-employed lawyer.

Now it mocked me: ‘”What a fool! Trusting your employer to keep his word!?!”

When hired, I’d explained that this needed to be my last job. I would work for until I hit 70 and would retire in honor. They readily agreed.

Now I was out on my ear, with no real explanation why. That, in my considered and pained and brutalized judgment, meant the explanation was probably an illegal one. My boss had even said, “My lawyers say I can’t tell you why.” It was hard to suppress the anger threatening to overwhelm my heart.

It’s like that old chestnut about the difference between a dead lawyer and a dead skunk in the road: there are skid marks in front of the skunk. Well, I could relate. I couldn’t find a damned skid mark in front of me. No one even tried to stop this demise.

I called my friends. My brother. Some old public defender contacts in San Bernardino.

And I stared at the walls, at my pictures, at my books. I didn’t turn on the television—I knew the rattle of inane comedy would only manifest my tragedy.

I felt like I was still falling, falling. I had a little money in savings, but it wouldn’t last into November. One month. Beyond that, chaos. I had a vision of myself standing on a street corner in a ragged three-piece suit with a tattered “Will Sue for Food” sign. Would passers-by be amused enough to spare a few bucks?

As the numbness retreated, however, my ego slowly began to reassert itself. “You’ve been in tough spots like this before,” it said. “Let yourself grieve for a few days, then decide how you’ll spend the rest of your life,” it said.

It was a good plan. But my anger and my grief would last a long time. I felt conned. I told them who and what I was. I had been radically honest. They had not. It kept coming back to me, on a loop like a bad song the D.J. couldn’t quit.

Slowly, my shock was lifting. My ego was right. I had been in tough spots, both before and after I passed the bar. This was just one more. This was the Universe untethering me from a questionable job with a questionable employer.

Defiance was my best response. I grabbed my car keys and headed out my apartment door. I was going for dinner. And a movie.

Screw those guys. I was still alive.

The day after I’m fired is Saturday. Part of me wants to lounge on the couch and watch bad TV all day, drink diet iced tea and feel sorry for myself. This is something I need to do, I told myself, so that I can feel better, ready to revise and change my life Monday morning.

But I know better.

Oh, I tried it. But after I watched a stupid situation comedy which not only insulted my intelligence but made me worry about the survival of Western Civilization, I got off the couch and pounce on my cell phone.

It was time to call in the troops.

Specifically, friends and family who might be able to help me find another job. Or, at least, who could lend me money until I can start bringing in an income.

You truly find out whether your friends and family love you or think you’re a schlump when you lose your job. In this case, I was in for a pleasant surprise.

The first person I called was my friend Shelby, who has worked for the Public Defender in a Southern California county for 25 years. After I explained to him what had happened, he laughed.

“Knew it was gonna go South for you,” he says cheerfully. “Just had that feeling.”

“You’re a great comfort,” I said. I resisted the urge to climb through the telephone line and strangle him. After all, I couldn’t afford to alienate someone who might get me back to gainful employment, even if he’s being a jerk.

“I’ll ask around the office to see if they might want you back,” he said. Rude comment forgiven.

I called my friend Jerome, who is a little more sympathetic.

“How could they do that to you?” he asked. Jerome is one of those guys whom everyone likes. He’s never been fired, never will be, despite jumping around in his legal career. He now worked for the same PD’s office as Scott.

“I’m not sure how they could, but they did,” I say.

“I’ll talk to the head of the office. Maybe they want you back.”

As I said, everyone likes Jerome.

I’m feeling a little better now. I’m thinking I can return to Southern California and go back to work for the old office, the one I left voluntarily for the job I’ve just lost. Not exactly as a conquering hero, but at least intact.

I called my brother, my older sister, and a 30-years-long friend of mine to let them know the awful news. All three offered to lend me a thousand or so to keep me from being on the street. Since I am still flush with severance pay, I thanked them all and told them I might call on them in the future.

As I hang up the phone, I realized that I am far too good at dealing with disaster. I’ve been through this before, both as a civilian and as an attorney. I always managed to muddle through. I’m not sure how I do it. After I’m out of danger, I always seem to look back and marvel that I am not buried under a smoking pile of rubble along some lonely freeway.

As a lawyer, I should have been embarrassed to call these folks and tell them that I’d been fired. Termination of employment is not normal in the legal profession. Usually, one gets fired from a law firm or a public agency for some heinous crime, such as leaving a comma out of a pleading that leads to the motion being denied. Or sleeping with a client. Were I to choose my sin, I would go for the sin of commission, not the one of omission. It seems more fun. Alas, the reason I was terminated is still a mystery to me. All I knew was that I couldn’t talk my way back into the job.

I go online and begin applying for any Public Defender job I could find. Despite my ugly experience with the firm, I am convinced that I am a good PD. My clients told me so. My colleagues told me so. Even the judges told me so. In fact, in a roundabout way, the prosecutors told me so—they would give me a hard time about filing too many motions, announcing ready for too many trials. In other words, I was making them work. How dare I?

So I am not embarrassed. I am irked. I am scared. I am puzzled. But not embarrassed.

That comes later.

Two

I am invited into an office with a window view. A round table sits near the door. Bookshelves line the outer wall. Pictures of an indeterminate theme dot the walls.

This is my first interview since being “resigned” at the old law firm. I wish I was more nervous than I am. Sad to say, I’ve been through a lot of interviews in my career.

The man who greets me is tall, about six foot two. He has sandy hair and startling blue eyes. He would be perfectly cast as a Southern Lawyer defending some unjustly charged young teenager in a melodrama about racism.

He is, in fact, from the South—Tennessee, he tells me. How he got to California is a labyrinthian story to which I listen respectfully. He’s about forty, twenty-one years my junior. He’s the head of the local Public Defender’s Office.

“I’m trying to build this office,” he says. “It was a mess when I was appointed.” I don’t ask him why it was a mess. You never know where the sore spots are.

“I have a lot of experience in Public Defender Offices,” I say, hoping it’s a strong point and does not advertise the fact that my career has been a checkered one. Checkers? More like Parcheesi.

We talk about what it means to be a Public Defender and how different it is from any other kind of job in the law. The difference between your typical private defense attorney and a Public Defender is that PDs have ethics, they have rules, they have 30 cases a day. A PD makes about a quarter of what a good private defense lawyer pulls in, though there are private lawyers that make ten times what a “line” PD makes—into seven figures.

(So, you are asking, why don’t I go that way? Well, to get to the seven-figure private lawyer world, you must start as a solo practitioner when you are fresh out of law school and carefully build your practice over twenty years. Then you need a bit of luck—landing a case with lots of publicity. It doesn’t matter if you win. So long as you’re on TV and in the newspapers, people will remember your name. At 61, I’m a bit too long in the tooth to try to build such a practice.)

But there’s more to being a PD than just a lot of cases and too little money. To be a Public Defender is a mindset—you fight, you work for your clients, you remember why you’re there. The best Public Defenders know how to work hard for their clients without alienating the prosecutors. You get good deals from them because they know how hard you’re going to make them work at trial, even on a slam-dunk case; and because they get along with you.

We talk about all these ideas. We feel pretty good about ourselves when it’s over. Our interview was scheduled for thirty minutes, but we’ve been going for nearly an hour.

He likes me, he really likes me. We have an easy conversation and agree on pretty much everything. I tell him that I can help him rebuild his office because I have the experience to help the younger lawyers. He nods his head.

“That sounds really good,” he says in his Southern accent. “I could use the help.”

I don’t spread my arms and say, “Here I am,” though I want to.

I walk out of the office feeling good about my chances. I change into more comfortable shoes with my car door open in the parking lot just as my interviewer runs out, rushing to court. I smile sheepishly at him and he says, “I’ve had to do that myself.” Another connection.

On the way out of town, I check out apartment and home rentals. They’re much cheaper than Sacramento—about half so. This is looking better and better.

I drive the hours back to Sacramento thinking I should start boxing everything up. I might get hired before the end of October when I will fly to Indiana for my son’s wedding. I’ve already bought the tickets. I’m pretty sure my new employers won’t have a problem with my disappearing for a week to see my only son get married.

I wait for the call to be hired. It never comes. To this day I haven’t even received a letter from that Public Defender’s office telling me thanks but no thanks. I guess rebuilding a PD’s office is so time-consuming you can’t dredge up the grace to say “no.”

Three

I have agreed to make an appearance for another lawyer in Dept 30 of the Superior Court. This is my first time back in court since the untimely demise of my career.

It is a misdemeanor court, so I will not see any of my former felony teammates. However, there will be others from the firm roaming the courtroom.

I see the woman who supervises misdemeanors for the firm. She is standing outside the doors talking to a tall man with a bad haircut. She is chastising him for some transgression.

I avoid her and sit in the audience. I contemplate my ruin while waiting for the doors to open. You know your career is near rock bottom when you start snapping up $50 to make brief appearances for other lawyers. You’re not even a pinch hitter. More like a stand-in for the movies. You are a non-entity, a nothing, a fool.

At 1 p.m. precisely, the bailiff opens the doors to Dept. 30.

The courtroom is both familiar and unfamiliar to me. It looks like every courtroom in which I’ve spent thirty years: Long row of chairs for the audience, a wooden “bar” at the front, a pair of pine-topped tables pushed together, the clerk off to the side in her little enclave and the bailiff at a small desk near the bar. At the head of the room, elevated so that one will be cowed by the majesty of the law, the judge’s bench. Mounted on the wall behind the bench is the Seal of the Great State of California. The goddess Minerva sits in the seal with her ill-fitting war helmet, a spear, and an impassive expression.

I sit in the audience, too embarrassed to sit in the jury box like I used to do when I was a person with a real job. The supervisor for the misdemeanors begins asking each person about their case.

“Which case are you here on?” she asks me. Then she looks closer.

“Oh, it’s you!” she says. I nod. Then she looks concerned. “Do you have a case in here today?” She’s thinking I committed a crime after I got fired.

“I’m appearing on the Smith matter,” I say, “for another lawyer.”

“Oh, the bail matter,” she says, and moves on.

No other attorney from the firm acknowledges my existence. One, a burly ex-Marine with whom I had engaged in discussions about the military, the law, and being a public defender, slides his gaze over me.

Another lawyer, a middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair whom I had helped with thorny legal issues, searches for his clients in every part of the courtroom except where I sit.

I get up and walk past the bar. I check in with the clerk, handing her one of my new business cards. Then I talk to a young woman from the DA’s office who is wearing matching purple jacket and pants, a daring look for a prosecutor.

I sit in the jury box, thinking that now my former office mates will recognize me and say hello. But they studiously avoid me.

I should be shouting “Unclean! Unclean!” to warn them that I am contagious and if they dare talk to me, they may be infected with the termination virus. How frightened they look. How cowardly.

I am Banquo’s ghost, the unwelcome guest at the feast. To talk to me would be to acknowledge that they, too, might someday find themselves out of a job. Nothing has been officially disseminated in the firm about my termination, though it’s been implied by the higher-ups that some “emergency” required my firing.

Judge Evans, who sometimes was friendly to me, takes the bench. He peers at me.

“What did you say your name was?” he asks.

I say my name and spell it.

I tell him I’m appearing for another lawyer and that we need the bail exonerated. There is a written motion, which he carefully reviews. He grants the motion. Then he’s on to the next matter.

As I turn to leave a young woman, dark-haired and brown-eyed, says to me, “Mark, I didn’t recognize you! How are you?”

She is also from the firm but she seems to be unafraid of my unclean status.

“I’m doing fine,” I said. She puts her arm around my shoulders.

“This is my last appearance in Placer,” I say. “I’m moving to Southern California soon.”

“Good luck to you,” she smiles. We say goodbye and I walk out of the courtroom. I am contemplating why the big burly men were afraid of me but this young woman was not.

As for myself, I shake the dust of the county from my feet. In a week, I am going to my son’s wedding. Then I’m moving back to Southern California, where I have a place to rent and friends in the court system.

After my unfortunate adventure up North, I’m going home.

The post Reflections on Being Fired as a 60-Year Old Lawyer appeared first on Lawyerist.

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maxwellyjordan · 5 years ago